Reflections for today 08/26- Brook's 10th birthday

While most people I know are sending of their little ones to the first day of school, I have an overwhelming sadness.  Today would be Brook's 10th birthday.  Everyone told me it would get easier as  I never got to see her or hold her.  She died at 5 months in utero and I haven't "gotten over it"to this day. Sure I don't go around miserable or feeling sorry for myself all the time.  But days like today are really hard.  To think of all the things I don't get to do with my child.

I hear comments about how I got to raise 2 boys that aren't  biologically mine.  That I should feel blessed. Those 2 boys don't speak to me anymore since their Dad and I divorced. I don't get to have children to habe over for holidays or to call to tell me they love me.

I have an amazing family with small children that love their "Sheesha" so very much.  I know how blessed I am in my life. 

But please don't tell sometime that has had a miscarriage or had their baby die in utero or die only a few hours after they are born something dumb like it gets easier or at least you didn't get to know them or they are in a better place.  Brook would have been in the best place in my arms.

I had my melt down this weekend as I do about once a year.  I'm fine,  but you never know what hurt someone is suffering.  Please just love that person.

I don't need words of apology about Brook.  I honor her every year.  Just like you do with your children on their birthdays.  I just felt the need to share and give people advice on how to care for rise like me.  Just show you care.

Tired of being Sick & Tired. (Long, very long)

This is SUPER LONG and really a rant to myself.  I almost didn't publish it and decided that for those that really want to read it - you can and it really is for me to release all my thoughts and ideas.

I have had my A-HA moment.  I have been making changes to my lifestyle and then I have a backslide moment or 12 before I realize that I am not doing well.
This week I had an awful "stomach bug."  I was told by several people that I got it from the dentist as it was the same day I went.  I really believed that to be true, it made sense.  But now - I really don't think so.

I started feeling better on Thursday and didn't eat too much and was able to keep food down.  Friday, I started feeling bad again, but figured I just wasn't 100% yet.

I went to Happy Hour on Friday with a good friend and had a few beverages.  I had made a pact with myself that I would only have alcohol once a week so I didn't over indulge (as I do when I drink).  I felt fine on Saturday, so was happy that my tummy was back to "normal" (normal for me).

My niece and nephew's birthday party at Mr. Gatti's on Saturday - led me to eat 1 piece of pizza and some cheese sticks and a few bites of cake. Then a few of us went to a new bar in RR - The Brass Tap.  I had a flight of beer (4 small taster beers) and a beer based cocktail - it tasted like a Summer Shandy (beer/lemonade).  Still feeling fine.  Went to dinner at Reunion Grille- because why not add insult to injury while I'm at it.  After that I had water for the rest of the evening.
This morning I woke up at 5:45 - sick as a dog.  I can't keep anything down.
Well - DUH Alicia.

Let's go over what I just said - I had a LOT of gluten.  I had greasy food.  I basically put a ton of crap in my body from Friday night until Saturday night.  My body doesn't like it.
I know better.

Brings me to my point.  I know what I need to do, I do it most of the time. I'd say that most of the time I do the right things.  I don't put crap in my car - I put gasoline in my car, so it goes.  I get regularly scheduled maintenance.  I maintain my vehicle so I know I can rely on it to get me where I need to go.  But, I can't manage to do that with my own body.

I get frustrated when I hear people say that they didn't lose weight this week when I know for a fact that they ate crap or drank alcohol or didn't work out.  I get angry when I hear people talk about how bad they feel from whatever ailment they have, but they aren't taking the proper measures to help themselves feel better and are relying on some pill to do all the work for them.  I become completely irate when I hear someone talking about how they hate their job, or their relationship - but they aren't doing anything to find another job, or another relationship.

But....I have realized why it makes me so upset - because I can see myself in those people, not taking action on what I need to do. I'm not saying that I haven't made forward progress in my life -as I have made leaps and bounds from where I was 5 years ago.   I don't expect to be "perfect" all the time, after all I am human, but I need to increase my awareness of what my choices are doing to my body.

I am 38 years old, I have celiac disease, fibromyalgia, more food allergies than I will list and high anxiety.

Celiac disease - Some people don't understand and it is hard.  Eating something with gluten makes me violently ill - I will spare you with those details - but just know from both ends.  I get the "gluten rash" all over my arms that gives away that I haven't been eating the way I should.

Fibromyalgia - there is no "magic pill" to make it go away - pain level goes from tolerable to unbearable depending on what day it is.  I know that if I ate "clean" that would help my pain level immensely.

