How healthy are you? Part 2

How much sleep do you get each night and is it consistent?
Lack of sleep can contribute to the onset and complication of diseases and conditions such as, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity and depression. Less severe but maybe more problematic in our daily lives is that fact that when we’re tired we just feel bad. Being tired can make us irritable, lethargic and poor performers of our typical everyday tasks at work and at home. The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that adults get 7-9 hours of sleep every night. If you insist that you have too much to do and just can’t sleep that many hours then you need to remove some of those demands from your life. It is essential that you give your body the rest it requires. If you are having trouble sleeping at night, see my blog post on that topic for some helpful tips.

How much water do you drink each day?
Your body absolutely needs water to function. The exact amount needed varies by person so it is hard to say how much you should drink. My advice is to be mindful of how much you are drinking and not to let yourself get thirsty. So on a hot day, when you’re exercising or when you’re sick be sure to drink a couple more glasses of water. A basic estimate is to drink around 8 glasses of water a day (8 ounces in each glass). Any beverage is going to have some water in it but I recommend you don’t rely on drinks like coffee or soda to meet your body’s water needs.

What kind of exercise do you do each day?
This one is a little bit complicated. There are thousands of things you can do for exercise and it is hard to make a general recommendation that goes for everyone. You’re exercise needs to be personalized to your needs and your abilities. I recommend that you consult your doctor to find out if you have any conditions that need to be accounted for when exercising. Then you should find a fitness professional that can help you determine in what specific ways you would like to improve your health. Once you know what you want to do then this professional can help you develop an exercise program that will be beneficial for you. Any exercise is better than none, but there are some risks of injury involved so if you aren’t completely clear on what to do it is important that you get help. If you don’t know any fitness professionals please feel free to contact us through our website and we can help you out.

My next two posts will address the rest of the questions from the original “How healthy are you?” post. Check back soon.