Month: August 2011

Let me preface this article by clarifying that I am not an anti-alcohol crusader. In fact, I just recently posted my recipe for the world’s best limoncello and also wrote an article about why you can still drink even if you are trying to get fit.

Each of us has to come to our own conclusions about alcohol and figure out how much is the right amount. For us. Not for anyone else, because we are all unique individuals.

I can only judge me, and I know I used to drink too much. No question. I would drink almost every night and would not stop until I was wasted. I even got a DUI back in the day.

That DUI was a wakeup call — sort of.

After the DUI, I quit drinking for 90 days — court-ordered. Surprisingly to me at that time, I had no problem not drinking, even though I thought I would. I guess I took it as a challenge.

(Keep in mind that I am one of those people who follows the rules. I may not agree with the rules, but I always try to follow them, because I don’t want to suffer the consequences. This means I probably drive slower than I need to, pay more taxes than I have to, and generally miss out on some stuff that people who live looser and freer enjoy, but so be it. I prefer a more predictable life.)

After the 90 court-ordered days of sobriety were up, I went back to drinking, but not as much, and never when I was going to be driving. (Well, unless I was driving a golf cart. I narrowly averted disaster one day on the golf course while engaged in a cart race while driving backward. My cartmate ended up getting stitches in his head after he fell out….)

When I moved to Texas, I got into the local music scene, which meant I was spending a lot of time in bars with people who liked to get hammered, so ….

Fortunately, beyond the incidents described above, I never injured anyone or got into any kind of trouble from drinking.

But in the mid-2000s, when my doctor put me on a cholesterol medication that messed with my liver, that is when I quit drinking completely for 18 months.

So, honestly, while maybe professional I should have, I never came to any great epiphany about my consumption of alcohol. I quit because I felt my medical condition required it, and you know what? I enjoyed so much being able to drive home from the shows at night without worrying about cops in my mirror, that even now that my condition is resolved and I’ve hopped off the wagon, I don’t over-consume when I’ll be driving, and I often don’t consume any alcohol at all when I’m out. Saves me a ton of money, too.

Do I have as much fun as I used to? Nope. But I figure I’ve been there, survived that, no need to push the envelope, knowwhatimean?

How about you? Do you drink too much? Only you can decide. But maybe this questionnaire from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism can help.

The questionnaire is only 10 questions. There is a whole long assessment process, but if you simply answer the questions honestly and take a good hard look at the results, you should gain some insight into your drinking habits.

Maximum score is 40, and the higher your score is, the more problematic your drinking may be. I scored a 7. How did you do? What does that tell you about your relationship with alcohol? Is it time to make some changes?

I remember when Jim Fixx died. You may not, so here’s a little about him. (You can read a short article about Fixx at Wikipedia.)

Jim Fixx is widely credited as being one of the pioneers of fitness. He started running at age 35, when he was overweight and a two-pack-a-day smoker. Ten years later he had lost 60 pounds, was smoke-free, and had written a best-seller about running.

Seven years after that, at the age of 52, Fixx dropped dead of a heart attack after a run.

This happened in 1984, and many people jumped on a bandwagon that claimed Fixx’s death proved that running is bad for you. There were even jokes circulating about it.

But what Fixx’s death was really displaying was the difference between fitness and health.

“Fitness” describes your body’s ability to do physical things, like running, lifting heavy objects, moving without pain.

Jim Fixx was a fit guy. He could run for miles. He was in shape.

But he was not healthy. The autopsy revealed that atherosclerosis had blocked one of Fixx’s coronary arteries 95%, a second 85%, and a third 70%.

Fitness does not necessarily lead to perfect health. There are always past behaviors, hereditary tendencies, and environmental factors that can bring disease to anybody, even the most fit people.

But you can severely lower your risk profile by getting into — and staying in — good shape.

I’ve witnessed this with my own body during my quest for fitness.

As I lost weight, I saw my blood pressure drop to normal, allowing me to stop taking two blood pressure medications my doctors had prescribed. I watched my bad cholesterol and triglycerides decrease drastically, and my good cholesterol increase dramatically. Pain I used to feel is now gone. I can run and climb steps without getting out of breath.

And all that increased fitness has led me to better health, lowered my risk of heart attack, cancer, and a host of other ills.

But I still struggle with my blood-sugar level. It’s down from where it was, but still borderline and doesn’t seem to be getting any lower. And this is happening in the face of the fact that I severely — and I do mean severely — cut back on consuming anything with added sugar about 18 months ago.

I haven’t given up looking for the answer to that health issue, but it’s there, even though I am more fit than I’ve ever been.

So fitness is one thing, health is another.

I often tell people that I may not outlive them, but it won’t be because I didn’t try.

How about you? Would you rather go out fighting, or lie on your deathbed, wondering why you thought everything else in your life was so much more important than getting fit?