Clock powered strategies for energy and longevity!

The day has had quite an interesting start and the opportunity to practice what I teach.

My favorite “stress management” system is HeartMath™. I put stress management in quotes because HeartMath is so much more than stress management. It has completely transformed my response to stressful situations and has given me a day to day sense of calm and focus, as opposed to the overwhelm I used to feel all the time.

My husband headed out at 4:30 a.m. to catch a flight — he’s off for his annual reunion of friends he’s kept up with since his high school and college days. As a result, some of the kid-care tasks he usually does, like driving to school, are my job for the next 5 days.

Unfortunately, after saying good-bye to him and falling back asleep, I either slept through the alarm or it didn’t ring, and I was late for getting my almost 14-year-old to a make-up science exam.

I managed to do my breathing and appreciation, in HeartMath fashion, to keep myself calm and focused and was doing quite well, until I spoke to the teacher. She was rude and abrupt on the phone, informed me that there was no other time to take the test, and then hung up… leaving me feeling outraged and angry.

“How dare she speak to me that way and be so inflexible and uncaring!”  I’ve had to practice my HeartMath processes over and over, and I still feel myself beginning to boil as I recount the story about how I was treated so rudely. And therein lies the silver lining.

Treat People With Kindness – Always

Take an extra few seconds to connect and care.

A few simple words, before or after, telling me she couldn’t talk because she had a room full of students like “Sorry, let’s find a solution,” or “Let’s talk about this later,” would have conveyed to me that she cared about us and would have completely changed my experience and the stories I was telling myself about her.

Even when you’re rushed, taking an extra couple of seconds to say a kind and caring word makes all the difference in the world, and the extra seconds can actually save you time.

I walked away angry and miffed at being treated so rudely, and it could have been avoided. Further, I could have added kindness to the situation by starting off with, “I know you’re busy so I won’t keep you,” or “I appreciate you offering Kevin the opportunity to retake the test, and I really blew it this morning.”

That approach would have offered connection and appreciation to her and probably would have made the conversation very different. I remembered to do that in an e-mail follow-up, and she offered to find Kevin at lunch and let him take the test then.

Assume Positive Intent

When I was studying parenting, which I approached with the same full vigor as I approach health studies, one phrase really stuck out and has remained with me.

“Assume positive intent” means don’t jump right to the conclusion that the other person is “doing it just to get to you.”

This is especially true with children and careless drivers! We are all just working towards getting our needs met, and when someone treats you less than kindly, it helps to ask, what need of theirs is being left unmet?

Then, feel compassionate towards them and look for a gentler way to get what you need.

How does this apply to health?

In every way imaginable.

Stress Transformations

When you’re angry, frustrated, overwhelmed and experiencing negative emotion, you trigger a cascade of stress hormones and chemicals that make you fat, sick, and threaten your life. That may sound like an extreme way to put it, but it really is true.

Cortisol and adrenaline, the dynamic duo of stress response, have the ability to raise blood sugar and blood pressure to increase your heart rate and respiration, turn on and turn off your muscles at the expense of your digestive tract and the high level thinking part of your brain, and create inflammatory chemicals in their wake.

Getting stressed out is not a pretty picture; however, you can turn it into a masterpiece by having tools at your disposal to transform the health-threatening chemical soup of stress into the life-enhancing broth of appreciation and calm.

One of the projects I have been working on is a 30-Day Transforming Stress System.  It’s close to completion, and I look forward to sharing it with you sometime soon.

In the meantime:

• Breathe deeply from your belly, connect to your heart, and find something to appreciate. Bask in that for a few minutes and the world will take on a new glow.
  
  
• Take the time to do this before each meal and your digestion will improve.
  
  
• Do it when your head hits the pillow at night and your sleep will improve.

Positive Newsletter Resources to Help You Transform

Timing is so important and the feature article today goes into detail about meal timing and its effects on your health and waistline.

This week’s radio show takes timing to a whole new level.  Be sure to mark your calendar and don’t miss my two-part series with Atom Bergstrom. We’ll be talking about what’s known as “solar nutrition” aka “chronobiotics.”  Learn how certain foods work best at specific times of the day and how important this knowledge can be to maintaining ideal weight.   Fascinating.

