Heart Health - 007

SPEAKER A The following program presents principles designed to promote good health and is not intended to take the place of personalized, professional care. The opinions and ideas expressed are those of the speakers. Viewers are encouraged to draw their own conclusions about the information presented. SPEAKER B Welcome to healthy living. I'm your host, Margot Marshall. There was a time when heart disease was the number one killer in Western countries, but not any more. According to the World Health Organization, heart disease is now the leading cause of death worldwide. Why is that? Stay tuned as we get to the heart of the matter. SPEAKER C Healthy Living is a 13 part production of three Abn Australia television focusing on the health of the whole person body, mind and spirit. You'll learn natural lifestyle principles with practical health solutions for overall good health. SPEAKER B In the studio with me today, I have Dr. John Clark and health psychologist Jenny Skues. Welcome, Jenny. And welcome, John. SPEAKER C Thank you. SPEAKER B This is a very, very important subject and it's just one that affects so many people. So John, would you like to start off by telling us your amazing story of someone who was able to turn their health around from heart disease? SPEAKER C Gentleman I'm going to tell you about today was a trucker. He would drive across the United States in a big truck. He was many miles from home down in Tennessee when he had a massive heart attack. They took him to a university hospital, checked him out, did everything they could, and said, there isn't anything more we can do. We can't do bypass surgery. You're not a candidate. We can't do any stents or anything. We're just going to send you home on oxygen. Well, they sent him home back up to West Virginia on oxygen. Now, this gentleman also had been smoking. So he had emphysema, which can contribute to heart disease. SPEAKER B It's a bad combination. SPEAKER C And he also had diabetes, which also increases the risk of plaque or atherosclerosis in the heart. And then he had the atherosclerosis that led to the heart attack. So these type of people are in very difficult shape and he was no exception. They say a large portion of his heart had died in the heart attack, and the result was something called congestive heart failure. His heart just wasn't pumping enough blood or much blood. And so he's home on oxygen, he's on diabetic pills, and he's in tough shape. SPEAKER B Complications? SPEAKER C Yeah, lots of complications. So you think about some of the things that might lead to a heart attack in somebody like this. SPEAKER A Well, you've given us a few good ones with the diabetes and everything else he had. SPEAKER B I think John's talking about some lifestyle things we already talked about him liking. Smoking contributes stress. SPEAKER A Major factor. Actually, the first organ affected by stress is the heart, then the lungs and then the lower organs. So his heart was being impacted totally. SPEAKER B And sitting in the truck day in and day out, he's not getting physical activity. SPEAKER C That's correct. Sedentary lifestyle. Well, he was at this place in West Virginia, and his wife was a church attender. And I came there to do a series of meetings on health topics. Well, the church said, well, will you see our church invalid? They called him. SPEAKER B Oh, good. SPEAKER C Labeled what a label to have. Yes. And why was he called an invalid? Well, when I got to see him, he sat in his chair with his eyes half open on oxygen. He would slowly puff away, and he had this oxygen tank that made a click every time he took a breath in. And I'm listening to this, and I'm thinking, well, I'm happy to see your church invalid, but I'm thinking, this is not a promising case. SPEAKER B No. SPEAKER C He can't walk across the room without feeling winded. His heart's totally messed up with a heart attack. His diabetes is contributing, and he hasn't done anything to fix that. And I'm just feeling, you know, there's more promising cases. Is this going to be a winner or not? And will he even do what if the church sends him to me? It isn't like he said, I want to go see Dr. Clark. SPEAKER B Not his own idea. SPEAKER A He wasn't a willing volunteer. SPEAKER C Well, at least that would be my question. Did you come here because you wanted to or because they said you're going? And that's a big factor, isn't it? SPEAKER B Motivation? Absolutely. SPEAKER A If you don't want to do it, you can teach them anything, and the person won't contribute, won't do anything. They've given up. It's like he'd probably already given up, and that means he's telling his body he's given up. The brain and the body are communicating. SPEAKER C Which is huge, and it makes a difference. People who give up or don't have anything they can do, especially men, will die. SPEAKER A We actually have a survival brain. Part of the brain is geared to survive, and it's an unconscious part that reacts, but you can actually consciously shut it down. He would have gotten off of that survival mode, started to go, well, there's no hope for me. My life is over. So he's allowing the brain to shut everything down. SPEAKER C And so he and his wife came his wife, I didn't really go into her health issues, but she definitely carried extra pounds. And so I said, okay, let's do our best here. And so I took their health history and their lifestyle history. I usually go through and ask them what they eat for breakfast, lunch and tea. SPEAKER B We might call it evening meal so that we don't complete, we all know. SPEAKER