SMART SLIMMING

Nowadays in the developed countries more than 50% of society has problems with excessive fat tissue. Every tenth Polish man is obese and almost 30% of women and 50% of men are overweight. The overweight and obesity are a serious problem for many people of all ages. In the past it was associated with wealth and prosperity, today they are treated as the lack of character, gluttony, indolence and a basis of many diseases. Despite the aesthetics itself we know that the overweight gradually leads to obesity, helps creating many chronic diseases increasing the risk of, e.g.:

• Cardiovascular diseases (coronary artery disease, hypertension, vascular failure)
• Diabetes
• Kidneys dysfunctions
• Digestive, respiratory, nervous system dysfunctions
• Rheumatologic diseases, especially concerning the joints of the lower limbs
• Immune system dysfunctions
• Cancers

The modern civilization promotes an ideal of a slim, healthy, fit man, but this very civilization has created a large number of temptations and obstacles that make it difficult to reach this ideal. The high standard of living, unlimited access to food and technological development made us free from any form of physical activity. The quantity of food products that we have at our disposal is increased from the average of 500 to 50000 and the consumed energy decreased by 25%. At the beginning of the 20^th century the natural complex carbohydrates constituted over 50% of the consumed caloric value. Today this share fell to 20%, however the consumption of fat doubled and the consumption of sugar increased by 240%.

The impairment of balance of the organic and mineral components caused the disturbance of all the biological processes in the environment. The lack of balance in the soil decreased the quality of plants and disrupted the balance of nutrients in plants which became a less valuable food for people and animals.

The modern technologies let us process the food, what as a result deprived it of the rest of valuable vitamins and minerals. By isolating particular nutrients, adding dozens of different chemical compounds in form of cultivators, colorants, odours, preservatives, we produce the modern food in a completely different form that the nature did. In 1985 the food committee working for World Health Organization (WHO) has set the average nutrition norms for the highly developed countries, but already in 1991 it turned out that e.g. because of the processing of food it lacks about 40% of vitamins, micro- and macroelements as well as fiber. An average man compensates it usually with an additional portion of food in order to get rid of the quality hunger. He gets fat, disrupts the balance of components in the organism and ruins the cells. He is completely lost in all the rules of healthy eating. We got used to comfort, we began to eat the beautiful, colorful, artificial and less healthy food.

In our menu we can find too many over processed food, artificial preservatives and colorants, canned meals or those prepared and warmed in the microwave ovens.

Let’s remember:

• a diet used during the weight loss cannot be a one stand torture that we end feeling relieved
• a correct diet must lead to balance in the organism, further change of habits and it must become a nutrition model for future

the process of the permanent weight loss without effort is possible only when:

• we believe in ourselves
• we learn to reduce stress
• we stop counting calories obsessively and trying to lose weight
• instead we learn to eat rationally, to compose meals efficiently
• we improve the functioning of intestines and fill in the necessary nutrients

We eat too much meat, white bread, sweets, sugar, salt, fat. We eat food that is incorrectly balanced when it comes to quality and quantity, we eat it irregularly, consuming it also between the meals. Instead of clean water and natural juices we drink too much fizzy drinks without any nutritive values, but with a great quantity of sugar, chemical flavors and fragrance additions as well as preservatives.

According to the most recent researches, the obesity is a disease connected to the qualitative malnutrition of the body. It is mostly a problem of metabolic processes than an excess of calories. The metabolic disorders may be caused by a long period of improper nutrition, using some medicines or different weight loss diets.

Most often the overweight is a result of many years of improper eating. More often we go on diet the more problems it brings. The “wonderful” diets are only momentary, but do not promote the balance in the body. On the contrary, usually they disrupt it and make the metabolic processes even slower. A diet limiting a quantity of energy (e.g. up to 1000 kcal) also is not beneficial because – with current poor quality of food – we are not able to complement all the ingredients.

