Thursday, January 31, 2013

Addictions Part II

I love anything penguin. I read about them, collect stuffed, glass and ceramic replicas, wear penguin clothing and jewelry and visit them at zoos and the Maui Marriott Hotel. My husband enables me in this addiction. Maybe he's codependent.  I should start a support group for others like me. I could call it Penguin Freaks Anonymous or PFA. However, after reading comments which insist that my clothing/shopping/sewing habits were really 'passions', rather than 'addictions', maybe I 'should' rethink or relabel my warm, fuzzy feelings about penguins.

My penguin passion began many years ago, when someone jokingly said that I looked like a penguin. Rather than feel insulted, I recognized a great explanation for my short legs, long torso and bloated belly (pre celiac diagnosis).  Rather than continue to feel frustrated with my abnormal shape, I began to identify with those cute little birds.  People, who needed gift ideas for me, were relieved when they learned I collected penguin stuff. My husband bought me stuffed penguins, wherever we found them.  I now have about 3 dozen stuffed penguins in various sizes and breeds on dressers and beds.  The family room fireplace mantel is loaded with small penguins (glass, ceramic, candlestick holders, etc.).  The front door to our house is guarded by 2 'porch' penguins, who wear different outfits during different months/seasons of the year. Right now they wear Valentine costumes.

During the Christmas holidays the penguins rule our house. Two more lighted penguins join the standard two porch penguins.  Our living room is filled with all sort of penguins, some of which sing and dance. The main attraction is our Christmas tree which is decorated with only penguin lights and ornaments. The kitchen and family room are equally resplendent with festive penguins. This year, in addition to my usual Christmas cookies I made chocolate frosted penguin cookies. I may bake those every year.

Penguin mania even spread to my email address and custom licensed plate for my car.  I've seen almost every penguin cartoon, full length movie and documentary out there. My favorite was "Mr. Popper's Penguins", because it seemed more plausable than cartoons. I even dream about penguins occasionally.  On really cold days, when I wear a heavy, oversize, down jacket, I tend to waddle and walk with smaller steps over icy walkways.  However, I never layed on my belly and propelled myself with my feet.

I don't know how long my penguin mania will continue. I can no longer describe myself as 'penguin shaped'. Avoiding gluten and other food allergies, taking digestive supplements and thyroid hormones totally flattened my formerly bloated belly.  During years of undiagnosed celiac disease I lost 1-1/2 inch in height. My legs are still short, but my torso (neck to waist) is shorter. So I no longer look 'long-waisted'.  (No, I'm not losing bone currently as proven by 2 normal NTX tests.) I get strange looks from sales assistants when I comment that I don't wear capri pants because they exaggerate my 'penguin shaped' body. They just see me as fashionably thin. What I really mean is that I have short legs. My height 5'3.5" also qualifies me as 'petite'. I probably should just say 'petite', rather than penguin shaped.  Nevertheless, I still have a prominent beak, I squawk when I'm upset and I flap more than usual for a human being.

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

My Addictions Part I

Years ago, before I was diagnosed with celiac diseease, food allergies and other digestive problems, I attended a support group for people who were addicted to food. In order to control the addiction, we had to eat a certain way, attend meetings and call another member, when we were tempted to overeat or eat a forbidden food. Now that I understand my symptoms were caused by physical disease and allergies, I can't believe I was ever 'addicted' to food. I need to eat to live. I may undereat or overeat at times, but I basically eat to feed my body.

However, I do use other substances in amounts that may seem excessive to healthy, normal people. No, I'm not talking about drugs. I'm talking about fabric, specifically crafted into garments. My husband tells me that we want excessive amounts of whatever we felt deprived of as small children.

 I was rather deprived of edible treats when I was a child. My mom took one look at my bloated (undiagnosed celiac) belly and decided I was getting too fat. She didn't seem to notice the rest of my body parts were normal sizes. Nevertheless she began restricting sweets so that I wouldn't get 'fatter'. Moreover, my mom often used my shape as a reason to not buy new clothes for me. She would often say "I will buy you new (nicer) clothes, when you are thin."

Because of early food restriction, I grew up wanting lots of sweets and pastries until I learned that I was allergic to gluten, dairy, soy, eggs, cane sugar, vanilla and nutmeg.  However after finding safe substitutes for all those foods/ingredients, I now bake my own pastries and treats.  I like to include sweets with every meal. Fortunately I now have normal metabolism and I like other healthier foods (fruits, vegies, etc.).

However, my childhood clothing restriction influenced my love affair (addiction?) with clothes, which began when I realized I really was 'thin'. I was never 'thin' enough for my mom to buy me fashionable clothes. So I wore really dowdy, unflattering clothes during high school. During my college days, I began to buy my own clothes without my mom's advice or money. Because I've stayed in the same weight range most of the time since my early 20s, I still have garments I purchased years ago.  I altered some clothes when I was very bloated with undiagnosed celiac disease 15 years ago. So I had to give those away after I recovered and resumed a normal body shape.  However I still have a few clothes (jeans, skirts, jackets, and shoes) which I wore during my 20s.

