Can Parasites Impact Your Health


Parasites in Galore

This is a question I have had to ask myself as I start to develop a poor state of health in spite of exercising and eating all the right food. Then one day, I stumbled on the idea that maybe I needed to clear out and clean out my system.

I started to do this cleanse and then I decided I would observe what I was passing in my stools, just to be curious. Wow, was I so surprised at what I saw in my stools! My eyes widened in amazement and I thought what are all these things and where were they hiding? I hope I don't gross out my readers with this but worse things are shown in movies and on CNN, so lighten up - the truth must be told - cleanse.

Then it became a perils in my food chain regimen that I continued to do for several months. All the while, I was searching and looking at samples of what was being passed everyday. I decided to take a visual log so I would have proof for myself perhaps to gossip about with close friends or show to my health care providers and for any non-believers that may exist.

The old saying is "seeing is believing". Take a look for yourself at what I was seeing at each passing of a stool, sometimes twice a day. Would these parasites not impact your health?

Is Gossip Heart Healthy?

New research has found that gossip is good for your heart so there's actually a benefit to those who find it necessary to heavily engage in the past time. A word of caution, keep it harmless fun and not vicious and malicious.

If you gossip about how a dress may have looked on your friend or that you heard she was talking behind your back, simple, stupid things like this can invoke a lot of laughter amongst friends. Who among us has not done this and giggled - laughter is very good medicine.

For example, is Facebook a good place? What if your high school alumni decided to start a group there and all your old friends are hanging out there? Should you join or should you ask them to follow you on your Blogspot blog or twitter hashtag instead? This is something you could gossip about with others and at the same time get valuable feedback.

New Perils in Our Food Chain

A recall on your turkey -- a little late, I'd say.
Makes me glad I ate a Tofurkey! This is serious stuff.

Reprinted from Gina Smith's Blog (Steve Wozniak's friend)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An Ohio-based company is recalling 46,941 pounds of turkey and ham products that officials fear could cause listeriosis, a potentially fatal disease, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said on Friday.

HoneyBaked Foods Inc. is voluntarily recalling the meat, which includes cooked, glazed and sliced ham and turkey, USDA said in a statement.

The meat, which was produced between September 5 and November 13, may be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes, which can bring about high fever, headaches, neck stiffness and nausea, USDA said.

Healthy individuals are not usually susceptible to the illness, but it can cause infections to infants, the elderly, or people with HIV or cancer. It can also cause miscarriages.received any reports so far of illness related to the meat products.

Almonds or Statin Drugs for High Cholesterol?

It is great to see that the University of Toronto played a key role in the recent study of how eating almonds, soy protein and vegetables could lower one's cholesterol as effectively as statin drugs. We have long advocated to our friends and family that we are what we eat. The things we do to our bodies we would not do to our cars.

For example, would we run our car without a tune-up at certain mileage intervals? The body's tune-up is cleansing at certain intervals - perhaps, at the change of each season or could be when we switch to Daylight Saving Time. Would we run our car without oil changes? The oil change for our body is daily physical activity to keep our motor (heart) working in peak condition and keep oxygenating our blood so it can flow easily.

Recently, a colleague used a natural diet guide (my accumulated knowledge and creative cooking recipes) that is very similar in composition to the Portfolio Diet, along with 40-minutes of exercise 4-times a week to lose weight. She had not been following her own advice - had been working 16-hour days and neglecting "herself" to her own detriment.

She was lucky that we saw the warning sign (unexplained hypertension). She had done her annual physical and all her results were good: normal cholesterol levels, etc. except that she was overweight. For her medium frame, she was carrying several pounds over the normal maximum of 140-pounds and she knew. After all, she had never been so heavy even when she was pregnant with her children. Her body was screaming, "Help Me!” we listened, followed-up with immediate action to restore her health and rescue her from imminent heart disease.

If only we can get more doctors to encourage overweight individuals to look seriously at diet and exercise as a way to heart health and not look to weight loss surgery, we would be well on the way to "an ounce of prevention being better than a pound of cure".

This study was conducted during American Heart Month (February) and just in time for National Nutrition Month (March). Thanks to the Almond Board of California, the University of Toronto Research team, (Dr. David Jenkins and Dr. Cyril Kendall) Loblaws Brand and all who made this study possible for bringing it to the attention of us, the public.