Health and Fitness

Arthritis, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

Making Hip Pain Go Away

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Gentle Reader,

How many of you have suffered from chronic hip pain? You’ve been to the doctor, the chiropractor, the massage therapist – and nothing seems to help for very long.  Julie Donnelly is a Deep Muscle Massage Therapist with 20 years of experience specializing in the treatment of chronic joint pain and sports injuries.   Thanks to Dr. Chaney, I received this excellent article written by Julie about a very simple technique you can use at home to experience dramatic pain relief.

If you enjoy today’s post, please forward this email to a friend.

How Can You Relieve Chronic Hip Pain?

Making Hip Pain Go Away

Author: Julie Donnelly

Hip Pain Getting rid of hip pain
the ball releases the tightness in the muscle

Do you have joint pain or stiffness?  Does it hurt when you’ve been sitting and you try to get up and walk? Have you tried to stretch and either it feels good for a few minutes and then you’re back to square one, or maybe even worse, it hurts more than it did before? Do you sometimes feel like your joints are just tied down and you’re no longer flexible? Do you maybe even blame it on “old age?”  The odds are extremely high that all that’s happening is your muscles are in spasm.  

If any of these statements fit you, you’ll really love today’s message.  As a bonus, at the end of this blog you’ll learn a self-treatment technique that you’ll love if you ever have hip pain.

I’ve mentioned many times that a tight muscle pulling on a tendon will cause joint pain, just like pulling on your hair will cause your scalp to hurt.  And, just like the only way to stop the pain in your head is to let go of your hair, the only way to stop the pain in your joint is to release the tight muscle.

Another analogy that I use frequently has to do with stretching and why you may feel worse AFTER you stretch than you did before you stretched. If you took a 12″ line and tied enough knots in it so it is now 11″, and then you try to stretch it back to 12″ without first untying the knots, you can see what would happen.  The knots would become tighter and the fibers on either side of the knot would be overstretched and could possibly even tear.  If the line was attached to a fixed point on either side you can imagine the strain that is happening to the attachment points.  This is exactly what is happening to you when you when you stretch a muscle that is tied up in knots (spasms).  You can see how important it is to first release the spasms before stretching.

Today I’d like to share with you how to do one of the Julstro self-treatments that we teach on the Julstro self-treatment DVD.  So many people have hip pain that I’d like to explain how to treat the tensor fascia lata muscle which is located on the outside of your hip, between your hip bone and the top of your thigh bone:

Using a tennis ball (hollow in the center so it is a bit less intense) or a Perfect Ball (solid in the center so it gets in deeper) place the ball right where the side-seam of your pants is located – between the two bones.  If you are in a lot of pain, start by leaning into a wall. If you want to go deeper into the muscle, lie on the floor on top of the ball.  You may need to move an inch or so to find the “epicenter” of the spasm, but you’ll know immediately when you locate it.  Always make sure you keep your pressure to a “hurts so good” level, you’re in control so don’t over-do.

Once you find the spasm, which is also called a “trigger point,” just stay still on it for 30-60 seconds. Lift your weight off the ball for a few breaths and then press into the ball again. This second time you’ll find that it won’t be as painful as the first time because you have already pressed out some of the H+ ions that are causing the spasm (and the pain).

Keep repeating this for a few minutes and then slightly move your body so you can find other trigger points that are around your hips. You’ll probably find points that are a little bit toward the front of your hip, so make sure you rotate your body so you’re facing more toward the wall or the floor, and then rotate your body so you’re back is more toward the wall or the floor.

This one simple technique has saved several of my clients from thinking they needed hip surgery! It will help you move easier and with less discomfort – and often it will totally eliminate the pain from your hip completely.

These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This information is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

Thanks to Julie for this advice.  For those of you who have sciatica, try this method to get rid of hip pain.  Let me know how it works for you.

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving

Betsy Bell

206 933 1889

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

4 ways to get a sore back fuctional

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Gentle Reader,

Sore back?  Been traveling, sitting in an airplane for hours?  Did you enjoy a vigorous hiking holiday slogging miles over boulders, roots and bogs for days in a row?  Maybe you had back surgery, successful but still stiff and cranky.  Or perhaps, you joined a new salsa dance class (that would be my recent experience) for the first time and the instructor had you swinging your hips in directions they hadn’t gone in 50 years.

There’s nothing that slows you down more than a sore back, whether it is caused by over-exersion, chronic arthritis, or a sudden move that sets everything zinging.  Here are four tips to get you moving comfortably again.

1. A muscle relaxant for a few days won’t kill you and will give those spasms a chance to quiet down.  There are a lot of over the counter medications to chose from.  My personal favorite is Aleve.  I can usually manage flare ups with frequent doses of Shaklee’s Pain Relief Complex, a herbal COX 2, 5 LOX inhibitor that will not damage your stomach.  99% of the time I can manage a sore back with Pain Relief Complex.  It gives me peace of mind to know I am not hurting my stomach or creating any bad side effects.

