What a pain!

I am supposed to up my protein intake to 70g from 50g and I thought, sure no problem but I just don’t really crave protein rich foods! Blech!

I get three sources of protein in and I am inclined to think that maybe that is enough. I have bought cheese for snacks but I am in the middle of my usual week of morning sickness and am not at all interested in cheese or anything heavy right now. Thank goodness for chocolate milk. I have switched to regular milk instead of soy milk (I think I said that in the last post) because I worry about the effect of phytoestrogen and it has taken some adjustment taste wise. My problem is that I am lactose intolerant so the milk often gives me stomach aches. What is a girl to do?

In my last posts I have complained about not sleeping well. I don’t know why but I just can’t get comfortable. Anyways, the fatigue coupled with the morning sickness has made me unable to exercise. I had mentioned in an earlier post how my exercise was helping with my chronic back pain. Well, no exercise means back pain and headaches. Sigh.

I did go to AquaFit on Saturday and it was great even if I couldn’t keep up to the old ladies. I am not dumb enough to blame the pregnancy but rather blame the lack of sleep.

I am not too annoyed with the pregnancy. I just want sleep. Who knows why I can’t sleep and who knows if it will remedy itself but I have taken to sleeping on the couch (because I seem to fall asleep there for some reason) and that bugs me. I’d rather sleep in my bed with my husband! I used to sleep on the couch all the time in my last month or so of pregnancy, because that is the only place that would support my chronically bad back and ever expanding stomach, but I surely don’t want to start that now. LOL.

Sorry about the whining today folks. Here’s hoping for a good nights sleep and the end of my morning sickness week to end early.

Now I get to find a Doctor. I really don’t want one but I guess I should have one. Plus, I should be able to hear the baby’s heart beat soon and I would really like to hear that. I really want a midwife but I need to know where I am living before I waste $2,500 on a provider I can’t use.

I finally caved and got the pregnancy test. Yup, two lines means pregnant. I am quite excited. I keep thinking this one will be my girl. After having a definitive answer I decided to evaluate my meal planning and found that I am a little low on the protein side of things for a pregnancy. I am sure I am getting more protein than I think because there is protein in whole grain bread and some veggies and other unexpected places. These aren’t considered good sources of protein but they contribute to the overall tally.

I have still been exercising but I am knocking it down a notch and I am splitting my usual workout into two days instead of cramming so much into one day. So I do weights one day, cardio the other and I swim once a week!

We told Kevin’s family today and they seem excited. After having had two babies I kind of thought people wouldn’t care too much but I was wrong. I mean, I didn’t get (or want) a parade but people smiling and saying, “take it easy” is nice. Even the boys are excited. It was my two and a half year old that spilled the beans today. He went and told his Peepa (Grandpa) that he was going to have a baby sister. He has been very excited about babies lately and I can’t wait to see the excitement mount when he can actually feel the baby’s movements.

My sister is due in two weeks or so and Trey keeps talking about Aunty Sandra’s baby. He can’t wait to see it.

I haven’t been sleeping well for a week and I don’t know if that is pregnancy related. Yesterday I forced myself to workout despite being terribly fatigued and the result was the best night of sleep I had all week. It was far from a great night of sleep but it was better.

So besides eating more protein I am not really changing my eating habits. I may drink the very occasional glass of cow’s milk (just so I don’t eat too much of the controversial phyto-estrogens found in soy) but I still refuse to eat eggs. Poor chickens. Poor cows and calves too actually.

Well I am still months away from an ultrasound. We always like to find out what it is. If it’s a girl it will likely be an Anna. A boy? We don’t know. We will start ploughing through those baby books if that event presents itself. Kev wants Anna Lexis but I dunno about that. Anna I am cool with but not so much Lexis. We’ll talk about that one some more.

For now I am having  a glass of chocolate soy milk and getting ready for bed!

Well, my weight has been acting funny. Despite exercise I have bloated a bit. I think it’s hormonal because I haven’t done anything to cause a small jolt in my weight up instead of down. Plus I think there is a chance I could be pregnant. I was wondering if that would have done it.

Kevin decided he had to have a little girl. We always wanted one and had talked about trying later (because I wanted to run my marathon) but he was at work and a co-worker’s wife dropped by with their little infant girl and he has been buggin’ me since. So I guess we are trying now.

I am so excited and I really hope it will be a girl because after having two boys I will cry if it’s not a girl.  This makes me a little sad because I wanted to get fit before I tried again. I will keep exercising even throughout this pregnancy but weight loss is not advised which means that I will likely end up with an extra 20 lbs on top of what I am already trying to lose! Man!

I am excited too because that will be my first vegetarian pregnancy. I am looking forward to taking care of my body and doing good meal planning and seeing the results of my healthy veggie baby!

I would love to have a home-birth again but things are really up in the air right now and we aren’t sure yet where God is leading us. When we get there we will have to figure out arrangements. If I can’t get a midwife I will definitely birth with a doula. I’d like to have the same one as last time but I haven’t been able to get a hold of her. I would also like to birth in a hospital without an anesthesian. That way there will be no temptation for drugs. When I had my home-birth I didn’t think about having drugs because they weren’t available. The thought never occurred to me during that time. At one point I wanted to pause the contractions and go have a nap but that’s about it. In my hospital birth the nurse used to come in and offer me an epidural every time she came in the room, even after we said we didn’t want drugs!

