Beauty is a health marker. Watch for your body signs. Forget cosmetics, plastic surgeries, or other. It’s smarter to have health than try to cover up the effects of ill physiology. It takes less time, costs less money, and you will never get embarrassed by a failing beauty prop.
Health talks. It communicates via body proportions, skin quality, nail or hair condition. Interestingly we are all unhappy about our appearance. Weight loss supplements fly of the shelves, blemish covering makeups are selling like hot cakes, and nail and hair strengthening products are in nearly everyone’s cabinet. What does the booming cosmetic industry tell us about our poor health?
.
Common body signs to watch for
Here are nine areas that may make you ponder about yourself:
1. Protruding belly
No surprise here. Over half of us carries this body sign. Too bad, because stomach bloat is neither healthy, functional, nor pretty. Obesity is a major marker for poor health. It increases the risk for insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, fatty liver, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, cardiovascular disease, stroke, sleep apnea, gallbladder disease, gout, and osteoarthritis. Where does a large stomach come from? Despite popular notions circulating on the internet stomach bloat seldom comes from “large genes”, “stubborn thyroid”, or “chronic disease”. A protruding mid-section usually come from a malfunctioning digestive system that follows years of poor-quality diet.
What to do:
A change of diet is a must. If you are stuck on a slimming menu that does not seem to be slimming you down, forget it. If you are “eating healthy” or eating according to your doctor’s or nutritionist’s advice and nothing is happening, question it. Healthy diets are slimming diets. If you are not slimming down effortlessly, you are not eating a healthy diet. Period. If you want to start your health and beauty journey in the right direction, book a consultation.
2. Cellulite
Those ugly bumps on the tights aren’t so much from your grandma, as they are from a poor lifestyle. Cellulite is linked to processed foods, sedentary lifestyle, smoking, and estrogen use[i]. Regardless or the details, cellulite is a sign of poor microcirculation.
What to do:
Don’t bother with cellulite creams. You will be throwing away a plastic bottle into the environment only to realize that it did not give you the legs you wanted. There is a better, more environmentally-friendly solution: ditch processed foods and embrace exercise. Once the microcirculation improves your legs will pay you back in full beauty.
3. Dry skin
America is gobbling up moisturizers as if the dry-skin gene infected the entire country. Rough hands, flaky skin, cracked heels… dryness has many faces. Dryness makes skin less functional, more prone to rashes, infections, and sunburn. Dry skin makes a person look old. But despite the popular belief, dry exterior is seldom due to lack of water. It is more due to lack of micronutrients like vitamin A, D, or zinc and lack of moisture-retaining fats in the diet.
What to do:
Don’t bother with the frequently useless “drink more water” advice. Focus more on avoiding processed foods especially those containing vegetable oils. Notice that people who eat high carb diet and fry their foods in vegetable oil have the worst cases of dry skin, including cracked and bleeding heels. Yet, those who have the best skin and use no moisturizers despite advanced age, eat a lot of raw animal fats such as butter, egg yolks, and raw dairy products. Look at your diet. See whether you can make it skin-friendly.
4. Fungus on toes
Humans need shelter and food to survive, but we are not unique. No virus, bacteria or fungus can live in hostile environment without access to nutrients. Athlete’s foot is not just an infection. It is a sign that the toe presents a fertile soil for fungal proliferation. Toes that have the hardest time with eradication of fungus have the most fungus-friendly environment: moisture, sugar, and alkaline pH.
What to do:
Expose feet to air as frequently as possible. This will dry off the moisture. Go on blood-glucose minimizing diet like low-carb, keto, or carnivore. Reduce your skin pH by rubbing non-filtered, non-pasteurized apple cider vinegar on the skin. Fungus can’t live in acid pH, neither in a dry and sugar-devoid area. Recurrent fungus has nothing to do with bad luck. It has a lot to do with having a fungus-loving environment.
5. Skin tags
Those necklace-entangling little growths can be pain in the arse, but despite a common belief they are not a job for a cosmetician. They are a job for a nutritionist. Skin tags appear frequently in obese and those with insulin resistance.[ii] Anecdotally I heard, they can fall off on their own when the physiology is brought back to its healthy homeostasis, but for that weight loss needs to happen, blood sugar and insulin has to be brought into balance.
