{happy valentine's!}

Happy Valentine's Day!

I spent the day in class and going to dinner with 2 girls :)

I also bought myself some chocolate covered strawberries, which I happily ate....by myself.

And for a laugh...this is my favorite Valentine's card this year:

{source}

{the verdict.}

After missing the first week of the semester for a capsule endoscopy, an upper endoscopy, & a colonoscopy:

I am a Celiac patient who's body is resistant to a gluten free diet.

I could think of a million things to say about how this makes me feel, but the one thing I've been feeling lately is anger.

I am so mad.

When I was diagnosed, I was told a gluten free diet was the only way to "cure" Celiac. Right now, I am struggling to accept the fact that the one thing that is supposed to make me better, is making me more sick. I am so angry about it.

I am angry that I have to deal with meal planning & weekly grocery budgets in college. Isn't this stuff supposed to come after college?

I am angry that I have to have bi-weekly weigh-ins to make sure I'm maintaing my weight.

I am angry that I have to base my travel plans around Celiac.

But mostly, I am angry that Celiac has made me an angry person. It is making me resent my new life, and I resent that it is. I thought I was over this. I thought I had come to a good place with this. I am sick of complaining about it. I feel awful complaining about it. I am sure my friends are sick of hearing about it.

I'm sure this blog is sick of hearing about it! ;)

Tomorrow I am going to go grocery shopping. Get started on some of my meals for the week. Bake cookies. Try to write some songs.

Tomorrow is a new day.

{my medical dramas & the c word.}

My body likes to keep things exciting. You know, since it gets bored with being so healthy.

::insert sigh here::

After being diagnosed with celiac, and going on a gluten-free diet, I immediately felt better. I had my energy back, and gained some of the weight I lost back, and I looked and felt healthier. I no longer felt pain everyday....until last summer.

Slowly, the pain started resurfacing. I ignored it in the beginning, thinking it was probably caused from eating at a gluten contaminated restaurant. However, the pain began getting stronger and coming more often. This past September, when I started my sophomore year, I decided to cook lunch and dinner and only eat in the dinning hall for breakfast. I had separate pots and pans, and shopped at Whole Foods.

In October, I had my celiac levels checked and they were high. Not good.

The pain continued and in November I had my levels checked again. They were the same. By December, my levels had risen yet again. On a strict gluten free diet, there is no reason for this. This means that somehow gluten is getting into my system. I also began losing weight and lost fifteen pounds in about eight days.

It was like two years ago all over again. In the beginning of January, my tests we so bad the next diagnosis they considered was lymphoma.

The word cancer hit me hard. The week of testing I went through was the worst week of my life. I had an upper endoscopy, a capsule endoscopy, an MRI, and a colonoscopy all within eight days. Needless to say, I've had better weeks. Thankfully THANKFULLY I do not have cancer. I'll explain the verdict in the next post.

{cupcakes!}

Chicago. Chi-town. Chi-cags.

One fabulous weekend in October, I went to the Windy City to visit my sister. The weather was fall meets winter. It was rainy & chilly, but then the sun would come out for 10 minutes. It was really weird. During one of the rain lapses, I took this picture on the ferris wheel... (as well as the one above).

While there, among completely redecorating her apartment, we went to a little place called...

They had a divine gluten-free red velvet cupcake. I don't have a photo, but it looked like this.

Fast forward to the cookie party my friend threw at Christmas. It was a cookie swap, but being the rebel I am...I made cupcakes. I think I should have gotten points for that. Add another 5 points for the fact that they were not gluten-free. I pretty much handed them out with a note that said, "You're welcome." I'm kidding. But really, these things looked good. I present, my chocolate chip cookie doughed-center chocolate cupcake:

Yum. Now I only need to make it gluten-free.

{i'm back...again.}

How has it been three months since I last posted??

My life has been nothing short of crazy. And not all the good kind.

Since my last post, there was Thanksgiving break. Then Christmas break.

And then I had a bunch of medical drama that I will get into another time. Let's just say, once I started fully accepting my new gluten-free life, it came back to bite me in the ass. Mixed with the start of second semester.....well, I've had better weeks.

I miss blogging. I miss having a place to get out my thoughts. I miss not having to cook all my meals.

I miss my twin sister. I'm having one of those days where I wish we went to the same college. I miss singing with her.

Compared to most of the world, I have an easy life. I know that. But lately, it seems like nothing's really going my way. I get frustrated with myself more easily and just want to snap out of this funk. Just one of those weeks.

::sigh::

Things will get better. Things will get better. Things will get better....