Think about it --
Immune cells of people under extreme stress age
faster than those of people not under so much
stress, according to a study.
"Chronic stress appears to have the potential to
shorten the life of cells, at least immune cells,"
wrote Elissa Epel of the University of California at
San Francisco. "The results were striking," added
co-author Elizabeth Blackburn, also of UCSF.
Okay, so doesn't that mean that if we invest in
relaxation and play now, we'll save money on
prescriptions later? I think so!
There are many ways to relax, but many that we
may have relied on at one time may suddenly cost
more money than we feel free to allocate, or we
may have the money but be hard pressed to find
the time.
For me gardening is very grounding, pun intended,
and rewarding when flowers appear, birds sing and
crickets chirp. But sometimes I am too stressed or
in too much pain to garden and then I need to turn
to more powerful, out-of-hands things. Yes,
sometimes that's prayer and affirmations, in fact
after an affirmation from Louise Hay worked
really well for me I added links to her site from
mine. But, what I specifically mean right here and
now is massage.
My first experience with "physical therapy"
massage, as opposed to that between friends and
lovers, was after I had whiplash and no longer
thought whiplash was a joke.
I didn't try massage until after I was told by a
medical professional that my pain wasn't entirely
from my bones being out of alignment. The
problem, I was told, was that my muscles were
shocked by the impact and they kept tensing up
and pulling my bones out of place. So, I could go
to a chiropractor and get temporary relief, but the
instant a small stress came up my muscles would
contract and shift my bones, so, I was told, the
thing to do was to get massage until my muscles
relaxed.
I thought that sounded great. What fun! But in
reality it was so painful that it made me angry.
Luckily the massage therapist was also a
reflexologist and knew about the nerve endings
from throughout our body being present in the
bottoms of our feet so that massage of the bottoms
of our feet, at the particular points corresponding
to our pain and problems in other parts of our
body would benefit those other parts.
I was skeptical and not much impressed by the
Chinese chart she pointed me to. But, I tried it.
And, surprisingly it worked. My back began to feel
much better and without the pain of the muscles in
it being massaged directly.
So, that means that when I felt I again needed
massage and didn't have the money for bi-weekly
appointments with a massage therapist I should
have purchased a foot massage machine.
The thing was, I was having a particularly serious
problem with my muscles in my abdominal area
tensing up and beginning to twinge as they had
prior to the extremely painful contractions I'd had
in my back muscles when I got tetanus.
My abdominal muscles did this when I tried to
walk around a store, or just as easily when I was
in bed working on some extremely stressful legal
thing in relation to the then foreclosure of my
home and other property. (As a result of the privy
pit.)
If I tried to ignore the tensing then I got a serious,
nearly paralyzing pain in my thoracic diaphragm
and once that happened it would be many weeks
before I could do minimal walking again.
If not for this experience, however, I would not
have credited stress with the power it has over our
health as I do today.
And yes, I tried muscle relaxants. I may not have
had very strong ones, but they were no match for
the power of my muscles tightening, and when I
continued to use them for over a week they
appeared to reduce my muscles tone, the little that
I had.
So, I ordered a massage chair and was remarkably
pleased with the results. For example, if my
abdominal muscles were badly tight to the point
where they were bending me over when I walked,
and I used the chair for forty-five minutes, my
muscles would feel nearly as good as they did in
the morning when I woke up, which was my best
time.
Once I realized that was true, I discovered that if I
used my massage chair as soon as my muscles
began to tense I had to use it only a third of the
time for the same relief.
Which was good except that thinking in terms of
using it only for relief and for the shortest times
possible caused me to forget that it is generally
relaxing. So, I don't use it now to relax because I
with my brain injury think of it only in the one
way, not in the broader way that would be more
beneficial. (Maybe with doing this page I will
improve my thinking.)
And that, actually, is one of the most important
things I have learned about improving my health:
that is, I have far more to do with improving my
health through improving my thinking about it,
than doctors have to do with improving it.
Yes, no doubt that pain killers prescribed by
doctors are sometimes a life saver, but doctors can
be wrong or the things they prescribe can have
side affects ranging from inconvenient and
temporary to death dealing, and that is not an
exaggeration. All you have to do is think back to
Vioxx which caused heart episodes and in many
cases death for over 27,000 Americans who took it.
In my case, I know that several doctors I saw
wanted me to be on Serafem, an expensive Prozac
look alike marketed to women for PMS, rather
than prescribing more frequent vitamin B12
injections. When a nurse practitioner at my
doctor's office told me that Serafem contributed to
weight loss I bought into it and gave it a try, but
for me it caused double incontinence and I was
terrified that it would not resolve.
