nutrition

Ostrich Medicine: Shouldn’t We Recognize Host Defenses?

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ostrich medicine

Everyone is aware of the proverb about the ostrich with its head in the sand. It has been a recurrent problem in medicine throughout its history. Louis Pasteur discovered that organisms, only visible with a microscope, caused disease. It became the first paradigm in medicine, accepted by all eventually. Pasteur spent eighty percent of his professional life in trying to get his ideas to stick. What would he have accomplished in addition to these discoveries if they had been readily accepted?

It is interesting to note, however, that on his deathbed he reportedly said “I was wrong: it is the defenses of the body that really matter”. Did he, in fact, provide us with a concept leading to a second paradigm in medicine – that maintaining host defenses matter as much as killing the pathogenic invaders? This post attempts to address this issue. What does it mean to bolster host defenses? Is this the next paradigm in medicine? And if it is, do physicians, like the mighty ostrich, have their heads in the sand when it comes to understanding host defenses?

The First Paradigm of Medicine: Kill the Enemy

The discovery of microorganisms led naturally to the idea of killing them without killing the patient. After many frustrating years, during which many lives were undoubtedly sacrificed, the discovery of penicillin opened the antibiotic era. During its golden age, antibiotics have indeed saved many lives, but we all know that bacterial resistance is giving rise to new problems. As new antibiotics are discovered or synthesized, they have to become more powerful in overcoming this resistance and as a result are increasingly toxic; a fact that has been amply shown on this website. The idea of “killing the enemy”, bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites, even spread to the treatment of cancer, the maverick cells that had to be eliminated. Does this first paradigm have its own limitations?

The Second Paradigm: Maintaining Host Defenses

Using the analogy of a fortress or castle, the question becomes very simple: can we assist the defenses of the body versus killing its enemies?  The answer is equally simple———-yes!  In order to explain this in a meaningful manner, I am going to liken the body to an old fashioned fortress. Fortresses were protected from hostile attack by thick walls that were surmounted by battlements. Sentries patrolled the battlements, watching for enemy attack. If such an attack was sighted, the first obligation of the guard was to notify the “keep”, the name given to the command post from which a commander controlled the defense. If the attack came from the west, off duty soldiers would be dispatched to the western battlements and the design of the defense would then require a stream of information by means of messengers between the command post and the areas of action within the castle. The castle would survive and remain intact only if the fighting soldiers were supported by additional services such as delivering ammunition, feeding them and replacing them with fresh soldiers when they were fatigued.  Finally, the castle had to be designed originally and it probably went through a series of design changes over the years as it evolved. This is a fundamental rule in warfare, that the troops must be fed and rested, ammunition replenished. In human health, however, we have forgotten that rule. We have focused all of our efforts on the killing of the pathogenic enemies, with little thought to maintaining the health of our troops.

Consider the Brain and Body Castle

We know that the design of animal systems, including the human body, is guided by genes acting as a blueprint in which mistakes can occur. There is no doubt that we have evolved over millions of years to reach the kind of sophistication that we have today. The questions surrounding that evolution are by no means answered yet, but the complexity is so abstruse that it suggests intelligent design rather than chance.

The skin is the largest organ in the body, so think of it as being like the walls of a castle. It is dotted with sensory cells that may be likened to the battlements. Mucous membrane forms a protective layer over sensitive tissues like the nose. The lower part of the brain known as the limbic system can be imagined as like the “keep”. The upper part of the brain houses the commander.

Now, imagine bacteria alighting on the skin or the mucous membrane of the nose: the recognition of an “enemy” by the sensory cells results in a message being delivered to the limbic system of the brain. This part of the brain is a computer, receiving and sending messages to the body automatically.  It is in constant communication with the upper brain. As the “ultimate commander” the upper brain is the thinking part, adding advice and consent to the ultimate action. Strengthening the limbic system, while weakening the action of the upper brain, most commonly achieved by poor nutrition, makes the ensuing action more primitive. The limbic system is the “caveman” within us all.

Organization of Host Defenses

Think of the white cells in the body as each being a soldier with a specialized function.  They must be directed to the scene of the attack and a battle takes place between the white cells and the “enemy”.  Like all analogies, it breaks down because body defenses are extremely complex, but I have tried here to establish a principle, that we possess sophisticated defenses that are organized by the brain.

For example, inflammation is used as a defensive process, controlled through the brain using the automatic (autonomic) nervous and endocrine systems to deliver the necessary messages. The whole defensive process takes place under the command of the brain, a most important factor that is much neglected in modern medicine. The brain/body coordinating mechanism in an emergency situation must be initiated as soon as possible and the resulting action requires a huge amount of energy, particularly by the brain. Because of this it is designed for short term use. The “illness” is the physical evidence of this coordinating mechanism going into action. An increase in circulating white cells means that the reserve “soldiers” are being deployed via the blood stream: the rise in body temperature is beneficial because it decreases the efficiency of the “enemy”.  The associated feeling of illness makes us go to bed and rest, thus conserving energy required for healing.  Remember that the misguided approach of using aspirin to reduce the temperature in a child with flu was responsible for the lethal disease known as Reye’s Syndrome.

How To Bolster Host Defenses

Under the heading of the second paradigm I said that we can indeed help the defensive procedure and that it was simple. By simple, I mean that the facts should be known by all.  The first principle that we need to understand is a rough idea of how the body/brain works, as I have outlined. The second principle is an understanding of routine preventive maintenance through appropriate exercise, rest and nutrition. Like the troops defending the castle, our immune system cannot fight the enemy without sufficient resources. These resources include nutrition, rest and exercise, the forgotten elements in modern medicine.

Both of these principles require education, starting at the earliest possible age in childhood.  We all need to understand that we have a health responsibility to ourselves and that the old proverb “prevention is better than cure” is one of the wisest statements that has ever been made.  The science of prevention is embodied in the development of Alternative Complementary Medicine, a form of medical intervention based on the study of energy metabolism and how it is preventatively or therapeutically treated. It states that if the genetic blueprint is intact, leading to a complement of sophisticated defensive body/brain equipment, the stress of living in a dangerous world can only be met by an adequate formation of energy to run the equipment. This can only be supplied by nutrition.

A new science known as epigenetics is the study of how our genes can be manipulated by diet and lifestyle, so even minor genetic mistakes can be overcome by supplying the correct fuel. Much has been written about this in medical journals that have been casually ignored by mainstream medicine. That is why I claim that mainstream medicine has its “head in the sand”.  Each time a new discovery is made, an attempt is made to find a way of manipulating errors in it through a drug rather than a possible lifestyle and epigenetic solution. Perhaps it is time to remember that health is about maintaining host defenses too and not just endlessly killing pathogens.

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.

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This article was published previously on Hormones Matter in October 2014. 

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I’ll Sleep When I Am Dead: Connections Between Diet, Sleep, and Health

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poor sleep

My journey into discovering what it means to be well began over 60 years ago, when Coca Cola’s popularity burst on the scene back in the late 60’s early 70’s, when a McDonald’s big Mac could be purchased for 49 cents, and Wonder Bread’s claim to fame was “Helps build strong bodies 12 ways.” Instead of eating a nutritious lunch, we were snookered into believing that bologna, whose first name was Oscar and was sandwiched between two slices of white bread, a Tab soda, and a bag of Charles chips was considered a healthy meal. It was anything but healthy and it left us feeling empty, with grumbling stomachs and an unsteady blood sugar level. I lived on these types of foods for decades as my health declined. I did not learn until I was 44 years old that my poor food choices were not only affecting my health but my capacity to sleep. I never slept. When I cleaned up my diet, sleep improved. Unfortunately, the improvements were short-lived because my thyroid became overactive with onset of Graves’ disease. This too, I largely resolved with diet, supplements, and alternative therapies, as conventional medicine seemed to make me worse and all that was offered were drugs and/or surgery. Although I am not yet recovered, I am much better than I was. This is my story.

