LNT_Best Life Magazine_021823

Best Life

MAKING THE TIME

Healthy living is possible, even with a busy schedule

ALSO: Getting mental health help in the Illinois Valley

Getting healthy with Seattle Sutton

Charcuterie board recipes for those who like to cook

Story by Brandon LaChance

The word change is one we can all relate to in one way or another.

Whether we take it well, poorly, or just go with the flow, we all experience many changes throughout the years in different ways: body size, hairstyles, clothing, train of thought, religious views, political views, jobs, spouses, vehicles, locations, and more.

Our society does the same thing as it changes and evolves. One of society’s biggest noticeable changes in recent times is the way we perceive stress, anxiety, and mental health issues. Once upon a time, all of us said, ‘I’m okay,’ ‘Nothing is wrong,’ or shimmied our way out of a conversation when asked, ‘Are you okay?’

Every day, more and more people are recognizing stress, anxiety, and mental health complications and are realizing they’re not okay and need help.

In the Illinois Valley, Maitri Path to Wellness in La Salle and Arukah Institute of Healing in Princeton are two top destinations for counseling.

“There is positive stress that gets us to do things like go to a job interview or fill out an application. But sometimes that stress gets overwhelming, and then it creates anxiety,” said

Stress, anxiety more recognizable, understood

Stephen Christopherson LSCW CADC (Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor), who has been with Arukah since

December 2022 and has been a social worker since 2017. “We don’t like that feeling. There

See HEALTH page 4

Mental health stigmas have decreased, but still exist

PHOTOS CONTRIBUTED

Top: Stephen Christopherson, LCSW CADC (Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor), discusses how to create programs that will make a difference to clients with Sarah B. Scruggs, PH.D. and Arukah’s chief executive officer.

Bottom: Arukah Institute of Healing hosts events such as the Farm to Table Dinner Auction to educate the community about its services and share the staff’s passion for serving those suffering from mental health issues.

are different ways to cope with that feeling. Typically, when we don’t learn about it, we engage in unhealthy behaviors like distracting ourselves, getting stuck on social media, drug use, overeating, and so many other things we engage in that are unhealthy options to avoid that feeling.”

“It’s important for us to experience that feeling. I know everyone has heard, ‘Take a deep breath.’ The science behind it is incredible, and a deep breath can be helpful. But in the moment, if you haven’t practiced it before, a deep breath isn’t going to help you because you don’t know how to actually make that deep breath benefit you to help calm your nerves down,” he said.

“It’s just like anything else. I don’t know how to drive a stick shift. If you told me I was going to drive a stick shift right now, I would fail miserably. But if I had time to practice, then I would know how to do it when they asked me to do it,” he added.

Christopherson would also ask for help or assistance as he learned how to drive a manual vehicle.

To help calm anxiety and find ways to dissolve stress, reaching out to a trained professional is going to help you get results.

“When I see a client in the lobby, I don’t ask, ‘How are you doing?’ because people ask that in passing every day, and our automatic response is, ‘I’m good, how are you?’ That’s not typically what the real answer is,” Christopherson said. “We feel like we have

to do good. We’re supposed to be doing good.”

“I know if you’re at a grocery store and someone asks you how you’re doing, you’re not going to go into full detail. But it’s about trying to be more conscious of how you’re actually feeling and not needing to feel like we need to put a fake face on for the world. We show the world what we think they want to see instead of being truthful and saying, ‘You know, I’m really struggling right now.’ It’s about taking time being real with where our thoughts and our feelings really are. Sometimes that can be a real quick fix by changing something small in your day, whether it’s removing or adding something,” he said.

“Sometimes, kids and adults think seeing a coun-

selor or getting help is a sign of weakness. However, it’s a sign of strength. Therapy doesn’t have to be a lifetime thing, but lying about something bothering you doesn’t help. Speaking to someone does help, and if you’re bottling things up, speaking to someone is one of the best things to do.”

The Arukah headquarters is in Princeton but services La Salle, Marshall, Bureau, Grundy, and Putnam County. Stephen Christopherson isn’t the only Christopherson at Arukah Institute of Healing as his mother, Lori Christopherson, is the Coordinator of Fundraising.

