It’s the weekend!!!!!!
I’m glad you joined me for another edition of Weekend Music Share this week.
Have a great weekend!
Melinda
Welcome back to Weekend Music Share, the place where everyone can share their favorite music.
Feel free to use the Weekend Music Share banner in your post, and use the hashtag #WeekendMusicShare on social media so other participants can find your post.
Thank you for joining me for this week’s Friday Quote.
Melinda
Every parent wants their kids to live a healthy and happy life, but they cannot expect their kids to understand all of this themselves. They are not the ones buying the food or paying for clubs and activities, which is why it’s so important for parents to know how to encourage a healthy lifestyle. If you want to ensure your kids grow up big and strong, consider these tips.
Your kids will not be able to live a healthy lifestyle if you don’t make healthy living accessible. Filling the home with candies and fatty foods will not do anyone any favors, so it’s worth buying whole foods that are good for their development and mental well-being to ensure they get into good habits early. It can be challenging to change children’s habits as they grow older if they haven’t been exposed to fruits and vegetables already, so establishing this kind of diet early can make a world of difference.
Similarly, parents need to lead by example. It’s not enough to push healthy foods or habits onto your kids if you don’t do the same, especially as they will look to you as an example. Besides this, you should also avoid common food mistakes that force kids to eat things they might not like, as this will only promote a negative association and could even impact their trust as they won’t feel comfortable eating what you serve them in case you’ve hidden other foods inside.
Healthy living is about what they eat and how they spend their time. Kids naturally need (and want) to burn off energy, so channeling this through sports and activities is an excellent way to introduce them to sports they may play for the rest of their lives. However, while you might want your child to be the next big football star, remember they might not share your interests. Instead, let them explore different sports to find one they love.
A healthy home is a cornerstone of a healthy lifestyle, so understanding how to create this environment is essential. Keeping the space clean and tidy is vital, as is cultivating a positive and supportive environment. Let your kids feel comfortable sharing their stories and feelings, and ask about their day to ensure they can see the value in being open and honest about their lives rather than trying to hide things from you.
Many kids can be scared of a doctor or dentist, but they need to understand how important regular healthcare and checkups are. You can help them by familiarizing them with medical professionals so they feel at ease. Besides typical doctors, treatment from physiotherapists, opticians, and chiropractic care are also important and can help your kids treat and overcome a variety of potential health issues as they grow up.
Healthy living can seem tricky for many parents, especially if they don’t have the time to put together lavish meals or cannot afford to buy their kids the newest sports gear. Still, these tips can make it easier for you to establish a healthy base that teaches your kids all they need to know about a healthy lifestyle.
This is a collaborative post.
Melinda
Repost
Thank you for joining me for Wordless Wednesday. I hope to see you soon.
I was kindly gifted The Joy of Selfish by Michelle Elman from WelBeck Publishing Group for an honest review. The book was released earlier this month, and the timing is perfect. This is a must-read for everyone.
When I saw the press release for the book, I knew this book was going to be a great seller. Most people know that taking care of themselves is important, but they don’t consider it critical to their health. Well, it is. If you keep putting yourself behind others and the daily tasks you have, you’ll never get around to yourself. You have to plan and prioritize, and most importantly, you have to buy in 100%.
It doesn’t matter if you’re chronically ill, a mother of five, just retired, or a college student; you need this book. It’s never too late to set boundaries for your life and create the life you want and envision.
Michelle Elman is a five-board accredited life coach, award-winning activist, author, and podcaster. In 2020, she was named one of the Top 50 most inspirational women in the UK and is respected globally for her work as a body positivity influencer, best known for her ‘Scarred not Scared’ campaign.
Michelle has over 300k followers across Instagram and Tik Tok and has been a guest on media outlets, including Sky News, Channel 5 News, Loose Women, and BBC Radio London. She’s written for publications including HuffPost, Grazia, Metro, and Stylist. Recently, she coached Emily Atack on her series ‘Adulting’ and appeared on Geordie OGs to discuss online bullying and its impact on mental health. She was also featured in the BBC3 documentary Being East Asian, which aired earlier this year. Michelle’s podcast, In All Honesty, is available on Acast. Her first book, Am I Ugly?, was published in 2018.
The Joy of Being Selfish redefines selfishness as a positive act, allowing us to love ourselves and those around us authentically without apology. It explores the different types of boundaries, offers tips on how to start setting them, and helps with the quilt of felt after boundaries are put into place.
