Hi again! Sorry for the quietude, but I've been busy reading, listening to teleseminars, and concentrating on my well-being during this first week of the Six-Week Detox. I've been keeping a mini-journal on a private forum for participants, and between that and reorganizing how I use my time, I'm a bit strapped for spare moments.

So, I'm going to copy (and lightly edit) a bit from my mini-journal there.

Today I decided to make an all-liquid day. I think I may break with that and have some oranges, because my body's been craving citrus a lot lately. I sat down and ate three whole grapefruits the other day for lunch/brunch. I love grapefruit! I was surprised I felt so satiated and satisfied having just grapefruit for brunch and lunch. (I don't tend to eat anything until at least mid-morning - my gut is much happier that way!)
Last night I made a very green smoothie, low (for me) on fruit and loaded with greens and green powders - chlorella, spirulina, wheatgrass, mullein leaf (good for mucus issues), and dulse. That's what I'll be having for lunch today. I also juiced last night and froze the jar for today - one bunch carrots with their tops, one large bunch parsley, the center 1/3-1/2 of a head of romaine, and two pears. Verrrry green for me, juice wise, but the pears made it still palatable.

I can tell I'm detoxing again - I'm getting mild acne on my face. >.< But being less strict - not doing 100% raw every day - means the detox is much more gentle than it was when I did 100% raw for a full week. I am not feeling so overwhelmed and angry, either. (Hm, sounds like I need to detox some anger... gee, big surprise! NOT!)

Another thing I've been craving and eating a ton of is green olives stuffed with whole garlic cloves. They are oily, but very delicious. I don't even really like green olives, but I love garlic and I know how tremendously healthy it is. I realized I was sitting and eating the equivalent of one or two heads of garlic in one sitting, and found myself thinking, "Huh, I bet my body needs and wants all that anti-microbial goodness."
(Plus they are so tasty!)
Grapefruit is the same way, especially the seeds - an anti-microbial power-house! Huh, I guess my body is trying to tell me something.

I'm going hiking in the woods with friends tomorrow, and we'll be playing games and chasing each other too, so it's going to be my super-high exercise day for the month. (I'm usually worn out for a couple days after these monthly game days!) But I think I'm going to go bowling and/or roller-skating for fun and exercise tonight and/or Sunday too.

I've been making a version of the "Leaky Gut Repair shake" - with hemp protein, a red-superfood powder, chia seeds, coconut, a banana, and about 20 oz. water - and it is not only giving me indigestion, it's making me a little constipated. The indigestion is probably from combining the banana and hemp - and I know better, but man, the shake tastes pretty gross without the banana to sweeten it. I'm going to try my shake again with stevia instead of the banana to sweeten it. I think it is the bad food combining that is upsetting my stomach, but if it is the hemp alone, I should know soon. I hope not, though, because I bought three canisters of hemp protein powder, and I know that stuff doesn't keep forever, even frozen.

The red powder contains lots of stuff, too much to list it all here, but it's lots of high-anti-oxidant red/blue/purple foods (like pomegranate, acai, purple cabbage, berries of many sorts, etc.), detox herbs (milk thistle, tumeric, aloe, ginger, etc.), and enzymes & probiotics. I saw it at Trader Joe's and it sounded just about perfect, so I decided to give it a try.

Well, wish me luck!

Days 4 & 5

I have made it 5 1/2 days at 100% raw.
This stuff is hard. But I made it... with my hubby's help again.
It's not really the food part, although that certainly takes a lot of adjusting...
The hardest part is all emotional!

I was definitely aware before that, under stress, I craved certain foods for entirely emotional reasons.

• "I've had a bad day, I need some chocolate."
• "I'm so tired, let's just order pizza."
• "Work has been so tough this week, I want breadsticks and nacho cheese."

Now, being so deliberate in my food choices, I am finding myself realizing how MUCH I reached for food for emotional reasons. Here are some of the more subtle examples I've noticed.

• "Hm, I'm so hungry, I don't have time for something complicated. Spaghetti sounds good."
• "I want to relax. I'll read a book and have hot cocoa."
• "I've had dinner but I'm still hungry. I'll have some gluten-free cookies, those are healthy, right?"

By themselves, spaghetti and a lot of other foods are pretty innocent. But something may be "healthy" or you may be "hungry," but that is NOT why you are eating it at all. And I did not realize before that these really were emotional cravings, habits, and addictions until now! Not only that, I did not realize how often I really truly thought I was hungry when it was just an emotional craving.

