life+running » fitness

Exercise as One Tool to Improve a Cancer Patient’s Quality of Life \\ David Haas Guest Post

chimes — Fri, 18 May 2012 15:00:00 +0000

Hey everybody — I’m outta town! In TX … or at least on my way. And hopefully enjoying it.

I mentioned that I had some great guest posts lined up. This is one of them. Which brings me to a related point: Notice my “sponsor” tab. After discussing advertising options and blog giveaways and product reviews with a few other fab bloggers, I decided to put together a little policy page. All ideas for sponsorships and giveaways are welcome, but look at the sponsorship page first.

That being said — I will NEVER ask a guest blogger to pay me to post in my absence. Unless their post is primarily selling something. In which case, I probably won’t want them to be a guest blogger anyway.

A couple weeks ago, I had a question from a reader named David Haas. David is an advocate for cancer patients and wants to make a difference in their lives because cancer has devastated so many people in this world. He was wondering if I’d be interested in sharing an article he wrote with my readers. Of course I am interested!

Here’s the article. Enjoy! I will direct any questions to him as I’m not an expert on the subject.

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Improving quality of life when patients are facing the challenges associated with a cancer diagnosis, a cancer treatment process or during remission is very important. One of the things that can positively impact a patient’s quality of life during this time is exercise. Making moderate exercise part of a daily routine has both physical and emotional benefits for the cancer patient and survivor.

There is no set amount or type of exercise a cancer patient or survivor should engage in. Each patient is different and so are their needs. The important thing is that the activity the patient chooses makes the patient’s heart work more than when the patient is at rest. This is the key to helping the patient build endurance, while becoming stronger and increasing flexibility.

The Cancer Institute at Stamford University suggests that any exercise routine needs to include a short warm-up period to get the heart going and the muscles stretching, a longer period of aerobic activity such as walking, swimming or cycling, a strength-building session, including weight-training, and some exercises to improve flexibility.

Building an exercise routine should be gradual, and patients should start slow, doing about 15 minutes of exercise 5 days a week and gradually increasing to 20 to 60 minutes each session. However, exercise does not all have to be done at once. A patient can also choose to do exercise in increments of 10 minutes about 3 times a day. The goal is to make moderate exercise a part of the patient’s regular routine. Exercise can also be easy to include if the patient considers the opportunity she has for exercise in her regular day, such as walking the dog, raking leaves in the backyard or taking a long walk.

Regular, moderate exercise helps to improve a patient’s overall physical condition. This is beneficial when going through treatments, such as mesothelioma treatment, that can take a harsh toll on a patient’s body. Physical benefits do not stop at making the body stronger and more flexible. Exercise can help a patient combat fatigue, deal with pain in the body, improve circulation and prevent blood clots, prevent heart disease and even fight osteoporosis. It can also help reduce the risk of diarrhea. One of the most valuable benefits, however, is that as the patient feels and becomes stronger physically, she also begins to be more independent.

This independence is also a psychological benefit provided by regular exercise. Other psychological benefits include improved self-esteem, something that many cancer patients struggle with, especially as their bodies are affected by cancer and cancer treatments. The entire process of cancer can also sometimes set off a depression and increase anxiety. Exercise can be one tool to fight both conditions, helping the patient keep a positive outlook in life.

It is important for cancer patients and survivors to discuss and be monitored by their doctors when engaging in any exercise program. It is also vital that the patient does not over-exert herself, since that can lead to additional complications.

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Do you have any personal experiences with how exercise or personal wellness has helped you overcome a health condition?

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BLEND Recap Part 2: Whoop-Ass Saturday

chimes — Sat, 12 May 2012 15:00:00 +0000

Oh HI there. I have more recaps of last weekend — but hey, thanks for sticking with me if this doesn’t interest you. I know that a good portion of my audience is into the crafty stuff. There will be more of that next week after I get back from Renegade.

Also, this is going to be a long post. I just looked and the gallery for this post has 46 photos. FORTY FREAKING SIX. I hope you like pictures. Long day = long post.

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Upon returning to Iowa after last Saturday’s bootcamp and hike, and Sunday’s bootcamp — all in high-altitude, I feel a little like this:

[ source ]

For realz. I did 4 rounds of my circuit for LiveFit on Wednesday after the retreat along with a bike ride. And ran up a hill at Ledges State Park on my way back to Ames from Colorado on Monday.

