Bethany Hamilton-Diet Guru?

Recently my family watched Soul Surfer, the movie about Bethany Hamilton's journey before and after her arm was bitten off by a shark.

 Photo from Here

It was really inspirational in the obvious ways. From the Chicago Tribune: 

"Now 22, the Hawaiian native and professional surfer, travels the country speaking about her faith in Christ, and how she continued to pursue her dreams of becoming a professional surfer, even after losing an arm."

But it's also inspirational because Bethany's super healthy, which I didn't know. From the Wall Street Journal: 



"When in her late teens, Ms. Hamilton started eating an almost all organic diet. She usually starts her mornings making a smoothie with açaí, a purple South American fruit loaded with antioxidants. While many athletes focus on protein, Ms. Hamilton is more concerned about eating her vegetables. "I think it's more important to eat the right amount of protein and not go overboard," she says.


She likes to cook what she calls a "reverse omelet" for breakfast, using one egg and adding extra onion, zucchini or asparagus to the pan. She tries to fuel herself with healthy food every three to four hours. One of her favorite snacks is homemade kale chips."

From her own web site:


"What’s your favorite food? Veggies! I try to eat 70% vegetables for every meal. They are so delicious and beneficial to good health."

It's not that I realize that throughout the movie the family is making smoothies for breakfast. Usually there's a tub of Sambazon (a brand built around the acai berry) frozen sorbet stuff somewhere around the scene. It's worth noting that although she's into eating the brand, I'm sure she's a paid spokesperson too.

In any case, I think she's probably right about eating so many veggies. I have a lot of trouble incorporating 70% of veggies for every meal, but I guess it's something to shoot for. I have also tried the Sambazon stuff and luckily it's flat out delicious. :)

Bethany's Sambazon Acai Fruit Smoothie Recipe

Another Acai Smoothie I found:

Ingredients

1 1/2 packets of Sambazon Acai Pure (unsweetened)
1-2 frozen bananas
1 cup Almond Milk
2 Tbsp Ground Flax Seed (optional)
1 cup Apple Juice
1 handful frozen blueberries
1/4 cup mango
1/4 cup pineapple
1/4 cup papaya

Directions

Blend as needed until smooth. Add more liquids (apple juice, almond milk, or water) if too thick, or add more frozen fruits if too runny.

Miracle of My Ass

I meant to post this two weeks ago, but in between then and now a nasty stomach bug ravaged my family. I believe we are still in recovery. Unluckily (or luckily, depending on opinion) for my family, we never all get sick at once. It's been a solid week of sickness because there are four of us.

Back to the matter at hand.

I have a little bit of redness on my nose and cheeks usually. And no, it's not a lupus rash because a) it's in the folds of my nose, b) it's got teeny veins in it, weird to say, and c) I've been tested for lupus.

Anyway, I ordered this rosacea cream off of Amazon.com:

I am sure that for many, many people this cream has worked wonders. In fact, I ordered it because most of the reviews were very positive. Another plus in its favor were the ingredients--I recognized all but two or three. It was mostly made of good things.

When it came, I eagerly slathered it on my skin every day.

After three days, my skin started peeling.

After six days, I woke up to a face covered in a kind of rash, uniform redness and raised bumps. It kind of looked like a chemical peel.

This picture was taken about three days after I stopped using the cream. It really doesn't do it justice because it was super red and bumpy. This photo makes my nose look big too. Probably I should have taken another one. ;) Alas.

I had to go out in public a few times two weeks ago and I honestly wore hats, wore my hair down, and did my best to pretend my face looked normal. It totally didn't.

The day I woke up looking like I'd been to dermatologist for face-burning, I finally realized maybe this face cream wasn't for me. I'm slow like that. I ran upstairs to my bathroom to re-read the ingredients. Lo and behold, "wheat germ" is listed as an ingredient.

I don't know if that, out of all those other ingredients, is what burned my face up and caused such a pointed allergic reaction, but I'm not taking any chances. I had never thought to check for wheat in lotions and make-up, but boy howdy I will now. :)

Damn wheat.

Boobies & BPA

So, I have posted about BPA before.

