He Cooks: Honey Ginger Chicken

Ingredients 

Per pound of chicken use (we eat about 2-3 pounds):

Marinade and reduction sauce

• 6 tb Soy Sauce
• 4 tb of Honey
• 4 tb non-alcoholic white wine
• 2 tb Ginger
• 2 tsp Fresh Garlic

To Experiment:
1 tb of Dijon Mustard
or
1 tb sriaccha sauce
or
Lime Juice

Garnish

• Cut green onions
• Sesame seeds

Steps

•  Cut the raw chicken into bite sized pieces
•  Mix the Marinade together and place in good sized bowl (wisk together until try components are well mixed)
•  Marinade the chicken in the bowl for about an hour.
• Once marinated, have a pan ready at medium high heat with a bit of oil and Sesame oil. When the chicken hits the pan, it needs to be already hot to give it a quick sear.
• Sear the chicken until brown. and then continue until the chicken is cooked through.
• Take all the chicken out of the pan, and pour the rest of the marinade into the pan. Lightly boil out some of the liquid turning the marinade into a reduction sauce. (until it is sticky)
•  Add the chicken back in and toss until the chicken is throughly coated.
•  Serve on top of white rice with a veggie.

He Cooks: Beef and Broccoli

Marinade
1 pound thin sliced sirloin
4 Table spoons Soy Sauce
1/2 cup beef broth
1 tea spoon garlic powder (or minced fresh garlic?)
2 table spoons brown sugar
1/2 tea spoon ginger

(To try: Green Onions? Leeks?)

Olive/Canola/Vegetable Oil of choice for Saute (Sesame Oil to try next time?)

3 tablespoons corn starch
Dash of Red Pepper
Dash of Black Pepper
Dash of Garlic Salt
Bit of Sesame Oil for flavor (if not used primarily)



Thin sliced Sirloin.






Marinade

Combine everything except the corn starch in bowl a and mix until it's disolved. Cut the thinly sliced Sirloin into bite sized strips and place into the bowl with the marinate Sirloin for 30 minutes.







Sear


Remove from marinade and heat pan with sesame oil. Saute the marinated beef in the marinade. Let the marinade reduce. (Boil down a bit). Add the Broccoli which should almost soak up the last of the liquid from the sauce, so add some more marinade back in with corn starch to thicken the sauce. Reduce this group down until the sauce in the pan is nice and thick. You should have to stir fry quite a bit during the time and watch closely. Finish with the last of the marinade into the sauce. There shouldn't be much left. After a minute or two (enough to cook any raw meat danger out of the marinade) pull off of heat and prepare to serve.



Top on to rice.

Story of My Life

'Cause I can't make you love me if you don't
You can't make your heart feel something it won't
Here in the dark, in these final hours
I will lay down my heart and I'll feel the power
But you won't, no you won't
'Cause I can't make you love me, if you don't

These lyrics have run their course through my head more than a few times over the last two decades. They always sting. They always hurt. They always make me cry.

 

I love. I love so much sometimes it becomes detrimental to my well-being. I am loved back, but not the same. Sometimes I am just tolerated. And I know it. And it hurts.

So for now I am just going to allow myself to be hurt. Because I know I am loved, but not really liked, by some of the people that mean the most to me in the world. And that sucks. 

I Am Fat

For purposes of this post, I am going to use fat instead of the word obese. I am going to use the definition of obese though, which according to the National Institutes of Health is:

"Obesity means having too much body fat. It is not the same as being overweight, which means weighing too much. A person may be overweight from extra muscle, bone, or water, as well as from having too much fat."

I honestly don't remember when I actually became fat. I look back at pictures of my younger self, including when I was a size 10 in High School and thought I was a blimp, and think, "Wow. I would love to look like that now."

You see, I wasn't fat. But I thought I was.

I remember hearing the words somewhere around third grade. I was 7.

"Overweight."

"Heavy."

It didn't take long for me to believe I was. I looked at the big girl in my class and thought, "Is that what I look like?"

It must be true. I looked at myself in the mirror and I don't remember what I looked like. ALL I SAW WAS WHAT I WAS TOLD.

I didn't hear it from my classmates.

I heard it at home.

"You don't need another helping."

"You don't need the sugar."

All I knew was that I was hungry and that I wasn't allowed to eat more. I would sometimes sneak food because I was legitimately hungry. We didn't have candy or processed food in the house. My Mom baked with honey and whole wheat flour. She made our yogurt and bread from scratch. We ate fresh vegetables and fruits every day.

