Walmart, The Good Guy?

Posted on February 2, 2011 by lkaholistichealth

Walmart recently announced that they will be reducing the sodium, cutting out added trans fats, and reducing added sugars in their store brand packaged foods while asking their suppliers of brand name foods to do the same.  They’ve also vowed to sell fresh produce at reduced prices so more people will have access to healthy foods.  And they’ve said the reduction in prices on produce will not be passed on to the farmers but absorbed by Walmart, resulting in lower profit margins for them.

This is good news and Walmart needs to be applauded for taking these steps to try to reverse the food trends in this country that have contributed to an astounding rate of obesity and chronic illness.  Of course, Mrs. Obama, with her Let’s Move campaign, played a major role in “convincing” them to undertake these measures.  She must have been very persuasive.

Some of the reasons people love to hate Walmart is that they have been known to choke their suppliers, small local shopkeepers who can’t compete on price, and their own employees. So regardless of these new initiatives, I will still refuse to enter a Walmart store.   But not just for those three issues.  The whole idea of Walmart in their role as the primary force behind commercialism and over-consumption in this country makes them entirely objectionable to me.  There has been an insatiable appetite in the U.S. for more plastic toys and housewares, more cheap, nutritionally devoid manufactured foods, more electronic paraphernalia  – more of everything.   When people have more “stuff” than they need and if it was acquired cheaply, they have little respect when the stuff no longer holds any allure, or breaks.  Then where does it go?  It goes into the garbage.  And where does the garbage go?  You should know, you should care. Our environment is becoming more and more toxic and certainly a large portion of the problem is what to do with all the discarded stuff.  To see a great video about over-consumption and the problems it causes go to: http://1degreetv.com/1degree/2010/12/the-story-of-stuff/

I hope the lousy economy of the last 2 years was enough to wake people up.  Over-consumption, credit card debt, mortgages that people can’t afford – we have an opportunity to learn from the mistakes of the past.  Going back there should not be an option.  When a store, like Walmart, promises huge savings, one really must question what they are saving.  You don’t save anything if you spend money on things you don’t need, no matter how cheap they are.  You save money when you don’t buy, buy, buy but instead put that money into savings.  The days of putting aside some money in the sugar bowl seem unheard of today.  But my mother-in-law put a down payment on a house with her sugar bowl savings in 1953.  Let’s re-gain our values.  Let’s live with less stuff.  An economy based on consumption is a house of cards.

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The American Society of Bariatric Physicians Weighs In

Posted on January 20, 2011 by lkaholistichealth

Glad to see the docs agree that lap band surgery is not something to be taken lightly.  Regardless of this official statement, some of their members are willing to perform these surgeries on patients who don’t qualify because they fall below the established weight and health risk guidelines.  As long as money is a motivator in health care, procedures will continue to be performed unnecessarily.  Unfortunately, it’s looking like the F.D.A. will, in fact, lower the current guidelines to include more patients for approved bariatric surgery.  At a time when we are trying to make sense of escalating health insurance premiums and health care costs, this seems like a very bad decision.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/opinion/lweb20obese.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

 

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Belly Up

Posted on January 19, 2011 by lkaholistichealth

While driving in Southern California last week, I could not help but notice scads of billboards promoting lap band surgery as a remedy for overweight. The subliminal message on these billboards was that lap-band surgery was acceptable as a method of attaining the slim body image many have been hopelessly striving to achieve.  The billboards seemed absurd, and yet, in Southern California, land of surgically altered living Barbie Dolls and GI Joes, they were almost surreally normal.

An advisory panel presented to the F.D.A. recently supporting the use of gastric lap band surgery for people who are just slightly obese.  Until now, these devices have only been approved for use by dangerously obese adults with life-threatening health concerns.  The F.D.A.’s guidelines will determine which individuals may be covered by health insurance for this procedure.

