Keeping it on the bright side

So my last post was a little down, but I'm feeling much better now.


I've not gone to see anyone about my anxiety, mostly because it's gone way down. I cut out coffee which helped a lot. Venting on here helped as well as talking with some really close friends and my husband about how I was feeling. It seems like once you get things out in the open it's easier to deal with. My husband was/is very supportive and he even brought home a list of people I could go talk to on our medical...which is nice to have just in case. I think the coffee was the biggest help of all though, silly as it sounds it really seemed to feed my anxiety. After a few brain dead days I feel better then I've felt in years and years. I've been drinking coffee since I was a teen and I never thought I would be able to get through a day with out it, seriously. But I truly feel better and I don't think I will make drinking coffee in the morning a habit again any time soon.



Moving on, since last I wrote we have made it through a few more parties and had a blast doing it. We went to a birthday party and I'll admit I was nervous about it. They were doing a pinata and everything...so the potential for disaster was high. I've yet to figure out anything that seems sort of like candy, so a get together and holidays that involve candy make me a little nervous. The only candy like thing I can make has to stay frozen or it gets mushy and so it doesn't pack well. Anyways Atty just happened to be playing in the pool with his daddy when the pinata fun started so my hubby stayed in there with him and our other two boys were able to join the fun. Atty didn't even notice, but we did have a back up plan. His Auntie had bought him some special little toys just in case he noticed the candy that the other children had. He brothers were so understanding and after eating two pieces each gave the rest of the candy to me to save for later before Atty saw it. I had talked to them about it before hand and that always helps. Being that they are only four and three it's really sweet that they are so understanding about their brother. I mean you know, candy is CANDY, and they still gave it up to support their brother. Gets my eyes all teary.


We also had a get together with Atty's biological brother and his family. His brother was placed with this family when he was six weeks old and we have been in contact ever since. He's two and a half now and it was wild seeing him playing with Atty. They were so much alike! We all had a banana cake I made to celebrate what we are calling Happy Family Day (we decided from now on our two families will celebrate Happy Family Day on August 1st), and Atty ate his special muffins so it worked out well. I put candles in the cake and the muffins and Atty didn't seem to mind at all.He's really be so accepting of this diet so far. We went to the zoo the next day and I packed a lunch for all of us, because I wanted to take care of our company but also so that I could be in control of the food to some extent and plan what Atty was going to eat around that. It went smoothly. Except for the fact that I brought four muffins that I tried freezing to see how that would work...and it doesn't work...they got mushy in the center when they thawed out and Atty declared them Yucky, so sad. I was hoping that I could just make big batches on the weekends and freeze them, sort of stock pile on them, since he loves them so much and goes through them so fast...but I guess that not going to be an option. At least the way I've been making them, maybe I will need to experiment a little more with it. Our company did want to buy the kids some ice cream or something to be nice. She talked to me first about it which I really appreciated and we settled on seeing if there were any snow cones. I read in a book about how you could get a plain snow cone and then add sugar free flavoring to it, like the stevita breeze powder so I thought we could try that. Unfortunately all the snow cones apparently came already flavored so it was a no go. Since there was no way to make a treat for Atty the subject was dropped and thankfully our guests realized that it wouldn't be fair to get any of the kids a treat if Atty couldn't have one.


Every time we successfully make it through a social function involving food I feel a little bit more confident. I learn new things every time it feels like and it makes the next time easier. I know that there are many more social events to come and right now I'm already trying to come up with different ideas for Halloween...the worst candy holiday of all!!! But with a little creativity I think we can make it work.


Atty is starting to not be so enthusiastic about food that he was loving before, which does make me nervous. There is so little for him to choose from that I'm afraid of running out of options and then having to force/bribe him to eat and it turning into a control issue. So far it's been a breeze for the most part and I've been really careful in letting him have choices when available and keeping things positive. He's starting to back off of the avocado some which I hate to see. The only meat he has been eating is his special hot dogs and turkey sausage and now he's not eating that as well, but doesn't seem to have anything else new that he likes more to replace it. He use to love chicken or roasted turkey but he's not into that right now either. He does love the muffins and they are made out of almond meal so there is some protein in there and he's eating certain nuts too so that's good. There seems to be a macadamia nut shortage or something because I can't find them bulk in my regular store nor have I been able to buy them bulk in the other two stores I looked at. I seriously don't know what that's all about. My regular store just told me that they haven't been able to get them in a while, but the guy didn't know why. They are the prized nut on his diet, so I really need to get my hands on some more!! I love that he is eating nuts because they are such a good source of protein and fat for his diet, but...they are so stinkin' expensive! One bag of almond meal is around eleven bucks and it only makes about 24 muffins! That only last about three days...so yeah, yikes! I think I'm going to need to order bulk on line and fork over the hefty price because in the long run it will save me money. The macadamia nuts are even more expensive then the almonds...and the cheapest nut {the peanut} he can't have because it has the highest carb content...of course. Nothings ever easy or straight forward on this diet. I guess because peanuts are not actually nuts that's probably why. The other nuts have carbs too, but because of the fat content, or something like that, his dietitian said I don't have to count those carbs. He use to love peanut butter, so I was sad to see it go. I can't get him to warm to almond butter he just doesn't go for it. I need to get a scale so that I can branch out in recipes for him. In all the Ketogenic recipes the ingredients are measured by weight, so in order to use those recipes I have to get a gram scale. I haven't done that yet because a good one is really pricey and I didn't know if I was going to need one or not. Being as he has to be on this diet for 2 years, and my creativity is starting to feel maxed, and he's already getting bored with the meals, I'm thinking I better just get a scale and jump in with both feet.