Another Sunday in the Kitchen

First, I would like to note that after six months of procrasinating, denial, and just plain forgetting, I finally updated my blogger profile to reflect that I am now ::gulp:: thirty. You know what though? I'm willing to own it. My thirties, thus far, have been surprisingly better than I thought they would be. I may or may not have started to get some much needed focus in my life and feel like I'm finally starting figure out what it is I'm doing with myself. Granted, it seems to me that most people have this figured out during their mid-twenties (or so is the case with at least 80%+ of my friends), but for me it took a bit longer. Somehow, what I thought I was going to be doing the rest of my life took a sidetrack before I even got started and it all had to do with addressing my health- both physically and mentally. Funny enough, addressing my health was actually putting me on a path to deciding what I wanted to do with my life without me even knowing it. I haven't signed up for the Holistic Nutrition degree program yet, but it's definitely what I want to do and I can't wait to figure out how I'm gonna pay for it so I can start learning.

But on to the food, right?

Spent another lovely Sunday afternoon in the kitchen yesterday and cooked up a weeks worth of meals so I don't have attempt to cook in the morning before I go to work (I work 11a-9p Mon-Wed nights, which requires have both lunch and dinner easy and quick to eat so I can avoid fast food or other unhealthy options). It was a perfect day for spending in the kitchen yesterday, we had a snow storm roll through that was lovely to watch but gross to go out in. It was snowing slush, essentially, and that snow is so heavy and wet I couldn't even shovel the driveway this morning. It sure does look pretty on the trees though!

For this week I made recipes out of Clean Eating and Vegetarian Times magazines, as I just got both new issues in the mail this week. I'm like a kid at a candy store when these magazines arrive, feverishly flipping the pages, dog-earing recipes, and showing everything that looks tasty to my husband (which translates to the majority of the magazines, but he plays along like a good sport to humor me). I pulled three recipes out for this week's meals, 2 from Vegetarian Times and 1 from Clean Eating. I'm trying to reduce the amount of meat I eat, though I can't reduce it completely due to my food allergies- veganism is not for those that are allergic to beans, tree nuts and raw soy products. I watched a movie called Eating that talks about how there is a correlation between the rise in disease and the increase in consumption of meat. It was pretty compelling. So, I'm renewing my effort to eat less meat and increase vegetable consumption.

The first recipe I made was Garlicky Leek and Artichoke soup from Vegetarian Times. The recipe is really simple, as most soup recipes are. The taste was exactly how it was described, garlicky and artichokey with a hint of leek.

Yummy! Oh, and super good for the gallbladder, btw (I haven't been pointing these things out lately, so I'm trying to do that again). The garlic, leeks, and artichokes all work on the liver and gallbladder to cleanse and thin the bile. This should not only give me the immune system of a super human, but it will also work on healing my liver and gallbladder which defintely took a hit this last week while I was sick.

The second dish I made was another Vegetarian Times recipe, Italian Orzo and Greens. It uses both kale and chard and is sprinkled with kalamata olives (a favorite of my husband's) and lemon zest and juice. The flavor is bright, though in hindsight I would have left some of the red wine vinegar it called for out. VT mag is obsessed with vinegar, not sure why, but I've noticed this in a lot of their recipes. Against my better judgement, I did add in the feta cheese it called for, though honestly I think it would have been just fine without and kind of wishing I had made a seperate batch without for myself and put the cheese only in my husbands. Funny how your taste buds change when you go dairy free for a while... you really don't even care for it anymore.

Doesn't the kale and chard look amazing once it starts to hit the heat? You just don't get more vibrant coloring than that!

It's quite addicting, if I do say so, despite my ambivalence about the feta cheese in it. Can't wait to eat that for lunch!

The last dish I made was from Clean Eating and it's quite fantastic. Beef and Broccoli with Orange Stir-Fry. The smell of the orange and soy sauce hitting the wok was the best part of cooking this dish. It is so succulent smelling, and it just makes you feel warmed. I will say though, that having made this dish I think I'm going to make it vegetarian next time. The basis for the recipe is good, but it's very flexible and you can mix up the vegetables and what you serve them on. For example, the recipe called for onions, I used leeks. It also called for serving it on Soba noodles, I had Udon so I used those, though I could have just as easily served it on rice. The stars of this recipe are the orange sauce and the broccoli, if you ask me.

The Anti-Antibiotic Cure

Antibiotics suck. I don't go on them unless absolutely necessary, and I have discovered over the last few years they really aren't necessary for the things we most commonly have them prescribed for- sinus infections and colds. And guess who conquered both a cold and sinus infection without antibiotics? This gal!

After a few days of misery, I am starting to feel more human. Wednesday I actually got kicked out of work, my supervisor told me not to come back from my lunch break. Granted, I was planning on taking a three hour lunch break anyway, to minimize my time at the office, but thankfully the schedule worked out that some of my coworkers could pitch in and cover the front desk for me in the evening. It was much needed and appreciated, and since I have Thursdays off, it gave me a good long chunk of time to just sit and get well.

