Since the last time I posted, I’ve started a new business, gone full on OMAD with a mostly keto approach, given up CrossFit (not because I hate it, but because I don’t have enough hours in the day) and have lost about 20lbs.
Is this 20lbs of muscle? Maybe. I’m still strong. I can still lift heavy shit. Can I go and do 350lb deadlifts? Probably not, but I’m lighter, leaner, I feel better, I’m not injured, and I don’t have enough time to care about anything else, really.
I started making camera and bag straps. What? Yes. I couldn’t find what I wanted online, so I bought a bunch of supplies, and figured out how to make them myself. Dave saw my stacks of new supplies and about killed me.. “You’d better sell some fucking straps!” is about what he told me. HA. Okay! I can do that.
Fast forward about 8-9 months, and we now have a full blown camera, bag, and guitar strap business. Blossoming like whoa, I can’t keep up with sales or demands. I’ve been doing markets just about every weekend and selling them like crazy. They are a total hit, and the patterns and color options keep everyone coming back for more. SoRetro Straps is a play on my last name which is Soret. Get it? It’s become so successful that I’ve been able to book shows around the country. I will actually be traveling to Michigan for the summer to do various events and craft shows throughout the state. I leave in mid June, and won’t be coming back to FL til the end of September.
Dali is still charging ahead at full speed, so it’s Dali by day, and Straps by nights and weekend. It’s insane. I’ve been to CF once in the last month, and I’m hoping to go back sometime before the end of May, but I have the Jacksonville Jazz Fest coming up, along with another show called Vintage Market Days in Green Cove Springs. Anyway, this post isn’t supposed to be about straps, but about me. So..
OMAD. Or, One Meal a Day. I started doing this out of necessity, because with my craft/market events, I haven’t had time to eat more than once a day. So I decided to go full blown OMAD and just make it easier on myself. This means, I eat one meal a day. Usually just a nice big tasty lunch, but when I’m doing events, I’ll eat after the event is over with, or not at all depending on what time I finish. My meals usually consist of a giant salad with dressing and the meat of my choice, or a ton of chicken wings, or 3 or 4 hamburger patties with cheese and mushrooms, etc. Sometimes I go a little nuts at Five Guys, or I’ll eat a whole plateful of fajitas.
Where it’s strayed a bit from keto is what I have along with my meals. If we’re getting Mexican food, I’ll eat the corn tortilla chips. If I go to a BBQ place, I’ll have some cornbread. If we go to Five Guys, I’ll eat some french fries. And, if we go to the wing place, I’ll have tater tots, corn on the cob, or fries in addition to my food. It’s been working for me because I’m down more than 20 lbs since I started about 2 months ago, and at the lowest weight I’ve been in 12+ years. I weighed in at 189.2 this morning.
The biggest jump in weight loss came from cutting out the heavy cream in my coffee and switching back to unsweetened coconut cream from the can. This was also my initial start to it, so it could’ve just been a combination of everything. I’ve been wanting to cut back on dairy (again) and I finally made the switch off of cream again. The weight fell off, it seemed! Anyway. It was hard in the beginning to go back to OMAD, but that was simply out of being used to eating at night. When I started evaluating if I was really hungry, or if I was just used to eating, the answer almost always came down to I was just used to eating.
So, here we are. My 8 year CF anniversary is next month. I’d like to say I’m going to go, but we’ll see. I’ve been doing nothing but working nonstop and I love it. I’m visiting my mom right now in Madison, which is really the only reason I have time to even write this, but don’t worry, I brought a whole shitload of straps to sew while I’m here, and I’ll ship them all back to FL at the end of the week.
So my weight was creeping up again. After the dogs passed away, and after our trip to Colorado for snowboarding, my god did I even talk about that here? It doesn’t matter. We went to Colorado basically on a week’s notice and took a week to go snowboarding and hang with family, it was much needed away time for both of us. Anyway, after that trip, I felt like I couldn’t control my weight again, even though I was still keto, still doing CrossFit. What the fuck. I felt like no matter what I did, or tried, or anything, it would work for awhile and the weight came back on. My lowest of 189 was short-lived, and I hung around in the mid to high 190s for months, and then the 200s came back. And I got back up to like, 210? 212? And I lost my shit. Why was I trying so hard, or so I thought, and not able to lose or even just maintain my weight?
Cue a talk with a friend. My friend Jared and I go back several years. We met at CrossFit Total Control back in 2012, he’s married, has two gorgeous kids, had a printing business that we ended up buying from him a couple of years ago, so we’re connected in a couple different levels. He had asked me a few times about keto, and I gave my uneducated response as to why it worked and how it worked, and probably sent him off to do his own research because really, wtf do I know?
Jared is also a big proponent of B12 shots for cold symptoms. I was like, yeah dude whatever, I’m not doing that. Fast Forward to two days before we’re supposed to leave for Detroit, and I was 3 days into some gnarly cold symptoms. It was inevitable, I’m doomed, I’m getting sick. This is it, my trip to Detroit with Dave is ruined, and it hasn’t even started yet. I was desperate for anything, even these ridiculous B12 shots he had always talked about. I sheepishly texted him, dude… tell me about this B12 nonsense. Do they really work?
