Anyone read "Lights Out"?

[pampered_mom]

I found a reference to it in Jessica Prentice's FMF and decided to check it out from the library. While I certainly don't agree with everything the author has to say, I've found it quite fascinating. Especially as how it fits in well with what folks like Taubes have written in regards to carbohydrates and fats.

Part of what has intrigued me most about this book is that it goes out a little bit further to look at what may be the broader picture. One of the things that I have been most leery of in our present food culture (even TF food culture) is that we tend to focus in on food as the *it* thing. As in...if we can just get the food thing in line then we'll all be healthy. When part of me wonders that perhaps there's a bigger picture thing we're missing.

Which ties in to my issue with SF and breastfeeding...for her the food part of the puzzle is all that matters...if the x, y, and z components are there nutrionally then that's all that matters. But the bigger picture is that there's so much more to breastfeeding than nutrition.

Which then begs the question raised in the book...what if it's more than just a nutritional issue?

[kmamma]

yes, i have read it and loved it! like you i didn't agree with everything, but just like with any book. it's bit unorganized in terms of ideas, but overall i felt much more enlightened afterwards. i also tend to think of food as most important ingredient of a healthy life--this book surely makes youi think of the big picture.
i like to try and go to bed soon after sundow, but it's hard to do. i did it for a while with the baby (to avoid fussy nights) and i felt so good. now he doesn't get so fussy at night anymore so i'm back to goin late to bed.

[phroggies]

I've read it and found it oddly convincing, given that it's not really a well-constructed piece of research. It syncs with a lot of other stuff I've read. I think maximizing exposure to natural light and minimizing exposure to artificial light is hugely important, but very difficult to do. One thing I've tried to do this winter is use candlelight after DS is in bed--and I usually have even that off by 9:00, sometimes earlier. I don't know if it helps or not, but this winter I've been MUCH less depressed (I think I have some SAD issues), much healthier, and I've been doing low-carb eating pretty successfully for the past month. There are a lot of other factors that could account for this, but I do hope to keep working on getting us all to get enough sleep.

I totally agree with the OP's point about food. We can get so obsessive about getting food right on this board (and I'm as guilty of this as the next person), but really there are so many other things that are important--our interaction with nature and with each other being chief among them. I mean this in a physical sense, not just a psychological one (though the lines get blurred): so much of our hormonal systems are meant to be in tune with nature and other people. Light, soil, love, plants, air, touch--they've all got a huge impact on our bodies.

[carnelian]

Phroggies, your candle idea is brilliant! I guess that means no MDC after lights out tho I think I may give this a try.

OP I seem to remember a huge thread on this book somewhere. It may have been here and it may have been on another board. I'll see if I can dig it up as it was a fascinating discussion with lots of personal experience offered up in relation to the book's premise.

[kmamma]

we did candlelight too, but the amount of oxygen candles take to burn (minimal I'm sure, but maybe in a one-bedroom apartment it makes a difference), seemed to make me feel odd, light-headed. So I dim the lights instead, turning most off, and try to put natural light bulbs in all my lamps. Unfortunately I haven't come across any that are 40 or preferrably 30 watts.

Anyone else notice how flourescent lights in stores make you feel? Especially at night. I hate it, so I try to avoid the worst kind of places like target or wal-mart. it's silly and such a waste since that much lighting is not necessary to see the merchandise.

[Panserbjorne]

I'm so happy to see this thread! This has been creeping into my life recently. I have been so obsessed about getting the "food" thing right that I've completely neglected the nourishment part. And not just in the physical way.

Yes, there is so much more to the picture than food! What difference does diet make if you are eating perfectly and totally miserable? You HAVE to have a connection to the earth, you have to have joy, you have to have purpose. I guess on some level that was one of the things that bugged me about SF so much. I jsut don't see joy. I do with Jessica Prentice which makes me want to listen to her.

There is so much to think about with regard to health! I'm glad to have found others that are doing so.

