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	Healthy Bones the Wise Woman Way Part 1 by Susun Weed SusunWeed.com
Astrology, Tarot, and Self Improvement for the New Age.

Healthy Bones the Wise Woman Way
Part 1
by Susun Weed

Every woman I know is concerned about osteoporosis. Frightening stories equate it with broken hips, bent spines, wheelchairs, and death -- things we all want to avoid. What can we do? Should we take calcium supplements? Hormones? Fosamax? Can we rely on our green allies?

The Wise Woman tradition maintains that simple lifestyle choices - including, but not limited to, regular use of nourishing herbal infusions, medicinal herbal vinegars, yogurt, and seaweed -- are sufficient to preserve bone and prevent breaks. And, further, that these lifestyle choices produce multiple health benefits, including reduction of heart disease and breast cancer, without the problems and risks associated with taking hormones. As for supplements, as we will see, they do more harm than good.

Forget Osteoporosis

First, we must rid ourselves of the idea that osteoporosis is important. In the Wise Woman Tradition, we focus on the patient, not the problem. There are no diseases and no cures for diseases. When we focus on osteoporosis, we cannot see the whole woman. The more we focus on disease -- even disease prevention - the less likely we are to know how to nourish health/wholeness/holiness.

In fact, focusing our attention narrowly on the prevention of osteoporosis actually increases the incidence of breast cancer. The postmenopausal women with the highest bone mass are the most likely to be diagnosed with breast cancer. Women who take estrogen replacement to prevent osteoporosis, even for as little as five years, increase their risk of breast cancer by twenty percent; if they take hormone replacement, the risk increases by forty percent.

These risks might be vindicated if we could show a correlation between bone density and bone breakage, but there isn't one. When I found myself at dinner in 2000 with Susan Brown, director of the Osteoporosis Information Clearing House, I asked her to point me in the direction of any study that shows a clear relationship between osteoporosis and broken bones. She smiled. "There are none."

"In a recent study," she continued. "Researchers measured the bone density of people over 65 who had broken bones. Twenty-five percent had osteoporosis. Twenty-five percent had high bone density. And fifty percent had normal density." Notice that those with high bone density broke their hips as frequently as those with osteoporosis.

Get Flexible

If osteoporosis isn't the problem, what is? In a word: inflexibility.

Flexible bones bend; stiff bones break. This holds true even if the flexible bone is thin, even if the stiff bone is thick. Think of a piece of dead pine wood. Though it may be thick, it is brittle and breaks easily. Think of a green pine twig. Even a small one is nearly impossible to break. Flexible bones, whether thick or thin, bend rather than break.

Flexibility is synonymous with health in the Wise Woman Tradition. It is created by nourishing and tonifying. Bone flexibility is created by nourishing the bones and tonifying the muscles around them. Tonifying is as important as nourishing, but because we are herbalists, let's focus on the benefits nourishing herbs offer to women who wish to have strong, flexible bones.

Enchanted Spirit assumes no liability for health care recommendations or treatments discussed by individual authors whose work is published on our website.

The information here is offered to help in your research and investigation of possible ways to manage your own health care issues. Common sense as well as solid professional advice from your own trusted medical care specialist or personal holistic health care practitioner should always be part of managing your health care choices.

Vibrant, passionate, and involved, Susun Weed has garnered an international reputation for her groundbreaking lectures, teachings, and writings on health and nutrition. She challenges conventional medical approaches with humor, insight, and her vast encyclopedic knowledge of herbal medicine. Unabashedly pro-woman, her animated and enthusiastic lectures are engaging and often profoundly provocative.

Susun is one of America's best-known authorities on herbal medicine and natural approaches to women's health. Her four best-selling books are recommended by expert herbalists and well-known physicians and are used and cherished by millions of women around the world. Learn more at SusunWeed.com

Susun Weed is a contributor to the Routledge International Encyclopedia of Women's Studies and the author of four highly acclaimed herbal medicine handbooks. She has been at the forefront of the herbal renaissance for 35 years.

By Susun S. Weed, author and herbalist. Write to: susunweed@hvc.rr.com for permission to reprint this article.

Visit Herbal Medicine and Spirit Healing the Wise Woman Way. For 500+ pages of women's health articles, recipes, and women's wit and wisdom.

Visit Breast Cancer? Breast Health! the Wise Woman Way. For women who want to maintain breast health and for women diagnosed with breast cancer. This site is designed with the purpose of empowering women in their health care choices.

Visit Menopause Metamorphosis. Gentle solutions for body, mind, and spirit: alternative approaches, herbal remedies, wise woman support. Your body knows more about menopause than your doctor does!

Legal Disclaimer: This content is not intended to replace conventional medical treatment. Any suggestions made and all herbs listed are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease, condition or symptom. Personal directions and use should be provided by a clinical herbalist or other qualified healthcare practitioner with a specific formula for you. All material on this website/email is provided for general information purposes only and should not be considered medical advice or consultation. Contact a reputable healthcare practitioner if you are in need of medical care. Exercise self-empowerment by seeking a second opinion.

Relationships based on obligation lack dignity.
~ Wayne Dyer ~
Born March 10, 1940

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Enchanted Spirit is a non-denominational spiritual center of healing, support, self-improvement, personal guidance, education and writing. We publish multi-media works of New Age thought and information to encourage serenity and growth in individual life choices, advance the universal search for life's meaning, and promote tolerance for positive ideas from all philosophies and religious traditions, believing as we do that truth is where you find it.

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Last updated September 11th, 2003

Planets in Retrograde -- The Basics
By
Rebecca Brents

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Why We Do What We Do: Understanding Self-Motivation
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Edward L. Deci, Richard Flaste