CONTROL

We are losing control in our world ... everywhere we look people are out of control, spending, eating, gaming, working, etc.  I could go on forever.  What is it that is facilitating this "out of control" world?  Lack of purpose, diet, society?  Maybe all and even more!

But all the while we are out of control ourselves we are still trying to control things around us.  In the past our family was involved with a very controlling family.  They wanted to get us out of their lives and we really didn't care one way or the other but instead of just ignoring us, they went out of their way to make life terrible for us.

Yes strange ...  I know

(there is a lot more to this story but I won't go into it here.  You will probably read about it in "It Takes Two" since it was a real trouble spot in our marriage.)

I have just met a young person recently whom has some depression and other medical issues.  I'll call this person, Jordan, since that name is neither male nor female and their identity will be protected.

Jordan is the oldest in his/her family and I truly believe the parents do not want to let go.  Why?  Because letting your children grow up is a sign that you are getting old.  Jordan's age is early 20's past 21 and Jordan wants to get on with his/her life, but because of the medical and depression issues the parents find it necessary to control their child's every move.  Even to the point of shipping them off to a medical facility.  Now I'm not saying they shouldn't go .. but what I am saying is if Jordan agreed to go then let him/her live their life.

Help your child make decisions even if means letting them make wrong decisions.  Now I know depression is a hard thing to watch your child go through ... I have watched it .. and I myself have gone through it, but really you will never make it out of the pit, unless you take a leap of faith.  

The fact that these parents are continuing to control Jordan and his/her coming and goings means only that they continue to facilitate the very thing they want to stop.  Jordan feels like if things go wrong they will be his/her fault because that is what Jordan's Mom told him/her.

So what does this have to do with diet?  Or God?

I'm glad you asked that! 

 ... first we need to find our security in God.  When we lean on Him for our every need and desire. Our need to control then goes away ... we know He is in control.  And what better BEING, than God, for us to allow to control our lives then the creator of universe.

If Jordan's parents had faith they could let go of Jordan, knowing that God loves Jordan more than they do ... You know when I realized that Jesus loved my kids more than me ... I was like ...

wait a minute ... that is impossible ... I gave up my body for nine months then another couple of years to nurse them, then 18-23+ more to help them grow up ... in fact I'm not done!

The Lord spoke to me only 4 words ...

"I died for them."

Ok ...I said you win ...

I love the Lord ... so few words but such great meaning ...

The other area .. diet ...

our food source is getting worse and more contaminated with GMOs, pesticides, chemicals, antibiotics, drugs, ... the list goes on ... and so ... without proper nutrition our bodies do not work properly ... our brains can not think or process things properly ... so we make bad decisions ...

What to do?

Detox, Detox, Detox ...
Read labels
Stay away from GMOs
Stay away from processed foods
Stay away from sugar, conventional meats, and vegetables, gluten, soy .... EAT RAW! 

I know this is hard ... but you will feel better ... and if you can't knock these things out ... then Detox ... more ...

And oh ....

                take a leap of faith!  

Sleep

Sleep is a true necessity .... I wish I could sleep for few days and not feel guilty.

It appears that sleep is necessary for the brain to function properly.  You know that if you have had a poor night's sleep you find it hard to concentrate during the day.  Experts are saying that in the western industrialized nations sleep deprivation is becoming the norm.  Burning the candle at both ends as many do can cause a person to have mircosleeps.  These are marked by brief periods in the day that you just drop off.  Or if you fall asleep within five minutes of lying down.

I think I should sleep for a few days....

I lay down and slept;
I awoke, for the Lord sustained me. Psalm 3:5

GM Contamination

Did you know to control native cane beetles in Australia, in 1935 101 toads were introduced to the continent.  It failed, now Australia is overrun by the toads and is one of Australia's worst environmental mistakes, ranking alongside the catastrophic introduction of rabbits.  I didn't even know they didn't have rabbits there naturally!

So what is my point ... GMO is also an environmental mistake.  

"GM contamination of conventional and organic food is increasing. An unapproved GM rice that was grown for only one year in field trials was found to have extensively contaminated the US rice supply and seed stocks.* In Canada, the organic oilseed rape industry has been destroyed by contamination from GM rape.** In Spain, a study found that GM maize “has caused a drastic reduction in organic cultivations of this grain and is making their coexistence practically impossible”.*** 

The time has come to choose between a GM- based, or a non-GM-based, world food supply. 


