Tag: back pain

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

Tips for women who have back pain because of osteoporosis

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Here they are:

Tip #1 Increase your vitamin D3   (more info about Vitamin D3 for bone density here)

Tip #2 Add weight bearing exercise to your routine

Tip #3 Eat more greens

Gentle Reader,

You have a sharp pain in your back and can’t remember that you lifted that bag of groceries 3 days ago even though you knew it was too heavy for you.  The pain subsides after a few weeks with the help of rest and some pain meds.    And then it happens again.

What’s going on?   You probably had a vertebral compression fracture, caused either by falling or by placing a load on outstretched arms such as raising a window or lifting a small child or a bag of groceries.  The front of the vertebrae collapse.  The spine is weakened by low bone density.  Our bodies can repair these hair line fractures on their own.  The trick is to lessen the chances of reoccurrence.

You go for your check up and they do a bone density test.  The dreaded report comes back. You have osteopenia.  They tell you that is probably why you’ve been having back pain.  This happened to me a few years ago.  My doctor immediately offered me drugs to increase the bone density.  I asked him to give me a couple years to change this picture and reverse the trend to osteoporosis.  The next bone density showed full blown osteoporosis.  I was very disappointed.  I’d been taking a good quality calcium for years.  Why hadn’t it protected me?  I was very physically active, walking all the time, skiing, working in the garden.  I pleaded again for more time and turned down the prescription.  It worked.  Here’s what I did.

#1 Increased Vitamin D3 to 6000 mg a day.  My blood test indicated a major increase was necessary.

#2 Stair climbing.  The advice was climb 200 steps every day while carrying 20 lbs.  I climbed 200 steps several times a week but didn’t carry any extra weight.

#3 Add minerals by eating lots more greens.  I eat 3 – 5 heads of greens (kale, chard, mustard greens, and collards) every week, usually steamed or in soups.  LacinatoKaleSpinach is good, too.  I also increased the supplement Alfalfa.

I was able to reverse the condition.  You can too.

I know you have done amazing things to turn osteoporosis around.  Let us know by leaving a comment.  If you found this helpful, pass it along.  And thanks,

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

 

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

Your friend said WHAT?

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Gentle Reader,

I don’t know about you, but the talk around me is about the latest aches and pain and what to do about it.  We’ve had foggy weather and below freezing temperatures out here in the Northwest.  One friend declared she couldn’t possibly so out because she might slip and fall.  Another friend wants to lose some weight but complains that she’s heard a lot of bad things about soy and can’t get into any soy smoothies.  Another friend’s husband is putting off getting his knees done by getting synovial fluid injections into his achy knees. Keep that arthritis at bay.  And still another friend’s husband ignored a bad cough for days until finally going to the doctor and ending up in the ICU for over a week with serious pneumonia.  One more friend who has player geezer

basket ball but is suffering from serious sciatica, shakes he head a 

head and says, “This cane will keep me going while the physical therapist fixes me up.”

I could go on and on.  You have similar stories.  We’re all trying our best to keep our bodies going for a few more months or years.

Where do you go for advice when you’ve got something that’s not working right?  Do you just stay indoors out of fear and trepidation?  We’re all over the web doing our research to see how other people are coping with our deal.  Who do you trust?  How do you judge the best solution?

When I first got introduced to the stuff I take 26 years ago, my problem was that I was running on nervous energy and every time I sat still for a few minutes, I fell asleep.  The product changed that.  So my body gave me a testimony.  Not content with physical data alone, I researched the company, ordered a couple of its peer-reviewed, published research articles and did a library search for back ground information.  (This was back in the days before the internet.)  All my due diligence confirmed my own experience.  I developed brand loyalty over the next couple years, the way people line up for the next Apple product.

I have never left my brain in the closet.  Company ownership changed several times and I researched each new team as if I were a complete outsider, you know, not going to other convinced sales people for their opinion.

Am I still influenced by my friends and family when they talk about their latest ache, their latest gadget, their latest restaurant?  Of course.  But I don’t leave my brain someplace else when deciding to follow their deal.  I hope you don’t either.

Before you go, my readers would enjoy hearing your discernment process.  Everyone evaluates with their own criteria.  What are yours?  Let us know.

