Reprinted from the Health District's quarterly publication mailed to district residents

Health District residents on average are a healthy bunch.

We’re good about getting our teeth cleaned regularly. We make annual trips to the doctor for checkups. And many of us faithfully get our blood pressure checked.

However, in many key areas including obesity, smoking and eating habits, adults in northern Larimer County fall short of meeting national goals for healthy living. Consider this:

• Yes, the majority of us here don’t smoke, but we’re still below the 88 percent national goal.

• We don’t even come close to consuming the recommended two servings a day of fruit and three servings a day of vegetables. (see chart for figures)

Cost and access continue to be barriers to healthcare. More than a quarter of local adults reported delaying care due to cost within the past two years. About the same number of people did not have a regular healthcare provider.

Our “picture of health” – as measured by the Health District in its community health survey of 1,835 adults – shows we still have some work to do.

Adults in the community we talked to agree. Furthermore, they point out that healthy habits even if achieved can be a struggle to maintain.

“My health awareness is high, but walking the walk is hard. It’s easier said than done with a busy lifestyle,” says the 48-year-old married mother of two who rates her health as “very good to excellent.”

Family and job keep her hopping as she tries to come up with healthy meals and still find time for regular exercise.

Cape joins her daughters in swimming, riding bikes and playing softball. “I try to role-model for my kids. What you do speaks more loudly than what you say.”

But for Cape to improve her health status to “excellent” will require more work – and discipline, she admits.

“I need to build it into a routine. I’m so darned flexible around my family. I often don’t make time for myself,” she says.

Cape already walks 45-60 minutes three to five times a week. But with osteoporosis in her family history, she wants to build muscle.

This was his wakeup call.

With the help of a book, Oliver eliminated added sugar and processed foods from his diet, and cut back on his favorite comfort food – ice cream.

“I know this is what needs to be done for my health,” says the father of a baby boy. “I’m 40, he’s 2˝. He will graduate from high school when I’m almost 60. I need to be there so that I can do stuff with him.”

If that isn’t motivation enough for Oliver, he looks to the “numbers” on his blood work and scale as living proof. He’s lost 20 pounds, dropped 15 points off his total cholesterol number and cut his triglycerides level in half.

The lifestyle changes have been beneficial for the whole family.

Staying on track
Veronica Ceja, 31, knows she needs to lose a few pounds but expects that will come once she improves her health habits.

“My focus is not so much to lose weight, but to stay healthy,” she says.

Ceja is trying to incorporate more soy products and fruits and vegetables in her cooking.

She gets buy-in from her family by including her 10- and 12-year-old daughters at cooking classes she takes through the Health District. Letting the girls pick out healthy recipes improves the chances that the dishes will be a hit at the dinner table, too.

Making changes takes time and patience – you don’t always see immediate results and, on occasion, you fall back on old habits. To keep on track, Ceja reminds herself: “Take one day at a time and reward yourself for the things you do right.”

Competing for time
For Basil Hamdan, the hardest part about staying healthy is the time commitment required.
“Working out in the evening or morning didn’t fit my lifestyle,” says the 40-year-old married father of two sons and one daughter.

Besides, Hamdan found exercising to be a chore. “What’s the point of lifting weights?” he would ask himself.

Then in March 2001, his whole world changed.

Doctors discovered a golf-ball-sized tumor in the orbit, or space, around his right eye.

While surgery and radiation was aggressive in removing the cancerous growth, it didn’t address lifestyle changes Hamdan should consider to improve his overall health.

“They don’t tell you what the cancer is caused by. But you figure it could be environmental,” he says. “If I want to give myself a better chance of not having a recurrence, I need to eat better.”

That’s when he sought nutrition counseling at the Health District to incorporate foods in his diet that are associated with a lower risk of cancer. “I’ve improved the quality of food,” he says, “but I still need to find a way to space my eating better.”

He has become an avid health consumer, taking advantage of low-cost screenings for such things as cholesterol and prostate cancer offered through the city of Fort Collins where he works.

The workplace also has given Hamdan an outlet for exercise that satisfies his competitive spirit without sacrificing time with his family. He plays pickup basketball with coworkers over his lunch hour.

“You can’t always control your schedule, your workload or your family commitments,” he says. “Time is precious and it’s hard to protect that time (for staying healthy).”