Healthy Living 2016 by Lynden Tribune

HEALTHY LIVING A special publication of the Lynden Tribune and Ferndale Record.

What’s Inside: North county folks participate in the Smart Trips program reducing car travel. Lynden’s Mike Jager follows through on a January 2015 resolution to get physically fit

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Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, January 27, 2016 | Ferndale Record

Healthy Living

Community

Smart Trips program rewards smart commuting A decision for fitness can also bring benefits of cash, discounts By Brooke Hansen for the Lynden Tribune

WHATCOM — Walking, biking or busing locally may help the environment, your health and your wallet, all at the same time, through the Smart Trips program. Susan Horst, director of mobility programs at the Whatcom Council of Governments, said Smart Trips is meant to educate people about ways to commute and their impacts. Anyone age 15 and older can log their trips to be eligible to receive discounts at local businesses and win cash prizes up to $1,000. However, cash isn’t the only incentive, Horst said. The Smart Trips website reports pollution prevention statistics for each user, so they can see their benefit for the environment. Since the program began 10 years ago, 18,362 people have logged Smart Trips.

Around 3,500 people are active users, which means they log 50 or more trips per year. There are 65 active users in Lynden. As of Jan. 21, people in Whatcom County had recorded almost 56 million miles of walking, biking, carpooling and busing that has saved 2.33 million gallons of gas, according to the Smart Trips website. That mileage adds up to 235 trips to the moon. The program’s goal isn’t to eliminate car travel. Horst encourages people to pick easy trips to change. Smart Trips can be applied to work, school, the grocery store or the movies. “We’re not anti-car,” Horst said. “We just want people to make convenient changes.” Those who take Smart Trips to work can take a free taxi ride home if there is an emergency that requires quick transportation. Tyler Hutchins has been biking and jogging to work for a year and a half, and it’s been paying off at the gas pump and on the scale. He lost 40 pounds in the first four months of taking Smart

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Erin and Tyler help motivate each other to physical fitness. (Brooke Hansen)

Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, January 27, 2016 | Ferndale Record

Healthy Living Trips. Every day he takes the six-mile round trip to his job at Retrotec on East Pole Road, where he’s worked with airflow systems for seven years. Hutchins’ lifestyle change was prompted by his wife, Erin Bernardy. After she had gained 30 pounds in their first two years of marriage, she decided to get herself back into shape. She knew that if she didn’t make a change, the weight gain would continue. Bernardy read an article that claimed a person can make a habit if they do an activity for 17 days in a row. Two years ago, she walked and jogged for 17 days — and she’s been doing it every day since. “The first day, I couldn’t even get to the mailbox without stopping,” she said. Now, she runs at least three miles every day, except when she’s sick. She ran her first 5K (3.1 miles) four months after starting her exercise program, and she felt a sense of accomplishment upon finishing the race without walking. Soon after Bernardy’s decision to get healthy, Hutchins started biking to work. The one-way trip of three miles takes him 15 minutes to bike and 27 minutes to jog. Hutchins has noticed positive changes in his life, too. He’s stopped drinking coffee in the mornings — he doesn’t need it when his blood is pumping after a jog, he said. He spends more time outside in-

Smart Trips benefits

Jennifer Sires stead of in the car, which is relaxing. He heard about Smart Trips from a friend at work in 2014. He logs his trips once a month, and likes seeing how much money he’s saving and how much exercise he’s getting. Bernardy and Hutchins motivate each other to work out, and sometimes they run together. They’ve helped each other have healthier lives, and it’s made them happier too, Bernardy said. Jennifer Sires buses from her home in Lynden to Western Washington University, where she works as an administrative assistant in the Department of Business and Economics. She’s been logging Smart Trips since 2014.

