Archive for category Health
6 Fun Ways To Spend a Cold, Dark Night
Posted by Abby Quillen in Family life, Health, Simple Living on November 8, 2010
Credit: rjshiflet
The color of springtime is in the flowers, the color of winter is in the imagination. ~Terri Guillemets
Yesterday most of us rolled our clocks back an hour, returning to standard time from daylight saving time. The sun is now setting at about 4:50 pm where I live.
I love cold weather, but the shorter days are always difficult for me to adjust to. Over the years I’ve stored up a toolbox of activities to make cold, winter nights more fun. I find myself especially in need of them in the days and weeks after the time changes.
1. Eat by candlelight
We didn’t light a lot of candles in my house when I was growing up, but occasionally we’d eat by candlelight. Those nights, along with random power outages, are some of my happiest memories. Flickering soft light just makes any dinner more special. Every year after we observe Earth Hour, I envision that we’ll spend one night a week using no electricity. We’ve yet to make that a reality, but we eat by candlelight now and then. And every time we do it, it’s as fun and uplifting as I remember it being when I was a kid. Maybe it’s because it’s hard to rush when you’re watching the reflection of flames dance on glasses.
2. Start a fire
There’s so much to love about a winter fires – the warmth, the mesmerizing flames, the way it brings the entire family together in one spot to look at something other than a TV screen. Bonus: we haven’t had to turn our heater on yet this year and have been enjoying some rather toasty nights.
3. Read aloud or tell stories
Years ago, an older friend told me that she and her husband had been reading books aloud to each other each night for decades. I loved the idea, and since then, my husband and I have read many books aloud together. These days we spend our read-aloud time reading to our son about Arthur, D.W., Francine and company. (He’s in love with them.) But I know soon, we’ll be onto chapter books, and then adult books again. There are so many great reasons to start a family reading tradition. I wrote about them in this post.
Storytelling is also a fun way to pass an evening. In Robert Shank’s book Tell Me A Story: Narrative and Intelligence, he explains that “human memory is story-based.” We’ve learned by telling each other stories since long before Homer. If coming up with a fictional yarn sounds more pressure-packed than taking the GRE, don’t worry. Just relax and tell stories about your childhood, grandparents, or past adventures. If you’re a parent, this kind of storytelling serves a bigger purpose: it helps kids recognize their place in a larger family and feel closer to their parents. Most people love listening to stories. And the more you practice, the better you get at telling them.
4. Throw a potluck
With the extra dose of darkness, we can all probably use double-shots of health and happiness. Well, the research is in: social connectedness is good for us. Researchers from Brigham Young University recently reviewed 148 studies and found that people with strong ties to family, friends or co-workers have a 50 percent lower risk of dying over a given period than those with fewer social connections. As The New York Times reported, “Having few friends or weak social ties to the community is just as harmful to health as being an alcoholic or smoking nearly a pack of cigarettes a day.” Potlucks are a thrifty and labor-saving way to invite your friends, neighbors, or colleagues over. My acquaintances may just be exceptional cooks, but potlucks never seem to disappoint.
5. Stargaze
I wrote about winter stargazing in this post last December. Shortly thereafter I made bold plans to stargaze every night of 2010 with my trusty copy of 365 Starry Nights, which my husband gave me for Christmas. The first few nights of January, I had a great time scouting out Orion and Pleides. Then it got cloudy. And it stayed cloudy until … July. Yes, rainy Eugene is not a stargazer’s paradise, and oh how I miss the Colorado night skies. But if you live somewhere with few clouds and a dark sky, bundling up and gazing at the stars is an age-old, relaxing way to spend a cold, dark winter night.
6. Make Something with your hands
In her book Lifting Depression, neuro-scientist Kelly Lambert argues that using our hands for manual labor helps us prevent and cure depression. She says that when we cook, garden, knit, sew, build, or repair things with our hands and see tangible results from our efforts, our brains are bathed in feel-good chemicals. I just got my knitting needles out after neglecting them for the summer, and it’s incredibly rewarding to see what I can make with my own two hands in a relatively short time (while I’m sitting in front of the fire, listening to a story, watching a movie, or otherwise enjoying a winter evening).
What’s your favorite way to spend a cold, dark night? Do you have any tips for coping with fewer daylight hours?
