Live in Fear or Is Awareness Power?
This past weekend I attended a 4-day symposium where practitioners all over the country came to hear all about functional medicine. The theme for the weekend was Innovative Ways to Heal Naturally. We heard from the leading doctors in chiropractic about the current science and research regarding how to heal our bodies. We live in a quick fix world that tells us that we should all fit into the same box. If your blood work levels do not look like the average population, we put a bandaid on it (whether it be prescriptions or supplementation). But, we are not all the same. We all have different genetics, life experiences and environmental responses that makes us all unique. So, the cookie-cutter protocols that we are used to are enhancing sick care not health care.
I see it time and time again in the office. Patients will come in and tell me their history and symptoms and how they have had every test under the sun and nothing of major importance is wrong. There was no diagnosable disease. Now, they still don’t feel well and they are back to square one. Most of the time while I am talking with them, no one had asked them about their diet, the toxins they are exposed to on a daily basis or the stress that they have in their lives. In my opinion, inflammation is at the center of all diseases of the body. The things we are exposed to on a daily basis, adds to our inflammatory markers over time and starts to create havoc in our system. Dr. Brandon Lundell gave a 4-hour lecture on how environmental toxins (i.e. glyphosates/roundup, mold, plastics, etc.) affect our neuro-endocrine, immune and neurological systems. He said that we are now exposed to about 100,000 chemicals in our environment everyday. He referenced a study done in Scientific Reports in 2017, showing that rats that were exposed to a low-dose of glyphosate - the active ingredient in Roundup - (and, by low dose, they used less than the average amount we get exposed to regularly) had higher non-alcoholic fatty liver diseases as well as different tumor-based processes. The research is staggering on all of the toxins that we can be exposed to on a daily basis and this doesn’t even include our diet and what we are eating every day.
In the office, we talk about diet and nutrition all day every day with every patient. We talk about how important it is in what we put into our body. We hear about it all the time. But, do we really listen? We tell every patient that walks through our doors to cut out the sugars in their diet. We all think we know the dangers of it, but we will let it slide more often than not. If we actually saw what it was doing to our body, we probably would think otherwise. One study that Dr. Dan Murphy quoted stated that “100 grams of sugar from glucose (that is about 1 can of soda), sucrose, honey or orange juice significantly decreased the capacity of our neutrophils (a type of white blood cell that helps us fight infection) in our immune system. So, think about the big glass of orange juice that we drink to help boost our immune system because of the Vitamin C. Research is now showing that the sugar component of that drink outweighs the benefits that we can get from one glass. And, it will actually decrease our immune system fight. Research has also shown crappy carbohydrates and processed food can interact with converting our serotonin in our body which is associated with our mood and emotional health. So, do we live in a bubble now for the rest of our lives or do we try to fight this?
The biggest thing that we can do to fight against this problem is to just be aware of the things that are out there and to slowly start cutting down exposter. We cannot live in fear or stop living life, but we can try to give ourselves the best shot. Over the course of the last couple of years, Paul and I started making the shifts to a chemical free household. We started replacing our household products to a more natural based solution. We got rid of every plastic container or cup we had and switched all to glass. We decided that we would cut out a few entertainment things a week, so we could work our budget around buying organic produce at the grocery store and farmer’s market. We started working to decrease our exposure to EMF’s by unplugging our router every night before going to bed. We also are on a regimen of vitamins and minerals to help our biochemical pathways detox these toxins out of our system. These are just a few things that we have done (there are plenty more!) and we just started slowly chipping away at them over the years. So, take one thing and one day at a time. Slowly start making the switch to start decreasing your exposure to things so you can keep Living Free.
**Here are a couple of resources we have used to make the switch.
https://thrivemarket.com/membership/welcome
https://www.onegreenplanet.org/lifestyle/20-switches-to-get-plastic-out-of-your-lif
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