Spring Inflammation Vacation - Cooking to Alleviate Fibromyalgia, Arthritis, ....

This is really going to be a neat class and I am looking forward to it and am going to reach out to people I know of who might be interested AND post this on facebook, etc in hopes of getting a lot of interest in this class.  It would be nice to have people be able to come here and discuss it as well, creating a virtual circle of supportive communication with tips, idease, etc.  So please do so if you're so inclined! 

I want to thank Monica for her prompt initiation of getting this class idea going from the moment of our first meeting in January (2011) of the core people for the Grate Groove of the Grand Valley.  I very much look forward to where this ALL goes from here!  So far, so GRATE!  ~~ Mardy

I'm so pleased to have been able to participate with Monica, who is part of the (Lumi)Grate Groove of the Grand Valley that kicked off this year to help with awareness about fibromyalgia and increase the competence and collaboration of providers and consumers alike. She just hopped right up to see that having inflammation be one of her cooking classes would be helpful. 

I learned something new within the first minutes of the demonstration (a #9 beginning on the barcode of produce indicates it is organic) and by the end of the well orchestrated cooking group process and enjoyable mealtime conversational which had gone into energy medicine, interestingly, I realized I'd learned more than I'll ever be able to really identify and write about here.  You just must take one of the classes if it sounds appealing.  Essentially it was an exercise in the synergy that can happen when you bring enought inquisitive and sharp minds together, as we have SO much to learn.  I think everyone was cross polinating a lot of information. 

And, while "cross pollination" is one of my favorite expressions about information exchanging through people, it's particularly useful here becasue we even talked about bees and pollen.  It was inspiring because Groove member Carolyn Lampshire had come to the class and we were going to meet immediately afterwards related to HER 'piece of the puzzle', which is bringing women together for teas.  To learn.  To share... to have something to look forward to every month.  To have connections to a community they relate to.   I'd attended her first two teas which is what landed her an invitation to be part of the core group in the Grate Groove because she did such a good job of 'making it happen' and I've known for years the enthusiasm and wisdow she exhudes and knew when her time came to step back to the professional platform, she'd be awesome. And I learned a lot about teas and how that came to be, which surprised her that so many participants were interested in the historicity of the tea time. (I'll ask her to write about it on Lumigrate for us, but it's essentially the same reason people go out for 'happy hour' if you want my theory about it.)

I also learned areas I'm recently 'coming up to speed on' with a new outstanding book called The Healthy Home, by Dr. Myron Wentz and Dave Wentz and found it so interesting that the first thing at the class we were to leave our shoes at the door and not drag in pollutants, JUST as the book that I was reading earlier in the day promotes.  I'd also read in the book a surprising amount about some of the core concepts of nutrition which were reinforced at this local cooking class and I appreciated having the opportuntiy to ask someone who is more knowledgeable than I on certain aspects. 

Alkalinity of the body was one of the concept they wove into the class and I liked her suggestion of having a green drink first thing in the morning, such as wheatgrass, because I have found a product I like to work in somewhere in the day which is a green powdered product. The Health Home had suggested lemon juice in water first thing in the day and I just don't like lemonjuice at that time of day.

Mostly what I appreciated about the class was the high level of health consumer Monica is teaching -- that is so very encouraging to see such knowledgeable people, in this case all women, coming together to share some time and move forward with their health and information 'fund of knowledge' and I learned something from each and every one of them, as well as the co-leader of the class who does an amazing job with entertaining and cooking.  I'd been asked to provide clues as to how people with fibromyalgia cook and several people had loved ones with FMS so I hope my suggestions here as follow up are helpful: 

• Use the blender and food processor of you have one,
• Use simple recipes that have only 5-10 ingredients and steps
• Find shortcuts such as using frozen vegetables of high quality, including chopped onions,  minced and jarred garlic, etc. (Not 'ideal' for nutrition but 'consider the tradeoff' -- it's better than not cooking due to fatigue

One of the reasons I am so 'fond of' the recipe I had suggested for green beans and green onion salad dressing of Deirdre Rawlings that she so kindly posted on Lumigrate LAST St Patty's Day (2010), is it's easy.  Monica had asked me to give her recipes of how I cook and truly that is the only recipe I have pulled up and made in the last year -- the rest of how I cook is this base, simple, energy saving stuff OR I do a lot of organic, frozen health food store (Vitamin Cottage/Natural Grocers) things.  I work more than full time and go out with friends sometimes or take something if it's a pot-luck, so I'm not cooking 'for people' much.  I estimate more than half of people with fibromyalgia are the same lifestyle and that's something educators could be more aware of, I think. 

Deirdre was astounded to talk with me and find out I am not that mindful of an eater because I eat in front of the TV, and I've been more aware by that conversation.  In all my years as an OT or otherwise going into other people's houses, I've only known of one person who when they didn't have a dinner companion would sit at the table after cooking a proper meal like he did when he had a family.  But his dogs were right there, so that's how I figured it translated and I think he had guests over quite a lot.  (He did not have medical / energy issues, this was a friend of mine.)

Look at how much you make and serve as 'I'm trying to get this much nutrition in this meal' -- our history of 'courses' for meals maybe is something that could benefit from changing for everyone and particularly those with energy or time restraints. 

Now, mind you, I wasn't complaining when eating the delicious soup, quinoa, salmon, chicken, kale, fruit for desert, plus kale chips and bean dip and vegies beforehand but really about half that much would have been what I would have done and then made it less stressful and relaxing because that's part of good health too! Particularly if I know the women who were coming and how cohesive their energies and mindset would be for discussions.  And then provided more take home information to try as homework 'after class' if people wanted.

