Published on: 26 September 2022
Last Updated on: 27 September 2022
Weight lifting is a good exercise with numerous benefits to physical and mental health. Weight lifting promotes blood circulation, aids metabolism, and leads to healthy and stronger bones.
Weightlifting can cause some soreness which is expected. However, back pain can be prevented through a proper weightlifting routine. Continue reading to learn about the appropriate weight-lifting routine to prevent back pain.
What To Do To Prevent Back Pain During Weightlifting:
1. Stretch Before and After Your Workout
Tight muscles are susceptible to injuries, which can be avoided by warming up. A 5 to 10-minute walk on the treadmill or riding a stationary bike will relax the tight muscles and improve blood flow.
The more relaxed the body muscle, the more you can get out of weightlifting and the lesser the risk of injuries. Post-workout stretching reduces soreness, aids recovery, and maintains good posture.
2. Be Aware of Your Posture
One of the best ways to avoid back pain is to watch your posture in everything you do. Keep up with the neutral spine no matter how heavy you are lifting. The neutral spine allows your back and neck to be exposed to less stress and strain and engage your core and leg muscles.
Do not slouch your shoulder when lifting weight as it will bend your spine and stress your muscles and backbone. You can enlist the help of others if you can’t monitor your posture during weightlifting.
3. Breath
People often believe that holding their breath when lifting weight will enable them to lift more. Sadly, holding your breath only damages your muscles because it deprives them of the essential element required for survival — Oxygen.
When you hold your breath, your muscles become tensed, strained, and vulnerable to injury. Instead of completely holding your breath, practice this; breathe out (exhale) when lifting the weight and breathe in ( inhale in) as you release the weight.
4. Start With Lightweight
How much weight you can lift and for how long depends entirely on your spine. The stronger your spine, the more you lift. It is vital to start with a small weight and work your way up. Frequent practice with lightweight will strengthen your spines.
Once you master lightweight and the basics of the neutral spine, you can make a smooth and gradual transition to heavier weight.
5. Don’t Over Push Your Body
Pushing your body beyond a certain point can lead to a severe injury. So, while you lift, learn to listen to your body, stop when it hurts and investigate the cause and source of the pain.
Apply ice to the affected area immediately to reduce swelling and capitalize the healing process when in pain. However, if the pain persists, talk to a professional.
6. Wear a Belt
Wearing a belt while lifting weight is advisable, as the belt supports your spine and protects you from a back injury. It also saves you from a back injury, strengthens your core, increases intra-abdominal pressure, and maximizes body energy.
7. Rest
Over-exerting your muscles will deprive your muscles and bones of the necessary healing period. Weightlifting causes a tiny tear in the muscles; these tears are necessary for the growth and adaptation of the muscles. Which needed time to heal.
To avoid pains and over-exerting your muscles and spine, you can switch to exercises like aerobics, and yoga. If pains persist though, you may want to check out osteo Warinma for a long-lasting solution.
Arnab is a professional blogger, having an enormous interest in writing blogs and other jones of calligraphies. In terms of his professional commitments, He carries out sharing sentient blogs.
You might have heard the term “functioning alcoholic” and wondered what it even means. Then, you might be searching for the meaning of the term and what it means to be a functional alcoholic. Then, let’s throw some light on the meaning of functioning alcoholics for your better understanding.
We often relate alcoholism with people who are unable to function properly in their lives. This stereotype of alcoholic individuals seems to be not accurate. This is because several individuals who are alcoholics seem to function properly and deal with their daily tasks properly.
If this is the case, then why are these individuals living a regular life while being alcoholic? While other groups cannot function properly because they are constantly under influence.
Therefore, in this article, we not only discuss what is a functioning alcoholic but also how they differ from those with more visible signs of alcohol dependency.
Perception About Individuals Battling Addiction
Your concept or perception of an alcoholic will change when you learn how a functioning alcoholic person works. They are capable of living or maintaining a normal life while battling alcohol addiction.
