Mama gets the sniffles

Here is a health-focused piece cross-posted from my main blog, Crunchy-Chewy Mama. I had been putting more health-focused pieces here and more snippets from life on the alternative mainstream divide over there, but I now that I am writing for The Washington Times Communities at "Reading Ingredients: Tales of a Health-Conscious Mom," I'm re-evaluating my blog strategy (which includes looking for someone to help me upgrade them all or combine at least these two blogs.)

Here is my tale of a recent illness and how I fought it off the pharma grid.

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We've got 60 degrees here in Metro DC and I think I'm finally getting over a cold that started two weeks ago. I never get sick and stay sick. This was annoying. Not so bad that I had to make the husband stay home or back out on a major event I was planning, but bad enough that I sounded like the woman from "The Nanny" if she had a sinus infection. Not pretty!

We don't do drugs in our house, so I did my best to self-medicate. This starts with food -- lots of nutrient-dense homemade (from pastured chickens) bone broth and a limit on refined carbs. When I look back, the weekend before I got sick I had hot rice cereal for breakfast one day and French toast another day (GF millet bread, but still) and a bunch of rice crackers. That's way more packaged food than usual. So I cut out what I could but still allowed myself some antioxidant-rich raw cacao.

When I started to feel an illness on I restarted the flower essences I maybe should have been taking all season long from Perelandra. On Tuesday the 12th, I tried the homeopathic remedy Hepar. Sulph. Calc. and promptly got worse with a sore throat and swollen glands. I think I honestly fell asleep on the floor of my bathroom while my son played with toys in an empty bathtub. A homeopath said it was most likely that this reaction was just pushing the natural course of events forward and that now I just had a cold I might as well let run its course. So I gave up on the homeopathy - none of the indications seemed 100% right on anymore,anyway - and just tried garlic & ginger in hot lemon water in the morning, eating well, getting sleep, staying in bed even if I couldn't sleep well (instead of getting up to work), and putting some eucalyptus in my shower. I kept meaning to get even just a basic saline nasal spray but didn't, and we found our humidifier but never got it working.

Well, all that, and a lot of water and a lot of bodywork. My head was killing me with major sinus pressure, so I looked for whatever healing hands had openings. On Wednesday, the day after I felt terrible, I had a chiropractic adjustment and acupuncture. On Saturday morning I had a massage, primarily of craniosacral therapy. On Monday afternoon I had another bodywork session, a combo of craniosacral therapy and lymphatic drainage massage. Each time I handed over my credit card after a session, I did feel better. But it didn't last to the next day, not as much as I wanted. I still had a lot of nose-blowing and some coughing.

Then, on Wednesday when I'd been sick for a week, my eye looked red in one corner, which I thought was from not sleeping well until the next morning when it was sticky and red all over. This was the day of my event. None of the many homeopathic remedies for conjunctivitis sounded spot-on for my symptoms, but I got so weepy when my friend rang the doorbell while I was trying to have my son nap, that I decided to take pulsatilla. And I found some homeopathic eye drops at CVS, which I think helped, for sure with the redness. The eye was cleared up a day later. (The second eye got it too and also cleared up after a day).

Friday I saw an osteopath who worked a lot on my head in general, my sinuses and even in my mouth and upper palette. I sounded like a different person after that appointment -- much less nasal. But the next morning I slept in and still felt like I'd regressed. Maybe shopping for a sofa, meeting friends for coffee and walking a mile in mild winter day were too much. But we did get a new rebounder, which I used twice, hoping that it would help my lymphatic system clear out. And I did fit in a little yoga.

Sunday I had to drag myself out of bed but felt a lot better after starting the morning off with Vitamin C before my lemon/ginger/garlic drink, to which I added turmeric and elderberry. And then I had a full breakfast and set to work on some reorganization of the house, which felt great. I even had a little decaf coffee and some GFCF sugar-free (maple syrup only) chocolate cake my son and I had made as a celebration of my successful event Thursday night (adaptation of this cake recipe but using mashed cherries instead of applesauce and adding cacao and coconut flakes).

Despite this indulgence, I could tell I'd turned the corner Sunday afternoon. It's now Monday afternoon, and though I still am not ready to go out and do a full run in this gorgeously warm day (or to be too far away from a tissue), I am glad I was able to ride this out and that so far, no one else in the house seems to have any symptoms.

