Housewifing Around 2.0

Hallo und willkommen zu meiner Website! that means in English 'Hello and welcome to my website!'


I love you for being here.  


If you came here from here, you've already been briefed on the exciting changes going on.  If you haven't, you're lucky you didn't have to read all that droll.  


All 50-something archived classics will be here for your reviewing pleasure, to the right, now with intrusive Ads.  Please feel free to work around them, or tell you're kids they're saving a dying puppy and leave them to click and re-click them for about an hour.  Ethically, I signed a contract that I won't be clicking them myself, otherwise I wouldn't be writing this.  If any of these links end up catching your eye though, I would truly appreciate if you plunge into them.  Segway into ...:









At least they allow me personal input in some of the content. This one, I side with them.





This one...not so much.

There are still a few bugs in case the pictures look funny or captions are haywire.  I have to manually check each one of them and re-code a few things.  My advanced apologies.  This will take a while. 


New features will slowly start to show up and the color schemes will gradually be less repulsive.  The ads will always remind you there is something you didn't know existed that you needed all your life. 


You will watch this ugly duckling transform into a beautiful swan as I learn how to manipulate it and add some flare and pizzazz. (I just wanted to use the word pizzazz.)  Please be patient with me.  I'm a cripple after all. (Pull handicap card: Check, Check).


Feel free to leave comments on the new website.  What you like. What is hideous. What is derogatory, distasteful, and offensive to PC.  What is in Spanish.  What is not compatible with your computer screen and all the left-behind errors from the transfer of one blog to another. 


If the websites are taking TOO LONG to load, please, please, please, notify me and I will look into bandwidth, storage space, and other jargon that sounds like 2-year old fake-arabic.  


You better believe it... Google is taking over.  We all know it.  It's time to embrace it.  Upgrade yourself.  Oh... and subscribe to me if you dare!

Quizzes by Quibblo.com

Thanks for humoring me, 


Elena the Wolf
(Maybe I can start a "thing" as The Wolf)

“Mawwage is what bwings us togwether today....”

In memory of my (not dead) husband:

Mawwage is awesome.  Some of the time.  Most of the time. Am I right?

It's been a year and a half.  I still consider us a pair of newlyweds.  I'm still madly in love and surprised at how in love you could be with someone you want to kill a few times a week.

I reckon since this blog is about being recently married and how to deal with so many changes all at once, it was due time to talk about man versus women.

If you've kept up with my mini-saga or read the bio, I've mentioned how immediately after marriage I - we- began to deal with serious health problems.  This causes a lot of conflict and confusion for a couple who is supposed to be  locked in the bedroom, high on endorphins and in honeymoon stage.  Even during the honeymoon, we had to make modifications due to my escalating symptoms.  Coming home to a surreal reality of problems is not for the weak.  While a women feels, "Thank God I have a good strong man to help me through this rough time", a man is most likely feeling, "This is not fair! We're supposed to be having the time of our lives."  Though a wife still acknowledges the unfairness of it all, a man's need to fix something he cannot can really test him, especially early in a marriage before either one has settled themselves into a role of new responsibilities.

This is not limited to couples with illness though.  Even before I got married, I was fascinated by the psychological relationship between husband and wife.  Being a naive and arrogant little girl, when I read books like Men are From Mars, Women are from Venus (for fun, yes, I'm a nerd), I thought, "Why don't people just say what they're feeling? Then they would both understand each other!!! It's so simple." Haha. Hahahahaha. Hahahahaaa.

There are delicate balances in a loving relationship, or a non-loving one.  There are so many fine lines that it feels more like a tight rope when having to express needs, wants, and emotions.  God forbid you overuse that word: f-e-e-l-i-n-g-s.

However, I'm proud to say that through hard work and application I've found the strength to be patient and found a man who in his limited-emotional male vocabulary, and has been patient with me as well.  Better said, we have been patient with the life we've been handed and managed to breakthrough to all the little surprises that life shoots at the fan and that all the poo that will continually be flying down on us just to keep us on our game.  Disease, unemployment, cars breaking down, Verizon rape bills...... I gotta give a round of applause for a man who deserves more than a break; and I appreciate him not breaking down on me like that damn Ford Focus he spent six months to pimp out for my anniversary gift.

He has proven to be made of that good tough material.  He still hasn't learned to make me a gluten-free vegan meal to save his life, but he tucks me in when my body is swollen and takes out the cat poop for me. More so, he trusts that there's still a little firecracker in me, even when I'm stuck on the couch.  My hero!

For all the other new brides out there, and by new I mean at least up to two years (so says one of my favorite books listed below), the "struggle" is normal no matter what difficulties arise.  Men are a different species and us wifeys have a hard time not swatting our men over their heads when times get tough or when inappropriate fart jokes are made.  But we must be patient for them.  We're the ones who have to figure it out before they do because they're not designed to read up or ask their girl friends for relationship advice.  Weepy and naggy women, no matter what how much we deserve to whine, can distance a man or make him recoil into passive aggressiveness, closing the door to certain intimacies.  We have to put our big girl thongs on and learn how to control the situation while making them think they're the ones in control.  It takes developing a strong measure of common sense and sass, if we haven't learned it already by the time we're ball and chain'd.  We're more scientifically gifted and versed in communication, so it's our burden and privilege to set the tone, the mood, to let them feel relaxed enough to take the reins.

Men can reach their husband potential relatively quickly if we support their individual needs;  all throughout keeping ourselves together during our times of needs when they're too stressed to cater to us.  They were not created to wait on our hand and foot to our every want, and even need.  As a matter of fact, we are their complement.  Some men will be very helpful while learning to love after the lust period, but it will not always come natural to them and we have to buck up during this process.  I will admit that some husbands can just turn out a dud altogether sometimes, but that's a whole other story.  But personally, I think, the ones who are honestly committed,  deserve a wife who can make them feel just as safe and secure during rough times, as they can to us.

So, here's what has helped me through times when we're both stumped, tired, annoyed, stressed, you name it....

• Prayers. I mean, heartfelt, all out, near-accusation-kneeling-supplications, to the Big Guy upstairs.
• Good and Selective Advice.  Limited to family, and one or two blood-tight friends (don't want to air business out to everyone), and wise/older/successful couples.  To them, I am forever grateful for their honesty.
• It's a Guy Thing - It's next to my bed.  Looove this book.  A look into the feminine and masculine balance and why men have to scratch and burp while we wonder where our flowers are.
• What No One Tells the Bride - This book, with collective realizations from different types of new brides, allows women to ease into the violent shock of living in a committed relationship with a penis carrier, especially the independent women.  It takes two years for the average woman to feel like a settled wife.  And we all fear becoming our mothers.  This alone will settle a girl.
• Why Mars and Venus Collide - I read this one before getting married. The knowledge carried through to the big plummeting vows was priceless.  Out of all the Mars and Venus books, this one seemed most relevant in its insight into times of high stress.  An reasonable  look into why men and women can't help the way they are and communicate, why it clashes even though its biologically designed to complement each other, and why modern stresses affect the natural balance.
• Feeling Good - This book is not about marraige.  It's actually about depression.  I never wanted to read it because at the time I did, I was not depressed.  But for anyone who is highly emotional and reactive, (which marriage can highlight this part of our psyche) this doctor can lead you into enlightenment about why we have certain emotional thoughts and  behaviors and how to find the root of controlling ourselves.  Knowing thyself.  The downside is that you can catch when everyone else is behaving irrationally too and you have to resist the urge of calling them out.  If we can command ourselves, we can deal with others better.
• Holy Scriptures - Oh yes, I'm serious. And I don't mean the Ephesians where we're all told who we are to submit to and that's that.  Proverbs 31:10-31.  It talks about the capable wife.  Every time I feel lazy, whimpish, resentful, or needy...I read this over and over and imagine a Middle-Eastern prowess of ancient times, taking care of business, and being honored by her hard working husband.  This woman is energetic, spiritual, a real go-getter, a community socialite, runs her house like a tight ship, earns the trust and respect of her husband by being proactive, and earns the praise of her God.  Highly inspirational and more motivating than any of the other books I have in my library.

