Health benefits of coconut oil. I don’t think there is one person who doesn’t heard this before. Coconut oil is a living legend these days, almost like the so controversial cannabis oil. A panacea, always available to us, yet so unknown. Till now. Because it seems it cannot be hidden from us anymore. 🙂
But while coconut oil has uncountable health benefits, the combination of it with honey has other uses. Also for our health and beauty, of course. Their combination mutually reinforce themselves and create the followings:
A super conditioning hair mask for dry hair.
An easy to do mask, that doesn’t require a specialist to make or apply on your hair. It takes 5 minutes to make it and the results will amaze you.
Mix 1 tbspoon unrefined coconut oil with 1 tbspoon on raw honey and apply the mxture to wet or dry hair. Make sure you apply enough on the most damaged, dry areas. Leave it in for up to an hour. I know, an hour is a lot! Well, keep it as much as you can from this hour. Cover it with a towel and do the rest of the things you do in the bathroom. After you have finished them all, return to your hair. Wash and condition the hair the way you like to.
Women reported amazing results after 3 washes, with visible improvements in softness and shining.
Cough Syrup
• Studies have proved that honey is combating cough. Children that received one teaspoon of honey just before bedtime, had less coughs and improved sleep.
• In combination with coffee, honey works wonders in persistent post-infectious cough. If you have had a cold or a flue, and after 3 weeks the cough is still present even while all the other symptoms have disappeared, then you are stuck with a persistent post-infectious cough. The most cheapest, not to mention tasty, natural remedy to get rid of it, it’s honey and coffee, (link to the post about it) taken 3 times per day.
• Honey combined with coconut oil and lemon proved to also be an efficient remedy for cough and sore throat.
To make it, mix 3 tbs of lemon juice with ¼ cup of raw honey and 2 tbsp of coconut oil (cold pressed). Heat the coconut oil a little, at low fire, until is liquid.
2 tbsp of this mixture is recommended to be taken just before bedtime.
Face Mask
A super nourishing face mask can be obtained from 1 tbsp of coconut oil combined with 1 tbsp of raw honey. It has been claimed that this mixture may treat conditions like acne, rosacea, and eczema. It also relieves dry or irritated skin and reduces wrinkles.
These are serious claims and I cannot tell if they are true or not. The truth is that both ingredients are anti-inflammatory, antioxidants and antimicrobial, so the results can only be good.
I personally doubt it can actually cure those disease, but I am sure they will relieve the symptoms and lead to super soft, clear and hydrated skin.
When you are at puberty and the hormones are popping in your face, this mask can mean a lot!
Nutritious Smoothie
We’ll need some extra ingredients for this one. The final result will be tasty but also full of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and healthy fats, just perfect to keep you feeling energetic and full throughout the day.
Blend the followings:
1/2 avocado
1 tsp raw honey
1 tbsp unrefined coconut oil
1 cup pure coconut water (optional)
1 cup frozen berries
Add the berries a little before the end of the blending, so your coconut oil won’t thick due to the the coldness of the berries.
Coconut butter
It’s more than a simple butter, it’s a spread good to be enjoyed on breads or other baked goods, as a topping on sweet potatoes or squash, in a bowl of oatmeal or granola, or mixed into a bit of Greek yogurt. Your choice entirely.
1 cup unrefined coconut oil
1/4 cup raw honey
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp sea salt (not iodized table salt)
Use a blender or other food processor you have and process for one minute on high. Do not over-whip it, as the coconut oil may liquefy and separate from the honey. After 1 minute, transfer the spread to a jar for storage, and keep in the fridge.
Why use coconut oil in everything?
Coconut oil can be helpful for all of you who want to enhance your overall health, for pregnant women, nursing moms, the elderly, those concerned about digestive health, athletes, even weekend warriors.
Coconut oil is helpful in:
• Alzheimer’s disease, as MCTs are also a primary source of ketone bodies, which act as an alternate source of brain fuel that can help prevent the brain atrophy associated with dementia.
• Thyroid conditions ( it balances the thyroid and normalizes cholesterol levels)
• Fat Loss (the medium chain fatty acids (MCTs) are the ones that promote weight loss and are helpful for shedding adipose fat.)
All these people can use it in their diet, there are thousand of ways of incorporating it in cooking.
Make sure you choose an organic coconut oil that is unrefined, unbleached, made without heat processing or chemicals, and does not contain GM ingredients.
Research says that among the explanations for its broad health applications we can enumerate:
– Lauric acid, which converts in your body to monolaurin – a compound also found in breast milk that strengthens a baby’s immunity.
