Being Healthier

Here is my story, I felt like giving some background info so that you understood more about where I am coming from. I have exercises below the novel. Enjoy!

In high school, I was on cheerleading, gymnastics, volleyball and track and field.  For track, I was specifically a triple jumper but ran sprints and hurdles also. Indoor season was all winter so we trained inside on hard gym floors, which are awful on knees when you are pounding on the floor. By the time outdoor season started, I had stress fractures in both ankles.

I pushed through and sat in ice baths up to my knees everyday after practice. I tried the shin compression sleeves and the trainer taped from my ankles up to my shins nearly every day.  All of those are fantastic for minor issues, however, they are like a bandaid to a bigger problem ( training through injury). My knee started hurting after that due to my improper form on top of the ankle pain! The stress fractures and “shin splints” in my lower legs caused my kneecaps to weaken and tear at the meniscus.

Listen to your body!
Training hard is wonderful and worth the effort, however, overtraining leads to injury and injury begets injury unless you properly recover! Take the time as soon as you feel true pain or injury to recover from it. It will make you stronger!

At that point, the orthopaedic urged me to choose physical therapy before going to surgery in hopes of strengthening to prevent surgery. I just wanted to run ( such a typical runner logic) so therapy seemed great by me. I got a brace to wear that stabilized me knee cap and I had combined therapy for my ankles as well.

During college cheerleading, I was thrown up into a stunt that worked perfect. Unfortunately, for the dismount, they just let go of my foot sending me crashing down on my ankle. This fractured my ankle in three places and I was not aware until 3 months of torture because the trainer thought it was a sprain.

Listen to your body!
I knew it was not right. I had an MRI finally showing it was still fractured in my ankle and foot. After wearing a boot for what seemed forever and going through physical therapy yet again, I dreamed about running all the time but was too worried to start.

I had been what I like to call, an Ellipticizer, mostly since last July. During recovery, it was the least impact-exercise that I could do. After hearing about friends starting to race and giving me encouragement, I randomly decided to run again in July and it felt amazing at first. One month later, I dislocated my kneecap on a short tempo run. I found myself wearing another brace and faced with MRI’s and physical therapy again.

I decided to do it on my own this time because I have learned so much about myself and from physical therapy, Why not put it to use? I felt that instead of going to yet another rehab/over-train/injure/rehab/ cycle, I will learn from my mistakes and get my legs stronger and save the medical bills!

I have been running happily since October and wanted to share with all of you what helps me! 

Simply put: I rested. I strengthened my knees. I stretched. I cross-trained. 

My biggest tool is my motivation. I spent so much time “recovering” and literally unable to run, that it built a motivation monster. When something like heading out of your house for a jog is taken away from you, it made me feel like a victim. I never want to feel like a victim, I run because I can. Find motivation for you, a goal event to be in shape for, a race to run in, whatever it is, there is something you can use to motivate you and focus on that when it gets hard to keep going.

More tools: stretching and strengthening for your knees and ankles!

Here are only a few exercises from my physical therapy stints. I try to do these daily still, if not, 3 times a week. The best part (and I think everyone will enjoy this) you can do them watching TV! 

Straight Leg lift

Start with your legs out in front, the non-lifted leg bent to stabilize.

Lift your straight leg, keeping it straight and hold it just below the knee of your bent leg for 5 seconds. ( notice the lifted knee cap is flattened)
 
Return it to the ground. When you return it to the ground, let it settle slowly, meaning you will see your kneecap release.

Repeat on this leg for a set of 10-15. Start out low and increase repetitions as needed. Repeat with other leg.

Heel Drags

Start with either laying down or propped on elbows, with your legs out in front.
 
Drag the heel of your leg toward your butt, keeping the other on the ground.
You will feel this exercise more in your hamstring ( notice just below my knee but before my hamstring is flexed, this helps the outer and inner knee ligaments/muscles).

All the way up to your butt ( or as far as you can). Notice my sock coming off- I intentionally kept this photo to emphasize that you keep your heel on the ground the entire time. 

