Nutrition

Nutrition – April 12, 2021

The Sceptic's Guide to Adaptogens

Having spent years and years of our lives on a meandering journey through health has done one thing for sure: turned us into sceptics. We’ve gone from being immediately impressed with certain “cures” and “instant fixes” to our eyebrows rising all the way UP at the mention of supplements, treatments and magic pills. It’s ironic for a supplement brand, we know. But we would rather be in the business of being honest and share what we learn along the way, than over-promise and under deliver. And that’s how we arrive at today’s topic of discussion: ADAPTOGENS. And how we went from curious to sceptical to convinced with more and more research. Buckle up, awaken your inner nerd and get ready to dive right in. Okay, what are adaptogens? Adaptogens are herbal or plant-based pharmaceuticals known to combat the effects of stress in the body. Like the name suggests, adaptogens ‘adapt’ to your body’s current state, notice an imbalance or gaps in your body’s way of functioning optimally and fill those gaps. More on this in a bit. First, a quick and interesting history fact to show you that adaptogens aren’t really a product of modern imagination. The medicinal use of adaptogens go as far 3000 BCE, to the early days of Ayurveda in India and traditional medicine in China. Adaptogens continue to gain prominence among the Greeks, the Vikings and the Khanty people of Western Siberia till 1100 CE, until we arrive in 1948, in a post-World War Russia, where Soviet scientists begin researching certain herbs in search of the perfect solution to help pilots combat stress and fly better, faster and for longer periods of time and thus coining the term ‘adaptogens’. Eventually, research continued well into the 2000s, with more and more studies proving their effectiveness. Woah! Sounds cool. How do they work? Adaptogens function at a molecular level by bringing about a state of balance in hypothalamic, pituitary and adrenal glands aka the HPA Axis aka the glands involved in stress response. You can think of adaptogens as “stress hackers”. What does this mean? Observe the cycle your body goes through when you’re under stress. First you’re alarmed, then you’re in a state of resistance i.e. your body is increasing your ability to focus and tackle the situation effectively, and finally, it all ends in a wave of exhaustion. The sweet spot in the stress cycle is the one in the middle – where your focus is sharper, your senses are alert and all your concentration is on the issue at hand. Adaptogens enter and do the work of assisting your body in staying in that sweet spot for longer. They help us ride the wave longer and slowly ease into the next phase, rather than dramatically crash and burn. Why is this important? Get ready to travel back in time again. This time, all the way to the Stone Age. Our ancestors hunted other preys and predators. And a fight or flight response was especially important for survival in the wild. And as dramatic as the implications were, life was really simple back then: eat, sleep, hunt, repeat. So, the function of hormones like adrenaline and cortisol was quite controlled. Now flash forward to current life. We’re under some kind of pressure ALL. THE. TIME. Be it that deadline at work, running out of toilet paper, surviving capitalism or personal drama. We’re pretty much in a fight or flight mode all day. The result? You spend more time in the alarm phase and the phase of exhaustion – this could also solve the mystery of why you feel tired all the time, even after getting 8 hours of sleep. Cortisol is basically having an unchaperoned party in your body. And you need the party police i.e. Adaptogens to rein it in because: Too much Cortisol is one of the main culprits of weight gain, especially in the belly area. It affects your gut health, which in turn affects your body’s digestion. During stress response, cortisol aids in moving blood flow towards your brain, large muscles and limbs because your brain thinks you are in mortal peril, thus suppressing digestive functions. This is why someone who is always stressed has digestion issues like constipation, gas, bloating, acidity. It won’t matter if you’re “eating right” if your body isn’t getting the chance to absorb these nutrients. And this in turns leads to nutritional deficiencies. Remember – after the high of stress comes the crash of fatigue. Being in a constant state of stress means you’re in a constant state of fatigue too. Too much cortisol sets off a domino effect of damage to immunity, hormonal balance, cognitive function and our internal clock. And adaptogens help how exactly? Like we mentioned earlier, adaptogens increase your body’s resistance to a stressor, thereby giving you ample time to slowly ease back to normal rather than crash straight into fatigue. It fills in the gaps in your system, and empowers you to soldier on until you reach a state of equilibrium. That’s not all, some adaptogens can even help us ‘adapt’ to stress and cope with it better. When your body is equipped to cope with stress, you automatically perform better, and are less prone to be stressed out easily, thus preserving your body’s stress response for far graver situations and limiting those cortisol parties in your body. Directly, adaptogens help you calm down, improve your focus, energise you and create a state of balance between your internal and external environments. Indirectly, it helps improve your sleep cycle, gut health, immunity, hormonal balance, chronic pain and other stress-related issues. Woah! Where do I find some? Some Indian adaptogenic herbs are: Holy Basil, Schisandra, Shilajit, Shatavari, Ashwagandha and even turmeric. In addition, herbs like ginseng, rhodiola, astralagus, goji berries, mushrooms like Reishi and Cordyceps are also known to have adaptogenic properties. The ancient Chinese went on expeditions to Siberia to find these adaptogenic herbs. The good news is, you have to do no such thing. You will find most of the abovementioned adaptogens in most of our mixes! But the key takeaway we want you to have from this long read isn’t that we are your go-to place for adaptogens (which, we are). It’s this: Your body’s primary job is to keep you alive. It cannot tell the difference between the stress of a deadline or actual danger to life. So when you stress out at even the smallest of inconveniences, it won’t know! And thus, being mindful of our response to these stimuli is essential to overall health and well-being. You can find adaptogens in our mixes like Stress Me Not, All Day Energy, Sleep Like a Baby, and What Women Want. And if you’re wondering where we got all this info from, check out these studies: https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8247/3/1/188 https://www.healthline.com/health/cortisol-urine#uses https://www.healthline.com/health/biological-rhythms#risk-factors https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3991026/ https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329007729_A_preliminary_review_of_studies_on_adaptogens_comparison_of_their_bioactivity_in_TCM_with_that_of_ginseng-like_herbs_used_worldwide https://bmccomplementmedtherapies.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1472-6882-12-70 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S037887410800216X?via%3Dihub https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/astragalus

