Rawsome Healthy Day 3/5 – Healing Journey Day 54

Journal:
I wasn’t as prepared for today as I wanted to be. I was exhausted, my stomach was hurting a lot from having junk food two days in a row, I didn’t sleep very much because I had so much to do, and I didn’t even prep my grapes for today. However, after reviewing the whole diet plan again, I decided the best place to start again was with the grapes breakfast because the only two breakfasts that are left include persimmons (of which mine are not ripe yet), or a smoothie of which I had no time to blend. So I chose to do Day 1 today, packed some grapes, spinach and bananas, and went off to school.

I got to eat breakfast around 10:00 am as my students were outside at recess which gave me some time.

In the afternoon, I was not able to make my smoothie because our school kitchen is not set up for me to do so at the moment as a lot of people have been using it. So, this meant that I ate a banana instead to tide me over. It’s still on the meal plan, just whole instead of blended. It was a way better option than eating more junk again today. I am breaking away from the bad habits I’ve developed in the past few days. I hate feeling miserable. Raw foods are definitely the way to go.

After I got home, I had to quickly get set up because I had a webinar to watch. So, I took my dog outside for a bit, then came in and cut up some kiwis as that was the “pre-dinner” snack. I could have made my smoothie, but sorting through spinach would have taken way longer than just slicing up some kiwis. So that’s what I did. In fact, I didn’t make the smoothie all day.

Now, after the webinar, and perhaps even during the webinar, I fell asleep. I was so exhausted. I’m literally sleeping like 5 hours a night because I stay up working so much. I keep saying I need to balance things out, but the truth is I really do. Perhaps this weekend I’ll actually draw up a schedule for every day.

After I woke up from my nap, I immediately had a huge stomach cramp and had to run to the bathroom. Three times today this happened, and it has been painful. My stomach is finally in a full rebellion of the junk food I ate and is starting to cleanse itself. Hopefully this is short-lived and my body can do its job efficiently because I didn’t even go to the gym tonight in fear of being too far away from a bathroom for too long.

I didn’t feel like eating again for the longest time, but did end up making a salad before bed. However, the salad didn’t taste the greatest (it’s very hit and miss with the dressings), so I only ended up eating about half of it. But because my stomach was fairly empty, I was so hungry and couldn’t even go to bed without eating something else. So, off the meal plan but still predominately raw, I sliced up some banana, drizzled some apple honey (honey consistency but made from apple, no bees required), and put a few vegan chocolate chips. Now, I’m not sure what was wrong with my kiwis earlier, but they were very “zingy” and it left what almost felt like some stinging in my mouth which made the late night dessert not so good. Perhaps my kiwis were not fully ripe; I really don’t know. I don’t have any food allergies and have never reacted to kiwis before, but perhaps there is more to the story than I know.

Now, tomorrow is National Sandwich Day and it is a planned, off-course day. It will still be vegan with tons of raw veggies, but I am intrigued to see how my body reacts to bread. I do suspect that bread will help stop the immediate bathroom needs which would be nice while I’m at work since the staff only have one washroom to split amongst us all, but I’ve also heard people discover their gluten intolerance when trying gluten after so long of not eating it. So this will be an experiment to see how my body reacts. Then I’m back on course with the last two days of the Rawsome Healthy Diet Plan. I’m still trying to decide where I want to go after that, but stay tuned and you’ll find out.

Review of Symptoms:
-Stomach is in an all-out war, cleansing mode!
-Tired/exhausted
-Acne is the same.
-Hair is so soft, but still a little static-y.
-Muscles are finally less sore today. Aiming for the gym tomorrow.
-Tongue/mouth seemed to react a little to the kiwis (not swollen, just like a “sting”).
-Hungry

Weight at the end of the the day = 165.6 lbs (down 4.8 lbs from yesterday)

Total Calories = 2087 (83% carbs, 10% fat, 7% protein… good macro ratio!)

I Threw in the Towel and Regretted It – Healing Journey Day 46

Journal:
This morning was rough. It actually started out good: I woke up early, finished one of the 3 papers that were due today, showered early, got ready on time, and even had enough spare time to make a smoothie for breakfast to take with me! I was so happy.

Then it began. My dog started scratching at the door which is not allowed. So I reprimanded him and went back downstairs to finish making my smoothie. I thought I was all done when no sooner had I finished dumping it from my Magic Bullet blender into my cup had I realized that half of the rubber seal was missing. I hoped that it had just broken from being old and was still intact in my smoothie somewhere, but to no avail. It was gone: disintegrated throughout my smoothie. Ugh. These were my only 3 truly ripe bananas and I don’t even have any spare frozen ones. There went the best smoothie of the day. I had to dump it out. This upset me the most. But then, I went to let my dog in only to find that somehow he unattached his lead again (it’s a chain link so I’m not even sure how he does this) which meant he had run through the muddy, dug-up garden. So I tried to contain him on the mat inside the door. However, the second I turned to grab the towel to wipe him down, he bolted and ran muddy footprints all through the kitchen, down the beige carpet on the stairs, through the hallway, and into my carpeted room. Ugh. What a morning.

You can see the half of the silicone ring that was left… There was no finding it with my knife. It was completely obliterated throughout the whole smoothie.

So after worship at work, I took a few minutes to go to the kitchen and quickly threw another smoothie together. It was simple, spinach and bananas. But I could easily taste the difference of bananas that are not as ripe as the last ones I sampled. And to top it all off, I threw out the equivalent of a banana and a half because they so badly bruised that they were literal mush. But, I had a green smoothie and that’s what day it is today. Three days of green smoothies will hopefully only improve from here.

I didn’t get another chance to make another smoothie until late in the afternoon. I was hungry and couldn’t wait to make a smoothie. I quickly went through my container of spinach, only to find out that an odd amount of moisture had somehow gotten in the container and started to make some of the spinach go bad. So I picked out all the good spinach that I could. Then I peeled the rest of my bananas, only having to throw one out. I also had a bag of peaches that I had been looking forward to. Come to find out, I had to throw out two of the peaches and the others were going bad quickly. However, I saved what I could, threw it in the blender, and blended it up. Words cannot express how terrible this smoothie tasted. Whether it was because of the deteriorating peaches, spinach I saved from the wilting ones, or the definitely unripe bananas, I can only guess they all were a factor. I honestly tried to choke it down. I mean, I discovered I hated rosemary a few days ago and still managed to choke it down. But this… this was awful. Words cannot describe. And as hard as I tried, I couldn’t do it. So there went some more money down the drain. Needless to say, I was frustrated.

So, out of frustration, I left school starving, came home, grabbed an English cucumber and the Daiya ranch dressing that I had left, and ate it down quickly. I then went to get a vegan burrito. Sure, it tasted ok. But to be honest, I would have preferred just a side of rice and beans. My taste has definitely gone more simplistic. But the way I felt while eating this burrito was not worth it. My stomach immediately felt bloated and full. I could not finish the burrito. I may eat that volume of raw foods, but definitely not of cooked foods. My body is not used to it. Ugh. This was a big mistake. If I’m going to rebel in frustration, it NEEDS to be with unplanned raw foods. Though I must confess, a burrito with beans, rice, pico de gallo and salsa is not a huge splurge. In my old days, it would have been all the junk food I could have gotten my hands on. But even so, this is not what I like my body to feel like; I’m missing the raw foods.

I came back home and began working on my sub plans for tomorrow. I’m going to a convention tomorrow and there was a lot of work that needed to be done ahead of time. I was able to get my work done, but my mind was continuing to think about how much better I felt eating raw foods. I made up my mind to be back on track tomorrow, and so that meant a very late drive to two grocery stores to try and find the most ripe bananas I could. Here’s to attempting my 3 days of green smoothies again tomorrow!

Since I didn’t go to sleep until the wee hours of the morning, I ended up grabbing what food I had around me. This included an apple cinnamon fig bar and another English cucumber with Daiya ranch and green Sriracha. What a messed up day of eating.

Tomorrow we are back on track with some mostly ripened bananas, kale and spinach. Let’s do it!

Review of Symptoms:
-Acne is better along my neck line, but worse on my cheeks.
-Digestion is so-so.
-Hair is actually doing alright. Washed with only water today.
-Energy is good.

