Phew! Glad that's over! Yesterday was Day 5 and the last day of our Great Juice Experiment! We survived 120 hours with nothing but delicious juices, water and herbal teas (with the exception of that minor mishap on Day 4...). I am actually really proud of us. I really think it was great that Mr. X. did it with me, it kept me motivated and I felt a sense of connectedness with him. He really is a trooper. I wonder what he's eaten at work so far today??
I'm not sure this whole experience gave me the clarity I really thought I'd get, but it did teach me that when I put my mind to something, I really can accomplish it. And if nothing else, that is a good lesson for us all. We get so caught up in our day-to-day lives that we forget to embrace the most simple thing, nourishing our bodies, with good, fresh, wholesome foods. This experience has taught me to slow down and enjoy each mouthful. To take a moment and breathe in between each bite. And to honor this gift of food.
Come to think of it, maybe I did get some clarity after all.
I'm going to spend this rainy afternoon flipping through a few vegan cookbooks I checked out of the library and decide what to make for dinner. One thing's for sure, I am so glad I will be eating my dinner off a plate tonight instead of sipping it through a straw.
Peace and love.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
The Great Juice Experiment - Day 4
Well I'm sure you are all anxiously waiting to find out if I decided to continue this journey or if I gave in to the hunger pangs. 24 hours without food is a long time, 48 even more. I never thought I could ever go two whole days without eating food, let alone 4! The last time I ate real food was last FRIDAY! So let me just pause for a moment to take you through the day.
Actually, it was a pretty uneventful day. Primo and Segundo had a few friends over to play, I got to catch up with a friend who I hadn't seen in a month and it was a bright, warm, amazing East Coast day. I had made a particularly yummy peach, pear, blueberry juice (antioxidants galore) around 2:00pm and all was good.
Around 4, the usual I'm getting hungry thoughts started to creep into my head, but I swept them under the rug with a beet, celery, carrot, kale, collards and apple combo. No problem.
Then the kids said they wanted pizza for dinner. Now I don't eat pizza anymore because I really think that vegan cheese smells like stinky feet and I just can't get my nose past that smell to eat it. And the few times I have bought one, I have just ended up throwing it out. It's oily, it doesn't melt right and that SMELL! It smells like what I imagine a teenage boys closet to smell like, I shutter at the mere thought of it.
So the kids were eating and I very innocently opened the refrigerator, more out of habit than anything else. When that damn tabbouleh that's been taunting me like a schoolyard bully for the last two days got the best of me. I grabbed it out of the fridge, cut half a piece of pita bread and grabbed the hummus. I measured out exactly 2 tablespoons of hummus and 1/2 cup of tabbouleh and packed the pita. I looked at for a minute and asked myself if it was something I really wanted to do. Would I regret eating it? Was I a complete failure? Would the last 4 days mean anything? Did I achieve that clarity and peace of mind that I was hoping for? And in the end I decided...
Fuck it! And I ate that damn sandwich. I did it. And I don't regret it. And it was really yummy! And I didn't go and binge on anything else. It was all I ate and it was completely satisfying. So there, I admit it, I ate something. That admission was completely cathartic. I think I just achieved that clarity and peace of mind.
And at least my belly won't be rumbling at 3:00am tonight.
Peace and love.
Actually, it was a pretty uneventful day. Primo and Segundo had a few friends over to play, I got to catch up with a friend who I hadn't seen in a month and it was a bright, warm, amazing East Coast day. I had made a particularly yummy peach, pear, blueberry juice (antioxidants galore) around 2:00pm and all was good.
Around 4, the usual I'm getting hungry thoughts started to creep into my head, but I swept them under the rug with a beet, celery, carrot, kale, collards and apple combo. No problem.
Then the kids said they wanted pizza for dinner. Now I don't eat pizza anymore because I really think that vegan cheese smells like stinky feet and I just can't get my nose past that smell to eat it. And the few times I have bought one, I have just ended up throwing it out. It's oily, it doesn't melt right and that SMELL! It smells like what I imagine a teenage boys closet to smell like, I shutter at the mere thought of it.
