Finding methods to cope with chronic pain can be exhausting. Try these four natural pain relievers to help alleviate some of your symptoms.
http://www.spine-health.com/blog/4-little-known-natural-pain-relievers
Showing posts with label natural. Show all posts
Showing posts with label natural. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 12, 2016
Thursday, February 25, 2016
Natural Pain Relievers
Sometimes it may be a good idea to try one or a combination of natural pain relief options for managing your chronic pain.
http://www.spine-health.com/blog/14-natural-pain-relievers
http://www.spine-health.com/blog/14-natural-pain-relievers
Friday, December 26, 2014
10 Best Dietary New Year's Resolutions
Many people think that New Year's resolutions are a waste of time.
People who hold on to this perception, however, base their views on the
many failures they have either experienced personally or watched others
go through. Yes, too many people spend time coming up with resolutions
which are eventually forgotten or only partially implemented.
For these people, resolutions are indeed exercises in futility.
On the other hand, there are some people out there who not only come up with great New Year's resolutions but they actually end up completing and benefitting from them. Subscribing to New Year's resolutions, then, is not the problem. Problems arise either because participants lack the stick-to-itiveness/discipline to complete their goals or they simply create or espouse poorly-constructed resolutions.
For the record, a good New Year's resolution is:
With that in mind, here are 10 realistic and likely-to-be beneficial dietary New Year's resolutions:
1. Eat fewer processed foods. Processed foods are heavily laced with all kinds of dangerous chemicals--most of them of a preservative, appetite-enhancement or appearance/taste amelioration type. Instead, go for natural foods; examples are raw fruits and vegetables, meats cut at your local butcher and nuts/grains obtained from local farms.
2. Eliminate or greatly reduce consumption of fast foods. There are very few nutrients in fast foods--most probably because they are often fried or processed. While you are on the road, these foods may be convenient but a viable alternative is to bring your own snacks and meals.
3. Be choosy as to how you quench your thirst. Most beverages out there are bad for your health, especially alcoholic beverages, carbonated drinks, and even otherwise-healthy drinks injected with artificial sweeteners. Your best bet is to drink filtered water (if drinking tap) or bottled water from a reputable dealer.
4. Stay well-read on the latest dietary development, trends and concerns. The best decisions regarding your diet need to come from the best-informed/updated sources--preferably those that base conclusions and theories on studies, tests and the opinions of well-respected experts.
5. Keep a close eye on condiment and seasoning consumption. The fact is that people in developed countries overdo it when comes to condiments and seasonings. This is especially true when it comes to salt and refined sugar. To put it more bluntly: we eat too much salt and refined sugar!
6. Stay away from carb-rich foods, especially if they threaten to burden you with more calories than your body needs. As a general rule, baked goods (e.g., breads, cakes, muffins, cookies, etc.) contain exorbitant amounts of fat and cholesterol. Another thing to keep a close eye on is bleached flour.
7. Greatly increase your consumption of fiber. This substance (naturally found in fruits and vegetables) can help relieve constipation (which can contribute to many medical problems), reduce chances of getting colon cancer, and help your body more efficiently digest foods (thereby improving nutritional absorption).
8. Be exceedingly careful as to how you cook foods. For example, avoid microwaving foods whenever possible. While the jury is still out as to whether microwaved foods pose an immediate danger, there are still too many questions regarding it's long term safety. Also, avoid using Teflon-coated cooking surfaces, as well as painted pots and pans (since some of them may contain lead paints).
9. Avoid uncooked foods whenever possible. When eating out, for example, choose meals that have been cooked, as opposed to things like sandwiches, raw fruits/vegetables and partially-raw meats (especially seafood). Some cultures have traditionally favored raw seafood delicacies but the oceans today are much more heavily polluted than they were in the past.
10. Reject so-called high-technology processed/created foods (until their safety has been definitively proven). These include GMOs (genetically modified organisms), irradiated foods, animals for human consumption injected with hormones and antibiotics, lab-created foods (like sucralose or Splenda), etc. Instead, grow your own fruits and vegetables (when possible) or buy organic products.
Conclusion
By all means, don't give up on New Year's resolutions just because they have not worked well for you in the past. If you take the time to come up with good resolutions, there is no reason why they may not ultimately be beneficial. This is especially true when it comes to dietary New Year's resolutions. If indeed we are what we eat, then we need to make sure that we eat the right things--more importantly, we need to develop the right attitude toward dietary habits.
