True Health Balance

If you can remember back to your days in Chemistry 101, you learned the concept of alkaline and acid. There is a Ph scale from 0 to 14. Pure acid is 0 and 14 is pure alkaline. So things like battery acid would be a 1 and Sodium hydroxide would be a 14. It takes 20 parts of acid to neutralize one part of alkaline.

One number that we are all aware of is our body’s temperature. It is around 98.6 degrees. There is another number that most people are not aware of. That number is 7.36. That is the Ph level of our blood. Unlike our body temperature, our blood has to keep that constant rate or we would enter a condition called acidosis. Acidosis is a condition in which there is excessive acid in the body fluids. The acid would eventually burn holes in our arteries and we would die.

So why does all this matter to us? To answer that, I have to use the following saying, “We are what we eat” If I can add to that saying, I would say, we are also what we think. I will explain that in a bit. Let’s start with what we consume. All foods have different minerals in them which make them fall somewhere in the 0 to 14 Ph level. For example, take a good old can of Coke. The Ph level is about 3.4 on the scale. It is very acidic. Asparagus is about 8.5. It is Very alkaline.  So when you eat these foods, the stomach starts to digest the food and the vitamins, minerals and acids start to be absorbed in the stomach, with most of the nutrients being absorbed in the small intestine.  Now, our bodies need to absorb some acid. Without it, we would not be healthy.  Unfortunately, we consume a typical Western diet that is very highly acidic. We drink coffee and soda all day. We constantly test our body’s ability to get rid of all this acid. Your body tries to keep up by using the alkalinity in the foods we eat.  That is where the problem lies. We eat very little alkaline foods. If your body does not get it from our foods, your body will take it from the alkaline reserves that we store in our body fluids. If that becomes depleted, your body will start to steal from your calcium based organs like your bones and brain. Sounds bad, doesn’t it. You would be correct.

If all this fails, your body keeps trying to fight back. It starts to produce massive amounts of Cholesterol to surround the acid and remove it from your blood stream. And by the way, I thought I would add that it takes that acid as far away from the internal organs as possible. Places like the Hips, butt, thighs, stomach and the back of your arms become the final resting place. Your blood vessels can only remove so much of the acid. After a while, Cholesterol starts to accumulate on the side of the walls and forms plaque. As the acid builds up in your blood, it starts to attack the blood cells. These cells have a positive charge on the inside and a negative charge on the outside. If your cells are healthy, the negative charges are pushing other cells away. It is very much like putting 2 magnets that are negatively charged together. They repel each other and flow freely. The acid starts to strip the negative charge away from the cell and they start to attract to each other. This is what they call blot clotting. You start to feel lethargic and tired all the time.  The clots keep much needed oxygen from flowing through the system. The clot grows and eventually finds its way to the heart or your brain. That can spell lights out.

If all of that is not bad enough, we have the concept of disease.  The wonderful world of germs. We have been told that germs cause sickness. Louis Pasteur was to thank for that. I am writing a blog entry that will put a kybosh on that theory. Let me give you an analogy. Have you ever been to the city dump? Well, if you have, one thing that you will see other that the endless trash is thousands of rats. These rats feed off the food and waste. They multiply at a feverous rate.  They break the food down, but create their own waste in the process. Your body works in the same way. Look at the acidic environment in your body as the trash and the rats are equivalent to the germs. The germs try to break the acid down. They too start to multiply and create their own waste.  The environment gets worse and worse.

Let’s throw some common sense into the mix here. If we had a problem of rats or mice in our house, what would we do? We would spread poison or set traps to kill the rodents. That would work for a while, but what would happen? They would eventual come back. Why? Because we took care of the problem, but not the cause. The problem is the rats, but the cause is the trash and mess that we have at the house. Here is a novel idea. Why not get rid of the trash and mess? Hmmmm. No mess, no rats. Modern medicine works like the rat principle. They try to kill the rats with procedures and drugs. Those rats just keep coming back. The problem is the rats bring their vulture buddies to join in on the feast.

