The primary nutritional needs of your body and for the growth and development of your baby are best met through food itself. Real nutrient-dense foods that are seasonally available and as local as possible create the best foundation for conception and human development. Consider your ancestors for a moment - what part of the world did they come from and what kinds of traditional foods did they eat? Our ancestors did not have access to foods made in laboratories and thrived on foods available from their environment. You may find that your body resonates with these traditional ancestral foods, and you might like to experiment with incorporating some of them into your weekly meal options to see how your body responds to them.
One of the reasons wholefoods are superior to supplements in meeting the body’s nutritional needs, is the fact that nutrients in wholefoods work synergistically. Just like a musical orchestra, when one instrument is missing, the synergy is lost. There are hundreds of nutrients and micro-nutrients in food that cannot be recreated in a lab. This synergy promotes optimal digestion, absorption, and assimilation by the body; the nutrients are more bio-available. This approach to nourishment is not new, just simple, honest, back to earth basics where food is our medicine and medicine is our food.
We may be conditioned to believe that the use of expensive supplementation is equal to good basic whole food; it’s not. Supplements can be helpful to resolve deficiencies and to treat disease, but they are not meant for long-term use, nor are they qualitatively equal to fresh nutrient-dense wholefoods. Supplements just like medicines are known to cause imbalances in other nutrients in the body and should be used wisely and only for designated time-periods. Folic acid is an exception and I will post more on this later.
Foundational basics for nourishment include the following:
1. Choose food that is real, unprocessed, preferably spray-free or organic, as local as possible, and seasonal
2. Good clean source of water
3. Daily sunshine exposure when available and fresh air (limit use of air conditioning)
4. Daily movement and effective breathing
5. Dark room for sleeping with electronics removed
6. Prioritise plenty of good quality sleep and rest
7. Connection with loved ones
Incorporating the above seven basics are essential to create a healthy foundation within which to gestate new life. They are also just good basic rules to live by that support the health of the body-mind. Our bodies like regularity, they need rhythm to function well, and are intimately connected to the biorhythms of the earth. Electronics and light sources during sleep disturb the body’s natural rhythms and prevent the production of necessary hormones and neurotransmitters, like melatonin, growth hormone, and serotonin, that function to repair and heal our bodies as we sleep.
Drinking filtered water will reduce your exposure to pollutants contained in regular tap water. Sunshine exposure is good for the soul and energising, and necessary to produce vitamin D. Physical movement is essential for the health and wellbeing of our bodies, our minds and helps us to integrate our experiences. Movement stimulates the growth and development of our babies, they love to be rocked, to feel the moving body of their mothers as she goes about her day. In addition, regular movement supports the optimal positioning of your baby inside your womb space.
#Nourishment #Conscious Pregnancy #Embodiment #Nutrition #Foundations of Nourishment