Post Wood Stacking Back Care

At 54, stacking wood can take a slight toll on my low back. I use my Functional Movement wisdom that comes from years of experience and my training in:

• Bio-mechanics as an RN to not hurt my body lifting & hauling on patients in hospital beds

• Movement anatomy, basically the same thing as biomechanics but I did not want to repeat the word. ; ). This I learned as a Physical Education grad student and Faculty Fitness Trainer at Syracuse University.

• Yoga practitioner and teacher for 28 years thanks to a very wise professor in the Phys Ed Department at SU

• Just being alive for 54 years and figuring out what works and what doesn’t.

Lifting and stacking wood takes much bending forward action. To counter this and bring rebalancing back to the body’s muscles, bones, joints, and tendons-ligaments; doing a varied Yoga routine of backbends, lateral bends, and twists of the spine seriously helps me function for the rest of the day.

I will add, at the end of this, an image of a PDF file I created to help low back issues. This is a series of Yoga Poses I specifically use for days when a lot of forward bending is happening. If you want a copy of the actual PDF for home use, join my newsletter and it will be your gift. Already on my newsletter? Email me and it is yours!

Wood stacking is one example of forward bending habits. Other lifestyle actions could be weeding the garden, housecleaning, scrubbing laundry on a washboard (come on, you do this, right?!), washing dishes, working at a computer, etc. We do much leaning forward motion in life and countering this is so good for your body, bringing balance in the muscles, bones, joints, and connective tissues. Any lifestyle habits that leave your lower back in a tizzy can use some wise manipulation of the spinal movements to set things straight.

Be wise, think about what you are doing and use good body mechanics, and help to open up the body. Things get tight from overuse strain. Just like people get carpal tunnel syndrome from holding their wrists in the “type on the computer or personal device” angle… well, your body gets hung up in the bending forward to lift and stack wood movement and just needs a good stretch back into everyday motion reality.

It takes me about 7-10 days to stack 15 cords of wood. I work in the AM, for about 1-2 hours, before I get to the day’s Functional Medicine & Sacred Circle Yoga Business. Towards the end of this wood stacking time frame… the back needs a little more than the post stacking Yoga spinal manipulation.

I bring out the big healing actions… (I refused to use the word guns here):

1. I love my back bender, actually called the Lumbar Extender. I rest on this for 15-20 minutes and bring some profound backwards reorientation to the curve of my spine. Aaaaah is the sound my spine and back makes.

Lumbar Extender on Amazon, I wish I had a local store to refer you to.

2. I try to remember to do this quick routine on both sides of my body, daily, after stacking wood. I also try and remember to do it every night before I slip into bed. This YouTube video explains how to bring quick relief to low back and sciatica issues.

3. More Back care info: Kissing Low Back Pain Goodbye & Bye Bye Back Pain (cont.)

Taking care of the body to prevent and heal repetitive movement strain is a key to vitality, low inflammatory issues, and happy longevity. Taking care of you is key. You are the caretaker of self (it is what Hands On Health is ALL about) … no one else will or can take care of you.

8/7/19 The Yoga Back Relief Poses will be posted here ASAP. I have to go to Five Elements Living and finish the VV. “It’s time to make the VV.”

See below, VV is finished on 8/8/19.

Yoga pose image also posted below. Want the PDF, sign up for my newsletter & it is your fee gift.

VV is finished & ready to Love up your female parts; check it out here & purchase if it sounds like what you need.

https://www.paulayoumellrn.com/my-books

Drugs do not heal. Lifestyle changes do.

Self Healing has been an important part of who I am and what / how I live and teach since I was a very young adult. And, quite frankly, I intuitively knew this growing up. I was the kid asking Mom to buy me the "brown bread" not the fluffy white, Millbrook bread. Remember that stuff?! 

Nursing school was a HUGE wake up call that what our system of medicine actually does is generally not about healing the body. Modern Western Medicine covers up a person's ill health symptoms with medications. 

Let me explain briefly & simply, using blood pressure medication as an example. When a person takes blood pressure medication, and there are many types using different mechanisms in the body, the medication makes the numbers on the blood pressure cuff or machine go down. All looks well. Life goes on as per usual. But, if nothing is done to change what actually contributed to the high blood pressure developing:

• unhealthy food choices over years of living

• stress

• excess body weight

• sedentary lifestyle

• lack of contact with the Natural World, remember You ARE Nature…

then the damage that these above lifestyle habits wreck on the body are still happening. Yes, the medication may make your blood pressure look as if it has changed, and the numbers have changed, but what you do in your daily life that causes bodily harm and damage, down to each and every body cell, is still happening.