Early Childhood: Skinny, Unattractive, and Sickly

As a child, I was very thin and clumsy. Nowadays, I probably would have been considered anorexic. I did not have an appetite due to the postnasal drip running down the back of my throat like a sieve. All I could eat on our weekly trip to McDonald’s was half of a regular size hamburger with no condiments. I remember picking through my food with my fork to dig a hole, hoping somehow the food would fall into the hole and disappear, or wishing the dog was inside so that I could hand off my vegetables to him.

The food I consumed came from what is considered a SAD diet (Standard American diet). It originated from the fast-food industry, had no nutritional value whatsoever, and laid a poor foundation for what I believe was my general unwellness. I was never well as child or young adult. As a result of my poor eating habits, allergies, buck teeth, breathing problems, and fitful sleep were my constant companions. I was labeled skinny, unattractive, and sickly. The Weston A. Price Foundation would have had a field day reviewing my overall health relationships. From inadequate nutrition to underdeveloped and overcrowded dental health which then led to poor physical health. I looked like a raccoon with dark circles under my eyes. I was a mess – (spoken with a thick southern accent.)

My mother did her best by encouraging me, providing what she considered to be a balanced diet, general health, and sleep basics, but over time, my body developed poorly, and I suffered miserable allergies to everything. Allergy shots were the recommendation for all of my environmental conflicts. I was left battered and bruised and they did not even work. Eventually, to combat the allergies, they removed my tonsils. This is a barbaric answer to solving a health issue, just remove the organ. I found out much later that the tonsils are an important part of our immune system.

Young Adulthood: Bone Demineralization and Costochondritis

I managed to make it through high school unscathed except for mononucleosis and skin irritations that could be traced back to a poor diet. College brought about new challenges when it came time to eat. This was solved by the plethora of quick meals that provided little to no vitamins or minerals, and of course, my sleep habits continued to decline.

At age 27, I was diagnosed with costochondritis. This was brought about by a rigorous exercise routine at the gym, in the name of getting healthy. “Let’s Get Physical” was the song that sent everyone running to the clubs to get fit and trim, but my lack of essential nutrients caused extreme damage to my ribs. Looking back, I find it hard to believe that I had two relatively healthy children, but then, they received most of the nutrients that were being ingested and I was left with zero. I was eating healthy salads, but I had no clue that my bones were breaking down.

By the time I reached age 39, I could now add osteopenia, depression, sleep deprivation and menopause to my list of infirmities. Nine medications and 75 pounds later, I would also be able to add obesity to my list. It was almost as if this deterioration had catapulted me into a rapid aging process. This makes sense, as Matthew Walker sleep expert, author, and professor at UC Berkley says, ‘the shorter your sleep, the shorter your life’.

Connecting Poor Diet to Poor Sleep and Everything Else In Between

While I was struggling with my own health issues, my son developed his own. At age 12, he confessed to me and my husband that he wasn’t sure he wanted to live anymore. Around the same time, my mother died. This was enough to send anyone over the edge, but my son needed me, so it was time to put my big girl panties on and get answers to why this was happening. I began connecting the dots. We both had depression, allergies or asthma, symptoms of ADD and the “piece-de-resistance” we didn’t sleep! Upon further investigation, I learned that we were both anxious all the time. Could the poor diet and sleep deprivation be behind our illnesses? Turns out they were.

From that point forward, I cleaned up our diet. My husband came home one day to find me chucking all the processed food into the garbage. We began drinking water instead of soda or other flavored drinks and I began to research sleep, nutrition, and energy medicine. This was now my passion. I was determined to not only repair the damage I had caused with the decades long poor diet, but to give my son the gift of healing and create a reason for him to live.

Polypharmacy Induced Vertigo: Enough is Enough

In 2003, I would unlearn everything I thought I knew about wellness. It began with trip to the ER to investigate vertigo. I was sent home with no information as to why I had vertigo other then they could do an MRI if needed. Could the very medications I was taking (9 prescriptions) be behind this malady? My nurse practitioner helped me to slowly detox from the medication I was taking for depression, and this is when I began seeing a nutritionist and using something called magnet therapy. I had read a study on Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) that showed promise as a novel antidepressant treatment. It was in 1831 that Michael Faraday discovered that electrical currents can be converted into magnetic fields and vice versa. How fortuitous I was introduced to a company that was utilizing magnets as wellness tools.

The nutritionist performed what is called microscopy. His assessment was dead on. He said, ‘I bet you’re tired all the time’. He also asked if I was on a statin, to which I replied ‘yes, but that I was trying to find a better alternative’. He suggested a liver/gallbladder cleanse and whole food supplements that would support these organs. If it were not for his intervention, I doubt that I would have my gallbladder today. I’m honored and humbled to have known Ted Aloisio and learn about how “Blood Never Lies” his book and his teachings that forever changed the quality of my life.

Thyroid Storm

Another pivotal time for me was September 2017. I wound up in the emergency room. My heart felt like it was about to be launched like a projectile right out of my chest. It was skipping beats too. I had lost a lot of weight with my new focus on nutrition. I thought I was just shedding the old me that was full of emotional discord, bad nutritional habits, and unearthing the real me that was hiding inside. I was in denial. In reality, I had not been feeling well for over a year. My sleep was horrible. I was lucky if I got 5 hours a night and there was a lump on my neck which scared the living hell out of me.

Here, I was a teacher of wellness, and yet was the poster child for being unhealthy. Surprise, surprise you have a problem with your thyroid Ms. Hazelgrove. The official diagnosis was thyrotoxicosis with nodule. My heart was reacting to a hyperactive thyroid, which was being fueled by an autoimmune condition called Graves’ disease. I was immediately put on propranolol for my heart. I asked if it was going to interfere with my sleep and was told that it would not. He lied. I was already having issues the very first night with melatonin production due to the influence of this particular beta-blocker. Beta blockers reduce melatonin release.

I was getting only 2 hours of sleep, so I started Hemp oil two days later. I was not about to go back into the depths of depression because of sleep deprivation. My visit to my primary physician 21 days later was short and sweet. After reviewing my blood lab results and the ultrasound, he had his office manager call me to tell me I was toxic and needed to find an endocrinologists immediately. My T3 was 13, which was extremely high. I agreed to go on methimazole in the meantime so I could look at options, but according to the endocrinologist, I had only the one option. “What am I going to do now?’ I thought to myself. My head was spinning. I knew I had to get away and think. ‘Can’t I just heal it by eating better, sleeping more, and eliminating stress?’

