Reasons to Fall in Love with a Coconut

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I am talking about the actual food, the coconut, silly. I am not going to give you reasons to fall in love with some (coco)nut person. You are on your own there.

I have always liked coconut but steered clear of it because I -- like so many people -- bought into the soybean lobbyist's interpretation of coconut oil being a bad health choice. In fact, the opposite is true.

I just enjoyed a melted tablespoon of extra virgin coconut oil in my decaf ginger tea. I drink two tablespoons a day of coconut oil and hope to get up to at least 3 tablespoons. I was hesitant to start drinking an oil but the first time I did, I felt like I had finally, finally put the right kind of oil in my body's engine. The tremendous pain I was feeling from fighting a Candida infestation was gone in an instant. I had a sustained sense of energy and I wasn't hungry for hours after drinking my coconut oil-ginger tea.

It's the only oil we cook with. I have even started putting it my hair as a conditioner and my dry hair went away! I have been researching information about coconuts (those lovely monkey faces!) and particularly about coconut oil. As usual, there are 'authorities' on this issue who contradict one another. I will post some articles below and you decide on your own about the merits or the demerits of this natural product. I am still learning about coconut oil and after experimenting with it, I am a big fan and I think it is a good thing to have in your health arsenal.

Here are the health benefits brought to you by a coconut from the Coconut Research Center:

• Kills viruses that cause influenza, herpes, measles, hepatitis C, SARS, AIDS, and other illnesses.

• Kills bacteria that cause ulcers, throat infections, urinary tract infections, gum disease and cavities, pneumonia, and gonorrhea, and other diseases.

• Kills fungi and yeasts that cause candidiasis, ringworm, athlete's foot, thrush, diaper rash, and other infections.

• Expels or kills tapeworms, lice, giardia, and other parasites.

• Provides a nutritional source of quick energy.

• Boosts energy and endurance, enhancing physical and athletic performance.

• Improves digestion and absorption of other nutrients including vitamins, minerals, and amino acids.

• Improves insulin secretion and utilization of blood glucose.

• Relieves stress on pancreas and enzyme systems of the body.

• Reduces symptoms associated with pancreatitis.

• Helps relieve symptoms and reduce health risks associated with diabetes.

• Reduces problems associated with malabsorption syndrome and cystic fibrosis.

• Improves calcium and magnesium absorption and supports the development of strong bones and teeth.

• Helps protect against osteoporosis.

• Helps relieve symptoms associated with gallbladder disease.

• Relieves symptoms associated with Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, and stomach ulcers.

• Improves digestion and bowel function.

• Relieves pain and irritation caused by hemorrhoids.

• Reduces inflammation.

• Supports tissue healing and repair.

• Supports and aids immune system function.

• Helps protect the body from breast, colon, and other cancers.

• Is heart healthy; improves cholesterol ratio reducing risk of heart disease.

• Protects arteries from injury that causes atherosclerosis and thus protects against heart disease.

• Helps prevent periodontal disease and tooth decay.

• Functions as a protective antioxidant.

• Helps to protect the body from harmful free radicals that promote premature aging and degenerative disease.

• Does not deplete the body's antioxidant reserves like other oils do.

• Improves utilization of essential fatty acids and protects them from oxidation.

• Helps relieve symptoms associated with chronic fatigue syndrome.

• Relieves symptoms associated with benign prostatic hyperplasia (prostate enlargement).

• Reduces epileptic seizures.

• Helps protect against kidney disease and bladder infections.

• Dissolves kidney stones.

• Helps prevent liver disease.

• Is lower in calories than all other fats.

• Supports thyroid function

• Promotes loss of excess weight by increasing metabolic rate.

• Is utilized by the body to produce energy in preference to being stored as body fat like other dietary fats.

• Helps prevent obesity and overweight problems.

• Applied topically helps to form a chemical barrier on the skin to ward of infection.

• Reduces symptoms associated the psoriasis, eczema, and dermatitis.

• Supports the natural chemical balance of the skin.

• Softens skin and helps relieve dryness and flaking.

• Prevents wrinkles, sagging skin, and age spots.

• Promotes healthy looking hair and complexion

• Provides protection form damaging effects of ultraviolet radiation form the sun.

• Helps control dandruff.