C And how much exercise he got, how much water he drank, and what some of his other habits were that were good or bad. And then I sat down and laid him out a program. What time to get up in the morning, what to do as soon as he got up, how much water to drink. Different exercises for his lungs, foods for his lungs for breakfast. Different times when to drink water in the midmorning and what to eat for lunch and when to do his exercise after lunch and after breakfast. SPEAKER B You're talking exercise to a man who can't walk across the room. SPEAKER C That's right. SPEAKER B So that would have been my question. SPEAKER A That would have been what exercise did you give him? SPEAKER C I'm glad you mentioned that because what I basically told him is this every 2 hours I want you to walk half the distance you can walk without stopping and turn around and come back. And then each time try to push it a little farther. So if you can only walk a block, walk half a block out and half a block back and see where you turned around. And next time take a few steps further. And so every 2 hours he was supposed to take a walk and practice some breathing exercises. Well, it's very interesting. I sort of dismissed him and thought, oh, well, I gave him this huge program, a lot of lifestyle changes. SPEAKER A Very structured because he was a very sick man. SPEAKER C Very structured. SPEAKER A He had to really stick to it. SPEAKER C He needed to stick to it. And within two months he was walking 3 day. SPEAKER B Wow. SPEAKER C He was starting his garden. His eyes were wide open. The oxygen was going down in the amount of volume he needed per day or per hour. SPEAKER B How long was that before? SPEAKER C Two months. SPEAKER B Two months. SPEAKER A Amazing. For someone who was so sick and virtually on Death Star and the emphysema. SPEAKER B I mean, the lung capacity is being compromised. And so it wasn't just the heart. It wasn't pumping enough blood and the lungs couldn't breathe properly. So both of those major things. That's wonderful. SPEAKER C And so he also put in a chicken house. He would come to meetings at the church. SPEAKER B What was this chicken house about? Was that just something he could do physically? SPEAKER C Something he could do physically. Got some chickens. SPEAKER B Okay. SPEAKER C And they were laying eggs and there was something to do. And his garden was starting to share stuff from his garden over time. SPEAKER B Gardening is actually quite more strenuous than just walking because even just getting down to ground level is quite a challenge. But it's a great exercise. SPEAKER C Yes. SPEAKER A He's a good example of that principle of motivation because he wouldn't have had any motivation when he started, which is what you questioned him on. You're willing to do this. But when you gave him a formula and he followed it, he took action, it increased his motivation. So that's a very good example of that. And then he would have taken more action, which is like, I want you those few steps further. And we can all do that. We don't have to feel like it. We just have to know this is what I have to do. And that's what he did. SPEAKER C You grow your motivation. SPEAKER B Yes, you do. SPEAKER A It's like your garden. SPEAKER B It makes me think of a little saying. I have to tell you this. I read it. It's a very good quote. A dream becomes a reality when you take steps to make it. So I have to laugh about that because it's a little joke I have with my daughter. She had a bit of a dream once and I said something like that to her and she was crushed. But you know what? She did it. We'll talk about another day. Yeah. So he did this. You put before him what could happen, and even you were a little bit unsure whether someone so sick could actually become well, but you put before him what could happen and how it could happen, and he took the steps and he haven't heard the end of the story yet. So you got more to this story, I think. SPEAKER C Yes. And so he went to see his doctor. They started cutting back on his diabetic medications and congestive heart failure improving. That's why he could walk so far. And then the last time I saw him, I didn't actually see him, I saw a picture of him in West Virginia. They had something called Health Camp, meaning people could come there for two weeks and enjoy the outdoors and get instruction and eat good food. And his picture was on the front of the brochure, walking big steps and looking just very vibrant. And as an advertisement for coming to Health Camp. SPEAKER B He was a good advertisement, very good advertiser. How long would that have been, do you know? SPEAKER C That was about a year later. SPEAKER B About a year later. And he was an advertisement for a health camp. That's astonishing, actually, isn't it, when you think about it? Someone who couldn't walk across the room and so on and had all of those health ailments and he was, oh, that's beautiful. SPEAKER A He actually applied his will, because in the brain, there's a physical part of the brain that is connected with the will and the conscience. And the will starts at the front of the lobe, through to the back of the brain, in the center there. And it's now scientifically found that the will is an active part. It's not just something that we don't see. It's really a physical part of the brain. So when he was so sick, his will would have been eroding. But certainly as he improved, then he put his will in action. It's like a muscle, it grows. So if we action the will, it will grow and it will strengthen. So it's an important point. SPEAKER B Jeannie, just