Unsafe chemicals in our skincare products, including sunscreen, insect repellant and cosmetics have been getting much recent attention, for good reason. What products are safe and which ones carry a toxic load?
Undoubtedly, eating a whole foods, nutrient-dense diet is essential for good health, but our attitude towards food and life and how we manage stress are equally if not more important, for nourishment is not limited to food alone. It includes all of the ways we feed the many needs we have as humans.
BPA — found in baby bottles and sippy cups, microwave ovenware, stain-resistant food storage containers, eating utensils, hard-plastic drinking bottles, five-gallon water jugs, and plastic wraps, to name just a few — easily leaches into food and liquids, and hundreds of studies have linked it to harmful endocrine-disrupting effects, causing reproductive, developmental, behavioral, and neurological harm.
Degenerative diseases, including heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer’s (including other forms of dementia), and diabetes, as well their kissing cousin, obesity, expend the majority of our health care resources in this country and possess a powerful inflammatory component. The onset of autoimmune disorders, such as multiple sclerosis, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis, and Hashimoto’s, are, according to Dr. Sears, “clear-cut examples of out-of-control inflammation.” Think of chronic inflammation as an army of pistol-packing outlaws roaming our bodies and robbing us of our health.
Butter. The thought of this delicacy might make some folks gasp in horror, as conventional nutritional advice has browbeaten many into believing that butter (and other naturally occurring fats) will make us fat and clog our arteries. Butter lovers can rejoice, as this is simply not true.
Just like those dark leafy greens that I’m often proselytizing about, Brussels sprouts are another vegetable that can get me on my high horse. Basically, get ‘em into anything and everything, people, because they are major cancer fighters.
Radishes, which are from the cabbage family, have powerful antibacterial, anti-fungal and detoxification properties, and as members of the brassica family (which includes cabbage, Brussels sprouts, kale, cauliflower and broccoli), have been lauded as vigorous protectors again cancer.
Berries are much more nutritious than many people realize and an ever-increasing amount of research is being done to prove just how important they are for warding off disease, especially cancer. Generally, berries are bursting with vitamins and disease-fighting compounds and not only are they powerful in cleansing and strengthening the blood, but they are also very densely packed with a variety of potent phytochemicals that can do wonders for normalizing and improving health.
Folks, consider asparagus the vegetable with benefits.
What’s on your whole foods hit list? Let’s talk about the food myths that have become mainstream “knowledge” and have catapulted the sale of some dubious health and diet books, many of which have thankfully faded into near oblivion.
