Aurora’s daughter did not get what she thought she rightfully deserved, so Princess Audrey went to the dark side. Yes, the story that unfolds in the song “The Queen Of Mean,” from Disney’s Descendents 3, has been an obsession in my home.
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We started with all the Disney shows, Mickey and Minnie, Moana, and Frozen. Now, at the old ages of 5 and 7, both of my girls have, almost overnight, moved on to The Descendents.
A series of Disney movies in which all of the bad people from your favorite fairy tales have been rounded up and moved to “The Isle Of The Lost.” Cruella Deville, Evil Queen, Jafar, and the evilest of all villains, Maleficent have kids, and those children are stuck there on that island. They are called, simply, VK’s, or Villain Kids.
Queen Belle and King Beast, of Beauty And The Beast fame, have a child too, a son, Ben. When Ben turns 16, he becomes a prince, and his first order is to give some of the VK kids a chance to live on Auradon, where all the good people live.
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So, they bring over four kids from “The Isle Of The Lost,” and wouldn’t you know it, Prince Ben falls in love with Maleficent’s daughter, Mal. Now Audrey, Sleeping Beauty’s daughter, who was expecting Prince Ben to marry her and make her the Queen of Auradon, is heartbroken. So, she steals the queen’s crown and Maleficent’s scepter and transforms herself into the Queen Of Mean. Thus inspiring the song that was viewed over two million times on the day it was released.
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The song eventually went gold and in an interview, ” Sarah Jeffery remarked, “I feel like people can relate to it because it’s this song about never being seen and being forgotten about, and wanting to change that.” I would agree with that one hundred percent. Even though Audrey has become a bad person in the movie, we can still understand how she got here, and the pain that drove her to do these mean things.
“Being nice was my pastime/But I’ve been hurt for the last time And I won’t ever let another person take advantage of me The anger burns my skin, third-degree”
When I first watched these movies with my girls I wondered if the characters were really singing these songs? It turns out they are, which is not surprising, as Disney actors and actresses are usually very talented. It’s an incredible piece of singing and performance by Sarah Jefferey, which you can witness here, as she sings in the studio.
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It’s so catchy, and I often find myself singing, “I want what I deserve!” It’s also changing all of my Spotify stats, as my girls like to grab my phone and play The Descendents’ soundtracks.
It’s funny, as my five-year-old daughter struts around the living room singing with the attitude of a woman scorned, I think, “God be gentle to the man who crosses her.”
Then there’s something you can do about how some schools, like Glenbrook (Ill.) High School District 225, are causing real damage to children by closing their schools.
Attend Rally To Open Our Schools, from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. on Wednesday, September 23 in Gallery Park, 2100 Patriot Blvd, Glenview.
Organized by the grass-roots citizens’ group, Reopen Illinois Schools, the rally will send a clear message to the District 225 School Board, the administrators and an advisory committee tasked with recommending whether students should be required to continue with remote learning. The message: Re-open Glenbrook North and Glenbrook South high schools now.
The district hasn’t been keen to listen to parents, students and other concerned citizens about the damage, possibly permanent, that remote “learning” and the closing of the two high schools are doing to their students
Said the rally organizers,
Our goal is to raise awareness that a majority of the community wants to get our kids back into the classroom for in-person learning with appropriate mitigation efforts in place to help prevent the spread of COVID. Despite our outstanding teachers’ greatest efforts, elearning is no substitute for an in-person education. Our kids are not learning at the same level online as they learn in-person. They also are sedentary and socially isolated. Their mental health is at risk. There are local schools returning to classroom teaching with great success. While the virus concerns are valid, we want all schools to safely reopen for in-person instruction.
Speakers at the rally will include Paul Vallas, the respected educator and public servant who is credited with turning around several failing schools, including, at the time, the Chicago Public Schools. Vallas is an outspoke advocate of re-opening the schools.
Also speaking will be Dr. Dana Russo, a board-certified obstetrician and gynecologist, and Grant R. Koster, Vice President of Clinical Operations at Athletico Physical Therapy. Also speaking will be some students who can speak first hand about the damage that remote learning is doing.
