11 things you MUST know about your food…

that the food industry hopes you NEVER find out!

What you don’t know…might kill you.

Did I get your attention? I hope so.  I wish I could tell you that headline is mostly hype…but unfortunately, it isn’t.

Our typical American diet is killing us…we spend more per person on health care than any other nation, yet we have a growing epidemic of obesity…diabetes…heart disease…high blood pressure…cancer…auto-immune diseases…depression…the list goes on and on.

We’ve also accepted that it’s “normal” to suffer from things like…acne and eczema…chronic low energy levels…aching joints…difficulty concentrating or attention deficit disorder…sinus problems…insomnia…and a stubborn roll of fat around our bellies.  It isn’t.

We tend to blame ourselves for being overweight or unhealthy – we think we’re lazy, or we lack willpower — but the fact is, the deck is stacked against us!  Our current “conventional wisdom” about healthy eating is spectacularly failing us – leaving us sick, fat, and unhappy.  But we have little else to guide us in our food choices — other than whatever the food industry chooses to market to us.

And so, unknowingly, we make critical, and deadly, mistakes in what we eat.

If that worries you, and you’re ready to learn more…

…this report may completely change the way you eat…and the way you feel.

My name is Kara, and my own story is, frankly…not that exciting — and not that important here.  Let’s just say — in the course of solving some health issues of my own, I’ve uncovered some information that shocked me. The important story is about what that means to you.

What I’ve found are some basic facts that everyone deserves to know…and yet they remain largely hidden.   If you’ll follow me through this report, I’ll share some of what I’ve learned with you.

We’ll talk about:

• what’s wrong with the typical American diet
• why diet is at the root of most of our health problems
• how we eat huge amounts of sugar, and why it’s killing us
• why simply eating “low-fat” is wrong, and even harmful
• how replacing fats with carbohydrates has hurt us
• how foods labeled “healthy” lead us astray
• why soy isn’t as healthy as you think
• why we don’t get the nutrients we need from our food
• why we need more protein
• how stress keeps us fat
• how you can stop dieting and still lose weight

Where our diet took a wrong turn.

The problem is that our diet, at least here in the U.S., has changed radically within the last 100 years — and not for the better.

After World War II, we retooled weapons plants to turn surplus ammonium nitrate into fertilizer instead of explosives.  We began to produce and use large quantities of chemical fertilizers — and then to produce huge quantities of corn and soybeans.

Government policy subsidized this and kept these crops cheap — cheap enough to support an industry that turns them abundantly into other products, like high-fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oils.

We also moved meat and dairy animals off of pasture and into large industrial operations where they could be fed these crops and other inexpensive, but unhealthy foods.

This left us with a very inexpensive, but less nutritious, food supply — and a food industry motivated to find ways to feed us…more.  And they’ve succeeded — but much of what is cheap, heavily advertised, and  readily available to eat is highly processed, full of calories, rich in the wrong fats and carbohydrates, and poor in other nutrients.

Disease…it’s more about your groceries than your genes.

This doesn’t just leave us overweight.

Although you’re not likely to hear it from your doctor, what you eat plays a much bigger role in your long-term health than your genetic makeup.  In fact, most chronic illnesses stem from some nutritional imbalance.  But few doctors discuss this with their patients, or test for signs of nutritional problems, instead relying on prescription drugs to mask symptoms, never addressing the underlying cause of the problem.

Unfortunately, even when you’re motivated to eat well you run into problems.  The grocery store is full of products making health claims, but made with unhealthy ingredients.  The media is full of conflicting advice and articles on the superfood of the moment, leaving us confused and overwhelmed.  And our food production is controlled by a few large companies that have no incentive to promote what ‘s good for us — while the government subsidizes the production of some of our unhealthiest foods.

Sugar is everywhere…and it isn’t just adding calories.

Once you start to look — you’ll see that many, many packaged foods have some kind of sugar in them — often in the form of high fructose corn syrup.  Long before sugar was so abundantly available to us, we developed a taste for it — a craving that’s hardwired into our brains.  When we were hunters and gatherers, it served us well, but in the grocery store or the fast food line, it’s just an easy way for the food industry to get us to buy and eat more.

