Dietary guidelines for your family; healthy foods and foods to avoid

 Written By Eeka King B.H.Sc (Acup)

In our rapidly changing society, people have lost their instinctive nature in the ways of eating and rely instead on their taste buds and visual sensations for choosing sustenance. People today tend to eat to live instead of eating to live. The fast paced life gives nutritious eating a low priority. It comes as no surprise that the food processing industry is one of the largest manufacturing industries in the world and also the most powerful. This industry naturally uses its financial clout to influence the slant of university research and the dictates that come from government agencies.

We need to go back to a clean, vital and healthy diet that our ancestors thrived off. A healthy diet is one that sustains robust health and produces healthy and constitutionally strong children generation after generation.

There are many diet fads going around at this time so it is very important to educate yourself and most importantly listen to what your body is telling you. Diets such as ‘all raw vegan food diets’ are relatively new and when you do your research there has never been a culture, tribe or village which has sustained a healthy population of children generation after generation on this diet. If you maintained an all raw vegan diet throughout pregnancy and breastfeeding you could very possibly be giving your child a genetically weak start to life and delayed or hindered development.

Let’s have a look at what foods have kept our ancestors strong and what foods best be avoided.

Unhealthy foods……

Sugar is one of the worse drugs for your body. Sugar is also known as sucrose, dextrose, corn syrup and fructose. It heats the body up, suppresses the immune system, interferes with and lowers absorption of vitamins and minerals (especially calcium, magnesium & vitamin E), destroys fertility and feeds cancer cells. Sugar is one of the biggest contributors to all of our modern dis-eases. Sugar creates mood swings, hyperactivity, poor concentration and ADHD in children. Sugar is not just in lollies, chocolate, ice cream, biscuits and soft drinks it is in just about every single processed or packaged food in the supermarket. Nearly all cereals, fruit juices, sauces, dips, table spreads, yoghurts, muesli bars and snacks contain large amounts of sugar. Look at the back of the labels and avoid at all costs.

White Flour together with sugar has contributed to the demise of good health and the explosion of today’s degenerative diseases. Most breads, pasta, cakes, cookies, baked goods are made with refined, bleached flour.

Soy is actually a dangerous food to consume. It is high in phyto-estrogens which disrupts endocrine and thyroid function and can cause disturbances such as infertility, breast cancer and hypothyroidism. Soy inhibits the absorption of calcium and can make your bones weak. Soy milk, soy cheese, Margarine, soy protein bars, soy burgers and tofu are made with soy. Some infant formulas are made with soy and it is the equivalent of giving your baby 5 birth control pills per day. Soy is damaging for young children. Miso (soybean paste) and tempeh are okay to eat occasionally because they are fermented. Be sure they are organic.

Milk, eggs, chicken and meat from animals that are raised in factories; When animals are given growth hormones, antibiotics, grains that have pesticides (or contain soy) and are not allowed to graze freely from pastured fields, these chemicals are passed on to the consumers.

Caffeine causes exhaustion, fatigue and addiction. Caffeine lowers sperm count and can make it difficult for a woman to get pregnant and stay pregnant. Caffeine is in coffee, black tea, soft drinks and chocolate.

Trans- fats are hydrogenated vegetable oils that have undergone an unnatural chemical process. Trans- fats are in most processed foods, bakery goods, cookies and pastries, chips, margarine and fried foods. Modern-day diets high in hydrogenated vegetable oils instead of traditional animal fats are implicated in causing a significant increase in heart disease and cancer. Beware of the diet-decorates and the ‘food processing industry’ which lead you to believe that margarine is better for you than butter. Margarine is bad!

Canola, corn, cottonseed, safflower and soy oils go bad before they are even bought; a chemical process that make them smell ok. These oils can destroy your DNA and deplete vitamin E. Store bought salad dressings and mayonnaise are usually made with canola or soy oil. Read labels before you buy.

Low-fat foods such as reduced fat milk and yoghurt are not good for you because we need fat to digest protein. We need cream to digest the protein in milk. It is best to avoid the bad fats mentioned above.

Healthy Foods…..

Proteins:

Eggs that are organic and from free range pastures

Fresh organic pasture raised meat including beef, lamb, game, chicken, turkey, duck and other fowl;

Organic organ meats from pastured animals

Bone broths and stews made from organic chicken, fish, beef or lamb bones. A slow cooker is an excellent appliance for slow cooking meat on bones over a long period of time. Organic broth is full of vitamins and minerals, calcium and marrow.

