Beware of Germy Gyms

 Email This Post

Whenever I get on a plane or use someone else’s computer keyboard and mouse, I whip out the disinfectant wipes.  Have you ever read the reports on the germy nature of just about every surface in existence?  Wonder where you got that cold, flu, or other illness?

While doctors will say that the benefits of exercise far outweigh the small chance of acquiring a staph or other infection at the gym (so don’t use this report as an excuse for hugging that couch!), you ought to take some common sense steps to protect yourself.  And since just about everyone makes a New Year’s resolution to “get fit” once the holidays are over, here are some tips for you to keep in mind when you’re ready to reacquaint yourself with your local gym:

1.Before you use equipment (including exercise balls, spinning bikes, and weight machines), wipe off the surfaces with a disinfectant wipe that has at least 60% alcohol.  Just wiping with a wet towel is not enough!

2.Don’t use anyone else’s towel or yoga mat – they’re fast lanes to bacterial, fungal and viral infections.

3.Shower immediately after working out at a gym.  Wear flip-flops in communal showers, and bring your own soap, unless the gym has liquid soap dispensers.

4.Don’t go into the sauna or whirlpool if you have a cut, scrape or bad bruise.  Chlorine generally kills a lot of bad bugs, but others can survive…and don’t drink the water in those tubs!

5.If a scratch, bruise or cut gets red, hot, or tender, see a physician!  Don’t just let the infection fester until it’s progressed to something serious.

6.Get your own bicycle and ride in the neighborhood.  Buy some free weights, get a trainer, or buy a variety of workout videos.  Working out in your own home avoids a lot of “bugs” – except those you get from your school-age children!

Eat Less, Move More

 Email This Post

There are two sure fire comments that I can make on the air which will get hackles way, way up.  The first is to say anything which even sounds remotely like a criticism of cats (for some reason it doesn’t work for dogs, chickens, pigs or parakeets…just cats) or comment that, for the most part, being fat is your own darn fault.  There’s even a fan site for my show called “We Love Dr. Laura” - which has a thread that goes wild whenever I take a “fat” call and give my opinion that by and large, being fat and unfit is a voluntary condition.

Let me give you an example: a woman called to tell me about her mean, mean, and oh so mean, husband who is trying to influence her to lose weight and start working out.  She just about had a fit on the phone, telling me that he should just love her the way she is…or he’s, simply, a bad guy.  Since when don’t we owe our families our healthiest selves: mind, body and soul?

When I didn’t agree with her, the harrumph resounded across the land.

I’ve basically told people who call about weight that it is ultimately a simple issue: “eat less, move more.”  That might not result in the kind of body they show off in all those home exercise equipment videos (by the way…does anybody believe you go from fat and flabby, to svelte and ripped exercising 20 minutes a day, three times a week?).  Nonetheless, you can evolve into a more healthy, fit, and attractive version of yourself.

This is all in preparation for an inspirational story of a fat man, 330 pounds, who wanted become a Marine.  Their answer was, well, nope.  Committed as he was to joining the military, he did what is generally said to be too difficult to do: without miracle weight loss potions sold on television, he moved more and ate less.  The 23-year old man gave up beer, cut his food portions way, way down, and exercised 140 pounds away in about a year.

Kindly, the Marine recruiters also worked with him - helping him to develop an appropriate, safe yet effective workout regimen.

When his friends would sit down for beer and pizza, he’d put on a head lamp and go out for a run in the dark.

Eat less…move more.  It’s the least expensive weight management program on the planet.

Depressed People Assisted in Suicides

 Email This Post

Researchers at the Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) conducted a study published in the British Medical Journal that shows 26% of terminally ill patients in Oregon (with laws supporting doctor-assisted suicide) who requested a lethal cocktail were diagnosed as suffering depression, which is technically a treatable mental illness.

Wesley Smith, a leading euthanasia opponent, says that the “assisted suicide law’s guidelines are merely for show and do not protect the vulnerable or depressed people in Oregon. He adds that the proposed guidelines appearing on Washington’s ballot in November do not require a person’s depression to be treated before a lethal cocktail is issued.”