Since the beginning of her employment in 2022, she has realized more and more about stress, anxiety, and mental health issues that she never noticed

before because it isn’t her specialty. Being around the doctors, counselors, and clients at Arukah has opened her eyes.

“Prior to my work at Arukah, I really didn’t understand the need that’s in our community just for folks to seek someone out to talk about the stress that they’re feeling or the anxiety that they have,” Lori said. “I knew that mental health is a topic now, but until working with Arukah and hearing some of the stories, I never realized how vast it was. When I approach someone for fundraising purposes, they want to talk to me about their story. They want to tell me how important it is that we have Arukah for people to turn to.”

“When I think about when I was raising kids, we are more self-aware in our present society. Where 25 years ago, the stress of the every day was manifested in a raised voice or something that isn’t in the best interest of whoever you’re dealing with. People didn’t want to admit that they had a problem, or you thought you just had to grow up,” she said.

“What I see now, I hear from so many people that they’re more self-aware. When they feel the anxiety coming on, they know that there is somebody or somewhere they can go to for help,” she said.

Kelly Jones, the founder and owner of Maitri Path to Wellness in La Salle, has been a social worker since 2016 but has been helping people with addictions and other stress, anxiety, and mental health areas for the last 25 years.

“The negative stigma of getting mental health counseling is less than it was, but it still exists,” said

PHOTO CONTRIBUTED Kelly Jones, the founder and owner of Maitri Path to Wellness, and Rachel Edgcomb, LSW CADC (Licensed Social Worker and Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor), are dedicated to helping clients with stress, anxiety, and mental health issues.

Jones, who opened Maitri in May 2021. “Quite a few of my clients would never have come to counseling if their primary doctor didn’t push for them to go to counseling. Once they get here, they say, ‘I don’t know why I didn’t do this years ago.’ Sadly, I think the numbers of completed suicides and overdose deaths are still on the rise. Is the stigma really lessened enough?”

“If the way that you’re thinking and feeling is affecting your ability to function normally in life, you may be experiencing stress, anxiety, or mental health issues. If you are not doing as many of the things that you have done in the past that bring you joy or if you struggle to socialize or go to work, even if you go to work, but it’s still a struggle to do daily life functioning things, reach out,” Jones said.

“The thing about reaching out for mental health counseling, it’s not always about taking medication or going to counseling for the rest of your lifetime. There are a lot of things that can be done to help. You can learn some coping skills relatively quickly to manage the symptoms that you’re having,” Jones said.

Maitri offers individual counseling for mental health and substance abuse disorder and Accelerated Resolution Therapy. Soon, attentive inpatient and outpatient services for substance abuse disorder will also be available.

Jones and her staff offer counseling where clients can speak in person or in a Zoom meeting with professionals. With Accelerated Resolution Therapy, clients can receive help with trauma, depression, anxiety, cravings for substance use, grief, and OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) in one to five sessions to resolve symptoms. With Accelerated Resolution Therapy, the symptoms can resolve or significantly decrease without talking. It’s a visualization process that doesn’t necessarily mean you need to talk to receive counseling.

One of the biggest complications Jones sees every day is the lasting effect of Covid-19.

“People isolating increases mental health symptoms, and Covid-19 forced people to isolate,” Jones said. “I have a lot of clients who are really struggling now because Covid-19 has (let up some), and we’re back in the community doing things, and activities are available. People are struggling to get back into that and leaving the isolation.”

“Isolation is sort of a cycle. You had to isolate, and it caused more anxiety. Now, that you could go back out into the world and you used to go out in the world, there is anxiety about being back out and being around people. People are struggling with getting out of the isolation pattern and how to go about it with the anxiety of returning to normal instead of isolation.”

Outpatient / Intensive Outpatient substance use disorder groups that include materials from:

• My Ongoing Recovery Experience (MORE) program which includes core education, guidance, and skill-building activities to help participants succeed in initiating and sustaining recovery

• Mindfulness Based Sobriety

• Seeking Safety teaching healthier coping skills

• Conflict Resolution for Recovery

• Mindful Self Compassion and other evidenced based materials that support long term recovery

Mental Health:

• Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART): quickly reduce symptoms of PTSD, Depression, Grief, Phobias, Anxiety or Addiction results in as little as 1 to 5 sessions.

