Category: Physical Fitness

Coping with COVID: Emotions and Grief Relief

Do you feel as though you’re being overwhelmed by your emotions and are barely able to cope with the COVID crisis that’s unhinged your world?

If you answer “yes” you’re not alone. Even the most “together” of us are experiencing a whirlwind of emotions. Emotions we don’t understand and are struggling to handle.

Do any of these feel familiar?

  • Anger
  • Fear
  • Isolation
  • Disillusionment
  • Anxiety
  • Sadness
  • Self-blame
  • Guilt
  • Apprehension
  • Suspicion
  • Hyper-vigilance
  • Scared
  • Separation
  • Depression
  • Pain (physical)
  • Numbness
  • Doubt
  • Dread

 

All of the above are classically categorized as “negative” emotions.

What about any “positive” emotions you might be feeling? Like:

  • Joy
  • Peace
  • Gratitude
  • Understanding
  • Compassion
  • Motivation (to help others)
  • Trust (in faith, family, friends)
  • Deepening faith
  • Generosity
  • Empathy
  • Conviction
  • Patience
  • Kindness

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Importance of validating Emotions—

You’ve likely heard when you were a child that there are “good” emotions and “bad” emotions, or at least gotten that impression based on something a parent or family member said or implied.

As a grief recovery chaplain, I’m going to tell you that it’s a travesty and healing hindrance to label them that way.

Why?

Because emotions just are. They’re feelings. And feelings aren’t good or bad. They are normal reactions to outside or internal stimuli—like death, loss, change, trauma, physical illness or injury, and shock.

When we label emotions good or bad, we often try to dismiss them or accentuate them. Other people may help us in that dismissing or accentuating (playing into) process; and they may shut us down from sharing or expressing them. But I’m going to encourage you!

 

Validate your feelings even if no one else will.

 

When you validate your feelings, you’re better able to identify those emotions and the root cause for them, evaluate them, and avoid being hampered by them or stuck in them.

We validate our emotions without letting them rule our lives.

Emotions are innocent. We must try to avoid making value statements about them, and thinking or making value statements about the emotions others experience.

Because that’s where things tend to go wrong—when we either demean our emotion or get stuck in an emotion and can’t let go of it.

Your varying emotions will come and go. That’s normal. Having an emotion doesn’t mean something is wrong with you.

But they can overtake you in a variety of ways.

And dismissing or hanging on to them can cause short and long-term problems.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Emotions and Physical Symptoms—

Emotions, and the mind-body neurochemical reaction to them, often trigger physical symptoms—headaches, backaches, stomach issues, sleep disturbances, inability to concentrate, allergies, asthma, and a host of other ailments.

The mind and body are really interconnected, and rarely does something happen in one system that doesn’t cause a chain reaction in the other. Perceived external or internal threats can take over every cell in our body.

Who hasn’t experienced a situation where abrupt fear hasn’t caused our heart rate to skyrocket, our blood pressure to sore, and our breathing to race?

It’s the old term many of you are familiar with: psychosomatic. Brain and body.

And many of the stresses we’re experiencing right now in this COVID19 crisis can dredge up emotions from old wounds and events we thought we’d healed from or moved past.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The purpose of validating our emotions—

As Dr. James Gordon, author of the book The Transformation, points out, there is a process to validating and understanding our emotions and dealing with them.

  • The first step is to pay attention to your emotions.
  • Then clearly see the messages they’re bringing to you.
  • Work with what the emotions can teach or reveal to you.
  • See what ways you can grow through and beyond the emotion to heal.

 

As I noted above, it’s not a good idea to try to suppress your emotions. When we do that, we usually end up creating more physical and psychological problems for ourselves.

What we can do is use our imaginations and creativities to discover what to do with these emotions. Keeping a journal helps in this process.

So how can we best identify, validate and respond to these wild emotions?

At the end of this post, I’ll give you several tips for validating and releasing your emotions and the stress they can cause. I’ll give you several tips today and more in the following weeks.

To keep you from getting stuck in your emotions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What does validating emotions have to do with grief?

Many of us are experiencing grief right now, and we don’t know it.

We can recognize grief by identifying and validating our emotions.

 

How do we know it’s grief?

To understand the answer to that question, let’s look at the definition of grief The Grief Recovery Institute experts provide us:

 

Grief is the conflicting feelings caused by a change or an end in a familiar pattern of behavior.

 

  • Changes in living arrangements—lockdowns, quarantines, new environments.
  • Loss of familiarity—schedule changes, loss of daily or weekly gatherings
  • Tangible or intangible losses, obvious or hidden—family members, friendships, belongings, jobs.

 

As C.S. Lewis so poignantly noted in his book A Grief Observed:

“No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing.

At other times it feels like being mildly drunk, or concussed. There is a sort of invisible blanket between the world and me. I find it hard to take in what anyone says. Or perhaps, hard to want to take it in. It is so uninteresting. Yet I want the others to be about me. I dread the moments when the house is empty. If only they would talk to one another and not to me.”

