Jan Castle

Well, technically I just want to be safe

Recently, I'm into the Low-glycemic diet because I really want to recover from PCOS. I don't want my insulin nor blood sugar to go sky rocket plus, I know I can control my food and I need to loose weight for my insulin to go down. 

I mentioned before in my previous post, 2015, A New Year, A New Healing and Hope For Women With PCOS, that PCOS may lead to diabetes if not treated or not careful with the food we intake that's why I'm doing the Low-glycemic diet. A Low-glycemic diet is where one tries to control their blood sugar level by consuming food with low glucose levels. One certain benefit that I like in this diet is that I don't crave much for "junk" food. Whole food is the way to go even if you're not in a diet. 

A little health hack to make a low-glycemic diet tastier - just add yogurt. Most of the food that I'm eating right now are vegetables mainly because, they're quite accessible and easy to prepare before work (no cook, just because... haha). Yogurt beats all those haunting calorie consuming dressings. 

To get an overview of the foods listed as low-glycemic, click "here".

A new family set-up and considering my health awareness is grander than I ever thought

2014, what was that? A lot of life changing decisions. Now, more than ever things are bound to change for good and for the better. 

I welcomed 2015 with open arms and countless sacrifices still. I lost my Grandma last year, during Christmas and that was the last of my family. All I have now is my mom. 

Health and Decisions

Life lesson: Take care of your health, period. 

I have been diagnosed with PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome) last 2009 and it has been quite a journey. Like every other woman experiencing PCOS, we have been recommended with contraceptive pills and metformin to induce our menstrual cycle as most of us tend to be irregular with our cycles. I'm glad to say that I have rid those prescriptions forever. 

I've been taking contraceptive pills for 5 years and a few months until I decided, this is not the results I want with my PCOS. I wanted to heal. I got rid of the pills hastily but I never thought it would be a good decision. I didn't get my period a month after getting rid of the pills. I got scared but, I will stay firm with the decision as contraceptive pills have done enough damage to my body system. It makes the woman's womb thinner, it makes you moody, makes you gain weight, it makes you feel bloated and it retains water in your system if not flushed out properly. 

To regain strength with the situation at hand, I had to be stricter with my diet. I've been a pesco-ovo-vegetarian ever since I was diagnosed with this sickness. Being pesco-ovo-vegetarian has helped me a lot but of course, I won't lie, I don't eat meat (beef, pork, chicken) but, I may tend to eat excessively especially on carbohydrates (RICE). I got back on track with my vegetables and fish, making it count on how it's cooked as well. Two months later after I got rid of my pills, I got my cycle back. I was very pleased but not so much as my bleeding was not enough. I was only spotting. I had to look for more solutions. 

During that month, a friend introduced me to USANA's supplements. At first, I was skeptical because, I didn't want to take medication anymore but, here I am today taking Usana's Essentials, Proflavanol C, and Biomega. I was amazed. I started taking Usana because, I joined to get discounted medicines for my Grandma who had Liver Cirrhosis in the hopes of getting her better but, upon joining I was too late. I lost another loved one just before Christmas. I thought to  myself, was this the right decision? What was the purpose of my membership now since I spent soo much on it and I had a lot of excess product (I was planning to sell them). I tried the supplements myself then. I tried the vitamin C first, Proflavanol C100.

To give you a quick look on what PCOS is (http://www.bupa.co.uk/health-information/directory/c/cervical-screening)

According to research, a woman may not get her period also when she lacks vitamin C. Vitamin C helps in the shedding of the thickening wall in the womb when a woman is ovulating. This thickening is the blood that comes out of our system. The wall of the womb thickens during ovulation period for preparation of a baby if the woman is fertile. Now, with PCOS the wall of the womb only thickens and thickens per month since, technically I am ovulating but not fertile. So, I tried my luck with vitamin c a week before my period. I didn't expect anything, and then tada (blood, HAHA)! It was the first time that I experienced cramps in a long time since with contraceptive pills, I don't feel any cramps when I get my period.

