There are more than 80,000 supplements on the shelves of supermarkets, drug stores, big box stores, and online websites and retailers. It’s a huge business worth close to $177 billion worldwide. Choosing the right vitamins, minerals, herbs, or botanicals to buy and consume is important because you want them to be a healthy addition to your food intake and lifestyle.

Choosing an anti-inflammation diet is one way to control inflammation in your body. For anyone living with chronic inflammation, finding a way to decrease symptoms and, if possible, erase the “bad” inflammation altogether, is a blessing. In many cases, living with inflammation doesn’t have to be permanent — you can treat, prevent, and sometimes even eradicate those inflammatory issues by knowing which foods are triggers for you, which foods are bad for everyone, and how to change your diet accordingly.

Being a participant in your care isn’t about pushing your doctor around or being demanding — it’s about understanding that you have a right to safe, accurate, and effective care. Whether you’re paying with insurance or out-of-pocket, you’re investing in a service, and like any consumer, you have the right to expect a standard of quality.

Somatic exercise is a form of exercise that uses the mind-body connection to discover things about ourselves and release physical and emotional tension. I like to think of somatic exercise as a “work in” as opposed to a workout. Somatic exercise is movement for the sake of movement, not for an external result.