Feeling Overwhelmed

Oh geesh. Things were going so well for so long (ok, so it seemed) and I'm just not handling it so well now...

Just spent 24 hours in the mountains with my cousins, and that was awesome. But when we went out to eat, there was absolutely NOTHING I could eat on the menu. I anticipated that, but to sit and watch them eat nachos and sweet potatoes and elk shepherds pie and burgers and salmon slathered in butter, and I only had a granola bar to gnosh on, it was honestly really difficult. Often I can push through and not let it get me down, but last night was no such night. It didn't help either when we wandered downtown Estes Park and stopped at this toffee/fudge/ice cream shop. It was KILLER. And who was the one eating a can of olives while everyone chowed down on their toffee while we played board games? Yah... :-/ Sooo just kinda sucked.

Then, at my nutritionist meeting yesterday, I found out I lost my clearing for cocoa powder again (ie, chocolate.......)...which explains why I've been feeling full/bloated and just really nasty. But if I lose a clearing, that's most likely something I'm pretty sensitive to (like the almond flour and grapes and apples and strawberries that I had previously been cleared for, kept out of my diet for 3 months, and tried again...and reacted). So that means chocolate is most likely going to be out of the picture the rest of my life. That sucks. That really doesn't leave much in the way of sweets for me to eat. Those Quinoa Tahini cookies are awesome, but again, b/c of the sugar, I can't have much since I react to sugar.

Then tonight, I came home from the mountains and have to leave for Bible study soon and have a lot to do in between...and have an empty fridge. I figured I'd have a salad tomorrwo for work - and dinner tonight. Just realized that not only is my coconut oil all gone but so is my olive oil. Hence, no dressing. Plan B: Pumpkin smoothie for dinner.

The nutritionist also kinda scolded me nicely...she said my stomach is still getting inflamed, and b/c I'm autoimmune IN the stomach -t hat's where the autoimmune has a party when it gets flared up - it's a double whammy. I really, really have to be careful of what I eat. I'm not absorbing the nutrients right now (my count of teaspoons of magnesium keeps rising, when it had been decreasing, so that tells her that I'm not absorbing them well). Plus, my nose is often stuffy, which tells me that the lining of my stomach is inflamed. Sigh. So she told me I need to stick with the same things for a month to let my stomach rest. Try absolutely nothing new. As soon as I have any sort of reaction, my stomach is jacked until I take care of it. So I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed. I'm going on the repair diet for 5 days (veggies, meats and a few fruits) and then will add in nuts and beans and quinoa again. Then I'm going to have to stick with that for a month. And I just printed off all these new recipes to try too. Sigh.

AND she told me that I need to be careful to not eat too many raw veggies/day (in the family of broccoli/kale/brussels sprouts) b/c that can tell my thyroid to stop producing something (medical term... ;)) I don't know if that is for everyone or just me. I'm special, clearly.

On top of that, she's telling me I need to get some cardio in daily to get the blood moving and that will help me feel better too. She's right. And that's important anyways for so many reasons. AND my physical therapist for my sciatica also has told me to be getting in cardio. But on top of all the stretches and exercises he has me doing daily. Which would add up to about an hour if I did all of them. And sadly, I don't have time. I mean, an hour of stretches, 30 minutes cardio, plus time to grocery shop and cook, which is extra for me. I mean, I don't even know where to start.  So I don't start any of them b/c I'm too overwhelmed. Which is uncharacteristic of me.

The one silver lining in the day tho, is that after hiking with my cousins, we stopped by Safeway to get some lunch. I was looking at granola bars and found one by Two Moms in the Raw. I'd never heard of them before, but could eat all the ingredients! I grabbed it and left, then was like dude, go back for more b/c this is awesome. So I walked back and there was no box, no more, nothing. So it was like someone had just left it there...I saw it as a miracle. When I went to check out, the register didn't recognize it...(which now makes me think that someone dropped it there? Or an angel literally dropped it there? I don't know!) and the cash register guy was like, well, how about I charge you...$1.49? I was like yah!

I came home and looked them up on line and they are normally $4... I feel SUPER blessed to have gotten that. There is no way I can sp end $4 on a granola bar. I thought the Lara Bars were tough enough to splurge on at $1.69/bar!

Then the three granola/power bars I just made to experiment with this week - two of which were amazing - but both have cocoa powder/chocolate. Sigh. Back to square one.