“What are You Drinking?” – Part One
Part 1 of 2
Have you ever engaged in “people” watching? I did it a few months back and noticed a lot of people were drinking a lot of different beverages throughout their day. How could I tell? Usually they were drinking something in a container with a logo on it from the place they bought it, and they were all different. Somewhere, someone right now is drinking something out of a bottle, can, or plastic cup made by someone else. It seems we have forgotten how to quench our own thirst these days without over-relying on others to do it for us. Our bodies are made up of about 70% water, but we try to replenish it with everything else other than H2O. The last time I looked, our body fluids were not a composition of lattes, sodas, energy drinks, and everything else found in liquid form in a commercially produced beverage. We must first filter out all of the unnecessary added ingredients that they are composed of such as artificial colors, preservatives, and sugars before we can begin to hydrate. You think you are quenching your thirst, but it comes at a high price. In reality, filtering out all of those added ingredients causes biological stress in the form of free radicals. Our taste buds are really the decision makers for most of us when choosing something to drink or eat. In the long run, our bodies are the real losers when trying to deal with those poor decisions therefore suffering the consequences of poor health. There is an alternative drink I would like you to consider consuming that has great benefits and is one of the best beverages you can ever have. But before I get into that discussion, let’s again review what free radicals are and what they do.
Free radicals are unhealthy molecules produced by our bodies when we make unhealthy food and life style choices. The free radicals damage our DNA, thus aging us. They are mostly created by our inability to effectively deal with the daily stresses in our lives, the consumption of overly prescribed prescription drugs, reliance on a daily diet of processed and fast foods, breathing polluted air, radiation exposure both from medical and natural sources (flying), smoking, our constant exposure to dangerous industrial chemicals that are present in our homes and offices (furniture, carpets, cleaners), the prepared foods that are stored in plastic containers and leach BPA when heated, the pesticides we ingest from our commercially grown produce, and the radiation emitted from our cell phones that we absorb every day.
Yes, as you can see, the creation of free radicals in your body is impossible to avoid; however, the free radicals can be managed effectively. They are a part of life both natural and man-made. The key is to slow down their creation and to neutralize them as soon as they pop up. You already know how to slow down their creation just by limiting your commercial beverage consumption. Now you need to consume a drink that has antioxidants to combat and neutralize them. One of the most effective ways to do that is to have a few cups of Camellia sinensis a day.
Yep, having a few cups of Camellia sinensis is one of the best things you can ever do for the preservation of your health. What is it? It is the official name given to the plant that gives us tea leaves. Many people think that black tea (regular tea), green tea, oolong tea and white tea come from different plant sources, but they all come from the same plant source. What makes them different is how the tea leaves are processed.
Tea originated in Southern China about 5000 years ago. Dutch traders were responsible for bringing this wonderful beverage to the West in the 1600’s. It was imported Chinese tea that was thrown overboard during the Boston Tea Party starting the American Revolution off of the ship called the “Beaver”. The most popular version of tea consumed (78% worldwide) is black. It is fermented through processing and has the highest caffeine amount, but the lowest in polyphenol levels of all teas (it is also the one that stains your teeth the most). Green tea is not fermented, just dried, giving it a low caffeine amount but a much higher polyphenol level per cup. Oolong tea is a carefully blended combination of both black and green tea while white tea is healthiest and most expensive of them all. Yes, tea can be soothing, relaxing and refreshing, but it’s the wonderful chemicals it offers to you in health benefits that we will discuss below.
The Emperors of China knew thousands of years ago that drinking tea had medicinal benefits without ever truly understanding why scientifically. Because of our advanced science today, we can now begin to understand why they were correct in so many ways and extremely wise in their conclusions. Modern science has now found previously unknown chemical compounds called polyphenols in high concentrations in tea, especially in the green and white teas. What are polyphenols? They are chemical compounds found in all plant life; polyphenols can do amazing things for our mental and physical well-being when consumed. Polyphenols are antioxidants that fight free radicals (they neutralize them). The American Cancer Society thinks that consuming antioxidants have some important health benefits in preventing cancer, high blood pressure, heart disease, and diabetes. The University of Maryland Medical Center thinks the same way. They suggest through extensive studies that drinking green tea may help in treating the following conditions: atherosclerosis, high cholesterol, cancer, bladder cancer, breast cancer, ovarian cancer, colorectal cancer, esophageal cancer, lung cancer, pancreatic cancer, prostate cancer, skin cancer, stomach cancer, diabetes, liver cancer, IBS (inflammatory bowel disease), as well as the prevention of dental plaque, and helping arthritis patients reduce inflammation thereby slowing the breakdown of cartilage that causes arthritis sufferers excruciating pain and loss of mobility.
I personally feel our over consumption and reliance on drinking commercially created beverages to quench our thirst is one of the underlying contributors promoting most of our devastating health issues that we deal with today. Imagine when consuming them as if they were highly flammable fuel igniting and increasing your internal fire (inflammation) instead of choosing a drink that reverses that process putting the fire out. One drink you might want to consider that helps put that fire out is the consumption of tea, specifically green tea and white tea. You could call them your personal internal health fire extinguishers. As you should always have a fire extinguisher in your kitchen, you should always…
“Have one for your health!”
There is way too much information to cover on this subject in just one newsletter, that is why I decided to continue this conversation into the next one (part 2). There I will explain why and how tea is something you should be drinking every day.