The Natural Prescription: a monthly feature offering Naturopathic medical advice on pertinent issues for the health conscious woman.
Bring on the shorts, sundresses and bikinis…but only if your skin is ready. We all love showing off our summer glow. Unfortunately, at this time of year your skin might not really be glowing yet. What to do? Exfoliate!
There are many products on the market for this very important step in every woman’s beauty routine, but you have to be careful. So many beauty products contain unnatural and unsafe ingredients. Many of these ingredients are known carcinogens and endocrine disruptors. When reading labels, always ask yourself “could I eat this ingredient?” If not, then it absolutely does not belong on your skin.
My favorite exfoliating treatment is one that I make myself. It’s so easy to do, so inexpensive and so effective. I recommend you try it at home and get a jump start on your summer glow. Always use organic ingredients whenever possible. Read more
The Natural Prescription: a monthly feature offering Naturopathic medical advice on pertinent issues for the health conscious woman.
Do you have the bug? These sunny Seattle days definitely have me throwing my windows open and enjoying some good old fashioned Spring cleaning. The house always feel so fresh and new after I’ve cleaned out the closets, taken all those old toys to goodwill and gotten rid of the dust bunnies that hide all winter long. This type of ritual really does prepare us for Summer, when everything just seems so light and life is carefree.
But what about another kind of cleaning—or should I say cleansing—that is much more personal and heals on a much deeper level? Spring is the perfect time to consider cleaning up your diet and supporting your body with a gentle detoxification. Read more
The Natural Prescription: a monthly feature offering Naturopathic medical advice on pertinent issues for the health conscious woman.
Happy New Year ladies! What’s on your list of resolutions? Many of you probably have “lose a few pounds” somewhere near the top of the list. And since 2011 is still fresh and new, chances are that you’re actively working toward that goal. We all know that we can accomplish healthy and safe weight loss by 
being conscious of good nutrition and spending some extra time burning calories at the gym. But did you know that sleep also plays a huge role in weight loss and maintenance of healthy weight?
Over the past few years, many studies have linked reduced sleep with increased weight. This data comes in all shapes and sizes (pun intended). Women (and men) who get less sleep gain more weight, gain weight faster, have a harder time losing weight and have much higher risk for current and future obesity.
Most of us are guilty of not getting enough sleep. Modern life provides us with light and activity well into the night. We stay up late going out with friends, watching TV, working and checking email. But at what cost?
Well, since we’re focusing on weight loss, I’ll lay it on the line. Inadequate sleep totally undermines any effort at losing weight. A study released in October reported that “sleep curtailment decreased the proportion of weight lost as fat by 55% and increased the loss of fat-free body mass by 60%.” Whoa. In non-scientific terms: if you don’t get enough sleep, then you burn muscle instead of fat. Read more
The Natural Prescription is a monthly feature offering Naturopathic medical advice on pertinent issues for the health conscious woman.
Hey beautiful women! As you have definitely heard by now, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, so let’s talk about “the girls.”
Breast cancer is serious business. According to the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed cancer among women worldwide. In the United States, it is the second leading cause of cancer death among women of all ages. One in eight women in our country will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime. Those numbers should have gotten your attention.
So what does this mean for our mothers, our sisters, our friends…ourselves? It means that we need to know the facts, be active participants in our own health, and make sure that the women who we love do the same. The good news is that the five-year survival rate for breast cancer, WHEN CAUGHT EARLY, is now 98 percent. That’s amazing! So how do we catch it early? Read more
The Natural Prescription is a monthly feature offering Naturopathic medical advice on pertinent issues for the health conscious woman.
Word is getting around that organic is the way to go. We all want to do what’s best for ourselves and our families, but what about the price tag? Organic foods definitely cost more, but we just can’t ignore the writing on the wall any longer.
Most scientists and doctors now agree that even small doses of pesticides can cause lasting harm to human health. These chemicals build up in our bodies and really take their toll on our neurological and endocrine systems, so it’s definitely best to minimize consumption of pesticides on a daily basis.
