Kansans and Friends In Weight Loss

I spent some time looking through one of my textbooks that I have acquired since going to school, looking for some ideas to give people out there in the blogosphere to stay healthy so they can keep doing what they love to do. I think before I can clearly give any sound suggestions. I think it is important that I have some sort of assessment tool in hand so I can maybe gauge what people are struggling with and what they would like suggestions in changing.

With that being said I do want to make you aware of the fact that I am not a Doctor (yet) and before you take the advice of anyone you should always consult a Medical Doctor and get a physical done before embarking on a new fitness and diet regimen. However, I can assist you with figuring out what you enjoy to do for physical activity and what you enjoy eating so that the term diet doesn’t sound so foreboding.

There are six dimensions of wellness that make up the health continuum

1. Physical
2. Intellectual
3. Interpersonal/social
4. Emotional
5. Spiritual
6. Environmental

A person can be emotionally well but not be physically well. They can have intellectual wellness but lack social wellness and spiritual wellness. Or even intellectual wellness but no physical wellness.  So what good is knowing all there is to know about blogging or even how to successfully build and maintain a web site if you are so run down you can’t focus? Instead you pop another No Doze and hope to stay awake for another hour trying to scoop someone. Before you know it the excessive caffeine builds up in your digestive tract and starts causing ulcers. Ok so that isn’t a very good push for caffeine as a whole as I am sitting here with a freshly opened can of Diet Pepsi next to me as I type this out. My problem is that I am on a high enough dosage of Zoloft that it makes me drowsy about two hrs after taking it so I need the boost through something so I go through a 24 can case of Diet Pepsi in about four days. That is six cans a day and at 35 mg’s of caffeine per can that is 210 mg’s a day of caffeine. So no I am not hoping on the caffeine is bad for you bandwagon because that would certainly make me look like a hypocrite.

I think what I would like to do instead is take some time to put together a survey OMG not another survey LOL. Yes just so I can help people see where their habits are and then help use the results to better suggest what they could try to make staying healthy maybe not so tedious and boring so they can be alert and handle the demands of their editors and readers or at least their readers if they are self edited. So I am going to be working after my podcast this Friday to put together my own little survey to send out to willing participants.

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For the next part of this assignment we are asked to write a story to ourselves as to why we will not follow the teachings in this book to change our lives. Kind of a way of identifying what we use for cop outs when we don’t want to acknowledge what we are doing isn’t working.

This is what I had to say

The reasons I fail to effectively deal with these issues are few and are cop outs actually instead of reasons. I don’t want to work through this because I don’t want to look weak even to myself. Crying is or at least was told to be a sign of weakness in my house growing up. There is also the one statement on page 28 that I seem to use a lot”Compared to what we could have had to endure, we aren’t doing so badly.” I seem to fall back on this one quite often. I always minimize what I have gone through because maybe it seems safer that way. If I keep minimizing it enough it just looks like another fact to life that some just have to go through. It is also my way of controlling what happened to me by not fully acknowledging the impact it had on me. Yes the “It’s too hard” resonates with me as well. I don’t want to deal with the emotional roller coaster I know this will put me on. That is the main reason I fail time and time again. I don’t want to deal with it> I want to feel normal in light of my abnormal past. I know I am not normal though so that is even more reason to work on what I have to work on.

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I opened up my email this morning and saw this story about bloggers who are blogging themselves to death. “Two weeks ago in North Lauderdale, Fla., funeral services were held for Russell Shaw, a prolific blogger on technology subjects who died at 60 of a heart attack. In December, another tech blogger, Marc Orchant, died at 50 of a massive coronary. A third, Om Malik, 41, survived a heart attack in December.”

I was disturbed at this trend in how we are becoming such a slave to the PC and Internet that we are willing to die for our work. Not only that but die at an early age. This got me thinking about what other trends in health are on the rise over just the course of a decade or so. According to National Center for Health Statistics,and National Vital Statistics Reports between 1999 and 2001 the leading six causes of death due to diet and inactivity were heart disease,cancer, stroke,diabetes,kidney disease, and hypertension.Further in a 2000assessment people who led sedentary lives had 23.2 days in a 30 day time period where they felt healthy. They reported 3.9 days out of the month were they felt sad, blue or depressed and 8.1 days having trouble sleeping.”Other bloggers complain of weight loss or gain, sleep disorders, exhaustion and other maladies born of the nonstop strain of producing for a news and information cycle that is as always-on as the Internet.” These numbersdefinitely support on some level the New York post’s information regarding blogging till you drop.

