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Nutrition
I often think about how people with incredibly strong beliefs are proof-everything. It is impossible to rain on their parades. Faced with things like the fossil record, Intelligent Design was invented, that sort of thing.
And it cropped up again in the vitamin section of Whole Foods where Sebastian and I went today in an attempt to find some magic formulas that would restore my energy and my hair (yep, falling out with unnerving zeal). Sebastian was his usual self, spirited, affable, a bit moist with drool.
My fragile nutritional state makes me occasionally vulnerable to sales pitches and hawkers can smell my susceptibility at 1000 yards, so before I knew it, someone was pitching a line of supplements my way that would have me swallowing a minimum of 8 tables over the course of the day (not counting the hair growth capsules that had been recommended to me). Someone else joined us (how she was lured in was beyond me) and then out of nowhere came the weird breast feeding line.
"Look at how kids puke all the time," the vitamin lady said, "we give them cow's milk from the moment they're born and wonder why it takes them a year to learn how to digest it."
Who, exactly gives infants cow's milk? No one told me to do that and I've been breastfeeding, though apparently my hard work isn't convincing since Sebastian was clearly the object lesson of the moment. (All right, he had spit up a little bit along the way to the store but he was far from a super-mess.) She continued: "My children were all breast fed and we only used those silly bibs because they were CUTE, not because we needed them. And besides a little drool is nice." Well, I don't use bibs much either because I'm lazy and can't ever find them. Drool is never "nice" in my opinion. Inevitable, certainly. Harmless, yes. Pleasant, not so much.
So I was thinking about telling the vitamin lady that, in fact, cow's milk had not crossed the baby's little lips, and that he was 100% breast fed, but I stopped myself fearing that saying anything in my (unnecessary) defense would open a portal. She would tell me that surely I don't eat well. That perhaps I drink a lot of coffee or maybe eat a ton of refined sugar (guilty by the way) or maybe I drink Diet Coke or have bacon or wine from time to time. I knew that no matter what I said, she'd have some kind of reply that would make her advice and her vitamins invaluable.
Happily Sebastian got impatient and began his new screeching trick, so I packed us off as fast as possible before he could start on his real operatic vocal tricks.
And the thing is, I probably would have been happy to try the stupid vitamins anyway. I have no brand loyalty these days. I didn't need someone to try to make me feel guilty about not doing something I'm already doing to sucker me in.
I would have been easy.
posted by Elise at 1:42 PM
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Laura Kramarsky said...
Let me tell you about pathetic. If you could see the number of herbal cures and nutritional supplements now littering my kitchen, you would laugh your rear end off.
At the onset of hives, I was all for modern medicine. When that didn't work, I went herbal. When that still didn't work, I bought every quack medication available. I mean, I probably spent $500 on things I KNEW wouldn't work. But I had to try them.
I even bought organic cotton underwear. It's nice, but did nothing for my itchiness.
By the way, if you ever run into an unbearable itch, there are a few things I can recommend:
1) Gold Bond cream. This stuff has the worst advertising/marketing team on the face of the planet, but it really works. The powder with aloe is pretty nice, too. Does nothing for itch, but it feels lovely.
2) Aubrey Organics makes a nice Anti-Itch cream. Doesn't last long, but feels nice going on.
3) Aubrey Organics also makes a good bath liquid called "Relax-R-Bath." Doesn't help with the itch much, but it is calming.
8/31/2007 6:21 PM
Ro said...
Elsie,
I heart your comment about strong beliefs bouyed against reason. I was born into an unreasoning household. My friend used to call me The White Sheep of my familly. Btw, it's really not a good idea to finally admit at the Easter dinner table, albiet when ganged up on by Nascar-shirts and cornered by parents, that you do not believe in God. Even as a 46 yr old woman. It did not go well.
But being a geek and a girl with a mind, I continue my merry, analyitical way. One big help to me in life has been learning about paleonutrition. It's a theory with an enormous predictive power; aspects of it's theories are being shown to be correct in current studies (I found out about it some years ago, when I was considered daft by my dr--who now has read about it in the Mayo Clinic Journal). I recommend Paleonutrition to you, to investigate for yourself. It's helped me enormously.
One particular thing I'd like to recommend: magnesium. Your comment about your hair falling out hit a chord. For years I had the same problem. I also suffered from insomnia, very dry skin, constipation, and most frightening--heart arrythmias. No doctor ever put these things together, until finally some passing comment on the Paleo list I subscribed to lead me to try magnesium supplementation in reasonable doses. It was nothing short of a miracle. My formerly intractable, dibilitating heart problems disappeared overnight. My cardiac dr was stunned, and shagrinned. I slept well for the first time in decades. And yes, my hair stopped falling out. It turns out, after years of SAD (Standard American Diet (of high fructose corn syrup) and also years of midguided digitalis prescriptions which were uneeded and had screwed up my potassium stores as well), I was horribly deficient, esp in magnesium. To this day, my primary care physician uses my case as a wakeup call to pay attention to all the "little things" in addition to the big ones like my heart arrythmias.
I don't want to diagnose, or promise, but I would at least point you to a discussion of this rather benign course of possible treatment for your hair with your doctor. Being tested for mild magnesium deficiencies is rather tricky, so in many cases it's easier to eat right and take some supplements for a few months and see how it goes.
Good luck!
9/04/2007 7:40 AM
Ro said...
This article points to a few other nutritioinal issues, aside from magnesium, that affect hair. It might get you started:
http://www.hairboutique.com/tips/tip214.htm
9/04/2007 8:00 AM
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Laura Kramarsky said...