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My Uncle Bob bought my family growing up their first ever telescope, a telescope so big that at the time it stood taller than me. I can remember watching the stars with the neighbors on a few summers nights.

He took us on a tour of StorageTek in 1988 showing off proudly the systems that they had built and the parts that he had individually machined.

He garnered a respect in myself for the sciences and engineering disciplines that still lives with me today. And along with his adeptness for engineering precision and measurement, he was a really nice guy.

Our lives are given meaning through others. We live through others, we live for others.

Our individual lives are a manifestation of all that who have come before us. And it’s only through giving back to future generations do we give thanks to those that helped us along the way.

Thank-you Uncle Bob. Rest in Peace.

Bob Sedlak April 2nd, 1950 - May 20th, 2008

My mother called me yesterday and told me that my sister had a mole removed from her leg and the doctors found it be cancerous.  My sister has been known to lay out the in the sun a little too long, but at only age 30, the percentages were definitely on her side for this very thing not to occur.

Today I was creating my "to-do" list for work and I list 1) finish up taxes (yes I know, they’re late), 2) some items regarding my daily job, and 3) call mom about Shannon.

It struck me as odd (and made me a little depressed) that I would have to created an item #3.  

Sometimes within my work I reach a level of focus for which all outside influences disappear and time is nonexistent. But with this hyperfocus, there’s a definite emotional disconnect.   And for the first time I am wondering what loved ones that have become second class to this overly stimulated way of working.

In the end, I feel incredibly guilty for making my sister’s condition just another checklist item.  I’m not sure what to make of this. 

I will admit it; I am a lazy person at heart.  But I’m not the typical lazy where I just prefer to do nothing. I am one of those people who perfers to put 10 hours up front to save 40 hours on the backend.  I enjoy researching ways to automate my life.  I once bought a robotic lawnmower to avoid going out in the hot summer sun.

When I stumbled across the concept sleep learning, I was immediately excited.  Who wouldn’t like to fally asleep to the audio of your favorite Cival War textbook and have instant recollection the next morning?

With the research done by Fox and Robbin, it’s shown that non-consious suggestions do have a fighting chance of being retained, but what good is this if there aren’t any correlations drawn with the rest of your knowledge?  Maybe if you’re training for Jeopardy (which isn’t a bad idea) passive retention is OK, but memorizing trivial facts is just that, trivial.

Is there a better way?

While there are older studies outlining passive learning while sleep, would it possible to become to induce a lucid sleep and then administer the desired knowledge to be retained (e.g. audio stream)?

Take a look at these devices…
http://brindefalk.solarbotics.net/kvasar/kvasar.html
http://mmallet.ottawaengineers.ca/projects/morpheus/index.html

It’s a build-it-yourself lucid dreaming induction device.  There are a couple commercial equivalents out there that are pretty expensive (plus they would have to be adapted for what we need for testing).

Here’s the idea….

The above device would have to be modified so that it could be connected to a PC (e.g. via USB). The user will be required to wear a small earpiece for which audio can be played through (maybe a little radio receiver for the earpiece and the PC audio jack is connected to a small FM transmitter?).

The lucid dreaming induction device would be required to report the amount of eye movement within the given user.  Not necessarily just the number of eye movements while in REM sleep but for the very beginning stages of sleep we would want to record this.

As soon as we can detect that the sleep process has been entered, our system will connect to a generalized knowledge site, say Wikipedia.org, and will retrieve the text of a random article  (via their RSS feed).  The system will then playback part of this article’s text through the through the user’s earpiece (we can find some sort of text-to-speech library to generate the spoken audio).

A different article is played at each different stages of sleep.  The full sleep cycle will be allowed to proceed as normal with the only exception being that the system will provide the audio/visual cues in an attempt to induce a lucid dream.  The point being that we try to introduce various facts throughout a full spectrum of unconscious states.

Once the sleep cycle has completed and the user awakens, the user immediately returns to the PC for which the device is connected to.  Utilizing the various text articles that the system read to the sleeping user, the system will derive simple questions from the article texts and present those to the end user in a quiz format (e.g. what color was the dog? how tall was John?)

The user repeats this process of sleep/quiz for several weeks.  Since the system knows what sleep state each set of facts was presented, depending upon where the user gives the most correct answers, the optimal sleep state for unconscious knowledge retention should be revealed.

Which begs the question, if we did find this magical state where we can effortless digest knowledge, could we induce emotional states as well?  What would happen if we’re in this vulnerable lucid state and our system plays an audio track with Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata overlaid with cries of people in panic?

