The Dirt Cure

I am crazy about The Dirt Cure.

Dr Maya Shetreat-Klein is fearless in connecting the dots between our soil, our food, our guts, our bodies and our brains to find lifelong health.

"All health begins in the gut. Most people think of the brain as the top of the totem pole, but in many ways, it's downstream from other organs. The gut - the body's soil - calls many of the shots. An unhealthy gut - or depleted soil - leads to an unhealthy immune system, endocrine system, and nervous system. These lead to disordered focus, cognition, behavior, sleep, and mood, among other symptoms. It's why, if not addressed, a child's disrupted gut can trigger an allergy or reactivity and eventually present as stomachaches, asthma, ear infections or croup, and later morph into troubling neurological dysfunction."                  
                                             Maya Shetreat-Klein, MD - "The Dirt Cure"

I've always loved the saying, "no guts no glory". Over the past few years, I have realized just how fundamentally true it is -
as an individual in search of good health,
as a Mom trying to buy, grow, cook and eat well for my family table,
as a coach inspiring my athletes to improve both mentally and physically on the field, and
as a Food Ambassador working to inspire better food education everywhere.

"Mistakes made in life are our lessons in disguise. 
And sometimes, the best lessons learned, came from the worst mistakes made."              - Curiano.com

The human soul is passionate about solving problems. Previous decades gave birth to new agricultural technologies and a factory farming system that had hoped to fix global problems of disease, weed control, crop failure and food shortages. Unfortunately, these technologies are producing unintended, horrific consequences on our health and well being.

Without the alarming increases in allergies, asthma, ADHD, Autism and learning disabilities would the microbiome research have risen to the forefront like it has? Would Dr Maya have written this book if her child did not get sick? Would I have EVER tried an elimination diet for Abbie if she had been thriving in school?

We will continue to make mistakes, we MUST continue to learn from them.

I just hope and pray we all have the gumption - THE GUTS - to fix them before it's too late.

Thank you Dr Maya
for being brave enough to write this book
for connecting the dots between such complicated issues
for giving us practical solutions on how to heal our food, our families...
and ultimately
ourselves.

Join me - It's time to open up your napkin around The Dirt Cure.

Our family tables will thank us later gator.

xoxoL

ps

My top two article reads for the week:
"No Food is Healthy, not even Kale" + Study: Monsanto's Glyphosate now most heavily used Weed Killer in History


pps

Still rocking out the #chimmie500 no matter where I go, workout clothes or NOT! HA! Go Hawks!

food nerd alert - a summer repost

nerd alert.  put your pocket protectors on.

just now, robyn o'brien posted this article on facebook and i decided to find and repost this blurb i buried in an early summer post and bring it to life again. as it's the passion behind the cooking love that's driving and compelling me forward everyday and i'm ecstatic to see more articles coming out on this subject.

"what would you do if you weren't afraid?"

it's catching on... the waterfall is spreading...  can you hear it roar?

***

I started this blog with a question:  Will this family food change help improve Abbie's symptoms and avoid an ADHD diagnosis with subsequent medication?  I'm signing off this Summer with my theory on why our family food change helped Abbie shed the ADHD and sensory processing symptoms. Was it the reduction in refined sugar?  The elimination of artificial color and preservatives?  The removal of gluten?  Or was it something else that connected these elements?  Today I'm going to talk about GUTS and connect some dots.

Here we go...

Antibiotics (ABX)
The effects of ABX on our gut bacteria are known by most of us.  Use them too often and they kill off the good AND bad guys in our guts; Think Vietnam agent orange carpet bombing.  Throughout our lives (starting in the womb), we get numerous, sometimes unnecessary (sometimes life saving) doses of ABX.  In addition, our factory farmed animal meat is loaded with it.  ABX make animals big and fat fast and they help animals survive the unnatural conditions of crowded factory farm barns.  How much ABX is left in the meat when we eat it?  More than we think.

