HYDERABAD: Your hair is not just your crowning glory, but your health app which is communicating crucial info about your health to you, says Dr. Khushboo Thakker Garodia, homeopath, an integrative health expert. A nutrition counsellor, a clinical hypnotherapist and a trichologist, the founder of Meraki WellBeing says, "Combining all aspects of my education helped me learn and see how one’s inner thoughts and emotions shape their external reality." We ask her more about the hair-health connect.
Is there any research/study that can tell us more about how our thoughts affect our health?
There is an amazing study that has shown practising mindfulness meditation or being involved in a support group has a positive physical impact at the cellular level in breast cancer survivors.
A group working out of Alberta Health Services, Tom Baker Cancer Centre and the University of Calgary Department of Oncology has demonstrated that telomeres - protein complexes at the end of chromosomes – maintain their length in breast cancer survivors who practise meditation or are involved in support groups, while they shorten in a comparison group without any intervention.
Although the disease-regulating properties of telomeres aren'st fully understood.
Just to explain this concept – shortened telomeres are associated with several disease states, as well as cell aging, while longer telomeres are thought to be protective against disease. The study was published online in the journal Cancer.
Hairloss is among the most searched term in Google, next to weight loss. What kind of thoughts do you think affects our hair quality and hair loss/gain.
Your hair can indicate that you need to change your lifestyle. Your hair can offer early warning signals of a number of health concerns. Stress is a common trigger of hair problems. There are three types of hair loss associated with high stress levels.
Telogen effluvium. Here extreme stress pushes large numbers of hair follicles into a resting phase. Within a few months, affected hair might fall out suddenly when simply combing or washing your hair and you will be shocked to see so much hair fall
Trichotillomania is an irresistible urge to pull out hair from your scalp, eyebrows or other areas of your body. It can be a way of dealing with complex negative emotions or uncomfortable feelings, such as anxiety, stress, tension, loneliness, boredom or even frustration.
Alopecia areata. Multiple factors are attributed to cause alopecia areata possibly including severe stress. With alopecia areata, the body's immune system attacks the hair follicles — causing hair loss. Get your stress under control, your might just grow your hair back.
An average adult in Hyderabad tends to come home from work at 8 pm and sleeps at 1 am while Netflixing or social media surfing between 10 am to 1 am. They often munch on snacks, chocolates, ice creams, namkeen etc. What can they do to fight these cravings. Is going early to sleep early the only solution?
The reason we are seeing a multitude of lifestyle disorders like heart diseases, diabetes, PCOS, some types of cancers today are because we have completely messed up your lives – routine, health and body When we spend the night binge eating and binge watching or vice versa – you are going against your body cycle.
Your mind is a computer and is in born with the command to process muscle repair, memory consolidation and release of hormones regulating growth and appetite – at night when you sleep. So when you are bingeing instead of sleeping – you not only halt the process of muscle repair, memory consolidation and release of hormones regulating growth and appetite – you also put your body under a lot of stress. So fix a bedtime and waking time. We crave junk at late hours is because we haven’t eaten well during the day. If we eat small portions through the day – of food filled with nutrients we will not crave junk food.
Late night cravings? Have this
Makhana or Fox nuts
Popcorn
Cup of Yogurt – plain
Kurmura
Hummus with vegetable sticks