Dry skin?

Dry skin is a problem fro some people all year long, but for many of us it is seasonal and creeps up on us when the weather changes. It is like someone has taken every ounce of moisture out of our skin, and all you need to do is rub your skin lightly and the dry skin flakes off almost like it is snowing.

We need to remember three things to solve and fix the seasonal dry skin dilemma.

1) Hydrate externally with lotions and oil products

2) Hydrate internally with oils from supplements and foods

3) Hydrate internally with water

That's it, that is all it takes for you to solve the dry skin problem. Why then do you ask does it seem to get worst and not better? The problem is most people only do one of the three things. Most people put lotion on once a day and expect miracles. For a lotion to work it should be high quality and chemical free utilizing natural ingredients. Did you know that many lotions actually that are labeled for dry skin relief actually have so many chemicals that it causes dry skin because of what is in the product.

The second thing is most people only eat and consume oils that are hydrogenated, like deep fried oils in their fast food. The oil they need they need to consume from food includes olive oil, sesame oil, salmon, sardines, avocados and all deep sea fish. These foods not only lubricate the skin but also help to lower the risk for heart disease and help lower cholesterol and blood pressure. The third is to consume supplemental oils like flax seed oil and omega 3 capsules. This way you round out the oils internally with the lubricating natural lotions you use on the skin topically.

Last, but certainly not least, water. Yes, something as easy as water consumption can hydrate you and make your skin soft, moist and subtle. We drink a lot of water in the summer because we can visually see and feel the signs of dehydration. But in the winter we are not hot, we are not thirsty so we do not drink water. Your skin is not all that suffers from your not drinking water. The winter months also, due to dehydration brings on the highest incidence of prostate infections, kidney infections, urinary and bladder infections as well as bacterial infections in the urinary tract. So when I stress water, I mean it. You may not be thirsty but you are in the inside and you just do not know it.

Dry skin over long periods of time makes you look and feel old, ages you long before your time and is not healthy. So follow these three steps and have beautiful healthy skin all year long.

Cold weather is coming to your city.

Wow, cold weather is upon us, and flu and cold season is here. Are you affected yet? I am seeing so many people all with red tipped noses, coughing, sneezing and feeling yucky, and the crazy thing is the season has barely begun.

It seems that every year I start nutritionally preparing everyone on what to do and what nutritional changes to make, and sometimes I feel like nobody is listening. But then again, at the end of the season I will get hundreds of e- mails thanking me for the suggestions and for helping them to get through a season without one sick day, this makes it all worthwhile.

Doesn't it just make you crazy when you give friends and family members advice, and they do not listen and they end up getting into the situation you warned them about and they look at you with that"how did this happen look"? Me, it makes me crazy and I wonder whether they listen to anything I say, ever?

Bottom line, all you can do is give people the tools that can make them steer themselves to a healthier, happier life. What everyone does with this information is not for us to worry about.

A few blogs ago we talked about flu preparation, check it out and remember you can always e mail me if you have further questions. I guarantee you that hind sight is always 20-20, and when you are sitting in an over crowed germ filled waiting room at two AM in the morning with every other sick person in your town or city, you will kick yourself for not putting yourself first and taking better care and focusing on some basic prevention, and you will be thinking, I will never do this again!

Election 2008 over at last

It seems as if this presidential election has been going on for years now, maybe that is because it has. Day after day of more mud slinging and gossip, positive and negative information coming from all sides,frankly I am sure the country has just about had it, I know I have.

As this Presidential election comes and goes we move onto a new era in American history. President elect Barack Obama will be the next president of the United States of America, and he will be the first African American president in American history.

This could also be the many of first for America. The firsts that I am listing here are hopeful scenarios that I would love to see come to fruition. Let's face it anything can and may happen and with positive thinking anything is possible.

1) The first health care program that makes health care available to all Americans, and nobody is left out.

2) The first time our economy becomes rock solid after years of it struggling to stay above water.

3) The first time the dollar starts to gain it's worth on a world wide scale in many years.

4) The first time we hear that cancer has been cured and it is actually true.

5) The first time our school system gets back on course and our High school graduates can compete on a global scale as truly educated adults for the first time in more years than I want to think about.

6) The first time all Doctors are open to using alternative nutritional medicine BEFORE they recommend pharmaceutical drugs.*

7) The first time all of us as a nation decide to take better care of ourselves and health becomes a nation wide focus.

8) The first time we as a nation decide to do everything we can to preserve our environment and make better and greener choices.

10) And the first time everyone decides that stress, illiteracy, poverty, pollution, greed, disease and crime are no longer words in the dictionary because they no longer apply.

I know, a lot to ask for, but I was always told to ask for as much as possible and maybe half of it can and will come true.