Update: 7/21/2006 10:03pm

I’ve had a few suggestions for upgrading my design.

For one, you may be able to build your own EEG machine for the same price as the REM sleep tracker listed above. Utilizing the OpenEEG framework ( http://openeeg.sourceforge.net/doc/ ), and some low cost electrodes, the EEG may provide a more accurate measure of brain activity and sleep cycles.

A neurophone offers an exciting opportunity in terms of administering the audio queues. If standard audiotory response shuts down during REM, what about the possibilities of ultrasonic sound ( http://www.neurophone.com/home.htm )?

Links

• Evidence that REM Sleep Can Support Unimpaired cognitive Function and a Methodology for Studying the Psychophysiology of Dreaming
• Psychophysiological Studies of Consciousness during REM Sleep

Before an intervention is called, I will go ahead and openly admit that I have a problem.  I am addicted to over the counter nasal spray.  Not because I have a killer sinus problem but because every time I fall off the wagon, the congestion returns with vengeance, blocking my nasal passages, stifling my sleep, and overall, decreasing my quality of life.

Summarizing from last weeks Grey’s Anatomy, the medical term of my condition is Rhinitis Medicamentosa. This is quite different from Allergic Rhinitis for the onset of my condition is caused by the continuous usage of OTC nasal sprays, as opposed to Allergic Rhinitis, which is a blockage of the nasal passage due to a common allergen.  Most of OTC nasal sprays use one of two main ingredients; Oxymetazoline or Phenylepherine.  Oxymetazoline is the most common active ingredient (as found in Afrin) while Phenylepherine comes in second (as found in 4-Way Nasal Spray).  Either of these ingredients work by temporarily shrinking the nasal membrane.  Both are very effective.  Both are very addictive.

My Story

My troubles started back in early May.  I had begun an intensive weight training program and had been making good progress towards eliminating body fat while gaining muscle and strength. 

But coupled with my intense workouts, a tight schedule at work, a flurry of "oh shit" home repairs, and ignoring my blood pressure medicine, I quickly found my head feeling like it was going to explode, and I was hospitalized soon thereafter.

Slowly through the usage of a combination of drugs, my blood pressure came back down. But I started to realize another issue; I was still receiving headaches.  Not the same headache that I had experienced earlier (frequent blood pressure checks confirmed this), but more of a sinus pressured pain.  The intensity would originate from the top of the nose to around the eye-brow and would work its way throughout the top of my head.  It was as if someone squeezing the top of my forehead. 

I was taking a combination of Atenolol, Hydralazine, and Dyazide for my blood pressure.

The pain always intensified after nasal spray usage, and would weaken as the day progressed.  Usually the pain would wear off after a period of 12-13 hours.  The congestion always persisted even after the headaches died down.  This lead me to believe that the headaches were induced by the nasal spray.

My suspicion is the my nasal spray was interracting with my blood pressure medication.  Hydralazine works by dialating the veins and nasal spray constricts the membrane tissue, so that conflict is probably what was causing my headaches.  It’s no coincidence that the headaches lasted on average of 12 hours (the same amount of time most nasal sprays remains effective).

I needed to kick this habit and do it quickly.   

I finally broke down and purchased the Rhinostat titration system. The premise behind a titration system is that you utilize the medication (in this case, nose spray) as needed, and when the liquid reaches a certain point in the bottle, you add a dilutent to reduce the contents of the active ingredient.  The Rhinostat system appeared to work fairly well in the beginning.  The bottle is a peculiar design and didn’t seem to penetrate my nasal passages the way a conventional nasal spray bottle did.  The dosage of the decongestant is quite small, so if you find yourself frequently using your nasal spray, the Rhinostat system is going to become diluted quite quickly.   Unfortunately the dilution of the system outpaced the withdrawal of my symptoms.  In the end, I was left with a fully diluted solution and still a stuffy nose.   In order to sleep, I relapsed.

I have tried several decongestant products since the Rhinostat system, and all have failed to clear my passageways.  Here are the products I tried in attempt to alleviate congestion (all of the products do not contain Oxymetazoline or Phenylepherine):

• Sinusbuster
• SnoreStop NasoSpray
• Colloidal Silver Nasal Spray by Source Naturals
• Sinus and Allergy Relief Nasal Spray by bioAllers

My Own Titration System

Since I was unsuccessful in finding a solution that allowed me to sleep in peace, I decided to create my own titration system that I could control the dosages.

