I've never been terribly fond of most other people. I really like myself, and wish more people were like me (this is a joke.. I couldn't stand being around me.. I'm obnoxious! ^_^).
For me, other people tend to get in the way of what I'm doing.
I am a hardcore introvert, which means I not only find interaction stressful, I could honestly do without the vast majority of it. Society is structured for extroverts, and that's fine, but us poor introverts, we have to make due in a world that relies far too much on interaction with other people.
For your average extrovert, social interaction is what keeps them going; it recharges their battery. These are people who enjoy meeting new people, who enjoy being in a crowd, and who enjoy the dynamic of an ever-changing social setting. Your average introvert tends to like the opposite; they become quiet and withdrawn in large groups, prefer the company of known entities, and their social battery is recharged by spending time alone on activities they enjoy.
I am so much the introvert that I rarely leave the house if I don't need to. My former counselor thought this was a sign of trauma (she was a VA counselor who dealt mostly with PTSD patients), and that a lack of social interaction was harmful for me, but I get more than enough interaction from my partner, my cats, the few people I call friends, and the internet. I completely close up in a crowd, even when I know all the people in the crowd, and it frequently takes me long stretches to think of something to add.
I've never really understood the social cues for conversation.. I can never find time to interject in a multi-person conversation, and I process the input slowly enough to miss what chance I may get. It's not that I don't follow the conversation, but that's all my brain can do at that point; process input. I now, honestly and seriously, raise my hand when I have something to add. People find it very strange, based on the looks they give me, but it's the only method I've found that works both for me, and for those I'm talking to, and as yet, nobody has commented on how absolutely bizarre it is to do. (It also, apparently, is a boon for my education; my professors are thrilled as can be that I have no problem raising my hand to ask questions or add to the discussion.)
For the ~80% of the population that function as extroverts, this IS totally bizarre, but for the ~20% who share my introversion, perhaps less so. Some of my friends who share my mindset have commented on the hand-raising, but I think they mostly understand the purpose, and I rarely need to use it around them anyway.
I have people express pity and sorrow over my lack of social circle, but I have chosen those people very carefully, and they mean the world to me; I don't want to dilute my relationships by having more of them. For most people, more relationships doesn't mean neglecting existing relationships, but when you have a limited storage tank for social interaction goo, relationships are a finite quantity. I have 5 friends. Yes, I can count them, and yes, I'm certain these people feel the same way; I remain friends with them because this is known. I don't like unknown. I am obviously friends with them for reasons other than that they are friends with me, but were they not quite obviously at least fond of me, well let's just say I've been known to cut people lose when I don't feel it anymore. Cold? Maybe, but life's too short to talk to people you don't like, especially if the interactions end up being stressful more often than not.
I don't want or need the clutter of acquaintanceship, I don't have the capacity to deal with flaky friends. If I feel an actual need for social interaction, it's usually somewhat pressing, and flaky people aren't reliable enough to satiate. I don't keep friends just to have them, and I don't keep family just because they share blood; that's silly! And yes, I did stop talking to my family because I didn't like them; no other reason, I just don't like them, as people, and don't really care to have them in my life just because we happen to be slightly more genetically related than any two random people on the street (99.5% of our DNA is shared between all humans, and 100% would be an identical twin, so there is 0.4% margin between the closest relatives and the furthest stranger).
So I keep a few friends who get my introversion. Most of said friends are also introverts, and I think that's primarily because they understand the drive to communicate via less social channels, as well as understanding that long periods of silence aren't necessarily a problem. My partner and a couple of my friends, however, are extroverts, and that's totally fine, as well!
My partner wants me to do things with him, and knows that my lack of contribution doesn't mean lack of interest; he understands that groups of people are a source of stress and discomfort for me, and has my back when people ask why I've gone off to be alone for a while. For my part, I appreciate that I can have social encounters without having to do all the work to have them. Conversation is difficult for me, and I usually revert to sharing interesting information... because that's what my life is; a series of interesting facts that I accumulate and spread when the opportunity presents itself. That's not much upon which to base an entire conversation, unless the other party shares the inclination for information... Which turns out to be pretty damned rare..
Basically, what I'm getting at here is that everyone is perfect, regardless what they do or do not, regardless how they feel about things, and regardless what anyone thinks of their behaviors. Each and every person does what they feel they need to do to be the happiest them they can be. And with very few exceptions (mostly those involving harm to another or object), they are right to do it, if it prompts feelings of fulfillment.
I'm strange, you are strange, everyone we know is strange, and we are all, every single one of us, perfectly us, and that is wonderful.
Showing posts with label comfort. Show all posts
Showing posts with label comfort. Show all posts
Monday, August 3, 2015
Thursday, July 30, 2015
The forlorn meowing breaks my heart!
It's almost 5 AM. I went to sleep around 12:30. I was woken by one of my cats licking a plastic bag. I don't know why he does this, but it drives me up the wall. I moved what he was licking, so he found something else. It sounds terribly cute, and it is, until it's 4 AM.
I'm trying to figure if this behavior is related to hunger or a food desire, so I offered him some wet food (he's very very picky about wet food, and won't eat any more than 10 minutes old). The opening of the can, of course, woke my other cats.
So here I am, mixing food for one cat, while another watches me suspiciously (this is not at all our routine) and then the meowing on the other side of the door starts up. The new boys were up as well.
For the last few days, Mickey has been reasonably comfortable with hand and arm contact, at least with me (my partner isn't spending enough time with them to form a good bond, so his progress will be slower) but Gizmo hasn't wanted anything to do with contact, only lots of kitty kisses (slowly blinked eyes). I haven't been pushing his comfort level too much, though I do offer him appendages for sniffing occasionally, lots of toys and food, and talk to him a lot.
Tonight, Gizmo let me love all over him. He was just as thrilled for contact as Mickey had been when he finally opened up, and they were both super affectionate, At the same time. That's exactly what I've been missing in my established cat dynamic; cats that get along well enough that I can pet them at the same time.
They also both really want to get out of the room and explore the rest of the house. The idea was to wait until both of my existing cats had gone in the room a few times, at least, and that's still the plan, but my cats aren't terribly interested in going in..
Scooter went in this morning, and just sort of walked around pretending there weren't other cats in the room, and that he owned the place. The whole time he was there, mickey had his nose up Scooter's butt, and followed him around relentlessly. Scooter, for his part, took it quite well, the whole thing was very civil, and when he started hanging around the door, I opened it for him, and he left.
Exactly the intro I was hoping for!
Gin, on the other hand, is offended that I'm petting another kitty, even though I am by no means ignoring her in the process. Gin had always been an odd duck; I got her from the shelter as a kitten, and she came home to an apartment full of 6 month old black lab and an asshole human I've since gotten rid of. She didn't get the positive start in life I wish I could have given her.
She's never been much of one for other cats, though I think this has more to do with them not matching her personality well enough to have a friend out of it. She's not actually aggressive and she hasn't claimed a person as territory as one of my other cats did (Omocha, unfortunately, needed to be re-homed; she was absolutely a one-cat-house cat, and we just couldn't give her that, so I found her a family that could). Indeed, it seems as though Gin just doesn't LIKE who we picked as her friend.
