Are You Suffering From a Nature Deficiency?

This modern, hermetically sealed lifestyle is turning many into indoor zombies — with dulled senses, suppressed immune systems, depressed spirits, and sharply increased risk for illness and disease. One can hardly call that living — particularly when the healing power of nature is so close at hand and, literally outside your front door. If you are suffering from a nature deficiency, and there’s a good chance you are, the good news is that it’s an easy fix — with benefits that have the power to change the course and quality of your life. Here’s how to get started:

Here comes the sun.
Though many of us have been scared off the stuff, sunshine in moderation is essential to our health. It enables the body to create vitamin D, which is key to boosting immunity and warding off serious disease. How to slip in a bit of sun without booking a flight to the Bahamas? Eat lunch outdoors a few times a week. When the days grow shorter, get out there for a brisk walk, point your face to the sun, and get your dose of D!

What’s that smell?
Stale office air, off-gassing office carpets and chemical-spewing copy machines at work all chip away at our overall health. Why steep yourself in it? Get out at lunchtime, even if it’s just to pick up some food from down the street. While you’re walking, take a few deep breaths, and fill your lungs with fresh outdoor air instead of the re-circulated indoor stuff. It will help clear your lungs, boost alertness and reduce your exposure to office toxins. In the evening, take a walk around the neighborhood with one of your kids, to sneak in a bit of fresh air plus that all important quality time. When I was growing up my father used to take a 30-minute walk with either me or my brother several times a week, and I remember how we each relished the time we spent on our one-on-one walks with Dad.

Keep it simple.
Getting into the great outdoors doesn’t necessarily mean climbing Kilimanjaro — although I highly recommend walks and hikes in peaceful locales. Sometimes, the wilderness is where you find it. Even a 10-minute break on park bench in a quiet park or garden will help calm your mind and reconnect you with the natural world. If getting yourself and the kids outdoors is a challenge, make a celebration of it. One of my patients turned an annual summer meteor shower into a friends and family star-gazing event, complete with a picnic dinner for all and kids on the lawn in sleeping bags on the watch for shooting stars.

Listen to the world around you.
Just as honking horns, barking dogs and crying babies can escalate irritation and blood pressure levels, soothing sounds from the natural world can calm the mind and body, and help bring blood pressure back down into the healthier range. When possible, head to a peaceful park, take the headphones off, and listen to the sounds around you. If getting outside isn’t an option, sound machines that replicate the sound of things like streams, running water and soft rains can help bring the sounds of nature indoors — at least until you can get out for a dose of the real thing.

Surprise your eyes.
Make your brain work a little harder by exposing your eyes to the ever-changing light and colors of the natural world. More vivid than any computer screen, the colors found in nature actually force your brain to work a bit harder to process it all — helping to increase activity in the brain and develop those neural pathways. Think of it this way: Step outside and get smarter — now that’s a no-brainer!

Explore new ground.
Hug a tree. Lie in the grass. Dig your toes deep into the sand by the sea. Bottom line: Connect physically with the earth and natural world to energize your body. By making regular contact with the ground, you’ll restore and help maintain the body’s natural electrical balance, thereby promoting your optimal health. To read more about the “earthing” connection to wellness, take a look at the fascinating new research in “Earthing.”

No matter what big pharma would like us to believe, ultimately, true health just doesn’t come in pill form — it comes from the things we do to promote our well-being. Though most of us know that spending time at the beach, in the woods or far beyond the city limits is a rejuvenating experience, it’s important to remember that nature has the power to heal — as long as we give it a chance — so get out there!

For more information on how to optimize your life, visit drfranklipman.com/.

Photo credit: Marina Perevezentseva

Tumors in Children: How One Family Thrives

I write this as I sit in an MRI room while my 8-year-old son Sami is scanned for the umpteenth time. Here we go – this is a big one. It is a follow-up scan from one just over a week ago. Enhancement. A possible brain tumor. All the other tumors are stable and I am told not to worry yet. This is not possible. But this is not where our story begins. It actually began in a doctor’s office three and a half years ago.