I know you are staying to yourself, “What do I do?” The answer is to take care of the cause and get rid of the trash. It is that simple. Disease cannot live in an healthy alkaline body. It can however live in an acidic environment. There are several ways to become more alkaline. Today we are going to focus on food and drink. The first things we have to do are learn what foods are acidic and what foods are alkaline. Before I go any further, I am going to ask you to be open and to not discount what I am going to say. Just take in what I say and then do your own homework. Don’t just take my word for it. This is where change comes in. We all just love to change. Yea right…

I have a list of foods that are alkaline and foods that are acidic. You can view that list... Alkaline food List. You will notice this about the list. On the acidic side, you have Meats, dairy, seafood, and sugar. On the Alkaline side, you have vegetable, some fruits, grains, and legumes. So what are you saying? Should I become a vegetarian? No I am not saying that. Currently, most people have an 80/20 diet. 80% acidic and 20% alkaline. I am just telling you to flip that.  Eat 80% alkaline and 20% acidic. I will tell you this. When I first saw this, my answer was probably the same as yours. I said to myself, “There is NO WAY I could do this”. I ate meat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I drank Coffee all day. I ate so much cheese, they called me Fedda. Fetty/Fedda, Get it? Anyway, my answer was to transition my toxic diet to a healthy one very slowly. I started to introduce more alkaline vegetables to my diet and reduced the acidic ones.  It did not take long for me to get to the 80/20. My cravings for acidic foods just faded away.

So why did I do this in the first place?

In a few words, I was a mess. My weight was starting to get out of control. My health was starting to dwindle. I had bad headaches, horrible reflux disease, my joints were sore and cracking when I got up or went up the stairs. I was dealing with sinus problems, allergies and lower back pain. I was always tired. I was depressed and taking depression medication. I was always fighting off acne, colds and all types of sickness. You’re not supposed to have acne at 40. I needed to do something and I felt like I needed to do it fast. I am the kind of person that will devour information on a subject. I set out to learn how to be healthy. My goals were easy. It had to be common sense. I did not want to go on a diet, and it had to be from God.  Since I was always into fitness, it did not take me long to accomplish my goals. After I reached an alkaline way of living, I started to notice my issues fading away. For a few months I was eating 100% alkaline foods. I was starting to lose weight at about 2 pounds a day. I lost 45 pounds in no time. I even started to worry that I was going to waste away to nothing. That did not happen. I stopped at about 180 and have been there ever since. All my pains and problems are gone. I don’t get sick. I don’t take any medication. I feel wonderful. I will admit that it was a little tough in the beginning. I was not a big vegetable eater. My tastes have changed drastically. I have no cravings for the sugar laden processed foods. I will never go back. I have more energy and stamina. I feel better now than I did when I was twenty. My suggestion to you is to try this for a month. After a month I am willing to bet that you will never go back.

People ask me if I cheat at all. Of course I do. I am not fanatical about this. I do not stress about what I eat. Stress creates more acid in your body. More than any food you could eat. If I want to have a cup of coffee or a piece of cake every once in a while I will. Also keep in mind, people will look at you funny. You will not be the norm. It is a shame that being sick, overweight, and popping pills have become normal. God gave me this body to take care of. In the bible, it says that our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit. I can at least give the spirit a clean place to live.

How many times did you hear from your mother to chew your food? Turns out she really knew what she was talking about. Unfortunately most of us do not chew properly. We live our life’s in this eat and run mode. We treat meals like an inconvenience. In our minds, eating has become a necessary evil. We have gotten into a pattern of speed eating, but how did it start? I believe that good old mom did a pretty good job slowing us down, but I believe that school was our downfall. They hurdle kids into the lunch room like cattle and give them very little time to eat. What makes it worse is recess is usually shortly after, so the quicker you eat, the quicker you can get to the more important tag and dodge ball events outside.  You now live your life is a stress mode. If we could cut out eating from out busy schedule, we would. Fast food companies know this. They prey on our stressful lives. They have us right where they want us, with our money in their pockets. Keep in mind, as we go on, that our nutrition is limited first by the proper function of our factory, digestion. Poor digestion means poor health.