I'm hoping that Mickey and Gizmo will solve this problem, by having different enough personalities not just from each other, but from my established cats, to fill any personality gap we may have. Cats have activities that they like to share with friends, just like we humans do, and similar to humans, it's tough to find another cat who likes all the same things. Just like humans, the more friends are available, the more likely they will have overlapping interests.
So far, everything is looking good, it's just a matter of time.
I'm trying to figure if this behavior is related to hunger or a food desire, so I offered him some wet food (he's very very picky about wet food, and won't eat any more than 10 minutes old). The opening of the can, of course, woke my other cats.
So here I am, mixing food for one cat, while another watches me suspiciously (this is not at all our routine) and then the meowing on the other side of the door starts up. The new boys were up as well.
For the last few days, Mickey has been reasonably comfortable with hand and arm contact, at least with me (my partner isn't spending enough time with them to form a good bond, so his progress will be slower) but Gizmo hasn't wanted anything to do with contact, only lots of kitty kisses (slowly blinked eyes). I haven't been pushing his comfort level too much, though I do offer him appendages for sniffing occasionally, lots of toys and food, and talk to him a lot.
Tonight, Gizmo let me love all over him. He was just as thrilled for contact as Mickey had been when he finally opened up, and they were both super affectionate, At the same time. That's exactly what I've been missing in my established cat dynamic; cats that get along well enough that I can pet them at the same time.
They also both really want to get out of the room and explore the rest of the house. The idea was to wait until both of my existing cats had gone in the room a few times, at least, and that's still the plan, but my cats aren't terribly interested in going in..
Scooter went in this morning, and just sort of walked around pretending there weren't other cats in the room, and that he owned the place. The whole time he was there, mickey had his nose up Scooter's butt, and followed him around relentlessly. Scooter, for his part, took it quite well, the whole thing was very civil, and when he started hanging around the door, I opened it for him, and he left.
Exactly the intro I was hoping for!
Gin, on the other hand, is offended that I'm petting another kitty, even though I am by no means ignoring her in the process. Gin had always been an odd duck; I got her from the shelter as a kitten, and she came home to an apartment full of 6 month old black lab and an asshole human I've since gotten rid of. She didn't get the positive start in life I wish I could have given her.
She's never been much of one for other cats, though I think this has more to do with them not matching her personality well enough to have a friend out of it. She's not actually aggressive and she hasn't claimed a person as territory as one of my other cats did (Omocha, unfortunately, needed to be re-homed; she was absolutely a one-cat-house cat, and we just couldn't give her that, so I found her a family that could). Indeed, it seems as though Gin just doesn't LIKE who we picked as her friend.
I'm hoping that Mickey and Gizmo will solve this problem, by having different enough personalities not just from each other, but from my established cats, to fill any personality gap we may have. Cats have activities that they like to share with friends, just like we humans do, and similar to humans, it's tough to find another cat who likes all the same things. Just like humans, the more friends are available, the more likely they will have overlapping interests.
So far, everything is looking good, it's just a matter of time.
Thursday, July 16, 2015
What's good for me...
I'm trying to talk boyfriendicus in to letting me add 2 more cats to my home (an adorable bonded pair of 8-year-old neutered male Siamese mix, just like one of my existing cats but with darker coloring).
He's not as thrilled at the prospect as I am, even though he doesn't do the labor of love for them; feeding, water, boxes, the bulk of attention and "training", and the majority of constructing toys and cat furniture, that's my job, and that's totally fine with me. They are, after all, my cats, and I am, after all, home a lot more often. My cats fill the social void in my life, especially when I'm not feeling well enough to be social with people. They are my companions, and I don't mind doing things for them, although I do sometimes have difficulty finding the drive to do said tasks in a timely manor.
I've been reading a lot lately about how having multiple cats actually makes said cats interact more pleasantly, and that, I think, is something my existing cats would like. As it stands, I have one very active cat, Scooter, a 2 year-old Siamese mix, and on not-so-active cat, a 7 year-old domestic short-hair named Gin (pronounced ghii-n, which is Japanese for "silver") who's communication skills are.. well.. not the best. Giving them a pair of cats to befriend increases the chance that both existing cats will find something to like, and should greatly reduce the existing friction. And that's what I want.
Yes, one additional cat can serve that function as well, but 2 give more of a buffer. When resources are plentiful, cats do best in groups. Goes straight against everything we've been told, no? But there it is. Cats are very intelligent, and very social, and just like people, they want friends to share activities with. If there are only 2 cats, and they don't have the same personality and interests, there will be friction as they continually ask each other for things they won't get. Just like with human friends, though, even 2 very similar cats won't like all the same activities. It's rare to find a human who likes skydiving, playing classical piano, going to clubs, and, say, cooking... all in the same person. Similarly, it's difficult to find a cat who will like everything the existing cats like, especially since the existing cats are so different in personality.
I've explained the logic, but it's so counter to everything we grow up hearing and believing that it's not going well on the convincing end. His concerns seem to focus around the litter boxes, and the need to change them more often. I don't see this being the case, as I strictly follow the "one box per cat plus one" rule, though I would probably do "one per cat plus one per 2" so I would have 6, not 5. Since I use shredded paper from craigslist for litter, this wouldn't cost any more than it does now, though the compost pile will grow more quickly. With the right number of boxes, the frequency of changes shouldn't be a concern, nor should it be significantly different than now.
The food cost is another issue he's citing. And I'll give him that. Canned food is a bit pricey, but I buy it in bulk every 6 months when I get my school money, so that when I'm broke, it's OK; I will still have food for them. The cost of food would double from $200/6mths to ~$400/6mths. Most people pay that in litter, alone. The place I buy canned food has the best prices I've found for a quality selection (~$0.30/can), and they do a bulk-order discount, so for every 10 flats (box of 24 cans) I get one free flat. I'd be buying 30 flats every 6 months, so I'd get 3 flats free. We have a basement we never use for anything, so I have no major concerns over where to put it all, and the saved effort of going to get it when I run out is more than worth the effort of buying it all at once.
As for the time and amusement needs, that's the joy of multiple cats; they spend time with each other, and it reduces the interaction need with humans. This isn't to say I don't care to spend a bunch of time with the cats, especially 4 of them, but the type of interaction would be different. More companionship, less guided play, because they can play together a lot better than they can play with a human. My cats currently have a bunch of pent-up energy that we can't properly discharge; Scooter has a boatload of energy, and assumes that all toys are for him all the time, which prevents my more relaxed cat from feeling comfortable playing. 2 more cats could even this out nicely, and allow me special time with the first cat I adopted on my own, Gin.
He seems to think that older cats are not as good as the younger ones, but as it turns out, they just take longer to acclimate. Indeed, older cats are likely to be better in the long run, because they were ripped from a happy home through no fault of their own, and just want a new friend or two. These two would be roughly the same age as Gin, so they should have the same level of maturity,if not the same level of activity. That's a good setup, and sure you could do it with just one cat, but it doesn't give the same friendship opportunities for the cats, especially when they aren't the same personality.
