Category Archive
The following is a list of all entries from the Tips and Tricks category.
Gluten Free? How long did it take for you to be diagnosed?
Perusing the twitterverse this afternoon I found a tweet that asked me a question that is very close to my heart. It was simple just “How long did it take you to get diagnosed with celiacs disease?”First that was a very straight to the point and I’m not sure that I’m going to get a very long blog post out of that. Well second was wow. The person in question (@BoulderLocavore ) mentioned that their adventure lasted 9 years! Geez that seems like a long time. It took me 17 years to get diagnosed and even then I didn’t get a real diagnosis. However I digress. This is not about me or the failings of our medical system. or the fact that it was not even a traditional medical doctor who diagnosed me in the first place. Wait I did say I was done right?
(Image from PureProActive Weight Loss and Wellness http://pureproactive.com/what-does-gluten-free-mean/)
This person put this question out there with I believe, the expectations of having many people respond with similar stories. However much to my surprise, and most likely the surprise of the author, the response was largely the opposite. Most responses indicated they were diagnosed immediately. Their health professionals recognized the symptoms and started them on the road to health immediately. I was surprised. It actually took me aback for a moment.
Whilst I sat in stark shock how much everything had changed and in such a short amount of time. I couldn’t help but wonder about my own daughter. She started showing some signs of problems with wheat. Bloating, stomach pains. Then she started getting tired, no, fatigued is more the appropriate term. I knew what had happened to me and how slippery a slope all of that was. So we (myself and my ever supportive husband) asked her to try it out. Nothing too complicated. Just change the rest of the meals she ate to gluten free. We already ate it most of the time as it was. Within a week stomach pains, bloating was all gone. We had her blood tested and found out she had low iron (another common symptom) and now she’s on supplements and doing well. When I look back and see how sick I became before kicking the gluten, I realize just how lucky she is that I had those experiences. Now she has the opportunity to lead a full and healthy life, just like me.
So… just putting it out there. How long did it take you to be diagnosed?
Cheers!
Pink slime in your hamburger
(Photo from Documentary Lovers http://www.documentarylovers.com)
Let me just start out by saying that I have tremendous amounts of respect for Jamie Oliver. I have been watching his shows on the Food Network for the past few years and I have been following him on his website. He is a visionary who is using his status to push the government and the food companies to really question what is good for the pocket book versus what is good for our bodies. He is one of my real food heroes. His show taught me how real food can be prepared without having to be dependent on all the processed goods that I had used in the past.
I have included a demonstration (click here to view) Jamie Oliver held to show people what they are really consuming when they eat ground meat. Especially the ground meat in hamburgers, etc… It really is truly disgusting. They use a mix of inedible beef trimmings that we would find in dog food, or chicken feed. They then mix it with ammonia and water to kill the bacteria. This mixture can then be added to ground beef without labelling it. All because the government says it’s safe. I think most of us had an idea about the grade of meat that was included into a McDonald’s burger (or shall we say that no one really believed that it was ever 100% Beef). However, have you ever thought about what could be added to the meat that you buy in the grocery store.
I was sadly appalled when the XL Foods scandal was in full swing to learn that my favourite butcher was buying their meat from them. It was awful. I never imagined that even my local butcher was buying from the same place as Metro and all the rest. It taught me that you really need to be careful and ask the right questions about where the food you are buying actually comes from. To this day I have noticed that over time the amount of water in the meat has increased. Have you noticed steak bought from certain retailers is impossible to fry. The water content is so high that as it is released from the meat it doesn’t just evaporate immediately but fills the pan and poaches your food. That should not happen.
Sorry for the rant but I’m scared for my families health. If we know this, how much is out there that we haven’t found out yet. Jamie Oliver is doing his best to raise awareness. It’s our turn to do the same.
