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Food, Mood and Women's Health – Be your healthiest, look and feel great!

Archives for April 2013

Glutamine for low blood sugar and calming effects

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Nicole is an NTP (Nutritional Therapy Practitioner) and fire-fighter paramedic and has problems with blood sugar control. Diabetes runs in her family. We met at the recent 2013 NTA (Nutritional Therapy Association conference) where I had a booth to promote my services and book The Antianxiety Food Solution. I also presented on the Role of Inflammation in Anxiety, Stress and Depression – which covered amongst other factors, the amino acids.

Nicole came by my booth after my presentation and she wanted to try the glutamine because of low blood sugar symptoms. The results she experienced were great!

You can watch this video to hear how powerful glutamine was for Nicole – she saw results in around 5 minutes. I really like to get testimonials like this because when I talk about the profound and quick effects of the amazing amino acids it almost sounds too good to be true! But in this case (and the majority of cases), it really is true!

Nicole says “I get irritable, I get shaky and I get to the point that if I don’t get food NOW I think I’m going to hurt something!”

She tried the glutamine and in under 5 minutes she went from that feeling to: “I’m ok. I feel happy, I feel calm, I feel I can make it longer without needing food right away.”

She finished up by saying “I’m impressed at how well that worked for me” and she plans to share the benefits of this amino acid with her clients who may have blood sugar issues and the associated symptoms of shakiness between meals, irritability, a frantic need for something to eat and often an intense desire for something sweet.

Signs of low blood sugar include:

  • Irritability, agitation, nervousness
  • Shaky between meals or when you skip a meal
  • Poor memory, focus and fatigue
  • Intense sweet craving at various times of the day
  • Feeling stressed & overwhelmed
  • Waking in the night (low blood sugar is one of many causes of insomnia)

When you have stable blood sugar, you will feel grounded, experience less overwhelm and stress and have no cravings – if your cravings are blood sugar related. Cravings can also be due to low serotonin, low endorphins, low catecholamines and low GABA, and even as a result of candida or yeast overgrowth. For many of my clients it may even be a combination of the above.

Naturally, making food changes can help a great deal as you can read in this blog post on low blood sugar and anxiety.

End emotional eating – no willpower required!

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chocolate-cake

I’m excited to be participating in the Emotional Eating Loving Food Loving Life telesummit being hosted by Aimee Serafini, a women’s empowerment coach and an energy psychology practitioner specializing in helping people transform their personal relationships with themselves and others.

Because we are all so different, the message can be many different things. The 12 experts are going to speak about emotional eating from many different angles including:

  • Which emotions are the biggest culprits
  • Why diets make it even worse
  • How Overwhelm and Overload contribute
  • How brain chemistry and hormones play a part
  • Why forgiving others who have wronged us can help
  • How our body image is a catch 22 with eating
  • A simple tool to release cravings right in the moment
  • How intimacy or lack of can affect our eating habits

Emotional eating isn’t one size fits all, so take advantage of this variety of experts to help you figure out what approach(es) are best for you.

I’ll be sharing “5 Easy Ways To Banish Emotional Eating and Balance Your Brain Chemistry – No Willpower Required!” and you won’t feel deprived! Really!

I’m going to be sharing how eating real whole food and using some pretty amazing nutrients can balance brain chemistry and end emotional eating, with zero willpower required and no feelings of being deprived!

There are some pretty amazing nutrients that can balance brain chemistry and end emotional eating and I will be talking about the amazing nutrient DPA (d-phenylalanine) or Endorphigen. It is SO effective if you’re low in endorphins! Just watch Angie’s reaction when she sampled some….she actually called it a miracle!

Join me and 12 other experts for a teleseries each evening at 5pm PST.   It starts Monday April 15 and runs through Friday April 26 

[Update: this event has concluded and this program is now available as a 6 week homestudy program: The Amazing Amino Acids for Ending Emotional Eating – No Willpower Required! Really!! (Home Study Program – with or without Live Q&A calls) ]

 

Eat Naked Margaret Floyd interviewed by Trudy Scott

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margaret-floyd-eat-naked

I’d love to introduce you to Margaret Floyd, author of Eat Naked: Unprocessed, unpolluted, and undressed eating for a healthier, sexier you and its follow up cookbook, The Naked Foods Cookbook: The whole foods, healthy fats, gluten-free guide to losing weight and feeling great, which she co-authored with Chef and husband, James Barry.

We met last year at the Weston A. Price conference and saw each other again at the recent Nutritional Therapy Association conference, where I interviewed her about her two fabulous books! (I also met her lovely husband James and delightful daughter Sia)

You can watch this video to hear why she wrote this book…

You’ll hear Margaret talk about: real clean food… misconceptions about food… healthy food… simplify… and plenty of recipes

Margaret wrote Eat Naked for her clients and to educate the public at large. This book is an excellent introduction for people who are completely new to the concept of real nourishing food. And if you have been on this path for a while, you’ll receive validation and some interesting new facts. This book also meshes so perfectly with the eating message in the first chapter of my book The Antianxiety Food Solution and is a perfect companion for those who are familiar with my work, and yet want and need more detail, and more “meat” (no pun intended!).

You may be in for some pleasant surprises if you’ve given up meat for health reasons and no longer eat butter – and yet secretly long for these foods. They are back on the menu, but with the emphasis of quality of course! I knew I was in for a treat when I read Margaret’s dedication to her gamma: “You were right, butter is better.”

