Death by coffee

I absolutely just choked on my coffee. My life just flashed before my eyes. And if you think I'm being dramatic, think again.

There's now coffee all over my pants. Classy, right? While I tried to spit it back into the cup to avoid choking, I discovered travel mugs are not ideal for that because the little spout opening is so small. So on my pants it is. Oh well. At least I'm alive! Death by coffee? Not cool. Maybe it's my body's way of reinforcing the fact that I've been drinking wayyy too much coffee lately and need to slow it down.

Anyhow, in the spirit of nearly losing my life, I want to share a little conversation between my honey and I from this morning...arguing about who loves the other person more. Typical of us.

Me: Yeah. Totes, baby. Hey did you know that I love you more than the number of fish in the sea?
Casey: That's alot, but did you know I love you more than there are stars in the universe?
Me: Well, there has to be more fish than stars. Has to be.

Dear God

Okay, Lord, I get it. I think.

Money doesn't matter. You provide us with plenty. You show me this each and every month. Yet I still push away the nagging feeling that we should give you more. We can be stretched thin, and it's okay. We'll be okay. You'll make sure of that. Why do I even doubt that?

We have enough. Enough to fill up our cars to get to and from work. Enough to buy groceries. Enough to pay the mortgage. Enough to keep the lights on and the water running. Enough to pay the medical bills. Even enough to buy for other people, for our (future) puppy, enough to do fun things, and even enough to buy some new white skinny jeans (that were on sale and free shipping) from AE. And absolutely enough to give extra to give to you. I think know you're trying to tell me and Casey that we can give more to you. More than we have been. It is your money, after all. You just let us take care of it for you. Although, sometimes I'm not sure why. Money makes me nervous. As much as the planner in me desperately wants to put extra money into savings (because you call us to be responsible with what you have given), maybe you're telling me, "Trust me. Give back to my church. To supporting the spread of my word. To supporting those who teach and give and need. Just trust me."

You're just so funny. We got this crazy, unexpected check from our mortgage company last week (Something about escrow surplus...I don't understand all that. Dad said we were good to go, and he's the financial whiz). Aren't we supposed to be paying them? And I was so stoked. God is blessing us! And I deposited the money into my account yesterday ready to just drive myself right home and transfer it to our savings account. Pup can get her shots! Our child can go to one day of college with this money! One of us can go on a cruise! Then, I got home to a piece of mail. Not a fun piece of mail either. CMC decided to send a bill for nearly $900 from my fall last July when I had to go to the ER. The same amount as the check we just received from the mortgage company. What? Why, God? Why $360 just for someone to take some rocks out of my knee and clean under a flap of skin. I could've done that.

At least it was not a bill to be paid with money we don't have. Pam, be thankful you just got that $900 check, not upset because it's out the window again. Even though we had no plans for that money besides savings, I was dejected. Today I called the hospital to question the bill because there appeared to be no deductions due to insurance coverage or anything. She said she would re-process the request to the insurance company, and they would send me a new bill if we still owe anything after. Sigh of relief. $900 is back! Maybe...

So, Lord, I do think I'm starting to truly get it. I'm going to talk to Casey, and see if we can't use our money more wisely for you. You already provide us with so much.

And my fears are just plain silly. We don't even have medical bills piling up that we can't afford to pay  like some people do. We both have jobs. We have a lovely house where the mortgage gets paid on time every month. Who am I to be selfishly unthankful? We can give more to you AND still afford to go to a movie or to dinner and to buy some new skinny jeans and save little bits for our puppy along the way.

Mondays: Stereotyped

Two things happened to me today that just scream MONDAY:

1) I ran this morning at work (treadmills in the lab for those of you who have no clue what I do) and then had to shower here...naturally. I showered and was getting dressed only to find out (after frantically tossing my clothes about) that I had forgotten a clean pair of undies. Seriously? What are my options? Go commando...in jeans? My worst nightmare. Or wear dirty underwear? My other worst nightmare.

