I was going to write about something else today, but came across this in my inbox. I don’t know who wrote it, I wish I did. I would gladly give her credit for expressing so well how I feel.

When I was a child in the 1960s the bathing suit for the mature figure was boned, trussed and reinforced, not so much sewn as engineered. They were built to hold back and uplift and they did a good job.

Today’s stretch fabrics are designed for the prepubescent girl with a figure carved from a potato chip.

The mature woman has a choice-she can either go up front to the maternity department and try on a floral suit with a skirt, coming away looking like a hippopotamus who escaped from Disney’s Fantasia or she can wander around every run of the mill department store trying to make a sensible choice from what amounts to a designer range of florescent rubber bands.

What choice did I have? I wandered around, made my sensible choice and entered the chamber of horrors known as the fitting room.

The first thing I noticed was the extraordinary tensile strength of the stretch material. The Lycra used in bathing costumes was developed, I believe, by NASA to launch small rockets from a slingshot, which give the added bonus that if you manage to actually lever yourself into one, you are protected from shark attacks as any shark taking a swipe at your passing midriff would immediately suffer whiplash. I fought my way into the bathing suit, but as I twanged the shoulder strap in place, I gasped in horror - my boobs had disappeared!

Eventually, I found one boob cowering under my left armpit. It took a while to find the other. At last I located it flattened beside my seventh rib.

The problem is that modern bathing suits have no bra cups. The mature woman is meant to wear her boobs spread across her chest like a speed bump. I realigned my speed bump and lurched toward the mirror to take a full view assessment.

The bathing suit fit all right, but unfortunately it only fit those bits of me willing to stay inside it. The rest of me oozed out rebelliously from top, bottom, and sides. I looked like a lump of play dough wearing undersized cling wrap.

As I tried to work out where all those extra bits had come from, the prepubescent sales girl popped her head through the curtain, ‘Oh, there you are,’ she said, admiring the bathing suit.

I replied that I wasn’t so sure and asked what else she had to show me. I tried on a cream crinkled one that made me look like a lump of masking tape, and a floral two piece which gave the appearance of an over sized napkin in a serving ring.

I struggled into a pair of leopard skin bathers with ragged frills and came out looking like Tarzan’s Jane, pregnant with triplets and having a rough day.

I tried on a black number with a midriff and looked like a jellyfish in mourning.

I tried on a bright pink pair with such a high cut leg I thought I would have to wax my eyebrows to wear them.

Finally, I found a suit that fit…a two-piece affair with a shorts style bottom and a loose blouse-type top.

It was cheap, comfortable, and bulge-friendly, so I bought it. My ridiculous search had a successful outcome, I figured. When I got home, I found a label which read — ‘Material might become transparent in water.’

So, if you happen to be on the beach or near any other body of water this year and I’m there too I’ll be the one in cut off jeans and a t-shirt!

I got a little sidetracked yesterday, but here’s the rest of what I learned about dieting and osteoporosis that I was going to share.

First of all, if you are on any of the drugs that are supposed to help build bone mass, please do your research or talk to your doctor. My mother was on Fosomax and it turns out it was a good thing we kept forgetting to give it to her. I have taken her off it completely and her doctor when I spoke to him about it, wasn’t at all surprised nor did he argue with me about it. Many of these drugs are being found to just make the bone harder, not actually help rebuild, causing complications with women’s jaw bones when they go to the dentist, etc. For more info see my blog at http://www.lauriannsnewlife.blogspot.com

Now for the other stuff. I don’t know how many of you have heard high homo-cysteine levels are the true predictor of strokes vs. cholesterol levels, but it turns out high levels aren’t good for your bones either. Both men and women are twice as likely to suffer from hip fractures when their homo-cysteine levels are elevated. Supplements of folic acid, vitamin B-6, vitamin B-12 and either choline and/or betaine can lower elevated homocysteine levels. By contrast diets high in fatty meats and particularly processed meats like hot dogs, sausages, bologna and pepperoni markedly increase the level of homo-cysteine in the blood for several hours after every high protein meal. Fasting homo-cysteine levels and LDL levels are also elevated in people who eat more fatty animal products and fewer whole grains, fruits, vegetables and nonfat dairy products.

