The benefits of adding flax to your diet

January 24th, 2012 by Deborah Walker

Whilst convincing one of my clients that drinking flax tea would help them to resolve a number of their health issues, they decided to go off and do their own research. I'm always happy when this happens because it means my clients are taking responsibility for their own health, and when they came back and said “is there anything that flax can't do for the body” I laughed, had a think and then they quickly responded “it hasn't yet created world peace”. I couldn't disagree, it hadn't but it's only a matter of time, because I do agree that flax is an absolute powerhouse in regards to it's properties and the benefits that it gives if consumed as a regular part of the diet.

Recently a piece of research into the use of flax has been supportive of my approach in using it with those clients who want to control their weight. Carried out by researchers from the University of Copenhagen, it shows that it has an appetite suppressing effect, decreasing hunger levels in those who participated, and due to it's fibre content increasing satiety. It managed to reduce calorie intake by 9% in those who took part, which is significant on top of all of it's other benefits for supporting the cell membrane, skin, hair, heart, hormones, blood sugar, and reducing inflammation and these are to mention just a few.

So how to take flax seeds, you can sprinkle them on your cereal, or fruit salad in the morning, make them into a tea, soak them and eat them, grind them down and sprinkle them, and finally use the oil on your food as a salad dressing or just a drizzle before you eat a hot soup, so lots of ways to get them into your diet on a daily basis.