I SAID WE’RE GOING TO TALK ABOUT EAR WAX!

Clean those things out, geez.

Ear wax, an oily secretion from the tiny hair follicles inside the outer ear, has many theoretical purposes ranging from collecting dust particles to trapping bugs before they get down into the ear.  I know about the latter as my father, missing an eardrum, has his ear wax cleaned out from down deep by a doc a few times a year.  Once the doctor pulled out a full-sized, fully intact fly…just in case you thought I was making the bug thing up.  The tackiness of ear wax is a good collector of foreign particles as well as a great catcher of sloughed-off dead cells from deeper places that aren’t used to much friction.  You probably don’t exfoliate your inner ear, which is a good thing, but inner ear skin and hair follicle cells still die and drop off your body just like skin does.  These cells need to clear outta there!  Ear wax is a great way to collect these tiny items into one heavy clump, making it easier to move  up and out of the ear canal.

Of course, if the ear wax doesn’t move, now you have lumps of wax and waste material sitting in your ears, decreasing the basic functions of the ear, which can include both hearing and balance!  How does this wax move out of the ear canal?  The muscle action of the jaw, of course.  Q-tips and cotton swabs are a recent invention, but Mother Nature’s plan requires full range of motion and regular use of the temporomandibular joint (that’s your jaw joint) to keep your ears functioning optimally.  If you eat and talk then chances are you are getting some good muscle action.  But, what if you carry your tension in your jaw? Tense jaw muscles decrease the range of motion of the joint, limiting the full movement of ear wax.  Also, many people talk more out of one side of their mouth as a learned speaking or accent pattern.  Some prefer to chew more on one side of their mouth.  In these cases, the muscle action is not symmetrical between sides, which (if you were paying attention) means one ear has more accumulation than the other.

The health of the ears is one of those things we assume will go with age, but many people are not suffering from age related hearing loss, but creating a “conduction deafness”.  When sound waves enter your ear they generate tiny vibrations in the hearing bones that your brain interprets as sound.  Accumulated materials and fluids in the ear decrease the ability for waves to enter and in the deeper part of the ears, can limit the movement of the three hearing bones.  Nerve health of the ear also depends on adequate circulation to the tissues, and a head projected forward of the torso, or hours of daily jaw clenching will reduce circulation to that area.  Muscular tension in the jaw is not only related to pathologies of the ears, but can also create issues of the teeth, jaw bone, and disk degeneration in the neck!

Healthy Ear Tips:

1.  Massage the area of the neck just below the ears and pull on your ears from all different angles to stretch and increase circulation to the temporalis muscle that your ear attaches to.

2.  Vigorously massage your “chewing muscles” before you go to sleep, or when you have a bit of free time in front of the TV or computer.

3.  Let your head hang forward to stretch the back of your neck, and take turns dropping each ear towards each shoulder.  Guess what – your chin should touch your chest and your ear should touch your shoulder.  Really!  Do this every day, spending a minute holding each stretch as you relax your shoulders.

4.  Reduce stress levels (are you seeing a trend here?)

Many people come in to the Institute and report they have “age-related” hearing loss…in one ear.  I always ask, How old is your other ear then?  We need to start thinking about these health items we accept to be true.  When I point out a little item like “if you have age-related hearing loss, but only in one ear” ask yourself, does that actually make sense?  Just putting a bug in your ear

Hair is complicated.  It’s never quite the style you’d like.  You may have too little…or too much.  Maybe you don’t know even know what color it is sans intervention.  But today, we’re going to look at the facts and see if we can shed a little light into what hair is all about.

First, it’s important to know that humans have three different types of hair:  terminal, vellus, and lanugo.  Lanugo hair was the hair you had in utero, which is all gone now. Vellus hair are those tiny hairs that you have all over your body, the peach fuzz.  Terminal hair is the type of hair you most likely think about when you think “hair”.  Head hair, armpit, and pubic hair are all terminal hair.  Chances are, that may be gone now too, with or without your consent!

