“If you can’t see the forest for the trees”

“If you can’t see the forest for the trees” – remember all trees are beautiful in their own way.

If you can’t see the forest for the trees is an old saying not attributed to anyone person, it is a reminder to help us remember not to get too caught up in details to miss seeing the bigger picture – (urbandictionary) – and it is equally important to remember that diversity and acceptance of all our differences is what makes up an interesting world – with forests and deserts and everything in between.

Disclosure: This information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of Fair Use. While I am a Registered Dietitian it is not intended to provide individualized health care guidance. Please seek an individual health care professional for the purpose of individualized health care guidance.

Age is a state of mind – and health

Age and health were discussed in the last post and my point was primarily that we don’t know how many tomorrow’s we have so getting priorities done sooner rather than later is important. I feel better now than I did at age 38. The age stands out in my memory because I had trouble standing, trouble walking, trouble not having severe migraines, and even as a dietitian with knowledge regarding weight loss strategies and research, I had trouble losing weight no matter how hard I tried with diet and exercise. Eventually I learned about the need for adequate iodine to counteract body stores of bromide, chloride and fluoride and I started losing weight fairly easily. There is more to that story bit the point is simply that it is difficult to feel young when your body is exhausted and in chronic pain – no matter how many birthdays you’ve celebrated.

At a young age I learned that lesson – when I was four – my eldest sister died that year of cancer/leukemia. I only have two memories of her. In one she was laying in her bed because that is all she had energy for, but she was entertaining me with a beanbag frog and a ping-pong ball – somehow she made it seem like the frog was eating the ping-pong ball and swallowing it – I don’t know if at age 13 she could just hide it or if there was a rip in the cloth frog. It was one of a set that my mother had made – anyone who has had summer fun in a frog pond would know that they can seem both easy to catch because there are so many at times sitting on lily pads and that they are hard to catch because they seem to see you from any direction and leap away in time. A bean bag game makes catching them a lot easier.

In the other memory she was laying in a box with her teddy bear and I was told that she was going away into the ground- or something like that – and my age four self knew she had been sick but I couldn’t understand why her teddy bear was sick too. I was young, it is a wordless memory so I don’t really know what I was told. I don’t think I understood at the time she wasn’t just asleep and eventually over time when I realized she wasn’t coming back to her normal bed the memory fragment gave me comfort because I knew she had her teddy bear with her wherever she was. Life is a circle. The beanbag frog didn’t go away and it was a favorite for me because it always reminded me of my big sister and her playing with me even though she was tired and laying in her bed.

Frogs represent life in an obvious way because you can watch them grow from tiny tadpoles into little tiny limbed frogs and eventually large ones who sit on lilypads chirping their twilight songs or leaping and swimming and eating flies. We all have a place in an equal opportunity circle of life.

Unfortunately fo frogs and other amphibians they are our Canaries in a coalmine. Their delicate skin and life cycle that spends so much time in watery habitats makes them particularly susceptible to pollutants and their health, population count,  and frequency of birth defects are an early warning of environmental toxicity.

Enjoy everyday and every moment – trite but true – today is a present, a gift to enjoy. Having health and having a healthy environment are not guaranteed and we all have to work together to protect both for future generations of children and amphibians and even flies – we all have a place in the cycle of life. Amphibians and insects are also part of the diet of some birds such as Sandhill Cranes. (Sandhill Cranes)

Sandhill Cranes in flight.
Sandhill Cranes in a corn field before spring planting of a new crop.

 

Near death experience survivors from around the world have similar stories to tell about their experience- in their many different languages. As a toddler I had a traumatic experience that I think was a near death, lack of oxygen, experience and based on the others tales of another state of consciousness I do believe that we have an energy form and that there is somewhere my sister is still in existence in energy form – as well as in my two brief memories- may we all coexist in peace.

*Nrf2 promoting foods may not be beneficial in some cases of drug resistant leukemia – the resistant cancer cells use it to protect themselves from oxidative stress. (http://www.pnas.org/content/107/16/7479.full) Research is being advanced in targeting the NRF2 pathways used by the resistant cancer cells – in coordination with other drugs. Inhibiting the Nrf2 pathways can be very toxic to other areas of the body. (https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/809638) Having the Nrf2 promoting foods in the diet as a preventative before cancer occurs would be also protecting against other inflammatory conditions.

Disclosure: This information is being shared for educational purposes within the guidelines of Fair Use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individualized health care guidance. Please seek an individual health care professional for individualized health care guidance. Thanks.

Connecting to the past through words

The written word allowed mankind to share knowledge in the present and across time. We can learn from others experience when it is shared in a written or audio format. Storytelling and reciting from memory was how history was passed down through generations for much of human history. The alphabet and written text in its various languages and appearance changed human culture.

Kurt Vonnegut was an exceptional wordsmith, crafter of words both real and of his own creation. To connect any interested readers or writers, in brief, I returned to the bookstore for a copy of Timequake to give to a friend and instead found a book that fills in yet more gaps in the biography, The Brothers Vonnegut, and autobiography/novel Timequake. Armageddon in Retrospect, And Other New and Unpublished Writings on War and Peace, (Berkley Books, 2008, New York), by Kurt Vonnegut, Introduction by Mark Vonnegut (one of his sons who is also a writer) is a collection of unpublished short stories and letters including one that was mentioned in both Timequake and The Brothers Vonnegut.

