Naturopathy Archives - Page 4 of 4

12/Sep/2017

Intermittent fasting is a different way of thinking about eating.

I’m suggesting that the majority of people have been eating too much and too often. I’m suggesting that breakfast is not the most important meal of the day. By following a few simple guidelines my readers can loose weight, feel great and be healthier than ever before. The guidelines are:

“6 to 8 and feel great”
“Eat what you need”
“Respect your food, respect yourself”

6 to 8 and feel great

Everyday eat within a 6 to 8 hour time frame. If you eat breakfast at 7:00am then your last meal of the day should not be later than 3:00pm. If you eat lunch at 12:00pm then your next and last meal should be no later than 8:00pm. In the first scenario you are basically skipping dinner and in the second scenario you are skipping breakfast. Water, tea, and even coffee are allowed outside of the 6-8 hour allotted time frame as long as there is no added calories, i.e. sugar, milk and or cream. There is also no snacking outside of your 6-8 hour window.

Now let me tell you why and how intermittent fasting works. Immediately after eating, a hormone in your body called insulin rises. Insulin tells your body to burn carbohydrates (sugar) for energy and to store whatever hasn’t been used in your liver and fat cells. This process continues for approximately 4 hours after eating. After 4 hours insulin drops and your body begins to dip into stored sugar and fat reserves for energy; or in other words that’s when you start burning fat.

It’s common practice for most people to eat 3 times a day with snacks in between, this means that we almost never dip into our fat stores. Therefore you would have to do some intensive daily exercise or eat incredibly small portions to loose weight. By following the 6-8 rule; you can almost be certain that you will be burning fat for approximately 10-12 hours per day. The only thing keeping you from shedding excess pounds is by being excessive with portion size and calorie intake, which brings us to the next guideline “eat what you need”.

Eat what you need

This guideline basically translates to portion control. One advantage about using the 6-8 methodology is that you will start becoming more in tune with your body and more aware of hunger and satiety. It is a great feeling to eat when you are actually hungry rather than out of habit. When we experience hunger, food is digested better. Hunger causes your gastrointestinal tract to prepare for food, including ample amounts of stomach acid aiding in the proper breakdown and absorption of nutrients.

Pay close attention to the point at which you no longer feel hunger and you are adequately satiated. Do not overeat. Eat to a point that you feel satisfied but not heavy and bloated. You may notice that portion sizes become smaller. Now, because we are eating only two meals per day, it is also important that when we eat, we eat nutritious food and a variety of foods. Which brings us to the next guideline.

Respect your food; respect yourself

This guideline is about what kind of food you eat and how you eat it. As mentioned in the previous section, since we are essentially eating only twice per day, we want to be putting high quality foods into our body. Fresh, local and organic foods are what you want to focus on. The great thing about this diet is that it there are no restrictions on foods, it’s more about quality. Try to have meals that have a good quality protein, and complex carbohydrates such as veggies and whole-grains.

While making healthy choices is very important, it is also just as important not to stress over your food. Do your best to cook healthy while acknowledging that sometimes you will find yourself eating out, ordering fast food, and having desserts. Don’t beat yourself up about the choices you make, love whatever it is your eating, own it and do your best to eat healthy most of the time. Love your food and love yourself.

Final Thoughts

The guidelines I have purposed, although expressed in an original way, are not new concepts. Eating within a 6-8 hour window is also known as intermittent fasting; a lifestyle and medical intervention that shown to have a multitude of health benefits including lowering blood pressure, staving off cardiovascular disease and improving longevity. Presenting these ideas in away that is easy to incorporate into a daily routine can help to improve the lives of many people. I encourage you to try it out, give it a few weeks and let me know how you feel.

Fitness trainer Mike O’Donnell (2 meal mike) does a great job of further explaining intermittent fasting and how to easily incorporate it into your daily routine. I encourage you to visit his site http://www.theiflife.com

DoctorShawn

23/Aug/2017

Relax an let go

We need to learn how to relax. Many great spiritual teachings and teachers have at some point arrived at a similar insight. At its essence it’s the importance of relaxation and letting go. A Chinese proverb states “Tension is who you think you should be, relaxation is who you are”. We spend an awful lot of time in a state of tension and many believe this to be a productive state, describing it as “good stress”. In reality, tension of the body and mind is a great inhibitor of creative thought and positive emotions.