The purpose of hair isn’t known, although there are a few theories.  In addition to making you miserable about one day a week (really…you’re going to stick up like that?), hair has been touted as a heat-maintaining mechanism, friction reducer, and heat conductor.  All that being said, different races and different genes give us different quantities of the stuff, so whatever hair is supposed to do, its purpose is probably not that simple.  Because hair is generated from the skin it grows from, the better the circulation to the skin, the healthier the hair.  How do you get healthy skin?  Increase the circulation to the muscles just beneath it (you knew there was going to be a muscular solution, didn’t you?!)

Head hair is a multi-million dollar industry from both an aesthetical point and medical point of view, as hair loss has become an increasing problem in the US affecting both men and women.  What are some of the biomechanical factors?  Friction.  Excessive friction (think putting a hat on every day) can cause hair follicles to inflame and potentially decrease rate of growth.  On the other hand, a lack of circulation to the muscles of the head can also decrease hair production.

Research shows that stress, tension, and anxiety are major contributors to hair loss.  Why?  Firstly, terminal hair development is affected by certain hormones.  Stress levels can raise and drop hormone levels, often in an instant.  But let us also consider the tension in the facial muscles when our stress loads increase (think Grand Canyon sized-crevice between the eyebrows).  Neck, shoulder, head, and face tension will also negatively impact blood flow to the head muscles, skin, and HAIR muscles.

Wait, did I say hair muscles?  You bet I did.  For every hair you have on your body (vellus and terminal) there is a small muscle (arrector pili) that can move the hair as well as pump oil from the oil glands at the base of each follicle to keep hair protected, which also helps hair maintain its strength. Hair strands themselves can be pretty strong in terms of tensile strength if your daily mineral intake is correct and you aren’t over-using minerals to deal with bone, stress, and muscle tension issues.  Thin and unhealthy hair may, in fact, be a good indication of mineral and metabolic issues that are happening at deeper layers of the body.  Ayurvedic science uses hair diagnoses to discern correct mineral, vitamin, and nutritional prescriptions.  Studies measuring tensile strength (how hard you can pull before it breaks) and mineral content of horse mane hair found that dietary intake changed the mechanical and chemical properties of hair after a few months.  The chemicals in shampoos can also alter the tensile strength of hair.  The more frequently you wash and heat-blast your hair, the weaker it gets.  Am I saying wash your hair less?  Yes!  We in the US wash our hair more than any other country, with the motivating reason being the smell of accumulated oil and cellular waste that comes out through our head’s sweat glands.  Don’t like the smell?  Your diet most likely contains items that your body cannot break down into usable units of energy and secreting waste through your sweat glands is a fast way to get rid of it.  Ew, I know.

Quick tips for stronger and more abundant hair:

1.  Clean up your diet, limiting processed and mineral-altering substances like diet sodas, and get your daily required minerals (see a nutritionist for a good understanding of your particular needs).  This will get you the correct building blocks to better hair and reduce your need to wash your hair daily.

2.  Gently massage face and entire head daily to stimulate blood to the skin and muscles that support healthy hair follicles.  A gentle hair brushing is a great way to relax your partner, child, or self at the end of the day (but it’s way better if you can get someone else to do it…)

3.  Keep neck and shoulders loose and try to relax your face when you feel tension come on.  Don’t cut off optimal flow to the head muscles with muscular tension just below!

4.  Reduce stress.  (Great tip, I know.  And specific too!)

5.  Don’t be so sure that your hair loss is explained by your genes or your menopausal state.  Until you have removed the junk (that means diet and regular soda) from your diet, aligned your head, neck, and shoulders, and increased blood flow to the skin of the head, there is no way to tell!

Ok.  Day One down on our 30-day commitment to learn more about our human machine.  Tomorrow, we head South.  Who’s excited??

With National Health Care on everyone’s minds, I think each of us can increase the health of our machinery with just a little information.  I hope you enjoy the next 30 days, and please, please bombard me with emails if you don’t see a daily post.  It is so much easier to keep a promise to you than it is to hold myself accountable.  WHY IS THAT?  I will do thirty body-science lessons, working from the head down.  This is a great way to educate your family (share this with your kids!) and friends on stuff that gets taken for granted…our body!   If we hit an additional 100 subscribers in the next thirty days, then I will do thirty more days!  If you keep spreading the information, I can get this book done

Drum roll please…

Are you excited?