This is not a political rally, but some people sadly have politicized the issue. This is a straight-out plea for freeing students from a learning environment that has been demonstrated to be imperfect, if not dangerous. The science is clear: The risk to children is substantially less, as demonstrated by nearby schools as Loyola that have successfully re-opened.
Don’t rationalize your silence by saying that education experts must know what they’re doing. You, the parents, are in charge of your children. Tell the “experts” that you and your children want the schools opened, now.
P.S. While you’re at it, tell the administrators that it’s time to restart sports.
My historical novel: Madness: The War of 1812 To subscribe to the Barbershop, type your email address in the box and click the “create subscription” button. My list is completely spam free, and you can opt out at any time.
I am standing beside my daughter’s bed, having a serious talk about school. She has no idea what her math homework is. She has no idea where her math homework is. She doesn’t pay attention in class, instead, she watches the students’ chats go by, which are silly and confusing. “One of the boys just wrote, “chickennuggets chickennuggets!” she gasps, unable to fathom such a bizarre outcry. I tell her it doesn’t matter what they’re writing, she has to pay attention to the teacher.
She cries. She cries so often, and I don’t. No matter how cathartic it would be. No matter how my chest aches.
I am standing behind my husband’s wheelchair, panting from pushing it up the incline of the pedestrian walkway between hospital buildings. My cloth mask feels hot, I have left it on beneath the surgical mask the hospital requires I wear either on top or instead, and I know my skin is breaking out underneath. I am explaining to him where we’re going next, which he knew, of course, but has escaped him again. I repeat the order of his appointments, all nine hours of them, and push him onto the elevator as I run through my own mental list to make sure I’m telling him the right order of events.
He makes a joke, and it goes over my head. It wasn’t a good joke, of course, but I was only half paying attention to him. I don’t have enough of me these days to give my full attention to anything. I ask him to repeat his joke, and he does, and I am aware enough of his talking to understand it, but not to laugh. He laughs to himself again and I watch the numbers on the elevator rise, my heart still pounding.
I am standing beside my daughter’s bed, and she wants to know where I’m sleeping tonight. “Downstairs, with Daddy,” I say, and she nods. For a moment I wonder if she wants to sleep in the master bedroom with me tonight, as is sometimes the case, but then I think, no. She wants to know I’m going to be out of the way so she can turn on her closet light and curl up on her giant teddy bear and draw until dawn. She does this when she thinks nobody will stop her. When I’ve caught her in the past she’s squeezed her eyes shut so impossibly tight she couldn’t possibly be sleeping, and I tell her gently that she’s not fooling me and she needs to get back into bed. Tonight she might not bother with the closet light, she may just sit at her desk. After all, I’ll be downstairs. There won’t be anyone to check on her.
I am sitting in my car at three in the morning on the dirt road outside the storage area where Shana’s things are locked away. I like to go there sometimes, to park over the highway and watch the cars go by. I’m chain-smoking, which is something I never used to do. I’ll go a week without smoking a cigarette, and then it will be midnight and I’ll be awake, and the children will be asleep and overnight nursing care will be here to care for Mike and one set of grandparents will be in the basement in case of an emergency with the kids, and I put on my shoes and grab my cigarettes and drive somewhere, anywhere, and smoke. And smoke. And smoke. I don’t even like it. I don’t feel good about it. But for a few hours, nobody can make me feel shitty about my choices except me. My time is my own. I could scream, or I could cry, or I could sing, but I don’t. I smoke and watch the cars on the highway, or the moonlight on the river, or the wildlife in the cemetery. I sometimes drive between parking lots, learning the late-night secrets of my corner of the world, which strip malls are busy at 2am, which convenience stores don’t enforce mask policies, which gas stations teenagers flock to, which grocery stores are restocking.
There are deer, and skunks, and possums, and chipmunks, and squirrels, and raccoons, and bats, and birds, and insects. Occasionally I see a coyote. I never get a good enough look at them. And eventually, I drive home for a few hours rest.
