Be thankful, be happy

Image: Julep Instagram.

Some research suggests that the key to happiness is gratitude, so I'm making a point to try to recognize the people and things I am thankful for--not only on Thanksgiving, but year round. Here are a few of the things in my life I'm grateful for right now:

• Living so close to my mom.
• My job.
• Dark chocolate.
• My iPhone 6.
• Friends who are having babies!
• Weekends with absolutely nothing on the agenda.
• Exploring new restaurants with Tim.
• Cabo 2014.
• Oprah chai tea lattes from Starbucks.
• My first wine club shipment.
• My health.
• New episodes of Homeland.
• Having a network of friends and family who are supportive of my personal and professional goals.
• Birchbox. Because is still makes me smile every month.
• Puppies.
• My Invisalign treatment is almost done!
• The never-ending source of entertainment that is my Kindle.

Wishing you a wonderful Thanksgiving with all of your favorite things.

Check your mate this Valentine's Day

I love a slightly provocative public health campaign. Something that catches my attention, but also helps me remember to take care of myself. These clever "Check Your Mate" e-cards from the Prevent Cancer Foundation do just that--and are available in time for v-day.

 

Here's what their website says: "Whether in bed, in the shower or anywhere you might find yourselves in the nude with your partner, take a few minutes to look for abnormal changes in your partner’s skin. The ABCDE rule is a quick and easy way to remember red flags for suspicious moles.

A word of caution: It would probably be awkward to do this on a first, second or third date. But if you're cuddling up with your hubby or live-in significant other, keep your eyes peeled. Moles or freckles that look abnormal or are changing are worth having looked at by a dermatologist. Skin cancer? Not sexy.

Visit checkyourm8.org to send an e-card or share via social media.

Now that 2013 is over, can I take a nap?

When I was a kid, I spent every New Year's Eve reading through old diary entries. Now that I'm a grown up, I have a blog to scroll through when I'm feeling nostalgic. Without even having to look through a year of entries, I can tell you that 2013 has been one of the busiest, most exciting years of my life. Stressful at times, but for the most part, quite rewarding. Here's a brief look back at the past year.

In Spring 2013, I testified for the Oregon State House of Representatives and Senate in support of a bill to ban minors under age 18 from using indoor tanning beds.

Testifying for the Oregon State House Health Care Committee.

Ultimately, the bill passed, and I was invited to the signing ceremony with Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber. The new law goes into effect in January 2014, so I'll be following closely to see how tanning salons handle compliance with the new restrictions.

Oregon teen tanning ban bill signing ceremony.

Meanwhile, I was also pretty busy planning the 2nd Annual Portland Melanoma Walk, which took place in May 2013. The event raised nearly $40,000, which was more than double our original goal!

Portland Melanoma Walk 2013.

More Portland Melanoma Walk.

Throughout the year, I got to travel to some pretty exciting places, including New Orleans, the Dominican Republic, Washington DC, Boston, and Sonoma Valley.

New Orleans in Spring 2013.

My best friend's bachelorette party in Sonoma.

Jessica's wedding week in Punta Cana.

Chelsea's bachelorette at the Oregon Coast.

Wine tasting with Tim and his family in Napa.

Several very important people in my life got married in 2013, including my friends Jessica, Chelsea, and Liz, my cousin Jameson, and my brother Andrew.

The bride and her MOH.

 

My brother's wedding in August 2013.

Me and Tim at Chelsea's wedding.

And let's not forget: I survived a three-mile run while being pelted with paint.

Me and Debbie at the Color Run in Fall 2013.

Earlier this month, as 2013 began to wind down, I started wondering whether it would be possible to "outdo" myself in 2014. How could I possibly schedule more than 10 trips or beat my fundraising goal again? While there are never any guarantees, I have a feeling that 2014 has some pretty exciting things in store for me. My philosophy on life these days can be summed up by a short quote from Louis Pasteur: "Chance favors the prepared mind." After years of preparation, I'm definitely ready to make my mark on the world.

With that, I wish you all a happy, healthy, and safe New Year. 

