The stupid things we waste our time on

Santa Clara County bans toys in Happy Meals

Meanwhile, I read somewhere that an organization (whose name I can't remember) is trying to get a bill to the Senate to force food manufacturers to change the packaging on unhealthful items marketed to children in order to make them less attractive to them. On top of this the Federal Trade Commission is putting together an interagency task force to establish industry wide guidelines on child marketing.

Now, I generally have no problem with Big Brother breathing over my shoulder. Heck, if I'm not doing anything wrong, what do I have to worry about? And if I am? Well, serves me right. But there is a big difference between Big Brother and a Nanny State. A Nanny State I DO NOT DIG AT ALL. And here's why in this specific case: Children do not purchase Happy Meals or Fruit Loops, parents do.

I know that the argument is that these manufacturers market their sugary, fattening products to children in such a way that it places pressure on parents to purchase it for their children abd they've got a point - they do! My response to this, however is: AND SO WHAT? As a parent, I don't have to buy the darn things. If I think that something is bad for my child, I don't care how much she whines and whinges and begs and tells me her friends are doing it, I'm not going to allow her to have it (at least not routinely - a little of what we love but is bad for us, doesn't hurt occasionally.)

The way I see it, it's just like drugs and alcohol and cigarettes: your kids' food habits are like everything else we manage or influence as parents -I see it as part of my parental responsibility to ensure I teach Daisy what's right and good and what's not. Will she sneak behind my back as she gets older? Yes. Will she go over to her friends' house and eat things I would never normally give her? Sure. Will she tell me that I am the worst mother in the entire world? Probably. But you know, that's life - I can't control everything. But for 18 years I get to decide what's best for her as much as I possibly can. After that, of course, all I can hope for is that I've given her the right life tools to make good decisions completely independently.

What I will not be doing if she reaches 18 and turns into a cow, however, is blaming food manufacturers for corrupting her with their enticing marketing.

I'm not exactly sure what we're surprised or mad about. That's their job. They're trying to sell products and make a profit. The US is, after all, the capital of capitalism. Free market and all that. Trying to tell companies that make products for children to produce and/or market their products in such a way as to make the children not want them is pretty stupid if you ask me. And it boggles my mind that people are spending time on this when there are so many other important issues to tackle in our country than can have a far greater influence on the health and well-being on our kids, who are the stewards of our country's future.

How about the fact that education is underfunded and school programs like arts and sports are being cut? The next most influential people in our childrens' lives are teachers, the next most important building next to our homes is their school. Yet we're allowing local governments to slash budgets, lay off teachers (or pay them so little that nobody decent would want the job), and close good programs. How about that? Do you think the "Nanny State" could maybe look at ensuring that my child receives a well rounded education so that she can head-out into the world and make a positive impact?

In childhood obesity, as with many other social ills, there is a socioeconomic and educational divide: obesity rates are higher amongst the poor and the poorly educated. So perhaps we should focus on better educating the youth of today to ensure a healthier populous tomorrow, rather than punishing for-profit companies for doing the very thing they are structured to do - make a profit.

And, for heaven's sake, let's return a little bit of personal responsibility back into our community. Although I am very left-leaning in the majority of my politics, that doesn't mean that I believe that the government should manage every area of my life to the extent that I have no responsibility for my actions or the consequences thereof. Similarly, I do not believe that, in a capitalist society, the government should have the right to impede a company's ability to turn a profit because some mommy can't learn to say no to her child.

Friday Motivation - Week 9: BOOOOOOOOOO!

Pic above is of me and my good friend "Nike" (Jenny) at her wedding in Dallas, October of 2007. Nike is now pregnant and her first baby is due in March of next year.

Again, another pic from 2007. I can't believe it was just 2 years ago - I look so much younger and healthier, it's SICK. If you go downhill so far in just 24 months, think what can happen by the time you hit your 60s! I think I'll maybe just drink myself into oblivion by then or something - go out with big bang rather than a slow creak.

Well, time to get down to the depressing stats for this week.

CURRENT WEIGHT: 155lbs
WEIGHT LOST THIS WEEK: A big fat ZERO! :o(
TOTAL WEIGHT LOST TO DATE: 6.2lbs
NUMBER OF WEEKS TO GOAL: 5
LBS TO GOAL: 10lbs

It's becoming increasingly more obvious that I am not going to meet my goal weight by the time we head-off to Jamaica. I've lost only 6lbs in 9 weeks, despite cutting out my evening meal, bread, and most processed foods as well as adding 3 trips to the gym each week.

Depressed. Dejected.

Friday Motivation - Week 8: Late

Just a quick update so you know I'm not slacking off.

Weight last Friday was 155.0lbs. Grand total loss last week of only 0.2lbs. Drats!