I am sitting at my dining room table, and my skin feels both hot and numb as I read that Ruth Bader Ginsberg is dead. My face tingles, and I stop myself to check if I’m breathing. I call the children downstairs, Rosh Hashanah services are beginning in a few minutes. I watch my mother lay her face on the table, looking dejected and lost. When the time comes for the mourner’s kaddish, I stand. I wonder how long I will be standing, how many deaths I’ll be mourning when the overlapping years of mourning are finally over. I think that if I were to mourn all the American COVID-19 dead for a year, I would have mourned longer than all of human history. I think of Shana and feel guilty she wasn’t my first thought. I imagine her joining me for services at shul. I remember her smirking and whispering to me over a Shabbat potluck that she thought my Rabbi was cute. I imagine her laughing at the idea of his singing Leonard Cohen during her shiva.
Later, in my pajamas, I take half an hour to scroll through lingerie ads, wondering which brands Shana would have recommended to me for a boudoir photoshoot. I’m not doing one, but I know it’s a conversation she and I would have enjoyed. She would have encouraged me so much to spend hundreds of dollars on silk and lace and mesh, to feel powerful and beautiful in my skin. Then she would have told me all the ways I could lose weight, that if I wasn’t exercising enough it was because I didn’t want to, and I had it in me to prioritize better if I actually cared so there was no point complaining if I didn’t like the way I looked. I glance through my schedule. My calendar is packed, and I hear Shana’s voice. “I guess it’s not that important to you, then.” I schedule an impossible workout anyway.
I am sitting at my computer, pointlessly yelling at Trump supporters on Facebook because what other void yells back? Only the things it yells back are nonsense. People call me a pedophile, accuse me of giving LSD to children, call me a communist and a terrorist and a liar. In a fit of exhaustion and spite, I plaster my sister’s picture on the threads for all to see, my beautiful sister, dead on a gurney, shrouded in yards of red velvet I was going to turn into a Halloween costume once, preserved forever in black and white pixels.
“This is my sister,” I tell them, “and if it weren’t for Donald Trump, she might still be here.”
“It’s clear from your profile you’re bought by Soros,” they say.
“If you actually scrolled through my profile for ten seconds, all you’d see is I’ve spent the last six months trying to keep my husband alive through his brain cancer treatments,” I retort. “A paycheck from Soros sure as fuck would have helped.”
They tell me I kill babies. They call me a Jew bitch. They scream, “MAGA!” and block me.
These are my neighbors, the people in my town, the people I run into at grocery stores, who send their children to the same school as mine, who walk their dogs past my house, who own and staff the gyms and stores and restaurants, who invite me to their church fundraisers. I donate to the Biden campaign in their names.
I am standing beside my bathtub, ready to step in, dipping my toes in bright orange water that smells of lemon and canteloupe. I’m nearly out of bath bombs, now, despite the flood of such products that came in sympathy and solidarity a few months ago. The water burns and I sink down anyway. The water is so hot that in a few minutes I am pouring sweat, chugging glass after glass of cold water. It is so hot I cannot relax, cannot read a book, but I put on calming music and light candles and sit in the dark, texting or scrolling through social media until my heart is pounding so hard I can hardly breathe.
Standing up, my hair is matted against my scalp, so drenched in sweat it’s impossible to know what is steam, or water, or me. I stand nude in front of the dark mirror, not looking at myself, and my muscles are erased, my limbs are gone, there is nothing to me but a pounding heart so strong my vision shakes. I wash my face, spend a quiet half-hour in a paper mask, or painting my toenails, and guzzle another cup of lukewarm tap water. Then I sink back into the tub. I soak until the bath is cold and the night is at its darkest.
I am standing beside my daughter’s bed and she grabs my hand as I walk away. “Mommy? Were you thinking of Aunt Shana during the mourner’s kaddish?” My chest feels tight and raw. It’s not as bad as after hours of numb crying and wailing and my legs not holding my weight when I tried to stand, I told the girls my sister was dead. I remember that moment, and the flesh at my temples seems to twist and tighten.
