Betsy Bell

Business Op

What’s a Bryn Mawr grad doing selling soap and pills?

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I asked myself this same question when I quit the multinational corporation I was working for to promote health through sales of my beloved healthnut products.  What was all that study, a BA and MA in Romance Languages from the top college for women for, anyway?  A couple people I invited to lunch so I could ask them to join me were affronted, shocked even, by my choice of “careers”.  One lovely man, a dear family friend, came over after accepting and paying for my ministrations in the form of supplements, begging me not to ruin our friendship by trying to sell him this stuff.  OMG

I figured I just had to learn how ‘permission’ marketing worked.  There was so much to learn in the era before computers and email and face book and blogging.  I practiced my scripts in front of the mirror and forced myself to pick up the phone and call friends and strangers.  It worked.  Probably because a wonderful woman who graduated from one of those other sister Ivy League colleges recruited me with the question, “Would you like to learn more about nutrition?”  That was the right question.  I did.  And here I am today, healthier than I was 27 years ago, happily earning a secondary income allowing me to travel the world, with friends and with grandchildren.

The system I’m found to earn money on line involvesblogging about your favorite topics and enrolling others to join you.  I’m looking for you if you are a person with a strong interest in health and wellness.  You also need to be interested in growing personally, in learning how to market effectively through the internet.  The system involves teaching a person how to do all that.  It’s as simple as following the leader–and there are powerfully good leaders in this organization–and spending time every day learning and working the system.

If you have 10 hours a week, a willingness to learn, this could be a way for you to make some serious money and do the things you have on your bucket list.  Go for it.  At least take a look before rejecting the idea out of hand.

If this is not for you, who do you know who is looking for something they can do from home that will earn serious income?  Pass it along.  Results vary.  It takes dedicated hard work to earn a fortune.

Betsy

 

www.DoWellWithBetsy.com

www.GrandaBetsyBell.com

 

Business Op

Who and What are you attracting?

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“You are a living magnet” says Brian Tracy in Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life. brian tracy book

He called it the law of attraction and states that you invariably attract into your life the people, ideas, opportunities, and circumstances in harmony with your dominant thoughts.

The leaders in Network Marketing Companies are attracting masses of followers into their groups, all with the vision of changing their thinking and changing their lives.  Doubt, low self esteem, and poor opinions of your own self worth have no place in the formula of attraction.  I remember when I was down so low from the misery of losing my husband that I called on people who were suffering even more than I was. Wrong direction.  I needed to go up, not down.

What I love about the Network Marketing is the self-development training.  Read an uplifting book every day.  I picked up Brian Tracy.  His book has been on my shelf a long time.  One of the first audio tapes I listened to over and over back when I first decided to cast my future with Multilevel Marketing was his speech to a large insurance sales force.  “Write your goals, the things you want in life, as many as you can in the next hour and don’t stop writing until the time is up.”  My husband and I were on a road trip.  We turned off the tape and began.  The very act of listing what we wanted in life gave me the courage and the will to persevere.  Try it.

Would you like training materials that propel you to the greatest things you can imagine in your life?  Join me.  There’s good money in it.  You fall in love with the ideas and concepts and you pass them on to others through our online system and tools.  They do the same.    Take a look.

Fondly, Betsy

www.DoWellWithBetsy.com

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

Arthritis, Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

I did not know him: a cycle of pain

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My brother died.  I went to Boston to be with his wife and children.  At first the pain and suffering was all about my loss.  In Boston I became one grieving sister in a sea of grief.  I did not know all these other grieving people.  Not his wife of thirty-five plus years and their three children, and all of his wife’s siblings, their spouses and their children.   And then his friends from high school and college and his medical practice and their church and his men friends.  Six hundred people in various degrees of pain.

I listened.  I discovered that I have not listened well; I let the stories of others come in unfiltered.  These stories gave me my brother.  How bitter sweet to have him and lose him at the same time.  The acute pain is mediated by the truth, the fleshing out of the man he was these years we had been separated by a continent and our too-busy lives.  Today back in Seattle, I feel less pain.  I also have far more compassion for his wife and their children who now begin the work of knitting a life without him physically present.

How are emotional pains like our body pains?

