The Catskill Chronicle

By Mort Malkin

Part one of this mini-series praised the medical profession for its advances in peering into the innards of our bodies with CAT scans and MRIs and even finding out which parts of our brains keep our secret thoughts and dark emotions. As well, their bionic technology can make us whole again with artificial hips & knees, and our ailing livers, kidneys, and hearts can be replaced with those of accident prone bikers. In the heart valve exchange there’s no waiting list — replacement with a porcine valve has become standard. If I ever need a new one, I’m going to request an antelope valve.

Part One, however, took the medicos to task for failing to keep us healthy in the first place. Because the insurance companies don’t pay them for counseling patients as to diet, exercise, and meditation, is no excuse. Doctors, supposedly, go into medicine to help people, not just to pad their bank accounts. Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine, to whom all MDs swear an oath, taught his students “The best way to keep a man healthy is to give him the right food and the right exercise, not too little and not too much.” Hippocrates said nothing about prescription drugs — he knew what happened to Socrates with hemlock.

So, what is the right diet and the right exercise, and how much is too little and too much?

There are eight basic categories of foods: a) green & yellow veggies, b) salad veggies, c) grains, d) fruits, e) starchy vegetables, f) legumes (bean family), dairy products, and animal proteins.  You can be very generous with categories a) and b) and progressively less so with each subsequent category as you go down the list. No, fats & sweets don’t need their own separate category as in the government’s Pyramid scheme. First, they are hardly food; and second, it is hard enough to keep them out of your diet even without their own category.

Your diet should be as varied as possible without too much of any one food, not even broccoli.  Your grandmother’s counsel of “if one is good, three is thrice as good” has never been scientifically established. In fact too much of one vital nutrient can interfere with the chemistry of another. Special treats — raspberries & cream with chocolate sprinkles, etc — are allowed, but only small portions and not twice a day. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be special.

Calories-in have to be balanced with calories-out (exercise). The best way to check the balance is to measure your waistline once in a while. If you can stay in the same dimension, you are on the path to health. Alternatively, keeping your gravity a constant will also work.

The right exercise starts with selecting the category that improves your body & brain chemistry, balances your various metabolic processes, and heightens your immune system mechanisms. That category is aerobic exercise. Your body defines aerobic exercise as one that uses large muscle groups in a rhythmic and weight-bearing fashion at enough intensity, time, and frequency (how far, how fast, how often). The how fast is a moderately hard workout. The how far is 40 to 50 minutes. The how often is 3 to 4 times a week, more or less evenly spaced, not all on the weekend.

So, what sports or exercises count? Only running and cross country skiing are true aerobic activities. Swimming and bike riding are not weight bearing, and tennis is too stop-and-go. Brisk walking uses calf muscles as the major power source, and the large muscle groups of the upper legs and mid body are given only the job of balance. Nor can the average person reach the how fast threshold.

What to do? Most people won’t run, and those who will soon get calls from their knees or back to stop. Cross country skiing, what with global warming (heating), is only a seasonal option. The answer is to make walking aerobic by changing the technique*. By using your heel instead of your toes and ball of foot for power at each stride, you will necessarily use your hamstring and gluteal groups — large muscles. In addition, advancing each hip to prepare for the next stride will add the mid trunk muscles. The total muscle mass will be beyond aerobic requirements. Then, make the transition from stride to stride as smooth and flowing as you can. With all that muscle power and a fluid stride turnover, you will increase your speed. Walking will be so aerobic we will have to call it something more exciting than brisk walking. The Gadfly Revelry and Research gang caucused re: a new appropriate name. All they’ve achieved so far is to nix: power walking, speed walking, and striding. Readers are invited to submit entries. If we cannot do better than aerobic walking, we may have to settle for that. And no, it doesn’t look as extreme as racewalking. If Stephen Colbert tries to make fun of aerobic walking, just challenge him to a race around the block.

Aerobic walking, besides the proper anatomy-based form, requires more than just strolling. Your perception of effort must be between moderate and hard on the Borg Scale of Perceived Exertion— no need to use target heart rate. Again, the distance, measured in time, is 40 to 50 minutes.

As in nutrition three times as much is not three times as beneficial. Overtraining occurs at 35 miles a week or 90 minutes for a single workout. Beyond those limits all the health benefits of aerobic exercise go into decline and you become more prone to illness.

Meditation, the third component of a Wellness lifestyle, requires only a simplified medical form of the stress calming technique of transcendental meditation — no Eastern mysticism or Buddhist belief systems necessary. Just sit in a comfortable straight-back chair, let your eyes gently close, and concentrate on your breathing, nothing else. No planning schedules, or what you will say when your spouse/companion says you are not attentive enough, no thoughts at all — only an awareness of your breathing. The meditative state should last for 20 to 30 minutes, You will not feel strange — for that you will have to try martinis — yet, your physiology will benefit remarkably.

Those are the essentials of the Wellness Triad. For questions, comments, requests, or complaints, please leave a note in the comment box below. If you know anyone living in The White House, maybe Michelle Obama, you could send this essay on to her. Just imagine — Gadflycare from sea to shining sea.

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* For further detail replete with diagrams, please refer to Dr. Malkin’s latest book on health and fitness, Aerobic Walking—The Weight Loss Exercise.