What Did You Choose to Put in Your Shopping Cart this Month?

Raise your hand if you bought Butyl Cellosolve this month?
It's in products like Simple Green, Spot Shot, and Windex.  It is linked to reproductive harm and can cause irritation and tissue damage from inhalation.

Any takers for Hydrochloric Acid?
Do NOT inhale is one of the warnings on this ingredient.  Yet is it even possible to use Febreze, Lysol, or Lime-a-way without breathing?

What about Sodium Hydroxide?
This chemical causes 75% of all caustic injury to the esophagus of kids under 5 years old.  It can cause burns to eyes, skin, mouth, and throat; chronic skin irritation, and liver & kidney damage. This ingredient is found in Palmolive, Tide, Woolite, and Clorox Clean-up.

And finally did anyone use Potassium Hydoxide in your home recently?
It is harmful if inhaled and can severely burn the respiratory and digestive tracts.  Repeated skin contact may cause dermatitis (Eczema).   It is an ingredient in Olay products, Arnica Cream by Boirin, Pantene products, Lysol disinfecting spray, Cascade, and Murphy Oil Soap.

Check out what is in your home on this national government database.

Want a Different Choice?  Take a look at the blog archives from 2010 and get The Real Dirt on Clean.

 
 
    

Shaklee Videos: Why Supplement?

This is exactly what Choose Healthy Lives' Mission is all about.

Shaklee Videos: Why Supplement?

Choose Healthy Fats

Despite the decades of advertising no-fat products and low-fat diets, Americans are continuing to decline in health.  That's because OUR BODY NEEDS FAT.

With so many different sources of dietary fat—some good and some bad—the choices can get confusing.

But the bottom line is simple: don’t go no-fat, go good fat.

If you are concerned about your weight or heart health, rather than avoiding fat in your diet, try replacing saturated fats and trans fats with good fats. This might mean replacing some of the meat you eat with beans and legumes, or using olive oil rather than butter.  But even organic butter is much better for your cells than margarine or other 'spreads.'

• Try to eliminate trans fats from your diet. Check food labels for trans fats. Avoiding commercially-baked goods goes a long way. Also limit fast food.
• Limit your intake of saturated fats by cutting back on red meat and full-fat dairy foods. Try replacing red meat with beans, nuts, poultry, and wild-caught fish whenever possible, and switching from whole milk and other full-fat dairy foods to lower fat versions.
• Eat omega-3 fats every day. Good sources include wild caught fish, walnuts, ground flax seeds, flaxseed oil, and soybean oil.

To ensure purity and potency when using omega-3 food supplements make sure to select a product that  undergoes a multi-step molecular distillation process, which:
• Concentrates and refines the omega-3 fatty acids
• Removes lead, mercury, arsenic, cadmium, dioxins, and PCBs, and other contaminants
• Reduces oxidation and formation of trans fats
• Minimizes odor and fishy aftertaste

Evelyn had a Choice and so do You!

This web site is about educating you to collect information and Choose a Healthy Life for yourself.  Obviously what works for one person won't necessarily have the exact same results for another, but over and over again I see people who Choose natural alternatives getting amazing results.  Here's Evelyn's amazing story.

I first came to Amy for guidance after I was diagnosed with calcium in my blood, hypothyroidism and hyperparathyroidism along with other health issues that were starting to take a toll on my life. I was having trouble sleeping, lacked energy, my finger nails were very weak and brittle, my hair was falling out. I, also, experienced muscle weakness and stiffness in the morning.

When the endocrinologist first told me that my blood results indicated that I had hyperparathyroidism, he said there is no treatment. There is no medicine that I can prescribe for you, which was fine by me because my general practitioner had started prescribing too many pills for me. So I didn't want to start taking another one. But then he said the only solution would be to have surgery. He wanted to just watch and see how I was doing in another 3 months, but in the meantime he told me to research hyperparathyroidism online.

So I began researching and asking Amy if she had any suggestions as to what I could do. My research online proved to me that I wanted no part of surgery. I read of accounts where people had side affects similar to those with Alzheimer's disease after having surgery on their parathyroid. So I was praying that Amy could lead me in another direction--that there would be an alternative to surgery.

Amy suggested that I start taking Shaklee Vitalizer Gold. She said that the Vitalizer would start to rebuild my body. I also started going to a chiropractor for regular adjustments so that my nervous system could correctly communicate with the rest of my body. I started drinking more water, at least my body weight in ounces. I stopped eating sugar, started eating more vegetables and healthy fats (coconut oil, olive oil and nuts), and started exercising.

Almost immediately, I started to see results. I was able to get to sleep and sleep soundly, which I hadn't been able to do for a long time. My body didn't have its usual aches and stiffness. The swelling and stiffness in my fingers were gone. My nails even started growing and being stronger. I had so much more energy, too.