So, I'm sitting in front of TV on Thursday watching a Real Housewives of Orange County (because trash TV does, in fact, cure colds) and started feeling those tell tale signs of a sinus infection. One look in the Kleenex and my suspicions were confirmed, my cold had caused a sinus infection. As miserable as I was feeling it was very tempting to go to the clinic down the street and have someone prescribe me some drugs, but I decided I was going to try to beat it myself. Without any antibiotics or other meds- or leaving the house, for that matter. I had already done some research online the night before for remedies for my hacking cough, and I combined that with my previous knowledge of what can work to get the "gunk" out.

Now, I already shared in my previous post about the remedies I use to boost my immune system to prevent and treat colds, but I needed more than the teas and supplements. I needed some hard core natural medicine to fight this one. As I said, Wednesday night I looked up natural cough remedies online and found some interesting ones. What I settled on that night was also because it said it would help me sleep (it's hard to sleep when you feel like you need to cough non-stop): vodka and honey. Yup, you mix a teaspoon of vodka with a tablespoon of honey and drink it. Like I needed an excuse for vodka, right??? At first, because of the vodka, I actually coughed a bit more, but after about three minutes the coughing calmed almost completely. I couldn't believe it worked that well! My guess is, that like antihistamines that are contained in many anti-cough medicines, the alcohol helps your body to relax which will naturally cause you to cough less. Of course, not wanting to drink all day long I switched the the more traditional concotion of the juice of half a lemon mixed with some honey the next day, and for me that was really effective. I liked the taste of the lemon and honey mixture, so sometimes I just drank it to taste it more.

For the sinus infection I had to get a little more creative. I immediately started doing my sinus rinses and added the powder from one probiotic capsule in with the salt packet. I use the NeilMed Nasal Wash because, unlike the NetiPot, it uses pressure to clean the "gunk" out of your head whereas the NetiPot only uses gravity. To me, the traditional Netipot is a complete and total waste of time. Anyway, adding the probiotic to the wash is key to attacking the infection. The healthy "bugs" kill the infection and rebalance the flora in your sinus cavities which works while the sinus rinse packet loosens and clears the gunk. Although normally I would only do the sinus rinse once a day, combating a sinus infection while dealing with a cold made me bump it to twice a day.

To really kick the cold and infection I decided to steam with garlic- which is a natural anti-bacterial and anti-fungal agent- and some eucalyptus oil. I have steamed with eucalyptus before, but this was the first time I added in the garlic. I took one clove and broke it slightly to release the oils and put it and a few drops of eucalyptus in my little facial steamer contraption I have (pictured above). Because it uses such a small amount of water in the steamer I probably could have used less garlic in retrospect. Two times on Thursday I steamed and it made a huge difference! After the first garlic/eucalpytus steam I could feel my sinuses clearing quickly, and I started to feel a lot better. The second time I steamed I could tell how well the first one worked because I could actually feel the garlic burning a little in my airway, whereas the first time I could hardly tell I was breathing in the steam. That garlic really kicked my cold's behind!

Word of warning on the garlic though that I found out the hard way. It can burn your skin! Make sure to moisturize your face before and after you steam with it, and wash with a gentle cleanser in between. The burn feels kind of like the second day of a sunburn, real raw and chapped. Not fun!

Since Thursday, I have kept up with the sinus rinses and have used the lemon and honey mixture frequently for the coughing. Honey, by the way, also has some anti-fungal properties to it, I believe, and the acid of the lemon will break up mucus. The one day of garlic steaming seemed to be adequate. Green gunk is gone and everything is yellow or clear now. Plus, I haven't had a sinus headache since I did the garlic steam on Thursday! Even better, last night I started to regain my sense of smell and taste now that my cold is almost cleared. Regained my smell after eating my really spicy Tomatillo-Orange salsa (see previous post). The hubby and I were watching a movie and eating the salsa, and about twenty minutes after eating it I could smell everything again!

The one other natural remedy I added in was to take a supplement we sell at work called Sinuplex from Metagenics. It helps with lung and sinus function and is basically the natural version of Mucinex/Guafenesin. I find Sinuplex more enjoyable to take than Mucinex not just because it's natural stuff, but also because it doesn't make my nose run quite as uncontrollably.

Today I haven't had the body shaking coughs and my nose is behaving itself much better. I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll be 100% again and the coughing will be gone!

PS Obligatory "I'm not a doctor" statement in case this post comes up on google searches. This is my personal experience, nothing more, consult your holistic healthcare practitioner, yaddah yaddah yaddah.

Sick, sick, sick

What's Valentine's Day for anyway? To eat at a fancy restaurant and share sweet nothings with your significant other. Nah. That's not how we run in my house, especially yesterday. It just so happens that I spent Valentine's Day at home yesterday annoying the crap out of my husband by making him do all sorts of stuff while I sat on the couch sick (and subsequently, whining about being sick). It was a thrilling Valentine's Day, let me tell you.

