ugh-liness in the world and where do you take your place?

I thought about cleaning the house for Christmas.
Then I sat down at the computer and thought about taking a nap, and went on Facebook and wrote a blog.

Is anyone else annoyed at social media and the way we are portrayed in general by social media.

I hate how the word 'porn' has become a normal word to describe things!

I hate how normalized it is about hard core sexuality is. People have become so graphic. On mainstream sites, you can find descriptions that are vulgar, demeaning, and normalized.

So sick of it.

I am also tired of how passive aggressive people are on Facebook. If you want to solve problems in the world, be the change. Get off the freaking computer and go do something meaningful.

Nobody ever wrote an article for news about how "such n such" meme made me go and save the world. I was tot's inspired by that, bruh.

Instead, they write any article that can get as many eyes as possible. Because views = money. That's why.

But, I hate to break it to you, money isn't going to solve your struggles or your pain.
Neither is power.

Only authentic love to others. if you have trouble understanding how to do authentic love, check out Jesus, he's a great example.

Hey everyone. If you want to see change in the world and you post about it on Facebook, get off Facebook, and go be who you are on Facebook for the world.

Deal with the grit in your teeth and the sand kicked in your face in real life, and love those people too.

The best way to bless someone is the show it to them, in real life.

The best way to see change in the world is the change yourself and grow into a different person than you once were.

in other thoughts, whether we like it or not, polarization is happening, and should be happening. We should not be lukewarm Christians trying to blend in to the sick, depraved culture that this world is now. We need to be the light, because, let's face it, the world is so FRICKIN DARK.

Blackout everywhere.

So be on the side where you know, without a doubt you are right. There shouldn't be any ifs.

I've been pro choice before, but there are "if's". Killing children for the convenience of others isn't right, period.

Nope. Na-nope. Don't interrupt. Nope.

Political views are personal, and thus, need to reflect my personal life.

This country, as a nation, is not a Christian nation. We want them to be, but they have been gone for awhile. So when our country makes decisions that are unChristian, the reason is clear. But if it is against what we personally believe, then we need to say it.

Don't be in the middle ground. Don't participate if you know it's wrong.

Be a light.

Being on the other side of the Christmas presents

Well it took three years... but we finally got our Christmas spirit on!

We have a tree. We have lights on the tree. I practiced and played "Have yourselve a Merry Little Christmas" for the Delp family gathering. It was great for me to stretch my piano muscles and lern something new that wasn't just something that I wrote.

We have a wreath that i created.

I made some chocolate.

And I did Christmas shopping for my kiddos.

We did stockings and the Dollar Tree served us well.

We got some nice toys that wer grown out of for Naisa.

We have gifts. They are wrapped. They will be under the tree. On Christmas morning. For kids to unwrap. and we are going to have stockings! And we are going to have hot chocolate and a yummy Christmas morning breakfast. :D

We are having a fantastic Christmas Eve dinner ! Thai coconut curry!! :D

Liver cleanse: Aftermath and how I feel

Yesterday (Wednesday) was the Flush (the toilet) day! Here's my thoughts!

Gallstones and Liver stones
At noon I felt the surges and right after mom's group, I had my first poo and I was surprised at the size of the stones! They were large! almost an inch in diameter, some of them. And then smaller. And so many! Between the several times I went to the bathroom I would say that I passed a hundred of them, many, many small stones, but also the larger ones. I don't think I would have been able to pass those without doing this cleanse, in which I used Livertrex to soften and start to dissolve the stones.

I am very thankful that I had this cleanse, because without it, I may have had to have my gallbladder removed.

Weight Loss:
Today I weighed myself and was down three pounds, putting me now at 190.8. This was a goal of mine, do be under 191 because we can get a discount on our health care sharing per month.

Energy:
I do feel I have more energy! Last night when I went to bed at 9 (and I got up before 6 that morning) I wasn't exhausted.