This will be my third time so I think I should be able to get some respect in a hospital birth room this time. Sigh, my home-birth was so great. I wish I could do that again. But even in Edmonton there isn’t really a certified midwife that I’d really want. I guess Barbara Scriver would be the best bet but she is soooooo busy that I would have to know what is going on with living arrangements for that. Although I have heard of people letting you use their homes as birth homes in the city. I am sure I could find one friend/acquaintance to let me use their home to birth if I wanted it bad enough.

I am about a week late but I haven’t taken a pregnancy test yet. If I am pregnant I guess I will have to put off my weight loss for a while. Oh well, it’s always worth it in the end.

I was reading Alive the other day (best magazine ever by the way) and was inspired to switch up my exercise regime. Increasing the intensity of my workout has been helping but that means that I have to spend an hour and a half everyday doing cardio, weights, stretching and resting. That is a long time. It is also repetitive and monotonous (especially the cardio). Obviously I want to get rid of this tire pretty darn bad!

Last Saturday a friend invited me to join her for AquaFit at Millennium Place in Sherwood Park. It was so much fun! Even if we were the only two people under forty years of age. They have these great waist belts that make it possible to exercise as hard as you can without fear of drowning!

The session lasts an hour and I was so tired at the end of it. It is really a full body workout. I noticed that my calves (and only my calves) were very sore for the next couple of days and I took that to mean that that is where my current workout is lacking. Maybe a weekly AquaFit class will help me get those areas I fail to hit during the week and make my workout regime a little more interesting.

I have also decided to add aerobics too. I have this Latin tape my mom gave me and it is fun too. It’s really hard trying to keep up with the dance moves they throw into the mix of aerobic moves but once I learn how to do them it will be so great.

I think I will do that three times a week. Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Then I can do my regular weight and stretching work after that. That leaves Tuesday and Thursday for the elliptical (plus weights etc.) and then Saturday is AquaFit day!

This sounds so much more interesting than re-watching episodes of Friends while trudging on an elliptical.

Here’s hoping that keeping it fun will make it easier for me to lose weight and feel great!

I am also going to be making extra efforts to release the stress that I am prone to carrying around. Being in charge of my family’s budgeting makes being stress-free much harder but with relaxing baths, reading my Bible and praying I should be able to keep the uncomplimentary stress at bay and achieve my goals faster.

I have some new recipes. I have a new pancakes recipe that totally trumps the last one and I have some raw recipes to add.

Eating raw is a great way to get the maximum amount of nutrition out of your food and so if I can find something raw that is nice and tasty enough to fool Kevin I will make that instead. Vegetables are full of health promoting agents and nothing makes you feel more energetic than a light nutritious meal!

My delicious flaxjacks (not raw):

First make your flax egg (1 tbsp of ground flaxseeds with 1/4 cup of water). Let sit until last. 

1 cup of whole wheat flour, 2 tsp of baking powder and 1/8 tsp salt (optional).

Then add 3/4 cups soymilk, 1 tbsp oil, 1 tbsp sugar or maple syrup or agave nectar and 1/2 tsp of vanilla.

Mix together then add the flax egg. Then just cook in an oiled pan just like you normally cook pancakes. There are flavourful (not like my last recipe) and fluffy.

Some raw recipes now:

Marinara sauce:In a food processor add 1 large tomato (cubed and seeded), 1/4 -1/2 of a red pepper, 2 tbsp of olive oil, basil, oregano, cayenne, salt and pepper to taste, 1 small clove of garlic (DO NOT go over this amount. Fresh garlic is REALLY potent). To make this completely raw you can put it on zucchini pasta (just shredded zucchini) or salad or anything else. I like to put mine on cooked (and cooled) whole grain pasta though.

Stuffed mushrooms with walnut pate. 

 You just stuff mushroom caps or a portabella mushroom with a pate made from 1 cup soaked (overnight) walnuts, 1/2 tbsp of lemon juice, 1 tsp of olive oil, 1 tsp of soy sauce, a dash of salt, a tbsp of onion (finely chopped) and some parsley (optional). You just toss it all in a food processor and mix until it has the consistency of a pate.

Another raw meal is sushi without rice. Just toss sprouts and veggies in these lovely nori sheets, roll, cut and dip in soy sauce if you want. They look just stunning!

Peanut butter/carob truffles: 

This recipe is mostly raw. It’s the peanut butter that makes it not raw (because peanut butter is made from roasted peanuts).

In a food processor mix: 3/4 cup of all natural peanut butter, 1/2 cup of sliced almonds, 2-4 tbsp of agave nectar (you do need this to make it stick so if you don’t have any, substitute with maple syrup a little at a time or as a last resort, corn syrup), 1/4 cup carob/chocolate chips, 1/4 chopped dates and 1/4 cup carob powder/cocoa powder.

Roll into little balls. Since natural peanut butter is runny at room temperature I would recommend keeping these in a refrigerator.

 Well that’s all for today folks. Good luck and good eatin’!