Start with a full bottle of nasal spray and every time the fluid level reaches half, fill in the rest of the fluid level with Saline nose spray.  BUT, not just any saline nasal spray.  Don’t go the cheap route on this; make sure that saline solution does not contain benzalkonium chloride (e.g. Simply Saline ).  Benzalkonium chloride has been shown to further increase the rebound effect. Most cheap saline solutions WILL WORSEN your symptoms (e.g. stuffiness). If you don’t want to continue having a stuffy nose, get Simply Saline oror something without the preservatives.

Repeat this process of filling the nasal spray bottle with Simply Saline until the solution is fully diluted.  

The Conclusion (as of 7/13/06)

So far, I still get somewhat congested and I can feel my sinuses swell up from time to time, but I think the intensity is slowing diminishing.  I’ve heard that it takes 4-7 days to withdrawal cold-turkey, so utilizing a titration system I can reasonably expect double that time-frame before I can draw any real conclusions.

I see an otolaryngologist (ear, nose, and throat specialist) tomorrow. While I am skeptical that he’ll have any real insight besides the standard "stop using the stuff!", I’ll be sure to follow-up if he has any better solutions.

Update (8/4/06 10:11pm)

After further research, I’ve discovered that some individuals have had success with a relatively new antihistamine called Astelin that doesn’t contain any steroids, Oxymetazoline or Phenylepherine.  My ear, nose and throat doctor was able to provide me a months sample.

A word of warning, Astelin is extremely bitter and even with a big gulf of mouthwash, don’t be suprised when the aftertaste remains.  The substance has a sedative effect, and after a liberal dose, definitely made me sleepy.  As a decongestant, it was mildly effective. My nasal passages opened up a bit, but by the time I had awakened in the morning, my stuffy nose had returned.  Over usage of the medication only seemed to worsen my congestive issues.  3-4 pumps appeared to be the optimal dosage for effectiveness. 

Further Updates (8/24/06 6:00pm)

Tim, author of the "Herbs and More" blog, was kind enough to further clarify his comments with an email outlining some specific herbal remedies for congestion.  He writes….

" My nose would continually stop up at night.  It would open at least partially during
the day, but at night, forget it!  I was on Allegra and Nasalcort spray, both
prescriptions which were around $25 each per month.
  
  Now, the only time I use an Afrin type nasal spray is right now, because I have a
bad cold.  This is the 3rd day.  Even so, I am only using it at night so I can
sleep.  Other than that, I have not used any type of decongestant for over 9
months.
  
  I take Stinging Nettles four times a day.  The cheapest place to buy them is at
Puritan’s 3 for 1 sale.  If you buy any from there, please get there through my
blog so I’ll get credit.  I also take a ginger capsule four times a day with the
Stinging Nettles.  I buy the Ginger at Wal-Mart…Rexall brand.
  
  Like any herb, it can take a couple of weeks before you start having an effect.
For nasal sprays, I alternate between Nasalcrom, which is non-addicting over the
counter which you can get at Wal-mart, and Nutribiotic Grapefruit Seed Extract
nasal spray, which is the cheapest price at Vitacost.  If you get anything from
Vitacost, please go there through my blog.
  
  At first, I had to heavily use the nasalcrom or the Nutribiotic GSE nasal spray.
But the longer I took the Stinging Nettles and Ginger, the less often I use those.
I probably only use one of them about 1 day out of every two weeks.  My nose
stays pretty clear, even at night, usually without them. 
  
  Good luck and I hope you find something non-prescription that works for you!  One
last thing…there are expensive herbal decongestant formulas without sudaphed
that are supposed to help your nose.  They are costly, even at Vitacost.  I tried
all of them and for me, they did not work.  The Stinging Nettles (1 bottle of 100
capsules is about $3.80 with puritans 3 for 1 sale) and the ginger (1 bottle of
100 capsules for $3.88 at Wal-mart) works for me….and it is much cheaper! "

If you like any of Tim’s suggestions, return the favor by buying your desired herbs from his site.

Update (9/10/06 10:24pm)

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.support.sinusitis/msg/c8025333cf1faae9?hl=en& 

The easiest way to get off Afrin is a short course of prednisone with an
antibiotic. Ask your doctor about this.
Murray Grossan, M.D. 

Anyone else have any experience with this treatment? 