“Neurofibromatosis.” “Neurofibromatosis.” “Neurofibromatosis.” I make the doctor repeat this word numerous times when he informs me my son Sami will need to see a specialist to confirm the diagnosis of Neurofibromatosis (NF). In my mom panic, I blurt out, “It’s not serious, right?” The doctor replies, “It can be not serious.” Yet, just like all of you who spend time reading doctor’s faces – I know this is not good. On to the world wide web – ahhhh, confirmed – not good. Maybe, just maybe, Sami doesn’t have it? But the specialist later confirms NF at his diagnostic appointment. Our conversation basically plays out like this:

Me: What does this mean for my Sami?
Doctor: He will get tumors.
Me: Maybe he won’t.
Doctor: He will.
Me: Maybe he won’t.
Doctor: Yes, he will.
Me: Okay how many?
Doctor: Ten to thousands.

So there it is: no cure, no real treatment, no denying it, no possibility he will escape tumors. We leave the office a different family. What happens next? I imagine our story is similar to many people or families who receive a life-changing diagnosis. We fall down, get up, fall down, get up and live life. We change course.

Neurofibromatosis, in a nutshell, means your tumor suppressor does not properly function and every nerve cell in your body has the potential to become a tumor. It also presents a whole lot of other health issues. In our case, Neurofibromatosis also becomes our family’s catalyst for change. One personal change, for us, is nutrition. I jumped in all the way after reading everything I can on tumor prevention and we go raw. I will not lie: There is actual crying at the dinner table. I see three sad little faces (and a dad) all of who are trying to embrace a new raw lifestyle. So we scale back a bit and now eat primarily a plant-based diet and are conscious about our food choices.

My youngest son loves green juice, and drinks it and asks for it on a daily basis. After this MRI, though, we will take the big plunge and go to a completely plant-based diet and see if it has any impact on his tumor growth. We make the decision to eat real food, primarily plants. We start with small changes.

We also go to a summer family retreat. We spend time in the hills with monks, nuns and discover practicing meditation and compassion with other families is transformative to the soul. It helps us to be a bit more mindful in our lives. Moreover, our children shine so bright with all this compassionate attention focused on them. We become part of the NF community, which is also a change in our lives. We meet other families, doctors, researchers, organizers in the field and connect on boards. Knowledge and these types of connections are essential.

I end up becoming a fundraising mom – this is a really big change for me. Again, I jump right in head-first hoping, praying for a treatment before even one tumor shows up in our Sami. I enlist everyone; family, friends, neighbors, community. Even people at cocktail parties are recruited for big jobs. This leads to the creation of our group the Littlest Tumor Foundation and a new career for me with a lot of adventures and hard work. Sami and I even get to meet President Obama to speak about healthcare and NF.

Living MRI to MRI has lit a fire in our family and lent to our message which we share with the Littlest Tumor Foundation. Today there are few successful pediatric tumor treatments. This is unnecessary and we can do better. Simple. Just like our foundation, our goals are simple: We raise research dollars for innovative research, we promote and embrace wellness with our annual family retreat and we want the world to know about our cause.

As for our Sami, he becomes a brave soul. Tumors do indeed show up. He braves up for PET scans, MRIs, first opinions, second opinions, surgery, more MRIs and too many specialists to count. He does this all while continuing to be a truly joyful, happy child. (He does much better than his mom, in case you’re wondering).

So when the tumors do indeed show up it all becomes very real – or surreal – to this mother to be speaking to specialists and surgeons about the fast-growing mass in our child. Time to make the big grown-up decisions in life. It is not simple, as all the specialists and surgeons have differing opinions. So we arm ourselves with all possible information and make the decision to jump. We decide to operate and feel we have found truly the best surgeon on the planet to remove this tumor. Off we head to Chicago to operate, and for all of you who have been in these shoes, you know it feels so incredibly wrong. You put on a brave face and move forward. You slip in and out of the stages of grief: mad at everyone, sad, making deals with God. I finally settle on consciously focusing on envisioning him awaking from surgery. He does and asks if they got the tumor, then adding he’d like to see it so he can bring it to his science class, as he just knows his science teacher Miss Becky will want to see it.

So we survive this tumor and now watch others and continue on with our journey like so many others. Our Sami continues to keep us focused. He is essentially the heart and soul of our foundation. He is the spark that causes all these changes and many more. He is the reason we understand as we sit for hours at Children’s Hospitals: “Why not us?” One look around at the many children facing chronic and catastrophic health issues and its clear – why not us. But most importantly, he is the inspiration that makes us believe why not us be part of the NF solution.

Back to the MRI room, here I sit again, watching my sedated child in an MRI tube again, hoping he does not have a brain tumor. It all feels so crazy. So when I am asked if I have any ideas for other parents in this situation, I simply say: Fall down get up, fall down, get up, fall down, but get up. Small changes in nutrition and wellness could – and will be – huge in the long run. Lastly, join us: We are all in this together and we can channel this crazy life of tumors in our children into a solution.

