Yoga and Special Needs

Part 3

APPENDIX

Naturopathic Nutritional Guidelines
Kim D. Furtado, N.D.
302-945-2107

NATURE’S PATH OF INTEGRATED HEALTH

GENERAL EATING GUIDELINES

Appreciate the nourishment process. Recognize the essentiality of food and make room for it in your life.

Take a moment to relax before eating. Let the tension of the day go. Open to receive nourishment. Just as you prepare your food, so must you prepare yourself for eating.
Chew. Eat slowly. Take smaller bites. Put your eating utensil down after taking a bite.

Eat small frequent meals. This helps your body provide a stable blood sugar level. It also allows your own sense of true hunger and satiation to develop. Often when people skip breakfast and/or lunch because they "don’t feel hungry", they are actually in a hyperalert "fight or flight mode". This is a state in which hunger and digestion are physiologically suppressed by adrenaline. If you wouldn’t dream of trying to drive your car on an empty tank, you would also not dream of asking your body to run itself on adrenaline (to maintain blood sugar levels). When you re- establish regular eating patterns and follow your own sense of when you are hungry, you are honoring your body’s unique and innate understanding of itself. Learn to trust it.

Choose seasonal foods which are locally grown. This choice will support your community. Recognize the relationship between food and the world around you. Assume responsibility for your environment by choosing organically-grown foods which promote sustainability. Also choose non-packaged products and products with recyclable packaging.

Make the majority of your foods plant foods. Choose fresh, unprocessed vegetables and fruits on a daily basis.

Choose whole foods, including whole grains and whole grain products. Choose the freshest, least processed foods.

Balance your food choices. Don’t allow your diet to focus too exclusively on a single food or food category. Choose a variety of colors, letting nature provide the variety of essential vitamins and nutrients needed.

Explore the world of cuisine: spices, seasoning, food traditions in other countries rich in understanding and nourishment.

Choose products that don’t have trans fatty acids, rancid oils masked by fragrance, don’t have additives, colors and preservatives, nutrients stripped & bleached out, haven’t been fried, and that make you feel groggy or bloated after eating.

GENERAL Cooking and Meal Planning GUIDELINES

One of the first steps in changing how you eat is first becoming more conscious of what goes into your mouth. This involves thinking about and reading labels for what you buy at the store. Meal planning is made much easier by keeping the pantry stocked with wholesome foods. Avoid processed flours and sugars, preservatives and additives in your ingredients and the meals you build will be wholesome. Be gentle and patient with yourself. Lasting change is often a process that takes time. As you begin to connect to the good feeling you have while eating wholesome foods, you become more aware of how tired, gasey or unfocused, etc.. you feel when you eat fast food or refined products. Create time and space for you to put deeply nourishing food as a mainstay in your life.

Meal Planning:

Simplicity is key: place some general criteria for your meals and build on these. They are meant for guidelines, and may need some individualization.

Breakfast: whole grain, some protein and fruit

Lunch: Leftovers from dinner, include fresh veges; or soup and a salad with grain side dish

Dinner: grain, bean, TWO vegetables. The dairy, fish/poultry, sea veges, nuts and seeds are side dishes and toppings- not the main structure of the meal.

Short cuts: Take the grain and bean you have made maybe earlier in the week, and add two vegetables (one cooked and one raw, or one green and one other color). If you care to add poultry or fish, dairy or nuts, they are complements to the meal you’ve built, not the main focus. Many nights you may just need to saute a vege and broil fish or poultry and use leftover grains and beans...

Economize:

Whole organic grains and beans bought in bulk are quite economical. Make a pot of a grain and one of beans for the next three days for your family, and then you only need to cook a pot of grains and beans 1-2 times per week.

Make your own salad dressing. It is quick and easy, and you avoid rancid vegetable oils, trans fatty acids and numerous additives.

Leftovers can be made into delicious treats. Pureed cooked veges into pancakes, beans and rice rolled into tortillas for lunch, grains tossed into a salad.

Cut down on costs of highly packaged, pre-cooked and highly marketed foods, which also often contain preservatives and additives. And can lead to many chronic symptoms.

Support local farm markets and buy fresh produce, organic when possible (CSA’s help economize for you and the farmer)

The less expensive veges include some of the most nourishing- sweet potatoes, yams, cabbage, carrots, zucchini, onions, brocoli, chard, collards, beets, and kale- and they are easy to prepare.

Bake a double batch of muffins, and put some in the freezer to be available to you.

COOKING can be a source of relaxation, a time with children to help you (measure and cut stir and enjoy the process with you), a source of creativity and sense of powerfulness over your health. Your conscious effort to create and nourish yourself WILL NOT go unrecognized by your body!

