The brain is the organ in the body that is most nutrient and energy dependent; it is also the organ most vulnerable to toxins in our system. The higher the quality of fuel you give it to work the greater capacity the brain has to perform at its best. Considering your brain controls all voluntary and involuntary coordination throughout your entire body processes, your body can’t be at peak performance if your brain is in a nutrient-poor environment.

Because the brain is so energy-dependent (or glucose-dependent, as I mentioned earlier), it’s also vulnerable to the poisons in our body’s waste elimination system. This is related to the toxic overload previously discussed.

Most athletes have the drive to succeed because they feed their brains well. If you give your brain high- quality fuel it can better control and coordinate the body’s movement at a much higher capacity than if you’re feeding it junk.

You want your brain to consume the highest quality fuel possible, so the higher quality nutrition you eat the better you perform.

What follows next are two lists of foods – the do’s and don’ts. These are very important to understand and follow as you build your strength and vitality through proper nutrition.

Do not eat

Ingredients:

Artificial Colors

Artificial Flavorings

Artificial Sweeteners: YES, I mean all of them!!!!!!!!

Benzoate Preservatives (BHT, BHA, TBHQ)

Brominated Vegetable Oil (BVO)

Carrageenan

Enriched Flours

High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS)

Maltodextrin

MSG (Monosodium Glutamate)

Olestra

Polysorbate 60

Propylene Glycol Alginate

Shortening, Hydrogenated and Partially Hydrogenated Oils: (Palm, Soy bean and others)

Textured Soy Protein

These ingredients in their own way have been linked to dysfunction Some examples are:

Allergies, Asthma, Dermatitis, Eczema, Hyperactivity, Headaches, Cancer, Autoimmune Disorders, Digestive Disorders, Inflammatory Disorders, Liver Disease, Kidney Disease, Fatigue, Obesity, Heart Disease, Stroke, and many, many more.

Good To Eat

Suppose I am a dairy producer and I have to add fortifications of Calcium to my milk; the first question any wise milk drinker should ask is, “Why would you have to fortify milk with Calcium. Doesn’t milk already contain Calcium?” As the producer, I’m not required to put on the carton packaging what chemical compound of Calcium is being used to bolster the milk.

The next question should be “What chemical form of Calcium do you use to fortify the milk?”

From a financial perspective, the dairy producer is going to use the cheapest form of Calcium that he can legally get away with using.

Last question, “Is the chemical make-up of the Calcium used the most efficient and effective for the absorption and utilization of Calcium in my body?”

And, of course that last question is the big one; usually the chemical is not that efficiently absorbed and utilized by the body.

Now, this scenario may not be 100% accurate, but it’s worth thinking about, and it gives us an easy example of what fortified means when you see it on food packaging.

WHAT ENRICHED AND FORTIFIED REALLY MEAN

The terms enriched and fortified in the food world are a gold mine to the industry and a curse for the consumer.

You believe that you’re eating something nutritious and actually you are unwittingly increasing the toxic load on your body.

What the food industry is doing is removing the high-quality nutrients, adding poor, lower-quality, cheaper nutrients, and your body doesn’t utilize them properly.

The same is true for supplements. Since they are not regulated, the quality standard for supplements isn’t about quality at all. What the supplement company claims is in the bottle may not be in there at all, or the formulation of the compound may be cheap and non-absorbable. Unfortunately, it’s more about their bottom line than your health.

For example, there are different compounds that are all considered Vitamin C, but they are not all equally absorbed and utilized by the body.

This is another reason working with a professional, with access to known reputable “nutraceutical” companies, is essential. That doesn’t mean that you can only get high quality supplements by going to a professional, but it makes it easier. Do the research on the companies; make sure they are at least GMP certified and don’t go by marketing testimonials.

Price is not always the determining factor for quality. Many of the cheaper supplements manufactured by the leading chain brands, are exactly what they advertise … cheap. And some of the more expensive supplements are just that … more expensive. They don’t necessarily work either, so it’s absolutely crucial that you’re working with a professional, a health coach or someone who thoroughly understands nutrition and can teach you as you develop, grow and perform.

Dr. Mitchell will be speaking at 1pm on Injury Identification and Prevention

The best time of the day for you to eat, should be based upon eating unusually small frequent meals, containing only high-quality foods. In terms of sports performance, priming comes anywhere between four hours to a half-hour before an event, training or practice. Be sure you’re taking in higher carbohydrate-rich meals all the way up to 30 to 60 minutes before your athletic performance.

During training and exercise, your body requires an intake of carbs and protein at about a 4 to 1 ratio by weight consumption. During recovery after exercise, training, or an event, a carbohydrate to protein ratio of about 2 to 1 is more appropriate.

EATING FOR RECOVERY

Optimal recovery requires that you are eating the right recovery foods within that 45 to 60-minute window of opportunity. Make sure the carbohydrates to protein ratio is correct – 2:1. Some research indicates that you have about two hours of time to take in the right nutrients for recovery, but my recommendation is that it would be best for you to keep it to under 1-hour, post exercise.

