Food-Lover's Cleanse (Day 1) Menu

I almost started this cleanse off poorly when I asked my sweet husband to bring me a cup of coffee.  Whoops!  Instead I had some hot jasmine tea with a nice big squirt of lemon in it.  Something about boosting the digestive system... I dunno. Anyway, on to the menu for today!

Breakfast
Omelet with Mushrooms, Thyme, and Caramelized Onions

Can you believe this was the second omelet I've made in my life? Pretty amazing.

1 slice of whole grain toast

Lunch
Avocado Tartine
Winter Vegetable Crudités
Citrus-Shallot Vinaigrette

Midday Snack
Vanilla-Date Smoothie

Dinner
Green Salad with Citrus-Shallot Vinaigrette
The Ultimate Winter Couscous.

The thing I'm most curious about is whether or not I will actually lose weight on this cleanse.  I've calculated a couple days of the calories and they are usually around 1700.  So here it is:

Current weight:  151.6
That's right, I count the decimal point.  At least I don't always round down.

No formal exercise for the day (I woke up achy) but I am wearing my ShapeUps to the mall.  Have a great day, everyone!

Happy New Year!

I'm one of those people who really loves making New Years Resolutions.  With the exception of those seven years I said I would stop biting my nails, I'm usually very good at keeping them.  Hopefully this year's resolution should be pretty simple: Take better care of me.

Last semester was pretty hard on me.  I lost a ton of strength and was flaring constantly.  All I could do was go to my internship and my classes and plug away on my thesis.  This left little time for exercise or stretching.  I even had to stop doing water therapy at physical therapy because I was just too busy to take an extra hour and a half to do all that was associated with going into the pool.  So, I'm trying to do better.

I've asked my supervisor at work if I could modify my hours so that I would actually be coming in four days a week.  I would come in late on Tuesdays, after physical therapy, and then would make up however much time by coming in on Thursday before heading to class.  I'm hoping it will work out well and that I can stick to it.  Other than my thesis I feel like my classes are going to be pretty easy.

On the other days of the week I' going to go to the gym and do yoga as it's possible.  I'm thinking definitely on Fridays I can go straight to the gym after class and do some of my reading.  I also got these:

I did a blog about them awhile back.  I got them for myself for Christmas, along with a couple yoga DVDs that are less intense than P90X.  I tried them out the last couple days- as such I am sore all over.  I'm hoping to see an increase in strength and flexibility in a couple months.

Finally, I need to jump start all these plans! In my last post I alluded to the Food Lover's Cleanse.  I start tomorrow with a caramelized onion and mushroom omelette for breakfast. I'm excited to start, but some of the ingredients are expensive and hard to find.  Also, I go back to work on Monday.  Diets are hard when you're supposed to be out the door at seven.

It's my hope that if I really stick to this I can start feeling better on a more regular basis.  Feeling better means fewer steroids and less vidocin.  And, if I don't need vicodin, that means I don't need to ask my doctor for medical marijuana instead!  Yay!

Well, Kevin's video game is giving me motion sickness- off to take a nap!

Christmas is over!

I thought about adding a frownie face after that title. Well, I did add one, but then I hit the backspace key and made it a smiley face instead.  And then I deleted that too, so that people wouldn't think I'm some pagan or something horrid like that.  As much as I loved Christmas and all the craziness that comes with it I was exhausted for most of my trip.  I did too much, as usual.

Also as usual, my granddaughterly guilt got the best of me and I worked hard to snuff it while I was in town. Mama and Papa aren't doing much cooking anymore, so I try to make a ton of healthy meals while I'm there so they can have some choices in the freezer. I made Senegalese peanut soup, chicken divan casserole, Italian beef (or turkey) and polenta casserole, baked ziti, a huge batch of meat sauce, butternut squash casserole, salsa and black bean soup, crockpot minestrone, and a couple loaves of harvest bread.

A couple of my triumphs.

I'm really not crazy. I've been tested.
Other than that, I was busy hanging out with kiddos and taking way too many pictures.  Here are a few of my favorites:

Holy cuteness.  This Christmas just had to go and kick every other Christmas I have ever had in the groin.  Children make the holidays so much better.  Their excitement and crazy antics made even my favorite childhood Christmas (the year I got the TI-83 plus graphing calculator... yeah I'm a nerd, why do you ask?) seem just silly.  Watching those kiddos grow up is going to keep me young, I think.  :-D

It was a really great visit.  I also went out to a fondue dinner with besties Cassie and Elisha (so much easier than buying presents for each other!) and then went out to the pub to see other friends as well.  For several days my calorie count lingered at around 2100 calories... on Christmas it was at 2700.  I'm not proud, but at least I was honest with myself.  How many people actually count points or calories during the holidays?  This is quite difficult at the in-law's home where the wine seems to just magically appear in your glass when you could have sworn you just finished it a second ago...

Our trip was just about the perfect length of time- our families were just starting to drive us crazy (kidding!).  But, we were missing our bed at home and I had finally caved in and started taking steroids to calm my lupus and it was making me feel wonky.  It was around time to take our leave at day seven. In fact, it was actually cut a tiny bit short by a winter storm warning the night before we were due to leave.  We packed it up in record time and missed ALL of the storm.  We were very thankful to have such great weather and road conditions on the drive up and back.  I was not prepared to have huge anxiety attacks (at least not on the ride up to Spokane... on my way back I brought extra "juice", a tip from my awesome MIL!).