My brothers and I ate the same foods. We played outside together. We all played soccer. So why was I the one singled out? Commented on? Because I wasn't skinny like the boys? Because I was a girl?

Look at this picture:

It was taken sometime in the late 1980s. I was about ten. I am not fat. None of us are fat. I can't even call myself pudgy here, but I was well into self-loathing by this point. I felt my fat thighs exposed in those shorts. I didn't like wearing shorts above my knees because I was trying to hide my fat. I intentionally wore clothing too big for me, again so I could hide my ugly body.

My older brother had started in on it too. He used to sing lines from "Baby Got Back" at me in a cruel and nasty voice.

"I like big butts and I can not lie"

"Red beans and rice didn't miss her"

He did this without punishment. He did this because he heard how my parents talked to me. One parent said to me in front of my siblings I could win Miss Universe because I was so large.

I'm about 11 here. See that sweatshirt? I'm using it to cover my enormous rear end. I wished the arms could cover my thighs better. They're practically bursting out the seams of those jeans.

I'm about 12 here. This is when I really started to wear clothing that was too big for me.

I didn't want to wear a bra when the time came. It meant I was fatter, not that I was female. I was filling out and was still only 5 feet tall. I wasn't curvy. I was fat. And I was ashamed. I wore baggy sweatshirts so much that my best friend thought I was wearing them to hide being flat. Oh how I wished!!! She told me her theory was wrong though, because she could tell I wasn't flat whenever the wind blew. I was mortified. Someone else had noticed my flab and pointed it out.

I remember when I hit 100 pounds on the scale. It was in Junior High, 7th grade. It destroyed me. I sobbed in the empty locker room. I heard voices in my head, mocking me and saying, "Well it's finally happened. She weighs 100 pounds. Let's have a party and celebrate our disappointment. We'll do this again every 100 pounds. It's inevitable."

I tried out for the soccer team and didn't make it. My neighbor then convinced me to try out for Drill Team because I had some dance training. I never thought I'd make it. I wasn't popular. I wasn't pretty. I wasn't skinny. But I had rhythm. I made the team. I was still fat though. I chose an XL skirt to wear. It was huge. I had to fold it over and pin it. It looked funny but I dealt with it because there was no way I could fit in anything smaller. That's what I get for being fat.

When we moved to a new state in the middle of my 9th grade year I was relieved. I was determined to make a fresh start with people that hadn't seen me blob out. These people were nice! They liked me! I wanted to try out for soccer again! I missed try-outs, but the coach was kind enough to let me practice with the team every day. He just didn't have the heart to tell me I sucked and that's why I was never officially on the team. I didn't even make first cut the next year.

During that season though, I started getting comments from girls on my nice, muscular legs. I was suddenly mortified again. After all, I was still being told at home that I was fat so I still wore baggy shirts to try and hide it. It couldn't be muscle they saw. Couldn't they see how I jiggled?!

I realized that my extended family (on both sides) had an influence on this too. I have a cousin that is obsessed with people's weight, including her own. She struggled with an eating disorder for years. Others constantly commented on everybody's weight, skinny or fat. I remember a visit to an Aunt's house when I was 16. I had finally had grown into my current height of 5'8". She put her hands on my hips to emphasize her point and said, "You're looking so good... and you've slimmed down." I hadn't done anything differently except grow taller, but I frantically racked my brain for something that I HAD done because whatever it was it worked! They liked me now! I MUST KEEP DOING THIS THING!!

During my Junior year I started noticing that guys were noticing me. And flirting. I was baffled. Me? Fat me?? And they wanted to kiss me?! Suddenly, my whole world had meaning. If these guys are attracted to me, that means I'm attractive right? RIGHT?! They must like me if they want to make out with me!

Thus began the horrid deception of self-esteem built upon what boys thought of me. I am still living with the consequences of that. The rest of my High School days and all of my 20s were spent caught in a vicious cycle of self-loathing. It influenced every single one of my life choices. Maybe that's when I became fat, I just couldn't admit it.

Moving to California was the best thing I could have done for myself. It took a while, and a lot of slip-ups, but I was now putting forth a concerted effort to build my self-esteem with an eternal perspective. I wasn't completely where I wanted to be, but eventually I was healthier than I had been at any other point in my life. Emotionally, physically, spiritually, and mentally. Completely independent of what ANYbody else thought of me.

I had come to grips with the fact that I would never be skinny, but I could get my weight into a healthy range. And I did. I was running 2 miles every other day. I was eating more vegetables than ever. I was limiting sugar. I was doing yoga and Pilates. It drove me nuts that my roommate ate fast food and junk constantly, never worked out, and was tiny. I will never have that luck. I will always have to work very, very hard to stay at a healthy weight.

