Rebuild from Depression Blog

Dr. Mercola at Mercola.com tracks the top natural health sites on the Internet. The Rebuild site is now listed in the top twenty five.

These rankings are based on the site's Alexa rank, an indicator of Internet traffic. The Alexa rank's weakness is that it only measures traffic from people with the Alexa toolbar installed on their computer.

If you are a PC user, install the toolbar today as a way to "vote" for this site when you are here reading.

Thanks for reading.

Thanks for putting up with my madness. ;)

I think this is deserving of a party.

The line between quirky and crazy is a fine one. You hear that all the time but I am beginning to see how true it is. I stayed in Fresno with friends last week to attend the Organic Pastures press conference. I nearly missed the press conference because my friends and I were engrossed in a fascinating topic: my mental health and the fine line between quirky and crazy.

The friends are both therapists. In fact one heads the mental health department in a nearby county.

"You are much more than a diagnosis," she assured me as we laughed about some of my crazy antics.

If you have read much of this blog you probably have some sense of my "quirkiness." I expect the event in early August may be the one most worthy of a call to mental health professionals.

Of course, the big question is how much of that quirkiness is just my personality and how much of it is worthy of a diagnosis. Apparently the line can be a fine one and the key distinction is to what degree your "quirkiness" is affecting your social relationships and your ability to be a good family member and good citizen.

That question became the question of the morning as they diagnosed me.

I expect I am about to disappoint the entire celiac community with this review of quinoa pasta. People with Celiac's Disease or wheat/gluten allergies cannot eat gluten and stay on the hunt for gluten-free replacements like these. Before you disappear, however, after my ho-hum review of these products, there are some very interesting grain-related resources on this blog, in particular the e-course that teaches kitchen preparation techniques to help you absorb more minerals in your grain. And now the ho-hum review.

The products on the left is corn and quinoa (wheat free)and come in a variety of shapes and sizes - spaghetti, angel hair, cork screws, and shells. I understand that a lot of wheat-free people like these products and, as a result, they are worth a try. I was disappointed, however. I found myself disappointed in the quinoa/kamut product as well.

First, I did not care for the texture. There seems to be a fine line between not cooked and overcooked. If there is a middle ground, it is elusive. (Whole wheat has this problem too.) I do not care for undercooked pasta nor do I care for overcooked pasta which made these products a bad match for me.

Second, I was attracted in the first place because of "quinoa" on the label. Quinoa is a fantastic nutrient-dense grain. It is a high-iron food choice for people seeking iron in plant-based foods. However, the label provides no information about how much quinoa there is in the pasta in relation to the corn or kamut. The nutritional content on the label is not any more of a standout than any other whole grain pasta, so the mineral content would not be reason to choose this pasta over another.

Since I am actually wheat sensitive, I have just come to accept life without pasta. A lasagna-like dish can be achieved with summer squash instead of lasagna noodles. Spaghetti squash is actually far better than actual spaghetti in my opinion and it increases the vegetables in my diet. On occasion I miss macaroni and cheese but I tend to get over it.

So I am going to pass on the gluten-free pastas. There is apparently a good reason that manufacturers use refined wheat. Of course I'll pass on the refined wheat too.

Try the pasta anyway and then you will know for yourself. It may be for you. It does have a fan base, just not here in California Hot Springs.

The wrong cookware will put more into your food and your air than what you bargained for. The toxins in your food and air will increase your requirements for nutrients. As the liver detoxifies foreign substances, it needs nutrients to do so. Of our depression-busting nutrients, B-vitamins, magnesium, and zinc are critical to detoxification that happens in the liver (see Yang and Yoo 1991; Campbell and Hayes 1974). Our lungs have nutrient needs as well as they filter air toxins. If we can select cookware that will reduce our toxic exposure, we have effectively improved our nutrient status.

Non-stick coatings

Non-stick cookware, notably the popular brand Teflon®, has made the news recently because researchers are questioning its safety. For decades Teflon®'s maker DuPont, has warned not to heat Teflon® above 600˚F because at about 680˚F, Teflon® will emit six toxic gases into the air. There have been studies of birds dying from these fumes. But even when the cookware reaches 446˚F, researchers argue that it begins to emit toxic particles. For an interesting discussion, visit the Environmental Working Group's analysis.

A friend of mine is pregnant with her first child. She's my age - extremely close to forty and many years behind her since she was twenty. I have been thinking about the issues that older professional women face when they have children. I wrote her a letter with some of the thoughts below.

~~~~~

Many of our perceptions of motherhood - what is possible and what is expected - is shaped by women closer to twenty than to forty. Traditionally, after all, women had their children closer to twenty than to forty.

When you see a woman with a baby at a ballgame, I can just about guarantee you that she's closer to twenty than to forty. The women walking their babies around the block three days postpartum are closer to twenty than to forty. The women with four babies under four are closer to twenty than to forty.

How do I know this?

Well, it is just about impossible for women closer to forty than to twenty to do those things.

Should we fight it and try?

Should we be down when we cannot meet those expectations?

No. We should hire a twenty year old to walk the baby around the block.

I am here to say out loud that it is a whole lot different to be forty than to be twenty. For one thing, many women having babies later are in professional, stressful careers. Those careers take some toll on our health. The added decades take a toll on our health as well.

In light of these issues, here is my unsolicited advice to you as you make it through your pregnancy:

No, it's not a private island in the Pacific or an exclusive mountain retreat. It's just home. Fall has become winter somehow as I sat inside and missed most of the fall season color. We do get color in our part of California but you have to be outside to see it.

I have learned a lot since early August when I began to spend far more time than I should working in front of a computer.

Here are some of the bigger lessons:

1) There is a big difference between "a little bit" and "none."

Here I am talking about exercise unfortunately. Through most of the summer and a good part of the year prior, I would put my amount of exercise in the category of "a little bit." I knew I should do better. It would help with my efficiency and muscle-building. (I am not supposed to write that other word.) What I did not fully appreciate is that I could do worse.

Who knew that walking across the property to check a garden hose counts as movement. It does.

I suppose you cannot fully appreciate that fact until you hit that "none" category. Older folks and bedridden folks tell me about this but I figured I was pretty close to the "none" category as it was. I was not. And even in this period of "none" I did manage to work outside clearing the hillside a number of times, but that's a whole other story (as you will see).

In any case, my food intake was healthy and reasonable and then, sometime in month three, I gained about three tons in two days. I expect to solve this particular problem with an elliptical trainer promised by my in-laws as a Christmas gift for my husband and I and a weight set.

2) Don't mess with poison oak.

It took Thanksgiving vacation for us to go through our mail and discover that one of my photos appeared in the newspaper for the Tulare County Farm Bureau. On September 21, we were instructed to take photos for a "Day in the Life of Tulare County." It was a bit of a dreary day, but started off with great fanfare. The sunrise is below.

I really love this "Day in the Life" concept. Of course, most of the day I sat in front of the computer, so perhaps I should have submitted a screen shot. :)