Just some more proof that getting your body moving does more than just make you look good…-Ai

A Utah man is crediting a local CrossFit gym with saving his life after years of struggling with depression.

On June 27, 2004, Riverton resident Bob Brown was riding his motorcycle near Emigration Canyon when he was hit by a car. Two weeks later, he woke from a coma, known know where he was, where he’d been and what lay ahead.

“I don’t actually have memory of it but I’ve had it recreated for me, I’ve been back up there, I’ve seen it, so I’m pretty confident I know what happened,” Brown said.

Suddenly the lifelong athlete couldn’t do things that made him happy, and he fell into a deep depression.

“Disbelief, rage, sadness, depression, just everything. I was, like, ‘This can’t be happening. I’m going to wake up out of this dream.’ It was crazy,” he said.

Brown didn’t think antidepressants were right for him, so he and his wife spent several years trying to find something to bring meaning back to his life.

“You know you need to have some kind of passion in your life, to give you reason to wake up. I don’t care what the passion is. Maybe it’s your children or your work or a sport or cross stitching it’s a reason to wake up and I didn’t have that and I was looking for it but none of them filled the void until CrossFit,” Brown said.

After many failed attempts, an online deal for a local CrossFit gym became Brown’s perfect prescription.

“I was there one day. Fell in love with it, it was totally different from anything I’d ever done before,” Brown said. “It’s very exciting. It makes working out more fun. It develops into being part of your life which then of course changes your life.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that one in every ten Americans suffer from depression, and more doctors are turning to exercise instead of pills to treat psychological disorders.

Multiple studies have found that Utahns are among the most depressed populations in the country, and one of the top consumers of antidepressants.

“We’ve become the Prozac generation and so forth but I think people are beginning to realize medicine doesn’t take care of everything and the problems in life that maybe cause the depression in the first place are still there,” said Dr. Gail Hilton, manager of crisis services for Intermountain Medical Center.

Hilton says that depression is a disease just like diabetes, but it’s more complicated to treat because the cure comes in many forms and is different from patient to patient.

“Starting at a level not jumping to medication in the beginning is a good way to go. Try other avenues now. If you’re not getting better, you should see a psychiatrist or a primary physician,” Hilton said.

Hilton is one of many physicians who support exercise as a way to fight depression. They cite the boost of endorphins that come from physical activity as one reason it’s successful.

“We absolutely know those endorphins do kick in and that can help with depression. But also it gives you a sense of control. One of the things people feel when they’re depressed they’re out of control with their life, what they are doing or who they are and an exercise program,” Hilton said. ”Something formal like that can give you back a sense of control. So it’s a very very good way of dealing with depression.”

Hilton says that because no two people are the same in terms of brain chemistry, treatment for medical illness, whether it’s medication, exercise or something else, can result in a number of outcomes. Anyone suffering from depression should first consult a physician.

Check out the rest of the article and watch a video at this link: http://fox13now.com/2013/05/02/crossfit-helps-utah-man-rise-from-depression/

For those of you that missed Regionals this weekend, here’s something that will make you feel like you’re there! What a race! -Ai

What do you do when life serves you a crappy workout gym on the road? You make the best of it….
Treadmill time trial…
Then tabatas…10 rds of 20/10 use the 10 seconds to transition…
-Bosu ball thrusters with rest in the OH Position
-Russian twists w/bosu ball pushups

You’re on a roll. You’ve lost 20 pounds in the last few months and are feeling as though you’re on top of the world. You only have a few more pounds till you reach the goal you’ve been striving for; so close! A few weeks go by and your body refuses to drop those last couple pounds. What’s going on? Don’t be discouraged! It’s completely normal…check out this article for some tips to get over that plateau so you can make those fitness goals a reality! -Ai

9 More Reasons You’re Not Losing Weight

By: Mark Sisson on Mark’s Daily Apple

A few years back, I wrote an article explaining 17 possible reasons why you’re not losing weight. It was a troubleshooting guide of sorts, aimed at helping people identify some of things they may be doing (or not doing) that’s causing their stalled fat loss. The etiology of obesity and weight gain is multifactorial, and can be complex. Additionally, we’re all unique human beings. So it can be difficult to pin down one simple cause – or even seventeen simple causes. While unwanted fat loss comes effortlessly to most people that eat according to the Primal eating strategy – as the success stories and hundreds of thousands of positive user experiences indicate – sometimes we inadvertently sabotage our best efforts, stray from best practices, or don’t fully grok what we need to do to become efficient fat-burners. So let’s take a look at nine more possible reasons, shall we?

