Smooties and socks

Rather embarassingly, I allowed myself to be cajoled into entering an office weight loss challenge. We have three months and the goal is simply to lose the highest percentage of starting weight (which was frightening); there’s a twenty dollar buy-in and the winner takes the pot, which is sitting at a hundred bucks. A chance to win a hundered bucks doing something I need to be doing anyway? Yeah, didn’t take much arm-twisting…

I’ve been going to Zumba two to three times a week for the past six weeks, and volleyball season just started – plus, spring arrived in Seattle so it’s pleasant enough to get some walking done in the evenings or at lunch – getting exercise shouldn’t be too much of a problem. The eating, on the other hand, needs a bit of tweaking because it’s ice cream season! (heh, isn’t it always?) I’m working on trimming the simple carbs and increasing the whole foods that I eat. Fortunately, I work right next to a public market so I can pick up produce any time I want.  Unfortunately, this same market offers a good variety of tempting treats which do nothing to help me reach my goal. Must. Stay. Focused. and avoid the mini-donut hut.

This morning I kicked off my day with a smootie, made with half a banana, 1/4 cup each of frozen blueberries, raspberries, mangos, yogurt, protein powder, and a cup of skim milk. I put it in my insulated, reusable smoothie cup and sipped it during my morning commute. Tasty and filling, with no added sugar (the fruit has plenty), and roughly 250 calories.  Lunch will be soup and a small baked potato sprinkled with lemon juice (try it, it’s a surprisingly good substitute for butter), and of course I’ll be drinking unsweetened iced tea all day. Don’t give me a bad time about the caffeine. It’s either tea or coffee, and since it’s too warm to be drinking coffee, tea is my beverage of choice. I’m just happy I’ve gotten to where I can drink it without sugar.

In between smootie sips on the train this morning, I got the second striped supersocke knit to the same length as the first, which is roughly at the base of my toes. I then put them both on the same needle so I can finish them off together. These are supposed to be for Chris, so I’ll knit another inch on the foot before doing the toe decreases. Wouldn’t it be a shame if they ended up fitting me, though?

 

Shave and a haircut

Today, I am debunking one of my biggest pet peeve old wive’s tales: that shaving makes hair grow back thicker / darker / etc..

It is imperative to understand some basic biology about hair in order to appreciate the silliness of this belief.

• Hair grows from follicles, which are below the skin. Follicles vary in size, they don’t last forever, and are governed by hormones, both good and bad (see any male with a bald spot).
• Your follicles grow hairs based on your own unique physiology – genetics, hormones, age, etc.. Illness, disease, diet, and habits like smoking  affect hair growth as well.
• The hair that you can see, that which is above the skin, is dead. If it weren’t dead, getting a haircut would hurt. Living parts of your body have blood supplies and nerves. Hair (beyond the skin) does not. Formation and growth happens below the skin, in the follicle. (Fingernails are similar – you trim the dead parts.)
• Follicles go through several phases, each lasting various amount of time from weeks to years – growth, transitional, resting. Each individual follicle has its own schedule, which is independent of neighboring follicles; this is a good thing, or else we’d all have random spots on our heads without hair, or half-eyebrows… When a follicle re-enters the growth phase, a new hair pushes out the old. We lose hairs all the time, as we are growing new ones.
• Cutting dead hair does not affect the growing part (the follicle) any more than cutting your fingernails affects the growing part of the nail (the bed).
• Pulling hair out by the root does, however, affect the follicle – it will damage it and over time the follicle will die.

(continued below this nifty graphic that I didn’t make)

Ok, so what about all the people who insist that they shaved something and the hair grew back coarser, darker, etc.?

A few more points to keep in mind:

• When a follicle is growing a brand-new hair from scratch, the first few bits are narrow – that is, the hair is thinner and tapered at the end. Light reflects differently on a thinner hair than a thicker hair, and it will appear lighter in color when it is thinly tapered. The tapered end is also soft and flexible.
• It is the size of the follicle that determines how thick your hair is. Cutting off hair does not make the follicle larger.
• Most people begin shaving when they are relatively young. Their hair follicles are still developing, still getting the hang of making hair – so logically, as the person matures they will have thicker, darker hairs because their follicles are getting better at making hair, and most people’s hair gets darker as they get older (until it begins to go grey, of course).