A Snapshot of Food in America
Posted by Abby Quillen in Health on October 25, 2010
Percentage of households in America that are “food insecure”:
Percentage of food in the country that goes to waste:
Amount the average American household spends on food each week per person:
Amount companies spend advertising food, beverages, and candy in one year:
$7,459,000,000
Percentage of Americans who grow a vegetable garden:
Percentage of food and beverage sales that are organic:
Percentage of 12-17 year olds who say they eat dinner with their families at least 5 times a week:
Percentage of Americans who regularly watch TV while eating dinner:
Average number of miles produce travels before it is sold:
Number of calories the average American eats per day:
3,774
Number of calories the average Guatemalen eats per day:
2,219
Adult obesity rate in 2008:
Adult obesity rate in 1971:
Percentage of school cafeterias that cook “less than half” of their food from scratch:
Percentage of school cafeterias that serve restaurant-branded fast food:
33%
Click on hyperlinks to see sources for statistics. All other statistics from the 2009 World Almanac and Hungry Planet by Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio
This is part of a New Urban Habitat series: Snapshots of America:
5 Winter Immunity Boosters
Posted by Abby Quillen in Health, Herbs on October 12, 2010
Most adults catch between two and four colds a year and the average infant or child catches from six to ten colds a year. That means, in our lifetimes, most of us will have a cold or flu for between two and three years. That’s a lot of Kleenex.
The good news is, nature offers us some powerful immune-boosters. You may want to have these on hand this winter.
1. Garlic
Garlic has antibacterial, antibiotic, and antifungal properties. Allicin is garlic’s defense mechanism against pest attacks, and in clinical tests, it also prevents the common cold. In one study, volunteers were randomized to receive a placebo or an allicin-containing garlic supplement every day between November and February. The garlic group reported 24 colds compared to 65 in the placebo group. The volunteers in the garlic group also recovered significantly faster if they did get infected.
You don’t have to buy a supplement. The tastiest way to take garlic is to eat it. Raw is best. But garlic’s active ingredients are also present in cooked food.
2. Lemons
Lemons are loaded with vitamin C. One lemon contains anywhere from 50% to 80% of the vitamin C you need in a day.
And if you do come down with a cold, one study confirmed that hot lemonaid (or another hot fruit beverage) relieves runny nose, cough, sneezing, sore throat, chilliness and tiredness.
3. Elderberry
Elderberry is a popular herbal cold remedy in Europe. It’s getting a lot of press this flu season, because in clinical tests its flavonoids compare favorably with the antiviral Tamiflu in treating the H1N1 flu . You can buy over-the-counter elderberry syrup at most health food stores. Or you can harvest your own elderberries or buy them in the bulk section of your local health food store and make your own syrup. (Recipe below.)
4. Ginger
Ginger increases circulation and brings warmth to the body. It excels at quelling nausea, motion sickness, and dizziness. Many people also insist it can knock out the common cold.
5. Chicken Soup or Miso
Chicken soup and miso are full of vitamins and minerals. At least one study (Chest 2000) confirmed that chicken soup mitigates the symptoms of upper respiratory infections, possibly by reducing inflammation. Plus, the taste, smell, and warmth of these nourishing soups just make us feel good.
Herbalist Rosemary Gladstar recommends adding any or all of the following immunity herbs to the broth for a bigger boost of vitality:
- Astragalus
- Dandelion root
- Burdock root
- Echinacea root
Here are four of my favorite recipes for the cold and flu season:
Lemon and Garlic Quinoa Salad
(Adapted from Feeding the Whole Family by Cynthia Lair.)
Salad
1 c. dry quinoa
1/2 tsp. sea salt
1 and 3/4 c. water
1/2 c. chopped carrots
1/3 c. minced parsley
1/4 c. sunflower seeds
Dressing
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 c. freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/4 c. extra virgin olive oil
1 to 2 tbl. tamari or shoyu
Rinse quinoa and drain. Place rinsed quinoa, salt, and water in a pot. Bring to boil, reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer 15 to 20 minutes until all the water is absorbed. Let stand for 5 to 10 minutes uncovered, then fluff with a fork. Place quinoa in a large bowl. Add carrots, parsley, and sunflower seeds. Mix. Combine dressing ingredients and pour over quinoa. Toss. Serve at room temperature or chilled.
Hot Ginger Garlic Lemonaid
2 cloves garlic
1 tbs. grated ginger root
Juice of one freshly-squeezed lemon
Honey, to taste
Hot water
Put ginger root in a tea ball or tea bag. Place garlic, lemon juice, honey, and tea ball or bag in your favorite coffee mug. Pour hot water in. Cover and steep. Drink very hot.
Miso
(Very loosely adapted from Feeding the Whole Family by Cynthia Lair.)
3 inch piece wakame
4 c. water
4 tbs. light or mellow unpasteurized miso.
2 scallions, thinly sliced, for garnish
Any or all of the following
1 potato
1 carrot
1/2 c. chopped bok choy
5 sliced shitake mushrooms
1/4 lb. firm tofu, cut into cubes
A handful of immune boosting herbs – astragalus, echinacea root, dandelion root, or burdock root.
