Health Revolution. Maria Borelius

      

      An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

      1 London Bridge Street

      London SE1 9GF

      First published in Great Britain by HQ

      An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019

      Text Copyright © Maria Borelius 2019

      Maria Borelius asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

      Hardback ISBN 978-0-00-832155-0

      eBook ISBN: 978-0-00-832156-7

      All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

      FOR RITA AND ANNIE, PATHFINDERS. SISTERS.

      We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.

       – T. S. Eliot

      CONTENTS

       Cover

       Title Page

       Copyright

       Dedication

THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT MY JOURNEY

1. A NEW YEAR

2. MY BODY JOURNEY

3. INSIGHT

       4. HEAL

       5. SALMON AND LINGONBERRIES

       6. GUT FEELING

       7. BREATHE

       8. GLOW

       9. BLUE ZONE

       10. AWE

       11. BLISS

       12. PEACE

       13. ROOTS

       14. ONE VAULT AFTER ANOTHER

       15. THE JOURNEY TO AN ANTI-INFLAMMATORY LIFESTYLE

       16. SOFT START

       BREAKFAST RECIPES FOR AN ANTI-INFLAMMATORY SOFT START

       Smart, Good-Looking Smoothies

       Classic with a Twist

       Rita’s Seed Bowl

       17. THE THREE-DAY CURE

       Breakfast Smoothie

       18. MY NEW LIFE IN THE KITCHEN

       BREAKFAST, LUNCH, DINNER AND SNACKS

       Jessica’s Pancakes

       ‘Bread’

       African Curry

       Veggie Box

       ANTI-INFLAMMATORY SAUCES

       Creative Pesto (or Gustaf’s Sauce)

       Harissa

       Sauce Xipister

       Caper and Dill Sauce

       Emily’s Tahini

       DRINKS

       Lisa’s Bulletproof Coffee

       Healing Water

       Greger’s Morning Tea

       Blue Zone Tea

       Emily’s Great-Skin Tea

       Power Matcha

       THIS IS WHAT I AVOID

       THANK YOU FROM THE AUTHOR

       REFERENCES

       LIST OF SEARCHABLE TERMS

       About the Publisher

THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT MY JOURNEY

      At the age of fifty-two, I was experiencing menopause symptoms, back pain, fatigue and a general feeling of melancholy about my life. I felt that everything was beginning to go downhill.

      But after just a few months with a new lifestyle, my life had changed. I was happier, stronger and pain-free – what had happened?

      Through a series of remarkable coincidences, I realised that I had stumbled on something completely new – anti-inflammatory food – that could cure and prevent illness and even mysteriously put the brakes on ageing.

      That’s how my journey of knowledge began, a journey during which, filled with wonder, I began to research this new landscape and discovered that it encompassed much more than diet. The contours of a whole new lifestyle emerged, and the clues came to me from many different people, each one amazing in his or her own way.

      I encountered, among others, an innovative and inspiring fitness model in Canada; a professor in Lund, Sweden, working at the very forefront of research; an Indian health spa with a punishing enema treatment; a prehistoric hominid in Addis Ababa by the name of Lucy; one of London’s most visionary dermatologists; unusually long-lived members of a religious sect in the outskirts of Los Angeles; a Danish TV celebrity who turned out to be fifteen years older than I thought; a gut group in the English countryside; a top geneticist at Karolinska Institutet, Sweden, with a weakness for riddles; a hip-swinging yoga instructor at a New Age meeting in California; and an ethereal detective searching for human wonder.

      Each of them has played a role in this drama.

      And so has my own experimentation. I have poked around among omega-3 fatty acids, probiotics, gluten, lactose, meditation, bone broth, Ayurvedic nose diagnosis, HIIT training, yoga, sunsets, inflammation markers and spirituality apps. I have set out filled with curiosity but have often encountered failures and had to find a different path.

      Step by step, I’ve felt my way forward as I worked to solve the puzzle of how low-degree systemic inflammation causes illness and what we can do to make ourselves stronger, happier and healthier.

      All of this has resulted in a five-point programme to bring out the best version of all of us, a programme that combines everything I’ve learned with the conviction that a lifestyle has to work