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Having a medical provider that matches your lifestyle and goals is imperative for a good long term relationship. Do you expect to live at their office? NO, but having an understanding with your provider on what you expect and your preferred choices will make the times when you need to see them (like with ill children) so much easier.
#1 Remember you are paying them. They work for you. They may be a professional, but it is called medical practice for a reason. The field is ever changing as new information is discovered. Some providers keep up on this way more than others. If what you are told doesn’t sit quite right, get another opinion.
#2 Do not walk into the office expecting a fight or disagreement over something. Expecting to be at odds makes everyone tense, and means you should really find someone else. If everyone is tense, no one is doing their best.
#3 Interview! Remember the ‘they work for you’? If you were to have someone to life coach you, you would interview them, right? Why do we not do this with our medical providers! It is totally ok to shop around! Come up with a list of questions and ask them all. Write the answers down and then compare away from the offices. I did this when I was pregnant with my second. Made a huge difference in the overall pregnancy and birth.
#4 Research. Yep I said it. Go to google. BUT select your sources wisely and find creditable sources for all sides. If I’m digging deep into research pick scholar.google. You get scientific journal resources, not a random sight. Look at the entire picture, not just pick lines out of the articles. Doctors cannot keep up with everything. Even if you agree with your provider sometimes it is good to ask questions.
#5 Compare different professionals. There is more than just modern medicine. There are chiropractors, massage therapists, naturopaths, homeopathic, or alternative medicine as well. Depending on what you are dealing, and your personal choices, with which provider might be best.
#6 Listen and ask questions. Never stop learning, never stop advocating. If your provider says something that contradicts what they said earlier, ASK about it. If they say something that you don’t agree with ASK about it, politely of course. Just ask for more clarification. Open the door for discussion and education.
Now you are ready to make the best of your provider relationships and find the one that is right for you.
Check out the YouTube link for the video!
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What is sooooo good about the great outdoors? I am truly blessed to have kids who love the outdoors, and love to be outside with me. We live on a farm and spend most of our days in the spring, summer, and fall outside. They play in the dirt, catch chickens, play with the dogs and calves, and help in the garden. One of the books I read a while ago had an excellent ‘recipe’ for preserving children.
“Take 1 large field, a dozen children, 2-3 small dogs, a pinch of brook, and some pebbles. Mixz together children and dogs; sprinkle the field with flowers; spread over all a sky of deep blue and bake in the sun. When brown, set away to cool in the bathtub.” ~The Encyclopedia of Country Living.
I might be biased, but country kids are some of the healthiest kids around. There are a few studies that have suggested this as well. Check out google scholar if you want to dive deeper there. But what does all the great outdoors have to do with health? Let's take a look at some basic things the great outdoors has to offer our health.
#1 Vitamin D! There is no doubt the best, most readily available source of vitamin D comes from the sun. When you are outside you soak up that Vitamin D, giving your immune system what it needs to help keep you healthy. With that said, do NOT go out and get sunburned. That is not helpful to your body.
#2 Fresh air! Remember over winter how stuffy the house gets to feeling? You cannot wait until spring to throw open the window and let all the air in? Fresh air allows us to breathe in clean sair, that is not loaded with bad bacteria that make us sick.
#3 Bacteria exposure! Before you go and freak out, hear me out. Bacteria way out number us. They live in us and surround us. Many ‘bad’ bacteria actually naturally live in the body. They only become ‘bad’ when they move to where they are not supposed to be, or become too populated. Your immune system is like a muscle, the more it works out the stronger it becomes. Outside is loaded with bacteria, good and bad. Exposing yourself to all that bacteria is like exercising your immune system. It becomes stronger, with small exposures, then when a large challenge (hello flu) comes around it is armed and ready to fight.
With those 3 things in mind, I’ll keep my kids outside as long as they can all year. Don’t worry, I’ll be out there too!
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Food, who doesn’t like food?!?! But what is your food doing to your health? What we eat has a huge affect on our health. Sugar, artificial preservatives, and caffeine and all common examples of food we consume that negatively affect our body.