Soak wakame in small bowl of cold water for 5 minutes. Put herbs in a large tea ball or bag.
Put water (and potato, carrot, and herbs if using) into a pot and bring to a boil.
Tear wakame into pieces, removing the spine. Add wakame to soup. Lower heat, cover pot, and simmer 15 to 20 minutes, until vegetables are tender. Near the end of the cooking time, add mushrooms, bok choy, and tofu cubes if using, and let simmer a few minutes more.
Remove soup from stove. Dissolve miso in a little warm water. Remove tea ball or bag. Add miso to broth. Stir well. Ladle into bowl and add scallions for garnish.
Elderberry Syrup
(From Rosemary Gladstar’s Family Herbal.*)
1 c. fresh or 1/2 c. dried blue elderberries*
3 c. water
1 c. honey
Place berries in a pan and cover with water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for 30 to 45 minutes. Smash berries. Strain mixture through a fine-mesh strainer and add 1 c. honey, or adjust to taste. Bottle the syrup and store in the refrigerator. It keeps for 2 to 3 months.
*Make sure you use blue elderberries, not red ones. Never eat elderberries that have not been cooked first.
(We got hit with a winter ailment this week, so I thought it was the perfect time to update Stay Well: 5 Winter Immunity Boosters and Winter Wellness Recipes, originally posted in November 2009.)
What are your tricks to staying well when the weather gets colder?
Do-It-Yourself Health Care
Posted by Abby Quillen in Health, Herbs on September 29, 2010
My family has watched our health insurance deductible go from $100 per person two years ago to $1500 per person this year. We pay more out-of -pocket each month and get less coverage than we used to. I know we’re not alone. Forty-six million Americans have no health insurance at all, and at least 25 million more are reportedly underinsured.
The reality is that for many of us in the U.S., going to the doctor is something we can increasingly do only when absolutely necessary. That makes having a knowledge of common illnesses and effective home remedies a necessity.
Of course, serious ailments are best left to the professionals – heart attacks, bone breaks, and strokes to name a few. But the good news is – for most minor ailments, home care is usually gentler, less toxic, and as effective as the treatments a doctor would prescribe. I’m continuously amazed at the body’s ability to stay healthy with the basics – clean water, healthy food, adequate rest, time outdoors, etc. – and to heal itself with the help of simple, inexpensive treatments.
I have stacks of books about diagnosing and treating common conditions and using medicinal herbs, which I flip through often. (Recently I’ve been using Smart Medicine for a Healthier Child by Janet Zand quite a bit.) But I have a secret resource that’s better than all of my books combined – my mom. She’s an almanac of everyday ailments and simple treatments, and I’ve learned so much from her, especially about being curious and resourceful.
Recently I had the opportunity to discover (or rediscover) these simple, effective remedies:
- Pink eye (infection of the membrane lining the eyelids) – Hold hot compress on eye for 15-20 minutes several times a day. Wipe contact lens solution on affected eyelid.
- Wasp stings – Apply a paste of baking soda and water.
- Joint pain or arthritis – Take Yucca root extract and/or fish oil.
- Wounds - Soak in salt water.
- Bruises – Treat with a witch hazel or caster oil compress
- Burns – Soak in ice cold water, then in soy sauce.
- Veterinary care – Animal Apawthecary tinctures. (I’ve given these to our cats for various ailments over the years and found them to be amazingly effective and safe. In many cases, they worked better than the drugs our vet prescribed, with none of the side effects.)
I hope health care becomes more accessible and affordable for all Americans soon. But even if it does, I’ll use home remedies – because they work.
Looking for more on do-it-yourself health care? Check out these posts:
- Simplify Your Medicine Cabinet
- Simplify Your Personal Care
- Stay Well: 5 Winter Immunity Boosters
- Winter Wellness Recipies
- Herbs Made Easy
- Simple Herbal Tonics
Have you discovered home remedies that are safe and effective? I’d love to hear about them.
A Revolution in the High Country
Posted by Abby Quillen in Gardening, Health on September 20, 2010
I lived in Central Colorado for more than half my life, and I loved many things about living there. I hiked the foothills most mornings and looked out on the valley where the massive Sawatch Range meets the Sangre de Cristos. I rode my bike and walked everywhere. I cross-country skied most weekends during the winter. The air was clean. I knew all of my neighbors.
But when I moved to Western Oregon, I was blown away by the food. Almost everyone has a backyard garden. The farmer’s market goes from April to November, overflowing with local, organic produce, wild berries, mushrooms, nuts, honey, meat, and eggs. We can choose from a dozen or more CSA’s. Small health food stores are open from early morning to late night in every neighborhood, stocked with affordable organic food – most of it local. I felt like I’d moved to Eden.
