Over the weekend my father in law, Mike, had breathing problems and was taken to the hospital. He has blood clots in one of his lungs and they are giving him blood thinning medication and doing tests. We are still waiting on the results. Mike has been struggling with depression for the last few years as well.

Prayers/good thoughts/etc. deeply appreciated!

Having lost weight on the Migraine Diet, I was interested to try out the Stomach Flu Diet. Wow! It's really efficient! With all the rapid fluid loss, inability to eat solid food, and the doctor's stern admonishment to stay on clear liquids, I lost 11 pounds in just 5 days! Even after starting solid foods again I lost the last pound. Who knows where it will end?

If you must be in a size lower dress within a week or ten days, I highly recommend catching a stomach flu virus. It can't be beat.

I am re-posting (by request) her letter to her supporters in her fight against Lyme Disease, for which she has no health insurance. You might remember Fran from my post some time ago about the book "Without A Net," an anthology by and about working class women. The letter below makes a very important point that I think applies to most women--the ease of giving vs. the shame around asking for help. It's an issue that I confront myself and anyone of us will if we are seriously ill or in need. Given these difficult economic times, we should be reaching out to each other and asking for help or offering it, or pooling our resources as needed.

Here is her letter:

My Very Dear (and Hella Pretty) Lyme Fighting Army:

Unbelievably, this thank you letter is close to five months in the making. I’d like to say that time moves quickly when you have Lyme Disease, but it doesn‘t. Time rolls together when you are chronically ill, long stretches of it with little to delineate a day in January from a day in late March, except for a bit more sun.

I had set out all of those months ago to thank you. I thank you multiple times each day but I wanted to offer a thank you that you could see, a proper thank you that you could hold onto and come back to; even point the misanthropes in your life toward as evidence that there is good in the world, and that it originates in you.

Recently a 27 year-old man in Maryville, Illinois walked into a Baptist Church and shot its Pastor to death. The man, Terry J. Sedlacek, has a very severe case of late stage, neurological, Lyme Disease. He did not start out a shoot ‘em up kind of guy, but once those bacteria screw themselves into your brain and get the opportunity to hang out for a while everything about you changes.

It is well documented that he did not receive the care he needed. Very few of us are actually receiving all of the care we need. But in the absence of an adequate or sympathetic health care system the support and belief of one’s community makes an entire world of difference.

I wish you could see yourselves from here. You are many beautiful colors, all sizes, most socio-economic groups, many different genders, and many different sexualities. You run the gamut from the healthiest to the strongest crips and survivors I’ll ever lay my grateful eyes upon. You live all over the country, and in Canada and in Europe. You have various, and sometimes opposing beliefs. Some of you are religious personnel and some of you are not so holy. I’ve known you for most of my life and there are those among you I’ve never met - and still you are my family. You are smart and funny and kind and compassionate and you hold me up - you have held me up for over a year now. On my very worst days when I am certain I absolutely can not endure another minute of this I imagine your faces, and I hold on.

Some of you have donated generous amounts of money to my recovery. Some of you donate every week or every other week. Some of you, with almost nothing of your own to spare, send me $5 or $10. You send me care packages, femmes always send me make up because that is armor and they know it. You send me letters and e-mails and cards. Sometimes you pray for me, sometimes you light candles, sometimes you just close your eyes and think, simply, for my health. And, all of it - all of it - floors me. I cannot wrap my rapidly deteriorating brain around it.

Before I knew that I was sick I was proud to be an activist. I worked for social justice in the health care industry and I donated my time to teach kids about poetry. I read and I performed at fund raiser after fund raiser. I wrote and spoke extensively with the earnest hope of making a difference in someone else’s life. Before I became sick I held a deeply-rooted belief that it is noble to give of one’s self and shameful to require gifting, though I never would have said that out loud.

Now I think differently. And because my body does not frequently cooperate and allow me to physically accomplish all of the things I want to I have a lot more time to think. Before late stage Lyme became my daily reality I allowed the pride I felt in being helpful and in giving to define me. I thought it said something about me. Unlearning that vanity has been almost as difficult as learning how to live each day with a daunting, progressive illness.
( Read more... )

Great New Zealand ad against domestic violence:



And change is possible:



Another story of change:

Abuse victims report long-term poor health and depression. Researchers are puzzled by this, according to the article. I'm not surprised at all. Long after bruises fade one is still affected by the verbal abuse that was heard so many times it has become part of one's self image. It takes a lot of conscious effort to try to counteract that.