Apart from the calories it adds, the big problem with sugar is that it wreaks havoc on our metabolism.  In short, eating sugar causes our blood sugar to spike — which leads to (among other things) too much insulin in the body — and chronic inflammations, degenerative diseases, and premature aging.

Eating the wrong carbohydrates — refined, highly processed carbohydrates like white bread, white rice, and pasta — does the same thing.  Unfortunately — many of these foods are what we’ve turned to in our fear of fat.

“Low-fat” isn’t the whole story.

Several decades ago, diet experts began telling us that fat was bad for you — especially saturated fat.  It, along with cholesterol, was supposed to be the primary cause of heart disease.  Nutrition experts encouraged us to eat more vegetable oils, as well as margarine, and to eat less fat overall.

As it turns out — that conclusion was based on some flawed (and complicated) science.  Now — we see that we’ve failed to stop heart disease — and we’re seeing that these supposedly “healthier” hydrogenated fats are actually much much worse for us that what they replaced.  These also increase inflammation in our bodies and promote chronic disease.

Worse, in our haste to get fat our of our diets, we also eliminated the healthy fats — fats that are essential for many critical functions in our bodies.  The whole story is complex, but “good fats” do a lot to promote good health.  Interestingly — without them, weight loss can be very difficult.  Yes — you might need to eat fat to lose fat.

More protein — but maybe not from soy.

Another thing we often miss out on while we’re avoiding fat is getting enough protein.  Eating protein helps us keep our blood sugar steady, prevents hunger and fatigue, and helps alleviate food cravings.  Try getting more protein and see how it improves your energy levels throughout the day — but be cautious if you plan to get it from soy.

Soy protein in various forms — soy protein isolate, hydrolyzed vegetable protein — has become a really common ingredient, especially in “healthy” foods like energy bars.  But unlike more traditional forms of soy, like tofu, soy processed and prepared in this way can cause hormone disruption and decreased thyroid function. Not exactly the healthy results we’re looking for.

Soy isn’t the only thing that has the potential to push our hormones out of balance — an unfortunate number of other factors can do the same thing.

When hormones go bad…

Sounds funny…but it’s not.  Hormones regulate much of what happens in our bodies — and their cousins, neurotransmitters, do the same thing in our brains.  Hormone and neurotransmitter imbalances can leave us moody, sleepless, depressed, and overweight.  Poor nutrition is a key factor — but so is stress.

Stress puts one particular hormone — cortisol — completely out of whack.  This is a complicated story too, but in combination with a poor diet, this can leave you with extreme fatigue, foggy thinking, intense food cravings, insomnia — and a new layer of belly fat, the kind that increases your risk of heart disease.  It’s just too much to explain here, but if any of this sounds like you, you owe it to yourself to learn more.  I’ll give you some resources later on.

As if that wasn’t bad enough…

Environmental toxins can make all of this worse…as can food sensitivities.

First, the toxins…  We aren’t just talking about the obvious toxins — things with warning labels — although its definitely worth minimizing your contact with those.  You also need to be aware of toxins we don’t usually think of that way — food additives and preservatives, hydrogenated fats, artificial sweeteners, prescription and over-the-counter drugs.  All of these make your liver work harder to process them — straining its overall capacity to handle toxins, hormones and fats.  A stressed liver stores more fats, among other problems.

And what about “food sensitivities”?  Notice that I didn’t say “food allergies” — I’m not talking about something as sudden, severe, and obvious as those can be.  You may have a sensitivity to a particular food and be completely unaware of it — while at the same time it is upsetting digestion, preventing absorption of nutrients, causing widespread inflammation, and creating reactions such as acne, eczema, or joint pain.

A common sensitivity is to gluten, which is found in wheat and related grains, but other foods, such as dairy, legumes, eggs, or yeast, often cause problems as well.  This is definitely something to explore if you suspect you may have a problem or if you don’t feel your best even on a good diet.  Again, I’ll recommend some resources on this.