Cheers,
Katie

Winter is coming: cold weather essentials

Please pardon the double entendre. I just finished book four in the Game of Thrones series, and it's true! Winter really is coming. Here are a few of my cold-weather favorites.

Winter is coming by katielise

Burberry earmuffs
Not a hat person? Me neither. Earmuffs are great for keeping warm sans hat hair. I have a pair I found on clearance at JCrew that I love, but I wouldn't mind a pair of these from Burberry. A girl can dream, right?

OPI glitter nail polish
Throughout the month of December, I keep my manicure festive with a coat of silver or gold glitter over my regular nail color. It's a foolproof way to add a little sparkle to your look.

Dr. Jart BB Cream with SPF 25
Just because it's cold outside doesn't mean you can ditch the sunscreen. Every morning, I use a moisturizer with sunscreen to protect against sun damage and premature aging. Feeling lazy? A BB cream with SPF built in keeps skin hydrated, protected, and helps even skin tone. This one is super moisturizing and the coverage is light enough that it works with my fair skin tone.

L'Occitane hand cream
My skin gets extremely dry in the winter, and my cuticles are a lost cause. I love this super-rich hand cream so much that I keep a tube of it on my desk at work.

JCrew cashmere infinity scarf
Earlier this fall, my friend hosted a scarf exchange. A solid 90 percent of scarves exchanged were "infinity scarves"--and with good reason. They're warm, stylish, and comfy.

Peppermint hot chocolate
The ultimate winter-time beverage. Reminds me of being a kid, in a good way.

Treat yourself

bralette / blush / foundation / lip shine / nail polish / false lashes / bright lipstick / mascara 

V-day may be all about romance and chocolate and roses, but don't forget about the most important person in your life: you! So whether that means buying a new lipstick or getting a babysitter for the kids this Friday, do something this week for you, by you.

After all, if you don't love yourself, why would anyone else want to?

Top Posts from 2012

Time to count down top 10 posts from 2012 like we're on a VH1 special (or Dick Clark's Rockin' New Year's Eve).

10. My story

9. Melanoma and mommyhood: Is it safe to tan when pregnant?

8. Does this look like a cancer patient to you?

7. Cancer can't be cute, right?

6. Ladies of the bachelor: Don't forget to wear your sunscreen

5. The man tan

4. My own "Dear 16-year-old Me"

3. Guilt trip

2. Irony on my newsfeed

And drum roll please (insert commercial break here)....

1. Spray tans might be bad for you now, too

 

Wishing you all a healthy, happy and safe New Year!

The many days of Christmas

Just turned on my computer for the first time in days. It's been nice to have a little holiday hiatus. Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! Here are a few snippets from mine:

Peanut butter reindeer cookies from our annual cookie exchange.

Ugly sweater party!

This picture brings me much happiness. Image: Pinterest.

Nothing like home for the holidays :)

Holiday hair and makeup!

Too much eggnog?

I promise a more substantive post soon. Cheers!

"It's OK" Thursday

Today I'm linking up with Amber and Neely for my first "It's OK Thursday." Here we go.

It's OK...

• That I've eaten at least 2 dozen Christmas cookies in the past week
• That I can't stop Christmas shopping for myself
• That I've been humming along to Justin Bieber and Taylor Swift
• That I watched the entire first season of HBO's Girls in less than 24 hours
• That I drove to work instead of taking the bus because it was snow/raining
• That I wore rain boots and big fuzzy socks to work (and then refused to put on "real shoes" because my toes were cold)

What kind of shenanigans have you been up to this week?

Thanks and no thanks

National Health Blog Post Month Day 22: Give thanks

Sick of Thanksgiving posts yet? If so, too bad. The #NHBPM prompt made me do it! :) I hope you all had a great day today. I got to spend time with family and eat excessively, which is always fun. Except when you're so full you can barely breathe...

Before the day is through, I'd like to take a moment to say "thank you" to my fellow bloggers who have been nothing but welcoming and encouraging since I started this blog last spring. I look to you for inspiration every day, and I'm so grateful that we've gotten to know each other. This includes (but is definitely not limited to): Chelsea, Rev. Carol Taylor, Al, Rose, and Rich. I've also made a few new connections recently, and I look forward to getting to know those folks as well.