Repeat: Bringing leg back to the starting position, repeat same leg and then the other for sets of 10-15

Tense and Hold

This is fairly “easy”.

Sit with legs, both straight out in front.
Now tense your quad, as hard as you can.

Hold it for at least 5 seconds in that tense position. Look at the kneecaps- They flex and straighten as you do this exercise.

Repeat 10 times.
(Here is a side view up close of one knee)
Relaxed:

Tensed:

Ankle

Alphabet:

I write the alphabet with my ankle. Using my toe as a pencil, I lift my leg in the air or just have it out in front of me and I write the imaginary alphabet. Here is a “C “

Toe Scrunching:

You can use a towel under your toes of an object of reference, but scrunch your toes up and hold them there for 5-10 seconds. Repeating ( I do about 20 times).

( the photo wasn’t as clear with my sock so excuses my unmanicured toes!)

This is probably the most important that I do because your IT Band stretches from your hip, across the kneecap, and down towards your shin. Clearly important for running and often causes the most problems due to lack of stretching. 

IT Band Stretches:

You will need some type of structure to hold on to. No worries though, it really could be anything, I use trees outside, benches, a chair, the treadmill arms, a wall.

Stretching Left Side:
 

Stretching Left Side: position structure on your right side, holding on to it for support, cross your left foot over your right and stretch left hip out towards the left ( away from the bench).
I guess Jack really wanted to be part of this photo, he ran up and stopped just as the photo snapped! He surprised me, hence my silly face.

Stretching Right Side:

Position the structure on your left (opposite) side. Cross your right leg over your left. Push/Hold onto structure on your left while pushing your right hip out to the right.

You should feel this from your hip, across your knee, down through your shin.

I really hope these become helpful tools for you. Happy exercising, injury-free!

–bheathier

Oh my goodness!! I had no idea how much I would love these chips!
Popchips were happy to pop over a sample of their product line of awesome healthy potato chips.
 

Jeff and I  ( Jack had a mini one and loved it too, who could resist that face?)
excitedlytried the first bag: Sea Salt and Vinegar ( probably our favorite combo in general)! Here is the nutrition info:
 

We were extremely pleased!!!
Review:
These were packed with vinegar and sea salt taste, they were crispy and crunchy but not harsh like chips can be sometimes. These were more light and airy like popcorn, thicker than a chip but MUCH less greasy! Hmm, fantastic! Just filled with flavor and crunch! They smelled just like any other sea salt and vinegar chip, and we weren’t sure whether they were popcorn or potato chips at first, so we read more about them.

All the flavor. So, Where’s the fat?

“Introducing an all-natural chip like you’ve never tasted before. We don’t fry it (unhealthy). We don’t bake it (undelicious). We take the finest ingredients, like wholesome potatoes, apply heat and pressure, and pop! It’s a chip. Then we use an artful blend of natural seasonings for a snack so tasty, crispy and dip-able, you won’t even notice it’s (we hesitate to say) healthier. ” I liked that last word (haha)

What Popchips http://popchips.com/ thinks:

We think there aren’t enough meals in the day. We think spoiling your dinner is just fine. And if there’s one thing we know as snack fanatics, if it doesn’t taste good, it’s not a snack.

But taste isn’t the only thing we care about. We’re just as concerned about putting good things into our bodies as the next snacker. Maybe even more so. And getting rid of trans fats is just a start. We also think about the other things that give snacking a bad rap — like saturated fats, calories, preservatives, artificial everything. It’s enough to make a snacker get out the chip clip and hold out for dinner.

So what were our options? Not many. In spite of snacks filling an entire grocery store aisle, we realized everything was pretty much either fried (unhealthy) or baked (undelicious). Someone needed to do something on behalf of all snackers. So we thought, who better for the job?

