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Benefits of Baltic Amber Teething Necklaces/Bracelets
Have you heard of these??
Amber is not a “stone” but a natural resin. So as it warms with the body’s natural temperature, amber releases its healing oils (these oils contain succinic acid )which are easily absorbed into the skin and then into the bloodstream. Baltic Amber has some of the highest concentrations of Succinic Acid found in nature, and this is what makes it so special. Succinic Acid is a natural component of plant and animal tissues, and it’s presence in the human body is beneficial in many ways. It is known to reduce inflammation of the throat, ear and stomach and to fight irritation, infections and respiratory disease as it dramatically improves the body’s immunity. Natural amber beaded necklaces are a completely non-invasive remedy for side effects associated with teething, such as lack of appetite, upset tummies, ear ache, fevers and colds. Baltic amber is also a natural analgesic that will calm your child and is recognized by allopathic medicine specialists as antispasmodic and anti-fever. Many adults report improvement of arthritis discomfort in their hands when wearing amber on the wrists.
The word “Amber” has always been associated exclusively with “Baltic Amber” even though there are other varieties of amber in different locations in the world. In fact, more than 125 types of fossil resins have been found but these are not amber, simply distant cousins. The Baltic Amber is the only amber sought after for its rare qualities including the ability to provide natural healing. Baltic amber resin comes from a fossil produced by ancient pine tress that grew in Northern Europe millions of years ago in an area that reached from southern regions of what is now known as Scandinavia as well as neighboring regions of the Baltic Sea bed. At some point, the climate grew warmer and these pine trees, known today as conifer trees, exuded great amounts of natural resin which scientists say achieved its stability over time through oxidation.Baltic amber facts
•Amber is a fossilized tree resin that has taken millions of years to form.
•Baltic amber is the only fossil resin that contains 3-8 % succinic acid, a medicinal substance with diverse effects. The highest content of the acid is found in the amber cortex–the external layer of the stone.
•Raw Baltic amber comes in diverse forms drops , icicles, dripstones and nuggets of various sizes, which show how it was formed and how it travelled – each piece is totally unique.
•Amber has a great diversity of color varieties, most common being cognac, honey, green, lemon, golden, butterscotch.
•Highly prized and greatly valued, amber will sometimes appear with inclusions that date back to its origination…a tiny piece of plant or a fragile insect that became part of the flowing resin and therefore preserved millions of years ago.
•Amber nuggets are warmer than other stones and when rubbed, they attract bits of dry grass and paper, as amber becomes electrically charged. It charges negatively, which is beneficial for people.
•Amber nuggets burn when lit, with a bright yellow flame, exuding a pleasant resinous scent.
•Baltic amber is alive, as the process of its internal transformations continues and it is beneficial to human beings.
Baltic amber’s remarkable medicinal properties include analgesics that reduce or eliminate pain associated with headaches, joint stiffness, dental discomfort such as teething, etc.Strengthening your immune system –
Succinic acid is the primary substance in natural Baltic Amber and has remarkable ability to boost the body’s immune system, to enhance natural healing, and to protect the body from infection.
Restoring Energy –
Succinate is a raw material and a major catalyst in the Krebs Cycle, one of our main sources of energy. During this cycle, our bodies metabolize carbohydrates, fats, and proteins for energy. metabolized for energy. Our own bodies naturally produce the same succinic acid to some extent. Succinic acid contains salt which is one of the key substances in cellular respiration as well as intercellular energy production. As a result, succinic acid restores both oxygen and energy to depleted cells and aids the body in returning to a normal, fully functional state.
Maintaining Wellness –
Under stress or duress, the human body’s cells require more oxygen more quickly. A lack of oxygen can result in lethargy as oxygen is vital to the intercellular creation of energy. When the body has low oxygen, it is much more at risk of illness. A healthy body is one that has a slightly alkaline blood “ph” balance which means that oxygen is being fully absorbed in all the critical areas with ease.
Breaking a cycle of (chronic) inflammation –
Whenever there is any form of chronic inflammation, disease is a good probability. With chronic cellular inflammation, the body’s immune system will automatically increase production of free radicals which can, in excess, cause inflammatory-related disease. Chronic inflammation is quite of the underlying factor in many seemingly unrelated illnesses.
Food Allergy?
To help determine if you or your child has a food allergy, there are a few steps you must take.
- Keep a log – write down very detailed symptoms. Be sure to note the food and how much of the food caused the problem.
- Call your doctor – Bring your log with you and tell your doctor all about it. He will do an exam and further testing.
- Blood Test – If your doctor suspects a food allergy, the doctor will most likely send you for a blood test. A blood test measure’s your immune system’s response to certain foods known as immunoglobulin E (IgE) antibodies. However, these blood tests aren’t always accurate, and produce false positives.