Have I got it all figured out? I don't think so.  There are many more obstacles and adventures to come before we croak and we're released from our sacred vows.  However, when you start with hardship, but constantly come out winning from each test, I swear it only gets better.

If children are involved, please disregard everything I've said and please find another source on advice.  I know nothing about dynamics with little ones and I'm no where near ready to know or comment on.  I would dare to say keep the scriptures attached to your foreheads like the Jews used to do.

Little Victories : Discovering Awesome Household products

Today I bought medical gloves to wear for house chores.  Specifically for any use of beach products or cat duties/doodies.  I slapped on the green nitrile gloves, got inside our bathtub and sprinkled Comet all over and started scrubbing away.  I got really into it.  Within about two minutes of finishing, the bottoms of my feet had slightly swelled, my legs had feathery currents running up and down up from toes to knees, I was sick to my stomach, nauseous, my head was pounding.  The chemicals had seeped up my bare feet, paying no mind to the hand protection I wore, and penetrated its way up.

Our bodies absorb everything and our feet are no exception.  To most people, these chemicals and toxins build up over time and your immune system will start figuring out what it is and find out by what process to get rid of them.  If too much builds up you will get sick, down the road.  With an autoimmune disease progressing in my body, it immediately acknowledged unlawful entry and planned an attack toward my own body.  I've known for a while I must go natural on home cleaning products, but I doubted they're effectiveness.

But it's a good day.  I really didn't have much faith that homemade cleaning products could be any good, but I figured it was still something I had to look into being at how transparent my pores could be to anything around me and honestly, the tub was in dire need of a serious scrubbin'.  Remembering back on my favorite book on domestication, No Hassle Housecleaning, I had learned about cleaning with tea tree oil, a natural powerful antiseptic big corporations are slapping the sticker their flammable liquids.   Additionally, I now have cat babies and they're the ones closer to the floors we clean with toxic materials; a reason many pets are also getting diseases in this modern world.  Oh yes, your dog may have lupus too. Inconceivable!

I bought a few ingredients for very low prices, some I already had, once my Target floor cleaner had been used up.  I looked up a recipe online and found this wonderful blog article and recipe:

BEST FLOOR CLEANER EVER

• white distilled vinegar
• distilled water
• tea tree essential oil
• baking soda
• spray bottle
• Optional - essential oil for fragrance - peppermint, grapefruit, eucalyptus, lavender, etc.

Obviously, sharing the recipe isn't my method of persuasion.  But I promise it was better than the expensive natural cleaners my mop was chugging through.  So, what are the hang-ups you might have?

EFFECTIVENESS
Amazing! Stains that had been on our apartment floor since before we moved in were cleared out.  A bit of baking soda smooths grit and leaves a polished gleam.  It takes some tweaking -more oils for me, waaay less baking soda -but it leaves the floor (and counters) sparkling!   I couldn't stop finding surfaces to clean.  I was so excited I almost sprayed Chev Chelios...the cat.

SCENT
Your house will not smell like salad dressing.  This was an important one to me because I DO NOT Like that acidic smell and am easily nauseous.  The good news is that the scent of vinegar fades and leaves behind the aromatic smells of the tea tree and/or the optional additional flavor you add on.  You must use the tea tree to clean and disinfect, the rest are just for additional aroma.  I had peppermint on the shelf so my house ended smelling fresh.  I did notice you have to shake up the bottle before each use or it'll smell of the smell of vinegar takes longer to fade.  I wanted it to smell stronger of peppermint, stored in my pantry for fresh breath, digestion, and muscle pain, so I added double the drops it called for.  An added plus is that peppermint repels bugs,roaches, and other creepers.  Even without an additional oil though, there will be a clean overall feel about the place.

PRICE
The above ingredients are all you need.  If you have a home water filtration system you're set in that department.  If not, buy...

• Distilled Water - Free or by the gallon. $0.65 cents. $0.25 for refills.
• Distilled White Vinegar, buy by the gallon about $2 or 3 dollars.  Will last a few months.
• Baking Soda - $0.78 per box.
• Spray Bottle - $0.98
• Tea tree oil - Starting from $8.99 and up at Vitamin Shoppe if you can't find a health food store. Will last forever.
• Optional essential oil - $4.89 for Peppermint (good for repelling bugs and creepers

CONVENIENCE

• You have a start-up fee of about $15 or less and don't have to replace the oils for a long time.
• The larger the sizes of vinegar and oils, the more you save.
• It serves wonderfully as a floor, stove, surface, multipurpose cleaner.
• It's safe enough to eat off the floor.
• The pets may feel free to lick the linoleum, if they're into that.
• Tie a red ribbon around it and it makes a cute homemade gift for all your "green" friends, ill family members, new moms, etc.
• The oils for other purposes as well, like ailments, aromatic burners, base massage oils, and bath and foot soaks.
• You can clean barefoot and not have to worry about dry yucky feet.

As you've read, I've been fighting my health issues since December, but it's taken me this long to pull a simple recipe together.  However slow at it may be, start allowing the idea to simmer that chemical free is better, and nature has always been superior, without the side effects (and the side effects do come to stake their claim one way or another).  Maybe in a few months or a year you'll be ready to try it too and love it as well.  I'm started to round up more ingredients already, like alcohol and borax, and see where that leads me.

Personally, I'm taking this experience as proof I can confidently venture into more homemade cleaning products, like bathtub, oven and glass cleaners that don't require a Hazmat suit to have a sparkly smell-good home.  I just had to share.

Additional Links:

• Best Floor Cleaner Recipe

• The Happy Slob Blog  - Author of No Hassle Housecleaning

• No Hassle Housecleaning Book - With recipes and quick home maintenance methods (Her cats follow her around while she cleans too!) 
• 

The Long Winded Ugly Truth

It's not that I forgot about my beloved blog, but I took a tiny hiatus to consolidate, arrange, and manage the numerous events I had going on.  Eat, Pray, Love would have us think that the best place to balance yourself is in Bali.  For the other 90% of us that can't afford a trip and stay to the other side of the world, we can definitely meditate and reinvent ourselves at home. Being unemployed gave me plenty of room to relearn and prepare for this lifestyle shift that I had no say in executing before the next working phase started.

For all those out there with autoimmune and chronic fatigue, I'm beginning to feel you a bit more.  Trying to enjoy all my free time with so many limitations has become a real challenge.  My body is still always tired, even though unstressed from the duress of a full time job.  So without a structured day, I was able to veg out for hours with the excuse that I didn't feel well.  Well, that doesn't lead to anything productive, or fun.  Sedentary reading and  Supernintendo Zelda never led to recuperation.  As a matter of fact, I learnt that my fingers stiffen up even faster, up to my forearms, and down to my toes, if I played for too long.  Reading in the same position too long made my back swell.

With more time and less bosses around, I was able to clean and organize my house to completion.  But the hurdles were the same.  The floor is still cleaned a portion at a time.  A bathroom scrub here, a vacuuming there.  Sitting sessions in between everything.  At the end of the day, it felt I had cleaned all day and barely rested.  Muscles still get sore swiftly and blood literally feels intoxicated.  However, I didn't have severe exhaustion as when I had the 9-5.  After about 3 weeks of being a full time housewife, I was able to think straight and started coming to terms with my limitations and new ways to handle things and healthy perspectives.

