Monthly Archives: February 2019

When Life Hands You Lemons, It’s Okay to be Angry About It

“When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” A common phrase almost all of us have heard at least once in our life. (At least I know it’s common here in the western USA, let me know in the comments if it’s common in your neck of the woods!) Even though it’s common, it’s a phrase I do not like. At all.

The phrase is supposed to mean “make the most out of a less-than-ideal situation.” Yes, it’s a good idea to take whatever circumstances life has handed you and try to make the best of it. However, I’ve found it gets used a lot to minimize or dismiss uncomfortable feelings. Using this phrase, or other phrases, to dismiss the negative feelings that come up when life gives us negative situations does far more harm than good.

When life hands you lemons, it never hands you the sugar needed to make the lemonade. It’s alright to be frustrated, or even angry, that now you have to go track down some sugar and take the time to make the lemonade. If life had handed you the oranges you had ordered, you would already be enjoying your citrus-y snack!

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Boring Self-Care: Medication Adherence

As I talked about in my first self-care challenge, not all self-care is glamorous or fun to do. Sometimes, it’s simply doing what we need to do to keep ourselves alive, even when we don’t want to do them. “Self-care” just means taking care of yourself!

One of the things I really do not like doing is sorting my medications for the week. I take a lot of pills every day to keep me functional, and for infertility. (This is not something that is open to debate and comments telling me to get off pills will be deleted. My doctors have put me on each of my pills for specific reasons.) With Dan also taking a lot of supplements prescribed by our fertility clinic, it’s easier for me to sort out all our medications at once because I’m already sorting pills.

To the challenge! (Click here)

How To Celebrate Valentine’s Day with Anyone

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Valentine’s Day has developed a bad reputation nowadays, likely due to how commercialized it has gotten and that it’s marketed purely as a romantic holiday. However, it doesn’t have to be either of those. As I talked about in this post, Valentine’s Day in my family was always celebrated as a day to be thankful for everyone you love in your life. Sure, it sucked being at school surrounded by couples “in love” (or pretending to be) when I was single, but when I got home we’d celebrate as a family!

Today’s post is going to be a quick how-to guide for how to celebrate Valentine’s Day with anyone and make it special! None of these ideas require you to spend a lot of money. In fact, with some creativity, these ideas can be completely free!

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Our Infertility Struggle, So Far – part 3

This is part three, and the final part, of my infertility catch-up series. Part one covers the beginning of our journey, what we tried before getting the official “infertility” diagnosis, and necessary medical background to understand the process (a detailed rundown of the menstrual cycle and how conception occurs). Part two continues with our journey and catches you up with all the testing we did the last half of 2018. Part two includes doctor changes, lots of blood tests, and lots of imaging.

This part, part three, will go into the details of what the infertility testing showed and what those results mean. I also give a list of the supplements that Dan and I have both started on the advice of our fertility clinic. This supplement list is for informational purposes only, and will never include dosages. If you’re interested in the supplements, please talk to your own doctor.

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Wowe Lifestyle Metal Tongue Scraper – Product Review

February’s installment in my Natural Lifestyle Tips series is another amazing product review from Wowe Lifestyle! This one is focused on lower waste oral hygiene tools.

When I was a kid, I had terrible oral hygiene. For some reason, my dental checkups were always great despite my terrible oral hygiene. When I hit college, I improved my oral hygiene dramatically. Unfortunately, something also changed in my oral chemistry around that time, and my checkups stopped being as great as I wanted them to be.

Since the shift, I do whatever I can to help my oral hygiene in easy ways, and hopefully with a low environmental cost. One of the tools my dentist recommended to me was a tongue scraper. He gave me a flimsy plastic tool with teeth on each side. This plastic tongue scraper was [obviously] plastic, and designed to be disposable (though you could reuse it for a while before you needed to replace it). I also have a sensitive tongue, so I hated how rough the teeth made it. Using that tongue scraper was an awful experience, and I thought the entire experience could be dramatically improved.

When Wowe Lifestyle reached out to me about testing some of their products, I instantly gravitated towards their tongue cleaners/scrapers! They have two kinds, copper and stainless steel. They have smooth sides, are made from metal (not plastic), and are designed to last a lifetime. Wowe Lifestyle also has other oral hygiene products that I did not review, but are perfect if you want to reduce your environmental impact. If you use a manual toothbrush, take a look at their bamboo toothbrushes as an environmentally friendly replacement for your plastic one!

Now, on to the review of the tongue scrapers!

Read more (click here)

Our Infertility Struggle, So Far – part 2

This is part two of our most recent infertility update. Please make sure you read part one so that we’re all on the same page before starting this part. If, at any time, you get confused, please make sure to go back to part one before asking questions (in case I already answered them).

This infertility update is a little different from my other infertility updates. I am not as emotional this cycle, so I wanted to do a comprehensive and logistical/informational update. This post is going to be about our infertility testing and get you caught up on the events that have occurred up to this point. It is going to be long, and there will be a lot of links to previous updates and Instagram posts so that you can get more details about certain parts.

Part three, and the final part, is where I will go into detail about our testing and treatments. Once it is published, it will be linked here.

I am not a doctor. This post is not medical advice. Do not change any aspect of your healthcare, without consulting any of your medical team, due to the content of this post. If this disclaimer is ignored, I cannot be held liable for any harm you may cause yourself.

Give me the details! (click here) ->

Our Infertility Struggle, So Far – part 1

This infertility update is going to be a little different. Right now, I’m not as emotional as I have been in the past, likely because I wasn’t expecting to get pregnant last cycle. This post series is designed to get everyone caught up on our infertility struggle. This will be a long, logistical post, with lots of links to previous blog posts and Instagram posts where you can find more details. I’ll be going over all the different infertility tests we’ve had, what we’ve found via testing, and what our plan is going forward.

This will be a three part update. The other two parts will go up over the next two weeks. This first part will focus on the background information necessary to understand the world of infertility. I cover the beginning of our story, as well as how a full menstrual cycle plays out, the steps necessary for conception, and what the main hormones are and how they fluctuate during your cycle. Part two can be found here, and explains our tests, procedures, and doctor changes.

Every person struggling with infertility has a different story. All I can speak to is my story, that I share with my husband, Dan. I am also not a doctor. I will tell you what supplements we are taking in part three, but I will not say doses. Do not use these posts as a guide for your situation, as I can guarantee that your doctor will have a totally different plan for you! Do not change anything in your medical routine without consulting your own doctor(s)! If you choose to ignore this disclaimer, I cannot be held liable for any harm you inflict upon yourself.

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