Running on Empty

During these stressful times of economic unrest, job lost, job security, struggling businesses and shaky health care.  You might feel like you are running on empty?  As you know a car cannot run without gas, oil and certain fluids.  Neither can your body run without the proper nutrients it needs to energize you and maintain wellness. Without feeding your body what it needs you will run out of gas.  You will also leave your body susceptible to chronic and deadly diseases. What can happen when you are continually running on empty? For one, INFLAMMATION - What causes inflammation? Many things, but mainly it is due to poor nutrition. What you put into you. Consider the following:


1. HIGH BLOOD SUGAR
Diets high in refined foods, sugar, and processed flours will spike blood sugar, which sends your body on an insulin roller coaster.  Your body tries to compensate for the rush of simple carbohydrates an that rush stresses the pancreas an makes cells inflamed, stiffer, an more prone to insulin resistance (one of the leading indicators of diabetes).

2. ACIDITY
Most of us have a pH balance that is desperately out of whack-much more acid than neutral or alkaline.  The higher your acidity, the more inflammation will wreck havoc on your body systems.  We consume too many acid-producing foods, artificial sweeteners, fatty meats, and canned and sugary foods.  These cause cumulative acidosis that may take months of healthy eating an vitamin supplementation to eradicate.

3. OXIDATION
Oxidation occurs when free radicals (molecules looking for an extra electron) move through the body and damage the cells they contact. In time, oxidation and the inflammation it causes can lead to cancerous tumors, Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, an other complications. But anti-oxidant rich foods abound: oranges, blueberries, and cherries, for example.  Each of these has an ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) value of 1,000+, and the higher the better.  Still, if you're prone to weakness or illness you may need values much, much higher than 1,000, more than you can get from your food.

4. TOXICITY
There are dangerous toxins and chemicals everywhere around you-lead, mercury, steroids, aluminum, nicotine, and caffeine, for example. these toxins cause a range of health problems from general malaise to the most aggressive of cancers. The scary things is that these poisons are in our homes, our air, our soil, an our food. You can't completely avoid them, but you can o something to fight them. Nutrients like calcium has been shown to displace lead. OMEGA-3 fish oils help fight mercury contamination and also lower the risk of heart disease, brain diseases like Alzheimer's and cancer.  Selenium has been proven to halt mercury's disruption of metabolism.

Are you running on empty?  Take the nutrition inventory below, (see below for scoring)

1. How many grams of fiber do you eat each day?
a. 0-5
b. 5-10
c. 11-20
d. 21-30
e. 30+

2. How many 8-oz. glasses of water do you drink each day?
a. 0-1
b. 2-3
c. 4-5
d. 5-6
e. 7-8

3. How often do you take a multivitamin supplement?
a. Never
b. Rarely; whenever I remember
c. Occasionally; 1-2 times per week
d. Regularly; 3-4 times per week
e. Every day

4. How often o you eat fast food (or processed snack foods, including chips, soda, and candy bars?
a. Every day
b. Regularly; 3-4 times per week
c. Occasionally; 2 times per week
d. Rarely; once or fewer times per week
e. Never (or less than once per month)

5. Do you suffer from any of the following:
regular heartburn, fatigue, overweight/obesity, indigestion/gas, food allergies, constipation, low immunity, dry/itchy skin, joint pain, body aches, osteoporosis, or PMS (for women)?
a. 8 or more
b. 5 or more
c. 3 or more
d. 2 or more
e. None of the above

SCORING
Use the legend below to tabulate your score.
"a" answers = 2 points
"b" answers = 3 points
"c" answers = 5 points
"d" answers = 8 points
"e" answers = 10 points

Of a possible 50 points how did you fare? If you are like the "average American-who eats only 11-13 grams of daily fiber, drinks little water, eats out almost daily, and struggles with a spectrum of health concerns, your score may be very low.  anything below 40 indicates you are not only running on empty, you are running the risk of seriously jeopardizing your current and future health.

Natural supplementation is the best way to boost your immunity, stave off inflammation in the body and win the fight against our toxic world.  Having the time to prepare the foods that are more healthy for us is a job within itself.  But it is a job necessary to take on to live a life of wellness.  To assist you with that job and to move your needle from "E" to "F" you have the option of taking natural supplements and vitamins.

Please use this blog to share your stories and or questions and visit my website to find out more on vitamins an supplements that will keep your body systems from running on empty. http://www.mynsp.com/holisticwise