Day 83 – Spring Break Begins

My wife and kids have the week off—because of spring break—and my 8 year old has all this fun stuff planned (at least in his mind) to do all the things he wants to do.  He had his heart set on going to Yellowstone, and we really wanted to make that happen but alas were unable to.  He has wasted no time in bombarding us with his requests starting with this morning.

He wants to go to Topaz Mountain—a local place in central (Northern Central) Utah where you can look for topaz and trilobites.  He LOVES the idea of being in the “field” and taking his little wooden chisel and hammer so he can gingerly extract the fossils he finds during his expeditions (probably almost his exact words!).  We could not go that far today but we did agree to take him to Antelope Island (an island in the middle of the Great Salt Lake that has bison and antelope on them (as well as salt on the beaches from the Salt Lake).

I did go on a run this morning and am feeling pretty good—I never pushed myself to train for anything like I’m pushing myself now (and I’m not even training for anything yet).  I wasn’t sure how far I wanted to go but decided 6 was a good number.  I got all geared up (with my wife’s watch and hear rate monitor because I can’t find mine) and then got ready to go.

While hooked up to my heart rate monitor I noticed what my resting rate was (while I was just sitting on a chair).  Now understand that about a year ago my resting heart rate was between 70 and 80 beats per minute—which is still pretty good but not where I want it to be.  I almost couldn’t believe what I was seeing… as I sat there I watch it go from 55 to 53 and then down to 52 BPM!  This was amazing to me.  I remember when I tried to do quite a bit of running about 11-12 years ago the best I did was getting my heart-rate down to about 60 BPM.  Here it is 12 years later and I’ve got it down to 8 beats lower than that and it feels great!

All the frustration I feel and all the anger I’ve felt over the past couple of months (almost 3 now) vanished for a while today looking at how great that was—I know the benefits are there more than I care to imagine right now and I can’t let how I feel (at least outwardly) affect how I feel about the changes that have obviously been made and have been happening in my body.  I get so worried about life at times and how we’re going to get the things done we want to do.  Our goals feel almost insurmountable.  I know I can’t—and haven’t—do/done it on my own, God has been there with me every step of the way.

For those of you out there that don’t believe in God I make no apology because I know that even the people who don’t believe in God generally believe in some combined power (energy) or whatever that keeps people together—this is God!  And no matter what each of us feels about the source of this power it is—in fact—the same thing, I just recognize it to be a power of a being that knows us to be his children and wants the best thing for us.  Every day convinces me of this more and more, especially days like today.

You see, my wife and I both served missions for our church (she served in Argentina and I served in Nebraska).  During these times we both met very special people who have been and continue to be very dear to us (they are our friends).  Well let me tell you about what happened when we visited Antelope Island (as we promised our 8 year old we would do.

We had every intention of driving around look at Bison, do some hiking and then head back to the island restaurant (Buffalo Island Grill).  As we were driving around we noticed a peak that people were hiking (Buffalo Peek) and decided to drive up there.  I had the urge to hike the peak (an uncommonly excited, almost giddy urge).  To my surprise my 8 year old and my 4 year old wanted to hike as well.  My wife was less than eager—since it was very cold outside and she had really only brought a jacket.

Well… we started to hike and really didn’t know how far we would get but just started hiking.  Our little 4-year-old was off and ahead of the group—cruising up this hill to get to the top.  I actually had to catch him because part of the trail was very narrow and really had a steep drop on one side, which I was positive he would find his way off of if we weren’t close. 

We found some rocks that had some pretty cool areas to take pictures and so decided to stop to get a family picture.  We have this pretty new camera and decided to use it—the coolest thing, we got set up and set it on automatic and it just kept snapping pictures and I ran there and let it snap a few.  We then snapped some 360 degree (panoramic) pictures just having a great time.

