Sweet Berry Wine.

Wednesday night I went out for wine and pizza with my law school girlfriends. The Riverview Wine Bar does not mess around with their wine portions-which is why I'm shocked I've never been there before. After two glasses of wine and a wine flight my night quickly went from discussing our job prospects to this:





I've posted that clip before and I'll post it again, because Dr. Steve Brule's wine experience was the fucking funniest thing I've seen in a long time. The first half-with his wine stained lips-that is my life. My husband is obsessed with Tim and Eric's Awesome Show-but I could just watch that clip over and over.

Needless to say Thursday morning I felt like my brain was attempting to exit my head through my eyeballs.

Gawk.

I barely remember writing my yoga/making my husband into Jesus blog. He had to come pick me up. LOL! He gets so pissed.

And I'm always just standing around where ever he has to get me-a glass of wine in my hand-Sweet Berry Wine if you will-grinning wildly and waiting for him to carry me home.

See Below...

For first example of smashed words.

Owww! My head! It's never worth it the next morning.

What's the diff?

So. I totally make my husband experience new things. And most of the time it doesn't even work, because he quit smoking the winter we got married and I keep smoking-one here and there when I'm with my friends-but-hence the title-what's ' the diff?

I'm feeling really closed off. I can't take a deep breath. I freak out when I'm driving.

Yesterday. Kundilni yoga. Some dude that invented it? Real stuff?

I don't know.


But on my way home from doing it-from which I find so much satisfaction:

I felt calm.
and I told him about how-at about 8 o clock I felt this intense-not really intense, but real feeling. Like, my husband loves me more each day. AND it sounds corny as shit.

and he felt the same. Like, this intense love and attraction.

Here's my secret.

And it should be all. To me.

I often quiver and quick with the meaning of life. Like I'm doing it right, or I'm not doing enough.


I'm confused and angry and lost. But here's the thing. I refuse to be lost with my partner. I can't handle it.

YOU are with me like family-and I hate you and love you and watch you play guitar.

But sometimes, at the end of the night, when all the disagreements and unsettled moral positions come to rest-I lay down in bed-and you wrap your arms around me-and stick you leg between mine-and we sigh-almost in unison-grateful for the warmth and the way we fit together-beyond all being-not quite, but almost, one.

I feel like the past is sucked beyond=and the future is one I am meant to create with you.

My love. My life. My infinite being.

How sweet it is.

When I am in yoga-opening myself up-and my husband feels at that time that he loves me so much-he needs to call and tell me-I know that I am more than my physical body to my partner. I AM his partner. I will not betray him, I will not lie to him, and I expect from him what I expect from myself-quite an old soul. but we wouldn't be here if not for him.

Turns, Wheel, Mushroom head?

This video has already been all over, but I'm amazed at how much this kid looks like a male version of me at that age. WHY oh why didn't I have YouTube? All I had was a pretend video camera when I busted mad moves and sang along to En Vouge, Boyz II Men, and Tony, Toni, Tone in my living room. With my mushroom hair and buck teeth.

Blind Item.

Just read this blind item on Dlisted:

"Which Twitter-happy star uses the social site to find his next hook-up? You could be next, he has no preference as long as you live within driving distance and seem somewhat discreet. It’s not Ashton Kutcher."

Micheal K's guess? John Mayer.

My response: Start following John Mayer on Twitter.

I'm not proud that I'm on Twitter or that I am now following John Mayer or that I read blind items and try to guess who they are about.

Let's just say that if I was within driving distance I WOULD be proud of how discrete I am.

DAMN you John Mayer...DAMN you for your cocky attitude that just keeps me coming back for more.



Well, I guess it's not just his attitude that's super cocky. It seems his actual cock is too.

FUCK you Chris Brown. And I'll say it again.

I'm having this really visceral reaction to these recent photos of Chris Brown enjoying life after beating the shit out of girlfriend.

It's as if this didn't happen:



or at the very least-doesn't rise to the level of importance where he would have some more sensitive PR work happening.

I know the photo of Rhianna is shocking and controversial-or maybe not anymore since it's kind-of old news and everyone has seen it. To me it's humiliating and sad and seems like it should be private. But I think it's good for young women and all women to see-this is what it looks like when you get your ass kicked inside of a relationship. Unfortunately, for this woman pictured above she's famous and so is her abuser so she's all of sudden become the de facto face of domestic violence-at least for now.

I volunteer at an organization that helps women leave abusive relationships and find emergency shelter and advocacy assistance-and while that doesn't making me an expert in this area-I know that abusive relationships are a dance of sorts- of codependency and unhealthy/dysfunctional patterns that allow the abuse to continue. That said-NO partner should kick the shit out of the other partner-regardless.