This one’s a tough one for me. Caffeine, especially in women who don’t get the recommended daily allowance of calcium, is a culprit in the loss of bone mass density. I drink a pot before anyone in the house is even awake, which is probably one of the reasons my BMD is already in trouble. The lifetime intake of the amount of caffeine in as little as 2 cups of coffee per day is associated with decreased BMD in older women. It’s also important to make teenagers aware of their dietary choices to protect them in the future. A diet high in meat, with the regular use soft drinks instead of nonfat milk as a beverage, will likely reduce peak bone mass in the young and increase the risk of developing osteoporosis in later years.

A diet of potassium rich fruits and vegetables is also reported to help reduce bone loss. For many this isn’t really an option as some of the prescription drugs for high blood pressure warn against extra potassium. The drug itself causes your body to collect potassium in your system, so be sure to read the warnings on the labels.

Many trace minerals are essential for maintaining bone density. The American diet is so full of white flour, sugar, refined carbohydrates, and refined fats and oils, that we generally don’t get the amount of trace minerals necessary. Here again are where more fruits and vegetables help fill the bill. Whole grains, legumes and dark green vegetables are the best dietary sources of magnesium and supply trace minerals and other factors that may improve bone health.

We all try to switch to more fruits and vegetables when we decide it’s time to lose weight, but there are so many other reasons to do it, the weight really is more of the “icing on the cake” and should happen as a natural side effect. Right now is the season to take advantage of so many wonderful fruits and vegetables that are fresh and make such great snacks. Have you tried getting in your “9 fruits and vegetables” (it used to be 5) a day? There’s hardly room or time to be eating all the “wrong” stuff. LOL.

For more info on magnesium of vitamin D deficeincies, see my blog at http://www.lauriannsnewlife.blogspot.com

Disclaimer: I am in no way a healthcare provider of any  kind and the stuff I pass on here is only from my own research. You should always consider consulting your physician if you plan on making dietary changes.

I try to pay attention. I know that with dieting you have to be careful about losing muscle instead of fat. I’ve heard about that forever! I know that as we get older we lose bone mass which can lead to osteoporosis. I didn’t realize that dieting could slow closely also result in bone loss. Where the heck was I during that class?

I also didn’t realize what an astounding effect a sedentary lifestyle has on bone mass density (BMD). As I read more, the opposite is also true. Excessive exercise also can lead to a lower BMD. I’m sure I won’t have to worry about that being a problem in my case. What I do need to worry about is making sure I do some sort of weight bearing exercise and strength training, as definite results were shown in greater BMD after just one year.

My mother has osteoporosis. One year she fractured her back 3 times and spent most of that year in the hospital. I don’t want to go there.

Other things we were not made aware of, and I still don’t hear about and I have 2 daughters, is how teenage girls involved in athletics and also frequently diet, are at high risk for osteopenia (low bone mineral content), stress fractures and broken bones. It also puts them at risk for early osteoporosis. This isn’t only common in teenage girls, but men and boys as well who frequently diet.

These are things that seem to help prevent or help cause osteoporosis. First let me say, with all the hype about soy products, there doesn’t seem to be enough evidence of it really doing any good to warrant using soy for treating osteoporosis. There is the suggestion that vegans, etc. use soy milk as a substitute for cow’s milk for calcium and vitamin D.

We all know how important calcium is. That is a given. Luckily there are many ways to get the calcium we need, but remember that vitamin D is necessary for absorption. If you’re getting your calcium from sources other than milk fortified with vitamin D, it’s probably essential to be taking a vitamin D supplement. We should be getting between 1300 and 1500mg. of calcium per day.

Too much Vitamin A may contribute to Osteoporosis. In Norway and Sweden they fortify low fat milk and margarine with retinol. They have seemed to find that the added retinol is at least partly responsible for osteoporosis in these two countries, along with cod liver oil. They advise people at risk of osteoporosis to limit their intake of pre-formed vitamin A (retinol) to the RDA level of 800 RE or 0.8 mg of retinol per day. This means food supplements with retinol should be avoided, as should supplements of cod liver oil. Now there is a slight conflict here in the way that most dairy products also contain retinol. A better way of getting your vitamin D is to go get some sunshine every day. 10-15 min. should be enough and not to much to harm you.

