A Crazy Year

As we approach the end of the year, I feel a review of sorts coming on. So, here we go: I didn't grow that garden. I didn't stay on a vegetarian diet, in fact, I have vacillated too much with my diet. The only constant was yoga.

I got my certification as a yoga instructor and have been having classes 3 times a week at my house. This has been a great blessing in many ways: the exercise is easy for me to do with FM and doesn't stress my body like walking or biking, although I did do a lot of biking in the height of summer. It also helps to keep my stress, anxiety and blood pressure down because we always do a few minutes of meditating after our workout. This helped me through some rough moments! Tremendously!

But I still couldn't find the energy to get outside and pull weeds and water and do all the things you need to do with a garden. We have a large area for one and that may have been a bit daunting, which in turn overwhelmed me. I barely kept up with the few flower pots we had.

I did, however, pick strawberries from our already established plants. And I planted some pepper plants in pots on my front porch. (Peter Piper picked ...) Does that count?

So, with all this behind me, I resolve to do better this coming year. Does that sound familiar? Ugh, it does to me. I really need to find a way to actually DO better, rather than just put it on my list. Anyone have any ideas on how to keep up your resolutions? That would be a great topic around the end of December! Email me if you have any fun things to share! sopositivelyhealthy@gmail.com

So here are a couple things I like that are yummy as well as healthy. First off, if you know me you know I love spicy stuff. Recently I made a couple spicy recipes that I'm sure lots of other people love as well.

The first was salsa. I just made some fresh salsa and canned it. That will be gone soon, you can count on it. The other was the spicy carrots, like they serve with your tacos at taquerias and really good, authentic Mexican places. Recipes below.

Who knew vegetables could be so fun to eat?

Cheers and hugs!
Denise

Spicy Carrots

6 to 8 carrots, peeled
2 large onions
6 hot peppers, green and red, washed and trimmed
6 cloves of garlic, peeled and divided
1/4 cup canning salt
2 1/2 cups distilled vinegar
2 1/2 cups water
Pint size jars and lids

Cut carrots, onions and peppers into chunks (size depends on what you prefer).
Combine salt, vinegar and water in a medium sauce pot. Bring to a boil.
Pack carrots, onions, peppers and garlic into jars, leaving 1/4-inch head space.
Ladle hot liquid over veggies, leaving 1/4-inch head space.
Remove air bubbles. Adjust caps.
Process pint (or quarts) 10 minutes in boiling water bath. Add 10 minutes for high altitude.
Let jars sit for 2 weeks before eating, to give carrots time to absorb flavors.

What's Up Doc?

It’s been awhile since I posted, mostly because I have been having all sorts of news concerning my health. I’m not here to complain, but to maybe help others find health and help for themselves, if they happen to be going through the same conditions.

Lee and I started having lots of out of town trips and that meant a lot of eating out; which makes it hard to eat vegetarian because most fast food places have very little to offer that doesn’t include meat of some kind. So we kind of fell off the wagon for a while.

And man, did I pay! All my symptoms suddenly got worse and I was having a hard time getting anywhere with my exercise. Here’s what happened:

I was waking up with a headache every day. I was feeling the need to “nap” almost daily, and we are talking 2-3 hours of knocked-out, full-on sleep! I never even did that in my pregnant days! I was noticing sharp pains all over my body in random places. This has actually happened to me my whole life, but it seemed worse at this point. My anxiety was getting worse, I was having a hard time concentrating or even ... what’s that word? ... oh yeah, remembering simple things like, um, words. Several other crazy symptoms manifested and I was just plain tired. And hurting. All the time.

So I did a crazy thing - I went to the doctor! Now, I am not one to just run to a doctor every time I get sick. In fact, I hadn’t been to a doctor in about 10 years. But after coming home one night wanting to cry because I just hurt everywhere, I figured it was time. I was at my wits end so I got on my computer, typed in “why do I hurt everywhere” on Google, and found this answer: fibromyalgia. Well, I certainly had all the symptoms but that didn’t mean I had that condition. But if the internet can come up with an actual answer to such a question, I figured I’d better go see a doctor.

Thank heaven for a good doctor! At my first visit he didn’t think I had fibromyalgia. Symptoms for that are so wide that it’s hard to tell for sure if someone has it. The symptoms for FM can fit so many other things that it’s hard to really know if it’s just that or another thing. So he tested me for thyroid disorder and sleep apnea.

My thyroid was fine. But when I did a simple sleep test (involving a clip that goes on your finger all night, hooked up to a small electronic device) it came out positive. So we did a stronger test, involving the same clip on my finger (which measures your oxygen and heart rate), another doohickey strapped to my chest, and an oxygen tube in my nose.

I went to the Sleep Institute for my results and found out something very interesting: I had severe sleep apnea. The doctor was right! (Thanks, Doc!) I was having apnea (stop breathing) episodes 68 times per hour! Side note: anything over 30 is severe.

So I got a CPAP machine to help me breathe at night. This helped my headaches, but my body was still hurting.

At my second visit to my physician, he ruled out other things and we realized that I also have FM.

Now I have to decide what to do about this. Exercise is good for FM but it is hard to do when you hurt and feel so run down. Plus, if you over-do it, you have several bad days immediately following. So I stretch, do some yoga, pretend to do some tai chi, and once in awhile I do some floor exercises.

I did notice, however, that I felt so much better when I was eating a more plant-based diet, so I’m back on the wagon, people!

And after reading Charlotte Gerson’s book, “The Gerson Way,” I have also put coffee enemas into the plan. (Don’t say “ew” so fast! You haven’t tried it yet!) These are wonderful for helping me feel better! I don’t really like doing them, but I really like how I feel afterward. In fact, just a few days ago I was feeling extremely bloated, like my liver was trying to push my stomach out the front of me, so I did the enema and all that awful bloatedness went away. I feel sort of cleansed. And I’m a little lighter. Does this really help with weight loss? I’ll keep you informed ...

And now I am back on a mostly vegetarian diet. Which we found out is called Flexitarian.

I love that avocados are vegetables. Well, technically fruit, but not much difference where the diet is concerned. These have to be the yummiest things on the planet. Lee and I call them “a vegetarian’s bacon.” Yeah, chocolate is good, but only if there is plenty of sugar in it.

My only problem is bacon. I love bacon. But now I just use it mostly on my spinach salad with poppy seed dressing. Mmmm, recipe below.

Happy eating!

Denise

Summer Salad (this is what we call it on our catering menu)

4 cups fresh baby spinach

1/2 red onion, thinly sliced

1 cup sliced almonds

1/2 cup real bacon bits

1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese (get the fresh kind that is in the wrapper and has a lot of “water” around it)

1 large can mandarin orange slices (craisins, apple pieces, grapes, or sliced strawberries may be substituted)

Poppy seed or Pink Vinaigrette dressing (recipe for this is on chefmamanise.blogspot.com)

Toss and serve!

By the way, I totally recommend this book:

"Healing The Gerson Way: Defeating Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases" by Charlotte Gerson with Beata Bishop. 

In it you will find information on how they discovered a cure - cure! - for cancer while finding a cure for heart disease and many other diseases. There are recipes and diet programs to help anyone cure and even reverse a great number of health problems these days. The "recipe" for a coffee enema is in there as well. This is actually a big part of the cancer cure, as it helps stimulate the liver into dumping toxins that have stored up in there. They don't recommend drinking coffee, but highly recommend the use of it in enemas to help cleanse the body. You can find more info at their website, too.

I'd love to hear what you think when you read this book! Let me know!