[traveling michele]

Sorry for the insomnia-- sure leaves you wiped out.

I'm wiped out due to Ellie (new puppy)!
I'm likening her to a baby just learning to walk and getting into everything but you have forgotten to put diapers on her!

She is having some diarrhea so I'm debating the vet or seeing if it will clear on it's own-- we changed living environments for her, changed her food, etc. She feels fine otherwise, is playing and energetic!

She went to sleep last night (after wailing in the crate) but woke up wailing a few hours later and wouldn't stop. I finally went down and found quite a mess to clean up. After I cleaned the crate she did go back to sleep till I got up at 4:45. Dh was home this morning to help but he leaves later today. I'm not sure how I'm going to get anything done with her!

Food and exercise this week-- crossing my fingers I don't get derailed with lack of sleep and puppy duties. It is staff appreciation week at school and we are going to be treated all week-- it's starting off with an amazing looking breakfast-- homemade scones and more-- that I'm trying to avoid.

I went to body pump last week and really want to repeat today. I keep making one class and then not going for a month or two and I really want to get back into the routine. However, if I have to take Ellie to the vet it obviously won't happen today.

[saef]

Georgette, you're reminding me I haven't made a good pot of minestrone for a while. Also, this is one of my ways to creatively use ground turkey. But I also know that my one-pot meals tend to trail off by June -- I don't seem to want to eat them once it gets really warm outside.

Michele, one of the best parts of my day yesterday was when I walked home from the gym, and there was a squirmy, barking Yorkie puppy in front of the produce market, whom I got to pet and baby-talk. The owner & I struck up a conversation, and I held the puppy's leash while the owner went inside & bought something. How that puppy pulled, longing to follow her owner!

Another tension-ridden day at the CT office, with a big meeting at 10 AM. Also, I'm going to see my doctor today, my general practitioner, whom I haven't seen since early last November, before the accident. Mostly I'm going because I need my antidepressant prescription renewed. They'll weigh me, take my blood pressure (which surely will have risen, from far less cardio & my current anxiety over work) and probably tap my blood.

Weigh-in this morning: 139.4, just about back to where I was on Friday.

Today's Meals:

Breakfast: Cranberry applesauce muffin; turkey bacon, broccoli & mushroom egg bake; cantaloupe with yogurt
Lunch: Hard to remember, because I ate quickly in the cafeteria, while clandestinely updating a friendly manager about what's going on. I think it was an arugula salad with lots of beans on top: a cannellini bean salad in vinaigrette, edamame, olives, some jicama because of Cinco de Mayo, and tri color pepper strips.
Snack: Cookies N' Cream Quest bar, once I got home at 6:30 PM, as lunch had happened back at noon, and I needed something before heading to the gym
Dinner: Chickpeas & spinach

Exercise for Today:

At the gym: 20 minutes walking 1.9 mph on treadmill set at maximum incline of 15, then Workout 2A of Strong Curves, which you're supposed to do twice a week. One of those nights when every time I wanted to use something, some big guy was on it. It was a warm summery day and the gym was packed tonight.

[Georgette]

Howdy Saef...You make a good point, 1-pot meals are more tempting in cooler weather. I also love salad with tuna and green olives, and there are some soups that I like more in the summer, like this one: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/jamaican-spinach-soup/

Michelle, you bring up something I've been wondering. What do you maintainers eat for breakfast? Good luck with little Ellie. Hope the diarrhea resolves ASAP.

[Mudpie]

Michele Didn't the breeder give you food for the puppy - to transition her from whatever they fed her to what you will feed? An abrupt change of food = instant diarrhea. And puppies get dehydrated very quickly so you will likely have to take her to the vet if the issue doesn't resolve by Thurs.

Strange that the breeder wouldn't talk to you about this.

Dagmar

[traveling michele]

Dagmar-- she did give me food and I was transitioning slowly. However, I didn't realize there was also a water change (they are on well water). I took her to the vet yesterday and she suggested cottage cheese and rice for three days (which we had already started at lunch yesterday). She weighed 10.4 pounds and looked great (other than the diarrhea). I'm supposed to bring a sample in so they can double check for bacteria, etc. (she's had multiple dewormings). The breeder said she's had other puppies get diarrhea for a day after the stress of their new home but it always clears right up. She made it through the night without diarrhea but she had it this morning. Her crate was wet so we didn't quite make it. I heard her at 4:30 and suspect if I'd gotten her out immediately, rather than 5 minutes later, she might have made it.