Also they should look at the sports study of concussions and brain injury.

I am reading some of the coverage of Chris Brown's abuse of Rihanna and everyone piling on her for reconciling. No one gets why it's so difficult for her to just walk away. That's because no one but her is in a relationship with him and in love with him. Without that emotion, it's so easy to see that she should leave him.

I'd like for her critics to imagine that suddenly the person they love hits them several times during a heated argument. I'd like for them to imagine the shock that this person they love is behaving this way. Those who say there should be a zero tolerance policy should imagine this. Imagine walking away from the person you love, the person who previously gave no obvious hint they'd ever do this. Imagine that person crying as they express remorse and promising to change. This person you love, this person you've shared so much with, this lover who is crying over having hurt you so badly. That angry person who hit you seems like an aberration. Surely this lover you've trusted with your heart and soul, who has been kind to you when you were sick, who has supported you in so many ways, this kind person is the real person, and will overcome the anger. Your love softens you and you agree to give them another chance. Everyone deserves a second chance, right? It's only fair.

Love doesn't stop on a dime. It takes a lot of beatings to kill it completely.

According to an article in CNN, Research shows that athlete's brains have damage from concussions.

This easily applies to anyone who has repeated blows to the head. Most battered women, if not all, are being struck in the head or having their head smashed into walls or floors. Even if you don't end up in the hospital with a serious concussion, you may have a mild concussion. This research shows that even those milder concussions are doing damage. The damage doesn't show up in MRIs or CT scans, but in this study they examined brain tissue of deceased athletes and saw extensive damage. Some of the symptoms of that damage were sleep disorders, depression, headaches, and memory problems. They call the disorder chronic traumatic encephalopathy.

So far six out of six brains of former NFL players show the disorder. The youngest case was an 18 year old who already had the beginnings of brain damage. Think about it, our high school kids who play vigorous sports who get their heads knocked around may be getting brain damage. Researchers were shocked to find damage deep inside, not just on the surface.

This was particularly chilling for me to read because I have the surface evidence of damage--leading me to believe I may very well have some additional damage that wasn't seen on the MRI.

I've written to the Sports Legacy Institute and suggested they expand their research to include people who've survived repeated domestic assault. All one has to do is donate their brain to the project. I plan to donate my organs and be cremated anyway, so I'd be happy to sign up. At least my family can get some answers.
( Read more... )

Thinking can make you fat, study shows

11 Sep 2008

Researchers found the stress of onerous mental tasks caused subjects to overeat.
The results may help suggest how modern lifestyles have contributed to an obesity epidemic.
The research team, supervised by Dr Angelo Tremblay, measured the spontaneous food intake of 14 students after each of three tasks.

The first was relaxing in a sitting position, the second reading and summarizing a text, and finally completing a series of memory, attention, and vigilance tests on the computer.
After 45 minutes at each activity, participants were invited to eat as much as they wanted from a buffet. The researchers had already calculated that each session of intellectual work requires only three calories more than the rest period.

However, despite the low energy cost of mental work, the students spontaneously consumed 203 more calories after summarizing a text and 253 more calories after the computer tests.
This represents a 23.6 per cent and 29.4 per cent increase, respectively, compared with the rest period.

Blood samples taken before, during, and after each session revealed that intellectual work causes much bigger fluctuations in glucose and insulin levels than rest periods.
Jean-Philippe Chaput, the study's main author, said: "These fluctuations may be caused by the stress of intellectual work, or also reflect a biological adaptation during glucose combustion."
The body could be reacting to these fluctuations by spurring food intake in order to restore its glucose balance, the only fuel used by the brain.

Mr Chaput added: "Caloric overcompensation following intellectual work, combined with the fact we are less physically active when doing intellectual tasks, could contribute to the obesity epidemic currently observed in industrialised countries.

"This is a factor that should not be ignored, considering that more and more people hold jobs of an intellectual nature."

