The Top Five Ways To Stay Healthy For The Holidays

By Rosanne Lindsay, ND

Holiday season is here and food is a central theme, beginning with Thanksgiving.  Thanksgiving is a time to acknowledge those people and things for which you are grateful. Gratitude reminds you that when you get stuck in life and feel overwhelmed, you can choose to see things differently. Practicing gratitude helps to free you up from judgment to see new solutions.

When it comes to health, how you navigate this time of year determines your success in staying healthy going forward into the New Year. If you were able to avoid indulging in all the sugar of Halloween, congratulations! But what will you do when faced with the challenges of all that food for Thanksgiving and the remainder of the year? And you are not in control of making that food.

If you don’t want to put “Losing Weight” at the top of your New Years Resolution’s list for the New Year, how do you stay healthy for the holidays?  Let us count the ways:

1. Be Choosy About What You Put Into Your Body.

See your body as a temple of your soul. Make a list of the foods to avoid so you are prepared when going into a meal prepared by others. Two Foods to Avoid? Sugar and Wheat.

Avoid Sugar 

Sugar becomes a food when you eat it as pastas, breads, cakes, and cookies. These carbohydrates break down to sugar in your body. Sugar, today, is genetically modified unless it has an organic label.

Sugar creates an acidic condition in your body. In this state, not only does your food not get broken down and digested, but it also ferments and feeds the pathogenic bacteria and yeast (known as Candida) in the gut to produce toxic byproducts. Yeast overgrowth is a common problem among many people. Yeast displaces your good bacteria, which creates the conditions of chronic disease.

It is the yeast in your body that causes sugar cravings. And sugar cravings cause blood sugar levels to swing, right along with mood. White sugar burns up B-vitamins, important for nerves and blood. Sugar depletes chromium, an important trace mineral for blood sugar balance. It displaces calcium, important for hormones, bones, and your ability to sleep through the night. Symptoms of nutrient loss illustrate the cascade of imbalances that lead to chronic disease.

You may not know that sugar has also been found to be as addictive as cocaine and heroin. It causes changes in the brain in ways very similar to drugs. In animal studies, bingeing released a surge of the neurotransmitter dopamine in the brain. When the sugar supply was withdrawn, animals became anxious. We experience the same changes as mood swings. Eating starch and sugar in the morning, makes it very difficult to control behavior because you’re craving sweets all day. So why not begin your day by eating protein and vegetables in the morning? A green smoothie or a vegetable omelet? Balancing blood sugar can also be done using spices or herbal tinctures, such as cinnamon, turmeric, cumin, coriander, chili powder, ginger, Holy Basil, as well as burdock root, rosemary, parsley, and fenugreek.

Avoid Wheat

Unless wheat is sprouted or organic, non-GMO, avoid it. Most wheat now contains the herbicide glyphosate, a chemical sprayed on wheat before harvest as a drying agent. This wheat harms both animals and humans, and is produced from the same corporation, Monsanto, that brought us Agent Orange. Just as Agent Orange destroyed everything in its path when dropped on the jungles of Vietnam during the war, the chemical warfare continues in our bodies as glyphosate-laced wheat.

While Monsanto officials claim glyphosate does not harm human cells, what they fail to disclose is that glyphosate destroys our bacteria’s Shikimate metabolic pathway. Since we are 10:1 bacteria to human cells, we are more microbe than human. Our microbes are in charge of our digestion and elimination. So when they stop working so do our digestive and elimination functions. Today’s wheat causes constipation.  If you do not have at least 2 bowel movements a day, consider yourself stopped up.

Most chronic diseases have poor digestion as a core cause. If you’re not digesting or absorbing your food, and not eliminating properly, you’re not only wasting your money but you are wasting away since empty calories mean you are not getting any nutrition to your cells.  You are not what you eat. You are what you absorb.

Gas and bloating is a big indicator of your body’s inability to digest and absorb your food. It is probably the most common symptom people complain about after indulging. As you get older it doesn’t get easier. So if you’re going to indulge over the holidays, and you cannot avoid certain foods, you can take enzymes or “bitters,” approximately 20 before you eat.

Enzymes or bitters help you digest and absorb your food better. An herbal bitters formula may include herbs such as gentian root, fenugreek seed, Oregon grape root, yarrow, dandelion root, orange peel, and peppermint.

2. Exercise Your Will Power.

A Healthy mind means a healthy body. If you want a strong will power, exercise it. Practice saying NO. No is very clear, it is not a yes and not a maybe. It’s like pregnancy, you either are or you’re not. There is no wiggle room with no.

3. Exercise Your Body.

If you can get outside and walk, that’s important for moving your lymph, increasing your heart rate, and supplying oxygen to your cells. It’s also good to get out with others in nature. Nature is shown to eliminate stress and relax the mind. Many studies out there show that. It also helps metabolism to burn those extra calories you may be ingesting. So move your body.

4. Detox.

You can safely and easily detox over the holidays to feel better and stay healthy.  I recommend taking a solution of an edible clay in water (1/2 tsp clay to 8 oz filtered water), or using activated charcoal after a big meal.  The negative ionic properties of clay bind to toxins which are positively charged so they can be easily eliminated from the body. Activated charcoal is a fine black powder made from a recipe of bone char, coconut shells, peat, petroleum coke, coal, olive pits or sawdust. Charcoal is “activated” by processing it at very high temperatures, which changes its internal structure, to make it more porous than regular charcoal. Like clay, its negative charge binds to toxins so they are not absorbed. Activated charcoal has been used to eliminate worms and parasites but is more often used to reduce gas and bloating. It is also used to treat over-the-counter prescription drug overdoses such as aspirin. A safe alternative are the homeopathic remedies of Nux Vomica, Ipecac or Rhus Tox. These are 100% safe and inexpensive.

5. Choose Healthy Foods.

I don’t recommend diets, which contains the word DIE. Besides, everyone’s nutritional needs are different.  Eat foods as close to earth as possible, foods that resemble their true nature, in their original packages; organic, non-GMO, unadulterated foods. Green juicing is a wonderful break from a meal. Freshly juiced vegetables bypass the digestive system and deliver nutrients directly to your cells for energy and clarity. Since we’re part of Nature, it makes sense to stay as close to nature as possible. 

As with anything, be aware of the consequences of your choices, and choose wisely.

One last suggestion: avoid getting bogged down in the materialism of the holidays. The Shop Till You Drop mindset will only cause regret later as you go deeper into debt.  Have we considered that our debt economy reflects our nutritional debts? Instead, spread a little love wherever you go. The world could use a lot more of that. And that’s free.

Rosanne Lindsay is a Naturopathic doctor, writer, Earth keeper, Health Freedom advocate, co-founder of Wisconsin For Vaccine Choice, and author of the books The Nature of Healing, Heal the Body, Heal the Planet and  Free Your Voice, Heal Your Thyroid, Reverse Thyroid Disease Naturally. Find her on Facebook at Rosanne Lindsay and Natureofhealing. Consult with her (Skype or Zoom consults available) at natureofhealing.org. Subscribe to her blog at http://www.natureofhealing.org/blog/, where this article first appeared.