Category Archives: Friday Feature

Friday Feature: Yeast Infections

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The nagging itch had come again and there had only been three weeks since my last bout. I went to the doctor. She gave me a prescription. I filled it. I used it. I was better for three weeks then I started the itch, see doctor, and get a prescription and relief cycle again. I was suffering with chronic yeast infections—from Candida albicans (the same fungus that causes athletes’ feet and jock itch)—and all my doctor was doing was treating my symptoms. I needed to understand why I kept suffering so I went on my own quest and what I found out has allowed me to treat and prevent reoccurrences:

• I had an imbalance in my flora, which essentially means that I had too many bad bacteria and not enough good bacteria in my intestines. We all have good and bad bacteria that naturally occur in our bodies. When there is an imbalance we get an infection.

• Sugar, white distilled vinegar (found in salad dressings, ketchup, mustard, barbecue sauce and tons of other condiments), dairy, fried foods, products containing yeast and fungi (mushrooms and aged cheese) are culprits for yeast infections. It’s not that I can’t ever have these things foods; it’s just that I had to cut them out for about three weeks to promote long term healing.

• During my three weeks, I ate low fat plain yogurt and used it like a prescription vaginal cream. Yogurt is full of good bacteria, or probiotics, the live cells that help restore your flora balance. I also took a probiotic supplement and do so almost daily to maintain my flora balance. I avoid regular yogurts, especially the ones with the fruit, because their sugar content counteracts the good bacteria. I ate bunches of raw and juiced vegetables and lean, non-cured meats.

• Using internal prescription medicines (antibiotics) kill the good and bad bacteria. This is the reason I would get better and eventually get sick again. If I ever have to take antibiotics I make sure to take some probiotics after my course of medicine.

I was able to restore my health by doing my own investigation and mainly using the teachings of two doctors who are Christians that I admire, Don Colbert, M.D. and Valerie Saxion, N.D. When my doctor saw that I was no longer having yeast infections, she said, “Whatever you’re doing keep on doing.” I then knew even greater that it was my responsibility to take care of my temple. I can’t ever expect a doctor to solely do that for me.

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith

Friday Feature: Free Flowing

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It’s so easy to give up after trying hard at something and not seeing the results you expected. I know. I’ve done this in trying to improve my digestive health. The change in eating certain foods, the increase in enzymes and even more water just didn’t seem to be working for me at one period. I finally realized that more water and fruits and vegetables for me meant more than the average person. My major increase helped, but I was still having a bit of sluggishness until I discovered that I needed to do the following to keep my colon free flowing:

    1) Avoid mucous-forming foods (also known as acid-forming foods), like cheese. Mucous can get caught on your intestinal walls and block the free flow of waste through and out of your system.
    2) Drink room temperature beverages with meals. Many of us love an ice cold glass of water, but cold and food don’t mix well. Cold drinks can solidify your food and keep it from flowing freely.
    3) Drink 32 ounces of room temperature purified water first thing in the morning. This helps my digestive tract get going after its rested overnight. I also have a friend who drinks a hot cup of water first thing in the morning. She says this does natural wonders for her system.
    4) Drink a freshly squeezed juice or vegetable drink in the morning. This also helps my digestive tract get going immediately.
    5) Drink a hot beverage after a meal. I like to drink tea. Hot drinks help to “melt” foods, helping them break down and allowing them to move easier. Sometimes for an extra boost I select fenugreek tea, which loosens mucous and is a natural diuretic.

If you are on the quest for better help, please don’t give up. Sometimes we strong black women think we have too much going on to work so hard on an issue like digestion. After all, we’ve dealt this long with a sluggish system; we can survive, some of us might think. But you don’t know this. God gave us everything we need for life and godliness. Taking care of our bodies in every way we can gives us life and helps us to be godly because we are honoring our bodies, the temple of the Holy Ghost, and the Holy Ghost, God Himself, deserves the best. We should give our best whenever and wherever we can.

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith

Friday Feature: Keep It Juicy

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It’s Black History Month so we must share our stories, those of the past and ones we are creating right now, even health wise. And health wise, the African American story is not so good overall. Black women contract AIDS four times more than Latina or white women, we have a higher rate of abortions per capita, and heart disease is staggering among us. We have to make a change. That’s what “Friday Feature” is all about, helping us get a handle on our health the natural way.

    WARNING:

The following may be somewhat graphic language, even for strong black women, but I had to give it to you straight.

While in grad school, I was working full-time, researching for a professor and excelling in my classes. I was keeping things together, but in more ways than one. One day, with penetrating pain in my belly that periodically had me doubled over in my seat, I had to leave class and go to the emergency room. After laying a few hours behind a curtain on an emergency room gurney, hearing crying and snotting beat-up Joe call and explain to relatives, police and medical workers how he got caught in a homosexual prostitution crackdown in a local park, the resident gave me the news. “You are compacted. Go to the drugstore and get a stool softener and you should be fine.”

I had left class, drove in pain, waited four hours, and heard sadly hellacious stories to be told my bowels weren’t moving. I wanted a real diagnosis, a prescription given, hospital admittance, surgery performed. I wanted to scream that my pain was because I was keeping things together that should have been moving on and out. Compared to Joe, I had a small problem, at least in that moment, but constipation can lead to more serious problems, like a perforated colon and colon cancer, and even “minor” ones, like halitosis.

