Parenting Even When You’re A Mess

Maybe I should be posting this on my old blog. Maybe I should try to combine the two.. I just don’t know.  If you’ve never read my old blog, it started as a way for me to cope with my diagnosis of thyroid cancer. It became just general life stories as my checks became more infrequent and my diagnosis approached the 5 year cancer free mark.  If you want some background, head over to the old blog and read through my 2009 posts. Are you caught up now? Good.

Fast forward to my appointment with a new endocrinologist and he asked the question “Has anyone ever told you that you are cancer free?”

No… they haven’t. I guess I assumed with undetectable TG levels I was clear even without the scans. Sure I’ve had neck ultrasounds with enlarged lymph nodes but no biopsies. It was more of a watch and wait approach. Again, my TG  levels were undetectable so this felt like a reasonable approach.  Sure I had nagging doubts about being told the RAI uptake in my lung was nothing or “took care of anything that could have been there.” I tried not to think about the possibility of recurrence even though recurrence rates are as high as 30%.  I’m fine… right??

Today I get a CT of my chest to follow up on that lung uptake from 5 years ago.  I’m terrified that it’s not fine.  While I’m there, they are also doing a neck ultrasound to follow up on those enlarged lymph nodes.  I’m upset to think that the watch and wait approach might not have been the best thing.  We have no reason to expect the worst at this point. Logically, I know that my TG levels are a pretty good indication that there isn’t anything going on, but I find cancer to be its own beast. Cancer makes its own rules.

Today I’m falling apart. My emotions range from anxiety to anger to admonishing myself for getting so emotional and not resting in the logic. I feel like I need to perform well on these tests but all I can do is lay there under the machines. I can’t just crack open a book and study to increase my chance of a good report. I won’t know my results until the 13th yet my future rests on what happens today….

Will I need more surgery?

Will I need more RAI?

Will I finally be declared cancer free?

I’m trying to stay strong, but sometimes it’s just so damn hard. I’m a weepy mess and my 19 month old daughter doesn’t understand. She looks at me quizzically and then laughs. I pull her close to tell her how much I love her and I take comfort in her cuddles. I need to be strong and be present for her because she needs her mommy. She needs mommy to play and laugh and comfort her through her day. So I’m pulling it together (even if it is just for short bursts of time). I’m taking deep breaths and putting on my mommy hat.

Lord knows the mommy hat is infinitely better than the cancer patient hat any day. 

A $300/month Grocery Budget?

I mentioned back in December that we were considering setting the grocery budget at a mere $300 for a month and that we were going to switch to cash while doing so.  And then we were hit with some dietary challenges that will make this budget a lot bit harder to stick to.  I will get to that in a minute but for now let’s look at the numbers…

Yes, we were OVER budget by $105.24. Let me break it down as to WHY I’m still convinced we can make $300/mo happen.  Let’s first remember that January was 5 pay weeks instead of the normal 4 so even sticking to a $75/week budget that would have been $375 allocated to groceries for the month.  Ok so maybe the $405.24 isn’t looking soooo bad now.

In January, we ran into some great stock up pricing on ground beef, chicken and pork.  We took advantage of this and currently our freezer has 12lbs of ground beef, maybe 6lbs of chicken and 18 pork chops and one pork roast.  This will save us money in the coming months when we use our stockpile rather than purchasing new at over $1.50 more per pound.

Also in January, I decided to jump on the freezer cooking bandwagon.  Sticking to our new dietary restrictions I purchased spices and ingredients for a Paleo plan that will provide us with 8 dinners and approximately 12-15 leftover lunches.  The spices and recipes were through Tastefully Simple and are amazingly easy!  I managed to put all the meals together with no pre-prep in about an hour!  Most of the meals can be prepared in the crockpot and since all the prep is done, all you need to do is remember to thaw – absolutely fabulous for working days! And most of the meals included 6 servings which is at least 2 meals for our small family.  The best part is they all fit in my tiny freezer! We have no deep freeze and I was able to fit them in our refrigerator freezer along with our stockpile of meat!  Contact me if you are interested in this plan and I can put you in touch with my Tastefully Simple consultant (who also happens to be my sister) for more details.

And as mentioned above, we are eating differently.  Due to some health considerations, we have gone to a lower carbohydrate diet. This means less processed foods (less opportunity for coupons!), more meat and produce.  Meat is expensive in general and produce can be.  Pasta, rice and beans are out… these are the backbones of every budget friendly meal plan I have ever found on Pinterest! I’ve gotten boxes of pasta for as little as $0.25 with sales and coupons and now they are sitting in my pantry useless.  But the dietary changes are working and eating this way will stay for a while.  I’m now challenged to find the best deals on whole foods like meat, fruits, veggies and dairy and am cutting out most processed food items (basically most anything with a brand name).  Thankfully, Grocery University – while being a coupon heavy guide to saving money – has provided me with valuable tips to saving money even on these non-branded items.

And possibly our saving grace to keeping positive about our $300/mo grocery budget is the opening of Aldi in our town!  They have had amazing prices on fruits, veggies and several other items we buy. Some items have been less than half the cost of our local grocery store.   It’s time for me to peruse some of those 25 Meals for $150 pins I’ve saved and see if they will work for our family!

So while technically we lost the $300 grocery challenge in January, I’m looking forward to the challenge in the upcoming months.

Do you have any special dietary restrictions that make meal planning challenging?  Have you found any tricks to stay within a small grocery budget while meeting the dietary needs of your family?