At one glance, you might not even know this person might have an addiction. Because they can do all their daily duties smoothly. Therefore, why was this term created, which means someone who is functioning even when dealing with addiction?
This challenges the common stereotype of an alcoholic person who lives an undisciplined and disheveled life. The term “functioning alcoholic” could be used to describe a person’s condition, but it is not officially recognized.
In the field of psychiatry, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) doesn’t recognize this term officially. However, several professionals use this term to describe a specific alcoholic person’s condition.
So, understanding the phenomenon of the functioning alcoholic is important. Because it helps identify people who are going through this hardship. When you recognize a functional alcoholic, you can help them get the right treatment, which will get them better.
Functioning alcoholics often hide their struggles with addiction while maintaining a normal facade. So, it becomes harder for you to recognize them and get them correctly diagnosed. Therefore, you must read this article to know how to identify one. This is so you can help them get the right treatment for recovery.
What Is A Functioning Alcoholic?
A functioning alcoholic seems to live a normal life while dealing with alcohol addiction. These individuals, you will observe, can do all the regular tasks and maintain a lifestyle without alcohol overriding their lives.
Even if they are always under the influence, they can hold down a job and other obligations. Not only that, but they can also excel in some areas of their lives without alcohol overriding their entire life.
Therefore, it becomes hard for you to identify these individuals. Because they look perfectly normal from the outside while dealing with addiction.
These individuals know how to keep their professional and social lives separate from their addiction. You see, functional alcoholics are aware of their alcoholic addiction, which helps them hide it easily. They become skilled at hiding their shortcomings from the world.
However, this addiction of a functioning alcoholic does not affect anyone other than themselves. It does affect their own lives if kept unchecked in the long run. As they continue to hide their struggle with alcohol, it becomes much more troublesome as time goes on.
Functioning Alcoholics Live In The Grey Area Of Addiction
A functioning alcoholic lives in the grey area of addiction, where addiction coexists with competence. While they are functioning like a regular individual, they also hide their addiction from their friends, family, or colleagues.
So, they operate much more separately than an alcoholic consumed with addiction and a normal non-alcoholic.
So how will you recognize a functioning alcoholic when they are living just like any ordinary person? You see, functioning alcoholics often rationalize their drinking habits as rewards for their accomplishments.
So, if they can get their work done, they reward themselves. Again, if they do their duty towards their family, they will reward themselves with a drink.
Again, their coping mechanism for dealing with the stress of daily responsibilities is through alcohol. So, when they accomplish their responsibilities day-to-day, they reward themselves with alcohol.
But this facade of normalcy is fragile as they become more dependent on alcohol over time. As they start to deal with life problems with alcohol, this results in psychological issues.
Maintaining a long-term facade of alcohol addiction is not the only problem a functional alcoholic face but health problems, too.
High Functioning Alcoholism vs. Traditional Alcohol Use Disorder
Traditionally, you could identify an alcoholic person from their visible signs of dysfunction. These dysfunctional problems were frequent performance issues, relationship problems, and deteriorating health.
In contrast, high-functioning alcoholics may lead seemingly successful lives, masking their dependency behind a façade of competence. They may hold prestigious positions, maintain social connections, and even drink expensive wine without raising suspicion.
Despite their ability to keep up appearances, high-functioning alcoholics often deal with a significant internal struggle. They might spend considerable effort hiding the extent of their drinking from others and themselves.
This can involve elaborate routines to cover up the smell of alcohol and secret drinking sessions. Again, a functional alcoholic persistently worries about being discovered because of their addiction.
You will see that the stress of maintaining a double life can be extremely problematic in the long run. In the long-term, this coping mechanism with alcohol can only affect negatively both physically and mentally.
Along with the stress of hiding their addiction to alcohol and dealing with life’s problems, a functioning alcoholic is bound to break down at some point. This will lead to their worst fear of revealing their true nature.
It’s this dual existence that differentiates high-functioning alcoholism from other overt alcohol use disorders. Other alcohol disorders are more visible due to their impact on an individual’s life.
