LOOK GOOD, FEEL GOOD

“Think of food as fuel,” says Lori Esarey, owner of Total Nutrition and Therapeutics in Lady Lake. “You cannot expect to go for a drive in your car without fueling it first. Similarly, we cannot expect our bodies to function properly if we do not fuel them in the morning. If you do not eat breakfast, your body remains in a state of fasting. When you finally eat lunch, your body is going to store everything because it wonders when it will eat again. By eating a healthy breakfast, we are turning on our body’s metabolism to burn fat. In addition, studies have shown that children who eat breakfast make better grades in school than children who routinely skip breakfast.”

DON’T SKIP BREAKFAST TRY HANDS-ON HEALING

While many people equate massages with relaxation and pampering, they are actually quite therapeutic. As a matter of fact, most of Michele LaFever’s business comes from clients suffering headaches, neck pain, muscle spasms, and sciatic nerve pain.

“I give more therapeutic massages than I do relaxation massages,” says Michele, a massage therapist who owns Healing LifeCare Center in Leesburg. “Massage has healing benefits for both the mind and body.”

As clients lie comfortably on a massage table with soft music playing in the background, Michele uses a combination of gentle and firm strokes to increase blood flow, stimulate nerves, reduce pain and muscle tension, improve sleep, and eliminate anxiety and stress.

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WRITER:

ITER: SHEMIR WILES

Curb Hunger With Sleep

A lack of sleep can increase a person’s risk of obesity because sleep helps regulate the hormones that make you feel hungry (ghrelin) or full (leptin). When you don’t get enough sleep, your level of ghrelin increases while your level of leptin decreases, which makes you feel hungrier.