Wow…I know…that’s a lot to digest (sorry).

But I’ve only scratched the surface.

This is a hugely complicated topic — way more than I can explain or than you’d want to read right here.  But — my hope is that I’ve given you enough information to show you that what you eat really does matter — all calories aren’t created equal.

And I hope I’ve encouraged you to want to reexamine your diet…and maybe make a few improvements?  If so — I’m guessing now you’re wondering what exactly you’re supposed to do…

Here’s the good news.

While the problems are complicated, the solution doesn’t have to be.  The answer is…to just eat what our bodies are designed to eat…real food.

So, what do I mean by “real food”?  Basically — anything that humans have eaten for thousands of years — prepared the way we have traditionally eaten it.

It means foods that are unprocessed or very lightly processed — most real food doesn’t come in a box.  It doesn’t have “ingredients”.

Now — I won’t say it’s completely easy…because in our world full of fast food restaurants, convenience stores, and processed food, it isn’t .  It does take a little bit of effort and attention.  But…I will say that it’s completely worth it.

Why is real food better?

Once you choose to follow a real food diet — you can stop “dieting”.  You don’t have to count calories, agonize over what to eat, count calories, suffer through cravings, or deprive yourself.

You just eat real, healthy, delicious food.  You’ll find that your excess weight will drop away, and you will feel better than you have in a long time.

Best of all, you’ll reverse or prevent the diseases that are so common with our typical American diet.

But please don’t take my word for it.

A real food diet is really something you need to try for yourself — I’d recommend at least a month or two.  See if you feel better…if you lose weight…if your cholesterol or blood pressure or blood sugar improve — my guess is that you’ll be impressed.

Consult with your doctor first, of course, if you have any possible health concerns. Do keep in mind that most conventional doctors are more tuned to changing your prescriptions than to changing your diet — so you may not get a lot of encouragement on that  front.  The important thing is to make sure that experimenting with your diet is safe for you — and to enlist your doctor to help you measure your results.  If you find that you really can’t discuss it with your doctor — you may want to seek out a more supportive and knowledgeable practitioner.

Here are some ways you can get started:

Option 1: Jumpstart your new diet with one of these plans.

My top recommendation for getting started the easy way would be to pick up one of the following diet plans.   Not everyone has the time or the inclination to do as much reading and studying as I’ve done.  That’s OK — you don’t need to.

I wanted to find a way to share what you need to do in a concise way — something to direct my friends and family to when they asked. When I looked, I found several diet plans that fit the bill.  I personally own all of them and I recommend all of them.  Each one offers good guidance and motivation, and each one has it’s own strong points.  You can choose the one that’s right for you by looking at my detailed reviews are in the box below.

I’ve reviewed three here — each one has all the details you need and lots of tips to get started. These are a great way to get going and give you all the basic information you need in one place.

Again, my top pick is” The Diet Solution” — lots of great information, plenty of motivating emails, fun, cute, everything you need. It is also guaranteed for 60 days, so if you aren’t happy with it, you’re completely protected. You can purchase the program here. This link takes you to a page with a video about the diet — it’s a good video, but if you want to skip it, just scroll down and click the button below it.

When you purchase, your order will be processed through ClickBank. They are pros at delivering downloadable products, so your transaction will be easy and secure. They also back the 60 day guarantee that you get when you buy. I’ve made several purchases through ClickBank myself and always had a great experience.

The Diet Solution This one is really my favorite...and you can't go wrong here. Created by a nutrition and exercise specialist (that's her in the photo) -- this plan covers all the bases. You get a quick start guide, a complete manual, recipes, meal plans, a shopping guide, and more. Plus -- you get some great emails -- lots of motivation, helpful tips, and bonus information. Of the three plans, this one's the best for keeping you engaged. Like I said, you can't go wrong choosing this one. You can find it at: The Diet Solution

Healthy Urban Kitchen Well...this one's really good, too! Also created by a nutrition and exercise expert, this plan includes a great basic manual, along with several other supplementary reports and audio files. This would be a good choice if you want the shortest, most concise plan.  It is very short-and-to-the-point, but still does a great job of covering the essentials. While there are no meal plans, he does include some great information on choosing foods, grocery shopping, and planning your own meals. Other strong points include lots of nice recipes, including some raw food recipes, and a great section on setting up your kitchen. You can find this one at: Healthy Urban Kitchen …..