Craniosacral therapy for my son

Originally posted at my other blog, Crunchy-Chewy Mama.

I don't claim to understand exactly what craniosacral therapy (CST) does, but I believe in it. I've read some books by Dr. John Upledger, and I've talked a whole lot with my practitioners about my body and my son's body.

And I've seen its results firsthand.

I've been getting CST for six years, since I first started pursuing alternative therapies, which ended up including diagnoses of celiac disease and autoimmune thyroid disorder en route to dealing with infertility.

I learned about the therapy through my sister and her work with her son, who is on the autism spectrum. CST has been immensely powerful for me, helping me to let go of a whole lot of energy I'd been holding onto, which caused physical and emotional problems. (For more, see my article in the Winter 2008/2009 issue of the Journal of Attachment Parenting).

I had my craniosacral therapist there at my son's birth, which was supposed to be all-natural in a birth center but instead was a c-section due to my baby's breech position and extremely short umbilical cord (see my poem about that in Exhale magazine). So instead, the therapist videotaped the birth, which gave her great insight into how to treat my son hours later. "There's a lot of unwinding in his hips," she said; I later learned breech babies sometimes need to wear harnesses because of their in-utero position (hip dysplaysia).

My son is now 3.5 years old. I schedule CST for him every few months, when it seems like he's just kind of off or working on something I don't know how to address. I'm so grateful that she's been seeing him since he was an infant -- really since even before he was born.

A few months ago I asked the therapist what might have been different if he hadn't been seeing her. I trust her with my life. She does tell some people they don't need to come back. She's never said that to me. "It's hard to tell. Maybe speech or other development issues. Maybe ADD or sensory integration problems."

I've had several different practitioners work on him, and they all say the same things about tight parietal bones and jaw intensity. Lately, E has been chewing on his shirt in a way that disturbs me. A lot of kids have oral fixations, but this one is causing my son's skin to be chapped, and, well, it just looks like an anxious reaction. So I made an appointment.

Usually she just plays with him on the floor with toys while they work in a gentle way. The appointment lasts a full hour. Today, after a while, she invited him up to the table, where she tucked him in. It was the first time I'd ever seen him laid down like a patient. It was a little freaky, but he looked so nurtured and cared for in the soft glow of the massage center room.

She said her recent sensory disorder training recommends letting kids follow their interest/obsession while they are getting treatment. So she did. He chewed on a toy and then, when she felt a big release, he was done with the mouthing and just sort of flopped into relaxation.

After seeing him so manic and wound up recently, it was a real gift to see him so calm under her hands. She explained some other physical things and gave me more ideas for ways to work with his particular needs, including broad and heavy strokes on his body and heavy weight on his legs in front of him, and offering him straws and other mouthing options. Her questions about other behaviors -- "does he seem to need to run full boar into things?" -- seemed so spot on. He's never gotten any kind of diagnosis, and I don't understand all the ins and outs of sensory integration issues and proprioception. But I do feel very good that I have this therapist on my team.

She said that it felt like a phase but like there was also an emotional component that was not yet resolved. His neck and chest were pouring off heat, she said.

I left a little poorer but more resolved to model and live the grounding, solidifying presence he and I both shun but deeply crave.

For more information on CST and children, see "Craniosacral Therapy and Scientific Research, Part II" by John Upledger, DO, OMM. The website for the Upledger Institute is pan style="font-weight:bold;">http://upledger.com/. Find practitioners at http://www.iahp.com/

Healing a Face Wound (and more?)

Almost a month ago, I went to the grand re-opening of Holeco Wellness Medi Spa, the first holistic/wellness medispa recognized by Green America as a Green company and listed in their Green Pages. The owner is a wonderful woman who recently spoke at a Holistic Moms meeting. They are in a building that just underwent some lobby renovations, including new glass doors. On my way into the event, where I hoped I might win some fun beauty or energy door prize, I got instead the most ironic of injuries -- I walked right into the glass door that I thought was open, cutting my nose bridge with my glasses and giving myself a huge blow that resulted in a mild black eye a few days later.

As someone who has gotten a ton of craniosacral therapy, I knew that this blow was going to be with me for a while. The knowledge that I was setting myself back hurt more than the immediate physical trauma, though that was pretty bad, too. I was so upset that I was not aware enough to prevent this injury. Honestly, a perpendicular piece of glass did sort of look like the door, but I still should have seen that the door was closed before I rammed into it.

