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marvelmadam08 · 4 years

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Baby Blues 13/?

Summary: Alex is forced to change Ace’s feeding methods again.

Warnings: Mentions of pregnancy, sexual tension, breastfeeding complications, (hints of) Daddy kink

A/N: None

~~~~~~

8 Weeks (and 1 Day Old)

Chris shut the front door as quietly as possible, in case Alex was asleep. The last thing he wanted was to wake her up, or worse, wake Ace up. Dodger greeted him, jumping and half whining.

“Gotta stay quiet bud, everyone’s asleep.” he whispered

“Not everyone.” Alex trudged out the living room, eyes red and swollen. Chris, at first, thought she was just exhausted but soon noticed how her cheeks were wet.

“Al, what happened?” Chris dropped his stuff and rushed over to Alex, she wrapped her arms around him and started to cry softly “Baby, what’s wrong?”

“I- I can’t pump, I can’t feed Ace. I’ve been trying to pump for hours, and I barely got half a bottle from it.”

“Oh Al, I’m sure it’s just a bad day, and you’ll be fine tomorrow. You’re just under some stress, that’s all.” He rubbed her back “It’ll be alright.”

“No, it won’t. If I can’t pump or feed him then he can’t eat.”

Chris sighed “Well, there’s always formula.”

“I don’t wanna do formula, I just want my boobs to work.” she cried harder, her tears staining Chris’s shirt now “What’s wrong with me?”

“Nothing! Al, there’s nothing wrong with you.” Chris turned her face up towards him "You’re tired, you’re body is tired. You need to rest.”

“I can’t, he’s gonna wake up soon and he needs to eat.”

“I’ll run and get some formula, I’ll be back before he can wake up.”

“I’ll go, it’s my fault anyways.” Alex huffed and started to step back

Chris caught her by her wrists, pulling her back into his chest, and his arms wrapping around her waist. She didn’t try to pull away this time, he was grateful for it. He missed holding her, being this close to her, but he wouldn’t over step, he learned his lesson last night in the shower; Chris suppressed a groan, thinking about seeing her naked for the first time in what felt like forever.

He loved her body, her newly accentuated curves, her hips, her breasts. It was hard enough to keep his hands to himself while she was pregnant. The sex was amazing, and creative, having to try new positions that were safer for her while she was pregnant. Chris wondered if there were ways sex could help with lactating.

“What are you doing?”

“This is not your fault.” he told her

“Chris-”

“Say it, say: ‘it’s not my fault, and there’s nothing wrong with me’.”

“It’s not my fault.”

“And-”

“And there’s nothing wrong with me.”

Chris kissed the top of Alex’s forehead. She relaxed into him a bit more, he testes his limits and kissed her temple. When she still didn’t pull away, he continued to kiss her, on her nose and cheek, and finally her lips.

“Mmm.” Alex sighed into the kiss, Chris’s hands snaked lower down to her ass. Alex tensed at first, but did her best to push her insecure thoughts to the back of her mind. The crying, however, couldn’t be ignored. “Chris- the baby.”

“Who?” he smirked

She playfully pushed him back “Go get my baby.”

****

A supermarket with a fussy baby was no fun for anyone involved, least of all the parents trying to soothe the infant. Chris rocked side to side, Ace strapped to his chest, and staring at the different formulas with Alex.

“Al, what’s wrong with that one?” he pointed

Alex swiped through the reviews on her phone “Not a lot of moms liked that one, this one even said it caused her baby to break out in hives.”

“What about this one?” he picked up another can

“Baby, that’s protein powder someone left there. You want him to be the only baby with a six-pack?”

“I mean it’s never too early to start.” Chris flexed his arms, stretching the fabric of his thin shirt a little more. “Right Ace? Tell Mommy you wanna be big and strong like Daddy.”

Alex stared, shamelessly at first, but snapped back to focusing on getting the formula for Ace.

“You are not feeding my baby protein powder.” Alex giggled

“Then you better pick a formula before I put it in the cart.” Chris hovered the can over the basket, slowly lowering it while humming the theme to Jeopardy

“Okay fine.” Alex half groaned and grabbed, in her opinion the best option from the selection of formulas. She took the protein from Chris and put the formula in his hand instead “You are such a dork.”

They continued to pick up a few more things they needed, dog food, diapers, a cute pajama onsie set that Alex just couldn’t say no to, ending up in the vitamin aisle looking at lactation supplements. Chris found it kind of ironic that they kept the condoms, birth control and pregnancy tests all on the same aisle as the prenatal and postnatal supplements.

Alex half muttered the side effects on the bottle in her hand, before putting it down to grab another and repeating the process. Ace was starting to nod off to sleep, whining whenever he woke back up.

“We’re leaving baby. It’s pass your bedtime, I know.” Alex stood on her toes to kiss Ace on his head, Chris tried to cover his yawn but failed “Aw, getting tired daddy?”

Chris tensed, catching the teasing tone in Alex’s voice. “What?”

“I asked if you were tired?”

“Uh yeah, something like that.”

***

Ace was asleep by the time they got back to the house, Alex felt bad for having him out so late, and knew the next time he would wake up, he’d be demanding a bottle. Chris wandered into the kitchen where Alex was fixing a few bottles for later. He snuck up behind her, and wrapped his arms around her waist.

“Coming to bed?” he whispered in her ear

“Yeah, just give me a minute.”

“Mm… sixty-” he kissed her ear lobe “Fifty-nine… Fifty-eight…” Chris lowered his lips to her neck

“Chris I’m serious.” Alex bit her lip and gently pushed him back with her elbow “I gotta finish this, and I’m-”

“Not in the mood. Got it.” Chris pulled away completely.

Alex caught the hostile tone in his voice and turned to look at him but he was gone and walking back towards the bed room. Annoyed, she rolled her eyes and secured the last bottle before heading of to bed herself.

Chris was already buried under the covers, he heard her come in the room but neither fully acknowledge the other until she slid under the covers next to him.

“I was gonna say, I’m almost done. But I guess, since you knew me so well, I’m not in the mood now either.” she turned off the lamp on her side of the bed “Goodnight Chris.”

#chris evans #100 days of productivity #sebastian stan #captain america #tony stark #marvel #babyblues #a starting point #the falcon and the winter soldier #wandavision #devil all the time

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fullstop-official · 5 years

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A Scheduled Four Hours of My Local Drugstore Hell

AKA: Chapter Two

Once upon a time, two high school sweethearts were married. They’d already fallen head-over-heels in love, so they tied the knot, bought a house, built successful careers, and even started a family together.

Then, they got divorced when their son was in seventh grade.

Since the divorce, I’ve lived with my mom in the Valley. Not too long after their marriage dissolved, my dad got a job offer to teach English at Purdue, and he couldn’t possibly pass up such a sweet deal, so he moved to Indiana. I only get to see him in person a few times a year, less and less since he started teaching spring and summer courses. At first, it was pretty tough and kind of hit me hard, but it probably could have been worse. It was a fairly clean break – there wasn’t really a lot of fighting. Instead, they just both sort of realized they’d married the wrong person. They’re still friends, which is better than what Bryson had to deal with when his parents split up, so I figure I’m one of the lucky ones.

***

After band practice, I’m back in the Gator’s passenger seat with an altered mood and the dread caused by the clause of a hastily written contract looming over me. At the very least, Travis is always musically prepared, so I don’t have to sit through the overplayed crap on the radio. Not all of his stuff is particularly to my taste, but it’s absolutely nothing like Selena’s so I can deal with having to hear a Nickelback song every once and a while.

I don’t have a car of my own, so this is all commonplace. Travis is basically my ride everywhere. We usually aren’t too far apart anyway. Both of us live in Woodland Hills in the third quadrant (as bisected by the highways and major streets) where the roads start to mercilessly curve in order to work with the mountains. The bends, levels and hills made it an equally exciting and terrifying experience learning how to drive, so more often than not, I graciously decide to leave that part up to Travis.

I live in one of the two-story homes, which is pretty rare because Woodland Hills is basically made up of single-story ranches that were definitely built during that bold period between the fifties and the eighties – low, gradual rooflines, giant stone on the same building as ugly siding, the whole nine yards. I wouldn’t be too surprised if half of them still have shag carpets, faux wood panels, and flower power wallpaper from the seventies.

Travis pulls into my driveway behind my mom’s car, and we both climb out of the Gator. We head inside through the front door. The smell of spices and grease hits me the instant we step from the LA summer heat into air conditioning. The scents waft from the kitchen in through the living room.

“We’re home!” I call out as Travis and I kick off our shoes. We follow the aroma, and the crackles and pops that start to become clearer, into the kitchen.

My mom’s still in scrubs which means when she got home the hunger and thought of dinner overruled everything else, including changing clothes. She’s standing before the stove with stir fry sizzling on the element.

“Doctor Scott!” Travis uses his standard greeting – a high, breathy, surprised gasp in his best impression of Janet from The Rocky Horror Picture Show. It does not suit his voice at all, but it’s been his go-to hello for my mom since we first saw the movie back in middle school. I’m sure that must be why it’s one of his favourite scenes because, honestly, it’s thirty straight seconds of people yelling names. And it repeats.

“Travis is here,” she states, half sarcastic and wearing a grin. “Big surprise.”

“Yeah, I just can’t seem to get rid of him,” I joke.”

Travis scoffs back teasingly as he drops into one of the chairs at our kitchen table. “Em fo dir teg ot gniog reven er’uoy, Nagrom,” he says in reverse.

“Taht tuoba ees ll’ew, Sivart.”

“Stop speaking in tongues or I’m hiring an exorcist,” my mom chimes in. She turns a bit to look over her shoulder while I open the fridge. She asks, already knowing the answer, “Are you staying for dinner, Travis?”

“If you insist.” I don’t have to see his face while I’m digging around to know that he’s smirking as he says it.

“Intercepting my leftovers before they even had a chance,” she sighs playfully.

“Is it vegetarian stir fry again?” I ask, only because I notice from the corner of my eye that her pan seems to lack protein. I kick the fridge door shut, hands occupied by two sodas. I toss the Cherry Coke to Travis and he, thankfully, catches it. There have been a few tragic instances where one of us has missed, and the can exploded as a casualty, and it really isn’t fun cleaning liquid sugar off of every surface in a seven-foot radius.

In response to my question, my mom lets out a little disapproving hum. “It wouldn’t be if you’d ever listen to me and take the chicken out of the freezer when I ask you to.”

Travis laughs as he cracks open his can.

“At least I know it means you’re eating your vegetables.”

“I mean, I don’t really have many other options. Between driving to somewhere for a burger or staying and eating your rabbit food, this one’s the simplest.”

“Kind of an Occam’s Razor for food choices,” Travis interjects.

“Precisely.”

“You two are weird.” She looks up from stirring the pan and focuses on me. “Work tonight?”

I nod. “At six. Short shift. But I wouldn’t be stuck in CVS purgatory if I already had a car and didn’t have to save for one.”

“I gave you a choice. Car now or tuition later.” She points the spatula at me. “And you, my friend, picked the smart option. Even if it means Travis gets to steal my food and camp out in my home. Will I be seeing him later, too?”

“Likely,” Travis answers. “I am his ride everywhere, after all.” It’s his small attempt at helping my cause and rescuing me from part-time retail, but it ultimately doesn’t end with my mom seeing the light and offering to buy me an alternative mode of transportation.

Travis changes the subject after taking another sip of his drink.

“Coming to the gig Friday night, Doctor Scott?”

My mom has told him many times that he can call her by her first name, or even just call her mom at this point. Travis refuses. She’s stopped trying to fight it.

“Nope. Date night.”

My mom has seen a few other guys since the divorce, but she’s been with her current boyfriend, Derek, for about six-or-seven months now, I believe. Ironically, he was my dad’s best friend all through high school. They were even in a band together back then, too.

“Besides, Ray’s Underground is kind of sketchy. Don’t they pay you in beer?” She gives me a “mom look,” one brow raised.

“They pay us. We get about four-fifty a show. Bryson funnels it back into the band.”

“The free beer is just a perk, not currency,” Travis adds with a grin.

“Why can’t you be like normal teenagers and just lie to me about your illegal shenanigans?” She shakes her head. Her hair is still pulled back, so the low ponytail flops between her shoulder blades. “I’ve heard you guys a hundred times anyway. You’re good. I don’t have to go watch every show.”

“Too bad. You’ll miss Morgan’s lead-singing debut.”

I feel the physical part of me freeze up, and others inside die instantly with that kill shot that came out of nowhere. My mom’s head whips up from the stove and her light, wide eyes spend a second bouncing between me and my best friend. He’s still wearing a smug face. I’m just trapped in that “stay perfectly still and nothing bad will happen” mindset like some stunned piece of prey. Eventually, after what feels like an eternity, her gaze settles on Travis in disbelief.

“Morgan?” she asks. “Morgan Scott? Morgan Jamie Scott the Second?”

My parents are both uncreative, naming-impaired, cruel narcissists. I have my dad’s first name and the middle is my mom’s, so I guess it’s a good thing they were both stuck with unisex names. I’ve been told it would have been reversed if I’d been a girl: Jamie Morgan.