So the kids were eating and I very innocently opened the refrigerator, more out of habit than anything else. When that damn tabbouleh that's been taunting me like a schoolyard bully for the last two days got the best of me. I grabbed it out of the fridge, cut half a piece of pita bread and grabbed the hummus. I measured out exactly 2 tablespoons of hummus and 1/2 cup of tabbouleh and packed the pita. I looked at for a minute and asked myself if it was something I really wanted to do. Would I regret eating it? Was I a complete failure? Would the last 4 days mean anything? Did I achieve that clarity and peace of mind that I was hoping for? And in the end I decided...
Fuck it! And I ate that damn sandwich. I did it. And I don't regret it. And it was really yummy! And I didn't go and binge on anything else. It was all I ate and it was completely satisfying. So there, I admit it, I ate something. That admission was completely cathartic. I think I just achieved that clarity and peace of mind.
And at least my belly won't be rumbling at 3:00am tonight.
Peace and love.
Monday, August 22, 2011
The Great Juice Experiment - Day 3
So today I was expecting to feel horrible and actually this has been the easiest day so far. Admittedly, yesterday was, in fact, horrible and I was ready to throw in the towel. But today I have a renewed sense of purpose and things have been chugging along quite smoothly.
When I started this experiment, I was thinking I would do it for 5 days. Now I'm thinking that today may be the last day. Not because I'm starving, but because I'm getting bored. I mean really, there is only so much juice a person can drink. We'll see what Mr. X wants to do (he's doing it with me). Maybe he can convince me that two more days will be worth it.
So I kind of thought that I'd drop like 5 pounds in three days or something, or at least the three I gained on previously mentioned gluttonous vacation. But just a measly 2 pounds?!? And that was probably just in poop. Not to be gross. But Mr. X has lost 7! See, this is what pisses me off about men. They lose weight so easily and never gain any even though they eat like pigs. And we women starve ourselves and work our asses off at the gym in an effort to rid ourselves of the bagel that resides on our lower abdomen! But I digress...
If I do decide to eat tomorrow, I really just want a big, huge salad with lots of crunchy veggies and hearts of palm with my favorite ginger dressing. I miss crunching. Salad on a plate is much more fun to eat than a salad in a glass.
Let me know what you think, two more days?? I promise I will take it into consideration...as I'm crunching on a carrot. :-)
Peace and love.
When I started this experiment, I was thinking I would do it for 5 days. Now I'm thinking that today may be the last day. Not because I'm starving, but because I'm getting bored. I mean really, there is only so much juice a person can drink. We'll see what Mr. X wants to do (he's doing it with me). Maybe he can convince me that two more days will be worth it.
So I kind of thought that I'd drop like 5 pounds in three days or something, or at least the three I gained on previously mentioned gluttonous vacation. But just a measly 2 pounds?!? And that was probably just in poop. Not to be gross. But Mr. X has lost 7! See, this is what pisses me off about men. They lose weight so easily and never gain any even though they eat like pigs. And we women starve ourselves and work our asses off at the gym in an effort to rid ourselves of the bagel that resides on our lower abdomen! But I digress...
If I do decide to eat tomorrow, I really just want a big, huge salad with lots of crunchy veggies and hearts of palm with my favorite ginger dressing. I miss crunching. Salad on a plate is much more fun to eat than a salad in a glass.
Let me know what you think, two more days?? I promise I will take it into consideration...as I'm crunching on a carrot. :-)
Peace and love.
Sunday, August 21, 2011
The Great Juice Experiment - Day 2
8:00am
Felt great when I woke up this morning. Not hungry at all, which was strange because my stomach was rumbling at 3:00am. I did sleep pretty well though. Drank a big glass of orange, grapefruit, carrot and ginger juice and headed of to a 9:30 yoga class. Yoga was just what I needed, I felt focused and strong and happy.
After yoga drove to Sunshine's house to bid her a farewell (sniff, sniff). Then drove home, crying the whole way.