If you’ve enjoyed this, pass it on.  Come on over to my face book page and hit the ‘like’ button.

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

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

What can help the pain after an accident?

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Help for pain after an accident?

Gentle Reader,

A woman I know suffered another bike accident on her commute.  She is in her late 40s and this is not her first tumble.  It is taking a long time to heal and she is suffering miserably, no fun any time and least of all at the holidays when there is no work to distract her.  Most of us can push through pain when we have professional obligations, right?

Stories like hers happen so frequently.  I don’t know what her doctor is suggesting.  There are no broken bones this time.  Typical treatment is ice packs alternating with heat to reduce the swelling plus anti-inflammatories.  The swelling seems to be gone, but the deep pain remains.

In my experience the deep healing of joint pain and muscle pain caused by accidents (as well as in arthritic joints) requires extra nutrition, more than it is possible to get from food alone.  Here is a list of vitamins that help:

Vitamin C is a natural anti-inflammatory and builds strong cartilage which has been ripped and bruised in the fall.  Vitamin C combats the chemical reactions of stress in the body.  Vitamin C helps the body absorb minerals which are necessary in joint healing.  As much as 6000 to 10,000 mg. of a highly absorbable sustained release Vitamin C would not be too much.  Take it as long as necessary.  Your body will tell you if you have too much as your stool will get loose.

Alfalfa, found in tablet form, made from organic alfalfa leaves, reduces the acid build-up in the body after accidental injury; this helps with stiffness and increases comfortable mobility.  People have found that as many as 30-50 Alfalfa tablets a day or more can make a huge difference in joint pain.

The full spectrum of B vitamins helps deal with the stress of traumatic pain.

Borage oil or GLA reduces joint tenderness, swelling and stiffness and is an excellent anti-inflammatory working deep inside the body.

Zinc promotes tissue repair.

Calcium Magnesium strengthens cartilage and alleviates pain.

After workout smoothies have ingredients in them that repair tears in the muscles. (I know personally of only one brand that for sure works like this, but perhaps there are others)  It is the process of repairing torn muscle that recommends these sports nutrition products for building bigger, stronger muscles.  The same repair work happens after an accident.  I know a woman who in her late 70s fell from the back end of a moving van onto her back.  She used a workout smoothie several times over the next hours and had very little pain from the trauma of the fall.  Even a long time after the accident, the smoothie can help.

At the Sunnyside Chiropractic Clinic observations were made charting an elderly population whose muscle mass had atrophied and weakened.  Over a 3 to 6 month period, men and women 65 – 84 years in age added the after workout smoothie on a daily basis and experienced increased mobility, strength and reduced joint and muscle pain.    http://www.healthsachoice.com/supplements/building-muscle-mass-in-the-elderly/  I have not been able to access the actual study from Dr. Brouse and the Health Education Corporation.  I know some of you want to see the science before believing.

Whether you are dealing with the pain of traumatic injury or the chronic pain of osteoarthritis and spinal stenosis, these supplements are worth a try.  The body does its best to repair. We need to help it along with additional nutrients we just can’t get from our food.  Medication alleviates pain but does not heal, repair or build new healthy tissue.

I recommend the supplements made by the Shaklee Corporation as these are the only ones with which I have personal experience.  They have helped me endure acute traumatic pain and avoid debilitating chronic pain from the severe osteoarthritis in many of my joints and spinal stenosis in my spine.  If you want to research the Shaklee version of these supplements, go to my shopping page and browse the Product Guide.  You can call me for a consultation about your particular situation and I’ll be glad to share resources.

Before you go, share our comments on supplements and vitamins that have worked for you after an accident that has put you in a world of hurt.

If this post has been helpful, feel free to share it on your Facebook page.

 

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

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

Blue Christmas

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Gentle Reader,

Does the over whelming need to be cheerful this season get you down?  Perhaps you are like me and Christmas brings memories, and some of them are not go wonderful.  It feels like an emergency.  I have to figure something out or I will go down in a wash of self pity.

The first session with my personal trainer, daughter Priscilla Bell was a positive step and the floor exercises for strengthening the abs feel as though they are making my back less vulnerable.  Arthritis pain is less and less.  There were some tweaks as the exercises took their measure of my joints.

