My health itself has not been the greatest. Never has been and the heat here has taken it's toll on me one too many times. I don't think I could ever go live or visit a very humid or hot country. I wouldn't survive it with my asthma, arthritis etc. The past couple weeks here in Ontario are not so bad but just prior to that we had a heat wave of which was counted as one of the hottest on record and warnings of the humid x were quite high. I had heat exhaustion just from bringing groceries up to my apartment on my own. I only have 2 osculating fans in my apartment and can't afford air conditioning like some.
This leads me into the first topic of this entry, the heat. First off you should always drink lots of water and as I learned I did the quick and best thing I could have done without knowing really when having heat exhaustion. I used frozen cloths and put them on major places such as head, stomach and feet to cool myself and bring my temperature where it needed to be. I drank a ton of water, but you should also drink anything with electrolytes in it such as sports drinks or even fruit juice because your body goes on a mass dehydration. I got this from the Mayo Clinic site. Feel free to check it out as it's a link to the side here on this blog about heat cramps, exhaustion and heat stroke. This being said many don't know the signs and symptoms nor do they believe that pets also can get sick from the heat as well as children and elderly are more prone to heat stroke. So please take caution.
Now that being said, my question to the public is why are we now needing any warning or seeing more and more frequency of children and pets being left in parked cars in parking lots of places such as Walmart or other shopping centers?Why are parents thinking that only 15 min is sufficient to leave their child out in the car unsupervised in the heat or leaving them at all!? Why do we need reminders that you in fact have your child with you? We shouldn't, right? As animals it should be our nature to protect our children and watch them and keep them healthy and safe right? But it seems that it's become more and more common these days to do so and multiple deaths have occurred across the nation. This has sparked some debate even among my friends on facebook of which I have to agree with one commenter who believes it to be something that should be charged by law, as it would be if it were murder. These comments were made by people who are parents, and even my own parents and a perfect stranger in a Tim Horton's can't comprehend as parents, grandparents and caregivers why one would possibly "forget" your child which was what one poster stated. That these situations are those that are parents out of routine and that they are accidents. There is no accident when you consciously leave your child, it's one thing for 10 seconds to get out and say "omg yes! I have little Sally or Johnny with me! I should put them in the cart and get them out of the car seat!" But it's another to consciously get out of your vehicle, know you have them with you, lock up and say "I'll be right back, it'll only be a few min while I grab some water and bread or hot dogs" and then leave them there! Not only are you setting the kid up to be possibly kidnapped but you're setting them up to die in the heat or extreme cold. Toddlers and little babies and pets, they don't know when to drink or untie themselves and roll down a window, they don't know where you're going or understand what "right back" means. They just know you're leaving them in the heat, in the cold, alone. To me if you do this you must not be in a sound state of mind and should not have kids or should not have them with you, they should be with someone who is going to take care of them.
Further let's talk about how industry affects children when it comes to toys. Now a while back I had mentioned the McDonald's toy debate, and in fact there are some kids who now actually believe that this is a gimmick for them to encourage buying of fast food and becoming obese. But again I say that it's not the gimmick it's the parents who have to decide and who are on the go and make that decision in the end to give their children this food because it's fast, easy, sometimes cheap and the lazy option rather than spending time to cook or make a solid lunch or breakfast. Now I admit that I'm not new to this and I myself will sometimes on my way home with a friend stop on a Friday night but I do say to myself, I'm being lazy, I don't want to cook tonight. Should I be cooking, probably but when it's 9pm and you're exhausted and hot why would you want to and why not have someone cook for you? I too also recall as a child wanting to collect the toys and play with them but it was a treat, it was a rare occasion that we were able to. Some parents do this, every single day! That being said we've also become lazy in that we don't go outside and play, we use TV as the babysitter or ipods and cellphones or tablets. We aren't spending time with our children encouraging reading, crafts, outdoors. And even schools have cut back on playtime and we're making little robots of information with the expectation that even in Kindergarten they're going to sit still and do work. When I was a kid, I played with dump trucks, dolls and sand and got dirty. I played in the mud. Now it's a "let's keep our kids locked in a bubble" and girls must play with girl toys and boys must play with boy toys? Wait a minute, no that can't be right, can it? Now I'm not going to get into an entire debate on the whole sexual orientation concept right now, that'll be another blog. However kids should play with toys that are educational and encourage them to be who they are or whatever they want to be. I remember playing with my nephew, who is 3 years old, months back, and he stated he wanted to be a builder while playing with large Lego blocks; then out of the blue he said, "I don't want to be a builder", he wanted to be something else. I and my parents both told him he could be whatever he wanted. But kids are discouraged these days and girls playing with Barbies is no different.
Barbie has always been an icon and though she's seen some decline in market due to other dolls etc. she is still popular and has made some changes in how she looks. She definitely looks more normal now with the changes. This now leads me to my body shaming topic of this week. There are a few posts and videos I'd like to share. Let's start with the criticizing of Kate, Duchess of Cambridge, shall we. Link 1, and Link 2. I really feel like women shouldn't be ashamed of themselves for having kids, and in today's society we are so consumed with this need to be super thin that we aren't thinking about our actual health. And in fact we are also being fooled by photo manipulation by health companies. Doesn't surprise me in the least.
This post here I was proud to read and know that love knows no boundaries when it comes to size. That's how it should be! In fact, hundreds of years ago, if you didn't have weight you weren't capable of being married. Why? 1. No dowry, 2. you had no money cause you weren't eating well in their eyes, 3. you couldn't bear children because you didn't have the hips and body for it. Says something about the "evolving" of the human race doesn't it? In fact one of the most common sculptures in art history is one of the Venus figurines from the Neolithic period. Big breasts, full hips. This leads me to that there was a large debate on facebook about this deviant art post. I love the piece personally and think all the body types are beautiful. There were many posters arguing as to which type was or not and there were quite a few, though they did not outweigh the many who agreed that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, that were discriminatory and rude, if not downright cruel stating that the heavier ladies are disgusting. Well I have to admit that this goes the same way around and that men can be just as heavy. Admittedly too that when I look at a guy, a guy with plenty of extra on him is not my type however, I don't mind a bit of weight nor do I mind muscle but not excessively so. Healthy is key but don't overdo it. Personality, takes precedence. Here is yet another look at some cases of discrimination as well that I find disturbing, what's wrong with the human race!!?
Going forward let's talk about food health. Apparently one woman found what seemed like mold, or an icky wormy slime up through the straw of a juice box. Now there is an icky thought for you! Apparently in some enclosed juice boxes, in this case Capris juice, there is the potential that it could be opened and exposed to air and cause mold. I've encountered it if it's gone bad and there is on occasion risk even with a see through bottle that there could be a mold to it but at least you can see before purchase. Here is the link to the video interview. Further more apparently packaging meat companies and store employees don't pay attention to what they are packing and putting on shelves. Chicken feet were found in a pack of chicken breast at one store in the US. Though it is in fact part of the chicken and though some people mocked the woman,making fun of her saying that it is in fact a chicken part and therefore what do you expect? I know I would prefer that the other parts of the chicken were not in my chicken breast thanks. This means that the meat could be and probably was contaminated by the way and who knows where the other parts of the chicken were. I question if one just.. fell into the processing machine?
And this wraps up this week's blog. I hope everyone keeps their kids and yourself safe out of the extreme temperatures no matter where you live, encourage your children to play and enjoy life away from tech, be with them! Stop shaming ourselves, even if you, like me, do it and put yourselves down, we have to stop it! And always check packaging for random slimy things (drink out of clear bottles) or parts that don't belong! Take care everyone and until next... week I hope! :)
