Nutrition for the New Year

Happy New Year! I am sure over the last few days you have been inundated with articles, TV segments, blogs and podcasts about how to make and keep a New Year’s Resolution for improved health. I will spare you from yet another one. I do want to offer one thought for you to keep in mind as the new year unfolds. You don’t have to get bogged down with calorie counting, food plans, points or any other such thing….just eat REAL food!

The more I study nutrition the more fascinating a topic it becomes to me. Eating is something we all have to do on a daily basis but when you dive into the world of nutrition for health it becomes so much more than filling a growling stomach to keep hunger at bay.  Proper nutrition is the key to health, yet in our modern world this simple message seems to have been forgotten - lost in the ever growing sea of processed “food”, marketing, and the idea that eating is mostly a form of entertainment.

In this day and age when there seems to be a drug for every ailment under the sun, we bypass the fact that our food can give us what we need in order to live at the peak of health. Recently I read a wonderful book that I highly recommend, The Wahls Protocol by Terry Wahls M.D. She is a western trained doctor who developed multiple sclerosis. She sought the conventional treatment using pharmaceuticals and was devastated to find her condition worsening steadily. She took matters into her own hands and discovered that by focusing on giving her body the nutrients it needed through whole foods, it would begin to heal and she could regain her health. She now helps others achieve the same success through nutrition.

This book fascinated me because as a student of natural health, using nutrition to keep our bodies functioning optimally seems intuitive and makes perfect sense. I was blown away that a medically trained doctor had to discover this idea for herself outside of medical school when faced with a challenging illness. We need to return to the simple idea that food is literally the fuel on which our body runs. When you provide it with the proper nutrients, there will be little need to have a pill for every ailment under the sun.

“When diet is wrong medicine is of no use. When diet is correct, medicine is of no need.” Ayurvedic Proverb

As I geeked out recently studying the roles various minerals play in running our systems, I was amazed at the possibilities for allowing the body to heal using food. Did you know that deficiencies in calcium and magnesium can cause depression and/or anxiety? How many people today including young children suffer from depression and anxiety symptoms? Could it be, in our fast food, processed food world that they are simply lacking in foundational minerals? For example - Could post-partum depression be caused by a lack of vitamins and minerals because the increased need for these during pregnancy was not adequately met? A PubMed study on peri/post natal depression seems to indicate a link -

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22952489

In other studies, low serum magnesium levels were linked to an increased chance of developing atrial fibrillation. There also seems to be a link between zinc deficiency and the large increase in people suffering from allergies-

 http://medcraveonline.com/MOJI/MOJI-01-00005.php

It is possible that all of these issues and many more could be avoided by simply providing the body with what it needs….proper nutrition.

Do you need a degree in nutrition or loads of money for supplements to reap the benefits of these miraculous nutrients? No. Start by simply eating more whole foods from the major food groups. If it comes with a label and loads of ingredients, skip it. Eat foods as close to how they were created as possible. If you have a particular issue you are interested in solving, do some research and learn what nutrients may play a role in your case. There are so many health problems that can be solved through nutrition without any negative side effects that pharmaceuticals can cause. Let this be the year that you start truly FEEDING your body what it needs so that you can thrive.

It’s Your Life - Choose Health!