I’m writing this while sitting on our lanai in Maui Hawaii. It is a delightful 80 degrees with a soft breeze blowing. We are here for ten days with our best friends of forty years, John and Sandy from the Sacramento area. If you have been following us for a while you may remember us doing an Alaskan cruise last year at this time with them. Our ages (68-75 yrs.) prompted us to plan a special trip together once a year to make memories!
#foodnaturesmedicine
Why Fruit Makes You Fat
Yeah, I know, I feel you objecting to this already!! But I love my fruit!!
One of the biggest questions I get is “how do I stop sugar cravings???” And the answer is…….it depends (dang!) There are multiple reasons we may have sugar cravings, so that’s not a “one size fits all” answer.
Blood Sugar Regulation
This is a crucial area to address not only for sugar cravings but for fat loss. If our blood sugars are swinging from high to low to high all day long, not only will we crave sugar but we’ll feel fatigued, have brain fog and this impacts our thyroid function. Regulating your blood sugar is a #1 in my book for long term health. Alzheimer’s is being called Type III Diabetes because of the connection to high blood sugars.
This is where fruit comes in. Fruit is wonderful food in its whole form, full of antioxidants, vitamins, and fiber. The problem is the majority of fruit is also high in fruit sugars. Sugar makes you fat!
From lowest to highest
- Strawberries – 1 cup 7 grams of sugar
- Guava
- Papaya
- Watermelon
- Grapefruit
- Nectarine
- Peaches
- Bananas
- Mango – one mango 45 grams of sugar!
So, as you can see, fruit can be “ok” and it can be a trigger for a big blood sugar surge!
Stress
When you are under stress you produce a hormone called Cortisol. Cortisol was designed to pull sugar stores (glycogen) out of your liver and muscles so you can run from that saber tooth tiger. Unfortunately, the type of stress we are under these days is a constant source, not an immediate danger source. This leads to sugar being flooded into the body constantly which creates “insulin resistance.” The cells get full of sugar and they change the lock for the insulin and it gets locked out of its sugar dump, so now it’s circulating around trying to find a place to put the sugar. What do you think it does??? It makes a new cell to dump the sugar in…..yep, a fat cell!
Adding more sugar to the diet, even in the form of fruit sugar, adds to this body burden of sugar storage. Even more challenging is we crave sugar when we are stressed!
Are You Addicted?
There was a study done with rats, sugar, and cocaine. The rats were given cocaine in a watering tube and sugar water in a watering tube. Want to guess which tube they drank from more? Yep, the sugar!
We know that our brains have “receptor sites” for sugar, drugs, alcohol, and neurotransmitters. The bummer is, the same receptor site for drugs and alcohol is the same receptor site for sugar. Yes, you can become addicted to sugar.
Always remember this, your brain is a protein and fat lover. When we crave sugar, often what the brain really wants is protein or fat. Julia Ross runs the most successful drug and alcohol rehab center in the U.S. using nutrition and isolate amino acids (protein). She has also written several books, The Mood Cure and The Diet Cure which both take a deep dive into the brain, addictions and the natural solutions to sugar cravings.
Sugar also depletes your brain of Serotonin, your “feel good” neurotransmitter. When you are low on Serotonin you crave more sugar! Just like an addiction, the more you use the more you want.
There is more but I won’t make this any longer. The body is a complex system, but remember this, you can live without any carbohydrates in the diet. The body can convert the little in protein to glucose and the little from vegetables to glucose. We have no minimum daily requirement for carbohydrates! Gasp!!
I teach you this and more during my 10 Day Detox which starts October 21st! I teach you which fruits and how many to eat each day, what you can do to “interrupt” your sugar monster and send him on his way, what foods balance your blood sugars and tips and tools to lowering stress!
Just in time to get your body “de-sensitized” to sugar before the holidays!
You Don’t Lose Weight to Get Healthy – You Get Healthy to Lose Weight
I know, that’s kind of backward from what you’ve been told! Today you’re going to learn the truth about why you may not be losing weight and why I think so many people struggle to do so.
Most of us never learn that in order for the body to release “fat” stores it must have the ability to detoxify first. Toxins are stored in fat! If your liver does not have the support to move these toxins into a water-soluble form and excrete them out of the body they get recirculated back into the bloodstream and back into the fat and fat loss stops.
