Make Time For Health

Archive for the ‘Medicine’ Category

Steroids are modernly associated with illegal abuse, self-destructive behavior, and competition. However, steroids have not always had this stigma nor was the aggression always associated with the effects of steroid abuse.Nineteenth century research and experimentation for both scientific and biological interests led scientific professionals to explore the physiological components of the male body. This exploration was driven by the need to know what distinguished a man’s body from that of his female counterpart.
The isolation of male bird testes had them hypothesize that placing testes in other parts of their anatomy would gravely affect the operations of their reproductive systems. So what did this mean in regards to what truly made a man a man? Anabolic functions are those that make simple substances or operations more complex. That being said, scientists suggested that the testosterone in male genetic make-up has many ambitions including physical power and heightened aggression.
So testosterone, when amplified in combination with other hormones, can be a threat to one’s ability to manage their behavior. To further explore these ideas, scientists went on to synthesize testosterone which subsequently became the first steroid. These steroids are essentially a synthetic by-product of the testosterone hormone thereby yielding both healthful and harmful effects. The naturally occurring anabolic functions in both male and female bodies serves our muscles, bones, and protein creation. The issue remains, the manufactured anabolism that is forced upon the body by way of illegal and unmonitored steroid use.
The injection of synthesize steroids often cause our naturally processed levels of testosterone to be submerged in unnatural and extreme amounts of hormones that can lead to an overdose, addiction, or death. In addition to these dramatic consequences of steroid abuse there are clinical studies that prove that impotence, hair loss, and disease are often also related to faulty use of steroids. Even when steroids are initially taken at a minimum in order to enhance workouts or overall physical performances, like most drugs that are taken without a doctor’s permission, users may pave a path for destructive behavior.

When it comes to medical treatment and the spread of diseases, the world is definitely getting smaller. This is the era of medical tourism, with people from affluent countries traveling to developing countries for cheaper health care. If you don’t have health insurance, medical care in developed countries is prohibitively expensive. It becomes imperative to reduce patient care costs. Moreover, there have been outbreaks of multiple epidemics across America, Asia, and Africa over the last few years, from H1N1 to hepatitis to meningitis. There is also a concerted effort globally to work on preventive measures. With the world becoming the proverbial global village and with increased international travel, the chances of exposure to new strains of communicable diseases are high.

There is also increasing awareness among the public about staying healthy and having good hygiene. The Internet offers members of a global audience more information on how to take care of themselves. There are technological advancements that take into consideration the needs of the public at large. Take smoking, for example. Traditional cigarettes are being replaced with electronic cigarette kits. A buyer can choose lower levels of nicotine. These hi-tech cigarettes emit no smoke. Not only is an e cigarette kit better than traditional cigarettes, but it also reduces exposure to secondhand smoke, which contributes to cancer, asthma, and other illnesses.

Notwithstanding all these technological advancements, the onus is still on individuals to take care of their own health and to reduce their exposure to contagious diseases. It’s important to maintain good hygiene. Wash your hands frequently; if possible, carry hand sanitizer with you everywhere. Regular exercise boosts immunity and makes your body less susceptible to strain and injury. Avoid junk food and eat nutritious meals at proper times. Drink plenty of water and stay hydrated. Reduce stress-inducing factors in your life. And above all, laugh a lot. After all, laughter is the best medicine.

When we consider the immense amount of money spent on healthcare and the pharmaceutical industry in the United States, we might assume that Americans are the healthiest people in the world. Our assumption would be wrong.

The American population is becoming obese, to the point of being called an epidemic. Is this because of too much food? Because of a lack of rigor in diet and exercise? Because of too many artificially created foods and livestock stuffed with hormones? Because of the immense amount of sugar ingested by Americans?

When is mass-produced food too much? Chickens raised for fast-food restaurants across the country are grown like plants in barns, without any chance to roam. Cows are raised in huge pens and not allowed to run free across the range. Fruits and vegetables are altered and reduced to one type to fill the demands of a hungry population used to getting what it wants.

Could the obesity problem be due to too many medicines? What studies have been conducted linking weight gain to the use of multiple medications? One wonders if medications may cause abnormal levels of hunger.

For example, Prednisone, a drug for cancer patients, is used to suppress the immune system, and its side effects include increased hunger. What if increased hunger is a general side effect of most pharmaceuticals? What if, in addition to the amazingly poor diet of the average American, prescription and over-the-counter drugs also contribute to increases in appetite?