Over recent months, but strongly highlighted for me this past week, I've come to realize that what foods appeal to us - what sounds good for dinner, what we pick at a restaurant, our favorites foods - are rarely a matter of choice OR a matter of listening to what our body needs and wants. Mostly they are from

1. What we are used to.
2. Smells, tastes, and textures associated with (usually unconscious) positive memories
   
3. Addictions to things like wheat, cheese, sugar, etc.
   

I have tried hard for years to eat what my body was telling me it wanted me to eat, so that I could guess what I might be missing nutritionally, and make sure to get it. I realized a while ago that my cravings for sweets and salty foods were not good messages - they were addiction-inspired cravings! Now I am realizing, much to my chagrin, that though I thought I was aware of what my emotional cravings were, way more of the food I would choose is from emotional cravings than I thought! I'm pretty bowled over by it all, really. And it's overwhelming.
Honestly, I had this thought (perhaps a horrible one) that I couldn't be using food to hide from emotions, because if I was, surely I'd be eating way more sweets and I'd be much more overweight, right? I had it in my head that only *really fat* people had issues with using food as a major emotional block. And while I'm not as slim as I'd like or could be, and I have days where I feel fat, I know I'm not really fat. So I couldn't have any serious food-emotion problems... right?
I feel so dumb... it's very humbling.
And now I realize that if I was/am doing it... so are most people, probably!
I've seen Valya Boutenko call part of this the "Food Imprint." The food imprint happens when we are young. Whatever solids we are fed early on by our parents, our bodies associate with health, nutrition, and comfort. Evolutionarily speaking, this is so we learn to crave those foods that our parents - who have our best health in mind, of course - would naturally feed us. We crave foods suited to our environment and suitable to health.

Except, you know, most of us aren't getting weaned onto green smoothies and fresh ripe fruit. (With some inspiring exceptions!) In American and many other industrialized nations, we are mostly weaned onto over-processed crap.

Wow, it's just a lot for me to think about. And damn, day five was HARD. I was overtired from lack of sleep and stress and I just wanted bread and cookies, chocolate and tortilla chips...
And wheat, dairy and corn are all extra bad for me (and many people). They are some of the most common allergens out there, period. They are also in everything! (Which is why they are common allergens!) So it is hard to avoid them all and easy to crave them!


I think I'm detoxing hard. I have had a headache for a few days and intermittent nausea for three days. It is NO fun. I am debating whether I need to pull back a little and eat 90% raw for a while instead... but given all this emotional stuff I am uncovering, I want to be careful not to make that decision for the wrong reasons. I really need to listen to my body. Mostly I think my body is saying, "lay off all the fatty foods, yeesh!" I need to eat more fruit, I think.

Day 4:
~40oz green smoothie
mango
cauliflower
kombucha
chocolate mousse (this is so amazingly delicious and healthy too!)
flax crackers with nut pate
nori rolls with apple, avocado, lettuce, and raw honey (YUM!)

Day 5:
apple
~35oz. green smoothie
carrots
salad of mixed greens with sliced tomato and avocado
kombucha
herbal tea
collard wrap with carrot, zucchini, onion, avocado, kale, and portabello mushrooms

Lots of delicious food!

No matter where I go from here, I am proud of myself. Every day, every hour I stay 100% raw is another day/hour longer than I ever have before. And so even if I don't make it through a whole month at 100% raw, I've still accomplished something. I know I can eat way more raw food than I thought before!

100% Raw, day two

Oof! I have been a busy bee these past couple of days. We got a new (enormous!) TV as a Christmas gift, and since we had no place to put it, I took it not only to mean that we would have to figure out a new piece of furniture, but also as the domino I needed to get a ton of cleaning and rearranging done in the house. I put my hubby (on mandatory vacation this week) to work cleaning, and yesterday and today I've been hard at work myself. The transformation is really something! It's also given me something to keep my mind on besides food, which is on my mind a lot lately. Since I don't have the space to get bored, I'm not munching mindlessly, either, which is very good! Eating 100% raw, even at home, has been harder than I thought, not so much in terms of the actual eating... The biggest problem seems to be emotion-related cravings. They are powerful! My ego keeps getting in the way, trying to keep me fearful. Whenever you are reluctant to change, that's usually your ego, trying to maintain control - AKA the status quo. And the ego is wily and fights dirty! I keep catching my mind trying to play tricks on me - and so far, I'm not buying it!
Part of the issue is that I had all sorts of healthy, cooked leftovers sitting around from a few days ago, and I really, really hate seeing food wasted. At all. I have been known on many occasions to stuff myself sick rather than see food thrown away - even if it is not very good food. Emotionally, I can't stand waste, especially of good food.
Fortunately, I have both a husband and a roommate who are less, shall we say, selective about their food choices than I am, so I don't have to see delicious, mostly-healthy cooked foods go to waste. Given my hatred of food-wasting, it would surely and sorely tempt me to eat the food just to make sure it is not wasted!

Here's what I've been eating the last couple of days:

Day 1:
2 big glasses green smoothie
chunks of pineapple
broccoli and cauliflower pieces with Kristen's (of Kristen's Raw) Cheezy hemp nacho sauce
Berry/nut soup (from Alissa Cohen's Living on Live Food - a fantastic book!)
zucchini noodles with nut-based alfredo (also from Living on Live Food)
Kristen's Holiday Chia Pudding

Day 2:
fresh juice - carrot, apple, parsley, and carrot greens
banana
2 1/2 glasses green smoothie
raw chocolate mousse (ridiculously easy and so amazingly delicious)
bowl of Go Raw chocolate granola

I love my green smoothies! I start with a banana or two, a handful of greens, and some water, and then add whatever other fruit I feel like that day such as blueberries, and usually some chlorella for good measure. I make about 40-50 oz at once and can easily drink the whole thing. They are delicious, nutritious, and filling. The bananas make it all sweet and somewhat creamy.
For more info on green smoothies, check out Green for Life, the book that brought green smoothies to the world. I have been drinking these for months, and if there is only one suggestion I would take to the masses from the raw foods movement, it would be green smoothies!