Why?

Because the gals who put together Blend had 3 ass-whoopin’ activities on the agenda for Saturday, along with one for Sunday (with an impromptu yoga class by Fitmixer that I wish I hadn’t forgotten about). And we were on top of a mountain for some of it. OXYGEN. Please.

The day started off bright and early at 6:45 AM with some Fitmixer Amino — which apparently is like crack for fit people. It keeps your muscles from eating themselves while working out and they give you MORE ENERGY to fuel your workout. Stay tuned. I’m giving some away next week.

You might notice that my Hello Kitty sweatshirt definitely had some threads on it from crafting a few weekends back.

Yesterday I mentioned that I wasn’t feeling the altitude. I think I texted Mark 900 times about how I might die. I woke up a few times during the night. I even had a dream that I called Mark and had him pick me up (you know, from 10 hours away) and that I got mad at him because he didn’t bring me back in time to hang out on Saturday night.

Fortunately (for Mark), none of that happened. I got up and my roommates were all ready to head to bootcamp. And apparently we discussed our wardrobe choices because damn we are matchy matchy in this photo. Left to right: Patricia (Vanessa’s friend — she brought a bunch of friends from her gym — so cool!), me, Vanessa and Gina (if you like food, go to Gina’s blog. Her photos are food porn.)

[ photo from Vanessa of Fit, Savvy and Haute ]

Bootcamp was lead by Lindsay and Tina and started off with two laps around the field we were going to use for our workout. Which proved to be a pretty damn long 2 laps because of the altitude. I was huffing and puffing. But I was still at the front of the pack. You know, because I’m competitive. Even when it comes to warm ups.

[ photo from Janetha ]

After a quick warmup, time for dynamic stretching. Note: I look ultra-dumpy in the front row next to Janetha and the Fitmixer gals (the one on the other side of Janetha is who’s doing my nutrition plan for Fitmixer bootcamp, come to find out!) The shorts I wore proved to be wedgie-inducing and not appropriate for being in the front row of a workout consisting of 60+ girls with cameras and blogs.

Tina started the party with some resistance band training. One of the moves caused the bands to slip out from underfoot if you weren’t careful. Which was kind of entertaining. Also, I may have purchased the pants Janetha is wearing in this photo. In purple. Contrary to popular opinion on instagram.

[ photo from Lauren ]

After Tina and Lindsay had their way with us (Lindsay did some great kickboxing moves!), we got to play a game. This was my favorite part — it ~~brought out my competitive side.~~ let the real me shine. We split into teams, and got in a big circle. Tennis balls with various exercises (including BURPEES, which thankfully we didn’t get) were placed in the middle. Each round, one person from each team had to sprint to the middle and grab a ball with an exercise for the team to complete. The faster you got a ball and got back to the team, the more reps of the exercise your team could complete. The team with the most reps at the end of the game won.

Our team didn’t win, but I discovered I could do 72 pushups in a minute. And I was kicking ass on all the rest of the moves. Except one. I can’t remember what it was but it was probably the last one.

TEAM FIVE. We were winners for sure. (Left to right: Nikol (sp?) — one of Vanessa’s friends, Katie, Sarah, um, I feel terrible because I didn’t catch her name, Kim and Jessica)

After bootcamp, we were served a fantastic spread for breakfast (sponsored by Xagave). But of course everybody had to get photos of the balls before leaving for breakfast.

So many girls. So many cameras.

[ photo from Janetha ... sorry about the drop shadow. it's not really my thing #designsnob ]

I had 2% plain chobani and a whole bunch of fruit and nuts with some xagave on top.

After breakfast, we quick snapped a few photos (really? yeah. we like photos) and ran back to our cabins to get ready for the Royal Arch hike.

[ Heather, Jessica and me ]

I don’t think I knew what I was in for. Lindsay said the hike was challenging. But she had also hiked it with a child in tow earlier that week. So, how bad could it be? I mean, it started off pretty tame.

I spent a good amount of time talking to Lauren at the beginning of the hike — LOVE her — but I fell behind quickly (she is kind of a hiking pro). And it didn’t help me much to have a fear of heights. I am proud to report that things that used to seem high are much LESS scary now that I’ve conquered Royal Arch.

I’m so glad I made the climb. Look at these gorgeous shots I got!