Well… these younger girls passed us and then this father looking figure came into view.  I thought he looked familiar but didn’t place him at all but my wife—who usually doesn’t say a word to people unless she knows (for sure) who they are—said: “you look familiar” to which he responded “so do you…”  He gave his name and my wife said: “Oh my goodness you served in the same mission as I did!”  He looked and couldn’t believe who he had seen.  They both gave each other hugs.

Well come to find out he actually is very good friends with a cousin of mine and they both went to law school at the same time.  This friend of my wife’s actually graduated from Harvard Law before I started law school.  I remembered him because he ran the St. George Marathon the same year my sweatie and I ran (2006).  He stuck out because she knew he was running and found out that he did extremely well overall and I remembered because I knew he was in law school when he did all this!  It may be hard to understand unless you are in law school, but that is a HUGE deal.

He is working at a law firm in Portland Oregon and is on vacation with his family in Utah and just happened to be on Antelope Island at the same time we were.  Not only that but he is working as an attorney and when I talked to him about one of the business ideas of mine he seemed very excited and thought other attorneys he knew would be as well.  Now it is easy to chalk this off to coincidence, and maybe it is—but I don’t think so… two people who met each other on the other side of the world with connections to not only my wife but to me—through my cousin—meet on some random mountain top in Utah at the same time.

Anyway… times like today are what keep the hope alive for things working out.  It was nice to talk to him about the struggles so many attorneys are feeling at this time—I told him I feel bad for the others but it is nice to know that I’m not alone.  Even he is looking to get out of the law and do something else—he is just sick of the hours and the being away from his family and I don’t blame him.  Things are changing!

A very good day!  We did cheat a little today (food wise) by stopping at Sam’s Club and getting a Rotisserie Chicken, which actually made both of us slightly sick—use to be one of my favorite fast meals and now it seems to make by body sick, not sure if I’ll be having that again.  We want to see if it will affect our progress with Candida at all but don’t want to go too crazy either!

I will post the rest of the spring break adventure tomorrow!

Day 82 – Easter Greetings

It is a good day to remind everybody that my posts are 1 week behind; since I wanted to make sure that I would be able to keep the blog going for a long while.  So far it’s worked great but it does make it a little difficult when there is a big holiday or something else that is easily marked and I’m not talking about it.  Although if there is something that I do notice on the night I post then I make sure that is clear in the post (at least something worth noting).

Sundays are usually especially nice because it is a day that can usually be a little less busy and one that is spent with family—especially on Easter Sunday.  Church was very nice; warm temperatures as well as good discussions and uplifting lessons—very very nice!  After our cheat day yesterday I didn’t know what to expect… however, when I woke up today I was feeling much better than I thought I would.  I’m not planning on extending our little trial more than we had yesterday but it at least gives me hope that many of the things we love are not out of our life forever but for a while (as long as we are more careful on them when they come back in).

However; gluten will still be out indefinitely… I’ve heard horror stories about how long it can take to get that stuff out of your system and it has only been about 6 weeks or so since our last gluten intake so we have a good 2 weeks or more (possibly) until it is completely out of our system again.  I am planning on also staying very clean in all aspects of my diet until my symptoms subside.  This is notwithstanding the fact that I did cheat yesterday.

I guess I’m saying that even though I cheated I’m not going to plan on making it a weekly or maybe not even a monthly event.  It’s just good to know that there seems to be plenty I can eat (including dairy) that won’t affect me after one day ‘off the wagon.’  I did want to eat a TON of stuff yesterday (such as a gluten free sugar cookie, chocolate shake, candy, and other things) but I didn’t… or at least didn’t go hog wild.  I took in a little, but to be honest the little bit I had wasn’t that much better than the healthy stuff I’ve been getting used to.

