We have such fantastic immune systems--better than any computerized system man could design.  Did you know that you have something in your immune system that "interferes with" foreign, harmful invaders like viruses?  Appropriately, it is called interferon.
Learn how interferon works as an essential component of your immune system at this website:  http://www.immunityfacts.com/index.html   There is also a great section called "Understanding the Immune System".  If you have any questions contact me. 

Health is a choice, and so is our diet!  

Have you noticed that you are seeing more frequent reports coming from the scientific community that poor diet and chronic diseases are closely related?  The chronic diseases most often cited are heart disease, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, stroke, and cancer.  It just so happens that heart disease and cancer are the #1 and #2 killers in the U.S.  Yet, much of the suffering and heartache from these chronic illnesses could be prevented.  According to the American Heart Association, 80% of all heart disease in women is preventable with proper nutrition and healthy lifestyle choices.  The American Cancer Society reports that 60% of all cancer-related deaths can be prevented by improving lifestyle choices like being physically active, losing weight, stopping smoking, and getting proper nutrition.

So how is diet connected to disease prevention?  Your body contains trillions of cells.  Billions of new cells are created every day.  Each cell is like a high-performance engine.  It needs high-quality raw materials (nutrients) to function properly.  The quantity and quality of nutrients you ingest affects every system and organ in your body including heart, lungs, kidneys, nerves, brain, bones, muscles, etc.  In other words, how you look, feel, and perform is directly affected by your daily nutrient intake.

Unfortunately, our Standard American Diet (S.A.D.) plays a big part in the obesity epidemic and disease incidence.  Our busy lifestyles drive us to make compromises of convenience so that 

• our foods are fast and our metabolisms are slow; 
• our drinks are soft and our arteries are hard; 
• our nerves are fried, and so is the junk we put into our bodies
• we are overfed, and undernourished.

We need to cut out the highly processed foods and add more fresh, whole foods.  Fruits, vegetables, and other plant foods are rich in healthy phytonutrients in addition to vitamins, minerals and fiber.  They have positive effects on the body over the long term--effects such as inhibiting tumor formation, lowering cholesterol levels, blocking the cancer-promoting effect of certain hormones, and fighting against chronic inflammation, which is linked to such diseases as heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, certain cancers, and Alzheimer's disease.

Scientists define a vitamin as a compound essential for life.  Since your body cannot manufacture most of these vitamins on its own, they can come only from the food you eat and the supplements you take every day.  Over the long term, proper nutrition impacts every aspect of your health--from its ability to maintain health to its role in preventing nutrition-related diseases such as heart disease and diabetes.  

Every day you make choices that will either improve your health or harm it.  Studies show that if you don't eat right, get to a healthy weight, exercise regularly, and supplement your diet, you increase your risk of developing certain chronic diseases.  Good health is a choice, which means that disease (in many cases) is also a choice.

Keep The "Give" In Your Arteries

Every time your heart beats, it pumps oxygen-rich blood out into your arteries to supply your head and brain and the rest of your body with the life-giving fluid.  With each contraction, the aorta’s walls stretch to accommodate the surge, converting it into a steadier stream.  When we are young our vessels are resilient and open readily so blood can push through them easily, but as we get older, the artery walls stiffen, losing their ability to expand when they need to, thus increasing the risk of high blood pressure, heart attack, stroke and mental decline.  How?

If your arteries can’t expand and contract easily, they aren’t able to shield the smaller blood vessels from the regular high-pressure bursts of blood that the heart sends out.  That can damage your brain.  If your arteries are stiff, your heart has to work harder to pump the blood out, which leads to heart failure, especially in those with high blood pressure.  What is it that makes these artery walls stiffen?

There are 2 main structural proteins in artery walls called collagen and elastin.  Collagen provides the fiber structure that protects and anchors the arteries to the surrounding tissues, while the elastin gives the vessels the elasticity they need to manage a smooth and continuous blood flow.  As we get older, both proteins can become “cross-linked” with other proteins to make the combination rigid rather than supple.  In the presence of blood sugar, this process is speeded up, resulting in the formation of Advanced Glycation End-products or AGEs.  The elastin proteins stretch out and start to rupture, like elastic in the waist of an old skirt or old underwear, leading to increasing loss of flexibility. So, what can you do to stop this process?

 1. Regular aerobic exercise!  During exercise the force of blood accelerates through the arteries, causing the vessel-lining cells to release nitric oxide, which relaxes & dilates blood vessels and prevents platelets & white blood cells from sticking to blood vessel walls, reducing plaque buildup.

2. Eat wisely- Restrict sodium intake; Avoid saturated and trans fats; Eat more vegetables & fruits; Consume more omega-3 fatty acids (DHA & EPA) found* in fatty fish. 

3. Slow/reduce the formation of AGEs. 

I’ll bet you are thinking, “Boy, I wish I could slow down the formation of those nasty AGE proteins.”  I would have thought the same, except that I know that Shaklee has a product that has been proven to do just that!  That product is VIVIX.  I remember the day that VIVIX was introduced to us at Convention.  The Harvard Researcher, who had just addressed us about the science behind the product, said to one of our Shaklee friends as he went backstage, “These people have no idea of the magnitude of the importance of this product they have just been given!”      

We didn’t realize the full extent of it then, but we are learning more and more about its amazing effects in the body. It impacts 4 key mechanisms of cellular aging:  1) It protects & repairs DNA;   2) It promotes mitochondrial biogenesis, which  increases energy production in the cells;  3) It activates key genetic regulators to turn down cellular aging and inflammation; and 4) the VIVIX polyphenols are 10X more powerful than resveratrol alone in slowing the formation of AGE proteins that clog up cells and do the damage described in the third paragraph above.

*Omega-3 fatty acids also are found in Vitalizer and OmegaGuard from Shaklee.

To learn more about VIVIX click here and then scroll down the playlist to VIVIX.

To learn more about VITALIZER click as for Vivix and then scroll down the playlist to Shaklee VITALIZER.

Shaklee Research Shows what Vitamin D Can Do!

Once again, Shaklee has breaking research. This time showing higher blood levels of vitamin D are related to higher HDL (good) cholesterol. This study was a followup of the Landmark Study, which showed, as you may recall that long-term Shaklee supplement users had markedly better health than users of other brands or no supplements. In that study it was noted that Shaklee users had blood levels of Vitamin D well above that found in most Americans and well within the optimal range recommended by vitamin D researchers.

So Shaklee commissioned the followup to determine blood levels of vitamin D in long-term, short-term and nonusers of vitamin D and their impact on cardiovascular risk markers. The results were certainly impressive. They showed that increased vitamin D levels were associated with increased HDL (good) cholesterol. Not only that, but they were also associated with decreased risk of metabolic syndrome and decreased waist circumference! These findings were presented in May at the National Lipid Assoc. Annual Scientific Sessions in Florida. Now, here’s something to prove the outstanding quality of Shaklee research: The full study manuscript was already published in the August edition of the Journal of Clinical Lipidology, and it was accepted without any comments or revisions from the journal reviewers, a nearly unprecedented event in scientific research publication! Folks, there is no other supplement company that comes close to having the sound scientific research that Shaklee has been known for for years. You can be very proud and glad that you get your products from such an exemplary company.



These are the products we would recommend to increase your Vitamin D intake:

• Vitalizer


• Vitalizer with iron


• Vitalizer Gold


• Vita Lea


• Vita Lea Gold


• OsteoMatrix