400LIFE January 2019: A healthy New Year

400 LIFE JANUARY 2019

Learning to Breathe Lauren Reese found a way to heal, now she’s helping others

Tom Lennon gains inspiration after diabetes diagnosis

Vonda Wright leads new Sports Medicine Network

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from the editor For the longest time, my understanding of the factors contributing to a person’s health was pretty narrow: genetics, exercise and nutrition.

Mainstream society’s grasp of what constitutes good health has become more well-rounded in recent years, and the stories in our first 400 Life magazine issue of 2019 reflect that.

Lauren Reese’s remedy for the pain of past injuries was yoga. Vonda Wright’s mission in creating Northside Hospital’s new Sports Medicine Network is to create comprehensive care for people dealing with injuries, and that includes encouraging patients to join social groups. Tom Lennon’s diabetes diagnosis inspired him to overhaul his diet. For those tuned in to the power of nutrition, we have two recipes that are simultaneously tasty and a sneaky source of crucial vitamins. And, yes, nature can have an affect on our mental wellness, especially around this time of year, so there are tips to help deal with seasonal affective disorder during the less-than-sunny days.

We hope this magazine was a source of healthy reading in 2018 with stories that are equal parts informational and inspiring. We intend to give you a steady diet of more of the same in 2019.

— Brian Paglia

inside

contributors Publisher Stephanie Woody Editor BRIAN PAGLIA Production Manager TRACIE PIKE Director Video Production BRADLEY WISEMAN Staff Writers Alexander popp KELLY WHITMIRE Advertising director nathan schutter

Driving spirit

Tom Lennon brings awareness to diabetes. PAGE 4

COVER STORY Lauren Reese uses yoga to heal self, others. PAGE 12 400 HEALTH Tips to beating SAD this season. PAGE 10 SPORTS MEDICINE Wright leads hospital’s new network. PAGE 16 400 EATS These recipes will help keep you healthy. PAGE 20

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Lift, Learn, Live Tom Lennon using apparel company to bring awareness to diabetes Story by Brian Paglia | Photos by Bradley Wiseman

4 | 400 LIFE

| January 2019

On a recent Friday, Tom Lennon was walking through OneLife Fitness, where he works as a personal trainer, when he was stopped by another diabetic. The customer asked him to talk with a friend whose son had recently been diagnosed with diabetes, and Lennon didn’t hesitate.

“Can I have just a few minutes?” Lennon said to a reporter, and off he went.

This is routine enough for Lennon now. He’s shared the story of his diagnosis and life with type-1 diabetes countless times. Lennon works part-time as a patient care technician at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta (CHOA) where he’s comforted families disoriented by their child’s diagnosis. He started a fitness apparel company, called Type-1 Fitness, and he engages with the more than 3,000 followers of its Instagram account. Sometimes, when he sees a stranger in public wearing a blood sugar-monitoring device, he’ll stop them.

“I’m like, ‘Hey, you’re a diabetic too!’ Kind of spark a conversation,” Lennon said. “It’s like seeing an

Continued on Page 6

Tom Lennon, a diabetic and personal trainer, started a fitness apparel company, called Type-1 Fitness, to help raise awareness of the condition.

‘I was pretty bummed out, I ain’t gonna lie. I’ve lived my life 34 years, no issues, and then all of a sudden get this.’

Tom Lennon, personal trainer at OneLife Fitness

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Tom Lennon lifts weights at OneLife Fitness.

almost-extinct animal in the wild.”

Lennon was born in Sharon, Massachusetts, a suburb 30 minutes south of Boston, and relished his upbringing. He was diagnosed with a learning disability at 5 years old, but Lennon was otherwise carefree with supportive parents. He played basketball, football and soccer, and he excelled enough in football to earn a scholarship to play at Curry College, a small private school just 30 minutes from home, where he studied graphic design.

A graphic design job was hard to find out of college, so he worked as a security guard at a hospital. That became unfulfilling, so Lennon joined the Air Force. He became a medic with the goal to eventually become a nurse, and he thrived for awhile, even earning the honor as the top airman for a ground medical unit in 2011. Seven years in, Lennon had married, and he and his wife talked of moving to Georgia. Lennon left the Air Force and got hired at CHOA. During the hiring process, Lennon had the option of getting a blood test, and he was eager to take it (“I’m always interested in seeing where I’m at,” Lennon said.) The results startled him: his blood sugar level was 390 mg/dL, well above the maximum healthy level of 140 mg/dL two hours after eating.

