Why Chocolates can be good for the Health?

Chocolates is the crowds favorite, almost everybody can’t resist having it. Young and old enjoy eating chocolates as a part of dessert or just fulfilling their cravings. But have you wonder if having a sweet tooth for chocolates can give you health benefits?

There were a research that proves chocolates specifically dark chocolates and cocoa powder has health benefits and it can even make life sweeter and longer. According to these researches, chocolates have substances that are natural antioxidant like resveratrol. Antioxidants are substances or nutrients in our foods which can prevent or slow the oxidative damage to our body. Antioxidants act as "free radical scavengers" and hence prevent and repair damage done by these free radicals.

And the antioxidant that was recently found resveratrol in chocolates. It is produced by certain fruits and vegetables including grapes, raspberries, mulberries and peanuts. The difference of resveratrol to other antioxidants is that it can cross the blood-brain barrier to help protect your brain and nervous system. Here the other health benefits of resveratrol :

• Protecting your cells from free radical damage
• Inhibiting the spread of cancer, especially prostate cancer
• Lowering your blood pressure
• Keeping your heart healthy and improving elasticity in your blood vessels
• Normalizing your anti-inflammatory response
  

Though chocolates have some health benefits, from nutritional perspective there are still better food to eat than chocolate. Here are some advices from Dr. Mercola if you are eating chocolates:

• If you eat chocolate, only eat dark chocolate

Dark chocolate has antioxidant properties, which can actually help to protect the body from damaging oxidative stress. It appears that adding milk to the chocolate cancels out the antioxidant effects, according to a study published in the journal Nature.

• Only eat chocolate if you're healthy

Chocolate, even if it is dark, still contains large quantities of sugar, and eating sugar is one of the most devastating things you can do to your health. If you're sick, your immune system is working hard to combat your illness, but sugar weakens the immune system. So eating chocolate will only make it harder for your immune system to fight the illness.

• Make sure you eat it in moderation

Even if you're healthy, you don't want to eat huge amounts of chocolate. The key is to eat it in moderation (something like once every two weeks) and enjoy it when you eat it. A small bit of chocolate can be very satisfying if you savor each bite, rather than just wolfing it down.

Breakfast for Better Health

Skipping breakfast is very common nowadays. This is because of the fast faced lifestyle and having a wrong idea that breakfast is not as important as the other meal of the day.
There are studies that show young and adults specifically the teens that skipped breakfast are more likely to be obese. They are the ones who tend to eat less healthy during the day and exercised less.

Breakfast is as important as the other meals of the day. As the day starts you need something to fill your empty stomach while you were asleep and something to charge your energy. But there is more to it than not skipping breakfast. Breakfast should be healthy. So if you’re planning breakfast you should avoid the following:

• Doughnuts
• Cereals
• Fruit juice
• Waffles and pancakes
• Bagels and toast (even whole grain organic types)
• ALL cereals (even whole grain organic types)
  

It is ideal to have healthy food during breakfast or in any meal. And to have a healthy breakfast, Dr. Mercola advised that you should avoid whole grain breads and cereals because it rapidly breakdown sugar and stimulating insulin production. He also said that eggs, juiced fruits and vegetables are ideal for breakfast.

You must take note that in preparing meals like breakfast for you and your family you must always consider the nutritional type. And by doing this you will enjoy a healthy lifestyle.

How to Get Healthy Bones

Bones are important part of our body. Its main function is to move, support and protect most parts of the body. And because of this it is needed that we take good care of it for a health bones.
Here are some tips according to Dr. Mercola on how we can make our bones strong:

1. Get plenty of omega-3 fats, such as krill oil, and reduce your intake of omega-6 fats from vegetable oils. (Studies have shown that a higher ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fats is linked to lower bone density at the hip -- a condition that could lead to osteoporosis.)

2. Make sure you’re getting enough vitamin K. It serves as the biological "glue" that helps plug the calcium into your bone matrix. Green leafy vegetables are excellent sources of vitamin K, but even better is natto, a fermented soy food that I personally eat nearly every day (it has the highest concentration of vitamin k in the human diet).

3. Eat more vegetables, according to your nutritional type.

4. Exercise regularly. This, along with diet, is a KEY to building strong bones.

5. Get the right kind of calcium. The best form of calcium is from milk. However, I would strongly advise you to avoid pasteurized milk like the plague. An acceptable alternative for most is raw milk. You can also convert the raw milk to kefir (fermented raw milk) for an excellent source of vitamin K2 as well.

