Category Archive

health

Take powdered supplements in shot glasses

There I was, bitching to my personal trainer friend about how my knees hurt, but I hate taking my glucosamine chondroitin pills because they’re SO BIG. But I wouldn’t drink the powdered stuff because I can’t down the whole glass at once. That’s when she dropped this genius on me…

Hacking myself: How I remember to take my pills

Lately, I’ve taken a stronger interest in my health. Step one: Get a baseline blood panel.

Lo and behold, I was super low in Vitamin D and Vitamin B. My blood pressure is high and my sinuses are a wreck. I’ve been prescribed sprays, allergy meds, vitamins and I am back on the aspirin.

So after a few years of taking nothing but prenatal vitamins, like a lot of Americans, I’m back on the daily pill party.

As I have a lot of other tasks vying for my attention, taking daily pills just isn’t something I always remember. But at least I know enough to hack myself.

7 tips for helping your child focus on their health — not the number on the scale

Throughout my elementary years I was a pudgy kid. By the time my lingering baby fat had fallen off I had learned to think of myself as overweight, unattractive, and lazy. I wore layers to hide my body, never went swimming in a group, and was a chronic dieter until my early twenties when I essentially stopped eating altogether. I eventually climbed out of that hole but here I am at twenty-six and I find myself feeling like that fat kid all too easily.

A retro-striped wall, starting succulents, and bubbling brewing wine in this week’s reader photos

Good Monday, Homies! Here’s a quick trip through the Offbeat Home Flickr pool to get us all up and at ’em for the week. And in Clicky Links? We explore improving a major metropolitan, homelessness-by-choice, and catching small game in a survival situation.

How acupuncture helped treat my post-natal depression

Tom’s birth experience was drastically different to what I’d been hoping for and expecting. Instead of a calm, quiet drug-free home birth, I ended up being whisked to hospital in an ambulance, and having every intervention I’d hoped to avoid. Immediately following the birth, I knew that my physical recovery would take a while. What I didn’t realise was how long it would take to recover mentally.

Quick and easy exercises you can do at your desk in 7 minutes or less

I’m not an exercise buff by any means — the most I do is yoga three times a week, when I’m really disciplined about it. Most of the time my schedule (working from home + parenting a small child = I’m all over the place) makes regular yoga attendance a challenge. However, this doesn’t mean I don’t like to at least feel like I’m being healthy while I’m sitting at my desk for a few hours each day. To combat the overall feeling of ick that I generally get, I created this series of small exercises to do to keep my circulation up and spirit happy.

How and why I voluntarily became a single mother at 22

When I was little, my rendition of “house” always included pretending I was a single mother struggling to make ends meet. I’m not sure if my eight-year-old self could foresee the future, or if I was just making do with the fact that I didn’t ever have a boy to play my “husband.” I dabbled in dating as a teenager. By “dabble” I mean my relationships never lasted more than three months and most were more like a few days. I just never had much interest in men (or women, for that matter), sexually speaking.

When home is a hospital room

The hospital was my literal home, but I soon realised I had to spiritually embrace my time there as well if I wanted to get out and make a recovery. I filled my room with little things to empower me to say ‘this isn’t just another nameless, faceless hospital room, this is MY space and goddammit, I’m owning it!’ With that ownership slowly came empowerment and a slow, slow process of finding myself again.