Learn how to deal with her being disliked, common responses to boundaries, dealing with invitations, block/mute/delete-how to limit information, learning to express yourself-and most importantly using you inane power to start a new life.
The idea of taking care of ourselves is being selfish is outdated and ridiculous. If we do nothing but give until we are depleted, who is going to take care of us, let alone our loved ones? I can’t agree with Michelle more on this message. Self-care is not selfish, and if it is, then get selfish.
In 2015, Michelle was a Life Coach at Crossroads in the direction of her career focus. She decided to see a Business Coach. Little did she know this chance meeting would make her future very clear, and she set out on a mission to accomplish her new goals.
The Joy of Selfish is a tool for anyone who needs guidance in setting boundaries. dealing with guilt and self-sabotage, and help with dealing with the outside influences that try to throw you off track.
The Joy of Selfish is a book for everyone, every age, every gender. We can’t be our best selves for others if we don’t take care of ourselves first.
We are Welbeck Publishing Group – a globally recognized, independent publisher based in London. Our mission is to deliver talent-driven publishing with leading authors and brands worldwide. Our books and products span a variety of categories, including fiction, non-fiction, stationery, and gifts. We are renowned for our innovative ideas, production values, and long-lasting content.
Welbeck’s amazing product comes to life for adults, children, and families in over 30 languages in more than 60 countries around the world. We have collaborated with many of the world’s leading institutions and licensors including – Disney, Universal, Paramount, HBO, Queen Productions, FIFA, International Mensa, Roald Dahl Literary Estate, the Science, Natural History and Imperial War Museums, and Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
Melinda Sandor
Repost from 2021
llness invalidation by medical professionals—sometimes called “gaslighting”—is an underappreciated and understudied problem in Lyme disease.
Many Lyme disease patients complain not only of fighting to recover their health but also of fighting to be believed by health care practitioners.
Expecting to receive understanding and proficient care from medical professionals, many instead experience having their persistent debilitating symptoms dismissed, minimized, disbelieved and/or psychologized.
How common is the occurrence of medical gaslighting in Lyme disease? Is illness invalidation by medical professionals related to disease severity? Are there specific constituencies who are being affected more than others?
These are some of the questions that a team of researchers led by Alison Rebman, MPH, Assistant Professor in Medicine and Director for Clinical and Epidemiological Research at the Johns Hopkins Lyme Disease Research Center at Johns Hopkins Medicine, set out to identify and quantify in a cohort of well-characterized Lyme disease patients.
The Johns Hopkins study, published in August 2024 in Scientific Reports, finds that invalidating encounters with medical professionals are common for post-treatment Lyme disease (PTLD) patients, particularly women and younger patients, and also are linked to higher illness severity.
Lyme disease is the most common tick and vector-borne disease in the US with about 500,000 new cases per year. Lyme infections are expanding geographically, and acute and chronic cases are on the rise in the US and Eurasia. Lyme infection-associated chronic illness affects around 2 million Americans and can be difficult to properly diagnose and effectively treat.
A Lyme infection can affect multiple body systems including musculoskeletal, neurologic, and cardiovascular. Patients with early diagnosis and appropriate treatment usually get better. However, about 10-20% of patients even when treated promptly with standard of care antibiotics do not return to health and are functionally impaired by persistent musculoskeletal pain, crushing fatigue, and cognitive dysfunction, known in the research setting as post-treatment Lyme disease (PTLD).
Patients frequently refer to this as “chronic Lyme.” Misdiagnosis and delayed treatments further increase the risk for PTLD as well as for more broadly defined community-based Lyme infection-associated chronic illness or “chronic Lyme.”
In the Johns Hopkins study, 49% of the PTLD patients reported a lack of understanding and 29% experienced discounting from medical professionals. Additionally, women and younger patients were at higher risk for experiencing more invalidation than men or older age patients.
The study found, “Before their initial diagnosis of Lyme disease, approximately half (51.3%) had first been told that their symptoms represented another illness or condition. This high rate is consistent with the hypothesis that diagnosis and treatment delays, and possibly exposure to inappropriate treatment, may be risk factors for PTLD.”
Women more often received alternative diagnoses (such as another contested illness like fibromyalgia or ME/CFS and/or a psychological illness) which in turn correlated with more discounting and lack of understanding. PTLD patients who reported the highest levels of illness invalidation were discovered to have greater symptom severity, lower quality of life, and less trust in physicians.
The pervasiveness of Lyme disease illness invalidation and the consequential negative effects on illness burden and health outcomes are not broadly known by medical professionals.
