Hfb Fall 2008-page6

Fall 2008

&

Health Fitness

Fun Kuts looks to expand in Arlington or Marysville by 2009.

Beauty

Heather Skidmore shows her new self with the help of Curves for Women.

Inside:

A “Neti Pot.”

• Karate instructor copes • Success with Curves • Neti pots for allergies • Kids haircuts - the latest rage

SUPPLEMENT TO THE MARYSVILLE GLOBE & THE ARLINGTON TIMES

Sharon Standish, mother of two and co-owner of the Martial Arts Club in Marysville.

The Marysville Globe/The Arlington Times

Health, Fitness & Beauty • Page 2

September 24, 2008

A life saved, by Botox Cosmetic drug controls muscle constrictions, transforms world for Marysville mother by Myke Folger Special section columnist

Health. It’s the one thing we couldn’t care less about when we’re up and running. Only while racked under the reign of a nasty cold or immobilized by a broken leg do we start casting about, realizing our thoughtlessness and start begging for the sweet return of good health. Most the time, it does indeed return, and we are grateful for a day. But when it never comes back, that’s when we are struck dumb and life’s hardest decisions are made. Two years ago, Sharon Standish began her descent into ill health, a measure in time that in other people might have proven lethal. But with Standish’s faith, her active lifestyle, a chin-up attitude and access to American science and drugs, an otherwise debilitating situation had become manageable. The 42-year-old, Marysville mother of two had come home exhausted after eight hours of teaching preschoolers. She summoned enough strength to drive with her teen-age daughter, Katelyn, to the martial arts center the family owns. But that’s when things began to unravel forever. “Then it felt like my

teeth were being ripped out of my jaw,” Standish said of her first real heart attack. She’d had bloody noses and some chest pain three days prior, but didn’t think much of it then. Three days later she had shortness of breath and “it felt like my chest was going back into my shoulder blades.” Still, she didn’t call 911. Back home, the pain lingered and then the chest pain increased and her daughter called 911. The paramedics drove her to Providence Everett Medical Center’s Colby campus where doctors confirmed she had a heart attack - but only after another bout with shortness of breath after spending six hours in the emergency room. She remained at PEMC for four days. Standish figured the busy lifestyle and her sleep apnea contributed to the heart attack. Not to let either slow her down, she continued to train at the martial arts center, participated in a heart walk to raise money for heart disease and now she wears a continuous positive airway pressure mask to bed every night. The CPAP looks like a mask a jet pilot might wear and has helped hundreds of thousands of apnea sufferers across the globe. Some find the CPAP to be

claustrophobic, but modern systems have become far less intrusive. Things seemed to be going well for Standish until one morning she awoke and noticed her left arm wouldn’t move. She could feel it but could not move it. Her husband thought she may have had a stroke because she couldn’t bend her left side well, either. She went to a neurologist at the Everett Clinic who sent her to have some physical therapy which didn’t do a thing for her. So the neurologist examined her again and this time, gave her some Levodopa and Carbidopa, a drug cocktail used for patients with Parkinson’s disease. Standish responded positively. Her arm and left side felt better. She reported that to the neurologist who then determined she might have Parkinson’s, a brain disorder that occurs when nerve cells in the part of the brain called the substantia nigra die or break. These cells make dopamine, which allow for smooth, coordinated function of the body’s muscles and movement. When 80 percent of these cells are damaged, Parkinson’s symptoms, such as tremors, appear.

Even more bad news Standish went to the

MYKE FOLGER Feature Columnist

Sharon Standish, mother of two and co-owner of the Martial Arts Club in Marysville, had a triple dose of bad luck, having a heart attack and getting diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and a rare muscle disorder. But of all things, Botox, the drug used to smooth out wrinkles, has saved her life.