So. He told me about Pure Hydration Spa. Right in Jax Beach. I hemmed and hawed a little, I’m just not into this. Whatever, I’m also not into being sick, especially while traveling. I don’t want to be that person on the plane. FINE. I called and talked to Hannah, she made some great recommendations for infusions, and I booked my appointment for later that day. I had decided on the Immunity Plus which contained B-Complex, B12, Vitamin C, and Zinc.
Fast forward to later that day, I walked in and it was incredible. Beautiful. Calm, clean, serene, and there was a dog. I’m totally in. They got me all hooked up in a nice, quiet, and private room, and puppers plopped on the couch next to me, and away we went. Can I just tell you? The combination of those infusions instantly made me feel better. I literally felt my sore throat going away. My headache, aches and pains, literally drifted away and were completely gone by the time I was done. My cold that was 3 days in the making had been wiped out. Science says it’s not possible? I don’t care. I definitely had a cold, sore throat and all. It was literally gone. Gone gone gone. I went from a total non-believer to sign me up, I feel so good I will be here every single day for this stuff.
That shit was so amazing, that I booked another appointment the next day, just to be safe before our trip. I felt even better, and I didn’t realize that was possible.We went on our trip, spent a few amazing days in Detroit, and when we came home, I went for a 3rd time, just to beat all the plane and travel germs at their game.
SO. The point of telling you all that was not to brag on Pure Hydration, but they’re awesome, so bonus for all of us. BUT to tell you about how Jared’s suggestions went from being interesting to I will now listen to everything you say and recommend. Please tell me more!
At this point, Jared and his wife had been doing keto for health reasons, but he had dove head in. I thought I was obsessed, he went above and beyond to steer their lives in a new direction by way of diet. All the stuff I ever did for Tex and Sammi, with food for their health, foos is medicine, food is fuel kind of stuff, he topped the charts on. Jared went into a full bio-hack mode, absorbing everything he could on the subject, consulting with doctors (Dr. Brian Anderson woop woop!) and so on.
He had previously asked me if I had tried Intermittent Fasting. No, not intentionally. I drink way too much coffee with cream to fit within a restricted window of calorie consumption. (btw, I’m back on dairy. I hang my head with guilt whenever I make my coffee, something I have decided to live with, in shame). But. Now that Jared apparently knows everything about life, I leaned in. Please tell me more!
With some info from Jared, and eager to learn more, and finally commit, maybe… I ventured off to consult the world’s best friend, Google, to tell me all about the wonders of Intermittent Fasting (IF). I determined my feeding window would start when I had my first coffee with cream, and end 8 hours from there. This meant I was about to embark on a 16:8 IF program. Fast for 16 hours, eat for 8. And when I say eat, I mean, consume calories, not just eat for 8 straight hours. It’s more like an OMAD lifestyle (OMAD = One Meal a Day) with the rest of my feeding hours filled with coffee with cream. This doesn’t sound so bad after all!
I dove in, and declared that on July 2nd, I would no longer be participating in dinner. The first few days were weird. What am I supposed to do with my time? Do I just watch him eat? WTF do I do now? Not cook? Have tea? This is so weird. I quickly got used to making sure I made the most out of my midday meal, as it was literally my one chance at eating what I really wanted that day. No do-overs, no take backsies, no 2nd chances later in the evening. I have my coffee at 8a with another coffee around 10a, followed by lunch somewhere, then another coffee around 3p ish and by the time I finish that, we’re at about 4p which closes off my eating window. After 4p, I can focus on water, tea, going to the gym, and not worrying about eating. Not eating in the evening has become really liberating. Only one time was I noticeably hungry and it was because I didn’t have enough calories earlier that day (I think). The rest of my ‘hunger pains’ have really just been wanting to eat something but not actually being hungry.
So what did the scales do? At first, they plummeted. From 207 to 197, which is where I currently sit. I am now trying to figure out why the stall again, but in my mind, I know the answer is, too much fat. I need to cut back on some of the fat from somewhere, and I say that like I don’t know, but it’s really a matter of putting less cream in my coffee, and sucking it up. I like the idea of using less cream, because that means buying milk less frequently and not supporting a factory farming industry as much.
I need this to be a to be continued… This is far too long, at this point!
But apparently I forgot I had a website to maintain. The CrossFit Open 2018 flew by, I got my first ever handstand pushup.. but not just 1… I did like 6 or 7 or them. It’s been so long that I don’t even remember, but I did it, and I’ll probably never do those again. (195ish lbs upside down on my spine and head just wasn’t what I was meant to do..)
We went snowboarding out in Colorado after Texie passed away. I had purchased new bindings before we left, which Dave installed for me on my old board, but then I won a new snowboard at a raffle, and she’s absolutely beautiful! My old trusty Head board with my old bindings are now proudly hanging on my office wall where they belong together. The new h0tness is ready to go for next year. I only got to ride her one day and already felt a huge difference. I was also exhausted from crushing it nonstop with Dave around Breck and then Winter Park, but it was really nice to go, and spend time with his family, as well.
