| We must eat and take supplements to help our bodies perform its maintenance functions.
If we have provided the appropriate vitamins, minerals, amino and fatty acids, the cells are happily doing their jobs. If the cells are happy, then we feel good and have no symptoms. However, can we trust our planet to supply those nutrients we all need? We already know about our topsoil, the devastation of food processing, and overcooked foods.
People all over the world for thousands of years have discovered that certain foods from certain areas have been curative for specific illnesses. |
| The exciting part of the program to most people is the close correlation between the sensory selection of the supplements and the blood values. This serves to illustrate the science, the uniqueness, and the reliability of this methodology. A daily blood test is not necessary to determine one's daily requirements. The blood tests give the general guidelines for the direction that must be taken, and then the daily evaluation of supplement needs can rest on the senses. |
Elizabeth Somer, M.A., R.D.
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 Thomas's Hospital in London reported that vitamin B6 supplements improved breast pain, called mastalgia, in women suffering from PMS who were unresponsive to hormonal therapy. However, in another study, 70 percent of the women taking "sugar" pills, who were told the pills were vitamin B6, reported improvements in symptoms, which suggests that at least some women respond to any therapy they believe will work.
How vitamin B6 might help treat PMS is controversial. |
| Tyrosine supplements boost dopamine levels in Parkinson's disease patients with degeneration of the nerves that produce dopamine.
A building block for tyrosine, the amino acid phenylalanine, is found in the brain in small amounts. Although its structure resembles that of amphetamines, it is unknown whether phenylalanine can affect behavior or curb appetite. However, a few studies show that this amino acid might help curb depression and improve symptoms of attention deficit disorder in adults. |
| A cousin to tryptophan available in supplements is 5-hydroxytryptophan [or 5-hydroxy-L-tryptophan (5-HTP)}, which improves mood in some people, but whether it is safe or effective for other symptoms of serotonin deficit is unknown.)
From Food to Mood and Back to Food:
A person consumes a protein-rich snack or meal.
Blood levels of all amino acids rise (including tryptophan).
All blood amino acids compete for entry into the brain.
Only moderate amounts of serotonin are made and stored.
Relatively low amounts of tryptophan enter the brain. |
| Serotonin levels rise twofold when people take tryptophan supplements, which reduce the time it takes for an insomniac to get to sleep; boost mood in people battling depression; calm people prone to violence; increase tolerance to pain; and help curb carbohydrate cravings. People who take medications—such as fenfluramine, for weight loss—that boost serotonin activity also report improvements in mood and a drop in calorie intake. This serotonin-stimulating drug also increases alertness and sociability and decreases feelings of tiredness and irritability. |
| New information on what herbs and supplements are effective is included in each chapter. You'll also find all-new snack and breakfast ideas, ways to trim fat without sacrificing taste, smart foods and calming foods, an updated Feeling Good Diet, a week's worth of new menus, fifty new recipes, two new chapters on managing appetite, and much more. Every chapter has been updated to include the latest research on:
• Why you crave carbohydrates, chocolate, ice cream, and salty foods, and how you can satisfy these cravings without sacrificing your waistline or your health (chapters 2 and 3). |
| From basic advice to eat breakfast, cut back on coffee, and exercise more to the latest research on natural serotonin boosters, memory-enhancing supplements, and energizing herbs, she separates the facts from the hype and provides the essential "take-home" messages about what really works, what doesn't, and why.
Food & Mood distills complex scientific information into practical tips and suggestions that are easy to incorporate into even the busiest lifestyles. Most importantly, Ms. |
Annemarie Colbin
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 It's usually either sugar or supplements; second-level culprits are white flour and juices in large amounts. I knew that Judy didn't eat sweets except perhaps at a party. "Do you take vitamins?" I asked. "Of course," she said; they had not been prescribed. I suggested she eliminate them for a while and see if that made a difference.
That same evening in class, Maria, one of my students, mentioned that she was never hungry. "I eat because it's time, because I know I should, because I'm with others . . . but never because I'm hungry," she said. |
| In our society, healing regimes that undo the damage done by the modern diet and lifestyle are invariably based, as we have seen earlier, on fresh, natural foods, sometimes with supplements, but always high in vegetables, fruit, grains, beans, and low in or devoid of fat, meat, salt, sugar, coffee, dairy, canned and frozen foods. Yet the pendulum swings, and I've also seen many imbalances arising from the rigid application of these regimes. These imbalances occur for two principal reasons:
1. |
Berkeley Holistic Health Center and Shepherd Bliss
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| They present a form of therapy used in their clinic in Texas that supplements traditional methods of treating cancer. These methods integrate the emotional and stress factors, and involve the patients themselves in creating the major lifestyle changes that are often necessary to complete their healing process.
THERE ARE over 200 articles in the medical literature covering different aspects of the relationship of emotions and stress to ma-_I lignancy, as well as other very serious diseases. |
Lendon H. Smith, M.D.