What I am not thankful for
I enjoy a good deal just as much, if not more, than the next person. But for some reason, Black Friday is driving me mad this year! Everywhere I go, everywhere I look, I'm surrounded by ads for 50% off this, 30% of that, buy one get one free, etc. etc. What bothers me is that I've started noticing these ads impacting my mood. For example: I might think to myself, "If only I had those Frye boots, I would be happier." Or, "If only I had that bracelet, my life would be easier." It's nonsensical, but I keep noticing this thought pattern repeating itself in my head.

It's strikingly similar to how I used to feel when I used tanning beds. With that, my logic would be something like: "If only I was tan and skinny, then maybe I'd be happy." It freaks me out a little when I notice these negative thought patterns in my head. I love the holidays, and I realize there's nothing wrong with treating myself to a new pair of boots or a pair of earrings every once in a while, but I shouldn't need to rely on material things or the way I look to be happy. I hope that this is a passing phase--one that will fade away as we head into the new year. I'd be curious to hear if any of you start having similar feelings around the holidays, and if so, how do you cope with them?

***

This post was inspired by the Day 22 prompt for National Health Blog Post Month.
View posts by other participants.

Happy Halloween!

Me and my friend Debbie dressed up as loofah's last weekend.

Happy Halloween! I hope you're all warm, safe, and dry. The weather hasn't been so great this week, has it? When I celebrated Halloween on Saturday, I got drenched, but at least I didn't have a hurricane to contend with (I'm looking at you, Sandy).

Anyhow, funny story: Shortly after I published this blog post about body image and Halloween costumes, I found myself waiting in line at Joann Fabric to purchase 25 yards of tulle. I had seen a couple of girls at the 5k dressed up as bath loofah's and I thought it was such an amazing idea that I had to be one, too. Apparently, I wasn't the only one. I got stuck in line behind another group of would-be bath-poufs who were having a really difficult time deciding which color fabric to buy. They seemed miffed that I had taken the last few yards of purple.

"Ugh, I can't be light pink! I'm not tan enough!" one of the girls said.

Of course, in my head, my first instinct was to think, wow, wasn't I just talking about this? My second thought was, what is this girl talking about, she's already eight shades darker than me.

As the bath loofah fiasco continued (they had the nice lady working behind the counter measure out 20 yards of light pink, only to tell her they wanted to do blue instead), I couldn't help but wonder why we sometimes have such skewed perceptions of ourselves. When I see olive skinned women berating themselves for being too pale, skinny women berating themselves for being too fat, etc. I wish I could smack some sense into them and let them see what they look like from where I'm sitting. I know I'm guilty of self-hate, too, but it just kills me when people beat themselves up for not being tan enough. I lived with that feeling for so long, and I wish there was something I could do to prevent other people from feeling the same way.

Side note: Totally reminds me of that scene from Mean Girls where The Plastics are huddled around the mirror, commiserating over all their physical "flaws." Enjoy!

White as a ghost

I've always loved playing dress up, so it's no surprise I adore Halloween. Last weekend, I got to celebrate a bit early by running a super hero-themed 5k with a couple of my friends. I re-purposed last year's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle costume into something that was more 5k appropriate, while my bestie found a little boy's size XL Batman costume at Walmart about an hour before the race. Believe me when I tell you: running three miles in a Halloween costume as harder than it looks.

Dressed up as a ninja turtle for the 5k last weekend.

Run Like Hell in downtown Portland.

When I dressed up as a ninja turtle for Halloween last year, I wore a teensy green dress--not rain-proof running gear. Now, when I say that being diagnosed with melanoma impacted all aspects of my life, it really has. Even Halloween.

Pre-melanoma, Halloween prep meant hours in a tanning bed. After all, how could I dress up as a sexy cop, nurse, cowboy, schoolgirl, etc. without the requisite tan? Stopping by the tanning salon was just as essential to my Halloween costume as stopping by Party City to pickup a new pair of fishnet tights. The Halloween after my diagnosis, I made a conscientious shift to seek out a costume that would flaunt my pale skin like an accessory. After watching hours of YouTube clips on how to fix my hair just right, I decided to dress up as a sexy, tan-free pin-up girl. Red lipstick and all.