Weight at the end of the day = 171.2 lbs (up 3.2 lbs from yesterday)

Total Calories = 2350 (68% carbs, 25% fat, 7% protein… totally blew my macros today…)

Fruit w/Salad Supper Day 3 – Healing Journey Day 40

Journal:
I woke up so cold today. This is the coldest I have felt yet. I honestly haven’t struggled with the desire of wanting something hot to eat yet, but I’m wondering if the colder temperatures will get me yet.

I actually was on the ball this morning. I was up and ready faster than normal. It has been my week to do worships at work, so I had everything ready to go and was even at work at my earliest time yet. I was impressed with myself today!

So, I have been thinking about ways I can get in more calories throughout the day, and today I knew that not only did my class had Reading Buddies with another class, it was my turn to have that time off. During Reading Buddies once a week, we take turns on which classroom the students go to and it is the duty of that classroom’s teacher to supervise while the other gets a short break. It really works nicely because what teacher doesn’t like a little bit of an extra break? I know I always have a ton of things to do, so a little extra time is nice.

While they were outside at morning recess, I quickly went to the kitchen and made a smoothie from three peaches, some water, and three frozen bananas. It actually was really good and I was able to drink it while my students were with their Reading Buddies.

I honestly don’t know where these giant mugs came from, but they were in our school’s kitchen so I’ve been using them. I seriously want to invest in one because they are the perfect size to sip away on a smoothie while still looking somewhat professional.

Throughout the rest of the day, I managed to eat two Mandarin oranges. It wasn’t a lot, but I definitely felt better after having that smoothie in the morning. If I could just figure out a way to make a smoothie each day, I’d be winning!

I ended up with two impromptu meetings after school. Following those meetings, I came home and put my dog outside. The sun had come out and had raised the temperatures to a nice, snow-melting temperature. So I figured my dog better enjoy it while he can.

Once he had been outside for awhile, I brought him back in, gave him some food and a treat, and hit the mall. I was on the hunt for white slippers to go with my pyjamas for Pyjama Day tomorrow. Do you think I could find what I wanted in any store in the mall? Absolutely not. It is a 2-floor, multi-level mall, and yet had nothing that I wanted. I then drove to another store and spent forever in there trying things on to change my outfit. But honestly, it all was to little avail. I came out with a new pair of pyjama pants that were on sale and only half-heartedly looked forward to tomorrow.

So amidst the hours of stress, fast-pace walking, jumping in and out of clothes, I managed to eat the apple I had stashed in my pocket. It was another Fuji apple that thankfully was delicious, but honestly it did little to fuel the calories I was burning off throughout the evening.

I ended up stopping by Subway to pick up a pre-chopped salad. I hadn’t eaten my nightly supper yet, and it would have taken too long to make my usual dressing and chop up all of the salad ingredients. I’m already not getting enough sleep and am preparing for a long day tomorrow as we have a staff meeting after school. So, I decided that assistance would be nice on this particular day.

The Subway lady was really nice. It was a half hour before closing (to give you an idea of how long I was running around), but she brought out her freshly washed tools to chop me up some tomatoes, cucumber, bell peppers, red onion and lettuce. Instead of choosing a regular dressing, I had guacamole on top (essentially mashed up avocado). I then took it home and added some chopped up mushrooms and made my dressing. Now, I didn’t know this before, but I definitely know it now. I do NOT like rosemary. Oh my word. I almost had to choke down my dressing (hence why it is in the bowl on the side). I would have much rather enjoyed the salad with just the guacamole. And do you want to know something? I actually finished this salad in less than an hour (it went down a lot easier once the dressing was gone…) AND I could have eaten more. I actually liked it simple. My tastebuds are improving!

As you’ll notice, the dressing looks a little chunkier than normal; that’s because it was. The amount that I used, according to the recipe, was just enough to fit under and around the blades of the Vitamix . Even when I added a Roma tomato to the blender to see if that would help, it just built up along the walls of the blender. So… yes… a little chunky.

