Category Archives: Living Well

Thoughts about how to be an honorable person.

Renovation–Why Did We Wait?

 

Kitchen renovation

New & Improved

For over 10 years, my wife and I talked about installing hardwood floors to replace the original early ’90s carpets and kitchen vinyl, and about replacing the builder-grade cabinets that were literally crumbling near the floor.  Those talks always evolved into:  “Should we expand with an addition?”  “Do we really need a dining room?”  “Whoa–How much?!”  Agreeing on what it should all look like and deciding to commit the money were challenges that always stopped us in our tracks.

 

Until this year.  We finally settled upon a general plan and a far more general budget, set up a home equity loan, and invited contractors in for estimates.  With a contract signed and details sorted, in October a dumpster landed in the driveway and work was under way.

I’m not going to claim to be an expert on home remodeling, but there is one very important thing that I learned:  We shouldn’t have waited.

Driving to work one morning I realized how much brighter I was feeling with work on the house underway.  Wood, paint, a little (well, a lot) of expense–It all seems pretty straight-forward.  Now the house looks nicer, the kitchen is much more user-friendly…just what we were after.  But I have to admit that the benefits have been much more than what shows on the drawings and invoices.  We’re all actually happier in the space.  Not a “let’s show off what we’ve got” type of happy–more of a contentment.  In fact, except for the grandparents, we haven’t had anyone in since the work was done.  We’re just….happier.  More comfortable in a fresher house.

I just wish we had done this years ago.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Finding Peace, House & Home, Living Well

Sticking Around

Healthy Options

Healthy Options

Last August 19.  That’s when everything changed.

At the time, I was working out fairly regularly, but my routine was primarily moderate weight training (machines and dumbbells), with some floor exercises and a weekly volleyball league thrown in.  I was also eating pretty much anything and any amount I wanted.  I knew I had put on some pounds, but I would have said that overall I was in pretty good shape–maybe near the cut between the top and middle third of people my age.

Then my employer offered a discount on health insurance premiums to all staff who participated in a free health screening, with completely confidential results, and I signed up to save a few bucks.

For context, I should mention that on my way back to the office after my screening that afternoon I planned to stop for a particularly unhealthy but amazingly sybaritic fast food lunch that, even in my most self-indulgent days, I only allowed myself a few times a year.

I never had that meal.

As part of the screening, I was quizzed, weighed, measured, and finger-pricked.  And then I was counseled.  A representative of the health insurance company reviewed my results with me, and that conversation was a turning point.  My cholesterol number had come back higher than I expected.  Not head-straight-to-the-hospital high, but worry-about-family-history high?  Yup.

Cholesterol may have been the only word that would have gotten my attention so effectively.  Many of the people higher up in my family tree died younger than they should have, often from strokes.

I did a little research on lowering cholesterol, compared the information to what my counselor had offered, and downloaded a free app to help me manage my calories.  Fruit became a BIG part of my daily intake.  (I actually edited that last sentence:  I avoid the word diet, preferring the term lifestyle change.)  After talking to my family doctor, I added a little cardio to the gym routine.  Nothing all that impressive, but a little.  And 10 months and a reasonable amount of weight-loss later, I can honestly say I’m in the best shape of my adult life.  Room to keep going?  Sure.  But that total cholesterol number is now out of the “borderline” range.  (That having been said, my LDL/HDL balance needs work.  But at least now I’ve read enough to have a general idea what that means.)

Cardio

Cardio

I’m no expert on health, and I’m not going to pretend that I don’t have a strong, selfish drive to stay alive, but a piece of this extended commitment has been the idea that I owe it to my kids to do my best to still be around while they need me–and I’d like to spend time with my grandkids someday.

I try to avoid offering too much advice, but I would go so far as to suggest that if you have any questions about your cholesterol, get it checked.  And if you need to drop the cholesterol, consider full-time calorie counting on your phone to support slow but steady progress.

Be well.  Here’s to many more August 19ths.

 

Note:  DadKnowsBetter has not received any consideration whatsoever for saying so, but the app I have been using is My Fitness Pal, powered by Under Armour.  There may be other good options, but this one has been a helpful tool to me, so it seems right to say so.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Activities & Sports, Health, Living Well, Uncategorized

We Know Snow Days

Living in Maryland, in a typical year we have 2 or 3 days when our local schools are closed due to snow.  In rare, disappointing years, we have none.  But every few years the snow days just keep coming.  This has been one of those years!  (Note my exceedingly rare use of an exclamation point…..)

Personally, both as an educator and as a dad, I welcome the snow days…at least until we use up the number allowed for in the school calendar and face sacrificing 80 degree June days to make up the time.  Sleeping a little later than usual.  Slowing down a little for a day or two without homework, practices, or other evening activities.  Getting outside to build snowmen or sled.  All of these strike me as a healthy change of pace for my students, for my own children, and even for Mrs. DKB and myself.

This year the timing of one storm was perfect, giving us two days at home during the Winter Olympics, and my 10 year old and I were inspired to create our own skeleton-ish experience.  [Apologies for the rotation of the video.  I’m looking at this as a learning experience.]  

I will miss these days now and then later in the year.  Not necessarily on one of those 80 degree days, but certainly at other times.  Good times.

Leave a Comment

Filed under Appreciation, Dad Takes A Break, Living Well