Greetings from LIFESTYLE CHOICES!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
“I feel immensely blessed to have a chance to get it right.” Oprah Winfrey
Generally from January until mid-February the gym is fairly crowded and then the crowd falls off their New Year’s resolutions and life becomes normal again. Oprah admitted all the things she vowed to do last year, she didn’t: more balance and time, daily workout, etc. After meeting Charla Nash, the woman who was violently attacked by a 200 lb. chimpanzee last February, and hearing her story, she stated in her magazine, “No more excuses.”
For years I didn’t make New Year’s resolutions. I thought they were “dumb.” However, what I realized was I was setting goals and accomplishing many of them but wouldn’t it be better if I actually wrote them down so I could refer to them as the years passed? Many of us are quick to judge ourselves harshly but what I’ve learned is we’re human and we just need to practice. We gradually get better at something but we forget how far we’ve come. What I do today is set goals each year in certain categories: Spiritual, Personal Growth, Marriage and Family, Financial, Entertainment/Fun (this has always been a hard one for me), Business/Professional, and Health. I then set specific goals such as reading particular books, attending meetings about a particular subject, specific networking groups, special events or times with my husband, family and friends, vacations, attainable lab values, etc. I always have something specific to work on such as Not gossiping, Not Judging Others, Not Complaining, etc. Then the question I often pose to myself (learned from Zig Ziglar) during the year when I’m faced with not enough time and several options is, “Does this take me closer to or further away from my goal?” As the year progresses, I have a “completed” column in the far right hand margin so I can fill in the date of each task completed. Sometimes circumstances require some things change. For instance we decided to go on a vacation to another location than the one originally planned. Well so what? I just changed it.
What I know for sure is this: I am a work in progress. I am a better human being than I was 40 years ago, 20 years ago, 10 years ago, 1 year ago. I will continue to make mistakes but I don’t have to stop altogether when I don’t fulfill my goals exactly as I wrote them. I can pick myself back up, hold my head up high, and continue going forward. No excuses necessary. At the end of the year, I will be a better person. That is what I know for sure.
Vitamin D Deficiency…The Most Unrecognized Epidemic?
Have you been reading the plethora of articles on Vitamin D and also seen on television Drs. Andrew Weil and Mehmet Oz discuss Vitamin D? It seems this vitamin is the new miracle drug and since it wasn’t given that much precedence while I was in nursing school, I thought I’d investigate it. After all transfat wasn’t discussed when I was in nursing school either and its destructiveness is absolutely detrimental to our health. No question about it.
Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin that may be found in fish liver oils and fish such as salmon, herring, and tuna. Since it is naturally present in very few of our foods, it is added as a dietary supplement in products such as milk. The sun’s UV rays contribute most significantly to the daily production of vitamin D. It is essential to building and maintaining healthy bones, teeth, and muscles. However, I have been most interested in its now being touted as an anti-inflammatory and a preventer of chronic diseases such as 17 varieties of cancer as well as heart disease, stroke, hypertension, autoimmune diseases, diabetes, depression, osteoarthritis, osteoporosis, muscle aches and weakness, muscle wasting, birth defects, periodontal disease, psoriasis, and more.
One of the most prominent researchers of Vitamin D is Michael Holick, MD, Ph D. For an extremely entertaining yet informative video produced by University of California San Diego School of Medicine and Grassrootshealth.org, view the following You Tube video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cq1t9WqOD-0 . Let me encourage you if you don’t have time to watch this in one sitting, then watch about 10-15 minutes everyday until completion (less than an hour). You will not be sorry you spent the time viewing it as it is not a dry, boring lecture. Many disorders are addressed such as dermatological ones on this video which I do not address here. For those of you who want a quick synopsis, here are the bullet points:
Pregnant women should be taking a minimum of 1000 IU of vitamin D/day in addition to taking a multivitamin (typically containing 400IU of vitamin D).
- If you give lactating women between 4000 and 6000 IUs/day, through breastfeeding alone their infants can get all of the vitamin D they require.
- When eating salmon, one would have to eat it almost every day to barely get enough vitamin D to meet one’s needs. Wild salmon get their vitamin D from the food chain but food pellets fed to farmed salmon don’t contain vitamin D so farmed salmon typically provide 100-250 IU of vitamin D/serving which is only 10-25% of the vitamin D found in wild salmon.
