What is Healthy? Who’s guiding you?
Transcript
We’ve spent the last couple episodes talking about movement and how it works to affect our stress response particularly Yoga and how we can sneak more of it into our day for the health benefits.
What you’ll find throughout this podcast are ways to improve overall health and wellbeing in 3 basic categories, physical, mental and emotional, and how those things connect with the health of our nervous system and stress response. That seems like such a simple thing to do. And Maybe it would be if it weren’t for the fact that no one really knows what being healthy really means. If we did, perhaps there wouldn’t be an epidemic of obesity and diabetes. We wouldn’t have the rising numbers of non alcoholic fatty liver disease and CVD that we have today despite the latest greatest health recommendations for government agencies.
So today I want to raise the question, what is healthy? What is health and how do we get it and keep it long term? One of the ways we’re asked to evaluate our own health is by following government guidelines. Specifically the USDA HHS 2020 dietary guidelines for healthy Americans. In the US we only review those guidelines every 5 years. A lot can happen in 5 years, a lot can change in the scientific landscape and a lot can get swept under the rug. As general and dumbed down as they try to make it, those guidelines for health are still 130 pages without the appendices.
What are the 2020 Guidelines?
In case you don’t know or maybe have forgotten, the DGA is a document written by USDA & HHS that has been reviewed by the scientific community that recommends how and what to eat to prevent chronic disease. And includes general recommendations for how much exercise generally healthy people should get to stay “healthy”.
Despite what I’m sure are their best intentions, according to the USDA’s own statistics 75% of American DON’T follow the DGA. One might think, based on that statistic that a majority of Americans simply have no understanding about what healthy is. Statistics are tricky though because I have to say that I don’t follow it either and I consider myself to be a healthy individual. However, in order to stay within my scope as a coach I am limited to sharing the information that is being promoted by the government. And scope is one of the tragic problems with the DGA.
This subject for me is rife with rabbit holes and triggers to rant, so I’ll apologize now in case I go off the rails but I’m going to try not to.
The DGA is designed to give guidelines to the general population. It assumes a healthy general population. Their scope is to make recommendations to healthy people to prevent chronic diet related diseases. Except the general population in the US is already ill. In fact 74% of adults are over weight or obese and 6/10 already has 1 or more chronic diseases.
Something doesn’t add up. Since the first official DGA in 1980 we’ve been getting fatter and sicker and less healthy.
What we have here is a failure to communicate - Cool Hand Luke
There is nothing wrong with the recommended guidelines for nutrition and exercise per se. In my opinion they are excruciatingly watered down and basically offer the minimum dose in order to not offend anyone. In presenting their recommendations this way they limit their credibility. If the purpose is to inspire the population to meaningful behavior change then that credibility needs a little work.
They’re just too general in scope. And that scope of a healthy general population is now in the minority. It’s also a little frustrating to offer general guidelines to individuals. Although in this latest iteration they’ve included a PDF to “Customize the dietary guidelines”. Don’t get too excited, it’s a 2 page list of foods that fall under each category.
I don’t care who you are, it’s difficult to change habits. Humans are contrary, especially if what you're asking them to do is uncomfortable. Changing what and how you eat and move is uncomfortable. Couple that with the fact that the recommendations are coming from the government with a serious case of “do as I say, not as I do” and it’s no wonder the general population doesn’t care to make any serious changes. Why would they?
One the one hand the USDA is telling us to eat more vegetables and fruits and on the other it’s subsidizing cheap corn, dairy and sugar. Those subsidies go to make cheap food cheaper, but not whole clean healthy food cheaper.
It also doesn’t improve the government credibility when science changes but recommendations don’t. For example:
The dietary cholesterol intake and low fat diet recommendations that were finally removed in 2015. Before we understood the role of cholesterol in the body, we were told in no uncertain terms that consuming foods high in cholesterol and full fat was bad and in fact could be fatal. So began the villainization of real butter and eggs and full fat anything. And so we slathered our toast with margarine and suffered through egg white omelets and replaced all the fat in everything with sugar (read high fructose corn syrup). Gag!
Only to learn after 40 years of being told that margarine was a healthy alternative oops our bad, trans fats actually increase cholesterol levels and now because we’ve hidden processed sugar in everything welcome to the world of obesity and type 2 diabetes.
The science of nutrition and the human body is always changing. Science should be challenged. Part of what makes it science and not religion is you can challenge it and it will either stand up to that challenge or it won’t. But if it doesn’t, rather than quietly sweeping it under the rug, maybe we need to be shouting it from the rooftops. Instead of pussyfooting around the big food, big pharma executives. We’re talking about people's lives.
