Off the Paleo Diet for One Week - Eek!

My CFS doctor recently sent me a lab slip to get some blood work done. I'm also supposed to get some blood work for the endocrinologist done sometime over the summer. Now seemed as good a time as any so I scheduled an appointment for this Saturday at the local lab. Today, I took the time to actually look at the doctor's lab slip and on there is a request for the Celiac disease test. Basically, it looks to see if there are any antibodies to gluten in my blood. One small problem - I haven't had any gluten except for the very rare oops since January. So, the chance of there being any antibodies in my blood, even if I do have Celiac,is pretty slim. So, what's a girl to do? Eat gluten!!! Yep, I'm going on a binge for the next four days, eating Chinese food, vegan baked goodies from Whole Foods Market and whatever else I can find! Yippee!

Of course, once I have the blood test on Saturday the gluttony must come to an end. I've lost 24 pounds since January and can fit into a size 6 dress again. I feel really good about the way I look and I do have a tad more energy during the day - not bunches of energy but a tad more. Another thing, if I feel really terrible even after just a day of this, I'm going to stop eating gluten immediately. There's no point in putting myself through hell to prove something I already know.

In other news, the honeymoon period with Daisy came to an abrupt end last week but we're starting to reach a truce of kinds and I think things are going to work out with her. Turns out that the first week we had her, she had kennel cough and a fever. So, her calm demeanor and constant sleeping was due to illness not personality. Last week, when she started feeling better after a course of antibiotics, she decided to start testing me to see who was dominant. She mounted the kids and humped them, snarled and snapped at me when I tried to take a stick away from her and refused to listen to my commands. I made my husband take her to the vet since her behavior change was so dramatic but they assured me it wasn't due to any health problems. Our whole way of doing things had to change. I'm in charge of feeding her at all times so that she sees me as vital to her life. In addition, nothing comes for free to her anymore. She has to sit on command before she gets food, let out in the yard, given a toy or even to be petted. Amazingly, this seems to have worked the proper change in her. I still don't trust her to be alone with the kids, I have to supervise constantly, but she seems to have figured out that she's at the bottom of our pecking order in this pack. Everyone is dominant to her and she seems fine with that. I can only imagine that as time goes by and we continue to work on her training she will bloom into an exceptionally wonderful dog.

I got lucky... at the shelter!

This is Daisy a lovely dog we adopted from the shelter on Friday, June 4. We were told that she's two and a half years old and that she was a Labrador Retriever possibly mixed with beagle. I took her to the vet this morning for her checkup and shots and the vet told me that this dog was 100% Labrador Retriever, not a mix. Imagine my surprise! I did not expect to find a purebred dog at the shelter. Of course, even if she was a Heinz 57 dog I would still be so happy with our find. Now, part of this personality she has may be due to being spayed just on Thursday. It's possible that some of the drugs they used are still circulating through her system. However, I really remember her being this way at the shelter when we first met her so I'm really hoping that this is just her sweet nature.

Daisy is in need of some obedience training but she is so eager to learn. She really wants to please us and does her best to understand what "sit" and "down" mean. She is crate-trained, house-trained and just wants as much love from people as she can get. Somehow though, she knows that Doug is the type of person who loves to get smothered in doggie kisses yet I don't. Although she has mouthed Doug (with a very soft touch) she hasn't even tried that on me. She doesn't seem to bark as we haven't heard her make one yet. She is very sedate and gentle around the children and tolerates all their crazy, giddy behavior. I never expected that I would find this type of personality in such a young dog and one who was in a shelter. I can honestly say that I love this dog and, although I'll always be a crazy cat lady, I'm completely nuts over this girl.

Right now we're just working on getting her to feel more comfortable with all the changes that have occurred in her life this week. She was surrendered to the shelter last Saturday (the same day we went there!), had major surgery on Thursday, was brought to a new home with new people on Friday and, then, she was hit with a ton of vaccinations on Saturday. I'm hoping that as she gets more comfortable with us, and recovers more from her surgery, the need to pee every two hours or so will get scaled back to a more normal frequency. The vet tested for diabetes and she was normal so the vet thinks she will be fine in just a few days. In the meantime, it's like having a new baby in the house - Doug and I aren't getting much sleep! However, it truly does seem worth it already. Just having a sweet dog to take for walks and to have fall asleep next to me while I stroke her head and ears is so wonderful.