2.  To relieve a sore back my friend alternated between hot compresses and ice, getting the blood to move through the low back.  The joints are not easy to flush with blood flow so this is an excellent therapy, especially if you have the leisure to work on the problem.  The hottub is excellent for the heat.  I use mine every night sending the jets on any sore muscles.  In the case of acute sore back, more frequent cold/hot changes will speed the healing along.

3. For immediate relief for a sore back, rub Joint and Muscle Pain Cream or other menthol analgesic into the area.  For years I relied on Arnica Montana or Icy Hot cream, but I have found that the pain-relieving effect seems to penetrate more deeply and last longer.

4.  I use the Back2Life machine daily and when my back is more sore than normal, I will relief the sore back by getting on the floor with my knees over the top of this contraption several times a day.  It’s gentle motion is like a Feldenkrais manipulation.  The small, steady lifting and lowering motion of the Back2Life machine, relaxes and opens up the sacrum, allowing blood to flow into the irritated and inflammed area.  The machine is set to do its work for about 13 minutes which is just about as long as a busy person can stand to be still, lying on the floor.  Past posts about the Back2Life Machine.BAck2Life machine

In addition to these excellent sore back relieveing strategies, I like to put Peggy Cappy‘s soothing voice on before I go to sleep every night.  In fact, her voice usually puts me to sleep.  She takes you through a muscle relaxing meditation for about 20 minutes beginning with the eyes and facial muscles.  By the time she has progressed through the entire body, you are so still and relaxed, you couldn’t move an arm or a leg.  The last part of the CD takes you even deeper and she talks to your “inner mind” about the way sore and damaged joints restore through rebuilding healthy new cells using the nutrients offered by the blood stream.  I am convinced that if I were to get an MRI of my lower back and spine today, the deforming and pain-causing spinal stenosis and osteoarthritis would be less evident, just because of her CD.  Sound to woo-woo for you?  Never mind.  Listen to her relaxing CD anyway for relief from the SORE BACK that has you moaning.  To read a past post about Peggy Cappy, click here.

Probably the most effective strategy of all is moving.  As soon as you can tolerate even a little movement, get up and walk.  It is only by getting blood flow back into the disturbed joint that healing can be accelerated.

I wish you well in your journey to a healthy back, and the end of the sore back experience.

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving,

Betsy

206 933 1889

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

Vitamin D may prevent Diabetes II

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Gentle Reader,

Vitamin D, seems to be the miracle supplement as research turns up more benefits. In my recent travels, along the Inside Passage in Alaska, I worried about the many “round” people from the cruise ships.  They may not have gotten a diagnosis of diabetes from their doctor.  But they may, like many of us, walk around leading what seems like normal lives with pre-diabetes.

Dr. Steve Chaney describes the condition in his recent newsletter.  [To read the whole letter, go to Resources: Diabetes is a deadly scourge.]  He says that when we become overweight our tissues become insulin resistant. Initially our pancreas responds by pumping out more insulin to keep our blood sugar levels near normal. It also starts releasing fatty acids into the bloodstream.

At this stage our blood sugar levels are pretty well under control, but our blood levels of insulin and fatty acids are higher than normal. We are asymptomatic for the most part, so many of us never realize that we have a problem.

And lots of us are pre-diabetic!

When the normal range goes to pre-diabetic and beyond.

My grandfather on my mother’s side was diabetic.  He was a Swede-Finn, emigrating to New York City in around 1900 and joining the dock builders union.  He worked hard, driving piles, helping construct the Brooklyn Bridge and the piers along New York’s maritime harbor.  Then he sat down.  His knees hurt.  His hands hurt. His back hurt.  He had arthritis and moving his body hurt.  Then he developed diabetes.

My mother was never diagnosed with diabetes.  I suspected her of being very close to slipping from pre-diabetic to diabetes in the last 10 years of her life.  Her shoulders hurt.  Her hands hurt.  She had old age arthritis at 55 and began taking Motrin.  I remember her and my father both taking drugs for their aches and pains when I was in high school. They both slowed down, walking less and less.  She was never diagnosed with diabetes.  She died of pancreatic cancer.

This family history is a major driver for me to stay slim and active in spite of major arthritis.

Dr. Chaney points out that there are several published clinical studies showing that lifestyle changes (weight loss, exercise and a healthy diet supplying all of the essential nutrients) can significantly reduce the progression of
pre-diabetes to type 2 diabetes.

Excercise

Supplement with Vitamin D3 by Shaklee

This is a blog about managing arthritis.  See how stiff joints, slowing down, mild and more severe osteo-arthritis, the kind that comes with aging, can be part of the pre-diabetic cluster of conditions?  The primary focus of Dr. Chaney’s article is the research about the benefit of Vitamin D on keeping the pancreas healthy.  Make no mistake, however, Vitamin D by itself will not prevent diabetes.  

Do not let your aches and pains keep you from moving.  Keep those joints active to the maximum extent of their flexibility.

Take Vitamin D if you are over weight and suspect you are pre-diabetic.  But there is no magic bullet.

I was talking with a young woman today who says she doesn’t want to take pills.  I’m all for avoiding medicines if possible.  It was a major challenge for me to understand vitamins are food supplements, foodlets, if you will.  Yes, they are in pill form.  I seldom refer to my vitamins as pills.  They are my supplements.  I take them to fill in the gaps and to compensate for the sluggish utilization of nutrients that comes with age.  We do not make Vitamin D from the sun the way we did when we were 10.

