Puberty at 8? Is Reliv Part of the Problem??

I received this article from Dr. Mercola's website and I found his comments very interesting and very alarming. More and more we are finding that girls are going through puberty earlier and earlier and they have found that this can increase their chances for breast cancer and other health and social issues. Though the causes can be many, I did find it interesting that Soy and Soy products were one of the things listed. Since Reliv is so high in soy, this should be a concern if you have your children on the Kid's Now or any of the other Reliv Products. There are so many other options out there for vitamins, you don't need to give your children something that is so strongly Soy based.

Puberty at 8? Girls' Earlier Puberty Puts Them at Higher Risk for Cancer
POSTED BY - Dr. Mercola - October 06 2007



Girls in the United States are reaching puberty at very early ages, increasing their risk of breast cancer, social problems, and emotional problems.

While the biological signs of female puberty -- menstruation, breast development, and growth of pubic and underarm hair -- typically occurred around 13 years of age or older just decades ago, today girls as young as 8 are increasingly showing these signs.

African-American girls are particularly vulnerable to early puberty.

Aside from the social and emotional implications, early puberty exposes girls to more estrogen, which increases their risk of breast cancer because the disease thrives on estrogen.

According to biologist Sandra Steingraber, the author of the report titled "The Falling Age of Puberty in U.S. Girls: What We Know, What We Need to Know," "The data indicates that if you get your first period before age 12, your risk of breast cancer is 50 percent higher than if you get it at age 16."

"For every year we could delay a girl's first menstrual period,” she says, “we could prevent thousands of breast cancers."

Theories behind what is causing the early-puberty trend abound, but the actual causes are not known. Potential causes noted in the paper include:

• Rising childhood obesity rates and inactivity
  
• Formula-feeding of infants
  
• Excessive TV viewing and media use
  
• Family stress
  
• Exposure to environmental chemicals

Early puberty is likely an “ecological disorder,” according to Steingraber, that’s being caused by a number of environmental factors.

The Breast Cancer Fund, “The Falling Age of Puberty in U.S. Girls: What We Know, What We Need to Know”

Chicago Tribune September 16, 2007

Dr. Mercola's Comments:

It is becoming increasingly common for young children, even 5- and 6-year-olds, to go through precocious puberty (aka early sexual development). The introduction of this report even states that studies have found girls as young as 2 years old entering puberty!

This is clearly a multi-faceted problem, but I believe one of its main causes stems from your environmental exposure to a whole slew of endocrine-disrupting chemicals.

These man-made chemicals affect your hormones, which control development and function in your body. There is mounting evidence that they can cause harm in the development of fetuses and children, who are particularly sensitive to the chemicals because they have not yet developed the protective mechanisms present in adult bodies.

If you think you and your children are not exposed to endocrine disrupters, think again. They’re commonly found in many household products and cosmetics, including:

• Bovine growth hormones commonly added to commercial dairy
  
• Soy foods, which are loaded with hormone-like substances
  
• Bisphenol A, commonly used in many plastics such as baby bottles, food-storage containers, and the lining of soda cans
  
• Phthalates, also commonly used in plastics
  
• Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) -- better known as Teflon
  

I want to place special emphasis on soy. As many VitalVotes readers have been pointing out, soy is present in virtually every processed food, and Americans are eating it in unprecedented quantities in foods like soymilk, soy burgers, and soy ice cream.

Meanwhile, some misinformed moms are still feeding their vulnerable babies soy infant formula, which exposes their child to the equivalent of five birth control pills’ worth of estrogen every day. For this same reason, it’s also important for pregnant women to avoid eating soy, as a high estrogenic environment in utero may increase their child’s subsequent breast cancer risk.

Other environmental chemicals like PCBs and DDE (a breakdown product of the pesticide DDT) may also be associated with early sexual development in girls. Both DDE and PCBs are known to mimic, or interfere with, sex hormones.

What is even more troubling is that endocrine-disrupting environmental chemicals can actually increase your child’s risk of obesity, which in turn may increase their likelihood of early puberty.

Early Puberty is Only the Tip of the Iceberg

Meanwhile, the same chemical exposures that are causing young kids to enter puberty well before their time can also lead to increased infertility and breast cancer rates down the road.

So if you have children, or are planning to, avoiding environmental contaminants and soy foods as much as possible (unless they are in the traditional, fermented form such as natto, miso, or tempeh), is a wise choice.

Here are some measures you can take to protect yourself and your children from common toxic substances that could cause them to go into puberty years before they were designed to:

• Store your food in glass containers whenever possible, as it is the most inert container you can use.
  
• Only use natural cleaning products in your home. Most health food stores will have these available or you can search online for them.
  
• Buy and eat, as much as possible, locally grown, organic foods that do not contain pesticides and added hormones.
  
• Avoid processed foods, which are loaded with soy and other unsavory ingredients.
  
• Switch to natural brands of toiletries, including shampoo, toothpaste, antiperspirants, and cosmetics. Use the same sources as above for these, either your local health food store or you can search online.
  

Finally, I encourage everyone with children or grandchildren to review Theo Colburn’s Our Stolen Future, which is one of the BEST resources on this topic.

Dangers of Soy - Reliv Has Soy

Are you convinced yet about the dangers of soy? Many aren’t. “Is soy bad for you? …Really?” I hear the question so often I want to scream.

After decades of hearing marketing spin about how soy is a wonder food, a protein-rich legume able to rescue us from our dependence on meat, I suppose it’s understandable why so many people have yet to understand fully the dangers of soy. Really, you’re not going to get the full story unless you research it on your own. And why would you, when soy is “universally” touted as a health food?

Well, it isn’t.


Dangers of Soy

Thankfully, more and more independent research has been done regarding the dangers of soy, and what it’s revealed should scare you.

Phytoestrogens

Soy is higher in phytoestrogens than just about any other food source. Phytoestrogens are plant-based estrogens that mimic estrogen in our bodies. In recent years, you may have read about studies which indicate phytoestrogens are good for you. But ask yourself, who funded those studies? The soy industry, that’s who. Independent research has clearly shown that consuming phytoestrogens is downright dangerous for the human body.

It’s only common sense. No one argues, for example, that a leading cause of breast cancer, endometriosis, uterine fibroids, infertility, and low libido is unopposed estrogen, or estrogen dominance. Why, then, would anyone argue that we should consume more of a food high in estrogen?

An infant taking the recommended amount of soy formula is consuming a hormone load equivalent of 4 birth control pills a day! Is it any wonder we’ve seen such a dramatic rise in precocious puberty with young girls starting their periods at 6 and 7?

Goitrogenic

Soy will destroy your thyroid. Many foods are goitrogenic (thyroid suppressing), but soy is king of them all. Goitrogens work by preventing your thyroid from getting the necessary amount of iodine. Friends, I believe this is what happened to Oprah’s thyroid. She pushed soy for years, featured it in everyone one of her “healthy” diets, and it destroyed her thyroid. If your thyroid fails, what happens? You gain weight. You have a harder time regulating your moods. You get colder more easily. You’re more easily fatigued. You demonstrate an inability to concentrate and remember details. The list goes on. You simply don’t want to mess with your thyroid.

Phytates

Phytates are enzyme-inhibitors that block mineral absorption in human digestive tract. They are naturally present in all grains, seeds, nuts, and legumes (which is why everyone should read this primer on how to eat grains, if you eat them at all.) But soy is so high in phytates that it’s almost impossible to get rid of them. Simply soaking soy overnight in an acidic medium won’t do the trick. Soy must be fermented in order to be digestible to humans. That means that if you eat soy at all, you should stick to fermented soy products like miso, tempeh, natto, or a naturally fermented soy sauce (tamari).

Trypsin inhibitors

Finally soy is rich in trypsin inhibitors. Trypsin is a digestive enzyme we need to properly digest protein. Without enough trypsin, you’ll experience many digestive problems including stomach cramps, diarrhea, and bleeding. You’ll also be leaving yourself open to future problems with your pancreas.

Debunking The Asian Soy Myth

But, people say, what about Asians? They eat soy every day, and they’re so healthy!

In this article by Nina Planck, she writes:

Soy farming started around 1100 BC in China, where it was used to build soil fertility and feed animals. Soy beans were not considered fit for humans until the Chinese learned to ferment them, which makes them digestible. Asian diets now include fermented soy beans in the form of natto, miso, tamari, and tempeh.

