By the end of this week women, and some men, were posting just a color in their status update ... white, beige, black, blue ... none. What did it mean? It didn't take long to figure out it was the bra color of the woman posting.
It's unknown who started this "campaign" but the end result was that for at least a day, people on Facebook were talking about breast cancer.
The world awoke Friday to discover that Davi’s bra is black. Janet’s is blue with bows. Kim’s is pink. And Susan’s is a “decadent beige.”
The colors were, at first at least, somewhat mystifyingly posted on thousands upon thousands of Facebook pages as their status updates, without any context. Just colors. “White .. for today anyway!” wrote Kerri.
By midday, the color craze had gone viral on the Internet and around the globe, as had the word that the colors were really bra colors. Almost immediately, cyber-arguments erupted about what it all meant. The blogosphere went wild. Was so openly and willingly posting something as intimate as one’s bra color an attempt to raise breast cancer awareness? Or was it all just another Facebook ‘send your friend a snowball’ or ‘take your celebrity boyfriend quiz’ silly game? A meme?
Whatever it is, its impact was immediate and dramatic: As bra colors went flying around the net, something strange happened at the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. After two years of intensive efforts to boost its profile through social networking, hiring two full-time people to do solely that, within two hours Friday morning, their fan base on Facebook exploded from 135 to 700.
But it can't stop there. We must commit everyday to doing all we can to stop breast cancer, and all the other forms of cancer that have killed so many people we love.
The first thing you can do is take preventative measures. Have that mammogram, lower the fat content in your diet, stop smoking. Don't do it as a New Years Resolution that will be broken almost as quickly as it took to utter the words. Make a commitment.
Urge friends and family to do the same.
I'm sure there's more we can do ... post your ideas below.
It's good to be back home, if only for a few days. I'm here for the NOW conference, which should be great fun. I'm also using this opportunity to catch up with old friends that I've reconnected with through Facebook. Also great fun!
This is an elections conference, where NOW members will elect officers who will serve for the next four years. I've only been here a few hours and already I can tell it's going to be quiet a lively debate!
On another front, my sister had quadruple bypass surgery last week and I'm pleased to say she is doing quite well. She came through the surgery like a trooper, and her doctors are now in the process of getting some of the other health challenges she faces under control.
I'm so glad she made the decision to come live with me. I think it may have saved her life. I'll update everyone again when I get back to DC.
Thanks to everyone who kept her in your thoughts and prayers.
As some of you may have noticed, I've been missing in action for a few days, so thought I would catch everyone up.
My sister Jane when into the hospital a little more than a week ago. She had gone to her cardiologist for a follow up visit, and was as pale as the sheet on the exam table. Her blood pressure had been dangerously low for a few days, and while she was doing all the right things to try and bring it back up it remained low.
Her doctor told her that he'd had finally received all her records and had a chance to review them -- and he thought her situation was much worse than what he had originally been led to believe.
They began running a series of tests, and then compared them with test results from Indiana.
We now know that she has a gall bladder full of stones, which could account for why she's been having trouble keeping food down. BUT, the surgeons in DC think they can improve her heart condition with surgery.
After reviewing the options with the surgeon she is now scheduled to have bypass surgery on Thursday, June 11.
She was discharged from the hospital on Wednesday, and is now relaxing comfortably at home. Her cat Sam, and my two dogs were sure glad to see her! It's nice having us all back under one roof again.
She will have the heart surgery first, and then a few days later the surgeons will remove her gall bladder. We are optimistic that all the surgery will go well, and that once done her quality of life will vastly improve.
I can't help but think the reason the surgeons here are so willing to do the surgery is because we live in an epicenter of stress! DC surgeons probably do a lot more of these procedures than surgeons Indiana.
I jokingly said to Jane, if Dick Cheney can survive open heart surgery, you can too!
The first time I represented Americans United it was as part of a panel on taxpayer funded school vouchers that included then-Florida State Legislator Debbie Wasserman Schultz. She was impressive then, and she continues to be today. She is a strong feminist, supports separation of church and state, and is a great mentor. One thing I love about her is that when she is getting ready to run for a new office, she finds a woman to replace her in the seat she is vacating. She keeps women in the pipeline.
She is not one to back down from a fight, so it comes as no surprise to me that she would deal with a personal health challenge with the same intensity. For the past year Wasserman Schultz has battled breast cancer. On Monday she will introduce legislation that calls for a national education campaign targeting women between 15 and 39.
When Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz steps to the lectern at the Capitol on Monday to push for greater awareness of breast cancer risks in younger women, she'll be speaking from experience.