Christmas still felt blue.  I am digging through old papers and came across the Christmas letter from 1993, the first communication to my friends since my first husband, Don Bell died the previous November.  The letter begins “Who’s going to dry my tears?  Who’s going to listen to my day?  Who’s going to plot the future with me now that Don Bell is dead?”  What misery!

The letter ends with gratitude for you, my friends who are there for me to dry my tears and hear about my day.

Five years later, I married our good friend Chuck Finney, widowed the same time I was.  Now it is five years since our last Christmas together.  He died Epiphany 2008.  Hard to realize I’ve been alone this long.  Most of the time it is good.  I have you, my family and my community at Saint Mark’s to sustain me.   But.  Christmas feels blue.

I went back to Priscilla for more training.  Action, in my world, leads to mental health as well as physical health.  This week she gave me weight bearing exercises with 5 pound weights.  OMG.  Much harder than the ones I was already doing on my own.  She noticed, rightly, that my shoulders are getting rounded from sitting too much and not standing tall.  This happens with age and if we want to keep going into our 90’s, we have to work on building those larger upper back muscles.  When strengthened they will open the chest and hold us tall.  The added benefit for the person with osteoarthritis and spinal stenosis, or any joint pain, is that a stronger upper back relieves the stress on the lower back.  She told me I was working my lower back way too much.

Two close and dear friends are suffering from terrible arthritis pain these days.  One visited her naturopath who recommended the Paleo Diet:  all vegetables and protein.  No grains or dairy (including cheese.  Yep, you got that right.)  You can read my post http://nowheelchair.wordpress.com/2012/03/19/it-comes-down-to-what-we-eat/ and watch the TED talk there by the amazing woman who was in a wheelchair when she changed her diet to this Paleo thing and is now healthy.

Does that plunge you into another low Blue Christmas?  Thinking about that kind of diet when you just went out and bought those beautiful cheeses and crackers, cream and butter for the feasts you are preparing?  Yes.

Be of good cheer.  January 2nd is coming.  Make a resolution to try the diet thing to rid yourself of pain.  If you want help with extra pounds, I’m your girl: the expert Turnaround Specialist.  Give yourself 90 days to get the new regimen into your system, watching the inches melt away and the joints behave themselves.  Then keep it up for another 90 days to cement the new eating and exercise habits.  This is the 180 turnaround we want for 2013.  Shaklee has a new program called 180 Turnaround.  Join me. I’m going to do it and will be glad to lead the way.

 

For now, be of good cheer without denying that this season can be tough.  Put on your rain gear and go outdoors.  The low lying hills are calling and the roads are clear.

 

Merry Christmas!  And keep moving.

Before you go, post a comment about your Blue Christmas.  Ask for kindness back to you.

 

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

 

 

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

Exercises for a bad back

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Gentle Reader,

I began this blog to report on ways to manage osteoarthritis and spinal stenosis by reflecting on my own experience.  I have to tell you that I have no symptoms these days.  I’ve been trying to understand what I have done to reduce the chronic pain to this degree.  I practice all the suggestions I have written about in my posts and they helped but didn’t bring me to this place of comfort.  The one thing that I have consistently done recently is listen to Peggy Cappy’s CD called Healing Back Pain.  While you know me as enthusiastic, I am also questioning and doubtful about the effectiveness of new age remedies.  However, I am growing more and more convinced that her voice and her message in this CD are healing my chronic pain.  Please take a moment to go to her web site and order it.  Download it into your computer and put it on your I phone, or other media player and listen to it at night or during the day when you lie down.  If nothing else you will be profoundly relaxed from all stress in your life.

I promised you I’d let you know what exercises Priscilla Hard Core Mother of Four gave me to develop more abs strength and lose that little bit of belly fat.  Here they are:

Pilates 100.  Put your head down flat  This is the posture for a bad back.  Be sure you have a nice neutral curve in your back.  Don’t move your head or your shoulders as you lie on the floor.  Your legs can be all the way up.  Now spread your figures wide, hold your arms straight and pulse 5 x to an in breath and 5x to an out breath, counting to 100.  This warms up the hips, abs regions.

 

This is totally fun.  By tempo change, she means go slow with your pointed foot from 12 o’clock to 6 o’clock and then zip around to 12.

