WITH ADDITIONAL STRESSES and strains on us all during these uncertain times, there are some fundamental steps we can take to stay buoyant and in good physical and mental health. They are fundamental – and completely cost-effective – yet we far too often neglect them: sleep, regular exercise and good nutrition. The basics. Add to that drinking eight glasses of water a day and cutting out or down on the bad stuff and you’re ready (or at least better able) for almost anything.
When I was ill almost 10 years ago, I came across Patrick Holford (right) and his Institute for Optimum Nutrition in London, through my daughter’s friend, who was studying there. I was eliminating dairy and other bugbears from my diet at the time, and found Holford’s Optimum Nutrition Bible and a number of his cookbooks invaluable, practical, upbeat and positively convincing. Treating food as medicine, and taking a proactive role in my recovery through diet, gave me a sense of control. It may have been illusionary, but hell, I felt better for it.
Holford started the institute in 1984 and has written more than 30 books addressing the connection between good mental and physical health and nutrition. His work serves to campaign as well as inform. You may take issue with some of it, but you will find great benefit in it, too. He’s giving a one-day seminar, Food As Medicine, next Saturday, March 28th, at the Royal College of Surgeons on St Stephen’s Green, Dublin. Tickets, including booking fee, are €90 from www.tickets.ie or tel: 086-3935895. Food for thought. Patsey Murphy