I am truly blessed to have such amazing friends and one in particular had offered to let me stay at her cottage for a weekend. This was about a month into my engorged thyroid, which was now causing me dreadful bouts of diarrhea. I had to wear a diaper on my trip down there, as my bowels were now in charge of my life. I got there and unpacked. This was not an easy task because my body was running “Mach 2 with my Hair on Fire.” Since the thyroid controls metabolism and mine was hyperactive, it felt like I was exercising 24/7. Maintaining energy was a continuous struggle, like a rollercoaster going up and down multiple times a day. I was in the fight or flight mode continuously and my body was in a constant state of catabolism, in order to fuel the persistently heightened metabolism.

Limited Options from Conventional Medicine

My visits with the endocrinologists started out cordial but didn’t end well. I stayed on methimazole for three months, to see if the numbers could be brought down – which they did eventually lower, but the liver enzymes went up and the level 10 pain was unbearable. The only option I was given was nuclear medicine, which meant using radioactive iodine to destroy my thyroid and test the nodule to see if it was cancer. I was told a needle biopsy would not be accurate. I didn’t like the side effects of radioactive iodine and the fact that it increased my chances of breast cancer, which was already an inherited trait in my family. The endocrinologist didn’t want to perform any tests or protocol to see if the nodule was cancerous until these numbers were in a more manageable range and scheduled a second appointment for 5 months later – 5 months!

This was not acceptable to me and so in the meantime, I began researching, and implementing other strategies. I had a friend who owned a wellness center, and I began using sound and infrared sauna therapy. I met with a colleague who recommended a liver cleanse and supplements to help with the healing process. When I had my lab tests done in January, all the numbers looked good, but the liver enzymes were still elevated. I remember the doctor telling me that I shouldn’t stay on the methimazole very long. When I questioned if the medicine had caused the increase in the liver enzymes, she became defensive and said that she didn’t think it was the medicine. Somehow, it was my fault that I didn’t want her to perform a test using radioactive iodine to see if I had cancer, which could inevitably cause cancer down the road.

When I saw her again in February, she asked about the methimazole. I told her that because my liver enzymes were high and so, I had stopped taking it and started taking Iodoral, a high potassium-based iodine supplement. There is much research on this form of treatment. She was not happy. She said that if the nodule was cancer, then it could have now spread to my liver and that could be the reason for the high liver enzymes. She continued to deny that the liver enzymes were elevated because of the methimazole. It was at this point, I mentioned that the nodule had receded. Her response was that nodules just doesn’t disappear. She then grabbed my throat with such force that it hurt. Needless to say, she was fired.

In March, I began seeing a practitioner that specialized in thyroid issues. He recommended running blood tests to see if there were any other autoimmune issues. Sure enough, I also had the Epstein-Barr Virus. I visited another practitioner that did thermographic imaging. The tests did not show any inflammation in the breasts or the thyroid area. March, I went back to my PCP and my blood tests looked good but continued with the propranolol because my heart rate was still elevated. It was also recommended that I keep a close watch on my eyes, so my eye doctor was enlisted to get his perspective on the pressure and strain the Graves’ disease can have on the eyes. In July, I went back to the PCP. He said that I shouldn’t do so much research into nutrition, that knowledge can be dangerous and referenced the Garden of Eden.

Discovering Energy Work

While all of this was going on, I finished my certification for the Emotion Code Technique (link to a reference The Emotion Code | Energy Healing Method | Discover Healing). In August, I started to learn how to meditate and in September started breast milk protocol (Milk Therapy: Unexpected Uses for Human Breast Milk (nih.gov)) to see if I could address a mitochondrial energy reboot and the autoimmune issue. I was gifted about a month’s supply of frozen milk from someone who owned an organic farm. Since breast milk has stem cells and T cells, maybe it could help increase neutrophils and help reverse the autoimmune disease. I read a blog by the medical medium that had talked about pregnancy and thyroid issues. It begged the question, what if my last pregnancy could have been the final straw to being so nutritiously energetically depleted that there was now collateral damage. Interestingly enough, my mom wasn’t able to breast feed me. So maybe this was another missing piece to my poor health.

January 2019, I had to go back on propranolol. I continued with sound and infrared sauna therapy each week. I am forever grateful to my friend who offered this treatment. Some weeks were just hard to rally around with energy to do even the simplest of tasks. Mind you I’m still running my Wellness teaching and coaching business but on a much smaller scale. February through April I concentrated on being a grandmother, you never know how much time we have with family. Easter Sunday, I met with a practitioner to experienced Pranic healing for the first time. This was definitely the icing on the cake as far as energy work is concerned. I went home feeling better that I had felt in years, but this too was short lived. In June, I was able to get away to the beach, which always rejuvenated me. Meditation continued to also give me some peace in between the thyroid revolution I was enduring, and it gave me a chance to learn different approaches to this incredible way to connect to our inner spirit. In September, I began to learn how to incorporate medicinal cooking and more about Ayurveda herbs. In November, my friend closed her wellness center and I had to teach my class at the University of Richmond from a chair again. My daughter came through with some more of her frozen breast milk, which seemed to help somewhat, but again, I would plateau.

Searching For Healing Amid a Pandemic

The pandemic brought us all a year we will never forget. It started with a high note but then April we would all experience dare I say it the new normal. The best thing I can say about 2020 is I continued to search for healing. I figured I had tried all I could to modulate the physical, so now I would elevate the spiritual side of me. We are after all spirit mind and body why not explore how this can facilitate and streamline the healing process? I began to learn all I could about Pranic healing. Each day I would incorporate my spiritual practice of meditation and cleansing of dirty energy. This worked well with my emotion code technique of taking out the trash of old emotional baggage that doesn’t serve us and can even cause illness. I was still teaching my class and now doing online podcast educating others how to create wellness. I began doing a lot of blogging about my journey of healing encouraging others and planting seeds of hope. Being at home gave me the opportunity to also do research and take classes to learn what I could about healing the whole self; a time windfall that otherwise wouldn’t have presented itself if it weren’t for the pandemic.

Discovering Thiamine

In April of this year, the eye doctor noticed an increase in eye pressure, which he wasn’t sure if it was due to the Graves or if it could be glaucoma. When I went back in July and it was still there, I was referred to an eye specialist to investigate further.  I am now seeing more cross-eyed, and it appeared to be worsening. In October, I learned about thiamine – vitamin B1 and began taking 500-1,000 mg a day. Wow, immediately my neck felt cooler, and the headaches I had been suffering from subsided. When I saw the doctor again in November and questioned whether or not the eye problems could be related to a thiamine deficiency, he got agitated and said he was not a nutritionist. He wanted to know if I had been tested to see if I was deficient in the first place. I guess physical improvement is not a sign of progress or healing.

It was around the same time that I also learned about pyrroloquinoline quinone and added that to what I was already taking. This is what I am currently taking: Kenzen Mega Daily 4® , Kenzen Omegagreen  plus DHA®, Kenzen Immunity® (14 medicinal mushrooms), Jade GreenZymes® (Gluten Free barely grass which has SOD/Superoxide dismutase an antioxidant), Kenzen Vital Balance shake®,(® from Nikken), Lithium, Iordoral, Bilberry, Ginkgo Biloba, Resveratrol, L Carnitine, N Acetylcysteine, Siberian ginseng, Boswellia – Frankincense, Vitamin B1, Cal-mag-zinc, D3 & K2, Ubiquinol + Pyrroloquinoline quinone, Astragalus tincture, oil of oregano, tincture, Bugleweed tincture, Sarsaparilla tincture, Artichoke tincture and cod liver oil. I drink a tea everyday with elderberry, Chamomile, fennel, hibiscus, and green tea because of ECGC (epigallocatechin gallate); which inhibits cellular oxidation and prevents free radical damage to cells.

