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Can you die from a broken heart? Technically, you cannot, but it may feel like it. A rare condition called broken heart syndrome strikes middle-aged to elderly women and can mimic the symptoms of a heart attack, including high blood pressure and an abnormal EKG. The patient will typically be brought to an emergency room and be put through the typical heart tests; however, within hours those same symptoms that brought her to the hospital will be gone and she will leave, completely healthy.

Everyone needs protein, whether they work out every day or they consider the trip to the kitchen to refill their potato chip bowl all the exercise that they really need. It is important that the right amount and the right type of protein be consumed, because too much of it can be a problem under certain conditions. Contrary to popular belief, you can get fat from eating too much protein, since excess protein calories are stored just the same as anything else. To know how much protein you really need, you have to first have a good look at what it does for your body. Secondly, you have to be honest about the amount of exercise that you really get every day.

During digestion, the body releases a number of hormones and chemicals to deal with the food. Everything eaten is converted to blood glucose and then burned immediately for energy, converted to glycogen, and stored in the muscles to be burned later or converted to fat for longer term storage in the body. One of the major components of the digestive process is the release of insulin, which decides how much of the food is burned and how much is stored. The higher the level of blood sugar in the body, the more insulin is released and the more that fat storage will occur. In diabetes, the pancreas does not release enough insulin and the body is not as able to deal with the blood sugar.

Celiac disease affects the small intestine, one of the major components of the digestive system. The intestine itself is over twenty feet long, starting at the stomach and ending at the beginning of the large intestine, also called the colon. The small intestine is divided into three sections: the duodenum, the jejunum and the ileum. Each section performs a different role in the digestive process.

Despite the increased interest in the disorder, depression is not a new thing and has been treated for as long as there have been doctors. Hippocrates, the father of medicine, diagnosed depressive symptoms referred to as melancholia. It is thought that many of the world’s most famous artists, musicians and others were suffering from one form or depression or another. Van Gogh was thought to have had bipolar disorder in addition to have epileptic syndrome, having seizures especially after drinking absinthe. (Source: Sarason, Sarason, 2008)

We all know that protein plays a vital role in our survival, from providing energy to promoting muscle growth and recovery. But, did you also know that there are a number of serious diseases that are caused by not having enough protein in our diets?

Medically known as steatosis, fatty liver is an accumulation of fat cells in the liver which can be caused by many factors. There are many types of fatty liver, including alcoholic and non-alcoholic. Each type of fatty liver is typically asymptomatic and is usually found in the course of normal or routine blood screenings or in the course of ruling out another disease or condition. It is thought that fatty liver sometimes occurs as a result of a faulty fat transfer from one part of the body to another, but may also be caused by increased fat extraction of fat presented to the liver from the intestine. Another cause for fatty liver is a decrease in the rate at which the liver breaks down and removes fat from the system.

The average diet has more than enough protein to meet daily needs, however, there are often times when the average diet becomes less than normal and may not be as adequate as it should be. Between the busy life that the average person leads and constant yo-yo or fad dieting, the fact is that what we should be eating quickly becomes what we do not eat and what we sorely miss.

There are two kinds of protein, complete and incomplete, which come from either plant or animal sources. Protein supplements, no matter what kind they might be, are derived from either plant or animal sources as well. Which is better between animal or plant based protein depends on a number of factors. There are those who choose not to eat meat or animal products for moral, ethical and religious reasons. There are those who find themselves unable to afford many forms of animal protein a majority of the time. Then there are those that just love the taste of a good juicy steak served up with a good cold beer. For our purposes, the comparisons of proteins will be based on these factors:

Face it, dieting is hard. If it were easy, there would only be one plan, it would work and no one would be overweight ever again. We eat to be healthy and to have energy. We eat because our body is convinced it is hungry. We eat because we see others eating and want to be social. We eat because we are happy, sad, mad, or indifferent. We eat because it is dinner time. We eat because it is Tuesday afternoon. Dieting does not address the whole picture, nor does it address the mechanics of the body. Diets, especially the extreme, hardcore, fad diets, are going to start off strong and then fade off after a week or two. Once the person stops the fad diet and returns to their normal way of eating, they regain what they lost and then some, starting off another swing in the vicious dieting cycle.