Recognizing The Signs of Alcohol Abuse
There are significant risks to being a functional alcoholic despite its outward appearance. Because their pattern of drinking can be more than seven drinks per week. This leads to health risks in the long term. Again, continuous dependence on alcohol to deal with life can have adverse effects on the person’s psychology.
From binge drinking episodes to the inability to stop drinking despite its negative consequences, these are some of the recognized risks of alcohol addiction. They may also experience withdrawal symptoms when trying to quit or cut back on alcohol consumption.
Recognizing signs of a high-functioning alcoholic can be challenging as they are good at hiding their addiction. Therefore, it’s essential to identify these individuals, get them diagnosed correctly, and treat them properly.
It’s important to note that these behaviors can be subtle and easily overlooked, especially when the individual is still managing to fulfill their personal and professional obligations. Over time, you will see that the consequences of high-functioning alcoholism become visible.
Be it strained relationships, personality changes, mental health issues, and physical health problems related to alcohol abuse. You will start to see its effects on a functional alcoholic.
Risk Factors and Consequences
Certain factors can increase the likelihood of high-functioning alcoholism, including genetic predisposition, environmental influences, and untreated mental health issues.
While they may avoid some of the immediate consequences associated with traditional alcoholism, such as job loss or legal troubles, high-functioning alcoholics are still at risk for severe health problems, including certain cancers and mental health issues.
These health problems can include liver disease, heart disease, and neurological impairments that may not become evident until later in life. The psychological consequences are equally concerning, potentially leading to depression, anxiety, and other psychiatric disorders that can deteriorate the quality of life.
Moreover, high-functioning alcoholics may face social consequences over time, such as eroded trust in relationships, marital strife, and a gradual withdrawal from social activities as they prioritize alcohol over personal connections.
Despite maintaining a veneer of normalcy, the cumulative effect of these risk factors and consequences can lead to a tipping point where the individual’s ability to function at a high level is compromised.
It is crucial to recognize these long-term risks and understand that the lack of immediate, visible consequences does not diminish the urgency for intervention and treatment.
Seeking Support And Treatment For The High Functioning Alcoholic
Addressing high-functioning alcoholism requires a comprehensive approach involving medical professionals, support groups, and rehab centers in Los Angeles specializing in addiction medicine.
Loved ones play a crucial role in encouraging their family members or close relatives to seek help, but it’s essential to approach the situation with empathy and understanding. Initiating this conversation can be delicate, as it often involves breaking through a wall of denial built up by the individual over time.
Friends and family need to be informed about the nature of high-functioning alcoholism, to offer non-judgmental support, and to avoid enabling behaviors that can perpetuate the addiction.
The process of seeking support often begins with an honest self-assessment or an intervention by concerned loved ones. This step is vital in helping the individual recognize the extent of their problem and its impact on their life and the lives of those around them.
Professional interventionists can be instrumental in this phase, providing the guidance needed to navigate what can be a highly charged situation. Once the individual acknowledges the need for help, the next step involves finding the right treatment program.
Treatment can range from outpatient therapy sessions to accommodate the individual’s work schedule. Or a more intensive inpatient program where you must take a temporary step back from daily responsibilities.
The treatment choice should be tailored to the individual’s specific circumstances, considering their level of addiction, personal responsibilities, and any co-occurring mental health conditions.
Throughout the recovery journey, ongoing support is essential for maintaining sobriety. Aftercare programs and sober living communities offer continued guidance and support, helping the individual to reintegrate into their daily life with new coping skills and a renewed focus on health and wellness.
Support And Treatment Facilities
Support groups like Alcoholics Anonymous provide a vital lifeline for individuals struggling with alcohol use disorders, offering a sense of community and understanding.
These groups facilitate peer-to-peer support and shared experiences, creating a space where individuals can speak openly about their struggles without fear of judgment.
