health

Navigate Healing With Loved Ones

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How can you support the heroine in your life and navigate the healing process? Find your inner Chris Columbus.

Being ill is overwhelming. Anyone with ongoing illness is a heroine on an epic journey. This journey can be filled with plenty of bumps, roadblocks, U-turns, and forks (aka decision-making opportunities). There are some awe-inspiring moments as well.

Everyone’s experience of illness is different. Even heroines with the same diagnosis or symptom list will have different experiences of the illness or dis-ease; and the impact on their physical, emotional, mental and spiritual well being varies.

This unique journey your heroine is traveling is not a straight, engineered path moving from A to B to C, so this isn’t a process for a GPS-esque one-size-fits-most solution. The heroine needs a navigator. A valuable way to support the heroine in your life is to be her trusted navigator. Even Amelia Earhart had a navigator.

Because no two journeys are the same and there’s often uncharted territory, lists of things to do may or may not be relevant. No list can cover every circumstance. But anyone, in any situation can draw on inner resources and embody the characteristics of the navigator role. What navigator inspires you? Find a role model for yourself. As you support your heroine consider the traits of your role model and bring that essence into your being.

Here are a few ways to view this journey through the lens of a navigator and embrace your role in your heroine’s healing journey.

Identify the Destination

Most healing journeys have multiple destinations. Each encounter with a healthcare professional could be its own destination. There is the ultimate destination of well-being. The heroine determines the various destinations as the journey unfolds. Regardless of the destination, there are common characteristics to know you’re at a destination that supports your heroine. A destination that works:

  • Feels comfortable ‒ whatever comfortable means to the heroine
  • Strengthens and renews ‒ ultimately the destination is uplifting
  • Encompasses movement on some level ‒ stagnation is not OK

Discuss this with your heroine so you’ll know when you’re on course. If during an appointment the heroine is uncomfortable or not feeling understood, this is feedback that you’re off course.

Pay attention to when the destination shifts. For example, what starts as getting relief for physical pain could shift to identifying underlying emotional trauma that impacts true healing.

Scout the Landscape

Wow, where to start with so much landscape to cover in the world of health, healing and well-being? This is intertwined with knowing the destination. When the destination is relief from symptoms, the landscape could be anything from acupuncture, to dietary changes to pharmaceuticals. When the destination is eliminating the root cause, you’re likely in the territory of older traditions that have studied health for centuries: Naturopathic, Homeopathic, Chinese, or Ayurveda. Pay attention to the destination to know which direction to scout.

Regardless of the landscape, it is helpful to:

  • Curate information – narrow down the vast information into relevant pieces like a museum curator
  • Bring a sense of curiosity –  explore options, ask questions like a child
  • Transform barriers into paths – go above, around, through, or chart a new path; a roadblock may be a sign to shift direction

Map the Cairns

Cairns are stone towers that have marked important places and travel routes for centuries. Your heroine may be struggling just to feel “normal” and have some sort of normal life, and feel how she used to feel. Even people who avidly journal or meditate may miss their own signposts. Having someone else note the journey, like a log book, can be valuable.

Cairns may mark straight routes, turning points, or places to pause and reflect; this could include:

  • Shifts in mindset – for example a new lens of the meaning of the illness
  • Noticing cause and effect – when the heroine feels different emotionally, physically, mentally or spiritually
  • Joy – with so much focus on not feeling well, celebrate even small wins

It can be challenging for friends and family to how to support their heroine. Finding your inner navigator equips you to be supportive moment to moment, and respond to your heroine’s evolving journey.

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter. 

Editors note: this post was published previously on September 2011 under the title, Find your Inner Chris Columbus: Navigating the Healing Process. It was re-titled for publication today.

Image by Cloé Gérard from Pixabay.

The Exquisite Simplicity of Health and Illness: Mitochondria and Energy

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For years I have struggled to get people to understand the relative simplicity of what causes us to get sick. Our medical model implies that each disease has a specific cause, and therefore, has a specific treatment. If you look seriously at what makes us tick, there are several obvious factors involved. Yes, we are provided with a “blueprint”, given in code called DNA, by our parents. Since the discovery of DNA, medical research has emphasized almost to exclusion of other factors, that genetics is the primary research area. The most amazing recent finding is that our cellular genes (the blueprint) can be manipulated by our diet and lifestyle.

Diet and Stress

Even though the great Hans Selye studied the effects of physical stress on animals, we have neglected it in relationship to human health. He said that humans were suffering from what he called the diseases of adaptation. What he meant by that was that any form of “stress” has to be met by an adaptation that requires a huge amount of energy. The brain causes the body to go into a defensive mode when we are attacked by a microorganism and it should not be surprising that it requires energy. Sometimes a severe form of stress is associated with fever that should be regarded as an automated defensive action. In fact, I knew of a patient in whom the cause of her persistent fever could not be determined by standard laboratory methods. It was written off as “psychosomatic”, because of personality factors.

The idea, however, seems to me to be a reduction to absurdity based on collective ignorance of the underlying mechanism. The symptoms that we develop are caused by all the actions that make up the defensive mode and we call that the disease. For example, fever is part of the defense because it renders the attacking organism less efficient. Hence, the attacking organism is a “stressor”. Perhaps prolonged mental stress can produce fever in a metabolically abnormal brain because of causative misinterpretation by the brain.

It has long been time-honored that we bring the temperature down artificially as part of the treatment for infection, thus losing an important part of the defense. It wasn’t the flu virus that caused Reye’s syndrome, a disease that caused the death of many children. It was the aspirin given by the mothers to bring their child’s temperature down.

