I haven’t written about this yet, and it needs its own blog post.

Our family friend/sister-in-law Darryl M had a goal of playing in the OK Native B-Ball tournament this past March. I haven’t played ball since long before my first hip replacement back in 2015. In January of this year we started playing at a local gym. There were just 4 of us at our first workout. My sister and I, Darryl, her husband Mo, and her niece Jan-u-fer. We shot around, got familiar with the ball again, played Knock-Out and Horse. Maybe we played 2-on-2? If we did it was just for a very brief amount of time. And that was about all we could physically do. I was so sore after that!! But we kept going back weekly, every Sunday, and we got more people to come out.

We gradually worked up from knock-out to playing 3 on 3. Then 4 on 4. We went from playing half court to full court. We had some youngins come out to play, and they were so supportive and encouraging of us! We found more 50+ and 40+ women to come play. Some the kids of the women who came out to play jumped in to help fill out a team or to be subs.

I think all of us started out playing in our running shoes. A vast assortment of Hoka Ones, Saucony, ASIC, and Brooks ran the court. We all gradually got court appropriate shoes. We worked out in spandex, old school mesh shorts, whatever was comfortable and what we could move in. We took lots of breaks. We had good music going. We tried to take a team picture after each session. There so much laughter, a little trash talking, that I looked forward to it every week.

There were several of us with health issues that showed up faithfully every Sunday. Me with my 2 replaced hip joints, my sister with her stuff, one woman needed a new knee, one had a heart attack previously, and another was recovering from a mysterious heart ailment. We all had grief, losing family members to the pandemic. But we showed up. And we improved. We were running full court games within a couple of months.

We were able to scrape together a team for the OK tournament. For the 50+ division, we had to play 6 on 6!! 😂 Some of us had never heard of that, much less played. So there was much YouTubing of 6 on 6 games and trying to practice it prior to the tournament.

I wish I could post a highlight reel here from the tournament. It was a sight! The thing that got me was that I felt like I was going full tilt…moving fast on defense, rebounding, etc. But when we watched the videos of our games we were all like, “Why does it look like we are moving in slow motion?” 😂😂😂 Just really given’er but barely moving. Soooooo many comical moments on the court….I think we laughed for days after at some of them!

We lost our first game right off the bat, which we protested. The official made us play down with 4 players because the other team only had 4. We should have been able to put 6 on the floor. It would have changed the outcome of the game, so we protested. We had to compromise on the protest. They wouldn’t let us replay the game, but they gave us our protest fee, plus half our entry fee back because their official messed up.

We worked our way back from the losers bracket to the championship game! And the 50+ women’s bracket games were all played in ONE day! Thank goodness there were only 4 teams total, but since we ended up in the losers bracket, we played 4 full games in one day.

We were exhausted by the last game. Before tip off we were already happy and excited because we didn’t expect to make it that far. One of our teammates said, “We’re already winners!” The other team out of Washington state was goooood. We got worked. We ended up with 2nd place at our first tournament!! Woooooo!!!! Darryl just hugged us really hard. She was our fearless leader and kept us moving towards her goal months.

I never ever thought I would be playing ball again at 55 years old. It has turned into self-care for me. Playing with these ladies on the weekends helps me take care of my physical, social, emotional, and mental health. I’m moving thee old bod, pushing it to do more as I am able, I get to laugh around for 2 hours, and do something I’ve enjoyed since 6th grade.

I’m so glad our weekly games have started back up again after the summer and fall hiatus. And I’m so glad to have found another form of self-care.

Today felt like a good day to turn my IG and FB status into a blog post.

School therapist life has been tough. We are at the end of the quarter and students are feeling that round of fatigue that accompanies the end of a quarter. We have a new teenager in our house, we retained guardianship of her in August. She’s amazing. But now I have 3 daughters in my house…and it’s a whole different ballgame than 2 teenage daughters.

My youngest daughter hit the last 3 cross country meets of her season still in good shape. Not injured, took her times way down, just tired. She was a model of self-care with her nutrition choices and allowing her brain and body to rest when needed. My oldest got a job and is getting antsy with her gap year. I’m still trying to sew and bead and building those boundary setting muscles.

It’s still a busy time of the year no matter how I schedule or say no. Parent teacher conferences for my 2 high schoolers and my work went on, plus appointments for all my kids and myself, traveling to meets….lots of stress. Trying to type out all of the activities and meetings, and concerts, and dental work, and clubs would create more stress. Lol.

I’m feeling all the effects of the last 1.5 weeks. I woke up with a headache, my jaw hurts, I didn’t feel rested, and I just generally feel run down.

Today my day is dedicated to restoration. Restoring my calm, my energy, my peace.