“My son?” The spatula tip is pointed my way again. The tenseness has begun to fade away and now I just want to roll my eyes at her theatrics. “Him?”

“Even signed a contract,” Travis confirms. “He’s going to sing our encore, front-and-center.”

“Wow,” she remarks. “I’m almost sad I’m going to miss that.” Her curious stare briefly finds its way back to me before her focus moves back to her cooking again. “What are you singing?”

Travis jumps in and answers before I can. “Blank Space.”

I notice a second too late that he refused to elaborate on which version we’re doing.

I feel that sinking pressure of remorse mixed with something that’s bordering on annoyance because my mom bursts out laughing after putting the title to a song, and the song to the original singer’s face, and then probably that face on my face. She’s obviously thinking about the overplayed pop version she’s heard a billion times.

“Thanks, Trav.” Monotone. Sarcasm. In response, he just raises his can of Cherry Coke to me like a small, mischievous salute. He’s grinning and practically glowing with schadenfreude.

When she stops mocking me, my mom turns. She shoves her spatula into my hand. “Watch the food, Taylor Swift; I’m going to go get changed.” As she steps around me to leave, she reaches up the height I’ve got on her and messes my hair, only adding to the humiliating taunting. “God, you need a haircut.” She says this about once a month to me, and every few days to Travis – not that it accomplishes anything.

I sigh silently as I take her place before the frying vegetables, and she disappears from the kitchen. I hear her laughter start up again – she isn’t finished basking in the sheer hilarity everybody except me seems to find in the deal I was bribed into making.

“She’ll be calling me Taylor Swift for the rest of my life.”

“No doubt.”

“I hate you,” I say.

“I know,” Travis replies, definitely still smirking.

***

When I get off of work at ten after a scheduled four hours of my local drugstore hell, Travis is waiting for me in the Gator, parked in a space by the door and blaring Sum 41 so loud all of Winnetka is liable to complain. He turns the volume down when I climb into the passenger seat to something more suitable for conversation.

“Fun night?” he asks to tease me.

“I think a piece of my soul died.”

Travis chuckles in response – he’s heard enough of my CVS horror stories to know I’m not exaggerating. He encounters some idiots at his job, sure, but there’s a special brand of general-public stupidity that I’m exposed to every single time I walk into CVS wearing a nametag and a polo.

“What did you do while I was being tortured?”

He’s wearing another conceited look as he backs out of the space in the vacant lot. “I met up with Sweet Caroline Wu for a little while.”

Sweet Caroline Wu goes to our school and had a major Neil Diamond obsession back in the tenth grade, hence the nickname. (She’s hot too, which is also pretty sweet, in my opinion.) Travis and Sweet Caroline have been hanging out as a pair for a couple weeks now, usually whenever I’m working. They both say they’re not dating or fooling around, but they absolutely are. Travis talks about her a lot in that dopey, smitten way. I end up hearing a lot about how her lips taste like strawberries, and how her hair smells like coconut, and how her breasts feel (perfect, according to him).

So, yeah, they’re totally dating.

“Is she coming on Friday?” I ask. I know Sweet Caroline doesn’t really like the kind of music we play, but she likes Travis enough that she’ll sit through an entire band practice just to fawn over him.

“Of course. I promised her a backstage tour after the set. And she can be another witness when you dump your girlfriend.”

Those words sound like a choir of angels to me. I almost expect the night-darkened heavens to part, and a beam of light to shine down on the promise of mine and Selena’s contractually-destroyed fake relationship as it’s so close to coming to an end. It’s the clause of my agreement with Bryson, however, that stops this from happening. It weighs heavily on me like a cloud of smog blocking the Godly illumination’s full radiance.

By the time we’re back in Woodland Hills and pulling into my driveway, the music has shifted to blessthefall. Travis shuts the Gator off in the middle of Hollow Bodies. He hauls a familiar overnight duffel bag over his shoulder as we walk to the door, which means that, at some point between making out with Sweet Caroline Wu and coming to pick me up from work, he went home, at least for a few minutes.

“How is it over there?” I ask him.

“Not safe. Have to wait it out another month.”

Travis’ older brother, Tyler, is home for the summer. He’s majoring in structural engineering at UCB, which means that Travis’ parents are asking him about his courses, and also asking Travis what his plans are after he graduates high school. They don’t like the answer that he gives.

Both Longfield brothers got in part-time at this garage during the summers, and, while Tyler sees it as a source of a few extra bucks, it’s what Travis wants to do – I mean, not the cleaning and administration stuff he’s stuck doing, but the fixing part. His parents think he can do better than “just a lowly auto mechanic,” even though he’d definitely have an apprenticeship lined up after vocational school, and a guaranteed full-time job after that. When his brother is home, that all goes out the window, and he has to spend most days and nights over at my place. He’d end up in a straightjacket otherwise.

My mom is still awake in the living room when we enter. She’s sitting in front of the TV, watching one of her recordings of some drama on NBC that makes her cry. I always tease her and tell her she should stop watching if she can’t handle the tragedy they’ve scripted, but she holds true to her claim that it’s all just too beautiful, and intricate, and deserves to be viewed. She keeps watching and crying over fictional characters.

“How was work?” She’s already dabbing at her eyes with a tissue.

“Hell.”

“That’s nice.”

She’s not really listening.

Travis and I go upstairs and leave her be.

I think my bedroom is relatively normal for a teenager – posters, books, clothes, a mother who’s constantly trying to make me clean it all up to no avail. The only uncommon thing is Travis’ bed. It’s a futon, but it’s never put back into couch mode, nor do the extra pillows and blankets ever leave it. Travis sets his bag down at the foot of it.

“What magnificent wonders of the past are you forcing me to watch tonight?” I pull off my polo – my glorified prison uniform – and toss it aside. I’d burn it if I didn’t need the money in my car fund.

Travis already has three DVDs in hand. He’s sort of a movie buff, which means I’ve seen just about every piece of cinema produced between 1927 and the present, regardless of whether or not it’s actually good.

“Psycho, The Searchers, or Casablanca?”

“Psycho.”

“Shower scene. Implied nudity,” he remarks. He’s smirking, mostly because he’s an ass, and also because he isn’t wrong.

“Beats cowboy racism and a movie I’ve watched a hundred times.”

“Casablanca is a classic,” Travis defends, already putting in the disc for Psycho. “Three Academy Awards.”

“I know,” I say, teasingly, “Because I’ve seen it a hundred times.”

He flips me off playfully, and we fall into something familiar and comfortable, despite the creepy motel vibe and plenty of chocolate syrup blood.

Chapter: 1

#writing #creative writing #chapter two #interlude #wip: interlude #book: interlude #original fiction #ya fiction #//swearing #ocs #oc #wip #morgan scott #travis longfield #writeblr

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peachdoxie · 5 years

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Cw mental health problems and eating disorder stuff

Please do not reblog this.

I've spent a long time actively building up my love for my self and acceptance of my flaws and issues. I actively work to correct negative self criticism and I stay away from comments that are self deprecating or hurtful to myself. And I've done a damn good job of these things. If you've followed me for a while and pay attention to my personal posts, you've probably seen me brag about myself a fair amount because I'm a fucking awesome person and I want to celebrate myself.

All of this being said, though, there is precisely one situation that comes up every few weeks that provokes feelings of self hatred in me. I try to correct my thinking whenever they happen, but usually if I get to that point, I've reached a real low mark and it's hard to get out of it.

It's whenever I've gotten to the point where I'm really exhausted and really hungry, usually after several days where I've eaten less than I should and I have absolutely no energy or motivation to cook. I'm desperate, and I make the choice to go to a fast food restaurant and get something to eat.

Despite the criticisms of fast food restaurants, that's not why I get so depressed and upset with myself. In most fast food, there's calories, protein, and usually some vegetable thing, like tomatoes or lettuce. So it's not completely fat and carbs.

Except that I can't eat vegetables. Not like, I have allergies or anything. No, I just have an eating disorder that for whatever reason makes it nearly impossible for me to eat vegetables (and many, many other things) without undue amounts of anxiety or without pulverizing them in a blender, and even then only certain vegetables and they have to be drowned out with fruit so I can't taste them. I also struggle to eat hamburger meat, and if I'm going to a fast food place, I usually have reached the point where I lack the spoons to eat them.

So. My meals are basically fat and carbs, with cheese. Grilled cheese, often. And fries. The devil's food that's destroying my health.

I hate it. And though I know rationally that there are many factors stacked against me, health wise, it's really, really hard for me not to think "I hate myself" just because I can't bring myself to eat anything other than something full of carbs and fat, just to get the calories so that I can regain some semblance of functionality.

I hate it and it's easy to blame myself for my inability to eat less than garbage food, my inability to eat vegetables and even just less unhealthy versions of what I'm currently eating, because, unlike most of my health issues and disorders, this isn't one that I can attribute to oppression under capitalism as a cause. Even if I were more stable, less stressed, this would still be something I'd have to deal with. At least, that's the path of justification my thoughts take when I get to these low points.

Very little, if any of this, is rational thinking. But it's always choosing between the lesser of two evils, both of which sap my health. Do I eat these carbs and fat in order to get enough calories to function for the rest of the day, or do I not eat at all? I always choose the first option, because not eating is a very quick way to put myself in the hospital, and I can't afford that to happen, in a variety of manners.

But my health is getting worse with this diet because I can't balance it out with vegetables and fruit and all the other things that are healthy in moderation. Hell, I can't even bring myself into a point where I'm not in the danger zone.

On my good days, I'm trying. It's really hard. I have limited fridge and freezer space in this shared flat. In the UK, they don't have a lot of my safe foods that aren't as damaging to me as my fast food diet. I often lack the spoons to cook, and when I have them it's usually for something less than ideal, but at least less fatty and carby than fast food. I'm trying to make smoothies and drink them, but adding vegetables and keeping the sugar level down is hard. And my new blender is having problems and I haven't had the spoons to try and fix it.

I know that, ironically, I'll feel better once I've eaten and aren't dragging from lack of calories. I may even be able to go sleep tonight without a piercing headache from a lack of calories. Tomorrow will hopefully be better.

I'm not sure why I'm posting this. Probably part processing my thoughts, part and cry for help. Or, well, not help, but just... support? If you've read this far, I'd appreciate if you just...idk, gave me a digital shoulder to cry on, which is kind of what I've been doing here. But please don't say "you can get through this" or "it will get better" because this eating disorder isn't really one with a chance of recovery. There's no proven treatment, and the stories I've heard from other people is that any "recovery" is very individualized and most people just have to find ways to cope through the bad times. It's a chronic thing. And for me, I don't see myself "getting through" this. It's almost impossible to imagine not having this ED since I've had it pretty much since I was born. To me, it's like having asthma or psoriasis. I've dealt with it as long as I've been alive and I'll just continue to deal with it until I die. I'm just not dealing with it very well right now and I need someone to acknowledge that I'm suffering.

#anecdotes by peachdoxie #cw eating disorder mention #cw eating disorders #arfid

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goddessofgamma · 5 years

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Windy Cities and Faulty Electronics, Chapter 11 (Ao3 link)

Summary: The rain keeps falling as Thor and Bruce finally talk to one another about what has been going on between the two of them.

“Come in, Thor, it’s already open.” Thor heard Tony’s voice from the other side of the door.

There was a lot to take in as he pushed open the door; the lab was large and full of fancy equipment, experiments and gizmos half of which were alien to Thor. His eyes scanned the workbenches and walls. There were a few things he recognised: a beam splitter, a protein model, and what appeared to be a miniature water wave machine, and there were some things that Thor suspected Tony had designed himself.

His roaming eyes fixed when he spotted Bruce sitting next to Tony on the work bench. Thor felt his breath catch in his throat as he saw Bruce, looking at Thor with an emotion he couldn’t quite place. He’d tried to keep his thinking so that he only saw Bruce as a colleague, but he couldn’t help how his eyes traced the lines of Bruce’s face, his hair, feeling a pull inside him that just told him he wanted to be close to this man, in any way that Bruce would have him. How did I fall so deep?

The pattering of rain on the sunroof filled the silence before Thor spoke.

“Good morning Stark, Banner.” He smiled as genuine as he could, nodding at each of them in turn but never letting his eyes leave Bruce.

“Hello to you too, Thor,” Tony replied, ignoring Thor’s slight rudeness. “Welcome to our humble lab. Well, I guess, not so humble. I paid for lot of the equipment in here so it’s a bit more cutting edge than most of the university labs. Which is only fair for our famous polymath professor.” Tony patted Bruce on the back as he walked around the bench to where a soldering iron was set up.

“It is very impressive.” Thor finally looked at Tony and gave him a courteous smile. “I must confess to not knowing what all of the equipment is.”

“Bruce has a bunch of biology stuff I steer clear from. I made some of the equipment myself, so that wouldn’t look familiar either. Actually, I was just working on a new stabiliser when you came in, but I seem to have run out of solder.” He shot Bruce a look that Thor was sure had some sort of hidden meaning. “I’ll just go a fetch some more, I’m sure Bruce will be happy to keep you entertained while I’m gone.” There was a particular melody in his voice as he said ‘entertained’ that almost had a teasing tone to it, and Thor felt out of the loop. Is there something I’m missing here?

As Tony left the room, Thor walked over to be nearer to Bruce.