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| We want advice about diet, and what supplements we should take to avoid getting sick. Most of us would rather save the use of drugs until we are hit with some "nasty" like pneumonia or for the temporary relief of insomnia or the control of allergies. Some of us even seek drugless methods of disease control, through naturopathic medicine, homeopathy, or chiropractic adjustments to get rid of our uncomfortable symptoms. And some of us even ask the doctors, "Why did I get sick?"
The standard allopathic doctors (M.D.s |
Mark Bricklin
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 Bioflavonoids, usually extracted for supplements from the inner peel and white pulpy portion of citrus fruits, are widely recognized in Europe for their ability to strengthen blood vessels, particularly the walls of the capillaries. In treating menorrhagia patients with bioflavonoids, the French doctors observed "progressive improvement, with the most marked improvement achieved by the third menstrual cycle." In Johannesburg, South Africa, doctors reported that vitamin A can reduce heavy bleeding (South African Medical Journal, February 12, 1977). |
Patricia Hausman & Judith Benn Hurley
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 Should You Use supplements?
Having focused on the food aspect of ulcer management for so many years, nutritionists have often overlooked the issue of supplementation for ulcer patients. As a result, there isn't much on which to base recommendations. We're struck, however, by the work of E. Harju of the University of Oulu, Finland.
Dr. Harju studied 14 patients whose stomach ulcers brought them into the hospital's surgery department. One striking finding was a very high incidence of iron depletion. Dr. |
| Foods that contain polyunsaturated fat have a little bit, but that's about the extent of it. Only supplements can supply large doses of this vitamin.
Potassium: A Major Mineral in Its Own Right
Potassium is to sodium what Burns was to Allen or Laurel was to Hardy It takes both of them to stage a winning act.
For a long time, it was believed that sodium acting alone had an effect on blood pressure. But that's not the case any longer. Researchers now believe that it is a balance between sodium and potassium that keeps blood pressure in check. |
Stanley W. Jacob, M.D., Ronald M. Lawrence, M.D., Ph.D.
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 Smith had tried a variety of supplements over the years but with little effect. One day a patient told him about MSM, and although he was skeptical, he started taking it.
"Around my house I'm a Mr. Do-It-All," says Smith. "On the weekends I enjoy painting, gardening, and plumbing and keeping the house in shape. Increasingly I was noticing that on Mondays I would be sore all over, tired, and almost in a flulike state.
"Immediately after starting the MSM this feeling disappeared. No soreness. No fatigue. I would take it Sunday night and wake up on Monday feeling great. |
Patricia Hausman & Judith Benn Hurley
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| Therefore, you should use supplements only with your doctor's consent.
Out with Oxalates!
If you are advised to restrict kidney-stone-forming oxalates from your diet, here is a list for you. We warn you, though, that on first reading, you may hardly believe your eyes. Many of the foods to avoid are the ones that nutritionists normally praise lavishly
Even though these foods are all-stars when it comes to preventing heart disease, cancer, and other common health woes, if you have kidney stones, you have to put your kidney problems first. |
Berkeley Holistic Health Center and Shepherd Bliss
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| There is nothing wrong with supplements in their place, but they cannot be used as substitutes for food. A proper nutritional education will include where and how to shop for food, how to prepare it, as well as when and how to consume particular foods. Again, it's more expedient to pop a pill than to work with a naturopath. Re-education of this sort is time-consuming and expensive. It also costs more effort. Yet, in the course of a lifetime, it's worth the effort to achieve a basic philosophical involvement with health. |
Ronald Klatz and Robert Goldman
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 Stephen Coles, an anti-aging specialist at the California Institute of Technology, mice who receive CoQ-10 supplements "look terrific, their coats are better, they groom themselves better—they look a few months younger." (Remember, mice only live for about two years, so a few months younger in a mouse's life translates into a few decades in human terms! )
Dr. Coles points out that the effects of CoQ-10 aren't really noticeable on younger mice. It's only when the mice start to age that you can tell the difference: "Halfway through life all the mice look alike. |
| Rats that had access to estrogen, either from their own ovaries or from supplements, were twice as successful at learning to avoid an electric shock than were rats that had no ovaries and therefore no estrogen.
Apparently, estrogen helped the rats synthesize a protein known as the nerve-growth factor. Nerve-growth factor, created within the brain itself, promotes the health of cholinergic neurons, the cells that make and use acetycholine. When rats had their ovaries removed and stopped producing estrogen, nerve-growth factor declined by nearly 45 percent over a period of only three months. |
| It also occurs after menopause when women are given estrogen supplements without progesterone.
Over 30 years ago, it was reported that women with breast cancer excreted 30-60 percent less estriol than non-cancer controls and that remission of cancer in patients receiving occurred mainly in those whose estriol levels rose. Therefore, low levels of natural estrogen relative to estradiol and estrone correlate with an increased risk of breast cancer.
