52 Weeks to Better Health - Week 2

Last week, I started a new blog series, 52 Weeks to Better Health. In my first week, I chose to immediately give up soda. I'm happy to report I have not had a single sip of soda this entire week. The first couple of days weren't exactly hard but I was definitly craving my favorite sweet drink. Only a week later and I can honestly say, I'm not really missing it!

This week, it only stands to reason that I focus on liquid consumption of the healthier sort and what is more needed and necessary for a healthy body than good ol'fashioned water?

It's long been said that one should consume eight glasses (8 oz) of water a day - roughly 1.9 liters. Though one can also get their daily intake of fluids from food sources (fruit) and other drinks (juices, milk, coffee), I'm going to focus mainly on water alone. I'm focusing soley on water for two reasons: 1) it's pure and 2) zero calories. But mainly, for the zero calories - let's just be honest, okay?

So that is the habit I will be instilling this week and, hopefully, keeping on a regular basis through, not only these next 52 weeks but my entire life. Won't you join me? Put down the pop, coffee, energy drinks and pick up a bottle of good ol'fashioned water. Milk may do a body good but water does it better!

For more information on how much water you should be drinking and why see this article my the Mayo Clinic.

52 Weeks To Better Health - Week 1

I've decided to start a blog series about bettering my health. Each Monday, I will take at least one step towards improving my health on a permanent basis. I'll be honest here - I'm not really looking forward to this. Trading in my bad habits for good ones has never really been my forte. I'm hoping that by going public, I will be more inclined to keep up the good work.

And, I'm really hoping that you will join in with me a time or two to improve your health as well. Please leave a comment and tell me about it if you decide to come along on this ride with me. I'd love to hear from you!

First up: Giving up, FOR GOOD (aack!), my beloved diet pepsi. Diet Pepsi and I have had a long, tumultuous, on again/off again, love-hate relationship for years. I think now it's finally time to say good-bye to this no-good thief of good health once and for all.

*sniff* I'm going to miss you Diet Pepsi. You've been sweet and you've been an energy lift but it's time I find someone who will treat me and my kidneys better than you ever will.

And my bones. And my teeth. And my bottom line (literally).

Want a list of reason why pop is bad for you? Here's a quick, to-the-point article on the subject:

8 Ways Soda Fizzles Your Health

This isn't going to be easy. I work at a restaurant. I am surrounded by a large variety of pop 5 days out of the week. It is my job to pour this stuff up for other people, hours on end. I think I can do it though. I just have to keep reminding myself that with every sip I take, I am literally poisoning my body. Blech.

Next week, I will talk about the importance of water consumption. Obviously, I'm going to have to substitute something for the pop I drink. Water seems like the best way to go. :) I hope I see you next week!

Getting From There to Here, Part III

I have come to write out this post several times with an idea of how I was going to write it and each time I got here, I turned and walked away from it. I kept thinking I wasn't in the right mood. Or I had things to do, the timing was wrong. Or the kids are around and they will interrupt my flow and train of thought. Excuses, really.

I just flat out didn't want to write this part of it. I was even regretting that I had started this series at all. But if there is one thing I've learned over the course of the last five years, it's that if I can't be authentic and an open book, then I don't want to be anything at all. I've been burned by that philosophy in the past (and it's hurt) but the benefits far outweigh the negatives so I fully believe in it and refuse to give it up.

So here I go.

Like I said, we got an offer we could not refuse. We were drowning. Going down for the last time. The stress in our house was palatable, to say the least. We worked so hard to own our home and everything in it and in the end, it owned us. We were both a slave to it and all our possessions (possessions I still don't miss, by the way). Paul was a slave to it financially and, I, physically. I could not keep up with a 3000 sq ft home and two small kids. I know a lot of women who can and great big kudos to them (sincerely) but I am not one of them.

That's where Paul's dad and his wife, Mary, came in.

My husband had left college back in 1991 just shy of getting his degree. This was something that never sat right with his dad. He had wanted to see his son graduate. Knowing we were in a financial mess with, seemingly, no way out and two adorable (if I do say so myself) grandchildren they wanted to spend more time with, they opened up their home to us. We could move in with them, rent free. But it came with one condition - Paul had to go back to school and finish his degree. His dad also offered to pay for school.*

So you see - how does one refuse an offer like that?