Tracy Wirtanen runs the Littlest Tumor Foundation. Neurofibromatosis affects 1 in 3,000 and causes tumors to grow anywhere in the body including the brain and spine and can cause a series of other significant health issues. They range from serious skeletal abnormalities to learning issues to difficult to treat cancers. She invites everyone to come together around this extremely important issue to create change.

Is Healing Your Body a Full-time Job? Tips for Easing the Overwhelm

Does this sound like a typical week? A doctor’s appointment, a massage, acupuncture, daily yoga, therapy, 25 daily supplements, morning green juice, daily meditation, cardio, cooking, and that’s after cleaning the house, getting the kids to school and finishing the sales presentation. Wow, I’m tired just thinking about it.

Healing your body from illness can seem like a full-time job on top of your regular life ? a job you didn’t even apply for.

How do you manage it all without going crazy or making yourself sicker? One option is to ignore your self-care and go on with life as usual. I’ve seen this work for some, but usually not for the long term.

Alternatively, you can try to do it all at once and get overwhelmed under the weight of juggling all your healing tasks with your family and career obligations. Early on, when I was healing myself from multiple sclerosis, I spent more nights at the dinner table crying from overwhelm than I like to think about.

I eventually found a third way between overwhelm and denying the disease. I found a way that honors the healing process without having it consume or define your life. Here are some those lessons.

Start slow.

It can be natural for some of us to take on all the healing modalities at once. That was biggest the mistake I made. I was so determined to stay out of a wheelchair that I jumped in with both feet. I don’t advise it. It’s not possible and it’s not wise.

Instead, start with a few items and build up your self-care muscle. Start with green juicing or 20 minutes of meditation every other day. Any one of these can give you more energy so you can later add yoga or massage.

Self-care is a project.

While you might not have asked for this job, it is yours. Put it on your to-do list. Not just the appointments, but also the juicing, the baths, the supplements – everything.

But don’t put it at the bottom where you will forget it. That’s easy to do without a deadline. Instead, place healing at the top of your list.

I know this sounds like it will create more stress. But it works to shift your paradigm, and put self-love front and center. If you are notorious for taking care of yourself last, illness marks the end of that.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying sales reports and soccer practice aren’t important. Yet if you are sick or too fatigued, you won’t make those anyway. There is a reason they tell you to put your oxygen mask on first.

Plan, delegate and execute

OK, all your healing tasks are on your to-do list. Great. But that doesn’t by itself make it any less overwhelming. Just like that big project at work, break down the tasks, plan them out, efficiently multitask and engage help when needed.

Here’s an example. You want to make green juice each morning, but you also need to get the kids and yourself out the door. Plan it out. Sunday afternoon clean, cut and prepare all the produce for the week. Then put enough for a day in seven separate bags. You can even have the kids help. Each morning, grab a bag, juice it and head out the door.

Make healing fun.

Ask a person who loves their job what they love about it and they will almost always say, “because it’s fun.” Why not make self-care fun?

Spice things up. Try Thai massage. Practice yoga naked. Dance in your skivvies to Lady Gaga instead of going to the gym. Play soccer with your kid, and score parenting and self-care points. Be creative.

Make healing sacred.

OK, the shot I give myself every day is not fun. Having to down all those supplements three times a day is no joy either. How do you get through the yucky stuff?

Make those moments sacred. Take a deep breath. Burn a candle or put on a relaxing sacred CD. (I love Tibetan singing bowls.) Then as you pop that pill or insert that needle, imagine it is a magic potion going directly to the source of your illness and restoring your health. Not only does this take the dread out of these tasks, you also incorporate the power of guided imagery that may even boost the healing effects of your medicine.

Be kind to yourself.

I imagine self-care like a serving tray overflowing with beautiful dishes. There are so many dishes piled up that occasionally one falls off. No worries, I just place it back on the tray and continue on. The same is true of all your healing methods.

Know that on any given week or day, something will fall off. You will forget your midday supplements. You will be too tired for yoga. It’s OK. Don’t beat yourself up. Expect it to happen. Why? Because you are human.

What do you do when it happens? Get back on the bike. Pick up the task the next day.

But one word of caution: Create boundaries around the ultra-important healing tasks. Those are the ones that will set your healing back big time if it falls off the tray. For example, I never miss my daily injection, no matter what. For you it may be a pill. Or yoga. Regardless, create strict boundaries around those one or two things. And then don’t cry over the other stuff.