If you want the original recipe, here it is (I think this is another Fully Raw Kristina recipe.. if you like rosemary, I’m sure you’ll love it):

-2 Cups Mango
-Handful of Dates (Approx 10)
-Handful of Fresh Rosemary

So tomorrow, the plan is to try and get a smoothie made first thing in the morning again. If I don’t wake up early enough, then I won’t be having a smoothie until lunch time which could still work. I will just have to eat some Mandarin oranges in the morning and have the smoothie in the afternoon. I will also take an apple or two to have during our staff meeting so I don’t eat all the chips and snacks they usually bring out. This will be probably my first staff meeting without indulging in junk… so here we go!

Review of Symptoms:
-Acne still bad… very bad…
-Hair is so soft, shiny and beautiful.
-Energy is still holding up despite everything going on.
-Eyes seem to do better when not on the computer as much.

Weight at the end of the day = I’m so sorry. I didn’t stay awake long enough to weight myself.

Total Calories = 1175 (89% carbs, 5% fat, 6% protein… still not yet enough food but slowly I’m getting there!)

What in the World is Going On? – Healing Journey Day 20

Journal:
Today was actually a pretty good day. Now, when I say it was a pretty good day, I’m reflecting and realizing that my “good” days have taken on a whole new meaning themselves. A “good” day now would have been a “crazy” day to me before. But I firmly believe in celebrating what is good overall, so I will continue to say that today was a pretty good day.

I managed to eat 2 bananas in the morning. This was a feat. I can’t remember the last time I actually managed to eat before the afternoon. The bananas were ripe and sweet and I was thankful. I was not craving any cooked food whatsoever.

At lunch time, we ran into the first big issue: hot lunch was not ready. I, in no way, blame the person in charge. He was doing the best he could with none of his help showing up. In fact, I felt bad. Being the teacher I am, I decided to move our lunch time to after lunch recess so that there wouldn’t be a huge rush and extra time could be provided. After explaining this to my students, they completely understood.

Before my students came back in from recess, I decided to go see if any help was needed. Instead of giving assistance, they told me to call out my orders according to my list and simply gather what was needed for my class. So that is what I did. I had 8 orders for my class and I worked on transporting everything and having everything prepared for my hungry students to eat when they came in. However, because it was such a rush, I didn’t realize that I had also taken the lunch of a student who had been sent home in the morning. Because it had been handled, the hot lunch could not be returned. So I ended up splitting the lunch with another student whose father had not yet shown up with her lunch. This wasn’t even because I really wanted the lunch to be completely honest. But it was because I have a problem with wasting food. The cheese slice they added to the veggie burger? It definitely came off. Since being vegan, I cannot look at cheese the same way. And for anyone who has not read my other posts, I work in a school that does not serve meat whatsoever, so on any hot lunch day, meat is never an option. Everything is either vegetarian (like pizza days) or vegan, often with the option of either.

So, I didn’t end up with a super heavy feeling which I credit to not eating the whole lunch myself. However, I did not feel as “fresh” either. I’m not enjoying cooked food as much as I thought I would. There really is something to eating raw. I think my biggest struggle right now is that I’m limited to a single fruit per day and I just really want some veggies in there too to give me a break from the sweetness. But that day is coming soon. I just have to keep this up a little longer (especially since the past 3 days haven’t been 100%). Tomorrow, I have to clean up and do a full banana island day.

After lunch, my next big event happened during gym class for my students. The student whose parents still had not shown up with anything for her to eat was keeling over in gym. At this point, I asked if I could go into the canteen and pick a couple more things out for her. I sat with her while she ate the two things we selected. After she returned to gym, I looked at the clock and realized I had only about 5 minutes left until it was time to pick my kids up from gym. So I decided to head back into the kitchen to see if any help was needed in the clean up from hot lunch (again, one person doing everything). As I went in to help, the announcement went for what should have been a lockdown drill. However, a small and yet huge mistake was made. In a rush to fit our drills into the day, the script from the emergency paper was read and instead of using the appropriate words to say that it was just a drill, the script that meant it wasn’t just a drill was used. I can’t even begin to explain the stress and panic that occurred following the use of the wrong script. Thankfully, it ended up being just a drill with the wrong words being read. But as soon as everyone was given the all clear, many teachers ran to find out what happened and I think it is safe to say that this mistake will not happen again.