I recently found an interesting web site called the Arthritis Management Program. They published a graphic of the pain/fatigue cycle which you may find helpful. arthritis pain cycle In a closed loop, each new painful experience pulls you further down into the pain and suffering.  In this downward spiral, pain leads to depression which makes exercise difficult.  One abandons the good diet.  Sleep is challenging.  All of these challenges occur while a loved one is struck down and then dies.  Each of these symptoms can by themselves contribute to the other symptoms, and all can make pain and fatigue worse.

Even worse, they can feed on each other. For example, inflammation from the arthritis can cause pain, which causes stress and anxiety, which can cause poor sleep, poor sleep can cause depression, depression can sometimes make it hard to eat as we should, and these can lead to more pain or fatigue, and so on. The interactions of these symptoms, in turn, make our arthritis or fibromyalgia seem worse. It becomes a vicious cycle that only gets worse unless we find a way to break the cycle.

A support group for arthritis sufferers, a good blog (hehehe) or web site can trigger a cycle-breaking strategy.  A memorial service in which all the sufferers participate can show the way to break the grieving cycle.  Neither strategy is permanent.  I have lost two husbands and this loss brings all that pain back.  It was hard to sleep, to focus my mind on anything.  I felt as though I was spinning.  How must those much closer to my brother have suffered from the physical and emotional disruptions of death.

I always go back to my mantra of Keep Moving.  If your arthritis pain gets too great to move in the usual ways, find new ways to move.  A warm-water pool and a class for arthritics; gentle Feldenkrais movements;  a quick trip to the Korean foot massage place (that was my strategy when I couldn’t sleep from the anxiety of my brother lying in the ICU with a stroke.)  Call a friend and ask them to help you get out of the doldrums.  Eat a salad with toasted pine nuts instead of chocolate cake.

You no doubt have been on this closed circuit pain path. How did you get out of it?  Let us know.

If this has been helpful, pass it along, post it on your face book page, and like my business page while you are at it.  🙂

Fondly, Betsy

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving.

www.grandmabetsybell.com

www.dowellwithbetsy.com

 

Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness

The last man standing

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Gentle Reader,

The focus of my weekly blog is health and how to prevent disease.  Sometimes nothing we do can prevent a health disaster.  A stroke taking down a healthy man is hard to understand.  I refer you to a TED talk by Jill Bolton Taylor, a research scientist who survived a stroke and recorded what was happening in her brain as she observed it taking her down.  If you have ever wondered how a stroke does its damage, listen to her talk.

I have posted many blogs on diet and exercise to prevent disease.  Many people who follow these suggestions, which are not original with me, still have strokes, heart attacks, or develop cancer to the head-shaking dismay of their closest relatives and friends.  Things like “It’s so unfair.”  “How could it happen to him/her?” are uttered in disbelief.  I recommend another reading of those previous posts to refresh your memory about life style choices for yourself.  There are no guarantees.  No matter how hard we try.

Today’s post is about me and how it feels to be the last man standing.  When my brother Eric died a few days ago following a massive stroke, his departure from this life left me the sole survivor of the original family of origin, two parents and three children.  His wife and children carry the greatest burden of pain, loss and suffering.  Their lives will be impacted daily by his absence, as will the circle of close friends, professional associates who saw or were touched by him.  His kindness, intelligence, generosity and quiet humor will be missed.  Profoundly.

A sister’s loss is different.  I was not part of his life these last 60 years.  We lived far apart and saw each other only occasionally for the FOO (Family of Origen) gatherings, Christmas, birthdays, weddings, funerals.  We didn’t talk on the phone much, once or twice a year.  So why do I feel this slicing away of part of myself?  This aloneness?  We never agreed on the family stories.  Now there is no one left to curb my tongue.  It feels vulnerable, frightening to be the keeper of the stories.  They will always be “Betsy’s fiction” because memory is particular.  This is not the collective memory of a people with an oral tradition.  My recollections of Eric will be as far from Homer’s of Ulysses as two stories can be.

As very small children we were together much of the time.  We made that migration after the war (WWII) from Westchester County in NY to the Great Lakes Navel base where our father was mustered out of the navy.  That winter we woke up early on clear cold days, strapped on our roller skates and raced around the flat streets of Waukegan, IL.  Once I rushed into the kitchen to tell Mommy that Eric was hanging from the tree.  She flew to the back yard where his jacket pocket had caught on a limb and he was dangling upside down.  My fear of heights probably originated from the time I was walking with my parents down the flat stone steps in Watkins Glen, NY.  They spotted Eric running full tilt, Lyman right behind him, along the top of the low flag stone wall beyond which plunged a waterfall crashing 60 ft below.  My mother whispered in that heart-stopping panic, “Port, do something.”