So after I bled all over the ground, went up to the open house and got some ice (and got looked at by a nurse), I drove home as soon as I felt it was safe to do so. When I got home, I immediately took Emergency Trauma Solution and then later Arnica. This was a Tuesday, and on Friday I had a previously-scheduled craniosacral appointment. The therapist said there was quite a bit of trauma, and he recommended Traumeel cream and anything to help with lymphatic drainage.

The next Tuesday, a week after the incident, I saw an acupuncturist and chiropractor who, before he did acupuncture, used an activator on my sinuses, which kind of freaked me out. But some stuffiness cleared up right away, and when I saw the craniosacral therapist again on Friday, he said I seemed much better than he would have expected. He gave props to the acupuncturist. Two weeks later, I saw him again, and he said that the intense jarring of energy actually let him work more deeply into my birth strain than he's been able to before.

So even though I really hadn't planned to spend that much money on treatment and time without exercising (even after three weeks, I still felt the injury in my nose when I first went jogging), I am trying to believe that there is/was/will be something good to come out of this injury, as the spa owner suggested when she kindly called me the day after the injury to check up on me!

Helping children with aggression

"But he showed remorse," said my kind friend when I called her crying to apologize that my son had bitten hers at school. "What more could you want?"

Um, for him to not do it at all?

Really, what I want is for my son not to feel that kind of out-of-control anger. I know he's three and a half and that some socially inappropriate behavior is, well, developmentally appropriate. But I also know that when he went through a similar phase two years ago, some body work and energy work really seemed to help.

And I know that as someone who suffered from undiagnosed depression all through my childhood, it's no fun to feel unhappy inside. Although medication helped through a few dark periods in my adulthood, it's become crystal clear to me that what has made the most profound difference has been a combination of non-drug remedies: a gluten-free, casein-free diet; regular exercise and yoga; and body work and energy work, including acupuncture, chiropractic and craniosacral therapy (CST).

So when my son had a biting episode a few weeks back for the first time (a 12-hour playdate is a rough thing for overtired cousins inhabiting a small space on a rainy cold day), I made an appointment with the acupuncturist who saw us when he had an ear infection months ago. While I waited the three weeks before that opening, I also got him in for CST work, which I though was probably more useful for him (lasting a full hour) but is twice as expensive as the acupuncturist who works with kids.

The acupuncture was scheduled for Friday at the end of the first week of school. E seemed to enjoy school fine and had none of the crying some other kids did upon leaving their moms for the first time. But on Tuesday, the second day, he did bite the arm of his friend, G, in what was probably a tussle over a toy. "It might have been provoked," the teacher said, having not seen the lead-up. But I was deeply troubled.

My kid is nice. He's usually patient and kind. When he does physical stuff, something seems like it's just not right inside. That's an awful feeling, and I don't want him to have it. To me, the biting is a symptom. Maybe he's feeding off of my stress. Maybe it's partly the change of season, as the acupuncturist suggested. Maybe it's that we've been trying some dairy in his diet, and maybe it doesn't agree with him any more than it does with me.

What I do know is that he and I both had a nice day Friday and a pretty mellow weekend after a week of volatility and meltdowns. All the doctor did was use a little roller on a few spots and then put little acupressure stickers on his ears, hands and feet. Thinking we might try needles on him next time, she did a demo on me with a quick insertion to two points that address the kidney meridian and fear. "You'll have a good day, too," she nodded to me.

And I did. Within a few hours, the sense of urgency and crisis was gone. My son and I had a lovely time together. We'll see if he can hold onto that calm through today, the first day of the second week of school.

Fighting the flu naturally

I haven't been pro-vaccine for a long time, since I got the flu vaccine in my 20s and felt terrible.

Now that we're facing a potentially bad flu year, there is a lot of talk about vaccines for flu and specifically for H1N1/Swine Flu. I'm hoping that the alternative folks are right that the best way to avoid getting seriously ill is by avoiding refined foods -- especially sugar and flour -- and generally eating a healthy diet, along with giving our bodies assistance in fighting things naturally by getting chiropractic work, acupuncture or craniosacral therapy.

But we don't always get the sleep, exercise, or nutrition that we need, so I've ordered from Perelandra the 2009-2010 Flu Season Balancing Solution from the Microbial Balancing Program and also FSBS+, which is supposed to address pandemic strains of the flu. These bottles are $10-15 and from a farm local here in Virginia. I know some folks are hoping their homeopaths can make a homeopathic version of the standard vaccine.