Energy Deficiency and Mitochondria

When you read a telegram giving you bad news, when you ride a bicycle, when you run cross country or shovel snow, we take it for granted that the energy will be forthcoming, that is if we think about it at all. Energy deficiency in the heart muscle could easily explain the “drop-dead” phenomenon occasionally experienced by elderly people in the winter when shoveling snow, usually written off as a heart attack from coronary disease that could easily be part of the event. Could that death have been prevented by analyzing the state of nutrition for that individual?

Another great discovery is that we have a separate set of genes that preside over the functions of our mitochondria. These are the organelles within each of our cells that produce the energy that enables us to function. Sick mitochondria produce sick people, because energy consumed must be met by energy synthesized. We now know that mitochondria have their own genes completely separate from the “blueprint” genes. Mitochondrial genes are passed to the children by the mother. When damaged mitochondrial genes are passed on to children, it becomes a form of maternal inheritance. An obvious question is whether the damage to genes can be caused in adult life from malnutrition or whether the damaged genes passed on to the children are invariably inherited from grandma.

Energy synthesis depends upon an exquisitely complicated set of nutrients that are derived from what we eat, so nutrition becomes the third factor. It is therefore very likely that an element of each of these factors is always involved. Yes, it is true that a genetic mistake may be the primary cause, but a lot of genetic mistakes are really risk factors that begin to produce a given disease in relationship to “stress” and “nutrition”, both of which always play a part.

We now know that the induction of the first symptoms of beriberi, a well-known vitamin deficiency disease that has dogged mankind for centuries, can be fully initiated by sunlight exposure in a person with marginal deficiency. There may be mild symptoms attributed to other “more acceptable” causes or even no symptoms of vitamin deficiency prior to sunlight exposure. In the early investigation of beriberi, the appearance of symptoms in many individuals at the same time misled the investigators who concluded that it was due to a mysterious infection. We now have reason to believe that ultraviolet light imposes a “stress” in an individual whose metabolism is marginal, thus initiating the true underlying cause.

Healing Comes Naturally If We Let It

The human body, as we all recognize, is beautifully designed and healing is a natural phenomenon built into our system. The body knows exactly what to do, but like stress factors, healing requires energy. So, it seems to make absolute sense that we cannot possibly produce healing by the use of compounds that are completely foreign to our cellular system. Shouldn’t we be using methods that assist the healing process by stimulating mitochondria to produce the necessary energy? Surely, the only possible assistance must be through the use of nutrients. At present, we know that there are well over 40 separate non-caloric nutrients that we must get from our food to maintain health and this may not be a full complement.

Feeding the Body Fuel to Heal: Of Vitamins and Minerals

I give this as a forerunner to news that I came across quite recently. I am reasonably sure that it will be known by people who love American sports. Everyone knows the name of Bernie Kosar, the great quarterback of the Cleveland Browns back in the good old days. Bernie understood the highs and lows of football. He had hundreds of concussions, broken bones and torn ligaments over 8 ½ seasons. In retirement he suffered pounding headaches, sleepless nights, anxiety and increased weight. Speech slurring made people think that he was drunk. Amazingly, his family didn’t believe that he had genuine symptoms and thought that he was merely trying to gain attention. The slurred speech was thought to be due to alcohol, the weight gain from overeating. After his retirement, apparently he spent some time in Florida and he learned there of a physician who was using intravenous vitamins to treat the kind of symptoms of which he complained. He tried it and immediately began to feel better. In fact he was so impressed that when he came north to live in Ohio he looked for a physician who could continue this treatment. He was directed to a doctor Pesek, founding holistic physician and CEO of Vital Health in Cleveland, Ohio. Dr.Pesek uses holistic superfoods and megadose vitamins to treat his patients. Kosar gets two or three intravenous infusions of vitamins a month. His headaches have decreased, his sleep is improved and he has lost 60 pounds in weight. This is loss of accumulated water in the tissues, a signature of  mitochondrial disease, not loss of fat. In fact he is so impressed that he is going to bring it to the notice of the NFL concussion settlement. He wishes that he had started it earlier. He says that “he knows of guys who are older and some who are younger than me and it goes south quickly”.

Healing the Brain

Because the methodology is “out of the box”, it is likely that a common explanation would be the so-called placebo effect. But that effect has to have a mechanism and perhaps the approach with nutrients actually stimulates this effect. What we know about brain injury is that the damage upsets the normal balance of metabolism. It causes a release of oxygen radicals, a phenomenon that can be likened to the production of sparks in a fire. The damage is cumulative, eventually giving rise to the kind of symptoms experienced by Kosar and also by Mohammed Ali, who went on to suffer from Parkinson’s disease. Neglect the early symptoms, almost always mistaken for psychosomatic disease, and the damage slowly accumulates, eventually becoming irreversible and untreatable. I suggest that this is represented as one of the many neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. Under the present medical model, it might easily be assumed that intravenous vitamins are a specific treatment for the effects of concussion and should be reserved for that. The point is that there are many avenues to metabolic imbalance. For example, if type I diabetes was determined by a genetic effect, why do the symptoms not appear for many years?  If genes are solely responsible, diabetes should be present at birth. The answer is that other factors come into play including malnutrition and aging. In fact, in the state of genius, it might be that even the best possible diet does not provide sufficient energy, perhaps explaining the long-term illnesses of the historical figures, Mozart and Charles Darwin, both of whom suffered lifelong from symptoms that have often been regarded by historians mostly as psychosomatic.

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter. 

Image by PDPics from Pixabay.

This article was first published on July 31, 2017.

Vitamin D’s Role in Preventing and Treating Multiple Sclerosis

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Modern lifestyles are countering nature’s intentions to keep us healthy. Since the advent of the Industrial Revolution in the late 18th century, we have migrated from farms to factories and office buildings. Nature intended for us to live and work outdoors in the sun—without sunscreen. Today most of us live and work indoors—often wearing sunscreen, or cosmetics containing sunscreen. By doing so, we have denied our bodies one of the most fundamental sources of health: the ultraviolet B (UVB) rays of the sun that initiate vitamin D protection in our skin.

