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New Perspective on the Dandelion

3/31/2020

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By Donna K. Kelly

When you see a dandelion, do you think, “oh no, a weed?” Weed is a term we use to label plants we have decided are undesirable. Another definition is a plant we have not yet found the virtues of or have forgotten its value. Do you believe that nature would spend the energy and resources to evolve a plant that was not useful?

Dandelions are food. People used to forage dandelions in the spring for their nutritious greens, blossoms, and harvest their roots in the fall. Today, you would only want to pick dandelions if you were certain they were never sprayed with chemicals or herbicides. I harvest dandelions from our garden and use the greens in salads. You can find recipes that use dandelions sautéed, in salads, and jellies. The blossoms can be used for making syrup and cookies. The root can be dried and used for teas.

Before refrigeration and advances in transportation, people had to rely on their local environment to sustain them. Shipping was by boat and by horse and wagon. People may have more easily understood the importance of protecting their environment so that the plants and animals could thrive.  

Bees will thank you for making peace with a few dandelions as they look for pollen. More bees mean more food since we need bees to pollinate our plants that give us fruits and vegetables. 

The hardy root of the dandelion breaks up the heavy clay soils and allows oxygen to get to roots and the soil’s bacteria. That reduces the need to aerate that lawn.

The bees and insects need diversity in their diet just as we do. Lawns are the second or third largest monoculture in the United States. Our green lawns require water, petroleum-based fertilizers, and pesticide and herbicide to keep that green appearance. But what is the cost to our environment of a weed-free lawn?

More biodiversity everywhere is what the earth and her bees, insects, birds, and wildlife are crying for. Are we willing to dedicate part of our lawn to allow more biodiversity into our lives with appreciation and thankfulness?  

We are a part of the web of life.  All life is connected.  


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​A New Perspective on Joy, a key to staying healthy with COVID-19

3/23/2020

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By Donna K. Kelly

Joy is a pillar for good health. Do you allow yourself to experience joy every day? Does joy truly help us to stay healthy? Do you even know what brings you joy or happiness? I hope your answer to each of those questions was yes. 

We may now have to opportunity of time to explore these questions in a new way. We may learn joyous opportunities we took for granted in the past. These might be as simple as sitting in a café and enjoying a cup of coffee or tea. We may miss hanging out with friends in our favorite restaurant. We may be missing attending lectures, going to the library. The list can truly to on and on as we are given the chance of a lifetime to experience the joy of life in an entirely new way due to our mandatory stay at home and social distancing orders. Now just a simple free walk outside and seeing other people at a distance can be comforting. Being outside with the sun and blue sky is rejuvenating and brings joy.

Our immune system is the front line for fighting any infection, viral or bacterial.  Of course, we know COVID-19 is a virus which we want to fight. So how does joy help us to keep our immune system optimal?

Our nervous system has two pathways. One is the sympathetic pathway, which is our fight or flight system. It is important when we are under stress or danger. This fight or flight system helps us to stay alive from injury. It helps our blood to clot more quickly and constricts our blood vessels, so we don’t bleed to death. Longterm, one may see how this may raise blood pressure.  

More importantly for dealing with COVID-19, stress decreases the optimal functional of our immune system, which requires a lot of energy for the body to maintain. If our bodies sense danger, they prioritize energy use on processes that enhance short term survival. Stress, whatever the form, activates our body’s fight or flight system, which does not know the difference between the proverbial tiger bite, the common cold, or COVID-19.  

The balance of our fight or flight system is our parasympathetic system. It is our rest, digest and repair system. We would be well served if we lived most of our day in this state. Here our body may more easily digest our food to absorb the life-supporting nutrients of our food. Our heart is at rest and pumping more slowly.  Our blood vessels are not constricted. Experiencing joy during the day may allow us to more easily drop to sleep at night, which is also critical for our health.  

Both paths of our autonomic nervous system are important for health. We would like to easily shift from one system into the other. In our hectic world, we rarely allow ourselves to be at rest. People may experience mental and emotional stressors. But we also face environmental stressors, like water and air pollution, nutrient deficiencies, injuries and of course infection from virus and bacteria.   

Joy may be a path to allow us to tip our body back toward the rest, digest and repair mode. Repair helps us to overcome sickness and injuries. As a bonus, it may help us to age more successfully.

Joy and happiness help us to be more optimistic. There are measurable changes in the body when we allow ourselves to experience joy. We have a decrease in cortisol (our stress hormone) and increases in endorphins, which help us to feel less pain. With less stress, our body feels safe and more easily shifts functions to long term survival; therefore, our immune system is given the energy it needs to functional optimally. Think, fighting infection. Our mood may be lighter because there are increases in serotonin (the happiness neurotransmitter) and oxytocin (the connection hormone). There is an increase in Brain Derived Neurotropic Factor (BDNF), which helps us to grow new neurons in our brain to protect our memory. We dilate our blood vessels and increase our lung capacity which helps to send more oxygen throughout our body. Laughter may force us to breathe more deeply. Just breathing deeper stimulates the vagus nerve, which runs through the entire body to let all the body’s systems know to rest, digest, and repair.  

How can we bring more joy into our lives?  There are comedy clubs, funny movies and books, and even laughter yoga. I am finding many humorous websites for jokes helpful. We would like gentle humor, not humor at the expense of another. You may want to google Christian jokes, Reader's Digest jokes, jokes for children, coffee, cats, dogs, computers, diets, daily life, dads, and moms. The laughs can go on and on. I am experiencing the joy of learning how to find humor to share.

