Category: health

Change of life

by Karen, posted in family, health, Midlife Crisis, no fear, tweens

What’s the first thing that comes to mind when you hear that phrase? I’m betting that it will have something to do with a midlife woman navigating the perimenopausal years. It certainly always did for me. Now that I’m in the thick of it, however, I’m realizing that this phrase has multiple layers of meaning and can be applied to people at any phase of life, not just midlife.

  1. Graduating from high school (or trade school or college) will amount to a huge change of life(style). No longer confined by the relentless schedule of classes and homework and studying, I still remember the feeling of enormous relief that I experienced the last day of classes when I left the room after the last final. It was a weightlessness, a “lightness of being”. Freedom!
  2. First car after years of taking public transportation. For me, this also brought with it a feeling of freedom, independence. Conversely, I wonder if going back to public transportation after years of carrying the burden of the inherent (read: crushing) costs of owning a car today would bring the same feeling of relief that finishing school brought.
  3. Having a baby. I used to just shake my head at the people (parents) who told me over and over that I didn’t know what it was like to have a child and wouldn’t until I had one. Now I just shake my head at my own naiveté. They don’t say “A baby changes everything” for nothing. A baby does change everything.
  4. Job change. Really, like the man you marry, the job you choose influences every last corner of your life. Every. Last. Corner. Once you’ve chosen, it’s easy to get stuck. Sometimes you are freed without warning (and without any say, for that matter)…angst-tinged freedom.

Of course, that feeling is quickly followed by the inevitable “Now what?” thought that follows so closely on its heels. Here’s hoping that old saying is true: When one door closes, another door opens.

Spring garden, part 1: the herbs

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, fitness, gardening, health
Chives

In honor of National Herb Week (first week of May) we’re starting to get our herb garden into shape for this year. A quick tour of the raised bed revealed a nice surprise: some of last years perennial herbs have greened up already and are looking pretty edible.

The first ones I noticed were the chives. As Stephen King says in the story “A Good Marriage” in his book Full Dark, No Stars, they are “upright and sniffin’ the air”. 🙂 Makes you want to cook something, doesn’t it?

The lemon thyme is just as beautiful, but currently is pretty flush with the ground so is not as readily visible. One of the prettiest plants in there right now is the lamb’s ears. Just one is up right now…so my husband asked me if it could hear me okay since it had only one ear…ha ha.

There were a few varieties of strawberries tucked in there last year, and I can see they are starting to send out some shoots; more shoots means more strawberries for me. Yay!

I’ve already got my annual rosemary plant waiting to go into the garden, but it’s not looking too healthy (as of this writing) so I’m hoping she hangs in there for a few more weeks on the kitchen counter.

Any of you have herb gardens? What are you growing this year?

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Addendum: Rosemary is dead. Oh well. Off to buy a new one!

Write it down, make it happen

by Karen, posted in books, Date night, family, fitness, health, Life in the cube, Midlife Crisis, no fear, Someone's gotta say it, tweens, writing, yoga

Okay, it’s a book (not mine!) title. It occurred to me to apply the philosophy of: “If you build it, they will come” espoused by James Earl Jones and put into force by Kevin Costner in the Field of Dreams movie which coincidently (?!) contained a female lead character named “Karen” (not sure how she spelled it!) played by Amy Madigan.

I decided to build my perfect work day.

  1. Get up–not too early.
  2. Get some exercise. I like Stephen King’s idea from his book On Writing where he would take writing breaks and jump on the treadmill that was next to his writing desk (if memory serves). A little bit of yoga couldn’t hurt…
  3. Get some coffee–oh wait! That should be first!
  4. Get some breakfast (ABO…or “Anything But Oatmeal” :)).
  5. Write until noonish.
  6. Get some lunch.
  7. Check email, blogs, FB (you know, all the usual time-sucking suspects) etc.
  8. Read until 4pm. This is when I get to make a small dent in my pile of books, magazines that I am dying to read but have no time to.
  9. Get some more exercise…go for a walk? At the beach! Look for sea glass, sand dollars, unusual rocks and shells. Sigh. Life is Good.
  10. Watch DVD’s or preferred TV series of the moment (The Good Wife, Survivor, Breaking Bad) with my husband.

