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Winter 2007Issue#2Welcome to the Winter Zen-tai Wellness Newsletter!
The trees are bare and the snow has begun to fall. Our bodies become more susceptible to illness during these months, so let's vow keep ourselves strong to enjoy the white beauty and crisp, fresh air of winter.
Click on the following articles to take a step forward to health and happiness:
Articles
Fun Stuff
Makoto's Health HelpBeat the Winter Blues Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) is a temporary depressive state experienced by a large number of people in the winter months. This condition is largely related to the lack of light exposure during the cold season.
Serotonin, a neurotransmitter (brain chemical) produced by your body, regulates sleep cycles and mood. This chemical decreases during the winter months due to our decreased exposure to sunlight. Melatonin, a hormone produced by the pineal gland, is also important for regulating sleep and mood, and has also been shown to play a role in SAD. Melatonin's production is also reduced during periods of low light exposure.
SAD can be dramatically improved with adequate lifestyle changes along with supplementation with herbs and nutrients. Of course, the best approach would be to consult with a health practitioner to best address your individual requirements for mood re-balancing.
General Tips
Supplements
** Be sure to consult with a naturopathic doctor before using these products; some can have adverse effects or interactions with medication or health conditions **Stay warm and make you and your family's health and wellness a priority - you deserve it.
In health,
Makoto Trotter BSc(Hons), ND
ˆ Back to TopDoug DeconstructsHealthy Winter Eating
Eating well is important for everyone. Regardless of where you are on your health journey, choosing nutritious foods is important to help achieve and maintain health. Good nutrition is equally important when optimizing any issues associated with diabetes, high blood pressure, weight management, and heart health. Dietitians can assess your current dietary habits and help you to make healthy choices that meet your personal goals that fit your lifestyle. Many find eating well a challenge as the days grow shorter, but this needn't be the case.
The shorter days of winter are associated with lower moods (referred to as SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder). While the degree to which this affects people varies greatly, most people do become a little more lethargic and less motivated to stay active with less sun and colder weather. Often we tend to reach for our favourite comfort foods to lift our moods. A little knowledge is all it takes to keep comfort foods comforting without sabotaging your efforts to eat well. When it's cold outside, nothing warms better than some of your old favourites.
Make sure soups are broth-based instead of cream-based [or use lower fat alternatives like 1% milk or low-fat soy] and be sure they include healthy ingredients like whole-wheat pasta, chickpeas, lentils, kidney beans and root vegetables like carrots, parsnips, turnip, and squash.
Comfort foods, regardless of the cultural basis, tend to be high in fat. If it's a meat based dish, be sure to remove all visible fat before cooking, choose leaner cuts and where recipes call for dairy, substitute lower-fat versions of yogurt, cheese, sour cream, or milk. You can usually use milk or low-fat soy beverage in place of cream with minimal impact on the recipe. In place of animal fats like lard, butter or suet, try using a healthier oil such as olive or canola oil. Remember to keep portions in check.
Doug Cook, RD, MHSc, CDE
Aileen's TidbitsWhy Christmas Is StressfulTo some, Christmas is the absolute best time of year. Unfortunately to most, Christmas is synonymous to stress!
Why is it that every Christmas, that backache you have flares up? Do you ever blame your mood swings or chronic back ache to "stress" yet wonder exactly how the heck it produces these symptoms? The culprit may be added stress during this time of the year.
The sources of stress vary for all of us but the one thing they have in common is that they cause a "fight or flight" response in our bodies. Our body's response to these stressors, whether they are a physical or emotional, will send a message to a gland in our brain calling for HELP! Help means releasing a hormone (ACTH) which in turn activates our adrenal glands to release two hormones: cortisol and adrenaline. Cortisol is responsible for increasing sugar in the blood which acts like fuel for your brain and muscles while adrenaline gives you that turbo charged strength to cope. Normally, once the stressors disappear, the cortisol/adrenaline response shuts off and allows all other hormones to go back to work. Unfortunately, when we are unable to remove certain stressors from our lives, this response is unable to turn off and puts us into a continual state of HELP!
Chronic stress causes a continual elevation of cortisol and adrenaline in our systems. This contributes to cell damage, blood sugar problems (hello mood swings and weight gain!), adrenal exhaustion and nerve damage since nerve hormones are unable to adapt properly and eventually turn off, leading to pain.
Although it may be harder to remove certain stressors in your life immediately, there are various ways to support and help your body in the meantime and help decrease the damage that stress has caused in your body thus far. Naturopathic doctors can help by using a number of modalities such as nutritional supplementation, adaptogenic botanical herbs and acupuncture to help relieve symptoms caused by stress.
Aileen Lim-Trotter BSc, ND
ˆ Back to TopAdnan AnnouncesWalk Away from Foot Pain this Winter
Experts state that 85% of the general population experiences some kind of constant or frequent foot pain. Prolonged standing or walking increases the possibility of having painful feet. In fact, as time passes, untreated foot problems commonly get worse, which may have an adverse effect on your legs, knees, and lower back. When asked, the vast majority of our patients think that this type of pain is normal. It is NOT!
