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Sitting is More Difficult Than Moving!

July 7, 2009 By Dr. Mom Online Leave a Comment

I’ve just spent MANY hours in the past three days sitting at my computer, completing the second edition of my book and home study course.

With pleasure comes some pain! I cannot believe how much I hurt!!

I’m no whimp when it comes to challenging my body with an intense work out or a grueling endurance adventure.

But sitting? Holy cow!! This, I stink at!

I’m so much more sore after sitting here for this many hours than I EVER am after the most challenging of work outs! I don’t know how people do this ALL day long, day in and day out, for years.

BUT, it sure is pointing out to me the critical importance of MOVING!

If you’re forced to spend much of your day sitting, no wonder you have some chronic aches and pains. It’s not normal!

Remember that movement fires up proprioceptive input to the brain and causes the release of healthy, “feel good” hormones. Sedentary living is a toxic input to the nervous system, creating nociception, causing the conscious perception of PAIN and causing the brain to release stress hormones.

Chronic sitting sets the stage for chronic pain, as well as all chronic illness. We are meant to move regularly.

As much as possible, get up and move… or stretch as much as you can in your chair, if you can’t get up. Do things like neck rolls or lumbar arches or contract your core muscles.

If you can, sit on an exercise ball! I’ve done this a bit in the last few days, but my kids think it’s fun to come in here and try to knock mommy off the ball! Kinda’ defeats the purpose of trying to efficiently get work done!

Now that I’m done, I’m vowing to not sit for the rest of the day! Should make my drive to the grocery store quite interesting!

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Movement & Exercise ~ Natural Pain Relievers

July 3, 2009 By Dr. Mom Online Leave a Comment

Sure, movement and exercise are important to help us maintain (or achieve) our ideal body weight and composition. They are also key components for cardiovascular health, respiratory health, digestive health… even mental and emotional health.

But did you realize that movement and exercise are an essential ingredients for successful pain management (meaning, ‘getting rid of pain’, not just dealing with it!), overcoming injuries, and healing?

If you experience aches, pains, stiffness, decreased range of motion, chronic inflammation, or injuries from time to time, check out this recent article to see how movement might be what’s missing from your approach to getting better and back on track.

As always, I’d love to hear your feedback!

http://www.articlesengine.com/Article/Movement-and-Exercise—Natural-Pain-Relievers/361642/1

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I’ve Been Completely Wrong All These Years!

April 21, 2009 By Dr. Mom Online Leave a Comment

Well, this is it. A phone call with my dad last night confirmed that I have been wrong all these years.

All this time, it has been my understanding that sickness, disease and symptoms in general happen as a result of our less-than-ideal lifestyle choices and our environment. This causes us to move away from health.

For almost 2 decades I’ve somewhat facetiously joked that we don’t get sick or symptoms due to a shortage of drugs in our systems (or by having too many body parts). Therefore, adding drugs doesn’t create health, and doesn’t correct the cause of the underlying problem… or so I thought!

I’m not saying that drugs don’t alter our physiology and make us feel different. That would be ignorant. The real question is, do drugs restore optimal function and restore homeostasis? No. I understand there’s something to be said about covering up symptoms and feeling better – that’s the subject of another article!

Anyhow, back to last night’s conversation with Papa Bear.

You may recall that very recently, dad was kinda’ sorta’ diagnosed with a rheumatoid-like condition called polymyalgia rheumatica. Hmmm. Interesting. The whole thing left me in a weird space between the wellness paradigm way of thinking and the allopathic paradigm of labeling a group of symptoms for the purpose of treating those symptoms (drugs or surgery).

I’m not into labels. I don’t care what something is called – How do I get better? How do I restore health, function and homeostasis to my body? THAT will make me feel better, most likely. (Again, in another article, I’ll talk about treating the symptoms when correcting the cause is no longer an option.)

I’m certainly not a fan of simply labeling symptoms, or a person, just so you can refer to the recipe book of drugs and write a prescription that is supposedly “for” this set of symptoms.

The “diagnosis” wasn’t the result of any definitive test. It’s more elusive. Not quite like rheumatoid arthritis, not quite like osteoarthritis, and so on. It doesn’t quite fit anywhere. Hmmm.

Oh, well… nonetheless, dad was prescribed the steroid Prednisone about 3 weeks ago. I had already related to dad that, according to medical literature, there is no definitive diagnostic test for polymyalgia rheumatica, and that part of their “diagnosis” was to see how you responded to the drug. He either didn’t believe me or didn’t hear me!

Remember, we all agree that drugs will most certainly change your physiology and most likely the way you feel. Prednisone synthetically mimics the naturally occurring corticosteroid, cortisol, produced in our adrenal glands.

Well, dad had his follow up visit with the rheumatologist yesterday. The doc asked him how he had been feeling since starting the drug. Dad responded that he has definitely noticed significant improvement in the way he feels.

The doc then revealed the magical confirmation of the diagnosis… “Since you’ve responded well to the Prednisone, this means that you do indeed have polymyalgia rheumatica.”

Even my dad, who still lives with one foot firmly planted in the “sickness care” paradigm, had to do a double-take! He asked me on the phone, “How is that scientific? Isn’t that what their big beef is with holistic, wellness folks like you? ‘They’re not *scientific*!’” I wonder the same thing, dad.

Call me scientific, call me crazy… I don’t care. The objective is to help people get healthy and cause no harm. Playing chemistry with human bodies seems unscientific and dangerous.

All this time, I mistakenly thought that what my dad was experiencing (as well as all other most common conditions we suffer from today) was the result of an accumulation of toxic and deficient lifestyle choices -nutrition, movement, mindset, stress, traumas – as well as the chronic, cumulative effects of his external environment for the past 74 years.

Nope. WAY off.

Apparently, since the “cure” for this condition is Prednisone, and the condition itself can’t even be diagnosed without a positive response to Prednisone, that means this condition must, in fact, be caused by a shortage of Prednisone in our systems!!!

“We don’t know what it is or what to call it… but if we add Prednisone to it and it gets better, you must have had a deficiency of Prednisone!”

Who knew?!

In all seriousness, if Prednisone and other steroids used for similar symptoms are synthetic mimics of naturally occurring adrenal hormones, it’s too bad we can’t just address why our adrenal hormone production is out of whack in the first place. AND, even if it’s too late to correct any limitations of matter that may exist, is the very next step necessarily a synthetic steroid? Can’t we come up with one that is either identical to our naturally occurring ones? Or at least FAR less dangerous than the synthetic ones?

Just a thought.


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