Food Allergies -  I know that I make light of this all the time - "that would kill me" but in all seriousness - I have a LOT of food allergies.  My "TOP food allergies are:  Gluten (duh), Milk(I'm allergic to the milk proteins), Peanuts, Shellfish and Red Snapper (I know weird).   Some of the lesser "reactive" allergies include sugar and honey (which are in EVERYTHING).

High Anxiety - I have taken medication for this before and let me tell you - I call that the Zombie Years.  See when you have high anxiety, you don't sleep that well.  So, they give you medication for the anxiety and then something else to sleep.  Then you are a groggy, zombie like person for your awake hours.  Do you know what helps with anxiety?  Eating healthy and exercise - CRAZY!

Oh and the newest thing - Vitamin D deficiency.  Like so bad the doctor himself called me and gave me directions on how much of a supplement I needed to take and to get out in the sun.  So, when I started researching - guess what - those with Celiac disease can't absorb Vitamin D or Calcium through food - because of the damage that has been done to our intestines.  How did I not get told this before?  And Vitamin D deficiency can make your pain so much worse.

I have learned not to complain about my tummy troubles and my body pain.  When people ask, I will tell them if I feel bad that day or if it is a "good day".  My food allergies are discussed on a regular basis as it seems that food is a center part of being social.  My anxiety - I think everyone who knows me knows when I am having a bad anxiety day.

What is my freaking point already?   I have to make a real change in my lifestyle.  I will say I am going to and I will do really well for a bit.  Then I fall off and HARD.

I am making a commitment to myself to make choices for the long run instead of the instant gratification.  Today I will be focusing on what my short term and long term goals are for me.

Note to myself:
I have been working out on a regular basis since March.  But, I can work out ALL day everyday and it won't matter if I am eating garbage even for 24 hours a week.  Eat healthy food that will be the fuel you need for your body, not the stuff that is going to leave you stranded on the side of the road.

The goals I am going to share as of this moment:
Continue my current workout plan
Make weekly menu plans so I can have my healthy choices in front of me (Planning for me is key)

I am going to make my specific goals as far as how much by when in regards to weight loss and/or inches.  I am going to come up with non-food rewards. I am not going to share those goals.  Why? They aren't for anyone other than myself.  I am not doing a workout plan/diet.  I am having a complete lifestyle makeover.  I am going to eat healthy and exercise in hopes that is will make me feel better as a whole.  When I focus on doing it for my health, the weight loss/specific size pants goals will come along with that as a side effect.

life update

So life isn't always fair.  Sometimes things beyond your control.  You can choose to be defeated or spin it positively in your favor.
Anytime I decide to eat healthy and work out on a regular basis,  I seem to get sick or hurt or both.  This is when I usually give up completely and go back to my old habits.  Because at that point I just want to feel "normal. "

Well, this time will be different. Hurting and not knowing why and then feeling sick and just wanting crackers. Being out in pain meds again just to get through the day.  Hopefully they can determine what the root cause of this pain is and I can get of the medication quickly.i can still walk.  I can still do what I can do.  I don't have to just stop completely. I can still choose healthy food even if I have a moment of weakness.

No one is perfect but I am going to keep on going as much as I can instead of quiting.

Thanks to all of my friends who are uber supportive and not judgy when I ate queso this weekend and drank sugary alcoholic drinks.  It was fun.  I felt awful the next day (not from a hangover but from my body saying-you are so dumb, for real).

Making different choices isn't always the easiest thing but it is the best one in the end.  So I'm going to keep on keeping on.

Day 1 Complete - No Animal Protein

So - today was Day 1. I thought it would be a lot harder than it was.  To be honest, I am normally extremely good during the day anyhow.  It's at night when I am super munchy, hungry.
Breakfast was a smoothie of unsweetened almond milk, 1/2 banana, peaches, some cinnamon and 2 scoops of green. I drank that along with 2-24 ounces of water before 9.  Reminder - I was up at 3:30 this morning.
I also took my supplements, which consisted of omega-3, fiber, cleanse and gymnema(which is suppose to help with carb cravings).

At 10:30 I was hungry. I ate my power greens salad with carrots and 1/2 small avocado, tossed with a little bit of garlic.

12:30 - I had another smoothie - unsweetened almond milk, 1/2 banana, mixed berries and my supplements.

Around 2 I am exhausted. I have been up for over 10 hours and I could crash.  I decided to take a break and went and ate an entire bag of frozen broccoli steamed. Yes, probably a little overkill, but I was hungry.

Get off work at 5.  Drive directly to HEB, do not pass go. I thought about stopping in at a deli and getting a salad bar instead, but realized that I would probably eat something ridiculous instead.

