Protecting Brain Health, Yeast Dangers, Vitamin C & Blood Sugar, Herbal Joint Pain Relief

In This Issue: 

• • Protecting Your Brain Health
  • Dangers of Nutritional Yeast
  • Optimal Vitamin C Intake
  • Vitamin C for Blood Sugar & Blood Pressure
  • Herbal Relief from Joint Pain

You’ll Find More Fascinating Health Posts my Facebook Page –

facebook.com/HealItAll/ – and lots of great recipes in my

Whole Foods Plant-Based, Gluten Free Diet & Recipes Group

Message from Bernadette Wulf

Greetings!

I love February!

Happy Imbolc – it’s the first day of Spring in the old Celtic calendar, also Brigid’s Day. It’s been feeling a lot like Spring for the past few days here in Sonoma County, CA, but I know it probably won’t last. It usually happens for a couple of weeks at this time of year, but then we get hit with our biggest rainstorms through February and March. Time will tell!

I picked my first pussy willows of the year yesterday. That is always one of the first signs that Spring is on the way. The dark, cold nights will soon give way to longer and warmer days. The acacias are almost ready to burst forth in glorious yellow blooms and the plum trees will soon explode into blossom. That always gives me a new sense of enthusiasm for life.

I hope your 2020 is getting off to a good start. In spite of all the craziness in the world, it feels like a good year so far. I have lots of fascinating articles to share with you this month. From taking care of your brain, to relieving joint pain, high blood pressure, and blood sugar spikes, you will find something here to make your life healthier and I hope happier.

I would love to hear what you want to read about. Feel free to send your requests, suggestions, questions, or any sort of feedback. I always appreciate hearing from my readers – Please do not reply to this email, but use this link Email Bernadette to contact me.

To your health and happiness!

Bernadette Wulf

HealItAll.com & Plant Based for Life

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Protecting Your Brain Health

What could be more important than having a functional brain? This article by one of my heroes in the health field, Neal Barnard, MD, covers the most important things you need to know to protect your brain. He starts out by sharing these important facts:

Saturated “bad” fat — found in milk, cheese, and meat — is strongly linked to the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, increasing risk more than threefold. Trans fats increase risk fivefold. Avoiding these fats can cut risk dramatically.

Foods rich in vitamin E, such as broccoli, walnuts, almonds, and sunflower seeds, also reduced dementia risk by as much as 70%.

Other studies show that foods overly rich in iron or copper can promote cognitive loss.

And also that folate, vitamin B6, and vitamin B12 may help protect the memory.

Then he goes on to list the main foods and metals that can cause the most damage to our brains:

1. 1. Saturated fats found in meats, dairy products, and eggs appear to encourage the production of beta-amyloid plaques within the brain. 
   2. Aluminum has been found in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients, so it pays to err on the side of caution. 
   3. Excess copper impairs cognition — even in mid-adulthood — and ends up in the plaques of Alzheimer’s disease.
   4. Excess iron can build up in the brain, sparking the production of damaging free radicals. 
   5. Trans fats, found in doughnuts and snack pastries, have been shown to increase Alzheimer’s risk more than fivefold. 

If you’ve been reading my newsletter for awhile, you will not be surprised to find that the saturated fats from animal products and trans fats in junk food can be harmful enough to seriously undermine your health. And you’ve probably heard that heavy metals can damage your brain. When taken all together, these five substances look like a recipe for dementia or Alzheimer’s disease.

It is pretty easy to avoid the saturated and trans fats by sticking to a whole food plant diet, but avoiding heavy metals is not so easy. Aluminum is even sprayed in the air for weather modification. It’s also in a lot of our cookware. Iron is found in our foods, supplements, and cookware (but we don’t have to worry about the non-heme iron found in plants). And copper is common in many foods, supplements, and even in our water pipes.

What to do about heavy metals?