But since I keep seeing things in the news about BPA I thought I'd update. So far I think BPA has been linked to:

• Breast Cancer
• Hormone Disruption (Affects fertility, sperm count, genital deformity, early puberty, diabetes and obesity....)
• Heart Disease/High Cholesterol
• Diabetes & Obesity 
• Prostate Cancer & Another on Prostate Cancer
• Behavorial Problems
• Autism?

From the Environmental Working Group Site

The FDA keeps rejecting proposals to ban BPA. Why?

This article from The Atlantic offers up a great answer: "BPA has become a classic example of how point of view influences decisions about low-dose chemicals in the food supply for which the science is uncertain. If you are a believer in the "precautionary principle," any suggestion of harm is enough to support banning BPA until it is proven safe. European countries tend to subscribe to the precautionary principle. Sweden, for example, has just banned BPA. If, on the other hand, you believe that nothing should be banned until incontrovertibly demonstrated by science to cause harm, you won't act against BPA until the evidence for harm is overwhelming. That's the FDA's position. Even though the FDA is troubled by the lack of better information about the safety of BPA, it recently denied a petition from the National Resources Defense Council to ban it..." 

As a mom, I am definitely a believer in the precautionary principle, which is why my son still doesn't drink milk. It made him puke and gives him eczema, so rather than wait until it got really bad we took milk out of his diet.

Plus, it's always about money. The Real Story on BPA sheds some light on the economics of regulating BPA: "In the United States, industrial chemicals are presumed safe until proven otherwise. As a result, the vast majority of the 80,000 chemicals registered to be used in products have never undergone a government safety review. Companies are left largely to police themselves." This is no less disheartening as any other money-driven (but bad for humans) practice--GMO foods, pesticides in food, etc.

I'm not anti-corporation, but I do believe that a) our taxes pay the FDA to at least attempt to keep us safe (not keep money flowing to big corporations) and b) companies should be concerned about the effects of chemicals they make.

Generally, in America, we wait until things get really bad, undeniably bad, to do something. We don't change our diets and start exercising until 'officially diagnosed' with high blood pressure or high cholesterol. So it makes sense that we'd be stupid and reactive (rather than proactive) with things on a nation-wide scale as well.

Whereas the French, and many other European countries, really are the opposite. France has completely banned BPA. Everyone (you know, companies $ who make plastic things, companies $ who sell to France, regulatory agencies...) is angry at France now because this BPA ban is complicating things. Too damn bad, I say.

This is like how the WHOLE STATE OF CALIFORNIA has that proposition that I see every now and again on labels. It's something like, "This product is in compliance with California Proposition 63 and contains ingredients/chemicals which are known to the state of California to be carcinogenic." Or something like that. I used to be annoyed, but now I'm just grateful for the additional information. Anyhow, some manufacturers just started making California-friendly things for everybody. So will the people who sell crap to France.

I digress.

Part of the BPA puzzle that really bothers me is the reality that it is so widely used is difficult to avoid. This MSN article talks about how BPA is hiding in canned food, which honestly surprised the crap out of me. I have a lot of canned beans, veggies, tomato sauce, and now I'm not sure I want to use it. (Until the end of the world comes, then eating BPA will be small potatoes compared to starving....)

They suggest avoiding canned food, receipts, and all plastic: "Your skin readily absorbs the BPA coating on cash-register receipts, so when you make a purchase you don't need a receipt for, like, say, a cup of coffee, ask for no receipt when checking out...some No. 7 plastics contain BPA, but other plastics contain different harmful compounds, as well. Your best bet is to avoid plastic whenever possible, and never heat plastic in the microwave or clean it in the dishwasher."

This is next to impossible. I have tried lately to refuse my receipts at stores and the checkout person always look so wounded. Plus, what about their BPA exposure!?

This article (also from MSN) offers up yet more things to avoid: 

• Limit canned foods & beverages.
• Don’t store foods in plastic.
• Filter your drinking and cooking water.
• Filter your shower and tub water. (?! Seriously?)
• Don’t transport beverages in plastic mugs.
• Limit use of hard plastic water bottles
• Minimize hard plastics in the kitchen.
• Skip the water cooler.