Compelling scientific evidence over the past century indicates the significant role vitamin D plays in protecting us from developing a wide variety of medical conditions including autism, autoimmune disorders, cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and thyroid disorders. It is not a coincidence that the prevalence of these diseases has emerged during “modern” times. These medical conditions, many of which are serious, chronic, and life-threatening, frequently result in health, financial, and social burdens to the patients and their families.

What is Multiple Sclerosis?

Multiple sclerosis (MS) befits a disease of modern civilization. First identified by French neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot in 1868, MS is a chronic, neurological autoimmune disorder that damages the myelin sheath, the multiple layers of fatty tissue that surround and protect the nerves in the brain, spinal cord, and optic nerves. When the myelin sheath is intact, electrical impulses are carried through the nerves with accuracy and speed. When the myelin sheath is damaged (sclerosis is the scar tissue formed by damaged myelin), the nerves do not conduct electrical impulses normally. The impulses are distorted or interrupted, resulting in a range of symptoms including numbness, blindness, paralysis, and brain damage. MS also can result in death.

Who is at Risk of Developing MS?

Despite the identification of MS almost 150 years ago, MS has no cure. Over 2.5 million people around the world have been diagnosed with MS including about 400,000 Americans. Women are to two to three times more likely to develop MS than men. Although MS is usually diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 50, the disease can strike at any age. In addition, Caucasian women of Northern European descent are more frequently diagnosed with MS than African Americans, Hispanics, and Asians.

As part of the Environmental Risk Factors in MS Study (EnvIMS), researchers at the University of Bergen in Norway sought to understand better the association between MS and sun exposure measures by studying a total of 1,660 MS patients and 3,050 controls from Norway and Italy. The researchers’ findings included significant connections between infrequent summer outdoor activity and sunscreen use and an increased risk of MS. Published in the January 10, 2014 issue of Multiple Sclerosis, the study’s conclusion stated, “Converging evidence from different measures underlines the beneficial effect of sun exposure on MS risk.”

It is not surprising that incidences of MS in the equatorial region occur much less frequently than at the higher latitudes. Epidemiological studies over the past several decades however indicate that women who live at higher latitudes have an increased risk of developing MS. For example, University of Oxford researchers studied MS patterns in Scotland by examining hospital admissions throughout the country between 1997 and 2009. The research team discovered a “highly significant relationship between MS-patient-linked admissions and latitude” across Scotland. This study was published in a 2011 issue of the Public Library of Science (PLoS) One journal.

In addition, a seasonal risk factor also exists for MS. Researchers at Queen Mary University of London conducted a systematic review of data for 151,978 MS patients to ascertain the link between month and location of birth, and the risk of developing MS. They found that babies born in April had the highest risk of development of MS, and infants born in October enjoyed the lowest risk of MS. The researchers also noted a direct correlation between the latitudinal location of expectant mothers and MS risk. The study, published in a 2012 issue of the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry, suggests the importance of maternal vitamin D supplementation in particular during the winter season.

What Causes MS?

The definitive cause of MS remains unknown but medical research suggests genetic and environmental factors influence one’s risk of developing MS. Interestingly enough, science has demonstrated that vitamin D plays a role in influencing environmental and genetic factors that may affect how likely one is to develop MS.

A landmark study at the University of Oxford, published in a 2009 issue of Public Library of Science (PLoS) Genetics, examined how genes and the environment interact in MS. A gene variant called HLA-DRB*1501 is associated with an increased risk of developing MS. The research team discovered how vitamin D influences the HLA-DRB*1501 gene variant. As we know, the amount of vitamin D synthesized by UVB sunlight exposure fluctuates from season to season. Therefore, women who give birth during the spring, carry the HLA-DRB*1501 gene variant, and have low vitamin D levels are more likely to produce children with a higher risk of developing MS.

The study’s author Dr. Sreeram Ramagopalan suggested that adequate vitamin D3 supplementation during pregnancies may decrease the risk of children developing MS in later life. The combination of carrying the HLA-DRB*1501 gene variant and lacking adequate vitamin D levels may impair the ability of the thymus, an immune system organ, to delete rogue T cells, a type of white blood cells, that play an important role in maximizing the immune cells. The rogue cells would attack the body, causing demyelination of the central nervous system.

How Can Vitamin D Protect Against MS?

MS is a neurological autoimmune disorder. Scientific research over the past few decades solidifies the connection between vitamin D and autoimmunity. Vitamin D plays an integral role in the regulation of the adaptive immune system.

Adequate vitamin D in our bodies can protect us from autoimmunity because adaptive immune cells contain vitamin D receptors (VDRs). These receptors are attached to the surface of the adaptive immune system’s antibodies and sensitized lymphocytes. When the VDRs receive adequate amounts of vitamin D, they enable the adaptive immune system to function properly by attacking new and previous invaders.

When the VDRs attached to the adaptive immune system’s cells do not contain sufficient vitamin D to attack invaders, autoimmunity may kick in, causing the death of healthy immune cells. Thus, vitamin D deficiency can contribute to the development of autoimmune disorders such as MS.

How Can Vitamin D Treat MS?

The scientific community is delivering hope to MS patients by investigating vitamin D intake as a treatment for the disease. Research suggests that higher vitamin D levels are associated with reduced disease activity in MS sufferers.