At the time of each starvation diet the metabolic process slows down from 15 to 30%. This phenomenon is caused by decreasing of the muscle mass, in which the processes of burning carbohydrates and fats takes place, and decreasing of the efficiency of the thyroid hormones that are responsible for the regulation of metabolism.

When after finishing each treatment we go back to our own nutritional habits, the weight is increased above the original state. Another diet begins when the fat tissue is more thicker and the metabolic process is lower. We come across a vicious circle – at each new trial the starting conditions are harder, the impoverishment and weight are higher. At the same time the key issue of weight loss is not to lose kilograms, but to maintain a new weight for a long time. A well set program will never be a starvation diet. Despite the reduction of calories, we can supply the body with all the necessary nutrients that are necessary for a proper development and functioning of all the cells.

By unlocking the absorption mechanism we make the whole body more effective, we feel and look better and the weight control seems easier.

To determine the level of overweight we commonly use the so-called BMI index (Body Mass Index) – we divide the number of kilograms by the height measured in metres and then we square it. For example: the BMI index of a person who is 170 cm tall and weighs 80 kg is: BMI = 80 : (1,7)2 = 27, 68 kg/m2/

Nutrition and civilization diseases

Atherosclerosis

It is a chronic disease in which the cholesterol is stored in the blood vessels. In time it leads to tightening of the vessels that cause the painful asthma, heart attacks, hypertension or a stroke. Today more and more young people may suffer from this condition.

The cause of circulatory diseases is often an improper way of nutrition full of all the refined carbohydrates (white bread, rolls, sweets, sugar, starch, pasta, etc.), animal fats (fatty red meat, ducks, geese, sausage, pate, offal, canned meat), cheese and powdered milk containing the saturated fatty acid and the oxidized cholesterol. The well known Polish dishes and fast food snacks full of preservatives, colorants and chemical compounds systematically disrupt the balance of microelements and cause the deficiency of vitamins of B group (B6, B12, folic acid). This is the reason why the atherosclerosis is a civilization disease that happens mostly to people with bad eating habits. Those people usually have a chronic deficiency of vitamins from group B which causes the improper biochemical change of homocysteine. The real medical power is in the plant dishes.

A lot of green leaved vegetables, tomatoes, carrots, beetroots, legumes, melons, pumpkins, grapes, red and yellow fruit provide our body with valuable vitamins, mineral salt and compounds biologically active that prevent us from heart diseases. Enriching the menu with nuts, almonds, groat, dark rice, brown bread increases the quantity of those compounds that accelerate the regeneration of the body. However complementing the diet in B6, B12 vitamins and folic acid does not let raising the homocysteine level in blood which effectively protect us from damaging the surface of the blood vessels.

For human health important is not only the quantity and quality of the fat but also the proportion of certain types of eaten fatty acids. A diet composed of the modern highly processed food available on market does not provide us with the Omega-3 acids, but plenty of Omega-6. This state causes the increase of inflammations inside a body and regular weakening of the immune system. A diet should include sea fish that are a good source of necessary Unsaturated Fatty Acids Omega-3 that protect us from heart diseases. The well known source of Omega-3 and other nutrients is flaxseed. Apart from the unsaturated acids from Omega-3 and Omega-6 groups it is a good source of lignans, natural antioxidants of the fito estrogen class that are a part of the seeds in the cell membranes. According to the newest researches the proportion of Omega-3 and Omega-6 acids in the cold-pressed flaxseed oil is 2,5:1 and is in the range from 4:1 and 1:1. The research showed also that the lignans have strong anticancer properties.

Rheumatism

Every third person has problems with joint, bones, arthritis, gout (podagra) or back pain. All those diseases are caused, e.g. by the excess of uric acid in body. In the period of food deficiency after 2^nd World War there were not many of them. In the animal world only the organisms of people and monkeys cannot decompose the uric acid. However only humans, by achieving the wealth, make many nutritional mistakes. We love to eat – we eat large amounts of animal proteins, fats and sugar. Eating too much of those can cause their storage in the body in minimal amounts, but regularly creating many disorders over the years.

