Today’s question comes from Ola and regards CLA, or conjugated linoleic acid. What is CLA? CLA is the “good” trans-fat that occurs naturally in meat and dairy, especially from grass-fed animals. In the stomach of ruminants like cows, sheep, or goats, millions upon millions of bacteria help the animal digest its food. They also help convert dietary linoleic fatty acids into saturated fatty acids. Well, that conversion takes several steps, and one of the steps is the creation of CLA, some of which never gets fully saturated and instead shows up in the animal’s body and milk fat. 28 different CLA isomers, or structural arrangements of the molecules, appear in CLA-rich animal fat. It’s very complex and quite different from trans-fat created by partially hydrogenating vegetable oils. Those lab-created trans-fats have definite negative metabolic and health effects, while the panoply of various CLA isomers from grass-fed dairy and meat seem to be beneficial. With that said, let’s get to the question.
Posted By: Mark Sisson
Do I need to really even say the holidays are a stressful time of year? Every lifestyle blog, magazine, evening news program, and newspaper will have a stress-related feature right about now. I bet Dr. Oz has a “holiday stress relief” show airing. It’s part of the culture – we expect holiday stress and seem to love wallowing in it. So I’m not going to go on and on about how stress is a problem, or even why it’s a problem (I’ve already done that), because we know it. So, how do we avoid it and, once it’s here, how do we deal with it? That’s the important part. How do we hack it?
Well, we don’t want to hack it all to pieces. We need stress, too – just not too much. It bears mentioning that many things can be considered stressors depending on the context. Lifting heavy things is a stressor, and the right amount causes muscles, connective tissue, and bones to respond by getting stronger, which are desirable; too much, or too little recovery, and muscles, connective tissue, and bones suffer and atrophy, which is undesirable. It’s about context, quantity, and quality. With that in mind, I’m going to break down anti-stress strategies into categories.
Posted By: Mark Sisson
Yesterday I mentioned that sea vegetables are a great source of iodine. “But what is iodine?” many emailers asked. Well, dear friends, iodine is elemental. Let’s take a trip through the land of iodine to learn what it is, what it does for the human body and whether you should make an effort to get more iodine in your diet.
Iodine is a highly water-soluble trace element that’s rare in the earth’s crust, but fairly prevalent in its seas. Our bodies require it, for several reasons. Our thyroid glands use it to make thyroid hormones (T3 molecular weight is 59% iodine; T4 molecular weight, 65%), and a severe deficiency can manifest in the development of goiter, which is the thyroid gland swelling up in an attempt to keep up the pace of iodine uptake from the blood and thyroid hormone production. Lovely stuff, eh? Other common symptoms of iodine deficiency include hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism. It can also increase the incidence of early mental retardation (iodine deficiency-related retardation is the most preventable kind, in fact), and even stunted infant brain development, provided the kid even makes it out alive: iodine deficient pregnant women are at a higher risk for miscarriages and stillbirths.
Posted By: Mark Sisson
It is with great pleasure and excitement that I am announcing the official launch of the ultimate Primal Essentials Kit – and with it a very special limited-time offer. But more on the special offer in a moment. (Click here if you can’t wait.)
The founding of my company nearly 15 years ago, the launch of Mark’s Daily Apple nearly 4 years ago and the release of The Primal Blueprint last year were all done with a singular goal in mind: to arm people with simple lifestyle hacks and elegant tools that make lifelong health and wellness effortless.
The Primal Essentials Kit is my latest attempt at fulfilling this mission.
Posted By: Mark Sisson
Included among last week’s “Ask Me Anything” responses were several requests for a Primal commentary on acne. A lot of people have asked for this kind of post over the years. The fact is, it’s a great question. Acne is a common problem that gives too many people too much grief. Our medical establishment’s prescription for acne generally involves dehydrating the skin into oblivion, sandblasting it with chemicals, or pumping hormones, antibiotics and potentially toxic meds into the patient. (If any of these methods have worked for you, I mean no offense. I just think people deserve better options than these.) Is there a healthier, more Primal method to a clear complexion? In a nutshell, yes. I’m not talking rabbit-in-a-hat trick but a lifestyle approach with natural options that minimize the systemic and external conditions associated with acne. Let’s look at the full picture.
Posted By: Mark Sisson
Premium Content
© 2013 Mark's Daily Apple | Design By The Blog Studio
