Dealing with Adrenal Fatigue and Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis

I recently found out I have been experiencing adrenal fatigue and have Hashimoto’s and honestly, it’s a relief to finally know what’s been happening to my body for the past three years. Over this time, I’ve been struggling with hyperthyroidism and hypothyroidism, not knowing for sure what was happening, only knowing something wasn’t right.

Right now I’m hypo, which means my body is pretty bloated, most days it’s difficult to get out of bed, I’m experiencing extreme fatigue and joint and muscle pain, not to mention a dense brain fog. What I have learned is that everything is very manageable if I eat right and treat my body and my mind with care.

That starts with what I eat.

Before my diagnosis, I realized I had what appeared to be a gluten allergy. I love carbs and starch-filled foods- pizza, pasta, potatoes, bread, rice, pastries- omg…nom nom nom! I can eat, and have eaten, an entire large pizza by myself in one sitting. It’s what I do! The thing about my “allergy” is, if I do that now, I feel like I’m dying- literally, I’m dying. I can’t breathe, my stomach is on fire, I bloat, my bowels feel like they’re going to erupt (and sometimes they do, and it can last for hours), my legs and fingers swell, my face is swollen, my hips are in pain…it is not pretty. It took months of going through this for me to notice what I was doing to my own body and acknowledge the misery I was putting myself through by way of my poor eating habits. Once I realized I could change, I did. I’m glad I did. It turns out that I have autoimmune antibodies which attack my thyroid glands. When I eat foods containing gluten, my immune system goes into war mode and attacks my body.

Two years ago after a bout with hyperthyroidism. I was 150 lbs.

Took this recently after the swelling in my face went down. I’m 210lbs, currently hypo.

Now I eat mostly gluten-free, and I feel worlds better. I still sneak in a few potato chips and a mouth full of pasta here and there, but I know my limits. Veggies and lean proteins are my go-to’s for every meal. I use dairy porducts very sparingly. I drink Shakeology daily and when I don’t, I make sure to take my supplements.

It’s going to be different this time around losing the excess weight. I’m 40lbs heavier than I was six months ago, and I’m determined to lose it and get my body back into functioning shape. My muscle tone is much weaker than it has ever been, and I am fatigued much more easily now, but I will not let that stop me. Even if it means just walking, I will purpose myself to walk.

I will walk every day until I can run.

As I’ve mentioned, I also must be careful of my thoughts. It’s very easy when I’m tired and in pain to give up on life in general. For about three months when I was at my worst I absolutely gave up on the idea of getting better. My thoughts toward myself were thoughts of pity and anger. I hated my body- I hated the way I looked, I hated how I felt, I hated that I’d worked so hard in the past and now it felt like everything I’d struggled to build was crashing in around me. I binged, refused to exercise, and I would criticize myself for looking and feeling like crap. In short, I bullied myself mercilessly over something I did not understand. When it comes to Hashimoto’s, self-care and self-love are not optional.

If I want to be healthy, I must be kind, loving and gentle with myself. I must speak loving words to myself about myself. I cannot hate myself for being overweight- my body is experiencing something that, if it could, it would change. I cannot be mean to myself when I’m tired or in pain. I will not use my fatigue or joint and muscle pain as an excuse to be lazy either. When I’m tired, I will admit it. When I can exercise, I will. I will not push myself so hard that I will break. I will feed myself with good foods. I will love my body, even if it is 40 lbs over.

More than that, I have added to my daily mantras-

I have a healthy thyroid

I have a beautiful body

I have good energy and I am full of energy

I am 152 lbs*

I love my body; my spouse loves my body

I am healthy, fit, sexy and whole

I am happy and healthy and confident

I truly believe that health and fitness includes our state of mental health and awareness. I am a more than just a body; I am a soul inhabiting a body. That there needs to be repair done in my temple is a good thing. I will repair it, and live a happy, long, successful life because I did.

Who’s ready to make miracles?

I will post pictures and recipes and menus. For anyone out there who is also dealing with this, please reach out! We can do this together. 🙂 ❤

*152lbs is my goal weight. I am currently 198lbs.

If you’d like to join in on my weight loss journey, get nutrition tips and recipes, or learn more about Shakeology, find me at my BeachBody Coach page. If you’re on Beachbody, add me as a buddy- Thundercat79. I’d be happy to workout or chat with you!

Tastes Like Chicken!

Ohmygosh it all looks soooooooo goooooood!