The Broward County Democrat and mother of three told The Miami Herald on Saturday that she successfully battled breast cancer for the past year and is going public with her story in the hope of alerting young women to its prevalence. She'll introduce legislation Monday that calls for a national education campaign targeting women between 15 and 39.
'I wanted to be able to not just stand up and say, `I'm a breast cancer survivor.' . . . I wanted to find a gap and try to fill it,'' said Wasserman Schultz, 42.
In the past year, she underwent seven major surgeries, including a double mastectomy and reconstructive surgery, while balancing motherhood, Congress and her roles as a chief fundraiser for House Democrats and a political surrogate, first for Hillary Clinton and then for Barack Obama.
"I had a lot going on last year," she said with a laugh, sitting in the living room of the Capitol Hill town house she shares with two other members of Congress when she's in Washington. "I'm a very focused, methodical person, and I wasn't going to let this beat me. I wasn't going to let it interfere with my life."
And she didn't. She was very visible in the 2008 presidential campaign, and hearing this makes her involvement even more impressive.
Breast cancer in younger women can be particularly aggressive, but it can be more difficult to detect because of breast density. And physicians, Wasserman Schultz said, can be slow to recognize the threat to younger women.
"Young women go skipping along through their life, thinking they're invincible, not worrying about breast cancer because they think of it as an older woman's disease," Wasserman Schultz said, noting that the focus is often on a woman's first mammogram, typically at 40.
The death rate from breast cancer has declined for older women, but remains stable for younger women because they are often diagnosed at a later stage, she said.
"It just pains me to know that younger women, because they don't know and because they're blown off by physicians many times, and because they squeeze their eyes shut and hope that it's nothing, that their death rate is much higher," she said. [...]
Wasserman Schultz discovered a breast lump through a self-exam, two months after her first mammogram at 40. Although the cancer was detected at an early stage, she also learned that as an Ashkenazi Jew of Eastern European descent, she was at greater risk of carrying a gene mutation that makes Ashkenazi Jews predisposed to breast cancer and recurrance. She tested positive for this BRCA2 gene mutation, prompting her to have both breasts removed.
She was also at higher risk of ovarian cancer and had her ovaries removed -- the day after Election Day. Her final surgery was in December.
Because the cancer was caught so early, she didn't need chemotherapy or radiation but will take the cancer drug tamoxifen for five years.
She said she decided to keep her cancer private, concerned mostly that her young children (then 8-year-old twins and a 4-year-old daughter) would worry, particularly with a mother who was also constantly on the go. They knew she was undergoing surgery, but she didn't tell them the cause.
'I knew from my doctors that if I went through their recommended course of treatment that I would get through it and I'd be fine, that I could come out the other side and confidently tell my children, `Mommy's fine,' '' she said.
She scheduled her treatment at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., during congressional recesses so she wouldn't miss votes in Congress.
I told you she is tough!
I'm so glad her cancer was diagnosed and treated early -- we NEED Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz in Congress. The work she does there benefits us all.
The Washington Post reports that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg underwent surgery today for pancreatic cancer. It appears the cancer was diagnosed early, which is encouraging. Pancreatic cancer, however, is one of the more aggressive forms of cancer.
Justice Ginsburg is a tireless advocate for many social justice issues I care deeply about. Please join me in extending best wishes to Justice Ginsburg.
Last night my niece and I spent about a half hour on the phone talking about healthy food choices for my sister. Let's face it, we all need to follow a healthier diet so this was a good exercise! Today's New York Times would agree:
Most people think heart-healthy living involves sacrifice. Give up your favorite foods. Break a sweat. Lose weight. But some of the best things you can do for your heart do not involve deprivation or medication. Simple and even pleasurable changes in the foods you eat can rival medication in terms of the benefit to your heart.
“Almost everyone has something they can do in their diet or activity that will impact their risk of heart disease,” said Dr. Graham Colditz, adjunct professor of epidemiology at Washington University in St. Louis. “It’s not about taking anything to the extremes of major deprivation, extreme marathon running or becoming a vegetarian.”
Even so, many people are not getting the message. While doctors still advise patients to diet, exercise and stop smoking, the medical community has adopted an almost singular focus on cholesterol-lowering drugs as the fastest and best way to battle heart disease. Americans spend $18 billion a year on cholesterol-reducing drugs, making them the nation’s biggest-selling class of drugs. [...]
But an important lesson from the last 50 years is that when it comes to improving heart health, it is important to look beyond the medicine cabinet.
