Well don’t fall off your rockers folks here I am
blogging again for the first time in 2 months. Life has been indeed busy and I
have had a lot of sickness to contend with hence my absence from my blog.
Now I don’t promise this is going to be any great
read, but I do promise it will be a bit of a catch up on the last 2 months.
Sickness and Battles…
After the great start to my elimination diet it all
had to go by the wayside due to having to have tests that required me to go
back on a “regular” diet. Not long after that I ended up in surgery so I have
spent a while recovering from that and trying to find out the cause of certain
illness.
No great shock it is age related (pooh) and I have
to investigate a path of treatment that suits me, I would much rather that then
just blindly follow what the GP says is OK…says HE a male Doctor who does not
have to suffer what we women must go through at a certain time of life.
We had a new fence erected and the gardens were "simplified" here are some before and after shots of the work...can you see a difference?
Our Yard was tidied up and a new fence erected.
Happier Times…
Well after not doing much sewing at all this year I
finally got my house blocks done for the house block swap I have been doing
with our online CRAFT group.
I thought I was going to die before I could get them
done, but Praise God they are done and handed in. now just waiting on the
others to come back to me and then onwards with putting it all together.
I tidied my sewing room and actually got a top
finished for my DD who has been waiting for 7 months for me to put together
something with the fabrics I bought for her at the craft fair in October last
year.I bought the Ghastlies
fabric and managed to get some yardage for the backing from the States. I just
have to sandwich it together quilt it and bind it and she will be happier.
I seem to have lost my Mojo again, I am just tired
all the time and not really motivated to get into the sewing room. That will
change I have no doubt….
I Recently found an old Genoa Lounge in an op shop
and was so happy when I got to bring it home and call it mine. Hubby and I have
longed for one of these little beauties most of our married life and yippee we
got one…it is not too shabby and will be re-covered in the next year. So now my
love for all things 1930-1940’s comes back to life.
Maybe I just yearn for the simpler life of 1940”s
yes we were a world at war but the amazing people and the things they did to “make
do” is really inspiring…
Alright this is becoming a novel and I need to rest…so
Hopefully in the near future you will see some more posts about the sewing I am
doing (hoping) and even the decorating I am doing in the lounge to match a 1940’s
style.
Don’t fall off your
chair, or sofa, or bed or wherever you are reading this blog from…But I
actually did some sewing for the first time in a long time, I must be feeling a
bit better.
I got in and sewed
up a couple of house blocks for the swap I am in, I need to finish them by the end of this month, is there hope
of that happening? Always…
I started out with
paper piecing but that was too time consuming because it required my brain to
be engaged and think about what I was doing…so what am I saying exactly? Well For
ME (not saying this is so for anyone else) I need a lot of brain power to do
the paper piecing so I don’t have to constantly “Reverse Stitch” and re-stitch
a piece. I decided to do the much easier task of wonky houses…can you see the
way I think? By doing wonky houses it does not matter if things are even or
lined up properly, as long as they look like a house and they measure out right
by the end…no problems.
I am hoping to get
a bunch of them done this weekend, but we will see how I feel…
How about you? Are you
sewing anything nice, do you have a project you would like to share?
When I started the new regime I
had no idea what to expect really, the Naturopath described a week of hell and
then taking off like a rocket…well there has been no hell and no rockets
either. Perhaps I am truly blessed because I have not had the horrible sickness
she described, and I could say I have had more energy than prior but it has
been hard to gauge because I was a solo parent for 12 days while Hubby was away
in Thailand.
So now as I continue with hubby
home and most things settling down again I may be able to see a bigger change,
Time will tell…
Very nice but not the same as real coffee sadly
In the last post I promised a
little more information about my intolerances and what kind of diet changes I
had to make. Well it is quite drastic due to those things my body has trouble
dealing with, some may just be for a season due to the fact that my body is so
depleted at present and finds it difficult to cope with things I may have a
slight intolerance to in the past but is exaggerated by a low immune system.
Totally yuckky...
