Nutritional Healing + Brain Chemistry Balancing For Eating Disorders

I'll be speaking on Brain Chemistry Balancing through Target Nutrition Therapy® at the International Conference on Nutrition & Food Sciences, Valencia, Spain 23-24th of Sept 2014. Complete Speaker program will be up here.

 

3 Things That Matter More Than What's On Your Plate.

Christina Santini offers nutrition target therapy + coaching + meditation/yoga .

Your body's biochemical functioning + brain chemical rebalancing takes place ONLY during those deep layers of sleep. If you are not sleeping at 10PM which is where we know from Ayurvedic Medicine that our body's main healing takes place, your body is simply not capable of healing from whatever stressors it has encountered during the day - that means that you can be an overly fanatic health-nut, cutting out this and that and carrying around Spirulina bags and whatnot, and yet you will suffer from a body that is slowly but surely breaking down.

Hormones such as testosterone and insulin are STRONGLY sensitive to sleep and the way you deal with stress.

In other words, if you can't seem to be losing that stubborn fat (particularly abdominal fat is due to an imbalance in testosterone/estrogen), and your energy levels are going down the drain - and especially for any sexual dysfunction - you may want to reconsider your sleep and meditation habits.

And if the word habit is not part of these practices, well, then you don't need to look at what's on your plate to improve your health in these areas - because it's a waste of time before your sleep and stress management tools are in place. Before that happens, your blood labs will be reflecting hormonal imbalances that are all over the map, including borderline diabetic tendencies. And this is true, EVEN if you eat a strict low-carb Paleo diet or whatnot. Doesn't matter - sort out your sleep and take some herbs that will help you calm down your mind. Everything else will fall into place after that.

Managing your nutrition before your sleep habits is like painting a house before the fundament is laid out.

Reference: J Pediatr. 2007 Apr;150(4):364-9. Association between inadequate sleep and insulin resistance in obese children. Flint J et al.

Kill The Flu With Nature's STRONGEST Antibiotic!

Fat isn't what's killing you, dieting is.

Some surprising truths about weight... Fat isn't what's killing you: Dieting is.
A medical establishment that equates "thin" with "healthy" is the problem. The solution? Stop the dieting madness.

I strongly recommend anyone why is dieting and trying to fit their body into our narrow accepted standards, to read Linda Bacon's book Health at Every Size - what does the statistics really show on health and weight. Our striving for the perfect body is vanity - not a health matter.

Think about it this way. Just because a study shows that bald men have a higher occurrence of heart attacks doesn't mean that it's the lack of hair on the head that's the risk factor - it's the low testosterone! So let's say we tried to fix this issue by giving them a hair transplant - that wouldn't really help one inch on the abnormally low testosterone now would it. And THAT approach is exactly how we are addressing the weight issue. We are telling people to just lose the weight and all things will be fine. Unfortunately, losing weight is no indicator of health or healthy ways. What is CAUSING the weight issues - THAT is what we need to address, because thinner people do not live longer. In fact, research shows that those we categorize as overweight live the longest, while those in the obese category live just as long as those in the normal weight category.

Does it make you happy? That's what we need to ask ourselves - happy people live longer.

What's YOUR relationship with FOOD?

Eating takes us to the CORE of who we are - what we believe we are worth and can achieve in this life. Don't underestimate the importance of the way you eat with the way you carry yourself in life and the results you get elsewhere. How you act in one area transcends to every area of your life - are you present when you eat? Do you listen to people when they talk to you - or are you eating over your laptop and pulling out your iphone whenever at a social setting, stuffing yourself with chips or counting the calories that pass your lips and believe you need to burn off bad calories at the gym.
That is not normal behavior, regardless of how accepted it is in our instant-gratification and vanity driven society. Healthy is not the woman in the gym with the perfect body, who eats the perfect raw vegan or whatever diet. The woman on the treadmill who controls every morsel passing her lips, posting pictures of her abs on instagram and facebook - living in misery. There is no pleasure, and yet our society is praising for that type of behavior - woman and man alike. And it is NOT healthy. These behaviors do NOT make you happy. They make you controlling, restrictive and moody. And yes, this affects your intimacy level and close relationships as well.

Success is being happy, vibrant and well-nourished activating our potential in life regardless of what we look like - it's time to let go of that shallow judgment we all do when we decide whether someone is healthy and successful - because most people with perfect abs are NOT happy - they're controlling and restrictive and severely insecure. We must stop this insanity. We cannot move forward if all our time is spent talking about weight loss and measuring our fat percentages - it has got to stop.

Are you overriding your hunger cues; did your relationship fall to pieces because you didn't listen and pick up the signals that started months, years before? Same baseline qualities manifesting in different ways in life.