Wild caught seafood of all types from deep sea waters; fresh shellfish in season; oysters; fish eggs

*Wild salmon, tuna and sardines that are canned in olive oil are ok in small amounts. ‘John West’ is the only brand that offers canned fish without vegetable oil and sugar

Fermented soy products (miso and tempeh) in small amounts

Fats:

Fresh butter and cream from pasture-fed cows, preferably raw and cultured

Lard and beef, lamb, goose and duck fat from pastured animals

Extra-virgin olive oil and unrefined flax seed oil in small amounts

Coconut oil; the benefits of coconut oil are endless. This is one fat that will help you lose fat!

Cod liver oil is an excellent source of vitamins A and D. Take a spoonful each day.

Dairy:

Raw, whole milk and cultured dairy products from pastured-fed cows or goats such as unsweetened yoghurt, piima milk, kefir and raw cheese

*Raw milk from pastured cows; “Raw” means that the milk has not been pasteurised. When a cow receives mainly green grass and hay and if her milk is kept in clean containers, then raw milk is an extremely healthy, safe food. When milk is pasteurised (heated above 118 degrees), all the goodness and beneficial enzymes that we need to digest it are destroyed. “Whole” means that the milk has the cream in it (unhomogenised) yum yum! Processed milk actually leashes calcium from your bones and many people have developed allergies to processed dairy. Raw milk is actually much easier to digest and most people who have allergies to dairy can tolerate raw milk. If you still have a slight reaction to it, fermented milk called ‘Kefir’ or the addition of other fermented foods in your diet such as sauerkraut make it tolerable and readily digestible as you begin to build up the enzymes and healthy gut flora throughout your digestive tract. I get my raw milk straight from the vat at a local farm. You can also buy it from some health food shops (Cleopatra’s milk) or you can look into options such as local farm shares or herd share to access this amazing food. If you are a vegetarian it is highly recommended to have some raw dairy in your diet to maintain exuberant, robust health.

Carbohydrates

Fresh fruits that are organic whenever possible and not canned with sugar

Fresh organic vegetables; variety is important. Aim to eat more raw salads and vegetables in spring and summer and lightly cooked, baked or steamed vegetables in autumn and winter.

Whole grains, beans, nuts and seeds that have been soaked, sprouted or fermented before cooking or consumption. The general rule for nuts is; if it’s bigger than your fingernail, soak it. Our ancestors and virtually all pre-industrialised peoples soaked or fermented their grains before making them into porridge, breads, cakes and casseroles. Check out recipes and food preparation methods in the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon for more information.

Fermented foods such as sauerkraut (fermented cabbage), homemade chutneys and pickles add many beneficial enzymes to aid digestion. Fermented foods have a long history of use from cultures all around the world and are one of the biggest health promoting additions lacking from the modern diet.

Beverages

Filtered, clean, high mineral water

 Lacto-fermented drinks made from grain or fruit; meat stocks and vegetable broths.

Condiments

Unrefined sea-salt; raw vinegar; fresh herbs, spices in moderation, naturally fermented soy sauce and fish sauce, homemade dressings and mayonaise

Sweeteners:

 Use these sweeteners in moderation; raw honey, real organic maple syrup, rapadura sugar (dehydrated cane juice) and stevia. Never heat honey or maple syrup or use in cooking as it destroys all the enzymes and vital nutrition. For cooking or baking always use rapadura sugar instead of commercial sugars (even brown sugar). Rapadura sugar can be purchased from all health food stores.

OTHER HEALTHY EATING TIPS

·         Aim for a diet which is 50% raw or enzyme enhanced. Raw foods include vegetables, fruits, meats, fats and milk products

·         When preparing a meal, always think ahead to what must be done for the next two meals; put grains and pulses to soak and meats to marinate, as necessary.

If you want to see weather food makes a difference in your family’s health, try and experiment. For a few months, do not eat sugar, refined flours, processed foods, or food that contains hydrogenated or polyunsaturated vegetable oils. Do not drink coffee of soft drinks. Find a farmers market or organic health food store near you.

©Eeka King 2010 for Bayside Acupuncture & Herbal Medicine Clinic

Balanced Emotions; the fringe benefits of acupuncture

Written by Eeka King B.H.Sc (Acup)

A lot of people do not realise that acupuncture can help with issues of our mind and emotions. Most people know that acupuncture can treat conditions of the body, pain and a sore back. However, acupuncture can also help with other aspects of our well being, outlook on life and how we cope with stress. I was inspired to write this article as a man came barging in our clinic the other day, demanding “Is there an acupuncture point that will stop my wife from being a moody b***h?” David looked up calmly from the desk and chuckled, “well yes sir, there just so happens to be a point prescription just for that”.  

