{Heart Healthy}

I have always been fascinated by the heart and how the body and heart work together. The way the inside of our body functions is just amazing to me. I don't know what it is, but the heart fascinates me. And i TRY to eat and be physically healthy(which i am not always successful at) because i know it is important. My dad has heart disease. He had what i guess you would call a slight heart attack when he was about 50 yrs. old. My mom and i were with him when it came on and it was very scary. We were on vacation when it happened. We happened to be visiting Tulsa where i grew up. We weren't too far from the hospital. My dad had to get open heart surgery while we were there and luckily he knew the Doctors and nurses working on him, since he worked there for over 10 years. It was a scary time....one that i don't like to replay in my head...if i do i start crying. Oh, i hate that. There are a few moments in my life where if i replay those moments in my head, no matter where i am, i start crying. One of those is when this happened to my dad. Ever since then i almost feel like i have a responsibility to learn about how to have and keep a healthy heart. My dad probably knows all there is to know about the heart...not only because he is a Doctor and specialized in the Heart(maybe you call the 'cardiology') but after this happened he researched and researched and researched everything there is to know about how to eat, and learned about all the little things that you can take into your body that are a huge benefit to your heart. It has helped me learn just a little bit about what is good and bad. Heart disease doesn't run in my family. I believe this happened to my dad because of stress in his life, and the way he ate(from the time he was young up to that point)....and maybe there were more things that factored in, but i know for sure those are two things that did it.

Anyway, lately i rented some books on the heart from the library. I love reading about it and learning about it. I am always so motivated to learn about how to stay healthy and be healthy. I wish i were this motivated with other things, like crafts, BUT maybe i am motivated with this for a reason. To keep my family healthy. Shane makes me nervous and always has. Maybe i worry too much about what happened to my dad happening to him, but i can't help it. Everytime he takes his blood pressure it is always at "pre-hypertension" level, which means he has a very good chance of getting high blood pressure if he doesn't change a few things in his eating habits and physical habits. He stresses easy....and doesn't eat so good. But that says something for me and the boys too. We should be eating better. Shane has a major sweet tooth. He wants me to make cookies and cake all the time. ALL THE TIME. Sweets weren't on my list of things to eat until i married him. I mean, i ate them once in awhile, but i didn't need them. Now after marrying him i find myself wanting sweets all the time. Maybe part of that right now is b/c i am pregnant! :) Anyway, i need to break us of that habit. FAST. So , my plan is to start making heart healthy meals....which aren't as tastey, but they are better for you. Anyway, so by the time i have this baby i should be educated enough to get us in shape! It is hard to do that right now, being pregnant and all....i mean, we can eat healthy right now, but i don't want to put too many restrictions on myself right now. :) Plus, it makes it hard for my family when i am pregnant b/c everytime i snack or eat they HAVE to eat too. Gavin lately seems to eat more than me. Maybe he is just going through a growth spurt, which i am sure that is what it is, but he surprises me. He eats as much as i do at dinner time!
So, i want to share something with you right now that i have found out. I think i might make another blog about health, like i did awhile ago, so we can learn together. Two things i found out...
1. Cheese is so fattening! Okay, i never thought about it. I just thought....oh its dairy, dairy isn't bad. Well, well ,well. I was wrong. I know, maybe you all already knew that, but i loved it so much i just didn't think about it. I love cheese on EVERYTHING. SHARP cheddar. oohhhhh, sooooo good. :) I looked to see how much fat is in it. For like once slice of cheese there is 9 grams of fat and 5 grams of saturated fat!!! I was like, "holy cow!!!" I eat at least 3 slices a day! Are you kidding me?! AT LEAST. :) That is a lot of fat, and especially a lot of saturated fat, which is horrible. I tried the other day to see if i could go all day with NO cheese. I did it, but it was sooooo hard! I wanted a cheese taco(which i put at least 2 slices on), then later i wanted to put cheese on my soup(2 slices), and later after that i wanted to put cheese on my ham sandwich(2 slices). I know, i go crazy with cheese. Think about that fat! If i would have used 6 slices i would have consumed, in cheese alone, 54 grams of fat and 35 grams of saturated fat. Oh sick. Seriously. Maybe my arteries are already clogged.
2. Olive oil is very beneficial. I knew it was beneficial, but not to the extent that i now know. Gulp down a tsp. to 2 tsp. a day. It contains antioxidants that help discourage artery clogging, makes skin more lustrous, slows down aging process, cholesterol free, lowers incident of gallstone formation, dissolves clots in capillaries, rich in vitamins A, B-1, B-2, C, D, E, and K and in iron, beneficial to the digestive system, if drunk before a meal it protects the stomach from ulcers, etc. The list goes on. Cool huh? Use olive oil people. Don't use veg. oil.

Anyway, i am going to start up a heart healthy blog. I will let you know the new address soon. I will just post everything i learn and you guys can comment about anything that you think could be beneficial for us to know! I want to post good and bad things about food and what we need to know to help us eat healthier. I know, food is good and it is hard to eat healthy all the time, trust me i know, BUT we have to take care of our bodies and hearts. It is so important. It will make us feel healthier, make us happier(i believe), help us live longer and we are setting an example for our kids. We are helping our kids eat healthy too by doing this.
With all the stuff i see about breast cancer on television it led me to believe that breast cancer is a huge problem, which i know it is, but heart disease is the number one killer of men AND women. I read that TEN times more women die of heart disease each year than women who have breast cancer. So, this is obviously a problem, i believe, that should be addressed just as much as breast cancer.
www.tryingtobehearthealthy.blogspot.com