Category: Life

Life

Letting Them Go Just a Little Bit More

Karen

http://twitter.com/#!/writefromkaren/status/31000382503124994

And that’s how my day started.

But it wasn’t just the stress of them driving to school, by themselves, for the first time (by the way, Dude drove them both, Jazz can’t drive yet. So, both my babies in the car – double stress!), it was the fact that I forgot all about the frost factor.

And Dude’s car’s back window defroster thing doesn’t work.

It all started with a warning, “Dude. Are you ready to drive to school on Friday?”

I received a grunt. Which doesn’t tell me much other than the fact that he heard my voice (not necessarily my words). That was good enough for me. (For I could also claim later, “but you GRUNTED! So I know you heard me!” Heh. I’m not a mom of two teenage boys for nothing, thank you very much).

I made sure today would be a good weather day. No snow. No ice. No thunderstorms on the way.

Sixty and sunny – perfect.

Only … I didn’t take into account that the weather would be a “frosty” 28 degrees when they took off for school today, and since the car they drive is outside, this means the thing was frost covered and required scraping.

Dude and I grabbed a scraper and I helped him scrape his windows. In the meantime, the clock was ticking and I knew if they didn’t get on the road in the next five minutes, they would be in serious trouble of walking in late.

Luckily, the car has a good heater aside from the broken back window defroster, and we soon had the car cleaned off. (In fact, I overdid it because I didn’t want to take a chance on him not being able to see out of his windows – not the most ideal situation for a newbie driver).

They got on the road at exactly 7:30. They had exactly twenty minutes to get to school, park, walk across the parking lot and get into class before the bell rung at 7:50 a.m.

I asked Jazz to text me that they had arrived so I wouldn’t worry about them. (I asked Jazz because I didn’t want to distract Dude from driving, parking, other drivers, etc).

At 7:45 a.m., I still didn’t hear anything. I tried not to worry but hello, I’m mom, it’s my job. At 7:46 a.m., I texted them both “Are you there?”

Nothing.

At 7:47 a.m., I called Jazz’s number – it went straight to voice mail. He hadn’t turned his phone on yet.

At 7:47 a.m. and 30 seconds, I called Jazz’s number again. This time, it rang several times before his voice mail message came up. At least the boy had turned it on, which meant THEY WERE ALIVE.

But still … I wondered, I fretted and I couldn’t take it anymore. I threw on a jacket, put on some shoes and drove up to the school taking the same route they would have taken just in case they had had an accident or broke down somewhere along the way and I would find them.

I tried not to, but I kept picturing them involved in an accident on my way to the school. I’m a big believer in NOT believing that kind of stuff happening, so I had a time struggling to keep my imagination in check.

But everything was normal up to the school. I drove into the parking lot of the school at 7:55 a.m. I wasn’t expecting to find them in the parking lot, but still … I had to check.

I saw a boy who looked exactly like Dude walking toward the building. My heart jumped into my sinus cavity and bounced off my cranium.

“Oh Lord. Something happened. And where is Jazz?”

I sort of sped through the parking lot (don’t do that, it’s dangerous, by the way), to see if that was indeed Dude. To my utter relief, it wasn’t – just another poor kid late to school.

I drove through the parking lot until I located Dude’s car.

Yes. Yes, I did. I probably shouldn’t admit that, and I won’t tell the boys that, but we’re all friends here and I can trust you, right?

RIGHT??

Anyway, I found the car. It was safely in a parking space and my heart finally safely resumed a normal beat.

In my heart, I KNOW they will be fine. Dude is a good driver, he’s very cautious, perhaps too cautious, but I can’t help worrying about them. I will probably continue worrying about them until they have some experience driving – I know that’s no guarantee that nothing will happen, but at least the odds of something happening dwindle as time goes on.

This letting go of my children thing is HARD. I’m getting better at it, but it’s times like these, like today, when I let them go just a bit more that it really hits me … this parenting gig is BITTER/SWEET.

Just you wait, you young whipper-snappers, your kids will be where my kids are now someday and you’ll know, first hand, just what the heck I’m talking about.

Food

Cooking Italian-Style Chicken Strips

Karen

This is Jazz, my youngest son, and he’s eating a dish that he cooked for us the other night.

