7.1.13

HAPPY JULY!

Hello Everyone! 

So we are now officially in the summer and with only a few days before the 4th of July its pretty cool to see the progress over the past weeks. So above is a photo i took of myself the other day when i was bored on the train. I realized that this whole process has made me completely obsessed with taking selfies. Obnoxious i know.. but it is all for a purpose! Like i mentioned earlier my face shows my weight a ton so its cool to see how that among other things in and on my body are changing! So i know lately i've been in a little bit of a slump and i'm not really sure what to attribute that to but i'm feeling a little bit more optimistic now and excited to be able to look back on this from the end of the summer and just be happy.

So officially 172 now WHICH IS CRAZZAAYYY. That's only one pound off of being 25 pounds down and two pounds away from my goal of being 170 for the 4th of July. 

So with the summer months upon us i find that my hankering for ice cream has sadly not gotten any easier BUT i did find a pretty cool alternative! So i read from some paleo sites that they like to make "ice cream" from pulverizing frozen bananas and putting in add ins like walnuts, dairy free chocolate chips, peanut butter or shredded coconut! Yumm. I am yet to take a picture of when i make it because it eat it so darn fast but i will soon.

In the mean time check out this blog for yummy paleo recipes to keep your tummy and body happy and healthy!

Obnoxious selfie for you to enjoy until my next post :)

June 25th Update

Hello everyone. So it looks as if i haven't really updated everyone on whats been going on for the past couple of weeks. It been crazy over here with all the weddings, graduations, birthday parties etc. 

So as the weather gets warmer this just means that it is the start of race season! My first (but certainly not last) mud race was the Ruckus run in Marshfield, Ma a few weeks ago. I did it with all my co-workers which was a ton of fun for everyone. This race is four miles long (the challenger) and has obstacles throughout. 

A super unflattering photo but i find it hilarious that i have daisies in my hair.. as you can tell i don't take these things too seriously...

I took some time to enjoy the nice weather and hang out by some pools.. (and that sushi in that container was awesommeeee. The sushi chef at Whole foods made me some rolls for myself without rice! Pretty sweet huh?)

Tequila lemonade and sushi poolside 

And then i spent some more time in a pool...

And somewhere in between there i remembered i needed to update my picture for bodybuilding.com and took this gem. 

June 21st, 2013 (174ish)

So as of a few days ago i weighed 173.8 which is pretty awesome. Although lately i've been getting frustrated that i'm not seeing as much progress as fast as i would like.. i do have to remind myself that this is all a process and that it takes time. And of course the universe sent me this gem so i can sit back and relax and see the progress take effect.

My goal is to be another 5 pounds down by the 4th of July or at the very least under 170 which would be the first time since high school. But if it were to mean that this is where i top out and that i'm healthy i would be totally happy. 

And sorry for the sort of lame post today i'm totally scatter brained!

Katie <3

Hot sweaty hot yoga

So with the diagnosis of Leaky Gut also comes with restrictions on types of exercise. Because i have an overactive adrenal gland i need to focus on more low-key exercise like yoga, walking and hiking. So it turns out that there is a yoga studio that does hot yoga near my house, so i figured i would give it a try tonight!

So being so SUPAH SMAHHT i decided to google some tips on things to do before/after or bring with me to the class. The interwebs people recommended that i bring a small towel, lots of water and to not eat before class.

"Power Vinyasa Yoga is a dynamic combination of strength, sweat and spirituality. It detoxifies, heals and electrifies. This accessible, challenging and flowing form of yoga will lead you to a state of transformation. It will sculpt, tone and hone the muscles of your body and your mind."

Well let me tell you something. I have seriously never sweat that much in my life.95 Degrees in a room with twenty other people. Literally sweat dripping off of my everything. And of course trusting the internet led me to some inconveniences.. Well next time i will bring a full size beach towel to go over my yoga mat. It was like a slip and slide except instead of landing in a nice pool at the end my foot would end up in some girl's face. No bueno. 