Again, just my suggestions for future people who do this type of class but this was a really successful first class of something that was new/first and covering both CFS/FMS and arthritis -- inflammation.  It gave us LOTS of ideas with the presentation which was excellent and I hope that there will be demand in the future for a class FOR people with FMS down the road which would include energy conversation information and then to avoid the 'do I sign up if I half the time can't go to things' issue, if everything that's covered is documented and provided it's essentially like taking a teleseminar class and skipping the listening and reading the transcripts.  The new ways of education are interesting to keep up with, but that's what I'm in the business to do here with Lumigrate, hence my inclusion in the process.

Both of the people with FMS who I had suggested the class to were unable to come ... but not directly because of their energy/wellness. I'm involved in shepherding their health care right now and can attest that they're spending tons of money on things to progress their health and it's just not in the budget for a cooking class at this time. They also both had particularly high expenses related to vehicles this past month. They'll hopefully have much lower costs in a few to six months or a year and then Less is more sometimes, particularly with Fibromyalgia.  People who have not managed the condition well yet, which is common as most providers or patients don't catch what is going on in time to early intervene, are likely not able to prepare and cook much at all and therefore the Catch 22 happens with health/nutrition and the downward spiral.  At least at some points in the process I hope they somehow muster some time and energy to obtain nutrition OR ask for people around them to do so temporarily and then one can hope we all get back to running around the kitchen as we used to. 

The abundant energy of Monica and her co-leader astounded me -- it really is exemplary and something we should all strive to have. She shared that she has seen changes in neck issues (osteoarthritis there) based on her eating/nutrition. They were 'inspiring' and I hope that my input beforehand, which I have essentially written about here in the follow up to benefit other instructors to expedite their facilitation of a class similar somewhere else out there that knows of Lumigrate, they'll benefit from the learning we had with this one.  Again, the FIRST specifically about inflammation and I'm very glad she took my suggestion about expanding to include a broader spectrum of disorders because neither of the people I knew with FMS locally who were interested in going could.  

Everyone operates as a team, which was something I was observing yesterday with a group of people who had not met prior and were comfortable in the kitchen working together.   When a person has a level of health that requires working to get back to chronic wellness from having a chronic illness OR if they're well and are on their way to ill, they're not in a vacuum -- it's every persons family, work, friends, community around them that influences.  Someone saw the Lumigrate flyer and just resonated with the You model, and yesterday Monica (and her co-leader) were the center of that model with all the others around. 

I hope in the near future there will be a growing number of people like these who come together for more classes, teas, YogaDances (next one by Grate Groover Kohava Howard is April 6, find info here at Lumigrate.com's forum on Movement Therapies or Search on the keywords). Carolyn and I forsaw this growing and growing and we had fun brainstorming the interests of the people who were at the class yesterday to turn those into education topics at future teas -- gardening, herbs, the skin, healthy home strategies.

Anyone who attended the tea who would like their comments to encourage others to attend Monica's cooking classes are welcome -- you may register as a user and write below OR email me a message and I'll post a list of statements (and sign how you want your name to appear or not, initials, etc.), possibly saying why you were interested in the class and what you thought.  This can be very helpful in marketing educational classes since, as you see above, it's a matter of 'is this where I'll spend some resources this month?'.  As I said yesterday, ITC Pharmacy will send a book out to everyone who attended who has an interest in the hormone aspects of health, and they're also a resource for nutritional supplements and expertise from co-presidents and registered pharmacists.  I'm going to follow up with Allan Jolly, who is also an ND, related to what I learned right away from Monica about green drinks (as I use a product called Green First from them) AND if anyone is interested in purchasing local honey from them check and see if they'll ship that or not.  I'm not clear about that.  We ended the day with a conversation about the benefits of local honey and had a question about if we can use Front Range honey in Grand Junction for it's allergy remediation properties. 

Again, there were so many interesting and educated brains in the room yesterday it was truly a Grate class with good cross pollinationa!  Kudos to all! ~~ Mardy

Thanks, Mardy, for thinking of us as a resource to ask questions of while you were at the class. It sounds like it was a good time and people were learning a lot, which I always like to hear, particularly when it's a group like you say you had there of very educated people who 'cross pollinate'. 

Related to pH testing -- this is not a simple issue.  Recommending pH paper is a specious argument.  There is a whole science around the analysis of urinary organic acids.  The saliva and especially the urine are by their nature acidic.  The urine is one of the main ways for the body to eliminate acids.  People will tell others to test their saliva and urine with pH strips and if they are acidic (which they always will be unless the person is really really sick) then they must take whatever product that they sell to alkalize the individual. 

Greens First is a perfectly good product and if you push hard it will transiently alkalize the fluids, but it is much more important for the nutrients and antioxidants it contains.  Wheat Grass will transiently alkalize too.  The attached list are foods that alkalize or acidify.

(Tune back, we're currently bringing the list up and in here). 

Please let the ladies know who attended the class how to get their copy to them and thanks for letting them know about ITC at the class, Mardy.

Gary

... and get this information out to them so they know -- Thanks guys! I really enjoy the book and will be putting it on the Lumigrate bookcase when I have a chance to get that written up (I worked in The Health Home since I thought it was going to apply as I knew the hostess/teacher was into shoes at the door.) ~~ Mardy