Lennon stewed for a couple days.

“I was pretty bummed out, I ain’t gonna lie,” Lennon said.

“I’ve lived my life 34 years, no issues, and then all of a sudden get this.”

But dwelling on his predicament was not in Lennon’s nature.

“I’m not a real negative person,” he said, and so he, with the help of his wife, resolved to make the necessary changes to his lifestyle. He dug into research to learn more about the condition that affects about 1.25 million Americans, according to

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| January 2019

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‘I would like Type-1 Lifting to be a well-known brand in the fitness industry.

I want it to be known as a great company giving back to diabetics.’

Tom Lennon, personal trainer at OneLife Fitness the American Diabetes Association, whose pancreas doesn’t produce the insulin their body needs to get glucose from the bloodstream into cells. He started to check his blood sugar level every three to four hours and regularly take insulin. He continued to exercise. He made a meal plan: oatmeal in the morning, sandwich wraps for lunch, Greek yogurt and frozen berries and gluten-free protein bars for snacks.

For dessert? Sugar-free Jello (“Best friend in the whole world,” he said.)

That formula — adequate exercise, a healthy diet and consistently monitoring his blood sugar level — worked. For example, within nine months, Lennon’s A1C level, which is a measure of the amount of glucose in a person’s blood, was down from 11.5 percent to 5.8 percent, right near the healthy limit of 5.7 percent.

And more and more, Lennon came to accept his life with diabetes.

“I didn’t want to let it get to me,” Lennon said. “I was like, OK, I have this, just live with it, roll with the punches and do the best that I can.”

Lennon saw that it wasn’t so easy for others, particularly newly diagnosed children and their parents. One moment still stands out.

About two years ago, while at CHOA, Lennon encountered the mother of a 5-year-old girl who was newly diagnosed. Lennon remembers the mother was emotional as she talked to a doctor in the hallway. “She looked absolutely miserable,” Lennon said.

Lennon walked into the girl’s room and struck an optimistic chord. “Welcome to the diabetes club,” he said, much to the mother’s shock. “The mom looked at me like, ‘What is wrong with you?’” Lennon said. Undeterred, Lennon spelled out his diabetes story to the girl and her mother, hoping it might assuage their fears.

The encounter also left Lennon inspired to find other ways to help the diabetes community. He gravitated toward his passion for T-shirts (Lennon, like many others, will buy T-shirts any time he visits a new CrossFit gym) and fitness. Type-1 Lifting seemed

8 | 400 LIFE

| January 2019

like an appropriate name, and Lennon used his graphic design skills to create the logo of a silhouetted man lifting a barbell with a light-blue circle, the international symbol for diabetes, on both ends.

Lennon then set about starting the company. He tested T-shirt material. He vetted screen printers. He searched for an organization to donate some of his profits to, eventually settling on the American Diabetes Association.

Type-1 Lifting started slow, but it gradually caught on through word of mouth. Lennon would tell his clients at OneLife and his co-workers at CHOA about the venture. A social media following grew, particularly on Instagram, where Lennon has met other diabetics whom he exchanges lifestyle and medical tips with. A few years into the business, Lennon has donated almost $1,000 to the American Diabetes Association.

“I would like Type-1 Lifting to be a well-known brand in the fitness industry,” Lennon said. “I want it to be known as a great company giving back to diabetics.”

If Type-1 Lifting did become a prominent brand, Lennon figures his message, for those newly diagnosed to push through their initial fears, could reach more people.

Diabetes still provides Lennon with plenty of trying moments.

Lennon and his wife recently went on vacation to Charleston, S.C., before their second child was born, and his blood sugar level stayed elevated in the 300s the entire trip. Lennon wasn’t sure of the cause. Maybe it was all the restaurant food? Maybe it was not being in his routine?

“The whole time I was frustrat-

ed,” Lennon said.

But Lennon’s naturally optimistic outlook took over. He sat on the beach, read a book, and told himself the same thing he tells anyone he encounters at CHOA or OneLife Fitness or anywhere who is facing a new life as a diabetic.

“Just roll with the punches,” Lennon said, “and everything’s going to be fine.”

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400 health

Don’t be SAD this winter season Daylight saving time comes to an end each fall, at a time when the hours of available sunlight already are beginning to decline.

Some people are more accustomed to darkness than others.