Halloween 2007.

Then last year, I picked the ninja turtle costume because I wanted to try something new. Something slightly less cliche and slightly more badass. I strut out in my teensy little costume, fully aware that almost every inch of my ghostly white legs were showing. Perhaps it's narcissistic of me, but I'm always worrying about what other people are thinking about me. On Halloween I worried less so because, well, everyone was dressed up, too. Consequently, it caught me by surprise when my friend's boyfriend made a comment about my costume/white legs.

"Shouldn't you have gone to a tanning salon a few times before wearing a skirt that short?"

Flaunting my fair skin in 2010.

I was pissed. Really pissed. Not pissed so much that my friend's boyfriend was making fun of me. 30-year-old men act like high school boys all the time. I really could have cared less that he was giving me a hard time about my Halloween costume. What drove me insane was that he chose to mention the one thing he should have known would really piss me off.

So it appears that no matter how old we get, I can't quite escape critique from my peers about choosing to embrace my natural skin color. *SIGH*

Have you ever gone tanning or spent extra hours at the gym so that you'd look better in a Halloween costume?

Hot dogs and health care

Happy 4th of July! As a side note, I was up in Vancouver, BC, over the weekend (which happened to coincide with Canada Day) so I feel like I'm double dipping in Independence Days. Oh well, fine by me. Let the BBQs begin!

I also wanted to throw a little belated celebration for the Supreme Court's recent upholding of the Affordable Healthcare Act. Politics aside, if more and more young people continue to develop melanoma (as trends suggest), then it is essential we have insurance so that we can detect malignancies as early as possible and treat them.

A little story of my own: A year or so after I graduated from college, I was working lots of lots of different temp jobs. I also decided to do a third unpaid internship, hoping I would be able to leverage my experience into a paid position--with benefits. Graduating from college in 2008, as you might imagine, made it difficult to find a job. Finding a job with health benefits and a retirement package? That was even harder. In the meantime, I was kicked off of my parent's insurance plan. I tried to secure my own coverage from several different companies, but was rejected everywhere I applied (not unlike the job market, eh?) I ended up being offered a COBRA-like insurance plan with a monthly premium of $330. I had a difficult decision to make: do I pay the $330 a month in case I get sick or do I take a risk and go without insurance?

It was during this time period that I went to the dermatologist for a routine skin check. As a frequent tanning bed user with a family history of skin cancer, I felt like I could rest easier if a doctor told me I was totally fine. Well, many of you know the rest of the story. I had a mole biopsied, and it turned out to be an early-stage melanoma. My overpriced insurance also came with high deductibles, but without it, I could have gotten myself into some major, major debt. I know I say this frequently, but most young people never imagine they'd be diagnosed with cancer in their 20s. I didn't see it coming. By letting young adults stay on their parents health insurance plans until their 26 and by guaranteeing health coverage for individuals with pre-existing conditions, we may be able to catch more melanomas before they metastasize--and prevent a myriad of other health conditions.

Have a great 4th everyone! Don't forget your sunscreen/sun-protective clothing!

How much can change in four years?

Embracing my inner tourist outside the Met in NYC.

What a crazy couple of weeks it's been! Last Monday, I flew to Alexandria, Virginia for work. While I was on the East coast, I figured I'd stay and visit with friends from college, which took me from DC to Philly, Philly to NYC, NYC to Westhampton, and then finally back to Portland from DC. My two cents on that: Thank goodness for free Wi-Fi on Greyhound buses and thank goodness for Christian Grey.

For those of you that don't know me personally, I've been a bit of a homebody since I graduated from college in 2008. By that I mean, I've traveled around the Pacific Northwest quite a bit, but I've only been on an airplane three times in the past four years. This is a huge lifestyle change for someone who picked a school almost 3,000 miles away from home. Ironically, my work/vacation coincided with the four year anniversary of my college graduation. I'm still in semi-disbelief that I've been out of college for as long as I was in it.