What I would like to do is point out some common sense, as well as a bit of technical information on why we should chew our food. Most of us don’t give chewing our food a second thought. We chew just enough to get it down without choking.  So right away, our common sense rears its wonderful head with my last statement. That little alert bell goes off in our head. Maybe that is just the old memories of mom telling us to slow down and chew. One thing she left out is, “WHY?”

Let’s see if I can fill that gap. Most people think your stomach is the first step in food digestion. This is not true. I bet you are thinking that I am going to say chewing is the first step. Nope, Wrong again. Your brain is actually the first step. It uses thought in conjunction with the two senses that are sight and smell to begin the wonderful process of digestion. The first phase is called the Cephalic phase. Neurogenic signals that cause the cephalic phase of gastric secretion originate from the cerebral cortex and in the appetite centers of the amygdala and hypothalamus. Say what??? Ya, I had to float some big words past you. Basically your brain prepares your stomach to digest food by churning up the digestive juices. This phase of secretion normally accounts for about 20 percent of the gastric secretion associated with eating a meal.

Now your teeth take over and crush the food into smaller particles. The next question most people ask me is how many times to I need to chew. I am not into the counting thing. I think that is a bit ridicules. I will tell you a better way. The simple rule to follow is if you can identify the food in your mouth by the sense of touch, your teeth have not done their job. Keep chewing. While we are chewing, the food is moving over the taste buds in your mouth. The taste buds are sending signals to your brain which in turn will release the proper digestive enzymes into your mouth and stomach. Different types of foods will need different enzymes. Carbohydrates need the enzyme “salivary amylas” Proteins need the enzyme “proteinase”  Fats need fat-digesting enzyme called lingual lipase.

So what happens if you do not chew well?

• The more you chew your food, the less time it needs to spend in your stomach being bombarded with acid. Chewing your food allows your saliva to cover more surface area of what you're trying to consume. If you don't chew as well, these enzymes don't have the ability to break down starches (providing you with energy) or start digesting fats (leaving them partially unprocessed). You’ll receive less energy and feel more sluggish as a result.
• Large pieces of food move through your system allowing for bacteria growth. This in turn creates gas and bad breath. Ask someone that has bad breath if they take time to chew their food.
• If the food is not broken down, much needed nutrients cannot be absorbed by the body

Take time to enjoy your food. Make sure you are not feeling stressed when you do eat. I highly recommend purchasing a juicer. I love mine. I also use the pulp for my salads. Also remember to combine the right foods. I wrote a post on Food Combining Here

We will test our saliva. You will need a small spoon and a Ph strip. I get mine at Amazon.com. Click Here to go to the page. The proper way to do this is to wait one to two hours after eating. We do this because the acidic levels rise after eating. Fill your mouth with saliva. Swish the saliva around in your mouth and then swallow. This is done to take care of any acids that have built up in your mouth. Then fill your mouth again with saliva and put it onto a small spoon. Move the ph strip in the saliva for a few seconds. (Do not wash the strip off). The pH paper should turn blue. This indicates that your saliva is slightly alkaline at a healthy pH between 7.35 and 7.45 (slightly alkaline). If it is not blue, compare the color with the chart that comes with the pH paper. The lower the number, the more acidic you are.

What are the dangers of having an acidic body? Most degenerative diseases are associated with a high acidic body, including cancer, arthritis, osteoporosis, and even tooth decay. Small symptoms begin to show, such as headaches, allergies, aches, and back pains. The body tries to get rid of the excess acid through the skin producing symptoms such as acne.

What causes an acidic body? There are several reasons. Animal products like meat, eggs, and dairy. Additionally, we eat acid-producing processed foods like white flour and sugar and drink acid-producing beverages like coffee and soft drinks. We use too many drugs, which are acid-forming; and we use artificial chemical sweeteners which are extremely acid-forming. Stress causes your body to create large amounts of acid.

How do I become more alkaline? You do this by eating health foods like fruits and vegetables. Take a calcium and magnesium supplement which can be found in most multi-vitamins. Drink 6-8 glasses of water a day. Add 2 glasses if you are overweight. Doing breathing exercises 3 times a day to exercise the lymphatic system. You can read more on this from a tremendous article I found HERE.

