FAIL!

Okay, so I never wrote during my "easing out" process. I am really bad at keeping up with this. The process was not to bad. The fresh squeezed orange juice was awful because they are not in season. It tasted like I was drinking orange rinds with lots of pulp. Because of this I cheated and had some bottled juice that I got at the store. I also cheated and ate soup before I was supposed to and solids...Next time I do the cleanse, I will make sure to do everything appropriately, but I just couldn't do it this time! I NEEDED to eat!

I also failed with the quitting smoking, but I have already gotten back on the wagon and I am giving it another go. I really, really want this to work. I just can not keep poisoning myself with expensive cancer sticks! Not to mention the fact that while my husband has been very patient about it, he hates smoking.  And since I am half way through my period now, the mood swings should not be so bad which will help in my efforts. I am doing this for myself, my husband, and our future family.

Next week is going to be a busy one. I need to get everything prepared for the big move. The movers come on Monday, August 27th and of our stuff will be on its way across the Atlantic. We have to get our apartment deep cleaned before we leave and I also need to get packed for my return to the USA on August 29th. Time is going to pass quickly. On the one hand, that is a good thing because I miss my sweet little dog so bad! On the other hand it stinks, because I am going to miss DH so bad and I won't see him until October. He will come for a vacation at that point. I hope we find something out pretty soon so we will have an idea of when he will be home for good. I do not like being apart from my man!

Well, that is about all at the moment. I hope things go smoothly in the next couple of weeks!

DAY 10! DAY 10! DAY 10!

Today is day 10! Yesterday I weighed in at 140 pounds and today I weighed in at 139.5. Amazing! I can not remember the last time I was in the 130's!

Since going without food for nine days, and dealing with PMS was not enough, yesterday I decided to stop smoking too. I have been wanting to for a while, but it is just so hard! I have quit so many times and gone back to it....but this time I have really made some other healthy changes in my life and I really want this to stick! So yesterday I did not smoke, and I have not smoked today either. So far, it has not been too bad. Usually the third day is the hardest for me though...so we will see.

Back to the cleanse though. Things are good. My mood is pretty good, and the little bit of irritation I feel is most certainly from the PMS and not from the cleanse.  I am super excited to begin the "easing out" process, and slowly work my way back to solid food (YEA! CHEWING!)

Kevin and I went to the grocery store last night for a quick trip. I needed to pick up some oranges for fresh squeezed orange juice, I needed lemons, another bottle of pure maple syrup, and some broth type "soup". I also picked up some actual food though. Now I have food sitting in the cupboard for myself!

My main goal coming up for the rest of this week and really from here on out, is to be active. I want to make sure I take  a daily walk...at least around the lake, some days longer, and maybe take some nice bike rides around town. I want to start to stretch on a regular basis on our living room floor, and I want to start doing some basic exercises that I can do without a gym. I want to get my metabolism burning well and keep this weight off as much as possible. After not eating for 10 days, my body has gone into starvation mode and it will probably want to hold on to every calorie and fat gram that I ingest at the beginning, so it is very important to get my metabolism revved up.

So that is about it. I will try to report about the "easing out" process and how my body reacts to eating solid food again.

Apparently every other day works better for me.

Once again I forgot to write yesterday. Not much has changed really, however when I weighed myself yesterday morning, I did manage to gain a half pound somehow. I was at 141.5. When I weighed myself this morning, I was back down and my current weight is 140.5. I do expect to gain some weight back once I begin eating again and I am very curious how much of it I will gain back. Hopefully not too much!

My intestines continue to do this weird gurgling thing in the evenings. All day I am fine, but the evening rolls around and I can feel my intestines moving all over the place. It is a really weird feeling.

I am continuing to be amazed by the amount of crap still coming out of me. I must have been harboring this shit for a very long time! It is good to get it all flushed out of me. Clearly I needed to do this cleanse.