Filtering the GMO debate

GMOs have really come into the limelight over the past two years.  I certainly had no idea about them when I started looking into our food.  One must separate genetically engineered organisms (GEOs) and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) first so that we can talk about our guts.  Think of what humans do in GEO's as forced plant sex... we've been doing it by hand in fields and in laboratories for centuries.  On the other hand, GMO's are created when scientists splice a class of herbicides such as glyphosate (the active ingredient in the popular weed killer "Roundup") with the plant seed's own DNA so that every cell of the plant gives off the neurotoxin.  These crops are classified as systemic neoniconitoids (SN-GMOs) and were approved in the glorious 1980's.  Because they are cheap, these crops overwhelm the ingredient lists of our processed food and new research is showing these crops have put the world food supply at risk.  But how could they have been approved in the first place?!  Here's what happened: These herbicides cause a fatal neurological pathway disruption (the shikimate pathway) in plant and bacteria cells which kills them.  This pathway does not even exist in our human cells so it was deemed safe back in the 80's because industry scientists and the FDA were not paying attention to the bacteria in our guts.  Like the tobacco industry, SN-GMO safety has been determined by its own GMO seed industry research, not by independent research = big red flag.  Also, their testing trial length is 90 days = not an appropriate length for human safety standards.

Are you still with me?:)

Enter in the science of Microbiology and the Human Microbiome Project.
Since the 1980s, we have learned much about the microorganisms that inhabit our bodies.  To this day, we have only scraped the surface on the association between our gut bacteria in both healthy and diseased individuals.  Here's the nitty gritty (and read more in this book): Our gut bacteria outnumber our human cells 10-1 in our digestive track.  The loss or weakening of our gut bacteria lining in our intestines = Dysbiosis or "leaky gut syndrome".  Food proteins can then sneak into the blood and these foreign proteins stimulate an immune response in our body = food sensitivities & allergies.  In addition to digestion, we are learning that gut bacteria handles mood regulation, neurotransmitter production (the ADHD brain?) and immune function.  The gut-brain relationship is a glorious new scientific frontier.  Bottom line: Bacteria = the building blocks of earthly life.  Bees, farm animals and humans all have gut bacteria and these little buggers keep us alive.

Connecting Roundup,  SN-GMOs and ABX
Common non-SN-GMO crops such as wheat and sugar are doused with Roundup to kill the crop and hasten the harvest.  Remember that Oregon Farmer who discovered illegal SN-GMO wheat in his fields a few years back? (Monsanto had planted and tested SN-GMO wheat in OR, but alas it was never approved by the FDA).  Imagine the farmer's shock when he sprayed his crop with Roundup and the wheat didn't die... So, not only do we have Roundup and other harmful herbicides INSIDE the DNA of our food protein, but we also have it sprayed all over the OUTSIDE of super common conventional food crops + we may not be able to STOP this crap from spreading in the wild. Yum.  The combination of toxic herbicide load, SN-GMO foreign food proteins and ABX overuse is altering and wiping out our gut bacteria which is leading to a wide range of unintended physical and mental health issues, unique to each person's own DNA.

Our food change worked.  Eating and cooking with real food (and choosing cleaner, organically processed food) helped repair Abbie's guts... all of our guts.   We will continue to avoid fake foods - artificial color and preservatives, SN-GMOs and heavily herbicide ridden foods like the dirty dozen, wheat and refined sugar.  Abbie has food sensitivities to these foods which was causing her symptoms.  We do cheat and symptoms come back, though never as severe.  Turns out we all feel better when we eat clean, and we're certainly slimmer (Me, Chris and my parents have lost a grand total of 75+ pounds with no "dieting").  It's the key to our continued, imperfect success and it's the common thread connecting all of the amazing health success stories I read about every day.  Each of our food maps look different and I'm hoping to give my Abbie, Mac and Tommy a foodie pen so they can write without me someday.  

So where do we go from here?

Spread the word birds: Russia just completely banned GMOs.  And Europe has always either labeled them or banned them (Europe also puts labels on food with artificial color explaining it causes hyperactivity in children).  Americans are unknowingly stuffing our faces with SN-GMOs & fake food because we have no labeling laws and we innocently trust our pisspoor FDA regulated food industry standards.  Read about how the famous Seralini Study has been republished after three rounds of rigorous scientific peer review (after being retracted by an editor who was a former Monsanto employee).  I hope we continue to reach out and hold the hands with the rest of the gathering world on GMOs and labeling laws.  You know what they say, "open hands are hard to hold on to anyway"...  I super hate the ending of Titanic.