Norwegians, Swedes and people living in Alaska and the upper reaches of Canada near or above the Arctic Circle may go through a period when winters can be especially dark.

Fairbanks, Alaska, gets just three hours and 42 minutes of sunlight on the winter solstice.

Those in Barrow, Alaska, will endure a period of 67 days of darkness, according to Alaska. org.

Residents of Seattle, which is even further north than cities such as Fargo, North Dakota, or Portland, Maine, deal with more darkness than those living outside the city may know.

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| January 2019

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Be aware of SAD Seasonal affective disorder, or SAD, is defined by the Mayo Clinic as a type of depression that’s related to changes in seasons, beginning and ending at about the same times each year. Symptoms tend to start in the fall and continue into the winter, sapping energy and making a person feel moody. As with other types of depression, SAD can

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get worse and lead to severe problems if left untreated. Light treatment, talk therapy and medication can help people who are susceptible to SAD.

Plan more social occasions with friends and families so everyone can collectively shoo away the winter blues.

Make daylight hours count Spend time outdoors while the sun is bright in the sky. Make an effort to switch your schedule if work interferes with getting outdoors, even if all that can be managed is an outdoor walk at lunch.

Sit by a bright window and soak up rays whenever possible.

Exercise more Use the darker hours as an excuse to exercise more, be it at the gym or outside. The Mayo Clinic says that exercise and other types of physical activity can relieve anxiety and depression, lifting an individual’s mood as a result.

Celebrate winter activities Go skiing, snowboarding, outdoor ice skating, or snowshoeing.

Look forward to winter for what can be done, rather than what can’t.

Socialize more often Instead of holing up indoors alone, frequent the places that become indoor gathering spots for locals. These can include coffee houses, breweries, restaurants, or even the local church.

Light a fire Set the kindling ablaze in a fire pit, fireplace or woodburning stove, or just light a handful of candles. Flames can be soothing and less harsh on the eyes than artificial light.

Fall and winter darkness does not have to send a person into the doldrums if he or she embraces the right attitude.

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YO GA

The fitness solution for everybody and every body

Lauren Reese, owner of Breathe Yoga Atlanta in south Forsyth, started the practice of yoga to help herself heal. Soon it became a passion she now 12passes | 400 on LIFEto |others.

January 2019

Photo Lesly Juarez, Unsplash

Struggling with injuries, Lauren Reese found healing — and business — in yoga Story by Peter Stoddard | Photos courtesy Lauren Reese

Lauren Reese began her journey into yoga via an unlikely path.

She had some injuries that would not heal, and her mother encouraged her to come along to a yoga class.

At first Lauren fought the impulse to do the “yoga thing.”

Combined with her need to heal, she wanted to burn 1,000 calories in an hour. She did not see yoga as the means to achieve either. She was frustrated, yet she stuck with it.

After two or three sessions, something changed. To coin a yoga phrase, after “downregulating” her nervous system, Reese’s body began to feel better. She emerged from the process more mindful.

She found that even her dietary choices changed without her intending them to.

Thus, she no longer needed to burn 1,000 calories in an hour.

That epiphany motivated Reese to open her south Forsyth business, Breathe Yoga Atlanta in 2012 with her mother, Peggy Smith.

Smith began yoga practice after a cancer diagnosis. Yoga helped settle Smith’s mind while she healed. Reese experienced the same

benefit while recovering from her injuries.

Reese never looked back. In fact, she stomped on the accelerator.

Prior to yoga, Lauren approached exercise as a healthful version of punishment. The very term “workout” suggests something one wants to end as quickly as possible. Yoga transformed Reese’s outlook, and it was a game changer. She grew to recognize that a session should be and is a reward for both the mind and body. Not to get too sappy, but Reese describes yoga to be about joy, love and kindness.

As a yoga practitioner, Lauren emphasizes the keyword, “practice.” Yoga is not something anyone ever masters. It is a process with many facets. She continually explores and discovers new ones.

Though Reese stays busy instructing, she still practices her own

Continued on Page 15

‘It looks like you indeed have a body.

Therefore, you already have a yoga body.’

Lauren Reese, owner of Breathe Yoga Atlanta

January 2019 | 400 LIFE | 13

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| January 2019

yoga sessions when no one else is around. No two days are the same.

