Two years post surgery and a new job!

I guess it's been a while again.  Now that all three of my kids are in school full time I hope I'll have a little more time here.  I'm thinking I'll post some more of my favorite "healthy" recipes and some fitness tips or just a little of my own crazy life.  

So, I now have three black belts in my own little family.  That's right!  Not only is my husband a 1st degree black, but so is my 11 year old son, and more recently my 9 year old daughter joined the black belt club.  My 4 (5 in 6 days!) year old is working on it, he'll be testing for his green belt in a week... So he's working on that black belt club membership too... I guess I'd better get on that for myself...

Aww, she's so cute!

So, in all these past few months I have had a few fun medical things involving myself come up.  First, I started having really bad episodes of pounding irregular heartbeat, dizziness, headache, and shortness of breath.  So a trip to my doctor turned into a trip to the ER, and now regular cardiologist visits...fun.

So, it turns out I have an arrhythmia called Ventricular Bigeminy, which means my heart likes to make extra beats.  Luckily I've been able to get it under control with medication, and also luckily it doesn't stop me from exercising!

Next, I just found out last week that I'm in menopause... Yep, I'm only 35... That means more medicine by way of hormone therapy, because I'm just too young to be without hormones!  

But even with everything going on, I've had a great recovery from my surgery.  You thought I'd forgot?  Of course not!  Here it is-

Exactly 2 years post surgery and I don't regret a thing.  I'm more comfortable in my body now and having my abdominal muscles repaired has finally allowed me to do ab work without the muscles sliding back.  Meaning I can actually do a sit-up!  More than one even! Hahah😂

Even more good news, I've decided that because videos such as p90x, Insanity, Turbofire, and Les Mills Combat played such a big part in my transformation to this point I have decided to become a Beachbody Coach.  I want to help others find their fitness, work their health muscles, and feel successful like I do. If you have any questions etc you can contact me through here or at www.beachbodycoach.com/AliciaFriedman

This was me about 5 years ago... And now...

I want this for others.  And yes, that's the same kid!  I will be here again soon, so what would you like to see?  Recipes? Fitness video information?  I'll be doing a full month test of Shakology soon, and I promise to post my honest opinion on it.  Until later....

My mommy makeover: Christmas, FrostyVoxBox, and it's been almost 18 months!!

My mommy makeover: Christmas, FrostyVoxBox, and it's been almost 18 months!!

Christmas, FrostyVoxBox, and it's been almost 18 months!!

First off, wow! It's been a long time and I'm sooo busy with three kids at home, I barely have time to pee alone! But it's almost been 18 months since my surgery and everything is going amazingly well.  I look and feel great, I still get a little bit of swelling over my stomach scar if I go a little too crazy on the exercise but nothing severe anymore.  I actually just ran my first 5k just a few weeks ago!

So, pretty proud of that!  Christmas and Chanukah for us pretty much revolved around karate.  Amazingly both my husband and 10 year old tested and received their certified 1st degree black belts, and my 8 year old received her conditional black belt.  Needless to say that kept us crazy busy for a while!  

Just in time for things to settle down a bit I received my second VoxBox form Influenster!  I love getting a VoxBox, it's fun to get to sit down and review things for free (meaning I don't pay them to receive the products and they don't pay me to review them, got it?).  

Fist off I got this e o hairstyles brush in my box.  Now, it looks and seems very cool.  It's made of eco friendly products and is supposed to give me a "full volume" look.  Problem is, I already have really thick curly hair, so if I even tried to use this on myself it would give me a very frizzy full volume look that I rally song want!  So I have chosen to register this to my sister in law, we'll see how much she likes it. For her long straight hair instead!

  Next up I received some Thyme!  A bit of a strange thing to review I think, but hey, I'll take it! So I used this puppy all over the place yesterday in my Christmas dinner...

I used it with a little salt and sage and mixed it with a LOT of butter and rubbed it all over my turkey.  That alone received rave reviews from my family, and it also added a nice flavor to my drippings for gravy.  I also added the Thyme and some garlic and avocado oil on a mixture of butternut squash, mushrooms, red pepper, red onion, and and asparagus that I roasted for veggies... So yummy!  I could eat it all day!

After all that Christmas goodness I got to try out Celestial seasonings Candy Cane lane tea.  A great end to a heavy holiday meal.  A nice, light pepperminty green tea. With a little side of red vines bites to share with the kids, hahaha.  I'm a fan of red vines anyway, but I liked the small pieces and cherry flavor.

Sorry it's sideways, it's the only photo I took before it was inhaled by kids!

