11 posts tagged “health”

2 articles from the UK today about how cel phone use may be worse than smoking and food additives could be as damaging as lead to kids.

Fun!

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-wellbeing/health-news/food-additives-could-be-as-damaging-as-lead-in-petro
l-804890.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-wellbeing/health-news/mobile-phones-more-dangerous-than-smoking-802602.html

You can print out a list of dangerous additives here:

http://www.actiononadditives.com/Take_action/#a

Several people have asked about the results from my Master Cleanser experiment. So here goes:

I am eating much less dairy. The occasional ice cream and real yogurt in smoothies, excepted. Not so much cheese.
I have lessened my caffeine intake to 2 c of black / green tea a day instead of coffee (1 - 3 c, daily).
I'm less phlegmy.
I have put on probably at least half of whatever weight I lost. I'm no longer gaunt, but my pants still fit better.
I am more conscious of the carbs I'm eating and am overall eating less of them, but with the whole family being sick the last week, I've slipped a bit there.
Eating more vegetables, soups.

Truthfully, I found the whole cleanser diet pretty easy to live with. I liked not worrying about what or how much to eat, what to shop for, what would be wasted. I'd be happy to live on it, most days.

How's your sick house?

Here's our status (I'm bored):

Clive- A-ok. Mood: Copious stress over work/strike and tired of family.

Queen Soledad  - Still coughing, but improved. Health, that is. Off to ballet with Daddy.  Mood: Somewhat especially foul.

SpitSpot - Napping. Fever most likely gone (at 8 am it was 99.2). Has the most vile yellow snot I have ever seen in one of my own children. Every sneeze produces thick ropes past her lips. Eeeeew. Mood: reasonable.

Me - Throat no longer sore, glands lightly swollen, head ache gone, but still stuffy head. Mood: on edge.

We all need to be better and back to our normal (and Clive, improved) schedules so that we don't implode. Even a trip to our favorite ice cream spot last night did little to improve our overall cheer. Wish us luck!

The pestilence still reigns at our home. Clive is back to work, though a bit wobbly. Queenie is out and about on a play date but still has a cough and stuffy head. Both are on 10 days of antibiotics, which Queenie thinks is great fun. Spit Spot and I came down with some version of their stuff Thursday and yesterday, respectively. I am doing everything I can to get rid of it as quickly as possible and prevent it from getting into my chest. Free! Free! I want to be free!

Anyway, all this sickness has ended up with TVALLTHETIME here at home. Thank you, Universe, for 24 hr Noggin, which is so much quieter than Disney and causes the kids to yell, "My turn!" far less. My whole family has also become addicted very quickly to Yo Gabba Gabba! It kind of creeps me out, but I cannot resist its pull, and their songs are ridiculously catchy. I've been trying most of the morning to find out who sings the "Rest Your Head" song, and can't. I have managed to find some ridiculously cute tee shirts and hoodies (iron on!) but no info on which *terribly hip and indie band* is singing it. If anyone knows, please let me know!

Spit Spot sang herself to sleep at nap time one of their songs. Too cute.

Check it out : http://www.yogabbagabba.com/

Clive has been incapacitated for the last 4 days with a wretched flu. 104 degree temp, chills, sore throat, and a wretched cough. He's been sleeping most of the days and nights away, poor guy, and dropping about 5 lbs every 12 hours.

I thought Queen Soledad caught it, too. Saturday, she attended a rousing 4 hour ice skating birthday party, complete with cake and cocoa. She had a blast, of course, but a couple hours later she had a low fever. Too much partying? Daddy's flu?

No, that'd be too easy. Seems she has managed to get strep again. Now, with scarlet fever. Wooo!

I blame the Hanna Montana toothbrush. I knew I should've thrown it out after the last bout, but thought a good ol' soak in hydrogen peroxide and GSE was enough. It was just a couple days old! From Santa! Damn.

Worst part is, tomorrow her class is having a Mardi Gras parade, party, and jazz concert. She worked on her float with her *krewe* all last week (theme, Summer) and has been planning her costume to the smallest detail. I had thought I could sneak her onto the scene to at least watch the parade, but now I fear she is too too sick.