 

Do any of these emotions and sensations sound familiar to you?

We have a sense of numbness, a decreased ability to concentrate. Maybe a decreased ability to care about anything going on around us. A struggle to get up, maintain a schedule and slog through our boring, same-old, same-old day.

Maybe our eating habits have gone awry. We have no appetite, or too much of one. We nibble and snack and indulge out of fear or boredom. Because we have nothing to do, no more reason to maintain a healthy weight. Or no motivation to do it.

I’ve noticed on some of my ZOOM calls that people aren’t paying as much attention to their appearances. They can’t get their hair cut. They’re not interested in showering. For weeks makeup has languished in a bathroom drawer. They’re living in underwear or clothes they haven’t changed or washed in days.

But they’re washing their hands raw and sanitizing every surface in their homes several times a day.

They’re overwhelmed by their emotions and their bodies’ responses.

 

Something unordinary occurred, and the body responded to the “conflicting feelings caused by a change or an end in a familiar pattern of behavior.”

We’re responding to painful—sometimes overwhelmingly so—information and a pandemic that no action could have fully or properly prepared us for.

Even though countries have experienced pandemics before, little can prepare us for the emotional reactions we each have to this particular pandemic, and how it’s being handled.

It’s important to remember that these responses are normal.

It’s okay to have them. It’s when we don’t have them that we should worry.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dealing with emotions and grief: focusing on small, correction actions—

Over the next several weeks, I’m going to give you some tips to help you uncover, validate and deal with emotions and your changes and losses. Confront your grief and heal.

But before we delve into this arena, we need to cover several bases.

 

  1. First, please don’t ever compare your loss with someone else’s; and don’t allow someone to compare her grief to yours.

Everyone handles her loss in her way. There is no “larger” loss to make yours seem small; no “smaller” loss to make yours feel larger or more significant.

A loss is a loss. Depending upon our ages, life experiences and faith, each of us handles our losses differently. Don’t ignore them and don’t grade them.

 

  1. Don’t expect time to heal you, or others. It’s not time that heals (a common statement and fallacy). It’s actions that bring healing.

The Grief Recovery Institute experts say,

“The false belief that time heals is probably the single largest impediment to recovery from loss of any kind.”

 

Instead, remember that:

“Recovery from grief or loss is achieved by a series of small and correct action choices made by the griever.”

For me, seeing a baby girl reminds me of my precious baby Victoria, and that memory still brings stabbing pain to my heart. The brain remembers, and it doesn’t ask permission before releasing memory chemicals of and pain response into my system. Sadness, remorse and regret automatically overtake me. If I allow those emotions to overwhelm me, depression will drip through my system until I’m overwhelmed by it.

But if I don’t try to stuff it and, instead, acknowledge it, note it, validate it and remind myself that sadness is a perfectly reasonable reaction to still have to my daughter’s death—and the trauma surrounding it—I’m okay.

I’m acknowledging I’m normal.

Like that event, I think many of us are going to be taking small, correct—healing—actions after this pandemic is long gone and parsed out in the history books.

 

  1. Understand that grief is a normal and natural reaction to any loss. It’s not a “pathological condition nor a personality disorder.”

But in the heat of a crisis, don’t be surprised if you find yourself having odds thoughts, performing odd behaviors, having odd dreams, or saying unusual things.

A couple of weeks into our quarantine, I had a PTSD nightmare I thought I’d never have again. It had been years since my last one. But there it was again. Not as intense. And, actually, it provided a happier ending.

And the funny thing about it was that I was in a light sleep and knew I was having it. And this time I didn’t seem to want to run away from it.

 

  1. Most of us have grown up with a multitude of myths that only hamper our emotions and grief responses.

In the following weeks, we’ll look at those and see how we can correct them. Further help for validating our emotions and healing.

 

Facing realities—

Normal isn’t normal anymore. And that may be part of the bigger emotional problem.

For better or worse, any kind of change is stressful, and our brains react accordingly. Stress hormones get dumped into our body systems, and our bodies respond. Adrenaline pumps. So much adrenaline that we might get wiped out from system overload.

For most of us this pandemic and the resulting lockdowns, job losses, massive schedule and life upheavals have been traumatic. And our brains (and bodies) are trying to process all of it, at one time. It’s not healthy or productive to try to ignore it or wish it away.

We may be looking at a new paradigm that will take time to become familiar and comfortable with.

I want to provide the tools and resources you need to survive this storm and thrive!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Invitation—

I invite and encourage you to use the following tools to identify and validate your emotions and not allow yourself to get stuck in them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  1. Keep an emotions journal—

One way of validating and responding is by keeping an emotions journal.

There are big benefits to jotting down your emotions on paper, even if your emotions flip flop wildly throughout the day.

And now’s a perfect time to start keeping one.

Seeing them written down in a journal helps validate them. It makes them real and manageable. And it tells you a lot about you and your present needs.

Many of us don’t have any place we can vacate to—alone—right now to assess and decompress. To blow off steam. To weep over losses and unknown futures. Although locking yourself in a bathroom and turning the radio up REALLY loudly might suffice.

