Today, we live longer and longer. It is up to us to see that we live a healthy life so that in our older years, we can have a healthy old age. The following ides are from Tri Vita vitamins and I have copied them here so that I can talk about them with those of you who read these.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THOSE WHO LIVE TO 100 AND PAST
Good longevity genes
Emotional resilience – ability to adapt to life's events
Resistance to stress – excellent coping skills
Self-sufficiency
Intellectual activity
Good sense of humor, including about themselves
Religious beliefs
Strong connections with other people
Low blood pressure
Appreciation of simple pleasures and experiences
Women tend to have borne children after age 40
Zest for life
Don't currently smoke or drink heavily
Many play musical instruments
Follow an anti-inflammatory diet that has been linked with longevity (eg, Mediterranean diet)
SOME ARE GENETICALLY PRIVILEGED
If any of your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and siblings have lived to extreme old age and if your family has a low incidence of diseases like cancer, Alzheimer's, diabetes and heart disease, congratulations! You are considered to have optimal anti-aging genes and have a great chance to make it to 100 if you take reasonable care of yourself
TUNE UP YOUR ATTITUDE
REDUCE STRESS. Try meditation, exercise or yoga. You can learn to modify your responses to negative situations even if you can't change your basic personality.
STAY CONNECTED WITH OTHER PEOPLE: Social support is vital and maintaining close relationships is associated with better physical and mental health.
CULTIVATE OPTIMISM: A Mayo Clinic study shows that optimists live longer and have better health, because pessimism may lower immune system responsiveness and enhance tumor growth. Good news: an excessively pessimistic outlook on life is changeable. Brief programs can change your thinking about life events and lower the risk for physical illness and even death.
WATCH YOUR DIET
EMPHASIZE FRUITS AND VEGETABLES, whole grains, fiber and polyunsaturated fats.
AVOID CHOLESTEROL, SATURATED FAT AND HYDROGENATED FAT (red meat, egg yolks, fast food burgers and fries, etc), which are linked to heart disease, breast cancer and prostate cancer.
AVOID REFINED SUGAR and excessive calorie intake.
AVOID PROCESSED FOODS and those supplemented with high fructose corn syrup.
ONE GLASS OF RED WINE A DAY still appears to lower the risk of heart disease.
DRINK GREEN TEA, which has antioxidants that may fight cancers.
CONSIDER TAKING ANTIOXIDANT SUPPLEMENTS like Vitamin C, Vitamin E and selenium. But if you choose this path, be sure to follow the medical literature on vitamin risks.
CONSIDER SUPPLEMENTING YOUR DIET with omega-3 fatty acids.
EXERCISE: even a little helps
Just 15-30 minutes a day of walking or bicycling is enough to gain longevity benefits and reduce the risk of heart disease and cancer. Resistance exercise, for example, walking up stairs or hills, guards against loss of muscle mass and benefits the heart. Exercise also provides a sense of well-being and helps maintain an agile and alert brain.
USE YOUR HEAD
According to the NECS researchers, retaining cognitive capacity "most often determines whether people can attain extreme old age while remaining active." Here is a sampling of mental workouts that can keep the brain razor-sharp as you age:
Crossword and jigsaw puzzles
Playing bridge
Learning foreign languages
Playing musical instruments
Learning dance steps
Writing
Sports, including yoga and tai chi
Taking classes
Traveling
Memory training
Experiencing the new and unfamiliar
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Friday, February 26, 2010
THE GOD-SHAPED HOLE WITHIN US
If I may synthesize the words of Blaise Pascal, a great thinker of the 17th century, and a theory of Dr. Mehmet Oz, contemporary America’s most trusted doctor, there is a God-shaped hole within us that we are forever restless in trying to fill. And in order to fill that hole, we long for something in our lives that is greater and deeper than our everyday reality of sleep, eat, work, home, repeat; knowing that filling that longing will give us a sense of purpose and raise our self-esteem. Some try to fill that hole with money, some with achievement, others turn to alcohol or drugs, still others to shopping and accumulating things, and some to food.
Scientists say there are biochemical reasons for this need for soul level satisfaction we seek, that we need oxytocin or nitric oxide, two chemicals that give us a feeling of satisfaction and reduce anxiety and stress. And although this soul- level of satisfaction is biochemical, it is still a drive, not for food or things, money or drugs, but a drive to fill the needs of our soul, the need to put God in the God-shaped hole deep within us.