Recently I underwent a quest of sorts with a good friend of mine in the wilderness of northern Ontario. We were both very lucky to have walked away from that experience with several insights. The most important lesson was that ones true self and ones ability to act with creativity, love and insight is most possible when the mind is able to let go and the body is able to relax.

Health

It is a fact that stress can negatively impact health if left unchecked. Stress affects the body, mood and behavior; it can cause headache, fatigue, insomnia, anxiety, depression and overeating. A Japanese study from 2002 examined 73,000 Japanese men and women, age 40-79, for two years. Men and women who reported a high level of perceived mental stress had between a 1.5 and 2 fold increase in the risk of stroke and congestive heart disease. [1]

In Kompier and Coopers 1999 publication, “Preventing Stress, increasing productivity: European case studies in the workplace”, the impact of stress related illness in the UK is estimated at an economic cost of 2.5-10 percent of the gross national product, with an estimated 30 million days lost due to stress related illness every year.[2] One can easily see that stress is an impeder rather than a supporter of productivity. Kompier and Coopers publication outlines a very technical analysis of strategies for preventing stress in the workplace; however, as a healthcare practitioner I see and understand the need for a simplified strategy that one can implement anywhere and at anytime.

Training

Thus I return to the idea expressed at the beginning of this article, namely to relax and let go. I can predict that many of you reading this are probably muttering to yourself “easier said than done” or something along that line, and you would be absolutely correct; it is! Experience has taught me that in order for the mantra “relax and let go” to stick it helps to have experienced a prolonged state of mental and physical stillness, awareness, or expanded consciousness. By sampling an elevated state of being one is able to better understand the benefit of a stilled mind and better equipped to return to awareness. Unfortunately it is one of those things that as Morpheus told Neo “you must see… for yourself”.

Many of you that have practiced meditation, living in the moment or even a transcendental occurrence through a near death experience or psychedelics may have a sense of what I am talking about. For the rest, step one is to capture a moment of stillness in order to sew the seed of relaxed awareness. For this I can suggest a few things:

Go into nature (nature emits a certain vibration that facilitates meditation, or at least filters out the hustle and bustle of modern mechanistic living).
Practice meditation (for centuries this has been the primary tool used to quiet and focus the mind and body)
Practice a paradigm shift (try to gain a new perspective on yourself and life by pondering a night sky, life itself and trying to live within the moment).
Respectfully and responsibly participate in a traditional healing ceremony (A sweat lodge or a ceremony incorporating herbal medicine, often psychedelics, is a centuries old practice traditionally lead through ritual. Psychedelics are traditionally used to promote expansion of consciousness and are gaining favor in modern medicine as possible treatment for PTSD and depression.) http://www.mwikwedong.com/?page_id=131 http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/how-doctors-treat-mental-illness-with-psychedelic-drugs-w470673

In order to train a muscle to act in a certain way you must implement repetition, a process known as muscle memory. It is the same with the mind, in order to train the mind to relax and let go you must repeatedly remind yourself to do this. I want to clarify that it is possible to practice this without prior experience in achieving states of expanded consciousness, it is just more difficult to maintain because you may lack the frame of reference as to what to return to and why to return to it. The persistent reminding of yourself to relax and let go may be facilitated with a strategy such as setting an alert on a phone, calendar or clock every 30 or 60 minutes. Ultimately you will find a method that works best for you.