I know, judging by his expression, that he appears not to like what he cooked, but actually, he was trying (keyword: trying) to appear cool in his approval.

I’m thinking he failed.

Anyway, he made this recipe in cooking class and he was dying to try it out on us.

Actually, Dude took the same cooking class and …

What’s that? How in the world did I coax my very manly teenage boys to take a cooking class?

You mean aside from my threats of getting out of the car when I drop them off in the morning, wave and yell so loudly that our neighbors in the next county can hear me, “Have a good day, boys! Mommy loves you!”?

Er … nothing. They WANTED to take the class. I didn’t have to do anything.

Granted, it sounded more fun than a lot of the other class choices, but still, cooking class – for my teenage boys. I was quite thrilled, if you want the truth. I mean come on, EVERYONE needs to know how to cook for themselves, right? I mean, I’m quite sure I’ll be over at their apartments every day making sure they drink more water than soda, brush their teeth and to pick up their dirty (stinky) socks, I can’t possibly make their meals too, now can I? I mean, I need to draw the line somewhere, don’t I?

(Okay fine, I’ll be cooking their meals, too. Whatever).

Anyway, where was I … oh yeah. Voluntarily taking a cooking class. Actually, the boys don’t mind taking classes they feel will benefit them in “real” life (because going to school to learn proper English and how to calculate distance is not real life, don’t you know). And this cooking class was definitely in that “real-life” category.

I’m proud to say that both boys quite enjoyed their cooking class (and when I asked them if there were a lot of boys in their cooking classes, thinking that maybe the REAL reason they wanted to take the cooking class was because it would be chock full of cute girls and they wanted to take advantage of the 50:1 girl-to-boy ratio, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that there were quite a few boys taking the class. Of course, they could have been lying to me but let’s humor my disillusions, shall we?).

In fact, Jazz enjoyed his class SO much that he wanted to try one of his favorite recipes from the class out on us.

So, last Thursday night was Jazz’s night to cook for us. I asked him what he needed, I put those items on our grocery list, I bought those items for him, and he cooked for us.

We had to monkey rig the breading a bit – there simply wasn’t enough to coat the number of strips we made, but it turned out really good and we’ll definitely be adding it to our recipe rotation list. (Kevin made a database of recipes and printed it out so when it comes time to plan the next week’s menu, all I have to do is take out that list and POW, instant no brainer. I like no brainers).

Here is the recipe for Italian-Style Chicken Strips if you want to try it out for yourself:

Italian-Style Chicken Strips

Prep: 15 minutes | Cook time: 20 minutes | Serves 4

1/4 cup dry bread crumbs (by the way, don’t waste your money buying bread crumbs, just toast some bread, then take a fork and scrape off the crumbs).
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
1/2 teaspoon Garlic Salt
1/2 teaspoon Pepper
1/4 cup corn meal (we had to add this just to make more breading. It worked nicely).
1 pound of skinless, boneless chicken breasts cut into strips
1 cup Olive oil
1 jar of spaghetti sauce
Spaghetti noodles (enough to feed four [or more] people).

One
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Two
Combine bread crumbs, Italian seasoning, garlic salt, and pepper in a bowl. Give it a good stir.

Three
Cut chicken into 1/2 inch strips. Place in breading mixture, coat chicken completely.

Four
Place chicken in a single layer on a baking sheet. Drizzle Olive oil over chicken strips.

Five
Bake 9 minutes. Turn pieces over and bake another 9 to 11 minutes until cooked completely through.

Six
Serve with spaghetti noodles, pour spaghetti sauce over chicken strips and noodles.

Seven
Praise your child immensely and try and talk your child into cooking for you more often. Momma needs more blogging material.

Enjoy!!

Food

Fasting Facts

Karen

Fasting is a natural practice done to promote healing. Taking a break from food allows for a re-balancing within the body.

So I read more about fasting …

I’ll admit, some of it sounds a little hocus-pocus to me, but I think there are definite benefits from fasting. Here is a bit of the information that I found (you can find a lot more information at allaboutfasting.com).

What are the benefits of fasting:

When we cease the over-indulgence that has become so common in our modern world, even for a short while, our lives and our priorities become clearer.

