John Arts Abundant Living www.johnarts.co.nz

The best part of what I do is getting positive feedback from people prepared to make the necessary changes to their nutrient intake.

he other day, we had a person in her mid 80s tell us the poor lower leg circulation that had bothered her for years had dramatically improved –and to her great surprise, her sense of taste had returned after more than five years.

You may ask what special treatments we gave her for her circulation and her sense of taste? The answer is no treatment at all. All we did was identify the body processes that were malfunctioning, then added a variety of nutrients and co-factors to help these processes return to normal. Given her programme was mostly targeting peripheral circulation, we added nutrients that help prevent blood from becoming too sticky and then those that help maintain the integrity of blood vessel walls. Specifically we were targeting the main connective tissue proteins of collagen and elastin. When elastin loses its elasticity and collagen its structure, our blood vessels cannot perform properly and the result is poor circulation.

The challenge with circulation is we only notice it when it is not working properly. I recommend every adult more than 40 years of age has at least some levels of pro-circulatory nutrients from supplements. This would include antioxidants from grape seeds, bioflavonoids – especially hesperidin – vitamin C and all the supporting vitamins and minerals. If you have diagnosed problems we need to be more intensive, especially in the short term.

What was completely unexpected was the return of taste sensation. There was nothing specific we added for this. Taste is a complex sense where taste chemicals in food are dissolved on taste buds, which triggers both chemical and electrical signals that the brain interprets as taste. All I know is that like any part of the anatomy, its function is governed by the health of its specialised cells. My guess is the actual taste buds may not have been detecting the taste chemicals so no messages were sent to the brain. Whatever the reason, this is again a testimony to the ability of our bodies to heal and to restore back to normal. Feed the body what it really needs and you too may be surprised.