So, for all those negative ninnies out there.  I bought 4 bags of vegetables for $35.  It will last me through Saturday and my family will be eating some as well.  So - I don't know how that is SO expensive.
I bought Brussel sprouts, asparagus, red onions, portabello mushrooms, beets, carrots, zucchini, yellow squash, a spaghetti squash (which was $6 by itself), broccoli/cauliflower mix (2 bags).

Now, did I buy all or any of this organic? No, I did not.  I am starting off with the dirty dozen which are rated the highest in insecticides/chemicals.  They include:

• Peaches
• Apples
• Sweet Bell Peppers
• Celery
• Nectarines
• Strawberries
• Cherries
• Pears
• Grapes (Imported)
• Spinach
• Lettuce
• Potatoes

The 12 I won't EVER be buying organic, unless the price is less expensive than non-organic are the ones that are rated the safest (least amount of pesticides) Those include:

• Onions
• Avocado
• Sweet Corn (Frozen)
• Pineapples
• Mango
• Asparagus
• Sweet Peas (Frozen)
• Kiwi Fruit
• Bananas
• Cabbage
• Broccoli
• Papaya

So nothing on my list today needed to be organic.  

Anyway, I went home and started making my salads for tomorrow.

I made a beet/carrot salad that has olive oil/honey/cinnamon dressing that it is marinated in.  Then I made my favorite cucumber/red onion salad that has apple cider vinegar/vinegar and it normally calls for sugar- I used honey as I don't have stevia at the house which is the only approved sweetener other than honey.  

While I am busy cutting up my veggies- I start cooking some small sweet potatoes for my dinner.  I wish I had taken pictures as they were tiny ones.  I ate two for dinner which was really the equivalent of 1/2 a regular one.  I ate it with guess what - BUTTER.  It was delicious.  I normally eat mine plain, but I hadn't had enough fat today logged, so I got to have a pat of butter.

I thought I would be able to sleep as I was so tired, but not going to happen.  Around 8, I decided to try my salads and had a small scoop of each. Delicious. I have some tweaking to do, but so good.

I spent the next couple of hours on pinterest stalking my healthy friends boards to find some good veggie recipes.  

What about protein - don't freak out on me.  My smoothies have tons of greens in them - kale, spinach, chard and they all have protein. :)

I am not hungry or less than satisfied.  I did drink a TON of water today and spent a lot of the day walking back and forth to pee.  Which is good - get all those yucky toxins out of my body. 

Hopefully I will be able to get a full night's sleep.  I feel accomplished today. I did want to cheat at dinner when the boys are heating up their meat and it smelled so good, but I just ate some mushrooms instead. 

Side effects today:  I was tired from no sleep last night so I am going to say my grumpiness was really from lack of sleep instead of the food changes.

I had a headache a few times today.  I know that is the caffeine withdrawal though. I am a coffee/tea drinker so switching to all water was hard.  And guess what gets rid of the headaches...MORE WATER.

I did get on the scale this morning just to have a starting point.  I will report periodically if there are "weight loss" benefits of this, but I am more about feeling good. 

Getting back on track with my exercise hopefully on Friday. I had to take an entire week off from having oral surgery last week and I should get the go ahead tomorrow!

That's all for now.  Thanks again for those of you that gave me a little extra push today with your kind words.  It's time like these you really know who your friends are.

Changing the way I eat/drink...NOT a DIET

I have been "sick" for a long time now with sleeping issues, eating problems, chronic pain, anxiety, depression and so on.
I have been to a  wide variety of doctors from holistic to medical.
Medications galore have been put into my body and help for periods of time.
At no point have I gone to the doctor and had them discuss with me the importance of nutrition or what/what not I should be eating.
With that said - how many times has a doctor told me that I am overweight? How many times have I heard, you should lose weight, that will assist with your pain/anxiety/sleep....
Almost every single time.  When I ask how, I have been told some "basic" guidelines, but more or less to eat less and move more.  Makes sense to me.  I have done almost every diet that has been invented. I have spent a lot of money on diet supplements, meal replacements, etc.
I have been told if I lose the first 20 pounds myself, that they would prescribe me with appetite suppressants.

All of these "diets" seem to cause even more issues with my stomach issues/food allergies.
Things were so bad a few years ago, my family paid for me to have extensive food allergy testing that is not covered under medical insurance.
I found that I am "allergic" to more things than not.  It would really be shorter for me to tell you what I "can" have than what I can't.   Not only food wise, but just in general.

