Books: Fatal

When I started listening to this book, my first impression was that it was going to be another screed against big business and toxic waste. (The last audiobook I listened to was Grisham’s The Appeal, regarding which I posted a moderately negative review six weeks ago.) Not counting the prologue (an apparently unrelated incident which is not explained until much later in the book), the novel starts with an accident at a coal mine, prompting concerns of safety violations and hints of possible toxic waste.

Then the book jumps to a separate storyline, regarding the pending approval of a new super-vaccine. Here the apparent villains are those responsible for pushing vaccines on the American public, touting their health benefits and minimizing or denying the risks. There are the drug companies, looking for big profits, doctors who benefit from a cozy relationship with the drug companies, and researchers dependent on grant money (much of it coming from drug companies).

Like David against Goliath, a small group of concerned parents (many of whom have watched their own children suffer terrible diseases – some have even died – after getting routine childhood immunizations) is fighting to make their concerns heard. They aren’t trying to get rid of vaccines, just to educate the public about possible risks, ensure that parents have a choice whether to have their children vaccinated, and push for more thorough research on the long-term effects of vaccinations.

Unlike Grisham’s book, this one was very enjoyable simply as a story. The plot is fast-moving, with a roller coaster of suspense as one new development after another reveals new dangers and new villains. The main characters find themselves in danger, escape in the nick of time, and are promptly back in harm’s way. The characters are well-developed and likable, heroic when needed but hardly without their own failings. There were hints which way the story was going but the end contained some surprises.

The controversy over vaccinations was also handled very well, I thought. Despite my initial concerns that the novel would simply feed widespread suspicion of the medical establishment, later on the perspective seems more nuanced. Vaccines do save a great many lives, the book acknowledges (via consumer advocate Ellen Kroft), and it is hard to argue for curtailing their use in order to prevent a muchsmaller number of children from developing disorders which can’t even be proven conclusively to have any causal connection to the vaccines.

High tech eye exam

I only vaguely remember my first visit to an optometrist, at age eighteen. I suppose he put drops in my eyes to dilate them, but I didn’t have to drive myself home (I don’t remember if my father took me or if I took the bus). I do remember an eye exam a few years later, and how difficult it was to drive home afterward, especially on unfamiliar streets (it was my first visit to that eye doctor), with all the lights seeming to stream out in every direction.

I made a point, from then on, not to schedule eye exams in the evening, so that I wouldn’t have to drive home in the dark. Of course, once we moved from greater Philadelphia to rural Michigan, evening appointments weren’t an option anyway. By then there was a second set of drops being used, as part of the test for glaucoma. These drops anesthetize the eye as well as adding a yellow dye that, until today, I always noticed but never knew what it was for. Different offices I’ve been to use somewhat different equipment for this test, and some of them mildly unpleasant and some a bit more so. 

At the end of one of my eye exams in Michigan, I found my vision so blurred that I couldn’t even see  well enough to write the check to pay for the office visit. I had to have the office clerk write all but the signature and position my hand in the right place to sign it.

Still, getting drops in my eyes is nothing compared to having to help my younger son get them. He can’t stand getting even water in or around his eyes – when he bathes I have to frequently hand him a towel so he can dry his face. Helping him relax enough for the optometrist’s assistant to put drops in his eyes is quite a challenge.

This morning I had my annual eye exam, and there were no drops. None at all! New high tech equipment has eliminated the need for either kind of drops, at least on a yearly basis and for healthy eyes. (My doctor will still use them on me perhaps every three years.) And he assures me my eyes are very healthy, as the results of his high tech tests show.

Root canal 101

I’m sure I’ve heard the term root canal many times in my lifetime, and just about always it was associated with feelings of pain and dread. Personally I’ve always associated it with people older than myself, people with a mouthful of dental problems. Until recently I never thought I’d watch a kid getting a root canal.

I was still hoping, up until we arrived at the dentist’s office this afternoon, that my 9-year-old wouldn’t need one. The appointment was just for a filling – though admittedly the broken front tooth was going to need a big “filling.” It was starting to look black inside, which wasn’t a good sign. But I figured that if we were told he needed a root canal, we’d be making an appointment to come back (or go to a specialist) some other time.

Instead, after confirming that a root canal was necessary, the dentist offered to do it on the spot. He said it wouldn’t take long, and would be no more painful than getting a filling. I figured it was best to get it over with rather than having to come back again (and live with the prospect looming over us in the meantime), so I said yes. Then, the dentist asked me to sign a form confirming I understood the risks associated with it. And then, he listed the various risks.

Since the form started by explaining that the only alternative was pulling the tooth, I asked only how much it would cost (less than I expected), and whether he was confident he could do it (knowing my son and his very sensitive gag reflex). Then I signed. And I spent the next hour watching my little boy (OK, not so little – but not so big either) get a root canal and a filling.