Well, Central Colorado is starting to feel a lot more like Oregon.
We first visited our friends Jon and Shannon and their two kids in Hotchkiss. They’re homesteading about 80 acres of land there. They built a beautiful passive solar house, and they have a sprawling garden, a greenhouse, an outdoor kitchen, and a pond.
Jon and Shannon took us with them to pick up their apples, peaches, and beef – not at the grocery store, but at local farms. One morning they treated us to a brunch at a bed and breakfast in Paonia, which served gourmet lluevos rancheros and peach pancakes – made with all organic and mostly local ingredients.
But Hotchkiss and Paonia are on the fertile Western Slope of Colorado – an area long known for its plump, juicy peaches. As we meandered through canyons and over mountains toward my hometown, I imagined we’d find it much the way we left it – a veritable food desert.
The mountain towns of Colorado were not true food deserts, a term coined to describe inner cities with no access to foods needed to maintain a healthy diet. When I was growing up there, Salida had three small grocery stores, and they were stocked with produce. But it was all trucked in from unknown locations thousands of miles away, and none of it was organic. When my husband and I moved back to the area for a year in 2001, we could sometimes find a few heads of locally grown, organic lettuce in the refrigerator of a tiny health food store.
But now Salida has a bustling farmer’s market every Saturday, which is teeming with fruits and vegetables, all grown in the area. I ran into a friend picking up his CSA share – a huge box overflowing with lettuce, basil, zucchini, vine-ripened tomatoes, and more.
My friends Dave and Suzanne of the Morgan Center for Earth Literacy invited me to their property, where they’re growing an enormous amount of organic produce in the shadow of Mount Shavano. They’re raising chickens and stocking an old-fashioned root cellar with preserves. They sell produce, flowers, and Dave’s homemade green chili and tortillas at the Saturday Market.
A store opened this year in downtown Salida selling cheeses and meats, fruits and vegetables – all grown and made in the region.
This part of Colorado is at 7,000 feet elevation and gets only about 10 inches of precipitation a year. It’s a climate and terrain that can be challenging for gardening. (Just 60 miles away, Leadville’s average growing season is 25 days.) So if the local, organic movement is revolutionizing this part of the world, I wonder what’s happening elsewhere.
Is a local, organic movement sprouting where you live too?
Kick Nature-Deficit Disorder
Posted by Abby Quillen in Family life, Health, Nature on August 16, 2010
Most of the new parents I know are anything but negligent. They take their toddlers to story time and enroll them in swim courses, dance classes, and music lessons. They serve fresh vegetables, read picture books, learn baby signs, and take workshops in infant massage and child development. A story time leader at my local library jokingly refers to my generation of moms and dads as “PhD parents.”
But with all the scheduling, classes, and shuttling around, we may be in danger of neglecting something that’s actually more crucial to our children’s health and development than workshops and classes – unstructured playtime in nature. Numerous scholars and environmental psychologists are sounding an alarm, arguing that kids today are at risk for developing what Richard Louv, author of the 2005 bestseller Last Child in the Woods and Chairman of Children and Nature Network, calls “Nature-Deficit Disorder”.
Humans need to experience nature.
Both adults and children have an innate affinity for the natural world and an urge to connect with other forms of life which Harvard researcher Edward O. Wilson coined “biophilia”. Unconvinced? Consider the following findings:
- Workers who could view a nature setting from work were more satisfied, felt better challenged by their jobs, and reported better health than co-workers who couldn’t view nature. (Kaplan, R. & Kaplan, S. (1989). The Experience of Nature: A Psychological Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.)
- Surgical patients randomly assigned to a room with a view of trees required less pain medicine, healed faster, and were discharged sooner than those with no window or a view of a brick wall. (Ulrich, R. (1984). View Through a Window May Influence Recovery from Surgery. Science, 224, 420-421)
- A view of green plants and vistas helped highly-stressed rural children relieve anxiety. The more plants, green views, and access to natural play areas the kids had, the less stressed they were. (“Nearby Nature: A Buffer of Life Stress Among Rural Children.” Environment and Behavior. Vol. 35:3, 311-330.)
- Girls living in inner-city Chicago Public Housing with views of greenery had more self-discipline, increased concentration, and reduced impulsive behavior than girls the same age living in identical housing in more barren areas. (Journal of Environmental Psychology, 22, 49-63.)
Unstructured play, especially outdoors, benefits kids.
We don’t just need a view of nature either. We need to get out in it. Research, like studies conducted by doctors Hillary L. Burdette and Robert C. Whitaker, has shown that playing outdoors alone or with friends, siblings, or parents not only helps kids stay fit, it helps them :
- pay attention
- solve problems
- sleep better
- interact with others
- avoid depression, anxiety, and aggression.
