Gluten Free Goodness

Yay! Isn’t my lettuce too cute for words? Winter isn’t exactly my favorite season. Between the cold, the snow and ice…yeah, I’m so over that. So somewhere along the way I decided I needed to get to see something GREEN and GROWING for a change to make life more wonderful, and so I got an Aerogarden for the holidays.

It’s been fun. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect–it seemed like people use the gardens for herbs, but I already have herbs outside. This year herbs are currently surrounded by a snow moat, so perhaps they would have come in handy, too. Ah well. So for my first go, I opted for lettuce.

Above right, we are at 2 weeks  of lettuce growth. Below is the “harvest” at 4 weeks.

It’s been kinda exciting to watch it grow. I was away for a week, and as you can see, I got quite a nice treat when I came back–enough for a decent sized salad! And the neat part is that I love lettuce, and I forgot that. I always eat baby greens and mix it with other stuff, and I forgot that I actually enjoy the taste of lettuce, on its own. So it’s been fun to have lettuce “snacks” along the day.

The aerogrow lives at my Fairfax office because the  felis destructus brigade has a long and illustrious history of plant genocide.

I am tempted to buy one of the bigger gardens for my other office to try for kale…we shall see. They do have kits to MYO mix, and that’s what I’m going to try next, and I’ll see how that goes!

So having something grow has brightened my days and expanded my lunch horizons. Especially since the groundhog cleared me out of veggies last summer, I think my new toy and I are going to be very good friends.

How do you keep life bright through the wintertime? And what are you thankful for this Thursday?

Today’s thankful is a bouquet of mini thankfuls: Thankful for fun recognition from the Washingtonian, thankful for my ability to receive it, thankful for the Olympics and thankful for Brazil nut chocolates!

I was surprised and very appreciative to see…ME! written up in the Washingtonian as one of the area’s best nutritionists. I’m honored and really appreciate it. I do love my job and work very hard, and yet often I focus on where I could be doing more, so it’s kinda nice to get the opportunity to receive positive feedback.

And it’s lovely to be at a point in my life where I can (sometimes) take in good stuff without feeling…well…weird, or overwhelmed, or search like mad for the other Cheryl Harris they must be talking about. That’s often been a struggle for me, and it’s so frequent that I see people, often women, duck and run for cover when compliments come their way. It’s definitely still a process, and it’s nice to see ways I’ve changed and grown.

I am also enjoying the Olympics tremendously. It’s such a wonderful thing to see the artistry and grace, and so beautiful to see people shining at what they do best, and showing their gifts. I absolutely love Jason Brown, men’s figure skater from the U.S. and there have been so many breathtaking performances. It’s strange for me to spend so much time watching videos, but so gratifying to have the pleasure to vicariously see the joy and marvel at what they can do.

Last but not least, I’ve made a variation on my Amazing Chocolates (pic above) to make them even more awesome! I’ve added in chopped Brazil nuts and coarse sea salt. For me, the chocolate/Brazil nut/salt combo is the epitome of excellence. The delicious Ms. Shirley of GFE was kind enough to include them in her mega chocolate roundup.

Oh yeah, I’m also hugely thankful we’ve got power! Fingers crossed that it stays on, and that our trees stay in their upright and locked positions.

Today’s “Thankful Thursday” theme is pretty easy. 5 years ago today, I was in an oncology unit at Virginia Hospital Center. I’d been sick, really sick for a few months, and tests seemed to show that I had leukemia. The good news was that I didn’t—I did have neutropenia, which feels supremely and epic-ly bad and can still kill you, but no cancer. Whew.

But it was an experience I’ll remember forever, mainly in a good way.

It was a wake up call, and mostly a rude awakening. I was always somewhere else in my mind, either worrying about what I’d done wrong, or worrying about what I was GOING to do wrong next. Planning for tomorrow as a stepping stone to somewhere when I would finally get it together and life began.

Life was a Mad libs.

I need to do ____because I’m (afraid of/intimidated by/can’t say no to/flattered by/insecure that I’ll never get the opportunity again) ____and sooner or later I’ll learn to (love myself/say no/make better choices/get my head out of my tush) and then life will be good. Once I get____ done, I’ll (take time off/take better care of myself/pay more attention to those I love).

Sound familiar?

I’d start living once I figured it all out, but until then it was just a dress rehearsal.

Except I finally realized that I couldn’t count on figuring out how to do the whole “real life thing” sometime down the road. The shock of realizing I might only have a few weeks was enough to shake me awake. Or at least, more awake.

When I realized that I didn’t know how long I had, life came into sharp focus. All I wanted was to learn how to accept myself fully, and love myself completely. I cared about relationships with the people and fur-balls I love. Everything else fell off my radar.

Initially, I called Mr. Dude. As soon as he answered the phone, he started ranting–apparently, I was so nervous that morning that I left the door ajar, and it blew open. Of course, it was a freezing day, and I was getting an earful on heating bills.