I’m sharing this with you all from the Team Beachbody Blog- 30 Healthy Chicken Recipes. These are very simple, quick to prepare recipes that are as healthy and nutritious as they are delicious!

Yum yum…April sure is looking good- 30 ways to eat chicken in thirty days- sounds like a challenge to me! Find all thirty recipes here. You can pin them for later and add them to your fabulous repertoire. I know I will!

Do you have any favorite chicken recipes you’d like to add to this dirty thirty? Share them in the comments and I’ll feature them on my Beachbody Coaching blog!

Chicken and Veggie Fajitas

Curried Chicken With Couscous

Chicken Pizza

Classic Herb Chicken

Grilled Chicken Caesar Salad

Choose Your Thoughts Carefully.

Last week I had an unfortunate run in with a friend over social media. This friend, while I love her dearly, has a tendency to be a “Negative Nancy”, and I (as wonderful as I can be!) am the opposite, if only by intention. I will admit, I have a tendency to be a bit scathing in my delivery sometimes, and I am working on that- after all, we are all works in progress if nothing else.​ So her “FML!” moment (because she has cancer) was met with my soliloquy on a soapbox about ​being positive and not giving in to the want of feeding her disease with negative energy.

This turned into a trolling frenzy.

I’m not saying I was right to try to tell her who to be, or what to feel, or how to vent. ​Admittedly, in trying to point this out I only made myself look like an ass-hat, because who tells a cancer patient who thinks she is dying that she shouldn’t rail against the heavens? I mean- what kind of friend am I? Well, I honestly thought I was being the good kind…but I digress.

​I’m a firm believer that t​he universe does not discriminate between positive and negative energy. I​t only gives us what we give it.

​Over my life, I’ve played with this idea several times and seen myself manifest numerous things simply through the power of intention- my first apartment being yellow, living in Rosedale (a.k.a my best friend’s backyard), the fact that I am a single mother​ and both my children are on the autism spectrum…all these things are things I contemplated heavily before they came to pass in real life. It is as if I specifically asked the universe to hand me these things…and it did. Were all of them things I wanted? Of course not. But I focused on them so much that they manifested themselves regardless of whether I wanted or didn’t want them.

I​t’s not that I didn’t want my friend to vent- like I said, defaulting to “fml” is her thing; it’s a knee jerk reaction if for no other reason than she’s practiced it for so long she doesn’t realize there are other ways to deal with loss or pain or frustration. And it’s hard for me to know she is in pain and setting herself up for more. On the other hand, I’ve worked in facilities where I’ve seen the elderly and formerly destitute, those who are amputees, cancer patients and survivors, and others with multiple medical diagnoses who live day in and day out with nothing less than a smile, whose response to “How are you today?” is always anywhere from “Hanging in there!” to “Couldn’t be better!” or my personal favorite, “I’m alive-can’t complain!”

It occurred to me after a couple years of coaching others to be responsible for their own lives that I ought to do the same for me, otherwise I am nothing but a hypocrite. “You Are A Creator- Your Words Create Your World”, I’d said, time and time again. For the sake of the outcome of my own life, I’ve had to learn to be responsible with my thoughts. ​I owe it to myself to be such.

Even in the midst of our suffering, if we shake our fists and shout to the heavens “F*CK MY LIFE!”, the universe hears us and says, “Okay- no problem!”- and brings us exactly what we do not want…because we asked for it! Pushing through the desire to be negative and transmuting that energy into something positive is the type of inner alchemy of which miracles are made.

​There’s a lot to be said for the power of positive thinking. If we head into every day affirming that the universe is, indeed, collaborating with us to make our dreams come true, we will see this truth manifest in our lives. It is possible, if we train our minds to do this by everyday practice. For some of us, this practice is not just necessary everyday but on a moment by moment basis, depending on what we have trained our personalities to agree is acceptable. Statistically, and especially among cancer patients, those with positive attitudes and expectations are more likely to have positive outcomes. One can practice mindfulness through a number of ways- stillness, prayer and meditation are excellent, ancient practices for training the mind and spirit. There are many different types of yoga one can try. Some people go for de-cluttering walks, others prefer to exercise, with or without music.

Personally, I enjoy reading personal development books and articles. I read anything I can get my hands on and I annotate while I read. And I pay attention to what’s coming out of my mouth. I set daily intentions for myself and keep a gratitude list so I can be mindful and present about the direction of my day, what I would like to achieve and how I’m going to achieve it.

