This weekend I visited Huntsville, Alabama for my Alma Mater’s Alumni Weekend. Many know that Huntsville is known as the Rocket City. However, what most people don’t know is that Huntsville is filled with many great restaurants. So of course while I was in town I took the time to visit one of my favorites, Another Broken Egg. This restaurant is a Brunch spot, with most of the locations having hours from 07:00 am – 2:00 pm and are somewhere in the South/West Coast.

My fiance and I dined in on Easter Sunday, which is usually a busy time for most Brunch locations. There was about a 35 minute wait for a table. Luckily, they had games such as Corn Hole set up outside, which made the wait seem very quick. We ordered the New Orleans inspired Beignets for an appetizer, which was a sweet start to our meals. They also come in half-orders which is great for those who fill up easily on appetizers. I decided on the Huevos Rancheros for my meal, which was delicious. Although I went with coffee for my drink of choice, there is also a full bar for those who prefer mimosas or bloody mary’s.

One of my favorite things about Another Broken Egg is the antique-inspired china. The atmosphere is a Sunday afternoon at grandmas vibe. Overall, my rating would be an 8.5/10. They would have had a perfect score however, the tortilla shells were a bit difficult to cut into. Usually, they are fresh, light, and crunchy. All in all, Another Broken Egg has multiple other tasty items, including the Cinnamon Roll French Toast and Eggs Benedict. They are also vegetarian friendly, which gives a women like me much to choose from!

Rating: 8.5/10

 

We’ve all done it before… It’s January first and we write down 10 things we want to accomplish in the year. For most people, health and wellness is usually included in this list of goals. However, by the time February comes, we’re a long ways from our goals and our resolutions are a distant memory. So what are some ways to remain motivated throughout the year and actually accomplish your health goals?

Here are my 4 tips:

Create a vision board

Where do you see yourself? What would you like to accomplish? Grab a poster board from your local craft store and some old magazines. Cut out anything you see in the magazine that reminds/inspires you of your goals then paste them onto your poster board. Once you’ve designed yours, hang it up some place where you’ll encounter it often. I have my vision board right next to my bed, on the side where I usually wake up. Every morning I am reminded to be healthy, to exercise…and surprisingly it works!

Don’t Beat Yourself Up Over Setbacks

So you slipped up and ate the cupcakes at your work party… It’s okay! Setbacks happen and recognizing them as such will help you move on from them. Often times, setbacks makes a person feel like all their hard work is ruined so they give up. Remember that every minute of every day is another opportunity to make a good health decision and get back on the right path.

Family/Friend Support

Another great way to remain motivated is to enlist the support of friends and family who will hold you accountable. My fiancé and I turned our fitness goals into healthy competition to keep each other on the right track. My favorite exercise includes playing Dance Central on the Xbox with my sister. Surrounding yourself with people who have the same desire for fitness places you in the position to accomplish them. “Birds of a feather flock together” right?

Celebrate The Little Wins

Reward yourself for sticking to your goals and achieving each milestone, no matter how small. If you’re trying to lose weight, remember that weight maintenance is a win and not a loss. When you’re deciding what to reward yourself with, try to celebrate yourself with non-food related rewards, such as a new hairdo or a manicure. Remember: Beyonce wasn’t built in a day, so celebrate the process!

The Journal of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners says that greater than 50% of nurses are overweight/obese. The same study also supports previous research in that there is a relationship between nursing shift work and obesity. It also suggests that modifiable contributors such as poor diet, smoking and sedentary lifestyles were a greater risk factor for obesity than the actual night shift work alone. So what can shift workers do to maintain their weight?

• Eat your larger meal closer to the beginning half the shift

We’ve always heard don’t eat a big meal before bed. However, when you’re a nurse coming home in the morning from night shift work, the first place you’re heading for is the kitchen. Try to limit smaller meals when you come home such as soup or light salad before going to bed. Eat a larger meal during the ½ half of your shift during then night.

• Increase Activity

It is recommended for people to exercise three times a week for 30-60 minutes for optimal heart health and weight loss. No time for the gym? Try taking the stairs instead of the elevator or choosing a farther parking spot. There are many ways to increase activity for those who are low on time.

• Limit Caffeine

This one was hard to type because I LOVE coffee. However, sleep is essential to a healthy lifestyle and for weight loss. Limit caffeine to one cup and only prior to midnight when working night shift. Therefore, you can have a more restful sleep once you get home in the morning.