Soy producers want you to eat more soy — more than the Asians eat, and more than is good for you. The Japanese and Chinese eat 10 grams of soy per day — about two teaspoons. Yet a soy manufacturer recommends Americans eat ten times what the Japanese eat — 100 grams of soy protein per day. In The Soy Zone, Barry Sears recommends a daily diet of a minimum of 50 grams of soy, and up to 75 grams for women and 100 grams for men.

It’s like red wine: a glass or two a day may be good for you; a bottle or two every day rots your liver.

Did you catch that? Asians only eat 2 teaspoons of soy a day, usually as a condiment, and it’s highly fermented! Fermentation takes care of many of the dangers of soy. Plus, the typical Asian will also consume soy with mineral-rich and nutrient-dense foods such as fish broth (naturally high in iodine & other minerals which support the thyroid).
So, Is Soy Bad For You?

The short answer? YES! Let’s be clear on the recent history of soy. The soybean was a modest and unpopular crop until food manufacturers intent on creating cheap vegetable oils convinced the U.S. government to start subsidizing it. The soy was turned into oil, and the industry was left with an industrial waste product. Then somebody had a brilliant idea:

Let’s take this industrial waste product full of toxins and carcinogens — isolated soy protein — and turn it into food that people will eat!

Soy foods were born. From Nina Planck’s article:

The FDA refused to approve isolated soy protein as a safe food additive with the designation “Generally Recognized as Safe.”

Agribusiness giant Archer Daniels Midland withdrew its application for the coveted GRAS status for soy protein, after an outcry from scientists about the toxins and carcinogens that come with it. They can still put soy protein in your food, but they have to get pre-market approval for every product.

Isolated soy protein is no health food. But we don’t eat soy protein with a spoon. How do we eat it? It is the main ingredient in soy burgers, ice cream, milk shakes, and fake cheese. These soy protein products are phony foods — but they must look like the real foods they imitate. So the soy industry transforms a small yellow soy bean into something resembling a hamburger. They make soy “milk” and “ice cream” white and creamy.

The other ingredients in these foods are no better for you than the soy protein that goes into them. Soy milk, for example, is simply a cocktail of soy protein, sugar, and vegetable oil. The “natural” MSG formed in soy processing is already bad for you, but even more MSG, and more flavorings, are added. Imitation foods need a lot of help to be tasty. Many savory soy foods are loaded with additives to give them the flavor of the real foods they mimic. Most imitation meat, for example, contains man-made MSG, which causes migraines and is associated with brain cancer.

Soy foods aren’t real food. They aren’t traditional. They aren’t old. They’re industrial waste products dressed up in pretty clothes and marketed to an ignorant public.

ETA: Reader comments below prompted me to include a couple of additions to this post. The questions: What about tofu or homemade soy milk? Their consumption is quite widespread in Asian cultures, and they’re non-fermented soy foods. Are they okay? The answers: Tofu originated around the 2nd century BC in China, and it was made from fermented bean curd. That is how it was traditionally made before the days of refrigeration. Most modern tofu isn’t fermented anymore. You can still buy varieties of fermented tofu (aka “Stinky Tofu” or “Pickled Tofu”) in some Asian markets, though. Also, according to the most comprehensive online account of soymilk’s history, its use was rare before the 20th century and widespread usage was highly unlikely. In other words, it’s not a traditional food. Nor is non-fermented tofu. They’re the Asian equivalents of margarine, hot bath canning, “vegetable oil,” or soda pop — something relatively new on the food scene which became very widespread with the industrialization of the food supply. And like these industrialized food products, they are bad for your health.

This post is participating in today’s Fight Back Friday carnival hosted right here at Food Renegade. For other interesting news stories, anecdotes, and recipes concerning Real Food, go check it out!


Please visit http://www.foodrenegade.com/dangers-of-soy/ for more info!

Looking for New Stories

Hello Everyone,

First of all I want to thank you for reading my blog. Life has been really busy and so it's hard to keep it updated like I should but I do try my best. But we are ALWAYS looking for your stories.

Please REMEMBER that we are NOT looking for success stories. There are other blogs / websites that will post your success stories. I have devoted my blog to people who want to share the TRUTH about Reliv and share their stories of how Reliv has not helped or even hurt them worse. There are many out there and my purpose is to provide a please for people to share so that others may have a chance to see both sides.

Too many Distributors will lie to you because they DON'T care about your health as much as they care about their pockets. I have seen this TOO many times.

And NO, I don't have an axe to grind as so many like to write and tell me. I just want both sides of the story to be told. YES, Reliv does help some but at the same time as many if not more are harmed or not helped at all. If the Distributors would share this info I would not need to! Start telling the truth and stop telling people to take more than the recommended so you can pad your pockets.

Sorry, I ranted there a bit! Please send your stories!!!!

Reliv divides families. . .root of evil

The following message is a update from our last post. It is really sad that Reliv / MLMs do this to families. I guess the Bible was correct when it said, "The love of money is the root of all evil".

"I wanted to give you an update on our horrible Reliv experience! So, we bought the stuff from my mother-in-law at a 40% discount. She gave us her discount, telling us she wasn't trying to make money off of us. She also told us that it had a 30 day money back guarantee. Now that we've told her we don't want to take it anymore, that money back guarantee has disappeared! We're now being told that because we had a discount, we don't get the guarantee and we are stuck with $570 worth of products to sit in our basement. This is our family! We feel completely taken advantage of by our parents, yet all they can see is that we want our money back and it is going to cost them. After this they found someone to buy the unopened products from us. We brought up the money back guarantee for the opened products explaining that she could receive new products to replace what we used for 1 week. We were told well we opened them and no one would want them so we are out. They don't want to go through the company to get replacement products and we are stuck with the cost. I calculated it and with shipping and tax we're out $220 for using Reliv products for 1 week!!!

The lesson we learned - Don't do business with family! Never use Reliv products because even if the container says it has a guarantee, they will find a way out of paying you back. Reliv divides families!!!!"

My Response;

"I am really sorry to hear what happened with your family. Reliv does make it hard to get replacement products. You parents have to pay you back from their pockets and then they would need to try and get replacements from Reliv. I think they have send the empty containers back or something like that. Granted this is no excuses but this is how Reliv makes people keep the products rather than returning them.

If this wasn't your parents, I would have suggested that you call Reliv directly and complain but at this point, no since in causing problems for your parents."

I believe Reliv is BAD!

The following is from an email that I received a few days ago, followed by my response. I don't care how many Reliv Distributors write in to tell me that I have an axe to grind and that Reliv is "really good for me", it does not work for everyone and does cause problems.

"I started taking Reliv 1 week ago. I was convinced by a family member this product would build my child's immune system. My entire family started taking it, and we saw amazing results with energy level, appetite, and overall feeling good. Once we started to research the products more, we found it was full of bad soy, and artificial sweeteners and additives. All along we have been told this stuff is "food" for our bodies, but that is far from the truth.

First my children's behavior has been out of control this past week. Once fairly obedient children turned into hyper active, non-listening children constantly in trouble. I contribute that to the high sugar content in the Kids Now.

Here's where I believe Reliv is BAD! I was diagnosed with a sinus/ear infection and given antibiotics. I had already been taking Reliv so I continued, but also began taking the antibiotics. After 5 days I still wasn't better, and began assuming the soy was interfering with the antibiotics. I decided that night to stop Reliv so I could get better. I have been off Reliv for 24 hours now and it has been the worst 24 hours of my LIFE! I feel like I"m going through a drug withdrawal. I've never been addicted to drugs, tobacco, or alcohol, but I've been dizzy, nauseous, hot/cold spells, foggy headed, and craving Reliv. I was pretty much in bed all day yesterday because I couldn't function normally. This was after only being on the product for 1 week. How can something so "natural" cause withdrawal symptoms so massively? I wanted to contact you because I don't know of anyone else who has tried to get off the products after such a short time and had these symptoms. I am hoping you have some information/advice for me since you've researched this so much. I feel miserable, but I refuse to continue taking these products. I firmly believe there is something addicting in them that causes people to feel so good when on them, but so bad when they stop taking them. Just like a drug huh? Do you know how long it should take to detox from this junk? I started taking a regular multivitamin and a huge dose of Vitamin B. Is there anything I can take to flush this crap out of my body?"

