“Neck pain is not a trivial condition for many people,” says Task Force president Dr. Scott Haldeman, clinical professor, Department of Neurology at the University of California, Irvine, and adjunct professor, Department of Epidemiology University of
California Los Angeles. “It can be associated with headaches, arm and upper back pain and depression. Whether it arises from sports injuries, car collisions, workplace issues or stress, it can be incapacitating. Understanding the best way to diagnose and manage this
problem is of high importance for those who are suffering and for those who manage and pay for its care.”
Researchers suggested that people suffering from neck pain should avoid using neck brace devices in an attempt to handle the condition. Also, they failed to find favor with corticosteroid injections and surgery. Treatments with corticosteroid injections and surgery for neck pain relief should only be considered when there is associated extreme pain in the arm or in the case of a fracture or a serious disease. Surgery should be seen only as a last resort for severe and persistent pain.
Which alternative therapy a neck pain sufferer should embark upon was not designated by researchers. They did advise that alternative treatments to manipulate the neck should be considered. Often, relief can be provided through Chiropractic adjustments as well as the intervention offered through Acupuncture and massage.
Researchers cautioned consumer awareness toward anyone that makes a “big claim” to solve neck pain. They also suggested that some relief should be noticed within 2-4 weeks of beginning treatment. If there is little or no relief after this amount of time, another
form of alternative therapy should be considered.

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Luke McMullan, a great person, friend, and owner of Branches Ecological Designs www.branchesnc.com, answered my plea for help in getting to the root of the organic vs. non-organic produce debate. He generously took the time to give me his thoughts. Thank you so much, Luke! You are helping many people!!

Here are Luke’s thoughts:

Laura asked me to talk about plant uptake of heavy metals so that is sort of what I will do. It is generally assumed that organically produced food is relatively non-toxic, while we need to worry about the toxicity impacts of conventional food. Guess what? Worrying is a waste of time, but if you’re going to worry you should worry about both. We know that chemical fertilizers contain significant levels of potentially toxic metals such as lead, mercury, cadmium, nickel, zinc, and arsenic, which in turn accumulate in the soil and are taken up by plants. What you don’t usually hear about are the organically approved natural fertilizers such as composted manure, rock phosphate, greensand, guano, and fish emulsion, which

• contain the same heavy metals
• accumulate in soil
• are taken up by crops.

The difference? This time the chemicals end up in the body of someone who thinks they are eating something healthier.

Several studies in Europe show that levels of heavy metals in organic food are sometimes twice as high as levels found in conventional food, yet there seems to be fairly dramatic variability. The species and variety of plants have a somewhat significant role in determining the potential levels of heavy metals per unit of nutrient; however, there are some other far more important factors to take into account, foremost being the level of heavy metals in the soil.

Several decades ago we knew very little about the toxicity of many of these metals or their potential to end up in our food supply, so agricultural pesticides loaded with lead and arsenic were dumped into the soil. These pesticides along with deposits from other industrial chemicals ended up leaving their heavy metals in the soil and there they remain until some plant picks them up to escort them into the food chain. This can happen either by eating a stick of celery grown in contaminated soil or a hamburger from a cow that ate grass or grain grown in contaminated soil.

Ugh. So what is a consumer supposed to do? When food is from a factory (grocery stores stock mostly factory farmed food) we have no idea what we are getting. But that does not have to be the case for you. A good start is to know the people who grow your food and the land where it is grown. Or better yet get to know the soil where you live and produce a portion of your food sustainably.

More thoughts from Laura

Luke is going to help my family prepare to grow some of our own food. He is a talented organic farmer and landscape designer who focuses on creating beautiful, healthy gardens that require little maintenance and produce wonderful food. Luke offers in-person consults, over-the-phone coaching and a monthly newsletter. You can reach him at: branches.landscapes@gmail.com to sign up for his newsletter or inquire about services.