Sigh. I'm sure I have worse nightmares than those. But that's just all I could think this morning. What's a girl to do? What would you do? I'm commando right now. Not that any of you care or need to know. But in the essence of being truly honest with you, I thought you should know that I am a clean person and could not imagine wearing dirty undies.

I know you've all been there, admittedly or not. Maybe you just don't talk about it as candidly.

2) I just ate my banana. I thought I had successfully examined and removed all the strings, and was putting the banana in my mouth only to feel one of those strings dangling at my chin. Disgusted, I immediately removed the banana from my mouth and disposed of the string. Gross out. I nearly ate a banana string. Ugh. This weekend my nephews were eating bananas, they have no qualms with a banana strings. I literally could not watch them eat. Is that really so strange? Who here likes string-less bananas and who could care less?

Oh another note, I was playing legos with Keller (one of my nephews) this weekend, and we were building and sorting. He had bought a new bag of legos from the Lego Store at Concord Mills (with his very own money...so cute). In the bag, there were 3 cool looking Atlantis characters. Now I'm not familiar with who they are, but I knew they were important because he kept talking about them. He has the sweetest heart. He insisted that I take one of them home with me to play with. His brand spankin new lego. AND, even cooler, it's a magnet too! My heart just melted. I told him I would borrow it until the next time I saw him and then he could have it back, so we could both play with it.

So here it is. Right at home on our fridge!

Veg Faj

Before you hate on me for the title of the post. That's what Kate and I had for dinner Thursday night. I finally felt up to eating after my experiences this week (that you can read about {HERE}).

We made Vegetable Fajitas. She abbreviated it Veg Faj which actually sounds quite disgusting if you say it out loud. Try it then you'll get me. So we couldn't stop calling it that all day and night yesterday. So that's the new official name. Welcome to our world!

So I had a ton of veggies stocked up and fruit and beans and nuts because before I went to the doctor, noted in the blog referenced above, I thought I needed to go on a natural foods and raw foods diet to cleanse me while still giving me sufficient nutrients, vitamins, and minerals. You know, no processed foods or artificial sweetener or coffee or dairy. Seems silly now that I know what's wrong. But I love fruits and veggies no matter, so I'll eat them right up. So I decided to get creative and make Veg Faj. I know have been slacking on the cool-recipe-posts, but I haven't been all out cooking a whole lot with Casey being gone. I'll just do simple stuff for myself like soup or salad or lean cuisine or a sandwich. And that's not exciting.

This recipe is super easy and super healthy. Now that I don't need a natural foods diet, I added cheese and these cool Flat Out wraps that we had tucked away in the fridge. We substituted these for tortillas. Here they are. You can view the different kinds at the Flat Out Bread Website.

So, I had a red pepper, green pepper, and white/yellow onion (who really knows the difference between a white or yellow onion anyhow?) all sliced up.

Throw a saute pan on the stove with 1 Tablespoon of EVOO and cook the veggies until translucent or slightly browned (up to your standards and preference) on medium heat.

In the meantime, preheat the oven to 350.

Once the veggies were cooked, we added about 2/3 can of black beans drained (you can do however many black beans you want, but we figured we'd save some for salads). Also, add McCormick Fajita seasoning (we used just half the packet of seasoning) and about 1/4 cup of white wine. The seasoning packet says to add water, but we do white wine. When is there not an occasion to use wine in cooking? It's way more fun. And you don't have to use the seasoning packet, you can throw in your own spices, but Thursday, we were just going for simplicity.

Stir and let cook for 3-5 minutes. If you need to reduce the liquid, cover the pan.

Meanwhile, half about 12-15 cherry tomatoes (who doesn't LOVE fresh tomatoes?). From your fridge, pull out some shredded mexican cheese, FF sour cream, and salsa. (Remember I don't have to stick to the natural foods thing, so the cheese and sour cream and flat out are okay to eat now!)

I prefer homemade salsa, but I just did not have time nor feel up to it. Please see the recipe for homemade salsa at the bottom of this post though.

Prepare your flat bread with you desired fixins' and pile on however many vegetables you want. They're super healthy so it's okay to mound them up high. It's like a veggie bonanza.

