Adrenal Fatigue, Depression and Illness: The Sleep and Fun Connection (Day 9)
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on March 9, 2010 – 9:30 pm -I work with a lot of people who are struggling with adrenal fatigue and depression. It’s almost an epidemic in our world today, and if you stay up with current events, watch the news and read the newspapers, there’s a good chance that you’re experiencing some adrenal fatigue symptoms and heavy mode as well. The media thrives on shifting people into fear mode. Fear sells. When you are fearful, the part of your nervous system called the sympathetic nervous system takes control, getting you ready for fight or flight. In this mode, your heart rate increases, your blood pressure increases and your digestion shuts down. The aftermath is fatigue, nutritional deficiencies and depression.
I just wrote a very detailed article for Purely Delicious magazine about stress, fatigue and burnout. It will be published soon.
When you’re burning the candle at both ends, you are much less able to deal with stress. To compound the problem, when stress levels are high, you have a tendency to sleep less, because stress can cause insomnia or frequent night time awakenings.
And of course, taking time for fun goes out the window in times of stress because of the perception that there just isn’t “enough time”.
My commitment for this month is to incorporate more fun and sleep into my life. Yours may also include eating balanced meals, eating more slowly, becoming more conscious when eating. These are all VERY important and I support you in your commitment.
So try this. Before you begin to put food into your mouth, stop. Take a nice deep breath. This alone is enough to shift you out of your sympathetic nervous system – remember–the system that causes your digestion to slow way down. Then take a few seconds to appreciate the food you are about to consume. Think about where it came from, how it was prepared, how it will nourish every cell. Only then, begin to eat, staying conscious of each forkful.
No kidding, it will take some focused effort to do this! Yet the time and attention to conscious eating, appreciative eating, is well worth it!
Go ahead and give it a try, and post a comment about how it went for you.
Join me on Wednesday March 10 at 12:30pm CST for my Blog talk Radio Show: Creating a Vibrant Life, during which I’ll reveal 5 strategies for balancing your mood through food. www.blogtalkradio.com/dr-ritamarie
My Report Card for Monday:
1- Green Smoothie – 2 quarts Done
2- weight training exercise Done
3- bed by 11:30 (how daring of me!) maybe even earlier a little later – 12:20
4- write a chapter in my new book did the research but didn’t complete the chapter
5- quality time with the kids – family conflict rather than quality time…
Commitments for Tuesday:
1- run 3 miles
2- bed by midnight
3- Drink 1 quart of green smoothie
4- drink 1 cup veggie juice
How about you? What are you committed to today?
Let us know. Post your comments below.
Love, Health and Joy to you,
Dr. Ritamarie
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, cleansing programs, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, DrRitamarie, exercise, fatigue symptoms, living foods, livingfoods, raw foods
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Articles | 1 Comment »
30 Day Fun and Sleep Challenge: A Big Day of Fun Goes a Long Way Towards Happy Adrenals.
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on March 7, 2010 – 12:05 pm -What a day! I had intended to get this posted this morning, but time escaped me. Between making breakfast for the kids and preparing for my Balance My Body webinar, I ran out of cycles.
After messing up on several of my comittments yesterday, I made up for it today! Seems FUN was taking the brunt of my unfulfilled commitments all week, but last night and today really made up for it.
After the Balance My Body webinar, I drove my son (or rather he drove me!!! He has his learner’s permit) to a friend’s house then went downtown to our beautiful hike and bike trail and did a 4 mile run around the lake.
Afterwards, I went to whole foods and bought some lovely vegetables. I was on my way to pick up my son and his friend frm the movies, when my husband called and let me knw that he could do it. So I stopped by Borboletta’s, one of Austin’s raw foods cafes, which recently changed management, to check out the changes. Low and behold, I ran into one of my students who’s become a dear friend. We sat and chatted, while eating drinking green smoothies and eating delicious raw and living foods, like kale salad, for hours.
I put in a couple of hours of work and now I’m off to hottub with the family and then go to bed.
A successful self care day on all fronts!
Here’s my report card for Friday:
- Exercise 30 minutes - FLOP – all I did was a few minutes of weights
- Fun: Quality time with my husband – a date for dinner at Beets Cafe! Yipee. It was great. We had a lovely dinner and good conversation.