Having a journal, or even loose paper you can keep together as a journal, is effective in noting how your emotions change throughout the day, and how you can validate and respond to them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  1. Learn to breathe and release—

 Learning meditation-type breathing techniques is invaluable for allowing the release of emotions. It allows us to be more fully aware, moment-by-moment, of how our what emotions might be lurking just below the surface and affecting us physically or psychologically.

Breathing can also tune you in to just how quickly emotions can come and go. And we can use our imaginations and creativity to learn what to do with our emotions.

You can find a lot of meditative breathing techniques on line. I’ve included some here for you. They can be done lying down, sitting or standing. The process generally involves breathing in slowly, deeply through your nose and exhaling slowly and completely through your mouth, making sure you are using your diaphragm to fill your lungs and allowing your stomach muscles to relax, or soften.

Try to put away any distractions, like ringing phones, when you do these exercises, although when you get good, you will be able to perform them in a busy environment.

Once learned and frequently practiced, they can be very effective at slowing your breathing and dropping your heart rate and blood pressure.

Rather than thinking of breathing exercises as emptying your mind, I like to have my clients and patience just become aware of the emotions they are feeling, without casting any judgments on them. And becoming aware of how these emotions affect your body: tension, stress, and shallow breathing are frequent side effects of out-of-control emotions.

Five to ten minutes should be adequate. If this type of breathing is new to you, just starting with a couple of minutes can be enough.

After your breathing, note what emotions emerged and any accompanying thoughts you had with them. Don’t dwell on them. Just note them. You can spend time analyzing them later.

In the first video, Dr. Andrew Weil gives a great, brief presentation on the benefits of breathing modulation and its effects on illnesses. He says it’s the constancy—regularity—of doing these exercises that result in dramatic changes.

 

In this next video, Dr. Weil teaches yoga breathing.

 

This City of Hope video provides a little more in depth breathing and imagery. The video below is longer and includes a guide imagery technique too. Just doing the breathing exercises for several minutes is enough for now.

 

And now we can move on to another tool.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  1. Draw your emotions—

Any kind of drawing—putting pen or pencil to paper—can stimulate the brain and creativity.

And emotions can be expressed through drawings. Even childlike ones. So don’t think that you have to be an artist to utilize this tool.

Grab several pieces of paper and crayons or markers.

Do the drawings quickly, with no more than several minutes spent on each. The drawings are simply about self-discovery.

Drawing #1: Draw a picture of you right now, the emotions you feel. Stick figures. Representative symbols. These aren’t complicated or necessarily detailed.

Drawing #2: Draw yourself and your biggest problem. The problem might be represented by a shape, a color, a word. What kind of emotions trigger this drawing?

Drawing #3: Draw yourself with your problem solved. How does the solving make you feel? Those are the emotions your want to recognize.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  1. Dancing or shaking—

Free dancing and body shaking are wonderful ways to identify emotions and express them.

When I was using movement gymnastics with my elementary school classes, I’d give each student a colorful scarf to dance to music with, run around the gym with. Dance with. Because they were less inhibited or self-aware, the kindergarten students were a joy to watch.

They stopped watching each other and just went with the movements their little bodies were dying to exhibit. They choreographed their emotions, their joys, their delights, their inhabitations. Their creativity. They danced and moved to their emotions.

They loosened up and released. They laughed and shouted.

Shaking can do the same thing.

This video offers a great teaching.

 

 

I hope you find these suggestions helpful.

NEXT WEEK: we’ll look at the myths of grief that hamper our long-term healing, and I’ll give you more tools to release and validate your emotions.

Until then,

keep breathing, dancing, and drawing. And remember that in any situation, we can make our life better and more fulfilling.

See you back here next week!

Blessings,

Andrea


Andrea Arthur Owan, M.S., A.T., R., is a fitness pro, chaplain, and award-winning inspirational writer. She works and writes to help people recover from trauma, grief and loss and to live their best lives — physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

5 Ways to Make a Fitness Habit Stick

Last week Friday, I headed to the gym for a morning workout. I thought I’d switch to a once-a-week morning exercise to see if what they say about morning workouts being better for fat burning were true. I was in high spirits, until I saw all of the cars in the parking lot and had to drive around it a couple of times just to find an open spot.

After scanning my membership code, and being greeted by a young, chirpy employee, I strode around the welcome desk and headed to the locker room. My mouth dropped at the number of people packed into the large facility.

Nearly every treadmill was taken. Every stationary bike had a sweaty, or soon-to-be-sweaty occupant. The free-weight exercise equipment area was packed. People swung weights, stretched, grunted and hopped around on nearly every square inch of the fake turf exercise area.

Where did all of these people come from!? I wondered.

Then it dawned on me—New Year, New Resolutions.

And I wondered how many of these well-intentioned, hopeful people would still be pumping the weights, spinning the stationary bike wheels, or padding the revolving treadmill a month or two from now.

If a recent Forbes article is accurate, only 25% of them will be able to make it past 30 days, and a measly 8% will be able to achieve them.