If you enjoy food - savor the bites, the flavors of life, usually you will find your connections to humans also deepen, because you have trained yourself to be present and pick up subtle signals in the moment, before they turn into red flags (overeating/restricting/relationship break-ups/etc. etc.).

Our eating is connected to our intimacy, love, money, our values and what we believe life is. That's why HOW you eat is equally important to WHAT you eat. Eating is connected to a primary domain of life... changing your eating, changes your life on a much more profound level than getting healthy, looking good etc. etc.

Do you get how important this is? Changing your relationship with food will TRANSFORM your LIFE!

The online conference for eating psychology is running online right now  - check it out here, it's great stuff.

Does Fish Oil Cause Prostate Cancer?

Odds are you've heard this outrageous headline somewhere the last couple weeks.
This has got to be one of the most ridiculous quoted studies, I've come across in a long time.

It seems that the scare going across the news these days, trying in vain to connect a link between fish oil and prostate cancer is based on some hidden agenda towards naturopathic medicine at worst, or just plain ignorance on how to interpret data at best.

First off the study quoted does not use fish oil nor look into whether the subjects took fish oil - they looked at their blood plasma DHA levels.

Second off, the study did not vary significantly in DHA values, so to draw any type of correlation here is fiction - the facts are quite clear in that. The difference in omega 3 fatty acid levels between non-cancer, total cancer, low grade cancer and aggressive cancer groups were 3.62%, 3.66%, 3.67% and 3.74% respectively, which is within normal variation - for the authors to suggest any type of correlation is extrapolating beyond the data. There is no variation.

And lastly - even if a study were to show a true correlation between high DHA blood plasma level and increased occurence of whatever disease, you would want to look into the source of DHA. Does the person even supplement with fish oil? If so, is the fish oil contaminated with chemicals and rancid.

It is VERY important - regardless of this study which results are of absolutely no value - that you do look into the source of fish oil in addition to supplementing with vitamin E. If you do not supplement with sufficient of antioxidant E, then the types of fats found in fish oil tends to oxydize and contribute to inflammation before they are able to heal on a cell level.

So yes, with supplements you also need to pay attention to quality and be aware of synergistic factors that must be taken into account to reap benefits.

Bottomline - should you avoid fish oil? No - you need those types of fats for healthy brain and cell membrane functioning. Should you look into the quality of fish oil you're taking and ensure it's not chemically processed and comes from small fishes such as sardines in addition to always supplementing with vitamin E to stabilize the fats from going rancid? Absolutely.

Think of it this way: just because blueberries can go molded, it doesn't mean that they're not good for you and you should only eat canned food. It simply means that you shouldn't eat a food that has gone bad, and with supplements there are some rules you need to be aware of as you can't determine from the look of it, whether it's a of bad quality similar as to mold on your fruit.

Using your common sense and working with someone who knows how to match natural medicine with your biochemistry blueprint solves any issues. Of course the (mis)information in the mainstream media and from pharmaceutical sponsored studies, is overwhelming and no one can expect to be an expert on human biochemistry from the one-diet-fits-all type of health magazines we're loaded with.

Be smart about your health and don't compromise quality-wise on it - wealth is worth nothing without health.

Got a question health a-z talk to me here.

Ref: J Natl Cancer Inst. 2013 Jul 10. Plasma Phospholipid Fatty Acids and Prostate Cancer Risk

in the SELECT Trial. Brasky TM, D

Probiotics more efficient than antidepressants.

Probiotics have time and time again been found to be more efficient that antidepressants. Simply because the main neurotransmitter involved in happy mood - serotonin - 95% is found in your gut. Depression is directly related to malabsorption, food allergies etc. Changing what you eat, changes how you feel - naturally and long-term. 
One of my favorite breakfasts is berries with raw sour cream or just plain yogurt - raw yogurt has higher probiotics contents and thus the antidepressant effect is that much more potent. If I'm on the go I'll layer in a jar - so pretty.

Raw Cocoa is nature's most potent tool to lengthen telomeres.

Kill The Most Stubborn of Viruses + Bacteria with Oregano oil

Reference: Appl Environ Microbiol. 2012 June; 78(11): 4057–4061.

TEDTalk Peter Attia on Understanding weight loss.

CAUSE OR EFFECT?
What if obesity is the coping mechanism for an underlying cell defect that we are not addressing via aiming to "just lose weight" - this is a profound difference in how to target weight issues.
What if this cell-defect is programmed to store fat rather than burn fat - and what we are eating does nothing to disrupt this message regardless of calorie restriction?

Why you should eat organ meats - nature's most potent superfood!

Calf liver from pasture raised animals contain every nutrient you need to detox from neurotoxins and many involved in boosting testosterone and metabolic rate - more nutrient dense than apples/ carrots or any veggie that we generally think of when we need a vitamin boost. And did you know that animals get sick and die if only fed lean cuts of muscle meat - many of the key nutrients we need to thrive are in the fat and organs - contrary to the health food mainstream brainwashing!