12:00pm
Got home to Mr. X making an amazing green juice with collards, kale, cucumber, celery, carrot, red pepper and lemon! That was a nice surprise! It was delicious and filling and just what I needed. The kids were dressed, they had already been to the farmers' market and everyone was happily playing. Gotta love Mr. X!
3:00pm
The afternoon food cravings have officially set in and I swear I could eat every corn chip and pretzel in the basket on top of the fridge. I am STARVING here people. And officially angry. Not at anyone, more at myself for thinking this would be a good idea. Deep breathing, deep breathing. Things get so bad that I actually SNIFF the empty Frito bag that Primo left laying on the couch. I have really sunk to a whole new low. Who does that???
3:30pm
Watermelon, blueberry and lime juice! Very tasty. But veggie Pad Thai would be even tastier!
4:30pm
I decided it would be a great idea to get out of the house and go to the mall. Wrong! It was just a plethora of sights and smells that only put me in a much worse mood. As I'm sitting in the food court watching Primo gnaw his way through a Subway sandwich and Segundo smear his face with pizza sauce, I thought I might pass out. I hadn't had enough juice today and now I was paying for it.
6:45pm
Got home, ran to the juicer and threw everything but the kitchen sink in it. I really thought I might cave at that moment and grab that bag of pretzels and hummus. But instead I choked down yet another green juice. I'll put it out there right now, I don't know if I can go through another day of this. The Great Juice Experiment may be over as soon as tomorrow. We'll see how I feel in the morning.
I have nothing witty to say. I'm just too damn hungry.
Peace and love.
Felt great when I woke up this morning. Not hungry at all, which was strange because my stomach was rumbling at 3:00am. I did sleep pretty well though. Drank a big glass of orange, grapefruit, carrot and ginger juice and headed of to a 9:30 yoga class. Yoga was just what I needed, I felt focused and strong and happy.
After yoga drove to Sunshine's house to bid her a farewell (sniff, sniff). Then drove home, crying the whole way.
12:00pm
Got home to Mr. X making an amazing green juice with collards, kale, cucumber, celery, carrot, red pepper and lemon! That was a nice surprise! It was delicious and filling and just what I needed. The kids were dressed, they had already been to the farmers' market and everyone was happily playing. Gotta love Mr. X!
3:00pm
The afternoon food cravings have officially set in and I swear I could eat every corn chip and pretzel in the basket on top of the fridge. I am STARVING here people. And officially angry. Not at anyone, more at myself for thinking this would be a good idea. Deep breathing, deep breathing. Things get so bad that I actually SNIFF the empty Frito bag that Primo left laying on the couch. I have really sunk to a whole new low. Who does that???
3:30pm
Watermelon, blueberry and lime juice! Very tasty. But veggie Pad Thai would be even tastier!
4:30pm
I decided it would be a great idea to get out of the house and go to the mall. Wrong! It was just a plethora of sights and smells that only put me in a much worse mood. As I'm sitting in the food court watching Primo gnaw his way through a Subway sandwich and Segundo smear his face with pizza sauce, I thought I might pass out. I hadn't had enough juice today and now I was paying for it.
6:45pm
Got home, ran to the juicer and threw everything but the kitchen sink in it. I really thought I might cave at that moment and grab that bag of pretzels and hummus. But instead I choked down yet another green juice. I'll put it out there right now, I don't know if I can go through another day of this. The Great Juice Experiment may be over as soon as tomorrow. We'll see how I feel in the morning.
I have nothing witty to say. I'm just too damn hungry.
Peace and love.
Saturday, August 20, 2011
The Great Juice Experiment - Day 1
8:00am
Woke up this morning refreshed and ready to begin what I will now call The Great Juice Experiment. Not feeling hungry yet from the night before, I jumped right in with a morning blast of vitamin C. I ran a grapefruit, orange, a couple of carrots and a nub of ginger through the juicer and it was amazing! I then jotted off to get my roots done (I'm a vegan, not a hippy for God's sake!). As I lay back getting my hair rinsed, watching the television on the ceiling playing the Food Network, I started realizing that I was getting pretty hungry and that enchilada she was making looked damn good! Breathe through the rumbling, deep yoga breathing, it's your body beginning to detoxify itself I kept saying in my mind.