To see the benefits of using Smart Trips or to log a trip, visit whatcomsmarttrips.org. Smart Trip Rewards: $250 Prize: Anyone who makes at least five Smart Trips per month is entered into monthly drawings for $250 cash. $1,000 Prize: Those who make at least five trips per month for three months are entered to win $1,000 cash four times per year. Local Discounts: After making 10 trips, users receive a Smart Trips Discount Card usable at over 100 local businesses until the end of the calendar year. Businesses include Lynden Dutch Bakery, KATZ! Coffee & Used Books, Lynden Skateway, Ferndale Massage Clinic and Mt. Baker Lanes. Gift certificates: For each 100 trips, users get certificates for items such as shirts, ice cream cones and doughnuts from local businesses.

Sires doesn’t drive to work unless she misses the bus, which adds stress to her day, she said. When she’s driving, she has to worry about parking and whether she’ll make it to work on time. When she’s on the bus, she gets to relax. “I can detach and destress when I’m on the bus,” she said. Sires brings her knitting, which she recently learned how to do, and listens to her favorite podcasts from Terry Gross and Marc Maron. “It’s ridiculous for me to drive. It takes the same amount of time for me to bus,”

Sires said. She takes the 6:50 a.m. bus, which gets her to Western’s campus in 45 minutes. Sires has been busing in Whatcom County since she moved here in the early 1990s. She was a work-study student at Whatcom Community College then, and she taught developmentally disabled adults how to use the bus system. “I’d be busing regardless of Smart Trips, but it’s a nice perk,” Sires said. Sires said she hasn’t won any cash prizes yet, but it’s worth it to log her trips so she can see how much gas money she’s saving.

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, January 27, 2016 | Ferndale Record

Healthy Living

Community

Lynden man achieves 2015 resolution to get fit Mike Jager: ‘I had to do something.’ So he took up serious running, following his c25k app By Calvin Bratt editor@lyndentribune.com

LYNDEN — This officially started as a New Year’s resolution for 2015. As an instinctive techie guy, Mike Jager also needed to find the right app to guide his decision to get physically fit. He found the perfect match with c25k, “from couch to 5K in just nine weeks.” “I knew I had to have a plan,” he said. Jager let c25k be the taskmaster, if he needed to blame anything. He just got his feet moving on the pavement of Lynden following instructions. Being cautious, he signed up for a 5K way out in August, the Bellingham Color Me 5K. But by March, Jager — diligent on his running program — realized he indeed was ready to test himself in a public timed run of the 3.1-mile distance. That opportunity was the Happy Feet 5K around Lake Padden on April 25, and Jager felt his first sense of achievement in accomplishing a goal. He started to set more goals. Two other things were also motivating him. For one, Mike, 36, had heard those words from his doctor, “You need to lose weight.” He knew he needed to do it for the sake of his family — wife Tricia, daughter Addison, 7, and Ben, 3 — and also because of his own heredity. In March 2014, after some time of searching, Jager — who was adopted into a Lynden home as a baby — made a connection with his birth mother. The impact was powerful. “Meeting her gave me a confidence and an esteem that I didn’t even know was broken,” he said. He also found out that his genetics reinforced the mandate to get fit. “I had the wakeup call: Your body is not going to survive the way you’re living. I had to do something.” Jager mostly does his training runs at night using a head lamp and a flasher on his back, three or four times per week on routes he has charted throughout Lynden. His

Left: Mike Jager finishes the North County 10K Road Run in Lynden on Labor Day. Above: The family of Mike and Tricia Jager includes daughter Addison and son Ben.