Georgette-- I eat the same breakfast most mornings. I have oatmeal (quaker oats high fiber packet with 1/3 cup of almond or cashew milk)-- in it I put a banana and berries and top it with a sprinkling of goji berries. I love it and never tire of it!

My weight is going the wrong direction though. No exercise yesterday. Not sure what today will bring. My whole body is sore and I can barely move my neck. Ugh.

Saef-- good luck at the doc. I bet he/she will notice your weight drop!

[Mudpie]

Michele I hope the rice and cc are working for Ellie. Trixie is having diarrhea in sympathy apparently. She is also incredibly itchy, even after we applied a flea/heartworm treatment last Friday. Asked the vet and they strongly recommended no other chemical flea eradication. So we will have to bathe her after the diarrhea stops. And she has her incontinence meds now - which I will also start after her tummy clears up. Dogs are fun!

You now should start posting Ellie pics every week - pretty please?

Dagmar

[neurodoc]

My breakfast varies a lot. Sometimes cottage cheese and berries on top of a slice of homemade banana bread, sometimes a scrambled egg with spinach and feta on an english muffin, sometimes 1/2 c. greek yogurt with granola and sliced fruit, sometimes 1/3 c. oatmeal made with milk and topped with pb2, protein powder, cocoa powder and splenda, sometimes a banana spread with 2 tbsp of peanut butter ... basically, I try to keep it around 300 calories and have it include 10 gm of protein.

Saw 130.x on the scale again this morning, and felt really sad. At least I'm sticking to my resolve to weigh daily. Now if I would just stop the after-dinner eating, I could get the scale to move in the RIGHT direction.

[Georgette]

Interesting, Andrea. I'm not a calorie counter....this strategy has never appealed to me since I hate this extra focus. I'm better with "guidelines" than tabulation. But out of curiosity, I looked up some of my typical breakfasts, and they are usually between 200 and 300 cals and have anywhere from 10 to 20 g protein.

My typical breakfasts are egg whites with spinach and cheddar, bran flakes with blueberries and soy milk, and oatmeal with cherries and walnuts.

After dinner eating is my achilles heal as well. Just tough tough tough. That and alcohol in the evenings.

[saef]

The tension grinds on. When the secrecy lifts, after a meeting at 11 AM tomorrow, that will make it easier. The people in the cubicles know by now, from some of their fellows being pulled aside, and all the closed-door meetings, though some management above me pretend it's still confidential.

At the doctor's office yesterday, this judgmental man who's always been all about my weight said to me, in a voice that sounded concerned: "Did you know you'd lost about 20 pounds?"

Well, since you put it that way ... yeah.

Weigh-in this morning: 139.2, pretty steady

Today's Meals:

Breakfast: Cranberry applesauce muffin; turkey bacon, broccoli & mushroom egg bake; cantaloupe with yogurt
Snack: Two apricots
Lunch: Baby arugula with peppers, jicama, onions, tuna and a big glop of guacamole on top
Dinner: Saffron chicken on top of steamed broccoli
Dessert: Chocolate chip cookie dough Quest bar


Exercise:

At the gym: I took a 45-minute spin class, for the first time since November. No, it wasn't like before the accident. I set the resistance at a certain level, not too hard & not too loose, and didn't increase it or drop it. I did all the moves, from standing to squatting. My leg felt fine, no pressure at all, in fact, it felt great. I will do this again. But I won't return to spinning the way I did before, as I need to weight-train rather than up my cardio.

[saef]

My doctor warned me yesterday about my vulnerability to infection. Like, if I go to the dentist, I need a course of antibiotics beforehand, in case of dental instruments piercing my gums or mouth and causing infection. Apparently it will migrate straight to the alien titanium now implanted within my leg, and could cause major issues. So I am paranoid this morning about my very sore big toe, which feels like maybe an ingrown toenail is starting. Have to think of ways to avert this before it becomes an issue, and watch it.

Oh, and yes, the extreme levels of tension at work are continuing. Bracing myself for the aftermath of the 11 AM meeting in which the rank and file will be told of the grand design.

No weigh-in this morning. Not denial, just decided I was starting to get obsessed by tiny fractional fluctuations. I want the data point but not to think about it excessively, like a test or SAT score indicating my entire self-worth. (Not that test scores should do that, but sometimes it feels like they do.)

Today's Meals:

Breakfast: Cranberry applesauce muffin; turkey bacon, broccoli & mushroom egg bake; cherries with yogurt
Snack: Two fresh apricots with the picker's fingernail marks in their skin
Lunch: Spring mix salad with black-eyed peas, a bit of pesto rice, lots of veggies
Snack: A MacIntosh apple, which I ate slowly and relished
Dinner: Saffron chicken on top of steamed broccoli
Dessert: Quest Double Chocolate Chunk bar

Exercise for today:

At the gym: Went at 5:15 AM for 20 minutes on Cybex arc trainer, resistance at eight, hill intervals, to work my legs before a day at the office. Also helps me work on the fear of crossing the street early in the morning at about the time the car hit me.