 

 

 

Single leg circles with tempo change 5 one way then 5 the other way

 

Here you are making small circles with your toes in 1st position, legs zipped together, first in one direction and then the other.  Totally cool.

 

 

These roll up moves are challenging.  Do not do them with your legs out straight if you have back trouble.  Plant your feet on the floor and reach behind your thighs to pull yourself up.  The assist really helps.  By rep 7 I can just about do the roll up without the assist.  It’s getting easier every day.

 

 

 

 

 

Put your hands underneath your head and with your legs over head, point toes in 1st position and take them out to the side and back 10 x.  The higher over your body your legs are, the easier on your back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Flex in frog, X10 For this exercise put your hands behind your head and you are drawing your feet in toward your face allowing your knees to go out to the sides like a frog.

 

 

 

 

Bridge clam X10/s

*I can’t find a picture of this one.  On your back lift your butt off the floor into a bridge. Your feet are planted on the floor about 8 inches beyond perpendicular. Both hands reach up to the ceiling as you drop one knee to the side for 10 repetitions. I can’t go down very far without pain to the right and less far to the left without pain.  So listen to your body on this.

 

Prone: Before beginning prone exercises, always spend a little time in Child’s pose, resting your back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Double kick extend up and back for 10/s.  You are lifting your kicking leg off the mat.  Do this slowly, lift the foot and then lift the leg an inch off the floor.  Drop the foot back down slowly and go to the other side.

Nose should face the floor so you are in neutral position. 

 

In this exercise, your head is still down.  Your legs are forming a triangle, knees out and feet together.  Lift both legs simultaneously and move your thighs together.  Rest.  Lift thighs and move knees out again.  10x total, 5 out and 5 in.

 

 

 

 

For this go outside or at the bottom of your stair case, take a bungee tube with handles (you’ve seen them in Big 5 sporting goods stores or on TV) instead of buckets of water.  Place the center of the tube under your right foot making sure there is no way it could escape and recoil into your face.  Bend standing knee slightly and bend the back leg slightly.  Then lift the back leg straight out behind you. Imagine your gluts.  Beautiful.  Weight should be on the leg that is on the step, not on the back leg.  Hopefully you get the idea.

 

You could also stand on the floor to make it easier.  Lift one leg off the floor straight back 5x and then switch.

 

OK, then.  Tell me how it goes for you.  Leave a comment for others and by all means, sign up to receive every post.

 

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

 

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

Hard Core Mother of Four

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Gentle Reader,

My daughter, Priscilla, the personal trainer extraordinaire (www.hardcoremotheroffour.blogspot.com) mentioned a Pilates move when we were talking after Thanksgiving dinner.  For the first time, I thought she could probably help me with my chronic back issues.  Funny how your children can be experts to so many and take a long time to claim that status for their mother.

Tuesday I spent an hour with her in the Fitness Lab and came home excited with new exercises that will strengthen my abdominal region (and probably get rid of the little belly fat that sits there) and not hurt my back in the process.  She did some fine tuning and now I’ve got new interest in my morning routine.  I will share my new routine next week.

Yesterday, Wednesday, as I often do, I went hiking with friends in the nearby mountains we fondly call the Issaquah Alps.  Tiger is one wild place only a few minutes from the city.  We chose a meander that took us 7 miles up and around, past some “caves” (old mining area) and around a shallow lake.  When we got back to the car, I started feeling my pockets for the keys.  Nothing. Turns out they had fallen out when I reached in to put the parking permit on the mirror.  It took AAA 2 ½ hours to get there to open the door for me and my cell phone was dead.  Talk about stress.  It got pretty cold toward sun set.  I tell you all this because of what I did to keep from dissolving into a puddle of stress.  (My hiking friends were reluctant to leave me, but I shooed them away to their own tasks. There were plenty of other hikers returning to their cars in this very popular hiking area so there was no danger.)

I did Priscilla’s new exercises.  Brilliant.  And a super slow walking meditation.  And a sitting meditation.  And built an elegant rock chairn.  And ate my left over cookies from lunch.  And watched it get dark while I did some more exercises.  All in all, it was a pleasant time spent in my own head with no electronics, nothing to read, no pen and paper for writing practice.  A dream-time.

