Paleo or OMG WHY AM I LOSING WEIGHT

Last post I let everyone know that I'm sick. Which means I haven't been doing much but resting. I'm not in bed constantly but in general I'm much less active then normal. I jump on the scale this morning to see how much weight I've gained. It's just a given that I would gain some because I haven't been doing much. Well, I was wrong.

In less then a week I have lost over three pounds. Now, this would be exciting if I had any idea how that was happening. I follow a pretty strict Paleo diet and I've lost weight but in a normal healthy way. over the last few months but this is a huge drop.

The only things I can think of are as follows - I wasn't getting enough calories before I got sick, now that I'm resting my calories and activity level are more appropriate so my body is losing weight. I find this one hard to believe because I eat Bacon (laughing).

I briefly thought about the fact that I may be losing muscle mass. I know this isn't the case because I just saw my doctor on Monday and she checked me out completely.

My only other thought is fat-loss fairies are coming to visit me as I sleep. These fairies sprinkle you with that stuff you see on TV or ephedrine and the fat melts off as you sleep. If you sleep very heavy they even perform weight loss surgery on you as you sleep. They're very busy fairies and most people never see them because their union only lets them work 10 days out of the year.

Yep, I think it's the fairies.  

I have Multiple Sclerosis – And I Feel Fine (most days)

I am in a reflective mood today. At this moment I am sick, very sick as faith may have it. I am not dying and I am not in some tragic French art film. My MS just exploded and it got its nastiness all over me. The nastiness I hard to get out of your hair and you should see my curtains!

I have had an intense amount of stress since August. A job that sucked my life away from me leads me to get a new job (yay). I loved this new job and my stress level was going down, but now with a merger, layoffs, and frustrated bosses taking their stress out with yelling, my awesome MS bubble popped.

I picture it like a water balloon dangling over my head and then one day the weight is so much it just explodes. Eye jumping, pain, muscle spasms, and fatigue came with this little explosion. I’m not having new symptoms so it’s probably not a flare. My doctor agrees that the intense amount of stress I have been under has probably caused my body to finally call uncle.

Do you know what though? I’m ok with that. I’m not mad, upset, or emotionally losing it. I think this is because I have an awesome support system with some awesome friends and that I have my soul back. I feel yucky and I want to sleep all the time which could be the fatigue but probably also the muscle relaxers, but I am good.

Maybe next week I’ll be annoyed or sad that I’m sick again but maybe not. I really enjoy my life and the challenges I face with it. If I didn't have things happening in my life it would be rather boring now wouldn’t it (smile)?

Dog Abuse! (not them me)

Love my huge boxers. They are 100 lbs of puppy love. Yes they are that big and they're not obese just HUGE. I love them to death but since I've gotten them they have decided that they love me SO MUCH that they want to be on top of me and hug me. This leads to doctors asking me "Have you been running through brambles?".

Today my legs were lovingly scratched today when one of them tried to stand on my lap. He also somehow scratched my chest when he tried to 'shake hands'. So, now I look like a victim of domestic violence. This is dog abuse in reverse! 

The Half Dark Side

Well, I took a step closer to the dark side yesterday "Luke I am not your father but maybe a closely related cousin". I bought a MacBook Air. Oh yes I said it! I also have a new PC gaming laptop (hence half). I must say that this little thing is amazing. I am blogging from it right now! Ok, well depending on when you read this I may or may not be using it to blog.

This is going to help me with travel and taking my work with me. Since I have MS I have fatigue very badly. When I travel I try to keep things as light as possible so I don't exhaust myself. When I'm traveling for work and I have not only a carry on but a heavy laptop and a phone, purse, paperwork, documents, and other little things like a phone charger (I don't trust any electronics in checked baggage), keeping things light isn't always as doable as it sounds.

This wonderful little addition to my life is going to help me keep things light and mobil. I'm actually traveling next week so we will see my plan in action. As for the gaming laptop (smile) well that is a topic for a different post. 

Whole30 WOW

No, I haven't started my Whole30 yet. I'm in the process of getting foods out of my house that will tempt me or are not Whole30 approved. My house isn't full of a lot of garbage food (some but not a lot) but let me tell you that Whole30 is really strict. I understand the basic premise behind it. How do you know it's affecting you if you don't take them out of your diet. This is also Paleo so no grains or wheat etc.

I agree with all this but I'm half-Korean (as you can tell from the title of the blog, I hope) and my mother is not paleo (smile). This means that I have traps all all over the place. I don't miss any of it except soy sauce. I love soy sauce. There are also hidden traps all over the house. My mom will add random things to food without me knowing. For example I made a soup today and while I was eating it I noticed corn. Not a lot of corn but corn. I need to really look at my food from now on (smile).

