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Let's Talk About...
February: Love Your Heart and Your Waistline Month
How do you stay healthy and trim while eating animal fats? Doctors, vegans and pharmacists will no doubt tell you this is an impossible feat. But amazingly you can do this with little trouble, and less disease, by making sure the foods you ingest are organic, come from the right source and are prepared properly. This is called health by nutrition.
Here's how to do it, and why it works:
Consider ketones, the energy molecules in the blood. Ketosis is a state at which the body has an extremely high fat-burning rate. Even the brain runs on fat, via ketone bodies. These become fuel for our brains after being converted from fat by the liver.
To encourage ketone production, the amount of insulin in your bloodstream must be low. The lower your insulin, the higher your ketone production. And when you have a well-controlled, sufficiently large amount of ketones in your blood, it's basically proof that your insulin is very low and that you're enjoying the maximum effect of your low-carbohydrate diet. By eating a nutrient-dense diet, meaning no processed foods, you are increasing the ketones and eliminating the possibility of too much insulin.
In other words, avoiding foods high in carbohydrates results in ketosis in which the body's use of stored fats takes over. Boom. A perfect setting for the body to behave in a perfectly tuned manner.
Cholesterol is one of the most important substances in the body. Link to this video of Dr. David Diamond explaining how dropping carbohydrates (sugars, starch, white bread) and increasing his fat and cholesterol intake saved his life.
While a low-fat, low-cholesterol diet was originally intended only for adults "at risk for heart disease," today it's applied to everyone. Begining with babies still in utero: Fetuses need their mothers to eat cholesterol and saturated fats during pregnancy. Without this developmental aid there are higher risks for developmental problems. Denying kids cholesterol-rich animal fats may hamper their bodies' ability to make all the necessary connections in the brain.
Sadly, this anti-cholesterol message has led many people to erroneously cut out any cholesterol at all including such healthy foods as organic, non-GMO eggs, meat and butter.
Important functions of cholesterol:
- Builds and maintains cell membranes.
- Essential for determining which molecules can pass into the cell and which cannot.
- Involved in the production of sex hormones (androgens and estrogens).
- Essential for the production of hormones released by the adrenal glands including cortisol and others).
- It aids in the production of bile, necessary for digestion.
- It converts sunshine to vitamin D in the liver and has hundreds of vital immune supporting functions. Vitamin D is also critical for calcium regulation in the blood.
- It is important for the metabolism of fat soluble vitamins, including vitamins A, D, E, and K.
- It insulates nerve fibers.
- Its the body's repair substance. For instance, if you injure yourself, your body will make more cholesterol to repair the damage.
- Critical to brain function and the formation of memory. You may become depressed and have trouble remembering things if your cholesterol is too low.
- For more, visit Metabolic Healing.
Where to find important sources of fats: Organic raw diary, eggs, butter, milk, and grassfed meats.According to the Weston A Price Foundation, the best milk comes from cows that live outside and eat green grass. It is not pasteurized or homogenized. Pasteurization destroys much of the goodness in milk and makes it difficult to digest. Homogenization breaks up the fats in milk and makes the innate components of the fat less healthy.
Raw Milk contains special substances that help strengthen the digestive tract; when milk is pasteurized (in high heat) these substances don't work and the milk can be very irritating to the digestive tract.
Raw milk's naturally occurring enzymes:
- Lactoperoxidase kills bad bacteria.
- Lacto-ferrin prevents anemia.
- Lact-bacillii is healthy bacteria that helps us digest our food very efficiently.
Raw Milk contains white blood cells and many other important compounds that are found in blood; for this reason, raw milk supports the immune system. These compounds don't work after pasteurization.
Raw Milk contains many important fats, which support our health in many ways. These fats are damaged during the process of pasteurization and homogenization.
For info on oils, good and bad:
How Bad Science and Big Business Created the Obesity Epidemic
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CLASS OFFERED
Nutrition for Healthy Families
Certified Nutritional Therapists Jessica Soine and Julie Johnson will teach a class on Nutrition For Healthy Families, 6-7 p.m. Feb. 6 and 13, at the Wood River YMCA in Ketchum.
Feb. 6: Value of Nutrition
-How nutrition affects our moods, hormones, sleep and energy.
-What systems in our body need support and how to identify when you're not at your optimal health
Feb. 13: Hands on Cooking
-Focus on fermentation and bone broth
-Discussion of food preparation, and benefits of nutrients/systems involved.
There will be easy recipes, food samples, and handouts.
The class costs $25. To sign up call 720 5757 or email jessicasoine@yahoo.com
Plan on joining the NourishMe Spring Cleanse to be held in mid-April. Sign-up will begin in March.
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Sinus issues? 
Julie Johnson hosts a radio show on the Wood River Valley's only community radio station, KDPI 89.3 FM. Her weekly show, Our Health Culture, can be heard live on 89.3 FM or streamed live at
