Dr. Glenn’s Blog

Courtesy of Validus… 

            Times are difficult. It is easy to spend time focusing on the negative and even easier to forget to be grateful for the blessings we do enjoy. The recent global economic crisis is no doubt affecting most of us financially, but how it affects our well-being is a choice we make. For instance, I know children living in villages in the mountains of Honduras. Their parents have no 401(k) plans, no credit cards, no mortgages and no health insurance premiums. Yet these children are more content and joyful than most any children I have seen. Perhaps having nothing to lose makes them appreciate the little they have. Conversely, with so much to lose we forget to appreciate the things (and people) we have.  
            Expressing gratitude is also therapeutic. Studies have shown that individuals who intentionally express gratitude have a measurably higher well-being. Gratitude and generosity together have been linked with reducing stress, improved coping skills and decreased depression. Expressions of gratitude and generosity even affect those witnessing the act of kindness. Interestingly, women find it easier than men to show (and receive) gratitude.
            Showing expressions of gratitude also changes our perspective on material wealth. In this season where the pressures of material giving are being restrained by financial pressures, consider giving the gift of gratitude to those you care about the most. Perhaps that will allow us to send just a little help to those kids in Honduras, or across town, who have nothing to lose.

Articles of Interest:

• Counting blessings versus burdens: an experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life. J Pers Soc Psychol. 2003 Feb;84(2):377-89.
• Gratitude and subjective well-being in early adolescence: Examining gender differences. J Adolesc. 2008 Aug 27.
•  Positive couple interactions and daily cortisol: on the stress-protecting role of intimacy. Psychosom Med. 2008 Oct;70(8):883-9.

I read lots and lots of books. This is a great one about the history, business, and environmental impact of bottled water. Elizabeth Royte is a great reporter, and this book is fascinating. Check out Bottlemania at Amazon.com

The 2008 Crescent Moon Sprint Triathlon was held at Cherry Creek State Park, in Denver on Saturday September 20th, and featured a 750 meter swim, 20K bike, and 5K run.

 It was a beautiful day with great weather, lots of sun, and 750 racers. I was riding my 29er mountain bike (The Gary Fisher Paragon) and finished somewhere in the high 300’s. I forget exactly. I could go look it up, but who cares.

Next up for me? Not sure. Check back to find out.

. No X-rays are involved.

What’s causing your headaches?

Headaches are usually caused by short, stiff and painful muscles at the base of your skull. Some of the nerves that go up into your head pass through these muscles. When the muscles become short and stiff, they can actually compress the nerves. You feel this as headaches.

How does this happen?

Some of the most common things that over-stress the muscles of the neck include:

• Spending a lot of time in front of the computer
• Accidents that cause whiplash injuries
• Chronic tension
• Stress

What does Dr. Glenn do to treat headaches?

First I check the muscles in your neck. Identifying and correcting the specific muscles that have become short, stiff and painful is the key to getting rid of most headaches. I do this by applying gentle tension to the muscle and combining that with specific movements. This is known as Active Release Technique^®, which I am certified to provide. If the joints in your neck are stiff and contributing to the problem, they may be adjusted. The combination of Active Release Technique^® and gentle adjusting can restore your body’s ability to move fully, freely and without pain. This usually gets rid of headaches.

Once you are feeling better, you will be given specific stretches and advice to keep your headaches from returning.

Call 303-300-0424 today for your appointment.

So, I have a lot of opinions about the food industry in this country. (In a nutshell, I think it sucks.) The food industry makes billions upon billions of dollars by taking simple foods, processing them, “adding value,” and selling them to us in various forms. They take cheap ingredients like corn and turn them into expensive crap.

The food industry could care possibly less about your health, my health or anyone’s health. High Fructose Corn Syrup is a shining example.

Giant corporate food producers - like  Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill, Staley Manufacturing Co. and CPC International – grow huge quantities of corn. Your tax dollars subsidize these crops. In the 1970’s corn was primarily used for processing into margarine and other fats. But soybeans were easier to grow and process. So the soybean took over the processed fats market. What to do with all that corn?