If I ask 10 people the question: “What causes disease?” The answer, most likely would be “Germs” There was a time that I would of answered with the same response. I now disagree with that answer.  To explain this further, we have to understand how the term “Germs” came about.  In the late 1800’s, there was a scientist that discovered germs. His name was Louis Pasteur.  I had heard from several health guru’s that the germ theory was bogus, so I decided to do my own research. Turns out there was another scientist named, Professor Pierre Jaques Antoine Bechamp.  Louis and Pierre were not the best of friends. As the record would show, Pasteur plagiarized much of Bechamp's work. At the time, Pasteur was in high favor of Napoleon III and the High Church. Bechamp was a workaholic and was not interested in fortune or favor.

Bechamp's investigations showed that the cell itself was made up of smaller living entities capable of intelligent behavior and self-reproduction. He referred to these as 'molecular granulations' and gave them the name of microzymas, which he said were the real basic units of life.  Bechamp described how in certain conditions microzymas could develop into bacteria within a cell and could, if the right conditions persisted, become pathological, so that infection could develop in the body without the acquisition of the germ from an outside source. This is called pleomorphism.

This is where it starts to get too technical, so I will spare you. Basically, Bechamp believed that disease starts within the cell and Pasteur believes it starts outside with germs.  There are staunch supporters of both theories on either side. They even say that Pasteur admitted that his theory was wrong on his death bed. I will be honest with you, both side make a great case for their cause.  BUT, and that is a big but, I have to look at this threw my common sense eyes. Pasteur seemed to run into controversy everywhere he went. Ole Louis was out for fame and fortune. Bechamp was quite the nerd and kept to himself. He basically just wanted to help people.

So here is how it went down. With the help of these new fangled microscopes, Pasteur found these germs hanging around dead matter and made the conclusion that these germs must be the cause of disease. You have to understand, before his theory was accepted, the belief was that disease was caused by evil spirits. Needless to say, at the time, they were very ripe to accept any other theory. People were terrified that the evil spirits would take them over. So along comes Louie with a small step up. Now, little creatures called germs invade your body and cause you to be sick. Now people were terrified to catch a germ. Here is the major difference. At least germs had the ability to be destroyed by man threw drugs and procedures. Those evil spirits just could not be caged. Now for the big catch. There were oodles of money to be made from the drugs and procedures that Pasteur convinced Napoleon III that he could create. And create he did. It all comes down to money, doesn’t it?

At this point, you are probably thinking that I do not believe in germs. No so. The germs are real and they will take you over, but they are not the cause. Let me ask you a question? Does this make sense to you? If you saw a pile of trash with a bunch or rats hanging around the trash, would you say, Hmmmm, those rats must have brought that trash here” Of course you wouldn’t! The rats came because the trash was there. The trash was in a nice bag. Now the trash is everywhere because the rats dug it out of the bag. Plus, the rats have left their own deposits, if you know what I mean. Germs are everywhere. We eat and drink them. They live in the soil and water and drift on currents of air. They survive without oxygen or in the absence of sunlight. They form dense colonies on virtually any artificial surface. There have been discoveries of germs found living in volcanoes, 650 degrees F. The presence of normal germs also appears to prime the immune system into a higher state of readiness. Without germs we would not be able to survive. That being said, why do we get sick? What is the cause? Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you are the cause. You are the one that brings the trash into your body for the rats to feast on. You push your body to the limit and when your body can take any more, you end up getting sick. The first thing you say is. “Those dam germs!” It wasn’t that you went out all night drinking and smoking. It is not that you feed your body with every processed food known to man. It is those dam germs. As far as the flu shot, I challenge you to do a Google search on how the flu vaccination is made. I, personally, do NOT get one. Alright, I have preached enough. I hope you get the point.

Your body goes way beyond tremendous. I HIGHLY recommend you read up on all the body’s defenses that it uses to combat sickness. The bottom line is that our body was made to deal with the germs, but not to the extreme capacity that we put it threw. We fill our body with trash every day. It sits and accumulates over time. The germs are there for a reason. They are there to take care of the waste. When we do come in contact with some bad germs our body is in what I call “Custer’s Last Stand mode” We all know what happened there. He got his butt whooped and so does our body.

