2019 - Barbara Byrge

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20 May

Hello My Name is Don’t No-No

As a kid there are a lot of ‘nos’ and a lot of ‘don’ts.’ There have to be, because there are a lot of rules of survival you have to learn. Don’t play in the middle of the street, don’t bathe with the toaster, don’t eat poison all come to mind as things our Moms told us ‘No!’ to at one point. Lots of Nos. Now lets add learning the rules of social decorum, more ‘don’ts’. Don’t chew with your mouth open. Don’t slam the door. Don’t hit your sister. Don’t pull the dog’s tail. My point is growin’ up requires a lot of ‘nos’ and ‘don’ts’ and that’s just the way it is. As a kid, everyday you are doing something wrong and getting reprimanded by a teacher, parent, mentor, sibling or family member.

I thought about some times in my adult life when I felt I could do no right, whether it was a bad relationship or a bad boss, times where I just didn’t know the rules and was constantly being ‘corrected’ in various manifestations. Its like you’re being pigeon holed into the ‘bad kid’ role when you are actually good, and frankly it sucks. No matter how gentle the no is delivered, it’s a crappy feeling to have your moves scrutinized and to be corrected constantly, even when you are legitimately trying hard. It’ll do a number on your head too. It kind of makes you want to quit trying, since everything you do is a ‘don’t’ or a ‘no.’ I think this kind of a cycle is where I was stuck with my kid before I had to yank the reigns and change up the game!

Today we enacted a chore chart for my 8 year old. We showed him how to get to ‘DO’ and ‘YES’ and before I was even out of bed, he’d made his own bed, let the chickens out, collected the eggs, and tried to bring up the trash cans, but the trash hadn’t been picked up yet. Just yesterday I felt like I was up to my rolling eyeballs in smells like teen spirit attitude, but this morning it is a whole new game. A morning full of ‘Thank yous’ and compliments and hugs and talk of rewards to come! I have clearly laid out expectations, and he jumped through every hoop I asked. Frustrated to proud literally over night. I praised him heartily! It was then I had the big epiphany: this kid really wants to be good, but I have to clearly lay the path to YES and GO KID GO. Because being told no all day by your parents, teachers, friends, family, and basically everyone would wear on anyone’s soul. I’m so glad I had this aha moment before we are home together all summer! I’ll think on more ways to tell him YES and GO KID GO, and I think the change in attitude will stick!

By Barbara Byrge Parenting
24 Apr

Becoming The Artist – More Editorial Photography

In some images, I feel my own journey to become an artist and to define myself in those terms. The baring of a soul that comes with creating art, and posting yourself right out there for the world to see. Still not quite ready to show the face. I don’t suppose anyone would like these images and that is why I created them. Just to have the space to make something I wanted to make without regard to getting ‘likes’ or paid or anything else. I like to use my artistic voice to show emotions thougths and ideas we don’t see everday. Things beyond the ‘happy people being happy’ that comprise the bulk of our newsfeeds. Don’t get me wrong, I love happiness and capturing it for others fills me with purpose and excitement and joy! But I’m a complex character with a full range of emotions, and there is a B side to life. Stress, worry, anxiety are players in this modern world and just about everyone I know is riddled with one if not all 3. I want to capture the way we really feel. I capture the happy sunny stuff in my professional role, this is my artists space to make things that are a little more moody. I was playing around with my shutter speed trying to capture not a crisp representation of what is actually there, but a blurry pattern of light and shadows that makes you feel something you can’t exactly put into words. So here is an image that speaks to the variety of emotions we all experience everyday, especially the darker feelings we don’t take selfies of.

‘Mixed Emotions’ by Barbara Byrge

These images are made in camera, only levels and tones were adjusted in post. No cutting pasting or cloning or stamping or warping was done to my these images.

By Barbara Byrge Musings My art The B Sides art editorial photography barbara byrge artist the barbarazzi, barbara byrge artist editorial art
15 Apr

Things You Didn’t Know About Me

Here are some things about me you might not know about me.