Mhhhmmm sweatyy

My instructor was really cool and we started off our 90 minute class with some breathing and light stretching then moving into some power vinyasa. Somewhere in between there we did some funky handstand things and then my favorite part was when we ended (but seriously) because we had a nice few minutes of meditating and laying down relaxed. The ending makes you forget all about that hour and half of slipping all over the mat, sweating your ass off...literally, and my personal favorite my clothes being soaked in sweat falling off of myself. So naturally i signed up for an unlimited month... :X

In the end i felt amazing after i left class.


And on another note i am officially under 175 and have lost 21 pounds! Stoked!!

live and die by the scale

So i've had a lot of people ask me about how often i weigh myself. If this were a normal circumstance of trying to lose weight and i was on (insert diet method here) and had no issues i would say any more than once a week is excessive.  In my particular case i use my weight as a health tool. I use it to track my body's response to foods, drinks or new exercises that i try to incorporate. I know that there are factors that determine your weight more than just body fat i.e.: when you last used the bathroom (1 & 2), what you recently ate, how much water you drank etc.

For me i personally go by the same rules for when i weigh myself. Right after i wake up in the morning i us the restroom and make sure that i am wearing light clothing (obviously if you are wearing a sweatshirt or other heavy clothing it will how on the scale) and then i step on the scale. I do this before eating or having any medications to try to get the most accurate reading.

Personally for a person having leaky gut i found this to be a helpful tool for incorporating new foods into my diet. I know that tomatoes and salsa aren't on my okay to eat foods list after having salsa one day. I found that i was bloated after i ate and the next day my weight went up half a pound. Although this is not the most scientific way of proving that i just know this method works for me.

If you have any questions feel free to email me at phillips.katie@live.com

:)

What is means to be "Sick"

So i feel like i have gotten a lot of grief from my own family as well as other people when trying to explain my condition and my pain.

I want to emphasize that just because someone does not physically see my pain it does not make it any less real.

Now let me explain to you what it feels like when i eat bread. I would say if i were to eat that devilishly delicious piece of french baguette that comes with my meal at Panera. Within ten minutes i would be clutching my stomach, rolled up in a ball on the ground and most likely cursing out whoever is closest for letting me eat that. Its like period cramps on steroids (its on both the sides of my abdomen and not centralized) and comes in waves of pain while its oh so slowly being digested. mhmmm sounds like my kind of party right? Completely worth it...sometimes :/

For five years before my diagnosis of leaky gut i had moderate to severe stomach pain after i ate anything. Now trying to explain this to people can be difficult. I would often excuse myself to go use the bathroom and cry or i would dip out of hanging out with friends to go run home to use the bathroom. Not only were the reactions from eating either completely embarrassing and humiliating (running to use the bathroom as if you had just eaten bad food from a brazillian steak house...see Bridesmaids for more details on that one) or i would go home and legit clutch my stomach and cry because there was a war of epic proportions going on in there and there was nothing i could do to stop it. And believe me i would prefer neither to happen when i go on a date...or hang out with friends.. or in general eat anywhere that isn't in my hypodermic bubble called home.

Now i use the word sick to describe a variety of things that could happen to save my friends the gory details. Because honestly how many poop conversations can you have with your friends before they just get that that's what you meant?

Being my type of sick is no fun. It has made me miss out on opportunities to experience new things, having fun with my friends because i'm not sure what food will be available or if there will be an excess able bathroom, eating new cuisines because i have NOOO idea what is in it and we don't want an erupting volcano moment.

So when you look at someone with THAT face, try to not judge and make me feel like my issues aren't any less real because you can't see it. Try to understand and hugs heal a lot more than you would think.

HUGS

My daily nom noms.

Okay!

Now to try to explain my super confusing diet that i certainly don't totally even understand myself..

So i started first ignoring all of my food that my blood panel told me i was a allergic to. Now let me impress you with my allergies... (level 1=less severe, level 2=hives, throat swells, level 3=anaphylactic shock, severe stomach pain etc.)

Level 1:

Brussel Sprouts

Blue Cheese

Cherry

Ginseng

Licorice

Lime

Millet

Nutmeg

Parsley

Pecan

Red Pepper

Pecan

Pumpkin

Radish

Tumeric

Turnip

Vanilla Bean

Almond

Asparagus 

Barley

Carrot

Cauliflower 

Swiss Cheese

Cocoa

Crab

Egg Yolk

Gluten

Cows Milk

Oats

Green Olives

Oranges

Peanut

Rye

Shrimp

Black Walnuts

Wheat

Yogurt 

Level 2:

Cranberry

Goats Milk 

Malt

Level 3:

Casein

Whey

Bakers Yeast

Brewers Yeast

TA DA! Look at them apples... now lets add in my other dietary restrictions.