 

Those numbers are discouraging.

 

It could be that a lot of these just chose the wrong goal, latched onto someone else’s goal, or were mimicking what they read somewhere.

Or it could be that they picked the wrong activity, got lured in by the discount price, were told by their doctor that they needed to lose weight, or else; or they wanted to start out the new year feeling good about themselves by doing something.

Exercise is important for overall physical, emotional and psychological health, but just how can you increase your chances of success and steam past those dismal statistics numbers?

 

 

Upping your chances of resolution success—

How timely it was that after my morning workout my mom’s AARP healthcare healthy living newsletter Strive arrived in my mailbox. I peeled it open to see what they had to say about sticking with a new fitness program and making it a habit.

They gave four tips, most of which I’d agree with.

 

  1. Set doable goals.

This is a big one and a major factor in stick-to-it failure. People, as the old saying goes, bite off more than they can chew.

If you want to be able to walk 10 miles (consistently) on an outing by the end of the year, work backward to set your daily or weekly walking goals.

If just walking around your half-mile block leaves you huffing and puffing, then you might only be able to trudge down to the corner and back on your first try. Keep doing that until you’re walking at a comfortable pace and not gulping for air.

 

To avoid injury and stick with it, the rule of thumb is to NOT increase your mileage by more than 10% a week, and NEVER increase your mileage and your moving speed simultaneously. Focus on ONE or the OTHER.

 

If you’re just aiming for mileage, then the week after making it around your half-mile block three times (or daily, if you’re really pushing yourself), then increase your mileage by 10%, which wouldn’t be very far. But that’s okay. We’re not shooting for the Olympics here, (and all of those Olympians had to go through this type of baby-step training process when they started). We’re aiming for consistent, recreational fitness, to help you enjoy life better and add more life to whatever years you have!

Once you get to a week full of mile walks, then add another tenth of a mile. As you can see, the higher the mileage you’re capable of, the faster the gains as you get closer to the ten-mile goal. It’s like a snowball that gets bigger and gathers steam as it rolls along.

If your goal is to walk a half-marathon by a certain date, use this same formula and work backward. You may be surprised to learn that your goal is too ambitious. Don’t give up; just walk your own half marathon on a day your selected and reward yourself with a trophy, medal or something you’ve wanted to purchase. Or enjoy a nice meal out with your significant other. And then check races/walks in your area to see what the next nearest event is. It might be a fundraiser. That alone could be a great incentive for you.

 

But the most important part of this advice is that you must know what your goals are!

Too often, when I ask a client what their goals are, they give me the deer-in-the-headlight look. They don’t know.

So, your first step is to think long and hard about what your goals are (try to keep it to one per area—physically, emotionally, spiritually), and then write one down for each. Once you’ve achieved that goal, you can tweak it or add more. Just be reasonable. You don’t want to sabotage yourself from the starting block. It would be like lacing on clunky hiking shoes to run a marathon!

And if you find that you’ve taken on too much, or too little, feel free to adjust. It’s okay. You’re allowed to play around with this goal stuff. As long as you don’t play around with it so much that you doom yourself to accomplishing nothing, like a procrastinator does.

 

  1. Just have fun.

I know what their point is, and, for the most part, I agree with it. But as a former athlete, I can tell you that some of my days just weren’t fun. Far from it. They were painful, annoying, scary. Most of the time I was having fun, but not always. But I still had to drag myself to the gym to practice.

And you know what? Most of the time I was really happy I did. I felt proud of myself and much better after the practice. I felt as though I’d climbed an obstacle and achieved something.

And that brings me to the next part of having fun: the better I got, the more fun it was!

When you’re just starting out a new activity, it can feel laborious and not worth the effort. The brain actually rebels with the new moves. But after a while, when new neurons are formed, your body responds better, it builds up a motor memory, and you can do things faster and better.

So whether you’re taking up salsa dancing, violin playing, (like a former co-worker of my husband who took up the violin after retirement and a horrendous round of chemo for cancer), swimming or hiking, remind yourself that it will get easier—if you stick with it.

 

  1. Track your progress.

Not only is it motivating to keep a record of your improvement, it’s also essential to sticking with and meeting your goals!

 

That can’t be stated enough. Research shows that those people who don’t write down their goals and share them with someone else are unlikely to succeed.

 

So get yourself a notebook and track your progress. Post a chart on your refrigerator or laundry room wall. I have a chalkboard calendar mounted on the utility room door in our laundry room that I mark my weight loss (or gain!) on every other day after I weigh myself. It keeps me honest and tuned into my goals.

It’s when I ignored my weight for an entire year that I packed on an extra 15 – 20 pounds my frame (and knees) couldn’t afford for me to pack on. It’s agony trying to get them off, but my new reduced-acid diet, workout program, and every-other-day weigh-in keep me motivated.

I also like to use a notebook at the gym to record my progress. When I notice that I’ve plateaued in my workout, I can change it up and re-start the body’s adaptation system.

