You may have heard the expression “life threw me a curve ball.” Well, that is certainly true in my case. If you’re following my blogs that are about the  ® nutrition plan I’ve been on for 15 months, you may have noticed I haven’t written one for two months. April Fool’s Day seems like a fun day to get back on track.

Because getting back on track occurs to be a theme for me these days.

I have only been on the treadmill once since Jan. 29. Before that, I had had a healthy regime of three to fives times a week on the treadmill plus one to two times a week walking around the lovely, art-filled, piped-in-music, gorgeous- landscaping lake that is just across the street from, La Condo, our home. Both take 30 minutes.

In Minnesota winters, the treadmill is my friend. In summer, I’d rather cycle or walk outside, of course, and with no snow, now, I’m eager to do that.

But Jan. 30, I began another fascinating life altering adventure. (Reminder: I started MB® Jan. 2, 2016.) Along with 12 members of Westminster Presbyterian Church, we flew to Cuba for a nine-day mission trip. As an international photojournalist, I volunteered to be the official photographer for the group and took 5,000 photos plus 50 short videos.

As a result and due to intentional planning, I have three Cuban photo exhibits opening this year, two in April and one in October. So I’ve been super busy getting ready for those.

Unfortunately, there also have been two life-altering events that have occurred. One, in retrospect, not so serious. Due to the 12-hour days, in which we did a lot of walking and mostly on uneven cobblestones, my poor already arthritic left knee — which had not given me any problems since loosing over 50 pounds — has flared up again.

It has been extremely painful for almost two months, and that has prevented me from getting on the treadmill.

So this week, at the recommendation of my MB® nutrition coach, Christine Lindell Detweiler, I went to a Mayo Clinic sport medicine doctor.

After several X-rays and an exam, she recommended physical therapy and a surprisingly painless cortisone injection. Thankfully to my surprise and delight, I had immediate relief!

I’ll start going to the pool now that I’ve finally bought a swimming suit that fits. I left my old one, about five sizes too big, with new friends in Cuba. Next week, I’ll be back on the treadmill. Yeah!

I mentioned I had two life-altering events. The second one was tragic. My sister, Sharon Henneman, died suddenly of an aortic dissection Feb. 21, three weeks before her 74th birthday. She had been my inspiration and the person responsible for me being on MB® after she had lost 90 pounds the proceeding year.

Despite enduring many deaths of family members and friends throughout my 71 years starting at the young age of 11 when my grandmother died, nothing has rocked my world in the worst way since my father’s suicide, when I was 12. Absolutely nothing can prepare you for a sudden death, especially since Sharon was the closest person to me my whole life.

As children on the farm where we lived, we played together for hours riding our ponies. In the summer, we’d walk up the gravel road to the culvert and squish our toes in the cool mud. We didn’t have a care in the world.

When Sharon returned to Minnesota after a few years of a hippy fling in San Fransisco and the West Coast during the 1960s, she was a newly divorced young mother with two young children. We became college roommates so I could baby-sit for her kids when she was in class.

When I lived in Europe for 20 years, we wrote letters. Since returning from Europe in the early 1990s, Sharon and I became even closer when along with our older sisters, we bought our grandparents farm, lovingly called La Farm, a play on our last name.

Whenever we went to La Farm — a 2½-hour drive from La Condo — we’d get together and talk for hours while playing Hand and Foot.

So her sudden death has been truly devastating. I’m still grieving. Thankfully, I have been able to keep extremely busy focusing on preparations for two of my photo exhibits, one opening next week in rural Minnesota (Thursday, April 6, Kaddatz Gallery, Fergus Falls) and the other opening in downtown Minneapolis (April 30th, The Westminster Gallery, noon).

Those two life-and-death events have obviously impacted my MB® success. In Cuba, I didn’t even TRY to stay on plan. I did, whenever we ate at restaurants, do my best to make healthy choices. I also drank wine whenever I had the chance, which wasn’t every day.

There’s no way I was going to go to Cuba and not take advantage of the local cuisine. OMG, it was fabulous! I ate a lot of fish, lobster, shrimp, salads, black beans and rice especially whenever we ate at churches. I did succeed in drinking seven bottles of water a day. Temperatures were in the 70s and 80s. I also experienced Cuban coffee and Cuban rum for the first time. The fact that I brought back two bottles of rum, one of which cost $40, and a 2-pound bag of Cuban coffee may indicate my enjoyment of the local fare.

