Well, finished my Chicken mole stew in the instant pot. Cooked a super giant chicken breast the size of a football. (Musta been a Texas chicken since everything bigger in Texas 🤣🤣😊) removed sauced chicken. Sauce was 2 small cans Herdez Caseria salsa, A good bit of Marie’s Mole in the cute reusable drinking glass jar, Garam Masala, garlic salt, chicken bullion cubes and several bags various veggies. Deboned the chicken breast and put it back in when done. So glad I got my desire to cook again. Enough Mexican stew for a family for 5. I like throwing things in the instant pot and hitting a timer. I just needed more flavors than the usual boring five ie. Italian, Chinese, Cajun, chili powder, And my usual paprika,cayenne, garlic salt, onion powder. It never dawned on me I could use any kind of ethnic flavor spice blend with bags of frozen veggies and add meat to it. Can’t wait to try Arabesque flavors.

Now to go to Pinterest and find some spice blend recipes. Problem is there is a million of the same recipes for the basic 5 ones. Gonna have to dig hard to find variety. I buy most of my spices for Spice and Tea Exchange by the ounce. Cheaper, fresh, and better flavor. It ships from Florida. I don’t buy their ready made blends because they are too expensive, So try to do that myself,

When I am depressed or feeling sad or anxious, it is always , a self check what is it that I have forgotten to do, or not doing ? Did I eat dirty the day before, Have I taken my vitamin supplements? Do I need to make a smoothie or drink green tea, or a liver cleans tea? Have I exercise enough or when was the last time I ate beets? Did I take my sea moss? And then I do what is necessary. And recalibrate!!! We all far short of caring for ourselves, but as long as you can breath we have to get up and try it again, and again, …

As someone who was diagnosed with these debilitating conditions at 16, I have probably tried about every treatment there is over the past 40 years. The most helpful suggestion by a psychiatrist i saw at one time, was to identify 3 things that bring me personal joy then to make weekly "appointments" with myself to engage in each of those 3 things at least once a week. It can be all together or spread across the days, but each one at least once. More often is better, but at least once a week for all 3 things.

When I have a severe episode, cannabis is the best medicine I've ever had, better than Xanax, zoloft Prozac, Buspar, trazodone, percocet, immitrex, and a ton of other pharmacopeia that makes me marvel how I have never OD'd or completely lost my marbles. Now I take 25mg zoloft in morning and 25mg trazodone at night. Thats all. I used to take 200 a day of each along with all the other aforementioned garbage. Best medicines come from nature, not labs.

As for the activities, the challenge for me the past few years is figuring out how to keep doing them with my spine conditions. Make them varied and flexible.

Other than all that, at the end of the day, I have found that how stressed and depressed I become is up to me and how I internalize whatever is causing it. There is no way to describe that in easy to follow steps. It is different for each person. Accepting the challenges is part of life. Everyone has them. They may not be the same, but they are there nonetheless. This is life. Accept it. Then Commit to getting through it. How you do it is up to you. Try meditating at the beginning and ending of each day, taking at least 10 deep diaphragmatic breathing, outside if weather/environmental conditions permit. 😌🙏

@A MySpondylitisTeam Member. Thanks! You have a nice day.

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