Regarding the cutting / shaving itself:

• When you cut a hair off at skin level (shave), you are removing the tapered end and exposing the full diameter of a mature hair. Light will reflect differently over this wide, mature hair than it did from the new, thinly tapered end.
• Shaving usually cuts the hairs at a slight angle, which reveals a wider profile of each individual hair – thus adding to the illusion of thicker hair. Add in the contrast of dark stubble against light skin and the effect is magnified.
• The wide, flat, cut end of a hair will also feel thick and sharp – because it is! Shaving is like cutting a tree; the trunk is wide and flat – but the tip of a new branch is slender and flexible. But cutting off the hair did not MAKE it thicker, the hair is thicker because the follicle is growing it that way, regardless of whether you cut it or not.
• Shaving cuts off a whole bunch of hairs at once, revealing a whole bunch of wide, flat, cut ends. Because you have just leveled the playing field, so to speak, you are seeing and feeling a lot of hairs in the active growth phase and  stubble appears to grow quicker / thicker than before shaving. Before shaving, your individual hairs are each in their own growth cycle and don’t all fall out at once, so the growth is staggered. You don’t notice all of your hair growing at the same rate because it doesn’t – but when you create a field of stubble you are much more aware of the fact that some 85% of your follicles are in an active growing phase at any given time.
• When you shave, you are able to observe up-close just how quickly hair grows – up to 1/2″ a month!. This is not nearly as noticable on longer hair.

Still with me?

When you pluck out a hair, you are re-setting the growth cycle of the follicle. It has to start over, and it may take awhile to do so. It also takes some time for the new hair to reach the surface of your skin and be visible – weeks, usually. And this new hair will be soft, fine, and flexible at first – because it does not yet have a blunt, cut end. This is the appeal of waxing – “slower” regrowth and softer hairs when they do show up. Plus, as I mentioned earlier, pulling hairs out by the roots damages the follicles so less hair will grow over time.

Ok, I’m sure some of you are still adamant that shaving makes your hair grow in thicker and darker. I want to point out a couple of if/then situations that might help.

1. If this were true, then every man who shaves would end up with black stubble the size of pencil lead. My blond son might actually prefer that…
2. If this were true, then all a person would need to do to get thicker hair would be to shave it. Millions of people with thinning hair wish this were true.

Sources: follicle.com; nature.com; surviving-hairloss.com; zapahair.com; snopes.com

Placing blame

I woke up in pain this morning. It’s not a new pain, but it’s one I had under control – for the past two years, it’s been under control – thanks to a preventative course of treatment by a skilled acupuncturist / naturopath, whom I was seeing once or twice a month for treatments that kept the inflamation down without medication. It’s a pain that two orthopedic surgeons previously told me was only treatable with surgery. It’s a pain that is debilitating, and it’s back.

It’s back because I have new insurance, and my new insurance doesn’t cover ”alternative therapies”. I now have to pay the full cost of each treatment instead of just a copay, and the cost is more than my budget can bear so I haven’t  been going. We have group insurance at work, for which I am very, very grateful; but this year our group was hit with a 52% rate increase because we had claims. Imagine that – some employees actually used their insurance! And because they did, my company was forced to cut back on benefits because we can’t afford that kind of rate increase. I understand our company’s situation, and I know they didn’t want to cut benefits but was forced to because our group dared to use its benefits and now insurance companies see that our group is costing them money instead of making them money. Never mind all the years my company has paid the premiums for its employees, never mind that we didn’t have any major claims for decades. One year with claims, and BOOM – your group is toxic. They can’t kick you out, but they can raise your rates so high that your company has no choice but to find options, which for us meant cutting benefits. As it was, my company swallowed double-digit increases in order to keep offering health insurance for our employees. 