Dr. Alberto Ascherio of Harvard University’s School of Public Health and colleagues recently concluded that vitamin D appears to be connected with MS disease activity and progression in patients who experienced an initial episode suggestive of MS and were treated with interferon β-1b. The researchers found that 20 ng/mL-increases of vitamin D levels within the first 12 months of experiencing an initial episode predicted a 57 percent lower rate of new active lesions as well as a lower risk of relapse. In addition, the results included a 25 percent decrease in annual T2 brain lesion volume and a 0.41 percent lower yearly loss in brain volume over four years. The Harvard study was electronically published on January 20, 2014 in JAMA Neurology.

According to a study published in a 2012 issue of the Annals of Neurology, a University of California, San Francisco research team examined 469 male and female MS patients over five years to ascertain how vitamin D affected disease progression. The researchers discovered that for each increase of 10 ng/mL in vitamin D levels, the MS patients benefited from a corresponding 15 percent decrease in new brain lesions as well as a 32 percent lower risk in inflammation of the myelin sheath.

A Finnish study, published in a 2012 issue of the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry, concluded that vitamin D3 supplementation significantly reduced the number of brain lesions in MS patients undergoing interferon β-1b treatment.

Paving a Way to Better Health and Quality of Life

Adequate vitamin D levels in our body may indeed protect us from developing MS. If you have experienced a possible initial episode or have been diagnosed with MS, please consider how vitamin D3 supplementation may decrease the severity of your symptoms.

We must take ownership of our health by understanding the importance of vitamin D as well as other micronutrients. Why wait years, or decades, to garner the results of further studies and clinical trials to define the exact relationship between vitamin D status and MS. We can be proactive by taking daily vitamin D3 supplements and enjoying moderate sunlight exposure to increase our vitamin D levels.

It is imperative to take enough vitamin D so this essential nutrient will be stored in your cells to help regulate your immune system. The greater your vitamin D level (easily obtained from a simple blood test called 25(OH) vitamin D), the more likely you will benefit from a stronger immune system that will protect your body’s cells from attacking one another.

No one wants to endure the health, financial, and social burdens of a chronic debilitating disease. By empowering yourself with adequate vitamin D, you may not only reap lots of health benefits but enjoy a better quality of life.

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter. 

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Image credit: Stephanie021299, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
This post was published here originally on March 4, 2014. 

Copyright © 2014 by Susan Rex Ryan. All rights reserved.

Let It Go! Forgiveness Is Part of a Healthy Diet

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As I pulled out of my neighborhood onto the main road in my town, a truck whipped up beside me the man leaning his head out the window, shooting me the bird. We were at a stop light but apparently I hadn’t sped to the stoplight fast enough for him. My initial reaction was to return the favor- two can play at the nasty, indignant driver game. But I was on my way to yoga class, so I decided to try practicing patience instead. It wasn’t easy. I was startled by the aggressiveness of his behavior over something so trivial. I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong but his anger and negativity affected me more than I was comfortable with. “Maybe he’s just having a terrible day,” I thought. “Who gets so hateful about something so insignificant?”

You may have heard the old chestnut, “Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.” It’s often attributed to Buddha or Nelson Mandela though it’s not clear who said it first. Versions of this quote abound because of the profound truth that anger and resentment can make us physically ill. While many religions preach forgiveness as a model for salvation or enlightenment, the science actually agrees that letting go of blame can make us healthier.

Forgiving Others

There are many theories about why it’s so hard for humans to forgive. It may be that we are not very good at living in the present moment, always worried about the past where someone may have wronged us or anxious about the present where someone may wrong us again. Or perhaps it is that we are simply wired to remember what has hurt us so that we can avoid it. For whatever reason, and no matter how counterintuitive it may feel, letting go of anger and forgiving may be one of the best things we can do for ourselves.

This can be a real challenge for many of us. Especially depending upon the type of offense and the level of hurt. It didn’t take me long to forgive the man in the truck for his obscene gesture. But I wondered how long it would take him to forgive me for the offense of not driving exactly how he wanted me to.

“People who are hurt by others too often are hurt because someone is seeking power—power over you. Forgiveness, in contrast, concerns love—-loving those who are not loving you.” 

Loving people who are not loving to you is a tall order- sometimes a Herculean, or rather Mother Teresan, task. So why should we do it? Doesn’t it just make me a sucker to forgive someone who has wronged me?

According to the Mayo Clinic, “Forgiveness doesn’t mean that you deny the other person’s responsibility for hurting you, and it doesn’t minimize or justify the wrong. You can forgive the person without excusing the act.”

If being the better person isn’t enough for you, how about being a healthier person?

A study published in the American Heart Association Journal shows a link between coronary heart disease and anger, particularly in men. “In other words, we observed a gradient in CHD risk, with evidence of increased risk even among men with apparently “average” levels of anger.”

Florida State University found a correlation between forgiveness and improved cardiovascular function.

And the European Heart Journal published a meta-analysis that concluded that outbursts of anger are associated with the short-term risk of heart attacks, strokes, and disturbances in cardiac rhythm.

If that’s not convincing enough, letting go of anger and resentment can also help with anxiety and mental health. Concordia University found that anger has a powerful and serious health consequences “for millions of individuals around the world who suffer from generalized anxiety disorder, anger is more than an emotion; it’s an agent that exacerbates their illness.”

Forgiveness can also make your life feel easier. A study done at Erasmus University showed that holding onto grudges can literally weigh you down.

“Metaphorically, unforgiveness is a burden that can be lightened by forgiveness; we show that people induced to feel forgiveness perceive hills to be less steep (Study 1) and jump higher in an ostensible fitness test (Study 2) than people who are induced to feel unforgiveness. These findings suggest that forgiveness may lighten the physical burden of unforgiveness, providing evidence that forgiveness can help victims overcome the negative effects of conflict.”

How Can We Forgive?