I hope you enjoyed and were able to follow my somewhat simple, geeky synopsis.  We have a light on the path that is much brighter than when I started two years ago.  I'm so glad I didn't wait to try cleaning up our food and I'm here to cheer you on.  

Go balls out for real food with me.  You.have.nothing.to.lose.

Don't let the torch go out.  Find your inner nerd.  Read and google about how to achieve strong, stellar gut... 

Find your inner athlete and start practicing in the kitchen.  Don't give up on your meal planning and bring your kids along on some fun cooking runs...  

Become a Food Patriot and start changing the marketplace with every purchase towards food companies you can trust.  YOU make a difference no matter how small a change you are making...  

Join our Food Revolution and help Jamie Oliver, me and the other 1000+ global Food Ambassadors get compulsory food education back into our schools... 

Come on America, let's have a big Food Day together and make our mark on the world as the generation who turned this mother ship around.

***

rhubarb lemonade + an evolving mullies = no guts no glory

Part 1

I have this unique ability to not hear anything going on around me when I type or read and when my oldest child Mac told me I was getting "too much screen time", well, I realized something's gotta give.  This lovely little blog was the beginning.  I started it after my sister came in town on Labor Day 2012; Katie gave me a frame with fabric embroidered inside, "to the mullies" giving homage to the make believe land we used to "swing" to after we jumped off our swing set.  She and her family are here now vacationing with us for a lovely looooong week.  Writing here helped get me through our life altering family food change... boy have I learned a lot.  Perhaps I will post again after the Summer, perhaps I will not.  In the meantime, you can find me with my family and friends swinging to the mullies on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and on YouTube.  Most especially, keep up with all of us in the Lake County Food Revolution on Facebook and Twitter cuz food is forever.

I'm having way too much fun smashing it with other ambassadors and foodie friends alike. Turns out I super love making videos cooking with my kids:)  I taught myself how to splice footage and edit videos together on my iphone and taking a break from the blog will give me a chance to see how much trouble we can get into showing how this American FoodRev family is swinging her bat.  Thumbs up, sideways or down... Single, double, triple or a home run... Let's cook tried and true recipes from all over the nation and globe together...  I hope you too will gather a little team and try cooking along with me - that way we won't feel so alone if our busy lives and kids give us the finger to sit the bench.  
The game goes by way.too.fast and I'm only sitting to catch my breath.

Here's our latest, just in time for your 4th of July picnics and barbecues!!!

An Ambassador Smash - Rhubarb Lemonade

Recipe sent with love from Food Rev Haarlem, Netherlands by Food Rev Ambassador Terri Salminen. She and I are having a blast communicating over the ocean and getting to know each other "on the line".  We have become fast friends and I feel so lucky to be connected with her!  I cannot wait to see what we smash up next:)  I decided to post her recipe as she wrote it to me, as it's so terribly simple and delicious and I want her voice to be here with me.  I had enough to make three last cocktails yesterday for the arrival of my sis and bro-in-law.  I added some vodka, cut strawberries and stirred it up in some gorgeous copper mugs.  Oh I'll be making this one again and again:)

Hello there Lindsey -- This is what I did: cut three large stalks of rhubarb into chunks and put them in a sauce pan, just covering them with water (about 1 liter). Squeeze the juice of one lemon, and drop the lemons in the pan with a whole vanilla pod. Bring the ingredients to a boil and turn down to a simmer. Let the rhubarb cook 15 minutes. Turn off the heat and strain the rhubarb through a sieve. Return the juices and the vanilla pod into the pan, removing the cut lemons. Now -- this is the fun part. Simmer the rhubarb juice to half its original quantity (about 20 minutes) on low heat. When cooked down and turning dark pink, add two to three tablespoons of honey -- sweetening it to taste. Let the rhubarb juice cool -- keeping the vanilla pod in for flavor. It's wonderfully tart and delicious -- especially with a splash of San Pellegrino mineral water, some cut strawberries and fresh mint leaves. xxxxxxTerri

Part 2

So with that, here's my parting thoughts on this glorious 4th of July week.  I'm thinking about my beloved America, about becoming a Food Patriot and it's such perfect timing.

I started this blog with a question:  Will this family food change help improve Abbie's symptoms and avoid an ADHD diagnosis with subsequent medication?  I'm signing off this Summer with my theory on why our family food change helped Abbie shed the ADHD and sensory processing symptoms. Was it the reduction in refined sugar?  The elimination of artificial color and preservatives?  The removal of gluten?  Or was it something else that connected these elements?  Today I'm going to talk about GUTS and connect some dots.

