Looking at Foods that Heal

As I see it there are a few issues with maintaining health. One is what we put into our bodies, via food, drugs, herbs, misc environmental chemicals, and so on. Another is exercise and then there's the pysical environment (noise, UV radiation, air quality, etc.)  For now, let's just look at some of the things that we put in our bodies that effect the healing process.

One the one hand we have a fabulous array of drugs that do an effective job of suppressing or curing whatever ails us. Antibiotics have saved millions of lives, for example, and aspirin is a wonder drug. Most drugs don't directly heal, but they let the body heal itself. Of course, if your genetic makeup is such that you are the person who gives meaning to that list of side effects...

And then we have Nature's pharamacy. Herbs have been used my many cultures for thousands of years. Plants generate all kinds of chemicals, naturally, and people have been taking advantage of this with varying degrees of effectiveness.

There are a couple of big issues with herbs, though: allergies and processing methods. Many people are allergic to the herbs themselves as well as any extra fillers that are added to the product. While most people won't have this issue it's something that one needs to pay attention to.

As far as processing goes... the way the herbs are collected, cleaned, and processed will have an effect on their potency. The makeup of the soil will also affect the potency. Since they're not regulated like pharmaceuticals the potency can vary from company to company, or even bottle to bottle with the same brand.

So what about foods that heal? It's not actually the foods themselves that heal. What they do is provide you with nutritional support which allows your body's natural regenerative powers to do the job. Vitamins and minerals provide necessary components to build all the compounds that the body needs, as well as clean up things like excess free radicals.  Obviously if you fill up on the tasty fat filled fried foods at the local burger joint you're missing out on some of these nutrients.

Another advantage that natural food has over processed food is that there are a number of micronutrients to occur in trace amounts. They don't make it onto the recommended daily allowance charts, but the body needs them. And they're not found in chips and dip.

Otherwise all foods suffer from some of the same issues as herbs - the quality of the soil that they're grown in, processing methods, length of time in storage before it hits your table, all have an affect on the quality of the foods.  If certain minerals aren't in the soil then they won't be in the foods gorwn in that soil. Same with vitamins. Processing and storage also allows vitamins to become worthless. This is why people recommend suplementation.

But foods have one major benefit that herbs and (even less so) pharmaceuticals don't... our bodies evolved, over millions of years, to process these foods, whether animal or vegetable, and make the best use of what they have to offer.

So what does one look for? For the veggies: if you were to look at the chemical makeup of a basket of brightly colored veggies you would see a huge variety of vitamins, minerals, anti-oxidants, co-factors, trace nutrients, and so on. And the larger the variety of food types that you're willing to eat the more of those that you get. Now, if you're really picky, and/or if pizza makes up 80% of your calories you might want to look into some good supplements...

Suggestions? The study of food, organic and otherwise, is the subject of many books, so I'm only going to make a couple of suggestions here. As usual, no claims are made here to the effectiveness of any particular food. Everything presented here is my opinion. Consult your doctor and so on.

The thing about foods, as opposed to drugs/herbs, is that we need to eat the right ones, mostly every day (it's ok if it get skipped now and then.) Eating a plateful of raw veggies, once, won't do you much good (but your gut will be happy.)

Apples have a great assortment of nutrients, especially if you eat the skin. They help with constipation and diarrhea, improve lung capacity, and help to cushion the joints.

Seaweeds provide a rich variety of nutrients and help to support the hormonal, lymphatic, urinary, and other bodily systems. They've actually been called the Ultimate Vegetable.

Red, yellow, and green veggies provide a variety of anti-oxidants which protect against a number of degenerative diseases by destroying free radical molecules in the body. This can help with environmental (pollution) damage and there's a growing body of evidence that they help with cardiovascular problems as well. (But, not if you eat them just once.)

Spices contain a number of phytochemical and phytonutrients. These chemicals, and others, work as anti-oxidants and micro-nutrients. Tumeric, for example, contains curcumin, which some research has show to have some effect on colon cancers. Spices such as ginger, nutmeg, cumin, and coriander, help block the effects of aflatoxin, a mold that is believed to cause liver cancer, among other ill effects.

More About Healthy Foods

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• Get a Fruit and Vegetable Into Yiour Diet
  
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• Can Himalayan Goji Juice Detox Your Body?
  
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