Ramblings...

I have been trying to find a balance, which has been more difficult than I would like. 

But such is life. 

This past week has been filed with birthdays and much needed school break hang outs. I've been trying to make good choices, but I have also been enjoying cake and adult beverages. Every day is a new day to do my best and make healthy choices & that has been my mantra. 

What I have started to do again without fail is yoga daily. Starting today. I am going to try to do it in the mornings as soon as I wake up so I don't have the day to make up excuses as to why I can't/don't have time. We'll see if I actually manage to wake early enough tomorrow to do it before school. I am not intentionally trying to set impossible goals for myself… I believe I can do it. 

Juicing Day 2...

So much colour !!!

I started officially juicing yesterday with the addition of eating a salad for lunch & dinner. 

{Although I couldn't finish either salad, I attribute that to being full but also having a cold} 

Carrots, apple & ginger mmmm

Today I decided to just do juices. 

I got sick a couple days before I decided to start this so it's really hard to determine what I am feeling because of juicing and what is from just being ill. 

Day 1 went fine, I felt kind of foggy all day & had a headache but I felt the same the 2 days before, so I think it was mostly my cold.

Today is going a little better. My cold is on its way out.

I have had:

Hot water with lemon

Juice #1: Carrots (3), apples(2) & lemon (1)

100% Coconut water (500mL)

Juice #2: Swiss chard (3 giant leaves), orange (1) & apple (1)

Juice #3: Beets (2 small), orange (1) & apple (1)

That's ice floating on top, I like my juice cold

Juice #4: Kale, cucumber, carrots, pear & ginger

All prepped & ready to be thrown in the juicer!

I am probably going to have a dessert juice later on, I'm thinking perhaps pineapple & pear. I'll also have a tea and I've been drinking water all day long.

I had some cravings today. When I made my lunch juice I also grabbed a frozen cupcake from the freezer & a Tbsp of natural peanut butter to put on it & made myself a coffee with cream… but once I finish my juice I felt satisfied and threw the cupcake out, dumped my coffee and put the pb back. I was proud of myself for having the willpower to just listen to my body instead of eating it anyway as I usually would have. I am really trying to change my relationship with food and although it is only day 2, I am still super excited about juicing and I feel like a switch has been turned on inside of me to change my life & get healthy for good.

Juicing….

I have decided to detox my body. I am feeling pretty awful having not been able to exercise since my surgery and I've gained some of the weight, that I worked so hard to lose, back. I recently watched Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead on Neflix and it really got me amped up to do what Joe did. So today I went out & bought a juicer. 

This one!

I made my first juice in it today to try it out {after taking it all apart and cleaning it} and it was DELICIOUS! Mind you it was mixed greens, apples and oranges. I love it a lot though. Well worth the purchase.
So starting on Thursday I am going to consume only fruits and vegetable for 30 days. Mostly in juice form.
I am ready to take control back of my body and get rid of my insatiable cravings.
I chose Thursday as it'll allow me the weekend to have my horrible coffee withdrawal headaches and cravings at home rather than at school.
I am super pumped about this.
I may even do it for longer, depending on how it is going.
I look forward to the weight loss it will bring, but I am mostly excited to feel healthy and have more energy. 
:)

Procrastination...

The problem with only being in two classes and not working right now is I have wayyy too much free time to procrastinate the work that DOES need to get done. 

I am a known procrastinator.

I am well aware that it has been a problem for me for many years.

But this semester of school is quite possibly the first time in my adult life that I have had so much free time to just do as I wish.

Granted, I am in this situation because I broke a body part…

Regardless! I need to make a schedule for myself, so I can start being ahead of the game rather than up-until-5am-the-night-before-it-is-due my usual, being behind the game. 

Today I had class {NURS 474 - Future Directions of Nursing} from 8-11am. 

We talked about nursing mixes in hospitals… {RN, LPN, HCA}

I decided to drive myself this morning so that I would have the freedom to do as I wish afterwards.