Went to Trader Joes yesterday and bought all kinds of yummy healthy stuff in an attempt to avoid falling off the wagon in any way, shape, or form.

Unfortunately, this blasted back strain has prevented me from working out. It's been almost a week since I got to the gym or got on the Total Gym. Pain has started to fade a bit today and I've been able to not take any painkillers, although I'll probably give in tonight to get some sleep.

Chiropractor said I've strained my iliolumbar ligament. Great. Even more parts of my body that I didn't know existed are hurting.

Nutrition and me

First of all, thanks to my friend, Elena for her words of encouragement and advice for my previous post. Elena - you crack me up. Yes, you are MADLY supportive, I'll definitely give you that.

The one piece of advice I am definitely going to take from Elena is to take it one step at a time and experiment.

My goal, if at all possible, is not to CUT OUT anything entirely (as in never-ever-ever eat it again) but to remove it from my regular diet.

I am very serious when I say that, while I admire Elena's resolve, I CANNOT and WILL NOT live a life where I examine every single ingredient on a restaurant menu or send instructions ahead of me to friends or family who invite me for dinner. Holidays and vacations are also non-restrictive zones. I'm not (what would be to me) spoiling those occasions by obsessing about every morsel that I eat.

Let me be clear: I'm not saying ANYTHING about Elena's reality here, just about what's not acceptable to me.

So, here's where I'm going to begin, based upon Elena's advice, my own research, and previous experience:

• Cutting back on processed foods is definitely something I'm going to start doing right away. I have done this in the past and I have noticed energy as well as weight-loss gains. The more and more I think about it, the more I realize that, with the exception of a few key items (like Heinz Baked Beans) I ate a lot more unprocessed food when I was living in England. Since I've moved to the US... not so much. Is it a coincidence that I now weigh a wopping 60lbs more than I did when I moved out here 15 years ago? I think not.
• Bread is bye-bye. Again, I have done this before (back when I was 105lbs) and have lost weight cutting it out of my diet. Honestly, it's not that big of a deal for me. Do I like bread? Yes. Is it essential to my enjoyment of food? Um, no.
• Cut back on inflammatory foods. Increase anti-inflammatory foods and ingredients. Fish, berries, vegetables, olive-oil, whole-grains, brown-rice, ginger, rosemary, garlic, onions, red wine, and green tea - IN. Salt, soda, bread, sugar, red meat, fried foods, smoked foods, and processed foods - OUT. (Honestly, aside from the sugar and processed foods, I don't really eat much of anything on this list already.) Dairy is also on the inflammatory list. I'm on the fence with this one - I love eggs, cheese and milk. These will be a last-resort removal, although I'll definitely be more conscious of how much I consume now. Let's face it, do enough research and you'll find that eggs and milk, especially, have many of their own health benefits. Everything in moderation. I truly believe that: I think that (with the exception of all the added-in crap for processed and packaged foods) your body needs a little bit of everything (some more than others) to work optimally. Cutting any major food group out just doesn't make sense to me, unless, of course, you can establish that you are allergic to it.
• Consider adding supplements and/or different herbs and spices to my diet. Chamomile, Ginger, Willow-Bark, Boswellia, Bromelain, Vitamin D, Calcium, Paprika, Cumin, Tumeric, and Fish Oil all seem to come up over and over again on websites I found on anti-inflammatory diets and digestive health. (Although, the more I started researching, the more I found that just about every vitamin, herb or spice seems to have a magical digestive or anti-inflammatory property which makes me somewhat skeptical overall.)

I'm also looking seriously at studying the Mediterranean diet in more detail. I've heard from many sources that people living in Mediterranean countries consume high amounts of fat but incidences of heart disease and cancer are lower. The Journal of the American College of Cardiology (so, not some goat farmer from a rural area of Greece) found that a traditional Mediterranean diet reduces inflammation and cardiovascular risk.

Finally, I'm not throwing the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. I'm going to continue doing (or try to improve my consistency in doing) many of the other, more basic things that I have always found to work: drink more water, eat little and often, and don't eat after 6pm. I'm also planning on keeping a food diary.

Last night we went to the store and I bought Ginger Tea (not bad as it goes), raspberries, lots of salads, spinach, onions, fish, and veggies. A good first step. This morning I ate a healthy egg-white omelette with onions, spinach and a small slice of cheese.

My main focus initially is to find things I already like that fit into the "new diet" category and eat more of those rather than to add new things into my diet that I may not enjoy so much. I mean, how likely am I to stick to a new nutrition plan if I'm not enjoying the food I eat? Knowing me - not frickin' likely at all.

As one website said: Eating well doesn’t necessarily mean cutting out your favorite foods. It entails making adjustments to the amounts you eat from each food group.

