Paying the Price; Who Gets the Mullah?

This last week I actually gained 1 pound, shamefully paying the price for:

a) not exercising every day
b) going off program for 2 days after eating at a family reunion (my family is unaware of this new adventure as of yet, I was saving face) and
c) being way too stressed out and not sleeping half as much as I should have (my boss was out of town; I got to do his job AND mine for 5 days. In fact, I just finished a 13 hour day at the office... sitting on my butt pushing papers)

What I have learned from this:
a) At least for my body, daily exercise is CRUCIAL... or else.
b) Week 1 and 2 weren't difficult but week 3 was a doozy; I know it will get easier from here and I really have to include my family in this adventure soon.  How about I commit to telling them after weigh-in number 4?
c) I grew up hearing the statement that "early to bed and early to rise, makes a man [or woman] healthy, wealthy and wise"; don't know about about the wealthy and wise parts but I'm pretty darn convinced about the healthy one!

In other news....

A lot of people on the OPTIFAST program are allowed to also eat unlimited vegetables (I don't know if there are certain ones to avoid or not).  I opted not to have the unlimited vegetables in my specific plan because I haven't been able to tolerate them since December so what would be the point?  Well, last week at my appointment I was encouraged to try eating a salad to see what happens.  Today was the day I chose to give it a shot.  Really needing to get a break from the office and coworkers (I was ready to toss one out the window; pity we're in a single-story building) I stopped by Alaska Premier Health for my weigh-in and went to Subway.  I ordered a Veggie Salad (redundant, I know) which I customized to contain lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, green peppers, pickles (dill), banana peppers and black olives (that was an accident, I don't even like black olives-thank goodness they only put like 5 slivers on) topped with vinegar and a shake of their salt and pepper mix.

Having not eaten salad in forever, I was in heaven munching on the greens while working.  The best components of the salad were the pickles.  I LOVE pickles.  I have loved pickles since I can remember.  They are amazing and go well on nearly anything imaginable (no, I have never put them on any sort of dessert and yes, as I kid I put them on pizza).  They are low-calorie and full of flavor!  Even better, pickles are GREEN, my favorite color! They're absolutely perfect and wonderful and oober yummy! Have I mentioned that I love pickles?

Whew, that was fun.

Continuing on...

About 2 hours after finishing the salad I got a little sick, but nothing like before.  The bloating I consistently experienced after eating greens before was minimal and other side affects were less traumatic than usual.  I'm hypothesizing that perhaps in combination with other triggers to my unhappy digestive system, greens and veggies wreak more havoc than they do alone.  This will be an ongoing trial, like a science experiment.  I may have just gotten lucky this round.  Wish me luck.