If you want to heal your high blood pressure or other health symptoms, issues, and diagnoses (and there is a *never ending list of lifestyle diagnoses)… You have to change your life.

Now let me explain another point: Western Medications have had very life saving impacts in many, many instances over the years & decades. Yes, Western Medicine is less than 100 years old. Natural Medicine - Herbs & Naturopathy - are thousands of years old. Let that thought sink in for a bit.

Western Medicine is amazing Emergency & Trauma Medicine. When there is an acute, gonna die right now or a trauma issue (think broken bones), Western Medicine can & does save lives and limbs. Using medications and medical skills for life saving moments is a VERY beautiful thing.

If you want to invoke real healing right down to the cellular level… this takes Lifestyle Medicine, Natural Medicine: changing the way you eat, live, and function in this world.

When You live and function as Nature intended, You will blossom with Vibrant Health & Longevity as Nature intended.

It IS that simple. Drugs, taken over the long haul, cannot heal your body.

Your body heals itself. That is what Nature does and You ARE Nature.

No one has deficiencies of chemical drugs. Illnesses are not caused by deficiencies of these drugs.

Change Your Lifestyle & Change the Way You Live.

Because Food DOES Matter in How Your Body:
Feels,
Functions,
Self Heals, &
Ages.

Free Natural Health-Lifestyle Medicine Information: Yes, click that blue link and change your life, heal yourself, make your life a better place to be!

*Just some of the diagnoses in the *never-ending list of diseases contributed to by one’s lifestyle habits:

• high blood pressure

• type 2 diabetes & obesity

• anxiety

• depression

• ADD / ADHD

• atherosclerosis, heart disease, and stroke

Wikipedia’s Lifestyle Disease Page:

Lifestyle diseases are defined as diseases linked with the way people live their life. This is commonly caused by alcohol, drug and smoking abuse as well as lack of physical activity and unhealthy eating. Diseases that impact on our lifestyle are heart disease, stroke, obesity and type II diabetes.[1] The diseases that appear to increase in frequency as countries become more industrialized and people live longer can include Alzheimer's disease, arthritis, atherosclerosis, asthma, cancer, chronic liver disease or cirrhosis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, metabolic syndrome, chronic renal failure, osteoporosis, stroke, depression, obesity and vascular dementia. In the UK the death rate is four times higher from respiratory disease caused by an unhealthy lifestyle.[2]

Some commenters maintain a distinction between diseases of longevity and diseases of civilization or diseases of affluence.[3] Certain diseases, such as diabetes, dental caries and asthma, appear at greater rates in young populations living in the "western" way; their increased incidence is not related to age, so the terms cannot accurately be used interchangeably for all diseases.[4]

Coming Back to YOU!

"When we walk the labyrinth of our soul out from the center and back into the world, the key is to slow down and observe our minds, observe every single one of our decisions, observe what we say yes to and what we say no to, observe what we give our energy to. It is by slowing down that we become aware of how deep certain patterns have run and are able to steer our course in accordance with our newly established beliefs, with what we have come to know about ourselves. By slowing down we can build our inner clarity and strength to find our way out, leaving the shattered remains of our discarded path behind us."   From Heart of the Labyrinth by Nicole Schwab, Womancraft Publishing.

I share this here as we move into the Spring & Summer seasons. Why you ask? Because so many of us give in to the indulgences of the friend, family, & community gatherings, the constant buffets & BBQs of not so healthy foods, excess sweet treats, and alcohol flowing freely.

We set out with good intentions; our plan to feed our body cells for health and healing, but something seems to get in the way.

When we open to soul, our inner light, grabbing at every sweet treat or salty indulgence offered no longer pulls at our reserves. When we align with spirit, our spirit, making choices based upon our wellness needs becomes second nature. No guilt, no feelings of deprivation, just blissful peace.

Question to ask yourself to bring peace when making celebratory food & drink choices:

"Is this best for my wellness, will this best feed my body cells for health and healing?"

I wish you peace on your journey of self healing.

I use this image frequently because it says so much, holds truth, and I appreciate Donna Farhi’s work in this world.

Common Sense Vegucation

• Grow, Buy, & Eat Organic Veggies

• Non-GMO is a must. Look into heritage varieties. GMO foods are hard on the precious and very important gut lining & gut microbiome. Protect yours.

• Gently cook your veggies so vibrant color and a crisp texture remains for your eating pleasure and cell nourishment. Yes, gone are the days of mushy, washed out colored veggies.