Most of us live our lives in a state of sickness just waiting for the next nasty bug to take us down. I got to the point in my live that I was just sick and tired of being sick and tired. I removed all the nasty things that were going in and replaced it with healthy natural food. I have not had a cold in almost 3 years now. I don’t take any medication. Not even Tylenol. All my ailments are gone. How do I feel now you ask? All I can say is, trying to explain the feeling to you would be like trying to explain what a rose smells like to someone that have never even smelled a flower.

I am going to end this post with this thought. Heinrich Hermann Robert Koch was a German physician in the late 1800’s. He became famous for isolating Bacillus anthracis, the Tuberculosis bacillus and the Vibrio cholerae and for his development of Koch's postulates. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his tuberculosis findings in 1905. Robert Koch made the discoveries that led Louis Pasteur to describe how small organisms called germs could invade the body and cause disease.

In the final decades of the 19th century, Koch conclusively established that a particular germ could cause a specific disease. He did this by experimentation with anthrax. Using a microscope, Koch examined the blood of cows that had died of anthrax. He observed rod-shaped bacteria and suspected they caused anthrax. When Koch infected mice with blood from anthrax-stricken cows, the mice also developed anthrax. This led Koch to list four criteria to determine that a certain germ causes a particular disease. These criteria are known as Koch’s Postulates and are still used today. Integral to these criteria is Postulate #3, “The disease must be reproduced when a pure culture is inoculated into a healthy, susceptible host.” Even today, with all of the advances in modern science, it would be impossible to prove that a specific germ is responsible for a disease without the use of laboratory animals.

Out of all the questions I get. The one that I receive the most is, “How do you get your protein?” First of all I want to say that I am not a vegetarian. I do eat some meat. Not very often, but I will. My taste for it has all but diminished. Where I live, we have bonfires often and I do like a good sausage over the fire. There is a popular misconception that the only way to get protein is by eating meat. This is not true.

What is Protein?

Without getting to technical, protein is one of the basic building blocks of our body. It constitutes about 16% of our total body weight. Our muscle, hair, skin, and connective tissue are mostly made or protein. Proteins are made up of smaller units called amino acids. There are 22 amino acids important to human nutrition. Nine of these are essential amino acids, meaning the body cannot make them. Instead they need to be provided in the diet. The body can produce the other 13. The role of protein in food is not to provide our bodies with proteins directly, but to supply the amino acids from which the body can make its own proteins. When we eat a diet that supplies each essential amino acid in adequate amounts, our body supports protein synthesis. For a more complex discussion on protein, Go Here 

How much protein do we need?

There is a calculation based off a person’s sex, weight, and calories that are consumed, but we are going to keep this simple. The RDA recommends .36 grams of protein per pound that we weigh. So for a 170 pound man, you would multiply 170 x .36 or about 61 grams of protein a day.

Did I get my protein yesterday?

The following is what I ate yesterday.

Let’s see how I did. I weigh 180 pounds. So that would be 180 x .36 = 64.8 grams of protein. Well, look at that. I actually went over my recommended limit. Since I do workout and lift weights, my protein need will be slightly higher.

Good quality protein

I know what you are thinking now. “Sure there is protein in vegetables, but it is a low quality protein”. When I hear someone tell me this, my first question to them is what is the difference? Most have no idea what this means. They just heard it and repeat what they hear. I am guessing the meat producers are feeding this statement. Well, guess what? It is true…. Sort of. It is only part of the story. Eggs, cow's milk, meat, and fish are high quality protein. This means that they have large amounts of all the essential amino acids. Soybeans, quinoa (a grain), and spinach also are considered high quality protein. Other protein sources of non-animal origin usually have all of the essential amino acids, but the amounts of one or two of these amino acids may be low. For example, grains are lower in lysine (an essential amino acid) and legumes are lower in methionine (another essential amino acid) than those protein sources designated as high quality protein.