I wish you a happy healthy week and joy and kindness in all your communications.

With much love and appreciation,

In a previous newsletter and blog post, I wrote an article about the dangers of eating frequent small meals. You can read it here.

Most people believe they need to eat frequently to avoid hypoglycemia. In fact, eating small, frequent meals has never been proven to accelerate weight loss despite what many experts claim. In fact, there are many more studies that suggest that less frequent eating promotes more rapid weight reduction.

And further, most people who claim they are hypoglycemic (and attribute feeling uncomfortable if they skip meals) really don’t experience true hypoglycemia. Many of the people I’ve worked with have discovered that their blood sugar is actually up when they experience the out of balance feelings they were misled into believing were symptoms of low blood sugar.

Many people do experience what’s known as “reactive hypoglycemia,” where their blood sugar plummets after being high (triggering too much insulin secretion) then going too low because of the over-clearance of sugar from the blood due to high levels of insulin.

Why It’s Best to Space Your Meals 5 – 6 Hours Apart

The first three hours after you eat, your body produces a hormone called insulin. Insulin’s job is to clear the sugar from your blood and pass it on to your muscles and liver so they can do their job.

About an hour after eating, if your insulin level and blood sugar levels are starting to come down as they should, then growth hormone is released. Growth hormone, in the early post-meal stages, triggers the build up of muscle protein, which is enhanced by the presence of insulin.

When insulin is activated, and when your body is functioning normally, your liver and muscles take on as much glycogen (your body’s storage form of sugar) as possible.

While Insulin is Active in Your Bloodstream, Fat Burning is Not Possible

About three hours after you eat a meal, your insulin level should be back down to where it was before your meal, and your liver begins to kick into high gear, mobilizing glycogen into blood sugar.

At that point you begin to burn fats that are in you blood for energy, thus putting to good use fats that would otherwise go into storage as unwanted fat!

More than four hours after eating, growth hormone begins to mobilize fat for fuel. However, this use of fat for fuel only happens when insulin levels are very low.

Why Snacking Between Meals is Self-Sabotage

The period in between meals should be an opportunity for your liver to exercise and clear out glycogen.

If you snack between meals or eat a meal too soon after the previous one, your liver’s exercise routine is blocked, thus setting you up for obesity, insulin resistance, and diabetes. When your liver doesn’t get enough exercise, it can synthesize excessive cholesterol, leading to elevated blood lipids even if the food you eat contains no cholesterol.

If your muscles are well toned, they will use up fat between meals much faster than untrained muscles. In fact, muscle tone can provide you with the energy that you need to keep going all day long.

When you eat too soon after a previous meal, insulin levels rise too soon — turning off your liver’s exercise routine, inhibiting fat burning, and causing calories to be stored rather than burned. Plus, your energy will plummet and you may suffer from food cravings.

If you consistently eat meals too close together, you’ll cause your pancreas to fatigue, your insulin receptors to become resistant, and you’ll struggle with your weight.

If You’re Hungry Between Meals

Feeling weak or hungry sooner than 5 – 6 hours after eating a meal can be due to:

• Not eating enough at the previous meal
• Eating too many carbohydrates at the previous meal
• Impaired digestion and absorption
• Being out of shape
• Weak adrenals
• A sluggish and congested liver
• Exhaustion
• Diabetes
• Insulin resistance
• Leptin resistance

As you can see, the biochemistry supports eating meals more frequently rather than less frequently. The ideal meal spacing gap appears to be 5 – 6 hours between meals with a 12-hour period between your evening meal and morning breakfast.

Support from Experts

According to Dr. Dennis Clark, author of The Belly Fat Book, “The recommendation of eating six small meals per day, to keep the furnace burning hot, has become dogma in some circles. However, the common advice for frequent meals to keep the body’s furnace burning hot makes no sense physiologically or biochemically.”

In the book Eat Stop Eat, Brad Pilon quotes Dr. Tim Crowe, nutrition specialist at Deakin University in Melbourne, as saying that the six meal per day diet is a “faddish dieting trend, with very little research in support of it.” Crowe notes that some research suggests that playing around with when you eat may actually cause you to put weight on.