WHOLE FOODS GUIDE

Whole foods are foods as they are found in nature. They contain flavor and ingredients that nature intended. They are free of artificial flavors and colors as well as added chemicals that are used to increase shelf life of processed foods. Since whole foods have been minimally processed, they provide more natural ingredients such as vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Food that is organic is free of chemicals, pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides. These foods are more flavorful and tend to be more nutrient-dense than foods that are commercially grown.

FRUITS: Fruits are most flavorful and nutritious when they are eaten in season. Eat a variety of organically grown fruits to coincide with the change of seasons. Fruit selections include: apples, apricots, avocados, bananas, berries, cherries, grapes, grapefruit, guavas, kiwis, mangos, melons, oranges, papayas, peaches, persimmons, plums and pomegranates.

VEGETABLES: Vegetables are also most nutrient-dense and flavorful when organically grown and in season. It is important to include both raw and cooked vegetables in your diet. Raw vegetables are higher in vitamin, mineral, and fiber content. Cooked vegetables are easier to digest. Vegetable selections include: artichokes, asparagus, beets, broccoli, Brussel sprouts, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, chard, collard, cucumbers, eggplants, kale, lettuce, mushrooms, parsnips, peppers, potatoes, pumpkins, radishes, rutabagas, spinach, sweet potatoes, turnips, and yams. Sea vegetables such as arame, dulse, hiziki, kombu, nori, and wakame, are good sources of minerals.

GRAINS: Whole grains contain more natural vitamins, minerals, protein, and fiber than refined grains. In addition to whole wheat, whole grains include amaranth, barley, brown rice, buckwheat (kasha), bulgur (parboiled, dried, cracked wheat), couscous (coarsely ground steamed wheat), millet, oats, polenta (coarse cornmeal), quinoa, rye, and wild rice. It is important to eat a variety of grains in your diet. This helps prevent allergies to wheat, which is the most widely consumed grain in the United States. Health food stores and a growing number of grocery stores carry products such as pasta, breads, cereals, and pancake mixes that are made from a variety of grains.

LEGUMES: Legumes are seeds that are grown in pods. They include beans, lentils, peas, and peanuts. They are a good source of both protein and fiber. Many nutritious products are made from soybeans including tofu, tempeh, garden burgers, and soy milk. Other beans include adzuki, black, broad (fava), butter, garbanzo (chickpeas), kidney, lima, navy, pinto, and black-eyed peas.

NUTS AND SEEDS: Nuts are most healthy in their raw, natural form. This does not include nuts that have been salted, sugarcoated, or roasted. Roasting of nuts decreases their content of minerals and B vitamins. Choose nut butters that have not been hydrogenated. This process alters the monounsaturated oil in nuts forming cholesterol raising saturated fats. Pumpkin, sunflower, and sesame seeds are good sources of protein, minerals, and vitamin E.

SWEETENERS: Refined white sugar can be substituted with less refined sweeteners that contain some nutritional value. Examples include: barley malt syrup, brown rice syrup, date sugar, dried can juice, fruit juice concentrate, honey, molasses, and pure maple syrup.

SEAFOOD: Seafood is a good source of protein. It also contains various vitamins and minerals depending on the type of seafood. Some sea foods such as haddock, mackerel, salmon, sardines, and trout contains beneficial omega-3 fatty acids. These omega-3 fatty acids may raise protective HDL cholesterol and guard against heart disease. They also are important for proper brain, eye, hair, and skin development. Some research studies suggest that omega-3 fatty acids may also help to protect against and treat certain auto-immune disease such as rheumatoid arthritis.

MEATS/POULTRY/EGGS/DAIRY: Animal food sources are most healthy when the animals have been raised without antibiotics and added hormones and other toxins. In addition, choose animal products from animals that have been raised without cages. Cage-free animals experience healthier, less stressful living environments that affect the quality of food they produce. There are a growing number of dairy alternatives. They include: almond milk and cheese, rice milk, soy milk, cheese and yogurt, brazil nut cheese, nutritional yeast, and tofu sour cream. Other foods high in calcium include dark leafy vegetables such as kale, collards, and mustard greens; sea vegetables and beans.

OILS: Use monounsaturated oils such as olive and canola (rapeseed) oil for sautéing foods because they are more heat stable than polyunsaturated oils such as sunflower, safflower, and sesame oils can be added to foods after it has been cooked or used in salad dressings. "Cold-pressed" oils are best because the slow-turning presses that crush out the oil generate little heat so that vitamin E and antioxidants are not destroyed. Heat-pressed oils are treated with petroleum-derived solvents and are bleached and deodorized. Deodorized oil is pale and very bland tasting. Oils should be stored in the refrigerator to prevent spoilage due to oxidation from heat and light. Beneficial omega-3 fatty acids are found in canola, flax, soybean, and walnut oils.

SEASONINGS: Seasonings enhance or add flavor to food. Whole food seasonings include basil, chili peppers, cilantro, dill, garlic, lemon, lime, mint, onion, orange zest, parsley, rosemary, sage, and thyme.