And when we have placed God in His rightful place in our lives and continue to see Him there, we no longer crave the money, the fame, the luxuries, the food in amounts far beyond our needs.
Friday, February 19, 2010
FRENCH BREAD EXTRAORDINAIRE
in her own words by bj, my friend
1 1/2 pound loaf bread machine - finishes out to one large round or oblong hand shaped loaf or two long baguettes.
1 ½ cups plus 2 tablespoons water
2 teaspoons salt
1.5 pounds or 4 2/3 cups unbleached white bread flour
2 1/2 t. dry yeast
Place ingredients in bread pan - set machine for dough cycle, start.
When dough cycle ends, machine will beep. I just leave the dough alone for as
long as 6 hours and just go do my life.
Give it a good punch and turn it out of the pan. I don't mess around with it much when I turn it out - just plop it out on counter and start to shape. Either shape into one large round loaf (flattening slightly with hands) or two long baguettes.
Place ingredients in bread pan - set machine for dough cycle, start.
When dough cycle ends, machine will beep. I just leave the dough alone for as
long as 6 hours and just go do my life.
Give it a good punch and turn it out of the pan. I don't mess around with it much when I turn it out - just plop it out on counter and start to shape. Either shape into one large round loaf (flattening slightly with hands) or two long baguettes.
I hand shape and put on an unheated baking stone.
Alternatively you could use a cookie sheet -- just keep an eye on it so the bottom does not burn if you are using a cookie sheet. Cover loosely with dish towel –
Let rise again about 1 hour. If the dough is sticky, sprinkle with a little flour so you can work it - just a little - and remember -- you are in charge of your dough!!!!
While bread is rising - preheat oven to 500 degrees.
While bread is rising - preheat oven to 500 degrees.
Have a spray bottle full of water before you put this in the oven.
At this point I slash the bread with a very sharp knife or a razor deeply and IMMEDIATELY put it in the oven –
I am spraying with the water in the mister as I am doing this. The bread will look like it is collapsing from the slash - but it should come back up.
Just be sure you do not slash it until RIGHT BEFORE you place in oven.
Just be sure you do not slash it until RIGHT BEFORE you place in oven.
Place in 500 degree oven, spraying oven and briefly lightly over bread with water in a mister. Set timer for 5 mins.
Spray well again, reduce heat to 450 degrees for 20 mins., spraying one or two more times with water early in the 20 mins. Just open the oven and start spraying.
Remove bread from oven and remove from baking stone or cookie sheet - cool
on rack to cool. Wrap well in Saran and freeze.
on rack to cool. Wrap well in Saran and freeze.
Notes
I shape this into either a round loaf, an oblong loaf or two long baguettes
- -- this is our house bread -- i make this many times a week - we love it. It
is also fat free.
- -- this is our house bread -- i make this many times a week - we love it. It
is also fat free.
I actually spray more frequently than this - especially in that first five
mins and then the early part of the 20 mins. at 450. I do not like the pan
of water deal that some people use - i recommend the use of this mister. I
spray everywhere - the heating element, the sides of the oven - i am fast -
Just before putting bread in oven, brush the bread all over top and sides with egg white (I keep these in the fridge in a covered jar - they will last for a few weeks –
and sprinkle with sesame and/or poppy seeds, if desired.
You can also make it without slashing. You can also not do the egg white /seed thing and leave plain or give it a good sifting of flour on the top before cutting.
And my notes ... from Linda:
I follow this pretty closely, using a scale to weigh the flour. That can make a big difference. I also spray several times in the first 15 minutes. That makes a good crust on the outside, the one that I often hear cracking as it cools.
And unless you are very strong, you will need a brad machine to knead the almost 5 cups of flour into a cup and a half of water.
I also finally bought a bread lame, a device that slashes the bread loaf just right to leave room for the bread to expand as it needs.
I make this for all occasions as it is wonderful with all food and it smells so good while baking. You all do enjoy.
THE SAGA OF THE BREAD, PART NEXT
You have to understand. I make a wonderful loaf of French Bread. I make a terrific Milk and Honey Bread. Years ago, when I taught in Quanah, I made wonderful sourdough bread which I often took to school for my students. And beautiful sourdough rolls.
Thus, when King Arthur advertised its New England sourdough starter from 1763, I wanted to once more bake beautiful sourdough rolls. They can be so lovely in the morning. And so began my attempts to reproduce what I had baked so many years ago. No longer having that recipe and having no idea who might have it, I turned to the Internet. From that and the King Arthur Flour website, I collected about 20 sourdough bread recipes and then chose three or four to try.