• Grow your own? Keep your soil organically, bio-dynamically healthy. Skip the Miracle Gro® and other non-whole food gardening additives. Yes, your soil needs to be lovingly cared for with a whole food mentality. Whole foods & whole food vitamins feed your body’s “soil” best. Only feed the Earth’s soil with whole fertilizers, compost, etc.

• Pull a carrot. Wipe the obvious dirt off. Eat without water washing & scrubbing if your soil is chemical free / toxin free. Soil microbes (think probiotics) are in the soil. If your soil is not chemical free, see suggestion directly above. ^^

• Vibrant Soil = Vibrant Food = Vibrant Body Cells = Vibrant Whole Health

• Prep veggies just before you are going to eat them or cook them. This preserves nutrients. When we cut into veggies, it creates open surface area that will begin oxidation and loss of water soluble vitamins. You want the most vibrant, nutrient dense food going into your body to make those cells squeal with delight.

• If you are steaming or light simmering veggies (remember, NO mush)? Use as little water as possible to retain nutrients in the food. Drain the cooking / steaming water into a mug, let coking water cool, & then drink. No more pouring nutrients down the drain. Don’t want to drink it? Save it for your house plant watering. Their soil needs nutrition too.

Suggestions for Adding Veggies to Your Life In Ways You Can Love Them

1.  Be adventurous, try new vegetables you have never cooked or tasted before.  There are so many more than the tried and true potatoes, carrots, lettuce, and broccoli. Remember: cucumbers, peppers, and tomatoes are really fruit.

2.  Find local farm stands, farm markets, and farmers who grow food sustainably.  The food will be far more nutritious and you will be eating local, seasonal produce; not food shipped from thousands of miles away.  Produce loses its nutritional value and vitality the longer it takes to travel to your plate.

3.  Grow your own, even a small raised box or potted vegetables, to enjoy food fresh from the plant.  Plant some berry bushes or maybe a fruit tree or two.

4.  Make the commitment to eat at least 2 to 3 servings per meal and snack on vegetables and fruit when you need a between meal lift.

5.  Make your plate mostly vegetables with high-quality, locally raised, grass-fed protein as the smaller portion on your plate.  Add beans instead of the animal protein for another plant and fiber boost to your diet.

6.  Add shredded carrots, beets, parsnips to your whole food baked goodies.  A beet cake is a fun alternative to the well-loved carrot cake. 

7.  Add beets, carrots, squash, and parsnips to pancakes and waffle batter.  I even add spinach, kale, collards, etc. to my kids’ pancakes.  They used to call these “green” breakfast pancakes Shrek pancakes. 

8. Make scrambled, poached, or fried eggs, beans and greens for breakfast.  Get your eggs locally from a farmer who lets the chickens feed naturally.

9.  Make omelets with lots of vegetables, different than the typical ones put in omelets.  Be creative and adventurous.  Add fresh herbs just before you fold it and shut off the heat. This prevents overcooking delicate herbs.

10.  Make a breakfast burrito with scrambled eggs, from naturally raised chickens, and/or refried beans.  Add plenty of vegetables and herbs and roll into a sprouted grain tortilla or a 100% whole grain tortilla. Buy organic so you can avoid genetically modified organisms, GMO’s*.  Also, try rolling the burrito fillings into large leaves of kale, collard, or Swiss chard and really up the veggie intake.

11.  Make vegetable curries for dinner and use the leftovers for lunch or breakfast.  Curried vegetables and beans, eggs, or meat are yummy for any meal.  Think past the typical refined grain breakfasts that most Americans eat: processed cereals and milk, doughnuts and coffee, or toast and juice.  Start putting real food and vegetables into every meal.

12.  Add hardy greens to soups, stews, stir fries: kale, collards, Swiss chard, dandelion greens, beet greens, spinach, arugula, mustard greens, endive, and escarole.  Cut them into small, fine strips to make them more palatable if you are new to eating greens.

13. Make fruit smoothies for breakfast or snacks.  If you avoid dairy, see my recipe on how to make fresh nut and seed milk.  Making your own nut and seed milk avoids the packaged, processed, non-dairy milk.  Remember to “chew” your smoothies.

14.  Buy large carrots and make your own carrot sticks.  Avoid packaged baby carrots.  Most commercially packaged baby carrots are actually large carrots that were less than desirable (rotting), carved into baby carrot shapes and soaked in chemicals to kill microorganisms.  This is not a healthy option

15.  Make “sticks” out of any root veggie that appeals to you, eat them plain, dip into hummus or other whole food spread or dip.  Root vegetables: parsnips, celeriac, turnips, daikon radish, rutabaga, carrots and beets. 