My Responce

"I have heard of a number of people where this has happened to and the same thing happened to us when we stopped the Reliv products. The only thing that I have heard of is to simply stop taking the products and soon your body will balance back out. I have heard of one extreme case where the poor girl couldn't stop taking the products. She tried time and time again to stop but the withdrawals were so bad that she couldn't quit. She posted a number of times telling of her attempts but I have not heard from her in about 6 months.

Thank you for taking the time to post your story to us."

Caution Urged on Soy Menopause Remedies - Soysentials

Caution Urged on Soy Menopause Remedies

A researcher said on April 9 that so little is known about how plant estrogens act on the human body that sales of soy supplements as a natural alternative to hormone replacement therapy (HRT) must be questioned.

Soy is being widely promoted as a natural alternative to HRT. This is because it contains genistein, a plant estrogen that has similar but weaker effects to normal estrogen found in women.

But Dr. Saffron Whitehead, reader in reproductive physiology at St. George's Hospital Medical School, London, said new studies on human cells have shown that genistein and other phyto-estrogens may also stop the enzymes that make these hormones.

This could explain why the incidence of breast cancer, which in many cases is dependent on estrogen, is about two-thirds lower amongst Japanese and Chinese women who consume diets rich in soy compared with women living in England.

Whitehead's team examined the effects of phyto-estrogens on human ovarian cells obtained during procedures for in vitro fertilization.

The results showed that several phyto-estrogens, including genistein, inhibited the conversion of androgens to estrogens.

The researchers believe this could be significant in postmenopausal women because as these women's ovaries cease to function, their only source of estrogens is converting androgens released by their adrenal glands.

"This finding is potentially important to the phyto-estrogen story," Whitehead added in a statement. "We really don't know how phyto-estrogens act in the human body. They could be weak estrogen mimics, estrogen blockers or enzyme inhibitors.

"If they do stop the natural production of estrogens, we should consider whether soy supplements be sold as a natural alternative to HRT."

Annual Meeting British Endocrine Society's in Harrogate, Yorkshire England April 9, 2002

Dr. Mercola's Comments:

I am not opposed to all soy. Clearly Asian cultures show benefit from consuming soy products. The central issue that is missed though, is that most of the soy Asians consumed is fermented.

Natto is a slimy foul smelling fermented soybean preparation that has been used in eastern Japan for over 1,000 years. Interestingly, natto has some of the highest content of vitamin K2 of any food known to man.

Mostly Asian researchers have extensively studied Vitamin K2 and found it to be a profoundly useful tool to treat and reverse osteoporosis.

Tempeh and miso are also other fermented soy products that are likely to have nutritional benefits.

It would be unwise to assume that highly processed foods like tofu and soy protein would provide similar benefits as the fermented whole foods.

From a vitamin K2 perspective, it is quite clear that the non-fermented soy foods, provide absolutely no vitamin K2 and will not protect and treat osteoporosis.

If you are still confused about this issue, don't worry. This is a highly controversial area. If you have some free time and want to review some of the many hundreds of pages I have compiled on this subject, please review the soy index below.

Your Stories Wanted - Reliv Problems

Over the time I have been running this blog I have come under attack by "Pro" Reliv users because I don't publish their positive stories. I have tried to be very clear on this point, the sole purpose of this blog is to give people a chance to share the negative side. If you search the internet there are many pro websites but few negative. Now many pro users will say that this is because the products are so good but I believe that people who have had problems with Reliv simple do nothing.

And so I created this blog to give them a chance to share their stories. If you have had problems with Reliv, their products or business, please take a moment to send us your stories so we can share them with others.

As far as those who want to post a positive story, do it somewhere else as it won't get published here. If you want to discuess, please send me an email and I would be happy to email you personally.

Rod and Anita Swift - Reliv No More!

The following is some emails that I received from Rod and Anita Swift. They have given me permission to republish their info. I hope you find it helpful.

"Dear Reliv Friends and Former Associates,

This information was prepared for those of you who might have heard rumors and were concerned about why Reliv has felt the need to terminate our distributorship. We have been over whelmed with inquiries and appreciate every call and email from our Reliv friends over this past month . The following letter was composed as a brief explanation and we have constructed a web site to explain and clear up any misconceptions in greater detail . Thank-you all for your love and concern.

As many of you know, Anita and I resigned as Ambassadors several months ago. We realized this may come as a shock to those of you who were not yet aware of it. What may be even more shocking to you, as it was to us, is the response we received from Bob Montgomery via e-mail. Then, two months later on October 26th (and again, via e-mail), were informed by Reliv Compliance that our distributorship had been terminated (as of October 1, 2008).

It's been hard to accept that over the past few months no one from Reliv has made any effort to personally contact us by phone in regards to this issue. So much for that warm friendly relationship we were led to believe exists between Corporate and its Ambassadors.

All the reasons for our decision to resign as Ambassadors were addressed in a letter to Bob Montgomery shortly after the International Conference last August. That letter as well as Bob's response is now available to all you who care about your future with Reliv. I will only add here that after many hours of research our letter of resignation was prompted by what we believed to be serious concerns in regards to the direction Reliv was leading us. In that letter I believe that we honestly made an effort to convey our love and concern for a faltering company we had poured our heart and soul into for over six years. The unwillingness on Reliv's part to discuss much less address the issues we presented them with is evidence to me we must have struck a raw nerve.

Their delayed response was just as I predicted, "shoot the messenger." It has been my experience that corporations are always quick to scrap old worn out machinery but very slow to scrap old worn out business practices. It is stated in the Reliv PA brochure that as President and CEO Bob Montgomery is committed to helping Reliv Distributors achieve their goals. I'm sure that is true but a commitment to a vehicle running on flat tires is not a recipe for success. The reality of life is that most Reliv distributors over the past few years have experienced burn out and are left strewn along Reliv's "Road to Success" that is for them a tumultuous and costly trail of tears..

I asked myself, "Why have Reliv distributor numbers plummeted over the past couple years instead of exploding like so many other companies? If Reliv offers people such a wonderful business opportunity, why were Reliv's profits down over 40% last quarter?" How could I, as an Ambassador, honesty continue to encourage others to join me in a business that I myself, was finding harder and harder to be successful at? Talking to distributors at conference revealed that our story was not an isolated case, but rather the norm amongst nearly every distributor and Reliv Ambassador we questioned (names are being withheld for obvious reasons).

Of course, this was confirmed by the $7 million drop in sales between the 2nd quarter of 2008 and the same quarter of 2006. Obviously there have been serious Corporate decisions being made that are counter productive in this modern day marketing climate. The decline in sales can not be blamed on a few lazy Ambassadors or distributors as Bob Montgomery implied in his response to us.

Let it be known, Anita and I never QUIT Reliv, nor did we expect Reliv to toss us overboard. We just needed another source of income to make up for our dwindling Reliv check. Anita could have gone back to work with her family business, but our sense of responsibility to the organization we had worked hard to build dictated we find that additional income by working from home.

After being exposed to the power of network marketing, one can no longer think in terms of an employee. An exhaustive search led us to a company with a patented cold press method of manufacturing healthy chocolate that was backed up with tons of clinical studies that showed the power of how important antioxidant rich cacao is for our bodies immune system.

Sharing a healthy alternative product that the average American was already eating 12 pounds of a year was pretty much a "no brainer"! Because we love helping people we knew that this was something anyone could do with very little rejection and none of the stress of follow up. (Unlike soy-powder, nobody needs to instruct nor remind you to eat your daily serving of healthy, decadent Belgian chocolate).

Our Reliv distributorship wasn't terminated because we recruited other successful Reliv distributors.(and contrary to rumors, MXI has not paid us to bring our whole downline with us.) We were terminated because we helped a few friends who had either quit Reliv, could not afford Reliv anymore or had just plain been unsuccessful at getting their Reliv business off the ground. They saw what we were doing and asked if they could join us. The unilateral voluntary servitude contract, we ignorantly signed with Reliv over six years ago to get the best price on the products, unbeknown to us, forbade Anita and I from ever communicating anything relating to any type of business or monetary trade outside of our Reliv business, with our friends or family for up to 18 months after retiring from our duties as Reliv Ambassadors. Caring more about helping people than abiding by such a rigid contract, we decided our usual modus operandi of honesty, ethics and transparency was still the best approach, and told Reliv Corporate of our plans. Sadly, the honest approach with Reliv was a mistake as it needlessly subjected us to the wrath of Reliv dogma and soon, the 100% forfeiture of our so called "residual income."

