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Wednesday, March 6, 2019

Weeks 5 and 6-- real food and more weight loss!


Positive Choice Week 6 and 7 

I will start off with the news I’m sure all are waiting to hear with bated breath…..

I’ve lost 27.6 lbs in 35 days!


This last week my weight loss was 3 lbs (before it had been between 4.2-4.6 lbs), so it is slowing down, but still pretty good. It should be higher next week, but we shall see.



Real food!
I mentioned before I was instructed to add another shake to my day. That did great for a couple of weeks at making me feel full, but Feb 24-27 I was so hungry I started shaking and was light-headed most of the time. I called Positive Choice. The PA I spoke with instructed me to  add a meal each day. So now I get to have 6 shakes a day (which is 150% of the nutrients I need) and then 3 oz of lean protein, 1/2 cup of non-startchy vegetables, and a small salad. So far this has helped me and I haven’t been shaky or light headed.

I am a bit concerned because I had all those shaky feelings, etc on days that did not exercise. I am really wanting to exercise. In fact, I did all the work in the program work book as well as accompanying book they gave me to set up an appropriate exercise program. I hadn’t started it yet because I was afraid that if I shook and was light headed without exercising I might feel worse with exercise, even with the extra food. I spoke at length with a NP before my meeting last night. Basically, she said I should be fine as long as I stick to the guidelines from the program.

My theme for this year is “Happy, Healthy Kornoff’s!”. In that light, I have been trying to add health to my entire life- including my family life. This means that my hubby and I got a babysitter and went on a proper date! Wohoo! We went to a restaurant and then a coffee shop to spend time together. It was even extra fun because I actually got to eat at the restaurant we went to— 6 pieces of wonderful sashimi!! It was the best tasting food I have ever had. I mean, it was good sashimi, but having that fantastic texture in my mouth was so exciting!! And the ginger they had to eat with it was delicious! Who knew ginger could be so delectable? We have another date set for Saturday during the day and I am looking forward to it as well. 

My pile of clothes to donate
In terms of my mental health, I have been doing better and taking time for myself. I have been feeling pretty successful and happy with the progress I am making towards whole person health. I was able to get rid of almost all the clothes I have been wearing for the last 5 months! It’s so exciting! I feel pretty and can see a difference in my face from the weight loss. I also realized that I have lost all the weight I gained after giving birth. This means the rest of the weight I have to lose is from IVF medications and pregnancy. This is encouraging to me because I gained exactly the recommended weight during pregnancy and had no power over the weight the IVF drugs put on me. This has helped my perspective immensely as I look ahead feeling like there is still so far to go.

In terms of spiritual health, I have been experiencing such renewal of the my spirit and can sense a change in myself. I find that I am first turning to God with situations that in the past would have caused me extreme anxiety and then maybe a couple days later I would think about praying about the situation. I will go more into that later.

Have a wonderful day!

Friday, March 1, 2019

Why I have a lemon in my freezer


Why I have a lemon in my freezer: coping/regulation strategies during the pursuit of healing

I chose this weight loss program because it addresses more than just weight loss. Each week I attend a group. This group is fantastic. I leave feeling heard, supportive, and with a feeling of community. The leader, Heather, is organized, but also fantastic at giving each member invested attention each week.

Our first group topic was Coping Strategies. I have degrees in Psychology and Sociology and a Master’s in OT, work experience with children specifically targeting emotional regulation strategies, and years of therapy. Even with all that experience, education, and mental health work, coping strategies/regulation strategies never seemed to be truly something I could integrate into my life. I do a great job helping Katya in this area and she now automatically put in a lot of her strategies to regulate herself, but I struggle to incorporate them in my life- perhaps because many of my maladaptive coping/regulation strategies have been in place for decades.

Coping strategies we came up with in class
Our leader, Heather, explained that if, on a scale of 1-10, your stress level is a 7-10, in order to cope with the situation you need distraction to help you manage and to regulate yourself. When your stress is between a 3 and 6.9, you need self-soothing strategies. Once you are between 1-2.9, you are able to implement strategies to improve the moment. I love this, because it has shown me a lot. she had us come up with examples of strategies for each category- non-eating ones of course!


One of the strategies she mentioned in using a frozen whole orange as a grounding technique. A grounding technique is a technique that immediately connects you with the present moment. I have tried some with mixed results. Heather said to freeze an orange and then when you are at a 7-10, get the orange out of the freezer and hold it. The cold will get your attention (distraction) and help you get to a place where you can use your other senses to connect with the present (e.g. scratch the peel and smell it, look at the color, etc). I decided to try it out. We had a plethora of lemons at the time, so I froze a lemon instead.

I am undergoing EMDR therapy targeting trauma. In correlation with this, I’ve had some difficult days. I find that once every couple of weeks, I end up being having an immediate trauma response to a trigger. The other day it happened when I was dealing with the toddler the other day. I was really struggling. I decided to get the lemon out of the freezer and try it. You know what? It worked! It brought me back to reality, helped me calm down, and helped me feel in charge of my body. It was wonderful. 

I’m not proud of how my morning went, but I can look back and see the good things that happened. While I was sitting there on the floor of my kitchen with the frozen lemon in my hand, Katya was sitting in her rocking chair— one of her favorite calming strategies. I did lots of story-telling (where you talk about what happened as a story to help process an event that was upsetting or traumatic) with her the rest of the day and eventually she drew a picture of what happened and then changed it to show we were happy now. My play-therapist mom, said that this demonstrated that Katya had processed the events healthily. So, there you go- I used a new strategy to help me and was able to help her process as well. While not my best day, I think I could have done a lot worse.

I think the lemon will stay in the freezer for now. At least until I am done with EMDR and don’t have any more trauma responses.