while we're chatting to you, does the heart have intelligence? SPEAKER A The heart is an amazingly intelligent organ, science is. SPEAKER B I kind of think that's going to be news to some people. SPEAKER A Just make this very scientific community is finding that the heart has an amazing intelligence all of its own. It's not like our thinking brain. It has an intelligence as to how it works. And it's actually the focus of the whole system, because if the heart fails, everything fails. The brain fails, and it has circuitry, electrical circuitry. It isn't just a pump. It actually has a lot of nerves and a very complex system that now, with new technology, they're finding out there is a lot more to the heart than we really believed. SPEAKER B Isn't that interesting? SPEAKER A We can actually shut the heart down. There's a syndrome called the broken heart syndrome. SPEAKER B Well, you hear about broken heart, people. SPEAKER A Die of a broken heart, literally. And a client I had a long time ago, she was at the doctors, and she said she was having this what seemed like a heart attack, but it was a panic attack because she was prone to them. And the doctor kept saying, you're having a panic attack? She's saying no. I'm having a heart. It's my heart. I'm having a heart attack that I know. It's my heart. And she finally convinced him because he's trying to get her to stop the panic. And he took it or sent her to the hospital, and they did help the heart. It was the heart. But the person who diagnosed her and the heart practitioner, he said that it was actually the broken heart syndrome, and that was because she'd had immense grief in her life she'd never dealt with, and that was partly why I was helping her. And she had all these losses and deaths and people around her, and that had caused such grief that the heart was, like, overloaded the heart. It was overwhelming. So you really can dive a broken heart. The circuitry, it interrupts that electrical circuitry of the heart, and the heart can actually flood itself. Oh, that's just and it's not a heart attack. It's actually the heart's breaking. So we've got to look after the heart. SPEAKER B So how would we do that? You might tell us that in a moment. But, John, you tell us you've given this man a very strict program. Did you tell us what sorts of things he was to eat? I don't know if you covered no. SPEAKER C I didn't quite cover that yet. And so I'm focusing on three different things congestive heart failure and coronary artery disease, emphysema and lung oxygenation and diabetes. So we're looking at three things we have to straighten out. And you might think, well, that's terribly complex. If he's on medications, he'd been on medications for all three. Well, what's sort of neat about the original diet and original lifestyle is it treats everything. SPEAKER B Yes, one size fits all. SPEAKER C One size fits all. SPEAKER B Tell us what it is. What is this original diet, as you call it, that goes back to the beginning of creation? What is that? SPEAKER C This would be like fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts and seeds. And of course, we did pick on certain ones as being things he should focus on. And so the things that we focused on for him were like foods for the lungs. Apples. A person that eats an apple a day, you know, the old will put. SPEAKER B You out of business. The doctor away. SPEAKER C Doctor away. An apple a day will increase the amount of air a person breathes by 150 every breath. SPEAKER B Wow. SPEAKER C Bigger breath. SPEAKER B How big is 150 ML? I'm trying to picture it. What would that be? Like milliliters half a cup? No, 250 is a cup. So it's a bit over half a cup, isn't it? You don't know because you don't do that. No, that'd be 125 is half a cup. So 150 is over half a cup. That's a lot of volume. Yeah, that's a lot of extra volume. And that's by eating an apple a day. SPEAKER C An apple a day. SPEAKER B Why don't we take a short break and have an apple? SPEAKER C We got an apple there. SPEAKER B It's the apple for the teacher, isn't it funny? I don't know if that's in all cultures, but there's this saying, an apple a day keeps the doctor away. And I'm surprised that you were going to undercut your profession. Yes. SPEAKER C Onions. You know how when you eat an onion, it's almost instantly on your breath? SPEAKER B Oh, yes. Especially if it's someone else's breath. SPEAKER C Yes. And onions have a phytochemical called corcitin, which is also very beneficial for the lungs. So we had him doing apples, onions, garlic. Grapes are good for the lungs. They have reservatrol, which helps lungs fight infections and be more healthy. And so lung foods were a big part of it. And then for his diabetes, we improved his intake of whole grains, especially things like oat bran, which oat bran helps to control blood sugars. SPEAKER A Does. SPEAKER C And then for his heart disease, we're looking to totally cut any kind of fats and eat lots of green leafy vegetables, which help plaque to disappear. SPEAKER B Okay. SPEAKER C Additionally, things that help plaque disappear are good sunlight and fresh air and exercise. You get out exercise basic principles. SPEAKER B So you're saying that these things actually reverse the buildup of plaque in the arteries? SPEAKER C That's correct. Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn of the Cleveland Clinic has shown on angiography that plaque can be totally reversed simply by changes in diet. And his recommended diet is a low fat diet. Beans and fresh fruits and vegetables. SPEAKER B It was a no added fat diet, if I recall correctly. SPEAKER C He was very strict. SPEAKER B Very, very strict. Remember him saying to the people in his study, you play by the rules or you get out of my study? Because he had to show he had to be able to show whether this worked or not, and if people aren't going to follow it yeah, he met him. He's a lovely man. Yeah. So that was like a whole food, plant based diet and the water and particular foods that were helping him. So that's really good. SPEAKER A Before we go on, I think you're going to ask me about the heart. One of the things I learned very early when I was learning more about psychology was someone who was a heart specialist did a talk for us, and he was saying that stress is a huge factor in causing blockages of the arteries. And that because it's like having racing cars in your veins, because the adrenaline and cortisol adrenaline speeds up the flow of blood. And what it does, it knocks cells off the wall, and now you get a build up that causes blockages. So I suspect he was probably a very stressed man, not just physical stress, but probably emotional stress or mental stress that would have caused contributed because he was such a chronic case. So it's amazing what can happen when we're stressed. SPEAKER B And so what you're saying, you're talking about the mind body connection now, and in this program, we like to look at the four aspects of what makes up a human being mental, physical, spiritual, social. All of those things play a role in making us well. Or if they're neglected or not used, then it contributes to not being well. SPEAKER A Well, a prime example is the heart brain connection, because the heart talks to the brain more than the brain talks to the heart. SPEAKER C Oh, really? SPEAKER A Yes, which is interesting. And what happens is every movement, every flutter of the heart gives the brain a message. And this is why, when the brain receives messages and it thinks the heart's being compromised at all, what it will do is flood more adrenaline. It kicks in the adrenals, your survival brain, the part of the brain that says, we've got to survive, and it actually works against itself at that point because adrenaline is going to get the heart up, race the heart, and it spikes and it's uneven. The beating becomes uneven. You're getting this sort of effect, and we want this effect. We want it to be really even. Particularly the beats between the heart need to be even. So you use that connection and they find that if you calm the heart rate, you actually help the survival brain to shut the adrenals off and to then allow the whole system to coordinate again. It's what we call homeostasis. So we have been given an amazingly wonderful ability to balance the whole system purely by calming the heart. SPEAKER B Now, you're going to show us how to do that? Yes. SPEAKER A All right. SPEAKER B I'm very interested in one of the. SPEAKER A Things they found, that with the heart, that when you put your hand on your heart, and this is now in research, when you cover the heart with the hand, it actually calms the heart. Okay, so put your hand there helps. And then what I get people to do is to breathe into the hand space and into the lungs. Most people either shallow breathe or start from the bottom, work from the diaphragm up, but this is the reverse. It's like feeling the heart there, and then you're just breathing in and into the lungs. SPEAKER B Why don't we have the people tuning in to join us in this with it actually feels lovely. SPEAKER A Just putting your hand it actually feels. SPEAKER B Lovely from that moment. SPEAKER A Well, what happens when you have someone, you have a shock or distress? Often people go like that. They grab the heart. SPEAKER B They do. SPEAKER A So the whole system is geared to automatically do things like that. SPEAKER B Isn't that interesting? We just do it instinctively, not even understanding. SPEAKER A So if you do a slow breath in, just breathing in slowly, I try and get people through the nose, if their nose isn't blocked, and then slowly out through the mouth, just like breathing through a straw. Do that to about the count of five in, count of five out. What happens? The heart rate stops spiking and jagged. And what it does, it starts to do this and once like that, just within. SPEAKER B Wouldn't take long. SPEAKER A One, two, three of those breaths. It will do it. And this is where they have scientifically hooked people up to equipment, EEG machines and things to monitor and have a look at what happens when you change the way you breathe. SPEAKER B Isn't that incredible? SPEAKER A And it's become a very important point that I found in helping people, particularly with trauma, because most people with stress and trauma, their heart rate is doing 100 miles an hour and it's all over the place. SPEAKER B Yes. SPEAKER A And the brain cannot focus and settle when the heart's like that. SPEAKER B So should we do this a couple of times? We can do this. Let's try it. I mean, I'm very keen to actually. Well, off you go. So I've got to be careful I don't touch my microphone again. That's okay on the heart. And then we're just going to breathe in for five. SPEAKER A Yes. Just slowly breathe. SPEAKER B What's? Your microphone. SPEAKER A Get your stethoscope out and see if it's working. SPEAKER B Okay, so you're going to count us in and count us out. SPEAKER A That's okay. SPEAKER B Breathing. We're breathing in through the nose of five. Slowly feeling it here and going in and going down. So you feel it here. SPEAKER A Just do the one. SPEAKER B Just do the one. SPEAKER A All right, so off you go. 12345. And then just pursing the lips like through a straw. 