The advice and informational content does not necessarily represent the views of mother's market and kitchen mother's recommends consulting your health professional for your personal medical condition.

Hello, I'm Kimberly King, and welcome to the mother's market radio show, a show dedicated to the Truth, Beauty and Goodness of the human condition. On today's show, we can't ignore the little aches and pains we have, and it could be a sign of inflammation, and that can lead to all other kinds of ailments, and today, we'll let you know how to help your body fight inflammation, plus later will tell you what's going on around town. And what's new at mother's market? But first up, Dr. Aaron Stokes is the Medical Director at mega food. She received her naturopathic doctor degree in 2001 from Master University, and currently practices in Boulder, Colorado. Aaron speaks around the US, educating people about health and wellness strategies to impact their lives in a positive way, and we welcome her to the mother's market radio show.

Aaron, how are you? I'm doing great, Cam, thank you so much. I'm happy to be here.

Why don't you fill our audience a little bit on your mission and what your work is, before we get to the show's topic.

I would love to thank you.

So being a naturopathic doctor, I really look at the whole person, and my personal mission is to give people the tools and the inspiration to make positive changes in their lives to improve their health and wellness. And I do that through different means, whether it's one-on-one work or a radio shows such as this... Presentations, but that's really what I'm all about. I love that, that's great. Well, today we are talking about inflammation and how we can control it, and so let's start by talking about inflammation in general and why we should be paying attention to them.

Yes, I think that's a great place to start. So we're all familiar with inflammation, whether we know it or not, there's acute inflammation when our bodies experience an injury or an infection, and our body appropriately responds, we see that we'll have redness, swelling, those are all ways that the body is trying to heal itself. However, in modern times, many aspects of our diet and our lifestyle, including stress, for example, can contribute to chronic inflammation, and we now know that chronic inflammation has been implicated as a root cause of many adverse health conditions and diseases, so it's really important to address information in fact, many practitioners and holistic medical doctors and really people, even in the mainstream medical community now acknowledge that inflammation is perhaps where many of the issues that we're dealing with start.

So looking at one of the tenants of Naturopathic Medicine, which is to always address the root cause, looking at inflammation, addressing inflammation from all different aspects is really important for help.

I love that, and I think we're right there as far as looking at that root cause, so good for you.

Are there any specific lifestyle changes we can make to favorably influence the inflammatory response?

Absolutely, there's been a lot of research around aspects of our everyday lives such as moderate exercise helps to decrease markers of inflammation, things that sound simple, but are actually really profound, getting enough sleep, and one that I like to talk about a lot, and I hope that will get into more today, is the connection between stress and inflammation. And not all stress is bad. In fact, for example, plants that are under stress have been shown to often have higher amounts of protective compounds such as antioxidants and phou tries, so it's that resiliency, and we all deal with stress every single day, and so we have to develop those resilient strategies, but when stress gets, or excuse me, out of control, then that can really lead to chronic inflammation as well, so those are a couple of the ways such as exercise and stress that we can look at in terms of lifestyle to address inflammation, there are also nutrition changes and of course, supportive botanical medicine therapies, that can be really helpful, especially in this day and age, and you're saying that rather than take a pill, go out and get exercise, so getting out the root of the problem, kind of a... Yes, I would say do all of the above. I like to look at lifestyle nutrition supplements, including the appropriate botanical medicine supplements, but don't just look at supplements, look at the whole picture because that's how you'll have the most effective result.

Very nice.

So how does nutrition affect inflammation and are there specific plant foods we should be eating... Two-part question, absolutely. nutrition plays a major role in inflammation and specifically looking at plant foods, we've all heard that we should eat a rainbow of fruits and vegetables every day, and so perhaps we can even think about the fruits and vegetables that we've had in the last 24 hours and we actually, really wanna build a rainbow and why is that? Well, the reason is because that spectrum of colors actually represents protective hint rents, the protective compounds on our founding plants, for example, berries such as cherries and blueberries, those rich sees that you see the blues, the Deep Blue, the deep breads come from anthocyanins and Anthocyanins are plant colors are basically a plant pigment, but also a plant compound that's been shown to reduce inflammation.

