I saw an interesting video on YouTube the other day. It was an old woman who was sharing a recipe that her mother used to make for her when she was a child during the depression.

She made a meal that was basically sauteed onions, potatoes, pasta, canned peas and some tomato sauce all mixed in together.

The woman said that this meal was a staple in their home. This made me sad because the foods included in her average diet were not conducive to good overall health. It lacked the healthier vegetables which have the best vitamins and was full of simple carbs, starches and very low in protein.

I started to see why people seemed so hopeless back then. Since mood is deeply affected by our diet I can’t imagine anyone feeling happy or healthy after a week of eating like that!

The truth is that meat consumption was very low during the depression because meat and dairy are pretty much the most expensive food items at the store. Have you ever seen Cinderella Man with Russell Crowe? He played a boxer during the depression and his family used to share small pieces of baloney just so they get some protein.

I was looking at my grocery bill and thinking about all the things on there that are unecessary. Yes we do buy ourselves little treats (like Silk Chocolate Soymilk) but we can afford to because we aren’t burdened by the excess expense of buying meat and dairy. I remember when I was newly wed how frustrated I would get when a third of my grocery budget was going to meat and money was tight.

I can buy a block of organic tofu for about $2.50 and that makes two meals for our family. Can you do that with chicken breast? Or talk about lentils. Lentils from the bulk section cost pennies and they are super easy to assimilate in a variety of meals. I can make a meal with a can of organic beans for $2.20 or less and it’s even cheaper if you use dried beans and cook them yourself.

So by buying beans you end up getting an adequate source of protein that is very inexpensive, doesn’t clog your arteries and increase your blood pressure. Not too shaby.

And if you aren’t spending all your money on meat and milk (which is unhealthy anyways (see my post on milk)) you can afford to buy more fruits and veggies which will help you to maintain better overall health.

So with a depression looming in the US and a recession coming to Canada I have been thinking a lot about ways to recession proof our home. We have made some changes to our budget and have made some drastic changes to our consumer habits!

For starters we aren’t buying anything we don’t need. Our house is bursting at the seams with products that we bought out of seemed neccessity that we seldom use. I think it’s high time we stopped being so foolish with our money. We also have debts that need to be cleared off and we are tired of paying interest to banks for no reason. It’s time to clear off that debt and start living for ourselves. We have moved to a bank book system and have given the debit card the boot. Without its convenience we will be much less tempted to spend money on items that haven’t been budgetted for.

We are making more provisions in our grocery shops to buy foods that are easier to assemble (for example: I make these awesome bean burritoes in about ten to fifteen minutes) so that we have a fall back option when I am too exhausted to make a regular meal. This has saved us about $100-$150 in eating out costs.

We have started going on less dates and doing more family activities instead. For example, we’ll rent movies with the kids and settle on the couch with some goodies. That costs us $10 instead of $30 for a movie and $50 for a meal out.

And we have said kudos to our VISA and other credit sources. If we don’t have the cash, we do without. This will have us sitting debt free in two years maximum!

Can you think of anything better for your health than eating good food and being debt free…ahhhhh!

In my dream last night I was told by the receptionist of my obstetrician that I had breast cancer.

The thought that raced through my dream mind was that it was so unlikely since I didn’t possess the risk factors. By that, I mean that I don’t have a family history of breast cancer (which in most diseases and cancers only accounts for 3% of the overall risk) and I don’t eat the foods that are more apt to create an environment conducive for a tumor to grow.

I mentioned in a previous posts that a higher body pH (about 8 ) was the healthiest and that a high body pH would make the body an inhospitable place for germs etc. to thrive thus making you more resistant to sickness and disease.

I tested my own pH a while back and found it to be basic instead of acidic and I figure I am on the right track. Now, I don’t think I have breast cancer (fingers crossed ha ha ha), but, even those of us who try their best can fall victim to disease.