*  Risky business: Economic and regulatory impacts from the unintended release of genetically engineered rice varieties into the rice merchandising system of the US. Blue, Dr E. Neal, report for Greenpeace, 2007, http://www. greenpeace.org/raw/content/international/press/reports/ risky-business.pdf


**Seeds of doubt: North American farmers’ experience of GM crops. Soil Association, 2002, http://www.soilassociation. org/seedsofdoubt 

***Coexistence of plants and coexistence of farmers: Is an individual choice possible? Binimelis, R., Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, Vol. 21, No. 2, April 2008 


So my point is God gave us the garden and then cast us out because we didn't listen.  Now through our toil and sweat we grow our own foods ... or run to Giant Eagle! But we want it easy! And we want it cheap.  And, we continue to not listen and destroy His foods.  Look, I'm not a environmental crazy but I do know that the world's food supply is in jeopardy.

More on GMO

So what is a GMO?  And what is all the hype about labeling?  Genetically modified (GM) foods are created using biotechnology to change their genetic material. 

Examples of What Genetically Modified Means:

Crops - toxin genes from a bacterium found in soil are inserted in the plant DNA which make the plant produce toxins specially deadly to the larvae of their pest insects
Soybeans - modified to tolerate high levels of weed killing herbicides
Farm Animals - pigs, cows, and chickens modified to have a faster growth rate.  Cows can produce milk that contain higher levels of bioactive milk protein or human blood clotting components or a human breast milk component.

Foods That Have Been Modified on the Market Today:

Maize (corn)

Wheat 

Rice 

Oilseed rape (canola)

Chicory

Squash

Potato

Soybean

Alfalfa

Cotton

Benefits  Of GM Foods:

Sturdy plants able to withstand weather extremes

Better quality
Larger quantity 

Higher nutritional yield***

Great shelf Life (tomatoes last longer, they also bounce)

Crops resistance to diseases and insects

So the benefits to the food industry are an increased shelf life, resistant to pesticides and insecticides, and improvement to the crop nutritional yield***.

Wow I just made a case for GMOs ... here is some other facts. Get ready for some heavy stuff.

Chinese researchers have found small pieces of rice ribonucleic acid (RNA) in the blood and organs of humans who eat rice.  The Nanjing University-based team showed that this genetic material will bind to receptors in human liver cells and influence the uptake of Cholesterol from the blood.  This is not the normal cholesterol** but that which collects and causes blood disease.  This type of RNA in question is called microRNA (miRNA) and has been implicated as players in several human diseases including cancer, Alzheimer's, and diabetes.  They turn or shut down certain genes that would prevent such things as diabetes. 

When used on crops, miRNA can make insects sterile or kill them when ingested.  It also changes the genes of the insects. This is cause for some concern since genetically humans and insects have a lot in common. If miRNA can survive the human digestive system, which the Chinese researchers have found to be true, then it is possible that miRNA could also affect humans with adverse conditions.

Now that is a brain full of information!
Here are examples of why GMOs are dangerous.


I personally like lists!

Higher levels of plant estrogens 

Contain unknown toxins

Risk of negative interactions

No long term research

Unknown Genetic effect on Humans

Higher fat content in foods

Insect and weed resistance (What is wrong with this?  Weeds and Insects become resilient, so they become more of a problem)

Little information available

More Allergens 

Claimed to have higher nutritional value, but our bodies do not recognize and so there is less absorption
Lack of Regulations on Labeling

Here is an article and action you can take to push through labeling of foods that contain GMOs:

Take Action, Demand Labeling

**Cholesterol has a place in the body.  It has many functions which I will address in another blog.  The dangerous cholesterol is not LDL nor the HDL.  WHAT???? When we lower our cholesterol we are actually making our cholesterol smaller. The smaller cholesterol causes the problems, and it moves through the blood and gets caught in places it isn't supposed to be.  Like I said, more on this in a later blog.

***Higher nutritional value but there is some debate as to whether or not humans can absorb the nutrition from the plant, or if the body refuses the food.   

 

Asian Diet vs American Diet

So why do Asians seem to eat soy without the health concerns?  Well, first of all they aren't eating the same types of soy that is in the American diet or as much.  Epidemiological* studies have shown that Asians, particularly in Japan and China, have a lower incidence of breast and prostate cancer than people in the United States, and many of these studies credit a traditional diet that includes soy. I personally do not believe soy is the only reason. Asians consume much more raw food than Americans.  

Studies showing the dark side of soy dates back 100 years," says clinical nutritionist Kaayla Daniel, author of The Whole Soy Story (New Trends, 2005)."The Asian diet does include small amounts--about nine grams a day--of primarily fermented soy products, such as miso, natto, and tempeh, and some tofu. Fermenting soy creates health-promoting probiotics, the good bacteria our bodies need to maintain digestive and overall wellness. By contrast, in the United States, processed soy food snacks or shakes can contain over 20 grams of non-fermented soy protein in one serving." **More than double the amount the Asians are consuming.  And think about it ... if you are trying to lose weight, you might have a protein bar for breakfast, protein shake for lunch, another protein bar for a snack. Then maybe a meal for supper, and lets pretend that the meal you are eating does not contain any processed food.  Probably you have consumed 60 grams of soy in one day alone.  Compare that to the 9 grams the Asian diet contains.  And remember they eat many more vegetables than Americans.

