As a youth and as a young adult, I pretty much ate whatever I liked. It never really occurred to me then that any of the food that I was eating could possibly be harming my health. Anyway, when you’re 20 years old, who thinks about health? At that time of your life, you think you’re indestructible, and old age was something that only happened to old people.

Times are changing. From a younger age, people are beginning to pay attention to what they’re putting into their bodies. Even some hamburger joints claim to offer a healthier version of this junk-food mainstay. A healthy hamburger? Hmmm.

There’s no doubt that your diet can affect your health, your resistance to diseases, your recovery time and your quality of life. Your diet may even determine your longevity, if a disaster doesn’t get you first. Here’s some food for thought, a list of diets which some people believe will give them length of days:

Organic Diet
You only consume agricultural produce untainted by pesticides, artificial fertilisers and other chemicals, and meat reared without artificial growth-enhancing feeds or hormones. Many chemicals are known to be carcinogenic and can also cause other health problems. Organic food is supposed to have less toxins than non-organic produce, and contain more nutrients and antioxidants. The organic diet is believed to reduce exposure to harmful chemicals and toxins in foods, boost health, lower the risk of diseases and illness, and also be kinder to the environment.

Less Red Meat Diet
To lower your risk of getting heart disease and cancer, this diet cuts out red and processed meat. Poultry and fish are allowed, and oily fish with a high Omega-3 fatty acid content is recommended to help reduce the risk of a coronary attack. Although eliminating red and processed meats from the diet may lower saturated fat, it is not necessarily healthier if consumption of vegetables and fruits is not increased.

Caloric Restriction Diet
Calories are reduced by 30% from the recommended 1,800-2,550 calories daily for adults, depending on age and size. The diet comprises vegetables, some fruit, and low-fat protein such as fish and lean meat. Fasting on certain days of the week is an option. Proponents claim that the diet slows ageing and extends lifespan by lowering blood pressure and insulin levels. The caloric restriction diet is also supposed to improve the function of the heart, veins and arteries. This is an extreme diet as it basically starves the body. You may have quantity of life, but your quality of life may suffer.

Vegetarian Diet
In comparison to the caloric restriction diet, the vegetarian diet may not seem too difficult to follow. All animal protein – meat as well as fish – is excluded. Plant-based protein, vegetables, fruit and whole grains typify this diet. The vegetarian diet is low in saturated fat from meat, high in antioxidants from vegetables, fruit, grains, pulses and nuts, and contains more fibre. It has been shown to reduce the risk of chronic illnesses, and many followers do live longer lives than most.

Blood Type Diet
Advocates of this diet believe that people should eat according to their blood type, as your blood type might predispose your body to certain illnesses. Eating more or reducing intake of certain foods may help to prevent these illnesses from happening. Nutritionists feel that this is a simplistic approach to health, as everyone’s genetic make-up is different, although they may share the same blood type. Therefore, there may be different reactions to the same diet, with different results.

Okinawa Diet
Okinawa, Japan, has the world’s largest populations of centenarians. This diet is based on what Okinawans eat, apparently at least seven servings of dark green vegetables daily, along with fish, soy foods and seaweed. Not only is this diet supposed to help you live longer, it is also believed to reduce the risk of heart disease, breast and prostate cancer, and obesity. However, the longevity enjoyed by people in Okinawa may also be influenced by other factors such as genes, environment and lifestyle.

Raw Food Diet
This is similar to the vegetarian diet, except that the cooking of food is avoided, as heat is believed to destroy enzymes that help digestion and strengthen the immune system. The temperature of food should be kept to no more than 46 deg C. Eating raw plant foods full of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants is believed by raw foodies to promote health, longevity as well as beauty. There is evidence that followers of the raw food diet have better sugar control and a lower risk of coronary heart disease.

No diet can ever guarantee health and longevity, but healthy diets can certainly help you feel and look better, and feel more energetic. That’s good enough reason to be discerning about what you eat and drink.