Kids are communing less with nature.
The research may be in, but those long summers many of us remember from childhood, where we roamed the neighborhood, collected bugs, made mud pies, and headed out for week-long family camping trips seem to be going extinct. Children’s playtime fell 25% between 1981 and 1997, and that trend has undoubtedly continued in the last decade. Moreover, by 1990, the radius kids were allowed to roam shrunk to 1/9 of what it was in 1970.
Why?
- We’re busy. Americans work about five weeks more per year than we did in 1970. And the bad economy is making people even more hesitant to take time off. When workers are able to take a few days off, many feel they should stay connected to work via cell phones, laptops, and blackberries.
- TVs, computers, video games, and hand-held electronic devices compete for our attention. The average person watches more than four hours of TV a day.
- We’ve become scared of nature. The widespread fear of sun exposure in the last few decades (possibly resulting in an epidemic of Vitamin D deficiency) exemplifies how anxious many of us have become about the Great Outdoors.
Six easy ways to re-connect with nature
1. Institute a family green hour.
If you’re a scheduler, pencil a “green hour” into each day. At that time, let your kids enjoy unstructured playtime in the backyard, a garden, a neighborhood park, or another safe and accessible green space.
Remember, connecting with nature is necessary for adults too. During your family’s green hour, get outside, work in the garden, draw or write in a nature journal, or just relax and observe your surroundings. You can connect with other families who schedule a daily green hour here.
2. Take a nature walk.
Pack a lunch and head to the forest or the city park. Nature walking is not the time for feeling the burn. Set a slow pace and observe birds, plants, tracks, insects, scat, rocks, and the sky. Bring along binoculars, a magnifying glass, field guides, or just your curiosity.
3. Feed the birds.
Install a bird feeder outside one of your windows, and observe the birds that come and go. Feeders don’t have to be expensive. Kids can even make their own. Read up on what kinds of birds live in your neighborhood. Different birds like different kinds of feeders. Don’t stress if you don’t see any action right away. It takes awhile for birds to find a new feeder. Attract even more birds to your yard by designing a bird-friendly landscape.
4. Watch the sky.
If you can see the stars from your backyard or patio, make a weekly stargazing date with your family. Find tips for what to look for each week here. You can also track the moon’s cycle here.
If you can’t see the stars from your abode, check out your local astronomy club. They often host free dark sky meet ups, where you can look through telescopes and learn about the constellations from dedicated stargazers.
5. Stare at the Clouds.
Connecting with nature doesn’t have to be hard work. Stretch out on the grass and gaze up. If you like what you see, check out the Cloud Appreciation Society’s website, or get your hands on a copy of one of their books: The Cloudspotter’s Guide and The Cloud Collector’s Handbook.
6. Take a Camping Trip.
If you’re trying to save cash on your summer vacation this year, camping is the way to go. You’ll need some basic gear – a tent, sleeping bags, a flashlight, water, a first aid kit, and plenty of food and water. You’ll probably also want a lantern, camp stove, and a good book.
You don’t have to go far from home, but the more off the beaten path, the better. Resist the impulse to overplan. Enjoy waking with the sun, spending long days wandering and relaxing, and talking and singing around the campfire at night. (Tip: leave the cell phone in the car.)
(Originally posted as Kick “Nature Deficit Disorder”: 6 easy ways to nurture your family’s connection with nature on July 6, 2009.)
How does your family connect with nature? I’d love to hear your ideas.
Eggs Are In, Breaking Health News Is Out
Posted by Abby Quillen in Health on August 2, 2010
It’s hard to believe last summer, we were waiting … and waiting for one of our chickens to lay an egg. Let me tell you, this summer, we have eggs. Lots of eggs. Our four chickens are each laying an egg a day right now. That’s 1.33 eggs per day for each of us. Oh my.
So we’re eating eggs … and more eggs around here. I know eggs, with the help of an army of publicists, have mostly repaired the dietary villain status they held in the eighties. (Take note, Mel Gibson.) But when I’m trekking out to the hen house to collect the eggs each evening, I still find it nearly impossible not to think about cholesterol.
In 1984, Time Magazine reported on a major ten-year study on dietary cholesterol in an article called “Hold the Eggs and Butter”. “Anybody who takes the results seriously may never be able to look at an egg or a steak the same way again,” the authors wrote. Then they relayed the then-current recommendation that women eat less than 225 mg of cholesterol a day, the amount in a single egg. And thus Egg Beaters and Margarine became staples in refrigerators across America.