 

  1. Reward yourself.

When you reach a milestone, treat yourself, as I mentioned above.

It may be that you can enjoy a rummage-through-your closet day to try on pants and skirts or other items to see if you can reduce a size. If so, toss those too-big clothes and buy yourself a couple of items to replace them. Don’t go too wild if you’re planning to lose more weight. Save the big treat for when you’ve reached your final goal.

If you’re still working, treat yourself to a vacation day.

It’s okay to pat yourself on the back for doing a good job. And if you’ve enlisted someone else as a cheerleader, include them in the celebration with a thank you gift.

 

And I’ll add another goal to the list.

 

  1. Even if you hit a snag, don’t give up.

Know that there will be obstacles and setbacks. Life is like that. Don’t be surprised by them.

If you’ve found that you’ve already dropped the ball on your goals the third week of January, don’t be discouraged or give up. If you’ve determined that you picked the wrong activity, try another one. If you’ve overdone it and burned yourself out already, re-set and try again.

And don’t let anyone else sabotage you. Unfortunately, a lot of people don’t like it when they see someone else succeeding at what they know they should be and could be doing.

Your consistency and passion (not your berating and belittling) may be just what they need to join you and set their own positive goals!

 

Until next week,

Get out there and enjoy the fruit of hitting your goal!

Blessings,

Andrea


Andrea Arthur Owan, M.S., A.T., R., is an award-winning inspirational writer, fitness pro, and chaplain. She writes and works to help people live their best lives — physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

2020: What are the Best Diets?

Well, the results are in, and you may not like what they have to say about your favorite diet.

U.S. News & World Report loves to provide “Best” rankings for a slew of categories, such as doctors in every specialty and colleges. Now their panel of experts has weighed in (no pun intended) on what they have whittled down to the top 35 diets overall. You might be surprised to learn where your particular diet lands on their favorite list. I’ll cover the top 5 only, and then tell you how the popular Keto ranks and why, but you can go to the link at the bottom of this post to see all 35 diets.

How the top 5 diets rank and why?

Okay, here’s number 1.

Drum roll, please. Brrrrrrrr….

 

  1. Mediterranean Diet

No real surprise here. This diet has been studied and emulated for years. But which country bordering the Mediterranean are they following the recipes and food of? They all tend to eat slightly different foods.

I think by now most people know that people that live in this part of the world consume good oils—like olive oil and good fats that primarily come from fish, but other key take-aways to any Mediterranean diet are that these people:

  • Have active lifestyles
  • Eat in a way that helps control weight
  • Consume low amounts of meat, sugar and saturated fat
  • Eat a lot of produce, nuts and other healthful foods
  • Eat primarily organically-grown fruits and veggies (that come from smaller or personal farms)

If you’d like more information on what foods to eat in what amounts, see the consumer-friendly Mediterranean diet pyramid developed by experts in a Boston food think tank.

(Who knew there was such a group!)

This diet was also awarded kudos for being nutritionally sound and having diverse foods and flavors.

 

  1. DASH Diet

Okay, I must admit I’d never heard about this diet, which stands for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension. But evidently it’s known for fighting high blood pressure and its nutritional completeness, safety, ability to prevent or control diabetes, and its role in supporting heart health.

It emphasizes:

  • fruits
  • veggies
  • whole grains
  • lean protein
  • low-fat dairy

It turns its thumbs down on:

  • fatty meats
  • full-fat dairy foods
  • tropical oils
  • sugar-sweetened beverages and sweets

Under the pro category, this diet was noted for being heart healthy and nutritionally sound.

 

  1. The Flexitarian Diet

Here’s another one I’d never heard of, which came about in 2009 when dietitian Dawn Jackson Blatner published her book The Flexitarian Diet: The Mostly Vegetarian Way to Lose Weight, Be Healthier, Prevent Disease and Add Year sot Your Life.

This diet—which is the marriage of flexible and vegetarian—emphasizes fruits, veggies, whole grains and plant-based protein. But Ms. Blatner says you can be a vegetarian most of the time but still enjoy an occasional fatty burger or steak when the urge strikes.

It was noted for its flexibility and abundance of tasty recipes.

 

  1. WW (Weight Watchers) Diet

Weight Watchers has done a good job evolving with the times and bringing their diet up to the modern research. It scored highest for overall weight loss and fast weight loss. But WW is also focusing on healthy living and overall well-being.

A big plus to the WW diet is the support system, via in-person accountability and support workshops and on-line or phone chats. The support people are trained in behavior weight management techniques.

With no foods being listed as off-limits, this diet scored big for being able to eat what you want, and for the flexibility in shaping your own diet.

 

  1. Mayo Clinic Diet

I did this diet as a high school junior. Way back then, it focused on very high protein meals, with eggs and meat being the centerpieces. I lost a heap of weight in two weeks, in time to be a bit more svelte for the National Gymnastics Championship.

Now it focuses on making healthful eating a lifelong habit. It also earned high marks for its nutrition and safety.