• Does not form harmful by-products when heated to normal cooking temperature like other vegetable oils do.

• Has no harmful or discomforting side effects.

• Is completely non-toxic to humans.

Suggested reading:

The Truth About Coconut Oil

Coconut Oil: Good Or Bad?

Break Out the Coconut Oil: It is Good for You

Is Coconut Oil Really a Thyroid Cure?

Is Pure Virgin Coconut Oil Healthy or Unsafe

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Could a Virus Cause Gluten Sensitivity?

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This interesting tidbit is from a website called Top News You Can Use. It is fascinating and I think quite hopeful to think that gluten sensitivity could be caused by a virus. Next thing you know, they find a cure for that virus or at least something to limit its effects and life improves drastically for millions of us.

Virus Infections Linked with Gluten Intolerance

A new research has suggested that Virus infections may be a contributing factor in onset of gluten intolerance (coeliac disease).

The experts reveal that gluten intolerance may usually show no symptom, and people may not know that they are hit by the disease if their symptoms are mild or uncharacteristic.

Gluten intolerance is an autoimmune reaction in the small intestine. The gluten that occurs naturally in grains such as wheat, barley and rye hampers the intestinal villi, triggering problems with nutrient absorption and potentially other problems too.

Gluten intolerance, an inherited predisposition, plays a vital role in the onset of the condition. The only known effective treatment is a lifelong gluten-free diet.

Academy Research Fellow Päivi Saavalainen, who initiated the research into the hereditary risk factors for gluten intolerance, quoted: "Some of the genes we have identified are linked with human immune defense against viruses. This may indicate that virus infections may be connected in some way with the onset of gluten intolerance".


Here is another great article about a new drug that could even help repair intestines damaged by gluten.

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How Is Your Appendix?

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Do you still have your appendix? If yes, you lucky dog, you.

Mine is missing. It was taken out in 2000 after it ruptured. I am a stubborn soul and my right side hurt for several days until I was finally bedridden on a Saturday. I screamed anytime I had to get up but laying down felt okay so I informed my husband that I would wait until Monday to see a doctor. Even back then I was suspicious that I was not getting the best medical care possible and I was no fan of doctors, mostly because I had been seeing an endocrinologist for several years who assured me I had no thyroid condition and it was all in my head. He was wrong on two counts as it was not in my head, it was in my neck, and I most certainly did have a thyroid condition.

Luckily for me, my husband is a wise man and he literally forced me into the car to go to the ER. Whattya know, my appendix had burst. Had my stubbornness prevailed, I would probably not be here now because when the appendix ruptures, you are likely to get some ugly gangrene spreading inside you.

As I was being wheeled down to the operating room, the ER doctor came out to meet me and I started grilling him on his experience. He was not happy about my giving him the third degree, but I didn't want any body part that was remotely necessary to be removed unless it positively had to go. The surgeon said that it was the most common procedure performed and he had done it hundreds of times. He also informed me that nobody needs their appendix. I thought that was an odd statement -- why did I have one if I didn't need it? It seemed like all of my other internal body parts served a very real purpose.

My husband added, "Honey, let's not piss off the man wielding the scalpel right now." Okay, okay, I said, let's get this thing out already. So it was removed and it had ruptured but thanks to my husband, it was caught before gangrene had set in.

For years afterward, I would try to find any information regarding the appendix because I wanted to know why we all had one if it was obsolete. I felt it must serve some purpose. I never found an answer, until now.

I picked up a fantastic book at Sprouts titled "Gut Solutions -- Natural Solutions to Your Digestive Problems" by Dr. Leonard Smith and Brenda Watson, N.D. They have an entire chapter devoted to the appendix. They write "In the past, medicine has not been able to assign a particular function to the appendix. Today, however, it is becoming more apparent that the appendix and surrounding lymphatic tissue probably serve an important role in immunity."

IMMUNITY. I have several autoimmune conditions: hypothyroidism, weak adrenals and the loss of female hormones. The only medicines I take are for hormone replacement. I am low in very important hormones because I ate foods for all of my 44 years that were toxins for me. Could the loss of my appendix have helped my autoimmune conditions take root? Why did it burst in the first place?

