Weight Benefit Seen Even if Mothers Are Obese or Have Diabetes

Sept. 26, 2006 — Breastfed babies are less likely to grow into overweight children than those fed formula, even if their mothers are obese or have diabetes, research confirms.

Exclusively breastfed babies had roughly a 34% reduced risk of being overweight during childhood, compared to children exclusively formula-fed, according to a new analysis of data from a study involving more than 15,000 children

Read the rest here.

*No, this does not mean I think the government should ever dictate or badger women into nursing! But FTLOG, a little support would be nice.

One friend miscarried and wanted help writing a way to let her family know about it (she’d only just told them). Another is frustrated with her job and working too many hours, but not quite prepared to let her employer know that they’re using her. A third just called (out of the blue — she’s almost more an acquaintance) asking if she could come stay with me for a few days on an emergent basis — it sounds like she’s reached the point of fearing her husband. I have space, so I almost consider it an obligation to help, because I *can.*

~~~~~

Within the past week, I’ve started to lean more toward getting a Masters degree in Counseling and setting any PhD plans aside until later. When I look at my life, my finances, and my location, it simply makes more sense. After a chat with the Fitness Director at my gym recently, I might also consider adding a personal training certification to that mix. Who knows, maybe instead of chasing the doctorate (yet), I can build a practice that focuses on wellness of the entire individual, physical, mental, and emotional.

Not so, not so.

After reading the article, (really, go read it) I see it a different way. When saying “fat is back,” the folks at details aren’t calling the women fat, but rather saying that they have fat on their bodies, a normal, healthy thing for all women. Frankly, I love seeing the return of curves, but I’m biased in that direction. Even when I’m a size four, I have very curvy hips. Since having a baby, I might even have boobs at a size four, too — but I don’t expect to ever learn whether that’s true or not.

It took me years to get here, but I realize now that in MY body, I simply don’t look good at any size lower than a six. Even a six is pushing it a bit. Comparing myself to someone with a stick-straight figure and naturally narrow hipbones is insane. Of *course* that person will wear a zero or two! That’s what their bone structure demands! A size zero on me would look positively anorexic — a strong-boned skeleton in motion. Ick.

True story — the other night, my father commented that I looked great, and asked if I’d lost some weight. After I gave him grief about his phrasing (What? I looked awful before? Perhaps you might say instead, ‘you look thinner; have you lost weight?’), I mentioned that yes, I’d dropped perhaps eight pounds over the past few weeks, and told him what my weight had been at the endocrinologist’s appointment on August 2. His jaw dropped, as did my (bird-boned, narrow-shouldered, no-hips) grandmother’s. You couldn’t *possibly* have weighed that! Where did you put it? And you weight what now? Anatomy lesson time, folks… I carefully explained to both of them that I am naturally quite muscular and strong. I would wear a smaller size now at 130 (not my actual weight…yet) than I did in high school at 110-115 — and look better, too.

Back to my initial point — I now find myself vaguely irritated at Amanda’s initial post. It, in my opinion (YMMV, as always) was misleading as to the nature of the actual article, which expressed hope that a trend toward more healthy, round female bodies will continue.

I’ll drink to that.

I will say this, though — the pig/sparkly shoes photo? Tacky and in bad taste.

I added this shot to my match profile (the version there is dated: 8/12/06). I figured I might as well try my bestest to avoid another of these situations.

Thoughts?

Freddy joined us for this Saturday’s hike, and he said Joy and I put him to shame. I’m not so sure about THAT, but it’s a nice ego stroke. We’ll try our 14ers next year. Freddy’s doing another one THIS WEEK. For now, I’m satisfied with meeting up for a beer or three and a few games of pool.

The whole gang, left to right: Maya, Allison, Freddy, Joy, and Dominic.

One gal sent this article with the email titled, “Proof that moms’ nights out are medically necessary:”

A landmark UCLA study suggests friendships between women are special. They shape who we are and who we are yet to be. They soothe our tumultuous inner world, fill the emotional gaps in our marriage, and help us remember who we really are. By the way, they may do even more. Scientists now suspect that hanging out with our friends can actually counteract the kind of stomach-quivering stress most of us experience on a daily basis.

Here, here. This is where working from home can be the worst of all worlds. I don’t have the freedom to parent full-time (say, at the zoo on any given Wednesday morning), but I’m also not in daily conversation with a group of peers. Being a WAHM is exhausting to me, and that’s why I’m job-hunting. Maya’s extraverted enough, I think she’ll benefit from being in a childcare setting now that she’s older. A year ago, we weren’t ready, but now, it’s time.

This part doesn’t surprise me at all:

The discovery that women respond to stress differently than men was made in a classic “aha” moment shared by two women scientists who were talking one day in a lab at UCLA. There was this joke that when the women who worked in the lab were stressed, they came in, cleaned the lab, had coffee, and bonded, says Dr. Klein. When the men were stressed, they holed up somewhere on their own. I commented one day to fellow researcher Shelley Taylor that nearly 90% of the stress research is on males.

Research done on men, then assumed to apply globally? No way. That doesn’t *ever* happen, does it? Say it isn’t so.

I’m especially guilty of this:

Every time we get overly busy with work and family, the first thing we do is let go of friendships with other women, explains Dr. Josselson. We push them right to the back burner. That’s really a mistake because women are such a source of strength to each other. We nurture one another. And we need to have unpressured space in which we can do the special kind of talk that women do when they’re with other women. It’s a very healing experience.

