I have been gathering the information to write this book for a long time.  As a young person, nutrition was very important in my family. I remember riding my bike in the early 1960’s to pickup up yogurt for my mother at the health food store. Yogurt was rare at that time and only available once a week in the town we lived in. My mother understood it was important along with cod liver oil, lots of fruits and vegetables and eating regular meals. My grandmother loved her carrot juice and recommended charcoal tablets for any digestive upsets. When visiting at her house I would be fed snacks of popcorn and sliced apples. I come from a lineage of women embracing natural foods and health.
      When I went off to college I thought initially that I would like to be an environmental engineer. I guess I didn’t read the catalogue closely enough, because it turned out to be heating and air conditioning and I wanted to be helping the world’s environment! I realized my other passion was nutrition, so I switched to the Dietetics option in Home Economics and became a Registered Dietitian. 
Later in life as a mother of two young daughters I explored how to keep them and me healthy. I studied homeopathy extensively and found it very useful for resolving most daily problems.  I began to use more herbal medicines and loved how they were so helpful and frequently much more effective then anything else I had used for first aide. I began writing this book in 1996 to bring all of this basic useable information and stories to people who could use it. However in 1997 it became clear to me I should attend Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine in Phoenix, Arizona and we moved. I attended medical school for four years and this book was placed on hold.
I am pleased to finally make this evolving book available to my many patients, family and friends, plus others I hope to meet, who have been asking me to share this information with them in an easily to accessible and understandable style.      
                                                                                                                                                                        Best wishes,

Dr. Valeria Breiten
Chandler, Arizona