11:15am
Two hours and a rumbling stomach later, I returned home, raced to the kitchen to prepare another juice. This time it was a combination of spinach, kale, celery, apple, carrot and lemon. It did fill me up for a while before I was hit with the most incredible headache I've had in a long time. It was like someone was smashing a hammer into my forehead. Remembering that I had read something about headaches being a side effect of the cleanse, I tried once again to breathe through it. Focusing my mind on calming thoughts. For the record, this calming thoughts thing may be a load of crap.
2:30pm
Headed off to a local juice bar for another round. The thought of cleaning that damn juicer again was making my head spin. Instead, I dropped $9.50 on a shot of wheatgrass and a kale, cucumber, celery and apple juice. This juicing thing is expensive by the way.
4:30pm
After a failed attempt at a nap, I realized that my headache was gone and it was time for a juice. I tried to make my own V8 with tomato, spinach, cucumber, carrot, red pepper and celery. I did throw some Tabasco in it for some spice (don't know if that's allowed) and down the hatch it went. Pretty good actually. I thought by this point I'd be in a pretty bad mood but surprisingly I've only yelled at Primo and Segundo once or twice today. :-)
7:00pm
I am officially starving. Even the chicken my kids are eating smells good, and I HATE chicken. Even when I ate meat, I hated chicken, the dirty bird. And now it smells good. I don't know how people do this.
7:30pm
Final juice of the night, orange/grapefruit. I think I needed some sugar because I'm feeling a little better.
Gonna chill on the couch and veg out. Did I really just say veg??? Until tomorrow...
Peace and love.
Woke up this morning refreshed and ready to begin what I will now call The Great Juice Experiment. Not feeling hungry yet from the night before, I jumped right in with a morning blast of vitamin C. I ran a grapefruit, orange, a couple of carrots and a nub of ginger through the juicer and it was amazing! I then jotted off to get my roots done (I'm a vegan, not a hippy for God's sake!). As I lay back getting my hair rinsed, watching the television on the ceiling playing the Food Network, I started realizing that I was getting pretty hungry and that enchilada she was making looked damn good! Breathe through the rumbling, deep yoga breathing, it's your body beginning to detoxify itself I kept saying in my mind.
11:15am
Two hours and a rumbling stomach later, I returned home, raced to the kitchen to prepare another juice. This time it was a combination of spinach, kale, celery, apple, carrot and lemon. It did fill me up for a while before I was hit with the most incredible headache I've had in a long time. It was like someone was smashing a hammer into my forehead. Remembering that I had read something about headaches being a side effect of the cleanse, I tried once again to breathe through it. Focusing my mind on calming thoughts. For the record, this calming thoughts thing may be a load of crap.
2:30pm
Headed off to a local juice bar for another round. The thought of cleaning that damn juicer again was making my head spin. Instead, I dropped $9.50 on a shot of wheatgrass and a kale, cucumber, celery and apple juice. This juicing thing is expensive by the way.
4:30pm
After a failed attempt at a nap, I realized that my headache was gone and it was time for a juice. I tried to make my own V8 with tomato, spinach, cucumber, carrot, red pepper and celery. I did throw some Tabasco in it for some spice (don't know if that's allowed) and down the hatch it went. Pretty good actually. I thought by this point I'd be in a pretty bad mood but surprisingly I've only yelled at Primo and Segundo once or twice today. :-)
7:00pm
I am officially starving. Even the chicken my kids are eating smells good, and I HATE chicken. Even when I ate meat, I hated chicken, the dirty bird. And now it smells good. I don't know how people do this.
7:30pm
Final juice of the night, orange/grapefruit. I think I needed some sugar because I'm feeling a little better.
Gonna chill on the couch and veg out. Did I really just say veg??? Until tomorrow...
Peace and love.
