Category Archives: ecology

GAPS

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More from the book Gut and Psychology Syndrome by Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride….

p.321

Top Ten Influences which boost immunity:

1.  Fresh animal fats (from meats and dairy) and cholesterol-rich foods (particularly raw egg yolks).  [Dr. Campbell-McBride emphasizes that cholesterol is very beneficial, despite the false promotion of junk science saying otherwise.]

2.  Cold-pressed oils:   olive oil, fish oils, nut and seed oils.

3.  Onions and garlic.

4.  Freshly pressed veggie & fruit juices. [the fresh foods have enzymes that help your body to digest them properly. ]

5.  Regular consumption of greens:  parsley, dill, coriander, spring onion and garlic, etc. [word of caution: coriander has an effect on mercury mobilization, and it’s not been researched so there is no reliable info. on whether it carries it out of the body, too.]

6.  Probiotic supplementation and fermented foods. [She explains that gut flora is seriously compromised in most of the population, and these will help restore normal flora.]

7.  Contact with animals:  horses, dogs, etc.  Having a pet in the family can do a lot for children’s immune status.

8.  Swimming in unpolluted natural waters:  lakes, rivers, sea.**

9.  Physical activity in the fresh air.

10.  Exposure to sunlight and sensible sunbathing.

**These are non-chlorinated swimming pools.  Pretty cool, eh?

…and if you prefer to do it yourself, Mother Earth News has this for you.  They lose me with advocating man-made materials, however, but you’ll get the basics from the article.

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Next, Dr. Campbell-McBride has a list of the Top Ten Influences that damage immunity:

1.  Sugar and everything containing it:  sweets, soft drinks, confectionery, ice cream, etc.  [she does, however, allow natural honey…whew]

2.  Processed carbohydrates:  cakes, biscuits, crisps, snacks, breakfast cereals, white bread, and pasta.

3.  Chemically altered and artificial fats:  margarine, cooking and vegetable oils, processed foods with these. [basically, the more they change the structure of the food, the worse it is for you–raw and fermented being the best foods.]

4.  Lack of high quality protein in the diet, from meats, fish eggs, dairy products, nuts and seeds.  [Dr. Campbell-McBride writes quite a bit against the vegetarian diet.  She says that the proteins in the plants are not easily absorbed/digested by our digestive systems.  I was a vegetarian from 1998-ish to 2006, when I was advised to start eating meat because of severe anemia, so I understand what she’s saying, but I had hopes that once I was well again that I could go back to vegetarian, but it doesn’t look promising.]

5.  Exposure to man-made chemicals:  cleaning and washing chemicals, personal care products, paints, fire retardants, petrochemicals, pesticides, etc.

6.  Exposure to man-made radiation:  electronic screens: TV, computer, play stations; mobile phones, high-powered electricity lines, nuclear stations, nuclear waste, anti-cancer medication, anti-viral drugs.

7.  Drugs:  antibiotics, steroids, antidepressants, painkillers, anti-cancer medication, anti-viral drugs.

8.  Lack of fresh air and physical activity.

9.  Lack of exposure to sunlight.

10.  Lack of exposure to common microbes in the environment. […]  Living in too sterilized environment is strongly associated with compromised immunity.

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More from the book:

p.71  […]  In an old Textbook of Psychiatry by Henderson and Gillespie, published in 1937, it is clearly stated:  “A thorough physical examination is absolutely essential in every case–schizophrenics are commonly poorly nourished”.  […]  Deficiencies in vitamins (such as niacin, or B3, B6, B12, B1, folic acid, Vitamin C)and many minerals (such as magnesium, zinc, manganese, etc.) are routinely recorded in schizophrenic patients.[…]  U.S. professor Curtis Dohan, M.D., devoted many years to researching what connection digestive abnormalities in schizophrenic patients may have with their psychological state.

…Dr. Dohan found that symptoms of schizophrenia could be dramatically relieved by cutting all grains…

He also found that some cultures in the South Pacific which never consumed grains, had no schizophrenia.  Only when they adopted a Western diet full of grains did they stat getting cases of schizophrenia.  Another good example is Ireland, where people did not consume wheat until the potato famine in 1845.  Before then there were no cases of schizophrenia or coeliac disease recorded in Ireland.

(I can’t find it now, but I had seen a link a while back where Germans also suffer from gluten intolerance.  They observed that schizophrenia went down dramatically during WWII, when grains were scarce.  So, yeah, I have both German/Irish genes, so I’m pretty much SOL in the gluten department.)

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I know this diet is spot on–but it’s not easy.  Dr. Campbell-McBride has a list of allowed foods and non-allowed foods.  She eliminates ALL grains, so I was correct in my thinking that I couldn’t eat rice nor potatoes (carbs).

On the non-allowed foods, I got to…chocolate.  Read it again to make sure that I hadn’t misread it….

