Taking your health into your hands

My wife chided me to lose weight.  It took me too long to realize I needed assistance.

I dropped a bunch, dropped a bunch and got down to a healthy weight. Then slowly gained 30 pounds.  Depression, stress takes its toll and how you deal can deal your body and health quite a blow.

Fast forward to spring 2014.  I have dropped 10 pounds with an eye on the next 10.  I have been messing around with running and finally got to a point where I feel okay to experiment.  Positive steps all along the way.  The Depression is not a daily thing anymore, I actually have moments of joy, which feels really nice.

Anyways, taking control of your health means doing things that allow you to move.  Eat less, eat better, move more, exercise, walk, climb, play etc.

It also means getting your data.  All of us visit the doctor and have some tests at some time or another.  We need to get those notes and those tests and be familiar with them.  You are going to run into some Doctor who feels your LDL and HDL are out of balance and says you should have drug X added to your diet.  Now historically if your LDL and HDL are always at that level it could lead you to question genetics .vs. diagnosis.

My family and I are healthy with a lower level of iron then the average of the population.  We do not have any signs/symptoms of being anemic. However, if a doctor does a single blood test it will flag us for iron supplements which, if taken as prescribed, causes no end to tummy troubles.

That history and the family genetics trump the doctors single source, single sample data.  You need to know this in order to not let modern medicine make you sick.

Viva la Canada!

When you go to a foreign land, you expect there to be stark differences, which enhance the experience.  When my wife and I first travelled up north I noted the different grocery items and the colourful monies.  As we were at the Expo, there was no real chance to interact with Canadians doing Canadian things.

We came up to visit relatives for many years, I got a small taste here and there, but very limited as we mostly kept to ourselves and to the more touristy spots.  So it seemed to be an extension of the Pacific Northwest culture.

Now that I have fully immersed I keep finding more contrasts and more nuance in language then before. One of the best things is the politics.  No one up here is a member of a party, they do not register like they do in the states.  This seems to move the discussion from the US Good and Evil, to the arena of ideas.  Also, the government is more sensibly local then in the US. Most provinces do not want federal poking their nose in their business.  So Canadians are more interested in ideas instead of vilification, unless your in the Media...