Alpha Gal and Potty Training

The weather was perfect last week, but tomorrow is chillier day. It's only one day though--and I saw in the weather there is a day marked for 87f next week. What, early July? Bring it on.

Our week this week (spring break for most public school kids) is light and free and open, with Becky's piano canceled and no nature group. I have plans to scrub my cabinets. Being 40 is wild. (Okay I'm 39 but you get it...)

I was thinking (and laughing) the other day about how I threw out a pair of finger nail clippers that were not made right because middle age doesn't have time for that. I will buy a pair that work correctly and I won't give those that don't another thought. How dare they make such an inferior product.

Last night I had an alpha gal reaction. I don't know what I ate... After two weeks of not having any symptoms (because I'm mammal product and dairy free) I wonder what it was. I did try three or four new things last week and I bet it was one of those...I went out to eat at Cava. I used their vegan only menu but any dairy could have easily been cross contaminated. It wouldn't be Cava's fault--I choose to eat from a restaurant that serves dairy so...anyway, I also tried these waffle fries from Alexia and I'm thinking it might have been those? They say vegan friendly on them which the Alpha Gal Kitchen Facebook page says some people have had reactions too... I won't be having the fries again because they made my blood sugar way too high, but they were delicious. I also tried a new kind of peanut butter. 

I have been so careful with what I have been eating that to have a reaction--and it was a strong one--was not fun. 

Oh, it could also have been myself cross contaminating myself, because I still serve my kids dairy. I have regulated all beef cooking and beef consumption of products to the weekend (because I believe beef and mammal products are healthy for my kids/husband) but cheese, milk, yogurt is still the norm around here for snacks for my kids on the daily. I am super careful though...

My bet is on the Cava, which is a bummer. I love Cava.

I need to figure out how to heal myself. But that is for another day--with homeschool in full swing here and all the things I'm juggling, I haven't been able to make appointments or do any googling to see if a cure does exist. 

It's five weeks until summer break! I'm so excited.

The only other thing going on around here is aggressive potty training. Esther is in underwear during the day! She's doing so great with it.

I hate potty training. It is not my favorite toddler activity. Little toddlers can't take off their own clothes, wipe themselves or navigate a lot of toilet use...perhaps I make it harder on myself by not having the right kind of equipment for the bathroom--which is something I will look into on Amazon forthwith, but regardless--this isn't my first potty training experience (hopefully it's my last) and I still don't like it.

It has nothing to do with the child. Esther is bright, wonderful, engaging and she's taken to the potty with the gumption and zeal. She wants to be big like her big brother and sister and she wants to use the potty. Most of the time. When she isn't playing. Or distracted. 

She has had a few accidents but it hasn't been bad. I mean, she's two. What did I expect?

I just don't like the interim phase. She can use the potty, when she wants too, but I'm also cleaning up a lot of pee (even though we have potty training underwear) and she had two showers already today... you get the jive.

But yesterday she made it in the potty every time. My expectations for today were high.

My expectations were wrong. I need lower expectations. 

If I was to write a memoir at this point it my life it wouldn't be Great Expectations, it'd be...Minimal Expectations, and as a subtitle: buy lots of bananas. Toddlers love bananas. I love bananas. We need more bananas. 

In short, potty training is a lot of extra work for mamma. Remembering to potty her before we leave the house, and then taking her to the bathroom every 45 minutes to 1 hour after. Singing songs about the potty. Stickers to celebrate making it in the potty. And a lot of talking about going potty. 

I'm not complaining, I'm just being realistic. I don't like potty training, and it will be 3-5 days or uh, 3-5 months, and maybe she'll get it. 

If you've ever potty trained anyone, you understand. 

Should I just go back to diapers? No, I hate changing them and she has to get it someday and diapers are astronomically expensive. Also, she's ready. She really is. And has anyone else seen the price of diapers lately? It's like $40 a box. Insane. I should have cloth diapered.

But this isn't supposed to be a list about what I should have done in my children's past. Mostly because it would be extensive and honestly would serve no purpose. Mother's aren't perfect, but we do try.

Oh, and this is Esther's last month to be two. It's so sad! It's so wonderful! Oh, my heart. She is growing up so fast. She will turn 3 on May 1 and we want to get her a water table for her birthday. She wants a very hungry caterpillar birthday party and I think we may do just that.

My Brain the Past Week

Why is one of our books always missing? This morning it was This Country of Ours. Of course I never notice it's missing until I want to read it. But, after 2-3 minutes of hunting I found it behind the books in the bookcase. Obviously. 

Continually stopping to find homeschool material of course interrupts my homeschool flow. So do cute, amazing toddlers, bickering kids, requests for food, my own seasonal allergies, my spring apathy and phone notifications. 

At least one of those things can be silenced. I will let you guess which one.

Back to the book. For the first minute I couldn't find it anywhere. Utter frustration. What had I done with it? It's not like the kids will wander off with This County of Ours for a little light reading. The toddler, then, was suspect number one. She's always absconding with books to make book stacks, because, toddler.

Invariably, the kids wandered off while I was searching for the lost book, and started to play wrestling/loud game in their room which did NOT help. Why they not help to find book? I don't know. I don't have time to ask them for help. I am searching for book, because homeschool day depends upon book.

Finally, I found the book behind the books in the bookcase, and felt bad after blaming the toddler, even mentally. I hadn't even gotten to the point of questioning anyone...but, guilt was there nonetheless. It definitely hadn't been her. Or me, or any of the kids, but merely the fact that we have...to many books, and sometimes some of them get shoved in the back, and covered up by other books.

I need a library.