Dairy, gluten, caffeine, most food
additives and colours, vinegar, yeast, chocolate, alcohol, tea, fruits such as
– nectarines, strawberry, kiwi, pineapple, berries, oranges, apple, rockmelon,
red & green grapes
All the nightshade vegetables such
as white potato, tomato, eggplant & red pepper.
White wheat flour, whole wheat,
corn, jasmine rice.
Sweet corn, mushrooms, sweet
pickles, dill pickles, tomato sauce (catsup) anything that ferments in the gut
such as soy sauce.
Most important part of the day...
Well that’s it mostly, so what is
left to eat when you eliminate all that from your diet you might ask…well quite
a lot really, it just means that most of my meals are from scratch and quite
basic, I do happen to be able to use most herbs and spices (with the exception
of the ones made from things off the list) which really lifts the game when
deciding what to make for dinner or lunch.
I can have chicken (skin free) and
most of the whole meats except pork. Olive oil to cook with or canola oil,
steamed veg that are on my list and you have a nice meal.
A big plus to all of the changes
to my diet is a renewed ability to lose weight, my weight loss had stalled
completely due to my body having a leaky gut but craving the bad things like
sugar (in many forms). So I have seen the scales go down by 5.7 kilos in the 2
weeks since I made the changes.
I guess for me the hardest thing
is thinking about what to have at every mealtime to keep it interesting and not
become repetitive and boring.
I love the web and finding recipes
that can be adapted to suit my needs, friends have sent me links or whole
recipes that might be of help (and a lot are).
Sometimes it is tough going like
when Hubby and I went out for the evening to the Glen Frey (of the Eagles)
concert, it would have been so nice to have a drink before the concert and a
coffee after, but alas it was not to be. Catching up with friends for a cuppa
has become a lot harder, I have suggested we meet in a park and BYO or
something like that…I certainly miss just grabbing a coffee while I am out
shopping. My closest companion is my water bottle.
Next time I will try to share some
of those recipe I have found that can be adapted to most diets.
Until then I hope you are healthy
and happy, enjoying your life and sewing up a storm.
Life has many twists and turns and we often
find ourselves at a point where we have to either make complete change or
perhaps lose our life to something that is overwhelming and so hard to fathom.
I have had quite a few health issues over the
last few years and I won’t really go into that but just to say that if I did
not make a complete change, well I would not be here to enjoy Grand kids.
Over the years My body has been my enemy, no
matter what I did to improve my health it didn’t seem to make much difference.
I started walking daily for 3 klm a day and Wow the benefits were amazing. But
my body started to object, in the form of my arthritis. So walking became a
thing of the past.
Frustrated with not being able to get out and
walk for a distance without paying for it for a week after with agonizing days
in bed and having many other symptoms that have seen me hospitalized a few
times. I sought medical help, but after a year of searching the medical world
was slightly stumped and could not offer me much in the way of an answer.
I knew that I had exhausted all medical paths
and after feeling like the living dead for far too long, I decided to bite the
bullet and go see a Naturopath. I have a belief that God created all things and
He created them for our own good. I do believe in modern medicine and that God
has certainly gifted people with amazing talent and brains, but when all that
modern medicine can offer has been exhausted I felt the only alternative was to
seek a more natural way.
So I am a strange subject and quite often
baffle the medical establishment. I have had many allergies for most of my life
and had to be rather careful of certain food types etc.
After all the testing and having a rather
good handle on my health issues (so I thought) I was not prepared for the
outcome of my visit.
I knew my immune system was struggling, but I
had no idea just how much. Let’s put it this way, if my body was a car and my
immune system was the fuel…I was running on empty (barely).
I have noticed over the last 5 years that I
have been having rather massive reactions to some foods that I previously had
little or no reaction to. I knew I most likely had an issue with gluten and
lactose but did not realize how much that can affect everything else.
I showed intolerance's to more things than I
could tolerate. Some were not a surprise and some were. The intolerance's showed
themselves in many forms, whether it was a rash, hives, diarrhea, constipation,
migraines etc and the list goes on. You may wonder how I managed to go along in
life with such symptoms for so long, well all I can say is that we kind of got
used to my weird body reacting to things in a weird way and medical people
could not help so I would just have to live with it.