The take away message from this discussion is that we can all be more productive, better listeners, more creative, more loving and more aware when we relax and let go. The “relax and let go method” is simple and can be practiced anywhere, you just simply have to remind yourself to relax and let go. It helps when you have a frame of reference as to what a truly relaxed state of mind and body is; however, it’s not necessary and with enough practice you will get there. There is no trying with this method, it is in essence the complete opposite of trying, one just has to remember, over and over, to relax and let go, relax and let go. https://doctorshawn.ca/about-me/

[1] https://doi.org/10.1161/01.CIR.0000028145.58654.41

Circulation. 2002;106:1229-1236

Originally published August 12, 2002

[2] https://books.google.ca/books?id=OFsSz45OxewC&lpg=PR11&ots=S64R_GVnY2&dq=stress%20and%20productivity%20in%20the%20workplace&lr&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=stress%20and%20productivity%20in%20the%20workplace&f=false

DoctorShawn

25/Oct/2016

THC and CBD the ABC’s of Medical Marijuana

The perspective of a Naturopathic Doctor

As a practicing Naturopathic Doctor, I have understandably been occupying a front row seat in what has become one of today’s hot topic health issues; the use of medical marijuana. I have seen a trend recently in my patients; they’re dropping the conventional pain medications and experimenting with the unquestionably still taboo, cannabis. Two things seem to be driving this phenomenon: traditional pain medications aren’t doing the trick anymore and there is a curiosity about this promising although misunderstood plant.

Professionally, I too have been very curious about the medical applications of marijuana. For years patients would confide in me and share their experiences with using different preparations of cannabis. One of the usual preparations is “hemp oil”, which can contain a significant amount of a cannabinoid called CBD. Hemp oil may have been dismissed as folk remedy; however, with the recent surge in medical marijuana use prompting an educated examination of a potential effective therapy. I can now appreciate that hemp oil is a way to reap the benefits of cannabis without getting intoxicated.

There are thousands of articles on the web that explain in depth what the different components of marijuana are and how they differ in pharmacology and therapeutic applications. The point of this article is not to give a thesis but rather present a concise easy to grasp understanding of what those components do in the body and why cannabis in one form or another should be considered as a first choice medicine.

Before presenting the different types and components of marijuana, I would like to give this article some context and legitimacy by introducing myself, and my medical background. I am a Naturopathic Doctor and have been in private practice for just over 7 years in Toronto Canada. Over the past 4 years my practice has focused on the treatment of pain, debilitating neurological conditions and cancer. This really sets the stage as the first few regulated cannabis medications in Canada, namely Nabilone and Sativex, were approved for neuropathic pain, spasticity and nausea associated with cancer treatment and multiple sclerosis; both of which I see more consistently than the average naturopathic doctor. Naturally I started having patients that had experience with these medications or who were experimenting with unregulated forms of cannabis.

A watershed moment in my practice occurred when I began treating a 10-year-old girl that had suffered a stroke. I thought she would benefit from cannabis but at the same time was hesitant about subjecting her to the hallucinogenic properties of THC. Fortuitously around that very same time I viewed a CNN Sanjay Gupta report about a low THC / high CBD strain of marijuana called “charlottes web”. Treatment with this strain had been helping a young girl with a rare debilitating condition associated with frequent seizures. My young patient didn’t have seizures but had chronic high muscle tone as is also seen during seizures. The report also mentioned how CBD is not hallucinogenic. I was certainly intrigued as to the potential efficacy of this treatment and devoted both time and resources in understanding medical cannabis and CBD. As a result of this study and promising results, I now recommend CBD regularly in my practice. Now let’s take a step back and understand what CBD is and what does it do.

Although there are thousands of potentially therapeutic compounds in cannabis, research has really focused on two: THC and CBD. Depending on the sex and strain of the cannabis some will be higher or lower in one compound than the other.

THC is what gets you high. It acts on cannabinoid receptors in the body and brain with the result of inducing the perception altering experience that marijuana is known for. Along with the “high”, research has pointed out that there are definite pain lowering and mood enhancing properties of THC. However; there are some concerns with THC as it may impact learning in the developing brain, may trigger a psychotic episode in individuals predisposed to schizophrenia and impacts the users ability to carry out daily living tasks such as operating machinery and driving.

CBD, on the other hand, is a non-psychoactive component of cannabis that can comprise up to 40% of the active cannabinoids in marijuana. Although large doses of CBD in my experience can induce an intense feeling of relaxation there are no perception altering effects from even the highest doses of CBD. Research into this curious compound has pointed out that rather than binding to cannabinoid receptors in the body, as does THC, CBD for the most part blocks activity at these receptors and exerts most of its effect at a receptor called 5-HT1a. The 5-HT1a-receptor is linked to serotonin activity.