“Hi, Thor.” Bruce smiled at him as he walked over, but his eyes occasionally darted away from Thor’s, as though he was trying doing his best to keep eye contact but failing a little. “How have you been?”

“I’ve been well. My brother has announced that he will be visiting in a couple of weeks, so I will have to prepare for my first visitor.”

“Could be nice to have family over.” Bruce nodded at him. “Are you looking forward to it?”

Thor tilted his head, unsure how to answer.

“Him and I do not always see eye to eye, but, yes, it will be nice to see him again. I do worry about him sometimes.”

Bruce nodded and bit his bottom lip, like he was trying to form his words in his mouth before saying them out loud.

“Er, Thor, I’ve been meaning to tell you something but there hasn’t really been a right time.” Thor’s mind whirred immediately. Could he be telling me why he doesn’t want to go out with me again? “After we had our – um, well – our date, I got a call to say that my father had died. That’s why I wasn’t at the university for a week afterwards, I went back to America for the funeral.”

Half of Thor’s heart soared and the other plummeted. He was crushed, sad on Bruce’s behalf and worried that Bruce would forever associate that night with grief, rather than the time that they had spent together. Still, a small, insistent voice at the back of Thor’s head told him he didn’t leave because of you. He could still want you.

“I’m sorry, I should have told you sooner, or texted you when I was there, I just…” Bruce cut off, looking down at his hands. “It felt like another world over there.”

He shouldn’t be apologizing. I’m the one who jumped to conclusions.

Thor took Bruce’s hands in his, gently.

“You have nothing to apologize for, Bruce. If anything, it is I who should have made an effort to support you through mourning.”

Bruce let out a single humourless laugh.

“I’m not exactly mourning him Thor, he wasn’t really the best father. And it would have been tough for you to support me when I didn’t even tell you he died,” he joked.

For a moment, Thor felt a stab of anger to Bruce’s father, wondering what he could have done that would make a kind man like Bruce care so little that he was gone.

“I wanted to tell you now, so you didn’t think I ran halfway across the world to get away from you.” Thor could hear an attempt at humour in his tone, but it fell flat as they both knew he wasn’t joking. “I had a good time with you that night.” Thor felt himself gravitate towards Bruce as he spoke. “I had – well – a better time with you than I can remember having with anyone.” A bashful smile was playing on his lips. “If you’d like to –“

“Yes.” Thor didn’t know quite how Bruce was planning on ending his sentence, but if it in anyway involved going out again, he was in. Bruce’s grin widened.

“You didn’t know what I was going to say. I could have asked if you wanted to eat our radioactive samples.”

“If that were served as a starter for our next meal together, I still think that it would be worth it.”

“That’s so sappy.” Bruce sounded as though he enjoyed Thor being cheesy. “What I was gonna ask was whether you’d like to go out some place soon, get some dinner.”

“Yes,” Thor replied again. “It would be a pleasure.”

“Okay.” Bruce looked more bashful than Thor had even seen him. “Where would you like to –“

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

A notification noise that Thor didn’t recognise came from his phone.

“Sorry,” Thor excused himself, reluctant to break his conversation with Bruce but wanting to know what the sound was.

He raised an eyebrow as he read the alert. His burglar alarm had gone off, having detected and intruder in the house, and had sent an alert to check that it wasn’t him before calling for the emergency services. It was a surprise to Thor; he rented his flat and hadn’t given it much thought when his landlady had asked him to give his mobile phone number for the system.

Bruce looked expectantly at Thor as his expressions changed as he got up to speed. Once Thor had explained to him what had happened, they thought it was for the best that Thor make his way home, so they headed out of the fire exit, into the grey weather.

Thor was slightly put-out that his conversation with Bruce had been interrupted, but he was still cheerful; he’d always loved the feel of rain on his skin, the sound of heavy rain, and that combined with what Bruce had said to him had put him in the best mood he’d had in weeks. He wants to spend time with me. I didn’t do anything wrong.

By the time they had gotten far enough away from the building that they could have a proper conversation, they’d were soaked enough that Thor wondered if Bruce could see anything though his rain-spotted glasses.

“I’m sorry Bruce, you were interrupted.”

Bruce moved his hair out of his eyes, causing water to drip down his face as he did so. Thor’s eyes traced the water played across his skin.

“That’s okay, would you – er – would you like me to walk you back home?”

My house is an hour’s walk away and he knows full well. Thor was a little puzzled, but the look in Bruce’s eyes told him that he’d like to spend time with him even if that time spent together was a long walk in the rain. He felt honoured.

“That would be very kind.” They started to walk back in the direction of Thor’s house. “So, I believe you were going to ask me where I wanted to go, the next time we go out together.” Bruce nodded. “I still have not seen all that there is to see of Edinburgh, I still haven’t been to any of the museums or walked any of the crags. Do you have any recommendations?”

“You haven’t been to any of the museums?” Thor shook his head in confirmation. “They’re really good, the National Museum of Scotland has a really big science section, it’s got Tim Peake’s capsule that he came back to Earth in, and Dolly the sheep on display. And that’s really near the Surgeon’s Museums. They have the largest public display of preserved organs on display in the UK, pickled body parts in jars that have been really helpful for research on how radiation affect the body.” Suddenly Bruce stopped and snapped out his rambling. “I’m sorry.” He held his forehead in his hand. “You meant for a date.”

“Don’t worry.” There was the hint of a chuckle in Thor’s voice as he replied. “I’m sure that walked past jars of dead people’s organs would make for a very romantic second date.” Bruce laughed a little as he covered his eyes, embarrassed by his own suggestion. “And Bruce, you must know that I would enjoy even the most confusing of days out, so long as it is time spent with you.”

Bruce finally allowed himself to look up, walking again, and making proper eye contact with Thor.

“I can come up with a better date idea than that,” he promised. “You deserve a better time out.”

“Well, I am the reason you are here, walking for miles in the rain. If anything, I am to repay you.”

Leaving the campus and making there way onto a quitter road, Thor noticed Bruce’s eyes flow over him, as if reading him. I suppose it is only fair given how long I have spent looking at him.

“Your hair looks good short,” he finally said.

“Really?” Thor ran his hand through the spiky, soaked hair on the hack of his head. It still felt unfamiliar to him. “I miss having it long.”

“Your looked good with long with long hair, too,” Bruce admitted. Thor felt a little smug. “What made you cut it, if you didn’t want it short?”

“Some creepy old man got bubble-gum in it. I’ve never liked it short before –“ Thor held his hand to Bruce’s arm “- but if it gets the admiration of the only one who’s opinion I care about, I am happy.”

Conversation between the two of them flowed easily as they made their way to the northern side of the city. The rain continued to fall, and Thor could feel his shoes soak through, but even that hadn’t dampened his mood. He knew he should be worried about what was going to await him once he got home, but none of his anxieties seemed to stick in his mind, too preoccupied by his companion.

As they made their way down a main road, a car passed at twice the speed it should have been travelling, diving through a puddle and causing a mighty splash in their direction. The lions share of the water soaked through Thor, who was closer to the road.

Instead of getting angry, Thor just laughed, and Bruce joined him.

“I don’t think I’ve seen anyone who isn’t a toddler enjoy the rain as much as you do,” Bruce said, amused.

“I never stopped loving the rain. I’ve made a career out of it.”

Walking back to his home, Thor felt that he should walk fast – they were going back there for an urgent reason after all – but as they got closer, Thor’s walking pace slowed, wanting to spend as much time with Bruce as he could before he would have to deal with something else. He wished that there would turn out to be some fault with the alarm, so he could invite Bruce in to warm himself up, without having to deal with the police. If Bruce could come inside, they would have the privacy to talk openly, to touch, to kiss… I have to kiss him again, Thor swore to himself, elated that the thought was no longer a distant imagining.

The journey could only be stretched so long, however, and it didn’t feel long before they were on Thor’s road, a police van visible outside Thor’s house.

Bruce stayed with him as he introduced himself to the police officer, asking about what had happened.

“We got a call from one of your neighbours at the same time that your alarm went off, telling us that there was a suspicious-looking individual climbing up your drains and trying to break into your window,” the officer explained. He had a badge on his uniform that called him ‘Happy’ but his expression did not match his name. “We have him in the back now, slimy-looking guy, says his name’s –“

“Loki,” Thor finished. He didn’t need to be told to identify the black-clad, glaring person staring at him from the back of the police van to recognise that face.

#Hope you like it!#i finally updated #thor #bruce banner #thorbruce #thruce #thunderscience #gammahammer

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drlaurynlax · 6 years

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The #1 Cause of HPA Axis Dysfunction (Adrenal Fatigue)

The HPA Axis Dysfunction or Adrenal Fatigue

HPA Axis Dysfunction or adrenal fatigue is real…don’t believe me? Read on for yourself to find out how it can happen to anyone, and the #1 cause behind it all.

I’ve been quiet in social media world the past several months and, to be honest, it’s been a rough stretch to say the least. In short: “Adrenal fatigue” or HPA Axis Dysfunction is real, and if you’ve ever experienced an extreme bout of stress, you’ll know what I mean. Here’s a little personal story, and the science and research to prove it.

Stress = The #1 Cause of HPA Axis Dysfunction

In fact, stress alone is the #1 driver of HPA Axis Dysfunction—the primary attributed cause of practically every known ailment plaguing our society today—from diabetes, to cancer, autoimmune disease, anxiety and beyond.

Contrary to popular belief, stress goes far beyond just mental stress alone.

Physical stress is often times even more detrimental, as it more easily goes unseen, including: imbalances in the basic human needs (such as lack of sleep, dehydration, poor nutrient density, sedentary or overtraining lifestyles), to gut dysfunction (SIBO, leaky gut, IBS), circadian rhythm dysfunction, inflammation, and light exposure (blue screens, light at night, etc.).

In fact, you can be sitting on a beach in Tahiti with a margarita in hand, seemingly no care in the world, but your body STILL be under a significant amount of stress, such as: fighting leaky gut and acne, experiencing shortness of breath from overwork in your daily lifestyle and lack of sleep, and hormone imbalances from overtraining in the gym and under-eating fat and protein.

Regardless of what type of stress you face (physical or mental), our bodies can only take so much stress. While stress is inevitable (impossible to avoid in modern day), if you go over your individualized threshold of stress or experience a significant amount of stress in a short amount of time, your body may back fire.

Enter: “Adrenal Fatigue” or “HPA Axis Dysfunction.”

My HPA Axis Dysfunction Story

It all began in March of 2018.

Actually, rephrase that: It all began about 3 years ago, in 2015—the beginnings of my business and life as an entrepreneur.

Eager to “save the world” with my business aspirations in the health and wellness field, I went to work on the front lines, doing things like:

My Job (“Saving the World”)

Therapy:

Providing counseling and therapy services to individuals with emotional baggage to get rid of;

Nutrition:

Offering support plans and nutritional guidance for individuals seeking health improvements;

Functional Medicine:

Knocking conventional medicine on its head with functional medicine—providing tools, resources, protocols and procedures for helping people truly heal, not just manage their disease:

—You know, just “saving the world” (or trying to).

Along with these pursuits, a sneak peek into my life as an entrepreneur looked something like this for a couple years:

HPA Axis Dysfunction Begins: (Stressful) Life of an Entrepreneur (Beginning Fall of 2015)

6 a.m. Rise & Shine. Wakeup to my alarm across the room (despite wanting to go back to sleep after 5 hours of sleep)

Brushing my teeth, swigging a protein shake, and rushing to get ready for the day to make it to the gym by 6:30 a.m. or 7

7-8:30 a.m. Workout. Hitting a workout in the gym first thing to get energized for the day

8:30 a.m. Breakfast: Another protein shake, greens, coconut butter and 1/2 a banana on my way to my office

9 a.m.-2 p.m. Work It Start the work day, seeing new clients and writing or creating my next online project or book.

2 p.m.-3:30 p.m. Workout #2. Hit the gym again for a break in the middle of the work day to burn off energy and clear my head.

3:30 p.m. Lunch. Chicken, avocado, greens, beets.

4 pm-7:30 p.m. Work It. Back to the grind.

7:30 or 8 p.m. Group Meeting. Mixing, mingling and talking more about business.

9:30 p.m. Workout. Force myself to hit the gym again after a long afternoon of sitting to work out pent up energy for 40-60 minutes.

10:30 p.m. Dinner. Dinner at home: Turkey burger patty, sweet potato, coconut butter, greens sautéed in ghee.

11 p.m.-1 a.m. Work. Finish my work for the day (e-mails, admin, etc.).

1 or 1:30 a.m. Bed. Hit the sack and sleep like a rock for about 5 hours.

Wakeup and do it all over again!

But Stress is “Normal” Right?…

Can you relate?

Or do you know anyone who is an entrepreneur, or in school, or loves what they do, or who is super stressed over their work or life—and keeps a similar schedule? (Burning a candle at ALL ends).

Face it: Stress and “running on a hamster wheel” is normal, and if you are NOT doing it, then you better watch out because (gasp) you may fall behind.

Although I thought I was made of “steel”—immune of stress wreaking havoc on my health—my body had other plans in mind.