Positivity is my thing. I believe in the power of love and the brain’s ability to find what it seeks, so I believe if you actively look for opportunity, love luck and light and you will find it! I had some powerfully negative experiences lead me to this path, and I studied a book called ‘The Happiness Advantage’ to learn the deatilas on how positivity leads to succes!

I am the last of 5 siblings. My eldest brother is 11 years older than me.

I am the first in my family to attend and graduate from college. I graduated class of ’00 from UCSB with a BA in Psychology and Arnold Schwarzenegger signed my diploma (he was governator at the time).

My father worked in Liberia West Africa for more than 4 decades, I have a Liberian step mother named Martha.

I visited Liberia in 2005 and was one of the few American women in country. Children would run alongside my Dad’s truck to get a glimpse of me. There is a video shop in Neezoe named ‘Bobra Video Shop’ which they named after me, for some reason. I think I was supposed to send videos. I will be sending educational videos, perhaps a little late for the success of Bobra Video Shop.

I used to work in Media Services, and can connect and troubleshoot all kinds of TVs, VCRS, and well as computers and peripheral devices.

I was employed as a Barista during college at The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, and I make a mean latte. I prefer Americano’s myself, all the freshness of espresso at the strength level I’m accustomed to in brewed coffee. Cream no sugar, please.

I succeed at the task at hand, and often go above and beyond. While in school I maintained nearly all As even through college (chemistry and geometery were my achilles heels). When I lead the backpack donations project, I doubled the donations from previous years. When I volunteered for the Professional Women’s Association at UCSB, I eventually became president.

I worked at UCSB for 13 years in IT as a technical support guru. For the last 10 years I worked at the college of engineering supporting Macs and PCs in a Linux based server environment. I am very skilled at troubleshooting desktop hardware and software issues. I did not care much for writing code.

I worked as a Technical Account manager for a software company that manages creates a real estate accounting software product for both residential and commercial and real estate and leared a lot about accounting, leasing, and troublshooting their software! I worked on the eLearning team and wrote classes to help train others.

I tell jokes. I’d have to get to know you probably to tell you the best ones because they are racy. Nothing mean, but sometimes scandalous in nature. These jokes come from a lifetime of Dad jokes and puns that permanently clog up my brain.

I have done some fun volunteer projects over the years. I collected money to buy ‘sweet cases’ for foster kids who are displaced through a charity called ‘Together We Rise’ and donated these cases to a local foster care agency for kids to use. I went to the Transition House in Santa Barbara and brought materials for the kids to do a craft and boxes of costumes so they could pick out Halloween costumes. I have photographed events like Earth Day, and been present during people’s final family vacations and gifted them portraits through the Dream Foundation. I dontated my time to co-chairing conference committees, and thusly planned and executed a several hundred attendee conference on women’s issues.

I have taken photos of people since I was 16 years old. I used to carry a film camera in my purse everywhere I went in high school and it was Chris Gutierrez who first dubbed me ‘Barbarazzi’ for always taking photos. I am a born nostalgic, and sap and photos are all about emotion and memories for me. No matter what else I do in life I will always take photographs. I see the world in still images.

Yo hablo español! My espanol no es perfecto pero, yo se dos cientos palabras y yo quiero usarlo! ja ja!

By Barbara Byrge Happiness Musings
14 Feb

Valentines Day means Love for ALL!

