The Picture of Health, part 2

How do we recognize health???  In part 1 of this blog, I discussed some basic qualitative measures of health, but this time I aim to discuss some basic quantitative measures.  This list does not represent optimal health, but should be considered a baseline that everyone should strive for.  These measurements are basic enough that EVERYONE can and should meet all of them.  If you don’t, you’ve got some work to do.

So let’s get to measuring!

Quantitative Measures:

• Blood work:  Here’s a list of recommended blood tests to have done.  Do you know where you’re numbers are at with these tests?  If not, get some blood work done and find out!
• Total Cholesterol 120-140
• HDL <50
• LDL 40-70
• LDL Size A large nonreactive
• Triglycerides 50-80
• A1c<5
• Blood Glucose <72
• C-Reactive protein <1.0
• Source: The Paleo Solution, by Robb Wolf, 2010
• For more information on cholesterol go here: http://chriskresser.com/cholesterol
• Body fat:
• General goal:  Here’s a general goal for body fat percentage.  There are a few ways to find out your body fat percentage like going to see your friendly local trainer (me?), or having hydrostatic body fat testing, or even the BOD POD.  If you don’t have easy access to any of these methods don’t worry, the next bullet point (waist to hip ratio) can function as the poor-man’s body fat measurement.  Again these numbers don’t represent ideal, but they do represent a minimum that everyone can and should reach.
• Women should be less than 25%
• Men should be less than 18%
• Source: http://www.bmi-calculator.net/body-fat-calculator/body-fat-chart.php
• Waist to Hip ratio:  Take your waist measurement at the smallest place (this should be just above your belly button), then take your waist measurement at the widest place.  Now take the waist measurement and divide it by the hip measurement.  Ratio’s higher than stated are typically indicative of insulin resistance, and are associated with cancer, heart attack, reduced fertility, and other malities.
• Women should be less than .7
• Men should be less than .9
• Source: The Paleo Solution, by Robb Wolf, 2010; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waist%E2%80%93hip_ratio

That’s my list of quantitative markers of basic health.  Again, this is by no means an exhaustive list, but a basic minimum we should all meet no matter our age or athletic ability.  How do you like this list, and what do you think of these markers?  Did I miss something, or just miss the mark on something?  Please let me know what you think…

                       

The Picture of Health, part 1

So, what is the picture of health?  Can you tell by looking at someone whether they’re healthy or not?  Which of these pictures make you think health?  How do these pictures make you feel?

The first of these pictures is a supermodel, who most certainly weighs the least of any of these pictures.  The next two pic’s are of Molly Galbraith (http://mollygalbraith.com/).  In the first pic(upper right) of her she was at one of the lowest bodyfat percentages of her life, yet admittedly felt horrible.  She said about that pic “I can remember feeling like every inch of my body had been beaten, and was bruised from head to toe”!  (Read more about that here: http://mollygalbraith.com/2013/07/extreme-leanness-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/) That doesn’t sound like health to me!  The next picture(lower left) is Molly again, at a much more manageable weight and bodyfat.  The last image is of a size 14 model which, as I understand it, is the size of the average American woman.  To me, this woman looks pretty healthy, yet our society might call her “thick” or even “chunky”.  From my perspective the two pictures on the bottom look more like “health” to me, than the two on the top.

That was an exercise to get you thinking about what “health” looks like, but mostly to get you realizing that “health” is much more than what we see with our eyes, and cannot be measured with one single measure like weight or bodyfat percentage.  Take for example the two pictures of Molly Galbraith…  If you saw those two side by side, you may automatically assume that she’s more healthy in the pic on the left, because she’s more lean.  For that matter you might think that the first picture of Molly better represents “health” than the picture of the size 14 model because she’s obviously more lean.  I hope the fact that she said she felt like complete crap when that photo was taken will get you thinking twice about either of those notions. 

So, how do we recognize health???  Previously, I talked about The Journey To Health and denying perfectionism on the way to health, but what are we actually striving for and how do we know when we’re there?

