If you take the most difficult of health issues in our world today, some that come to mind would be cancer, autism, alzheimers, and type 2 diabetes. There are many more, but to keep this blog somewhat short, I will just go with those, but for most health issues we can apply the same concepts I will be referring to below.

The biggest impact to these diseases and health challenges is often diet and nutrients and stress reduction in order to help your body do its job to clean up and make healthy new cells. Poor food choices and stress impacts our body in ways that limit detoxification, proper immune response, and inflammation. Those are game changers for health so giving your body resources to support those functions is important.  Our best resources come from quality foods. Quality has to do with how food was grown/raised and how close it is to its natural form (not processed) and with very little chemicals and non-food items added to it.

• Foods with fibre to help move bowels and get toxins out as well as feed our good gut bacteria.
• Foods with a spectrum of nutrients donate anti-oxidants, vitamins, minerals and enzymes to help catalyze the many reactions that allow communication and information to move around our bodies so our brilliant cells can fully do their jobs.
• Foods with good fats to create healthy hormones (communicators) and support the brain and give every single cells a functioning cell membrane.
• Foods with healthy proteins to help create neurotransmitters so we can have a good mood and clear thoughts.
• Foods with limited sugar to keep inflammation from being chronic.
• And of course water – needed to help flush out toxins and support movement of nutrients into our cells.

So when we add all of those good things in, we then have less room for the not so good stuff.

**Limit/remove foods that cause irritation or allergies as that causes inflammation and immune reactions.  This can be different for everyone but junk and processed foods are main irritants for everyone. However some may not tolerate gluten or soy or eggs, etc. The food log from 2 weeks ago can help find what foods irritate you specifically so that you can avoid it and see how you feel. Imagine if you found the food(s) that caused your biggest health concern? It is possible.

In the autism world, diet is said by most families to show huge improvements in their child’s symptoms. There are a few studies on this, and the most recent is this one below. I share this because not many studies are done on the impacts of a good diet along with nutrients, so this is interesting to see how it can help the complexities we see in autism. (If you are interested in learning more: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5872787/)  

In the reading that I do of books and articles written by doctors and health professionals, the same can be said about the other diseases. What we put in our mouths for food and beverages really has an incredible impact on the ability for our cells to do what they were meant to do.  When our cells have what they need, then our tissues, organs, and systems can better fully do their jobs and create health for us.

Have a great week!

Lisa Aschenbrenner, RHN - Registered Holistic Nutritionist 

For more information please visit RealFoodForThought.ca