Ode to the tomato and other things...

Lunch time today turned out to be all about the tomato. Not on purpose... It just sort of happened. I'm ok with that.

My daughter LOVES tomato soup. She asks for it frequently. Until recently I was so-so about that. I mean, it is tomatoes which is great, but the canned stuff is full of sugar and other such villains. I hit Google and found a version of homemade tomato soup with basil. This turned into so much more! This version (I'm not sure why) had butter and cream and sugar but the base was solid so... Heatzification!

2 C crushed tomatoes
1 C chicken broth
Basil to taste ( I used roughly 2 T dried)
Stevia again to taste (I used about a tablespoon... My daughter's appeal to the canned stuff is the sweetness so this helps find the happy medium for her)

That's it. Heat and serve! My daughter asked for this today and grilled cheese. Keeping with the tomato theme I went caprese with mine. Yum! Did you know the Lycopene in tomatoes can help fight cancer? Oh yes it's true..

 Now what I love so much about this is that this base can be used for more than soup!
As much as my daughter loves her soup, multiply that by 1000 and that's my husband's love for pizza! Omit the broth and add in preferred spices (crushed red pepper, onion, garlic, etc) boil down to desired thickness... Bam! The freshest tasting pizza sauce!

You could do much the same and turn it into a pasta sauce. (Mushrooms... Spinach perhaps?) Oooh just thought! Add pesto and use it as a spread for sandwiches. Just have fun with it. It's good for you! Haha ;) It freezes well too. If you try this let me know what you think!

Next order of business... Sweating! I adore a great sweat session. It makes me feel tough and all bad ass lol. I've been down (but mind you...not taken out) by this bout of Shingles. I had to take a break from the physical to let my body heal. Now... It's back to business! I thought I'd share today's workout with you.

Lately (along with circuits) I have been into splitting my strength sessions. Upper body/lower body. Today is upper body! Everyone talks about leg day, but I feel my tris just as much! Arm day is no joke! I like to do a low number of reps with high weight
 It's all about strength and muscle for me. I'm trying to build back what I lost. Plus muscle burns fat so...hey!

Today's exercises:
Bench press
Kettle bell rows
Incline press
Lat pull down
Lat raises
Tri pushdown
And DB curls

Depending on scheduling I will turn that into a circuit for incorporated cardio or do straight cardio after.

Woo! Where's my protein shake? ;).
What is your workout routine like? Do you love it or just power through? What motivates you? I want to put together a playlist so feel free to leave some of your favorite jams in the comments! :D thanks for reading. Much love <3 br="" nbsp="">

No fuss Friday

It's been a bit since I promised blogging and so here we are. I have a bit of a confession to make... Whenever I feel "under the weather" I have a bad habit of going MIA. I don't like to Facebook, blog, text, make calls. I just go kind of blank. Are any of you like that? I don't mean to be this way... I just tend to feel blah and want to just stare into space ha-ha.

Well the past week I have been dealing with Shingles. Thaaaaaat's right. That thing they talk about on the commercial. Get your shot ha-ha. Mines a bit of a different circumstance with the leukemia and all,  but I am here to tell you... PAIN!

So my confession is that it's been a rather lazy past few days. Especially with the medicine making me sleepy.

One thing that makes me feel better is chicken soup. So I made a big batch. BUT this isn't your typical chicken soup. I love olive garden's chicken and gnocchi spinach soup. Tons of flavor. However I like to lighten things up and easier if possible so I made my own "heatzified" version.

The pictures don't do it justice and I froze the left overs for no fuss meals for whenever I don't feel like cooking!

This recipe is your basic chicken broth with veggies recipe.

I started with 2 1/2 cups water and 2 chicken bouillon cubes and 4 ounces boneless skinless chicken breast. Once beware us cooked through I shredded it and added back to the pot with half a small chopped onion 4 garlic cloves minced and a whole carrot chopped. Onion and garlic amounts are to taste. We love onion and garlic around here. I also as poultry seasoning. It as such a great flavor.  Add 1 c spinach. Boil for about 10 min. Then it's time for the gnocchi. Well except this time no gnocchi. I haven't mastered making gnocchi yet and my family loves dumplings. So...mini dumplings! Healthy easy fast. 1/6 c wheat flour 1/6c heart healthy Bisquick, 1/3 c milk

Seasonings to taste 

Add these to the soup a few at a time. Added benefit... This thickens the soup for you! No additional cornstarch or flour:)

Let me know what you think. What do you like to do when you feel crummy ?

On to the rest of my fuss free Friday ..a movie with my daughter<3 p="">

Heatzifying...

Welcome! Well, welcome back maybe? I started this blog a couple years ago as a way to chronicle my time with leukemia. That time, which I hoped would be short, turned into much more. Two rounds of leukemia, a transplant, Guillain Barre Syndrome, much support and love later...here we are! If you want all the deets (lol), you can check out my previous posts.

My blog has been MIA so to speak for a while. I have been thinking about bringing it back for a min, and finally decided...why not? I love to share workouts, clever food swaps, crafts etc and this seems like a great way to do that :) I am working on some great themes so I hope you will keep in touch and share your thoughts! The Internet makes this world so much smaller. What a great way to learn, grow, motivate, and share some love.

Path back to positive

Hey everyone. I hope all is well. I am writing with a bit of a different mood today, but I hope that by sharing I can help others out there going through the same. You're not alone...

Since the beginning of this whole thing I have tried to keep positive...find the good in every bad situation. It almost seemed to come naturally. Being positive is just who I am. It's just how I felt. It was how I got through the first two leukemia rounds and a bone marrow transplant.