[Dillpicklechip]

This idea is fascinating to me. It really makes sense to me that there are so many ways to achieve health and balance in your life that go way beyond food. I think maybe a lot of us put a high emphasis on food just because the SAD is so abysmally bad, it's an area that needs such obvious correction. But even if you eat the perfect diet it's possible to not be healthy if you are ignoring other needs like proper rest, exercise and sunshine, not to mention joy and purpose as firefaery mentioned.

I'm just about to read the chapter on this light and darkness thing in Full Moon Feast, really looking foward to it now.

[holyhelianthus]

this makes me even more excited to get my FMF! i ordered it yesterday. i hope it comes in soon.

i totally agree with the food thing. there is so much more. it's overwhelming but i think so worth it.

[Attached Mama]

Haven't read the book but did read the chapter in FMF. I don't need much convincing that light has a huge impact on us in so many ways. But what I didn't agree on is the whole cover up your windows and seal the cracks at night. It seems far more natural to me to sleep with them wide open under the light of the moon. I think the covering them and then sleeping for a night or 2 midcycle with a light on is an artificial mimicking of sleeping under moonlight. Just my opinion - nothing scientific to base it on.

[Panserbjorne]

Originally Posted by Attached Mama

Haven't read the book but did read the chapter in FMF. I don't need much convincing that light has a huge impact on us in so many ways. But what I didn't agree on is the whole cover up your windows and seal the cracks at night. It seems far more natural to me to sleep with them wide open under the light of the moon. I think the covering them and then sleeping for a night or 2 midcycle with a light on is an artificial mimicking of sleeping under moonlight. Just my opinion - nothing scientific to base it on.

I think you're right....except that those of us in the city would not get starlight, but streetlights! In that instance her suggestion makes sense.

[fourgrtkidos]

Yes!! I agree, too, with what you are all saying. The food part of NT is just one small part. Health is about so much more!!!
Thanks for the reminder.

[pampered_mom]

: I'm coming back to post because MDC always seems to go crazy whenever I try to post. Yesterday I had a bit post typed up and lost it all!!

I'm just about finished with the book. I've finally made it to the "so what" chapters. I've really appreciated the author's tongue in cheek writing style - especially her take when it comes to the high-carb, low-fat, crazy amount of exercise being recommended. There was a quote where she refers to a tiger chasing you in the first few chapters that made me laugh out loud when I ws reading (in the library, lol).

Above all what I've taken away from this book (and FMF) was that we have lost our connection to the world around us. Not only should we be eating seasonally, but our sleep should be seasonal in it's pattern as well. It really was a nice follow-up to FMF.

phroggies - I'd be interested in having you elaborate on why you don't feel it's a "well constructed" piece of research. It's really supposed to be a book for lay people so from what I understand it's really more of a survey of the avialable literature at the time it was written. There are almost 100 pages of endnotes at the end of the book - I certainly wish I had more time to read through all of them, but I do at least hope to make survey of some of them.

Anyway...off to see if I can find another thread on this topic.

[phroggies]

Originally Posted by pampered_mom

phroggies - I'd be interested in having you elaborate on why you don't feel it's a "well constructed" piece of research. It's really supposed to be a book for lay people so from what I understand it's really more of a survey of the avialable literature at the time it was written. There are almost 100 pages of endnotes at the end of the book - I certainly wish I had more time to read through all of them, but I do at least hope to make survey of some of them.

Take this with a grain of salt; it's been some time since I read it and for all I know it might have been a different edition. But I think of well-constructed scientific journalism (not speaking here of primary research--I'm thinking of other works also written for lay audiences) as linking very specific claims in the main text to very specific academic studies in the bibliographic material. My dim recollection is that the endnotes did not do this; I think in some cases I couldn't tell what material was meant to support what claims. In others the links were to works of varying degrees of acceptability--sometimes newspaper articles, sometimes texts written by non-scientist (sometimes with very dubious titles).