“Yes,” I reply, letting that lone word say everything. Yes, I thought of her. Yes, she is always in my mind. Yes, I am mourning her. Yes, I see her in my mind’s eye every day. Yes, you look like her, sometimes.
“I was, too,” she says, and I sit. “You miss Aunt Shana, huh?” I ask, and she nods, her lips sucked into her mouth, her eyes wide and her forehead creased.
“Me, too,” I say. The tightness comes again.
But I don’t cry. Not in these moments. Not when the pain is at its most tangible.
Instead, I cry when my daughter comes downstairs so proud of her drawing of Ruth Bader Ginsberg after she stayed up all night knowing I was on another floor and wouldn’t check in on her. I cry when the three of them sneak up behind me and sing, “The orphanage…” I cry when I read them, “A Series of Unfortunate Events,” and Brett Helquist goes on for a few paragraphs about grief, and loss, and sadness, and although they are silly books about nonsense, these things are true: Grief isn’t linear. Loneliness is more than not being around people. Hope is its own form of pain.
Hope gouges me, over and over, sneaking up on me, wiggling its way in with every conversation. When people ask if Mike is getting better, I feel the beating not of butterfly wings, but something large and wild as a cormorant, shaking against my ribs. Is he? I don’t know. Hope wants to come out, but I have grown weary of letting it wound me.
When people ask what I expect will happen in November, I tell them I think Trump will win. Not legally, not honestly, but he has never cared about that. He will claim he has won, and there will be violence. My friends and father refer to the polls, their optimism that this fascist nightmare might be coming to a close, and I feel those beating wings in my chest, but don’t dare to hope. Broken hope is its own kind of heartbreak.
Going about my daily life, driving past the place where Shana’s things are, I imagine stepping inside, smelling her smell, and that thing pummels me again. I want to smell her smell. I want to be with her things. I want to imagine her with me, to have her with me in whatever way I can. But my mother and sister aren’t ready, and they don’t want me to go without them. Instead, I drive past and try to remember her smell, and my heart hurts, and I chain smoke.
And I don’t cry.
My hope has been broken too many times. I have tried to hold onto it and it has beat its wings against me until I was bloodied and bruised and it was all I could do to run a bath hot enough to try to soak my wounded soul. But hopelessness is a different pain. My children can smell it on me. Mike can see it in the air around me. When I despair, no mask keeps them safe from being infected by it.
I am standing next to Mike’s bed, and he is having a panic attack. Probably because of a seizure, but that doesn’t matter. I climb into bed with him, kiss him, hold him, remind him that this isn’t permanent. “Either you’ll get better, or you’ll get worse,” I tell him, knowing this is a comfort. Being together for thirteen years of life-or-death illness teaches you the deep truths about a person, and I know better than to feed him comforting lies.
“Things can’t stay this way,” I repeat.
He smiles a little, “That helps,” he says.
I sigh, sinking down against him, my chest resting on his, his hand wrapped around my shoulder. We lay there in silence, and there is no beating of wings in my chest. There is no promise of hope. There is no threat of hopes broken. There is only what there is, this. All of this. The grief, and the anger, and the sadness, and the loneliness, and the confusion, and the fear. Either it will get better, or it will get worse, but it will not, it cannot, continue as it is.
The next morning, he is able to move his fingers. He hasn’t moved them this way in six months.
The next day, we learn there’s a mass on his kidney.
I am sitting in my car waiting for the first streaks of blue to show me the horizon. I am almost out of cigarettes. I have lost thirty-five pounds. I can’t imagine Shana’s smell. I have dozens of updates from teachers in my inbox I haven’t read. I have a calendar overloaded with appointments for Mike, a few for me, and somehow also the things every family has to confront- laundry and meals and paying the bills. I know I will be tired all day. I know I will be short-tempered on the internet. I know I will be short-tempered with the children. I know I will be distracted around Mike.
Loathing myself a little for doing it, I light another cigarette. I put the keys back in the ignition. I roll the windows all the way down and feel the air on my face. Each breath of smoke feels like screaming into the void, raging against the lack of answers, the lack of understanding, the lack of direction, the lack of clarity.
Outside the blackness of 200,000 years of human history swallows the smoke. It swallows the sound of the radio.