- In the summer, UV rays from the sun can create all of the vitamin D we need in a few minutes if exposure is between 10am and 3pm. Dr. Holick suggests 5-15 minutes 2-3X week to arms and legs without sunscreen. According to Dr. Holick, SPF 15 sunscreen reduces the manufacturing of Vitamin D by 99%; therefore, he suggests applying sunscreen to the face but leaving arms and legs without sunscreen application. After this amount of time, sunscreen can be used to help prevent premature aging and increased risk of non-melanoma cancer.
- In winter people who live north of Atlanta, Georgia (or north of 35 degrees latitude) do not make any Vitamin D from sunlight exposure from November through February.
- Excessive exposure to sunlight increases risk of non-melanoma skin cancer which is relatively easy to detect and treat if detected early enough. The key to responsible use of sunlight to ensure optimal vitamin D status is to ensure you don’t get sunburned.
- Aging decreases our ability to produce vitamin D via sunlight. A 70 year old has a 70% reduced ability to produce vitamin D via sunlight compared to a 20 year old; however, Dr. Holick suggests taking the elderly out into the sunlight twice a week for 15-30 minutes in order for it to be beneficial.
- Obesity increases the need for vitamin D intake and/or sunlight creation because storage of vitamin D in fat cells reduces the amount of vitamin D that’s available to the rest of the body.
- Dark-skinned people require more sunlight exposure due to melanin allowing less UV ray absorption. Dr. Holick states 30-50% of African-Americans have Vitamin D deficiency.
- Many people diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia may actually have osteomalacia which is caused by Vitamin D deficiency. Common symptoms of Vitamin D deficiency are bone and muscle aches although D deficiency signs and symptoms are not always manifested.
Serum Lab Test to measure Vitamin D levels: 25 hydroxy D level; Optimal Range as suggested by Dr. Holick: 50-60ng/ml (definitely not below 30ng/ml)
Suggested Dosage for both Adults and Children by Dr. Holick: 1000 IU/day + a multi-vitamin (typically has 400 IUs) for a total of 1400 IU/day (supplemented) and a couple of servings of food that contain Vitamin D. Many physicians recommend as much as 10,000 IU/day. You should definitely have your serum levels measured prior to this much supplementation and your nurse practitioner or physician should recommend the dosage for your optimum level of health as well as monitor your blood levels on a regular basis.
Suggested Dosage for dark-skinned individuals, lactating women, elderly adults: ask your nurse practitioner/physician as your therapeutic dosage may need to be elevated, especially during winter and in northern climes.
D2 is ergocalciferol and D3 is cholecalciferol. Many physicians recommend D3 over D2. Dr. Holick does not according to the video referenced. Ask your physician which she prefers.
Calcium and Vitamin D- Calcium requires Vitamin D for absorption.
Vitamin D intoxication– according to Dr. Weil’s website: “No adverse effects have been seen with supplemental vitamin D intakes up to 10,000 IU daily.” Dr. Holick discusses one man who became Vitamin D intoxicated on his video as referenced above. This particular patient was ingesting an absolutely unbelievable amount of D in error.
Don’t forget your sunshine between 10am and 3pm as stated above!
Dr. Holick is Professor of Medicine, Physiology, and Biophysics Director, General Clinical Research Center Director, Vitamin D, Skin, and Bone Research Laboratory Director, Biologic Effects of Light Research Center Boston University Medical Center Boston University School of Medicine. In 2006 he received the 18th Annual Award for Excellence in Clinical Research for his pioneering contributions in the basic science of vitamin D and on May 15, 2009 Dr. Holick received the Linus Pauling Institute Prize for Health Research.
http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/vitamind.asp
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/vitamin-d/NS_patient-vitamind
New England Journal of Medicine, Volume 357:266-281, Number 3
http:www.vitamindcouncil.org/scientists.shtml
http://www.drweil.com/drw/u/ART02812/vitamin-d
HeartMath® Improves Pastors’ Lives
More than 300 Reformed Church in America pastors have completed HeartMath training over the last three years with significant and positive results: 22.5% decrease in medical costs with hypertension diagnosis for HM participants vs. 46.9% increase for nonparticipants; 3.8% decrease in medical cost trend for HM participants vs. 9% increase for nonparticipants; clinical lab improvements in triglycerides, blood pressure, glucose and body mass index.
HeartMath® is a scientifically, evidenced-based stress reduction program of which I am a licensed provider. I have had tremendous results in helping people with their stress, anxiety, high blood pressure, and more disorders.
http://images.rca.org/docs/bobs/1009BOBSMinutes.pdf