– Capric acid, a fatty acid present in smaller amounts, is an antimicrobial component.
– Its medium chain fatty acids or triglycerides (MCTs), raise your body’s metabolism and fight off pathogens such as viruses, bacteria and fungi.
Coconut oil for low thyroid problems.
Do you know if you have a low thyroid problem?
You may avoid going to a doctor, I know I do this all the time. Check if you have the following signs, and if you do, than you should run some blood tests to see how your thyroid works. Even if you will not be diagnosed with hypothyroid, but you experience a number of the symptoms associated with this condition, this may result from an undernourished thyroid gland. Here are the symptoms:
Cold hands and feet, low body temperature, sensitivity to cold, a feeling of always being chilled, headaches, insomnia, dry skin, puffy eyes, hair loss, brittle nails, joint aches, constipation, mental dullness, fatigue, frequent infections, hoarse voice, ringing in the ears, dizziness, loss of libido, or weight gain, which is sometimes uncontrollable.
Take your body temperature.
If you are not sure if you have low thyroid, take your body temperature for four mornings in a row before you get out of bed. Shake down a glass thermometer to below 35°C (95°F) and place it by your bed before you go to sleep. Upon waking, place the thermometer in your armpit for a full ten minutes. It is important to move as little as possible during this time. Remain still with your eyes closed. Don’t get up for any reason. (from dr Mercola’s advice. See references in the footnotes.)
After ten minutes, record the temperature and date. This should be done for four consecutive mornings. Individuals with normal functioning thyroids have a basal body temperature between 36.4°C (97.6°F) and 36.7°C (98.2°F). Basal body temperatures below this range may reflect hypothyroidism.
Do the pencil test
This is a method presented by Dr. Oz.
To illustrate the idea that loss of the outer edge of the eyebrow can be a thyroid symptom, he said “to line up a pencil vertically with the outer edge of your mouth. You should have some eyebrow that extends beyond the pencil. If not, said Oz, “it’s either hypothyroidism, or overzealous tweezing.” 🙂
Dr. Oz also mentions Vitamin D3 as most important in a thyroid condition.
“One of the reasons Vitamin D is so important is it reduces autoimmune responses. That’s probably the number one reason we have inadequate thyroid hormone in America. I wanted to get that out there because if you think about one thing you should do in your life to avoid becoming one of the 27 million American women who have thyroid problems, take vitamin D.”
Remember that thyroid problems cannot be cured that easily. If at all. Blood tests come back negative sometimes, but they may be misleading. To cite Dr. Oz.again, “It’s about symptom management, not getting the right blood test”.
Fat loss?
Yes, research says that women with weigh problems have under-active thyroid, caused by fluoridated water (which is a potent inhibitor of thyroid function) or polyunsaturated vegetable oils like soybean oil. (Today, it is nearly impossible to eat at restaurants or buy packaged foods that don’t have soy oil in the ingredients. Often labels only say “vegetable oil.”).
Soybean oil have been used for livestock feed because they cause the animals to gain weight. These oils are made up of what is known as long-chain fatty acids—the kind of fatty acids that promote weight gain.
Soy oil and other dietary oil are bad for thyroid
Yes, and we use them in cooking almost every day and they are plentiful in commercially prepared foods. Why are they bad?
“Unsaturated oils block thyroid hormone secretion, its movement in the circulatory system, and the response of tissues to the hormone.” (says Ray Peat Ph.D., a physiologist who has worked with progesterone and related hormones since 1968)
In the study The effects on the thyroid gland of soybeans administered experimentally in healthy subjects, by Ishizuki Y et al., healthy individuals without any previous thyroid disease were fed 30 grams of pickled soybeans per day for one month. The results showed goiter and elevated individual thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH) levels (although still within the normal range) in thirty-seven healthy, iodine-sufficient adults. One month after stopping soybean consumption, individual TSH values decreased to the original levels and goiters were reduced in size.
Long-chain fatty acids in vegetable oils are so damaging to the thyroid because they oxidize quickly and become rancid. Food manufacturers know about this propensity towards rancidity and, therefore, highly refine (hydrogenate or partially hydrogenate) their vegetable oils. After this process, there will be trans fatty acids, which will especially damage cell tissue and have a negative effect on the thyroid as well as health in general.
Because the longer chain fatty acids are deposited in cells more often as rancid and oxidizing fat, impairment of the conversion of thyroid hormone T4 to T3 occurs, which is symptomatic of hypothyroidism. To create the enzymes needed to convert fats to energy, T4 must be converted to T3.
Why is coconut oil good for thyroid?
