Five Advance Warnings of Multiple Sclerosis

Today’s almonds have been activated by:

⏰ IN A RUSH?

Today’s 30-Second Summary

If you don’t have time to read the whole email today, here are some key takeaways:

• Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an autoimmune disease that can manifest in a lot of different ways, but there are five up-front warning signs to watch out for.

  • These warning signs have such a strong high association with later diagnosis of MS, that they can be considered early-stage symptoms before the main neurological symptoms appear.

• There’s more to yoga than getting in a few stretches (wonderful as those are).

  • Today’s sponsor, Breathe and Flow, will teach you for free about such diverse areas as skill training, optimal recovery, structural integration, complementary practices and more

Read on to learn about these things and more…

👀 WATCH AND LEARN

The 3 Most Important Muscles To Stretch, That You Probably Don't (5:58)

Hint: it’s not “hamstrings, hamstrings, hamstrings”*

Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

Stretchy menu:

• 0:22 | Pectoralis minor

• 2:24 | Rectus femoris

• 3:47 | Bonus: ITB tightness

• 4:16 | Deep cervico-thoracic spinal extensors

_{*Although technically the hamstrings are three muscles: the biceps femoris, the semitendinosus, and the semimembranosus!}

Want to watch it, but not right now? Bookmark it for later 🔖

🚨 MAIN FEATURE

Five Advance Warnings of Multiple Sclerosis

First things first, a quick check-in with regard to how much you know about multiple sclerosis (MS):

• Do you know what causes it?

• Do you know how it happens?

• Do you know how it can be fixed?

If your answer to the above questions is “no”, then take solace in the fact that modern science doesn’t know either.

What we do know is that it’s an autoimmune condition, and that it results in the degradation of myelin, the “insulator” of nerves, in the central nervous system.

• How exactly this is brought about remains unclear, though there are several leading hypotheses including autoimmune attack of myelin itself, or disruption to the production of myelin.

• Treatments look to reduce/mitigate inflammation, and/or treat other symptoms (which are many and various) on an as-needed basis.

If you’re wondering about the prognosis after diagnosis, the scientific consensus on that is also “we don’t know”:

Read: Personalized medicine in multiple sclerosis: hope or reality?

👆 this paper, like every other one we considered putting in that spot, concludes with basically begging for research to be done to identify biomarkers in a useful fashion that could help classify many distinct forms of MS, rather than the current “you have MS, but who knows what that will mean for you personally because it’s so varied” approach.

The Five Advance Warning Signs

Something we do know! First, we’ll quote directly the researchers’ conclusion:

So, these things are a warning, five alarm bells, but not necessarily diagnostic criteria.

Without further ado, the five things are:

1. depression

2. sexual disorders

3. constipation

4. cystitis

5. urinary tract infections

Read the paper for yourself:

Association Between Diseases and Symptoms Diagnosed in Primary Care and the Subsequent Specific Risk of Multiple Sclerosis

👆 Hot off the press! Published only yesterday! 🔥

Want to know more about MS?

Here’s a very comprehensive guide:

National clinical guideline for diagnosis and management of multiple sclerosis

Take care!

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Yoga Beyond Asana

There’s more to yoga than getting in a few stretches. Those are great, of course, but if you would like to deepen your practice, this free newsletter will take you there.

Here you can learn, for free, about such diverse areas as skill training, optimal recovery, structural integration, complementary practices and more:

🌏 AROUND THE WEB

What’s happening in the health world…

• One in eight older adults use cannabis products, suggesting need to screen for risks

• Pfizer to rethink weight loss pill after high side effect rate

• Which blood sugar monitor is best?

• New research explores future limits of survival and livability in extreme heat conditions

• Harnessing the power of a parasite that can stop pain

• 70-year-old Ugandan woman gives birth to twins after fertility treatment

• 18-month meditation program improves psychological wellbeing in seniors

More to come tomorrow!

📖 ONE-MINUTE BOOK REVIEW

The Power of Fun: Why fun is the key to a happy and healthy life – by Catherine Price

It's said that nobody's dying regret is to wish they'd spent more time at the office, yet many of don't make enough time for fun.

This book has been published with two different subtitles:

• Why fun is the key to a happy and healthy life

• How to feel alive again

One offers a sensible reason to read this book; the other offers a deeply emotional reason. Both are entirely valid.

Catherine Price sets out in this work to identify what fun actually is (she puts it at the intersection of playfulness, connection and flow) and how to have more of it (she gives a five-step method to build and integrate it into life).

In the category of criticism, this 334-page book is (in this reviewer's opinion) a little padded and could have been an article instead. But the advice contained within it is sound, and the impact it can have might be profound.

Bottom line: if you find you've settled into a routine that's perhaps comfortable, but not actually that much fun, this book will help you to liven things up.

Click here to check out The Power Of Fun, and feel more alive!

May you always be on top of your health,

The 10almonds Team