It is now almost impossible to avoid getting too many heavy metals, so my solution is to drink the Medical Medium heavy metal detox smoothie just about every day. I really notice the difference if I skip it for more than a few days and I feel MUCH better when I have the smoothie for breakfast:

Here are the Ingredients:
1 – 2 cups of frozen wild blueberries 
1 cup cilantro
1 – 2 tsp spirulina
1 tsp barley grass juice powder
1 – 2 tbsp Atlantic dulse flakes (available from Amazon.com)
1 – 2 bananas
1 orange
1 cup water (optional)

Dr. Barnard’s List of Foods That Support Brain Health

1. 1. Vitamin B12 [Super important for brain and nerve health. For best assimilation, make sure you get one with a combination of Methylcobalamin and Adenosylcobalamin, like VeganSafe brand. – Ed.]
   2. Blueberries and grapes
   3. Beans and chickpeas
   4. Sweet potatoes 
   5. Nuts and seeds [ ] Just 1 ounce — a small handful — each day is plenty.
   6. Green leafy vegetables

Read more about Protecting Brain Health https://foodrevolution.org/blog/foods-for-brain-health

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Dangers of Nutritional Yeast

Speaking of Brain Health, did you know that nutritional yeast can damage your brain?

Yes, it looks like nutritional yeast, that rich, cheesy, umami-laden darling of vegetarians and vegans around the world, can be very detrimental to your health. Unfortunately, even top researchers like Dr. Greger are still recommending it, but thanks to the Medical Medium information, I’ve been avoiding it for years. This article makes me glad I followed the MM advice.

From traditionalcookingschool.com:

…unnaturally fermented or manufactured foods contain something called “processed free glutamic acid”. In other words, glutamic acid has been freed from its protein during the manufacturing process. It is now an excitotoxin.

Excitotoxins interfere with normal brain function by overstimulating neuron receptors in the hypothalamus and causing the death of neurons.

This is why nutritional yeast is considered impure — it most likely contains processed free glutamic acid (source). When ingested, the highly concentrated glutamates enter the bloodstream then the brain without going through the proper channels of digestion (source). 25% of the population reacts adversely to free glutamic acid, usually within 48 hours of ingestion.

The ingestion of MSG has similar side effects to neurological drugs (source). Excitotoxins also cause long-term, serious neuro-degenerative damage, including Alzheimer’s Disease and Parkinson’s Disease (source).

Before you dump nutritional yeast all over your popcorn (though corn is also a no no on the Medical Medium protocols, because of GMO contamination), or use it to make your vegan “cheese” sauce more cheesy (try using chickpea miso instead), please give this article a quick read. It could make a big difference in your future health. Apparently, even if you do not notice an immediate reaction, the damage from eating nutritional yeast and other sources of MSG can be cumulative.

Read More About Why Nutritional Yeast is Not a Healthy Food – https://traditionalcookingschool.com/health-and-nutrition/healthy-living-health-and-nutrition/why-nutritional-yeast-is-not-vegan-health-food/

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Optimal Vitamin C Intake

Dr. Greger has looked at all the studies on Vitamin C and concluded that the optimal daily dose should be 200 mg per day. However, therapeutic doses are often much higher. Doses of 500 mg. or more per hour are not uncommon.

The Medical Medium vitamin C shock therapy for colds and flu calls for 1000 mg. EsterC every two hours:

Ingredients:
2 500mg capsules Ester-C 
1 cup water, preferably warm
2 teaspoons raw honey or pure maple syrup 
Juice of 1 orange or lemon, freshly squeezed

Why the huge discrepancy in dosages?

My guess is that 200 mg is probably perfect for daily maintenance, but we seem to use up a lot more vitamin C when faced with illness, including viruses. I have used high doses of vitamin C to knock out both viruses and bacterial infections. It works really well, especially when combined with a good quality zinc sulfate.

Apparently any excess vitamin C is flushed out of the body, but I suspect that a lot of pathogens get flushed out along with it. Obviously, we need more studies to verify the role of vitamin C in fighting viruses, but in the mean time, I’m going to load up on vitamin C whenever I feel a cold or flu bug coming on.

