Natures Vaccine Fundamentals

Dr Vanessa Ingraham, ND, FAARFM, NMHNZ

In order to bounce back from stress, maintain optimal immune function and feel fantastic,  we need to support the natural ability of our body to achieve homeostasis - or balance.  To begin our journey towards flourishing mental emotional and physical health, we suggest starting to optimize the quickest, easiest and most cost effective components of the Flourishing Formula:

• Light and Dark

• Breathe and Pause

• Food & Fasting
  
  
  Light & Dark

The light we are exposed to can have significant impact on our health.  When we sit inside under consistent artificial lighting all day, our cells get confused about what time it is and what they should be doing.  All of our cells operate under a day/night cycle determined largely by cues from natural sunlight, food timing and genes which program the cells daily activities. When we do not get the changing spectrums of sunlight throughout the day and are exposed to artificial light and screens after the sun sets, we create something called “circadian disturbance”.  This sets the stage for poor sleep, weight gain, mood disorders, and increased risk of cancer and immune disturbances.

1. Dialling in Light

   1. Get OUTSIDE at Key times of the day for at least 10 minutes:

   2. One hour after dawn/sunrise - The “temperature” of light from the sun in the morning is high in a type of infrared light that allows our body to make the sleep hormone melatonin.

      1. Tip: Take your shoes off and stand barefoot for extra benefit

         1. Tip: Do a bit of exercise in the morning outside and have your first meal AFTERWARDs for optimal sleep tonight.

   3. Midday - Get outside during the warmest part of the day, and expose your skin to some UV light to make vitamin D, boost feel good chemicals, increase energy and banish brain fog!

      1. Protip: download Dminder app to see when UV light is strong enough to make Vitamin D and to track your levels.

   4. Sunset - watching the sunset makes you feel great and helps to reinforce your body’s day/night cycle

   5. Darkness at night is also crucial for health. It allows the release of the powerful sleep and immune balancing hormone melatonin. After sunset use Red lighting candles indoors, and limit screen time. If you Must use your laptop download F.lux or Iris software, and turn your iphone screen red.

   6. Wear blue light blocking glasses.

   7. Sleep in a pitch black room - If you can see your hand at 2 ft from your face with the lights off; its too bright for restorative sleep and may make you gain weight:

      1. Tape over LEDs on devices with black duct tape

      2. Use blackout curtains

      3. Wear a sleep mask.

Breathe and Pause

Connecting to and controlling our breathing patterns is the most powerful, free and accessible tool we all have to improve our health and wellbeing.  Different types of breathing can help calm us down, cope with pain, overcome emotional reactivity, support sleep, realize deep insights about ourselves, and increase creativity, energy and focus.  Proper breathing supports every other system in the body through balancing the stress response and improving oxygen delivery to cells.

1. Harnessing the Power of Breath

• Learn how to breathe from your abdomen

1. As soon as you wake up, take your hand to your navel. Inhale and try and push your belly into your hand taking a long slow breath. Exhale pulling your navel in to help empty your lungs.

   1. Take 10 breaths before you get out of bed

   2. Take 5 deep abdominal breaths before eating to support digestion

• Try Breathing to calm you down

1. Square Breath (above) : Inhale to the count of 4, hold for 4, exhale for 4 counts, hold for 4 counts, inhale to four counts.

2. Alternate nostril breathing

1. Try Breathwork to go deep and heal emotional wounds

   1. Cristabel Zamour

      1. Ecstatic Breathwork

   2. Stann Groff

      1. Holotropic breath work

   3. SOMA Breathwork

2. Learn Breath retention (PAUSE) to support blood flow, immune function and stress response

   1. Wim Hoff Breathing

   2. Buteyko breathing

   3. Breath hold tables traditionally used in freediving

3. Yoga Breathing for ENERGY and FOCUS

   1. Kapalbhati (breath of fire)

   2. Right nostril breathing

4. Breathing tools. If you like gadgets to remind you to breathe, we suggest:

1. Breath trainers

Food and Fasting 

Any discussion about health would be incomplete without talking about food.  BUT what about fasting?  Old advice from the 1990’s suggesting we snack every hour to boost metabolism has been shown to be incorrect and has led to a society with ever increasing blood sugar and inflammation levels. For flourishing health we need to understand that fasting or giving our body a break from the work of digesting food is AS important as EATING itself.  Food timing really matters.  If we eat the same meal at 12 noon, we will have a completely different hormonal response than the same meal consumed at 12 midnight. SO where do we start?