I do personally know two women who were not qualified for the surgery under the F.D.A. guidelines but were willing to pay for their surgery out of pocket and easily managed to find a physician ready to perform the surgeries even though there were no apparent health risks in either woman.  In both cases, the surgery was done purely for aesthetic purposes, as one might undergo a facelift. Lowering the current F.D.A. standards would, in effect, promote lap band surgery as an aesthetic procedure that is covered by health insurance.

The most troubling aspects of the proposed F.D.A. approval of slackening the guidelines on this procedure are that there have been many serious side effects reported in lap band surgery patients and no long-term studies that might reveal more than the short-term risks of undergoing the surgery.  In an Op-Ed article in the N.Y. Times this past week, Diana Zuckerman articulated these concerns rather eloquently.  She points out that 5% of patients “required additional surgery one to nine months after getting their lap bands, and in most cases this meant permanent removal.”  Zuckerman also sites a three- year study of very obese patients finding that “one in four had their lap bands removed and not replaced.”  Common side effects include “vomiting, difficulty swallowing, pain and gastrointestinal reflux.”

I had a conversation with a young woman who was the head of a lap band surgery support group.  She reported not only the above side effects but also that eating was never the same after surgery.  Only very minute amounts of food can be consumed at any one time. Some patients manage to stretch their smaller stomachs over time and regain weight. And the surgery does not eliminate the need to be ever vigilant about one’s diet.  She said if she had fully realized what life would be like after the surgery, she never would have undergone the procedure.

Since lap band surgery is not a substitute for learning healthy eating habits, why not just learn the healthy eating habits and lose weight slowly but steadily?  Why risk a serious surgical procedure unless the risk of not having the surgery is greater?  Lowering the bar on lap band surgeries to include people who are mildly obese and without serious health problems invites more of us to consider vanity as more important than putting our lives at risk.  Not to mention the cost of the surgeries being covered by health insurance companies when health risk is not an apparent motive for the increase in these procedures.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/12/opinion/12zuckerman.html?_r=1&emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

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Poisoning the Children

Posted on May 19, 2010 by lkaholistichealth

A newly released report in the medical journal, Pediatrics, links the use of pesticides to the occurrence of ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) in children.  The study, conducted by Maryse F. Bouchard, a researcher at the University of Montreal in Quebec, shows that children with higher than average levels of 6 different chemicals were nearly twice as likely to be diagnosed with ADHD than children with undetectable levels of these poisons.  Although the study has been characterized as inconclusive, the findings are so startling as to be “fairly significant” according to Bouchard.

These findings follow on the heels of the report issued by the President’s Council on Cancer almost two weeks ago linking pesticides and other chemicals to increased levels of cancer.  With a few more studies, I would guess we’ll see a lot more links between pesticide use and many of the chronic conditions that plague our modern society.  The dangers have been apparent for decades but with little in the way of government regulation of chemicals and the strong chemical company lobbying efforts, the information the public needs to be informed has been quashed.  Many assumed the government was watching out for our best interests and that if the chemicals came to market, they must be safe.  Not so.

Although the causes of ADHD are “uncertain” and often linked to genetic factors, more and more attention is being directed at environmental factors including nutritional deficiencies (such as Omega-3 Fatty Acids and Magnesium); allergies; fetal exposure to nicotine, alcohol, and cocaine; metals toxicity (such as lead and copper); food additives; high sugar, high refined carbohydrate diets; and chemical exposures.  Anecdotally, when these factors are eliminated or corrected, symptoms of ADHD may diminish.

The significance of this study is huge.  It is the largest of its kind ever conducted.  It raises enough questions to warrant further studies and to expand the studies to include other neurological differences such as learning disabilities and autism.  In a report issued in 1998 titled “Can A Poisoned Environment Play A Major Role in a Child’s Ability to Learn?” the author questions the accepted practice of treating ADHD with Ritalin or intensive psychotherapy which he characterizes as a “bandaid approach” rather than address the underlying causes for the sudden increase in the condition. Within 45 years, the number of ADHD children increased over 500%.  Dr. Stephan Edelson’s report contends that the most common cause of ADHD is allergies, followed by toxic dysfunction, nutritional aberrations, and a stressful home environment.  He further claims that genetics plays only a minor role.