My energy continues to be good and I have still not had any mood swings. I do feel them beginning to creep up on me, but I think that has more to do with PMS than the cleanse.

I am really beginning to miss food. Not because I am hungry, but more so because I miss chewing stuff! When I hear DH chomping on bagel chips, it is the crunchiness that I crave....not so much the food itself. I don't feel hungry during the day because I am religious on keeping up with my lemonade. I have to admit...a little different flavor would be nice too. I am not going to stop now though because this is day 8! I have almost completed this journey! Not to mention, I made a bet with a friend. He really did not think I would be able to do it, so he bet me a bottle of wine (at least 10 euros..no cheapy stuff). I am so happy to prove him wrong and I can already taste the Fumé Blanc!

So overall, things are good. Our anniversary dinner on August 14th is going to be the best pizza I have ever eaten! I am sure I will be smiling from ear to ear!

Oops, I did it again. (This is not a Brittany Spears post)

Well here I am at day 6 and I missed day 5! No biggie. I forgot to weigh myself yesterday anyway and by the time I remembered, I had just finished drinking a liter of salt water so my weight would not have been accurate. I just decided I would make sure to remember to weigh myself today, which I did. I weighed in at 141 pounds! Another pound and a half gone.

Overall I am feeling good. Yesterday I had some rumbling going on in my intestines...serious stuff. I could actually feel my intestines moving and twitching. It was weird, but so far, none of that today. My energy level is very good as long as I keep drinking my lemonade. Tonight we might go out with some friends, so I need to bring my ingredients with me. Because of this little fact of toting everything around with me, I have felt kind of house bound.  The one day that I went to the pool and waited to long to drink my lemonade and I ended up very hungry. It made it much more difficult to stick with it. I did it though. I just prefer to keep up on it and it basically eliminates the difficulty at this point.

I am actually really beginning to enjoy this (that is not to say that I do not miss eating real food). I am feeling empowered and healthier than I have in a long time. I have actually developed a taste for the saltwater and the lemonade. I was so nervous that the saltwater would make me want to gag and vomit, but I am actually enjoying it at this point. That is a very big surprise!

So I am officially past the half way mark. After today I will have only 4 days left and then the "ease out" portion. Good times!

Oops..I missed day three and now it is day four.

So yesterday when I woke up and weighed myself, I was down another 2 pounds putting me at 143.5 pounds. I was shocked. I simply can not believe how all of this weight is melting off of me so quick.

My day was pretty good. Every day gets easier to stay away from food. I went to the pool with a friend of mine and her daughter and we had a lovely afternoon, but I ended up waiting longer to have my "lemonade" then I would normally wait and I was starving. That made it difficult, as everyone around us seemed to be eating french fries from the restaurant at the pool and my friend's daughter was eating a bunch of fruit that looked so juicy and yummy. I know she was concerned about having food in front of me, but I told her not to worry. I can not expect everyone else to stop eating because I have chosen to do so. Besides, I have to watch DH eat every evening! Once I got home, I made myself a lemonade and got passed it.

This morning I woke up and I was down another pound. So I am currently at 142.5. I can't even remember the last time I weighed this little. It was at least 6 years ago. None of my clothes fit me! This was actually a problem before I started this cleanse, but now it is WAY worse. I won't complain about that though. My MIL takes me shopping for my birthday every year and then we go out to lunch, so I will get some new pants on September 4th! I think I might also bring some of my other pants to get altered so I don't have to waste a bunch of perfectly good pants. This is a good problem to have as far as I am concerned.

I am feeling pretty good at the moment and tomorrow I will be at the half way mark. I feel so good about this that I have decided that I might make this a yearly thing that I do....although I will do it sometime in March. Doing this during the summer kind of stinks, and besides, it won't hurt to shed some winter weight before bikini season starts!