- Water – 8 cups Success
- Get myself signed up to take the Vibrant Health Mindset Course and recommit to my own goals. Didn’t quite makt it and will move this to tomorrow.
- Bed by midnight – Superflop. The evening out and a 2 hour excursion with my almost 16 year old son took time from a commitment I had to make. I taught a webinar class thsi morning for my Balance My Body group, and needed to prepare the case studies, and get everything set up, plus I needed to finish the maintenence Plan for the 6 week detox, as promised. Thus I got to bed at 2. I did sleep until 8 so this is still a better night’s sleep than I was getting last week. Progress not perfection.
Saturday’s Commitments…made this morning but posted in the evening:
- Fun – 30 minutes
- Exercise – longer run – 4 miles
- bed by midnight
- Hot-tub or Sauna before bed
How did you do yesterday? What are your commitments for today? Comment below.
Enjoy!
Love, Health and Joy,
Dr. Ritamarie
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, DrRitamarie, exercise, green smoothie, livingfoods, raw foods
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Articles | 1 Comment »
30 Day Sleep and Fun Challenge Day 4: Support Your Adrenals and Decrease Fatigue
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on March 5, 2010 – 6:22 am -Wow. What a day. I’ve been in sessions all day, and didn’t get to post my commitments for today until now.
It’s quite interesting for me…making a public commitment to go to sleep. It has really been driving my late night behavior. Last night it was particularly tempting to just ignore the commitment and work late, as I had lot to do. Yet I would have felt really bad having to post that I went to bed at 3 when I committed to 12.
I did a class on adrenal health last night for my online program, Balance My Body Blueprint. It was a great reinforcement for me to teach everyone about the importance of breathing, sleep and having fun. I’ve been focused on breathing and appreciation all day and I love how it feels. This activity can ease the burden your adrenals and alleviate fatigue.
So here’s my report card for yesterday:
- Exercise: 2:30 – 3:30 get out for a run and do a few weights – I did this at 4:30. It was a beautiful day and i had a great time.
- Fun break: 9:30 PM – after my Balance My Body Blueprint teleseminar call on Balancing Adrenals – I am afraid this was a flop, unless you count cuddling with my 11 year old…which I think is fun.
- Off computer by 11:30, in bed by 11:45, lights out before midnight. I was off computer by 11:27. My 11 year old was troubled by some school events and needed cuddle time with Mom, so I lay with him in his bed, dozing, until I went to my own bed, lights out by 12:15! Great accomplishment!
And here’s my commitment for today:
- 64 ounces smoothie/green soup
- Off computer by 11PM
- Sauna 30 minutes
- Bed by 11:30
- Fun reading for 15 minutes
- Lights out between 11:45 and 12.
How did you do yesterday? What are your commitments for today? Comment below.
Enjoy!
Love, Health and Joy,
Dr. Ritamarie
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, commitment, fatigue symptoms, fun, livingfoods, raw foods, whole foods
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Articles | 3 Comments »
30 Day Sleep and Fun Challenge: Day 3 – Conscious Competance
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on March 4, 2010 – 12:35 am -So, I’m going for progress not perfection. Habits take time to change and sometimes it takes days or even weeks of repetition to make permanent changes.
This challenge has brought my habits in need of change to my forefront and that’s what’s important. I learned a long time ago, from the teachings of Abraham Maslov, that all learning comes in 4 stages:
- Unconscious Incompetence
- This is the “ignorance is bliss” stage. You don’t know what you don’t know, and are not bothered by this lack of knowledge. For example, most people walk into fast food restaurants, completely unaware f the way that food effects them, without knowledge of or competency in a different way of eating.
- Conscious Incompetence
- Here’s where you become aware of what you don’t know. Perhaps you attend a lecture or read a book and realize that your way of eating is making you sick. You are conscious of a new way of eating, but you have no skill at it; you are incompetent, yet aware of it every time you put something into your mouth
- Conscious Competence
- You now understand or know how to do something, ie how to eat healthfully. However, demonstrating the skill or knowledge requires a great deal of consciousness or concentration. You need to stop and ponder the choices and consciously make yourself make healthy choices when confronted with a wide array of food.
- Unconscious Competence
- You have so much practice and skill, that the behavior becomes “second nature” and can be performed easily, without concentration or conscious control. You can at this point easily follow through without thought or effort. In our example, you know what foods are helpful, which ones are harmful, and you naturally choose the ones that promote health. It’s a non issue.