Then, of course, there's the fact that Spit Spot and I are completely stir crazy. Sigh.

I have officially finished the Master Cleanse. Whew! 10 days of drinking *spicy water* (1 oz. fresh squeezed lemon juice, 1 oz. maple syrup, 8 oz. filtered water) and 3 days of weaning back onto food. Clive was going to do it with me, but quit after three angry days of kidney cleansing.

I did it because I've been feeling just awful the last few months. My diet and appetite were out of whack, I'd gained weight, my skin was a mess. And I was suddenly getting sick, twice in a month. The last time, just after New Year's, took weeks out of my life. And so I figured, since I had barely eaten for a couple weeks anyway, it was as good a time as ever to try again (the last time I did it was back in grad school).

The first day was awful because of the caffeine withdraw, but the rest were mostly fine. I wasn't hungry much until nighttime, and then I just went to bed. I got a bit tired of squeezing and buying lemons (A dollar a lemon! When did that happen?), but I really enjoyed the simplicity of the whole thing. No worrying about what to eat for breakfast, lunch or dinner. No stressing over carb-balancing or calories. I also really love lemons and syrup, so all was well.

Weaning back onto food has been more troublesome. Today I think I overate on soup and felt uncomfortably full for the rest of the day and night. Who knew?

So, 2 weeks later, I'm less tired, less phlegmy, and my pants fit better. Hopefully, I'll not jump back to cupcakes anytime soon. Anyway, here's hoping for a healthier 2008.

The girls are still sick. Their fevers are down to non-medicated stages, but Queen is still getting the chills, Spit Spot is clingy, and both are more crabby than quiet.

The parents, meanwhile, are restless. There's shopping to do, and rooms to clean, and peace to be had. But that's hard in a 2 bedroom apartment where we're all on top of each other, separated by disheveled blankets and pillows that have migrated out of the bedrooms. There are unruly piles of crafts, magazines, books, and toys half-finished with, tissues, and tea cups, and glasses of juice. In a word, ugh.

Yesterday, there were bits of peace. After a certain point, I gave up my plans to get things done and actually enjoyed going nowhere, doing nothing more than stringing Jiffypop for the tree, watching Clive help Queen with her reading and math But then I had an intense need to clean the bathroom, pick up the toys, shower.

Today I am hoping to escape a bit to the gym for yoga or spin. I intend on sending Clive to Whole Foods to finish Christmas meal shopping (his domain - Farmhouse chili and cornbread for dinner, pumpkin pancakes for breakfast), and get his own antsy self to the gym.

What I really want to do is to escape to the spa and the movies. Being home all day, I've caught up on much of my New Yorker reading -- all the art, jazz, movies I've been missing. So much to see!  In another week or so, our lovely Texan neighbors will be back from their vacation and will babysit for us, so that Clive and I can begin to get back out in the word again.

Babes restless and infighting again. Must go mediate yo-yo's and tiaras.

The girls are both sick, but not necessarily with the same thing. That makes it fun, kind of a challenge, because now we get to guess if one will give the other what they already have, and double the period of sickness, or if they'll both just kind of move along their own wretched tracks.

Spit Spot has a fever of about 102 and a case of the cling-ies. She's got *hot feet*. The Queen has no fever, but is living in phlegm city. She has this annoying habit of "power sniffing" when her nose is stuffed. She combines incessant snuffling with some weird hyperventilating-like breath. I can't stand to be near her when she's doing it. And lucky me, she's currently in my bed ("the Fever Bed" as Clive is fond of calling it) because when they're sick, both the girls must be on top of each other, and me. Doesn't matter how many times I move Queenie to her bed, she'll be back, determined to suck up the last bit of available space, even if it means sleeping halfway on the bedside table. She's a determined thing, if nothing else.

So I need to go to bed early, as a fear a lousy night of sleep filled with medicine dosing. Really, I'm just hoping for a vomit-free night.

update: No vomit, but now they both have the fever and we got no sleep. Sigh....