Because of this I still am not on Whole30. I will clean out the rest of the house tomorrow and then protect my food as much as possible (smile). 

I Don't Look Sick but Then Again You Don't Look Stupid, Yet Here We Are

I have Multiple Sclerosis. If you read my ramblings you probably already caught on to this. If not then I've just outed myself for you. However, that diagnosis does not define me as a person. I also, work, go out with friends, exercise, sing, draw, laugh, travel, get funky, dance in circles, cook (a lot), am a foodie, follow the Paleo diet, enjoy teasing my Korean mother, make fun of my dogs and harass them, geek out, go to school, am a girlfriend, and probably do and am a few other things. I have fun! I just happen to also have MS.

I always get the "You don't look sick" comment. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to look like but me. Actually, in my Physical Therapists office there is one of those amazing medical posters. You know the kind that lists symptoms or shows you why your eye is falling out of your head. This one has this young pretty woman on it (before MS) who then gets diagnosed (After MS) who then is all screwed up! She can't dress, as evident by her pink over sized sweater and ankle length green skirt. She no longer has a smile on her face and her hair is now flat and lifeless. She is also standing in a random kitchen cause I guess that's where we hang out after we're diagnosed (side eye). Maybe THIS is what I should look like! Then people would nod and say "OH yeah I get it you have MS. I saw that poster!".

That's not me. I do have a handicapped placard in my car though. It's this cool hang tag that I can take with me if I'm someone else's car. I don't look sick but I do have MS. I have insane fatigue sometimes and my legs can ache so bad I just want to sleep to make it go away. Can you see that? No, but it's there. What I don't need is some idiot yelling at me because I'm using my "Grandmothers handicapped parking" or cursing me out for being a horrible human.

OK, listen you people who stick your nose in other peoples business. First off you have NO idea who I am or what I might have. Same goes for other people parking in the handicapped spaces. Keep your judgments to yourself and focus on your own issues. Second, lets trade. You get to have the chronic medical condition and then the handicapped tag, and I'll not have MS.

Trust me you judgmental person. I would rather not have this disease or this tag. I didn't even use it for a month because I didn't want to get harassed about it. You can take it and my disease because trust me if I had a choice I'd rather not have MS.

I would rather not worry that one day out of the blue I wont be able to walk, or that my eyes will go out on me again. I would rather not have fatigue so bad that I miss things like my god daughters birthday or other social events. I would rather not have to give myself a shot every day that burns like a bee sting. I would prefer that my immune system wasn't attacking my nerves, eating away the myelin and causing a multitude of problems that could change at any time.

So, here is my deal with you random parking lot screamer. You can have my handicapped tag and my MS and I'll park a few spaces further away. Ready to switch?

A Book, a Website (ok a few), a blog (not mine), and a Challenge.

So, we all know about my Paleo diet and how much I love it. LOVE it. There is also this great book entitled It Starts With Food by Melissa and Dallas Hartwig that I have come to view as one of the best books out there to discuss Paleo and to learn about the Whole9 and Whole30 program. I could never do it adequate justice here so please pick up the book or visit their website Whole9life.

And nope they're not paying me to talk about their stuff. I'm sure they have no idea about my little millimeter of the internets. I just really wanted to give you guys a heads up on a great book and some great information.

In a previous post I was discussing going back on a leptin reset. I believe that I am going to do a Whole30 instead as an experiment. I haven't started yet and probably wont until next week but I will keep all of you posted!

For those that want to join in and need some recipes I really suggest you check out NomNomPaleo who is posting 30 days of recipes on her site! Honestly, a great food site in general for Paleo geeks. 

Go visit her, buy her iPad app, awesome t-shirts, and oh try out the recipes! The riced cauliflower and the mayo recipes are amazing.


See the images above? They're not mine, they're copy-written, and I don't own them. I didn't draw them or take the pictures so please don't give me any kudos! Go visit them (pushing you through the interweb).

Six hours later...

I love health insurance. I'd probably work for free as long as I could continue to receive good health insurance. Paperwork and red tape associated with health insurance? I hate that. On January first we switched to a new insurance plan at my company. Today I have a doctors appointment, lab work, and prescriptions that I have to pick up.

Normally this takes maybe an hour for the doctor and lab and then I drop off the new prescriptions to pick them up after work. Well, one little problem I don't have an insurance card yet. Like a good little compulsive person I go online, print a letter of insurance, get my numbers, and be bop to my appointment.

25 minutes after my appointment time I get to see my doctor. Not because of the doctor (rare I know) but because it took that long to verify and get me into their computer. Self, I say to myself, it's fine we knew it might take awhile. I go to get my blood taken and 30 minutes later I get my blood taken again because of verification. Self, I say to myself, that's OK at least the woman didn't have to stab you 25 times.