When the tow truck finally got there and let me drive away, I headed for the nearest Tully’s (i.e. Starbucks) and ordered an eggnog latte.  Hot soup and the hot tub awaited me at home.

Today, no lower back pain.  No arthritis in my bad joints.  No spinal stenosis acting up.  Life is good.

A friend just sent this wonderful video in his blog. I commend it to you.  William is a healer.  http://www.bodyandsoulmentor.com/

Now, take a minute to tell me about a stressful situation you had recently, what it did to your body and how you handled it.  We can learn from each other.  My readers love comments, so feel free.

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

 

 

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

Can we eat pie this Thanksgiving?

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Gentle Reader,

Are you shopping for Thanksgiving yet?  Tell me about your resolve to eat so your joints don’t hurt, the achy knees don’t creak, the back doesn’t twinge when you go from sitting to standing?  Have you been eating a dinner plate big on greens with a small portion of meat or fish and the starch in the form of a boiled new potato or rutabaga? I thought I’d better show you one in case you never bought or cooked it.  Really tasty, better than turnips.

Most especially, have you tried gluten-free?  And I don’t mean picking up those prepared foods that say gluten-free on them.  I believe, because I have tried it consistently over time, that a gluten-free diet helps with arthritis.  You’ll also lose weight which will help with arthritis pain.  At this time of year with your favorite recipes coming out of the box for your traditional offerings, you buy a big sack of white refined flour, white refined sugar and pounds of butter and plan your day of baking.  Unless you have greater resolve than I do, you’ll be eating some of those goodies and not just giving them to friends and family.  There will be more than one kind of pie on the table and it will be challenging.  Right?

Today I am passing on a web site I came across this week.  This gal, Christie Bessinger, has a serious celiac problem and has taken the time to research ways to identify hidden gluten.  Celiac is a hard condition.  Your body reacts with bloating and sometimes even more severe nutrient absorption shut down when you get yeasty things in your stomach.  Breads, pasta, lots of canned soups, other prepared foods.  Most of us who struggle with achy, congested joints are not severely impacted by gluten grains, at least not in the digestive area.  However, getting gluten-free for a few months would tell you a lot about how your body functions in a gluten-free atmosphere.  Two things will happen for you:

1.  You will lose weight

2.  You probably will have less joint pain, even if you have severe osteoarthritis or spinal stenosis.  Any of the problems affecting the joints will most probably improve with a gluten-free diet.

Enjoy Christie’s blog.  Here’s a nice place to start with her delicious cupcakes made from a company she trusts.  http://celiac-scoop.blogspot.com/2011/11/gluten-free-cake-bites.html  You can even order their mixes from her web site.  How sweet is that?  Christie has suggestions for eating out gluten-free in New York City, too.

Live in Seattle? We are lucky.  Here’s a web site for people who want to avoid gluten when they eat out.  http://www.urbanspoon.com/t/1/1/Seattle/Gluten-Free-Friendly-restaurants   and here is a retail store for delicious foods in Seattle http://www.wheatlessinseattle.net/ .

Before I go, dear Reader, a day or two of lovely indulgence never sent us to surgery for a knee replacement.  You know that, don’t you?  It’s the change we make over the long haul in diet and exercise that makes the difference long-term and keeps us moving.

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

 

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

Heart attack? Climbing high

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Gentle Reader,

How do you survive trekking at a high altitude?  The second day of our Engadine Valley hike in Switzerland began and ended from the little village of Zuoz, a bus and train ride from Guarda where our 1st day ended.

No more sciatica or lower back pain.  No more arthritis troubles with Pain Relief Complex on board.  Now the only task was to climb from 5700 ft to 8400 ft. to Escha Hut.  We knew it would be hard, but we managed to make it harder.  Instead of muscles spasms and a struggle with osteoarthritis, the pain and suffering of the day was mostly in my head.