In our pursuit of the snackers’ holy grail, delicious and healthier, we discovered popping. We’re able to simultaneously keep all of the flavor in, while keeping half the fat of fried chips out. Since we do all the popping ourselves, we can make sure of that. Our quality control mantra? If it doesn’t taste good, it’s not a snack, of course.

That’s why we’re so excited about all-natural popchips™ brand chips. We’re not hoarding the bag. We want snackers and snack fanatics alike to share the joy!”

Salt and Vinegar were my favorite, however, I enjoyed all of these honestly. Here are the rest in order of personal taste preference…

Original Flavor

I am holding one up so you can see what it looks like! It tasted just like a regular potato chip but with a much better texture! It also isn’t greasy so I am for sure sold as a future consumer of popchips. You will see more of these as a snack on here!

BBQ

Jeff had these and really liked them! I tried one, but I have never liked bbq flavor. I actually liked these! I gave a bag to Jeff’s sister Melissa so I will have to see what they think!

Parmesean Garlic

These were my least favorite flavor, only because the garlic was a little harsh afterwards on the breath! Still crunchy, crispy packed with flavor just not my fav.

Thank You to Tory at Popchips!!! These are really tasty and I am heading out to buy some big bags for our girl’s weekend trip to the beach!

I will update this again with another photo!

Angel Food Cake ( Alton Brown)

Ingredients

1 ¾ cups sugar

¼ teaspoon salt

1 cup cake flour, sifted

12 egg whites (room temperature)

1/3 cup warm water

1 teaspoon orange extract, or extract of your choice

1 ½ teaspoons cream tartar

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2. In a food processor, spin sugar about 2 minutes until it is superfine.

3. Sift half the sugar with the salt and cake flour, setting the remaining sugar aside.

4. In a large metal bowl, use a balloon whisk to thoroughly combine egg whites, water, orange extract, and cream of tartar. After two minutes, switch to a hand mixer.

5. Slowly stir in the reserved sugar, beating continuously at medium speed.

6. Once you have achieved medium peaks, sift enough of the flour mixture in to dust the top of foam. Using a spatula, fold in gently. Continue until all the flour mixture in incorporated.

7. Carefully spoon mixture into an ungreased tube pan.

8. Bake for 35 minutes before checking for doneness with a wooden skewer. (When inserted halfway between the inner and outer wall, the skewer should come out dry).

9. Cool upside down on cooling rack for at least 1 hours before removing from pan.
   

I don’t know, maybe it was just me not having Angel Food Cake in forever or my high expectations as a perfectionist or just because I was in a weird mood today, but it was incredible sweet and chewy. It was moist and springy. We followed step by step directions. I just wasn’t a huge fan.

I did like this much more..
Pound Cake, from Joy of Cooking Cookbook

Ingredients

1 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter

1 cup sugar

4 or 5 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups sifted cake flour

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

2. Have all ingredients at room temperature.

3. Grease and flour one 9×5-inch loaf pan.

4. Beat butter in a large bowl at medium-high speed for 1 minute.

5. Gradually add sugar and beat until light and fluffy, ~5 to 7 minutes.

6. Add each egg one at a time, beating well after each addition.

7. Add vanilla and beat 1 minute.

8. On low speed, slowly add cake flour, mixing only until thoroughly blended.

9. Scrap the batter into the pan.
10. Bake the cake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 1 hour for a loaf pan.

10. Let loaf cool in pan on a rack for 10 minutes.

I did most of the mixing, ingredients stuff so I couldn’t take more step pictures. It took us until the very end of class to finish baking the pound cake.

We sampled our professor’s Chiffon Cake..

It was very similar to a regular birthday yellow cake, only this was way lighter and fluffier. This “unshortened” cake utilizes oil instead of butter and egg whites similar to angel food.

Here you can see our angel food cake, the chiffon cake and a slice of another groups’ Sponge Cake.

This Sponge Cake…

This cake is a “shortened” cake meaning it has an added fat ( egg yolks) giving it more moisture and yellow color. This particular one wasn’t mixed as well as it could have been, so it tasted a little eggy.