Fasting will:

1. rest the digestive system (BINGO! And the biggest reason I would even consider fasting).
2. allow for cleansing and detoxification of the body (!!)
3. create a break in eating patterns, while shining a spotlight on them
4. promote greater mental clarity (I have my doubts about this)
5. cleanse and heal “stuck” emotional patterns (sounds a little new age to me – however, if you feel better physically, I’m sure the emotional is not far behind)
6. lead to a feeling of physical lightness, increasing energy level (I could definitely use more energy)
7. promote an inner stillness, enhancing spiritual connection

Apparently, fasting initiates the body’s own healing mechanisms. In fact, this site claims that when someone fasts, they can often times experience flu-like symptoms because the body works overtime to rid itself of toxins. I can buy this because your body goes through something similar when you start an exercise program. Have you ever exercised after a long period of being lazy and felt more sick than good? It’s because your body is burning fat, which traps viruses and when it burns, the toxins release thereby causing your body to go into protective mode, fighting off the released viruses. I’m sure fasting does something similar, at least, that makes sense to me.

When we overindulge, our bodies are overwhelmed and it creates a burden on the body. When this happens, the body goes into survival mode and concentrates on the areas of the body that need attention first, shoving less important issues to the side. When you fast, the body can concentrate on those less important issues and work on healing/fixing them.

Interesting.

During fasting, we rest our system from the constant onslaught of food stuffs. We usually think of food as giving us energy, so it can be a new way of thinking to understand how the food we eat actually requires energy. Digesting, assimilating and metabolizing–these activities require a great deal of energy. It is estimated that 65% of the body’s energy must be directed to the digestive organs after a heavy meal.

Free up this energy and it can be diverted to healing and recuperation. It can detox and repair cells, tissues and organs, eliminating foreign toxins as well as the natural metabolic wastes (which are also toxins) produced even by our healthy cells.

And this is what the body will do during a fast. It will take advantage of that time and energy to do some housecleaning. The overloaded, overworked system, unable to properly handle all the toxins, has been storing any excesses in the tissues where they can be dealt with later. This is one of the great health benefits of fasting in that it offers this opportunity to play “catch up”.

Fasting itself isn’t necessarily a “cure” for anything. What it does is “set the stage” or create the environment in which healing can occur. Our bodies know how to heal themselves. We just have to “get out of the way”, and this means on all levels of our being. Fasting has a way of rebalancing us on all those levels.

Interesting. Oh wait, I already said that.

It warns that people who are anemic should not fast. Hmm … I am anemic, but not severely. I think if I build up my iron reserves before starting the fast I should be okay. I will also have to wean myself off caffeine before starting as well to save myself from the killer caffeine-withdrawal headache. (Which are pretty killer for me).

Oops. Just read that people recovering from surgeries should not fast. Rats. That would be me. I’ll have to wait a few more weeks at least before I attempt this. But that’s okay, that will give me more time to properly prepare myself. Because a person who is prepared to fast will often suffer less than a person who hasn’t prepared.

There are different types of fasting:

Fruit Fasting – A popular form of fasting is fruit fasting, ingesting only fresh, raw fruits. This is a good fast for beginners, especially the one-day fruit fast. It offers some choices as to the fruit to use, and like all fasts, you can create your own specific routine.

A fruit fast, like any of the fasting methods, will create an environment for your body to heal. You will experience an internal cleansing as the body’s systems begin the housekeeping they’ve been unable to do before. Toxins stored in the tissues will have an opportunity to be flushed out.

This detox will come with symptoms resembling the flu. Headaches, nausea, diarrhea, sore throat, coughing, fatigue, body odor, body aches, and sinus discharge are all considered normal reactions during a fast. If you find yourself with any of these side effects, take heart! and know they are a sign that your body is healing.

Does the sugar content of fruit concern you? Don’t let it. Fructose, the sugar in fruit, is slowly broken down and converted by the body through several complex processes, into sucrose and glycogen, supplying energy over a long period of time. Fruit is actually recommended for many with sugar-metabolizing disorders, such as hypoglycemia.

A fruit fast is actually what they recommend for one-day fasters and/or beginners. I’d probably stick with apples, though there are many more fruits you could choose from. They recommend four apples for the day – one for each meal and one for a snack. I could easily do this for one day and this is probably the one I’ll start first. I’d then like to go on and try the juice fast. You can read more about the healing effects of a juice fast here. (This will also give me some time to shop deals on juicers).