Me posing with my new Never Summer Infinity 2017 snowboard, with new Flow bindings
Fast forward to the last month or so. Life is absolutely insane. We just finished one of our biggest jobs of the year so far, where we did all the signage (and when I say all, I mean like, all the fucking signs and banners and fence scrim) for Rolling Loud Miami, which is a massive hip hop festival. P.Diddy/Puff Daddy/Sean Puffy Combs/Diddy called it the Woodstock of Hip Hop while he was there last weekend. Supposedly this is a big deal. I also can’t believe that was just last weekend. We spent weeks printing and cutting and grommeting banners and signs. We went through rolls and rolls of banner material, we printed miles of the stuff, including the perimeter scrim all outside the Hard Rock Stadium, it was a big deal. Anyway, yeah. That sort of put a halt on reality. Everything stopped so that we could get that job done.
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The day after we got home (last Tuesday) we hit the ground running with a Lululemon install.
I made it to the gym Wednesday for Bring a Friend Day, hooray! I’ve been sore the rest of the week from it. Two weeks of no CrossFit + 1 hour of CrossFit/Cardio/Wall Ball nonsense will jump start your soreness career all over again. Excited to get to it tomorrow and get back into my regular routine.
Keto is still great. I’m sitting pretty at 199 right now. I had gained weight back after the pups passed, just from lack of caring? I still stuck with Keto, I just ate too much. I was up to 205-206, which was mortifying. I worked so hard to get down to 189, so being at 199 a few days ago was really exciting for me. My goal weight is still around 180, although seeing as how hard it’s been just to stay in the 190s, I’ll just be happy to stay here for awhile and maintain.
I gave up on the coconut cream in my coffee stuff and went back to full fat heavy whipping cream. I didn’t see or feel a difference, and decided that ordering dozens of cans of full fat coconut cream off Amazon wasn’t worth the effort and expense. I will say that I have this horrible guilt every time I consume beef or dairy products, but I try to ignore it and just make sure the animal products I buy aren’t wasted. I have considered eliminating beef altogether, and I have actually cut back quite a bit on beef consumption, but it’s nothing to write home about. Maybe someday I’ll man up and make the big change. It’s honestly a topic I don’t care to get into or argue about, because I don’t like that I do it. So, we’ll leave it at that.
I have started following a more OMAD lifetyle though. Keto OMAD. OMAD stands for One Meal a Day, and in my next post, I’ll go into more detail on how liberating this really is. Thanks for sticking with me. 🙂
I have been wanting to quit adding so much cream to my coffee for months, and months. And I’ve never found any worthy substitute, so I could never actually commit. I wanted a high fat, not coconut oil or butter, cream substitute that would leave me feeling full and satisfied. After the suggestion of some keto friends online, I tried unsweetened coconut cream and was astonished. While it wasn’t the same as regular heavy cream in my coffee, it still had that thick and creamy texture that I desired. And it had a slightly coconutty taste, but it wasn’t this slick layer of oil settling on top despite my best emulsifying efforts. So, we are two days in, going on 3 tomorrow, and I just went and bought 6 more cans of the stuff, this time from Trader Joe’s. I’m hoping theirs is better than the Thai Publix brand. I will report back.
For what it’s worth, I already feel less bloated, less self conscious, and I feel like my stomach is flatter over the last two days. I’ve still had some dairy, like cheese and sour cream at Chipotle yesterday and again on my fajita salad today, but the difference is astounding.
As for missing my dogs, the immediate sting and shock of them being gone has faded, but I still feel like everything else happening around me is completely and utterly insignificant. My head is full of… Nothing matters, nothing’s important, what’s the fucking point, who cares about whatever it is you’re complaining about, omg, seriously, shut the fuck up already.. I find their dog hair on my clothes from time to time and instinctively, I go to brush it off, and then I stop and think how I don’t have a steady, reliable source of dog hair anymore. And then I still proceed to pick it off my clothes. It’s sad. The whole thing is sad.
Sammi died January 1st, 2018, not really my ideal way to start the year.She was ready, it had to be done, there was no turning around, no fixing her.I have come to terms with this.I cried for days, off and on at the slightest hint of her memory, but I still had my Tex Mex to worry about.He was the sole recipient of our love and attention now, thank god he was still here!But, my sweet 16 year old Tex wandered aimlessly around the house for days, weeks, looking for her.It was worse at night.He didn’t know, he wasn’t there when she died, we had no way of telling him where his angel sister was and why she wasn’t home with us anymore.He’d ask to go outside, and look all over the yard at all hours of the night for her.Peering around the corners, he’d start to come back in, and then he’d go back out into the yard and check again.She was gone and nowhere to be found.The fact that he couldn’t get up anymore from a laying down position did not help.This meant that several times throughout the night, he’d whine or pant heavily, usually out of discomfort or anxiety, which would wake us up from the deepest of sleeps.One of us would get out of bed, help him up, and he’d proceed to wander around, get a drink of water, he’d search the house, he’d pace around, and he’d settle back down again, only to repeat this process.We’d help him up, let him out, bring him back in, and we’d hope to sleep for a couple more hours without interruption.He was mourning the loss of his sister who had been in his life for the last 9.5 years.They had spent literally every single day together, except for the nights they each had their surgeries last Fall.It got to the point where we didn’t want to leave him home alone, because we knew that once he laid down, he’d be stuck there til we got back.This happened literally the day Sammi died.It was as if all of a sudden, he just didn’t have the strength