Thursday, August 18, 2011
I Dream of Spinach
Last night I had the strangest dream. I had bought a bag of spinach at the grocery store and when I opened it half the bag was filled with dead, crunchy autumn leaves. I kept emptying and emptying the bag, sorting the dead, brown leaves from the bright green spinach leaves. The bag was bottomless and I couldn't understand how so many leaves and spinach got into such a small bag. When I finally managed to get to the bottom of the bag, poof, the dream was over.
Now I have never been one to make too much of the deeper meaning of dreams, but I have to say, that was one of the stranger ones I can remember. So I Googled what it means to dream of spinach (I honestly didn't think anything would come up) and strangely, this is what I found out:
According to the website DreamMoods, "To see or eat spinach in your dream, indicates your need to be reenergized or revitalized. It is synonymous with strength and power. Alternatively, the dream may simply be telling you that you need to eat better and lead a more healthy lifestyle."
WOW! Probably not a coincidence, right? The whole point of embarking on this juice fast is to do exactly that, reenergize and revitalize my body and my mind.
On the other hand, maybe I've just been buying too much spinach.
Please pass the salad dressing, I'm going to bed.
Peace and love.
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Sunshine
As I sit here tonight listening to two best friends argue over which Harry Potter movie is the best, I am reminded why this evening is so bittersweet for me. My best friend in Anytown is moving this weekend, and I really don't know what I will do with out her. I will call her Sunshine, because that, in fact, is what she is. It is hard for me to put into words what an amazing person Sunshine is because there are not enough beautiful adjectives to describe her. She is kind, warm, bubbly, funny, generous and has a wonderful spirit that lights up a room.
I met Sunshine a few months after moving to Anytown. I had no friends yet and was struggling through a decision about what preschool class Primo should be put into. Should he be the youngest in the class or the oldest? Will he feel insecure about being the smallest boy or relish in being the biggest? While all these little things seem insignificant now, they were big decisions that were weighing heavily on me at the time.
I was coming out of a New Families meeting at the school when Sunshine came up to me and introduced herself. The next thing I knew, I was in tears, crying on the shoulder of a total stranger over a child she had never even met. She gave me a hug and we talked for a while and she told me that everything would be alright. And she was right. As it turned out, her son was in Primo's class and is the same child that currently resides on my couch.
From that night on, Sunshine and I have been the best of friends. Friendships in your 30s and 40s are complicated. It's hard to get to know people on a more-than-acquaintance basis. I find that as I get older, it's the friends I have known that longest that mean the most to me. Don't get me wrong, I have some amazing friends here in Anytown, friends that I would do anything for and that I trust completely. But it is a rare and special occasion that you meet someone that is so genuinely kind and happy that she brings sunshine into every room she enters.
So as I sit here in front of the computer and type, it is with tears in my eyes and a very heavy heart. She has a new and exciting journey ahead of her. And while I know that I will always be part of her life, it is a journey that will be moving forward without me.
So just for tonight, I will shift my focus away from this weekends endeavors and let myself feel sad -- just for a little while.
Peace and love.
I met Sunshine a few months after moving to Anytown. I had no friends yet and was struggling through a decision about what preschool class Primo should be put into. Should he be the youngest in the class or the oldest? Will he feel insecure about being the smallest boy or relish in being the biggest? While all these little things seem insignificant now, they were big decisions that were weighing heavily on me at the time.
I was coming out of a New Families meeting at the school when Sunshine came up to me and introduced herself. The next thing I knew, I was in tears, crying on the shoulder of a total stranger over a child she had never even met. She gave me a hug and we talked for a while and she told me that everything would be alright. And she was right. As it turned out, her son was in Primo's class and is the same child that currently resides on my couch.
From that night on, Sunshine and I have been the best of friends. Friendships in your 30s and 40s are complicated. It's hard to get to know people on a more-than-acquaintance basis. I find that as I get older, it's the friends I have known that longest that mean the most to me. Don't get me wrong, I have some amazing friends here in Anytown, friends that I would do anything for and that I trust completely. But it is a rare and special occasion that you meet someone that is so genuinely kind and happy that she brings sunshine into every room she enters.