The overall effect of CBD in the complicated milieu of the human body is that it is anti-inflammatory, mood enhancing, offers protection for the nervous system, promotes relaxation, anti-spasmodic and negates some of the unwanted side-effects of THC consumption. CBD has even been shown to prolong the beneficial effects of THC by increasing the body’s amount of cannabinoid receptors. Furthermore, there has yet to be any evidence for negative side effects or toxicity even at very high doses of CBD per day. CBD research is currently exploring promising therapeutic effect in epilepsy, dementia, migraine and cancer. So all in all it’s a pretty impressive compound.

Now you may be wondering; “how do I get CBD?” – do I need a prescription and is it legal? Technically in Canada any derivative of Marijuana including THC and CBD is classified as a schedule 2-drug and can only be legally obtained with a prescription from a medical doctor. Personally I find it frustrating that Naturopathic Doctors, who receive 4 years of training in botanical medicine, are restricted from prescribing marijuana (a botanical last time I checked) whereas the responsibility falls on medical doctors who typically have no training in prescribing botanical preparations. Fortunately hemp, which is part of the cannabis family, is high in CBD, low in THC and in some cases legal (The legality of the extraction depends on factors such as THC levels and what part of the plant is used).

There are now many companies which specialize in CBD preparations derived from hemp and do not require a prescription from a medical doctor. Unfortunately the CBD on the market continues to be a bit pricey per milligram ($1/10mg) since a therapeutic dose often starts at around 40mg all the way up to 200mg per day. Hopefully in the future we will start to see some higher potency, cheaper preparations of CBD.

As a Naturopathic Doctor, I offer the following personal and professional perspective to both botanical medicines as a whole and specifically CBD. Medicines derived from whole botanicals are a complex collection of thousands of compounds. Often we really only have an understanding of a few of those compounds and that is what disorients many practitioners, especially medical doctors. However, I believe we should appreciate the complexity of botanical medicines precisely because our own physiology is just as complex. Pharmaceutical preparations are very specific in their composition and action in the body. Our bodies are not built that way and that is why we often see side effects with pharmaceutical preparations.

Certainly I do not claim that there are no side effects with botanical medicines, but it is a fact that there are far fewer. Pharmaceutical medicines have a definite time and place in specific treatment but we should not be frightened to use botanical medicines because it is their complexity that often make them safer for prolonged use proving for a more balanced therapeutic effect.

During my relatively short period of recommending CBD, I have seen the benefits in: Pain, Sleep, Focus and Rigidity. I work with a great deal of patients who have suffered from neurological injuries (Spinal cord injury, brain injury, stroke) and neurological disease (Multiple Sclerosis, Transverse Myelitis, Chronic Regional Pain Syndrome, Migraine, Fibromyalgia). I have witnessed more than half of these clients taper down or completely come off of several pain medications including addictive opioid medications and manage their symptoms more effectively with a combination of THC and CBD.

I have a number of patients who after several years of insomnia return to a normal sleep pattern with a therapeutic program that includes CBD. Many of my clients with high tone and muscle rigidity experience a relaxation response within minutes of taking CBD. In fact patients will often take a dose of CBD during a treatment session and will see the effects immediately. I have several patients tell me that since starting CBD their thinking has been clearer. I even have one patient who has told me that her vision is clearer, which makes sense in the context of inflammation of the optic nerve often experienced in multiple sclerosis.

As a Naturopathic Doctor it is my job to be on top of the latest research and treatment-options within the realm of nutraceuticals, complimentary therapies and herbal medicines. CBD is an exciting new treatment option with an excellent safety profile, promising results and that fits in well with my patient population. I am proud to an advocate for medical marijuana and have made a commitment to continue to update my patients and peers as to my clinical experience with CBD.

Newer Posts

Eat What You Need: Intermittent fasting made simple

Relax and Let Go; training for a clear mind

Why CBD is my new favourite medicine

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