1. You’re engaging in too much mindless eating.

If you asked most people what made them overweight in the first place, it was that sneaky, tricky combination of eating and, well, doing everything else but focus on the food. It’s eating while watching TV. It’s eating while driving (I’ve seen a man eat a bowl of cereal on the 405). It’s eating while cooking (not tasting to stay abreast of the dish; full-on eating). It’s popcorn at the movies. It’s beer and wings and more beer during the game. In other words, it’s mindless eating. Eating that feels like breathing, like something you just do. You take a few chews, rarely enough to qualify as real mastication, and down the hatch it goes, with a follow-up handful close on its heels. Since increased frequency of eating (i.e. mindless eating or snacking) is strongly associated with the United States’ steadily increasing average energy intake, it’s plausible that mindless eating leads to eating more food.

Be more mindful when you eat; practice mindful eating. Eat food with others, sit down to dinner, take the time to appreciate the food you’re eating. Just because you’re scarfing down grass-fed beef and pastured eggs doesn’t mean you can get away with mindless consumption.

2. You’re eating too many “pleasure foods.”

Paul Jaminet really has a knack for coining phrases, doesn’t he (“safe starch,” anyone?)? A lesser known one is “pleasure foods.” These are things like nuts, dark chocolate, and raw honey – all foods that have gotten the stamp of Primal approval in the past, all foods that are calorically-dense and easy to overeat. This is hard to grasp, because these foods also confer some health benefits. Nuts are rich sources of micronutrients like magnesium, vitamin E, and selenium, and multiple studies suggest that nuts help weight loss. Dark chocolate got an entire post devoted to its impressive polyphenol content (and its fatty acid profile isn’t too bad, either), while honey is quite possibly the best sweetener around. At the very least, it and its bevy of bee-related compounds outperform other sweeteners like maple syrup and plain sugar and result in fewer metabolic issues. All that said, these foods are delicious, packed with calories, and can be overeaten, particularly because they have the reputation as “health foods.”

If you’re not losing weight, moderate your intake of these foods.

3. You’re eating too little.

It’s well-established that prolonged dieting – taking in fewer calories than your body expends – will eventually lead to a downregulation in the basal metabolic rate. This is simple stuff, really. Reducing your food intake will lower your body weight, usually, but it’s not a simple matter of dropping them lower and lower as you lose weight. The body isn’t a passive thing that you’re merely adding to and subtracting from. Instead, it’s a living, breathing, reacting, adapting entity that responds to the lowered caloric input by lowering its energy expenditure. Since you can’t lose weight forever (you’re not just going to waste away into nothingness), perpetually lowering your caloric intake will eventually work against your desire to lose weight.

Instead of sitting at a chronic caloric deficit, consider cycling your caloric intake. Eat less one day, more the next. You might also look into periodic refeeds, which may be able to kickstart a stalled weight loss.

4. You’re under “hidden stress.”

In the previous article, I explained how stress can make us gain weight, or stop losing it. Cortisol – which we release as a part of the stress response – inhibits weight loss, catabolizes muscle, worsens insulin resistance, and promotes the storage of fat. Although back then I was referring to the obvious sources of stress in our lives, like bills, traffic, jobs we hate, bosses we hate, relationship strife, there are other “hidden” types of stressors that result in the very same physiological responses as obvious stressors cause. Foremost among the hidden stressors is the lack of nature exposure. In the literature, researchers often speak of “forest bathing,” or spending a day or two or three in a forest setting to reduce cortisol, enhance immune function, and improve glucose tolerance. I prefer to look at this a different way. Instead of nature exposure being a positive anti-stress agent, urban living is an active stressor. Spending a day in the woods is a return to normalcy rather than an “intervention.”

