Probiotics vs Prebiotics
Over the years I’ve worked with many families of children who have either been diagnosed with Autism, are going through the process or are thinking it might be something they should be considering. As a result many of them ask me about Zac’s diagnosis and what it was that made us think he might need to be assessed and how did we as a family cope when he did finally get diagnosed so today, I’ll share that story with you.
Product Review – Soft Drinks
Over the past 30+ years there has been a huge increase in the consumption of soft drink (both full sugar and now diet options), sport drinks and energy drinks.
It’s nothing to see a young teen walking to school with an energy drink in their hand at 8am, or drinking a sports drink, even though there isn’t a piece of sporting equipment in sight and consumption of these is becoming more and more common..
So let’s break it down, what is really in these drinks.
Is Fertility An Issue?
It seems we’re waiting longer to have kids than ever before and as a result lowered fertility and IVF have become the new normal. In fact, the other day I heard an IVF clinic advertising that if you’re even thinking of getting pregnant then you should attend one of their information seminars… That surprised me as I would never have thought to involve an IVF clinic at the beginning of my pregnancy journey.
I always thought of IVF as something we do when we’ve been trying naturally for awhile and it hasn’t been happening, I certainly didn’t expect to hear them advertising on commercial radio for couples to attend information sessions on how it all works but I guess the world s changing.
Supporting Your Child’s Learning Challenges
Let’s be honest, all kids have a bit of a disobedient, defiant or impulsive streak. They question us, challenge us and definitely have a mind of their own, but is there a line where this behaviour becomes too much to handle? Is there a point where this behaviour isn’t “normal”?
This was the exact situation we came across in the early days before Zac was diagnosed with Autism.. what was normal behaviour for a child (boy) his age and what wasn’t.. now before you panic.. if your child does have some challenging behaviours or learnings I’m not suggesting they have Autism but there’s definitely some things to think about as far as what you can do to help them.
GAPS Diet Long Term
Over the years I’ve talked about The GAPS™ Diet extensively, how we were doing it as a family and the ups and downs that went with that. It’s been a number of years since we did The GAPS™ Diet and I find that a lot of my patients are very curious as to what we’re doing now so I thought I’d share that with you and perhaps give you a strategy for the long term lifestyle approach we’ve adopted.
My decision for the family was to find a happy medium whereby we were still monitoring our gut health and eating based on The GAPS™ Diet but it was a much more relaxed version.
As a GAPS™ Practitioner, when I’m working with patients, the general rule of thumb is that after you’ve finished the Introduction Diet you move to The Full GAPS™ Diet and follow that for 18 months to 2 years before transitioning off The GAPS™ Diet.
Headache and Migraine Hell
Headaches can be quite a pain, literally and given the fast paced, stressful lives we now live it’s really not that surprising that many of us suffer from them in varying degrees. If you do suffer from headaches it’s important to know that there’s different kinds which means there’s different ways of treating them.
Gut Health and Weight Management
Leaky gut, dysbiosis, SIBO, gut flora imbalance, call it what you like, it seems the unhealthy gut bacteria has a lot to answer for. Not only is there inflammation, autoimmune conditions, mental health issues, ADD / ADHD, Autism, recurrent illness, bloating, IBS and a myriad of other conditions, now we also know that it can affect our ability to lose weight.
Bone Broth vs Meat Stock
Being a GAPS Practitioner has meant promoting and using lots of meat stocks and bone broths as part of the healing process. The one thing I’ve come to realise very quickly has been the confusion between what the two are and when is the best time to use them. Today I thought I’d cover off the difference between bone broth and meat stock to try to make it a little easier for you all.
The first thing I’ve noticed is it seems to depend on where you live in the world as to what you interpret as being a broth or a stock as in the USA they tend to use the word broth for what we call stock so no wonder everyone’s confused.
The below explanations are given based on The GAPS Diet and the way we use meat stocks and bone broths to support gut health, healing and sealing as well as ongoing health maintenance.
Kick Sugar Addiction Now
Sugar, Sugar, Sugar…. It’s the curse of the 21st Century…
It’s behind obesity, heart disease, anxiety, depression, migraines, chronic fatigue syndrome, mood swings, PMS, Type II Diabetes, inflammation (which of course leads to other significant health conditions), cancer and don’t even get me started on kids behaviour when they’re on a sugar high..
Cheating on GAPS
So I was looking for something the other day and stumbled upon this and thought it might be a good reminder for those of you out there who might sometimes wonder why you’re putting in all the effort to do The GAPS Diet with your family.
When we were doing the GAPS Diet I would do a nightly poll on how everyone was going with all the changes and restrictions that were involved. The questions asked went something like this: