GAPS Report – Days 3-5

HOLY COW YOU GUYS – I DID IT!!

I have made it 5 days on GAPS with no cheating and I’m feeling very proud of that fact. It has not been easy, the first few days were the WORST! But on the eve of day 6, I’m feeling moderately better about the whole situation. I have been keeping a personal journal with all the TMI that you guys don’t want or need to know, and reflecting back I am seeing some positives.

Let’s start with mood: the first few days were awful, I was angry, frustrated, teary, EXHAUSTED, bloated, crampy, and headachy, fuzzy thinking. I felt very unsettled, back and forth and back and forth about what I was doing with this stupid diet (which was hard for me because, while I may take time to really make a decision, once I make it I don’t generally change my mind – so to be changing my mind every couple of hours was just agony). Then, gradually my headache went away, the cramps went from constant to intermittent, to gone, and I’m tired but not exhausted (like having 2 naps a day like I was). Today I feel ok. More energy than I’ve had since I started, still tired though. No more crazy mood swings. No tears today. However, we have a new symptom: achy hips at night, achy joints all day. Arthritis or further die off? Time will tell. I have read other people’s blogs about GAPS though, and the joint pain seems to be right on schedule.

Foods: Thanks to a dear friend who’s baby had such severe allergies she could only eat 6 (!!!) foods while breastfeeding him (the same friend I called the first night), I have many new ideas about what to do with food. She told me about the make-believe shepherd’s pie and last night she suggested a lemon, ginger, honey drink with my Soda Stream (it carbonates water which is GAPS legal). I made that today and it was delicious!! I threw a roast in the crockpot with broth, onions, and carrots – delicious!! And then I just drank the extra broth with my meal.

I have officially started on Stage 2 of the Intro Diet – which means that if I didn’t have an egg sensitivity, I could start adding in eggs. But I can’t. So it means I have started drinking sauerkraut juice (1 tbsp) before every meal to improve stomach acidity and just today I got to actually eat some. It’s pretty delicious. Bubbies brand is naturally fermented, so it is GAPS legal and saves me from making my own – which I may yet try, but for now seems like a lot of additional work on top of what I’m already doing. The best part of Stage 2 though, is the addition of Ghee (clarified butter). I had some on my zucchini at dinner tonight and it was a little piece of heaven. Depending on how my guts fare with these new introductions over the next day or two, I may move on to Stage 3 quite quickly – that means avocado for those of you playing at home.

Some successes of the past 5 days: Asking for help when I need it. Two birthday parties, no cake.

Also, in a dark moment I sent a pitiful email to my ND, who told me I could do some beans instead of meat. There are some beans allowed on full GAPS but certainly not in the intro because they are hard to digest. With my trusty Vitamix however, I can pulverize them beyond recognition before putting them in a soup, or mixed in with some broth or something, so hopefully that will work for me. It’s nice to know I have options.

Planned indiscretions:

1. Ian and I are going in to Toronto on Thursday to see The Wizard of Oz and we are going to go out to dinner. I have already perused the menu online and picked the most GAPS-friendly items – but I would probably be asked to leave if I asked them to boil my steak, so the method of cooking may be illegal. Unless I could find a poached fish of some sort….and I will try to skip desert.
2. Dinner out with friends this weekend – again, have pre-selected my meal. Also, a Kindfood cupcake may be involved. While they are not grain free, they are gluten, sugar, and dairy free. So not too big a problem – I hope.

So all in all, it’s been a good couple of days since my last post. I have to say though, that the nightly detox baths are my favourite part! And Ian can’t even complain about them because they are part of the program, and he wants me to succeed! 😉

GAPS Report – Day 2

After I wrote my last post, I had a colossal melt-down. Called my friend crying, saying I hated broth and meat and that there was no way I could do this. I went to bed firmly resolved to throw in the towel in the morning.

Morning of Day 2 arrived with a pounding headache (had been there all night) and me not feeling able to face the day. I know part of this was caffeine detox. I also had terrible uterine cramping (like menstrual cramps – but I’m nowhere near due for those). I realized I wouldn’t get through the day with this headache, so I made myself some half caf coffee and had half a cup – so really, only a 1/4 cup of caffeine! Black, with honey (so still GAPS legal – in fact some coffee is allowed on the later stages, so I wasn’t really breaking any rules). I felt better within about 20 mins.

Ian and I had a long talk about this GAPS business – he’s so supportive and would love to see my guts (and thus me) get better. So I asked him to start prepping the days meat, because I just didn’t think I could do it. Off he went to the kitchen to simmer me some hamburger patties in broth.

