Update on US!

Man, time flies. I keep meaning to update my little blog here. A lot has happened, but yet nothing of giant significance. We are so close to graduation. Trevor and I both graduate in April! The long road to our bachelors is finally (almost) over! I don't even know what it will feel like to not have the guilt of doing procrastinating homework. (I really want to read this book, but I should be doing homework. Or, I really should be doing homework right now, but the bathroom needs to get cleaned, etc).

Trevor is hard at work searching for an internship over this next summer. He's got quite a few good leads. So we'll see what's happened. I'm working and am loving my job. I'm a bookkeeper right now. It's good fun. I feel so lucky that I can go to work every day and use the things I've learned in my degree. So many college graduates can never use their degree because it's...well...worthless, which is so unfortunate.

I'm one test and a project away from getting my diploma. Trevor will walk the stage in April, and I will in August (even though I graduate in April as well.)

The path to starting a family requires patience. This I've been learning. I'm coming up on 6 months since the miscarriage. I'm doing great now. Sundays can be tough, but as far as day to day, it's in the past. I've had to work with the doctors a lot though. I'm quite the pill popper now. I'm on multiple medications. After the miscarriage they did a whole range of tests and found out quite a few things.

1. My blood clots really well...just a little too well.  They think this could have contributed. So I take a baby asprin every night to keep my blood a bit thinner.

2. I'm on a special prenatal. Very special. The tests showed that my body is missing an enzyme that allows my body to break down the "normal" folic acid in your normal prenatal. This could also be a huge factor in the miscarriage. So I'm on a prescribed prenatal that has "meta-folin" in it. This is a folic acid that is already broken down past the metabolic phase. So my body can absorb it. It's such a new idea and product that there is literally only one prenatal out there with this stuff in it. I feel pretty special, but my wallet hurts each month when I have to purchase it.

3. I take a daily vitamin D3 pill. Which is pretty common.

5. I'm on a hormone replacement therapy. AKA fertility pills. It's a combination of estrogen, progesterone, and Letrozole

6. I'm also on Metformin, it helps with the PCOS. (See below).

7. I also take magnesium. It helps with the muscles.

8. I take acidophilus every day as well. It's a probiotic, not antibiotic.

9. I have PCOS (Polycycstic ovarian syndrome). It runs in the family. I didn't have it until after my miscarriage. After my D&C I had 3 periods in 6 weeks. I went to my OB and it turns out I had cysts all over. Good fun. I was placed on birth control for 2 months to get my hormones back in balance. Then I went back in and got another ultrasound. The cysts were gone! Woot! So I started some fertility pills. I went back in and the cysts were back. Boo.... So, he upped my dosage of pills and I got a shot. It was progesterone in oil, which triggered a period so we could start all over.

Having realized that I have PCOS, I've decided to make a lifestyle change. This is something I'll have my whole life, but it can easily be managed by eating right and exercising. PCOS has side effects of stubborn weight gain, acne, the dark line on the back of your neck, unwanted face growth and others, oh and irregular cycles and the painful cysts. Those lead to infertility problems. After researching and doing some of my own testing, I've realized that I am insulin resistance. So, the root problem of all this kind of goes down to my eating.

When I eat foods that spike my blood sugar, my body produces an over amount of insulin, which makes me "crash" (get tired and groggy). That's it in a nutshell. So I've worked hard to find what foods spike my blood sugar.

I've found that white potatoes, white rice and white bread and of course, candy, will spike my blood sugar and it ends up being a long day. There is one diet out there that works. And it's not really a diet, but a lifestyle change which I've been doing and I've seen such great results. It's the Low-Glycemic diet. Basically it takes out the starches and sugars from a diet, or limits them. It's actually a really healthy diet and can be done with a little bit of diet modifications.

So I've given up white potatoes, which was probably the hardest thing for me because I LOVE potatoes. I'm an Idaho gal. Then I am very moderate with my white rice I eat. What's really cool, is I make my own white bread, (I refuse to buy it because of the additives and cost). We use it for Trevor's lunches every day. I've been able to control myself around the bread. I no longer crave it.

What's also great, is I've come to control my cravings. I don't crave sugar anymore. I eat a good breakfast every day (either cherrios or eggs) along with 8 oz of water and Metimucil (a fiber drink). If I don't get enough fiber in the morning, I'll be hungry by 10 am and will get some cravings. I drink it religiously.