We are going into the winter months when those of us in the north will get less and less sun exposure.  Why not supplement with Vitamin D3?  Especially if you are little round in the middle.  Then, by all means, consider the 180 Turnaround program for losing those extra pounds.  You’ll be thrilled with how much easier it is to move with even 10 pounds less to carry around.

To your good health,

Be well, Do well and Keep moving,

Betsy

206 933 1889

PS If you would like to comment or ask a question, please email me at betsy@hihohealth.com.  I’ve had too many spammy comments and have limited access to the comment section, but I would still love to hear from you.

 

 

 

Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness

5 Surprising Signs of Dementia

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Gentle Reader,

Are we showing signs of demenita?  Traveling with my sister-in-law for a month on ferries, in rental cars and my car; staying in new rooms night after night has resulted in a few missing things, left here and there.

“Our life style is not compatible with our memory issues,” Joan said and we both burst out laughing.  We had to make a stop in Friday Harbor on San Juan Island to buy the plug for our cell phones.  She is taking pictures with my camera because she didn’t bring her charger for this round of sites.  And then there is the misplaced earring.

It wasn’t enough to spend 3 weeks poking around five towns in the Inside Passage of Alaska.  We decided to extend our ferry-boat travel to Lopez, San Juan and Victoria with a full afternoon at the Butchard Gardens.

The Sunken gardens at Butchard in Victoria BC
The Sunken gardens at Butchard in Victoria BC

Tonight we are in our beds in the James Bay Hotel, Government St. in Victoria.  A half-moon hangs over head.  The lights on the government buildings glittered like Christmas time.  The street musicians entertained enthusiastic passers-by and the little harbor taxi spun like a wind-up version of the bumper cars.  At Butchard the gardens are transitioning from summer to fall with beds full of chrysanthemums, tight-buds hint lavender, gold, yellow and orange .  The zinnia patch is a clown-riot of color. The tuberous begonias and impatience vibrate their more nuanced color palate.

Butchard Gardens, Victoria,BC
Butchard Gardens, Victoria,BC

The visit to the gardens began with high panic:  I couldn’t find my wallet.  I put it in a different place in my purse, changing a fixed habit.  Dashing nervously back to the car (if you have been to Butchard Gardens you know how far everything is), I was relieved to find it on the floor of the car just inside the door. All was well.

Do we have the early signs of dementia?  A few years back, my daughter Grace, who was working with a University of Washington hospice project, asked me to subject myself to a base line test of memory.  I did.  I passed.  Somewhere in my medical records there is an account of my memory capabilities at 70.

This recent report may interest you. We can watch for early signs of dementia and take steps to avoid the full-blown condition.

By Alysha Reid, Everyday Health Staff Writer

There’s growing evidence that small changes in the way you walk, chew, sleep, and feel may be subtle early indicators of dementia.

Dementia is characterized by the progressive loss of cognitive functioning as brain cells are destroyed.

But long before you show obvious signs of dementia, certain changes in your behavior could signal that you may have the condition.

One: Trouble Chewing Hard Foods

The act of biting an into apple may predict your odds of developing dementia, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society (JAGS). Researchers at Karolinska Institutet and Karlstad University in Sweden studied a sample of 577 people aged 77 or older and found that those who had trouble chewing hard food such as apples had a much higher risk of mental decline. The Swedish researchers offered one possible explanation: Since chewing is difficult when you have few or no teeth — which may be the case for some older people — they chew less, which reduces blood flow to the brain and therefore may put you at higher risk for dementia.

Two: Slow Walking

Your walking style could predict your dementia risk, according to a report presented at the 2012 Alzheimer’s Association International Conference. Several studies presented there found a correlation between walking abnormalities and signs of cognitive decline on neuropsychological tests. Another study presented at the conference analyzed the at-home walking behaviors of 19 older subjects using motion-sensor technology. They found those with a slow pace had smaller brain volumes, which is often true of people with dementia.

Three: Trouble Sleeping

More bad news for night owls: Your sleep cycle now may lead to dementia later. In a December 2011 study published in Annals of Neurology, 1,300 healthy women over the age of 75 were followed over the course of five years. By the end of that time, 39 percent had developed some form of mild cognitive impairment or dementia. Researchers found that women with weaker circadian rhythms(those who performed less physical activity early in the day) were 80 percent more likely to develop mild cognitive impairment or dementia than women who were active early in the day.

Four: Carrying Extra Pounds

Being overweight is linked to many health dangers — including type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and arthritis. But one study, published in May 2011 in Neurology, linked a high BMI to a higher dementia risk. In an analysis of 8,534 twins aged 65 and older, it was noted that 350 were officially diagnosed with dementia and 114 with possible dementia. When researchers tracked their BMIs from 30 years earlier, they found that those with dementia or possible dementia now were 70 percent more likely to have been overweight or obese back then.

Worried that your extra weight could lead to cognitive decline later on? The answer may be tostart a workout program. A July study presented in the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference concluded that exercise may protect the aging brain.