I knew the cold was coming Saturday and ran to the natural health store to get a refill of my Sovereign Silver nose spray. I took that back in October when I felt a cold coming on it and fought it off, much to my surprise. Somehow, the silver disinfects everything- and it feels that way too. Much to my disappointment, the natural health store was completely sold out of it, so I settled for the Cold and Flu remedy with collodial silver you see on the left. It sounds promising with silver, echinacea, goldenseal, pau d'arco, red clover, peppermint, and lemon, but I think it's better as a preventative. I'm still taking it, but I'm not sure it's doing near as much as the Sovereign Silver nose spray would have done. Sunday morning I woke up with a ridiculously sore throat and went straight for the Throat Coat tea. That stuff is a miracle tea, and when rotated with the Gypsy Cold Care, you are sure to be feeling better in no time. I, however, wasn't so good about continuing to drink it through the day so it's no surprise I still feel awful today. Adding to the mix, I've been taking my homeopathic Cold and Flu remedy which contains seven different forms of zinc. Good news, not taking any OTC cold remedies that jack with your heart or liver and feel functional. Nonetheless, I'm still sick. Hoping tomorrow is better.

Anyway, we hadn't planned on doing anything for Valentine's Day, cold or not. I'm not a big fan of lavish displays of gift giving and affection so the key to my heart is to tell me what you want to eat and if I think it sounds amazing to me too, I'll make it for you. No gifts, no flowers (allergic anyway), no chocolates. I'm pretty straight forward and don't like wasting money on Valentine's Day gifts, but will spend stupid amounts of money on a fabulous meal- at home or at a restaurant, depending on the year.

This year we had already planned on doing dinner at home, which worked perfectly given my awful cold. Dinner was Vietnamese Pho Bo, which I hoped would kick my cold's butt in to remission. Interesting note, the majority of the ingredients in the Gypsy Cold Care tea are the same as what is in Pho Bo stock! Sadley, yesterday's Pho Bo wasn't my best effort at making it, so it wasn't as effective as it usually is. Happens when you're sick and you are relying on your hubby to help you in the kitchen (which is not his strong suit).

That aside, I did make a pretty awesome dish to eat this week. Again, keeping with the idea of kicking my cold's behind, I went for something with some spice and detoxifying properties. What better than a curry, right? Onion, cayenne, garlic, ginger, cilantro, cumin, serrano chilis and corriander equals a whole lot of detoxification. Oh, and flavor.

The dish? Coconut-curry lamb meatballs, also known as a little bit of heaven. The smell in the kitchen was exotic and just inhaling the aromas was enough to make my cold dry up. My husband was chomping at the bit waiting to taste it while I was making it, as was I. Even though I made the dish with the intention of not eating it until today as single meatball wasn't enough. Once it was done cooking I took two meatballs out for us to taste test. I ate both of them, practically licking the curry sauce off the plate. Took two out for my husband and he did the same, and before I packaged up to put in the fridge we each at one more. The heat is mild, tamed by the coconut milk, but the curry still shines through and warms your whole body.

For lunch today, I reheated the meatballs and served them over a bed of whole grain, high quality, brown rice. The recipe I followed said the curry would taste better the next day and it wasn't kidding, that was quite possibly the best meal I've had in a long time. While I was eating it, my cold symptoms all but disappeared, and it stayed that was for almost an hour afterwards. Even now, seven hours later I know that dish has lessened the severity of my cold. I'm going to keep that recipe in my back pocket for the next time I get sick. I can't wait to eat more tomorrow.

Sugar Free Challenge!

Prior to yesterday's post about my issues with sugar addiction I had already been planning this challenge. For the past few weeks I've been painfully aware of how much excess sugar I've been consuming. In fact, I think I've talked about it almost every post for the last month? Maybe? Anyway, my sugar consumption needs to be reigned back in. Sugar in large quantities becomes toxic in our bodies and creates imbalance in our organs and nervous system. I personally believe overconsumption of sugar is the main contributing factor to many of today's deadliest diseases and is the driving force beyond the many other health problems that have spiked in recent years. For example, food allergies. I don't have any numbers for you about that, but I hope to sit down someday and start compiling the statistics.

The statistics aside, for the past few weeks I have been planning a sugar-free challenge for during lent. These past few months, as I've had some setbacks in my overall feeling of health I did some soul searching to determine exactly what was different in my diet from now to when I first made this lifestyle change in July of 2008. I've tried cutting gluten back out, that wasn't it and I've discovered I NEED gluten for my digestion, I've tried experimenting with various levels of dairy consumption, not it, and I've tried bringing the veggie consumption back up, not it either. I reduced meat consumption, I added in more herbs, I starting reintroducing more digestive supplements, none of that worked either. Final conclusion: sugar is the culprit. For almost four months in 2008 when I was in the early stages of the detox diet I had more energy than I could remember in, well, forever. Despite my body still "detoxing" and my frustration about if and when the "detoxing" symptoms would stop after every meal, I felt amazing. Even the "detox" after every meal made me feel energized! My energy was through the roof and I required no more than the occassional caffeine from, gasp, green tea. Yup, green tea which contains a fraction of the amount of caffiene of a cup of coffee was enough to perk me back up on long days.

During that time I ate little to no sugar, of any sort. Breakfast was the only meal that contained even a moderate amount of sugar in the form of honey and fruit, or some rice milk. That was it. And I felt amazing.