Don’t get me wrong, I love my sugar and coffee as much as the next momma and often consume more than I should, but I also recognize how it negatively affects my health. So what does all the sugar, caffeine, and preservatives do to your body?
Sugar (including syrups like corn syrup) is very addictive and can lead to heart disease, and type 2 diabetes. Sugar also suppresses the immune system making it more difficult to fight off infections. Be aware though the sugar isn’t just coming from the desserts. Sweetners are snuck in everywhere. That bowl of cereal or yogurt or granola bar, just might be hiding a lot of sugar too. The good news is a sugar addiction can be broken in about ten days.
Caffeine is a stimulant for the body. Hello that’s why it’s so good in the morning! But that caffeine boost stimulates the body into the fight or flight mode. Long term it can increase the release of acid in the stomach, leading to stomach upset or heartburn.
Artificial preservatives can cause digestive problems, headaches, and cancer to name a few. They require a lot of energy for your body to break down and eliminate, and provide no nutritional value.
So how does someone do better? Who has time today to prepare every meal from scratch, using all fresh ingredients? I sure don’t! So how do I feed my family better without losing my mind? Keep it simple and meal plan.
When I shop I don’t buy the boxed dinner. It’s full of junk that does not feed the body. Sure I still buy some prepared foods (hello chocolate chips), but I go for food with less than 5 ingredients and no preservatives. Yes that cuts out many of my old go to salad dressings I would use as seasoning. Good news you can get a salad dressing mixer and make it yourself fairly easy. Buy whole foods and buy local food, if you cannot grow a garden. Fresh food has many enzymes, that help the body break food down, that are destroyed in processed foods.
Meal plan. I’ll admit I need some work on this one. When I do meal plan, my family eats better, variety meals (instead of an egg sandwich for the 3rd time this week). This also helps know what to buy for the week, budget better, and reduce food waste. When I have a plan for the meal I also avoid the stress of trying to figure out food with hangry children underfoot and another meal of egg sandwich.
I take 30 minutes one morning or afternoon and lay the cookbooks out and start going through the recipes. Leave the books out for the week with pages marked and the list of meals and what I need to pull out of the freezer on my cookbook stand.
Do you have a favorite meal plan strategy? Let me know! I could always use new ideas.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Courageous + Purposeful Mommas group! This community is for the Mommas, mommas to be, in the midst of raising, and kids grown, looking for tips on building your family up and providing for them through natural methods. Tips include: gardening, bulk buying, caning,/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
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This blog has taken quite a while to write, not because of the difficult topic, but because I keep changing it. I tend to write in my head long before I ever put it to paper, but this one has been difficult to nail down. I have always known the importance of time and rest, but I have a much more difficult time putting it into practice. I’m a go getter, a person driven by the lists and to-dos. Slowing down is difficult for me. I know I need to enjoy the time now, and this period of life because all too soon the kids will be grown. The grandparents ageing, and the great grandparents gone.
Over labor day I had a very stark reminder of this. Instead of taking a vacation as many families do, we went down to the place my mom grew up to help do some maintenance work on my grandparents house, take down the rest of the corrals, and pick up a billiards table. Remember the not slowing down part? Anyway…As a younger adult, I didn’t really enjoy my time there. There is no internet and cell reception, well if you climb the grain bin you might be able to make a phone call. If you do find that sweet spot in the house, just leave your cell there and you’ll at least get text messages through, sometimes. Now as an adult, who’s job revolves around her phone? I love going there, because phones don’t work! It is a forced unplug time.
I wanted to pick up the rest of great-grandma’s canning jars while we were there as well, since I managed to use my entire stash this year. I also agreed to split them with my sister who was wanting some. When we walked up to the house part of my heart broke. The office door was open, and many of the windows broken out. Not going to lie, I went back to the pick up for a gun, just in case we encountered some animals or snakes who decided to make it their home. Armed we begin walking through the house, making as much noise as we could to scare anything out before it was cornered. What was inside broke my heart more. Tumbleweeds in the office, dirt and broke glass all over. Piles of memories scattered around. The house had been mostly gone through and cleaned out before, but some of the odd things left: Great-Grandma's pans, her dishes, Great-Grandpa’s old desk, the records, coffee cups, vases, dishes and bowls grandma had painted.