I have written about my earlier attempts with the sourdough starter and how none of them was what I was looking for; but nothing was as "blogworthy" as this last attempt at sourdough bread. Selecting an aptly named Old San Francisco Sourdough Bread recipe, I took the starter from the refrigerator Tuesday morning and went through the sequence of throwing away a portion, feeding the rest with a half cup of water and a cup of flour, stirring it together, and leaving it several hours to proof.
Now, the truth is that you usually leave the starter to ripen for about four hours; and although I knew that I had a very busy day ahead, I thought I could handle it all. And off I went to dash across town to the bank and back to Central Market for fresh produce and extra "goodies." Of course, everything took much more time than I had planned; and by the time I had all of the food in the house Tuesday afternoon, it was later than I had planned.
Of course, friends stopped by to chat, the telephone rang, I needed to chart my eating on MYPLATE.com, I was hungry, and the doorbell rang. By the time I got back to the kitchen to wash the various fruits and vegetables and package them for storage, the starter had been ripening to the point that I feared it might be overly ripe! Have you ever smelled sourdough starter? Have you ever smelled bad sourdough starter? Ripe is NOT the right word. And I was sinking. I had not eaten in hours. I was hungry. I knew that the blood glucose was down. I wanted food.
And I was tired. Very tired. With Fibro, there are rules about just what you should do in one day. One of those rules says that grocery shopping should be done on a day when you do nothing else at all. This wasn't going to be that day. I had things to do. I had to eat. And so I took another look at the ripe starter and it was still quite fine. I hastily prepared one of those meals that I do when I have no time and I have to eat: a slice of roast turkey and canned green beans warmed together in the oven. It's fast and it tastes good as I season it well. That taken care of, I began dealing with the produce; and about two in the morning, I turned to the starter. It smelled good; it looked fine. All was going to be wonderful. There would be fresh bread tomorrow.
Running to the computer, I dug into the recipe collection there: documents>written documents>recipes>bread>sourdough breads>SAN FRANCISCO STYLE SOURDOUGH BREAD. It was simple. I could do that one in the bread machine. That's how I do my French bread: set it up at night to make dough and leave it there to rise about six hours, wake up, take out the beautiful dough, make out the bread, set it to rise, set an alarm, take a nap, wake, and bake bread. That's how I did it forty years ago; that's how I would do it now.
And I went to sleep. (If you remember how my sleeping med works, I take a dose, sleep 4 hours, wake, take a second dose, sleep about three hours, and wake again.) I woke a little after noon, feeling terrible, stumbling around like fibro people do on a bad day. I went into the kitchen and remembered what I had forgotten as I slept all through the night: there sat the bread machine and I knew there was bread dough inside. But after sitting there for ten or eleven hours, what sort of state it would be in I was about to discover.
I could see on the sides of the machine bread pan where it had risen up and fallen back. That might be OK. But the dough looked funny. Something didn't look right. It wasn't as much bread dough as it was a batter of some sort. I read the instructions to knead the dough and shape it into a round boule. The stuff in that bread pan was not going to shape into anything. Perhaps, I should reread the recipe.
Well, first of all, for this one recipe using a sourdough starter, the instructions said to measure the starter cold, straight from the refrigerator. That would certainly make a difference. In other words, instead of using one and a half cups of cold starter, I had used one and a half cups of ripened starter. That would make a big difference as the dough went together. Oh my ...
And so, I laid out the silicone mat on which I knead and shape and all that, covered it with a layer of bench flour into which to pour whatever it was in that bread machine pan, and did just that. And that dough did pour out onto the mat ... as if it were batter! Can't you just see that thick batter sprawling out all over the mat? It spread faster than I could contain it. What was I going to do with that mess? Scoop it up and into the prepared bread pan? What would that bake into?
As I looked at it, inching its way to the edge of the counter, I decided to add more flour and perhaps work it into the mass to make it more like dough. I folded the mat over the creeping mass of whatever it was and turned to get the flour. As I picked up the scoop inside the bread flour container, I read the handle which read 3/4 cup! Well, another error there in the exhaustion of the night before: for every cup of flour the recipe had called for, I had put in only three-fourths of a cup. I was a cup off what was called for. No wonder, I had such a mess of flour paste there on the counter. What on earth could I do to save this?