I don't want to make too much of this. One of the reasons I support TF is because I think that we place way, way too much trust in science today and that the way people have been doing things for ages is a much more sensible approach than whatever the latest spin on the latest study is. That said, some research is shoddier than other research, and there are certain things that make alarm bells go off in my (admittedly academic but in no way scientific) mind. I have the same problem with Nourishing Traditions--love the book, owe so much to it, but those side notes are often ludicrous as far as scientific claims go.

I'd be happy to be contradicted, of course. I really found the book convincing just on a common-sense level and (as mentioned above) because it tallies nicely with other reading I've done.

[suzukiaustin]

To the OP - Thank you for posting about this book. You saved me from killing my screaming 2 year old by taking him outside to get some fresh air and to pick some flowers. I turned off all of the lights in the house and we just went outside, even though it was raining. He immediately calmed down and I relaxed a bit. It wasn't anything he ate that day that caused him to have the crazies...he just needed some time outside and with his mama.

There's so much that plays into our health and we DO get bogged down with food as the sole source of our well being. After spending that time outside with my son, I decided that it was time to go back to the USA and be with family again. He needs that connection and so do I...there's only so much raw liver one can take for trying to heal depression. Sometimes you just need a hug from your mom.

[rayo de sol]

Well, I really shouldn't be up this late, especially to discuss Lights Out, but the ideas in the book really made sense to me. Putting them into practice is another matter.... It's so hard for me to go to sleep with the sun. I seem to be a night owl even though I don't think that's healthy.

I totally know what you mean, phroggies, about how the book doesn't make it easy to figure out, "OK, now where did she get that particular piece of data?" Also, maybe it's just me, but the author's tone really grated on my nerves. :

But in spite of all that, I actually liked the book. I think she is exploring some really important ideas. I think humans falling out of synch with the light/dark cycles of each day over the course of the year is a huge missing piece in everyone's health. And I was intrigued by her idea that jogging/running is actually bad for us (maybe because I can't jog/run to save my life .

[Panserbjorne]

My dh and I own a personal training studio and have been in the field together for 8 years, he for far longer than that. We have always supported and practiced the idea of functional training. Meaning we don't have machines in the studio and don't do anything that doesn't have an action that correlated to real life. I think she (and many others) are dead on in that respect. Exercise was never meant to be long and tedious. It is meant to be quick, functional and applicable to life. There is no real life application to circuit training or marathon running. It is a complete waste of time and drain on the body.

[Dillpicklechip]

Originally Posted by suzukiaustin

To the OP - Thank you for posting about this book. You saved me from killing my screaming 2 year old by taking him outside to get some fresh air and to pick some flowers. I turned off all of the lights in the house and we just went outside, even though it was raining. He immediately calmed down and I relaxed a bit. It wasn't anything he ate that day that caused him to have the crazies...he just needed some time outside and with his mama.

There's so much that plays into our health and we DO get bogged down with food as the sole source of our well being. After spending that time outside with my son, I decided that it was time to go back to the USA and be with family again. He needs that connection and so do I...there's only so much raw liver one can take for trying to heal depression. Sometimes you just need a hug from your mom.

When my son was 2 and he would have a meltdown, I used to find the same thing: Taking him out to the back yard would calm him down immediately. Unfortunately, he would often start crying again when we went back in the house! Even yesterday when I brought him in after playing outside for an hour (because he was cold), he had a meltdown because he didn't want to come in.

There are many ways that our modern lives take us so far from the environment we evolved to exist in. Our bodies want to sleep in the dark and be awake in the light, and they also want to be outside in the fresh air. Airtight houses are a very new invention!

And as Jessica Prentice discussed in the closing chapter of FMF, we all have a deep seated need to belong to a community, to have meaning in our lives, whereas today so many people live in total loneliness and isolation even within a busy city.

It only makes sense that there is more to a healthy, happy life than the food we eat. Food is a pretty important piece of the pie, but I still think it's only one piece.