Acupuncture can actually balance your moods, put the fire out of your anger, lift sadness, ease grief, abate fear and conquer the feeling of panic. It can pull you out from a lost dead-end street and put you back on the right path. It is amazing how you can be stuck in an emotion of frustration with everything in your life and after 30 minutes of acupuncture the world has changed. Many people feel a warm fuzzy sensation all over, as if they are about to float off the table. They walk out of the clinic like they have just had a heavy duty pain killer. They’re on cloud 9, asking themselves, “What was that feeling I was having before?”

In Chinese medicine, mental activity has always been considered to be inseparable from bodily functions, and mental diseases were generally not treated differently from any other disorder. Mental energy is simply regarded as a more refined form of physical energy. More ‘refined’ just means another level of vibration or another plane of our being. Our thoughts are simply energy vibrations that trigger our nervous system to release chemicals in the brain which are then felt in the body as emotions. Quantum physics has been exploring this phenomenon for some time and now science is just beginning to understand the implications of what the wise ancient Chinese inherently knew.

In TCM each emotion has its own vibration and each vibration affects specific organs.

Anger affects the Liver

Joy affects the Heart

Worry affects the Spleen      

Sadness affects the Lungs and Heart

Fear affects the Kidneys

Pensiveness affects the Spleen

Shock affects the Kidneys and Heart   

Emotions become causes of disease only when they are excessive or prolonged or both. You cannot avoid being angry and a temporary state of anger does not lead to disease. Sometimes anger is beneficial in life to create change. However, if a person is constantly angry about a certain situation in life for many months or years, this emotion will definitely alter the balance of the internal organs and the harmony of our ‘yin and yang’ and ‘Qi and blood’. Emotional stress is an internal cause of disease which injures the internal organs directly. On the other hand, the unbalanced condition of our internal organs due to other causes will also in turn affect our emotional state.

For example, in Chinese medicine, anger affects our liver energy. The liver is responsible for the free flow of ‘Qi’ within our body and anger therefore will cause the Qi to get stuck. This could result in something like gall stones, polycystic ovaries or liver disease. A lighter manifestation may be irregular periods, tight neck and shoulders and migraine headache. However, the balance of the liver energy may also be affected by eating a diet which is too heating. Consuming large amounts of deep fried fatty foods, cigarettes, coffee and alcohol will definitely heat up the liver. The liver doesn’t like to be hot. A hot liver will surely make a person frustrated and angry without even knowing why. Someone who is frustrated and angry will find that nothing in life is going their way. Their ‘Qi’ is not flowing.

This example clearly shows that on the one hand, emotional stress injures the internal organs and, on the other hand, disharmony of the internal organs causes emotional imbalance.

When you come for an acupuncture treatment it is our job to uncover any imbalances in the body’s energy. We do this through reading your pulse and tongue and checking with you of any signs and symptoms you may be experiencing. If it so happens that you are having digestive issues, a course of acupuncture will also help clear away emotions of worry, confusion, obsession and poor memory and focus.

In China, Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine has had a long history of treating people with mental emotional disturbances such as clinical depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. It is nonexistent that you will come across someone experiencing these mind disorders to have complete vital and vigorous health in the rest of their bodily systems. They may show signs of low energy; excessive perspiration, dizziness, palpitations and of dampness; loose stools, diarrhea, heaviness and a foggy head. Acupuncture and Chinese herbal prescriptions may need to be performed for some time to remove these imbalances in the organs and ultimately calm the mind so that new healthy thoughts of life and emotional outlooks will begin to emerge. Changing our Qi changes our emotions.

Generally, it is important to have treatments on a regular basis as a form of preventative medicine. Just like you would service your car and insure your house. You can then keep your emotional state in check and ensure your body is providing you with enough energy and that you are vital and full of life. When you do this and you do happen to go out of balance a little bit in your emotional state- life throws something at you, or you get lazy with your diet, it may only take a couple of treatments for you to be feeling happier again and peaceful in your mind. Don’t leave it until you are so deep in depression that you will not even be able to see past the fog to know that there is a way out of it.

©Eeka King 2010 for Bayside acupuncture & Herbal Medicine Clinic

Acupuncture for a Natural & Efficient Childbirth

Written by Eeka King B.H.Sc (Acup)

Preparing for the birth of your child is a massive journey. Well for me it definitely was. For the first time mother childbirth is an enigma. There is so much about birthing to explore and on all levels physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually we as women must delve deep inside and transform, transmute and open ourselves so that a new being may enter through us out into this world. It’s extraordinary. For some the whole concept of childbirth is so terrifying, consciously or unconsciously that they want to be numbed to the whole thing and opt to go under the knife, or alternatively just put on a brave face and go into complete denial about the fears and the emotions going on inside of them.

