Wellness

Health / Wellness

Easy Does It: Email-Interview (Part II) with Dr. Joan Vernikos

  Welcome to part two of my email-interview with Culpeper’s own Dr. Joan Vernikos.  This month’s Wellness and Wellbeing segment began last week as she shared her research, both from earth and space to encourage us to move.  This week, it’s all about what she calls “the juice of life”.  Stress. As Joan explained it, stress is as much a part of us as breathing. It is a stimulus we need to energize us. But when there’s too much, it is the most pernicious cause of illness and pain, making every health condition worse, ultimately leading to early death.  Yet…

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September 12, 2019
Health / Wellness

Living is Moving: Email-Interview (Part I) with Dr. Joan Vernikos

“If you come upon someone who is not moving, your first thought is, are they dead?” Now that you mention it, she’s right. She is Dr. Joan Vernikos, a Doctor of Pharmacology, speaker, author, an inspiration, and great fun on the tennis court.  Culpeper is lucky to have her.  She was born to a 60-year-old physician who trained in Medicine before the use of most technological diagnostic tools and laboratory tests.  Instead, he used his hands, checking body temperature, asking questions, and listening to the patient. This approach is now what we think of as Functional Medicine and was foundational…

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September 12, 2019
Nutrition / Wellness

Eat Well, Feel Well, Be Well

“What we eat profoundly affects both our physical and mental health”.  This is according to Wolfram Alderson, MS.  He, along with Dr. Robert Lustig founded the Institute for Responsible Nutrition.  This organization was eventually merged with EatReal.org.  This month you will meet him along with Roberta Ruggiero, the founder of the Hypoglycemia Support Foundation (HSF).  As President, Roberta along with Wolfram, HSF’s CEO, are working from the grassroots-up.  Through advocacy and education, they have impacted the health and wellbeing of tens of thousands of people. This journey began for each of them as a personal one.  Roberta explained, “no matter…

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August 4, 2019
Nutrition / Wellness

Email- Interview with Roberta Ruggiero, Founder of the Hypoglycemia Support Foundation

What concerns you most in the world of wellness and metabolic health? Here in my home office in South Florida, e-mails arrive on a daily basis from around the world. I correspond with parents, teachers, students, patients and even doctors from as far away as China, India, Africa, Pakistan and even the Kingdom of Bahrain. These people have one thing in common – they all suffer from hypoglycemia, also known as low blood sugar – and they have nowhere to turn. They are often desperate. Through the organization I founded, the Hypoglycemia Support Foundation, my book, The Do’s and Don’ts…

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August 4, 2019
Nutrition / Wellness

Email-Interview with Wolfram Alderson – CEO, Hypoglycemia Support Foundation

From your personal experience, as well as from your work with the Institute For Responsible Nutrition and the Hypoglycemia Support Foundation (HSF), how do sugar and processed foods contribute to how we feel, what we do, and how we relate to others? Thank you for mentioning my work founding the Institute for Responsible Nutrition (with Dr. Robert Lustig). After merging that organization with EatReal.org, I decided to “swim upstream” in the field of metabolic health and nutrition, seeking a point in the development of chronic disease that was early enough to make a significant difference and prevent folks from advancing…

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August 4, 2019
Connections / Wellness

That’s what Friends Are For: Email-Interview with Keith Brown

That’s what friends are for.  They give you hope; make you smile and remind you of who you are and what is possible.  It turns out that friends are good for us.  And so, kicking this off with a friend seems only fitting.  Let me explain.  This is the first of what I hope to be a monthly series of email-interviews focused on the specific aspects of wellness and wellbeing, primarily from the perspective of Culpeperians living it and working it every day.  No one will be doing it perfectly, but hopefully they will all offer us just a little…

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July 31, 2019
Connections / Resiliency

A Father’s Light

  At the top of my list is my dad. Recently I participated in a webinar on the science of effective coaching.  The instructor, Dr. Richard Boyatzis, is a leader in the fields of Social and Organizational Psychology.  In all his wisdom, he started the class with a simple question.  He asked us to think over our lives and our careers and consider who were the people who helped us the most in our development.  For me, there were quite a few family members, supervisors, and teachers.  But number one was my dad. Dr. Boyatzis then asked us to recall…

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June 21, 2019
Resiliency / Thrive

Turtle Lessons

This week I came upon not one, but two turtles.  I had noted along the way that a new bridge had been built across the creek.  In seeing this, I knew immediately that this was the problem.  Their habitat had been altered, and they were displaced. I began imagining the difference I would make in their lives if I could just get them back home and safe again.  I was especially concerned about the second turtle.  He seemed to be struggling to extract himself from a deep hole.  But wait.  Something was wrong. The longer I watched him, the more…

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June 8, 2019
Purpose / Thrive

Drive With Purpose

During our travels over the recent spring break, my family apparently diagnosed me with “a poor sense of direction”.  I mean yes, I missed a few exits and a few turns.  But with the navigation system on (we call her Vanna) and in full effect, I always knew we’d get there despite my mistakes and missteps.  I knew Vanna would “recalculate my route”.  All I had to do was know where we were going and be willing to drive on, no matter what.  She would handle the rest. The technology these days is amazing.  I don’t know if I’m allowed…

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May 20, 2019
Self Care / Wellness

Taking A Breath For Others

By the time you read this, I will have thankfully celebrated another year of life.  But it’s funny.  A fellow Aries and dear friend of mine posted asking if she should choose celebrating her birthday just as she would like, or should she schedule a business meeting. What a great question. This is a choice so many of us make, not only on our birthday, but every day of the year.  I so empathized with her because she asked this question of her friends, explaining that she was exhausted.  She said she needed a day off.  Not only was she…

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April 6, 2019