Day 1 was butternut squash soup, boiled onions, boiled chicken, and broth. Day 2 was soup for breakfast (threw some chicken in to really spice it up), hamburger patties with carrots and cauliflower ‘sauce’ (boiled them in broth with the patties then threw it all in the vitamix). Supper was ‘shepherd’s pie’ – bottom layer of boiled ground turkey and butternut squash, second layer of boiled broccoli, third layer was whipped cauliflower. And broth. Lots and lots of broth.

Now most of the time I like meat. Since I fell off the GFV wagon we’ve eaten meat several times a month, mostly when we got out. But I think this much meat is going to kill me. I feel gross and bloated. And maybe starting to smell like meat a little. YUCK! I really don’t know how long I am going to be able to keep this up…

I’m trying to separate “die-off” symptoms from my body telling me cut it out with the meat. I will accept that the bloating, headache, fuzzy head, and EXTREME exhaustion are part of the die-off and detoxing from sugar/caffeine etc. However, those menstrual like cramps have me worried. For 10 years, they have been a sign that I am putting something into my body that shouldn’t be there. So now what? Do I push through, ignoring what my body is telling me in this respect? Or do I listen to it, thereby throwing in the GAPS towel? I just don’t know what to do.

Depending on how long I stick to this stupid Atkins diet, there are some helpful things I will take away:

1. Adding naturally fermented foods to my diet to increase digestion and good bacteria.
2. Decreasing almost to the point of elimination, refined sugar.
3. Decreasing grains, even the gluten free kind.

Anyway, I have a warm cup of broth waiting for me so I should get to drinking it! Stay tuned for more updates, because at this point it’s less day to day and more meal to meal.

GAPS Report – Day 1

Last night I was pumped – happily making my soup, broth, and boiled onions for the coming day.

Tonight? I have a headache, am exhausted, and find myself already sick of broth, soup, and boiled onions. Even the detox bath didn’t help.

I am DYING for some sugar.

Less than 24 hours in and I’m ready to give up. Ugh.

Going GFV was a freaking breeze compared to this. GAPS will certainly be a day by day thing for me and in a pinch, I’ll just flip back to GFV now and maybe try GAPS again in the future.

But for now, I press on…going to go simmer some meat patties in broth now.

Gluten-free vegan: REDUX

*sigh*

So here we go again. Back to the crazy world of attempting to use food to heal from the inside out. I am a mess. My joints hurt, my guts hurt, and my thyroid is out of control – normal antibody levels are less than 35. I checked them last week and it didn’t actually read a level – just said it was GREATER THAN 1000! What a disaster!

Since my last post almost a year ago, any kind of dietary anything has been non-existant. I’ve been spending a lot of time debating doing the GAPS diet – but it’s pretty restrictive and can be challenging at the best of times. In a nutshell, GAPS is a diet used by a lot of parents who have kids with Autism, ADD, etc, to promote healing and psychological improvement (if you want to know why this works, you’ll have to look it up, or ask me – but it’s too involved to go into here). Anyway, GAPS is meant to heal the gut and subsequently the body’s inflammatory process is lessened and auto-immune issues thereby decreased.

GAPS starts with drinking copious amounts of meat broth and moves to eating lots of meat, eggs, and naturally fermented foods (sauerkraut etc). When I read the book, it made a lot of sense for gut healing. But, when I consider what I know about anti-inflammatory/anti-estrogenic diets (for me), the amount of meat required just seems to go against all of that.

I met with my Naturopath to discuss the finer points of GAPS for me specifically and she agreed that all that meat would not be good for me. Further, I have an egg sensitivity and GAPS requires a lot of egg eating (I was really excited about this because I LOVE eggs), so that’s not going to work either. But, the gut healing aspects of the Intro Diet *would* be good for me.

So, basically we’ve decided that the best approach would be to start with the GAPS Intro Diet for a month or so, then moving on to a modified GAPS with a focus on Vegan and Gluten Free. I felt SO GOOD when I was eating vegan and GF and my body responded positively as well (recall when I actually made myself hypER thyroid).

What it boils down to is this: In keeping with Vegan/GF, I’ll be dairy and egg free for sure – with organic, grass-fed, antibiotic free blah blah meat or fish on occasion, and no gluten. In addition, I’ll be following the grain and sugar free approach of GAPS – no rice, quinoa, oats, etc and only honey as sweetener.

I can hardly wait.