It is so hard thinking about working this hard for an indefinite amount of time and although I don’t seem to feel affects I do believe that had I continued to indulge the relief I’ve gained over the last 80 or so days would be GONE… I want to see full relief before considering letting things to too far back (if at all) to the way they were.  This is the biggest test of endurance I think I’ve ever committed to, but beyond that it is the biggest test of endurance I’ve ever done (and succeeded with!).  My wife and I went 79 days without ANY type of cheat with what we set out to do (and we had initially only planned on going 30 days (which at the time seemed overwhelming!).  It is amazing what you can talk your body into doing.

Day 81 – The Devil is in the Details

Another Saturday come and gone but I didn’t get a chance to run today.  My wife needed the run more today than I did and she went out at about 7:00 this morning, but our day was so busy that we needed to get going after she got home so we could make it to an Easter Egg Hunt. 

We decided that today would be a little cheat day.  My 8 year old has a friend that is moving to Texas and today they are having a lot of their friends meet them at a local pizzeria for a good by party—we decided we wanted to go but didn’t want to sit there and just have our kids eat pizza so we checked out the menu and found out they have a gluten free menu.  It seemed like a good day to try quite a few other items but still leave gluten out of our diet.  Especially since we have an idea of how gluten affects us already.

Well… the Easter Egg hunt went great!  All I can say is it was the best 30 second Easter Egg Hunt ever!  Although I think the term ‘hunt’ is a little misleading since it is really not a hunt at all but rather a mad dash to the Easter eggs and is a little reminiscent of the old school game dodge ball where the bigger stronger kids run all over the littler kids.  My kid is small but I’m not complaining about him getting run-over, he does seem to hold his own—especially when in a contest such as a hunt—but he is a little sensitive about getting enough Easter eggs which he didn’t feel like he did today.

The pizzeria was GREAT!  It was the first time since the end of last year that I’ve had anything like pizza—and although it was gluten free it was wonderful.  It took a little bit of time to make the pizza but it was worth the wait.  They also had some gluten free pasta which was good to but I noticed something today about the marinara sauce that I had forgot about.  As soon as we put it in our mouth you could taste the added sugar on it.  My wife told me she could taste it before I tried it but when I tried mine I was sure that mine had more than hers did.

I had her try it and she said it had the same—“WOW” I thought, “this is what we looked at as normal for all those years.”  When I used to make marinara sauce at home we would just by the Prego or Ragu and then add all sorts of things to the mix (including added brown sugar, which we thought made it awesome).  Honestly… I like our natural marinara sauce and a lot of our natural foods much better than I like the other foods!

However; the most interesting thing happened with my wife while she had a conversation with one of our friends friends there.  We’ve long thought that Teflon pans are not good for you—even though we do still cook on one—but have not been too worried because it is fairly new and we will get rid of it long before flaking.  But… according to this lady there is Teflon that is in the bag material microwave popcorn is in and you ingest a ton of it into your diet.  We did look up some info and there is stuff out there that confirms this idea, although I’m not sure on the accuracy of the sites or where they get their information.  I wonder how many other people out there have heard or know about this as an issue?  This is where the devil is in the details.  This site also claims that the Teflon is found in the wrappers used in fast food restaurants to wrap hamburgers and other goodies in!  YIKES! If this is true…

Dinner was leftovers—since we didn’t want to stretch this into another day and since my wife went to dinner and a movie with her mom and a friend last night (The Host) which they liked a whole lot!  I also had some ice-cream tonight but did watch the amount I ate (a full serving is about ½ a cup and I had about ¼ of a cup).  So far I don’t feel so bad but we’ll have to see what tomorrow brings!

Day 80 – Cacao Nib Cookie Crazy

The post exercise slump hit pretty good this morning and I ended up staying in bed until my boys woke up at about 6:45am.  My wife did get up and exercise—she is always so good—at about 6:00am.  Food for the day was steel-cut-oats, juice for breakfast; eggs and some toast (gluten and sugar free of course) as well as salad and quinoa for lunch and spaghetti noodles with salsa for dinner.  Although we did have a great snack tonight with some Cacao Nib Cookies my wife made using a recipe she at http://cookieandkate.com/2013/gluten-free-chocolate-chip-cookies/

The raw dough tasted so good but when we cooked the cookies they ended up bleeding together and created one huge sheet cookie on our tray.  They were still pretty good—the best cookie we’ve had in a LONG time.  We did adjust them a little and added about half of the maple syrup it called for but then a bit of stevia (about 7 drops of stevia to be exact), still very much worth making.