One of the main things we can do to release the negative feelings associated with holding a grudge is to cultivate empathy. I tried to do that with the rude driver and I try to do this with anyone in my life exhibiting behaviors I don’t understand or find off-putting. I don’t know what the truck driver was going through that day. Perhaps his girlfriend had just broken up with him and he wanted to lash out at someone. Maybe the person who parked their car so terribly has a sick child at home and was too distraught and hurried to be more considerate. We never know what other people are going through. As another favorite old chestnut says, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

Another way to practice forgiveness is to let go of expectations. Expectations are the root of all conflict. Expecting other people to think and act like you, to understand what you understand, to feel how you feel, to look at the world as you look at it- these are all ways we place unfair burdens on others.

Practicing empathy and letting go of expectations for others are just part of the forgiveness process. We must also learn how to do these things for ourselves.

Forgiving Yourself

If you’re anything like me, you may find forgiving yourself to be exponentially harder than forgiving others. According to University of California, Berkeley, “The ability to forgive oneself for mistakes, large and small, is critical to psychological well-being. Difficulties with self-forgiveness are linked with suicide attempts, eating disorders, and alcohol abuse, among other problems.”

This can be particularly difficult for women. According to study published in the Spanish Journal of Psychology, guilt is significantly higher in women. The same study claims that the problem is not that women feel more guilt but that men don’t feel enough. But that’s a topic for a different article. What can we do about all this guilt? Simply, we can forgive ourselves.

How exactly do we do that?

Steps to Forgiveness

Feel the feelings

The Greater Good website from the University of California, Berkeley explains, “Research suggests that criminal offenders who recognize that doing bad things does not make them bad people are less likely to continue engaging in criminal activity. And remorse, rather than self-condemnation, has been shown to encourage prosocial behavior. Healthy self-forgiveness therefore seems to involve releasing destructive feelings of shame and self-condemnation but maintaining appropriate levels of guilt and remorse—to the extent that these emotions help fuel positive change.”

Take responsibility and apologize if the situation warrants it

“In order to forgive ourselves, we first have to admit to ourselves that we blew it. We have to take ownership and acknowledge the flaw or mistake—and that feels almost counter to our sense of survival! It’s how we learn and grow.” – Psychology Today

Practice empathy for yourself and the person you wronged

You are human and make mistakes. The person you wronged is human and makes mistakes, too.

Learn from the experience. One of the great things about feeling bad is that we don’t like it. In fact, we go to great lengths to avoid feeling bad. And that’s exactly what makes feeling bad, making mistakes, such a powerful teacher. Our mistakes are painful so that we may learn from them. Try not to miss the lesson in whatever situation you find yourself in so that you don’t have to relearn it again in an even more painful situation.

Ask for help if you need it

According to Joretta L. Marshall, PhD, a United Methodist minister and professor of pastoral care at the Eden Theological Seminary in St. Louis, it can be done with or without formal therapy. “But not without community of some kind. It is in the context of our relationships (whether with therapists, pastors, counselors, churches, families, and friends) that we experience the grace of being forgiven and forgiving others.”

We Need Your Help

More people than ever are reading Hormones Matter, a testament to the need for independent voices in health and medicine. We are not funded and accept limited advertising. Unlike many health sites, we don’t force you to purchase a subscription. We believe health information should be open to all. If you read Hormones Matter, like it, please help support it. Contribute now.

Yes, I would like to support Hormones Matter.

Photo by Saad Chaudhry on Unsplash.

This article was published originally on August 11, 2016. 

Summer’s Best Bargain: Free Vitamin D

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The warmest season of the year is around the corner. Many of us are looking forward to school holidays, work vacations, and relaxing. And shopping often accompanies our summer fun. So take advantage of the best bargain of the season: better health – for free! That’s right, I am talking about sunshine: the light emitting from the fiery heart of our solar system. Ultraviolet B (UVB) rays from the sun provide us with an essential nutrient called vitamin D. Yes, this is the vitamin that not only strengthens our bones and muscles but may significantly protect us from a wide range of serious diseases including autoimmune disorders, cancer, contagious illnesses, diabetes, and heart disease, according to a plethora of credible medical studies from around the world.

Many people—across generations and geographical locations—suffer from low vitamin D levels from lifestyles that do not include unprotected sunbathing. Since the late 1980’s, the medical community has emphasized the need to “shun the sun” to avoid skin cancer. Consumers have embraced this advice by spending billions of dollars so they can slather chemical-laden lotions with exponentially increasing sun protection factors all over their bodies. This behavior has resulted in a vitamin D deficiency epidemic.

Moderate sun exposure is healthy for most individuals. Our bodies possess an inherent mechanism to process only the necessary intake of sun rays, about 20,000 international units of vitamin D. After our skin is exposed to direct sunlight under optimal conditions for about 20 minutes, its safety mechanism turns off the initial production of vitamin D. For many folks, it is then time to move to the shade or don additional protection to reduce the risk of sunburn.

Optimal conditions to enjoy summer’s vitamin D depend on a number of factors that we can, and in some cases, cannot control. These factors include:

Geographic location. The closer you are to the equator and the higher your altitude the better your opportunity to acquire vitamin D-rich sunlight.

Time of day. The window of sunlight between 10:00 in the morning and 2:00 in the afternoon is optimal. If your shadow is shorter than your height, you are in the potential vitamin D-producing time frame.

Sky clarity. An azure sky is highly preferable to cloud cover. UVB light is decreased by about 50 percent when penetrating clouds. Ozone pollution absorbs UVB rays before they reach your skin.

Skin. The less clothing, makeup, and sunscreen you wear, the better the odds that your skin can produce vitamin D. It also is important to understand that melanin, the pigment in your skin, absorbs UVB rays. The lighter your skin, the better chance you can make vitamin D more efficiently.