We can’t wait for conclusive evidence on the causes of ADHD while drugging and forcing behavior modification techniques on our children.   Each child is an individual case that must be assessed for particular irregularities and sensitivities. Immunotherapy and dietary interventions along with an avoidance of toxic exposures are worth exploring NOW.

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Chemical Warfare

Posted on May 18, 2010 by lkaholistichealth

Back at the World’s Fair in 1939 when Dupont promised us “better living through chemistry” we had no idea how the onslaught of chemicals over the next few decades would actually end up killing some of us.  In 1962, Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring” was published.  Carson was warning us of the negative effects of pesticides and the purposeful misinformation that was being spread by the chemical companies. On Thursday, May 6th, the President’s Cancer Panel issued a report on the cancer risks from chemicals and toxins in the environment.  Without equivocation, they warned of the “grievous harm” of chemicals and other toxins citing a “growing body of evidence linking environmental exposures to cancer.”  They urged President Obama “ to use the power of his office to remove the carcinogens and other toxins from our food, water and air that needlessly increase health care costs, cripple our nation’s productivity, and devastate American lives.”

There are some 80,000 chemicals now in use in this country.  Only a few hundred have been tested for safety.  The regulatory agencies, under-staffed and under-funded, have not been able to keep up with the proliferation of new chemicals. The President’s Cancer Panel called our regulatory approach “reactionary rather than precautionary.” The Panel’s report states, “Many known or suspected carcinogens are completely unregulated.”

Although it will take many years to turn this situation around, there are things you can do right now to counter the effects of and limit your exposure to toxic chemicals:

SUGGESTION #1: Choose organic produce whenever possible and available, especially if you have children at home.  Pesticide residue is far higher in the urine of children who eat conventional food than in those who eat organics.  This is especially important for pregnant women.

SUGGESTION #2:  Drink lots of filtered water in containers made of glass or stainless steel rather than plastic. Water helps the cells, blood, and kidneys remove toxins from the body.  Drink enough water to urinate every hour or so, if possible.  BPA, a chemical found in many plastics, has already been banned in other countries.  We’ve known about the concerns over BPA for many years, yet to date, the U.S. has done nothing to stop its production and use in common household items.  While you’re at it, bring along reusable cloth bags when shopping and refuse plastic bags at stores.  Tell the stores you frequent to change over to bags made from biodegradable resources. Do not use plastic garbage bags that are not biodegradable.  All of that plastic ends up in landfills and the chemical residue subsequently ends up in the ground water – we’re choking our ecosystem with plastic.

SUGGESTION #3:  Microwave food only in glass or ceramic vessels.  Better yet, don’t use the microwave oven at all. It is thought in some circles that microwaving food reduces its nutritional value substantially.  And one of the ways to counteract chemicals that already exist in our environment is to get as much nutrition as you possibly can to keep your immune system strong.  Warm up leftovers in a conventional oven or on the stovetop in a double boiler.  Since you already have that microwave, use it to sanitize your sponges and dish rags daily – 1 minute on high power.

SUGGESTION #4:  Do not char meat on the grill or eat meat that is cooked well-done. High-heat cooking of meat causes carcinogens to form.

SUGGESTION #5:  Get a massage; sit in a steam room or sauna; dry brush your skin with a long-handled, soft-bristled body brush daily; at the end of your shower, alternate between hot and cold water several times – all of these methods are used to promote lymphatic drainage which is one of the body’s most potent mechanisms for detoxification.