The results of the study, carried out at Université Laval in Quebec, Canada, are published in the most recent issue of Psychosomatic Medicine.

No one likes to think about it, but there is something you need to know when it strikes you. A severe case can be life-threatening in some people. Your heart depends on keeping a good electrolyte balance for it's functioning. This was brought to mind by a sick friend today, who needed this formula.

To replace electrolytes lost in vomiting or diarrhea:

1 qt water
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp table salt
3 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt substitute (lite salt) if available

Only for those over 12, under 12 you can use pediolyte, available at pharmacies without a prescription and I've even seen it at grocery stores.

It is vitally important to keep a proper balance of salts when you are rapidly losing them due to vomiting, extreme perspiration on a hot day, or other causes. And of course most people know but it bears repeating, that you shouldn't overdo water, even on a hot day, especially if you are not replacing mineral salts such as potassium, magnesium and sodium. In a few instances, people have died from drinking too much water as a result of a hazing incident or a radio contest. These tragedies were perfectly avoidable.

http://www.merck.com/pubs/mmanual_ha/sec3/ch18/ch18d.html

Finally, evidence of what the fat acceptance movement has always said (based on comparisons between fat people in their native cultures vs. those who move to America and live a less heart healthy lifestyle): Overweight doesn't always mean heart risks and normal-weight people aren't always heart-healthy!

Excerpt:

CHICAGO, Illinois (AP) -- You can look great in a swimsuit and still be a heart attack waiting to happen. And you can also be overweight and otherwise healthy.

A new study suggests that a surprising number of overweight people -- about half -- have normal blood pressure and cholesterol levels, while an equally startling number of trim people suffer from some of the ills associated with obesity.

The first national estimate of its kind bolsters the argument that you can be hefty but still healthy, or at least healthier than has been believed.

The results also show that stereotypes about body size can be misleading and that even "less voluptuous" people can have risk factors commonly associated with obesity, said study author MaryFran Sowers, a University of Michigan obesity researcher.

"We're really talking about taking a look with a very different lens" at weight and health risks, Sowers said.

Of course people of any size with a family history of heart disease will want to be cautious about weight gain and want to be particularly careful with their diet. It is recommended that they also keep their cholesterol well below the 200 that used to be considered normal. (Mine was only slightly higher than that in the years leading up to my diagnosis.) We should all be aware of our risk factors since heart disease is the number 1 killer of both men and women.

Soul legend Isaac Hayes died at age 65. What a shock, right after Bernie Mac!

(CNN) -- Soul singer and arranger Isaac Hayes, who won Grammy awards and an Oscar for the theme from the 1971 action film "Shaft," has died, sheriff's officials in Memphis, Tennessee, reported Sunday.

Relatives found Hayes, 65, unconscious in his home next to a still-running treadmill, said Steve Shular, a spokesman for the Shelby County Sheriff's Department.

Paramedics attempted to revive him and took him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after 2 p.m., the sheriff's department said.

No foul play is suspected, the agency said in a written statement.

What a shocker: Bernie Mac died today at age 50 from complications of pneumonia. Friends said that they thought he was getting better.

I was puzzled about what complications can occur so I looked it up. I knew about one of them but here's a page that gives a full list.

I confess that I am shocked by the recent group of famous people dying in their fifties. I mean, it's possible to die at any age and people die much younger. Maybe it's just that I am about to turn 50 myself, both my parents died in their early fifties, and so I'm sensitized to that age group and death. I don't know. But it seems like we are losing some really good people way too soon.

(Since I posted the link to an article about sleep apnea and the increased risk of death, I thought I would re-post from my forum about symptoms and treatment.)

The public is just beginning in the last few years to hear about sleep apnea. Normally you hear that it is something that interrupts your sleep and makes you tired and prone to have car accidents. Maybe you've heard that it is a cardiac risk factor but have no idea why. You hear also that people who are over weight and snore loudly are at risk, and since you are thin and don't snore or snore "gently" you think you are probably safe.

Think again. Respiratory therapists who treat it think it is one of the most underdiagnosed diseases out there.