Lea Grover scribbles about sex-positive parenting, marriage after cancer, and vegetarian cooking. When she isn’t revising her upcoming memoir, she can be found singing opera, smeared to the elbow in pastels, or complaining/bragging about her children on twitter (@bcmgsupermommy) and facebook.
The ChicagoBears need Mitch Trubisky to play better than Daniel Jones to win.
The Chicago Bears are a team that needs a lot of help to win football games. They need all hands on deck otherwise things are going to get ugly. They were so lucky to have come out on top against the Detroit Lions in week one. They played bad defensively by their standards and couldn’t contain the run. Adrian Peterson was awesome against them so you have to imagine that Saquon Barkley is going to have himself a good game. The Bears’ defense needs to step up in order to win.
In addition to the Bears containing Barkley, they need a little bit of help from their offense. That starts and ends with their quarterback, Mitchell Trubisky. He was the starter in week one against the Lions and he was nothing short of bad for three quarters. He was awesome in the fourth quarter and that allowed the Bears to win. If they didn’t end up winning, we might be talking about Nick Foles as the starter going into this week.
Well, there is no controversy right now as Trubisky is going to be the guy against the Giants. It is very important that he plays well. He needs to be better than their quarterback, Daniel Jones. Jones has a chance to be a good player in his career but it might take a minute. Their offensive line isn’t that good so the Bears defense needs to step it up and create pressure on Jones and the running game.
This is a game that the Bears must win. They are playing two weaker teams to start the season so if they want to make it to the playoffs than they need to win as much as possible. Trubisky isn’t the answer and was a bad draft pick but he needs to outperform Jones this one week. Jones is going to have a much better career but this matchup favors Mitch for one week.
Of course, Mitch needs to make his reads and throws. The Giants have a pretty good defense but it isn’t anything that Mitch shouldn’t be able to handle. He is going to outperform Jones and the Bears are going to win the football game if he does.
The ChicagoBears have had quite the week when it comes to contract talks, and one player may end up getting a deal before Allen Robinson.
All week long, the Chicago Bears have been in headlines not because they pulled off an impressive and miraculous comeback in Week 1, but because of a star player’s contract situation.
For weeks now, we have seen teams getting extensions done with some of their best players. It’s happening all around the league — except in Chicago.
General manager Ryan Pace has to have heard this message loud and clear by now: It is time to extend wide receiver Allen Robinson. The past week has been especially straining on the situation after Robinson removed all Bears content from his Instagram page and reportedly asked about a trade.
After his agent refuted that report, things started to calm down a bit. People are starting to believe that Pace and the Bears’ brass are going to get a deal done for Robinson, and hopefully soon. However, it may not come before one of Robinson’s teammates gets a new deal.
The #Bears and RB Tarik Cohen have had fruitful discussions about a contract extension, sources say, and there is a push to get it done today in advance of Week 2. The deadline for a signed deal is 3:59 pm today to be official for Sunday & it’s a real possibility. Stay tuned…
The Chicago Bears better be careful who they decide to pay first.
Running back Tarik Cohen is also in line for an extension, and while it didn’t happen Saturday, it appears as though it could happen soon enough. But, the Bears extending Cohen before Robinson? That makes absolutely no sense.
Pace is sending the wrong message to the fan base, here. Understand, Cohen is a fun guy. He’s a great personality and loves the fans. But, he has no where near the impact on this team as Robinson does.
Without Robinson, this offense would sputter worse than it has even with him at times. You’re looking at a guy who is in the top 10 of targets, receptions and contested catches (number one in that category) across the entire league since joining Chicago two and a half years ago.
Meanwhile, Cohen has not been the same guy since the 2018 season. He’s regressed if anything, and the Bears should be very weary of extending him. Not to say he isn’t valuable, but he plays the most replaceable position in football.
Not only is he replaceable, he’s replaceable at a much cheaper cost. The Bears could easily find another running back who does similar things as Cohen, and they could find it in the middle rounds of next year’s draft, if need be.