I worked a cup of flour into the stuff there, poured it into the bread pan, covered it, set it to rise for an hour, and left it to do its thing. I had things to do. But I felt so bad. I wanted only to sleep or sit and stare at the TV or anything that was nothing. I came to the computer. Might as well read some of my email. Somehow, it was 5:30. The TV news came and went and I continued on the computer. The Olympics came on and I got so wrapped up in what I was seeing that I forgot all about watching American Idol. Besides, it was now about 9:30 and I was hungry.
Funny. Coming down the hall heading for the kitchen, I could smell something in the oven. The oven! The thoughts washed over me: I turned on the oven to heat in order to bake the bread. The bread! I had again forgotten the bread! As I looked at it, I could tell that this was going to be very interesting. It had risen to the top of the bread pan and no higher. I suppose that the yeast had been completely worn out the night before. Oh well. I might as well bake it. And so I did. And so I did.
I have never before taken a fresh loaf of bread from the oven and not wanted to cut it right then while it was hot, wanted to slather butter all over it and eat it right then. I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do with this stuff. Do you want to know what it was like? Well, not bad. Not too good, but not bad. It had the consistency of batter bread, except maybe twice as heavy. And it needed more salt ... and I had used more than the recipe called for.
And this morning, I made toast from it. Not bad. Still not good enough to spend my carbohydrate count on it. I think that there is something wrong with the recipe. I need to stay with the King Arthur recipes. I shall toss this experiment in confusion and make a good loaf of my French Bread Extraordinaire. I'll post the recipe for that one so that you all can share the good bread. This is a French bread that you will want to eat straight from the oven. It is crusty on the outside and chewy on the inside. Sometimes, you can hear the crust cracking as it cools just out from the oven. Oh, it is so good.
A good diagonal slice across one end and I get the "Pope's nose," the very best part of the bread and this one I will slather with lots of sweet cream butter, maybe even some apricot jam ... or honey that somehow will get on my elbows while I am eating. Sometimes, it is so good that I have to have another thick slice. You are invited to join me with that one also.
Thus, when King Arthur advertised its New England sourdough starter from 1763, I wanted to once more bake beautiful sourdough rolls. They can be so lovely in the morning. And so began my attempts to reproduce what I had baked so many years ago. No longer having that recipe and having no idea who might have it, I turned to the Internet. From that and the King Arthur Flour website, I collected about 20 sourdough bread recipes and then chose three or four to try.
I have written about my earlier attempts with the sourdough starter and how none of them was what I was looking for; but nothing was as "blogworthy" as this last attempt at sourdough bread. Selecting an aptly named Old San Francisco Sourdough Bread recipe, I took the starter from the refrigerator Tuesday morning and went through the sequence of throwing away a portion, feeding the rest with a half cup of water and a cup of flour, stirring it together, and leaving it several hours to proof.
Now, the truth is that you usually leave the starter to ripen for about four hours; and although I knew that I had a very busy day ahead, I thought I could handle it all. And off I went to dash across town to the bank and back to Central Market for fresh produce and extra "goodies." Of course, everything took much more time than I had planned; and by the time I had all of the food in the house Tuesday afternoon, it was later than I had planned.
Of course, friends stopped by to chat, the telephone rang, I needed to chart my eating on MYPLATE.com, I was hungry, and the doorbell rang. By the time I got back to the kitchen to wash the various fruits and vegetables and package them for storage, the starter had been ripening to the point that I feared it might be overly ripe! Have you ever smelled sourdough starter? Have you ever smelled bad sourdough starter? Ripe is NOT the right word. And I was sinking. I had not eaten in hours. I was hungry. I knew that the blood glucose was down. I wanted food.
And I was tired. Very tired. With Fibro, there are rules about just what you should do in one day. One of those rules says that grocery shopping should be done on a day when you do nothing else at all. This wasn't going to be that day. I had things to do. I had to eat. And so I took another look at the ripe starter and it was still quite fine. I hastily prepared one of those meals that I do when I have no time and I have to eat: a slice of roast turkey and canned green beans warmed together in the oven. It's fast and it tastes good as I season it well. That taken care of, I began dealing with the produce; and about two in the morning, I turned to the starter. It smelled good; it looked fine. All was going to be wonderful. There would be fresh bread tomorrow.