One I was surprised to hear about that isn’t widely publicized is Vitamin K, or the lack there of contributing to bone loss. Unfortunately if you’re on blood thinners, this is probably not a good solution for you. A recent meta-analysis examined 7 studies in which elderly subjects were given either 15 (one study) or 45mg of vitamin K2 or a placebo. Remarkably those taking the supplements of vitamin K had reductions in hip fractures of 77% compared to those given a placebo. Fractures of the vertebrae were cut by 60% and all other fractures were reduced by 81%. If you’re following a good healthy diet, you should be getting vitamin K from all those green leafy veggies you’re eating.

Tomorrow I’ll go into the minerals etc. for preventing osteoporosis. It’s amazing to me how young I should have been paying attention and what I’ll be telling my daughters now that I know.

Disclaimer: I am in no way a healthcare provider of any kind and the stuff I pass on here is only from my own research. You should always consider consulting your physician if you plan on making dietary changes.

The health article that caught my attention today was from issue 2658 of New Scientist magazine, 29 May 2008, page 12. It was all about how “thoughts of death make us eat cookies.” I’m serious. There is a study about how people who wrote essays on death vs. dentists ate more cookies and had lower self-esteem. “The authors believe people with low self-esteem use consuming as a way of subconsciously escaping self-awareness, which is heightened by thoughts of dying.”

I found this fascinating in the way that I always thought thoughts of dying would help you control your eating and make you exercise. You want to have a healthier lifestyle. You want to live longer. Instead, they are saying that eating is a possible mechanism for dealing with “death anxiety”.

I would say that my self-esteem probably isn’t what it should be, especially since I’m home so much more now and socialize so much less. Also the fact that I have gained a lot of weight hasn’t exactly lifted my self-esteem to new heights. I also worry a lot about dying (before I’m ready) because I know I don’t lead a healthy lifestyle. It seems to me, the fear of dying too soon would cause you to quit eating cookies instead of making you eat worse.

Maybe it’s time for yet another “paradigm shift”!

Yep. I finally joined a challenge on one of the diet sites. I thought “okay. 30 days. I can do this.”

There’s a new workout routine every day. It’s all laid out for me. No boredom. The “exercise queen” that did the workout videos was actually quite good. They’re considered “medium impact”. Little did I know at the time I definitely should have started in the “low impact” department. The very first day I threw myself into the routine. A little marching in place, a little big marching in place, a little side to side marching in place. All that was good. Then came the jumping jacks.

I knew my left arm was sore and I did not have the range of motion I should have. Due to some “sleep” issues with the BF, I’ve been sleeping for extended periods on my left arm and feeling it slowly get worse. (Read the article “Is Sleeping With Your Spouse Killing You?”) LOL. I did my jumping jacks. I did the “punch to the front”. By Wednesday morning I could not move my left arm. By Wed. afternoon I was in tears and looking for drugs. I evidently tore or damaged my rotator cuff. It is so friggin’ painful! I am starting to do a little better as of today. In the mean time I don’t have the patience to type one handed, so I didn’t do much of anything. Now I am doing range of motion exercises, and as it starts to feel better, I will start working out with a resistance band to get my arm back where it should be.

The moral of the story: Keep moving. I’ve known for a year I was falling out of shape sitting in front of the computer day in and day out. I kept saying “tomorrow”. Well I’m here to tell you, tomorrow came and went, and it was painful. I should have been doing a little something every day. No matter what size you are, what you do for a living, you must make time for your body in there somewhere. I’ve spent the last few days finding out how many things are either excessively hard one handed, or I can’t do at all. I’m really lucky if this doesn’t end up permanent.

I don’t care what we are doing to lose weight, you have to admit that we all still keep looking for that “something magic” that will make it disappear faster and easier. I for one cannot help but notice the ads, etc. even when I know most of them are bunk, and some I even go for.

I ran across a magazine while in line at the grocery store a couple of days ago, (exactly why they put them there), and the main story on the front was “Walk Off 96% More Fat” “Lose 43 lbs. by Memorial Day”. This is the walking plan used by Kim, the fitness guru from the “Biggest Loser”. I have tried just about everything when it comes to exercise, but I really didn’t have a workout plan, so I end up not doing much. This has a definate 3wk plan, and it includes weight or circuit training, so I am giving it a shot. After the first day of walking 30 min. with “steam engines” in between, I could definately feel it where I was supposed to the next day. Here’s hoping this is one I can stick to, at least for the 3wks. and then decide what to do from there.

