11 minute read
HEALTH & WELLBEING
THE HEALTH BENEFITS OF GETTING STUCK INTO A GOOD BOOK!
From Hogwarts to Westeros, reading can transport us to completely different places from within the comfort of our own homes – something that is even more valuable for people who find themselves unable to leave their home.
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Somerset County Council runs the Home Library Service with the support of amazing volunteers, delivering books to people who are unable to get to their local library due to illness or disability. The service is open to people of all ages. Cllr Federica Smith-Roberts, Somerset County Council Lead Executive Member for Communities, said: ‘This is a brilliant service. Reading books can help keep your mind engaged as you grow older and help prevent cognitive decline – improving memory and helping to reduce the likelihood of dementia. But it can also help people of any age to reduce stress by lowering blood pressure and heart rate.’ For more information, visit www.somersetlibraries.co.uk, call 07814 079831 or email kjenssen@somerset.gov.uk. The Reader is a national ‘Shared Reading’ scheme where volunteers are trained to share short stories and poems and invite people to discuss the content. The groups are friendly and informal. It’s about bringing people together over literature but not in an academic way, using more of a ‘feeling’ approach. For example, people can often externalise their own feelings by relating to or engaging with a fictional character. The stories and poems also offer a world where people can escape from their own problems, even if only for a short time.
In South Somerset there are two library groups in Yeovil library on Mondays from 11.30am to 1.00pm and in Wincanton library on the second, fourth and fifth Tuesday of each month at 2.30pm. They are free and open to anyone who would like to drop in. There’s also a programme in day-care centres, specifically aimed at people living with dementia. Shared Reading has been particularly successful with this client group, particularly when using poetry. Reading and writing for health, also known as bibliotherapy, is a powerful intervention, with health practitioners referring people to libraries for ‘Books on Prescription’ schemes or ‘reading pharmacies’. In a nutshell, books can make us feel better!
For further information about the service and to find out about how to become a Reader Leader volunteer, go to www.thereader.org.uk, call 0151 7292200 or email Laura Merritt at lauramerritt@ thereader.org.uk. For more information about wellbeing in South Somerset, visit www. wellbeingsouthsomerset.org.
DR JOHN SARNO’S APPROACH TO BACK PAIN
By Dr Andrea Haas, Inner Strength
Dr John Sarno was an American Rehabilitation physician who ran his own rehab centre in New York helping people manage back and neck pain. What was different about his approach was that he purely looked at the stresses people had in their lives at that time and any past stress. He realised that there was a link between what was going on in their lives and pain. For thousands of years physicians had been aware of the mind-body connection, how thoughts, beliefs, emotions have a profound effect on us physically. Hippocrates in the fourth century recognised this connection as do Ayurvedic and Chinese Medicine dating back 2,000 years. However, in the seventeenth century, a French philosopher, Rene Descartes, decided there was no connection between the mind and body. And it was downhill from there.
Have you ever come home from a stressful day at work with a headache, or found you kept running to the bathroom prior to giving a speech or having an uncomfortable conversation with someone? These are all physical symptoms produced by the thoughts and emotions being triggered by the situation. We spend most of our time doing things we feel we ‘should’ do because that is what is expected of us. Let’s take the example of the young man who wants to buy an expensive fast sports car. It would give him pleasure and status. On the other hand, he has a family with young children and a mortgage. He can’t really afford it and he may be putting his life at risk. His thoughts yo-yo and this conflict causes tension, which becomes too much for the subconscious, so it produces pain as a distraction. Then there are the pressures we put on ourselves: the need to be perfect and the need to be good.
Dr John Sarno was aware of these conflicts and would ask questions to explore what was going on at a subconscious level. What was going on in your life when your pain started? An acrimonious divorce may well trigger backpain as a distraction from the painful emotions caused by this. He would ask about past emotional challenges. Life is full of emotional ups and downs, and we move on from them feeling stronger and wiser. However, we never fully resolve these emotions and so they get buried in the subconscious.
By exploring how we truly feel about what is going on in our lives and the past, and the pressure we put on ourselves, brings them into the conscious. The subconscious then becomes impotent. If you want to learn more about Dr Sarno, he has written several books on this subject, including The Divided Mind and Healing Back Pain.
Dr Andrea Haas 07770 672122
EMOTIONAL LOVE LANGUAGES
By Tracy Frost
Did you know that there are unspoken love languages? If you did know, do you know yours?
There are five love languages and we all have some of the five in us in varying degrees, but normally we have a top two that are our primary love languages. These top two are how we give and receive love and affection, not just in intimate relationships but with everyone we interact with. You know when there is that someone in your life, be it family, work colleagues, friends that you sometimes don’t understand where they are coming from or they don’t get you. This may be down to love languages. When you understand your own emotional love language, you have a much better insight into yourself and how you work. Maybe you start to understand why you get offended at certain things or words said, why you feel that your efforts go unnoticed or that gift you gave seemed unimportant to the recipient.
For me, once I knew my love languages, how I ticked, how I related to and perceived the people and world around me, I felt I had a better understanding of my life. I could see how I would be able to hear what people were saying to me in a different way, so my response was different or I could see more clearly why I was triggered. In the book The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman, he talks about having a love tank, when this is full we feel loved, understood, cared for, happy and whole. When it is empty we feel sad, lonely and unloved.