Scary…
Creating your happiness
In my quest for health the main recurring theme that I have encountered has been happiness. Happiness was like a leaf blowing in a breeze. Always being swept just out of reach. Being sick makes us depressed. We feel bogged under and just tired and, well sick. It sucks and you just want to cry. As of late I have been reflecting on how I got from depressed, sick and tired to creating my happiness. There was the regular assortment of doctor appointments and specialists. There was no one that wanted to know how I was feeling. They want to see if they can prescribe you another pill or if they can fix whatever it is that is ailing you. However if there is no medication they just toss you aside. Unfortunately that just feeds into the downward cycle of sickness and feeling of loss that inevitably ends up becoming a spiral of depression.
That was my life. I was miserable. I felt depressed. I couldn’t work and the little bit of energy I had was so minute that I had to pick and choose what activity I would do today. Would it be cleaning the floors, or laundry. I was exhausted. Exhausted from being sick all of the time. Then as I started feeling better the veil began to lift. I saw a light at the end of the tunnel. It didn’t happen overnight and it didn’t happen quickly. As I got slowly better I felt happier. I started to enjoy life again, and the things that I love. I started to live in the moment again and enjoy all of the little things that I had started missing because I was too sick to see it.
Happiness is a state of being. For me happiness is:
- Feeling the dew on the grass between my toes in the morning
- Jumping in a pool on a hot summer’s day
- Spending a day with my kids at the park
- A hot cup of tea on a cold winter’s day
- Going for a walk or cycling
- Reading a good book
- Touching a soft blanket at the store as you walk by
- Baking
Those are just some of the examples. Everyone has their own happy place that they can work with. I know some people who find their happy place doing the dishes or vacuuming. We can be a happy person and sometimes still feel down. I try to make sure that when I have those moments I do something that makes me feel good inside. It doesn’t have to be much and it doesn’t have to take a lot of time. But it works just the same and reminds me of just how far I’ve come.
For the next week try to “Create your Happiness”. Spend 20 minutes and make a list of 7 things that make you happy. Every day you need to action 1 of the items on your list. The goal is at the end of the week you will completed each item on your list. You can make them as easy or difficult as you like but just make sure that you are able to complete them in a week (so maybe adding climbing Mount Everest would not be a good idea at this point). At the end of the week look back at your accomplishments and how they made you feel. Spend some time and also reflect on how you felt before you started. You’ll feel much happier than you did at the beginning. You’ve created your own happiness, another step along the path.
Cheers!
Act successful and you will find success
Have you ever found yourself thinking “I don’t belong here” or “why do other people seem so happy and I don’t”? All of us have from time to time. We all wonder the same things and often enough we convince ourselves that we don’t deserve it. We self talk ourselves out of great opportunities in life because we are too scared.
I was watching TED Talks the other day on Netflix and one of the speakers answered just that question. Amy Cuddy has spent her professional career as a professor studying people, and if body language has an effect on happiness, instead of the other way around. Interestingly she found that if you acted as though you were happy, you would almost immediately become it. Most people would have assumed that after repeated activities we would eventually become happy, or assured, or assertive. However the link in your brain with the actions that we make when we are happy is so strong that we are able to overcome many circumstances if we just
“act it out”.
Amy had a great way studying this and found that if you assumed a powerful stance before an interview that presence would continue through the interview and increase the likelihood that you would be hired. She recommended something called the “V”.
(Photo from National Geographic http://www.nationalgeographic.com)
This move is done when humans are victorious. We subconsciously raise our arms in a V. This is an action that is made throughout all cultures and has the same meaning. If before an interview, or a moment that you wish to appear assured, take a few seconds and raise your hands to the air as if you have just landed that new job. That is enough to change your mindset and show to the world around us that we are already victorious.
Body language has an incredible effect on our minds and the minds of those around us. If we learn to use it consciously we can learn so much about our surroundings and why we react to certain people in certain ways. I don’t know about you but the next time I go into an interview or find myself speaking to a group of people I am most certainly doing the “V”.
Go Naked Nutrition 