Here we go...

Antibiotics (ABX)
The effects of ABX on our gut bacteria are known by most of us.  Use them too often and they kill off the good AND bad guys in our guts; Think Vietnam agent orange carpet bombing.  Throughout our lives (starting in the womb), we get numerous, sometimes unnecessary (sometimes life saving) doses of ABX.  In addition, our factory farmed animal meat is loaded with it.  ABX make animals big and fat fast and they help animals survive the unnatural conditions of crowded factory farm barns.  How much ABX is left in the meat when we eat it?  More than we think.

Filtering the GMO debate

GMOs have really come into the limelight over the past two years.  I certainly had no idea about them when I started looking into our food.  One must separate genetically engineered organisms (GEOs) and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) first so that we can talk about our guts.  Think of what humans do in GEO's as forced plant sex... we've been doing it by hand in fields and in laboratories for centuries.  On the other hand, GMO's are created when scientists splice a class of herbicides such as glyphosate (the active ingredient in the popular weed killer "Roundup") with the plant seed's own DNA so that every cell of the plant gives off the neurotoxin.  These crops are classified as systemic neoniconitoids (SN-GMOs) and were approved in the glorious 1980's.  Because they are cheap, these crops overwhelm the ingredient lists of our processed food and new research is showing these crops have put the world food supply at risk.  But how could they have been approved in the first place?!  Here's what happened: These herbicides cause a fatal neurological pathway disruption (the shikimate pathway) in plant and bacteria cells which kills them.  This pathway does not even exist in our human cells so it was deemed safe back in the 80's because industry scientists and the FDA were not paying attention to the bacteria in our guts.  Like the tobacco industry, SN-GMO safety has been determined by its own GMO seed industry research, not by independent research = big red flag.  Also, their testing trial length is 90 days = not an appropriate length for human safety standards.

Are you still with me?:)

Enter in the science of Microbiology and the Human Microbiome Project.
Since the 1980s, we have learned much about the microorganisms that inhabit our bodies.  To this day, we have only scraped the surface on the association between our gut bacteria in both healthy and diseased individuals.  Here's the nitty gritty (and read more in this book): Our gut bacteria outnumber our human cells 10-1 in our digestive track.  The loss or weakening of our gut bacteria lining in our intestines = Dysbiosis or "leaky gut syndrome".  Food proteins can then sneak into the blood and these foreign proteins stimulate an immune response in our body = food sensitivities & allergies.  In addition to digestion, we are learning that gut bacteria handles mood regulation, neurotransmitter production (the ADHD brain?) and immune function.  The gut-brain relationship is a glorious new scientific frontier.  Bottom line: Bacteria = the building blocks of earthly life.  Bees, farm animals and humans all have gut bacteria and these little buggers keep us alive.

Connecting Roundup,  SN-GMOs and ABX
Common non-SN-GMO crops such as wheat and sugar are doused with Roundup to kill the crop and hasten the harvest.  Remember that Oregon Farmer who discovered illegal SN-GMO wheat in his fields a few years back? (Monsanto had planted and tested SN-GMO wheat in OR, but alas it was never approved by the FDA).  Imagine the farmer's shock when he sprayed his crop with Roundup and the wheat didn't die... So, not only do we have Roundup and other harmful herbicides INSIDE the DNA of our food protein, but we also have it sprayed all over the OUTSIDE of super common conventional food crops + we may not be able to STOP this crap from spreading in the wild. Yum.  The combination of toxic herbicide load, SN-GMO foreign food proteins and ABX overuse is altering and wiping out our gut bacteria which is leading to a wide range of unintended physical and mental health issues, unique to each person's own DNA.

Our food change worked.  Eating and cooking with real food (and choosing cleaner, organically processed food) helped repair Abbie's guts... all of our guts.   We will continue to avoid fake foods - artificial color and preservatives, SN-GMOs and heavily herbicide ridden foods like the dirty dozen, wheat and refined sugar.  Abbie has food sensitivities to these foods which was causing her symptoms.  We do cheat and symptoms come back, though never as severe.  Turns out we all feel better when we eat clean, and we're certainly slimmer (Me, Chris and my parents have lost a grand total of 75+ pounds with no "dieting").  It's the key to our continued, imperfect success and it's the common thread connecting all of the amazing health success stories I read about every day.  Each of our food maps look different and I'm hoping to give my Abbie, Mac and Tommy a foodie pen so they can write without me someday.  

