We all know the feeling; you get a great idea and you just go with it. You go full out, head first, with an enthusiastic, “I can do this” attitude and then the realization of reality kicks in and you get the wind knocked out of you. In all of your glory you forget that you actually have to do something in order for the great idea to happen.  This, my friends, is what goes through our minds when we think about initiating a lifestyle change. Whether it be challenging you to go to the gym or vowing to eat organic, we all have this great intention but don’t always follow through.  With the New Year just around the corner I figured this would be a great time to nudge you to stick with it with a little advice.

The most challenging hurdle that we must all overcome in order to succeed at anything is ourselves!  We are our worst enemy and the only way to get past our reservations is to push the mental challenge in a positive yet selfish direction.  You might think, positive yet selfish? You’ve
got to be kidding me. No I am not. This is the hard reality here.  You want to think positively as in “I can do this” but you also need to be thinking, “I can do this because this is what I want.” When setting a goal you have to keep in mind that this is your goal. Not anyone else’s.  No one is going to wake you up at 5am to get you motivated to hit the gym.  You have to rely on yourself and be strong.

Staying strong especially through the holidays is really tough to do.  Pre-holiday festivities, holiday work parties, after-the-holiday parties and plenty of other reasons to overeat and forgo the gym are upon us. This is the time where our will power is tested and where we can really show ourselves that we have what it takes in order to succeed.  The best thing to do is to stick to as normal of a routine as possible.  If you go to the gym after work on a regular basis, continue to do so.  If you have an obligation to attend then work out before you go to work.  Make small changes in your routine, do not alter altogether because this will disrupt your normal pattern and can ultimately lead to you accidentally “giving up” on your goals.

Forget the past and move on. Slipped up and ate too much or skipped a couple of workouts? Don’t panic.  You cannot waste time or energy thinking of ways you could have “been better”, what’s done is done.  The only thing you can do is get back on the horse.  After a binge at a holiday party or a couple of unexcused absences from the gym, the best thing to do is to acknowledge the mishap and get back into your normal routine.  Congratulate yourself for feeling guilty and know that this is a good sign, it means you care. It’s not too late to being again with extra enthusiasm and some insight as to what can happen if you get off track.

Now is the time for you to start a change!  The holidays and the New Year is a good excuse for initiating a lifestyle change but honestly, any day is a good day to start.  It does not have to be a New Year’s resolution or anything pertaining to anybody else.  This has everything to do with you and what it will take to get you motivated enough to think about making a change and then actually implementing it.  The idea of making a change is exciting and thrills even the best of us but it is those who actually stick to their idea who are really rare.  My only question is, are you strong enough to be one them?

Allow Change

Ever try to capture a moment and put it in a bottle, or try to stop the seasons from changing? It just can’t be done. The simple truth is that everything of this world is subject to change. Change is the only constant. You are subject to change. Your body changes, your circumstances change. You are quite literally not the same person you were a year ago, physically, emotionally or in your life circumstances. With all this change we have the choice of moving with the flow of change or resisting it.

Letting attachment go

To allow change requires letting go. Letting go of our attachments of wanting things to stay the same. Letting go of our mental constructs of how we believe things should be. Our homes, automobiles, lifestyles, even our loved ones. We want them to stay the same. We create memories, positive impressions of events in space and time. We personalize them and identify ourselves with these past impressions. We come to believe that these past impressions are somehow better than whatever is happening now.

Learn to Trust

Change can be scary and the uncertainty of unknown outcomes in our life can be frightening. Now imagine letting go of the fear of the unknown. Letting the change flow, letting life become a joyous celebration of change. No fear, no attachment to a past that is gone forever. Honor the moment, the memory of it, by letting it go. Think of how much energy it takes to hold up all these attachments, beliefs. Imagine having all that energy at your disposal. Imagine letting things be as they are and letting the change just flow. Imagine then becoming the change that moves through your life. Consider your relationships, do you put those closest to you in a holding pattern, not wanting them to change? Imagine all the energy you would have to place somewhere creative, somewhere loving. Imagine how would it change your life, change the world, by becoming the change.