anymore.He poured all of his last efforts into being strong for her.My little alpha boy.When we realized he was stuck every time he laid down, we started taking him everywhere with us, unless we knew we’d only be gone for a short period of time.Tex dining on the patioWe had a trip to Miami planned for a friend’s birthday.Instead of leaving him in Jacksonville with a friend watching after him, we took him with us and he spent the weekend with us, and with his grandma (Dave’s mom).The following weekend, we had another trip planned for Miami, this time for Dave’s little cousin’s Bat Mitzvah.Something we couldn’t skip out on, something the entire family would be at.We brought Texie with us again.This time we had rented a house to be near the venue, thinking we could just leave him there while we were gone, and we were so wrong.Dave set up a video camera so we could check on him, and instead of finding him resting peacefully, calmly, he was instead howling and crying, sheer suffering and panic.It was one of the most gut-wrenching things ever for me to see and hear, and we turned around immediately and put him in the car with us.I was hysterical just at the thought of him going through whatever anguish he was feeling.He simply couldn’t stand being alone in a strange place without us, or without his sister.During dinner, during the Bat Mitzvah itself, and then during the whole reception/party afterwards, Tex Mex was in the car with the car turned on and AC running during the day, and windows open in the 60* evenings.We’d go out and check on him every hour or so, give him some water, let him out, walk him around, spend some time with him, and then go back inside.I was tired, but I would do anything for him.It was also right around this time that Tex got to meet the puppy. Tex and Hudson going for a walkHudson is our cousin Samantha’s puppy.In this picture, he was maybe 3 months old.(mid January) Tex perked up when he met sweet little Hudson, and it’s like a little fire rekindled again in his heart.Something finally distracted him from Sammi’s being gone, and while Hudson crawled all over him and stole his toys and Tex would get all grumbly in the process, he still adored him being around.We were fortunate enough to have Hudson stay with us for a few days, and he’d come over for visits here and there, as well.The last time Tex saw Hudson was January 27th, and they were just sweet little buddies.Tex and Hudson waiting for treatsBy this time, Texie’s mobility had taken a steep decline and I bought a bunch of traction rugs to help him with his paths around the house.He’d stick to the rugs mostly, and he did alright with them.He was actually sleeping better throughout the nights, too, especially after being worn out on Hudson days.I was giving him melatonin to help him sleep, and also gabapentin to help whatever pain he may have been in, but after awhile, I started wondering if the gabapentin was contributing to his poor mobility in the mornings.He’d be wobbly and woozy, could barely stand, he’d fall over, and his back legs would splay out if we weren’t right behind him to catch him in time.Because of this, I took him off the gabapentin after a week-ish of being on it.I just didn’t want to keep him drugged.The back legs thing worsened.I’d literally have to hold him up by his rear butt fluff to keep him standing and walking properly.Because we took him to work every day with us, this wasn’t too much of a problem because we’d go out on our regular schedule, he’d be able to stand and walk around long enough to do his business, and then we’d go back inside very carefully and he’d find a spot and lay down and snooze.Thankfully he was comfortable and resting during the days.On January 30th, he had a particularly rough day.We toyed around with the idea of getting a cart or wagon for him, and I was like, fuck it.I don’t care if we only use it one time, it’ll be worth it.Texie in his wagonHe always loved going for walks, but the last walk I had taken him on had caused his little toenails to bleed, because they’d drag after awhile.The night we got the wagon, we put it together, and even though it was late at night, we took him anyway.We had it all padded up with his bed and towel, and away we went.When we got home from our walk, I picked him up out of the wagon, and set him down in the driveway.Instead of walking inside, my stubborn man turned around and headed down the driveway on his own, right for the neighbors’ grass across the street.It was the house that I’d always pull him away from, because he’d always want to smell the entire yard as we walked by.We let him this time.With my holding and helping him walk, he made it all the way to the stop sign on his own.He loved every second of it!I finally picked him up and carried him back to the house, and we went inside.This night was a particularly rough night for Tex and me.He woke me up several times, and at this point.I had been doing a little maneuver that I coined the old flip and roll.In which, I’d flatten him out on his side, and then rotate him 180 degrees to get him laying on his other side.I figured if his hips or elbows were bugging him, this would alleviate the pressure.We flipped and rolled quite a few times that night, and I remember crawling back in bed and telling Dave I can’t do this anymore. We can’t keep doing this. He’s absolutely miserable. I don’t think Dave realized how serious it was until the next morning, but I had a feeling that this was our last night with our little man.I had been texting with our vet, Dr Tim Holloway, to make sure he was going to be around.On January 31st, Texie had taken a big turn for the worse and nothing made him smile or made him happy.The thing that really solidified it for me was his not wanting to eat his fucking homecooked meals that were really ridiculously delicious.But he wanted water.He was so thirsty!He had been so thirsty all month, especially at night, and I had no idea why.But whatever, if he wants water, let him have more water.I walked him outside a few times, and he only peed a little.Nothing made him happy.Even letting him lay outside in the cool temps, one of his most favorite things, didn’t spark any interest or joy from him.Texie laying outsideI started making arrangements with our vet, and we proceeded to spend every waking moment with him.We carried him inside, cuddled with him, cried endlessly, rubbed his