Category Archives: Going Healthy

Dr. Mercola Complete Probiotics Review: Happy Gut, Healthy Body

I used to think gut health simply meant not feeling bloated and gassy. But, over the years, I’ve learned a healthy gut plays a vital role in the health of our whole body, including our mind.

Maintaining a healthy diet comprised of whole, minimally processed food is the biggest factor to ensuring a happy and healthy gut microbiome. By feeding yourself, and therefore the symbiotic bacteria/organisms inside your body, with nutritious foods, you’re helping to reinforce yourself with a healthy body.

A common example of the microbiota living inside us are gut bacteria that thrive on probiotics. For me, I make a point to eat various cultured and fermented foods like yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, etc. But, if you tend to be constantly stressed, travel a lot, or exercise, having a good probiotic supplement is essential to help support your immune system.

Even someone who considers their diet to be very healthy, like me, can benefit from supplementing with a high quality probiotic. I’ve been taking Complete Probiotics by Dr. Mercola for almost two weeks and already notice an improvement.

DSC_1702

When it comes to taking anything in pill form, I am extremely cautious. Many manufactures have other ingredients like magnesium stearate or artificial colors just to make the capsule look “cool”, but Complete Probiotics has none of that. Click here for a PDF of their complete product label.

After about 2 days, I felt a little better inside and things just moved better, to put it nicely. Not that I had a lot of trouble before, but with my constant need to exercise daily and finding anything to stress over for no reason, a little help was welcome. As a lover and daily consumer of plain Greek yogurt, I always figured I’m getting plenty of beneficial probiotics, but never thought of the effect high heat pasteurization has on reducing the beneficial bacterial.

Most commercial yogurts are not a good source of probiotics. Heat pasteurization significantly reduces most of the “good” bacteria benefits.

Guess that’s one reason I still felt bloated so often. Thanks to Complete Probiotics, I’m feeling better mentally and physically by just taking two capsules first thing in the morning.

Even better, since they do not need refrigeration, they are perfect for travel, when we need them most. I will never advocate a supplement in place of a diet with real, wholesome food, but with the difference I’ve felt after taking Dr. Mercola’s Complete Probiotics, I think they’re worth looking into. Check out their site for extensive information on what makes Complete Probiotics stand out from the rest, and to order your own.

Here’s a snippet for the summary of advantages as listed on Dr. Mercola’s page.

Dr. Mercola, probiotics, gut health

If you find that you’re constantly stressed, exercise vigorously, travel a lot, or just feel rundown, a good probiotic might help you improve. Again, no supplement will ever make up for a poor diet, so I’d always say look to make changes there if needed.

Since I’ve felt the good results from taking Complete Probitics, I’ve become interested in all of the products Dr. Mercola has to offer including things for pets, kids, fitness, household use, and more.

Check out their site and let me know what supplement or other product you’d like to try most.

*The product/s mentioned above have been given to me to review, and without any form of compensation. The opinions in this article are solely my own, and have not been influenced by Mercola.com and/or other parties. I understand that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has not evaluated any of the statements mentioned above. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any health condition. Pregnant women, nursing moms, and people who are taking medications or have a medical condition should consult their physician before using this product.

Stand Up To This Challenge For A World of Healthy Kids

We all want healthy kids, right? So be a part of history in the making and take a stand by joining this challenge and maybe winning something for yourself.

Before I knew about this challenge from Tim Ferriss, I was already a backer of Standup Kids, an organization pushing to get standing desks in classrooms in all public schools across the US. If it really takes off, possibly kids all over the world will benefit!

When I worked in an office, before we had Avery, I was the only one on my floor to have a standing desk for a long time. And I really had to push and shove until I was able to have my desk converted to standing. Once they finally allowed it, all it took was a few bolts coming out, the desk getting lifted, and bolts back in…..simple. But geez, you would’ve thought I was asking for a group of servants to come and hold me on their shoulders as I worked all day!

Anyway, Standup Kids has a simply stated mission…..

The mission of StandUp Kids is to get every public school child at a standing desk in 10 years, to combat the epidemic of sedentary lifestyles and inactivity, and to better reflect 21st century education goals.

StandUp Kids provides education on the health risks associated with sedentary lifestyles and resources on why standing desks create an environment where children can become healthier and more active.

At StandUpKids.org, we believe children’s sedentary behavior is a public health crisis and that children need to MOVE MORE and SIT LESS. Standing desks are a simple and elegant way to create a movement rich environment where children are more engaged and perform better academically, burn more calories, eliminate or minimize orthopedic problems and disease, feel happier, and just plain move more.

While I don’t think they need to focus on the calorie burning effects of a stand up desk so much, the rising childhood obesity issue makes it a notable benefit to standing vs. sitting. And, well, if you haven’t noticed, kids do a lot of sitting.

Here is a downloadable PDF packed with info sure to motivate you to join the challenge and donate what you can for this to become reality: Standing vs Sitting_Standup Kids

 

Humans were never meant to sit for extended periods, and with recess time lacking in public schools, standing desks are a perfect way to keep kids healthy and learning better too. Check at these stats I found on the Standup Kids website.

