A Little Science Lesson for You! :)

There is a reason I chose to teach Social Studies and not science.  I am clueless about it! LOL  But, over the last year, i've learned quite a bit about our bodies and what they need to run correctly.  Especially in terms of heart health.

Nitric Oxide is what the body uses to dilate the vessels of the body.  Dilated=open=blood can freely and quickly move around the body, doing all the things that blood is supposed to do.  Nitric oxide is created by the body naturally, using something called endothelial cells.

If your body cannot open it's vessels, blood flow isn't there, and that is where we experience the heart attacks and episodes.  No blood flow to the heart=death of heart tissue.  Studies suggest that meat/dairy play a huge part in the destruction and death of these cells.  A plant-based diet, on the other hand,  can help restore these cells!  I find this amazing...talk about foods that heal!

For Kyle, he spent about about 4 days in the hospital last summer with something called a "nitro-patch" on his chest.  Because his body doesn't create enough nitric oxide, his heart has the tendency to try to clamp shut and not dilate.  This is what caused the chest pain/angina last year. The patch contains a medicine version of nitric oxide.  You can also take it in pill form, as well as an "under the tongue" spray.  All 3 did the same thing=give him HORRIBLE headaches from the dilation of the vessels.  (As someone who has had to start/stop blood pressure medicine, it can be miserable to take any med that affects your blood vessels)

After being released from the hospital, we went to Walgreen's where we turned in the RX for two nitro meds (pill and spray).  Went home, where Kyle took the first one and was immediately hit with a headache from hell.  After one pill, he decided that this was not going to work.  There was no way he could function like that!  So-many hours of research and reading began, and we decided to try a "natural" method to increase his nitric oxide intake.  It turns out that grean, leafy vegetables are nature's own source of nitric oxide!  The fresh vegetables that we rarely ate could be the very thing that would keep his vessel's open, and blood flowing smoothly!

Now-we know how hard it is to get veggies in, much less fresh, raw veggies that are full of the nutrients that could help him.  That is where juicing came in for us.  Juicing is an easy way to get LOTS of veggies in, without having to eat pound after pound of produce.  And-because it is processed (kind of like your food being chewed up for you LOL), it can immediately get into your blood stream and go to work.  Of course, we are learning to eat and cook differently, and actually enjoy many of the foods we used to turn our noses up at.  (Kale, anyone?)  For us, it truly came to the point where we needed to "Eat to Live, not Live to Eat".

Part of our reading was finding foods that packed more punch in terms of heart health.  We had to read bits and pieces of different websites to find  out which foods were good, great, and best for us.  Today I began reading a website, and found this nice little chart!  Where was this thing one year ago?! LOL  I definitely will be referring back to it while we meal plan, so that I can make sure we are getting in foods high in the nitric oxide.

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