And I told him that I just had a bone marrow biopsy.

*Poof*! Just like that, the heating bill fell into the “your argument is invalid” category.

Having that intense fear shaped my decisions about work and about life. What to include, and what wasn’t worth the effort. I made choices more un-apologetically, and chose to end certain relationships that aren’t healthy. I chose to add in more days off on my calendar. The fear of dying gave me the permission to be more conscious about how I was living.

I don’t mean to give the impression that I left the hospital and began life as an enlightened being and floated away on a cloud of peace and goodness. In fact, I made some colossally bad choices.  Yes, I still get bent out of shape over small and trivial things, but I’m definitely different as a result of it, even 5 years later. In my experience, there’s some kernel of good that can come out of even the most challenging experience, and I’m tremendously thankful that it did help open my eyes to what matters in this life.

It reminds me of this awesome video that inspires the heck out of me.

Oh, and speaking of the things in life that really matter…chocolate post up yesterday!

Everybody say hi Edgar! Edgar is my dragon co-pilot. Just for the record, he’s not a hippo, and he’s not a dinosaur, thankyouverymuch. He’s a dragon, and generally a happy dragon. To tell you the truth, I’m not a happy driver. Although I have lived in NY and MA, I never drove much when I was there. Since an accident in the snow a few years, it’s definitely a struggle. Traffic gets me kinda jumpy, and so does snow, ice and crazy people. So perhaps DC isn’t the place for me this winter, but here we are.

Seeing Edgar’s happy little face makes the drive more peaceful. I mean, if the dragon in your car isn’t mad or breathing fire, the guy who cut me off can’t be THAT bad, right? I appreciate his vote of support, and as strange as it sounds, I do think I’m more relaxed with him on my dashboard.

And no, I was not driving when I took Edgar’s pic.

Apparently the dragon love has gotten trendy, so if you need a smile, do check out this letter from a 7 year old asking the Australian Science Agency for a dragon for Christmas.

I was really grateful to be diagnosed with Raynaud’s a few years ago. No, not right way, but as soon as the dust settled, it was actually a relief. I was in such pain whenever it was cold, and it was truly unbearable. I’m sad to say I blamed myself for years, because I thought I was doing something wrong or just complaining too much.  As a teen I was at track meets with purple hands and feet, and sometimes my lips and face would turn purple! Since everyone else was okay, so I assumed that I just was whiny and needed to toughen up. (why do we do that to ourselves?) So it was actually a huge weight off to find out that there was a real reason the cold was so painful.

But then part 2 is, okay then, now what?

I’ve been able to make a lot of changes by what I do and what I wear.

The best purchase I think I’ve ever made was a heated floor mat. I got a small one (above) which was about 2 foot by 3 foot, and it was a complete fail. It was catted in about 60 seconds flat, and G would not share with me. So now I have a big one, and it’s often catted as well, but there’s room for the three of us. Yes, it’s pricy, but I honestly think it’s the best investment I’ve made in years in my health, and I think that’s made a bigger difference for me than anything else. I am pushing for heated floors for my workspace at home (eventually) but because that’s so expensive, it’s going to be a while.

I also have a ridiculous amount of clothes from Under Armour that I wear every day under my normal clothes. My favorite? The base 4 leggings. They’re supposed to be for going outside in “brutal cold”, I need to wear them even INSIDE daily, just to avoid the numbness and tingling. And for super duper cold days?  They have extreme coldgear leggings, which are thicker and not as comfortable, but they’re such a huge help for my circulation so I don’t mind being bulky.

It’s annoying, but such a big help! It’s kinda painful to spend $90 on a pair of pants, but I wear them every day so it kinda-sorta evens out. The UA site also has an outlet which I tend to stalk to get more stuff. I also really like that they have pants for short people like moi and that they have the leggings numbered by coldness rating. I did try out the leggings from Nike and I found the site really hard to navigate and didn’t like how those leggings fit, either.

I’ve got the UA gloves, but I’m not crazy about those and still looking for something that may work better. Suggestions are welcome.

The combination of wearing leggings/warming shirts under my clothes and using the heated floor mat daily makes all the difference in the world. I honestly can’t imagine how I managed to deal with the pain and numbness  all those years…and I can’t believe it took so long to realize how simple the solution was!

So weeks like this one aren’t super comfy, but they’re doable. Between all that stuff and an ungodly number of blankies, I’m all good.

I know most people don’t have to go to such extremes, but honestly, I can’t believe that it took me so many years to realize that this was a necessity for me and take it seriously, and I’m sure I’m not the only one out there. *knock on something* so far, I haven’t had a single attack this year and it’s been a cold one, so I’ve been tremendously grateful.

And, as an added bonus, I was grateful that most of the roads were clear of ice today, and that I’m home safe and sound.