Some symptoms have worsened.  During this time I didn't write.  I wasn't avoiding the things I enjoy, but I was being forced to drastically give up a few more gifts we naturally have, into a Nazi type regimen. Rest and medicine, rinse, repeat.  That's what it felt like anyway.  I had heard that people with Lupus should not receive sunlight. As usual, I thought I was the exception.  Although the heat had already started giving me hives, the sunlight didn't seem to be the culprit.  However, the past few months had been spent indoors at work.  Now I was noticing that a short trip to the grocery store was inducing palpitations, a weird head stretchy feeling, mental fogginess, shallow breath, weakened and tingling muscles, and sobbing spells.  Basically, extreme fatigue.  So yes, I now cannot healthily tolerate the sun's rays, which instigate my immune system to attack itself.  Instead of getting sad about it, I resisted at first, as I do with anything you tell me I cannot do.  I told myself it's all in my head, I'm being dramatic, I'm being a wimp.  Then I found myself a blessing of a Colombian neighbor who also has Lupus and validated my new symptoms for me.  But all this free time, and I cannot sit at the pool, go to the beach, take a walk, or drive to the library in the day.  I'm still molding to this particular restriction but have worked out a more nocturnal lifestyle.  I still do plenty of these things and pay for them later, much like it happened with my diet.

On top of being laid off, I was so stressed about the toil and trouble of preparing gluten-free, vegan meals w/o nightshade vegetables, preservatives, additives, etc., that I would still "cheat" (what is otherwise healthy eating to others: a tomato, a lean steak, a whole wheat slice, oatmeal) about once a week.  I was hungry and too sore to make my scratch meals.  My habits didn't change much at first either because I was in a celebratory mood and didn't want to spend all my day cooking.  But after enough bladder spells from pizza sauce, inflamed colons from one cookie, and hair on the floor, I couldn't take it anymore.  I'm avoiding all detrimental foods like no tomorrow.  I spend all day now cooking, sitting, cleaning, sitting, folding clothes, stretching.  By sitting, I don't mean I sit and stare at the wall.  I pay bills, have friends visit, write letters, or just lightly walk around.  I actively rest, like hardcore strength trainers do.  I may not be able to work out, but I push myself like one would.

With a very unhealthy momma-in-law in the way, we both came to the epiphany that sometimes to be healthy, we need to focus on ourselves, and almost, but  selfishly tend to our needs.  Therein lies the reason I usually resist my next incremental phase in this disease, because I don't want to focus on just health all day (says the girl who was previous a health nut anyway).  But the truth is, just like I would rather my ma-in-law to be selfish than sick, I surrender in saying the same goes for me.  I know that it's better to fight for my health than try to keep living a life that wears down my body.  My husband would rather watching me suffer turning down stuffed waffles, than suffer washing my hair.  (Yes, it's starting to get difficult to even include showers.)

To me, and all who have been through a similar path, it's a victory.  I take pride it keeping my health and home.  I have not let my limited energies keep me from living a satisfactory lives, limit my amount to love others and do what I can for them.  I still continue on a path to health and in search of ways to halt this progression, because it can be controlled and maintained.  The proof is my neighbor who once tinted all her home windows, crawled to bathrooms, and her joints deformed.  Now she goes to the gym on a sunny day consecutively after cooking a meal from scratch.  I have high hopes, if not very ambitious goals.

In a few days, I begin bare minimum diet that helps heal the stomach through vegetables, grains, and juicing.  I added more natural things to control my pain and inflammation: Collagen, alpha lipoic acid, noni juice, aloe vera juice, liquid multivitamin, colon cleanse, chlorophyll...every day. Three times a day.  I will be adding flax oil as well.  These keep my body maintained and my skin almost looking like it did before I was ill.  I just received a juicer as a gift so that I'll be able to add more nutrients into my bloodstream without slowing down my digestion which doesn't work very well these days.  Oh yes, big plans in the works and I'll be sharing some of the things I've learned or will learn along the way.

And lastly, I got a job.  Unfortunately, full time, but it will not be exhaustive.  If for any reason it does, I will selfishly start looking elsewhere again.  I'm on a mission to take care of myself (and be humble enough to ask help when I can't do it myself); it might be expensive, tiring, frustrating, and outright stupid at times, but it ain't nothing I can't handle.

Anyway, that is the update.  The future still looks ultravioletly bright and I have a few things I can add to this here blog.  Thanks for reading!

Qwerty-itis

Being solely a housewife, housewifing around, is as bittersweet as I ever thought it would be.  It's okay, I like bittersweet.  It's the only chocolate consumption that I have control over.  But not having a mandatory, preset hour to rise, scheduled lunch hour, and clock-out time has me all over the map.  Now, I could definitely see myself enjoying this unemployment if our income remained the same:

• Coffee rendezvous
• Charity work
• Gourmet meals everyday
• Expensive hobbies
• "Lunching"
• Raising babies

Nope, I'm confined to a 5-mile radius to save on gas and eating more rice and beans than my country people back in El Salvador.  Being forced to take it easy is nice on my energy levels, but the bone-works still creak and spasm.  I still clean-up in the same manner I did during the good ol full-time days, in tiny spurts.  I've gotten more workouts in, more reading, more rest, and family time.  But I'm spending plenty of time plugging away at the keyboard as if I still had a job to get out of the house as soon as possible.

My one rule when I got canned was to wake up and get dressed, including makeup, even if I don't plan on going out or felt like poop.  Some days I dress casual, some I get in gym clothes, as if I could still make the treadmill cry.  It makes me move at a steady paced as opposed to PJ mode.  And sure enough, I've signed up at staffing agencies, scattered my resume across the Tampa-metro, and gave monster.com a good spike in web traffic.  In between brakes, I cleaned kitty litter.  They're so much happier now that I have time to refresh their potty box more often.

Progress update:

I'm still avidly searching with hints at a slightly better future.  Not too much.   Let's not get carried away here.  I'm looking for part-time so that my body may live 5 more years than if I had the full-time job, but those gems don't abound.  Administrative skills call for "9-5" days which are really8-5.  What a deceiving term.  Focusing on the Downtown Area so that I'll land in the heart of the city and feel more spunky than I did in an office with three guys burping and farting.  Making sure that this time there is a balanced gender environment, for sure.  I got a go-ahead from the county to take a Civil Service Exam and see if I can squeeze into a position for Library Assistant.  Dream. Job.

I immediately drove around my alloted perimeter and checked out books on the information I will be tested on and have been practicing my typing skills.  It is required to have 75 words per minute with 90% error rate allowed.  Haha, yeeaaaaa.

The next two days I will be practicing my little fingertips off and refreshing my multiplication skills (since I've had Excel do all my math work in the last 10 years).  I find the task challenging and exciting and it keeps my day mentally busier than killing the 30Rock Seasons on Netflix.  Even if I fail this time around, I love any reason to go to Downtown government buildings; and there is always next year.  I want that job.  I'm already practicing bossing people around, telling them to "Shhhhh!", and visualizing myself rolling around in a pile of books when the lights are out.

via blog.calgarypubliclibrary.com

So, what's your typing rate?
http://www.sucss.state.il.us/etest/itest.asp

Shotgun on All Natural vs Organic, for the curious on health

Let me learn you on something new.