I looked into some other statistics and what I found was just more confirmation that our sedentary lifestyles are not helping us but hurting us instead. In the most recent study I could find from the CDC I found this:

The percentage of adults who spent most of their day sitting increased from 36.8% in 2000 to 39.9% in 2005. A similar increase was seen among both men and women, adults aged 25 years and over, and non-Hispanic white adults. Overall, the percentage of adults who spent most of their day standing or walking decreased between 2000 and 2005. A similar decrease was seen among adults aged 65 years and over and non-Hispanic white adults.

Kansas Jumped from 5% reporting unhealthy days of more than 14 days to 9% from 1993 to 2006

Kansas also jumped from 6.5% to 9.1% reporting mentally unhealthy days of more than 14 days to 1993 to 2006

Overall in Kansas there has been an increase of 4 days to 5.4 days of being physically or mentally unhealthy.

Between 1998 and 2006 Kansas reported fair or poor self rated health initially in 1993 of 12.0 to 17.3 in 2006

These numbers are from

Health, United States an annual report on trends in health statistics.

On the plus side smoking has decreased for men and women nationally with smoking by men at 50% in 1965 to just under 30% in 2005 and just over 30% in women to about 20% within the same time frame. Even smoking by pregnant mothers declined from 20% in 1995 to 10% in 2005

Between 1999 to 2004 adults between 18 and 44 eat 1 to 3 meals out at a rate of just over 50% while they eat 4 or more meals out about 35% of the time

Overweight including obese has risen from 45% to 70% for the 20 to 74 yr old age group between 1960 to 2004

Arthritis/musculoskeletal, heart/circulatory, mental illness, diabetes are the top 4 conditions reported between 2004 to 2005 that cause activity limitations

Last but not least Antidepressant use by men increase from about 3% between 1988 to 1994 to about 7% between 1992 to 2002 and by women from about 4% between 1988 to 1994 to about 13% between 1999 to 2002

So you can see some pretty disturbing trends here. I love to blog and at the moment I am not getting paid huge bucks to blog, but I can’t see running my health into the ground to get a jump on the competition. I am in bed no later than 12:30 each night with the rare exception that I am working on a design, I keep healthy foods around to snack on like whole wheat bread for peanut butter and jelly sandwich’s , carrots, grapes, bananas, yogurt, skim milk, diet soda just to name a few. I make sure I get at least 30 min of fairly intense activity about every other day. At the moment that is taking the form of house work and playing out doors with my kid. I too am on antidepressants so I really have to work at keeping my body in good shape so the antidepressants can properly do there job.

You can see why now is it is crucial to focus on preventative health measures instead of treatment. Because in the case of the bloggers who blogged themselves ragged their deaths could have been prevented if in fact their sedentary lifestyles contributed to the cause of their deaths, in which reading this article it appears that it did.

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Want to help your kids break the junk-food habit? Try offering them these seven healthy snack options recommended by the National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases:

1. Fresh fruit
2. Canned fruit in juice or light syrup
3. Small amounts of dried fruits like raisins, apple rings, or apricots
4. Fresh vegetables such as baby carrots, zucchini slices, tomato wedges, or cucumber spears
5. Reduced fat cheese or small amounts of peanut butter on whole-wheat crackers
6. Low-fat yogurt with fruit
7. Graham crackers, animal crackers, or low-fat vanilla wafers

For more healthy and easy snack ideas, try my Fit Kids Eat Right snacks!

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Kansas Firm Recalls Cattle Heads That Contain Prohibited Materials

Recall Release CLASS II RECALL FSIS-RC-012-2008 HEALTH RISK: LOW Congressional and Public Affairs (202) 720-9113 Amanda Eamich WASHINGTON, April 4, 2008 - Elkhorn Valley Packing LLC, a Harper, Kan., establishment, is voluntarily recalling approximately 406,000 pounds of frozen cattle heads with tonsils not completely removed, which is not compliant with regulations that require the removal of tonsils from cattle of all ages, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service announced today. Tonsils are considered a specified risk material (SRM) and must be removed from cattle of all ages in accordance with FSIS regulations. SRMs are tissues that are known to contain the infective agent in cattle infected with BSE, as well as materials that are closely associated with these potentially infective tissues. Therefore, FSIS prohibits SRMs from use as human food to minimize potential human exposure to the BSE agent. The products subject to recall include: [View Label | Larger Image (PDF)] Various weight bulk boxes of “BEEF WHOLE HEADS, KEEP REFRIGERATED.” Each shipping package bears the establishment numbers “EST. 19549A” inside the USDA mark of inspection, as well as a package code of “91700″ or “93700.” The company is recalling all products packed before March 28, 2008, with the package code “91700″ or “93700.” These products were sent to distributors and wholesalers nationwide. The problem was discovered at a State-inspected processing establishment that received some of the recalled products and verified that there had been incomplete removal of the tonsils. FSIS has received no reports of illness at this time. Media and consumers with questions about the recall should contact company President Mike Grant at (620) 896-2300. Consumers with food safety questions can “Ask Karen,” the FSIS virtual representative available 24 hours a day at AskKaren.gov. The toll-free USDA Meat and Poultry Hotline 1-888-MPHotline (1-888-674-6854) is available in English and Spanish and can be reached from l0 a.m. to 4 p.m. (Eastern Time) Monday through Friday. Recorded food safety messages are available 24 hours a day.

