Archive for July, 2010

So I’m collaborating on a new beauty book with a skin genius, which means that my already off-the-charts wrinkle phobia has reached a fever pitch. I’m currently in full-tilt discovery mode, researching any and all remedies  — cockamamie or completely sound — for keeping the crinklies out of my not-too-distant future. (And your not-too-distant future, too; I know there are millions of like-minded moms out there, fretting about this stuff…)

One such prevention strategy is so basic, yet so completely hard to do if it’s not your thing: sleeping on your back. During pregnancy, we mamas were cautioned against this. And at least for me, the recommended preggo position — on the left side — became so addictive that the minute Hubby and I enter any hotel rooms now, I immediately claim the side of the bed that will enable me to maintain my lefty stance.

Quelle surprise: I have the left-side-of-my-face crow’s feet to show for it. So I’m now on a mission to change my evil, wrinkle-causing ways. And in my quest, I’ve even happened upon a role model…

It’s not like we’re besties, so I can’t actually verify this, but allegedly Heather Locklear credits her youthfulness to the fact that she doesn’t smoosh her pretty mug into her pillow every night.

Thus, I’m endeavoring to at least fall asleep on my back. What happens afterward I can’t really be responsible for, right? I’ve seen some weird “fixes” on the Internet, like sewing old tennis balls to your pajamas so you’re so uncomfy you wake up. But that seems a little extreme. (Plus, my sewing skills aren’t exactly stellar…)

Until I master this major life change, I figure the least I can do is mitigate some of the damage with satin: Satin pillowcases, satin eye masks, maybe even this groovy, satin-wrapped special pillow. I’m throwing some satin at the situation, and hoping for the best.

It was on the TODAY show last week, and I’ve been spotting it here and there in various health publications and websites I read, so I guess it’s official: there’s a link between thinning brows and hypothyroidism, aka an underactive thyroid. Of course, skimpy brows are but one of a long line of symptoms, some pretty egregious, such as fatigue, weight gain, depression and monster periods. But if you find you’re having to wield your tweezers a little less frequently, and are all but welded to your couch and daily afternoon doses of Ellen, it’s definitely worth your while to get tested.

For me, my diagnosis came long before I connected the dots to less-than-lush brows. Though for some reason my general practitioner is loathe to point the finger at my pregnancy, I’m perfectly fine with saying that I have postpartum thyroiditis. That doesn’t mean that I’m not turning cartwheels about having a baby — I am. It just means that prior to delivering the Wee Lass, I didn’t have a thyroid condition, and now I do. No biggie.

Not that I’m thrilled to have an underactive thyroid, because I’m most certainly not. It turns losing five freaking pounds into the epic battle of the century, and I’m personally not keen on taking Rx meds of any kind. Thus, I’ve toyed with the idea of looking into alternative therapies, and have had the definitive text on the subject, The Thyroid Solution by Ridha Arem, MD, on my nightstand for about four years now.

Some day I’ll dig deeper to learn more about this vital, albeit tiny, part of my body, and why it decided, après-baby, to just konk right out on me. But in the meantime, I’ll lay off the plucking and make like hot mama Brooke Shields.

I’m sure you’ll be overjoyed to learn that I’m really loving my weekly tennis lessons, which are held, oh-so-conveniently, on the rooftop of our condominium complex. After a long day of being chained to my desk, it’s great to get out there and smack those balls into smithereens.

But now that we’re a few weeks in, and I’ve officially gotten my sea legs, I’m lusting after more racquet-whack it power. Especially when it gets to the serve portion of the program and my upper body strength has gone AWOL. After years of trying, I finally have my serve technique sorted out.  It would be kind of fabulous if I also had the energy and oomph to back it up.

So this week, in preparation for the whack-fest, I’ve been doing old-school push ups. I’ve also been jumping rope like a madwoman — twice this week I powered through 3000 jumps (using my trusty Tanita HealthyJump rope with the built-in counter, of course, because if you think I have the presence of mind to count to 3,000, you are sorely mistaken….) Although I’ve never really wrapped my mind around why jumping rope strengthens your arms, I’m just super-happy it does.

I’ve also been thinking about that trusty yoga move — the Plank — which also offers a little one-stop shopping in the form of both core- and arms-strengthening. Lord knows my stomach could use all the help it can get.

And lest I forget my  “Definition” exercise DVD. If I continue to break that baby out on a regular basis, I’ll be sending those balls straight into the stratosphere.

Overnight, it’s as if every blade of grass in my lovely East Coast neighborhood has turned a ghastly shade of taupe. Not a good look.

Couple that with my incessant trips to the hyper-chlorinated town pool and the skin on my legs and arms is begging for mercy. It’s borderline crepe-y, which is a beauty bugaboo I wasn’t expecting to have to deal with for at least another decade. In my opinion, nothing reads “old lady” quite like a pair of forearms doing a stellar impression of a crepe-paper banner at your five-year-old’s birthday party.