16.  Snack on red pepper halves filled with hummus, yummy!  Or fill them with fresh herbed cottage cheese or herbed egg salad.  Use your imagination.

17.  Make fruit salads with local, seasonal fruits.

18.  Add new vegetables to your raw, green salads that you have never tried in a raw salad.  Try anything.

19.  Skip desserts and eat fresh, local, seasonal fruit.  Off season?  Try local fruit you froze or canned. Try organic frozen fruits.

20.  Make homemade pizza with whole grain crust and load it up with vegetables.  Eat with a salad greens and veggie salad or a shredded root veggie and cabbage salad.  Have that fruit salad for dessert.

21.  In the fall and winter, bake quantities of squash, sweet potatoes, or yams and keep the extra for quick meals and snacks. 

22.  Add extra squash and sweet potatoes to pancake and waffle batter.

23.  Extra squash is also yummy added to “egg nog” smoothies.  I even add cooked beets to get vegetables into my kids.  

24.  Avoid ready-to-eat packaged vegetables and fruits.  Sure they are convenient but once produce is cut up it loses nutrients and starts to decompose faster.  Most pre-cut fruits and vegetables are wet. Wet sealed bags are an easy place for mold to grow.

25.  Skip the “greens” in a salad and make a salad out of all kinds of raw chopped vegetables, grated root vegetables, and shredded cabbages.  Mix it up and use simple oil and vinegar dressing.

26.  Grill veggie chunks on kebabs. Add pineapple chunks for extra flavor.

27.  Roast vegetables in the oven for fall and winter warming dishes.  Try tourlou, a Greek roasted veggie delight.

28.  Make big pots of soups and stews and eat all week.  Think lots of vegetables.

29.  At restaurants: skip the bread (it is refined flour anyhow) and ask for extra vegetables in your salad and as a side dish.  Order pasta dishes without the pasta and have the chef put the pasta sauce on a pile of steamed vegetables instead.  You avoid the refined flour pasta and get the benefits of vegetables.  Skip any flour- based food when you are out and about (crackers, noodles, pasta, bread, desserts, white rice) and opt for extra vegetables instead.

30.  Skip the factory-farmed meat at fast food restaurants (skip the fast food altogether, but if you find yourself with no other option…) eat a salad and baked potato with beans and salsa.  Hopefully there is a salad bar with beans to add some digestive “staying” power to the vegetables.  Protein and fat, balance out the meal, creating greater and longer satisfaction between meals.

31. Use whole grain quinoa, millet, amaranth, teff, or brown rice to make a “pasta” salad.  You will be skipping the actual packaged pasta and using the whole grains instead.  Then add far more vegetables to your whole grains than most people do to the average summertime pasta salads.

32. Grate up all kinds of veggies and use instead of pasta. Quick stir fry grated zucchini or yellow squash and use as pasta. Use an actual spaghetti squash instead of pasta.

Final thoughts:

• Fruits are generally easy for people to add into their diet, vegetables are where people can get stuck.  Avoid Shopper’s Rut (using the ame produce week in & week out).

• Fruits and vegetables make for good cell replication - healthy cell biology.   

• Every step towards healthy, whole food eating creates positive changes in the health of your cells and your whole body. 

* GMOs are genetically modified organisms, in this case genetically modified foods.  These are foods that have had their genetics manipulated in laboratories; they have had extra genes spliced into their genetic material.  Examples are tomatoes with salmon genes spliced into them, supposedly to make the tomato more cold hardy.  While this may make sense on some level to some people; did nature intend for tomatoes to have salmon genes?  I think not.  I will go with nature’s plan.  She seems to know what she is doing.

Sink into the Rhythms of Nature with Sacred Circle Yoga™ Mentorship

Sacred Circle Yoga™ Mentorship

My Best Gluten Free - Grain Free Bread Yet!

UPDATED 9/28/22

Why was this particular loaf so much better? I have made several varieties of the gluten free, 100% whole food flour, bread from various websites. One was too eggy. It had 6 eggs per one loaf of bread. It was more like eating some sort of weird loaf of quiche. Others were too moist and dense. This one I remedied by cutting the eggs to 4, adding lots of extra butter, and using milk.

The top is nice and brown crispy. And it is not doughy in texture. I had a slice warm from the oven and literally slathered in slices of butter. Delicious!