What does a perfect day for you look like? Quick! Go right it down; then maybe you can figure out a way to make it happen! 🙂

Clearing Clutter for Clarity, continued

by Karen, posted in fitness, Midlife Crisis

I have unsubscribed from many of the automatic emails that I’ve been getting. You know, the ones from stores that promise to send you exclusive coupons if you sign up? Well, what I’ve found that (for me)  what that leads to is the clutter of the (nearly daily) emails from them in my inbox, which I have to read and then make decisions about. Usually, there will actually be a coupon that looks pretty good to me, sparking that well-worn refrain in my mind of “Hey, I might need that!” which leads me to print it out.

Seems harmless enough, right?  But now that coupon will be added to the glut of other coupons that I already have stuffed in my pocket-book: more physical clutter. Then, I will carry it around for a long time, usually for so long that I forget that I have it. If I should happen to recall it when I am at the store (which rarely happens; I’m much more likely to recall after I’ve left the store), the there are so many other coupons in there that I am unable to locate it in a timely manner.

Is it in my wallet? Is it in the special coupon holder that I keep to file these things in an organized way so that I can find them quickly (like, when there is a long line of unsympathetic shoppers waiting behind me)? Is it stuck in the front zipper compartment of my bag? Could I have left it in the car? At that point, I”ll usually give up, shrug, and just pay full price. And then when I get home, there it is (of course): right there on the kitchen island where I left it, where I’d be sure to see it before I left the house.

So today, I’m exercising my will power by not cutting out any coupons from the Sunday paper. Hey, at least I’m doing some sort of exercising today!

At least it’s not too strenuous.

🙂

The 6 W’s diet

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, health

I was talking with someone the other day about her desire to lose weight.

She and her friend were working on their weight and following a diet. “Which one?” I asked her. “The 6 W’s diet,” she replied. “What’s that?” I asked. Since I work in the healthcare field, I thought I’d heard of them all, but this one was new to me. “We invented it,” she said. Okay, well, that explained why I was unfamiliar with it, at least.

She said it was the culmination of years of ‘trying everything’ that led to her decision to make up a diet for herself. “It can’t be any worse than any of the ones I tried already,” she reasoned. Also, her spouse had gastric bypass surgery, lost a lot of weight, but had already gained back 25 lbs. “See? Even getting the operation doesn’t work!”

The 6 W’s diet:

  1. Watch the fat
  2. Write down everything you eat
  3. Walk more
  4. Water: drink more
  5. Win!!!!

“That sounds great,” I said, “but that’s only 5. What’s the 6th W?” “Oh,” she said, ” I added ‘wine’ to the list,” she said. “‘Wine’ … or ‘Whine’?!” I asked. “Both!” she replied, laughing, “depending on what kind of day I’m having!”

Makes sense to me.

🙂

Pause and reflect

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, family, fitness, friends, health, local fun, Midlife Crisis, Someone's gotta say it

Spring has sprung me–and as they say, better late than never. My cocoon of too much food and too little exercise has cracked open. What I’ve learned this winter is this: the more I eat, the more I want to eat, and the less I exercise, the less I want to exercise.

My wake up call? Well, that’s just it; it hasn’t been just one thing.  I had 4 this week:

  1. My husband said that the way I can always be go-go-going and doing so much and having so much energy have so many projects going was something he loved about me when he first met me. Now? Not so much.
  2. My yoga teacher said: “Are your pants on backwards? That little white triangle thing is usually in the front, isn’t it? Well, it’s on your butt right now!”
  3. Those shorts that were loose last spring have not one iota of extra room in them now. Not. One. Iota.
  4. When I unexpectedly had some unstructured time, there were so many things I wanted to do that I wasted some of the time because I couldn’t decide what to do!

I decided first to pause and reflect…this lasted about 30 seconds. Through my indecision I was conscious enough to note that it was 61 degrees out and sunny, and the huge snow banks had (finally! finally!) melted so that it was safe to walk my neighborhood streets again (read: drivers could see me). Before I did what I do best–that is, talk myself out of exercising, I grabbed my jacket, shoes and keys and headed out.

When I got back, I realized that it was time to eat something…not because it was suppertime (although it was: 5:10PM), but because I was really hungry. Usually I have others to cook for and feed, but tonight it was all up to me; I had only myself to please~”Party for one!” as my friend Denise would say.  I had a greek yogurt doctored up with frozen blueberries, flax meal, and cinnamon and a big cup of ice water. After I finished, I checked in: yep, still hungry. I slathered a slice of my homemade bread with almond butter and honey. Yum!

Then I wrote this blog post. I wrote a book review. I made and froze some lentil soup for work lunches this week. I edited several pages of  my book.