How will you organize your week so you have the time to make self-care an integral and non-overwhelming part of your life?

Laurie Erdman is a holistic health coach and the Chief Wellness Hero at Chronic Wellness Coaching. She helps her clients take the overwhelm and confusion out of their healing journeys.

Photo credit: Tyler Axtell

Low-Fat Diets: Grossly Misrepresented

For more than two decades, many commentators have discussed and cussed so-called low-fat diets and gotten away with talking nonsense. It is time to look at some facts.

Virtually all of these discussions are based on recommendations of reports of the National Academy of Sciences during the 1980s when the initial suggestion was made to reduce total dietary fat to 30 percent (from the average of 35-37 percent of calories). I know because I co-authored the first of these reports on diet and cancer in 1982. Then, during the next decade or so, this 30 percent benchmark became the definition of a low-fat diet. A myth was born because this diet did not lead to obesity, as claimed.

During the next 10 years when this low-fat myth was growing, average percent dietary fat barely changed, maybe decreasing a couple percentage points to about 33 percent, at best. In reality, the amount of fat consumed increased because total calorie consumption also increased. Furthermore, during this same period of low-fat mythology (1980s-1990s), obesity incidence increased.

Now, enter Robert Atkins and other writers who argued that obesity was increasing because of our switch to low-fat diets. By going low fat – so the mythical story went – we were consuming more carbohydrate, an energy source from plant-based foods. This was a serious misrepresentation of the facts.

By falsely blaming low-fat, “high-carb” diets for the obesity crisis, these writers were then free to promote the opposite: high-fat, “low-carb,” high-cholesterol and high-protein diets rich in animal-based foods, a so-called “low-carb” diet. During the initial discussions of this “low-carb” diet, no distinction was made between the refined carbohydrates (sugar and white flour as commonly present in processed foods) and the natural carbohydrates almost exclusively present in plant-based foods.

Later, some attention was given to refined carbohydrates (sugar, white flour) as a contributor to obesity, but by then the damage due to this obfuscation had been done. “Carbs” were out; protein and fat were in. By initially demonizing “carbs” and so-called “low-fat” diets and emphasizing increased protein and fat consumption, the intended path was clear: Consume a diet rich in animal-based foods instead of a diet rich in plant-based foods.

Obesity continues to climb, but not because of a switch to a plant-foods rich diet naturally low in fat and high in carbohydrate (total carbohydrate, that is). Rather, obesity increases as physical activity decreases and as sugary, fatty, salty, processed food consumption increases.

More serious, however, is the effect that this mythology has had on suppressing information on the extraordinary health value of diets that are truly low in fat (10-12 percent). I am referring to a whole-foods, plant-based diet that avoids added fat, and processed and animal-based foods. This diet contains about 10-12 percent fat, sometimes pejoratively referred to as “extremely low fat.” Call it what you will, but this diet (also low in total protein, about 8-10 percent) produces, by comparison, “extremely low” incidences of sickness and disease. In fact, it now has been shown not just to prevent these illnesses but to treat them. Importantly, this dietary lifestyle cannot be dismissed by the mythological argument that so-called low-fat diets have been proven to be questionable.

Professional medical researchers and practitioners also repeat this same mantra as if it were real. It has been shown, for example, in the very large Nurses’ Health Study at Harvard over an observation period of at least 14 years that reducing dietary fat from about 50 percent to about 25 percent of total calories has no association with breast cancer rates. Based on this and related studies, the sole manipulation of fat within this range does little or nothing when the diet still contains such high proportions of animal-based and processed foods. Total protein remains very high throughout this range and worse, the proportion of protein from animal-based sources, already high when fat is high, if anything, increases even more when fat is independently decreased.

It is time that we seriously consider the health benefits of a whole-food, plant-based diet, which is naturally low in total fat, animal-based protein and refined carbohydrates, but rich in antioxidants and complex carbohydrates. The health benefits that are now being reported for this dietary lifestyle are unmatched in scope and magnitude of effect. It is time to discard the gibberish about low-fat diets being responsible for the obesity epidemic. This demonizing of low-fat diets does not apply to whole-food plant-based diets, even lower in fat, because this dietary lifestyle really works. Just try it; but stay with it long enough to allow your body to overcome your taste preferences for fat that arise from its addictive nature.

For more information on how to optimize your health, visit tcolincampbell.org/.