What to do:
Focus on weight loss, but don’t go on low-cal or sugary smoothie BS. The weight loss should come from eating low glycemic index foods, or eating a low-carb real-food menu. In the meantime, avoid necklaces. They can irritate the skin tags and make them grow even further.
6. Liver spots
Don’t blame the sun or age for the brown discoloration, but rather your body’s low antioxidant capacity. Those random brown patches on the back of hands or head, also called age spots, appear due to accumulation of lipofuscin. Lipofuscin is a pigment that forms due to excessive oxidation of proteins and fats. Liver spots don’t just appear on the skin. They also accumulate in the liver, heart, nervous system, kidneys, and the eyes. Appearance of lipofuscin suggests excessive wear and tear of the tissue. For example, lipofuscin is strongly related to macular degeneration, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s or COPD.
What to do:
Consider increasing antioxidants or antioxidant precursors in the diet as well as investing in a few antioxidant supplements. Vitamin E and L-carnitine can slow down the progression of the age spots. However, the best prevention may be to focus on boosting liver antioxidant capacity. How can you accomplish that? Eat a good diet, lose weight, and focus on improving gut flora. After all, everything that happens in the gut, goes into the liver for processing. Oh, and eat quality meat. It is abundant in carnitine, the youthing booster.
7. Thinning hair
Hair loss is a big deal. Over half of us will experience some kind of hair loss by the time we get to middle age. But not all hair loss is genetic. Many types of hair loss have been linked to failing health. Hair loss can be caused by insulin resistance, prostate inflammation, hormonal insufficiency, autoimmune disease and heart condition. Many prescription medications including for high blood pressure, cancer, arthritis, and depression can also thin the mane.
What to do:
Before you sign up for a laser treatment know that there may be better solutions. First, lose a few pounds if you have excess, drop high glycemic index foods to prevent blood sugar swings, and add more cholesterol into your diet to prop up hormone production. Avoid falling into a trap of veganism. Low protein or low-quality protein diets are is the fastest way to hair loss.
8. Puffy face
Getting fatter on the face? Maybe it is nothing, or maybe it is yet another of those unhealthy body signs. Chronic inflammation causes systemic water retention and that means your entire body, including the face will look extra “thick”. Bags under the eyes, double chin, and sagging cheek jowls all look larger when filled with water. Forget anti-aging creams, cosmetic surgeries, and diuretics. There are better ways.
What to do:
Target inflammation and gut health, not facial treatment. Say no to junk, no to grains, no to legumes, and possibly no to all polysaccharides. A chronically inflamed person can lose ten pounds of water in a matter of few days after having adopted a non-inflammatory, non-irritating to the gut diet. If that happens to you, treat it as a sign that your body has been in a chronically inflamed state for quite some time and you should continue the non-inflammatory diet for several months or even a year to bring your face to full glory. Self-sculpting is cheap and exciting. Every morning your mirror may hold a nice little surprise for you. Watch for it!
9. Grey hair
Grey hair is not just a privilege of the old. It is an important body sign. Graying is linked to oxidative stress. Hair that hasn’t changed the color out of spite. It re-grew white from oxidative stress. Grey hair is far more frequent in people who are under stress as well as those who are malnourished. Lack of vitamin B12, B6, D, E, magnesium, zinc, copper, and L-methonine can all contribute to it.
What to do:
Definitely ditch processed foods. Processing and storage dramatically reduce nutrients. Eat more animal foods. L-methonine is abundant in animal, but not in plant proteins. Animal foods have higher bioavailability of zinc and vitamin B12. Eat fatty dairy. It is a great source of vitamin D and E. Go sunbathe. Sunshine will help you boost vitamin D.
10. Five rules to follow to improve body health signs
Let’s not make it too complicated. Sure, eat that, avoid that, use this, ditch that… who can remember all those rules? So, lets uncomplicate. Good health is simple. Believe it or not, it only needs five ingredients. Do you know what these are?
.
Be well. Stay beautiful. Fix your unwanted body signs.
.
.
