Why did I chose to become a doctor? I have always been a good student. Many of my high school classmates were amazed and even a little annoyed that I achieved high test scores with seemingly minimal effort.
It didn’t help that I frequently fell asleep in class. I had a couple of great teachers early on who taught me how to really pay attention to a lecture, and take good notes. But struggling to stay awake in the middle of afternoon classes eventually became a significant concern. One that led me to seek the advice of the smartest, most caring man I knew at the time––my chiropractor, Ed Counselman, DC.
The conversation went something like this:
“I keep falling asleep in class, for no apparent reason.”
“How much sugar do you eat?” he asked me.
“How much have you got?” I replied. I then confidently suggested that since I had always been thin, there was no reason to not eat as much sugar as I could swallow.
“The sugar is making you sleepy,” he said.
“What? Sugar gives you energy, doesn’t it?”
“And no matter how much you eat, you still fall asleep in the middle of the day, right?”
I nodded, confused.
“Your body doesn’t know what to do with all that sugar, when you’re just sitting around in class,” he said. “It’s a roller coaster. Your blood sugar spikes then crashes. And so do you…”
This was my introduction to the profound effects of diet, nutrition and exercise on nearly aspect of health. I quit eating any sugar, and immediately felt dramatically better. Intrigued with the possibility of helping people with nutritional as well as physical problems, I decided to become a chiropractor myself.