Before I realized it, various (silent) health issues began to arise including:

Health Issues Arise (2016-2017)

IBS

SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth)

Unwanted weight loss (losing about 10 pounds over the course of about 3 years due to malabsorption and gut issues)

Bloating after eating

Chronic constipation

Shortness of breath if I slept less than 5 hours multiple days in a row

Gym performance decline (loss of strength, endurance, gains in the gym)

Hormone imbalances (losing my period)

However, despite all these “new” symptoms, I was completely checked out from my body—laser focused on checking off to-do lists, getting further ahead in business and growing a company.

In addition to not feeling on “top of my A-game,” other things in my life began to shift too, such as:

Lifestyle Imbalance (2016-2017)

Isolation from friendships (in place of work)

Working on weekends and evenings instead of spending time with people or taking breaks

Lack of interests and activities outside of work

Disconnection from my “source”—time spent in Word, prayer

Disconnection from the great outdoors (staying inside most of the days)

Over-screen exposure (upwards of 10-12 hours per day in front of a computer)

Loss of “who I am” or what I like to do (outside work)

Running towards a goal with no end in sight

To say the least, I became more like a robot, and less like “Lauryn”—the well rounded individual I am in my core.

I could talk and write all day about living a health lifestyle, and I knew WHAT to do, but when it came to my own health and life, there wasn’t time to do all the things I preached about!

As a busy entrepreneur, trying to save the world, who had time to do things like sleep 7-8 hours, or mix up my workouts, or eat a variety of nutrient dense foods, or make time for hobbies and passions and relationships?!

This schedule and pace continued for a good 3 years before my body really began to speak—letting me know that something was up.

Getting Out of Balance: SIBO, Leaky Gut, IBS & Beyond (September 2017)

Come September 2017, I was hit with a severe case of SIBO—Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth—in which my body, under high amounts of physical and mental stress, developed a gut condition where unhealthy bacteria overpopulated my small intestine.

The result?

Rapid weight loss and IBS.

Although I have struggled with “gut stuff” (constipation and IBS) most of my life, things really kicked up.

Seemingly overnight, I went from just feeling bloated after most meals to having to run to the bathroom after most meals with loose watery stools, or the opposite, waking up super constipated—unable to go at all.

This conundrum continued for a good 4 months before I decided to dig deeper and consider what else may be going on under the hood.

Thanks to my functional medicine background and training program at the time, we were actually learning about SIBO at the same time, and come to find out, SIBO is exactly what I had—triggering unwanted weight loss, malabsorption, bloating, constipation, tummy cramps, and the inability to tolerate most FODMAP foods.

At the turn of the New Year (January 2018), I was treating SIBO at home with a strict supplement protocol, courtesy of my functional medicine training, and by the end of February, I was feeling much better on the gut front—except about 10 pounds lighter than I’d want to be.

“What’s wrong with Lauryn?” I could sense others saying with their eyes, and it appeared I was “back” into my eating disorder that I had struggled with from ages 10-24.

I could hardly look in the mirror myself, and sitting at barely 100 pounds (on a “good day”), for my 5’4’’ frame, I felt it—felt weaker, and more discouraged, despite being more at peace with eating, feeding my body well and even giving up cardio in place of more muscle building workouts.

However, despite my efforts to gain weight—it wasn’t happening. Eating approximately 2400 calories each day wasn’t doing it. “Carbing up” wasn’t doing it. Working out a little bit less wasn’t doing it.

By March 2018, I found myself in a Gastrointestinal Doctor’s office to try to “get to the bottom” of things to see what—if anything—in my gut was still keeping me from putting on some weight that I wanted, and the conventional medicine “rabbit hole” began.”

The Plot Thickens: The Triggering Event (My Colonoscopy) (March 2018)

To start, the doctor ordered a CT scan of my intestines to start, finding a presentation of a “Megacolon” and “Autoimmune bowel,” and advising we do a colonoscopy to do some deeper digging to see what, if any, autoimmune diseases were present as well as any blockage or structural issues preventing me from absorbing nutrients and restoring bowel function.

In addition, I had a full blood panel done and hormone panel, and the results revealed:

Iron Overload

Low Thyroid Function

Low Vitamin D

SUPER High Cortisol

Low Sex Hormones (practically NO testosterone, estrogen, progesterone)

By the end of March, “C-Day” (“colonoscopy day”) arrived (and so did countless health side effects from this invasive procedure).

Colonscopies: More Harm Than Good

Colonoscopies have become one of the most prescribed outpatient procedures in America with more than 15-million performed each year (1) (CDC, 2016), and are only growing in prevalence.

While only about 50% of adults, ages 50-75, who “should have” colonoscopies comply with recommended guidelines, in 2018, the National Colorectal Cancer Roundtable (a group of public and private organizations) aims to raise the percentage of people screened for colorectal cancer to 80%.

And although colonoscopies are thought to be “necessary” for detecting “gut issues”—particularly colon cancer—they actually may be more detrimental than good.

In fact, according to Dr. Mercola and Dr. Michael Greger, about 1 in every 350 colonoscopies end up doing serious harm.

I am a case study example.

Colonoscopy: Little Known Side Effects

Common (little known) side effects from this invasive bacteria with a scope include:

Perforation (puncturing) of the intestines (Gatto et al, 2003) (2)

Dysbiosis (imbalanced gut bacteria) (Lorenzo et al, 2016) (3)

Infection with another person’s gut bacteria

Eradication of healthy gut bacteria from prep (Lorenzo et al, 2016) (3)

Electrolyte, bacteria and blood sugar imbalances (from the “prep diet” and extreme cleansing that is mandated) (Shobar et al, 2016) (4) (Mai et al, 2006) (5)

The result?

A gut microbiome that is “worse” off then prior to the colonoscopy.

Given that our gut bacteria and our gut itself is the “gateway” to health, if our gut bacteria gets off (or even MORE off), then you can bet your bottom dollar, other body systems get “off” by “imbalanced.”

Healthy gut bacteria or unhealthy gut bacteria determine whether the following body mechanisms are healthy or unhealthy, including:

Gut Bacteria Govern Our Health

Immune function (disease, skin) (Oregon State University, 2013) (6) (Nanjundappa et al, 2017) (7)

Digestion (Lawrence, 2017) (8) (Kim et al, 2012) (9)

Heart/cardiac function (Tang et al, 2017) (10)

Weight and metabolism (Filip et al, 2018) (11)

Blood sugar regulation (Kumamoto University, 2018) (12)

Brain health (anxiety (Hoban et al, 2017) (13), depression (Clapp, 2017) (14) and memory (Lund University, 2017) (15)

Adrenal health (i.e. “HPA-Axis” affecting hormones, cortisol and thyroid) (Konturek et al, 2011) (16) (Cryan et al, 2011) (17)

Exercise progress (or plateaus) (Clarke et al, 2014) (18)

Headaches (Gonzalez et al, 2016) (19)

Attention/ADHD/ADD (Carmen et al, 2017) (20)

Cancer (Fellows et al, 2018) (21)

A better option than colonoscopies?

Stool testing—Addressing gut bacteria and gut health itself—prior to looking for structural issues with a scope. (Bullman et al, 2017) (21)

Since gut bacteria, gut infections, parasites and bacterial imbalances determine whether you get cancer, IBS or autoimmune disease in the first place, comprehensive stool analysis, like this one by Doctors Data or this one by GI Map, can be tremendously helpful in assessing “underlying issues.” Additionally, organic acids testing, SIBO breath testing and even a new blood test (Tsai et al, 2018) can give you more information as well.

(This is something a GI doc won’t typically tell you).

Me: Post Colonoscopy (April-May 2018)

My colonoscopy was the “straw” that broke the camel’s back —accumulating the past 3 years of stress in one fatal swoop on “C-Day” (colonoscopy day).

The “prep diet” was too much for my already-weakened body to handle (i.e. clear liquid fasting). Couple NOT eating all day with a full bottle of Miralax laxative powder, laxative tablets and all afternoon on the toilet, and by midnight that night, I was “far gone.”

Walking up the stairs to go to bed, I blacked out—passing out on the floor, and eliminating more bowels.

It took me about a minute to come to, as I don’t remember what happened, and strewn on the floor, my body started convulsing and trembling, my teeth chattering, and all I remember is asking my mom for a banana—some potassium.

Ten minutes later, the ambulance was there, and I was hooked up to IV fluids, EKG monitor and a blood pressure cuff on my way to Dell Seton Medical.

“Electrolyte imbalance,” the ER doc diagnosed, and by 4 a.m., my mom and I were back out the door to prepare for my 5 a.m. colonoscopy arrival time.

I went through with the procedure, but little did I realize the “health issues” were not over, as my body spent the next 5-6 weeks trying to recover from the stressful event, inclusive to:

2 more ER visits (for “electrolyte imbalances” and hypoglycemia)

3 urgent care visits for more fluids and blood work

A GI Doctor office that would not return my phone calls post-procedure

A severe acute allergic reaction to a cat that moved in with a new roommate

Blood sugar highs and crashes

And more than a handful of diagnoses, speculations and prescriptions from docs trying to figure out what was going on, including: Asthma, Type I Diabetes, obstructed respiratory system, low sodium, iron overload, and…adrenal insufficiency (aka: “adrenal fatigue” or “HPA Axis Dysfunction”).

Adrenal Insufficiency (aka: HPA Axis Dysfunction)

Adrenal insufficiency (aka adrenal fatigue—or “HPA Axis Dysfunction”) IS real, and although our bodies are resilient to handle stress, if TOO MUCH stress happens at once, or a SUPER STRESSFUL event sets you over the edge, then HPA Axis Dysfunction is a byproduct.

The result?

Complete body imbalance.

The news was really no new news to me. It was more like an “A ha!” moment.

A ha! This is EXACTLY what I had been experiencing all along, I thought.

I could talk about adrenal insufficiency or HPA Axis Dysfunction ALL DAY LONG. I could write about it and educate others about it.

However, when it came to looking at myself in the mirror and facing the facts that I had NOT been taking myself…easier said than done. (It is like the nail salon technician that paints everyone else’s nails—but their own).

Flat on my back, in a hospital bed in the ER after an emergency trip due to a 3 a.m. hypoglycemic blood crash after a friend’s wedding in Dallas was the wakeup call I needed.

For the past two years, (ever since my symptoms of SIBO, gut dysfunction and other health maladies had begun), my prayers had been:

“Lord, be Lord over my body,”

“Lord, bring the manna and balance to my life,” and,

“God, help restore my body to health and help me put on healthy weight.”

Be careful what you pray for.

Never in a million years did I think that my “answer” to my prayer would be in the form of a blood sugar crash, but it was the wake up call I needed.

It was as if God was saying: “Lauryn, you DON’T have to save the world…I have already done enough.” And, “Instead of trying to bring glory to yourself, bring glory to me. Live out the gifts I’ve created and let me provide the rest.”

Mic drop.

I spent the rest of the weekend, praying, thinking and broken. I didn’t want to go back to my hamster wheel ways.

And you know what…I didn’t have to. I don’t have to. And whatever plates you are spinning or race you are running too…You don’t have to either.

How HPA Axis Dysfunction Happens

So…how did my body get SO out of whack in the first place?! How does HPA Axis Dysfunction REALLY happen?

In functional medicine, there is typically a “triggering event” that sets the body “over the edge” for HPA Axis Dysfunction and distress.

In my case: the colonoscopy (on top of the past 3 years of stress) resulted in disrupted gut bacteria, along with my side effects:

My Side Effects of HPA Axis Dysfunction

“Diabetes,” hypothyroidism

Unwanted weight loss and inability to gain weight

Suppressed immune function

Autoimmune disease

Feeling “wired and tired”

Shortness of breath

Hormone imbalances

Apathy about my work

IBS

Poor workout performance

Electrolyte imbalances

Melancholy mood

…And, to say the least, an entrepreneur who was anything BUT her healthiest, most vibrant, kick-ass self.

Other Side Effects of HPA Axis Dysfunction

For others, “adrenal fatigue” or HPA-Axis Dysfunction may present as one or several of the following:

Inability to lose weight

Mood swings

Fatigue

Anxiety or Depression

Autoimmune conditions

Food intolerances

Insomnia

Needing coffee or sugar to function

Headaches

High blood pressure

Low or high heart rate

Feeling dizzy when standing up

Inability to concentrate/focus or memory loss

Lyme disease

Catching colds, flus or illnesses easily

Not “feeling like yourself”

Skin breakouts or acne

Feeling burned out or unable to do your usual basic “to dos”

Inability to tolerate exercise like you once did

Random allergies you’ve never had before

How does adrenal fatigue happen to one person but not another? What separates “adrenal fatigue,” or HPA Axis Dysfunction from regular stress?

Check out this blog to find out ALL about adrenal fatigue and HPA Axis Dysfunction, how to find out if you have it and how you (and I) can heal.