Todd came along at the right time in my life. Any earlier and I would have been too insecure to handle our relationship. He loved me. Size 12/14 and all.

Even now after our three babies, he still loves me at a size 16/18. I can no longer deny that I am fat. I can't find pants that fit me because of my muffin top. Actually, it's more like a loaf. I have a big, squishy belly that sags and doesn't look right in anything. I have back fat. I can see the cellulite on my shins now. I hate going anywhere because that means I have to put on clothes that I look horrible in. I am heavier now than I have ever been. I hate pictures of anything but my face lately. Even that is getting fat. I am still hearing comments about my weight, but for the most part I have a much healthier relationship with my family members now.

It would be nice if I could blame the fat on baby weight, but I actually lose weight during a pregnancy. I weigh less postpartum than I did pre-pregnancy, but for whatever reason I balloon up 20-30 pounds within a few months.

Maybe it's my thyroid. Maybe it was always my thyroid. Who knows. Who cares.

All I know is that it is something I will continue to struggle with for the rest of my life. It sucks. It's hard. I hate it. I hate the way I look. I hate my body.

But for my children's sake, I can't. No matter what I may feel about it, I can't say anything out loud. I am terrified that my negative body image will affect them. How could it not? Fortunately, Rylin doesn't even know the words "fat" and "skinny" yet. I have tried so hard to eliminate them from my everyday speech. I refuse to use them in front of her. I let her eat when she is hungry, and let her stop when she is done. We limit sugar, but don't deny it. She wants to play sports and we're going to let her do so. We're also going to check her thyroid when she's a teenager and hope she doesn't have to face the same battles I do.

She's a tiny little thing and gets comments about how petite she is all the time. It drives me crazy when it's said as a compliment. As if it's something she should always aspire to. I never want her to experience the shame I did. I'm working on how I am going to help her establish a healthy lifestyle which includes a healthy self-image.

I honestly don't remember when I became fat, because I always have been.

Bzzzzzt

I've decided that an abscessed tooth is the worst pain I have ever been in. Period.

Yup. You read that correctly.

More pain than giving birth to a 9 pound baby with no pain meds whatsoever.

Agony with no relief in sight.

12 hours after I was put on antibiotics, I wasn't waking up crying from the pain anymore like I had been for the previous 48 hours. Mostly because they gave me a hefty dose of narcotics.

I was in a drug-induced stupor for two days.

Then it was suddenly Christmas.

It's been a week since the ER visit and my house is. a. disaster. All three kids have been sick for over a month and now Josie isn't just not gaining weight, she's losing it.

The antibiotics I'm still on have me nauseated 24/7 and the smell coming from whatever is in my kitchen sink is preventing me from going anywhere near the dirty dishes that desperately need to be done.

Who am I?

Where am I?

When am I?

Let Me Help

That is a phrase I have heard after every single one of my babies. I am able to give a weak smile and say, "We're managing." But here's the ugly truth: we're not. I only say we are because I don't wish to burden these well-meaning individuals with any guilt. They won't be able to help. They can't.

They can't be here at 7:00 in the morning when Rylin and Evan get up and I'm too exhausted to feed them breakfast. Sometimes they stay in their diapers and pajamas until around noon when I can finally lift my weary body off the bed. Yep. They watch TV all morning with nothing to eat or drink until I can get up.

They can't be here from 3:00-7:00 in the morning to continuously feed Josie for four hours straight.

They can't fork over the $300 it will take to fix Josie's lip-tie.

They can't be here every day to hold the baby long enough for me to take a shower.

They can't fix my broken dryer.

They can't provide Todd with business.

They can't heal my sore and bruised breasts.

They can't get rid of our unwanted insect tenants.

They can't provide us with a second vehicle just to get to Doctor appointments.

They can't take Rylin to and from preschool.

They can't make Josie gain weight.

They can't help me deal with sleep deprivation and the resulting postpartum depression.

They can't stop Evan from playing in the toilet and Rylin from arguing with me about Every. Single. Thing.

They can't spend 12 hours a day feeding a baby.

They can't do any of these things, so I don't even bother asking. It hurts too much when they laugh and think I'm joking.

You know how you get when your tired and/or hungry? That's me all of the time. I'm a monster. I'm not nice to anybody.

It's time for dinner right now and I don't have the energy to think about let alone prepare something to eat. They had string cheese and fruit snacks for lunch. I finally ate something when 2 out of the 3 of them were asleep. That was 6 hours ago.

Let me help?

I force myself to not burst into maniacal laughter when I get told this.