I wrote this note on Valentines Day way back when in an essay style ala the popular school assignment ‘what blah blah blah means to me.’ Its funny to think about how different I was then, 15 or so years ago. I was single at the time, and I wrote this after researching the holiday online and trying to debunk the legitimacy of it all together. So I can’t be accused of being to smug and in love as I am now when writing this. My writing style has evolved a bit since then, but I fought my temptations to rewrite it and just let it fly in all its sophmoric glory. Its the sentiment that counts, I think that’s still spot on. In fact last night at dinner I told Arion this story of St. Valentine, the guy who cared about love in other people’s lives. The story really does resonate with me, and every Valentine’s Day since I try to promote love in everyone’s lives in tiny chocolate ways! And so many of us do don’t we? We get cards and gifts for our Mom’s, our sisters, our friends, grand children, children and their teachers. Its just another day to show love with sweet treats and to that I say a delicious emphatic yes. In my case that will mean spending 2 days making homemade treats to avoid allergens, but I enjoy cooking and sharing love via chocolate so…. (while I’m a bit on the bah humbug side of the Christmas-o-meter), to Valentines Day I say BRING THE LOVE! And by love I mean chocolate ;0)

What Valentine’s Day Means to Me

by Barbara Byrge

For many of us Valentines Day represents a day of expected pleasantries, red and pink flowers, chocolates, and tiny candy hearts that say ‘be mine’. Some call it the worst of the ‘Hallmark holidays’ sensationalized by corporate America in a frenzy to sell greeting cards, teddy bears, lingerie and for the lucky, maybe a Mercedes or a trip to Spain. We take great pride in knowing the historical basis and traditions of our holidays like Christmas, Chanukah, Easter, Independence day, and so many others, yet the story of Valentines day goes untold year after year. The reason for this is simple; the legend is about rebellion, unsanctioned love, and martyrdom. The story of the beheading of St. Valentine is not one you teach to 2^nd grade kids. My teachers always left that out, but I somehow knew that making that construction paper mail box was really, really important and if I didn’t I’d be left out of something really special. I realize now I was left out of something special, the true story behind the day.

Most believe that the holiday as we know it is a celebration of the life of service of St. Valentine. There are 3 St. Valentines commonly revered throughout history, but the one that’s most interesting lived in 270 AD in Rome. He lived under the reign of evil King Cladius II who involved his country in many bloody campaigns. Soon, he did not find many willing men to sign up for his army, so he outlawed marriage in hopes that single men would be more likely to enlist. Legend has it that St. Valentine believed in love so deeply that he continued to marry couples in secret. He was eventually caught and ordered to be executed. He spent a good spell in jail, during which time lovers whom he’d married would leave flowers, poems, and gifts outside his prison window to thank him, and to testify to their belief in love. The guard was so enchanted with St. Valentine’s love of love, he even let his own daughter keep company with him in his cell during his last days. He left her a note on the morning of his execution marked ‘love your valentine’ which is a metaphor often used, but little understood.

Even before St. Valentine was beheaded, the Romans celebrated the feast of Juno on February 14^th each year. She was known as the queen of the gods and goddesses and also the goddess of women, marriage. Pagans observed that birds picked their mates around mid-February, and started their courting rituals around the same time. When people say ‘love is in the air’ they are talking about the magic of spring. This phenomenon of animal lust, pair bonding and general altruisim are best defined by what the rabbit ‘thumper’ in Bambi. When Bambi asks what’s wrong with the birds cooing and circling each other, thumper happily explains ‘they are twitter-pated.’ He couldn’t explain it in words, but the magic of spring infects even the most unsuspecting beasts! Perhaps that was Claudius’ reason for choosing such an important day to have St. Valentine killed. Perhaps he intended to send a message to the world that love was not going to be tolerated. Claudius’ murder of St. Valentine did send a message about love to the world. A message that has carried on for thousands of years: Love will live forever in our bleeding hearts, and always serve to remind us that money, power and status are not the most important things in life. Some people are willing to sacrifice their life for love. Not just for love in their own lives, but to see the cause of love promoted to the highest degree possible. That’s what Valentines Day means to me!

Reference:

Here is a link from History.com that tells this story.

