Dear Readers, old ones and new ones, when I publish this blog, I will have been in lock down for eight weeks in Spain, which has had one of the strictest lock downs in the world. Now the government is timidly opening up but still in a state of emergency and should the virus spike again we may be sent in doors again.
It is not new that we are all connected and perhaps with the Covid-19 we have all become more aware of just how connected we are and just how much we touch each other´s lives. So, the only way governments have known to protect us from this virus has been to disconnect us, while we wait for science to come up with a better solution.
I just hope that the solution does not make us more ill than the virus. As more families have economic struggles healthy eating may become a struggle and I must admit I have been surprised by the lack of healthy living advice from the Spanish government, at least there has been none in the newspapers, I don’t watch television, maybe it is there.
Moreover, I was astonished to learn from an article in the Spanish newspaper El Pais, that all provinces in Spain had decided to carry on giving school meals to the most vulnerable children who had already been granted with meal tickets, which is great, but the province of Madrid had decided to give that to fast-food chains, most of them to Telepizza.
No fruit was included. I mean…. What were they thinking?
Our immune system is our best ally now! We boost that by eating healthily, exercising, being kind and quieting our monkey mind. I have seen a lot of people on Facebook offering online gym classes and guided meditation for free and a few with cooking advice.
I have seen no comment on this in the Spanish newspapers it has mostly been concentrated on how much the government was boosting the economy and what we were not allowed to do.
What would have happened if they have told us what we were allowed to do? And not just what we were not allowed to do. I know it wasn’t much but maybe a more positive approach with some creative suggestions would have created less fear and less secondary effects?
People who are locked in apartments with no possibility of getting outside may suffer from a lack of sun, exposure to the sun is the most natural way to create vitamin D.
Lack of Vitamin D can give you: hair loss; bone loss (osteoporosis); getting infected more often, difficulties to heal wounds and depression, just to mention a few.
People need between 15 min and 2 hours of sun exposure every day to ensure a sufficient level of vitamin D in their body.
According to MD Lynn Mary Morsky, certified in family and sport medicine says that there are many different types of exercise and they all benefit you in a different way. So, lack of exercise will affect you in different ways and the combination of a lack of exercise and a sedentary lifestyle will significantly increase your risk of developing a long list of life-threatening conditions.
Also, I saw a small notice in the economist about how people who had been in isolation because of other outbreaks like SARS or Ebola showed symptoms of post traumatic stress, especially in the children.
In Danish we have an expression called hudsult, which literally means skin-hunger it is a condition where you lack being touched by another living being. When we are being touched by another living being (human or a pet) we release the hormone oxytocin, which among other things decreases stress and makes us more sociable.
Then you may ask what I can do to keep my health during the lock down, when I don’t have any control of what I can and cannot do.
Well, first find out what you are allowed to do and then find the most healthy way for you. Your exercise could be to dance every day. You can lift bottles of water or bags of flour or what you can find to strengthen your muscles. I have personally used elastic bands.
You can watch your alcohol consumption, you can google nutritional advice, you can find the window in your house with the most sun and make sure you sit there or workout there.
You can look for guided meditations or find a mantra that you like to repeat while you are doing household work here is one, I use:
I am, free of pain and illness, that I am.
You can create your own one I am, ………. That I am.
please stay connected,
With kindness and my best intentions
Ivalo
More to read: Vitamin D appears to play role in COVID-19 mortality rates https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-05-vitamin-d-role-covid-mortality.html
Post originaly posted on May 8 2020