My health test results and how they are scaring me into action

I’ve mentioned a few times here on Girlgetstrong that a  while back I flew to California with a dozen or so other bloggers to meet the folks at Nutrilite and take a tour of their Center for Optimal Health.  Nutrilite’s known as the world’s leading vitamin, mineral and supplement maker and I was excited to learn about nutrition and supplements (like: is there a secret magic formula that can make us younger? Fitter? Slimmer?) but even more I looked forward to the opportunity to learn more about my body.

How so?

Well, Nutrilite offered us the chance to take part in a sample of the health testing they do on-site. They promised to send a full analysis of the tests to each of us by mail and I’ve just received my results, so I thought I’d share the whole story with you now. The good, the bad, and the ugly!

Down in California, Nutrilite experts first gave us an informative run-down on the basics of nutrition, Nutrilite’s organic farming methods, and their leadership role in preventative health. We listened to LA Sol soccer superstar Marta talk about how important proper nutrition and supplements are to athletes, to Micheline Vargas, a nutritionist who gave us the specifics on nutrition and to Sean Foy, a fitness expert who had us “running’ in our chairs (see photo on left) and showed us some other quick and easy exercises that those of us bloggers suffering from blogger’s butt could do in our chairs.

Then we were whisked upstairs to a room set up with a half dozen or so testing stations, each manned by a Nutrilite expert.

I felt a little nervous, wondering how my body would measure up. After all, I’m currently in the worst shape (yes, worst!) of the past four years, weighing in at my highest level since I had children (around 136 pounds where I’m usually at 126).  I also have only been running sporadically and have been taking a “break” (doesn’t that sound nice?) from Pilates for the last two months.  In short, not the best time to have my health check done if I want to feel good about myself, but then again probably the best time to shake me up a little and get me motivated again.

Despite my nervousness I still thought I’d probably come out of the health testing okay, because, well, I always have been lucky that way.  But still, you never know after you hit your 30′s and I can’t coast on luck forever. I know one day it’s all going to catch up with me – after all, I can’t run as fast as I used to.  Getting and staying in shape is a little lot more work now.  And of course it was possible the health check up might turn up something dire, or at the very least some warning signs of dire things to come.

Blood Pressure

First I had my blood pressure taken (just like the blogger in the photo on the left) and there I felt pretty confident.  I’ve always had low blood pressure which doctors tell me (a bit too enthusiastically) is “great!”

I’m not sure I’ve ever agreed that it’s so “great” when all my life any hot / stuffy environment makes everything swim before my eyes and my vision goes dark and I start to swoon like some silly woman in an old fashioned romance novel (and rats, there’s never – not once – been a hot man waiting to catch me!). But the doctors constantly assure me how healthy my blood pressure is, so I guess dizziness can be a good sign after all. Who knew!?

With a smile, the Nutrilite technician took my blood pressure. My result was 116/73. A desirable result is about 119/79 and anything higher (from 120-140 over 80-115) is classified as pre-hypertension. Results that are even higher are classified as severe hypertension. Because mine was lower, it was classified as desirable and I was once again congratulated.

Upper body strength

Next I was off to test my grip strength,  which is as simple as it sounds. You can see in the photo that I’m holding onto a strange looking instrument and I was asked to squeeze as hard as I could while dropping my arm from a raised position down to my hips.  I did the grip test twice for each hand.

My result: I could squeeze 83 kilograms.  For women aged 30-39 anything above 73 is excellent. (123+ for men)

Okay. So far, so good. Since I’ve never worked on my grip during exercise, I figure the great result is due to chasing around and trying to grab my four kids after they’ve done something naughty… not really sure there’s any other explanation. But it’s nice to know I can catch kids with the best of them!

Just when my confidence level was rising and I was thinking that this health testing session might not be so bad after all, things went downhill. Fast.

Body Composition

I walked over to the next station, where a sweet teen-aged male blogger was having his body fat tested.  Curious, I listened in on the result.

Big mistake.  His body fat was six and a half percent, which the Nutrilite expert told me (in awe) was pretty much NO fat at all.  Hmf.  I’m not a teenager, not a male, and I definitely HAVE body fat.  When I giggle, my belly fat giggles back -  you know what I mean? Still, I kept a smile on  my face. I couldn’t be that bad, right?