Adjusting back to the non-cleanse diet:
I'm going to be completely honest. I jumped right in to eating the things that I missed the most when i wasn't cleansing.
(Raw, grass-fed) Cow's milk? √
(homemade whole wheat) Bread? √
Cheese? √
(grass-fed) Steak? √

Don't worry! I also had veggies! and ate lighter at dinner.

Things I learned:
During the cleanse there were several times when I was hungry and I just didn't have the option to eat, or it was bed time and I couldn't eat more. So I just dealt with being hungry.
This was good for me. It is important to be able to be hungry sometimes and just exist with it.
It is now easier for me to be hungry and not feel urgency that I need to eat.

I also learned that five meals a day works pretty well for me. I don't feel as hungry and the smaller meals are manageable. And I think my stomach shrunk getting used to eating five meals.

Drinking the olive oil wasn't the hard part: keeping the olive oil down was.

It was very important to have the high-fat filling foods readily available for almost every meal (not breakfast). I had nuts mid-morning, an avocado with lunch, nuts mid afternoon, and another avocado with dinner. I would have had a lot more trouble if I couldn't have the fat.

Conclusion:
I feel better. I liked the cleanse overall, though there were occasional unpleasant things. The Roxy-powder was very effective, and I never felt dehydrated from it. The livertrex's taste was mild and tolerable and the acv and water tonic was very mild. The Epsom salts in water was very bitter, but it was only 8oz, so also tolerable. The olive oil was icky, but when drunk with orange juice as a chaser, it was just fine. This cleanse did not have any negative side-effects for me. My body feels better! Remember, I'm only 24 and I had lots of stones. Depending on your lifestyle, you may or may not have stones as well.

I highly recommend this cleanse for anyone thinking about it.

Would you do a liver cleanse? Do you think you could do it?

See my liver cleanse day 1-2 here.
See day 3-4 here.
See day 5 (flush day) here.

Liver cleanse: day 5 flush day

Day 5: Today is flush day! It's different because I don't have shorter times between meals, which is hard. It is also hard because my day started extra early! Ben's day begins an hour earlier so we got up at 5am. I was able to enjoy several hours of quiet time this morning, because they slept in until 8:30.

Here are some foodtos (see how I did that?) for visual effect!

breakfast: watermelon 

Foods I used in this cleanse (minus the dried apples in the back: watermelons, avocados, walnuts, olive oil

A sample lunch: 1 lb cauliflower, 4c kale, 3 garlic cloves, and one avocado (not pictured)

Cooked and mashed.

My flush day juice, pre juice!

Juice! Love the ginger! See my liver cleanse schedule on the fridge!

Juice enjoys the outdoors from afar.

So I have felt more hungry today because of the breaks between eating, but it's not the end of the world. Next is epsom salts at 6pm, for 'dinner'. (hahaha) then my late evening snack is olive oil and OJ. yum

I felt pretty weak in the morning, and frustrated when I was at the grocery store (though that is more from the grocery cart (do they EVER fix those???) or the toddler pressing hard against me saying "out" of the carrier.

I had two avocados with lemon for lunch, and then at three I made the juice seen in the picture. It kept me feeling full for three hours. . . and is the only thing I had until I did the oil chug.

I chugged the Epsom salt in water at 5:30. The technique for drinking things that are yucky is to do a deep inhale, then exhale and don't breathe while drinking. This is because you don't taste it as much when you aren't breathing. I only tasted the bitterness afterward. I took a video of that, but it is uneventful. 

The came 8pm. I was starting to over think it, so I just had to do it. The oil was slightly thicker than I anticipated, but I took a gulp of it then a big gulp of orange juice and I was back at neutral (not grossed out ready to vomit). I finished it, then lay on my side, and knew it was doing something in my liver because I could feel some discomfort.

