From My Heart to Your Body / Mind / Spirit if YOU Spend Time and Energy Reading This

Since it's the Friday before Valentine's Day, I was already preparing yesterday to write about heart health here today, and was watching Dr. Oz, as he was working with a bunch of fire fighters who had asked for an intervention basically, about the way they ate around the fire house.  My head was spinning about that, because it just seems so obvious that our tax dollars in 2010 should be going to buy foods for our firefighters that make the WELL prepared to do their jobs that day as well as for a long time (as they're expensive to train and invaluable with their experience the more they've been on the job to partner with the newer incoming staff).  They have health insurance provided via tax-funded means and so you would just think that 'the system' would be set up long ago, since the information has CLEARLY been available for decades now, to have reduced medical costs for their insurers. 

In theory, their insurance plans would then be cheaper for their municipalities.  So I was very involved in thinking how MESSED UP our entire systems are in this country and how long a road it is going to be to get health care on track.  It's almost like it's going to need to just totally fall apart and start over.  I hate to think about what that is going to entail; it's going to literally be like the Haiti earthquake here in a way, and that is frightening to me.  I had the opportunity two years ago to be learning about 'systems theory' from a family and family therapist who comes at relationship difficulties with his expertise in that area.  I'm finding it very helpful today when projecting what might happen with the US system and with the systems of people that are discovering Lumigrate and our 'integrative medicine'. 

How can you have a group of human beings, held hostage for multi-day shifts where you can really influence their health through eating, who presumably have to show receipts for their purchases at the grocery store when they shop on 'the people's money', who work for governments that employ dietitians for other branches, and not be regulating what they eat?  If firefighters -- 'the good guys' of every community, who are at least average if not above average educated, incomed, and lifestyle 'balanced' people can be where they are at with things related to eating and health, how are we ever going to have effects with the public 'at large'?  Systems theory will say that a system can't change very much, so when I saw what the 'consultant' Dr. Oz had on was suggesting they do to change their eating, I literally was standing there thinking 'how can this show be so right on one day and then do something like this the next?' when the program was interrupted to say President Clinton had been hospitalized for what we later found out was a stent surgery to open one of the four blocked arteries they'd bypassed six years ago, since one of those was totally blocked.  As the late-night news shows had medical experts saying it wasn't his current stress or eating that caused it, I kept waiting to hear 'and this is a great example of how once you have a health problem that turns into a major one, you're better off to have done prevention before it became a problem in the first place.'  I still haven't heard that said anywhere, so thought I'd take care of that right here, right NOW. 

And by the way, I also thought related to the cooking/eating consulting for firefighters: "I'd really like to know what Deirdre Rawlings would set them up with, Lumigrate's featured nutrition expert who is a naturopathic doctor, certified health coach, and has a PhD too!  Somehow I think that her and our teaming up is going to do a lot of good in the future, for a LOT of people.  I know I've already learned from her, and I've only known of her for a month or so!

Health care as an industry, which then includes the people/consumers in the "You model" of Lumigrate's home page in my way of teaching the occupation of health care to the public and professionals increasingly finding their way here and tuning in, requires a 'deep soul searching', per the great philosopher and physician, Deepak Chopra.  Dr. Oz last week, on the wonderful Oprah show he guested about diabetes, said the costs of diabetes alone in the US, if people overall continue with the consumption of foods that have been provided and popularized (and now are our 'habit'), will bankrupt health care in the U.S., leading to under treatment of other conditions.  And if you haven't noticed -- this has been happening for a while.  People haven't had as good medical care here for many years as they did in the past. 

For myself, I can track it back to about the time health maintenance organizations came along in Colorado, which I thought made 'so much sense', but in effect what happened was the cycle of shorter appointments due to less reimbursement was beginning, which is when the doctors started only having time to greet, discuss the outward problem, and hand a prescription, generally speaking.

I didn't spend enough time thinking it through perhaps, and at that time I was healthy (or at least I thought, though I now know I had adrenal fatigue brought on by chronic stress both mental and physical via food allergies of the relatively unknown  "IgG type" and an averse reaction to a 'bad vaccine'.   Our University's going to an HMO meant my husband couldn't venture to the teaching hospital in his home state that had taken care of his complex medical issues for the last 10 years since his troubles were finally discovered with the advent of the CT scan.  That ended up being a good thing, because he'd suspected they might be 'oversurgerying' him, and he had picked up MRSA in his brain fluid in what turned out to be his last surgery with them at the time that he and I had started dating. 