The current dynamic in the house isn't the greatest. Boyfriendicus doesn't seem too interested in learning (on his own) how to be friends with my cats, although after I explained how just being in the room with him was a sign from Gin that she was ready to be his friend, he took to acknowledging her presence and giving her kitty kisses (slowly-blinked eyes). This means, to me, that the whole situation could very easily change, and for the better, with just a bit of work from the two of us, and that translates DIRECTLY to cohesion with a new set of cats, as well. Every trick he learns to interact with Gin, who is really a very sweet kitty with a rough history and trust issues, is one more trick to apply to new cats.
Every effort given to the cats we have now is an effort that will have much weight when the existing cats show the new ones the ropes "see that big human? The one who who isn't home all day? Yeah, he's completely clueless, but he's trying, go give him some love". Cats can communicate complex ideas, just like we can. We just don't understand them, and so assume it doesn't happen. This, I think, is the point above all others that should encourage friendship; if you have it with one, you are more likely to have it with the others. They understand effort, and they appreciate it.
He's concerned that doubling the cat population in the house will lead to new problems, but I've seen the way Gin and Scooter interact with the neighborhood cats from their outdoor 8x9x9 enclosure. They want to be social, but on their own terms. That is to say, they want to be social, just not with each other, because their needs aren't being properly met with the current setup. If Scooter could get his play out with other active cats, he could leave Gin in peace, and she might actually like him. She tries really hard to like him now, and even grooms him occasionally, she just can't be his best friend right now because he pesters her for play.
My conundrum is this; I really, honestly, think 2 cats, especially an older but active pair which are significantly less likely to be adopted (both because they are older, and because there are two which cannot be separated), would be a good fit for us. Boyfriendicus brought up the idea of getting another cat, so it's clear that he enjoys them, and I've always had cats, and view pats as a "the more the merrier" situation. Their behaviors and interactions are fascinating, and I feel good when I make them feel good.
I want to convince him that it's our best best for a happy home, but at the same time, I respect his opinion, and he shares this home, so it impacts him, as well. The last time I went to the shelter to get a cat, I tried to convince him to get 2, and he said no. We should have gotten 2 then, and I probably wouldn't be looking now.
I did tell him if we got 2 more, I wouldn't want more until one of them died, and it's true; 4 is all I want, it's my kitty limit. I just want there to be at least one cat available most of the time for affection, and I want them all happy. Those aren't such bad goals, especially for a household with no intention of having kids.
He's not as thrilled at the prospect as I am, even though he doesn't do the labor of love for them; feeding, water, boxes, the bulk of attention and "training", and the majority of constructing toys and cat furniture, that's my job, and that's totally fine with me. They are, after all, my cats, and I am, after all, home a lot more often. My cats fill the social void in my life, especially when I'm not feeling well enough to be social with people. They are my companions, and I don't mind doing things for them, although I do sometimes have difficulty finding the drive to do said tasks in a timely manor.
I've been reading a lot lately about how having multiple cats actually makes said cats interact more pleasantly, and that, I think, is something my existing cats would like. As it stands, I have one very active cat, Scooter, a 2 year-old Siamese mix, and on not-so-active cat, a 7 year-old domestic short-hair named Gin (pronounced ghii-n, which is Japanese for "silver") who's communication skills are.. well.. not the best. Giving them a pair of cats to befriend increases the chance that both existing cats will find something to like, and should greatly reduce the existing friction. And that's what I want.
Yes, one additional cat can serve that function as well, but 2 give more of a buffer. When resources are plentiful, cats do best in groups. Goes straight against everything we've been told, no? But there it is. Cats are very intelligent, and very social, and just like people, they want friends to share activities with. If there are only 2 cats, and they don't have the same personality and interests, there will be friction as they continually ask each other for things they won't get. Just like with human friends, though, even 2 very similar cats won't like all the same activities. It's rare to find a human who likes skydiving, playing classical piano, going to clubs, and, say, cooking... all in the same person. Similarly, it's difficult to find a cat who will like everything the existing cats like, especially since the existing cats are so different in personality.
I've explained the logic, but it's so counter to everything we grow up hearing and believing that it's not going well on the convincing end. His concerns seem to focus around the litter boxes, and the need to change them more often. I don't see this being the case, as I strictly follow the "one box per cat plus one" rule, though I would probably do "one per cat plus one per 2" so I would have 6, not 5. Since I use shredded paper from craigslist for litter, this wouldn't cost any more than it does now, though the compost pile will grow more quickly. With the right number of boxes, the frequency of changes shouldn't be a concern, nor should it be significantly different than now.
The food cost is another issue he's citing. And I'll give him that. Canned food is a bit pricey, but I buy it in bulk every 6 months when I get my school money, so that when I'm broke, it's OK; I will still have food for them. The cost of food would double from $200/6mths to ~$400/6mths. Most people pay that in litter, alone. The place I buy canned food has the best prices I've found for a quality selection (~$0.30/can), and they do a bulk-order discount, so for every 10 flats (box of 24 cans) I get one free flat. I'd be buying 30 flats every 6 months, so I'd get 3 flats free. We have a basement we never use for anything, so I have no major concerns over where to put it all, and the saved effort of going to get it when I run out is more than worth the effort of buying it all at once.
As for the time and amusement needs, that's the joy of multiple cats; they spend time with each other, and it reduces the interaction need with humans. This isn't to say I don't care to spend a bunch of time with the cats, especially 4 of them, but the type of interaction would be different. More companionship, less guided play, because they can play together a lot better than they can play with a human. My cats currently have a bunch of pent-up energy that we can't properly discharge; Scooter has a boatload of energy, and assumes that all toys are for him all the time, which prevents my more relaxed cat from feeling comfortable playing. 2 more cats could even this out nicely, and allow me special time with the first cat I adopted on my own, Gin.
He seems to think that older cats are not as good as the younger ones, but as it turns out, they just take longer to acclimate. Indeed, older cats are likely to be better in the long run, because they were ripped from a happy home through no fault of their own, and just want a new friend or two. These two would be roughly the same age as Gin, so they should have the same level of maturity,if not the same level of activity. That's a good setup, and sure you could do it with just one cat, but it doesn't give the same friendship opportunities for the cats, especially when they aren't the same personality.
The current dynamic in the house isn't the greatest. Boyfriendicus doesn't seem too interested in learning (on his own) how to be friends with my cats, although after I explained how just being in the room with him was a sign from Gin that she was ready to be his friend, he took to acknowledging her presence and giving her kitty kisses (slowly-blinked eyes). This means, to me, that the whole situation could very easily change, and for the better, with just a bit of work from the two of us, and that translates DIRECTLY to cohesion with a new set of cats, as well. Every trick he learns to interact with Gin, who is really a very sweet kitty with a rough history and trust issues, is one more trick to apply to new cats.
Every effort given to the cats we have now is an effort that will have much weight when the existing cats show the new ones the ropes "see that big human? The one who who isn't home all day? Yeah, he's completely clueless, but he's trying, go give him some love". Cats can communicate complex ideas, just like we can. We just don't understand them, and so assume it doesn't happen. This, I think, is the point above all others that should encourage friendship; if you have it with one, you are more likely to have it with the others. They understand effort, and they appreciate it.