For years, America has been adopting little lessons on health and slowly converting meat eaters into herbivorous creatures, as nature intended.  People have slowly started accepting that Coke cleans rust off car engines.  Wary citizens refrain from cocaine and stick to weed.  (Hey, it's better than the chemical alternative.) In my world, it seemed like I was on the vegetarian bandwagon alone, so much, that my insecure teenage paranoid personality wasn't ready to be that outcast.  I ate anything in my path.  Eventually, I said screw that and ventured on my own into veganism.  I got laughs, scoffs, and many reactions similar to the Big Greek Wedding movie...."Ok, I maek laam!"  During this time, people thought I only chewed on lettuce and grazed for berries.  In reality, I spent much toil and money to enjoy an interesting variety of yummy foods.  I raved about how healthy, alert, and energized I felt and people blankly nodded while munching on the BBQ ribs, not really caring to understand the concept of radically changing a dietetic lifestyle.  That's fine.  I wasn't trying to impose it on anyone.

Until recently, I only had one friend, who lives a few states away, understand healthy and natural eating.  The ins and outs of vegetables and grains, the (not-so-secret but certainly not published) nature of mainstream foods, bad habits, and tofu marvels.  In the last week I have learned that two+ friends are now vegan and one is going gluten free.  This makes me rejoice.  I....rabbit food eater....was able to eat a gluten-free chocolate cake among friends.  The scene of the world is changing.

Friends are discovering books like Alicia Silverstone's The Kind Diet, Suzanne Somers' Sexy Forever featured in Sex in the City and other books on hormones and health, that NY housewife Bethenny Frankel's Naturally Thin, and other diets that encourage healthy and plant based diets, ditching or at least moderating, foods that are not naturally beneficial to the human system.  No meats, no dairy, and if so, do it organic.  While not bragging about it since I certainly wasn't the first hippie to grace the planet and since I'm not even following a solely veggie and grain diet currently, I've been reading books like Skinny Bitch (about not eating crap food) and watching documentaries like the Future of Food (free on Hulu.con, and shocking) and changing the way I eat since I learned how to fight for my natural reaction to the movie Babe the Pig when I was eight. I just knew something lay deeper than meat is hard to digest.  The story of corporate food is what is harder to digest.  Please heat this if nothing else, a hard life lesson... HAD I STUCK TO MY HEALTHY DIET, I MAY NOT HAVE HAD A DISEASE TODAY.

I'm so proud of my friends trying to be healthier and closer to nature.  Not only discovering new lifestyles, but loving it.  I've been trying to share that for a very long time without isolating myself every time I wanted to tell you that your chicken had beak pieces in it or that your cheese is affecting your puffiness.  In relation to what I said in my last post about celebrities okaying certain topics of awareness, this is one that affects everyone, and can be enjoyed in so many personalized/customized ways.  So if it takes Olivia Wilde to inspire vegan eating, this is one time I'm willing to swallow my words about celebrity endorsing.  Go for it.

Here is one I'm beating you to the punch to though:

If you're trying to be healthy, unless you do your research, you're probably still being taken.  If you think that taco meat at Taco Bell is real meat, you'll wanna read this.  If you think eating an all natural carbonated beverage is any different than the average marketed death drink, peruse a little bit.

THERE IS A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN "NATURAL" AND "ORGANIC". Label reading has not been made any easier as they're trying to vaguely promote through a smoke screen of advertisement claims, with FDA and USDA stamps....read on.  And if this is the first you hear about it, I'm totally taking credit for it.  If you're trying to eliminate chemicals or unnatural ingredients in your food, please consider this:

http://www.live-the-organic-life.com/natural-vs-organic.html

IMPOSTORS!

Cause now I know in a few years, everyone will believe me and not just think I'm an overbearing stickler that now falls under the medical and psychiatrist diagnosis of having an eating disorder: Orthorexia (people who abstain from chemicals and pesticides who eat a raw diet).  Goes to show every one in the labeling business are idiots!

And for those who are not curious enough about changing such an embedded lifestyle in regards to food-for-fuel vs food-just-to-eat, that's understandable.  It usually takes an emotional push to get there.  But I do encourage you to toy with the idea.   Curiosity killed the cat, but that feline had a dang good recovery rate to come back 9 times.  Leaf through these books and watch these documentaries on what you are eating.  Imagine what foods you can eat and enjoy, rather than what would be taken away.  The best book for people who aren't ready for a full on commitment is the Kind Diet mentioned above, which teaches you how to flirt with food.

This is not fanaticism my friends, it's a way of life worth sharing for those who want to be vibrant and radiant after they eat a hearty and exciting plate of legumes, rice, and veggies; not take a half-day nap with nightmares after eating a Triple Appetizer from Chili's.  Click on stuff below.  Click it. 

More articles on Natural versus Organic:

http://www.dailyspark.com/blog.asp?post=natural_vs_organic_whats_truth_and_whats_hype


http://almostfit.com/2008/08/13/demystifying-chicken-labels-from-organic-to-all-natural/

http://www.organicfacts.net/organic-food/organic-food-basics/difference-between-organic-and-natural-food.html

Link that recently inspired a meat-lover friend to eat a plant based diet...The China Study, for you Dr. Oz fans.

For those with Autoimmune Diseases, pay attention about CRP (C-reactive protein or inflammation) levels. Please enjoy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTdVT9UFMFY

Back me up ya'll!

Relating to Reality TV

Catherine Zeta Jones admits to the public she's battling bipolar disorder, so it's okay for the public to be a little more honest about their own mental health issues.  Now Toni Braxton is coming out with a reality TV show (because who isn't coming out with a reality TV show?) on the WE channel to display to the world "THIS IS WHAT LUPUS LOOKS LIKE".  Maybe now people will understand what it's like? Whatever!

As if being a D-list celebrity with no worries about having a real job or wracking your head over where to afford the tests you need to understand health, rights, and benefits, is a realistic portrayal of what having lupus is all about?  I'm already fed-up, and hope the rest of you are, with Reality TV, but exploiting whatever minimal survival stories paired along side with dying fame is shameful.  Having a TV crew, makeup artist, and whatever else entourage may follow you and your ridiculous fame-seeking leaching family members and telling people it's hard to be you because you're tired doesn't extract empathy from people in the real world.  Should it really take the voice of a celebrity to raise Lupus Awareness?  Not everyone with the Wolf Disease jumps on the diseased marathon band wagon or cares to attend conferences about "hope" and "butterfly survivors" and "spoonies."  Certainly not me.  Some glamorize the disease as if it's a culture in the making.  Same with the Breast Cancer Awareness, which has become more of a marketing opportunity, than actual knowledge and understanding of cancer.  Seriously, what truths have you learned about Pink Ribbons other than "it happens a lot" and "it's a real problem"?

Although my feathers were ruffled upon hearing of this show, this scolding one is not truly toward the Braxton family.  My own frustration with my health is the reason over the upset of this edited view of chronic illness.  It's a whole lot more than being exhausted.  It's so difficult to try to be understood when you barely understand yourself.  It's a lot uglier than what the public will perceive while these ladies parade their drama in couture apparel.  Many will think they relate to it, but they won't.    Misinformation about any illness shouldn't be a surprise to anyone who isn't directly experiencing yourself of someone you love.  Exploiting one case to the public will not accomplish much except limited awareness of the existence of this growing epidemic.

I don't want to be a hater.  If people want to expose their life on day time TV, they have the right to do it, but please don't bother with the catch phrase: "This is what lupus looks like." Reality TV...is not real.

http://www.wetv.com/shows/braxton-family-values

Maybe I should just keep my opinions to myself and be grateful that someone is willing to talk about it, even if in a comedic warped Hollywood script? Life should still be fabulous even if you feel like poop all the time, right? Right? (I ask, cause I honestly don't know.)