P.S. I recommend that you continue to ditch the heels, no matter what the reporter said!

P.P.S I like that Lori pointed out that 1.5-2″ elevated heels on an athletic shoe impacts your alignment just as much as a dress-wedge!

P.P.P.S If you would like to watch a 45-minute session from the Women’s Health Webinar, please click here to listen to Dr. Perales (podiatrist) talk about footwear and simple solutions.  The webinar is still available in its entirety – contact me if you are interested!

The government is offering money to those willing to change careers to farming.  GET YOUR GOVERNMENT GRANT MONEY HERE!

I found this very interesting and continuing in the theme of last week’s blog.  My grandparents were farmers and I will be looking for a little plot of land to start a bit of food production myself.  As we’ve moved away from the farming age, we have seen an increase in disease, obesity, muscle atrophy, and extremely poor nutritional choices.  Talk about a simple solution.  Get out on your farm, your community garden, or tend to some pots on your patio.  Enjoy the physical, physiological, and nutritional benefits.

A healthy lifestyle is just a click away!

“What should I be eating?”

And, I say this.  The biochemistry of food and its effect on the insanely complex functions of metabolism and human anatomy is so complicated, most diets are approximations and theories that seem to work well for some and not as well for others.  Those with the most pristine diet can still suffer from the same diseases as those that eat McDonald’s every week.  The guy that eats bacon for breakfast may not have any cardiovascular disease, while the vegan can still battle high cholesterol.  There are factors beyond the calorie, beyond the carbohydrate quantity, and beyond the grams of fat.   In addition to the tough science, politics have always played a role in food prescription, and once you’ve got profits coming from food recommendations, you should know that the bias may not be in your favor.

I don’t usually answer the What To Eat question beyond the basics – avoid processed foods, stick to fresh ingredients, and cook for yourself!  And now, thankfully, I don’t have to do anything anymore beyond pointing inquiring minds to Food Rules.  Author Michael Pollan (The Omnivore’s Dilemma) and featured expert in Food, Inc., has created a five-dollar pocket book of guidelines on what to eat.  Not only are the guidlines brilliant, the simple information may be the best weight-loss program one could possibly do if trying to shed a little body fat and increase over-all body performance.

Perfect for vegetarians or Argentinians (those beef eating South Americans!), Food Rules will tell you how to shop (around the edges of a grocery store ONLY!) and what to buy (avoid eating anything with any ingredient your sixth-grader can’t pronounce).  I won’t give too much away (you can read the entire thing standing in Barnes and Noble), but I will say that yes, it is suggested to have a glass of wine a day.  An entire bottle of wine, however, would not be part of the perfect dinner for one.

This week I have added rice and salad to every day (I am shooting for foods that have less than 5 ingredients…and rice only has one!) and will attempt small fishes (sardines) later this week.  Next week I am attacking bread.  Try to find a bread with only whole ingredients (stuff I can grow in my yard) and you will find yourself at a bakery three times a week.  Too expensive.

You know what’s not expensive?  The ingredients found in bread!  Who knew?!

This weekend I will get the electric bread maker (still in it’s box!) I got as a gift a few years back and join the ranks of my father, who bakes his bread fresh twice a week.  Am I really sooo busy that I can’t throw some flour, yeast, salt, and grains into an electrical appliance and let it mix, knead, rise, bake, and cool bread for me?  (What, this machine won’t cut it too? I want my money back!)

Food, coupled with our beliefs and preferences, is a huge issue for most people.  Until we have scientists dedicated to researching food from the perspective of pure biochemistry (and not which food additives won’t kill you) and time dedicated to personal gardens that generate even 10% of our daily caloric intake, this issue will begin to weave itself heavily into the current health care issues (mark my words).  Do you want to reform Health Care?  Start with the personal responsibility of becoming a conscience (food) consumer!  Join me, and take the 30-day, eat by the Food Rules challenge.  You can do it!

