The 1,100 Calorie Day

I switched to Gluten Free a little over 4 years ago due to being intolerant. I lost weight and even stopped some medications for pain, fatigue, mood swings and depression. I didn't stop taking everything because ya can't cure crazy right? Lol Seriously though, autoimmune diseases with chronic pain and some bipolar is shitty. It's an uphill battle with Food Is Medicine, Medicine Is Food.


Anyway, I've even stepped that up a notch recently by cutting way back on the Gluten Free baked goods, bread, cookies, donuts, cakes......because Enter weight gain. Damn it. Sugar!
I eat pretty healthy for the most part but really ramped up the extra healthy.


Here's what an average day of eating is for me now. I keep eliminating processed foods, and eating way more whole foods, WAY more. Holy cow did I eat a lot today!

Instead of someone eating 1 meal from McDonald's of a Big Mac, Large Fries and Large Coke totalling 1,400 calories.....think about that....1 meal = 1,400!! I ate SIX meals/snacks for 300 LESS calories.

Let me break this down for you:

Breakfast: 170 calories
2 Cups of black coffee
1 Protein drink

Mid Morning Snack: 145 calories
1/2 Cup Light Greek Vanilla yogurt
1 Banana

Lunch: 250 Calories
Very filling light taco salad
3 Cups of mixed lettuce, greens, raw spinach
2 oz cooked rotisserie chicken
1/2 Cup black beans
Salsa

Afternoon Snack: 125 Calories
16 Almonds
1/3 Cup Bing Cherries

Dinner: 330 Calories
2.5 oz Bacon Wrapped Pork Loin
1/4 Cup Cooked Brown Rice
6 Brussel Sprouts
1/3 Butternut Squash

Dessert: 80 Calories
Low fat Ice Cream Popcicle

I ate every few hours, with Lunch and Dinner being very filling and I got to eat healthy, delicious, and some sweets too, but in moderation. I enjoyed several different foods and was able to satisfy all cravings.

I'll be posting randomly my daily meals and hope to put together a weekly menu.

I've been eating this way for 2 weeks and lost 7 pounds. I started at 145. I'm more focused on the nutrition than I am the weight. I'm just so shocked at how much food I ate!

According to "My Fitness Pal" <<(Download This App!!) I ate 90 grams of protein, which is a little high and too much can make your body actually turn it into sugar so I'll be working on that better. 135g of carbs, 25g of fiber, 50g of sugar, 25g of fat, 130mg of cholesterol, 1300mg of sodium, 3200mg potassium, lots of Vitamin A and C and about half what I needed in calcium and iron so I'm slowly tweeking things to get everything where it should be but I came in under my goal on the bad stuff and pretty high on the good stuff.

I may not be a Licensed Dietician but I can play a Nutritionist on the Internet. 😉

All that food and low calories and I still burned a few hundred doing housework, cooking, walking and some exercise band stretching. I'm getting ready for summer, and every summer after that!

It's dessert time so I'll catch ya hippies later 💝
Much Love all!

When there aren't enough spoons

There isn't really a short simple title that says....

I'm a Stay at home mom SAHM
I'm Disabled
We travel full time by RV (most of the year, hibernate in winter)
I home school twin boys.

I am a stay-at-home, disabled, full-time traveling, twin boy road-schooling mom. I wonder if that would fit on a business card.

I used to say "I'm an accountant". Life can throw a nasty curve ball called "I bet you thought everything was going great. Now watch this". Enter severely bad health and multiple surgeries along with a lot of DV.
(This is a good site. If you are NOT SAFE AND IN FEAR, PLEASE GO TO THIS WEBSITE AND LEAVE QUICKLY http://domesticviolence.org/)

The Spoon Theory

 https://butyoudontlooksick.com/articles/written-by-christine/the-spoon-theory/

The idea behind this is that you have so many spoons for the day or week. These spoons are your energy. Some days it takes all my spoons to get out of bed. Other days I hope to still have a spoon left for sex. If my husband helps with things during the day, which he does if he can, I have spoons left for that night.
Sometimes I start the day with negative spoons, which means I can't do anything and just hope that tomorrow I wake up with one.