• Individual Counseling: One on one confidential therapy for your mental health and/or substance use disorder concerns. We will help you develop and improve coping skills for everyday challenges, life stressors and personal growth using evidence-based tools and individualized treatment planning. Our Staff

DESIGNING

the life you want

People who say they are too busy for exercise and healthy living may want to learn a few lessons from Kelly Campbell. This Oglesby woman is on the go non-stop and still manages to make exercise and healthy eating a daily priority.

Campbell has three jobs – she’s an account executive at Shaw Media, a fitness coordinator, personal trainer, and group exercise instructor at the Illinois Valley YMCA, and she’s an independent online health coach through BODi. On average, she estimates she works anywhere from 55 to 60 hours a week.

Her work schedule and home life as a single mom to her 18-year-old son, Jude, keep her busy. To help her stay on track, she gets up early to start her morning routine.

“It depends on the day, but I am typically up between 5:30 and 6:30 a.m. I have a morning routine that is non-negotiable and sets the tone for my day: Drink my pre-workout drink while reading some personal de-

velopment and getting some sort of workout in. Typically, my workday ends at 7:15 p.m. after my last training session,” she said.

Campbell has been surrounded by fit, motivated exercisers throughout her life.

“My dad was a marathoner when I was growing up; my mother ran as well, so fitness was always around me. In college, my roommate taught group exercise, so we were constantly at the university

gym. When I was 36 years old, the running bug finally bit me, and I have been running ever since. In 2015, I added home workouts to my routine,” she said. “Between teaching classes and my own personal workouts, I would say I work out 8 to 10 hours a week. If I am marathon training, then it’s more than that.”

These days, Campbell no longer struggles with finding

Oglesby woman makes healthy living a priority

Kelly Campbell’s office at the Illinois Valley YMCA is decorated with motivational signs.

Story and photos by Shannon Serpette

Kelly Campbell of Oglesby makes exercise and an active lifestyle part of her daily routine.

FROM PAGE 6

the motivation to exercise.

“I have developed such a consistency and made movement such a priority that it’s become automatic to want to do it. But there was a time I struggled with motivation,” she said.

For those struggling with finding the motivation to begin an exercise program or continue with the one they’ve started, Campbell recommends looking at your end goal or the reason you started in the first place.

“I think looking at the bigger picture is what works best. It’s so easy to rationalize skipping something that you know you need to do. But if you can tell yourself that it’s the baby steps that get you to the finish line, it’s easier to get it done,” she said.

Another component of health that Campbell takes seriously is nutrition.

“I really enjoy food and the occasional splurge meal, so I am careful not to deprive myself and just eat mindfully and according to the plan that works for me as consistently as possible. This allows for treats here and there without the guilt,” she said.

“I have worked really hard to overcome poor eating habits or negative emotions that I tied to food in years past. I believe it was a struggle at one point. For whatever reason, I felt shame and was embarrassed that I enjoyed food. Over time, as I have really dove into nutrition and becoming my healthiest self,

I have transitioned to a completely different mindset. I am not ashamed to say I love food and love to eat, and it has truly become freeing,” she said.

As a personal trainer, Campbell helps motivate others to reach their goals. It’s a role she loves and takes seriously.

“What I love most about personal training is watching my clients become stronger over time. I have seen it time and time again and it never gets old,” she said. “With that strength grows an inner confidence that they may not have had when they first start working with me. Those types of changes on the inside are vital to then seeing sustainable external changes, like weight loss.”

With such a busy schedule, Campbell’s free time is limited, and it’s no surprise that many of her recreational pursuits also involve movement.

“I’m definitely an extrovert. I love being social, being out and about with friends at local restaurants and events, traveling, and when it’s warm out being outside in the sun as much as possible doing anything from gardening to biking to laying beside a pool,” she said.

Having that time to unwind, form tight relationships, and pursue your interests is another crucial component to a fulfilling, happy life.

Overly-packed schedules can be a source of stress, and Campbell isn’t immune to that feeling.