P.S.  Does anyone know what to do with sardines???

If you have some time, a DVD player, and a good library card, check out these movies and book titles:

The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver

Food, Inc.

King Corn

I love the section some magazines have where they list interesting and fun statistics, like… 48: Number of bugs eaten per year in your sleep. 3,154: Number of texts sent by the average teenager (per month). 14: Number of states visited in an average lifetime.

I have some statistics for you, and I assure you, nobody’s laughing.

80: The percentage of women who will suffer a pelvic floor disorder in their lifetime.

1 in 9: The number of women who will have surgery on their pelvic floor.

50: The percentage of women who, after having a first surgery, will have a second, third, or fourth surgery for the same issue.

10 million: The number of Americans estimated to have osteoporosis. 8 million are women.

25: The percentage of us who experience debilitating foot pain, RIGHT NOW.

Weak Bones. Leaky Bladder. Fragile Feet.

Are these the burdens of being female?

The plight of the woman seems like an eternal struggle. We can’t be the CEO of a corporation because we have to have a child. We can’t be a firefighter because we don’t have the strength. We can’t pee standing up…and I really wanted to do this one as a kid. But as we make progress on most gender-related issues, we still seem to be failing in the genetics arena. Sorry about your bone density – you just don’t have enough space for minerals in those tiny bones! You and your mom have bunions? Well that’s just genetic. Pee when you laugh? Or sneeze? Or walk? That’s just the penalty of having a baby, of getting older, and you got it, being a woman.

Now, what if I told you that your bones were actually strong and big enough to maintain your bone density, however, the posture you are choosing to stand in is signaling your bones to weaken? What if I told you that your foot pain, your plantar fasciitis, your neuroma, or your bunion is caused by how you walk? And, that your mother’s bunion is caused by how she walks? And, you learned to walk by watching her. What if I told you that there was one thing, one habit you have that you do every day, that is causing your organs to move down, your bladder to fail, your lower back to hurt and your hip joints to die?

Well, that’s what I am telling you.

Women’s health, while making huge progress in some areas, is progressing like a limping slug in others. As a biomechanical scientist specializing in pelvic floor physics, I am continuously appalled by how misinformed people are regarding their own equipment. The muscles in your pelvic floor have very important jobs. First, they keep your bathroom functions running…uh, smoothly. Secondly, they support the weight of your pelvic floor and abdominal organs. This is a lot of work for this complex group of muscles. And, if you ask most medical and exercise experts how to strengthen these muscles, they will give you the same exercise: the Kegel.

Named by OBGYN Dr.Arnold Kegel, the Kegel exercise is a contraction of some of the pelvic floor muscles. I doubt that he invented it. In fact, I’m pretty sure people had been practicing Kegel exercises for hundreds of years before it had a name. I want to name a muscle action after myself, too. How about lifting the second toe? Let’s call that the Bowman. We’ll see if it sticks.

Anyhow, the Kegel seemed like a good solution to increase the tone in the pelvic floor back in 1948, following Dr. Kegel’s creation of a device that measured the pressure on the pelvic floor. In the last sixty years, however, there has been much more evidence, research, and anatomical understanding of this area, which has shown that the Kegel, while providing a short- term solution, actually creates a greater problem later on, both in pelvic floor function and with sacroiliac pain. Yet I bet most of you, when asking your doctor, favorite movement teacher, or friend what to do about your incontinence, will be given this out-dated, situation-worsening exercise.

In the age of information, it is time for women to understand how their bodies work and what simple things they can do to take back their health. No more hearsay! Here’s the real, most up-to-date science on what pelvic floor muscles, bones, and the tissues of the feet need to stay functioning well. You might be blown away by what you didn’t know and how quickly you can improve your health.

Quick Info:

1. Osteoporosis is not an all-over bone disease, but an indication of where your bones are being loaded properly and where they are not. You need to know where in your body your mineral density is low to design an osteogenic (bone generating) program that is specific to your bones. Foot Pain can be significantly reduced through exercising the feet!

2. Twenty-five percent of the number of muscles and bones are from the ankle down. Using your feet while exercising the rest of your body doesn’t do much for the health of the feet – they need their own set of exercises.