There’s a rice fast, I’ve never heard of this one. (Who am I kidding, I’ve never heard of 95% of this stuff) and “a brown rice fast can alleviate many digestive troubles.” Hmmm, I may have to try this one, too.

There is also a water fast and a master cleanse fast, but I’m not really that interested in those.

I think I’m going to have to try this over the weekend as I will have the time to simply rest, which is what is recommended. (They actually recommend taking naps – I can do that!) I’ll try a one-day fast to begin with and possibly work my way up to a two, or even a three day fast, but we’ll see how it goes. I’m really curious to find out how my body reacts to eating nothing but apples and drinking two quarts of lemon-flavored water.

Be careful not to fast too frequently; allow your body sufficient time to rebuild nutritional reserves. Two days per week is too frequent, as is one week every month. Recommended fasting times for regular, occasional “maintenance” and rebalancing are one day per week and/or 3 days per month and/or 10 days yearly.

I’m thinking two days per month might be better for me, but again, we’ll just have to see how my body reacts.

I’m excited to try this. I’m not looking forward to the detox symptoms, but I’ll prepare and hopefully it won’t be that bad. I’m most excited to see how this affects my digestive tract. If I can keep it cleaned out, then I shouldn’t have any problems. Right? At least, in theory. We’ll see how it works out when I actually start one.

In the meantime, hide your candy. 😉

P.S. By the way, things are quietening down again. I think it was just gas yesterday. I just picked at my food all day so my intestines wouldn’t have to work as hard. There is definitely a learning curve to this experience.

Life

Preparing to Fast

Karen

I’ve been reading about fasting.

Don’t worry, I’m not developing an eating disorder and though I’d like to lose about thirty more pounds, I’m not leaning toward fasting to obtain that goal, either.

No, I think fasting would be a good thing for me to do, once in a while, to give my intestines a rest.

Before we go any further, I’m fine. In fact, I’m more than fine, I’m feeling pretty great, quite honestly. I’m so excited to have regular BM’s again that I proudly tell my family whenever it happens because I’m so overjoyed with getting back to normal. (Though funny at first, my family is getting quite sick of my little “announcements”. I’ll have to celebrate on my own in the future, I think).

I even lost weight from this whole ordeal, which is a nice little side perk from having my guts surgically removed from my bloated body. A few days before I finally threw in the white towel and went to the emergency room, I weighed myself.

I never weigh myself. One, it’s useless. I’m a big woman and I have some poundage under the best circumstances and two, I keep track of my body mass by how tight my clothes are fitting. But something felt off … I was bloated, my fingers were sausages, my face looked like someone stuffed walnuts into my cheeks. The thing was, I wasn’t eating. I felt too full/bloated/uncomfortable to eat anything and yet, my body kept expanding.

Out of curiosity, I weighed myself. And nearly had a heart attack. The number was NOT flattering. In fact, it was quite shocking.

Of course NOW I know that that was largely due to the fact that I was carrying an extra three feet of intestine inside my body and had weeks worth of fecal matter impacted in my intestinal walls.

A few weeks after my surgery (can you believe it’ll be a MONTH since my surgery on Thursday??), after the swelling had gone down and my poochy belly wasn’t so poochy, I weighed myself again.

I had to get my glasses because I was convinced I wasn’t reading it correctly.

I had lost FIFTEEN POUNDS!!

Wow. (By the way, I would NOT recommend having your guts removed as a weight loss option. Just saying).

So … NICE. Fifteen pounds lighter. I’ll take it. In fact, I was able to finally fit into a pair of jeans that I couldn’t even button shortly after my surgery. They’re still tight, but not to the point where I can’t breathe.

I wore them the past few days and I felt GOOD about myself. I plan on keeping that poundage off so I can continue to wear them. (Remember? Don’t buy bigger clothes – that just gets you into trouble).

However, last night, I started feeling … weird. My insides were sore and tender. They’re still a bit on the tender side today, but not as bad. And I think that’s because I wore my tight jeans the past few days and the pressure just squeezed them too much. I’m giving them a little more breathing room today.

Also, my insides have started grumbling again. Not like they were before my surgery, but like they were waaay back before any of this became an issue (about five years ago).

So I’m wondering, is this normal? I’m guessing it’s trapped gas – I’m passing gas, so I’m not worried about that, but the rumbling is happening in different areas, deeper areas.

