Colostrum is the first milk produced by the mother following the birth of a child.  It is loaded with all sorts of immune and growth factors that in the baby help condition the gastrointestinal tract and give it the immune protection it needs until its own immune system is up and running.  In the adult, colostrum helps heal the gut, which is crucial to our health and well-being.  Many, perhaps most, diseases and illnesses enter out bodies through the gut.  They are able to do this because of the damage we do to the gut lining by things like drinking alcohol, coffee and sodas, smoking, taking NSAIDs and aspirin for pain, poor diet and the like.  Our gut lining is also damaged by environmental toxins in the water we drink and the food we eat.  A healthy gut lining keeps out toxins and disease-causing organisms, but a damaged gut lining can allow these through due to increased permeability. 

Colostrum has been proven to heal these injuries and restore the permeability back to where it should be.  It promotes the growth of beneficial bacteria while killing harmful bacteria, like H. pylori (a major cause of ulcers) and fungus, like Candida.  The immune components of colostrum also helps protect us against pathogenic bacteria and viruses.  Taking colostrum regularly as a nutritional supplement keeps us healthy and prevents colds and flu before they can take root.  “

To read the entire article, click HERE.

Our family has been taking bovine colostrum daily in order to optimally support our immune systems (along with not eating sugar/grains).  It can be purchases online or in a health food store. My kids don’t LOVE it, but two-year old will down a whole capsule with a spoonful of coconut oil and a splash of raw honey).  My four-year-old will drink it mixed into a smoothie or green drink.  If you’re really fortunate, you can find a farm that will sell you real live colostrum! We’ve gotten that before from our goat farm, and then cultured it—talk about a superfood!

For those of you who love to read scientific studies (or if you don’t believe me), you can find A LOT of studies (I stopped counting after 38; and I wasn’t even halfway down the page) HERE.

Stay safe and healthy!

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1) Cut out sugar.  The only exception I allow is a little bit of honey every so often in baking.  Sugar is so addictive and harmful, and one of the many disastrous effects of sugar is that it suppresses the immune system.  Ever notice how everyone starts getting sick after Halloween and around Christmastime?  I’m sure the glut of sweets doesn’t help things, if it doesn’t cause them altogether.  What you can do now is to start to wean yourself off refined sugar (and all refined carbs, since they metabolically become sugar in your bloodstream) by ditching sodas, boxed cereals, cookies, cakes, “fruit snax”, candy, and fruit cocktails. For 75 other good reasons to cut out sugar, check out this article by Nancy Appleton, CN. 

2) Eat probiotic-rich foods such as lacto-fermented sauerkraut, pickles, homemade yogurt, kefir, or kombucha. (Check out my resources page for great starters to affordably make your own) The beneficial bacteria populate your gut, improve your digestion and thus increase mineral absorbtion which in turn better feeds and fortifies your cells to fight against disease. I like the way James Elsen explains it here:

“….these healthy bacteria are vital
for healthy life. They make vitamins, they digest food, they make
antibiotic substances to keep down pathogens and they function as our
immune system.”

His entire article is fasinating, as he expounds on the healing nature of the GAPS diet (for which more info can be found here), which is the diet we have used to help heal our daughter.

3) Eat more good-quality fat. Butter from grass-fed cows, pastured lard and tallow, as well as coconut oil are all excellent choices. Saturated fat from animals (not hydrogenated vegetable oils!) are actually in composition the most like human body fat, thus the body is best able to convert these fats into energy (read: effeciant fuel, meaning your cells have what they need to fight disease!).  Coconut oil, especially, is essential for boosting the immune system due to its chemical makeup:

“Short and medium chain fatty acids contained in virgin coconut oil such as Caprylic (C8), Capric (C10) and Lauric (C12) have been found to have strong anti-viral, anti-bacterial and anti-protozoal properties and are essential building blocks in boosting the bodies immune system. The essential fatty acids in coconut oil have been shown to be active in combating Candida Albicans. Furthermore, the digested form of lauric acid, monolaurin, has been shown to be active against lipid-coated viruses and has shown to be a successful resource for the reduction of the viral load in HIV patients” Source

For more info on how to obtain good quality animal fats and coconut oil, check out my resources page.

4) Take your cod liver oil! Or, as my kids call it: “Fishy oil”.  Yes, just like grandma used to do! Cod liver oil, especially the fermented variety, which can only be purchased online at this time (go here to order), is worth every penny due to its many, many benefits, which I explain in more depth here.

5) Eat a produce-dominated diet such as the one outlined in The Garden Of Eating: A Produce-dominated Diet & Cookbook
.  Chef Rachel, whose awesome blog is worth reading, suggests that each meal contain about 75% produce, with the rest being fat and protein from good quality animal products. Produce is rich in antioxidants, which even WebMD asserts are good for boosting immunity!  Here’s my review on The Garden of Eating Diet. It can be purchased directly from their website or through Amazon, but I hear you’ll get it much faster if purchased through their site.

 For more extensive information on this topic, you can read what Kevin Trudeau,  author of Natural Cures They Don’t Want You to Know About has to say about Swine Flu and Mass Vaccinations over at Kim’s Natural Cures Blog Carnival!

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