First, let me say I don’t think we’re ever “there”…  Aspiring to be healthy is a never ending story (not this one: http://youtu.be/3khTntOxX-k), and there is ALWAYS something you could do better.  That said I think there are ways for us to measure either qualitatively or quantitatively whether or not we’re healthy, and that’s what I’ll attempt to outline here.  What follows is what I consider to be some baseline measurements for health.  Do I mean that if you don’t meet all of these metrics you’re not “healthy”???  Well no, not exactly.  I would say that you should me most of these metrics, and more importantly you should know which ones you meet and don’t meet.  Because after all, knowing IS half the battle!  A big piece of the healthfulness puzzle is understanding what areas you need to improve on.  Understanding your strengths and weaknesses, and addressing those weaknesses in a systematic fashion is what we should all strive to do.  I think we can all agree that this approach is a lot better than making some vague and/or unreachable new years resolution every year, then failing to follow through.  Or worse yet, just never addressing what’s wrong with us, and continuing to live blind (and without health).

So without further a due, here is the first half of my very basic list of health markers:

Qualitative Measures:

• Proper Exercise: Do you get regular (3+ times per week) exercise?  Do you move regularly (ie-walking, playing, etc.)?  If you exercise regularly, do you make sure to get enough quality rest to recover properly between sessions?  Are you keeping some athletic skills polished (ie- sports skills, gymnastic skills, etc.)?  To be able to check this box, you need to answer yes to all of these questions.  Here’s some basic guidelines:
• Exercising enough, but not too much: More 2 days/week; less than 7
• Lots of low intensity movement: Walking or other slow movement 5+ days/week for 30+ minutes
• Some strength training: Between 2 and 5 strength training session/week
• Some high intensity training: Between .5 and 4 high intensity sessions/week
• Proper recovery: this has many pieces including sleep, diet, and mobility covered elsewhere in this article; here I’ll just say you should take at least 1 day off/week, and more days will be needed if those other things aren’t dialed.
• Maintaining adequate strength: 5 pushups, 35 air squats, ¾ bodyweight deadlift, and 1 pullup are the minimums
• Aerobic capacity: Jog a mile in 10 minutes or less
• Skill: Maintain some sort of sport-specific skill whether it’s golf, bowling, softball, skiing, or otherwise at an average (or above) level.
• For more information on this topic: http://chriskresser.com/9-steps-to-perfect-health-7-move-like-your-ancestors

• Proper Eating:  Do you eat mostly proteins and veggies?  Is it rare for you to eat processed food from a box or package?  Do you mostly keep sugar, grains, and alcohol out of your diet?  To be able to check this box, you need to answer yes to all of these questions.  Here’s some basic guidelines:
• Diet of whole foods: Lots of lean protein, lots of veggies, some fruits, some good fats, cheats and treats (processed foods, sugar, grains, alcohol) are 20% of your intake or less.
• Eating enough, but not too much: when eating a diet of whole foods, most people can just eat until they’re full and not overeat; when cheating or enjoying treats we should be conscious of not overeating.
• For more information on this topic: http://robbwolf.com/what-is-the-paleo-diet/

• Healthy Sleep:
• Sleep enough: 7-8 hours in completely dark room
• Aim wake up without an alarm clock (I know…I know…)
• For more information on this topic: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/the-definitive-guide-to-sleep/

• Healthy Joints:
• To call a joint healthy it should move in a full range-of-motion without pain; we should strive to achieve this with ALL joints in the body
• Adequate mobility: Be able to perform the duties of your life (job, workouts, sports, etc.) safely and without pain or discomfort, by maintaining adequate mobility (range of motion, and stability) to accomplish the required tasks.
• Perform “basic maintenance” on ourselves: Stretching, mobility exercises (next bullet point), and seeking treatment (massage, chiropractic, PT, etc.) as needed for maintenance.
• For more information on this topic: http://www.mobilitywod.com/

