Category: Keto

It had been a hectic month and a half, what with 3 important, somewhat unexpected events at work. To think they weren’t even large expos or festivals. One was a dinner, the second one was a breakfast and those two were pretty easy. They flowed well. The last–and largest–was the most stressful. It was a 2 1/2 day event and it was my department’s duty to take care of all details (and by my department, I mean my boss and myself LOL). I asked myself daily if I’d actually be able to pull it off. We got tons of help from EZ, Bob, Michelle and Gerry–tons. I was eternally grateful. And in the end, everything worked out, THANK GOD.

The press conference at the airport started late, but it went well. Lunch at House.Wine was perfect; they do such a great job with our groups!

I’m pending a photo from the first evening’s dinner at the museum. Alexis, Michelle and Anabel took over for me and helped me so much that night. I made sure to have everything ready since they’d be taking over for me. Jorge and I had already made plans way before we learned about this event to attend the George Strait “Cowboy Rides Away” Tour. Of course I was on my phone the entire time, making sure the violinists arrived, that the crew ate, that the food was ok, that there was enough seating, etc. I really didn’t relax until George’s encore!

I was a little nervous about the concert, as we got to attend last year in San Antonio and it really wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. He didn’t sing an encore, didn’t sing very long, sang a few covers instead of his own songs and at the end, didn’t even sing “The Cowboy Rides Away! BUT. He completely redeemed himself with this one!! He did a great rendition of “Folsom Prison” with a huge gunshot blast and all, had an encore, sang “The Cowboy Rides Away” at the end and sand for almost 3 hours!! It was fantastic :).

Anyway, the most important part of the visit, the ceremony, was the next morning. After that, I headed to the office to double and triple check my RSVP list. I KNEW I was going to get some last-minute attendees, but so far, everything was okay.

After many, MANY visits to shops downtown and HEB, Gerry helped us get the gifts ready and then Michelle, Bob, EZ and I headed to Quinta to set up. After a misunderstanding (isn’t there always one??), we were ready to go.

Everything went without a hitch, thank goodness. Even after 13 extra people showed up O_O.

Since our crew didn’t get to eat, our boss took us to House.Wine for dinner. We chit-chatted, ate and had dessert. He even gave me a high five. All the weight floated off my shoulders. The last part of the event was the next morning and then, THEN I could relax.

The Cowboy Breakfast the next morning was a hit and everything went smoothly. I was so glad!! After picking up some vases we forgot at Quinta, I was FREEEE!!! I joked with Jorge that I needed to get a T-Shirt that says, “I Survived SLP Delegation Visit 2014” LOL.

I made sure to ENJOY and relax the rest of the weekend. Well, as much as I could following a 3-yr-old around and vice versa LOL.

I was awarded a gift certificate to Tony Roma’s so Jorge and I planned a date night for Wednesday. It was so odd to have a non-stressful week! But you can bet I appreciated the crap out of it!

My babies were picked up the Thursday afternoon (day of the first event/concert) by their dad and his family. They were taking them to Disney World. I tried my hardest not to text every 5 minutes to ask Mario to please take care of my children. And when I felt that I was missing them to the point that I was going to become depressed, I’d keep myself busy. Mario was nice enough to send me photos of their activities throughout the trip, and I spoke to them every single day, so that was nice and comforting.

I’d been running and eating well for 2 weeks straight (running for almost a month in total, with breaks in between)…until the Wednesday before the event, and after that my diet and exercise went down-hill :(. I keep saying I’m going to start again but Jorge and I started watching Orange is the New Black while our kids were gone so…yeah. You can say it took precedence =\.

Jorge and I finally had a date night on Wednesday. I can’t really remember the last time we had a date night. We eat lunch together often, but we’re usually accompanied, so it doesn’t really count, heh. It was nice to spend time alone together and reflect on our day and talk about ourselves and just everything. The food was pretty darn good, too.

We didn’t have dessert there. Instead we went to House.Wine just to have the Banoffee ^_^. It was a pretty great night :).

Thursday was a pretty easy day at work and I got to take Friday off. I made the most of it, cleaning a little, making myself breakfast and lunch and I finally decided I was going to plant a succulent garden! So I went to Home Depot and picked up these babies:

It was a lot of work to find the perfect pot and to get them just right in the pot, and even then I left a few spaces in the pot bald =\. But it was so satisfying to see it come together and it brought such a huge change to my patio table!

I hope they thrive! I check on them all the time and I even added new cactus soil to my old ones on my windowsill ^_^.

I’m reading up about propagating them and have a few started up already, most of which happened on their own.

Sally and I finally got a chance to meet up on Saturday :). We tried having brunch at Birdie’s but that didn’t work out very well so we ended up at Los Cazadores. We had a nice long catch-up chat; it was therapeutic!