Words carry power. They enchant, entice, incite, excite. Words are magic. My thoughts control the words that are coming out of my mouth. If I can control my thoughts- if I can catch them and hold them there and take a good look at them before they have the chance to escape my mouth and create havoc, I may yet have a chance.

I’ve come a long way. I didn’t mean to be mean to my friend but I can see how I came off as arrogant and lacking empathy.

If I could take it back, I’d explain to her that I watched my mom die of cancer but that after she was diagnosed with stage IV cervical cancer, she taught her kindergarten class and traveled and planned picnics and events for the neighborhood and decided she wasn’t going to let her diagnosis slow her down, and she lived seven years longer than the doctors said she would.

I’d tell her that one of my other really good friends is also presently in a nursing home, living as vibrantly as possible with the same diagnosis she has- stage IV colo-rectal cancer; her tumors are decomposing. The doctors don’t know what’s keeping her alive and in such great shape, but every time I see her, she’s smiling and at 6′ 3″, she is as loud as she is tall!

If I could start over, I’d begin by reminding her that she is not alone, that she is loved and surrounded by love, and even though I know she is in pain, she can draw from that loving energy around her and surround herself with peace and calm, happiness, love and light. And I’d encourage her to think and speak and live as though she were preparing to live, not as though she were preparing to die.

I’m not perfect, and I don’t know everything, but what I do know is, regardless the circumstances, we always have the power to choose.

“Whenever you suffer, next time don’t complain, don’t create an anguish out of it. Rather, watch it, feel it, see it, look at it from all possible angles. Make it a meditation and see what happens: the energy that was moving into the disease, the energy that was creating suffering, is transformed, the quality changes. The same energy becomes your awareness, because there are not two energies in you, the energy is one. You can make it sex, you can transform it and make it into love; you can transform it still higher and make it into prayer, and you can transform it still higher and make it into awareness—the energy is the same.”~ Osho

​

Blessings & Affirmations

Find the practice that works for you and allow yourself to enter your quiet space. 

Acknowledge that the universe is a vast, infinite source of energy.

Tap into that energy and let that energy flow through you.

Release your negativity- pain, fear, worry, misunderstandings, feelings of lack and insecurity- and allow the goodness of the universe to flow through you.

Choose your thoughts carefully and embrace what is yours.

I have permission to create my future. 

The Universe wants me to succeed.

Money is flowing to me easily and effortlessly and I trust the Universe to take care of all my financial needs.

I am going to let myself participate in life and enjoy it. 

I can choose love. I am love.

I can choose peace. I am peace.

I can choose calm. I am calm. 

I can choose surrender. I have surrendered.

I choose blessings. I am a blessing.

I can choose abundance. I am abundant.

I can choose prosperity. I am prosperous.

Namasté .

Fighting back when your food tries to kill you

I don’t have celiac disease but gluten-sensitivity is real. 

For the past few months I’ve been dealing with hypothroidism and gluten sensitivity which has literally forced me to pay attention to the food I’ve been eating and switch to a high protein, gluten-free diet.

For anyone who is rolling their eyes, I’m telling you this gluten sensitivity thing is real. No one naturally gains five or more pounds overnight. The bloating, joint pain, swollen face and legs, muscle aches, and aggravated respiratory distress is not imaginary. I’d like to be able to breathe when I eat! While I don’t carry the genetic marker for celiac disease, the stress on my body when I eat certain foods is very real. What causes it is a mystery to many- I grew up eating a carb-heavy diet- rice, bread, pasta, flour tortillas are among my favorite foods- but I’ve never experienced anything like I have in the past seven months.

Since eliminating wheat products from my diet, I’ve seen a turnaround. I am breathing easier and rely on steroids less frequently on a daily basis; my body feels lighter even without having lost the extra weight. Drinking green smoothies and including anti-inflammatory aids such as pineapple, ginger, turmeric and carrots has reduced my daily need for NSAID pain relievers. I feel stronger. My mind is clearer. Most recently, I added Shakeology (a Beachbody product) to my diet as well, and haven’t had to consume the seven-plus vitamin and mineral supplements I had been taking (each of which cost over $15.00 per bottle) to maintain my health for the day.

All things considered, I feel great! Now to lose these pounds and snap my body back into shape!

If you want to join me on this journey, you can check out my progress on the beachbody website- http://beachbodycoach.com/thundercat79.

Workout buddies of all fitness levels are most welcome- we’re all champions here!

Interested in Shakeology (what is it made of? what does it taste like? where can I get some?)? Leave me a note in the comment section-let’s chat! ❤

(Photos used do not belong to the author)