Age. Youth trumps older ages because the concentration of the vitamin D precursor in our skin, called 7-dehydrocholesterol, decreases with age.

Weight. Less weight means typically more vitamin D production from the sun. As vitamin D is fat-soluble, the body’s fat cells more rapidly absorb vitamin D, decreasing its availability to organs, tissues, and cells.

You may be thinking, “I live near sea level, far from the equator, in mostly cloudy conditions with cool summer temperatures; work full-time during the day; and am dark-skinned and overweight. How on earth (literally) can I get any measurable vitamin D from the sun?” Take advantage of sunny weather by enjoying an outdoor lunch break. Remove that hat, roll up your sleeves, and soak in the sun. Ten minutes of sun exposure is better than none.

Each individual’s options for absorbing nature’s gift of vitamin D may differ.* Fortunately, widely available sources of vitamin D including vitamin D3 supplements may be highly effective in raising your body’s D levels to protect you from a wide array of medical conditions. The information about, and benefits of, vitamin D could fill a book. In fact, I am so impressed with vitamin D’s health benefits that I recently published a book called Defend Your Life to encourage people to improve their health by taking vitamin D.

Happy summer, and happy health!

*Persons who have developed sarcoidosis, specific granulomatous diseases, and rare cancers may experience hypersensitivity to sunlight exposure.

Copyright © 2013 by Susan Rex Ryan
All rights reserved.

Image by pixel2013 from Pixabay .

How Did I Get Here?

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As many of you may know, I have been working on a few books as of late. This has limited my ability to write for Hormones Matter with any consistency. Absent new content, numbers drop. (For all of you who have been contemplating writing for us, now is the time.) In the meantime, I decided that I would share excerpts from the books. This is an excerpt from the first chapter of the book that I have tentatively titled: How to Heal from Almost Anything.

How Did I Get Here?

“And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack

And you may find yourself in another part of the world

And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile

And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife

And you may ask yourself, ‘Well… how did I get here?’”

–Talking Heads, Once in a Lifetime

Ask anyone who suffers from a chronic and debilitating illness about when they became ill and they will often pinpoint an event or time frame before which they considered themselves healthy but after which they were ill. Sometimes the event is another illness, perhaps something seemingly benign like a cold or flu, or maybe, a particularly stressful period of life, like loss of job, divorce, or death of a loved one. For girls and women, reproductive changes like the onset of menstruation, pregnancy/postpartum, or even menopause often precipitate chronic illness. In many cases, chronic health issues can be linked to medication or vaccine reactions, sometimes acute and other times accumulative. Surgical procedures too might herald the onset of illness, even when the surgery is considered a success. Whatever the cause, however, when speaking with people about their illness, they will inevitably proclaim: “I was healthy before ‘X’ and now I am not.” In contrast, when speaking with people who have recovered from chronic illness, they will often express how they have never been healthier, that they look and feel younger, and that they are doing things that they never imagined possible. This begs the question, do we really know what health is? Probably not. We think we do, but how modern, Western culture portrays health, has very little to do with actual health.

So, how did we get here, or more specifically, how did you get here? How did you get to the point where your health has declined so much that no physician yet has been able to help you heal or even offer hope of healing? How is it that after seeing dozens of physicians, after being given multiple diagnoses, sometimes simultaneously, and each with its own complement of medications, you are no closer to health than you were before illness became your life? In large part, the answer rests in how we conceptualize health versus illness. Think back to when you considered yourself healthy. What did that look like? What was your diet? What was your level of activity? Did you already take medications for minor ailments? Did you drink? Did you smoke? Answers to these questions define whether what you considered ‘health’ was actual health or just an illness waiting to happen.

If we deconstruct what most of us consider healthy, we find that it has nothing to do with actual health. For example, in our work on Hormones Matter, we see case after case of women who develop serious illnesses after a medication or vaccine. More often than not, they considered themselves ‘healthy’ prior to the medication or vaccine reaction, but when we dig in, we find they were not healthy per se, just relatively symptom free. That is, their diets were typical Western diets, full of processed foods, high fructose corn syrup, and chemically laden, conventionally grown produce, if fruits and vegetables were consumed at all. Frequently, alcohol was used regularly, perhaps not in great quantities, but regularly nevertheless, as were various medications, like ibuprofen and other pain killers, sleeping aides, maybe allergy pills or anti-depressants, and often hormonal birth control. All of this, of course, is in addition to, an increasing number of antibiotic, vaccine, and other chemical exposures common in Western countries. Nevertheless, even with this constant onslaught of chemicals, most of the folks we speak with were quite active, some were athletes, scholars, or successful professionals before their current illnesses struck. That is, with the help of medication, they functioned and functioned quite well. The question is, can we call that being healthy?

Certainly, if we define health by one’s ability to function, no matter how many medications it takes to achieve that level of functioning, then yes, this can be considered health. And for most of Western medicine and Western culture, functionality and outward appearances define health. So long as one functions, is able to perform whatever tasks deemed necessary to living, and so long as one ‘looks’ healthy e.g. is of an appropriate body weight, neither the quality of one’s diet nor the environmental exposures, the alcohol, tobacco or medication use, or any number of other obviously unhealthy behaviors matter.

Seriously, does anyone really believe that a diet of chicken nuggets washed down by soda and tempered by a regular cocktail of metformin and statins is healthy?

Until, of course, it does matter and that is where the problems with Western medicine become fully apparent. When there are no more medications or surgical interventions that let us approximate health, when indeed, each new medication only worsens health, and when functioning becomes utterly impossible, that is when we wake up and begin asking some very difficult questions, not the least of which is ‘how did I get here?” In so doing, we often find that how we defined health until this point, was anything but healthy. It was a useful facade, to be sure. It allowed us to ignore what deep in our gut we knew were not healthy behaviors and continue on as if they were. It allowed us to ignore all of the early signs of impending demise, and most importantly, it allowed us to function in an otherwise chaotic environment rather than change the environment.