Someone got the idea of concentrating the fructose in corn in to a syrup. This was cheaper than using cane sugar, and cheaper is really all that matters to the food industry. So High Fructose Corn Syrup started replacing cane sugar in just about everything.

Fructose sounds a little healthier than sugar. That’s because fructose is the sugar found in most fruits. When you eat fructose, it leaves your stomach and heads for the liver where it’s turned in to glucose or triglycerides (the building blocks of fats). When you eat real fruit, the fiber slows down the absorption of the fructose, so the liver can convert more of it to glucose. Your body can handle this.

When fructose is concentrated in High Fructose Corn Syrup, it hits the liver like a fructose bomb. Since there’s no real demand for that fructose to become glucose (unless you’re in the middle of some intense exercise), your body turns most of the fructose it gets from High Fructose Corn Syrup into fats. In many people, this just may lead to elevated cholesterol and triglyceride levels. And of course you know that these blood factors are related to heart disease. (You may have seen a commercial or two selling drugs to lower cholesterol.)

Anyway, the moral of the story is this – avoid High Fructose Corn Syrup. If you start looking, you’ll see the stuff is EVERYWHERE. If you read labels, you’ll see it’s in sodas, ketchup, most breakfast cereals, almost every kind of bread, cookies, pizza sauce, etc. So start looking and start avoiding.

If you want to read a GREAT book on this subject, check out Michael Pollan’s book In Defense of Food. You can also get a pretty good movie called King Corn.

A study published in the July 2008 Mayo Clinic Proceedings shows the combination of red yeast rice (RYR), fish oil, and dietary changes significantly lowers cholesterol, and does it as well as the prescription drug simvastatin. The open-label trial involved 74 participants who were split into two intervention groups: simvastatin (40 mg/day) or a combination of RYR (600 mg 2-3 times daily), fish oil (1053 mg EPA and 840 mg DHA twice daily), dietary advice to follow a modified Mediterranean diet, and increased exercise. Significant decreases in total cholesterol and LDL were seen in both groups, without any significant difference between groups. However, triglycerides were significantly lowered in the RYR/fish oil group only. This a great example of a realistic naturopathic regimen that works better than the typically used drug therapy, and one that improves health overall rather than just lowering cardiovascular risk markers.

Becker DJ, Gordon RY, Morris PB, et al. Simvastatin vs. therapeutic lifestyle changes and supplements: randomized primary prevention trial. Mayo Clin Proc 2008;83:758-764

OK, so I promised to be a better blogger. I was not. Here’s a brief update. For those of you that get the newsletter, watch your mailbox for more info…

On August 2nd, 2008, I did the Xterra Indian Peaks race. It was, by far, the toughest bike course I’d ever seen. I finished dead last with a 4:01. I did, however, beat the people who DNF’d.

I’m presently training for a sprint distance race in Cherry Creek State Park (Colorado) on September 20th - the Crescent Moon Triathlon. After that will be the offseason and some duathlons just for the hell of it. You can get more info on those races here:

 http://www.racingunderground.com/crescentmoontri/

Next Year, I’m planning on doing the Xterra races at Buffalo Creek, Crested Butte, and Beaver Creek.

I just bought a cool new bike, and am eagerly awaiting delivery. It’s a 2008 Gary Fisher Paragon 29′er. I’ll let you know how I like it.

Yes, I finished. And I actually crushed my own goal, which was 3 hours. I did the race in 2:20 and finished 86th out of 100+ people. I don’t know the final count since the results aren’t up yet.

Let’s just say I’m pretty pleased. Want to hear the whole story and see some pictures?

It started with the swim. At about 10:00 100+ of us were set free into Wellington Lake. I’m in here somewhere:

This was the very first time I ever swam in open water, and it was not bad at all. I posted something around 21 minutes for half a mile. Good enough, but certainly not great.