See, I've been 'at this game' since I was 25, which is literally half my lifetime.  So I want MY experience and knowledge to help YOU and millions of others potentially, not have to go through what I have.  Prior to that, when he was a graduate student, his health care costs had been $500/month.  That lead him to drop out of his PhD program, and in my opinion it allowed him to join a project that really needed his talents, as it needed mine, but our marriage ended over our both wanting to go back to finish our degrees.  Just as I would go to great lengths back then to make something happen for my personal education and life, I also would for my health.  I'm not aggressive about such things anymore and I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing as I ponder it, and will have to come back and give that more thought. 

Maybe I was influenced about HMOs when I first heard about 'the movement', by my own very good experience with the HMO-style clinic my father's employer provided all of us when they were a thriving company.  But that was the company itself paying for the clinic and the providers and wanting to have healthier employees with healthier families -- socialism on a small scale, basically.  Very different when it is an insurance company paying a medical provider who owns a private sector clinic.  But after the 'big run' of our country's post World War II economy and a bad decision made by the company's primary administrator about whether radial tires were a "flash in the pan" or here to stay, even that program changed and looking back on the medical treatment I received later on, it's appalling to me.  

The last time I went there was as a teen when I was blacking out every time I stood up and they did a three hour blood sugar test on me, finding it was down to 60 at hour #3 after going up into the diabetic range initially.  But 60 wasn't 'low', but the doctor didn't order a longer (meaning more $ to them) test and sent us out the door saying I was going to be diabetic as an adult.  It turns out that after another year or so of blacking out I went to the regular doctor in our mountain community because it was so very obvious that I had not been in good hands with the previous doctor and clinic if 'they' couldn't figure out the trajectory of a blood sugar swinging up and down like that and order a longer test, and the five hour test was ordered which showed my sugar going to 37.  No WONDER I was feeling like I was about to have seizures sometimes!

The 'big bummer' is that if you look today at the blog post about the book 'Adrenal Fatigue' ("Search" on Adrenal Fatigue in the upper right corner of this page when you're done here) and find that book to read from the library or order it if you have the money, or for most people "chose to spend $15-25 on a book instead of something else", as I did a year or so ago, you'll learn that blood sugar thing of my teens was a symptom of 'adrenal fatigue'.  Which is what leads to fibromyalgia, which has made me 'uninsurable' and cost me extensively in time, energy and money for the majority of my adult life.  And I am no different than anyone who has it, and anyone who has any chronic illness that 'gets the upper hand'.  Fortunately, I have it turned around and 'managed' now, and due to some other good fortune I have an open heart about people and their health care, and sincerely want what is best for people and their health through learning about integrative medicine's approach to 'higher health'. 

The costs of diabetes is a major factor why Michelle Obama planted a garden last year and this year launched an initiative about childhood obesity, I'm figuring. It takes fifteen years from the time someone becomes 'diabetic' to when they become expensive and their body shows the real results of "bearing the burden" from the damage done to high sugar in the blood. Are you going to care about your blood sugar today so that you can be healthy in fifteen years?  And I need to ask myself that question as well.  Because for so many years I felt better if I didn't eat, I developed a habit of not eating, and since I spent most of my youth having low blood sugar I'm kind of used to that as well.  But I know full well that not eating frequently enough is certainly not helping my health right now.  Is that my only 'bad habit'?  Probably not, but I also concentrate on what I manage and balance fairly well, and overall I'm doing things well.  But I could do better with chosing to work less and take care of myself more.  Right now I want to get this posted so that people can learn today.  And then I'll eat.  Maybe should have taken a ten minute break at noon (an hour ago).  Tomorrow I'll try it and see if the world still spins! (Where I WILL write about heart health, as I have some good information about it.)

Dr Oz credited Oprah last week -- and keep in mind this is one of the best cardiovascular surgeons in the US, learning from a television talk show personality, and businesswoman phenomenon, that people change based on what they FEEL, not what they KNOW. That's kind of important for the medical industry to know, wouldn't you think?  How is it we aren't taught that in our training programs?  Advertising knows that -- why do you think they plan on our emotions for humor or tears so much?  My challenge with Lumigrate, I had been confiding in 'my team', is to figure out how to motivate people now and hopefully EARLY ON, when they are not yet in a health care crisis, and provide good education that they integrate into their lives, not just read and don't 'do'.  The firemen ALL have the knowledge about how they were eating, yet they only now decided to 'do' something different. 