The latest articles are of course about breast cancer. The Breast Cancer Fund has a great article about this Satanic BPA: "Bisphenol A (BPA) has been associated with increased risk for cardiovascular disease, miscarriages, breast and prostate cancer, reproductive dysfunction, metabolic dysfunction and diabetes, and neurological and behavioral disorders...Present in many household products, BPA is also commonly found in the epoxy lining of metal food cans and in polycarbonate plastic food containers, including some baby bottles, microwave ovenware and eating utensils. Because BPA is an unstable polymer and is also lipophilic (fat-seeking), it can leach into canned foods..., infant formula and other food products..., especially when heated...Once in food, BPA can move quickly into people—a particular concern for women of childbearing age and young children. Two recent studies have explored the effects of increased ingestion of food and drink packaged in EDC-containing sources. Both found rapid (within a few days to a week) increases in BPA levels in urine and/or blood samples taken from subjects who intentionally increased their intake of common foods and drinks packaged in BPA-containing products..."

Graphic From Fast Company

I took out their extensive citations because it made it confusing to read but please go to the article directly to see the studies they reference. It's a really well-backed article. It goes on to talk about levels of BPA in humans and what studies have shown about BPA levels in other mammals and during gestation.

Plastic be bad, yo. It's all well and good to say that we should just live our lives, enjoy everything, and stop worrying so much. But I guess...that's easy to say until you get cancer or have hormone problems. Then all of a sudden it seems worthwhile to use Pyrex instead and get rid of your rubber spatulas (which, for the record, I have yet to do....) It's possible to try and avoid plastics and not be a basket case. I swear. :)

Yoga: A Party For My Body!

I have been on Nature Throid for maybe two months? Two and a half? It's hard to remember. But my biggest complaint (really my only complaint) is that I still have joint pain. I keep thinking back to how treating my hypothyroidism with a drug or supplement seemed to eliminate the arthritis, at least when it was adequate treatment.

I am reluctant to consider that now, despite adequate treatment, I might just have arthritis. The reason this bothers me is because I do believe that pain of any sort is our body's 'alarm system'. Arthritis must mean that something is still causing my body to be inflamed. Anyway, I went looking for some articles on unresolved joint pain.

Here's a link to an article about a woman who basically suffers from the same symptoms, hypothyroidism and join pain. Unfortunately, most of the suggestions are not natural, it's mostly about taking drugs. :(

This article kind of says the same thing: "If joint and muscle aches, stiffness, swelling or redness continues in thyroid patients who are well-treated, their doctor may need to thoroughly evaluate them for the possibility of other rheumatic diseases being present. If thyroid disease is the autoimmune type, a patient is at higher risk for developing other autoimmune diseases, including Rheumatoid Arthritis."

Good news! I've already seen a rheumy and I do NOT have rheumatoid arthritis or osteoarthritis. So....where does that leave me?!

This page is one I have referenced a few times. I keep thinking about what vitamins and minerals are needed to help break down protein in the...joints? But I think the terminology and the finer points of the chemistry of my body are beyond me. Maybe I just need to devote more time to DH's collection of biology textbooks. Anyway, this is what this link says:

"Hypothyroid arthritis. Arthritis from an underactive thyroid gland is related to excessive deposits of certain proteins in connective tissues. Thyroid stimulating hormone, produced by the pituitary gland at the base of the brain, may cause the excessive protein collections. Symptoms include vague aches and pains, but usually there are no inflammatory signs. Joint thickening and fluid collections occur in 33% of patients. Knees, ankles, and small hand and foot joints are involved and are unusually thick. Knee x-rays show a characteristic thinning of bone near the joint."

Another possibility that occurred to me (albeit before recent test results were in) is that I have joint pain because I'm under treated, as in, I need more thyroid hormone. "What is undertreated hypothyroidism? It's hypothyroidism at the cellular level that means you still have hypothyroidism symptoms such as fatigue, weight gain, depression, fibromyalgia/muscle & joint aches and pains, hair loss or coarse/dry hair, infertility and more --despite taking thyroid replacement and having a "normal" TSH level."


Now, my TSH is currently somewhere around .898. That's supposed to be dang near perfect. But according to an alternative web site (alternative in that the authors do not agree with the 'mainstream' doctor solution of giving Synthroid and calling it good....), .898 could still be too high for me. 