1. Fasting and Food Hacking

   1. Fasting 101:

      1. Start with time restricted eating (13 hours overnight ‘fast’) - stop consuming anything but water for 13 hours overnight. This has been shown to benefit cancer risk, reduce blood sugar levels, improve lipid levels and digestive function as our gut cells cannot be replaced if there is food present.

      2. Intermittent fasting can be paired with circadian eating as generally our blood sugar control and digestive function is stronger during daylight hours.

         1. Start with watching the sunset one night and skipping dinner when you get home

         2. Drink lots of water and herbal tea

         3. We sleep best with an empty stomach. If you do choose to eat dinner aim to stop eating 3-4 hours BEFORE sleep.

         4. Eating a big meal before bed will mean you wake up tired and hungry while not eating for 3-4 hours usually results in you waking up energized.

         5. If you are waking up, or NEED a midnight or late snack, you are encouraged to ask your doctor to check your ‘fasting insulin and glucose’ and ‘HBA1c’ level to examine blood sugar regulation. Healthy people can fast overnight without issues, if you cannot, something is awry.

      3. Once you are comfortable easily fasting overnight, try Intermittent fasting for 14-18 hours Please read this beginners guide to intermittent fasting first.

      4. In order to achieve even more benefits of fasting, most of us can easily tolerate a 24 hour fast. A 24 hour fast has additional benefits including: reducing inflammation, increasing growth hormone levels (declines with age and needed to preserve muscle mass and brain function), and stimulating something called autophagy. Autophagy literally means “cell eating old and dead cells”, and represents a biological cellular cleanout.

         1. Please read our Fast2Flourish Guide or this beginner's guide to fasting before embarking on your first 24 hour fast.

   2. Food

      1. We all generally overeat animal protein (including dairy), grains alcohol and processed foods. Excessive consumption of non organic, or conventionally raised foods from animal sources increase our risk of breast, prostate and colon cancer.

      2. We all generally over consume rancid seed oils and trans fats (in processed food, takeaways, deep fried foods and pastries). These cause significant inflammation (which underlie most chronic diseases from cardiovascular disease to cancer).

      3. We all generally overeat sugary and highly processed foods. Read this guest blog i wrote to understand how bad excessive sugar is for our health.

      4. We all generally eat too quickly, when we are not actually hungry and without sitting down and preparing ourselves for food- leading to overeating and poor digestive function.

   3. Flourishing food Guidelines

      1. Eat seasonally - shop at your local farmers market for better nutrition, lower cost, fresher food, and a much more enjoyable shopping experience.

      2. Eat a whole foods Plant based diet - Aim to consume a green salad, or plate of lightly steamed veggies with each meal. Yes even breakfast.

      3. Aim to consume ONLY wild caught fish, shellfish, game or organic meat only. Choose higher quality and eat less frequently. Consider a day a week of no animal foods.

      4. Do an oil detox. Avoid processed foods and throw out anything containing soybean, canola, peanut oil. Cook with olive oil, macadamia nut oil or coconut oil. Full list of “safe cooking oil” here. We recommend avoiding palm kernel oil due to the ecological impact of harvesting.

      5. Ditch Dairy (except butter or organic yogurt if you tolerate them). Milk is generally watered down, sugar added processed food that reeks hormonal havoc on our body and increases IGF1 linked to diabetes, obesity and certain cancers. Milk sugar (lactose) and protein (casein) are some of our most commonly seen allergens. Most people who think they tolerate milk, feel much better without it.

      6. Consume nuts and seeds instead of processed foods. Raw walnuts, pumpkin seeds, macadamia nuts etc all contain healthy fats which keep you full and reduce inflammation.

      7. Consider a green drink. Powdered vegetables and fruit that can be mixed into water are a great alternative when you are busy. Locally Nutrient Rescue produces high quality green and red powders that can help calm digestive inflammation and boost your energy levels while providing extra servings of fruit and vegetables to your diet.