Posted by
Kate W
on
Friday, June 29th, 2012
Lupus is an insidious disorder. Symptoms vary from person to person and can overlap with many other disorders, making diagnosis extremely difficult. It affects nearly the whole body; your skin, joints, kidneys, brain and other organs can all be affected. Pain and fatigue will plague you every day. I don’t have lupus, but I am intimately acquainted with it. Three and a half years ago, my perfectly healthy 25-year old husband complained of chest pain; three days later he was in the ICU with full-blown double pneumonia. After two years of seemingly nonstop tests and endless visits to rheumatologists, we finally found out what triggered such a catastrophic and quick illness seemingly from nowhere; at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville my husband was diagnosed with lupus. And we’re lucky; without good health insurance, we’d probably still be in the dark.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Thursday, June 28th, 2012
There are hundreds of supplements advertised on TV and in magazines that promise miraculous weight loss with the simple swallowing of a pill. If it were that easy though, America likely wouldn’t be smack dab in the middle of an obesity epidemic. The only tried and true way to lose weight (assuming you don’t have a medical issue or disability that prevents it) is through eating a balanced diet and exercising (and laying off the jelly beans). Still, there are some tried and true natural remedies that can assist you on your weight loss journey:
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Wednesday, June 27th, 2012
Proponents of natural medicine are almost universally in favor of tea tree oil, mainly because it is a natural treatment for countless ailments. From your head down to your feet, if you have something wrong with you tea tree oil may help ease the symptoms.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Tuesday, June 26th, 2012
When I was a kid, we took a lot of family road trips. Much to my parents’ dismay I usually had my head buried in a book, completely oblivious to the majestic sights around me. I’ve driven past snowcapped mountains and desert plateaus without deigning to give them more than a passing glance; I was always more interested in the world inside my own head.
Now though, if I so much glance at an open book in the car, I won’t be able to see the scenery around me, because I’ll have my head in a barf bag. The older I get, the more motion sick I become. I prefer being the driver of the car now; even riding in the front passenger seat gets my stomach churning. I always take the aisle seat on a plane, just in case I need to bolt to the lavatory. Forget about boats, too; even before the sharks get me, I’ll keel over from dehydration from the total seasickness that overtakes me. It’s no surprise I suffered from hyperemesis during the entirety of my pregnancy; some studies suggest the two conditions may have the same underlying cause. Hyperemesis, incidentally, is one of the contributing factors behind my decision to only have one child.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Monday, June 25th, 2012
My dad has always been a spicy food fanatic. He never met a meal he didn’t think could be improved by a hefty dollop of hot sauce, whether it was cold leftover pizza or burgers hot off the grill. When I was nine years old he moved into a house that had an interesting architectural detail: a shelf ran along the top of the walls of the living room and kitchen; presumably, the previous homeowners had been collectors of some sort. He contemplated taking the shelves down, but then decided he might as well start his own collection. That’s when the hot sauce collection began.
Every time my dad traveled somewhere new, a bottle of local hot sauce would make its way into his collection. Just a few years later he had run out of shelf space, but by that point the collection had taken on a life of his own; friends and family members presented him with bottles for birthdays, Christmas, Father’s Day, etc. He ended up hiring a contractor to build more shelves. By the time he moved out of the house a decade later, he had amassed over 300 bottles.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Friday, June 22nd, 2012
My husband and I are not particularly outdoorsy. My husband has red hair and fair skin, and so he has historically stayed out of the sun. His decision to do so was reinforced after his lupus diagnosis; even a short amount of time outdoors in the heat of late spring can cause a flare-up. This means that even though we live just a few short miles away from the beautiful Florida Gulf Beaches we never go. I have to say I don’t actually mind that much, thanks to my well-documented fear of sharks.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Thursday, June 21st, 2012
I have a food obsession. It’s not chocolate or butter or anything gooey or decadent; it’s just a little something that spices up my life nearly every day. I’m talking about cardamom.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Wednesday, June 20th, 2012
I have a friend who is obsessed with avocado. I have actually watched her dip sushi rolls that were already packed with avocado into guacamole for a snack. She credits her frequent avocado consumption with the gorgeous shiny hair and healthy glowing skin she has that I am so envious of. But while I am perfectly willing to slather avocado on my face and hair in an effort to replicate her natural beauty, I just can’t bring myself to eat it.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Tuesday, June 19th, 2012
As I’ve discussed in the past, I have trouble sleeping. Because I’m not crazy about the thought of taking heavy-duty prescription sleep drugs because I want to be readily alert in case my infant daughter needs me in the middle of the night, I have been exploring more natural sleep aids. I tried melatonin for a while and while I found it quite effective, it did cause me to have vivid and rather disturbing dreams.I could mostly shake these dreams off, but after a particularly realistic one about leaving my daughter with a babysitter while I ran errands, only to discover my babysitter had decided to run errands of her own while leaving my baby napping at home, I decided to try other alternatives. Because I’m not a huge fan of radicchio, valerian root was next on my list.
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Posted by
Kate W
on
Monday, June 18th, 2012
The day I turned sixteen, my mom drove me to the DMV to get my license. I had been driving on a learner’s permit all year, and I had already bought my first car, a used 1994 Toyota Corolla with money I had earned from three years’ worth of summer jobs (as you can tell, times were different then; now, a teenager can barely afford to park a car). It’s hard to tell who was more excited of the two of us; I would finally have the freedom I had always craved but my mom would finally have someone else to do the grocery shopping and cart my younger sibling around to school and extracurricular activities.
I passed the driving portion with flying colors, and then it was time for the eye test. That was fine as long as my glasses were on, but without them I couldn’t even read the top line. Before the woman behind the counter handed me my license she cautioned me, “Honey, I know how teenage girls are about their looks but you have to promise me you won’t be driving without your glasses on. You are legally blind for the purpose of driving without them.” I assured her that wouldn’t be an issue; frankly, I knew I wouldn’t be able to find my car without my glasses on, much less drive it.
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