Five: Being Depressed

Feeling blue isn’t only bad for your emotional well-being — depression can take a toll on your brain health, too. A study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry evaluated the medical records of more than 13,000 California residents over the course of six years. Those with late-life depression had double the chance of developing Alzheimer’s disease, while those with both mid-and late-life depression had more than triple the risk of developing vascular dementia.

Dear friends, I hope this can be a little wake-up call for.  Not an alarm bell necessarily, but a cautionary suggestion to take a look at some of the creeping behaviors that might be addressed sooner than later.

By all means, to avoid early signs of dementia, keep moving!  Email me or comment here with your stories about dementia.

For supplements that can help, see resources.

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving,

Betsy

206 933 1889

www.EmpoweredGrandma.com

 

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

No Magic Pill to end Arthritis Pain

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Gentle Reader,

In the end, and in the beginning, there is only one thing we –you and I– can do to bring lasting health to our aching bodies.  Life style change.  As I travel the Alaska Marine Highway, eat in the cafeteria on board, snack along the wharf in the various Inside Passage towns, I struggle with how to maintain my eating habits with poor choices everywhere.  Some people go on vacation and throw their healthy life-style to the winds for those 7 – 21 days.  Unfortunately the stomach doesn’t know you are on vacation and when the deep fried foods, extra sour dough bread with butter come rolling down the intestinal track, the joints react.

I’ve been having a few digestive and joint issues until yesterday when I found an IGA in Skagway with a ripe peach, some snap peas, and carrots.  Amazing how getting back to the healthy routine will quickly restore one to their mobile less-pained body.  Did I mention I also found a 4 mile round trip hike up to Dewey Lake right out of Skagway on 2nd Ave?

hiking in Skagway
hiking in Skagway, Dewey Lakes

So good to move after strolling.  What a difference.

This article about the new weight loss drug Dexaprine came across my desk.  Dr. Chaney talks about the hazards of relying on a magic pill to take care of the pounds that weigh our joints down.  It simply doesn’t work. Read his whole article here.

Want to really make a difference in your health?  Lose 10 pounds.  Safely.  Let the fat go, keep the lean muscle.  Have the energy to work out, or a least begin a walking program.  Change the way you eat, permanently.  That’s what the 180 Turnaround kit and the Lean and Healthy Kit are all about.  Consider these Shaklee products as a way to launch yourself into a permanent life-style change.  Personally, I’ll be drinking –or pouring over my breakfast cereal–a Shaklee 180 smoothee for the rest of my life, just as I have been doing ever since I achieved my goal weight 25 years ago with the Shaklee shakes and vitamins.  Why not?  Excellent science behind the product.  Delicious. Sustains energy all day. Convenient to use (I have packets with me on this trip.)  Cheaper than the fast food items at Starbuck’s or McDonalds.  Begin today.

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving,

Betsy

PS to catch the latest on the Alaska expedition, click here

PPS Leave me your diet success/struggle stories in the comment section.

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

Alaska, here we come

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Gentle Reader,

My sister-in-law, Joan Bell, arrived last Wed. just as I was cleaning the paint residue from the back garden and deck. We were Alaska-bound and she had the excited energy that quivered, “Alaska, here we come.”  Of course, I had a few more things to do to be ready for our Friday morning departure. We got away by 9:30 on the 16th, heading north in the Shaklee car, my 2002 Prius.  Two stops along the way included the return of an air purifier to a customer after getting it fully functional once again, and a lovely lunch stop with the Schleh family in Mt. Vernon.  All three grandchildren were there, a rare opportunity.  Young adults are hard to gather in a clump.  They were between fairs.  Daniel and Ian proudly showed me their belt buckles, winnings for showmanship in the Skagit County Fair.  By now they have hauled into the Monroe Washington State Fair with Boar goats, Saanen goats and Highlander cows.  This will be the first year in many that I will not watch them parade their animals around the ring.

Tents on the stern of the Columbia
Young travelers to Alaska bring their own state-rooms.

Over tuna salad, Joan Schleh, my step-daughter, regaled us with her tales of jumping on a ferry for Ketchikan, fresh out of high-school, back-pack laden and ready for work in the canneries.  She had heard the call:  Alaska, here we come, figuring she could make money as well as the Filipino women who were working the line.  Without a map or a number to call, she got off the boat after 36 hours of sleeping on the deck and sharing pot luck with other campers.  Unable to locate the friend-of-a-friend, she boldly caught a ride to where there was work and signed on.  Two weeks later, she’d called home and discovered there was a job waiting for her in Washington, DC and she caught the next ferry home to try her luck on the other side of the country.  It was just as well.  No place to stay at the cannery, the foreman had cleared a shelf and indicated the space was her’s for the sleeping.  Joan’s children listened to their mother’s adventure, rapt with attention.

Columbia ferry lifebouy with Bellingham in the distance
Bellingham, WA from deck of the Columbia

We departed from Bellingham, the starting point of the Alaska Marine Highway.  My great friend and sponsor in Shaklee lives in B’ham where she has become a well-known ceramic artist. We stopped by a gallery featuring her work on our way to the ferry.  The Columbia is the biggest boat in the 11 boat fleet.  About half the crew got off with us in Ketchikan having worked a week, traveling up to Juneau and then back down to Bellingham, thence home.

