Growing older together

I subject I rarely write about but should more often is about aging and sex. In particular how does walking help with a healthy sex life as we age. I made the following comment on a blog I follow and the writer wrote back. Leslie wrote an opinion on the new marketing of a female viagra pill. Follow the link below for her discussion:

"Sexuality as a age I find is interesting. I have occasionally used viagra. What I believe works better without side effects is a love marriage where in a relaxing atmosphere everything is worked out. I at least experience definite changes as we age. When love comes with sexuality even as we decline the relationship continues to meet the challenges. The drug may be helpful, but it can't replace old lovers."

1. image: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0km3b8aT7vXJdy_5SLqLsyl0HlYHdNxi8Z3ar8s_fFq3dwjQmcqL4g6NAg_sW8BL2sWkNDUP5-1wwUn9581bJah1jzkdtTaMJntkQKrNzau6vypfGusOQbeZid4AD0k2qJcb48iLYYVc/s35/blogcrop.jpg
   
   Leslie Leyland FieldsAugust 21, 2015 at 10:08 AM

   Hi Bill, I agree with you, that love and understanding are likely to make more of a difference than a pill. Love this phrase, "when love comes with sexuality, even as we decline the relationship continues to meet the challenges." So good!!

Read more at http://www.leslieleylandfields.com/2015/08/do-women-need-anti-viagra-drug-what.html#OjFvl0PeVvOeBLLX.99

Female viagra explained
https://www.sharecare.com/health/sex-and-relationships/slideshow/female-viagra-explained-in-5-clicks

How do they work through sex issues?
What if they can't have sex, how are they coping?

Walking has the following benefits for aging lovers. 
Walking aerobically opens the blood vessels for increase blood flow through out the body. It is definitely a plus for the brain and body.
Walking helps keep the weight off which in turn helps with lovemaking. 
Recumbent bikes have a better seat design which will not restrict blood flow.
Walking helps the heart and that in turn helps our sex life.
http://walking.about.com/od/malehealth/a/edwalkgood.htm
More important then walking is the intimacy of the relationship gets older that works through the issues that come with our decline. A loving couple will have the ability to adapt to the changes that occur as we get older. Even when we can longer have sex due to health, the closeness, touch, and intimate companionship remains.
It is very hard for Hollywood, popular media to get a handle on old lovers. We wince at the thought of old lovers. Many men discard their wives for younger models, insane in my opinion. 
Go for a walk, do romantic things, work through together viagra or not and grow old together. Keep walking
Proverbs 5:18, 19 "Let your fountain be blessed, and take pleasure in the wife of your youth. 19 A loving doe, a graceful fawn —let her breasts always satisfy you; be lost in her love forever."

I failed a health test, cool - learned from it

I took a test well Weekly quiz

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/14/the-weekly-health-quiz-mosquitoes-walking-and-brain-health/#int-chad-ballot-wrapper-20150814-healthquiz

I failed

The questions I missed two of the answers. I could've made a better connection in my answer. But there were several questions that I miss because the material is new to me. 

#2 a study of older men and women found that walking briskly for this many minutes per week improve scores contest of thinking skills:

75 minutes

150 minutes

225 minutes

Cognitive scores improved with all levels of exercise

My brain shifted to a 150 minutes. That is recommended minutes of walking we should do every week. I did not really read the last choice, cognitive scores improved with all levels of exercise. Had I really read it I would've reason of course that's the right answer.

The good thing is the New York Times gives a reference to the article that supports the answer. So I clicked on and read the article.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/12/the-right-dose-of-exercise-for-the-aging-brain/?ref=health

The study was done with 101 people divided in four groups. One group doing the same that they have always done. One group walked 75 minutes, another 150 minutes, and still another at 225 minutes. They did this for 26 weeks. The more you walk the more fit you were, but all three groups improve their thinking.

The study is one more study that demonstrates walking may be able to delay dementia. It also helps a healthy brain that is aging to stay more engaged. Delay is good. Keep walking

The things I have learned being a professional patient...