Having said that it is most often the case
for a lot of people that Living with it is not really living and until recently
I just believed it was my lot in life. How wrong could I be, I don’t have to
put up with feeling like I have been run over by a heard of elephants and all
the time.
My most recent symptoms were the most
concerning and I have had not way of knowing it was all connected, the thought
of losing my eyesight was a little scary to say the least.
The New Beginning Begins
So after seeing the Naturopath and getting an
understanding as to what is causing a lot of my problems it was time to make
the changes that will lead to a better life with more years of joy with my
family.
You can go here to get an understanding of intolerance's.
I guess from a young age we learn that if we
don’t get sick immediately after eating a certain food then we have no problem
with it, it is not even a spoken thing it is just a natural fact that if we eat
something and we have a reaction (visible) then we would know not to eat that
food again…but intolerance's don’t work like that as you may have read.
You can eat something for years (like me) and
not been aware of the connection between the way your body reacts and the food
in question.
Is there an answer?
Of course there is but it might not be the
answer I was hoping for. Simply because it is going to take a massive amount of
work and brain energy to work through everything and come to a place of
understanding my body better and how it reacts to certain foods. Changing my
diet drastically so as to give my body time to heal.
The biggest threat for me at the moment is a
little thing called “Candida Albiacans”
What are Your Symptoms?
Do you experience
fatigue and "foggy" thinking?
Do you crave sugar, have
a bloated abdomen or abdominal pain?
Can't lose weight no
matter what you try?
Do you have
"intimate" (male or female) infections or rashes -- to the point
where they are interfering with your love life?
Do you have a white
coating on your tongue, fungus on your toenails?
Have you been sent home
time and again by doctors who say "nothing is wrong" with you --
when something so obviously is?
Do you feel 20 to 30
years older than you should?
If any of these conditions sound
familiar to you... You may be dealing with a Candida infection or Candida
yeast overgrowth.
While most of these symptoms I do have like
foggy brain, craving sugar not being able to lose weight, being sent home from
the doctors with no answer and feeling 100 years old. I don’t have the obvious
thrush symptoms ( that would have been easier to figure out) mine is strictly
contained in my gut and digestive tract.
Where To From Here?
Well I have already started on the very
strict elimination diet to starve the candida, the replacement of good enzymes
in the stomach will aid recovery and the use of some pretty heavy duty vitamins
(in powder form) will help bring my immune system back to life.
My eyesight should return to normal (hopefully
no permanent damage) but the Eye doctor will be the judge of that.
I should be able to do simple things like
have a shower without feeling like I have run a marathon. Concentrate on
something and give it my all instead of feeling like my brain is missing. But the
best thing is I should not have those debilitating migraines anymore.
I think I have jabbered on enough so I will
save some of my Jibber Jabber for another post.
I think I will talk more about my specific
intolerance's and allergies and how that affects what I can eat, and how I go
about finding recipes and changing my life completely.
I
was one very blessed woman just recently; Hubby surprised me with a weekend
trip to Launceston in Tasmania for our 22nd wedding anniversary.
He
is a romantic at heart (well he tries); he had plenty of input from loads of my
girlfriends and his mates as well so how could he go wrong.
We
flew into Launceston on Friday lunchtime and picked up our hire car.
Audi A1
Then
off to the city of Launceston we went.
Checked
into Alice’s Cottages, the Camelot cottage was waiting for us.
Dining/ Lounge looking into the bedroom
Fire Place
Bedroom Canopy Bed
Spa Love the Mural
Ceiling above canopy, note the crown
Lounge
We
had fun exploring the local scenery and shops; we had some really nice Dickens Cider
with our fresh Italian pizza for our first meal in our cottage.
We
went for a drive to the Cataract Gorge and enjoyed the beauty of it all.
We
took a drive out to the wine region and went to a lovely winery called Pipers
Brook and Janz
Came
home for a nap and spa and then we were going out for Dinner but ended up
staying in as I didn’t feel so well (sadly) we enjoyed a very beautiful Indian meal
from a local restaurant and just enjoyed each others company and the peace and
quiet.