To the yoga beginner or veteran, Reese sees one key immediate benefit. Today people’s brains are oversaturated with stimuli. Life seems to be a nonstop effort to multitask. Yoga offers the opportunity to turn down the volume of thoughts racing through your mind. It enables you to focus on your body and mind.

“People take time out of their day to be here,” Reese said. “… Whatever is going on anywhere else can wait an hour.”

With each session, Reese encourages participants to focus on whatever they need that day. It may be diaphragmatic breathing, tissue therapy, self-massage or addressing a localized pain.

Reese smiles when a new visitor tells her they want a “yoga body.” She jokes, “It looks like you indeed have a body. Therefore, you already have a yoga body.”

Consistent with that thinking, Reese states that yoga is for everybody and every body. There is no one body type that benefits more than another.

Even athletes in prime physical condition may resort to yoga only when injured. With increasing frequency, leading athletes now incorporate yoga into their regular fitness regimen. Enhanced blood flow, respiration and mobility benefit everyone, whether injured or healthy, athletic or … “other.”

Reese is reluctant to offer a Top 5 or Top 10 reasons to practice yoga. The reasons are virtually infinite, she says, and attempting to compose a quantified list would by necessity exclude a myriad of benefits not listed.

Why do it?

According to the American Osteopathic Association, maintaining a regular yoga practice has many physical and mental health benefits, among them: • Increased flexibility • Increased muscle strength and tone • Improved respiration, energy and vitality • Maintaining a balance metabolism • Cardio and circulatory health • Improved athletic performance • Protection from injury • Lessen chronic pain • Lower blood pressure • Reduce insomnia • Manage stress • Improve mental clarity and calmness • Increased body awareness • Sharpens concentration

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Northside recently announced Dr. Vonda Wright had been hired at the hospital to head up the new Sports Medicine Network and combine expertise from three of the system’s practices —Northside East Cobb, Northside Cherokee and The Orthopedic Sports Medicine Center of Atlanta — to provide care across the system’s locations.

‘Whether they’re an athlete or not’ Head of Northside Hospital’s new Sports Medicine Network shares her story, vision for the network’s future Story and photos by Kelly Whitmire

When hearing the term sports medicine, many might think of team doctors for professional teams or reconstructive surgeries from high school or collegiate sports injuries.

But for those who have similar injuries to those sustained on the field, sports medicine is typically the best choice to get the patient moving again.

“Anybody can tear their rotator cuff whether they’re an athlete or not, so we’re the ones that take care of that,” said Dr. Vonda Wright, an orthopedic surgeon and chief of the Northside Hospital Sports Medicine. “Anybody can step off a curb wrong and tear the ligaments in their knee. Usually, it’s a soccer player playing a game, but sometimes it’s just a clumsy person, and they come to sports medicine for instance. It’s really about the kind of injury it is.”

In August, Northside announced Wright had been hired at the hospital to head up the new Sports Medicine Network and com16 | 400 LIFE

| January 2019

bine expertise from the three of the system’s practices — Northside East Cobb, Northside Cherokee and The Orthopedic Sports Medicine Center of Atlanta — to provide care across the system’s locations.

“Sports Medicine is a part of orthopedics that takes care of people from little-bitty kids on the soccer field, all the way up to masters athletes who are 90 running in races and everyone in between,” Wright said. “Only a small portion — about 1 percent of all the athletes we take care of — are truly professionals, the rest of them are mortals like you and me who are just active and using mobility and smart nutrition to live a great life.”

Wright said the system currently has 15 sports clinicians and 10 locations and said the goal is “creating a comprehensive sports medicine program that is not only surgeons but is nonoperative sports medicine doctors,” including professionals with experience in ultrasounds, orthobiology, sports nutrition and

sports psychology.

“There is no avenue of a person’s health that we do not cover,” she said. “We have a whole group of partners that if you need a dermatologist, we’ve got the guy for you. If you need an internist, we’ve got the gal for you because we want care to be all in one place and for it to be easy.”

She said she likened the system to that of a professional sports team and said she believes young athletes who have more of a future should get the same care.

“On a professional football team, there is a dentist, there is an eye doctor, there is an emergency room doctor, there is a concussion doctor,” Wright said. “There are sometimes 12 clinicians on a professional team mandated by the league. It does not make any sense to treat our kids or our high school kids or even our college kids differently.”

At the Northside Forsyth Campus, the team uses the 2000 Building, a new 135,000-square-foot facility which offers programs for physical, occupational and speech therapy, stroke rehabilitation, a therapy pool with an underwater treadmill, a surgery center for out-patient hip and knee replacements and an imaging center.

