What do you do if heart
disease or cancer runs in your family? Family
history does not mean that you should give up and resign yourself to an early
demise. These diseases, while having a
genetic component to them, can still be counterbalanced through a healthy lifestyle. A good many people
develop a “why bother” attitude. All
that this means is that they feel that they can blame their ancestors for their
shortcomings and avoid taking personal responsibility.
That is an irresponsible
attitude. If you examine your ancestry
you will likely find that your parents still lived longer than their parents,
and it is very likely that you will live longer than either one of them. Living a healthily
lifestyle will push those diseases further into the background and may even
prevent them from happening at all.
Self care and health care
will keep you in good condition. A
little care on your part will keep your weight under control, your heart and
circulatory system healthy, your bones strong and your nervous system firing on
all cylinders. If you are already in
crisis, you can still improve your health by making self care a priority. It is okay to be selfish. If you don’t take care of yourself, nobody else
is going to do it for you.
If you
feel that you are at risk, work with your health care team to watch for every
eventuality. Don’t wait until you are in crisis mode to get in shape. What will it be; a healthy lifestyle or cardiac
rehabilitation? You choose. They are exactly the same except one happens
before a heart attack and one happens afterwards.
Your genes account for about
30% of how long you will live, but it is your environment that influences how
long and how well you will live. Whether you develop a disease, even if
predisposed, is determined by how you live.
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