Pumpkin Seed Blog

You’ve probably heard a heap of times that eating whole seeds is really good for you, so that’s why you want more, or just some, in your diet. Or you may want more in your children’s diet.

If you’re like me and haven’t grown up with lots of seeds in your diet, you can be at a bit of a loss as to how to get more into the foods you like to eat.

Eating more whole seed bread isn’t always appealing. You have to be a bird anyway or spend half your time chewing just to make sure you crunch all the seeds to get the benefits from them.

Some seeds, like sesame and flax seeds (parent omega 3!), are so good for you but how hard are they to eat?! They’re so small, chewing them is almost impossible.

Buying seeds already crushed means the delicate oils are exposed to air so they go bad quickly and you end up throwing half the packet out. Plus I know of only LSA (linseed/flax seed, sunflower seed and almonds) mix which is not a lot of variety. Also if you want a specific type of seed there are not many options.

I have found a solution. Its not actually my idea, I got it from YouTube.

I wanted to increase the amount of parent omega 3 in my diet to complement the Omega 6 I get from our pumpkin seed oil as per Professor Brian Peskin’s recommendations*. Fish oil is not an option as its not in the parent form that our bodies need*.

The best source of parent omega 3 is flax seed oil. I’m not at all impressed with any flax seed oil produced in Australia (it all tastes rancid). In my book eating flax seeds is a must. But how?

The guy off YouTube was making a smoothie and added freshly ground Flax Seeds. He recommended grinding them fresh so the oils in the seed was at its best. Fantastic!

So I went off to hunt for a seed grinder. I wanted one that can do small amounts, 1 tablespoon, at a time - just enough for 1 (me!) to add to my porridge. Every machine seemed like I would need to grind enough for a week. Not very appealing for the freshness factor.

Finally after pounding seeds in a mortar and pestle for a few weeks and not getting very good results I bit the bullet and bought a grinder.

Although the grinder packaging doesn’t say, which I think they really should, is that they do really small quantities. When I say small I mean small - less than 1 tablespoon of flax seeds! They get wizzed around by the speed so even though they don’t fill up to the blades they still get chopped into a fine powder. Just what I want for my porridge.

My grinder is by Sunbeam and is called a Muligrinder. Its a coffee grinder. It can also be used for herbs and spices. I love it. Do you know how freshly ground seeds, herbs and spices smell? Delicious.

So, to some it all up. If you want an easy way to add more seeds like flax seeds, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds etc to your diet,  disguise them in with your other foods.... get a grinder. They are really tasty and you feel good for eating them.

In winter add ground seeds to porridge, soups and sauces. In summer add them to smoothies, cereal and salads. Anytime add them to biscuits, muffins or breads.

Its easy - only takes a few seconds to grind them up. It will leave you with a good feeling that for the less than 30 seconds effort to add them to your food. You can feel proud you did something good for your health and wellbeing.

Best of all adding more seeds to your foods will give you the nutrients and protein you need and help stop sugary snack cravings, great for weight loss.

Till next time, have a great day.

Sharan

You can be a man or a woman and have the hair on your head start to thin. Do you remember how thick it was when you were 10? How does it compare to that now?

It can be difficult to notice especially when it generally happens very slowly. Take a look at your hairbrush and the bathroom floor. Quick hair build-up in these areas is an easy tell-tail sign. Most people don’t notice any change until its about 40% GONE.

You may have mentioned to friends, family or your doctor that you think your hair is thinning as you’ve noticed a lot of hair in your hairbrush and what do they (or the internet) tell you? “Don’t worry! We all loose around 100 hairs a day.” I think this is AN OLD WIVES TALE! I wonder how longs its been since anyone ever counted???

Well, I did, about 8 months ago. I was able to do this because I have long hair which I brushed thoroughly to remove any loose ones. I then tied my hair up in a pony-tale for 24 hours, brushed it thoroughly and then painstakingly counted...

Yes, the couple of days I did this I counted up to 98 hairs lost BUT, this was while I was going through chemotherapy. Now I think everyone knows or has seen someone who has lost their hair due to chemo... when it goes, ALL of it goes. The drugs I was on don’t generally make your hair fall out. I was very lucky that I didn’t loose my hair but my hair was (still) falling out in what seemed like large amounts.

The thing is, my hair had been failing out at roughly that same rate for probably 2 - 3 YEARS, that I can remember, prior to my cancer diagnosis (read about that on my other blog).

It had caused me some concern but I was reassured by the 100 hair a day myth. I thought it may have been zinc deficiency so a took the recommended dose (occasionally) but that didn’t seem to help.

Then the cancer was diagnosed and after surgery I went to the naturopath to get nutritional support for while I did chemo and beyond. One supplement was zinc. I made sure I took it EVERY day...

I started to notice a decrease in my hair loss.

After approximately 6 months on zinc supplements, my naturopath did a zinc test. The rating is; deficiency: 1, scaling up to not deficient: 4. I was about a 2.

