Hungry

I’ve decided to start doing some regular fasting, as recommended in a video my sister-in-law sent. My plan is to fast from 8:00 PM the previous night through till the following morning. In case I don’t make it, instead of going hog wild, I’m allowing myself a light dinner of chicken broth & seaweed halfway through the fast.

I know some of you are thinking, bleck! We’d rather go hungry! But I actually find broth and seaweed comforting, and there’s nothing better for feeling like you’re eating healthy!

Speaking of seaweed, my sister sent me this funny picture the other day:

She was in a rush, and trying to make herself a quick cup of tea. She saw a small unlabeled bag of what looked like black tea leaves in her cupboard. But something wasn’t quite right, lol! She made tea from dried seaweed! I must have left it there when we stayed with her in February and March while I had my surgery done.

The morning of my fast started off fairly regularly, because I don’t usually eat early in the morning anyway. This particular morning I had to go to the cancer center to do my bloodwork. On the way home from getting my blood drawn, I noticed there weren’t very many cars in the Trader Joe’s parking lot. Hmmm.

I used to regularly and frequently go to both Sprouts and Trader Joes. But since my surgery and covid started, John has been doing the grocery shopping, once every two weeks. He alternates between Sprouts and Albertsons. He hasn’t attempted to go to Trader Joe’s because it’s crowded and I haven’t asked him to. Most of my Trader Joe items I can get at Sprouts or online. Except one thing. One measly, but very important item – my laundry detergent.

I attempted to buy a substitute laundry detergent from Amazon, but it stinks so bad that I’m going to have to give it away. I didn’t even open it – it’s SEALED and it still stinks so bad I’m going to give it away. I’ve been rationing my laundry soap, using less and less per load…it’s finally time to do something radical. Like actually going into Trader Joe’s!

Turns out it wasn’t bad at all. No lines to get in or to check out. I just grabbed two of the size large containers of laundry detergent and headed to check out. My checker was super nice and wiped down the detergent bottles for me. And he complemented me on my purse. (My purse is made out of seatbelts, and it is really cool.)

I realize how I miss those casual friendly interactions with people – strangers or coworkers or anyone.

Meanwhile, first major hunger pains at 11:00 AM.

At noon I had an online Zoom meditation group. It’s the weirdest thing, sitting in silence for an entire hour, staring at people in boxes on a computer. I’m new to this particular group, so I was staring at strangers in silence on my computer. However, I’ve done these types of groups before, so I knew we’d introduce ourselves at the end of the hour. Sort of backwards, I know, but that’s how it’s done.

Our intent for today was “healing”. Healing whatever. Healing us, our friends & family, our country, the whole world. We could all use a little healing right now. I sat outside – the weather has been perfect in Albuquerque for several days now. About halfway through the session, helicopters started circling overhead. My volume was muted, so my fellow meditators couldn’t hear them. Just me. First I tried to ignore them. Failing that, I tried to incorporate them into the theme of healing. But the sound of circling helicopters is not restful. It was worrying, ominous, repetitive and insistent. Around and around. They eventually quit around the time the hour-long meditation was over.

Second major hunger pains at 2:00 PM.

In an act of brilliance today, Amazon took someone’s box, which already had the address label on it, and stuck a second label with my name and address on top of the original label, partially obscuring the original address and delivered it to me instead of them. Surprisingly, I noticed before opening it, and knew it wasn’t my box. On the partially obscured label I could see the whole name of the person, the street name and zip code, but not the actual house number. His name is fairly unusual, so I managed to look him up online and find his phone number. He came by and collected his package and was very grateful I had tracked him down. I figured it was easier to google him than it would have been to call Amazon! Amazon doesn’t answer their phones. Turns out the package contained snow boots for his son. Now my only question is, what box was that label with my name and address supposed to have been on?

3:00 PM and I am hungry! I have a session with a client for an hour, which will distract me.

Now it’s 4:00 PM, and this is getting old! It’s already late afternoon and I don’t feel like I’ve made as much progress packing as I’d like.

6:00 and getting annoyed with fasting, but on the plus side, I suddenly started spontaneously dancing to my music. That hasn’t happened in MONTHS. Where’d that energy come from? It can’t be sustainable. Presumably I will crash soon.

7:00 and I can smell John’s dinner. At least he fixed it for himself! I could fix my broth and seaweed, but I’m actually curious to see if I can do a complete fast for the whole day (and two nights).

Conundrums: I just realized I usually take my vitamins at dinner time. Can I take my vitamins on an empty stomach? John thinks that vitamins wouldn’t be as hard on my stomach as the decaffeinated coffee I’ve been drinking all day. Ok so I’m switching to carbonated water and taking my vitamins, all except the gummy vitamins, which probably have sugar in them. I’ll take them tomorrow.

8:00 and wondering if it’s safe to go in the hot tub after fasting all day? The weather is still warm but it’s cooling off at night and I’m feeling a bit chilly. Maybe if I don’t stay in very long.

Now time for some TV! I almost never watch TV. I’ll go for weeks without watching anything. But I’m not up for doing much of anything else tonight.

9:00 and I’m giving up and going to bed. Too many food commercials on TV. Taco Bell nachos are somehow suddenly appealing? Even the fruit loops looked good – or at least edible.

9:00 AM the next morning: Breakfast! For breakfast I had my gummy vitamins from yesterday, coffee, a scoop of plain yogurt with blackberry and chia seed topping, a few grapes, and two breakfast tacos (2 corn tortillas, 2 eggs scrambled with green chili and cottage cheese, and 2 sausage patties). I would have taken a photo but I was too busy eating!

The fast wasn’t fun, but it turned out to be perfectly doable, and I hope those hungry cancer cells suffered!

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