If Tennessee drug treatment results in reduced ingestion of drugs, perhaps the beneficial side effects will be weight loss, better nutrition, and overall better health.

Was it the way your parents built their morning brew-fest into their daily routine? Or was it the alluring smell at the office? There are dozens of motivations that compel coffee drinkers to start wielding the foam and even more for why they continue to ingest its bodied taste regularly, but what are the most compelling of these reasonings and what do they say about the coffee drinking culture?

It’s a scary world out there, only heightened by the deadlines, crunch times, and unexpected twists and turns of our regimented schedules. Some of us rely on the morning workout, others on the blaring tunes from our ipods or car radios, and still others await the break of day donut to get our day started. We need that morning pick-me-up, that healthy refresher that reminds us we ought to be grateful for another full day, feel alive, and embrace what lies ahead as the hours tick away.

We don’t always have to talk about the morning coffee to hone in on the animated effects of your coffee drinks. Coffee drinkers use words like “energy,” “initiative,” and “endurance” to describe the desired effects of their coffee drinks and those are all vital to our functionality. It’s no surprise that most coffee drinkers began making coffee stops to recharge their batteries.

The aromatic and tasteful complements might have kept you on the coffee train, but the addictive and highly effective caffeine components of the average coffee drink can be said to have first initiated most coffee drinkers. It’s important to remain moderate in your coffee consumption in order to keep the habit healthy and beneficial to your overall being.

Female embodiment has evolved grossly from the turn of the twentieth century and yet some facets of female personality and potential have remained the same. Women are silly, inspired, paranoid, lovable, insecure, ambitious, romantic, fascinating, we boring; the circumference of what it means to be human. In acknowledging the various components of our physical, emotional, and spiritual existence, we are equipping ourselves with the tools to take care of our whole selves.

It’s important to keep a journal. Go ahead and spit out advice even if unsolicited if you deem it appropriate or constructive, and utilize your gift of language to achieve and share freedom. Each of us manifest these entities in different ways based on our unique circumstances, resources, goals, and agendas and this variety is truly the spice of life. We eat, we move, we cry, and we seek guidance from friends and family and even from strangers in order to reveal the truth about our lives and how we should and can live them.

From doctors to therapists and cousins to life-long girlfriends, there are people who care to find out not only what is going on in your life but how it makes you feel. Our physical, emotional, and spiritual beings are encompassed by overlapping realities that all need nurture, attention, and treatment. The truth is, we need to care about ourselves enough to remain loyal to the non-toxic people and environments in our lives in order to truly take care of our hearts, bodies, and minds.

Seeking outside help has often been stigmatized to equate with weakness, but on the contrary, only the wise accept that we cannot always be everything we or others need and reaching out a hand is a sign of courage. Whether it’s a book on the shelf or an appointment with a trusted professional, there are resources available to help you see yourself clearly in order to take care of yourself even better than you thought you could.

To reconcile any two entities is a feat seemingly out of reach for mortals. Our humanity, the very essence of having found ourselves with a life we did not request or prepare for, compels us to use our resources wisely to find a balance in every aspect of our live. Yet this balance always seems one step way from attainable, and so the elusive search consumes our existence.

So while a lifetime does not seem an adequate temporal frame in which to balance that which satisfies our goals of fulfillment, teetering between a balance of personal, intellectual, and spiritual, we attempt the impossible anyway. We seek advice and counsel from those that will listen and even from those who won’t. We want to get to know ourselves better each day so that we can better give to the world, the one we’ve created for ourselves and the one at large.

Our lives are tangled webs of opposing forces and circumstances, only in hopes of ascertaining truths, much like history’s most prolific thinkers did before our time. We seek a guiding force, through a contemplative experience about which none of us are experts and yet we pledge allegiance to our role as participators. We devise a plan of action to reach happiness. Unwilling to accept that we have the capacity for absolute morality or intuition regarding matters of fulfillment, we still try.

In wrestling with these issues, it’s important to be deliberate in any delivery, whether by voice, written word, or action. The holistic nature of being human affords us the abilities and rights to represent our multi-dimensional beings in a multitude of ways. By remaining open to the changes in ourselves and the people and world around us, we remain adaptable, teachable, and far from ignorance. In doing so, we are allowing ourselves to be ready to acknowledge a sense of fulfillment when it’s finally within our grasp.

To overcome an addiction is to surmount one of life’s gravest obstacles. The weight and pull of an addictive force may often be more powerful than the wind of a tornado or the force of an antagonistic word. The daily struggle to battle an addiction sometimes starts at the first dawn of breath in the morning. Thoughts of the contention that will rule your morning, day, and night flood you brain as you attempt to get out of bed.