I don't know the details of what happened in this well publicized case-I don't know if she was hitting at him or provoking him. Things I've heard brought up to somehow (subtly) justify the abuse or explain Brown's behavior as being somewhat rational.

I was in a long-term severely emotionally dysfunctional relationships. It pains me to even call it abusive because A. It's embarrassing to think of myself as a victim in that sense and B. I really did love him and felt like it was normal at the time. I think of myself as a really strong, capable woman and what person wants to think or believe that they too are vulnerable to emotional and/or physical and/or psychological abuse.

But looking back I see how it happened. This cycle of codependency and control, humiliation and neglect. When I began a relationship with my husband I was stuck in that place still-I began a dance with him vacillating between extremes and I attempted to provoke him-several times through words, through actions, through so many things. We had all out brawls, neither one of us was very healthy (I did piss him off-OH MY GOD-did I piss him off to the point where he punched a punching bag OFF the ceiling it was hung on, kicked a table and cracked it in half, punched the back off a chair, threw shit at doors, and broke a handle off a pot by throwing it against the wall). It's like I was fucking daring him to fuck with me-and even though breaking shit isn't that most appropriate response he has not laid one hand on me. NOT ONCE has he grabbed me, pushed me, or tried to hurt me physically. Over time we've had to work really hard through our problems-which meant that BOTH of us had to come to the table acknowledging our roles and taking responsibility for our behavior. It sucks, but it's worth it and it doesn't allow one of us to be the "bad guy" and the other the "victim."

I could easily have ended up looking the Rhianna in the photo above. And I know that when I was in an emotionally dangerous relationship-if I had looked like that-I would have gone back. Just like she has.

It's not pretty.

And saying that does not mean that women are always victims and men are always aggressors (not to mention that abuse that happens in same-sex relationships) and it doesn't take away from the complexities and complications that I know-that I've experienced-exist in relationships.

But at the end of the day-when someone has a photo with their eyes closed and bruises all over their face put there by the hand of their partner-that isn't real love.

Chris Brown is a damaged person-sitting on his jet ski-seemingly without a care in the world.

And that is when the woman in the picture below him starts to look like a victim and he really starts to look like an unforgiveable asshole. And that pisses me off-him making it so easy to hate him and feel sorry for her.

So-I say-FUCK you Chris Brown and your stupid woman beating/shit eating grin.
FUCK you.

Jezebel did me wrong.

I love going to Jezebel and I visit the site several times a day, but this post was inaccurate and irresponsible:


A Bitter Pill To Swallow
From multivitamins to weight loss pills, some scientists are warning that dietary supplements are at best a waste of time, and at worst, a risk to women's health.

New research suggests that middle-aged women who take a multivitamin are just creating expensive urine, as there is no sign the pills reduce common cancers, heart disease or death, reports the Wall Street Journal. Results of the largest multivitamin study in postmenopausal women ever conducted were published yesterday in The Archives of Internal Medicine. Researchers analyzed data from 161,808 women between the ages of 50 and 79 who participated in the Women's Health Initiative, a government-funded clinical trial that studied the women's health for eight years on average.

The study found that there were few differences in disease outcomes between vitamin and nonvitamin users, and recommended that women focus on getting nutrients from the foods they eat, not vitamins. An excess of water soluble vitamins (whether from food or supplements) is excreted, but excess fat soluble vitamins like A, D, E, and K, are stored in the liver and can cause negative side effects. "Based on our results, if you fall into the category of the women described here and you do in fact have an adequate diet, there really is no reason to take a multivitamin," said researcher Dr Sylvia Wassertheil-Smoller, according to The Independent.

While multivitamins may not be helpful or harmful in most cases, today, the Food and Drug Administration is issuing warnings in its continuing investigation into weight loss supplements, according to The New York Times. StarCaps have been promoted by professional football players, featured on the Today show, and sold in vitamin stores without a prescription, as a natural papaya-based dietary supplement. But now the FDA has found that the pills also contain an unlisted ingredient: a pharmaceutical drug call bumetanide, which has dangerous side effects.

In addition to StarCaps, the F.D.A. has found that dozens of weight-loss supplements, most of them imported from China, contain hidden and possibly harmful drugs. The warnings have already prompted recalls by some distributors and an F.D.A. spokeswoman says the agency will issue a longer list of brands that are spiked with drugs in the next few weeks. The current list includes 69 tainted weight-loss supplements, which were marketed under names like Sliminate, Superslim, and Slim Up. The undeclared drugs could cause problems like elevated blood pressure or seizures, and may have toxic interactions with other medications.

The F.D.A. investigation is raising questions about the way dietary supplements are regulated. Unlike drugs, which must be approved before they go on sale, the agency can only spot check supplements after they've go on the market. Even when contaminated products are discovered, the F.D.A. can't remove the pills from stores. It must first try to get the manufacturers to issue a recall, and eventually if the companies do nothing it can seize the products or file criminal charges. The F.D.A. admits there may be hundreds of contaminated drugs on store shelves that they just haven't identified yet.