Free from food cravings (Part 4)

I don’t remember whether I had had my usual loss of appetite and weight during the summer of 2007. It had been a stressful year, as had the past several years. In four years we had moved twice, dealt with the death of my father-in-law and both my parents, job loss (between me and my husband, both voluntary and involuntary terminations, we had left five jobs) and the resulting financial difficulties, and we were learning to deal with the challenges of raising an autistic child.

That fall, the church we attend announced a new emphasis on revival, using a book and DVD series called Downpour. I didn’t find the book especially helpful, and I felt left out when people started giving stirring testimonies of what God was doing in their lives. But I joined a small group that was studying the book, and I read it and did my homework. One week this was going through a list of sins, identifying those which I needed to repent of and forsake. I don’t think it listed overeating, but self-indulgence was there, along with several others that I knew described me.

I felt very low. Guilty, depressed, ready for a change but not really knowing how to make it happen. What hadn’t I tried already? If feeling guilty and wanting to do better and praying about it were the answer, I wouldn’t have been struggling with the problem for so many years.

The next day, someone at worldmagblog mentioned an online course to deal with overeating, and how it had helped her. I followed the link to the Lord’s Table, and signed up for the course. The next day – even though it was mid-November rather than mid-May or June – I felt no food cravings.

Of course, I had experienced that before. It was always only a matter of time. Sometimes it might take months instead of weeks, but slowly the cravings came back, until they overwhelmed me and I gave in. I’d tell myself it was just one little bit, but it was like opening floodgates. One bite made me want two then three then four then the whole bar or bag or package.

Free from food cravings (Part 3)

In my mid-30’s it seemed that things started to change. One Sunday morning after a sermon that hit home particularly hard, I decided that if I had to choose between God and food, I was choosing God. A short time later, while waiting to pick up a prescription I noticed a book by Geneen Roth, Breaking Free From Emotional Eating. I promptly purchased and read the book, and recognized some of the big mistakes I had been making in trying to control my eating.

Like many dieters, I tended to promise myself I would give up unhealthy foods … tomorrow. Or next week. But then I would want to take advantage of being able to still enjoy them tonight. And I’d probably eat extra, both to enjoy them before having to give them up, and to get rid of what was left in the house so it wouldn’t tempt me later. Then the next morning I would feel lousy, both physically – from having eaten too much and emotionally – from having eaten too much. And I would decide to postpone giving up those unhealthy foods so I could eat some that day and feel better.

Roth points out that the problem isn’t so much what you eat as why you eat. Eating to meet emotional needs leads to all the problems I had. What I had to do was learn to eat to meet physical needs. She also recommended eating foods you felt a desire to eat, even if they weren’t the most healthy, as long as you only ate enough to satisfy hunger.

I found that when I was hungry, I actually preferred healthier foods. And if I did decide to eat a cookie, or some ice cream, I didn’t need to eat a huge amount. I’d enjoy some, and then put it away, and promise myself I could have more the next day if I wanted to. Sometimes I didn’t even want to the next day. I lost weight, and for a time I thought I was finally free of that long struggle.

Free from food cravings (Part 2)

I think I was in my early 20’s when I admitted to myself that I was a “junk food junkie.” I fit the description of a compulsive overeater – I ate in secret, I sometimes ate until I felt sick, I thought about food all the time and fantasized about what I would really like to eat. Afterward I always felt guilty and depressed, but the only relief I know how to find for those bad feelings was in the instant gratification provided by more food.

Sometimes I did pray about it, asking forgiveness for misusing my body and for release from the cravings. When I was a young Christian I had sometimes promised not to overeat like that again, but after breaking my promise a few times I decided it was better not to make a promise I knew I would not keep. I was sure I could not be in fellowship with God when I was overeating, but given a choice between the two, the eating usually won.

After all, even when I was eating right and exercising, prayer and Bible reading still felt pretty hollow. I never had the sense that other people seemed to have of a close personal relationship with God. Sometimes I thought maybe I was really not a Christian after all – I even hoped that was the case, because then I could become one and things would finally change. But I had already believed the best I knew how, repented and asked forgiveness, and asked Jesus to be my Lord and Savior – and as far as I could tell I meant it. Repeating it didn’t seem to make a difference.

Periodically I tried to eat better and to exercise more. I had absorbed enough of my mother’s teaching on healthy eating as a child that I knew what was the right way to eat – I just didn’t enjoy it much. I knew that fad diets claiming quick and easy weight loss were not the answer, because the weight loss lasted only as long as the diet, and then one would revert to the old habits and gain it all back. (I tried the cabbage soup diet once, mostly because someone else had already made the soup. I only kept it up for a couple days – but I really liked the soup.)

Free from food cravings (Part 1)

[This is fairly long, so I am breaking it up into a few posts. If I seem to spend a lot of time and space on what happened a long time ago, it's because the changes in the past year or so are more meaningful against the backdrop of the preceding 35 years.]