I made it! And so did my camera and phone (thank goodness … one of the girls almost lost hers)

[ Roomie pic: Gina and me ]

And so did the 70ish girls that were in our group. Yeah. We were those people.

[ photo from Lauren, who's on the left, then Lindsay, Heather and me ]

At the top, the crazy dog people (including myself) in the group got a special treat. Little dog. At the top. She climbed all the way! Seriously. She’s about half the size of my dog.

[ photo from Tiffany ]

After the hike, Gina and I decided to join a group of girls (and one husband) at Mountain Sun for lunch. I already recapped the glorious sandwich that I ate. So I won’t do it again. Here’s a group photo from Lauren.

[ From left: Kelly, Lindsay, Gina, Me, Heather ]

And the whole table, courtesy of Lynne, who is on the far right in this photo.

This place had some pretty awesome decor. And bumper stickers.

[ photo from Tiffany ]

After lunch, we dinked around on Pearl Street for a while and headed to Avery Brewing company, where we got a special tour.

[ Laura and Ashley ]

I tasted a couple of Laura’s beers and decided to order a couple of my own. Including the Beast. I want this. Again. Now.

A few hours went by and we all decided to head out for dinner. So back to Pearl Street. Gina, Heather and I spent a little while trying to find the restaurant at which a big group was convening for Cinco de Mayo (or Cinco de Drinko as it was coined later by Janetha). We caught sight of this Hippie Taxi.

We made it. And everybody was doing free shots of tequila. But I wanted food. So I went to the tables where people were eating.

[ photo from Ashley — top — Ashley, Gina. Bottom — Ashley, me, Katie ]

Ashley (in the bottom photo with me) and I split some fantabulous mahi mahi tacos (<=== I am a little concerned with my spell check because “fantabulous” didn’t get flagged, but mahi mahi just did).

Seriously. Yum. And it was on Fiestaware, which I ~~unfortunately couldn’t fit in my purse~~ seriously want at my house.

I’m getting tired just writing this post. It was a long day. Hence the long post. We were all ready to crash, though a bunch of the girls were Cinco-ing it up.

[ what I looked like at 10 PM when everybody else was probably doing body shots or getting frozen yogurt ]

So you can pretty much guess that my plans for this weekend include: Sleep. Sleep. More sleep.

Have any big plans for the weekend? Ever gone hiking?

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Come BLEND with me!

chimes — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 15:00:00 +0000

Picture this: Beautiful Colorado landscape. Fabulous food and giveaways. Great activities planned (no lectures!) and/or shopping around town for the weekend. All of this with your favorite fitness and foodie bloggers. It’s the BLEND retreat!

Sold yet? I’ll be there and it’s going to be a blast. And it would be fabulous to have a road trip buddy from Iowa to hang out with me on the way there. We can even stop at all the cheesy road trip landmarks. I’m booking bed and breakfasts for the day before and day after too. Lots of fun girl time!

It’s May 4-6th. Check out the deets. And look at all the awesome foodie sponsors. We’re even getting our own custom BLEND of granola!

If you DO decide to be cool and come with, you should mention that I referred you. All the you’ll have to do is put my name in the Roommate Preference box, with the word referral after it (example: Calee Himes-referral). We don’t have to be roomies (but we can if you’d like!).

Just FYI – ticket prices will increase to $100 on April 1st … so if you’re on the fence, do it now!

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Humpday Blog Love: meals&moves + my first WIAW

chimes — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 14:00:00 +0000

First, some blog lovin’ then some What I Ate Wednesday (WIAW) action — because it’s what all the cool kids do.

It’s been a LONG time since I’ve done a Humpday Blog Love post. A very long time.

Since in t-minus-a-month-and-a-few-days I’ll be heading off to Colorado for the BLEND Retreat, I thought I’d give some blog-lovin’ to some of the lovely Blends (blogger + friends) that I’ll be meeting very soon.

I’m starting with one of the ladies who put this great BLEND retreat together: Janetha [ Janeeeeeeetha ] from meals & moves.

[ image from meals & moves ]

I’ve been following Janetha’s blog since 2010ish. And she’s informative, entertaining, and inspirational. She has two hilarious ~~doggies~~ kids — one of which, Randy, steals and buries food items that Janetha is given to to test, like Larabars, and saves them for later. Oh and she loves cereal … a lot. And I’m pretty sure she likes cookies just as much as I do.