The rest of the day went fairly well, aside from an earthquake drill we had to practice later in the day. It was not the most productive day at work. But I came away from the day proud of my students and how they handled each situation. I am just happy we were all safe.

Though I did have a meeting of sorts again after school, I was actually home by 6:00 pm. It is a record for the past few weeks. It felt so good to just leave my classroom a mess, not worry about prepping for the next day, and not worrying about having to get up early the next morning to do it all again. I was home, I was safe, and for one evening, work could wait.

I would like to say the rest of the evening went well, but it didn’t. Around 7:00, I started wondering why my husband had not messaged me since lunch. He almost always messages me when he gets home around 6:00. And then I found out what happened.

A year or so ago, my mother-in-law was involved in a massive court case as her assistant had embezzled a bunch of money from the company. As she is second under the owner, she was just as much if not more involved with taking this lady to court than he was. While this was going on, my mother-in-law’s house was broken into: the door was kicked down, things were stolen, etc. Police were involved, the door was taken for fingerprinting, and the house was searched. Nothing ever came from this case, though suspicions were strong. She then installed some cameras along the driveway and put an electric gate at the end of the driveway as well. Nothing seemed to happen after that.

Well, yesterday, someone had come along and not only disconnected everything from her electric gate, but had also unbolted and stolen all of the electric gate equipment. To me, that took someone who had premeditated this as the person would have had to have all the right equipment to do it while also trying to be fast so as not to be caught when someone drove by. Though there is still a slight possibility it was someone looking to make some cash, it doesn’t seem likely.

Not only was that bad enough, the reason my husband had not contacted me was because someone had actually broken into the house again. But instead of just kicking in the door and stealing some things, they had turned on her gas burners and left them running. No, they were not ignited; they were simply turned on so the gas would continue to fill the house. Honestly, this is so much like a tv show. These are things you don’t think will ever happen to you. But this is real life and this is scary beyond belief. The worst part of it all is I had two of my dogs upstairs in a kennel. If they had blown up the house or burned the house down, my dogs would not be alive today. I freaked out. The worst part is, they called the cops, they came and took a look but of course could do nothing. The best advice they gave her was to set up cameras, fix the gate, and attach a sign at the beginning of her property saying that it was under surveillance. Even for myself, I find no comfort in this whatsoever. I think I’m still in shock now, even as I write this. This is one of my “homes”. This is my husband, my mother-in-law, and my dogs. If anything happens to them… I just can’t even fathom right now.

So needless to say, I didn’t leave the house. The gym was the furthest thing from my mind. And though I did manage to eat a total of 5 bananas today, only 2 of those were after I got home. My appetite was far from here. I’m on edge. I just can’t even imagine…

Review of Symptoms:
-Tired
-Stressed
-Not so hungry due to stress
-Cooked food is causing me to feel not as great.
-Acne is the same.
-Haven’t “eliminated” in several days…

Weight at the end of the day = 174.6 lbs (still no weight change)

Total Calories = approx. 1237 (78% carbs, 15% fat, 7% protein… much better ratios today)

Choosing Your Battles

Now, in many relationship advice books or forums, people will tell you to choose your battles. Of course, this comes in incredibly handy in relationships because, quite frankly, nobody is going to be the same as you. Especially when you live together, you are then trying to fit two lives into one and there will be many conflicting issues when two opinions are trying to melt into one.

However, my story doesn’t focus on a relationship per se. But it is about learning to deal with the small stuff, and only making a big deal over big things so that people have no way to argue back with you.

When my husband and I got our first apartment, it was in a “fixed” state. And what I mean by that is simply that the people before us were very rough on the place, having big parties and crazy enough to throw a couch off the deck into someone’s car below. Needless to say, they were kicked out, and all the stickers on the fan blades, the dirt and garbage throughout the place, and patch work here and there needed to be done. It wasn’t perfect when we got it, but it was our first place and that was all that mattered.