While I am not fully recovered, I am doing much better, in part because of dietary changes that have allowed me to sleep longer, and more soundly which has enabled me to achieve a parasympathetic or healing response. I am hopeful that 2022 will bring to light some interesting answers. I have an appointment with a doctor of Chinese Medicine soon and looking forward to improved health. Stay tuned to find out what happens next on my journey navigating the road less traveled.

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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A Rant About Diet and Responsibility

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diet and responsibility

The American diet is atrocious and largely responsible for the growing epidemics of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and obesity, not just in America, but worldwide. The highly processed, high calorie, high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated fat, and high chemical additive products that line grocery stores are products of American ingenuity; products that we have exported internationally, and sadly, products that are responsible for the declining metabolic health worldwide. This is a fact that many of us are reticent to accept. We are poisoning ourselves and everyone else around us by the products we make and consume.

A recent study found that fully 80% of metabolic disease can be attributed to lifestyle, e.g. poor diet and a lack exercise. Eighty percent. That is a staggering finding especially when one considers that 476 million people worldwide have diabetes, most of them Type 2 (T2). This represents a 129% increase since 1990, when the number stood 211.2 million. During the same time frame, the rates of cardiovascular disease have increased from 271 million to 523 million. Underlying a significant percentage of these conditions is the obesity epidemic, with 13% of the world’s population considered obese and 39% considered overweight and heading towards obesity.

In the US, the situation is quite dire, only 12-20% of the population, depending upon the criteria utilized, are considered metabolically healthy. Clearly, our approach to metabolic health is not working and yet, much of the focus in health research remains centered on either identifying that one medication or combination of medications that resolve all of our bad choices or an overly simplistic approach to health represented by balancing the calories in/calories out equation. As evidenced by the exploding numbers of metabolic disease, neither of these perspectives seems particularly useful.

While both personal choice and calories play a role in these epidemics, the problem is much broader. The food ecosystem has been decimated and in its place, we have non-nutritive chemical-toxicant food-like products that were designed to be highly addictive. When consumed, these products fundamentally change the metabolism of the individual who consumes them, and not for the better. Every bite of a chemically processed food is one step closer to metabolic disease. Beyond that however, the choice to allow industry to create, utilize, and ultimately dump these chemicals into food, other products, and into the environment, rests on us as well. Those are choices too; choices that affect the metabolic health of communities, and more broadly, the world.

We tend to think of industry and the pollution they create as amorphous, self-propelling and promoting agents of doom, forgetting of course, that each and every one of these organizations is made of people; people like you and me who make decisions to produce and promote these chemical poisons; people who choose to put poisons in foods under the auspices of the pathetically weak and ineffective GRAS guidelines. People make these choices. We do not get forever chemicals that fundamentally disrupt all aspects of metabolism without people who chose to create them, others who chose to use them in common products (and deny any and all risk), and all of us who relish in the novelty of these products. We do not get 80,000 synthetic chemical entities currently on the market without people putting them there. We do not get 1.8 billion pounds of glyphosate used every year, enough for every person on the planet to consume 4lbs annually without people that made choices to produce, use, and not regulate this chemical. We are the problem. We made these choices. We are the ones who are destroying our health and the health of others by the choices we make.

So when we look at the skyrocketing numbers of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and obesity, it is not enough to say ‘eat better and eat less’. We need to clean house, top to bottom. We need to stop producing the garbage food that pollutes our bodies and the environment. We need to take responsibility for all of the choices that lead us to the point where only 12-20% of the population can be considered metabolically healthy.

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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A Letter to New Physicians: Thoughts on Medicine after a Lifetime of Practice

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Let food be medicine

By way of introduction, I was educated at St. Bartholomew’s Medical College in London England and graduated with MB BS from London University. After National Service in the RAF as a medical officer, I entered family doctor practice under the National Health Service. I immigrated to Canada by joining the Royal Canadian Air Force on a short service commission. In 1960, I did pediatric residency at Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio and was then invited to join the staff in 1962. My experience during the next 20 years showed me that what has come to be called Integrative, or Alternative Complementary, Medicine was an exciting and fulfilling way of practice. It is about this that I would like to talk to you.

First of all, ask yourself why you became a physician, for which you may have incurred a frightening financial debt. Was it because it provides a good income? Was it because of your fascination with science or was it because of your desire to heal the sick? Give it some thought because it can make a difference to your choice of practice. Let me pass on to you my experience because I enjoyed my entire medical career and did not retire until the age of 88.

Let’s look at the history of medicine as it has developed. During the Middle Ages there was absolutely no model to explain health and disease. You remember that Louis Pasteur and others like him discovered that microorganisms attacked us and killed us. Therefore, the first paradigm in medicine was an attempt to kill the microorganism without killing the patient. For many years this was extremely frustrating and many unfortunate patients did not survive the “cure”. Then came the exciting discovery of penicillin and the antibiotic era was born. Microorganisms became “the enemy” and the idea spread to killing the cancer cell, or indeed anything that appeared to attack our health. You know of course that we are coming up against some severe problems with reference to the antibiotics. Apart from bacterial resistance, their toxicity was found to be so great that some were diverted to the treatment of cancer cells.

During my tenure at Cleveland Clinic I was a pediatric oncologist for six years. The children with cancer all died and when I had the opportunity I diverted my interest to the study of inborn errors of metabolism and handed the oncology to a colleague. What was so interesting to me was that the nature of the biochemical lesion for inborn errors had to be discovered at birth, giving rise to the state screening laboratory. If not discovered at birth, nearly all of them would become mentally retarded. In many cases, an appropriate diet could be formulated by the discovery of the biochemical lesion. The damaging effects could be prevented. This is preventive medicine at its best.

One day, I was confronted with a six-year-old boy who had intermittent episodes of self-limited cerebellar ataxia. Each episode had left his mental functions a little bit worse and he had the earliest signs of optic atrophy. He had been tested by every conceivable neurological and neurosurgical method, all of which had been normal. By studying his biochemistry it became apparent that he had intermittent beriberi. His inborn error was due to a defect in the ability of thiamine to bind to pyruvic dehydrogenase as its cofactor. Each episode of cerebellar ataxia was initiated by some form of stress such as a cold, a mild head injury, and on one occasion, an inoculation. The biochemistry was apparently good enough to produce cellular energy, unless some form of physical stress was imposed on him. By giving him large doses of vitamin B1 his episodes of ataxia could be prevented.

To me this was a dramatic experience that completely changed my perspective of medical responsibility. I found by simple trial and error that many of the pediatric problems facing me responded to large increments of a completely non-toxic vitamin ( thiamine) used as a therapeutic agent. I began to be aware that Hans Selye was absolutely correct when he formulated the General Adaptation Syndrome. He recognized that an animal’s ability to meet stress demanded cellular energy to adapt. This was intuitive, because knowledge of energy metabolism in Selye’s day was limited. The collapse of a stressed animal was due to cellular energy deficit and he stated that humans were suffering from “diseases of adaptation” because of their cellular energy deficiency. Skelton, one of his students, had been able to initiate the General Adaptation Syndrome in animals by inducing  thiamine deficiency.

