Green Smoothies for St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patty's day!
I totally forgot about the holiday until the drive to Pilate this morning when I heard it on the radio. Then, at Pilates, everyone (except me) was dressed in green workout clothes! Ah, how I missed my bright green workout shirt today...
So, as a late celebration for the green holiday, I decided to have a green smoothie lunch.

Green Smoothie:

2 cups baby spinach or baby kale (or 2 leaves large kale)
1 banana (preferably frozen)
1 pinch green stevia leaf powder
sprinkle of cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1+ tsp coconut sugar (to taste)
1/4 scoop VegaOne Vanilla Chai Nutritional Shake
optional 1 tsp chia seeds

Blend until smooth & enjoy!



Variation:
Instead of the coconut sugar, add a handful of frozen berries or frozen peaches & use whatever protein powder you have on hand (or omit the protein altogether).


Picture from: https://pixabay.com/static/uploads/photo/2015/03/20/17/49/green-682620_960_720.jpg  (labelled for reuse)

Struggling with Candida: the "diet" that worked for me

A bit of a personal post & general thoughts on foods:

In spring 2012, I found out that yeast overgrowth in my digestive tract was causing my acne, which I had been fighting since early teen years. (Candida, or yeast, is quite normal to have in your gut, but an imbalance can lead to 'dis-ease'.) It's been a bumpy road to health, but I think I'm finally closing in on it for good. My body feels strong & healthy. My acne is under control & my face is healing. I have found more confidence.

Those who have been by my side through my journey know that my diet has been the biggest part of my health journey. At the very beginning, my diet was strict, but as I became healthier I was able to enjoy more and more foods. However, some things have stayed constant:

Healing Foods (to consume daily):

• whole milk (not 2% or lower!)
• cocoa
• ground ginger (spice, not fresh)
• cinnamon
• eggs
• 1 TB unheated oils: corn, sunflower, safflower
• something green & something orange (eg. spinach and yam)
• black beans (weekly)

Foods I avoid:

• pork & pork products  (sigh...the guilt of cheating on bacon is real)
• wheat  (but not necessarily gluten)
• yogurt  (sugar + probiotics that could throw off my own gut bacteria)
• dried fruit  (HIGH sugar)
• fruit juices  (high sugar & no fiber to slow down the digestion)
• added sugars  (sweeten with coconut sugar and stevia instead)
• yeast  (theory that yeast nurtures yeast)
• alcohol  (especially beer and sweet liquors)

Anyone familiar with candida & the typical candida diets (which emphasize eating no sugars to starve out the yeast) will be questioning why I drink milk. Lactose is a sugar after all.

However, it seems that yeast is unable to use lactose. In addition, lactose (and milk in general) is incredibly important to build up the good bacteria in the gut.
While I find it difficult to find literature of yeast & lactose in English, the idea that yeast is unable to metabolize milk sugars is very popular in German.


My diet is much more in depth, but I've posted this list because I believe that almost everyone would benefit from following it - at the very least, focusing on having the "healing foods" on a regular basis.

Naturopathic School Interview

Wow! It's been so long since I posted anything on this blog. I miss it, but I've also been so incredibly busy. Last week I flew to Vancouver, BC to visit BINM for an interview. I also got to sit in on a class in the morning.
I know that prior to my day at BINM, I did a lot of online research to try prepare myself. Honestly, there's very few posts about what the interview is like at any naturopathic medicine school, so I decided to post about my experience.

View from the Skytrain - beautiful mountains!
But no, BINM students do not get a transit discount.

In the morning I got to sit in on a bio-medicine 1st year class that goes from 9am-12pm (with a break or two). I learned that this class usually has about 2 quizzes a week, so you have to keep on top of the material. What I love about how BINM teaches, is that they teach all of the bio-medical sciences in one integrated course!
Students then have a 1 hour lunch break. There's plenty of fridges, freezers, and microwaves to use - almost everyone brings their lunch from home. Although every Thursday students get 10% off at the Subway across the street.
The next class is from 1-4 pm. I didn't sit in on this class, as my interview started at 1pm. The schedule for BINM students is always this regular - 2 classes a day, school from 9-4pm. I like the fact that you will always start and end school at a regular time. I'm told that CCNM schedules look more like undergrad schedules - class times differ depending on the day.

The interview consists of 3 panels, whom you talk to for about 20 minutes each. They each have slightly different types of questions, which I outline below. Keep in mind, this is not a complete list of the questions they asked me.

Classic interview-style questions:
What frustrates you?
How do you manage conflict?
How would you like us to remember you after this interview?
Why Naturopathic medicine? Ie. what got you interested in this field?
Why did you apply to BINM? What do you expect from BINM?

Personal questions:
Tell us about yourself.
How do you work in a group? How do you deal with conflicting personalities in a group setting?
Tell us about a failure and how you managed it.
How do you propose to take care of yourself physically, emotionally, mentally?
Describe yourself using only 5 words.
Have you applied to any other schools? If so, why Boucher? Pros/Cons

Situation questions:
Ethical question: explain your decision process given an ethical dilemma.
What do you do to counsel someone?
You are working in the clinic as an intern, and your supervisor corrects your mistake in front of your patient. You are embarrassed. What do you do?
You see a friend cheating on an exam. What do you do?
Imagine you're a ND: what do you think will be your least favorite aspect of your career?


