Dr. Hauschka’s is one company whose products and methods are very popular with health-seeking, beauty conscious people. A number of years ago, I used and recommended their cosmetics myself. Recently one of my readers pointed out some differences in our approaches to skin care. Her email prompted me to review carefully Dr. Hauschka’s famous “7 facts that will change your skin.”

Hauschka’s philosophy differs slightly from mine. (Or shall we say mine differs from his? After all, he’s the doctor!) I don’t disagree in every respect, but there are a few tenets that I feel compelled to challenge. Read the rest of this entry »

What gives hair that frizzy look? The part of your hair that you see—the shaft—consists of three layers. The outer layer is called the cuticle. It’s transparent, and under magnification looks like tiny overlapping fish scales. When the scales lie flat, hair looks healthy, normal, shiny. When the scales don’t lie flat, you get “frizzy hair,” and your hair loses its shine, takes on that dull, lifeless look.

It’s not just a matter of looks. The function of hair’s outer cuticle layer is to protect the soft middle layer, the cortex. When the cuticle’s scales get ruffled…no protection!  This may lead to split ends over time, a condition called trichoptilosis.

Some ends can actually split into several pieces, even break off easily. Neglect them a while longer, and those split ends will migrate up the length of your hair shaft toward the roots, damaging the entire hair length, leaving you with just one option—cutting all that damaged hair off!

Why does hair get frizzy? There are several causes. Here are the major ones: Read the rest of this entry »

In my book Quantum Eating I present abundant scientific research on how not eating in the late afternoon will give you the ideal weight, youthful energy and powerful breaks on aging process. Not eating at night gives our digestive system a chance to rest, letting our whole body use the available energy for regeneration, damage repair, and cleanup in all its nooks and crannies. But there’s one organ I encourage you to feed at night—your skin. Read the rest of this entry »

Healthy eyelashes, seemingly insignificant parts of our features at first glance, are normally short durable hairs that grow on the edges of both upper and lower lids. Eyelashes are there to keep your eyeballs healthy by protecting them from dangerous, foreign substances and causing you to blink when necessary.

Not only that, but if you are also taking care of the skin around your eye area, long luxurious lashes can transform a pretty pair of eyes into stunning peepers. Read the rest of this entry »

For good health, you need a bowel movement at least once a day. Twice is better. Medically oriented websites note that merely not having a bowel movement on a particular day doesn’t mean you’re constipated per se. As a raw-foodist of fifteen years’ experience, I’ll say this: Unless you’re fasting, not having a bowel movement daily is constipation.

Regular evacuation of your bowels is essential for being healthy, for maintaining ideal weight (or getting down to it), and for having clear, youthful skin. For more on that, read my article: The Straight Poop. Read the rest of this entry »

I just came across an article that says: Did you know that Americans get most of their antioxidants from coffee? It’s true, according to U.S. dietary researcher Dr. Joe Vinson from the University of Scranton…. It clearly shows that coffee is our number one source of antioxidants…. Someone out there reading this article will decide that coffee is a great source of antioxidants, and we all ought to bang back eight or ten cups a day.

The current mainstream research says roughly this about daily coffee drinking…

Read the rest of this entry »

Skin belies aging like no other organ. It takes all the blame, while in fact it only reflects what it covers. The skin is the outermost organ of our body. Its purpose is to cover our deeper structures and first of all, the muscles. Read the rest of this entry »

They’re good for you…that is until they’re bad. You don’t have to look far these days to find nutrition science changing its mind right and left. Oat bran is good for you, they tell us, and it’s a “must,” plastered across every cereal box. Next thing you know, they’ve discovered it’s not such a great idea. First you hear caffeine is bad for you, then the nutria-gurus recommend we drink a coffee a day for the antioxidants. So what about vitamins? For decades now we’ve all been assured we need a good multi-vitamin every day just to be sure our bases are covered. Read the rest of this entry »

Got coarse-textured hair that grows fast? Good for you! My own hair is fine (meaning each individual hair strand has a small diameter) and growing it has always been a challenge. Now, this would be just great if I were sporting a cute little pixie cut—it would be simple and practical.

But no—not me. I’ve always wanted long hair. Always preferred it. This was challenging enough in my youth. But after 40, it just hasn’t grown as readily. And once my hair reaches a certain length, it seems just to stop growing altogether. If your age is forties or better, you know exactly what I mean. For some of us, growing hair can be as challenging as growing palm trees in the arctic. Read the rest of this entry »

More Water=Less Efficient Filtering?

I got an interesting e-mail a while back: I thought you might find this interesting, Tonya. In the Ladies Home Journal (Christie Brinkley on the cover, July 2009, page 141), a study is quoted…’in fact, there’s evidence your body is less efficient at filtering out toxins when your water intake is higher.’ That, Tonya, is what you say in your books!!! Read the rest of this entry »