Just a few small changes — eating more fish, vegetables, nuts and fiber — can have a major impact on your risk for heart problems. For some people, drinking moderate amounts of wine may offer additional benefits. Even a 55-year-old man who is about 20 pounds overweight and does not exercise regularly will have a heart-disease risk far below average if he regularly consumes fish, nuts, fiber and vegetables and drinks moderate amounts of wine.
It’s hard to believe that such simple food changes can make a meaningful difference, but data from hundreds of studies show they can.
So what is your risk? Below are a few ways you can assess your risk.
My risk is above average: "Above average risk doesn't mean you'll definitely get heart disease. It's just an estimate based on your risk factors, some of which you may not be able to change."
The beats and breaths calculator will amaze you … and may even leave you breathless. In a typical minute your heart beats about 72 times and you take in about 15 breaths. In terms of numbers for beats and breaths, that's more than 4,000 heartbeats and 900 breaths in an hour. And in your lifetime? Let us do the math with our beats and breaths calculator! By entering the month, day and year of your birth we'll estimate your beats and breaths so far.
Number of heart beats since my birth: 2,110,081,104 Number of breaths since my birth: 439, 600,230
Wow!
And finally, the Tailgater's Handbook for a healthy heart! Hummm ... now if I could only get my friend DCup and her family to move to DC, she could prepare some of these delicious items for me!
If only it weren't so expensive I would certainly think about having Braco cloned. She was the best dog I've ever owned. How wonderful would it be to be able to have her around forever! Check out Beloved Pets Everlasting? in today's New York Times.
A report on the connection between blood sugar control and memory decline is the most popular article in the newspaper's heath section.
Spikes in blood sugar can take a toll on memory by affecting the dentate gyrus, an area of the brain within the hippocampus that helps form memories, a new study reports.
Researchers said the effects can be seen even when levels of blood sugar, or glucose, are only moderately elevated, a finding that may help explain normal age-related cognitive decline, since glucose regulation worsens with age.
The study, by researchers at Columbia University Medical Center and funded in part by the National Institute on Aging, was published in the December issue of Annals of Neurology.
“If we conclude this is underlying normal age-related cognitive decline, then it affects all of us,” said lead investigator Dr. Scott Small, associate professor of neurology at Columbia University Medical Center. The ability to regulate glucose starts deteriorating by the third or fourth decade of life, he added.
Since glucose regulation is improved with physical activity, Dr. Small said, “We have a behavioral recommendation — physical exercise.”
So maybe it's time to get up from your computer and move around!
And speaking of getting up from your chair, it's now official -- even having unlimited resources can't prevent some of us from holding on to those extra pounds. In New Year, New You? Nice Try Oprah Winfrey laments that:
“I didn’t just fall off the wagon,” she wrote in the January issue [of O magazine]. “I let the wagon fall on me.”
Here is a news flash for Jay Leno, and everyone else who loves to make fun of people who are overweight, obesity is an accident of birth. Children born to fat parents are genetically predisposed to be fat. In order to be normal weight an obese person must take extraordinary measures every single day to fool their body -- and that shit gets tiring sometimes. Even for Oprah.
It was explained to me that there are numerous mechanisms in the human body that control whether a person is normal weight, overweight or underweight. One of the reasons it's been such a challenge for researchers to develop one magic cure for obesity is that any given person it's a different configuration of these mechanisms that are working incorrectly. For an obese person, their body's set point might be 250 pounds, when they should probably actually weigh no more than 150 to be considered "normal" weight. Every day their body will fight to maintain that 250 pound weight. In order to alter that weight, the person must "fool" their body by consuming fewer calories than needed to maintain the weight, and engage in physical activity to help manage their metabolism.
“Most of us think that we can change our lives if we just summon the willpower and try even harder this time around,” said Alan Deutschman, the former executive director of Unboundary, a firm that counsels corporations on how to navigate change, and the author of “Change or Die,” a book that asserts that even though most people have the ability to change, they rarely do. “It’s exceptionally hard to make life changes,” Mr. Deutschman said, “and our efforts are usually doomed to failure when we try to do it on our own.”
In a season of change, in a year of change, most people who embark on a journey of self-renewal can expect anything but. Research shows that about 80 percent of people who make resolutions on Jan. 1 fall off the wagon by Valentine’s Day, according to Marti Hope Gonzales, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Minnesota.
The inability to "change" may seem "un-American" to people who live in "a country born of change (revolution), and our most cherished historical archetypes (the Pilgrims, the pioneers, the rags-to-riches entrepreneurs) are parables of reinvention".