Improved physician education is needed to help engender more patient-centered paradigms that incorporate the patient illness experience and better recognize how that experience may impact the healing process.
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) has helped validate infection- associated chronic illnesses as being significant public health problems that need greater national attention, a coordinated strategy, and considerably more federal resources.
NASEM held its first national workshop on infection-associated chronic illnesses (IACI) in June 2023 to explore overlapping symptoms and biologic pathways for IACIs including Lyme disease, long COVID, ME/CFS, MS, and others.
In July 2024, a follow-up NASEM meeting focused specifically on Lyme infection-associated chronic Illness. Both forums discussed the importance of listening to and incorporating patients’ illness experience perspectives into improving diagnostic and treatment approaches. For example, patient-driven data such as MyLymeData can be leveraged to improve research and clinical care. It is vital to listen to patients especially when diagnostics are problematic, treatments are inadequate, and the science is contested or evolving.
Building upon insights and collaborative momentum from the NASEM IACI meetings, a coalition of advocates (patient, scientific and medical) are now calling for the creation of a new National Institutes of Health (NIH) office to help strengthen and coordinate research across infection-associated chronic conditions and illnesses including Lyme infection-associated chronic illness, Long COVID, ME/CFS, PANS/PANDAS, POTS/dysautonomia and others.
Listening to patients will be key to advancing solutions, reducing invalidating patient-practitioner encounters, and improving health outcomes.
Nancy Dougherty is an education and communications consultant for the Johns Hopkins Lyme Disease Research Center. Other research investigations at the Center include Pilot Treatment Trials and the SLICE Studies.
Melinda
Damon has exciting posts that always make me stop and think. Be sure to stop by and say hello.
Melinda
Excessive stress is associated with health complications. Are there ways to accurately measure stress levels?
Although stress is a natural and inevitable part of life, many people feel that they’re experiencing excessive stress levels.
However, there’s no objective way to define “excessive stress.” Many people find it hard to express or quantify their stress.
There are a few methods for measuring stress. These look at certain biomarkers — in other words, physiological responses — to assess how your body responds to stress.
There are two components of stress:
When we talk about measuring stress, we tend to be talking about measuring triggers or responses. Measuring stress triggers can include taking stock of the major life changes you’ve been under.
However, everybody responds to triggers differently. Events that might be very stressful for one person can be easily manageable for the other.
The following ways to measure stress look specifically at measuring your stress response. These methods of measuring stress look at your body’s physiological responses. They record stress biomarkers such as your heart rate and brainwaves to assess how stress affects your body.
Heart rate variability (HRV) analysis is a common way to measure stress. It involves recording the variation in time between consecutive heartbeats. In other words, it doesn’t just look at how fast your heart is beating, but how the time period between heartbeats changes.
HRV is controlled by your autonomic nervous system (ANS). The ANS includes your sympathetic nervous system — responsible for fight-or-flight response — and your parasympathetic nervous system, which takes charge when you’re relaxed.
When you’re chronically in fight-or-flight mode, your ANS is unbalanced. This imbalance can show up in your HRV. HRV is lower when you’re in fight-or-flight mode and higher when you’re in a calm state. High HRV is associated with stress resilience and improved cardiovascular health.
A healthcare professional can check your HRV via an electrocardiogram. Personal wearables, such as chest strap monitors, can also measure HRV.
Electroencephalography (EEG) measures brainwaves. Research suggests that brainwaves can be an accurate way to measure stress response.
In particular, a 2020 study found that alpha asymmetry — an imbalance in alpha brainwave activity on different sides of the brain — could be a potential biomarker for stress.
Mental health practitioners who use neurofeedback can measure brainwaves and train the brain with positive feedback when the EEG finds that treatment goals are being met.
Two hormones associated with stress are adrenalin and cortisol.
When you’re stressed, your body will produce adrenalin to give you energy to handle your stressor. It’s a part of the fight-or-flight response, and it’s why you might feel restless when anxious.
In times of stress, your body also produces cortisol, which assists with the fight-or-flight response. Cortisol is a hormone produced by the adrenal gland.
Cortisol is also involved in regulating:
Your cortisol naturally ebbs and flows during the day. Neither cortisol nor adrenalin is “bad,” but when cortisol is chronically high, it can harm your health. For instance, it can lead to the following:
Lab tests can assess your cortisol levels via urine or blood samples. You can purchase home cortisol testing kits, which usually involve testing cortisol through urine.
The Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) is a questionnaire that was developed in 1983. It’s used to assess the amount of stress that you feel you’re under.
