Wow! My second Blog, and it has only been one week since my first, and I remembered. Amazing, maybe I'll be able to keep this up.
One topic that has been on my mind for sometime now, is how to live healthier. 5 years ago if you asked me how healthy I thought our lifestyle was, I would have said we are a pretty healthy family! I thought we were doing just fine. Then 3 years ago, my oldest son Josh started getting these terrible headaches. They happened 1-2 times per month and would be just awful. They would make him very sick and he would be in pain until he fell asleep. I had similar headaches when I was in my early 20's and worked in a bar/restaurant called Di Matteo's. Back then you could smoke in bars and I found that I was very sensitive to second hand smoke. I would get migraines occasionally and they were very scary. I thought my head was going to burst, they were so painful. After I stopped working there I never got another one. My oldest child, however was the lucky recipient of this condition.
We started seeing a specialist for Josh to determine that they were in fact migraines. We kept a journal of his headaches, he had multiple tests done, and we worked hard to figure out what his triggers were. It was during this time that I started researching the food we ate and our activity level. I got a full eye opener about the hormones, pesticides, and preservatives put in the food we had been eating and the chemicals in the products I had been cleaning with. This stuff is pretty scary when you start to think about the poisons we had been breathing and ingesting. I had been one of those people who didn't understand the people spending so much money on organic foods, but that all changed after my research. Our food bill also changed and now that all three boys are eating quite a bit our bill is close to $750 a month instead of $400 from 3 years ago. Shocker, right? Our health is so very important, it is worth every penny. I also only use a cleaner for toilets, a safe oil for wood and white vinegar for everything else. I used to think that if a product was available to buy, then it must be safe. Think again. No one knows the long term effects on the environment with all of the chemicals used, and they are not necessarily safe. I used to think anti-bacterial sanitizer was great, now we don't touch it and wash our hands more. We get sick much less now. The size of my garden has doubled and during the spring, summer, fall months I grow much of our produce.
After a few months of seeing the specialist, Josh's migraines were determined to be of multiple sources: audio sensitivities, food, weather, hunger, stress, lack of sleep, hormones. Even now new possibilities of migraine triggers pop up, and it is something he will have to figure out on his own as he gets older. As long as he gets his medicine before the migraine gets bad, he only lays down for about 30 minutes and is fine. If he puts it off and doesn't say anything until he is crying, then the migraine is terrible. Again, something he has to figure out. At this point the number of them is still 1-2 a month and we have gone through stretches of months (summer) when he didn't have any. School stress is a definite trigger.
We also decided to join the Hockessin Athletic Club (HAC). We had been at the Y for awhile, and we as a family needed something more. Joining HAC was one of the best decisions we ever made. It is a little pricey, but totally worth it. I watched my husband who has struggled with weight loss lose 25 lbs. I never really struggled like him, but I lost 10lbs myself and was down to my pre-marriage weight. The kids are involved with gymnastics, swim lessons, dodgeball, tee-ball, flag football & karate.
This has been our healthy living journey so far. We have made it a priority in our lives and we hope we can continue it for our lifetimes. We also hope we are teaching our kids valuable lessons on how they treat their bodies. God only gave us one body and it is our job to take care of it the best we can. My husband and I are currently working on a challenge and weigh in is tomorrow, so stay tuned for that blog....
Peace
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