If you would like to know more about the 4 stages of competance, this series of articles goes into great depth.
http://www.drritamarie.com/go/4StagesOfLearning
For me, eating well is stage 4. For sleep, I am at stage 2.
Given that, I honor the progress I have made this week. I am light years ahead of last week. So here’s my “Report Card” for yesterday, March 2.
1- Shut down the computer no later than 11:30, lights out by midnight - I got off the computer by 12:05 and lights out by 12:25.
2- Drink 2 quarts of green smoothie. Yeah! did this.
3- Exercise for at least 30 minutes FLOP. It was cold in the morning, so I opted out of a 7AM run, then had to drive kids to school, then had a busy day. Was intending to do the stairmaster (in my bedroom) after my teleconference call, but a neighbor friend had hurt his back so I worked on him at 9:15 PM. After that I had bits and pieces and follwo-ups to do and never got to the exercise. Lots of excuses, eh! Lesson: Look at the calendar in advance and plan a specific time to do exercise.
FOR Fun: Water color paint for 5 minutes - FLOP again. Instead for fun I hung with my 11 year old and talked about his day.
OK. So I am making progress.
Here’s my comittment for today:
1- Exercise: 2:30 – 3:30 get out for a run and do a few weights
2- Fun break: 9:30 PM – after my Balance My Body Blueprint teleseminar call on Balancing Adrenals
3- Off computer by 11:30, in bed by 11:45, lights out before midnight
How did you do yesterday? What are your commitments for today? Comment below.
Enjoy!
Love, Health and Joy,
Dr. Ritamarie
P.S. If food is an issue you are working on, check out the recording of a teleconference call I did Tuesday night with Nomi Shannon, the Raw Gourmet
http://www.drritamarie.com/DeliciouslyQuickRawFood-SignUp.php
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, fatigue symptoms, goal setting, living foods, livingfoods, Maslov, raw foods, unconscious compteance
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Taking Care of YOU – Slow Down and Enjoy Each Moment to Protect Yourself from Cancer
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on February 7, 2010 – 12:31 pm -
It’s been a week to remember and all the messages I’ve received all week were “slow down” and “take care of yourself”.
A couple were obvious…others more subtle.
I don’t consider myself a tired person; quite the contrary. My energy seems almost without limit. I sleep very little, am constantly on the move and I get a lot accomplished. Yet a nagging voice in the back of my mind has been wondering if I may be causing some hidden damage to myself by sleeping so little.
On Wednesday evening I ran into to technical challenges with the teleconference for Week 3 of my Balance My Body Blueprint course. I had a slide presentation ready to go, and was all set to launch into new territory. The technical challenges prevented participation on the web, where more than half my students participate. So I decided to do a question and answer segment. It was just the right thing to do. I was able to answer lots of questions, and even helped a few people to determine the probable cause of long standing health challenges. Wow. Slow down. Most people were not ready to jump into what I had planned. They were perfectly fine with slowing down and getting their questions answered.
On Thursday, I was moving quickly through my kitchen, and caught my slipper on a door stop. It sent me flying through the air and I landed hard on the tile floor. My left arm hit first, and it hurt so badly that I immediately thought it was broken. While I had lots of plans for the rest of the day and the next, I spent most of the time in bed, icing my arm and resting. Slow down. It took an injury to get me to get a good night’s sleep. It’s recovering nicely now, as evidenced by the fact that I can type today. Yesterday I could barely hunt and peck with one hand.
I’m getting small messages, and I’m taking them to heart. Better listen to the soft calls than to wait for a big one.
Earlier this week I received the sad news that a dear friend had died of cancer. She was a young woman, in her forties, and she’s survived by her husband and four children. The children are young. Her oldest is about the same age as my youngest. And now they are without their Mommy, and the world will no longer experience the joy of Anna’s sweet, kind heart and loving and giving nature.
I’ve experienced the loss of a loved to cancer several times over the past 5 years. And while the importance of diet and detoxification are high on my list of cancer prevention techniques, Anna’s death forces me to really look at the bigger picture.
