With respect to hours, that may be another consideration for looking into Allied Health (OT/PT/SLP). While therapists in some settings do work occasional weekends (hospitals for example) or evenings (outpatient private practice for example), there isn't usually as much alternative shift work overall. Obviously the hours aren't a big deal to some people but it is possibly something to consider.

In the past we have celebrated at the park. I take their pictures with them holding up a sign that reads "Not Back To School" and the year on it. One year we ordered pizza and ate it at the park. Last year we picked up donuts (my DS1's favorite and something that only happens about 2-3x a year) and hung out at the park. This fall we'll be on vacation :D for our Not Back to School festivities :) Our "NBtS" day is always the first day that public school opens in our area. We school year round with breaks as needed, so it doesn't really impact our schedule to have the day off. It isn't really *our* first day. We celebrate on the day everyone else heads back.

I don't know if she is set on nursing, but other health fields she might be interested in are physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy. When I was in high school I spent time volunteering at an outpatient private practice physical therapy clinic. In order to apply to programs at that time you had to have a certain # of volunteer hours. She may be interested in observing a therapist if she isn't 100% certain she wants to do nursing specifically. Allied health is still a field that is in demand, and there is a lot of flexibility in settings. PTs, OTs, and SLPs have a good bit of autonomy in many states. All 3 fields require a master's degree to sit for licensure. There are also programs for therapist assistants, like PTAs (physical therapist assistants) and COTAs (certified occupational therapist assistants). It isn't very easy to transition from a PTA to a PT or from a COTA to an OT, however. Therapists practice in outpatient clinics, hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, home health, rehab hospitals, etc. I worked in pediatrics, which was a lot of fun. PT/OT/SLP programs require multiple internships. When I was a student, I rotated through four internships. One was 5 weeks, one was 6 weeks, and two were 8 weeks long (I graduated w/ my master's in 2001). It is usually required or strongly encouraged that the student rotate through different types of settings...inpatient (hospital for example), outpatient (like an outpatient orthopedic clinic), and then in the last 2 internships sometimes something more specialized (spinal cord rehab, pediatrics, etc.) was an option. I was eventually hired by one of the places I interned at (a pediatric clinic doing a mix of outpatient and early intervention. EI is run a bit like home health and I saw children 0-3 years old in their homes). I had several students shadow me when I was still working and I always enjoyed the experience.

I'd do a trifle.

We joke about cooking like your grandmother with respect to waste. Like the poster above said, we make our own chicken stock, etc. It stretches the $$ you've already paid for it. One other thing I thought of (not sure if it was mentioned upthread) is PYO farms. Every summer we do PYO blueberries and get a really good price per pound. We flash freeze the berries and try to have enough to last us through the fall, winter, and spring. The place we buy from was certified organic at one point but couldn't keep up the cost of the certification. THey do not spray.

3 of my biggest helps: Watch what you throw out. When we switched to organics I made sure to be way, way better at minimizing waste. I rarely need to toss stuff out. I use and freeze scraps of things like onions, the tops and bottoms of celery, etc. to make stock. I freeze leftovers and don't toss them out. We eat low carb, and can save money by buying our meat in bulk. It brings it down to 3.50 a pound or so for grassfed. We don't really buy convenience foods, except for a few quick to heat up items that we only use when the alternative would be going out to dinner (at 5x the price). eta: totally agree on the dirty dozen. I'd rather prioritize my money and use it for grassfed meat/dairy (hormone/antibiotic free). We mostly buy the dirty dozen organic, and the rest conventional (depending on price). If the budget is tight I use hormone free dairy vs. organic or grassfed. Some non-organic brands like Tillamook (we buy Tillamook cheddar at costco for about 3.50/lb sliced) have a pretty solid reputation.

:iagree:

I'm not totally sure but I think WM only price matches an advertised price. As in, an actual price in dollars and cents. I don't think they'll pricematch a B1G1 type deal. Hopefully someone else will chime in, but I am pretty sure that's the case.

Was the doctor's test quantitative or qualitative for HCG? If it was qualitative you may have just not had your hcg climb high enough for the lab to call it positive. I'd retest with first morning urine if you can tomorrow. Here's my weird story. I have PCOS and long cycles. We went through IF txs to have my oldest son. I got a surprise faint positive w/ my pregnancy with my DD. Tested the next morning with the same brand (First Response Early Response) and it was negative. Took a different brand's test, and it was also negative. I assumed it was a chemical pg and figured I'd start bleeding within a few days. That didn't happen, so I retested and had a very positive result. I then took a quantitative blood test and it was veeeeerrrrry positive at that point. I have no idea why I tested + and then negative. Early loss of a twin and my DD hadn't implanted yet? The same brand of test had varying sensitivities (I believe this is possible?). FRER definitely has a low threshold for testing positive. If you don't know if your blood test was quant or qualitative, I'd start there. Oh, and was the first test (the positive) read in the prescribed time frame? Some people get "ghost" lines and so forth after the 10 mins are up or whatever. If you read it within the time frame listed, I'd consider it a real positive. If you fished it out of the trash 15 mins after doing the test, I'd assume it was a ghost line. Did you use the same brand each time? Some detect lower amounts of hcg, and some won't come up positive until you are over a level of 50, for example. I don't think bc would impact your hcg levels. Is the website peeonastick.com still around? That site was filled w/ more info than you would ever want to know!

Do a better job at self-nurturing. I am terrible at taking me time, even though I have a supportive DH. Less computer time More sleep (explain this to my 16 month old for me please!)