So where do we go from here?

Spread the word birds: Russia just completely banned GMOs.  And Europe has always either labeled them or banned them (Europe also puts labels on food with artificial color explaining it causes hyperactivity in children).  Americans are unknowingly stuffing our faces with SN-GMOs & fake food because we have no labeling laws and we innocently trust our pisspoor FDA regulated food industry standards.  Read about how the famous Seralini Study has been republished after three rounds of rigorous scientific peer review (after being retracted by an editor who was a former Monsanto employee).  I hope we continue to reach out and hold the hands with the rest of the gathering world on GMOs and labeling laws.  You know what they say, "open hands are hard to hold on to anyway"...  I super hate the ending of Titanic.

I hope you enjoyed and were able to follow my somewhat simple, geeky synopsis.  We have a light on the path that is much brighter than when I started two years ago.  I'm so glad I didn't wait to try cleaning up our food and I'm here to cheer you on.  

Go balls out for real food with me.  You.have.nothing.to.lose.

Don't let the torch go out.  Find your inner nerd.  Read and google about how to achieve strong, stellar gut... 

Find your inner athlete and start practicing in the kitchen.  Don't give up on your meal planning and bring your kids along on some fun cooking runs...  

Become a Food Patriot and start changing the marketplace with every purchase towards food companies you can trust.  YOU make a difference no matter how small a change you are making...  

Join our Food Revolution and help Jamie Oliver, me and the other 1000+ global Food Ambassadors get compulsory food education back into our schools... 

Come on America, let's have a big Food Day together and make our mark on the world as the generation who turned this mother ship around.

No guts no glory.  

Happy Happy Birthday America,

xxooLindsey



ps

I hope you enjoy this lovely Summer song;)  

"Should this be the last thing I see? 

I want you to know it's enough for me.  

Cause all that you are is all that I'll ever need... 

Lumiére darlin over me.

...so in love"

to the mullies... 

i'll be seeing you and your grass stains.

the mullies + the dominican republic = rad

yup i got my self in some dudu alright.

before i take you on my wild vacation ride, i just found this AMAZING article connecting ADHD to food sensitivities and it 100% correlates to our family's experience.

food intolerance and ADHD - what every parent should know

read.it.now.  then check out & bookmark this sweet ADHD blog later when you have more time.

a lot of people wonder what in the world "to the mullies" means...

we're all trying to get somewhere
whether we are
in our house
or on a vaca
swinging from a tree
or a zip line
or some monkey bars
or simply trying to get down the stairs
it's time to take a chance
and try to get where we want to be
there's nothing to lose
we may fall a bit awkwardly
but it is always and forever
worth
it

here's a little video that perfectly explains: me = swinging to the mullies 

now you know how i like to go for it... balls out baby.  no regrets... i guess until i break my face in la la land.

me and my guy love the dominican republic.

i'm that blog right now... jet setting and showing off... but this here's my little diary and one must share when we get to swing far away into wonderlands.

it was two vacations in one:
the first five days were spend with my wonderful sis and bro-in-law.
the second five days with a big group of lovely friends.

from cabarete's el magnifico hotel to cabrera's villa de flor - thank you from the bottom of my full belly up to my big heavy heart - i hope the memory of good-family-friends-food-sun-surf will live in my brain forever.

i have fallen for you, mi republica dominicana... with a big splash.

enjoy my super serious zoolander illustrated portfolio.  katie made.me.do.it.

do you think i could kite board like that someday?

everyone fought over reading tina fey's bossy pants.  hold on to your b-holes, you'll lol on every page... i'm not kidding about that... the entire beach could hear us.

the best.restaurant.in.cabarete = la casita de papi.  i will be chasing this "a la papi sauce" for the rest of my life...  stay tuned for that adventure:)

and then we landed in cabrera's villa de flor...

whaaaaaaaaat!!!

we still have water in our ears from waterfall jumping, cliff repelling and scuba diving... wicked stuff.