When I quit painting and marketing watercolor paintings (10? years ago), I started sewing.  I literally taught myself to sew, just as I taught myself to paint, but for different reasons. I didn't NEED paintings. So I sold them and supported myself with my painting business. I NEEDED clothes ... sewing allowed me to have more clothes inexpensively and to alter store bought garments to fit my body even better. 

Even now, when many women my age wear dowdy clothes and unflattering hairstyles, I make fashionable clothes, when I'm not buying what I like at H&M (my alltime favorite store), Loft Petites, Express, Nordstrom TBD, and occasionally Wet Seal (which I first discovered in Maui) or Forever 21.  However, I prefer to sew simple styles (skirts, peasant blouses, sleeveless or short sleeved tops, shorts), which I can make for less than I would spend at a store. 

My husband always knows what to get me for Christmas, birthday, any 'giftable' occasion.  Often we spend my birthday 'shopping'. So he doesn't need to buy and wrap anything before my birthday. I also enjoy the 'chase' for the perfect item, but I sometimes go home empty handed. 

Do I have enough clothes now? Well, actually I go through my closets annually to give away garments which I don't want to alter to fit better or clothes which are too worn or never flattering (what was I thinking?).  If I don't get rid of clothes by giving them away or selling them in consignment shops, I don't have room in my closet for new items. 

Currently I'm altering garments which I haven't worn for a year or so, but still like. Also I alter any garment that doesn't fit well, but I like the color or style.  I almost like alterations even better than sewing a completely new garment. I alter garments which I already love and can easily coordinate with other items in my wardrobe. Finding old garments and altering them is like buying a new garment for free.  Also I'm satisfied by the work I did to make the garment fit better.

Am I addicted to clothes?  I sometimes wonder whether I'm addicted to shopping. However, I don't shop just to entertain myself. I usually have a goal garment or accessory, which I 'need'.  Shopping also gives me ideas for garments to sew and save money. However, after awhile I feel 'shopped' out and want to go home and sew or bake cookies! LOL

 I suspect my honesty is opening up a whole closet of opinions out there. I look forward to your responses.

Monday, January 28, 2013

There's a Crow on my Head

I don't think I look like a tree. Yet during my walk last week a crow landed on my head over a dozen times. I need to add that I walk around our local lake path and feed crows 'not for human consumption' peanuts, which I buy at Wild Birds Unlimited.  I suspect those peanuts are intended for squirrels. Originally my husband fed peanuts to squirrels. However, when I noticed that crows also tried to get 'squirrel' peanuts, we started to feed crows, too.  We soon learned (and I have read) how intelligent crows really are. No matter what hat, coat or other clothes I wear, crows recognize me and start following me, landing in front of me, and looking up at me, as if to ask "where are the peanuts?"

So I suspect I'm known as the 'peanut lady' among our local crows. A few crows even beg for peanuts by landing on the power line connected to our house and 'cawing' until we lay peanuts on our porch bannister. They seem to hear us open the front door and come for peanuts. But I digress ...

I regularly notice crows following me while I walk and I toss peanuts to them.  Occasionally a crow seems to drag his claws through my hair (or sometimes a knit cap). My husband says that they are trying to get my attention.  However, I believed that they were just trying to land in front of me and misjudged my walking speed and their landing angle so that they collided with my head on the way to the ground.  Sometimes I'll experience several (4-6) collisions within a short distance.  I've considered trying to catch a crow when I feel it on my head, but they usually leave as quickly as they land.  Nevertheless, I once sensed that one crow stayed for more than a few seconds.  So I wondered whether that bird was just catching a free ride during the peanut chase. 

During last week's crow feeding expedition I experienced multiple head landings. I believed that several crows were 'misjudging' their landing angle. However I began to notice the crow(s?) began to land on different parts of my head (back, sides, rather than just crown). So I decided I would talk loudly to the next crow to land on my head. If multiple crows were landing on my head, I may need to shout at several crows before the head landing ceased. 

Within a minute or so I felt another crow land on my head. So I shouted, "Hey! Stop that! I'm not a tree."  That immediately ended the head landings for the day, which made me conclude that only one crow was landing on my head that whole time.  I wonder what he was thinking ... (The other crows continue to follow me to beg for peanuts.)

Later that night I asked my husband to look at the top of my head to check whether I had a little sign saying "For more peanuts, land here."  I may never know why that crow landed on my head so many times ...

