What could possibly be worse for your health than smoking?

What could possibly be worse for your health than smoking?

Some experts suggest there is an everyday substance even worse for your health than tobacco. A substance that is far reaching, it can be hidden or the main ingredient in many foods. It is as pure and white as the driven snow, and sweeter than your sweetheart.

The substance is sugar. It comes in many different disguises and always tastes good. It’s not just found in the obviously sweet foods such as pop, cakes, biscuits and chocolate, but also in tomato ketchup, salad dressing, cereal, peanut butter, bread, pickle, baked beans, yoghurts and many, many, more everyday foods.

So how can you tell what to look for and what makes sugar so bad?
Check the ingredients of the foods you buy, you’ll be surprised at how many contain sugar and/or it’s disguised derivatives:Glucose/Dextrose (refined sugar)

• Glucose Syrup/Corn Syrup (processed from corn)
• Sucrose (white sugar)
• Invert Syrup/Treacle (found in golden syrup, toffee, black treacle)
• Lactose (milk sugar)
• Maltose (found in germinating seeds such as barley for beer)
• Hydrolysed Starch (just another description for sugar)
• Fructose (fruit sugar)
• Raw, Brown or Demerara Sugar

All the items in the above list are refined sugars, which are anti-nutrients. They deplete your body instead of nourishing it (giving ‘empty calories’), some would say in the same way a poison does. The raw plants are stripped of all their nutrients during the refining process.

Sugar is linked to all sorts of nasties, including -Immune system suppression

• Hyperactivity, anxiety and difficulty concentrating
• Premature aging
• Alcoholism
• Weakened eyesight
• Yeast imbalance leading to thrush
• Increased risk of diabetes, heart disease and obesity

It’s no coincidence that some sugar plantation owners during the slave era suffered type 2 diabetes (they were the only ones who could afford refined sugar), while the slaves themselves who chewed on the raw cane had no problems from it.

Glucose, lactose, maltose and fructose can all be found in nature. That doesn’t mean they’re ‘natural’ when refined and added to foods. They’re all found in whole foods, and when eaten as a whole food (a fresh, crisp apple), all the necessary fibre and enzymes are included for correct metabolism and absorption of all the goodness of that said food. That’s why whole foods don’t come with a list of ingredients.

Although no type of sugar is good for you, refined fructose has been implicated in some pretty serious crimes - obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardio-vascular disease, high blood pressure and lipid (cholesterol) problems. These diseases are collectively known as metabolic syndrome, and are the cause of the obesity epidemic we’re now facing.

Fructose is found in ice cream, fromage frais desserts, soya yogurts, cakes and ‘light’ foods. This refined sugar has the same long term effects on your body as alcoholism (alcohol is fermented sugar), only you don’t notice so much as you don’t get drunk. So next time you see someone with a beer belly (not just on men!), it means they’re likely to have a sweet tooth instead of/as well as high alcohol consumption.

What about brown sugar? Is that better for you than white sugar?
Sorry, but it’s bad news. Brown sugar has either been washed less than white sugar, or has had molasses added back into the white sugar to coat the crystals and give it a bit of a different flavour. So it’s still had all its nutrients stripped during the refining process and is no better for you than white sugar.

What about artificial sweeteners?
The news is even worse for artificial sweeteners. Aspartame, found in Canderel, diet colas, sugar-free fruit squashes etc, has had more reactions reported to the US Food & Drug Administration than every other food additive combined. Reactions included migraines, headaches, memory loss, hallucination, fatigue, nausea and vomiting to name just a few of the milder symptoms. Sucralose (E-number E955), found in Splenda, is linked with enlarged liver and kidneys, reduced growth rate, aborted pregnancy and diarrhoea.

So what can I use?
My personal approach is to avoid sugar all together. I’m not always successful at it, but once you cut it out, you realise how sickly doughnuts and chocolate are, and how sweet fruit and vegetables are. Suddenly I have a whole new appreciation for roast parsnips, sweet potato wedges and slow-cooked onions. Strawberries that have been warmed by the sun become like nectar, and pineapple is my version of a bag of penny chews.

If ever the mood takes me to do some baking, I’ll use xylitol to replace the sugar in the recipe. This is found in shops as Xylobrit, Xylosweet or Perfect Sweet. It’s not perfect, it has a laxative effect in high doses, but it has also been found to be good for your teeth (its used in sugar-free gum) amongst other benefits.

So now we’ve discovered the true source of the obesity epidemic and it’s nothing to do with fat. It’s all about the sugar. Phew, after all this technical stuff I need a break, and in the next article, we’ll discover the power of taking 15 minutes out everyday.

