Foundations of Health

Did you know that what you eat directly impacts how well your body functions? Eating a well-balanced, nutrient-dense diet is vital to giving you the energy to go about daily life. Nutrients found in Whole Foods are needed for your body to grow and develop optimally. Eating a variety of whole foods can help you balance good health and hormones and prevent or reduce diet-related illnesses. Food is more than fuel or energy for your body. Every bite you choose to take sends a message to your cells. Nourishing food contains macronutrients, micronutrients, vitamins, and minerals. Without them, your body would break down. “When you miss key vitamins and minerals, your body doesn’t work properly. You feel rotten. And you get sick.” (Berardi, St.Pierre, & Scott-Dixon, 2021) Unfortunately, the modern diet over the years has changed dramatically. The first human diets were nutrient-dense, minimally processed, and came 100% from the earth. According to the NTA’s Evolution of the Modern Diet Student Guide, “living this way, societies were largely free from many of the chronic diseases that are widespread today, including obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.” (NTA 2020) Today’s challenges can be overwhelming, especially when trying to sort through all the information thrown at you. Women, especially, can become obsessed with trying to be a perfect size or hit a specific number on the scale rather than aiming to achieve optimal health. You can achieve overall health by applying six foundations that heavily rely on each other to support the proper function of your body. The foundations are; diet, digestion, blood sugar regulation, fatty acids, mineral balance, and hydration. If any one of these foundations becomes unbalanced, your body cannot function optimally.

Have you ever been curious about how digestion works and how digestion supports theoverall health of your body? Digestion begins when you start thinking about food; before you even take a bite, your salivary glands begin working and producing enzymes necessary to break down and absorb the nutrients found in food. Everything you eat or drink has to move through your digestion system, which comprises multiple organs that work together to break down the food you eat and transform it into energy and nutrients for your cells. Your digestive system must operate at its fullest potential for you to perform at your fullest potential. Everything in your body survives off the nutrients you consume, your heart, brain, muscles, andhormones. Even your mood can be affected. The best way to support your digestion is to eat asmindfully as possible, taking the time to chew your food thoroughly. Chewing your food into smaller pieces helps your digestion system work more effectively. It begins the chemical processes needed to make energy. Eating a variety of whole foods rather than processed foods is essential to nourish your cells and provide them with the vast array of nutrients needed to function optimally. Digestion has 3 phases, Cephalic, Gastric, and Intestinal. Think of digestion as food traveling from North to South. Food goes in your mouth, gets chewed and swallowed, and moves down through your esophagus into your stomach. It gets washed with acids and turned into Chyme (chewed-up food mixed with stomach secretions). The hope from here is that the Chyme moves into your small intestines, where nutrients are fully broken down and absorbed into the bloodstream ( making energy). Whatever Chyme you have left moves into your large intestines, where the last nutrients are absorbed, and the rest gets excreted as waste. There are a millionreasons why your digestion system doesn’t work optimally. It is essential to understand when there is a dysfunction; your body cannot digest or absorb the nutrients necessary to achieve overall health.

Why does blood sugar regulation matter if you haven’t been diagnosed with diabetes or hypoglycemia? Poor blood sugar regulation contributes to the most common chronic diseases, including diabetes, obesity, heart disease, dementia, and infertility. The dysfunction that can lead to these outcomes can start building years before it shows up on a blood test but may show up as symptoms in your everyday life that you brush off as “normal.” Symptoms may include; brain fog, excessive hunger, fatigue, constant cravings for sugar, difficulty sleeping, irritability, inflammation, headaches, and shakiness, to name a few. Glucose comes from the food you eat and enters your bloodstream once digested. Glucose triggers the pancreas to release insulin, a hormone that helps bring glucose into your cells for energy. Excess glucose is stored as glycogen in your muscles. It is also stored in your liver as triglycerides and fat cells. Your body can use the glucose in your bloodstream or your stored glycogen for energy. Eating a diet too heavy in carbohydrates and sugar can disrupt your metabolic processes and lead to health problems. According to the CDC, more than a third of U.S. adults have prediabetes. Up to 64% of those people may develop Type 2 diabetes. The good news is that much of this is preventable. You have a lot of control over your blood sugar—and in turn, your metabolic health through choices around diet and lifestyle.