After Waukegan, our family made our way to Oklahoma City.  Eric and I were squeezed together, the fillings of a sandwich formed by our belongings and the roof of the station wagon as the family drove south stopping in St. Louis for the night.  Our little brother sat between our parents in the front seat.

In Oklahoma City, we rented in a neighborhood peppered with giant grasshopper-armed oil rigs, pumping oil night and day.  I remember sitting with Eric, our noses poking through the chain link fence, watching the workmen change out the pipes from the top of an oil derrick.   One of the men lost his footing and plunged to his death on the ground a few feet from where we sat.  I remember my first thought was to protect and comfort Eric, too small at 7 to witness such a thing.  I would have been 8 ½.

My playground memories from that year figure Eric pulling my braids, my back up against a small tree in the school yard, his feet pressed against it, one braid in each hand, laughing sardonically at my surprise and pain.

We often sat on either side of our Grandpa, our little brother in his lap.  Gramps took us to the library each Saturday and read us book after book in his deep voice.  We stood together at his bedside when he died on Easter.  I was 9, Eric was just turning 8.

We finally settled in Eastern Oklahoma, Muskogee, where we lived those formative junior high and high school years.  He and I often rode our bikes to a dirt bank by the railroad track, sacks of match box cars and trucks dangling from the handle bars.  We spent hours building roads, tunnels, villages in the perfect hard sand.  Swimming on the swim team and playing the flute kept us together in high school when our lives were otherwise separating.  Eric spent more time with our younger brother Lyman than with me as I began dating and spending time with girl friends, loathing the annoyances of younger brothers.

Why are those early formative experiences so vivid and important above all else?  None of them matter to the people who weep at his funeral next Monday.  They have little if anything to do with the man he became.  His passing leaves them with me and me alone.

Is it totally weird to have this acute pain as if your childhood takes on a surreal, ghostly quality because one of the key players is no longer a phone call away?  I never asked him to corroborate any of these stories—and I could tell many more—so I do not know if he even remembered them.  There is something so final in the passing away of that one who could have said, “Yes, I remember that.  Wasn’t it scary?  Wonderful? Awesome?”  The mirror is broken.

I would love to hear your stories of your siblings, whether gone or still among the living.

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving.

Betsy

206 933 1889

www.DoWellWithBetsy.com   Would you love a ready-made blogging platform that could earn you money?

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com  Would you love products that help keep you well and help the planet, too?

 

Be Well health tips, Business Op

The Triduum and Easter, darkness to joy

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Gentle Reader,

The great Triduum or three holy days ending triumphantly in Easter begins today.  I took on one new thing for Lent in response to the half page of suggestions our Saint Mark’s Episcopal worship committee sent out, activities that would increase mindful living.  When I read on the list “Write a letter to someone, stamp and mail it,” I thought about the boxes full of letters I have from my husband, Don Bell, and from my daughters when they went off to college, plus much of the correspondence from dear friends who meant so much to us and to me over the years.  These letters are treasures, little vignettes of life, soul pictures living on paper.  I have a grandson in college.  I wrote to him and quoted some passages from his grandfather’s letters to me.  Don died before any of his grandchildren were born and I have been writing the memoir of our early time together with these ten grandchildren in mind.  Ben’s response surprised me.  He wrote back to me asking for more.

Writing a letter requires slowing down, with intention, choosing words carefully, pouring over Don’s letters for just the right passage to share.  It felt like holy work.

Our whole-heartedly secular culture does not help the practicing liturgical Christian any more than it supports the Muslim or Jews in following their holy calendars.  I felt this tension more acutely this Lent than ever before.  A new business possibility came into my inbox and has swept me off my feet, nearly obliterating the contemplative aspect of these 40 days.  The battle between successful entrepreneurship and prayer put me in an anxious state.  I discovered a left over bag of Reese’s Peanut butter cups, Halloween candy, in the freezer.  I made myself a cup of tea, sat down and ate them.  All.  Excitement over this new thing that promised expert training in network marketing and a compensation plan that create wealth kept me awake.  The combination of sugar and sleeplessness resulted in a head cold.  Is my immune system that stressed by a heap of sugar and lack of sleep?