Health care is NOT medicine, Medicine is NOT health care
But it’s ok right because we have the best health care system in the world. We should be the healthiest. Our medicine borders on the miraculous. There’s almost nothing that can’t be poisoned out of your body in some way. Wait no, that’s not right.
Medicine can help you survive. It can save your life. But it can’t make you healthy. Only you can make the kind of choices that will do that.
Now before you all fly off the handle let me explain that I’m not talking about communicable diseases. I’m not talking about infections or acute trauma to the body. I’m talking about chronic, non communicable, lifestyle disease.
Don’t get me wrong, they try. That’s where statins and beta blockers, maybe metformin, even prozac and xanax come in. So many options for better living through pharmaceuticals. So let’s ask the question again. What is healthy?
We have a list of biomarkers that we can use to make that assessment. Things that are testable. Blood pressure, glucose, cholesterol, those are the basic ones most of us know right? And then we get more guidelines for healthy ranges. Not optimal ranges, because no one actually knows that just a range that may seem a little arbitrary when they move the bar every once in a while. Like they’ve done with cholesterol levels. Like they did a few years ago with blood pressure. (but that’s another rabbit hole)
So let’s say you’re an otherwise healthy adult (in other words they haven’t found anything wrong with you yet) and you visit the doctor and they diagnose you with high blood pressure. Doctor says, “you can either exercise more and eat better or take this pill everyday for the rest of your life.” You take the pill, because the other thing sounds hard. Now your blood pressure falls within the normal range.
Are you healthy? Will you get healthier? No. no, take your time...I’ll wait.
I have another question for you. How sick and tired do you have to get for enough to be enough? No one lives forever but what kind of life do you want?
Even if you never get off your meds, eating better will make it easier for your body to keep you alive. Even if you never get off those meds, moving more, getting physically stronger will make your body healthier from your smallest cells to your biggest muscles.
These things are true even if you never drop a pound. And both movement and nutrition improve sleep, and together they can lift the burden on your nervous system at its most primitive level.
The fact is that there is no step toward health that goes unnoticed by the body. It all counts. If you want to get healthier you have to do something healthier. Even something small, drink more water, walk to the end of the driveway, anything. Do it everyday till it’s easy then add something new, an extra vegetable, replace the chips with fruit.
I know people who’ve dropped their triglycerides from over 400 down to 50 with diet alone in 6 weeks. It can be done. You have to want to do it.
There is just as much science behind that as there is behind FDA drug approval without all the scary side effects. In fact, let's compare side effects. Nutrition & exercise vs. High BP meds.
BP meds come in lots of flavors so without going too far into the weeds let's just pick one kind and go from there. Beta Blockers
Side effects of Beta Blockers
Higher risk of
Blood sugar changes leading to Type II diabetes
Weakness, leg cramps, or fatigue. Potassium levels depleted
Asthma symptoms
Cold hands and feet
Depression
Erection problems
Insomnia and sleep problems
Side effects of good nutrition and exercise
Lower risk of type II diabetes
Stronger muscles and bones
Weight loss/maintaining healthy weight
Improved blood pressure & cholesterol numbers
Improved state of well being lower risk of depression lower anxiety
Improved sleep patterns
Improved cognition
Improved mobility
Improved gut health
It really isn’t rocket science (you don’t need an MD) but you do need a reason that outweighs all the excuses. What's yours gonna be?
Thanks for listening and if you like what you heard and want to learn more about how you can get extra movement and nutrition throughout your day head to elementalkinetics.com/snacktime or freeresources and download whatever resonates with you to get started on your own Work IN.
See you next time!
Resources
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/17/8793937/why-fda-banned-trans-fats
https://www.nutritioncoalition.us/news/2020-dietary-guidelines-committee
https://www.nutritioncoalition.us/news/2020-2025-dietary-guidelines-final-release
Customize the Dietary Guidelines
https://www.nutritioncoalition.us/news/2020-2025-dietary-guidelines-final-release
2020 Eat Healthy Be Healthy PDF
https://www.dietaryguidelines.gov/sites/default/files/2020-12/Infographic_Eat_Healthy_Be_Healthy.pdf
My Plate
Make every bite count
I’m Ericka,
health coach, nutrition specialist, yoga instructor & certified TRE provider. And after 20 yrs of experience in the fitness industry I believe it’s time for a shift in focus. It’s time to move wellness beyond simply what the eyes can see.
I offer online, on demand private sessions, courses & memberships for individuals, small groups and corporate clients looking to build resilience and recover from stress injury.
I teach a powerfully effective modality called trauma release exercise that works through the body without the need to relive the story.