As we made our way room to room, on our way to the basement where the jars were, we assessed the damage time and nature had done. The natural flow of nature is order to disorder, when no energy is imputed, and the house showed just that. No one had lived there for nearly 20 years, with no one wanting to live there, the house wasn’t worth maintaining. Once grandpa and grandma moved, the house wasn’t kept buttoned up either. We relived the memories as we walked about. Great-grandpa sitting in his chair under the window in the living room, Mitch (the dog) laying in the office, eating ice cream at the kitchen table. The door we always went to, you can’t even get through anymore. We laughed and cried a bit, then set our minds to the task at hand: jars and anything else that was salvageable before it was all lost. When Grandpa walked in his face fell a bit though he tried to hide it. He knew the house was in bad shape, but didn’t know it was this bad. The home he was born and raised in was in ruins.
As silly as it may seem I haven’t been able to get that old house off my mind. For me it is a visual reminder, burned in my mind, of the importance of taking time for family while they are still here. Enjoying the seasons of life no matter how difficult they are. Not just being physically present, but mentally present as well with those around you. A reminder to put down the phone and enjoy the toddlers while they are still young. To invest in their lives and teach and train them.
I may be home with my kids everyday, but I’m not always present. I’m busy looking up that information, taking that call, replying to that text, working on a project, just wanting to get the list done. They unfortunately get placed on the back burner a lot and just drug along for the ride. That isn’t fair to them. And it greatly affects their behavior. See my kids act out most of the time to get my attention. It is the only way they know to say “Hey! I NEED YOU TOO!”
Starting now, I will do better, for me and my family.
Work stays within work hours (nap time).
Everything else will be done at a slower pace with the kids.
Sundays will be family days, for time together.
You all can keep me accountable. I give you permission.
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What is the biggest thing you can do to improve your overall wellness? I’ll give you a hint. It is not a supplement or anything you can buy. It comes free, and is actually quite necessary for life. Any guesses?
If you guessed SLEEP you would be correct!
Now I’m not talking about sleep all the time and never do anything kind of sleep. Although you wouldn’t have to deal with the stress of different people. There is a difference in QUANTITY and QUALITY of sleep. For example, my husband and I can go to bed the same time and wake up the same time, but our sleep outcome is very different. He wakes rested, I feel like I could sleep a few more hours. See, he goes to bed and says asleep, I get up 2-3 times with kids (just an example, he actually lets me sleep in way longer than I should).
So how do you know if you are getting enough of the right sleep? There’s all different sources telling how many hours (quantity) of sleep you need. For most adults it is 7-9 hours recommended. Another better recommendation is to get between 5-6 sleep cycles. Each sleep cycle is about 90-120 minutes. But what if you get the 9 hours (moms can roll their eyes here), and wake tired? Chances are you are not getting restful sleep. But WHY?
There are many different reasons you may not be sleeping as well as you thought. First if you are waking up in the middle of a sleep cycle you will feel tired and groggy, whereas if you wake between the cycles you feel more refreshed. It is worth getting to know your sleep cycles for that reason. You could also be having problems breathing, sleep apnea, in which you should seek medical assistance out for help correcting this. You might toss and turn all night. You could be like me and just struggle to shut your brain off.
So what can you do to get better sleep? First, why are you not sleeping well? If you are tossing and turning all night, you can seek out chiropractic care. Re-aligning your spine can help to ease the pain. Also make sure you have a mattress that is correct for you. Adjusting the firmness of the bed makes a difference in keeping your body aligned. When I struggle to fall asleep, or shut the rabbits down, I use essential oils. You have to know your source though with these methods. Message me if you want to discuss this further. Some people use melatonin, or warm tea, or a warm cup of milk.