As time would go on, the lack of a screen door on our deck (the previous tenants had smashed that), had started wilting the corner of the door inwards. We mentioned it several times for almost a year, but it apparently wasn’t a big issue. We also had a screen missing in our bedroom window which was mentioned, but that never got fixed either. My husband wanted to stop paying our rent and be a little more forceful when it came to getting these simple repairs done, but I took the much gentler approach and said that we’ll just wait a little longer.

Now, as you can imagine, when those -40 winter days come, having an exposed corner of your door to the outside was a huge issue. When I could sit on my couch and see the snow outside on my deck through the one corner, that was an issue. Unfortunately nobody did anything about it. We kept being promised that something would happen, but it didn’t. And after a year and a half of being there, I decided that it was finally time to make a little noise. So I found the e-mail for the CEO of the rental company, thanked him for making cheaper places available and for having pet allowance (that a lot of places don’t), I simply explained to him our situation and reminded him how awful it was going to be on another -40 night. My door was fixed within 2 days. Now, I also had my fridge quit, and that was replaced right away. Had I complained and been more forceful about everything, I don’t think this would have been the case.

In my e-mail to the CEO, I also mentioned I was planning to move to another one of the company’s rental properties simply for being closer to work, and without asking, in apologizing for what we had been through, he waived our transition fee and got me an apartment rather quickly. I also had an ex-landlord of our current property (she was promoted higher in the company) call and offer any assistance in the transition I needed. Now think about that for a moment. I chose my battle. I didn’t battle every little thing. When you have lots of little incidences built up, people can see where you’re coming from over the bigger things and are usually more than willing to help you out.

Fast forward to our new place. In the year we’ve been here, we moved in with 2 broken sets of blinds (still never been replaced), a missing screen in our office window, the basement leaked every time it rained, our basement completely flooded twice, and just recently our tub quit draining. Now of course, my husband wants to take the same forceful approach because in reality, it is ridiculous. However, they did fairly quickly respond to the flooding, it took them about a year to fix the cracks in the basement, but they still did it, and it’s now taken them 5 days to fix our tub, plus I will have to call them back tomorrow because the piping from the tub is still dripping over our kitchen counter. But I haven’t made a big deal about any of it, and I choose not to because the more compliant you are over the small things, the more compliant they will usually be when it comes to something big.

So people, choose your battles. Don’t make a huge deal about everything or people will treat you as that “complainer”. But be patient with the small things, and you watch how much people will do what they can for you when it comes to a big thing.

The Most Emotional Spring Break

Wow. Where do I even begin…

This year I was actually looking forward to my Spring Break (for the first time since I’ve started teaching). I had the new passion planner my parents got me, I booked my days full of cleaning and catching up on life… and grading too.

On Friday, the very first thing that happened was my washing machine broke. I had so much laundry to catch-up on, but that was going to have to wait. Not a good beginning sign…

The next few days went rather well. Starting Monday, I found myself sticking to my schedules I had created, and conquering so much of the work that had been put off for way too long. I cleaned my basement, my kitchen, my entry, my stairs, my bedroom, part of my office, most of my bathroom, and even categorized some items I have to sell! It was so productive. And yes, I got quite a bit of grading done as well. I even spent excess time with my dogs and my skinny pig. I was so happy.

First, I got news that my sister was pregnant. Normally, this would be exciting news, except my sister’s life has been very rocky the last few years. She was currently with a not-so-good boyfriend, a not-so-good job, and renting a bedroom from a house – definitely not a place or situation to raise a child! She also has not had healthcare for years, and is not consistent with taking care of herself – not good for the baby, let alone her!

This turned into a very rocky situation of my step-father taking her to his hotel with him, her leaving behind his back, him buying her a plane ticket and her never returning to the hotel like she said she would. It turned into many phone calls, texts, and Facebook messages, few and far between responses from my sister, and potentially very bad situations that I cannot elaborate on at this time. What resulted of the situation was that my sister promised to be back in time for our day together on Friday which never happened. My step-father ended up picking her up on Sunday, keeping her with him Sunday night, and flying out with her on Monday. I was worried she would even refuse to get on the plane, but for some reason, she did it. Now she is home with my family who will help her get back on her feet and hopefully be able to handle her emotions at this time. It’s going to be a long road for her.