High-protein diet causes the gradual increase of purine bodies in blood. People prone to arthritis or gout shouldn’t eat more than 1 g of proteins for a kilogram of the body mass. Cooking meat causes partial rinsing of the purins into water, that is why in a given meal we can eat either the brew or meat, not both at the same time.

The plant products that we should avoid include: legumes (bean, peas), asparagus, spinach, lentils, champignons and boletus. A lot of purines is also in the beer, beer yeast and yeast flakes. However the alcoholic beverages successfully inhibit the production of urine acid by kidneys. It is also worth to avoid sweets with refined sugar, it is not hard to understand why after parties with a lot of food – big amounts of proteins, fat, sugar and alcohol, we often suffer from different inflammations, colic, another arthritis attack or the gout.

People prone to podagra and strong rheumatic pains should avoid not only the high-protein and high-fat diet, but also the long-term starvation diets and intensive weight loss diets with a fast process of fat burning. The fast increase of products of metabolic processes are again inhibited by the removal of uric acid from the body.

Osteoporosis

It concerns about 10% of the population in the Western countries. In our country, according to the data from 1996, the statistics is higher by 50%. The reasons can be found in the environment pollution, lifestyle (alcohol, cigarettes, lack of physical activity) and in the incorrect diet of the Polish people.

The “escape” of calcium with urine is caused by many factors connected to the way of nutrition and lifestyle. One of the main reasons is excessive eating of high-protein animal products and purified carbohydrates. The acidification of the organism caused by the excessive consumption of sugar and proteins accelerates the functioning of kidneys and may remove the calcium with urine. The scientific researches from the last years show that in this situation the calcium balance is negative because of the amount of the delivered calcium.

The natural level of calcium is disrupted also by phosphorus compounds. Phosphates may produce hormones of thyroid that activate the calcium supply from bones. At the same time the phosphates present in many food products bond water in cold meats, thanks to which they look better, it improves the consistence of cheese and melted cheese, they leaven the pastry, “enrich” snacks and puddings, complement the instant coffee, fizzy drinks, etc. Especially harmful is the orthophosphate acid in the fizzy drinks. Children and teenagers who drink it may develop an abnormal bone structure with lower density. The researches show that 0,3 l of coke (one can!) drunk during one day by a 10-year old blocks completely the absorption of calcium and magnesium. Additionally it accelerates development of plague, acidify the body, irritates the stomach mucosa, causes heartburn, bloat, erosion.

Menopause

Menopause, despite the fact that it is a physiological period of a woman’s life, for the reason  of many changes happening inside the body is a reason of bad mood and accompanying diseases, is controversial and we are often afraid of it. Most often these include the hormonal disproportions, disorders and many diseases. They include the metabolic disorders, central obesity, diabetes, hypertension, high level of cholesterol, osteoporosis, thyroid diseases, circulatory diseases or degenerative-inflammatory diseases.

Currently 1/3 of the woman’s life on average is a period of menopause. The knowledge of proper methods of alleviating the symptoms and ways of early prevention of diseases and overweight is a base of good health. The individually set complex action plan, including diet, relaxation and proper prophylactics, gives good effects until the old age. The most effective therapies used in the menopause period is a natural hormonal therapy (bioidentical hormones – NHT), natural supplementation (herbal – plantal, antioxidants, vitamins, microelements) and, of course, properly adjusted diet enriched in the flaxseed oil.

Author: Doctor in biological science Grażyna Pająk

A biologist, nature therapist, dietician, long-term employee of the Polish Science Academy, member of the Polish Hydrobiological Society, Polish Phycological Society and Scientific Committee of the Polish Convention of Energy Therapy, Master of Energy therapy. As one of the first people in Poland she developed and promoted therapies and regeneration of the organism thanks to the cell nutrition. Since 1992 she has managed the Centre of Health Promotion “Herbacell”. In her practice she uses different natural methods of regeneration restoring vitality and health. She is the author of “Deacidifying diet”, based on the unique program of deacidification and nutrition influencing the improvement and strengthening of the organism defense system.