SOME of us may already be doing a good job at wrecking our heart, besides other organs in our body, but for the others who may not be as innovative and cunning, here are eight easy and simple ways to accomplish the job more efficiently and effectively.
- If you are not a cigarette smoker, start smoking or inhale as much secondhand smoke as possible. If you are, continue this very dangerous and expensive habit. Out of the 1.3 billion smokers around the world, one dies from smoking every 6.5 seconds. Smoking kills 5.4 million each year. This is projected to rise to 6.5 million by 2015, and 8.3 million by 2030. One billion will die from tobacco use in this century alone. Besides heart disease, smoking causes cancer of the lungs and other organs, besides causing emphysema and air-hunger. Secondhand smoke is no less a brutal killer. People who quit smoking lower their risk of heart disease to the level of nonsmokers in just 2 years and protect their loved ones from secondhand smoke.
- Binge daily, 3 times a day or more, on saturated animal fats like red meats (pork, beef, especially processed foods like bacon, hamburgers, ham, hotdogs, sausages, etc.), french fries, junk food, and foods with trans-fats. Do not eat any vegetables, fruits, nuts, oatmeal, bran, and other hi-fiber foods because these lower cholesterol, are good for our immune system, and lower our risk for cancer. Besides, these are healthy foods, good for our body. They will not damage but protect our heart, colon, brain, kidneys, liver, etc. So, stay away from Mediterranean diet and other health diets, and binge on fast foods and other unhealthy diet. Your aim is to wreck your heart (body, life) anyway.
- Throw away the scale. Just take in all the calories you can grab, especially carbohydrates (rice, bread, cookies, candies, ice cream, sweets, and many people’s favorite beverage, the mega sugar-loaded soft drinks, which I call the ‘liquid candy,’ the poisonous potion). Allow yourself to put on as much weight as possible. Forget about the gorgeous body curves, ladies. The fatter, the heavier, the faster we can damage the heart, and obesity will also give you the privilege of getting diabetes, heart stack, stroke, and even cancer. So, do not read food labels and learn about the calorie-fat-sodium-trans-fat contents. Just don’t watch your diet, because losing 10 pounds alone will lessen the risk for heart attack by 50 percent and help lower cholesterol, blood pressure, and the risk of cancer too. So, stay heavy. Fat is cute, anyway.
- Be a couch potato. Be lazy. Live a sedentary life. Do not exercise. Do not move a muscle, except the fingers needed to click on the TV remote control, as we gorge on junk food while watching the soaps, sports, or game shows, comfortable in a couch; or doing social media on your laptop or cell phone. Lack of exercise weakens not only our body but our heart and brain. Believe it or not, it also impacts our psyche. For those who are overweight, dieting and counting calories would be more effective with daily exercise in achieving the target more effectively. So, why exercise? It will only help bless you with a healthy body lengthen your life.
- Eat more salt. Don’t listen to your doctor. Add salt to everything you eat, even before tasting the food. Just keep on shaking. This will raise your blood pressure and cause damage to the arteries in your body, including those that supply blood to your heart. The higher the blood pressure, the greater the risk for stroke and heart attack. If you lower the salt intake, it will help lower your chances of developing high blood pressure, and among those already with hypertension, it will greatly help in maintaining a normal blood pressure. Eating a lot of salty foods also increases the chances of developing cancer of the stomach. For flavoring, go the natural way and use pepper, garlic, onion, oregano and other no-sodium food seasoning. But I want to warn you that this will NOT damage your heart.
- Sleep and rest as little as possible. The TV shows are exciting and worth the time. You can nap while you drive, anyway, and you can also snooze on the job. If you want to harm your heart, why even have rest and relaxation, which are simple and natural pleasures that are healthy. Those who lack sleep are prone to heart attack, high blood pressure, and stroke. These conditions and diabetes become harder to manage and control when sleep and rest are not adequate. Why even sleep? And if you are suspect to have Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA), do not have a Sleep Study, because this will clinch the diagnosis of OSA, and require CPAP to prevent you from holding your breath for a long time, hundreds of times at night depriving your brain, heart, and other organs of oxygen, and increasing your risk for high blood pressure, diabetes, heart attack, strokes, Alzheimer’s and even cancer. Remember, sleep is not important unless you want to be healthy and well.
- Do not pay attention to stress or depression. Both have adverse impacts on the heart, besides the mind and, actually, on the whole being. The earlier they are managed, the easier they are to cure. Stress and depression increase the risk for heart attack by more than 30 percent and also lead to weakened immune systems, which predisposes these people to other illnesses as well. So, why prevent stress and depression? Allow them to overwhelm and control you.
Almost 1.6 million people die from heart attack (or 3 every minutes), 136,000 from stroke, about 75,000 from diabetes, and about 263,000 from cancer each year.
Those seemingly effortless 7 steps are, indeed, very tempting. But since they are obviously dangerous alternatives that only guarantee sickness and misery, the more prudent and wiser “one-step” option is living a healthy lifestyle and growing self-reliant and happily to as close to a hundred or so.
However challenging and often frustrating growing older might be, the blessing of a long and fairly healthy life is a privilege. While getting old is a problem, growing old is a solution, in spite of all the aches and pains that come with the package. Life is tough, and more especially so for the seniors. Growing old is, indeed, not for sissies or the faint of hearts.
But let’s be realistic and face it, we’ve got only one other option. That option is to stop aging. And the only way to achieve that alternative is to die young. Not a palatable nor a more attractive alternative, indeed. Since we cannot control and direct the winds in our voyage through this sometimes-harsh ocean of life, we can at least, to quote a wise man, “adjust our sails,” and find happiness and peace during our journey and wherever fate takes us.
* * *
The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Asian Journal, its management, editorial board and staff.
* * *
Philip S. Chua, MD, FACS, FPCS, a Cardiac Surgeon Emeritus based in Northwest Indiana and Las Vegas, Nevada, is an international medical lecturer/author, Health Advocate, newspaper columnist, and Chairman of the Filipino United Network-USA, a 501(c)3 humanitarian foundation in the United States. He was a recipient of the Indiana Sagamore of the Wabash Award in 1995. Other Sagamore past awardees include President Harry Truman, President George HW Bush, Muhammad Ali and Astronaut Gus Grissom (Wikipedia). Websites: FUN8888.com, Today.SPSAtoday.com, and philipSchua.com; Email: [email protected].