I started thinking about our medical approach. Since healing is a natural process within the body itself, shouldn’t we be assisting that in addition to attempts to kill the enemy safely? I came to realize that the use of nutritional elements represented the fuel that our cells use to produce energy. Provided that the DNA blueprint is either perfect or that its imperfections can be improved by epigenetic use of nutrients, the blueprint can be manipulated by understanding the nutrient implications. A study of ideal human nutrition in the process of energy synthesis is absolutely essential to our ability to retain complete health in a hostile environment to which we have to adapt continuously.

I left the Cleveland Clinic and joined with a physician who had opened a practice specializing in the therapeutic use of nutrients. The effects on my patients were dramatic and I can only say that this is the formula that was given to us by Hippocrates who said “let medicine be your food and let food be your medicine”. Now we know a great deal about the essential elements that make up human nutrition. It is as though medicine could be represented as a journey on a rough road. It came to a fork in the road and a signpost pointing one way stated “kill the enemy”. The other signpost was perhaps blank and can now be said to state “assist the defense”. Could it be that it is a new paradigm? It is interesting that Louis Pasteur was said to have stated on his deathbed “I was wrong. It is the body defenses that count”.

Perhaps you, reading this, might think about the truth existing behind these words. Would you be interested in doing your own library research to find out what has been written concerning the art and science behind the much maligned “Alternative Complementary Medicine”? After a lifetime of practicing medicine focused on supporting host defenses with nutrients, I am convinced this is the direction medicine should be taking.

As a new physician, you have yet to experience the frailty of the current medical model. You will; and as you do, consider whether simply ‘killing the enemy’ with antibiotics, tamping down the inflammatory reactions, or overriding any of the body’s many innate mechanisms to deal with illness, is working in your patients. If you come to the conclusion, as I did, that these methods simply do not work for many patients, consider the proposition that we must support host defenses in order to let the body heal.

Yours sincerely,

Derrick Lonsdale, M.D.

 

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The Wrong Fork: Understanding the Current Medical Model

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Medical fork in road

The Western Medical Model

Looking at the history of the development of medical thinking, there are many different models. A model represents an idea, a structural format that fits for the cause and treatment of disease, a word defined in Webster as “any departure from normal health, an illness”. For example, the model that is used today in the West is completely different from that used by the ancient Chinese and it would seem to be pertinent to look at how our Western model was developed in the first place.

Until the internal structures of the body and their functions were defined it was totally impossible to understand any principles of why we get sick. Throughout medieval history there was in fact no model. Very early concepts blamed demons and evil spirits and for several centuries, bleeding the patient seems to have been the only treatment offered. These ideas were developed out of ignorance. Our present model was derived from the discovery of organisms that were so small that they could not be seen without a microscope. This idea, however, was born even before the development of the microscope.

Germ Theory

Semmelweis was a 19th century Hungarian physician. He had observed that physicians would enter the delivery room directly from the morgue to deliver mothers of their infants. Since the puerperal “childbed” fever had a mortality rate of 10 to 35%, but germs had not yet been discovered, Semmelweis concluded that the physicians were “bringing something in on their hands”. He made them wash their hands before delivering any of their patients. Childbed fever virtually disappeared, as we would now expect. Even with this practical evidence that the current medical model was wrong, Semmelweis was persecuted and derided by the medical profession because his concept was “out-of-the-box”. It infringed on the philosophy that governed medical thinking at that time, an unforgivable sin in the eyes of his medical compatriots who were ultimately shown to be themselves wrong.

Well, as we all know, the germ theory was finally accepted and it provided the very first idea for the cause of disease. The foundation of this model is that an attacking agent is “the enemy”. The direction that took place was to kill “the enemy”. The philosophy was “kill the bacterium, kill the virus, kill the cancer cell” and medical science has spent years and is still trying to develop compounds and treatments that would kill the “enemy” without killing the patient. You can be sure that they killed a lot of patients (and still do) in their attempts, until the dramatic discovery of penicillin that opened the so-called antibiotic era. Antibiotic resistance is now a new threat conjured up by the “enemy”.

Facing the Fork in the Road: Kill the Enemy or Bolster Defenses

I like to think imaginatively that medicine was “walking down a long rough road”. It came to a fork with the road leading to the right that carried a signpost. The signpost said “Kill the enemy”. The road leading to the left had no signpost so the right fork was the obvious one to travel. Kill the bacteria; kill the virus; kill the cancer cell. Be aggressive; don’t let the disease take over the show.

The rest of this article deals with what the left fork may have yielded. I suggest that the signpost would have said “Help the defense”. Copy Hippocrates; don’t do any harm; above all, avoid a noisy mechanical hospital so that the patient can assist himself by proper rest while listening to gentle music. Make sure that his nutrition is appropriate so that “food becomes his medicine”.

The Body Is a Fortress

I now call into effect the reader’s imagination. Think of the body as like an old-fashioned fortress. An attack would demand a defense orchestrated by a commander. To watch for an attack there would always have to be guards or sentries posted on the battlements. Sighting a would-be attack by a guard would involve sending a messenger to the commander so that he could organize the defense. The body works like that. White cells are just like the imagined soldiers as they “go into battle”. All the other phenomena that we call “an infection” are really generated as part of a complex defensive system. I write more about the body as a fortress in Ostrich Medicine: Shouldn’t we Recognize Host Defenses.

The Brain and Body Work in Unison To Sustain Health

The human brain, complex as it is, consists of two basic parts which I am going to call the “upper” and “lower” brains. The upper brain is responsible for our thoughts and voluntary actions, the “ego” described by Freud. It conducts messages to the body through a nervous system that is called voluntary, giving us what we call willpower. The lower brain, the “id” described by Freud and where the central command is located, is automatic and controls an involuntary nervous system known as autonomic. It initiates a number of reflexes, the best known of which is called the fight-or-flight, a survival reflex activated by any form of danger that threatens life. It acts with “advice and consent” provided by the upper brain, that is then able to modify the reflex action. There are many other reflexes controlled from id, all of them being protective of either personal survival or survival of our species. The fight-or-flight is personal protection whereas the primitive part of our sex drive is species protection. So let us see how an infection (the enemy) is handled.

Imagine someone who has picked up a splinter in his finger. Unknown to him the splinter carries Staphylococci. The first defensive reaction is the development of what we call a pustule. This represents what I like to call a “beachhead”. The pus that forms is created from the dead white cells that have sacrificed themselves to killing the Staphylococci. This is a local mechanism and if handled successfully will resolve the problem.

If this defense is unsuccessful, the “beachhead” is breached and the Staphylococci begin to flow into the body through the lymphatic system. The “battlements” have been breached. The lower brain is informed and begins to activate a general defense. The body temperature goes up (yes, it is the brain that causes your fever) because germs are programmed to have their most noxious effect at 37°C, normal body temperature. By increasing the temperature of the body, the efficiency of the germ is compromised. A message goes out to the body organs to release white blood cells as the defensive “soldiers” (they go to the “breached battlements”) and explains why the white cell count increases in concert with the fever. Lymph glands increase in size because they are being prepared for destruction of the germs that they encounter. The patient feels ill, forcing him to take a rest. This conserves the energy required for carrying out the defensive system. Now the battle is in full effect and the outcome is resolution, death or sometimes stalemate where the battle is neither won nor lost.