You would think we mulled this over and over, weighing out our options, the pros & cons but, really, we didn't.

You know that joke about the guy in the flood? God sends him two boats and a helicopter and he refuses them all saying, "God will provide". He ends us dying, meeting God and says, "What happened? I put my faith in you!" and God replied, "I sent you two boats and a helicopter! What more did you want?!"

Well, when you are drowning, you grab hold of whatever is thrown to you and hang on. That's what we did.

The decision did not come with a heavy price, however. We knew we would have to walk away from our home and default on the lease of our car. We also knew that it would not be enough. We had to file bankruptcy. If you think any of these decisions we just shrugged off with ease, you'd be wrong. I don't know of anyone who takes this sort of thing lightly. It made us sick to our stomachs. I can't tell you how much sleep my husband lost over the several months it takes to declare bankruptcy. This, on top of the sleep he had already been losing trying to figure out how we were going to survive. I literally watched the gray on my husband's head double during this time.

It took months for my husband to come to peace with this decision. We had lost everything and in it's place, we had guilt. We were two people who simply were not raised to "walk away" from our responsibilities. Some of you may judge us for our decision and, you know what?- that's fine. You do that. You can't judge us any more harshly than we did/do ourselves. Except you get to live with you and we get to live with our decision. You get the better deal, trust me on that.

We sold more than 80% of our possessions, packed the rest in a moving truck, headed across country and moved into the 800 sq ft** basement of my in-laws home in Nebraska on November 15th, 2008. To say there have been adjustments is an understatement. To say that God has taught me more humility than I ever thought possible is an understatement. To say that I have had to learn how to readjust my thinking, my patience, my stubbornness, my need to control, my acceptance of other people and my nearly absent ability to give-in is an understatement.

To say that I have learned a deep sense of compassion and understanding for other people in similar situations and desperately want to hug them and say, "You're going to be okay" is an understatement.

So that's it. That is how we got from there - in deep debt in Mesa, AZ, to here - Small Town, Nebraska, learning how to build our way back.

When you hit rock bottom, you've got two ways to go - straight up or sideways ~ Winona Judd

*Paul has been able to pay back his dad nearly all of the tuition money with grants.

**That's an approximate. I really have no idea the square footage of the basement. I just know it's too small for a family of four. lol!

Cooking with Campbell's Soup

I love to bake but cooking is not my thing. I can get your basic meal on the table but I don't have much fun doing so. Cooking, to me, is a chore right up there with laundry and cleaning the shower. I do it because it has to be done. I do it because, for reasons unbeknownst to me, my four and soon-to-be seven year old have yet to learn to do it for themselves.

Or for me, for that matter.

When I was a kid, other than for the occasional spaghetti or meatloaf dinners, I was not made to learn how to cook. My helping out in the kitchen was mainly regulated to peeling and chopping the veggies (which, for some odd reason, I was insanely eager to do), and to cleaning up afterwards. And that was just fine with me. Being a last-born baby, I was perfectly at ease with the system of having my plate of food magically appear before me each and every night. Who am I to mess with a working system?

When Paul and I were first living together, our dinners consisted mainly of Taco Bell and the occasional spaghetti which, despite this being one of the meals I did learn as a young adult, Paul would actually make. I think I may have buttered the garlic toast but I can't be sure. It could be that I just think I buttered the garlic toast but, since it has been so many years, I am now simply confusing fantasy with an actual memory.

After a year together we moved to Omaha where we lived for two years. Yes, you read that right, we really did do this once before. During those two years, we barely had a dime between us so it didn't take long before we realized that cooking at home made more financial sense than eating out every night did. Sometimes, it takes us awhile.

So we did what any kitchen-savvy young couple would do. We went to the grocery store, grabbed a very large bag of pre-cooked, heat-n-eat chicken breasts, threw it in the cart and then filled the rest of the cart with .89 cent boxes of Pasta Roni. We were set to feast!