So one of the best things we can do is to really incorporate that wide spectrum of colors of fruits and vegetables, and we've also... Many of us have heard about the benefits of fish oil.

Well, when you look at diet, you definitely want to think about incorporating now, of course, if this is appropriate to you, some of our listeners may be vegan or vegetarian, and in which case, they would be looking at something such as nuts to fill in avocados to all of us should be looking at that.

But in addition, if fish can be a part of your diet, healthy fish oils that are found, for example, in wild salmon and sardines and cod, really, if we can incorporate those, that can make a difference as well. And if we look at aspects of, say, the Mediterranean diet and the Japanese diet, for example, we'll see some of those healthy foods that they incorporate naturally into their traditional diets, and I think that we can learn from that and move away from hydrogenated oils and processed foods and towards more of a diet that really starts with a base of a wide rieti of fruits and vegetables, but then includes healthy fats as well in different spaces. For example, turmeric is one that I would love to talk more about, and I think we will... That you can incorporate both in nutrition as well as in supplements.

Yeah, actually, I wanted to you a little bit about turmeric while we're on it.

Sure.

What are the pluses of Mark, why you're talking about it? And how can we utilize that in our daily diet?

Absolutely. So some people talk about the pronunciation of tumors because that's always a question, some people say numeric people, traumas, it's all good tomato potato. But turmeric is a plant that's been used in India in a form of medicine called IR Vedic medicine that comes to us from India for thousands of years, and like many plants, we are seeing that modern research is validating traditional historical use, and so we're really... It's fascinating to me, and I think that we're really... If you take a moment to recognize we're really honored in modern times to actually be using and utilizing all these plants that come from traditional cultures all over the world. And turmeric is definitely one of them, is just to get a visual. It looks a little bit like ginger. It's actually a cousin of ginger, okay. It looks like ginger until you open it up, and when you open it, Ginger has a yellow, pale, yellow, traumatic or turmeric has the bright orange, and that actually is attributed in large part to curcumin, which is found in turmeric, and curcumin has been the subject of hundreds if not thousands, at this point of studies that have shown beneficial effects, and what are those? Well, tuber and specifically curcumin, and I believe in the whole plant, but I think we are finding a superstar compound within this plant has been shown to impact inflammation and basically help us maintain a healthy inflammatory response, and it's quite remarkable. All of the points at which does that there's... You can look at graphs and charts that show all the different points and pathways where it makes a difference, so anything I've ever read about both of these C. Carman and numeric, because they are together and you say That superstar compound, they say cancer fighting is usually what they both come back to, and I think a lot of that may come back again to inflammation. Yes, yes.

So when you really look at the pathways and you look at the biochemistry of it, I think that it does come back to inflammation, it's just what you've described, and so how can we incorporate that in our diet with this with... Is it a supplements in the food base, so how do we incorporate that in our diet? Yes, so absolutely, you can incorporate it into your diet as well as taken as a supplement for many Americans, we may not be having traditional curries on a daily basis, perhaps in India, so uni... It can be incorporated into curries, and it's often the curry powder in the medium that it's delivered in is thought to facilitate its absorption.

Now, when you are taking tumor in a supplement form, the thing is that we found is that it generally stays in the gastrointestinal tract, so it stays in the gut unless it has a synergistic compound like black pepper, and there's specifically a form of Black called bio-paring that has been shown to help facilitate tumor into systemic into the entire body system, and for most of us, unless we are dealing with a specific specific inflammation in the GI tract, we want that whole body response, so we actually wanna make sure that it's getting into the entire system.

Wow, that's fascinating. We have a lot more information and we're talking about inflammation here with Dr. Aaron Stokes. So stay with us. We will have a lot more information. So stay with us. We'll be right back.

Thank you, thank you.