Here are a few of my favorite parts of Eat Naked:

  • It’s for people who love food, want to eat well and don’t have loads of time
  • It covers all the bad stuff: hydrogenated oils, sugar and HFCS, artificial sweeteners, soy
  • It covers all the good stuff: organic produce with some great information on pesticides and climate change and why canned tomatoes are a good choice
  • It addresses some interesting aspects of red meat: the Certified Humane Label, the sustainability of meat and a nice review of grass-finished
  • The discussion on eliminating sugar!  (why? because as you’ve heard from me many times, sugar is toxic, addicting, and can contribute to anxiety and depression)
  • How to transition to this way of eating and how to shop naked (don’t you just love the play on words!?)
  • Many delicious and yet simple recipes (try the Eggs on a Bed of Greens)

I LOVE recipe books and The Naked Foods Cookbook is a happy addition to my collection and is one I’ll use and recommend to clients. It fits the bill of having simple, fast and delicious recipes with the added bonus of them being super-nourishing too.

Finally, don’t you just love the covers of these books and the concept of naked undressed food!? How can that not make you fall in love with real food all over again!? And as Margaret says, eat like this and soon you’ll be proud to see your naked body!

Here are links to purchase these books on Amazon: Eat Naked: Unprocessed, unpolluted, and undressed eating for a healthier, sexier you and the cookbook, The Naked Foods Cookbook: The whole foods, healthy fats, gluten-free guide to losing weight and feeling great

Margaret Floyd is a Nutritional Therapy Practitioner, Certified GAPS Practitioner and Healing Foods Specialist based in the Los Angeles area. She’s a passionate advocate for the healing power of a real, whole-foods diet, and works with clients all over North America and Europe to regain their health and vitality through food and lifestyle.

Anxiety and Depression Association of America 2013 conference highlights

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My gluten-mood poster at the 2013 ADAA conference
My gluten-mood poster at the 2013 ADAA conference

Last weekend I attended the annual conference of the Anxiety and Depression Association of America / ADAA and am pleased to share some of the highlights.

  • Gluten does have such a big impact on mood for so many people and I had many interested and curious visitors at my poster presentation (see the above picture)  “Evidence-based Research On The Serious Effects Of Gluten On Mental Health, With An In-depth Look At Testing And The Gluten-free Diet.” A number of people shared how gluten removal had eliminated their anxiety and/or depression too: a mom whose daughter quit gluten and found that this eliminated her panic attacks, a Canadian MD who didn’t know about gluten intolerance and infertility and the director of an anxiety clinic in Argentina. I was also honored to have Dr. Jerrold Rosenbaum, MD, ADAA Past President, Chief of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital and Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, stop by. He said “interesting… everyone where I live is going gluten-free.” I asked him “and what kind of feedback are you getting?” Dr. Rosenbaum: “They’re all feeling better!”
  • I attended a great presentation by Dr. Teri Pearlstein: “Treatment of Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders”. Dr. Pearlstein shared studies that show that babies born to depressed moms may have similar health problems as those born to moms taking anti-depressant medications i.e. lower birth weight and smaller head circumference. However, I also learned this: in a JAMA Psychiatry study of more than 1800 children, investigators found an adjusted 2-fold increased risk for ASD (autism spectrum disorder) among mothers who used an SSRI during the year before delivery and a 3-fold increased risk when SSRIs were ingested during the first trimester. The study was done in 2011 so it’s not new but it’s still an important finding. To me, this provides a very big incentive for using drug-free solutions for pregnancy – which is why the amino acids, fish oils and other nutrients that I cover in The Antianxiety Food Solution are worth investigating as a better option.  We really need some research in this area!

I’ll be sharing some other interesting posters (like “Mindful-based stress reduction for stress and cognition in older adults”) and presentations (like Benzodiazapine side-effects and tolerance) in my next post on the ADAA.

Gluten and the serious effects on mental health: ADAA 2013

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logo_adaa

The 2013 annual conference of the Anxiety and Depression Association of America  is April 5-7 at the Hyatt Regency La Jolla at Aventine (La Jolla, California).  It’s a wonderful conference to hear all the latest research on anxiety and depression.  The focus of the conference is primarily therapy and medications with some presentations and posters on exercise, nutrients, guided imagery, yoga and one topic on gluten (mine!)

I’m doing a poster presentation Friday, April 5, 6:30 – 8pm, “Evidence-based Research On The Serious Effects Of Gluten On Mental Health, With An In-depth Look At Testing And The Gluten-free Diet.” 

This poster will identify what gluten is, where it is found and if the gluten-free diet is a fad or very real concern for those with mental health disorders. The following will be explained: gluten sensitivity, celiac disease, and wheat allergies. Evidence-based research will be reviewed, showing the serious impacts of gluten on various mental health disorders: anxiety, social phobia, panic attacks, depression, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

Here are a few examples of some the research that will be reviewed: 

  • “gluten sensitivity remains undertreated and underrecognized as a contributing factor to psychiatric and neurologic manifestations” (Jackson, Psychiatric Quarterly 2011)
  • Spectrum of gluten-related disorders: consensus on new nomenclature and classification (Sapone, BMC Medicine, 2012)
  • Celiac disease, wheat allergy, and gluten sensitivity: when gluten free is not a fad. (Pietzak, Journal of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition 2012)
  • Gluten-free diet may alleviate depressive and behavioural symptoms in adolescents with coeliac disease (Pynnönen , BMC Psychiatry 2005)
  • Social phobia in coeliac disease (Addolorato, Scandinavian Journal of Gastroenterology 2008)

There will be an in-depth discussion of the various testing options and the many associated health problems that may be associated with gluten intolerance. This session will clearly define gluten-containing versus gluten-free foods when it comes to eating a gluten-free diet.