Luckily, I don't have the WE channel and I don't have to bother with it.  I'm learning to deal with my health nearly on my own.  As you see, it causes a lot of emotional upset.  It requires a lot of humbling toward myself, toward our finicky nature and it's complexities, toward the unsuspecting.  It feels more like a magical illusion than a balancing act, but it'll be a wonderful success when I finally accept this new evolving lifestyle without getting so pissed about how other people deal with it.

Hearing about this new show amidst a barrage of addiction to celebrity lives caught me on a bad day and incited a rant.  I hope the next time I come to this blog is on a good day, one where I'm at a point of acceptance.  For now, I'm glad I had a reason to bitch about something else rather than my own problem. Ha.

Here's a handful of positives vibe to make up for the venting comin at ya:  Relax, relate, release!

For anyone else suffering a chronic "something", how do you find your balance? Or how are you finding it? Do you ever figure it out? Would love to hear someone else's take on this.

Unemployment: Just What the Doctor Ordered

New posts have been scant, I know.  Stress levels had spilled over the brim and inflammation levels had reached my brain.  Until yesterday.

I said I wouldn't write about work on this blog... but I've been canned, so that dark little hole is unplugged and I can tell you all the horror stories and gripe until my face turns blue and my fingertips bleed.  But I won't.

Bosslady came down from New Orleans to let me go.  I did not see this coming.  Budget cuts, not enough work, blah, blah, blah.  Until I have evidence to the contrary, I will assume they were implying, "bye bye sick lady" (that's my cynical side talking).  However, for a change, Bosslady seemed genuinely distraught about having to let me, and a few others go.  She rolled in without barely looking at my face until the moment she called me in to "talk" to me.  Even then I didn't see it coming, but I sent a quick prayer for peace to control myself from spewing out obscenities about the hell I'm in.  I walked in in peace, and came out of there with even more peace.

I have bitched and moaned enough about that place.  At this point, venting about it is just piss in the wind.  Enough emotional energy has been wasted there.  Enough neck veins have gorged themselves stiff.  More than all the collective sighs and under-breath mutterings have been emitted.  Now, I'm free and absolved of being a quitter.  Because I'm not a quitter.   I should have been, the moment I realized that place started to take an emotional, therefore, a physical toll on my displaced chi.  But I waited it out like the good girl I've forced myself to become.

I drove home, Husband waiting for me with a shot of tequila, he with a Damiana drink *(that we still have leftover from out honeymoon. Yes, we went through customs with about eight bottles from Cabo with us).  I tell you... it was like I took a bottle of Xanax.  I was laughing, cracking jokes, and carelessly having a conversation, at our living room, with my favorite person.  Something that hasn't happened as much as it should in the last few weeks.

You know how when you go to the doctor with a million complaints and they just tell you you need to reduce your stress, right before your adrenalines spikes from resisting the urge to punch him in the nads for such a daft answer?  Well, he was right.  Let go of that frickin job that makes you miserable.  Obviously, we're not all in the position to lose our salary and benefits.  Hell, I wasn't.  But isn't like Americans to wait until you have a heart attack to stop eating hamburgers?  How long would I have stayed in that personal Hades until I spontaneously burst into flames?

What happens now? I'm not sure.  All I know is that this morning I actually got to partake in faith-based works on a Tuesday morning and I'm more a human than I've been in a while.  I just finished filing for unemployment.  My house will be spotless now that I have time to tend to it.  By the end of the week, a job hunt will ensue, after vegetating for a few days. That in itself is reason for another aphrodisiac drink (see Damiana link above).  Being without health insurance, as near-futile as it is, is essential for Husband and I.  But this is a brand new slate, and now I might have the ability to be more picky about where my next job will be.  Maybe not.  Maybe I'll just fall into another slaving demise in order to survive our increasingly stupider economy.  I'm not sure how we'll afford my elaborate holistic health treatment and the thousand of supplements I need just to function, but strangely, I'm not worried about it. These things always work themselves out if you don't get lazy about it.

Meanwhile, I'm so grateful that I was kicked out.  I'm looking forward to the upside of not being in the negative and drowning environment that killed my spirits everyday.  I finally have the opportunity to think, I mean, really think, about my next move in regards to a job that doesn't dual with my physical and mental health.

My only regret is turning in the office key so quickly.  I would've come in the dark, before business hours the next day, and peed on the Swede's fabric chair as my final building exeunt, with a note behind that read: "We can hear everything you do the bathroom."

Enough about personal problems!  If your stress levels are coming out of your ears, here is what was helping me decompress before the big news: Ginseng Complex! and Super Energy Up! from The Vitamin Shoppe.

If you have Lupus, or any of the inflammation based diseases,  stress is an enemy of extreme.  The amount of backlash from tension and tiredness will start to decompose you before you expire.  Two weeks ago I started taking this and I was suddenly able to think without short-circuiting, crying, taking nap after nap, other bodily functions if you know what I'm saying, relax, etc.  Hair loss that comes with many autoimmune diseases is at a halt, which is more important than walking to me, but I'm even able to walk longer periods of time right now.  I recommend it to anyone who feels they're about to go postal.

So, if you can't bring yourself to tell your boss what you really think about him and get yourself fired, read up on B-12 and chinese herbs.  Little tid-bit: Americans market Ginseng as an energy booster.  Chinese apply Ginseng to achieve calmness.  Center your chi people!

Britney Spears Prophesizes the End of the Times

Housewives, either with lucrative careers or unsatisfying desk jobs, still, at the end of the day, have the inherent need to socialize, be involved, and do their part in the world.

*Like I mention in my Tid-Bits,  I won't be involving the spiritual aspects that fulfill women, or any person; although it does largely pertain to some of the following.  Fill in your own blanks there.

Aside from yapping with girlfriends and contemporary mommies, secular interests and exchangin ideology plays a part in women's connectedness. News, politics, trends, and world events are a part of that background life, even if it's not personally high in our esteem.

In the case of politics, personally, I don't carry these things in the forefront or feel too strongly about them.  I'm neutral about politics, and try not to opine on something that is only a smoke-screen, while the top-dawgs play chess with us pawns.  I only try not to watch in horror.

My attention attempts to focus on my home, my family, faith, friends and some R&R.  But when I am housewifing away and needing to distract myself from tedious laundry folding or that husband is still two days from returning home, I turn on that frickin TV; like a robot.  And since I only have a meager nano iPod -because I lovingly surrendered my 120GB treasure with a 300,000 song capacity to Husband for his job- the residual comparison that of 8 gb's is not enough to bother changing out the same old albums.  And, I'm easily bored by not-new music.

Slightly digressing, I did get the new Britney Spears CD, Femme Fatale, but it's only okay, and the auto-tune isn't going to carry my interest through for more than a week.   So, again, the TV.  And since basic television (no cable or satellite by our mutual choice, or we'd never get anything done) is so bad it makes you want to cut yourself in inconspicuous body parts, you're left with the painstaking George Lopez or the predictable 10:00 o'clock news.  There is only occasional relief from the show Fringe, which is bad a$$.

So the options:

---boredom by radio music without real instruments

---death by un-funny, mediocre, or overly scripted news and television, out-shined by a bombardment of commercials of the plastic surgery you need and getting your Feast On at Checkers

-- or silence.  And teaching the cats to say dirty words in Spanish.

And I shamefully admit to having a slightly unbalanced rotation of these.  Except for the cat thing.  You know I don't speak Spanish, Baxter!  I usually pick silence, and then my housework has no rhythm and preparing a simple meal takes  lifetime to complete.