I'm Adnan Rayan, D.Ch., and I have devoted my professional career to helping people end their foot pain. I have treated everything from commonly encountered problems such as ingrown toenails, warts, corns, calluses, bunions, flat feet, and high-arch feet, to more complex problems such as diabetic foot ulcers, sports injuries, fractures, arthritic foot and ankle problems and complex foot and ankle deformities.
Helping people of all ages...
If pain is making it difficult for you to walk, call us to relieve your foot problems, since only a foot specialist can help relieve your foot pain, as well as provide you with advice on how to avoid it on a daily basis. Whatever the problem, and whatever your age, you can be confident that effective treatment is available. At our office, we can provide you with the variety of services available, ranging from most advanced diagnostic non-surgical and surgical treatment techniques. Varieties of therapeutic options are yours to explore, ranging from custom orthotics, wound care and soft tissue surgery.
Heel and arch pain are halted with the most reliable solution in foot pain -- orthotics! We can custom design orthotics using special molds of your feet. These special shoe inserts can be worn with sport, work or dress shoes, and are virtually invisible. And the best part is that orthotics relieve pain without the necessity of surgery. Ingrown and fungal toenails can be safely and comfortably treated. Bunions and hammer toes can tremendously limit your work and social life. These can be treated effectively in a conservative manner using techniques with proven results.
Find out how we can help you walk away from foot pain. We offer non-surgical and surgical options for all your foot and ankle problems.
Adnan Rayan, DCh is a registered chiropodist and foot specialist
ˆ Back to TopChris' Massage MusingsMy Winter Wellness Survival PlanHi all, Chris here, your friendly neighborhood RMT. Fall is here and winter is coming; this darkness is brutal, isn't it? I wake up in the dark, I get home in the dark, and I find myself coveting the sunshine. I find the season change difficult; I'm tired and sleepy a lot. Last year I plowed through the fall season and continued my pace into December vowing not to let it get to me and instead I got sick. December can be especially challenging due to the approach of the "festive season", I find it a busy and chaotic season, which can be very stressful. The harder we push ourselves the more our immune system is stressed and eventually one of those mutating viruses will find a home in our chest.
This year I decided to make a few changes hoping to avoid the bug and I will share them with you. A friend of mine said she took vitamin D, she swears it helped her with her S.A.D. which stands for Seasonal Affective Disorder; it's a fancy way of saying you get really bummed out in the winter - yeah, I do too. So I started taking it daily and it seems to really be helping, so far so good. I have also decided that even though regular workouts are important, getting enough sleep will be my priority to avoid winter burnout this year. I will let myself get the rest I need and then go work out. I also gave myself permission to say "no" this year, it was difficult and I am proud to say I got out of the family Xmas in Calgary...wahoo! I feel better already. I allowed myself to prioritize based on what I really wanted to do, as opposed to all of those obligations that really stressed me out last year. It helps that I have a really supportive partner who also wants to minimize stress.
I decided that I would endure hat-head this year more so than last year because the fashion statement is not worth the flu, keeping your head warm conserves energy and helps your immune system. I also decided to make fruit, especially berries, a part of my winter diet for the antioxidants, and to take my B-complex vitamins daily to fight stress. So far I am still trying to give up caffeine, not doing so good there yet, oh well, but I have started drinking herbal tea at night so that I can sleep better, and drink more fluids.
Everyone has his or her own cold-killer remedy, so if you do end up getting sick despite everything that you have tried to avoid it, sometimes it still finds you, here's mine. If you start to feel like you are getting the bug, feeling a bit achy and your throat feels like you swallowed a towel, my cold killer that I swear by is called "Echinaseal: Echinacea, Goldenseal and Propolis Tincture with Myrrh" by St Francis. Makoto and I laugh because we both agree it's horrid and the stuff works (it makes Buckley's seem like ice-cream...seriously). It will kill whatever is trying to grow in your throat and a few hundred taste buds for about ten minutes too, but it really does the job if you take it at the first sign of getting sick. So good luck to us all with the upcoming "festive season' and know that I am here to help with a massage whenever you need me. :)
Chris Godi, RMT
ˆ Back to TopHolistic HumourThe Zen-tai Funnies Recipe for SuccessBlack Bean soup with Lime and CorianderIngredients
3 cups Black Beans (used canned to save time) 1 Tbsp olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 medium onions, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
2 tsp chili powder
2 tsp jalapeno pepper, chopped
1 ½ tsp dried oregano
1 tsp ground cumin
½ tsp aniseeds
6 cups chicken stock
1 can (14oz/398ml) stewed tomatoes
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp pepper
4 tsp lime juice
Directions: Heat oil over medium heat; cook garlic, onions and celery, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes or until onions are softened. Add chili powder, jalapeño pepper, oregano, cumin and aniseeds; cook, stirring occasionally, for 1 minute. Add beans and stock; bring to boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 45 minutes. Add tomatoes, salt and pepper; simmer for 10 minutes.
In food processor or blender, purée 8 cups (2 L) of the soup in batches. Return to pot; heat through. Stir in lime juice. Taste and adjust seasoning.
(Make-Ahead: Let cool; cover and refrigerate for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 2 months. Reheat gently to serve.)
Makes 6 servings.
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