Women should realize that estrogen alone does not contribute to breast cancer. |
| Research by Catherine Woolley of the University of Washington and Bruce McEwen of Rockefeller University found that removing the ovaries from rats caused the number of synapses in their hippocampuses to decline rapidly—although when the rats were given estrogen supplements, their synapses remained relatively intact.
Although estrogen is primarily a female hormone, men also produce it. In fact, estrogen levels in men can be higher than in post menopausal women.
In a related process, estrogen appears to protect nerve cells that produce acetylcholine. |
| ESTROGEN AND ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE
Mounting evidence suggests that estrogen supplements help ease the mental fogginess and memory lapses that many women experience after menopause. Studies have shown that women are three times more likely than men to suffer from Alzheimer's disease. Women produce estrogen until menopause, while men's bodies continue converting testosterone to estrogen into later life. Researchers believe this could give men a natural protection against Alzheimer's. |
Patricia Hausman & Judith Benn Hurley
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| They then compared the ability of both folate supplements and orange juice made from frozen concentrate to restore normal folate levels. The juice and the vitamin pill did the job equally well-a testimony to the wholesomeness of juice from concentrate.
If you are wondering how orange juice stacks up against whole oranges, the answer is pretty well, with one exception. Apparently due to their fiber content, whole oranges have proved more filling than orange juice. If you are a dieter, you have probably noticed the difference yourself. |
Christian Ratsch
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 In the United States, both the herbage and herbal tablets and tinctures were available without restriction prior to 2004, but an FDA ban on supplements containing Ephedra went into effect on April 12, 2004 (cf. Hirschhorn 1982).
Literature
See also the entries for Ephedra gerardiana, Ephedra spp., and ephedrine.
Hiller, Karl. 1993. Ephedra. In Hagers Handbuch der pharmazeutischen Praxis, 5th ed., 2:46-57. Berlin: Springer.
Hirschhorn, Howard H. 1982. Natural substances in currently available Chinese herbal and patent medicines. Journal of Ethnopharmacology 6(1): 109-19.
Hu, Shiu-Ying. |
Patricia Hausman & Judith Benn Hurley
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| Be sure to keep these supplements out of children's reach, though, as iron poisonings are most common among curious children who get their hands on the supplement bottle and swallow a handful of pills.) In addition, here is a list of iron-rich foods to enjoy.
Zeroing In on Zinc
Good
Better
Best
1 cup cooked beans
2 slices rye bread
4 oz. lamb
4 oz. lean beef
2 slices whole wheat bread
4 oz. lean pork
4 oz. dark turkey meat
1 cup cowpeas 4 oz. oysters
1 cup crabmeat
Yz chicken breast
4 oz. chicken meat
4 to 5 hard-shell clams
8 oz. surf clams
1 cup cottage cheese
1 oz. |
Mark Bricklin
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| The problem, it turned out, is an inherited disorder in zinc metabolism, which requires supplements of this trace mineral to maintain normal health.
Actually, zinc isn't the only nutritional therapy for this condition. The other treatment is an exclusive diet of breast milk.
The disease never appears in babies who are being breastfed but strikes only after the baby is weaned to cow's milk or formula. Restoration of breast milk immediately abolishes all symptoms. Since breast milk and cow's milk both contain adequate amounts of zinc, the presence of zinc is not the problem. |
Dian Dincin Buchman, Ph.D.
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 Add B-complex supplements to the diet as well as extra B6 and B2 (riboflavin), which are specific support remedies for mouth sores and cracks.
NERVOUSNESS Water Therapy
Long, leisurely, neutral or moderately hot full baths always help to relax the mind and body. Any number of herbs can act as tranquilizers or sedatives, among them hops, passionflower, valerian, catnip, melissa (lemon balm), and oats. Use the herbs singly or in groups. These are so popular in Europe that the Germans produce combinations of the herbs valerian and peppermint, or valerian and melissa, which also help insomnia. |
| Supplements that will alleviate adult flareups are kelp tablets, B-complex tablets, vitamin E, and zinc. Zinc is essential for the production of the digestive acid hydrochloric acid, and for its known ability to convert essential fatty acids into anti-inflammatory substances. Add only a minimal dose of zinc to the diet.
Foods can trigger eczema attacks. Try eliminating dairy products, eggs, tomatoes, and citrus fruits, then reintroduce each food one at a time. Watch out for a reaction, and remove any offending food from the diet.
Cell salt therapy is most useful. Start with ferrum phos. |
| General Therapy
Take vitamin C and vitamin E supplements. Add more fiber to the diet, including whole-grain breads and cereals, and many green vegetables and fruits each day. A high-fiber diet with plenty of liquids is likely to prevent the formation of hemorrhoids and make the stools bulkier and softer, thus causing less straining. Try eating around the same time each day. Chew food slowly and thoroughly. Never ignore an urge to defecate. Include some brisk walking and other exercise in your daily routine. Learn to breathe in an easy way, especially when lifting, stooping, and squatting. |
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