Until I can figure out how to hook up www.slacker.com radio to my stereo or afford another mega-iPod, my goal is to keep that TV off, even if I need a lending hand in the background while I wash the dishes (my dishwasher sucks).  I will not allow Inside Edition to create ambiance in my house.  I won't have it anymore.  I will succumb to going back and forth, with soapy hands, between my sucky iPod and moving the shuffle button along through the albums I'm sick of.  I will look into audiobooks, since I don't have time to read anymore anyway.

But the point to all this is mostly that:  I will no longer bother watching the crap on television unless I'm purposely going to watch a specific show or carefully selected movie (one with actual dialogue) that I like.  No. More. Mainstream. Media.  No more re-runs of that dysfunctional-hailed lunatic Charlie Sheen's Two Men and a Baby or whatever.  Not funny.  Not charming.  Downright degrading and misogynistic.  A quick mourn for all the brain cells that I've neglectfully exposed to the tube and moving on.

However, I don't think its wise to be completely disconnected from world events either.   Especially the way things are going now.  But ABC and Faux (Fox) News is definitely not the place to know what's going on.  If I hear about one more dog who adopted a litter of pigs or find out what a Snookie is despite all my efforts to be dis-informed about it/her/him, I swear I will go Postal on the Good Morning America team.  (I have a dream of punching them in the face, all in a row).  The mainstream agenda pushes mental illness on kids. Hell, they push ADHD on any person with a hint of stress.  They're feeding us bull about wars and wasting air time with highly scrutinized rehearsed, cut, rolled, and smoked presidential press speeches, which only inform of us our impending doom.  And they show emotionally unnecessary playbacks of the most painful scenes in Japan.  And we watch, because what other news do we know?  And because our brains are genetically (more recently technically and addictively) wired to watch train wrecks.  And so our stress levels follow suit.

Now, I don't know if there is an elephant in the country about who owns the news stations and the way they choose, chop and screw the information they'll force-feed us, or whether people genuinely know that there is so much more going on then a soldier saying hi to his family on webcam.   A buttload of is not being said about what truly affects our day-to-day and though in the end, we cannot do much about it, if I am to be informed, I'd rather hear some unfiltered and propaganda-exempt free-press.  Or read somethings else with IQ (or EQ) value.

In case you're curious, here are some links of the more informed, publicly censored , journalists who don't require an excessively staffed entourage and botox to be on a screen, without the mind-numbing, intelligence-mocking, drug-pushing mumbo-jumbo on TV:

http://www.projectcensored.org/

http://inteldaily.com/

It's also free from other alternative, schizophrenic, fear-mongering news you can get from Alex Jones or Infowars.  These guys scream 'conspiracy' and although it is mostly likely true, if you holler like banshee, people will automatically question your veracity. Thank you for that, Reptilian George Bush believers.

I like the more fact based, neutrally dispensed, honed key points, and occasionally healthy whistle-blowers,  that actually tell us where the real problems are coming from and leave it up to us how we will protect ourselves and our families.  Issues like:

The pentagon spending more money on war that the government spends on the Citizens of America.:

http://inteldaily.com/news/173/ARTICLE/13219/2009-12-25.html

Or how Monsanto (the boss of mostly everything you buy on the shelves and produce section) is still secretly circumventing ways around the FDA and USDA to genetically modify our foods, unnaturally altered foods that are getting people sick.  *ferociously points at self!!!*

http://inteldaily.com/2011/04/lawsuit-seeks-to-invalidate-monsanto%E2%80%99s-gmo-patents/

And while on the topic of unproven conspiracies, Brit-Brit's hit song is the same exact song as Enrique Iglesias, "Tonight I'm Loving you." Yes, it is.  If you're keen on picking up on pattern recognition, you already suspected this.

http://www.aolnews.com/2011/03/04/britney-spears-til-the-world-ends-a-whole-lot-like-enrique-ig/

I know, I know...from the outside in, it seems I have a cynical way to view the music and tv that comes into our homes. But yes,  there is so much garbage out there eager to reach our eyes and ears and I'm not letting it come into my home to leave me wondering why I feel so off, disconnected, conflicted, and misinformed.  Even unmotivated at times.  The numbers of issues and our general ignorance has played a huge part in why I'm not healthy and must spend my free time catching up on chores.  So yes,  I'm a little more careful of what buzzing media influences my view of life.  And yes,  I'm also just insatiably curious of why the Department of Defense is mysteriously, unquestionably, not required to list their books when they suck up all our monies.

As fun as it is to sing and "keep on dancing til the world ends", all that party vibe, live for the weekend, or reality TV has a small, monitored, place in my little world.  With all I got going on, with all that the universe has going on, I had momentarily slipped into the hypnotic bad habits of the American mass, but occasionally I take note of where I'd like to be at and whether I'm there.  The more important things have my attention now.

I will stick to reading, maintain a relatively awareness to the world around me, keeping up with the times but away from the hype, more in-tuned with building relationships, individual growth, and keeping my house a peaceful, cozy place.

Thanks for reading and hope you get your tax refunds back before the universes' consciousness shifts.

P.S. My husband thinks I'm a dork.  Haha.

Disclaimer: I understand this is probably not the most popular standpoint when it comes to media, entertainment, and leisure, but it's taken about 28 years to embrace the gritty feeling of going against the grain.  That being said, I relate to all and respect everyone's stance on how they choose to work, play, and their individual viewpoints, whether strong and laid-back.  Variety is the spice of life and it helps raise the important questions.

Bonus:

Look at that! In español.  What?  You thought Telemundo wouldn't stoop to corporate buy-outs?

Pa tu mama!

http://www.proyectocensurado.org/

Second Edition: But You Don't Look Sick.

I watched Love and Other Drugs before yesterday, which had more flesh than necessary to tell any story... ever.  I had wanted a comedy about pharmaceuticals nonetheless, but about mid-way I stopped laughing so much.  I did not know it was a chick flick.  One close to home.  The following contains spoilers (not in detail), but if you still plan to see it be careful.


So, the main character had Parkinson's.  A degenerative disease the progresses with time.  I had paused the movie at this point where I realized I was in for some head work and went downstairs to the garage, carefully because my ankles were weak and crackly, legs were tight, knees stiff,  back had strange swelling, other organs flared, and decided to see what's up with Husband. And hug him.  I told him how hilarious the movie was.  It was awesome, blah blah blah.  Looking straight at me, he immediately asked, "She's sick, isn't she?"  Boy can read me like a book. (p.s. Props to him for being there for me, doing laundry, and making sure I don't feel sorry for myself.)


And, so I've never connected so much with the character a movie star portrays (Except Amelie, story for another day).  The fears, the annoyances, the inconvenience, the insecurities, and the walls of conscious denial someone with limitations has to live with.  People that are sick are usually misunderstood or treated different by many, if only slightly enough to make you feel unsure.  It's usually the ones who have struggled with some temporary illness, an sick family member,  or some kind of infirmity that sympathize and/or empathize with you.  You either end up with the ones who view you with indifference and expect you to carry on as if your life wasn't severely affected, or the extreme opposite who ask you how you are doing like you are made of porcelain mentally and physically.  Sometimes it could just be a personal perception, an isolation that occurs from being set apart from the healthy, where you imagine people are viewing you a particular way when really their heads are not thinking about it at all.  (At this point, it's become a question of living with it without using the 'sick' undertone, and more like :lifestyle 'overtone'. )

I've gotten the  "How are you doing today?" with the severe head tilt that's about to fall off as if I were incapable of handling being out in public.  Of course, the worst one, "If I had to live on your diet, or if I couldn't eat gluten, I would shoot myself!".  However, the reactions that make me most aware of my situation are the ones with non-reactive behavior.  The blank stares.  The ones who will search the floor and ceiling tiles searching desperately for something inspirational, as if we need it every time we see them.  The ones who skip over what you just said, indifferently, because you're officially boring.  The friends that stop calling because you can't hang out much anymore.  During the day, I get all too many reminders of what I can't do.  Apparently,  I can't even rent  feel-good movie without the risk of having to re-live the emotional torture of how illness in young people affect work, love, play, and peace.