I want to feel that amazing again. My head felt clearer, my body felt energized, and my mood was fantastic. I miss feeling good like that and want it back. Lent is the perfect time to make that happen. Although I don't consider myself a religious person, I am spiritual and I also believe in self-improvement. Making a sacrific of giving up something you love during lent teaches you a powerful lesson about not only self-control, but of self-empowerment. You are more than that peice of chocolate, you are more than that TV show, you can do more than you imagined without those things, and new possibilities can happen. Long story short, it makes you a better person. And I'm all for making myself better. The best part about it, I become healthier physically and mentally as a result. Why not take advantage of this tradition of the Catholic church, right?

Wednesday will officially begin my sugar free challenge and it will last from Ash Wednesday until Easter. The only sugars I will be allowed are honey and maple syrup and even they will be used sparingly. I will say good-bye to even my beloved Agave Nectar because I have discovered it's tastiness is just as addicting as a piece of chocolate. As always, I will blog through the whole journey to keep myself on track and to share the challenge with you, my few but mighty readers.

And just in time for my sugar free challenge, I stumbled on the blog Naturally Knocked Up and she happens to be just finishing a 30 day Sugar Free Challenge! It was meant to be. Warning, she rambles a lot in the video, but the information is great so it's worth a listen.

Binging, again

I had a different post planned for today involving pictures, but blogger doesn't seem to like my pictures today and refuses to upload them. So, on to other topics, I guess.

Yet again, my binge eating habit is rearing it's ugly head. Okay, I'm gonna get real and call it for what it really is: stress eating. I'm on the verge of making a HUGE change in my life by starting this Holistic Nutrition program and whenever I am confronted with changes of this magnitude I unconsciously eat. And eat. And eat. And it's always sweets. The last few weeks it's been chocolate and today my comfort food of choice was BOTH chocolate and sweet and crunchy peanuts. Oh, the indigestion!

But let's not make this a TMI Thursday post, let's talk about the stress. By working through the stress and dealing with the emotions we (and I) can begin to heal and stop the illness. That's what this blog is all about, right? Getting healthy naturally and healing without drugs.

My eating disorder is always triggered by stress. Sugar seems to call my name from within my own head and I feel powerless against it. I just start eating and somehow my "full" button turns off in my body while I am acquiescing to the drug of sugar. There are chemical things going on in my brain, it's just unfortunate I don't remind myself of that while it's happening so I can consciously stop myself, you know? I've worked on this a lot in therapy, but I forget about it when I'm in the middle of a binge. Don't we all? On some level, I feel like studying holistic nutrition will give me another tool to regain control when this happens, but isn't it interesting that I'm sabotaging that very dream right now with my food choices?

Yesterday we talked about how your thinking can effect your health and this is a "case in point" moment. My food addictions are triggered when I start to feel I am not worthy. That little voice in my head quietly tells me "I'm not worthy, I'm not good enough, I'm not capable," and the sabotaging begins. Sugar, excessive eating, procrastination, and all sorts of other things happen. The end product is feeling sick- indigestion, nausea, sinus problems, candida, etc. It's all tied in.

So here I sit, watching Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew (love this show!) and they are talking about the same thing. Every time they feel they aren't worthy or what-have-you they get high or drunk. For me, and I think many other people, it's food as a drug. Sugar, salt and fat combinations can affect our brains in similar ways by releasing all of those feel good chemicals- it's what allows us to be able to eat massive quantities without getting full. It's what has allowed our society to get so obese and ill. We are eating emotions and eating ourselves to death.

The great thing is, we can get sober from food addiction. I was sober for a few months when I first started on the journey of fixing my health in 2008. Like an alcoholic, however, I allowed myself to relapse, telling myself that I could control it. For a while I did, but it is getting harder and harder every time I take another bite of chocolate. Issues still need to be worked on and identified before true recovery can happen and the binging will stop.

My name is Jes, and I'm a food-aholic.

Anger Management (and fear)

Anger management has been on my mind a lot the last twenty-four hours. Ok, a lot of things have been on my mind the last 24 hours, but anger management has me contemplating deep thoughts.

I started reading Louise Hay's book You Can Heal Your Life for work a few weeks ago. We are doing a lecture on the book next week and it is part of my job to put the lectures together. Naturally, I feel obligated to read said book so I can help the lecturer out. I'm a bit behind on finishing this one, but I'm working on it. Anyway, last night I read a large chunk of the book and the topic of anger kept coming up. Repressed anger, expressed anger, and all of the inner happenings that go along with it. According to Hay, anger and bitterness can cause many dis-eases within the body. After reading that, I believe it.

Well, tonight I had a bit of a lesson in anger management. A coworker was disrespectful of not only her patent's time, the office's time (and schedule), but of my time as well. It took every once of self-control I had to not lash out verbally because I was so angry at the end of the day where my time was disrespected. Luckily, I was given and out and left before I said anything out of my anger that would be counterproductive and relationship damaging. I was pissed.