In stark contrast to Joan Schleh, Joan Bell and I enjoyed a cabin with bunk beds and a bathroom with shower, money enough to eat in the dining room after drinks in the luxurious bar.  The inside passage proved to be as intimate an encounter with wild shoreline, leaping Orca whales, porpoise, harbor seals and eagles as advertised.  While we are disappointed that the uncharacteristic cloudless days of July are gone in this early Fall, the mist and fog drape the low-rise islands with seductive vails, layering green on green, reaching higher and higher into the cloud cover.  Armed with rain pants and umbrellas, we are loving the cloud-play and ever-changing weather.

View from the cabin Joan and I rented for4 nights.
Intimate harbor in front of Christmas House B&B in Ketchikan AK

Here in Ketchikan, we are tucked into an old 1940s cabin on stilts with high-tide water under the floor boards, an old propane burner in the center of the patterned linoleum floor.  Our windows look out onto an intimate harbor complete with eagle, heron and king-fisher.  Both of us have slipped into memories of cabins in Colorado, Maine, New Hampshire and Oklahoma from our childhood family vacation days.  We have 4 nights here and will not run out of things to do or places to visit.  Just today we spent several hours at the end of the road going north where its turnaround is just beyond a well-kept state park.  Various civic groups helped construct one of the safest, most extravagantly beautiful stair-filled hiking trails I have walked.  The deep sun-dappled rain forest floor covering is a Bigalow carpet of moss and tiny golden mushrooms.  Moss drips from the prickly branches of the Sitka spruce.  Brilliant red berries hang from elderberry shrubs and light the path from the centers of bunch-berry dogwood.  Salmon swell the swollen river plummeting down from the steep hill that characterizes these Inside Passage islands.

We spent the late afternoon at the fish hatchery at the extreme south end of the Tongass highway watching black bears feed on salmon, along side flocks of argumentative seagulls.  Even though three enormous and grotesquely out-of-place cruise ships dock in Ketchikan every Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, the streets and coffee houses are not overly crowded.  I’m not sure where all the people go.  Perhaps they are swallowed up in the various tours offered by entrepreneurial guiding services.

My step-son, who fished further north during his high school and college days, scoffed that Ketchikan was worth 4 hours at most.  Certainly not 4 days.  We are content to gaze out our window, sleep late, cook local sea food, read and read some more in between long wandering visits to the magnificent parks and trails our rental car takes us to.  Four days will be perfect.

In spite of old bones, creaky knees and complaining hips, we are both moving comfortably  helped by Pain Relief Complex and, in my case, a long session on the cabin floor to get things oiled up and moving.  That is the main remedy after all, moving.

Let me know if you have ever answered the call, Alaska, here we come.

Be well, Do well and Keep moving yourself.  And pass this along to your friends.

Betsy

206 933 1889

 

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

Confessions of an arthritic painting contractor

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Gentle Reader,

Confessions of an arthritic painting contractor:

Taking down paintings, emptying book shelves, moving furniture, rolling up rugs, pulling up old wall-to-wall carpet, removing electric face-plates and then spackling, sanding, taping, and painting every wall that faces the outside is a sure-fire recipe for arthritic flare-ups of major proportion.  No matter how many times I lay down on the floor and hung my knees over the Back2Life machine; no matter how many of Shaklee’s herbal Pain Relief Complex tablets I took, I could not prevent pain from coming on.

The people I was supervising as general painting contractor were:

Carsten Rossen and Jack Dahlstrom, 14 and 16, grandsons who did major lifting and prep work and even some priming.

Hanna Rossen and Ben Killorin, 17 and 19, grandchildren who turned out to be excellent painters and were able to mask, spackle, sand, edge and roll paint with only a few drips here and there.  They each put in hours of time, their music blasting, bags of gorp and dried mangos, enormous sandwiches and Shaklee Performance drink for rehydration consumed.  Ben made the sandwiches as his first summer job was the Deli department at a local grocery store.

Elizabeth Skewis, friend of Grace, my oldest daughter, and now a great friend of mine, is a woman who has done everything under the sun for a living including painting.  She was my right hand gal, with skill and stick-to-itiveness, esthetic judgment and coaching for me and the teenagers.

Pete Rossen and Hanna, father and daughter, came to move the furniture back where it belonged after the final (almost final) painting was done.  He was the one who suggested I could hire my grandchildren when I was fretting about whom to get to do the painting.  I loved their youthful energy in the house and their “there, there, Grandma. Don’t lift anything.  Just tell us and we’ll do it.”

Mike Walker, my renter who lives down stairs and is a finish carpenter.  He put all the running toe board back in every room with his power tools.

The problem child in this final stage of the energy upgrade was, you guessed it, ME.  I love hard work and couldn’t stop myself from all the above mentioned tasks.  I did stop lifting.

Two observations that may help you who suffer from arthritis when you are over-active.