What about protein combining

The “incomplete protein” myth was inadvertently promoted in the 1971 book, Diet for a Small Planet, by Frances Moore Lappe. In it, the author stated that plant foods do not contain all the essential amino acids, so in order to be a healthy vegetarian, you needed to eat a combination of certain plant foods in order to get all of the essential amino acids. It was called the theory of “protein complementing.”

Frances Moore Lappe certainly meant no harm, and her mistake was somewhat understandable. She was not a nutritionist, physiologist, or medical doctor. She was a sociologist trying to end world hunger. She realized that there was a lot of waste in converting vegetable protein into animal protein, and she calculated that if people just ate the plant protein, many more people could be fed. In a later edition of her book (1991), she retracted her statement and basically said that in trying to end one myth—the unsolvable inevitability of world hunger, she created a second one—the myth of the need for “protein complementing.”

In these later editions, she corrects her earlier mistake and clearly states that all plant foods typically consumed as sources of protein contain all the essential amino acids, and that humans are virtually certain of getting enough protein from plant sources if they consume sufficient calories.

What happens if we get to little or too much?

Here are some symptoms of protein deficiency:

• Edema – A collection of fluid under the skin, which most commonly affects the legs, feet, and ankles, but can occur anywhere on the body.
• Weight loss
• Thinning or brittle hair, hair loss
• Ridges or deep lines in finger and toe nails
• Skin becomes very light, burns easily in the sun
• Reduced pigmentation in the hair on scalp and body
• Skin rashes, dryness, flakiness
• General weakness and lethargy
• Muscle soreness and weakness, cramps
• Slowness in healing wounds, cuts, scrapes, and bruises
• Bedsores and other skin ulcers
• Difficulty sleeping
• Headache
• Nausea and stomach pain
• Fainting

The risks of too little protein are as follows:

• Gallstones
• Arthritis
• Heart problems
• Muscle deterioration
• Organ failure
• Death

Good Sources of Protein

When you think about this process of losing weight, do you have a negative thought process, or a Positive one? If your thoughts on doing this are negative, as I suspect they are, your journey will be a roller coaster and it will come to an end very quickly. You need to get into your thoughts and find out what is driving you to lose the weight. Write them on a piece of paper. Pro's on one side negatives on the other. This is a start. Most people eat to compensate for other things. Write them down too. Attack those issues BEFORE you begin the process of losing weight. You have to get your mind in the game, so to speak.

Your goal should be to fill your thought with positive information. You are being bombarded by negative information all day. You open the morning paper to 98% negative stories. You go to work and you can hear everyone complaining about something. Your boss can always point out the negative aspects of your ability to do your job. You come home and turn on the news. Is it possible to get one positive story? All of this is a problem. Your mind it very complex. All this negative information will churn in there. It will eventually get the best of you.

So what can we do? You need to combat this by filling that space between your ears with positive information. First you need to fight the negative information. I do not read the paper, or listen to the news. When people start to complain to me, I just simply tell them I am sorry, but I am afraid my negative barrel is filled and I can’t put anymore in. I read positive books and listen to positive tapes. My buddy Zig Ziglar is a great place to start. Once you get you mind into gear, then you can start to lose weight, but make sure it is a positive experience.Remember this, You are not taking something away from yourself, you are giving yourself a gift. See how that works?

I read an article in the New York Times that said that in 1970, Americans spent about $6 Billion dollars on fast food. In 2008, it was almost $140 billion. Play the small movie below. It is very disturbing. It shows how fast the obesity rate is climbing every year. 

Some of those states jumped 20% in 10 years. The government is so worried about heath care as it stands today. What they should be trying to fix is peoples eating habits. Then again, you can’t fix stupid. That’s not quite right either. We are supposed to have a government run by the people for the people. That is not the way it is. Government is run by big business for big business. The large companies that we have grown to trust are not trust worthy anymore. They are run by greed. It has become a science to mislead the consumer without them knowing the whole truth. The whole marketing business is run on little white lies. Read up on Aspertame someday. I wrote a small blog on Aspertame. The product is in well over 9000 other products. It is poison and causes Cancer, but yet it is still on the market. The way it was pushed threw was more crooked then an Annie Anne’s pretzel. We trust the FDA. We think they are there looking after our well being. THINK AGAIN!!!!

