I am an emotional lady, I eat when I am:

• HAPPY
• STRESSED
• OVERWHELMED
• BORED

I am not one of those people who gets “full.” Sound like you?

I can get on the band wagon of HEALTHY LIVING for a while, when I have an event coming up and that keeps me going for a little, but then usually something kicks me in the pants and I fall, slipping back into the habits of grabbing a bag of chips, reaching for seven snacks before dinner, then dessert every night. Can you tell this is a habit?

I don’t know why we do this to ourselves, I know I am not the only one, but when you get so far down the hole, it can feel impossible to get out.

Let’s fast forward, I knew I was sick and tired of…”okay just buy another pant size bigger, it’s not a big deal.” but it was not a BIG enough narrative for me to actually stop being mindless of what I was doing with myself.

That was until May 2021, our kiddo went down.

It was the perfect storm.

We all had the stomach flu that week so we didn’t think it was a big deal, until it was a big deal. I have to say, I have never seen someone look the way our kiddo did. We did our best to keep our kiddo hydrated, trying to feed rice, potatoes, bread, crackers, pedalyte, etc. but on this particular morning, our kiddo had eyes sunken in, weak, cold but hot, etc. something FLIPPED and it FLIPPED QUICK!

I took our kiddo’s temp, and it was LOW,

“what the heck, it must be broken.” I went to the store and bought a new one…

*READS THE SAME*

We raced to the ER.

The ER nurses ask if our kiddo has any medical conditions, they ask for photos of what our kiddo looked like before, so I scroll through my photos and provide a photo to prove they this kiddo is ALREADY a TWIG, the kid can eat anything and not change. Legit lives on candy, pop tarts, etc. But, we were still having a conversation that this kid might be STARVING TO DEATH and I am sitting int the ER thinking they think it because of me, should we have arrived sooner, what’s going to happen? I thought honest, we would go to the ER, they would pump our kiddo with electrolytes and we would be home that night.

I was wrong.

I told you, it was the perfect storm. Who goes to the hospital for a stomach flu? The flu traveled through our family and each of us had it for 5 days, pure toilet action, so to think that this particular family member had something different, seemed unlikely.

We did not go home that night. Our family lived in the hospital for three weeks.

There was so much guilt, so much regret, so much so much, Ben and I felt so alone, so helpless, so many emotions of WHAT THE ACTUAL F*CK this can’t be happening, they think we are horrible parents, Is our kiddo going to make it?! We should have gone sooner.

After a helicopter ride, CT scans, MRI scans, and then sedation, our kiddo didn’t wake up for days, three surgeries, etc. It felt unbearable.

I stayed at the house while Ben stayed in the hospital, we have a business to run with employees, farm animals and another kiddo at home, we had to divide and conquer.

Let’s remember that this story does end positive, our kiddo is healthy, now.

I spiraled and no joke probably ate two or three drumsticks a night, then cereal, then a pizza all while burning my eyes into the screen of a phone waiting for the next update from the hospital.

Our kid was in septic shock, hence the reason for being freezing cold, but also an internal temp of hot. The helicopter flight to one of the country’s best children’s hospital and it just happened to be in our state only two hours from us. Rushed into emergency surgery and staying in PICCU .That’s a blessing they had a spot for us.

Our kiddo had a ruptured appendix, and Dr. Malcolm, told us it was one of the worst cases he has seen. The next thing he said was, whether the doctors told us this to make us feel better or if it was true, appendix’s rupture in 1 of 20 people. In children’s cases, it is very hard to tell because communicating pain location, type of pain, etc is difficult. It was probably the night it had ruptured and then in the day had taken a HUGE turn for the worse because all the fecal was defecting into this bowels and that’s when we took our kiddo in. It happened so fast.

This was something we didn’t share about to many people around us because we felt horrible, we didn’t want to be judged, we are lucky our kiddo is alive.

Remember, this was a perfect storm, our entire family was just throwing up in the same manor that our kid was. Am I still living with the regret and guilt, YUP, so maybe I am repeating that sentence to make myself feel better, or willing you to believe.

Skip forward the medical heartache, and see that this was a blessing for our family. That sounds HORRIBLE, let me rephrase.

LIFE IS PRECIOUS and hot dangggg it is FRAGILE.

It was a kick in the pants of needing a REBALANCE.

Our family was out of wack, I was out of balance, I was not centered in the meaning of what I needed to be doing, and that was PRIORITIZING.

As our kiddo was getting better, it was a long recovery, multiple surgeries, and weeks in the hospital, I spent our savings on a few pieces of gym equipment, through Amazon. I will share with you what we have.

Ben and I met at the gym, going to the gym is not foreign to us, but when I opened Simply Stained Shop, I let that become my priority. When we decided to move to start Simply Country Ranch, I let that become my priority. When shut downs started happening, I didn’t see a way of getting to a gym location.

So we took a corner of our garage and laid a mat down, dumbbells, a squat rack, and a bench press station.

First thing I realized is, MIND is your first priority. I didn’t have my mind right, I was allowing my thoughts to get in the way, I thought I needed to have two cups of rice instead of a single serving, I thought I needed to nibble on fries while we made dinner, + have a regular helping of fries at dinner too.

I was not in control of what I put in my body.

Even before setting foot in the gym, I made a plan to watch what I eat, I downloaded 1st Phorm app, they help you set your goal, hone in on the amount of protein, carb, fat, ratio, etc.

GAME CHANGER for my mind. I know “counting calories” has a bad name. but for me, it allowed me to be aware of the AMOUNT of calories I ate in a day, it allowed me to see, hot dang Lauren, you’re only eating 30 grams of protein when a goal could be 130.

It didn’t happen overnight. I am still working on learning what to eat and how it makes me feel. But my mind is getting better at learning choices, priorities, and balance.

It’s sooo much easier to type this all out then it is to act it. I get that. so start small, just START.

Water was the next thing, I bought a gallon of water jug, YUP, a gallon, I fill it up each morning and I chug. Yes, you will go to the bathroom, you will go to the bathroom ALOT, at first, but then it gets easier, I promise and you won’t go as frequent.

Then came the gym… I stepped foot in the gym and I could not believe that I used to go to the gym on a regular basis and lift weights.. I entered for the first time and tried to do a lunge and sweated. I could not hang on a bar without dropping when I used to do pull ups.

HOW COULD THINGS CHANGE SO FAST.

I was frustrated, I was disappointed, I was angry with myself for slipping backwards SO FAST AND SO HARD.

What was I doing? This was not getting ready for a wedding, a concert, a hawaii trip this time, this was showing up to live the life I know I am capable of, having health on my side so I can fight sicknesses, health is my intention, feeling GOOD is my priority.

Needless to say, the first two weeks of the gym are BRUTAL. I couldn’t walk because my muscles were not being used like that before.

Show up anyways, laugh it off that your legs are shaky, DM me and tell me that your legs are sore so I can tell you to keep going.

When writing this blog, in October 2021, I am down 39 lbs.