You can be young, thin, snore loudly, barely snore, be athletic, not think you are tired during the day, and still be suffering from sleep apnea. The only way you can know for sure is to be tested. Testing is easy now and can be done in your home in most cases. A respiratory therapist can hook you up to painless heart monitors, and a tube that measures your breath will be taped so that it is at the entrance of your nostrils, recording the oxygen level and breaths. You sleep through the night and the data collected in a small device is then taken back to the therapist for evaluation.

Some of the indicators of sleep apnea may be:

daytime drowsiness or feeling groggy upon awakening, even with 8 or more hours of sleep, needing lots of coffee

tossing and turning at night rather than sleeping in one position

remembering only a few dreams rather than several or more

snoring is classic, and it needn't be loud

excess weight is a risk factor but in some cases may be caused by the fatigue of apnea (in a sort of feedback loop)

heart disease diagnosis or high blood pressure may indicate sleep apnea as a silent cause

risk increases with age, or apnea itself worsens with age

physiology--a respiratory therapist can often tell from facial and neck structure that you are likely to have apnea

memory problems, attention deficit, getting worse over time, more than seems age-appropriate

lethargy, sense of laziness that has worsened over time

parent or grandparent has apnea
( Read more... )
More info on Wikipedia.

I had a sleep study done to update my authorization for more sleep apnea supplies. It's time I got a newer machine where they can check how I'm doing by looking at output from the machine's own data card. By machine I mean a CPAP, or continuous positive airway pressure device. It measures when my oxygen level dips and turns up the pressure to keep my airway open at night. I never sleep without mine.

Last night started out, though, with a half night without a CPAP to verify that yes, indeed, it is sorely needed. I normally use mine even to nap because now that I'm used to REALLY sleeping, I find that without a CPAP I jerk completely awake, heart pounding, soon after I initially fall asleep. This pattern continues the whole time. Where I used to be so chronically tired that I kind of half slept through my apnea episodes, now I'm not used to them and my body goes to full alert mode. It's like a torture method--prisoner starts to fall asleep and you startle them awake again. Over and over. You can see why I won't sleep without my machine. They had never met anyone so compliant as I am. I was reluctant to do that part of the study but insurance requires it. I was so relieved to get my CPAP back for the second half so I could just get some sleep!

For those afraid to get diagnosed--don't be. You won't believe how much better you will feel with real, deep, restful sleep. If the first mask you try doesn't work well for you, ask for another kind and insist, even if you pay for it yourself. There are so many kinds that one will definitely fit your face and sleep style and they are designing new ones all the time. Sleep apnea is a booming business now. They are discovering that even normal people may have up to five episodes a night. It's the one who have severe apnea that need to get treatment of some kind.

ETA: Sleep apnea boosts your risk of death, study shows! Yet another reason to get tested if you have any symptoms. Using a CPAP device was found to reduce the patient's risk of dying.

The Myth of Moderate Exercise examines the role of exercise in weight loss. Along the way they make a very important point:

Still, the underlying question remains: are diet and exercise a reliable cure for obesity? Modern-day obesity researchers are skeptical — achieving thinness, they say, is not simply a matter of willpower. Research suggests that weight may largely be regulated by biology, which helps determine the body's "set point," a weight range of about 10 lbs. to 20 lbs. that the body tries hard to defend. The further you push you weight beyond your set point — either up or down the scale — some researchers say, the more your body struggles to return to it. That might help to explain why none of the women in Jakicic's study managed to lose much more than 10% of their body weight. After two years on a calorie-restricted diet, keeping up more than an hour of physical activity five days a week on average, most were still clinically overweight (though much less so than before). But what Jakicic and other obesity researchers stress is that a 10% reduction in body weight represents a tremendous boon for overall well-being, lowering blood pressure, improving heart health and reducing the risk of Type 2 diabetes. For the obese, the end goal should not be thinness, but health and self-acceptance, which are more realistic and beneficial objectives. "The women's health was absolutely improved," Jakicic says.

Regardless of whether it contributes to substantial weight loss or not, exercise does lots of other things for your health. If women could only be as excited about improving health as they are about improving appearance according to society's standards, imagine how healthy we all could be!

Randy Pausch, famous for his Youtube video of his final lecture, dies at 47 from pancreatic cancer. I saw him give the same lecture on the Oprah show recently. It was amazing and I am sure at least part of the credit goes to the parents who instilled the values he lived by and provided such a good start in his life. It is a shame he couldn't have more time with his own children.