But the numbers tell a different story.
Dr. Edward D. Miller, the dean of the medical faculty at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, said more than 70 percent of coronary bypass patients revert to unhealthy habits within two years of their operation. Dr. Dean Ornish, the cardiologist and diet author, frequently cites a conclusion by a panel of nutritional experts convened in 1992 by the National Institutes of Health that two-thirds of dieters gain back any lost weight within a year.
The difficulty of changing may have evolutionary origins, said Marion Kramer Jacobs, a clinical psychologist in Laguna Beach, Calif., and author of “Take-Charge Living: How to Recast Your Role in Life ... One Scene at a Time.”
If one believes that human beings are social animals, our hierarchies within families, governments and businesses depend on people who know their roles and perform them dutifully.
“We’re hard-wired not to change quickly,” Dr. Jacobs said. “Think of what chaos would ensue if you could snap your finger and change instantly tomorrow. You would be one person today, someone else tomorrow.”
Okay, but can't I just snap my fingers and be normal weight for the next 50 years or so? Oh, and can my friend Oprah have the same wish?
But who has the nerve to wait it out to see? If you have ever lost someone to cancer, both my parents died from it, you know that it's a horrible way to die. Hearing the word "cancer" strikes fear in everyone, and I would think anyone who heard that word would want to do all they could to rid themselves of it as quickly as possible.
There are, however, some cancer researchers who are having a change of heart.
Cancer researchers have known for years that it was possible in rare cases for some cancers to go away on their own. There were occasional instances of melanomas and kidney cancers that just vanished. And neuroblastoma, a very rare childhood tumor, can go away without treatment.
But these were mostly seen as oddities — an unusual pediatric cancer that might not bear on common cancers of adults, a smattering of case reports of spontaneous cures. And since almost every cancer that is detected is treated, it seemed impossible even to ask what would happen if cancers were left alone.
Now, though, researchers say they have found a situation in Norway that has let them ask that question about breast cancer. And their new study, to be published Tuesday in The Archives of Internal Medicine, suggests that even invasive cancers may sometimes go away without treatment and in larger numbers than anyone ever believed.
At the moment, the finding has no practical applications because no one knows whether a detected cancer will disappear or continue to spread or kill.
And some experts remain unconvinced.
“Their simplification of a complicated issue is both overreaching and alarming,” said Robert A. Smith, director of breast cancer screening at the American Cancer Society.
There is certainly a lot to take in with this report, and I'd be curious to know what others think.
Donald A. Berry, chairman of the department of biostatistics at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, said the study increased his worries about screenings that find cancers earlier and earlier. Unless there is some understanding of the natural history of the cancers that are found — which are dangerous and which are not — the result can easily be more treatment of cancers that would not cause harm if left untreated, he said.
“There may be some benefit to very early detection, but the costs will be huge — and I don’t mean monetary costs,” Dr. Berry said. “It’s possible that we all have cells that are cancerous and that grow a bit before being dumped by the body. ‘Hell bent for leather’ early detection research will lead to finding some of them. What will be the consequence? Prophylactic removal of organs in the masses? It’s really scary.”
But Dr. Laura Esserman, professor of surgery and radiology at the University of California, San Francisco, sees a real opportunity to figure out why some cancers go away.
“I am a breast cancer surgeon; I run a breast cancer program,” she said. “I treat women every day, and I promise you it’s a problem. Every time you tell a person they have cancer, their whole life runs before their eyes.
“What if I could say, ‘It’s not a real cancer, it will go away, don’t worry about it,’ ” she added. “That’s such a different message. Imagine how you would feel.”
Okay, so as I was surfing the web trying to decide what to post tonight, I was also giving the dogs their nightly treats, making sure they went outside to powder their noses, I brought in some plants from the deck that keep falling over in the wind and probably need to come inside anyway because it's getting cold out there, finally settling on a story that not only looked interesting, but sort of fit in with my last few weeks ... all while watching the Pussycats and Missy Elliot on Dancing With the Stars ... which I must confess did capture almost my complete attention for the entire three minutes they were on the screen.
So why would a New York Times story on multitasking seem like the perfect post?
Isn't it obvious? It's what many of us do MOST of the time. And what I listed above is nothing compared with the additional tasks parents face.
Some people look at you funny if you want to complete one task before starting another. You can hear the comments under their breath ... lightweight ... wimp ... loser ...
Okay, maybe they aren't quite that harsh, but you must admit they at least look a little suspicious.