He's concerned that doubling the cat population in the house will lead to new problems, but I've seen the way Gin and Scooter interact with the neighborhood cats from their outdoor 8x9x9 enclosure. They want to be social, but on their own terms. That is to say, they want to be social, just not with each other, because their needs aren't being properly met with the current setup. If Scooter could get his play out with other active cats, he could leave Gin in peace, and she might actually like him. She tries really hard to like him now, and even grooms him occasionally, she just can't be his best friend right now because he pesters her for play.
My conundrum is this; I really, honestly, think 2 cats, especially an older but active pair which are significantly less likely to be adopted (both because they are older, and because there are two which cannot be separated), would be a good fit for us. Boyfriendicus brought up the idea of getting another cat, so it's clear that he enjoys them, and I've always had cats, and view pats as a "the more the merrier" situation. Their behaviors and interactions are fascinating, and I feel good when I make them feel good.
I want to convince him that it's our best best for a happy home, but at the same time, I respect his opinion, and he shares this home, so it impacts him, as well. The last time I went to the shelter to get a cat, I tried to convince him to get 2, and he said no. We should have gotten 2 then, and I probably wouldn't be looking now.
I did tell him if we got 2 more, I wouldn't want more until one of them died, and it's true; 4 is all I want, it's my kitty limit. I just want there to be at least one cat available most of the time for affection, and I want them all happy. Those aren't such bad goals, especially for a household with no intention of having kids.
Wednesday, July 15, 2015
Trading in Problems
WARNING - this post discusses GI functionality. I will do my best to avoid any graphic language, but be aware. You have been warned.
For as long as I can remember, I've had tummy problems. Actually, that's not strictly true; for most of my life, my tummy problems were transitory, came and went depending on my diet. A number of years ago, possibly around the time of my military service, but I could be mistaken, everything changed.
Suddenly, I was getting cramping, bloating, and motility issues. I thought, for sure, it was the large quantities of milk I was drinking every day, because when I stopped, so did my tummy problems. Lactose sensitivity was, I believe, only the beginning, because when I cut dairy from my diet, the problems went away for a while, but then came back just as strong.
It got to the point where nothing I eat sits well. Within a handful of hours of eating, my tummy blows up like a balloon, so I now only eat at night, knowing that at least if I'm asleep, I don't have to try to do anything when my tummy pain is at it's worst. I was diagnosed with IBS-C, which I will leave to you to look up if you are not familiar.
IBS isn't so much a diagnosis as an acknowledgement of distress. There's no known cause, no known cure, and the treatments are lifestyle and amazingly strict dietary changes that severely impact quality of life, assuming they even work (for many, including myself, they do not). Additionally, IBS is more of a compilation of symptoms than an actual condition, as the criterion for it are quite broad and overlap with numerous other, known, conditions. Frankly I think it's a cop out; patient gets a diagnosis, which is all some of them want, but that's it. Once you have an IBS diagnosis, that's more or less where your guided treatment (with doctors) ends, because most of them have absolutely no clue what to do, and yes, that does include, for the most part, GI specialists.
So I started doing my own research on the symptoms I experience, and I brought this info to my doctors, both to get their opinion of it, and see if there was any way they could help. Mind, I'm not getting paid to do their job for them, but I certainly should be. I'm not entirely negative on doctors, but I'm absolutely balls-to-the-wall frustrated by their lack of giving a shit. I realize that there are a plethora of new ailments these days, likely caused by the industrial lifestyle we live today, and that's difficult to keep up with and all, but when your doctor asks, every visit, "Where would you like to see your treatment go? What do you think would help? Is there any treatment you'd like to try?" it really emphasizes that they aren't doing any looking on their own. Isn't that what doctors are supposed to want to do? Learn how to help their patients find relief, even if it means doing a bit of *gasp* continued education? After all, a doctor who has done the bare-minimum professional development (continued learning) will be out-of-date on a lot of info, and the longer they have been practicing, the more outdated their information becomes.
It's not my job to be a doctor, to do a buttload of research, to suggest my own treatment. I don't know what I'm doing, medically, but because I find the topic quite interesting, and go out of my way to learn about biology and medicine, I probably know a lot more than the average person. I shudder to think what the average person goes through when they hear something like that, especially if they don't have the innate drive to research that I have developed. I believe this is a symptom of a larger problem; it goes along with drug companies marketing direct to uninformed consumers, rather than to doctors, as they should, and are required to do in many parts of the world where direct-to-consumer drug marketing is banned. They are relying on people with no knowledge of biochemistry, hormones, anatomy, organ interactions, etc etc etc, to request their drug based on misleading commercials. And people do exactly that. Because the commercial tells them to talk to their doctor about it, when the doctor should be talking to them about it. That whole system is a disaster-mess, and it's WRONG. Wrong and harmful, depressing, alarming, and it makes the patient feel worthless. If their doctor doesn't even care enough to suggest another treatment, the patient must be complaining too much, or have a problem the doctor doesn't care to solve.
Consider it this way; you are having a house built. You hire an architect to design the building, which turns out to be very complicated structurally, even though from the outside, it looks fairly simple. Something goes awry, and you notice a problem with the structure, and you point out the problem to your architect. Said architect then asks you what you think should be done about it, and you have the pleasure of learning all about construction to answer, because said architect will do no research for you. Even though that's exactly what they get paid for, and they know more about it than you do. More likely, you get upset and fire the shitty architect. You wouldn't stand for that sort of treatment, yet this is exactly what happens every day with doctors across the country, and it's horrifying. They aren't all like that, but enough of them are for it to be a major problem.
I have gotten little help from doctors on my IBS problems, so of course I looked for any dietary factors that could help, and I hit on beneficial bacteria. Now, I know that probiotic supplementation isn't likely to cure long-term problems, so I went into it expecting little. I used kefir for my probiotics, both milk and water varieties, and cultured my own with grains I bought on amazon for $12. Kefir contains 10+ (actual number varies from one set of grains to the next, depending on what they are fed) strains of bacteria and yeasts per type of culture, and the residents of milk kefir are different from those in water kefir. OTC and Rx probiotics contain 1-5 strains in much smaller quantities, and I'm a cheapskate.
I was surprised. I still have major tummy problems, the gas and bloating are still entirely present, as are the abdominal cramps, but joyously, I have switched sides from IBS-C to IBS-D. Believe me, the latter is easier to deal with. Unfortunately, the problems I have remaining seem to be something like SIBO, although I strongly doubt it's a bacteria overgrowth; more likely it's a candida -yeast- overgrowth, since yeasts produce copious amounts of gasses. I'm not yet entirely certain how to deal with this, but new information comes out about digestive problems rather frequently, so perhaps it won't be long.