Rita Marker of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide says, “Let’s face the economic facts and force of economic gravity. If someone is depressed and they happen to be terminally ill too, it’s a lot cheaper to write a prescription for a deadly overdose of drugs than for medication to treat the depression, possible counseling to treat depression, and also medication to delay the death.”

No physician should agree to terminate someone’s life, even on their say-so, when they are suffering from a depression. If they were treated for that depression, a significant number would probably wish to squeeze out of their lives every precious moment with their loved ones that was possible. At least we ought to give them that opportunity.

Older Brains Helped By An Internet Workout

 Email This Post

According to a study being released in November’s American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, Internet web searching may just enhance brain activity and keep your elderly (55-75 years of age) brain working at top function.

The study compared 24 subjects between the ages of 55 and 75, and discovered using MRI scans that reading a book helped stimulate certain areas of the brain that had to do with language, memory, and visuals.  They also found that searching the Internet created these same stimulations, but activated more of the frontal, temporal, and cingulated areas of the brain - areas that have a lot to do with decision-making skills.

Can People Ever Really Change?

 Email This Post

A recent female caller wondered if she should stay with and even marry a guy who spent the full first year of their relationship being violent.

I immediately said, “You’re a grown woman.  If you want to play Russian Roulette with your life you have the right to do that.  Please, though, have your Fallopian tubes tied so that you can’t bring any babies into this situation to either be hurt directly or indirectly by a messed up, violent home-life.”

She wanted to know if people can change.  Well, the correct answer is….YES!  Of course people can change.  When people are motivated and disciplined and committed to being, thinking, and doing things differently, they can most definitely evolve in a positive direction.  It does take time and simply acknowledging the need for change is not (contrary to popular thought) 50% of the problem.  You all know that’s true because every one of you remembers making a New Year’s Resolution - which clearly acknowledges a need for change - and even a plan….which just evaporated with time and ennui.

Therefore, in the context of this woman’s call, a person prone to violence is not one who is going to make a quick change.  The caller wanted to know if there was hope that in the future…no matter how distant…that he could be different.  Well, sure - IF he makes the commitment and is committed long term to whatever it takes to change his way of looking at the world, intimate relationships, and his own identity.

An interesting fact is that when people do make such profound changes, they rarely are interested in the people who wanted them when they were less positively functional, as they recognize that it takes a less functional person to be attracted to same.  Said in a bit ‘o different way: emotionally healthy people, even though they may protest love and compassion, just don’t commit their lives to a recalcitrant, unwilling to change, difficult, or dangerous person.  It is because of their own sad inner dynamics that they find solace in being involved with an unhealthy person…it makes them feel needed or puts the responsibility for their unhappiness somewhere else or is simply a place to hide from the threat of not being capable of a good life.

This particular caller thanked me for my advice…I asked her to tell me what my advice was; she said, “I don’t want to play roulette with my life.”  I gave her kudos for making a healthy and good choice.  I also told her that she’d feel stupid for the time already spent, lonely for the company, scared of being alone, and more…but that this decision was still a healthy and good choice.

You see…she is the one in her life she had the power and the necessity to change; focusing on him was just a way to hide from that.

I love the beginning of happy endings…and that call was one of those.

You’d Better Get Your Flu Shot

 Email This Post

I never gave a second thought to the flu or prophylactic vaccines until that one day the symptoms hit like a sledge hammer.  I was in the middle of a counseling session, when my joints spontaneously began hurting.  All of a sudden, I started to feel so weak that I couldn’t believe it, and got a bit frightened.  I had to tell my client “I’m so sorry - I’m not feeling well.  We’ll have to finish this session some other time.”

I then called my husband to come and get me.  By the time I got home, the total body pain was so great I could barely tolerate getting my street clothes off and my p.j.’s on.  After that experience, I started getting my flu shots every year, and never had a recurrence.

Well, I’m here to nag you!  The flu-shot season has officially begun, and according to Dr. William Schaffner, President-elect of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, “People should start getting vaccinated now…yesterday, actually.”

There’s an ample supply of vaccine this year - somewhere between 143 to 146 million doses (more than ever before manufactured).  As you probably remember, last year’s vaccine was somewhat inadequate, because a surprise new influenza strain emerged.  The Centers for Disease Control (CDC)  has checked around the world where the flu virus is already circulating, however, and has found that this year’s vaccine is a good match.