The story probably also resonated with me tonight because multitasking caught up with me today when I realized I'd made a pretty big mistake. Let me just say this about that ... making a mistake that costs money is not what you want to do during tough economic times. I also feel bad about it because I let a good friend down -- and I hate that. Thank goodness I have a very forgiving friend.
We are engaged in activities leading up to the election, getting ready for our annual meeting the following week, and I've had changes is staff that have left my department a little short handed right now.
Let me just say that the people in my department are terrific, and they are working their butts off. We also have a great staff, which accounts for why I can make a mistake and have the person who is inconvenienced the most be so understanding.
I kept replaying the day as I was driving home, so I'm sure I wasn't as alert as I could have been. Traffic seemed more congested than usual, and as I passed a number of cars I noticed the drivers were either talking on the phone or texting.
Traffic came to a complete stop a few times, and I had to wonder if it had anything to do with the drivers ahead of me who were possibly talking and texting, and therefore not really focused on the drive home.
Can we do it all? Can we multitask and not lose focus? I think the answer is obvious ... no.
As you are reading this article, are you listening to music or the radio? Yelling at your children? If you are looking at it online, are you e-mailing or instant-messaging at the same time? Checking stocks?
Since the 1990s, we’ve accepted multitasking without question. Virtually all of us spend part or most of our day either rapidly switching from one task to another or juggling two or more things at the same time.
While multitasking may seem to be saving time, psychologists, neuroscientists and others are finding that it can put us under a great deal of stress and actually make us less efficient.
Although doing many things at the same time — reading an article while listening to music, switching to check e-mail messages and talking on the phone — can be a way of making tasks more fun and energizing, “you have to keep in mind that you sacrifice focus when you do this,” said Edward M. Hallowell, a psychiatrist and author of “CrazyBusy: Overstretched, Overbooked, and About to Snap!” (Ballantine, 2006). “Multitasking is shifting focus from one task to another in rapid succession. It gives the illusion that we’re simultaneously tasking, but we’re really not. It’s like playing tennis with three balls.” [...]
But despite what many of us think, you cannot simultaneously e-mail and talk on the phone. I think we’re all familiar with what Dr. Hallowell calls “e-mail voice,” when someone you’re talking to on the phone suddenly sounds, well, disengaged.
And as I thought ...
Their 2001 study, published in The Journal of Experimental Psychology, found that for all types of tasks, the participants lost time when they had to move back and forth from one undertaking to another, and that it took significantly longer to switch between the more complicated tasks.
Although the time it takes for our brains to switch tasks may be only a few seconds or less, it adds up. If we’re talking about doing two jobs that can require real concentration, like text-messaging and driving, it can be fatal.
The RAC Foundation, a British nonprofit organization that focuses on driving issues, asked 17 drivers, age 17 to 24, to use a driving simulator to see how texting affected driving.
The reaction time was around 35 percent slower when writing a text message — slower than driving drunk or stoned.
So what is the solution? Again ... it's so obvious!
So the next time the phone rings and a good friend is on the line, try this trick: Sit on the couch. Focus on the conversation. Don’t jump up, no matter how much you feel the need to clean the kitchen. It seems weird, but stick with it. You, too, can learn the art of single-tasking.
As I read the story of a Pennsylvania woman who suffers from environmental illness I couldn't help but think about Lily Tomlin's character Pat Kramer in The Incredible Shrinking Woman. When Pat Kramer, an ordinary woman, is exposed to a unique mix of chemicals, she begins to uncontrollably physically shrink. Now it could be argued there are other symbolic reasons to explain why Pat is literally disappearing before are eyes, but more than 25 years after this film was released there is evidence the chemicals we ingest daily are having an impact on our physical health.
Ten hours a day, every day, Elizabeth Feudale-Bowes confines herself to a galvanized-steel-and-porcelain shed outside her house. Inside are a toilet, a metal cabinet, a box spring with the metal coils exposed, and a pile of organic cotton blankets. Aluminum foil covers the window.
The place is as austere as a prison cell — but it's also her sanctuary from an outside world that she says makes her violently ill.
She and her husband call the structure "the bubble."
This bubble, though, may be about to burst: A judge has ordered it taken down by the end of the month.
Some of the couple's neighbors in suburban South Whitehall Township complained that the 160-square-foot building is unstable and so unsightly it could drag down their property values. The couple also hooked up electrical, water and sewer service without securing permits.
"For the wife's medical problems, there is sympathy. For the owner's defiance of the township's lawful directives, there is no excuse," Judge Carol McGinley ruled earlier this month.