For the first couple of years after school, financial constraints and a sporadic work schedule made it impossible to travel. Now, four years later, because I felt like so much has changed since college, I was honestly a little bit nervous to go back and "face the past." For example, the last time any of my friends from college had seen me, I was still using tanning beds. Would seeing the same places and people from before challenge my new lifestyle choices?

Reunited with my friend Leanne from college.

Yes and no. A few days before I flew out of PDX, my friend mentioned that we might be going to a pool party while I was out visiting. Almost as instinctively as breathing, I thought to myself, Oh crap, I'm going to have to get a spray tan. Then my normal brain caught up with my subconscious: Katie, you are much more comfortable in your own skin than you were four years ago. You just rocked an orange mini-dress at a party--totally sans tan--you know you don't need to be tan to be beautiful.

Was my mind just playing tricks on me because talking to an old friend evoked feelings of that old version of me?

At the end of the day, my anxieties were for naught. I had an absolutely amazing time on my trip. Seeing my old girlfriends, part of my felt like no time had passed at all. We were able to pick up conversations right where they left off four years ago. In a way, it was kind of like the best of both worlds: new me meets old me. Not unexpectedly, I did feel a little "homesick" for parts of my old life on the East coast. When I left Portland for Pennsylvania in 2004, I never thought I would be coming back. But here I am. Such is life. Apparently you can't always predict how things will turn out.

On a lighter note, you may have noticed in the picture above that I finally found a big, floppy hat!!! It's made by this company called San Diego Hat Co, specially designed to provide protection from both UVA & UVB. I absolutely love it!

Time to start planning my next vacation...

Unluck of the Irish

On St. Patty's day, everyone loves to be Irish. Drinking beer before noon, decorating your body with temporary shamrock tattoos (amongst other things)... what's not to love about being Irish on March 17? If only I felt the same way about my partial Irish heritage the other 364 days of the year. My mom's dad was a full-blooded Irishman. When I was a kid, I remember coming home from school, sitting with him in my grandparent's living room, telling him about what I learned at school that day. He always sat reclined in his favorite armchair. I still remember him that way: sitting in his armchair, his legs poking out from underneath a wool blanket--legs that were white to the point of translucence.

If I had to guess, I'd say my grandpa's skin tone would have been classified as Fitzpatrick Type I. The Fitzpatrick Skin Type scale is a system used by dermatologists--and by tanning salons--to determine how your skin will react to sun UV radiation. Very fair skin is classified as Type I and on the other end of the spectrum, very dark skin is classified as Type VI. Many of us Irish folk, with fair skin, light eyes, and light hair, are classified as Type I or Type II, which means we're more susceptible to sunburns. Lucky us, we're also lighter more likely to develop skin cancer.

The tanning bed industry claims that they will not sell UV tanning sessions to patrons with Fitzpatrick Type I skin. Tanning bed users with Type II or III skin, according to Tanningtruth.com, should only tan up to three times per week, starting with three-minute sessions. I can tell you from experience, tanning salon operators in Oregon, New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey have not limited me to three times weekly, three-minute tanning bed sessions, even though my skin tone is naturally Type II. According to a study conducted by several congressional representatives which was published just last month, 51% of tanning salons denied that indoor tanning would increase a fair-skinned teenagers risk for cancer (based on a survey of 300 salons nationwide by congressional interns). Quite the opposite, actually. Four out of five salons surveyed said that tanning would actually be beneficial to a teenage girl with fair skin. Some went as far as to say that using a tanning bed would prevent cancer. Why such a discrepancy between the science, FDA regulations, claims by tanning industry lobbyists, and salon owners and operators?

Whether you're Irish or just pretending to be for the weekend, I hope you have a safe and happy St. Patrick's Day. If indeed you do have a bit o' Irish blood in you, be sure to keep slapping on the SPF, keep up with regular skin checks, and stay out of tanning salons. Call it "unluck" of the Irish, but us fair-skinned folks have a higher risk of developing melanoma and other skin cancers.