Eating fats makes you fat—FALSE! Despite what you may have been told, fats are your friend. Fats, also called lipids, are critical for achieving optimal health. Your cell membrane, which surrounds your cells, is made from the fats you digest. That membrane keeps everything inside the cell, helps maintain an electrolyte balance, responds to hormones, regulates inflammation, and more. Your cells must be fluid and not too stiff to perform at their best. This can be obtained by eating suitable types of fats. Fats also are the building blocks for your hormones, are essential for vitamin absorption, and give you sustained energy. The key is to eat the correct type of fats. Not what is traditional in the American diet. It’s best to avoid those highly processed hydrogenated oils and trans fats and choose good quality healthy fats such as coconut oil, flaxseed oil, grass-fed butter, ghee, egg yolks, salmon, avocados, nuts, and seeds. Believe it or not, having a fatty acid deficiency is an epidemic and can be linked to musculoskeletal, endocrine, cardiovascular, immune, skin issues, allergies, and depression. Adding more fats to your diet has many advantages. My favorite is that it makes food taste better and keeps me satiated longer.

Minerals, although small, are mighty and essential. “Minerals only compose 4% of our body.” They are known as little guys with the big job. Minerals are cofactors and act like little spark plugs in your body to kick off different reactions. Most times, they don’t get the attention they deserve. They are vital for building strong bones and teeth, controlling the fluids inside and outside your cells, helping turn the food you eat into energy, and balancing hormones. Minerals are also essential for producing stomach acid, cell growth, cellular replication of DNA, and contracting and relaxing muscles. For women, something as simple as being on birth control or lots of stress can cause either an excess or deficiency of minerals. Unfortunately, the symptoms are often ignored or brushed off as either burnout or digestion issues. Modern doctors don’t think to start with something like a mineral deficiency. The bad news is your body does not have or make minerals. The good news is eating a nutrient-dense whole-food diet can, in most cases, give you the minerals you need to support optimal health.

I saved the most critical foundation for last– HYDRATION! “Many Americans live in a state of Chronic dehydration.” (NTP 2020) Water is the most crucial nutrient in your body. The other functions I have mentioned without proper hydration can’t adequately work as they should. Two mind-blowing facts, you can survive for weeks without food but only days without water, and water makes up 55-60% of your total body mass. Water plays numerous vital roles in your body, including transporting nutrients to your cells, moistening oxygen for easier breathing, cushioning your bones and joints, regulating your body temperature, removing waste, and flushing toxins. Since your body can only produce about 8% of your daily water, youneed to get the other 92% from the foods you eat and drink. Some early signs of dehydration are being thirsty, tired, having cravings, dry mouth, muscle cramps, anxiety, headaches/migraines, or the ability to concentrate. Being dehydrated for an extended period of time can lead to more severe or chronic signs and symptoms such as; heartburn, joint pain, back pain, constipation, inflammation of the colon ( Colitis), and exercise asthma. Dehydration can be so severe that it leads to death. Appropriately recommended water intake varies by age, sex, environmental conditions, size, activity, and even if you are a pregnant or lactating woman. It is most definitely bio-individual. Some tips for drinking water are to make sure you are drinking water from a healthy source, if you are drinking tap water, have it tested to see what you are ingesting, use a sound filtration system, and if you do not like plain water feel freeto add lemon, lime, cucumber or berries to give it some flavor. Lastly, ensure you drink enough water throughout the day until your urine becomes light yellow or straw-colored. If this is difficult for you, try to drink water on a set schedule, such as when you wake up and 20 -30 minutes before a meal.