Feudale-Bowes, 52, says she was diagnosed several years ago with "environmental illness," described as extreme sensitivity to everyday substances.
Some doctors question whether environmental illness is a genuine physical disorder and suggest it is psychological. Feudale-Bowles says she was diagnosed by Dr. William Rea of Texas, who has been accused by the Texas Medical Board of promoting "pseudoscience." He vigorously disputes the charge and continues to see patients.
Feudale-Bowes says fabric softener, nail polish, perfume, new sneakers, upholstery and many other items can make her body go haywire. She says she has suffered from a range of chronic ailments, including migraines, joint pain, bladder inflammation, seizures and temporary paralysis. Her insides, she says, have sometimes felt like "fire with ground glass in it."
Is this a hoax? Is the food we eat and the air we breath literally making us sick? Have you ever noticed a change in how you feel following something you ate, drank or from the air you were breathing? So what do you think?
WARNING:The following post might contain too much information for some ... read at your own risk ... you can't say I didn't warn you!
Posting has been a little light the past couple of days, as I prepared for my first colonoscopy. Yeah, ugh!
As some of you might know from a previous post, I did get to meet Katie Couric earlier this year, and for a fleeting moment I considered asking her to go to the hospital with me ... since she is largely responsible for the significant increase in colonoscopy screenings nationwide.
She launched a one-woman campaign following her husband's death from colon cancer.
I largely tried not to think about it, but as it came closer to C-day I was forced to go to the pharmacy to get the PEG/Lytes solution (more on this later) and to pick up a few food items for the day before.
My exam was this morning, so yesterday I began my day with two eggs, toast with blackberry jam and a bottle of water. I should have made the Jello the day before, but who knew it would take so long to set? (For those who don't know me, I'm the person looking for "toast" at the grocery store!) So, the eggs became that last solid food I would consume for another 30 hours or so.
I was given four laxative tablets to take at 3 pm. Also, because I'm bad at reading directions the PEG/Lytes solution that should have been mixed and placed in the refrigerator at 1 pm, wasn't mixed until about 3:15 pm. So it won't be quite as cold ...
The first part of the "fun" begins at 7 pm. For the next two hours I drank an 8 oz glass of the solution. It's kind of a thick liquid, not the best tasting stuff in the world -- but it might have been better had I remembered to get the Crystal Light to add to it at the store. Note to self: Be sure to take a shopping list to the store!
I got through the first hour fine, and was probably a little too cocky about it all. The second hour was a different story.
The drink became harder to get down. The directions said wait a few minutes between drinks if you are feeling a little nauseous -- and I was.
By the end of the first hour everything began to kick in and it was back and forth to the bathroom about every 10 minutes or so. The dogs, who normally accompany me to the john, got a bit bored after the fourth trip and decided to just hang out on the ottoman and wish me well as I sped by.
The directions say to drink a total of eight glasses over the two hour period, and the seventh one was really hard to get down. I was only about 15 minutes behind schedule at this point and thought to myself "I only have one more to go ... I can surely drink one more."
By glass six it feels like you are doing number 1, only everything is coming out of opening number 2. It's quite and odd feeling, and since that part of the body is not accustomed to passing liquid it's not as capable of holding it in while you make the trip! My advice to anyone who is still reading this ... stay close to the bathroom after glass five!
It was time for the last glass, and while it was very hard to get it down I did feel a sense of relief. Finally, no more thick liquid. Things were flowing smoothly, so I wouldn't need to drink any more. The deal is, if things aren't clear -- or at least yellow -- you have to keep drinking until they are.
My stomach was a little upset, so I decided to drink a little ginger ale. That might have been a mistake, because it caused everything to come right back up! I was really pissed, because I had just gotten it down and didn't want to have to drink any more of the stuff.
I decided to wait awhile to see what happened.
Whatever remained in my stomach was enough to do the trick, so no more thick liquid!
At this point, even though you haven't eaten all day you really don't want to eat anything because you don't want to have to go through the process again!
This morning I got up early, fixed breakfast for the dogs, took my shower and I was off to the hospital. I thought I knew when I was supposed to be there, but I found out after I arrived that I was an hour late! I panicked, because I didn't want to miss my appointment and have to go through the prep again! Thank goodness they rushed me right in and I went through the hospital prep in record time.
Before I knew it I was in the procedure room, being hooked up to a heart monitor, blood pressure monitor and getting my least favorite thing at a hospital -- and IV. I warned the IV nurse this was my least favorite part and not to take it personally. It took her a long time to find a vein (I could never be a IV drug user, as my veins are so hard to find). Once she did, she had me hooked up in a snap! I must say it didn't hurt at all.