I promised, a few months ago, to write more about what led to my losing 40 pounds, and more importantly to no longer feeling the urge to chow down on junk food. Karen O reminded me about this recently, in her comment on Nutrition by the numbers, and MMacMurray outlined the basics of what I learned in an online course, The Lord’s Table.

To really explain it, though, I have to back up and describe what my relationship with food used to be. It may sound strange to talk about having a “relationship” with food, but for a portion of my life food was a dominant factor in shaping my behavior, not just my body. 

My unhealthy eating habits started, for the most part, in middle school. In elementary school I had had little choice in what I ate – hot lunch at school, and the healthy foods served at meals at home and available for snacking (fruits and vegetables, cheese, healthy crackers such as Triscuits and Ryvita). But in middle school I discovered the freedom offered by getting in the “a la carte” line at lunch.

Nutrition by the numbers

This morning I got an email from HyVee (a supermarket chain where I shop sometimes and receive weekly emails from) about a new food labeling program to help consumers pick more nutritious foods when they shop. It won’t take the place of existing nutrition labels, but it is rather intended to supplement them by giving a food products a single numeric score, that takes into account all those details specified in the existing labels.

I have to admit that I have sometimes had difficulty deciding which product to buy based on the current labels. I check for fat content (looking for low saturated fat), fiber (the more the better), and sugars (the less the better, at least on packaged products where the sugar is generally added rather than an essential part of the food). Sometimes I check for iron, especially when I’ve just been deferred from giving blood because of low iron. I might check protein content, though I’ve read that we Americans generally get more protein than we need, so I’m not too concerned about it.

Several weeks ago, my younger son came home from school talking about eating foods with less fat and sugar and more fiber. I was surprised to discover that this sudden interest came not from a lesson on nutrition in his 3rd grade class, but from something in the reading portion of his computer lab work (the students work at an individualized pace on reading and math). So next time we went to the supermarket, we looked together at the nutrition labels on breakfast cereals, yogurt and pudding, peanut butter, and crackers.

Time for bed

At first the headline under Breaking News surprised me: “Poor Sleep Increases Risk Of Getting Sick.” It surprised me not because of what it said, but that something that seemed so obvious to me could be considered any kind of breaking news.

I’ve noticed for years that I am more likely to get sick when I haven’t been getting enough sleep (not to mention more likely to be depressed, moody, irritable, and/or hungry). I figured it’s my body’s way of insisting that I get some rest, by putting me in bed whether I want to be or not.

But it’s still interesting to read the scientific results – and wonder whether I would have taken the $800 to have a cold virus sprayed up my nose and then sit around in a hotel five days to see if I got sick. Being sick apparently means not only getting infected (which happened to 135 of 153 volunteers), but developing the symptoms of a cold – congesting and runny noses. By that measure, only 54 were affected.

Simply going to bed early does not necessary provide the illness-fighting benefits of a good night’s sleep. Those who toss and turn a lot during the night, or who lie awake a long time unable to sleep, may be even more prone to sickness than those who are short on sleep but sleep well when they do go to bed.

You’d have to ask my husband whether I toss and turn. His main observation is that I “mummify” myself in the blanket – and that I inevitably wind up sleeping flat on my back with my arms crossed on my chest like a corpse. I used to lie awake in bed a long time, but I have found that a few games of handheld Boggle or Sudoku work well for getting me sleepy.

Unfortunately the Sudoku is missing and the Boggle is broken. I’ll have to settle for an old-fashioned book. But I don’t want a cold, so I’m off to bed.

When does eternal life start?

Eternal life
When I was a teenager, in the church where I came to faith in Jesus Christ, they liked to emphasize the present tense of the verbs in 1 John 5:14: He that hath the Son hath life (they only used the King James Version). As I remember, this focus was about having the assurance of salvation and eternal security – the present possession of the gift of eternal life meant that one could say with confidence, “If I were to die tonight I know I would go to heaven.”

Eternal life itself seemed to be viewed primarily in the future, however. It was rather like a minor knowing that a large fortune has been set aside for him in a trust fund, available to him only when he becomes an adult. He knows it is there, and is guaranteed that he will be able to live comfortably on it then, but its benefit to him right now is limited to having that confident hope for the future.

Not that hope isn’t a wonderful thing to have. (It’s on my H list for three days from now.) But in other churches I learned later to see 1 John 5:12 in a new way. Eternal life is a current possession, something I have and can enjoy right now. It starts when I become a Christian, and simply never ends. Physical death entails some kind of change in its nature – a change all for the good from my perspective. But physical death isn’t the beginning of eternal life, only the end of mortality.

So what makes eternal life here and now different from life here and now without it? Words that come to mind are joyful obedience, answered prayer, Spirit-empowered (to serve, not to control). Only problem is, those are more descriptions of what I know abundant life in Christ is supposed to be like than a report of my own experience.

Certainly my life today is more in line with this than before my conversion at age 14. But then, thirty plus years of living might have something to do with that. Not that people always mature as they age, but there is no way I can say how my life today might compare with what it might have been if I had continued as a somewhat religious agnostic.