 And finally the big combo!  Makeup!  What girl doesn't like to have a little fun playing with makeup? And free is even better.  So yesterday I broke out the makeup and tested Rimmel Landon's Scandal eyes...  I like the look of eyeliner, I really do.  But I have had such issues with the stuff that I hate wearing it.  Every pencil I've tried has been almost impossible to mark on my eye lids, either I can't make a mark without a lot of painful pressure or the line is really inconsistent.  I've tried liquid liner but it's just too harsh of a line for me... But this stuff, the "scandal eyes" was Ah-Maze-Ing!  It went right on, smooth as could be!  I was practically jumping up and down I was so happy and excited.  I will definitely be buying another one of these babies in the future!

Then comes the lipstick.  NYC Expert Last Lipcolor in Sugarplum.  Now although I'm not 100% sold on the color, it's a teeny bit pink for what I usually go for

It was a very nice lipstick.  Both my mom and I tried it and we agreed.  It goes on nice and feels super creamy, which is good.  The coloring is nice and shiny and overall very pretty, and it did last a decent amount of time.  No, it wasn't one of those lip stains that last forever and stains everything, but it did last several hours of eating and drinking and surprisingly did not leave bit lipsticks marks on cups or other people's faces after beeping kissed.  I definitely give this two big thumbs up!

Sorry for the bad photo quality, front camera on my old 4s isn't great!

Now, I hate to do this, but I absolutely have to give a bad review, major thumbs down to one product in my box.  This...

Um, yeah... Gentle makeup remover my foot.  This may as well been water for all of the makeup it removed, which is to say none!  All it did was smudge and near my eye makeup all over, forcing me to rub my eyes repeatedly and I finally had to resort to cocnut oil (which worked wonderfully by the way) to get my eye makeup off since I was out of my usual remover.  It's been almost 9 hours since I used this stuff and my eyes still feel irritated and raw.  A definitely do not buy!

But on the plus side I got a nice creamy serum from Boots No7 to try on my irritated skin this am and it really felt nice.

Now, I've gotten Boots face creams before at Walgreens and I will say I'm a fan.  Everything ice tried from them has been great.  Now with such a small samplei can't really speak to the two week wrinkle reduction claims on this serum, but I can say it smelled nice, not too perfumy and it felt really good going on and my face is soft after.

So, overall my Christmas and Chanukah season has been great!  Writing review has been fun, but I'm definitely looking forward to a few days to relax before New Years!!

GoVoxBox and 9 month post surgery update

A while ago I joined influenster for fun, it's an interesting way to get to try new products!  So today I got my first box, the GoVoxBox, full of interesting health related products to try. This is what I got-

A fun group of things!  Unfortunately I personally connot use half of them...  The food shake mixes look good and somewhat healthy, and my three year old tried the berry one and loved it, but it can't try it because I am currently doing low crab trying to get my post surgery body into the best shape for a bikini this summer (I'll show you that in a bit).  Same is true for the blueberry flavored almonds...can't because of sugars!  I also have no intention of using the platter sport tampons, first I don't use tampos because every time I've tried I get sick, vomiting and passing out, yuck!  And second, they're scented, and I don't really want to stick anything "scented" inside my body.... I'm sensitive enough to perfumes as it is outside my body.  I'll let my kids use the coupon for a free Muller yogurt to try, we really enjoy yogurt!  But I fully intend to use the bath salts for myself!

Haha, my little buddy was sooo excited to get a box in the mail!  "I received these products complimentary from Influenster for testing purposes."

Now on to surgery stuff.  I'm what 9 months post surgery at this point, and I know I've been horrible about updating!  I've been incredibly busy!  But I'm definitely working on my new body and enjoying its perks (like bikinis!).  I did gain some weight after surgery, not at first, but after a while because I couldn't exercise then Halloween, thanksgiving, Chanukkah, Christmas, New Years, my Birthday, our Anniversary, Valentines....well, you get the idea!  So my brother and sister in law discovered a new diet called "The Carb Nite Solution", and we all decided to try it.  It's a different type of low carb diet that truly burns fat and not muscle, meaning that the fat loss comes with easy muscle definition and great shape! 

So this is a before and after from the first few weeks.  I've lost a total of about 12lb and several inches! I'm feeling pretty confident about my post surgery body and am actually looking forward to summer!  I still get some swelling just above my scar, but that's sompletely normal until about 12-18months after surgery to completely go away... The swelling isn't too bad, it's just a little "pooch", but I'm definitely looking forward to my stomach staying flat all day, not just first thing in the morning!!