SUGGESTION # 6:  Use the following herbs and foods whose properties are natural detoxifiers and/or anti-cancer substances: garlic, onion, dark leafy greens, beets, red bell peppers, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, celery, parsley, radishes, winter squashes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, turnips, yams, apricot, blueberries, cherries, cranberries,  dates, figs, grapefruit, grapes, lemon, lime, mango, orange, papaya, peaches and nectarines, pineapple, plums, raspberries, strawberries, watermelon, alfalfa sprouts,  beans, lentils, green peas, almonds, Brazil nuts, cashew nuts, olives, walnuts, basil, cilantro, cayenne pepper and paprika, cumin, dill, ginger, mint, mustard seed, nutmeg, oregano, black pepper, rosemary, saffron, tarragon, thyme, turmeric (curcumin), mushrooms (shitake, maitake, and reishi), seaweed, green tea.

SUGGESTION #7:  Drastically reduce consumption of all processed, packaged foods, convenience foods, foods whose labels have more than 5 ingredients or ingredients you can’t pronounce, fast foods and cheap chain restaurant foods.

SUGGESTION #8:  Use only organic virgin or cold pressed oils. Processed oils are extracted by high heat and/or chemical means making them unhealthy. Avoid all fried foods due to inferior quality oils/rancid oils.  Avoid all trans fats and hydrogenated fats.

SUGGESTION #9:  Use “natural” and environmentally sound cleaning products both to diminish your exposure to chemicals and to keep these chemicals from entering the environment.

SUGGESTION #10:  Use “natural” cosmetics and personal care products. Your skin is a large organ of elimination.  Avoid chemical laden skin care products, soaps, and shampoos.

SUGGESTION #11:  Avoid dairy products, meat, poultry, and eggs from animals that have been exposed to hormone and antibiotic treatment. Buy products from animals that have been “pasture raised” and preferably organic, not “feed-lot” raised animals.

SUGGESTION #12:  Get regular exercise and plenty of restful sleep.  Consider nutritional supplementation, especially if you have any known deficiencies.  A large percentage of our population is deficient in Vitamin D and in Omega 3 Fatty Acids.

Keep your immune system strong and the chances of developing cancer will be greatly diminished.

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Kid Talk

Posted on May 3, 2010 by lkaholistichealth

Interesting conversation with my daughter and her friend, Jackson, on the way to school this morning.  Kids have a way of saying the craziest things.  A little knowledge can take them way over the top.

My daughter is a Darwinist.  Survival of the fittest is her mantra.  The subject of fast food and processed, packaged food came up for discussion.  In a reference to the movie “Idiocracy” that takes us 500 years into the future, the population has “degenerated into a dystopia where advertising, commercialism, and cultural anti-intellectualism run rampant and dysgenic pressure has resulted in a uniformly stupid human society devoid of individual responsibility or consequences.”  (Wikipedia)  The premise of this movie is that the cultural and intellectual elite slow their birth rate down while the “intellectually challenged” population continues to reproduce at a high birth rate, eventually leaving only a stupid population.

Lily and Jackson took it one step further.  What if the exact opposite happened?  What if all those “challenged” types became extinct from eating too much junk food?  Over time, the lack of nutrition would make them sterile so they could no longer reproduce, and further, lead them to higher rates of chronic illness that killed them off.    All the while, those smart enough to eat nutritionally sound diets would reproduce without problems and live long, healthy lives leaving us a world in which only creative, intelligent people survive.

Well, that’s just silly kid talk.  I think.

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Farm Boy

Posted on May 1, 2010 by lkaholistichealth

We just got back from Bloomingdale’s.  We went to buy a new toaster oven.  Carol, in the small appliances department, was very helpful. She asked what exactly we used our toaster oven for – I said, “Toast, mostly.”  And to warm up foods rather than use a microwave.   I was puzzled by the question.  Carol enlightened us.  She said most customers buy the toaster oven to “cook” foods.  In those cases, she points them to the more sophisticated models with convection ovens and large enough to hold a 12-inch frozen pizza.  She said that in many cases, this is the only appliance people use.  They don’t cook from scratch but pop frozen chicken nuggets into the toaster oven and that’s dinner for the kids.  Oh dear.