Like releasing oneself from the grips of the strongest man in the world, it takes relentless action to even get up. You may feel weak and helpless against the addiction’s cunning strength, so you convince yourself why you will lose. In an effort to restore sanity, you may dismiss all thoughts related to the addiction and convince yourself that this is the day that things will be different. But when habitual behavior returns, your will is tested.

It leaves you hopeless at times, as you grasp for strength and motivation to go on. The desire to fight might leave you as you give in again and relish in the defeat. Then the addiction is more powerful as it is now accompanied by the belief that recovery is not possible. Before you even can embrace the meaning of recovery, you remind yourself that this battle will exist everyday for an indeterminate amount of time. Suddenly, you feel panicked and anxious and all the rationality you know is there as a resource seems out of reach. It takes an effort from one’s mind, body and soul to proceed.

Those who believe change can happen are the ones who have a chance. And yet, if you are not yet in that place yet, you should embrace the belief that you can be soon. Addiction does not afflict only the terminally unique, but rather the friends and family members of every hard-working, sane individual across the world. The help is available for those ready to embrace it. And the support is available for those that need that nudge to believe they can be in time.

To be human requires us to accept certain unadulterated truths, those which may only be learned in times of tragedy or misfortune. To believe that things may change is often a given definition of hope, and to be human means to accept that hope alone does not change things. Similarly, we can recognize ourselves as characters that exist within the function and form of artistic creations, debilitated by our limited capacity for change and yet focused on momentary actuality.

Sometimes out jobs, our family, our friends, and our partners gives us a somewhat alarming reality check as to the limitations created for and by us, as mortal human beings. We are reminded that sometimes it is important to understand ourselves as flawed, seemingly powerless entities in a world created for us. Just as lovers await a kiss that will never touch their lips, so too do humans live this life without having fulfilled dreams and ambitions they sought to experience. But the beauty and truth exist within the parameters of these disappointments.

Both the triumphs and the disappointments in life leave us with a mantra of sorts, defining the value that life holds despite the negative qualities it embodies. We are humans who seek control in a hasty life as we attempt to define the struggle that abounds when that which is created becomes immaterial to the qualities it represents.

As life is a fusion of thoughtful analysis and conjecture based on individual perspectives on a visionary experience, that which is observing living on a “sun up to sun down” temporal experience, so too is the experience trying to better ourselves and making a physical and mental transformation.

Torn by the ambiguity and paradox often presented in life, yet pacified by the overall meaning derived by unifying the pieces of the whole, we have the potential to come away with a response akin to truly feeling alive; one which stirs up satisfying imagination with the impending feeling of loss or dissatisfaction always lurking in the background or subconscious. Accepting all that comes with each day will empower us to stand up to the life we find ourselves working with.

You have become an obsession! Obsession; one of those words thrown around in our society most often referring to fetishes like shopping addictions or relationships gone wrong. But you are embedded in my very being and I can’t live like this anymore. The level and frequency with which my daily effort, my mental and physical energy, and all my time spent harping and wrestling with and against you, has reached a degree of fixation.

You are distressing, obnoxious, and intrusive. It started out as the most self-destructive form of idolatry but I don’t believe in you anymore. You are not my friend, my savior or my quick fix. You have evolved into my enemy because you make me ashamed, regretful, and submissive. Therefore, I don’t even recognize myself anymore.

I find myself, instead, hiding thoughts and behaviors, and thereby rationalizing my routine to myself, often because I fear lying to myself.  You sick, self-destructive, manipulator, you have taken hold and now there are dueling voices in my head concerning you.  Do I eat, overeat, purge, hide, lie or do I make excuses, act out a fear or isolate? You have mediated an unhealthy relationship with something that I used to be fond of. You gained my trust in the beginning and then you tried to destroy me.


You are overwhelming and proud.  You cause me inner frustration and a sense of helplessness and fear. This fear continues to manifest itself in too many ways to count. Fearing that with every new second, this body of mine will once again remind me that it is a part of me, part of the holistic representation of me, and needs something from me. I don’t want to struggle with my temple, but you have caused this strain.

I want to let YOU go. You have had enough practice, polishing your conventions and tracking your success. You don’t think I can compete with you, but I can. I refuse to be bullied into a life that isn’t mine anymore. I want it back. Letting you go is my new obsession.