Hildreth on Health: Muscular movement vital as we grow older

Good morning to all. Give yourself a Christmas present. Do some homework. Instead of looking for another colored pill, which we do need from time to time as crutches, ask what could I do to help myself. You did not get this way in a month or so.

In this case, gravity has been pushing you down since you were walking and slowly taking its toll. We have the musculoskeletal system to counteract gravity, but it has to be kept in good shape and used.

The increasing curvatures of the back and the loss of some height constrict musculoskeletal movement and internal organ function, which can be a precursor to organ failure.

Let’s find out how important muscular movement is. The body cannot live without oxygen. Can you take a deep breath now as you could have 30 years ago?

Read on.

In Part II, we are going to discuss the relationship between musculoskeletal deterioration and aging and its influence upon the nervous system including the brain, the heart and lungs and digestive and elimination system, which includes bowel and kidney function. These are the very systems that many of us are taking a lot of pills for just to maintain function.

The musculoskeletal health and tone maintains vertebral alignment and reduces the potential of vertebral scoliosis and kyphosis, and vertebral compression resulting in nerve compression which not only involves pain down the legs or arms but can influence internal organ function also including brain function.

The only support the musculoskeletal system has to maintain health is to depend upon strong healthy bone structure and the guidewires that are made up of strong muscles that keep the vertebral column in line.

Strong muscular tone requires use (if we don’t use it, we lose it). How does one maintain use when you can hardly get out of the chair or hurt too bad to just move enough to get to the bathroom?

For the brain and nervous system, the heart and lungs, and the digestive and elimination system to function properly, they must be healthy and functionable within themselves.

To accomplish this, the cells of these systems must be functioning in an environment free of toxic polluted surroundings and have access to adequate oxygen and nutritional supplies.

I am not referring to the big outside world around us, but to the inner world of the fluids that all of the 60 trillion plus cells that our bodies are bathed in.

All of the cells that make up these individual systems that I have listed are most capable of living and functioning normally up into our 90s and for some of us beyond if we receive good healthy bodies to begin with.

What in the world is the relationship between our slowly degenerating musculoskeletal system which we can blame on 50, 60, 70, or 80 years of gravity and the internal environment of all the cells that make up our bodies?

One of the keys to this relationship is the lymphatic system sometimes referred to as the auxiliary circulatory system, or the garbage collector of the body, or the vacuum cleaner system within. It really is a significant part of the immune system.

The lymphatic system is really a part of all of these descriptive terms. It truly is a key player in keeping the internal environment in a livable state. This system is made up of millions of small thin tiny tubes scattered in an organized way throughout the body.

The distal ends are open and all are directed toward the neck area where they empty into a large vein in the neck. They display small one-way valves every so many inches and go through periodic filtering systems on their way to the neck called lymph nodes.

This system has no pump as such. The system depends upon muscular activity to move the contaminated lymph fluids that all the cells are bathed in along. It is designed in such a way that with musculoskeletal health it maintains a negative pressure within to act as a vacuum cleaner.

Cellular activity that produces energy, hormones, nerve impulses, muscular contractions and brain function breaks down the food that we swallow and digest.

The cells act as little nuclear plants, thus giving off toxic exhaust or byproducts that will slowly destroy the very cells that keep us alive and active.

As the toxic byproducts increase within the sea around all of the cells of the body, they become dysfunctional and will slowly die by inches or have a sudden heart attack or stroke.

The only way that we can clean up the internal environment is by improving the removal of the toxic waste.

The key is improving lymphatic drainage and improving the internal distribution of essential nutrients and oxygen to all of the cells of the body.

Part III will describe the relationship of active musculoskeletal mobility, strength and health and its relationship to digestive function, insulin and all other hormone output, lungs including carbon dioxide and oxygen exchange, and the all important never ceasing heart and circulatory system that transports all of the nutrients and oxygen in and the waste out.

As a medical community, we have almost overlooked the fact that the skeletal muscle exists to make it possible for us to move our frame around a gravitational environment and maintain a consistent internal environmental homeostasis.

It is well known that the state of the musculoskeletal system can be a good reflection of our general health including internal organ health.

At the end of this series on hypokinetic disease, I will discuss possibilities that are available and that have been well researched.

One such program probably could be applicable to most anyone, irregardless of physical condition at this time and can be carried out in one’s own home.

Prepare for good holidays. Reach out to someone even if it can be with only a handshake. You are all great.

Contact Dr. DeWall J. Hildreth at 625-1101 or cnhcgv@yahoo.com. His office is located at 210 W. Continental Road, Suite 130 in the Continental Shopping Plaza.