Sometimes by pausing, you get more done than if you just pushed full steam ahead.

P.S. This is my 200th post!!!! Yay!!!!

“Clearing clutter for clarity”

by Karen, posted in books, family, health, Midlife Crisis

Okay, I borrowed this alliteration from the book  Ask and It Is Given by Jerry and Esther Hicks. Spring is in the offing. In the spring, when a young man’s thoughts are lightly turning…women’s thoughts are turning too: to thoughts of Spring Cleaning.

I was reading an article in the March issue of Whole Living magazine entitled “Cleaning House” by Susanna Sonnenberg about decluttering. She says that it helps to ask three questions when you are wondering about keeping something:

  1. Do I love it?
  2. Do I need it?
  3. Does it bring me peace and energy or uneasy trouble? (Italics added by me)

I found this very motivating. Maybe you will too. I decided that it doesn’ t have to be a major deconstructive (read: overwhelming, make me want to quit before I start) effort to declutter. Here’s my plan:  starting now, as I handle every object throughout the course of my day,  I will ask myself those (above) questions, and if the answer isn’t “YES!” to any of them, out it will go.

This is my plan. Since I am a midlifer, I can only hope that I remember it (reference the book: I Remember Nothing by Nora Ephron). 🙂

Now, my husband? He’s great at this. Me? Not so much. Hmmm…maybe that’s he has time for his thoughts to “lightly turn…” in the spring?? Ha!

“You are my sunshine” (Grieving my dead relatives, continued)

by Karen, posted in family, good grief, health
Mary

So, it’s that time of year again; when the anniversary of the day a relative died rolls around and you try to remember without being too sad.

This is my mother. At the time this picture was taken, she was a sister, a daughter. At the time this picture was taken, she was not yet a wife, a mother.

She was graduating from high school then, and her life was ahead of her. Too soon, it was over.

My husband took me for a ride a few days after she died with no particular destination in mind. We ended up at a local market with an attached greenhouse. As I walked around the store clutching my Kleenex, I was drawn to some colorful plants that my husband told me were primroses. For a moment, I actually felt happy looking at the little faces of the flowers, so on impulse I purchased one. I took it home and placed it on the little shelf above my kitchen sink.

Every time I looked at it, I remembered my mother’s death with a pang that was then tempered with a little bit of calm. In the spring, my husband planted it in the back yard.

Each year that followed, I brought home another little primrose plant and in the spring we planted it outside. Over time, all of these plants thrived and soon, without specifically intending to do so, I’d created an entire garden of  primroses, which became sort of a tribute to my mother. I was very sad to leave it behind when we moved.

This year when I was browsing at Trader Joe’s I spotted some primroses which (of course) immediately evoked thoughts of my mother, so I bought one. This spring I intend to plant it in my kitchen herb garden to revive my mother’s tribute garden from years past.

I chose yellow for the first plant because when I was growing up, she bought me an outfit that I refused to wear: yellow pants and a yellow shirt. “Who wears that color pants?” I complained. She ended up returning the outfit which I wouldn’t  have been caught dead wearing. Years later though, I recall this incident and wonder, “Why couldn’t I just wear it? Give her what she wanted?”

It’s ironic that yellow is now my favorite color.

Also, “You Are My Sunshine” was a song she loved and sang to us frequently when we were kids.

She died on leap day, February 29. We joked afterward that she chose that day purposely, so we would only have to feel sad about the day she died once every years. She was nice like that. 🙂

Kennebunk Winterfest with tweens

by Karen, posted in (it's all about the) food, family, fitness, friends, local fun, restaurants, tweens

The Kennebunk 2011 Winterfest was yesterday in (you guessed it) Kennebunk, Maine. It was great that it wasn’t February 25th, since we got (yet another unwelcome) snowstorm. It was fun, but would have been more so if it had been about 10 degrees warmer (I’m just sayin’).

It kicked off with a pancake breakfast at Duffy’s for $5.99 per person (the money went towards supporting the Winterfest event) which included a drink and 2 enormous pancakes. I didn’t photograph them because they weren’t anything special…they were too big, too thick, too pale, too insubstantial…a disappointment really. When we were leaving I saw some smaller, thinner, better browned pancakes coming out of the kitchen, but it was too late for us. I mentioned to the server that maybe the kid portions should have been one pancake if they were going to make them that ginormous; maybe they listened? It was also a little bit disconcerting that the food arrived so quickly. In one case, I saw people’s pancakes arrive after they had barely sat down and they hadn’t even gotten their drinks. I also felt like they were rushing to get us out, but wasn’t sure why.

