Healthy Me

Well, I'm thankful to say that my knee is feeling so much better.  I guess I can chalk up last week's pain to having strained it.  I was so worried that I had torn something.  But, now I'm really appreciating how important healthy knees are!

In fact, I'm appreciating how important healthy bodies are.  I mentioned in my previous post that I had a complete blood workup done after my last physical.  I also recently had my mammogram.  And, the good news is that all those results came back great.  I am healthy overall.  But, what I've also realized is that if I want to STAY healthy...and if I truly want to THRIVE...then I need to take better care of myself.

What a gift our health is.  And frankly I have been treating that gift very poorly & taking it for granted.  I know that this is a result of many, many deeply ingrained bad habits.  And, changing these habits & patterns is going to mean changing my mindset.

Of course, I've made that realization before and have tried before and have found myself back in this same spot again of NEEDING to make changes.  But, so help me.  I will keep trying and keep working at this.  I will not give up.

I was recently reading  Eating for Life by Joel Fuhrman.  In it he talked about how our neural pathways are essentially formed by repeating the same behavior over & over.  They become the 'easy route' in our brain.  Feeling depressed or bored?  Well, if the repeated behavior has been to eat something unhealthy for a quick boost, then that becomes our brain's go-to each time we feel that way.

We CAN create new paths.  But, they take time.  As I was reading that section, the visual image I got is of when my boys go sledding in deep snow.  The first pass or two, they don't get very far as they are plowing through that snow & trying to create that path.  But, as they keep going again & again their path goes farther & easier until they are flying down that path.

And that's where the different mindset comes in.  I have always wanted the path to be clear & easy from the start.  I wanted to fly down the hill & didn't want the hard work of pushing away the snow in the way.  When I hit those barriers it's been so much easier to pick up my sled & go back to those easier bad habit pathways.  So, basically I need to keep pushing through even when it feels like to much work.

Anyway, I'm hoping to start that new path and not give up.  I already feel better because I've been getting a lot more sleep this last week.  It started out that I was going to bed earlier because my knee hurt & I was exhausted from hobbling around on it & I knew I needed to rest it.  But, now, 8:30 or 9 rolls around & I feel like going to bed.  And, I'm waking up earlier.  But, I'm also waking up rested.  I haven't felt rested in a very long time.

The other good part about going to bed earlier is that it eliminates the chance for night-time snacking.  Night time snacking has been one of my biggest downfalls.  I think not eating before bed probably also contributes to a better sleep.

I'm still weighing what changes I want to take in regard to my diet.  I've done a vegan fast before & it's really good for feeling better & losing weight.  I also don't find it sustainable over a long period of time.  I definitely want to cut back on empty carbs, sugars, and animal products & beef up on fruits & veggies.  I also need to start incorporating exercise.

For now, step by step, inch by inch I'm going to create my new pathway.

Happy Thanksgiving and More.

Happy Thanksgiving.  I have sorely neglected my blog.  But, I need an outlet for writing down my thoughts again.  And, so I'm coming back to my old friend to do just that.

First of all, I hope you all have a very blessed Thanksgiving.  I'm enjoying a quiet moment right now.  My children have disappeared down the hill to Grandma & Grandpa's house to 'help' get things ready for dinner.  I'm sitting on the couch resting my knee because I somehow hurt myself yesterday & I'm hobbling around in pain.  I need to get started on the food that I'm making soon.  But, right now I'm just having a moment or two to myself.

I am definitely feeling blessed.  I've been so aware of how fortunate I am to have my family, our health, our home & security.  I'm keenly aware of how blessed we are to be living in relative peace & lack of turmoil and in a country where we have our freedom.

I've also been saddened by things going on in the world around me.  Close to me there are friends whose loved ones are fighting for their lives against cancer.  There are friends & family who are struggling in their marriages or other relationships.  There's a family member who desperately wants children of her own someday, but for the sake of her health, may have to make the decision to have a hysterectomy.

And, when I look at the world around me there are wars & rumors of wars, as well as so much conflict & tension within our own country.  And this past election seemed to bring out the worst in everyone.  There are tragedies that we hear about on the news.  This week is was a school bus crash that killed 5 precious children and seriously injured many more.

It's all so heavy sometimes.  I feel things deeply.  And, it's just a lot.  I feel so helpless in the face of so much sadness & suffering.  I don't know what difference I can make.

I know that it starts at ground level.  It starts with how I interact with people each day - my husband & children, friends, even strangers at the grocery store.  And yet, even there I fail often.

It's hard to feel a lack of control over circumstances.

So where am I headed with all this?  Well, I guess I've been feeling challenged to take control of & be a good steward of the things that I am able to.  I've been challenged to exercise self-control.  So, for me this would boil down to two major areas - My home and my health.

Those might not seem like big things in the scope of all that I listed above.  But, these are two areas that if they are disjointed or chaotic it seems to spill over into the rest of life & the attitudes and feelings that I have regarding many things.

My home:  We are messies.  With four boys & a husband who are all outdoorsy, hands-on kinds of guys...who value function over cosmetics....it reflects in the very lived in state of our home.  But, I also struggle to keep up with things that need done in our home.  I dislike cleaning & it can all seem very overwhelming.  So, I just watch the mess grow & grow until I can't stand it & try to do a whirlwind of straightening up.

It's not a good cycle.  And, it's one that we can change.  I need to better involve my children in the upkeep of our home.  And, I need to dig in to the tasks that need done & tackle them one by one.

My health:  I had a physical recently.  I wanted to talk to the doctor about pain in my knee as well as my weight gain & exhaustion.  She ordered some bloodwork and an xray of my knee to check for arthritis.  The good news is that all of my blood work came back very good.  So, I am healthy & there aren't any contributing factors to my weight gain.  The xray showed some bone spurs but nothing overly concerning.

So what does that mean?   Pretty much what I already knew.  I need to take better care of myself.  I have nothing to blame my weight gain on other than my poor eating habits & lack of exercise.  But, here's the other thing...if I continue on this path I can't continue to count on having good health.  So, it's time to get myself back on track...for real.

Taking control of my home & my health.  That's my goal.  And, I will be using my blog again to help document my progress.  Here we go!