Health Benefits of Avocados: Amazing Skin & Hormone Control

One of the most nutrition-robust foods on the market today, the health benefits of avocados include vibrant skin, hormone control and weight loss. Thanks to their mild flavor and creamy consistency, avocados make an excellent addition to dips, deserts and so much more!

Green Superfood

There is no doubt avocados are a green superfood. Just take a look at everything that is crammed into an avocado:

• Beta-sitosterol, glutathione & other phytochemicals – Rich in phytochemicals, eating avocados help fight diseases such as cataracts and macular degeneration.
• Copper, iron and other minerals – Avocados are rich with minerals, including iron, copper, phosphorus, magnesium and potassium. In fact, you would have to eat two or three bananas to equal the potassium of just one avocado.
• Fat-soluble vitamins – avocados are loaded with fat-soluble vitamins A, E and K. Not only do our bodies need these essential vitamins to work correctly, the vitamins can work together with magnesium, zinc, and other essential minerals in such a unique way that it serves as a gentle reminder of God’s wisdom and power and why we should eat more nutrition-packed treats like avocados.
• Fiber – the health benefits of avocado helps to stabilize blood sugar levels, maintain weight control and enable proper bowel regularity thanks to their high level of fiber.
• Folate – while folate is already known to decrease the risk of some birth defects, such as spinal bifida and neural tube defects, it has also been proven to prevent stroke.
• Monounsaturated fats – avocados are an excellent source of monounsaturated fats. In fact, they are one of the best sources in the world. Monounsaturated fats are said to reverse insulin resistance and making them a great treat for diabetics.
• Phytonutrients – polyphenols and flavonoids are examples of anti-inflammatory phytonutrients that reduce degenerative disorders affecting joints, connective tissues, internal organs and the skin.
• Protein – yes, protein! Avocados have the highest levels of protein and the lowest amount of sugar of any fruit. This unique combination of the health benefits of avocado helps your body build lean muscle mass while destroying fat cells.
• Water-soluble vitamins B and C – since B-complex vitamins and vitamin C are not stored in the body, they need to be replaced daily. I am sure you’ve all heard the saying, “An apple a day keeps the doctor away,” but that should really be changed to avocado.

4 Benefits of Eating Avocados

Yes, avocados are an amazing superfood, and should be in our diets as we focus on boosting our immune systems with bioactive, anti-inflammatory foods.

While you may not have heard of bioactive foods before, you are most likely familiar with the term “antioxidant.” Antioxidants are the main reasons why more people should be talking about bioactives.

• One definition states that bioactive compounds are “components of food that influence physiological or cellular activities in the animals or humans that consume them.”
• Or, in more practical terms, they are “phytochemicals found in certain foods “are capable of modulating metabolic processes, resulting in the promotion of better health.”

With these definitions in mind, “bioactive foods,” therefore, would be those foods that are rich in plant-based chemicals that help boost immune function and promote robust health.

As an bioactive-rich food, these four avocados health benefits can be yours in you eat them regularly.

1. Good For Your Skin

Do you want glowing, beautiful skin? Eat avocados. When eaten or applied topically, avocados are a wonderful natural moisturizer. Rich in fat-soluble vitamins and monounsaturated fats, avocado benefits make this fruit Mother Nature’s number one moisturizer.

Using avocado oil or rubbing the inside of an avocado peel on your skin will promote healthy, shining skin and fight acne. Add in a few therapeutic essential oils, such as peppermint, rosemary or lavender, and boom: you have an affordable, natural lotion that’s much more powerful than the chemical-filled potions you buy at the store.

2. Cancer Fighting

Do avocados have secret cancer-fighting powers? Some new research says, “yes!” In fact, the journal Nutrition and Cancer recently ran an article touting the phytochemicals in avocados as powerful tools against oral cancers. The report went as far as to say avocados could work as a replacement for chemotherapy for oral cancer patients.

Ohio State University scientists took the theory a step further and they’re now trying to figure out exactly why avocados are so powerful. In an early report published in 2011, researchers suggested that the specific phytonutrient combination of avocados could be the key to the fruits cancer-killing abilities.

3. Hormone Balancing

Avocados have a plethora of health benefits and have been found to help lower metabolic syndrome in adults. Avocados help with high blood pressure, hypertension, and weight loss, all of which are cluster conditions that are associated with heart disease, stroke and diabetes, and they also help to regulate hormones, which are key variables in these risk factors.

Intriguingly, no data relating to the effects of avocado on disease risk factors had been published until the Nutrition Journal reported about a 2001-2008 survey. Thanks to that report, we now have a ton of information to go by. Here are just a few interesting facts researchers discovered by monitoring the eating habits of 17,567 U.S. adults:

• Those who included avocado in their diets were more likely to eat a balanced diet than those who did not eat avocado.
• According to the study, “Avocado consumers had significantly higher intakes of vegetables; fruit, diet quality, total fat, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, dietary fiber, vitamins E, K, magnesium, and potassium; vitamin K, and lower intakes of added sugars.”
• Body weight, body mass and waist circumference were reduced and HDL levels were increased in participants who ate avocados regularly.
• People who ate avocados on a regular basis were 50% less likely to develop metabolic syndrome.

4. Heart Health

Thanks to their fatty acid composition (71% monounsaturated fatty acids, 16% saturated fatty acids and 13% polyunsaturated fatty acids), avocados and avocado oil are especially efficient at promoting heart health.

Now, after decades of their health benefits being virtually forgotten, an emerging body of research and clinical studies are starting to explain the impact of avocado consumption on heart disease.

For instance, scientists from Mexico provided an avocado-heavy diet to healthy participants and participants with high cholesterol, and compared them to a group that did not eat avocados. Just one week into the study, it was revealed that the healthy people with normal lipid levels who ate avocados reduced their cholesterol level by 16%.

The results for the participants with high cholesterol were even more insightful. Not only did their total cholesterol drop 17%, so did their LDL (22%) and triglycerides (22%), and their HDL even rose 11%!

If you are still not sold on the importance of eating avocado daily as part of your natural health regimen, it’s time to wake up. Implementing avocado into your diet is actually easy. Here are a few useful tips.

• Avocado can be used as a butter/fat replacement in baking
• Diced avocado makes an excellent soup topper
• A food processor can whip avocado into desserts, such as puddings, mousses and more.
• Skip jarred baby food and mash avocado until it is smooth

Let us know your favorite ways to enjoy avocado benefits and share a recipe or two in the comments below.

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