In the course of this swap, however, I seem to have lost 13 lbs. I've never, in my life, lost 13 lbs; since the time I started wrestling at about 14 -when I went from 115 lbs and 21% body fat to 119 lbs and 14% body fat- I've been within 4 lbs of 123. I'm reasonably active; I run full-speed up and down the stairs in my house multiple times through the course of my day, lift and shift heavy objects regularly, including 5-gallon buckets of water for my aquariums, etc. I eat mostly healthy, home-cooked food (my partner cooks for me; he's wonderful-I'm not a great cook.) and nothing, as far as I am aware, has changed except how long food stays in my system. Oh, and I cut out some sugar from my diet (by "diet" I mean "coffee"), because holy fuck is that stuff bad for you. Seriously, sugar, in the quantities we consume these days, is toxic. But I don't think cutting a minor amount of sugar from a diet that already contains very little (except I do love my fruit and occasional candy) would have done this.
So now I have a conundrum; If I eat more, I get the pleasure of more frequent pain. If I don't, I may lose too much weight to be healthy.
What would you do, in this position?
For as long as I can remember, I've had tummy problems. Actually, that's not strictly true; for most of my life, my tummy problems were transitory, came and went depending on my diet. A number of years ago, possibly around the time of my military service, but I could be mistaken, everything changed.
Suddenly, I was getting cramping, bloating, and motility issues. I thought, for sure, it was the large quantities of milk I was drinking every day, because when I stopped, so did my tummy problems. Lactose sensitivity was, I believe, only the beginning, because when I cut dairy from my diet, the problems went away for a while, but then came back just as strong.
It got to the point where nothing I eat sits well. Within a handful of hours of eating, my tummy blows up like a balloon, so I now only eat at night, knowing that at least if I'm asleep, I don't have to try to do anything when my tummy pain is at it's worst. I was diagnosed with IBS-C, which I will leave to you to look up if you are not familiar.
IBS isn't so much a diagnosis as an acknowledgement of distress. There's no known cause, no known cure, and the treatments are lifestyle and amazingly strict dietary changes that severely impact quality of life, assuming they even work (for many, including myself, they do not). Additionally, IBS is more of a compilation of symptoms than an actual condition, as the criterion for it are quite broad and overlap with numerous other, known, conditions. Frankly I think it's a cop out; patient gets a diagnosis, which is all some of them want, but that's it. Once you have an IBS diagnosis, that's more or less where your guided treatment (with doctors) ends, because most of them have absolutely no clue what to do, and yes, that does include, for the most part, GI specialists.
So I started doing my own research on the symptoms I experience, and I brought this info to my doctors, both to get their opinion of it, and see if there was any way they could help. Mind, I'm not getting paid to do their job for them, but I certainly should be. I'm not entirely negative on doctors, but I'm absolutely balls-to-the-wall frustrated by their lack of giving a shit. I realize that there are a plethora of new ailments these days, likely caused by the industrial lifestyle we live today, and that's difficult to keep up with and all, but when your doctor asks, every visit, "Where would you like to see your treatment go? What do you think would help? Is there any treatment you'd like to try?" it really emphasizes that they aren't doing any looking on their own. Isn't that what doctors are supposed to want to do? Learn how to help their patients find relief, even if it means doing a bit of *gasp* continued education? After all, a doctor who has done the bare-minimum professional development (continued learning) will be out-of-date on a lot of info, and the longer they have been practicing, the more outdated their information becomes.
It's not my job to be a doctor, to do a buttload of research, to suggest my own treatment. I don't know what I'm doing, medically, but because I find the topic quite interesting, and go out of my way to learn about biology and medicine, I probably know a lot more than the average person. I shudder to think what the average person goes through when they hear something like that, especially if they don't have the innate drive to research that I have developed. I believe this is a symptom of a larger problem; it goes along with drug companies marketing direct to uninformed consumers, rather than to doctors, as they should, and are required to do in many parts of the world where direct-to-consumer drug marketing is banned. They are relying on people with no knowledge of biochemistry, hormones, anatomy, organ interactions, etc etc etc, to request their drug based on misleading commercials. And people do exactly that. Because the commercial tells them to talk to their doctor about it, when the doctor should be talking to them about it. That whole system is a disaster-mess, and it's WRONG. Wrong and harmful, depressing, alarming, and it makes the patient feel worthless. If their doctor doesn't even care enough to suggest another treatment, the patient must be complaining too much, or have a problem the doctor doesn't care to solve.
Consider it this way; you are having a house built. You hire an architect to design the building, which turns out to be very complicated structurally, even though from the outside, it looks fairly simple. Something goes awry, and you notice a problem with the structure, and you point out the problem to your architect. Said architect then asks you what you think should be done about it, and you have the pleasure of learning all about construction to answer, because said architect will do no research for you. Even though that's exactly what they get paid for, and they know more about it than you do. More likely, you get upset and fire the shitty architect. You wouldn't stand for that sort of treatment, yet this is exactly what happens every day with doctors across the country, and it's horrifying. They aren't all like that, but enough of them are for it to be a major problem.
I have gotten little help from doctors on my IBS problems, so of course I looked for any dietary factors that could help, and I hit on beneficial bacteria. Now, I know that probiotic supplementation isn't likely to cure long-term problems, so I went into it expecting little. I used kefir for my probiotics, both milk and water varieties, and cultured my own with grains I bought on amazon for $12. Kefir contains 10+ (actual number varies from one set of grains to the next, depending on what they are fed) strains of bacteria and yeasts per type of culture, and the residents of milk kefir are different from those in water kefir. OTC and Rx probiotics contain 1-5 strains in much smaller quantities, and I'm a cheapskate.
I was surprised. I still have major tummy problems, the gas and bloating are still entirely present, as are the abdominal cramps, but joyously, I have switched sides from IBS-C to IBS-D. Believe me, the latter is easier to deal with. Unfortunately, the problems I have remaining seem to be something like SIBO, although I strongly doubt it's a bacteria overgrowth; more likely it's a candida -yeast- overgrowth, since yeasts produce copious amounts of gasses. I'm not yet entirely certain how to deal with this, but new information comes out about digestive problems rather frequently, so perhaps it won't be long.
In the course of this swap, however, I seem to have lost 13 lbs. I've never, in my life, lost 13 lbs; since the time I started wrestling at about 14 -when I went from 115 lbs and 21% body fat to 119 lbs and 14% body fat- I've been within 4 lbs of 123. I'm reasonably active; I run full-speed up and down the stairs in my house multiple times through the course of my day, lift and shift heavy objects regularly, including 5-gallon buckets of water for my aquariums, etc. I eat mostly healthy, home-cooked food (my partner cooks for me; he's wonderful-I'm not a great cook.) and nothing, as far as I am aware, has changed except how long food stays in my system. Oh, and I cut out some sugar from my diet (by "diet" I mean "coffee"), because holy fuck is that stuff bad for you. Seriously, sugar, in the quantities we consume these days, is toxic. But I don't think cutting a minor amount of sugar from a diet that already contains very little (except I do love my fruit and occasional candy) would have done this.
So now I have a conundrum; If I eat more, I get the pleasure of more frequent pain. If I don't, I may lose too much weight to be healthy.
What would you do, in this position?
Thursday, July 9, 2015
The heat is coming
It's been going back and forth between chilly and almost too hot.. I'm really waiting for the 2-3 week span of over 100 days that we normally get near the end of summer.
But, for those of you who live somewhere that doesn't have winter 2/3 of the year, this is probably the perfect time to share some stay-cool-cheap tips that I've used.