By Barbara Byrge Happiness Musings Uncategorized
07 Feb

Straddling Two Worlds

I often find myself on the dividing lines between worlds. When I was in Jr high I came to California from Arizona, and the fashion demands on teens in my new home were like entering into a new culture. I had lived on Cottonwood Arizona with my Mom, and every kid in my class dressed in clothes from Wal-Mart down the street. It was a new Walmart, by far the biggest store in town, very exciting stuff in Cottonwood circa 1992. I don’t even think there were any other children’s clothing stores, and it was pre internet. There was one kid who’s parents ordered her clothes from the Guess catalog. She was pretty fancy, and we all knew it, but she rubbed elbows with all the regular Wal-Mart kids, lest she be completely alone in her Guess jeans. It just wasn’t much of an issue.

One quick airplane ride to southern California, and a brand new junior high and I was thrust into 6^th grade hell. I was frequently harassed because my clothing had the wrong label on it: Lee instead of Levis. I had no idea I had done anything wrong, but the ‘pack of she wolves’ let me know. It tanked my self-esteem, and I found myself friendless at times.

So there I was, in my new home in California where I had moved in with my Dad, who I sort of met at age ten. I mean, I can’t remember the before age 5 years and he was in Liberia West Africa after that. He had spent the last decade or so trying to mine diamonds and in the process witnessing, and at times trying to ameliorate immeasurable amounts of human suffering. Children without food who wore the same Mickey Mouse shirt everyday (proudly) were a routine vision, and here I was asking him to care about Levis instead of Lee. My Dad chided me at my demands for $100 Levis (which in the 90s was ostentatious) he scolded me loudly insisting there were children in Liberia who got Polio because their parents couldn’t afford a $.25 vaccine, he told me how many families that would feed for a month there. Even as a selfish tween I couldn’t deny his words were correct. I have always at my core been a bleeding heart, and compassionate about people suffering. He was right, this branding seemed kind of stupid. I mean both were good durable pants. Did I really want to be friends with people who would judge me based on wealth? At age 12 you do. Thank God you outgrow that shit.

When I went to college I definitely felt I was straddling 2 worlds. I was a first generation college student, and had no idea what I was in for when I showed up at the dorms. My Mom was homeless, and my dorm room was my ‘home’ and I had all my things with me. There was no bedroom back somewhere for me to go chill and escape the drama of dorm life. Still I hit up my sister’s couch quite often. She was a single mom of 2 kids, living with Crohn’s disease (I hadn’t been diagnosed yet) and I was her person for a long time. I tended to her during hospital stays while I stayed at her place and cared for the kids through her surgeries, spent holidays there, then when she was better went back to college studying for midterms and keg parties. When I was at my sister’s apartment complex I was the stuck up college girl. When I was in college I was the poor kid from a broken home. In the 2 hours it takes to drive to my hometown from college, I became a whole other person, and vice versa. Each time.

Fast forward to 2019, I’m in the beauty industry as a pinup and glamour and wedding photographer. I suppose it was nearly dying a year and a half ago that got me thinking about what I really want my life’s legacy to be about. ART came to mind. Of course art. I have so many stories to tell both in writing and visually, these things are bursting out of me and I crave release. I think art, specifically photography, will always be part of my life. And that brings me to my love of pinup. I mean, the eye candy right?! The coifed hair, the makeup, the tattoos, the classic styling, I adore that look I truly do! I feel like a lucky photographer to be in pinup, I mean these girls spend all this time and money to get so damn gorgeous and then I get to photograph them? Someone pinch me please, this must be a dream! I have so many ideas for photo stories I want to tell, ways to take this thing to the next level, and always with people so why not go pinup for styling! Va va voom, right!? RIGHT!

Then I got what I will call a right hook to the face from the universe and it made me stop and think. I had to sit across the table from someone and listen to them tell me I’m not worth it, bash me to other clients, and go so far as to forbid ‘her pageant girls’ from booking with me. Her final email line was ‘good luck in your photography career’ and I watched opportunities dry up, whispers abound. People sent me screen caps and told me things. Whisk me right back to junior high why don’t you.

