obesity Archives - Page 2 of 3 - Damron Chiropractic & Wellness

Fatty Liver Disease

February 7, 2017 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

Not many of us think about fatty liver disease. In fact, most of us make the assumption that only alcohol and drugs contribute to this disease. Fatty liver disease is increasing because of the Western diet, which includes highly processed foods, fast food, and sugary drinks. However, a precursor to this disease is an increase in obesity, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and liver inflammation. In 2004, to prove this epidemic, Morgan Spurlock created a highly controversial documentary called Super Size Me. In it, he chronicled his month-long journey, consuming only McDonald’s food and the effect it had on him.

When we choose convenience with food, we typically sacrifice our health. At first, the impact is unnoticeable. Yet, as time goes, on our body becomes less equipped to handle the nutritional deficiencies offered by convenience. Over a period of 30 days, Morgan watched himself change. His body mass increased by 13%, his cholesterol spiked, he experienced mood swings, sexual dysfunction, and a staggering increase in his liver enzymes. All that from convenience food!

Unfortunately, just because food available to purchase it does not mean it is good for you. While it probably tastes very good, that does not make it good for your body. We must stop equating good taste and convenience with healthy. Fast food companies and processed food manufacturers are in business to make money. That means they must sell. To do that means convincing you to purchase the food they make with creative advertising, gimmicky promotions, convenience, and attractive prices. What we choose to eat is up to us.

Most alarming to Morgan and his doctors was the effect this diet had on his liver. Often, fatty liver disease has no symptoms. However, it is common for a person to have insulin resistance, extra weight, and type 2 diabetes. These should be viewed as symptoms. Regular eating of a Western diet increases the likelihood of developing fatty liver disease. Morgan’s diet created an overabundance of fat cells in his liver which then began to leak into his bloodstream. The speed at which this happened to his liver concerned his doctors because many Americans eat a Western diet every day.

It is time to stop making excuses as to why we need that donut or why we need to hit the drive-thru. It should not matter what advertisements say to us or what the latest promotion is. We need to value our health more than we value saving a dollar. The obesity trend can be reversed, but it is up to each individual to do our part.

Advertising Unhealthy Lifestyles

January 31, 2017 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

We will never live in a world without commercials. It would be nice, but commercials pay for the programming we watch and listen to on the radio. Companies that use this form of advertising for their product or service are hoping to attract more business. Regulations are in place to ensure that what is advertised is safe; however, there are no regulations in place to ensure that the product is not unhealthy. We must decide that for ourselves.

Recently, I heard a radio ad for life insurance asking if I enjoyed eating wings, mashed potatoes and gravy. If I was then this life insurance was for me. I could get the coverage I wanted for my family, yet still enjoy the lifestyle I wanted. As an added bonus I could also receive the company’s recipe for fried chicken! I kept waiting for the punch line, thinking it was obviously a joke, but none came. Here is a company leveraging American’s unhealthy lifestyle and increasing obesity rates to benefit their bottom-line. Is it safe? Yes. Is this product in our best interest? No.

We must be smarter than the companies that are advertising to us. Making assumptions that simply because the product or service is advertised it is in our best interest. This situation has contributed to the health crisis we face today from obesity, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and a sedentary lifestyle. Instead, most of us chose the path of least resistance, allowing companies to make millions on unhealthy choices and the consequences that follow. Perhaps it’s time to hold ourselves accountable and change this trend.

Think about the various commercials and advertisements you see and hear each day. What comes to mind? Cars, pharmaceuticals, weight loss products, chain restaurants, colas. Only those companies with the highest revenue can afford to invest in this form of marketing. Does this mean these products are safe? Not necessarily. Does this mean these products are in our best interest? Not necessarily. Advertising does not equal best or ideal. It only means the company had enough money to invest, whether or not the product is good.

Think about all the healthy things that are not advertised from organic produce, water, cage-free eggs, toxin-free cleaning products, and even chiropractic care. Should the benefits be discounted due to lack of high profile advertising? Should we let ourselves be swayed by what we see on television and hear on the radio? At what point do we assume responsibility for ourselves and our health?

Standards of Care in Chiropractic

January 24, 2017 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

Standard, defined as “a level of quality or attainment.” Synonyms for the word standard are quality, guideline, norm, and ideal. Our daily life involves many standards, or guidelines, of care including:

the food pyramid
an academic grading scale
recommended daily physical activity
ideal weight
adequate sleep
water intake
alcohol consumption
medical check-ups

Research helps to define the standards we live by today. For example, the surgeon general determined after conclusive research that smoking was bad for your health, specifically linked to lung cancer. Therefore, not smoking is a standard for optimal health just as 150 minutes of moderate exercise per week is the standard. Having guidelines helps us to live as healthy as possible. In the field of chiropractic, there is also a standard of care, too.