I'm not a big fan of overly-cold cooling methods, so anything involving ice in direct contact with any part of the body, or very cold showers... I'm not including those.. :p
We don't use AC, even though we have a window unit. I think since we got it from my step-dad, some 3 years ago, we've used it twice, for a day or two at a time at most. I'm not sure if that says something about the house, us, or the shit weather we get, or just that the other tricks work well enough that that sort of electricity drain isn't necessary. Whatever the reason, I've gone most of my life without AC, including the 3 years I spent in Houston, and I don't see that changing now, just because I can stretch my budget to afford it, if I eally really wanted to.
So I imagine I'm not the only person who either can't afford or doesn't want to pay for AC, yet a lot of chronic pain sufferers don't deal well with heat. In the spirit of making life better, I thought I might share some crazy tricks that really help you beat the heat, cliche though that statement may be.
On to the crazy ideas!
Everyone says "use a fan in a window" but I've got an improvement over such an easy concept. I used to live in a house with no functional venting on the second floor; no heat, no cool. I put a box fan into a window, airflow pointed out, and duct-taped cardboard around the fan, functionally sealing it so that air couldn't blow back in around it. In summer, a second window -usually in the basement, but any shaded window in a cool room will work- is opened just a bit to allow air movement, and the fan is left on indefinitely. This works best for a bedroom window or any apartment window, as larger houses generally need a bit more than this. My current house (~1500 sqft) is a bit too large for this to be the only life-saver. If you have a large enough space, and it isn't anything near air-tight, this can also be used in winter, even in the coldest of areas. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's entirely true, and I've done it. It's probably not great for the heat bill, and almost certainly not better than a space heater, but when your options are be cold or waste a little heat, well the answer seems kinda obvious.
Use white tagboard or paint some cardboard white, and tape it to any windows that get direct sunlight. A matte finish works best, and reflects more light than gloss or semigloss (crazy, right?). This will reflect a good amount of the sun, and prevent it from heating up your space. If you can put the white material between the window sashes and the screen/storm window, even better, because the warmed material would never come into direct contact with the air in the room. If your area allows it, foil can also be used with great success for this, however care must be taken; if installed poorly into a window that gets direct light, even for 5 minutes a day, the reflection and concentrating of the light rays CAN AND DO melt or discolor siding, even on the neighbors' houses. Trust me on this one; I used to work warranty claims for a window company (FYI, that is never covered by warranty, and usually not by insurance unless the damage was done to you and not by you)
If your room is quite dark because you are trying to keep the sun out, try putting mirrors around in places where light does come in (because hey, if you aren't using AC, you probably have a window open somewhere!) such as a mirror across from the window, or even a few under the window, angled to reflect light. This will reflect the light around the room, increasing how bright it looks. Not strictly a heat-buster, but since you won't be keeping as many artificial lights on, it can certainly help! If possible, open windows should be in shaded locations, but enough light still comes in for mirrors to help substantially.
Swap your lights for LED bulbs, and unplug all electronics which aren't in use. This seems more like an energy-saving tip, but remember; energy converts into heat in all electronic devices we have, bar none. We don't have the capacity to make waste-heat-free devices, currently, since heat is one of the main byproducts of the electrical resistance required for said devices to work. LED light bulbs produce significantly less heat than other types of lights, and because of this lack of waste, they use a lot less energy. I have replaced all of my commonly-used lights with LEDs, and I adore them. I get mine at Menards for about $4 each, and they save at least that in the first year of use, if swapping from incandescent. They stay cool enough that I can handle even a still-on light bulb that has been on all day. Lights used infrequently can be replaced with CFL bulbs, as well, and even that helps. To make this more understandable; the bulbs I use are 65 watt equivalent, which means the same light output as a 65 watt incandescent bulb. For a 65-equivalent CFL, the power draw is 21 watts, and for an LED, it's about 9. Just think about that; same light output between the incandescent and LED, but 56 watts less energy, which means 56 watts less HEAT.. per bulb!
Unplugging devices is basically the same concept. All electronic devices draw power whenever they are plugged in, even though, to my understanding, they have an internal switch that is supposed to prevent that. Over time, it wears down, and current feeds into the device, even though it's off. This is especially true of large devices like TVs, game consoles, and computers, which use a lot of energy, and anything with an LED indicator light. If the light is on, you are wasting electricity and generating heat. Even if the light isn't on, if the device is plugged in, you will be using power. My solution was to plug everything in to power strips that have on/off breaker switches, organized into power groups; stuff not used daily -video game systems, for example- have a power strip that stays off most of the time, while commonly-used devices like TV and computer are wired to a single strip so they can easily be turned on during the day. The difference between having the devices plugged directly into an outlet vs. using a power strip is that when you turn off the power strip, the circuit is interrupted, and no power flows through the strip, so it can't even reach the device to be wasted. You can't do that with standard outlets (although GFCI outlets are good for this).
Invest in a small kiddie pool or a large sturdy tote. I know, whaaaaat? Even if you live in an apartment, a cool foot soak can easily turn even the most miserably hot, still night, into an entirely comfortable (and skin-nourishing!!) experience. If you have enough space in your living room, move the table and set up a cool foot soak (if you use a kiddie pool, get one that is hard-sided; you do NOT want to risk it going flat and flooding the living room). Water contact causes you to lose body heat 25 times faster than air contact, which is why you get hypothermia so much faster in water than air, but the same applies to small temperature differences, as well. As long as the water is colder than about 80 degrees F, it will help you feel better. As a bonus, when you no longer need or want your foot soak, you can use the water (assuming you didn't add anything to it) to water houseplants!
Close off any view of outside, and watch a string of winter-themed movies or shows. Seriously, it really does help. Since we generally watch winter-themed movies in winter, and the sight of snow reminds us of cold, this is purely a psychological trick, but a reasonably effective one. Just resist the temptation to look out the window to verify the weather, and allow your suspension of disbelief to take over.
I find that cold showers just make me miserable really quickly afterwards; your body is convinced that it's now cold, and you thus need to conserve body heat. As contrary as it sounds, though, a hot shower on a hot day is marvelous. For much the same reason as the cooling problem, the body thinks it's REALLY hot after a hot shower, and that it needs to cool very quickly. Because any temp post-shower is cooler than during-shower, you feel better, and the effect lasts longer. Best to air-dry. I find this actually makes me quite chilled for a long while, while a cold shower leads me to sweat within minutes of getting out.
If you want to do outdoor activities, pick up a parasol or cheap umbrella; the sun/shade difference is really quite impressive, and you aren't stuck hanging out under trees. I took a parasol on a whale-watching boat ride a few years ago, and it was easily the best choice I've made about sun protection in a long time. A parasol/umbrella and a utility clamp combine to make an excellent chair shade on-the-cheap, and the whole setup is great for sitting around the outdoor kiddie pool, soaking feet and having some frozen drinks.