Now since I haven't eaten all morning and it's fast approaching 10 I think I should eat. I decide that I'll go to the pharmacy first (driving noises). 1 hour later after verification I get my first prescription and since I'm super special I have to get medicine from different pharmacies. At this point my stomach is eating itself and I'm scowling like the mad cat (car noises) off I go to the other pharmacy! This was even MORE fun because the young girl taking care of me had no idea what to do without a physical insurance card.

Now at this point, I may have been abducted by Aliens. I have a block of missing time so large I have no idea how else to explain it. Somehow I got home at 4:00 pm. Now, this wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't started this at 8:30 this morning. That's AM for those of you who are confused.

I'm not dead because at Walgreens they have snacks and I shoved something that I think was a potato chip into my mouth around 2. However, that might be a false memory that the aliens have implanted into my brain to help me mentally comprehend where all my time went today.

A Butcher, a Baker, and a Paleo Girl

I love to bake and being Paleo has kinda put a damper on that. I really am not tempted to eat any of what I bake but I really would like to be able to bake more things that are Paleo friendly. This has lead me on a long journey of finding alternatives.

The two I have found are Almond Flour and Coconut Flour. They have their pros and cons and I haven't started using them 100% exclusively yet. It's also the holiday and when I bake I like to just bake. I've given most of it away and only ate small bits. This really made me notice a few things.

Paleo really does work for me as evidenced by the tummy problems and heart burn I had (smile). I don't like fad diets. So once-in-awhile I get it in my head that Paleo is a fad and I'm not doing anything positive. Then I eat a cookie (laughing).

I am debating the merits of doing another leptin reset. It worked very well for me before and maybe it will again. Hm....

One of the best things I attribute at least partially to my diet? The fact that I feel better and my MS hasn't been as 'bad' this year. When I say bad I mean muscle spasms and small things like that when combined add up to a big thing. It's been rather nice.

I'm going to have to find a way to make baking paleo so I can combine two things I enjoy. Maybe it's not possible but I'm going to try! 

Pumpkin Cake! (Yeah not Paleo, YET)

I really am sorry to post this on my blog in which I talk about healthy eating and living Paleo, but for those who read this that just have MS, or just want to read it because I'm crazy, I thought this might be something for them.

I am going to do a recipe make over on this Pumpkin Cake and once I find the right combinations I will post it on here!

A little background. My mother loves Pumpkin Bread and when I was small she made it all the time. Fast forward to me being an adult and us living in Florida. She had forgotten her recipe but had the basics of what was in it. I started playing around and I finally got it exactly the way she remembered. I was doing this for her so making it Paleo wasn't in the books at the time. Plus I can't eat raw Pumpkin because I'm allergic to squash and it seems raw pumpkin. What? Why are you looking at me like that? FINE I'll tell the story.

I'm allergic to squash and zucchini. Yes it's a random food allergy and yes it's real. Sweet potato pie looks a lot like pumpkin pie right? One year by mistake my parents bought a pumpkin pie and when my dad and I had a piece  he realized what it was to late, I had already shoved some in my mouth. So, because of that unplanned experiment, I know I can eat pumpkin. I realized I could not eat raw pumpkin taste testing a recipe when I first started cooking. That one taste with my finger tip had me sick for 3 days (BIG SMILE).

OK, back on track. I can't taste test when I bake with pumpkin. So it's hard for me to see if I got it right when I mess with ingredients. This recipe is great though because I had some after I made it (laughing)!

Pumpkin Cake 

1 1/4 Cup of Coconut Oil (Yeah I know it's a lot. Use Applesauce if you would like to cut it)
2 Cups Sugar
4 eggs
2 Cups Pumpkin
2 Cups of Flour (this is where I need to make it paleo but I need to play with Coconut and Almond Flour)
1 Tsp of Vanilla
1/4 Tsp Salt
2 Tsp of Baking Soda
1 Tbl Baking Powder
2 Tsp Cinnamon (my mother does not like nutmeg but I've added 1/2 of nutmeg and it's great or 2 Tsp of pumpkin pie spice)

Preheat your oven to 350'.

Combine the coconut oil and sugar. I heat my coconut oil up just a little to make it liquid for this.

Once completely combined add in one egg at a time and make sure it is thoroughly combined before you add the next. Repeat for all four eggs

Add Vanilla and salt and mix well

Add pumpkin and mix well

Sift the Flour, Baking Soda, Baking Powder and Cinnamon together. Slowly add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients I break it into four parts making sure each part is thoroughly combined before adding the next part.

I use a bunt cake pan for this. It takes 40 minutes in a 350 degree oven. If you use a cake pan the time will be less so please adjust. The cake is ready when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Tada! Happy New Year!  (my mother had already eaten some and cut it up by the time I let it cool)