Since then, a number of studies have vindicated eggs, which, by the way, humans have been ingesting since about 1500 BCE. Today eggs are more likely to be celebrated than disparaged in articles with titles like, “The Incredible Edible Egg” and “The Sunny Side of Eggs”. They’re said to be rich in protein, cholate, zinc, vitamin D and other nutrients. And about that cholesterol? A 2007 study of nearly 10,000 adults demonstrated no correlation between moderate consumption (about 6 eggs a week) and cardiovascular disease or strokes. Then another study of 4,000 volunteers, the results just released, revealed no association between eating eggs and the risk of developing diabetes.
So eggs are back on the menu across America. And I’ve decided to take something else off my menu: breaking nutrition news. I still read it; I just don’t take it all that seriously. Micheal Pollan compares nutrition scientists to surgeons 360 years ago:
Nutrition science, which after all only got started less than two hundred years ago, is today approximately where surgery was in the year 1650 – very promising, and very interesting to watch, but are you ready to let them operate on you? I think I’ll wait awhile.
He advises that people simply focus on cooking and eating real food – food our great grandmothers would have eaten, that eventually rots, and that contains ingredients we can pronounce. Pollan’s advice makes sense to me. And it’s much simpler than trying to keep track of which micro-nutrient prevents diseases in lab rats and which foods contain choline, omega 3s, or whatever nutrients are in vogue at the moment. Instead maybe we can go back to eating and taking pleasure in food for how it tastes and makes us feel.
Can you help us get more creative with our egg-based cuisine? What’s your favorite egg dish?
12 Easy Ways To Use Less Plastic
Posted by Abby Quillen in Health, Simple Living on July 28, 2010
Photo: Bardsworld
We live in a plastic world. It’s hard to believe the substance only came on the scene about 150 years ago when Alexander Parkes, an Englishman, mixed collodion, camphor, and ethanol together. He exhibited his invention at the 1862 Great International Exhibit in London. Then in 1907 Leo Baekeland created an entirely synthetic plastic from phenol and formaldahyde and coined it Bakelite. Its chemical name is harder to pronounce: polyoxybenzylmethylenglycolanhydride.
Imagine how novel this cheap, light, colorful material was to people accustomed to glass, clay, and cast iron, and it’s easy to appreciate the zeal for plastic in the last century. Think of sixties housewives furnishing their homes with fiberglass tables and chairs, donning polyester dresses, and hosting Tupperware parties on the weekends. Plastic wasn’t just for adornment either. It brought real progress – film, vinyl records, cassette tapes, compact discs, computers, artificial heart valves, prosthetic body parts, contact lenses, and more.
Recently, however, the fervor for plastic has given way to anxiety. Why?
Health concerns
People began questioning what’s in the long chains of unpronounceable chemicals filling our homes. What are our babies sucking on when we hand them a pacifier, bottle, or teething ring?
Bisphenol A, a chemical used in polycarbonate plastics – including pipes, dental fillings, water bottles, canned food, and many food wrappers – has come under fire. Bisphenol A is a “xenoestrogen” – a known endocrine disruptor. Numerous animal studies have found effects on fetuses and newborns exposed to it. Nearly everyone in the U.S. is exposed to it, because polycarbonate plastic breaks down over time and leaches BPA into our bodies. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) found detectable levels of BPA in the urine of 93% of people they tested.
In 2007, 38 experts agreed that the average levels of BPA in people are above those known to cause harm to animals. A panel convened by the U.S. National Institutes of Health stated there’s “some concern” about BPA’s effects on fetal and infant brain development.
Manufacturers rushed to take BPA out of water and baby bottles. But can we rest easy? Probably not. In 1999, the European Union banned all pthalates in childrens’ toys. Pthalates are the chemicals used to soften plastic, and they can leach out of the plastic when chewed or sucked and perhaps cause cancer, mutations, and reproductive damage. The U.S. didn’t follow the EU’s lead in banning pthalates until January 2009, so toys manufactured before that may contain them.
Even if we stop eating off or chewing on plastic, the plastic manufacturing process has health implications. When Formosa Plastics Corp. built a factory in southeast Texas, ranchers noticed their steers losing weight, cows miscarrying more frequently, and calves being born with birth defects or stillborn. Texas A & M researchers discovered DNA damage in the cows living near the factory. The cattle downwind had the most damage.
Waste
Every time someone eats a tub of salsa, drinks a Styrofoam cup of coffee, sips on a bottle of Aquafina, or says yes to a plastic bag at the supermarket, a plastic container gets dumped. Plastic recycling rates are dismal. Only about 25% of all plastic bottles, 12% of bottled water containers, and 1 – 3% of plastic bags are recycled. The result? Plastic is littering our roadways, filling our landfills, mucking up our waterways, and killing marine life.