Went back to the gym for 7 PM Pilates mat class. Not my best class. I am really weary from the week's drama.

[silverbirch]

I didn't know about vulnerability to infection with titanium implants. Thanks for mentioning it. A friend's grandmother was an early guinea pig for titanium hips - she went on for years.

Good luck with work, saef. It does sound challenging. Is your position in the grand design a permanent thing or is it a staging post towards the future? (I know, we cannot tell the future.)

[Georgette]

Saef, I have heard this about implants/replacements. A good friend of mine had a double hip replacement done recently. She had a small infection, cutaneous, which she cleaned and treated with antibacterial ointment on my advice (RN). It went away within 2 days, yay, right? But then she became very very sick about 2 weeks later with staph in one of the hips. They had to go in and replace the ball and her recovery is back at "square 2" as she calls it.

Now, there is no way of knowing whether the infection came from that small cutaneous infection, or if it was bacteria that got in during the surgery itself (she was only about 8 weeks post-op) or from another site. We don't know. But I felt terrible that she hadn't called her MD. After this experience, I would encourage anyone with a replacement or implant with any kind of infection to call the MD's office and let them know what's going on and get advice.

AS for me: I'm still below red-line. My dinners for yesterday and today were derailed by my parents wanting to host us now that they are back. (Have to brag again, my dad just ran the Boston marathon at 65.) Last night we had Vietnamese broth soup-pho-so pretty low-cal. I always end up stuffed after that. There was also very delicious bread and butter on the table. I really enjoyed one piece and didn't find myself driven toward more! What a relief to be able to eat those higher cal foods without an internal battle!!!!!! I think it is helping to know that there are foods I can eat as much as I want of (volumetrics honeymoon, maybe?)

Tonight they are hosting us for seafood stew. It's in a tomato-cream base and so not low-fat. But the seafood is low fat. I'm not going to sweat it, and I'll just enjoy. It promises to be delicious.

B-oat and blueberry pancakes
S-fruit and nut bar and fruit
L-tacos with black beans
S-Fruit or smoothie
D-Seafood soup, salad?
Ds-Icecream sundae

Those oat and blueberry pancakes...well, it's a new recipe and I really felt like having them. I calculated their cals, and they are over 400 for the serving I'm going to have. I decided to just go for it. I'm not wanting to restrict as it seems to backfire, and they are pretty healthy other than just being danged high carb. I'm deciding that I'm not worried about it. The rest of my day is looking pretty ok. I'm going to focus on the seafood instead of the broth of the stew, and I will eat a lot of salad at dinner too, I hope.

Blech. Have I ever mentioned that I hate having to think about this stuff? But maintenance is worth it I spose.

[alinnell]

And now I know why my in-laws have to have antibiotics prior to dental cleanings (they both have artificial knees). See, we learn a lot here!

[traveling michele]

Georgette-- I thought you work in a school? Are you a school nurse? I love Pho but the sodium kills me (I looked PG the last time I had it). I concentrated on volumetrics last night with tons of veggies.... my weight was down .6 today and I was certainly full.

I have heard about the antibiotics with artificial parts-- Saef-- good to be aware, no need to be paranoid....

Almost Friday-- I've felt all week that it should be a day later than it is so today feels like Friday!

Any Mother's Day plans? I don't have any that I know of but I'm sure dh will treat me nicely and probably cook a delicious dinner. I'm realizing I didn't send my MIL a card and it's too late now so a call with have to suffice.

[alinnell]

Michele~I've convinced myself that my children will not know it is Mother's Day and therefore nothing will happen. DH joked that if, by say 7 PM, they have not called me he's going to text them saying they are bad kids and they've been cut off (since they are still in school we do support them financially). It'll be a joke but I'm pretty sure the day will go on without them calling. I texted my DS on Cinco de Mayo, at 5 PM saying happy Cinco de Mayo. He replied 2 hours later saying, "wow, I didn't even know."

Anyway, it'll be a typical Sunday for us--golf, lunch, maybe a movie and then dinner at my house. All with the in-laws. And MIL will get a card and gift from us.

I'm happy to report that even though I still despise getting up and doing it, I am doing my exercising each morning. My weight is still above what it should be but I'm getting stronger as I can do twice the strength exercises than when I first started.