Sometimes our health is dependent on being able to admit to some hard truths about ourselves. And today I did that. I had a nice conversation with my voice teacher- that involved much crying on my part- talking about how it was okay for me to decide not to do the Met auditions this year. That had been the goal for the majority of the year, and we both new that vocally I was in the right place. Unfortunately, my gallbladder and body had other ideas and have slowed me down. Tonight I admitted that my health had to remain the top priority and the auditions would have to wait one more year. And although next year will be the last year I can do the auditions, it's okay. It has to be okay. Keeping on track with improve my health and well-being has to stay the priority for a bit longer before I can truly prioritize on other large, intense, goals.
For some people, going fast works well and they thrive on that type of pressure. In my case, I thought for a long time that I was good at going fast and could thrive under pressure. I ignored signs from my body that it was too much, that I wasn't ready, and that I needed to slow down. As a result I am dealing with some really not fun health issues at a young age and having to slow down to the point of a screeching halt to address them. Granted, I had slowed down before then, but now I have to slow down mentally as well. Which is quite possibly the hardest part for me because my brain has always run at a mile a minute. This is due in large part to how I was brought up and what I was taught. I internalize so much negativity and pressure and other bad things (and things that I make worse than they are) that my brain is cluttered with incessant mental chatter. I am sure this is evidenced by the rambling nature of my blogging... which is much like my brain. I don't know how to stop talking, and it is a compulsive habit of mine to say too much. So I am focusing on slowing down. Slowing down how I think, how I act, what and how many things I prioritize, and the pace at which I work towards my goals and every day activities.
It's taking a lot of baby steps, and admitting it out loud today was a just another baby step towards achieving a true state of well-being.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Monday, October 13, 2008
The great corn-holio
I discovered today why it is recommended that you not eat corn if you are having gallbladder problems. That stuff, tasty as it is, does not digest. I saw the proof today, if you know what I mean. Last night I indulged on a bit too much corn (admittedly), and I paid for it today with lots of gas, indigestion, discomfort, and seeing the undigested pieces... well, you know. So, as tasty as it is, I think I will forgo the corn again.
The funny thing is that as a result I didn't feel hungry at all today. First thing this morning I was hungry, but as soon as I sat down to eat breakfast I wanted nothing to do with food the rest of the day. Granted, I still ate because I know how important it is to eat your three squares a day, but I did not snack at all (which is weird for me) and literally forced myself to eat something for dinner. But then again, I guess we all have days like that where our stomach just needs a break.
In other news, I realized the true and full benefit of chiropractic today. This weekend I slipped and fell while we were at a Quizno's and ended up undoing all the good work we had done fixing my back the prior week. Now, I knew I had done this when my back starting to bother me pretty bad from a nerve pinching in my lower back that just made me want to start punching things from the sheer discomfort (not pain, mind you) that it caused throughout my whole body. So, I got an adjustment today and told my doc that I had fallen, blah, blah blah. She told me that I had actually managed to get my uneven hips to become uneven on the opposite side! In other words, the one hip that had been higher was now lower than the other hip. Anyway, she worked wonders on my back, adjusting all the way up my spine and I feel a lot better. Thank goodness for chiropractors!
The funny thing is that as a result I didn't feel hungry at all today. First thing this morning I was hungry, but as soon as I sat down to eat breakfast I wanted nothing to do with food the rest of the day. Granted, I still ate because I know how important it is to eat your three squares a day, but I did not snack at all (which is weird for me) and literally forced myself to eat something for dinner. But then again, I guess we all have days like that where our stomach just needs a break.
In other news, I realized the true and full benefit of chiropractic today. This weekend I slipped and fell while we were at a Quizno's and ended up undoing all the good work we had done fixing my back the prior week. Now, I knew I had done this when my back starting to bother me pretty bad from a nerve pinching in my lower back that just made me want to start punching things from the sheer discomfort (not pain, mind you) that it caused throughout my whole body. So, I got an adjustment today and told my doc that I had fallen, blah, blah blah. She told me that I had actually managed to get my uneven hips to become uneven on the opposite side! In other words, the one hip that had been higher was now lower than the other hip. Anyway, she worked wonders on my back, adjusting all the way up my spine and I feel a lot better. Thank goodness for chiropractors!