According to Pilon, 56 percent of adults eat between two to four times a day, while 37 percent eat five to seven times daily.

The “three meals per day” eating pattern becomes more critical for keeping a low body fat percentage as you age and your metabolism slows down. This slow-down can be partly corrected by regular strenuous exercise.

(Research references available on the blog)

What To Do if You Have Hypoglycemia

If you think you can’t space your meals because you have hypoglycemia, think again.

Get a blood glucose meter and check your blood sugar between meals.

When hunger comes on too soon, stave it off with water flavored with essential oils or lemonade made with water, lemons, and a pinch of stevia if desired.

Make friends with hunger. It can be your friend.

Hunger indicates that your body is in fat burning mode. If you learn to tolerate a little hunger and gradually increase the space between meals, you’ll be rewarded by weight reduction, hormone balance, and improved blood lipids.

Give it a try. I have had patients who only did the meal spacing when we first started working together and began to release pounds that had, up until then, been stuck for a long time.

When it comes to meal spacing and what’s best, which do you want to believe?

Modern day dogma or the science of how your body works?

Comment on the blog.

How long do you leave between meals?

Once a month, you can join us LIVE in Austin, Texas for a local raw food potluck where you can:

• Meet like-minded people and make new friends.
• Learn new and exciting recipes.
• Gather valuable health and nutrition information.
• Feel supported on your health quest.

Click HERE to learn more about the event and find out all the details on what to bring and what to expect.

Upcoming Dates

(last Saturday of every month unless noted otherwise):

• Saturday, April 28th, 6:30 p.m. central
  
• Saturday, May 26th, 6:30 p.m. central
• Saturday, June 30th, 6:30 p.m. central
• Saturday, July 28th, 6:30 p.m. central
  

What our attendees have to say about recent potlucks:

• “I had a great time meeting new people and gained new knowledge and wisdom regarding blood sugars and the importance of a clean, whole food diet. The food tasted amazing and the display of all the dishes looked wonderful. Thank you to Dr. Ritamarie, her husband and all of the people who contributed to make this connection possible. What a great experience.”
  — Bridget
  
  
• “Incredible! The food was awesome. You won’t leave hungry. Lots of very interesting people. Ritamarie was a wonderful host. She shared some extremely helpful information on health restoration. I wish now I had brought three more people to hear this information. She was so gracious, answering questions and sharing her knowledge with wit and compassion.”
  — Yvetta Myers
  

Click HERE to join and follow this Meeting Group.

Dr. Ritamarie’s Vibrant Health Solutions Radio Show: combining experience, education, and practical advice to make healthful eating fun again! Click here to learn more.

Future Show Schedule:

• Thursday, April 26th – It’s Not What You Eat; It’s WHEN You Eat It That Makes The Difference! – Part 1 with Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo and Atom Bergstrom
  
• Thursday, May 3rd – It’s Not What You Eat; It’s WHEN You Eat It That Makes The Difference! – Part 2 with Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo and Atom Bergstrom

You’ll find a wealth of free natural health resources when you visit our radio shows archive! Look for the most recent shows in the sidebar of the Vibrant Health Solutions Radio Show homepage.

Here are the latest shows we’ve added:

• Cleansing and Detoxification Strategies for Spring with Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo
  
• Practical Changes When Going Gluten-Free with Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo and Debbie Sipowicz
  
• Emotional Changes When Going Gluten-Free with Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo and Debbie Sipowicz

Join me in the first-ever Food Revolution Virtual Summit.

Bestselling author John Robbins is personally interviewing 21 people who are leaders in movements for healthy, sustainable, humane and delicious food. And you can join in — for free!

From April 28th – May 6th, there will be three free interviews broadcast daily. You’ll get cutting edge disease-beating, health-activating, age-reversing information. These tools can help you and your family to thrive and to make a difference in the world.

Get more info on the amazing speakers, and register today:

https://drritamarie.com/wp-clone/go/FoodRevolution

You’ll get the latest thinking on preventing and reversing heart disease, cancer and diabetes; the truth about GMO foods, soy, raw foods, and grass-fed beef; the social, ethical and environmental impact of what you eat; and how to inspire your family to join you in making healthy choices.