Don't offer unless you're really, REALLY willing to do what it takes to truly help and not just what you think will.

Here's what's unhelpful but all too common:

Unsolicited advice - If I didn't ask, I don't care. Really. I don't.

Comparisons - I don't need to hear how easy breastfeeding was for you, or how you have a maid, or how your baby is such a good sleeper, or how your husband waits on you 24/7. These make me want to punch you in the face.

Showing up at my door with no notice - I haven't showered. My hair possibly has small animals nesting in it. My teeth are fuzzy. I smell like sweat and sour milk. You're making me put on a shirt and maybe a bra. I hate you in this moment.

Telling me to "enjoy this time" or any other comment that reminds me I am somehow not doing this whole motherhood thing right.

Let me help.

I'd love to. Really I would.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Baby!

When you aren't working full-time any longer and your baby is overdue, you start to look for things to pass the time. I started reading the Harry Potter series again. I also wanted the house clean and enough laundry done so that I wouldn't worry about wanting to do them for a week.

The days dragged on.

I went to work the Friday and Saturday before I was induced mostly so I could have something to do. I also wanted the pity tips. Both reasons were satisfied. I'm going to miss serving while pregnant.

Todd's parents were in town for the weekend also, so we headed to his sister's house for dinner on Sunday night. I claimed a spot on the couch next to on top of the air conditioning vent while we, as a family, tried to come up with good names for a baby boy. I don't know why, but we really struggle with boy names. We were pretty set on our girl names, but were waiting to meet the baby like always.

Right after we found out we were pregnant, we started talking about middle names. Both Rylin and Evan have names from my side of the family, so I figured we could look at Todd's. Here is what was available from his four grandparents: Alva, Althea, Wilda, & Lee. Now, if YOU were about to give your child an identity, which of those names do you think you'd pick? Also, both Todd's Mom AND Dad have the middle name of Lee. It was a no-brainer for us. Boy or girl, the middle name would be Lee. Spelled just like that.

Side funny story, Todd's Grandpa (Lee) gets a little... concerned whenever he hears about a new pregnancy. He firmly believes that two children is the cap. Especially if you have one of each gender. Pretty much this is what we've heard from everybody from the get-go:

We were therefore a little hesitant to let him know about this pregnancy. I hoped that telling him about our middle name choice might soften the reception. Here's how the conversation went:

Me: We're going to have another baby!
Lee: Uh oh! Here we go.
Me: And boy or girl, the middle name will be Lee.
Lee: (pause) Well congratulations!!

It still makes me chuckle.

At any rate, it was fun sitting around with Todd's family even if no name ideas came from it. Then one of the things I hate most about being pregnant happened. It's always by some older gentleman that thinks he's being funny. Why?! What is it about those grandpas?!?!?! They look at me, look at my belly, and say, "Are you sure there's not two in there?" After I inwardly roll my eyes and try not to throat-punch them, I say, "Yup. Just one." Their inevitable response is, "Well, you're just so big!"

This is not an appropriate thing to say to anyone. Ever. Especially a 41-week pregnant lady that YOU BARELY EVEN KNOW!!!! (He was my sister-in-law's Father-in-law. No relation to me and I had only briefly met once before). I don't understand why they think this is OK. I've seen pictures of pregnant ladies in the '50s. They looked huge in those freakin' mumus!!

Don't even try to tell me otherwise.

My Grandmother thinks women should still wear these and doesn't like the current fashion trends, "Where you can see every bump and roll." She even offered to buy me a mumu and didn't understand when I told her they don't sell them anymore.

By the way, I was NOT huge and when I told this "kind" sir that I wasn't even as big as I was with my last baby, his astonished, "Oh, really?!" was enough to make me tell Todd it was time to go home.

Harrumph.

Monday was spent cleaning the house and getting things set for Sandy (Todd's Mom) to take care of the kids for the next two days. Just as we were about to walk out the door at 19:30, the impending thunderstorm finally hit. Within minutes the sidewalk was flooded! I can say that the baby's birth story starts out with, "It was a dark and stormy night..." Ha Ha.

We got to the hospital checked in, met the nurses and midwife, and got settled. They started me on cervidil at 21:45. They told me I could still eat, so Todd rushed to Macaroni Grill before they closed at ten for a late-night mushroom ravioli craving. We finally went to "sleep" a little after 23:00 and I knew I was in for a rough night.