I hope that we can do okay, as we did last winter on health and wellness except for the week after the Holistic Moms chapter launch (and the Inauguration, which was an exciting but very long day). The following week, my son came down with an ear infection that I'm pretty sure was his system's response to his mom's stress. That lasted over a week but cleared without drugs. We were still nursing at the time, though, and this year, he won't have that protection.

This season, I hope we can find the inner balance we need and can count on the Perelandra solutions (the above, as well as the Immune and Lymphatic solutions) to stay healthy.

Dropping some silver on supplements

I just spent $132 at the Vitamin Shoppe. Wow. My husband has an eardrum that has been ruptured for over 48 hours and still hurts a lot. I bought some tea, colloidal silver supplement and nasal spray, grapefruit seed extract ear drops and nasal spray, some probiotic (on sale), calendula tincture (seemed like a good idea) and some more homepathic remedies (including something that my son grabbed because it came with a little Curious George pouch - even the alternative stuff markets to kids! He's been sick, too, so I cut him some slack, especially after he agreeably put several items back on the shelves and since he'd been whining a whole lot before we got into the car).

When I first went on my Save-My-Adrenals-and-Thyroid health kick starting in early 2004, I spent that kind of coin on capsules often. A lot was at the Vitamin Shoppe, where you get little coupons every so often if you spend a lot, and I also shopped at Village Green Apothecary in Bethesda, where they carry brands usually only practitioners have but at a better price. Since my thyroid has stabilized and my nutrition is so much improved, I haven't been as much of a supplement junkie. And certainly in this economy with a one-income family, I'm usually more reserved before throwing $25 bottles of dried mushrooms into my basket (my sister-in-law swears that one helped her). But since the hubby isn't of a mind to get energy work and is still in a lot of pain, he told me to get "whatever looks good." After a week at home with my sick son, who was on a nursing binge to fight his fever (which also turned into an ear infection), I was ready to jack up the credit card for our health at the supplement store (and I already have with craniosacral therapy and an acupunturist who used some cute little tools on my boy to open his meridians and did a few needles on me when I mentioned his clinginess. It always comes back to me!)

Considering a possible run for reconception, I'm also thinking that it's probably time for me to actually see a doctor -- a holistic-minded one for sure, and preferably one who starts with some energy work, but someone who can make sure I'm in a safe place to possibly go forward with trying for a bigger family. That will cost a pretty penny, too, I'm sure!

Taking a Fall

Two weeks ago, I fell taking a step onto a neighbor’s basement stairs. My foot just slipped on the carpet and I was about to bounce down the stairs on my bottom. Having sprained my ankle in September 2007 two weeks before I was going to run a half-marathon, I was determined not to let my legs take any of the ill effects of this fall.

So I braced myself with my hands – I let all the weight fall into my upper body. Within minutes, I knew my arms were going to hurt. I was in a fragile emotional state before the fall, and I knew that the feeling of upset and the trauma were going to settle into my body in a powerful way. I went home and sobbed for a few minutes after I took my first round of drops of Perelandra’s Emergency Trauma Solution (ETS Plus). I repeated the drops every 5 minutes four or five times. Then I took arnica and applied Traumeel lotion topically.

But it hurt a lot to raise my arms out to the side, and I knew that whatever I did, I was going to need help. I kept taking arnica – no OTC painkillers and the next morning called the massage therapy center where I’ve been going for over a decade. I knew my regular craniosacral therapist wasn’t working that day, but the other one was, and she had an opening. Fortunately, my husband had a few days off of work, so I could take the appointment.

The session was very powerful. Not only did I leave feeling like almost all the pain was gone, I was profoundly relaxed. It was clear that I needed the session anyway; CST simply needs to be part of my regular life, at least as long as I’ve not got a consistent yoga and meditation practice going on.

I happened to get in this past week with another CST practitioner I used to see a lot before my son was born. He has more experience with visceral manipulation and other aspects of Upledger training. He worked on my son for 30 minutes and for me for the remaining 20 minutes. The work felt deeply therapeutic. He said I was still locked up from the incident and that he worked to release the tension. That night I actually felt tired before 11:00 for the first time in a long while. That would not be the first time that CST helped me to chill out enough to be able to get to sleep at a decent hour.