Running to the computer, I dug into the recipe collection there: documents>written documents>recipes>bread>sourdough breads>SAN FRANCISCO STYLE SOURDOUGH BREAD. It was simple. I could do that one in the bread machine. That's how I do my French bread: set it up at night to make dough and leave it there to rise about six hours, wake up, take out the beautiful dough, make out the bread, set it to rise, set an alarm, take a nap, wake, and bake bread. That's how I did it forty years ago; that's how I would do it now.
And I went to sleep. (If you remember how my sleeping med works, I take a dose, sleep 4 hours, wake, take a second dose, sleep about three hours, and wake again.) I woke a little after noon, feeling terrible, stumbling around like fibro people do on a bad day. I went into the kitchen and remembered what I had forgotten as I slept all through the night: there sat the bread machine and I knew there was bread dough inside. But after sitting there for ten or eleven hours, what sort of state it would be in I was about to discover.
I could see on the sides of the machine bread pan where it had risen up and fallen back. That might be OK. But the dough looked funny. Something didn't look right. It wasn't as much bread dough as it was a batter of some sort. I read the instructions to knead the dough and shape it into a round boule. The stuff in that bread pan was not going to shape into anything. Perhaps, I should reread the recipe.
Well, first of all, for this one recipe using a sourdough starter, the instructions said to measure the starter cold, straight from the refrigerator. That would certainly make a difference. In other words, instead of using one and a half cups of cold starter, I had used one and a half cups of ripened starter. That would make a big difference as the dough went together. Oh my ...
And so, I laid out the silicone mat on which I knead and shape and all that, covered it with a layer of bench flour into which to pour whatever it was in that bread machine pan, and did just that. And that dough did pour out onto the mat ... as if it were batter! Can't you just see that thick batter sprawling out all over the mat? It spread faster than I could contain it. What was I going to do with that mess? Scoop it up and into the prepared bread pan? What would that bake into?
As I looked at it, inching its way to the edge of the counter, I decided to add more flour and perhaps work it into the mass to make it more like dough. I folded the mat over the creeping mass of whatever it was and turned to get the flour. As I picked up the scoop inside the bread flour container, I read the handle which read 3/4 cup! Well, another error there in the exhaustion of the night before: for every cup of flour the recipe had called for, I had put in only three-fourths of a cup. I was a cup off what was called for. No wonder, I had such a mess of flour paste there on the counter. What on earth could I do to save this?
I worked a cup of flour into the stuff there, poured it into the bread pan, covered it, set it to rise for an hour, and left it to do its thing. I had things to do. But I felt so bad. I wanted only to sleep or sit and stare at the TV or anything that was nothing. I came to the computer. Might as well read some of my email. Somehow, it was 5:30. The TV news came and went and I continued on the computer. The Olympics came on and I got so wrapped up in what I was seeing that I forgot all about watching American Idol. Besides, it was now about 9:30 and I was hungry.
Funny. Coming down the hall heading for the kitchen, I could smell something in the oven. The oven! The thoughts washed over me: I turned on the oven to heat in order to bake the bread. The bread! I had again forgotten the bread! As I looked at it, I could tell that this was going to be very interesting. It had risen to the top of the bread pan and no higher. I suppose that the yeast had been completely worn out the night before. Oh well. I might as well bake it. And so I did. And so I did.
I have never before taken a fresh loaf of bread from the oven and not wanted to cut it right then while it was hot, wanted to slather butter all over it and eat it right then. I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do with this stuff. Do you want to know what it was like? Well, not bad. Not too good, but not bad. It had the consistency of batter bread, except maybe twice as heavy. And it needed more salt ... and I had used more than the recipe called for.
And this morning, I made toast from it. Not bad. Still not good enough to spend my carbohydrate count on it. I think that there is something wrong with the recipe. I need to stay with the King Arthur recipes. I shall toss this experiment in confusion and make a good loaf of my French Bread Extraordinaire. I'll post the recipe for that one so that you all can share the good bread. This is a French bread that you will want to eat straight from the oven. It is crusty on the outside and chewy on the inside. Sometimes, you can hear the crust cracking as it cools just out from the oven. Oh, it is so good.
A good diagonal slice across one end and I get the "Pope's nose," the very best part of the bread and this one I will slather with lots of sweet cream butter, maybe even some apricot jam ... or honey that somehow will get on my elbows while I am eating. Sometimes, it is so good that I have to have another thick slice. You are invited to join me with that one also.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
THE SAGA OF THE BREAD
is not being written tonight. Because I think of myself as a writer, having been doing this since high school and having been a member of Sigma Tau Delta, I can't just toss something down. I work at it. And since I really need some sleep, writing must wait until tomorrow. It's better that way. Believe me.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
HELP FOR FIBROMYALGIA?