Here is what the authors of "Gut Solutions" have to say: "Obstruction of the appendix can occur due to solid pieces of stool or as a result of the stool becoming hard like stone."

I remember talking poop in college with a girlfriend and I was shocked to learn that she had bowl movements EVERY DAY. This was news to me as I went once a week. Where did all that poop go? Apparently some of it was turning to stone in my appendix.

Now that I have become self-educated on digestive issues as a sheer necessity to staying alive and thriving, I can see that I have had lifelong gut issues . . . but no one put them together until I was 44 years old.

I hope each of you will take stock of your gut. Ask yourself a lot of questions and keep asking until you find the answers. Pay attention to how you feel after you eat anything. If you have ANY autoimmune condition, look closely at what you are eating and consider blaming your diet for helping your condition along.

Most important of all -- listen to your gut.

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I Am Watching what You Eat

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That's right, I am watching what you eat. I can't help it!

Today I went to two grocery stores (Sprouts for produce and meat and great gluten-free items and HEB for everyday stuff like household cleaners) and I looked at what the people around me were buying. The folks at Sprouts had a lot of healthy, yummy things in their baskets, but that is to be expected if you are at a health food store, right?

HEB was a different matter entirely. My lane's checker was mighty s-l-o-w so I got a good stare at the person's choices in front of me. I noticed right off that she had a puffy look to her, like I did when I was really ill. I can barely keep my mouth shut any more when I see people with that telltale puffy face. I want to give them Food Education 101 on the spot, but I try to be good and stay quiet. She also had lost the outer edges of her eyebrows, which points to a thyroid problem.

This lovely but puffy person had some of these items in her cart: hot dogs, sausage, white bread, corn chips, whole milk, Egos, potato chips, rice, ears of corn, oranges and grapes.

The only thing remotely healthy she choose was the fruit, though some even call that unhealthy if it isn't organic. If I were able to take away all the suspected items that might be causing her puffiness, she would have only walked out of the store with the oranges and the grapes and the rice since it wasn't white rice. I don't mean that they were unhealthy because I somehow knew that she had allergies to those products, I mean I do not think those items are healthy for anyone.

When I traveled to the Texas Coast last week, I noticed what everyone at our table got when we ate at a pizzeria. I made two trips to the salad bar and I didn't even miss the pizza. I was the only one who did that in the entire restaurant, but I guess most folks don't go to a pizzeria to get salad, now do they? Maybe they should, though, maybe they should.

Everyone at our table had several slices of pizza and some calzones. I wished I could have done a poll in a few hours to see how everyone felt after a meal like that. I REALLY wanted to stand up on the table and yell out that everyone was eating very unhealthy and in many ways, life-threatening food (if you ate enough of it, or say, ate it throughout your lifetime) but once again, I was a model of self-restraint. I know, I am so thoughtful to others eating what I used to eat just last year, aren't I? :)

After dinner, we all did talk about our many health issues and every single woman there had a major problem from diabetes to fibromalgia. The men weren't in any better health and had faced cancer and heart attacks. One woman walked with a cane and had very swollen ankles. If I had had one more glass of wine that evening, I would have stood up on the table and shouted over and over and over: what you are eating is killing you!

But alas, I kept my opinions to myself.

At least until I could spill them all here. . . .

How Are Your Guts?

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Your guts might very well be inflamed. You might have symptoms and a suspicion that you have a gut problem caused by gluten (the protein source found in grains such as wheat and rye) or you might be REALLY unlucky and have a gut issue with no symptoms that alert you to it until it is too late.

It has been estimated that as many as 144 million Americans have a sensitivity to gluten. If you have one gut sensitivity, chances are high indeed that you probably have another sensitivity as well. Through trial and error, I have discovered that I cannot tolerate gluten, dairy or corn. Avoiding corn has been the hardest by far for me, since the food industry seemingly has never met a product it can't inject corn starch or high fructose corn syrup into. I honestly believe that high fructose corn syrup should be outlawed. It is good for nothing except causing horrible health problems.

Am I getting anyone's attention??? If 144 million of us have a gluten sensitivity, that means either YOU or someone you love has this issue. This is not just your Grandma's disease any longer.

Still don't believe me? How about this little fact: there has been a 400% increase in confirmed Celiac Disease diagnosis's. Here is an article that warns of what your future will look like if you ignore your gut: cancer, heart disease and early death.