Then I went to bed. I couldn't sleep because I was so nauseous (vomiting is, by the way,  a valid way to remove toxins). So I i threw up around ten, and then I slept much better. When I woke up before six and still felt generally unwell. So I had a cup of orange juice and took the last Oxy powder for the cleanse. I feel almost better, but the idea of olive oil makes me want to vomit.

today is literal flush day. Flush the toilet day! I will be removing toxins all day today and probably some tomorrow! Looking forward to it. 

See liver cleanse day 1-2 here!
See liver cleanse day 3-4 here!

Liver cleanse day 3 & 4

This liver cleanse is five days long, and today I begin the fifth day. Today is the day when I get to chug the olive oil, which I am (obviously) looking forward to like a trip to the zoo! (not)

Here's how Sunday (day #3) and Monday (day #4) went!

Sunday

Sunday morning began early: the oxypowder was working! At 4am, 6:45am, then 8am I was at the elimination station. As can be expected, I felt a good bit weaker today, and hungrier at other times.

I made do with the veggies allowed and made a tasty and filling mashed garlic, cauliflower, and kale "mashed potato", with an avocado. If I felt like perfection (and extra dishes to wash) I would have put it in the food processor until the kale was thoroughly incorporated. So naturally I used the hand masher and chewed my own kale. It was very, very filling! I couldn't finish it, and I typically I have a ravenous appetite. But as the cleanse has gone on, I have less and less of an appetite (could it be my food choices?? Perhaps!)

I did not feel too bad other than the weakness in the morning, but I did have a slight headache after my dinner juice. (My friend Shelah gave us a juicer to use, and I love having it around!) I used two beets with their greens, two carrots, at least six kale leaves (also from Shelah's garden!), and a lemon which I peeled, and also had an avocado (which I couldn't finish). It made 16 oz of juice. I was not hungry later that evening, but thirsty!

That evening, I had a mild headache for a small amount of time. I did not workout on this day. Not important info, but my caloric intake for this day was right around 1500 calories. This is very low for me (not too low, just lower).

I SO wanted to eat the dinner I made for the family, and the leftovers in the fridge!, but I didn't need them.

Monday
I felt incredulous that I have made it through to day #4. The first time I looked at the detox (I was still nursing Yonah at the time, and thus, eating very much, very often, I was having a hard time imagining myself making it through a cleanse with no meat and no grains. However, I learned this great phrase from a support group for T-tapp (the workout I do). It is to say to yourself, "Thank you for your opinion," after you have feelings of, "I don't wanna workout," or "It's too hard, I don't wanna do this cleanse." This has made a difference in my exercise and my food habits!

I had the early morning run to the pot and then three more throughout the day for a total of four total for day #4. I had incredible amounts of thirst today, so I was drinking the most of the ACV water today.

I had watermelon for breakfast, almonds for a snack, and did the mashed cauliflower again for lunch, and couldn't finish it again. I had a snack of walnuts, then for dinner I had an avocado and two cups of the mixed veggies my family had at dinner. It's not on the recommended veggie list (except carrots), but I have been so good, it was okay for me to have this little wiggle as I toe the line. I made my family freaking steak (from our grass fed quarter), so I deserve my mixed veggies....(what a rationalization.... ugh. I AM ALMOST DONE!)

(and just for reference, the diet plan on the instructions, although very specific about the veggies and foods you are supposed to eat, has a big gaping grey area between the rules of things you most definitely should not eat. So, for example, they say don't have cow's milk, but almond or hemp milk is ok during the cleanse, but no where in the daily plan of food does it give any room anywhere for hemp milk to be included. Ok, rabbit trail over.)

After dinner, besides getting over myself emotionally (wanting steak, wanting cheese, wanting beans and rice, wanting cow's milk, wanting chocolate, wanting ice cream... etc etc etc until the end of the food chain!), I started feeling a little more un well, slightly more nauseous than the night before, slightly more icky in the belly. I welcomed the bed time before nine.

In general, I have felt a little like I'm in a haze, more specifically, when I am doing something where I have to invest significant amounts of concentration (practicing a piano piece), and switching back and forth between the focusing on that and then (obviously) breaking up fights between my children and managing a couple situations at once.