I did a little digging and found this behavior is RAMPANT in the pinup world, and there is a very well known beef between two of the biggest clothing designers in pinup, each who accuse the other of bullying. I think we are going to have a real life rockabilly rumble y’all! For those who read this who are not involved in the pinup world, here’s your cue to laugh. Anyone who is in the world knows exactly who I am talking about and will speak to the topic. HA!

Now this particular person who incited mobbing to the detriment of my business has WON the mother of all pinup popularity contests. She certainly wasn’t nice to me, but hey unlike high school, I can leave this microcosm in a heartbeat. I’ve made some amazing and genuine friends in that realm, and I will always style women in this beautiful way. And you can’t keep me from my rockabilly music and car shows. But the idea of a pinup girl beauty pageant, when you look at the big picture, has just really got me scratching me head right now….

So I get off Facebook groups arguing about which pinup designer bullied the other, then I check my email and get a message from Mr. Harmon, the pastor of my step Mother’s Church in Liberia. He is letting me know they have had to discontinue feeding the children weekly, and can only afford to do so once a month now. I know he is asking for money, without asking, like I have sent before. He just got back from the interior of Liberia, the place he goes to convince the tribes to accept Jesus and to end the practice of murdering young men to eat their hearts. Heart men they call them. They will find bodies with their organs harvested on a semi regular basis and they say ‘heart man come-o!’ I become sick, deny that its true, and shut my email.

I snap back to reality and have to decide whether to get my roots done, or send some money to Liberia so the kids can eat and the cannibals can learn about fellowship and how to not eat your fellow man. Straddling 2 worlds is an understatement. The fact that there is more pain and suffering in this world than I can heal with my personal resources is frustrating. So it’s easy to just turn the page, and go do some retail therapy, maybe grab that new eye shadow palate from Sephora.

I watched my step Mother walk this line for many years. She did like to spend money on herself, but she gave more away. For every nice purse she owned, I knew she’d donated as much to her church. She found a way to split it so she could have nice things and give lots too and I admire her for finding her balance in that way. She married the white man (my Dad) and got all the relative wealth (rich white man can’t afford Levis?), but its hard to enjoy that fortune while everyone around you is starving. Well, its hard if you’re Martha and from a communal culture like Liberia anyway. I don’t think its hard for the average American. I can turn it off if I choose to, go back to laundry and dishes and forget about the heart man. I have that luxury and that hot running water. The incongruity and cognitive dissonance is impossible, but we can try. Like my Liberian Ma Martha I strive to find my balance living in this first world with all its microcosms of excess, peering into other worlds where people are just trying to survive. For me that balance is opening a charitable corporation: Hearts of a Feather! Hearts of a Feather Help Together! We can’t solve the worlds problems, but together we can help!’

My concept is simple: Take excess wealth and distribute it to the poor! Like Robin Hood, only legal and fair. My goal is to open a thrift store and accept donations of things people no longer want, and turn them into resources for those in need. This concept is not new, there are several corporations operating under this MO in town, and I believe there is enough excess that we have room for another! In addition to selling the goods locally, we will ship things to our friends in Liberia. Again, sending container loads of clothing and goods to a 3^rd world country and paying for the freight with capital generated from sales of other goods is absolutely not a new model , but its sexy and I want to start there. I have huge dreams for this corporation, but that is the starting point.

I think that is a good way for me to straddle 2 worlds. I see the consumption and excess in so many worlds, not just pinup. Whether its ‘fast fashion’, Cosplay, fancy food sculptures, a handbag that costs a week’s wages, or what not, the ways the first world uses its resources while our planet is dying and people are starving kinda sucks. I want to keep my creature comforts running water, eating out, electric toothbrush luxurious life, but I also want to do something to help. When I do make it back to deaths’ door, I want to know my life meant something. Somehow just consuming things and making pretty art doesn’t seem like enough anymore. I know that it will be hard, but that’s no excuse for not trying. My advice to anyone feeling conflicted about wanting to consume stuff but not impact the planet is two fold: buy used, and buy half! Instead of buying 2 lipsticks buy 1 and donate $20 to the charity you like best, or go buy someone who is hungry a meal. I promise you can get by on one new toy, and the joy you get from helping others will be greater than you having those shoes in every color!