3.  Pelvic Floor Disorder (PFD) is typically though to be a result of child-bearing, but the fact of the matter is, the statistics of PFD show that women who have not given birth are just as likely to develop a problem in their muscular function.

As a Gaiam reader you’ll receive a $50 discount (enter code GAIAM) on Katy’s webinar series: Visit here to register for both a lecture and an exercise program that will teach you how to care for your pelvic floor, bones, and feet.

And for those of you calling and emailing the Institute that would like to know where you can get the exercises mentioned in the article, the entire foot health program is available on DVD.

If the Institute were a Super Hero, Sitting would be our arch nemesis.  Why?  Because sitting alters the muscle lengths in the legs so greatly, the lower half of the body no longer gives muscular support to the cardiovascular system.  The calves and hamstrings become so tight they cannot hold their share of blood, causing excess strain on the main arteries, increasing the risk for cardiovascular disease.  The Evil Henchman Sitting also places increased forces on the sacrum (especially if you sit with you tailbone tucked under) which pushes this free-floating bone deeper into your pelvis, putting slack on your pelvic floor muscles.

Why doesn’t one want slack pelvic floor muscles?  Let me count the ways.

• PF muscles are the “closers” of the urinary and fecal doors to the world.  I want proper tone in these muscles, and I hope you do too.
• PF muscles are the only support you have to the weight of the abdominal and pelvic organs.  If these are slack and weak, the organs have no choice but to go with the gravitational flow and drop downward.  Ladies, that means prolapsing organs.  Menfolk, that means your organs are now increasing pressure on the prostate.  Not fun for your prostate, I promise.
• PF muscles are 1/2 of the system that stabilizes your sacrum.  Slack PF muscles means that puppy is slopping around between your sacroiliac joints.  Low back pain, anyone?

I could go on (you know I can), but haven’t I given you enough information for one day?   No?  Then how about this news piece today.  “Experts warn of danger of sitting”.  The results from a 10+ year study on 17,000 Canadians showed that risk factors and actual death occurred more in those who sat often as compared to those who didn’t – regardless of if they participated in fitness exercise or not. Exercising, even one hour per day, was not enough to reverse the metabolic damage sitting had inflicted on study participants.

Again, I will state that replacing all day movement with intense bouts of exercise is an inappropriate prescription for health.  You have to eat a certain amount of kcals and nutrients too, but you wouldn’t eat an entire day’s worth of energy in one hour, or only eat three hours per week, would you?  Think of how that would mess up your energy regulation, fat storage, blood glucose, and pancreas activity!  Fitness activities can be fun and beneficial, but in the long run, studies do not support that fitness (monitored heart rates, heart rate percentages, weight training, and aerobics) increase longevity or quality of life as quantified by medications, surgeries, or daily pain.  Do you have to exercise?  No.  Do you need to move?  Yes!  All day long!  You need to walk and stand,  letting your leg muscles hold you up, increasing the strength of the blood vessles in the muscles, decreasing the pressure in the larger arteries, and signaling the bones to hold more minerals (bone density).

Don’t know where to start?  Stand up.  Right now.  Get out of your chair.  Spend $20 on plywood and make a box that holds your computer a foot off your desk so you can be part of the solution.  You up?  Good.  Now, leave a comment, turn off the computer, and go take a ten minute walk!

Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2009 May;41(5):998-1005.  Sitting time and mortality from all causes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer.  Katzmarzyk PT, Church TS, Craig CL, Bouchard C.

Br J Sports Med 2009;43:81-83 Too much sitting: a novel and important predictor of chronic disease risk. N Owen, A Bauman,W Brown

What do I think of swimming?  Well, first off, I love it.  Being in the water is one of my favorite activities and submerged playing makes me VERY happy.  I was also a competitive swimmer in school.  I love everything about the water.  I like the buoyancy.  I like the way the oil on my skin mixes with the water and makes my body slimy.  I could do without the manos del prune.  (This is Spanish for prune hands…and if anyone knows the correct Spanish term for prune hands, would you let me know?)  So there you have what I think of swimming.  But maybe you wanted to know what I think of swimming as an exercise program?  That is a better question.

