linking you....

One thing I want to accomplish while living in Jackson is to be healthier. I'm blogging about it here.

Can't explain why. That just tends to be my designated health-ish blog spot.

life recently

Physically

Yesterday was my last day of officially eating white flour, sugar, fructose corn syurp, and gluten. However, today included left over pizza for breakfast (breakfast for champs). I'm glad that chapter of the experiment is over, though I also mourn its end. That block of foods was my favorite on the forbidden list. Viva el pan. Plus,I have to readjust my mentality from being able to eat almost anything to having to be careful in my selections; I'm going from plenty to scarcity... again. Very soon, I will again be fighting against the fear of scarcity and looking for the silver lining of can. I don't look forward to returning to that cold world of eating, though I do want that better pan of health.

As previously mentioned, I had a good experience in yoga on Thursday. My teacher kept complimenting me and asking what was different. She was passionate about something being different, whether it was an internal change manifested externally or vice versa. I thought maybe she forgot the improvement I showed when I last saw her like a month before until I shocked myself by getting into shoulder stand. It was the first time ever. I called her over to me because I was convinced that I had to be doing something wrong. She said no; it was right, it was good. Well yea! Her comment about things sometimes just aligning and being right in life resonated with me. It made me think of the realization that I'm happy and seem to be earnestly moving towards my highest self. Yoga is part of that journey for me and for that I'm glad. I did find it ironic that this praise and accomplishment came on a night when my right side was clearly more open and flexible than my left. But even in the midst of imperfection, God is there.

Food-wise, I'm back to the control phase of the diet. I'll be there 2-3 weeks depending on how I feel and then bring back aspartame or nitrate, neither of which sound like something that one shouldwant in his or her diet. Dairy, like the yeast/gluten block, is thought to increase yeast production. Thus, I don't want to run those back to back. I want to really give my body time to throw out the extra yeast if that's really one reason I've been hurting lately.

Today, I ordered a life jacket from amazon. I have no idea what level life jacket it is. I'm hoping it has a tag with that information when it gets here. If it's crappier than anticipated, I'll return it. I bought it mostly because it kept coming up when I searched for a plus size life jacket. Anyhow, my uncle Mark said he'll teach me how to swim (on top of the water) and that it'll be easier if I do it with a life jacket. Well here I am moving towards progress.

Family

I have 5 cousins graduating this year from high school. Have I already told you that? One of them, I didn't even know was my cousin. oops.





Relationships

If you're been reading along, you know that I'm in love with Cindi still. There was a period where I thought I was getting over her. Then, there was me realizing that I am ridiculously in love, just like before our break-up. Now I'm reaching a point of being fine with loving her despite not wanting to be with her. I think that acceptance is good. Disagreeing with those thoughts when they come might also be good. I don't know. I've never loved anyone as I love her; I have no real reference point on how to not be in love with her. I guess I've worked to get over crushes or love interests before so maybe I can do more of those things. That's basically what I was doing in the beginning when I thought it was working. Yea right, and Donnie McCurklin is really someone that was only formally attracted to men. In the beginning, I thought that talking to and seeing her less would result in my falling out of love, but it doesn't work that way apparently. Running parallel to all of those thoughts and emotions is excitement about meeting someone new. In all fairness to them, I hope that my feelings towards Cindi shift even more as I spend time with them. A few weeks ago, Tina,Felicia, and I ran through ideas of who I could date. I can't say we came up with any promising possibilities :).

Professional Life

Work was really tough two weeks ago. I told someone that I felt like I was pushing a boulder up a hill and I meant it. Often. Things have calmed down some now. At a training I attended Wednesday, the presenter said that not feeling like they belong is the number one reason people leave their jobs. I thought that was interesting. It made me think of some of the dynamics I experience but even more so my general desire to have decent relationships with those with whom I work. It also made me think about a conversation I had with a newer employer. I hope the isolation doesn't run deep.