Day 2 of The Master Cleanse

I made it through yesterday somehow. It was not easy. I did not feel hungry...the "lemonade" did a good job of keeping my hunger at bay...but I just wanted to eat because I couldn't. It did not help that I was watching the Olympics and since McDonalds is a sponsor, there were constant commercials for them. I only eat fast food once or twice a year, but those french fries just looked so good!

Today I started out by drinking a quart of warm water with two teaspoons of sea salt in it. It was not delicious, but it was doable. I just tried to think about salty fries while I was drinking it. Anyway, this is supposed to work as a natural laxative....and it definitely worked.  I was a bit explosive this morning.

Today was a little bit easier to not be so tempted by food. I was not so bothered by commercials for food. The problem seems to arise around 4:00pm. I do well all day, but as the dinner hour approaches, I want to eat. Yesterday DH cooked a stir fry for dinner and it smelled wonderful. He is really trying to be supportive of me during this time though, and he made more than enough so that he could just re-heat food for the next couple of days instead of cooking every night. Hopefully that helps.

My mood seems to be stable and does not seem to be affected yet. I am happy about that. I also weighed myself this morning and I am down a pound from yesterday morning. I am at 145.5 pounds. I can not believe it!

"The Master Cleanse"

So I might be crazy, but I have decided to do "The Master Cleanse". If you don't know what it is, you can Google it. I am doing this to flush my body of toxins and start with a clean slate. I have been consistently  losing weight since the end of September and today I have reached the 20 pound mark, so I am NOT doing this cleanse for weight loss. I am losing weight just fine on my own. My main reason for this is because I have  really been making an effort to eat healthier and be more active, and I thought it would be good to clean out my colon of all of the nasty stuff that has built up over the last 30 something years of a bad diet. Hopefully I will feel like a million bucks after this.

This is the first time I have ever tried doing a cleanse, but my friend swears that it will change my life. She does this twice a year and she is a very healthy and active person, so I am taking her word for it.

It is not going to be easy because I will go without food for 10 days. I am not a big eater or snacker anyway, so I don't think it should be too hard, but if I get a craving for pizza (which I am about to start PMS, so that is a VERY good possibility) it could get difficult. I just need to stay focused and look at my countdown on our dry erase board by the front door, and remember that this is not forever. Plus, I will end my cleanse a few days before my 4 year anniversary with my wonderful husband. I have already informed him that I do not want a fancy-schmancy dinner for our anniversary. I just want to go out for pizza!

I wanted to blog about this so that I could document my feelings, cravings, and/or the empowerment I will get from this cleanse. I am very thankful my husband is so patient, so if I get crabby, I know he will forgive me.    
;-)

So today is day one. My starting weight at the beginning of the cleanse is 146.5 pounds. Wish me luck!

Another vinegar fiasco but a new lesson learned!

April 10, 2012

It has been a little while since I have written....what can I say? We have been busy. DH got an email about one of his interviews and they are interested in him becoming part of their team. He needs to find out what the next steps would be on our end in Germany and he still needs to talk about salary and relocation. This happens to be the job he wanted the least out of all of them, so we are trying to hold out and we are hoping he will here about another one that he had a lot of interest in. There are so many factors to consider, that we have no idea what we are doing. I feel good though. I am happy that someone wants him...now hopefully we will have choices (hopefully I am not being to greedy. ;-)).

Now...back to the vinegar thing. I had a week of uneventful showers after my original two incidents and I am still thrilled with the vinegar hair conditioner thing.  Although I had a smooth week, I did have a new incident occur and I learned something new because of it.

We went to Berlin on Thursday and stayed until Monday. We stayed with some friends and had a great time. When we arrived, I began to unpack our bathroom stuff to put them in the shower, and I realized that my spray bottle with the vinegar had leaked...almost all of it. Now, fortunately I did not have very much in the spray bottle to begin with, and also I had packed all of our toiletries in a thick plastic bag. None of our clothes were covered in vinegar.  Every thing in the bag was covered though....and this included things like my deoderant, hair brushes, face lotion, and my toothbrush. Yes, my toothbrush. I tried to rinse everything thoroughly (especially the toothbrush) and I dried everything off. Thankfully my toothbrush did not taste like vinegar when I used it.