Booth Gardner Parkinson’s Care Center in Kirkland for therapy. It was there that doctors discovered she did indeed have Parkinson’s and also Dystonia, a rare muscle disorder that causes the muscles to contract and spasm involuntarily. Her first signs of Dystonia were subtle and Standish figured it was just part of the Parkinson’s. But then it just got worse, much worse than the Parkinson’s. “I’d be at the grocery store and suddenly I can’t walk,” she said. “The worst time was when I was at the zoo and the Dystonia hit and it took me two hours to get to the exit.” She and another preschool teacher had taken their students to the Woodland Park Zoo when Standish

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felt the Dystonia coming on. She told her friend that she was going to start toward the exit. In full force, the Dystonia immobilized her and the pain was near unbearable. “I cry when it hits,” Standish said. “I lie out on the floor and cry.” Each episode can last up to 20 minutes. Once, her arm constricted so tightly that her elbow bent back into the middle of her back until her shoulder was about to pop. “The muscles contract as tight as they can go, then contract more and pull in awkward positions,” she added. Then, the doctor at her Parkinson’s therapy session in Kirkland, suggested she try Botulinum toxin, or Botox as it is commonly known. The neurotoxin, which has gained household status as a wrinkle remover, was originally used as a way to treat severe muscle spasms just like the ones Standish was enduring. She figured she had nothing to lose and received her first injections about a month ago. “I got four shots in my leg and four in my shoulder,” she said. The doctor would put a probe directly into the affected muscle and inject a dose.

“It is amazing how you feel when everything is going well,” Standish said. The shots worked, the muscles no longer constricted. The downside was that her insurance company, Regence Blueshield, didn’t cover the Botox injections. That aside, Standish is a new woman. “Last year at this time, I didn’t know how I was going to work, but now I say, ‘Bring it on!’” Every three months, Standish will get a Botox injection. She goes in for another dose in November. She also takes other medication to help with Parkinson’s tremors. There are surgeries available for the Dystonia, where a pacemaker is placed in the brain and sends impulses to control the spasms. But for now Standish is content with the Botox. She said she never dreamed her life in her 40s would turn out the way it has. But she has learned to deal with what life brings and moves forward. Her faith and her family are where she draws support. She still exercises, still trains at the martial arts club and is considering putting on a fundraiser to raise awareness of Dystonia.

Health, Fitness & Beauty • Page 3

The Marysville Globe/The Arlington Times

September 24, 2008

‘Strong Teens’ needs you by Myke Folger Special section columnist

The Strong Teens program at the YMCA has entered its fourth year and area organizations have once again made sizeable contributions to fund it. Organizations such as Kimberly-Clark, Kirtley Cole, Everett Clinic, Group Health and Children’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center are among several that have contributed roughly $100,000 to fund the countywide program that helps teens and their parents make healthy diet, exercise and lifestyle choices. The twice-a-week course is free, too. The five participating locations are Marysville, Monroe, Mukilteo, Everett and Mill Creek. Interested parents and teens should go to www. ymca-snoco.org for more sign-up information. The Monroe branch is already filled up, but the other four have plenty of room, especially Marysville. “We think everyone knows about the program, but in reality they don’t,” said Caro-

line Brown, the Health and Wellness Director at the YMCA branch in Marysville. The other possibility is that with September comes school and that’s when families are slammed with homework, housework, and everything in between. Those are the only reasons Brown can think of as to why participation in her city has been so low. Brown has pushed back the class dates to accommodate late comers. The new class times will be 6-7:30 p.m., Mondays and Thursdays starting Monday, Oct. 6. The two 90-minute sessions are con-

ducted each week for three months then once a week for six weeks. There are currently four teens and their four parents signed up in Marysville, leaving a total of 32 slots (one parent, one teen) open. Teens must be between 12 and 14 years old and be in the top 95 percentile of their body/ weight mass index. Getting parents 100 percent on board with the program has been an issue in the past, Brown said. She knows family lifestyles are hectic, but counters by saying this is an opportunity for parents and their teens to eat

more meals together, shop together, take turns cooking and to generally make better lifestyle choices. “Parents have to participate because parents are basically the ones who make the decisions at home about what they’re eating, what they’re shopping for,” Brown said. “Parents have to mentor good healthy habits and lifestyles to have healthy kids.”

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Health, Fitness & Beauty • Page 4

The Marysville Globe/The Arlington Times

September 24, 2008

Children’s Hair Care starting to sprout by Myke Folger Special section columnist

Get them while they’re young, they say. And indeed that is the case with the children’s hair care industry, a $5 billion market with more than 40 million children in the