Food has been the biggest issue lately—it isn’t so hard to make the things we make but it takes so much time and we don’t find ourselves branching out as much as we probably ought to.  It creates a bit of a food rut that feels hard to get out of.  On the one hand we love the food we prepare and love how it makes us feel, but on the other hand… it takes so much time that it feels like it takes away from some of the other plans we are trying to put together.  The only reason we’ve been able to do what we do is because I’ve been home with our son; however, as things pick up with business I’m working on it won’t be the same and will be almost impossible to keep up on the scale we’re able to devote now.

We do still need to eat healthy, because our symptoms are not completely gone, but I’m unsure on how to go about doing that without spending so much money on food and without spending so much time.  At times I feel it would be easier to cave to my simple food desires and fast food fantasies.  Yes… I have fast food fantasies, not because of the food itself but because of the easiness of the food—I can be on the run and grab something from McDonalds that costs under $3.00 and when I eat it I’m full and done in 10-15 minutes (you can’t do that when you want to eat healthy).

I still plan on seeing this through—at least until all my symptoms are gone—but there are days that I just want the simplicity and frugality of fast food and easy (mostly premade) food to cook at home (did somebody say Papa Murphy’s?).  I can’t deny the health benefits I’ve felt over the last 80 days, but I also can’t deny the amount of time and work it’s taken to go that long!

Oh… I did try some garlic cloves again this morning—they did not sit very well with my stomach and I just couldn’t bring myself to do it again all throughout the day.

Day 79 – Runnin’ Fool

My brother and I trained for the St. George Marathon last year and he has only run one other time since—although I can’t say that like I’m Mr. Wonderful… I’ve only run a hand full of times since.  I called him last night and talked him into going on a run with me at 5:30 this morning.  Very hesitantly he agreed and I called him bright and early.  It took a little coaxing but I finally talked him out of bed—which may have been a good thing because if he had finally said no I may have gone back to bed.

All the research (as well as the program we’ve been doing) says that exercise is a must for a Candida program but I’ve not been very good at being consistent.  It was fairly easy early on as the energy came very quick but as soon as the first set of juice only days hit the exercise almost stopped entirely for me.  My new resolve is to do something every morning—although I will probably take a break from it all on Sundays.

We ran the route I usually run so my brother drove to my house and we walked to the starting point and ran and ran.  When I was running with my brother last year I remember my heart rate always being the one that would go higher.  Mine would hit 180-190 and his would stay at 160-170.  This time it was his heart rate that would jump up to 180-190 and mine—although my strap wasn’t working—didn’t feel like it raised more than about 160 or so.  I kept pushing him along when last year I would have been happy to stop or slow down when he did.

I did, however, finally slow a little toward the end—probably the last ½ mile or so because we do always like to talk and/or rant and rave about the news and the political issues of the day and then give our own biased views to each other, let off some steam and move on!  All in all I went 3.65 miles but my pace was not very good—I didn’t break any of my records or anything.

The food aspect of the whole journey is feeling very old because there has not been a whole lot of branching out so I’ll just say that we did our usual favorites (or other menu items).  I did purchase some Eggies because they looked like a cool little invention—however, I was not as impressed with the actual product as I was about the infomercial associated with it!

I was pretty tired this morning, but worry how I’ll feel tomorrow because the lag in energy after exercise for me usually hits more the day after.  I did feel like I got a lot accomplished today and had a great day overall!

Here’s to hoping I’ll have more exciting news to report tomorrow.