12345. SPEAKER B Feel fantastic. SPEAKER A Yeah. And then if you do that a couple of times, you'll find your whole system will calm and you'll actually align. We have a three brain system, including the survival mechanism, that will settle and focus back in the present and you'll be back in balance. The emotions will settle. If you're anxious person, the fear will dissipate. SPEAKER B Yes. Beautiful. Thank you for that. And for those tuning in, I hope you've tried it and I hope you will. And at any time when you're feeling stressed or even not, perhaps, sometimes we feel nurture. SPEAKER A Put your hand over your heart and just do a few breaths and be kind to you and think of pleasant things because the brain all like, that lovely. SPEAKER B Yeah. That's been very helpful and inspiring. I've got to say that, John. Absolutely inspiring. To think that a person with all of those ailments, not just one emphysema, would be bad enough and never mind congestive heart failure and diabetes and diabetes and so on, so those altogether and for him to be not able to walk across the room and then become so well, is just an amazing thing. And just with such simple things, I mean, I say simple and they are simple, but challenging to change because that's our biggest thing. Habits can be something that really gets hold of us. But did he have it sounds like he had support. He went to a church, so I guess he had friends and a support network there that would have played a role. SPEAKER C Yeah, the friends at church were very supportive. His wife was definitely there to make the foods he's supposed to eat. But I don't think she really did it for herself. It wasn't like she lost a lot of weight or anything. SPEAKER B All right. But she did it for him. And that's huge, isn't it? Because looks that's another thing that impacts on our health is the social aspect of our lives. And people who are the most socially isolated have between two and five times the death rate of those with close social ties. SPEAKER A Very depressing. SPEAKER B So we're very complex beings and all of these things have an effect, even the spiritual part, which would have been playing a role. Perhaps he didn't even realize that. But it does because there's been about something like 1200 studies on the relationship between spirituality and health in the last number of years and they all show positive results. Absolutely amazing. Yes. I went to a conference on spirituality and health and it was an absolute eye opener. And spirituality does things like it helps the immune system and brings more blood flow to the front part of the brain. The executive part, where we're focused in presence yes. Where the will is and spirit. SPEAKER A More motivation. SPEAKER B Yes. SPEAKER C Better outcomes. Surgery. SPEAKER B And when you've got all four going together, there's a synergy. It is, yeah. It's greater than the sum of the parts. So when you've got them going together, you get some amazing, absolutely amazing outcomes. SPEAKER A It is. I'm very impressed with this man and his outcome because it took a lot for him to reverse it, to start that journey out. SPEAKER B Yes. SPEAKER A Particularly in the condition he was in. His brain would not have been very coherent or working well. SPEAKER C Oh, no. And after he went on the program and we would see him, his eyes were wide open, he started studying the Bible a lot more and really he got back his brain. SPEAKER A Yes. See, with those conditions, he would have lacked oxygen in the brain. Therefore the brain couldn't function well and focus. SPEAKER B No. And that's right. You get sick and then you don't have so much ability to do the things you need to do to be well. So fortunately his wife at least was supportive of what he needed to do even if she wasn't following the programme. And it's a shame that we have to have something like that happen to be sufficiently motivated to do something about our health and wouldn't it be good if we could do it sooner? And Jenny, I think you talk sometimes about baby steps. Yes. SPEAKER A We really need to just focus on that initial goal and do what we can do because that will give us momentum to do the next step and the next step. The brain can cope with little chunks but it can't cope with looking at the whole lot. And that's probably what he did. He just saw his health and it was horrible and there was nothing he could do about it. But you gave him a purpose, but you gave him steps to do and once he focused on go that little bit more, that little bit more, it makes a huge difference. SPEAKER B Yes. So I would definitely encourage people tuning into even if you're not sick, even if you haven't got anything really bad going on, why not get in before that happens and just prevent that? Because it's just not a nice place to be, is it? When horrible, when you're that sick and you might even lose hope and so on. But if you do have some health concerns, and it may not be the diseases that we've talked about, but if you do have some health concerns, then definitely just do something, do something that's going to make you better. Well, I don't know that we would have answered all your questions today, but if not, you can contact Dr. John Clark or Jenifer Skues by emailing [email protected] And to watch our programs on demand or download our fact sheets, visit 3abnaustralia.org.au and click on the watch button and so you can view this program again or other programs. And remember, today is the first day of the rest of your life. God bless you all.