Over the years I have become more and more passionate about focusing on healing naturally with food and whole food supplements. From having eczema all of my life, and then being diagnosed with cancer in 2008, I had to get to the root cause of my illnesses and really figure out how to heal from them. There are so many outside factors that can cause disease, but I know that I make the choice of what I put into and on my body. There’s a saying, “If you eat junk, you’ll be junk” and this is so true. Foods are meant to give us vital nutrients to be our best selves. They are not meant to make us sluggish, overcome with inflammation and diseased. There are too many foods out there that are laden with chemicals, preservatives, antibiotics, hormones… you name it! Our bodies aren’t meant to consume these foods, and when we do our bodies cry out because it doesn’t know how to process it all, and a whole host of diseases can arise.
I’ve learned that eating foods that are unadulterated and of the highest quality can aid our body to better health and even prevent and reverse illness all together! Going through topical steroid withdrawal isn’t a sprint, but a marathon, and our bodies need all the support that it can get to repair and heal, and that support can be found in the nutrients of whole foods and quality supplementation. I know for sure that changing my diet to alkalinizing foods and taking whole food supplements has improved my overall health. I don’t look at this as a temporary diet, but a complete lifestyle change, and as I continue to heal, I know that I never want to be in a diseased state ever again!
Eczema is a departure from health…
- It is a departure from the body’s natural state, whether it be internally, externally, or both. Internally, optimal health is determined by our genetic makeup, which includes complex and sophisticated digestive, absorptive, constructive, maintaining, metabolic, protective, and healing mechanisms. Because individuals differ genetically, optimal health is also somewhat different for each individual. Externally, health is determined by the natural environment, which provides: the surroundings, the building blocks from which our body is constructed and continuously reconstructed, and toxic substances that can interfere with processes that underlie health and healing (Erasmus, p. 414).
- The most common causes of eczema include malnutrition, especially to the skin (deficiency of essential substances or nutrient imbalances) and internal pollution (interfering substances such as pollutants, heavy metals, drugs, metabolic waste products, toxins produced by yeast, and toxins made in our body as a result of allergic reactions).
Eczema can be reversed by changing the diet you are eating…
- Reversal of eczema caused by malnutrition and internal pollution requires improved nutrition and detoxification.
- Introducing the consumption of nutrient dense food, whole superfood supplements, fresh juices, smoothies, and food concentrates will improve one’s nutrition.
- With implementing a healthy diet, you will balance the properties and functions of your foods which will bring balance to the properties and functions of your body. Balance is a coupling of opposites, and all natural systems exist by coupling such opposites (the balance of alkaline and acidic foods is a great example of this). Chronic illness, like eczema, is a sign that one of the opposites has become too dominant, the the other too weak.
Important guiding principals for a healthier body…
- The best diet to follow when healing from eczema should be one where you consume only original foods or foods modified minimally, instead of consuming isolated or synthetic compounds (single amino acids, single essential fatty acids, vitamins or minerals). From the food we eat, our bodies must derive all 50+ essential nutrients, on a daily basis, to function in a healthy way. Deficiency of any of these essential nutrients can lead to degenerative processes and degenerative diseases such as eczema.
- It’s difficult to define the impact of a particular nutrient on any specific disease. This is because nutrients work together synergistically, not separately, to improve physiological function, reduce disease risk and help the body defend itself against disease producing processes.
- It has been scientifically proven through clinical research that individuals with eczema appear to have deficiencies in essential fatty acids. Instead of taking essential fatty acids as individual supplements like fish oil, it is always better to eat foods high in essential fatty acids, like wild caught salmon, walnuts, hemp seeds, flax seeds and wild blue green algae. Therefore, we can look at “nutrition” and the “eczema diet” as the the consumption of a family of related compounds that work together synergistically to enhance the body’s ability to function optimally throughout the genetically determined life span of the individual. How healthy an individual becomes depends on what he/she chooses to put into their body every day. A very important concept to reverse eczema is to eat (start eating) your way to better health by following a nutrient dense, whole foods diet.
I think it’s important to keep the perspective of seeking health, not avoiding illness. One shouldn’t feel like they’re trying to escape illness and end up being motivated by fear instead of hope. One should look at a diet/lifestyle change as a way of seeking all that life has to offer and not avoiding it’s dangers. Taking your time and easing your way into a lifestyle change can be a better route for some people instead going all in at once. As I learned more and more information about nutrition, I started to make the steps to change my diet, and started omitting offending foods. Overtime, I didn’t even miss them from my diet, and found that my new diet was so much more beneficial to my body. It’s truly been a journey, and I’ve found myself in love with learning about all of the healing aspects of food and found eating healthy enjoyable, and not a chore. I love to cook, and create delicious and healthy meals that I know are giving my body all the vital nutrients that I need to be my healthiest self!
***info cred goes to:
http://eczema-natural-healing.com/index.html
Erasmus, Udo. (1993). Fats that heal Fats that Kill.
Burnaby, BC: Alive Books.
Eczema Holistic Healing 