THAT I can deal with. Wish me luck!

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Side note for Elena: I tried a Gluten-Free diet for about 4 months last year (had to stop when I got pregnant on the advice of my doc) I experienced no significant health or weight loss benefits as a result. Conclusion: I am not gluten or wheat intolerant. While some foods that contain gluten and wheat will probably be on my no-no list for other reasons, I don't see any value in removing either entirely.

Connecting the dots

Yesterday I went to see my massage therapist. She has been on vacation for a few weeks and so I have not seen her in more than a month. During that time I have been stepping up my workout routine in an effort to get fit, get strong, and well, let's face it, lose that effin' baby weight. So, with all those things combined, I was a ball of muscles, tendons, ligaments, and fascia all fighting for a channel to spreadh their pain message. Tanya, my massage therapist, as usual, found them all one by one. It was brutal.

Today I went to see my osteopath. I had not seen her in 2 weeks. Her nose scrunched up in disappointment when I told her my current pain level (3-4) and list of ailments. (Nothing you haven't already heard, so I'll spare you the details.)

I told her I had been stepping up my exercise routine and thought that may have been the cause of the increased issues. She asked me exactly what that meant (ie: what I had been doing and how often) and by the time I had finished listing everything I do, she was pretty gobsmacked. It was only then I realized myself how much all these things I've been incrementally adding actually added up to:

• Power yoga 1-2 times per week
• Cardio @ the gym 3 mornings a week
• 30 minutes of strength training on the Total Gym 3 times a week
• 30 minute walks 3-4 times a week

Of course, I had the passing thought: Why the hell am I not losing weight? I didn't have time to linger because my treatment started.

At some point during an assault on my IT band, the doctor asked me if I was pooping fine. Strange question to ask, right, given that I was there for hip, groin, and thigh pain? It was, however, a thought-provoking question because that... um... particular element has been somewhat back-and-forth from different extremes lately. (Sorry if this is TMI - you know where the "x" is on your web browser!)

When I reported my... problem (let's call it) she said that osteopathic medicine believes that there is a connection between IT band tightness and my GI tract. Blockages or areas of tightness in my lateral thigh, therefore, could be caused by my erratic pooping or, of course, visa versa. I asked her which was which in my case and she said it was a bit like the chicken and the egg; you don't know which way around it is.

Logically, my brain went to the conclusion that nutrition and diet could be affecting all of this. (Of course --- and before you get to the comments section Elena --- this is not the first time I've heard this but it was the first time that I've opened my mind to the possibility.)

Further research when I got home basically led to articles on the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS), which is a part of it. In lamens terms, the PNS regulates the body's visceral organs via the innervation of three kinds of tissues, one of which is muscle tissue. Through this process the PNS is connected to your GI tract, your bowels, your pelvis, and, particularly your pelvic diaphram. (It's all a lot more complicated and involved that that but that's the reader's digest version.)

Since all of these things are connected, it is possible that either:

(a) Many of my pain issues are causing pooping issues or

(b) My pooping issues are causing many of my pain issues, particularly in my pelvis and pubic bone area.

Of course, if it's (b), a different diet could help.

And then, of course, there's the issue of my not losing weight despite all the exercising and dieting I have been doing.

And then I connected the dots.

And then came the acceptance.

Maybe - just maybe - if I changed my diet, I could affect my pain outcomes and lose weight.

Bottom line, I've been avoiding this conversation with myself for quite some time. I've seen friends change the way they eat and report benefits above-and-beyond weight-loss but I thought I knew better. (Or, realistically, hoped I did.) I've lost weight in the past on my own knowledge and under my own steam and thought I could just go down that the same path again.

Yet, it's not working. I've been at it for more than 4 months now and haven't really lost a pound. Ok, I haven't always been as "good" as I could have been and have only recently stepped-up the exercise but there should have been some incremental improvement; I haven't seen it.

Although I have been too stubborn to admit it, my body is not responding as it once did. This could be attributable to my age, my hip surgery, the fact I carried a baby, and/or my c-section. Who the hell knows? When I list it like that, it's quite frankly unsurprising that my body may be a different beast these days.

I'm not saying I'm definitely convinced there's some hollistic answer to all of my problems and I'm absolutely not saying I'm going to become some crazy person who will only eat certain foods and who delivers a 20 minute list of dos and don'ts to the waitress at a restaurant. I'm just saying that I'm open to modifying my diet right now. The whole nerve thing made sense on a practical level (rather than the hocusy-pocusy level that this stuff is often presented on) and so I'm willing to try.

So, I started googling nutrition and pain. I've already found some interesting information I think I can put to work right away and I'll report on that in a future post. For now I'll end here and await the "I told you so!" (and helpful advice) from my friend, Elena. :o)