Posts

Why You Should Avoid Soybean Oil Now

Most Americans today use soybean oil for cooking, baking, and drizzling. In 2019, Americans consumed 11 metric tons of soybean oil!!! Today we’ll explore how soybean oil can be hazardous for your health and what to use instead.


 
Using traditional animal fats nowadays seem to be unwelcome. You see, people have replaced these fats–lard, tallow, and butter–with plant-based oils because people have been misguided into thinking that animal fats are unhealthy and plant-based oils are far healthier.
 
I can see why it’s confusing.
 
Soybean oil is low in saturated fat, so most Americans see this as a healthy option. But saturated fats are, in fact, healthy and are much better than unstable polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) oils–most especially in cooking.

Soybean Oil is Unstable

 Soybean oil is high in unstable PUFAs. Well, PUFAs are not all bad for you. Actually, omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids are good. But not all PUFAs are created equal. There are types that are highly unstable, easily oxidized (damaged by oxygen), and pro-inflammatory.
 
I’m talking about linoleic acid–a bad fat. And soybean oil is half linoleic acid.
 
Linoleic acid is already bad news, but when you heat it, it’s worse! It generates oxidized lipids (fats) which cause inflammation in the bloodstream, leading to heart diseases and the hardening of your arteries (atherosclerosis).
 

Soy, Digestion, & Thyroid

Soy products are not easily digested which can cause gas, bloating, and damage to your gut (which can weaken your immune response). Soy can also interfere with proper thyroid function (your metabolic regulator). And… 93% of soy is genetically modified and while we won’t truly know the long-term effects on health for years to come, preliminary data shows that GMO foods interfere with the healthy balance of your gut flora.
 

Soy, Obesity & Diabetes

The massive use of soybean oil has led to an increase in the number of people suffering from obesity and diabetes as well.
 
This occurs, in part, because soybean oil disrupts normal hypothalamus function.
 
By that, I mean soybean oil manages to alter the genes of the hypothalamus, impairing the healthy functions of your organs and hormones.
 
The hypothalamus is a small region at the base of the brain that is responsible for many functions, such as regulating hormones through your pituitary gland, regulating your temperature, controlling your appetite, and managing your sexual behavior among other roles.
 
In other words, the hypothalamus is the control center of the brain. And the soybean oil which many believe to be healthy is disturbing its function.
 
One of the genes that soybean alter is the OXT gene, the one that makes oxytocin. Oxytocin is known as your love hormone, but it is also critically important to your gut health. Oxytocin regulates motility (lack of oxytocin can contribute to constipation, for example), inflammation, and gut lining maintenance.
 

So what does this all mean?

Long-term intake of soybean oil leads to chronic illnesses by interfering with proper gut function, immune function, thyroid function, and brain function.
 
I encourage you to intentionally reduce your consumption of soybean oil–read labels at the grocery store and go through your pantry and freezer. Many sauces, dressings, baked and canned goods contain soybean oil.
 
Most restaurants also use soybean oil, so that’s another reason you may steer away from fried foods when eating out.
 
When cooking at home, choose natural fats like tallow, lard, duck fat, grass-fed butter and ghee. If you want plant-based oils, have coconut, avocado oil, and olive oil. 
 
It is my passion to work with people like you whose health symptoms are getting in the way of you living life fully and with a sense of freedom in your body. I can help you to regain your health so you can feel great and free to enjoy life fully.
 
If you’re ready to discover where your best health has been hiding, I’d love to connect with you!
Apply for a complimentary Unstoppable Health Discovery Session. http://bit.ly/schedulinghealth (subject to availability).

Until next time, I’m wishing you unstoppable health!

~Rebecca

Poo Matters: What You Need to Know about Constipation

Yep. Today we are going to be talking about poop and what some underlying causes of constipation are.

The truth is, we often think imbalance in the diet is to blame when we’re suffering from constipation. It’s true in most circumstances, but we should not forget that there are other factors that play a role.

Let’s understand first why the gut is so important and then how the gut works to have a bowel movement.