Resources

1. CDC. 2016. Colorectal Cancer Screening Capacity in the United States

2. Nicolle M. Gatto, Harold Frucht, Vijaya Sundararajan, Judith S. Jacobson, Victor R. Grann, Alfred I. Neugut; Risk of Perforation After Colonoscopy and Sigmoidoscopy: A Population-Based Study, JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Volume 95, Issue 3, 5 February 2003, Pages 230–236,

3. Lorenzo et al. 2016. Persisting changes of intestinal microbiota after bowel lavage and colonoscopy

4. Shobar et al. 2016. The Effects of Bowel Preparation on Microbiota-Related Metrics Differ in Health and in Inflammatory Bowel Disease and for the Mucosal and Luminal Microbiota Compartments.

5. Mai, V., Greenwald, B., Glenn Morris, J., Raufman, J., & Stine, O. C. (2006). Effect of bowel preparation and colonoscopy on post‐procedure intestinal microbiota composition. Gut, 55(12), 1822–1823.

6. Immune: Oregon State University. (2013, September 16). Gut microbes closely linked to proper immune function, other health issues. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 28, 2018

7. Immune: Nanjundappa et al, 2017. A Gut Microbial Mimic that Hijacks Diabetogenic Autoreactivity to Suppress Colitis.

8. Digestion: Lawrence, K., & Hyde, J. (2017). Microbiome restoration diet improves digestion, cognition and physical and emotional wellbeing. PLoS ONE, 12(6), e0179017.

9. Digestion: Gene Kim, Fnu Deepinder, Walter Morales, Laura Hwang, Stacy Weitsman, Christopher Chang, Robert Gunsalus, Mark Pimentel. Methanobrevibacter smithii Is the Predominant Methanogen in Patients with Constipation-Predominant IBS and Methane on Breath. Digestive Diseases and Sciences, 2012; DOI: 10.1007/s10620-012-2197-1

10. Heart: Tang et al, 2017. Gut Microbiota in Cardiovascular Health and Disease

11. Weight: Filip Ottosson, Louise Brunkwall, Ulrika Ericson, Peter M Nilsson, Peter Almgren, Céline Fernandez, Olle Melander, Marju Orho-Melander. Connection between BMI related plasma metabolite profile and gut microbiota. The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 01 February 2018 DOI: 10.1210/jc.2017-02114/4834036

12. Blood Sugar: Kumamoto University. (2018, April 10). How intestinal bacteria can affect your blood sugar and lipid levels. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 28, 2018 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/04/180410100937.htm

13. Anxiety: Alan E. Hoban, Roman M. Stilling, Gerard M. Moloney, Rachel D. Moloney, Fergus Shanahan, Timothy G. Dinan, John F. Cryan, Gerard Clarke. Microbial regulation of microRNA expression in the amygdala and prefrontal cortex. Microbiome, 2017; 5 (1) DOI: 10.1186/s40168-017-0321-3

14. Depression: Clapp, M., Aurora, N., Herrera, L., Bhatia, M., Wilen, E., & Wakefield, S. (2017). Gut microbiota’s effect on mental health: The gut-brain axis. Clinics and Practice, 7(4), 987.

15. Memory: Lund University. (2017, February 10). Gut bacteria may play a role in Alzheimer’s disease. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 28, 2018 from

16. Adrenal Health: Konturek, P. C., Brzozowski, T., & Konturek, S. J. (2011). Stress and the gut: pathophysiology, clinical consequences, diagnostic approach and treatment options. Journal of physiology and pharmacology : an official journal of the Polish Physiological Society, 6, 591–599

17. Adrenal Health: Cryan, J. F., & O’Mahony, S. M. (2011). The microbiome-gut-brain axis: From bowel to behavior. Neurogastroenterology & Motility, 23(3), 187–192. doi:10.1111/j.1365–2982.2010.01664.x

18. Exercise: Clarke, S. F., Murphy, E. F., O’sullivan, O., Lucey, A. J., Humphreys, M., Hogan, A., . . . Cotter, P. D. (2014). Exercise and associated dietary extremes impact on gut microbial diversity. Gut, 63(12), 1913–1920.

19, Headaches: Antonio Gonzalez, Embriette Hyde, Naseer Sangwan, Jack A. Gilbert, Erik Viirre, Rob Knight. Migraines Are Correlated with Higher Levels of Nitrate-, Nitrite-, and Nitric Oxide-Reducing Oral Microbes in the American Gut Project Cohort. mSystems Oct 2016, 1 (5) e00105-16; DOI: 10.1128/mSystems.00105-16

20, Attention: Carmen Cenit, María & Campillo Nuevo, Isabel & codoñer-franch, Pilar & G. Dinan, Timothy & Sanz, Yolanda. (2017). Gut microbiota and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: new perspectives for a challenging condition. European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry. 26. 10.1007/s00787-017-0969-z.

21. Cancer: Fellows et al. 2018. Microbiota derived short chain fatty acids promote histone crotonylation in the colon through histone deacetylases. Nature. 9(105). doi:10.1038/s41467-017-02651-5.

Tsai et al. 2018. Prospective clinical study of circulating tumor cells for colorectal cancer screening. Journal of Clinical Oncology. 36, no. 4_suppl. 556-556… DOI: 10.1200/JCO.2018.36.4_suppl.556.

22. 6. Bullman et al. 2017. Analysis of Fusobacterium persistence and antibiotic response in colorectal cancer. DOI: 10.1126/science.aal5240

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petdogfaq · 4 years

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How To Stop My Shih Tzu From Eating Poop The Natural Way

A really gross topic here but very common behavior problem is people have dogs to eat poop. nWith lots of things we can try to get our dog to stop this behavior, but first I want to go over why do dogs do this in the first place.

How to stop my Shih Tzu from eating poop. You can add natural products like Pineapple or Papaya juice or you can use pills from your veterinarian that will make your dog’s poop taste and smell bad. You can also train your dog to leave poop alone, we discuss all the methods and which is best for your dog.

Three Reasons Why Shih Tzu Eat Their Own Poop

There are a lot of theories as to why dogs eat their own poop there’s none that I’ve actually been scientifically proven, but a lot of the theories make a lot of sense, one of these theories is simply that your dog is hungry.

Hunger – Dogs in the wild that are malnourished don’t get enough food and have been observed many times eating other animals poop or eating their own poop because they’re hungry and they’re just looking for something to eat.

If your dog is underweight or is eating poop check to make sure that we’re feeding him the appropriate amount of food.

Nutrition – Another reason that dogs can eat your poop is the lack of nutrition, and when I say lack of nutrition I’m referring to not getting enough minerals and vitamins and iron in their diet.

So in a dog’s mind if they eat the poop again and they process it again maybe they will get that nutrition that they didn’t get the first time.

Boredom – A very common thing that has been proven and that your dog is bored. He doesn’t have anything else to do in the backyard, you left him alone, he poops, he runs around the yard a few times and now you look for something to do. Instead of digging holes he decides to eat the poop.

So we want to make sure if that is the case that we always leave our dogs with things to do. We wanted people to have a way to say to our dog, this is what I want you to do what I’m not home. Puzzle toys, bones are a great way to do that.

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What To Put In Dog Food To Stop Eating Poop

OK so these are three of the large reasons why dogs tend to eat their own poop, so how do we stop our Shih Tzu from eating their own poop?

Luckily there are a lot and lots of things we can try, the first thing I want to talk about is things that we can do that don’t require you to be there.

The first thing we can do is add stuff to our dog’s food. When we feed them we can add a few things and these have been proven to be quite effective.

Does Pineapple Stop Dogs Eating Poop?

First you can try adding pineapple juice to your dog’s food. You put pineapple juice right in the dog food, when it goes through their digestive system and they poop it out for whatever reason it just makes the poop taste bad.

They eat the poop that has been processed through their body with the pineapple juice and they spit it right out. I don’t know if it’s the taste of it or it makes it smell differently and it can smell unappealing.

I tried it with a few dogs and it has stopped them eating it both ways. Some of them just smell it and leave it alone, I have seen others that pick it up in their mouths and spit it right out because the pineapple juice made it taste bad.

You can also add papaya juice which helps digestion by breaking down the protein in your dog’s food.

Another thing to try is MSG, it sounds crazy but it’s actually quite effective. I find it’s more effective than the pineapple juice.

Same thing, when you go to feed your dog you just sprinkle it on top, give them the bowl the next day same thing happens. They smell their poop and the smell has changed so that’s the deterrent. Sometimes they actually have to eat it and the taste has changed and that’s the deterrent.

Another idea is adding an ingredient to your dogs food so it helps him or her to properly and completely digest their food or make the poop smell offensive to the dog.

So you can add: Broccoli, Cabbage & Brussels Sprouts, help digestion and contain a high sulphur content when digested smell very offensive to dogs.

Meat tenderizers contain natural vegetable enzymes which break down protein fibres, using meat tenderizers comes with some negative feedback as it contains MSG And off course there is the “Coprophagia” supplements they are products which produce the same effect as natural products I just mentioned.

If you ask me what would I use out of these options I would definitely stick with the natural option like the broccoli and cabbage or the papaya and pineapple juice because they are natural choices with no side effects.

I might even try the meat tenderizers & be sure they don’t contain MSG but I will definitely keep the supplements as my last choice.

Both of these things are food additives you can try but how much do I add to my dogs food?

I don’t know the kind of food you feed your dog, I don’t know how much your dog weighs so I can’t give you any dosages for every single weight of dog and every single food.

If you are unsure I would always advise you to speak to your veterinarian and they would be able to tell you what the right amount is for your dog.

These are things we can add to your dogs food but there are pills that you can buy and these aren’t anything you need to get from your veterinarian. You can just get these from a local local pet store or online from Amazon.

These and similar to the pineapple juice or the MSG, you just give it to your dog at meal times, it goes with your body and next day it makes it smell different or taste different.

So these are three items you can just add to the food so when he goes poop when you are not there and he goes to eat his poop these bad smells and tats will put him off from eating his own poop.

These are a few things you can try, you can try them and see what works for you, just because it works for one dog doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to work for another.

Now let me mention these are what you can do at times when you’re not there. It’s going to be a lot easier the times you are there with your dog when he goes to the bathroom.

One thing that you can try when you are there is hot sauce, regular old hot sauces like Tabasco. So just carry it out with you when you take your dog out to go to the bathroom and when your dog poops just cover the poop with the hot sauce before they can eat it.

They will go to smell it and usually the smell is enough to put them off. The Tabasco sauce has such a strong smell and dogs noses are so sensitive that just the smell alone will usually be a deterrent.

My dog has now learned that just the sight of a bottle of hot sauce he goes running because he knows what that smells like, and if they go to eat it odds are they’re not going to eat it again because it’s such a bad taste.

Additionally you need to work on teaching a dog to leave it. That’s very important especially if you have a dog who eats other dogs poop, because all of these things aren’t really going to work if you’re out for a walk and your dogs off leash and he eats some other dogs poop.

One more thing you can do is to keep the yard clean. OK mother dogs will have puppies and it’s not uncommon for them to eat their puppies poop because they’re trying to keep the area clean.

If you are in the habit of letting your dogs poop pile up make sure we are doing our best to keep it clean because if we’re not, it’s almost a dog doing the cleanup for you.

I’m guilty of that myself sometimes. I send my dog out into the yard for a poop and my dog goes to the bathroom in just one section of the yard. I have a gravel area that’s about 6 foot by 5 foot and that’s the only area he goes to poop.

If I’m not good about cleaning it up, then it starts to pile up very very quickly because that’s the only area if he goes. So make sure that you focus on cleaning up the poop so he doesn’t have to leave it up to your dog to do it.

There are lots of things you can try like adding things to your dogs food because it’s a little bit less work on your part. It’s nice if you can just add them to the food and then that does the job for you.

If not, work on some training with your dog. Teach him to leave it, cleaning up and the hot sauce trick that works really well.

You can try the bitter sprays too but I think the hot sauce is more effective. You have to do it one time and then you’re done as opposed to the bitter spray. It works sometimes, yeah it’s unpleasant but it’s not so unpleasant that your dog may pick it up a few more times.

There are lots of stuff you can try and remember to give your veterinarian a call if you are not sure about how much pineapple juice or MSG etc to put in your dog food otherwise try the pills. All or just one of these suggestions can hopefully get your dog’s poop eating habit under control.

Coprophagia

Coprophagia is a fancy word for a very disgusting habit that many dogs have eating their stool. As disgusting as it may seem Coprophagia seldom does any harm to your dog’s, but what causes it, there are three main reasons for Coprophagia dogs.

Number one is medical, number two is behavioral and number three is nutritional. Let’s take a moment and examine the medical issues that may arise that caused coprophagia in animals.

The first reason is exocrine pancreatic insufficiency, the second one is pancreatitis, the third one is intestinal infections, the fourth one is malabsorption syndromes and the last one is over feeding, especially foods that are high in fat content.

Now because of these medical issues, the very first thing you should do when you first notice that your dog starts eating its waste or the waste of another animal is to talk with your veterinarian.

I am NOT a doctor so I cannot go into great detail about these issues but I’m sure that your vet can go into much greater detail than I regarding these medical reasons.

Let’s move on to the behavioral reasons.

There are many behavioral reasons that are hypothesized by experts in the field as to why dogs will engage in coprophagia.

The first behavioral reason is attention seeking behavior. Some dogs when they don’t feel like they’re getting the attention that they need will start eating their dog waste, and as a result owners will often correct them and this negative attention is still attention to the animal.