I was thrilled after getting back and inviting a Cuban friend over for a meal and photo slideshow, when he gave us four tiny Cuban coffee cups — and they even match our dishes perfectly!

For the most part in Cuba, I didn’t eat between meals nor have seconds. I did eat a lot of fresh fruits — mango, pineapple and watermelon — and veggies.

A delightful throwback to when I worked as editor of a weekly newspaper in the U.S. Virgin Islands back in the early ’70s was rediscovering the delicate taste of plantain, a type of banana, served as a dessert fried in butter. Yum.

I was delightfully surprised that upon returning home, I’d only gained a pound. That was totally due to the incredible amount of walking exercise I had. The downside was the damage to my knee of excess walking on uneven surfaces.

Exactly two weeks after returning, Sharon died. I don’t know about where you live, but here, especially in rural Minnesota, when someone dies, people bring the affected families food. And it’s absolutely not what I eat on MB®. It’s what is commonly called comfort food, for good reason.

From Day 1, cousins, friends and neighbors brought catering-size pans of homemade lasagne, pork and beans, mac and cheese, scalloped potatoes and ham, tater tot hotdish (for some of you, that would be a casserole) and blueberry crumble.

I didn’t even attempt to stay on plan during that first week. In fact, I was so shocked, that I didn’t even remember to track my food, something, I’ve done every meal since starting on MB®. In addition, another life event was our granddaughter’s 9th birthday when we returned home, so we bought her a Dairy Queen birthday ice cream cake.

After all that, it was seriously time to get back on plan. Due to a lack of exercise for the past seven weeks, I’ve gain 6 pounds, and I still have 36 pounds to reach my goal weight — now that I have a pain-free knee and can start exercising again. That is baring any unplanned life-altering events. I intend to reach goal by this Thanksgiving.

When I reflect back to 2015, before I began healthy eating, between Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s, I gained 9 pounds. After being on MB® for nearly a year in 2016, during the same time frame, I lost 3.5 pounds.

Those are the kinds of results of which I’m proud. It’s important to me to have balance in my life, and when life throws those curve balls, you just have to deal with it the best you can, one day at a time.

The good news is that each new day, I get to choose.

Here I am at the former convent where we stayed for four nights in Matanzas, Cuba, filling my water bottle with filtered water. One of the members of our group from Westminster Presbyterian Church is responsible for helping design and install 44 water systems in churches and schools on the island. The was the day we spend an afternoon at the beach.

This group of young women accompanied us on our afternoon at the beach with lunch following at Dora Valentin Presbyterian Church in Cardenas conveniently located two blocks from the beach.

The ice cream dessert was huge so I shared it with our driver, Orestes.

A great start and end to any Cuban day always began with a cuppa strong Cuban coffee. I like mine black with no sugar.

One of the spreads prepared for us after a presentation at the offices of the Cuban Council of Churches, where attention to presentation was evident and appreciated. It was as tasty as it looks.

Not exactly your Lutheran Church basement meal … Here Pastor Yoelkis Gonzalez of Guanabacoa Church in Havana along with a parishioner prepare our self serve meal of chicken, black beans and rice, salad and fruit.

The meal at Chiquirrin Restaurant in Matanzas was suburb. Here one of the Chef is painstakingly arranging the lobster and thin deep fried potatoes that I had.

Even the bread was served with flair at the lobster restaurant.

My lobster dinner at Chiquirrin Restaurant in Matanzas. Yummy!

A perfect ending to another terrific meal this one at Café Mundo in Matanza … cream caramel and Cuban coffee. They could have kept the sprinkles, though.

This is another entrepreneurial restaurant created in the courtyard of a private home in Matanzas.

A celebration meal at our sister church, Versalles Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Matanzas, was enjoyed by members of the parish and our group of 13 members as seen here. Chicken and black beans and rice followed by a sweet coconut cake and Happy Birthday sung in Spanish and English. Pastor Carlos Emilio Ham, stands at right.

This is one of four squares in Havana that are a perfect place to have a late afternoon coffee or a glass of beer, rum or wine.

The convent dining room was set up for our breakfast. The large cups on the table were for tea. Cuban coffee cups are very small like French expresso cups. By the way, the convent stay was $6 a night including breakfast! I was one of the lucky ones who had a hot shower.

A fruit stand in Havana.

As you can imagine, this white layered cake celebrating our partner church’s 115th anniversary was super sweet.

Sharon’s funeral program featured a photo I took of her on her birthday almost a year from the date she died. I also wrote her obituary.