The first step is to avoid things and practices that have proven to be troublesome for others or about which there are simply too many questions/concerns. After that, it's a matter of sticking to initiatives and endeavors more likely to do us good than harm.
Copyright, 2014. Fred Fletcher. All rights reserved.
References & Resources
1. http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/resolution.aspx
2. http://postscript.com.au/features/health/keep-new-years-resolutions/
3. http://www.processedfreeamerica.org/resources/health-news/48
4. http://www.ecomall.com/greenshopping/teflon4.htm
5. http://healthimpactnews.com/2014/how-eating-processed-food-made-the-world-sick-and-fat/
For these people, resolutions are indeed exercises in futility.
On the other hand, there are some people out there who not only come up with great New Year's resolutions but they actually end up completing and benefitting from them. Subscribing to New Year's resolutions, then, is not the problem. Problems arise either because participants lack the stick-to-itiveness/discipline to complete their goals or they simply create or espouse poorly-constructed resolutions.
For the record, a good New Year's resolution is:
- Practical
- Realistic
- Measurable
- Based on sound (scientific) reasoning
- Compatible with one's lifestyle, resources and abilities
With that in mind, here are 10 realistic and likely-to-be beneficial dietary New Year's resolutions:
1. Eat fewer processed foods. Processed foods are heavily laced with all kinds of dangerous chemicals--most of them of a preservative, appetite-enhancement or appearance/taste amelioration type. Instead, go for natural foods; examples are raw fruits and vegetables, meats cut at your local butcher and nuts/grains obtained from local farms.
2. Eliminate or greatly reduce consumption of fast foods. There are very few nutrients in fast foods--most probably because they are often fried or processed. While you are on the road, these foods may be convenient but a viable alternative is to bring your own snacks and meals.
3. Be choosy as to how you quench your thirst. Most beverages out there are bad for your health, especially alcoholic beverages, carbonated drinks, and even otherwise-healthy drinks injected with artificial sweeteners. Your best bet is to drink filtered water (if drinking tap) or bottled water from a reputable dealer.
4. Stay well-read on the latest dietary development, trends and concerns. The best decisions regarding your diet need to come from the best-informed/updated sources--preferably those that base conclusions and theories on studies, tests and the opinions of well-respected experts.
5. Keep a close eye on condiment and seasoning consumption. The fact is that people in developed countries overdo it when comes to condiments and seasonings. This is especially true when it comes to salt and refined sugar. To put it more bluntly: we eat too much salt and refined sugar!
6. Stay away from carb-rich foods, especially if they threaten to burden you with more calories than your body needs. As a general rule, baked goods (e.g., breads, cakes, muffins, cookies, etc.) contain exorbitant amounts of fat and cholesterol. Another thing to keep a close eye on is bleached flour.
7. Greatly increase your consumption of fiber. This substance (naturally found in fruits and vegetables) can help relieve constipation (which can contribute to many medical problems), reduce chances of getting colon cancer, and help your body more efficiently digest foods (thereby improving nutritional absorption).
8. Be exceedingly careful as to how you cook foods. For example, avoid microwaving foods whenever possible. While the jury is still out as to whether microwaved foods pose an immediate danger, there are still too many questions regarding it's long term safety. Also, avoid using Teflon-coated cooking surfaces, as well as painted pots and pans (since some of them may contain lead paints).
9. Avoid uncooked foods whenever possible. When eating out, for example, choose meals that have been cooked, as opposed to things like sandwiches, raw fruits/vegetables and partially-raw meats (especially seafood). Some cultures have traditionally favored raw seafood delicacies but the oceans today are much more heavily polluted than they were in the past.
10. Reject so-called high-technology processed/created foods (until their safety has been definitively proven). These include GMOs (genetically modified organisms), irradiated foods, animals for human consumption injected with hormones and antibiotics, lab-created foods (like sucralose or Splenda), etc. Instead, grow your own fruits and vegetables (when possible) or buy organic products.
Conclusion
By all means, don't give up on New Year's resolutions just because they have not worked well for you in the past. If you take the time to come up with good resolutions, there is no reason why they may not ultimately be beneficial. This is especially true when it comes to dietary New Year's resolutions. If indeed we are what we eat, then we need to make sure that we eat the right things--more importantly, we need to develop the right attitude toward dietary habits.
