Drugs like Ozempic are increasingly used for weight loss purposes. While calories in vs. calories out do matter and most of us are simply too sedentary, the cause of obesity is complex. Obesity is one of the biggest challenges we face today for various reasons - only some of which we are in control of. Some of us suffer from emotional overeating/ binge eating disorder that requires a completely different treatment approach than conventional dieting advice offers. Some of us have loads of environmental toxins in our body i.e. microplastics messing with our hormones. Some of us are not sleeping properly - poor sleep is directly linked to insulin resistance and weight gain. We really need to get better at understanding our own body and which things we can control. We also need to get better as practitioners in the health care system at working cross disciplinary together and understand the interplay of various factors to better help the client. Calorie counting is simply not cutting it anymore.
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Lessons from 15 years in clinical practice: 4 Key Things That Cause Migraines
Headaches are almost as commonly accepted as the flu these days. And while there are many reasons why we suffer from headaches in our modern sedentary lifestyle, it is not something we should accept - it is a sign the something is off and painkillers alone is not going to bring our body back in balance even if they temporarily can help calm the pain.
Many of the same triggers that causes a simple headache are involved in the more severe migraine attacks. Migraines are not the same as regular headaches that most people experience occasionally. During a migraine attack, you may feel sharp, stabbing pain, typically on one side of the head. Migraines are much more intense than regular headaches and often come with other symptoms like visual disturbances, nausea and vomiting.
Headaches, especially migraines, can greatly affect your quality of life.
Prolonged migraines may result in a combination of chronic migraines and tension headaches.
While every body and biochemistry is unique, I have found some or all of factors to be the root causes of migraines in most cases:
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Meta-study confirms: Eggs are a no-go for breast and ovarian cancer
Aren’t eggs supposed to be super healthy? Yes and no. Eggs are a food group that can be problematic depending on one's medical history - and no, it's not about cholesterol. The cholesterol debate - and what causes elevated levels in the body - was misleading and has long since been dismantled, but there are other aspects that make eggs less suitable for daily intake for everyone.
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Glyphosate found in high levels in almost everyone
Many of us turn to clean skin care products - it has almost become a gimmick at this point in time. Especially as many of the so-called clean beauty products do nothing good for the skin - they don’t contain actually skin benefitting ingredients, but can get a label touting “clean” simply by avoiding the main allergy-triggers.
Although it is a good idea to focus on the health-damaging chemicals around us, it is even more important that we understand how to prioritize our efforts to not get overwhelmed with insignificant details. I.e. it doesn’t matter if a little perfume has been added to a soap (unless we are hyper allergic), but it does matter how clean our drinking and bathing water is and whether we cook and store food in contact with plastic (heat/ acid effect primarily). It is most often from such boring everyday sources that the majority of the chemicals we get back on the lab tests done on clients are derived from. Chemicals related to increased disease risk incl. cancer.
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Did you know that figs actually contain compounds that help the body detoxify from fake estrogens (xenoestrogens from chemicals and mold etc.) in the body?
If you struggle with hormone imbalance don't treat the hormones!
8 out of 10 people struggling with hormone imbalance is due to hormone disruptors present in the body - chemicals, mold and/ or certain heavy metals.
If you fail to test for the causes of the hormonal imbalance, you will be stuck taking often very high dosages of bioidentical hormones. Hormones - regardless of being bioidentical or not, are never without risk. While they can be an absolute game changer for treating issues related to menopause (female hormone decline) and andropause (male hormone decline), what I’ve found in 80% of cases is that you can get the body back to balance with either no hormone therapy or with the bare minimum IF you first treat hormone disruption issues.
This is because mold and various hormone disrupting chemicals often attach themselves to our hormone receptors, blocking bioidentical hormones from attaching.
So treating hormone imbalance with hormone therapy is the wrong way to go in 8 out of 10 cases.
You can read more on how various toxins from mold cause dangerous high estrogen levels here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/nursing-and-health-professions/zearalenone
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Magnesium is the no. 1 most commonly found deficiency today
It would be optimal if we could eat enough of all the vitamins and minerals, because food is more recognizable to the body and it is easier to absorb. The sources of magnesium in our food products include whole grains, nuts, sprouts, legumes, cocoa, meat and vegetables. However, what I see when I test, is that many lack it - in 9 out of 10 cases, we see a deficit of magnesium. Magnesium is, together with zinc and silica, among the minerals we commonly find is difficult to obtain an optimal level of through our food because the soil is so depleted and our demands for these minerals have increased due to various stressors in modern life.
Read MoreArticle feature: Why is it so hard for us to lose weight (and keep it off)?
I’ve written an article for Danish health organization NatureHelse about why we struggle with weightloss resistance and how to break through the plauteau. You can read it here: on p. 18 in Danish only. Click here to read it.