Unhealthy Food Mistakes that Parent Make

Healthy eating habits of children start with the parents. And as parents it is their responsibility to guide their children on proper eating habits and teaching them which food are healthy or unhealthy. Most of the parents are likely to give their children healthy foods but because of the external factors they tend not to give health foods. And you are not giving your child a favor by just giving them food that makes them smile without thinking if it is health.

According to the observations of Dr.Mercola in his Natural Health Newsletter, here are some common food mistakes that parents make :

• Limiting healthy fats. The word “fat-free” or “low-fat” does not belong in a child’s diet (or yours for that matter). Healthy fats like those from animal sources, coconut oil, raw nuts and seeds, olive oil, avocado and others are essential for your child’s development. An excellent way to get some healthy fats into your child’s diet is to add some butter (organic, grass-fed and, ideally raw), raw cheese, or olive oil to lightly steamed veggies.
• Using food as a reward. This sets up your child to think eating unhealthy foods is necessary for their emotional fulfillment. It’s best to nip this one in the bud early on, or not start it at all.
• Forcing your child to eat everything on his plate. Assuming you’re offering a variety of healthy foods at each meal, there’s no need to make your child eat every last bite. Most kids will naturally stop eating when they’re full, and this is a feeling you want them to learn to honor for the rest of their life. If you start telling them to overeat now, there’s a good chance they’ll overeat later too. (To avoid wasting food, only serve your child small portions, or save what they don’t eat for later.)
• Letting them eat junk instead of a family meal. I’m always shocked at how bad most “kid’s foods” are from a health perspective. If your child only wants “kid foods” like pizza, French fries and macaroni and cheese, do not give in. Kids can eat the same things as adults (cut-up or mashed when necessary) and they will be much healthier for it.
• Giving infants French fries and soda. One study found that infants seven months and older are being given soft drinks in their bottles, and that French fries are the most popular “vegetable” eaten by children aged 19 to 24 months. Please do not fall into the mindset that you’re “depriving” your child by not giving them soda and French fries. You are actually doing them a huge favor.
• Saying you doesn’t like vegetables. Your kids will hear this and decide they don’t either.
  

Natural Ways to Lower Blood Pressure

Blood Pressure is the force in the arteries both when heart beats and at rest. And when this force became abnormal it is usually called hypertension or high blood pressure. It is defined in an adult as a blood pressure greater than or equal to 140 mm Hg systolic pressure or greater than or equal to 90 mm Hg diastolic pressure.

High blood pressure may occur in both children and adults but mostly in adults. And having this condition increases the risk of coronary heart disease and stroke.
And according to Dr. Mercola in his Natural Health Newsletter, you can lower blood pressure naturally. Here are common ways to quickly lower blood pressure without taking drugs:

1. Eliminate grains and sugars as described in my nutrition plan. This will lower insulin levels and normalize blood pressure in about 75 percent of people.


2. Address the common stresses in your life that tend to elevate blood pressure. EFT is a simple, effective, and inexpensive tool that you can use to help in this area.


3. Getting one hour of exercise a day seems to be an important contributor to the long-term benefits of those currently suffering from high blood pressure.
   

How to Be Diabetes FREE

Diabetes is a syndrome of metabolism, resulting to abnormality of high blood sugar level. It is usually due to a combination of hereditary and environmental causes. This abnormality may lead to other health problems and that is another why you should take action to manage and treat it.

Conventional treatment is focused on fixing the symptom of elevated blood sugar, rather than addressing the underlying disease and it is doomed to fail in most cases. Treatments that concentrate merely on lowering blood sugar while raising insulin levels can actually worsen rather than remedy the actual problem of metabolic miscommunication that is at the root of diabetes. It just trades one evil for another.

And according to Dr. Mercola Natural Health Article, the solution to diabetes has been available ever since and remarkably simple. Here are some tips to cure or prevent diabetes:

1. Severely limit or eliminate sugar and grains in your diet.


2. Eat a diet that’s right for your nutritional type. While nearly all type 2 diabetics need to swap out their grains for other foods, some people will benefit from using protein for the substitution, while others will benefit from using more vegetable-only carbohydrates. Therefore, along with reducing grains and sugars, determining your nutritional type will give you some insight into what foods you should use to replace the grains and sugars.