Admittedly, there are many positive aspects of this approach. Life requires survival, and adapting to a chaotic environment by whatever means possible is the pinnacle of survival. Where we run into problems, however, is when this approach becomes the dominant model of not only everyday life, but also, of medical practice and we forget entirely what health even looks like. That is where we find ourselves now, so enmeshed in this model of medicine, we have forgotten what health even looks like, much less how to achieve it.

That is all for now.

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Nutritional Ketosis 101: A Personal Account

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Carrying a lot of excess bodily “cargo,” I decided to embark upon a bifurcated journey of nutritional ketosis, or keto for short. First, I seek to lose at least 20 percent of my body weight. Second, I want to compare my pre-ketosis blood test results — specifically the lipid panel — with the values after being in nutritional ketosis.

What is Nutritional Ketosis?

In short, nutritional ketosis is the metabolic state of burning fat while on a low-carbohydrate, moderate-protein, high-fat diet. The words “high fat” usually conjure a vision of the cardiovascular system laden with animal fats. But this is mistaken because mainstream medicine and news outlets equate “high fat” to high cholesterol, and believe high cholesterol heightens the risk of heart disease. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Consuming healthy saturated and non-saturated fat as part of a ketogenic diet makes the body feel great. Health benefits include: effective weight loss and maintenance; satiety; stabilized blood sugar and restored insulin sensitivity; and eliminated heartburn to name a few. Furthermore, my blood lipid panel values — cholesterols and triglycerides –- plummeted after keeping keto for about two weeks! My physician exclaimed, “Impressive!”

Scientific research including rigorous preclinical and clinical studies indicates that a ketogenic diet offers “a promising and powerful option for adjuvant therapy for a range of cancers.” For example, University researchers in Salzburg, Austria concluded in the February 2018 issue the journal Aging that a ketogenic diet induces ketosis that can starve cancer cells of energy while normal cells use their ketone bodies to survive. In addition, the reduction of blood glucose normalizes insulin, resulting in less fuel for cancer cells.

How Do I Enter Ketosis?

A ketogenic diet burns fat; whereas, high carbohydrate consumption burns sugar, usually not getting past the stores of glucose to achieve the state of burning fat. We know that many diets are replete with carbohydrates – bread, pasta, rice, sugar, cereal, processed foods – and, many people (including me) who ingest those carbs are waddling around wondering how they became overweight or obese. (I endeavor to become a former overweight person.)

Simply stated, get all sugar out of your diet. In today’s world eschewing sugar presents a daily challenge, given hidden sugars lurking in processed foods including dressings and sauces. Sugar is almost everywhere! But there are ways to eliminate it from your daily diet.

So, what can you eat? Mainly foods high in fat. Such as bacon, egg yolks, beef, and sausage. Also healthy fats such as avocado, coconut oil, extra virgin olive oil, and organic butter.

I understand that many of these foods are perceived as “no no’s” in our diets. However, they are necessary to achieve and maintain ketosis—to enjoy a healthier and slimmer life.

How Do I Test for Nutritional Ketosis?

Ketones, fuel for our mitochondria, are the overall product of nutritional ketosis for which testing can be easy, relatively inexpensive, and private.

The most common ketosis test involves urinating on a disposable strip containing a small chemical pad to detect the level of acetoacetate (AcAc) – the primary ketone body in urine. Another test can be performed at home by measuring beta-hydroxybutyrate (BHB) in the blood. A third way of evaluating ketones entails using a breathing device to measure acetone, the main ketone body in the breath.

Ketosis Versus Ketoacidosis

It is imperative to understand that when maintaining your blood sugar level in the normal range (less than 100 mg/dL) and producing insulin, the presence of ketosis is not harmful! However, if you encounter any doubters, including medical professionals, who claim that nutritional ketosis is unhealthy, see if they have confused “ketosis” with “ketoacidosis”.

Ketoacidosis occurs in diabetics who have both high blood glucose (greater than 240 mg/dL) and elevated blood ketone values (greater than 10 mill molar/L). Diabetic ketoacidosis occurs primarily in Type 1 diabetics who cannot produce insulin. Some Type 2 diabetics who have excess blood sugar and blood ketones as well as dependence on insulin also need to beware of ketoacidosis.

How Do I Attain My Ketosis Goals?

Often referred to as the father of medicine, Hippocrates wisely stated,

“If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise, not too little and not too much, we would have found the safest way to health.”

Based on my recent experience with ketosis and moderate exercise (a rowing machine), I may have found the “sweet spot”: 1) steadily losing weight and inches, 2) feeling healthy and satiated, and 3) attaining and maintaining healthy cholesterol and triglycerides. And I am confident that my risk of cancer as well as a long list of medical conditions is being reduced as I enjoy delicious food and healthy exercise.

I penned this article with the intention of presenting the reader a brief introduction to a nutritional ketogenic diet. For additional information, I recommend consulting ketogenic diet books including:

  • Keto Clarity. Moore with Eric C. Westman, MD. Victory Belt Publishing LLC. 2014.
  • The Obesity Code. Jason Fung, MD. Greystone Books. 2016.

We Need Your Help

Hormones Matter needs funding now. Our research funding was cut recently and because of our commitment to independent health research and journalism unbiased by commercial interests we allow minimal advertising on the site. That means all funding must come from you, our readers. Don’t let Hormones Matter die.

Yes, I’d like to support Hormones Matter.