I must tell you that passive residual income I mention had dwindled from $15,000 per month to a measly $5,000 a month over the last 3 years, in spite of massive financial expenditures (over $35,000 in advertising costs in 2007 alone) and tremendous sacrifice of time and effort on our part just to out-sponsor the continually rising attrition. Nonetheless, $5,000 a month is a small price to pay to escape Reliv's all knowing eye and regain our rights and freedom again.

Over these past months we have discovered that few network marketing companies today require anyone to sign an exclusive agreement anymore. In fact, many even encourage their distributors to explore ways to create multiple streams of income through other DSA- member companies. Once again, as a distributor, Reliv forbids you from earning any income or achieving financial success from an outside source. Once you sign up as a distributor you either succeed or die with Reliv. If Reliv is such a wonderful company to be a distributor for why do they feel they must shackle their distributors to an outdated exclusivity contract? Direct-Selling competitors such as USANA, Herbalife, MaxGXL, Youngevity, TriVita, Univera, VitaMark, MXI Corp, and so on... none of them feel a need to imprison their base of distributors to themselves, but instead offer their distributors more modern and cutting edge methods of doing business and some gather upwards of 50,000 attendees or more to their regional conferences, sadly, Reliv is a very different story.

What is it that makes Reliv feel they must chain down distributors with forced contracts of Unilateral Exclusiveness? If the Reliv Success System was as good as they had us claiming and teaching it to be, don't you think we would still be successful Reliv Ambassadors mentoring our exploding organization and just consuming healthy chocolate as an antioxidant rich treat? Your distributor contract shackles you to the Reliv plantation which promises you nothing in return from your loyalty. Reliv didn't promise you that they would never change or dilute the products. They didn't promise you that they would keep products as squeaky clean and naturally pure as the floor of the mauufaturing facilities. They called us distributors "partners" but they never asked our opininon when they decided to join the CRN.

The Council for Responsible Nutrition is a misleading name for an organization of chemical and pharmaceutical companies who's agenda is to control the food and nutritional industry under the WTO's police dog, CODEX. CODEX is scheduled to go into affect Dec. 31, 2009, Google CRN and CODEX for yourself and see how they plan on controlling your right to alternative health as well as the kind of food you buy. Monsanto now controls over 95% of soybean seed in the world and has spent $11 billion over the last ten years buying up every seed company they can get their sinister hands on. This is the company that has given the world "Agent Orange" (a defoliant), "Round-Up" (an herbicide), and a host of other deadly chemical toxins that are contaminating our planet and killing off the honey bees. If it's honey bees today will it be people tomorrow? Out of the words from their own mouth, the answer is "YES".

What benefit can Reliv hope to achieve by their alinement with muliti national chemical and pharmaceutical companies? Why has Reliv refused to put a GMO FREE (Genetically Modified Organism) label on their products? Could it be because Dr. Carl thinks St. Louis based Monsanto is a "Great Company" and he doesn's have a problem with GMO's, atificial sweeteners, artificial flavors or synthetic vitamins as long as they are FDA approved? Now, with the hiring of the new Director of Product Research, Dr. Salty & Sweet, Tom Reynolds, (who's backgound includes the development of Nutri-Sweet) we see Reliv heading down a dark road to the future. Could it be that the real reason Reliv chose to terminate us was because we began to shine some light on this secrete darkness? Why else would Bob Montgomery claim "we made such a fuss" in our efforts to get Reliv to abandon the use of artificial ingredients? We thought we had gained a victory when Dr. Carl, reluctantly agreed, to take the Acesulfame Potassium out of FibRestore and Now. Sadly to say, that victory for clean products was short lived. The whole time we were fighting that battle he was formulating the new product "Glucaffect" with that same artificical sweetener which, by they way, remains in your childrens "Kids Now."

The Bible tells me there are none so blind as those that have eyes, but refuse to see. History tells us that Martin Luther was persecuted as a result of his efforts to reveal truth to the dogmatic and manipulative Church of his day. The Founding Fathers of our great Nation tried to reason with and reveal truth to a close minded and controlling British King. They were persecuted and labeled as traitors for their efforts. Our story of honestly trying to open the eyes of a company we had loved dearly for six years is a far cry from the stories of Martin Luther or our Founding Fathers, but we are secure in the knowledge that we have been led where The Heavenly Father wants us and both Anita and I believe with every fiber of our beings, we have moved forward with our strength and integrity well intact and will be blessed.

As Bob Montgomery himself has said so many times over the past six years of conferences we've attended, "You will never be able to pick up that $1,000 dollar bill as long as you are holding on to the podium." Well, the Bible also tells us to be thankful for all things. So we just want to say, "Thank You Reliv, thank you for all you have done for us over the past six years. But mostly we want to thank you for cutting the chains that bound us to that Reliv podium we so dutifully clung to. We harbor no bitterness of heart, only disappointment that what we tried to communicate went unappreciated.

Anita and I are now free to grab that MXI $1,000 dollar bill, in fact, we're securely inside and driving our new vehicle toward success, road map in hand, with no speed limits. Thanks again Bob, we now know exactly where we're going and how to get there! I suppose, one way or another, Reliv really does make dreams come true.

Sincerely,
Rod and Anita Swift"

For further information, enter the info requested in this link http://RelivAmbassadorsNoMore.blogspot.com (or call or e-mail us personally 541-298-2559 omegasblooms@gorge.net ) and we'll send you link to our Private Unpublished Reliv Page where you'll have the rare opportunity to read correspondence between Rod & Anita Swift, Reliv Corporate, CEO Robert Montgomery, John & Jacquie Hayes and Reliv Compliance, all of which lead without any notice, to the sudden Full Termination of Rod & Anita Swift's entire Reliv Business, including all forms of their residual income.

Distributors Lie to Sell Reliv - Dr. Hastings a god?

The following is a post that I received from one of our readers. Thank you for taking the time to send this and if anyone else has some negative results / experience with Reliv, please take a few minutes to send it to us so that others can see that Reliv isn't a miracle drug.

"I recently was visited by my mother in law, who deems Dr Hastings as a god and Reliv as a panacea. She has been bugging me for YEARS to become a distributor and get my kids on it as fast as I can. (Fortunately, I am well-educated in nutrition and health since graduating from a well-respected kinesiology/exercise science program at a state university!) She told me that The university of Illinois recently conducted a study on the glucaeffect (Innergize) product and found that it made history by working 100% of the time for every participant and that no one dropped out of the study. (Supposedly, the researchers did a double blind controlled study and no one knew what the product was except for Hastings himself--all this told to me by my MIL who was trying to impress me, to no avail) Yet, I cannot find these remarkable and newsworthy findings anywhere! BUT I did find that Dr Hastings and Reliv was a corporate sponsor of the Functional Foods program at University of Illinois in 1997...call me a conspiracy theorist but it seems more than coincidental to me that the university chosen to do the study was Hastings' alma mater and the one he sponsors.

LOVE your website!! I check it often! Oh the stories I could tell about my experiences with the one distributor I know!"

Reliv - An Enormous Source of Frustration

The following is an email that I received from one our readers! I want to thank him for taking the time to send this and I hope that this will give you some insight into the other side of Reliv. Please read it carefully and if you have a similar story, please take a moment to share with us.

"Reliv Watchdog,

I ran across your website and I thought it may be good to share my experiences with Reliv with you as it has been an enormous source of frustration for me. It all started a couple years ago when a friend of my father introduced my parents to "The product". My parents started taking it and I think they really bought into the multiple success stories that were provided via conference call in the beginning. They were sold on it and got into the MLM scheme for the discount. My father convinced me to try it, so I did for a month and saw no benefit so I decided it was too expensive for me and stopped. My parents seemed offended by this and pressured me to start taking it again in practically every conversation. Our telephone and in-person conversations inevitably shift to the most recent over hyped Reliv success story which may just as well be coincidence. My father has a mysterious chest pain that comes and goes that he won't allow the doctor to check. When it comes back he ups the dosage and when it dissapears for a while he gives the credit to the Reliv. My mother has no real health problems, but probably likes it because the soy may help her with menopause (just a guess). I figured things would just fizzle out soon and they would shift their interest to something else, sadly I am still waiting for that day to come...