So as I sit here in front of the computer and type, it is with tears in my eyes and a very heavy heart. She has a new and exciting journey ahead of her. And while I know that I will always be part of her life, it is a journey that will be moving forward without me.
So just for tonight, I will shift my focus away from this weekends endeavors and let myself feel sad -- just for a little while.
Peace and love.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
I Confess...
...that I really know nothing about blogging. The only blog I read (religiously) is Perez Hilton. But please don't judge me based on that. In fact, please don't judge me at all.
Who am I? Well, from the outside, I guess I'm a pretty typical, suburban mom with two boys, I'll call Primo and Segundo (Big Night fans rejoice!), a husband, I'll call him Mr. X and two very loud crazy dogs. We live in Anytown, CT just outside of New York City. My mom likes to say our town reminds her of a Richard Scarry children's book, where everything in the town looks just so. The lawns perfectly manicured, the mail trucks at the post office all perfectly in a row and the people perfectly coiffed. I had never really thought about Anytown this way until she pointed it out. Now it's all I can think about when I see those mail trucks.
Life is good in Anytown, why wouldn't it be? Every Saturday morning in the Fall in Anytown, mobs of high-strung, type-A parents swarm the soccer fields with their Venti lattes and L.L. Bean fleeces yelling and cheering for little Johnny to make a goal. And yelling and screaming when he does not. Anytown is a sports town. And God help you if you don't have a child that likes to play sports (like I do). During the week in Anytown, the husbands leave to catch an early train to NYC and come home after the children are in bed. The wives (myself included) spend the morning getting the children ready for school, then leap in their cars like gazelles to head off to the gym. I forgot to mention, every woman in Anytown is skinny (but more on that another day). And me, being of Italian decent (huge gasp!) am on a constant mission to keep up with the "Skinny's". You might think that I don't like living in Anytown, I do...sort of. I am a City girl, I love, love, love New York City. I lived there for 11 years prior to having Primo. I'd move back in a heartbeat, but Mr. X thinks Anytown is a much better place to raise children. Oh, and one more thing...
I'M A VEGAN!
Now, let me just say, that I have only been vegan since January of this year. It all began with a three week cleanse that I did to detox from all the crap I had eaten over the holidays. I followed Kathy Freston's Quantum Wellness cleanse. And for three weeks I gave up caffeine, alcohol, sugar, gluten, dairy and meat. Cold turkey (no pun intended). For years I had been an on-again, off-again vegetarian, giving up meat for months, sometimes even years on end, only to go back to it eventually. But this time, something just clicked. Giving up all the things that had been slowly poisoning my body was a real life-changing experience. I also began reading all I could about the industrial farming system and the horrible lives these poor animals lead only to be tortured and inhumanely slaughtered so that we, as Americans can enjoy that Big Mac. And then I look at my sweet dogs, who feel pain like we do and I think to myself, I could never eat you. So why then would I eat another animal? It just all began to make a whole lot of sense.
I watched Michael Pollen's Food Inc. to learn about where our food really comes from and how each of us has a responsibility to ourselves, our families and our beautiful planet. I read Fast Food Nation, Eating Animals and the Omnivores Dilemma. I tried to watch the documentary Earthlings, but was too devastated by what I saw and could only get through 30 minutes of it.
All that said, I am not going to try and convince you to give up meat and dairy. It is a personal choice and I have no judgements. My family eats meat and dairy, Primo and Segundo can't get enough milk, we go through a gallon every few days. But perhaps, I may write something here that will get you thinking, even if for just a moment, about where your food comes from and what it may be doing to your body.
Now, for the real reason I have started this blog. This weekend I am going to try something I have never done before. I am going to try a juice fast. I need to detox my body from a gluttonous vacation and regain my focus on health and fitness that has been waning over the summer. We purchased a juicer over the weekend and we've already been experimenting with lots of delicious new juices. So we'll see how it goes. They say you shouldn't tell a lot of people that you are doing it, but I think if a lot of people know, it will help me keep my focus. We'll see. Maybe I won't even last a day. Maybe I'll be so grumpy and irritable that Primo and Segundo will run screaming from the house. Maybe I'll faint in my Sunday morning yoga class. But maybe, just maybe I will be able to look inward and focus on the bigger picture of healing my body and clearing my mind. And maybe this journey will make me stronger, centered and more accepting. Maybe.