Posted: September 8th, 2009 under Diet, Health Basics 101.
Comments: none

When you’ve got estrogen-receptor positive breast cancer, you need to try to reduce your exposure to this hormone. This is no easy task, as estrogens are found everywhere, in the environment as well as foods. I wrote about this in some detail in a previous post titled “Beware Hidden Estrogen”.

There was a time when I decided to follow the Budwig Protocol, an alternative cancer program characterised by the consumption of large quantities of flaxseed oil, flaxseeds and quark or cottage cheese daily. To my horror, during the 14 months that I was on the program, tumors grew on my chest and bled profusely. One day, I discovered that flaxseed is a rich source of estrogen, as are dairy foods. I also found out that flaxseed is a blood-thinner, which is a big problem when you have bleeding wounds or tumors. I stopped consuming flaxseed in all its forms, as well as cottage cheese. That particular combination obviously did not suit my body. Reluctantly, I also started on a course of Tamoxifen, and my condition began to improve.

People who tell you that you can eat whatever you want are morons. What you eat and drink definitely affects your health. Numerous studies have proven this. If you have estrogen dominant breast cancer, familiarise yourself with the phytoestrogens – the natural estrogens found in plant foods – which mimic the action of estrogen in the human body. Phytoestrogens are a weak form of estrogen, and can be helpful in filling estrogen receptor sites on cancer cells, preventing dangerous estrogens like estradiol from occupying those sites. In my experience, however, large amounts of flaxseed oil combined  daily with cottage cheese actually fed the breast cancer and caused it to spread. Perhaps the real culprit was the cottage cheese, a dairy product. Why knows? Dairy products are known to cause many health problems.

These are some foods high in estrogen (this list includes some animal sources as well, so go easy with those):

Alfalfa
Animal flesh
Anise seed
Apples
Baker’s yeast
Barley
Beets
Carrots
Cherries
Chickpeas (garbanzo beans)
Clover
Cowpeas (black- eyed peas)
Cucumbers
Dairy Foods
Dates
Eggs
Eggplant (aubergines)
Fennel
Flaxseeds
Garlic
Hops
Licorice
Oats
Olive oil
Olives
Papaya
Parsley
Peas
Peppers
Plums
Pomegranates
Potatoes
Pumpkin
Red beans
Red clover
Rhubarb
Rice (relatively high)
Sage
Sesame seeds
Soybean sprouts
Soybeans
Split peas
Sunflower seeds
Tomatoes
Wheat
Yams

There are also food sources which inhibit or block estrogen:

Berries
Broccoli
Buckwheat
Cabbage
Citrus Foods
Corn
Figs
Fruits (except apples, cherries, dates, pomegranates)
Grapes
Green beans
Melons
Millet
Onions
Pears
Pineapples
Squashes
Tapioca
White rice
White flour

If you’re wondering why white rice and white flour are listed as estrogen blockers, apparently it’s because they coat and stick to the villi of the duodenum, blocking the absorption of estrogens in the food. I learn something new everyday.

Posted: September 6th, 2009 under Alternative Remedies, Cancer, Diet, Enemies To Health, Hormone Health.
Comments: 1

Morinda citrifolia, Indian mulberry, cheese fruit, beach mulberry – these are some of the other names of the noni plant. ‘Noni’ is a Hawaiian term. Originally from Southeast Asia, the noni plant grows in many parts of the world, including much of Polynesia and other tropical and subtropical countries.

Interestingly, noni’s Sanskrit name is Ayushka, meaning longevity. Indeed, virtually every part of the noni fruit and plant has been used for its medicinal properties. Noni fruit has a pungent smell, but it can also be eaten raw with salt. It is also cooked as curry by many of the tribal populations of Southeast Asia, Polynesia and Australia. The seeds of the noni fruit can be roasted and eaten. The protein-rich young leaves of the noni plant are sometimes eaten as vegetable as well. The leaves are also used as poultices.