The letter was published in a newspaper after WWII. It is the initial, oh, you may not have heard yet family, but I’m not dead and no longer Missing In Action, letter to his lived ones. I haven’t read past the letter. Tears in my eyes make it difficult to read – or write. War is bad. We need to be reminded of that everyday until we figure out how to manage life more humanely. I share the hope that humans can do that soon.

Learning to write better may be a goal which reading well written words can help achieve. Learning to live better may be a bonus.

Previous post about The Brothers Vonnegut: https://transcendingsquare.com/2018/03/01/who-owns-science-or-should-all-ideas-be-shared/

Previous post about Timequake: https://transcendingsquare.com/2018/03/05/timequake-a-novel-by-kurt-vonnegut/

Disclosure: This information is being provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of Fair Use.

Group homes for mixed age groups

 

Having a goal of providing a full size/full functioning apartment even if efficiency size for homeless or low income people may be supportive of individual need for privacy and autonomy, however if the goal is to support health and improving functional living skills then a group home with private sleep accommodations and lockable areas for personal things, and group areas for cooking, daycare, and recreation might be more effective and less expensive.

In my professional career I worked with low income populations with young children or in prenatal points in time before a first child had arrived. A common complaint I heard about my job from some people not in need of help was that it was unnecessary or wasteful for the government to provide food and education for low income women and families. A common complaint also seemed to suggest that anyone receiving aid was a lazy or not trying or a user. In my experience this was not true of most participants. While some did seem to just want food benefits and seemed to feel entitled to receiving help from others with no exchange of cooperation with the larger health and education goals, most recipients were extremely grateful for the help and just wanted a job or a better job so that they wouldn’t need the external source of government aid. Some areas of the country have plenty of jobs but housing is too expensive to be able to live nearby and commutes add time and expense to get to the job, while other areas don’t have enough jobs and housing may be available nearby but it is old and inefficient for the climate (too expensive to heat or cool and dehumidify in extreme temperatures).

Current systems that provide housing aid generally provide individual living units. While that supports individual tastes in personal habits and food choices it is more expensive than group cooking facilities would cost. It is also currently very difficult to remove children from a low functioning home unless something like drug use is discovered. A group living facility with group daycare and group kitchen facilities could require a certain amount of volunteer hours from people living in the group home and additional staff could be present to provide guidance and over-site of the management of the larger goals of providing healthy variety in food and activities. Lower functioning parents would be mixing with better role models of parenting and/or at least the children would be mixing with better role models of what effective caregiving is like. Even having one positive adult role model in a child’s life can help a child become a well functioning pro-social adult instead of becoming a dysfunctional adult.

An advantage of providing group homes from the perspective of the common complaint of not wanting to give handouts to the ‘undeserving’ would be that a group home wouldn’t be the same as a regular efficiency or larger apartment. The people living in a group home might end up actually preferring the continuity and social benefits of living in a community or they might improve their skills and health and access to regular employment so that they could earn their way into their own regular type of housing.

Dormitory style housing units plans that already exist could be a starting point in designing a low income group home but they are not ideal for a mixed range of ages and interests. The group areas in college dormitories are designed for one type of age range and aren’t child friendly. A group home for mixed ages and types of families and single people might have more homelike, smaller rooms so that smaller groups could enjoy a variety of types of activities or television shows. Sleeping accommodations might be shared with lockable cupboards available such as those found at bus stations for a few personal items. Or small private sleep areas might be preferred for single people and small families. Compared to a tent or sleeping in a car, or sleeping sitting up in a public area, even a very small private room would be a luxury.

All people appreciate respect and feeling valued can improve self esteem and willingness to work towards improving. Feeling marginalized or observing others being marginalized has been associated with increased risk for violence. Experiencing child trauma or domestic violence has also been associated with increased risk for violence. Being male and having a history of binge drinking has also bee associated with increased risk for violence. if we want less violence and less mass shooting incidents in our society than instead of focusing primarily on gun control it would make sense to focus more help on providing children with safer environments and providing them with more pro-social role models in their lives. Child trauma happens and the children who have a positive adult role model in their lives are the ones who are more likely to develop resilience and pro-social habits as adults.

If we want less violence and fewer mass shooters then it seems reasonable to focus on promoting fewer people prone to violence. Targeting the underlying issues that have been associated with risk for violence makes more sense than simply trying to take away guns – there are a lot more guns and other means for violence available than there are people prone to violence. Trying to provide more effective alcohol abuse treatment could be helpful as that is a risk factor. Reducing marginalization of minorities and mental illness could help reduce the risk of observers with similar problems feeling hopeless and helpless about their own situations and reduce their risk for violence.

Group homes might be a helpful solution for low income people or veterans, homeless, low functioning, mentally ill but non-violent individuals, people trying to end addictive behavior patterns, or non-violent people with a history of a prison record. Some group homes might be focused more on people with children and some on single people or mixed ‘villages’ might be better for both groups. It takes a village to raise a child and children can be a delight and reason for hope in all age groups. Respecting and valuing elders in a community might be easier for a child who had plenty of story time with a variety of grandma and grandpa types in their lives.

Villages are small ideally, for human comfort level. Business research regarding the most effective size for individual team/facility units within a larger corporation has found that around 150 people is what works best for individual workers, and psychology research supports that our brains have comfort levels for community size. Smaller apartment buildings/group homes that seek to shelter around 150 people per unit might be most conducive to building a sense of community within the occupants then having larger units. Or within larger units small communities could be organized around smaller communal living areas, cooking and daycare facilities.

Disclaimer: Opinions are my own and the information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of fair use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individual health guidance. Please see a health professional for individual health care purposes.