Category — Healthy Living

photo by garry
This has nothing to do with my weekend. Unfortunately.

Hooray for Friday. (Do I say that every week? It’s because I really mean it.) Hope you’ve all had a great week so far. The Man and I are in a money-saving mood so tonight we’re making a home-cooked dinner instead of going out to eat. When you can’t really do much physically, eating out is about the only way to get out of the house. I know, thrilling.

I don’t know about you, but this weekend’s shaping up to be ho-hum. I’m going to do a little writing, probably clean, and most definitely organize. And if I don’t go to the gym both days, I’m blogging my address and asking anyone within a 50 mile radius to come over and beat me up. (All right, so I’m being a little dramatic.)

Most weekends I have big dreams but rarely get everything done I need to. (See last weekend’s failed gym attempts.) So here you go—my list of dreams and the unfortunate reality:

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photo by just luh.

You all had some great insight into yesterday’s discussion about kids’ chronic snacking. If you didn’t get a chance to read it, check it out here and leave your thoughts. I think going forward with the rising rates of obesity, the topic of emotional eating versus eating for hunger is going to continue being a big issue.

A couple people mentioned the fact that kids today are also moving less. That’s a whole other problem, but they go hand in hand, right? Well today I read about a study on our lack of movement. (Nope, this trial didn’t involve kids, but you can see how it could apply to the video game generation, too.)

I understand the irony of what I’m about to say seeing as I’m hooked on five—count ’em: five—TV shows. (If you’re curious, they’re Lost, 24, Fringe, Bones, and Heroes in that order.) Anyhow, turns out twenty- and thirtysomethings who watch more TV are more likely to develop risk factors for heart disease by the time they hit their 40s.

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photo by joe thorn
That’s not our new bookcase. I wish. Ours is a sliver of an Ikea one.

Welcome back to the workweek, all.

I had one of those weekends where I simultaneously felt like I got a lot done and did nothing at all. (With a little failure and guilt thrown in for a good measure.) Don’t ask me how that works.

We got a lot done…
While I plugged away at some editing for work, The Man put together a bookcase and two nightstands from Ikea. He’s pretty awesome at deciphering those instructions, which is a talent seeing as they’re drawn by 5-year-old Swedes.

Of course, buying new furniture never stops at construction. So I took a break from work to rearrange our bedroom. Sounds easy, right? Well, it would have been except one of our walls is slanted. (Someone must have thought, “Wouldn’t it be fancy and special if the far wall was tilted?” They were wrong. It’s just annoying.) Since I like symmetry and parallel walls, it took about forever to find a setup where I didn’t feel like all my furniture was askew.

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photo by strategyjohn

There’s no birth certificate, so I can only guess. My work computer was born some time around 1995. Most days, it drags along like an old man with emphysema trying hard to choke out a long story.

Sometimes I’m patient and listen to the whole story—bearing each painful breath between breaks. Mostly, though, I just wish I could pull the plug.

“Open my e-mail, Microsoft Word, and the Internet,” I’ll say with three double clicks. At first, it stares at me like it’s waiting for a whistle or sign or smoke signal. Or maybe it’s just trying to understand my demand.

I imagine it thinks, So much to do! Such tiresome tasks! Should I open e-mail first? Or maybe Word? But the Internet is so nice. And what if I can’t get the e-mail open at once? Should I try to perfect that before I start on the others? What to do?

On a good day, I jostle it from a deep sleep at 8 a.m. By 8:20 it’s rearing to go, and I’m done longing for the Mac I have at home. By 9 I’ve finished reading e-mails and eating breakfast. If all goes well, my computer hasn’t yet taken a nap.

But yesterday it conspired with the rest of technology to thwart my plans.

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photo by d sharon pruitt

You guys rock. No, really. I’ve been reading all of the awesome comments you’ve left this week and it makes me so happy. There: Another thing that makes me happy. Add that to yesterday’s list.

Anyhow, just thought you should know.

This week has been dragging along as always—I think I have a chronic case of the Wednesdays—and despite our better judgment The Man and I put off grocery shopping for yet another day. Well, really, we made him put off grocery shopping since I don’t go. Yeah, he’s swell. So it looks like another painfully boring peanut butter and jelly sandwich for me today. (That’s only fun in a nostalgic kind of way when you don’t eat them for a week straight. Trust me.)

So I want to preface this post by telling you that I love kids. I think they’re great. I think they’re cute, especially when they say crazy things like, “You have really yellow teeth.” (Not that my sister did that or anything when she was three.) I have three insanely adorable nephews who make me laugh and smile every time I see them.

But…

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photo from cute overload
This makes me happy. Very happy.

By now you know that eating healthy foods—think whole grains, fruits, and veggies—exercising, and not smoking can keep your ticker tocking. Well, scientists say there’s another way you can lower your chances of getting heart disease: Be happy.

In a 10-year study of 1,739 men and women, researchers learned that happier folks were less likely to develop heart disease. They measured participants’ joy on a five-point scale and learned that for every point that measured happiness, excitement, enthusiasm, or contentment the risk of heart disease dropped by 22 percent. So unhappy people had a 22 percent higher risk of heart disease or chest pain than people who were somewhat happy. And those so-so people had a 22 percent higher risk for heart disease than moderately happy people.