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Random Allergic Reactions... Again
Friday was a weird day. About an hour or so after lunch I had developed a rather swollen lip for no apparent reason. What felt like a few large hives formed on the the lower right side of my lip and my throat on the right side also felt kind of swollen and tingly. I resisted the urge to take Benedryl because I was at work and didn't want to get too drowsy. Luckily, the hive started to go away after about an hour, however, I then developed a rather severe headache and felt slightly off the rest of the day.
Here is the worst part- I can't figure out what the heck caused the allergic reaction! Everything I ate that day were things that I had eaten all week with no problems (including chocolate). My body certainly operates in mysterious ways and I'm not quite sure what to make of this occurrence. Perhaps I need to do a serious detox again and lay off the chocolate... which, as we've discussed this week is hard for me to do with constant temptation. Or maybe there is something else going on, or I really did eat something I was allergic to and didn't know it. Long story short, I don't know, but I am grateful that the reaction cleared on it's own and I was able to avoid the Benedryl this time.
On a positive note, my husband and I travelled to Chicago yesterday to see the Lyric Opera perform Manon, which was awesome- Dessay and Kaufman were absolutely brilliant- and we stayed overnight at the new Aloft hotel by O'Hare. While it would seem the positive was that we went to the opera, the biggest positive for me was that even though I forgot to pack my non-allergic shampoo and conditioner I successfully used the hotel's highly fragranced shampoo and conditioner without getting a crazy, itchy, burny scalp!!!! Such is the life of an allergic person. :) We take pleasure in the silliest victories.
Here is the worst part- I can't figure out what the heck caused the allergic reaction! Everything I ate that day were things that I had eaten all week with no problems (including chocolate). My body certainly operates in mysterious ways and I'm not quite sure what to make of this occurrence. Perhaps I need to do a serious detox again and lay off the chocolate... which, as we've discussed this week is hard for me to do with constant temptation. Or maybe there is something else going on, or I really did eat something I was allergic to and didn't know it. Long story short, I don't know, but I am grateful that the reaction cleared on it's own and I was able to avoid the Benedryl this time.
On a positive note, my husband and I travelled to Chicago yesterday to see the Lyric Opera perform Manon, which was awesome- Dessay and Kaufman were absolutely brilliant- and we stayed overnight at the new Aloft hotel by O'Hare. While it would seem the positive was that we went to the opera, the biggest positive for me was that even though I forgot to pack my non-allergic shampoo and conditioner I successfully used the hotel's highly fragranced shampoo and conditioner without getting a crazy, itchy, burny scalp!!!! Such is the life of an allergic person. :) We take pleasure in the silliest victories.
Thursday, October 9, 2008
The lure of chocolate
Chocolate and I have a long history together. Even after almost three months apart I still get a pretty intense craving for it's sweet smoothness, and as soon as it touches my lips the cravings get even more intense.
This week at work I have been eating some of the chocolate candy we have hanging out at the front desk. Go figure, the stash is located at my desk in particular. So, a few times a day my co-workers are coming by to get a piece or two. This is no good for me. For the first few weeks I did really well in resisting the temptation... which was helped by the labels all saying that they contained tree nuts (as discussed in an earlier post). Forget about it. Ever since the Ghiradelli showed up I've been a really bad girl, eating at least a few pieces every day, and about mid-day today (on my day off) I was stressing out and tired and got myself a bar of it. The espresso flavored dark is truly sinful, it's so good. And, yet again, the Ghiradelli went over just fine with my gallbladder and stomach which only makes it worse for this very addicted chocoholic!!!! I wish I would have an allergic reaction or something so that I have incentive to not eat it! Ugh! At least I kept myself to a single serving size of chocolate, unlike my pre-GB issue days when I would eat the whole thing in one sitting. Yeah. The chocolate addiction is that bad... and I still would want more.
Chocolate wasn't the only bad thing I ate today. I also ate chips and salsa as a snack. While this may seem harmless to anyone else, for me, the extra meal can put extra stress on my GB and the corn in the chips also is rough on the gallbladder. Surprisingly, that went over fine, too! Does this mean I'm getting better? Well, maybe, but my stomach did finally start to revolt on me with some nausea after dinner. I probably would have been fine if I hadn't done dessert, but I was being bad today because my brother-in-law was visiting.