Now, I saw the possibility with the supplement. So, I started taking the Essentials together with Proflavanol C100 and Biomega. I'm taking the Essentials because, in order to eliminate PCOS or any other sickness I believe, is to keep a healthy overall body system. I may be strict with my pesco-ovo-vegetarian diet but, that does not suffice with the overall nutrients that I need. The Essentials, Usana's premier product, has been concentrated with the amount of vitamins and minerals for the body's everyday consumption. The product comes in a pair, Mega Antioxidant and Chelated Mineral. You must be wondering, what is the difference with this multivitamin with all the others and why does it come in a pair instead of just 1 pill unlike Centrum? Well, not to let anyone down, Centrum is rated a negative star in a medical book I found. So why in a pair? Acid plus base in one pill will kill it's effectivity rate, right? Not all vitamins and minerals will work together thus Usana had them separated in a pair for a more effective absorption rate in the body. I've been taking this for a total of one month and already, I feel the difference. I've always had excessive acne and scars at the back part of my body due to the effects of PCOS. Taking the Essentials, I noticed that my pimples and scars were reduced which is good, it means that this could be one sign that my body is healing from PCOS. The other one I take is the most essential factor for PCOS, basically this is the alternative for the contraceptive pill. It's Usana's Biomega. Biomega is actually fish oil, Omega 3. What Omega 3 does to the body really is to help stimulate brain activity but not only that, it also helps with the balancing hormones since having PCOS also, makes you hormonally imbalanced. Omega 3 is usually taken by pregnant women for healthier pregnancies. As a woman with PCOS, I am basically infertile, and what Omega 3 does to my body is help it to become fertile. Let's do another comparison, what's the difference of this Omega 3 supplement with the ones locally distributed? I already had some knowledge of this before hand, so I went on ahead and looked for omega 3 in my usual local supplement store. So I picked up a bottle and checked, It says 200 mg worth of it. When I asked my doctor about it, she said to maintain a good amount of brain activity for everyday when you're on Omega 3, your body should receive about 2000 mg worth of it. So, I didn't find anything worth it in the local market. Coming across, Usana's Biomega, I checked it's label and it indicates 1000 mg per capsule, which is good and worth it, unlike taking 5 or more capsules of Omega 3 found in the local market. It saves you time, effort and money.

I've been battling PCOS for a total of 6 years, I can't believe that it took soo long to see some sort of silver lining to this sickness. I thought with prolonged use of the contraceptive pills, it might help out but, no. From this experience, it's really important to keep healthy as it will save the life of you and the life of others.

It's 2014, it's time to shed some light on creating positivity. 

Happy new year, folks! Greetings from my cousin and I, trying to take in more positivity this year to be able to use our heads and hands to make a lot of things possible. 

This is a belated Merry Christmas and an advanced Happy New Year to everybody

Recently, I changed my hair color (surprise! *insert sarcasm here*) to a Pastel Lavender Blue shade. I thought I might do another tutorial on achieving pastel shades especially this shade as it can double up as a toner for Yellow hair from hair bleaching.

This tutorial is pretty image heavy, click below if you are interested or just curious. 

Artifact

Dead girls stay golden (*slash* insert some other cheesy title here)

Hello dear readers! It has been a while since my last update because, I don't really care anymore and I've been busy outside life online. Anyway, this is a recent photo of myself trying out some face paint at 4 in the morning and, I had a little too much fun. I made a video of this for a film org I'm joining in school. It's just a webcam quality kind of video, nothing that special just all conceptual. Aside from the face paint and the video, I have photos to show! Finally, some photography back in my life (well, actually it's kinda a vain thing to do but, whatever. Who else can model for you at 4 am and the face paint was pretty cool, I needed a picture to immortalize that moment). I'll post some of the pictures in my next post, if I don't end up lazy or busy.

Greymon is my muse and my cause of "perfectionism" 

Let me expound on my previous post (I feel like explaining), I was busy because of this. Okay, It looks simple enough (ehem, not). About a week ago I started doing this, CMYK t-shirt printing. 

CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, black), four colors to make a full colored t-shirt print. Okay, sounds simple but the work is painstaking. Well, it's partially my fault for making a lot of tiny details in the artwork and making it big enough to cover almost 3/4 of a shirt. To make this print happen, I needed 4 screens about 25" x 20", I think. Each screen corresponded to one color. So, for this one design, it takes 4 screens = 4 more times the effort (now, when I sell this to public market under Livestock, I hope no one goes saying "ang mahal" or "it's too expensive". I swear, I will slap you in the face).  

There were a lot of problems doing this, since I'm no expert and it was my first time doing cmyk printing. Today, I haven't perfected the design but I'm coming closer to a perfect print as I rip more flesh from my hands and sniff some more chemicals from making stencils. 

Lately...

I've been perpetually busy with a lot of stuff. It's quite hard to make a living while being a student with a lot of ambition. Career, career, career, everyday (I don't even get to lose weight, what a bummer. Fatty for life but, it's fine).