That’s my list of qualitative markers of basic health.  Again, this is by no means an exhaustive list, but a basic minimum we should all meet no matter our age or athletic ability.  In part two of this blog I’ll share my list of quantitative measures of health.  Look for that next week…

How do you like this list, and what do you think of these markers?  Did I miss something, or just miss the mark on something?  Please let me know what you think…

Every Day, In Every Way, We Get A Little Better

Growing up I was never a great athlete, in fact in most sports I wasn’t much above average and that remains true to this day.  That said I did work hard on my conditioning and training in the second half of high school and into college.  That resulted in me getting in pretty darn good shape, which had me thinking I should make an attempt to play college football.  I walked on at Southern Oregon University, and trained with them through their winter conditioning program and spring football practices.  At that point I was cut from the team, and my dream of going from small college walk on, to NFL star took a serious blow.  Even though I didn’t make the team, the 6+ months I spent training with those guys had an impact on me.  I learned a lot about what a college level strength and conditioning program should look like, and I also learned some of the finer points of coaching.  The head coach at SOU at that time was Jeff Olson, and he had a saying he used at practice all the time…  “every day in every way, we get a little better”.  That saying has been bouncing around in my head for 11 or 12 years now, and I’ve even used it at plenty of practices I was coaching, but I’m writing today to tell you why that saying is dead wrong…

My problem with this saying is really just with the middle part, and the implications that come with that middle part.  I would like the saying just fine if it was just “every day we get a little better”, but that doesn’t have the kind of rhythm as saying needs to become a good chant!  Here’s the thing though…  I see people all the time who are paralyzed by perfectionism, and I used to be in the same place.  I’ve gone through multiple periods in my life where I lost a bunch of weight.  The only way to do that, is to have multiple times in your life where you gain a bunch of weight.  The times when I’ve gained weight have always started with getting “too busy” to get to the gym, which has rolled into an extended period of doing nothing, which has rolled into an extended period of eating like crap.  See I always used to battle this all or nothing mentality where I told myself that if I couldn’t train like a competitive athlete, then it wasn’t worth doing anything.  Additionally I had a mentality that if I wasn’t working out like a beast, I might as well eat whatever I want cause I’m going to gain weight anyway.  It’s sounds completely ridiculous to write it out, but that’s the way my head used to work.  Would I have been better off spending some time walking each day even if I was really “too busy” to get to the gym??  Yes…  Would I have been better off getting to the gym a couple of days a week, and doing what I could, instead of quitting altogether when I felt I didn’t have time to train like a competitive athlete???  For sure!  Would I have been better off eating clean while I wasn’t exercising???  Most definitely!!  I was paralyzed by all-or-nothing thinking, which is a form of perfectionism.

I hear and read people all the time who say “I don’t have time for exercise right now”, or “I don’t have money to eat healthy” (all-or-nothing).  I also hear and read people over-analyzing the details of eating plans, so much so that they paralyze themselves trying to figure out the most minute details (paralysis-of-analysis).  Lastly, I’ve come across so many people who make some positive changes, but the first time they slip up they fall completely off the wagon (perfection-or-bust).  In my mind all three of these types of excuses are very closely related.  Whether you’re an all-or-nothing person, a paralysis-of-analysis person, or a perfection-or-bust person, it’s time to give up the ghost!

  

We don’t need to improve every day in every way to continue heading in the right direction.  We don’t need to train like an NFL athlete in the off-season to improve our fitness.  We don’t have to worry about whether green beans are paleo, to improve our eating habits.  And we don’t have to do everything right all the time to be improving our health.

Today you will have an opportunity to make a few hundred decisions, which will impact your health.  In my mind if you made one more positive decision today than you did yesterday, then today was a success.  In fact if you made ANY positive decisions for your health, then today was a success!  Give yourself praise for the positive choices and changes you make, and forget about the mistakes.  It’s a marathon not a sprint, and every step you take gets you closer to where you’re headed.

What did you do for your health today?  If you can’t come up with an answer to that question, what’s holding you back?  If it’s some form of perfectionism, let go of that, and move forward one small step at a time.