Adding salt to my diet miraculously improved my life and a friend of mine improved her health just by eating more fat.

Conventional wisdom says fat bad for us, so my friend avoided it wherever possible until her doctor told her she was making herself ill.

She was right to avoid saturated fats, such as butter and cheese, but she needed to eat foods rich in essential fatty acids, such as olive oil.

They are called essential fatty acids because we can’t make them ourselves and it’s vital to consume adequate amounts to maintain good health. Every cell in our body is surrounded by a double layer of fat molecules and as we are always making new cells we need good quality of oils and fats to produce good quality cell structures.

There are two types of essential fatty acids, the omega-6 group and the omega-3 group, and we need both in the right proportions. JL Wilson MD suggests a ratio of 4:1 for optimum health.

Omega-6 fatty acids are found in seeds such as sesame, sunflower, safflower and corn whilst foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids include salmon, sardines, soya beans and flax seeds (also called linseed).

Unfortunately, my friend’s doctor forgot to tell her not to cook with olive oil so she didn’t get the health benefits immediately. Essential fatty acids breakdown when heated to form harmful free radicals. She eventually switched to sunflower oil which has a higher boiling point and fries the food without burning the oil.

JL Wilson also suggests we should, “Avoid all nuts and seeds that have been commercially roasted or deep fried. The high heat and poor quality oils used in this process usually make them go rancid quickly. Rancid oils are poisons and need to be avoided. They interrupt the normal metabolism of oils in the body and contribute to free radical damage in the cell walls.”

By adding nuts, seeds and oils to her diet, my friend’s health problems cleared up, the condition of her skin improved and she even started to look younger.

Catherine