Next year, I will go to Perfecto’s Caffe on Main Street in Kennebunk for breakfast instead.

Then next stop was the Kennebunk Town Hall where a craft show was held from 9am-2pm. There was a big crowd here (even Elvis made an appearance!)  Dory’s Dogs was there making Nutella and Banana Crepes to die for. I took a bite and died right there. They were amazing. I couldn’t get a picture because my hands were covered with Nutella…I wasn’t worthy.

The kids had the option of making some glass bead projects, but those were not cheap. The key rings were the least expensive project at $3, then there were earrings, bracelets, and other projects, some costing as much as $15. The two women running the craft were awesome: funny, patient, helpful. The kids loved it.

Next: the scavenger hunt. They were given “clue bags” and had to go around to area businesses to get the different parts of the snowman and then assemble it at the end to get the chance to win a DQ  or a toy store gift certificate (we’re still waiting for the call that we won…). This is where it would have been very helpful if it was a) warmer…it was in the low 20’s) and b) did not span the construction zone at the bridge or c) include the Mail It Unlimited Store that was way out of the way from the general location of all of the other participating stores. There was a shuttle, but there were supposed to be two (if found out later that one broke down). The one that was running was never at a stop when we needed it, and it was so cold that it was better to keep moving.

After some compromising (that involved driving to the last two stops that were past the construction area) we finished the hunt and headed for the Soup Contest. This was awesome. You paid your $3 and then sampled coups from 18 different pots and then voted for your favorite. It was tough; some of them were excellent, but some were decidedly not. After telling them that they should have had separate categories for cream soups and broth soups, I picked the Farmer’s Chicken Soup to win, and Izzy picked the Hot Sour Soup to win. My runner-up was the Roasted Chestnut with Sage and Creme Fraiche. This year, they didn’t disclose which local business made which soups (as they had done last year) so we were voting blind.

Overall, it was a great day: good food (except for the pancakes), good exercise to work it off, good fun with tweens.

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Head underwater

by Karen, posted in family, friends, health

Well, it isn’t really underwater, but it sure feels like it. I awoke last Friday with an odd feeling in my right ear. I mostly ignored it; I had plans to celebrate a friend’s birthday and so was distracted by good company and good food.  The next day, I awoke to a completely blocked right ear. It felt like it was stuffed with cotton…but from inside my skull.

I continued with my most effective health management weapon: denial. So, I got up, went to my yoga class, complained about it but not too much (I hope!), and then carried on the rest of the day at home with all of the self-care measures that I knew of, to no avail. By 5pm, it was worse, not better.

I’d been talking myself out of going to the Wells Urgent Care for hours…but finally, when it was going to close in an hour and a half, I grabbed my coat and keys and went. On the way over, I told myself:

  1. If it’s really crowded, I’ll just leave.
  2. If my ear (miraculously) becomes unblocked on the way over, I’ll just keep going on down the street (Dairy Queen is now open!) and turn around in the parking lot and go home.
  3. If the wait is too long, I can just leave (reference DQ note above~it wouldn’t be a total loss to have gone out!) and head back home.

Well, none of these things happened. I had barely gotten in the door and they greeted me and ushered me into an “intake” room where they checked my blood pressure (yikes!) and temperature (none) and wrote down my concern. Minutes later I was taken to another room to wait for the doctor, who came in almost before I could read an entire sentence in the book I’d brought to kill time while I waited.

Diagnosis: Otitis Media. What? Are you kidding me? Little kids get that! Stupid ear infections! Yes, plural: not one, but two ear infections, although the blocked ear (surprise!) was the worse of the two.

Let me just say that I now have a world of empathy for those poor little kids who have fluid in their ears and can’t hear properly for however long that lasts. In my case, they told me to plan on it clearing about 48 hours after starting the antibiotic. After  almost 72 hours, while it’s not actually clear yet, it’s much better. I’m very glad that I went because the morning after I did I woke up feeling much worse, but I wasn’t worried about it like I was the day before, when I didn’t know what the cause of it was. Knowledge is power…and peace of mind.

I decided that ‘head underwater’ is an especially appropriate title because I was under…well, overwhelmed by doing so much for so long that my immune system must have just said, “Hey, I need a break. You’re on your own for a while,” and then just went on strike.

It hasn’t been pretty. I’m hoping to woo it back with ten days of amoxicillin.