When I went back to the doctor's office with my
incontinence problem the same nurse practitioner
took the flyer I had brought in from the Serafem
box that said it should not be prescribed in cases
where there were blood disorders (B12 deficiency
often causes the blood disorder of Macrocytic
Anemia which is the blood cells becoming too large
as a result of not properly dividing the way that
healthy blood cells do) the nurse practitioner took
the pamphlet from me, crumpled it and threw it in
the wastepaper basket, leaving me wide-eyed at
her total lack of concern.
Another time a doctor told me that I could not
have a vitamin B12 deficiency because I am not a
vegetarian. So she would not prescribe B12
injections without me begging. She was completely
wrong in her belief that only vegetarians can have
low B12, but wrong or not she had the power to
withhold the shots that had been improving my
health.
All of which leads me inevitably to conclude that
we must pay attention to our health, ourselves.
In the same way that drug companies perform
studies and run trials to see if they can market a
drug for use in particular health situations, we must
makes studies of our own health and the affects of
different vitamins, foods, drugs, situations, rest,
and exercise on our health.
It is vitally important to keep in mind that within
drug company studies not everyone is benefited by
the drug under consideration. Only a percentage of
the study participants benefit. When the
percentage is acceptably high then the drug gets
approval for mass marketing and possibly adverts
to be run during the evening news with the most
people will see them and be influenced to ask to
try the drug.
I know that in the past I have found it much more
reassuring to go to a doctor and be told what to do
than to figure things out for myself, but when I got
double incontinence I began to have second
thoughts. After that keeping track of my symptoms
and reactions (both good and bad) was something I
made myself do regularly.
It is only because of what I know about my own
health that I am now able to foresee a day when I
can travel again.
Not many years ago it was almost impossible for
me to garden because of back pain, those days are
past and new issues have come up that I am
addressing now, with, I hope, equally good
long-term results.
I encourage you to begin keeping a Time Line of
your symptoms, test results if you have any, and
the vitamins and drugs you take. Begin to study
how things work for you and adjust your diet,
vitamin regime, and exercise plan to benefit you,
personally.
It is ultimately the most reassuring thing to observe
that after taking a magnesium tablet my headache
goes away; that after using methylcobalamin
lozenges my feeling of depression goes away, that
after using several grams of vitamin C a day my
toothache goes away. "Reassuring" because once I
make the observation I can repeat the thing that
gave me the good result.
Try it. Start keeping track and start maintaining
your health for less money by using vitamins and
relaxation rather than drugs and costly doctor visits.
For sure, start now.
faster than those of people not under so much
stress, according to a study.
"Chronic stress appears to have the potential to
shorten the life of cells, at least immune cells,"
wrote Elissa Epel of the University of California at
San Francisco. "The results were striking," added
co-author Elizabeth Blackburn, also of UCSF.
Okay, so doesn't that mean that if we invest in
relaxation and play now, we'll save money on
prescriptions later? I think so!
There are many ways to relax, but many that we
may have relied on at one time may suddenly cost
more money than we feel free to allocate, or we
may have the money but be hard pressed to find
the time.
For me gardening is very grounding, pun intended,
and rewarding when flowers appear, birds sing and
crickets chirp. But sometimes I am too stressed or
in too much pain to garden and then I need to turn
to more powerful, out-of-hands things. Yes,
sometimes that's prayer and affirmations, in fact
after an affirmation from Louise Hay worked
really well for me I added links to her site from
mine. But, what I specifically mean right here and
now is massage.
My first experience with "physical therapy"
massage, as opposed to that between friends and
lovers, was after I had whiplash and no longer
thought whiplash was a joke.
I didn't try massage until after I was told by a
medical professional that my pain wasn't entirely
from my bones being out of alignment. The
problem, I was told, was that my muscles were
shocked by the impact and they kept tensing up
and pulling my bones out of place. So, I could go
to a chiropractor and get temporary relief, but the
instant a small stress came up my muscles would
contract and shift my bones, so, I was told, the
thing to do was to get massage until my muscles
relaxed.
I thought that sounded great. What fun! But in
reality it was so painful that it made me angry.
Luckily the massage therapist was also a
reflexologist and knew about the nerve endings
from throughout our body being present in the
bottoms of our feet so that massage of the bottoms
of our feet, at the particular points corresponding
to our pain and problems in other parts of our
body would benefit those other parts.
I was skeptical and not much impressed by the
Chinese chart she pointed me to. But, I tried it.
And, surprisingly it worked. My back began to feel
much better and without the pain of the muscles in
it being massaged directly.
So, that means that when I felt I again needed
massage and didn't have the money for bi-weekly
appointments with a massage therapist I should
have purchased a foot massage machine.
The thing was, I was having a particularly serious
problem with my muscles in my abdominal area
tensing up and beginning to twinge as they had
prior to the extremely painful contractions I'd had
in my back muscles when I got tetanus.