Usually feeling this way makes me crave sweets or other comfort foods. Today my body was craving something different. I cooked up several cups of wild rice, the real stuff, and I want to make stuffed acorn squash soon. I wasn’t sure if I was hungry for porridge or some kind of substantial salad. So this is what came to me.

Organic salad greens on the bottom that I got from the store 2 days ago. I wanted celery but didn’t have it, so used diced mini cucumber instead. Added some raspberries and blackberries, diced apple, dried cranberries. Added some pecans, sprouted pumpkin seeds, hemp hearts, and topped it with some warm wild rice. I mixed up a maple vinaigrette, I wanted a lemon maple dressing but didn’t have any lemons. So I put together olive oil, white wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, sea salt, fresh ground black pepper, and some maple syrup.

I know this sounds corny as heck, but I felt that this fed my body and my spirit. Drank some filtered water, and now making some spearmint tea.

Today is going to be lots of water, tea, fresh foods. Whatever I decide to do today, I am moving slowly and deliberately. No rushing allowed today. Remembering to breathe. I want to get outside enjoy a walk, or just get a good stretch in. Whatever thee old body feels like doing is what we are rolling with today.

rest #restore #selfcare #indigenousfood #mni #ceyaka #wildrice #calm #peacefulmindpeacefullife

I’ve been feeling my grief and depression for 3 weeks. It’s been hard to cook, hard to feel like exercising, hard to do the work on my emotional eating…everything seems to take more energy than I have. And my therapist brought to my attention that Wednesday was the 17th…it’s been 6 months since my mom passed. And next Friday is my first birthday without her.

So I just gave myself a break in order to function at home, with my family, and my job. Just let myself feel and be. I didn’t beat myself up for not managing my eating or getting out to walk….I knew I was doing good just to get out of bed and function at work. Then the time change threw me for a loop. This week has been physically exhausting. Our meals have been an assortment of comfort foods, take-out and frozen meals lately. Thank goodness my family is understanding and they help out wherever they can.

Yesterday I read a 12-part thread on the Humans of New York page about a woman who used food to heal her daughters’ medical issues. Reading about all the adversity they experienced in their move to the US and opening a diner, and how it has tested and strengthened their faith…it gave me a lift.

Today I felt like cooking, and also felt like cooking with colorful ingredients. As I chopped up the red bell pepper and put it in a bowl with broccoli and chopped onion, I realized it’s been a minute since I cooked with lots of veggies.

I’m an emotional eater, and it gets the best of me. So I return again to what I know and what I can live with…cook with and eat nutrient dense food…drink water…take my supplements and get back on my probiotic…eat fruit when I have a sugar craving…cook with and eat real food.

I saw this recipe for a savory salmon and veggie frittata and tried it out. Also felt like eating the kale, Brussels sprouts and cranberry salad we make around the holidays, but I forgot to get the sprouts. So it’s a kale, cranberry, pecan, and apple salad and I made a lemon vinaigrette.

This is really good. Here’s to getting back on the wagon. I think as long as I keep getting back on, it doesn’t matter how many times I fall off.

We have a #snowday here in the #LFK

And we have rolling power outages here as well. I figured I’d better fix myself a hot brunch before anything happens on our street.

In case you’ve been following my blog, I’ve been learning about #emotionaleating and how I experience this. I’m reading a very informative and engaging book (more on that later as I get further in to it), and learning about #radicalacceptance

I am still a proponent of keto for many different reasons that are not weight-related. But as I’ve said in my blog, I’m taking a step back from all specific WOEs (Ways of Eating), while I learn about myself and how to work through my emotions as they relate to my behaviors surrounding food.

I’m still enjoying keto foods, and Mediterranean diet foods, and other familiar recipes. I’m cooking and eating what I have access to and what I think will be good fuel for my body.

So today, for my hot brunch before any power outages, I fixed my favorite soft-cooked eggs, on low-carb toasted bread, and I fixed a Cesar salad for my green veggies. It was so good. As an added bonus, it just happened to work out that I broke a 16-hour fast with this plate of food. I wasn’t trying to fast that long, I just didn’t feel hungry or experience any emotions that triggered snacking. #happytuesday #intermittentfasting #ketobrunch #emotionaleatingrecovery #radicalacceptance

Earlier this week, I found myself in the mood to snack. To provide some context, the extreme cold weather generated some fear and anxiety. I worried about our power going out, worried about my Dad and my sister and their power going out. I worried about our adult children and their families, and my best friends in Oklahoma, who are not used to the extreme weather. I worried about my family in Michigan and Montana. Not to mention thinking about the homeless and pets who have nowhere to go. And then I had some work meetings which used up much of my mental and emotional energy. The outcome for all meetings was positive, but there was a big mental drain that gave me the weirdest headache right in the middle at the top of my head.