Mayo’s diet is focused on helping you get your eating habits straightened out and breaking bad habits and replacing them with good ones. They also have their own unique food pyramid, which emphasizes fruits, veggies, and whole grains, which allows you to eat more while taking in fewer calories.

According to Mayo, someone on the diet can expect to lose 6 to 10 pounds the first two weeks (!), a lot of which I would expect to be water, and then 1 to 2 pounds weekly until you’ve hit your goal weight. I’m not sure what you do when you hit it, but that is probably in the book.

The 6 to 10 pounds seems like a lot to me. I’ve read a lot of information cautioning people against losing that much weigh that rapidly—for heart reasons, and also for the inclination your body has to reset your calorie point to a lower per-day need before kicking into starvation and fat-storing mode with such drastic weight loss.

But they’re Mayo, and they’ve undoubtedly done their research and checked it twice.

It got additional marks for being nutritionally sound and allowing you to shape your diet.

 

  1. MIND Diet (Tied with Mayo and Volumetrics below)

The Mediterranean-DASH Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay (MIND) is another new one to me, but it’s definitely keeping up with the current concerns on maintaining mental health, as it aims to prevent mental deterioration.

One expert found it to be a healthy, sensible plan backed up by science. (I always love how they throw that in, and then we learn a decade later that “new” science has deleted the old facts.)

What this diet does is take both the DASH and the Mediterranean diets and focus on the foods in each one that specifically affect brain health.

I’m always a little concerned when diets focus too much on one aspect of health, but evidently this diet has been found to reduce Alzheimer’s risk by 35% for people who followed it moderately well and 53% for people who really adhered to it. So I think it deserves a closer look.

It does focus on fewer carbs than is currently recommended by our government guidelines and is known to bring on quick weight loss.

The pro category had marks for its blending of two proven healthy diets and its brain-power boosting focus. The cons were that the diet details were not “fleshed out” and the recipes and resources were slim.

 

  1. Volumetrics (Tied with Mayo and MIND, above)

Penn State University professor Barbara Rolls pioneered this diet, which experts say is really more of an eating approach than a focused diet. It’s designed around:

  • learning how to decipher a food’s energy density
  • learning how to cut that energy density in meal planning and eating
  • making choices that fight hunger

Food is divided into four groups: very low-density, low-density, medium-density, and high-density. You might already guess that non-starchy fruits and veggies would fall into the very-low density category, while crackers, chips, chocolate candies, cookies, nuts, butter and oil fall into the very-high level.

The pro checkmarks for this diet were that it is filling and no food is off-limits. The negatives included lengthy meal prep, and if you don’t like fruits, veggies or soups, sticking with it could be tough.

 

The list continues with a total of 35 rankings, including Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, Dr. Weil’s Anti-inflammatory Diet, Dr. Dean Ornish’s Diet, Vegetarian, Vegan The Engine 2 and Paleo.

 

But where did the Keto diet fall?

In spite of its increasing popularity and the medical attention it’s receiving, experts rated this popular diet near the bottom, at #34, behind Paleo (at 29), and Atkins (32). And even though more research is being done on the effects of this diet, a July 2019 Journal of the American Medical Association Internal Medicine (JAMA Internal Medicine) stated that “enthusiasm outpaces evidence” when it comes to a keto diet having a dramatic effect on diabetes or obesity.

A friend of mine from high school is a keto-type diet aficionado and it has helped her tremendously with her diabetes control and weight maintenance. She said it was such a relief to no longer have to count carbs for her daily glycemic intake measurements. The last time I saw her, she looked healthy and had a ton of energy.

Granted, that’s anecdotal evidence, but it’s important to her and her health. Since it takes a long time to do research, it may be that the evidence is just taking time to catch up.

 

To see the entire list, read the overviews, and get more information on each of these diets, see the report.

 

And until next week, (when I’ll tell you about the new diet geared toward people suffering from acid reflux that my husband and I have embarked on),

Happy Dieting!

Andrea

*This list is to serve as general information and not to be intended as an endorsement of any diet plan or a prescription. Always consult with your physician or personal health practitioner before beginning any diet or exercise program.


Andrea Arthur Owan, M.S., A.T., R., is an award-winning inspirational writer, fitness pro, and chaplain. She writes and works to help people live their best lives — physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

8 Steps to a Good Night’s Sleep

A couple of weeks ago I promised to let you know how I’ve changed my sleep patterns and how that’s been going for me. Well, today I’m going to give you my new ritual and let you know how it’s measuring up.

The process of deciding on and planning for a good night’s sleep—

The first thing I did wanted to decide, once and for all, what time I wanted—needed—to go to bed every night and how much sleep I would aim for nightly if I were going to be a fully functioning, alert individual.

1) First, I decided on a no later than 10:00 PM in bed and lights out schedule and a 6:30 AM wakeup. I know from past experience that I function best on 7 to 9 hours of sleep a night and usually lean toward the longer number of hours.

2) Second, I set my smartphone to switch to darker yellow light at 8:00 PM. With the bedtime schedule set on it, the phone alerts me at 8:00 that I need to be in bed at 10:00, and that my preparations should start at 9:00. (I get plenty of warnings.)