Breakfast Woes

Are you guys any good at breakfast? I’m not. It’s mostly the result of my sheer laziness and my inability or desire to get up early a lack of time. Also, the things I crave aren’t what I should be eating: Eggs in all their forms, Tim Horon’s bagels lovingly covered in cream cheese or their equally delicious counterpart – the tantalizing Sausage Breakfast Sandwich, and pancakes/waffles/crepes (ok, so those last few really are due to a lack of time, because they can easily be made ‘safe’).

Good, nutritious breakfasts are something I really struggle with. Sometimes I legitimately don’t have time – I get called out in the middle of the night/early morning and have to go – a few hours later there’s a new person in the world and I’m STARVING after all my hard work (haha!). At that point I usually end up eating some toast and peanut butter (if we’re at the hospital) or some toast and peanut butter (if we’re at home). This is not nearly nutritionally good enough to get me through the last few hours of recovery, so by the time we’re all done I’m fantasizing about the BF sandwich again! The other thing I do is leave the house for clinic without eating anything – I’m usually fine for the morning, but then the afternoon comes and I’m all about the bad food choices!

My other problem is that I don’t love cold stuff in the morning – especially in the winter. So that makes cereal, fruit, yogurt and nuts, and my smoothies all seem very unappealing. Also, I don’t much love instant oatmeal – I like the real stuff, but see above re: time.

But a good breakfast sets the tone for your whole day and I know it keeps me from making bad food choices later in the day. So I’m going to work on this. For the next few weeks my goal is to have tasty, fast, nutritionally appropriate breakfasts. That can be eaten with one hand – while driving.

No, they didn’t kill me!

Sorry to leave y’all hanging after that last post. The good folks at Clear Passage did not kill me, I just found myself needing to rest and veg out the next couple of days. Then we were flying home. Then it was right back into work and……life gets in the way.

I kept meaning to write more about my time there – and didn’t want to write any other posts until I had finished the series properly – and so my perfectionist nature prevented me from writing anything at all….

So here we are, 5 months after the fact – trying to catch up:

 

The rest of my time at Clear Passage was good. The day after they kicked the crap out of me, I made them go a little easier on me. I was still red and achy the next morning. I’m going to skip over the rest (mostly ’cause I don’t remember the details) and just say that while it didn’t fix everything, it did make a tremendous difference where pain was concerned!

Though an ultrasound 2 months after confirmed that my tubes were (are?) the same, all the pain typically associated with my cycles and endo is SIGNIFICANTLY reduced. Surprisingly so. I even have a visual reminder of the change as my appendix scar (for 10 years has been kind of puckered in) is totally smoothed out now. It took me sometime to get used to the difference in how it looked and felt. Oh, and did I mention I now have almost NO PAIN??? 🙂

So, ultimately the verdict is that I would recommend this treatment to someone with wicked endo pain and I would absolutely consider going back myself, for a “tune up”, should the need arise.

I call this a success.

 

Clear Passage – part 2

So, uh, day two was a little LOT more intense than day 1. I arrived at 9am and met with Evette again. This time she spent the hour focused on my uterus and bladder – it felt more intense than the day before, but she was just getting things warmed up! My second hour was with Larry (Belinda’s hubby and the other co-founder) and all I can say is “holy crap”.

He seems like a bit of an odd duck, but nice. Passionate about his work and really wanting me to be involved – ie, let him know exactly what I’m feeling and where, if any of the treatment was too intense and any emotions that might come up during the treatment. We chatted for about 10 minutes and then he got down to business.

He started by doing a general assessment of my abdominal organs. It was so interesting to feel how pliable things are on the left but how rigid things are on the right. When he was done that, he positioned himself sitting beside the table, facing me with my right leg draped over his right shoulder and then he started digging massaging my lower right abdomen. Gradually he increased the depth/pressure until I was sure he could feel the table through my back! He slowly (like 20 mins) worked his way up the right side of my abdomen to just below my ribs (most of the time I was feeling like things were on fire and ripping in my belly a ‘slight burning sensation’). At this point he had moved my leg back onto the table and it basically felt like he was folding my liver in half! I spent much of this time focusing on my breathing and talking myself through it like I do women in labour (“slow deep breaths, relax your shoulders, relax your hips, let all your weight sink down into the bed”). His treatment felt “productive”. Then, while he was kicking the crap out of my transverse colon (right across the top of my abdomen) I got all flushed and nauseated! Hello vaso-vagal response, how nice to see you! This lasted about 10 mins. Then he started to work his way back down my right side and I guess his hands were getting tired because then he stood up, raised the table, and started having a go at me with his ELBOWS! Good grief! This lasted about another 15 minutes and then we were all done. Phew!

