21st Century Stress

This is turning out to be a pretty tough century. Or at least so far. The recent earthquake-like shocks in the economy have impacted everyone, and most people's stress levels are sky-high. Jobs have been lost, retirement savings have shrunk drastically, and energy prices are rising again. Economic stress leads to real physical stress. Stress is more than just a state of mind. Stress has real physical components, including tight muscles, headaches, difficulty falling asleep and restless sleep, abdominal pain, allergies and asthma, inflammation, and high blood pressure. Some results of stress may have long-term consequences. Prolonged high blood pressure, for example, may lead to heart disease, heart attack, and stroke. Long-term inflammation may lead to weight gain, diabetes, and even kidney disease. Of course, we could have stress because we have stress. We're stressed, and now we begin worrying about all the things that could go wrong because we are under stress. Not a good plan. A better plan would involve being proactive and beginning to take action steps that support our health and well-being. The action steps include the usual suspects - exercise and good nutrition. Everyone knows they "should" be doing regular exercise and "should" be eating good food every day, the difficulty is that no one wants to do what they "should".3 The way to reducing one's stress levels is in choosing to take action. We choose healthy behaviors because we want to, not because we think we "should." The concept of personal choice is powerful and may lead to shifts toward behaviors that are healthy. From an information point of view, both exercise and good nutrition have potent effects on a person's health.1,2,3 Both reduce inflammation. Both neutralize circulating free radicals, reducing a number of health risks, and both provide new energy resources, making us healthier and happier. Choosing good health improves our lives in countless ways. By choosing, we take back the power of good health. Everyone in our lives benefits from our renewed energy, creativity, productivity, and love for life. Beginning a program of chiropractic care is another positive choice we may make. Chiropractic adjustments help our bodies work more efficiently and effectively, directly reducing physiologic stress and indirectly improving our ability to effectively manage the stress in our daily lives. Your chiropractor is an expert in health, wellness, and well-being and will be glad to help you design exercises and food plans that will work for you. Remember - being healthy is a choice! Dr. Dave Edenfield, "Your Jacksonville Chiropractor", and Lakewood Chiropractic offers the most advanced treatments for back pain, sciatica, neck pain, whiplash, and headaches. They also treat auto accident victims with state-of-the-art technologies. Now accepting VA patients. For more information visit: Lakewood Chiropractic Jacksonville, Florida 32217 904-733-7020 lakewoodchiropracticjax Visit our facebook page! Follow us on Twitter! 1Appel LJ, et al.: Effects of comprehensive lifestyle modification on blood pressure control: main results of the PREMIER clinical trial. JAMA 289(16):2083-2093, 2003 2Elmer PJ, et al.: Effects of comprehensive lifestyle modification on diet, weight, physical fitness, and blood pressure control: 18-month results of a randomized trial. Ann Intern Med 144(7):485-495, 2006 3Viera AJ, et al.: Lifestyle modifications to lower or control high blood pressure: is advice associated with action? The behavioral risk factor surveillance survey. J Clin Hypertens 10(2):105-111, 2008

Meditation - A Good Antidote to Stress The notion of meditation brings to mind images of very healthy-looking people sitting cross-legged on the floor. They are chanting or doing deep breathing. Incense may be burning or small bells ringing. Well, we may not like incense. We may never be able to get into those pretzel-like positions. Chanting or deep breathing exercises may make us feel weird. Fortunately, meditation is not really like all that. And, a regular meditation practice may help to significantly reduce the effects of stress - both physically and mentally. "But I could never sit still for half an hour," you say. "I could never concentrate on one thing for thirty minutes at a time." Again, fortunately, you don't have to. The benefits of meditation can be obtained from as little as ten minutes each day. Also, meditation is not about "concentrating on one thing." Your thoughts go where they go. The only purpose of meditation is to notice your thoughts and return to a quiet place. In one popular form of meditation, you focus on your breathing. Not deep breathing. Just regular breathing - in and out. You focus on your breath. Your thoughts go where they go, and you notice and gently bring your attention back to the breath. That's it. Sit comfortably in a chair with a firm seat or on a mat. Focus on your breath and meditate for ten minutes. This may not be the easiest thing to do at first, but you'll be surprised at how easy this becomes. Make this a daily habit. You may want to eventually add another ten-minute session. Soon, you'll notice a decrease in your levels of stress and an improvement in your sense of well-being.