There’s a plastic waste dump site in the Pacific Ocean twice the size of the continental United States. According to a UN Environmental Program estimate, over a million seabirds and more than 100,000 marine mammals die every year from ingesting plastic debris.
A non-renewable resource
Plastic is a petroleum by-product, and more Americans are looking critically at our reliance on petroleum products after watching thousands of gallons of oil spew into the Gulf of Mexico in the four months after BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig exploded on April 20. Petroleum extraction is also responsible for a myriad of social and political troubles around the world.
Is it time to part with polymers?
Americans throw away 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour according to the Clean Air Council. But quite a few of us are looking for ways to generate less waste.
Here are 12 easy ways to use less plastic:
- Carry a stainless steel coffee mug or water bottle everywhere.
- Bring reusable bags to the store. Keep some in your car or bike saddle bags so you don’t forget them.
- Don’t take plastic produce bags. Put produce in a reusable bag or wire basket.
- Stock up on jars and use them to store food instead of tupperware. You can also freeze leftovers, breastmilk, or baby food in them. Just leave a little room at the top and thaw slowly.
- Use cloth bags to store dry food, like bread or grains.
- Buy food from the bulk section when possible. Bring glass jars for syrup, olive oil, nut butters, shampoo, etc. Ask the checkout person to weigh your jars before you fill them and write the tare weight on the lid.
- Cook from scratch.
- Make your own. It’s easy to mix up cleaners and toiletries, like deodorant, bath salts, and even shampoo and conditioner.
- Factor packaging into your decision-making. If you can afford to buy the glass jar of tomato sauce instead of the can, it may be worth a little extra cash.
- Buy products in larger quantities to reduce packaging waste. For instance, get the largest size of detergent.
- Don’t buy plastic toys.
- Consider using cloth diapers and/or reusable menstrual products.
This is an updated version of Parting With Polymers: 12 easy ways to use less plastic, posted June 19, 2009.
Are you finding ways to use less plastic? I’d love to hear your ideas!
Adventures on Foot
Posted by Abby Quillen in Health, Nature on July 21, 2010
Appalachian Trail. Credit: Jasen Miller
I’m reading Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods, a hilarious account of his adventures on the Appalachian Trail (AT). Of his first day on the trail, Bryson writes:
It was hell. First days on hiking trips always are. I was hopelessly out of shape — hopelessly. The pack weighed way to much. Way too much. I had never encountered anything so hard, for which I was so ill prepared. Every step was a struggle. The hardest part was coming to terms with the constant dispiriting discovery that there is always more hill.
The AT is 2,160 miles. It runs from Mount Katahdin in Maine to Springer Mountain in Georgia, traversing 14 states. According to Bryson, 1500 people set out to complete it each year, but only 300 people make it to the end.
Despite Bryson’s eloquent descriptions of the miseries of trudging day after day through endless forests weighed down by a gigantic backpack, I’ve always dreamed of taking an adventure on foot when my son’s older. I love to walk, and I hope I’ll get the opportunity to tackle at least some portion of one of these trails someday.
- The Colorado Trail (CT)
The CT stretches almost 500 miles, from Denver to Durango, traveling through six wilderness areas and eight mountain ranges and rising to 13,334 feet. I’ve done day hikes on many portions of the Colorado Trail, and every part I’ve visited is beautiful. (The below picture is actually from a stretch of the 401 Trail near Crested Butte, Colorado, but it gives you an idea of what makes hiking in Colorado worthwhile.)
Colorado Scenery. Credit: trailsource.com
- The Pacific Crest Trail (PCT)
The PCT zigzags 2,650 miles from Mexico to Canada through California, Oregon, and Washington. It passes through six of the seven ecozones in North America, including deserts, mountains, and old growth forest. Three hundred hikers attempt the entire trail each year, walking through the Mojave Desert, the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Yosemite, Crater Lake, and the Columbia River Gorge.
Pacific Crest Trail. Credit: nordique
- The North Country Trail (NCT)
The longest hiking trail in the U.S., the NCT stretches 4,200 miles from New York to North Dakota. It spans mountains, forests, and prairies and skirts Lake Michigan and Lake Superior.
North Country Trail. Credit: Daniel Morrison
We have no shortage of long hiking trails in the United States. The National Trails System totals 60,000 miles in all 50 states. It’s longer than the Interstate Highway System. If you’re looking for a place to hike, or just want to dream of your own adventure on foot, you can find lots of information about America’s hiking trails at americantrails.org.