Legumes and indeed, all carbohydrate-based foods these days, often get a bad rap. However, in defense of legumes they do have a lot of good things to offer and have been a vital mainstay of poor people's diets throughout the world and down through the ages. The fiber they provide help prevent some of the diseases of the colon that modern low fiber diets have contributed to. (I had zero polyps when I was examined on '06--the doctor said that's very rare for someone my age in America.) Fiber is also good for a heart-healthy diet since it helps lower cholesterol.

Here's some more information for anyone wanting to make an informed decision about the role of legumes in their diet, perhaps in moderation and with an application of Beano. ( Read more... )Source: http://waltonfeed.com/self/beans.html where you can find much, much more information.

...a letter to Cary Tennis about migraines, that is.

Excerpt:

Dear Cary,

I've held off on writing this letter. I was raised in a household where we don't complain about aches and pains; I am supposed to be stoic and able to cope, but I'm beginning to feel defeated by pain. Eighteen months ago I started getting migraines. What started out as a low-grade migraine 15 days out of the month has turned into "Chronic Daily Migraine," in which every day I cope with pain that ranges from feeling like someone is attempting to use a bottle opener to pry off my cheekbone, to a thunderbolt-type pain that blasts along my forehead and makes moving my eyes agonizing.

Cary had a nice response, and as a migraine sufferer he at least knows what he's talking about. He referred the letter-writer to http://www.thedailyheadache.com among other things. It's good to see that I'm not alone. Coincidentally, I have a bad migraine that started last night, so it was a great time to see this column. I hadn't checked out Salon in awhile, so I can't help but feel like I was meant to see it.

Of course the letters in response have lots of ideas for treatments that worked for the letter-writers, so I'm learning about some things I haven't tried yet.

Don S. Davis died on June 29th of a heart attack. Fans may know him best as General Hammond on Stargate: SG1.

Excerpt:

His family released a statement that said "so many of you have been touched by not only the work and art of Don S. Davis, but by the man himself, who always took the time to be with you at the appearances he loved, that it is with a tremendous sense of loss I must share with you that Don passed away from a massive heart attack on Sunday morning, June 29.

"On behalf of his family and wife, Ruby, we thank you for your prayers and condolences. A family memorial where Don's ashes will be scattered in the ocean will take place in a few weeks, and should you wish to, please make a donation to the American Heart Association in Don's memory."

"Stargate: Atlantis" executive producer Joseph Mallozzi told reporters during a conference call July 1 that Davis would certainly be missed.

"He had a bigger heart and was even nicer than the Hammond character that he played," Mallozzi said. Fans "would approach him in the sense that they were approaching Gen. Hammond. but once they got to know him, they got to know Don Davis, a very warm-hearted, incredibly self-deprecating man, who sadly will be incredibly missed by not just the fans, but anyone who worked with him."

George Carlin died today of heart failure at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica.

George had a history of heart disease. In his own words:

Q. Somewhere in there I was reminded of the bit on your Web site where you talk about your second heart attack at Dodger Stadium. And somewhere in there you say, "The Mets beat the Dodgers. Fuck the Dodgers." I was thinking, "That's a New Yorker."

Carlin: Yeah, they tore a hole out of this city when they left. I was a young Dodger fan at that time. I was in my late teens, approaching 20. I had spent all of my young life adoring them for their non-corporate image and their warm, human, fallible, blue collar, beer-drinking image, whereas the Yankees were U.S. Steel corporate and the account executives and Wall Street guys were there. Now that has switched. Now the Mets, who were my National League choice, have that kind of suburban following, and the Yankees have the pot-smoking Third-World people in the stands. It's a little generalization on both sides, but for the most part, there's some truth in it. They've traded places.

Q. Speaking of the heart attack, what do you learn from three heart attacks?

Carlin: You learn a lot about heart disease, or rather coronary artery disease. I never had any profound wake-up call, and it didn't scare me. The thing about a heart attack is that once the discomfort in your chest is over, once they've aborted the heart attack, and you live through it, there's no more discomfort. You feel fine. You're the same as before the heart attack. You don't feel weak. You don't feel hurt. You're not sore anywhere. You just lie there and say, "OK, I'll eat better and I'll exercise. When can I go home?"

