healthy and beautiful

If you’re someone who takes medicine daily, any medicine, it’s important to step back and consider whether you still need to be taking it. I’d also brush up on the side effects. While I’d love doctors to focus on getting patients off unnecessary meds, let’s face it medicine is a business.  But if you, or someone close to you, are one of the 15 million Americans who take a certain type of acid blockers, there are some serious side effects. There is a class of acid blocking (“heartburn”) meds called PPIs. Examples of PPI’s are Prevacid, Nexium and Prilosec. The c oncerns about taking these meds long-term have been out there; however, almost daily I have a client in my office who feels they’re totally safe. Whenever I see one of these meds in a new client’s chart I ask a few questions. How long have you been taking this medication? Have you tried going off of it? What modifications do you make in your diet for your reflux or heartburn? The answers are quite similar. Most clients hav...

Sure you want to eat that? What are you uncomfortable discussing? Sex? Money matters? I would normally add politics to this list but most of us have extinguished that fear this election season. Today I’m shooting a news segment on couples and food. The producer joked to me “it’s easier to get heroin users to talk to us.” I sent a few emails to clients and friends. We have two women and one man on board to open up about food differences in their relationships. However, the majority of the responses I received went something like “this is a huge issue for us but I’m not sure we want to air our dirty laundry.” Really? We weren’t asking people to strip naked. Rather “he’s a health nut and I’m not” that sort of thing. When a client enters into a new relationship I always ask, “what kind of an eater are they?” While this may seem unimportant initially, while everyone is on good behavior, you eat three times a day, it will matter. If you love to stay home and cook and he wants to go out every...

Do you ever read your horoscope and feel it rings eerily true? Maybe you don't read horoscopes at all but, even if you say that, I'd guess when you see yours you peek. Horoscopes are confusing for me. I'm what they call "on the cusp" between two signs. This makes me insecure as sometimes I'm a Leo and other times a Virgo. I've sided with Virgo mainly because everyone says "you're SUCH a Virgo." What they mean by that is that I'm particular and either neurotic or a control freak or, in my case, both.   Anyway, I'm on a plane right now. I have my usual seat next to the crying baby and I read Marie Claire magazine in an attempt to distract myself.  In about 10 minutes, I found myself on the horoscope page. My  horoscope basically said do one thing at a time. Revolutionary? No,  but it was a reminder I needed. For example, yesterday I was in the house for most of the day and found myself making a red white and blue açai bowl, researching ...

Most people watching yesterday’s final round of the British Open were likely focused on who would win the Claret Jug (or is it mug). I watched, and although it was as exciting as golf can be, I wasn’t fixated on the jug/mug. Two topics were more interesting to me. The first was that these athletes breaking records and duking it out were both in their forties. And second, Phil trimmed down. It turns out Phil has gone Paleo and upped his fitness game and, as a result, he’s dropped 25-ish pounds (over 2 stones). I’m not sure that Phil got the idea from Lebron. It’s not as though Lebron started the paleo diet but of course “Phil lost weight following the Lebron diet” was a headline I came across more than once. Lebron was hardcore paleo for 67 days. This means their diets consisted of fruit, vegetables, protein, nuts and limited carbs (no dairy, no grains/gluten/sugar). For me, it’s one thing for average people to pursue paleo but quite a shift from old-school “carbing up” for athletes to...

We field a lot of hormone-related questions. After all our hormones affect everything from our appetite to our mood, throw in 198 other potential symptoms and you have a major wellness impediment. Last month, Carolyn and I filmed a video we called “ WTF PMS ” because a) we didn’t feel the need to choose a classier title and b) let’s face it we have no issue with semi taboo topics. The strange thing is that cycles, hormones and periods have sort of come out of the closet. Yesterday, the New York Times ran a story called “ Candidly Spelling Out the “P ” word about period tracking apps. One could argue that using “P” instead of period is neither candid nor spelled out. On the same day, I received an email from Greatist “ what’s up with digestion during your period ”. I feel one-upped by them because they hit two taboos in one title, dang. Check out the video for our Food First Aid Kit for PMS, find out why the snack below from Navitas Naturals is a PMS crusher and hear our PMS theme son...

Fun slideshow via Health Magazine for some summer inspo . Yes, I voted for our beloved green tea (extra cred for matcha, try unsweetened almond milk matcha latte at Fika if you haven't). And of course because Foodtrainers help you be booze trainers and "lose while you booze" a fun "healthy' cocktail idea utilizing the superpowered Wakaya ginger. I'm not sure I agree with the intro that summer best time to lose, summer has its own challenges. See what you think. What do you do to keep it healthy when it's summer (even though technically isn't)?

On Sunday, I was watching OWN (Oprah’s network) but not Super Soul Sunday (my fave), this time I was watching Where Are They Now . Oprah was interviewing George Hamilton…you remember him super tan, dapper, dated Elizabeth Taylor?At one point in the interview they showed footage of George’s closet.    My heart tends to skip a beat when things are lined up and organized perfectly but there was something else. George had multiples of the items that work. At seventy-something he knows he likes denim shirts when he’s dressing casually and white dress shirts on other days.   This reminded me of my gingerade kombuchas in the fridge or my son’s chia pods. The next day I spotted this article on Facebook. It’s about men from Steve Jobs to President Obama and this same concept of wearing the same thing every day.   Obama said: ‘ I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make. G...

Last week, I was in my office for client sessions. Many clients had Rosh Hashanah on their minds. For any special event, I try to gather information in order to formulate a plan. “Where will you be for the holidays?” On this particular day three clients informed me that their mother in-law was hosting. Each of these clients shared this with evident apprehension.   Humor is my favorite antidote for anxiety so I dubbed it “ the Mother In-law challenge ” and we went from there. When my sessions were over, my mind drifted back to mother in laws and all the accompanying stereotypes. This definition made me chuckle.   A phrase appended to names of relationship, as father, mother, brother, sister, son, etc., to indicate that the relationship is not by nature There are books written on the subject including one from psychologist Terri Apter entitled… What do you want from me?  And it will come as no shock that the most complicated relationships are between mother in-laws and daug...