In my pH post I mentioned that the foods that lower your pH (into the acidic side) are animal products and processed foods. My family and I try to eat very little processed food, no eggs, no meat and very, very little dairy. Being pregnant (with two other little fellas) has made me very tired and more prone to cheating on our healthy diet. I have found myself eating more french fries and burritos than I used to. This has had a direct effect on my body pH and my overall health. For example, we have weaker immune systems after a bad food binge than we do when we eat well. I also have much more energy and clearer skin when I eat vegan than when I don’t.

But what about cancers? We think of these as non-preventable and non-reversible.

In The China Study PhD T. Colin Campbell states that in his forty years of lab work he has found that animals exposed to carcinogens in their food only developed cancer in the instances where they were also consuming animal proteins. A high animal protein diet was very conducive to cancer growth (100%) whereas a low protein diet showed less proliferance. When the protein was switched for plant proteins there were zero cases of cancer no matter how much protein was consumed.

He was also able to show that you could switch the already established cancer off and back on again by changing the animal protein in the diet to plant protein and vice versa. This means that even though it seems unlikely that you can reverse an already established tumour, you can certainly cause the cancer growth to stop and enter a period of remission. There are diseases (heart disease, diabetes etc.) where the damage can be reversed but I don’t think that we can truthfully say that of cancer at this point.

So it seems that the best diet for prevention is a vegan one composed of whole foods.

I also talked about gene expression very briefly about two months ago. Gene expression is the word use to explain how genes in our DNA may be able to predict where our genetic vulnerabilities are. For example, you aren’t supposed to get lung cancer if you don’t possess that “lung cancer gene.” This explains why a chronic smoker dodges the cancer bullet while his twelve year old daughter, who has never smoked but has been exposed to second hand smoke, gets lung cancer.

But unless you get a gene map done (and I haven’t the foggiest how expensive that would be) you won’t know where your vulnerabilities are. Therefore, your best bet would be to try to prevent disease in general.

Any kind of activity that can help boost your immune system, like getting adequate sunshine, sleep, fresh air, exercise, vitamins etc. should add years to your life.

It only makes sense that garbage in should equal garbage out so eat well and live long!

I have touched on the topic before and it is such a vast and controversial topic that I feared not being able to do it justice. But I can’t wait anymore. I am going to give you a crash course on vaccines and will direct you to more resources to further inform you, should you have the desire to do so.

Vaccines.

The first vaccine was the cowpox/smallpox vaccine created in 1796 by Edward Jenner. It was learned that if you infected a person with cowpox they would become immune to smallpox.

The premise of the vaccine is that you inject a weakened (or in some cases dead) form of the virus/disease that you are trying to develop immunity to into the body and that allows the body to quickly overtake the disease and build antibodies to it.

Immunity is a very complex system and no one really understands how it works. Most people understand the basic principle but no one understands why a vaccine can’t provide lifelong immunity. When you develop a disease and defeat that disease naturally, your body retains those antibodies and remains immune for life. With a vaccine the immunity wears off. No one know why.

This destines you to a lifetime of booster shots. This is where it gets silly.

Take Chickenpox. They are immunizing against it in small children (babies actually) now. So we will see a decrease in Chickenpox in children. This is stupid! Chickenpox is rarely dangerous when young children get it. The immunity provided by the vaccine has an expiration date. Most people do not keep their immunization schedules up to date after they leave school. Which means that by the time Chickenpox is at its most lethal the majority of people will be unprotected. This is nonsense!

It’s the same with the Hep B vaccine. Hep B is a disease that is contracted through intimate contact with another person or through the use of intravenous drugs. They give this vaccine to infants! The logic is that they want to get the kids immunized before they become sexually active. By the time they do become at risk they will require a booster shot. Why not start the first rounds of Hep B immunizations then? They won’t be protected in the future if you vaccinate that early anyways!

And the flu vaccine is one of my biggest pet peeves. The vaccine contains the three strands that lab workers guesstimate to be the big ticket strands for the year. So the flu vaccine is only effective IF you contract one of those three strands and IF you have developed antibodies (immunity) to it. If you don’t, you will still get the flu this year. So why inject yourself with mercury (which IS in the flu vaccine) for nothing?