Wrap up your tortilla, so it looks like a burrito. We kind of ended up with a fajitto (fajita-burrito).

Place on a baking sheet (we used the toaster oven pan cause it's just the right size). And put in preheated oven to completely warm through and melt cheese.

Top with a touch of sour cream and salsa and enjoy the Veggie Fajitto.

Disclaimer: It's not as huge as it looks. I use salad plates for dinner in our house. I don't know why. That's not a full-size dinner plate. Do not be alarmed or overwhelmed.


Homemade Salsa!! 
This stuff is like a party in your mouth. Especially with the fresh cilantro.

4 vine ripe tomatoes
1 red onion
1 lime
1 cn white corn
1 can black beans
1 small wishbone italian dressing
cilantro
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
2 serano, jalapeno, or habanero peppers (small)

Dice tomatoes, onion,  and peppers. Pour dressing over mixture. Rinse beans and corn and add to mixture. Add garlic and stir. Put lime in microwave for 10 seconds to realease all oils and juice. Roll lime on counter, then cut in half. Squeeze lime halves over mixture. Add chopped cilantro, as much or as little as you wish. Chill at least 3 hours.

*You can vary this as you like. Take out corn and add diced, ripe peaches, as an example.

My Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday

So, in a nutshell, I was having crazy shooting, sharp pain in my lower abdomen on Saturday. I thought it was just a tummy ache, and I can live through that, right? Well, it went away (mostly) on Sunday, so I thought nothing of it, until it came back in full force on Monday. That's when I officially decided: natural foods diet all the way. At least for a couple weeks. I had to cleanse my system of all things processed and artificial and potentially harmful to my system. What better way than to stuff myself with fruits, veggies, and legumes? So I went out Monday night to Lowe's Foods to stock up. Then Tuesday, the pain spread. It was no longer intermittent, sharp pain, but it was all across my abdomen below my belly button and spread slightly to the left and all the way to the right side up to the bottom of my ribs. It was especially bad when I pushed on my stomach. 

This was no ordinary stomachache. I felt nauseous, but I just kept to myself at work even though I wanted to leave. Then I went to do my run after work and just had this terrible pain while I was running, I kept on though. What's a little pain, right? I must have eaten something old and terrible to make me feel this bad. What the eff? (Please note, I don't actually say the F-word. I do say eff sometimes. I don't around small children or people I don't know. I don't want to give them the wrong idea about me. I'm a nice girl. And I don't curse.) 

So I felt better when I got home and just curled up in the couch. I was not hungry at all though. But I stuffed some food in my mouth because I knew I should. When I went to bed (at 8:30 no less) I felt worse. All the pain was lower abdomen and and on the RIGHT. Warning lights. Loss of appetite, nausea, lower right quadrant pain. Kate told me I HAD to go to the doctor on Wednesday. No question. I mean it was pain I could live with (not comfortably mind you), but I knew something wasn't right.

So Wednesday morning I woke up and still in pain, could not eat, and just felt like I had no energy. I'm talking energy drained enough that I skipped yoga on Tuesday night. Boooo. So I went to work and called and the doctor's office scheduled me right away.

So I'm waiting around at the doctor and getting a little dizzy, and I can't even remember Casey's phone number to write on the form. What! Then I was sent back to my little room and waited around some more. When the doctor finally saw me, guess what? Pain shifted left. He was stumped. I still had some pain on the right and all the pain below my belly button, but now it was left. Again, what the eff? I legit thought I had a tumor. 

He says, immediate CT scan with contrast dye. He says to the imaging center, "call my cell phone with the results." Cell phone? Not even the office? What is wrong with me? Then he said he'd call me right away. I do not want surgery...the money, the no running, the recovery, the I-have-to-be-at-work, the I-don't-want-Casey-to-feel-like-he-has-to-come-home, the it'll-ruin-my-anniversary-present-for-him. No no no. Not an option. More than that, I was deep down scared that it was a mass in my abdomen. Do I have to live with this constant pain for months? What else will I need to get better? Will I get better?

I'm a "what-if" person to the max. I think of all possibilities and run with the ideas. It was a struggle to calm down in my mind and not think of all the worst scenarios.