How do you know if you're not getting QUALITY sleep? The Sleep Foundation says your sleep needs improvement if, it takes you more than 30 minutes to fall asleep, you have been diagnosed as having insomnia, you regularly wake up more than once per night (not because of kids), you stay awake for longer than 20 minutes when waking up in the middle of the night.
Overall, creating better sleep habits will help you have a better night's sleep. Cool the room at night, set a consistent sleep schedule and stick to it. Create a pre-bed routine and stick to it. Avoid caffeine 4-6 hours before bedtime.
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Courageous + Purposeful Mommas group! This community is for the Mommas, mommas to be, in the midst of raising, and kids grown, looking for tips on building your family up and providing for them through natural methods. Tips include: gardening, bulk buying, caning,/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
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Going through college I loved my nutrition classes. I was an animal science major and went on to get my masters degree in cattle nutrition, I loved the nutrition focus so much. Those classes were the first time I was exposed to the importance of good nutrition. The saying I heard over and over was “prevention is the best medicine.” My veterinarian friends favorite saying was they “fixed what the nutritionist screwed up.”
The most interesting thing to me is that the most important nutrient is the same across all species, humans included.
Water.
Yep, that simple thing of water. Without water your body can do nothing. Keeping your body hydrated is critical to keeping you healthy and your body functioning at optimum. Over half your body weight is actually water!
Water helps to keep the gut moving and regular. It is necessary to make saliva, reducing the bacteria in your mouth, thus decreasing the bad breath. It is needed to keep cells hydrated and plump, helping with the healthy appearance of the skin. Water helps keep the.blood volume up, so your oxygen is delivered more effectively to the tissues that need it, like muscles. For your body to flush toxins out, water is needed. Water is a pretty big deal!
What happens when you don’t drink enough water? Even before you are technically dehydrated, you may notice some things from not drinking enough water. If you are not drinking enough water you may notice constipation, persistent bad breath, fatigue, frequently ill, poor skin health, sugar cravings, and decreased urination. When you are dehydrated your body can not easily access the glucose stores in your body, which triggers the cravings for the sugar. You may experience a slight headache, lack of focus, or mood change, when slightly dehydrated. Those dark bags under your eyes is not just from lack of sleep, but more lack of water too.
How much water should you drink? The Mayo Clinic recommends 2.7 liters for women and 3.7 liters for men a day. This can change based on weight and size. A good rule of thumb is an ounce of water for every pound you weigh. So if you weigh 130 pounds your goal fluid intake should be 130 oz, which is close to one gallon (128oz). If you feel thirsty or hungry try drinking some water.
But I don’t like the taste of water. How will I ever drink that much water? I love to add lemon or lime to my water, especially if I’m traveling. I am a very picky water drinker and often don’t like the taste of water away from home. A drop of lemon essential oil (a great detox helper too) and I’m good for a couple fill ups through my tumbler.
I can’t keep track of my list, how am I ever going to keep track of my water intake? I love to use my 30 oz tumbler. I fill it 4 times during the day and I know I’m pretty close to my goal water intake. One of my friends loves her giant gallon water bottle. I recommend stainless steel and something that will stay cold for several hours. I also found that I drink water better if I have a straw to drink out of (and prevents backwash from kids).
Wanting a community to lean into? Join the FREE Courageous + Purposeful Mommas group! This community is for the Mommas, mommas to be, in the midst of raising, and kids grown, looking for tips on building your family up and providing for them through natural methods. Tips include: gardening, bulk buying, caning,/preserving, livestock, homesteading, and home remedies. Your family is precious, and this group is to help you gain the knowledge and tools to keep your family well and not reliant on outside professionals. Remedies and tips are easy and simple for the busy momma, time is precious after all, including pregnancy, birth, young kids, and illness. Trust your Momma gut again! This community offers the resources + community you need to help get started on your journey and prepare for whatever future you envision.
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