And that’s so true, for me at least. When I’m stressed out, I NEED to be around other people, and yet when I’m highly stressed, I sometimes withdraw. Part of it is the whole “not wanting to dump my baggage on someone else,” which is why the blog is a wonderful help. Once I got over the public nature of the blog, I decided that I could write whatever I wanted here. As I’ve said before, the blog isn’t for an audience; it’s for me. The friends I’ve found via this blog (and others) are such a bonus.

Go read the rest.

I mean *really* annoys me?

Being treated as if I’m an inactive slug who eats badly, because I’m still not skinny after having a child. Actually, it doesn’t annoy me. It pisses me off. It also hurts, and I find myself questioning this whole “dating” thing because of it.

Where’s this coming from? Here’s where.

Pursuant to last weekend’s date: (see the comments for his initial reply)

My apologies for not getting back to you sooner. I’ve been busy plus it takes me a while to unpack how I feel about a date.

So, yes. I think we are a good cultural and intellectual fit, and counter to you apology, I really enjoyed the spunky, out-there you. However, I do have some ambivalence around the curvy body type thing (curvy is not my preference). You raised it a few times during our date so I feel a bit more comfortable talking about it here. I know myself well enough that if we dated, I would be ambivalent…which is not fair to you or to myself. Basically, the ‘no’ has to take precedence even if there is a solid ‘yes’ in the picture as well.

So, yeah, that’s where I’m at. And if you would like, I’m very open to staying in touch at a friend level (though I know the reality of converting a date into a friendship (especially a semi-long distance one) is rare).

A couple comments:

• I’d already written this guy off. Even if he’d written something glowing asking me out for this weekend, I’d have likely declined. Waiting so long to reply was (IMO) a pretty clear indication that he wasn’t “that into me,” and I prefer to not waste my time on such.
• If he’d somehow convinced me he really was into me, that would tell me that he’s playing some games. I don’t have the time or patience for those, either.
• I actually respect that this guy was willing to know his own preferences and to be honest about them. As much as it hurts, at least now I KNOW what the problem is, rather than speculating about it…or pushing it to the back of my mind and moving on to the next one.

So, if I’d already written this off (like deleted him off my “current matches” page, even), why does this still bother me so much? I’ll tell you why. It’s because I’m hearing exactly what I expected to hear, and what I anticipate hearing from any man I meet.

I hike. Miles. I sweat, and I work. I eat well. I lift weights.

But for the attitude I get, I might as well just quit and dine on Ben & Jerry’s for the rest of my existence. I don’t blame this guy for seeing me as somehow undeserving because I’m wearing a size 12/14 right now. Do you want to know why on that one? It’s because I despise myself for it, too. After I finish despising myself for being fat, then I despise myself for looking down on fat in and of itself. The cycle of loathing keeps increasing, until I hit a point where I hate everyone.

Fuck me. I have a dinner date with a new man, also from match.com, planned for Friday. Earlier today, I was thinking about some things to write about something he said to me yesterday:

For Friday evening, I think we should have dinner and enjoy a walk outside somehow. I don’t know much about the nightlife [in your town], but I will do a bit of research, I have a few possibilities to look into. I mostly want to simply talk with you and find out more about what you’re about. I have to say, you will make it easy for me as I will look forward to sharing your company no matter what we do. Give me a little time to look into some highlights we may be able to partake in.

Thank you for choosing to go out with me, I will be in touch with some ideas for our date. If you have any burning desires , feel free to let me know.

(bold added)

He’s correct to look forward to knowing me. I’m worth knowing, goddammit. I’m funny. I’m cute. I’m intelligent and have interests that roam all over the place. I’m attentive, and I know how to listen rather than just talk about me-me-me. (I get that out of my system here.)

But here’s the dig. It doesn’t seem to matter to most men, the ones I’ve met, anyway. I “need” to drop twenty pounds. Twenty-five would put me into stone-cold-hottie-stopping-traffic territory, but 20 would do. 15 would even be fine.

This (new) man has given me no reason to think that he’d be so shallow as to esesntially tell me, “you’re incredible, but you have a fat ass, so you’re not worth my time.” Still, I want to cancel Friday and go hide in a closet for the next few months. Or, at least, until I get to see the goddamned endocrinology doctor in a few weeks.

The very fact that I felt a need to (offhand) comment about being “curvy” to the Friday-guy speaks volumes on my own feeling about it. It’s like there’s this little girl inside of me jumping up and down and screaming, “Don’t look at my ass! It lies! See me! Look at ME!”

My P.A. did it in my appointment with him last week. (In retrospect, I realized that he WAS condescending to me. Why do I have such a difficult time being angry with people I know IRL? If someone had treated me like that online, I would have kicked his *skinny* ass.) Friday-guy did it to me both then (inspiring my need to “excuse myself”) and today in an email. The message is this: “You SAY you’re active, but really, you’re full of shit, and I don’t believe what you say about everything else.” Fine. You want anger? I’m angry.

I am angry. I am hurt. I planned to write a short, flippant post about “hey, glad I dodged THAT bullet,” but I think I had more to say and feel.

Fuck me. How is any man I meet supposed to see me as worthy when I don’t see myself that way in the first place? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

I’m going to take a bath. But before then, I have to wonder, with a little evil laughter. Should I even reply to this email? Dear (name), Thanks for your honesty; I can appreciate your taking the time to get inside your own head and figure out where you stand. Thanks also for saving me from wasting my time. I can lose weight. You’ll still be a shallow asshole.