3) Unless I miscalculate on preparation hours, or an emergency deadline or need arises, I shut of my computer by 8:00 PM, preferably 7:00. If I’m really motivated, I don’t get on it after 5:00.

4) Around 8:00 PM, I start dimming lights around the house or shutting most of them off completely. When I enter my bedroom at 9:00, I turn on my bedside light and leave the main, intensely bright lights, off.

All of this helps trigger my melatonin production to prepare me for sleep.

5) If I need or want to shower to relax, I shower around 9:00 and prepare for bed in a relaxed manner.

6) No later than 9:30, I’m in my little sitting room just off my bedroom, with a good book in hand, reading. I’ve stopped reading in bed, with my head cocked at an obtuse angle, putting strain on my neck muscles, back and hands.

7) A little before 10:00, the engineer and I hold hands and say our bedtime prayers. And we always ask for a good, peaceful and restful night’s sleep.

8) Then it’s off to bed. Nightstand lights out. At 10:00, my phone conveniently darkens its screen and shows little stars and a slivered moon as it blocks any incoming calls, text messages or emails from waking me up. The phone doesn’t even vibrate. It just stores everything until the next morning. It takes its place on my nightstand, ready to awaken me with lovely, soothing music that gradually gets louder until I turn it off. Once I do, the screen greets me with Good Morning!

 

How has my bedtime ritual benefited me?

Sleep is arguably one of the most important times of our day. Lack of it causes a host of physical problems, including weight gain and inability of the body to shed toxins or rejuvenate itself or heal properly. Lack of sleep can also cause depression, worsen it, and lead to cognitive dysfunction and physical and emotional stress.

The first night we tried our new sleep schedule we were amazed by the results.

Doing the new schedule was difficult for the engineer because he usually returns to the computer right after dinner and sits for hours in front of the blinding screen before running directly from his office to bed. If he wanted to try to unwind—do something mindless before bed—he might watch an old movie on television before hitting the sack.

He wasn’t sleeping well.

Within 15 minutes of starting our reading, though, our eyelids felt so heavy that we had to quit reading earlier than expected. Both of us fell asleep instantly when our heads hit the pillows. When my music started the following morning, I had already started awakening naturally to the sunrise and wasn’t jarred awake by the music.

It was actually a pleasant wakeup, and I felt energized and ready to go.

But first, I took the advice of my Shetland sheepdog (and all of the cats that have condescended to live with me over the years) and did some stretching in bed before swinging my legs over the side of it and letting my feet hit the floor. After toileting, removing my retainer and brushing my teeth, I am ready for some light calisthenics that get my blood pumping and lungs ballooning.

 

After five weeks of this regimen, I’ve never felt better after a night’s sleep! With the increased melatonin production, my body is always ready to lay it down, even if I add some light exercises to the regimen before showering or grabbing my book to read. And my night’s sleep is deeper and more rejuvenating.

When I skip this regimen during the weekend and go to bed too late, and without my reading ritual, I can feel it. Maybe it’s my age (most probably it is), but I can’t shake that lousy bedtime preparation off like I used to.

 

Physical benefits of sleep—

One of the big benefits, after trying nearly everything else in the way of diet and exercise, is that I’ve managed to shave eight pounds from the scale! Yippie!

The better and longer sleep, in combination with

  • making sure I avoid all of the foods that cause problems for me or cause inflammation (inflammation can wreak havoc on your sleep);
  • regular (3-4 days a week of strenuous cardio and weight lifting exercise) exercise; walking leisurely (about a mile) after dinner to ramp up the digestion;
  • walking a more fast-paced mile every other morning and on the days I add several strenuous nighttime calisthenics to my daily activities;
  • not eating unless I’m hungry and then maybe deciding not to eat even then;
  • making my evening meal the lightest one of the day and always making sure I consume it by 6:00 PM;
  • not going to bed within 3-4 hours after eating;
  • not exercising within 3 hours after eating;
  • avoiding most desserts and reducing my sugar intake;
  • ditching the coffee;
  • reducing my dairy product consumption;

has done wonders for my energy level and improving the way I feel physically.

 

Psychological and emotional benefits of sleep—

I’ve also found that my melancholy and depression has reduced significantly. And when it does sneak up on me, I am more capable of resisting and combatting it. For that I am most grateful.

I’m more alert, less sluggish. I have more energy for exercising.

 

But now that the days are getting shorter and the nighttime is lengthening, I may lengthen my sleep. The engineer and I call it “keeping farmer’s hours.”

Doing a better job at maintaining the rhythm of life.

But there are certainly bound to be days when I’ll need to arise before the sun does, so I’m purchasing a sunrise “alarm” clock. If you’ve never heard of one, it gradually lights up at the rate the sun would come up and illuminates the room as a sunrise would.

People I know who use one swear by them, and the reviews are good. I’m ordering mine this week, so after I’ve had a chance to try that out for a while, I’ll give you my take on that method.