One of the most popular myths about chiropractors is that you need to keep going once you start. Yet there is some truth to this myth because of the physicality of the adjustment. The doctor is training the body, much like we do when we exercise. Stopping the adjustments is similar to stopping exercising. We all know what happens when we stop working out. Our weight starts to creep up. We lose muscle mass. Our energy level declines. Chiropractic adjustments keeps our body in alignment so it can function as it is intended to. Without this type of care, daily life negatively impacts our body. Aches and pains return.

Ironically, despite knowing about guidelines and recommendations society tells us that we don’t always follow them. If we did, we would not have an obesity epidemic, smoking would cease, and every student would receive an A. Free will gives us the choice and all too often we choose poorly. The good news however is that we can choose differently which can reverse unhealthy trends.

Standards of care exist chiropractic, as well. This standard is one adjustment per week as it is meant to be proactive. Just like visiting your dentist every 6 months to prevent cavities. Visiting the chiropractor keeps the body functioning as it should rather than letting the daily wear and tear of life compromise it. And yes, that is exactly what life does. We go through each day incurring a series of micro-traumas from falling, playing a sport, working out, and poor posture. Yet a simple and painless adjustment once a week and significantly offset this.

The choice is ultimately ours to make. And while knowledge is power, it really only is when we do something with it.

Avoid the “Perfect Storm” of Disease-Care

January 5, 2017 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

In 2000, George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg starred in the movie “The Perfect Storm”. It is based on the true story of a commercial fishing vessel lost at sea during a storm. This storm was exceedingly rare due to the combination of adverse weather factors. In the chiropractic world, we see a lot of people who got caught in a perfect storm. Negative and unpredictable factors affect their lives in such a way that their quality of life is significantly diminished. Factors such as:

a sedentary lifestyle
car accident
work related injury
smoking
poor diet
diabetes
obesity
chronic pain

Some factors can be self-made, others can be simply bad luck or hereditary. Either way, these factors can create a perfect storm that equates to illness. At Damron Chiropractic & Wellness our goal is wellness for life. We take a person’s perfect storm and work with them utilizing chiropractic, rehabilitation, massage and nutrition.

We hear a lot about disease care with people suffering from chronic conditions. Rarely is there any press on wellness. Wellness means that a person is feeling good and looking good. In our world, being well means the perfect storm is over and that person can get back to doing what they love with a higher quality of life.

Life can give us lemons, and lots of them. But we do have a choice. We can choose to settle for what life hands us or decide to seek help. This does not mean using a band-aid approach either, as tempting as that might be. Rather, it means finding a resolution once and for all by ignoring disease-care. Disease-care actually cares for the disease and not finding out what is causing it in the first place. The presenting symptoms may appear to be coming from the leg, but it is really nerve interference in the spine. Treating the leg pain with disease-care does not address the nerve interference in the spine. Consequently, the leg pain will return. That is not wellness.

If you suspect a perfect storm in your life there is a solution. Life happens, but wellness does not, unless you decide to seek it out.

Why Student Athletes Need Rehabilitation

December 15, 2016 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

Over a million high school students play a sport, according to the National Federation of State High School Associations (August 2016). The highest percentage play football, followed by track and field, basketball and soccer. Farther down the list is volleyball, baseball, cross country, softball, tennis, plus swimming and diving. This is great news in light of the current health crisis in the rise of obesity. However, this is also a warning. Injuries within the student athlete group cannot be overlooked nor minimized.

Unfortunately, in many situations they are, due to various reasons:

a state title is on the line,
the fear of losing a college scholarship,
missing out of the competition and fun,
or the pain isn’t “that bad.”

There are long term ramifications for this mindset. Therefore, advocate for your student athlete by closely monitoring their sport participation and actively look for potential problems.

The goal is to prevent serious injury, in addition to keeping the body working at it’s peak performance. Also, not creating a ripple effect of other injuries, too. This approach allows the student athlete to enjoy life, long after their sport years are over. Pain-free.

Football is a dangerous sport, even with all the protective gear. The older the player, the harder the hits. Sustaining even a mild injury creates future problems if not addressed immediately. However, all too often, the player jumps right back into the game, never giving the injury time to heal. With the body already compromised, the additional micro-traumas add up faster.

In these situations, rehabilitation is essential. With a shoulder injury, the student athlete might notice a popping sound while lifting weights as he conditions. This popping sound is due to weakened muscles and tendons that can no longer hold the shoulder in place. With proper rehabilitation, those muscles and tendons can be strengthened to hold the shoulder in the socket and eliminate the popping.

The best approach is to align your student athlete with a professional that specializes in rehabilitation. Most of all, be proactive in an investment in your child’s future.