Now I should point out, that all the while he kept checking in with me, making sure the pressure was ok, making sure I was ok. They are not trying to intentionally inflict pain, but sometimes breaking down scar tissue is a painful process – there is no way around it. Like I said, it felt effective. And looked effective. My belly was red for at least an hour afterwards…

Then it was time for lunch and since I only had an hour break, mom brought lunch to the clinic. We ate and then went for my prescribed walk around the neighbourhood before starting back again for the afternoon.

The first session of the afternoon had Evette hanging out with my cervix and tailbone again. And again, not so bad. It is however, an odd feeling to have someone massaging your tailbone from the inside!

The last session of the day had me with Kim again. I really warmed up to her this time – she seems like a lot of fun. She picked up where Larry left off – by kicking the crap out of my guts. She was focused on my left side though (equal opportunity for abdominal abuse today) and by the time she was done with me I was also feeling pretty done as well.

We came home and sat by the pool for a bit. I was eating arnica by the handful, slathering myself in homeopathic creams for inflammation and bruising and I also slept for a while. Several hours later I still had finger marks and redness all over my abdomen and I really felt beat up.

Mom and I went out for a bite to eat and a drink (we toasted to my pain and suffering) and then we went shopping for a bit (they told me I have to walk, they didn’t say it couldn’t be around a store – haha). As I was trying on some clothes, I noticed my poor red belly in the mirror – what really stood out though, was my appendix scar. Ever since I can remember, my belly has been puckered in along the scar, with a distinct divet to be felt. But now, it’s mostly gone! CRAZY. There is still one small part that puckers, but it looks totally different. I ran out of the change room to show my mom, but she didn’t really know what she was looking at. But I do because I’ve been looking at it for 9 years and it looks different. Scar tissue be gone!

At this point I was starting to feel really bruised and battered so we went home, I did my castor oil pack and went to bed. Nervous about letting them touch my abdomen tomorrow, but excited by the changes.

Clear Passage – Day 1

I’m not holding any details back in these entries, so consider yourself warned! 🙂

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Background is here.

My first appointment was scheduled for Monday, 9am. We arrived a few minutes early to fill out some last minute paperwork and make the final payment (thanks mom!). The place was clean and cozy and less flashy than I had imagined (I figured private health clinic in the US would be big on appearances). It is in an office/clinic complex – small waiting room when you first walk in with lots of magazines and books on health, well-being and fertility stuff. Once we were all settled, the administrator took me on a little tour of the place – washrooms, treatment rooms, kitchen that can be used by us as well. Mom came with me and sat in on the first two sessions.

I was given a robe and fuzzy blanket that are mine for the week. I was also given a paper gown that I was told I would wear during treatments. She said they would be replaced as I went because they might get a little torn up – I didn’t think she meant they would actually be ripped apart! But that’s what they do, as you lay there, they rip open the parts they need to access whatever part of your body they are working on. Keeps you covered otherwise though…..some of the pictures I saw before hand had people with strategically placed towels but I guess the laundry got to be a pain in the butt? Who knows…..

Anyway, my first one hour session was with Evette – a really lovely woman from Louisiana. For this first hour, she did an overall assessment of me. Had me standing in a bra and underwear poking, prodding and looking at my posture, feeling where there might be restrictions, checking my range of motion etc. The consensus is that my right side is wound up tight tight tight. From head to toe.

After a 10 minute break, I met Kim – also lovely, but at this point I liked Evette the best. Kim did the first ‘hands-on’ treatment – basically, she massaged my abdomen for an hour, all the while feeling for the mobility (or not) of various organs. She also felt that I had a lot of restrictions on the right side – things just aren’t moving and sliding around as much as they should be. Her session was ok in terms of intensity. Felt like a lot of treatments I have had from my osteopath before. Some stuff she did elicited some strange pulling and tugging sensations in other parts of my abdomen, but that would only make sense if you think that things are all stuck together in there.

After that I had a two hour break where mom and I did some grocery shopping for the week. We have a hotel with a kitchen, so we can cook our own food rather than eating out so much.