I learned two lessons through all of this. One, when travelling, it might be better to bring the bottle of vinegar and then fill the spray bottle when you arrive at your location. Or, just buy a small travel size container of conditioner for the trip.  Two, vinegar does an amazing job of cleaning your hair brushes! Both of my hair brushes had a decent amount of hair in them, particularly my round roller brush that is really hard to clean out, but the vinegar basically made the hair fall right off the brushes. It was all hanging off so I just pulled the hair off and threw it in the trash. Just a quick rinse and my round roller brush looks like it is brand new!

I am officially in love with vinegar. I just keep finding new things that it is good for and I am thrilled. Hopefully by writing about this, I can save some of you from the same mistakes that I made, and hopefully you can benefit from my new discoveries!

We are almost out of fabric softener now, so we will be switching to vinegar for that soon too. I will keep you all updated!

Another day, another lesson

So today was day two of using vinegar as conditioner for my hair. I was wondering what my hair was going to look like after I used vinegar yesterday and then dared to allow my hair to air dry. Usually when I let my hair air dry, it turns into a afro-like mess. I was pleasantly surprised! My hair was shinier and smoother than it has ever been using conventional hair conditioner! Fantastic news. When I woke up this morning, it was still smooth, shiny, and fairly tame. Amazing!

I bought myself a spray bottle today so that I would not have a repeat of the "eye incident" today. I was looking forward to my shower this evening to see how well it worked. I was not sure how much I wanted to spray on since yesterday I just dumped it on and possibly used more than necessary. No biggie though. If I did not use enough, only DH would see the afro mess and he has seen it before.

So when I took my shower this evening, I waited until the end of my shower to use the vinegar because you are not supposed to let it sit on for long. You basically coat your hair and rinse it out. So I figured I would end my shower that way. HUGE MISTAKE! Whatever you do, NEVER EVER use vinegar on your hair AFTER you shave any part of your body.  As I rinsed the vinegar out, various precious parts of my body began to burn, and I am fairly certain it was worse than the eyes. I would go as far as to say that I may never have to shave again because hair might actually not grow back...  Can you tell that I like to exaggerate a bit? Seriously though, it really did burn.

In the end, the "eye incident" was avoided, but I still learned a new and valuable lesson.  My hair was soft and easy to brush through, and I look forward to a shower where there are no new lessons to be learned. :-)

A word of advice...

March 27, 2012

So I had run out of conditioner and I have committed to using vinegar as a replacement. When DH and I went to the grocery store on Saturday morning, I was looking for a spray bottle to put the vinegar in for easier application, but the store did not have a spray bottle. How is that possible you ask? I have no idea. This store is one of the largest stores in Germany and it is an all purpose store, not just a grocery store, but there was no spray bottle to be found.

On Sunday we had a pajama day and I did not even bother showering, so it was no big deal. When I showered on Monday, I used nothing on my hair for conditioner. I did not want to just dump the bottle on my head and waste a bunch of vinegar.  Tonight however, when I took my shower, I knew I needed to use something.  So I decided I would just try the dumping method until I can get to the store tomorrow and get a spray bottle.

I learned two things in this process, and I was reminded of one thing. First of all, whatever you do, DO NOT GET VINEGAR IN YOUR EYES. It really stings! This is one of the reasons that the pour method is not a good one.  The thing I was reminded about is how bad vinegar tastes. Only a few small drops had run down my face, but I managed to permanently damage my eyes (Okay, that might be a slight exaggeration), and the taste on my lips would not go away for the rest of my shower!

With that being said, the second thing I learned was that vinegar really works! My hair was definitely easier to brush through than on Monday when I used nothing at all! I am so excited about this!

Overall, I would say that I had success. I mean, as long as you learn something, it can't be a complete failure, right? Now I just need to get a spray bottle to avoid further eye casualties.

