An ounce of prevention

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." Benjamin Franklin

I have heard this in the past and really thought that early detection was prevention. After learning that we are responsible for what happens to us I understand what it means a little better. Prevention is acutally doing something to stop a disease before it starts. The online dictionary defines it as:
1. To keep from happening: took steps to prevent the strike.
2. To keep (someone) from doing something; impede: prevented us from winning.
3. Archaic To anticipate or counter in advance.
4. Archaic To come before; precede.
Below I have added the definition of cure. The first three definitions all apply to health, it is unfortunate that there is not mention of avoiding disease in the prevention definition.

Yesterday I was driving behind a car that had two of the ribbon magnets on it. One was yellow for the troops and one was orange. This is the first time I had seen an orange one, it was for leukemia awareness. It was struck with the realization that as disease becomes more prevelant we are going to run out of ribbon colors before we are able to recognize all the diseases that people are passionate about finding a cure for. What does cure mean? According to the online dictionary you have 7 choices:
1. Restoration of health; recovery from disease.
2. A method or course of medical treatment used to restore health.
3. An agent, such as a drug, that restores health; a remedy.
4. Something that corrects or relieves a harmful or disturbing situation: The cats proved to be a good cure for our mouse problem.
5. Ecclesiastical Spiritual charge or care, as of a priest for a congregation.
6. The office or duties of a curate.
7. The act or process of preserving a product.
I think number one is what people are after when they are searching for a cure, unfortunately the cure usually comes in the form of number three, a drug. I used to think that a drug "cured" the problem.

If I had a headache and took a Tylenol then the tylenol "cured" my headache because it went away. Further, the reason I had the headache was because I was deficient in Tylenol. This logic seems funny, but if you believe the Tylenol "cured" the headache the logic works. In reality the Tylenol only masks the symtoms of the headache. To take this a step further the headache is only a signal your body is giving that something is wrong. You don't just "get" headaches. For me I was having daily headaches for two reasons: 1. I was dependent on caffine in my life. It took me awhile to acknowledge this for what it was, but every afternoon if I hadn't had my Diet Coke, I had a headache. 2. I had spinal subluxations (I needed a chiropractic adjustment). Once I started under chiropractic care the headaches reduced substanially, once I kicked the caffine habit they were gone. Notice that no where did I have a need for Tylenol, therefore the headaches weren't caused by a Tylenol deficiency. I recognized what I was doing to my body, and rather than look for a cure, something to make the disease go away after I already had it, I did what I needed to do to prevent the headaches.

I know you may be thinking that is good for headaches, and to date I haven't seen a headache awareness ribbon, but what about cancer, diabetes, parkinson's disease, gall bladder problems, etc., etc., etc.? This are all symptoms of something that is going on in our bodies. Two years ago I would have told you that these are things that just happen. I was wrong. There are six decisions we make in regards to our bodies. Depending on our choices in these six things we get the resulting outcome. Now there is no gurantee that poor choices will result in the disease, (but it is highly likely) and there is a chance that the disease may come anyway, but we increase our chances of living in total health when we become aware that everything we do to or with our bodies has an impact whether positive or negative.

The list of six:
1. What you eat.
2. What you drink.
3. How your exercise.
4. How your rest.
5. How and what you breath.
6. Most important, what you think about.
To read more in depth about each of these 6 items please vist this website www.dinoffchiro.com
You will learn that you make the choice with each of these six items but you cannot control the outcome. You are better off doing the best, ths way your body can give you the best results!

What is the cost to find a cure? I don't think you can answer that, Kelly Ripa recently raised 3.7 MILLION to help find a cure for breast cancer, I don't think they are any closer than they were pre 3.7.

I am going to design a ribbon, I think pink with green polka dots, and it isn't going to champion a cure for anything instead it is going to promote prevention, cost FREE!

"Instead of buying, begging, or stealing a cure, it is better to stop building disease. Disease is of man's own building, and one worse thing than the stupidity of buying a cure is to remain so ignorant as to believe in cures. The false theories of salvation and cures have built man into a mental mendicant, when he could be the arbiter of his own salvation, and certainly his own doctor, instead of being a slave to a profession that has neither worked out its own salvation from disease nor discovered a single cure in all the age-long period of man's existence on earth.." J.Tilden M.D.