[naturemama1]

Originally Posted by phroggies

I think maximizing exposure to natural light and minimizing exposure to artificial light is hugely important, but very difficult to do. One thing I've tried to do this winter is use candlelight after DS is in bed--and I usually have even that off by 9:00, sometimes earlier.
snip
I totally agree with the OP's point about food. We can get so obsessive about getting food right on this board (and I'm as guilty of this as the next person), but really there are so many other things that are important--our interaction with nature and with each other being chief among them. I mean this in a physical sense, not just a psychological one (though the lines get blurred): so much of our hormonal systems are meant to be in tune with nature and other people. Light, soil, love, plants, air, touch--they've all got a huge impact on our bodies.

I completely agree with the above.

We do the same. When I read that book (and there's a LOT of chaff to separate from the wheat in there, but the main points are pretty compelling) the statistic that stood out the most was the one showing that adults used to get an average of 9.5 hours of sleep at night -- compared to the current American average of 6.5 hours. Even taking into account the decrease in physical labor these days, that is a big difference!

Some benefits we've noticed since we stopped relying on so much artificial light are slower, quieter evenings together as a family; increased sleep for my kids (during the winter they are asleep by about 7:30pm and wake up sometime after 8:00am), which means means more couple time for my husband and I in the evenings and more personal time for me in the early mornings; drastically lower electricity bills; a greater sense of living in tune with the seasons; and a deeper appreciation for winter and its gifts of rest and family and hobbies and quiet. Also, it just feels more peaceful when the house is softly lit at night. We have huge windows so using artificial lights during the day has never been an issue, but at night it's really made a difference in the household ambiance.

I would love to read more about this, preferably in a better-quality book. Mary Sheedy Kurcinka addresses the concept of long-term sleep deprivation on children in her book "Sleepless in America," but while I think Kurcinka is a fantastic parenting author and find her to be full of common sense, my kids aren't her target audience so I don't get a lot out of her books personally. This ought to be a mainstream concept. I'd love to see more research and discussion about it. Getting more sleep, living closer to nature, and the importance of nutrition. Such good things!

[bluebell]

oh wow! this thread is so interesting, just ordered 'lights out' it sounds so facinating. i am so sensitive to artificial light - totally agree with the poster who posted about the supermarket lighting it is soo depressing to me! i thrive in natural light, i crave sunshine and i feel so much better when i'm outside for most of the day - which in winter in england is difficult to do. i get S.A.D and i am desperate to live in a sunny country!

this is also so relevant to my dd we spent her first three years in a small basement flat in central london with no outside space, because it was basement we had lights on all day long. i think the light/fresh air (lack of) was a major thing - it totally affected me as i had very bad sleep patterns, and couldn't get to bed early. as a baby/toddler we would only go out once a day and in the winter sometimes not atall, wow this is really interesting.
i so agree with others that its not just all about the food - we are sorting this out but there is so much more to being healthy!

really looking forward to reading this book - and FMF!

[bluebell]

Originally Posted by firefaery

My dh and I own a personal training studio and have been in the field together for 8 years, he for far longer than that. We have always supported and practiced the idea of functional training. Meaning we don't have machines in the studio and don't do anything that doesn't have an action that correlated to real life. I think she (and many others) are dead on in that respect. Exercise was never meant to be long and tedious. It is meant to be quick, functional and applicable to life. There is no real life application to circuit training or marathon running. It is a complete waste of time and drain on the body.

firefaery, i was thinking of buying some type of exercise machine like a stationary bike or vibration platform. what do you think of these things? exercise is badly missing from my healing, but it is because of lack of time. i can't go to a gym i'm homeschooling have no help and dd needs me at night. she dosn't like walking much and we don't have many places to walk to so i'm thinking of getting something like a stataionary bike to use in the house. i need exercise to be something i can do in the odd half hour without really leaving the house to do it iyswim! any recomendations or suggestions as to what to do would be great! thanks.