Support your Healthy Resolve in 2022
As January begins what often motivates our New Year's resolutions is that we have "let things slide" over the holidays.
Lack of exercise, too much food, sugar, or alcohol can leave you feeling bloated, toxic, and fat, with post holiday low energy and suppressed immunity. So to help you in your quest for improved wellness, here are some ideas for getting back on track.
Though obviously a person may not want all the products mentioned, go through and see what resonates for you!
Here are some straightforward steps you can take to help your Healthy Resolve in 2022!
Maintain your Immunity
Beyond the basics, like Vitamin C and Vitamin D, (note: we recommend Vitamin D that has been microencapsulated), to reduce the chances of succumbing to a cold or flu keep a bottle of oregano oil on hand to take at the first tickle in your throat, nausea, or when a co-worker has the sniffles. Personally, I have found our Opti-Oregano Max to be incredibly effective...but the "gachh" factor after you swallow can be pretty intense! Inexperienced users are advised to have a glass of water handy, or to use our Opti-Smooth Oregano instead, which is a little easier to handle!
For day-to-day ongoing immunity, formulas like Optimum Health’s Bee Immune that contains propolis, echinacea, goldenseal, elderberry, garlic, vitamin C, and zinc among others, can be extremely useful. (In my opinion, propolis is an extremely under-appreciated anti-viral!)
On the other hand, if symptoms start Opti-Immune C & F, (soon to be renamed Optimum Immunity), can be extremely handy to “nip them in the bud”. Featuring a unique synergistic blend of immune stimulating herbs, such as Astragalus and Elderberry, and unsung herbal heroes like Pau D’arco, Bitter Melon and Resveratrol, many of our staff do not leave home (or work) without this formula. Experience has shown that it can be especially useful when others around you in your household are getting sick, and you want to avoid the same fate and remain well.
Also, don't forget your probiotics! Whether in foods like ferments, or in a supplement, probiotics not only support digestive comfort and nutrient assimilation, but boost and balance overall immunity. By calming your gut they also help keep inflammation in check.
Since the 1990's I have recommended the DDS strain of probiotics found in our Opti-Elite Probiotics, simply because I have found them to be the most effective for promoting gut health and reducing food sensitivities/allergies... issues which can definitely come into play after people give into temptations over the holidays that they would normally resist. (You know...the ones where you hear yourself saying "Well I'll probably pay for it, but what the heck!")
Support your detoxification...and digestive system
An essential step to quickly turning around the holiday hangover is to give a boost to your detoxification, i.e. support your liver. For this, raising levels of the master molecule called Glutathione is critical. Glutathione helps your liver process toxins and move them out of your body.
To support liver health Optimum Health provides Opti-Liv Extra. This formula contains Milk Thistle, well researched for its ability to regenerate damaged or overworked liver cells, and NAC, a direct glutathione precursor. Also included in the formula is Schizandra, which not only increases glutathione, and protects the liver, but helps shield you from numerous kinds of stress, while maintaining your energy production.
The "Extra" in Opti-Liv Extra is Alpha-Lipoic Acid, (ALA) which is highly antioxidant, also significantly raises glutathione levels, and plays direct roles in energy production. Lastly, the mineral Selenium is included to support the function of the extremely important antioxidant enzyme glutathione peroxidase. Together these ingredients provide a synergistic effect, helping you neutralize and clear harmful substances, while reducing inflammation and supporting your mitochondria's ability to keep using oxygen normally.
Also, due to the vast array of foods we tend to consume over the holidays, our digestion (and elimination) can take a hit. If your digestion is off you might consider help to get it back on track with digestive enzymes such as Opti-Digestaway.
"On the other end", so to speak, if you are backed-up, cleaning out your colon with a bulking and gently stimulating product such as Opti-Colon Cleanse can be an immense relief, and improve how you feel almost immediately!
Balance your Blood Sugar and Metabolism
Chocolate, cookies, and candy-canes signaled the season… as well as the body’s insulin production! The high levels of insulin that come with elevated caloric intake over the holidays can result in extra (belly) weight, increased blood pressure, elevated cholesterol, and can be very inflammatory. [1] [2] Not only does all this sugar have to be burned-off or stored somewhere, (like in your fat cells), but while in your bloodstream it is extremely reactive, and can stick to all sorts of different tissues. This may sound very “Candy-cane and Christmas-like”, but when glucose or especially fructose react with proteins in your blood, or tissues like your nerves, the resulting products, known as AGES and RAGES are not only very sticky, but they create a lot of inflammation and a high oxidative free-radical load.[2] Since many throw caution to the wind over the holidays, it is good to know that Alpha-Lipoic Acid not only helps with insulin sensitivity and blood-sugar balance, but also inhibits these reactions, known as glycosylation and fructosylation, thereby preventing damage. [3]
Those of you who want to shed extra pounds can work on your fat burning potential with things like L-Carnitine. The basic function for L-Carnitine, (reviewed in every physiology textbook for the last 30 years), is to increase the transport of fatty acids into the mitochondria, where they are burned as fuel. So if you want to burn more fat for fuel especially during exercise, L-Carnitine can be very helpful. For this purpose, I usually recommend 2 x 500mg capsules twice a day, i.e. upon arising, and again in the afternoon (L-Carnitine is absorbed somewhat better if taken on an empty stomach).
Minimize Carb Cravings!
If you still find yourself giving in to cravings that you can't seem to control, the Garcinia cambogia in our Opti-Slim Garcinia is another tool for helping quell them. By diverting glucose from being stored as fat, and converting it to glycogen instead, not only does Garcinia help keep our blood sugar balanced, it also raises serotonin. (4) This increases feelings of being satisfied, and reduces cravings, particularly for carbohydrates. Overall, Garcinia taken prior to meals decreases appetite, which you may or may not want over the holidays!
Keep Calm.
For many who enjoy the holidays a little too much, January can definitely bring on anxiety and strain on our emotional well being! The three ingredients in our Opti-Calm product, i.e. Theanine, Rhodiola, and Relora, can be invaluable to calm you down without slowing you down. They help keep your mind clear under pressure, without going into overwhelm. Those who have a tendency to get stressed will likely find that Opti-Calm simply helps them take things in stride.
For best results Opti-Calm should be taken away from food.
I hope these suggestions serve you in 2022!
Happy New Year to you all!
Be Well,
John
References:
- https://jbiomedsci.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12929-016-0303-y
- http://www.intechopen.com/books/glycosylation/plant-derived-agents-with-anti-glycation-activity
- https://dmsjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1758-5996-6-80
- https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlehtml/2019/ra/c9ra01345h