Maybe all it really takes is letting go.

The study was conducted over the lifespan of 2400 individuals and looked at grip strength, chair rises, and standing balance times at ages 36, 43 and 53 years.  The participants were asked to complete a survey, at each age, questioning their fitness habits such as frequency and duration of physical activity in past months.  The results conclude that those who were physically active at the younger ages performed better at the activities at the older ages.

The more active you are now can mean you will be more fit later on in life.  This is great news: not only is  being physically active in the present day helpful to prevent developing various diseases,  it is now shown  to help us be in better shape as we age, “aging gracefully”, if you will.
The more active you are the more fit you will be later on in life which can mean reducing your overall risk for developing diseases that take so many lives.  Now is the opportune time to start being more physically active if you aren’t already and if you already are… keep up the good work!

A  ground-breaking study  made public recently has revealed that common over the counter acid-reflux drugs such as Prilosec and Nexium can be detrimental to users’ health and have potentially fatal side effects.  Petitions have been presented to the U.S. Food & Drug Administration urging law enforcers to place the strongest warning labels possible on these over-used over the counter drugs.

Use of such proton-pump inhibitor medications can result in worsening symptoms as a result of “rebound acid hypersecretion”, causing an addiction-like dependence on the medication. Moreover, long-term use of such drugs can result in magnesium deficiencies, severe muscle cramps and potentially critical cardiac arrhythmias.  There are safe and effective natural remedies that can help acid reflux conditions and avoid poteintially life-threatening side effects such as herbal supplementations and medical masage techniques like postional release  therapy.

These findings come to no surprise to us at the Center.  We often use acupuncture to successfully reduce nausea and vomiting in early pregnancy and during chemotherapy.  There is now a consistent record in modern medical literature to support this important use of acupuncture.

In a December 2000 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), we saw that acupuncture used with drug therapy was three times as effective as drug therapy alone to reduce nausea and vomiting due to chemotherapy http://jama.ama-assn.org/content/284/21/2755.short.  And in a September 2004 issue of the journal Anesthesia and Analgesia, researchers at Duke University Medical Center also found acupuncture to be as effective as zofran for post-operative vomiting, with the added benefit of providing pain relief http://today.duke.edu/2001/10/acupunc1001.html.

What a great sense of satisfaction and purpose it gives to see modern clinical research validating ancient wisdom!  The more studies are released on acupuncture, the greater it’s acceptance and use becomes.

There is much debate regarding whether red wine is beneficial for your health or not. The debate began with the observation that the French population has lower rates of heart disease compared to the American population, even though the French diet is higher in saturated fat consumption. This has been termed the “French Paradox”. The cause of this paradox is believed to be due to the higher consumption of red wine by the French. In the past 20 years, there have been many studies, including many animal studies, to investigate whether red wine is the main factor in this paradox. However, there have been very few human trials that have shown that there is a positive health benefit. More clinical trials are needed to explore these benefits.

Resveratrol is the main active ingredient in red wine that is thought to have cardiovascular health benefits. Resveratrol is found in the skin of red grapes, and also in blue berries and bilberries. Most supplement forms of resveratrol are made from the roots of Polygonum cuspidatum due to its high amounts of the active resveratrol. A 5oz glass of red wine contains about 0.3-1mg of resveratrol. The kind of grape also makes a difference, as Pinot noir has the highest amount of resveratrol. Grapes grown in warmer, dryer climates have less.

Many studies using mice have found that resveratrol has cardiovascular benefits including lowering LDL cholesterol and raising HDL cholesterol, preventing atherosclerosis, and blood thinning effects similar to aspirin. Resveratrol has also been found to be anti-inflammatory, anti-carcinogenic, and estrogenic.

Resveratrol has been shown to increase insulin sensitivity. Since insulin is a fat promoting hormone, and insulin-resistance increases fat deposition, then increasing insulin sensitivity works to lower fat deposition and improve metabolic efficiency. Resveratrol also directly stimulates lipolysis and decreases the amount of fat cells.