Have you been able to pin point a connection between sugar consumption, lack of rest and catching a cold?  Not too far-fetched. WebMD published an article on the immune system which includes comments on sugar.  From their page on Cold, Flu & Cough Health Center:

3. Eating foods high in sugar and fat: Consuming too much sugar suppresses immune system cells responsible for attacking bacteria. Even consuming just 75 to 100 grams of a sugar solution (about the same as in two 12-ounce sodas) reduces the ability of white blood cells to overpower and destroy bacteria. This effect is seen for at least a few hours after consuming a sugary drink.

For the whole article, click here:  10 Immune system booster and busters.  I knew this.  I ate the stuff anyway, without thinking about the consequences.  The priets are available for confession on Good Friday.  For a person who claims to care for my body as a holy thing, I feel stupid and guilty.  I will probably just take a long walk and eat tons of Swiss chard and kale, drink Throat coat tea and shovel in the Vitamin C.  Eating sugar doesn’t seem like it deserves the sacrament of confession.

I’d love to hear how this Lent/Passover is going for you.  Anything come up that effects your health?  Perhaps we can all support each other.

Do not forget the joy.  There will be 30+ people in my living room on Sunday.  The college and highschool, middle school aged kids will be full of conversation as well as ham and potatoe, asparagus and salad.  It will be glorious and promises not to rain so we can spill out into the back yard.  They don’t want to give up dyeing eggs even though it is doubtful they will hide any.  Children want to hang on to the traditions even though it means not being cool.  I love it.

Fondly,

Be Well, Do Well, Keep Moving

Betsy

Injured at 52. Diagnosed and sentenced to a wheel chair at 55.  Hiking, skiing, dancing and walking at 75.  Read my story. 

206 933 1889  betsy@HiHoHealth.com   www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com  http://www.weirdmarketingtips.com/funnel/?id=b2

Scientific resources

10 Immune system boosters and busters: WebMD article

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Cold, Flu, & Cough Health Center

10 Immune System Busters & Boosters

Are you secretly sabotaging your immune system? Some common lifestyle habits can have a detrimental effect on your ability to fight off infections like colds and flu – as well as your overall resistance to chronic illness.

If so, you need a lifestyle tune-up. Replacing bad health habits with good ones can improve your immune system health. Check the list of immune system boosters and busters to see where you’re doing well – and where you could use some improvement.

Recommended Related to Cold & Flu

When Healthy Habits Backfire

When it comes to healthy habits, can there be too much of a good thing? Absolutely. Eating wholesome foods helps keep you healthy, but overeating will make you fat and prone to illness. Exercise helps keep you fit, but working out too hard or too often can cause injury and fatigue. Of course, these are only two of the most obvious examples of how healthy habits can backfire. Here are seven more: 1. Cleaning your kitchen. No doubt about it — a dirty kitchen can raise the risk of contracting…

Read the When Healthy Habits Backfire article > >

5 Immune System Busters

1. Lack of exercise: Sitting at your desk all day can not only make you feel sluggish, it can leave your immune system sluggish, too. Studies show that regular, moderate exercise – like a daily 30 minute walk — increases the level of leukocytes, an immune system cell that fights infection. When you’re a non-exerciser, your risk of infections — such as colds — increase compared to those who exercise.

Being inactive can weaken your immune system indirectly, too. A sedentary lifestyle can interfere with sleep quality at night and can lead to obesity and other problems that increase your risk of illness.

2. Being overweight: Carrying extra weight puts you at risk of developing diseases such as diabetes, cancer, and heart disease. Part of the reason may lie in how excess fat cells in your body affect your immune system.

A high number of fat cells trigger the release of pro-inflammatory chemicals in the body, leading to chronic inflammation. When the inflammation is ongoing, healthy tissues get damaged.

Animal studies also show that being overweight or obese can impair the immune system. For example, studies have shown that obese and overweight mice make fewer antibodies after receiving common vaccinations. Antibodies are a measured immune response to vaccination.

3. Eating foods high in sugar and fat: Consuming too much sugar suppresses immune system cells responsible for attacking bacteria. Even consuming just 75 to 100 grams of a sugar solution (about the same as in two 12-ounce sodas) reduces the ability of white blood cells to overpower and destroy bacteria. This effect is seen for at least a few hours after consuming a sugary drink.