The doctor came in for a pre-exam chat. He looked alert and seemed in good spirits -- a good thing. I apologized for being late and he said not to worry. Another patient had come in an hour early so they just switched our times! Clearly the Goddess was looking out for me.
There was some confusion among the nurses about whether or not I would be completely sedated, or just given something to relax me. They thought sedated, so I asked for a CPAP machine. I suffer from sever sleep apnea, and didn't feel comfortable being fully sedated without letting someone know. A wonderful woman named Margaret came in and hooked me up.
The doctor seemed at ease about everything and I didn't have to fear that I would stop breathing, so I was good to go!
As it turns out, I was pretty much awake for the entire procedure. I was facing the monitor, so I got to watch the whole thing! It's really amazing looking at the inside of your body. I had a similar experience recently when I had a sonogram of my heart. Watching my heart beating was really cool!
The music playing in the room was old Blue Eyes. Frank Sinatra is fun, but everyone agreed the sound track didn't quite fit with the images. An underwater sound track might have been more appropriate -- maybe something from Waterworld.
The procedure itself really isn't that uncomfortable. They are putting air in to open everything up, so that gets a little uncomfortable at times. It was only really uncomfortable once (and only for a few seconds). When I mentioned it to the doctor he said they were "turning a corner" and that it would be over soon. The nurse in the room pressed on my stomach, which helped ease the pressure.
The entire procedure only took about 25 minutes. The doctor and nurse were thrilled that I was "clean as a whistle." I asked for a copy of the report -- which includes pictures(!!) -- and the results say "normal colon, no polyps." Great!! It also says that I should be screened again "in several years!" More good news!
I'm glad I did it. As others had said to me, the prep is worse than the procedure, but it's not really that bad. Being uncomfortable for a few hours the night before, and 25 minutes the day of, is certainly worth it. The consequences of not being checked could be so much worse.
This is very sad news. Doctors have determined that Sen. Ten Kennedy has a cancerous brain tumor, which caused the seizure he suffered on Saturday. The Associated Press reports:
The Massachusetts Democrat as a malignant glioma in the left parietal-lobe, according to doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital, where Kennedy, 76, has been undergoing tests since Saturday after having a seizure at his Cape Cod home.
The usual course of treatment includes combinations of radiation and chemotherapy, but Kennedy's treatment will be decided after more tests.
"He has had no further seizures, remains in good overall condition, and is up and walking around the hospital," said a joint statement issued by Dr. Lee Schwamm, vice chairman of the Department of Neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital and Dr. Larry Ronan, Kennedy's primary care physician.
The doctors said Kennedy will remain in the hospital "for the next couple of days according to routine protocol." [...]
Malignant gliomas are a type of brain cancer diagnosed in about 9,000 Americans a year — and the most common type among adults. It's a starting diagnosis: How well patients fare depends on what specific tumor type is determined by further testing.
Average survival can range from less than a year for very advanced and aggressive types — such as glioblastomas — or to about five years for different types that are slower growing.
Surgery can be an option for some types, especially to reduce symptoms as a tumor enlarges and puts pressure on the rest of the brain. Many gliomas infiltrate normal brain tissue instead of forming a solid mass, making it hard to remove much of the tumor.
This is such difficult news to hear. As I have mentioned in the past, my interest in politics was sparked by John F. Kennedy's campaign for the White House in 1960. I was seven years old at the time, and even though my parents were registered Republicans -- and my mother worked for the local Republican Party -- she encouraged my interest in the race.
I was also a Bobby Kennedy fan, following his campaign in 1968, and was devastated when an assassins bullet changed the course of history forever.
Ted Kennedy has been a champion of liberal causes for the more than four decades he has served in the U.S. Senate. Very often taking the lead on issues important to women. We need his voice in the Senate.
The Kennedy family is known for its strong faith. Please send positive thoughts to the Senator and his family during this difficult time.
UPDATE: There is a place on Sen. Kennedy's web site where you can send best wishes.
No, I haven't moved to West Virginia, but I did just step out of my new little hot tub. Gee, if I'd known it would be this relaxing I would have gotten one a long time ago.
I'm taking an extended vacation, and made an executive decision that instead of going somewhere exotic, I'd just bring what I most look forward to while I'm on vacation to me instead.
I've recently spent a lot of time and money renovating my home, and it's very comfortable being here. My job involves a lot of travel, so for me it doesn't really seem like a vacation to pack a bag and get on an airplane.