“I think I have definitely

felt the stress over the years from a busy schedule. Having this kind of workload as a single mom is not always an easy feat. Now that Jude is older, it has become easier to juggle everything. It absolutely takes a village, and I have been blessed to have a supportive family that has helped immensely over the years,” she said. “To be honest, I have always felt like I have ‘thrived in the busy,’ and while I enjoy downtime and sometimes just doing nothing, I get antsy sitting idle for too long.”

Campbell loves to see people reach whatever goal they’re striving for while attempting to live their best life. She offered advice to those who are trying to reach a major goal.

Take small steps. Take that major goal and chunk it down into smaller goals that you can reach quicker, to help keep you motivated and accountable,” she said. “Focus on one change you can make and develop a consistency with it. Consistency over time yields major results, so give yourself grace and know it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Celebrate the small wins, because that’s what is going to get you there.”

And for those who struggle with putting themselves first or finding their motivation to make a healthy change in their life, Campbell offers this advice: “Simply put, you are worth it, as are the people you love. A healthy lifestyle enables you to give your best self to others and to enjoy your life to its fullest. There isn’t any better reward than that.”

Seattle Sutton’s Healthy Eating clients can tailor their meals and their meal pick-ups around their schedule. There are 105 meals in a five-week menu cycle, which gives 21 meals a week, including three a day for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Smaller plans are also available around the 1,200, 1,500, and 2,000 calorie options.

Connecting healthy food to a healthier you

Seattle Sutton creates packaged meals based on guidelines, nutrition, proper portions

Story by Brandon LaChance

Seattle Sutton Healthy Eating runs and operates on many values and principles. Its mission is to create fresh and healthy food to support the most important thing in life – good health.

Seattle Sutton, the company’s originator in 1985 who ran it until she sold SSHE to Rene and Michael Ficek in 2018,

summed it up in her book – The Seattle Sutton Solution: No Gimmicks – with this quote: “A person’s greatest asset is not a house, a car, or money in the bank. It’s good health. And to keep it, we must make smart choices. If we smoke; we can stop. If we ride in a car; we should wear a seat belt. If we lift a fork to our mouth; it should be hosting healthy food.”

The Ficeks have continued to design Seattle Sutton fresh-packaged meals around Sutton’s ideology.

“I think sometimes we are not taught at a young age that food is the No. 1 key to being healthy. The way that we eat as Americans, it isn’t something that is ingrained in us,” said Rene, who worked for Sutton as a licensed dietitian and nutritionist before

purchasing the company. “A lot of people are on their own health journey, but at some point, you realize the importance of eating healthy and how it impacts your daily mood, your ability to move and exercise, and generally how you feel.”

“Sometimes people come to it early in life, and sometimes they don’t realize the importance of eating healthy until the first time they hear they have high cholesterol, they’re struggling with high blood pressure, or they’ve gained weight and they don’t know how to take it off,” she said.

“We’re here for people at every stage. It’s not that we focus on certain groups. I feed Seattle Sutton meals to my kids because it doesn’t have special ingredients, it’s not diet food, or specialty items that only we can get. It’s just freshly prepared meals cooked in a way that tastes good and is healthy,” she said.

The meals can be ordered in different ways. There isn’t a contract forcing you to stick with the program for six months, a year, or more. Instead, the client is able to tailor the meals around their schedule and finances.

The full program consists of 21 meals a week for five weeks (breakfast, lunch, and dinner), which includes 105 different meals to avoid any repeat items for the entire five-week menu cycle. There are three different calorie packages ranging from 1,200, 1,500, and 2,000 calories.

On Monday, a client picks up four days’ worth of meals, and on Thursday, they pick up three days’ worth of food – unless the client wants only meals during the week (Monday pick-up) or through the weekend (Thursday pick-up).

Seattle Sutton packages can be delivered to your door or picked up at one of the five locations: Ottawa (the SSHE headquarters), YMCAs in Peru, Mendota, and Streator, and the

Princeton Metro Center.

“A comment that we get very often from new customers is about portion control. They ask, ‘What is a proper portion?’ Even people who we perceive as healthy ask,” said Ray Anderes, who is Rene’s father, the former owner of Uptown Grill in La Salle, and the CEO of Seattle Sutton. “It’s a great thing. They may only be with us for two or three weeks, and then they’re done with Seattle Sutton meals, but they learned portion control.”