4. Experiencing constant stress: Everyone has some stress in their lives. And short-term stress may actually boost the immune system – the body produces more cortisol to make ”fight or flight” possible. But chronic stress has the opposite effect. It makes you more vulnerable to illness, from colds to serious diseases. Chronic stress exposes your body to a steady cascade of the stress hormones cortisol and adrenaline, which suppress the immune system.

5. Being socially isolated: Having strong relationships and a good social network is important to your physical health as well as your mental health – and specifically your immune system.  Several studies support the idea that people who feel connected to friends – whether it’s a few close friends or a large group – have stronger immunity than those who feel alone. In one study, freshmen who were lonely had a weaker immune response to a flu vaccine than those who felt connected to others. Another recent study found that isolation changed the immune system on a cellular level: Being lonely affected the way some genes that controlled the immune system were expressed.

5 Immune System Boosters

1. Regular exercise:  If you want to boost your immune system, get active. Getting your heart rate up for just 20 minutes just three times a week is associated with increased immune function, and a brisk walk five days a week can help reduce your risk of catching a cold. Regular exercise increases the level of leukocytes, an immune system cell that fights infection. Exercise also is associated with increased release of endorphins, natural hormones that pump up your sense of well being and improve sleep quality, both of which have positive effects on your immune system.

2. Get more antioxidants in your diet: A diet rich in antioxidant vitamins and nutrients can boost immunity to help fight infection. Your body produces free radicals — molecules that can damage cells. Antioxidants help neutralize free radicals so they can’t do any damage. Researchers believe that when the balance between free radicals and antioxidants is upset, it can contribute to the risk of developing cancer and heart disease, as well as age-related diseases.

Top antioxidants include vitamins C and E, plus beta-carotene and zinc. To get enough of these antioxidants in your diet, experts recommend eating an abundance of brightly colored fruits and vegetables, including berries, citrus fruits, kiwi, apples, red grapes, kale, onions, spinach, sweet potatoes, and carrots.

Other immune-boosting foods include fresh garlic, which has claims of  antiviral and antibacterial properties, and old-fashioned chicken soup. A study showed that if you do come down with a cold or the flu, a bowl of steaming chicken soup can boost immunity and help you get well faster.

In addition, mushroom varieties such as reichi, maitake, and shiitake may have some influence on immune function.

3. Adequate sleep:  Fatigue increases your susceptibility to illness – you may have noticed you’re more likely to catch a cold or other infection when you’re not getting enough sleep. A lab experiment bears this out: When students at the University of Chicago were limited to only four hours of sleep a night for six nights and then given a flu vaccine, their immune systems produced only half the normal number of antibodies. Like stress, insomnia can cause a rise in inflammation in the body – possibly because lack of sleep also leads to an increase in the stress hormone cortisol. Although researchers aren’t exactly sure how sleep boosts the immune system, it’s clear that getting adequate amounts – usually 7 to 9 hours for an adult – is essential to good health.

4. Practice relaxation techniques: If chronic stress suppresses the immune system, then learning techniques to reduce stress should help return your immune system to health – and maybe even give it an additional boost. Reducing stress lowers levels of cortisol. It also helps you sleep better, which improves immune function. And some studies show that people who meditate regularly may be able to increase their immune system response. In one experiment, people who meditated over an 8-week period produced more antibodies to a flu vaccine than people who didn’t meditate. And they still showed an increased immune system response four months later.

5. Laugh: Comedy is good for you. Laughing decreases the levels of stress hormones in the body while increasing a type of white blood cell that fights infection. In fact, even just anticipating a funny event can have a positive effect on your immune system. In one study, a group of men who were told three days in advance that they were going to watch a funny video saw levels of stress hormones drop while levels of endorphins and growth hormones rose. Both endorphins and growth hormones benefit the immune system.

Thanks to WebMD! http://www.webmd.com/cold-and-flu/10-immune-system-busters-boosters

Arthritis, Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

Who is Peggy Cappy?

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Gentle Reader,

Whether it is the new exercise classes or the intense gardening, I cannot say for sure.backcaremed (1)  What I am sure about is increased pain and then the magical release from it.  Here is the unexplainable magic.  I have mentioned it to you several times in the past.  It is a 20 minute meditation tape by Peggy Cappy about Rejuvenating the Back.   She talks in a soothing voice about how every cell in your body is capable of reproducing into a fresh, new creation, whole and healthy.