A Cohen extension, at this point in time, makes zero sense. He has to prove he can return to the type of player he was two seasons ago before the Bears start handing out dollar bills.
Robinson has done all he can to prove he’s worth the money — whatever money he wants, quite frankly. This team is so heavily dependent upon his contributions that they cannot afford to wait any longer. Robinson’s deal should be far and away more important than Cohen’s extension, period.
We’ve reached a new pandemic milestone. Two hundred-thousand Americans have died. Sadly, because of the way our government is handling the pandemic, it’s estimated the number will double by year’s end.
While we mourn the souls that have been lost, there is plenty of blame to go around. Here’s five who get more than their share:
#5. Brian Kemp-Governor of Georgia
Remember when the coronavirus task force set-up guidelines for the reopening of states safely? Remember when Donald Trump immediately ignored them by Tweeting “Liberate!”?
Brian Kemp took him seriously. He reopened bars, restaurants, gyms, hair salons, bowling alleys almost as soon as he heard Trump’s word. That led to other southern state governors following Kemp’s lead by reopening their own states. That led to outbreaks of Covid-19 in states which had been doing a solid job of keeping their citizens safe and healthy.
All that occurred because Brian Kemp wanted to show he could be a good little Trump flunky.
#4. Kristi Noem-Governor of South Dakota
South Dakota had a spotless record in the fight against Covid-19. The keyword is had because all that started to change when the calendar turned to July 4.
Donald Trump decided he wanted to have a rally at Mount Rushmore. Just a few thousand people gathered together with no social distancing and very few of them wearing masks. It was all good with another Trump flunky, Kristi Noem.
She doubled down by allowing the yearly Sturgis Motorcycle Rally to go on. Five hundred thousand people packed this small town for ten days, against the wishes of the communities residents. Then, they headed home to spread the virus in their own communities.But, at least they brought major bucks to Sturgis and the rest of the state. The economy ruling over health…again.
She finished up by not canceling the South Dakota State Fair.
Since these three events, South Dakota has gone from being a model example of how to operate safely during the pandemic to being on a list of states that if you’ve been in, you’ll need to quarantine for fourteen days. Thanks, Kristi!
#3. Deborah Birx-Coronavirus Task Force Chair
While Mike Pence is the leader of the task force and Dr. Anthony Fauci is the voice of reason, Dr. Birx has the title of Chair. She’s the one who was brought on as the task force coordinator.
Birx is certainly qualified for the position. She has served as the United States AIDS coordinator since 2014.
She’s counted on to give good, professional medical advice, but occasionally strays from doing that. Birx sometimes backs up Trump’s wild, bizarre and unproven theories lies. Whether she does this to keep in Trump’s good favor or to keep her job, this gives credence to Trump’s ramblings.
By doing this, Deborah Birz has cost lives.
#2. China
The whole thing started in Wuhan. That’s fine, they couldn’t help that. But, their irresponsibility in the handling of the virus and their lies caused a worldwide pandemic.
#1. Donald Trump-President of the United States
Under normal circumstances, China would clearly get the top spot. However, the the administration of Donald Trump, the only thing normal is the abnormal. Everything he does either downplays the dangers of Covid-19 or is an outright lie. His delay in acting cost thousands of lives with many more becoming seriously ill.
Then, there’s his endorsements of ridiculous remedies, the far too early reopening of the economy and now, his touting and trying to force an approval of a vaccine that will be far from ready for public usage. Now he’s back to having rallies that have no social distancing and very few of his supporters wearing masks. Lately, he’s been talking nonsense about masks and how they not only are not helping, but may be spreading the virus.
All of this to try to win re-election!
When you add it all up, he’s the clear winner for the number one spot. Congrats, Don…you’ve done it again. But, this is nothing new. Whenever something goes bad in the USA, Trump’s fingerprints can usually be found all over it.
We’ve heard projections that the numbers will double. Four hundred thousand are expected to die from Covid-19 by year’s end. I’m guessing that when we assign blame for that, Trump will remain in the top spot.
My so called friends think it’s time to edit this section. After four years, they may be right, but don’t tell them that. I’ll deny it until they die!