1.  Don’t stop moving.  In the middle of this ordeal I took a 3 ½ mile neighborhood walk which included a long downhill, then a beach walk and finally a 190 tread staircase and 4 long blocks uphill.  Moving keeps the nutrients flowing to the joints which are poorly nourished.  Without good nutrition, the crumbling joint cannot heal itself.  Which brings me to the second point:

2.  The cells in our joints are constantly repairing and rebuilding new, healthy cells to replace the worn out ones and to solve the problems of collapsing vertebrae.  Peggy Cappy talks about this in her meditative CD “Healing Back Pain” which I listen to nearly every day.  Wednesday, after hiking 9 miles round trip, 2000+ ft elevation gain, on Mt. Rainier’s east side to Summerland alpine meadow, I stopped for the evening with one of my hiking buddies.  Her husband is a neurologist with Group Health here in Seattle.  In our conversation he stated that these broken down joint cells do get replaced with fresh, healthy new cells that attempt to fix the problems.  He has told me many times to keep moving, no matter what.  Find something to do that doesn’t hurt and keep doing it.

Today, I spent the morning hanging pictures and scrubbing pain spots off the hard wood floors.  I have no pain.

You can build healthy joints, but you must keep moving to help your body accomplish that feat.

The house is beautiful.  It was all worth it.  Here’s a video I put together to show the energy upgrade work that was done.  When you see the space age water heater, you’ll appreciate the remark made by the city inspector when he came to sign off on the stepped-up electrical power,

“Wow.  This thing should be in the living room where you can sit with your friends, smoke a joint and watch it.”

Whoa!

May I offer a further explanation of the energy improvements under the new roof.  The Crown Roofing guys took off the old stuff including the particle board and before they put the new base and shingles on, the Vesta Performance guys laid down rigid insulation covered by a thin layer of reflective material which would further divert summer heat from entering the house.  They also installed a fan system circulating air in the summer and avoiding mold build-up from a poorly ventilated crawl space over the ceiling and under the roof.  I desperately needed a new roof and was able to fold the cost of the roof itself into the energy upgrade low-interest loan from the Puget Sound Community Credit Union.  This banking institution works with the city of Seattle to implement the Community Power Works program for the homeowner who wants to lower their carbon foot print.  A new roof by itself may or may not reduce heat loss from your house.

You are welcome to drop by and tour the garage and I’ll offer you a cold drink of some sort, but mostly you won’t notice anything different about the house.  It does look fresh and clean but I didn’t change the colors or the furniture.  If you are a person who notices roofs (is there such a person?), you’ll see that mine is beautiful, new and no places where the shingles have flown off in the latest wind storm.  But who looks at roofs?

I am so proud to have done this major effort to reduce my carbon foot print as part of Seattle Community Power Works.  The final numbers came through in the blow test today.  Looking good.  One tight house.  It’s for the Planet and the grandchildren.  I hope you’ll take advantage of any opportunity you have to do the same.  Congratulations if you already have.

Leave me a comment and while you are at it, please ‘like’ my Face book page.  I’d appreciate it.

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving,

Betsy

www.EmpoweredGrandma.com

206 933 1889

 

Arthritis, Health and Fitness, Keep Moving: Managing Arthritis

Joint pain reaction to bee sting

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Gentle Reader,

The energy retrofit continues this week.  The work took me and one roofer through a yellow jacket nest on the side of my hill.  The result was painful stings.  Mine were on the belly and chest.  The roofer had to be taken to the emergency room for treatment. He became short of breath and had other severe reactions.  He didn’t return to work the next day.

Arthritis pain can be greatly exasperated by insect bites.  Here’s what I learned doing a web search after experiencing so much joint pain.

“Allergic Reaction

“An allergic reaction involving the entire body can occur, this can be due to one or multiple stings and may range from mild to fatal, and death can occur in minutes. The majority of the reactions occur within the first 15 minutes, and nearly all occur within 6 hours. There is no connection between the number of stings and how severe the reaction will be. As a general rule, the faster the symptoms come on after the sting, the more severe the reaction will be. Death that occurs within the first hour of the sting is usually from airway blockage or low blood pressure.

“The earliest symptoms consist of itchy eyes, facial flushing, generalized hives, and dry cough. Symptoms may worsen rapidly causing  chest or throat constriction, wheezing, difficulty breathing, bluish discoloration of the skin, abdominal cramping, diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, vertigo, chills and fever, shock, fainting, loss of bowls or bladder, and bloody, frothy sputum. The early mild symptoms can progress quickly to shock.

“A delayed allergic reaction, appearing 5 to 14 days after a sting can occur. Typical symptoms include fever, fatigue, headache, hives, enlarged lymph nodes, and multiple joint pains. Commonly a person will have forgotten about the sting and will not understand why the symptoms have suddenly come on.” Advanced Patient Education.

My own joint pain occurred in the first 36 hours.  I didn’t put two and two together for a while. My weekly hiking buddies and I went up a steep trail on one of the so called Issaquah Alps foothills of the Cascades, Squak Mt.  My knees were killing me and my hips.  The Pain Relief Complex helped, but I was glad to get to a flat area where I could stride out and loosen the joints up.  The crazy remedies that helped with the swelling and the tenderness included one of our skin care treatments called Calming Complex and our toothpaste, called New Concept Dentifrice, and a third product, Desert Wind Roll-on Antiperspirant.  All these products are effective because of the ingredients.  You can read about them at the resources page.