There are many reasons people exercise, so let us break those reasons down to evaluate swimming as a health program.

• Weight loss
• Bone Density
• Muscle Mass
• Joint Health
• Cardiovascular Health

Weight Loss. If you are a non-exerciser beginning a swimming program, you may notice a decrease in weight initially, but to see continuous changes in body composition, research shows that swimming is not the best choice.  The temperature changes the body goes through coming in and out of the water seems to signal a complex nerve pathway that lowers metabolism.  Why this is, physiologists are not sure.  It is most likely due to the heat regulating processes of the body.  Being submerged in water makes it more difficult to maintain body temperature, so the body responds by using less energy.  Even competitive level swimmers – swimming multiple hours per day at high intensities – carry the greatest percentage body fat relative to athletes of most sports.

Bone Density. If you are exercising to increase bone density, know that swimming is the least effective type of movement when it comes to strengthening your bones.  In order to stimulate bone generation (osteogenesis), bones must be weight bearing along the axis of gravity – which means you have to carry your body weight around while standing up!  The buoyant force of water makes bone loading almost zero in the water.  Better option?  A thirty minute walk to the pool is a good strong-bone choice as is maybe alternating a swim day with an hour of walking.

Muscle Mass. Swimming can definitely aid in increasing your muscle mass as water is great resistance.  But, keep in mind that swimming as most people do it, is a sport.  Swimming strokes have been developed to use the water as minimally as possible to reduce any drag that may slow the athlete down.  What does this mean?  It means the better swimmer you are, the less muscle benefit you will receive from your best stroke.  Water aerobics classes are great for creating exercises that use more muscle than your basic swim strokes.  Another option, ditch your favorite or best stroke and start learning a new one!

Joint Health. Healthy joints need regular use, but there’s a catch.  If you use your joints when your muscles are tight, movement can have a more detrimental effect than if you didn’t use your joints at all!  Swimming is a great way to get whole body movement, but are your shoulders tense?  If you are doing stroke after stroke and your neck and shoulder muscles are tight, the risk of developing shoulder impingement syndrome (shoulder bursitis, deltoid tendonitis, rotator cuff tendonitis or tear, bicep tendonitis or tear) significantly increases.  If you like to swim for joint health, then you need to make sure your shoulder alignment is correct.  You also need to work to decrease your neck, deltiod, trapezius, and rotator cuff range of motion.  This spinal alignment DVD has great corrective exercises for shoulder girdle alignment.

Cardiovascular Health. Again, swimming is a great way to increase your circulation – always a great benefit to the heart and lungs.  Something to know about your circulatory system is this.  Circulation does not increase throughout the entire body, but only in the muscles you are using.  To truly optimize cardiovascular function, you need to use as many muscles possible and make sure that your muscles are in their longest possible position the rest of the time.  When you are done swimming, you need to stretch.  And, when designing your swimming workout, make sure that you rotate through different strokes.  Maybe even create some of your own!

So, what do I think of swimming as an exercise?  The most simple way to state it is this.  Each type exercise is like a food.  How many different types of foods do you need for balanced nutrition?  The answer is many.  Is swimming a good exercise?  Sure.  But it shouldn’t be the only “food” that you eat, or you will most likely be missing the movement “nutrients” required for keeping other tissues healthy.  Our understanding of exercise is over-simplified.  Movement is chemistry.  Every tissue in the body (bone, blood, nerves, organs, muscles) requires a unique component of exercise to keep that tissue healthy.  The exercise that “nutrifies” most of your tissues is well-aligned walking.  Stretching to maximize your bone placement and joint space while walking is also extremely important.

Should you swim?  YES!  But swim because you love it and love how it makes you feel.  Know that when you get out of the pool there is still a lot of work to be done to keep your other tissues healthy.  Exercise prescription is very much like planning a healthy diet!  We’d all like to eat our favorite foods all the time, but in order to optimize our human machine, you have to make sure all the food groups are there.

Whoa.  Sun’s out.  Better comb the field for survivors.