  Now as promised, I got a bikini!  Actually, two, hahaha.  And please ignore my pasty whiteness... 

A few recipes

I feel like sharing a few recipes instead of talking surgery today... In case you're wondering I'm fine, still swelling but fine.

So anyways, it's fall... Or at least according to everything on the internet it's fall.  I live in Arizona and it's October and still 95degrees, feels like fall (insert eye roll here).  But seeing the rest of the countrys fall themed posts makes me feel like baking fall foods.  Why not?  I'm inside in the a/c I can bake whatever I want!!  Of course I went pumpkin crazy and I really do love pumpkin!  It's healthy, can be used as an oil substitute...and obviously it tastes great!!

So I made pumpkin soufflé, and it was really pretty good! Lite and fluffy and smelled and tasted like pumpkin pie... Recipe here!

Then I had to use my leftover pumpkin so I made waffles....and oh-my!  These were fantastic!  My kids and even my husband inhaled them, there were no survivors!  Recipe here!

Finally I needed something non-pumpkin and I found my idea in the frozen foods section of my grocery store...rhubarb!  It looks like red celery and without sugar is quite sour...my mom actually used to eat it raw dipped in salt!  Blech!  I love it with other berries and pretty much every recipe out there used strawberries, and my poor husband is allergic to strawberries.  Plus everything was a pie or a cobbler, and no offense to either but I really wanted a crumble, I wanted a crunchy oath top with a soft but not too sweet fruity bottom.  So I did what and good cook does, I improvised and created my own recipe.  I used frozen fruit but fresh would be fine, and if you really want strawberries go ahead and replace the blackberries.  You could increase or decrease amounts to get the right crust to fruit ratio for your personal taste.  This suited me and my family just fine-

Ingredients-

Filling-
2C rhubarb
1.5C raspberries
1.5C blackberries
1/4C white sugar
1/4C raw sugar
1/4C flour
1t lemon juice

Crumble-
1/2C flour
1/4C rolled oats
1/4-1/2t cinnamon or pumpkin pie spice
1/3C brown sugar
4T cold butter

1. Preheat oven to 400
1.  Toss all of the filling ingredients together in a 8x8 inch pan, make sure to cut fruit into fairly even size pieces.

2. In a separate bowl mix all of the dry crumble ingredients. Cut the butter in with fingers until it resembles coarse sand.

3. Spread the topping over the fruit mix.

4. Bake at 400 for 10 minutes, then reduce oven to 350 and bake for another 40-50 minutes.  It should be golden on top and thick and bubbly on the bottom!

Yum, yum, yum!

Six weeks finally!

Yay I've finally hit the six week mark!  That means that I have gotten past the main phase of healing, the rest of the healing is the slow part, it can take 6m to a year after surgery to stop swelling and see the final result.  

After a few days of not wearing my scar strips the hypersensitivity is gone.  I am only wearing the strips at night now and I haven't had any issues, which is great because I don't know what I would have done if the hypersensitivity had continued.

I had an appointment with my surgeon the end of last week (just after 5 weeks post-op) which went really well.  He said everything looked good and was healing well.  He took some more pictures and said he would take more at my 6m appointment and that by then the swelling above my scar should be gone and my tummy would be completely flat. Woo-hoo!  He also told me I don't need my binder unless I want it anymore...thank goodness because it was driving me nuts!  And I'm allowed to start exercising.  He said I can do whatever I want but to start out slow and listen to my body.

So, Friday I went jogging.  It felt so good to get out and move!  The jog went well, we went a total of about 2miles and I jogged maybe a total of one, trying not to push myself too hard.  Since the jog went so well, Saturday I decided to try one of my easiest videos, and do the "modified" version, so no impact.  Although the video itself went well I could tell by the end of the day that I'd done too much, I swelled so much it actually hurt!  After having Sunday off I went jogging again Monday and again it went really well and I felt fine, so Tuesday I tried a different easy video without impact.  On Tuesday again I swelled big time... Ouch.  So today I decided to see if it was the videos making me swell or doing exercise two days in a row... So I went jogging this morning.  Guess what?  I am so swollen right now. Owwwwwww....  I guess this means that at least temporarily I will jog every-other day and that's it until my body gets used to it again and I can do more.  

