Random, Unplugged and True Stories
1. Going on vacation is a vital part of an overall effective wellness plan. It refreshes every aspect of your being: mental, spiritual and physical. Find a way to work regular vacations into your life. I should do a post on this for my series Balancing God and Life, but it would only be 322 words, the length of this post, thus far.
2. Our vacation was awesome. We rented a beach house in St. Augustine, Florida—just a few miles away from where we used to live. The weather was spectacular and we fell asleep to the sound of the ocean. The name of the house was The Bohemian.
4. When Jon’s employer was wooing us to move to Kentucky, I got to spend an entire day with a realtor while he spent the day in interviews. When she asked me what I’d like to see in Louisville, I said, “The ocean.” I don’t think she thought that was funny. True story.
5. Jon and I decided that The Bohemian was a cool name for a house. We want OUR house also to have a cool name. We can’t think of one. I’m taking suggestions. Feel free to chime in.
6. For me, vacation is a strange dichotomy of fitness extremes. On the one hand, my favorite exercise of all time is to run/walk on the beach. I try do it every morning for an hour. Let me rephrase that: I try to STOP after an hour, because I love it so and need to see my family at some point on vacation. On the other hand, I eat desserts—like a lot of desserts. My goal is to run/walk long enough to burn off excess vacation dessert calories. I have no idea if I reach that goal because I don’t calculate calorie intake or output on vacation. I just make stuff up.
7. My friend Angel had a great idea for a blog name: I Make Stuff Up. I told her if I ever start another blog, I’m stealing that name.
8. This is Angel and me in St. Augustine. She’s one of my Florida Friends I miss so terribly. *sniff*
9. This is my cat drinking from our fish bowl. I’m calling this photo Endangered Fishy
10. Here goes a Rapid Weight Gain update: My weight is exactly the same, which is actually good news considering the amount of dessert I consumed on my vacation. My goal is to lose five pounds by June 1st. At the rate I’m going, I should actually gain about seven.
11. I met with my personal trainer before vacation to discuss a new strategy. He thought I really needed to concentrate heavily on the cardio for the next month. He thinks I need to burn 500 calories a day, which he says is about an hour of moderate to high intensity cardio. After 30 days of focused, calorie-burning cardio, we are going to restart Body for Life, which I have done two times and has always given me amazing results. I wrote about it here.
12. I went to a doctor to discuss my rapid weight gain and to see about a lingering cough I’ve had for six months. She diagnosed me with asthma and put me on steroids and Singulair—not to be confused with Cingular, which is a mobile phone company, yet pronounced exactly the same. I would like to be prescribed more rollover minutes.
13. After I adopted Elijah and was completely sleep deprived and stressed out with a two-year-old and a newborn, our pediatrician actually wrote me a prescription for a house keeper. I love that woman.
14. The new meds are seriously messing with my brain—my official excuse for the condition of this post.
15. This morning, I decided to Google “natural remedies for asthma” and found this at Shirley’s Wellness Café.
“Conventional drugs used for treating asthma, particularly steroids, can impair immune function and lead to more serious health problems. “Doctors tell you that steroids (cortisone, prednisone) only cause side effects after many years. But new research shows that permanent damage is immediate and devastating. Studies show that steroids cause permanent, debilitating effects after a single dosage. Steroids are probably the most sleazy of modern day medications”
~John Mills, former professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco and chief of infectious diseases at San Francisco General Hospital.
16. Note to self: Next time, Google BEFORE you go to the doctor and start taking immediately and permanently debilitating sleazy drugs.
17. Sleazy drugs. That’s all I have to say about that.
18. I also found this:
Dr. Rapp identifies the major symptoms of potentially unrecognized allergies in children and adults, suggesting possible sensitivities to dust, mold, pollen, foods or chemicals. Allergies are much more than high fever, asthma and itchy skin. It is possible to identify allergies by simply looking at someone. At times it is surprisingly easy to find and eliminate the cause. The typical clues of allergies and environmental illness can include any combination of the following: Rubbing Nose Upwards; Eye Wrinkles; Dark Eye Circles Sudden Aggression; Scarlet Earlobes A SPACEY LOOK Extreme Activity Changes Wiggly Legs; Red Cheeks A Mottled Tongue.
Did you see that???? A spacey look!?!! I’m so spacey right now, I can’t even come up with something witty to say about having a spacey look.
19. The good news is, the doctor didn’t seem at all concerned about my weight gain. She said my BMI was still in the normal range (barely) and that natural changes in the metabolism happen around ages 30, 40 and 50. She said, “It’s like someone flips a switch and everything you were previously doing doesn’t work anymore.” Well, that about sums it up right there. She did take a whole lotta blood just to make sure something funky isn’t going on, besides being 40-ish. Which is funky in it’s own right. I’ll have those results in a few days.
20. My husband was quick to point out that, based on her assessment of my metabolism, I can look forward to another rapid weight gain in about 9 years.
21. This is also the same man who, when I spent $150 at a high-end salon to have my hair cut a few years ago (and they took thinning sheers to it, leaving me to look like a 2-year-old with wispy toddler hair), comforted me with the words, “You look like a cancer patient—but at least you don’t REALLY have cancer.” True story.
22. I think he felt really guilty for moving me from Florida where I had the BEST hair guy, to Kentucky where I spent $150 for Toddler/Cancer Hair. And no ocean.
23. There exist no pictures of me in the year 2005 because of the Toddler/Cancer Hair Fiasco.
24. This is what you can expect for dinner if you are the child of Fitness Friday Girl.
25. The nose in that picture is a wrap, made with a whole grain tortilla, chicken and fresh veggies. It was so yummy.
The polls are now open. Please submit your best suggestion for the name of my house and your best natural remedy for asthma so I can kick my sleazy drug habit. Which, by the way, has a potential side effect of weight gain. Awesome.