Funny story though, I called my supervisor to tell her what happened and when I got off the phone with her and then vented (quite heatedly) to my husband I accidentally dialed my supervisor while I still had the phone in my hand. Being the understanding person she is, she called me back to let me know I had just "butt-dialed" her and she had heard my rant. Thankfully we laughed about it, and I didn't feel mortified or anything of the sort.

That aside, I realized while reading You Can Heal Your Life that my years of pent up anger really did have an effect on my life- and sometimes that anger still comes pouring out in a very unattractive and, shall we say, stated manner. The anger will just pour out of me in long uproars of emotion with many expletives thrown in. It ain't pretty, but it's real. The problem is, when this happens the anger overtakes me and controls me to a point where I can't get control. I can't regain my composure and take a deep breath to let it go. One time, a friend told me to just "let it roll off [my] back, like water running down the back of a duck." I laughed at him and told him it wasn't possible. Now, of course it's possible, it's just not something that I, especially at that time, could make happen within myself.

Anger is much less controlling in my life than it use to be, and I believe that Hays is right that anger can be the cause of dis-ease in your body. She goes as far as to list many diseases and what their emotional causes/roots are. Sounds coo-coo, I know, but there is quite a bit of validity to it when you start reading it and doing inner reflection. Let's list a few of my health complaints and what she says are the underlying emotional causes are, shall we? Fun!

1. Allergies/hay fever: Who are you allergic to? Denying your own power. Emotional congestion. A belief in persecution. Guilt.
2. Asthma: Smother love. Inability for breathe for one's self. Feeling stifled. Suppressed crying.
3. Candida: Feeling very scattered. Lots of frustration and anger.
4. Gallstones: Bitterness. Hard thoughts. Condemning. Pride.
5. Liver: Sea of anger and primitive emotions.
6. Post-nasal drip: Inner crying. Childish tears. Victim.

That's just the short list for me, I hate to admit. But reading that list got me thinking about how emotions really do manifest themselves in physical ailments. My anger manifested itself throughout my body in these ways, and it wasn't until I removed the root of my anger that these things began to heal. I haven't healed one hundred percent, but the anger hasn't diminished yet either. Every so often I am confronted with the anger again, and sure enough my health goes down hill with it. Not to mention, it usually provokes another animated venting session that my husband has to sit through. He probably has some of my rages memorized by now because they typically are about the same thing and I subsequently say the same thing over and over again.

So what happened tonight to make me so angry? A disrespect and disregard for me and my person. That will get me angry every time, because it triggers that childish place that has yet to heal in my heart. There is much work to be done still.

Anger aside I am apparently freaking out about something currently, too. Monday night I had a dream that woke me up in the middle of the night having a full-blown panic attack. I dreamt that I was in a tropical location and a friend and I were traveling between two islands on little rafts. The rafts would move like they were motorized once we left the dock on each island, but to get to the raft you had to get on them like regular rafts by getting in the water and pushing yourself up on it. The water was crystal clear and you could see the smooth beige sand underneath even though the water was deep. The sun was shining extremely brightly and the mood, for quite some time during the dream, was joyful and playful as my friend and I played on each dock and island. Can't remember all the details of that part of the dream, but it got vivid at the end (of course). We were leaving one of the docks again to travel back to the other island and I jumped in the water and got on the raft quickly. When I jumped in the clear water I noticed a shadow down deep in the water- a shark. I got on the raft, crunched down in to a tight ball and grabbed tight to the sides of the raft- which strangely enough had hand grip cut outs in it so there was a small buffer between the actual side of the raft and where I held on. I yelled to my friend to not get in the water, that a shark was looming down below. Even though it was still a dark shadow the shark butted up against the sides of the raft by where I was holding it. Not biting, but bumping and threatening. I held on tighter and tighter, hoping the shark would go away. The raft was far enough from the dock that I couldn't get back to safety with my friend, but my friend kept wanting to come join me despite my protests and warning of the shark. This kept repeating itself with the dark shadow below in the clear water and the shark kept looming. I woke up with every muscle in my body tensed as though I were holding on in fear.

This dream would have been more interesting had I had it last night and woken up to the earthquake that I experienced this morning, but it was not. I did actually feel the earthquake though, as a side note, and it was cool. I woke up at 4am to get a drink of water and decided to go pee while I was at it. Was on the toilet and felt a sudden shaking. First reaction was, "is that an earthquake." Second reaction, "stop hallucinating, Jes, it's not an earthquake, you're just tired and your butt spasmed or something." Nope, earthquake confirmed via facebook a few hours later.