The Left Fork in the Road

The point that I am trying to make here is that the defensive mechanism is as important to the resolution as killing the enemy in a safe way. It demands a colossal amount of energy to be effective and this is generated from the results of good nutrition. So let us see how we can assist the process. The paradox is that two thirds of the world population is suffering from starvation while one third is dying from over eating the wrong foods.

The clinical effects of starvation are completely different from those incurred by eating too much of the wrong foods. Behavior of people in the state of starvation is governed by the catastrophic hunger and search for food. The people eating the wrong food have an entirely different course, the effects of what I call high calorie malnutrition. These are “the walking sick”. They are not hospital cases and their symptoms are often referred to as being psychosomatic because all their conventional tests are negative.

A Case Study: When Short and Long Term Defenses Are Ignored

By way of example, let us follow the case of John Doe. He sees his physician complaining of palpitations of the heart. The focus is on the heart and no thought is given to the action of the autonomic system. He gets a prescription which governs the symptom. A month later he sees the same physician because of alternating diarrhea and constipation. He receives a diagnosis of irritable bowel syndrome and gets a prescription. No thought is given to the action of the autonomic system or the possibility that the former prescription has made things worse. No questions are asked concerning the nature of his diet. If and when he has emotional disease such as anxiety, outbursts of anger or depression, no thought is given to the abnormal chemistry occurring in the brain. Imagine the kind of diet that this American citizen, John Doe is ingesting.

Let us suggest that he has a doughnut and two cups of coffee for breakfast, a coffee break midmorning and enjoys a two Martini lunch. Let us suggest that he has a macaroni dinner with several more Martinis before. Exhausted from the day’s work, he sits in an armchair watching television and goes to bed, only to repeat the same performance the next day. His health is good and remains good for many years on this, or a similar, regimen. Let us say that 10 years later he is the John Doe that gets a prescription for heart palpitations. Because his symptoms are constantly relieved, he has a very high respect for his physician and continues to attend periodically for various symptoms such as “an allergy”. The years roll by and one day he develops mysterious symptoms related to his nervous system. He sees the same physician and is referred to a neurologist who diagnoses Parkinson’s disease. In the present medical concept there is absolutely no connection between his years of dietary indiscretion and the appearance of a chronic neurological disease. John Doe may even ask the physician whether his diet has any bearing on the development of this disease and he is told that it has absolutely no connection at all. I submit to you, the reader, “that this is “food for thought”.

Energy Metabolism: A Foundation for Health or Disease

The combination of between 70 and 100 trillion cells make up the human body. Our functions are dependent upon the cooperation of every single one of these cells, each of which depends on energy. Brain cells, and particularly those of the lower brain (the command center) are highly sensitive to energy deficiency. Oddly enough, the reflexes that I have described above become much more active. Panic attacks, so common today, are fragmented fight-or -flight reflexes. They indicate DANGER. The symptoms generated like this are nothing more than warnings. They are merely indicating that the cells in that part of the brain are either starved of oxygen, the vitamin/mineral combination that enables oxidation to occur efficiently, or that empty calories are overwhelming the ability of the vitamin/mineral combination to perform that function. As I have said in other posts before, it is exactly what would happen in a car if the engine was “choked” by too rich a mixture of gasoline.

When you are young, your cells can cope with the situation and for many years you may have either no symptoms or the kind of symptoms that get classified and can be treated with medications, mostly. When they cannot, these symptoms are often deemed psychosomatic. Ultimately, as we saw with the case of John Doe, permanent damage develops. It is not surprising, then, that the brain becomes the focal point of the disease. This strongly suggests that as we “take the left fork in the road”, prevention is far better than cure.

Are Vitamin and Mineral Supplements Necessary?

One might wonder, given the cautionary tale of John Doe, if vitamin and mineral supplements are necessary to maintain health. I would argue that they are, especially when dietary choices mirror those of our example. Additionally, however, because farming practices have changed, even when one’s diet is rich in fruits and vegetables, those fruits and vegetables may not have as much nutrient density as they once did. When coupled with highly processed foods, even those with vitamin enrichment, I suspect our nutrient needs yet outweigh our current intake capabilities. I am, therefore, inclined to believe that vitamin and mineral supplements are becoming a preventive necessity. It does not, however, take us off the hook. Restricting ourselves to real food is still necessary.

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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.

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The Three Circles of Health

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Derrick Lonsdale, MD

Physicians who practice Complementary Alternative Medicine talk of and write endlessly about oxidative metabolism. Our present approach is, however, largely shot-gun in character. That is a reflection of our collective ignorance, but the question arises as to whether the application of non-caloric nutrients (vitamins and minerals) is an appropriate methodology in the treatment of virtually any disease, the model on which a great part of Complementary Alternative Medicine (CAM) is founded. Is it truly a paradigm shift in overall concept? We certainly know that it usually, if not always, works. We have a huge amount of information about vitamins and minerals, but still do not know how to balance them. In spite of the general impression that modern medicine is a scientific bonanza I see myself standing on the “beach of knowledge, looking at the ocean of ignorance”

Over the years I have provided my patients with a model that introduces them to the concept of oxidative metabolism in a very simple way and this essay is to describe it. It also provides an intuitive concept of how stress is converted into disease.

The Three Circles of Health: Genetics, Stress and Fuel

The three circles of health presented below are derived from Boolean algebra that seeks to describe the influence of variables by the degree of overlap between them. Genetics, for most of us an unknown factor, always enters the equation, since we are born of parents. With a strong Mendelian defect it may be the unavoidable factor, but the discovery of epigenetics tells us that even this can be modified for benefit since it is the study of how nutrients and lifestyle influence our genes. Cystic fibrosis, an example of a genetically determined disease, can be helped by nutritional implementation. That represents the overlap between the genetics and fuel circles.

Figure 1. The Three Circles of Health

three circles of health

Stress, poorly defined for medical purposes, is defined here as a “mental” or “physical” force imposed by living in an essentially hostile environment. It includes all the variables of mental and physical forces to which we have to adapt as we encounter them daily throughout life. Unless the force, whatever that may be, is overwhelming as in any lethal mechanism imposed, it is not the stress that is the problem. It is how we adapt or maladapt to it that is the problem. The fuel circle is our nutrition.

Let us take a simple analogy. Imagine that you have bought a car. You do not know it, but somewhere in the structure of that car there is a weakness, perhaps a flaw in the engine. As it ages it is being “stressed”, particularly by the hills that it has to climb. One day it breaks down on a hill and when you receive the bill for repairs you are told that the breakdown occurred at the site of the structural weakness. Do you blame the hill or the structural defect, about which you were ignorant? Obviously you can blame neither.  The hill was a part of the journey undertaken. But suppose that you never bothered to read the owner’s manual and you have been putting in a fuel that is not consistent with the engine design. If and when the breakdown occurs, it is only the fuel that can be blamed since it created less efficiency in the function of the engine, imposing a greater liability for breakdown. The body has exactly the same problems in principle. This becomes an easily understood concept of how stress is converted into disease, the equivalent of breakdown.

Oxidative Metabolism: Understanding the Fuel

The next part of the model depends on understanding that efficiency in a fuel-burning machine, including the 70 to 100 trillion cells that make up the human body, is defined as the useful work produced by the machine in proportion to its fuel consumption. A car is said to be about 35% efficient, meaning that 65% of the energy produced from burning gasoline is wasted in friction and noise. The body is estimated to be 75% efficient, a very different story.