Now that Christmas is over we have to get back on track.  All the laundry is clean (just not hung up), we've discussed tearing down the tree (frownie face), and I purchased many of the ingredients for my upcoming Food Lover's Cleanse (more to come!).  In a day or so I'll go over the rest of my plans for the new year.... it's time to focus on Kara!

I hope everyone had a great holiday!  

Celebrate SAFELY tomorrow night and have a Happy New Year!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

The semester is officially over with the exception of the silly requirement that I need to snail mail a copy of my thesis to my advisor. I made it clear in our last meeting that my draft would be much more like a rough outline, but he still insists that I mail it instead of emailing it. Sigh.
I'm so thankful to be finished for the semester. I've been sleeping in and trying to take it east. However, my joints seem to get pissed off due to the most ridiculous things. I did the dishes two days ago and I still can't type (what I'm currently doing is using maybe four fingers, total). My knees are also killing me. This could have been caused by wearing my shapeups for too long of a time or wrapping presents on the floor yesterday. Regardless, it's silly.
But, work needs to be done before we go to Spokane. I'll have to find the strength somewhere. Speaking of which, I went in to be reevaluated at physical therapy. It's this stupid deal that the insurance people want. They measure my range and my strength, blah blah blah. Not surprisingly, I've gotten worse. I've lost so much strength in the past year and a half. I feel so weak... constantly. My doctor asks me if it's because of my lupus or because of grad school that I don't exercise. My answer is "yes?" Next semester will be better. Stay tuned.
Since it's obvious that my thesis won't be worked on until after a paraffin wax treatment, I guess I should go wrap more presents. Pray for my knees.

thanks, lupus!

It's thirty minutes until class starts. I'm blogging on my phone-how hip and techie of me.For the past week I've been waKing up more tired than when I laid my head down the night before. I thought it was the vicodin at first, but no-just general fatigue.
I was pondering on my way to school what I would write on that page of my thesis where I get to thank people. Obviously, my husband is first on that list. His patience and understanding and his support in my graduate school quest has been amazing. I wouldn't be here today without him. My grandparents are going to be on that page as well-they don't understand my desire to be a social worker but they still listen to me rant about school and clients with interest. My thesis is on sexuality, a taboo topic to their generation, but they have never spoke a bad word about my topic or my passion for advocating for the LGBTQ population. I'm very fortunate.
But to my main point: Would it be weird to thank lupus? I am so strong because of my disease. People are struggling in this semester of grad school. A cold or a difficult paper brings other students to their knees. Their minds wander to quiting or failure. Never for me. I feel like I can accomplish anything. Thank you, lupus. I would be quite the wimp without you.
So... Thoughts? Should I give a portion of a page to recognizing how lupus has strengthened me?

Dear sciatica,

Dear sciatica,
I was just bragging today how you've stopped bugging me since I've begun taking the gabapentin again. Then you had to go and damn near ruin my enjoyment of the newest Harry Potter movie with your nonsense. Now I have to take a vicodin instead of enjoying the nice bottle of wine my husband opened tonight.
I hate you.
Respectfully,
Kara

Giving thanks a bit early

I’m very fortunate.  I believe I state that in around half of my blog posts.  I got my blood work back and met with my rheumatologist on Thursday.  No anemia and no kidney damage.  My lupus is obviously very rampant- I’ve been feeling it for two months now.  I have 21 days left in the semester and four days of classes left.  But I’m going to make it.

My friend is less fortunate right now.  She’s been my vision of what the future will be.  Her lupus was bad when she was my age but things have been wonderful for her recently.  She was even thinking about having a baby soon.  Her last blood test wasn’t as great as mine.

I’m keeping her in my thoughts as I sit in class and stare at her empty seat.  This semester has  been difficult.  Professors admit that the Fall semester in the second year of grad school is the hardest.  Everyone is interning three days a week, there are classes to attend, and most of us are working to write our thesis.  Then, of course, there’s life.  I was speaking t another MSW student yesterday about how I realized with dread tat Christmas as quickly approaching.  I have to think of presents, of cookies, and of how to navigate the drama of splitting times between two families and my friends.  Absolute dread.

One aspect of my lupus that I’m focusing on is the sciatica and migraines I’ve been suffering through for this semester.  I had finally reached my breaking point.  Almost daily my leg would hurt from the middle of my ass down to my toes.  And it was making me tired.  So, I’ve started Gabapentin again.  I was on it when my sciatica first started a few years ago.  It seems to be working- at least today my sciatic pain is just a twinge.  It’s nice to see a positive change.

Another positive note: I’m officially losing weight.  My doctor freaked for a few minutes- thinking it was a drug side effect or my lupus or maybe I just wasn’t eating.  I informed him of my diet and also told him that I haven’t been able to exercise.  He then asked me with a very serious face if I couldn’t exercise due to pain or due to time.  I told him both, and then laughed a bit.

If you don’t laugh, you’ll cry.  Right?