Well, a magic fairy godmother did not appear with a wand and gift me a library like she gifts teenagers dresses, so I dusted off the book, made sure my bookmarks were still in the right place, and looked around for the kids.

They were still playing a game, loudly, in their room. And, with those happy noises I realized...my homeschool day had been derailed. The groove has been disrupted, everyone needed to be re-assembled to school time and...thus I set down the book and went to get them.

They all huffed about me disrupting whatever game they started playing. Excuse me, this is school time. Even when I'm searching for lost educational material that the bookshelf decided to eat. 

Here, I wanted to skip over the part that once I got everyone assembled back into the living room, I couldn't remember where I had set down This Country of Ours. Yes, on the way back I temporarily lost the book again because I set it down in an obscure place (the top of the piano) as I was on the way back to their rooms...but lets not focus on my mom brain. Everyone came, and school was had. 

I need that meme about throwing off the Emperor's Groove...literally me.

There, perfection. 

We ended last week with Esther having a little cold. She even fell asleep on me which was so cute. She never sleeps on me anymore...I enjoyed cuddling her for an hour while she snoozed. 

Then we had daddy's birthday weekend, which was awesome. I did not get a picture with me, because I am the one who takes pictures. I have stopped feeling sad about it. I only feel resigned to obscurity at this point.

The boys went off to see that new space movie with the rock Pokemon and the spaceships and the weird sun eating space algae. 

I haven't read the book, can you tell?

So now, this week is here. I have been having a bad health week but pushing through. I hate bad health weeks. Everything takes so much more time and effort and I'm really quite exhausted. Though I am feeling better today! By better, I mean, I have energy again. I thought I was getting a UTI so I took a bunch of supplements Monday and Tuesday and maybe it helped--maybe I did have a kidney infection and/or UTI. I don't know. But yesterday, I decided to give up gluten and maybe that's why I feel better. I don't know what's wrong with me, but I hope one day I will find out. Actually, that's not all the way true. I know some of what is wrong with me. I have alpha gal and I have type two diabetes and I have some kind of gut issue...but beyond that, God only knows. 

I also made bone broth today and I have no idea if that is why I look about 5 months pregnant with bloating. I thought bone broth was supposed to be good for you.

Yesterday the kids set up some tents as forts--they love doing this in the summer! This year we have a girls tent and a boys tent. So fun. They played in them all day yesterday after school. 

Today it hailed like crazy--I have never seen it like this in central Virginia before! It hailed for at least five minutes and we all stopped what we were doing to watch. Except for Esther, she took one look at what was happening and couldn't care less and went back to watching Zootopia 2. Being two is wild, ya'll. 

How was your week?

Adjustments

I think I am burnt out a bit from homeschooling. I'm feeling better and more hopeful mid-week today, the warm weather is making me smile. And yeah, mourning the loss of whole food groups (beef/dairy) due to Alpha Gal...is part of the process of acclimating to my new diet. The most important thing to remember is, I'm going to be okay. And I can thrive, I just have to adjust and get over the learning curve. 

Our dryer broke so I am enjoying hang-drying my clothes. I actually find this peaceful. Except our 200 cloth tissues--that's no fun. And, for some reason the clothes smell bad when I hang them outside. They may be staying damp too long, Virginia is very humid. Or maybe there is something wrong with our washer. I will clean the washer and see if it helps. Brian says he will try to fix our dryer this weekend and then I won't have to worry about smelling like algae...or old socks. Whatever it is? 

The kids are cycling through a little cold. No fevers, just sore throats and sinus issues. I'm giving Narayani War (1M) and also Narayani Sinus (30C) homeopathy to the kids, and our nettle/oatstraw "sick tea" and lots of steamy hot baths. For myself, I did two garlic enemas, sick tea, and fire cider. I also took the homeopathy but I forget to re-dose myself often...so I am not sure if one dose did anything. The garlic enemas nipped it in the bud for me in 24 hours! The kids do not want to try an enema, and I respect that. But I still tell them how amazing they are so perhaps they can do them to themselves when they are an adult.

For the kids, the illness seems to last three days, with the end of the first day and the second being the worst, with the third day a recovery day. 

I quit our Monday co-op. It was a great co-op but I can't do an all day co-op from 10am-5pm. It just won't work. I have tried to reconfigure our lives to get it to fit and it's impossible, especially with my chronic fatigue. Monday is the day I try to get as much done as possible to get myself set up for the week in case chronic fatigue hits and stays. Usually I don't have chronic fatigue Monday until noon, if it comes. Because of this, Monday can't be our busiest, out of the house day. It wrecks the whole week. 

The Monday co-op used to be only 2-4pm which was perfect. I’m sad they changed! We still have nature group twice a month, and church, and playdates…so my kids won’t lack for friends.

It's sad, but I have to make the best decision for our family. I know this is the right decision, even if it hurts. Reuben was a bit sad about not going back but Becky, my introvert, was relieved. And Esther really doesn't care...

Before we all got sick, Reuben learned to make a fire with a magnifying glass. All by himself. I was amazed! Here he is with his park friend who trumped him in chess just an hour before, making fires. And we did it safely, put it out completely before we left, and had a lot of talks about fire on the way home. So don't worry. 

God is so good. I'm making spaghetti for dinner--sans meat for me. I might make myself a salmon on the side...been craving it lately. I need to make sure I am getting plenty of calcium foods and iron. And I'm taking a really good supplement for both those...hoping it can help. I don't know how my body will do without its daily deluge of raw milk, but I am hoping I'll be okay. 

This weekend is Brian's 41st birthday and I'm so excited to celebrate him.