Amidst those difficulties, worrying and stress, my skinny pig died. After having an awesome week, being able to spend all that extra time with him, we noticed he was acting strange on Friday morning. So we went to the pet store, bought liquid vitamins to put in his water, and by the time we came home, he was dead. Mind you, he was at least 4 years old, if not more than that. So for a skinny/guinea pig, he was in the upper range of their age. It is just incredibly sad that he has been with us for 4 years and we have bonded with him so much. Our little guy’s passing was incredibly hard to take amidst everything else on this break.

As the title of this blog speaks, this was probably the most emotional Spring Break I’ve ever had. I hope it’s the last one like this I ever have. But from here, we can only move on and hope for better.

Sleep Walking: What’s Your Story?

I am NOT a habitual sleep walker, at least I don’t think so. But I do have some instances where it has happened.

Reminds me of Robert Munsch’s 40 Below where the dad went sleepwalking outside in 40 below.

When I was little, and I mean really little, like 4, I can remember living at my grandparents house with my mom and sister (1 at the time). My parents were just going through a separation leading to divorce and so mom had moved “home”. I remember my grandfather informing me of a little event that happened the night before, something I had no recollection of at all. This is what he told me happened:

My grandfather was in the kitchen making a late night snack. Our kitchen was designed as a square with an open rectangle on the edge of it, a mini entrance hallway that opened into the kitchen. So if you were at the sink/stove/cupboards, you could not see the front door. You would have to walk around the wall to look at the door. However, the table was on the opposite wall of the stove so you could easily see both sides at the same time.

Anyways, my grandfather was facing the cupboards, using the counter to make his snack. All of a sudden, he heard the door open, so naturally ran towards the door to see what was going on. Nobody was breaking into the house, his little granddaughter was leaving the house, in the middle of the night! He called my name and asked me where I was going, and I apparently told him I was going to walk the dog. I don’t even think we had a dog at the time. My grandfather told me it was the middle of the night and I needed to go back to bed. I easily complied and walked myself back up to bed, asleep the whole time.

Now, something important to note here is that it was not an easy walk from my bedroom to the kitchen and back. I would have had to go to the stairs, go down the first set of stairs, turn on the landing, go down the long set of stairs, turn, walk down the hallway, turn again, walk through a zigzag hallway, through the doorway into the kitchen, walk around the table but not too close into the cupboards so my grandfather didn’t notice me, around the wall, down the hallway, and open the door! And of course, do all that in reverse on my way back up. Can you imagine this?

After that, I don’t have many stories of sleepwalking until I hit university where my sleep-functioning was due to such extreme lack of sleep. From conversations where people couldn’t even tell I was sleeping, to looking at people in my sleep (they said later the only thing they noticed was that my eyes were red, but honestly had no idea I was asleep), to grabbing the control for the fire place and trying to turn down the tv, to who knows what. That was a time my night-functioning was at an all-time extreme.

Sleepwalking almost always comes with an interesting story. I’m curious to hear yours! Leave your story in a comment below!

Week 2 Day 6

Oh how nice it feels to sleep in… those were my thoughts today! Of course, when I did wake up, I realized that I needed to get my butt in gear and get ready for my appointments. I had a massage, a chiropractor, and an acupuncture appointment back to back. I’m telling you, it was like being pampered in a spa!

As I was leaving, the fact that I had not eaten anything yet was starting to bother me. A few times, earlier in the summer, I would stop at the convenient drive-thru A&W on the way home. This thought crossed my mind again. But I began to mentally challenge myself. Do I really want something so greasy? Do I really want to waste my macros? Or possibly have a chance of going over? Is my body really being rewarded by eating that burger?

Then it hit me: It wasn’t the really the taste I was craving, it wasn’t really a love for the food, it was convenience, it was habit. How awful is that! Sure it would have been so easy to turn in, grab a burger, and satisfy my hunger sooner than later, but that’s not really what I wanted. I want to look good, to feel good, and to be in control of my body and the nutrition I feed it. So I kept on driving.