I can’t believe I’ve been writing this blog for four years.
It started as a health/wellness thing and over the years has morphed to include so many things that I don’t know how to describe it anymore.
I really thought this was going to be the final year of the blog but then Donald Trump came along. It looks like we’re good for four more years..God help us all!
Oh yeah…the biographical stuff. I’m not 60 anymore. The rest you can read about in the blog.
Are you focusing on your health and well-being? It is surprising to me that it has been 6 months since we began social distancing practices due to COVID-19. Time has flown by, and I am shocked that it is almost the first day of fall already. I have attended my fair share of zoom workshops and read more articles than I can count about how to cope during this challenging time. Even though I struggle often, I try to stay positive and focus on any tiny bit of good that can emerge out of this horrible pandemic. I created this list as a way to have concrete items I can do to increase my well-being. There is really nothing new in my list; however, I wanted to share with others the ways that I am trying to stay healthy. I do not do everything every day or even every week, but it helps me when I focus on these seven concrete areas.
Keep your immune system high
-Eat nutritiously
-Exercise daily
-Get enough sleep
-Don’t catch a chill/be cold
-Watch drinking alcohol
-Take vitamins
Practice ways to quiet your mind
-Meditate
-Do yoga
-Sit in nature
Keep a routine
-Get up at the same time each morning
-Take a shower and get dressed
-Stay organized
-Separate work and free time if you are working from home now
Do things you enjoy
-Think about hobbies you haven’t done in awhile
-Do some self care like nails and home facials
-Renew old dreams
Let yourself feel those emotions so you can process and release them
-Journal or write notes you throw away
-Talk to someone
Focus on the positive
-Keep gratitude lists
-Let go of what you miss and don’t have now
Keep connections
-Talk to your loved ones through text, video or phone calls
-Find groups on social media with like-minded people
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While it is easy to focus on the negative aspects of life, I choose to continue looking for the good in people and in the world around me, and I want to share why they do what they do. I am the proud mother of three adult daughters and live in the Chicago area. I have worked in the Early Childhood Education field since 2001, and I write books when the inspiration comes.
I once read an article about sugar and the writer compared sugar to cocaine. I thought that was extreme. Unless you have health issues that consuming sugar will impact, I believe you can consume sugar in moderation. The American Heart Association recommends 6 teaspoons (25 grams) of added sugar a day for women and 9 teaspoons (36 grams) for men. According to this organization American adults consume an average of 77 grams of sugar per day, more than three times the recommended amount for women.
Consuming too much sugar can lead to several health issues including obesity, heart disease, Type 2 diabetes, tooth decay and certain cancers. Sugar can accelerate the skin aging process and drain your energy. Sugar can also lead to chronic inflammation.
Reducing your sugar intake will take effort on your part. It is more than watching the desserts you eat. There are several products that have hidden sugar. Read the labels to see if sugar is included in the ingredients. Look for types of sugar such as cane juice, sorghum and corn syrup. Chemical names ending in -ose indicate sugars. Products that contain sugar include bacon, ketchup, salad dressing, pasta sauce, barbecue sauce, cereal, energy bars, soda, juice and alcoholic beverages. (The good news is that some companies are starting to make these products without sugar.) Eating mostly whole unprocessed foods will help decrease your sugar intake. I stay away from artificial sweeteners because there is a debate whether they are more detrimental to health than natural sugars.
You may have to deal with sugar cravings. Instead of taking drastic steps you should take gradual steps to reduce sugar. If you like drinking soda try seltzer water instead with lemon or lime. Consider reducing your portion size. Try using a food journal where you can track how much sugar you are consuming. Search for recipes that are low in sugar. You should create a plan that meets your needs.
I know that reducing your sugar intake is not easy; however, the health benefits are worth the effort.
I have been interested in preventive medicine since my childhood. In the 70s, my aunt would take me with her to meet with a doctor who emphasized preventive medicine. A lot of the things that doctor discussed then has become standard today.
Then there’s something you can do about how some schools, like Glenbrook (Ill.) High School District 225, are causing real damage to children by closing their schools.
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