All that being said, the question still stands, why are we getting so fat? I hear people blaming it on McDonalds. They did invent the Super Size Meal. My question on that is. Do big meals cause obesity, or does obesity cause big meals? Personally I think we need to blame Bill Gates. Well, maybe not Bill, but how about technology. Technology had made us extremely lazy. When I was a kid, we had 4 channels on the TV. We had to get up off our rears and change the channels. It did not take long to find there was not a dam thing on. So we went outside to play. Today we want everything handed to us. We don’t want to lift a finger to do anything. If our meals take more than 10 minutes to cook, we don’t want it.

Here is another thought. Today almost 50% of all Americans are taking a prescription drug. As the age go’s up. The percentage go’s up. We are a pill popping nation. The drug companies have some of the best marketers on their team. Why do we need to eat right, when we can just pop a pill and everything will be ok? I want you to think about that for awhile. Is everything alright? What happened to the war on Cancer started by Nixion in the 70’s? We are no further to a cure now that we were back then. The statistics on disease is staggering. We are becoming a sick nation. Scratch that, we are a sick nation. Pills are making us worse.

We need to change, but most of us will not change until there is a life threatening situation. We don’t know what feeling healthy is. We have been used to feeling like crap all our lives and we are used to it. People tell me all the time that I am wasting my time trying to help people’s health. I disagree. I am starting to see people that need a change. They want to feel that wonderful feeling of good heath that I talk about. The people that I have helped all say the same thing. “Why did I take so long to do this?” What I teach is not magic. It is pure common sense.

Aspartame is marketed at Equal, NutraSweet, Benevia. And many other companies are coming out with similar products, now that the patent has expired. It is in well over 9000 products and growing. You have undoubtedly heard that Aspartame is a safe product. I am also sure you have heard quite a bit of bad press on the product. I am hoping that you take warning to this article and remove all products with aspartame in them from your diet.

Aspartame is made of 3 components, 50% phenylalanine, 40% aspartic acid and 10% methanol (wood alcohol). In the body, methanol breaks down into formaldehyde (embalming fluid) and formic acid. When the temperature of Aspartame exceeds 86 degrees F, methanol converts to formaldehyde and then to formic acid, which then causes metabolic acidosis. (Formic acid is found in the poison of fire ants). Just a bit of biology, remember your body’s temperature is 98.6.

Aspartame is one of the most acid forming products on the market. I say acid forming because in its natural state, it is slightly alkaline. Toxic buildup in the body is greatly increased when more than 7.8 mg per day of methanol is ingested. One liter of a drink containing Aspartame contains about 56 mg of methanol

If you suffer from the following issues, I would suggest removing all products from your diet that contain this poison.

• Fibromyalgia Syndrome and symptoms of Fibromyalgia
• Multiple Sclerosis symptoms
• Dizziness
• Headaches
• Menstrual problems
• Spasms
• Shooting pains
• Numbness in your legs
• Cramps
• Vertigo
• Tinnitus
• Joint pain
• Depression
• Anxiety attacks
• Slurred speech
• Blurred vision
• Memory loss

For more information view this video form Fox news on the dangers of Aspartame

A new study from the Harvard boys has just come out. The study was done by the Department of Epidemiology Harvard School of Public Health, and Division of Cardiovascular Medicine and Channing Laboratory. There has been study after study that has come out toting the bad effects of meat on our bodies. There are issues that stem from cancer to heart disease. This new study was published in the journal Circulation. This time they are blasting processed meats.

The study went through more than 1600 studies and broke it down to 20 that investigated a link between meat and disease risk in more than 1.2 million people. Here is what they found. If you eat processed meats like sausage, bacon or cold cuts, you have a 42% higher risk of heart disease.  It also says you have a 19% higher risk for type 2 diabetes. You might want to think twice about adding these to your diet.