My sister has also bought into the Reliv scam. She spends hundreds if not thousands of dollars on the different powders and consumes them herself and gives them to her children. Her husband, like me, is not impressed but she is so convinced that they could not survive without Reliv that she would probably leave him and take the kids if he tried to stop her from wasting their money on it. Her daughter (six years old) suffers from eczema, bowel problems, and (just developed) asthma-like symptoms. My sister has had her on Reliv for about 2 year now and there has been no improvement, if anything her symptoms have worsened. These problems may even be aggravated or even ORIGINALLY CAUSED by the soy in Reliv. Her husband also took it for a while and dismissed as a waste when he saw no results.

So, some time passes and my parents talked me into attending a Reliv meeting. The meeting was more of an emotional support group than a business meeting. The people were sharing their problems and generic success stories such as "I feel better on Reliv, I can really tell a difference". The guy essentially running the meeting was a chiropractor who told me not to listen to doctors because they don't know anything. Everyone seemed to defer to his judgment, nobody actually knew anything about the product they were peddling and were very resistant to anything that seemed related to math, science, or facts. I asked repeatedly about the ingredients or if there had been any studies conducted to prove the claims of the people representing the product.

Here are some samples of the answers I received:

• "Maybe try calling the company"
• "I don't care what's in it and you shouldn't either, it just works"
• "Check the website, all the information is there for you" - Practically no credible information exists on the website as I'm sure you already know.

Other crazy claims:

• "Reliv works at the cellular level to restore your body"
• "In 7 years of taking Reliv all the cells in your body will be replaced with new healthy cells"
• "If a child got into a can of Reliv and ate the whole thing you don't need to worry"
• "Reliv is food for your body, if you take it you don't even need to eat anything else"
• "Reliv can cure cancer"

After this meeting, I suggested to my mother that this man (the chiropractor at the meeting) was a snake oil salesman and it erupted into a very passionate 30 minute conversation outside the hotel. I reluctantly agreed to try the product again, this time for a full 3 months. I took 4 different kinds of Reliv: Classic, Arthaffect, Fibrestore, and Innergize. I took them all simultaneously for the full 3 months, every day, multiple times, at the directed dosages of my parents and their up-line (the stuff was expensive, I wasn't going to half-way do it and not be sure at the end). I saw absolutely no change in how I felt or my overall health. I haven't taken any since. I am completely, 100% convinced that the Innergize is sold just as a flavor enhancer, because let's be honest, the stuff is disgusting without it. It's nothing but sugar, salt, and chromium to help your body metabolize the sugar... of course some gullible people are going to think they feel better after taking it, it's sugar! Just look at the ingredients on their flagship product, Reliv Classic... 7g soy protein, your usual array of vitamins and minerals, and a "Proprietary Blend" that only makes up 142mg of the dose. Even if this "Proprietary Blend" did contain the most potent magical ingredients, 142mg isn't enough to do anything. At 17.9g per dose as stated on the can, this means their "Proprietary Blend" is less than 1/126th of the total dose!

This next story is sad, but 100% true. My parent's neighbor recently discovered he had cancer. They talked him out of chemotherapy and had him taking Reliv instead. At first they reported that he was feeling better and had more energy, but after about 3 months he became very sick and his wife took care of him at home. He continued to take his Reliv and died in the middle of the night His wife said that Reliv was the last thing he had that night before falling asleep. I believe his wife blames my parents (though she has been very forgiving) and I feel terrible for her. He was a really, really, nice guy.

On to the most recent episode. My wife is currently pregnant, and my parents wanted her to use Reliv during pregnancy. At first I didn't have a problem with it as they agreed to give us the products for free and I viewed Reliv as a "harmless waste of money maybe slightly superior to a multivitamin". Now I think my initial assessment was wrong. My wife took the cans to her doctor and she was told not to take it, of course I had to break the news to my parents and once again I look like the bad guy because "Those doctors just don't know anything". I just can't win, my family has chosen some wacko vitamin powder over me. If there is some sort of birth defect I'll never hear the end of how Reliv could have prevented it.

I'll wrap this up with some final thoughts:

This next part is purely speculation, but it's something to think about. Once they convince you to buy in and spend the thousands of dollars up front to become a distributor, it's probably not easy to back out without taking a loss. I have never sold the stuff myself, but I imagine that if you wanted to quit you would have to find a way to get rid of all the cans of Reliv stacked up in your basement. This keeps people perpetuating the hype while they try desperately to avoid financial failure. I'm sure many people spend money they don't have on these products and panic when they aren't able to sell them, thus they are willing to say anything for a sale.

The whole thing reminds me a lot of a cult, like the "Christian scientists" that believe all medical problems and sickness can be cured with prayer. I'm not sure if it's like this everywhere, but from the cross-section I've been exposed to so far, most of these people are Christians and they seem to get Reliv intertwined with religion and it almost becomes their new religion. The distributors push it like a group of crazies and make outrageous claims like it can cure aids, cancer, hepatitis, and anything else you can imagine (no exaggeration here). The support structure creates emotional links and false hope that keep this whole scam going and it takes advantage of people in vulnerable situations looking for help. It has practically destroyed the relationship I had with my family and I'm sure wasted much of their wealth and time.

Thanks for your website, I hope one day I can find a way to convince my family that Reliv is a bunch of BS. Hopefully the company will go bankrupt due to the recession or something. If you put this on your website, please don't use my last name.

Thanks,
"Concerned Person""

Serious Warning about Reliv

The following article was copied from http://relivnomore.blogspot.com. To read the full article please visit their blog at the address above.

The following Correspondence includes letters and emails following up to Reliv's harsh and injudicious Termination of dedicated & hard working distributors, Presidential Bronze Ambassadors, Rod & Anita Swift, stripping them of their million dollar distributorship, including all Rank Advancements, all Level Positions & Entitlements, their entire organization including personally sponsored distributors and downline hierarchy, the cancellation of all monthly Generation Royalties (lifelong residual earnings per Reliv's Compensation Plan, as well as the removal of all future bonus pay).

Grave Concerns Regarding
Reliv's Chosen Path

Like many distributors before us, we've had our share of concerns with respect to countless product changes (whether known or unknown), the addition of synthetic ingredients, the inclusion of arguably dubious artificial sweeteners and other man-made chemical or non-natural flavoring agents. Such unannounced, closed-door product tinkering has not helped, but hindered our efforts to effectively promote Reliv products in recent years, plaguing us with an increasing distributor (and customer) attrition rate that Anita and I found more and more difficult to keep up with. We have witnessed the exodus of many key Reliv distributors crossline to us, and watched everyone new and old, struggle just to maintain the status-quo. The steady decline of our own income throughout 2008 glaringly lends itself to the fact that Reliv's profits were down company-wide, by 40% in the 3rd quarter [3Q/08] which falls in direct proportion to the decline in sponsoring and rising attrition experienced by the majority of active distributors still trying to build a profitable distribution network.

Last summer around mid July, we became so alarmed by the early warning signs that trouble is on the horizon for Reliv that we decided to write a somber letter to our up-line, John & Jacquie Hayes (outlining the same four key-points we later wrote to Reliv CEO, Bob Montgomery) in which we documented our concern over these alarming trends, possible causes and potential solutions. At this time, Anita and I felt compelled to include Mr. Montgomery in our missives and also convey to him what we were experiencing in the field. With Reliv's 20th Anniversary Conference celebration drawing near, we felt it would be more appropriate to wait until after all the festivities before sending our letter to Bob in order to thwart any dampening of spirits. After all, weren't we promised something BIG that would rejuvenate our floundering businesses to be announced on stage for all Conference Attendees? Weren't we supposed to see upwards of 20,000 or more cheering distributors at the big 20th Anniversary Reliv bash? Well, as so many of us already know, this big conference was a total bust. "Auto Ship" was Corporate's 'Bright Idea' to fix dismal quarterly sales, with Reliv attracting an equally dismal attendance count of a paltry 5,000 participants for its Big 20th Year Birthday Celebration in St. Louis. On his organizational call the following Monday morning, our upline John Hayes' only remark regarding the conference was, "I'm not satisfied with where Reliv is, at this point."

After some sleepless nights following conference (which many say felt more like a memorial service) Anita and I realized we could no longer, in-good faith nor conscience, continue representing Reliv in the capacity we'd served as Ambassadors. Grieving over what appeared to us like a warning sign of things to come looming ever closer to our beloved Reliv, the decision to pull away from our leadership position was not an easy one, and writing a letter of resignation to Bob even more difficult.