If you’re not doing this already, take a day or two out of the week to get outside, preferably amongst unkempt, wild nature. It needn’t be a forest or a craggy cliff. The beach, the desert, or even a park will do just fine. In a pinch, you can even listen to nature sounds and look at nature scenes on your computer.

5. You’re too focused on diet to the exclusion of all else.

When you realize the wool that’s been pulled over the collective eyes of society regarding nutrition, it’s easy to become obsessed with your newfound knowledge. It’s easy to stay up late, night in, night out, perusing nutrition blogs, reading comment sections, devouring PubMed articles. You’ll hear about some arcane but totally essential nutrient and think that it’s the Answer. Am I getting enough magnesium? What about boron – I need some boron, right? How about vitamin A? Should I go for the preformed retinol or rely on the conversion from beta-carotene? Should I drive fifty miles out of town to get goose liver, or should I just take a vitamin K2 supplement and call it a day? Choline – that’s the stuff! Nothing but liver and egg yolks from here on out!

Diet is the obvious primary arbiter of body composition, but there’s more to life than worrying about what you put in your mouth. It’s counterintuitive, and there aren’t any randomized controlled trials showing it, but you might have more success just enjoying life, getting some exercise, and hanging out with good people instead of micromanaging your nutrient intake. Relax.

Want more? Follow this link: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/9-more-reasons-youre-not-losing-weight/#ixzz2SUVMvRRg

Interesting thoughts…what would YOU change? -Ai

We’ve all seen the video…now listen to his commentary throughout the entire lift…enjoy! -Ai

8 Ways to Cultivate Health Integrity

By: Mark Sisson on Mark’s Daily Apple

How do we cultivate health integrity? Let me offer some thoughts – some wholly practical and a couple a little unorthodox. I hope you’ll add your own additions to the list.

Make an excuse board.

Put it all out there – every last whine, reason and justification you use for not living healthily. Make columns for eating crap, chronically skipping exercise (everyone legitimately needs rest days), going to bed late, drinking too much, stressing yourself sick, etc. Every time you use one of those excuses, give yourself a gold star next to it. At the end of the week/month, see how much you’ve excelled at cheating yourself. Harsh, yes, but effective.

Accept your own resistance.

Let’s not gloss over the fact: there are times when we don’t feel like showing up for ourselves. Every one of us probably would pin a different reason on that one, but we’ve all been there. For some, it comes out in our health related choices. For others, it can take a different form (e.g. money, alcohol, etc.). But here’s the rub. We don’t have to like “showing up.” Seriously. You don’t always have to relish making the healthy choice. If you’re generally living well – eating Primally, moving frequently, challenging yourself enjoyably, sleeping soundly, destressing regularly – you know the benefits. Likewise, if you’ve ever backslid – by choice or circumstance – you also know how much you can pay a price. Still, we move through however many moods and challenges each day. Accept that you’re going to be more willing some times than others, but still stick with your basic intention.

Deal with serious underlying issues.

Sometimes there are deep and difficult reasons behind our tendencies toward self-sabotage. Be honest with yourself about the internalized messages and ongoing compulsions that keep weighing you down. Get the help you need to sort it out, and grant yourself permission to believe you’re capable of a better life. Surround yourself with the support and engage in the self care you need to see yourself differently. Accept that it may be a life long commitment and not a single “fix.” While it’s not your fault you were left with the baggage, it’s a choice whether you let it hang around your neck each day.
Plan for your weaknesses.

Keep some Primal worthy snacks at work for the days you have to work late. Put a list of last-minute simple recipes on the fridge for mornings you don’t have time to make what you’d planned. Don’t let the weekend pass without cooking your stash of meat and chopping veggies if you know it means you’re setting yourself up for failure come Monday’s dinner. Keep up on your life enough that you’re not testing yourself unnecessarily. Some things won’t rattle you. Other things will. Be mindful of what will, and be preemptive however you reasonably can.

Accept that you can’t plan for everything.