Unlike the above-mentioned methods of measuring stress, this tool relies on your own perception of your stress. The questions don’t focus on the events you’re currently experiencing, but your emotional and mental state.
It could be helpful to use the PSS to check in with yourself. It’s available in PDF format.
There are at-home devices that claim to track stress. Usually, these devices track stress by measuring your heart rate and heart rate variability. Many fitness trackers, including smartwatches and chest strap monitors, have stress analysis features.
Are wearable stress trackers accurate? It’s not easy to say. There’s a lack of research into whether these are accurate. However, because these trackers only use one variable — typically your heart — they don’t give a complete picture of your body’s stress response.
Stress is a part of life, and it’s natural to feel stressed from time to time. However, excess stress can be harmful to your health.
When is stress considered excessive? There’s no objective answer to this question. However, if you’re experiencing physical symptoms of stress, or if you feel unable to relax, it may be an indication that you should speak with a healthcare professional.
Similarly, if you feel like you can’t cope or feel overwhelmed most of the time, you might benefit from speaking with a doctor or a therapist.
Symptoms of unhealthy stress levels
The symptoms can include:
Although these issues can be caused by other factors, it’s worth speaking with a doctor or a therapist if you believe that stress is causing physical or emotional symptoms.
There are a number of ways to manage stress in a healthy way.
If you’re often stressed, you might find it helpful to speak with a therapist. Anybody can benefit from quality therapy — it can help you build resilience to stress and process stressful events in a supportive environment. If the cost therapy is a concern for you, consider other affordable therapy options.
Stress is a natural part of everyday life. Numerous methods of measuring stress, such as heart rate variability analysis and hormonal testing, could help you find out whether you’re excessively stressed.
However, you don’t need to measure your stress levels in order to justify reaching out for help. If you feel that you could benefit from handling stress better, consider speaking with a therapist or using stress management techniques to improve your well-being.
Melinda
Reference:
https://www.healthline.com/health/stress/stress-measurement?utm_term=roundup&utm_source=Sailthru%20Email&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=fibro&utm_content=2025-03-04&apid=36735751&rvid=7f053d6ecf820dccd09e4914833cbd49bdfe95bb517404ee9b41601767d1bace#ways-to-manage-stress
Thank you for all the great feedback on the Blogger Highlight series. I’ve enjoyed meeting each blogger and sharing their site with you. This week, we highlight Awakening Wonders. Mary is a fellow Texan, where everything is bigger. HAHA. I’m sure you’ve heard the saying. Mary is multi-talented, from her smooth writing to her photography and other creative endeavors. I look forward to each post; she leaves me with a feeling of warmth.
Since early childhood I have had an obsession with the creative process, which always took me on new, enchanted pathways. As a result, there were some stumbles and tumbles along the way, but I always managed to land on my feet! I grew up in southern Minnesota with the magnificent countryside as my creative playground. As a results, I was free to wander, ponder, and dream.
M. What are your favorite types of posts?
M. I enjoy posts that are uplifting and positive based while inspiring a reader to have a better day! And I connected to your blog with that in mind!!
M. When you left corporate life behind, what was your goal?
M. Well, I didn’t retire, I just rewired and am enjoying the good life!
My favorite post from 2024
The post reminisces while looking at old photos of family members and our memories of them. It reminded me of my grandparents and the love we share.
Be sure to stop by, tell Mary hello, and read through her archives. You’ll be glad you did.
Melinda
Although many narcotic drugs and medications have similar effects or characteristics, each substance is unique. Here are some common examples.
From codeine to heroin, there are many narcotic substances. Some have medical uses and are available by prescription, while others do not.
The term “narcotic” originally referred to any substance that relieved pain and dulled the senses. Some people use the term to refer to all drugs — particularly illegal drugs — but it technically refers to opioids only.
Today, “opioid” is the preferred term, in part due to the connotations the term narcotic has.
Opiates are naturally occurring compounds. Opioids include naturally occurring compounds as well as semi-synthetic and synthetic compounds. Opiates are a subcategory of opioids.
Clinicians often prescribe opioid and opiate medications:
Opioid and opiate medications can cause many side effects, including:
The higher the dose, the more potent the medication.
Some of the most common opioid and opiate medications include:
Your doctor or other healthcare professional may recommend a controlled substance to help treat an underlying health condition, like anxiety or insomnia.
They’ll work with you to determine the appropriate dose for your needs and advise you on any side effects or risks associated with use.