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2. Healthy eating on the road – tips from complementary medicine practitioners.
3. Detox Diet Menu Plan

Dr. Goodheart could also strengthen unresponsive muscles and determined complicated nutritional needs quickly for many problems. He developed a system called Applied Kinesiology and began teaching AK to-read more

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It’s true.  How you think about yourself, how you treat yourself, and what you say to yourself affects all of your other relationships from friend to lover, child to parent and parent to child.

When you get up in the morning and look into the mirror do you say, “I love you just the way you are!”  Or do you look for more lines and wrinkles, bags and sags and then go on to count them and complain about your hair.

You say things to yourself that you would never say to your best friend.  Worst than that, you’ll easily forgive a friend for an infraction and yet beat yourself over the head for the slightest mistake.  Everyone makes mistakes.  That’s how we learn.  If you didn’t learn from your mistake don’t worry about it because you’ll get another chance to make the same mistake again until you do learn.

You are with yourself 24/7.  There’s no getting away from it.  If you want a solid, loving relationship with someone, the best thing you can do to promote it is to love yourself.  This is not being prideful.  This is being smart.  Think about it this way….

If you were flying in a plane through turbulence and the oxygen masks dropped down, you need to put yours on first before you can help anyone else with theirs.  Why is that?  If you don’t take care of yourself – in this case, by getting enough oxygen – then you could easily pass out before you help anyone and then who will be able to help you?

When you take care of yourself and are 100% fit, fine, and optimistic, then you can give 100% whenever needed, wanted, or necessary.  If you’re only 50% together, you short change everyone including yourself.

If there are things about yourself that you don’t care for, accept the way you are first and go from there.  When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.

Phran Gacher, CH, Hypnotherapist

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Our complimentary medicine professionals and green living consultants share their dream healthy Valentine gifts (see comments below).

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“We do not live in the natural world as we used to. We live in a society that increases the toxic load on our bodies every day,” explains Darlene Holloway, LMBT, CT, SIT, the owner of Alternative Health Center of Cary and the president of North Carolina Colon  Hydrotherapy Safety Association. “Colon cancer is one of the leading causes of death in the United States. We are what we eat and drink. Read the labels of all those boxed processed foods that we bring back home from the grocery store. They are full of chemicals. Our fruits and vegetables absorb all the pesticides and artificial fertilizers they were sprayed with. Our body is not designed to process chemicals. Our body is designed to process food. Man-made chemicals effectively confuse our digestive system and as a result are stored in the body.”

According to Holloway, most “cleansing” pills on the market are composed of herbs, fiber and laxative compounds.  When the fiber enters into the colon it will swell, absorbing all the water content in the colon.  This can lead to constipation and is the reason why the laxatives are added to expel the fiber.  Over use of laxatives will lead to constipation, so the pictures of gross stuff you see on the websites that promote their “cleansing” products are not actually captured and expelled toxins, but the fiber compound itself.

“Colon Hydrotherapy”, continues Holloway, “is the best, simplest, and the most ancient way of detoxification.”

Colon Hydrotherapy is a very old practice. Ayurveda, a five thousand year old wellness system from India, recommends Basti, an Ayurvedic form of Colon Hydrotherapy, as a part of seasonal cleansing along with special diet and massages.

According to Egyptian texts, it was presented to a High Priest by Thoth, the god of medicine, who turned into Ibis, took the water into his beak and injected it into the anus.

“Colon hydrotherapy is simply a cleansing of the large intestine,” says Holloway. “The large intestine is five to six feet long, and two to five inchs in diameter. Even during a normal bowl movement the remains can be trapped in sacks of the colon and start decaying and fermenting. It then turns into a liquid substance that is highly toxic, and can be re-absorbed into the body causing headaches, fatigue, low back pain; the list goes on and on,”  she continues. “You would not tolerate a sewer system that leaks back in your house. Don’t let it happen to your body.”