Which brings me to another subject- the strong association I have with eating and family get togethers/celebrations. Growing up, eating was the central focus of all of our family get togethers: holidays, graduations, out of town relatives visiting, etc. The main discussion of any event was what are we eating and who is bringing what? Unfortunately, I have an extended family full of wonderful home cooks who all can whip up some pretty darn tasty food, no matter the occasion. Get togethers were spent with hours of appetizers, followed by a full dinner, and an extravagant dessert of some sort. Not to mention, while eating the appetizers my aunts and female cousins and I would all sit around the table of appetizers eating while we socialized. Family and food (and overeating) go hand in hand for me, and even though I made a great effort to make everything healthy today I still ended up binging throughout the day.
I think that changing this habit and mindset is going to take a while, and perhaps I need to work a lot more on the emotional side of things to break the compulsion to prepare an extravagant spread (seriously, you should have seen me at the grocery store stocking up on snacks and food this morning, just for the three of us) before I can truly change those habits. For me, it is very much tied in to the need to please people and win their love and affection with food, because, truthfully, that was the only form of love I really knew growing up. I've spent 29 years feeling and expressing love and affection through food, and it might just take another 29 to learn how to feel and express love in other ways. Recognizing this, I think, is a start in the right direction.
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
The consequence of bad behavior
Clearly, I am not ready for some foods yet. That cheese I had Sunday in the risotto? I could tell it was still effecting my digestion, because my lunch of avocado with EVOO and lime and some millet bread was sluggish in it's digestion and made me nauseous enough to take some acid drops. That meal usually goes over much better than that. Then, being the glutton for punishment that I am, I ate some Dove chocolates pieces before dinner last night which resulted in some nausea, indigestion once I did eat dinner, and some mild allergic reactions (they are serious when they say it may contain trace amounts of tree nuts). Ugh! Darn gallbladder!
That being said though, the question that keeps coming to mind is why it is virtually impossible to find a chocolate that is completely free of traces of nuts? How do us allergic people enjoy the wonderful taste of chocolate without fearing reaction? I, for one, happen to me really addicted to chocolate (to the point where it gives me a feeling of a high when I eat it, bad, I know), but it's hard to find chocolates that are safe to eat. My brother and one of my friends are severely allergic to peanuts (for me, it's just the tree nuts) and it's hard to even find chocolate chips for homemade cookies that don't have trace amounts in them. For a while I used Ghiradelli chocolate chips for my friend when I made things with chocolate, but I believe they even now have the warning label on them. At some point I should just start making it home made! Which is completely ridiculous, but in this cross contamination filled manufacturing society we have it's probably the best solution for allergic people!
That being said though, the question that keeps coming to mind is why it is virtually impossible to find a chocolate that is completely free of traces of nuts? How do us allergic people enjoy the wonderful taste of chocolate without fearing reaction? I, for one, happen to me really addicted to chocolate (to the point where it gives me a feeling of a high when I eat it, bad, I know), but it's hard to find chocolates that are safe to eat. My brother and one of my friends are severely allergic to peanuts (for me, it's just the tree nuts) and it's hard to even find chocolate chips for homemade cookies that don't have trace amounts in them. For a while I used Ghiradelli chocolate chips for my friend when I made things with chocolate, but I believe they even now have the warning label on them. At some point I should just start making it home made! Which is completely ridiculous, but in this cross contamination filled manufacturing society we have it's probably the best solution for allergic people!
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Risky Behavior
I've been living on the edge these last few days, let me tell you! Eating all sorts of things that aren't on the diet, and crossing my fingers everytime that I don't get sick! Thankfully, I haven't gotten sick though I can't say my gallbladder didn't struggle to digest a few things.
During my indulgences I discovered that while I can surprisingly digest turkey bacon avocado sandwiches like a champ (aka a person with a normal and healthy digestive system), having them two days in a row starts to cause some frustration for my digestive track. I also discovered that I actually now feel bad if I am not eating enough vegetables. I had a wonderful Tofu Pineapple Curry at dinner last tonight (at our favorite restaurant in the Quad Cities, Le MeKong) but there was not a single piece of pineapple in there and I had to hunt down the three slices of zucchini that were actually in there. Plenty of tofu and curry sauce was there, just no veggies and pineapple. I was upset!
