Grillin' and chillin'

You know when you get a whiff of someone grilling up something amazing for dinner and you get a little jealous??  Watch out neighbors.  Here comes the whiff...tilapia and asparagas sizzlin with a little lemon pepper, dash of salt, drizzled with some olive oil and garlic...oh yeah.  Squeeze a little lemon on there and you've got yourself a meal.

Neither Tom nor I had ever grilled tilapia before so I looked it up online.  Pretty easy.  Spray your grill with non-stick spray.  THEN light it.  Very important.  Okay so now spice up your fish however you like.  Place on grill at 300 degrees.  5 minutes on each side.  Throw your asparagus on after the first 5 minutes.  Easy.  No heating of the oven.  BAM!  You've got yourself a healthy dinner :) 

These are the days I miss having a nice adult beverage.  Nothing crazy...maybe just a glass of wine.  Yeah that would be nice.  But unfortunately, I havn't been able to reintroduce anything in March.  I've had seven.  Yes SEVEN migraines so far this month.  However, I think I've found the culprit.  Let me explain.  At the beginning of the month Tom and went to Aldi's (great store) and found a great price on pstachios.  I love me some pstachios so we got a great big bag of them.  I was so proud of myself for getting a heart healthy snack I could actually eat!  So I've been rationing them out for the past two weeks taking 1/4 of a cup every day for my snack at work.  Well, the past two weeks have been awful for migraines and I also had weird stomach issues. 

Well, I finally decided that those little nuts were the only different thing I had been eating for the past 10 weeks, so I googled "migraines and peanuts" and yes, sure enough nuts are a HUGE trigger for migraineurs (that's what we are called-kinda cool to actually have a name.  Hello my name is Laura and I'm a migraineur. Haha.)  Okay back to business.  Apparently there are food allergies and then there are food intolerances.  Food allergies cause drastic physical issues such as extreme swelling or even death.  Food intolerances cause stomach aches and head pain, but not death.  It's just your body's way of telling you that it doesn't process foods well.  Migraineurs can actually be "intolerant" to certain foods, but there is no intolerance test...only allergen tests so you have to do an elimination diet as I have been doing this year.  As a result of this research I have concluded that I am intolerant to refined sugars and nuts.  So I'm cutting nuts out of my diet, which isn't a huge issue, but that means no more homemade sugar free peanut butter cups...super sad face :(  And I've been having almond milk with my cereal every day because I thought maybe dairy was the issue.  One step closer.  I also think a bulk of my issues come from hormone inbalances, which can be tested via a saliva test.  That's my next step! 

Here are the running totals:

January total migraines: 4
February total migraines: 4
March migraines to date: 7
That brings my total to 15.

But I am still very thankful because I could have had 30 by now.  The average number of migraines I had per month prior to the anti-inflammatory food plan was 8-10.

Pounds lost : 16

My pants have been falling down and I was rockin the low rise ghetto look at school so my awesome co-worker brought me a whole bag full of dress pants, khakis and capris the next size down that she doesn't need anymore cause she lost a bunch of weight in the past couple of years.  Go her!  She totally rocks my world. 

Now I'm off for another bike ride to soak up this incredible weather. :)