For those of you who are stubborn about getting these shots, you should know that flu hospitalizes about 200,000 people a year, and kills about 36,000. 

You have a choice in vaccines.  The old fashioned flu shot is good for all ages, and the nasal vaccine FluMist can be used in healthy people aged 2 to 49. 
The CDC says that 261 million Americans qualify for the shot.  For the first time, the CDC is recommending that every child, age 6 months to 18 years, be inoculated, unless they have a serious egg allergy.  Any child under 9 years of age who is being vaccinated for the first time will need two doses, a month apart.  A single dose suffices for everyone else.

There are scads of local places to get flu shots, and you can find out where at www.findaflushot.com.

Why You Love Junk Food

 Email This Post

Asked by the Pew Research Organization why they choose to eat so much junk food, the respondents overwhelmingly say it’s due to its convenience.  The second most common reason is junk food’s good flavor, and the third reason is because it is so heavily advertised.  Fourth is its affordability, and the final reason why people eat so much junk food is “ignorance of food values.”  Yeah, I really believe that last reason!

Since approximately three-quarters of the respondents eat junk food out of convenience, it seems a good time for them to re-work their lives so that breakfast and dinner are family meals at home, and lunch is considered a lighter repast to keep the engines going during the day.

Want to really relieve stress?  Take off your figurative plate all the overscheduling - running around with too many activities and piling on too many responsibilities.  Two-career homes leave little time for the lovely, “home-y” amenities.  Rethink your lives and you’ll probably live longer, while being healthier and happier.  Having lots of personal possessions and living beyond your means is a disastrous recipe for stress that leads to all kinds of self-destructive behaviors.

The Government is Making Me Eat Healthily!

 Email This Post

All those who don’t follow the guidelines for good eating and no smoking are just going to have fewer choices available to them.  Free will to be self-destructive is about to managed by the government.

The Los Angeles City Council approved a one-year moratorium on new fast-food restaurants in a 32 square-mile area of South Los Angeles, an area plagued by above-average rates of obesity:  30% of adults, as compared with about 21% in the rest of LA.  Nationally, 25.6% of adults are obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

When you look at the realities, an intact family with a homemaker mom or dad (versus a two-career, busy, busy, busy set of parents) generally results in everyone eating less fast food, and more nutritious at-home meals.  But promoting marriage and a division of responsibilities is politically incorrect, isn’t it?

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill into law ordering that, as of 2010, no California restaurant will be able to serve foods containing a harmful form of fats called trans fats.  Baked goods containing trans fats will be banned in California as of 2011.  If a product’s list of ingredients contains the words “partially hydrogenated,” the product contains trans fat, which is used to harden vegetable oils into shortening and margarine to help extend product shelf life.  Trans fats lower “good” cholesterol (HDL) and contribute to other health problems.

According to the New England Journal of Medicine, eliminating artificial trans fats from the food supply “could” prevent between 6 and 19 per cent of heart attacks and related deaths each year. 

Do you think there’ll be an underground market for trans fat products?

San Francisco is ready to become the first city in the nation to ban sales of tobacco products at pharmacies, which last year accounted for almost 20% of U.S. tobacco sales.  The logic is that pharmacies are places people go to get healthy, so cigarettes ought not to be on the shelves as they are a known health hazard. 

Since trans fats are going to be off the supermarket shelves because they’re unhealthy, shouldn’t supermarkets stop selling cigarettes too?

I am all for healthy habits.  I work hard at eating as healthily as possible, generally ordering fish without sauces in restaurants and salad without dressing.  As sauces, gravies, and dressing are very high in calories, perhaps they should be banned from restaurant recipes, or ordered only under a physician’s approval…assuming you already have a very high HDL level.

Lastly, restaurants around the country will soon have to post on menus the exact calorie count of a meal.  It will blow your mind to see what you thought was healthy is actually loaded with hidden calories.  There’s a terrific book, called “Eat This, Not That” which will make your head explode when you find out where calories are hidden in some of your favorite meals.