~~~~~

A couple months ago, I visited with my P.A. about an odd soreness in my left breast. Although he felt nothing out of the ordinary — perhaps fibrocystic tissue — he still forwarded me on for a mammogram. After all, I was hitting 35 in a few short months, so we might as well do it. Tell me how pleasant *that* experience was. After two basic shots on the right and more detailed shots on the left, the tech called me back for additional shots on the right. Then, they ultrasounded the left, in the area where I’d been feeling pain.

In the end, I was told that everything was fine.

I still hurt. If both sides hurt in the same way, or if this were a cyclic/monthly thing, I wouldn’t think much about it. Instead, it’s a stabbing pain that almost feels like it radiates from the lower side, underneath at the chest wall, and only on the left.

Within the past couple weeks, an acquaintance forwarded me some information on Inflammatory Breast Cancer, a very different (and aggressive) form that doesn’t show with lumps…and 85% of the time doesn’t show in mammograms. I’m unsure about its visibility in ultrasound (guess I should look that up). I’m fixating now. I finally viewed the video link she sent yesterday, and now each time I feel the pain on my left side, I wonder.

I’m an adult here. I can be realistic. When I look at the signs and symptoms, the only thing I’m experiencing is the tenderness/pain plus a nagging feeling that something isn’t quite right. But, then again, what I read says that pain is usually a first symptom, and other symptoms are often absent until the condition is rather advanced.

This is just neurosis, and I know it…at least I hope it is. I’m probably just searching for some way, any way, to put off getting stuff done.

That’s all…just needed to get this out of my head so I can focus on work instead.

~~~~~

As a PSA (or maybe just so that you can join me in my hypochondria), here’s the video. I had no idea this form of cancer even existed.

Windows Media Player required to view this.
To install, click here.

Here’s a link to the original KOMO/Seattle news story. If you need/want the code to embed the video in your blog, drop me a comment.

I had forgotten, however, that effexor makes me yawm. Don’t get me wrong; it does *not* make me tired. But I yawn. Constantly. I just keep needing more air.

Anyway, he agreed that I’m sounding symptomatic of thyroid disorder, and that a blood panel was in order. He also gave me 4 weeks’ worth of Effexor samples — I expect to stay on the lowest dosage as much as possible (that’s where I was even before Maya), but to make it four weeks until the re-check, I’ll likely have to step up from 37.5mg to 75mg. We reviewed my previous thyroid results from December 2001, and I was in the normal range (low end, but not extreme) for TSH, low-normal for T4. With 4-1/2 years having passed and a baby in the interim, it’ll be interesting to see how it looks this time around.

As much as it would suck to take synthroid for the rest of my days, it would be a relief to have some explanation for why my weight keeps steadily climbing, even while I workout 4-5 days per week (at least) and do challenging, 3+ hour hikes. My diet isn’t perfect by any stretch — especially not this week, as I’ve willfully self-medicated — but it’s normally quite healthful. Doing “all the right things” to see no results has been exasperating. A nice bonus would be to stay awake at 3pm without the help of coffee.

Weight…granted, this is post-breakfast and coffee and fully dressed…but the doctor’s scale showed me a full ten (TEN!) pounds higher than the last time I weighed at home. TEN!

On an unrelated note, I think looking like a Barbie doll might be a prerequisite for the job of pharmaceutical rep. One gal arrived at the same time I did. She was about ten feet tall, skinny (I’m talking super-model skinny), and blonde. As we waited, another gal emerged with the same stats, just different clothing. Now I understand why I had no chance at the pharma jobs I applied for as a newbie business school grad. I’m short and brunette!

Mental health, baby.

As I posted before, taking oil had some severe effects on my mood — effects that reminded me of how I physically felt during full-blown depression. While the sugar water didn’t have an adverse effect at first, it started to after about the first week. Given the choice between glorious thinness (uh, yeah) and mental stability, I’ll choose stability every time. Add to that, I not only didn’t lose weight; I gained a pound or so, plus I feel “squishier” (technical term, that).

For all of those folks who find SLD to work, more power to ya. For me, it’s not turning out to be an option.

I need to get back to studying for this Saturday’s GRE. More later, perhaps. Then again, maybe not.