Enter numerous infections (including meningitis which damaged my cognition and memory and put me in a coma) and GBS. It has truly been a fight. For a long time. One I am still fighting. I am learning to walk and use my hands again which is going well. But lately my emotional state seems to be changing toward the negative despite my best efforts to keep it positive. I don't like this.It's not me.

I cry so easily now. I've had dreams in which I am playing and chasing Lillia and walking.  Every time I fall and wake up crying. I feel this agitation and anger and resentment at this beast who doesn't exist.No one to vent to or attack back, and I'm not sure it would help for more than a minute if I did. I find myself looking at pictures of our family before the leukemia and it makes me so sad...one in particular of Lillia and I. We look so happy with the biggest smiles. And  instead of enjoying such a beautiful picture, all I feel is this longing to warn them of things to come and protect them. I want to say I'm so sorry to the little girl and the amazing man behind the camera. But I can't make it o.k.

It's on me now to make this better.I have to take control of my own thoughts. Part of this is getting all of this out there. I am also going to be talking with a nurse specialist in this area that can give me the tools to get back to the real me.

Thanks for reading. Love to you all...~H

Home Sweet Home

After much prodding from my husband, I am back on the blog. I didn't feel much like writing because well...let's just say I have a lot to update.

In November, I started losing strength in my legs and my cognition was starting to degrade. By December, it was at it's worst and I went into the hospital. I had meningitis. I was later diagnosed with Guillae Boron (GBS). a neuromuscular disease that effects the nerves and muscles and weakens the body. In Jan., my O2 dropped drastically. They put me on a mask and took me to the ICU.

In the ICU, I went into a coma. I had histoplasmosis-a lung infection, and a clot in my lung. Also pneumonia so my lungs were a mess. They put me on a nasal tube,and a ventilator. The Dr. told my husband I may not make it. He was wrong. When I woke up, my cognition was really bad. I had terrible,vivid dreams that I thought were real and couldn't tell the differences between reality and visions I was having. I developed adenovirus and other infections.

I finally started getting better and moved out of the ICU in late Jan. However the GBS had taken over and I was so weak I couldn't move. By late Feb I was able to it on the side of the bed and then moved to Dodd-a PT rehab facility for a little over a month.I owe them all of my mobility. I am home now finaly after facing my own version of hell reaping my own version of heaven-my family. Throughout all of this I have never forgot how lucky I am. I am breathing and i have the ability to keep fighting- I sure will. Out patient PT/OT starts Friday. Time to kick some ass ;)

Asking for help

So I know it's been a while. Most of you keep up on facebook anyway haha but I am day 17 after my bone marrow transplant. I actually got to go home (our new home...we moved, it's great) for all of like a day and now I am back at the James. I have some symptoms that could be nothing or could be graft vs host disease so they are monitoring me. Being home that short time I was so shocked at how much strength I have lost.

I had to do something today that I don't like doing. I'm having to ask for  help. I am so used to being independent, keeping up, doing things for myself. I never ask people to help, but lately that feels like all I am doing. My Aunt Rindy is always taking Lillia with me being in the hospital and James needing to do this or that. It's hard. I feel like a bad mom and now today I've had to ask family to come over to essentially babysit my and my daughter once James goes back to work. I hate putting my problems on others. I was so convinced when I got home I would feel good and I could do it.But knowing now that's not true is frustrating. I am just thankful and blessed that I do have people in my life that will help when I need them. I know this won't last forever, but giving up control and not doing things for myself ESPECIALLY taking care of my daughter is really hard for me.

I know this is a short blog but I just needed to vent and say thank you to my support system. Take care and enjoy the day,
Heather

Waiting...

Hey everyone : ) I hope you're all well. Much like the title says, right now I am just waiting. I have gotten past the fevers and am feeling the best I've felt since I've been here. My counts are climbing but we're waiting for that magic number: 500. My neutrohpil count has to be at 500 for me to go home. I am so close and feeling this good it's hard not to be a little antsy.

Since the last blog I had a birthday. Even though it was here, it was an amazing day. My family came and stayed all day and night. It felt like home. I love having them here. They really made it a special day. I am so thankful to have this birthday. As I am feeling better and it's getting closer and closer to transplant, all that comes with that is becoming even more real.

I did some reading yesterday...which was a bad idea. I thought it would help. It just really freaked me out haha! There are two things I am really afraid of. The first being that this will make me even more sick and kill me. The second being that it doesn't keep me in remission..which would kill me. I think I've been avoiding thinking on it too much, but like I said it's closer and I can't help now but think about it. It's a scary realization. Aside from the statistics, there were these lists of things that I won't be able to do, medications I'm going to have to take (and THEIR side effects). While this could be the cure, my life and my family's lives are not going to be the same for a while. It will take about a year before I can go back to a "normal" life.

Last night I had a long talk with my nurse about the things I had read. She was a nurse at the Cleveland clinic specializing in BMT and while she's on the unit here she floats down to the BMT floor here too, so she's had a lot of experience. She told me not to freak out too much. That a lot of that information with the statistics and medications are outdated. That the research has come a long way and they now know how to better control things like graft vs host disease. The medications aren't as bad with the side effects now and an important positive going for me are my donors. They have found two donors that are a 10/10 match. The better the match, the better my body will accept the donor.

It's just scary, not knowing and not being able to picture the future. BUT as always I'm trying to focus on the positive: good matches, better medicine, and a loving support system. It's going to be hard, but this will be my cure. This will be my life back. That's all I want. Now to get my counts up and go home!

I thought I would leave you with a video from the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. I watched this earlier and it inspiring. There are people out there trying to cure what I and so many have. LLS is helping them do that and I am proud and happy to help in any way I can with that. They are a great group, and if we can all work together we can make the difference.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Axlfyi6apys

Take care and thanks for reading :)