What is this ingredient? Fructose, especially high fructose corn syrup which is found in soft drinks, sodas and many bottled juices.

Fructose is lipogenic, which means it turns even non-fat foods into body fat. It makes you fat, which can affect all parts of your body. It also promotes inflammation in the body. Inflammation a major factor in almost every modern disease, including allergies. It also increases the risk of obesity and fatty liver disease. A vicious circle, isn’t it?

Think about that when you next reach for a soft drink or bottled juice. Choose fresh juices instead, or just plain clean water. Your liver will love you for it.

Like all health conditions, thyroid dysfunction is usually the culmination and result of a combination of factors including toxic load, deficiencies in magnesium, iodine, iron and vitamin A; stress; hormonal imbalances, lack of sleep, depression, overwork, chronic infections, heavy metals, petrochemicals and solvent exposure.

In my experience, hypothyroidism commonly escapes detection by standard thyroid tests. However, it can sometimes be detected by a low basal body temperature. Â First thing in the morning before you get up, take your temperature with an oral mercury thermometer in the armpit. Â Do this for three days in a row.

For menstruating women, take your temperature at day 2 to day 4 of your periods. If your temperature stays below 36.3 degrees C, your thyroid may be underactive, and you should consult your health practitioner.

Possible Signs of Low Thyroid:

• Low basal temperature in early mornings average over 7 days
• Slow movements, slow speech, slow reaction time
• Muscle weakness
• Excessive tiredness
• Thick tongue (seemingly too big for mouth)
• Swollen feet, face or eyelids
• Pale lips or yellowish skin
• Enlarged thyroid gland
• Frequent sore throat or husky voice
• Dry mouth or eyes
• Excessively dry or coarse skin
• Very low blood pressure
• Decreased ankle reflexes
• Loss of outer one-third of eyebrows.

Underactive thyroid and other hormonal or glandular problems should be treated, as they can have serious health effects. At my clinics, we use a combination of natural therapies, including diet and hormonal balancing that has restored many women to complete health and vigour.

But are these drugs really beneficial? Not so much for women, researchers say.

Research shows that women do not get the same protective benefits from statins that men do. They are also more likely to experience serious side effects than men, including severe muscle pain, diabetes and memory loss.

So why are so many women taking these drugs? Because they’re afraid of dying of heart disease.

Yet high cholesterol is not a blueprint for heart disease. It’s one possible risk factor. What’s more, in most cases, cholesterol can be reduced with a combination of diet, exercise and fish oil. These same factors strengthen and tone the heart, improve circulation and reduce inflammation.

And learning to de-stress regularly with Tai Chi, Qi Gong, Meditation or deep relaxation removes the real major cause of heart disease and emotional stress.

The only way to avoid these toxic effects on the prostate is through detoxification. You can do this naturally by eating lots of fresh, pesticide-free vegetables and fruits, drinking lots of filtered or good spring water (tea, coffee and juices do not count), exerising every day and keeping your home as free as possible of food additives and environmental and domestic chemicals. Also, avoid cigarette smoke as it contains high levels of radioactive elements.

If your past diet and environment has been less than pristine, or you were regularly exposed to car, petrol or other toxic fumes; cleaning agents; farm chemicals or other toxins in your home or workplace, then your body will need help getting rid of accumulated toxins.

Research has shown that lymphatic detoxification helps prevent prostate cancer and breast cancer. By helping the body eliminate acidifying toxins more quickly, lymphatic detoxification helps to restore your body’s pH to more alkaline condition. This enables the growth of the beneficial intestinal bacteria (flora) which play an important role in protecting your body from infection, parasites and inflammation, and also creates an inner environment that inhibits the growth of cancer cells.

According to more recent research, adults with the highest levels of vitamin C are 60% less likely to develop type 2 diabetes than those with the lowest levels of vitamin C. That’s a very good reason to eat less cereals and potatoes and make fresh fruits and vegetables the major part of your daily diet.

Other than giving fruits a good wash to remove traces of pesticides, eat them as nature provided them. Most vegetables can be eaten raw, or if you cook them, don’t overdo it: lightly steamed or quickly stir fried vegetables retain more nutrients and useful fibre.

If you in the diabetes risk group, take note: Fruit juices, even those you squeeze yourself, are not the same thing as fresh fruit.

Juices dump loads of sugar into the body fast, whereas whole fruits also provide unrefined natural fibre that helps pace the absorbtion and digestion of sugar and nutrients. In fact, research showed that drinking just one fruit juice a day increased the risk of type 2 diabetes.

Here are a few more tips to help keep your tummy quiet and happy. Try just a little to begin with to make sure that you do not react to the natural essential oils found in these plant foods.

Rosemary is especially good at helping the body digest lamb and lamb fat. This herb has strong essential oils, so don’t eat it raw. Instead, cook it with the lamb. It adds wonderful flavour and aroma!