ears, gave him water, flipped him around, helped him stand up and reposition himself, and he even had a special visit from his Uncle Ivan.Texie getting some love from IvanWe took him to Dr Holloway around 5p on January 31st.He couldn’t stand up on his own anymore, he still wanted water.He was telling us that he was ready to be let go.I had asked him over and over to let me know when he was ready, and he did.Up until this point in this post, I have written everything without crying. Most days, I am so numb, I just go through the motions of what I need to do, and that’s it. I just don’t give a shit about anything. But the smallest thing will trigger me, and I am inconsolable. It’s at this point where I can’t help but be completely flooded with emotion.I laid on the floor with Tex, staring into his eyes and rubbing his face as we said goodbye.Dave sat on his other side and we both bawled our eyes out.It was so different than it was with Sammi.I was equally hysterical, equally ripped apart with sadness and grief.They were such different beings, personalities, but their endings were both so, concrete. Definitive.There was no turning back, or stopping the process.Our pups were gone and nothing could stop the waves of emotions we were both experiencing.For me, I was saying goodbye to my baby boy.The little man that I rescued over 15 years ago from Broward Animal Control.This little boy that healed and turned into the best dog ever.So sweet and loving.A complete terror at times, but an absolute Momma’s Boy.I don’t think most people know the history that Tex and I have shared, and to many, it’s just a pet who has died, and whatever, we’re sad, and we move on.To keep it brief, I saved his life in 2002.He had been brought in as a stray, and was most certainly going to be put down very soon.He was covered head to toe in demodectic mange, and my thoughts were, he just needs a bath and some antibiotics.Within 2-3 months, he was completely healed.You would’ve never known the torment he went through during the first stages of his life if I hadn’t told you.Raw, bleeding, open wounds.I happened to go to Broward Animal Control that day to just play with the puppies. And he was there. Crying.Crying likely on the same level as the crying we had heard him doing on camera when we left him alone in the rental house for fifteen minutes. And when I would pet him through the chain-link fencing, he’d stop crying.How could I leave him there?After that point, I made every effort to go back and rescue him, and I did.He was covered head to toe with Demodectic MangeHe had been through everything with me.Dad’s death, my breakup with my ex, my move from our house to my condo, then from my condo to my house, and then our new life with Dave.The beginning of the business, the successes we began to have, then of course when we rescued Sammi.Ha, the day he became not an only dog!He was excited about it until he realized she wasn’t leaving.Oh man, they loved each other though.I am so glad we got to take them to Asheville, that they both got to experience snow.Ultimately, they both got to experience life and freedom and an amazingly loving home.I want to stop writing but I have more to say.I don’t want to drag it out into another post.I kind of want this to be my closure, but I don’t know that that will necessarily happen once I publish this.The house will still be eerily quiet.We will still just be going through the motions of our lives, get up, make coffee, work, make more coffee, do more work, go to the gym, and then home.A piece of me as been ripped away.I honestly absolutely HATE the sad faces and sympathy that people offer.I know it’s what we do as a society, but it feels like nobody really, truly gets it.This is my own pain, my own loss that I have to deal with.I don’t want to cry in front of others.I don’t want to feel these things.Yes, I know he was loved, I know they had amazing lives.I know they loved us more than anything.I know we gave them amazing homes and opportunities at life, blah blah blah.I fucking know all that.I also know that everyone says this stuff because we don’t know what else to do. Our society of sympathy and prayers and sad faces.I am not upset with our decisions to let them go.They were decisions we had to make and were in their best interest.Sammi wasn’t getting better.Tex wasn’t getting better.There was no selfless reason to let them keep on living and suffering.It didn’t make sense for us to prolong their lives beyond the points they were both at.I am not upset with this.It was their time, and they both let us know they were ready.I am upset that I will never see them again.And this is where I break down all over again.I will never see my dogs again.The two beings that were my children have been torn away so quickly from us.I will never hear them dreaming again, or barking.I’ll never hear their footsteps at night on the tile, or the sounds of them eating or drinking.I’ll never see the joy on their faces again when I bring home new squeaky toys.It’s this stuff that tears me apart.There won’t be any more dog hair to mess up our clothes.The dog hair that I sweep up now will be the last dog hair that ever came off of them in this house.I’m afraid to clean my car, or sweep from under the furniture, or wash too many blankets, because every time I do this, little pieces of them are disappearing more and more.Pieces that I can’t ever replenish or get back.I feel like a broken human.And if you read to this point, omg I’m sorry.I know we’ll be okay.I know it’ll get better with time.I know we’ll eventually adopt new dogs and save new lives and love them just as much.
They’ll bring us joy and laughter, and I’m sure they’ll destroy stuff and we’ll take pictures and do all sorts of fun things with them.I know this is in our future.It just really sucks right now.Thanks for being patient with me, thanks for giving me my space.Thanks for allowing me to write, and feel, and express all of this.Our first day and last days together.November 27th, 2002 and January 31st, 2018
I feel like every new post has a little more despair than the previous one. I get up, drink my coffee, answer emails, go to the office, drink more coffee, deal with whatever, come home, drink another coffee, go work out, come home, and crash. It’s this monotonous cycle, but I’m okay with that. I have always been one to favor consistency and repetition, thanks Dad.