There are 168 hours in a week 

I'm going to average this since there are many things that only happen once a week, or once a month.

Average week: 

Sleeping = 42 hours (if I'm lucky) If I slept 8 hours a night, I would have zero time left after everything else. The less hours of sleep I get, the less spoons I wake up with. The more sleep I get, the more spoons I have, but the less time I have to do anything.
This, is the chronic pain conundrum.

Teaching home school = 25 hours (not including PE, arts n crafts, science experiments, museums, field trips, etc AND cleaning it up. 

Preparing/cooking and serving 3 meals a day = 7-10 hours (sometimes we eat out, or hub helps)

Dishes/scrubbing/sweeping/mopping and general cleaning = 10 hours weekly average at least

Laundry/grocery shopping/errands = 10 hours easy 

Traveling assistant; making 20 phone calls to campgrounds, Rv parks, motels/hotels, any place to stay, car or truck rental, mapping the route, or co-pilot, assistanting in all aspects of traveling, mapping every location along the way and places we'll need once there, finding gas stations, places to eat, laundromats, checking prices, numerous online searches, research, contracts, hiring, etc (since this doesn't happen every week, I'll say the average is) 5-10 hours 

Doctor appts = 1 hour average (unless I have to drive or fly from our job site, then its several hours, if not a day or two)

Bathing/primping/manicuring = 5 hours 

Traveling is not every week, but on average, driving time is = 5-10 (average a few days a month)

Referring, playing with and entertaining fighting twins, taking care of pets = 10 hours 

Due to chronic pain, it takes at least an hour every morning to get out of bed, take my pills, drink coffee, and pray for a good day = 10 hours, at least. If not at least an hour, I'll start throwing those 'spoons'.

 

Making necessary phone calls, paying bills, helping everyone do everything else = 2 hours 

So apparently I have a few hours a day to myself where much needed rest and recouperation is greatly needed. And in that space, we try to have quality time for us. 

Mind you, I am mentally (Ptsd and anxiety) and physically disabled (endo, fibro, mctd) for life, have a permanently dislocated unusable shoulder (that needs a state of the art surgery), suffer from severe chronic pain and migraines, and can not function normally on a daily basis.
 

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/post-traumatic-stress-disorder/home/ovc-20308548
https://www.womenshealth.gov/a-z-topics/endometriosis
http://www.webmd.com/fibromyalgia/default.htm
http://www.medicinenet.com/mixed_connective_tissue_disease/article.htm
 

It's still not always good enough. If I'm not on top of things daily, I appear lazy. 

When full blown fibro flares kick in, I am down for days at a time. Whatever my man can't help with, since he works, is all still waiting for me when I'm better. I don't have a team of helpers to do my job for me when I can't.

I just hope it's good enough.
 

Guest blog for Screw Depression

I've been blogging for almost 6 months now, and it seems so natural. I can't figure out why I didn't start this earlier. Oh yeah, my mom read my diary, and I was terrified anyone would know my inner most thoughts and feelings. Which all in of itself is ironic, since I had always planned on writing about just that.

I became disabled a few years back when, after a nervous breakdown, and complete loss of thinking capabilities led me to further destroy everything around me, that hadn't been destroyed already.

My Fibro got worse. My Endo required surgeries. I was getting garnished way to much money at work from my first ex husband (the one who has 50/50 custody of my older boys, that he won't let me see, because he is still obsessed with punishing me for leaving him.) All the stress was causing me to fail school, which I had started, again, in hopes of getting out of the rut of being a single mom and barely getting by.