We all have a need to feel love and affection; this is a basic human emotional need.
This is where the love languages come in; your partner, friend or parent could be showing and telling you how much they love you but if they are not speaking your love language, you will not feel what they are saying or doing. Your love tank will not be full; you may feel sad that the people important to you don’t love you. We tend to show love and affection how we like to receive it, so we speak from our love language, thinking that is how everyone needs to be shown and we know now that is not the case.
This is just a tiny amount of information about love languages. If this has made you curious, you can go to www.5lovelanguages.com and take the quiz to find out yours. I hope this has given you food for thought; I am here to help with your emotional wellness if you feel that is what you need.
Until next time, much love. Tracy x
Inner Sparkle
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Tracy Frost
STEP INTO ACTION ON NATIONAL FITNESS DAY!
By James Cattigan, Sports Centre Manager
National Fitness Day has been an annual event in the United Kingdom since 2010 and aims to encourage people to take part in physical activity. Last year over 22 million people in the UK took part in some form of physical activity!
This year, National Fitness Day takes place on Wednesday 21 September and here at Sherborne Sports Centre, we will be celebrating the day with various activities, challenges and competitions to entice you into the world of health and fitness. We often push exercise to one side when life gets in the way, but there are numerous benefits in regularly taking part in physical activity, so it is definitely worth finding a way to fit it in. Why not use this day to get yourself down to Sherborne Sports Centre to see what we’ve got to offer and how we can help? We will be there to give you advice on how to incorporate regular exercise into your busy schedule.
There are several benefits of regularly taking part in physical activity, including: • stress relief
• increased social networks
• aids weight control • energy boost • promotes better sleep • having fun Recent research conducted in 2018 found that regular physical activity and continued lifelong activity reduced the onset or development of over 40 chronic conditions, such as premature ageing and osteoporosis. Recommended guidelines state adults should be completing a minimum of 150 minutes of moderate exercise throughout the week or 75 minutes of vigorous activity. Although the benefits of physical activity are known, fewer than 60% of adults living in the United Kingdom currently meet these guidelines.
The day aims to spread as much information as possible about the countless ways you can get involved in exercise as well as removing any misconceptions that you may have regarding your health and fitness. Often, we are worried about taking that first step into health and fitness, scared we aren’t strong or fit enough, or will look silly taking part in a busy exercise
Sports Centre
class. Once you take that first step, you will realise all your fears are unfounded and you too can enjoy taking part!
National Fitness Day is the perfect opportunity for you to get out there and go beyond your limits, as there will be opportunities to get involved in throughout the day.
So, get the date in your diaries and look out for Sherborne Sports Centre’s promotions on what we’ll be offering on National Fitness Day. Get in touch with us: www. sherbornesports.co.uk, @ sherbornesports on social media, call 01935 810548 or email gym@sherborne.org.
THE BENEFITS OF REGULAR EXERCISE
By Maggie Lason, Fitness Instructor, and Laura Hoole, Fitness Instructor
There is a national drive to get women of all ages back into doing some form of physical exercise.
In an online survey of 8,000 adults across the country in February, 38% of women said they had got out of the habit of exercising during lockdown.
• 11% said they got into good exercise habits but struggled to maintain them and 14% gave up exercising completely, the organisation’s Healthier
Nation Index showed.
• 37% reported their physical health got worse in the previous 12 months and 47% said they had failed to do any vigorous exercise.
• 67% of women cited a lack of motivation compared with 51% for men, and 35% of women said they felt they did not know where to start when it came to exercise, compared with 28% of men.
Vigorous exercise is defined as activities such as running, swimming, aerobics class or gymnastics.
This is something Oxley Sports Centre aims to reverse.
Regular activity can positively impact our physical health as well as our mental and emotional wellbeing. As we grow older, it becomes important to remain active and maintain our independence. If you are an older adult, exercise can help you live a longer, healthier life. Some of the key benefits of exercise for older adults are: • reduced risk of certain diseases
• improved bone health
• decreased risks of falls
• improved brain function and mental health
• improved social wellness/ social engagement and a wonderful way to catch up with friends or meet new people
We have some fantastic classes on offer for women at all stages of life, shapes and sizes:
For those of us of a certain
age: Step aerobics improves overall fitness by building strength, reducing fat and boosting your cardiovascular health.
Pump Fit is a barbell-based, resistance workout that is specifically designed to help you get toned, lean and fit. Great for those ladies who after a certain age need to be focusing on their impact exercise.
Silver Zone is a low-impact class especially designed for our members over 50. The variety of exercises makes the workout fun and keeps you motivated through the session.
And don’t forget Aqua which is a great all-rounder and nonweight bearing.
For those who are pregnant or have recently had a baby:
There are plenty of benefits when exercising during pregnancy and after birth. It can help as stress relief and for relaxation, as well as improving mental health and emotional wellbeing. It can also help the body adjust to the physical changes of pregnancy as it adapts to accommodate the baby. Keeping active through pregnancy can help the body prepare for labour and can initiate better resumption of exercise post birth. It is important to listen to your body and regress exercise as pregnancy progresses. After having your baby, depending on your pregnancy, labour and recovery, you can start low-intensity exercise, progressing gradually. Postnatal exercise should include some focus on strengthening the pelvic floor muscles and restoring the abdominal muscles that are affected through pregnancy and childbirth.
Join in September and get December for FREE* .
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