However bleak the reaction or non-reactions received,  it's the raw truth, not bitter deprecation. Some people honestly have the right intentions and are more aware of their reactions and some just have to say something, anything, to stop talking about illness because it's so depressing to them. But every once in a while, somebody gets it.  Some are even interested to know what it might be like.  Some even offer to help.

So for those who care to know, below is an very concise illustrative story that -although I find it very cheesy and verbose- one Lupus patient used to describe to her friend, who had asked to know what it's really like.  I couldn't help but choke up a bit.  This story grew to a theory and a band of Lupus followers who call themselves Spoonies.  I won't join that wagon.  I love to make spoons, but prefer to fork.

I've always been fascinated with disease and pathology, even before I had any inclination that I might ever get struck with one of these hip, trendy  epidemics.  I would read books about it for fun (NOT WebMD).  However, I still didn't let myself relate to a person in pain, with trauma history, or mental illness, too much that it would inconvenience me unless they were already in my life.  One good thing I've gained from being in an unfortunate position  is that I now empathize with almost anyone, especially the ones becoming ill or that just need someone to listen.  And if my health allows, I prefer to do more than just care and be there for them in whatever method it be. If.

I'm just as cheesy as the spoon story below, but experience will take the poop jokes out of your stories.  Sometimes. If the occasion really calls for it.

Read below if you are interested what one day with Lupus is.  Skip through the wordy parts. I've read this before, but one of my blog subscribers sent it to me.  It made my day, that day. See the link if you're tired of being on the same website (like I get bored of being on one page too long.  The fast track, people!)

http://www.butyoudontlooksick.com/articles/written-by-christine/the-spoon-theory-written-by-christine-miserandino/

Thanks, Tiffany and Christine

The Spoon Theory

by Christine Miserandino www.butyoudontlooksick.com

My best friend and I were in the diner, talking. As usual, it was very late and we were eating French fries with gravy. Like normal girls our age, we spent a lot of time in the diner while in college, and most of the time we spent talking about boys, music or trivial things, that seemed very important at the time. We never got serious about anything in particular and spent most of our time laughing.

As I went to take some of my medicine with a snack as I usually did, she watched me with an awkward kind of stare, instead of continuing the conversation. She then asked me out of the blue what it felt like to have Lupus and be sick. I was shocked not only because she asked the random question, but also because I assumed she knew all there was to know about Lupus. She came to doctors with me, she saw me walk with a cane, and throw up in the bathroom. She had seen me cry in pain, what else was there to know?

I started to ramble on about pills, and aches and pains, but she kept pursuing, and didn’t seem satisfied with my answers. I was a little surprised as being my roommate in college and friend for years; I thought she already knew the medical definition of Lupus. Then she looked at me with a face every sick person knows well, the face of pure curiosity about something no one healthy can truly understand. She asked what it felt like, not physically, but what it felt like to be me, to be sick.

As I tried to gain my composure, I glanced around the table for help or guidance, or at least stall for time to think. I was trying to find the right words. How do I answer a question I never was able to answer for myself? How do I explain every detail of every day being effected, and give the emotions a sick person goes through with clarity. I could have given up, cracked a joke like I usually do, and changed the subject, but I remember thinking if I don’t try to explain this, how could I ever expect her to understand. If I can’t explain this to my best friend, how could I explain my world to anyone else? I had to at least try.

At that moment, the spoon theory was born. I quickly grabbed every spoon on the table; hell I grabbed spoons off of the other tables. I looked at her in the eyes and said “Here you go, you have Lupus”. She looked at me slightly confused, as anyone would when they are being handed a bouquet of spoons. The cold metal spoons clanked in my hands, as I grouped them together and shoved them into her hands.

I explained that the difference in being sick and being healthy is having to make choices or to consciously think about things when the rest of the world doesn’t have to. The healthy have the luxury of a life without choices, a gift most people take for granted.

Most people start the day with unlimited amount of possibilities, and energy to do whatever they desire, especially young people. For the most part, they do not need to worry about the effects of their actions. So for my explanation, I used spoons to convey this point. I wanted something for her to actually hold, for me to then take away, since most people who get sick feel a “loss” of a life they once knew. If I was in control of taking away the spoons, then she would know what it feels like to have someone or something else, in this case Lupus, being in control.

She grabbed the spoons with excitement. She didn’t understand what I was doing, but she is always up for a good time, so I guess she thought I was cracking a joke of some kind like I usually do when talking about touchy topics. Little did she know how serious I would become?

I asked her to count her spoons. She asked why, and I explained that when you are healthy you expect to have a never-ending supply of “spoons”. But when you have to now plan your day, you need to know exactly how many “spoons” you are starting with. It doesn’t guarantee that you might not lose some along the way, but at least it helps to know where you are starting. She counted out 12 spoons. She laughed and said she wanted more. I said no, and I knew right away that this little game would work, when she looked disappointed, and we hadn’t even started yet. I’ve wanted more “spoons” for years and haven’t found a way yet to get more, why should she? I also told her to always be conscious of how many she had, and not to drop them because she can never forget she has Lupus.

I asked her to list off the tasks of her day, including the most simple. As, she rattled off daily chores, or just fun things to do; I explained how each one would cost her a spoon. When she jumped right into getting ready for work as her first task of the morning, I cut her off and took away a spoon. I practically jumped down her throat. I said ” No! You don’t just get up. You have to crack open your eyes, and then realize you are late. You didn’t sleep well the night before. You have to crawl out of bed, and then you have to make your self something to eat before you can do anything else, because if you don’t, you can’t take your medicine, and if you don’t take your medicine you might as well give up all your spoons for today and tomorrow too.” I quickly took away a spoon and she realized she hasn’t even gotten dressed yet. Showering cost her spoon, just for washing her hair and shaving her legs. Reaching high and low that early in the morning could actually cost more than one spoon, but I figured I would give her a break; I didn’t want to scare her right away. Getting dressed was worth another spoon. I stopped her and broke down every task to show her how every little detail needs to be thought about. You cannot simply just throw clothes on when you are sick. I explained that I have to see what clothes I can physically put on, if my hands hurt that day buttons are out of the question. If I have bruises that day, I need to wear long sleeves, and if I have a fever I need a sweater to stay warm and so on. If my hair is falling out I need to spend more time to look presentable, and then you need to factor in another 5 minutes for feeling badly that it took you 2 hours to do all this.

I think she was starting to understand when she theoretically didn’t even get to work, and she was left with 6 spoons. I then explained to her that she needed to choose the rest of her day wisely, since when your “spoons” are gone, they are gone. Sometimes you can borrow against tomorrow’s “spoons”, but just think how hard tomorrow will be with less “spoons”. I also needed to explain that a person who is sick always lives with the looming thought that tomorrow may be the day that a cold comes, or an infection, or any number of things that could be very dangerous. So you do not want to run low on “spoons”, because you never know when you truly will need them. I didn’t want to depress her, but I needed to be realistic, and unfortunately being prepared for the worst is part of a real day for me.

We went through the rest of the day, and she slowly learned that skipping lunch would cost her a spoon, as well as standing on a train, or even typing at her computer too long. She was forced to make choices and think about things differently. Hypothetically, she had to choose not to run errands, so that she could eat dinner that night.