Reading this whole page was like reading about me (I'm sorry, this is quite a bit to cut and paste, but there was nothing I felt I could cut out!):

"For example, a doctor has his patient make her way up to 1-2 grains, notices great improvements, but also has continuing problems. OR, a patient makes her way up to 2 grains and notices NO improvement. And it’s common to think that desiccated thyroid is not working! In reality, it may simply mean a patient isn’t on enough! It can also be very wise to check adrenal function, since low cortisol can prevent thyroid hormones from making it to the cells….and you will still feel bad.

• BEING ON AN OPTIMAL DOSE and FEELING GREAT, BUT BEING LOWERED DUE TO THE TSH LAB RANGE Similar to #2 above, this is the person that made his/her way up to an optimal dose, or the dose that simply made them feel very good and removed symptoms, but having the dose lowered by a doctor who saw your suppressed TSH (i.e. below the range). This is doctor who thinks that ink spots on a piece of paper tell the truth more than your symptoms! When on an optimal dose of desiccated thyroid (or being very near), you WILL have a suppressed TSH without being hyper. 

• THINKING YOU ARE ON TOO MUCH BECAUSE OF HYPER-SYMPTOMS Yes, a doctor can guide you to  go too high with desiccated thyroid and you’ll have hyper symptoms. You would then want to decrease your amount. But even more common is having hyper-like symptoms (anxiety, shakiness, fast heart rate, etc), especially on doses lower than 3 grains, because of underlying low-functioning adrenals (i.e. not enough cortisol), or even a low Ferritin or iron—-each and/or both of which can be quite common in hypothyroid patients."

If low functioning adrenals is really a "thing", then I am happy to say that I have started to do yoga to help my whole body in general. I highly recommend relaxing yoga. There is a streaming video on Netflix called "Crunch: Candlelight Yoga". I am in love with it. I feel so relaxed during and after and get excited to do it beforehand. That can't be a bad thing. I also noticed that in Dr. Grantly Dick-Read's book, he recommends yoga exercises (um, not ALL yoga is pregnancy-friendly) to help open the pelvis for childbirth. What isn't yoga good for?

I have also noticed that getting enough sleep helps with the arthritis, surprise, surprise. Maybe I just generally need to take better care of myself, more sleep, more Vitamin D and Iron. 

The Lump, Vajajays, and Pain in Childbirth

This blog post is going to be all over the place, I warn you. However, I will provide handy subject headings for your navigating ease.

The Lump (Also Entitled, Male Avoidance Issues)

Maybe two weeks ago, I noticed my husband had a lump on his upper thigh. I will spare no details. As soon as I felt it once, unintentionally, I couldn't stop touching it because I wanted to feel all there was to feel about it. DH does not appreciate this sort of touchy-feeliness. If there's any probing, or any discomfort at all, he immediately recoils and morphs into a sort of simpering version of The Hulk. If you can imagine that.

Me: "What's this?!"

DH: "I don't know. I noticed it like two months ago."

Me: "You don't think you should get it looked at?! Has it gotten bigger?"

DH: "I....I was kind of ignoring it. I probably should get it looked at."

Me: [Squishing lump around.]

DH: "STOP!"

Me: "I have good news. I don't think it's cancer."

DH: "Yeah? Why's that?" (He's always doubting me.)

Me: "Well, because especially in the last few years I've been reading up a bit on cancer because I'm always convinced that's what I'll end up having. Also, I asked a doctor to look at my lymph nodes and tell me if they were enlarged because I had cancer and was going to die.

DH: "And?"

Me: "Cancer is hard and kind of immovable, whereas your little lump is squishy and moves and.... [pause]...I should probably stop touching it in case it is cancer and I'm inadvertently spreading it to other parts of your body."

The fact that my husband would notice a NEW GROWTH on his body and choose to ignore it reminds me of many, many manly shortcomings. ;) My grandpa, whom I loved dearly, had cataracts and some sort of retinal detachment for years. He is the sole driver in his marriage to my grandma, so while he was slowly going blind, he just pretended like everything was dandy and kept on driving on the highways, interstates, expressways. I found out after the fact that at my wedding he was basically blind, but pressed on. Silly men.