Calf liver sauteed in pasture butter with spring onions and mushrooms and just a bit of bacon.

Saturated fats rate high on satiety index

One of the biggest issues for dieters today -  and that I constantly hear from my clients - is the struggle against hunger. A couple questions quickly reveal that most of them have cut saturated fats down to nothing - something that they've been brainwashed to do by the diet industry. Please keep in mind that the diet industry depends on you failing in the weight loss battle, otherwise they don't get repeat customers: they need you to lose weight and then struggle with cravings and a sluggish metabolism to ensure you gain it all back and come crawling back to them and spend more money.

Your brain, hormones and cells are mainly made up of saturated fats. So common sense will tell you, that this is something your body also needs from your diet for healthy functioning. Mother's milk is made up in large by saturated fats, because it is so essential for brain development etc.

In fact, I often start my mornings with heavy cream in my coffee, grassfed butter on my Ezekiel toast topped with a softboiled egg and a couple slices of delicious avocado and a bowl of banana/blueberries/macademia nuts. So fingerlicking good!

I do not struggle with cravings. I do not go to the gym. I do not count calories. My bodyfat is 18%. This is not due to great genetics - on the contrary, I have low serotonin symptoms running on both my parents side, so I need to pay attention to my metabolic type in order to keep my brain chemistry balanced and inactivate my genes of disease.

This breakfast rich in saturated fats keeps me satisfied without feeling stuffed for a good 5 hours. Whenever I skip my saturated fats and do something commonly thought as healthy, such as oatmeal with almond milk or low fat milk, I feel physically stuffed without being satisfied - I will have more food cravings for sugar and quick carbs that day. Not really a great feeling.

It is imperative that you know your own brain chemistry dispositions in order to know what to eat to feel great. And the right types of fats play a huge part.

Which fats did you eat today?

The Biology of Your Cravings.

Cookie Monster is a perfect example of someone

with a low level of serotonin,

 and perhaps also an excess of dopamine,

making for an anxious, aggressive personality type 

of a carb-loving furry friend.

One of the most typical issues I deal with in my work as a medical nutritionist, is helping clients break addictive behaviors around foods - especially high-carb foods. Cravings and out-of-control eating is always, always linked to brain chemistry imbalances, along with a series of other potential triggers that vary depending on genetic blueprint.

If you fail to recognize the underlying biochemistry imbalances, then you will struggle with this for the rest of your life. One thing I can promise you, is that if left untreated, it will only get worse. That is why 95% of all diets fail - they are not balancing your brain- and biochemistry, rather they are worsening the existing biochemistry problem that caused you to gain weight in the first place! Whether it be an imbalance linked to low metabolic rate (your dopaminergic neurotransmitter system), or it be one associated with addictive and binge behavior patters (your serotonergic neurotransmitter system).

Brain chemistry imbalances and triggers are highly individual and can be pin-pointed according to your genotype via specific lab tests, of which I’ll take you through the most relevant to detect what is causing your cravings. Keep in mind, cravings may be due to an isolated factor or multiple imbalances/allergies, and each one needs to be addressed, before they completely vanish. But vanish they will, once you focus on the cause - which is an imbalanced biology, rather than doing the same thing over and over again. White-knuckling it on one fad diet or another, yet you continue to expect a different outcome. Maybe this time, maybe Monday - it is wishful thinking and you know it.

So let’s go over the most common triggers associated with cravings, and why that cookie jar is oh-so appealing in the late hours...(...)

Read the full shenanigans on FoodFacts here.

New Breakthrough in Treatment Resistant Anorexia: Brain Implantation.

A brain implant that gradually stimulates normal appetite and lifts mood. This is the first time the brain implant treatment has been tried on severely anorexic patients, and suggests that other mental illnesses like eating disorders might be treated similarly. Six patients, all women with severe anorexia nervosa aged 24 to 57, were in such poor health that they agreed to enroll in the risky treatment pilot study at the Krembil Neuroscience Centre in Toronto, Canada. None of them had responded to previous eating disorder treatments, and all were at a high risk of dying of the illness. One of the patients suffered from anorexia symptoms for 37 years, and four of them had been admitted to the hospital more than 10 times. All of them except one also suffered from psychiatric conditions like major depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder. Researchers say that the study results, published in the medical journal The Lancet on March 6, "give hope to patients with especially pernicious forms of the disorder and their families."

Reference: Lipsman N. et al. Subcallosal cingulate deep stimulation for treatment-refractory anorexia nervose - a pilot study. Lancet 2013 Mar 6

Butter Up! Vegetable Oils Linked To Higher Death Risk.

