Back Health & Exercise Course

Core Activities: Lesson 4

Hello and welcome to the fourth lesson of your Back Health & Exercise Course.
 
In this lesson we're going to talk about nutrition, food / vitamin supplements and fluid intake and their impact on your back and overall health. You might be thinking "what has diet got to do with sciatica and back pain relief".

Good question. I'm a certified "health nut" and used to think I had a great diet. Nevertheless I still had a lot of aches and pains, especially in my back, general tiredness and joint stiffness, which I just put down to "old age".

Luckily, one day I happened to be talking to a friend who mentioned they were taking a food supplement and they described some of the health benefits they had got from it. Some of the benefits they claimed were quite amazing.

It didn't cost too much, so I thought to myself "I might as well give it a try". I was amazed too. Most of my aches and pains, tiredness, joint stiffness and back pain quickly disappeared.

Why? Well who knows what the real reason is, but the theory is that a supplement ensures your body gets the vital trace elements it needs to work properly that are missing from most foods these days. Once it has that your body can go about healing itself just like the amazing wellness machine it is.

I think most people understand the basic equation for a healthy diet (if not go here), but one of the main reasons that there is a whole industry making billions of dollars out of weight loss programs is that it's so easy to eat the wrong foods and there's less 'inbuilt' exercise in our daily lives.

So what is a healthy diet, what is the role of a dietary or nutrition supplement and how do you choose the right one? (Note: We are using the word diet here to mean your eating routine, not a weight loss program.)

What Are The Basic Things To Look For In A Healthy Diet?

Healthy diets have the following:

Number 1: Fresh natural foods win every time.

Grains, fruit, vegetables and grilled lean meat or fish are your best bet.

Generally, the more processed food is, the less available nutitional value it has. I use the word available deliberately, becuase the label might say it is chock full of vitamin X, Y or Z, but the question is your body's able to make use of the nutrient in a processed form?

Number 2: General exercise (eg. walking) as a component of the diet.

The higher you get your resting metabolic rate, the more you can eat. This is a fancy way of saying exercise more.

Your body has a energy burn rate (your metabolic rate) depending upon your lifestyle and genetic makeup that you can raise by increasing your activity level.

If you exercise regularly, you get two benefits.

(a) the benefit of the energy burn from a specific exercise session and

(b) you also raise the resting energy burn level. This means you burn more energy (and fat) even when you're resting.

Good news!

Do I Need A Nutrition Supplement?

1. As mentioned above, much of the food now available to us has low nutritional value, in terms of our bodies' ability to use the nutrients. Synthetic vitamins and foods are simply less effective than their natural equivalents and in some cases plain toxic.

2. Even some fresh, natural foods are low in vital elements.
One aspect is that much of our food (fruits, vegetables and grains) are now being grown on land around the world that does not always  contain enough of essential minerals. This can occur because of over cultivation or chemical based intensive farming.

Our physical well-being is more directly dependent upon (trace) minerals we take into our systems than upon calories or vitamins, or upon precise proportions of starch, protein or carbohydrates we consume.

The result: We are 'starving' - no matter how much we eat. Nobody today can eat enough fruits and vegetables to supply his or her system with the minerals they require for perfect health because their stomach isn't big enough to hold them!

So you could be amazed at the effect of taking a NATURAL nutrition supplement. Many of your aches and pains, tiredness, joint stiffness could quickly disappear.

Why? Because your body gets what it needs to work properly! Simple as that. Just like a car that gets the right fuel, oil and lubrication.

Nutrition Supplements

We've tried several supplements over a period of time. One of the favorites is BodyBalance® from LifeForce International. It costs about $60 a month for two of us. Its the best we've found so far in terms of results vs cost.

BodyBalance is a liquid sea-vegetation blend that actually contains more phyto-nutrients and phyto- minerals than any other kind of food. (Phytonutrients are certain organic components of plants that are thought to promote human health.)

As important, Body Balance® is a WHOLE FOOD (unlike many synthetic vitamins), so up to 98% of its nutrients are immediately available for absorption by your body.

Other supplements we have tried include Mattol-K from  Nutrimetics (liquid) and USANA vitamins (synthetic).

Results For Us With BodyBalance:

- Way more energy & with less sleep.
- Less back and joint pain.
- Fewer colds and minor ailments.

Note : Google BodyBalance and quite often you can get it on a free 30 day trial. You'll should certainly see a difference by taking it for 30 days.

More recently we've gone to an ordinary mutli-vitamin supplement purchased from the local supermarket. That is working well too. My theory is that taking  BodyBalance has built up reserves of the trace elements. Note to self: remember to watch out for any re-emergence of tiredness etc. 

Fluid Intake

The importance of fluid intake is emphasised with many different wellbeing and fitness programs.

With respect to back health, it is recommended that you drink 80-100 fl oz of water per day.

There are 2 main reasons why fluids are important to your back:

1.  If you are suffering from (inadvertent) dehydration, your disks lose some of their fluid and thus their normal function and ability to cushion the verterbrae from impacts.

2.  Plentiful fluid intake enables you to flush accumulated toxins from your system. Otherwise these toxins accumulate in your back and affect its correct functioning, which likely means pain and stiffness..

So remember to drink 80-100 fl oz of water per day.

Good luck, stay well.

Rita & Chris

Reminder: Take a look at the Better Back System It includes a set of unique exercises to loosen and strengthen your back and you can  amazingly good results in a very short period of time.