Anna was a raw food enthusiast. I met her at an Alissa Cohen Teacher training. She was the founder of Purely Delicious magazine. She was excited about sharing what she learned about the health benefits of raw and living foods with the world. Still, she got breast cancer. Sure, her diet wasn’t perfect, and we can point fingers at her imperfections, and blame them for her cancer. Yet others, many of my family members included, eat way less “perfectly” than Anna did, and use toxic home and body care products and drink tap water, and they don’t have cancer…yet.
The sad truth is that almost 50% of us will get cancer. Perhaps not all will die as a result, yet it’s an alarming statistic nonetheless.
While it may be easy for skeptics and critics of the living foods lifestyle to use Anna’s story as an excuse to just let it all go and eat whatever they want, it’s important to look beyond, and continue to hold the utmost respect for the value of high antioxidant, unrefined, whole fresh plants as a vital element in keeping you healthy.
I could quote from all sorts of research right about now, and try to convince you from an intellectual level of the importance of diet in protecting you from cancer, yet I’d rather speak to you from my heart. It’s easy to hear Anna’s story and become fearful, and doubt your choice to lead a healthy life and eat a healthy diet. The truth is, there’s a big picture here. And many of its parts are a somewhat mysterious.
Cancer is always caused by exceeding your body’s ability to detoxify and repair. Cancer starts almost daily in just about everyone, and is quickly thwarted by an intact immune system and a working detoxification system.
The choices you make daily effect your ability to detoxify and thwart cancer before it takes over. Those include the quality and quantity of the water you drink, how much sunshine you get on bare skin, your movement, your thoughts, your feelings – fear and judgment create a breeding ground for cancer–how much fun you have, how much deep restful sleep you get, the quality of the air you breathe and of course, your diet.
There are so many elements that determine your cancer risk…and your ability to be healthy. Some may appear to be beyond your control:
- Genetics: some of us were born with genetic variations, called single neucleotide polymorphisms, aka SNPs (pronounced snips), that make it difficult to detoxify our environment without a little extra help.
- Your Mom’s Emotional State when she was pregnant with you. You may have been born with worn out adrenals and low cellular energy as a result, making you prone to cancer and other illnesses.
- Your Mom’s nutritional status and toxic exposures while she was pregnant with you. If she was depleted, you were born with nutritional imbalances.
- Early feeding:Whether you were breast or bottle fed and what your early solid foods were determine the state of your digestive tract and immune system. Leaky gut and immune system problems can increase your risk of cancer and other illnesses.
Many people embark on a health journey and address a single aspect. I see many living foods diet followers who don’t exercise, or stay indoors all the time, or push themselves hard and don’t sleep enough (like me). It’s easy to fall into the trap of believing that the good food can compensate for shortcomings in the others, but very often it cannot.
It’s time to look at the big picture. Sometimes just eating a healthy diet isn’t enough.
As a mother of 4 and editor and chief cook and bottle washer for a quarterly publication, Anna had no time left for herself. Even after she found out she had breast cancer, she continued to put others first, until she had to slow down. Unfortunately, it was too late for Anna. She opted for chemotherapy and radiation out of fear and perhaps desperation.
Most likely one or more of the early factors were at play with Anna. Yet, in spite of your genetics, early exposures and maternal environment, you can do what it takes to give yourself the best possible healthy and happy life. Once you identify the early factors that may be at play, through a combination of family history and genetic testing, there are steps you can take to correct for the inborn and early deficits.
It’s important to take inventory of your life and self correct where you can. If you’re not sleeping enough because you’re not going to bed at a reasonable hour (guilty as charged) then make a different choice. If you’re not sleeping enough because you have difficulty falling or staying asleep, you might have a hormonal imbalance. Adrenal imbalance and insulin dysfunction are the most likely culprits and they are both correctable.
If you have a lot of stress in your life (who doesn’t) you owe it to yourself to master te
chniques for transforming the negative impact on your body to positive.
Enhance your body’s detoxification systems, harness the power of blended greens and drink your greens at least once a day. Look for the positive and practice appreciation. Get in touch with really matters to you, and make daily choices that are consistent with your highest good.
Take care of others, but not at the expense of yourself. It’s important to take time for fun and pleasure each day, even for just a few moments.
No one can predict the length of your life – that’s out of your control. You can effect the quality of your life and decrease the likelihood of suffering as Anna did by making conscious and consistent choices to put your self first. Yes, you need to put yourself first. It is only by taking care of your needs that you have the energy and ability to take care of others. And if we all took better care of ourselves, there would be a lot less need to take care of others.
