April 2012 Birthday Catch-up: Spencer

We only got video on the big day, but here is Spencer the day after turning 29.

Picture courtesy of any number of children under 4 1/2 feet tall.

Overheard

Spencer: "It is less scary for me to stick a needle in someone's spine than to drive this."

Some 'Splainin to Do

July 2009

As Faith has mentioned before, we have made some pretty significant changes in our home. (Here, here, and here.) We spend a lot more time and money at Whole Foods, wear toe shoes, and are keeping the chickpea industry afloat.

All this may or may not be some sort of early mid-life crisis, possibly brought on by the fact that we will both be 29 soon and still in school. But mid-life crisis or not, we both feel like we are in a very good place physically, emotionally and spiritually.

I have considered writing this post for a while, not to brag, but in the hopes of helping to motivate someone else to make changes. Just looking at that picture of us in 2009 makes me realize how far we both have come. It is embarrassing for me personally to think what I let happen to my health.

For me, the change started in July 2010, when rotations began. The first 2 years of medical school are just books and lectures with very little clinical experience. Rotations, for years 3 and 4, are mostly clinical with some lectures here and there. My first rotation in July '10 was Internal Medicine. I spent 10-12 hours a day in the hospital. The majority of the patients were sick in the hospital because they did not take care of themselves. Most of them were overweight, if not obese. Years of neglect and food abuse brought them to that point. For me, it was a wake-up call. My family history is not riddled with Octogenarians. My Dad will be the first Cotterell man to see the age of 63 in 3 generations. I felt like a hypocrite talking to these patients about their health when I was not exactly taking care of mine. These feelings started small but grew until I decided to do something about it. So on August 18, 2010, I began paying attention.

I started with what I knew. (When considering it was after 2 years of medical education, it is sad to see what little is taught in medical school regarding nutrition and health.) Conventional Wisdom says that in order to lose weight, you need to decrease your intake and increase your output. I decided I needed to limit my food portions. I made a conscious effort to eat less and just by paying attention, I started to lose weight. Soon after my decision to do something, I read this and it helped solidify my commitment. I lost 10 pounds in 2 weeks. It was amazing to see how much weight I was maintaining just by overeating.

At this time, I didn't so much change what I was eating, I just changed how much I was eating. I was eating what I thought was a "healthy" diet. Lean meats, whole wheat bread/cereal/pasta, low-fat everything. I of course was also eating desserts and treats and whatnot. I just ate less of everything. Instead of eating 4 cookies, I would eat 2.

This tactic worked for 30 pounds. I tapered off by April and thought I was in a pretty good place. I had more energy and started exercising more. I started running and was running about 9 miles a week. People I hadn't seen in a while were complimenting me and, though it was embarrassing, it was nice to know I had changed enough for others to notice.

In the back of my mind I thought I could do even better, but I had hit a wall. I didn't lose much if any more weight from April to July.

Then in July Faith read the book Eat to Live and made changes outlined in this post. I was a little skeptical (because, hey, I am going to be a doctor. I know everything.) at first. But I read the book at the urging of Faith and started eating humble pie. Humble pie and lots of fruits and vegetables. I recommend the book to everyone because:

1. It is not a "diet" book. It is a book about how to live a more healthy life. The "problem" is that even though it is not a diet book, if you follow the principles in it, you will lose a ton of weight as you improve your overall health.
2. The book teaches well and the knowledge gained from it is incredibly empowering. You gain tools that allow you to filter out all the mis-information that is out there in regards to health and nutrition.
3. There are a whole lot of studies cited in the book. Dr Fuhrman manages to sort through a lot of data and presents it in a way that is clear and easy to understand.

*Side note. If you don't have time for the book, watch the documentary Forks Over Knives on Netflix. It is pretty much a 1.5 hour summary of the book.*

So after making these changes, I lost another 20 pounds from August to the end of the year. None of my clothes fit anymore. It is a nice problem to have. More than the weight loss though, I feel healthier than I ever have. Even looking back at the time I was playing Lacrosse at BYU, I feel I am healthier now. I have more energy. I am running a lot more than 9 miles a week (I ran 9 this morning). I have more energy to play with the kids and be the kind of dad I want to be. I have visions of a future where I will be keeping up with them and roughhousing the crud out of them.

Like I said at the beginning of the post. I do not want this to come across as bragging. I do this in the hope that at least one person will read and decide to make changes.

The picture at the beginning of the post is one we have hanging in our room. Before August 2010, I would see it next to our engagement picture and long to be "me" again.

Now I see it as a reminder that people can change.

As cheesy as it sounds, Faith and I decided to try to recreate the picture for an "after" picture. We wore the same shirts for effect. (Of course the above picture was taken by a professional. The picture below was our point and shoot with the timer set.) I still can't believe the difference.

Feb 2012

And here is a nice picture Faith's sister took of us last week.

Here are some blogs I have found recently that I like:

No Meat Athlete

Nerd Fitness

Christopher McDougall

iRunFar.com

The Science of Running

Barefoot Running University

Christmas and Pictures

Andy, Lilia and Anne with Santa at the library.

With Santa at the ward Christmas party.

Christmas Eve with their presents.

Wearing their presents.

After church. The girls are wearing their new Christmas dresses. The boys are wearing their usual with Benny using one of my Christmas ties.

In her new dress.

Wearing his hat Faith made for him.

Posing with her candy cane.

He loves his suit of armor. I had the exact same one when I was a kid.

Next to his car-hauling truck and new church socks. He was almost as excited for the truck as the socks. The kid loves his socks.