Your gut is where you take all the good stuff you eat and drink and transform it into the many building blocks your body needs to make energy, think clearly, sleep well, maintain a healthy weight, build muscle, and clear out toxins that need clearing out daily so you can thrive. It’s also where 80% or more of your immune system lives.

It is my passion is to work with people like you whose health symptoms–like low energy, gut/digestive issues, excess weight, mood imbalance, chronic infections, and skin & sleep problems–are getting in the way of you living life fully and with a sense of freedom in your body. I help you to regain your health so you can feel great and free to enjoy life fully.

Nothing will spoil your day like being “backed up” and holding onto waste in your intestines. You don’t feel well physically or mentally when you’re constipated. Let’s take a closer look at what is going in in there.

After you eat, food travels from your stomach to the small intestines or small bowel. After nutrients are absorbed in your small bowel, your body needs to expel the leftover waste. So the small bowel delivers this leftover waste to the colon or large bowel. The colon is a 5- to 6-foot muscular tube that delivers stool to the rectum, and while stool passes along this tube, fluids are removed and absorbed into your body. Your gut needs two important things to carry on this function: pressure and lubrication. Fiber from your diet, muscle tone, physical activity, and a healthy nervous system create the pressure your gut needs to propel stool forward in your digestive tract. The pressure also relaxes the lower sphincter so that stool can pass. Lubrication, on the other hand, is achieved by drinking enough water and hydrating fluids (coffee doesn’t count as it is a diuretic) and eating healthy fats (like olive oil, flax, ghee, avocado, coconut, etc). By the way, having enough hydration is also important for creating pressure.

In addition to considering your intake of fiber, fluids, and healthy fats, remember that transit time– how long the stool sits in your colon–and the amount of water absorbed from the waste also affect the consistency of your stool. These factors are affected by a number of mechanisms.
Let’s explore some of them:

Hormones

Did you know that an adequate progesterone level is required to have a healthy bowel movement? Low progesterone levels can cause your colon to slow down..and the longer the stool stays in the colon, the drier it gets and the more difficult it is to pass through.

Low estrogen also slows down the digestive process. How so? Estrogen keeps cortisol, your primary stress hormone, in check. When cortisol levels rise, your body’s digestive process is impaired and slows down. Similar to low progesterone, this lengthens the time it takes to break down food and slows down evacuation of stool.

I’ve worked with a lot of people who have low thyroid function. In people with low thyroid, metabolism slows down (sometimes significantly!), resulting in the same effects low levels of estrogen and progesterone have on the bowel.

Nervous System

Butterflies in the stomach when you’re nervous happens for an obvious reason: your gut and nervous system are very much in sync. Stress affects the gut and vice versa. As I mentioned earlier, the stress hormone cortisol delays the digestive process. Adding insult to injury, the key nutrients that help you with relaxation and laxation (aka good BM’s), magnesium, potassium, and vitamin C, decrease when stress is high. Not a good combo! You need more nutrients to handle your stress, not less.
By disrupting your nutrients, imbalancing your stress hormones, and nervous system, it comes as no surprise that stress can also cause inflammation in your gut.

Lifestyle

Your body was designed for regular physical activity. That’s why a sedentary lifestyle is precursor to a variety of conditions, including constipation. In order for the muscles of your bowel to contract properly, your body must get the exercise it needs every day. This can be as simple as walking.

Emotions

This goes hand in hand with what we’ve talked about already with your nervous system and stress hormones.  When you experience emotional imbalance, it can cause you stress and/or be caused by stress.  Your body tends to freeze and slow down to protect you. That’s why, in traditional Chinese medicine, constipation is associated with being unable to let things go. With clients who’ve struggled with chronic constipation, exploring emotional holding patterns is an important key.

Now that you know more about what can contribute to constipation, how can you apply this to improving your digestion? What’s a baby step you can take? As they say, progress, no matter how small, is still progress! And I am rooting for you.

In the next newsletter, I will be giving you some tips and actions to fix and support constipation.

Until next time, I’m wishing you unstoppable health!

-Rebecca