And feast we did! For about three months. Actually, I don't think we even lasted that long. It doesn't take long at all, really, for one to get tired of heat-n-eat chicken breasts and Pasta Roni four or more nights a week. The day finally came when I had had enough. I was going to figure out this cooking thing even if it killed me.

I remembered I had a cookbook in the top cupboard above that stove-thingy. I got it out, dusted it off (and I mean that literally as it was a few years old and had remained wholly untouched) and started looking through it. It was a Campbell's Soup Recipe book. Each and every recipe started out with a Campbell's soup as a main ingredient. What I liked about this cookbook was it gave you three to four variations for each recipe so you could tweak it to your liking. I picked out a couple recipes and made my grocery list.

Once home from grocery shopping, I set out to make my very first "real" meal. I was happily surprised to discover how easy it was! So easy, in fact, that from that point on, for a very long time, recipes from the Campbell's Soup Recipe book became a mainstay. There were times, even, when I found myself at the grocery store without a list or a plan, I would simply head to the soup aisle, pick out a couple cans of Campbell's soup that had recipes on the back and proceed to do my grocery shopping from there. Hey, whatever works, right?

I like to think that I've come a long way since then and, in some ways I have, but I have got to admit that cooking with soup is still easy and convenient. Somewhere along the way, I lost that original cookbook but have, through my luck at garage sales, picked up two more. Over the next weeks, maybe even months, I'm going to be sharing with you recipes from those two cookbooks. Even if you are well adept in the kitchen, you still may find something new to try or a twist on an already favorite recipe of yours. If you are like me and simply not all that passionate about cooking, you might find something inspirational to get you passionate. Or, at least, not be so bored about it. Either way, I hope there is something for everyone.

I'll keep up with it until I've gone through the majority of the recipes or until my food starts to magically appear before me again. Whichever comes first! :)

Getting From There to Here, Part II

Continuing from my last post...

Paul lost his job in January of 2008. You are probably thinking that is when we started to panic but you'd be wrong. In the home sales business, it is not uncommon to go from one builder to the next. It happens all the time either by choice or by force. We had been down that road before and, while it wasn't much fun, it wasn't too hard to deal with when you had played the cards right and had enough savings tucked away to see you through to the next employer...which we did.

Except, there was no "next" employer.

Paul had already decided, much to my delight, that he was not going back into real estate. He had decided, much to my chagrin, to give insurance sales another try.

Let me just stop things right here and explain to you a couple of things: while the real estate biz was pretty good to us, I was exhausted from the financial uncertainty that comes with it. We lived by the words, "Some days steak. Some days hot dogs". I was tired of the rollercoaster ride and I wanted off. I was tired of seeing my husband stressed by the business of commission sales and I wanted him off that damn ride, too! But if there's one thing that I hate more than the business of real estate, it's the business of insurance sales. I have said for years that you either must have a solid three years of living expenses in the bank or you really have to hate yourself before getting into insurance sales. It is not for the faint of heart.

It's also not for a (sort of) young couple with two small kids who have bills to pay. Lots of bills.

So when he said he was going to give insurance another try, my heart sank but, at the same time, I trusted my husband and thoroughly believed in him. And regardless of how the decision to go back into insurance may have played a part in where we are today, I will never regret believing in my husband. I do still to this day.

Needless to say, insurance sales went no where. We lived off of our savings for nearly ten months. I am thankful that my husband had the diligence to put money into savings like he did or we wouldn't have had even those ten months. During that time, we tried to sell our home. Ha! Now there's a laugh. We tried to sell our home during a real estate down-turn. We tried to sell our home when there was NO WAY possible we could get what we owed on it.

Needless to say, we couldn't sell our home. I will tell you a little more about our home and how my 3000 sq. ft dream home was our day-to-day living nightmare in another post on down the line. It's another story entirely but one worth sharing with you.

So there we sat - no income, savings depleted, unable to sell our home, bills to pay. What do you do when you are in that situation? We didn't know. We had never been faced with something of this magnitude before and we felt like we were out of options.

That's when it came to us...an offer we could not refuse.

To be continued...