Update (12/9/2006 2:00pm)

  If you can get a heated humidifier and add some "Vicks Vapo Steam" (http://www.walgreens.com/store/product.jsp?CATID=306484&id=prod352095) to the water, it should help a bit to open up your passages (only temporarily though).  Stick your face close to the humidifier, and try to breathe in as deep as possible.  Or a Vick’s Personal Steam Inhaler may be more appropriate than a general humidifier ( http://www.achooallergy.com/sinus-vicksinhaler.asp )

Update (2-22-07 8:00pm)

As if we needed any more reason to quit using OTC Nasal Sprays, I ran across this 1994 study outlining a few cases where OTC nasal spray was attributed to inducing paranoid psychosis in some patients.  I can personally testify that looking back, I was clearly more hyper when utilizing the spray and would get these periods of adrenal rushes where it was nearly impossible to sit at my desk and concentrate.  I no longer experience these intense hyper moments, but to be fair, I have also quit caffeine as well, so that could have been the contributing factor.

Here is a link to the study for those interested: Paranoid Psychosis Induced by Oxymetazoline Nasal Spray

Update (3-15-07 9:17pm)

Just to clarify…. 

From some of the emails that I receive, I think we have to make a distinction here. If you’re congestion is partly due to sinuses, alergies (pollutants, allergens, etc), cold, etc, there may be ways  to reduce the congestion.  You could look at using an antihistamine, Corticosteroid, cromolyn sodium, a decongestant or flush regularly with a pure saline spray.

But the above text above is addressing the issue of stufiness as it stems from the overuse of over the counter nasal/nose spray.  I never had problems with sinuses and such, so it was much easier for me to isolate my problems directly with the nose spray usage.   But if you have other related issues, you should look at getting those problems resolved first before discontinuing your nasal spray.

Why is that?  You have to treat the process as a science experiment.  For instance, if you have chronic sinus issues and have used the nasal spray heavily for several years, if you discontinue the usage of the nasal spray yet remain stuffed up, how do you know if the issue is that you’re not fully withdrawn from the nasal spray or is it just your sinuses continuing to complicate matters?

Remember to isolate the process, taking it one step at a time. 

Information Links

• http://www.rhinostat.com/
• https://www.uspharmacist.com/index.asp?show=article&page=8_1302.htm
• http://efrenzconnect-health-and-wellness.blogspot.com/2005/11/power-medications-for-rhinitis.html
• http://www.astelin.com

How do you relate to a 60 year old grandma that being 50% overweight is a risk?  Do you tell her that she’s twice at risk for heart disease, diabetes, or colon cancer?

No, I don’t think the average individual can conceptualize the above diseases.  Sure we’re all aware of the illnesses, but the actual effects are hard to put into frame.

The health industry certainly doesn’t lack information; health risk assessments have well been established.  What is needed is a bridge, a verbiage from which average citizens can take health information and ask "what does that mean for me and my family?"

One way to do this is to make the assessment personal. Take smoking for example; if a 55 year old grandpa is a smoker, he can expect to lose at least 5 years off of his life.  If the average male lives to be 70 years old, this grandpa can only expect to live until 65.  Now let’s say that grandfather has a two-year old grand-daughter. In the end, this grandfather can reasonably expect to miss his granddaughter’s high school graduation.

Lung cancer may mean nothing, missing a graduation may mean everything.  We must learn to build bridges.

My name is Jim Jones and I am a software engineer living in Lincoln, NE.  I’m fascinated by the strange, the weird.  I probably day dream too much. 

My goal is to create the next "Big" thing (for whatever that is).  So far the only thing getting big is my waste line which leads me to the development of this site.

There’s a lack of websites dedicated to the fitness inept.  We’re not talking about the stick that debates whether she should be eating 80 grams or 90 grams of protein a day.  There’s no shortage of those freaks online.

I’m talking about the individual that walks into the gym and looks clueless. Where to begin? I realize that it’s scary.  I used to be in great shape in high school and actually did collegiate sports my freshman year.

Now, when I walk into a gym I can’t help but feel the eyes in the room gravitate towards my breasts flopping wildly while my feet pound the treadmill like a three-legged elephant.  I weigh as much as a baby panda.

So what’s the resolution?  I’ve come up with a few solutions that I will share in the coming weeks but I still struggle like everyone else. Why do Twix bars have to come in pairs?  Do the peanuts in Snickers count as my daily protein intake?

Nutrition sucks, fitness sucks harder, but being fat sucks the worse.  I want to be able to ride a roller coaster without worrying if the harness will fit.