My next “new thing” is, I am not one for “cleanses” even tho I am so toxic I could be the next waste dump. I smoke (damn it), I drink a bit of wine, I have mercury in my teeth, and I’m obese. There’s probably more, these are just off the top of my head. I could never stand the thought of going without food for 2 days, having only water or fruitjuice or whatever liquid. I also didn’t like the idea that when my body flushed all these toxins, more than likely it would be at a very inopportune time when I was miles from the nearest bathroom, so I just didn’t really consider it.

Lately I have been reading so much about the benefits of hydrogen peroxide. It does everything! From killing mold and mildew in my shower, to killing all the bacteria in my kitchen, to lightening my hair, it does it all plus some. What I’ve been reading more of lately is the benefits of ingesting it. They make a food grade hydrogen peroxide which when heavily diluted, adds oxygen to your bloodstream, cleanses out toxins, and returns your whole system to a ph balance. (Disclaimer: This is not to be misconstrued as medical advice. Speak to your personal physician before doing anything).

I have been taking it for 3 days now, starting at 3 drops 3 times a day and building up 1 drop every time each day from there. Today is my 3rd day, I’m up to 6 drops in 5 ozs. of water 3 times a day, and already I am sleeping better and my joints aren’t nearly as sore as they have been. This whole thing ends up being quite a process, but if I’m seeing results already, I’m looking forward to it. I’ll have to let you know how it goes as I progress, but I am very concious of when I eat due to how you have to space this out between food, which has also made me more concious of what I eat.

I think 2 new things are enough for one day. LOL.

Anyone see the “World News With Katie Couric” night before last? Yep, tore apart another widely held belief in our self-help healthcare. I’m talking about the fact that we really don’t need 8- 8oz glasses of water a day after all. This news spread almost as fast as “Mammograms Don’t Save Women’s Lives”.  What’s funny is one of the newsletters I get from a doctor who believes regular medicine is just for getting regular doctors more money, and regular doctors say he’s a Quack, has been saying this for ages. He too, says it’s really only neccessary to drink when you’re thirsty, or doing some kind of exercise where you are excreting water. He also says you can tell if you’re getting enough by the color of your urine.

The thing we need to remember, those of us on the weightloss trail, is that we don’t drink water just for hydration. We drink it to help flush the fat from our bodies. Obviously that wouldn’t work if we didn’t drink. Water like many other things, is a tool for us to use.

The other thing I wanted to bring up is the “Sutter Health TV” website. They had an excellent special on the other night about Women’s Health that I thought was excellent. They are a great resource, but I was especially interested because it had a lot of interesting info concerning exercise for women in their 20’s thru 60’s. Which kinds of exercise were most important based on age, etc. If you’re interested at all, you can visit their site at http://www.sutterhealthtv.com.

Have a great weekend everybody!

Easter went off just fine. Both the kids had to work, but that’s okay I guess. The ham  was perfect and I even made gravy from the pan drippings. (A little salty for my taste). I have to admit, without the Easter Baskets this year, it was like there was a little something missing all day. As old as the kids are, I used to make them hunt for eggs, etc.  This year I also had to worry about dessert, something that never mattered before because everyone ate the chocolate in their baskets. Thank goodness for sugar free instant pudding and fat-free milk. LOL. I made a banana cream pie, folding a little Cool Whip into the top half, in a lower fat grahmcracker crust and then just a drizzle of Lite Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup. If I tracked the points right, it still was 4pts. a slice, but it was good. Luckily I was too full after dinner, so I had it for breakfast. I know, shame, shame.

I did want to say that I have been “listening to my body” for that “satisfaction sigh”, when you’re supposed to put down the fork and be done. The problem I’m having with that is that I apparently am like Pavlov’s dog. I’ll be eating and start thinking about it, then I do it. I don’t think that’s how it was meant to work. Sometimes I think about it shortly after I start eating and then it happens. If I follow the rules, I’m nowhere near satisfied (of course, that probably wouldn’t hurt me any as far as dropping a few pounds), but it’s frustrating! If anyone else uses that as a “body signal” how do you handle it? Is it just me? When I think about it and I’m not eating, it makes me yawn. Weird.