After 18 months of being successful, and then failing (as I see it) I went back to him. The Abuser. The second ex-husband. I spent 10 years in a marriage where I wore the pants in the family, and he couldn't say boo unless I told him to. That's not my idea of a marriage. Some women like control. Some women don't like raising a husband.
So the next guy was the complete opposite. His evil slowly came out after I got pregnant (quickly).
It got even worse after I married him. That didn't last long, thank goodness.

There are so many painful memories from my childhood. I know for a fact that there are a lot of good ones too, but I can't remember too many of those. Those are the ones that fade away. The evil that was done, is what creeps up on me when I lay down, when I see something that reminds me of my past, when I hear something, and even when I smell something. There is that 'smack in the face' flashback that keeps ripping, little by little, the last fragment of hope and happiness that you carry around.


I'm on the road to recovery. It's a slow, painful process, but it's still a forward process. I have Bipolar 2 rapid cycling. That means I can change moods quickly, and without warning, and I am a prisoner to it. A prisoner. I'm a prisoner in my own body and am always arguing with the warden. Sometimes I get put in the hole. Sometimes I'm let out in general public, with a warning.

It's frustrating, having other moods, an almost unknown entity, make your decisions, carry out plans, and talk to people when it doesn't even feel like 'you'. The real you stays at home, cries, is miserable, depressed, bored, lonely, battling so much in your head. The other 'you' is the one that goes out in public, talks to people, goes grocery shopping, runs errands, pays bills, goes to meetings at the kid's school, talks to acquaintances, and acts 'normal'. When shit hits the fan, the real you comes out and no one recognizes. Now you seem different and fake. If they only knew you were out of your comfort zone and a stronger version of you stepped in until you can go back home and fall apart. It's so much work.

Anxiety, agoraphobia, depression, mania, chronic pain, surgeries, relationships, bills,..it all seems to come crashing down on me at once. I have to fight to dig thru each one, one at a time before more comes down. PTSD, the wonderful life of having flashbacks, not just memories, but full on visual and mental experiences, like you're right there. Someone may raise their hand to give you a high five, and you're ducking because you think you're going to get hit. People don't like that, now you're weird, and omg how could you think I was going to hit you? calm down jeez. If I had control of my memories, I would have done wiped out the bad ones long ago.

No, I don't like the bad thoughts, and I try to re-group and focus on the now as soon as I can. I don't go around telling people everything that's wrong with me, but I am opening up a lot more now. People are interested, they ask questions, they're curious. Hmm, you don't seem super crazy, maybe you're a cool person after all. Educate. De-stigma.

Have you ever had an open conversation with someone who came right out and said, 'I am bipolar. I am OCD, I'm on anti-psychotic medication and there is nothing I can do about it for the rest of my life'? Probably not. But that cool chick you were talking to at the park, the lady in front of you at the register, the kid's mom next to you at the school parking lot, the guy playing ball with his kids, the teenager who dresses wierd, the neighbor you sometimes wave to? I bet they have some mental issues, and you'd never know.

So the next time you see someone who seems a little strange, give them a smile, say hi, you might just brighten up their whole week, because you noticed them. You acknowledged their presense.

Endometriosis is for girls

Endometriosis is non-cancerous little tumors and sores that grow on the inside of your uterus. Sometimes referred to as lesions or adhesion. It hurts, as in hurt like being punched in the baby maker and in serious pain and you want to cry like a little girl for your mommy to make it go away. It turns you into that girl from the movie "I'm Gonna Get You Sucka". This dude was going to hurt her and she turns around with her face all distorted and screams I GOT CRAMPS and his friend comes running cuz he heard someone scream like a girl.

Your periods are more painful, more bleeding, cramping, in the fetal position, way more than your normal shitty period. This will put you down for a few days. My daughter has been suffering with it for a few years now and thanks me for it every month. I'm like, uh thank all the woman before me too because there is Fibromyalgia, lots of allergies, Rheumatoid Arthritis: its all Auto-Immune problems, maternally inherited....One day we might have lupus or something else, who knows.