This industry is about money! The bulk of the vaccines in a child’s immunization schedule are for disease that are of no direct threat to your child. You may say that the reason that they aren’t is because we have high vaccination rates and that it maintains “herd” immunity. Well, these charts (http://www.vaccinationdebate.com/web1.html) show that these diseases were eradicated by two causes: better hygiene and nutrition as well as the advent of better education for the management of sewage and food.

The idea of vaccines being the savior of the modern world is a little stretched. There is merit to vaccines, like in a pandemic situation, but the use of vaccines for every cough and sniffle (and by that I mean for illnesses like the flu and chickenpox!) is unwarranted.

Please take a break from my blog and read these stats from this website: http://www.vaccinationdebate.com/web2.html They are very informative and will give you a clear picture of the actually efficacy and safety of vaccines.

The other problem with mass vaccination (like that done to children and babies and that done during the flu season) is that it isn’t safe! The Vaccination Dilemma (see resources) states that over 400 babies die every year from vaccine side effects (like encephalitis). Add to that the hundreds of babies who develop autism or are damaged in some other way (think liver or brain damage) and you are wracking up quite a toll of damage. The vaccines are tested on healthy children in controlled trials but when they are administered to the mass populace they are administered to those who have weakened immune systems from a sickness or disease, as well as premature babies, babies and children who are underweight etc.

These babies are not able to tolerate the assault of these dangerous injections. Injections that contain ingredients like aluminum, mercury and antifreeze. These are used as preservatives to keep the vaccine fresh and alive but even in high school biology they teach you that these heavy metals are not expelled from the body. Just like the mercury found in fish flesh, we have mercury trapped in our bodies too. These can result in a plethora of problems either immediately or in the future. See this website for a list of toxins found in vaccines: http://www.vaccinationnews.com/dailynews/may2001/whatsinvax.htm

Add to that the chance that the vaccine may not provide immunity and the case for mass immunization starts to look a little weak! This link shows historical evidence that vaccines can fail to provide immunity: http://www.vaccinationdebate.com/web2.html

 Vaccines and the diseases they are supposed to protect us from, both have risks. As a parent you need to become educated and decide what course of action you will take. Some vaccines are moreso associated with problems (ie. MMR vaccine and autism) than others and you may want to pick and choose what, if any, vaccines you want to give your child. The MMR vaccine is a combination vaccine containing Measles, Mumps and Rubella. If you want to immunize for these one at a time or leave out one entirely you should talk to your doctor or public health nurse about getting them in singles instead of the combo.

You need to do your own research because your doctors and nurses are bound to tell you only one side of the story. A nurse in the David Thomson Health Region in Alberta was fired for encouraging parents to look at the ingredients in the vaccines they were told to give to their children.

After a long legal battle she was re-hired because, apparently, it’s unethical to fire someone for encouraging parents to become informed. Her name is Bea Campbell and I had the opportunity to hear her speak two or three years ago.

I also have a close friend who is a newly graduated nurse. When I asked her what she was taught in school about vaccines her response was, “basically that it’s good and that we should do it.”

Wowsers! If you want truth you will need to go on this journey alone. Good luck! 

 

Resources:

National Vaccine Information Centre: http://www.909shot.com/ This website offers information about the vaccines and about the disease that they are supposed to protect us from. You can evaluate the risks of both and make a decision that is informed!

Vaccine Risk Awareness Network: http://www.vran.org/

www.vaccinationdebate.com/ This website has charts, articles, case studies and lots of other information to help you learn more about these little needles.

A Shot in the Dark http://www.amazon.com/Shot-Dark-H-Coulter/dp/089529463X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1225814604&sr=1-1

The Vaccination Dilemma (a compilation of stats and articles from all over. There are some great charts in here about the actual risk of the vaccine versus the risk on contracting the disease). http://www.amazon.com/Vaccination-Dilemma-Christine-Murphy/dp/1930051107/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1225814721&sr=1-1 

Kids-First: Health with no interference by Dr. Ogi Ressel http://www.amazon.com/Kids-First-Health-No-Interference/dp/0970111088

Global Vaccine Institute: www.thinktwice.com

Other books from Amazon (there are hundreds of books out there): http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_b?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=A+shot+in+the+dark