Then back we went for the afternoon sessions. This time I met Belinda (one of the two co-founders). She was a little less warm and fuzzy, a little more clinical. She did some work on my sacrum and my hips. Like my osteopath, it feels like there’s not a whole lot happening and then she straightens out my leg real fast (or something) and I feel all kids of things shifting in my pelvic bones and tightness I didn’t know I had disappears! Magic. She worked on my abdomen a bit, giving a decent amount of attention to the area around my appendix scar.

Another 10 minute break and then back with Evette for the final session of the day – she wanted to finish the assessment from the morning, this time paying particular attention to my cervix. It wasn’t so bad (though it was strange to be on the receiving end for a change). She was checking the position and mobility of my cervix and tailbone and started doing a bit of treatment on it (ie pushing it around). I was prepared for much worse, and I’m happy to report it wasn’t so bad. During this session, we talked a lot about my job and her births and the culture of birth in the US. How odd to be talking midwifery while someone is mucking around with my cervix – definitely a first!

They said I might be a bit achy after the treatment and they recommend walking after the morning and afternoon sessions and also epsom salt baths etc. All in all I felt pretty good. Took my arnica, walked and swam in the pool and had a warm bath. At the end of the day I was still feeling a little apprehensive about how effective this will all be, but hopeful.

Oh, and as an adjunct to all of this, before I left I picked up the new protocol my naturopath wants to try – which basically involves me taking 30 pills a day (to help decrease inflammation and scar tissue and help my liver to detox). We thought the treatments and her protocol would be enhanced by happening together. And it does feel kind of therapeutic to focus on myself so much for this week – my diet is great, I’m drinking lots of water and getting some decent rest. All good things!

Feeling defeated…

As you all know, my diet has been REALLY REALLY good since the beginning of September when my friend started cooking at my house. All kinds of GFV yumminess being consumed and frozen for those on-the-run meals.

So you’ll understand why I’m so puzzled as to why I’ve been SUPER SICK since Sunday. A while back I had posted about a new health issue that I wasn’t prepared to talk about – basically I found out that my fallopian tubes are, in the words of the doctor, “a train wreck”. In short, I have bilateral hydrosalpinx – he says caused by my endo (but I have my doubts – more on that later**). It is so bad that my tubes, which are normally supposed to be the width of a human hair, are now dilated to an inch in diameter, the entire length of the tube and filled with who knows what. The doctor said they are some of the worst he’s seen and given this chronic infection in my pelvis, he’s surprised I’m not sick – like really sick.

Except, the funny thing is I DO get sick when I get my period – and have for a couple of years. On days 2 and 3 of my cycle, I get bloated, achy and chilled. One time it was so bad (before I knew what it was) that I made Ian take me to the hospital where they kept me all day, heavily medicated on painkillers, did all kinds of tests and said they didn’t know what was wrong with me. A few other times I went off-call ’cause I just didn’t know what was going on and I just felt awful. Lately though, it’s been manageable – and better since my diet changes.

This month though, has been the worst it’s ever been (except for the time I went to the hospital). I was so bloated I looked pregnant and my entire abdomen hurt to the touch. I am nauseated (haven’t really eaten much in 3 days) and any time I do eat it gives me terrible intestinal cramps. I feel like I have the flu – weak, achy, chilled, fever. And yet, when one of my midwife friends came to do blood work on me yesterday, the results showed ZERO infection. Absolutely no increase in white blood cells. Being the medical mystery that I am however, I am not surprised – when my appendix was taken out I had no increase in white blood cells; when I went to the hospital so sick two years ago, no increase in white blood cells. I wonder if my body is just so used to being chronically inflammed that it takes more than a little pelvic infection to register with my immune system.

Ugh.

The solution that they offered me was to take my tubes out. Not an option I’m keen on – up until the past few days, I have really liked my tubes and want to keep them around as long as I can. But, if this is going to be an ongoing thing – my tubes and I are going to have to revisit their tenancy agreement.

Being the hippie that I am, and holding my firm belief that the body can heal itself if given a chance (you’ll recall last year during my GVF trial that I had NONE of these sickness symptoms that final month), I am not giving up. I will keep eating GFV and doing things to promote wellness and healing in my body. And as a further part of that little endeavour, I am flying to Florida in 10 days for some physical therapy, not unlike intensive Osteopathic treatment.

Clear Passage claims to be able to break down adhesions and scar tissue from endometriosis, previous surgeries, IBS and a whole host of other things, including treating blocked tubes. They do this by doing some pretty deep, intensive, abdominal massage for 4 hours a day (2 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon) for five days. Some people might call it quackery, but given what I know about massage and osteopathic treatment, I am hopeful for SOME kind of improvement.