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I am revisiting this book because there are still strategies I need to continue to work on in order to get things right in my head and get strong for the pending release of my sons father from prison this month.

In this assignment we are asked to challenge our beliefs, by listing in order of significance the top five things in our life that we have simply failed to fully or completely acknowledge to ourselves.

The list that I had made when I originally sat down to do this what seems like a year ago now is as follows:

1.  Failing to work on feelings associated with the sexual abuse at my grandfathers hands
2. Failing to deal with my actions of starting the fire when I was 10 years old
3. Regrets over not being there in my grandmothers final moments
4. Wishing I had enough guts to do what is needed to put some closure on my dads death
5. Failing to work on my feelings of self worth

Sitting here looking at this list now I would have to say that the list has changed somewhat and now looks more like:

1. Failing to deal with the sexual, physical and verbal abuse at the hands of my grandfather
2. Failing to deal with being raped twice
3. Failing to come to terms as to the true reason I gave my first son up for adoption
4. Failing to deal with the physical and verbal abuse from Jeff and Wayne
5. Failing to deal with feeling of abandonment at an early age and all the things that happened to me as a result of that abandonment- this includes dealing with the triple whammy of being taken away, having to go to my dads funeral, and then going right back into the foster homes we were placed not less than three days before. This also includes my mom ditching us when I was 7. This also includes the deaths of several key loved ones who showed me kindness and caring in an uncertain time in my life.

Looking back at the list I made first I can not change not being able to be there when my grandmother breathed her last breath. I had maintained almost a steady two week vigil at her bedside off and on and dealing with being a a newly single parent as I had just left his father earlier that year. I can’t change the fact I didn’t check to make sure the ringer on my cell phone was set to ring instead of vibrate and missed the call to get to the hospital. So I need to stop beating myself up over this.

The other things though all contribute to my feeling of self worth and that even though I am enjoying certain successes in life right now I still don’t feel like I am good enough or worthy enough of these moments of success.

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I was doing something for MomPack one morning when I came across this site called L’ Bri. I contacted Judy Alders who is the representative for the site I came across and asked her if she could send me the sample pack for oily skin and within a matter of just a few days she had sent me the sample pack. I will say I was very impressed with the packaging. It makes you feel like your opening up a special treat just for you.

Here are some pictures of what the sample packet looks like. I will warn you ahead of time my digital camera doesn’t take the best pictures in the world so I really had to do my best to clean up the pictures I did take.

In the packet I received comes a mask which yields two applications, Smooth n’ Firm Eye Repair Gel which I am not sure how many uses as I am using it sparingly because it feels so soothing and cool when I put it on my tired eyes late in the day. It also comes with cleanser, refresher and moisturizer along with a pamphlet that describes the product with Judy’s Name and contact information on the back.

About the products themselves, as I said I am still using the eye repair gel and I really enjoy it and am planning on buying the full sized product maybe next month. I wasn’t too crazy about the mask as it felt almost too tight and I couldn’t wait to wash it off. I did like the cleanser and I substituted it for my regular cleanser for two weeks. There was a small two day time frame where I did have some breakouts because of the change in product, but overall my experience with the cleanser was not so negative that I would not consider using it again. I liked the refresher, it is light and fragrance free. The moisturizer I did not like because it was packed with too much fragrance and products with a lot of fragrance do not do well on my skin.   That is not to say it wouldn’t do well for someone else though I am just giving you my take on how it worked for me.

Overall my experience with finding this site,contacting the representative, getting the product and using it was very positive and I would highly recommend women to please check this site out when they are looking for skin care alternatives.

You can contact Judy Alders at www.judyalders.lbrionline.com

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To be body confident for me means to be comfortable with what I see when I look in the mirror. I am not the classic overweight person. I have 20 lbs to lose tops. At one time I found something that worked and then they took it off the market. It was ephedra. I lost 10 lbs while I was on the Metabolife shakes that had the ephedra in them. I have been struggling to find something else that will help me lose the weight as nicely as the ephedra products did. One trick that I have benefited from is the removal of all my FAT clothes. Once I started losing the weight I lost the FAT clothes as well. So when I feel my jeans getting a little snug that is my reminder to back off of the bad eating habits and regroup.

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