Stress, Head and Body Aches, and General Health Issues

In the coming months, I have big plans to explore the subject of stress and how it relates to health. I heard a doctor on a podcast, just yesterday, say that perhaps 80% of health issues may be stress related. Don’t ask me to cite the study or even tell you my source. I was listening to it while working out. The podcast was Dr. Chaterjee’s Feel Better, Live More, and his guest was Dr. William Li. Dr. Chaterjee has a great podcast and compelling guests, by the way.

So, stress was what I was talking about. Stress is a killer, and we will explore more about that another day. Today, I want to talk about some ways to mitigate that stress. Although we will talk about it at length another time, everyone is familiar with things that cause their own stress. Right now, my stress is related to school, both mine and the kids, business and finances, busyness, and just all the demands of this modern world.

What can I recommend as a fellow victim to this stress? This cause of literal headaches? This monster of body aches, weight gain, and general exhaustion? Maybe I should start by reframing that. I’m not a victim of stress. I’m a combatant, a warrior standing against this common enemy.

One of the first things in our strategy against this force is to not make things worse. How do we make things worse? One of the most frequent ways we make things worse is our diet. Now, in this context, diet is not that nasty four-letter word. By diet, I mean anything you eat. Without getting into a whole big thing, eat less processed food, including fast food, and most restaurants. I realize this requires some more time, and time may be a stressor. Take heart, with some good planning, even I can do better, and I’m sure you can too. I’ve learned a thing or two since I became a certified nutrition coach, so feel free to reach out. 

One thing I swore I would never do is fasting. All the benefits to be explored at length in another article; however, one of the huge things intermittent fasting helps me with is I only have to plan one meal a day. If I would have read that even three months ago, I would have moved on. Stay with me. Fasting has so many benefits, including fostering ketosis (burning fat), autophagy (your body’s recycling system to get rid of inefficient pieces of cells), better insulin resistance, and increased immunity. I just love everything I have learned about fasting and can’t wait to write that article.

After not making things worse through our diet, what can we do? Exercise. Plain and simple, we need to move. This not only helps circulate blood and promote breathing, but by moving more, our immunity is better through circulating the lymph carrying away toxins. Do any form of movement: walk a little more, play a recreational sport, garden, anything to move more. If you need help to either motivate or plan in this area, I am here to help. I’ve had some experience motivating people to be physical, as a former sergeant in the US Army. That said, I am a certified personal trainer, and I can help anyone who just wants to be healthier, right here in our training room. If you are more advanced, and need a gym and more specific training, I can refer to some very qualified trainers.

So, I mentioned diet and exercise. What else? Of course I am a little biased, but there are also many studies showing the benefits of massage therapy on stress. If you follow some of the other recommendations, such as exercise, you may physically benefit from massage therapy also. As a student in the professional program at the College of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine, Medical Qi Gong is part of our curriculum. It is a great way to mitigate stress, and I am always happy to share that knowledge with my clients. If you have made it this far in the article, I thank you. To show my appreciation, if you mention this article, I will give you 40% off the listed price of massage services (one time for mentioning this article, and applies only to John at New Beginnings Massage and Wellness, LLC/New Beginnings Performance), regardless if you are a new or returning client. During your appointment, I am happy to answer any questions or consult with you about personal training or nutrition services.