The rest of the day went well, until supper. My husband had to drive around to various tool shops looking for the right tools he needed for work. We had already driven around our side of the city, and decided we might as well drive to the other side of the city and get all the tool shopping done. So we planned on eating out (macros allowed for it).

Our favourite East Indian restaurant was on that side of the city. This restaurant has a buffet so it is very easy to control what gets put on your plate. But something happened that has never happened here before.

When we get buffet, the hostess always expects you to get up and start serving yourself. Then they always bring you a jug of water for your table. Well, this time, there was no jug of water when we got back. In fact, despite my trying to catch a waitresses attention (they were very busy), we probably didn’t have water for at least 15-20 minutes. When the waitress came over and realized, she gave me a look of horror and apologized so sincerely. I kept telling her it was ok, and she had a fresh jug of water rushed over to us. But that wasn’t the end. She also came over with a plate of 3 desserts. Oh boy…

The lady told us that as an apology she had picked out her top three favourite desserts from their storefront bakery and that she hoped we liked them. I felt so horrible. I could not eat them and run the risk of hurting her feelings, or I could eat them and let her know I liked them and that everything was good. Main point of the story, I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, and I felt really bad that she felt so bad, I tried to eat them. Half way through, she brought us a fresh, straight out of the kitchen dessert. Now don’t get me wrong, they were delicious, but FOUR DESSERTS! My husband took a couple bites to help me, and I tried to get them all down, but needless to say, I was STUFFED and managed only a bite or two out of the last one. This was the worst thing I could have done.

See, upon reflection, I could have politely ate one and then asked for a box for the rest. I could have figured out other ways of not hurting her feelings instead of just going to the worst alternative. Because afterwards, I felt SO SICK.

I did make it to the gym that night, but managed to only complete half of my workout which was a circuit of four exercises. I felt so awful. Not to mention I haven’t had processed sugar in quite some time, since starting this challenge. All I wanted to do was sleep so that I didn’t have to be awake and feel the way I did. It really was that awful.

What can I say to sum up this day? Lesson learned!

Changing Your Diet Doesn’t Have To Be Hard

I cannot tell you how many times I’ve seen people fail with diets. In fact the very word “diet” has so many negative associations. I am 100% using the term a lifestyle change because to me, a diet is temporary thus causing temporary results. I want something more permanent, something that will change my life.

Lately, I’ve been giving advice to a cousin of mine. She has paid for every fitness/diet program that has been available in her city. Every single one of them has either left her feeling horrible, or never gave consistent results. It just seemed so hard! And who can blame her?

Most diets require you to switch your entire daily life in an instant. If you’re an avid junk food eater, try having no junk food for a week, or even a couple of days. It’s almost like quitting smoking cold turkey. For most people, it’s hard!

But it doesn’t have to be that way. What I’ve been telling my cousin to do is to switch out things in her diet slowly. So for example, one week she tried switching regular fries for baked sweet potato fries, coconut oil instead of a canola oil, Ezekiel bread instead of regular breads, and other simple switches like this. The other thing she has been doing is trying to try a new food every week. She had never tried things like avocado before. So one week, she bought a couple to try, and found out she loved it! There went all of those fatty condiments out the window.

It’s not hard, and it doesn’t have to taste bad or even bland. One comment my cousin couldn’t believe is that the food tasted so good. And what did I do? I gave her support, I gave her ideas, and I gave her suggestions about wholesome, healthy food.

I will be going after my nutrition and fitness certificates this summer. I love being involved in the fitness world and seeing the positive effects on everyone. My cousin has lost 18 lbs for the month I have been helping her, and that includes no extensive exercise, simply walking and at-home yoga or pilates if she has the chance. The main result has been diet. She’s seen improvements in her own energy, she feels better, so many good things.

If you would like to make changes in your life, and need someone to support you, let me know. I’ve been heavily involved and have tried many different styles of workouts, many different diet plans, and I would love to help you. Most often, all we need is support, and when it comes to making lifestyle changes to be healthy, you definitely have mine!

Just remember, only about 10% of success happens in the gym; 90% is the battle in the kitchen. You can do it!

Extra Tip

If you’ve never tried this before, do it! You’ll be surprised how that candy craving goes away, and how delicious your new “candy” is!