Nutritional Needs

Nutritional Needs

Most people are unaware of some of the most basic fundamentals of proper nutrition. This has a lot to do with misinformation intended to keep large agricultural companies making money. It’s easier and more profitable to grow large monocultures like corn or soy with toxic pesticides, herbicides, and chemical fertilizers than it is to grow a variety of fruits and vegetables organically with nutrient-rich soil. This is especially true because of government subsidies for farmers. This is one of the reasons the United States of America grows such an overabundance of corn and soy.

So what does that have to do with nutrition?

Well, the conventional process of growing food uses dangerous chemicals and depletes the soil of numerous minerals. The more these large companies keep people in the dark about the dangers and differences of conventional vs local and organic food the more they will sell. Big agriculture companies do this using lobbyist to help manipulate government and public information. This is why the old food pyramid that I learned as a kid is much different than it is now. The foundation of this terribly inaccurate guide for healthy kids was lots of grain. We now know that all these processed flours and bread are just one of the reasons for our increase in obesity.
Follow the money and you will typically see more unethical and unhealthy practices with your food. What kind of food is actually healthy and provides good nutrition? Here are a few basic tenets for good nutrition.

1. Quality

1.  Closer is better. Locally grown, in-season food. The farther the food travels to get to you the more likely that waxes or other sealers are present to prevent spoiling. This is very common in apples or cucumbers and is very hard to remove. Local farmers are far less likely to do this because they are producing on a small scale that doesn’t have to stay on the shelf for longer. This means the nutritional quality of the food will be better instead of just “looking” better.

2.  Organic. No pesticides, poisons or synthetic fertilizers. Synthetic fertilizers provide only the basic macro-nutrients needed to make them look good and weigh more. Farmers are paid for size and look not for nutrient quality.

3.  Variety. Most types of vegetables have been bred for size and stability in order to make more money and last longer on the shelf. This results in a lack of different types of food and can make it even more likely that the food less nutritious because

 Man Vs. Nature

1. The less adulterated your food the better. There is no apple product that is healthier than a freshly picked organic apple. The same can be true of virtually all foods. Food is always processed to increase profit and not nutritional quality. For example, pasteurization increases the shelf life of juice and milk. This means less waste and more money. However, this process destroys many of the live enzymes and vitamins during the heating process. Raw non-pasteurized foods will always be healthier.

2. High Fructose Corn Syrup is another example of a highly processed food that becomes a dangerous substance. High Fructose Corn is linked to obesity, diabetes, heart disease, reduced immune function, tooth decay, and more. You will find no such correlation with eating fresh organic corn.

3. Organic is not always best. While organic food is better than GMO it’s important to realize that it’s not healthy just because it’s organic. If you eat organic High Fructose Corn Syrup you’re still eating a very unhealthy and highly processed substance. Being organic just means that chemicals were not used to create it. This is better than not organic you’d be better off eating conventional corn that is fresh and local.

3. Supplements

1. It is very hard to get all the nutrients needed from food alone in our Western Culture. The emphasis on cheap, convenient and fast leaves us with fewer healthy high nutrition food choices. The same problem is seen in vitamin and mineral supplements. Most are cheap highly process, pieces of vitamins and minerals with much less nutritional value when compared to minimally processed whole food supplements.

2. Bigger isn’t always better. Most people have been fooled into thinking that the more of a particular vitamin or mineral in a supplement the better. This is like looking at a pig or chicken production and assuming that the bigger it is the healthier. Unfortunately, it is very common for these unhealthy grain-based diets, genetic modification cage and other processed to be used in order to increase the product size for increased profit.

3. Getting quality nutrition from supplements can be challenging. Like food, most supplements are produced with a lot of processing, chemical, and heat. Many vitamin or mineral supplements are created from coal tar or crude oil instead of actual food. If you’re taking supplements and you don’t know if they are helping they are probably not. Often the reason they aren’t helping is that they are most closely related to pharmaceutical chemicals than food. As a result, they are not easily assimilated by the body. New research is even starting to show that some of these supplements can have negative side effects when taken or long periods of time. Supplements made from whole foods and minimally processed are not only safer but are much more effective at improving your health. The reason for this is because they nutritional benefit of foods and supplement is not in just high concentrations of one or even a few vitamins or minerals that are highly processed. This is like eating corn syrup instead of corn and expecting a health benefit. Yes, you have a lot more calories but you lose a LOT of nutritional value of the whole food when you separate the many other vitamins and minerals from their whole food form.

4. Find a trusted source. Supplements are not highly regulated. This means that the quality and composition of supplements can widely vary. It is not uncommon for larger manufacturing companies to used fillers like sugar or other cheap substance in their supplements. Even many “whole-food” supplements companies have been found to use very little of the beneficial parts of the plant or food claimed to be in the supplement. I.e. an herbal supplement where the beneficial part of the plant is in the leaves may use the entire plant including branches, and roots as a filler. This can reduce the potency of the supplement but increase the profit. This is why it is imperative that you find a capable and trustworthy doctor to guide towards quality supplements so you don’t waste your money.

5. I have found Standard Process and Mediherb to be the best quality. These are the only supplements that focus on the nutritional quality in whole food form instead of highly processed and concentrated pharmaceuticals like vitamins and minerals. Standard Process and MediHerb, when used properly, have shown significant improvements in my patients’ health and nutritional needs.

If you would like help finding safe and effective whole food supplements to improve your health call us to set up a nutritional exam. We can do very noninvasive testing to determine what nutritionally dense supplements will likely benefit you the most.