 

 

I come in from the garden hurting in every lower back, hip and knee joint, shoulders and hands, as well.  I turn on the Ipod to her voice and prop my knees over the Back2Life machine (I have described this contraption several times in previous posts) and when the tape is over, I stand and walk without pain.

BAck2Life machine

 

 

Back2Life

 

 

The third thing I do is take an herbal tablet that inhibits the pain path.  The Pain Relief Complex is helpful but does not bring such complete results by itself.

 

I urge you, if you suffer pain, to invest in Peggy Cappy’s cd.  You might want the Back2Life machine, too, but it probably is less important than her relaxation/rejunvenation message.

 

I’d be interested in hearing your techniques for curbing acute pain.  So let us hear from you.  If you investigate these techniques and like what I have shared, please pass the message along to your friends. While you are at it, like my facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/BetsyBellsHealth4U.

Fondly,

Be Well, Do Well, Keep Moving

Betsy

Injured at 52. Diagnosed and sentenced to a wheel chair at 55.  Hiking, skiing, dancing and walking at 75.  Read my story. 

206 933 1889  betsy@HiHoHealth.com   www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

Arthritis, Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

World champion at 86: How did he do it?

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Gentle Reader,

Every so often I hear about a person who just won’t sit down and quit.  This guy ruined his knees running and went in search of a new sport which didn’t require so much stress on his knees. Here’s his story. Enjoy.  And thanks to Bob Ferguson for passing it along.

Dean Smith Rows to new World and American Record

 Dean Smith set new US and World records at the World Indoor Rowing Championship, hosted by the CRASH-B Sprints that took place on February 17, 2013 at the Agganis Arena in Boston. Over 2,200 athletes raced from more than a dozen countries, with competitors ranging in age from 14 to 95. Dean’s world record time in the 2000 meter row was 8:10.5. Just Google Dean Smith Rowing to see how he has been keeping active.

Dean, a former world- class runner is used to being on the winner’s podium. Previously in Masters Track & Field he won World championship gold medals in Hanover, Germany and Gothenburg, Sweden for the 800 meter run, as well as several national championships.  Bad knees brought an end to Dean’s running a few years ago, so he was delighted to find a new sport in which to compete. He joined the Rocky Mountain Rowing Club when he moved to Lone Tree, Colorado seven years ago. Since then he has won NINE World Championships in sculls on the water in Zagreb, Croatia, Vienna, Austria, Birmingham, England and Vilnius, Lithuania.

Dean is a young 86.

He attributes his edge for success to using Shaklee Sports Products.  Dean Smith

Email deansmith3@msn for more information & complete sports history

My wish for everyone of my readers is a long active life.  We may not all win medals, but we can all keep moving.  Pass this along as an inspiration to your friends and family.

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving,

Betsy

Betsy Bells Health4u

206 933 1889

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

Arthritis, Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

Watch out for the metal detectors!

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Gentle Reader,

His long legs and narrow hips will soon carry him back to the gym.  He will be back on the machines and lose the ‘love handles’ that have crept on from lack of exercise. The long process of identifying what caused the sciatica, the sharp pinching pain radiating down the leg, making his once strong stride impossible is over.  It took months to identify a worn out hip as the culprit.  He has a new one now.hip replacement

No more arthritis pain from that degenerated joint.  His bones were healthy enough at 70+ to give the surgeon something to work with.  Other joints–knee, shoulders, ankles–still hold.  No advanced osteoarthritis everywhere.

Rehabilitation takes time.  His spirit is good.  He hates hurting or talking about hurting, so he will use the special chair lifters, the raised toilet seat, and take the procautions he must take to avoid damage to the new joint as the supportive muscles and tissue and tendons readjust to the trauma of surgery.

This world traveler will soon set off the alarms in the airport again.  What joy.  What thanksgiving.

Here are some tricks to rapid healing that his doctor may not tell him.

1.  Lecithin is an oil that helps emulsify, make more liquid, substances that are sticky.  After an incision or any wound to the body, our own mechanisms for repair rush to the task of healing.  This healing process causes lots of swelling, too many repair cells for the space.  To help bring this swelling down quickly, an emulsifier makes the spent repair cells easy to slough off through the normal waste stream.  Several lecithin capsules a day, not just one or two.

