Month: July 2020

Prescription from the wings-Hardwiring Holistic Health

How to Gut out Poor health – Over view

Ever  wondered about the term “GUT FEELING “.Can the Gut feel?  We will come to that in a minute

A long time ago, when I started practicing primary care back in the United States, I did so the same way most doctors do: by hearing what patients complain of their poor health (maybe a cough, cold, headache, anxiety, stress, etc.) and prescribing them a quick pill to pop. Results are visibly effective with both parties getting what they want   and seeing less of each other. 😉

Heals in the short-term? Yes. Long-term? Not always.

Let me explain. 

 To the “good health” seekers. Gut works! Over the years of staying connected and updated, I have learned to appreciate the wonderfully designed body we humans have and its capacity to self-heal. 

A solid awareness of what is entering and exiting your gut must always be an important consideration. Many of my patients in the US come to me with anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, and autism. Sadly, it is to do with their SAD or Standard American Diet (no pun intended) and their lifestyle.

  • Gut health has significant relevance in irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory bowel disease, constipation, metabolic syndromes, and behavioral health.
  • Prebiotics and probiotics create better environs for a healthy gut.
  • Natural home remedies, via good gut health, can help with weight loss, metabolic syndrome, and related disorders such as Diabetes Mellitus and high Cholesterol.

Now we will dig deeper into some of these conversations and my personal experience.  

How to gut out poor health – Part 2

Two sodas a day keeps good health away.

That was perhaps the unconscious mantra one of my patients lived by, ignorant of her lifestyle.

A 70-year-old, white female, walked into my clinic to get treated for irritable bowel syndrome and anxiety. But all her blood tests and colonoscopy were normal. She took multiple medications, but to no avail.

Let us investigate her diet.

For the most part, it consisted of a white bread cheese sandwich for breakfast, ready-to-eat hamburger for lunch, and red meat chops for dinner. She would drink at least four cups of coffee and two liters of soda every day.

Bad? Yes.

She was ONLY suggested for a change of diet with oatmeal for breakfast instead of the cheese sandwich. Fresh vegetable salad, soup, fruits, yogurt, sauerkraut, home-cooked chicken or salmon preparations for lunch or dinner. Alongside this, she was asked to increase her water intake and exercise at least half an hour to forty-five minutes daily.

The results were flawless.

After a few months, not only her anxiety waned but her bowel habits were more regular with less abdominal pain, flatulence, and bloating.

How you may ask? Surely, gut.

Gut, which has more than 100 million nerve cells, also called the enteric nervous system (ENS), is being called the second brain. Multiple studies have shown that treating this second brain can treat your brain. They are both parts of the nervous system  and nurturing one, will nurture the other tackling your various behavioral health issues.

Gut health does not bias with age. It is important as much as for babies as for adults. Babies, who are born by natural birth and have been breastfed have more bacterial diversity in their gut. This further gets augmented with diets rich in fibers, whole grain, and fruits in adult life. These bacteria, in turn, produce more butyrate (short-chain fatty acid), which makes the gut lining less porous and hence less entry of toxins in the blood and to the brain, besides having an anti-inflammatory effect and boosting the immunity of the body.

So, the take-home message is, we need more fruits, vegetables, lean meats in our diet along with hydration and exercise. Pre-biotics and pro-biotics create a better gut environment and the key to a better gut microbiome is, greater diversity of bacteria which means a variety of healthy foods.

Holistic and preventative health needs to be our priority in current COVID times and Gut health plays a big role in it.

The gut needs to be courted well and on a long term basis , like  a  good friend ,spouse or girlfriend for a healthy and happy life.

Gut out. Gut going. Stay gutted.

Gut health has had many exciting breakthroughs in the recent past. We would again touch base soon in near future

Till then

Stay Safe

                                                   Dr. Shruti Aggarwal https://twohomes.blog/

                                                                       (Insights from my Topsy World)

The Silent Patient-Debut Novel of Author-Alex Michaelides

“He who does not understand your silence will not understand your words”

                                                     Elbert Hubbard-IAMFEARLESSSOUL.COM

We have shared multiple book reviews on this platform in the past and most instances I have felt “the Nudge “ by those books. I was waiting for that cue, as far as my fiction writing skills were concerned. Ironically, that is yet to happen but in the meantime, I came across this brilliant debut novel and I had this compulsive desire to share it with you.