So I clearly noticed something was very wrong when the twins were about 6 months old and one crawled across my stomach and it felt like it was pregnant! And it hurt like I was. I had three kids already so I know what it feels like when you get jumped on by a toddler right on your precious pregnant belly! I felt it and pushed on it, and oh ya it felt like I was about 2-3 months but I knew I wasn't because I had a C section and had my tubes tied. This was not good.

This is what happened over the next 2 years! Mind you during this whole time I have infant to toddler twins.

 I work full time and come home to an abusive man half that year, the other year and a half was more peace and hard work, including two surgeries, lost two jobs and my dad died. What a fucking year!

I go to the doctor, same OB who delivered them. At this hospital the staples were taken out at 36 hours and we were all sent home at 42 hours. Yes, I had an emergency C-section with twins and we were not even there 48 hours. (AND the nurse laughed when I was scared about her taking out the staples, and said "Ha Ha, what, are you afraid your stomach is going to fall out?, uh YAH!)  And when I cough/sneezed the day after getting out, and bloody water gushed out of my sliced open stomach, I wanted to take my clothes to the hospital and rub it in that nurses face and say "Oh yah, then whats this bitch, not from my stomach huh?"


ANYWAY, he examines and yes I definitely need an ultrasound to see whats going on. If he wasn't the actual doctor that tied my tubes he would have thought I was pregnant. He felt around up there like he was looking for his watch or something and doing that push down on your lower abdomen thing. I almost pushed his nuts up his groin with my foot. My periods were horrible and there was way too much pain involved. He said that he would start me on some hormone treatment and probably have one within 6 months. Huh?
Not to mention that this stuff is rarely seen on an ultrasound.

Unfortunately we moved out of state. For every other reason than my health it was time to move. For that exact reason I should have stayed. Once we moved, it took forever to get insurance, find a doctor, get my records sent over and have a few exams. This is already a few months. I'm getting worse. This new doctor puts me on birth control. Birth control. I have had 5 kids and my tubes tied, the last thing I need is birth control, considering that they mess with my hormones anyway. I am trying to tell the doctor this. It's falling on deaf ears.

Over the next few months, again more ultrasounds, more exams, more tests, more follow-ups to the follow up. Finally! A referral to a surgeon. I go see him and he does his whole poking around thing and looks at this and that and says ok, lets schedule this.

One of the happiest moments in my life. Someone finally listened to me after complaining about this for over a year. Getting surgery is pretty serious too.


The surgery goes well and I wake up in the recovery area for Birthing/New Mothers. It was an OB who did it, so I recovered on his turf. It was weird being the only one there without a baby. I thought of babies I had lost, and then I thought of woman who have lost theirs in childbirth. How sad and lonely to be the only woman in the baby section without a baby. The nurses liked me. I was easy to deal with. In fact, I got to spend most of my recovery hanging out in the nurses station holding the newborns. My babymaker was dead and buried so I was going to hold, and give back other newborns.

As it turned out, the Endometriosis had spread extensively and became Adenomiosis, which means same thing but on the outside of the uterus. I didn't realize at the time what that would implicate. Later I would learn that means that it still continues to grow inside your body. Fast forward 6 months later and I had to have a ping pong sized Endo tumor removed from inside my muscle wall of my abdomen, which ripped apart my muscle when it burst, at 2 AM. I thought my intestines burst or something. It was hot and painful and had
this spreading sensation. I thought I was in serious trouble.

The surgery for that was pretty easy. I was only there a few hours actually. It's amazing the technology today. Cut open your gut and your home for dinner. It was painful until then though. This constant knot in my muscle wall. It was just 'there'. Make it go away. It would grow and shrink through out the month and I hated it.