If you have a remedy you have used for insect bites, I’d love to hear about it, and so would my readers, so please leave a comment.  If you’d like to see the videos I’ve been shooting as this project goes forward, here is one.   Go to my You Tube channel to see others.

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving!

Betsy

Be Well health tips, Health and Fitness

I’m reducing my carbon foot print

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Gentle Reader,

I am reducing my carbon foot print. My house is organized chaos. All the furnishings are stacked in the middle of each room, covered with sheets. Two young men are drilling holes in the outside walls of every room, caulking the heat registers, the joint where wall meets floor, and every nook where air can leak.
In Seattle we have an Energy Upgrade program to entice a home owner to do this. Over two thousand families have opted in, gotten their financing together, had the energy audit and done the work. The opportunity for low interest loans and government rebates may be extended if Cascadia Consulting, the small, forward reaching firm who operates this program can persuade the city to do another round, without Federal dollars.
What took me so long to sign up for this? I have a reputation as a carbon off-setter. I have bought shares in wind farms on the Lakota reservation. I have planted trees through Re-leaf America, the oldest environment organization in the US, founded in 1903. But my house was more of a tent with permanent walls, leaking air like a sieve.

Hudson River from Mary Ann's
Looking through leaky windows toward the Hudson River

After a recent trip to New York City with my granddaughter, I find myself reflecting on the actions of a single individual in the face of the enormity of the problem facing the world. We must get our carbon parts per million down to 350 or find ourselves in an irreversible environmental catastrophe. Compare the interest and effort in this far flung corner of the US with New York City.

My hostess, Mary Ann, lives in a beautiful rent controlled apartment on the Upper East Side, the Hudson River in full view from her spacious north facing balcony. The fine old metal and glass paneled windows do not latch. Walking along the path beside the river just 100 yards from her building’s front door, Ellie and I joined cyclists, mothers with baby carriages, old people leaning on canes, joggers, strollers. This is one New York’s back yard retreats.

Hudson River view from Upper West Side
New York’s back yard, walking along the Hudson

 

The sun danced on the wavelets of a calm river. New green, that not-shiny-yet true green that appears miraculously every May after a hard winter of snow and bitter cold. This year in New York, they were locked in a cold that would not stop, seeping into bones and the cracks in all the houses.

I asked Mary Ann how she managed to stay warm in this 17th floor apartment with its rusty metal-framed windows.

“The heat in the building is so great; I have the windows open all winter.”
Can you believe it?

The carbon foot print of New York City by itself, if reduced by 15%, could turn 400 ppm to 380, I have no doubt. This is an emergency. Federal dollars could reverse the course of disaster by compulsory retrofitting every building in New York City, changing every light bulb. People would be put to work in the process.

It would be worth every penny. Repeat the process in Chicago, Detroit, Boston, and Gary, Indiana. Every major city where old high rises scrap the sky as wicks of heat pouring into the atmosphere.

I have learned in talking with my environmentalist daughter that NYC has excellent energy recovery projects underway. It is a huge job.

My little project will off-set the carbon foot print I create every time I get on an airplane for the next 10 years. It is a drop in the bucket. My visit to New York discourages me from the belief that we can save our planet for future generations.

What are you doing in your neck of the woods? Let us know, please.

By the way, are you reducing your carbon foot print by using highly concentrated, biodegradable cleaning and laundry products?  Check them out on my shopping page.  You’ll be so glad you did.  You’ll throw away 1 bottle for every 50 of those other products.

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving, Betsy

ps:  I made a video showing the energy upgrade project.  You can see it on YouTube. <iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/ta1n0-YU9jI” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

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

New approach to hip surgery

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Gentle Reader,

A dear friend and hiking companion was talking with me yesterday as we climbed to the saddle above Pratt Lake in the Snoqualmie Pass section of the Cascade Mountains.  Her husband, an athletic 71 year old has worn out his hip and finally, after months of thinking it was only a sore knee, agreed to have hip surgery.  His doctor is promising him a speedy recovery from his arthritis, so he will back on the tennis court and out fly fishing in a matter of weeks, not month.  Curious about this approach, I researched it and pass along a fascinating article from the New York times, published in March of this year.

A New Approach to Hip Surgery
By PETER JARET
Larry Kufel’s surgeon, Dr. Joseph T. Moskal, used the anterior technique for his hip replacement. Mr. Kufel said he was back at work the second week after the operation.
Kyle Green for The New York Times
Larry Kufel’s surgeon, Dr. Joseph T. Moskal, used the anterior technique for his hip replacement. Mr. Kufel said he was back at work the second week after the operation.

Larry Kufel had always been an active man, tall and rangy, who worked out regularly and picked up basketball games at the gym. But age was taking a toll on his joints, and it had become clear that he needed a hip replacement.

“It got to the point, if I did any exertion, even getting out of a chair, it felt like the muscle was tearing away from the bone,” he recalled.