  • Sitting too much causes disease and orthopedic dysfunction, and impedes children’s ability to learn.
  • Kids at standing desks burn between 15% to 25% more calories during the school day than the ones who remained sitting.
  • Obese students the desks had an even bigger impact, increasing calorie use by up to the 25% to 35%.
  • Small movements at standing desks, such as fidgeting, has a large impact on calorie expenditure.
  • Kids in standing classrooms are more engaged.
  • Classroom management is easier.
  • If kids are given the opportunity to move throughout the day, they will do so.
  • When students move more, their education improves.
  • Children feel happier when they can move more and aren’t restricted to a chair.
  • Classroom behavior improves with active learning.
  • Children who move more have greater creativity.
  • Educational test scores improve.
  • Students can shift their bodies and change position when they need to stay focused.
  • Standing prevents the body’s tissue adaptation to static positions (i.e. short hip flexors & hamstrings, rounded upper back, poor shoulder position) AND it does not erode the child’s physiology like sitting does.
  • Standing maintains the integrity of all the complex motor skills required for optimal physical function.
  • Reducing daily sedentary time literally reduces cell aging, which means kids will live longer and be more healthy.

Please check out the site to learn more on how you can help and why this means so much for the future of our kids. Oh yeah, and with the founders of this movement being Kelly and Juliet Starrett, the team behind one of the first 50 Crossfit affiliates and the site MobilityWOD.com which changed how we look at human movement and performance, I’d say they know a thing or two about why this is such a big deal.

I listen to several health and fitness podcasts where the well-known hosts in the industry are all getting behind this move and donating for the cause. Even a $1 will help get this project closer to its goal and the hopeful event that this will take off across the nation.

Here are the podcasts I listen to that have featured the movement:

Ben Greenfield Fitness

R Della Training

Tim Ferriss Show

However you get there, and whatever you do, please go to the donate page and give what you can and/or share with everyone you know to help spread the word.

As for the challenge Tim Ferriss is offering a giveaway for a round-trip ticket to just about anywhere worldwide as long as Star Alliance flies there. Supporting a feel good cause and possibly winning something like this? I’m in, are you?

New Shoes for My Wife on Father’s Day and A Workout

Happy Father’s Day to all dads out there! Without us, there would be no kids to be father to. Then again, same could be said for all mothers. But we already celebrated them last month, so YAY us!

DSC_0580

Fine, to avoid getting hit (too much), YAY all Moms too! I love and appreciate all my wife does, that’s for sure. 🙂

DSC_0594

Speaking of Moms, I was so kind as to get Going Mom some new shoes even though it is Father’s Day. Yep, four of them to be exact, and they were not cheap! I’m not one for fashion, but when it comes to performance and reliability, I’m all about it. Which is why her new shoes are all identical and look like this….

New Tire on Suby

Be honest, how many of you already knew I was talking about tires? Her car was overdue for a new set and as a car enthusiast and someone who used to work on them every day, I happily researched and settled on these beauties. Nothing extreme, but better than OEM. So thanks to Tire Rack for shipping to a local tire shop to have them installed.

I hated not being able to do it myself since I used to do it all the time, but that requires a special machine I obviously don’t have access to anymore. Plus, I was able to make good use of the 90+ minute wait time by heading to a place nearby with an outdoor fitness area. The only bad thing was that I had to walk across hell’s parking lot.

Walmart Pic

Luckily, I survived and made it to my destination. It wasn’t much, but had all I needed for what I planned on doing.

Outdoor Workout Area

After a brief warm-up, I did slightly altered version of the Crossfit benchmark WOD “Cindy“. Instead of pull-ups, I opted for chin-ups and did as many rounds as possible in 20 minutes of:

5 chin-ups

10 push-ups

15 body weight squats

I love this routine as you can do it almost anywhere, and as long as you go hard for that 20 minutes, you’ll feel it! I’m not great at chin-ups, so that always slows me down, but practice makes perfect slightly better than before. I usually have a pen and paper to mark each round I complete, but since I didn’t have that, the wood chips had to do.

Woods Chip Counters

Yeah, 16 rounds. Not my best, but I was going off of only black coffee at the time in my defense. Now that I’m another year older, I have a little thing I must do every day. Last year, for 30, I did 31 1-legged squats/leg + 31 push-ups almost every day. If I didn’t do that, I did 31 burpees + 31 push-ups. It’s always one more than my age.

This year, I’m sticking with 32 split squats/leg + 32 push-ups. The split squats really let you feel it the next day and I’m happy I chose them to do every day! You should try too. Find a move you could safely do every day and do reps of that move for how many years old you are. It’s great to say you did something, and might motivate you keep going.

For instance, after the WOD, and my 32 squats/push-ups, I went ahead and finished off my legs with 100 walking lunges/leg. Then walked around another 30 minutes until the tires were finally ready. Yep, I have no legs now….

No clue what’s in store for today, but if Kelley really knows me, it’s a whole lot of not much at all. And a Ferrari. 🙂

Hope everyone is having a happy Father’s Day or just an awesome day if you’re not celebrating!

Do you ever find ways to keep active instead of sitting in a waiting room?

If you said no, are you going to try next time your car is in the shop or something else?