Part of what has helped me move past that place of extreme frustration was to create a list of all the tasks contributing to how I was feeling and figure out what I could do about those things. Many of my assignments can only be done after someone else does his or her part. I was back at a place of trying to figure out how I could work around needing other people. If I can control it, perhaps I can get it done, at least progress can be made. Honestly, I don't know where this list is but creating it helped. And yes, the work is moving. Slowly. For the people part of all that frustration, I basically just accepted it. My employees don't like me. Right now, I'm not aware of it but if you dig through it all, it's probably still true. I accept that. Next....

The Garden

The garden is doing well. I planted zucchini last week and it's started to bloom already. I don't see any major issues brewing and am grateful for that.

At work, we started on that garden Tuesday. One of the clients figured out how much lumber we needed to buy and the job began. Trying to figure that stuff out on my own made me feel like I was in high school math again flunking the test I had studied for so hard.

One container (4 x 8) was assembled and another was started. Our cucumbers are in the ground. Whoo-hoo! We're supposed to work some more Monday, hopefully building 6 additional containers, buying lumber, and getting starter plants and food into the ground by 5pm. Writing it out, that sounds lofty. We'll see.

And last- my car. I love my car. It has been good to me. However, Goodyear just charged me $630 to fix some brake-related issues. Then they told me that my oil is spilling over into the engine and that I need tires. Plus, my speedometer is broken. My car is a 1998 ya'll. With this many issues on the radar, it might be time to move on... but to what? Now is when I feel like I have very little money :(.

Blessed be.
Well, that was probably way more than you actually wanted from me. I've just been feeling the need to update lately but have not had the time. Here you find what's been going on.

down with whites

This morning, I woke up in such discomfort that I wanted to throw in the rag on eating white flour, sugar, etc. More than pain, it causes stiffness, achy stiffness. My armpit hurts? Well, it's the part that connects the arm to the body. Also, my ankles, toes, knee joint, thigh, sometimes my funny bone-- basically, it's not been a fun experience (but it's been darm yummy). It's time to decide what things I want to eat before I resume my lifestyle without white flour and white sugar, to commence no later than Saturday (after the left over pizza is gone). By then, I want:
1. Chick-Fila mini-biscuits- what a yummy, fun breakfast
2. The chicken garlic sandwich from Al-Rayan, because it's important to support local businesses
3. Hummus and pita- 1) Local buying, 2) Best hummus in Memphis
4. Pizza because I love it, duh. I think I'll go with Memphis Pizza Cafe, though there's a local place near my place that I want to try
4. Jasmine's. OMG. I can't believe I've been free for white pasta but not eaten at Jasmine's. JASMINE'S.
5. IHOP's. I love their omelett. It comes with pancakes. Nitrates are going to be in the mix but I might still stop by. Or not.
6. Biscuits. I love biscuits. I plan to cook one final big breakfast before the Monday of white stuff free hits.
7. Cookies. I don't know from where but it must be so.
8. Donuts. I love donuts. Yum.

This experience has affirmed this process. Until now, I haven't felt a significant difference (consistently) by eating things from the forbidden food groups. This one has tested positive again and again, removing all doubts I had about if any group independently would show significant results. Before, the pain and stiffness were hitting 3s on the 10 point scale, noticeable but not unbearable. Well, time tells a stronger story. I'll probably stuff as much of the remaining items down my throat as fast as I can because I'm deeply ready to end this phase of the experiment. But, I do like to say goodbye. In the future, I can have a chick-fila sandwich on occasion but I do understand that bread is not to be a beloved part of my life. Ciao my dear white friends.

today's update

Today has been low on the pain scale. If whites do bother me, they gave me a break today. I'm not sure that there seems to be any rhyme or logic to food and my pains.

I felt better this afternoon after my mom gave me pepto bismo. You shouldn't underestimate that stuff, I suppose.