Nutrition – April 08, 2021

Addition Diets vs Subtraction Diets: A Game Changing Approach to Nutrition

We may not consider ourselves math geniuses, but when it comes to nutrition, we do understand one equation entirely too well: Addition Diet > Subtraction Diet Say what now? You read it right. It is exactly what it says. From skin concerns to sleep concerns to weight concerns, for as long as we can remember, the solution always boiled down to one thing: “cut ____ out of your diet”. But no matter how hard we tried, we always ended up back to square one, always burdened by guilt and disappointment. Turns out, it’s not just about will-power or self-control. It’s human nature. Say 'yes' to more natural ingredientsWhen you’re approaching nutrition from a perspective of foods you CAN’T EAT, you’re falling prey to a mindset where now you’re constantly thinking about these “forbidden foods” (and this is only natural), as opposed to focusing on meeting your daily nutrition goals. The result? You manage to stick to this for a week, maybe two weeks, and then just like that, you find yourself binge eating and back to square one. ‘Addition diet’, as the name suggests, focuses on adding more foods to your everyday diet, while keeping everything else you eat as it is. In essence, it’s a simple shift in perspective. Instead of approaching your nutrition from a scarcity and deprivation mindset, you approach your nutrition from a wholesome, filling mindset. It’s not only a more positive way of looking at eating, but also a more sustainable one. How come?First off, you’re not depriving yourself of the foods you enjoy. You’re just reorganizing your plate a little bit. And because you’re not depriving yourself of what you like, you don’t feel like you’re being punished, which automatically keeps you from the slippery slope of binge eating and the guilt and negative self-talk that follows. For our optimal health, we are expected to rein in on certain junk food habits of course. But you don’t have to give up on enjoying life through food. Okay, but how to go about an Addition Diet? We’re glad you asked. We’ll give you some actionable steps to set you on your path of wholesome, joyful nourishment without any of the guilt and negativity. When Cosmix started, it began with an intention of making ourselves and everyone around us fall in love with the concept of nutrition, nourishing our bodies and taking care of our health without making it a constant battle with the self. We realised that in the whole process of subtraction, we could be depriving our bodies of essential micronutrients that play such an important role in our physical, physiological and mental well-being. Here’s how you can ADD foods, especially micronutrients to your daily diet. Track what you eatSpend anywhere between 5 to 7 days doing nothing but making a note of EVERY SINGLE THING you eat. It’s okay. No one else has to see this, except yourself. So be honest and don’t hold back. We’re just tracking what we eat, nothing else. Fortunately for you, there’s apps that can actually help with this! Observe the findingsNow, simply observe your food patterns and understand where you can make improvements. What to add?When it comes to micronutrients, there are nearly 30 vitamins and minerals your body cannot manufacture, and need from the outside. Here’s some of these vitamins and minerals and how you can add them to your diet: Vitamin A: carrots, cantaloupe, mango, papaya red peppers Vitamin B6: Bananas, potatoes with skin Vitamin C: Guava, oranges, kiwi, strawberries, pineapple, cauliflower, broccoli Vitamin E: Nuts and seeds, avocado, Micro-minerals (calcium, phosphorus, sodium, potassium, magnesium): milk, yoghurt, beans, spinach, oats, bananas, tomatoes, regular & sweet potatoes, beans, pumpkin, tofu, brazil nut, peanuts, cashews, almonds Trace minerals (iron, manganese, zinc, copper and selenium): spinach, peanuts, cashews General guiding principles of an Addition Diet Processed foods are engineered to get us addicted to them, so naturally when you set out to eliminate them out of your diet completely, you are going to struggle. Addition diet’s role is to fill you up such that you don’t rely on these as much as you would. And occasionally even enjoy these “junk foods” without feeling too bad about it. The key thought behind an addition diet is that by adding high-quality sources of nutrients to your diet, you are automatically reducing room for anything that doesn’t add value to your health. Make proteins and fibre the starting point/building blocks of your diet. And add healthy fats and carbohydrates to this, as you need. Eat only as much as your body requires, according to your activity level. And as much as you can, choose foods derived from nature and those that are minimally processed. When it comes to nutrition, it’s what you do MOST OF THE TIMES that makes a difference, not what you do occasionally. So focus on an addition diet on a daily basis consistently, and the rest will effortlessly fall into place. Did this make sense to you? Are you going to practice adding nutrients to your diet rather than subtracting? If yes, we’d love to hear how! Drop a comment and share your thoughts!

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