Last year I started experiencing - Chronic pain. I'm not talking about a little soreness  here and there - like getting old pains.  I am talking about it feels like someone beat the hell out of me everyday pain.  Migraines, joint issues, overall pain.  EVERY DAY.  I thought I had the flu.  I went to my general doctor, then had a wide variety of useless tests done - MRI, Echo cardiogram, Stress Test, Ultrasounds on my female organs, a mammogram (I'm 38) and guess what they found nothing.  I was referred to a rheumatologist as my ANA levels were a tad high. I was started on more medication that again, helped a little for a bit.
I don't have anything that they tested me for and they can't explain why I hurt and things are swollen.
So, they give you a diagnosis of Fibromyalgia if you have a bunch of qualifying symptoms on a list over a specified period of time.  I was put on a higher dosage of daily medication and a sleeping aid. If you aren't sleeping, guess what your body will hurt.  It's telling you to slow your roll.....

Why the rant?  NO ONE TOLD ME how to eat.
Not once.
Not, you should do X or Y or Z or have you looked into this.....

Let's just put a bunch of chemicals in your body that is making you more sick or more dependent on us so you continue coming back from more medication.

So tonight I went to a nutrition seminar.  I signed up for a 21 day detox and purification program.  All of the natural products were $170.  The first 10 days you eat mainly vegetables, some fruit and oddly enough - fat.
Day 11-21 you add lean protein to your diet.

Yes, the suggestion is to eat mostly organic vegetables (free from chemicals) and fruit and grass fed/hormone free protein.  I am going to stick with the Dirty Dozen as far as organic fruits/veggies - because of cost.
No dairy, no grains (except brown or wild rice), no nuts/seeds, no alcohol/caffeine/tobacco and no processed foods.

So, I get home and start talking about the program and the organic veggies/fruit and hormone free meat.  The comments I get - that's so expensive, who eats like that, etc.

Really?  I have answer to that.

1) "It's too expensive to eat healthy" - I call bull.
Yes, I bought 3 organic honeycrisp apples for $9.  - Oh my goodness, you spent $9 on apples.
Really? You don't have a problem spending $9 on a mexican martini. You don't have a problem spending $9 on that chinese food you ate for lunch. or how about that $6 Starbucks?

3 Organic Honeycrisp apples are 6 - count them 6 of my snacks. As they are SO big, that I cut them in half and put some lemon juice on them to keep them from browning.

So, while you consume whatever you are putting into your body - I challenge you to "record" how much money it really costs to eat that and then look into your healthy options - you will be surprised at how NOT much more expensive it is to eat healthy.  I'm not talking about fast food or in a restaurant - I'm talking about YOU not being lazy and making your own food to take to work or eat for dinner.  Yes, convenience food is more expensive to eat healthy.  That is because they know you will pay it or just eat their crap that costs nothing for them to make and therefore is cheap for you to eat.  Crap in is Crap out - quite literally.

2) $170 is a lot of money for 3 weeks worth of supplements...I have an answer to that.
I have spent THOUSANDS of dollars for tests, doctor appointments, medication that sits in my drawers. I have lost a LOT of my time dedicated to "figuring out" what is wrong with me.  $170 is NOTHING.

3) Oh, well when are you going to start this "detox"  We have X event and then Y and then there will be this other thing?  I have an answer to that.
EXCUSES can ALWAYS be made to put off ANYTHING.

I don't think the world will stop or be overly concerned if on Friday I don't eat a cupcake at someone's graduation, if Saturday I don't drink a sugary sweet alcoholic beverage or if on Monday - I eat a veggie plate  at a birthday celebration.

Will it be hard - ABSOLUTELY.  We are so programmed to fall back into the ways we know.  To enjoy the company of others around food that make us "feel" happy or have a drink to make the pain go away.

Guess what I am TIRED of trying to feel good in that moment and then suffer for countless other moments.

I am asking the negative people to please leave their comments inside themselves.  I am asking for your support and your positive vibes while I am trying to make lifestyle changes so I can feel better.

This is not an attempt to "lose weight" or "look better" - this is a decision I have made so I FEEL better. I am sure that with the positive changes I am going to make I will have those first two things happen as a side effect and I will just call that my bonus.

Please don't be offended when I don't eat or drink the food you have prepared if it isn't within my parameters.  I am sure it is tasty and you put a lot of hard work into it.  It just isn't going to benefit me in the long run.  Will I be perfect? I am sure I won't be, but I am asking for support in making the right choices for me.

I will let you know how my journey goes along the way.  I am looking forward to the upcoming weeks and to a new healthy lifestyle.  NOT a DIET.