Getting Healthy with Sadie

  How Practicing Gratitude Can Build Resilience   By Sadie Tollberg, Outreach Director   The Steven A. Cohen Military Family Clinic at VVSD, Los Angeles   Resiliency. The definition of resiliency is the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties, toughness. That is something that was taught during my time in service, but I do not know if this word was ever used.    In the military, you can feel like you are kicked over and over but it is not about getting kicked, it is about getting back up again and becoming stronger each time. I remember thinking that I was always given hard tasks and put in situations where I was scared, and I was not happy about it at the time. But those were some of my most character building and mentally and physically strengthening moments of my career. Gratitude came from really recognizing the small things and how important they are in the grand scheme of things. When I was deployed and there were days without water to...

How to Start I was on the kitchen floor crying when I started. Technically I’m not sure I ever stopped but this was what I will call the start of the true and real journey to better health. I had been meal prepping for 6 hours on my one day off a week and my feet were killing me. I had heartburn with flames licking up my throat and everything I ate pissed it off! This was the “rock bottom” people talk about. Maybe that doesn’t sound like rock bottom to you because you have been in worse situations but that’s the beauty of each story, we are all different.     I started dieting around age 13 or so. In 4 th grade I was started to be called chubby by other kids, but it wasn’t until about age 13 that I realized that I should look like Brittney Spears, and I must find the key to get that body. That summer I ran around my neighborhood and started eating salads. I just wanted to cut off my belly and then I’d be golden! Down the spiral I went to self-loathing and hating my body. It o...

"There’s no way I can live without tacos."  "You can’t convince me that I would be healthier if I gave up desserts." "Grandmas chicken noodle soup is my blood." OK OK I hear you! Let’s not focus on giving up the things that you love! Let’s figure out how we can incorporate them into your life but maybe make them a little bit more nutritious and full of healthier ingredient list! Sound good?  I hear tacos a lot. People love tacos. Me too! I grew up eating tacos from a corn shell with high fat meat, sour cream, cheese and maybe a sprinkling of lettuce. That was the tacos I had at my family‘s gatherings. I also grew up with Taco Bell tacos! When I became an adult and started to cook food for my own family I started experimenting with other toppings. I found out that there were lots of other exciting toppings to be had and some of them even unhealthier.  So when I started to shift to being healthier and didn’t know a lot about nutrition at this point, I was he...

 There is no Wagon to Fall off of!  You've heard the saying a million times. "I've fallen off the wagon." Sometimes its in reference to addiction or to a diet but it's a very familiar euphemism. But what if I told you there is no wagon. You cannot fall off of something that doesn't exist. Let's zero in on the analogy in regards to eating healthy or following a healthy lifestyle. Say you spent 3 weeks eating really well and meal prepped. You even got to the gym a few days each week! Way to go! But then a holiday weekend creeps up and you've been invited to a BBQ and there is so much food! You indulge and since you already screwed up, you might as well go out the next day and get yourself a treat. You deserve it! You've worked hard! And you know what, you also deserve a break, skip that gym date and you can pick back up in a few days. Uh oh, you've caught a cold and now you have no energy to eat well or go back the gym. Looks like the ship is sai...

What is dirty? What is clean? Picture this. You are walking through the produce aisle at your favorite grocery store and you see the most gorgeous peaches you have ever seen. They literally look like an advertisement! You immediately start thinking of all of the delicious things you can make with these peaches! You’ve got a parfait in mind and grandma‘s peach cobbler! How exciting will it be to bite into that juicy goodness?! Before you get to the peaches a woman walks up to the area and starts picking up each peach to inspect it and then setting it back down. She then reaches to her backside and scratches inside of her pants. With the same hand she goes back to those peaches and inspects them to find the perfect one! OMG!!! One of the most disgusting things a person can do! But unfortunately this is a society we live in! And what can you do but just pretend that this type of stuff doesn’t exist? Well I’m here to ease your mind a little bit on how to care for your produce and when to b...

 Preventable or Inevitable? Disease or Life Sentence?     When I started my journey into health care as a certified nursing assistant, I began in a skilled nursing facility which was state funded and essentially became a dumping ground for people to spend their last years on earth. It was a sad sad place. Understaffed, underfunded and full of people who were once full of life, laughter and purpose. It was almost too much to see this happening and perform my duties with dignity and respect under these conditions.      I noticed one thing that really stuck with me, how can the man in room 101 be 62 and barely able to function while his neighbor was 98 and still managing bingo every week? As I learned in nursing school to go through patient's history and understand the function of each medication I started to piece together that many of these things are in fact preventable and were caused by a hard/unhealthy life. I would see the calluses on the hands of ...