Me: Spending Money on Health Books

I admit it, the other day, I cracked and watched Oprah when I heard that Dr. Oz, the author of You: Staying Young: The Owner's Manual for Extending Your Warranty was going to be on talking about diet, exercise and other ways to stay young. I had told myself repeatedly to stay away from these silly daytime TV shows but I figured I might learn something more about how to stay in decent health. And I did. The show gave basic advice for people on how to eat right, exercise and take various vitamins such as fish oil. It did seem like a repeat of most of the stuff one should know, however, a refresher course every once in a while is good and I even went as far as to order the book from Amazon.com (but still chastising myself for letting it get that far). The book was kind of interesting although not what I thought it would be.

I was hoping the book would focus mainly on a concrete diet and exercise plan but alas, it did not. It was more of a guideline for staying young with tips scattered throughout the book on what to trash from your refrigerator such as saturated fat, (duh) trans fat, corn oil, soybean oil and simple sugars.

There are a set of tests in the book to see how fit you are. First, push-ups, here I flunked because with my ICD, if I even do one push-up (normal is 11-14 for a woman, 20-24 for a guy in his forties), I pull the wires in my chest and it hurts like hell; next came sit-ups where I barely did 27 (normal for a woman in her forties is 20-24, for a man 25-29); and finally, the balance test where you stand on one foot, close your eyes, put your hands out to your sides and time yourself. Amazingly, I made it over 30 seconds which is considered good. Try it and see where you stand or fall, depending on how good your balance is.

So, a bit disappointed with the absence of a detailed diet plan and recipes, I decided to go purchase You: On A Diet: The Owner's Manual for Waist Management and was very pleased with the book. The book had easy breakfast, lunch and dinner plans along with snacks and included dinner recipes for gazpacho, various soups, salads, fish dishes and even whole wheat pizza. There was even a section on exactly what to purchase from the fast food places to meet the requirements of their diet. For example, at Wendy's, the authors recommend the Mandarin Chicken Salad, at McDonald's, the Fruit and walnut salad or Caesar salad with grilled chicken or at Taco Bell, the Spicy Chicken Soft Taco. Good to know if you travel a lot or are an over-the-road trucker.

The diet book is kind of uplifting and cheerful and does really get you thinking about a holistic way of approaching health. Again, I didn't see anything here that was groundbreaking but if one follows the advice in the You books, I imagine some degree of health improvements would occur.