Here I think is a good cartoon they have in every hospital room. My family will laugh at this because they side with the nurse, my wife.
In the past, hospital rooms we're actually wards. In the ward there would be ten to a hundred people in all different states of health. It had to be similar to experience I had in many intensive care waiting rooms.
I remember being in Children's Memorial Hospital intensive care unit where children miraculously survived or died every day. Our grandchild lived through several life or death emergencies. They finally found the rare disorder and fixed it. He lived. But children were not so lucky. In the waiting room was like living in war. I couldn't wait to leave.
Our feisty patient in the cartoon is very aware of obvious suffering. I have been there. When I have looked closer at the people the nurse was treating, I became aware that there were others indeed more sick then I. I then was also the patient another time who was so sick I was barely conscious.
All this experience doesn't necessarily change how much I've groan to Barb, which is why my family is still laughing. But the perspective we have is important both to the nurse and the complaining patient. The professional has seen it all, and yet they have to pay attention to the personal experience of the patient who may be at a low point and not at their best.
Overall my experiences I am very thankful for the caregivers. It is usually later at night when nobody's around that I come to my senses about the wonderful the care Barb gives me. Why I am such a baby with her is amazing. I guess it's why I found the cartoon funny. Keep walking

Get Cooperized, basics

Last week I was hit with a virus and became increasingly weaker with inflamed pain throughout joints and muscles. We had to cut our weekend trip and seek medical advice. The doctor advised treatment and in a couple days health was restored.
Dr. Cooper shares 8 steps to get Cooperized. Back to exercise most days, eat heart healthy most of the time, continue to work on being mindful of late night eating where I can easily binge.
Each night I now plan a healthy alternative I will eat when on the prowl. This will be part of my overall diet that is healthy and on target with losing weight. I will eat it at the table and enjoy each bite. I will return to the bedroom with an activity to ready me for sleep and letting the urge to binge pass. Here right now looking at stress in eating disorders.
My friend, Dr. Jasinski knowing my negative thought patterns that can ruminate from post traumatic stress, suggest to develop a good experience before I go to sleep. He thought of music.
I have added Addiction and Grace by Dr. Gerald May in my personal therapy growth. It is always nice to be back in the walk, keep walking.

Really I am just starting to work on my issues with emotional eating

At least a year ago a medical doctor friend of mine asked if I ever looked into emotional eating and if I thought it related to my difficulty in losing weight? At the time I was still trying to deal with the x’s and o’s of an effective plan to lose weight. Eating disorders, I just can't get a handle on it as it related to me. 

As time moved forward I knew that I had to relook at the whole walking with fatman approach. Walking did return me to a healthier me. I have lost 54 pounds, improved all my health numbers and was walking 4 miles everyday. I was eating small plates, 1 helping, and was actually feeling pretty good. 

Storm clouds came into my life. Some of that I didn't see coming at all. Other things I did, but it all came on. Stressors that accumulate can take a toll that I just didn't figure on. Insomnia, frustration at not being able to change some things kept gnawing at me. At work and at church there was things I couldn’t accept or change. When my son's health had a crisis, I didn't know it, but I cracked. I entered the world of the black dog, depression. I don't give up, I'm a fighter; but the wind in my sails ceased. It was like I was in the ocean but my ship was no longer moving. At this point it would not take too many stressors for me to reach the end of my energy. 

My wonderful wife and My son came to the rescue. They can see what happened and all my ruminating was not productive. In fact, it was part of the chemical imbalance that was going on the in my brain. I entered the hospital for treatment and things started turning for me. About a year later, I re-entered the outpatient care and I was clearly on a path to put my illness in remission. 

I have documented my injuries due to cerebral palsy which made walking more difficult to do. It triggers other problems including weight gain. During this time I successfully got into resistant training. Later I was able to acquire an indoor recumbent bike and practice indoor walking with Leslie Sansone.

Back to the idea emotional eating. I have begun to explore it in therapy and daily I am working through some books to try to get a handle on it. Basically I have learned irrational beliefs and actions in regard to eating. I am working to understand the craziness of it. Much like panic attacks and outbursts that have their roots from post traumatic stress from childhood. I want to put in place ideas and strategies that can de-energize the irrational urges relate to binge eating. In the same way, I do not want anger and depression to define me in my senior years, I do not want to be controlled by binge eating either. 

One thing that I'm trying to do right now is to be mindful on my thoughts and feelings when I'm on the prowl to binge. I am journaling them and trying to bring them to full consciousness where the irrational meets the rational. Just doing this has me more aware to say no. 

I was thinking how the strategies they'll learn to deal with my panic attacks could be used with my frenzy eating? 

Rumination, perseveration, can all be part of the chemical transmitters in the brain. 

My own medical doctor thinks 80% of the work I need is diet., vs. exercise and lifestyle. But for me to control my diet I think I'm going have to understand my binge eating and the emotional needs connected with over eating. Keep walking