Here’s what Dr. Greger has to say about vitamin C:

That magic level of intake appears to be about 200 mg a day. When we take up to 200 mg daily, our body absorbs it all. Above that level, however, the body tries to block further absorption, suggesting that our “intestinal vitamin C transport mechanisms… have evolved to fully absorb up to about 200 mg of vitamin C” a day.

Read more about Dr. Greger’s conclusions on vitamin C absorption – https://nutritionfacts.org/2019/12/05/how-much-vitamin-c-should-you-get-every-day/

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Vitamin C for Blood Sugar & Blood Pressure

Therapeutic doses of Vitamin C appear to do even more than fight off viruses. In this study, vitamin C had a dramatic effect on both blood sugar and blood pressure levels.

From NaturalHealth365.com:

In a double-blind, placebo-controlled study published in 2019 in Diabetes, Obesity and Metabolism, adult participants with type 2 diabetes were randomly divided into two groups. One group took 1,000 mg of ascorbic acid in divided doses every day for four months, while the other group received a placebo.

[ ] The vitamin C group experienced significantly lower after-meal blood sugar levels – reducing by roughly three hours the time spent every day in hyperglycemia – a state of elevated blood glucose.

[ ] The ascorbic acid also lowered elevated blood pressure – a primary risk factor for heart disease.

The team reported that participants’ blood pressure readings dropped by an average of 7 mmHg in the systolic number (which measures the pressure exerted by heartbeats) and by 5 mmHg in the diastolic (which measures the pressure in between beats).

[ ] The researchers concluded that the study provided evidence for use of vitamin C as an adjunct therapy to improve control of blood sugar and blood pressure in people with type 2 diabetes.

Of course, it is not a good idea to depend on vitamin C to counteract the effects of a poor diet. Both type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure have been shown to be caused by excess fats (especially saturated fats) in the diet. So the best way to fight diabetes and high blood pressure is to keep fats at around 10 to 20 percent of your calories and eat a healthy, whole food plant diet that naturally clears the offending fats out of your bloodstream, arteries, and muscles.

Read more about Vitamin C and blood sugar/blood pressure – https://www.naturalhealth365.com/reduce-blood-pressure-3218

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Herbal Relief from Joint Pain

Joint pain is very common, especially as people get older, but pain is not a natural part of aging. It is a result of many years of poor diet, repetitive motion, injury, and/or lack of exercise. Most people turn to NSAID drugs to relieve their pain, but all those drugs have terrible side effects like stomach or liver damage. Fortunately, there are safer and healthier alternatives.

From NaturalHealth365.com:

Turmeric and ginger are perhaps two of the most widely studied herbs for reducing joint pain, and both are hailed for their powerful anti-inflammatory properties. Turmeric is a root of a plant that’s related to ginger, and it’s the curcumin in it that offers the anti-inflammatory benefits.

Multiple studies have found that taking curcumin regularly works as well as nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) and without some of the side effects

Ginger [ ] has properties that work in a similar way to celecoxib and ibuprofen and works to turn off specific inflammatory genes – making it an excellent pain reliever.  For example, studies have found that taking 500 – 1,000 mg of ginger extract can help to reduce disability and pain [in] individuals with knee and hip osteoarthritis, and it’s been found to offer excellent anti-inflammatory effects in people with rheumatoid arthritis, too.

Important note on turmeric: Many sources of powdered turmeric have been found to contain lead, added to make it a deeper yellow color. Try to get fresh turmeric tubers, available at many natural food stores, or at least check your sources to make sure the powdered turmeric you buy is lead free.

More Herbal Pain Relief Options from NaturalHealth365.com:

• • • Willow Bark
    • Omega-3 (preferably from algae and other plant sources)
    • Capsaicin: Found in chili peppers, capsaicin, applied topically [in a carrier oil – Ed.]
    • Rose Hips: From the seed pods of roses
    • Bromelain: Found in pineapple, this group of enzymes has been shown to help reduce pain and swelling in people with osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis

Read more about relieving pain with herbs – https://www.naturalhealth365.com/joint-pain-herbs-3251.html

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