Who am I? Well, from the outside, I guess I'm a pretty typical, suburban mom with two boys, I'll call Primo and Segundo (Big Night fans rejoice!), a husband, I'll call him Mr. X and two very loud crazy dogs. We live in Anytown, CT just outside of New York City. My mom likes to say our town reminds her of a Richard Scarry children's book, where everything in the town looks just so. The lawns perfectly manicured, the mail trucks at the post office all perfectly in a row and the people perfectly coiffed. I had never really thought about Anytown this way until she pointed it out. Now it's all I can think about when I see those mail trucks.
Life is good in Anytown, why wouldn't it be? Every Saturday morning in the Fall in Anytown, mobs of high-strung, type-A parents swarm the soccer fields with their Venti lattes and L.L. Bean fleeces yelling and cheering for little Johnny to make a goal. And yelling and screaming when he does not. Anytown is a sports town. And God help you if you don't have a child that likes to play sports (like I do). During the week in Anytown, the husbands leave to catch an early train to NYC and come home after the children are in bed. The wives (myself included) spend the morning getting the children ready for school, then leap in their cars like gazelles to head off to the gym. I forgot to mention, every woman in Anytown is skinny (but more on that another day). And me, being of Italian decent (huge gasp!) am on a constant mission to keep up with the "Skinny's". You might think that I don't like living in Anytown, I do...sort of. I am a City girl, I love, love, love New York City. I lived there for 11 years prior to having Primo. I'd move back in a heartbeat, but Mr. X thinks Anytown is a much better place to raise children. Oh, and one more thing...
I'M A VEGAN!
Now, let me just say, that I have only been vegan since January of this year. It all began with a three week cleanse that I did to detox from all the crap I had eaten over the holidays. I followed Kathy Freston's Quantum Wellness cleanse. And for three weeks I gave up caffeine, alcohol, sugar, gluten, dairy and meat. Cold turkey (no pun intended). For years I had been an on-again, off-again vegetarian, giving up meat for months, sometimes even years on end, only to go back to it eventually. But this time, something just clicked. Giving up all the things that had been slowly poisoning my body was a real life-changing experience. I also began reading all I could about the industrial farming system and the horrible lives these poor animals lead only to be tortured and inhumanely slaughtered so that we, as Americans can enjoy that Big Mac. And then I look at my sweet dogs, who feel pain like we do and I think to myself, I could never eat you. So why then would I eat another animal? It just all began to make a whole lot of sense.
I watched Michael Pollen's Food Inc. to learn about where our food really comes from and how each of us has a responsibility to ourselves, our families and our beautiful planet. I read Fast Food Nation, Eating Animals and the Omnivores Dilemma. I tried to watch the documentary Earthlings, but was too devastated by what I saw and could only get through 30 minutes of it.
All that said, I am not going to try and convince you to give up meat and dairy. It is a personal choice and I have no judgements. My family eats meat and dairy, Primo and Segundo can't get enough milk, we go through a gallon every few days. But perhaps, I may write something here that will get you thinking, even if for just a moment, about where your food comes from and what it may be doing to your body.
Now, for the real reason I have started this blog. This weekend I am going to try something I have never done before. I am going to try a juice fast. I need to detox my body from a gluttonous vacation and regain my focus on health and fitness that has been waning over the summer. We purchased a juicer over the weekend and we've already been experimenting with lots of delicious new juices. So we'll see how it goes. They say you shouldn't tell a lot of people that you are doing it, but I think if a lot of people know, it will help me keep my focus. We'll see. Maybe I won't even last a day. Maybe I'll be so grumpy and irritable that Primo and Segundo will run screaming from the house. Maybe I'll faint in my Sunday morning yoga class. But maybe, just maybe I will be able to look inward and focus on the bigger picture of healing my body and clearing my mind. And maybe this journey will make me stronger, centered and more accepting. Maybe.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)