I also followed a Dr.Feingold's diet for four weeks following my diagnosis to calm my stomach from all possible irritants. (i also briefly avoided FODMAP foods but since they were all already on my other lists is seems pointless to mention it) So there goes:

Artificial food coloring

Artificial food flavoring 

Many others (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feingold_diet )

So basically all the delicious foods in the world haha.

Currently i follow a Paleo diet and i add some of my other diets ideas in there too.

So for me i avoid all:

Gluten

Dairy (casein, whey)

Wheat 

Yeast (bakers and brewers)

Grains (oats, rice)

Red Meat

Added sugars, flavorings or colors

Nightshades

Corn & Beans

So basically i live on a steady diet of eggs, turkey burgers, jack daniel's honey BBQ sauce, chicken, salad and sweet potatoes. Now i found certain cookbooks to be a HUGE help in finding what to eat. I LOVE the Practical Paleo book. It goes into great detail about which certain foods and activities can be avoided to help your particular situation. 

I do occasionally do cheat by eating gluten free bread (contains brown rice flour) or frozen yogurt. They don't hurt my stomach but i do notice an immediate gain in weight or stomach bloating. 

Please if you have any questions feel free to drop me a line :) 

Introduction

Hello Everyone!

My name is Katie and i am a 21 year old living in suburban Massachusetts living with leaky gut. Now for some of you who may not know what that is...

Leaky Gut (aka. intestinal permeability) is when your digestive system isn't properly functioning! Rather than allowing smaller single amino acids to pass though the intestinal lining into your blood stream, it allows larger partially undigested proteins to pass through and make havoc on your body! This leads to all sorts of nasty problems :/ in my case the allergic to "everything", resistance to weight loss, weight gain, stomach bloating, mild to severe stomach pain and a backed up lymphatic system. For other people they can also have problems like: constipation, diarrhea, gas, vitamin deficiencies, frequent colds, intense seasonal allergies or other inflammatory responses. 

PICTURE TIME!

Now to explain this. I like to think of my intestinal lining like little security guards (like the ones at Buckingham Palace..who don't do their job apparently) who are the gate keepers to my blood stream and SHOULD let only fully broken down proteins through. Now see my guards got lazy and decided to let anyone into my blood stream and thats where we get this leaky gut party started! Now the impermeability can be caused from many things: an overactive adrenal gland, infection, taking NSAIDs medications, hormonal or neurological problems, or a bad diet. And the best part of all of it?!.. drum roll... this diagnosis is not accepted by all "traditional" doctors and is a process of elimination for the diagnosis not just a set test. 


Now all of this came from about five years of playing the super fun game of "guess whats making Katie sick?!". I had been to my primary care doctor and at every visit i would make mentions of my growing stomach pains. The past three years after consistently going to from specialist to specialist just to end up begging for tests that i have determined from my oh so reliable internet searches to perhaps contain the answer. First i thought it was my thyroid (which wouldn't have been too far off) since hypothyroidism was in issue in my family, i had at this point gained about thirty pounds and after reading the symptoms so many times i'm pretty sure i convinced myself i was loosing my hair and had thickening skin. Now blood test after test kept coming back as negative, within normal range or positive. Nothing was coming close to my badly needed diagnosis. 

Now after this point i had been looking for a new PCP since i was getting annoyed and felt like he wasn't taking my pain seriously. I mean what does a girl have to do to get some attention around here?! I know i wasn't blowing up like a pufferfish and turning blue but just because you can't see it apparently that makes some people feel like your problem isn't real. :(

I had heard about integrative doctors and i liked the more holistic approach to healthcare. So in conjunction with him my new holistic primary care and a naturopath we came to my mystery diagnosis.

Now i was set off on my way with a new diet, new medications and some lifestyle adjustments to manage my pain and make me a healthier and happier me! (see future post)

And now we start my story and battle with managing a health leaky-free life...