Whew! It feels like I just jumped off a really fast merry go round. Good thing I landed on my feet just in time to send out my August newsletter.

Life has been way too busy lately. Too many funerals. Too many boxes to unpack. Too many changes all at once. Fortunately, I've been remembering to take my vitamins - and most of the changes are good ones.

This month seems to have an S.O.S. theme. We start out with Save Our Soil, which is something that affects everyone, and especially the generations coming after us. Then we have Save Your Teeth with some good pointers to help improve and maintain dental health. Our third article is about saving people from the ravages of chemotherapy. It appears that keeping the gut lining healthy can help to protect cancer patients from chemotherapy treatments, and it is a good idea for all the rest of us too.

Finally, we have an article that is mostly just for fun. I could call it Save Your Gum (for when you don't want to lose weight), but that would be silly. Read on to find out why gum chewing won't help you keep the pounds from collecting around your middle.

From Mercola.com - "Environmental pollution is a significant problem. But while most of the focus is placed on polluting industries, toxins like mercury and small particle traffic pollution, a major source of environmental devastation is caused by modern food production. Far from being life sustaining, our modern chemical-dependent farming methods:

- Strip soil of nutrients
- Destroy critical soil microbes
- Contribute to desertification and global climate change, and
- Saturate farmlands with toxic pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers that then migrate into ground water, rivers, lakes and oceans."

Xylitol is especially fun, because it comes in Xylitol gum. That makes it seem like you are getting way with something when you are actually doing your teeth a favor. Instead of rotting your teeth, it kills the germs that cause cavities! It doesn't have any unpleasant aftertaste, either.

A recent study at the University of Michigan suggests that taking probiotics and eating a plant-based diet will help to counteract the damaging effects of chemotherapy. Based on a study of mice given fatal doses of chemotherapy, the mice that were treated with a natural substance that triggers regeneration of the gut lining were up to 75% more likely to survive. Here is the interpretation of Mike Adams of NaturalNews.com:

It appears that there is a direct relationship between gut health and chemotherapy survival. One way to support healthy gut lining and the resulting new stem cells is to encourage healthy gut flora by taking daily probiotics and eating a diet high in the vegetable fibers that healthy gut flora thrive on. While we are waiting for more conclusive studies, we may improve survival odds by creating a healthy environment in the gut. That is good advice for anyone, and especially people facing a life-threatening illness.

You knew it had to be too easy, didn't you? Though people sometimes think that chewing gum will curb their appetite and prevent them from overeating, studies show that people will eat just as much and actually choose less healthy foods after chewing gum!

From BottomLinePublications.com:
"Participants claimed to feel less hungry after chewing gum—but they still consumed the same number of calories after having gum as they did when they had no gum. And here’s the most startling part—after participants chewed mint-flavored gum, not only did their intake of the healthful foods plummet as they opted instead for the junky foods, but they also claimed to like healthy foods less than they did after chewing fruit-flavored gum or having no gum."

There you have it. You can still enjoy Xylitol gum, though, knowing you are doing your teeth a favor!