It wasn't such a crippling heart attack that I had a bad rehab; I just had to take it easy. They did do an angioplasty, but I've had six angioplasties. I'm usually at work the next weekend. I'm definitely out of the hospital the next day. It's hard to take it all very seriously. It's plumbing. It's really mechanical. I know there's a disease process at work, but you get in and clean it. Everything I've ever had could be fixed: a hernia , a bad knee, they scrape that shit out of your arteries. I never had an organic disease/function where things are changing and getting weirder. I've always just had mechanical plumbing shit and carpentry.

I'm a very positive person. I'm optimistic about my own life and the people who are close to me, yet I'm not that way about the world. That optimism takes me through the illnesses when I had them. That's really the only stuff I had, that and allergies. That stuff about my immune system from swimming in the Hudson -- it strengthened my immune system. It's tempered in raw shit. I'm lucky, I've got a great genetic package.

http://www.billhicks.co.uk/faithinaction/carlin.html

My husband wanted to understand how Tim Russert could die of a heart attack so suddenly when he was on medication and exercising regularly, dieting to lose weight, and so on. Why, he wondered, does someone die when they are managing their risks and doing well? Russert passed a treadmill test in April and had just used a treadmill for exercise that morning with no apparent problems. His heart disease was still asymptomatic--no chest pain, no trouble getting out of breath with exertion or fatigue, and it was being well-managed. (Note that you can be up to 75% blocked by plaque in one or more arteries and still pass a treadmill test. I passed one in 1999, just two years before my quadruple bypass.)

One of the features of heart disease is, indeed, the suddenness with which it takes its victims. With other diseases there are usually the warning symptoms and then a diagnosis and a warning that death may occur within a certain time frame if treatment is not an option. The patient's condition may visibly worsen and then friends and family gather to say goodbye. There are a few known causes of very sudden death aside from accidents, and these are usually cardiovascular. Stroke, aneurysm, AVM, pulmonary embolism--these too will strike suddenly and sometimes without prior warning. One may get a warning that one is vulnerable to stroke or heart attack, or has an AVM, but the timing of the final event is unknown. Walking around with this knowledge is a lot like living under the fabled sword of Damascus.

Usually when you hear someone has died of a "massive heart attack" what they are really talking about is sudden cardiac arrest. Newsweek has an article explaining how heart disease leads to heart attacks and, potentially, sudden cardiac arrest. I think it is important to remember that risk factors, such as having plaque in your coronary arteries, are like lottery tickets. One can "win" with only one ticket, but the more tickets you have the greater your chances of "winning." In the case of having lots of risk factors, or tickets, for sudden cardiac arrest, winning can mean a quick death unless a defibrillator is immediately available and implemented. But, remember, it only takes one ticket to win, and any plaque in the coronary arteries creates the danger of a rupture and subsequent blood clot.

Dick Cheney has so many lottery tickets for a cardiac event based on his previous heart history that he was implanted with a defibrillator internally that is supposed to kick in and restart his heart if it should falter. Given that stress is a huge risk factor and that being a Vice President is stressful, one can imagine that an implanted defibrillator is a must-have accessory for a politician with heart disease.

No matter how long a person has heart disease prior to their death, it still comes as a shock. I remember getting the call that my mother had died and not quite believing that it had finally come. She'd had two coronary artery bypass surgeries and had lived with heart disease for twelve years and still I was not prepared for that call. It's all the more shocking if your loved one has not been diagnosed--many people do not survive their very first heart attack--or has been living very successfully and managing all their risk factors to the best of their ability.

Likewise I was shocked by the sudden death of my father, which resembled Tim Russert's death. My dad didn't even know he had heart disease on the day he died while working in his garden. He had passed a physical just six months earlier.

Living with heart disease means that you have to be sure to let the people in your life know every day that they are loved. You may not get a chance for the dramatic death bed scene where you get to say your farewells. Isn't that something we all should do, regardless of risk factors? After all, accidents also take people suddenly and without prior warning.

My heart goes out to Tim Russert's family, including his second family at NBC.