From the time I had sent Bob our 'Signature Delivery Certified' letter, an entire month passed without a response from anyone, Bob notwithstanding. In light of Reliv's failure to respond in a timely or respectful fashion, I wrote a follow up letter to remind Bob (or anybody at Corporate for that matter) that Anita and I still had not received an acknowledgment from him, aside from the certified postal confirmation allegedly signed by Bob when he took receipt of my letter. So Anita and I waited with earnest patience once again in hopes our request would be received, and again found ourselves waited some more... And more... And still we waited... A week, then two weeks had passed and still not a peep from anyone, which began to put us in an awkward position, feeling marginalized if not a little neglected, our resignation request pending indefinitely or outright forgotten.

Suddenly, after two and a half weeks (6 1/2 weeks total), it happened, we got a call... only it wasn't exactly the call we expected from Bob or Steve Hastings or somebody at Corporate, it was our own downline, a frontline Ambassador asking us if the rumors were true that Anita and I had resigned as Reliv Ambassadors? The feeling of betrayal was undeniable, like we'd just crashed into some hidden Reliv iceberg in realization of what had seemingly just occurred without our knowing... Reliv Corporate had gone behind our backs and called several key people (but not us) in our organization, informing them of our resignation from Reliv and warning them to stay away and sever all further ties with us, indicating we might (false) be secretly planning to recruit them into a more profitable competing company outside of Reliv. (We had already been working our new network marking venture for almost two consecutive months prior to this and not a single distributor in our entire organization had ever complained we had mentioned nor tried to sponsor them into some other business!) Reliv's subterfuge and subsequent paranoid slander is disturbingly unethical, if not utterly mystifying to Anita and myself.

The very next day we finally get the response we had expected 6 weeks sooner. It was a rather harsh and hastily written e-mail from Reliv CEO, Bob Montgomery. He briefly acknowledged our resignation, stating he would personally handle our speedy removal as Ambassadors from Reliv. Bob went on to say that if a distributor's business ever falters financially, it is solely the distributor's fault and their fault alone, because Reliv is considered infallible by many and essentially above reproach. No compassion whatsoever to our plight, no concern regarding the issues we brought to light, no.. "I'm sorry these issues are affecting you," no... "What can we do to help change things for the better?" ... not a single iota of regard for distributors needs nor well-being. Just pious warnings and veiled legal threats that he [Bob] would do every thing in his vested power to retain allegiance and ownership of Reliv's property and trade commodity; its legions of contract-bound distributors. Anita and I were saddened to learn Bob's harsh response would be the extent of love and attention we would ever get again from Reliv's Top-Dog. Our praise for six long years of unending hard work and selfless promotion of Reliv and all that it promises. For voicing our concern and offering to open proactive dialog of dwindling incomes and endemic attrition rates, our reward is cruel and unjust back-stabbing, total ex-communication and utter abandonment from the very man who once garnered so much respect from us. Truly we are all witnessing the end of Reliv as we've known it.

With so much conjecture and many baseless remarks, I wrote Bob a follow up email that night, refuting some of his harsh accusations regarding our heartfelt decision to gently withdraw as active Ambassadors (while still maintaining our current level of support to the Reliv community at large.) The next morning, on Oct 1st, Anita gets a call from our up-line friend and esteemed mentor Jacquie Hayes. The two of them share warm, congenial conversation as they have so many times before. Jacquie seems so understanding toward the issues we discuss and knows the importance of supplementing our income, crying and getting mushy and telling us how much she regrets seeing us resign and how much she appreciates having us in her and John's downline. Because Anita has always felt a kinship with Jacquie (this call being no different), she confided in her that we had obliged Alex Rad and Gwen Curtis' request that Anita and I sponsor them (both of whom were no longer active in Reliv) into our new business (and no, we didn't recruit them, as some false rumors allege, both Alex and Gwen asked us at different times if we would be willing to sponsor them, so we obliged their wishes) Jacquie warned us to be careful saying, "You know Reliv policies."

Strangely, on Oct 1st, that very same day, our Reliv Distributorship was Terminated, only hours after Jacquie's call. Of course, we would not be made aware of this news for almost a month! In fact, we heard nothing from anyone following Jacquie's call. Our nearest active upline Ambassador, Janet Brewer, called us on Oct 26th to inform us we were no longer showing up in her Reliv downline organizer?! That was the first indicator that we had possibly been terminated. Of course once again, nobody from Reliv Corporate bothered to lift a finger and give Anita and I a clue of this shocking news, deciding instead to leave us virtually in the dark regarding the status of our own business for an additional 20 days.

Our only direct communiqué from Reliv was a solitary letter of Termination, which we found amidst a pile of other mixed mail in our rural mail drop upon returning from our annual Hawaii trip, November 6th. Anita managed to find a generic boilerplate e-mail from Reliv Compliance on her laptop regarding the Termination, I guess in case we didn't get the surface letter. We found no messages on our answering machine from Reliv either, no condolences, no farewells, no advanced nor prior notices of an impending banishment nor reason thereof. Yes, there you have it Boys and Girls, that's the way you're treated by Reliv International if you care enough about integrity and morals to stand up and make waves or help promote the best-interests of the people through better products; you get silenced, shunned, and your check gets shafted, all in one day!

With all that was said and done over the course of this recently concluded fiasco, Anita and I are still thankful for what the Reliv opportunity provided us these past several years. Not only did it give us an opportunity to learn and experience many awesome things, it helped us earn an income while strengthening our character and providing us a way to meet each of you, now part of our extended family, which has proven time and again as the best possible blessing God could have ever given us during our Reliv career. We also want you to know that we harbor no lingering resentments toward Bob and Reliv for the stinging blows so harshly dealt us, because a scorpion does what scorpions do, they cannot behave any other way than what's in their nature. Anita and I are just sorry that we were in no way, shape or form, successful in opening Reliv's eyes to what we felt were (and still are) critical areas needing deadly serious attention and solutions for, in order to help ensure that each Distributor, whether new or old, gets a chance to experience and achieve the same levels of success Anita and I did. Sadly, Reliv's hidden agenda for its commodity of walking billboards shall remain a mystery...

In the end, Anita and I are both eternally thankful that Reliv has chosen to turn its back on us by Terminating our Distributorship and income altogether because its smoother sailing now as we chart a new course for success and so much more satisfying than the outdated square-peg system Reliv tried to force us to follow. And while we're happily gaining momentum in our exciting new business, we cannot deny the fact that we loved Reliv a lot. In fact our dedication was so strong, we would have probably went on futilely wasting endless time and energy, sounding the call in attempts to keep Reliv's products wholesome and begging Corporate to please join the Internet Age before profits and retention crumbles another 40%. Now after having just read the ingredient label on the newest product 'GlucAffect,' we can clearly see that Reliv isn't really all that concerned with keeping the products as "Squeaky Clean," as they are cleaning the mirror-finish floors the products themselves are manufactured on.

Bob has often plagiarized the famous Zig Ziglar line, "If you help enough people get what they want, you will get everything you want." We have found that when given a choice, people prefer the tasty benefits of all natural Healthy Chocolate 10-to-1 over synthetically infused, chemically sweetened, artificially flavored GMO soy powder, and with similar health results through consistent daily use. Anita and I are making a ton of money as our momentum explodes marketing online and off, and we're having the time of our lives offering people that choice.


Rod & Anita Swift


To read the actually letters sent to and from Reliv please visit, http://www.relivnomore.blogspot.com/

Back Online

Hello Readers - I am really sorry for the lack of posts lately but I had to change ISPs and so I have not had any easy access to the Internet for a while but we are connected again and I am back online!!

As always, if you have any negative stories about Reliv or the Business part, please send them to me so that others can have a chance to learn from your mistakes. My purpose of this blog is to give people a chance to see both sides of the picture. The Reliv distributors are only going to give the positive as they are making a lot of money by selling the products to you. So it's always good to hear from those who didn't get any help from the products.

Reliv Causes Stupidity

Since I began this blog I have been SHOCKED at the stupidity of some of the Reliv Distributors and Users that write to me trying to convince me that I am angry or that I have an agenda. It does not matter how many times I tell them that the purpose of this blog is to give people a chance to see both sides of the coin, that there is no such things as a universal cure. Just because something worked for "Joe" does not mean it will work for "Mary".