Figure 2. Oxidative Metabolism

oxidative metabolism

Lack of oxygen (anoxia) is lethal as we all know, but it is not usually known by many as being lethal in excess. Every diver knows this. Thus, in this simple figure, efficiency is plotted against the volume of oxygen being consumed. This volume will be less at rest and will increase in proportion to the mental or physical exertions of the individual.  On the left side of Figure 2, oxidants are the equivalent of spark plugs in a car. On the right, antioxidants are the equivalent of the cylinders since they represent the “firewall” that enables the energy to be controlled.

Let us turn to another analogy. Imagine that a camper wishes to light a fire in a clearing in the forest. He risks setting the forest on fire so he puts his fire in a fireplace. But as the fire becomes more flagrant it begins to throw off sparks that also endanger the forest. The camper places a wire grill over the fire in order to catch the sparks and thus protect the forest. Now he wants the fire to burn as fast as possible.

The body has the same problems to solve. Every cell has to create its energy by literally burning fuel. This is called oxidation and it is carefully controlled in “fireplaces” in the cell, known as mitochondria. When we are at rest we use less oxygen and when we exercise physically or mentally we use more. As long as we keep it in the bounds that are represented in Figure 2 by the vertical lines, we maintain efficiency. On the left of the Figure we see the oxidants or “spark plugs” and on the right we see the antioxidants, the equivalent of the wire screen in the Figure. It is to be emphasized that the wire screen is an important analogy because it is only effective because of the multiple wires. None of them can catch the sparks on their own.

Mother Nature knew that these “sparks”, known as free oxygen species, would form under any form of stress and took steps to put together a series of chemicals that all work together like the wire screen in the analogy. It is therefore important to understand that antioxidants only work as a team and any one of them alone does not provide metabolic safety. Nor can we ask whether, for example, vitamin C is “good for any particular disease” in the same way that we might ask whether aspirin is good for headaches. The nutrient scenario is completely different from that of the pharmaceutical treatment method.

The Cathedral Roof

We can now imagine that the oxidants form one half of an imaginary roof and the antioxidants the other half. They must balance just like an architect would design a roof. The whole roof or part of it might fall in or the roof could sway one way or the other. Like all analogies, this is an incomplete representation, but it does provide a basis for understanding the problems facing us in what might be called “repairing the roof”.

Brain Body Relationship

Figure 3, shown below, is an obvious oversimplification but introduces the concept that we have two parts to the brain.

Figure 3. The Brain Body Relationships

brain body relationshipsThe “cognitive” part does the thinking whereas the limbic system is clearly a very complex computer that continuously senses the state of our personal environment. It is responsible for all our survival mechanisms that include the fight-or-flight reflex, and vital components of species survival such as appetite, thirst and basic sex drive. I think of the body as like an orchestra where the organs are like banks of instruments and the cells within them are the various instrumentalists. The limbic system is the “conductor”. The conduct of our daily lives depends on the conductor’s ability to play the “symphony of health”. The two parts of the brain “talk” to each other to modify our behavior. The computer “talks” to the various organs in the body through a balanced activity of the sympathetic and parasympathetic branches of the autonomic nervous system. This system is involuntary and is automated by the limbic system. The computer also controls the glands that make up the endocrine system by a closed biofeedback mechanism. Hormones are really messengers of the conductor’s ability to communicate with the organs. The organs even “talk” to each other.

Oxygen, Nutrition and Health

The last part of this model depends on the tissues in the body that are most dependent on oxygen. Brain is well known to be number one in this requirement, particularly the part known as the limbic system and the brainstem, since they function all the time throughout life. The heart also works full time and is perhaps next on the list. It possibly explains why the ancient scourge of beriberi, due mainly to the vital relationship between vitamin B1 deficiency and ingestion of simple carbohydrate is a disease of the heart, brain and nervous system. Beriberi is still seen in the cultures where rice is the staple diet. It was (and still is) caused by the use of white rice that  is produced by milling off the grain cusps that contain vitamin B1 and its “spark plug” colleagues. The excess calories cannot be “burned” (oxidized) efficiently. Many of us can remember that we had a mechanism in cars called a choke. If that mechanism stuck after starting the car from cold, the engine would splutter and the car would hesitate. Black smoke from the exhaust represented unburned hydrocarbons. That is what happens to many people in our modern world who insist on the pleasure derived from eating masses of sweets and simple carbohydrates. They are never able to understand that their many symptoms, usually written off by physicians as psychosomatic, are due to their “junk”. Like white rice, “junk” is defined as a substance that we eat that contains no “spark plugs”. This gives rise to the term “empty calories”. Notice that I used the word “substance” rather than “food”.

The extremely common result of all this is a condition that I have called Functional Dysautonomia. Although published in medical journals, it is not a term that you will find in a medical textbook. It is, however, perhaps the commonest condition in Western civilization since the diet of the masses is frequently appalling. I refer to it as High Calorie Malnutrition and the early stages of the decline that results produces symptoms that are usually diagnosed as “psychosomatic”. In a crazy world, two thirds of the human population are dying from the results of increasing starvation, while one third are suffering disease and decay from overeating the wrong foods.

The Three Circles of Health Revisited: Genetics, Fitness and Nutrition

To summarize, there are only three things that you need to remember in maintaining health. The first is that genetics represents a blueprint given to us by our parents. The second is that “stress” is an inevitable result of living in the world. Injury, infection, toxic substances and business decisions all make up forms of physical and mental “stress”. Stress, if not in itself overwhelming, is less important than the way we adapt to it. The third thing and probably the most important is the way we choose our nutrition. Each of the circles represented in Figure 1 above is dependent on the interplay with the other two circles. Each circle may be the dominant cause of an illness but the other two circles come into the equation. The new science of epigenetics has shown us that nutrition and lifestyle have a direct and important effect on our genetic predisposition. The way we adapt to various forms of stress is by physical and mental fitness, maintained by exercise and nutrition, both of which demand self-responsibility.

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From Anorexia to Athlete

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Recently, I had a conversation with some girlfriends about working out and specifically doing push-ups. One friend invited us to do a push up program where you start out doing as many as you can and build up to 100 (even if you can’t do 1 it’s designed to build you up to 100 over time). She decided she was going to do it, but not the whole program because she was afraid, “it will make my boobs even smaller, which is the one downfall to losing weight.”

Another girlfriend confirmed this fear. I added my two cents on the matter, “it should make your breasts look perkier and larger when you build up the pectoral muscle behind them.” That didn’t matter, their fears of looking less feminine outweighed their fitness goal for more strength.

Of course why wouldn’t it? In a culture that punishes female Olympians with the ridicule of taking a gender test if they don’t look feminine enough or break a new record that women weren’t supposed to be able to break (read more here Are the 2012 Olympics the Year of the Woman?).

I’m not saying that I’ve never been afraid of loosing what little breasts I have or that I’ve hated the fact that my little sister wore a bigger bra size then me by the time she turned 16. It’s only recently that I’ve been able to conquer my own self-hatred of my body by accepting that it just that – a body. It’s been a long battle, but on most days I sit on the side of victory and look in the mirror and see flesh, bones, muscles and organs that help me achieve my goals – physical, mental, and spiritual enlightenment and acceptance.