I should have read these articles sooner, but I had read Dr. Teitelbaum before and he hadn't told me anything that new. But something sent me to his web site today. I don't know that I know what... something I read on the Real Age web site sent me looking for information on D-Ribose. The name rang a very distant bell, but it really didn't mean that much to me.
What I learned is that D-Ribose is a natural sugar that the body produces. The body then uses this to create adenosine triphosphat, ATP, which in turn creates energy for every part of the body: muscles and brain. If the body fails to produce Ribose, then the body experiences fatigue and the brain doesn't always function the way it once did. Now, all that I had known for years is that energy was produced by B vitamins and sugar. I had tried all the B vitamins one could take with no result. I had simply given up, assuming that the Fibro had taken away all of the energy the B's could give. Now, I was reading about the real source of energy in the body.
B vitamins are a key component of this energy, but Dr Teitelbaum felt that a key component was missing. When he studied the biochemistry of energy molecules, he saw that they are also made of 2 other key components — adenine and Ribose. Adenine is plentiful in the body and supplementing with adenine had not helped CFS. And so he and his research team turned to Ribose. Ribose is made in the body in a slow, laborious process and cannot be found in food. He knew that CFS/FMS causes the body to dump other key energy molecules like Acetyl-L-Carnitine. And then he found that the body did the same with Ribose, making it hard to get the furnaces working again even after the other problems were treated. Without Ribose, the fire was out.
The more Dr. Teitelbaum had researched, the more he had become convinced that D-Ribose could make a difference in the lives of patients with CFS and FMS, Chronic Fatigue and Fibromyalgia. And it did. Reading this, I got excited. What if there were something else to try, something that might actually work? After all, I am 71 (Real Age 65). How much energy am I looking for? I continued to read.
Dr. Teitelbaum's experiments with real patients showed that 2/3 of his patients experienced increased energy, well being, and/or decreased pain with regular use. Decreased pain? Increased energy? Why had I not heard about this? Why hadn't I read this article months before when I had been to this website. A recently concluded study showed a 59% increase in energy for the participants who used Ribose.
That was it. That was his conclusion. He is now using this product in clinics all over the United States, one of which is right here in Fort Worth. I had known about it, but ... Well, they do not file insurance. I have no idea whether Medicare would pay any of it; and if they did, Medicare wouldn't pay what the doctors in that clinic wanted to charge. Dr. Larry Sharpe here uses it; but I would have to pay him up front also, and then wait to be reimbursed. He had told me that I would need $2000 to start the program in his clinic. I didn't go to his clinic either.
Now, I might possibly be able to do it by myself ... with the help of my current doctor and the expense of a great deal of money to purchase the products, none of them covered by insurance. None of them needs a prescription for which insurance would reimburse. All can be purchased at the different health food stores. And Dr. Teitelbaum has posted his program on his web site for anyone to follow. There is a support group for his program here in Fort Worth ... in MY zip code.
And so, because I never give up, I am going to try one more time to find something that might make a major difference in my life, something that promises to give me more energy and less pain. First, I have to purchase the big product, D-Ribose $45.00 and the other vitamins that will complete it, another $40.00. But his website returned the information that they are OUT of product.
I had made up my mind. I was ready to try something. It felt like NOW or never. I did a search and found the right product, Corvalens, at Amazon. And Amazon was OUT. Finally, I went to the manufacturer's site and ordered the product I decided that I was going to try. As I paid for it, I thought of all the new products I had decided to try this month: a vitamin D drink, an antioxidant product, a multi-vitamin and mineral, and now, this.
But if all this works, if adding this to the work at Carter Fitness Center and the recumbent bike at home, and the air stepper at home, and the so carefully prepared meals, and to the Probiotic and to the glucose control products, and the real attempt to sleep 7 or 8 hours every night no matter what else I really want to do, if any or if all of this works, I shall be a new woman, free of the pain and fatigue of Fibromyalgia. And you ALL will hear about it, probably every day for the rest of my life.
What I learned is that D-Ribose is a natural sugar that the body produces. The body then uses this to create adenosine triphosphat, ATP, which in turn creates energy for every part of the body: muscles and brain. If the body fails to produce Ribose, then the body experiences fatigue and the brain doesn't always function the way it once did. Now, all that I had known for years is that energy was produced by B vitamins and sugar. I had tried all the B vitamins one could take with no result. I had simply given up, assuming that the Fibro had taken away all of the energy the B's could give. Now, I was reading about the real source of energy in the body.