Earthquakes aside, that shark dream happens for me a lot. A little different every time, but every time the same result- I wake up with my body tensed and in panic. I'm on the verge of working past a fear, I think, and hopefully this means that I'm making some progress in my life. Heck, this time the water was clear and it was sunny, and usually that is not the case. Progress! Oh, and if you know anything about me know this- I am deathly afraid of swimming in water I can't see the bottom of, even lakes, because I am still scarred from having watched the Jaws movies when I was seven years old and had just moved by the ocean for the first time in my life. Seven year olds should not watch that movie, people. To this day, I have panic attacks going in to water that isn't a pool. Heck, sometimes I have panic attacks in pools! It's bad. I promise I'm working on it though. When I went to Puerto Rico for vacation in 2008, I actually went in to the ocean where the water was up to my stomach. The water was super clear that day and I told my husband that if he held my hand and promised not to let go I would wave-jump with him in the water. He made good on his end of the bargain and held my hand the whole time and we spent about 15 minutes in the water together. I'm not sure who was prouder of my accomplishment that day. :)

Decisions, decisions

I've started formally announcing it to friends and coworkers, so I guess it's time I formally announce it to the blogger world. No, no babies. Stop jumping to conclusions people... I promise the title of that post when that time comes will be much more obvious. Until then, stop speculating on the status of my uterus. :)

Here's the big news: I've decided that I am going to pursue a degree in Holistic Nutrition.

Cool, huh?

Well, it's cool to me at least. I'm really excited about it. In an odd, or maybe not so odd, way I feel like I've been on a journey the last ten or so years of my life that brought me to this place. I've gone through so many ups and downs with my health and everytime I experience an up in my health it's because I have focused on nutrition and natural supplementation. All of the downs involved massive quantities of prescription and OTC meds and lots of bad food. Through it all, I have cooked. I have obsessed about watching Food TV, I have obsessed with trying new foods and restaurants, I have obsessed with making things work for my food allergies and restrictions. I am passionate about this in a way I have never been passionate about anything before, and the response I get to my healthy food is positive and encouraging that I'm doing something right. And it's something people want to know more about.

There are more and more people out there looking for solutions to their health problems, hitting dead end after dead end with diets of the moment and doctors throwing prescriptions meds and surgical knives at them to put band-aids on the problem. I want to be able to (intelligently) help people discover natural solutions/options and make them a part of their lives. Nutrition changed my life, and I believe proper nutrition can make a whole lot of change for this country.

So, I've started researching Holistic Nutrition programs with a focus on distance learning. Leaving my full-time job is not an option financially, nor is moving away from my husband (who's company will probably have us located where we are for years to come) to join a hoard of teeny-boppers at a college campus somewhere else in the country. Having only ever taken one online class before during undergrad, I'm not sure what school or program to choose. I think online would work well for me, but a correspondence only program- while more streamlined and fast-paced- scares me a little that I won't have a shred of accountability short of my own willpower.

Of the two programs I'm looking at, the correspondence only one is much cheaper and I could have a working degree in a year that would allow me to start practicing professionally before I complete the higher levels of the certification program. The online program would get me a Masters Degree in Holistic Nutrition, but is quite expensive in the long run and requires at least a year of me taking prerequisite courses before starting the actual degree program. I'm hoping there's a happy medium program out there somewhere that I haven't found yet.

What would you do?

Salsa and Guacamole!

Do you ever have one of those days where you have about fifteen different blog post ideas in your head but you 1) forget what they were when you finally get a chance to start blogging, and 2) realize that it is too much of an unfocused mess to throw in to one post? Yup, that's about where I am.

I did however remember that I promised pictures of my homemade salsas and guacamoles (courtesy of the great Rick Bayless). If I could choose one food to eat for the rest of my life it would be chips and salsa. It always satisfies and is packed with a ton of nutrients, flavor and satisfying calories to keep me content for a while. If I could add some guacamole to it, all the better.

This was my first attempt at homemade salsas, but I am a seasoned pro at guac. My brother happens to be a chef and he specializes in Latin American cuisines. For my wedding rehearsal dinner we did a Mexican Fiesta at my parents house and my brother contributed his homemade guacamole and fresh squeezed margaritas. It was fantastic. Everytime he came home after that I made sure to pay close attention to how he made his guacamole- because it was my hands down favorite- and I was able to find a Bobby Flay recipe that looked pretty close. A lot of Food Network viewing and trial and error later, I have the recipe down to a science. My guacamole is pretty darn fantastic, if I do say so myself.

Only problem is, I always forget to take a picture of it to share! Yesterday, when I finally remembered to take a picture of my guacamole I had already covered it with plastic wrap for transporting to the Super Bowl Party. So, it's the best you are going to get. Ignore the plastic wrap and pay attention to the beautiful colors and all the little ingredients you can't see in there: roasted garlic, cilantro, lime, salt, jalapeno, and red onion. It's so good I want to bathe in it... well, minus the fact that the jalapeno would start to make my skin burn, but you get the idea.

For the salsas I was quite suprised by how easy they were to make. All last week on Rick Bayless's PBS show, Mexico: One Plate at a Time, he was making homemade guacamole and salsa, and even did a guamole bar. The salsa looked so easy to make and the ingredients sounded so tasty and luxurious that I decided to make that with the guacamole. I love being inspired by the things I see and the idea of how a combination of ingredients can excite my creativity and taste buds to create my own. Granted, I didn't alter from the recipes at all since I am new to making salsa (and the recipes were just that great to begin with), but why mess with something that's great to begin with. The flavors were amazing and complex and I can't wait to use the salsas for more than chips later in the week. I'm thinking marinades for meat or toppings for breakfast scrambles! Yum!