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Corn Starch Is Even More Evil Than Corn

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If you have been reading this blog, you will know that we have cleaned out our pantry three times.

First we removed anything that contained gluten, and this included stuff you would not expect, such as ketchup and soy sauce. We quickly became world-class experts on how to avoid gluten.

Next we removed anything containing caseins, the protein found in dairy. This includes butter and yogurt. I loved cheese but I said good-bye to it as it is not worth feeling like I have the flu for a week if I get caseined.

Next came corn. Anything and everything that had corn in it was given away. Corn seems harder to avoid than the above two toxins (they are toxic to me and to as many as 144 million other Americans) because high fructose corn syrup and corn starch are added to anything that the preservative-loving food industry can think of to put it in. If they could inject into fruit and vegetables, they would have already done so.

Well I was feeling quite good, the best I had felt for years. Maybe even in a decade. Maybe even in two decades.

Then I started to feel like crap again. I was tired, grumpy, stinky and I had a very upset digestive tract. I looked again at every single thing I had been eating or drinking over the past few days. At first I suspected it could be rice, but I have been eating rice once or twice a week for months and never felt any reaction to it.

So I kept looking and finally got to my vitamins and minerals that I take every day. I am or was low in some very important vitamin levels so I am sure to take my vitamins and minerals every day. One pill I have to have is an iron pill but I had not been taking it for the past few weeks/months as the store ran out of the one brand I can tolerate well. I am hypothyroid, and that condition keeps trying to make me become anemic again. I believe that gluten and its good friends corn and dairy caused so much havoc in my body that I became hypothyroid. I get my blood tested every few months and if I don't take as many as 5 iron pills a day, my ferratin levels can slip below 20. A healthy woman should have a MINIMUM ferratin level of 70. Feeling anemic to me is the same as feeling hypothyroid and that feeling is much like being a slug with zero energy and just about as much interest in life.

I was feeling so sick today that I looked again at every single supplement I take . . . and there I found the cause of my sickness. The iron pills contain corn starch. The grocery store where I buy them had a new supply last week so I brought home three bottles and started taking iron pills again.

I threw them away, even though each bottle costs $9.

This long learning curve is literally killing me at a gut level. Now my body has to take the time it needs to heal my guts, yet again, thanks to the damage done by the iron pills that contain corn starch.

Some days I am really pissed off that so very much JUNK is put into our food supply. Today is one of those pissed off days.

Corn Is Evil

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We stopped trying to eat gluten in our house 10 months ago. We made many mistakes since the gluten-loving food industry sneaks gluten into products you would never expect to find gluten in, such as soy sauce. Just last night I ate a delicious gluten-free meal at P.F. Chang's and they brought me out some gluten-free soy sauce and it tasted so much better than the "normal" gluten-rich soy sauce. Why oh why would someone even think to add gluten to soy sauce?
After I started gaining a small measure of my energy back sans gluten, my husband and I decided to remove all caseins (the protein source in dairy) from our diets. I have learned the hard way that if you have an issue with gluten, you are very likely to have an issue with caseins as well. We did. Good-bye dairy.

We both slowly started feeling healthier than we had in years but still we both felt bloaty and still tired, especially in the afternoons. I happened to gain a significant and life-changing chunk of wisdom from an Austin pharmacist whom I called when I became concerned that my adrenal medicine might have dairy in it.

The pharmacist listened to my concerns and then asked me about corn. Was I still eating corn, he asked? I wasn't just eating corn, I was shoving in it as fast as I got my hands on it since it was serving as the one source I used to replace bread. I was eating corn tortillas like they were going out of production the very next minute.

The kindly pharmacist told me that corn is mostly genetically modified these days and most people have trouble digesting it. He recommended that I stop ingesting corn immediately. We did, and that meant another clearing out of the pantry. My God, what doesn't have corn starch in it????

We removed all the corn and corn-like products from our house and from our menus.

And then something miraculous started happening. It happened to my husband first. He was downright jolly in the afternoons, when we would normally be sagging and tired. He was singing and dancing in the kitchen and he started going on long walks again with our dogs. I noticed his increase in energy and I was very happy for him, but I wasn't there yet.