What kind of almond flour are you using? My personal preference is Honeyville Grain. The texture is much better in a lot of baked goods (IME) than Bob's Red Mill. I like Bob's, but I think Honeyville is a step above. In some recipes you don't notice a difference, but in others, IME it really does make a difference. We also bake w/ coconut flour sometimes, but it is very thirsty and you usually have to use a LOT of eggs with it.

Our local library has a limited selection of things I'm interested in. They do carry things like the DK Eyewitness videos that I'll pick up for the kids. For some reason they charge for "fiction" based DVDs for kids, but nonfiction are free :confused: so we usually just stick w/ educational videos (once every week or two). DH often uses the library closest to his employer to find movies for us, as they carry a more extensive selection of things we are interested in. We have been watching Mad Men on DVD from the library.

Have you had your D levels checked? There is some connection between D and PMS symptoms (several studies on this). So many women are deficient. I was, even though I supplemented for a long time before getting tested. B vitamins? Calcium/magnesium?

:iagree:

I'm so sorry you are dealing with this :grouphug: I worked in healthcare pre-kids, and I am of the mindset that we absolutely need to have healthcare for all. You and your family will be in my thoughts.

Ah, the famous fishy pool :D I was trying to find it when we were planning our HB and no one had it in stock at the time. We went with a different inflatable pool that was like an inch or two shallower. Same idea though. I really, really wanted the fishy pool though at the time!

We did a test run in advance to figure out how much hot water we would have, etc. We kept water going on the stove and used that to adjust the temp as needed. It wasn't the easiest thing ever but we had extra hands (MW assistant, and my parents were there to help with the kids, who ended up being asleep for most of my labor). I don't regret skipping a fancier system. I believe my MW now rents pools but she was not at the time I was pg. We used the little aquarium thermometer to make sure we were in the desired range.

Yep, I didn't expect to love it, but I did :001_wub:

My oldest is 7 and just purchased a Nook. He spent his own money and used some GCs. He's treated his digital camera well, etc. so I'm hoping it goes smoothly. So far he's been enjoying it. We've been using e-books from the library and free public domain books.

Yep, I used an intex inflatable pool when I had my 3rd baby (homebirth) in 2010. I had two easy labors w/ my older 2 kids and wasn't sure I'd want/need a pool for the homebirth. I didn't want to go to the expense given my history of not really needing the water, or not wanting it when it was available. With DS1 I was at a hospital and labored in the tub there, but wanted out in transition. THeir policy was no waterbirth, but laboring in the tub was ok. I wouldn't have wanted to remain in the water anyway. I wanted out. With DD, things moved fast and I never missed having the water (was at a FSBC, had the option to do a waterbirth). THe third baby was born in the water. 2 pushes, no tearing. Easiest recovery of the 3 (never even wanted/needed to use a peri bottle). I am short (5'2" or so) and a few more inches of water would probably have been ideal. For the price, the option we had worked out well. I think our pool was $30 via amazon as it was early spring and we couldn't find much out at B&M stores. I really wanted the intex "fishy" pool a lot of HBers use, but couldn't find it in stock anywhere at the time. I'm not sure if it was discontinued. Ours was the one that looks like a star with rainbow colors LOL ;) I am not sure if you encountered this advice, but we got a special adapter to fill it from our bathroom sink, a pvc free/drinking water safe hose, and an aquarium net (in case you need to remove a BM from the water. Didn't need it, but the aquarium net is like 2 bucks). Oh, and an aquarium thermometer w/ a little suction cup so we could gauge water temp (was very inexpensive). And lots of towels.

I don't technically get a totally abnormal GTT test, but I have symptoms and have PCOS. My GTT isn't totally normal either, and I haven't had one done in a number of years. Now that I'm older, I might be more likely to get an obviously abnormal result. I'm sure if I did a longer GTT (not really practical) or a euglycemic clamp test, I think I'd see a definite result. Do you have symptoms that you are wondering about?

Hemoglobin A1C. My DH's was creeping up a few years ago even though he's of normal weight. He has a family hx of type 2 diabetes. Between that and my PCOS/IR we decided LC had to be a long term thing for us. It has been a great help.

Well, the only way to know for sure would be to actually get blood levels for insulin from a lab. I don't know of an at-home way to measure this. I once had a 2 hour GTT done. RX said 2 hour GTT *with* insulin levels. The lab only did glucose levels (a more traditional GTT) and I had to have the entire test repeated (not fun!) as a result. That's because in order to determine IR, you need to see how much insulin your body is putting out in response to the glucose load. Just looking at sugar levels will only give part of the pic. I think many general practitioners are not always great at figuring this out. That's why some PPs recommended an endo testing/interpreting the results. If a patient raises concerns about this topic, many docs seem to (IME) only test fasting blood glucose, or fasting insulin, etc. which really is not a great indicator.

As far as I know, a 2 or 3 hour GTT with insulin levels will give you the info you are looking for, which means a blood test. There are some indicators of IR (you don't need to have these to have IR, but they can be signs) that include things like skin tags and acanthosis nigricans (a velvety hyperpigmentation. Kinda looks like a "ring around the neck" that can't be washed off). A tendency to gain weight mostly in the middle is another (aka central adiposity). Again, you totally do not need to have those symptoms, but if you happen to have them, they can be good indicators. I don't have any of the above but my mom had them prior to moving to a LC diet. (i do have IR as part of my PCOS). You may feel "foggy" after a carby meal or crash and burn tired a while afterward. Some people have reactive hypoglycemia. Testing your sugar will give you part of the equation, but for IR, you need to know what the insulin levels are doing as a reaction to the sugar levels. I believe you really want to look at both when you are determining if you are dealing with IR.