B vitamins are a key component of this energy, but Dr Teitelbaum felt that a key component was missing. When he studied the biochemistry of energy molecules, he saw that they are also made of 2 other key components — adenine and Ribose. Adenine is plentiful in the body and supplementing with adenine had not helped CFS. And so he and his research team turned to Ribose. Ribose is made in the body in a slow, laborious process and cannot be found in food. He knew that CFS/FMS causes the body to dump other key energy molecules like Acetyl-L-Carnitine. And then he found that the body did the same with Ribose, making it hard to get the furnaces working again even after the other problems were treated. Without Ribose, the fire was out.
The more Dr. Teitelbaum had researched, the more he had become convinced that D-Ribose could make a difference in the lives of patients with CFS and FMS, Chronic Fatigue and Fibromyalgia. And it did. Reading this, I got excited. What if there were something else to try, something that might actually work? After all, I am 71 (Real Age 65). How much energy am I looking for? I continued to read.
Dr. Teitelbaum's experiments with real patients showed that 2/3 of his patients experienced increased energy, well being, and/or decreased pain with regular use. Decreased pain? Increased energy? Why had I not heard about this? Why hadn't I read this article months before when I had been to this website. A recently concluded study showed a 59% increase in energy for the participants who used Ribose.
That was it. That was his conclusion. He is now using this product in clinics all over the United States, one of which is right here in Fort Worth. I had known about it, but ... Well, they do not file insurance. I have no idea whether Medicare would pay any of it; and if they did, Medicare wouldn't pay what the doctors in that clinic wanted to charge. Dr. Larry Sharpe here uses it; but I would have to pay him up front also, and then wait to be reimbursed. He had told me that I would need $2000 to start the program in his clinic. I didn't go to his clinic either.
Now, I might possibly be able to do it by myself ... with the help of my current doctor and the expense of a great deal of money to purchase the products, none of them covered by insurance. None of them needs a prescription for which insurance would reimburse. All can be purchased at the different health food stores. And Dr. Teitelbaum has posted his program on his web site for anyone to follow. There is a support group for his program here in Fort Worth ... in MY zip code.
And so, because I never give up, I am going to try one more time to find something that might make a major difference in my life, something that promises to give me more energy and less pain. First, I have to purchase the big product, D-Ribose $45.00 and the other vitamins that will complete it, another $40.00. But his website returned the information that they are OUT of product.
I had made up my mind. I was ready to try something. It felt like NOW or never. I did a search and found the right product, Corvalens, at Amazon. And Amazon was OUT. Finally, I went to the manufacturer's site and ordered the product I decided that I was going to try. As I paid for it, I thought of all the new products I had decided to try this month: a vitamin D drink, an antioxidant product, a multi-vitamin and mineral, and now, this.
But if all this works, if adding this to the work at Carter Fitness Center and the recumbent bike at home, and the air stepper at home, and the so carefully prepared meals, and to the Probiotic and to the glucose control products, and the real attempt to sleep 7 or 8 hours every night no matter what else I really want to do, if any or if all of this works, I shall be a new woman, free of the pain and fatigue of Fibromyalgia. And you ALL will hear about it, probably every day for the rest of my life.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
OUR WINTER WONDERLAND
I don't think that I had ever seen anything so lovely. I didn't have to drive in it; I didn't have to work in it. All I had to do was watch it; and I did just that. It began Thursday morning just before four o'clock, just about the time I went to sleep. Wednesday afternoon it had been cold, cold and damp, the wind stinging when it hit my face; but I didn't think about that as I went to bed. I didn't look to see if the promised snow were beginning.
When I woke Thursday morning, my world was covered in snow, snow deep enough to have covered everything completely. Why, the meteorologists had predicted snow, but only enough to cover the grass somewhat, not enough to stick in the streets. Besides, the temperature wasn't going to go below thirty-three, not cold enough for the snow to even stay around. But here it was, piled up on everything. I grabbed my camera and went outside. Each time, I looked at the temperature, it continued to read 33.
But once back inside, I got busy, doing I know not what; but I did think about the snow from time to time and when I would look out, the snow was still falling, big flakes, thick snow, covering everything. Snow piled up on tree branches, covered cars, completely blanketed the streets. It continued to snow, pausing only briefly for a few minutes in the afternoon.
