July's Challenge Is....?

Welcome to July! I always love July, long days, cooling in the evenings to be out playing, local fruits and veggies come into season, some of these are my favorites, the 4th of July, I love my country and celebrating the many wonderful freedoms we have here in the Great U.S.A. and mostly because it is the month of my wedding anniversary, awwww.

With all that fun stuff, I have an exciting challenged planned for you this month, eliminating sugar! It
will be a lot of fun, I promise.

The sugar I am challenging you to eliminate is not natural sugars, like fruit, veggies, good honey. No, I want you to eliminate processed sugars, man-made sugars. Those sugars that cause major problems in our bodies, like inflammation, weight gain, diabetes, heart problems and many others. We have five weeks to eliminate different types of sugars, with some you might not realize I am going to ask you to give up, for at least a week. Take note of how you feel, your energy levels, you rmood, sleeping patterns, today, write them down. Then, at the end of the month go back and see what has changed.

This week, we will start big, night as well, go big or go home is one of my motto's! To start us off, lets eliminate high fructose corn syrup. In the link provided, I have two videos talking about how bad this stuff really is for us. The first is apparently no longer available, sorry. The second one is jam packed with great information. Watch it! You might need to watch it several times to understand, that is just fine. To keep it all in my head, I have watched it multiple times along with the one from Dr. Lustig he mentions. I will link it again at the bottom.
I am sure most of us know HFCS is bad for us. But, did you know:

• It is linked to obesity.
• Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Syndrome, people have to have liver transplants due to this, who have never drank!
• High blood pressure
• Heart Disease 
• Gout
• Diabetes 
• Resistance to many hormones 
• And the list goes on the more we learn

This stuff is in everything! I mean everything, sport drinks, soda, bread, cereal, just about anything you buy on the shelf. This is going to require you to read every label. I know it is going to be difficult, but I promise you it is worth it. Your liver will thank you.

Your steps for this week are:

1. Write down how you are feeling, mood, sleep, fatigue, high blood pressure, anything you notice
2. Watch the video as many times as you need.
3. Read every label when you are shopping
4. Eliminate this toxin

Good luck! This will be one of the best decisions you have made for your health.
Saving the world one stick of butter at a time.
God bless,
Jenn