How Fear Keeps the Extra Weight On

November 29, 2016 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

Fear. It comes in different forms. There’s the fear you feel when watching a scary movie. Or the fear you have of being stung by a bee. Fear can also be somewhat healthy, like the fear in making that big presentation at work. However, there is another type of fear that holds us back. Prevents us from living our best life. That fear is difficult for many of us to even admit. Because if we do, then we are admitting we are aware of our situation yet have denied its existence. A great example of this type of fear is with our weight.

There is absolutely no denying that a majority of us are not healthy. Statistics validate this fact time and again. Many times the trends in data show an increase in the number of people who are overweight and obese. This extra weight causes several weight related conditions, too, from type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and inflammation. If we know this to be true, why does the trend continue to grow? In one word, fear.

It is difficult to admit that there is a problem. If we do admit that there is a problem then that means we must do something about it. Otherwise, we look and feel worse. We may think that people perceive us as failures or that we let them down by acknowledging we need to lose weight but don’t. Revealing our health issues to others and ourselves means we accept responsibility for our current state of affairs. We look awfully foolish if we own our obesity yet continue with life as if we never did.

The fear of admitting to ourselves how unhealthy we are creates a ripple affect that can be overwhelming. So, rather than deal with the problem, we bury ourselves in life. We pretend we are fine with our body. Fear can keep us stuck exactly where we are. But that fear can rob us of a longer life. It can also rob us of living pain-free. Choose to look at your current health as an opportunity to become the best version of yourself and put your fear in a corner. Today.

Has Obesity Made You a Spectator In Life?

November 8, 2016 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

No matter what the season, there is always plenty of sports to watch from the professionals to little league. We love being spectators, too. Unless, of course, our team loses. As a result, we somehow believe that as a spectator we can change the outcome of a game. Cheering intensifies in a close game, rally hats come on when our team is down, and booing erupts in an attempt to change a bad call. Even fights erupt between rival fans over something they are powerless to change.

Ironically, there is a parallel between this spectator phenomenon and our approach to health and wellness. The evidence rests in the most recent health statistics from the American Public Health Association:

29.6% of the population is obese
10% of the population has diabetes
there has been a 4% increase in drug deaths

Almost a third of the U.S. population seems to be sitting on the sidelines with obesity as a spectator. This passive approach to life has a domino affect on our life as obesity leads to other health conditions such as heart disease and stroke, high blood pressure, diabetes, some cancers, and osteoarthritis. However, many cases of obesity are preventable and treatable.

Sitting on the sidelines is like sitting in the passenger seat of a car, because we are simply along for the ride with no control over which direction the car goes, how fast or slow, or its destination. Why would we consciously choose to be a passenger, especially in life? Taking ownership of ourselves means we want a say, that we care about the journey. Having an active role in the game of life elevates our quality of life because we are living on our terms, not limited by external forces. Ironically, these outside forces are something we subject ourselves to voluntarily by:

Eating fast food.
Living a sedentary lifestyle.
Relying on medications to relieve symptoms.
Consuming too many highly processed foods.
Limiting fresh fruit and vegetables in our diet.
Making countless excuses to not exercise regularly.
Not holding ourselves accountable to a healthy weight.

If you are one of the almost 30% who are sitting on the sidelines acting like a spectator to your own life, perhaps it’s time to change that. The first step is deciding to join the game. Commit to yourself.

What Are Good Fats?

November 1, 2016 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

Fats always get a bad rap. Remember the low-fat, fat-free craze of the 90s? Seemed like every product on the shelves had little, if any, fat in it. There were SnackWells cookies, fat-free Fig Newtons, Lay’s WOW chips, I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter margarine, and fat-free cheese. It took some time, but eventually people have begun to realize that it’s a fad that doesn’t work. In fact, people not only gained weight, but also consumed a ton of unhealthy chemicals including high fructose corn syrup. So, what’s the deal with fat? Can it be healthy for us? And if it is, how much and what kind is?

Fat is one of the key building blocks our body needs to sustain metabolic functions. These functions range from keeping our nerve safe to hormone production. Eliminating or significantly reducing fats presence in our body has a negative impact on our health as evidenced by the dual impact our society is experiencing with obesity and type 2 diabetes. Unfortunately, it has taken far to long to figure this out due to bribery and misleading studies instigated by a sugar-industry trade group (JAMA Internal Medicine, September 2016). If we add this to the fact that it takes a long time for the winds of change to take effect, then one can see the ramifications involved.

With the recent trends toward shopping local, holistic health care, and whole food consumption, the tides are turning. Yet people still question if fat is good. The short answer is that overall fat is indeed healthy for us. However, there are several variables to consider to help you make the best decision.