Consequently, I find myself reaching for the same robo-moisturizers I was slathering myself with this past winter. Though at first I was a tad fearful — will I feel and look like a big ol’ greaseball? — I quickly got over that paranoia when I saw how my thirsty epidermis responded. Even my favorite body oil is sinking right in and disappearing faster than Pinkalicious cupcakes from our kitchen counter.

Here’s what I’m using, all of which are both luxe and natural-slash-aromatherapeutic:

Mama Mio OMega Body Oil

Comfort Zone Aromasoul Oriental Body Cream

Yes To Carrots Deliciously Rich Body Butter

Kiss My Face Peaceful Patchouli Ultra Moisturizer

While most of these have a thicker consistency than I would expect to have to deploy at this time of year, they’re working like a charm. But you could always just use a butter or cream at night, pre-bed (after a quick hot shower, soooo yummy and relaxing) and a lighter lotion during the day. But just use something. We hot mamas gotta keep the “crepeys” at bay.

My good mama-friend Alev is in town from the Netherlands for a few weeks, and I have to say, she looks quite slim and trim. Since she’s pretty much allergic to standard-issue exercise, I was a tad suspicious. Had she secretly been Master Cleansing à la hot mom Demi Moore? Or perhaps siphoning off euros from the family funds for lipo and a tummy tuck?

Turns out she’s been tooling around on a Bakfiet, a cargo bike that has such a big basket-y thing in front that she can easily tuck her two adorable kid-lets inside and whiz them to school, playdates, the market or wherever the wind and their whims may take them. Of course, it helps that the city in which they live — The Hague — is as flat as the proverbial pancake, and positively jam-packed with bicycle lanes.

Still, I was impressed. Especially when she told me that she has a special suit for rainy days, which are apparently abundant in the land of windmills and wooden shoes. (I know, biggest clichés ever…I’m surprised I didn’t mention tulips…oops, I guess I just did…) The wee tots have their own special canopy, so of course not a drop of aqua touches their cute little mugs.

Pretty cool, right? Eco-friendly family transport and thinner thighs? Might be time to reconsider the Mom-Mobile…

The sweet little town pool we joined doesn’t look like this, but Hubby and the Wee Lass and I are enjoying it just the same. And while I need to get the snack bar situation under control — suffice it to say that I haven’t been making the best choices on that front — it has become a welcome addition to our summer-weekend itinerary.

If only my dear hair liked it as much as we do. Since I’ve already outed myself for my less-than-desirable natural texture, I guess there’s no shame in saying that the chlorine at said beloved town pool has exacerbated the problem. Between that and the havoc the sun is wreaking on my single-process color, it’s no wonder I wear it scraped back into a crisp, tidy (albeit vaguely aging) bun most of the time.

But then I remembered that old beauty trick of dousing your hair in regular H20 before going for a dip. Theoretically, our tresses can absorb only so much water at any given moment. So if you wet it with the good stuff first (tap, Evian, Poland Spring), the bad stuff can’t penetrate to the same degree. Ironically, here’s what also helps: Scraping my hair back into a crisp, tidy (albeit vaguely aging) bun after wetting it. Reduced surface area = reduced damage.

Though I already own enough shampoos to fully stock the shelves of my local drugstore, my other plan of attack is to nab a few natural, gentle and sulfate-free sudsy cleansers that purport to zap dastardly pool chemicals. After conducting a bit of research, here’s what I’m on the hunt for:

Aubrey Organics Swimmers Shampoo

Alterna Life Solutions Clarifying Shampoo

Avalon Organics Lemon Clarifying Shampoo

For mamas who don’t feel like springing for yet another shampoo, here’s a homemade clarifying hair-rinse recipe for deep-sixing chlorine: Mix 1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar into a cup of warm water, give it a good stir and pour it on. Wait a minute while you’re flipping through the latest issue of Us Weekly, then rinse with plain wah-wah.

Tomorrow, I’ll weigh-in on yet another summer beauty bugaboo: Lizard-dry skin.

Momover Lady absolutely loves getting fan mail — particularly when it’s packed with helpful suggestions as to how I can perform my advice-dispensing services a little better. So when I recently opened a gushy e-missive from Kate, a mama of three who hails from extremely far away, I did the happy dance.

“I’m delighted there’s someone offering a holistic approach to new-mum sanity and health,” Kate somehow managed to write while tending to her tots, including a four-month-old diapered darling. “I just loved your book and think you’re so inspiring. Since I read it, I have been exercising every day, if only for ten minutes, and I have so much more energy.”

Awesome, right? But here’s where it gets better: She gave me brills topic ideas for the next edition. What Smart Kate would like me to add are two sections, both of which are exercise-related. One is on managing bladder leakage, especially while hopping around on a mini-trampoline, which I’m forever yammering about. The second is on juggling breastfeeding with a gradually more intense post-baby fitness regimen.