So for about half what I would have spent on airfare and hotel costs I purchased a portable hot tub. The other advantage is that for not a lot of money I get to test whether or not I would actually use one, if I had a more permanent set up.
Well, based on the test run just complete, it was definitely money well spent.
The dogs were playing in the backyard, I was watching a movie on the television in my back room (former storage area, now comfortable living space), while the water bubbled around me and I hadn't packed a single bag ... sigh ... it was heaven!
First reports were that Sen. Kennedy had suffered a stroke. I was attending the NOW Mid Atlantic Regional Conference when Ellie Smeal interrupted the speaker to announce the news. She urged everyone to send best wishes to the Senator and his family.
Kennedy has come under fire from feminist recently for his endorsement of Barack Obama. Women, who have supported Kennedy for decades -- during some of the Senator's most difficult times -- felt let down that he was not returning the favor. But while me may differ with him on who the Democratic nominee should be, there is no question that Sen. Kennedy has been a champion of women's rights in the Senate. In some cases leading the battle.
Sen. Clinton issued the following statement: "My thoughts and prayers are with Ted Kennedy and his family today. We all wish him well and a quick recovery."
I have the best doctor in the world. I've been a patient for the past 18 years. I mention this because I informed her today that she's my longest relationship to date. She smiled.
It was time for my annual check up, which according to her records I do about every four years. Ugh. Better put that on my list of things to improve on.
I guess the bottom line is that no matter how much you like your doctor, having a physical is never really "fun."
This part is always a blast. Good thing I remembered to brush my teeth before going!
And shave ... yikes!
My blood pressure was good ... EKG okay ... lungs sounded good. The blood work will come back later.
And no lumps where there shouldn't be lumps ... that's always good news.
She does want me to have a stress test, since I desperately need to exercise, and I don't want to have a heart attack or stroke! (they run in the family)
Overall, except for the extra lbs., I'm doing okay.
I firmly believe that 14 out of ever 10 people love chocolate. I account for at least two of them. A recent report in the Washington Post is shedding light on one possible reason why.
Researchers have discovered that people really do have a "gut" reaction to chocolate.
If that craving for chocolate sometimes feels like it is coming from deep in your gut, that's because maybe it is.
A small study links the type of bacteria living in people's digestive system to a desire for chocolate. Everyone has a vast community of microbes in their guts. But people who crave daily chocolate show signs of having different colonies of bacteria than people who are immune to chocolate's allure.
That may be the case for other foods, too. The idea could eventually lead to treating some types of obesity by changing the composition of the trillions of bacteria occupying the intestines and stomach, said Sunil Kochhar, co-author of the study. It appears Friday in the peer-reviewed Journal of Proteome Research.
The study was commissioned by Nestle, but they claim it isn't "part of an effort to convert a few to the dark side (or even milk) side of cocoa."
I'm a dark chocolate lover myself, and have often said 'milk chocolate is for wimps.'
[T]he study was delayed because it took a year for the researchers to find 11 men who don't eat chocolate.
Kochhar compared the blood and urine of those 11 men, who he jokingly called "weird" for their indifference to chocolate, to 11 similar men who ate chocolate daily. They were all healthy, not obese, and were fed the same food for five days.
The researchers examined the byproducts of metabolism in their blood and urine and found that a dozen substances were significantly different between the two groups. For example, the amino acid glycine was higher in chocolate lovers, while taurine (an active ingredient in energy drinks) was higher in people who didn't eat chocolate. Also chocolate lovers had lower levels of the bad cholesterol, LDL.
You see, eating chocolate IS good for you!
Who knew that: "how gut bacteria affect people is a hot field of scientific research."
Still to be determined is if the bacteria cause the craving, or if early in life people's diets changed the bacteria, which then reinforced food choices.
Past studies have shown that intestinal bacteria change when people lose weight, said Dr. Sam Klein, an obesity expert and professor of medicine at Washington University in St. Louis.
Since bacteria interact with what you eat, it is logical to think that there is a connection between those microbes and desires for certain foods, said Klein, who wasn't part of Kochhar's study.
Kochhar's research makes so much sense that people should have thought of it earlier, said J. Bruce German, professor of food chemistry at the University of California Davis.
This could have a significant impact in dealing with the obesity epidemic in this country.
Kochhar said the relationship between food, people and what grows in their gut is important for the future: "If we understand the relationship, then we can find ways to nudge it in the right direction."
By the end of this week women, and some men, were posting just a color in their status update ... white, beige, black, blue ... none. What did it mean? It didn't take long to figure out it was the bra color of the woman posting.