And as a nice bonus, my mom is coming with me – so even if it is total hooey, I’ll still have a nice week in Florida with my mom. And after how I have felt this week, that will be a nice treat!

Though I am hopeful about the continued diet and the treatment in Florida, this sickness has me feeling pretty defeated. Even more so the fact that I can feel so terrible and it doesn’t even register with my body. That is just not fair.

 

**As to why my tubes are blocked, I have my suspicions that it is a result of the hysterosalpingogram that I had done in December 2009. At that time, I was told that my tubes were nice and normal in size and shape and open. In August of 2011, the ultrasound showed a train wreck. How does this happen? The doctor said that an infection from that is highly unlikely….but, you know me! I seriously wonder if my immune system didn’t just over-react to the dye in my tubes (given my auto-immune pre-disposition to attack everything in sight) and cause the blockage. He thinks I’m crazy. My GP knows how messed up my body is and she also had the same question. I guess we’ll never know….

Camping – Part 2, plus menu.

Brrr! Camping last weekend was a bit chilly! But we did have a really nice time, got to see some lovely fall colours and spend some quality time together. Finding tasty, easy to prepare camping meals was not the easiest task – I didn’t want anything too complicated because I didn’t want to spend hours cooking. Also, I wanted some easy, go-to, grab and go snacks since I had been hoping we were going to do some hiking and canoeing. As it turns out, the snacks were fun while we were playing cards in the tent!

We got up there LATE Wednesday night – around 11. Obviously, it was pitch black and we were setting up a tent we had never used before. FUN! And it was raining lots. MORE FUN! But, we got the tent et al. set up pretty quick and snuggled in all cozy, me, my dog and my man.

The weather the whole time we were up there was inconsistent – cold, or rainy, then cold AND rainy. Thursday morning was cool and crisp, but the sun started to come out a bit in the afternoon – so we went for a walk. At our furthest point from our site, the thunder/lightening started and the skies opened up. We were drenched by the time we got back to the site. The next day, we wanted to try canoeing. The day was crisp and beautiful until 3, when the rental place opened, and as we headed over to rent the canoe it started to pour rain again. Oh good! 🙂

The only time our spirits were dampened (haha) came when we tried to start a fire – we had really crummy wood that just wouldn’t catch. Ian and I are both experienced fire builders and it took us almost 2 HOURS to get a good fire going! Sheesh. So annoying!! Our last night and morning were COLD – I think it was 3 degrees C that last night! And windy – and rainy! It was miserable. The next morning we just wanted to get the heck out of there!! We went into ‘town’ for breakfast (ie, the mechanic shop/1980’s greasy spoon closest to the park), and then got back, packed up and hit the road.

As far as the menu was concerned, I did some pre-prep – and made a lot of things ahead of time. That way I could just heat things up, but we were eating good, un-processed food.

Wed Night:

Plan was dinner on the road (I was hoping Kindfood “to go”) but the day got away on us and it ended up being a stop along the 401 that was neither vegan, nor gluten free and made us both feel ick.

Thursday:

• Breakfast: GF/V pancakes from a mix – just ok
• Lunch: OSG Carrot Apple Ginger Soup & Grilled Cheese with Aidan’s bread and Daiya (I made the soup ahead of time and brought it with us).
• Dinner: OSG Maple Baked Beans (These are the BEST things I’ve ever eaten!! And they were so easy to make – I will certainly be putting these into heavy menu rotation.)

Friday:

• Breakfast: Breakfast Burrito – GFV tortilla filled with refried beans, guacamole, salsa, daiya and fried potatoes
• Lunch: OSG Hummus, Veggies, Crackers
• Dinner: Amy’s Lentil Soup

 Saturday:

• Breakfast: Intended to be Overnight Oats, but it was so cold and miserable out, the thought of eating cold oats (or even heating them up) was sooo off-putting, I made Ian take me into town and ate things some breakfast type things which I lived to regret. Informed choice right? I knew the risks of my decision and I did it anyway.
• Lunch was going to be a black bean salad, but we were still full from breakfast and just wanted to pack up and get out of there! So we ate tortilla chips on the road. And some dried apples.

Snacks:

• Fruit roll-ups
• Dehydrated cinnamon apples
• OSG Go Go Glow Mix (this stuff is awesome!)
• Kale chips
• Popcorn (yes, I did bring my whirly pop!)

While we were there, we found some amazing walk-in campsites, right on the lake and away from the hustle and bustle. We may just try to book one of those for a weekend next fall!