The only time consuming part of making the salsas was roasting the garlic and tomatillos and jalapenos. But even that was easy as can be- you literally roast them in a pan on the stovetop! Don't the raw ingredients by themselves look fantastic? I couldn't believe how amazing they looked before I started to put everything together.

The first salsa, for which you can see most of the ingredients above, is a Orange-Tomatillo salsa. The sweetness of the orange balances out the heat of the onion and chipotle peppers and the tangy-ness of the roasted tomatillos rounds the flavor out. If you are looking for a good way to clear a head cold or drain your sinuses without burning your mouth completely, this is it. The heat is bareable and really addicting. The spice lingers nicely in your mouth but the flavors still sing through, which makes for an amazing salsa. I will be making this one a lot in the future!

The second salsa is a Fire-Roasted Tomato salsa. There is a deep flavor of lime in it and the roasted tomatoes and savory underlay of roasted garlic is really enticing. The roasted jalapeno adds a kick, but not so much that you can't eat it. To me, the lime and cilantro are the star of this salsa, breaking through all of the complex flavors to bring it to another dimension of flavor. So good.

Here is the only problem. I really want to go bury myself in a bag of chips and salsa now.

An Allergy-Friendly Super Bowl Party

Ok, just want to post a quick note about what a great experience I had at the Super Bowl Party I attended tonight. The hostess surprised me by asking what my food allergies/restrictions were ahead of time, and even sent me her menu so I knew what she would have ahead of time! I was just gobsmacked! As a food allergy sufferer, it is the coolest thing in the world when you can go to a party and feel like the hostess has made sure to have options for you. She even pointed out that she would keep the carrots (one of my "interesting" food allergies) seperate from the other veggies, and made a point to mention that the Italian beef eggrolls she was making were both carrot-free and some would be made specially for me without cheese!

Now, being the super conscious allergenista I am, I did bring my own dish to pass and let her know I would be doing so ahead of time. This is always a good idea, especially if you aren't 100% the menu will be safe. I was concerned by the number of items she was offering with cheese in them, so for me it was a "just in case" back-up plan. While I didn't need it- there was plenty I could eat- the homemade guacamole and two salsas I made were enjoyed by all and a great compliment to what she was already serving. I promise pictures will be coming very soon.

I did overeat, but I felt good in knowing that the food I was eating was healthy and safe for me. Ok, the football shaped chocolate rice krispie treats weren't healthy, but at least the chips, salsa, guacamole, fruits (she had a TON of fruit, yeah!), and Italian beef eggrolls (not fried, they were baked) were nutritionally worth it. Nonetheless, I think a fast is in order for tomorrow...

I make this look good....

Today was allergy shot day. It occured to me that I have never actually taken photographic evidence of what an allergy shot looks like, and I've been getting them for well over four years now. I wish I had taken a photo when I was first getting them- the allergy shots (I get three: animals, trees, and other stuff, molds, mildews, what have you; this is what happens when you are allergic to the planet) would swell so large that they would become one large uber-hive on my arm. It actually bruised from swelling once. Serious. It was shortly thereafter we split them up to two on one arm and one on the other arm. Helped out a lot, and no more bruising and football sized swelling. So, even though they aren't freakish and crazy like they use to be, I thought a picture was in order.

Well, here you have it. This is the arm with two, the small welt is the animals shot and the large welt is the trees shot (I believe).

And another shot. I think this one gets the redness of it the best- when you put your hand on it, even through clothes it feels really hot. Feverish and angry. They used to itch like mad, but not so much anymore.



And here again. See how large the tree one gets, even after all these years?

Allergy shots have gotten me to a point where I take little to no daily meds for my environmental allergies anymore. I love them and swear by them and am still kicking myself for waiting to get them for so long.

Granted, I'm not sure I would have seen as good of results had I started earlier...

Here is the kicker, my reduction in allergy medication and symptoms came primarily after 1) My sinus surgery to fix my deviated septum in October '07, and the grand finale of 2) changing my diet and detoxing my body in July '08. Up until the sinus surgery, I was still taking allergy meds and sinus thinning medications daily, and a slew of inhalers and other meds to stop the swelling. After the sinus surgery I was able to reduce my nasal inhaler usage to a more infrequent level, and I cut down on meds quite a bit, but still found myself reaching for them regularly (which was still a reduction from daily, mind you). It was my diet changes and detox a year and a half ago where sinus relief and asthma relief become more permanent. In fact, I now only take allergy medicine on the day I get allergy shots, and that is under strict protest I will have you know but my allergist says I have to- something about potential adverse reactions, blah, blah, blah. One of these days I'm gonna get the shots without taking medicine beforehand and see what happens... shall I tempt fate?

Anyway, I do still love my allergy shots and know that if I'm starting to feel a little wheezy or "allergic" I can just go get my shots and start feeling better. In fact, this fall I was feeling asthmatic from the leaves dying (the fall is my asthmatic season from the molds/mildews/dust), went and got my shots and felt the asthmatic sensation go away about 10 minutes after the injection. Relief felt really good. They have changed my life and allowed me to live it much more fully. I still won't go camping, don't get me wrong, thats just asking for trouble, but at least now I can go on a picnic or be in a house with animals and not need more than "emergency" meds if, on the off chance, I start to have a problem. It's nice.

