POST-CHRISTMAS HEALTH CONTEMPLATION

I'm thinking a lot about health as this year ends.  It's been a challenging year in some ways and I was not at all well for many months of GI distress and migraines and general stress and anxiety and overwhelm due to that "little" (haha) relationship disruption I wrote about previously.  My therapist was rather alarmed at my lack of sleeping and eating, or leaving the couch. Sigh.  So, yeah, I wasn't taking very good care of myself there for awhile.

Now, being back on track emotionally gave me the space to take a look at my physical symptoms and decide to do something different, like sleep....

This morning, I was up by 5:00 a.m.  Again.  Still, my Fitbit tells me I had a FAIR night's sleep, likely marked down some by not hitting my 7 hour minimum sleep goal, but hitting all other benchmarks for the sleep cycles.  So many variables go into the calculation of the Fitbit "sleep score", which has become my barometer for knowing if I slept well or not, instead of trusting my body and the degree to which I feel rested. 

Lest you think I'm the only one Fitbit dependent, a friend of mine made an emergency doctor visit after a period of time in which her Fitbit did not give her any sleep score at all due to being unable to gather enough data while she was asleep.  She first, wisely (haha), bought a new Fitbit but when that didn't solve the problem she was off to the doctor to have her heart checked. They sent her home reassured, and we all had a stern talk with her Fitbit for playing naughty tricks on her...and learned that maybe these tracking devices are not infallible.  Go figure.

Anyway, my Fitbit also sends data to my Medicare Advantage Preventative Health plan which gives me "dollars" to spend on gift cards, as allocated by how many "active days" (based on steps taken) and exercise classes, etc I take with Silver Sneakers or on my own, as well as keeping up on preventative medical visits and tests.  This year I've earned $160 to spend on gift cards and mine will all go to the Amazon option.  This is a mere pittance of what I'd earn if they paid for ALL my classes. (They only allow you to "claim" 4 classes a year!  Ridiculous! I take that many in a week.)  But I'll enjoy a few freebies from Amazon, so that's some motivation, I guess.

In addition to sleeping better, I decided to eat better too.  After watching the documentary (on Netflix -- check it out) "Forks Over Knives",  I started in early November to eat a mostly plant-based diet.  No land or air meat at all.  Maybe every 10 days or so some prawns.  (Holding out on a decision on salmon next year when it's back in season.)  For a few weeks I was vegan and ate no dairy and no eggs, but I've eased up on being that restrictive.  I eat those infrequently, but without hesitation.  And guess what?  I feel so much better!  I know it could be the relieved stress helping my symptoms, but I just feel so much better overall I can hardly believe it.   I'm sticking with it.

The biggest hurdle this holiday season, as every year, is my descent into sugar addiction.  I swore it would not happen this year, given my new healthful eating plan.  But it did.  Cake, cookies, brownies, pastries, candy, ice cream, mochas, eggnog lattes...oh my.  These are my drugs of choice.  I am powerless.

So yesterday, in a fit of disgust, I Googled "giving up sugar".  There are hundreds of "hits" for articles, books, documentaries, essays, ads....  I settled on two guides to start with:  "Beating Sugar Addiction for Dummies" (cuz I find those "dummy" books about complex subjects to be very readable, so I guess I'm the target "dummy" audience) and "Year of No Sugar" by Eve O Schaub, whose memoir writing is so funny and down-to-earth true; I love her.  This one is about how her whole family spent a year not eating any added fructose in anything!  I don't know if I can go that far, but what I've read about the way sugar ravages our bodies makes me want to purge 69 years of sugar consumption and get on the stump with a megaphone.  I'm going to start with just eliminating anything I know to be purposely sweet -- the aforementioned cakes, cookies, sugar drinks, etc.  -- and not worry too much yet about what sugar there is in my Dave's thin-sliced multi-grain bread.  I will leave off the jam though.