I was surprised that after 6 months of supplements I was still deficient. I know it was a stressful time and stress increases your need for zinc, but it was still a bit of a shock.

After another few months I started to notice I had a lot more SHORT hairs on my head. Absolutely fantastic! My hair was growing back.

In the last couple of weeks I’ve had another test. I’m was still deficient (I’d just had a cold). I know I need to keep getting as much as possible. I still have lots of shorter hairs growing around my hairline and above my temples and its great.

I am starting to notice my hair BECOMING THICKER.

My naturopath suggested I get zinc test every 3 months and I will do so until I’m not deficient and then spread it out to 6 monthly test. I will gave to do another drop count again....

I have noticed that if I don’t take my zinc for a week or so, my hair drop increases and decreases when I start again. It is also helping to clear up my skin which has broken out in pimples a lot more since chemo.

The point of this blog is to let you know that if your hair is thinning it could very well be a zinc deficiency and you need to check and take supplements and check again and again as it can take months and MONTHS to build up. This is from personal experience.

Zinc Information:

• Zinc test are simple, easy and cheap: most health food stores do them for free or a couple of dollars, just ask. All you do is hold 10ml of a special zinc liquid in your mouth for 30 seconds. If you can’t taste it: you’re deficient, get some supplements, if you can: great! but it doesn’t taste that nice so you can be happy you probably don’t have to have another one for another couple of years.
• When you are deficient in zinc its harder for your body to absorb it as it is needed for digestion in your stomach. You NEED to take supplements.
• If your body cannot get the zinc it requires it will start using your selenium to convert to zinc.
• About 70% - 80% of people in Australia are thought to be deficient.

How do you get zinc in your diet? Well, another reason why I love our business and am even more passionate about making it a success is that pumpkin seeds and our pumpkin seed meal is a super source of zinc. You also get it from most animal foods predominantly red meats and its particularly high in oysters. Apparently it is absorbed better by our bodies when its found with protein. That's why pumpkin seeds are very good for vegetarians, they get the zinc and the protein.

Please, please, PLEASE, even if you have not noticed your hair falling out, make it a priority to get a zinc test THIS WEEK. Its needed for so many functions in your body, which I will talk about a LOT more in blog posts to come, so make sure you subscribe in the box to the right, so you don’t miss out on helpful tips for your health and happiness.

Bye for now.

Sharan West

I have been inspired many times... over the last 6 - 8 MONTHS.
The inspirations come from a blog I receive by a copywriter on marketing and business, every couple of DAYS.

Every couple of days for 6 - 8 months I get a reminder of what I’d like to do but haven’t done anything about... it got me thinking...

Have you ever been inspired or excited about doing something and then never done anything about it?

Most people would probably say ‘yes’ to that question.

Have you ever wondered what stopped you? How does it make you feel that you never did it?

It makes me feel like a failure. It diminishes my trust and confidence in myself as it subconsciously says that I can’t get things done.

Failure pops up twice here. What stopped me doing it in the first place? Some might say that its just laziness or procrastination but is it really? If you look a little harder you may see that these emotions come AFTER the fear of failure to do what you want to do in the first place. Its easy to say “I can’t be bothered to do it right now” “ I’ll do it later” and just keep putting it off, but if it got you excited in the first place you’d want to do it right now!

But you don’t because a little thought or voice pops into your head that you might fail and so you procrastinate and don’t get it done. And there’s the proof to yourself that you ARE a failure because you didn’t get it done!

So how do you get out of this never ending loop?

By getting realistic in defining what ‘failure’ is, letting yourself know that “its OK to fail” and then taking ACTION.

The only way to fail is to not do anything, to not try. But if you don’t follow through with a particular idea, and you ‘fail’, THAT’S OK. It just means you didn’t do it. Its says nothing else. The sun will still rise tomorrow.

For me my inspiration is in writing a regular blog to inspire people to do things that lead to true health and happiness and yes, promote all things pumpkin seed. To do this I need to write blogs that people want to read and give them value and inspire them to take ACTION in many areas of their lives and not hit that ‘unsubscribe’ button. ;) The little voice says that not doing this would mean failure.

See that’s not realistic failure... of course some people may hit the unsubscribe button! No one can be expected to please everybody, all the time. The only ‘failure’ would be to not try... people could still live without having read a blog article by me ;)

I CAN write a blog (this is it!) - it may not inspire everyone but if I inspire just one person even if its just myself (so I write another one next weekend), in my book, I’m not a failure and that makes me feel good and brings a bit of happiness to my life. Mission accomplished!

If you’re still stuck at starting, ask yourself what’s the worst that can happen? If its life threatening, consult a few other people. If its not, then just go for it! Stop listening to the voice in your head and just write a plan of what to do and just start. You can be a winner too.

Bye for now.

Sharan West

"Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass.... its about learning to dance in the rain." (Vivian Green)