Some people would suggest that you should simply ignore the problem in hopes it’ll go away but we will talk about some other solutions later on in this article.

The second behavioral reason is mimicry, this is a learned behavior. For some dogs that spend time in a shelter situation may observe another dog in the shelter eating its waste or the waste of another animal. As it notices this it picks it up and adopts this behavior as its own at home.

If you’re a good pet owner and you clean up after your dog every time it goes there’s a good chance your dog will begin to associate this idea that when the waste comes out it gets cleaned up. And so by understanding this your dog will begin to help keep the yard clean and the only way it knows how which is eating the waste.

Why Do Female Dogs Eat Their Poop?

The third behavioral reason is maternal. Now this is an instinctive behavior of mother dogs, they will intuitively clean off the bottoms of their pups and keep their nesting area clean.

Mother dogs will actually often eat their puppies’ poop, and some scientists believe this could be a behavioral adaptation to avoid parasites in the wild. You see, most dogs, and other carnivores will poop away from their dens, so they don’t come into contact with larval parasites in their feces, accidentally reinfecting themselves and increasing their parasite load.

But puppies can’t leave the den, so mothers will often eat their puppies’ fresh feces before the parasite eggs inside the poop become infectious. Puppies will often mimic this behavior, but most will grow out of it by adulthood.

That said, according to the American Kennel Club, about 16 percent of dogs are “serious stool eaters.” So, you should definitely see your vet to determine if the cause of your dog’s coprophagia could be related to his or her health.

The fourth behavioral reason is dominance behavior. Some dogs are trying to assert themselves as the alpha dog, and so what they’ll do is they’ll adopt the attitude of “I’m top dog so I’m gonna eat your waste” and that’s how they will assert their dominance over non dominant dogs.

The last behavioral reason that dogs engage in coprophagia is reinforcement behavior, basically what this means is that the dogs begin to develop a taste for the waste.

Dogs will begin to eat their waste, they’ll develop a palate for the waste and once they realize that the dog waste is actually pleasing to them they will continue to do it. They do this because it lights up the positive reinforcement centers of their brain and they continue to do this behavior somewhat compulsively.

Alternatively, the coprophagia could be due to anxiety or environmental stress. For example, according to the American Kennel Club, if a dog is severely punished when it poops in the wrong place.

It might get the wrong idea and assume it was punished because it was pooping. So in the future, it may eat its feces to hide the evidence.

The final reason that dogs will engage in coprophagia is nutritional. What this means is that you may be feeding a low-quality food or it has inadequate nutrition for them or it’s simply an unbalanced diet altogether.

What you can do is upgrade your food to make sure that your dog is getting all of the nutritional requirements that it needs and that it has a balanced diet.

So what can be done to stop Coprophagia?

There’s no one reason that anyone seems to agree on but one that absolutely works every single time is to clean up after the dog. Why does this work? First of all if there’s no waste in the yard there’s nothing to tempt your dog to eat it, so it’s very important that if you want to stop Coprophagia that you clean up after your dogs every time.

When I used to work in a clinic many years ago we would get the question all the time about “what can I do to stop my dog from eating its waste?” Vet clinics do have some products that they can give you to help make the waste unpalatable but what is often cited as a means to make waste unpalatable.

There is one thing that all pet owners need to be worried about and that’s parasites. Now if you take your dog for a walk along your neighborhood or you take them down to the dog park and your dog engages in Coprophagia by eating the waste of another animal your dog could come in contact with parasites such as roundworm or hookworm.

And in the case that your dog is eating your cat’s waste right out of the litter box, there’s a chance that your dog could become infected with a parasite known as toxoplasma gondii which causes the disease toxoplasmosis in your dog and can be very dangerous to pregnant women.

In light of this it’s often suggested that you train your dog to avoid the waste altogether. If you notice that your dog is going towards waste they need to know the leave it command, you can teach them leave it but it’s going to require a great deal of persistence on your part and consistency over time to teach them this command.

So that they do not go near the waste when they listen to you and they do not go near the waste you need to reward them as positively as you can, it would not hurt to also add a recall command into the mix.

Related Questions

My Dog Ate Poop How Do I Clean His Mouth?

Your dog has eaten some poop so how should you clean their mouth? To get your dogs mouth clean we brush their teeth with hydrogen peroxide and baking soda.

The tools that you’ll need are a toothbrush, hydrogen peroxide, cup of water baking soda and a bowl to mix everything in.

This segment is about brushing your dog’s teeth with hydrogen peroxide and baking soda, the reason why you would use hydrogen peroxide and baking soda is because the hydrogen peroxide is about killing bacteria in the poop and then the baking soda is about freshening the breath.

The item first that you need is a toothbrush. Most people are always going to use a child’s toothbrush because it’s small, it’s not as bulky and it’s easier to maneuver inside of a dog’s mouth, especially a little dog like a Shih Tzu.

But if you have a larger dog and you need to cover more ground feel free to use an adult toothbrush.

Some dogs aren’t a big fan of putting foreign objects into their mouths so if your dog is one of those people, feel free to use your finger mouth just like you use a toothbrush. Nice and simple and as long as you get it on their teeth you should be just fine.

What you want to do is take your bowl and mix some hydrogen peroxide, not a lot, I would say maybe a bottle top full. Add in some water to dilute and then add in your baking soda and stir it together.

You want it to get to a nice thick consistency as you mix it together, once you have it you’re going to scoop it up onto your toothbrush.

How to get your dog to sit still

This is kind of tricky because a lot of dogs aren’t always a fan of getting their teeth brushed so the more that you play with your dog’s mouth the easier and or fun experience this is gonna be for them. All you want to do is make sure you have some treats and practice.

Take your finger or toothbrush and go all in the mouth, lift the lips behind and make sure that she understands that putting her hand or something in her mouth is not a scary thing. The more you do this the happier you will be and the easier it’ll be on your dog.

How To Get Her To Open Their Mouth

Take your hand put it on the bottom of their chin, thumb on one side forefinger on the other and then just take your forefinger on the back of the lip and go all the way back. She opens her mouth or at least will give you a nice pretty smile for you to do what you need to do.

Again if you have a big dog who’s not gonna sit as still ask a friend to help and then always have treats so that this process can go smoothly.

You really want to make sure you get all the way in the back of the teeth, that’s the most important since that’s where all the poop gets embedded so lift up all the way in the back and then do the same on the other side.

You don’t have to worry about hydrogen peroxide being dangerous, you can drink it as a human as long and we’re using such small amounts that it will not bother your dog but it would be different if they drink an entire bottle

If your dog is not a big fan of the baking soda paste and doesn’t really enjoy the taste go to your local pet supply stores where they will have toothpaste for dogs as well as scope and breath fresheners if that’s something that you’re really looking for to help freshen your dog’s breath.

The beautiful thing about getting the toothpaste from a pet store is that as long as you get it on the teeth then you’re good to go, it will do all the scrubbing and bubbles and making your dog’s breath clean for you.

It also comes in all different kind of flavors, chicken and beef flavors, your dog is sure to love.

So that’s how you brush your dog’s teeth with peroxide and baking soda after they have eaten poop.

source https://www.petdogfaq.com/how-to-stop-my-shih-tzu-from-eating-poop/

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lauramalchowblog · 5 years

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Whey Protein vs. Pea Protein

In response to the recent post on whey vs. collagen, a number of readers wrote in asking about pea protein. Today, I’m going to compare the two.

Before I begin, let’s get this out of the way: I’m biased toward whey protein. I sell the stuff. But the reason I sell whey protein is because I really like it, not the other way around. All my products are things that solved a problem I was having, an itch I needed to scratch. I made Primal Kitchen Mayo with avocado oil because I couldn’t find one without industrial seed oils and I didn’t want to make it fresh every time I wanted tuna salad. I put together Adaptogenic Calm (formerly Primal Calm) to help me and my buddies recover from heavy training. And so on. I made Primal Fuel out of whey protein isolate because it is the best gram-for-gram protein powder around. But pea protein is having its day in the sun now, and readers want the facts.

Common Arguments For Pea Protein

Is pea protein just as good as whey at building muscle?

Well, let’s take a look at the literature.

First of all, pea protein contains all 9 essential amino acids. That’s great.

Pea protein contains fewer branch chain amino acids—those amino acids that contribute most to muscle protein synthesis, but it does have them.

Pea protein is about 9% leucine, a very important amino acid for muscle building. Whey is 10-11% leucine, so pea comes pretty close.

In one study, resistance trained men and women in their 20s-40s were split into two groups. One group used pea protein. The other used whey protein. Both groups trained in the same manner (Crossfit-esque). At the end of 8 weeks they measured changes in muscle thickness, force production, and WOD (workout of the day) performance. Neither group had an advantage. Both groups gained about the same amount of muscle, performance, and force production.

In another study of resistance-training adults (men, aged 18-35), pea protein and whey protein resulted in similar bicep muscle gains.

That all looks pretty good for pea (and whey), but these were relatively young adults. As people age, the quality of the protein becomes ever more paramount. A young man or woman is hormonally primed for hypertrophy. Nature is working with them, not against them. If anything, they can actually get away with eating less protein than an older person of the same weight and still gain and maintain muscle because their ability to utilize dietary protein is optimized. Older people need more protein to do the same job because their ability to utilize dietary protein has degraded.

Not only do older people need high quantities of protein, they need high quality protein—bioavailable protein full of amino acids that promote muscle protein synthesis. Whey is simply higher quality on a biological level than pea protein. That difference may not show up as much in the younger person lifting and drinking protein shakes to increase their calories for mass gain, but it certainly shows up in the older person lifting and drinking protein shakes and trying to hold on to their lean mass.

Okay. You’re younger. You’re eating plenty of calories. You’re trying to gain weight. Your muscle protein synthesis capacities are optimal. You should, in theory, be fine with pea protein. Right? Sure, but why?

Pea protein is usually more expensive. It’s still technically lower quality than whey. The best justification for using pea protein to gain/maintain muscle is either you’ve got an uncle who works at a pea protein processing plant and can get you a great deal, or you’re vegan. That’s it.

All that said, pea protein looks to be the best plant-based protein around for performance in the gym. No arguments there.

What about high blood pressure? I’ve seen claims that pea protein can lower it.

Perhaps. In hypertensive rodents (probably working high stress jobs, enduring long commutes, and generally deep into the rat race), pea protein causes drastic reductions in high blood pressure, while the reductions are much more modest in humans taking pea protein daily for three weeks.

Whey does it too. In humans, a single dose of whey protein after a meal reduces postprandial blood pressure and improves arterial stiffness for up to 5 hours. It may just be the protein. Extra protein in general is great at lowering blood pressure, especially if you remove carbohydrates.

The (Relatively) Unique Strengths Of Whey Protein

The thing about protein powder is this—although whey gets most of its accolades on account of its effect on hypertrophy—gains, larger muscles, better performance, etc.—that’s not everything it can do. It also has some very unique health effects that other protein powders, most especially plant proteins like pea, do not possess.

Whey is anti-allergenic.

On the one hand, whey intolerance is the dairy protein intolerance with the lowest incidence. People are far more likely to be intolerant of or allergic to casein. But whey isn’t just less likely to be allergenic. It’s downright anti-allergenic. Whey-based formulas have shown efficacy in the prevention of allergic diseases like asthma and eczema in susceptible children and infants.

There’s no evidence that pea protein powder can do this.

Whey is anti-stress.

In “high-stress” subjects, a whey protein shake improved cognitive function and performance by increasing serotonin levels. The same shake had no effect on “low-stress” subjects. And dietary whey also lowers oxidative brain stress, at least in mice.

Pea protein may do this, but I haven’t seen the research.

Whey boosts antioxidant capacity.

Whey protein is one of the best foods we know that increase levels of glutathione—the body’s master antioxidant. We use glutathione to detoxify the liver, to metabolize alcohol and other toxic substances, to control allergic reactions, to recycle and restore to active status vitamins and antioxidants, to quell free radicals, and to perform many other vital processes.

There is simply no evidence that pea protein has the same effect. It doesn’t have enough cysteine.

Whey transforms when you digest it.

Once the whey protein hits your GI tract, many different bioactive peptides with their own unique effects are formed. In a recent review (PDF), a team of Polish researchers explored the effects of at least nine of these whey-derived peptides. Some improve blood lipids, lower blood pressure, or act as opioid receptor agonists (if you’ve ever seen a milk-drunk baby bliss out after nursing, his opioid receptors are likely being severely agonized by bioactive peptides). Others induce satiety and improve metabolic health biomarkers.

I’m sure other proteins change when digested, but their effects haven’t been studied as closely as whey.

Bioactive Components In Whey (But Not Pea Protein)

There are also a number of bioactive components in whey protein that are not in pea protein:

Beta-lactoglobulin

Promotes glutathione synthesis and reduces allergic disease incidence.

Improves retinol/vitamin A absorption and uptake.

Alpha-lactoalbumin

Protects against seizure in epileptic rats.

Increases serotonin levels in plasma.

May have anti-tumor effects.

Lactoferrin

Improves bone healing and prevents bone loss.

Chelates excessive iron, preventing it from fueling infections (many bacteria require iron), increasing inflammation, or becoming carcinogenic.