3. Exercise regularly and at the appropriate intensity. It increases the sensitivity of your insulin receptors, causing the insulin already present to work much more effectively, so your body doesn't need to produce as much. I’ve discussed how to use exercise to your best advantage in this past article.
   

Fat Can Be Healthy

Is it really possible that fat can be healthy and thin is not? The answer is YES. According to the report of “The Archives of Internal Medicine”, they compared the weight and the cardiovascular risk factors of 5400 correspondents. And it shows that half of the overweight people and one-third of obese people in the study were “metabolically healthy.” That means that many overweight and obese adults may have healthy levels of “good” cholesterol, blood pressure, and blood glucose. And at the same time one out of four slim correspondents had two cardiovascular risk factors which are typically associated with obesity.

It is said in some studies that treadmill is the best way to indicate healthiness than body mass index. And with this studies just shows that there are proportion of obese and overweight people who are metabolically healthy.

Even with this studies that obese and overweight can be health it is better that people this condition should start doing something fit and more healthy.

Here are some tips from Dr. Mercola Natural Health Articles in achieving optimal weight:

1. Tailor your diet to your nutritional type. These are the foods that are right for your biochemistry, and these are the foods that will push your body toward its ideal weight. (By the way, these foods may be high in fat, high in carbs, heavy on protein or heavy on veggies, it all depends on YOU).
   
   
2. View exercise as a drug. When you’re trying to lose weight, a casual walk here and there is not going to cut it. Many studies find that exercising for one hour, five days a week is actually needed, and I tend to agree with that. There is also strong compelling evidence that strength training and high-intensity anaerobic interval training may be especially effective for weight loss.
   
   
3. Let go of your emotional blocks. Tools like the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) are your friend and ally when it comes to losing weight. For some, emotional eating is more complex, and an experienced EFT practitioner may be able to help unravel some of your deeper emotional issues.
   

Top Six Health Myths

As we the world continues to evolve, people tend to find ways to answer their health problems from what causes it to what can cure it. And sometimes we are not getting the right information we really need.

According to Dr. Mercola with Rachael Droege here are the top six health myths:

• Myth: Sun Causes Skin Cancer

Experts say that being exposed to the sun can cause skin cancer but the truth is that it actually prevents cancer and other diseases because it promotes formation of Vitamin D. What you should remember is that you should be cautious about sun exposure protect yourself from burning under the sun.

• Myth: Milk Does a Body Good

Commercial pasteurized milk is not a health food and should be avoided, when milk is pasteurized the structure of the milk proteins changes (denaturization) into something far less than healthy.

• Myth: Saturated Fat Causes Heart Disease

Saturated fats in the foods we eat that is causing all of this heart disease, but rather, and far more, it is the excess carbohydrates from our starch- and sugar-laden diet that is making people fat and unhealthy, and leading to epidemic levels of a host of diseases such as diabetes and later, heart disease. Trans fats are another major contributing factor.

• Myth: Fish is Good for You

Sadly, as fish would otherwise be one of the healthiest meats on the planet since it is packed with the incredibly beneficial omega-3 fats, fish (and shellfish) easily accumulate high levels of chemical residues from the water they live in. Residues in fish can be as much as 9 million times the amount found in the water!

• Myth: Low-Fat Diets are Healthy

Your body cannot function properly without adequate amounts of fat--it influences everything from blood clotting to vitamin absorption to brain function.

• Myth: Whole Grains are Good for You

While nearly everyone, including myself, agrees that whole grains are better for you than refined grains, whole grains are still not something that most people should be eating. And high insulin levels benefits from avoiding grains, yes even whole grains.

For more information Health Myths, subscribe to Mercola Free Newsletter

Energy Drinks Can Be Lethal

Energy drinks are beverages that contain large doses of caffeine and other legal stimulants like ephedrine, guarana, and ginseng giving you a quick boost of energy. This kind of beverage has been popping up all over the supermarket and convenience store shelves. And has grown its popularity for the past years, with $4.7 billion in sales in 2007, up from $3.5 billion last 2006. With these popularity health professionals was worried about who’s drinking them.