You and welcome back to the mother's market radio show. And we wanna remind you that if you missed any portion of today's show, you can always find us on iTunes by searching mother's market or download the show from our website, mother's market dot com, click the link from our radio and listen to past shows and download healthy recipes and money savings coupons, all available at mother's market dot com. And now back to our interview with Dr. Aaron Stokes, doctor, we were just talking about Emeric, the subject of a lot of research.

Yes, yes, turmeric has come to the forefront for many people, I'm happy to say that it's really gaining not just attention in research studies, but also in the general public, and inflammation in general is receiving more attention... It's been on the cover of Time magazine, for example, which to me is always a marker that it has arrived into the mainstream world. Yes, and so I'm happy about this because I think people are starting to pay attention to inflammation, and turmeric is definitely the plant that has emerged at the forefront in terms of being able to really maintain a healthy inflammatory response in the body, and I think so too so I think that's wonderful, and that is an area of research for you as well, we also have been talking about, and something I know of the... Mike, we've been talking about the impact of stress and inflammation... Let's talk about that now.

Yes, I would like to. I like to starving that all... Stress is not created equal. Yes, stress can actually propel us to do great things in life when we're under stress, we can push forward, the thing is, is that have something called the fight or flight response, and that comes from our adrenal glands, that's the epi center of our stress response, we have two adrenal glands, they sit atop each kidney, and when we are faced with a stressful event, whether it's running late for an appointment, getting stuck in traffic, financial concerns, job concerns, the list really goes on. We can create a lot of cortisol, and this is meant to protect us, so if we think about how we've come throughout the years, we need a response to protect us, and probably all the listeners out there can think of a time when maybe they had a close call, whether it was a car swerved into our lane, or you had to have a quick reflex, a quick response and your or flight response protects you... Is that it really is meant to protect us, the thing is, is that there are many people now that are living in constant fight or flight, and the way that we are designed physiologically is to respond to the proverbial face the tiger people sometimes say, fight or flight is you meet the dragon, you face the tiger, and then you recover, and then when the next stress comes, you meet that challenge, and then you recover, if you don't go into that recovery phase, you will be secreting high cortisol chronically. And when you do that, you can be at greater risk for things such as anxiety, insomnia, obesity, which tends to get people's attention, and many people go Really obesity, but we're all interconnected and there's a strong connection between high cortisol levels and the Tyrolean, for example. And a myriad of other conditions that really don't allow us to feel our best each day, and so I think for a lot of people, they're stuck in this cycle of stress and high cortisol and also high corozal leads to high levels of chronic inflammation and so when we don't have our stress in check and we don't have our stress response basically healthy, then we can't have a healthy inflammatory response, and I guess that's the bottom line, is that a healthy stress response and the healthy inflammatory response are intertwined.

That's a really fascinating to hear this side of it because you're right, with this day and age with children with jobs and then being on the Internet and constantly go, go, go and meeting deadlines. I think it's not just one person that's in that fight or flight, meeting the Tiger, I think our listeners out here are going, Oh my gosh, that's me, that's me. So I think you are speaking to a lot of listeners right now, and it's that we want to help ourselves right now early on to do something about that chronic inflammation, so what can be done, what are their herbs and that support both healthy stress and Healthy inflammation now and how... Yes, one of my favorite plants is holy Baal, and holy basal is also an IR Vedic herb, like turmeric, and they're actually complement each other very nicely, and Holy Basil is held in such high regard in India that is actually planted around temples, there really... Is that why they call it Holy holy, holy basil? And holy basil has been shown to help with a healthy stress response as well as a healthy inflammatory response, so it really works in both realms, and it's the perfect complement for this issue that we're addressing.

Wow, okay. And places that we can get this at mother's market, this is... Yes, so there is a formula called extinguish that incorporates many elements of what we've talked about today, it has the whole turmeric route, because I really believe even though we've identified curcumin as the superstar, we are often finding new plant compounds in plants are designed to work as a whole... And in synergy, so one of the things that I love about extinguish is that it has both the whole time or accrue as well as the extract that standardized to contain 95% curcumin.