Cancer centers in America are now including Colon Hydrotherapy as a part of the treatment. Danbury Hospital in Connecticut uses it for prep in colon scopes.

Properly trained colon hydrotherapists assess the client based on their diet, emotional state, and medical history. The initial series includes one to three sessions, with maintenance visits 4 times a year.

Colon hydrotherapy is a useful tool for many reasons, including  preparing a person for surgery, preparing for a colon scope, flushing out toxins after chemotherapy, preventive therapy, detoxification, or just to tone a “lazy” colon. Research shows that colon hydrotherapy does not kill friendly flora.

Darlene has recently been recognized as colon hydrotherapist of the year by the Interational Association for Colon Hydrotherapy (I-ACT).  As president of the North Carolina Colon  Hydrotherapy Safety Association, she  is involved in working towards licensing for  colon therapy in the state of North Carolina. She holds licenses in both Florida and North Carolina for massage.  She holds the highest degree with I-ACT as an instructor, and is National Board certified.  With 30 years of experience in colon therapy and massage, she is one of the most experienced and educated women in her field.

For more information contact:

Darlene Holloway, LMBT, CT, SIT,  Alternative Health Center of Cary.  (919) 380-0023

http://www.ahealthcenter.net/

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3. Setting the Stage for Imbalance

Two glasses of water (filtered), one glass with one-half of a lemon squeezed into it.

Breakfast:

One piece of fresh fruit (at room temperature), such as apple, pear, banana, grapes or citrus.  Chew well, mixing each bite with saliva.

15-20 minutes later:  One bowl of cooked whole grains – specifically millet, brown rice, amaranth, quinoa, raw buckwheat or buckwheat.

Flavoring may be two tablespoons of fruit juice for a sweeter breakfast taste, or use the “better butter” mixture mentioned below with a little rock salt or tamari for a deeper flavor.

11:00 a.m. One to two cups veggie water, saved from steamed vegetables.  Add a little sea salt or kelp and drink slowly, mixing each mouthful with saliva.

>Lunch (Noon – 1 p.m.):

One to two medium bowls of steamed vegetables; use a variety, including roots, stems, and greens – e.g., potatoes and yams, green beans, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, beets, asparagus, kale, swiss chard and cabbage.  Chew well!

3:00 p.m. One to two cups veggie water, saved from steamed vegetables.  Add a little sea salt or kelp and drink slowly, mixing each mouthful with saliva.

>Dinner (5 – 6 p.m.):

Same as lunch.  (change vegetables for taste variety).

>Evening & Bedtime (Asleep by 10 p.m.):

Herbal teas only – e.g. peppermint, chamomile, pau d’arco or blends.  Before bedtime is a good time to take your Calcium/Magnesium suppliment

Seasoning

Butter/canola or flaxseed oil mixture.  Make this “better butter” by mixing one half-cup of cold pressed canola oil (or olive or flaxseed oils) into a soft (room temperature) half-pound of butter; then place in a dish and refrigerate.  Use about one teaspoon per meal or a maximum of 3 teaspoons daily.

Note

You may feel a little weak or have a few symptoms the first couple of days – this will pass.  Clarity and feeling good should appear by day three or four, if not before.  If during this diet, you start to feel weak or hungry, assess your water intake and elimination; if needed, you may eat a small portion of protein food (3-4 ounces) in the mid-afternoon.  This could be organic fish; free-range, organic chicken; or some beans, such as lentil, garbanzo, mung or black beans.

The Detox Diet summary, copyright Elson M. Haas, MD 2001.

Presenter & Practitioner:  Cynthia Winslow, NH.D., Company: Bality, Inc. Raleigh, NC

cyndiwins@nc.rr.com

919.760.0900

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So what can you do to get something healthy on the road? Hear are a few tips from people who made wellness their profession.

Planning ahead will help.  Know your weakness and prepare for it.

Solution #1: Pack your own food.

