Summer Days of Fruitrition 3/7 – Healing Journey Day 65

Journal:
We are back on track! I woke up super tired. I definitely went to bed too late, but the menu was completed and sent so that my family could buy their groceries today. I am praying for them!

So, something happened this morning that I have not talked about in this blog. But I believe this part is crucial for FEMALES who may be embarking on a journey similar to mine, so I will comment about it as of today. Today, I got my period. Yes, I know, that seems like no big deal. But it is a big deal when I tell you that I haven’t had my period for 94 days. I knew I wasn’t pregnant, and I knew it could happen because of my change in diet. Although I enjoyed not having it for so long, I was prepared for it to come back at any time. I do the fertility awareness method (check it out here: http://www.tcoyf.com) but had slacked for awhile so even though I could have probably been able to tell when it would come, my lack of tracking made it slightly more difficult to tell. Was I worried when I didn’t get my period? No. If something was really wrong, I would have noticed something different. But I didn’t notice anything different; I felt great, didn’t feel like I was lacking anything except water, and it is fairly common for people who go raw. I’ve also done some research online of people who even question how “normal” a typical period is and I must say it is fascinating. I encourage you to do some research of your own. 🙂

So this morning, I went with the Summer Days of Fruitrition Wednesday schedule. That meant blending up some strawberries and mangoes this morning to make a “fruity soup.” I didn’t follow the exact proportions, but it really did turn out so good. I could see making this soup throughout the summer regularly.

For lunch, I chopped up 6 bananas and blended up 1 lb of strawberries to pour over the bananas as a strawberry sauce. It was honestly so simple, but so good.

Because I got in a bit of a “rush” to get to the gym and back, I indulged in a bit of rice. I am figuring out that part of my issue is prep time. No, I know I don’t seem to be “fixing” everything as quickly as expected, but part of the ability to fix things is to understand why they are happening. My last meal was going to be chopped up mangoes and tomatoes eaten in cups of lettuce. That’s a lot of prep whereas rice you just throw in a pot. Perhaps if my primary food was a different fruit, I wouldn’t have to spend as much time to eat. But, I’m going to keep going.

I had a superb workout. I did a full body workout, hitting each muscle group with at least one exercise. I finished up the session by doing some HIIT cycling. I felt SO GOOD. I missed the gym. I loved being back. But, they did rearrange the whole gym set up, so it took awhile to adjust my bearings and find all the equipment and benches I needed. But I did it, and I loved it.

After the workout, I was dangerously hungry… which led me to pick up a salad on the way home. Guys, this is huge. I easily could have picked up a sub where I would have had bread for the same price, but I went with a salad, no bread included. I am honestly so proud and amazed at myself that I’m picking such better food than I normally would have. I have changed, big time!

However, it fell apart – a bit – once I got home. Salads that you buy are usually much smaller than what you would make for yourself at home, and so, it didn’t fill me up. So as soon as I got home, I made some peanut butter dates, rice, and junk (aka finished the vegan ice cream in the freezer). I was ravenous! Crazy. Honestly crazy. If I was a binger, this would have been my binge. But, it’s over and I’m not replacing these junk foods that I’m eating. So, if they aren’t in the house, I won’t eat them. And that’s going to be a strategy going forward.

Review of Symptoms:
-Acne is bad.
-Hunger was ravenous after the gym.
-I actually got my period after 94 days!!
-Can tell I need to drink more water.
-Excellent strength and endurance in the gym.

Weight at the end of the day = 167.4 lbs (same as yesterday)

Total Calories = 2739 (87% carbs, 8% fat, 5% protein… I ate a lot!!)

When Your Spouse Is Your Manager/Business Partner

I hate to admit this, but today, my husband and I had a run-in. I’m not proud of it, I’m not proud of the way I acted, and it definitely was a huge series of miscommunications. But I’m sharing this for anyone else out there who may struggle with the same thing.

Now, my husband is not my manager nor my business partner. He’s really more of my personal trainer. But the aforementioned names popped up from a tv series I sometimes watch called, “The Divas”. If you haven’t seen it before, the “Divas” are the females of the WWE. The show more or less follows their lives, no different than the Kardashians or some other show. Anyways, one of the “Divas”, Eva Marie, has her husband as her manager, which seems to work well most of the time. However, in one episode, she was struggling with something, and she yelled at her husband saying that sometimes he just needs to be her husband and not always her manager.

Now, imagine the struggle. Their lives are literally personal and work intertwined all the time. There is definitely a need to draw the line of when it is appropriate to be a husband, and when it is appropriate to be a manager. Work does take up a majority of people’s lives, but it’s important to just be with each other and forget work for awhile.

Thankfully, my husband is only my personal trainer at the gym. And quite honestly, though we’ve struggled training together in the past, I’ve really enjoyed training with him the past week and a bit. I will admit, I complain every once in awhile about too many sets or reps, or exercises that I absolutely hate, but overall, it’s been good. I’ve actually had fun with him and he’s done so well at learning to ignore my complaints because that just tells me I need to do it regardless of what I think. It works for me. I need that tough attitude in the gym sometimes.

However, today was a different story. I put in a HARD leg workout on Monday. We then stupidly worked out after midnight last night doing chest, and I was a little upset that he made me change my grip and I know my chest didn’t get the same stretch that it usually does, plus my shoulders were more tired today from the odd grip. So let’s just say we went to bed around 2 in the morning.

We were back in the gym by 11 this morning. I was tired, not feeling 100%, and my legs are so sore. We get to the gym, and the first thing he tells me to do is more squats. I was a little ticked because he knows my legs are killing me already. But I didn’t throw that much of a fuss (ok, a small one), and stormed off and did them. I actually was thankful for doing them by the end, not that I wasn’t a stupid kind of sore, but my form felt better than it has in awhile for some reason. So it actually was ok.

After squats, we began the back workout, except he started me right off with one set of deadlifts with the heaviest weight I could. Now mix tiredness with soreness with already knowing my body is not in tip top ability shape. Had I done 1 or 2 more reps than I did, I’m pretty sure my back would be seriously injured. That just set me off. And for some reason, instead of ignoring me today, my husband wanted me to tell him what was wrong. So I told him about the squats and then thanked him, but then told him about the deadlifts and how I should have built up rather than going to my heaviest right away, and then told him how back day was too close to leg day because I could tell it was affecting my workout. This did not go over well, and I was more than visibly upset for the rest of the time in the gym.

Towards the end of our workout, when I was doing my bicep exercises, my husband came over and apologized to me. I still was in a bad mood though because by this point, not only was I feeling everything else I mentioned, my back was a little tender, my rib problems were annoying me, my wrists were cracking, my forearms were sore, and I literally felt like I had nothing left to give in the gym; I was honestly on “zombie” mode. My brain had shut out a long time ago. My body was just going on its own. My form suffered, I had to lift lighter, and when I finally was doing my last set of barbell curls, I only made it to 7 reps at a lower weight range than normal, ended up dropping the barbell and ran to sit down to hide my face to stop myself from crying. I literally had nothing left to give. My body was done.

Now, my husband didn’t know I was on the verge of crying; he just knew I was ignoring him, wouldn’t look at him, and he left to go to the car. I couldn’t say anything. I didn’t want to cry at the gym.

There are so many things that went wrong in this story. There are miscommunications, there was the fact that bringing up things at the gym is one thing my husband asked me not to do because it’s his stress-free place, and I definitely and visibly did not make it stress free today. There’s also the fact that of any day, I wish my husband would have been more of my husband today and realized that it’s been awhile since I’ve been at the gym, and my body is not up to the recovery level it used to be. Just so many things gone wrong…

The thing is, we came home, we talked it out, and everything is ok again. My mood was just too toxic to have a healthy conversation at the gym. I needed to replenish some of the energy stores in my exhausted body, and he needed to cool down from the attitudes he received from me. We’re ok. It’s just learning the fine line of what we each expect, what we want, and how to know when to be that personal trainer, manager, or business partner, and when to be the more sensitive husband. I will admit, it’s not the easiest, especially when I ask him to not give in to me at the gym. Today was just a different story.

So ladies and gentlemen, remember that even if you do ever get into some type of work-related situation with your spouse, make sure you know when to be that loving spouse, or when to act in a business way. It’s important and necessary to keep your relationship functioning in a healthy way.