These caffeine-loaded beverage causes blood to become sticky, a pre-cursor to cardiovascular problems such as stroke. One hour after drinking energy drink like Red Bull, can make your blood system becomes abnormal, as might be expected from a patient with cardiovascular disease.

Another bad effect of drinking energy drink is when it is mixed with alcohol. It is combining stimulants with depressants which usually occur in bars. Energy drink like Red Bull when mixed with alcohol became a popular bar drinks like "Vodka Bulls" and "Yager Bombs”.

The combined effect of these substances is unknown, but researchers say overloading your body with heavy stimulants and heavy depressants could lead to heart failure and according to previous news stories about fatal outcomes from this deadly mixture, that’s not just a theory.

Everything that is overdone or excessive is bad. And instead of taking artificial energy boosters like energy drinks, you should know the reasons why you feel tired and look for more natural ways in increasing energy levels.

Here are some reasons why you lack energy:

• Poor food choice
• Low-quality food
• Stressful lifestyle
• Negative emotions
• Lack of sleep
• Lack of exercise
  

And according to Dr. Mercola's Natural Health Newsletter increasing your energy levels, then, is as easy as remedying these factors by:

• Eating right for your nutritional type
• Increasing your intake of omega-3 fats
• Eliminating grains and sugars from your diet
• Releasing emotional stress and negativity with the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT)
• Sleeping when you’re tired
• Exercising

Obesity May Contribute To Bone Problems

According to the study of 115 18- and 19-year-old women, shows that excess body fats contribute to poor bone health. In the study, researchers did a bone scans of women with normal body fat (less than 32%) and high body fat (greater than 32%). As a result, women with high body fat have weaker bones around 8 to 9 percent than those with normal body fat.

Here are some tips from Dr. Mercola Natural Health Newsletter on how to lose weight and strengthen bones:

• Eat more vegetables
• Exercise regularly
• Increase the intake of omega 3 fats
• Have enough exposure to the sun
• Make sure you get enough Vitamin K
• Get the right kind of calcium. Best source of calcium is non pasteurized milk.
  

For more Natural Health Tips visit www.mercola.com

How Long Does Your Food Last

What most people are afraid of is food poisoning. We usually use our own judgment in checking if leftovers gone bad. Slimy, stinky, spotty or chunky changes in food are considered by scientists as spoilage bacteria and on the other hand pathogens that make you sick are odorless, colorless and invisible. And since consumers can’t depend on the looks or smell of the food, scientist’s advice to use the rule of 4: no more than four days at 40 degrees Fahrenheit or 4 degrees centigrade. (Freezing fresh food at zero degrees Fahrenheit will keep it safe indefinitely.)

However, here are some common foods along with estimates of how long they typically last in the fridge:

• Butter: 1-3 months
  
• Milk: 5 days
• Eggs (fresh): 3-5 weeks
• Ground beef, ground turkey, chicken and fish: 1-2 days
• Beef steaks and roasts and pork roasts: 3-5 days
• Cooked or uncooked veggies: 3-5 days
• Leftovers: 3-4 days
• Mustard, soy sauce and Worcestershire sauce: use within 1 year of opening
• Salsa: 1 month
• Ketchup, peanut butter and jelly: 6 months
  

And to maximize your food lifespan it is better that you put enough space on your fridge so that the cool air circulates better.

But of course you should consume before it get spoiled, the fresher the food the better.

For more tips on avoiding food poisoning visit Mercola Natural Health Tips.

Sunlight for better mental health

There were a study that proves the association of darkness and depression. In the studies, neuroscientist kept their test subjects (rats) in the dark for 6 weeks. The animals not only exhibited depressive behavior but also suffered damage in brain regions known to be underactive in humans during depression.

There are disorders that are directly related to lack of sunlight like SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) and “winter blues”. SAD is a depression that occurs during the fall and winter months when sunlight is not abundant and “winter blues” is a condition not as serious as SAD. An estimate of 10 – 12 million people in the US suffer from SAD and about 25 million suffer from “winter blues”.

Your body is designed to be in sun. In your internal body clock, you tend to feel tired and sleepy when its dark or at night and tend to be more active when sun comes up. Internal clock does much more than just help you sleep in the evening. Your body actually has many internal clocks -- in your brain, lungs, liver, heart and even your skeletal muscles -- and they all work to keep your body running smoothly by controlling temperature and the release of hormones, some of which impact your mood.