As we climbed, I was short of breath. Then came the unsettled stomach.  Then a feeling of light headedness.  We passed a couple in their late 70’s from Zurich who had been in Zuoz over the weekend to play bridge and stayed on for a couple days to “take a little walk” in the area with their retired seeing-eye dog.  Looking very out of shape and carrying only a light nap sac, these two seemed to climb this trail with ease.  They did turn back when the path left the farm road and joined the cow tracks leading straight up the treeless slope.  Paging through all I know about women and heart disease, reviewing in detail my mother’s congestive heart failure symptoms and subsequent death AT MY EXACT AGE, I managed to get myself into a panic, anticipating a heart attack any moment.  At one point I called out “Would you just glance back here once in a while to see if I’m still upright?”  At this point Jaco, my Dutch friend, decided to walk behind me.  I later learned that all of us were struggling with shortness of breath. Chris, the 83 yr. old veteran of several Mt Rainier climbs, reminded us of deep inhales and slow, whistling out breaths.  The gals in front were already taking 10 steps and resting for a couple breaths.  I was absolutely sure I was having a heart attack.

At the top, we had the most delicious pumpkin soup, thick and creamy, sitting in the sun, our backs against the stone wall of Escha Hut, a busy place in the summer and even busier in the winter.  A mountain biker peddled up the way we went down, paused for a drink and went down the way we had just come up.  Way more impressive than Lance Armstrong.  No doubt powered by his own lungs, blood and muscle, this cyclist was out for recreation.

As we sat there gazing at the Bernina mountain range in the distance, completely covered with snow at 13,000 ft, I remember my first ascent to 10,000 ft on Mt. Shasta and realiz

ed I was suffering from altitude sickness, not heart disease.  The relief was so great, I fairly danced down the far side of the valley, past this amazing high mountain field of art. 

To avoid the precipitous downhill trail, we cut through a pass and circumnavigated the mountain in front of us, extending out trek by an additional 7 miles, making it a 14 miles day.  The benefit was this shot of a marmot late in the afternoon, one of many familiar critters scampering and diving into their burrows.  I’d been looking for them as all the telltale signs of marmot, just like in the Cascades, were everywhere.

One more physical challenge before our 6 days RyderWalker self guided trek was finished.  Tune in next Thursday for more pictures and that story.

 

 

 

 

Now let’s hear from you.  Have you had altitude sickness?  Were you aware of what was happening to you or did you think you were having a heart attack?  We’d like to hear your story.  If you enjoyed this read, pass it along.  Check me out on Facebook:  betsyjbell, and while you are there, ‘like’ my business page, https://www.facebook.com/BetsyBellsHealth4U.

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

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

Hiking the Engadine: Avoid arthritis pain

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Gentle Reader,

I am back safe and sound from my hike through the Engadine Valley in the Alps in Switzerland and the Writers Workshop in Villa Lina north of Rome.  And my body is not suffering from arthritis!  Sitting in the airplane for the long flight to Amsterdam, the first stop of my journey, I actually slept with the help of medication, Lunesta is my sleeping aid of choice, a prescription only drug that costs plenty.  I used it twice on the trip to help me get into the European hemisphere and the first night back home.  Otherwise, Gentle Sleep Complex, an herbal combination of Valerian, passion flower and chamomile.  It works like a dream to take 3 before going to bed, no matter what hotel I found myself in.

The real challenge to a body with a lot of spinal stenosis and potential joint discomfort is hauling suitcases and loading the heavy hiking pack up onto my shoulders.  Paying close attention to all the good advice I have posted over the past 1 ½, and asking for help getting in and out of trains—“you’re looking strong.  Can you help me with my suitcase, please?”—I managed to arrived back home without pulling a muscle from lifting suitcases.  Read on to see what a silly thing I did to pull a muscle badly.

I’d like to share my challenges with you in case you ever encounter similar problems.  You might avoid the same pitfalls.

First, a little back ground.  I am in a hiking group that hits the trails in the Pacific Northwest every Wednesday, rain or shine, except for January and February when we cross country ski.  Keep moving to keep arthritis at bay, is our motto.  Of all the gals in our group, Pedie took me up on taking a hike in Switzerland.  Jaco, our friend and fellow hiker who has returned to her homeland in the Netherlands to live out her life, was eager to join us as she missed our weekly hiking and friendship.  She, Pedie and I all celebrate our 75th birthdays this year, so this was an added incentive.  Our fourth hiker was Chris, already 83 yrs old. May I just add here that we met plenty of older people hiking as this sort of trekking is not unusual in Europe. Jaco and I took an overnight train to Zurich and then a train to the southeast part of Switzerland to join the other two.  You’ll recognize the place names St. Moritz and Davos if you follow the rich and famous.  We stuck to smaller, less glitzy places.

