The Wonders of Water: Amazing Secrets for Health and Wellness

Water prevents and helps to cure heartburn.
Heartburn is a signal of water shortage in the upper part of the gastrointestinal tract. It is a major thirst signal of the human body. The use of antacids or tablet medications in the treatment of this pain does not correct dehydration, and the body continues to suffer as a result of its water shortage.

Not recognizing heartburn as a sign of dehydration and treating it with antacids and pill medications will, in time, produce inflammation of the stomach and duodenum, hiatal hernia, ulceration, and eventually cancers in the gastrointestinal tract, including the liver and pancreas.

Water prevents and helps to cure arthritis.
Rheumatoid joint pain - arthritis - is a signal of water shortage in the painful joint. It can affect the young as well as the old. The use of pain-killers does not cure the problem, but exposes the person to further damage from pain medications. Intake of water and small amounts of salt will cure this problem.

Water prevents and helps to cure back pain.
Low back pain and ankylosing arthritis of the spine are signs of water shortage in the spinal column and discs - the water cushions that support the weight of the body. These conditions should be treated with increased water intake - not a commercial treatment, but a very effective one.

Not recognizing arthritis and low back pain as signs of dehydration in the joint cavities and treating them with pain-killers, manipulation, acupuncture, and eventually surgery will, in time, produce osteoarthritis when the cartilage cells in the joints have eventually all died. It will produce deformity of the spine. It will produce crippling deformities of the limbs. Pain medications have their own life-threatening complications.

We hear this all the time; be prepared and you will perform well.  Whether it’s for a meeting with your boss, a presentation for your class, or being ready for the big game, the more time you put into it, the better off you will be.  Why is it though that we tend to overlook preparation when it comes to our health and nutrition?  Too often we turn to poor choices because we did not plan ahead. Not having food in the freezer or refrigerator often leads to stopping at a fast food restaurant in order to quiet the stomach rumbling.  Immediately following the absorption of these calorie and sodium packed meals, we often wonder why we feel so bad.  Instead of pointing the finger at the super-sized meal, let’s point the finger at a lack of preparation.  Try these helpful and healthful tips to ensure proper performance throughout the day, no matter what challenges you might face.

The first step to preparation begins with writing out a grocery list.  As you put this list together, think about all of the foods on the perimeter of the grocery story—fruits, vegetables, deli meats, and freshly cut chickens, steaks, and fishes.  While the fruits and vegetables are packed with healthy nutrients, vitamins, and minerals, the lean meats are loaded with muscle feeding proteins.  These nutritious foods should make-up the majority of your grocery list.  While completing your list, think about some different meal combinations to put together each night of the week.  Try mixing different colored vegetables with multiple sources of lean meats.  Broccoli, zucchini, squash, and a yellow or red pepper serve as a tasty compliment to a chicken or turkey breast. 

Paleolithic Diet

The Paleolithic Diet ("Paleo" is a common abbreviation) is based on eating foods that our Paleolithic ancestors ate. The "Paleolithic" refers to the Paleolithic Age, which is a formal time period on Geologic Time Charts from about 2,500,000 years ago to about 10,000 years ago. The premise is that during the Paleolithic, we evolved a specific genome that has only changed 0.01 per cent in these last 10,000 years. However, during this recent time span mass agriculture, grains/grain products, sugars/sugar products, dairy/dairy products, and a plethora of processed foods have all been introduced as a regular part of the human diet. We are not eating the foods we are genetically and physiologically adapted to eat (99.9% of our genetic profile is still Paleolithic); and the discordance is an underlying cause for much of the "diseases of civilization", "syndrome X", obesity, and  "diseases of old age" that are so epidemic in our society today.

As Dr. Cordain and others' scientific research reveal - the evolutionary, genetic, and clinical evidence point to a natural (i.e., unprocessed foods), omnivorous diet as the healthiest way to eat. Dr. Cordain's research shows that 70% of the average caloric intake of Americans is from foods that did not even exist for our Paleolithic ancestors. This discordance is having tremendously negative health consequences for our society as a whole.

Our genes determine our optimum diet, and our genes evolved according to the environments in which our ancient ancestors lived, including the foods they ate. Our Paleolithic ancestors did not eat just one single diet, but rather they ate within a range of natural, unprocessed diets - depending on variables like geography, climate, competition, ecologic niche, season, and glaciations. All of these Paleolithic diets did share some universal characteristics, though:

Some Paleolithic Diet Details - the ingredients

1. Eat whole, fresh, unprocessed, natural foods.
2. Eat only foods that will spoil, but eat them before they do.
3. Eat naturally-raised proteins including fish, seafood,
   poultry, beef, lamb, game, organ meats and eggs.
4. Eat whole, naturally-produced milk products, preferably
   raw milk and butter or fermented products such as whole
   yogurt, whole cheeses and fresh raw sour cream.
5. Use only traditional fats and oils including butter and
   other animal fats, extra virgin olive oil, expeller expressed
   sesame and flax oil and the tropical oils – coconut
   and palm.