Daily Grit by Wes Thorp

Increasing my literacy about strokes compliments of Dr. James Dobson

I remember when my mom had her stroke and how her symptoms slipped right by me when I talked long distance to her on the telephone.  Now I'm at the front end of the age where I need to be concerned for myself.

Dr. James Dobson of Focus on the Family had a stroke and in these two segments of his radio program he talks to stroke experts who give the who, what, when, where, how and why and so what of strokes.  They seem to do this in a very understandable way.

I will listen to both episodes again.  I know I need to increase my stroke and heart attack IQ.  Here are the links:

• Part one of what you need to know about strokes.
• Part two of what you need to know about strokes.
• Recognizing a stroke with three questions.
  

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Tags: strokes, dr. james dobson, focus on the family, american stroke association

My life in Michigan today: Myth or reality; does taking vitamin c help get rid of a cold?

It has almost become a reflex to reach for the vitamin c bottle when I get cold symptoms.  Adding to the joy of living in the stressed state of Michigan, I have a head cold.

By almost reflex, I reached for the vitamin c on the top shelf in our kitchen where we keep it with a collection of other vitamins.  Each tablet, according to the label,  contains 500 mg of vitamin c.  For the past two days, I have been taking 2 tablets every four hours. 

I'm not sure I'm feeling any difference.

I Googled vitamin c to learn more  about what it's supposed to do.  It seems like the answers are on the ends  of the continuum. 

Natural health proponent Gary Null wrote this pretty clear and strongly positive explanation of vitamin c benefits.

Is he right or is he wrong?

Is it time for me to redirect my babyboomer habit of reaching to this everytime I feel a cold coming?

Using Twitter to help me stay accountable with my daily walk

For about 12 years, I was a jogger.  I really enjoyed it and it helped me keep my waistline down.  Since then, my waistline has expanded and the meniscus in my knees has gotten pretty beaten up.  So, I'm trying to walk everyday.

I now take a new friend on my walk, my new iPod Nano that was released a couple of weeks ago that my son, Justin, gave me as a gift.  I have loaded my iPod with podcasts, including audio and video and with music. 

Here's the Twitter part:  When I get done, I send a message on Twitter to my son that, hey, I've done the walk and share what I've listened to.

Today, I listened again to James McDonald of Walk In The Word.  His daily podcast is 23 minutes.  I can time myself by how much of his message I listen to.  Today it was from his Pour It On Me Now sermon series.  Then I listened to music from the organe Wow worship CD.  It was great.  It put a pop in my step and it exercised my soul too. 

I would recommend both the iPod and using Twitter.

Take note Apple: Baby-boomers are a good market for iPods

I'm sitting on our living room floor, lacing up my walking shoes for a two-mile quick swing through our neighborhood.  I'm taking a few friends.  James McDonald of Walk In The Word, Jeff Manion of Ada Bible Church, Michael W. Smith, Gary Vaynerchuk, Wintley Phipps and a bunch of others.

They are all on my new iPod Nano which my son bought me right after it was recently introduced by Apple.  It has a ton of storage and it has a small, high-definition screen. 

As I walk, I listen to all the folks I listed and many more.

As a member of the first-class of baby-boomers born in 1946, I know that I need to concentrate on physical fitness.  This really helps.  Listening to a pastor's sermon with earbuds provides a different experience from actually being in church.  The message is much closer to my brain, I guess and so is the music.

When I'm done, I'll Twitter my son that I just completed my Nano walk.  So, there's an element of accountability there too.

Anybody want to join my Twitter exercise group?

My ophthalmologist, Dr. Kevin Liu says he's hopeful about my right eye vision

This is how I looked one week ago after I got home from the Michigan  Surgical Center in East Lansing.  My ophthalmologist, Dr. Kevin Liu, had just performed surgery to relocate a lens implant inserted six years earlier that was starting to move downward.

It was my first somewhat major health situation as a newly-minted sixty year old.  I was confronted face-to-face with some of the issues that I will face as a member of the first class of aging baby boomers. 

Here's some background:  About a week-and-a-half before I went to the ophthalmologist to get this checked out, I started seeing double for brief periods of time.  It would go away when I blinked my eyes or when I moved them.  Then I noticed that when I read content on the computer, it would blur out until I blinked or moved my head. 

I tried to talk myself into believing that it was my eye glasses prescription.  Then I started to believe I had a problem.  I called my friend Carnell, who has had eye health challenges and asked for his advice.

Cataract patients: You need to know that lens implants can come loose; mine did

This past week and a half I noticed that my vision was getting worse. I couldn't figure it out. I went through a pretty comprehensive mental check list. Because of past cataracts and present glaucoma, my list is probably longer than most.

I would drive and I would notice a shadow version of the car in front of me. Then I would blink or move my head and it would be gone. I would be on the web reading an online newspaper or a blog post and it would fuzz out and then come back when I moved my head or blinked.

During the week I would take off my glasses and find some relief, but my vision lacked the detail that puts you in a comfort zone without straining my eyes.

Technorati Tags: baby boomers, cataracts, eyes, glaucoma, lens implants, opthalmology

Take a guess: How many Americans die each year from cigarettes?

Every morning I do a quick scan of the headlines out of Iraq about the undeclared civil war in that country.  I look at the casualties on all sides.

But, I wasn't prepared for the casualty count about another civil war taking place right here in this country between smokers and cigarettes.

The Wall Street Journal says this morning (requires subscription) that out of America's 45 million smokers an estimated 440,000 die each year.  Try to wrap your head around that statistic.  It's amazing.  Compare that to the casualty count in the Iraq war.  It's not even close.

Technorati Tags: cigarettes, smoking

Morning read: Flawed prescriptions kill more than 7,000 each year in U.S.

From the Notebook section of Time's Jan. 29, 07 edition, there's this eye-opening fact that flawed prescriptions each year kill more than 7,000 people in the U.S. and injure more than 1.5 million. 

It's part of a short story of an attempt to get more doctors to use computers when writing prescriptions as a means to bypass legibility problems and to get instant feedback on drug interactions. 

They have a big selling job to do, according to Time, because out of this country's 550,000 doctors fewer than 10 percent use software to write prescriptions.

Technorati Tags: doctors, prescriptions, medical malpractice, puppy

Coming out of the closet as an online Weight Watcher

I've struggled with being overweight for a long time.  I'd take it off
and then put it back on.  I can't blame it on anybody other than myself. 

Online Weight Watchers is right up my alley. Can I do it and then keep it off?  Stay tuned.

By the way, this morning, I ate oatmeal with Splenda, along with Craisins.  It should be four points.  And, yes, I will record it right after I'm done posting.

UPDATE--FOR LUNCH: I just had lunch for seven points.  I had a Healthy Choice Lemon Pepper Fish dinner and I had two reduced fat chocolate chip cookies.  And, yes, I did record what I ate on the computer.
Technorati Tags: Weight Watchers, obseity, baby boomers, nutrition