Health – Laugh Out Loud and Lose Inches

Two out of every three adults are over weight – that is no laughing matter.  However, what is a laughing matter is that laughter can help your lose weight.  Ridiculous you say!  Did you hear the one about…?  Really, laughter has been shown to be a very effective weight loss tool.  You won’t lose tons of weight overnight, but it will help with weight loss and improve other aspects of your overall health.

There is a new branch of psychology called ‘laughter therapy.’  Some hospitals have incorporated this therapy for pain relief and depression.  You might have seen the movie, Patch Adams.  Robin Williams played a real life physician who was also a clown.  Dr. Patch Adams found significant improvement in his patients when laughter therapy was used.  Laughtercising is a new exercise craze that gets you laughing when you don’t feel like it.  Laughter has been shown to stop cravings – and those between meal snacks.

Laughter has been used for over a thousand years to improve your health.  Proverbs 17:22 states that a cheerful heart does good like a medicine, but a broken spirit makes one sick.  Martin Luther used humor to counsel people with depression.  Immanuel Kant, an 18th century German philosopher used laughter to restore balance and equilibrium.  Clowns were brought into hospitals in the 1930’s to cheer up kids with polio.

There are a few famous quotes on laughter.  David Nathan said, “Laughter is part of the human survival kid.”  Joel Goodman said, “Seven days without laughter make one weak.”  E. E. Cummings said, “The most wasted of all days is one without laughter.”  My favorite is from Milton Berle, who said, “Laughter is an instant vacation.”

A lot of people eat because of stress.  Emotionally, you feel relief or happiness from eating.  It’s the first level of happiness – physical senses.  You eat, you feel better; therefore, you stress seems to be lessened.  It takes a little more than a two-second laugh though.  Laugh out loud – a nice hearty laugh for at least 30 seconds or longer.  Do this ten or more times a day and you will feel happier and notice that you no longer rely on that extra piece of chocolate cake.  You also notice that you have more energy.  You develop a better sense of well being.

Most people cannot laugh for 30 seconds ten or more times a day.  We could when we were kids, but something in our psyches has changed over the years and we just don’t let go like we used to.  We take everything more seriously today.  It takes time and you have to work hard at laughing out loud.  Extended laughter actually requires a great deal of physical exercise and muscular control.

Think of a belly laugh as internal jogging.  It works on the same principles.  At least fifteen facial muscles and dozens of other muscles are involved when you laugh.  The louder you laugh the more intensity you exercise your muscles.  You will notice your pulse and respiration increasing which results in more oxygen entering your bloodstream.  Can you imagine that your doctor might prescribe a regimen of  laughing out loud for fifteen minutes a day for weight loss – it might be here before you know it?

There are multiples causes for you being over weight.  It is rare when one factor alone is responsible.  Diets and exercising can be supplemented with a laughing regimen – and it doesn’t really cost you anything but your time – and you feel better for doing it.  Laughter is not aerobics.  Laughter is mood enhancing and strengthens your emotional base.

In the past forty years researchers have found that laughter increases blood flow, increases your immunity, decreases stress levels and calms your nerves, releases endorphins, lowers your blood sugar, increases your energy, increases your feeling of well being, increases your HDL cholesterol, and relaxes you for better sleep.  Laughter improves the emotional and physical quality of your life.  Some will tell you that laughter increases your joie de vivre – the joy of living.  Laughter actually makes you more attractive.  Happy people appeal to others.  A very interesting aspect of laughter is that it can reduce pain.

Look at life with laughter in mind.  Don’t be so serious all the time.  Be serious when you have to, but keep in mind that everything in life is not meant to be viewed as serious.  Keep smiling – it’s a beginning to a laugh.  Choices have consequences.  Choose to smile and laugh as often as you can.  You will feel better, look better and lose a few pounds.

Choices have consequences.  Your Prosperity Professor, Red O’Laughlin

Health – Cancer Update – Metastasis, What Else Can You Do?

Why would surgical removal of a tumor cause new cancer cell growth at the micrometastasis sites in your body?  It is somewhat counterintuitive – if I cut something out, why would it have an effect of what is left?  One of the processes in your body is called angiogenesis.  This process produces new blood vessels from pre-existing blood vessels.  Your body requires angiogenesis in order to grow and for certain types of healing.  Your tumor commandeers this process and causes blood vessels to begin developing within the tumor so that it can grow.  Tumors cannot grow without new blood vessels – their maximum size without new blood support is 1-2 millimeters, about the size of a pinhead.

Getting back to my original question – how can a removed tumor cause new cancers to grow in different locations in your body?  When a tumor takes control of new blood vessel creation for its own use, it produces a factor, an anti-angiogenic factor, which curbs the development of metastases elsewhere in your body.  So long as the tumor is in place and growing, other cancer locations will remain dormant.  Cut the tumor out and you have shut down the anti-angiogenic factor which prevents further cancer growth and allows metastasis cells to begin growing.  These new sites begin usurping your angiogenesis process and new blood vessels are directed into your newly growing tumors.

There is a double-whammy attached to surgical removal of tumors.  The first is the inhibition of anti-angiogenic factors and the second is the increase in vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF).  VEGF is another factor which causes an increase in angiogenesis.  The surgical process actually turns on VEGF and keeps it elevated for a while after surgery.  VEGF causes your angiogenesis factor – new blood vessel growth – to go into hyper drive – and provides new blood supplies to the latent microscopic cancer cells.

What recourse do you have to reduce, inhibit or stabilize your angiogenesis factor after surgery?  If you can shut down the increase in VEGF, then you can shut down the hyper drive component of new blood vessel growth.  Several common nutrients inhibit VEGF.  They are epigallocatechin (EGCG) from green tea, curcumin, chrysin, silibinin, and genistein from soy isoflavones.  Some studies have shown up to an 80% reduction in VEGF and angiogenesis using select nutrients against certain cancers.  Even without surgery, some of these nutrients have been shown to reduce the size of certain existing tumors in test animals.