Our first stop in the Engadine valley was a town called Scuol.  It is famous in Europe for its mineral baths and the modern spa is worth the trip.  I had so much luggage that I had exploded into a collapsible cloth bag to make my back pack as light as possible and still not leave anything behind that I might need on the trail. We were walking from one village to the next, up over the mountains and needed to be ready for any change in the weather.  Ryder/Walker, our self guided tour company, arranged for our luggage to be taken to the next hotel along the way, arriving in our rooms well ahead of us.

Helping with jet lag and pounding our muscle into jelly, we spent a luxurious afternoon soaking in the mineral baths, going from super hot indoors, through the watery opening into the sun, blue sky and swirling outdoor pool with its jets and waterfall showers.  By the time I got back to the hotel, I was a noodle.

Here’s the trouble #1.  I spent half an hour bent over my luggage rearranging things to begin hiking the next day.  When I tried to stand up, all the muscles in my lower back had stretched out and refused to budge.  Here I was, pain shooting through my body, unable to catch my breath or stand and walk to dinner.  I got out my theraband and hit the floor with stretches and exersizes; filled the ice bag I had brought just in case and took a couple Pain Relief Complex herbal Cox 2 and 5 Loc inhibitors, pain pills that don’t hurt your stomach.  I’m the one who put this great hiking experience together and I wasn’t going to be able to walk a mile, much less carry a pack.

After a fabulous 8 course dinner and a bottle of Swiss wine between us, more ice and Pain Relief Complex, a good night’s sleep, and a ice bag tucked into my hiking pants, I was ready to walk it out this next morning.  It worked.  Walking is the best thing for lower back pain.  After about a half hour, I was ready to dump the ice and the rest of the 6 days I was free of lower back difficulties. 

The take away from this is

1.  Never do any extreme movements after a hot tub, deep tissue massage or the pummeling pleasure of a mineral springs spa.  I should not have bent over rearranging my luggage, and a little voice told me that at the time, to which I paid no attention.

2.  Don’t give up on yourself when you do pull a muscle.  Ice, stretch and do your best to walk it out.  This idea of lying flat on your back and taking muscle relaxants, in my opinion and long time experience, is not the way to handle lower back pain.  I have loosened up sciatica several times in the past by icing, stretching and walking.

Now, Please, tell us your methods for dealing with this kind of muscle pain, how you got yourself into the mess in the first place and how you got out of it.  We all want to learn from each other.  So go ahead, leave a comment, and sign up to get notification of my next posting which will take you on down the trail in the Engadine to the next near calamity on our great adventure.

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com

 

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

Here’s where you begin

Posted on

Gentle Reader,

What is the difference between fixing a problem and prevention?  Most of my blog posts consider specific problems developing from pain in the joints caused by traumatically induced arthritis or the age related osteoarthritis and spinal stenosis issues some of us face just because we’ve been moving hard and fast all our lives.  The fix-it approach tries to mimic the medication or prescription our doctor has recommended, but take care of the problem—fix-it—with supplements or therapies instead.  The “problem” may be a wakeup call, that tolling bell that asks, what could I have done to avoid this in the first place?  You question the traditional medicine path that suggests a medicine or surgical procedure because they have developed a sure-fire protocol for the problem you want fixed.  Is there another approach?

You really want better overall health and think it might, just might make the arthritis pain lessen if the whole body were better fortified.  You already eat a healthy diet of more vegetables than breads and cakes, of lean grilled meat and fish over fried fish and chips or hamburgers with all the trimmings.  You limit your alcohol intake to a couple glasses of wine a week, maybe a beer or 2 and the rare martini.  You use olive oil instead of butter and hardly ever open a box to make breakfast or dinner.  The last time you swung through the Golden Arches was back in ’89. You haven’t microwaved left overs in a flimsy plastic container or sipped water from a thin film plastic bottle that has been sitting in the sun.  Toxin-free, healthy diet, exercise.  A+.