Vitamin D - The Superstar Supplement

You may remember the public health slogan, "Vitamin D helps build strong bones". This message could be seen on colorful school posters and heard on radio and television programs as early as the1950s. Getting enough Vitamin D was a major health issue, primarily for its role in preventing childhood rickets - "softening of the bones".1 More recently, and quite dramatically, vitamin D has been strongly associated with reduced cancer risks, preventing autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and lupus, preventing cardiovascular disease, and even helping to prevent diabetes.2 Vitamin D seems to be a one-stop shop for helping combat many serious chronic diseases, and yet vitamin D deficiency is common in the United States.3 Very few foods are natural sources of vitamin D. The primary source of vitamin D for humans is sunlight - sunlight causes cells in the skin to produce vitamin D. But most of us don't spend enough time outside to get sufficient sunlight to provide us with our normal daily requirement of vitamin D. Supplementation is needed, in the form of fortified foods such as milk and in vitamin/mineral tablets. Interestingly, meeting our vitamin D and calcium daily requirements is only one step on the road to healthy, strong bones. Vitamin D helps the body absorb calcium from the intestinal tract. Also, vitamin D helps bone cells utilize calcium to build new bone. But - in adults, new bone will only be built if there's a need for it. Mechanical stress causes the body to produce new bone - and the best source for this kind of bone-building mechanical stress is exercise. Yes, the E word. It's not enough to passively swallow a bunch of supplements every day. We need to exercise regularly to get the most out of the nutrition we're providing our bodies. When we exercise - particularly when we do strength training and other gravity-resisting activities such as running, walking, and bicycling - our bodies react not only by building new muscle but by building new bone as well. This response follows a physiologic principle known as Wolff's Law - bone remodels along lines of physiologic stress. In other words, bone responds to mechanical challenges by building more bone. The result is more dense, stronger bones. Such bones are significantly less likely to fracture. And. logically, exercise helps prevent loss of bone mass, a primary cause of osteoporosis in postmenopausal women and older adults. Chiropractic health care helps provide assistance to these metabolic processes. All of our metabolic activities are directed by signals from the nerve system. Our nerve impulses tell our cells when to start and when to stop these complicated biochemical processes. Chiropractic care helps ensure proper flow of information throughout the nervous system, helping us maintain optimal physical health and well-being. Your chiropractor is an expert in nutritional health and will be able to recommend a program and plan that will be right for you. Dr. Dave Edenfield, "Your Jacksonville Chiropractor", and Lakewood Chiropractic offers the most advanced treatments for back pain, sciatica, neck pain, whiplash, and headaches. They also treat auto accident victims with state-of-the-art technologies. Now accepting VA patients. For more information visit: Lakewood Chiropractic Jacksonville, Florida 32217 904-733-7020 Visit lakewoodchiropracticjax.com! Visit our facebook page! Follow us on Twitter! 1Lins P: Vitamin D physiology. Prog Biophys Mol Biol 92)1:4-8, 2006 2Cavalier E, et al:Vitamin D: current status and perspectives.Clin Chem Lab Med 47:1, 2009 3Holick Me, Chen TC: Vitamin D deficiency: a worldwide problem with health consequences. Am J Clin Nutr 87(4):10805-10865, 2008

Osteoporosis Developing osteoporosis is a frightening prospect for many older people. If a person with osteoporosis falls and fractures a hip, the recovery may be slow and prolonged and the person may never be the same. Also, hip fractures in the older population may often be fatal, the person dying from a blood clot that made its way to the lungs or a major blood vessel in the brain. So, there are many very important reasons for treating osteoporosis. And of course, preventing osteoporosis in the first place is even more important. The very good news is that prevention is easy. It just requires some work, attention, and discipline. Osteoporosis - loss of bone mass - is prevented in large part by daily vitamin D and calcium supplementation and by regular exercise. When is the right time to begin such a program? Right now. It's never too early in life to begin regular exercise and begin regular vitamin and mineral supplementation. Even if you're an older person who hasn't exercised in many years, today is the right time to begin. Make sure to check with your chiropractor to learn about the types of exercise that are b