Many try to convince me that Reliv is a cure all and that Reliv has many scientists working on their products and therefore they "must be" good for us. But I wonder if they have ever stopped to think about the fact that these same scientists are making millions from the sell of Reliv. I kind of doubt they are going to directly disagree.

If we would just pull our heads out of the sand, stop looking at the info that we have seen about the benefits of soy for so many years and look at the new research it is clear that Reliv can't be healthy. Sadly it takes humanity years to undo thoughts and false learning from the past. I mean just look at the millions who died during the early days of our medical system with many of it's false concepts that finally were discovered to be wrong.

Reliv is not healthy, it is high in soy and the body was not designed to ingest these high dosage vitamins. Please if you read this blog, take some time to study soy for yourself. Do so with an open mind and let go of everything you have heard in the past. If you study with a bias, you will lean towards and get stuck on that bias. When I was first shown the dangers of soy myself, I spent weeks trying to disprove what I shown, but sadly I realized that what I had been raised to believe was wrong.

Here is a short summary of the dangers of soy,

Have you ever wondered about soy? It's promoted as the miracle food that will feed the world while at the same time prevent and cure all manner of diseases.

But what if all you've read about soy is nothing but a multi-million dollar marketing strategy based on scanty facts, half-truths and lies?

Most people remain unaware that soy is known to contain an array of potent chemical toxins. The modern manufacturing processes of high-profit industries make no effort to remove these potent toxins. High levels of phytic acid, trypsin inhibitors, toxic lysinoalanine and highly carcinogenic nitrosamines are all present in soy products.

Phytoestrogens that disrupt endocrine function and are potent antithyroid agents are present in vast quantities in soy, including the potentially devastating isoflavone Genistein. Infants exclusively fed soy-based formula have 13,000 to 22,000 times more estrogen compounds in their blood than babies fed milk-based formula, the estrogenic equivalent of at least five birth control pills per day. Premature development of girls has been linked to the use of soy formula, as has the underdevelopment of males. Infant soy formula has been linked to autoimmune thyroid disease.

Soy is linked to infertility, breast cancer, hypothyroidism, thyroid cancer, and many other disorders.

"Imagine drugs that are known, by years of scientific documentation, to be both carcinogenic and to also cause DNA and chromosome damage being prescribed and administered through the food supply to populations of many countries around the world without the knowledge or consent of the individuals consuming these foods ... with no way to track dosage, individual reactions, or harmful side-effects ... and without any concern for some people’s increased vulnerability to these drugs, such as cancer patients. It sounds crazy, but that is exactly what is happening around the world when Soy is added to our food supply. Soy contains the scientifically documented carcinogenic and DNA damaging and chromosome damaging natural chemicals genistein and daidzein." - True Health, the magazine of Carotec Inc., Naples, Florida. May/June 2004.

"(Soyfoods) are not nutrients. They are drugs."
Dr. L. White, Honolulu Aging Study.

How could anyone get away with this?

The answer is simple, given the soy industry is one of the world's most wealthy and powerful multi-billion dollar industries.

"Despite an impressive array of scientific evidence that soy is not a fit food for man nor beast, the soy marketing mastodon has marched through the American market like Sherman through Georgia - and likely doing about as much damage as Sherman's Union Army did. In our opinion the widespread use of non-fermented soy is part of the chronic disease problem since soy is known to wreak havoc with the human thyroid and other hormone systems." - True Health, the magazine of Carotec Inc., Naples, Florida. May/June 2004.

The result is an industry that will systematically steamroll anybody that dares suggest there may be problems with the darling soy. When we first questioned the safety of soy, a representative of Protein Technologies told us that they had:

"...teams of lawyers to crush dissenters, could buy scientists to give evidence, owned television channels and newspapers, could divert medical schools and could even influence governments..."

This boast has proven all too true, and you'll be shocked to learn that much of what you've read about soy is nothing but a con.

Are all Soy Beans bad?

Soybeans are widely known to contain a gamut of natural toxins - and it makes no difference whether they are organic, "Round-Up Ready", or in any number of modern products (see our GUIDANCE page).

The trouble with modern soy products is that fast industrial processing does not equate to historical methods of fermenting "for two summers" or boiling "for the length of an incense". The method of modern get-rich-quick corporations is simply to leave these well-known natural toxins in our products.

"Among the Hawaii "study's" conclusions: that tofu accelerates brain weight loss in aging users, that the more soy you use the more it impacts your mental abilities, that soy acts like a drug, not a food." - True Health, the magazine of Carotec Inc., Naples, Florida. May/June 2004.

The above info was copied from, http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/

Some Foods Have Estrogen-Like Effects - Soy and Reliv

Hello Reader - Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. I am sure that those of you who care about your body and health will find the following article very interesting. More and more scientists are finding new ways to test the foods we eat and new research is showing that many of the foods we assumed were healthy, aren't. Soy is one of those foods that we assumed was healthy but really isn't. And as you know, Reliv is full of Soy. The following article was received from Dr. Mercola.

Two Food Additives Found to Have Estrogen-Like Effects

Scientists have developed a fast new method to identify food additives that act as "xenoestrogens" -- substances with estrogen-like effects that are stirring international health concerns.

They used the method in a large-scale screening, and discovered two additives with previously unrecognized xenoestrogen effects.

Xenoestrogens have been linked to a range of human health effects, including reduced sperm counts in men and increased risk of breast cancer in women.

The scientists used the new method to search a food additive database of 1,500 substances, and verified that the method could identify xenoestrogens. In the course of that work, they identified two previous unrecognized xenoestrogens -- propyl gallate, a preservative used to prevent fats and oils from spoiling, and 4-hexylresorcinol, which is used to prevent discoloration in shrimp and other shellfish.

Sources:

Science Daily March 2, 2009

Chemical Research in Toxicology January 2009;22(1):52-63

Dr. Mercola's Comments:

I've written about the dangers of endocrine disruptors such as bisphenol A, PFOA and phthalates many times. I like to consider xenoestrogens fake estrogens but their name literally means “foreign estrogens.” Either way they are synthetic chemicals that mimic natural estrogens, and have been linked to a wide range of human health effects.

There are so many of them, and they’re used in so many common consumer products that trying to avoid them may seem like a fruitless struggle.

For example, you come in contact with hormone disrupting chemicals through:

• Pasteurized dairy, which commonly contains bovine growth hormones
• Soy products, which are loaded with hormone like substances
• Plastics – many of which contain bisphenol A
• Personal care products that contain phthalates
• Cooking with Teflon-coated pots and pans

Now you can add certain food additives to the list – and some very common food additives at that.

Hormone-Mimicking Food Additives Recently Discovered

In the U.S., more than 3,000 substances can be added to foods for the purpose of preservation, coloring, texture, flavor and more. While each of these substances is legal to use, whether or not they are entirely safe for long-term consumption – by themselves or in combination – is a different story altogether.

The analysis published in the journal Chemical Research in Toxicology actually found not just two, but 31 potential estrogen-mimicking food additives during their search.

Of those, propyl gallate was found to act as an antagonist, and 4-hexylresorcinol as a potent transactivator. Antagonists block the binding of an agent at a receptor molecule, and transactivators increase the rate of gene expression. In conclusion the authors’ state:

“Some caution should be issued for the use of propyl gallate and 4-hexylresorcinol as food additives.”

However, I don’t think we’ll see any of them removed from the market any time soon. Propyl gallate, for example, has been used since 1948 as a preservative to stabilize cosmetics, food packaging materials, and foods containing oils and fats. It can also be found in:

• Hair products
• Adhesives and lubricants
• Processed meat products and potato products
• Chicken soup base
• Chewing gum and candy
• Dried milk
• Baked goods, and more

Propyl gallate is frequently used in conjunction with BHA and BHT, which come with their own set of health hazards. These two additives also keep fats and oils from going rancid and are commonly used in processed food products such as cereals and potato chips, even though some studies have found they too, cause cancer in rats.

The other food additive mentioned above, 4-hexylresorcinol, is commonly used as an anti-browning agent in shrimp and other shellfish.

But it’s also used as a starting material to produce synthetic catecholamines, which have important physiological effects as neurotransmitters and hormones (such as epinephrine, adrenaline, norepinephrine, and dopamine).