So I mosey (or drive) over to Carolinas Imaging Center just down the road. They are THE nicest people in the world. Nicest people ever at a medical facility. No joke. You can visit them here: Charlotte Radiology For any of your imaging needs, please go. The one in Matthews is great.

The nice ladies tell me I have to drink two LARGE containers of nastiness. The one lady (who ends up doing my scan) recommends a little variety. Take 1 vanilla and 1 mocha. I think, "I can totally do this, I haven't had coffee in a few days. Mocha sounds nice. I'm a champ. I can suck those down." Let me tell you a little something about Barium Sulfate. It does not taste good. Not even a little bit. And it certainly did NOT taste like coffee. Here they are.

Tall, cold containers of delciousness. Not. By this time mom had arrived (she's the sweetest--she left work early to come hang out with me). We chatted for a few, and I was FREEZING. This stuff was making me feel sick. Then daddy showed up too! What a nice surprise. They are the best. I had convinced myself I was fine by myself cause I was just sitting there, afterall. But it was nice to have them there with Casey being out of town. It passed the time and was comforting especially not knowing what was wrong.

So I waited an hour and half (had to drink the nastiness over an hour's length). I was not allowed to shotgun it. Then I went back, and they put in an IV to shoot the dye through my veins so I would light up real bright when I was scanned. I tell you what, that dye was crazy. I felt like I was on fire from the top of my head to my face to my hoo-hah. I legit thought I had wet the CT scan bed. I mean I had dranken (is that correct grammar?) alot of liquids. And a strange metallic, blood-like taste was in my mouth. So strange. But then that was it. Quick as a bunny. Done.

Now they said this sulfate stuff would make me go to the bathroom and not to be surprised if I went alot on Wednesday night. Well, kids, I did not go. At all. Or yesterday. What is wrong with me? Shouldn't I be going if they said to expect it? So now I'm just waiting. TMI? I don't care. Goes with the territory of 5 hours at the doctor.

The doctor called very quickly with my results, which in my mind is either good or bad. The verdict: not appendicitis or a tumor. I had a hemorrhagic ovarian cyst. That burst. Inside me. I had a pool of blood floating around inside inside me which explained the moving pain. The blood will resorb into my body and the pain will go away within two weeks. Take Ibuprofen. Can a girl not get something more powerful than that? 

So I went home and to the gym. I was in alot of pain when I was working out. I could barely finish the workout which was more frustrating to me. I just cried all the way home. When I got out of my car, I just willed a new letter from Casey to be in the mailbox. To my surprise, there were 4! In that moment, I was so excited for backlogged mail. But just wished he could be inside when I walked in the door. To hug me and make me feel better. I think I cried so much because of all the unknowns and the relief all jumbled together. And him being gone and knowing the pain would stick around for 2 more weeks.

So yesterday, I stayed home from work to get back to normal and just relaxed, had a better workout, went to Barnes and Noble with my fam to hang out, and then went to get my nails done with Kate. Then we went home for a movie and dinner and bed. Low key day.

I was trying to take a picture and the best place to see the blue was against my white shirt, but it looks so awkward cause I'm trying to get my hand and hold the camera with the other and not take a full boob shot. Sheesh. Don't judge me. As long as you can actually see the PRETTY color, we're good. Kate helped me pick it out. I'm thrilled with it. It makes typing at work way more fun.

I feel like a million bucks today compared to the rest of the week! PTL!!

(Ibuprofen was plenty. And I haven't even taken any today! Sometimes doctors know what they're doing.)

I feel like such a wimp. Because so many people have so many bigger problems than this. But it was a scare. That I might be one of them. That no matter what the result was, it was God's plan. There was a purpose. And when something like that happens, it's kind of hard to completely trust and be okay with the outcome knowing the Lord is in control. He was truly watching over me. And maybe he knew better than I that I needed a day off work! Also, comes back to the blog about money, that it's something each month. Now we have a CT scan deductible to pay. He's funny. God is.

Letters to Casey (Week 2)

BABE! I prayed for you today. I've been praying for you everyday.