Resveratrol also has very weak estrogenic effects. It is unknown whether this is protective or not, similar to other phytoestrogens such as soy, and is therefore not recommended as a supplement for those with hormone sensitive cancers.

In general, it is my recommendation that small amounts of red wine, not more than 1 glass daily, along with a balanced diet low in processed foods, can have an overall positive effect on all aspects of your health.

 Do you have a slow metabolism or fast metabolism? Your thyroid gland plays a role in your metabolism. If it is low or hypofunctioning, this could lower your overall metabolic rate leading to weight gain. A blood test can determine your thyroid functioning.

 Sugar metabolism plays a large role in energy expenditure and fat storage. However, not all sugars act the same in our bodies. Glucose stimulates insulin secretion that then promotes the cells to take up glucose for use as energy or to store as glycogen. The presence of insulin inhibits fat breakdown for energy (because now the body is using sugar) and promotes fat cells to not only take in fat, but also to produce fat (typically in the form of triglycerides). Therefore in the presence of circulating insulin, the body is going to make and store fat. This is why insulin resistance is associated with weight gain.

Fructose on the other hand, does not stimulate insulin production. It is metabolized in the liver and stored as glycogen or fat (in the form of triglycerides). Therefore, if we are inactive and not using our glycogen store in our muscles, we will convert fructose directly to fat. This is why fructose sweetened beverages and excessive consumption of fructose may be a possible health problem and could be contributing to the obesity epidemic. ^1,2,3 Glucose, insulin, and triglyceride blood tests can be performed to determine your metabolic status.

 Chronic inflammation can also lead to weight gain. Most commonly inflammation is thought of as painful or swollen joints, but chronic inflammation can brew in the body as a response to diet and environment. Inflammation may have an affect on a hormone called leptin.^4,5 Leptin, mostly produced in fat cells, sends signals to the brain to decrease appetite and increase energy expenditure. Since leptin is produced in the fat cells, it circulates in our bodies proportionally to the total number of fat cells. This makes sense since leptin decreases appetite and the more fat cells there are, the less need there would be to eat. However, inflammation and too much leptin leads to leptin resistance, causing a decreased ability for leptin to decrease appetite. One way to reduce inflammation is to investigate any food allergies that could be causing chronic inflammation. I have seen success with patients who follow a personalized hypoallergenic diet according to their food allergy results and successfully lose weight. Having a personalized diet plan is often more successful than trying a diet that is marketed to the masses for weight loss.

 J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2004 Jun;89(6):2963-72.Dietary fructose reduces circulating insulin and leptin, attenuates postprandial suppression of ghrelin, and increases triglycerides in women.

Teff KL, Elliott SS, Tschöp M, Kieffer TJ, Rader D, Heiman M, Townsend RR, Keim NL, D’Alessio D, Havel PJ.Monell Chemical Senses Center, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia 19104, USA.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15181085

Nutrition. 2010 Nov-Dec;26(11-12):1044-9. Epub 2010 May 14.Fructose and metabolic diseases: new findings, new questions.

Tappy L, Lê KA, Tran C, Paquot N.  Department of Physiology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland. luc.tappy@unil.ch

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15749839

 Am J Clin Nutr. 2004 Apr;79(4):537-43. Consumption of high-fructose corn syrup in beverages may play a role in the epidemic of obesity.

Bray GA, Nielsen SJ, Popkin BM.  Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70808, USA. brayga@pbrc.edu

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15051594

J Immunol. 2005 Mar 15;174(6):3137-42.  Leptin in immunology.

Matarese G, Moschos S, Mantzoros CS.  Gruppo di ImmunoEndocrinologia, Istituto di Endocrinologia e Oncologia Sperimenttale, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Naples, Italy

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15749839

 J Am Coll Cardiol. 2008 Oct 7;52(15):1201-10.  Leptin resistance: a possible interface of inflammation and metabolism in obesity-related cardiovascular disease.

Martin SS, Qasim A, Reilly MP.  Department of Medicine, Cardiovascular Institute, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-6160, USA.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18926322