Ivy's Holistic Health

https://youtube.com/shorts/LzYDAs4sCM4?si=FFDFCOV3_yG9nNTs

This will change how you look at your life. Most people create stories around their experiences that are not rooted in the truth.

I've been surprisingly under the weather the past few days. Today I had a client friend who was in worse shape.
So I spent the day preparing myself to give him the very best remote session. (Sometimes when we feel under the weather, we surrender more easily to the true Healer anyway.)
I set myself up with nature's green above and below, with many different birds singing and arriving at different points during the session, the sun sparkling and some helpful tools to keep my body going in conjunction with my strong intention.

It was an awesome session. His words.😊

I'm grateful to get to do this. Grateful to have learned modalities such as the Total Knowledge Technique that can also incorporate everything I've learned prior. Grateful for people who can sense our connection beyond physical presence and who have trust and faith and experience that moves them to KNOW rather than simply believe. Grateful for knowing the Power that made the body, heals the body. Grateful for that Presence, all ways.
😇

https://youtu.be/fMZqgebohu8

How to Prepare for Better Sleep by Dr. Nancy Lonsdorf -- Maharishi Ayurveda Hi, I am Nancy Lonsdorf. I am an Integrative Medical Doctor, meaning that I combine the best of western medicine with natural approaches. Particularly, I us...

"Drink water from the spring where the horse drinks. A horse will never drink bad water.
Make your bed where the cat sleeps.
Eat the fruit that was touched by the worm. Freely pick the mushrooms on which the insects sit. Plant your tree where the mole digs.
Build your house where the snake suns itself.
Dig your well where the birds build their nests in hot weather. Go to sleep and wake up with the chickens and you will reap the golden grain of the day.
Eat more green vegetables, and you will have strong legs and an enduring heart. Swim more often and you will feel on land like a fish in the water.
Look at the skies more often and not at your feet, and your thoughts will be clear and light.
Keep silent more often, speak less, and silence will reign in your soul, and your spirit will be calm and peaceful.”

Valuable reminder.

https://www.facebook.com/sacred.dreams/photos/a.222455371240219/1121658627986551/?type=3&sfnsn=mo&mibextid=6aamW6

The average length of a hug between two people is 3 seconds. But the researchers have discovered something fantastic. When a hug lasts 20 seconds, there is a therapeutic effect on the body and mind. The reason is that a sincere embrace produces a hormone called "oxytocin", also known as the love hormone. This substance has many benefits in our physical and mental health, helps us, among other things, to relax, to feel safe and calm our fears and anxiety. This wonderful tranquilizer is offered free of charge every time we have a person in our arms, who cradled a child, who cherish a dog or a cat, that we are dancing with our partner, the closer we get to someone or simply hold the Shoulders of a friend.

A famous quote by psychotherapist Virginia Satir goes, “We need 4 hugs a day for survival. We need 8 hugs a day for maintenance. We need 12 hugs a day for growth.” Whether those exact numbers have been scientifically proven remains to be seen, but there is a great deal of scientific evidence related to the importance of hugs and physical contact. Here are some reasons why we should hug::

1. STIMULATES OXYTOCIN

Oxytocin is a neurotransmitter that acts on the limbic system, the brain’s emotional centre, promoting feelings of contentment, reducing anxiety and stress, and even making mammals monogamous. It is the hormone responsible for us all being here today. You see this little gem is released during childbirth, making our mothers forget about all of the excruciating pain they endured expelling us from their bodies and making them want to still love and spend time with us. New research from the University of California suggests that it has a similarly civilising effect on human males, making them more affectionate and better at forming relationships and social bonding. And it dramatically increased the libido and sexual performance of test subjects. When we hug someone, oxytocin is released into our bodies by our pituitary gland, lowering both our heart rates and our cortisol levels. Cortisol is the hormone responsible for stress, high blood pressure, and heart disease.

2. CULTIVATES PATIENCE

Connections are fostered when people take the time to appreciate and acknowledge one another. A hug is one of the easiest ways to show appreciation and acknowledgement of another person. The world is a busy, hustle-bustle place and we’re constantly rushing to the next task. By slowing down and taking a moment to offer sincere hugs throughout the day, we’re benefiting ourselves, others, and cultivating better patience within ourselves.

3. PREVENTS DISEASE

Affection also has a direct response on the reduction of stress which prevents many diseases. The Touch Research Institute at the University of Miami School of Medicine says it has carried out more than 100 studies into touch and found evidence of significant effects, including faster growth in premature babies, reduced pain, decreased autoimmune disease symptoms, lowered glucose levels in children with diabetes, and improved immune systems in people with cancer.