During one of my meetings, we discussed how when individuals act out, or employ different tactics that could be seen as “manipulative”, that there is a NEED that is not being met. And the individual is using the tools and techniques that they know work to get their needs met. The thing that struck me about that conversation was the reminder about viewing some behaviors as a symptom of an emotional need not being met. Which brought home a favorite quote from the author and psychologist Susan David, “Emotions are data, not directives.” Our emotions inform us of our needs, they do not direct our actions.

I ate my lunch before 1pm, but at 3pm I was starting to graze on the chocolates left in the Valentine’s box, and some fruit and Greek yogurt. When I took a bite out of the 3rd chocolate, I realized I was starting to mindlessly snack. So I paused to do a check-in. I was not hungry, but my head hurt with that weird headache and I was TIRED! Mentally and physically tired.

I did a quick inner assessment and figured out that my emotional, mental and physical tiredness and the weird headache came from worrying about the extreme cold and it’s effect on my loved ones, and the tiredness from my meetings. So I was deliberate in thinking to myself “What do I need?” What need is not being met that I am trying to meet with snacking?” Reminded myself that my emotions are clues as to what is going on with me, not internal physiological orders or directives to snack.

I came to the conclusion that I needed rest. Not necessarily sleep, but I needed to give myself a few moments to let go of draining thoughts and allow my brain to just rest. I tried to convince myself to do a short yoga video, but I truly felt too tired to do so. Since my work day was done, I went to lay down for a bit. I gave myself permission to lay down and read or just lay down with my eyes closed for a short time to recharge. The takeaway here for me was figuring out what I needed and figuring how best to meet that need with the resources available to me. I am noting my emotions and train of thought and my decision making, and starting to see where my go-to coping mechanism for a long time has been to stay busy, to keep doing things, to keep powering through, so I don’t have to think about how I feel. And that has contributed to where I find myself now with my physical and mental health.

What needs do I have that are not being met that I think can be met with food? That’s my new self check-in question. Self-discovery things like this make me happy to be a social worker for the self-help purposes. 😁

It’s been a little over a week since I acknowledged my emotional eating, and started to heal from that. I wanted to give a brief update on how things are going.

I am doing my self-check-ins, starting as soon as I wake up. Before I get out of bed I take note of how I am feeling. Do I feel rested? Are there any muscle aches or pains? Do I have a headache? What is my mood and what thoughts immediately come to mind? I acknowledge that the thoughts and feelings are there and then I let them go without attributing a “good”’or “bad” label to them.

This has been a nice way to wake up. I’ve noticed that by doing this, when I actually get out of bed, I feel more awake and alert. My awareness has been heightened and it has a positive effect on my energy. I’ve felt exhausted waking up for the past 4 weeks. I attribute the improvement to my self-check-in, and also my body is finally adjusting to the Meloxicam.

I find myself doing a check-in before I decide to eat anything as well. This has been really helpful to me. If I am anxious or stressed, I put making a food choice and eating on hold until I can reduce my stress. Some of the tools I’m using to reduce my stress are doing 4-7-8 breathing, yoga videos, doing this (writing in my blog), and EFT Tapping.

One of changes I’ve noticed with these small changes is that I need less coffee to feel awake and alert. I also have had very few cravings in the last 5 days. When I had stressful days prior to my current health practices, my thoughts were only on having a big bowl of homemade stovetop popcorn with real butter. But I just realized today that I have not craved popcorn for the last 5 days. And yesterday was SUPER-stressful. The diminished craving for sweets or popcorn was a big surprise to me. I started on this journey with the knowledge that my stress and my cravings were connected, but to actually feel how managing my stress impacts my food cravings in real time….wow!!

A NSV that I took note of happened on Thursday. We picked up 2 ALDI Take & Bake pizzas for our dinner. While the pizzas were in the oven, I started to eat potato chips out of the bag because the bag was left out on the counter. It was right there looking at me, demanding to be noticed….and also I was hungry. lol. I stopped myself and did my check-in to see how I was feeling. I determined that it was in fact just hunger (I hadn’t eaten anything since 10:30am) and not stress, so I got out a little bowl and put a small handful of chips in there and enjoyed them. Then I did something I haven’t done in years. I made a Cesar salad to eat with my pizza. Back in the day we used to do that regularly. We would be mindful to have a veggie side with pizza because it helped fill us up and balanced out our plates. I even cooked some broccoli so my daughter had a big serving with her cheese pizza.

It was a good week! A few NSVs and also some intrinsic validation that I’m on the right path. I bought a book from our local bookstore The Raven about emotional eating so I will post about that when I make some headway through it. Stay tuned…..