Additionally, you can find it in common consumer products such as:

• Pharmaceutical acne treatments
• Anti-dandruff shampoo
• Sunscreen lotions
• Antiseptic mouthwashes
• Skin wound cleansers
• Throat lozenges

Potential Health Dangers of Propyl Gallate

In addition to being an endocrine disrupter based on this latest analysis, the results in a previous study by the National Toxicology Program (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) showed that propyl gallate caused various types of cancer and other health problems in rats, including:

• Thyroid tumors in male rats
• Rare brain tumors in low-dose females
• Prostate inflammation
• Mostly benign tumors of the preputial gland (glands that produce pheromones)
• Pancreatic tumors
• Adrenal gland tumors in low-dose males

As you can see, in some instances the health effect only showed up in the low-dose groups but not in the high-dose groups, and only in either males or females – a perfect example of just how little anyone really knows about how these types of chemicals might affect your body, or the body of an infant, for example.

Potential Health Hazards of Common Anti-Browning Agent

The anti-browning agent 4-Hexylresorcinol is applied to shrimp and other crustacean seafood to prevent the development of black spots which may occur naturally.

A toxicology study by the School of Biological Sciences, University of Surrey, England, discovered that 260 mg/kg was lethal to all cats used in the study. Granted, that is a very high dose; however, based on their data, the researchers also concluded that 4-Hexylresorcinol was carcinogenic in both the 13-week and 2-year studies, and also caused a high incidence of nephropathy in mice (an autoimmune disease that affects your kidneys).

A 1984 study determined the probable lethal dose for humans to be anything above 500 mg/kg.

How to Protect Your Family

If you have children xenoestrogens are clearly something you will want to avoid. Here are some measures you can take to protect you and your children from common toxic substances that could cause them to go into puberty more than a decade before they were designed to:

• Store your food in glass containers whenever possible, as it is the most inert container you can use.
• Only use natural cleaning products in your home. Most health food stores will have these available or you can search online for them.
• Buy and eat, as much as possible, organic foods, especially mik which is frequently contaminated with bovine growth hormone.
• Avoid processed foods.
• Avoid artificial food additives of all kind, including artificial sweeteners and MSG.
• Avoid all varieties of unfermented soy.
• Switch to natural brands of toiletries, including shampoo, toothpaste, antiperspirants and cosmetics. Same sources as above for these, either your local health food store or you can search online.
• Review Our Stolen Future, probably the best resource on this topic

Related Links:

12 Food Additives to Avoid

New Chemical Alternative to MSG That is Coming Soon

Link Between High Soy Diet During Pregnancy and Nursing and Eventual Developmental Changes in Children

Reliv isn't a Silver Bullet - Soy Warning

""If they are radically altering their diet where they're only eating soy in the hopes that this is going to bring their cholesterol down, they're deluding themselves," said Crawford, who was not on the panel that issued the new statement." I think this statement has a lot of truth and we need to pay close attention to it. Many use Reliv assuming that it will do them good but sadly like some of our posters have noted, Reliv has not helped them. Reliv has been presented as a "Silver Bullet" but sadly this isn't always the case. While some have had positive results, is what I am concerned about is what will happen in 10 or 20 years from now by consuming these large amounts of Soy based products.

Review casts doubt on soy health benefits
JAMIE STENGLE, Associated Press

DALLAS - Veggie burgers and tofu might not be so great at warding off heart disease after all.

An American Heart Association committee reviewed a decade of studies on soy's benefits and came up with results that are now casting doubt on the health claim that soy-based foods and supplements significantly lower cholesterol.

The findings could lead the Food and Drug Administration to re-evaluate rules that currently allow companies to tout a cholestorol-lowering benefit on the labels of soy-based food.

The panel also found that neither soy nor the soy component isoflavone reduced symptoms of menopause, such as "hot flashes," and that isoflavones don't help prevent breast, uterine or prostate cancer. Results were mixed on whether soy prevented postmenopausal bone loss.

Based on its findings, the committee said it would not recommend using isoflavone supplements in food or pills. It concluded that soy-containing foods and supplements did not significantly lower cholesterol, and it said so in a statement recently published in the journal Circulation.

Nutrition experts say soy-based foods still are good because they often are eaten in place of less healthy fare like burgers and hot dogs. But they don't have as much direct benefit as had been hoped on cholesterol, one of the top risk factors for heart disease.

"We don't want to lull people into a false sense of security that by eating soy they can solve the problem (with cholesterol)," said Dr. Michael Crawford, chief of clinical cardiology at University of California San Francisco Medical Center.

"If they are radically altering their diet where they're only eating soy in the hopes that this is going to bring their cholesterol down, they're deluding themselves," said Crawford, who was not on the panel that issued the new statement.

The FDA in 1999 started allowing manufacturers to claim that soy products might cut the risk of heart disease after studies showed at least 25 grams of soy protein a day lowered cholesterol. A year later, the Heart Association recommended soy be included in a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol.

But as more research emerged, the Heart Association decided to revisit the issue. The committee members reviewed 22 studies and found that large amounts of dietary soy protein only reduced LDL, or "bad" cholesterol, about 3 percent and had no effect on HDL, or "good" cholesterol, or on blood pressure.

They did a separate analysis of isoflavones. The review of 19 studies suggested that soy isoflavones also had no effect on lowering LDL cholesterol or other lipid risk factors.

"Soy proteins and isoflavones don't have any major health benefits other than soy protein products are generally good foods," said Dr. Frank Sacks, a professor of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston who led the committee. "They're good to replace other foods that are high in cholesterol."

Still, the Heart Association statement notes that soy products like tofu, soy butter, soy nuts and some soy burgers should be heart-healthy because they contain a lot of polyunsaturated fats, fiber, vitamins and minerals and are low in saturated fat.

"Soy isn't a magic bullet, but it can be a valuable contributor to a heart-healthy diet," said Jo Ann Carson, a professor of clinical nutrition at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas who was not part of the panel.

It's important not to think about foods in black-and-white terms, said Dr. Michael Lim, director of the cardiac catheterization lab at Saint Louis University School of Medicine.

"There's no quick fix," he said. "Our bad cholesterol numbers would certainly get worse if instead of eating tofu burgers we went out and had hamburgers each night of the week."


ON THE NET

American Heart Association: http://www.americanheart.org

Huge study boosts disappointment on multivitamins

Here is an interesting article tonight that I found on Yahoo News. Bottom line, you might be wasting your money on Reliv.

"Huge study boosts disappointment on multivitamins

CHICAGO – The largest study ever of multivitamin use in older women found the pills did nothing to prevent common cancers or heart disease. The eight-year study in 161,808 postmenopausal women echoes recent disappointing vitamin studies in men.

Millions of Americans spend billions of dollars on vitamins to boost their health. Research has focused on cancer and heart disease in particular because of evidence that diets full of vitamin-rich foods may protect against those illnesses. But that evidence doesn't necessarily mean pills are a good substitute.

The study's lead author, researcher Marian Neuhouser of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, offered this advice: "Get nutrients from food. Whole foods are better than dietary supplements," Neuhouser said.

The study appears in Monday's Archives of Internal Medicine.

Co-author Dr. JoAnn Manson said despite the disappointing results, the research doesn't mean multivitamins are useless.

For one thing, the data are observational, not the most rigorous kind of scientific research. And also, it's not clear if taking vitamins might help prevent cancers that take many years to develop, said Manson, chief of preventive medicine at Harvard's Brigham & Women's Hospital.

She said multivitamins may still be useful "as a form of insurance" for people with poor eating habits.

The study involved an analysis of data on women in their 50s and up who participated in long-running government studies on postmenopausal women. Almost 42 percent of the women said they used multivitamins regularly.

After about eight years, roughly equal numbers of vitamin users and nonusers developed common cancers, heart attacks and other cardiovascular problems. Overall, there were 9,619 cases of cancer, including cancers of the breast, lung, ovary, colon and stomach; and 8,751 cardiovascular ailments including heart attacks and strokes. In addition, 9,865 women died, also at similar rates in multivitamin users and nonusers.

Alice Lichtenstein, a Tufts University nutrition professor who was not involved in the research, said the study is important because it involved so many women.

"All the evidence keeps pointing in the same direction," Lichtenstein said.

Eric Jacobs, an American Cancer Society epidemiologist, said while his group doesn't advise vitamins to prevent cancer, it does recommend maintaining a healthy weight and eating at least five servings of fruits and vegetables daily while limiting red meat. Similar habits are also thought to help reduce heart disease risks."

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On the Net:

Archives: http://www.archinternmed.com

American Cancer Society: http://www.cancer.org