4. STIMULATES THYMUS GLAND

Hugs strengthen the immune system. The gentle pressure on the sternum and the emotional charge this creates activates the Solar Plexus Chakra. This stimulates the thymus gland, which regulates and balances the body’s production of white blood cells, which keep you healthy and disease free.

5. COMMUNICATION WITHOUT SAYING A WORD

Almost 70 percent of communication is nonverbal. The interpretation of body language can be based on a single gesture and hugging is an excellent method of expressing yourself nonverbally to another human being or animal. Not only can they feel the love and care in your embrace, but they can actually be receptive enough to pay it forward to others based on your initiative alone.

6. SELF-ESTEEM

Hugging boosts self-esteem, especially in children. The tactile sense is all-important in infants. A baby recognizes its parents initially by touch. From the time we’re born our family’s touch shows us that we’re loved and special. The associations of self-worth and tactile sensations from our early years are still imbedded in our nervous system as adults. The cuddles we received from our Mom and Dad while growing up remain imprinted at a cellular level, and hugs remind us at a somatic level of that. Hugs, therefore, connect us to our ability to self love.

7. STIMULATES DOPAMINE

Everything everyone does involves protecting and triggering dopamine flow. Low dopamine levels play a role in the neurodegenerative disease Parkinson’s as well as mood disorders such as depression. Dopamine is responsible for giving us that feel-good feeling, and it’s also responsible for motivation! Hugs stimulate brains to release dopamine, the pleasure hormone. Dopamine sensors are the areas that many stimulating drugs such as co***ne and methamphetamine target. The presence of a certain kinds of dopamine receptors are also associated with sensation-seeking.

8. STIMULATES SEROTONIN

Reaching out and hugging releases endorphins and serotonin into the blood vessels and the released endorphins and serotonin cause pleasure and negate pain and sadness and decrease the chances of getting heart problems, helps fight excess weight and prolongs life. Even the cuddling of pets has a soothing effect that reduces the stress levels. Hugging for an extended time lifts one’s serotonin levels, elevating mood and creating happiness.

9. PARASYMPATHETIC BALANCE

Hugs balance out the nervous system. The skin contains a network of tiny, egg-shaped pressure centres called Pacinian corpuscles that can sense touch and which are in contact with the brain through the vagus nerve. The galvanic skin response of someone receiving and giving a hug shows a change in skin conductance. The effect in moisture and electricity in the skin suggests a more balanced state in the nervous system – parasympathetic.
Embrace, embrace with your heart.~~

art: Dorina Costras

🙏🏽

Ivy and I hopped on a podcast together and went through about a bajillion (ok, not quite that many!) tools that you can use to set your mind in the right place to get well (along with whatever other traditional tools you may be using). Choose one that seems right for you, or try them ALL! Podcast airs Thursday at noon, link to follow....
Love, love, ~Dr. Tate

Well done. I've always loved learning how different foods and substances affect the body, and never have I found a piece that describes so specifically how alcohol affects the body.

What Alcohol Does to Your Body, Brain & Health | Huberman Lab Podcast #86 In this episode, I discuss the physiological effects that drinking alcohol has on the brain and body at different levels of consumption and over time. I also...

Sweet potatoes promote productive bacteria in the stomach, small intestine, and colon, while at the same time, they starve out unproductive bacteria and fungi such as mold. By keeping these microbes at bay, sweet potatoes help enhance the body’s production of B12.

Sweet potatoes help prevent megacolon, which is an expansion of the colon due to proliferation of C. difficile, Streptococcus, Staphylococcus, E. coli, H. pylori, Chlamydia, and/or other bacteria. Plus, they help alleviate narrowing of the intestinal tract due to the chronic inflammation that’s so commonly diagnosed as Crohn’s or colitis.

Orange-fleshed sweet potatoes are packed with carotenoids such as beta-carotene and lycopene. If you are fair and eat a sweet potato daily, before long you’ll see your skin take on a glow, as if it’s been sun-kissed. The lycopene, combined with sweet potatoes’ abundant amino acids, helps draw radiation from the body.

Sweet potatoes are phytoestrogenic and help rid the body of unusable, destructive, cancer-causing estrogen that interferes with the body’s hormone function. These estrogens come from plastics, pharmaceuticals, food, and environmental toxins, as well as from the body producing an overabundance of the hormone (due to a diet high in estrogen-producing foods). By purging this excess estrogen, sweet potatoes make room for healthier estrogens to take their place.