"Industry discovered soy and found that lots of money could be made from the plant, every part of the bean makes a profit. Soy oil has become the base for most vegetable oils; soy lecithin, the waste product left over after the soybean is processed, is used as an emulsifier; soy flour appears in baked and packaged goods; different forms of processed soy protein are added to everything from animal feed to muscle-building protein powders. 'Soy protein isolate was invented for use in cardboard,' Daniel says. 'It hasn't actually been approved as a food ingredient.'"**

"Soy is everywhere in our food supply, as the star in cereals and health-promoting foods and hidden in processed foods. Even if you read every label and avoid cardboard boxes, you are likely to find soy in your supplements and vitamins (look out for vitamin E derived from soy oil), in foods such as canned tuna, soups, sauces, breads, meats (injected under poultry skin), and chocolate, and in pet food and body-care products. It hides in tofu dogs under aliases such as textured vegetable protein, hydrolyzed vegetable protein, and lecithin -- which is troubling, since the processing required to hydrolyze soy protein into vegetable protein produces excitotoxins such as glutamate (think MSG) and aspartate (a component of aspartame), which cause brain-cell death."**

Switching to organic soy isn't the answer either.  Soybeans naturally contain plant estrogens, toxins, and anti-nutrients.  These can not be removed from the plant.

Taking a look at each one of these substances; anti-nutrients block the body's ability to digest properly, mainly trypsin inhibitors; which limits the amount of energy the body has to use and process.  The result is a lack of proper absorption of what the body needs.

The toxins that the many articles I read referred to haemagglutinin a clot-promoting substance that causes red blood cells to lump together. Think blood clot ...

Along with the trypsin, heamagglutinin is a  growth inhibitor.  Makes you wonder why so many mothers use soy formula.  Goitrogens, which are also in soy, are substances that depress thyroid function.  In the last decade the US has reported a rise in thyroid disease, in humans as well as America's pets.  Soy is highly used in pet foods.

Lastly, plant estrogens (phytoestogens), which have been highly debated, almost as much as soy in the American diet is the last one I will look at in this entry.  Some experts feel that phytoestogens are great for replacing estrogen in a woman after menopause, while others say they are the main cause of cancer in menopausal women.  Some claim that phytoestogens have lead to the rise of infertility in younger American women.  Phytoestrogens are readily absorbed into the body, circulate in plasma and are excreted in the urine.   

*Epidemiology is the study of the distribution and patterns of health-events, health-characteristics and their causes or influences in well-defined populations.

**Parts of the information in this blog are from The Dark Side of Soy by Mary Vance from Terrain.

The Tiny Powerhouse in Your Body

Your adrenal glands are a powerhouse of energy.  They are about the size of walnuts.  They are best known for the their ability to aid in the fear or flight response while experiencing stressful situations.  There have been reports of real cases of unbelievable strength in people, demonstrated by lifting very heavy objects off loved ones.  I remember watching an episode of "I Love Lucy;" Lucy lifts a washing machine off someone in a department store and she is proclaimed a hero. She retains her strength throughout most of the episode, but loses it when another person is stuck. Lucy flexes and then attempting to use her super strength tries to lift the heavy object but she fails. Of course we are entertained by her attempts and the many faces she makes.  Lucy received the ability to lift heavy objects during an emergency situation and then lost it when another emergency arose. I'm sure that this isn't a documented event, but I do know we are given unbelievable strength or speed when the need arises.

The adrenals aid in the fear or flight but they do so much more.

It is also your adrenal glands' job to keep your body's reactions to stress in balance so that they are appropriate and not harmful. For example, the protective activity of anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant adrenal hormones like cortisol helps to minimize reactions like swelling and inflammation in situations ranging from allergies to autoimmune disorders. Also these hormones closely modulate many metabolic processes:

the utilization of carbohydrates and fats

the conversion of fats and proteins into energy

the distribution of stored fat  – especially around your waist (the spare tire) and at the sides of your face

normal blood sugar regulation

proper cardiovascular function

gastrointestinal function

The adrenals kick in to replace the hormones that give women a sex drive after menopause. Your adrenal glands are small but so important.  

 

What happens when you over use your adrenal glands?  How do you over use your adrenal glands?  Athletes have been known to have trouble when they over train.  Usually the body exhibits this by restless legs and insomnia.  The most common condition, that actually encompasses the above conditions is called Adrenal Fatigue.  This condition can affect other glands in the body, the thyroid being the main one.