Healthy Living

Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, January 27, 2016 | Ferndale Record

southwestern-most point is the bottom cal recovery from it. He joined with about of the hill at Kok Road and 19th Street 90 others in running two times around while to the northeast he will be on Aar- Lake Samish, good for just over 13 miles on Drive and return past Lynden High in all and counting as a half-marathon of School to his central Lynden home. the Greater Bellingham Running Club. His weekly long run can be from 6 up He still follows the directions for to 11 miles, depending on what he may training given by his app c25k. He also be training for. uses fitbit for activity tracking and health “There are nights that I say, ‘I really improvement. “It’s what works for me,” don’t want to do this, but I have to,’” he Jager said. said. On the other hand, he is not so hung up on the running regimen that he won’t give himself a day or a weekend off from it. Big picture, he wants it to stay fun. He knows now that “it’s not so much that I can’t do this as that other things will stop you.” By day, and sometimes on call off-hours as well, Jager is an HVAC tech with DK Systems out of Burlington. He participated in these open runs in 2015: Color Me 5K, North County Road Run 10K on Labor Day in Lynden, Everyday Superheroes 5K and Owliday Virtual 5K in October. Some of these runs lent support to causes he values: children’s education in a village in Tanzania, Africa; helping foster Above: A Superheroes theme adds some fun for and adoptive families. the kids. Below: Holding the race medal is always On Jan. 10, 2016, the finishing touch. Jager completed his most ambitious effort so far, and he hardly missed a beat in his physi- His family has been very supportive, Mike said. He has lost 115 pounds of weight, with just a few more to go to reach his goal. Medically, he has gone from a diagnosis of pre-diabetic to being clear of any signs of diabetes now a year later. “The doctor didn’t even recognize me,” Jager said. And he takes that as a good thing.

Let us help you make more of your trips by walking, biking and riding the bus.

Visit WhatcomSmartTrips.org or call 360-756-TRIP

Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, January 27, 2016 | Ferndale Record

Healthy Living

Medical

Listen to your heart and your body Some symptoms can indicate something more serious happening within your body

2. You’re tired and swollen. Swollen feet or ankles or extreme tiredness can all be signs of heart failure. Heart failure doesn’t mean your heart is on the verge of stopping. However, it does mean that your heart isn’t pumping blood to your body as well as it should. 3. Exercise makes you ache. Chest pain triggered by physical exertion can signal angina, which isn’t a disease itself but is a common symptom of coronary heart disease. Having angina or chest pain could be a sign that you are having a heart attack.

Is your heart trying to tell you something, and you don’t know it? Here are five potentially heart-related signs and symptoms to pay attention to, says cardiologist Elisa Zaragoza with PeaceHealth Medical Group:

4. You huff and puff. Feeling short of breath can be a warning sign of a heart attack or heart failure, especially if it comes on suddenly, persists or is progressive.

1. Your heart skips a beat. The sensation that your heart flutters, skips a beat or beats too fast at times is called having palpitations. It’s common and usually harmless. On the other hand, palpitations can sometimes be a sign of arrhythmia — an irregular heartbeat that’s triggered by a problem with the heart’s electrical system.

5. Walking is a pain. If you feel pain or cramps in your legs or hips when you walk, or if they feel tired, then you may have peripheral arterial disease. PAD can significantly increase your risk of having a heart attack or stroke. Some of these symptoms, such as chest discomfort or shortness of breath, could mean you’re having a heart attack. Play it safe, and call 911 right away. If you experience any of these warning signs, speak with your primary care physician.

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Healthy Living

Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, January 27, 2016 | Ferndale Record

Medical

Five ways to test your health at home These can be tip-offs to deeper health issues, but you can catch them early by staying aware Ready to jump-start your health in 2016? The doctors at American Family Care have mapped out five ways to test your health at home. 1. Plank It Up! Get into push-up position on the floor. Now bend your elbows 90 degrees and rest your weight on your forearms. Your elbows should be directly beneath your shoulders, and your body should form a straight line from your head to your feet. If you can’t hold this Plank position for two minutes, AFC doctors warn that it could mean you are carrying too much weight. Improving your core is important for your overall movement stability and strength. 2. Sit, Rise, Stand Based on Brazilian research, this test examines how well you get up from a seated position on the floor. Sit down, then try to get up without using your hands or knees. The idea is to use as few body parts, as possible, testing your strength, balance and flexibility.

