That's the Fat Jack

We don't like to discuss it, but that doesn't make it go away.  What?  BELLY FAT!  Have you heard about the dangers of abdominal obesity?

Belly fat increases the risk of:

diabetes

heart disease

cancer

Did you know that it could literally be killing you, even if you are at an ideal body weight?

A group of scientists at the National Institutes of Health recently analyzed data collected from 44,000 women in the Nurses' Health Study over a 16-year period and asked if abdominal obesity affected their death rates from heart disease and cancer (Zhang et al, Circulation, 117: 1658-1667, 2008).

The answer was yes!

You ask "How can they be at ideal body weight and still have abdominal obesity?"Of course, the women who were both overweight and had abdominal obesity were even more likely to die from heart disease or cancer.

There is a natural tendency to lose muscle mass as we age. When we add in the inactivity associated with the American lifestyle that loss of muscle mass is accelerated and the muscle is replaced with fat.

Thus, it is actually possible in today's world to have both normal weight and abdominal obesity - and that is not a good thing!
So it is not just about not looking good in your bathing suit - abdominal obesity is a killer!

The good news is that you can do something about abdominal obesity.  A combination of exercise, a healthy diet and the "Cinch Inch Loss Plan" is a proven way of getting rid of that unsightly belly fat forever!

Thank you to Dr. Stephen Chaney for this information.

If you want a credible person to speak with who will help you get rid of abdominal obesity (belly fat) and want confidentiality, call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308.

What is Resveratrol and what good can it do?

It has been awhile since I've posted any information in my blog.  Life has a way of throwing curve balls, right?  Anyway in getting back on track, I wondered what would be good information to provide.  Many testimonies and emails told me to write about resveratrol. 

What is resveratrol?  According to MD Cancer Center, A substance found in the skins of grapes and in certain other plants, fruits and seeds. It is made by various plants to help defend against invading fungi, stress, injury, infection and too much sunlight. It is being studied in the prevention of cancer and heart disease. ... 


So what good is it?  Why should we take resveratrol?  Are all resveratrol supplements the same? 

Resveratrol, when combined with elderberry extract, pomegranate juice, elderberry juice powder and pomegranate extract is a concentrated supplement that actually gets to the DNA level in our bodies.
Why should we take it?  If you want to slow down the aging process, have more energy,  address health issues, wanting to prevent a health issue that is hereditary, etc.  then you would want to take this specific formula.

Like a multi-vitamin there are many products out there that claim to be natural, the best, the cheapest, etc.  So if you're like me, you want a company that puts science and research first.  A company that doesn't make something because it is the fad.  A reputable company that has it's consumers' best interest at heart. 

If' you're like me, you want to live a long HEALTHY life and not be a victim to prescription drugs.   You only want side benefits!

Click here to see what I'm talking about.  Call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308 if you want vitality and increase your energy level.

Many blessings,

Mary Beth

What's that smell?

Do you walk down the isle that has detergents, cleaning products, fabric softeners and the like?  If I must go down that isle for something other than those products, I run.  The smells are so strong and too fragrant for me.  Some people like those smells.  They think clean smells just like that.  But did you know clean really doesn't have a fragrance?

But did you realize that many of the cleaners that you buy in the supermarket - and some of the biodegradable cleaners that you buy in the health food store - release toxic fumes in your home that can adversely affect the health of you and your children?  Want to know if the products you use are dangerous to your family's health and to your health?  See the list.

Dr. Stephen Chaney relayed the following:  The prevalence of childhood asthma increased 74% between 1980 and 1994 and has continued to increase in the years since.  The causes of this rapid increase in asthma prevalence are likely to be complex, but evidence has accumulated in recent years that some of the increase may be caused by early exposure to toxic chemical fumes in the home.

And to get the smell out of the home, well no one opens their windows any more.  That would be wasting energy and contributing to global warming.

The other thing is that we live in a fast paced world.  No news to you, right?  So we want something that will clean without a lot of effort.  Here's what I know, my family doesn't get headaches when they are cleaning (yes my son 15 and daughter 12 help clean the house), I don't have to worry about pets getting sick or something fatal because they licked the floor, and if I don't want to use gloves when I'm cleaning my hands don't feel like they've been in the desert for 40 days. Why?  Click here to find out what I use.

If you want to do everything you can to prevent illness, have clean air in your home, save money, and reduce landfills, call Mary Beth at 810-813-3308.

Who is testing your supplements?

Thank you to Dr. Stephen Chaney for providing this information.  This is the rest of the story from March 10.

The FDA did not initiate the law suits and force the manufacturers to take their contaminated products off the shelves.

Instead an environmental consumers group had to sue them for not including PCBs on the label! They sued them under California proposition 65 which requires a warning label whenever a product contains toxic ingredients.

The defendants in this lawsuit were Omega Protein, a Houston-based company that is the world's largest producer of omega-3 fish oil, and the many companies that they produced fish oil for - companies like Rite Aid, CVS, GNC, Now Health Group, Pharmavite, Solgar and Twinlab.

And those aren't the only ones. The Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation only tested 10 omega-3 supplements manufactured by Omega Protein to date and have found PCBs in all of them. They plan to continue testing and to add other companies to the lawsuit if their products are also contaminated.