On
the Sunday we were flying out in the afternoon so we went had a drive through
the areas of Launceston we had not seen yet, the architecture was divine.
We
went off to Evandale to the local markets where I was very sad to say I wanted
to buy everything but could only fit so much in my luggage…I found a few little
trinkets for my children as gifts and a couple of things for us, including
Hubby’s new hat.
We
had a late lunch and returned the car to the airport as we awaited our flight
home.
The
one thing I noticed most about Launceston was the quietness and lack of people,
even in the city center on a Friday afternoon there didn’t seem to be many people
around…I thought they had all been abducted by aliens (jokes). I guess it is
just a sleepy kind of country town after all.
Sewing
starts up again this week so I am excited to get back to Khristina’s for some
fun together.
I missed blogging yesterday but didn’t miss taking
my picture…
Here is a beautiful cup that my darling friend
Merilyn gave me for Christmas 2012…I love it and use it all day for every cup
of coffee or tea I drink…it is nice and big.
I have a beautiful tea set that I found in a
little country town, however I only managed to get 2 cups and saucer sets with it…so
my dear friend Judy gave me another pair for my birthday last year (2012)…I
love the set.
I hope you are enjoying your new year…I hope you
are using your pretty cups too.
On November 24th 2012 we lost a very
dear family member, our cat Aetius (pronounced I shus). He was very much loved by all and sadly was
knocked by a car when he very sneakily got out a window early in the evening
after he was supposed to be locked in for the night.
My Son who has aspergers was so very attached to
Aetius and it hit him really badly when he was killed. I have to say one of the
hardest things I have had to do as a Mum is tell our son that Aetius was
killed.
Asperger’s kids can often form attachments to animals
much more deeply than to some humans, he was like that with our cat.
Here with my daughter
After a month and a bit since the loss our son
will still get teary if he sees something that belonged to Aetius or something
he used to play with. This has in itself been difficult at times because he
kind of just goes right back to the grief of his loss and it takes a little bit
to distract him from it.
Dress Ups
In the early days of losing Aetius we were all a
little shell-shocked but realized that we had to continue on in our everyday
lives and just be happy to have had such a sweet cat as a companion to us all.
The biggest challenge was to help our son get past this stage and move onto
feeling a peace about it and thankfulness for having had the chance to love our
cat the way we did.
We don’t always succeed in this and everyday is
a new challenge but it is getting better.
As a part of the grieving for my son and myself I
wrote a little ode to help us remember the good times.
Ode to Aetius
My little fatty boom
bah how I miss thee, let me count the ways…
I miss the tinkling
of yourbell that reminded me you
were never far away.
I miss your meow at
the gate because someone had closeditand locked you out.
I miss walking around
the garage and finding you sunning yourself on the patio chairs.
And how you would look
at me and then roll around on the chair as if to say “come scratch my tummy
please”.
I miss seeing you on
the roof in the early hours of a spring morning looking for the heat of the
sun.
I miss sitting at the
computer in winter and you jumping up to sit on my chest and snuggle into my
pink fluffy dressing gown.
I miss you waking me
atfour in the morning for your
breakfast and to be let out.
I miss how happy you
made Elijah.
I miss you sitting
with me as I sewed, and then stealing my chair when I got up to iron something.
I miss you sitting out
the back on YOUR chair for most of the day, just loving the peace and quiet.
I miss you rolling in
the dirt like a dog, and playing chasey with me around the yard.
I miss you running
around the outside of the trampoline as we played chasey.
I miss in winter how
you would give me that look, the one that said “I am cold it’s time for bed”.
I miss you snuggling
between daddy and I in winter and your little snores.
I miss your traps you
would often set 4 me, how you reeled me in by acting like you wanted a tummy
rub but then sprang on me and had a rough house time.
I miss how you tried
to push Nana out of the bed when she dared to sleep in YOUR room, and how you
snuggled her every night she was here.
There are so many
things I miss…but most of all I miss YOU.