Treatment facilities offer residential treatment or outpatient tailored programs designed to address the unique needs of high-functioning alcoholics, providing medical supervision during the withdrawal process and equipping them with coping strategies for maintaining sobriety.
These facilities often employ a multidisciplinary approach, combining medical treatment, psychological counseling, and behavioral therapy to address the complex nature of addiction. The programs may include individual therapy sessions, group therapy, educational workshops on addiction, and relapse prevention planning.
In addition to traditional treatment methods, some facilities offer holistic therapies such as meditation, yoga, and art therapy, recognizing the importance of treating the whole person.
The Importance Of Mental Health Resources
Recognizing that alcoholism is not solely a physical dependency but also a mental health problem is crucial. Access to more mental health resources, including therapy and counseling, can help individuals address underlying issues contributing to their alcohol use and develop healthier coping mechanisms.
These resources are vital in treating the emotional and psychological aspects of alcoholism, which often include stress, anxiety, depression, and other mental health disorders that may co-occur with substance abuse.
By providing a supportive environment for open discussion about mental health, individuals can gain insights into the emotional triggers that lead to drinking and learn new strategies for managing these triggers.
Therapy can also assist in repairing relationships damaged by alcohol abuse, rebuilding trust, and improving communication skills. In addition, counseling can offer guidance on how to establish a balanced life. You can set achievable goals and create a supportive network that fosters their long-term recovery.
Treatment programs need to integrate mental health services as a core component of addiction recovery, called dual diagnosis treatment. This integration ensures that individuals receive a holistic approach to their treatment, addressing all facets of their well-being.
As society continues to destigmatize mental health issues, the hope is that more people will feel empowered to seek the help they need without fear of judgment or stigma.
Ultimately, enhancing the availability and accessibility of mental health resources is a critical step in supporting the recovery journey of functioning alcoholics. Their lasting sobriety helps improve their mental health issues.
High Functioning Alcoholics: Is There Such A Thing?
High-functioning alcoholics can often seem to have it all together, balancing significant responsibilities while battling their addiction in silence.
Despite heavy drinking, they are typically individuals who seem to lead productive lives. They often excel in their careers, maintain social relationships, and uphold daily routines.
This can make it difficult is difficult for others and sometimes even for the individuals themselves to recognize the problem, as their success often masks the underlying issues.
We can help individuals struggling with high-functioning alcoholism by raising awareness and providing support. This will help them regain control of their lives and improve their overall life.
How to Help a Colleague (...Who is Also Recovering)
Helping someone in recovery from alcoholism is as simple as learning the signs and subtly helping.
But remember they are on a journey, not at the destination. Part of that journey includes being open about their lives but not praying too much. A casual “How are you doing today?” can go a long way.
Be Responsible Yourself First!
Help your co-workers make healthy choices by creating a clean, responsible environment.
Don’t go to work events where the primary focus is drinking, and don’t invite them to join if you do.
Be mindful of their limits; never encourage or force them to drink more than they feel comfortable with.
If they make the choice to leave an event because others are drinking too heavily, offer to accompany them.
Find Alternative Activities
Encourage them to engage in healthy activities, even if it is during office breaks. You can go for a walk with them at lunch or get involved together in a wellness group at work.
Not only do these kinds of activities help alleviate stress, but they also give your colleague something positive to focus their energy on.
Plus, showing that you’re willing to invest in their well-being as professionally appropriate helps build a stronger working relationship between the two of you and gives them an added source of support while they recover.
Do not Get Too Personal
But still, you need to draw the line and not become too personal with them. You should only keep any conversations limited to work-related topics unless they would like to share them with you.
Be mindful of their personal space as well because, in the end, it is their own recovery.
Supporting a colleague in recovering from alcoholism requires empathy, respect, and understanding.
By being a supportive colleague, you help to not only nurture their recovery but also help foster an inclusive and compassionate workplace. Remember, it’s the little things that mean a lot.
Conclusion
It’s crucial to understand that high-functioning alcoholism is a real and serious condition. When you acknowledge its existence, you take the first step towards addressing the unique challenges it presents.