“The realization that you can live and feel comfortable on 1,200 calories or 2,000 calories is an eye opener. We have a list of 40 ingredients or items that cannot be in any of our products. That eliminates a vast majority of the commercially available food products,” he said.

Part of maintaining the healthy food mantra of the company is checking the eliminated ingredient list (which includes artificial colors, artificial flavors, sweet-

eners, high glucose corn syrup, and MSG among others), making sure to include fruits and vegetables, and following guidelines by medical associations.

“There isn’t brand new science out there that is conflicting with what was out there 20-30 years ago,” Rene said. “The message on healthy eating hasn’t changed all that much, although in this day and age, you would think there is some special new diet and some special new breakthrough every week. But that’s not really how it works.”

“Fresh fruits and vegetables are definitely our differentiator as to what makes us different now and what has made us different for 37 years. There are certainly a lot of meal plans out there. The vast majority of them are frozen meals. When you’re freezing meals and not eating them fresh, a lot of nutrition is lost. It is certainly something that helps

PHOTO CONTRIBUTED

Ray Anderes (left, CEO), Rene Ficek (president and owner), and Mike Ficek (owner) are the three executives at Seattle Sutton’s Healthy Eating. Seattle Sutton was built in 1985 by Seattle Sutton before the Ficeks bought the prepackaged meal company in 2018. See SUTTON page

FROM PAGE 11

us follow the guidelines that we follow, which are the American Heart Association, American Diabetes Association, and the Dietary Guidelines for Americans,” she said.

Rene added that the foods customers will see more in meals because of the company’s values and guidelines are lean proteins, whole grains, and fruits and vegetables. With the help of foods we should eat and the elimination of foods we shouldn’t eat, SSHE is designed for everyone.

“There is a lot of misinformation out there. The internet has made it really easy for people to find the wrong answer or to come to a misconception about what they should or should not be eating or how to be healthier,” said Dan Rosier, SSHE director of marketing. “It really is far simpler than people make it out to be. If you want to be healthy and follow the simple guidelines of how food is made,

what food is doing, getting the right balance of different ingredients and calories, you don’t need a fad or anything fancy like powders, shakes, or a fad diet.”

“You can follow a proper diet whether you do it yourself or let us do it for you. We find people who say, ‘I have this (medical ailment) and I don’t understand how your plan will help me.’ Our plan isn’t designed for a specific personal issue. It’s designed to help everyone as a whole. It addresses being healthy,” he said.

Michael Ficek knew what his family was getting into when they purchased the company. He knew his wife enjoyed what she was doing and was good at it. He knew the food was substantial and beneficial to all clients. He knew it was a challenge; one beneficial to him and the staff as they help to improve each customer’s health. Improving health, in the words of Seattle Sutton, means improving life.

“Seattle always summed it up by saying, ‘It’s what you should be eating for the rest of your life.’ That’s almost it in a nut-

shell,” Michael Ficek said. “She could have said it’s how you should be eating for the rest of your life. It’s not magic. It’s specifically following a proper diet. It’s proper nutrition and proper portions. It works for everyone because that is how you’re supposed to eat.”

“It’s a challenge for us because it’s much easier to do it the way that everybody else does it. Shipping frozen food and getting it to people is simple because there is a longer shelf life. It’s much harder with the fresh fruit and fresh vegetables and keeping the nutrition value at its premium, but it’s more beneficial,” he said.

“These meals eliminate all of the thinking, the prep, the cook, and the cleaning. It’s a no-brainer if you want to do it. We have a number of success stories where they say they couldn’t walk around the block, and now they’re running half and full marathons. They’re still using Seattle Sutton,” he said. “It’s just healthy eating and what it does to your body and how it makes you feel.”

PHOTOS BY BRANDON LACHANCE

Seattle Sutton Healthy Eating not only packs its meals with nutrition, but it packs them with dietary-approved portion sizes.

Right: The Seattle Sutton packaged meals are put on an assembly line and go through the process of getting put in a bag, checked, stickered, and placed on a rack with other food bags ready to be shipped.