The researchers say there are a few reasons people who wear rose-colored glasses may avoid heart problems. They may sleep more, have heart-healthy behaviors, have less stress or better handle stress, or they might just be physiologically different than their glum peers.

According to the researchers, people can significantly reduce their risk for heart disease if they do things that make them happy. So that’s the catch. See, making ourselves happier is easier said than done, isn’t it? I mean, when I’m down in the dumps, the last thing I want to do is purposefully make myself happier. (Yeah, that sounds depressing.)

So in case you’re feeling down but fear its ill effects on your heart, I’ve created a list of things that make me happy. You’ll probably have your own happy triggers (list ’em in the comments), but these always cheer me up…

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photo by thomas wanhoff

Ever read one of those articles promising a svelte body from sweat? You know, the ones that say soaking up heat in a sauna can cleanse your body of some horrible toxins? They talk about visiting a glamorous spa where everyone looks like Bar Refaeli, zoning out in a sauna, and buying a pair of skinny jeans on the way out. And if you don’t do it? You’ll be bloated, boring, and acne-ridden for the rest of your life.

Well, they fooled ya.

I read an article recently that said the idea of detoxing in a sauna is a whole lotta baloney. Rachel Vreeman, MD, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Indiana University School of Medicine and coauthor of Don’t Swallow Your Gum! Myths, Half-Truths, and Outright Lies About Your Body and Health, told HealthDay that our body has it’s own detox process. The crazy ways we get bad toxins out of our bodies are … through the liver, the kidneys, and the colon. All right, not so crazy. I thought I’d build a teensy bit of suspense.

Should your liver, kidneys, and colon stop doing their jobs, don’t look to your sweat glands. (Really, how would that work?) Vreeman says that’s not the way our body does its thing. Instead, we sweat to regulate body temperature. As in: hot → sweat → cool.

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photo by scarleth white

Ah, Monday. You seem to sneak up on me like a creepy stalker. Sometimes I wish you’d go away.

But not today. That’s because this Monday is my sister’s birthday. So, Happy Birthday Jill! We won’t be getting together for her special day because she’s about 450 miles from where I live. But I’ll suck it up and eat a birthday dessert in her honor. (Selfless, I am.)

If she did live around here, I would have bought her a ticket to Shutter Island this weekend. The Man and I went on Saturday, and I’m still thinking about the movie. It was packed at 3 in the afternoon, and I was petrified I wouldn’t get to straighten my legs to prevent my knees from killing during the entire movie. (If any of you ever see me at the movies, I’m the rude girl with her legs resting on the seat in front of me. Talk about me behind my back but don’t sit in front of me. Let’s just say an hour with bent knees is pretty much torture.) Lucky for me, no one sat there. Whew, crisis averted.

I won’t go into too much detail here since you really need to see the flick for yourself. I will say Leonardo DiCaprio delivers a killer performance as always. I’ll also mention that I love Martin Scorsese’s work and this film is no exception. And I’ll let you know that there’s a twist to the story that makes you want to watch the movie all over again once the credits roll. That’s all you’re getting. Now go. Go see it.

In honor of my little sis’s birthday, I wanted to give you a few good gift ideas. And, no, none of these are what I got her. (It’s a surprise, folks!)

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photo by jessi.bryan
Overeat? Who, me??

I have a lot of bad habits. I eat dessert every day. I sometimes skip workouts. And I always sleep too late. You know what? I’ll probably do some of those bad habits this weekend. I’ll sleep till 10 and wake with a headache. I’ll O.D. on brownies or cookies or Hershey’s kisses with the paper flag still attached because I’ve scarffed them down so fast. OK, maybe that last one was a lie or long stretch of my imagination.

Everyone has bad habits. In fact, every time a new study is published, we learn about bad habits we never knew we had. Canned goods have BPA—so if you eat ’em, add that to the list. I could go on. Sure, I feel guilty 80 percent of the time because I feel like I’m not doing enough—I’m not eating healthy enough; I’m not exercising long enough or hard enough or often enough.

Despite my faults, I do have a few a few good habits I’d like to pass along. I’m going to give you the five healthy habits that make the biggest difference in my life. I won’t talk about the whole eat healthy and exercise … yada, yada, yada. Pretend those take precedence, then move on. Thanks.

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photo by liminalmike

Remember the movie Pay it Forward? Little Haley Joel Osment played a 12-year-old boy with big dreams who launched a so-cute-you-can’t-help-smiling plan to make the world a better place. Osment’s character does good for three people under the condition they’ll pass a good deed on to another three strangers. And so on until everyone in the world has been helped out a bit—and has helped others. I won’t give away the ending in case you haven’t seen it, but let’s just say it requires a few Kleenex boxes.

The whole paying it forward idea was the topic of a recent Liberty Mutual commercial (thanks for the specifics, Google.) A man picks up a child’s toy from the road; the child’s mother stops a stranger’s coffee from spilling, and an onlooker sees her. That man helps a fallen stranger up off the ground. And so on. The basic idea is this: When you do something good, people notice—and take action.

Turns out that’s true. Researchers writing in an upcoming issue of the journal Psychological Science learned that good deeds inspire other good deeds. In their study, people who had watched a program featuring musicians and their mentors were more likely to help a stranger out than those who watched a clip from a nature documentary.

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