Love yourself. Slow down and have fun daily. Choose happiness daily and allow good health to follow.
In memory of Anna Tipps, friend, Mom wife, daughter, teacher and kind hearted loving soul. You will be missed.
Love, Health and Joy,
Dr. Ritamarie
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, cancer, cleansing programs, detoxification programs, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, livingfoods, raw foods, raw foods recipes, whole foods
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Avoid Adrenal Fatigue by Taking Time For Self Care
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on February 2, 2010 – 4:06 pm -So what does adrenal faigue have to do with self care? Everything. When you take care of yourself, your stress levels go down. And when your stress levels decrease, that’s a good thing for you!
Do you have any idea what happens on a physiologic level when you gt stressed out, worry about the future or fret about he past? Your body releases a cascade of chemicals designed to help you escape from tigers. Your heart rate speeds up, your blood pressure elevated, your sex drive goes away and your digestion shuts down. Does that sound like the rpescription for a healthy, energetic and happy life? Certainly not
The stress hormone cortisol gets secreted into your blood stream, and makes trouble throughout your body. Sure, it helps you to fight tigers, but that’s not going to help you much when you’re getting all stressed out about the state of the economy. And it certainly doesn’t help you to think of creative ways you can deflect economic trends and prosper in spite of the world around you. In fact, it does just the opposite.
One of the effects of cortisol is cortical inhibition. That means, it temporarily shuts off the higher-level thinking center of your brain. This is important when you’re fleeing the real tiger, because solving economic problems would be counter productive when those big teeth are about to turn you into lunch. Cortisol activates the primitive parts of yoru brain, the survival centers. It also causes damage to a part of your brain called the hippocampus, which is responsible for short term memory. “Brain fog”, forgetfullness and lack of focus are sigs of adrenal fatugue.
Cortisol also inhibits your immune system and its ability to fight off invaders, to maintain balance, kill cancer cells, and keep you healthy. Cortisol also makes you fat, especially around the middle. Why does stress make you fat? Well, stress leads to increased production of cortisol, which triggers a mechanism in the body to release more sugar into the blood, because you’re going to need it to escape the tiger.
The release of sugar into the blood causes the release of insulin because insulin is what is needed to remove the sugar from your blood and get it into your cells, where it’s needed. That’s great when you have a real tiger chasing you. And it doesn’t present a problem when the stress response is infrequent and short lived. The problem is, in our modern lifestyle we get stressed often and we stay stressed for long periods of time.
And as if it’s not enough to be more prone to illness and cancer, stress kills your sex drive! And it stresses your mitochondria so they can’t produce enough energy, so you get tired.
If being a stressed out sick and overweight individual with no sex drive and no memory does not sound like fun to you, then you need to learn how to take care of your needs and transform the stressful responses to recharging ones.
In my Transforming Stress teleseminars I describe some of my favorite techniques for turning the stressful times into positive physiologic responses, using the power of appreciation.
I recorded a video on how to make the time for self care, in spite of your busy schedule. Consistently taking time for self care allows your adrenals to restore, and can even reverse adrenal fatigue.
What do you do to take care of yoruself everyday?
Write it down below for me.
Thanks,
Love, Health and Joy,
Dr. Ritamarie
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, DrRitamarie, exhaustion, fatigue, fatigue symptoms, Gluten Free Diet, livingfoods, raw and living foods holiday recipes, raw foods recipes
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Addressing Adrenal Fatigue and Sluggish thyroid: Start with a Detox
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on December 4, 2009 – 1:53 pm -
Everyone is always looking for answers that are complicated, sophisticated and sexy. The truth is, most health issues have simple solutions. Notice I said simple, not easy.
In fact, some of the simplest solutions of all are often the hardest to follow.
1- Fresh food: When you’re running around chasing after deadlines, it’s not always easy to find fresh food. It’s certainly not in the vending machines or the fast food joints.
2- Fresh, clean water: Unless you carry your own, it’s not generally available, although more and more places carry bottled water. I was in a restuarant last week with family that didn’t! What a shock.
