Clean(ish) Fifteen

May 20, 2015
"So I thought I would be good and make my coffee at home this morning instead of spending money and calories at Starbucks. It's never the same but it was good enough so I felt pretty proud of myself. Of course as soon as I get to work all of my coworkers start clamoring for a "drug run" to Starbucks and my willpower crumbles instantly. Instead of opting for a tea or anything remotely resembling "healthy" I go for sugary coffee crack (at least I got a small... right?). I'm not sure what divine intervention nudged me to look at the bottom of my iced latté when I got it but I did and I found these awful white curd looking things that weren't dissolving. They just sat at the bottom of my cup and I was so grossed out I refused to drink it.
All I could think about was how, if I had gotten my normal drink (which is either blended or hot and therefore in a non-clear cup) I would have consumed the nasty white curd things and never would have been the wiser. And then it hit me - WHAT THE HECK AM I PUTTING INTO MY BODY?! That's disgusting!! Why would I want to do that?! I think that I'm going to start a reward system with myself. Every 15 days without artificial sugar and chemicals and fast food I get to treat myself to something special. So basically I just have to eat super clean and I get rewarded for it. Not too bad right? My first reward is going to be a massage."

May 21, 2015
"Whose idea was it to be healthy and why do they want to kill me?! Day one of this detox thing has kicked my butt and not in a good "that hurt but was awesome" way... more in a "what the hell did I get myself into" kind of way.

So basically I am a week into this and its getting a lot better. The first two days were absolute torture. The sugar-withdrawal headaches and lack of sugar-induced energy made me a suuuuper un-productive employee. For large spans of the day I would just sit and stare at my computer because I literally couldn't convince myself to do otherwise. It's getting easier and I finally have more energy. I cheated a little this weekend and I really cheated today but otherwise I've been doing really well... Honestly I just can't believe I've gone a week without coffee.

Celebrating The School Stuff

Last weekend my big little brother graduated from college with his Bachelors.

It was incredibly cool to see my younger brother participate in such a life changing event and I am so glad I was able to escape work for a day and hang out with my family (Anthony, regrettably couldn't get out of work) even though it was only for about 24 hours.

Our family and my soon to be in-laws. So blessed to be able to call such wonderful people my family.

I also got to see the last home series of my brother's college baseball career and even better that they kicked butt!!!

 I figured this was my last baseball game for a while so my traditional pretzel had to happen. It's not a baseball game for Elaina if a huge soft pretzel with salt isn't present. Also spilling mustard all over my leggings definitely had to be a highlight of the trip.

 She's already family but in November she will officially be my sister!!

So proud of you for finishing college William!!! I love you!

And speaking of school.... I've decided that I'm going back.... And I am so excited I think my head is going to explode!!!! I will be pursuing a Nutrition Certificate and a Personal Trainer Certification with the goal of helping people like me with jacked up bodies or just anyone that wants to be healthy to achieve health in a natural/holistic way. I can't wait to be back in a learning environment and be better equipped to help myself, and eventually others, to live life at the healthiest capacity. I'll still be working full time and focusing on mainly taking night and online classes but I'm over the moon. Plus, having something to focus on at work that I'm excited about makes me less likely to pitch myself off the roof (just kidding, I'm totally afraid of heights). My always brilliant mother has suggested that I document my transformation (physical and educational) through this process so that I can help others later using my personal experience so there you go.

Life Happens

I know that in my last post I said that I wanted to launch my new Vegan/Recovery Blog on April 20th. At the time I really meant it. I was really excited about it. I planned it out a bit and got started and then, wouldn't you know it, life happened. It's been doing that a lot this year.
It started on Easter when Anthony and I found out that my Granny was diagnosed with cancer and given a few months. It didn't come as very much of a surprise (thank you heavy smoking) but anyone who gets news like that and carries on like normal may in fact need serious help. We cleared our schedules and coordinated with my dad to go up to the Bay Area for a long weekend two weeks later to see her and my Bay Area family.

As it turned out we really didn't have that much time and a week and a half later we were driving up to meet my dad and celebrate the life of a wonderful woman. Anthony and I, along with my parents spent about a week going through my Granny's house and getting things organized and in order. I was doing really well the entire time that we were there but once I got home I fell into a fairly serious bout of depression. We didn't really eat a home cooked meal for two weeks afterwards, and I could hardly bring myself to do just about anything. It felt like we had just gone through this with Anthony's grandmother, who passed away in February, and I was just tired. I was physically and emotionally exhausted and overwhelmed with work and I let it roll over me like a train. It's been a slow upswing since then. Eventually I went grocery shopping and eventually I hung out with some friends and things gradually resumed to normalcy. I've gotta say that I married an absolutely incredible man because I don't know what I would do without his love and support. Also my family... I'm not dumb, I know that I have been incredibly blessed to have such an insanely wonderful group of people love me and call me one of their own.

So right now I am just trying to figure stuff out. I've made some big decisions in the past week and I promise I will write about it as soon as I have hashed out all of the details. 

I guess that even though life has been happening, it is going to continue happening. I just need to readjust myself. Easier said than done sometimes but it has to happen eventually.