I have overdue library books. One of them is The World's Top Photographers: Portraits. From it, it seems that I like the work of Patrick Fraser, Andrew Eccles, Terence Donovan, William Claxton, E.J. Camp, and Michael Birt. Maybe I can check out more by them later.

pain update

I am on day 5 of eating white flour, sugar, gluten, etc. It might hurt. Saturday, I couldn't go back to sleep after I took my early morning restroom break because of the pain. Eventually, I got up to take ibuprofen 800 and moved around a bit to stretch my parts and give the med time to start working. When I woke up, I could still feel the pain in my back and thighs but obviously, it was mild enough to allow me to sleep. Six hours after ibu, I took tramadoll. I had a wedding to attend and photograph and I wanted to be as comfortable as possible during that process. I'm beginning to reach the point where I'm not afraid of my ability to function on tramadoll. I've taken it 4 or 5 times and seem to respond fine to it. Like usual, I can drive on narcotics, no problem. It quieted the pain but it didn't go away. Yesterday was a reminder of old times. I hurt all day, the question was how much was I hurting at a given point in time. Right now, my back hurts (but thankfully, that's it). I'll keep watching and see how it goes. The strange thing about reintroducing whites is I'm used to meal planning around them. Now, I have to intentionally incorporate them-- no Amy, it's okay to have bread with your "sandwich" today.

welcome back, whites!

Sometimes, I make these aha! decisions about this anti-pain diet I'm accepting. It's the same kind of aha! that resulted in my tongue piercing and has influenced other decisions in my life. It's when I just know. Today, what I knew is that I'm ready to start eating bread again. I didn't want to wait until Friday. Since I knew that and my co-workers were going to McDonalds, I ordered a chicken biscuit for breakfast. Yum, even after debreading the chicken.

Later, I realized that my biscuit was made from white flour and that simple carbs are a different category from yeast and gluten. puzzlement. Can I reintroduce one without the other? After considering that here and there for a couple of hours and rereading the article at webmd, I decided that it'll be most practical for me to reintroduce sugar (yea!), simple carbs, fructose, yeast, and gluten at once (which means I didn't have to debread my chicken this morning). If it turns out to be a high pain category, maybe I'll try to break them out later. For now, I can eat bread. Yum. Oven baked biscuits that were purchased months ago tomorrow for my first meal. And again I say yum. This works well for me, too, because I had a Pepsi yesterday. I heard a client offering them while I was roaming the men's area. "Did you say I can have a Pepsi?" I hollered back. "Yep. They're in the dining room," replied the voice (God?). I hurried through the checks I was completing and joined in the Pepsi refreshment. Pepsi after 3 months clean-- ahhhhh. Tomorrow, I'm calling people to encourage them to make a monetary donation to Workers Interfaith Network. Pizza (Achilles heel 1) will be there for volunteers. I've long said that I'm going to eat some pizza once I got here even though it has cheese. Oh how I love pizza, oh how I look forward to having it just once. Once. I don't know that I'm going to spend that on national chain pizza with simple toppings. Memphis Pizza Cafe has been calling my name.

I'm happier about the bread than the ice cream (sugar). Before, I was debating which of those categories I would reintroduce next. Yeast and gluten won. Now, I guess they get to be friends (or joint villains).

A piece of my brain did question whether it is wise to bump up the reintroduction seeing that I'm having residual symptoms from Friday. aha won. I'll notice if new issues appear verses the slow movements still mandated from achy, enjoyed muscles.

I'm happy. For a while now, I've had moments where I've realized that I am well-pleased with my life; I am happy in my soul. Oddly, I think this joy appeared after the breakup. I remember going, "I'm happy, even single" (though I didn't say that Directly after the break up). It holds true. I keep having those moments. I'm not sure the reason(s)-- being around women so much lately (book club, the brief drumming period, the stone)? not trying to make/encourage/will someone to love me that doesn't? being in town more often instead of doing the split memphis/nashville lifestyle? taking more control of cleaning my apartment? reading? more yoga? hell if i know. But I'm happy and thought I should tell the world. Fibromyalgia sucks. I hate it, in part, because of the ways in which it threatens to steal my life. But it cannot take my joy.

EDIT: Perhaps I am happy because I am moving towards the highest me, the highest vision. I am (mostly) living true to myself in all areas of life. I am being the me that I would like to be. How can one not be pleased by that?