I have several clients that are really struggling with health challenges. Not surprising. Adverse childhood experiences are known to lead to specific chronic health conditions.
chronic pain
gut issues… yeah, lots of these
chronic fatigue
headaches
brain fog
depression
I won’t bore (or discourage) you with the entire list. It’s pretty long.
Yes, we’ve been dealt a pretty lousy hand. But there are things you can do about this. Just because you’ve got some crummy beginnings does not mean you can’t support your body now.
So for starters, what are you eating?
Most of you know that I work with trauma survivors as a mentor. But what you probably don’t know is that I also spent four years working for a functional medicine doctor.
Since she had a micropractice, it was just the doc and me. No other staff. And that meant I was doing lots of research for her, reading all the functional medicine authors and creating her patient support materials.
Here’s the first thing I learned:
Your diet is critical to your health. I know, you knew that already. But I’m going to remind you. When you already have a compromised physical situation, you owe it to yourself to do the best you possibly can for your body.
But instead of taking on something complicated (we’re already feeling overwhelmed), let’s start small.
1) If you can’t grow it, hunt it, milk it, or gather it, DON’T EAT IT! Fake foods like margarine, soda pop, sugar alcohols, fat substitutes, etc., are not real food.
2) If you can’t tell what it used to be, DON’T EAT IT! Foods that have been processed to death (and I do mean death) have absolutely no nutritional value left in them. They’ve taken out all the good stuff to make it tasty for our adulterated taste buds.
A whole potato or potato chips? A bowl of oatmeal or fruity pebbles? An orange or orange drink mix? You get the picture.Your body doesn’t know what to do with this stuff and there’s zero nutrition in it. It will fill you up, but leave you starving.
3) Our food supply is loaded with chemicals. There’s a reason we need organizations like the Environmental Working Group (EWG). They are the watch dogs for our food supply, identifying the worst offenders for pesticides and herbicides. These harmful chemicals are neurotoxins. And since we are already brain fogged and nervous, I don’t think we need these either.
These are not difficult things to do. 1) Eat real food. 2) Eat unprocessed food. 3) Choose organic, as much as you possibly can.
This approach made all the difference for me.
Get educated and make these simple changes. It could make all the difference for you too.
Until next time,
Anne
For help on which foods to purchase organic, find the Dirty Dozen and Clean Fifteen Lists here: https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/
This page contains the opinions of the author. You should talk to a medical professional about any changes to your diet or lifestyle.