What's with today, today?

It started last night with not being able to sleep. I tossed and turned for about an hour, and despite being exhausted, I could not get to sleep. My neck was hurting and I was just cold enough that the combination of the two made me restless. So, being the junkie that I am, I took a very long, very hot shower. Ah! Relief. I still woke up a few times during the night, but at least I was warm and feeling more comfortable.

To me, there is nothing more therapeutic than a hot shower. I would take a hot bath, but if you saw the current or previous state of my bathtub from our bathroom remodel you wouldn't want to take one either. Either way, I think there is something to be said for the sensation of warm water running down your head and over your body. It's soothing and relaxing and feels like a warm embrace.

Over the past two years since I started having problems with my gallbladder and my health in general, I have resorted to many a hot shower. At first, the hot showers helped to make the pain go away when nothing else would- and I mean nothing, I pumped myself full of so many OTC pills I'm surprised my body still function (although I guess it wasn't functioning and that was the root of the problem, right?). During the early stages of the gallbladder healing process, the hot showers were still for that therapeutic feeling when I had flare-ups (and still do use it for that), but now it seems I have to take the hot showers because I am literally that cold. In losing the better part of 60lbs, my body has completely lost the lack to self-regulate heat. And in the cold Midwest, that is not a good thing.

Granted, I believe that once I am fully healed (read: get up the guts to do a complete GB flush even though the idea scares the crap out of me though it promises relief) my body will start regulating it's heat better. In the meantime, I'm an icicle pop the majority of the time and long hot showers are not so much a luxury, but a necessity.

Anyway, last night's shower made it possible for me to sleep, like I said, though I still didn't sleep the whole night through. Woke up groggy and wanting to complete do-over on the night. Alas, no such luck, and no such Groundhogs Day miracle for me (haha, funny). The morning didn't start off well either as a result, I wasn't very productive and time flew by while I was doing a whole lot of nothing and I found myself scrambling to make food for the day and get ready for work. Tuesdays seem to go like this sometimes, and I think it's because I don't work until 1pm, it leaves a lot of time for mindless goofing off.

Burnt myself cooking- more than once-, almost started a fire from overheating the olive oil, got aggravated that my kitchen was messy, got aggravated that my husband hadn't emptied the dishwasher or helped clean any dishes from two nights ago despite our "i cook, you clean" agreement, and then I almost forgot to put on make-up before work because I had spent so much time with being frustrated. Got to work, and things were not much better. The boss was in a funk, and that made us get in a funk. I had to promise myself mid-day that I would not be a disgruntled employee.

Ok, so the day got better after the boss left and things calmed down, and when I got home I discovered my husband had actually finished the dishes and done more work on our bathroom remodel (thank goodness!). Things were looking up!

Until I spilled an entire glass of water all over my keyboard and desk.

Stupid.

So I ask: What's with today, today?

And PS I'm officially throwing out the rest of the Red Velvet cake. Despite the frosting being awful, I keep eating it and it's not making me feel very well. I'm still trying to fix the candida situation was from the (stupid) antibiotics and it ain't helping. So good-bye vegan Red Velvet cake!

I swear, I'm off the sugar bus for real again this time. She is a cruel mistress and will not tempt me again!

A bit disappointed...

I was so excited about that red velvet cake yesterday! Can't say the results lived up to the anticipation though. The cake itself is quite good, but the frosting, well, not so much.

For the cake I doubled the vegan cupcake recipe I used this summer from Bittersweet blog. Those cupcakes were amazing, so why not, right? I didn't have the canned beets it called for so I used the beet juice I have in my fridge and mixed in some of my homemade pear sauce to add some texture. Viola, worked perfect. Plus, to make the cake heatlhier I used succant for half of the sugar (that was all I had left) and used whole wheat pastry flour instead of all-purpose. Fiber, yum!

Look at the beautiful color!

It tasted as good as it looks too! I couldn't stop licking the spatula- the sweetness of the beets and chocolate powder was a perfect match and made for some very addicting flavors!

Note to self, however- DO NOT wear your favorite white sweatshirt while working with beets or beet juice or anything beet related.

The cakes came out of the oven smelling all chocolately and sweet and the color was just divine.

I made the frosting recipe from the Go Dairy Free blog recipe yesterday. BIG disappointment. Ruined my cake, if you ask me. Needs more sugar, the flavor is bland and has the texture of licking shorterning. Your mouth feels coated with shortening for about 30 minutes after eating it. The sweetness just isn't there, you don't get that salty sweet combo of a traditional butter cream, and it comes no where near having the flavor of a cream cheese frosting (even though I never liked cream cheese even when I was eating dairy, THAT would have been more flavorful than this). I used the Earth Balance shortening sticks, and I don't know if that was where I went wrong, but I don't think so. I think it needs more sugar and more rice milk to balance it out and get some more flavor in there.

At least the cake looks pretty, right?