 

The engineer and I are ecstatic with our sleep results. And to add extra melatonin help, we’ve started using a major brand name lotion that contains both lavender (a soothing sleep aid) and melatonin. The engineer swears it helps kick his sleep into high gear.

Next, he wants to try taking melatonin when he has to travel overseas on business, when sleep is usually at a premium and not restful.

 

If any of you have used melatonin for travel, I’d love to hear your feedback!

 

Until next week,

Happy sleeping!

Andrea


Andrea Arthur Owan is an award-winning inspirational writer, fitness pro and chaplain. She writes and works to help people live their best lives—physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

The Benefits of Active and Passive Rest

I’ve been thinking a lot about sleep lately, probably because I hadn’t been getting as much sleep as I needed. Knee injury pain made sleep—or any kind of decent rest—impossible for several weeks, and my own careless lifestyle added to the problem.

I was staying up too late, reading too many articles on my phone, getting my eyeballs fried from the glaring light and lack of blinking. (You know we blink less when we stare at tech screens, don’t you? That causes our eyes to take in more light and get dry from the lack of moisturizing when benefit from when we do blink.)

I finally had enough, so I mandated some going-to-bed practices for myself and enlisted my evil cell phone for support! Next week, I’ll tell you all about what I did and how well it’s working for me. But today, I want to cover a couple of other important habits or lifestyle practices that can help you stay healthier and happy.

Like sleep, they fall into the category of rest.

 

Active Rest—

According to the 12 Minute Athlete, “active rest” is when you’re still moving but not at the intensity level that you normally move on a regular workout day. It’s important for people who workout daily to rest overworked muscles and aid the recovery process.

 

But what if you’re not an athlete, or everyday, hardcore exerciser?

Active Rest is beneficial for anyone who is busy and pretty active on a daily basis. And you don’t have to be running, lifting weights or participating in heavy cycling.

Think about your daily workload and the stress you incur while working. Do you have to run from office to office, or building to building? Are you going brain dead from all of the nonsense planning meetings you have to attend?

Active rest can be a day where you change up the pace a bit by slowing down and focusing on more relaxing, gentle movements.

According to the article, active rest can be:

  • Going for an easy to moderate hike with your friends or family
  • Taking an easy bike ride
  • Going for an easy swim
  • Light stretching
  • Taking a relaxing walk (This is not power walk time!)
  • Playing with your dog, kids, grandkids
  • Doing some sort of fun activity that you enjoy. Maybe something new to exercise or stress different body parts. Nothing competitive.

 

The goal is to get moving, but not too much.

Some of the article feedback noted people doing house cleaning, Pilates and stretching. Other people liked to box. (That seems to be gaining popularity, especially among women.)

My husband used to pull out his roller blades and he, I, the kids and the dogs would head down to a local park for several zooms around the walking path. The boys would wheel right along with their dad. I was the designated dog walker, by choice. A roller blader, I’m not.

 

Passive Rest—

While athletes will define passive rest as participating in an active that allows your heart rate to drop back to normal as quickly as possible, we’re aiming for something a little more pedestrian or general public level here.

For our purposes, passive rest is when you’re quietly resting but still awake, and not engaged in multitasking.

 

I think a lot of people might engage in this too much, but there are others—like my husband—who have great difficulty just sitting and resting quietly. It’s taken years of practice, but now he looks forward to it. Advancing age may be contributing, but he’s making the most out of his passive rest periods. It’s a time he can shut his overactive brain down and recover.

What kinds of activities constitute “quietly resting?”

You could be lying on the couch with your eyes closed. My mother used to say she was “checking out the backs of her eyelids” when she did this, when we accused her of sleeping.

Although some say watching a movie or television is quiet resting, I’d be cautious about putting that in the resting category. Unless it’s a comedy or a somewhat interesting movie, television watching has been shown to actually decrease brain wave function to a damaging level. You want to rest, but I don’t think we’re aiming for brain dead.

 

As a society, we sit way too much and much of that sitting is down in front of a television, anyway. I would recommend that you use this rest technique judiciously and sporadically because it’s also contributed to the horrendous obesity epidemic we have going on in our country.

Another good passive rest can be a soak in a spa tub or bubble bath, eyes closed or reading a book.

 

But whatever you select, make sure you pick out an activity that makes you feel relaxed and that slows your breathing. Maybe coloring, brushing your dog or cat, daydreaming. Watching a sunset or sunrise. Listening to your favorite classical or acoustic worship music.

 

Mix it up—

Make sure you incorporate both active and passive resting periods into your week.

Sunday—the most popular day of rest—is a wonderful day to fit these in. Try using these techniques to unwind and recharge mentally, instead of using Sunday to run errands or hit the mall.

I think you’ll find the health and fitness rewards amazing!

 

Until next week,

Find your passive resting happy place or space.

Your brain (and body) will be celebrating!

Blessings,

Andrea


Andrea Arthur Owan is an award-winning inspirational writer, fitness pro and chaplain. She writes and works to help people live their best lives—physically, emotionally, and spiritually.