With the right resources and support systems, you can improve functioning alcoholic individuals to live a life free from alcohol. You can find them the help they need to recover from alcohol dependency.
Therefore, you need to know about functional alcoholism and identify functional alcoholic individuals.
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Your health is the single greatest asset that you can ever possess. It can determine how successful you will be in business and whether you will live to achieve your lifetime resolutions or not. You should, therefore, never gamble with your health by failing to take due caution to lead a healthy lifestyle. As part of the good health practices that you should endeavor to keep in your life, being disciplined forms the foundation for ensuring that you safeguard your health. Here are 10 healthy habits that can help improve your health.
1. Observe your diet:
Your dietary habits have a direct effect on your health. Whatever you consume or fail to consume consequently affects your ability to lead a healthy lifestyle. When thinking about diet and its effect on your health, emphasis should be put on particular issues such as the kind of food you eat, eating habits or schedule, and the portions you consume. As part of the initiative to lead a healthy lifestyle and improve on your health, you should endeavor to consume a balanced diet in fair and well-distributed portions during breakfast, lunch, and supper. Your daily servings should comprise portions of proteins, carbohydrates, fats, vegetables, minerals, and water or fluids.
2. Exercise well:
Physical exercise forms the backbone of maintaining a perfect body physique. Well-structured physical exercises impart your body with numerous health benefits including helping keep your muscles active. Aerobic exercises can also help with cardiac health through the maintenance of a good distribution of blood across every organ including the skin. Well-focused physical exercises can also help in maintaining a perfect balance of certain physical attributes such as body weight and overall body shape. When thinking about exercises as part of your routine, you should endeavor to maintain a perfect balance between the different kinds of body exercises you have, including aerobic exercises and body-trimming exercises.
3. Slotting time for health check-ups:
Irrespective of whether you feel sick or not, health checkups are crucial when it comes to improving your health. Finding time to either visit a health facility for a health checkup or even utilize the Home Doctor Service for convenience when securing appointments with your nutritionist or doctor allows you to evaluate the progress you have gained so far in your bid to lead a healthy life.
4. Get sufficient sleep:
Your sleeping patterns do directly or indirectly influence how healthy you will be. Without sufficient sleep on a daily basis, you will stand to lose out on your productivity while detrimentally affecting your physical health. As a recommendation, your body needs not less than eight hours of uninterrupted sleep to maintain the right physiological condition for body growth. Lack of sufficient sleep compromises your immune system, thereby leading to vulnerabilities to disease conditions.
5. Meditate often:
Meditation is often disregarded when it comes to the observation of healthy lifestyles. However, research has shown that sufficient meditation on a daily basis does have physiological and mental benefits. Meditating sufficiently gives your body an opportunity to deeply relax, something crucial for your immune system. The practice is also crucial in helping control stress, anxiety, and other forms of emotional suffering that can take a toll on your health. Besides, meditating sufficiently helps in building mental awareness while improving your ability to control addictions.
6. Taking water, lots of water:
Staying hydrated is a crucial factor in maintaining your body's health. The human body is 60% water while all other crucial organs in the body such as the brain, lungs, kidneys, bones, and muscles are comprised of between 60 and 85% water. The only way to stay sufficiently hydrated is to take not less than 2 liters of water on a daily basis. To help nature this habit well, you should endeavor to drink water even when you do not feel thirsty.
7. Socialize effectively:
Being social, surprisingly, has a huge benefit on your health and can help much when it comes to your health improvement habits. Socializing with your friends helps brighten your moods through laughing and playing. This practice helps improve your mental capacity and general immune health through the production of certain hormones. Such hormones, when circulated in the body, help maintain a perfect physiological condition for a healthy life. Such a social life also helps keep away detrimental health practices such as stress and being frightened.