Wish me luck y’all! And from now on a portion of every pinup photoshoot will be donated for meals for the children of Liberia West Africa! So hey, book me and I’ll get to art and to give, my 2 current fav things, straddling all my worlds.

By Barbara Byrge Happiness The B Sides Uncategorized
04 Feb

You Know What I Want!

This Dad Joke comes in an email with a little more context. Am I wrong to think these jokes are funnier because a Dad is sending them to his daughters? Oh well, at least I’m not 16 like when he first told me this joke…

Sometimes humor helps. Do you girls remember the joke about the man who picked up a nice looking girl in a classy bar. After a long evening of wining, dining and dancing the night away they ended up in a high class hotel room. The man disrobed quickly, being in an aroused state. The girl was kind of stalling. He asked what was wrong. She replied, well, I am shy because I had a mastectomy. He was a bit taken aback but rallied and encouraged her. She resumed disrobing for a couple of minutes, then stopped again. He said “what now”. She replied despondently.. I also have a prosthetic arm. The guy was really annoyed, but decided to follow through. So she unscrewed the arm and laid it by the bed. The guy reached for her again, and once again she stopped him.” well, I have to tell you one of my legs comes off”. The guy lost it completely and screamed at the girl ” WELL. GODDAMMIT, YOU KNOW WHAT I WANT, JUST UNSCREW THE SON-OF-A-BITCH AND TOSS IT OVER HERE!”
Laughter is the best medicine.
Lovedaddy

By Barbara Byrge Uncategorized
04 Feb

Everything’s Great But….

Here is a joke Dad sent, just as he typed it out!

JOKE:
The police found an old man wandering in the park, crying. They asked him what was wrong. He said “I have a beautiful young wife who does everything for me. She cooks fabulous food, cleans the house,and gives me great sex any time I want it. I live with her in a beautiful mansion and we have millions in the bank.”. The cops said, “for Gods sake why are you crying?” The old man replied” I can’t remember where I live”.

By Barbara Byrge Dad Joke Jokes
04 Feb

Fly Dirty Birds

You judged without knowing

(She got to you I know)

The prescient whispers

Made you fly up and go

You spoke aloud your truth

But fear crept in the night

You lashed and called her your monster

And absconded in utter fright

She is not your monster

She has no victim chemistry

But burgeoning and growing

The artist she will be

She thrives without bitch light

Wet or dry or day or night

Phoenix from the ashes

Gray with colored under flashes

Too dirty for your use

You seek the adoration

She seeks muse

Fill your eyes with crunchy plague

Eat up sickly sorrow like slime

Take away the viruses leg

Give back a piñata burst of time

All albatrosses will beg

Unto myself I will awake

Alas no time for them to take

A flight of feathers plastic and fake

Leaving only lightness in their wake

By Barbara Byrge Uncategorized
22 Jan

LEAP Day 1: Leap out of Bed!

LEAP PROTOCOL DAY 1

Well, I LEAPT out of bed today! That’s a real thing I do, when I’m excited about the day ahead. It most often happens photography related, when I’m shooting a cool creative, pinup girl or a cool wedding! Today its diet related. And the LEAP is more the protocol name than the physical motion out of bed this morning. In fact I didn’t even wake up in bed this morning. I woke up on the couch. Because I sweat through my sheets last night after stuffing my face with nasty fast food burger, fries and a coke. Sometimes I get night sweats as a symptom of my Crohns.

So the terrible night’s sleep reminded me of why I’m doing the LEAP protocol in the first place. I want to be well. Not just feel better, but BE better, so my innards aren’t eating themselves leading me to more hospitalizations and surgeries.