Over the Holiday I also got a look at being an “empty nester”. The kids had gone to friends after work Sun. nite and stayed most of Monday. It was definitely quiet around here. While I am anxious to have them move out so I can have my house back, I have a few doubts on how well I’m going to handle it. As they’ve grown up, we’ve really become quite good friends. I’m just hoping I’ll be busy enough changing everything around, I won’t have time to notice they’re gone.

I am sort of in a hurry as I am going into San Francisco this AM. I’m actually kind of excited as I haven’t been in quite awhile, even tho I only live about 45 min. away. I’m going with a friend to “Butterfields and Butterfields”, altho in San Francisco it’s “Brohmans and Butterfields” or something like that. They are a huge auction house that deals in everything, sort of like the Antique Road Show. My friend has some pieces of jade he wants to sell and once a month these guys will appraise 5 things for free. Since we’re going up, I’m going to take some of my grandmother’s old jewelry. I’m not interested in selling, but there are a couple of pieces I’m curious about. Most of it’s costume (I think), but it’s “old” costume and very pretty. I’m pretty excited to see what they have to say about it.

As for my exercise this AM, I figure I will get it in the City. It’s almost impossible to park anywhere close to where you are actually going, and as long as I’m up there, there are a few places I’d like to go. I figure I will get in my share of walking. I can always play with the weights or roll on the exercise ball later. I’ve been gathering more exercises to do with the ball, but I’m a little old and stiff yet for some of them, and I’ve discovered my balance isn’t that great either, but that’s ok. I don’t mind building up to things. I’ve been so sedentary, I feel good getting any exercise in at all! The exercise bug is actually starting to bite. The other day I woke up with a slight headache, so I didn’t get up and work out in my home gym. About 3 hours later my headache was gone and I felt such an “itch” that I had to do something, so I went for a brisk walk in the California sunshine. I just need to be consistant about doing something!

After writing the post on the “9 Reasons To Start A Fitness Plan”, it actually did motivate me to start using some of the equipment in my “kitchen gym”. I have discovered 2 new things.

1) I need to do my exercise as soon as I get up in the morning (well, after 2 cups of coffee and 2 cigs. I don’t advocate the cigs). When I think back on when I was so successful walking every day, that was the routine. I had a walking buddy and I would either try to wake up early enough to get in the coffee, or if I was late I just woke up, got clothes on and we left. Yesterday and this morning that is my routine. Already today I was ready to flake on myself, but with the exercise equipment right there, I have no more excuses. No matter what time I get up (I get up at 0 dark 30, much too dangerous for walking by myself) I can exercise. I also found myself exercising for a fast 10 minutes last nite while baking biscuits for dinner. While I realize not everyone has a huge kitchen (kitchen, dining room combined) if you get imaginative enough, it’s amazing what you might come up with. My stepper and ball fit easily under the dining room table out of sight and out of the way. My abdoer is placed like a chair at the kitchen table. My weights, exercise bands, and bars sit on the window sill around the dining area where they are easily accessible. The only thing I have left is to bring the exercise bike in and I will be ready for circuit training! Obviously, if I’m having a formal dinner I wouldn’t want that stuff sitting all over the window sills, but this way I can gather it all up in just a few minutes and put it out of sight. In the meantime, I have it ready to go any time I am in the kitchen. According to the exercise gurus, exercising 10 to 15 min. at a time, 3 times a day can be just as effective as working out for 30 min. straight. This works well for me right now as I have been pretty sedentary for several months now.

2). The other thing brought to the forefront of my consciousness this morning as I was roaming thru blogs and message boards is the fact that when we drink water, we should be drinking ice water. I’m not sure if I knew this or not. I do remember reading about drinking ice water when you first get up in the morning, but never gave it much thought after that. Every one just harps on how important it is to have the water. If you make it ice water it works even harder for you as it takes extra calories for your body to warm the water to your inside body temperature. While this is a very small change, when you figure you’re drinking 8 to 10 cups a day, it could add up. Anything I can do that’s this relatively easy to squeeze burning even a few more calories out of every day is a ”do” for me!