The first step is to avoid things and practices that have proven to be troublesome for others or about which there are simply too many questions/concerns. After that, it's a matter of sticking to initiatives and endeavors more likely to do us good than harm.
Copyright, 2014. Fred Fletcher. All rights reserved.
References & Resources
1. http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/resolution.aspx
2. http://postscript.com.au/features/health/keep-new-years-resolutions/
3. http://www.processedfreeamerica.org/resources/health-news/48
4. http://www.ecomall.com/greenshopping/teflon4.htm
5. http://healthimpactnews.com/2014/how-eating-processed-food-made-the-world-sick-and-fat/
Tuesday, April 1, 2014
Why You Should Care About Bees (For Your Health)
Bees are essential to the plant foods we eat. In the U.S. alone,
industrious bees annually help pollinate crops worth more than $200
billion. Pollination is the main job they perform for humans. Raw honey
is the main product they produce.
What is “raw" honey? Isn't all honey the same—a sweet sticky substance made by bees that you add to your tea or drizzle into a bowl of cereal?
Wrong! Raw organic honey (preferably from a local source) offers so many benefits, it's quite likely honeybees are more helpful to humans than any other insect. That's why it's crucial to discover the reason for the mysterious large-scale deaths of honeybees in the U.S. and Europe during the past six years and stop the trend.
Making honey is another important honeybee craft, one that takes incredible beehive teamwork. Producing a single pound of raw honey takes the effort of approximately 60,000 honeybees, altogether traveling up to 55,000 miles and extracting pollen from more than two million flowers!
Raw honey has been used for millennia as a food. It's rich in nutrients, containing 22 amino acids, 27 minerals and a whopping 5,000 live enzymes. Nature's “super food," honey strengthens the immune system, boosts healthy digestion, fights disease, and helps eliminate allergies.
You can garner all these benefits from one daily spoonful in your tea or spread on a slice of toast. That single nutrient-rich spoonful (unlike refined sugar, which has no nutrients) provides four grams of fructose, or fruit sugar. If you're healthy and not advised by your doctor to avoid all sweeteners, you should be able to eat honey in moderation and profit from its healthy qualities. Count your total daily fructose grams and stay below 25, including honey and any fruits you eat.
When you have a cold or sore throat, swallow one-half teaspoon of raw honey to coat your throat and lessen irritation. Stir one teaspoon of raw honey into a pot of very hot water, cover your head and the pot with a towel and breathe in the steam to unblock your sinuses. Honey works as well to soothe coughs as the OTC cough medicine ingredient dextromethorphan.
Allergy to honey is almost non-existent; however, raw honey poses a risk for infants. The Centers for Disease Control recommends that you never feed honey to a baby less than one year of age.
Clostridium botulinum spores may be present in raw honey. Children older than one year and healthy adults have fully-developed digestive systems that inhibit the spores from flourishing. Infants less than one year of age do not, making them vulnerable to a rare, serious disease that causes varying degrees of paralysis.
Honey has numerous topical uses as well as internal ones. Its natural antiseptic and antibacterial properties are useful for treating wounds and burns more effectively and with less pain or side effects than traditional medical treatments. It reduces swelling, prevents infection and promotes healing.
Clinical trials proved that Manuka honey, a dark honey made with pollen from the medicinal Manuka bush in New Zealand, can wipe out more than 250 strains of bacteria, including such resistant types as MRSA and other staph varieties. While Manuka contains some as-yet-unknown factor that other types of honey don't have, research shows that other raw (unprocessed) honey also helps heal wounds.
Raw honey is additionally a
natural beauty product that was used as far back as Cleopatra's era,
when the queen of Egypt took milk-and-honey baths to soften her skin.
It's added to many popular beauty products today: as an anti-aging skin
care ingredient, a deep conditioner for dry hair, a skin moisturizer,
and others.
In order to do these things, honey must be raw -- unprocessed. Processed honey from the grocery store does not provide these health benefits because (at the very least) it has been heated and filtered. This processing destroys honey's natural nutrients and enzymes. A full 75% of the commercial honey sold in top American supermarkets—including those brands labeled “natural" (an unregulated term that has no real meaning on food labels)—is imported from China and is so highly processed that it retains none of its beneficial properties or even any pollen.
Your best source for raw, unprocessed honey is a local beekeeper. Often, local raw honey is sold at farmers markets, co-ops or health food stores. (A teaspoonful of local honey every day beginning two months before the start of allergy season can prepare your immune system to fight regional allergens.) If you don't have access to local raw honey, your next best bet is a store such as Trader Joe's or Whole Foods Market that sells certified organic 100% pure raw honey.