Different regions have different laws around prescription medication and other controlled substances. Familiarize yourself with the laws in your area to ensure you’re properly storing your medication.
Some opioid and opiate substances aren’t prescribed by clinicians. They’re typically used for their pleasurable effects and have a high potential for dependence and misuse.
Common examples include:
Opiates are naturally occurring compounds. Opioids include naturally occurring compounds as well as semi-synthetic and synthetic compounds. Opiates are a subcategory of opioids.
Clinicians often prescribe opioid and opiate medications:
Opioid and opiate medications can cause many side effects, including:
The higher the dose, the more potent the medication.
Some of the most common opioid and opiate medications include:
Your doctor or other healthcare professional may recommend a controlled substance to help treat an underlying health condition, like anxiety or insomnia.
They’ll work with you to determine the appropriate dose for your needs and advise you on any side effects or risks associated with use.
Different regions have different laws around prescription medication and other controlled substances. Familiarize yourself with the laws in your area to ensure you’re properly storing your medication.
Some opioid and opiate substances aren’t prescribed by clinicians. They’re typically used for their pleasurable effects and have a high potential for dependence and misuse.
Common examples include:
With substances like opioids, there’s always the potential for tolerance, dependence, and addiction. Although these terms are often used interchangeably, they’re not the same.
When you develop a tolerance to a substance, it becomes less effective. In time, you’ll need a higher dose to get the same effects.
When you develop a dependence, your body begins to rely on the substance to function. It’s not related to the dosage needed to feel the substance’s effects.
Caffeine, for example, can cause physical dependence. Some people develop a headache, have difficulty concentrating, or experience fatigue if they go more than a day or so without coffee or other sources of caffeine.
Addiction, in contrast, is a chronic dysfunction of the brain system involving memory, motivation, and reward. When it’s related to drugs, it’s sometimes referred to as a substance use disorder. It can be managed with treatment.
You can develop an addiction to a wide range of things, from over-the-counter substances — including caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol — to controlled substances.
Different substances have different thresholds for tolerance, dependence, and addiction.
Heroin, for example, has a high potential for addiction. People who use the substance often develop a tolerance, requiring a higher dose or more frequent use to produce the same effect.
Harm reduction refers to various strategies implemented to reduce the negative consequences associated with drug use. Safer substance use refers to using substances in a way that minimizes harm.
This might include not using a substance while alone or having a trusted friend or loved one check in on you.
Understanding the effects of different substances, using only one substance at a time, and staying hydrated can also reduce your risk of harm.
If you’d like to learn more, many organizations can help. And likewise, if you’re looking for support for yourself or somebody else, there are places you can go.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) offers free resources and treatment referrals. You can call the 24/7 helpline at 800-662-HELP (4357) to learn more.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse provides information and research on substances and substance use, including opioids.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse for TeenagersTrusted Source provides information and research for teenagers and young adults about substance use disorders.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)Trusted Source offers information and support around opioid use.
Narcotics Anonymous (NA) offers support and meetings for people who experience substance misuse.
Adam England lives in the United Kingdom, and his work has appeared in a number of national and international publications. When he’s not working, he’s probably listening to live music.
Melinda
Reference:
Melinda
I became a host for Borrelia burgdorferi (the microbe at the root of Lyme disease), at a time when no one knew what it was. This was over 40 years ago, in 1982, only a few years after Lyme disease was discovered.
It would be decades before the telltale symptoms of unseasonal fevers, bull’s-eye rashes, faux-arthritis, and inexplicable neurological symptoms would become more known to people and doctors living in Lyme-endemic areas.
So, I was initially untreated, giving the Lyme bacteria decades to slowly and quietly populate my body, generating few symptoms or warnings along the way.
As we now know, Borrelia burgdorferi is a devious bug with unique abilities to evade the immune system and keep itself alive. I was healthy, athletic, and active in the world, apparently achieving a kind of multi-year balance, or truce, between the slowly and inexorably growing bacteria and my body’s natural ability to ward it off.
Meantime, Lyme silently and slowly took over, embedding itself—undetected—in my brain.
It was held at bay for most of the first two decades, but that couldn’t go on indefinitely. After a period of intense business stress, I was hit with overt and acute symptoms, as if a storm had blown into my body. Apparently, the microbes had selected my central nervous system as a cozy home, rather than the joint soft tissues that affect so many patients.