Elegant & Delicious

Create an amazing display with charcuterie boards

harcuterie boards are trending for a reason – they are immensely popular because of the large variety of foods you’ll find on them. They’re an excellent alternative for picky guests or those who want to eat whole foods like fruits or vegetables that don’t contain processed ingredients. A well-designed charcuterie board will generally have several types of cheese, meats, fruit, or vegetables. Crackers and dips or spreads are another staple for charcuterie boards, and to ensure your board is extra special, you can make some of these from scratch if you have the time. The beauty of charcuterie boards is that they can be as simple or as complicated as you want. They are only limited by your imagination. Here are some outstanding recipes for you to make and include on your charcuterie board at your next party.

Olive Tapenade

INGREDIENTS

1 and 1/2 cups pitted, brine-cured olives

1 tsp anchovy paste and 2 anchovy filets, minced

3 Tbsp capers, rinsed

1 and 1/2 Tbsp parsley coarsely chopped

3 cloves garlic, roasted

3 Tbsp fresh lemon juice

Salt and pepper to taste

1/4 cup olive oil

DIRECTIONS

In a food processor, combine olives, anchovies, capers, parsley, garlic, lemon juice, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Pulse two to three times until it is chopped coarsely.

Add in the olive oil and pulse several times until it becomes a chunky paste, making sure to scrape the sides. Add the desired amount of salt and pepper and serve at room temperature.

Homemade Hummus

INGREDIENTS

3 cups chickpeas

1 or 2 cloves of garlic

1/3 cup Tahini

The juice of one lemon

Salt Olive oil

DIRECTIONS

If you like a super creamy hummus, you should microwave or cook your canned chickpeas for a few minutes because

the softer they are, the creamier the hummus will be. Put all the chickpeas, garlic, Tahini, lemon juice, a pinch of salt, and a drizzle of olive oil into a food processor and let it run for four or five minutes. Add in any extra olive oil or salt, as desired. If the hummus looks too thick, you can add more olive oil or a tiny bit of water.

Serve with an assortment of vegetables, crackers, or pita chips.

Story by Shannon Serpette

Homemade Cheese Crackers

INGREDIENTS

8 oz shredded cheddar cheese

4 Tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature

1 tsp salt

1 cup flour

2 Tbsp ice water

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Using a mixer, mix the cheese, butter, and salt in a bowl. After they are fully combined, mix in the flour and add the ice water, one tablespoon at a time. The dough should stick together but crumble if you squeeze it with your

Garlic Cheesy Pull-Apart Bread

INGREDIENTS

1 crusty loaf of bread, like Vienna

1 cup shredded Mozzarella

8 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened

2 minced large garlic cloves

1 Tbsp fresh parsley, chopped

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine the butter, salt, and garlic in a bowl and melt it in the microwave. When it’s done, stir in

the parsley. Cut the bread from the top to nearly the bottom in one-inch squares. You shouldn’t cut all the way through the bread. Use a knife or your fingers to pry open between each square and drizzle in a little of the butter combination and a bit of the shredded cheese. Brush the surface of the bread with any remaining butter. Wrap the bread with foil and bake for 20 minutes, until the cheese has melted. Then unwrap and bake for five more minutes to make the bread crusty. Move the bread to your charcuterie board and serve immediately.

hand. If it’s too dry, add a tiny bit of additional ice water.

Separate the dough into two halves and shape the two halves into discs. Wrap them in parchment paper and chill for 30 minutes in the refrigerator. Roll the dough out to a thickness of 1/8 of an inch. Cut into one-inch by one-inch squares and pierce a hole in the middle of each square for ventilation while baking. Put the crackers on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake for 13 minutes until

Pesto

INGREDIENTS

1 large bunch of basil leaves, washed and dried

3 medium cloves of garlic

A small handful of raw pine nuts

3/4 cup of Parmesan, freshly grated Extra-virgin olive oil

DIRECTIONS

Chop the garlic, pine nuts, and the basil leaves into a fine mince. Then add the cheese and re-chop the mixture until it’s all fine. Drizzle in olive oil and stir the basil until it’s the consistency you like.