I’m very glad to have these practitioners in my life to keep me from holding on to negative patterns and then compensating for them in other problematic ways.

Drinkin’ and a-Runnin’

Who knew that May 31st was the day before June 1st?

When my friend’s husband asked if I was available to come to a surprise birthday party for her, I didn’t put it together that the half-marathon I’d just registered for was the following morning, Sunday, at 7:00 a.m. – a hour away. We talked at length about the ideal time for the party – 5:00-7:00 p.m. – to maximize the chances of folks getting childcare and enjoying the catered wine tasting.

Once I set out to make hotel reservations for the race city, I realized the problem with the dates. Don had already booked the caterers for Saturday night, so I decided we’d skip spending the day in Annapolis and instead head there after a decent dinner at home. The boy would fall asleep on the way, we decided, and I just wouldn’t do more than sip a few of the wines.

Once we got dressed up and dropped our son off at a friend’s, where he was happy to play with her and her daughter, it was hard to hold back from fully enjoying the night. This was the first time my birth class buddies and I had been together without our children in tow! I sipped and sipped some more, and by the sixth out of eight wines to be sampled, I realized I’d moved beyond mildly buzzed. My head felt only a little warped, and I was happy to have had so much fun with my friends. I’m so sensitive in my body now, that’s where I felt it. I had the sensation of my blood becoming toxic and my liver getting perturbed. But I had a race to run in less than twelve hours, and there was still dinner to make and eat, packing to finish, a toddler to nurse (not the cleanest milk he’d ever had, I know), and a drive to do (with my husband behind the wheel). I didn’t feel great about exposing my son to the alcohol, but now that he’s over two and doesn’t nurse a whole “meal,” I decided he could handle what came into my milk from less than three (maybe even only two) glasses of wine over two and a half hours.

My real concern was with myself -- would I be in running condition the following morning? I hadn’t ever studied up alternative tonics to mitigate intoxication – I hadn’t needed to. But this night, I’d imbibed beyond any level I’d had for years. I tried to focus on believing I could cleanse my body and purge the toxins. While my husband drove, I placed my hands on top of my liver and on my back, trying to send healing energy to move the alcohol through my body rather than settle and store itself in my tissues, a technique I learned by reading John Upledger’s primer on craniosacral therapy, Your Inner Physician and You. I took deep breaths and tried to cultivate compassion for myself and my body and not to shame or blame myself. I had, indeed, had a great time with my friends, and I realized that the party and wine buzz may have given me some freedom from the fear I might have otherwise had about the race. Six months earlier I sprained my ankle less than two weeks before the first half-marathon I’d registered for, and it’s been a long recovery of body and mind to believe I could come back to health and complete my goal without another major snag. Maybe I needed the push out of my over-analyzing brain.

On the solely physical level, I drank lots of water in small sips and also drank some of the Vita Coco coconut water I’d purchased on a whim for post-race recovery, noting its claim as a “nature’s sports drink” and “natural rehydrant” at the bottom of the package and being impressed with the vitamin content and claims to replace electrolytes with no added ingredients – no salts or sugars. Shortly before we got in the car, I saw in my race materials that Zico, another brand of coconut water, was going to be giving away samples at the finish line (see Zico's nutritional information), so I figured this was a good hangover buster.

Alcohol has always affected my metabolism, making me ravenous. After a big dinner of chicken and vegetables and a snack of banana and nuts in the car, I nursed EJ back to sleep in the hotel bed around 11 p.m., said goodnight to my husband, and stayed up get my gear ready and to finish dinner’s leftovers (and snack some more on top of that). I took a few doses of Perelandra’s Emergency Trauma Solution (ETS), and of a solution of few Bach flower essences – Crab Apple for cleansing, Gentian for discouragement , Larch for fear of failure, Impatiens for desiring a hasty recovery, Walnut for major transition and White Chestnut for monkey mind/thoughts going round and round in the head.

There were wedding guests in the hotel who’d had a lot more to drink than I had, and the sleep I found between 12:30 and 5:45 a.m. was disturbed by hallway noise more than once. I started the morning with some water, coconut water and the remainder of the green juice I’d made right before we hopped in the car the night before – parsley, celery, lemon and garlic. I sipped it slowly as I got ready. Before I put on my shoes I mixed some Valor essential oil blend from Young Living Oils into some lotion and rubbed my feet with it. Young Living claims: “Valor® is an empowering combination of therapeutic-grade essential oils that works with both the physical and spiritual aspects of the body to increase feelings of strength, courage, and self-esteem in the face of adversity. Renowned for its strengthening qualities, Valor enhances an individual's internal resources. It has also been found to help energy alignment in the body.” Ingredients are: Spruce (Picea mariana), rosewood (Aniba rosaeodora), blue tansy (Tanacetum annuum) and frankincense (Boswellia carteri) in a base of almond oil.