I guess the problem is more pervasive than I thought.  Who is watching the Food Network if no one is cooking?  If you want to be healthy, you must cook.  Or be able to afford to hire a cook.  Because the only way to control the quality of the ingredients that goes into your meals is to buy them as close to the way Mother Nature intended as possible.   You really have no way of knowing what went into your processed food but you can be quite sure that in the interests of making a profit, quality is not at the top of any food manufacturer’s list.

Speaking of chicken nuggets, I’m reminded of the time I brought my daughter and a boyfriend to a Stone Barns Farmer’s Market.  As we turned into the farm’s driveway, the chickens were out in the pasture to our left grazing and pecking the way chickens were meant to graze and peck.  The boyfriend turned green, truly feeling sick at the sight of these birds.  Farm Boy had never seen a live chicken in his life.  He was 18 years old at the time.  Dan’s idea of chicken was the little nuggets that came tidily packed in plastic and cardboard and popped into a toaster oven!  He didn’t want to know what his food looked like before it came neatly packaged from the frozen food aisle.  He didn’t want to know where it came from.

And that is precisely the point – when you buy a package of chicken nuggets, you don’t know where that “food” came from.  You don’t know how that chicken lived its life, whether it was humanely treated, able to roam freely in a pasture in natural sun eating the food a chicken is meant to eat.  Since the chances of the aforementioned scenario are quite rare these days, you can pretty much count on the chicken in your packaged chicken nuggets to have lived in a small, crowded cage, having had his beak clipped to keep him from pecking at the other birds sharing his abode.  The cages are crammed together in a barn with some bare light bulbs and an exhaust fan as the only clue that there is some fresh air  and light.  The chicken is fed an unnatural diet, even sometimes cannibalizing the remains of other chickens that didn’t survive their cruel and inhumane treatment. Antibiotic use becomes necessary as the crowded conditions under which these birds are raised means disease is more rampant. And the chickens are fattened up to go to market as soon as possible, meaning their skeletal systems have not matured enough to carry their own weight.  Many succumb before they ever get to be slaughtered.

Of course there are folks that don’t want to know about this.  They’re able to put on the blinders because it’s easier not to know or to care.  Until we get sick.  And we’re flabbergasted that some horrific chronic ailment has befallen us.  What we saved in food dollars on dubious food items, we pay in spades on the other end with health care dollars.  The next time you question whether an organic vegetable from you local farm is too expensive, think about the cost of one prescription for drugs, one doctor visit, one hospital stay.  When it comes to food, go for the gold.  You ARE what you eat.

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Don’t Empty Your Head, Fill It!

Posted on February 5, 2010 by lkaholistichealth

A walk in the park can be one in which you are meditative or one in which you are considering the deadlines you have at work.  If you are doing the latter, you will certainly miss the experience of walking in the park.  To make it a truly meditative experience, you must decide in advance to notice as much as you possibly can.  If you are noticing what is around you, it’s impossible to be thinking about your deadlines at work.  Turn off that Blackberry and all other electronic devices for the duration of your walk.  Allow yourself this time in peace and utter awareness.

Because you are actively walking and intentionally looking,  you should be able to “see” what you may have previously taken for granted.  Notice the flora and the fauna – all trees, shrubs, grass, plants, seeds, dogs, squirrels, chipmunks, birds, fish, insects.  All stones, paths, fields, streams, lakes, puddles, soil.  Sky, clouds, temperature, breezes.  Sounds and smells.  Rustling of leaves.  Falling of leaves. Leaves under foot.  Sit on a bench.  Watch the people walking by.  Notice their clothing, their height, their facial expressions, the way they walk or jog, their voices (certainly THEY will be on their cell phones but YOU will not.)

Things that might come into your field of attention:  a Monarch butterfly, a white dove taking flight, a fish jumping up from the water, a heron swooping in for a landing, a  group of pigeons, a child blowing soap bubbles, a kite flying on high, two lovers kissing in the grass –  this could go on and on but you’re getting the message.  There are hundreds of things to see on your walk in the park, if only you would notice them.