Other than the swelling I feel great, hungry, but great.  I am having such a hard time with food.  I don't want to be one of those people who gets a tummy tuck then gains 15lb!!  So far I've been lucky and I only weigh 2lb more than I did the day of surgery, and I'm not sure how much of that is swelling.  But I really need to stop eating so much, I'm constantly starving and I'm craving sugar and caffeine... I think my issue may be that I'm running tired.  With three young kids I'm not exactly getting tons of rest during the day, naps and such.  Maybe sleeping more will help me eat less. I've started each day with the plan to eat healthy and count my calories, and I'm not even talking counting low calories!  I've given myself 200 extra calories above what I normally eat and I just can't stick to it... I think most days I'm eating upwards of 3000 calories!!!  Eep!!  I will, I MUST take control!  I will not gain weight!!

So on to picture updates!  This is from this morning, six weeks-

Sorry they're awkward, I had to do my own photos since my husband had to be at work early.

For comparison this is four weeks post-op vs today-

Wanna see what I mean by swelling??  This is last night vs this morning, HUGE difference!

Four weeks and hypersensitivity.

The past weeks has gone really well.  I've been feeling good and have been able to be more active.  I've cleaned the house and made dinner myself and have even done some exercising.  

Now, the exercising is still really light but I feel better doing it.  I've been trying to "walk" 30 minutes a day on my elliptical, plus I've been using my 5lb weight to do a few moves for my shoulders, biceps and triceps, and doing squats and lunges.  I definitely feel a bit more flabby not being able to do my usual workout but this is a step in the right direction.

I've realized I'm still moving more slowly than I'm used to and get tired much faster.  Before surgery my morning would be get kids dressed and fed, pick up the kitchen, do my daily housecleaning, workout (45min-1hour), and shower... Usually I'd be done with all of this around 10 or 11.  With my new slowness I have a hard time finishing all of this by 12 and half the time I don't get the walk in until the afternoon (if at all)!  At least I'm trying and moving!  I feel pretty good to be doing things for myself.

Sleeping has been getting better, I really enjoy sleeping in my own bed.  Especially with the binder on I've found that moving in my sleep can be difficult, I wake up just to roll to my side and adjust.  That, and getting out of bed reminds me of when I was really big and pregnant because of how I move, lol.  

So last night since I was four weeks post-op I decided to sleep without the binder on.  At first it felt strange and even cold, but after I relaxed a bit I was much more comfortable than I have been.  I am looking forward to wearing my binder less as time goes on, except for one thing, SWELLING.  I have been taking the binder off for 2-3 hours in the evenings after the kids are in bed and I'm mostly sitting reading or watching tv and my waist will gain 1-2 inches in that time! I definitely feel that my swelling is less than it was.  Before this week I bulged out a bit above my scar and even in the mornings my waist was about 31inches (before surgery it was 29) and would grow as the day went on even with the help of the binder so by the end of the day I could be up to 35 inches in the waist!! But the past few days I've been at 29-30 inches in the morning and no more than 32 in the evenings... So definite improvement!

I mentioned hypersensitivity in my blog title here, and it was awful!!  As I've mentioned before I've been having some pretty bad itching along my scar (specifically along the front right side), but Tuesday morning about 30 minutes or so after I put on my new set of silicone scar strips that area started BURNING like I was being attacked by fire ants!!  Any time I moved or something touched that area it brought tears to my eyes, it hurt that bad.  Tylenol did absolutely nothing for it and by the time the kids were in bed I broke down and took a Percocet, which only helped in the sense that I was too loopy and nauseated to care that I hurt, it didn't get rid of the pain.  When it wasn't gone Wednesday morning I called my doctor.  His response... Take off the silicone scar strips!  I had no signs of infection or anything else other than pain, so he feels that I need to wear the strips less.  I have been wearing them nearly 24/7 because the box says to wear them at least 12 hours a day, so more must be better, right?  Apparently WRONG!  He said some people can be a bit sensitive to the scar strips and wearing them for too long causes itching, irritation, and hypersensitivity.  So he has me going two days without any scar strips on and then I can only wear them at night.  Although I feel a bit disappointed because I can see how much the strips have helped my scar already and I want that to continue, but the strips have been off 24 hours s far and already the pain is almost completely gone, my scar is just a little irritated.  

Wanna see some pictures??  I feel so much more confident in my body, I can't wait for clothes shopping!!

This is a close up of my scar, the lower red spot is where my drain came out-

The bumpiness along the top is really just the texture differences with my stretch marks.  There was no way the doctor could completely remove all of my stretch marks, they were all the way up to my ribs... Now they're just above my belly button!  And I honestly don't care about getting rid of my stretch marks, they're reminders of my pregnancies and deliveries.

And here's my four week tummy shot!

Sooo much better!