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Wellness Tips Worth Researching

We have to do what we can to be able to support ourselves and our kids. Today we are discussing my health system, giving you five wellness tips, and explaining how I adapt it to my kids. I encourage you to take what I share here to your own doctor and get his or her insight on these tips. This is my disclaimer. This is the conversation that I have with other moms that I trust and that trust me. You can take this with a grain of salt, do your own research, take it to your medical provider, and tweak it as you see fit for your life.

There are 5 wellness tips I have to share, that I would shout from the rooftops because of how much it has helped my own family. If you follow all of these tips, they are sure to help you a lot throughout the cold and flu season. Make sure to stick around for the unexpected last tip!

Wellness Tips: #1 – Food

The first of our five wellness tips is all about food. Let’s discuss some ground rules for what you should and shouldn’t be feeding your kids. Although it is hard, we can always do better when it comes to feeding sugar to our kids. You can research this to see what actually happens to our bodies and to our immune systems with regular table sugar and synthetic sugar.

In addition to sugar, we are also talking about grains and over processed snack foods that kids are drawn to. Eating sugar causes blood sugar spikes. This also includes juices, “health” bars (that are basically candy bars), and other snacks. We have them in our house too. It’s really important to eliminate these this time of year.

Focus On Foods Straight From The Source

What you do want to be focused on are seasonal foods, local foods, more fat soluble vitamins. What this means is actually getting your vitamins from food. The number one source of getting vitamins through food is from animals. There are tons of nutrients and vitamins from things that grow out of the ground. You are going to get a huge heavy dose from animal products. For us and our family, what we are striving for all the time are raw dairy, raw goat, things that have not been processed and any kind of animal meat that comes straight from the farmer. There are ways to do this.

Organic is a step below that, which has still gone through some processing. That’s what I’m shooting for at all times as much as I possibly can. It looks alot like my grocery cart, it has a lot of squashes and potatoes, things that are grown, pears, persimmons, less of the berries, oranges, pomegranate seeds, apples. Do my kids love them all the time? No, they don’t, but we do the best that we can. I try to put these in my own body as much as I can. 

Just being intentional with your kids’ food will go a long way. One thing that I have learned that has been super helpful for me has been the one superstar meal per day. I learned this in a cavity book, wildly. How to Cure Tooth Decay book, I learned so much about how to give our bodies nutrients. They talked about the practicality of modern living and how difficult it is to do this at every meal. It really is. I mainly focus on dinner and just let breakfast and lunch fall as it may.

Wellness Tips: #2 – Taking Care Of Your Body

There are two main parts of this. The first part is your sleep. Think about sleeping in the rhythm of the sun. Go to sleep a little bit earlier and sleep in a little bit later. The days are shorter on purpose. Trust the rhythms and sleep with the sun as much as you can. 

The second part is making sure you are exercising. Moving your body is so important. Focus on getting your exercise in. This will help move your lymphatic fluid around and we detox a lot through movement. Exercise as often as you can. This will help you detox.

Wellness Tips: #3 – Sunshine And Less Busy-ness

“Focus internally on what is going on in your home. That connection is going to force you to slow your pace down and provide more opportunities to sit at a table to a well-crafted meal.”

Wellness Tips: #4 – Supplements

The fourth wellness tip is a huge part of what actually helps my kids get well when they are sick. I’ve learned a lot about supplements over the years. I try very hard to get what we need from our food but it is difficult. You aren’t going to find it all at most of your big box grocery stores. It’s unfortunate but that is the world that we live in. If you aren’t living in the States and you actually have access to better quality food, that is possible. You of course can get better quality food in America, you just have to look a little harder and pay more money. So this is where supplements come into play.

The CADZ Protocol

Supplements are necessary and we supplement very strategically in our house with a protocol that my doctor has given us called the CADZ protocol. It’s a pretty straight forward protocol. Vitamin C, vitamin A, vitamin D and Zinc. I feel pretty strongly about not giving you specific amounts because that is something that you need to discuss with your doctor. I’m not a doctor. Here’s what we do: we up our vitamin D pretty intensely for 3 days at the onset of an illness and then back it down to a normal routine after that. We stick to vitamin C packets.

We do not use any type of electrolyte drinks at all because they are full of synthetic stuff that is not good for us when we are trying to create wellness. The Emergen-C packets are really great, they have some good things in them supplement-wise. There are some other really great options out there too, but this is the one that my kids will actually take. We also have some zinc gummies, we follow the standard protocol on the bottle. Vitamin A has been really hard to find in a supplement that the kids love. We keep tossing them around.

The Magic Of Umcka

You should definitely have about 14 bottles of a product called Umcka at all times. You can get it on Amazon. We started this at ages 2 and over. The active ingredient in it is called pelargonium. It’s all natural and tastes like actual bliss. My kids love it. It comes in a chewable and in liquid form. We get the kind that is cold & flu plus elderberry. We all drink it like it’s a water feeder in a rabbit cage. You have to take it at the very first sign of illness and stick with it. Umcka takes care of all our upper respiratory stuff. It’s magic in a bottle and I would never do life without it. I highly recommend getting it.

Wellness Tips: #5 – Cleaning And Separation

The fifth wellness tip is to clean more intensely than usual and keep the sick person separate from the rest of the family. Illness may spread through your house like wildfire, but there are measures you can take to prevent that from happening. We have had a really great outcome with being able to contain our illness and not spread it throughout the house. Separation is really important. That is hard, especially with little kids, I know. Here’s what my mom always did and we still use it to this day. It’s called the “sick chair.” We have king size “sick sheets” which are just old top sheets of sets that we don’t have anymore and throw it over one section of the couch or a recliner. Whatever sections are as separated as possible.

That is the designated sick person spot that only that person goes to. Everything stays in that spot and everything gets washed. The sick person doesn’t get to sit anywhere else. It may seem odd to have the sick person in the living space, instead of in their room. This, however, is because I firmly believe that when someone is sick they need to be loved and around people in order to be well. Growing up, my mom gave me a bell when I was sick. I was nurtured so very well as a child. I don’t want to just throw my kids in a room. I’m sure some would love that, but I would have to go up the stairs and down the stairs. So we bring them out into the main space.

Try Not To Cross-Contaminate

We don’t have electronics in bedrooms so if they want to sit and watch TV all day while they are sick, they have to be on the couch. That is such a huge part of not cross contaminating. We also have a separate bathroom for the sick person that no one else gets to use. And they completely stay out of the kitchen. I guess it’s a beautiful life to be sick over here, now that I am thinking about it. They get waited on hand and foot. I don’t want them in and out of the kitchen, spreading their germs everywhere. So, that’s how we do that.

Disinfecting Is Key

Also, this is the only time that I use disinfectant wipes and I do it twice a day, every morning and every evening. I wipe the main surface and main floor that the sick person has been in and around. It’s a quick, three minute process, just using two wipes. We wipe the fridge, remotes, all the door knobs, all the surfaces. Frequent hand washing is also vital. It works most of the time. We do a really good job with not cross contaminating. I use my elbows a lot. We have important things to do, I don’t want to get sick, I want to be well.

Wishing You A Season Of Wellness

I have a lot of moms come to me and ask for this information. This is so timely and so important. I hope these 5 wellness tips have given you the confidence and courage to care for your family a little differently this season. I hope it serves your family well. Wishing you wellness this year!