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So… it happened on the day after Thanksgiving: I ate salmon, and I am no longer a vegetarian. I woke up on Friday knowing in the back of my mind that I would eat salmon that night.

And I did.

And it was delicious, digested just fine and it felt as though my body was craving it. I had bought the salmon probably 2 months ago – wild Alaskan sockeye salmon, one of the most nutrient-rich fish you can eat. (I will only eat wild caught stuff anyway, farmed stuff is awful). Because of my hair situation and overall health, it had been in the back of my mind that I might go back to eating fish one day. But I’d bought the fish, stuck it in the freezer and mostly forgot about it.

I know I have gone on and on and on about my hair on this blog. Forgive me if it’s annoying. It’s just that my hair is one of my best attributes – or at least once was. I’ve always had long and thick hair (well, as of age 11 onwards) and since becoming an adult it’s been shiny and soft as well. However, as mentioned previously, after doing the high-fruit vegetarian thing for a few months, my hair not only started thinning, but was just… yuck. It was breaking, coming out in the shower and after the shower (full strands) and would lay flat and lifeless. I tried different shampoos – organic and non. I tried making changes to my diet, including adding eggs, adding fat, eating more plant protein, removing fat, etc etc. I started taking raw food high-potency vitamins (which oddly enough don’t seem to be doing much for me). Things would seem to work to fix my hair – I would get excited and share the ‘good news’ here – only to find out that it wasn’t really working. Up until this morning when I washed my hair, I’d still end up with several strands coming out.

Truth be told I had to ditch most of the organic shampoos I was using. Because of my candida situation, I was getting dandruff again and finally got sick and tired of it, and went and bought dandruff shampoo and conditioner. Since starting to use it a couple of weeks ago, there has been a slight overall improvement in my hair. I’ve been using it along with an organic body-building conditioner. (But my hair was still coming out).

Anyway, I believe that hair and nails are a sign of overall health. My nails go back and forth from being super strong to thin. (Right now they are suffering, which doesn’t make much sense considering I’ve been taking vitamins).

So, I figure I’ll eat salmon a few times a week for a month and see if it seems to be doing me any good. It’s way too soon to tell for now.

Anyway, that’s what has been going on. Over the holidays I gained a few pounds back. I’m not surprised, given all the sugary crap I was eating. I don’t know what possessed me to keep pie, cookies and cheesecake around. I should know better after all these years that I just can’t have that stuff in the house!

You know what my meal consisted of on Thanksgiving? We had: homemade cheese enchiladas, mashed potatoes, stuffing (which I passed on considering I don’t like it), homemade macaroni and cheese, pie, cheesecake and raw veggies (which I barely touched). There was also a cheese tray! I mean, come ON. Those foods are just about the worst foods a person can eat! Starch, fatty, greasy, salty. I could taste the excess salt. No WONDER I gained an additional 2 pounds back (plus the 3 from the week prior). I find all of those foods nearly impossible to eat in moderation. They are all highly addictive for me.

Is this what large gatherings will be like from now on? With no meat, will there always be a heavy emphasis on cheese and starchy dishes?

Unacceptable.

(Sorry, didn’t mean to rant. I was grateful for the food, it was delicious!)

Moving on… I’m really hoping to see the scale start to go down, especially since I’ve cleaned up the junk food eating.

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All symptoms of the [swine] flu are just about gone. The only thing I’m noticing is residual (and occasional) body weakness/tiredness and excessive sleeping. Everything else seems back to 95% normal!

I got on the scale today. It said 149.8. I’m being patient. I’ve been doing fabulous with my ‘clean’ intakes. Yesterday I had lots of fruit and no more than 950 grams of sodium. I’ve been counting both calories and sodium grams the past few days.

I’m going to enroll in a local gym sometime this week. I feel like I’ve lost most of the muscle progress I’ve made this year, which is really depressing! I worked so hard and it seems to be all down the drain.

WARNING: INSURANCE RANT AHEAD

Today I had to sign up with a new insurance company. My old one (Nationwide) is seriously the most incompetent company I have ever had the displeasure of dealing with! I was a loyal customer for 2 1/2 years! I can’t even begin to explain the hassle and problems I’ve dealt with over the past few days with them. I spent hours on the phone with them last week while I was really sick, trying to get them to switch the policy over correctly. Each time they promised everything was fine. But they never sent me my proof of insurance via email, so I had to call back several times. Actually had to talk to a manager to get her to send me proof. And guess what? It’s not even active! I gave the new number to the bank who financed my car. Today the bank tried to call them for proof of insurance. Guess what… they couldn’t find my policy in the system! Grrr! Even after all those phone calls and smooth-talking sweet representatives who promised everything was fine and dandy. To top it all off, they somehow mixed up my policy with someone else’s, and sent me the other person’s policy via mail. So I got a policy in the mail under someone else’s name with MY address! WTF??! Also, for some reason they quoted me an outrageous price to switch the policy to my new car.

So today I was absolutely beyond fed up, so I called a new company (State Farm). Not only does this new place have me paying a fraction of what I was paying at Nationwide, but I now have renter’s insurance included. The sign-up was hassle-free and the woman had my proof of insurance emailed to me within an hour. And she also took the time to call the bank with the insurance proof info!

Whew. What a relief. Good riddance Nationwide. Except now I have to fax a written statement to them to cancel my policy. I have a feeling that will be as much of a hassle that the rest of this has been. I’m not sure the people working there can tie their shoes, let alone cancel a policy correctly. (OK, that’s mean).

END RANT.

So, many of my long-time readers on here know that I was involved with Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) last year. I had somehow developed a really bad habit of drinking alcohol every day. It started as heavy partying in 2006 – right after I quit my day job to do TheSkinnyWebsite.com full time. I lived in a building full of alcoholics. So being of addictive nature, I easily fell into the habit myself. It got to the point where I started drinking every day. I figured I was an alchy, so last year in the spring, I started going to meetings after moving back here to Tulsa. I went pretty regularly from April 2008-December 2008. But my last AA meeting was January of this year. I just couldn’t bring myself to continue, because I didn’t agree with some of their logic. Since quitting, I’ve been OK on my own. I don’t fit much of the criteria for an alchy, but I do some, and I do still occasionally struggle.

Anyway… on that note, I went to the dealership where I bought my new car to sign a couple more papers and schedule the ‘Touch of Class’ special maintenance thing I’m getting done later this week. While I was there, my salesman handed me a few things I’d accidentally left in my old car, buried under the seats. One of the items was my old AA book! OMG! It has three 2008 sobriety dates written inside, 2 crossed off. How embarrassing! They must think I’m a total alchy. I don’t like to advertise my prior experience in AA, so this to me was pretty embarrassing.

LOL. Oh well.

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Here is what I ate yesterday:

• Cantaloupe
• 6 large bananas
• 16 ounces of fresh mango juice
• a few green grapes
• 2 corn tortilla chips (oops!)
• large bowl of mixed salad greens with 1 cucumber mixed in
• handful of grape tomatoes

I actually did not eat enough yesterday. But that’s OK, I’ll do better today.

By the way, that mango juice was pure HEAVEN in a glass!!!!

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