So what’s the problem? Why not just buy all organic? If you can, then go for it. Organic food is better for you and organic farming is better for the planet. Unfortunately, most of us simply can’t fit a 100% organic diet into our budgets, so what’s a girl to do?
Thank goodness for the crew at the Environmental Working Group! Their Shopper’s Guide To Pesticides is a great tool to keep with your grocery list. It lists the fruits and vegetables that they classify as the “Dirty Dozen.” These are the produce items which should always be purchased organic because they have extremely high pesticide levels. The guide also lists the “Clean 15.” These are ok to purchase non-organic because they usually have very low pesticide levels.
The EWG notes that if you eat five non-organic items per day from the Dirty Dozen list, then you’ll be consuming over ten pesticides on average every day. On the other hand, five non-organic items from the Clean 15 list will expose you to fewer than two pesticides per day. Sign me up!
Pull it up. Print it out. Put the app on your iPhone. Do what you gotta do to get it in your purse and stop eating all those pesticides! Ciao.
The Natural Prescription is a monthly feature offering Naturopathic medical advice on pertinent issues for the health conscious woman.
Summer has finally arrived in Seattle! These glorious sunny days, the burst of growth in my garden, and the laid-back attitude of summer have inspired me to focus more on the simple pleasures. With that in mind, I’ve decided to share with you ladies my Top 5 Tips For Radiant Health. This is simple stuff: things you can easily do every day to look and feel your best. Healthy inside equals beautiful outside…and we all want to be beautiful, right?
1. Eat Right
Summer is when we lighten up our fare, so at this time of year it’s so easy to eat a simple, healthy, whole foods diet. No, I don’t mean that you have to shop at Whole Foods. I mean eat foods in their whole form, as they come out 
of the earth. Cook from scratch. Stay away from processed foods. Eat organic whenever possible. Focus on fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean meats, beans, nuts, seeds, cold-pressed oils, yogurt, cheese, etc. One of my favorite teachers in medical school always said “keep it simple, sweetheart.” Apply this wisdom to your grocery shopping and cooking…it will take you far.
It’s also important to focus on protein. Eat adequate amounts of protein throughout the day to help balance your blood sugar, give you consistent energy, improve your mood, and keep you feeling satiated. Try to eat some sort of protein (lean meat, beans, nuts, seeds) with every meal and snack, especially early in the day. Breakfast really is the most important meal of the day, so be sure to get protein in the morning to start the day right!
Forget the 5-a-day rule…go for a perfect 10! Ten servings of fruits and vegetables a day will provide you with the fiber you need to keep your cholesterol down, reduce your risk of colon cancer, maintain a healthy weight, and a myriad of other benefits. A serving of fruits or vegetables is 1 cup raw or ½ cup cooked. Start counting! Read more
The Natural Prescription is a monthly feature offering Naturopathic medical advice on pertinent issues for the health conscious woman.
Believe it or not, Summer Solstice is just around the corner. This cool and rainy Spring still has us cruising around in our jackets and boots, but June 21 is almost here, and that means that the sunshine must be coming too. As you get ready for beachcombing, biking, boating, and generally enjoying every last ray of summer sunshine, take some time to consider which sunscreen you’ll toss into your bag.
Of course, we’ve all heard about the importance of sunscreen to help prevent sunburn, premature aging, and skin cancer. But have you heard that sunscreen really isn’t the best protection? And did you know that some sunscreens may actually do more harm than good? Read on, savvy women, read on.
The ever-fabulous Environmental Working Group recently released their 2010 Sunscreen Guide. In their press release last month, they wrote:
The fourth annual Sunscreen Guide by Environmental Working Group (EWG) gives low marks to the current crop of sunscreen products, with a few notable exceptions. EWG researchers recommend only 39, or 8 percent, of 500 beach and sport sunscreens on the market this season.
Those EWG researchers are tough on the sunscreen industry, but rightly so.