 

Adrenal fatigue is a dangerous syndrome that is diagnosed when your glands work below normal levels. Usually this happens when you are in a situation of prolonged stress or illness.  Adrenal fatigue can wreak havoc with your life.

 

Here is a web site where I found an adrenal fatigue test along with loads of information. Run by Future Formulations.  Some of the above information is from that site.  The site has many helpful tools and plans for adrenal support.  Dr. Wilson provides programs for de-stressing.  Stress will cause your adrenal glands to overwork, which leads to adrenal fatigue.  Adrenal Fatigue

 

Lastly I am no expert when it comes to Adrenals but I am experiencing moderate adrenal fatigue myself.   Our church service really is a help to me when my adrenals are going full force.  Below is an event that got me started looking into the Adrenal glands as I was thinking about getting into worship but feeling like I didn't have the energy.   

So ...I starting thinking, what gets you excited at a sporting event?  Well, it is your adrenals, they give you the energy to cheer and root for your team, but also yell at the refs!  But I also have noticed that in church when the Worship Leader starts with a upbeat song, I get into worship quicker.  Last night our Worship Leader started with a medium beat song, but because my adrenals were already flowing from the day's activity, I got right into the song.  On some Sunday mornings, I find it hard to jump into the song or worship because I am not awake. I need a warm up to get going, so take note Worship Leaders; want to create energy in the service?  Start Upbeat!  Besides it matches the natural rhythm of the body.  Think about it .. we need to warm up to exercise, you just don't jump right into a heavy workout or stretching.  One last thing .. it gets me into worship on time when I hear the music and it is upbeat.

So What's Wrong With SOY?

Recently I went to my son and daughter-in-law's for a visit.  My son is into raw nutrition.  He also has been teaching a summer course on nutrition at a community college. So while being there he shared some of his course information with his dad and I.  One of the main things he suggested was to for me to take all soy out of my diet.  I exercise and thought I ate right but had a huge stomach.  Most of time I held it in but lately I couldn't even do that anymore.  My son said that if I take the soy out my stomach would reduce.  I thought I ate only a small amount of soy and didn't think that the soy I ate was a problem, but when I started reading the labels I was shocked how much soy I was really eating. 

First off my protein bars first ingredient was soy and then again twice down the list.  I'm gluten free, so I started reading all my labels.  Soy was in almost everything I was eating.   Over the next few days I am going to share with you the wisdom of my son's nutrition and what I have found out while researching soy.

The media tells us that soy is a health food so we feel good about eating it.  But God created soy to be used as a soil refresher.  Farmers in Asia would plant soy alternating years to replenish the soil.  At first they never ate it just plowed it under before planting the next years crop of rice.
Most soy is GMO .. Genetically Modified (this is a whole other topic but just take it from me right now ... avoid GMO foods, I talk more about that later)
Soy is loaded with trypsin Inhibitors, trypsin is an enzyme that helps you digest protein.  So when you eat soy your body's ability to digest protein is inhibited.

Tomorrow ... more reasons to why you shouldn't eat soy.  Until then read the labels and eat up what you have so you can move towards a Soy Free Diet.

PS ... Fermented soy is ok in moderation. An example of that would be Soy Sauce.  Not Tofu...

Soy??? Should I or Shouldn't I?

I am going to start a series on soy and GMOs but first a question.

I have removed most if not all soy from my diet and I have never had body odor before, in fact my husband teased me that I must be alien since I didn't stink.  But now I do... Has any one ever heard of body odor being caused by taking soy out of your diet?

Mandy Pitinkin ... Gideon the best of the best!

Ok so I could go on about soy or GMO's .. but another day... right now I'm obsessing over Mandy Pitinkin!  Not only can the man act, is passionate about Israel, BUT he can SING ... and my favorite song of all times. Over The Rainbow!  I love his voice.  Over the Rainbow

My husband and I are presently watching season one of Criminal Minds.  I know why Mandy left and I do understand his thinking but if his counterpart is working anywhere with the FBI;  then the thought that comes to mind is that, I am so thankful for those whom are working the horrific crimes and hopefully solving them.
As far as Mandy's acting.  It is superb!  The connection he makes with his fellow actors and audience is wonderful.  Although Joe Mantegna, (David Rossi) is good ... Mandy as Gideon is a much better character.  Being an actor myself, I know the concentration it takes to create a character so real that the audience has to believe that they truly exist somewhere in the world.  Mandy has done that with Gideon. When the actor creates a character so real he/she takes it all home and so my guess is that played a role to his decision to leave.  I would love a showdown with Rossi and Gideon, as they meet some old unsub that both have investigated.  I would love to be that unsub of course, who wouldn't! 

It would be great just to see him return and I believe would bring a wonderful refreshment to the show.  I know Spencer would love him around, even if for a couple of shows.  CBS can you do it?  Convince Mandy he should return?