On a completely different note, DH has received two emails regarding setting up a second interview for a job back in the good ol' USA! I am feeling so happy about this. I want to get home to our family, friends, and a normal life (or at least normal for us). I am saying prayers that this pans out for us and we can move soon. I really need to get out of here!

I was also semi-productive around the apartment today and the animals and I enjoyed some time together. Overall, I would have to say that I had a good day. :-)

A better attitude!

March 20, 2012

Well I know it has been a while since I have written, but that is because I have been doing a lot of thinking about where I want to go with this blog.  I have decided to have a "fuck it" attitude towards living in Germany and the attitude I get from so many of the people that live here. I figure at this point I don't like Germans very much (I know that is a generalization, and I do like some Germans...just not most of them), so why should I care about whether they like Americans or not?  Americans have a bad name in a lot of places and I was always struggling to prove that Americans are a great group of people!  I have decided that it is a waste of my energy (they aren't going to change their minds anyway) and it only stresses me out, so I am done.  I don't really care what Germans think of Americans anymore. I am going to go about my day, being nice and friendly, and when they give me attitude, I will simply roll my eyes and ignore them completely.

With that being said, I am going to try to switch over to a more positive blog so that I can remember all of the good things in our life, which means I should also consider coming up with a new title for this blog....too bad I am not very clever about those sorts of things. Maybe DH and I can work together to come up with something good..

So it is the first day of spring and things are going pretty good.  DH had another interview  (I am not sure if I updated about the last one or not. The people decided that they did not have the budget to hire someone, so he did not get the job...but neither did anyone else).  DH is also waiting to hear back from someone else that had sent him an email telling him they would like to discuss some potential opportunities, so we will see what happens.

I went to the Netherlands with DH for a few days last week (he had to go for work), and it was a nice getaway. It felt good to get out of this apartment.  We also got to visit with a couple of our friends that live there and we rarely get to see.  I did come home with a cold though. I should have known it was coming because I took a two hour nap one of the days that we were there and I was complaining to DH about my ears itching. I think I am on the upswing of this cold because I seem to have a bit more energy today. I decided to strip the bed and wash everything and hopefully DH won't get sick (although he did mention that he feels like it may be coming). He has been taking his Echinacea though, so hopefully that will work.

I guess that is it for now. I just wanted to give an update on the changes I plan to make with my attitude and my blog. Here is to better things!

I don't know how much more I can handle.

February 27, 2012

What a week I have had.  Last Wednesday I met up with a friend that had moved out of Nürnberg but was going to be in town for the day.  It was nice to have coffee with her and chat. After that we went to the Red Cross to check out the second hand clothes. I did not find anything for myself this time, but I did end up getting a couple of stuffed animals for Bailey. She rips her toys apart so fast, I would much rather get her toys there at a fraction of the cost, than at the pet stores.  We went and got a couple of drinks after that and had a really enjoyable day. The sun was shining and it was actually warm enough to take our coats off for a bit while we sat outside and soaked up the sun.

Thursday was an okay day. DH worked from home that day so I did not have to drive him to work so I could use his car to go and clean our friend’s apartment.  We went to the gym together in the morning so that was nice…except that I got into it with this total tool at the gym.  I have seen this guy many times before and I always kind of laughed in my head about him. He always has a ponytail in and chomps on gum like a cow chomps on grass. He also always walks around the gym like he thinks he is totally the shit, when what he actually is, is a total tool.  Anyway, I had never had any encounters with him until Thursday.  He had put his towel on one of the only two abdominal machines in the place. He had actually “reserved” 4 different machines with various items he had brought with him to the gym. I didn’t worry about it to much at the time because I was still doing my cardio. When I was done on the treadmill, I went over and did some stretching, and then moved on to the weights. I did everything that I wanted to do except this one machine that this dork still had his towel on. I saw him doing another exercise so I finally got tired of waiting and I removed his towel and hung it over the sign next to the machine. As soon as I sat down and he noticed it, he stopped what he was doing and began yelling at me telling me that the machine I was using was his. I told him that he did not own the gym and he could not just “reserve” all the machines that he wanted and expect nobody else to use them. He told me that he could do that, and my response was, “well, if you can do that, than I can remove your towel when you are not using it so that I can get on….and you don’t have to like it”. He looked at me very angrily and then told me that I had two minutes, to which I responded with a “whatever” and some eye rolling. 