My real issue right now is, I miss our fucking dog. I can speak of her fate in so many different ways. I can choose to be eloquent, to be blunt. I can opt for flowery terms. Sammi’s gone. We had to put her down. We helped her cross the rainbow bridge. We couldn’t save her, we couldn’t fix her, we couldn’t stop her internal bleeding. She’d feel better for a few hours, move around, go outside to use the bathroom, and collapse from exhaustion. I’d have to carry her back in, or just let her lay in the grass for a few minutes til she caught her breath and then help her back inside. It was sheer torture for us, and probably even more so for her. We couldn’t tell her what was wrong, she was likely so frustrated that she didn’t have the stamina to stand up and pee, or play, or just walk. She’d be so determined to move around though that she’d do it, and then she’d frantically aim herself towards the nearest dog bed (they were all over the house) and collapse.
I never thought I’d ache so much with her absence. She was such a pain in the ass, so loud, so barky, would never listen when we wanted her to stop barking! omg. I used to joke about how I wanted to give her away. I used to say tell people I’d make them a great deal if they took her off our hands. I hate myself for this. I hope she never felt unwanted by us, or unloved, or unappreciated. I miss her personality, her presence. She forced her way into our lives, there was no stopping it. If we were there, she was there. I miss the sounds of her breathing, the sounds of her dreaming. Of her sleeping on her back and scraping her nails against the wall while she was running in one of her dreams. When she got excited and literally couldn’t contain her whining. She literally could not stop herself from freaking out when she got excited. She’d knock down everything in her path on her way to the door, because she was so excited to be going somewhere. She was so excited to get to the office, so excited to go outside, so fucking excited to do anything with us. Anything. She didn’t care, she just wanted to be with us. And now she’s gone. In an instant. Talk about PTSD. I will go into more detail on her site if you want to read more about it, I don’t want to write it out twice, and I don’t want to cry any more about it than I have to. I’m so sick of crying..
My last few moments with Sammi
Gym life. Between holidays, trying to mend my dogs, trying to keep shit going at work (so busy with local jobs, it’s absurd. It’s awesome, but it takes so much out of us!) the gym has been an afterthought. I’ve been going, but not as often as my mind would like. When I do go, I find myself just there to do the workout and leave. I don’t care so much about the social aspects, at all, anymore, whatsoever. In my mind, nobody can relate to what I’m going through, I don’t feel like explaining, I don’t want to deal with small talk, I don’t want to smile and say the fake niceties, I just want to go in, work out, and leave.
It’s my own fault I don’t have time. I need to make the time to do the things I love. It is my responsibility to make time for the things that make me feel better. But… I will complain for a minute here. I really have been hating the WODs that we’ve had. I’ve always been our gym’s biggest advocate, but jesus fuck, I really hate the WODs lately. I just want to lift weights and do like, a little cardio. Maybe, power cleans, push ups, wall balls, and I don’t know, deadlifts? That’s a good one. Or, just power cleans and push ups. Or just power cleans. Or power cleans and wall balls. Ooph. Every day. Trap city. Quad city.
But you know what? Again, it’s on me. If I want to do nothing but power cleans and wall balls, and maybe a few push ups here and there, that’s on me. I need to make that happen. I could go in and do those. I could even go in the garage right now this very second and do goblet squats, jump rope, and push ups right now but instead I’m wallowing in my misery and complaining about the programming. Maybe I will go do that. I am sore from yesterday’s wall balls and it feels so good. It feels good to hurt from something that I did intentionally to myself to help myself get stronger, better.
It’s interesting how some hurt we crave, and other hurt we despise. I love the “sore muscles” hurt. I hate the “my beautiful dog is gone and won’t ever come back because she had incurable cancer” hurt. Do I put those in quotations? Italics? I don’t know. I just spent too much time trying to format that and then realized I don’t care enough to research it.
I love being busy. I hate being overwhelmed. But it’s such a minuscule line between the two. One phone call can take me from being busy and productive to wanting to rip my hair out and give up on everything. Why is that? I love projects. I love completing projects. I love seeing the end result. I hate ongoing projects. I hate unfinished business. I hate loose ends. Tie that shit up. I hate things that are out of my control, even more so.
Maybe that’s it? I don’t mind the hurt that comes from things I can control. I did 115 wall balls yesterday and my quad are sore as a result. I did that to myself, on purpose. I knew what would happen and I went balls out, anyway. I hate the hurt that is a result from things I cannot control. When I’m out of control, I don’t know how to stop it, I don’t know when it will end. I can’t prevent it. I have to let it happen. I have to experience the anger and pain and hurt until the universe determines that I’ve had enough.
Okay, Universe. I’m ready for a good year, please.
Hello! Here we are for out monthly update, and happy thanksgiving to all of my fellow Americans. I can’t believe a few things here:
My dog is still alive. (she has cancer yay, 90 days post op!)
My other dog is still alive. (he’ll be 16 this week whaat)
It’s fucking the end of November.
I skipped over decorating for Thanksgiving and skipped right to the Christmas decorations
I’m capable of (and that I even care about) decorating a house in the midst of my chaotic life
Exciting stuff, I tell you. So.. Facebook memories decided to show me a super horrific picture of me Saturday. It was so bad, that I actually went to the gym for the Saturday WOD instead of going straight to shopping instead. It was a tough sell, but it was a bad picture. I then pestered Tom repeatedly to take some good pictures of me so that I could create what you will see below. I’m sure I was less than thrilled when he sent me the good picture, but now that I have my little timeline collage put together, it all worked out. I am capable of making far more flattering faces, but apparently he didn’t think those were picture-worthy. Thanks, Tom!