Frozen drinks bring me to my next point, though; they don't cool you down. Not really. They may make you feel cooler, briefly, but similar to a cold shower, the extreme cold temp of the ice actually shocks your system, and can increase heat output. The best thing to drink on a hot day is just-cooler-than-room-temp water, something in the 60-80 degree range, depending on preference. Just like the shower trick, though, you CAN drink hot fluids when it's hot out, and for a very similar reason, it will make you feel cooler after a brief uncomfortable period.
If you have a desk fan and a spray bottle, you can mist yourself when it's really bad, but beware; after the water dries, you'll feel warmer than you were before. This trick is really only good for the worst of the hot days, because you have to keep spraying yourself to stay cool. It does work, just not the best.
With a bit of metal tube, an aquarium water pump (from amazon, you can get a decent one for about $8-12) a foam cooler, some ice, and a fan, you can make a dehumidifier/air conditioner. This will only work until the ice melts completely, so it's not really a long-term solution, but it can be super useful on really humid days. You can probably find a way to add dry ice to it to make it last longer, but I don't really know where to get that around here, so I haven't tried it. Either way, I found directions for it online. There are also directions to convert an old window AC unit into a dehumidifier for the house, but I haven't tried that, either.
If you want cold coffee (iced-style) but don't want it watered down (seriously, eew) you can pour what's left of your pot into ice cube trays and pop them in the freezer. Add a few of these to your coffee for a wonderful iced-but-not-thinned morning cup. Whiskey stones are also quite good for this. Avoid using those plastic water-filled ice cube things, though; not only does heat tend to increase leaching of chemicals from plastics, the sudden shift in temp can cause them to break.
If you have access to your ventilation system, and especially if you keep your furnace in the basement, keep your fans blowing year-round. If your always-on furnace fan isn't sufficient, consider investing in in-line vent fans; they aren't too pricey, and they drastically increase air movement, though they do tend to be a bit on the loud side. If you have the option, have your air drawn from the basement in summer; the basement is a natural heat sink, generally staying right around 55 degrees F (~12C) so circulating that air will help keep everything much cooler. This trick works best when you keep it running this way for days at a time, because it does take time for the heat to leach out and equalize.
Just like with heating in winter, close off any rooms (ideally, corner or south-facing rooms) not in use, but keep windows open in them. The closed rooms will act as a heat/cool buffer zone, and help to regulate the overall temp, while also decreasing the cubic footage that needs to stay cool. By keeping windows open, with a fan blowing out if you have one to spare, you ensure that heat and moisture don't build up beyond the ambient outdoor levels, preventing humidity-related damage as well as preventing a pocket of excessive heat from being in contact with the rest of the space (through walls/door). This helps most when it's hotter outside than inside, and you don't have windows open throughout the house. Rooms can be opened again when the temp falls below whatever comfort point you like, to maximize air flow. I have a second floor south-facing room that spans the entire front of the house, and that sucker gets amazingly hot very ridiculously quickly. Closing it off, having light-blocking curtains, and keeping the windows open has made HUGE improvements to the temp of the rest of the house. And with just one room!
If you have a window AC, and more than one story, put it somewhere on the second floor, close to the middle of the structure or near the stairs, make sure your ventilation system is running, and put a circulating fan in front of it to blow the air into the hall. This can keep most average-size homes a reasonable temperature, but don't expect it to keep the whole house at 50 degrees. Cool air, being more dense, sinks, and the heated air tends to be concentrated on the second floor anyway, so this strategy is very effective. As a bonus, if you have a non-bedroom you can put the unit in, it will keep noise levels manageable, and should keep most rooms fairly comfortable. This couples very nicely with the window fan with cardboard mentioned above.
Share your odd tips and tricks for staying cool, I love learning news hacks to make life easier!!!
But, for those of you who live somewhere that doesn't have winter 2/3 of the year, this is probably the perfect time to share some stay-cool-cheap tips that I've used.
I'm not a big fan of overly-cold cooling methods, so anything involving ice in direct contact with any part of the body, or very cold showers... I'm not including those.. :p
We don't use AC, even though we have a window unit. I think since we got it from my step-dad, some 3 years ago, we've used it twice, for a day or two at a time at most. I'm not sure if that says something about the house, us, or the shit weather we get, or just that the other tricks work well enough that that sort of electricity drain isn't necessary. Whatever the reason, I've gone most of my life without AC, including the 3 years I spent in Houston, and I don't see that changing now, just because I can stretch my budget to afford it, if I eally really wanted to.
So I imagine I'm not the only person who either can't afford or doesn't want to pay for AC, yet a lot of chronic pain sufferers don't deal well with heat. In the spirit of making life better, I thought I might share some crazy tricks that really help you beat the heat, cliche though that statement may be.
On to the crazy ideas!
Everyone says "use a fan in a window" but I've got an improvement over such an easy concept. I used to live in a house with no functional venting on the second floor; no heat, no cool. I put a box fan into a window, airflow pointed out, and duct-taped cardboard around the fan, functionally sealing it so that air couldn't blow back in around it. In summer, a second window -usually in the basement, but any shaded window in a cool room will work- is opened just a bit to allow air movement, and the fan is left on indefinitely. This works best for a bedroom window or any apartment window, as larger houses generally need a bit more than this. My current house (~1500 sqft) is a bit too large for this to be the only life-saver. If you have a large enough space, and it isn't anything near air-tight, this can also be used in winter, even in the coldest of areas. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's entirely true, and I've done it. It's probably not great for the heat bill, and almost certainly not better than a space heater, but when your options are be cold or waste a little heat, well the answer seems kinda obvious.
Use white tagboard or paint some cardboard white, and tape it to any windows that get direct sunlight. A matte finish works best, and reflects more light than gloss or semigloss (crazy, right?). This will reflect a good amount of the sun, and prevent it from heating up your space. If you can put the white material between the window sashes and the screen/storm window, even better, because the warmed material would never come into direct contact with the air in the room. If your area allows it, foil can also be used with great success for this, however care must be taken; if installed poorly into a window that gets direct light, even for 5 minutes a day, the reflection and concentrating of the light rays CAN AND DO melt or discolor siding, even on the neighbors' houses. Trust me on this one; I used to work warranty claims for a window company (FYI, that is never covered by warranty, and usually not by insurance unless the damage was done to you and not by you)
If your room is quite dark because you are trying to keep the sun out, try putting mirrors around in places where light does come in (because hey, if you aren't using AC, you probably have a window open somewhere!) such as a mirror across from the window, or even a few under the window, angled to reflect light. This will reflect the light around the room, increasing how bright it looks. Not strictly a heat-buster, but since you won't be keeping as many artificial lights on, it can certainly help! If possible, open windows should be in shaded locations, but enough light still comes in for mirrors to help substantially.
Swap your lights for LED bulbs, and unplug all electronics which aren't in use. This seems more like an energy-saving tip, but remember; energy converts into heat in all electronic devices we have, bar none. We don't have the capacity to make waste-heat-free devices, currently, since heat is one of the main byproducts of the electrical resistance required for said devices to work. LED light bulbs produce significantly less heat than other types of lights, and because of this lack of waste, they use a lot less energy. I have replaced all of my commonly-used lights with LEDs, and I adore them. I get mine at Menards for about $4 each, and they save at least that in the first year of use, if swapping from incandescent. They stay cool enough that I can handle even a still-on light bulb that has been on all day. Lights used infrequently can be replaced with CFL bulbs, as well, and even that helps. To make this more understandable; the bulbs I use are 65 watt equivalent, which means the same light output as a 65 watt incandescent bulb. For a 65-equivalent CFL, the power draw is 21 watts, and for an LED, it's about 9. Just think about that; same light output between the incandescent and LED, but 56 watts less energy, which means 56 watts less HEAT.. per bulb!