Sources

Vitamins Fail to Reduce Health Risks for Women [The Wall Street Journal]
Multivitamin Supplements A Waste Of Time [The Independent]
F.D.A. Finds ‘Natural' Diet Pills Laced With Drugs [The New York Times]

At first this information just felt intuitively wrong to me. I mentioned in an earlier post that I've been using the "natural family planning" method to prevent a baby from growing inside of me (although I'm sure my hostility and negativity has, at times, kept a new little soul from wanting to take hold), but I started noticing after a few months that I really couldn't use this method very effectively-because I wasn't ovulating. My period would have fits and starts and come every 5-6 months. So I went to a traditional western doctor (oh-I'm so anti-established medicine and progressive)-and they tested my hormone levels and came back with the results and were like, "Well you have a raised level of this hormone and it looks like polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) and every three months you will have to take these birth control pills and force a cycle."

Here were the reasons I was upset with that result:
1. I didn't want to take synthetic hormones which cause cancer and force my body to have a reaction if I don't need to. They never discussed with me natural hormones and I got off the pill to get off the pill. I didn't want to get off the pill only to get back on it with a super dose every three months.

2. Doing my own research I discovered that not only is PCOS the leading cause of infertility in the United States (fine, I can't get pregnant) the bigger deal is that it causes weight gain, acne, excessive hair growth, and cardiovascular problems. So, great I'm going to be a fat, hairy, zitty lady with a heart condition. FUCK! I was so pissed-so I cried at work.

3. They never discussed with me what else could be causing this rise and shift in my hormone levels or what was going on in my life. It was just such a quick snapshot and one solution.

SO
I went to Dr. Mayfield my secret boyfriend and number one health guy. He's like, Oh PCOS is linked to raised insulin levels too-he measured that-it was fine. But in the meantime found out I was severly vitamin D deficient and had like toxic everything and and "OH YEAH" this raised hormone can also happen when you have stress-and I was working two jobs, going to law school, taking care of a teenage niece who was living with us, and helping my husband who was back in school after 12 years. So , I was a amped on the fucking stress.

I started taking a round of supplements to detox (yeah-shitting and even puking at times-it was FUN! I guess I wasn't supposed to puke-it just seemed so detoxy to me), supplements to help balance my hormones, a natural progesterone cream that I slathered on once a month, and supplements to help up my Vitamin D levels. I also quit one of my jobs, detached with love from my niece, started doing yoga again, and let my husband take the responsibilty for his own education. Overtime, my stress decreased and what do you know? My period is back like clock-work-every month-and now I'm not walking around with like 1/32nd of the amount of vitamin D I needed.

Anyway, the point of my story. There is a time and a place for Western medicine and a time and a place for Dr. Mayfield. I would argue there is always a time and place for Dr. Mayfield, but he can't do open heart sugery so I'm not going to stop going to the doctor. I recognize the value in each, but I feel like if I didn't have the option I would be stuck taking pills to force on my period, thinking I had PCOS and living my life at the same dangerously stressful levels causing even more problems down the road.

Needless to say I sent Dr. Mayfield the articles decrying the use of supplements and this was his response:

Sara,

The alleged 'experts' quoted in the article are very consevative ones. Even 18 years ago the conservative Journal of the American Medical Assoc (JAMA) published an extensive review of the health conditions that needed additional vitamin/mineral supplementation to support or reverse the health disorder. The summary was that 85% of all Americans needed a basic multiple. Even further are the two dozen nutritional related medical journals that discuss the rampant, extensive nutritional deficits found in average Americans eating a "healthy" diet. One example is that if you do not take a vitamin D3 supplement (2000-5000 IU) every day, you will end up in the 80th percentile who are markedly D3 deficient.

The article you referenced is old, rehashed conservatism based on antiquated concepts. The new paradigm held by the majority of real experts recommend antioxidants, minerals, etc to optimize one's genetic expression so that disease is prevented or modified. I will gladly experience 'expensive urine' as the multiple vitamin / minerals wash through my body cells to improve the gene/environment experience. It is much more than getting the RDA levels of 1948 level thinking.

I attend 30 plus conferences per year led by the top experts in their related field of medicine, and all of them advocate a minimal multiple. Every 5 years the government runs the HANES study where they survey people throughout the country. They take their health symptoms and compare it to what they are eating in the alleged "healthy diet". Bottom line: the average person measures out to be deficient (average) in at least 14 nutrient deficiencies.

I could go on and on to make my point, but you can get the general idea. Hope all is well your way!

That is why I love him. It also serves as another reminder to continue my skeptical view of anything I read in the Wall Street Journal-which really only happens by accident.

Dr. Mayfield 4 eva.