- Skin Test – This is typically performed on the back for children, and on the inner arms for adults. Your skin is pricked with a very tiny needle, and a tiny amount of the allergens are placed beneath your skin’s surface. If you are allergic to something, an itchy raised bump will form. The doctor will rate the size of the bump with the severity of the allergy.
- Restricted Diet – Depending on your results, you will be asked to remove certain foods from your diet. If the doctor thinks that you may have an intolerance or sensitivity rather than an allergy, he may ask you to remove certain foods from your diet, and gradually add them back in to check for specific symptoms when reintroduced. This will narrow down which foods specifically are causing the problem. If you are truly allergic, the doctor will recommend the food be eliminated from your diet completely.
- Oral Tolerance Test – This test is done in your doctor’s office or a clinical environment, where doctor’s are prepared with emergency medication. A small amount of the allergen is given to the patient to ingest. Typically they start with a very, very tiny amount of the allergen. If that it tolerated, then increasing amounts are given at set time intervals, typically a every half hour or so. If you don’t have a reaction during this test, you can typically begin including this food back into your diet again.
Your Saliva On Pacifiers Can Ward Off Childhood Allergies, Asthma, & Eczema
In an article posted on Medical News Today, researchers from the University of Gothenburg, Sweeden, reported in the Journal Pediatrics (May 6th, 2013 issue) that cleaning your babies pacifier by sucking it, you may reduce your infant’s risk of developing allergies, asthma, and eczema!
You can read the article here
The Never Ending Skin War….
My kids tend to have a slew of issues with their skin, as does my husband. Mine is sensitive as well. When my husband and I were dating, he had mentioned that he breaks out in these little red dots if he uses the wrong detergent. So he explained to me how he would find a detergent and fabric softener combo that would work for a while, and then they would come back and he would have to find something else.
Over the years, we have gotten used to lots of things. Then, when we had the kids, we noticed the same thing, even with us using the specially formulated baby detergent. So, we had to play the game all over again.
Unfortunately, no one has ever been able to pinpoint what causes these little rashes, usually localized to their upper arms. So, we just deal with it the best we can.
You can imagine how elated I was when we had finally come across a combination of things that worked. And it was something we have been successfully using for the last few years…. YEARS!! And just when I let myself start thinking, “wow, I think we have finally figured this out”….BOOM! The rashes were back.
So, we went back to scouring the supermarkets and health food stores to try to see what we could come up with. When I say that we have tried everything, I literally mean everything…..we have made our own, used vinegar, used essential oils, used commercial products…. and every combination of those things. And we spent days looking for something new, all the while the laundry kept piling up.
That’s when I had decided I had enough guessing and called my naturopath. He knows our history and everything that we have tried. I asked him to recommend something new for us to try. That is when he mentioned All Free and Clear. He asked us if we had ever tried it, and I was surprised when I checked our list (yes I keep a list) and found that we hadn’t. So, we went out to get some and while we were at the store, also came across Downey Free and Sensitive Fabric Softener. We bought that as well, since we had not tried that one either. Imagine, both these things right under our noses and how stupid we felt that we had never noticed them!
We began using them just a bit ago and so far so good (knock on wood for me though, would ya?)! I am hoping that for now, we at least have this at bay.
If anyone else has had any experiences with this, I would love for you to share them with me!
Winning the Food Allergy War?
Every day more and more children, and adults are diagnosed with allergies. Food allergies, environmental allergies, seasonal allergies. Oh, and don’t forget there is asthma and eczema included too. My almost 8 year old, has all 3, plus asthma, and we went through a bought of eczema this past winter. The child takes more medications than I do. Inhalers, nasal sprays, and pills. Packing her an overnight bag is like packing her a small pharmacy. I am seeing this more and more with children, and even adults are having seasonal allergies who have never had them before. It all makes me wonder WHY?
Scientists are doing a crazy amount of research to find out why, but no one really has a definitive answer. There are so many theories out there… GMO’s, fast food, lack of breast feeding, eating the allergen during pregnancy, the rise of planned c-sections, & use of hand sanitizer – just to name a few. The list goes on and on. There are many experimental food allergy trials out there, with things like desensitization (ingesting small amounts of peanut flour). Now they are saying to start children on foods with allergens as early as 4-6 months. Before they could not have peanuts until age 2. Do they really know what will actually help or are we all just guessing? They claim that they are making great strides in the right direction. Personally, it all sounds like a bunch of trial and error, along with lots of hoping that somewhere along the lines something will truly make a difference.
How do we truly know what will work to help win the food allergy war, until we know the cause of the war and what we are actually fighting against? Until they find a cause and a cure, I am thankful for support groups, and other Allergy Warriors who are fighting this battle right along side my allergic child and I.
