We Can all be Natural Beauties!

So you have moved out to the country, rid your house of all chemical cleaning products and you eat only pure organic produce.   Your body should be clean and sparkling of health inside and out, right? Wrong!  Take a second look at your vanity case, shower cabinet, make-up bag and sports bag.   Read the list of ingredients on the bottle - would you believe our bodies absorb 5kg of cosmetic chemicals through or skin every year.   What makes it even more shocking is that these chemicals would NEVER pass safety regulations to be ingested in our diet! So if you wouldn't put it in your mouth why put it on your skin?

The largest organ in our body is actually on it, not in it! It’s our skin. And as an organ, it has many functions to maintain balance in our body.   One of the functions is in the detoxification process, ridding our body of a harmful build up of toxins, along with our liver.   Other functions include immunity, temperature regulation, a sense of touch and, to hold our structure.

Our skin has a huge capacity to absorb chemicals; this is due to the fatty component of skin making it permeable.   Medicine has recognised this function and even used it to its advantage in treatments for endocrine disorders, diabetes and nicotine addiction - nicotine patches work this way.   So why hasn't anyone told us, or made it clearer, that our anti-aging cream is being absorbed straight into our blood stream!  The health implications and hazards of chemicals found in beauty products have started not only to be recognised in mainstream media but also in the medical community.   Many of us have now heard of parabens, petrochemicals, phenoxyethanl and sulphates.  These chemicals even weaken our skins natural protective barrier, making chemicals more easily absorbed into our bodies.  Others are now carcinogens but what I feel, is more shocking, is the effect these products have on the reproductive system.  Parabens, found in nearly EVERYTHING, are known endocrine disruptors.  So they basically interfere in our ovaries, day job!

So what can we do to change this!?   There is so much you can do! First stop buying mainstream cosmetics and read all ingredients! Us ladies wear make-up but why should we suffer because of it!  Changing your beauty regime is so much fun and you learn amazing tricks, like how an avocado can be both a delicious snack and a tasty facemask!  There is even an association in the South of France, Atelier Créa’Manie, that teaches groups how to make your own face cream! To get you started, here are a few tips;

Our skin is naturally acidic, this is to protect itself from infection due to bacteria and fungus.   Sebum production establishes the pH balance and so stripping our skin of its natural oils is counterproductive.   Find a shower gel that is pH 5.5 but does not contain sulphates these are like paint stripper to the skin.  Plus, stripping the skin of its natural pH, increases bacteria replication and I think we all know what BO stands for! Soap is also the most aging product for our skin! If you want to maintain a healthy glow NEVER put soap near your face, this little tip is far cheaper than all those anti-aging cream!

As for our hair, sulphates again are our enemies, but we also need to know about silicones.   This ingredient is responsible for our super straight, smooth coifs.   But here is the truth; every wash that includes silicones means our hair is coated in plastic, making it look healthy by hiding all manner of damage! It also blocks any goodness you may do to your hair in the way of deep conditioning masks.  If it is covered in plaster, how does the goodness get it? I'll be honest with you now, giving these up, makes your hair a nightmare for about two weeks! Trust me it get better and then is gets fabulous!

Back to the sulphates - we know sulphates make our skin too alkaline! What does this do to our scalp! Its make it weak of course and a weak scalp means falling hair! A tip, mix apple cider vinegar with some flower waters and spray after every wash, you'll soon have a healthier scalp!

All this information can be hard to get our heads around.   Most think our eight-hour cream is harmless, I’m sorry to have to tell you the truth! Natural cosmetics are so important for everyone but especially for us women and teenagers! But most of all, its so much fun learning about new products!

I'll be, with the help of my make-up artist cousin, Kim Walker, reviewing all bio cosmetic brands.  Think of me as the Mari-Claire of organic make-up and skin care! Surprisingly, bio make-up is amazing, bio shampoos are fantastic and bio moisturisers leave our outsides and insides beautifully healthy!

Homeopathy, as well as being a treatment for chronic long standing disease, can also be used frequently at home to help manage seasonal illness, quickly and easily.

Acute illness such as coughs, colds sore throats differ from chronic diease, as they are self limiting.  This means you notice initial sympotms, such as a scrapping sensation in you throat for a cold, symptoms increase for a day or sometimes a week depending and then you are all better, usually! With homeopathic remedies, you can manage your symptoms, relieve pains aches, and even cut the duration time of your acute. 

Most of my patients have also noticed that they feel better after an acute treated with homeopathic remedies than with just simple painkillers.  The trick to treating an acute is, to choose the right sympotms to help you select a remedy and to know when to change a remedy.  Illness has 3 stages - inflammation, suppurative and then recovery. So identify which stage you, or who you are treating, is at and then select your remedy. Try and look for unusual symptoms, intense sensations such as "fishbone in throut" feeling that comes with Hepar Sulph sore throat or complete "aversion to movement" seen in Bryonia fever/pain.