Her blog is mostly filled with her take on fitness and nutrition — so there’s … you guessed it — meals and moves. Recipes + workouts. But there’s also a bunch of other things. Guest posts. Gear reviews. And she talks about her GI issues, which makes me especially appreciate her blog given I have GI issues and I feel her pain. She’s even more of an open book than I am [ guys, it's possible! ] and hits on tough / personal issues like suicide, drugs & partying, and her mother’s stroke.

Janetha’s the reason I started doing LiveFit. Specifically her abs in this post [ amirite? ]. Her review of LiveFit after she was done with it made me get my ass back in gear and honestly give Phase 2 another go … I was punking out on lifting heavy with my already large thighs and butt.

Most of the topics she covers on her blog should sound pretty familiar because I’ve gone off and tried most of the stuff she’s blogged about. And I typically leave a page-long comment when I comment on her blog. Or two. Or three. She probably thinks that I’m a weird-crazy-stalker-person. But actually, I just like good writers with a real message and well-thought-out content. And writers who take the time to react and respond to their blog comments — either by a follow-up post or by personal responses. She does a great job!

Anyway … if you’ve not visited meals & moves yet, you should probably go do it. Even if you’re not big into health and fitness, she’s great to read. She discusses a lot of other issues and has great stories about crazy happenings at work and about her dogs.

If you do, leave her a comment and tell her I sent you! If nothing else, scroll to the bottom of her page and read her most popular categories / posts.

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Now for WIAW, I bring you what I ate LAST Wednesday. I wasn’t aiming to go green, but boy did everything turn out GREEN. Even the fair trade chocolate I snagged on super-duper-ultra-sale. Check it!

And I apologize because half of these pix were taken with my iPod because I was SO excited that I remembered to do WIAW but had left my actual camera at home.

Breakfast was extremely green. I made another green monster and added some kale that was leftover from dinner on Monday. Note: Kale is not the best addition to a green smoothie if you don’t like tasting your greens. I was okay with it, but it was a bit much for breakfast.

For a snack I had some grapes. Purple. Not green. Mark likes the green ones, but I like the purple ones.

Lunch was leftovers from dinner on Monday — kale pasta toss from Eat Live Run — sans pasta and the feta. Pasta because I don’t eat it and feta because I forgot it.

And I assure you that this is MUCH better than it looks (look at her photos in her recipe in the link above). The chicken sausage in my pic looks kind of gross.

Afternoon snack was the rest of a green pepper that Mark had cut up for pizza night the previous Friday.

Wednesday nights I’m on my own for dinner, so I did a mental inventory of what was in the fridge on the way home and decided that I could do breakfast for dinner (BFD). I only had 2 hours between work and an embroidery class that I was taking, so it had to be something fast. But, I needed to pick up an item to make my BFD complete.

I’ve been working with a nutritionist-in-training (dietetics student) on campus and I’m actually getting more from her than I have from therapy regarding binge eating. She suggested that this week I pick up some binge items and have them in the house. And NOT HIDE THEM.

That’s kind of scary. So I thought I’d start with something that’s a little healthier than a bag of cheetohs. So, I picked up some Love Crunch granola. I’ve been known to eat an entire bag in one sitting (I’m sure I’m not the only one), but usually at night when I’m not even hungry.

And guys … I still have this bag. I can’t even tell you how exciting this is! When I have anything snacky or sugary, it’s gone in a day or two. It’s been a WEEK. It’s so empowering.

I had some for dessert after my amazing BFD: egg whites with asparagus and goat cheese. Holy ~~cow~~ goat was this yummy.

And no, your eyes aren’t playing tricks on you. Somewhere along the way I started eating all my dessert items with my baby spoon, so I snagged it from my parent’s house a while back. I have no idea why I do this, but I do. And it’s a ritual. Maybe it’s so I take tiny bites and the dessert lasts longer? I don’t know.

Oh, and one of the non-essential items I picked up at our local co-op? A Theo chocolate bar. They didn’t have my favorite kind, but they did have a mint one. So I picked that up. And giggled a little after I checked out and realized the granola and chocolate was all I got — because I knew I was going to do WIAW and both items are packaged in pretty similar green packaging.

And no, I didn’t eat the whole chocolate bar either. I broke off a square to taste-test it and stuck it in the freezer. Whoop whoop.

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