United States receiving a haircut an average of eight times per year. Any salon from Debi’s Hair & Tan of Arlington to Smart Style Family Hair Salon in Tulalip will take kids for customers, but the salons just for kids is truly starting to

bud. One of the more notable ones, which has yet to surface in the Northwest, is Snipits. Founded by Joanna Meiseles in Framingham, Mass. in 1993, Snip-its has evolved into a haircut adventure. Not just swivel chairs, scissors and mirrors, Snip-its has a custom cartoon-like interior, checkerboard floors, goofy characters and interactive computer play stations. There’s also kids’ line of hair care products. In Seattle’s Phinney Ridge neighborhood there’s Beachcomber Kids. The boutique location of fewer than 1,000-square-feet features checkerboard tile floors, wicker wait area benches, a massive play area where kids can burn some energy while they wait their turn. There are seafoam green walls with stencils of ocean waves and leaping dolphins. The three swivel barber chairs are molds of a sea turtle, seahorse and

dolphin. And each kid can pick from dozens kid-friendly movies. In Snohomish County there’s Fun Kuts in Lynnwood and Kids Cuts in Everett. But not much yet in Arlington or Marysville. But Fun Kuts has Arlington and Marysville in its sights. “We’d like to move up there,” said Fun Kuts co-owner Ian Armijo. “I’m ambitious with that, and we’ll see in a year or so.” In January, Armijo and his partner, Tess Lochner, bought the existing salon and added a whole lot of kid-friendliness to it. They painted the walls in various colors of the rainbow and, like Beachcomber, has themed stations from Hotwheels and speedboats to kitty cats and princesses. There are seven stations in all and the plan is to dedicate one of those spaces to parents. The co-owners, particularly Lochner who had been a stylist at Fun Kuts before buying the business, noticed a

MYKE FOLGER Feature Columnist

The farm and race car are just two of the seven themed stations at Fun Kuts in Lynnwood. The company wants to expand in Arlington of Marysville by 2009.

lot of parents were asking to get their cut while their kids were getting theirs done. When the opportunity to buy came up, Lochner and Armijo had to think about the market. They both saw that the industry was growing. There were children’s salons in Kirkland, Bellevue and

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Seattle, but the industry was virtually untapped in the more suburban, blue-collar markets. So they agreed to a deal. And business continues to be strong. The week leading up to the start of school in the county, saw each of the business’s three stylists handling up to 18 heads a day. “It was insane,” said stylist Lacy Thornhill. Lochner has continued her role as stylist on top of being floor manager and co-owner. Armijo will do the books and payroll. They plan to focus on the current store, fine-tuning the day-to-day system and capitalizing on ideas that work. If adding a station for adults works, they may lease space in Arlington or Marysville as early as next summer. “I’d love to make Fun Kuts a household name,” Armijo said. “It’s working so now it’s just a matter of whether it catches on. At this point we don’t see why it wouldn’t.”

The Marysville Globe/The Arlington Times

Health, Fitness & Beauty • Page 5

September 24, 2008

Eating with all our senses by Timi Gustafson R.D.

One of my most favorite times of the year is the Farmer’s Market season. Nowhere is food more fresh and nutritious than when it comes from a farm nearby – and with your purchases you get a chance to support your local economy as well. I also enjoy the personal touch when interacting with the farmers; but more so, I love to see, touch, smell and taste the food I’m buying. You can’t do that with

processed, canned, packaged or frozen items. All you get to see is a photo on a label – and usually that looks much more appetizing than the actual content. It’s a curious thing that we don’t taste our foods anymore before purchasing. We may choose according to visual appeal, picking the bright yellow banana rather than the spotted brown one or the immaculate tomato rather than one that’s soft and slightly wrinkled. But it’s not the same experience as biting into an

apple or a pear that has been harvested just a few hours before. Most of us have lost touch with the food we eat, the region it comes from, the soil it grows in, the people who harvest it and who bring it to our table. We don’t have the time or energy to be concerned with all that. Like everything else, our food has to be instantly available and conveniently served. Of course, the fact that we have almost unlimited food supplies in this country is an achievement of great importance and goes to the credit of the respective industries. But for us, the consumers, this also comes with a sense of loss and disconnect. There’s no longer a relationship between what we eat and who we are. I myself have no background in agriculture. I grew up in the suburbs where there were no farms nearby. But almost every family in my neighborhood had a small garden in their backyard where they planted a variety of vegetables and

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a few fruit trees. I remember my mother lining up tomatoes on the windowsill to let them ripen in the sun. What we didn’t consume right away was preserved in glass jars for the winter months. I learned as a small child to distinguish between different seeds and watched with fascination the miraculous growth of beans and cucumbers. I almost think of it as good luck that my parents had to grow much of our produce themselves because they couldn’t afford to buy it in a store. These memories of my childhood still influence my relationship to food today. I imagine that these early experiences have also generated my lifelong interest in cooking. The very idea of preparing a meal from scratch (as opposed to ready-toeat) still gives me great pleasure. I don’t ever consider cooking as a chore.