This is the short version of the Endo story. Diagnosed. Hysterectomy. Tumors redevelop. Surgery. My lower back and lower abdomen hurt. It still feels like there are baby tumors growing. All the cutting open from the C-section, hysterectomy, tumor removal happened in 2 1/2 years. The last 2 were 6 months apart. I lost a lot of weight. Let me tell you surgery wipes you out for a long time. I just suffer now. Endo grows on scar tissue so I think there is enough of that down there for now.

It should be the same diet for a cancer paitent. Nothing to help it grow. I try to watch what I eat (too much coffee, sugar, chocolate, red meat makes it worse) before I put it in my mouth. It's hard. There is a different diet for every ailment. But there is no cure. Some woman get better after birth control pills, pregnancy, and in the extreme cases yes, a hysterectomy. But I come from Murphys' Law which states that it will go wrong for me. So even after that, still a tumor, and after that I still have it.

And the whole time I'M SINGLE MOM WITH TWINS. I DID IT ALL BY MYSELF.

Endo sucks, it really does. It's for girls!

The Phantom Bleeder

          I had a hysterectomy a few years back for Endometriosis but opted to keep my run-down ovaries, that is if they looked ok when the doc went in. They weren't too bad so that's all that's left of my womanhood down there, other than my boobs, I mean I'm still a girl ok, even if everything is a little run down or lower that it used to be.

          So this phantom bleeder that I've mentioned, it sucks. My daughter is on her period, her friends probably are, both of our dogs are in heat. Damn bleeding bitches. I feel everything still, just a little less than before.

     It only makes me want to choke a little less of the people that cross my path so that's good for them too. My lower back still hurts and I still feel cramping but that's just the Endo that got left behind that flares up with any surge of hormones. (Seriously, so much got left behind, they have to keep going in and cutting it out, and yet Endo grows on scar tissue, so it's this wonderful merry go round.) I still get emotional, irritable...all the same stuff that happens on a period, only I don't bleed. I also have no way of knowing when it's coming. There's no PMS. There's no warning. One day I'm Mary Poppins, the next....Medusa. I made cookies for the kids one time, and ate most of them the next day. It came on that fast. At this point, I'm looking forward to menopause, because I don't know how long I can handle menobroken-record.

Between that, the Fibro and arthritis I creak and hobble around. It looks like I'm trying to do the "Thriller" video dance down the hallway.


     So I'm "phantom bleeding" right now and I just wish I only had to do this every 6 months like the dogs. My daughter put a doggie diaper on her little one, it's her first heat. It was cute. You just have to take it off or change it every time you take them out to use the restroom.

A diaper you have to take off so you can pee. Fascinating. I had toddlers that did that without asking, bless their pissing little heart.



I got one for my dog and it would be fit for a small pony. But then I probably would forget to take it off so she could go outside and then freak out cuz she can't get the poop out and run around trying to figure out what to do, with crap hanging out as she's dragging her ass on the ground trying to get that contraption off of her. It was way more of a mess than anticipated. Then the dog got a hysterectomy. She's just mad she can't have chocolate. 

My phantom period has all the trademarks, moody, emotional, irritable, hungry, need chocolate, in pain, muscle cramps, crying during commercials. I had a hysterectomy 10 freaking years ago, and the lack of bleeding is literally the only difference. And now I get to be anemic. I wish there was some type of expiration date on these things that actually made sense. Like, one day you push out a kid, and your whole uterus just pops out too. "Oh you have a girl, and you graduated periods! Congratulations!!"

Being on the rag though, ugh....
I'm pretty sure that's how it got the name "the rag". A long time ago, the first bleeder could only think of one thing, stick a towel up that freaking faucet. I'm so glad I didn't have to clean out bloody wash clothes over and over. I don't remember seeing too many stories about that in Little House on the Prarie..."Oh no Laura, it's that time of month? Do you happen to have any spare rags in your outhouse?"

Sure Betty, they're next to the corn cobs. We got Pa's old hankies and Ma's dish towels, depending on your flow.