Caution: not all lecithin is the same.  Granuals or huge jars of capsules can go rancid quickly like any oil exposed to the air and light.  I prefer a small jar with 180 capsules.  There should be no smell of rancidity.  A rancid fat causes more damage than you can imagine, so take care what you buy.

2.  Alfalfa.  This food for horses and cows is King of Vegetables and helps all systems in the body with its nutrients.  In this case when the hip joint and surrounding tissue need held, it is there to do the job. Here are a few of Alfalfa’s contributions to our body:

  • a great aid in digestion, aids in peptic ulcers, great diuretic and bowel regulator,
  • effective barrier against bacterial invasion, anti-inflammatory, anti-histamine.
  • Natural body deodorizer, helps support the natural ph of the blood .   
  • High in protein: 18.9% protein as compared to beef 16.5%; milk 3.3% and eggs 13.1%.
  •  Remember, muscles are composed of protein and the lack of it causes them to break down resulting in fatigue and weakness. 
  • After surgery, naturally replenishes joints and tissues with its healing properties.

How much Alfalfa?  Lots and lots.  It is like eating peas.  Take a big spoonful and wash the tablets down with your favorite smoothie.  Or make a hot tea.  Or chew them up.

Caution:  Not all Alfalfa is the same.  Often genetically modified, the brand I use exclusively is grown by a very picky company’s organic farmers in Antalope Valley.  The leaves are picked at sun-rise.  No stems are included in the tablets.  Open the bottle and take a whiff of the farm land where it grew.

If I had to pick only one supplement to take, it would be Alfalfa by Shaklee.  Dr. Shaklee felt the same way.

Happy healing to my friend, the best travel leader I have ever known. And Happy Travels.

Fondly,

Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving,

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com    206-933-1889

 

Arthritis, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

Why do we work so hard to keep healthy?

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Gentle Reader,

Ever stop to question why we work so hard to keep ourselves healthy and active?

Obviously the main reason is to avoid the pain that comes from neglected arthritis.  That knee pain, back pain, fingers and that thumb that got dislocated skiing years ago, and the old ankle fracture just get cranky if they aren’t tended to with a good diet and stretches, supplements and all the self-care practices we have learned and continue to learn.  So we do this work to make ourselves happy and comfortable, even if you have the diagnosis of osteoarthritis or spinal stenosis.

I did have a sad and troubling thought the other day having to do with the people I love and care about who do not take care to keep themselves healthy and active.  I have this thought that I will use my last quarter century sitting with people as they suffer and die, some before their time.

I have already lost two husbands to cancer.  Neither of them shared my fervor for the kind of moderation I require (not speaking for others here) in sugar, alcohol, fat and refined flour consumption.  Increasingly I notice friends and family eating or drinking or medicating in ways that may not lead to the best of health.

Then I notice that in this moment they are doing OK and are not searching for different answers to their problems with sore feet, aching hips, hands that don’t hold the driver or tennis racket without discomfort.  I might say something like, “It must make you discouraged to have a hard time sitting in the theater when your back gets so tight and uncomfortable.  I remember taking a special pillow everywhere when my pain was acute.”  (I still fold up a jacket and place it behind my back to avoid that pain.)

I might say that I found some ways to keep that from happening to me that I could share, if they were interested.  But only if they don’t know already that this is my passion in life and work and that I earn my living at it, sharing information for free and selling the supplements that I have found helpful.

Could it be that the second reason I work so hard to stay healthy and active is precisely so I can be around to give comfort without blame, unconditional comfort to those I care about.  Those pesky thoughts still come up about how they might do their life differently and avoid all that pain and suffering.  I get better at noticing “there’s that thought again,” and letting the judgment go.  It seems to take daily practice.  Staying out of other people’s business and loving them where they are.

Can you be a Health Nut with no judgment?  Yep, you can. Eat-Stop-Eat-healthy-eating

Can you imagine how much fun it is when you find someone who is just as nutty as you are about all this prevention stuff, two heads together sharing information?  So I just put it out there and if it’s right, it’s golden. If it’s not right, it’s golden, too.

Fondly,

Be Well, Do Well, Keep Moving

Betsy

Injured at 52. Diagnosed and sentenced to a wheel chair at 55.  Hiking, skiing, dancing and walking at 75.  Read my story. 

206 933 1889  betsy@HiHoHealth.com   www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com