Social Distancing! What The Dickens Do I Do Now?

Social Distancing at Its’ Best…Perfect time to practice reducing stress & building health equity!

Right now, having a strong immune system is most likely at the forefront of everyone’s mind but we should all be more concerned with our level of STRESS!

The time to build a strong immune system is long before you need it. The time to boost your immune system is now. But it’s never too late to start and that starting point is to reduce stress or at least learn to manage it…and yes, I know the kids now have a 5 month long ‘summer’ vacation!

Stress accounts for up to 80% of doctors visit. Except, it shows up in the form of diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, anxiety, depression etc. The main thing you can do for your overall health, is learn how the body handles stress and apply this knowledge of stress management to your unique self. Start with testing your adrenals. Then supplement with adrenal support and other modalities such as yoga or medication.

Your adrenals are two tiny grape size glands located above your kidneys. They are designed to only handle acute stress. When chronic everyday stress persists, they get worn out. Understanding and supporting them while working on reducing and removing stressors is how to build a strong immune system. There are four key lifestyle pillars to building resilience - NUTRITION. EXERCISE. SLEEP. THERAPY for STRESS REDUCTION. In practice they all fall under STRESS REDUCTION!

Mental, emotional and nutritional stress, overwork your adrenals and can severely weaken your immune system, even more so if you’ve experienced a tragic life event or struggle with a chronic illness. About 80% of your immune system is in your gut (GALT). Over 90 percent of your feel good, serotonin hormone is also made in your gut. If you told me this a few years ago while I was only practicing pharmacy, dispensing antidepressant, I would have quietly dismissed.

Now, seeing the results I get with my clients by focusing on gut health and stress using Lifestyle Medicine, Functional Nutrition & supplementation still amazes me.

A simple at home indicative test is to check your blood pressure after a few minutes of lying down then test again upon standing. Normally, your blood pressure should rise 10-20 points. If it drops, particularly by 10 points or more, weakened adrenals is indicated.

Nutrition and health have become some of the most confusing topics in science. With any search one can find millions of results, both for and against, all with articles and proven studies to support…

As a pharmacist and functional nutrition practitioner I believe that the answers are quite simple and anything that makes it more complicated is stressful and due to my practical and pragmatic nature, such complications are either effectively distilled or set aside, because the ultimate goal is to reduce stress.

In future blogs I will endeavor to simplify as much as possible, but for now, here’s a picture of what’s in my immune boosting, virus fighting arsenal stash. And yes, not pictured, but definitely included in my arsenal kit are my immune boosting infrared sauna and homemade garlic ear oil, complete with a ‘get that lymphatic drainage system moving’ bounce on the mini-trampoline. Shhhhh! There’s the added plus of getting them to do some heart rate boosting exercise.

I hope my stash, as well as yours will remain stashed!

Prevention is always better than cure!

Wash your hands. Often.

No hands in face!

Be safe.

Thanks for your unwavering support!

p.s. blogging is absolutely foreign to me. Please excuse any unmet expectations. I’m sure to get better with time :-)

Deluge Health Spa

there’s health…then there’s everything else!