As good as it is to plan and prepare, it’s important to not make the journey one massive control trip. Loosen up, lighten up, and cultivate enough self-possession that you don’t go nuclear if you forget your lunch one day.

Accept your own resistance.

Let’s not gloss over the fact: there are times when we don’t feel like showing up for ourselves. Every one of us probably would pin a different reason on that one, but we’ve all been there. For some, it comes out in our health related choices. For others, it can take a different form (e.g. money, alcohol, etc.). But here’s the rub. We don’t have to like “showing up.” Seriously. You don’t always have to relish making the healthy choice. If you’re generally living well – eating Primally, moving frequently, challenging yourself enjoyably, sleeping soundly, destressing regularly – you know the benefits. Likewise, if you’ve ever backslid – by choice or circumstance – you also know how much you can pay a price. Still, we move through however many moods and challenges each day. Accept that you’re going to be more willing some times than others, but still stick with your basic intention.

For more, visit Mark here: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/8-ways-to-cultivate-health-integrity/#more-35945

Scary Stuff…

This is why we do what we do…what an incredible story!

Do Fear and Anxiety Define Your Health Journey?

By: Mark Sisson on MarksDailyApple.com

Think for a minute about the health messaging sources in our culture. Think of the pharmaceutical ads in every magazine and television show. Think of the medical talk shows and evening exposes on obscure conditions, the nightly newscasts depicting the ravages of epidemics in far flung corners of the globe and “expert” sound bytes warning of pathogens closer to home. Then there are the messages themselves. How many doom and gloom health statistics and inflammatory stock images do you encounter in a day? How many times do you hear “Ask your doctor if [insert medication] is right for you”? This doesn’t, of course, even begin to scratch the surface, but you get my point. Aside from the marketing blitzes telling us why this pharmaceutical is the next best thing or this box of snack food is heart healthy (hint: it’s not), the most commonly viewed/heard “health” related information spinning around in our culture paints a pretty negative, agitating picture.

On an individual level, some people are genuinely facing emergency level, literally do-or-die situations. It might be the diagnosis of an acute condition or the long seen crescendo of a chronic, un-/under-attended lifestyle disease. But too often, we’re gripped by an anxiety beyond reason, without reason. On the clinical end of the spectrum, experts estimate about 1-2% of the population suffers from what’s considered “pathological health anxiety,” although it’s likely around 10% for people who have had serious health problems in the past. True hypochondria can be destructive enough to unravel a person’s life, and experts agree the condition is fed by fears that go much deeper than the latest health headlines.

Beyond this extreme condition, however, are the “worried well” among us who request unwarranted, radiation-laden scans, risky medications, and unnecessary labs because we’re so anxious about our health. Sure, sometimes it’s doctors who fear litigation if they don’t go down every avenue or hospitals who want to profit from expensive testing procedures, but it’s often the will of the patients, too. Increasingly, it’s the patient who’s looking to go down a checklist of his own. Blame the ratings-hungry sensationalist media, self-diagnosis on the Internet, or the general sense that we’re all going to hell in a hand basket.

All this hand-wringing, however, doesn’t seem to do much good in the collective sense. It’s enough to trump up fear and loathing but not enough to inspire much meaningful lifestyle change. Our anxiety is too often misplaced. We have no problem eating fast food multiple times a week, but fear the flu or the next pandemic is waiting to grab us like the bogeyman in the night. Ebola is a mere plane flight away from stealing our children. Food poisoning is lurking in every meal. We can never have enough triclosan, Purell, or antibiotics to quiet our nerves, but here’s a caramel mochachino to take the edge off.

The backdrop on all this, of course, is the real state of affairs. We’re in sad physiological shape as a society, and that’s the understatement of the century. Truth be told, we have plenty of reason to worry – except worry isn’t the answer. No one ever gets healthy cowering in a corner or gnashing their teeth. I think you have to opt out of the game in general – the fear, the escapism, the distraction, the preoccupation. It’s instead about embracing something else entirely.

Read the Article in Whole: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/does-fear-and-anxiety-define-your-health-journey/#ixzz2Pufxyvqq