When I became pregnant I suddenly became aware of how much our society breeds fear into us about childbirth. The biggest fear of all is the ‘pain’. Birthing is considered to be unnatural and labour is treated like an illness, with drugs and admission into hospital. Birth has become medicalised, impersonal and detached. Rates of intervention and caesarean sections are rising at a phenomenally rapid rate and account for up to 50% (and climbing) of births in some areas, with Australia leading the way.

Most women today have lost contact with their birthing power, belief and faith in their body and the memories and birthing rites of our foremothers.

I believe the way we enter the world and our first emotional imprint from this birthing experience sets up our psychological blueprint for life and ultimately effects how we experience and go out into the world. I have a huge desire to help change the ‘perception’ of birth in our motherland because as we heal birth we also heal the world. The more children born with love and into love, the more loving and peaceful our world will be.

There is a way acupuncture can help bring back the power of birth to women. Acupuncture can replace drugs as a natural pain reliever to those who do feel they would like to have some support available and also offers a natural approach to inducing labour. Acupuncture can also help so many more women achieve natural labours by helping to prepare your mind and body for labour. Also, the success rates for turning breech or mal-positioned babies with acupuncture and moxibustion (moxa) is very high, reducing the amount of breech related caesareans in hospitals. Breeched babies are not dangerous births in themselves, just more painful and possibly distressing. However, our  maternity departments never advocate or encourage breech natural births.

Breech Presentation

Studies have shown that the optimum time for turning breech babies with moxa is around 34 weeks, before the baby has grown too large. Since close to 50% of babies will have turned spontaneously by 36 weeks, many women don’t present for acupuncture until the midwife or doctor discusses the prospect of the foetus remaining breech until this time. We encourage women to have treatment and learn the moxa technique earlier (34 weeks) rather than later, however some babies still may turn as late as 38 or 39 weeks.

Acupuncture as a routine Pre-birth treatment

Pre-birth acupuncture refers to a series of treatments in the final weeks (from 36 weeks) of pregnancy to prepare a woman for childbirth. Acupuncture helps to ‘ripen’ the cervix for birth and certain points can be added to help the baby’s head fully engage in the pelvis, promoting a natural and efficient labour. Treatment can also be given to deal with other medical conditions that may arise at this time during pregnancy, such as pregnancy induced hypertension  and symptoms such as heart burn, back pain, energy levels and general well-being.

Clinical studies show a trend in woman who receive pre-birth  acupuncture to either go into spontaneous labour on or around their due dates, or, if an induction was required, to respond well to acupuncture treatment for induction and progress efficiently into a natural birth.

Pain Relief during labour

The analgesic (pain numbing) effect of acupuncture normally takes about 20 minutes after the pins have been inserted. Ear acupuncture can also be performed which frees up the woman to have an active labour. The pain sensation is not completely taken away, but it is made more bearable so that the woman is able to better breathe through the contractions without the extreme intensity that is sometimes experienced. Woman often report that they feel calm and relaxed from the acupuncture.

If you are unable to have an acupuncturist available at your birth, acupressure on these specific points can also be taught prior to childbirth to the woman’s partner or attending support person. Women who have experienced acupressure during labour also report a numbing effect on their pain levels and greater relaxation levels.

Difficult or prolonged labour

In certain circumstances, acupuncture would be the treatment of choice if contractions have weakened in strength, rhythm or regularity or if they are totally absent. Labour can go on for days for women when there are energetic imbalances in the body, emotional blockages or the woman is holding on to deep fears. Long labours are tiring and if uterine contractions are insufficient for too long, intervention is often required.

Studies show that acupuncture greatly reduces the duration that women spend in labour by stimulating regular, rhythmic and efficient contractions.

Preparing emotionally and mentally for labour

Is birth meant to be painful? Or is it just our fears, emotions and inability to surrender and breathe into sensation that causes our muscles to tighten up and our bodies to feel pain?

Throughout my first pregnancy I felt the most important thing to do was explore deeply all the fears that I had surrounding birth and motherhood and to talk about and express all emotions as they came up. Acupuncture also supported me to balance my emotions and abate any fears which were stored in the organs, tissues and glands of my body.  It was a powerful therapy to clear and calm my mind in preparation for labour.

Women have been given the most precious and priceless gift; creation. We must take back the power of birth and rejoice its magnificence. Conscious birthing provides women with the greatest opportunity to open up spiritually and connect and merge with the divine.

Acupuncture is helping more women and babies achieve a natural, efficient and harmonious birth. 

©Eeka King 2012

If you are pregnant and would like to book in an appointment or find out more information, call 02 66851088 or email Eeka at Bayside Acupuncture and Herbal Medicine clinic in Brunswick Heads.