3. Bad Breath Barometer Bad breath can turn into more than just an awkward social situation. Halitosis can be a sign of a serious health problem. Doctors suggest this test: Scrape your tongue with a spoon. Put the spoon in a plastic bag, close it and smell it. A fruity odor can point to diabetes, a fishy smell may indicate kidney failure, and sour mouth could be tied to sleep apnea. 4. Test of Time How sharp is your mind? Swedish researchers developed a clock drawing test to screen for cognitive development and dementia. Simply start with a blank piece of paper, draw a clock, put in all the numbers and set hands for 10 and 11. This test taps into a range of cognitive abilities and can set off a signal if impairment is present or developing. 5. Track your pulse. How strong is your heart rate? Did you know a weak pulse can be not only a sign of heart disease but also of

a blood clot in your arm or leg. Place two fingers, not using your thumb, on your wrist, and press lightly until you feel a pulse. Using a watch or clock, make note of how many heartbeats you feel in 15 seconds. Multiply that number of heartbeats times four. This is your pulse. This is your pulse, or heart rate per minute. A normal resting heart rate ranges from 60 to 100 beats a minute. Why do this? To see how well your heart is working. In an emergency situation, a pulse rate can help determine if your heart is pumping enough blood. Check for blood flow and get a gauge on your general health and fitness level. American Family Care has walk-in medical clinics providing urgent medical care in the Southeast.

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Lynden Tribune | Wednesday, January 27, 2016 | Ferndale Record

Healthy Living

doTERRA provides essential oils for many uses Many uses exist for oils, sold locally by Craig Cottle By Brent Lindquist news@ferndalerecord.com

WHATCOM — When grave robbers stole from the crypts of ancient Egyptian pharaohs, they weren’t necessarily just looking for gold. Often they were seeking out frankincense and myrrh, valuable fragrant oils used in mummification. The oils have other uses, too, including antiseptic, anti-fungal and anti-inflammatory purposes. Frankincense and myrrh are just two essential oil products sold by Craig Cottle, a Whatcom County doTERRA consultant. DoTERRA, Cottle said, was founded six years ago in response to the lack of purity and potency in the essential oils market. “The objective is to provide essential oils as pure and as potent as possible,” Cottle said. “They’re all about the high-quality oils.” DoTERRA’s products come in two varieties: oils and blends. Single oils include

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lavender, lemongrass, frankincense, ginger and oregano. Blends include On-Guard, a product intended to strengthen the immune system, and Breathe, one created to help the respiratory system. About 65 to 70 single oils and 12 to 15 blends are available. In addition to the oils themselves, Cottle said, there are other offerings to be found on the market. “There’s a whole boatload of peripheral products,” he said. These include rubs, soups, detergents, lozenges, toothpastes and more. “And they all start with oils,” Cottle said. There are a number of ways to use these oils and peripheral products. They can be applied aromatically and topically, as well as internally, though these carry some caveats. “We’re very careful when we start talking about internally,” he said. The oils can have far-reaching benefits in a variety of areas, Cottle said. They can help the skin, the digestive system, the respiratory system and the nervous system. Cottle first learned about these products from his wife, Kristin, who had used them in the past. He was so convinced, in fact, that he went into the business full-time. “They worked well enough, and I was impressed enough with them and with their

new year

Craig Cottle looks through his case of essential oils, consisting of both blends and the oils themselves. (Brent Lindquist/Ferndale Record) business model, that this is what I do now,” he said. There are also several ways to obtain these oils. The best way is to contact Cottle

himself at craig@essentialoiljoy.com or to call him at 389-2583. “They work,” he said. “That’s the reason I got involved. They just work.”

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Live the healthy lifestyle you desire. It doesn’t take a lot to see a difference. Just 30 minutes of activity five days a week will bring results. Add in a healthy diet and you’ll see benefits such as weight loss, lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels, reduced stress and overall better health.

Our Whatcom County clinics: • Birch Bay Family Medicine • Everson Family Medicine • Ferndale Family Medical Center • Lynden Family Medicine

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