Later that night, those same meteorologists were saying that the snow would surely end by midnight; but at midnight, it still continued to fall. Quiet, beautiful, still, the world I live in was completely covered in snow.
On FaceBook, everyone was posting their photos of the world in the snow. Snow for us was such a new thing, such an unusual thing, something we only see on TV news, that everyone was rushing to document this anyway they could. I wrote about it on FaceBook so that Friends from California to Florida to upper New York State could see our snow.
Everywhere else, the snow had left drifts in feet, not our inches; but our few inches were such a new thing for us that we compared our snow to their snow, even when they scoffed.
Several of us had wondered why the snow continued to fall and yet when we measured the snow, it did not seem to really change. I never measured above four inches. And then I realized that with the temperature at 33 and 34, the snow was melting from the bottom. Only those with cumulative rain gauges would get a correct measurement. Only after everything was all over could we hear that we had had an official 12 1/2 inches of snow.
Friday morning, the sun was shining, the snow having stopped about four in the morning. It was still quiet, but the streets were rutted and the cars were moving. The main streets were clear; the sides streets, ice ruts; and everywhere the big trees so common in my part of town were heavily laden with snow ... and breaking.
It seems that those trees with long branches loaded with leaves, the Live Oak and the Magnolias, held so much snow that the branches simply couldn't bear the weight and were splitting from the tree trunks and falling into the streets and into the yards. These were beautiful trees that had been such striking features in the yards of the lovely homes in this area. Now, so much of their branches were firewood.
And so, today, it has ended. The sun shines brightly and the constant drip of melting snow tells me that the snow will soon be gone. The temperature is in the forties today; will reach the fifties by Monday; and once again it will be Texas in the winter with most days, sunny days, green buds on many trees, and Spring, just around the corner.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
MAGIC JACK
Of course, I have to watch my pennies. I'm a retired teacher and as such, the amount of my retirement check is determined by the legislature; and the last time that we had a raise was 2001. I could ask if you know just how much prices have changed since that year; but of course, you do. You are living with this economy as well. And this isn't easy at all.
Anyway, recently, I, just like so many others, have been looking for ways to reduce expenses in order to have a little money at the end of the month. My Internet I had to keep and I really like my connection through Charter and wanted to keep that. And the cable TV is the only recreation and entertainment expense I have had for a long time, having let magazine subscriptions go, even finally letting the newspaper go .. and I have been reading the Fort Worth Star Telegram since 1942.
My telephone connection is very important to me, but I simply could no longer afford that one. Even though I tried to keep it under $100 a month, it kept inching up and up. Finally, I bought MagicJack; and after looking at it for 6 months, I installed it. You know what? I am very happy with it. It works... well. My calls are crisp and clear. My telephone does work just as it always has worked. You know what? I like MagicJack.
For those who are questioning, I do have a telephone to use just in case something happens and the computer connection goes down. Yes, I have a cell phone, a Tracfone, so that I can control that expense also. I couldn't deal with the contracts with the big charges for those others. Sprint made me crazy.
So, here I sit tonight, quite contentedly, happy with my Tracfone and my MagicJack, ready to talk to anyone at anytime. My costs for communication are finally controlled and I am a happy woman.
Anyway, recently, I, just like so many others, have been looking for ways to reduce expenses in order to have a little money at the end of the month. My Internet I had to keep and I really like my connection through Charter and wanted to keep that. And the cable TV is the only recreation and entertainment expense I have had for a long time, having let magazine subscriptions go, even finally letting the newspaper go .. and I have been reading the Fort Worth Star Telegram since 1942.
My telephone connection is very important to me, but I simply could no longer afford that one. Even though I tried to keep it under $100 a month, it kept inching up and up. Finally, I bought MagicJack; and after looking at it for 6 months, I installed it. You know what? I am very happy with it. It works... well. My calls are crisp and clear. My telephone does work just as it always has worked. You know what? I like MagicJack.
For those who are questioning, I do have a telephone to use just in case something happens and the computer connection goes down. Yes, I have a cell phone, a Tracfone, so that I can control that expense also. I couldn't deal with the contracts with the big charges for those others. Sprint made me crazy.
So, here I sit tonight, quite contentedly, happy with my Tracfone and my MagicJack, ready to talk to anyone at anytime. My costs for communication are finally controlled and I am a happy woman.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)