 I'm also working on exercising. I have gym membership and go every day after work. I have a fitbit and strive hard to hit 10,000 steps every day. It's so important to get moving every day. It's helped fight my fatigue. It also encourages me to eat healthy and even better, we are eating dinner earlier in the night. We have been eating dinner around 5 or 6 pm instead of 7 or 8.

What's been so successful for me was my decision to finally make the lifestyle change. It's a healthier diet, it's an active lifestyle. I'm so grateful for modern medicine because I've been able to learn more about MY body and what it needs to be healthy. What's more, is I've found the strength to do this everyday because I've asked God to help me. Making a lifestyle change is hard, but it's easier with God helping. I'm doing my best to take care of my body He gave me and He's helping me do it.

Every day is a new day. A new start. A new beginning.

- SamiMae

I Married this Guy!

About 3 weeks ago, this stud had an important career fair. We were lucky enough to have a wonderful aunt offer to purchase him some Men's Warehouse clothing. WOW! This guy looks awesome. The picture does no justice. The clothing fit him perfectly and he felt great. He also rocked the career fair! 

I'm so lucky to have married this guy! I'm so proud of him. He works so hard at school and getting great grades. This smarty pants gets to graduate in April with his bachelors! All his hard work is starting to pay off. We are so close to graduating. He's done such great work, that he's cut his master's down to only 8 months. He's done most of his master's research and will even have a few grad-level classes done before he even starts. He works so hard, I'm proud of him! LOVE YOU! - Sami

Miscarriages happen

We miscarried our baby. It has been a very sad and trying time for us, but our faith keeps us strong. You can read my post about my lessons learned here.

Mountainside Walk

Last night after dinner, Trevor and I decided to go for a walk. We  do this on a pretty regular basis. It gets me out of the house and away from homework and we get to spend some time together. Normally, we walk around Wymount and up around the temple. This time, we decided to do something different. On our little excursion, I was, by coincidence - wearing my practical footwear. AKA - my holey ballet flats. Anyway, we walked up past the temple to the Rock Canyon trailhead. We drove up there once, but haven't been back since. We discovered it really wasn't that far from where we lived! Within about a 25 minute walk, we were there exploring around. It was later in the evening so we caught some amazing views. I was disappointed that I didn't have my Nikon with me. So, alas, these pictures are from my phone. I was also surprised at the amount of wildlife we saw. A few days ago, I saw a deer outside my bedroom window, and on this trail we saw a lot of little bunny-like creatures and some ducks crossing the trails we walked on. 

We finally had to call it quits and go home, both of our allergies started to act up and we couldn't stop sneezing! If you look in the picture below, you'll see a big green bowl like area. We walked from where this picture was taken, down the mountain, across the big green bowl and down the road to the temple and then into Wymount. It was quite the little hike we went on, but we sure did enjoy getting to know our surroundings a bit more. That big green bowl like area is a GIANT grassy field. The only real reason we could figure out why it was there is because there is a very large water tank up at the top, so assuming it broke, the water would have somewhere to go so it wouldn't flood the whole city. 

What's interesting, is all this that we discovered last night was only one more road north from where we usually talk our walks. Interesting what you can discover when you mix things up a bit. :) 

- SamiMae

Ern the Fern

Meet Ern. He's a fern, well not really, he's more of a cactus. Actually he's an Aloe Vera plant. He's my happy little plant who sits on my window ledge and keeps me company throughout the day as I'm doing homework. He cleans the air and watches the weather for me. I quite enjoy him. He watches the quad.

He got his name from Harry Potter three "Take it away Ern" from the Knight bus. hahaha.

Ern has a friend, Weinhard. They sit on the ledge together.

- SamiMae

Project+ Certified! 6 Credits down!

On Thursday I passed my CompTIA Project+ test and am now certified! YAY! That class was 6 credits and I did it in 4 weeks, but I was in Idaho for about a week and didn't study. HA! So now I can move all my classes forward 4 months! I'm enrolled in a Managerial Accounting class. I did my first real bit of studying today and LOVE IT! Since March I've done 15 credits! My goal is to do another 9 credits before Sept, which I think I can do. :)

- SamiMae

Passed Another Class!

Yesterday I passed my Marketing and Business Communications class with an 80% on the test! On to Project Management!

- SamiMae