8. Cook for yourself more often:
Sometimes, it pays to give yourself an additional challenge when it comes to your diet. You may, therefore, prefer cooking for yourself rather than eating out. Hotel or restaurant-prepared food does not offer you much of the flexibility that you often desire. Cooking for yourself ensures that you observe the strict dietary habits that you so much need to lead a healthy lifestyle. Also, the experience of cooking in the kitchen gives you a positive mental challenge. It also serves as an opportunity for social development that is crucial for your general body health.
9. Have a proper schedule:
Whereas it may sound unbelievable, the kind of schedule you lead on a daily basis can directly influence your ability to live a healthy life. To enhance your health, you should endeavor to ensure that your day is well planned with activities being slotted rightly. Such planning comes in handy in helping keep away unwanted habits while also taking charge of your health. A properly planned schedule is the right platform that ensures that any health-based resolution you set in place is upheld and regarded accordingly.
10. Have a good interaction with nature:
Nature has an indirect way of helping keep your body healthy. Interacting with nature more often as part of your routine schedule gives your body an opportunity to experience some benefits. You should, therefore, endeavor to factor in much time to take a break from your office or home enclosures and have a nature walk. Any sightseeing events such as strolling down the forest and beholding trees and birds help your body to relax as much as possible.
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Heart disease is still one of the UK’s biggest killers and so it is incredibly important to be aware of cardiac risks and how best to take care of your heart health.
There are over 30,000 cardiac arrests each year outside of hospitals each year in the UK and shockingly few of the people who suffer these arrests survive to go home from the hospital. Current figures show less than 1 in 10 people who go into cardiac arrest outside of a hospital survive, despite the best efforts of paramedics and hospital doctors.
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Can seeking the help and advice of a private cardiologist reduce your risk of becoming just another statistic?
Keeping on top of your heart health
With such low survival rates for cardiac arrests across the UK, it is advisable to keep yourself as healthy as possible to avoid a heart attack in the first place. You may choose to visit a private cardiologist for regular check-ups to ensure that your heart is as healthy as possible and working at optimum levels.
Regular check-ups will not only give you the peace of mind that your body’s most important muscle is working to the best of its ability but it will also give your cardiologist to spot any changes should they occur. Spotting any changes to your heart’s normal rhythm can indicate problems and early diagnosis and treatment could prevent future cardiac arrests and ultimately save your life.
Treating symptoms early
Changes in your heart’s health can cause you to experience symptoms which a cardiologist will want to hear about. Symptoms of heart disease can be obvious, such as palpitations, pain, and discomfort, but they can also be subtle changes which increase over time.
Subtle changes in your heart’s health can be as simple as feeling breathless after physical activity. Many of us might put this down to aging and not being as fit as we once were. However, if there is a problem with your heart, causing your lungs to struggle too, then you will end up becoming breathless after simple tasks such as walking up the stairs.
Breathlessness, pain, and palpitations should always be investigated and a private cardiologist will often be your quickest route to a diagnosis and treatment. With such an important organ as the heart, time is of the essence. If you are suffering early symptoms of heart disease or other cardiac problems then the likelihood is that it will not improve by itself- you are going to need medical intervention. The earlier any problem is diagnosed then the more chance you have of making a recovery or receiving the treatment you need to prevent further damage to the muscles of your heart.
Avoiding Waiting Lists
While we are all very grateful that we have our fantastic NHS in the UK, often getting to see a specialist can involve a long wait on a list of possibly hundreds of other patients. This wait, while unintentional, can have disastrous consequences for your heart’s health.
Choosing to go to a private clinic can have you in front of a cardiac specialist within a fraction of the time that you may have to wait with the NHS. If your initial consultation ends in you requiring further tests then these will also be conducted quicker than with the NHS and you should receive your results much quicker. From there, treatment plans can be put in place to ensure that you don’t end up with further damage to your heart and a higher risk of cardiac arrest.
A private cardiologist can literally save your life before you get to the point that medical intervention is critical in keeping you alive. Early diagnosis and treatment are to avoiding serious cardiac problems in the future.
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