Ingredients  

• 2/3 cup organic buckwheat flour

• 2/3 cup organic quinoa flour

• 2/3 cup organic millet flour

• 2 Tbsp coconut flour

• 1 rounded teaspoon baking soda

• 1 rounded tsp baking powder

• 1/3 cup + a little extra organic Pasture Butter, I am very generous with the butter, and I gently melt it before adding to the batter

• 1 TBSP apple cider vinegar

• 2 TBSP local maple syrup

• 4 local & organic eggs

• 3/4 cup local, organic Goat’s milk

• ½ teaspoon unrefined pink Himalayan salt

Vinegar, Milk, Salt, & Eggs

1. Melt the butter

2. Beat the eggs

3. Mix in melted butter, milk, & maple syrup

4. Mix dry ingredients together

5. Add dry to wet & mix well

6. You will have more of a thick bread batter than a traditional yeasted bread dough

7. Pour into a well buttered bread pan ( I use 8 1/2 L X 4 3/4 W X 2 3/4 D )

8. Bake at 350F for 55 minutes or so until top is crispy brown & loaf pulls away from the bread pan sides

Let cool for 10 minutes and then remove to a plate. Allow to finish cooling.

Slice & use for your favorite sandwiches, toast for a buttery delight, add jam, melt cheese on, spread with hummus / peanut butter / Nuttzo butter… whatever pleases you! Bologna from well raised pigs?? I no longer have a source for such childhood comfort foods. Bummer.

Goat’s Milk Butter

I have one frozen package of Piggery Bologna left… the business has been closed for over a year. I will miss this pasture raised pork bologna when I finally decide to break it out of the freezer and indulge.

It's Not About The Poses

“The success of Yoga does not lie in the ability to perform postures but in how it positively changes the way we live our life and our relationships.” ―  T.K.V. Desikachar

Or maybe it is? Let’s explore this thought…

Many people come to Yoga looking for a “practice” to work their body into fitness. Yoga is a physical thing for them. I will confess, I did the same, or so I thought. At 35, I gave up weight lifting* as I was bored and tired of it. I wanted something else to occupy my daily fitness time and Yoga seemed like a fine, new space to explore.

I have written about this, and the endless benefits of Yoga, many times on this blog. Scroll to the bottom, type in Yoga on the search bar, and explore my thoughts on this life changing gem we call Yoga.

A historical fact about Yoga is that the poses of Yoga are only a couple hundred years old. British colonization of India was the spark that added poses to the spiritual practice of Yoga. English culture, at the time, was obsessed with fitness and gymnastics as a manner of attaining fitness. As the British sought to make India’s spiritual practices their own, they changed the practice of Yoga. Prior to Britian’s addition of gymnastic like poses to Yoga, the only poses of Yoga were basically seated postures for meditation.

The now many poses of Yoga have evolved into, well, many styles of “doing” Yoga.

Yoga poses have suited me well. I am a very energetic person. Sitting for hours (Seriously, who am I trying to kid? Sitting for minutes drives me crazy) in meditation would have me climbing the walls inside of myself. I suspect, with practice, I would get better. But why bother? Yoga poses, the physical - moving meditation of Yoga, work for me. I can do poses for 5 minutes, or 45 minutes, of complete peace even when the world around me is spinning with crazy.

I do Yoga daily, at my home, surrounded by two teenaged males, a dog, and several cats. The chaos disappears when I am on my mat doing poses. The poses are a “vessel” for me to be the hollow bone. As I am doing poses, I am creating a Sacred Space for Divine Consciousness, the Collective Soul, to flow through me with each and every breath. Yoga poses are my moving breath and body awareness meditation.

A daily woods walk, with my best friend Lily, is the moving meditation’s, icing on the cake.

As humans, we are spiritual beings. Our bodies are the hollow bone, the hollow reed, for Divine Consciousness to flow through. Most of us live at frenzied paces and have little time to be aware of our connection to everything; that we are everything and everything is us. Moving into a pose, holding the pose, and moving out of the pose with complete breath awareness is a gift of slowing down. A gift of being in the flow of the Universal Energy.

Meditation in motion, Yoga Poses, is a gift I give myself every day when my mat gets rolled out onto the floor. Or the ground. Or a rock.

May your 2019 be filled with Peace, Love, Connection, and Vibrant Health.

*weight lifting, practiced with the same mindful attention to breath, body, mind, and spirit is Yoga. As is doing dishes, laundry, stacking wood, mowing the lawn, or any activity. Plowing, I admit, is better with beer!