When we got to the end of her pretend day, she said she was hungry. I summarized that she had to eat dinner but she only had one spoon left. If she cooked, she wouldn’t have enough energy to clean the pots. If she went out for dinner, she might be too tired to drive home safely. Then I also explained, that I didn’t even bother to add into this game, that she was so nauseous, that cooking was probably out of the question anyway. So she decided to make soup, it was easy. I then said it is only 7pm, you have the rest of the night but maybe end up with one spoon, so you can do something fun, or clean your apartment, or do chores, but you can’t do it all.

I rarely see her emotional, so when I saw her upset I knew maybe I was getting through to her. I didn’t want my friend to be upset, but at the same time I was happy to think finally maybe someone understood me a little bit. She had tears in her eyes and asked quietly “Christine, How do you do it? Do you really do this everyday?” I explained that some days were worse then others; some days I have more spoons then most. But I can never make it go away and I can’t forget about it, I always have to think about it. I handed her a spoon I had been holding in reserve. I said simply, “I have learned to live life with an extra spoon in my pocket, in reserve. You need to always be prepared.”

Its hard, the hardest thing I ever had to learn is to slow down, and not do everything. I fight this to this day. I hate feeling left out, having to choose to stay home, or to not get things done that I want to. I wanted her to feel that frustration. I wanted her to understand, that everything everyone else does comes so easy, but for me it is one hundred little jobs in one. I need to think about the weather, my temperature that day, and the whole day’s plans before I can attack any one given thing. When other people can simply do things, I have to attack it and make a plan like I am strategizing a war. It is in that lifestyle, the difference between being sick and healthy. It is the beautiful ability to not think and just do. I miss that freedom. I miss never having to count “spoons”.

After we were emotional and talked about this for a little while longer, I sensed she was sad. Maybe she finally understood. Maybe she realized that she never could truly and honestly say she understands. But at least now she might not complain so much when I can’t go out for dinner some nights, or when I never seem to make it to her house and she always has to drive to mine. I gave her a hug when we walked out of the diner. I had the one spoon in my hand and I said “Don’t worry. I see this as a blessing. I have been forced to think about everything I do. Do you know how many spoons people waste everyday? I don’t have room for wasted time, or wasted “spoons” and I chose to spend this time with you.”

Ever since this night, I have used the spoon theory to explain my life to many people. In fact, my family and friends refer to spoons all the time. It has been a code word for what I can and cannot do. Once people understand the spoon theory they seem to understand me better, but I also think they live their life a little differently too. I think it isn’t just good for understanding Lupus, but anyone dealing with any disability or illness. Hopefully, they don’t take so much for granted or their life in general. I give a piece of myself, in every sense of the word when I do anything. It has become an inside joke. I have become famous for saying to people jokingly that they should feel special when I spend time with them, because they have one of my “spoons”.

Never Crave French Fries Again

(EDIT: fixed the link below)

White potatoes are part of the nightshade vegetable family.  I still can't tell if they personally affect my inflammation levels.  I hear its different for everyone.  I don't crave crave homemade potatoes ever, but when I smell regular McD type fries, the scratchin and twinchin starts.  They don't even taste that awesome to me, so I reckon it's the heroin they add into their frying lard bins that tells my brain I must have them.  Either way, I still stay away from french fries or anything fried.  But I do crave starches, as we should, and it's tiring eating brown rice all the time.  Hellooooo Sweet Potatoes! this tater is in the clear for dangerous toxin avoidance.

So I tried this lil easy and quick recipe.  This is an addiction that doesn't terrorize the body and mind.  Like the recently added word from the Oxford dictionary implies: OMG!

When I saw the recipe and imagined the flavors together, I couldn't have imagined how awesome it would turn out. So, click below and check it out.  Filling, satisfying and it feels like indulgence. And its so pretty.  However, even the oils are good for you (if the rest of your diet during the day/week is balanced).  Yes, this meal was nice to me.  No pain, no inflammation, no weirdness.  The trick now is seeing if Husband will like it when he gets back to town.



[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="Roasted Sweet Potato Salad w/ Cranberries & Roasted Pumpkin Seeds"][/caption]

http://vegvacious.blogspot.com/2011/02/roasted-sweet-potato-salad.html

Note:

I didn't have Dijon mustard so I improvised and probably will keep doing it my way. My dressing involved two parts.  Since I didn't know if the tastes would blend well, I made them separately and mixed them on the plate instead:

• 1/3 olive oil
• 1/2 cup white vinegar
• white onion (small half, sliced thin into slivers)

(the extra can be used as an everyday healthy salad dressing.  But I don't like yer typical greens salad. Yeck.)

Separately, I just mixed honey mustard:

• 2 tbsps Organic mustard (or any yellow mustard)
• 3 drops of Pure honey

Kay, that's it. Buh Bye.

Top Ten Lists

The dog days are here (for Florida). It's March Madness. I turned 28 this. I hesitantly signed up for the gym (since you know I have wonderful health). I returned a Blockbuster to movie Redbox. Husband has been out of town way too much. Oxford put LOL and OMG in the dictionary. This week skipped a day. Well, it didn't really but I took work off Wednesday, convinced it was Thursday, missed my meeting, and now have an extra day of work, or so it feels like it.

Mercury must be in retrograde or the vernal moon threw everything off.  There's a poor sense of flowing continuity. More like random scattered events and chores are taken care of during pocketed moments of lucidity and then I'm sucked back into a timespace jumble box where the days and minutes jump around. Also, I may be reading too much on parallel world physics.

Not feeling so hot lately, except for the literal heat beating down from the sun onto my sensitive skin or immune system. In the last few years, when I would spend a day at the beach, the rest of the week I would have some kind of feverish symptoms and be depleted. I always thought it was the beer/hydration but oh, how I'm learning new things. Now I'm getting the full blown detriment of what the sun does to people with lupus (which is still very confusing to me). There is something about heat, that to some, releases histamine wildly into the body. I either break down in hives or 'exercise' hives (urticaria), shut down completely, feel flushed, or swell up all over.  This is just another explanation for the abovementioned hesitance for signing up to a gym.  I overheat and then got little red bumps everywhere, thankfully its usually beneath the clothes, nothing obvious; but when I take a hot shower I look like a sci-fi creature.

Anyway, things should get better when I get my car back since I'm driving a car with no AC right now; or, when winter comes around again.  I'm not sure how the sensitivity to the sun works since everyone with Lupus reacts differently.  But for now my health, therefore sanity, is on a crazier roller coaster than Lindsey Lohan's sobriety.

So that little intro segues to the following comedic relief that I found floating around the net.  The absurdity of life.

Here's to hoping I get better soon so I can blog about something coherent, useful, and worthwhile without having to drop celebrity names to get more hits on the web:

10. Life is sexually transmitted.

9. Good health is merely the slowest rate at which one can die.

8. Men have two emotions: Hungry and Horny. If you see him without an erection, make him a sandwich.

7. Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day; teach a person to use the Internet and they won't bother you for weeks.

6. Some people are like a slinky... not really good for anything, but you still can't help but smile when you shove them down the stairs.

5. Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in the hospital dying of nothing. 

4. All of us could take a lesson from the weather. It pays no attention to criticism.

3. Why does a slight tax increase cost you two hundred dollars, and a substantial tax cut saves you thirty cents?

2. In the 60's, people took LSD to make the world weird. Now the world is weird and people take Prozac to make it normal.

1. We know exactly where one cow with mad-cow-disease is located among the millions and millions of cows in America, but we haven't a clue as to where thousands of Illegal immigrants and Terrorists are located. Maybe we should put the Department of Agriculture in charge of immigration.