CANOLA OIL - Biggest Health Scam EVER: DESIGNED TO KILL.

How much vitamin C to combat infection and fatigue?

Top 4 GMO Foods Linked To All Digestive Disorders.

These 4 are in everything from roasted nuts to your peanut spread and chip dips and tortillas, if not organic. It is crucial to read labels if in The States to avoid these 4 absolutely toxins! This is not about amount - even a fraction will produce pesticides within your body.

Europe has widely banned the use of GMO, but unfortunately even a minuscule amount disrupts digestion and leads to malabsorption that can take typically 2 years to fully recover from once on a healing program geared to restore your gut flora and stomach lining. The easiest is to prevent - so cut these four out completely! This is not just about excess calories that your body can burn off - these 4 act like neurotoxins and linked to mental disorders as well.

Remember a strong mind starts in your gut. You are what you absorb.  And what you absorb affects how you think... feel... and behave.

Skinny Vanilla Latte Linked to Stroke. Oh, and obesity, cancer, binge eating, palpitations and drug-relapse.

The main issue I have with aspartame is its ability to alter serotonin level and thereby affect everything involved in a balanced mind-body connection - heart rhythm, anger outbursts, insomnia, cravings for drugs, carbs etc. Why I drink my latte with full fat raw milk, pure cream (low casein a1 and lactose) or simply a nut milk; preferably cashew milk. And that's it. If you must have the sweet fix to mask the delectable taste of roasted coffee beans.. which is beyond me... then go for plain, real sugar; your body and brain knows that stuff on a biochemical level and can burn it off. End of story, no permanent damage done. Don't be fooled by the zero calorie count on the nutrasweet pack. It's brain garbage.

Reference: Drug Chem Toxicol. Epub 2012 Mar 2.
Long-term consumption of aspartame and brain antioxidant defense status.
Abhilash M, Sauganth Paul MV, Varghese MV, Nair RH.

Foods Designed to Kill: Why You MUST Avoid These 8 GM Foods.

There are many reasons to buy organic. One being that genetically modified foods and derivatives thereof have become widespread the last decade. We have yet to truly understand the neurological damage that these foods may have long-term, however, common sense tells us that these foods are to be avoided, as they have shown in animal studies to increase pesticides within the body - pesticides act like neurotoxins and disrupt your endocrine system. Children are most vulnerable to the devastating effects of neurological damage, as their brains are still developing. And in many cases, once neurological damage is done - well, it is done.

Genetically modified foods are engineered to produce their own built-in pesticide in every cell. When bugs bite the plant, the poison splits open their stomach and kills them. Biotech companies claim that the pesticide, called Bt—produced from soil bacteria Bacillus thuringiensis—has a history of safe use, since organic farmers and others use Bt bacteria spray for natural insect control. Genetic engineers insert Bt genes into corn and cotton, so the plants do the killing.
The Bt-toxin produced in GM plants, however, is thousands of times more concentrated than natural Bt spray, is designed to be more toxic, has properties of an allergen, and unlike the spray, cannot be washed off the plant.

AAEM states, “Multiple animal studies show significant immune dysregulation,” including increase in cytokines, which are “associated with asthma, allergy, and inflammation”—all on the rise in the US.

Applying this knowledge into your everyday life means that you need to avoid following 8 GM foods, or make sure that they are 100% USDA organic:

Corn and derivatives is used in just about every shelf product
- and if it's not organic it's GMO. In short: it is designed to kill you from within.
Yes, the pesticides it produces within does not differ
whether you are an insect or human being - it's still a food designed to kill.

• Soy
• Corn
• Cottonseed
• Canola
• Sugar from sugar beets
• Hawaiian papaya
• Crookneck squash
• Zucchini

If you have been eating these foods, then you need a customized detoxification program geared at ridding your body of pesticides in order to prevent permanent neurological damage.
Contact us for more information.

References:

M. Green, et al., “Public health implications of the microbial pesticide Bacillus thuringiensis: An epidemiological study, Oregon, 1985-86,” Amer. J. Public Health 80, no. 7(1990): 848–852.

Ashish Gupta et. al., “Impact of Bt Cotton on Farmers’ Health (in Barwani and Dhar District of Madhya Pradesh),” Investigation Report, Oct–Dec 2005.Identification of a Brazil-nut allergen in transgenic soybeans (New England Journal of Medicine, Vol 334, No 11, pp 688-692, 1996)

Effect of diets containing genetically modified potatoes expressing Galanthus nivalis lectin on rat small intestine (Lancet, Vol 354, No 9187, pp 1353-1354, Oct 1999)

Safety of genetically modified food questioned: Interview with gene scientist, Dr Arpad Pusztai(http://www.wsws.org/articles/1999/jun1999/gmo-j03.shtml )