Lizzie”s Wordless Wednesday
My princess always has to match what I do, and I love it…I would NOT ask for it any other way…. But that does come with its own set of drawbacks. This picture shoes why it is so critically important for me to follow a gluten free diet, even though gluten is not an issue for me. As parents, we lead by example, and in my case, I have my fantastic little copycats watching my every move. They are my reasons for living, my everything, and I owe it to them to provide the right kind of example to follow. Me cheating and adding gluten only cheats the people I hold dearest to my heart.
Healthy living?
So many things claim to be healthy for you, but are they really? We are told to eat lots of fruits & vegetables, because they are healthy for us. However, most people pick the fruit & vegies from their local grocery store. If they are not organic, then they are full of chemicals and pesticides. Corn and corn meal are in so many products, and things I have heard lately is it is almost impossible to get corn that is not GMO, even seeds. We are told to drink lots of water because it is good for our bodies, but I have seen so many reports that say the water is tainted with chemicals like chlorine and fluoride. Prepackaged food are high in salt or fat. Our meat is feed GMO corn feed, and shot up with antibiotics. Many foods contain high fructose corn syrup, which is another product they claim is bad for us. Soda has become a staple in many people’s diets, even the caffeine free and diet can still dissolve rust off a car battery and does an excellent job at cleaning toilets. Shampoos, make-up, body washes, diapers, wipes, dish and laundry detergents, and even plain old soap. They all have ingredients that are bad for us. It seems like everything out there is bad for us. Where do we draw the line? How do we keep ourselves and families safe from all of the bad things that seem to be in everything we eat?
I realize I cannot keep my children safe from everything, but I have made gradual changes in the products we use. It wasn’t an overnight change, but as we started running out of things, I started purchasing natural cleaning products, soaps, shampoos, foods that do not have high fructose corn syrup, and more organic fruits and vegies. We also plant a garden each spring to grow some of our own fruits & vegies.
So my question for you is… have you altered the products you use or the food you buy to natural products? Do you clean your house with vinegar or some other safe solution? Do you have a specific shampoo or toothpaste that you absolutely love? Do you only purchase organic? Tell me some of the things you do.
Allergies and Chiropractic Care
In addition to having issues with gluten, both my children ( and myself) have environmental and seasonal allergies. And while there are literally thousands of things that fall into these categories, sometimes I feel like we may have wound up with reactions to a good percentage of them. For awhile we had been on the seemingly never-ending cycle of allergy medicines that did not quite work well enough and overly tired, crabby kids due to the medication. On top of that, I would typically limit our time outside, knowing that the longer we were out, the worse it would be for the kids later. Now, my kids are the kind that would be perfectly happy living outside, if there was a way to do it, so cutting their time outside short never ended well for any of us.
That is when my husband and I began to look into other options for treatment. This is what lead us to natural medicine, including chiropractic. After a long period of research and continuous learning, we now choose to treat our children naturally and homeopathically whenever possible ( by this I mean that if there was a serious condition going on I would of course bring my children to their traditional pediatrician). While starting down this new path, we can across the idea of chiropractic. I had previously always thought it was something that either older people or people with back problems used. I never realized the vast amount of conditions that chiropractic can help treat, and actually prevent.
We did our research and had meetings with multiple chiropractors before we found one that was the right fit for our family. Before we even told him our concerns, he was able to look at the kids and pinpoint a lot of their conditions, which amazed me. He then explained to us that our bodies have this insane healing ability that most of us are not aware of, and once everything is in alignment, our body is able to take back over and work on healing. We spoke of the laundry list of things that I was concerned about with the kids, and myself, and we got to work on a treatment plan.
Soon, we were all going for regular adjustments. After the first adjustment, I noticed amazing results in the kids. Temperaments were better, they slept better, they even ate better. As time went on, I began to see a drastic reduction in the way they responded to their typical allergens. Reactions were far less severe and medication was rarely necessary. Of course, our chiropractor advised us that the likelihood of a “cure” for their allergies was far-fetched, and not something we should be anticipating. But, he also let us know that with continued adjustments, we can help keep their reactions at bay, since their bodies are better able to handle being exposed to the allergen.
We now continue to go for regular adjustments and check ups. We use a homeopathic allergen blocker right under their noses on days we know the mold and pollen counts are high, which helps keep those days less severe. We still keep Benadryl on hand, just in case we have a bad day or two, but I can honestly say I could not tell you the last time I needed to use it for seasonal and environmental reactions.
I am well aware that chiropractic care is not something that everyone is open to. However, if you are, and if your family and children are, do your research and think about adding this to your treatment plan. For us, it has made all the difference in the world.
Allergy Warriors & Gluten Free Living 