So, after the swim, I stood around admiring my success, and took a whopping 6 minutes to transition to the bike. Apparently, this kept me from finishing several places higher.

The bike was brutal. It started off with a 1000 foot drop over 3 miles of dirt road. Pitted with giant ruts, huge potholes, cars containing campers, and a fox with a mouse in its mouth, this was one hell of a ride.

After the 3 mile downhill, we crossed some rolling single track for about a mile, climbed about 700 feet on some gravel, for  another mile, descended for a couple miles, and then…

We climbed back up that 1000 foot drop we started on. I averaged, according to my GPS watch, 5.7 mph on this stretch. It took me like 30 minutes to go up three miles. Brutal.

Anyway, here’s a pic of me taking off on the bike, which my 3-year-old son has named “Serious Cookie”

I pre-rode this course before the race and it took me about 2 hours. On race day, I got it done in about 1:20. Not bad.

Of course, after the bike it was time to run. I’m not going to lie, my run training was not great. It took me 30 minutes to cover 2.5 miles. Could have been better, but I’ll take it. The run had way more hills than I thought it would, so I was happy I didn’t fall. Here I am setting off to start the run.

And of course, after the run was the finish line. Since I did way better than I thought I would, my wife wasn’t ready at the actual finish line with the camera. Here’s me shortly after the finish. To the right is Andrew, my 3-year-old, telling me I’m #1. As long as he thinks so, it’s good enough for me.

So, what’s next?

I’m dong the Xterra at Eldora on August 2nd. www.digdeepsports.com. It’s supposed to have the toughest bike course in the whole wide world, so it’ll be interesting.

I’d like to thank my wife and kids for coming along with me to the race and putting up with me during training. You guys are the best and I love you. I’d like thank my dentist, the guy who runs the Xterra Buffalo Creek, Dr. Robert Martinich. He’s a great dentist, by the way. I’d also like to thank the B&B that we stayed at in Pine the night before the race. That awesome breakfast may have been my edge. www.crystallakeresort.com/bedbreakfast.htm

I’d also like to thank you for reading this far.

So, my suckiness at the swim will cause me to downgrade my plans. Now I’m doing the half X-terra at Buffalo Creek on June 21st.

However, I’ll be training for the full Xterra at Eldora on August 2nd. www.digdeepsports.com.

The bike and the run are going great. In fact, I’m thinking about moving up to a full-suspension bike. I’ll keep my hardtail, but it wouldn’t hurt to have another horse in the stable, would it?

I’m looking at the Fisher Hi-Fi’s and I might check out the Konas. But I am a card-carrying Gary Fisher fan.

Anyway, check back soon to see what I’m up to.

I’ve been busy. So busy that my blog has gathered dust for about a month. Sorry about that.

 I’m still training for the June 21st Xterra  Race at Buffalo Creek. Weight loss: Without chaning my diet, I’ve dropped about seven pounds. Here’s a summary of my training:

Bike. Going well. I’m a pretty strong mountain biker. I stopped riding the steel beast- my 1993 Trek 930 and picked up a 2007 Gary Fisher Tassajara. It’s a decent hard tail and I’ve been enjoying the hell out of it. I put in about 15 miles yesterday in Cherry Creek State Park. They have some surprisingly decent dirt in that park, which is riding distance from my house.

Run: Running is going well. I put in 4 miles last Wednesday, which is a personal best for me. Running with my wife, a former marathoner, has helped tremendously.

Swim: I suck at swimming. I can put in about 16 laps before I think I’m going to die. I ordered a DVD called Freestyle Made Easy from Amazon, so we’ll see if that helps. I’m swimming 3 times a week at Lifetime Fitness in Parker.

I think I’m alos going to do the Mountain Bike portion of Elephant Rock on June 1st, and the Indian Peaks Xterra in August.

Buffalo Creek Xterra: www.youtriit.com

Elephant Rock: www.elephantrockride.com

Indian Peaks Xterra: www.digdeepsports.com

Anyway, that’s my brief update. I’ll try to be a better blogger.