& boy did I!

I ran some errands that I had planned, but then instead of going home and getting started on school work I went to a movie {Blackhat} 

That face was worth it
Photo cred: IMDb

It was an alright movie, I didn't love it though. I would recommend it as a renter. So strange to think that renting a movie doesn't have the same meaning as it used to… unless you use RedBox, which I often do & love. It reminds me of old times, going down to the local Blockbuster or Rogers Video. It still makes me sad that those places have been phased out. 

MY PLAN!

Tomorrow morning:

1. Make a schedule of the readings I need to get done for next week.

2. Start said readings.

3. Bike for 15 minutes.

4. Appointment with surgeon @ 1pm

5. Swimming with sister & nephews @ 4pm

Solid.

Typical Tuesday...

Today was pretty typical.

Had class {NURS 472 - Leadership} from 8-11am.

Walked over to the Starbucks across the street from my University to study.

Got to hang out/study with my best nursing friend {who is now in the semester ahead of me since I had to stay behind :( }. She gave me the scoop on how stressful the first 5 weeks of the last semester of nursing really is… O_o

Studied there until around 4pm when I got picked up. 

Came home.

Read an additional article for tomorrow's class.

Rode the bike for 15 minutes.

Cuddled this adorable creature…

Watched the latest episode of Revenge.

& now I am laying in bed at possibly the earliest hour that I have ever been in bed on a school night. 

Life happens...

My intentions to blog are always cut short when life gets in the way. I feel like those are the times when I should be blogging MOST, to have a record of all the craziness that can happen sometimes… 

So to recap, 3rd year went swimmingly {I say this lightly}. I had a job that I had worked the previous summer and had continued to work the weekends that I went back to full time for the summer. I visited Europe for the first time in my life with my best friends.  Germany & France…

 Then spent a week in Montreal…

Summer was flying by when all of a sudden… 

No fun.. no fun at all. :(

I did some real damage to my right knee while playing in the park with my nephews. Feeling all sorts of care free. I had been doing really well with exercising and eating right too. {I was riding my bike to & from work everyday which worked out to around 16km a day. I had also started doing another C25K} I was down 30 lbs. woo. But that all came to a screeching halt. Obviously.

So I ended up having to have surgery to repair all of the damage I had done.
6 weeks in a splint to keep my leg straight.
6 months of PT.
…and a possible second surgery once all of this is said & done. please no

The injury happened on August 11, 2014 around 9pm {I remember seeing the time on the clock inside the ambulance on the way to the hospital}, surgery August 12, 2014. The first thought I had after my fall and hearing the horrible cracking sounds was "but I have to go back to school in less than a month and I have to be a nurse in a year!!! This can't be happening!!!"

I initially started going to PT 3 days/week, then 2.. now I go once every 2 weeks.
I started 4th year of nursing school in a wheelchair and it was not fun.
I was still on pain medication and sitting in 3 hour long classes was brutal.
So after toughing it our for a month and a half in 4 classes PLUS PT 3 days/week, I decided to cut my load a little and extend my degree. There was no sense in me finishing theory when there was a good chance I wasn't going to be strong enough to go into my preceptorship come January {I wasn't}.
So I ended up dropping 2 of my courses {Nursing Leadership & Future Directions in Nursing} and those are the 2 classes I am currently taking right now.

It was a difficult decision and I fought with it for quite some time before I actually came to it, but I feel like it was the best decision for my health and wellbeing.

So that is a wee little update.

I see my surgeon on Thursday to see what the next step is.
At my last appointment he said if I wasn't at a 90 degree bend yet, he would have to go in laparoscopically to remove some of the scar tissue and force my knee to bend. o_o At my last PT appointment I was at 87 degrees, so I feel like I am out of the woods. But we shall see what he thinks. 

Update soon! 

I would promise… but we all know that wouldn't help any.