Over the next few years, I wrestled with peripheral neuropathy (sirens of pain in my feet), skin and scalp inflammation (what’s going on inside blooms on the surface), Bell’s palsy (complete with an eye patch to hide the purulent discharge), chills and buzzing throughout the body, brain fog, brain dysfunction, deep fatigue, “air hunger,” dizziness and an incipient loss of balance.
This finally crescendoed into a “cryptogenic” stroke [of unknown origin], complete with a week in hospital. It was apparently caused by a weakened small blood vessel that had been undermined by Lyme.
Ok, yes, that’s a typical litany of symptoms for post-treatment (or no-treatment) Lyme disease. As my case rolled out over a second 20 years following the first 20 years of near-dormancy, I became an inadvertent observer and participant in what one might think of as “Lymeworld.”
As a somewhat over-educated guy committed to the world of rationality and science, I began a quest for health in the allopathic or mainstream medicine side of Lymeworld.
But as anyone familiar with Lyme knows, the involvement of conventional medical science with Lyme is a heartbreaker. Even today, many doctors don’t “believe” in Lyme (as if it were a mystic religion rather than biological fauna). They wouldn’t know even a fresh case if it bit them on the butt and left a bull’s-eye!
My first internist in my Lyme-endemic geographical area literally fired me as a patient when I tried to convince him to consider Lyme as a possible cause of my painful burning feet.
I went from doctor to doctor, specialist to specialist. I even went to one of the drafters of the Infectious Disease Society of America’s guidelines for Lyme treatment. In a single visit, he dismissed my case as no longer active, though many symptoms were still to come.
I stuck with allopathic doctors, in my heart of hearts believing that after 50 years they would soon have a cure for this bacterial disease, as medicine had cured so many other bacterial conditions.
After getting a high positive count on the Western blot test for Borrelia in my cerebral spinal fluid—not a good thing—I got hooked up with a 30-day intravenous infusion of ceftriaxone. When that finally provided only the most minimal symptom relief, the infectious disease specialist told me: “There’s nothing more we can do for you.”
Those are hard words to hear when you think you’re dying.
But I refused to accept that there was nothing more to do. I became my own advocate and researcher, a path everyone with long-term Lyme must follow—because there is so little help from others.
I’d lost a lot of mental functioning but mercifully could still do online medical research. Being retired, I had the time to turn over every stone.
Eventually, with myself as test subject, I created a multi-pronged protocol based on in vitro studies that indeed began to work, one that grew from a foundation of credible laboratory science (if not quite yet proven in the clinic).
Many of the strange-sounding botanicals I used are in fact the basis of pharmaceuticals, and not toxic or dangerous. Their action is slower because they work to support the body’s own immunity, and they don’t have noticeable side effects. But their efficacy is clear.
I have put my experience into a book called Lyme with a Twist: A Path to Triumph Over Chronic Infection. It recounts my story and what I did to get better. (My healing is the “twist.”)
I hope it can help people afflicted with Lyme and their loved ones escape the loneliness that Lyme can induce. It takes persistence, discipline, time, and tenacity to recover from a Borrelia infection, and it’s worth the effort. My life has taken a dramatic turn for the better, finally the days are bright again. A message for Lyme sufferers: you can overcome this, you really can.
Lowell Miller is a writer, businessman, and artist living in the Hudson Valley, New York. Click here to learn more about Lyme with a Twist: A Path to Triumph Over Chronic Infection.
Melinda
It’s the weekend!!!!!!
I’m glad you joined me for another edition of Weekend Music Share this week.
Have a great weekend!
Melinda
Welcome back to Weekend Music Share, the place where everyone can share their favorite music.
Feel free to use the Weekend Music Share banner in your post, and use the hashtag #WeekendMusicShare on social media so other participants can find your post.
Thank you for joining me for this week’s Friday Quote.
Melinda
Making changes to your diet can be challenging, but many people give up before they’ve given their new lifestyle choices enough time to become a habit.
You know that making better choices like eating better and moving more can help you feel better and live a longer life.
Maybe you even set a New Year’s resolution for yourself to improve your diet and get more exercise. But here you are, a few weeks into your new lifestyle, and your resolve is already wavering.
Change is hard; there’s no doubt about it.
However, experts tell us that there are things we can do to improve our chances of making real, lasting changes. One is being aware that it takes time for your new behaviors to become habits.
Marie Kanagie-McAleese, MD, from the University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Health, explained: “Some perspectives suggest it takes 21 days to create a new habit. ResearchTrusted Source on behavior change shows an average of 66 days for a behavior change to become a habit, with a range of 2-8 months.”
