Improving Health Through Nutrition

  Written by Jim Hughes on Dec 1, 2007 3:03 pm

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Improving Health Through Nutrition: No Quick Fix

By Michael Wagner, BA, LMT, CFT

THREE OF SEVEN TIPS REVEALED TODAY.

FOUR THROUGH SEVEN TOMORROW.

Improving Health Through Nutrition...

Improving Health Through Nutrition: No Quick Fix

By Michael Wagner, BA, LMT, CFT

When recommending dietary supplements to persons with health deficiencies, one of the

most common questions we'll hear is, "How fast will this stuff work?" If we can help steer people away from the "quick fix" mentality and, instead, adapt realistic expectations for realizing improved health through nutrition, I believe we've performed a great service.

That's because the restoration of genuine optimal health takes time and patience the quick

fix mind set will never allow. True, there are exceptional cases, especially with exceptional

supplements or unique circumstances. Some people begin a dietary supplement regime and realize amazing results. But they are exceptions. And although certain symptoms may have subsided, the body very often has a lot more healing to accomplish over the long term.

To assist consumers of dietary supplements to "stay the course" and not quit their program

prematurely because they "weren't seeing anything" we need to educate them. Not only

about the supplements in their regime, but about their own body and how nutrition

supports the body to effect improvements in overall health. To this end, I've found seven

principles worth remembering and passing on to those people we wish to see benefit from

nutritional supplements and programs.

1. With nutrition, we are not suppressing or manipulating symptoms as with

pharmaceuticals. We are not treating condition as with herbology. We are simply giving the

body what it needs to heal itself and rebuild itself anew and this takes time. When

correcting nutritional deficiencies, while we won't see instant improvements in most cases,

we will be promoting true and lasting healing. Pharmaceuticals may sometimes "work"

instantly, yet never address underlying causes and possess unwanted side effects.

Contrary to popular thinking, drugs don't heal anything: only the body can do that - when it

gets what it needs. In Optimum Sports Nutrition, Dr. Michael Colgan explains why patience

is the key: "A principle of nutrition you need to know is physiological dynamics. Unlike

drugs, nutrients do not have rapid effects. No quick fix. The business of nutrition is to build

a better body. That has to wait on Nature to turn over body cells. A blood cell lasts 60-120

days. In 3-4 months your whole blood supply is completely replaced. In 6 months almost all the proteins in your body die and are replaced, even the DNA of your genes. In a year all your bones and even the enamel of your teeth is replaced, constructed entirely out of the nutrients you eat."

This time course is well illustrated by the course of deficiency diseases. If I remove all the

vitamin C from your diet within 4 weeks blood vitamin C will drop to zero. But, you will see

no symptoms of disease at 4 weeks. You will have to wait until enough of the healthy cells

have been replaced with unhealthy cells. It is another 12 weeks before the symptoms of

scurvy start to ravage your body. "So when you implement an optimum nutrition program,

don't expect to see rapid results. In one of our studies at the Colgan Institute, runners were

supplemented to try to improve their hemoglobin, hematrocit, and red blood cell count. But

after one month of supplementation, there was no improvement at all. After 6 months,

however, all three indices were significantly increased." "Think of it this way: If you take a

neglected houseplant and start feeding and watering it, the leaves may perk up a bit from

the improved nutrition. But you have to wait for the old leaves to die off and new leaves to

grow before you get a really healthy plant. It is the same with a human body. When you

start feeding it better, you have to wait on physiological dynamics of the body to grow new,

improved cells in the improved medium. After 18 years in sports nutrition, the shortest

program we will give any athlete is six months". With patience, nature can do its work and

produce its miracles.

2. We are all unique. Individual biochemistry's are affected by diet, lifestyle, drug usage,

stress, fitness level, genetics, toxins, etc. It's inevitable, therefore, that some persons will

respond more rapidly than others to improved nutrition. If you're not experiencing results as fast as you'd like, it could be a factor of any number of things. It might be that the body has priorities other than the one upon which you're focusing. For example, you may be wanting to lose body fat while your body may want to lose a tumor you don't even know you have. Give your body permission to have its own priorities and timetable.

3. Positive health changes can be occurring without your "feeling something". Research

studies utilizing blood tests, bone density and body fat measurements, etc. confirm this.

Improved health begins on the molecular and cellular levels. Later, this may translate into

the alleviation or disappearance of specific symptoms and conditions. The already healthy

or symptom-free person, especially persons with abundant energy, might take note: Your

health benefits from optimal nutrition tend to come in the form of your body's correcting

sub-clinical problems-depletions, imbalances and toxic builups that haven't yet become

clinical conditions or "felt" diseases. In other words, in optimizing and maintaining health,

remember "feeling healthy" really only means "feeling symptom free." Actor Michael

Landon was "feeling great" on National TV: three months later he died of cancer. Virtually

everyone can benefit from improved nutrition since, simply by living, toxins accumulate

within our bodies, the body wears out and chronic degeneration slowly settles in. Giving

the body what it needs to stay healthy can minimize the ravages of modern living and

optimize health.

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