My abdominal muscles did this when I tried to
walk around a store, or just as easily when I was
in bed working on some extremely stressful legal
thing in relation to the then foreclosure of my
home and other property. (As a result of the privy
pit.)
If I tried to ignore the tensing then I got a serious,
nearly paralyzing pain in my thoracic diaphragm
and once that happened it would be many weeks
before I could do minimal walking again.
If not for this experience, however, I would not
have credited stress with the power it has over our
health as I do today.
And yes, I tried muscle relaxants. I may not have
had very strong ones, but they were no match for
the power of my muscles tightening, and when I
continued to use them for over a week they
appeared to reduce my muscles tone, the little that
I had.
So, I ordered a massage chair and was remarkably
pleased with the results. For example, if my
abdominal muscles were badly tight to the point
where they were bending me over when I walked,
and I used the chair for forty-five minutes, my
muscles would feel nearly as good as they did in
the morning when I woke up, which was my best
time.
Once I realized that was true, I discovered that if I
used my massage chair as soon as my muscles
began to tense I had to use it only a third of the
time for the same relief.
Which was good except that thinking in terms of
using it only for relief and for the shortest times
possible caused me to forget that it is generally
relaxing. So, I don't use it now to relax because I
with my brain injury think of it only in the one
way, not in the broader way that would be more
beneficial. (Maybe with doing this page I will
improve my thinking.)
And that, actually, is one of the most important
things I have learned about improving my health:
that is, I have far more to do with improving my
health through improving my thinking about it,
than doctors have to do with improving it.
Yes, no doubt that pain killers prescribed by
doctors are sometimes a life saver, but doctors can
be wrong or the things they prescribe can have
side affects ranging from inconvenient and
temporary to death dealing, and that is not an
exaggeration. All you have to do is think back to
Vioxx which caused heart episodes and in many
cases death for over 27,000 Americans who took it.
In my case, I know that several doctors I saw
wanted me to be on Serafem, an expensive Prozac
look alike marketed to women for PMS, rather
than prescribing more frequent vitamin B12
injections. When a nurse practitioner at my
doctor's office told me that Serafem contributed to
weight loss I bought into it and gave it a try, but
for me it caused double incontinence and I was
terrified that it would not resolve.
When I went back to the doctor's office with my
incontinence problem the same nurse practitioner
took the flyer I had brought in from the Serafem
box that said it should not be prescribed in cases
where there were blood disorders (B12 deficiency
often causes the blood disorder of Macrocytic
Anemia which is the blood cells becoming too large
as a result of not properly dividing the way that
healthy blood cells do) the nurse practitioner took
the pamphlet from me, crumpled it and threw it in
the wastepaper basket, leaving me wide-eyed at
her total lack of concern.
Another time a doctor told me that I could not
have a vitamin B12 deficiency because I am not a
vegetarian. So she would not prescribe B12
injections without me begging. She was completely
wrong in her belief that only vegetarians can have
low B12, but wrong or not she had the power to
withhold the shots that had been improving my
health.
All of which leads me inevitably to conclude that
we must pay attention to our health, ourselves.
In the same way that drug companies perform
studies and run trials to see if they can market a
drug for use in particular health situations, we must
makes studies of our own health and the affects of
different vitamins, foods, drugs, situations, rest,
and exercise on our health.
It is vitally important to keep in mind that within
drug company studies not everyone is benefited by
the drug under consideration. Only a percentage of
the study participants benefit. When the
percentage is acceptably high then the drug gets
approval for mass marketing and possibly adverts
to be run during the evening news with the most
people will see them and be influenced to ask to
try the drug.
I know that in the past I have found it much more
reassuring to go to a doctor and be told what to do
than to figure things out for myself, but when I got
double incontinence I began to have second
thoughts. After that keeping track of my symptoms
and reactions (both good and bad) was something I
made myself do regularly.
It is only because of what I know about my own
health that I am now able to foresee a day when I
can travel again.
Not many years ago it was almost impossible for
me to garden because of back pain, those days are
past and new issues have come up that I am
addressing now, with, I hope, equally good
long-term results.
I encourage you to begin keeping a Time Line of
your symptoms, test results if you have any, and
the vitamins and drugs you take. Begin to study
how things work for you and adjust your diet,
vitamin regime, and exercise plan to benefit you,
personally.
It is ultimately the most reassuring thing to observe
that after taking a magnesium tablet my headache
goes away; that after using methylcobalamin
lozenges my feeling of depression goes away, that
after using several grams of vitamin C a day my
toothache goes away. "Reassuring" because once I
make the observation I can repeat the thing that
gave me the good result.
Try it. Start keeping track and start maintaining
your health for less money by using vitamins and
relaxation rather than drugs and costly doctor visits.
For sure, start now.
Health Boundaries Bite
http://www.health-boundaries-bite.com/Fingernails.html
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