Zoom Zoom Zoom goes the year

Amazingly another year has slipped by us and as the holidays slip on by we will be at the doors of another night of New Years Eve resolutions. Can you believe it is that time again? I seriously do not know where the year went. I am still trying to figure out whether it is because I am older and life is zooming by, or that I have way too much going on and I am just forgetting to smell the roses, Hell, I do not even know where the flowers are any more.

It seems like it was just a few years ago when I wishing to be older so I could be treated like an adult and people would stop referring to me as a child. Now as I am approaching, excuse me while I swallow, 50, all I want to do is go back to being a kid. To a time when the only deadline in my life was a paper on a book I was supposed to read. When doing chores was something I hated but when they were done I could have fun. When the countdown of time was for Christmas and summer vacation alone and nothing else. How do we go from the simpler times to where we are as adults.

Bills, deadlines, mortgages, shopping, car payments, insurance, upkeep of houses, clothing and our own personal up keep as well. Making payments on everything and trying to meet that someone special in what seems to be a world of people would act like someone different because they themselves have gotten lost in the translation, if you will. We are all in a hurry to keep up with the Jone's, and we do not even know who the Jone's are. People are driving cars they cannot afford, wearing clothes they should not be wearing and living a lifestyle that has us in a hurry to go know where quick.

I guess I am at the point where I say enough!! It is time for friends and a slower lifestyle. A time to be ourselves and be with the people who accept us for who we are. To be doing the things we really enjoy, and living the life that actually makes us happy. When we all stop acting like we are better than everyone around us and just be happy we are not alone. A handful of incredible true to life friends is worth a hundred acquaintances who in an emergency would never be there when we really needed them.

A back to basics philosophy. Basic food and nothing crazy, basic nutrition, good quality that covers all the basis. A career that you enjoy getting up for every day and do not hate the entire day you work at it. Pets, yes pets, we all need them as they are the key to unconditional love. Pets have the right idea. They never see us being overweight or out of shape, or never see us on a bad hair day as anything than the one that loves them. They do not care if we are the president of a company, or the person that drives the president around. Love that is always there every night when you get home and every morning when you leave. Pets have it right, simple ideals, simple lives and they get to sleep all day waiting for their special person to walk through the door.

Remember, when you think you are in overload with hundreds of things to do write them down and prioritize. You will find that out of that list of a hundred things, only a few are actually pressing to be done today. We all just get so far turned around and the plate is so full that we lose the state of reality and cannot see clearly. So stop, take a breath and ask yourself some questions, just a few, but I guarantee they will make you say hmmmmm.

1) Do I like my chosen career?

2) Are my friends there when I need them, and am I there when they need me?

3) Do I like myself unconditionally, and if not why?

4) Am I the kind of person I would want for a friend?

5) Do I take care of myself?

6) Am I as healthy as I can be?

7) Am I doing anything I set out to do when I was younger with dreams? If no, why?

8) Is my relationship healthy, if not why am I in it?

9) Do I spend my day pleasing my self, or spend it worrying about pleasing others?

10) Have I ever had unconditional love, if no get a pet?

I was just reminded by someone special that I forgot something very important, I am amazed I could forget something so important to me.

11) Have you laughed today alone or with a friend, if not, look in a mirror. I feel laughing at ourselves is the BEST MEDICINE AROUND!

November, here we go!!!!!!!!!1

I know, I know, you had a lot of candy left over from last night and you do not want it to go to waste. A good excuse and one used for a very long time. The answer, knock on your neighbors door and say, will your kids enjoy this as I need to stay clear of candy, problem solved.

We are so good with weight based excuses, as Americans we have all of them on the tip of our tongue everyday, along with the marketing folks who know us better than we think. They have the best ways to may garbage food look good to you,wonderful inviting ways to make inconvenience a thing of the past and food with no nutritional value seem the only way to go. Remember, they are selling something to you, and they a re great at it. They are in the drivers seat and leading you to a golden road filled with the promise of nutrition, great tasting food and convenience to make your life so easy you will have more time to sit on the couch.

The next few months are actually the time of year people all across America put on the more weight than any other time of the year. Christmas parties, eating late, fast food because you are swamped with end of the year projects, holiday stress around every corner. Let's try an experiment, when you are shopping the next time for groceries, look around you and focus on the center of the store. Look in other people's carts and notice that most people shop in the middle part of the grocery store. The isles where all the nice labels, pre- made easiness are.

Try just one time to do all your food shopping from the outside walls. This is where you will find vegetables, fruits, meats and poultry and freshly made bakery. If you shop in this part of the store you will actually have to do preparation and really have to cook, wow, what a concept, but you will feel great.

