Category Archives: HEALTHY-ER

Stretching With God!

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I’m not young, skinny, or athletic, but I have exercised most of my adult life. I believe in exercise! I’m not all that healthy but I keep trying because our bodies are the temple of God. So we should do what we can to be as healthy as we can be.

In 2012, I was diagnosed with bilateral brain tumors and subsequently a genetic disease called Neurofibromatosis Type 2. If you want to hear more about that, you can read my book, GOD, LIFE & HULA HOOPS.

Anyway, without going into all the gory details, I’m completely deaf in one ear and partially deaf in the others. Along with that I also have multiple other health issues, including  serious balance problems and fatigue among other things.

At one point, I didn’t have the energy to do much of anything and could barely walk.

I decided it was time to take control of my health.

I decided it was time to start exercising again.

I was told I should go to physical therapy for my balance issues. Instead, I started researching it and ending up developing an exercise routine to help with my balance and flexibility. I call it Stretching with God, because I incorporated the seven days of creation into the workout.

So how’s my health now? I’ve lost 50 pounds, I usually do 2-3 miles on the treadmill at least 3-4 times every week, and can bend over to pick stuff off the floor without falling! I still have my struggles, but I’m healthier than I’ve been in a long time. And I believe Stretching with God has helped!

Want to know more about it? Click on the page that says Stretching with God, and it gives the full workout!

 

God Bless & Good Reading!

Hope Prevails–A Book Review

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HopePrevails

It’s interesting how God works, don’t you think? I’m in the process of writing a new novel where the main character suffers from depression and is suicidal at one point. Sounds depressing but it really isn’t! So when I had a chance to get a free copy of Hope Prevails: Insights From A Doctor’s Personal Journey Through Depression, I took it.

And I’m so glad I did!

This is not a medical book but a spiritual book. Dr. Bengston (author) shares her own spiritual journey as she suffered from and overcame years of depression. This is a great book to use as a Bible study and, in fact, that’s exactly what I’m doing right now.

It’s as if Dr. Michelle Bengston and I are one and the same. A lot of what she talks about in Hope Prevails that helped her is exactly the same things that have helped me deal with my brain tumors for the past four years. It’s great to get some validation!

Imagine being a doctor who works in the mental health area and realizing you have depression and the treatments you prescribe to your patients aren’t solving the problem completely.Dr. Bengston shares her journey through the valley of darkness known as depression and how God was right there with her. This book is filled with practical information to help others get through their own valley.

I highly recommend this book! For anyone whether you suffer from depression or not. This book will boost anyone’s mood and self-esteem. and I’m pretty sure we could all use that!

This is not a medical book but a spiritual book.

NOTE: This book was given to me in return for an honest and unbiased review.

GOD BLESS & GOOD READING!

What’s Your Excuse?

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We all know that exercise is good for us but….too tired–don’t feel good–not enough time–or maybe you’re honest enough to admit you just don’t like it! We have all sorts of excuses…oops I mean reasons why we don’t exercise. But the truth is if you want to be healthy–er, then exercise needs to be part of your life. Unless, of course, you have a physically-demanding job, but that’s not many of us these days.

And it’s certainly not me!

Between my writing time and my TV time I admit I’m a couch potato but I didn’t realize just how much until I got a FitBit for my birthday that I asked for. It’s made me more conscious of just how much I don’t move.

But I exercise almost every day and have almost all of my life. It didn’t keep me skinny but I believe(and so does my doctor) it’s why I don’t have diabetes since it runs on both sides of my family. Now having said that, let me also admit that my daily exercise was definitely on the low-intensity side of the meter. Probably why I didn’t stay skinny.

But the last year I’ve been working hard to get healthy-er. And that includes eating healthy, losing weight, and working out more. I’m now up to working out for 30-40 minutes almost every day and ….yes, I’m actually sweating these days!

And I can tell a big difference! I still have my mobility difficulties because of my balance (because of my brain tumors) issues, but I feel better and stronger–sort of!

So what kind of exercise is the best? The kind you do, of course! And keep on doing. The key to exercise is to do it consistently–day after day; week after week; month after month. Now I don’t mean you have to exercise every day or that you have to do the same thing every day. If you only want to work out three days every week, that’s fine with me. I’m not sure that less than three will make a difference but it might. But I do know that two days are better than ZERO days.

Back to the question of what kind of exercise. I have incorporated balance, stretching, cardio and strength training into my exercise. I only do strength training a few times every week but the others I include whenever I exercise.

If you really want to get healthy, it’s time to stop making excuses and start exercising. Start slow and increase it as you start to feel stronger.

YOUR TURN: What’s your favorite type of exercise?

GOD BLESS & GOOD READING!

 

 

Who Knew???

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I hate when interesting things come up on the rotating AOL news feed! Because it takes so long to read it and get to the point but every now and then I can’t resist clicking on an interesting topic. Today, I saw a lady holding a peeled clove of garlic between her lips. I just had to check it out.

Turns out the article was about ways to get rid of cold sores-which I get from time to time. So I waded through all the advertisements and here’s some of the treatments:

  1. Dab milk on the sore and leave it on–do several times a day.
  2. Peroxide instead of milk–same idea.
  3. Peppermint oil instead of milk or peroxide. Can also use Tea Tree Oil or vanilla.
  4. Eat licorice. (Yuck–I don’t like it.)
  5. And hold a clove of garlic on it for 5 minutes.

They also recommend holding ice on it to reduce the swelling and the pain. I wonder what would happen if I combined all the ingredients together to make one super-duper treatment! I can’t say I want to get another cold sore but the next time I do, I hope I remember these treatments!

WHO KNEW???

YOUR TURN: Got any old family remedies for whatever ails you that you’d like to share?

GOD BLESS & GOOD READING!

 

Healthy–er!

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Yeah, I know that’s not how you spell healthier but I wanted to get your attention. So mostly this blog is about books–mine and others as well. I’ve decided to add a new feature, HEALTHY-ER. I change things up here from time to time by trying new things to see what interests people and I’m doing it again.

So you may or may not know that I was diagnosed with brain tumors in 2012. Thankfully, they were benign meaning not cancerous but they weren’t benign meaning harmless. Someone asked me yesterday how I was doing. My response was that I would never be quite as healthy as I was before the tumors but I was doing the best I could under the circumstances.

Doing the best I can means working on getting healthy-er. Get it? I won’t ever be completely healthy but I can work on getting healthy-er. Thus the title of this blog post.

I know I’m not alone. Just in my own family, there are so many of us who have some type of chronic health condition that affects us on a daily basis. Not to mention getting older brings its own set of problems as well-even if you don’t have any specific health problems.

It seems to me there are two choices: do nothing or do something!

I really believe in the philosophy of the more you do the more you can do; the less you do the less you can do. So…I keep on exercising in the hopes that it will improve my ability to “do more” in my everyday life.

I have to say I’m a lot healthier than I was last year at this time when I finally finished the treatments for my brain tumors for the foreseeable future, but I’m still frustrated that I can’t do more physically, like shopping and sightseeing. You know–all the fun things!

Anyway, I want to share some of my health struggles with you and what I do about them to encourage others to keep trying. I also plan to bring you some useful tips from time to time that I come across as I keep trying to get healthy-er.

YOUR TURN: How about you? Do you agree with the philosophy of the more you do, the more you can do? If not, what’s your philosophy regarding your health issues?

GOD BLESS & GOOD READING