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Study confirms: limit cell phone exposure during pregnancy
"Many studies have shown that electromagnetic fields can have destructive effects on sex hormones, gonadal function, fetal development, and pregnancy. So people must be aware of the negative effects of EMFs. Although the impact of the waves varied at different frequencies, it is better to stay as far away as possible from their origin because of the risks associated with exposures to these waves. In addition, people can use natural antioxidants to help reduce the effects of these waves."
A review on Electromagnetic fields (EMFs) and the reproductive system: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5014506/
In short: stop carrying your phone on your body especially during pregnancy or when wanting to become pregnant as it may affect both your own fertility as well as your offspring’s development (autism is a big worry right now that seems to be linked to excessive EMF exposure).
Keep your phone 3 meters away from your body to limit EMF exposure when not using it, and stop scrolling on it like it is your best friend, cos it is not. We are all wasting our lives scrolling non-stop on these smart phones and all these smart devices are under suspicion for wrecking our health big time.
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ARTICLE feature: Women’s Health - 7 Essential Supplements to Keep You Healthy
“As a woman, you have unique nutritional needs when compared to men. And in a perfect world, you’d meet all those requirements through a balanced diet. But in reality, eating healthy isn’t enough.
“A key thing I see a lot of women struggling with is being undernourished–in large part, due to depleted soil which results in our fruit and veggies only containing a fraction of nutrients compared to what they did 50 years ago,” says Christina Santini, clinical nutritionist and owner of The Nutrition Clinic in Los Angeles, CA. “This is easily a recipe for disaster because both our overall health and hormones along with our appetite control center is tightly regulated by how nutrient dense our diet is.”
So even if you eat a wholesome, balanced diet, proper supplementation is key–especially during the winter. Here are the best women’s supplements to keep you healthy and vital all season long–and for years to come.”
I am interviewed for an article on women’s health in alternative medicine read on here:
https://alternativemedicine.com/vitamins-supplements/irreplaceable-supplements-for-women-in-the-midseason/ and feel free to share it.
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Mold - when your home is making you sick! NEW TALK (Zoom webinar - Danish only) 13th of April
Christina Santini has been the first therapist in Europe to treat mold exposure since 2013. Did you know that 25% af astma is linked to mold exposure? How about we treated the cause instead of the symptom! It is important to get a handle on our basic needs for healthy air and clean water before we embark on more advanced dietary trends - especially since diet does not help much if our water and air are highly polluted. Gain insight into whether this is a problem for you and possibly related to your symptoms and get help to find out how it can be best managed.
To sign up for webinar click here: https://tidslerne.nemtilmeld.dk/295/
Please share.
Read MoreEssential minerals in today’s world - NEW TALK (Zoom webinar - Danish only) 2nd of March
Minerals are one the single most important factors in overall health status. We will go over the most important minerals to support gut health, immune health, mental health, skin and bones. To sign up for webinar go here: https://tidslerne.nemtilmeld.dk/294/ Please share.
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You are only as healthy as the home you are living in! Hint: Are you sick and moldy?
I’ve been treating mold illness as one of the first practitioners in Europe since 2012. To this day it still surprises me how deeply unhealthy homes many of us live in, yet we are hyper focused on our eating habits. However, it doesn’t matter however healthy you eat, if you are literally inhaling toxins with every breath you take.
We need to master the basics of clean air, pure water supply and solid sleep in order to expect any miracles happening our way. These are basics we cannot eat our way out of nor exercise our way out of.
Some of us need to relax and eat a slice of cake and focus on what is really making us sick - which may have nothing to do with what we eat (or don’t eat).
This is why it is a good idea to get checked out, so we are not stuck guessing what is wrong with us and trying every new diet fad under the sun to no avail.
I wrote an article about how our moldy homes are making us unwell - read it here (in Danish only): https://lns.dk/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/W2-22_LNS_NATUR-HELSE_2022_Maj.pdf (page 18 and on)
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Early science: How your Smartphone may impact your pregnancy
We already know that men shouldn’t be carrying the phone in their pocket, if they want their guys to work. However, it is not a far fetch to think “huh - how about women? how might our excessive smartgadget use be affecting pregnancy amongst women?”
Well, here you go:
“The findings of this review showed that EMF radiation exposure is associated with hormonal, thermal, and cardiovascular changes among adults. However, the reviewed studies did not consider the impacts of EMF radiation exposure on pregnancy outcomes specifically, which makes it difficult to draw conclusions from this review. Only four of the reviewed studies were conducted among pregnant women. These studies reported that EMF radiation exposure during pregnancy is associated with miscarriages and fluctuations in the fetal temperature and heart rate variability, as well as infant anthropometric measures.”
Read full article here: click here. And feel free to share.
Read MoreI'm talking about our toxic relationship to food (podcast interview)
I'm talking about health myths and facts and what a healthy relationship to food really is.