Coming soon! How Tuesday's oil chugging goes! 

See how day 1 & 2 went right here.
See how day 5 (FLUSH DAY) went right here.

Liver cleanse, day 1-2

Many of you know that I had some gall bladder attacks for an extended period of time after Yonah was born. Thankfully they dwindled off and I didn't have to seek medical attention for my gall bladder. I reached my goal of nursing Yonah until he wanted to stop. He weaned himself at the end of October (16.5 months) and then I was home free to finally regulate my eating habits, jumpstart my weight loss, and the not so fun part: cleanse my gall bladder and liver. I was going to wait until after Christmas to do the cleanse, because it was going to be one of my christmas presents. Unfortunately, over thanksgiving, I had a familiar pain creep into my right side and I knew what it was: my gall bladder reminding me I needed to do some holiday cleaning. So I ordered the Liver Cleanse Kit from Global Healing Center on Black Friday (although I should have waited until Cyber Monday, because I could have saved $15), and it arrived on Friday.

Why I chose this cleanse: I wanted to follow a specific, doctor-created and doctor-recommended cleanse. This had specific directions for diet and had a colon cleansing component. I discovered this cleanse when I viewed the documentary series called "The Truth About Cancer", where this doctor was featured and he specifically discussed the tonic that he created that helped loosen and dissolve gall and liver stones as a part of a liver cleanse. Since I figured i needed all the help I could get, I decided that this was going to be the cleanse I was going to do. I read the directions and looked at the diet and decided that I was going to suck it up and do no dairy and no meat for five days. It also has a flushing component that was similar to over gallbladder cleanses I had read about.

http://www.globalhealingcenter.com/about/dr-group

The products I am using:

http://www.oxypowder.com/wp-content/themes/oxypowder/images/colon-cleanse-oxy-powder.jpg

OxyPowder: This is the colon cleanser: It loosens your stool and uses ozonated magnesium oxides to help dissolve the impacted stool that is residue on your colon. Most people have impacted stool on their colon unless they recently had a diarrhea virus. :P

http://www.globalhealingcenter.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/l/a/latero_temp.jpg

Latero Flora: This is the probiotic that you take at the same time as the Oxypowder. This bacteria repopulates your colon in a positive way while the Oxy Powder is dissolving your old crap. (hahaha)

Livertrex: this is the tonic I was excited about! These are the ingredients: the formula is called: Spagyrex® formula. It is made with vegetable glycerin, and the proprietary blend is this: Borotutu bark, Yellow dock (root), Dandelion (root), Chanca Piedra (herb), Chicory root, milk thistle (seed), turmeric (rhizome), peppermint leaf, fulvic acid. All ingredients are either organic or wildcrafted.

This is the diet:
I have a fruit breakfast, wait an hour, have the Livertrex in water, wait an hour, have acv water with nuts, wait an hour, have the Livertrex water, wait an hour, have a veggie lunch with acv water, wait an hour, have Livertrex water, wait an hour, have nuts and acv water, wait an hour, have Livertrex water, wait an hour and have veggie dinner with acv, then I take Oxy powder and LateroFlora before bed.

Now to how it is going!

Day 1 wasn't hard: I felt a little hungrier a the end of the day, but I just had some more nuts, as recommended and wasn't hungry at night.
Day 2: This day was harder. I did not feel too bad in the morning: I did a portion of a workout. I also had a slight headache in the morning that got more pointed after lunch and gained some nausea and smell sensitivity. This went away after about 20 minutes. At the end of the day I had a second loose poo and then felt worse then. I also had negative thoughts about the food I was eating while my family was having pasta in meat sauce for dinner. but I got over myself and didn't have any of it at all. I took the recommended amount of the Oxy Powder and Latero Flora before bed.

See how day 3 - 4 went here!
See how flush day (day 5) went here!