Sweet potatoes help regulate hair growth. And if you struggle with insomnia or another sleeping disorder, sweet potatoes provide a critical form of glucose that stimulates the development of neurotransmitters such as glycine, dopamine, GABA, and serotonin, all of which aid in the ability to sleep soundly.

How To Use:

Whether you like orange, yellow, white, pink, or purple sweet potatoes, eat up. Each type holds medicinal qualities. Steamed sweet potatoes (or in soups, stews or stir-fries) hold the most healing propertie.

Let's talk vagus nerve toxicity & bottlenecking & how to detox the vagus nerve.

The vagus nerve is likely the most valued nerve in the body. Cranial nerve [CN] X is responsible for many functions. It is the main nerve stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system.

Ideally, fluid & particles exit along the trigeminal nerve & then they intersect right behind the ear lobe on the mastoid bone & go into the your lymphatic system where they're shepherded out of the body. But sometimes, when your lymph is congested, toxins can sit too long & they can get uptaken into the nerve & cause what's known as a vagus nerve infection, where there's a small infection in the nerve, that's then sending an infection signal to the body. So when the immune system, kicks in, it does a couple of things; it immobilizes you so you have pain, like fibromyalgia, or it makes you tired, so you can rest & heal, such as chronic fatigue syndrome, or it makes you more sensitive to other things in the environment, so you avoid them & allow yourself to heal, such as multi-chemical sensitivity.

If the vagus nerve is infected or the lymph isn't really flowing, that delays the movement. Just like if you're traveling on a freeway & it went down to 2 lanes from 4 on a busy afternoon, that would create bottlenecking, just like here.

The more you can help to shepherd toxins out of your body, the more you calm the immune response & the inflammatory response. And that can be challenging, because toxins leave the cell when it's safe, when your body's in parasympathetic mode, then they travel to the lymph, then the blood, then the liver & the gallbladder, then the gut & ideally, the toilet.

Feel free to reach out to me if you would like personalized info on supporting these systems holistically. 🙏🏼

Thank you for being a part of this page this year.

Thank you for recognizing that caring for your mind and body is not a luxury but a valuable investment that appreciates with curiosity, exploration, education, vision and teamwork.

Thank you for choosing to honor your inner terrain, mentally, emotionally and physically.

Thank you for paying attention to where you are resonating and doing your best to make smart choices.

When crises have arisen for you or loved ones, thank you for finding ways to take a step, believing that the next step will be revealed, even if it's the often painful step of letting go of something or someone.🙏🏼

You are wise and capable, a radiant and loved offspring of the Creator. May this year be filled with the light of this truth and may you emerge even more centered in your wholeness and joyous creatorship.

Happy New Year, 2022💖

Ivy

Self healers and healthy connections.

If you understand trauma + the deepest need we have for connection to another person, it’s completely understandable why people stay in unhealthy or abusive relationships.

We live in a society who shames or cannot grasp why people are in these dynamics:

“Why does she stay?”

“She’s a smart girl, you’d think she’d know better”

“Why does he keep going back to her?”

The answer is simple: connection. Toxic connection is still connection. And for some of us, that is the way we’ve known connection our entire lives.

Red flags don’t look like red flags when they feel like home.

Sometimes in my comment section, a person will share something about their relationships (maybe a partner who’s controlling, who “gaslights,” or who has manipulative tendencies) + people will chime in saying ‘just leave.’

All of this comes from a good place. And often times people are actually speaking to themselves when they leave these comments— the self that has stayed in toxic relationships, or that is still coping with pain or shame of them. That self feels helpless when it sees someone else in the situation we were once in.

How do we end domestic abuse? We raise children in homes with secure attachment. With parents who have healed their own generational trauma + can provide an emotionally safe home for a children to learn relationships as: open, curious, transparent, + shame free.

Staying in abusive relationships, missing your abusive ex, or “waiting” for things to change doesn’t make you stupid. It doesn’t make you a fool. Your friends who’ve told you over + over that you need to move on, it’s understandable that you hide things from them or fully retreat from the relationships all together.

You’re getting a connection. Any connection. And childhood trauma makes it so that we seek connection that is unsafe.

We seek what we know.

We can ALL heal from the way we’ve learned relationships + seek a new, healthy way to connect to other people as we do our own work