Now it was time for another blood test. I was anxious to see the test results to see if this alternative method was really working. One thing I forgot to tell you too was that I had stopped taking my thyroid medicine. Would the Vitalizer and the change in life style be enough? Well, guess what? My thyroid, parathyroid, and blood calcium levels were all normal. Praise the Lord. I needed no medication or surgery.

Evelyn Strasbaugh

Fort Myers, FL

So what did Evelyn do?  She Chose to make some healthy lifestyle changes and provide her body with the nutrients needed to heal.  She Chose a natural, healing approach instead of a surgical option that was permanent and had not guarantees.  There was not guarantee that supplements, diet, or exercise would heal her, but she had nothing to lose and everything to gain.  Evelyn Chose a Healthy Life.   Won't you?

Want to know what Vitalizer is that Evelyn used?  Watch This.

 

Non-Profit Partnerships for Healthy Financial Stability.

See what can be done with a Partnership between Shaklee and your non-profit to develop a steady stream of income to support your mission while helping even more people Choose Healthy Lives.

Shaklee Videos: Shaklee Lifestyle: Dean Aldridge

It Just Makes Your Blood Boil

Thanks to Dr. Chaney for his weekly Tips from the Professor column.  I'm re-posting a great article supporting the belief that YOU CAN CHOOSE A HEALTHY LIFE.
 
By now you've probably figured out that I like catchy  titles. So what do I mean by "It Just Makes Your Blood Boil"?

In this case "It" refers to sweetened drinks - soft drinks, bottled teas, energy drinks and fruit-flavored drinks (By now you've probably figured out the "fruit- flavored" drinks are not the same as fruit juices).

And they don't exactly make your blood boil, but they can cause high blood pressure according to a major study that has just been published (Brown et al, Hypertension 57: 695-701, 2011).

High blood pressure is a silent killer. It's called a silent killer because many people who have high blood pressure never realize it until they have a heart attack or stroke.

This study looked at 2696 people aged 40 to 59 years old from the United States and England. It compared people who consumed no sweetened beverages with those who consumed one or less servings of sweetened beverages per day and people who consumed more than one sweetened beverage every day.

The bottom line is that sweetened beverage consumption was directly correlated with blood pressure. That's scientific jargon that simply means the more sweetened drinks/day consumed the higher the blood pressure.

Based on other human and animal studies, the most likely cause of the increased blood pressure was the extra amount of simple sugars consumed by the people drinking the most sweetened beverages.

However, there were other differences between the groups.

Sweetened drink consumption packed on extra calories (397 calories per day when you compare people consuming more than one sweetened beverage per day compared to people who drank no sweetened beverages). And those extra calories did result in added weight (44.8% of the high sweetened beverage consumers were obese compared to 31.4% of those people consuming no sweetened beverages).

And, the sweetened beverages were replacing healthier foods. The group consuming the most sweetened beverages had significantly lower intakes of fiber, protein, vegetable protein, omega-3 fatty acids, magnesium and calcium than the non-sweetened beverage consumers.

So we cannot be sure of the exact mechanism by which consumption of sweetened beverages affects our blood pressure,  but it is clear that high consumption of sweetened beverages causes high blood pressure.

The take home message is clear:

You already knew (or maybe suspected) that those soft drinks, bottled teas, energy drinks and fruit-flavored drinks weren't really good for you. But now you have yet another important reason to avoid them.

Your best bet is to drink water, unsweetened teas, low fat milk (or low fat soy or rice milk). Real fruit juice is better than the fruit-flavored juices, but it should be consumed in moderation.

And don't think that diet sodas will get you off the hook. This study reported that diet beverage consumers had a higher BMI (were more likely to be overweight) than non-consumers. (There actually is no evidence that long term consumption of diet sodas actually results in weight loss).

And, a study reported this year at the International Stroke Conference in Los Angeles found an increased risk of strokes in people who drink diet soft drinks.

To Your Health!
Dr. Stephen G Chaney


These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This information is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

RE-LAUNCH of blog.

It's been such an exciting year, I wasn't able to really establish a habit with blogging and keep up with my original plan.  But it's never too late to start over.  So  let's talk about choices:

• 80% of all heart disease in women is preventable with proper nutrition and healthy lifestyle choices.  CHOOSE TO JOIN ME TODAY TO BECOME HEALTHIER!
• 60% of all cancer-related deaths can be prevented by improving lifestyle choices - being physically active, losing weight, stopping smoking, and getting proper nutrition. CHOOSE TO JOIN ME TODAY TO BECOME HEALTHIER!
• 90% of all type 2 diabetes is preventable with proper nutrition, achieving healthy weight, and engaging in other healthy lifestyle behaviors.  CHOOSE TO JOIN ME TODAY TO BECOME HEALTHIER!