The really sad thing is, it’s not the insurance companies that suffer – it’s the people that need the insurance in the first place.

I have hip impingements, in both hip joints. I have had xrays, MRIs, taken regimes of NSAIDs, been to physical therapy, and seen two different bone doctors. Both told me surgery was my only option, but I sought a third opinion – one that doesn’t require cutting into my hips or shaving off excess bone, one that treats the body holistically and helps it to deal with a condition that is not going away on its own but that can be managed. And it was managed. For two years, I was able to live relatively pain-free, to play volleyball and softball. To go for long walks and take bike rides. To sit without pain, to sleep the night through, to get in and out of the car without groaning and grabbing onto the door for support. To walk without limping.

And now, because I can’t afford to pay $200 each month for preventative care to keep this pain in check, I haven’t been able to get my acupuncture treatments, and the pain is returning. Our screwed up health system is to blame – they won’t cover alternative therapies but will pay for a hip surgery. Hell, they’ll pay for two, plus the resulting physical therapy – but they won’t pay for the preventative treatments that have kept me out of the operating room for two years. What kind of sense does that make??

These boots are made for walking

I’m racking up the miles on my tennies*: 2.8 miles on Saturday, 2.5 miles on Sunday, and 2.0 miles today (Monday). I have some workout clothes under my desk so I can take advantage of the unseasonably warm February weather we’ve been enjoying thus far, and I bought rain pants & a jacket for when the clouds come back to Seattle.

* What do you call your workout shoes? I still call mine tennis shoes (tennies for short), though I’ve never played tennis and I’m pretty sure mine would not be good court shoes. I guess technically I have running shoes (that’s what the sign said in the store where I bought them), but since I don’t really run it seems like I’m letting them down to call them that. Sneakers? Athletic shoes? Joggers? Cross trainers? Mostly I walk, with small bits of jogging thrown in for good measure if my knees are cooperating. Whatever they are called, I think mine are about due to be demoted to lawn-mowing shoes and I’ll need to go buy a new pair – ones that will keep out the rain.

False advertising

It’s one of my favorite soap boxes to climb onto: be an educated consumer.

Certainly don’t fall for slick advertising, fads, and smokescreen claims that the megacorporations use to persuade you to buy their products. Don’t go in blind. Know what you are buying.

Advertisers are quick to sink their hooks into trendy terms such as “All-Natural” without backing it up with anything real. Right now, greek yogurt is hot — so it’s no surprise that the big guys are all over that.

The definition of greek yogurt is “yogurt which has been strained in a cloth or bag to remove whey, resulting in a thicker yogurt with a consistency between regular yogurt and soft cheese”. Strained yogurt is also higher in protein, which is the big selling point.

Chobani greek yogurt is a brand that is popular in our grocery stores, and the ingredients in the vanilla flavor are: cultured pasteurized nonfat milk, sugar, natural vanilla flavor, five live active cultures including S. thermaphilus, bulgaricus, L. acidophilus, bifudus, and L. casein.

Fage greek yogurt, another popular brand, contains milk, cream, and the live cultures above that make yogurt into yogurt.

Oiokos, another greek yogurt, is made from cultured pasteurized organic nonfat milk.

I’m sensing a trend.

Yogurt is a simple food – milk and enzymes (plus fruit / sugar / honey if you desire).

So why, then, (and I’m totally throwing them under the bus here) does Lucerne’s greek yogurt contain locust bean gum, pectin, protein concentrate and corn starch? Oh, but it’s ORGANIC corn starch, as if we aren’t force-fed enough corn products… Why do they pass this off as greek yogurt? Because they are counting on you not knowing the difference and buying their crapola-yogurt-made-thicker-with-more-crapola because they put the word GREEK on the front. Adding a bunch of thickeners doesn’t make it greek, it’s greek because of the process of straining.

If they are this misleading about their yogurt, how can I be sure their cage-free eggs really are? Somehow, my bullshit meter doesn’t buy it.