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The Marysville Globe/The Arlington Times

Health, Fitness & Beauty • Page 6

September 24, 2008

Some natural remedies to consider by Myke Folger Special section columnist

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The Marysville Globe/The Arlington Times

Health, Fitness & Beauty • Page 7

September 24, 2008

Weight off their minds and bodies by Myke Folger Special section columnist

It’s amazing what you can lose with a little stick-to-itiveness. That’s certainly what Heather Skidmore discovered a few years ago. It was the summer of 2005 and her fiancé at the time, Jason Skidmore, had just asked her to marry him. She said yes. She also decided to get in shape for the wedding. She hadn’t really been big on exercise before. She enjoyed eating pizza and drinking beer and that trifecta contributed toward her weight – 233 pounds. She wore size 22 pants. Her weight embarrassed her, diminished her self concept. In fact, at work, where she engages with children, she purposely avoided taking leadership roles or making decisions because she didn’t want “eyes on” her. And the ultimate embarrassment to her was when she tried to get on the roller coaster at the Puyallup Fair. “There was only enough room for me and nobody else,” she said, recalling the day she climbed into one of the ride’s two-seat cars. “That’s when I realized it. I just felt that this wasn’t right and that I didn’t want to look like this or feel like this anymore.” So she signed up with Curves for Women, the now well-known fitness center with franchises across the country, two in Marysville and another in Arlington. She goes every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, spending a half hour working on hydraulic weight machines. She spends about $35 a month on membership fees. She also stopped drinking beer and has cut down on pizza, replacing it with

more fruits and vegetables. The change in diet and regular exercise has resulted in a loss of 53 pounds. She now weighs 170 pounds and wears a size 14. And as is the case with many people who work exercise into their daily lives, she feels better physically and emotionally. “I feel amazing,” she said. “I have so much more energy to go out and do things and I’m more willing to be a leader instead of a follower.” Her boss commented on how Skidmore is more open with the children and parents she works with. Family members comment on the weight loss and the spirited attitude and last year she was married. “My husband is very proud of me and he let’s me know every day how good I’m looking. He talks about my sexy legs,” she added with a laugh. That frustration Skidmore was feeling is a common element among the clients at Curves, according to Arlington franchise owner, Carol Sluys. The average person is probably 20 percent over weight, frustrated with a lack of activity, wants to work out but not at a normal gym, doesn’t want to be seen in her “fluffy” state by people she perceives as being more fit, and ranges in age from 10 to 84, Sluys said. Curves tends to be a place where women can be themselves and not worry about societal pressure. “A lot of women come in their pajamas,” Sluys said. Renee Miller is one of Sluys’ success stories. Miller was overweight, had an irregular walk and her doctor had sent her to Curves for exer-

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Heather Skidmore — Before

cise treatment. She went with her mother, Pat, and the two have become regular attendees. In fact, Renee Miller has lost 22 pounds (13 of them body fat), 21.75 inches and all of that in 78 visits to Curves. Miller works out three days a week. The weight loss and the activity itself has been a good thing for her. “For Renee, this is probably one of the best things to happen in her life,” Sluys said. “She’s gleeful when she does her weigh-ins.” Sluys got her start at the north Marysville Curves, but two and a half years ago branched out and started the Arlington franchise. A key part of her job as owner, she has found, has been making encouraging follow-up calls to women who may have strayed from their exercise routine. It’s a delicate task, because, clients sometimes growl about it.

Courtesy photo

Heather Skidmore — After

“Every week I identify who hasn’t been in the week before, and I ask staff about them, ‘are they sick? Are they gone?’ We do outreach calls every Friday morning, and sometimes they resent it, they feel embarrassed.” But Sluys keeps encouraging women to get out there and work, because she wants to be there for them as well as keep them as clients. She also knows that women 50 and older lose 5 percent of their muscle mass every year. Many members can go free of charge, too, through their Medicare plans. Sterling Insurance, for example, said there were more than 300 women in the Arlington area who are insured through the company, who qualify for free attendance at Curves. And now Sluys is starting a breast health program at Curves, giving new members small

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The Marysville Globe/The Arlington Times

Health, Fitness & Beauty • Page 8

September 24, 2008

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