We went to Marshall’s next and browsed and then I dropped her off and came home to be picked up by Jorge, Jr. and their cousin Joey and his wife, who are in town for a while. We went to Cheddar’s for afternoon drinks and this was the continuation of my bad eating (had scrambled yellow eggs, bacon and a pancake at Los Cazadores, then spinach artichoke dip and chips and a Maui Margarita at Cheddar’s). We shared some stories and shared some laughs, it was nice. We headed to a Vape Shop for Jorge and then we tidied up at home since everyone was coming over to watch the UFC fight. I managed to stay awake most of the time, until we ordered pizza and I crashed out on the patio sofa LOL. Poor Jr. wasn’t far away, lounging as well since he was in pain from being diagnosed with gout =\.

Father’s Day was the next day and my babies came home early that morning. They brought me some gifts <3. [caption id="attachment_2247" align="aligncenter" width="253"] Cheshire cat cup and Ariel blouse![/caption]

We all settled inside and I started making breakfast. Took Jorge some breakfast in bed and asked what he wanted to do. He said: nothing. Just stay home and relax and do nothing. We obliged :). Well, until we had to go get a few groceries LOL.

We had the traditional botana from Espi’s and watched movies with the kids. It was a really low-key day, just like he wanted :).

We had a lunch date yesterday at Kumori. We hadn’t been there in a LONG time!! I missed the miso soup and the jalapeño firecracker. MMMmmm.

We took my truck in to the shop since the air conditioning in the back of the truck stopped working so I picked my love up after work. We did some MORE grocery shopping and we got home to find out poor Emmos didn’t feel well. Needless to say, she had a terrible fever around midnight and I had her sleep with us since fevers at night terrify me. That’s always when they get so much worse. So I held her and gave her medicine and water and took her to pee and refreshed the washcloth on her forehead. We woke up, took Jorge to work and I took her to the doctor. She had a throat infection and the ear infection started as soon as we got home. Since I was already in the office, I got another cholesterol lab done. I was hoping I’d be eating well and exercising–the way I had originally planned so I could get off the pill completely, but I ate like crap all weekend =\. I wouldn’t doubt I still have to be on the darn thing :*(.

My Emmos had fever on and off all day, but she was in good spirits and I’m hoping the fever finally subsided. The only bad thing is, now she’s really feeling the sore throat. I cleaned up since I was home and the boys helped me with the lawn. Made dinner and now I’m beat and ready for bed. Hoping for a much better day all around tomorrow :).

I’ve been telling myself for months that I need to start eating better.

There was always an excuse though: Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, my events being back-to-back at work and not having time to eat better, selling (and eating) Girl Scout cookies. I vowed to myself that after the whole Girl Scout cookie thing and after February 16th, the date of my last major event, I would start eating better and jogging again. But February 16th and then the 17th came and I continued to eat crappily.

The girls were sick the week of February 7th so I took them in to the doctor. I was already there, so I figured I’d go in to get help with my acne again.

That’s a whole other story, but to summarize: I was on birth control since I was 17 years old, after having Eenan. I got my tubes tied after I had Emily on February 2009 at the age of 27. About 6 months later, after not being on any kind of birth control, I started getting acne and about 2010 (combined with the stress of the divorce and fighting for my kids) my face erupted like never before. It was awful. So in 2011 when I couldn’t take it anymore my doctor put me on Minocycline, an oral antibiotic, plus pledgets and a topical antibiotic. My face cleared up a lot, thank God, but in 2013 I must have become immune because it stopped working. So I changed my eating habits, drank more water, etc. and nothing seemed to help.

So I went in with the girls that day and my doc went ahead and did my yearly physical while I was there, plus blood work. When I had picked the girls up I’d had 4 Thin Mints with Emily (grrr), so I reminded the girls at the office that my sugar might be a little higher due to that, and being checked after lunch. Dr. Guzman prescribed birth control to help with my acne, and we went on our way.

Fast forward to 1 1/2 weeks later and Laura calls me on the 19th at 3pm that they need me to go in. That always means that something came back abnormal on the results. She tells me that my cholesterol is super high and they need to see me. So in I go. My cholesterol total was at almost 400 and my “bad” cholesterol was at 300. Not good. I even reminded all the girls that I’d had those Thin Mints that day before my blood work was taken but Dr. Guzman somberly said no, this was something that was developing for a while. She said I was thin, healthy overall so she was blaming my crappy genetics. (My first thought was Damn you, Mother!!)

She put me on a strict diet and basically told me to stick to the produce section of HEB, fish and chicken. That’s it. She also gave me a list of names that were a creative cover-up for high cholesterol on “Fat Free” or “No Trans Fat” packages. The first thing I thought was, “OMG. No cheese. No cookies. No butter. No BACON!”

Oh yeah, and she also prescribed Lipitor. Yup. I tried getting out of it by telling her I would cure myself by eating better and exercising (like I did back in 2008 with the diabetes) but she said no way; it was too high and I needed to take the pill. It really sucks. I had a bit of a hard time dealing with it for a few days.