Healing Gourmet This plan is probably the most information-packed of the three -- and also the least "diet-like". It was created by a nutrition and natural health expert, and focuses more on explaining the multiple ways food affects your health, as well as how to make the right food choices. It is organized into 10 modules, each one dealing with a different topic, with one explaining how it all ties together. This one has lots to read, but if you have the time, it will get you on the right track, and give you a truly sound understanding of why you want to be there. The plan modules also backed up by a very extensive website that offers a wealth of additional information. This one is a bit more expensive than the other two, but if you're an information sponge, this one's for you. You can find it at: Healing Gourmet

Now for some incentives…

When you buy any of these plans through me, I do offer some extra free bonuses to help you get the most out of whichever plan you choose — I really want to be sure that you’re successful with this!

The first bonus I offer is a downloadable Real Foods Wellness Journal. I designed and use it myself, and you can’t get it anywhere else.  I think it’s super helpful when you’re trying to change your diet. It is a daily journal and it has space to record what you ate and drank throughout the day, and what kind of exercise you got, and how much. It also has space to rate and record how you felt — all over — during the day.

This last part is something a bit different from most journals — and it’s really important, as some of the changes you experience may not be instantaneous. For example, after following your new plan for a month, your skin may look better than ever, or you may no longer feel a mid-afternoon energy slump. Keeping a journal like this really helps you notice and track your progress with these longer-term changes! Even more importantly — it’s almost essential for identifying those particular foods which aren’t right for you.  I think you’ll really like it.

The second bonus I offer is a 30-minute one-on-one phone consultation with me, to get you started off on the right foot. I can walk you through the diet you selected, answer questions you may have, guide you in using your new Wellness Journal, and help you get your kitchen and shopping list ready to support you on your new plan.

And a few other important things…

Each of these products is sold through ClickBank.  They host and sell downloadable products for all kinds of merchants, and they are very good at what they do.  All products sold through ClickBank offer a 60 day money-back guarantee, which is backed by ClickBank.  If you’re not happy, you are completely protected.  I have never had a problem with any ClickBank transaction, and I’m confident that you won’t either.

To get your bonuses, you’ll just need to send me your ClickBank order number.  You’ll see it on your receipt, and you can send it from the contact page.

If you’re wondering…yes — I do get a commission from the sale of these products.  And, no — I don’t recommend things that I don’t really believe in just to try to get your money.  Bad karma!  You can read more about my philosophy on this on my disclosure page.

Option 2. Get a little more support.

Sometimes it helps to get a little bit more encouragement and advice. This is so important…a little bit of help can mean the difference between success and failure.

I’m not a doctor…or a nutrition expert…I can’t offer you medical advice, and I’m not a personal trainer.  What I can offer you is my own experience with putting this into practice in my own life and getting great results.  I can help you figure out the tricky parts, give you some extra motivation and accountability, help you set some goals…and provide a bit of hand-holding as you get started.

We will schedule one 30 minute phone consultation per week, and you’ll have my private email for questions and support.  I can provide this for a rate of $45 a week, and you can cancel anytime you like.

I won’t be able to offer this for long (there’s only one of me!) — so please contact me soon if you’re interested.

Option 3. Learn a little more first.

Not quite ready to take a big first step? That’s OK.

A good option for you would be to start with a book or DVD…then come back and get started.  You can find some recommendations on the best ones to start with here.

You can also just take some time to explore my blog and website here.

Also — you’re on my mailing list, and I’ll be in touch occasionally.  When you’re ready to take another step, I’ll be here to support you!

Eat well and be well –