Wishing you peace and good health,

Bess

Uncover the truth about fats - the good, the bad and the ugly.

It’s now becoming widely known that not all fats are bad, but do you know which to avoid and which are important to include in your diet?

The idea of a low-fat diet spread from America in the early 80s. Studies found that the less fat you ate, the lower your cholesterol levels and the lower your risk of heart disease. It was also assumed that a high fat diet lead to being overweight. Were those studies correct or flawed? Do we even need to revisit the studies when you just have to look around you to see the evidence?

So which fats are good fats, and which are the bad guys? And are there ugly ones too? Yes, and it gets even more confusing as good fats turn ugly, and the bad ones aren’t so bad after all…

Unsaturated fats, found in vegetable oils are widely considered as the good guys. Which is correct, to a point, but there are some issues. Here’s why:

There are two types of unsaturated fat. On an atomic level, it’s all to do with how many double bonds there are in the fatty acid chain, mono (meaning one) and poly (meaning many).

Poly-unsaturated fats are unstable and go rancid easily. Free radicals in the rancid oils have been shown to contribute towards premature aging, increase of heart disease and cancer and damage of organs.

Poly-unsats can be further divided into omega 6 and omega 3 oils, again classified according to how many double bonds there are. Most commercial vegetable oils contain high levels of omega 6 compared to omega 3, which is unfavourable (it should be equal, and poly-unsats should make up no more than 4% of your total calorie intake). High levels of omega 6 in the diet have been linked to increased tendency to form blood clots, high blood pressure, weight gain, inflammation and more.



Mono-unsaturated fats, such as olive and avocado are more stable and don’t go rancid as quickly. Extra virgin oils are pressed at low temperatures without exposure to damaging oxygen and light.

And then, in the making of margarine and spreads, when unsaturated fats are super-heated and hydrogenised, they turn into trans-fats. These are the ugly fats, which are toxic and to be avoided at all costs.

What about saturated fats, aren’t they the bad guys?
Nope, saturated fats, such as those found in lard, dripping, goose fat and butter aren’t the cause of many of our modern diseases. They play a vital role in bone health, protect the liver from alcohol and other toxins, enhance the immune system, lower Lp(a), which is a substance found in the blood that indicates the likelihood of heart disease, and are needed to help retain the benefits of omega 3s, amongst other virtues.




So what fats should I use in my cooking?
Butter is actually less likely to cause weight gain than olive oil or other commercial vegetable oils as it is directly absorbed for quick energy. This is due to its’ short-chain fatty acids, which are antimicrobial (helping maintain good bacteria in the digestive system), antitumoral and supportive to the immune system.

Extra virgin olive oil is great for pouring over salads, making up dressings, and cooking at moderate temperatures. It is rich in antioxidants, but don’t overdo it, as it’s longer chain fatty acids are more likely to contribute to fat build up.

Animal fats such as lard, beef dripping and goose fat are stable, useful for frying and bring lots of flavour. If you haven’t tried roasting potatoes in goose fat, I highly recommend it, they’re delicious! Some researchers suggest pork products may contribute towards cancer, others say that it is only the meat that does this, not the fat. Pork is a good source of vitamin D however, so I’ll leave that decision to you.

According to Dr Mercola (www.mercola.com), where I did most of my research about this article, all the following oils should be avoided; safflower (borage), corn, sunflower, soybean and rapeseed, as they contain too much omega 6 compared to omega 3. You are much better off eating the raw, fresh seeds, such as sunflower seeds, than using the commercially produced oils.

Flax seed oil has a much better omega 3 to omega 6 ratio, so is valuable when poured over salads but should never be heated.

Coconut oil has strong antifungal and antimicrobial properties and doesn’t contribute towards heart disease. It is very stable and can be used in baking.

We did as we were told, we reduced our fat intake, but obesity has increased and continues to do so. Why? Find out in the next article, when I’ll explain about the different types of sugar.

Besslow's Hierarchy of Universal Needs

The idea for this came from a client of my clinic, who I was talking to about the ANH group I run. She thought that Maslow’s hierarchy of needs was relevant, and worth discussing. So I thought about it, and decided to turn the pyramid on it’s head, start at the bottom, and reach to infinity. It’s all a process (See Deepak Chopra’s thread “Insights on Healing…” on the ANH forum), and as it only took about an hour from conception to upload, it will evolve as I get your feedback on it.
It was originally just going to be my pyramid on it’s head, but when I looked further into Maslow’s process, I discovered that later models include transcendence, which overlap with the universal process of increasing the peace. So then I decided to add Maslow’s pyramid to the bottom of mine, so that it became an integrated part, rather than a separate entity.

I'd love you to share your experience of this.

Peace

Bess