I’m working with a dietician to eliminate almost every food then re-add them one by one! Day 1 I had 2 egg whites and some cauliflower for breakfast. No butter. Then I had a sweet potato with some prosciutto and more cauliflower. And water. So. Much. Water. So far, so good. I’ve eaten a lot of good satiating foods, but no refined carbs like I’m used to.

So far not hungry, just a little head achy! Wish me luck!

By Barbara Byrge Uncategorized
22 Jan

Leap Day 7: Progress not Perfection

First off, its working. Second of all, I failed.

During phase 1 of the LEAP protocol you are supposed to eat only 20 or so low reactive things, including spices. My list included things like baked sweet potato, lentil soup, pork chops, and meatballs. Many of my recipes call for stock, and any stock from the store would have been made from carrots, which are on my red ‘do not eat ever’ list. I had a lentil meatball soup one night and I had to make the stock then make the lentils then make the meatballs. It didn’t happen all in one day I can tell you that much, but it was a tasty outcome. The dark side I have been spending the majority of my time for the past week just trying to eat allowed food. The modern American lifestyle just isn’t made for eating to this level of intricacy. We are the ‘grab and go’ culture when it comes to food, and I was no exception.

The first few days were getting to know foods that I hadn’t eaten in awhile, and that has a learning curve. I steamed cauliflower, and roasted broccoli and made pork chops and soups. I fortunately had the time to spend in the kitchen because if I hadn’t it just wouldn’t have worked. Clean eating is messy! It sure takes most of your day at first with the shopping, cooking, eating and cleaning up the mess from the cooking! You have to meal plan and be organized and eat your leftovers when you don’t feel like it and its frankly not all that fun. As a long term plan it just wasn’t tenable. There I said it. Which brings us to the cheats.

I admit it, I ate a handful of chocolate chips (at least they were ‘clean’ I told myself). I’m sure that wrecked the whole dealio, but you know what, after about 4 days of very little sugar (1-2 servings of fruit) I was so tired and moody and wanted to kill someone! I stormed the kitchen a grabbed a handful of my soy free dairy free chocolate chips and boy did it improve my mood! Oddly my stomach didn’t churn like it didn’t with the grapes I’d had the day before, so I took that as a promising sign for good things to come. I got back on the bandwagon, until I literally got onto a band wagon.

We went to a live show, and I had to have some booze! I was proud of myself because I didn’t indulge in all the free hot dogs and cupcakes and cakes and snacks that were everywhere at this party, but I really wanted some tequilla. I had a double neat, and yes I did pay for that. Ouch.

But overall things are working out ok. One goal was to poo once per day, and we are almost there. This elimination diet has helped me get more in tune with my body and the MRT blood test identifying foods I can tolerate is huge. Now I know which foods I should focus on eating. I tried eating them, many with success, others not so much. It surprised me to find that some foods listed as low reactive, like the walnuts are a no go for now, and maybe strawberries too. Since I have Crohn’s its not quite as cut and dried as it could be for others changing their diet with an MRT blood test and dietician’s help.

I’m on phase 1 day 7/10 and I have my meeting with my dietician tomorrow. I’m really glad that eating only a few simple foods is helping me learn in depth about my sensitivities. That part seems to be working out. I’m eating fiber I was afraid to eat, and the results are somewhat promising. I am however anxious to add back a food a day (which is what the LEAP protocol manual told me) so I might just go ahead and start that process a few days early (since so many of my ‘safe’ foods werent’) and because I want my diary back! I think adding some parmesan and butter to all these veggies would feel like a very decadent treat compared to what I’ve been eating! I guess that’s part of it too – to hit the rest button on yummy and redefine how sinful food has to be to still be delicious!

Hopefully I can convince Christine its the right time to start phase 2, and I can get some parmesan soon! Oh man, I’m already drooling at the recipes I can make.

By Barbara Byrge Uncategorized

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