You probably never imagined there would be so much to notice.  Stay focused on every detail for as long as you can.  You don’t have to label what you see, hear and smell.  You don’t need to form an opinion about it. If you try to form an opinion about any of it, you will miss the next thing you need to notice.  Just stay with noticing.  That’s all.

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Meditation Requires You To Empty Your Mind of Thoughts and You Just Can’t Do That.

Posted on February 3, 2010 by lkaholistichealth

Meditation has no requirements beyond being in the moment.

There are many ways to practice meditation long before you ever sit down in the lotus position.  No sense trying to force this on yourself.  Meditation should come easily, naturally.  If you try to force it, it will never happen.

There are many ways to be ”in the moment.”  Practicing some of these will automatically take you out of your thinking mind and into your attentive mind.  Pick what appeals to you and give it a try.  Some of the suggestions are active, others more passive.  All serve to get you to the same place.  Bringing more and more attentive moments into your life sets the stage for a deeper form of meditation.  For now, just practice being in awareness.  The more you do, the better you will get at it.

Wash the dishes instead of placing them in an automatic dishwasher.  It sounds so retro, doesn’t it?  But give it a try. Fill up the tub of your sink with hot, sudsy water.  Use a natural sponge and go for it.  There’s something about having suds up to your elbows that is very satisfying. You can get lost in a sink full of dishes.  By lost, we mean that you can just stay with this project without having a million thoughts firing off in your head. Keep the focus on those dishes.  Enjoy the suds and the warm water.  Many people find washing the dishes to be a relaxing activity.  Just don’t try it with the kids and the dog running around the kitchen.  This needs to be a solitary endeavor after a satisfying meal when everyone else in the house has retired to another corner to do their own thing.  Washing the dishes while talking on the phone is also forbidden.   No television watching, no radio playing, no iPod earphones. You can’t get into a meditative state unless you give yourself over to those dishes.  No multi-tasking, please.

The idea is just to be one with the dishwashing.  It is an extension of you.  Allow yourself to “melt” into the motions, the sensations, the fragrances.  Scrub when necessary – give it your all.  Gently rinse.  See the shine, feel the clean.  Be one with the task.  Permit yourself to enjoy the experience rather than loathe it.  How does that make you feel?

Some of you will like this, others may not.  Don’t give up.  There are many more ideas for getting into the moment.  The important thing is that you enjoy it.  If you don’t enjoy it, you won’t do it.  The idea is for you to do it.  Not to feel forced or like you “should.”  There are no “shoulds” in meditation.

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You Don’t Have Time To Meditate?

Posted on January 29, 2010 by lkaholistichealth

A meditation only takes a moment.  Giving over your focus to the moment you are in constitutes a meditation.  There, you’re done.  That was easy, wasn’t it?

With some practice, you may be able to string together several of these moments.  But take your time with it.  A good way to start is to make a conscious decision at least once per day, if not more often, to notice the moment you are in – or to gain awareness as the case may be.  Amazingly, we have a tendency to march through our day trying to accomplish many goals, crossing things off our to-do lists, and generally being efficient.  In the process, we tend to miss even the simplest of things.  Life just happens all around us but because we’re not focused on it, we miss seeing it.  Set an alarm clock if you don’t think you’ll remember to stop to notice a moment.  Let that be your signal to pause whatever you are doing and observe.  With any one or all of your senses.

An easy way to begin is to notice your breath. We take breathing for granted.  Our body’s autonomic nervous system keeps us breathing throughout the day and while we’re asleep but mostly, we never notice this.  Breath is the gift of life.  You can pay homage to your breath quite easily by stopping yourself every now and then to notice it.  We call this conscious breathing.  Take a deep breath and exhale slowly with a discernable sigh.  Do it again.  And a few more times.  You can do this sitting at your desk, driving in your car, standing on line – pretty much anytime and anywhere the mood strikes you.  No one will even realize you are doing it.  Since you breathe all day, you don’t need to set aside a special time to do it – you are already doing it, you’re simply not aware of it.  Bringing attention to the breath is the oldest and simplest way to meditate.

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