Heidi Strickland-Clark

Two days later and I’m now Nordic Walking qualified! Never has walking been so critiqued and analysed! I did find it all highly amusing on day one. Got a fit of the giggles several times and thought I might get told off for being naughty. I managed to get away with that embarrassment, even though the sentence ‘take your paws off’ sent me into a ridiculous contortion with tears running down my face.

(paws are the little shoes you put on the end of your poles when you are walking on concrete ground) 

I did enjoy myself though. For once on a course I was outside. I loved it! I love being out and getting some weather thrown at me. And I found it strangely addictive. Everytime we were sent off to practice ‘planting’ or ‘releasing’ or just walking. I was either in much discussion with fellow walker Russell from Essex discussing how, when, where ….if (!) we’d use this new skill. Or getting some good head space to sort my thoughts out for all that has gone on this past month in terms of the new stuff I’ve learned.

I met some very nice people too, Eleni from Cyrpus and Itzsik from Israel who both kept me from losing the plot completely as I kept thinking how far they had traveled to do this course and didn’t want to ruin it for them with me being disruptive.

Nordic Walking may look a little odd at first. Walking with poles that is. But it really did make a difference to how you walked, how much effort you put in and how much ground you traveled. I will be running a few small, free trial sessions over the next few weeks if you are interested in giving it a go. Drop me a line if you are!

All courses are now over for a while! I have a weekend of my own this week coming. Will probably be writing my first ION assignment!

If this had been the number of books we’d been recommended to buy / read/ seek out this weekend at ION then I probably could have coped. However, it wasn’t. My book list is now huge! My Amazon Wish list looks like a Dr’s library and my credit card has taken to hiding at the back of my purse! Thankfully given that some of us had already undertaken some training with ION this year we got one of the books as part of enrolling. Good job too! Retail price is £150!

The first weekend has been an eye-opener. 95’ish students undertaking year 1 of a three year course. 4 of those are men. I’ll leave you to make your own mind up on that one!

We’ve had lectures on citations and referencing, how to reflect on your academic experience (easy…’hot’, ‘uncomfortable’ and ‘long day’ spring to mind) cells, functional medicine, discussions on what is health?  We’ve discussed assignments, essays, how we learn questionnaires and February exam dates. I also had the dawning realisation that I can’t wing this, leave it to the last minute and hope to do OK anymore! 20 hours a week is expected….better get planning my diary!

If we’d been in a lecture theatre like this …

all would have been good with the world.

But we were in one of these.

Sized for 5ft 4 inch students, with short legs and small bottoms. Not 5ft 10 inch fidgeters with wider beam than seat width…

Thankfully I’ll be outside and walking tomorrow! Looking forward to it!

So, fourth weekend into my continuing education and what a 4 1/2 days I have in store!

I am about to embark on a three year Nutritional Therapy Diploma with ION and following a year of Science Access courses and exams I am starting big school proper this weekend! Seminars will be one weekend a month, but the week prior to that weekend there will be a 3 hours tutorial. For me that’s going to be this evening. Many of our Science Access students are in the same tutorial group so am really looking forward to seeing them again after the summer.

Tomorrow and Sunday we will be at Birkbeck University of London all day so brain really needs to wake up. I need to be a much more organised student as I have a bit of a reputation for being a ‘last minute’ madam. Proved by the fact that I have only just finished my Initial Assessment work that was set some weeks ago and needs to be handed in to tomorrow. This however has worked in my favour as knowledge gained from the past two weekends has been used in my essay on the ‘eatwell plate’. It’s not all by the skin of my teeth folks!

Not happy that my weekend is already choc-a-bloc, I am then off on a two day course to Olney near Milton Keynes to train to become a Nordic Walking instructor. Nordic Walking is a fitness based walking program. My fellow Personal Trainers, Strength & Conditioning coaches and Fitness Professionals will probably scoff at walking for exercise. However, it works for me on several counts, 1) I really like being outside. Running Fit Camp has made me realise this. 2) There is an exercise program for everyone, not everyone wants to train with weights, do classes or yoga or Pilates. 3) Most people can walk…what great way to get people back into fitness before you move them on to take on a more challenging activity.

So, full review and update after the weekend finale of a month of courses!

Dr Nigel Plummer knows a lot of stuff and as such ran over on the first day, so came back on Sunday to give us his second presentation. It was all about the bugs we carry around with us on our skin, in our mouths, digestive tract and guts. Fascinating!

For instance did you know that whilst it’s already staggering that we are made of about 100 trillion cells, our intestines carry about ten times that amount of microorganisms. If that’s put you off your breakfast, it shouldn’t! It’s a really useful relationship we have with them and they keep us healthy and alive!