Like any good resolution-maker, I'm starting in earnest on January 1.  This will be VERY challenging for me.  Society uses sugar in so many ways that have nothing to do with nutrition (of which there is none) -- it's used to say "I love you"; "Let's celebrate"; "Feel better", etc etc.  Sugar is everywhere -- not just the hidden kind (read the labels!) but the obvious kind too.  There are whole cookie aisles! Whole bakeries within the supermarket!  I know!  I love them!!!

I am heartened, however, to realize I've already given up cigarettes (1982, but with a very occasional, like on average less than once/year "cheat", until 2011), alcohol (2011), red meat (sometime over the past 15 years; not sure when exactly), and the rest of the land/air animal flesh 6 weeks ago (OK, two chicken cheats) and now I miss none of it and don't feel weird or socially out of place (most of the time) with my choices.  So I hold out hope for this to be difficult for awhile (2 weeks is the typical 'withdrawal/craving' timeframe for sugar addiction) and then, hopefully, easy. (Easier.)

If you've gone before me on this sugarless path, send suggestions for not gnawing my fingers off.  I can't help but assume there is some trace fructose in my new Lemon-Rosemary Balm hand lotion and it will sound awfully good in a few days...I can see myself licking my paws like a cat, can't you?

At least, that's the view from here...©

PS:  I just checked my Dave's bread:  2 grams sugar per slice in the form of organic fruit juices to supply the "sweet".  Ms. Schaub would have eliminated this from her diet.  I'm not gonna.  Yet.  I get into trouble and have zero long-term follow-through when I go all or nothing on things like this.  Baby steps.

Photo Credit:  www.pixabay.com

BABIES AND BELTS: BOTH CHALLENGING

I've been up nearly all night.  Long story, but the gist of it is an almost one-year-old little girl having a sleepover at Grandma and Grandpa's house, but being fairly unaware of the part about "sleeping".

She went to bed at 9:00, got up at 12:45, refused to settle back down in spite of me pulling out all the stops with all the tricks I know about how to soothe babies in the middle of the night (dry diaper, warm bottle, rocking, walking, singing, allowing a bit of fussing -- but not so much as to wake her sister!, more walking, more swaying, not interacting, finding darkest corners of the house to reduce stimuli...)  All to no avail: she was ready to party!

So at 2:00 I gave up and carried her downstairs to the TV room, where I could close the door, and allowed her to toddle around, jabber away, and give the remotes a good going over while I sat dazed and exhausted, not daring to actually turn the TV on and stimulate her further!  I noticed a few yawns at about 3:30 and she finally lay on the floor and feel asleep.  At that point I decided to let sleeping babies lie.

So, I tried to find comfort lying down on the love seat, but mostly kept focusing on my sore kinked neck and cramped legs and the tick, tick, tick of the clock on the wall.  So here I sit with baby at my feet,  wondering when her 6-year-old sister will be up and ready for those promised blueberry pancakes.  Soon, no doubt.

Which brings me to ruminating about my waistline.  Of course I've been scrolling through late night posts on Facebook and happened upon a sponsored ad from a local women's clothing store.  Here's what I saw:

Breathe Life into Your Wardrobe with a Fabulous Belt

I thought about my wardrobe, consisting almost exclusively of yoga pants and hoodies these days, when Granny Nanny care takes up 30 hours a week, my yoga classes about 3-9 hours a week, then  writing, housework, errands, and coffee with friends thrown in.  In the evenings Hub and I relax in what we jokingly call our "nursing home clothes" -- basically "jammie pants" and fleece pullovers.  Since I quit working and going to church, I see that my wardrobe has taken a turn to the ultra-casual.  No need for a belt.

But even when I used to actually get dressed, belts were never my friend.  For one thing, take a look at the waistline in the graphic above.  I've never, ever had that waistline.  Even in my 20s when I weighed about 120 pounds, I carried any excess weight right about where that belt sits.  And now, at 65 and fighting to nudge the scale below 140, one side profile look in the mirror shows EXACTLY where those extra pounds have settled.  Right at the buckle.  Trying to reign that mess in just accentuates my "problem area".  

A belt may breathe life into some skinny lady's wardrobe, but as for me, I just want to breathe.  

And sleep.

At least, that's the view from here...©