• Fruits: apples, prunes, grapes, grapefruits, figs (great iron source)
• Soaked and home roasted nuts
• Hard boiled eggs
• Vegetables: Sliced carrots, broccoli sticks, celery
• Cheese sticks.
• Protein and vitamin powdered drinks
• Home made muesli, with a large number of nuts, dried fruits
• Home made trail mix (nuts, dried fruit, pumpkin or sunflower seeds, and carob chips)

Don’t forget to have something to boost your immunity:

• EmergnC packets
• Green Food packets, mix together each morning
• Vitamin D3 2000iu daily
• Digestive enzymes
• Probiotics
• And keep some Activated Vegetarian Charcoal tabs around in case you come across Montezuma’s Revenge (2 tabs immediately then another 3 hours later usually do the trick) and for the party lovers 2 before bed helps ward off hangovers

Solution #2: Eating out.

• You are not required to order meals as they appear on the menu. Just pick various foods described in the meals and create your own dinner.

• • Choose salads
  • Order smaller wild caught fish. Smaller fish are preferred because exposure to mercury is lessened, and wild caught fish are preferred because fish farmed in a self-contained system are treated with antibiotics and chemicals.
  • Never eat shrimp from a foreign country, as they are farmed and treated with antibiotics and chemicals that are illegal in the United States
  • Order salad dressings on the side: vinaigrette, not creamy.
  • Order romaine, baby greens, etc. not iceberg lettuce.
  • Order omelet or other egg item with butter on the side
  • Order proteins, baked, broiled or grilled, not fried.
  • Order sauces and gravies on the side.
  • Get vegetables du jour, not potatoes or order potato and veggies and salad and forget the meat.
  • Ask for whole grain breads and rolls.  If whole grain breads are not available, skip them.
  • Ask for real butter and never settle for margarine.
  • Unless eating at an organic restaurant, any meats will have hormones and antibiotics, which raise numerous health concerns and should be avoided. Of all meats, conventional hamburger (as opposed to organic, free-range) should be absolutely avoided. Hamburger recalls are almost a monthly event.

• Sushi restaurant comes on the top of the list.
• Choose ethnic restaurants
• Ask the locals about good vegetarian or Indian restaurants
• Do some research on many of the larger chain restaurants to see what the calorie counts and nutritional content of the foods on their menus are. Choose 2 things that are low fat and low calorie from each restaurant and keep a list with you. Just order one of the things on your card.
• Once you get your food, bless it and eat it knowing you did the best you could with what you had.  Your effort will be honored and you will feel great.

And don’t forget to ask the locals.  They always know the best restaurants.  People like to be helpful and love to tell you where to go.

If you are on the road a lot: invest in “The Healthy Highways”, a total guide to all the healthy eateries and stores in the USA – on sale at Harmony Farms (Raleigh, NC).

And sometimes you just have to make concessions and eat stuff you don’t normally eat.

Many thanks to our contributors:

• Julie Seibert, the owner of Healing through Organization, LLC www.healingorganization.com
• Steve Long, the owner of Harmony Farms Natural Foods Store www.Harmony-Farms.net and Café Harmony www.CafeHarmony.net
• Cynthia Winslow, NH.D., BA Psych., Practitioner ; (919) 760-0900
• Barbara-Lynn Freed, Aromatherapist and Spiritual Healer, www.AromatherapyCelebrations.com:
• Cherry Pfau, MSN, RN, AHN-BC, Wellness Nurse; 919-830-1520
• Marilyn Shannon, Coach, owner of Power of Dialog www.powerofdialogue.com
• Ann Jones, CNHP, CNC, (919) 469-9953
• Denise Souza, Body Symmetry, 919-600-8840.
• Laura Combs, Healing Foods Specialist,  founder of Moving Strongly Forward, (919) 460-7092 ; www.movingstronglyforward.typepad.com
• Rev. Phran Gacher of www.PerfectCeremonies.com

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