Mint is a a good digestive cleanser. I eat it raw and in my smoothies. It’s also good as an after-dinner cup of mint tea, and to help releive indigestion.

Cardamon is a spice that increases the flow of salivary enzymes which improves digestion. A seed or two in hot water makes a flavourful tea to drink before a meal! In the Middle East, they add a seed of cardamon to their gut wrenchingly strong coffee. In India, it’s often used to flavour warm milk and milky desserts, making them more digestible.

A new study confirms that a vegetarian and gluten-free diet (no animal products, wheat, rye, or barley) significantly improves rheumatoid arthritis. After 12 months, patients on a vegan diet experienced substantially decreased symptoms. The study from the Karolinska Institute in Sweden was published in Arthritis Research and Therapy.

Other studies show that vegan or vegetarian diets also result in easy weight loss, lowered blood pressure and decreased cardiovascular disease.

You don’t have to go vegan or completely vegetarian to reap benefits. Just eating fewer animal products can benefit many health problems and improve wellbeing. Excellent non-animal sources of protein are plant greens, nuts, and legumes.

It is very tempting when confronted with basketfuls of colourful chocolate and candy eggs and other sweets to eat more than is good for you. That’s part of the fun, isn’t it? Just keep in mind that the sugar, chemicals and trans fats found in most Easter sweets are very hard on the system. They can disrupt normal body processes, make your body more toxic, affect your moods and brain function, and increase allergies in many people.

Easter is a time for family traditions. Whether your tradition includes breaking a fast with an after- midnight feast or a family gathering at the beach, why not make it healthier? Go for quality over quantity.

Choose dark (if possible), good quality chocolate. Bake your own hot-cross buns with whole meal or organic flour, perhaps a combination of wheat and quinoa or rice flour. Try out a cake recipe using polenta, almond meal or egg whites instead of wheat. Enjoy your sweets in moderation.

Make sure your children eat a good breakfast and lunch so that they’re satisfied with fewer chocolate eggs after their egg hunt, and want less sweets. Provide more of the healthy stuff: large salads, seafood, grilled chicken, fresh, raw or lightly steamed veggies with hummos or avocado dip.

Plan more activities: a family walk at the beach; a hike in nature, egg-in-spoon or sack races. Feed your soul a little more, your sweet tooth a little less. And enjoy your blessings.

So the first thing you can do NOW to prevent dementia or Alzheimer’s is to detoxify and heal your body.

Research has clearly linked toxins to dementia, especially aluminium, which is added to our water. Aluminim and fluoride make an even more toxic combination. You can also ingest aluminium from foods cooked and served with aluminium utensils, or canned softdrinks and juices.

Since the cannot effectively clear itself of heavy metals like aluminium, so you might want to see a qualified health practitioner, who can also suggest supplements to ensure that your brain get the nutrients it needs. Research shows that people with Alzheimer’s tend to be low in calcium, iron, zinc, vitamins A and K, and Omega 3 fatty acids.

Another way to avoid mental decline is to keep your brain active.

Exercise and challenge your brain. Change your route to work. Learn ballroom dancing, hip-hop or tango. Dancing involves hundreds of different mental functions that stimulate different parts of the brain. One study found that ballroom dancing reduced dementia by 76%!. Learning music exercises your mathematical and patterning brain functions. Learn a second language. Research favourite topics on the web. For your brain’s sake, be daring. Do things that you’ve never done before, or stopped doing years ago, and have fun.

A third way to keep your brain in top form is to develop a positive attitude to aging.

Your mind has a powerful influence on what happens inside your body, and can actually affect your DNA. Even if you think you’re not thinking harmful thoughts, if you carry negative beliefs about your health, body and aging, and resent getting older (as so many of us do), you are actually telling your DNA and your cells how to age….badly! Instead, learn to age with joy, to enjoy the unique freedoms, the challenges and the wisdom that age brings.

But there’s lots of research to show that we actually need to sleep more. Professor Stanley Coren from the University of British Columbia in Canada, author of ‘The Sleep Thieves’, says that the standard 7-8 hours sleep a night leaves us chronically sleep-deprived. It’s affecting our mental skills, our motor skills, our emotional wellbeing and our health.

Also, he says, it affects road safety. Canadian traffic statistics show that with the loss of just one hour’s sleep each night after the switch to daylight savings time, there is a 7% jump in traffic accidents. When daylight savings ends in Autumn, there’s a 7% decrease in traffic accidents.

When you sleep is just as important as how long you sleep. When we sleep later, we disrupt our biorhythms which regulate our body’s ability to heal, repair and rejuvenate. If you chronically sleep late, you create hormonal imbalances that affect your health, energy levels, mental performance…and your beauty.

If you want to feel and look your best and get more out of life, go to bed early and get at least eight hours of sleep every single night…even 9 or 10 hours if you need them. The earlier before midnight you go to bed, the more your body will be recharged. This is the best thing you can do to stay young and healthy, and be at your mental best.