• Proper Diet

Avoid any starvation and/or unrealistic diets because the effects are not long-term. Do not skip a meal, especially at work. Have healthy snacks on hand to get you through the night. Fruits can provide a healthy night shift snack and it also will give an energy boost. Avoid any processed foods or sugars. Maintaining a diet that is low in carbs and high in protein is the best type of diet for health and weight loss.

• Be A Role Model for your patients

Our last and most important tip is to be a role model for your patients! You can’t preach to patients about changing their lifestyle if cannot do so for yourself either. Changes in lifestyle habits can reduce the risk of obesity in nurses. Although shift work has some relationship to being overweight, those who live healthy lifestyles aren’t as affected by shift work as those who have other risk factors. We hope you try implementing our tips for maintaining a healthy weight while working your next night shift!

-Author: Alice Charitable, Co-owner of Graceful Med Boutique

Reference

** Miller, S., Alpert, P., & Cross, C. (2008). Overweight and obesity in nurses, advanced practice nurses, and nurse educators. Journal of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, 20(5), 259-65. doi: 10.1111/j.1745-7599.2008.00319.x.

 

When you look at nature and all the wonders of this Earth, you can vividly see the evidence of Creation. Because we are made in the image of the Creator, we too are also designed to create. He is the One who instills these desires in our hearts with a unique purpose in mind.

Recently, I was back home at my parent’s house. In their closet, hangs a high school project of mine called “The Road Map of My Life.” Although it had been hanging on the wall there for some time now, it had been years since I truly looked at what I wrote. Of course there were some unmet goals, such as being married by 2015 (a way far off projection…YIKES). Conversely, I was surprised to see how many met goals there were as well. My Road Map declared that I would graduate with a Bachelor’s of Science in Nursing degree, which I completed in 2013. However around year 2016, there was a shift in my goal planning. My Road Map stated I would go back to school for Fashion Design and start my own fashion line. Without even looking back to this Road Map until recently, our business Graceful Med Boutique was already being planned and designed in 2016. How fitting is it that my Nursing background and my love for fashion design would eventually merge into one?

Finding this Road Map again, served as a great reminder to walk in my purpose. Being a thought leader, places a unique burden on those also challenged with this mindset. It’s easy to get comfortable in the lifestyle of a Monday through Friday 9-5. The creative lifestyle is hard work. It requires early mornings and late nights without the guarantee of a return. It requires a humble spirit to accept criticism. It requires authenticity and patience. The alternative, which is walking away from the purposeful design God has created us to be or hoarding our gifts, only leads to a life unfulfilled. Therefore, embrace your God-given talents and develop them. Start Something.

I promise this is not another weight loss blog post. However, as a registered nurse and as someone who has struggled with my weight for a majority of my life, I’ve learned a thing or two about weight loss along the way. I know that certain food items that we put into our bodies allow toxins to accumulate, which ultimately impedes weight loss. It is not until we can recognize and act on the need for detoxification that we maximize our weight loss goals. The same concept also goes for toxic friendships/relationships in our life.

The most obvious form of toxic friendships/relationships are those that are physically and verbally abusive. However, they don’t always come in this cookie-cutter form. They come disguised as friends who do not support you and never have something good to say when a blessing comes your way. They also come disguised as relationships that have great chemistry but lack maturity, only bringing negative qualities out of each other. They come disguised as friends who constantly drain you of your energy, who always need reassurance and feed off your emotional strength. They come disguised as friends who never have anything nice to say about anyone, including you… (behind your back of course!) They come disguised as people who are so quick to take from you but are never willing to give.

If you recognize any of these toxins in your life, it may be time to reevaluate your friend list and I’m not talking about Facebook. The only real way to rid yourself of these toxins is to go through the detoxification or a cleansing process. For some that might mean blocking/unfriending on all social media sites but it takes much more than that. It is realizing these relationships are a threat to your self-care. It is realizing that you have to let them go and acting upon it.

We need to realize that maintaining relationships with toxic people adds unnecessary baggage in our life to carry. It depletes your energy and eventually prevents you from reaching your goals. Sometimes as you grow and progress, relationships that weren’t toxic to begin with can become toxic. Just like the weight loss journey, if you hang on to toxic friendships/relationships long enough, you end up right back where you started.

It’s time to drop the weight!

“Walk with the wise and become wise, for a companion of fools suffers harm”. – Proverbs 13:20