Are You Healthy or Afraid to Find Out
I’ve just returned from having my blood taken for my yearly check up thingy. Blood pressure and heart rate are in a good position and in a ‘fit’ category.
There's no reason to worry.
Next is to see what the blood work looks like. Everything last year looked good so we’ll see what things look like this year.
While I was at the clinic I was chatting with the nurse and we ended up talking about people who don’t go for a physical because they simply don’t want to know if there is anything wrong or out side of the normal range.
This is troubling because the first step to getting your health in order is to know where you are right now. If something is out of whack I want to know about it so I can take the necessary steps to correct it…or at the very least do as much as I can in my power to get it as close to normal or optimal as possible before turning to medicine or any other kind of procedure.
Burying your head in the sand is the worst thing to do. Knowledge is power and the more you know about your body and your current condition the better you can decide how to proceed with your diet and fitness lifestyle.
Having your blood work done isn’t the be all and end all of everything related to your fitness and health, but it’s a vital chunk of information that you should be aware of. This is one area of health research that is a good predictor of certain health risk such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes and some related morbidities.
As I’ve stated in the past and will repeat here, I think there is a shape to health, and the closer you get to your ideal Adonis Index raito (for men) and Venus Index ratios (for women) the more likely your health measures will all be in good standing.
I say this because they type of life you need to live to get to AI or VI is also a life that requires some effort in the gym and some *some* discipline with your diet.
Add these things together with an eye to these specific body shapes and the picture starts to take form that ‘health’ isn’t a destination but rather it’s a process.
Your personal definition of health and how much you value it will determine how much or little info you want to learn about your body and how much action you will or won’t take.
The choice is always yours.
John
2 Responses to “Are You Healthy or Afraid to Find Out”
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June 14th, 2011 at 7:34 pm
John–I completely agree.
Something I would like to clarify from some of your previous podcasts, though–a person who chronically eats a certain amount over their energy expenditure won’t be gaining indefinitely.
Instead, their weight will eventually increase up to a point at which the (excess) intake becomes the new equilibrium. Make sense?
June 15th, 2011 at 3:08 pm
Jason it’s likely a few factors. Most people don’t chronically eat above maintenance every day. It’s more of a slow creep. There is data to suggest there is some upregulation of total energy expenditure but it’s not much. It’s likely that people just overeat here and there and that’s what causes the gradual weight gain. We know that heavier people spend a bit more energy simply because there is more mass to move around, but any compensatory increase in metabolic rate is small. I think the answer is that people don’t usually chronically overeat every day…but for the few that do, they will just continue to gain.