Here we go.
Left Photo. First starting CrossFit. I remember hating the picture. Look how fucking ginormous I am. My ass, my arms, my stomach, seriously what the fuck. Look at my clunky tennis shoes, good God, fat lady. Get your shit together.
Middle photo. What you can’t see is that there are like, 2 15lb plates on that lady bar. That puts that weight at a whopping 65 lbs, I know right?! 65lbs for me is laughable now. I can’t even tell you what I do with 65 lbs now. Nothing..? I usually skip right to 95, but that’s cool. 65 lbs on the bar, it is. And I look like I’m riding the struggle bus, hard. And what am I doing, deadlifting?? Seriously, I’m deadlifting 65 lbs here. Great job, lady. Crushing those 65lb deadlifts.
Right photo. I’m getting ready to run my 100m run in our partner relay. Yes, I ran like, 6 times on Saturday! Not usual, not common, but it was the only thing between getting and not getting that red-lettered RX on the board, so I sucked it up. (and my feet have been suffering since, so ridiculous.) And when I say run, I mean like, slow jog. People lapped me several times. Clearly I cared. I’m probably yelling at my teammates here, cheering them on, looking all tough and shit. I imagine this is likely the face I make on a regular basis when I’m out in public. Lady your kid is screaming, what the fuck. Hands on the hips, pissed about something, and looking rather formidable. Or ready to stomp on someone. Or ready to say something inappropriate. So feminine! Such a lady.
On the left, size XL shirt, size XL pants. Giant arms, giant face, giant ass. Belly that went for miles. Entirely miserable. Wondering if I’d ever be good at something. Pretending to be happy. I probably bent over like that thinking it would conceal something on my body. Nope.
Middle. Same. XL everything. Calves so big my socks slouched down. Probably left rings around my ankles.
Right. Size Small t-shirt. Size 10 lululemon. I could wear size 8, but I have too many size 10s I need to wear out. I’m thrilled the size Small shirt was comfortable enough to wear that day.
The last 9 weeks have been crazy. Our 10 year old German Shepherd Sammi had to be rushed to the vet for emergency surgery, and we didn’t know why or what was happening, and we didn’t know if we’d ever see her normal again. Turns out, she has Hemangiosarcoma, and had to have an emergency splenectomy to have a ruptured tumor (and her spleen) removed. Her abdomen had filled with blood and she was anemic and barely able to stand on her own. It was basically a nightmare, and it popped up seemingly overnight. I will spare the details here, but she made it! You can read about her very own Keto Journey here, because of course we started a website for her to document her progress along the way.
Fast forward several weeks, here we are. I’ve neglected my site, I’ve neglected CrossFit, I had a shit cold which lasted 3 weeks, and I just got over it. I traveled to Wisconsin to see my mom and we road tripped north and around the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where she spent a few days with girlfriends near Traverse City, and I booked it on down to Detroit, and spent the week with John’s kids. Can I just say I really fucking love Detroit and Michigan altogether? I fucking love Detroit, I love Michigan. It is home to me. When I am there, I feel like I am finally somewhere I belong. (Sorry, Dad..)
I got home on Sunday, Oct 8th. Dogs were great, Dave was miserable (he caught my horrible cold/flu/strep/whatever it was..) but we were all in tact and okay. The next morning, Tex had bloat.. but with torsion. Again, you can read all about it over on his sister Sammi’s website. Trying to keep these things separate, but it’s like my whole life.
So now that we’re relatively back to normal, my projects, gym time, and business madness may resume. In the last 3 weeks, I’ve worked out like, 4 times, maybe. I need to get my shit together, but family (dogs) and business come first right now, so making sure I was caught up in those areas was key before I started dropping 2 hours of my day to devote to CrossFit.
And for fun, here’s a picture of Dave and me from last night. Me still sitting pretty at 189-190, and Dave most recently weighing in at 237; the lowest he’s been in 15 years? Bananas.
As of this morning, post workout, I was 189.6. The last time I weighed this was probably the first 6 months that Dave and I dated. We ate a lot, we started a business, we rode our sportbikes, we didn’t exercise. The weight piled on for both of us. But here I am, under 190! I feel amazing. I am so proud of myself. I get compliments all the time, which I am still not used to, but they all make me smile. People are actually noticing! This is incredible!
My initial goal weight was 180. Now that I’m less than 10 lbs away from that, I’m reconsidering my goal weight, and possibly pushing it back a bit to more like, 175. We’ll see. I will assess and adjust as necessary!
One of the biggest issues though. I hate complaining, but I’m going to complain… is people asking me how to do Keto. Here are some of the questions I’ve gotten from people over the last couple months, and they pretty much all have the same fucking answer.
“Hey Alicia, if you could just give me the quick rundown of this keto thing, that would be great, thx.”
“Girl, tell me how you do this! What is keto?”
“I did some research and it’s kinda difficult because all I get is recipes and we both know I’m not gonna cook… I need the most basic form where I can like meal prep and know… how much I’m supposed to eat of each thing… I was wondering if you could help me out…”
“Are you on the keto diet? Any info you can provide would be awesome!”