Download my starter guide and read through the symptoms.  I'll put regular posts up, to help you further learn the remedies and other helpful information including how to understand the benefits of a fever!

Julia

FR2DAY - 27/4/2010

For all of you who moved to the beautiful, sunny south of France hoping for a 'sneeze-free' life, only to be hounded by hayfever, this is for you! It's recently been reported that there are as many as 16 million sufferers in the UK. This figure is even higher for our neck of the woods. However help is at hand! Here are some natural and practical solutions to manage your symptoms. Hayfever will soon be 'so last year'!

The major hayfever protagonist is the cypress tree, a well known allergen, found in gardens all over the Mediterranean. It's best to find out which pollen rubs you up the wrong way. Ask your doctor to do a skin test - also known as a prick test.  Knowing when your particular pollen is released will make managing your symptoms easier.

So then what? For short term relief of symptoms, follow some of the suggestions below.
If your symptoms include sneezing, a blocked nose and headaches, it's worth seeing an osteopath. Working with your posture will make sure your sinuses are draining properly. This will relieve the sinus headaches and improve a streaming nose. Dairy products and citrus fruit also cause the body to over produce mucus, so avoiding these foods during your season will give you some respite.

Vitamin C is known as a natural anti-histamine. Finding a supplement that is sugar and aspartame free is difficult but worth its weight in gold in the long run for your general health. Do not exceed 3g daily as it can cause gastric irritation.

Homeopathic remedies are chosen based on your individual symptoms and being natural will not lead to the well known post-anti-histamine catnap!

From the angle of an alternative therapist, what you are allergic to is not as important as why you are allergic to it. Being allergic to anything, simply means, that your immune system is over-sensitive to say, pollen, reacting to it like a virus. There is usually more than one contributing factor causing our systems to behave like an elephant seeing a mouse. You may have an allergic constitution or family trait, such as eczema and asthma sufferers for example. Or have an over taxed liver, which coupled with stress, will leave your immune system not knowing its elbow from its ear, hence the over-reaction. Liver toxicity is one of the most important factors I look at when treating hayfever and it's for this reason, over-medication of anti-histamines and steroid injection which only offer temporary relief but also eventually lead to the very cause of you hayfever.

What does this mean for long-term relief? As there are many factors to consider in order to get to the root of allergies, choosing an holistic therapy, which take you all your symptoms into account, is the best approach. Therapies that are known to have good results for hayfever are acupuncture, homeopathy and reflexology. All of which offer a natural approach, reducing intake of medication which leads to the vicious circle of liver toxicity.

Last but not least, here's a very practical solution to desensitizing your system. Find a good supplier of local honey, this will contain all the pollen in you local area. Taking a teaspoon a day during the autumn and winter months will get your system used to the pollen and it won't see it as the enemy any more! Here's to a sneeze free summer!

Julia Edgely
Homeopathy - Kinesiology - Baby Massage
5 Avenue Guillabert,
06600 Antibes
Tel: +33(0) 627 09 68 57

Living on the Cote d'Azur can be a dream come true for some but a nightmare if you are one of the many people who suffer with allergies. 
An allergy is our body's over reaction to a foreign particles.   Our immune system identifies, for example pollen, as a pathogen and so the body starts the process of reaction. 
As this is not a "normal" immune response, histamine is released causing swelling, mucus production and irritation of the bronchial tubes leading to difficult breathing.   The aim of treatment, with an alternative/complimentary practitioner, is to help the overactive immune system and so reset it back to normal function.

The most common of these allergies is, of course, hayfever or in French, rhume des fois.   Hayfever is on the rise and the culprits down here in the South of France, among others, are the pine and cypress trees. 
Homeopathy offers a natural alternative to steriod inhalers, which work wonders for an attack, but little to treat the underlying cause of hayfever.   Long term affects of steriods is also detrimental to our health.

There is also another group of allergies called sub-clinical allergies.  Healthcare workers are seeing the affects of certain foods, additives or chemicals on people's health.  Symptoms can be allieviated by taking a good look at your diet or toxin levels in the body.
The symptoms of a sub-clinical allergy are not as instant or violent as the above allergies.  It can be seen 3-4 days after ingestion and on a lower, less intense level.  It is for this reason, pin-pointing the substance causing the reaction can be difficult and a rotation diet is recommended.  Joint pains, headaches, IBS are a few examples of the types of disorders linked to sub-clinical allergies.

If you have any questions or would like an appointment, please contact me