Five years ago I started doing thirty-day classes with Dr. Jana Schrier here in Georgetown TX. They were called “Detox to Weight-loss”. She had asked that I spend one night a week with her patients educating them on why you must detox the body first before the weight will come off. Not only was it a huge success (many alumni are still practicing what they learned) but Dr. Schrier saw many of the lab numbers for some of these patients that were very positive changes in a thirty-day time frame.
Have You Heard of Obesogens?
Obesogens are artificial chemicals that are believed to contribute to obesity. They come from things like plastics, cookware, cosmetics, pharmaceutical drugs. Additionally they come from pesticides and herbicides, and chemicals used for industrial purposes just to name a few.
Obesogens interfere with your endocrine system and affect your hormones. Some endocrine disrupters exert their effects by activating estrogen receptors. This can cause harmful effects in both men and women.
The role of environmental chemicals in obesity has garnered increased attention in academics. The National Institutes of Health has come on board. They are suggesting this could be part of the reason for our obesity epidemic. “There are many studies in both humans and animals. The National Toxicology Program found real biological plausibility.” In 2011 the NIH launched a 3-year effort to fund research exploring the role of environmental chemical exposures in obesity, type 2 diabetes, and metabolic syndrome.
When you lose weight you free up all these Obesogens from the fat stores and “wham!” the body gets inundated with toxicity! This, in turn, leads to the lowering of your active thyroid, which lowers metabolism. This makes you hold onto fat!
You ARE Toxic!
We come into the world toxic. As far back as 2005 a study done on ten newborn baby’s showed 287 chemicals in those little bodies!
There is no way you or I are not filled with toxins. Even if we eat organic, reduce chemical exposure in our home with our cleaning products, cookware, cosmetics, etc. we live in a sea of chemicals.
If you work in an office you are surrounded by plastics that out-gas, carpets that out-gas, the air that is full of this stuff. If you wash your hands you absorb chlorine and fluoride right through your skin.
The most recent area of toxicity is coming from the “unseen” world of Electro Magnetic Fields. Science has now shown that these EMF’s can lead to insulin resistance (among hundreds of other problems). The EMF’s affect the calcium channel on the cell site, which is a primary cell function, and in doing so impact the whole cell. You and I live in a “sea” of wi-fi signal and cell signals!
Before Starting Any Weight-loss Program – Detox!
This may feel overwhelming but I’m here to help you sort all this out and guide you towards detoxing safely!
I’m first and foremost an educator. What we found in our “live” classes was, the participants “got” why they needed to detox, not only for weight-loss but for long term health. Let me teach you things you did not know about why your body is holding onto weight!
10 Day Detox
Our next class starts on October 21st! This is the perfect time to do this, before the holiday’s hit and the cold and flu season is in full swing. We will be setting your body up to get off sugar, gently detox, lower inflammation, boost immune function as well as teaching you tips and tools to start to lower your toxic burden.
I will be coming back from a ten-day trip to Hawaii and I will be ready to DETOX with you!!
Join us on this journey……learn more HERE
Let’s do this!
Chris
Why I Don’t Get the Flu Shot and What I Do Instead
It’s that time of year again. Get Your Flu Shot signs everywhere! Nobody likes to get the flu and for some it is down right dangerous, but do we all need a flu shot????
I choose not to get the flu shot because according to the the Centers for Disease Control, most flu vaccines contain mercury in the form of thimerosal, some containing as much as 25mcg per dose – which is more than 250 times above the EPA’s safety limit!
[Read more…] about Why I Don’t Get the Flu Shot and What I Do Instead
Why You Must Have Morning Sun
What was morning like for most of humankind one hundred years ago? A vast majority of people were living rurally and owned farms and ranches so they woke up with the “chickens” and went to bed with the sunset. In doing that, they were in the Circadian Rhythm of their body’s.
12 Signs You May Have a Toxic Liver
Up until 1900, around 1% of deaths were caused by cancer. Today, 42% of Americans will develop cancer in their lifetime and 24% will die from cancer. Many experts point at toxic overload from pollutants in our air, water, food, household cleaners, skincare products, chemicals from carpets, furniture and clothing, just to name a few!
