This Year's Theme: Acceptance

I've never done well with new year's resolutions. I don't think I have ever even made a serious attempt to make any. I think a lot about it. I think a lot about a lot of things. I think thinking is probably my number one hobby if I am to be honest. Hahaha. But, I have never in my recollection, made resolutions on January 1st that require me to give up something, or change myself into something new for a new year. It's just not my style.

Goal setting, however... that is different. I know some people might see them as the same things with different names,  but to me they are not. Resolutions are, within this context, something to rid of, or banish. It feels like it's almost a punishment. Like, I'm gonna somehow be different come January 1st. December 31st, cake and alcohol, but January 1st it's all kale and smoothies. "I'm getting serious in 2019", I hear people say. It's straight from one extreme to another, usually without a long term plan of sustainability. Just the end goal in mind. People usually know what they want, and they have a kind of clue how to achieve it short term, but not on hard days, or days when things aren't following the plan, or all kinds of other obstacles.

Where I've Been

Some of you that follow my blog are probably surprised to see this entry pop up in your social media feed. You may have wondered where I've been, or even forgotten about me, since it's been 2 months since I've written anything.

Summer has always been a busy time for me, and my family. There's just so much more to do in the summer, and I always need to be outside, and on the go, which means being online has to be done in small intervals. This summer has been no exception to that. We have been trying to get out as much as possible to enjoy the outdoors, and all of the activities that summer brings. They are all of Bean's favorite things to do, so I try to maximize opportunities as much as I can. However, this year has been harder than others to do that due to chronic migraines. Every other day, or two I have one, and it's a struggle for me to keep up with life in general. The swirling nausea, and dizziness slows me down, and the aphasia makes it impossible to write on a lot of days, even if I were to have the time.

Health wise it has been really difficult. Having a chronic illness kind of rearranges your life forcibly in ways you never thought about before, but suddenly have to deal with. I have no choice. It's not heroic, or inspirational, or any of those things. I'm a mother, and a wife, and a human being who has responsibilities. I have to get on with things, even if I have to do so in a different way then I had before. So, things have been prioritized, delegated, rearranged, and done at probably much slower speeds than I used to do them, but they're getting done.

Another reason that I find it hard to find the time to write anymore is that taking care of Beans has really

One Year Post #Hysterectomy Update

On July 29th it was one year to date since I had a hysterectomy. I thought that doing a little update post about how that year has been for me, and how I feel about it now would be good for women that may be considering having one, or possibly just had one.

Of course, this is just my experience. I don't intend to represent a standard of healing. I do, however, want to tell my story, and possibly offer some hope for others. If one was to look on the internet for hysterectomy stories a lot of what you'd come away with would be bleak. I don't know why. Positive stories aren't as easy to find as the negative ones.

I think the hardest part was the healing time. Since I am in such a busy household I couldn't really rest as well as I'd like to have. I talk about that some in a past post: Recovering From a Hysterectomy in an Autistic Household so I'm not going to repeat it all here in this post.

The first few months after the hysterectomy everything seemed to be doing okay. I was easing back into my routine, and all was pretty good. The only thing that was not was that I was still in pain. I spoke to my doctor about it, but no one quite knew why my bladder was hurting so much, but chalked it up to just a slow healer.

Then, in October my energy dropped, and depression started setting in. A different kind of depression than any other I've had. It was a deep to the bone heavy weight, immobilizing kind. I pushed through it. It came, and went.

By January my bladder was hurting worse than ever. I went to see a doctor, and long story short after several appointments with specialists I was diagnosed with interstitial cystitis.  I realized that a lot of the pain I was blaming on the endometriosis was really due to this bladder issue. Most of the time it is not all that bad, but sometimes the pain is comparable to active labor pain. I am in pain every day, but usually it is tolerable. Now, I can get the correct treatment that I realize that not all of the pain I was experiencing was due to the endo.

During the months of November through early January I had began to gain weight. Nothing I did seemed to help, and it was all gathering around my tummy. It was evident as my mood shifted, and my weight changed that even though I had kept my ovaries they were not working properly. I had thought that I had made the worst mistake ever. I felt like I was doomed to this life of weight gain, and depression.

Thankfully, by February

The Toxicity of the New Fitspirational Movement

It seems here in the last few years that being 'fit' is trendy. You can't scroll through any social media without seeing photos designed to be inspirational, and motivational. Fitspo, or Fitspiration as it's called is everywhere. It's staring at us from magazine covers as we check out at the grocery store, and screaming at us from our television programs. Photos of half naked women fall across our computer screens posed in dim washed light with sweat dripping off of their body. Motivational words splash across the photo letting us know that we can't give up, we need to train hard, remember to never quit, and that we can have or, be the person we want if we just try harder.

Are these posters really healthy? Are the ideas behind the words motivating? How is this trend affecting girls, and women everywhere?

5 Easy Tips for Eating Healthier on a Budget

One of the things that astounds me about America (and probably other countries, too) is how unaware we are of nutrition. I mentioned a bit of this in this entry. We are diet obsessed, but that's not the same as being healthy. Even when I do hear people talk about healthy eating it's usually all about organic whole foods markets, and posh foods many of us don't even know what they are, nor could afford on a regular basis. There is a gray area between eating a bunch of junk because we don't know any better, and going to the extreme of being that know-it-all health nut that has a huge grocery budget at their disposal.

So, how do we eat better on a budget? What are some basic rules?

17 Tips for Eating Healthy on a Tight Schedule

Do you think that you're too busy to eat healthy? Do you often find yourself stopping at a convenient store, or drive thru due to tight schedules, and a a rumbling stomach?

This is such a common issue that I believe it is warranted a bump up on my blog posting list about developing healthier habits. On a previous post about this topic a reader asked me for some tips about how to eat healthy while balancing a hectic schedule. I would have liked to do a post about what to eat, and what to keep in check first, but I wanted to address this question, because it is a terrific one. I believe that time is probably one of the biggest, second only to maybe not having the correct information, obstacles most of us face in eating better, more nutritious food.

I will address the reasons why in a later post, but here are some tips to eating a healthy diet when busy:

*If you can afford it, take advantage of the already prepared produce trays at the store. This can cut down time when you're in a hurry, and is still likely less expensive to prepare a meal using already prepped ingredients than eating fast food.

*Cook things likes beans in bulk, and freeze them for tacos, and chili meals.