Wright said an important component to the team is not letting egos get in the way and sending the patient to the doctor with the most expertise.

She used a recent example of a softball player whose injury Wright could have operated on but decided to pass to a specialist.

“If you come to me, and there’s somebody better to do what you need, then we’re not going to be selfish like that because it’s not about us. It’s about you,” Wright said.

Wright said the eventual plan is to serve the highest levels of athletes.

“We take care of about 14 high schools in the region and two colleges,” she said. “We’re newcomers to sports, so someday we will take care of pro teams here. Our goal is to build a campus because that’s what I know how to do and that’s why I was brought here.”

Before coming to Atlanta, Wright served as head of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Lemieux Sports Complex. She said she practiced at the hospital for 13 years and one of her last undertakings was building the sports complex, which attracted Northside to build their own sports medicine network.

“During that time, I did a lot of really fun stuff,” she said. “I was the team surgeon for the University of Pittsburgh football team, and we got to go to a lot of bowl games. That was fun. I was head surgeon for some of the Olympic teams at the University of Pittsburgh. I served as medical director for the Pittsburgh Triathlon.

“I’m a world rugby doctor, which means I get to go all over the United States and take care of the U.S. national team as well as some really big tournaments, including the World Cup last year in San Francisco. You think SEC football is tough, rugby players are incredible.”

Wright received her doctorate of medicine from the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Medicine after earning degrees from Wheaton College and the then-Rush Presbyterian St. Luke’s Medical Center, now known as the Rush

Continued on Page 18

January 2019 | 400 LIFE | 17

Since 2006, Vonda Wright’s research has focused on active aging. Focusing on active seniors, she said she found there was “a myth in this country and abroad that aging is the inevitable decline from vitality to frailty and that most people spend about 20 years dying.”

University Medical Center.

She completed her residency in orthopedic surgery at UPMC and is board certified in orthopedic surgery and sports medicine and is a fellow with the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgery, the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine and the American Orthopaedic Association.

“I’m in the fortunate position to be old enough that if orthopedics was a family, my grandfather would have invented the field. Not literally, but I am one generation from the origin of the field,” Wright said. “My mentor’s mentor, who was one of the founders of orthopedics, said, ‘If you take care of the patient first, the patient will take care of you,’ meaning sometimes our egos want us to put ourselves first, but when you put the patient first, it will all be fine.”

Since 2006, her research has focused on active aging.

Focusing on active seniors, she said she found there was “a myth in this country and abroad that aging is the inevitable decline from vitality to frailty and that most people spend about 20 years dying.”

“What I found, in summary, is there is no age or skill level that we cannot harness the power of our bodies to rejuvenate,” Wright said. “From the muscular level, we can build new muscle. From the bony level, we can maintain our bones. At the cellular level, we can activate our stem cells to act younger, and we can maintain our brains by investing in our mobility every day.”

More or less, to use the old idiom, people don’t stop playing 18 | 400 LIFE

| January 2019

because they get old, they get old because they stop playing.

Wright has authored four books, mainly focused on active aging: “Fitness after 40,” which was later revised to “Fitness after 40: Your Strong Body at 50, 60 and Beyond”; “Guide to Thrive,” a four-step guide to improving health; “Younger in Eight Weeks”; and “Masterful Care of the Aging Athlete,” a textbook.

In April 2019, she will debut a new book, “A Parent’s Playbook for Raising Healthy Athletes,” which she said she wrote from both a medical and parental perceptive, as she and her husband — two-time Stanley Cup winner Peter Taglianetti — have raised a blended family of six athletes.

“Right now, there is literally an epidemic of overuse injuries in young athletes because we are playing them year round, we specialize too early and a variety of other parenting activities that really are not benefiting our children,” Wright said.

“Because in reality, when you pole professional athletes, for example, you take the Pittsburgh Penguins, they didn’t specialize until they were 16. The greatest hockey player in the world, Sidney Crosby, played baseball until he was 16. We’re asking our children to subspecialize when they’re 11 or 10 and play them year round, it’s a disaster.”

She said the network is also working on an education campaign with pediatricians and parents to let them know sports medicine doctors are capable of looking after them.

“All fellowship-trained sports doctors have significant experience taking care of child athletes,” she said. “Interestingly,

many pediatric orthopods have a wide experience taking care of things like scoliosis and congenital deformities, but not as much experience taking care of young athletes.”