Too many of us have a toxic relationship to food and our body, and it is time we focus on thriving, rather than depriving ourselves. Afterall, life is too short to be miserable.
Listen in on the Danish podcast show #tothemoon here (in Danish only).
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Why athletes thrive on a plant-based diet (and why you likely won't long-term!)
There has been a lot of buzz surrounding going all-in vegan aka plant-based. A popular Netflix doc was made showing how athletes reported greater endurance, performance and so forth when switching over to a plant-based diet.
And this totally makes sense.
However, this led non-athletes to believe that they should copy the eating pattern of athletes, because “obviously“ this was showing to be the ideal way to eat.
Now this totally does not make sense.
Athletes typically have an energy demand of around 8000-10000 calories daily and require 1-1.5g of protein pr. kg. bodyweight. An average Joe might have an energy demand of around 2000-3000 calories daily and still require 1-1.5g of protein for optimal appetite control, bone health and muscle growth.
The athlete is thus needing to eat 3-5 x as many calories to meet their energy demand, yet their protein demand is about the same as your average Joe. This means the athlete is going to benefit from eating more plant-based food because they can easily reach their protein requirements from plants alone due to the high volume they are taking in daily.
Now if you downsize that food to about a quarter which meets the energy demand for the average Joe, you’re going to have great difficulty meeting your protein needs. And this will affect your overall health negatively: often weightloss resistance, cravings, muscle-loss, bone-loss and sagging skin even.
Read MoreI'm LIVE: talking with personal trainer Rocky Snyder
I'm talking to personal trainer Rocky Snyder about how mental health, hormone imbalance and men's health issues more than ever is tied to toxicity issues (also lots of crazy facial expressions going on here, but hey, I just had a double-dipped chocolate croissant, so probably a sugar-high, what can I say).
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12 major things that affect your health today (and it's not gluten or cake)
When we want to improve our health, we oftentimes spend all our time focusing on one aspect of our health. And this aspect may not be the one which is causing the health imbalance. This is why “test don’t guess” becomes super important - we want to know our weaknesses and also what our body nutritionally needs (protein/fats/(carbs/vitamin/minerals etc.). If we don’t know the facts, then we might be missing the boat completely. It is super unscientific to guess what will make an impact on our health. Health is not simply “move more and eat more greens”. Everyone knows that, yet many of us who follow that basic recommendation, are not at all healthy. We struggle with abdominal fat, infertility issues, fragile bones, migraines, digestive upset whenever we are not eating bland diet foods and in worst case, we get cancer. The key here is to understand the many different factors today that affect health and pin-point which are relevant for our specific situation. We want to focus on our weakest link. Quite often that has nothing to do with eating glutenfree or skipping cake.
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Silica better than collagen? Its relation to bones, hair, nails and skin beauty.
I am currently experimenting with different types of silica and bioavailability. Silica is something 99.9% lacks when I test for it, and this is a crucial mineral for everything beauty and bone related. And let’s not forget it is placed next to that heavy metal aluminium in the periodic table and these two guys have a tendency to exchange places. Meaning, when our body is lacking silica, we become more vulnerable to store aluminium. Silica (or silicon) minimizes wrinkles, improves hair strand strength and nails, it increases collagen production and thereby also the appearance of cellulite. I am completely convinced silica is THE MOST OVERLOOKED beauty and bone nutrient of today. Better than Botox, may I add.
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Low-carb diets may be detrimental for bones (study shows)
Why you might want to step off the keto-wagon and newly up and going carnivore diet - research reveals impaired bone-markers after even short-term following low-carb diets such as keto-diet. Read the full study here: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fendo.2019.00880/full As always just because something is good (fat and/or protein), it doesn’t mean that more is better. Everything in excess is opposed to nature, a smart man once said (Hippocrates).
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Is keto good for low thyroid?
Low thyroid tends to affect the mitochondria negatively, when you then eat a keto diet, all the energy from ketogenesis goes directly to the mitochondria (which are often malfunctioning), to produce energy. This will worsen energy levels and weight for the majority. You are taking the fatty acids of fat and transporting that into the mitochondria, and if there are any issues with the carnitine-shuttle, then there are going to be problems. On top of that, then you are doing a fatty acid oxidation, so you are breaking that down in to acetyl-CoA and making it go through Krebs cycle and the electron-transport chain. This results in a very poor energy outcome in cases, where there is mitochondrial malfunction. Typically, when our thyroid is not working, we are struggling with chemical, infectional and/or heavy metal load, which is affecting the mitochondrial function. We do not want our energy production to have to go through this malfunctioning pathway then - we want to focus on glycolysis instead. The key here to understand is, that as our body changes with time, so do our dietary needs. And healthy eating is only healthy, if we are eating right for our body’s needs.
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