If you have, or have heard of cystic fibrosis, you will likely know that digestive system management is pretty much a full time job. From calculating fats and carbs to digestive enzymes and insulin, as well as dealing with the CF symptoms that can occur.

Over the last few years I’ve learnt some tricks that help me to better manage my digestive health and keep my tummy happy.

I’m so happy that I’ve finally put this in a blog post - both for my own documentation, but also to give anyone that needs it some ideas of tweaks that you can experiment with.

I talk about: what I do and don’t eat, what I do and don’t drink, what kind of movement helps, hormonal considerations

I started taking my first CFTR modulator drug - Symkevi - on 31st January 2020, after it was made available on the NHS in the UK.

For someone with cystic fibrosis (CF), I consider myself really healthy. But, with each year that’s passed until now, maintaining good health has taken more and more work. My hope for starting Symkevi was that I would have to work a little less hard to maintain the health that I have now. But the changes that I saw in myself have actually been very different than that… Am I actually working harder?

People seem to be suffering with sinus issues more and more. So, as we’re well into allergy season (a lot of tree pollens start to build from March), I’ve already stepped up my sinus care regime and found myself seeing friends and family following suit as they see the benefits I get.

Outside of the obvious, I find the amount of waste that I produce really frustrating. If I want to stay healthy, I have to take my medication. If I take my medication, I have a tremendous amount of packaging to deal with.

Inhalers are one area that I’ve been trying to become extra conscious of.

Ten months ago, I quit my job to save my health. You can read more about why I did that in my article from October 2017.

Last month, I was featured talking about my career change in the latest issue of CF Life magazine from the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, so I thought now would be a great time to write an update on what has changed since I left a high-pressure, full-time job last summer.

A lot of people have a job that negatively impacts their health to some extent. It might be mental health, or it might be physical health. Perhaps your stress levels are too high, perhaps you don’t sleep properly, perhaps you skip meals or buy junk food or have extremely low activity levels because of your job. If so, you need to make a change. 

Employers may tell you ‘health comes first’. But often, it seems insincere: something that HR have told them to say so that they don’t get sued for neglecting occupational health.

Sometimes when people have said it, ‘health comes first’, I’ve believed that they really do think that health _should_ come first. But does it? No. Not until you’re hospitalised (or threatening to leave your job) and they are forced to be accommodating or risk losing you permanently. Or, even if they believe it with every bone in their body, perhaps they just don’t have the resources or authority to actually make ‘health first’ a reality.

But whatever the situation, you should never let it get to the point where your health tangibly declines before you or your employer starts valuing it. 

It’s 100% true that if you do not make time for better health now, you will have to make time for illness later.

So, with this in mind, I quit my job.

Good health is achieved from the optimisation of the elements in the ‘health triangle’; a trinity of nutrition, training and sleep. While all of these elements work together, even the best training routine and nutrition programme cannot compensate for insufficient rest from good quality sleep.

Sleep duration and quality can affect many things, including muscle recovery and building, weight loss and maintenance, hormone levels that influence your overall health, athletic performance, and cognition. 

So, here's what you need to know about sleep, as well as a definitive list of all the ways (according to both sceience and my own experience) that you can induce and improve your sleep.
 

When I find heard that DNA fitness and diet testing had emerged on the consumer market, I was 100% fascinated. I loved the concept of a plan based on my unique DNA. 

As you will likely have read, I have taken tests based on blood samples, but unlike DNA, these are fluid and changeable, where your DNA is fixed. I like this idea and it made me think that DNA testing could be more useful in the long-term. 

I was keen to know what my DNA could tell me, and whether it could help me further improve my health through fitness and diet. 

Has this feeling stuck around after speaking to some experts and trying a couple of DNA fitness tests for myself? Read on to find out...