3- Fresh air : Our air is filled with chemicals and pollution. Unless you live in a pristine area far far away form the cities, clean air is hard to find. And the indoor air is even worse; it’s polluted with all the chemicals used in building materials, carpets, paint and cleanin supplies.
4 – Exercise : When you’re working 12 hour a day, taking care of kids, and running a mile a minute to keep up with obligations, finding time to exercise can be a challenge, unless you are dedicated and make it an important part of your day.
5- Positive thoughts : If you listen to the news, read the newspaper or watch TV, the constant reporting of terrifying events, ominous predictions and financial gloom are enough to wear your positive thoughts to the bone.
6- Fulfilling Relationships: When you’re working hard just to survive, it’s easy to overlook the kind words and deeds and special touches that keep your relationships flourishing.
7- Sunshine : It’s lovely, abundant in many parts of the world and ellusive to many because we stay cooped up indoors working and taking care of our families.
Your health would improve dramatically if you could incorporate all of the above SIMPLE things into your life on a regular basis.
The hard, cold reality is, try as you might, you’ll slip up on some of these “simple” health tips more than you’d like. And when you do, your detoxification pathways suffer and you open yourself for fatigue, lack of focus and illness.
That’s why I developed a variety of cleansing and detoxification strategies that I perform at least 3-4 times a year to detoxify my system.
So just how toxic are you? Because there are so many genetic and environmental differences between people, the buildup of toxins effects each of us a bit diferently.
I have a test you can take to assess how much your health has been effected by toxicity. The test has ben around for a long time, and was originally developed by a mentor of mine , Dr. Jeffrey Bland, back in the 1980s.
My webmaster computerized it so that you can take it and get instant feedback.
Here’s the link.
http://www.drritamarie.com/sixweekdetox/toxicity-signup.php
It takes about 2 minutes. Invest 2 minutes in yourself today to determine how toxic you are and get a personalized email with tips for improving your health.
http://www.drritamarie.com/sixweekdetox/toxicity-signup.php
To your health and Vibrance
Dr. Ritamarie Losclazo
www.FreshnFunLiving.com
www.sixweekdetox.com
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, chronic fatigue, cleansing programs, detoxification programs, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, exercise, exhaustion, fatigue, fatigue symptoms
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Chronic Stress, cleansing programs, exhaustion, fatigue treatment | No Comments »
Overcoming Chronic Fatigue and Adrenal Exhaustion by Having Fun!
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on November 6, 2009 – 2:47 pm -I work with lots of patients and clients who suffer from adrenal exhaustion, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, and thyroid problems. I learn a lot from them. One thing I’ve noticed is that they are too tired to have fun. Imagine not having enough time in your life for enjoyment? By the time they finish doing all the things they “have to” do, they need to rest, and are constantly turning down offers to go out for fun activities. Even though I don’t suffer from fatigue–in fact quite the opposite – I still sometimes fall into the trap of putting fun last.
I’ve learned a lot of lessons about this very topic this week. It started last Sunday when I had an unexpected day of unplanned connection and fun.
I realized that although I value having fun, I sometimes let it take the back burner to work and family oligations.
One of the tools I use when coaching both private and group coaching clients is a fun assessment. They are guided to list at least 20 things they love to do, and create a strategy for incorporating fun into each day. I haven’t done this myself in a long time, and I plan to do it this weekend. Because your interesets may change from time to time, it’s a good idea to revisit the activity regularly, or at least twice a year.
So schedule some time…at least a half an hour..to sit back, relax and make a list of all the things you love so much that you feel a calling to them. Then schedule as many days as you can (at least 4) to have scheduled fun time. Start with 5 minutes. It’s addicting and you’ll soon find yourself extending the time you’ve allotted.
Just do it. When you’re having fun, your biochemistry changes. You become more relaxed and your digestion improves. Your hormones are more balanced. Your neurotransmitters become more balanced and as a result your mood improves and your energy increases.
I’m planning to schedule at least 5 minutes of fun every day. My life and my health depend on it.
How about you? Will you join me? Post your reply in the comments section below.
Love, Health and FUN.
Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo
http://www.drritamarie.com
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, DrRitamarie, exercise, exhaustion, fatigue, fatigue symptoms, thyroid
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, exhaustion, fatigue treatment | 1 Comment »
Overcoming Chronic Fatigue and Adrenal Exhaustion with Pleasure!