So why are they picking on processed meats? Well, both processed meats and unprocessed meats contain very similar amounts of saturated fats and cholesterol, which can do a number on your arteries to begin with, but processed meats contain considerably higher amounts of preservatives and sodium. I will also point out that the “Smokey flavor” in these meats creates even more havoc. Do a search on this in Google.

I realize that meat is a staple food in our western diet, but so is obesity and heart disease. I am not saying you have to cut meat out all together. I eat some meat every once in a while. What I am saying is to get smart about your diet. Don’t take my word about it. Do your homework. The internet is a powerful tool. The more you read, the better feel you will get for pointing out the bogus information. Common sense tells you that if the article was subsidized by the meat packing industry, you are not getting the whole truth. Learn to read between the lines.

When I tell people that you are not supposed to combine certain types of foods, they just look at me with a look of disbelief. So what exactly does food combining mean? Foods can be broken down into 4 types of foods. Proteins, carbohydrates, Fats and Oils, and fruits. 'Food combining' refers to the combination of foods which are compatible with each other in terms of digestive chemistry.

You can’t watch TV nowadays without viewing a commercial on indigestion. The industry spends over 2 billion dollars a year on antacid promotion. Not million, Billion, with a capital B. It used to be that you could take a pill and in a bit of time, your problems would be solved. Now, you take a pill before you know you are going to over indulge.

Have you ever wondered why you get indigestion? Are you just eating too much food? Are you eating the wrong foods? Well, not exactly. Somewhere down the line, food was transformed from nutritional based consumption to what it is now, a form of entertainment.  It has become the norm to gorge on all types of foods at one meal.

This is not good. It is time to get a bit scientific. Don’t worry, I won’t get too nerdy. Let’s take 2 types of foods, a protein and a carbohydrate. First, before I go on, you might thing that this is over the top and a pain in the rear to do, but let me assure you, this is worth picking up. The very core of good health starts right here. At least as far as nutrition goes. Just remember, change can be hard at first, but it takes no time at all to get used to it. So, back to the protein and carbohydrate conversation. Let’s take a good ole American meal. Steak and potatoes. Your steak is a protein and the potato is a carbohydrate. Different foods require different enzymes to aid the digestion process. Some are acidic and some are alkaline. Your steak is a protein that needs a highly acidic environment to be digested. The potatoes need a more alkaline environment. Let me take you back to science 101. If you mix alkaline with an acid, what happens? They neutralize one another. We won’t get into the 20 part acid to 1 part alkaline discussion here. Do you see the problem? Your stomach becomes a war zone. Your stomach keeps pumping in more acid to break down the proteins and it also is trying to do the same with alkaline to break down the carbohydrates. Nothing gets accomplished. Leave some food on the counter for a day or two and watch what happens. Turn up the heat in your house to 98 degrees and watch what happens. The same thing happens in your body. Undigested proteins putrefy (rot). Undigested fats go rancid and undigested carbohydrates ferment. Filling your body with toxins. This situation often leads to indigestion, bloating, gas, abdominal discomfort. The stomach finally gives up and pushes it to the intestines. This is where most of the nutrient absorption is accomplished. Since the food is not broken down the absorption of nutrients is minimal.

Here are some rules of thumb in food combining

• The most important rule is, do not mix starch and proteins at the same meal
• Eat proteins and sugars (fruits) at separate
  meals.
• Eat starchy foods and sugars (fruits) at
  separate meals. Fruits undergo no digestion in the
  stomach and are held up if eaten with foods which
  require digestion in the stomach.
• Drop the desserts. Eaten on top of meals they
  lie heavy on the stomach, requiring no digestion
  there, and ferment. Bacteria turn them into
  alcohols, acetic acids and vinegars.

Do you remember when your mother told you to slow down and chew your food? For the most, I am guessing she was not quite sure why, but there was a good reason. The more you chew your food, the less work your stomach has to do. This means that the stomach does not have the time to destroy the nutrients. I also want to add that it also works to your advantage to eat a meal that is void of any stress. Stress creates acid in your stomach. It does not go well with starches.

Here is a good chart of what food that you can and can not combine.