Coconut oil is a saturated fat made up primarily of medium-chain fatty acids (MCTs), known to increase metabolism and promote weight loss. While increasing metabolism, basal body temperatures are also raised (a good thing for low thyroid).
Because coconut oil is saturated and very stable. Unrefined coconut oil has a shelf life of about three to five years at room temperature and when cooked, it does not easily turn to trans fatty acids (which makes it one of the best oils for cooking).
Due to this stability, the body is not burdened with oxidative stress as it is with the vegetable oils. Coconut oil does not require the enzyme stress that vegetable oils do, preventing T4 to T3 hormone conversion, not only because it is a stable oil, but also because it is processed differently in the body and does not need to be broken down by enzyme dependent processes as do long-chain fatty acids.
Many people have improved their thyroid health, have lost weight, and increased their energy by including two to three tablespoons of virgin coconut oil in their diet.
Other foods that contribute to healthy thyroid function.
- Other healthy fats and oils: virgin olive oil and butter.
- Iodine-rich foods: sea vegetables, fish, seafood, and eggs.
- Take vitamin and mineral supplements: zinc, selenium, B vitamins, vitamin C, vitamin E, vitamin A, vitamin D
- Juices from: radish juice, carrots or cucumber, celery, and lemon. You may add a dash of powdered kelp or dulse for a boost of iodine. Cranberry is another helpful juice.
- Avoid certain foods can block iodine from being absorbed by the thyroid gland (aka goitrogens): turnips, cabbage, mustard, cassava root, pine nuts, millet, peanuts, and soybeans.
- As much as possible, omit refined grains, sugar and sweets, caffeine (coffee, black tea, sodas, and chocolate) and alcohol.
- Limit exposure to fluoride and mercury. Use a water filtration system that removes fluoride and other chemicals. Use a fluoride free toothpaste (I recommend those with propolis). Get mercury amalgam fillings removed from your mouth. When eating fish, order more smaller cold water fish such as salmon and halibu, they have less mercury.
- Exercise. Again, exercise, the same old story. There is nothing we can do about this. We have been made to be moving creatures. It’s the way our body works best. Exercise stimulates thyroid gland secretion and increases tissue sensitivity to thyroid hormones.
The easiest exercises are walking (min 50 minutes per day) and stretching. And jumping on a mini trampoline is really good for our lymphatic system and it’s easy to do. A minimum of 50 jumps per day will do the job. Equivalent of a professional lymphatic massage.
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References and picture credits:
Raw Honey and Coconut Oil: 5 Fantastic Uses of This Superfood Duo
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2003/11/08/thyroid-health-part-two.aspx
https://www.verywell.com/dr-oz-got-it-right-about-thyroid-disease-on-gma-3895545
coconut picture credit Hans via pixabay.com
Are there any honeys that are good for the thyroid
?
What if you had your thyroid radioactive ablation ; due to toxic , lethal levels unreadable! GRAVES DISEASE. currently on Tirosint for the rest of my life. Starting Bee Pollen now! Any thoughts?Thanks
Hi Donna,
Your situation is pretty complex and clearly cannot be discussed in a comment section. But as a rule, natural products have a broad spectrum and address to the whole body, bee pollen is a good choice, but perhaps even better would be propolis and royal jelly. Please read about them.
Laura
This article is for hypothyroid only and not a hyperthyroid please be specific in your post. I had a hyperthyroid and seafood or anything that has iodine can cause palpitations. also goitrogens for Hyperthyroid is good such as broccoli,cauliflower and cabbage.
Though coconut oil is good also for hyperthyroid based on my experience please do be specific for hyper and hypo.
Hi Mark,
Coconut oil does not contain iodine. When you buy it, some labels show a “iodine value” but this does not refer to the quantity of iodine contained into coconut oil, it is a measure of the degree of the unsaturation of an oil. Technically it is the value of the amount of iodine, measured in grams, absorbed by 100 ml of a given oil. This value is used primarily in industry, it gives an indication of the oil’s stability and health properties. The higher the iodine value, the less stable the oil and the more vulnerable it is to oxidation and free radical production. High iodine value oils are prone to oxidation and polymerization. During heating, such as when used in cooking, oils with a high iodine value readily oxidize and polymerize.
Here are some iodine values in oils:
Coconut Oil 10
Palm Kernel Oil 37
Beef Tallow 40
Palm Oil 54
Olive Oil 81
Peanut Oil 93
Canola Oil 98
Sunflower Oil 125
Soybean Oil 130
Coconut oil supports healthy thyroid function. It regulates its functions, either hyper or hypo.
Laura
PS. I encourage you to ask your physician about this, or a naturopath. Your body listens to your beliefs only!