It is recommended that you develop the desire for and a lifestyle that includes mostly complex carbohydrates, high quality fats and lean high- quality proteins. You can easily achieve this by getting added supplements through a protein shake or a high-quality medical food.

Included in optimal recovery is rest in-between training sessions. Then high-quality sleep (a deep, sound sleep on a bed with a good firm mattress for 7-9 hours every night). During your sleep cycle, your body gets the opportunity to heal and repair without disruption from activities.

The result is the next day you can perform at your best once again.

NUTRITIONAL TIMING

Nutrition timing varies between athletes and between sports. One key underlying factor is your fluid intake. Water is your primary liquid in sports and in life. I recommend 64 oz. for children and 96 oz. for adults per day. Sports drinks are added to the 64-96 oz. requirement. Consumption of water during exercise or event is also essential.

Electrical muscle stimulation, or EMS therapy, is used to treat a variety of painful issues, much like therapeutic massage, from muscle strain and injury to fibromyalgia symptoms. This commonly sought after treatment uses an electrotherapy device that delivers a small, pulsating current to the muscles and nerve endings. This current encourages blood circulation, muscle stimulation and healing.

One of the greater benefits of Electrical Muscle Stimulation (EMS) is that it can be used to treat weak or atrophied muscles resulting from an injury or from long periods of immobility. This works by stimulating muscles, which causes them to contract and relax, much like normal physical activity. Electrical Muscular.

Stimulation helps develop strength in the affected area and can be used to treat completely incapacitated patients by creating involuntary muscle contraction responses, thereby improving and also maintaining muscle tone without any actual physical activity.

Many sports-related injuries reduce the range of motion in joints, especially in the shoulders, elbows and knees. EMS can be used on an impeded joint to increase range of motion and promote healing in the injured area by increasing blood flood and thereby reducing inflammation.

Many of my patients suggest that EMS helps relieve their chronic pain in joints and muscles, as well as their suffering from stress and tension. This therapy is great for relieving pain in patients with fibromyalgia and also can be used to treat chronic headaches, muscle weakness and fatigue, as well as overall body aches and pain.

Because of the restricted range of motion in tender and swollen joints, EMS therapy works well for arthritis sufferers by increasing range of motion in their joints and reducing pain and inflammation. EMS does this by channeling a low-frequency electrical current through muscle nerves and the connective tissue. Pain relief is accomplished when the body begins secreting additional amounts of endorphins and other natural pain relievers to the affected area.

How EMS Works

Electrical Muscular Stimulation works by placing electrodes at the site of the injury and gradually increasing the electrical current output. What the patient feels in the beginning is a tingling sensation. As the electrical current increases, the tingling feels stronger but not uncomfortable in any way. Over a short period of time, the patient’s body adapts to the electrical current, which necessitates an increase in the electrical current level every few minutes. A typical treatment lasts from 10 to 20 minutes, depending on the condition being treated.

Some of the more common injuries that are treated with EMS include strained ligaments, muscle sprains, strains and spasms.

Therapeutic Massage involves the use of a state licensed massage therapist to manipulate superficial and deeper muscle layers and connective tissue through various massage techniques that tend to enhance function, aid in natural healing, decrease muscle reflex reactions, promote relaxation, and improve health.

In a therapeutic massage, the patient is massaged while lying on a special table built for massage therapy, or while sitting on chair especially designed for massage. The patient may be fully or partially clothed.

If you are injured, massage therapy plays a vital role in your healing process. Massage involves working with acting on muscles, tendons, ligaments, fascia, skin, joints or connective tissue. Areas targeted by the massage therapist, under the guidance of your doctor, might include hands, fingers, elbows, knees, forearm, or feet, as well as the cervical, thoracic, or lumbar spine as well as your stomach. Massage can also assist in the proper drainage of the lymphatic system. Proper drainage is critical for the elimination of waste products from the body. Massage therapy promotes this elimination process while mobilizing soft tissue at the same time.

Massage Therapy provides great benefit for the following conditions:

• Muscle spasms, tension, and stiffness
• Limited ROM (range of motion) of the muscles and joints
• Restricted circulation of blood and movement of lymph flows
• Promotion of faster healing of soft tissue injuries
• Reduction of scar tissue
• Improvement in posture
• Reduction in overall stress and anxiety, thus creating a feeling of well-being
• Promotion of a relaxed state of mental awareness

It is never wise to have massage therapy performed on an injury prior to a professional examination and diagnosis. Improper care of an injury can lead to further damage and longer healing periods. When receiving any type of therapy, make sure you are being treated by a qualified professional and be fully involved in the process. Whether at our office or another clinic, therapeutic massage can be a useful tool in getting you back to doing the activities that you love.

Tissue injury to the body is a common issue we see in our patients. It can be from a sports injury, such as improper lifting of weights, or one that occurs through repetitive stresses, such as sitting in an awkward position with poor spinal posture while performing work duties or by improperly going through a sports training.