In any case, we made an appointment to have it looked at by our doctor. From this point until his appointment, we really didn't worry too much about it. But then, our doctor wanted to get it ultra-sounded. DH was convinced that Doctor Awesome would shrug it off and reassure us that it wasn't cancer and it was something called XYZ that we didn't have to worry about. Instead, she was sending us to a specialist. Red flags! Red flags!

Contrasting our earlier nonchalance, now we were trying to convince ourselves it wasn't cancer. I Googled things and either it was cancer or it wasn't. I really narrowed it down. I put my money on a lipoma, a deposit of fat that....well, I don't know what the hell it's doing there.

We had many interesting discussions about what we would do if it was cancer. Surprisingly, my husband said that he'd already put some thought into it and had decided that he would gorge himself on everything wonderful that he loved (Arby's, giant cinnamon rolls, bacon, anything processed) and then start a cancer diet consisting of mostly vegetables. Also, we would immediately make another baby in case he died. And he would take medical leave and focus on not having cancer. The weird thing about any life-changing health problem is that one day you're okay, unaware of said problem, and the next you have a bomb drop. Life is surprising like that.

Ultra-sound day, we all went to Denver together. Not unlike when we went to get ultra-sounds for our babies, we were curious and optimistic. Boy or girl, cancerous or benign?!

The ultra-sound tech (the unofficial person who is not allowed to tell you anything) said that, "I've seen these before, it's common. I don't think you have anything to worry about." Which my husband happily took to be the Word of God. Luckily, she was right. It's just a lipoma. I don't know what we were worried about anyway; Google totally already told us that.
  
Vajajays

In an effort to educate myself about VBACs, Vaginal Birth After Cesareans, I have been reading up a little on statistics. I came across this gem today, and it really buoyed my spirits. Seriously, buoyed 'em way up there. Here's the part that meant the world to me, as if God leaned down and whispered encouragement:

1. 'A VBAC candidate who has had a previous vaginal delivery has an 89% success rate for a VBAC and fewer complications as opposed to a woman who has never had a vaginal delivery. It is therefore not appropriate to ask  women who’ve had successful vaginal deliveries to have repeat c. sections based on “hospital policy.” '

That's me! I pushed an eight pound (seven, fifteen, but come on...) baby out my hoo-ha! I can do it again! The odds are with me! That is all.

 

Pain in Childbirth


So, I have recently been reading Childbirth Without Fear by Dr. Grantly Dick-Read (British names, right?) and there was a whole section that really knocked my socks off. In a chapter that basically said we need to stop assuming childbirth HAS to be painful, he addressed whether or not God really cursed woman with 'pain' in childbirth. It turns out that the Hebrew word there isn't 'pain' but is really more like 'toil', the same Hebrew word used to describe Noah building the ark.

From the book, actually a Hebrew scholar writing to Dr. Dick-Read: "I was very pleased when I read the first sentence of Genesis 3, v 16, where the Hebrew word "etzev", which is usually translated as sorrow and pain, has obviously been misconstrued. The words of pain in Hebrew are "ke-iv' (pain), "tzaar" (sorrow), and "yesurim" (anguish). 


At no time would any Hebrew scholar use the word "etzev" as an expression of pain. The meanings of "etzev" are manifold, ie, labour...In Proverbs 14, v13, "etzev" is used as expressing labour..."Etzev" can also mean "concerned" or "anxious"...

The scholar goes on to say that "etzev" can also mean "displeased" or "of being perturbed". This is very different than my prior understanding, which was that woman sinned and now I would always suffer horrible PAIN in childbirth, so why try to avoid it?!

The reason I think this is important is wrapped up in the assumption that we all have, from movies and horror stories and even personal experience, is that childbirth is the worst agony we will ever face. In one of Ina May Gaskin's book, she writes extensively about how a woman's emotions and expectation of pain can actually make things hurt more. I get that. If we could relax and not be so fearful of what's coming, it would probably hurt less. Dr. Dick-Read (I'm sorry, it makes me laugh every time...) tells anecdotes of women who were not raised to think of child-birth as painful and therefore experienced little pain at childbirth.

All I'm saying is, is that sometimes the power of our assumptions, thoughts (fearful thoughts, in this case), and emotions is underestimated.