I also had a few glasses of wine this weekend, some of which I did not have with a meal or follow up with my gallbladder helping drugs. And I did fine! No gallbladder attacks, no nausea, I was fine! We are definitely making progress and I am very excited about it. Because I have been doing so well digestively I thought I might get really adventurous and include some cheese with my dinner tonight. Not a lot, just a little to see how it would go. Eh. Mixed reviews, I think. I'm not sick, but I definitely had some really thick and gross tasting mucos in my mouth for a while afterwards with a slight unease in my stomach. We will see as the night progresses how I fair. The dinner I decided to add cheese to was a butternut squash risotto recipe I saw Giada De Laurentiis make yesterday that I had to try. It was good, but my husband and I agreed the butternut squash risotto recipe we have from our Crate & Barrel cookbook is much better.
During my indulgences I discovered that while I can surprisingly digest turkey bacon avocado sandwiches like a champ (aka a person with a normal and healthy digestive system), having them two days in a row starts to cause some frustration for my digestive track. I also discovered that I actually now feel bad if I am not eating enough vegetables. I had a wonderful Tofu Pineapple Curry at dinner last tonight (at our favorite restaurant in the Quad Cities, Le MeKong) but there was not a single piece of pineapple in there and I had to hunt down the three slices of zucchini that were actually in there. Plenty of tofu and curry sauce was there, just no veggies and pineapple. I was upset!
I also had a few glasses of wine this weekend, some of which I did not have with a meal or follow up with my gallbladder helping drugs. And I did fine! No gallbladder attacks, no nausea, I was fine! We are definitely making progress and I am very excited about it. Because I have been doing so well digestively I thought I might get really adventurous and include some cheese with my dinner tonight. Not a lot, just a little to see how it would go. Eh. Mixed reviews, I think. I'm not sick, but I definitely had some really thick and gross tasting mucos in my mouth for a while afterwards with a slight unease in my stomach. We will see as the night progresses how I fair. The dinner I decided to add cheese to was a butternut squash risotto recipe I saw Giada De Laurentiis make yesterday that I had to try. It was good, but my husband and I agreed the butternut squash risotto recipe we have from our Crate & Barrel cookbook is much better.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Acupuncture as an alternative to drugs
A really really cool thing happened today. I learned that acupuncture can actually induce labor. A patient who is slightly overdue called up today in tears because she had not gone in to labor yet and her ob-gyn wanted to chemically induce her. She was already scheduled for an acupuncture appointment for Friday in the case that she had not gone in to labor yet, but due to the pressuring for chemical induction from her ob-gyn she had to move the appointment up a day.
Although she did not go in to labor immediately after the acupuncture session, she told me that she could feel a change happening in her body and that things felt like they were starting to move a bit. I am hoping that the session was effective and that we will hear news that the baby was born today as a result of the acupuncture inducing labor. I would hate to see her doctor make her resort to chemicals.
Curious about the effectiveness of acupuncture inducing labor, I started to do some googling and found many articles discussing it. This one in particular I found very informative and interesting. How I was unaware of this use for acupuncture until today, I don't know, but I am so excited to have learned about it.
Acupuncture's benefit seems to be getting a lot of press lately. Just last week the Today Show did a segment on acupuncture helping with infertility, and during the Olympics there was a segment on the athletes using acupuncture to recover from playing their sports quicker and more effectively. It is thrilling to see this natural treatment used in Asia for centuries finally getting some serious recognition for it's effectiveness here in the States.
Although she did not go in to labor immediately after the acupuncture session, she told me that she could feel a change happening in her body and that things felt like they were starting to move a bit. I am hoping that the session was effective and that we will hear news that the baby was born today as a result of the acupuncture inducing labor. I would hate to see her doctor make her resort to chemicals.
Curious about the effectiveness of acupuncture inducing labor, I started to do some googling and found many articles discussing it. This one in particular I found very informative and interesting. How I was unaware of this use for acupuncture until today, I don't know, but I am so excited to have learned about it.
Acupuncture's benefit seems to be getting a lot of press lately. Just last week the Today Show did a segment on acupuncture helping with infertility, and during the Olympics there was a segment on the athletes using acupuncture to recover from playing their sports quicker and more effectively. It is thrilling to see this natural treatment used in Asia for centuries finally getting some serious recognition for it's effectiveness here in the States.
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