Why should you consider taking a full body-scan? Here’s why.
For most of my adult life, I never took my health as serious as I do today. I used to assume that I must have inherited my maternal grandfather’s longevity genes – he lived to 105 – and therefore, I too, would live to 100. I assumed, that since I had never needed to go to the hospital for anything, I must been in tip-top shape. Well, there was one incident where I needed to go for an emergency trip to the doctor due to a sudden case of testicular torsion, but that’s another story. I also assumed that since I was not cartoonishly overweight and obese – like those infamous stories of people being so morbidly obese that they couldn’t physically exit their own house – that I must be relatively healthy and thus had no reason to think seriously about my health.
However, looking back, making such an extreme comparison in my mind was not a realistic indicator of whether I was healthy or not. If anything, it was nothing more then a diversion from any serious consideration of my health. Unbeknownst to me, I desperately needed a wake-up call that would shatter my comforting obliviousness about the severity of my health situation.
In 2016, my brother and I went to get full body-scans in the city, where they would do a complete scan of our entire bodies. My brother had suggested that we should get body scans for a while and when I finally agreed, I arrogantly assumed that I would be given a clean bill of health. I was not in any pain and I wasn’t sick all the time, so how unhealthy could I actually be?
Well, that state of comfortable thinking all came crashing down when the physician – not holding back anything – informed me that I was anything BUT healthy.
Being completely frank and not sugar-coating anything (believe me, the last thing I needed was anything coated with sugar), he informed me that I was on a dangerous trajectory with my health, and that if I did not make any drastic changes, I was looking at possible and potential strokes and heart-attacks in the coming years.
To say that I was shook afterwards would be an understatement. I was completely shattered. I remember leaving there almost staggering, my mind racing like it’s never raced before. I distinctly remember the first action I did after the consultation; I remember rushing to the local IGA and buying a can of sliced beetroot – something I hadn’t eaten since I was a kid.
The results of my body-scan finally forced me to take my health seriously. The idea that I could be facing a possible stroke and heart-attack in the near future made me realise that I needed to get my act together. Improving my health was not something I could delay or put on the shelf to deal with later, no, I needed to get started with it now!
I started by taking small steps, like eliminating all sugary soft drinks out of my diet. I also began going on long-distant walks more frequently. As the years went by, I became more conscious about what I ate and what I drank. I began going to the gym more often with my brother and recently I went through a complete weight-loss challenge.
Looking back, as much as the results of the body-scan in 2016 devastated me, I shudder to think of what my life would have turned out to be if I hadn’t gotten the body-scan. There’s no doubt in my mind that I would have continued living as I did, completely uninterested in my health and taking care of myself. I would have continued drinking excessive amounts of soft drinks and eating fast food, completely oblivious that I was on a conveyer belt of death – heading blissfully unaware to an early grave.
I guess you could say that the body-scan and blunt physician saved my life. It gave me a brutal wake-up call that I didn’t know I desperately needed. That is why I think everyone should consider taking a full body-scan – sometimes all you need is for the truth to be there in your face.
By Jackson. T. Trout
Read Jackson’s personal experience with weight loss through his eight part series! Click to read Part 1 – Introduction
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