Chocolate?  She wants me to give up chocolate?  Was she freaking crazy?  I didn’t think I could do it….*anything* but chocolate…

…so I ate a bunch of chocolate…

…and felt so awful that I thought I’d have to at least give it a shot.

I’m at day five…and holding my own.  I have a fear that closer to *that* time of the month, however, I’ll be craving it like crazy and will lose the battle…

On the more positive side, I have lost fifteen pounds since March.  And my gut is less swollen.  It’s freaking amazing. 🙂

The History

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…of this land has been horribly twisted to put white European settlers as some sort of heroes, when the truth is far from that.

From Indian Country, exploring the Native American side of that history. Contrary to belief, this land was not a “wilderness”, but a carefully cultivated eco-system that worked, amazingly, for 10,000+ years…and it took the Europeans only a few hundred years to trash the place…

There are several links at the bottom of the story.  I don’t have time to click on all of them, but did this one.  When I told my son about the smallpox infested blankets, he didn’t believe me.  He couldn’t imagine someone being so evil.   Bio-warfare, like drones, is a coward’s way to win at war–“if we can’t win by our physical and mental stamina, we’ll cheat and introduce a disease that will knock them out…” Sickening.

Monsanto’s toadies…

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organic consumers has this link up to the toadies willing to do Monsanto’s bidding.

From the article:

Only food packers and processors will be effected. Farmers and grocers are not responsible for food labels. Farmers of crops that can be genetically engineered are already aware of what they’re growing. Genetically engineered seed is patented, branded and marketed as GMO.

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More on the GMO labeling fight. (hat tip to organic consumers)

Oregon is also getting in the fight.

 

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Onto other environmental issues–

The Japan nuclear nightmare might not be “over” as they would like to proclaim.  This article is pretty depressing….”Chernobyl on steroids.”  Makes you feel all warm and cozy inside…/snark

Farm bill 2012

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Environmental Working Group’s take on Farm Bill 2012. (hat tip to organic consumers)

Instead, legislators created an expensive new entitlement program (called “shallow loss”) that guarantees nearly 90 percent of the income of farm businesses already enjoying record profits. It also leaves untouched a bloated $9-billion-a-year crop insurance program that pays about 60 percent of farmers’ crop insurance premiums, no matter how large the farm, and sends billions to crop insurance companies and their agents.

Most of the benefits of these proposed programs would flow to the big five commodity crops (corn, soy, cotton, rice and wheat) that provide feed for livestock, raw material for processed food and corn ethanol fuel for our cars. Not only would these proposals be highly inequitable and wasteful, but the new revenue guarantees, combined with unlimited insurance subsidies and high crop prices, will create powerful new incentives for growers to plow up fragile wetlands and grasslands and erase many of farming’s recent environmental gains.

 

I like that it at least adds monies for food stamp recipients to purchase locally grown food at farmer’s markets.  Great idea.  I actually made the suggestion to our housing authority folks to help us get some land to plant our own vegetables to raise organically.  *crickets*

 

Link to Craig Cox, of Environmental Working Group’s statement on it here.

Death by Delay…

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…or, would you like some neurological and heart disease in your formula, baby?

And the question begs to be asked:  Why are they putting flame retardants in children’s clothing when they have been associated with cancer, and other serious health affects?  Killing them inch by inch…

(Makes me glad that I sewed my kids’ pajamas…one less thing for them to be exposed to)

Even though Michelle Obama will promote organic food…well, organic food is great, but if you’re sleeping in chemicals every night for eight hours or so, it kinda negates the good of eating organic food.

Organic consumers.org has this up on the ever-increasing growth of Walmart and Michelle Obama.

And then there’s this.

So…yeah…it’s not hard to see why the Obama Administration hasn’t moved forward.

Whatever happened to looking forward, not backward? (just a little snarky)

Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride

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It’s weird how some things come together at the same time…(or not! 🙂

I was doing research on gut health, and came upon Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride’s book Gut and Psychology Syndrome.  I am still finishing up The Inconvenient Hero by Vincent Harding and then I had another book to read, before I got to this, but I think I’m going to check this out after seeing the video posted by a member of the mercury support group.  I can’t get it to post, but here’s the URL:

 

In just the first ten minutes of this video, Dr. Campbell-McBride re-states that all health begins in the gut….and, this was quite shocking–that lab experiments showed that those with compromised gut health were unable to chelate mercury/heavy metals.  Wow.

Okay, I wanted to post this really quick because the video lasts an hour and that’s all the time I have in the library.  Off to view the rest…

Free (Hidden) Speech

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Protestors against the pipeline were hidden out of view while supporters of the pipeline were given a prime location to vocalize.

When asked about this inequity, the police said, “they were probably on private property and have been given permission to be there by the property owner.” That private property was a public sidewalk, and we all know who really owns the sidewalks at the “pipeline crossroads of the world.”

There’s a note in the comments that this story originated on the 350.org website (scroll down), but there’s no mention of that on common dreams. Hmm…getting a little sloppy there, folks…