Weeks went by before I sat up one day and realized that I am never tired in the afternoons anymore. I even started singing and dancing and while fun, I am tone deaf so my apologies to anyone who has to listen to me sing. Next thing I knew, I was working out with a DVD I months ago with a trainer deemed "the toughest trainer in America." I haven't had the physical strength to work out for a decade.

Your energy level fades away slowly and you don't really notice it leaving, especially if you do what I did, and that is to prop yourself up with caffeine and sugar in the afternoons. Just as my energy level sagged over the past 10 years, it is now slowly creeping back in. I would do anything to feel vibrantly healthy again and to reclaim my long ago status as that of an athlete. Adding corn to the "will never eat again" column was easy.

Good-bye corn. I do not even miss you.

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We Got Caseined

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Instead of those omni-present Got Milk advertising campaigns, I would one day love to see people asking instead: Have you been caseined?

We got caseined over here recently. We were at a local, small town restaurant and I pulled the waitress aside and said we could not eat gluten, dairy or corn. How I wish I had said PLEASE don't give us anything that has casein in it. PLEASE.

What is casein?

Casein is a protein that is found in milk and used independently in many foods as a binding agent. You stand at least a 50% chance of having an issue with caseins if you have an issue with gluten. Isn't that special that they run in the same crowd?

My husband has felt for years that he was lactose intolerant so we removed lactose from our diets . . . but didn't yet know about caseins, which were still present in the lactose free milk and in many, many other suspicious foods we were still consuming.

I stopped ingesting caseins to support my husband and I was convinced that I did not have an issue with "dairy." I was wrong. I knew I did when I finally added some dairy back in my meals. I felt awful for days. It wasn't pleasant.

When we ate at the locally owned Mexican restaurant, I ordered chicken fajitas and ate them with no tortillas. Jeff had a wonderful grilled shrimp salad. If you can get through a Mexican meal and not touch a single corn tortilla chip placed on your table, you know that your will power to stay healthy is growing. We had no chips and felt good about our food choices.

A few hours later, Jeff's stomach was in knots and he did not feel well at all. I felt okay which may mean something or it may mean nothing at all in terms of my ability to digest caiseins. I called the restaurant and the hapless person who answered it listened to my questions about gluten, corn and dairy. She put the phone down and I could hear her yell to someone "HEY! do we put gluten in anything these people had for lunch here? They had chicken fajitas and the shrimp salad." She came back to phone and informed me that nope, we had ingested no corn, gluten or dairy. I didn't feel right about her "researching" my questions and by the way Jeff was feeling, I knew he had gotten something bad for his system, but what? It's the not so fun game of trying to figure out what you ate where that was now poisoning you. That game gets old in a hurry.

Then my phone rang suddenly. It was the restaurant owner! She wanted to tell me to ask for her next as she knew exactly what the ingredients were in every meal. She then asked me a question I will never forget to ask in the future: "did you tell the waitress to leave out the dairy or did you tell her about caiseins?"

I did just say dairy! Wow, someone in the teeny small Texas town we live in knew about caseins! She told me that they dip both the shrimp and the chicken fajitas in BUTTER before they grill them. Butter has caiseins! Our food sleuthing worked this time, not that it helped Jeff in the short term but it will for all of our future food restaurant dining. That restaurant is now our favorite little restaurant in town and we send them customers by the boatloadfull. (Though I do think it would help to have all of their waitresses well versed in casein-ology)

After that meal, I look the waiter in the eye and say clearly: we have some SERIOUS food allergies, please help us to not anything that might possibly contain wheat, gluten, corn dairy or anything that is made of a dairly substances such as butter.

Then I ask my honey if he brought that epi pen with him. Okay, I don't always ask about the epi pen but I will say that if I feel the waiter is not paying attention. Usually the threat of my throat closing up tends to make them perk up a bit and listen. Not that my throat would swell up but that sounds so much prettier to say than my guts will swell, don't you agree?

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Great article on-line article about gluten

My brother sent me this outstanding article on gluten and its devastating affect on so many of us.

Please take a minute or three to read this important article. It is written by an M.D. That way those of you who may be doubting what a lay person such as myself is saying about gluten . . . well, you can hear it straight from the horse's mouth (so to speak).

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