Nigel spoke to us about IBS, bowel disorders including cancer, auto-immune diseases and allergic reactions. All linked to how healthy our guts are, how populated with the good bacteria we are and how well we feed them (tip: fibre is really important! they like that)

More important trivia: How much mucus do we secrete each day? 10 litres! Impressive eh?

Even more important trivia: The microflora we carry around with us, weighs about 3lbs in weight, the same as the liver.

Keeping your microflora in tip-top condition is helpful for good health (its the largest immune organ) and can be topped up with pro-biotics in capsule form each day. (tip: Always take your probotics with food.)

Nigel’s research company is just about to present some staggering research results that showed how newborns who were given probiotics from birth showed a 60% reduction in risk of getting allergies like eczema and subsequent asthma.  This is all from a small probiotic supplement each day.

Phil’s second day covered topics on hormones, keeping your thyroid healthy, how to test for thyroid disfunction, and what to do to help yourself fix it. He spoke about the trouble with excess estrogens in the foods we eat, the cosmetics we use, the water we drink. Excess estrogens accounting for many of the problems we’re seeing today like the feminisation of males (moobs and infertility), the early onset of menstruation in young girls, excess fat around the hips and thighs and on and on it went!

It wasn’t just about estrogen either. Testosterone took a battling and we learned what decreased it, what increased it and why it’s so important in heart health for men. There was discussion on B12, sun light and growth hormone, sleep and vitamin C, pre and post workout nutrition and sex. We did get it all!

It was a fascinating two days. Loads more to tell than I can blog about. So will come back with some specifics over the next few weeks. I think a short article on IBS and digestive problems will be the first one up!

So, this weekend Vida and I found ourselves at the very lovely Palm Hills Hotel in Bracknell (they say Ascot, but I don’t think it’s quite Ascot!). We were booked in for a two day seminar with both Phil and Dr Nigel Plummer a micro-biologist and generally nice person who knows rather a lot about fish oils and gut micro flora to name but two things!

Over 100 people were at the event and we did manage to get ourselves front row seats. Ideal for both hearing and seeing but also being near the open doors out to the garden so we had a nice balmy breeze blowing in to cool us.

The first day covered topics on attaining true health. Not just focusing on hammering out the reps in the gym or the miles with a run. But attitude, love and companionship and stress levels all accounting for how successful we’ll be in the journey to health and fitness. Don’t expect good health and physique if your emotions are in turmoil, your relationship is bad and you’re harbouring bitter thoughts was the basic message here.

He spoke of how our beliefs of our own ability to succeed can be effected by those people surrounding us. If they are negative, success will be harder, if they are rooting for you, success will be easier. Sounds obvious right? So why do we hang around with energy sappers and negative people in our lives? How many facebook ‘friends’ do you have who are ALWAYS posting how crap their lives are, how it always happens to them? I deleted mine sometime ago! Anyhow he played us this interview of Tony Robbins talking about how Sly Stallone got Rocky made … if you have a spare 9 minutes, do listen to it. It’s a brilliant story of sheer bloody mindedness. Very inspirational.

Tony Robbins on Sly Stallone

Dr Plummer spoke about cytokines (immune system cells) at length and whilst most of it was fascinating I do remember quite clearly that he confirmed that women really do feel pain more than men! I think that was after trying to convince us Man-Flu is worse than real flu…appeasing us all I feel! He spoke too at length about inflammation and how it affects us internally leading to disease like atherosclerosis and obesity and IBS to name but a few. Apparently 20% of UK adults suffer with IBS. And 30% of 30 years olds, 40% of 40 year olds and 50% of 50 year olds are suffering with undetected Helicobacter pylori – the most common stomach infection decreasing acid production in the stomach. Left undetected this can lead to ulcers and stomach and gut problems. Looking after your micro flora in your guts will help with this. More on this later.

Phil spoke again, this time on blood, looking at blood to see potential health problems and how to improve it. How to oxygenate blood more to prevent disease and illness and life style changes to improve health. Like avoiding cosmetics and toiletries with parabens, avoiding microwave ovens, having mercury fillings removed , avoiding sun creams and getting sun on your skin for the vital production of vitamin D and increasing your vitamin C levels, the list goes on.

Nigel Plummer’s final presentation for the day was about the beautiful anti-inflammatory benefits of fish oil. Fish oil is really key to good health. It is vital in the prevention and help with depression, mood control, heart and circulation health, metabolic systems, reducing allergic reaction, brain function…on and on it goes. We’re all deficient in Omega 3 fats and are over saturated with Omega 6s (we get these from polyunsaturated fats and should be cutting them right back)  We need to readdress the balance and take a good quality, pharmaceutical grade fish oil to see health benefits. A supplement for everyone. Children, adults and the elderly.

Oh I could go on. There was more, way more. But that’s day one for now! Day two coming up ….