 

About the Author: Susan Rex Ryan enjoys research and writing about health as well as experiencing its amazing benefits. She authored the award-winning and perennial bestselling book called Defend Your Life about her journey with vitamin D3. Ms. Ryan recently wrote her second book called Silent Inheritance: Are You Predisposed to Depression about understanding depression and how to cope with it.

Visit Sue’s blog at smilinsuepubs.com for a plethora of health articles. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter @vitD3Sue.

© 2018 Smilin Sue Publishing, LLC. All rights reserved.

Health Lessons from the Amazon

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The morning after I picked up my discharge papers from the Marine Corps, I boarded a plane bound for Peru. After 4 years of being told where, when and what to do, I decided that the best plan was to have no plan. Against the advice of my direct supervisor, parents and a lot of friends, I left for 2 months with the attitude, whatever will be, will be.

On the first morning in Lima, I met Dany, a tour guide – sorta, in my hostel. In America our tour guides accompany large groups of people around cities explaining the historical significance of buildings and areas. In Peru, tour guides have licenses, but their tours can be a little less formal. I was a single woman in a foreign country where I didn’t speak the language and I accidentally hired Dany as my personal guide along the Amazon for 2 weeks (I misunderstood and thought I was joining a group already going – oops! Whatever will be, will be).

We flew from Lima into Iquitos and from Iquitos took a riverboat along the Amazon for 15 hours. Not intentionally trying to get off the beaten path, I was the only gringa on the boat. The children were as fascinated with me as I was with them. We got off in a town with some electricity and running water thanks to an abandoned missionary. After a quick lunch, Dany hired a couple to take us on a peka-peka (a hand carved canoe with a little motor on it that made the sound, “peka-peka”) further into the abyss. A few hours down a smaller river and deep into the rainforest, we stepped onto the muddy bank and walked into a village of about fifty or sixty people. There was no electricity or running water and some of the younger children had never even seen a white person before.

We stayed with the village elders and the children came over to play with my hair, draw pictures in my journal and try to communicate with the strange, tall white woman who had mysteriously shown up with Dany. I tried their various foods and discovered that the Amazonian miracle foods that are sold here aren’t even comparable to the true miracle foods in the jungle. Down there food is life and life is a miracle. During my time in the rainforest, I learned that virtually everything that we can cure with a magic pill in America can be treated with a root or leaf brewed into a tea or soup. On the third day, I started to develop the symptoms of a urinary tract infection and was concerned that if left untreated it could travel into my kidneys. I explained to Dany my concerns about being so far away from a doctor or hospital if the infection got worst. He explained to me that he went to school in Iquitos to learn about medicinal plants before moving to Lima to become a tour guide. Dany placed his hand on my lower back, on my stomach, felt my forehead and said my kidney’s felt warm. He made a delicious tea of roots, berries and leaves and within an hour my symptoms were alleviated. I didn’t have any further problems during the whole trip. On another morning I complained of a headache and Dany concocted a remedy for it as well. It was clear that these people didn’t need health insurance, doctors, hospitals or pharmaceuticals. They simply weren’t plagued with incurable diseases like cancer, Alzheimer’s, or autism.

Fortunately, I have always had great health and have never had to take a long-term prescription. I drink plenty of water, get plenty of sunshine, and hardly ever take OTC medications. However, now I wonder if I will ever be quick to reach for a bottle or prescription in the future. According to the CDC approximately half of Americans are on at least one prescription and many on multiple. Furthermore, CNN reports that: “Today, the United States consumes most of the world’s supply of opioid painkillers. By 2010, enough opioid painkillers were prescribed to medicate every American adult around-the-clock for a month. And every year, nearly 15,000 people die from overdoses involving these drugs… more than from heroin and cocaine combined.” And it’s not just the pharmaceutical companies that spent nearly 60  BILLION DOLLARS in 2004 on advertising, twice as much as they spent on research and development; last year the outgoing chairman of Aetna, the third largest health insurance company in the US, got a 68.7 MILLION DOLLAR farewell package. Is there a place for conventional medicine in my life? Yes, but only as a secondary resource or when it’s obviously necessary (I recently cut my hand open on glass and had to get stitches – in the jungle they probably would have wrapped it up in a leaf and I would have survived all the same). I go to doctors appointments prepared to fight the “take a pill, numb the symptom” approach to my health. Thanks to ProPublica, there is now a database which lists doctors that are on big pharma’s payroll. This database is not all-inclusive yet, but is growing and now list 761.3 million dollars of disclosed payments to doctors from 12 different pharmaceutical companies.

The lesson I learned in the Amazon wasn’t “down with pharmaceutical companies and western medicine,” although I do question our societies pill popping problem. The lesson was that health starts with our diet and lifestyle. We can’t all move to the Amazon or harvest and market their indigenous plants for our benefits, but we can learn from their way of life. The families that I briefly lived with woke up with a clear purpose each day – to survive. Their day was spent repairing their huts, farming, hunting, and caring for one another. They laughed, unfortunately a lot of it was at the silly gringa. They were out in the sun, drank water instead of soda, lived without cell phones, wireless Internet and computers everywhere they went. I don’t know if they live longer than we do, but I know they lived healthier lives without new diseases that can now be cured with a pill. The first thing I did when I came home was get rid of my smartphone and make it a daily habit to disconnect from the virtual world at least once a day. I also eat more whole foods, ask my doctor to find and fix the problem not the symptom, and I laugh, a lot, everyday.

We Need Your Help

Hormones Matter needs funding now. Our research funding was cut recently and because of our commitment to independent health research and journalism, unbiased by commercial interests, we allow minimal advertising on the site. That means all funding must come from you, our readers. Don’t let Hormones Matter die.

Yes, I’d like to support Hormones Matter.

Photo Credit – Lisbeth Prifogle, 2009

This article was published originally in October 2014. 

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