It’s a pretty known fact that I love food. My Facebook and Instagram streams are probably 70% pics of food that I make, or food that I’m eating at restaurants. I just love food. The expression “sad” is an understatement for how I feel about having to make grand changes in the way I eat.

There’s no better way to kick your ass into gear than being told you have extremely high cholesterol. So my meals went from:

(FYI, Mambo Seafood’s service SUCKS. Jessica and I were 30 minutes late to work and I never got my cocktail sauce!!)

To this:

I got that hummus recipe from Pinterest, but instead of using white beans used the traditional chick peas and OMG. Seriously the BEST hummus I’ve ever had! I just wish I could find a good, healthy, low-cholesterol store-bought pita bread or a recipe for a good one. It wasn’t bad with celery at all. Jorge wasn’t too fond of it. He did the whole *aherk* thing, so boo LOL. More for me!

So it’s not too bad, but man I miss my cheese. And bacon. And beer brats. Waah.

I’ll get over it, and maybe, hopefully used to it. I thought of food all the time before, and now it’s even worse. Before I eat anything I research it. I research my recipes for the day. I have so much to re-learn. And it sucks to be surrounded by food at work (donuts, chocolate chip cookies from Jason’s Deli, grapefruits that I can’t have because it clashes with my medication, etc.). I seriously felt like this on Friday:

I almost resent and detest people as I see them stuffing delicious food in their mouth, but I have to pep-talk myself into not cursing them 🙁 . Jorge is certain that my test results were wonky and incorrect, but I don’t know. I was eating badly. And then I was doing the Keto diet and stopped suddenly and started stuffing my face with carbs, so maybe that had something to do with it? It’s been almost a year since I’d started Keto. I started after my birthday in April and stopped around July 4th. So who knows. I wasn’t going hardcore or anything with the red meats and say, Bulletproof (butter in my) coffee. I’ll have to ask next month when I go in for a follow-up.

Wish me luck on this new journey!! I kind of feel like I’m damned, but by golly, I WILL get over this darn thing! I will get off the pill!

Well, for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out how the heck to change the background and header back to the old images before I decided to “update” the Pinboard theme. Tried to no avail since last night, so I had to resort to my old, old theme. I really wish I was still php/css/Wordpress savvy!!

Had a hard time waking up today but jumped in the shower after 15 minutes of snoozing the alarm. I had my morning pep-talk with myself: “Get over it. You may be tired, but at least you woke up this morning. At least you have a roof over your head and hot water to shower in. At least you have tons of clothes to find “nothing to wear”. At least you have your babies and a vehicle to drop them off at school with. At least you have a job.”

Jorge woke up early and showered too. We chit-chatted, I got Aly ready, and then, out of nowhere, Jorge and I got into an argument over an old Directv box that neither one of us had sent back with the Post Office. It was stupid really. I picked up some breakfast at El Pato (chicharron and eggs…so spicy!) and got to work. After a few texts back and forth with Jorge, we both just gave each other the silent treatment. Then, at 11:30am he texts, “I want to see you for lunch.” I replied, “Ok”.

He and Marco met me at Logan’s. As he slid into the bench beside me, he side-smiles and apologizes again. We threw a few playful jabs at each other throughout our meal, but I was glad we could smile and have a nice hour together.

Lunch was soooo good! I was craving this since we had it last Friday.

Salmon in dill sauce. And skewers…heaven!

My day at work went by fast, thank goodness. I searched for a dress to wear to the George Strait concert (eeep!!!) on Pinterest and later Forever21 (which I made a new board for here!).

I got out of work and went to Old Navy, since my search online showed a dress in my size and the color I wanted. But of course, I didn’t find it. But I did find a lilac cardigan I’d been keeping my eye on for $3.77!

I was feeling extremely tired, so I picked up my Keto-friendly iced coffee across the street at Starbucks. I picked up my boys and we came home while we talked about their day and their field trips. The kids all joked around and played while we waited for the wings and pizza Jorge had ordered for dinner. He was actually supposed to cook dinner tonight, but he cheated LOL. Emily spent a chunk of time upset with Jaylen, ’cause he hurt her feelings. She responded with, “You’re ruining my life!” Or something like that LOL. She’s so dramatic!

I bathed the girls, the boys bathed themselves and we chilled out watching TV for a few minutes till I put them to bed. Poor Aly complained for yet another night about her knees hurting =\. Eenan stayed up a little bit working on a Powerpoint presentation while I painstakingly attempted to fix my blog (and ate a Carb Smart fudge pop. Oh, how I suffer, heh!). Bleh. I’m so glad tomorrow is Friday! I desperately need some rest. All week Jorge and I have said we’re going to jog! Or do P90X! But man, we’re just exhausted all the time. I really do want to give our brand-new SIDEWALKS a try!

I haven’t even bothered flat-ironing my hair all week! I’ve sported my wild, curly mane every single day. And tomorrow will be no exception. 5am wake-up call for this gal! Goodnight!