Unplugging devices is basically the same concept. All electronic devices draw power whenever they are plugged in, even though, to my understanding, they have an internal switch that is supposed to prevent that. Over time, it wears down, and current feeds into the device, even though it's off. This is especially true of large devices like TVs, game consoles, and computers, which use a lot of energy, and anything with an LED indicator light. If the light is on, you are wasting electricity and generating heat. Even if the light isn't on, if the device is plugged in, you will be using power. My solution was to plug everything in to power strips that have on/off breaker switches, organized into power groups; stuff not used daily -video game systems, for example- have a power strip that stays off most of the time, while commonly-used devices like TV and computer are wired to a single strip so they can easily be turned on during the day. The difference between having the devices plugged directly into an outlet vs. using a power strip is that when you turn off the power strip, the circuit is interrupted, and no power flows through the strip, so it can't even reach the device to be wasted. You can't do that with standard outlets (although GFCI outlets are good for this).
Invest in a small kiddie pool or a large sturdy tote. I know, whaaaaat? Even if you live in an apartment, a cool foot soak can easily turn even the most miserably hot, still night, into an entirely comfortable (and skin-nourishing!!) experience. If you have enough space in your living room, move the table and set up a cool foot soak (if you use a kiddie pool, get one that is hard-sided; you do NOT want to risk it going flat and flooding the living room). Water contact causes you to lose body heat 25 times faster than air contact, which is why you get hypothermia so much faster in water than air, but the same applies to small temperature differences, as well. As long as the water is colder than about 80 degrees F, it will help you feel better. As a bonus, when you no longer need or want your foot soak, you can use the water (assuming you didn't add anything to it) to water houseplants!
Close off any view of outside, and watch a string of winter-themed movies or shows. Seriously, it really does help. Since we generally watch winter-themed movies in winter, and the sight of snow reminds us of cold, this is purely a psychological trick, but a reasonably effective one. Just resist the temptation to look out the window to verify the weather, and allow your suspension of disbelief to take over.
I find that cold showers just make me miserable really quickly afterwards; your body is convinced that it's now cold, and you thus need to conserve body heat. As contrary as it sounds, though, a hot shower on a hot day is marvelous. For much the same reason as the cooling problem, the body thinks it's REALLY hot after a hot shower, and that it needs to cool very quickly. Because any temp post-shower is cooler than during-shower, you feel better, and the effect lasts longer. Best to air-dry. I find this actually makes me quite chilled for a long while, while a cold shower leads me to sweat within minutes of getting out.
If you want to do outdoor activities, pick up a parasol or cheap umbrella; the sun/shade difference is really quite impressive, and you aren't stuck hanging out under trees. I took a parasol on a whale-watching boat ride a few years ago, and it was easily the best choice I've made about sun protection in a long time. A parasol/umbrella and a utility clamp combine to make an excellent chair shade on-the-cheap, and the whole setup is great for sitting around the outdoor kiddie pool, soaking feet and having some frozen drinks.
Frozen drinks bring me to my next point, though; they don't cool you down. Not really. They may make you feel cooler, briefly, but similar to a cold shower, the extreme cold temp of the ice actually shocks your system, and can increase heat output. The best thing to drink on a hot day is just-cooler-than-room-temp water, something in the 60-80 degree range, depending on preference. Just like the shower trick, though, you CAN drink hot fluids when it's hot out, and for a very similar reason, it will make you feel cooler after a brief uncomfortable period.
If you have a desk fan and a spray bottle, you can mist yourself when it's really bad, but beware; after the water dries, you'll feel warmer than you were before. This trick is really only good for the worst of the hot days, because you have to keep spraying yourself to stay cool. It does work, just not the best.
With a bit of metal tube, an aquarium water pump (from amazon, you can get a decent one for about $8-12) a foam cooler, some ice, and a fan, you can make a dehumidifier/air conditioner. This will only work until the ice melts completely, so it's not really a long-term solution, but it can be super useful on really humid days. You can probably find a way to add dry ice to it to make it last longer, but I don't really know where to get that around here, so I haven't tried it. Either way, I found directions for it online. There are also directions to convert an old window AC unit into a dehumidifier for the house, but I haven't tried that, either.
If you want cold coffee (iced-style) but don't want it watered down (seriously, eew) you can pour what's left of your pot into ice cube trays and pop them in the freezer. Add a few of these to your coffee for a wonderful iced-but-not-thinned morning cup. Whiskey stones are also quite good for this. Avoid using those plastic water-filled ice cube things, though; not only does heat tend to increase leaching of chemicals from plastics, the sudden shift in temp can cause them to break.
If you have access to your ventilation system, and especially if you keep your furnace in the basement, keep your fans blowing year-round. If your always-on furnace fan isn't sufficient, consider investing in in-line vent fans; they aren't too pricey, and they drastically increase air movement, though they do tend to be a bit on the loud side. If you have the option, have your air drawn from the basement in summer; the basement is a natural heat sink, generally staying right around 55 degrees F (~12C) so circulating that air will help keep everything much cooler. This trick works best when you keep it running this way for days at a time, because it does take time for the heat to leach out and equalize.
Just like with heating in winter, close off any rooms (ideally, corner or south-facing rooms) not in use, but keep windows open in them. The closed rooms will act as a heat/cool buffer zone, and help to regulate the overall temp, while also decreasing the cubic footage that needs to stay cool. By keeping windows open, with a fan blowing out if you have one to spare, you ensure that heat and moisture don't build up beyond the ambient outdoor levels, preventing humidity-related damage as well as preventing a pocket of excessive heat from being in contact with the rest of the space (through walls/door). This helps most when it's hotter outside than inside, and you don't have windows open throughout the house. Rooms can be opened again when the temp falls below whatever comfort point you like, to maximize air flow. I have a second floor south-facing room that spans the entire front of the house, and that sucker gets amazingly hot very ridiculously quickly. Closing it off, having light-blocking curtains, and keeping the windows open has made HUGE improvements to the temp of the rest of the house. And with just one room!
If you have a window AC, and more than one story, put it somewhere on the second floor, close to the middle of the structure or near the stairs, make sure your ventilation system is running, and put a circulating fan in front of it to blow the air into the hall. This can keep most average-size homes a reasonable temperature, but don't expect it to keep the whole house at 50 degrees. Cool air, being more dense, sinks, and the heated air tends to be concentrated on the second floor anyway, so this strategy is very effective. As a bonus, if you have a non-bedroom you can put the unit in, it will keep noise levels manageable, and should keep most rooms fairly comfortable. This couples very nicely with the window fan with cardboard mentioned above.
Share your odd tips and tricks for staying cool, I love learning news hacks to make life easier!!!
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