Has anti-bacterial effects against food pathogens like E. coli and Listeria.

Immuno-globulins (A, M, G)

Neutralize toxins from viruses and bacteria.

Prevent adhesion of bacteria to tissues.

Inhibit bacterial growth.

Could pea protein have similar aspects that have yet to be quantified and studied? Perhaps. But I doubt it.

After all, whey was designed by evolutionary processes to be food for other entities. It’s meant to be consumed—that’s its express purpose, and it’s why it has so many interesting bioactive components that support health. Pea protein was not, and likely does not.

Again, if you’re vegan and looking to gain muscle, pea protein is a great choice. But if you’re not, and you’re interested in other aspects of health, whey protein is the much better option.

Thanks for reading, everyone. Take care!

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References:

Banaszek A, Townsend JR, Bender D, Vantrease WC, Marshall AC, Johnson KD. The Effects of Whey vs. Pea Protein on Physical Adaptations Following 8-Weeks of High-Intensity Functional Training (HIFT): A Pilot Study. Sports (Basel). 2019;7(1)

Babault N, Païzis C, Deley G, et al. Pea proteins oral supplementation promotes muscle thickness gains during resistance training: a double-blind, randomized, Placebo-controlled clinical trial vs. Whey protein. J Int Soc Sports Nutr. 2015;12(1):3.

Teunissen-beekman KF, Dopheide J, Geleijnse JM, et al. Protein supplementation lowers blood pressure in overweight adults: effect of dietary proteins on blood pressure (PROPRES), a randomized trial. Am J Clin Nutr. 2012;95(4):966-71.

Bumrungpert A, Pavadhgul P, Nunthanawanich P, Sirikanchanarod A, Adulbhan A. Whey Protein Supplementation Improves Nutritional Status, Glutathione Levels, and Immune Function in Cancer Patients: A Randomized, Double-Blind Controlled Trial. J Med Food. 2018;21(6):612-616.

Chandra RK. Food hypersensitivity and allergic diseases. Eur J Clin Nutr. 2002;56 Suppl 3:S54-6.

Markus CR, Olivier B, De haan EH. Whey protein rich in alpha-lactalbumin increases the ratio of plasma tryptophan to the sum of the other large neutral amino acids and improves cognitive performance in stress-vulnerable subjects. Am J Clin Nutr. 2002;75(6):1051-6.

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jesseneufeld · 5 years

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Whey Protein vs. Pea Protein

In response to the recent post on whey vs. collagen, a number of readers wrote in asking about pea protein. Today, I’m going to compare the two.

Common Arguments For Pea Protein

Is pea protein just as good as whey at building muscle?

Well, let’s take a look at the literature.

First of all, pea protein contains all 9 essential amino acids. That’s great.

Pea protein contains fewer branch chain amino acids—those amino acids that contribute most to muscle protein synthesis, but it does have them.

Pea protein is about 9% leucine, a very important amino acid for muscle building. Whey is 10-11% leucine, so pea comes pretty close.

In another study of resistance-training adults (men, aged 18-35), pea protein and whey protein resulted in similar bicep muscle gains.

All that said, pea protein looks to be the best plant-based protein around for performance in the gym. No arguments there.

What about high blood pressure? I’ve seen claims that pea protein can lower it.

The (Relatively) Unique Strengths Of Whey Protein

Whey is anti-allergenic.

There’s no evidence that pea protein powder can do this.

Whey is anti-stress.

Pea protein may do this, but I haven’t seen the research.

Whey boosts antioxidant capacity.

There is simply no evidence that pea protein has the same effect. It doesn’t have enough cysteine.

Whey transforms when you digest it.

I’m sure other proteins change when digested, but their effects haven’t been studied as closely as whey.

Bioactive Components In Whey (But Not Pea Protein)

There are also a number of bioactive components in whey protein that are not in pea protein:

Beta-lactoglobulin

Promotes glutathione synthesis and reduces allergic disease incidence.

Improves retinol/vitamin A absorption and uptake.

Alpha-lactoalbumin

Protects against seizure in epileptic rats.

Increases serotonin levels in plasma.

May have anti-tumor effects.

Lactoferrin

Improves bone healing and prevents bone loss.

Chelates excessive iron, preventing it from fueling infections (many bacteria require iron), increasing inflammation, or becoming carcinogenic.

Has anti-bacterial effects against food pathogens like E. coli and Listeria.

Immuno-globulins (A, M, G)

Neutralize toxins from viruses and bacteria.

Prevent adhesion of bacteria to tissues.

Inhibit bacterial growth.

Could pea protein have similar aspects that have yet to be quantified and studied? Perhaps. But I doubt it.

Again, if you’re vegan and looking to gain muscle, pea protein is a great choice. But if you’re not, and you’re interested in other aspects of health, whey protein is the much better option.

Thanks for reading, everyone. Take care!

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References:

Chandra RK. Food hypersensitivity and allergic diseases. Eur J Clin Nutr. 2002;56 Suppl 3:S54-6.

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northsyria04-blog · 5 years

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How to Cook Tofu: Easy & Delicious Tofu Recipes

Once you learn how to cook tofu you’ll have a whole new appreciation for this ancient food! There are so many ways to make it, but here are 3 easy and delicious tofu recipes to get started with.

Tofu. Growing up I didn’t like the stuff. It’s one of my dad’s favorite foods, so I could always depend on being served something with tofu when I was at his house. I’d let the sauce soak into my rice and avoid all of the marinated blocks of tofu and most of the veggies. I was such a picky kid. So ungrateful! Here I was being served perfectly prepared tofu made with love, and I couldn’t get past the fact that it had a funny texture and an equally funny name.

Now as an adult, I can appreciate tofu fully. I still haven’t managed to incorporate it into my diet as much as my dad does, but I’m more fond of it than ever before. Over the years I’ve learned and experienced how truly versatile and nourishing this humble soy bean curd can be. I’ve had it incorporated into the most luxurious vegan desserts, transformed into the crispiest “tenders,” and fermented to umami heaven. I’ve relied on it as a hearty filling breakfast, and the perfect savory late night snack. I’m finally starting to see why my dad is such a fan.

What is tofu? First created in China over 2,000 years ago, tofu is a bean curd made from soy beans. Soy beans are turned into a milk, then curdled to make all varieties of tofu: silken, soft, firm, or extra-firm. Since its creation all those years ago, tofu has become an important part of many Asian cuisines, and has quite recently become popular around the world. In the United States tofu is almost only eaten for vegetarians and vegans, and thought of as a meat replacement.

However, in Asia tofu isn’t part of a separate culinary category. It became a traditional staple food throughout the region, for all parts of the population, vegetarian or not. Though it is true that Zen Buddhist monks enjoy(ed) tofu as a replacement for meat.

Nutrition

Tofu’s high protein content does make it a perfect dietary alternative to meat. Unlike most beans, soy beans contain all of the different amino acids that the human body must get from food, making tofu a “complete protein.” Tofu is also a fantastic source of calcium, iron, manganese, magnesium, copper, selenium, omega-3 fatty acids, zinc, and vitamin B. Soy beans, and thus tofu, also contain an impressive variety of phytonutrients that help protect our bodies from diseases like cancer (source). Consumption of soy has been linked to a lower risk of breast cancer and prostate cancer (source).

Soy products like tofu have also been shown to lower cholesterol and heart disease risk. Since heart disease is the #1 killer in the United States, followed by cancer, think of how important those benefits truly are. Imagine the improvement in American health if people replaced meat and dairy products with nutrient-dense, plant-based alternatives like soy. We’d have a very different society, maybe even one in which the fight for basic healthcare isn’t the number one priority and stressor for millions, and in which the medical industry isn’t able to make billions of dollars a year selling us expensive pharmaceuticals and procedures for preventable lifestyle diseases.

So much controversy! You may have heard the never-ending controversy over whether or not soy is a health food or a harmful food. It irks me that this conversation is happening at all given the thousands of years of evidence showing that soy is a healthy part of a balanced plant-based diet. In China and Japan, two countries known for their regular consumption of soy products, rates of cancer and heart-disease have traditionally been very low.

It’s true that traditionally most cultures in China and Japan (and throughout the world) have eaten a plant-based diet (not to be confused with completely vegan), so it’s a given that heart disease and cancer would be a rare occurrence. However, so much of what people currently fear about soy products in the United States is that soy will give them cancer. Where is the scientific evidence of this? In fact, as I discussed above, scientific evidence shows that soy consumption is linked to a lower risk of some cancers.

GMO

Another fear people have is that all soy is GMO, or genetically modified. While most soy is genetically modified in the United States, the majority of that soy is used to make processed soy products like soybean oil and soy protein isolates, which are used to make junk food, and for animal feed. Most minimally processed soy products like tofu are non-GMO and often organic. Don’t believe me? Take a look at the labels the next time you’re at the grocery store. Since the impacts of GMO plants are not fully understood yet, I advise avoiding them as much as possible. The best way to do that is to avoid highly processed foods and junk foods (including at fast food restaurants, where they often use soybean oil for frying, among other things).

Estrogen

What about estrogen? The other huge American preoccupation with soy is the fact that it contains phytoestrogens. Some Americans fear that consumption of phytoestrogens will interact adversely with our human estrogen and result in reproductive issues and even cancer. First, it’s important to know that many plants contain this form of estrogen: flaxseed, oats, other beans, lentils, wheat, and more. Common sense tells us that these are all healthy foods, yet soy stands out as the one bad guy.

Studies show that soy products do not cause “man boobs” or reproductive cancers. There may be some concern for women who have had estrogen-sensitive breast cancer, but otherwise moderate amounts of soy are shown to have protective benefits. If you are afraid of the effects of estrogen from outside the body one thing you should make sure to do is to avoid all animal products. Too much mammalian estrogen may lead to reproductive problems and cancer. Obviously you are an animal, not a plant, so it makes sense that adding too much of the type of estrogen you’ve already got can be harmful.

Keep in mind that while the United States is the world’s largest producer of soybeans, Americans on average eat less soy in a year than the Japanese eat in one day. The rate of death from heart disease in the US is about double the rate in Japan. And the US’s rate of cancer is about 50% higher than Japan’s. Meanwhile, in the United States, those who eat a vegan diet have the lowest rates of heart disease and cancer, as well as other common lifestyle disease like type 2 diabetes and obesity, compared to vegetarians and meat-eaters (source). Of course, diet is only one among the many factors that affect these rates, but explain to me how these statistics support the idea that tofu is somehow connected to adverse health outcomes?

We’ve gotten that out of the way, so now we can talk food! Tofu is cheap, readily available, and highly nutritious. Thankfully it’s also very easy to make. Below are 3 simple recipes you should try if you’re new to tofu.

Easy Tofu Scramble | How to Cook Tofu

Make sure you press your tofu for the best results. To press tofu, simply drain and remove it from the package, wrap it in a couple layers of paper towel or a kitchen towel, put it in a container or plate, and place a heavy object on top (I always use a full tea kettle). Allow it to sit and press for about 1 hour. If you forgot to press it, a quick 20 minute press will do.

Author: Jenné

Serves: 2-4

Ingredients

1 tablespoon grapeseed oil (or other cooking oil)

½ yellow onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, minced

½ red bell pepper, diced

1 block firm tofu, pressed and mashed

1-2 vegan sausages (I used Field Roast brand), diced

2 tablespoons nutritional yeast

½ teaspoon turmeric

1 teaspoon salt, plus more to taste

1 teaspoon black pepper

cayenne pepper to taste, optional

Instructions

Warm oil in a large skillet or frying pan.

Sauté the onions, garlic, and red pepper on medium heat until onions are translucent.

At the tofu and vegan sausage followed by ½ teaspoon salt and stir well. Cook for about 10 minutes, stirring halfway.

Add the nutritional yeast and turmeric, the remaining salt and black pepper (and cayenne if you want), and stir again.

Cook another 5 minutes.

Serve!

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Crispy Tofu Tacos | How to Cook Tofu

Be sure to press your tofu at least one hour for this recipe for maximum crispiness. Notes on pressing tofu scramble recipe above. Feel free to use other spices for this crispy tofu. It's also great with Ethiopian berbere and Indian curry.

Ingredients

2 tablespoon grapeseed oil (or other cooking oil)

1 block extra firm tofu, pressed and cubed

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon chili powder

½ teaspoon salt

8 corn tortillas

4 leaves romaine lettuce, chopped

½ cup salsa

1 avocado, sliced or mashed

¼ cup red onion, thinly sliced (or try pickled red onions)

Instructions

Place the cubed tofu in a mixing bowl. Sprinkle on the cumin powder, chili powder, and salt, then toss the bowl to thoroughly coat the tofu.

Warm the oil in a skillet or frying pan on medium-high heat.

Add the tofu, then use a spoon to spread the cubes evenly onto the skillet.

Cook for about 5 minutes on medium heat, then flip the tofu.

Continue doing this every 5 minutes, until all sides of the tofu are golden brown and begin to crisp up, about 30 minutes total.

Warm your tortillas over a gas flame or microwave, keeping them warm between the folds of a kitchen towel.

Once ready, fill the tortillas with the crispy tofu, romaine lettuce, salsa, avocado, and red onion.