I am so tired of Germans thinking that they are so much better than everyone. I am tired of their sense of entitlement that they have. I am tired of them thinking that what I do is any of their business and that they have a right…no, actually a duty, to inform me about all the things I do wrong. Of course I know that this is a generalization, and not all Germans are like this, but it seems more often than not, these are the people that I have run ins with and I am tired of it. I want to go home.

Of course none of this is helped by the fact that I have not started my period yet.  I still have sore nipples, emotional instability, cramping, etc.  I even did it to myself again….I allowed myself to think that maybe, just maybe one sperm managed to squeak by DH’s blockage (after all, when he had his SA done, they found 35 dead sperm). Maybe a sperm managed to squeak by and somehow survive.  Maybe, just maybe I happened to ovulate a decent egg this time. Maybe, just maybe, God had decided that I had suffered enough and I was going to be that “miracle story” that everyone tells you about (although nobody actually seems to know any of these people). Maybe this was going to happen. I actually bought a pregnancy test when I went to the grocery store. All of those maybes turned out to be no though. The test was negative of course. Then I got mad at myself for even allowing myself to think like that again. Why do I keep letting myself go down that path of possibility? It only disappoints me every time.  I wish that DH had zero sperm in his SA and I wish that it was actually impossible in every way for us. At least then I could move on and stop torturing myself.  All of this just makes me mad at God all over again. I keep praying to Him and asking Him why he allows these thoughts to get into my head. Why is He doing this to me? Have I not suffered enough? Does He get some sort of kick out of watching me suffer like this?

It certainly seems to be that way. Friday night we went to a party and there were two pregnant girls there. Two very lovely, well deserving, pregnant girls. It is only a reminder of how I will never have that. It is not that I am not happy for them, because I am. I am just sad for us. Very, very sad for us.  I smoked that night and drank a lot of wine.  I don’t know what else to do.  In addition to this, we have about 10 friends that are pregnant right now. Every time I open up FB I see baby shower photos, ultrasounds, status updates about feeling the baby kick, and so on. I smile for these people, but I cry for myself. I am tired of feeling sad and frustrated.  I am tired of forcing a smile.

Saturday DH and I relaxed for most of the day. He surprised me by getting our favorite pizza so when I woke up around lunch time, he was on his way home with food. That was nice.

Sunday we had some really wonderful friends over for a big breakfast. We made a ton of food! We had thick French toast, buttermilk pancakes (made from scratch), coffee cake, fruit salad, bacon, homemade sausage (DH is good at that), coffee, champagne…..we REALLY ate! Our friends have a lovely little girl that is definitely entertaining to watch. We took her to the park that is right by our apartment and it was fun to watch the men play with this sweet little girl. Of course, it made me a little bit sad to watch how wonderful DH is with kids and we can’t have any. Mom ended up cold and asked me if I wanted to go back in the apartment and I said sure. It worked out for both of us. She didn’t know I was sad, but I was able to get away from the scene and she was able to warm up. I smoked two cigarettes . Rats.

And now here we are at Monday. I do NOT plan on calling MHM today because I just can’t deal with it. I have things I need to get done, but I just feel exhausted because of this never-ending PMS. I will try to get something accomplished today. I need to go to the gym because we did not go all weekend, but I don’t feel like it at all. I have no idea how to force it.  All I can think about is getting back to the States, getting a job, and being around family again. Blah…….