“Wow you look great! I wanna do this, how do I do this?”
“Looking good! I’d love for you to send me this new diet of yours!”
“I just need someone to tell me what to do…”
While I love inspiring people, I am not your personal coach. I am not going to just give you all the answers. I will not sit down with you and write up a meal plan, for fuck’s sake. That’s your job. I did my research, you can do it too. If you would like to PAY ME to tell you what to do, I’d be happy to, and my going rate for unprofessional, uncertified diet and exercise advice is about $150/hr. I’ll even take your happy ass to CrossFit at no extra charge and give you a good ass-kicking. Let me know.
I DO recommend that everyone who is interested run out and buy this book called Keto Clarity. The book answers so many questions, and breaks it down so simply. It’s not difficult, but it does require dedication. For God’s sake, just GOOGLE IT! How the hell do you think I got all this information?? I didn’t create the diet… And the second someone responds with “Oh my god I could never do xyz.” I am instantly turned off, I’m sure I make a not-so-nice face, and typically respond with, “You’re right, good luck!” {turns and leaves..}
And after I finish this post, I will be putting together my own guide to keto, so that the next time someone asks me about it, I will just link them to here, which will then link them elsewhere.
Negative post? Sure. Honest post? Absolutely. Mad at me? Okay, fine. Don’t read my shit. But you know what? It’s also a really awesomely positive post, because, I’m in the 180s, bitches! I fucking deserve this! I’ve worked my ass off to get here, and I’ll be damned if I don’t fucking celebrate it!
So, one of the disadvantages I’ve had with keto, or not so much keto, but losing weight, is the loss of my strength at the gym. We had some really crazy unbroken hang clean sets recently that totally broke me down. It was supposed to be 80% or something of our body weight, and for the first time, I should’ve been able to do those at my new weight BUT… I was basing that off of my previous strengths! Not my current..
I was able to get like, one hang clean at the correct weight, but not 3 unbroken. (It was something like, it should’ve been 155lb hang cleans, x3, unbroken).
I barely held on at 115. I was so disappointed in myself and felt like a total failure. But I had to keep reminding myself that the 15 minutes of the workout did NOT trump the other 23 hours and 45 minutes of my day, and that my strength in the WOD was not more important than how I felt the rest of the time. That has been what I’ve been telling myself, and it’s been helping.
Of course, it also helps that I crushed one of the workouts last week, which was a 3 rep max touch and go power clean complex. I was able to get 160lbs x 3, and it was quite glorifying! My old 1RM was 185, so to be only 25lbs off, at a 3 rep max, felt really amazing.
For me, it’s a very fine line between eating to sustain strength, and eating to lose weight. I have been eating a mostly paleo diet to sustain and grow my strength for the last 5 years. It wasn’t until I went strict Keto in January that I actually found longer term weight loss successes, as I fueled my body in a way that allowed for me to be satisfied/not hungry and lose weight. One of the biggest challenges I’ve dealt with my whole life with weight loss was that I was constantly hungry. Being hungry sucks. At some point, any normal person will be like, fuck this. This is stupid. I’m tired of being hungry. And well, that’s what happened to me time and time again.
With Keto, I eat enough fat to keep me satiated. Not hungry. Not craving shit. I actually don’t crave the things I can’t have, for a few reasons.
I know how sick they’ll make me if I eat them, and that by itself is enough to keep me away. I don’t want them. My body literally is turned off at the thought of eating those things.
I know how hard I’ve worked to get to where I am. Eating cake or ice cream full of sugar and bread and gluten and whatever is just not enticing.
It’s not good for me. I embarked on this diet for a reason, and putting processed sugars and starches in my body goes against all of that.
I have turned into a carb and sugar snob, too. I see people’s carts at the grocery store loaded with low fat nonsense and processed snacks, and I can’t help but be disgusted. We as a society have become complacent with eating garbage, and it’s maddening. McDonald’s is not food. It’s not nutritious. It’s not nourishing. Boxes of food product aren’t good for you. I’m sure I make faces without realizing it. I don’t care. Look at me (and check out my giant, muscular legs too while you’re at it), judge me all you want. Because I’m likely doing the same right back (I’m judgy, I can’t help it..) I’m also the healthiest I’ve been in years. The numbers don’t lie, kids.
Alright, back on track here. So, Keto and CrossFit. There is a book I have, but have yet to dive into, called The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Performance, that discusses the keto diet in conjunction with being an athlete. It is my latest book to ‘carry around until I actually read it’. Which is usually effective to a point. I’m finally at a point where I feel like I can start building my strength back up by lifting heavier again, or at least going for it.
Another issue I am dealing with is being lightheaded. When I’m squatting down and stand back up, I am almost always light headed during the process. This comes and goes, but I think part of it can be attributed to getting back into ketosis. I think my constant state of ketosis isn’t actually happening, and when I’m re-entering ketosis, I feel like this is when this lightheadedness is more likely to occur. I have been more carb conscious* this last week and have noticed that it’s more significant the last couple days, but I will report back on this.
*When I say carb conscious, I mean watching out for hidden carbs in things like sweetener in my coffee, ketchup on my burgers, eating too many cashews, etc.