Our bodies will react the same even if we are faking the laughter or smile. When was the last time you experienced a good belly laugh?  It might be helpful to have a good laugh every day.
In closing, I offer you this.

Day 4 of our new 6 social distancing: I struck up a conversation with a spider today.  Seems nice.  He’s a web designer. 

Disclaimer: This information is being provided to you for educational and informational purposes only.  It is being provided to you to educate you about healthy eating and lifestyles and as a self-help tool for your own use.  It is not medical or psychological advice.  This information is to be used at your own risk, based on your own judgment. For my full disclaimer, please go to www.donnakkelly.com.

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New Perspectives on the Importance of Darkness

3/10/2020

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By Donna K. Kelly

The importance of the correct quality and quantity of high-quality sleep cannot be overstated. During sleep we renew and repair our body and cleanse toxins from our brain. Sleep is when we lay down new short-term memories into long-term memory. For those of us wanting to perform better, getting a good night’s sleep is critical, especially before an event where we want to do our best. Is there a day where we don’t want to do our best? 
​

Sleep may help us optimize the use of our prefrontal cortex, the part of our brain that helps us to make good decisions. This can be important in everything we do from choosing better foods, to having more patience with our family, fellow workers, and even other drivers on the road. 

Optimizing sleep may allow us to have more energy and not be tired. With more energy, we may decide to move more in our day. Better sleep may calm your desire to eat to get more energy.

Total darkness helps improve the quality of sleep. Melatonin, the sleep hormone, is maintained better in total darkness. This is darkness to the point you can not see your hand in front of your face. This can be difficult to attain if you live in the city and have streetlights nearby. Blackout shades on the windows can help. These should also not allow light in around the edges. Using a sleep mask is another inexpensive way to eliminate light from reaching your eyes while sleeping.

In a study done in Tel Aviv, researchers measured the amount of light from streetlights. Then they overlaid this on breast cancer incidence in the city. The two areas matched. Just because they matched does not mean that the light caused the breast cancer. Correlation is not causation. However, it may be prudent for one to increase sleep quality so one can repair and heal optimally each night.    

Walking safely in the dark is imperative. It is critical to avoid slips, trips and falls. Clear the paths of trip hazards. For lighting, there are red-light motion sensor night lights. Plug those into an outlet in your bedroom, hallway, and bathroom. You should be able to see appropriately to navigate the area safely in the dark. The red light will not decrease your melatonin production; therefore, you may be able to drop back to sleep more easily. 
If you find this helpful, please share!
Disclaimer: This information is being provided to you for educational and informational purposes only.  It is being provided to you to educate you about healthy eating and lifestyles and as a self-help tool for your own use.  It is not medical or psychological advice. This information is to be used at your own risk, based on your own judgment. For my full disclaimer, please go to donnakkelly.com/disclaimer.

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​New Perspectives on Daylight Savings Time

3/2/2020

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By Donna K. Kelly

Sunday, March 8th, at 3:00 AM, we will spring forward and be on Daylight Savings Time (DST) in most of the United States, Europe and Canada. This abrupt change in time in relation to daylight may be the cause of a variety of negative health and safety effects. Many people struggle for a week to overcome the time change. People experience lost productivity, lower quality of life, increased illness and complain of just feeling tired.  

Focusing on selfcare before the time change may help to alleviate some of the impact. You might:
  • Try to go to bed 15-20 minutes earlier each night for 2-3 nights before the time change. This may allow your body to adjust more easily. 
  • Begin to adjust the timing of your meals a little earlier each day for 2-3 days. This may be especially important with dinner.
  • Get some early morning sunlight, especially on the first day of the time change, Sunday. The bright light helps to set your body’s clock to the new daytime hours and become fully awake.
  • Be careful driving and operating machinery if you feel drowsy. Your reaction times may be delayed, and accidents may happen.
  • Stick with your normal bedtime on Sunday to get plenty of sleep for your Monday normal waking routine.
  • Avoid using phones and computers in the evening to decrease the blue light wavelengths which decrease melatonin, your sleep hormone.
  • Avoid caffeine, nicotine and alcohol for several hours before bedtime. Caffeine is best consumed before noon. 
 
Studies show the negative health consequences of DST. 

Monday is routinely associated with more heart attacks than any other day of the week. It is known as the “Monday cardiac phenomenon.” After DST there is an additional 24% increase in heart attacks on Monday. Conversely, there is also a 21% drop in heart attacks on Tuesday following the end of DST.

There is an increase in traffic accidents and workplace injuries on Monday after DST. 

There is lost productivity after DST. Cyberloafing, surfing the web for unrelated content to work, increases after the time change. 

Judgement may be impaired.  There are studies showing increase in spending on the Monday after the time change. A study of federal courts found 5% longer sentences handed down on “sleep Monday.” Managers may find themselves doling out harsher criticisms.

Students taking a test on the Monday after DST may find a decrease in test scores. 

Our European neighbors have plans to phase out DST in 2021. The European Union has noticed these negative consequences to their population’s health and economy and are acting. Russia stopped their time changes in 2011. Asia and Africa do not change their times during the year.  

Disclaimer: This information is being provided to you for educational and informational purposes only.  It is being provided to you to educate you about healthy eating and lifestyles and as a self-help tool for your own use.  It is not medical or psychological advice.  This information is to be used at your own risk, based on your own judgment. For my full disclaimer, please go to donnakkelly.com\disclaimer

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