To have better mental health, we should enough exposure to the sunlight. During summer, it is advised that you should spend some time in the sun. If you live in the US, keep in mind that come late September till late March the sun is lower in the sky for most of the day, which means that a light-skinned person may need longer than 20 minutes in the sun each day, and a dark-skinned person could need one hour to 90 minutes to get all of the benefits of sunlight.
Since it can be impractical to move places during winter, you can try using light bulbs in your home and office with full-spectrum versions that simulate the qualities of natural outdoor sunlight.

For more details on sunlights natural benefits, visit Mercola Natural Health Articles

Things You Don’t Know About Plastics

Plastics are common household material for different purposes, from food storage, baby bottles and even toys. Plastic is not an inert substance as its manufacturers would like you to believe. It contains chemicals like BPA, used to strengthen some plastics and phthalates to soften others. This harmful substance has a capability to mimic hormones in your body.

Here are some of the alarming effects of being exposed with this kind of substances:

• Structural damage to your brain
• Hyperactivity, increased aggressiveness, and impaired learning
• Increased fat formation and risk of obesity
• Altered immune function
• Early puberty, stimulation of mammary gland development, disrupted reproductive cycles, and ovarian dysfunction
• Changes in gender-specific behavior, and abnormal sexual behavior
• Stimulation of prostate cancer cells
• Increased prostate size, and decreased sperm production

Knowing these effects leads us to a solution, cut down the plastic exposure. And according to Dr. Mercola here are some tips to reduce plastic in our lives.

1. Boycott plastic shopping bags. Use reusable canvas or cloth varieties instead. (This also applies to the plastic produce bags in the grocery store.)
2. Don’t buy bottled water. Filter your own using a reverse-osmosis filter and put it in a glass bottle. I am going to be helping you in this area soon as my team is just finishing up a glass water bottle that you can use to carry around with you. It is covered with a neoprene sleeve to protect it from breaking and has a easy lid to drink from and is wide enough so you can easily clean the bottle. I hope to have them available in the fall as they are at the factory right now being produced.
3. Avoid using plastic cups, utensils, dishware and food storage containers. If you get a beverage while on-the-go, bring your own cup with you.
4. Buy toys made of natural fabrics instead of plastic.
5. Look for products that use minimal packaging, or buy in bulk.
6. Give up plastic wrap (and never use it to cover your food while it’s heating).
7. Avoid buying canned foods and drinks (the can linings contain plastic chemicals). Try your hand at canning fresh produce at home instead.

For more information in maintaining natural health articles visit www.mercola.com

Natural Ways to Relieve Migraine

Migraine is not an ordinary headache. It is neurological syndrome characterized by altered bodily experiences, painful headaches, and nausea. And according to the reports, more than 300 million people – around 6 to 7 percent of male and 15 to 18 of female is suffering from this pain. But unfortunately it is poorly treated.

There are cases that these painful headaches are preceded or accompanied by sensory warning or aura like flashes of light, blind spots or tingling of arms or legs. It is also accompanied by signs or symptoms of nausea, vomiting and sensitivity to sound or light. Migraine pain can be excruciating and may incapacitate you for hours or even days.

Although there were studies about migraine, there were no exact conclusions about its cause and cure. Even though there were no cures there are already treatments to ease the pain and lessen its occurrence.

Here are some tips to naturally relieve migraine from Dr. Mercola – Natural Health Newsletter:

1. Stimulating your body's natural painkilling ability. By putting pressure on a nerve just under your eyebrow, you can cause your pituitary gland to release painkilling endorphins immediately.

2. Taking 10 teaspoons of cayenne pepper in a glass of water. Endorphins are released by your brain when the cayenne hits your stomach lining.

3. Using Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT). Newcomers who use this simple process by themselves achieve relief 50 percent to 80 percent of the time and, in many cases, the relief is complete and permanent. More sophisticated uses by an EFT expert may be required for some migraine sufferers.

4. Green apple scent. One study found that the scent significantly relieved migraine pain. This may also work with other scents that you enjoy so consulting with an aromatherapist may be beneficial.

Other useful techniques include:

• Putting a cold compress on your forehead or behind your neck
• Massaging your ears and ear lobes
• Massaging the "crown" of your head -- the ring of muscles that circle your head where a crown would sit

For more Natural Health Tips and Natural Health Articles, Log on to www.mercola.com