At about 6:30, I ate a half a banana and a few small leftover coconut flour pancakes before leaving to walk the 0.8 mile from the hotel to the start of the race. My husband waved goodbye from bed, but EJ stayed asleep next to him, marking the first time we’d start the day without nursing. In fact, he later told me, “I slept with Daddy the whole time!”

The run was great. I felt strong through mile nine and only then felt a little like the slight uphill should have been in the other direction. When we exited the bike trail for the last mile along a steamy, sunny highway, I was glad to be almost done. But, cheered on by another runner, I finished very strong and have smiling race photos to prove it. My time was better than I’d expected, and I felt no ill effects upon finishing. After the race I drank a lot more coconut water, ate nuts, seeds, and chocolate-covered goji berries, took some Rescue Remedy and ETS, had a great shower, ate a lot of food and enjoyed the day -- including getting lost and walking another two miles back to the hotel with my boys. I could have fallen asleep on the way home, but once I got past that, I had so much energy, I stayed up until 1 a.m. that night.

The next day my muscles felt used but not especially sore. I was happy that I’d finished the race and enjoyed myself and also that I’d been able to manage the ill effects of unwise decisions in drinking. Later in the week I went to bed early and felt more tired than I had in a while. After that post-CST exhaustion I described in the last post –and my lofty goal of turning in before midnight and getting up to at least walk early in the mornings – I’d reverted to my night-owl habits. Since the race, I’m finding it easier to honor more reasonable hours. And I’m looking for the next candidate for a long race to keep up my momentum.

Tired for the Very First Time

It was like I'd forgotten what it meant to be sleepy.

I wrote a few weeks agoabout trying to see sleep as the gentle restorative time it's supposed to be rather than the time I'm not getting things done - cleaning, cooking, writing, exercising. That was all a nice idea, but I was still pretty revved up and having a hard time putting my brain and my computer on standby before 1:30 a.m. Not until I had a craniosacral therapy appointment did I realize how profoundly not tired I'd been.

The therapist did not say my system seemed agitated or "upregulated" as she's said before. In fact, she thought I was doing well; my rhythm had more "amplitude" and I seemed generally calmer than the last time I saw her. But she also said we had a "really deep session," which I knew. I completely dropped down into another level of calm. After the session was over and she left the room with the instructions to take my time and get up gently, I fell asleep.

Later on that night, my husband I had 9:00 p.m. reservations for Restaurant Nora, the organic restaurant near Dupont Circle in Washington, DC. My mother-in-law was visiting, and she's the only one who's ever put our son to bed. We had a nice drive in, and I was still glad we were having date night, but I was so tired I could hardly see straight. All I kept thinking about was being home and being asleep. I remembered the same thing happening several months before -- for a few weeks after a treatment I actually felt like going to bed early. This work is powerful.

The contrast between that feeling and my regular pep was profound. I've enjoyed having high energy, but I also know I've been a little snippy and impatient with my son, the kind of attitude that comes from the body not replenishing its sleep stores for several days in a row. I'm pretty sure my son was feeling that energy, too. Sleeping only from 2:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m. (or earlier, if my son wakes to nurse earlier) and then nursing in a half-sleep off and on until 7:30ish does not give me the space and my body the time to unwind. And clearly, I was wound up, literally and energetically. My therapist helped me through some unwinding in my neck; that was when I stopped chatting and really sunk back into a quiet dark space behind my eyelids.

I enjoyed the food at dinner but, once we got home, I could hardly get into jammies fast enough. I was in bed by 11:30 p.m. and didn't wake until E woke at 6:00 a.m. -- a good run of sleep for him and for me. Normally I get up to pee before 5:00 even if I've only been in bed for three hours. This time I slept for seven uninterrupted. That's probably a 26-month record!

A week from tomorrow morning, I will be running a half-marathon at 7 a.m., so this week's project is to commit to going to bed before midnight so I can reasonably get up at 6:00 with rested rather than revved adrenals.