Surprise attack

We thought the Boy was invincible. Nothing phases him – he has never suffered the bodily revolt that allergies bring on. The Boy weathers every season without a pollen-induced sniffle. He uses any soap, lotion, shampoo, and deodorant without a second thought. He reads ingredient lists for fun rather than to screen for potential foes – nary a worry about peanuts, soy, wheat, or milk. Bees and mosquitoes don’t phase him. Never have I had to worry about what he ingests, contacts, or encounters in the environment.

And then yesterday I walked in the door and the Boy greeted me with a funny look on his face and I was overwhelmed with a slight sense of vertigo as I took in his countenance. He was beet red, with a bit of puffiness to his face, and completely covered in small, raised, rash-like dots on every exposed bit of skin. HIVES! Wait, hives are an allergic response. The Boy doesn’t have allergies, unless he fell into a pit of nettles or poison oak… Which he didn’t, he had been on a bike ride with his dad and took along some snacks for energy.

I tell ya, the boy could eat nails and not suffer a moment of indigestion – but he was completely undone by a Tiger’s Milk bar. Within an hour of consumption he noticed the itchy hives and read the ingredients on the bar; the only ‘new’ food that he didn’t remember ever eating before was carob. We all prefer real chocolate, so I have never bought carob and now that I think about it I don’t recall seeing it in any foods that I have purchased so it is quite possibly the first time he’s eaten it.

I gave him a couple of Benadryl tablets and warned him to watch for respiratory distress; the hives began to fade and he claimed to feel fine after awhile. He plans on testing out his new potential allergy, much like one continues to poke at a new bruise to see if it still hurts, by obtaining some carob and seeing if the hives return when he eats it. I’m not thrilled about him toying with a histamine response, but he seems rather bemused by the situation and who can blame him? His body has launched an attack on a seemingly innocuous ingredient that none of us ever gave a second thought to.

(carob seed pods, image from the ‘net)

Beginning shut down sequence

in five… four… three…

This is a very personal blog entry – it involves girly stuff and aging stuff and if either of those wig you out then I suggest you move right along to something else.

Since I have always been attuned to my body and its changes, I catch on early when something is new or different. There were major changes when my daughter began her monthly cycles – oy, the hormone overload in the house did a number on me – and then over the past six months or so I’ve noticed some things that recently have escalated and accumulated to the point where I have started paying serious attention.

Like the additional chin hairs. It seems like I have to pull several each week. Always a nuisance, these seem to be on a mission to see how fast they can populate my face before I catch on and tweeze them. It’s amazing how many can pop up overnight.

The dry skin. I have gone through a lot more lotion this winter/spring than normal, and the skin on the backs of my hands is getting that “old lady” texture. My daughter even commented on it, so I know it’s not just me.

The increased PMS. I never used to get anything, and now I have the full range from bloating to back ache to tenderness to downright crankiness. I’m a walking commercial. And cramps – they really hurt now, to the point I take Tylenol for them.

My cycle has never been regular, but it’s gotten even less regular — and it’s gotten heavier (TMI, I know. I warned you up front). For years I was blessed with what I always called an Inconvenient Period (as opposed to the Debilitating Period that so many of my friends seemed to get) but mine is being rebranded and I’ve had to change my monthly supplies to keep up. And just to keep things exciting, I now have mid-cycle spotting to deal with.

Then there is the mood swings. Heavens to murgatroid, I can feel them. One day I feel great, the next I want to cry.

My sleep has been off. I need less (which is kind of a good thing) but I also have more trouble falling asleep, and for the first time in my life I’ve started waking up in the middle of the night.

Never enthusiastic, my metabolism seems to have gone into hibernation – I am eating better than ever and exercising more and yet the fat, particularly around my belly, is more stubborn than ever.

And finally, my internal thermometer seems to have a hitch.  I don’t experience night sweats or hot flashes, but I range from chilly to overly warm throughout the day (and night), when previously I never really thought about it. I’ve become a sweater-toter, a shawl-packer. Today, I even layered a cardigan.