Originally published at HuffingtonPost.com

Photo credit: (OvO)

Let’s Talk About Alcohol

Plenty of resources exist for those of us who identify as alcoholic (Alcoholics Anonymous [AA] is free and world-wide, for example, and there are countless books available on the subject of addiction), but this post isn’t about that. This post is for those of us who probably don’t qualify for a diagnosis of alcohol abuse or dependence, but could stand to explore our relationship with what I like to call “Social K-Y.” Let’s face it: in this day and age, that’s most of us.

How many of you out there have made tons of Crazy Sexy changes (you’re juicing and meditating, and you’ve cut out meat and even gluten, for example), but you still drink alcohol, and sometimes you even drink … a lot of alcohol. Is this you? If so, listen up.

The definition of “binge drinking” (this is shocking for many people) is four drinks or more in a two-hour period for women, or five drinks or more in a two-hour period for men. The math on this isn’t random. The reasoning behind it is that it takes your body about an hour to process one alcoholic drink (12 ounces of beer, six ounces of wine, or one ounce of hard liquor) and drinking more than that at a faster pace creates toxicity. Do it once and you’re probably fine, but do it with regularity and you’re increasing the likelihood that you’ll suffer a variety of physical symptoms and repercussions, as well as a reduction in your general vitality and overall health.

Unfortunately, there are many of us who are not alcoholic who drink like this all the time. Even more unfortunate? Doing it is not only bad for your health, it increases the chances that you will become an alcoholic over the course of your lifetime.

What?! Yes, you heard me.

There are three primary pathways to addiction, two of which are commonly known (genetic heredity and environmental influence). The third is the least talked about and most underestimated, and it’s repeated exposure to toxic doses of an addictive substance. As we continually expose ourselves to high doses of alcohol, we increase our tolerance and habituate our bodies to ever increasing amounts. The more we drink, the more we crave, and that’s when that sneaky bitch we call dependency slips in the back door.

If you think what I’m describing could apply to you, then it’s important that you change this pattern, and doing so begins with reevaluating your relationship with alcohol. Here’s how to do that:

In addiction treatment, one of the things addicts learn to do is understand their personal triggers — the people, places, and things — that make an addict want to use, so they can avoid them or figure out how to handle them. Non-alcoholics have triggers, too — the most common ones being social occasions and stress — but if we sit with ourselves and are really honest, we may notice that we have other triggers as well.

For example, do you sometimes drink when you’re alone? What about when you’re angry or sad? If you only really drink during social occasions, but you find that you tend to drink too much at these times, mindless drinking may be the culprit. Regardless, the only way to really evaluate this is to give yourself a break from drinking entirely and see how it goes.

If you want to give yourself a huge gift (I’m talking potentially life-altering here), take a month off from drinking altogether, no cheating. Now, notice when you want to drink. When a craving arises, sit with it instead of acting on it. What are you feeling? What thoughts or emotions are coming up for you that you would prefer to avoid?

If taking a month off seems too hard, think about that. What are your fears? If you truly cannot handle the thought of it, try to take a week off at first and see how it goes. If that seems undoable, you may have to consider that your relationship with alcohol is more intense that you previously believed. This is very important information for you.

For those of you who go with the month-long challenge, this may curb your social life a bit, but keep in mind that it’s only temporary. You might find that you have to be a little bit more creative about how you spend your time, and if so, great — you’ll probably find yourself reengaging in old hobbies or picking up new ones. This is a great opportunity to find new and diverse ways to spend your time.

You may also find that you have to be more contemplative about how you handle stress, and meditation can be very useful.

Once the month is over and you start drinking again, try to do so mindfully, especially at first. Your tolerance will be lower than it was before, and this is a good time to recognize how much alcohol it actually takes for you to get buzzed, and to go from buzzed to drunk. If you continue to drink mindfully, you’ll notice that you don’t “need” nearly as much alcohol as you did before to relax or to have a good time.

It’s common when people try this exercise to notice that their tolerance level (and drinking level) creeps back up over time. This tends to happen mostly when people slip back into “mindless” drinking behavior. If you find this happening, try to take a little break again. It might not need to be a full month the second time around, but experiment with it a little bit and see how it goes. When it comes to “highly triggering events” (a wedding, for example, if you tend to drink too much at social occasions) it may be helpful to do a seated meditation before going out.

I hope this helps. If you have any questions, please put them in the comment section below. I’ll be here to respond throughout the day.

Photo credit: quinn.anya