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

January Update

I haven't posted for over 2 months. Lots happened, but not much medical news. A friend told me that she rarely read my blog, because I just talked about medical conditions. I previously posted what I thought others might like to read, but during the past year used this blog to track symptoms while I slowly increased my thyroid supplement up to an effective dose. Since I reached that effective (no more hypo symptoms) last August, I didn't have much news to post during the past few months. 

I should probably update what I last posted about visiting my doc and getting IAG (arabinogalactin) to fight frequent colds. I used that for several days and felt better rapidly. However, I had forgotten how much gas and bloating side effects I experienced when I took IAG regularly. Because my doc mentioned that DHEA helps with immunity, bone and brain health, I decided to resume taking DHEA, which has no side effects at low levels (I take 2.5 mg sublingual daily). So I stopped taking IAG and stopped the 'side effects'. Since I resumed DHEA, I've had no real colds. Occasionally I get slight cold symptoms (sinus headache or throat tickle or slight sore throat or fatigue), but slightly increasing my DHEA (to 4.0mg daily) or just getting more sleep or even eating very spicy food or ginger cookies quickly eliminates those symptoms without developing a real cold.

Also my doc requested another NTX (bone health) test.  I 'passed' in the normal range again.  So when my HMO PC pesters me about getting a bone scan (which I consider unnecessary radiation), I can tell her 2 NTX tests showed that I am NOT excreting bone.  I may have lost bone during all those years when she misdiagnosed my celiac disease symptoms (and I wasn't absorbing calcium). However, I've been gluten free for almost 9 years and the NTX tests indicated that I'm not losing bone.

Another interesting (okay, excellent) side effect of taking an effective level of T3 supplement is that I can eat as much as I want of anything (to which I don't have diagnosed allergies) and not gain weight.  During the holidays I baked a birthday cake for my husband the day before Thanksgiving. So we enjoyed cake (and ice cream a few times) well into December. Then I started baking 5 kinds of Christmas cookies (thanks to my allergy free baking books). I missed pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving (when we had leftover birthday cake). So I had to make pumpkin pie and a dairy/soy free topping for Christmas dinner.  Sometime during the holidays (New Year's?) I decided to make muffins after tiring of pancakes with syrup and sausage for weekend breakfasts. So we've enjoyed homemade cranberry/coconut muffins every weekend since then.  We still have a few Christmas cookies left (2, 2, 3 and 20 of my favorites which I rarely share) of the 5 batches I baked, even after giving away 5 gift plates to members of our church group. We may finish all the cookies and muffins just in time for my birthday (less than 2 weeks away), when I plan to make an apple spice bundt cake with maple glaze.  After eating all those goodies plus regular meals I weigh less than I did during my last mid November post.

 I need to clarify that I'm not one of those people who can ignore fullness, when I eat. If  I don't stop when I feel comfortably full, the next symptom is 'painfully' full.  So I rarely graze or binge eat, although I did that regularly during previous years.  Maybe having H. Pylori, Celiac Disease and all those gut bug infections shrunk my stomach. Or maybe having normal metabolism thanks to thyroid supplements means I burn more of what I eat. I suspect that I must have restricted my calories enough during all those years I had hypothryoidism so that I wasn't overweight.  So now that I have normal metabolism, I can eat whatever and actually lost weight, but I'm learning to choose more dense calorie foods, rather than too many 'healthy' fruits and vegies.

Maybe the previous paragraphs still sound like 'medical' updates.  Lemesee ... after all that baking, eating and holiday outings (Christmas shopping, seeing holiday displays, church services and 2 ice skating sessions at local holiday rinks), I'm finally getting back to my first love, sewing. Maybe that should be 'clothes', because I sew for myself. Right now I'm altering garments that don't fit as well as I'd like.

 I also took a pair of (expensive) designer jeans back to Nordstrom and used my alterations credit  I purchased those over 4 years ago and wore them maybe 3x, because they were wide leg. I liked the high waist feature, but I realized the wide leg part really didn't flatter my short legs after I started buying more skinny jeans.  So I had them altered to 'boot cut'. The leg opening as still wider than I like, but the denim was so heavy that I didn't want to make trouser or skinny jeans. The weight of the jeans makes them hang well. With a short jacket and boots, the altered jeans make my legs look very long, which I need just to look normal rather than 'penguin' shaped. LOL

I can't remember whether or how much I posted about our "Course in Miracles" group.  Meetings were moved from the church library to the leader's house (which is about 7 minute drive from our house).  Then the leader asked that we rotate leadership for meetings.  One member volunteered for the first rotated leader meeting. So I volunteered for the next meeting, which will occur this coming Thursday. (We also changed the meeting day.) I only have a vague idea of  how I will lead the meeting/discussion.  Hopefully that will just come to me during meditation or sleep or somehow before Thursday night ...

That's enough update. Maybe next time I'll have less medical news ... or not. LOL