But I’ve decided that I don’t want to wait until Momover: The Sequel before I investigate these matters further, so they’re officially on my articles To Do list. In the meantime, here are some breastfeeding / fitness tips, courtesy of Kate:

1. Always exercise directly after a feed, so your breasts aren’t engorged.

2. Don’t try martial arts or other contact sports unless you can be certain you won’t cop a blow to your breasts.

3. It’s okay to wear an underwire sports bra, but take it off ASAP.

4. Beware of sweat- and friction-generated thrush in your nipples. Symptoms include major sensitivity (beyond the norm for being chewed-on eight times a day!) coupled with stabbing pains that seem to pass from inside your breast out through the nipple. (Note: Thrush, while irksome, is a common yeast infection frequently passed between mothers and newborns. Read more about it here.)

Though I initially attempted to breastfeed my little lady, it didn’t come together as planned. So I’m grateful to Kate for these excellent exercise pointers. I’m all ears for anything that helps new mamas get off the couch and back in the wellness game.

I looked fine. Not amazing, mind you, but perfectly okay. So why did makeup-less moi want to run for cover when I spotted my neighbor this week as I nipped out to grab lunch and The New York Times? Clad in shorts, a T-shirt (one of those new, incredibly soft “vintage” numbers currently on sale at Gap) and my beloved Birks, I had just worked-out (ahem, finalement) so my skin had a nice, rosy glow.

Still, I didn’t have a stitch of makeup on. And if you’ve read my book or the bulk of my blog posts, you know I’m allllll about polish and presentation. I just believe in it. I also believe in lots of other stuff that’s about a million times more important than polish and presentation, but the two Ps? They’re right up there.

One of the reasons we mamas get so down on our ourselves about the way we look is because we A) think it’s “frivolous” to carve out the time to buff and fluff and B) feel guilty if we’re taking one nano-second away from the tots, the peanut-butter sandwich-making and popsicle-dispensing, the dustbunny-removal, etc., etc. And because we’re laboring under these misguided notions, we often backburner the small confidence-boosters, like a quick swipe of blush or a dab of tinted moisturizer.

I’m mighty keen on quick swipes of blush and dabs of tinted moisturizer, which is why it’s so very rare that I saunter out into the Big Wide World without them. And when I did that this week, I didn’t feel at my Momover best. I like feeling at my Momover best. Ergo, the lip gloss and eyeliner in heavy rotation.

While part of me is stupefied by the fact that I set the bar so high for myself — increasing my number of workouts for 2010 to 200, as compared to 138 for last year, a 45 percent spike — the “go for it” Momover part of me really, really, really wants to just do it, Nike-style.

In my head, I keep hearing that creaky old phrase: “There are two kinds of people in this world: Doers and Talkers.” And I want to be a Doer. Well, actually, I aspire to both — Doer and Talker. But lately I’ve been talking (read: blogging and writing) a lot more than I’ve been doing.

So just how far have I fallen off the fitness wagon? A quick scan of my trusty log tells me I’ve moved it a measly 80 times this year. That means…I need to turn on the calculator on my iPhone to figure this out…that I have to crank through 5.45 workouts per week for the remainder of the year.

O.

M.

G.

The Talker is officially speechless. So I’m digging out my ancient copy of 100 Ways to Motivate Yourself and heading straight up to the gym.

A few months ago, we were ordered by the family vet to trim our boy cat, Thunder, waaaaaaaay down. We could tell just by looking at him that he was “trending” in the wrong direction, but when we received word that he was to shed one-third of his total weight, we knew it wouldn’t be pretty. But we bit the bullet, and despite his incessant pleading for grub, he has miraculously peeled off a couple of pounds of kitty-blubber.

In an effort to maintain momentum with Project Slim & Trim, we opted to use our Cat Mate automatic feeder to dispense meals while we were on our Fourth of July mini-break at Hershey Park. Basically, there’s no way Thunder could be trusted to share a giant bowl of dry food with his sister Lightning, so we went on auto-pilot, and each would have their own smallish portions of wet food at a pre-designated hour.

A smart plan, right? It totally would have been, had we remembered to click the tiny “start” button on the bottom of the clever little contraption. Instead, we arrived home last night, after a lovely stay at the Hotel Hershey and two days of intense chocolate consumption, to two cats that hadn’t eaten in 48 hours. We were so, so, so, so upset. And they were so, so, so, so hungry. And pissed-off, to boot.

So this week, as a show of solidarity — and an effort to mitigate some of the damage from the Create Your Candy Bar attraction — I’m scaling seriously back on my food consumption. I’m controlling my portions and keeping a food log. That’s how bad I feel about this whole automatic feeder debacle, not to mention Thunder’s ongoing battle against the bulge. I’m with ya, Big Guy, every step of the way. Meow…