Kanagie-McAleese went on to say that the specific amount of time is really dependent on the individual as well as the changes that they are trying to make.
Other factors to consider are whether the changes are new to the individual or are simply building on existing behaviors.
“For example,” she said, “drinking more water each day will likely become a habit faster than incorporating a regular exercise routine.”
Kanagie-McAleese also pointed out that it probably took years for you to create your current pattern of eating habits.
“It will take longer than a month to rewrite those old habit pathways in a person’s brain,” she said, “but it helps to break big change down into smaller, more manageable steps.”
Brittany Placencia, a Nutritionist and founder of Simple Plate Nutrition, advises that the best way to make changes in your eating habits is to tackle one change at a time.
“When you have success with one change, you get a boost of confidence in tackling the next change,” she said. “It is not realistic to change your entire diet all at once and think it will stick long-term.”
One way to do this is to adopt an “addition mindset” rather than a “restriction mindset.”
“You want to figure out what you can add to your current diet to start a healthier path rather than cutting out foods altogether,” she stated.
“For example, begin with aiming to eat five servings of fruits and vegetables per day. That’s it. Don’t worry about other aspects of your eating yet. This is adding nutritious foods to your diet instead of a heavy focus on restricting foods,” she explained.
Placencia said that having an addition mindset can be helpful because you don’t feel like you are doing something wrong, which eliminates one of the common challenges that people face when trying to change their diet.
“Once your diet is balanced with more nutritious foods, it becomes easier and easier to enjoy less nutrient-dense foods like sweets occasionally,” she added, “as you have never felt restricted by them, and you can tell a difference in how your body feels after eating more nutritious versus less nutritious foods.”
Kanagie-McAleese further suggests setting SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Realistic, and Time-based).
“Instead of saying your goal is simply to snack on more fruit, a SMART goal would be ‘I will choose an apple for my 3 pm afternoon snack on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday each week instead of a bag of chips, starting next Monday,” she explained.
In addition to setting SMART goals, Kanagie-McAleese offered three other tips for successfully changing your eating habits.
“If you can connect your goals to deeper motivations, it becomes easier to stick with them,” she remarked. “For instance, eating healthier to prevent diabetes so you can live longer and enjoy your grandkids is more motivating than fitting into a pair of skinny jeans.”
“Linking new, healthy changes to your identity makes the change more intuitive,” said Kanagie-Aleese. “If you want to eat healthy and improve your family’s health, it becomes easier when you identify as someone who prioritizes health and is a good role model for your children.”
“It helps to have others that are interested in creating similar habits or who can support you and help to hold you accountable,” she said, adding that working with a certified health and wellness coach for a few weeks or months is one good way to do this.
Eating better can help us feel better and live longer.
However, making changes to our diet can be hard, leading many to quit after a few weeks.
Nutrition experts say it is important to give your new way of eating enough time to become a habit. On average, it takes about 66 days to form a new habit, but it can take up to 8 months, research suggests.
Breaking things into small, manageable goals makes it easier to create lasting changes.
Knowing your why, making your new eating habits part of your identity, and finding your community can also help.
Melinda
Reference:
I have been battling depression for several months. I have Treatment Resistant Biplor Disorder. What that means is many medications don’t work on me, or if they do, they stop working at some point. I have been dealing with this up and down since 1992.
One of the medications I started in the Spring, which was working wonders, stopped working. I’ve been working closely with my Psychiatrist to change doses, but nothing is working. He increased the dose today on one of my medications, and I’m always positive it will work. My fingers are crossed.
I’m sure you’ve noticed I have been posting less; I can’t wait to get back to myself.
If your medications stop working, don’t abandon your medications, call your doctor and get the attitude that the next drug will work. You can’t do it alone.
Melinda
I’m glad you joined me on Wordless Wednesday and I hope to see you soon.
Melinda
According to the Levi Strauss website, this was the day that Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis, the innovators behind the sturdy blue jeans we all love, got a patent on the process of adding metal rivets to men’s denim work pants for the first time in history. The pants were called waist overalls until 1960 when baby boomers began calling them jeans.
The bottles of bubbly are estimated to have been traveling from Germany to Russia during the 1800s when they sank to the bottom of the sea, says New Scientist. Turns out that the bottom of the sea, where temps are between two and four degrees Celsius, is a great place for wine aging. Oenologists, people who study wine and winemaking, sampled the champagne and described it as, “sometimes cheesy,” with “animal notes,” and that it had elements of “wet hair.”