My natural healthcare specialists tell me that we should eliminate waste after every meal. Hmmm, I don’t know many people who do that and I even know a woman who says it’s normal for her to handle her business once a week. Once a week may be normal for her but it is not normal. We have to flush the waste out. Otherwise, just like garbage that sits and gets smelly and moldy, our insides will get smelly and moldy. We have enough problems fighting sagging, dimpled and wrinkled skin. Let’s work to keep our insides straight.

So, like natural healthcare practitioner Sunyatta Amen says, we got to “keep it juicy,” her way of reminding people of the importance of eating foods that have lots of water so they can lubricate your body and help your food to flow through and push waste out. Nothing can replace actually drinking water, but here are some of my juicy favorites that do well giving my water an assist:

Cabbage
Collard Greens
Leafy Greens salad
Watermelon
Oranges
Apples
Mango
Strawberries
Blueberries
Squash
Eggplant

What are some of your favorite juicy foods? Share yours and if you don’t eat them raw, tell us how you eat them.

Friday Feature: Abstinence and Trust

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Life and death have met me a lot this week—their notions and results of those who have chosen each have caused me to think deeply, more definitively, about my own beliefs, particularly in light of the 38th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion. Whenever a hot button issue surfaces, Christians should take a stand, if not publically, in their own hearts based upon the heart of God. His counsel to us—not our feelings or conscience—is what we must follow, but this is not always easy to do, especially for women like strong black women.

In keeping with natural methods of healthcare, abstinence is undoubtedly the only natural way to keep from getting pregnant. This should be the decision for Christian singles, with sex being reserved for marriage. In marriage, ideally you and your husband should agree on whether or not to have a child. If you decide not to have children, the only natural form of birth control is the rhythm method. You could abstain from sex, but you would have another set of issues besides unwanted children, and those issues you don’t want.

But what about those hard issues, like an unexpected (and unwanted) pregnancy that comes from a slip in decision on a lonely night or from a cruel man, a stranger or one in your own bedroom? Is abortion acceptable in these situations? Is abortion the “natural” response to getting rid of something you didn’t expect, want, or plan for or don’t want around to remind you of a bad decision or the violent act? If the mother of a poet I love who loves so many or an evangelist who feeds the souls and bodies of thousands each year decided abortion was natural after they were raped, I and so many others would miss the love of these soul-feeding wonders. And I wonder what soul-feeding wonders were among the more than 50 million babies aborted since the passage of Roe v. Wade in 1973. And I wonder how many mothers thought their decision was natural because they were told that what was in their womb was not yet life or that they had the power to change their destiny and they believed it, wanted and needed to believe that, because they didn’t know or hadn’t considered the counsel of God.

We have believed that we have the freedom to choose in all things. God would not have given man volition if we didn’t have the right to choose, we say. But He says, “This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live” (Deuteronomy 30:19). God gives us a choice but then commands us to choose life. I choose life, personally knowing the horror of rape and the turmoil of receiving something I didn’t expect from it. God’s council is true and life affirming even in the midst of personal darkness, death visited upon us. His council is the only one that we can trust and eventually rest secure in (Psalm 56:11, 2 Corinthians 1:8-10).

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith

Friday Feature: Swallow It Up

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Resting well heals your body and makes you look and feel good, too. We talked about this last week and I hope you got some good, long sleep. Did you? If you didn’t, try to do so tonight. And I want you to add another basic practice to your healthy quest repertoire that will also heal your body and make you look and feel good, too.

    #2 Drink More Water

I know you have heard it before, but are you drinking more? And if you are drinking more, is it enough for YOUR body? I ask this because of these amazing statements I’ve heard over the years:

  1. Most Americans are dehydrated and don’t even know it.
  1. People are more toxic than they should be.

Dehydration and toxicity were two of my main issues, making my skin and digestive system really suffer. I can always tell when I haven’t had enough water: Pimples pop out seemingly out of nowhere and the food I’ve eaten doesn’t flow as freely through my system. Water helps to flush out waste, moisturize skin, hair and nails, lubricate joints and eyes and a bunch of other functions we take for granted or that haven’t even occurred to us. When we don’t have enough water to flush out the junk through our digestive system, some of the junk remains and some seeks to escape through our skin, the largest body organ. With our bodies being composed mostly of water and us losing about 10-12 eight ounce cups of water daily from our normal activities, we have to replenish our supply so we don’t get dehydrated. Dehydration can also cause memory loss. Lack of lubrication can cause us to shrivel up on the outside and the inside then what good can we be when we’re supposed to be grapes and not raisins?

We have heard that the average person (whatever that means) should drink at least eight eight-ounce glasses of water each day. I haven’t found a modern health professional that can say where this formulation came from and why we should follow it. I also heard that daily we should drink half our body weight in ounces (e.g., if you weigh 140 lbs then you should drink 70 ounces). When I follow this plan (drinking purified water) and a add a few ounces on top of that, I find I have less problems with my skin and my digestive system is free flowing.

Then the LORD replied to me, “If racing against mere men makes you tired, how will you race against horses? If you stumble and fall on open ground, what will you do in the thickets near the Jordan?”—Jeremiah 12:5 (NLT)

The Lord was asking Jeremiah how he would be able to deal with more troublesome people if he was having problems dealing with people on a small level. This is why I’m challenging us to rest well and drink more water, two very basic practices for good health. How can we go on to more intense health practices if we may be struggling with these basics? We have to start here. It’s not enough for us to possess information if we don’t put the information to use. Having water with us is not enough. We have to open that bottle and swallow it up to be (or continue) on our way to better health.

Copyright 2011 by Rhonda J. Smith