I haven't had time to blog ages...here's a summary of recent highlights:

We spent a month in  Maine this summer, which I won't do again until I have my own house/hotel there, survived, and started the oldest in first grade. She's also started soccer, which officially makes me a soccer mom, much to the amusement of some of my friends. I find soccer-momming unduly stressful, what with team snacks, and 2 trips a week to the field, picture day, awards ceremonies, and wet grass.  Queenie's fast, and really seems to like it. There's also a couple other toddlers and some pups around to entertain the little one. Luckily, it's only an 8 week season and we're already half way through.

The kids are obsessed with Annie. Spit-spot spends her days singing "Tomorrow" to everyone's amusement. I miss the days when Queenie used to sing "Moonraker."

I got rear-ended in the supermarket parking lot and am in negotiations with the Insurance folk. Just a fender bender, but I intend to get justice.

Spit-Spot woke me up a couple weeks ago proudly yelping, "Look Mommy, I ate it all! I ate it all!" and holding open an empty bottle of thyroid medication. Let me just say that the Poison Control people are the nicest folks on earth and deserve a big raise. She's fine, I just about had a nervous breakdown. Because I learned that the one thing worse than thinking your kid is about to die, is that you just killed your kid.

I've apparently become asthmatic. Technically, it's EIA, or Exercise Induced Asthma. Either way it's kind of bumming me out as I'm now on 2 additional medications and feel alternately that my body is failing me, or that LA is killing me. Fire Season here is not helping my opinion on the latter.

Mentally preparing to go back to work. Sad but true, I fear the time has come. Now my goal is to find a well-paying, low stress job with super-flexible hours and convenience to home and day care and easy parking.

Counting down the days to when Clive finishes grad school and we can get some semblance of a normal household back and I can stop feeling like a single mom (which is kind of unfair as Clive really does help a lot but still I want a man with regular hours).

It's been shoe month here as I've been shopping for an outfit to wear to a  cocktail/dinner event for a friend. My friend Maryann came down from SF to help and is lending me some fabulous jewelry to ensure I don't look like the poor cousin at the party. We bought a gorgeous pair of ruby red patent leather peep toe pumps with 4 inch heels that I have been petting like a new kitten. Too expensive for our current situation, however, so I asked Clive to return them for me, as I did not have the heart to do it myself. 10 bonus points for Clive! I did, however, buy a lovely pair of every day peep toes with a short heel for me for my upcoming birthday in an attempt to class up, a bit, and an agreeable  pair of black patent peep toe pumps for 1/3rd the price of the original ruby red pair. Also, some new makeup and bras. Just need some new hosiery and a compact and I'm done. I may even skip the hose. I mean, it's LA, right?

When sweet Maryann came down to help me shop, we also went out to a movie (The Darjeeling Limited) and drank a bit too much. All in the same day. Wooo!

I've taken up yoga, finally, in an attempt to become a more flexible and balanced human being. I think it' s going well, although I'm a bit squirmmish with the chanting. One of the teachers calls us "Oh Great Ones" and I'm finding myself jonesing for that every once in a while.

I've also taken up drinking macha, thanks to MA, and have given up half and half in hopes of fitting back into my favorite jeans.

I'm trying to finish some felting projects and it's not going well at all as I keep falling asleep when I put the girls down to sleep.

To that point, I'm going to sign off now and go back to sleep.

Queen Soledad has surgery scheduled for next Thursday. I've been coached to call it a *procedure* instead, as if that will help me be less nervous about it, and won't overly alarm people we tell. It really does seem to be more procedure than surgery. There's no incision, and supposedly, no real pain or discomfort afterward. But they do need to put
her under to do it, an IV, all that.

She must be in perfect health for them to go ahead with it. I know in the middle of cold and flu season, this is pretty much a gamble, but she's been really healthy all season so I was feeling lucky.

Then today I volunteered at her school.

Everyone, almost everyone there -- the students, the teachers, the siblings at drop-off -- are filled, and dripping with, snot. And so now I'm petrified. How can we escape it?  We probably can't. But all I need are 6 more days of cold-free living. Just 6 little days!

A couple people have asked me if I'm going to keep her out of school next week, but what would be the point of that? I feel like it's probably already in her, and she'll fight it off, or no. Besides, what am I supposed to do with her? Keep her home? All day? For 6 days? She'd kill me.

Anyway, fingers crossed.