It is traditionally believed that noni:

- stabilizes cholesterol at normal levels
- increases energy when consumed over a period of time
- delivers abundant antioxidants to scavenge free radicals
- helps maintain the immune system
- helps maintain a healthy heart
- supports a healthy cardiovascular system
- reduces inflammation
- enhances energy and wellbeing

The noni fruit is packed with vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals, amino acids and antioxidants. Over 150 nutraceuticals have been found in the noni fruit, including all the B vitamins, 18 amino acids, antioxidants such as vitamin C, beta carotene, calcium, linoleic acid, and minerals like magnesium, iron and potassium. Noni fruit contains a number of phytochemicals, including lignans, oligo- and polysaccharides, flavonoids, iridoids, fatty acids, scopoletin, catechin, beta-sitosterol, damnacanthal, and alkaloids.

What is particularly significant is that a rare compound known as proxeronine, a precursor of xeronine, essential for the regeneration and growth of healthy cells, is found in the noni fruit. Noni also contains an anthraquinone compound called damnacanthal, which has promising anti-cancer properties. The journal CANCER LETTER [73 (2-3) 1993, 161-166], reported that Keio University and The Institute of Biomedical Sciences in Japan observed that damnacanthal caused normal morphology and cystoskeletal structure in K-ras-NRK pre-cancer cells. Put simply, this compound found in noni fruit may possibly turn pre-cancer cells into normal healthy cells. The researchers reported that damnacanthal reversed the proliferation of cancer cells, showing an ability to block or inhibit the cellular function of RAS cells, which are considered pre-cancerous cells.

The Cancer Research Center of Hawaii has been studying noni juice health benefits with regard to cancer treatments, since a 1999 study suggested that Noni Juice helped to stop the growth of tumors. Laboratory studies have examined noni’s effect on the growth of cancerous tissue in mice. One such study in vitro found that noni reduced growth of capillary vessels sprouting from human breast tumor explants and, at increased concentrations, caused existing vessels to degenerate.

Research indicates that noni fruit stimulates the immune system, regulating cell function and cellular regeneration of damaged cells. As the Noni fruit seems to operate at the very basic and critical cellular level, noni may help to heal a wide variety of conditions.

Noni juice also contains a precursor to melanin, which enhances all body functions depending on melanin. This could explain why the prolific consumption of noni juice has been reported to reverse diabetes, macular degeneration, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson’s disease in some people.

The strong odor of the noni fruit as well as its bitter taste may make noni difficult to consume in its raw form. Fortunately, pleasant-tasting noni juice is available from some manufacturers of health supplements. While noni juice from the Polynesian islands of Hawaii and Tahiti is well-known, noni fruit grown in Hawaii is said to be the best because of the pure air, water, and volcanic soil in which they are grown. Neways Authentic Hawaiian Noni dietary supplement, for instance, uses 100 percent pure Hawaiian noni, grown far from areas where nuclear testing occurred near Tahiti in the Marquesas Islands of French Polynesia.

For the highest quality noni health supplement and best results, always choose noni products which are never fumigated with deadly chemicals or irradiated, and grown without pesticides. The authenticity of the noni product must be guaranteed by its manufacturer and should use only the Noni fruit pulp, not other parts of the noni plant.

Besides noni fruit puree, Neways Authentic Hawaiian Noni juice is enhanced with raspberry and blueberry fruit concentrate, as well as momordica fruit extract. Red raspberry delivers high levels of ellagic acid, a powerful, natural substance that supports the body’s defence mechanisms against carcinogens. Blueberry has powerful antioxidants proven to scavenge free radicals that can damage DNA molecules and lead to cancer. Mormodica fruit is an antioxidant and immune system booster which has been popular with the Chinese for centuries. You can find it in Chinese medicine shops and groceries, where it is usually better known as “lo han kuo”.

Neways Authentic Hawaiian Noni is as pure as it gets, with no added sugars, no added preservatives, colors or artificial flavors. If you can’t stomach the natural taste and smell of noni fruit, this delicious, power-packed cocktail will help you get the goodness of noni into your body. Buy it at the wholesale price here.

Posted: September 4th, 2009 under Antioxidants, Cancer, Healing Foods, Health Supplements, Immune System Health.
Comments: 1