The protagonist’s single-minded pursuit of “ silence “ of her heroine and his obsessive efforts to solve the mystery surrounding her by unraveling the knots of her mind is worth a read.

Author, Alex Michaelides, commenced his literary trajectory with a degree in English from Cambridge followed by screenwriting. He has written screenplays for the films, “Devils you know “ and the “Con is On “.There was a brief interlude in his writing career by being trained as a psychotherapist. He is of Cypriot – Greek and English descent and currently resides in London.

Psychological thrillers have always touched a chord in me as my patients in primary care have behavioral health issues in multitudes and they are one of the most recalcitrant problems to treat. Navigating the human mind is  an ongoing challenge of present-day medicine and medical challenges are always  thrilling  for me

                                                Excerpt

Theo Faber is a psychotherapist and he is intrigued by Alicia, the beautiful artist, who had gone mute after killing her handsome photographer husband. Alicia had grown up with a mentally unstable family and she has her mental health issues  but is an artist of promise and potential and her only communication to the world after the murder, is  a painting “Alcestis”

She paints “Alcestis”, the heroine of a Greek tragedy by, Euripides, who volunteers to die for her husband, Admetus, and when” Alcestis “ is brought back to life by Hercules, she loses her speech.

Alicia is committed to a secured psychiatric unit “The Grove” as there are concerns about her mental competence in the court of law.

Six years later there is an opening in the “The Grove” and Theo joins the unit though the unit is on the brink of closure due to financial hardships.

Theo’s endeavors to treat Alicia has an unconventional and obsessive quality to it, while he deals with his mental health issues, drug addiction, and infidelities of his wife. He prefers to “Bury his head in the sand” and refuses to confront his wife about it

Alicia reacts violently to Theo’s psychotherapy sessions but Theo’s empathy for Alicia bordering on to infatuation persists. He patiently and steadily prods ahead with his interviews of the people, who, he thinks could be remotely associated with Alicia’s present state

As a last resort, Theo wants Alicia to start painting again.

 I  do not want to be a spoilsport for readers by demystifying the plot, so I would  let them read it for themselves

                              All-Pros, hardly any cons

“ The Silent Patient “ splashed on the” Best Seller” world almost a year back and it is still making ripples on all the major bestseller lists. Author amazes us with  an  amalgam of psychotherapy training and his literary skills

The novel has a perfect opening “Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband “

But the icing is the end when all my deductions and rationalizations come to naught and your “Aha “ moment is way off from the actual story

The greek tragedy “Alcestis” inspired him when he was a school going, kid. His heroine Alicia, the artist, and the murderess undergoes a similar transformation after the intense mental trauma of her unreciprocated love.  Besides readers who love literature, it was an added dimension of storytelling which added mythicism and romanticism to the novel

Despite not many crescendo decrescendo moments, the story hurls forward with plenty of twists and turns and the climactic pull is always intact.

The  interview sessions, bureaucratic   cordons  and  interoffice politics of the Psychiatric unit gives us a perfect backdrop of the novel

The chapters are short and crisp and dialogues predominate [his screenwriter presence] which keeps up the paciness of the novel.No wonder in most of the reviews of the book, it has  been called an unputdownable pageturner

The human mind surpasses supercomputers in its complexities and we are still navigating its mazes. Its defense mechanisms are strong when it protects us from various traumas the mortal world inflicts on us like betrayals, loss of loved ones. But its reactions could be equally varied. On one end of the spectrum, it can be as accepting and forgiving but when the avenger side of the brain predominates, it can be as ruthless, conniving and devious

People are seeking help for their mental disorders if their self-awareness is up to the mark. Mental disorders could be a refuge, a camouflage, a retreat but some times it is a societal threat and if not identified at the right moment, it raises its ugly head in the most catastrophic manner

“The Silent Patient “ has been bagged by the movie makers and I am sure it is going to be a grand success

We are all eagerly waiting for the author’s next venture

Hope to talk to you soon on this platform

Till then keep safe and happy

                                  Blog – Insight from my Topsy World[https://twohomes.blog]