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on November 5, 2009 – 3:34 pm -I work with a lot of people with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Adrenal Exhaustion. There are a few strategies I teach right up front that are almost guaranteed to improve energy metabolism. The beauty of the approach I’m about to share is that it’s a pleasure to incorporate into your daily health rituals.
Much of what I learn about health and healing, I learn form my kids. They have an uncanny way of opening my eyes. I learned a lot of lessons this week. It started last Sunday when I had an unexpected day of unplanned connection and fun. I’d had a particuarly busy week the week before…3 coaching programs running at the same time, and each with specific tasks to do…emails, private consultations, teleseminars, group coaching calls, and materials creation.
My bad habit, when it comes to my health, is staying up too late. Because of the intensity of the workload I had been going to bed at 3AM or later for 2 weeks. I decided to sleep in on Sunday. After getting up at 10, the plan was to go for a run, then have a green smoothie and do some writing and editing. I’m working on completing 2 books… the most complete book about dehydation on the market today with my coauthor Chef Alicia Ojeda (www.ezrawfoods101.com) and a complete holiday recipe and health guide. They both needed edits.
As fate would have it, my run was delayed until very late…when I went into the kitchen to get some water before running, my teenage son Eric was there, and in the mood to talk.
If you’ve ever raised a teenager, you know that when they’re in the mood to talk, you drop everything and listen. It’s a rare and incredible experience.
So we chatted, and I made him breakfast. We chatted some more and I made him lunch. In cleaning up after the meals, I realized some of my spice jars needed refilling. As I filled the spice jars, I realized that I needed to do some reorganizing. When I brought something to my bedroom to put away, I noticed that my painting table needed to be cleaned off…it had become a collection spot for miscellaneous items without a home.
I decided to set the table up so all my water color painting supplies were ready so I could paint at any time. With that set up, I could sneak in a few minutes here and there and maybe finally finish the painting I started a year and a half ago. Realizing that now was as good a time as any to start, I decided to do 10 minutes of painting before my run. 10 minutes lead to 40! It felt great.
It was 4PM by the time I started my run. When I returned, Eric asked me to drive him to the store for some needed toiletry items. I agreed and again spent some enjoyable time with him.
This very pleasant Sunday put me in touch with the realization that I love having unscheduled time. I realized how much I miss just hanging out, and I decided that I need to schedule a day a week off email and work related activities. It was a great day.
A very important part of your health plan is schedled time for fun. I teach it all the time and sometimes I get caught in the time trap and ignore my own advice.
Since then I’ve scheudeld time almost every day this week for fun. And my painting is coming along nicely.
Do it. When you’re having fun, your biochemistry changes. You become more relaxed and your digestion improves. Your hormones are more balanced. Your neurotransmitters become more balanced and as a result your mood improves. Your fatigue disappears. Your adrenals repair.
I’m planning to schedule at least 5 minutes of fun every day. My life and my health depend on it.
How about you? What will you do to get your daily dose of fun? Post your reply in the comments box below.
Love and Health and FUN,
Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, DrRitamarie, fatigue symptoms
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Chronic Stress | 1 Comment »
Conquering Food Cravings: Stop Sugar Cravings and Overcome Adrenal Exhaustion
Written by Ritamarie Loscalzo on November 3, 2009 – 12:18 pm -What causes food cravings…you don’t really need the sugar and bread, do you? The cravings for food you you can’t seem to control are a cry from your body for help. What really causes food cravings is a deficiency of one of your basic needs. When nutrients are out of balance, your body craves food to rebuild its stores. When you respond to the cravings with sugar, starches and nutritionally depleted and harmful foods, you add stress to your body, which burdens your adrenal glands. So giving in to food cravings can contribute to adrenal exhaustion.
Learn why and and how breaking free from emotional eating and providing the nutrition you really need will stop cravings in their tracks. By supplying your body with the building blocks of a healthy mind and body, you allow your adrenals to rebuild, your fatigue and exhaustion improve and the cravings lessen.
Question of the Day: What do you crave and how do you handle it when the craving gets really strong? Post your answer in the comments box below.
Tags: Adrenal Fatigue, emotional eating, fatigue symptoms, food cravings, green smoothie, living foods, raw foods diet, stop cravings, sugar, sugar cravings
Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Articles, green smoothies | 4 Comments »