my best and biggest wishes to a new friend, ty.  have a ball in your upcoming adventure to pennsylvania and i hope you get to connect up with food revolution pittsburg.  when and if you ever return from the states to your lovely dominican home, may the food rev follow you and your wonderful dreams.  there is no doubt you will light.it.up no matter where life takes you my friend.

thank you thank you thank you

miss you, love you and we.will.be.back with our three little amigos soon:)

xoxoxo

what is THAT doing in my food? answers from dr maffini

what is in the food i buy?
where is my food coming from?
how can i increase my cooking gumption?

those are my big.three.questions and since they are probably on your mind too, i thought i'd start some regular posts full of great links and resources around these uber important food revolution challenges.

here are my working titles (perhaps i'll get even more clever...):

what is that doing in my food?

where art thou my chow chow?

get me some cooking gumption


without furthur ado, here are today's lovely links from one of my favorite websites, healthy child.

5 questions on food additives with scientist dr maricel maffini

avoid food dyes to reduce ADHD

how to avoid risky food additives



xoxo

2nd grade hiccups - a gluten goof-up

it still amazes me how quickly abbie slides downhill when given any amount of gluten.

i bought some peanut butter corn puff cereal to mix in with our more expensive gf granola abbie loves. when i grabbed it off the shelf, i of course looked at the label, but my eyes just glossed right over the "whole oat flour".  my head was clearly up my arse.

we had such a bad morning after she ate her bowl of granola/cereal for the second day in a row.  we had major & ridiculous argument about wearing a coat (it was only 34 degrees outside) so i sent an email to her teacher warning her that we had a rough start before i connected the dots with her food. here is what her teacher had to say about her behavior on the gluten goof-up days.  it takes abbie about 2-3 days for the gluten effect to wear off.  

"Yesterday and today Abbie has been a little off.  It makes sense now that I read that she had a rough start to her day yesterday.  During school she was very focused during a few of our classroom activities, but not all.  She almost seems upset and would easily become frustrated.  There were a couple instances where she had trouble getting along with the other students at her table.  They are usually able to cooperate well.   I don't know if this is in relation to something she ate, or if it's a result to a sour start to her day yesterday.  We will see how her afternoon goes."

crazy isn't it?

whole oat flour (unless it specifically is labeled gluten free) is not to be trusted and i have learned my label lesson yet again.  i haven't bought cereal other than a good quality, gf granola in over a year and i won't be doing it again unless there is a clear gluten free label on it... the funny part is abbie didn't even like the cereal anyways!

abbie's back on track again and we have three great reasons to celebrate this mistake:

#1 abbie has yet another experience where she can directly understand how gluten effects her.
#2 her teacher now knows how gluten effects her both socially and behaviorally in the classroom so she can really help me pin point another food blunder.  just a week earlier she asked me how abbie acted before the food change!  though i hate that i goofed up, i love that her teacher now knows what symptoms to look for in abbie.
#3 abbie is starting to take the reigns: "mom, quit giving me gluten, ok!?"

yes, abbie, my bad.

whether you are in the process or simply thinking of making a real food change in your family, i have found another amazing resource for you.  i am so happy to find it cuz i don't have to write the post!
check out this 6-week ADHD clean eating guide by a fellow food revolution blog of the month, ourfamilyeats.com.  the only thing i would add is removing gluten week 4.  moreover, you can check out the salicylatic content of foods (case in point, abbie goes coo coo if she has too many strawberries which are high in salicylates) as you gain speed.  over the course of the past year, i too have slowly gone "clean" with our household products and beauty supplies and it sure has made a difference for all of us.  this is the make-up i use now and i'm seriously hooked.for.life.  

you can do anything for 6 weeks.  if it doesn't work, good riddance.  if it does work... well now that would be something to build your city on - no regrets, just rock and roll baby (i couldn't help myself with that song, the mullies kitchen is currently jammin to the 80's).

enjoy love bugs

xoxo

ps

happy halloweeeeeeenies - no need to buy a costume to be little orphan annie and daddy warbucks:)

that's how curly my hair is if i let it go cray cray.  i need my sis/bro/niece's red hair and i would have been PERFECT!!!!!

chicago tribune asks - do diet changes help ADHD children?

do diet changes help ADHD children?

why yes, yes they do.

i've never loved my sunday paper more!