I had no less than three things attached to me at all times: my IV, the baby heart-rate sensor, the contraction sensor, the blood pressure cuff, and the oxygen sensor. This made getting comfortable nigh impossible. I get really warm at night and the plastic mattress had me sweating. Thankfully they brought in a fan that made it bearable. To top it all off, I was also having contractions. They weren't really painful, more uncomfortable. I was having a lot of back labor though, so the muscles up and down my back seized up with every contraction. I was only able to doze off and on all night. By the time morning came, I felt like somebody had been punching me in the back for the last 12 hours. 

I had progressed from a 1+ to a 3 in dilation on my own overnight. That was progress, but not enough. I was in too much pain and knew how much was ahead of me. I also knew that my body was exhausted. I knew that I was going to need Pitocin, and I knew it was going to hurt. A lot. We decided to get an epidural after all. We were disappointed, but knew that healthy was the goal. A Mommy under tremendous stress puts the baby under stress too.

The epidural and Pitocin were started at 10:30. Going off of my previous labors, we figured the baby would arrive by noon. Nope. Lunch came and went. I decided to finish reading Harry Potter book 3.

The Pitocin had been pretty high, but the baby's heart-rate had dropped too much so they cut my dosage in half. At 14:00 I was barely at a 4.The midwife offered to break my water, and we agreed.

It had meconium in it.

Crap.

Literally.

It means the baby's first bowl movement has passed and doesn't normally happen until after they are born. This can mean many things, but it always means that the baby is now ingesting and possibly inhaling their own poop. It can (but doesn't always) lead to some pretty serious complications. For now it meant that the pediatrics team was going to take the baby as soon as it was born and might have to perform some heavy-duty suctioning to get it all out.

That's all I needed, more reasons to stress. It really made me want to get the baby here now.

So we waited some more.

Todd had this delivered (and I couldn't eat it yet!!) and all the nurses were jealous:

My awesome cousin surprised us with Jamba Juice (which I could eat!) later in the afternoon.

Around 17:00 the midwife said I was officially in "active" labor and I was at a 5.

More waiting.

Shift change happened at 19:00 and while I was waiting to meet the new (and now third) midwife, I started feeling a lot of pressure.

At 20:00 the midwife was still dealing with another birth (that mother better freaking hurry!!!) and I was feeling constant pressure (the baby's head was now engaged).

At 20:15 the midwife and nurse still hadn't returned so I told Todd to go find them and tell them I was ready to push.

I clicked the epidural button again and a few minutes later everyone was finally showing up in our room. I was in transition and was shaking.

At 20:29 after 24 hours and no more than four pushes, baby arrived!!! The chord was wrapped around the neck once (like I needed any more scares), but only delayed things for a moment while the midwife unlooped it. We were still waiting to find out the gender, and nobody was talking, so I yelled, "What is it?!?!" Todd said it was a boy initially, which I have to admit made me sad for just a half of a second. Then I was happy. Then the midwife said, "Nope, it's a girl!" I was so happy I started crying. Todd was able to "catch" her and cut the chord before she was taken to the warmer by pediatrics.

Her first Apgar score was 5. She had only let out a feeble whimper initially. Once she was on the warmer they started rubbing her down vigorously and had to suction out her nose and had a tube down her throat to suction out her stomach and esophagus. She finally started crying loudly and her second score was a 9.

8 pounds 2 ounces, 20 inches long

 They brought her back to me within a few minutes saying she was just fine.

 
She was so alert for being on that epidural for so long! I couldn't get over all her dark hair either. I secretly don't like bald babies and am always jealous of people with dark hair because their babies have it too! Rylin and Evan had some hair, but nothing close to this! I still can't get over it. :)

We stayed in the hospital for the next two days to get to know our little baby girl and recover. We kept going back and forth between naming her Josephine and Olivia. What did she look more like? Josephine is Todd's Great-Grandmother and it's safe to say that the genetics are strong.

From top left: Rylin, Evan, new baby, Todd, Josephine.

See what I mean?? It's all in the eyes.

Todd's Mom brought the other kids by and they got to meet their baby sister for the first time.

We were still torn on the name though. We liked the name Josie and we liked how Rylin was right that it was a girl and "her name is Olivia." At some point I suggested the idea of two middle names. I did a little bit of research and found out it wasn't as big a deal as I thought it might be. I was worried filling out government and school forms and such would be a hassle. We wouldn't do two middle names if we went with Olivia though. So that's where we were after one day. She was either Olivia Lee or Josephine Olivia Lee.

The second day in the hospital, Todd had to go to a training all day. I had to fill out the birth certificate form and we had been leaning towards Josie. I looked at the baby and it just felt right. Now she officially had a name.

Josephine Olivia Lee Allison

We love baby Josie with all of our hearts and are so glad she is part of our family!