Paula King's "Strategies for Lasting Change" has been a video available on Lumigrate.com since the website was formulated for that reason, at my request, to address the issue of 'resistance', a psychological term.  And it's always good to see when someone invests the $20 and downloads an hour-long seminar ("streamlined" time-wise, it's only an hour!), as it includes a guided imagery exercise ('progressive') by a valid provider who is FUN.  (Those are Lumigrate's four main concepts for information.) However, generally, the people who are really 'using' Lumigrate, and we've gotten to share with them their changes and improvements, do so when they are scared.  I'll never forget the day I saw someone multiply downloading the same video which clued me they were having a problem and I contacted them.  The person had just returned home from the doctor and found out 'diabetes' was now a factor!  That person has really moved forward, against the established, archaic allopathic model unfortunately, and is looking at a much better 2010 than prior to Lumigrate.  People also reach out more when their pain has then in a bad place, or they are fed up with their low energy, or have just 'lost something' they valued in their personal or professional life.  In other words, they are generally inspired when being in a 'bad place' and not a 'preventive place'. 

Thinking about President Clinton AND the firemen who belatedly got on the food wagon yesterday, finally acting on information that we ALL have had presented to us for years and decades before, what can we learn from this?  That the expensive and painful surgical procedures that are thankfully there to rescue us down the road maybe are 'too little, too late' and not all that preferable if you REALLY want to live a long and healthy life with reduced health care costs to your bank account, the insurances and taxpayers who end up supplementing or paying the tabs entirely increasingly.  Is his wife's delaying her trip to the middle east by a day really worth the damage done years and decades ago when he was choosing to ignore the information he clearly knew about diet and exercise and heart disease/ heart health in our paradigm of 'integrative medicine'.   Perhaps a local public figure, such as firemen or a world leader such as President Clinton's experience can speak to YOU today and, combined with reading this, start you on your road to 'higher health'.  Perhaps you'll hear MY heart speaking through this unusually grinchy blog and get it together.  Maybe I'll get more inspired and re-activated about where I want to be with my life as well.  (2009 was a really difficult year for me overall, but still -- 'no excuses') 

Finally, I see something VERY concerning, causing me to pick up the phone and call one of my advisers yesterday:  People are mostly coming to Lumigrate and reading and watching perhaps, but then continuing to talk over on facebook (where I LOVE to see people go and interact and get to know each other and foster ideas they then come and write or read more about in the Forums) about where they are today.  Mostly these are people who have fibromyalgia and chronic pain, and are they taking the time to take advantage of the FREE blog information, links, products ideas, forum areas (and links out), and free videos?  (Let alone the small % of content that is a small charge.)

Are they 'taking action' and reading, thinking, DOing, or are they going back to play games on facebook, and sending gifts around to each other? Are they going to discussion boards and reinforcing what they knew yesterday and spending their time that way instead of more time learning right NOW and in their future moments, days and years?  I think about the expense that health care workers went through to learn what they know to help people that come to them and then how little the consumers spend in time, energy, and money on their own 'self help'.  Granted, we need to supply good and economically feasible information to providers and to the public in my opinion, and that is my ultimate goal with Lumigrate.  But it does NO GOOD if each one of YOU don't do your part.  

Earlier today I commended someone for their active role in their health last year which has them off of pharmaceuticals for cardiovascular issues and well controlled, inspired through the 'integrative model'  you experience here on Lumigrate.  I took the time the other day to send a link to my sister and request she print something out for my father to read about probiotics and foods for gut health, as half or so of our immune system is 'in the gut' (it was a link to a blog post I wrote in the past about Dr. Lepisto's presentation).  

So here it is, another Valentine's Day later, and there is a HEALTHIER HEART because of Lumigrate, and I hope by talking about a "regular guy" who simply changed from the allopathic model to the "integrative medicine model" (which can include pharmaceuticals, but it is the LAST resort and not the FIRST resort), it might inspire you. If not, I hope that seeing a world leader benched at an important time in what is really only his later mid-life inspires you, as well as seeing what changes he DID make once he got the 'stuff' scared out of him six years ago.  And if you see your firefighters shopping at the store, or rescuing your neighbor from a fall as I did recently, thank them for their service and suggest that they check out Lumigrate if they're interested in a website they can spend some time on when at the firehouse.  We have a developing food education area, and a Yenta and hopefully in the near future much more as groups find us and develop areas for their interests.  Perhaps we should start one for firefighters and see what happens!  We'd LOVE it if they would contribute, so that we can contribute to their better health and well-being this Valentine's Day and every other day. 

~~ With Love from My Heart to Your Eyes (and hopefully body / mind / spirit)   ~~~    Mardy

Links to areas of Lumigrate YOU might learn from if you take the time:

Products: www.lumigrate.com/page/products [1]

Videos: www.lumigrate.com/catalog/seminars [2] (Would make a lovely gift for your loved ones for Valentines, and several are free).

Blog: www.lumigrate.com/blog [3]

Forums: www.lumigrate.com/forum [4] (note: the top area has 'What YOU Can Do To Get the Word Out', How to Write in Lumigrate, Discussions about the videos, and below that is an area to share ideas of how to utilize facebook and other social media and the Internet for health care progression).