Still, Mr. Kufel, 63, a financial controller in Roanoke, Va., worried that conventional hip replacement surgery would mean a long, painful recuperation. Instead, his doctor proposed an alternative that is gaining popularity across the country, an operation that many surgeons say helps patients recover more quickly.

Mr. Kufel was amazed by the results. “I was back to work the second week after the operation,” he said. “By the fourth week, I was doing a spin class at the athletic club.” A year later, he’s cycling, lifting weights, and even playing racquetball.

“I feel like I never had surgery,” he said.

The procedure that Mr. Kufel received is called anterior hip replacement. The surgeon makes the incision at the front of the hip instead of through the buttocks or the side of the hip. This approach permits the doctor to reach the hip socket without cutting through major muscle groups. Proponents claim that the procedure results in less pain and fewer complications for patients than standard hip replacement.

“We’re seeing more and more data that patients recover quicker, discontinue use of a cane or walker sooner, and have a quicker return to a normal gait,” said Dr. Joseph T. Moskal, chief of orthopedic surgery at Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine and Research Institute, who was Mr. Kufel’s surgeon.

Surgeons have used an anterior approach to perform emergency hip repairs for decades. Anterior hip replacements were first described in the United States in the 1970s and have gradually gained popularity. No one knows how many surgeons currently use the new approach, but at a recent meeting of hip and knee surgeons, an informal survey suggested that as many as 20 percent of hip surgeons are now performing anterior hip replacements, according to Dr. Moskal — up from “less than a handful” in 2005. With more than 400,000 total and partial hip replacements performed each year in the United States, a change in technique would eventually affect millions of Americans.

Proponents note that because the operation spares muscles, patients don’t need to limit their movements during the recovery period.

“You can bend over,” said Dr. Robin N. Goytia, an orthopedic surgeon in Houston. “You can reach down to the floor. You can cross your legs — all things that patients with a posterior approach have to be careful about for a while because they can dislocate the hip.”

Surgeons who perform the procedure also say the anterior position makes it easier for them to use fluoroscopy, a real-time X-ray technique that allows doctors to precisely position the implanted artificial hip. That, in turn, may allow artificial hips to last longer.

And since the major muscle groups of the hip are left untouched, there appears to be a lower risk that the artificial joint might pop out, or dislocate, said Dr. Francis B. Gonzales, an orthopedic surgeon and assistant clinical professor at the University of California, San Diego.

Conventional hip replacement techniques have a dislocation rate of about 1 percent. Preliminary studies suggest that the rate following anterior surgery may be less than one-third of that.

Yet reports of the benefits are mostly anecdotal, based on surgeons’ experience. No large randomized studies have been done comparing the outcome of anterior surgery with other approaches. And there are downsides.

Anterior hip replacement often takes longer to perform and can result in more blood loss. Some patients experience temporary numbness in the thigh afterward.

Because the operation is tricky to perform, there is a steep learning curve for physicians, which partly explains why it hasn’t been taught as widely as other approaches in medical schools. Special operating tables have been designed that make the surgery easier to perform, but many medical centers don’t have them.

Even surgeons who perform the new procedure are quick to say that it isn’t “minimally invasive,” the term often used in marketing materials.

“We can do any of these approaches through a small incision, but it’s a little like assembling a ship in a bottle,” Dr. Goytia said. “If you’ve ever seen a hip replacement, it’s not a tissue-friendly surgery. We have to do a lot of bone work and cuts, and we use a lot of power tools.”

Despite a rising chorus of support, not all orthopedic surgeons are convinced that anterior hip replacement offers significant advantages over the traditional approaches.

“As far as we can tell from the data, it doesn’t appear that the surgical procedure is as important to recovery as the pain management protocol, the rehabilitation protocol, and a patient’s baseline pain and functional status,” said Dr. Kevin J. Bozic, professor and vice chairman of orthopedic surgery at the University of California, San Francisco.

In the end, he said, a surgeon’s skill and experience are by far the most important factors. Doctors who do hundreds of hip replacements a year typically have very low complication rates, no matter what approach they favor.

“Most surgeons become comfortable with a single surgical approach and they perfect that over time,” Dr. Bozic said. “You definitely don’t want to go to a surgeon trained in the posterior approach and insist on an anterior approach.”

His advice? “Find an experienced surgeon and a medical team you trust and feel comfortable with, and leave the technical issues up to them.”

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: March 25, 2013

An article on Tuesday about the anterior approach for total hip reconstruction described the history of the operation incorrectly. The technique was first described in the 1970s, at a medical conference; anterior hip replacements were not first introduced in the United States about 10 years ago.
A version of this article appeared in print on 03/19/2013, on page D5 of the NewYork edition with the headline: New Approach to Hip Surgery.

After surgery certain dietary supplements can be helpful with swelling and numbness. Please see my post http://www.grandmabetsybell.com/2013/03/07/watch-out-for-the-metal-detectors/ for details.

Sometimes it is important to back away from a dogged determination to avoid surgery at all costs , get a second opinion, and move forward.

If this has been helpful, feel free to share.  And by all means, let us hear your comments.

Be well, Do well and Keep Moving

Fondly, Betsy

www.grandmabetsybell.com/blog/

www.EmpoweredGrandma.com

www.DoWellWithBetsy.com