I miss you like WOAH. Isn't it funny? I feel like it's last year all over again. When you lived in Boone and I lived in Charlotte without you. Every night I would just long for you to be there so I could hug you and kiss you. I forgot what that truly felt like until now.

I realized earlier this week that I'm counting the weeks you are gone by the number of times I bring the trash can and recycling bucket back into the garage. That's only two times so far. Sigh.

It's really no fun to go to yoga by myself. Or to brush my teeth by myself before bed. Or to not have anyone to kiss goodbye in the mornings. Or doing handstands without you. Or eating cereal without you on the weekends. Or having the most handsome man in the world sneak up behind me on the treadmill at the gym. Or occasional trips to Sweet Frog and the grocery store without you. I miss the simple most ordinary things.

I also miss the unique and special things you do and say that make me feel like a zillion bucks. You make me happy. Did you know that? Yeah. YOU can do that. Turn my frown upside down. Make me giggle when I'm down in the dumps.

You're missing out on the Challenge, The Bachelor, Teen Mom. All the good shows. JK. But you're a doll to watch all those silly shows with me. What you're legit missing out on is Revenge. It is so good! And Bethenny starts soon. She's so so funny. Like me. (And actually, to let you in on a secret, the Challenge actually is really good so far.)

I bought our puppy (I almost said her name, but that's supposed to be a surprise for the viewing audience. I cannot believe I almost slipped!) her water and food bowls last night. And her leash. On wag.com. How cute is the name of the website? You'll approve of the selections. Cause I've got style. Trust me. 

I also wanted to remind you to do your best in all you do. That's all that matters. YOUR best. Not someone else's. And it glorifies the Lord. Isn't that we're in this world for anyways?

Also, I wanted to remind you what Timmy (Tebow) (as if I really had to clarify...) always said to himself for motivation when he needed an extra push in his training:

"Somewhere he is out there, training while I am not. One day, when we meet, he will win."

(I picked orange for the Broncos! And for Florida! Convenient, huh?)

Now, you use that as motivation to do your best.  And to keep training hard, not just enough to get by. To beat them all on that 1.5 mile run, on those push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups. And in the classroom. To stand out.

But even if you don't beat any of them, I love you and am proud of you for being there and working hard and giving your best.

I love you wrapped around the world infinity times plus 22.

P.S. Look! I found another heart. This time it was in my eye shadow. You know the first coat I put on. You know I don't have ghostly eyes with this pearlescent color. But another heart. Just for us. I find them everywhere and in the strangest places, huh?

You know you're spoiled by your Nook when...

I was at the gym today. I was doing some cross training on the elliptical, so took advantage of reading the latest Runner's World we got in the mail. I cannot read mags on the treadmill, only my Nook, which I never thought I'd ever be able to do either. But it's surprisingly easy and passes the time like crazy...and I can make the text bigger on the Nook, so the bouncing up and down doesn't inhibit my ability to read. Besides, if you're running effortlessly and smoothly, you shouldn't be bouncing much anyways, right?

Okay, totally beside the point, so back to the elliptical story. I was reading my Runner's World, and instead of physically turning the page, I tapped the bottom right of the left page there (see picture below). It did not go to the next page. 

 

 Then I came back to reality. OH MY GOODNESS. This is a magazine. Paper. I have to turn the pages myself. Did I seriously just do that?? That's when I realized I've been reading too many books and am spoiled by my Nook (it's a touch screen...you know iPod or iPad style). I was a little embarrassed, but laughing at myself inside.

Truthfully, I don't think you can ever read too many books.

Then I noticed the quote at the bottom of the page when I went I back to take a picture for you guys:

"I think I get addicted to the feelings associated with the end of a long run. I love feeling empty, clean, worn out, starving, and sweat-purged. I love the good ache of muscles that have done me proud."

I love that quote. It pretty much sums up running for me, except she forgot to talk about the adrenaline and the high too. I just love running. And being capable of running and being passionate about it.

Unfortunately, it doesn't change the fact that I'm still apparently spoiled by my Nook.