There are three types of fats:

Saturated
Monounsaturated
Polyunsaturated

All can be healthy, if care is given when choosing. Examples of saturated fats include coconut oil, butter, and the fat in red meat. Monounsaturated fats can be found in olive oil, avocados, and raw nuts. Polyunsaturated fats include flaxseed and walnut oils.

Not all fats are created equal, either, for example, Big Mac fat is not the same as that found in an avocado. One is natural, the other highly processed. So what can you look for when determining which route to go with your fat intake?

Go with fats that boost omega-3s such as wild salmon, winter squash, leafy greens, and pecans.
Avoid heavily processed oils like canola, corn, and soybean. These oils are high in the bad omega-6 fatty acids which cause inflammation to our body.
Use oils that smell like where they are from. High quality olive oil should have a good flavor and smell.
Purchase high-quality grassfed butter as this is considered good animal-based fat.
Treat your fats like a buffet, opting for variety.
Always opt for high-quality, organic fats.
Avoid high-heat cooking.

Toss out your old fears and misconceptions about fats and learn the truth. Your body needs it to thrive.

Commit to Your Health

September 22, 2016 By Pam Rezai Leave a Comment

Bringing a child to the grocery store is challenging. A battle typically ensues that is a balancing act between food that promotes good health and food that does not. When we grow up things are no different. We battle ourselves over how much we should indulge ourselves and how well we should eat. As an adult the difference is there is no one telling us ‘no.’ We are left to make decisions for ourselves; countless ones, each and every day.

We can face making too many bad choices over a long period of time. Things like too much fast food, not enough water or exercise, eating processed foods, and skimping on sleep. At some point in our life we second guess our bad choices. We want to change, but change can be difficult and it take time to see results.

However, change can happen if we are committed to ourselves. After awhile, poor lifestyle choices ultimately have a domino effect on our bodies from weight gain, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, type 2 diabetes, and obesity. It can even then lead to conditions like chronic pain in places like our back, neck, and legs.

A healthier life means surrounding yourself with others that have the same wellness goals as you. That doesn’t necessarily mean joining a health club (although those are fantastic places to find those people) but rather doing simple things like:

walking with a friend.
heading to the local farmer’s market and talking to the farmers about their produce.
packing a lunch for you and a co-worker instead of going out to eat.

It’s amazing how surrounding yourself with the right people in the right environment can inspire you. At Damron Chiropractic & Wellness (DCW) we work hard to create an environment of wellness. We work hard to be a positive influence in people’s lives through weight loss, alleviating pain, strength training and healing gut issues. We are committed to your health, but are you committed too?

Why We Need Mobility and Stability as We Age

September 8, 2016 By Pam Rezai

In our youth we take many things for granted – our health, time, money, high metabolism, and there will be food on the table when we get home. We have a sense of immortality, that nothing bad will happen to us. It is the gift of our youth, ignorance. You can tell by how kid behave on the playground this sense of innocence. Climbing, running, swinging, it seems they are showcasing the benefits of their youth. Compare this to those who are living in a nursing home. The sharp contrast in both the mobility and stability between the two groups is obvious.

Mobility implies freedom. The freedom to move from one place to another. The ideal is the ability to move easily and without pain. Stability, on the other hand, implies strength and steadiness. Children manifest both. The older we get, the more we need to work to keep both. However, the reality is that we don’t appreciate what we have until it is gone. According to the most recent statistics published by the CDC, over a third of U.S. adults are obese (11/2015). But it doesn’t stop there. In addition to the extra weight, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke and certain cancers are also connected to obesity. So, what happened? In one word, life happened.

Mobility and stability are not only for the young. Granted, it is easier for our youth to be like that because not enough life has happened yet. However, as we age, keeping our mobility and stability is essential to living well and here’s why. Mobility is freedom. Being mobile allows us to remain active which helps keep us fit. Stability helps to prevent falls. Falls, especially in older people, contribute to broken bones and other injuries. These consequences of falls can affect our mobility which in turn can affect our weight and create further health issues.

At DCW, we help our patients with both mobility and stability through our Rehabilitation Department. We make it a priority to individualize treatment plans to ensure each patient can improve their ability to move without pain. We also incorporate balance exercises to strengthen stability. While we cannot be young again, it doesn’t mean we can’t reverse the effects of time on our body and regain our movement.

Fatty Liver Disease

Advertising Unhealthy Lifestyles

Standards of Care in Chiropractic

Avoid the “Perfect Storm” of Disease-Care

Why Student Athletes Need Rehabilitation

How Fear Keeps the Extra Weight On

Has Obesity Made You a Spectator In Life?

What Are Good Fats?

Commit to Your Health

Why We Need Mobility and Stability as We Age

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Dr. Andrew Damron, Chiropractor

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