Oh my goodness, so it has both. And then it includes the basil, really acknowledging that connection between stress and inflammation, and then Holy Baal has that dual approach, it's often said to uplift the spirits, and I'm sure many listeners felt that uplifting is something that we all can use, and then it includes the black pepper that we talked about earlier, that's very important for facilitating the whole body, remember talking about the whole body inflammatory response, and we wanna help maintain a healthy whole body inflammatory response because of all the reasons we talked about, all the things that inflammation can contribute to, and that we're really looking at it as a root cause of so many different diseases, so the black pepper is in there for synergistic effects to help facilitate absorption, and there's more... Because Mega food is really committed to Whole Food, and we're very committed to our farm partnerships, and so we have a food state, vitamin C, and all of our vitamins and minerals are delivered in Whole Foods while our food state vitamin C is delivered in oranges, organic oranges, from Uncle mats, some of the listeners may be familiar with Uncle mats organic oranges, and they're actually just hand-picked from his fourth generation family, organic Orange Grove in Florida in December, and then we take our vitamin C, we include and integrate our vitamin C. So that's delivered through whole food, now, the orange and the vitamin C are very important for their antioxidant and protective compounds as well, so it's really taking this multi-tiered approach, and we talked... When we were discussing nutrition, we talked about the rainbow of fruits and vegetables, and we also talked about anthocyanins that are found in berries, and you'll find some of those barriers in this formula as well, so it's very unique to find things like black cherry in inflammation formula.

A question, How would someone know they have an increased inflammation, how do they know... That's a great question. So there's a few different ways. If you go to see your healthcare practitioner, they may run a lab called CRP, and CRP stands for C-reactive protein, and it is a marker of information in the body, very widely accepted as the marker that we generally look at.

Now, people may also have other signs of inflammation such as aches and pains not recovering well from exercise, feeling stiff, children don't... Generally seven-year-old can ski all day and he feels great, but as we get older, sometimes those aches and pains are actually connected to inflammation, and many of us just assume that we have to live that way, but we can optimize the health of our tissues and cells in our bodies so that we aren't feeling so chronically run down and having those aches and pains, and then I guess the last thing I would say is that there's a term called Silent inflammation. And that's why CRP can be a good idea, is that the bottom line is, is that we all have increased inflammation, so I'm not... Being a naturopathic doctor, I really tailor my suggestions and treatments to the individual, and inflammation is one case where almost every person can benefit from strategies to help maintain a healthy inflammatory response because it is so universal.

And that's a really good point, and I think the busier we get and the older we get, especially... That's good, that's a very good practice to just look out for.

This has been really interesting, and I really thank you for your time today, and I hope you can come back a great advice and we appreciate your knowledge and look forward to having you on again, but in the meantime, you have a website, doctor, and we hope that that we can all get on its Megaport com, that's right. If you're interested in more information, particularly about the extinguish formula that I mentioned, please go to Megaport Com and learn more.

Excellent, Dr. Aaron Stocks, it was nice to have you on with us today.

Came was a pleasure. I really enjoyed talking with you. Thank you, thank you.

If you've ever enjoyed the delicious food inside our kitchen, you may have tried this tasty dish, now you can make it yourself, this is a deli favorite at mother's market, it's not in rice salad, the recipe ingredients are two cups, Brown, buzz Modi rice, four cups water, half cup salary thinly sliced.

One quarter cup personally means one-quarter cup green onion thinly sliced, one quarter cup current, a half-cup or com pieces a half cup walnut pieces for the sauce, two tablespoons, olive oil, two tablespoons to marry one teaspoon spike seasoning. One half teaspoon white pepper.

So the process is first to combine the rice with water and bring it to a boil, you simmer that covered for 50 minutes and you allow it to cool, the second step is to whisk all the sauce ingredients together, you add that to the rice with the remaining ingredients and toss them lightly together, the salad is great coal or served warm as a side dish, it serves six to eight as a side dish, and it's been a favorite at mothers for years in our deli noted rice salad.

Thanks for listening to the mother's market radio show, and for shopping at mother's market, the advice and informational content does not necessarily represent the views of mother's market and kitchen, mother's recommends consulting your health professional for your personal medical condition,