Battling Anorexia

Not too long ago, I looked in the mirror and thought that I was obese, grotesquely obese. I’m nearly 6’ tall and have never weighed over 165 lbs. I’ve never been close to obesity, but on my darkest days there was no way you could convince me of what I wasn’t or why it really mattered. Becoming an athlete, someone who sets physical goals and goes out to achieve them, not only saved my life, but also enhanced it. As an athlete I push myself not only on the track (or in whatever sport arena I participate in), but in life as well. The lessons go beyond accepting my body for what it is, but loving my ability to run 26.2 miles, jump up and do pull ups, participate in Spartan Adventure Races, and most recently complete various Cross Fit workouts (which short of the Marine Corps, are the most challenging work outs I’ve ever done). Of course, it’s been a long journey to get here.

I spent the better part of my late teens and early twenties hungry and malnourished by choice. In college, I woke up at 5 or 6 AM every morning to run 6 miles (10-15 miles on the weekends). I then carefully monitored how many calories I consumed during the day to make sure I didn’t exceed my limit of 1000 calories. I beat myself up if I didn’t go to bed with a growling stomach. At one point, my friend Joel would not let me get up from the table until I had consumed what he considered enough for me (he’s a rather large and intimidating man so when I say force, I do mean by loving force). Of course, I simply found excuses not to eat with my friends in order not to exceed my strict calorie limit, but Joel always (and to this day still) asks me if I’m taking care of myself in a way that makes me realize that food is not the demon, the perceptions in my head are.

Becoming an Athlete

When I was 24-years-old, I decided that I was going to be a Marine Corps Officer. I trained for the nine months prior to leaving for Officer Candidate School (OCS) by running six miles and weight training. I worked out at the gym at the recruiters’ office. They were the first mentors that discussed proper nutrition for an athlete with me. All of my coaches in high school somehow missed this important subject. They put it very simply, “You are going to burn more calories than you can possibly consume at OCS. Libby, you’re going to have to eat if you want to make it through. If you don’t, you’ll end up a medical drop.”

I have no idea where this determination to be a Marine came from, it was certainly a relatively new life goal, but I heeded their advice and ate everything the cafeteria workers piled on my plate. I wanted to be a Marine more than I wanted to be thin enough, enough for what I still don’t know. I was amazed by how much energy I had, how much I enjoyed food and how much time I had wasted counting calories.

Today, I don’t count calories, or get on scales. I don’t let myself partake in the idea that there is some invisible standard set by the media, Hollywood and society that I’ll never reach, but should keep trying at all cost, because if I don’t reach it I won’t be loved/successful/fill in the blank. On my bad days, when I tell my boyfriend I feel fat even though I know I’m not, he simply laughs at me. I remind myself that my body is my vessel and needs to be fueled properly. I wonder if this will be a battle I will always fight? If so, I know that as long as I constantly challenge myself, both physically and mentally, and know that I won’t meet my goals without the proper fuel, I will win. My latest challenge is Cross Fit, but I still enjoy running and other various sports. In September I start classes for holistic health with a focus on nutrition.

Feminine Enough

As an athlete, or at least a very fit person, I face a new battle. Looking “feminine enough.” Again I ask, feminine enough for what? As women push their bodies and break records in the Olympics, I listen to the sportscasters, friends and strangers comment about their lack of female curves. My own boyfriend has voiced concern that I will look “manly” if I get to strong (to which I laughed). I am, always have been, likely will always be a svelte person. Without the aid of plastic surgery, I will never look like Marilyn Monroe, and that is okay. I have learned, the hard way, that suffering in order to fit into someone else’s idea of beauty, health, success, etc., will only make you suffer. In the end it will never be enough because it’s not what you want.

Love Thyself

It was a slow progression from obsessive calorie counter to amateur athlete. Today, I eat until I am full and enjoy healthy fats and, gasp, carbs! I have a slight dark chocolate addiction and am healthier and fitter at 31 than I was at 21. I hope that my girlfriends realize that their goals should always trump someone else’s ideal of worthiness. If a woman wants to work up to 100 push-ups or run a marathon or become a racecar driver, she shouldn’t let society’s preconceived notion of gender roles and standards of femininity/beauty stand in her way. I wasted too many years avoiding the pleasure and nourishment of food in hopes of being thin enough and learned that in the end you are just starving for self-acceptance and participating in the life you want to live. I honestly believe that becoming an athlete saved me from Anorexia.

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Are We Really that Fat and Does it Matter?

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Body mass index (BMI), the dreaded math calculation used for decades to tell us whether we are merely fat or morbidly obese, suggests that over 41 million or 35% of us are in the latter category. As bad as that may seem, it’s about to get a whole lot worse. Researchers from New York University found that BMI underestimates the obesity numbers, especially for women.

In a study published on PLoS ONE, a peer reviewed open access journal, researchers suggest that when more accurate measures of adiposity (fat) are used, at least 74 million Americans (64%) should be deemed obese. Whoa.

BMI and Women’s Health

It appears that BMI (weight in pounds/(height in inches)2×703) while a quick and easy indicator of obesity, ignores several important factors that tend to underestimate obesity levels in the female population. Most importantly, BMI doesn’t account for the relationship between lean body mass and fat mass. Sarcopenic obesity, the loss of lean mass or muscle combined with the increase of fat mass, plagues women more frequently than men, especially as we age. As we age and lose more lean mass, BMI measures of obesity become less and less accurate. According to the research, BMI underestimates the obesity levels in women by 40% across all age groups, but for the older age groups, >60 years, the number approaches 60-70% error. This is striking, not only because of the high mis-classification rate in women (remember medical decisions are made based upon BMI assumptions) but also, because BMI potentially underestimates the number of women who should be considered obese. Or does it?

While I agree that many of us are not as slim as we should be, I wonder if we might not need new measures of health and fitness. I am thinking of the female athletes in the Olympics – not the gymnasts or divers (although even as petite as those athletes are, their weight, because of muscle mass, to height ratio could be skewed by BMI standards), but the female weight lifters, boxers, wrestlers, judokos, and even the water polo players. Many of these women would be considered overweight  by current BMI standards, and yet, they are at the pinnacle of health and fitness. What does that say of the BMI standards when those at the height of health and fitness can be considered fat while those at edge of illness, who are noticeably overweight are considered normal weight because of skewed lean to fat mass ratios?

The Paradox of Obesity: Why BMI Doesn’t Predict Health

And here we have the paradox of obesity (and the problem with BMI); obesity doesn’t correlate with mortality. Indeed, with many conditions and under many circumstances-stroke, cardiovascular disease, hemodialysis, cancer and others, being overweight increases survival. Maybe it’s not the fat, or even the lean muscle to fat ratio, but the fitness level that should be measured. Research shows that individuals who are metabolically healthy regardless of weight, have no increased risk of mortality from cardiovascular disease than their normal weight counterparts.

Resting Heart Rate Better than BMI

It is well known that athletes, no matter their BMI, have lower resting heart rates than couch potatoes. Perhaps resting heart rate might be a better indicator of overall health. Indeed, several studies have demonstrated that a low resting heart rate may be a better indicator of cardiovascular and metabolic health in women than BMI. So, before we go starving ourselves to reach some physical notion of health (and beauty) based upon a faulty metric, embrace your inner athlete and exercise.

To the researchers who bemoan the growing obesity epidemic and associated health costs, it’s time to move beyond what we look like as a matter of predicting health and move toward how our bodies function. Resting heart rate may be one solution, biomarkers may be another, but BMI is not an effective metric for evaluating women’s health.

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