Some of that grumbling could be because I”m hungry. I’ve been trying not to eat as much as I have been, mainly because I figured it’s easier for my body to process and then dump, but it’s got me thinking …

What if my problem comes back? I mean, don’t laugh, but what if I start growing extra intestine again? Which begs the question, how the heck did that extra intestine even get there to begin with? (A question I plan on asking my doctor when I go back and see him in a couple of weeks). I mean, I was born with it, so my doctor says. Did it grow with me? I mean, if I’ve had it my entire life, why hasn’t it given me problems before now? Or, did my body just produce extra intestine over time and … is it possible for that to happen again??

I know it sounds bizarre, but the fact is, I had three feet of extra intestine … this is not usual. I even tried Googling it and came up empty. Now, if the Internet doesn’t even acknowledge a person having extra intestine then you KNOW it must be something weird and out of the ordinary.

I guess I’m wondering … is the grumbling I’m having causing my intestine to stretch and grow? I know this sounds a bit alien-ish, but honestly, we’re in science fiction territory here: I don’t have an alien in my body, but I DO have extra organs.

Tell me that’s not weird.

At any rate, I’m relearning my body once again. I’ve been paying close attention to how it’s working and I’ve been eating all of the foods that I avoided before all of this craziness even began. I’ve been eating fruits, peanuts, ice cream, brans, oats and so far … everything seems to be working just fine, though I do wonder if some of these foods are causing me excess gas, which would explain the grumbling.

I’m also thinking about scar tissue … a lot.

I was reading a blog the other day, and the gal had had to go to the hospital because her small intestine stopped working. They suggested she not eat anything for a few days and walk. (Walking encourages your bowels to move) and to my knowledge, that did the trick.

The doctors suggested she fast because doing so gives your intestines a break. Things quieten down in there and they have a chance to naturally discharge anything that’s built up – they have a chance to “catch up”, if you will.

When you’re in the hospital, they will often put patients on NPO (nothing by mouth) to give your body a rest and make sure your stomach is empty before surgery, etc.

So I’m wondering, should I be fasting once in a while to help heal my intestines? Will that help prevent build-ups around my incision and will that prevent future problems? I’m thinking, what can it hurt?

I mentioned that I’ve been reading about fasting and wow. There are of course, all sorts of fads and weird rituals you can supposedly do to cleanse your colon, but I don’t want to jump on any fad wagon, I just want to cleanse my body as naturally as possible.

The question is, how? And for how long? I’m still doing some research, I’ll let you know what I end up doing and how it goes. But I feel like I should try this if for no other reason than to give my body a rest and hopefully prevent any future complications from developing from scar tissue.

My steri-strips have nearly all fallen off. My scar has been itching like crazy, which is a good sign, I guess, it’s healing. I’m still not supposed to do any sort of exercising for another two weeks (save for walking), but other than that, I seem to be getting back to normal. I wasn’t able to walk very fast for a few weeks (whenever Kevin and I went shopping, he would have to slow down to wait for me to catch up. It’s funny, our situations are completely reversed than what they were when he was recovering from his motorcycle accident), and coughing and sneezing nearly killed me. But now, none of that stuff bothers me anymore and I’m back to waiting for Kevin to catch up with me. I still have some pretty significant pressure and pain if I push too much, so I’m taking it easy in that regard, but otherwise, things are getting back to normal.

I FEEL normal again. Now I’m on a mission to keep it that way. I don’t want to obsess about having scar tissue complications down the road, but it’s hard not to think about it when it’s a very real concern.

Updated: So, I spoke too soon, apparently. I’m feeling uncomfortable today, but I don’t know if it’s gas, tenderness or what. I also have what looks like a blister around my incision. Of course I Googled it and incisional hernia came up. I don’t think that’s what this is, I think it’s a blister as the area is precisely under where the zipper of my jeans would rub. I’ve put some gauze on it to protect it and I will definitely keep an eye on it, but I don’t think there is anything to worry about at this point. It’s so weird, I felt fine until today. But like I said, I’ve been eating foods I’ve been avoiding up to this point so it might be a gassy reaction from something I ate. But again, I’ll pay close attention and bring it to my doctor’s attention when I see him in a few weeks. Don’t worry (mom). 🙂