Taken individually my symptoms are all ‘normal’ and experienced by most everyone at some point. What caught my attention is that these are all happening, every month. Combined with my age and family history, I’ve scheduled an appointment with my doctor to talk about these changes, because according to my research they all point in one direction: perimenopause.  Not exactly exciting news, but if I’m right, then perhaps there are some additional lifestyle changes I can make to ease this process.

More Pi, please

See? Just on and on with the knitting of the Pi Are Square Shawl. I took this to knit night on Wednesday and I’ve got the feeling I ought to check it very carefully for errors; lace and chatting don’t usually go well together.

In the meantime, I’ve put a few more rounds on my sister’s socks and have started the sleeves on my Featherweight Cardigan. I have another cardigan planned out and the yarn is bagged with the pattern, but I successfully avoided startitis last night — which was difficult because there it was, all ready to cast on and calling to me… But no, must. finish. other. projects. first.

In other news, I went for my first “run” last night. (I use quotation marks because there was more walking than running, but I’m excited nonetheless.) I bought an app for my iPhone – the Couch to 5K – and just grabbed my headphones and hit the sidewalk after dinner. The first fifteen minutes were the hardest but I persevered and by the end I was feeling great (tired, but great). Today I have the exercise hangover, complete with sore muscles and stiffness, but I will be lacing up my sneakers again tomorrow for another “run”. I have no illusions that I will become a marathon runner, but I really need to shed some ballast and should increase my endurance if I’m going to survive another summer of softball and volleyball.

(If you aren’t familiar with the concept of couch to 5k, it is a graduated exercise plan that eases you into running by alternating walking with running over a 9-week period, so that by the end you can run 3 miles without stopping. We’ll see about that.)

Helping hands

Today I took a 6-hour CPR / First Aid certification class. I have to keep my certification for both work and Girl Scouts, and even if they didn’t require it I would still take the class because it just feels good to know that I can help if someone needs it.  Even if all I can do is apply pressure to a wound and offer comfort and reassurance while waiting for an ambulance I know I’ve helped that person; and truthfully, I hope I never have to give someone CPR – but I know how to if needed. I encourage everyone to take the class for the sense of empowerment that can be gained. Rather than feeling helpless in an emergency situation, you would learn how to take control and make a difference. Maybe even save a life.

Sneaky ways to make your kids eat better

I have had many years of practice in getting more healthy foods into my kids than they know about. They may turn up their noses at green beans, but I have a few tricks up my sleeves to ensure they eat them, and many other things they don’t know about.

Tip #1: ground flaxseed, high in omega 3, manganese, and dietary fiber, is easily added to a variety of baked goods. Try adding a couple tablespoons to banana bread, spice cake, muffins, biscuits, and even brownies. If your kids eat hot cereal, you can sprinkle a little in there as well.  Even trickier: add to baked macaroni and cheese, casseroles, bread pudding, and rice dishes.

Tip #2: a blender is your friend in the ninja-vegetable war.  Cooked veggies, when blended with a little milk or broth, are easily hidden in a variety of foods – you can add some to rice for a tasty, creamy side dish. They also make an awesome soup or stew base. Cook and puree a variety and then add chicken and noodles to make a healthy soup. If your kids like squash soup or mashed sweet potatoes, you can sneak in extra red and orange veggies like red bell peppers, sweet potatoes, red onions, and tomatoes. Mashed potatoes are white, so think white veggies – cauliflower, parsnips, and onions. Go green with pureed peas, broccoli, asparagus, bell peppers, and green beans – then stir in cooked ground beef and call it Monster Mash.

Tip #3: use your food processor. Zucchini, carrots, potatoes, and broccoli are easy to hide. Shredded raw veggies are an awesome addition to meatloaf, quiche, chili, and a variety of casseroles and pot pies. Try baked chicken and rice with a cup of shredded veggies mixed in.