Try for the rest of the year to shop here.Resist the temptation to open a box an throw a frozen container in the microwave, resist the temptation to have food thrown thrown through the window of your car. You will have more energy and stamina, feel and look better and your heart, waistline and cholesterol levels will be most appreciative.

Halloween already?

Although Halloween is a holiday of a sort, it is not really a holiday about giving thanks like Thanksgiving and many others. I thought I would include a wonderful story that came to me via e mail, I hope they do not mind that I am sharing this as it has to do with two things I love, animals and the devotion of animals to their humans.

This is a wonderful story, enjoy.
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Anyone who has pets will really like this. You'll like it even if you don't, and you may even decide you need one!Mary and her husband Jim had a dog named 'Lucky.' Lucky was a real character. Whenever Mary and Jim had company come for a weekend visit they would warn their friends to not leave their luggage open because Lucky would help himself to whatever struck his fancy. Inevitably,someone would forget and something would come up missing.Mary or Jim would go to Lucky's toy box in the basement and there the treasure would be, amid all of Lucky's other favorite toys.

Lucky always stashed his finds in his toy box and he was very particular that his toys stay in the box.It happened that Mary found out she had breast cancer. Something told her she was going to die of this disease....in fact , she was just sure it was fatal.She scheduled the double mastectomy, fear riding her shoulders.The night before she was to go to the hospital she cuddled with Lucky.A thought struck her...what would happen to Lucky? Although the three-year-old dog liked Jim, he was Mary's dog through and through.If I die, Lucky will be abandoned, Mary thought. He won't understand that I didn't want to leave him.

The thought made her sadder than thinking of her own death.The double mastectomy was harder on Mary than her doctors had anticipated and Mary was hospitalized for over two weeks. Jim took Lucky for his evening walk faithfully, but the little dog just drooped, whining and miserable.Finally the day came for Mary to leave the hospital. When she arrived home, Mary was so exhausted she couldn't even make it up the steps to her bedroom.

Jim made his wife comfortable on the couch and left her to nap. Lucky stood watching Mary but he didn't come to her when she called. It made Mary sad but sleep soon overcame her and she dozed.When Mary woke for a second she couldn't understand what was wrong. She couldn't move her head and her body felt heavy and hot. But panic soon gave way to laughter when Mary realized the problem. She was covered, literally blanketed, with every treasure Lucky owned! While she had slept, the sorrowing dog had made trip after trip to the basement bringing his beloved mistress all his favorite things in life. He had covered her with his love.

Mary forgot about dying. Instead she and Lucky began living again, walking further and further together every day. It's been 12 years now and Mary is still cancer-free. Lucky? He still steals treasures and stashes them in his toy box but Mary remains his greatest treasure. Remember....live every day to the fullest. Each minute is a blessing from God. And never forget....the people who make a difference in our lives are not the ones with the most credentials, the most money, or the most awards. They are the ones that care for us. If you see someone without a smile today give them one of yours!

Live simply. Love seriously. Care deeply. Speak kindly. Leave the rest to God. A small request: All you are asked to do is keep this circulating,even if it's to one more person. In memory of anyone you know that has been struck down by cancer or is still living with it.

Germs are everywhere, even in places we forget to think about

I hear so many people say that they cannot believe the picked up the flu or cold bug because they did not go anywhere where sick people are. You must remember that things you do everyday that you would never think twice about expose you to germs. Below is a list of things you touch that have more germs than you can possibly imagine. Always carry a small container of hand sanitizer. People will say that is kind of over reacting, I will usually say, when you are flat on your back with the flu for a week, I will remind you.

Remember, this list is just to make you think that simple things we do every day expose us to millions of germs, and then we go on and do not wash out hands or we eat in the car or wipe your nose or mouth.

1) ATM machine buttons

2) Fax machine buttons at work

3) Door handles everywhere

4) Shopping carts

5) Baskets at the grocery store

6) Public phones

7) Pens at the bank

8) Buttons on point of purchase machines everywhere

9) Shaking hands

10) Hugging

11) Escalator handles

12) Revolving doors

13) Coffee machine handles

14) Drinking fountain handle

15) Kids toys

16) Dressing room doors at clothing stores

17) Restrooms, handles, sinks, toilets, toilet seats and flushers

18) Airplanes, seats and handles and bathrooms

19) Hotels, all doors and even bedding and furniture

20) Your luggage handles after you pick up baggage at airports

21) Copy machines at work

22) Sugar and creamer bottles at your morning coffee place

23) Napkin dispensers at restaurants

24) Counters at all establishments

25) Even when you are looking at CDs at the store that others have handled.

This is just a short list, but the point is that germs are all around us everyday. Make sure to take extra Vitamin C, your Wellness formulas, Echinacea and Golden seal, and bottom line wash your hands often, or carry hand sanitizer. Small price to pay to stay healthy and avoid the crud.