What I am good at are small changes. I first heard of them as real methods for change and techniques on how to do it and why small changes are important while reading The Spark by Chris Downie of sparkpeople.com, a site I've talked about liking before.
Some of the small changes I've made seem big but they're not when taken in small bits. I take vitamins I think will help. I exercise. I eat right. Those aren't all things I used to do and I didn't change them all at once. I crept up on them to get in the habit with something small and then gradually adding to it until I'm closer to where I want to be.
I take:
Fish Oil This is supposed to be good for triglycerides, dry eyes, and my heart as well I think.
Vitamin D3 I take this as an immune system booster & because of the meta-study that says those that take it live longer. I like living.
Glucosamine: I take this for joint pain. I had some knee pain from running and when I take this I don't have it. Maybe it's in my head but the pain's not in my knee so that's okay.
Magnesium (as citrate, but not the liquid): I honestly can't remember why I'm taking this one. I even remember the article being specific that the citrate was better than the other one but for the life of me I don't remember why.
Low-dose aspirin: I've heard it could help not have heart attacks. I asked the doctor & he said it wouldn't hurt so I take it. Maybe I don't need it but they're cheap and flavored. Yum!
Probiotics: This one I don't take all the time but I buy a bottle a couple times a year and take it until it's gone. I don't know that I need it but it doesn't hurt. I plan on learning to make my own sauerkraut and then I can get my gut-flora that way instead of by pill.
Benefiber: I take this WITH the probiotics at night before bed and in the morning with my coffee. With the probiotics it makes the bacteria I'm swallowing happy because they have something to play in while they wander around my guts. All the time it's supposed to help with cholesterol. Also, I imagine pooping is good so there's that. *shrug*
Green Tea: Remember I said I take Benefiber, the soluble flavorless, non-gritty fiber at night with the probiotics? Yeah. I take that stirred into a cup of hot green tea for lowering cholesterol, and like a thousand other things, but mostly, cholesterol.
That's all the stuff I make a point of putting in me. It looks like a lot but it's not and I didn't start them all at once. I added one at a time to see if I could tell a difference or if it did what I thought it would do. The cholesterol ones seem to be helping as my cholesterol numbers seem okay and they weren't okay before... The magnesium one... I really wish I could find the site that recommended it to me, there were several, but I can't find it. I have no real way of knowing if it's working or not since I can't remember why I'm taking it. Obviously it wasn't for memory lol.
*I eat healthy foods. I take supplements to supplement what isn't there or what I may not be getting enough of, not as a replacement to make up for a poor diet. I mostly cook at home using ingredients from the edges of the grocery store: Produce, meat, dairy. I don't buy packaged food and can count the number of times I eat out in a week on one hand, and still shake my finger at most of you. :) When possible I use fresh produce.
Failing fresh from a garden I go for either frozen or stuff in the produce section if it's from the US. I'm not US-centric. I just don't think you can get broccoli to me from Lima in a reasonable amount of time.. even if it is sitting there wrapped in plastic... I'm not sure how old that is. I'd rather have frozen if it's from another continent just because of time off the vine. Canned is a last resort because canned food is, to me, generally mushy and flavorless compared to frozen.
No comments:
Post a Comment