Regardless of age, Wright said there are four main things everyone can focus on to improve health: find a way they enjoy moving for an hour a day; dieting, especially by eliminating sugar; resting; and being active in social groups.

“If people would do those four things, it would go a long way,” Wright said. “That’s how we should start our new year.”

For the importance of social groups, Wright said even watching sports can be a healthy activity.

“Social groups are very important. Isolation is detrimental to health, so that’s why sports teams are so amazing,” she said.

“Whether you are a fan of sports time like [Atlanta United supporters] Footie Mob or Resurgence or Terminus Legion watching the MLS team, that interacting is good for your health of any kind. Whether you’re watching SEC football from the stands or playing it, it is good for everything that is going on.”

While watching sports for health might be easy for some, cutting out sugar will likely be more difficult, but Wright said the impact is tangible.

“I’m an old athlete, and I hurt all the time,” Wright said, “but when I am not eating sugar, I don’t feel my body. It’s like I’m 26 again. Sugar is a huge inflammatory, and it causes lots of pain. If you want to get out of musculoskeletal pain, stop eating sugar.”

‘What I found, in summary, is there is no age or skill level that we cannot harness the power of our bodies to rejuvenate. From the muscular level, we can build new muscle. From the bony level, we can maintain our bones. At the cellular level, we can activate our stem cells to act younger, and we can maintain our brains by investing in our mobility every day.’

Dr. Vonda Wright, an orthopedic surgeon and chief of the Northside Hospital Sports Medicine

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400 eats

Sometimes fitness can be overly complicated.

With a myriad of different gyms to go to, workout philosophies to prescribe to, equipment to buy, diets to try and classes to attend, sometimes it just all seems like too much to handle, combined with all the other things that take up our daily lives.

And in my very limited experience, more often than not, the simplest things sometimes work and feel the best; a brisk run in the park, the taste of a crisp apple, 30 minutes of time spent meditating Sometimes basic fitness techniques just feel better.

For this issue of 400 Eats, I tried to encapsulate the idea of simple healthy eating, with two delicious recipes to start your day.

One, a different take on the usual morning protein shake, takes the flavors of apple, vanilla and cinnamon, and blasts them with good daily vitamins and minerals. The other, gives you an all in one, nutty, chocolaty meal or snack that is easy to make and easy to grab on the go.

But what’s great about both of these recipes is that they can easily be changed, swapped and experimented with for dietary restrictions, taste or curiosity.

Content by Alexander Popp | Photos by Bradley Wiseman

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| January 2019

‘Apple doesn’t fall far from the Shake’ Protein wakeup Ingredients 12 ounce Almond milk (it’s definitely OK to use regular milk or water if those are more your speed) 2 scoops vanilla flavored protein 1 apple, sliced into wedges 1 cup of spinach 2 tbsp of almonds 1/4 cup of uncooked oats Ice Cinnamon to taste Blender Directions 1. Slice up your apple, you can take out the seeds and core depending on your preference, I don’t mind eating the entire apple so I chose to just roughly chop it up.

2. Add your milk, protein powder, apple spinach, almonds, oats and a dash of cinnamon to the blender. Blend until the shake is fully mixed and evenly blended.

3. Do a few taste tests to see if your shake needs more liquid or Cinnamon, and keep blending until there is no grittiness from the protein powder.

4. Pour over ice in a tall glass and enjoy.

5. This recipe should easily make several servings and can be customized to fit any dietary restrictions easily.

January 2019 | 400 LIFE | 21

Chocolate chip no-bake energy balls inGRedientS 1 cup oatmeal 1 cup peanut butter 1/2 cup sunflower seeds 1/2 cup chocolate chips 1/3 cup honey 1 tablespoon chia seeds 1 teaspoon vanilla extract DIRECTIONS 1. Combine oats, peanut butter, sunflower seeds, chocolate chips, honey, chia seeds, and vanilla extract together in a bowl.

2. Mix thoroughly until a sticky “dough” forms.

3. Cover the bowl and chill in the freezer for about 30 minutes, then roll the dough into balls about the size of a ping pong ball.

4. Roll each ball in chia seeds for added nutrients and less stickiness.

5. Make sure to store these balls in a cool place, preferably the refrigerator, to insure their structural integrity.

Recipe inspirations from Men’s Health Magazine and Allrecipes.com

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