Still, something isn’t quite right.  The finger nails are still thin, and like your hair ends, break easily.  You bruise every time you bang into the ball at the back of the car that pulls the trailer.  You have bad breath and dandruff no matter how much Listerine and medicated shampoo you use.  You’re not sleeping the way you’d like and you hit the wall every afternoon around 3 looking for a cookie and a coke.

Why isn’t the great diet, good exercise and toxic free world giving you the optimal health you are wanting?

The wise person that answered that question for me 26 years ago suggested that maybe I wasn’t getting enough nutrition.  My food wasn’t cutting it.  Perhaps I needed supplements.

You are already taking supplements, you say, and you still have some of these not-so-great physical situations.

In 2004, Shaklee’s new owner, president and CEO, Roger Barnett, did an extraordinary thing.  He had blood drawn from 500 Shaklee consumers who had been taking a variety of supplement (“the shelf”, we call it) for at least 20 years and handed over the data to one of the pickiest health organizations in the US, the University of California, Berkeley, School of Public Health.  Take this, he said, and compare the blood samples of these Shaklee users with people who have taken at least a multivitamin for 20 years and people who have never taken any vitamins.  Whatever your results, publish them.  What Chutzpah, what daring, what risky business.

The results were astonishing to the head researcher, Dr. Gladys Block.  On every possible measure the Shaklee users’ overall health markers were significantly better than the others.  The user of generic multivitamins were, by some measures, less healthy than those who took no vitamins at all.  You can read the entire study here.  Here about the study here.

Then Shaklee’s scientists designed a new product called Vitalizer containing 6 pills/capsules, tablets designed to get into the blood stream and work were the nutrients are most needed in a multi-patented delivery system.

When you ask me for (or go in search of) specific supplements for specific issues, step back for a minute.  Take a bird’s eye view of your overall health and ask yourself. “Am I getting a good absorbable protein and the basic vitamins and minerals that form the building blocks for everything?”  Perhaps beginning with an Energizing Soy Protein and Vitalizer for 90 days (it takes that long for the blood to be all new) will fill in the gaps and give you an overall healthier base.  Then see to the “fix-it” issues.  The specific supplements designed to alleviate pain, reduce stress, lower cholesterol, reduce menopause symptoms, sooth sore muscles, aid digestion and build solid bones.  We call this the Common Sense Approach to Health and Wellness.  Changing brands could make all the difference.

Take action:  Check this list of symptoms.  If you treat any of them with over the counter medicine, you are putting a tape over the red light on your dashboard and not looking into the root cause.

__Tired

__Overweight or Underweight

__Stress

__Dry/Oily skin/Problem skin

__Thinning hair/Dull hair

__Emotional on empty stomach

__Dandruff

__Need caffeine/sugar

__Can’t wake up

__Can’t sleep/Restless sleep

__Poor attention span

__Splitting Nails

__Irritability/Depression

__Nervousness/Anxiety

__Allergies

__Bruise easily

__Heartburn/Need antacids

__Sinus problems

__ cold hand or feet

__Poor night vision

__Back pain/Leg pain

__Constipation/Diarrhea

__Poor digestion/stomach

__High/Low blood pressure

__High/Low blood sugar

__Various aches and pains

__Elevated cholesterol

__Cravings for sweets

__PMS/Hormonal problems

__Menstrual cramps/problems

__Subject to colds/flu/infection

__Muscle cramps

__Joint pain/Arthritis

__Bleeding gums

__Headaches

__Breath or body odor

__Decreased sex interest

__Infertility/Sterility

__Menopausal symptoms

__Vague “blah” feeling

Shocked or pleased with your results?  Let us know.

My challenge to you is this: If you take the Starter Program of Energizing Soy Protein and Vitalizer for 30 days, and see no change in our health, you will get your money back, no questions asked.

Shop at www.HiHoHealth.com.  This Vitalizer Wellness Starter package retails at $135.50 plus tax and shipping.  My offer to you is 10% off.  Vitalizer Gold for the over 50 is a little more, or $142.00 plus tax and shipping.  This is a 30 day supply.  The 10% rebate comes at the beginning of next month.

Fondly, Betsy

Be Well, Do Well and Keep Moving

BetsyBell’s Health4u

www.GrandmaBetsyBell.com

206 933 1889  1 888 283 2077

betsy@hihohealth.com