Register Now!

https://drritamarie.com/wp-clone/go/FoodRevolution

Health-Seeker, if you’re like me, I’m guessing you’ve spent a lot of time learning techniques on how to improve your life.

But I have a simple question to ask you… are you actually getting what you want and feeling like your life is fulfilling and enjoyable?

If you’re not, then I think you should watch this revealing free video with personal coaching pioneer Cheryl Richardson, where she covers two important topics:

• How to remove fear, anxiety and overwhelm in order to live a soul-directed, purpose-driven life where you actually get to have what you want and feel good doing it…
  

• How to set boundaries and say no to others in order to get what you want
  (and how to do it without feeling guilty and worrying that you’re hurting or letting others down).
  

https://drritamarie.com/wp-clone/go/CherylRichardsonVideo

I think the powerful and easy-to-implement steps she outlines in the video can help you to take some serious steps forward in your life.

There are nearly 1,000 comments of praise and appreciation for the amazing videos from Cheryl, Nick Ortner, and Kris Carr.

If you haven’t yet seen the other videos make sure to watch those also after you see Cheryl’s presentation.

Here’s the link again:

https://drritamarie.com/wp-clone/go/CherylRichardsonVideo

Dr. Ritamarie

P.S. – Did I mention that this event is free?

I want to emphasize that because this is one of the most valuable events you’ll ever attend online. I highly recommend you check out what’s going on here, as this event only happens once per year…

https://drritamarie.com/wp-clone/go/CherylRichardsonVideo

Today’s recipes will offer you “a meal with staying power” that will fill you up so you can go for 5 – 6 hours easily.

Konjac noodles are produced from the root of the konjac plant (Amorphophallus konjac) that grows in both China and Japan, as well as other tropical climates. They are similar in taste and texture to bean thread noodles.

Konjac noodles contain zero calories, 9 grams of fiber, and 20% of your daily requirement for calcium in one 9-oz bag. The thinner angel hair and linguini noodles have the best texture. The thicker ones are a bit more chewy.

Konjac fiber is filling, stabilizes blood sugar, and has many health benefits. You’ll find more details and products here:

https://drritamarie.com/wp-clone/go/KonjacFoods

Konjac Noodles with Nutrition-Packing Pesto Sauce

Ingredients:

• 1 package of konjac noodles
• 1 cup fresh basil, packed or 1/4 cup dried
• 1 cup raw kale, chopped
• 2 cups raw spinach
  
• 1 tablespoon kelp powder (optional)
• 1/3 cup walnuts
• 1/3 cup pumpkin seeds or hemp seeds
• 1 clove garlic
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
  

Directions:

1. Prepare konjac noodles according to package instructions.
2. If you have a food processor: Put remaining pesto ingredients in food processor and process until smooth, but with a bit of texture.
3. If you don’t have a food processor yet: Put all pesto ingredients except the greens in the blender and add enough water to keep it moving. Blend until smooth. Finely mince the greens and stir in.
4. Adjust salt and basil in pesto to taste.
5. Top prepared konjac noodles with pesto sauce and serve with Braised Garlic Greens (included below), salad, or a vegetable side dish of your choice.
   
   

“Braised” Garlic Greens

Ingredients:

• 1 head kale, de-stemmed and shredded or chopped into small pieces
• 1 head collard greens, de-stemmed and shredded or chopped into small pieces
• 4 cups baby spinach, washed and drained
• 2 lemons, juice of
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1/4 cup macadamia nut oil or olive oil (optional)
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
  

Directions:

1. Rinse and chop greens and place in a bowl.
2. Cover greens with salt and massage until they wilt. Continue until the greens have shrunk in size and there is green water in the bowl.
3. Drain the liquid, reserving for later.
4. Add 1/2 the lemon juice and massage again.
5. In a separate bowl, combine remaining lemon juice and oil with a few teaspoons of the reserved liquid.
6. Press garlic into the juice/oil mixture and stir or shake well.
7. Pour dressing over greens and toss well, squeezing with hands so that the marinade penetrates the greens.
8. Allow to sit at room temperature for 15 minutes or longer, preferably in a salad press, or warm in dehydrator at 140°F for 15 – 30 minutes before serving.