Wrong.

My result: 23.3% body fat.

Gah! I flashed back to Nutrilite fitness expert Sean Foy’s earlier chat with us where he showed us a plastic model of 1 pound of fat.  It wasn’t pretty. In fact, it was down-right revolting looking.  To think I am almost one-quarter composed of fat. That’s 136 divided by 4….um….almost 34 pounds of fat!!! YUCK!

Immediately, I FELT fat and heavy. (Do you ever feel that way? Is it just me? I feel that way before my period too….)

The technician told me I wasn’t that bad, but I think he was just trying to make me feel better because on the results chart the top range for a 30-39 year old woman is 21%.  My result of 23% is the desirable percentage for a 50-59 year old woman!

Well, now I feel FAT and…OLD. Bah. Why did I come here again?

I got out of that chair as fast as I could.  Hopefully things didn’t get any worse!

Flexibility

On to the flexibility station.

At the flexibility station I took a photo of ultra-athlete Sarah Stanley while I waited my turn (how do I end up between a  totally fit teenaged boy and an ultra-athlete? I may have NO self-confidence left by the end of this!).

As you can see from the photo of Sarah on the right, the flexibility test involved sitting down with our legs stretched straight out in front of us. We then looked down and stretched our fingertips forward as far as we could.  Similar to reaching down and touching your toes.

I didn’t have the heart to listen in on Sarah’s result (I learned my lesson!) but mine was 40.5 centimeters.  Anything above 40 for my age range is excellent. Whew.  I’m okay on that one, probably because as a lapsed runner I’m religious about stretching to stay limber.

Height and Weight

Height: 5 feet 8 inches.  This is not good.  Why? Because I’ve already lost half an inch.  I used to be 5′ 8″ and a half. Visions of my late grandma flash in front of my eyes. She was only 4 feet tall. I wonder what her height was when she was younger?  Definitely time to take Pilates up again!

Weight: 136.  Ugh.  Something to work on for sure. I wasn’t too worried about it but now that I know that one quarter of those pounds are fat(!), I realize I have some serious work to do.

Bone Density

On to the last station, which was bone density.  Other than the body fat station this was the station I was most nervous about.  I’ve never had my bone density measured and because we’re always hearing about the epidemic of osteoporosis in women, visions of me shrinking to four feet with frail or broken hips flash through my mind.  I love running and I don’t ever want to give it up. I’d love to still run in my eighties, just like a lady I saw at the Victoria Marathon.  I want to be that lady in my eighties!

At this station, however, the results weren’t given to us.  I’m not sure if that was because it takes a while to analyze or if it was because we were in a hurry to get onto a bus and head over to  meet the AC Milan men’s soccer team, whom Nutrilite sponsors and was in town to play David Beckham and the LA Galaxy.

But since my results just arrived in the mail, I’ve now got them to share with you.

My result came back with a “medium” risk of osteoporotic fracture. That means that my “stiffness index” is between 10% to 25% lower than the normal value found in healthy young adults.

This is the result that scared me. A lot.  I know now that I cannot let my health coast on “luck” any more.  I need to eat better, be more active and make sure I’m consuming adequate amounts of both calcium and vitamin D to combat osteoporosis. (400-800IU of vitamin D3 and 1000 mg of calcium per day for my gender/age).

Basically, I’ve been scared into action.  So my goals now are to lose all or at least most of the ten pounds I’ve gained, and also to make sure I’m consistently active.  I probably should start some weight training, and I definitely need to remember to take my vitamins each day.

I need to make some changes, small steps, not drastic changes but lifestyle changes I can live with.

There was a sign posted in Nutrilite’s Center for Optimal Health and I had one of the other bloggers take a photo of me pointing to it. It says “Changing a few choices can set you on the road to optimal health.”

I’m going to write about the steps I’ll be taking to improve my health and lower my risk factors.  If you have any advice or comments I invite you to share them with me as I go through this journey. I’m hoping that by sharing my story on the blog I can perhaps help motivate other women who also may have risk factors and that being accountable here on Girlgetstrong might help me too.

~ Melanie