The lights at Rhema Bible College.

We had to get this picture, what with Faith's matching hat and all.

We had lots of fun with our friends Steve, Lynsie, and Raymond.

Though she probably couldn't see much, Anne seemed to love the lights.

First Day of School

Yesterday was Benny's first day of school.

Here is proof:

And Faith wanted a picture of her two students:

This will be the only year we will be students together. I think it is pretty cool.

Andy wanted to get in the picture. It is kinda sad to see how much he misses Benny (can't really tell from the picture, though).

Joplin

This weekend I was able to help out with the cleanup in Joplin. It was surreal to see the damage up close.

The Church organized the Helping Hands program to use local/regional member to help when humanitarian aid is needed. About 200 men from our stake were organized into 32 crews of 6 and each crew was given 2-4 work orders to complete per day. A work order consisted of what the family needs done and could include cutting up fallen trees, patching roofs, clearing debris from the property, or anything else with which they needed help.

We left Tulsa Friday night and arrived in Joplin around 7:30. As we started driving along Main Street, I didn't notice anything wrong. I wasn't sure what to expect, but at first Joplin seemed like your typical Midwest town. Then as we went along, you would see a damaged billboard here, some shingles there. The damage along the road got worse and worse until we reached the area hit directly by the tornado. There were rubble piles where houses used to be. There were cars crumpled up, a mattress in a tree and everything was the same height. Then as we continued on Main Street, the damage became less and less apparent until we were back to nothing visibly wrong. We stopped at Babe's Drive-In for dinner, then got to the campsite on the far end of town. We set up tents, got oriented, then talked a bit before going to bed.

Our crew had 2 work orders and since we only had 1 chain-saw, we didn't get tree-choppin' assignments, but debris clean-up ones. We got to the first house about 7:30 and got to work. The owners weren't there, but the neighbor was taking care of the place. We used a tarp to cover the holes in the roof and then worked for the next 2 hours cleaning. Someone had already come with heavy equipment to cut up the trees and move the big stuff to the curb, so we were left with branches, shingles and endless styrofoam insulation. The heat and humidity could have been worse and there was a blessed breeze on and off throughout the day. We stopped frequently to hydrate and I would guess I drank 6 or 7 liters of water and Gatorade the whole day.

We got to the second house at about 11:00 and they had a similar situation. Their house was undamaged, and their fallen trees had already been cut and cleared and they were left with debris everywhere on their 1-acre property. We worked for an hour, got lunch, then worked till almost 5. Looking back on it, we might have been able to do it quicker, but the heat just takes so much out of you that we all were taking frequent breaks. The couple was probably in their 70's and they were working a lot of the time we were. One of their sons was there and told us about his house, just 5 blocks away, was completely destroyed, as was his brothers' house, 5 miles away. I started to offer some condolences when he kinda shrugged and said, "It's just stuff. All my family is okay." He didn't seem to be in any denial, he was just matter-of-fact about it, and even joked as he told the story of being in his brother's basement when the house was destroyed, then later finding his gone as well. These men were very grateful and wanted to donate money to help rebuild the Joplin Stake Center that had been destroyed. They both started getting teary-eyed and it made all the work, heat and sweat worth it.

As we got back to camp, we learned that they were sending 22 of the crews home because we all got so much done on Saturday. I was happy to have served, and would have loved to have done it again, but I wont complain that I got to sleep in my own bed last night and not have shared a tent with a snoring High Priest.

It was incredible to see the number of people who came to help the people of Joplin. Most were from the Midwest and the South, though I did meet a chaplain from California. There was so much bottled water donated that the Red Cross had to ask people to stop sending it. Everywhere you went, there were signs saying "Free Food," "Free Ice," "Free Chain Sharpening," "Cold Water." In the parking lot of what was left of the high school, there were people from out of state who had, for 14 days, been cooking meals 13 hours a day. There were pallets of diapers, wipes, clothes, toilet paper, toys, and other things for people to come get, no questions asked. There were people driving around, offering bottles of water and sack lunches to anyone outside.

Joplin is an amazing place. I got the feeling that they will be just fine, regardless of whatever outside help they get. Everywhere you looked, there were spray-painted signs filled with hope and faith in God. I wish I had gotten a picture of it, but we drove by a dollar store that had the windows blown out and the roof damaged. The amazing thing was, there were still items on the shelves. No one had looted, or if they had, they left a bunch of stuff behind. There was a marquee in front of a bookstore that read "Looters, Hang 'Em. Hang 'Em High."

Now for some pictures:

Not sure what store this was. I think Sporting Goods.

Lots of cars like this. The X spray-painted on the side indicated that search crews had checked it already. They did the same with houses and there was a way to indicate whether everyone was accounted for, if any were missing, or if any were dead. I saw a car that had an X and showed that a person had died in it.

This Sutherland's sign was pretty cool to see. Folded in half.

The sign on the tree on the left reads, "God Knows. God Cares. And He has already worked it out."

"God Bless Joplin."

I need to work on my drive-by photography.

The set-up in the HS parking lot.

Thought this was pretty funny.

What is left of the High School.

These two were at a stoplight taking water bottles to anyone who wanted them.

"Still missing cat. We R OK :)"

This piece of wood had lodged in the grass.

This is how all of the trees remaining looked-minimal branches, some or all of the bark gone. Some of them looked like toothpicks.

The Burger King play place is apparently a pretty safe place to be in the event of a tornado.

If it shows up, the "Before" picture is below.

View Larger Map