I’d also like to take a hut trip someday. On these adventures, you spend the day walking in the woods. Then instead of sleeping on the ground or on a platform in the outdoors, you sleep on a bed in an inn. Huts range from rustic cabins to grand lodges. Europe abounds with hut hiking adventures. The accommodations in the Alps are supposedly quite luxurious; think: “arugula salad, beef consommé, entrecôte steak, and fine cheeses”. But you can also take hut trips in Colorado, New Hampshire, Georgia, Glacier National Park, Yosemite, and other locations around the U.S. You can learn more about hut hiking here.
Have you ever taken an adventure on foot? Would you like to? I’d love to hear about it.
Depression-Proof Your Life
Posted by Abby Quillen in Health on June 9, 2010
Photo Credit: D Sharon Pruitt
Is depression a disease of modernity? That’s what Dr. Stephen S. Ilardi, a clinical phsychology professor at the University of Kansas, argues. According to Ilardi, depression was almost unheard of in traditional aboriginal cultures, and the depression rate in 1900 was around one percent. Yet today 23 percent of Americans will suffer major depression during their lifetimes, and the number is increasing.
Depression can be a crushing, debilitating disease. Ilardi, who works with depressed patients, writes that it “robs people of their energy, their sleep, their memory, their concentration, their vitality, their joy, their ability to love and work and play, and—sometimes—even their will to live.” And unfortunately, despite the hope and hype of the last few decades, the majority of patients who are clinically depressed do not find lasting, permanent relief with anti-depressant medications.
Frustrated by the failure of current treatments, Ilardi poured through voluminous research looking for what might be psychologically toxic about our lifestyles and came to the conclusion that, “Our bodies were never designed for the sleep-deprived, poorly nourished, frenzied pace of twenty-first century life.” In Ilardi’s book The Depression Cure: The 6-Step Program to Beat Depression Without Drugs, he outlines six lifestyle changes, which he says have helped a great number of his patients beat depression. And he’s convinced that the following program will help everyone – depressed or not.
1. Physical Exercise
According to Ilardi, it takes a surprisingly low dose of exercise to fight depression. In one study just 30 minutes of brisk walking three times a week relieved depression as well as Zoloft in the short-term and better in the long term.
2. An Omega-3 Rich Diet
Our ancestors consumed Omega 3′s and Omega 6′s in roughly equal measures. Omega 6′s promote inflammation; Omega 3′s are anti-inflammatory and the building blocks for our brain tissue. According to Ilardi, “In the past century, our dietary balance of omega 6′s and omega 3′s has shifted so far out of balance that it now stands among Americans at 16 to 1 … it has a profound implication for our physical health and unfortunately for our psychological well-being as well.”
Ilardi recommends that people consume more nuts, fish, and vegetables and less processed food for long-term prevention and treatment of depression. But he says a high dose of Omega 3′s can help severely depressed patients restore their balances more quickly; he suggests about 1,000 of EPA a day (usually about 6 capsules).
3. Engaging Activity
Depressed people often have a tendency to “ruminate”, or brood and dwell on negative thoughts. Ilardi says we are hard-wired to mull things over and that can be a good thing, but it becomes toxic if we let it go on to long. He advises that people consciously notice when they’re ruminating, and make a decision to redirect their attention to an engaging activity after a set amount of time. He suggests conversation (about another topic), social activity, reading, or going online, but cautions against watching television, warning that it’s not mentally engaging enough to distract us.
4. Natural Sunlight
Ilardi says natural sunlight , which can be 100 times brighter than any sort of indoor lighting, is where we’re designed to spend most of our time. We have specialized light receptors in the back of our eyes, which control the biological rhythms in our brains. So when we don’t get outside enough, our body clocks can get out of sync. Ilardi says bright outdoor lighting can have an instant short-term anti-depressant effect and a more lasting effect within seven days.
5. Ample Sleep
Ilardi points out that sleep disturbances or deprivation precede depression in about 85% of patients. He says that although we all need about eight hours of restorative sleep a night, the average American only gets about six and a half hours. He advises that people go to bed at the same time every night and turn off overhead lights and screens at least an hour before bed.
6. Social Connection
In an interview, Ilardi said:
When anthropologists spend time with aboriginal peoples, one of the very first things they almost always comment on is that these are folks who spend so much time with their loved ones that they almost have no concept of privacy the way we do. I tend to think that is the default setting for the human brain and human psyche. I believe it’s time that we start living as Americans as if relationships are the things that matter to us the most, not our achievement, not our possessions, not our money.
You can listen to that interview with Dr. Stephen S. Ilardi on The People’s Pharmacy here.
(If you liked this post, you may be interested in Is Knitting Better Than Prozac? about Dr. Kelly Lambert’s research.)
What do you think about Dr. Ilardi’s lifestyle approach to preventing and treating depression?
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