In any case, injured tissues undergo physical and chemical changes that can cause inflammation, pain and diminished function for the sufferer, all in a short period of time, and can last indefinitely if not properly treated. Spinal manipulation, or chiropractic adjustment, of the affected joint and tissues, begins the process of restoring mobility, thereby alleviating pain and muscle tightness. This process permits tissues to heal naturally.

Evaluating the Patient

I find the most effective method to begin a treatment protocol is to evaluate patients through clinical examination, laboratory testing, diagnostic imaging, and other diagnostic interventions to determine whether chiropractic treatment is right for the patient’s condition. Sometimes, I refer patients to the appropriate health care provider when I determine that chiropractic care is not suitable for their condition. Other times, the condition warrants co-management in conjunction with other members of our health care team and we manage all necessary services within our clinic.

The primary focus of my chiropractic treatment, and any other procedures that we perform in our clinic, is to use the right approach to alleviate the health issue. That’s it!

Getting healthier is definitely about lifestyle improvement and the chiropractic adjustment is a powerful tool, but just one of many. The practice of chiropractic manipulative therapy is the most powerful tool that can be applied to physical conditions and does a lot of great things. However, it is not the end all/be all of healthcare. It has to be incorporated and used appropriately when needed, the same way nutrition, rehabilitation and anything else must be used to help a patient improve their health and well- being.

1. If you get injured, STOP PLAYING IMMEDIATELY! This is an extremely simple concept that those who get injured can put into action immediately and easily. “Suck it up” and “Walk it off” are not good strategies for caring for an injury.

2: The acronym RICE will help you remember what to do and in what order: RICE stands for: Rest it, Ice it, Compress it, and Elevate it. This is the gold standard in the athletic training world. Just to be clear: the ‘I’ in RICE stands for ICE, NOT heating pads and hot tubs. I would also like to add the letter “S” for the word “Support” to this acronym, as in the various support devices that help to stabilize the area. But, I believe the acronym RICES seems a bit strange and not as catchy for anyone to remember.

3: Seek out a health care professional or injury specialist. In this day and age it may be as simple as walking to the sideline. Many teams now have athletic trainers and coaches on staff that can handle the evaluation and, on occasion, care for some injuries. Side note: Athletic trainers do not receive the respect that they deserve. They are the top of the food chain when it comes to the evaluation of acute injuries, and they are often placed in difficult situations. They sometimes make life-altering judgment calls in a matter of seconds, and they, for the most part, do one heck of a great job. It is easy to criticize when you see an injury the next day in the comfort of a clinic, and the treatment plan and/or diagnosis might change, but that takes nothing away from what the trainer did for urgent care. I have tremendous respect for what they do!

4: Let your body heal! Jump back into the game too early because you feel “OK” and you will quickly learn what a second or secondary injury feels like. A complete healing cycle must occur for the injury to heal properly. This process can be accelerated but only through the help of a professional who treats injuries.

5: DO WHAT YOU ARE TOLD! I do not go to my tax accountant to receive tax advice and then flush that advice down the toilet and do whatever I want. In sports, this behavior can get you seriously injured. If you have recommendations from a professional, listen and implement the advice, including:

• Take the necessary time off to heal
• Follow the treatment protocol diligently
• Follow the rehabilitation plan to get yourself back to being able to perform

It’s sad to say but injuries do happen. Acute injuries can become chronic, and chronic injuries are the most prevalent cause of diminished sports performance. Decreased performance leads to the demise of the athlete. general, take responsibility for your health and seek help when necessary. Then you get to talk about what you are able to do now instead of what you “used to be able to do”.

In general, food is often neglected or overlooked when, in fact, it should be the cornerstone of your routine. As an athlete, your body requires certain nutrients so that it can be prepared to perform at its best. That being said, don’t ever go out and grab the first diet/nutrition plan you see.

Everybody is different and so are athletes. What works for one may not work for another. I believe that having a customized nutritional program is your best bet to ensure that it’s tailored to your specific needs and your particular sport involvement.

Often poor nutrition is the cause of injury, and this type of injury doesn’t go away all by itself. These are the injuries that linger and you may never feel the same again if you don’t take proper action. Injury can also lead to chronic inflammation, which results in further injuries that your body can’t repair properly.

Its far more critical than you know

In short - make sure that you eat the right foods. It’s far more critical than you know. If you don’t have the right nutrients to perform your energy levels will be low, and you may sustain an injury. If you don’t have the proper nutrition, it will be more difficult for you to recover after exercise or injury. If you get hurt and your nutrition doesn’t feed your cellular structure, the tissue can’t be repaired and that may lead to a whole slew of other problems. If the tissue doesn’t heal properly, it can’t perform at its optimum, and optimum performance is what you strive for in your sports involvement.

Then, when you try to push yourself through your routine exercises, like you always would, you might end up hurting yourself. Damaged tissue is an injury. When it comes to food, getting what you need, and getting it at the right time, in the right form, can help you avoid injury. If you do get hurt, the right food can help in the reparation of damaged tissues.

by Dr. Thomas M. Mitchell, D.C., CCSP | Owner, Clinic Director Chicago Institute for Health and Wellness Copyright © 2013