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How to Cook Tofu: Easy & Delicious Tofu Recipes

Total time

1 hour 15 mins

No need to press the tofu for this recipe. It's best with firm tofu, not extra firm, though either works. If you have extra tofu cheese leftover use it as a spread, dip, or in pasta. Note: Be sure to factor in the time it takes for the dough to rise when looking at the cook time. You can premade pizza dough at the store if you'd rather not make your own.

Author: Jenné

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

Pizza Dough

½ teaspoon sugar

½ envelope active dry yeast

¾ cups water, 110 degrees F

2 cups white whole wheat flour, bread flour, or all purpose flour + more for kneading

1 teaspoons kosher salt

4 teaspoons olive oil

cornmeal, just a little for sprinkling on baking sheet

Tofu Cheese

1 block of firm organic tofu

½ cup nutritional yeast

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

1½ tsp sea salt

Instructions

Pizza dough

Combine the water, yeast, and sugar in a glass bowl, and stir well.

Mix the flour and salt together in a mixing bowl.

Make a well in the center of the bowl and pour in the yeast water.

Stir well with a wooden spoon, and then knead the dough with your hands.

Transfer the dough onto a floured workspace, and knead lightly to form the dough into a ball.

Place the dough ball into another mixing bowl coated in a light layer of olive oil.

Cover the mixing bowl with plastic wrap, or an equivalent to seal, and set aside for one hour to let the dough rise.

Tofu Cheese & Assembly

While the dough is rising make your tofu cheese: place the tofu in a food processor, along with the nutritional yeast, apple cider vinegar, and salt. Blend until creamy, then set aside until you’re ready to use it for the pizza.

Once the dough has doubled or nearly tripled in size, remove it from the mixing bowl, and knead it into a ball again.

Cut the ball in half or quarter, and form them into smaller balls.

Place each ball onto a plate, and cover with a slightly damp and clean kitchen towel. Allow to set for 10 minutes.

Preheat oven to 500°.

Sprinkle some cornmeal onto a large baking sheet, press your pizza dough directly onto it (to prevent sticking), and flatten the dough into a thin pizza crust shape.

Top with your pizza topping: sauce, of course, always goes first, then tofu cheese, then basil.

Bake for 10-12 minutes. Serve immediately, and enjoy!

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Check out these other amazing tofu recipes on my blog: Broccoli & Crispy Tofu, Sweet Potato & Tofu Curry. And don’t sleep on tempeh––fermented tofu cake––it’s delicious: BBQ Tempeh Sandwich, Maple Mustard Tempeh Salad, Smokey Tempeh & Kale Salad, and Classic Tempeh Tacos .

Source: http://sweetpotatosoul.com/2018/08/how-to-cook-tofu.html

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honeynuggetslife · 5 years

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I just love your thin, frizzy hair – said no one ever

For those of you who suffer under the weightlessness of thin and porous hair, there’s hope.

Sure, the idea of growing it is about as fanciful as a talking pig riding a unicorn over a rainbow.

However, Against all odds (and there many, many odds) I have grown my thin and porous hair to my elbows. It has the juiciness and weight of healthy hair and shows no signs of discontent.

Don’t know if you have porous hair? Thegoodwifebeauty has a great how-to. Essentially, if your hair is always fuzzy and resistant to all things sleek, it’s probably porous.

Photo by Livin4wheel on Unsplash

Nutrition

You are what you eat, we get it. Moving along.

Organic iron supplement

Iron supplements are notorious for waging spartan style battles with the stomach. No one is interested in swapping lethargy for bloating, nausea and constipation.

This is why you need the organic variety. I have been taking organic iron tablets for 3 years and have not experienced a single negative side effect.

If you take it consistently, you should notice your hair thining a little less after about a month. If you continue to take it, the new growth will add volume to the old growth, albeit very slowly. The new growth will no longer be taxed in replacing older and longer growth as it abandons the scalp in droves.

Organic iron will not thicken your hair strands. That will take divine intervention.

However, it has the added bonus of hardening your nails and bringing an end to cursed peel. You may also develop a healthier glow to your skin and eyes.

Wins – many, losses – 0.

Zinc

I have read that Zinc encourages quicker hair growth and regulates the oil around the follicle. My experience with zinc supplements reflects this.

However, before you take a zinc supplement, read the label carefully. If taken on an empty stomach, it will likely cause nausea. Honestly, you have been warned. Further, I believe it cannot be taken over a lengthy period of time and breaks are required.

Protein

This deserves a mention because hairdressers will insist you apply “repair” products, which are predominantly protein-based, whilst in the same breath, tell you to be careful not to apply too much protein to the hair. There is doom at either end of this vague tunnel of trickery.

Unless you have been violating your hair with regular unprotected heat and endless chemicals, I very much doubt a lack of protein is a contributing factor to your hair woes. The planet is protein obsessed and to be honest, I’ve grown tired of the word.

The chances that you are not getting enough protein in your diet or in your hair products is highly unlikely.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Circulation

Getting regular blood flow to the scalp will make a noticeable difference in the density of your hair. Infrared energy devices that encourage blood flow to the scalp are used by hair loss clinics for this very reason.

Don’t rush out to buy an infrared device just yet. I purchased a very expensive infrared cap from a hair loss clinic about 4 years ago and noticed no difference what so ever. Well, other than a lesser bank balance.

The best way to increase circulation around the root of your hair is boring ol’ exercise. Regular exercise not only improved the density of my hair, but it also visibly reduced its porosity.

Now I am not suggesting you sign up to Ninja Warrior. However, 30 minutes of exercise at least 4 days a week, with enough intensity to get your face and scalp sweating will improve the quality of your hair over time, guaranteed, abnormalities aside.

Photo by bruce mars on Pexels.com

Cold Water

Nothing beats cold water for closing the hair cuticle, reducing its porosity. It’s free and simple. It will give your hair a gloss that a product will never equal.

All you have to do is rinse your conditioner or treatment (whichever you apply last) of with nothing but straight up, cold water. The colder the better.

This is torture at first and in winter, the cold water can give you brain freeze. If you stick with it, you will eventually climatise. Your hair only needs to be under the cold water long enough to ensure all of your strands are officially cold, which is usually about 10 seconds.

The most comfortable way to do this is to flip your head upside down so you can hold it under the cold water while your body remains safe. Alternatively, you can save the rinse off for the bathroom sink whilst your body is snuggly wrapped up in your towel.

Consistency will slowly reduce the porosity of your hair and improve strand density.

If you rinse with cold water each time you wet your hair, it will continue to close the cuticle. A closed cuticle will trap more moisture within the hair shaft. Your hair will also be more resistant to damage as the closed cuticle will provide a stronger shield.

Wetting your hair opens the cuticle. The longer you can keep it closed and coated, the better.

As your hair is thin and porous it will likely look dirty (as opposed to oily) by the day following a wash. Resist the temptation to wash your hair every day. Wash your hair as few times in a week as you can pull off.

To last longer in between washes, you can hold your head upside down and blast the hair at your scalp with the hair dryer on its cool setting. This will help to dry the oil. Then use your dry shampoo or corn starch as you ordinarily would.

Photo by Juha Lakaniemi on Unsplash

Products

Cheap conditioner – the miracle cure

Conditioner is the most important thing for protecting your hair. This really struck me when I read that conditioner protects against heat damage far more effectively than products specifically sold for heat protection.

Buy a cheap and watery conditioner intended to moisturise your hair. I found Sunsilk (the pink bottle) perfect for this.

Step 1.

Before you wash your hair, whilst it is dry, load up the mid-lengths to ends with the cheap conditioner until they are drenched. If you can do this sometime before your shower to allow the conditioner time to soak in, even better, however, this isn’t make or break.

The purpose of this step is to give your shampoo something to wash before it gets to wash away the natural oils in your hair.

Do not add conditioner to the hair around your scalp. Ever! Your natural oils are more than enough.

Step 2.

Wash the hair at your scalp only, with quality shampoo (discussed below). As you rinse the shampoo out, the soap will run down, through the rest of your hair. As your hair is thin and porous, I promise you, this is enough.

If you have loaded up on dry shampoo and need a second wash, do it, but again, only the hair at your scalp.

Don’t worry about build up of product. Your hair will receive a thrashing at the basin of your hairdresser at each appointment.

Photo by Element5 Digital on Unsplash

Step 3.

After shampooing, apply a quality thick cream or balm hair treatment (discussed below), coating your hair from the ends up to mid-length only. To be safe, stay closer toward the ends.

Alternatively, you can simply apply the cheap conditioner again as you would ordinarily use conditioner. Do not apply the treatment or conditioner to the hair around your scalp. Ever!

Now, I know you have thin hair and thick balms weigh it down. I understand hairdressers everywhere tell you that you need “light” everything – I call bollocks

Thick creams and balms are a blessing for porous hair. Avoiding the scalp will help to balance the heaviness of the balm and minimise the chances of your hair looking like a dead weight.

Step 4.

Rinse with icy old water.

Step 5.

Squeeze the water out of your hair with a towel. Never rub or rough as this will open the cuticle defeating all of your hard work.

While your hair is still wet, apply the cheap watery conditioner from the ends to the mid-lengths in the same way you would use a regular leave in conditioner product. You can afford to be more on the generous side here. Do not apply it to the hair at the scalp or soak your hair in it as you would if you were in the shower.

Comb the conditioner through with a wide tooth comb.

Simply replace your leave-in conditioner with legitimate cheap conditioner. Once your hair is completely dry, it will be juicier than it usually is and carries the weight of denser hair. No more floating in the air like fluff.

As your hair dries, it will go through a hideous phase. Bare with it, it becomes more glamorous once it has completely dried.

The key here is a cheap watery conditioner. Not the nasty stuff or fancy and expensive conditioner. I’ve tried and the results are nowhere near as good.

I believe the cheap watery conditioner works best due to its moisture to residue ratio. It has plenty of water for your hair to soak up and leaves just enough residue to coat the hair and seal the water in.

Step 6.

If your hair is long enough, you can also tie your hair in a loose bun until it dries. Once you let it out, you will have loose juicy curls.

Otherwise, now that your hair slightly more glamorous than it was yesterday, carry on with life.

Brushing and Straightening

I found that straightening my hair once the cheap conditioner has dried, achieves a better result than any other product I have used

Try to use only a wide tooth comb on your hair if possible. This is literally, all I own to brush my hair.

If you choose not to straighten your hair, which I do more often than not, avoid brushing it at all once it is dry. This shouldn’t be much of an issue with the messy look and conditioner in your hair preventing tangles.

Photo by Valerie Elash on Unsplash

Making the cut

This business about having to get your hair cut every 6 – 8 weeks is nonsense. Following this regime often mean you are only cutting off what you have just managed to grow.

It’s not a secret – blunt cuts and a fringe help to make thin hair appear thicker. Boring I know. I also only get my hair trimmed every 10 – 12 weeks and limit the snip to the scraggy tips only.

Let it grow

For 2 years the only hair product I used, other than shampoo and the odd experiment, was Sunsilk conditioner (the pink bottle). That’s it. I did not use any other in shower treatment, heat protection, leave in conditioners, straightening balms, curling sprays, oils, anything.

It is the single best beauty discovery I have ever made. The monetary saving was also brilliant.

I am confident that I have used a majority of salon and store brand hair products. Sunsilk (the pink bottle), used in the way described above, moisturised and protected my hair far better than any other product I have ever used.

So…I just do that forever?

At first, I recommend using a gentle natural shampoo for oily hair from say, a health food store. Contrary to what hairdressers insist, my experience with salon products is that, unless my hair is already in great condition, salon products make the hair much worse.

Once the quality of your hair has improved you can change to the more industrial strength salon products. If you swap to a salon product and find your hair in decline, just go back to the hippie shampoo until your hair ready for a more serious commitment.

In the past year, I swapped my shampoo to Joico for fine limp hair (green bottle). I have also swapped my in shower Sunsilk conditioner with Joico treatments. I simply apply the treatment as I ordinarily would a conditioner.

I recommend Joice Moisture Recovery Treatment Balm, for when you intend to apply a lot of heat to your hair. This is because it is incredibly thick and coats the hair very well. Your hair will be juicy and feel dense.

Constant use of the balm will become far too heavy for thin hair. I recommend alternating with Joico K-Pack Care Intense Hydrator (the gold one) for when you’re doing beach hair or the office up-dos.

When you first start using a thick cream or balm (discussed below), your hair may look greasy. However, if you straighten or blow dry, the greasy appearance (not your hair) will dry up. Further, your hair adapts and will stop looking greasy after some time.

If I use the Joico K-Pak, I recommend also using the VO5 Heat Protection spray on the mid-lengths to ends after towel drying. This spray is exceptional at giving the hair the appearance of a closed cuticle and also adds texture.

However, I have found nothing better than cheap conditioner as a leave-in protective conditioner.

How to Grow Thin Porous Hair I just love your thin, frizzy hair - said no one ever For those of you who suffer under the weightlessness of thin…

#Beauty #hair #hair growth #hair hacks #hairstyle #healthy hair #tips

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clarencebfaber · 6 years