I think my interview went pretty well! I will be hearing back from them within 2 weeks to see if I got in or not!

I hope this post will help some of you prepare for your interviews & get a better idea of the school :) Remember to relax & be yourself! It also helps if you have some questions to ask them... it shows your interest.


Update: I got into both BINM & CCNM! I will be attending CCNM in Fall 2016

Green Mint Chocolate Ice Cream

Summer has finally come to Alberta! It's been incredibly hot these past few days, and the ice cream maker has been in use. If you don't already own an ice cream maker - I highly recommend you get one! If not, ice cream can still be made in the freezer, but it won't be as creamy.

Since I'm not having dairy or eggs, I made coconut milk based ice cream. It's creamy and satisfying! Plus, you can change the flavor/sweetness to be exactly how you like it. :) This recipe even sneaks in some veggies for that lovely green color instead of using artificial colors.

This is the easy ice cream I made today, based off of Food Babe's recipe.

Blend in a high-speed blender (like Vitamix):

2 cans coconut milk

1 cup coconut palm sugar

3 tsp peppermint extract

2 loose handfuls spinach

1 pinch Himalayan sea salt

Then pour into an ice cream maker, follow manufacturer instructions and add a handful of cocoa nibs halfway through.

ADHD & Diet

Our brains are extremely sensitive to nutrient availability and are the most energy demanding organ in our body. In fact, our brain requires approximately 125 grams of glucose every day (a very important reason not to cut out carbs).

An astonishing 60% of our brain (dry matter) is fat. This fat comes from and is directly influenced by our diet! Our diet can change cognition, learning, behavior, sleep, focus, and memory by influencing the brain's development.

Children with diagnosed ADHD have significantly lower levels of omega 3 and omega 6 fats: arachidonic acid (AA), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). These children (from the same study) also had a higher number of behavioral problems and higher incidences of those behavior problems, as well as temper tantrums and sleep deficits.

Note: Arachidonic acid is an Omega-6 fat. Decosahexaenoic acid and eicosapentaenoic acid are Omega-3 fatty acids. In the typical Canadian diet, we do not get enough omega-3 fats.

Another study also found that lower levels of AA and DHA are linked with more learning difficulties and more visual or auditory deficits.
In fact, the physical symptoms of many children with ADHD (more urination, greater thirst, dry skin) are like those of a fatty acid deficiency.

Foods for healthy brain development:* 

• Fatty fish, seafood (eg. salmon, sardines, herring, cod liver)
• Flax seed oil (great to hide in smoothies, salad dressings, or in cereals)
• Ground flax seeds (go rancid quickly: best to refrigerate)
• Hemp seed oil
• Fish oil
• Omega-3 enriched eggs

*It's also recommended not to restrict fat consumption from whole foods in children.

See "Dietitians of Canada" for a list of foods with omega-3 fats & the amount of omega-3s they contain.

TL;DR ADHD is a multifactorial condition that is associated with low levels of AA and DHA (omega 6 and omega 3 fats). A diet rich in omega-3 fats can help healthy brain development and may prevent ADHD.


References:

Stevens, 1995: Essential fatty acid metabolism in boys with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/62/4/761.full.pdf

Mazurak, V. Anti-aging Nutrients: Can the aging process be slowed? [Pdf document]

Images:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/77/Lasse_Kromann.jpg
http://gifsoup.com/MTkxMTQzMA

Community Nutrition: False Advertising

This video is self explanatory. We watched it in my community nutrition class: CBC Marketplace Food Fiction: Lousy Labels.

If you have some time, I highly recommend you watch it so you can be more aware of false food claims when going grocery shopping. The food ingredient list and nutrition table are much more reliable than the claims on the front of the label... 

It frustrates me that, as consumers, we must research and criticize every ingredient on the food label to determine whether a product truly is healthy. Eating right should not be this difficult! Click here for a list of 10 ingredients to avoid in your foods, by Food Matters.

30 day Yoga Challenge - Complete!

It's been a busy month! I was able to complete all 30 days of yoga (see my day 3 update here). I feel so much stronger, flexible, and overall balanced. Sometimes it was inconvenient to set aside an hour plus driving for yoga and for myself, but in the end it was always worth it.
As a bonus, that yoga place is giving anyone who successfully completed the challenge another 30 days free. Woohoo :)

And I'm happy to say that I can now hold myself in the crow position for a fair while! At the beginning of this challenge I couldn't even get myself up...

I'm currently working on my headstands.

 See how I got my legs up a bit? That's so exciting!! But I'm pretty terrified of holding my feet up right over my head so I'll need to work on trusting my body as well as strength.

The cat in the background is our beloved Silver... relaxing in the sun :)
Isn't he just adorable??