Curcumin is an interesting nutrient because it is a directly obstructs the angiogenesis factor process and VEGF.  Additionally, curcumin blocks the cancer cell adhesion process, which restricts where cancer cells can land and build a new home.  Some surgeons begin their patients with a regimen of certain nutrients (EGCG, curcumin, and soy genistein extracts) up to one week before surgery to squash the VEGF factor.

Studies have shown that general anesthesia and morphine can cause metastasis growth after surgery.  General anesthesia weakens and reduces your NK (natural killer cells that attack cancer cells) cells.  Morphine is typically used after surgery for pain control.  Morphine weakens your immune system immediately following surgery when you need it the most, which further reduces the NK cell support that you need.

Regional anesthesia reduces the amount of general anesthesia required during surgery – this reduces the impact on your NK cells.  Regional anesthesia has been shown to reduce the amount of morphine needed for post-operative pain control.  Experiments with laboratory animals showed up to a 70% reduction in the overall impact of metastasis advancement compared to general anesthesia alone.  In human studies, some cancer surgeries employing regional anesthesia showed almost no impact on NK cell degradation.  Regional anesthesia has also shown reductions in recurrence of cancer after a three-year follow-up for breast cancer surgery.  Regional anesthesia has also shown significant improvement in post-operative recovery.

If you are bound for cancer surgery, regional anesthesia might be an important topic to talk about with your anesthesiologist.  Another topic to include in your discussion is the use of tramadol instead of morphine for post surgery pain control.  Tramadol does not hinder your normal immune system function.  Additionally, tramadol does not inhibit your NK cell activity.

Choices have consequences.  Your Prosperity Professor, Red O’Laughlin

Health – Who is in Control?

I was standing in line today at Whataburger.  The weather was dismal, cold, dreary, light rain, windy, dark overcast, with barren trees and dead grass as far as the eye could see.  As I moved forward towards the order point, the lady in front of me had a beautiful smile – very graceful, almost angelic.  I noticed her for a couple moments and decided to comment about her smile.  I said something along the order of, ‘You seem very happy today!’  She said she was happy and blessed to be standing here.

I asked another question and we ended up in a very interesting conversation.  She had been in a wheel chair a year ago.  Seven years ago her health started going downhill – stress, trauma and more stress.  She had undergone a terrible experience with her dentist that left the hinges of her jaw bone on both sides of her face non-functional.  The doctors told her that she would never have use of them again.  She managed to find someone who did fix her mouth and she can eat and talk and do everything anyone else can do.

But, her health started in a downward spiral with that event and got worse over time.  A year ago she decided that enough was enough.  She was taking charge of her own life.  She started an internet search on what was causing her health problems so that she could take some action.  She said that she studied neuro-transmitters and began an adoptive therapy – not everything that was identified in her research, but what she had found and what she thought would work for her.

I asked her what neuro-transmitter supplements she was taking and she listed a half-dozen very quickly.  I didn’t go into details of dosages or brands or anything like that.  She offered me the name of a book and a website for my further information.  I told her that I was in the process of writing a book about pain control and that I would check into some of the items that worked for her.  She asked if I was a doctor, and I told her that I was not.  I gave her my business card and told her that I had an interest in personal health and blogged about it often.

Most people in a wheel chair, racked with pain, do not take it upon themselves to take matters into their own hands.  They sit back (so to speak) and take whatever pills and advice their doctors give them.  They are passive to a point of near incapability.  They will take what the doctor tells them, but they won’t go any further.  I applaud this lady for the initiative she took to take charge of her own health.  Very few of us do it.

What’s worse, we begin looking for health improvement options only when we enter that downward spiral.  We choose to be corrective than preventive.  We do choose preventive actions with our car, and a few other things in our lives, but very few.  We wait till something happens and then react.  Yet, everyday our health is descending – one day at a time till we die.  The change is so gradual that we don’t see it.  One day we can’t do what we used to do.  We accept that we’re getting older; yet, our brains tell us we have not changed.

I still think like a mid-20 year old, yet I have passed that era a long time ago.  Fortunately I am taking no prescription medicines and never have except for a short period of time to address a malady at that specific time in my life.  I exercise daily, but not enough to work up a sweat, except during the summer time.  I eat what I want, but it could be healthier.  But, I do take supplements with things that I know are exceptionally good for me.  I start with supplements that work at the cellular level and keep my energy stores primed and working efficiently.

Health is a major part of our lives.  It allows us to do the things we want to do.  Our wealth may postpone doing those things, but if we have the money and the time, we want the ability to do them.  Almost every prescription medicine came from some natural herb or plant.  The natural product in the herb or plant worked well in conjunction with everything else that comprised the plant.  When an active ingredient is extracted and synthesized it undergoes a transformation – many times with some degree of toxic side effects.

White willow bark was used for centuries as a pain killer.  Salicin is the responsible pain killer compound.  Salicylic acid was synthesized in 1838 from the wintergreen tree.  It relieved pain, but left people with gastric distress and vomiting.  Acetylsalicylic acid (aspirin) was synthesized in 1893 and reduced a lot of the gastric side effects.  But it still has side effects that salicin does not have.  Yet, salicin is still available today for us, but it cannot be prescribed for pain by physicians – it’s not a drug.

Take a look at the drugs you are taking.  What are the side effects?  Are they worth it?  Is there something else that can be used that is just as effective without the side effects?  Who is really in control of your health?

Choices have consequences.  Your Prosperity Professor, Red O’Laughlin