Even scarier is that many of labels on these products said that the omega-3 supplement was treated to reduce or remove PCBs. As a consumer you were lead to believe that they were safe!  The bottom line is that the manufacturer probably didn't test for PCBs and neither did the companies selling their omega-3 supplements to the consumer.

The alternative - that they tested the products, knew that they were contaminated with PCBs and sold them to the public anyway - is even worse.  As if that weren't scary enough the FDA announced a massive recall of products containing textured vegetable protein manufactured by a company called Basic Food Flavors because of salmonella contamination.

The problem is that there are at least 56 different kinds of consumer products containing this company's textured vegetable protein - including salad dressings, dips, packaged snacks, potato chips and soup mixes (Who knew that salad dressings contained textured vegetable protein?).

That means that this recall will be huge. It will affect many foods that most people buy and use every day.

What can you do as a consumer to protect yourself?

1. Get your supplements from an established company with a reputation for quality and integrity. I would recommend choosing a company that has been around for a number of years so that you know that their reputation is based on their track record over the years rather than just on hype.
2. Make sure that they run rigorous quality controls on their products. I would choose a company that requires pharmaceutical grade quality controls on their products.
3. Make sure that they have published clinical studies on their products that prove both safety and effectiveness. Again I would recommend choosing a company that has many published clinical studies on their products rather than just one or two.

Of course, I am here to help you.  Call Mama Bear Productions at 810-813-3308.

Who's Testing Your Supplements

It's so tempting... You've been getting your supplements from a company that you know and trust - a company that does clinical studies on their products and performs rigorous quality controls.

You know their products are pure, safe and effective... BUT... You're shopping in your favorite drug store or discount store and you see the same supplements for just a couple of dollars! You can't help thinking... "Wow! Here's the same stuff I've been taking for a lot less money"..."Why not save my money?"..."They must have run some quality control tests on their products"... "After all, how bad can they be?"

The answer is - pretty bad! Check out the following information from Stephen Chaney, PhD.
The events of last week illustrate just how bad. On March 2nd, 2010 the makers and sellers of fish oil supplements were sued by the Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation in California for not telling consumers that their products contained toxic levels of PCBs.
The FDA did not initiate this action and force the manufacturers to take their contaminated products off the shelves. Instead an environmental consumers group had to sue them for not including PCBs on the label! They sued them under California proposition 65 which requires a warning label whenever a product contains toxic ingredients.
The defendants in this lawsuit were Omega Protein, a Houston-based company that is the world's largest producer of omega-3 fish oil, and the many companies that they produced fish oil for - companies like Rite Aid, CVS, GNC, Now Health Group, Pharmavite, Solgar and Twinlab.

And those aren't the only ones. The Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation only tested 10 omega-3 supplements manufactured by Omega Protein to date and have found PCBs in all of them. They plan to continue testing and to add other companies to the lawsuit if their products are also contaminated.

Stay tuned next week for the rest of the story.
 
Mary Beth Potrykus
Mama Bear Productions

GE-Alfalfa

What is GE Alfalfa?  It is geneticially engineered Alfalfa.  Translation is chemically grown Alfalfa. 

Many people put price before quality.  What has happened is that many organic farmers are becoming extinct.  The reason being is that they their crops are being grown the way they use to back in the pioneer days.  Naturally.  Part of which is crop rotation, limited or no pesticides and herbicides (which is a word that is misused as they are chemicals and, basically, not good for humans or animals). 

Organic contamination is devastating for organic farmers, especially organic dairy farmers, most of whom use organic alfalfa for feed. The presence of even the smallest amount of GE material can cause a farm to lose its organic certification.  To read the whole story, click here. 

Tell the USDA you can about GE contamination.  Keep Monsanto's genes out of our food! 

What we do today, affects our children's future.  Be a part of the change!!

Zero Calories

Dr. Stephen Chaney once again brings up excellent facts on why people can't loose weight. 

"Are "zero calorie" foods making you fat?"

That question might seem like a no-brainer. Eating calorie-free foods rather than foods that contain calories has to be helpful in keeping your weight under control. Right? Let's look at calorie free soft drinks.

Between the years 1987 and 2000 the number of people drinking calorie free soft drinks in this country increased from 70 million to 160 million.

During that same period of time:
- the percentage of adults who were overweight increased from 52% to 66%.
- the percentage of adults who were obese (obese is defined as a BMI greater than 30) increased from 20% to 32%
- the percentage of children who were obese increased from 10% to 17%.
The answer is that we are using these calorie-free soft drinks to wash down Big Macs plus fries, Mrs. Fields' super-size brownies and Starbucks' chocolate chip muffins. 

The theory is that the high sweetness of both diet and regular soft drinks causes the brain to release chemicals that make us crave other sweet foods - so we eat more.

Before I knew how harmful aspartame is, I was just like that.  Big Mac and Diet Coke.

There is some evidence that they may even be making your weight control problems worse by encouraging you to eat high calorie foods to go along with them.  Also, aspartame has been linked to neurological problems. 

So the next time you reach for that "zero calorie" soft drink or the packets of "zero calorie" sweeteners to add to your coffee or tea, just be aware that there is no evidence that they are useful in helping you control your weight.

Now this is the short version of what Dr. Chaney has to say on Zero Calories.  Want the whole story?  Contact Mary Beth at marybeth1957@sbcglobal.net