At the start of any movie made by the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studio, there’s the iconic lion that roars at the audience. While MGM has gone through several iterations of lion mascots, the sound of the roar is always the same. The company trademarked the “sound mark” with the United States Patent and Trademark Office in the ’80s.
The lucky buyer, John Reznikoff, holds the Guinness World Record for the largest collection of hair from historical celebrities, reports NBC. The not-so-lucky barber Marx Sizemore, who cut Armstrong’s hair, received threats of being sued by Armstrong’s lawyers who said he violated an Ohio law that protects the rights of famous people. Sizemore said he wouldn’t pay, and Reznikoff said he wouldn’t give back the hair but that he’d donate $3,000 to charity.
You might associate St. Patrick’s Day with wearing green and drinking so much you think you actually see leprechauns. However, until 1961, there were laws in Ireland that banned bars to be open on March 17. Since the holiday falls during the period of Lent in the heavily Catholic country, the idea of binge drinking seemed a bit immoral.
Tesla was a European electrical engineer who paved the way for current system generators and motors. The way electricity gets transmitted and converted to mechanical power is thanks to his inventions. However, despite experimenting with electricity, he despised being in the presence of pearls. One day when his secretary wore pearl jewelry, he made her go home.
Thanks to Edison’s invention of the Kinetograph in 1892, he was able to record and watch moving images for the first time. He filmed short clips in his studio named Black Maria. Some of his shorts feature famous people like Annie Oakley and Buffalo Bill, but the real stars are The Boxing Cats. Check out the video Edison captured of adorable cats in a boxing ring circa 1894.
During Pitt’s prime acting career, he filmed Troy, based on Homer’s Illiad. He played the brave, and buff, Greek hero Achilles. Legend has it that Achilles could not be defeated unless hit in his Achilles heel. While filming an epic battle scene, Pitt ironically hurt his Achilles tendon that put him back two months.
Based on an ancient papyrus document, Egyptian women urinated on wheat and barley seeds to determine if they were pregnant or not, according to the Office of History in the National Institutes of Health. If wheat grew, it predicted a female baby. If barley grew, it predicted a male baby. The woman was not pregnant if nothing grew. Experimenting with this seed theory in 1963 proved it was accurate 70 percent of the time.
Everyone remembers Dr. King as a leader of the Civil Rights Movement and often quotes his “I Have a Dream” speech that he delivered in 1963. However, over a decade before his legendary speech, while attending Crozer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania, he earned a C in public speaking during his first and second term.
So glad you are enjoying the post, I love hearing your comments.
Melinda
Repost
On the way home from work, I vomited in my new Land Rover. I could not pull over fast enough; vomit was everywhere, and I didn’t have any napkins. Once I arrived home, the clean-up began. It was getting late, and I stopped to find I had locked myself out of the house. I was living in a new neighborhood and only had three neighbors. I found a light on, and asked if I could borrow a phone book, and she said yes. Bet I smelled bad, and this was the first time I met her. Even after a professional cleaning, it smelled, and I traded it for something else.
My friends and I went to dinner to celebrate my 33rd birthday. Out of the blue, I got a tattoo and a belly button ring. Several of us drove to a bad part of town because they wanted to watch me get the tattoo. Thank goodness I was drunk. The sign said not to be drunk, but at that age, I was on top of the world.
FYI, the belly button piercing hurt so bad, like your guts were being pulled out. After six months of babying the spot, I took it out.
My gramps had Prostate and Bladder Cancer; the two pushing against each other caused him to have to pee about every 10-15 minutes. My cousin was in a small plane crash and was in really bad shape; Gramps had to go see him. The problem was that the hospital was 1.5 hours away. Knowing that we would be stopping along the way, I took an empty Gatorade bottle for emergencies. I’m flying down the highway close to 100 miles an hour, and Gramps says I have to pee now! I had to push the accelerator all the way down to find an exit. I was Speed Racer! I found a spot, and he peed in the bottle. It wasn’t funny at the time, but it sure is now.
Melinda
Repost
Melinda
March is not only the beginning of Spring but it is chocked full of awareness days, weeks and months. Due to the size of the list, I only included the monthly awareness days. At the bottom of the post there is a link where you can see the full list.
Women’s History Month
National Reading Month
Disability Awareness Month
Kidney Cancer Awareness Month
Red Cross Awareness Month
Self-Injury Awareness Month
Brain injury Awareness Month
Multiple Sclerosis Awareness Month
Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month
Melinda
Reference:
https://www.goodgoodgood.co/articles/march-awareness-days-months
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