Don't be put off by raw honey's crystallization or dark specks. It's far superior to honey that's treated with heat to remain smooth, liquid and appealing. Go for the raw!
Selected Sources
http://www.cdc.gov/nczved/divisions/dfbmd/diseases...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/12013... “Honey could be Effective at Treating and Preventing Wound Infections," January 31, 2013. Source: Society for General Microbiology.
What is “raw" honey? Isn't all honey the same—a sweet sticky substance made by bees that you add to your tea or drizzle into a bowl of cereal?
Wrong! Raw organic honey (preferably from a local source) offers so many benefits, it's quite likely honeybees are more helpful to humans than any other insect. That's why it's crucial to discover the reason for the mysterious large-scale deaths of honeybees in the U.S. and Europe during the past six years and stop the trend.
Making honey is another important honeybee craft, one that takes incredible beehive teamwork. Producing a single pound of raw honey takes the effort of approximately 60,000 honeybees, altogether traveling up to 55,000 miles and extracting pollen from more than two million flowers!
Raw honey has been used for millennia as a food. It's rich in nutrients, containing 22 amino acids, 27 minerals and a whopping 5,000 live enzymes. Nature's “super food," honey strengthens the immune system, boosts healthy digestion, fights disease, and helps eliminate allergies.
You can garner all these benefits from one daily spoonful in your tea or spread on a slice of toast. That single nutrient-rich spoonful (unlike refined sugar, which has no nutrients) provides four grams of fructose, or fruit sugar. If you're healthy and not advised by your doctor to avoid all sweeteners, you should be able to eat honey in moderation and profit from its healthy qualities. Count your total daily fructose grams and stay below 25, including honey and any fruits you eat.
When you have a cold or sore throat, swallow one-half teaspoon of raw honey to coat your throat and lessen irritation. Stir one teaspoon of raw honey into a pot of very hot water, cover your head and the pot with a towel and breathe in the steam to unblock your sinuses. Honey works as well to soothe coughs as the OTC cough medicine ingredient dextromethorphan.
Allergy to honey is almost non-existent; however, raw honey poses a risk for infants. The Centers for Disease Control recommends that you never feed honey to a baby less than one year of age.
Clostridium botulinum spores may be present in raw honey. Children older than one year and healthy adults have fully-developed digestive systems that inhibit the spores from flourishing. Infants less than one year of age do not, making them vulnerable to a rare, serious disease that causes varying degrees of paralysis.
Honey has numerous topical uses as well as internal ones. Its natural antiseptic and antibacterial properties are useful for treating wounds and burns more effectively and with less pain or side effects than traditional medical treatments. It reduces swelling, prevents infection and promotes healing.
Clinical trials proved that Manuka honey, a dark honey made with pollen from the medicinal Manuka bush in New Zealand, can wipe out more than 250 strains of bacteria, including such resistant types as MRSA and other staph varieties. While Manuka contains some as-yet-unknown factor that other types of honey don't have, research shows that other raw (unprocessed) honey also helps heal wounds.
 | |
| Bees, Jerry! Bees! |
In order to do these things, honey must be raw -- unprocessed. Processed honey from the grocery store does not provide these health benefits because (at the very least) it has been heated and filtered. This processing destroys honey's natural nutrients and enzymes. A full 75% of the commercial honey sold in top American supermarkets—including those brands labeled “natural" (an unregulated term that has no real meaning on food labels)—is imported from China and is so highly processed that it retains none of its beneficial properties or even any pollen.
Your best source for raw, unprocessed honey is a local beekeeper. Often, local raw honey is sold at farmers markets, co-ops or health food stores. (A teaspoonful of local honey every day beginning two months before the start of allergy season can prepare your immune system to fight regional allergens.) If you don't have access to local raw honey, your next best bet is a store such as Trader Joe's or Whole Foods Market that sells certified organic 100% pure raw honey.
Don't be put off by raw honey's crystallization or dark specks. It's far superior to honey that's treated with heat to remain smooth, liquid and appealing. Go for the raw!
Selected Sources
http://www.cdc.gov/nczved/divisions/dfbmd/diseases...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/12013... “Honey could be Effective at Treating and Preventing Wound Infections," January 31, 2013. Source: Society for General Microbiology.
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