Don't just survive... Thrive!

I realize it's been quite a while since my last post. The truth is, I've had quite a lot of big, big stuff on my mind. I've done a good bit of writing in my person, paper journal, but I have been doing a lot of reading.
As you can see from the sidebar, the number of blogs I'm reading regularly has shot up. Probably too many, especially when you add in things like Facebook, Twitter, and LiveJournal, all of which I am still (theoretically) reading too, but only on occasion. Mostly, I am reading a lot of raw foods, sustainability, and crafting blogs, as that is where my mind is focused lately - internally, but looking to others for inspiration and ideas.

I have decided to go 100% raw on Jan. 1.

I have been adding more raw foods to my diet over the last six months and have seen some good results. My skin does better when I am eating a good mix of raw foods. Cooked food gives me headaches and brain-fog. Also, when I eat raw, I feel light, energized, happy, and optimistic. When I eat cooked food, I find myself becoming lethargic, pessimistic, listless, bored, and depressed. I can see this effect within a couple hours (or less) of eating.

I envision the person I want to be, the person I think I am inside the fatigue, headaches, eczema, depression, poor concentration, aches and pains, breathing trouble, etc.... And that person is healthy, happy, full of energy and love, and aglow with life. Everything I read about eating a raw vegan diet leads me to believe that this diet can help me manifest the life I want. My experience with eating more raw foods in my diet has been almost uniformly good. The only problem I have run into is how easy it is to pig out on rich, delicious raw desserts, and my digestion is too weak to handle that much fat at once. I now realize I need to take systemic enzymes before consuming rich dishes like that!

My cravings for greens, mentioned in an earlier post, comes and goes, but the healthier I eat, the more I find I want healthy food.
As an example:
Mexican food was a staple growing up with my family. I have many positive memories of it as it is one of my parents' favorite kinds of foods and eating out was about the only time we all ate together, so Mexican food is comforting to me. So, the other night, I went out for Mexican food. I had been craving it intensely and I thought it would be a good thing to satiate before jumping into raw foods so that I wouldn't keep thinking about it.
And... it was really disappointing.
All that thick cheese, heavy beans, corn... ugh. It didn't taste as good as I remember, and it made me feel heavy, sluggish, and achey before I was even done eating. But someone else's unwanted side of guacamole and lettuce? My mouth watered just looking at it, and I ate as much as I could scavenge from around the disgusting pile of sour cream. Yum. It was far from the best guac I've ever had, but it was what I wanted.

So, I've decided to give 100% raw a try. I have a one-month meal plan, a ton of recipes, and lots of books and blogs to keep me inspired. I figure I can do one month and see how I feel and what I want to do from there.
There are so many reasons I want to do this. My health is the primary one, but there are so many others... I want to be happy, and I want to be the best person I can be, not just for myself, but for every member of my family and friends, present and future. I want to be someone I can be proud of and that my family and friends can be proud of. That means taking the best possible care of my health that I can. I am done just surviving, just slogging through the work day to go home and flop down exhausted. I'm tired of going through things either half-asleep or so preoccupied I wonder where each month, each year has gone.
I want to be fully ALIVE. I want to THRIVE.

Love,


Kasi

Still craving greens!

I am still craving greens! I can't get over this, it's weird. Tuesday and Wednesday I had salad for lunch AND a green smoothie once I got home, and I want more!

A couple weeks ago I sat in a Wendy's as a couple friends were eating. Since we were there and I was hungry and craving salt, I decided to get french fries. As I sat and looked around, I had the sudden, terrible revelation that I was surrounded by death. From the greasy french fries we shared and the chicken nuggets and burgers they ate that came from tortured animals raised in unsanitary factories, to the tons of plastic for windows, seats, ads, trash cans and the disposable, single-serving everything, to the overweight customers killing themselves with so-called "food"... Death. There was death everywhere. It was like one of those movies where suddenly the character realizes that it's all an illusion and suddenly sees the broken lights, rotten wood, and sunken skull-like faces behind everything and every face around them that looked so bright and normal a second ago.
I asked myself, then, what if I decided to make choices that affirmed life, in every decision I made? What food I eat, whether or not to buy something, what materials to use in my garden and house, even what hobbies I have and how I spend my time.
What if, every day, when faced with a decision I asked myself the simple question, "Is this life-affirming?"
And if the answer is no, then don't buy/eat/do that.
Choose the most life-affirming option in every decision you make.

I don't think it's a coincidence that my cravings for wheat products have dropped dramatically recently. I look at them and think, "My cravings are just a manifestation of emotional need - I should deal with the source, not the symptoms" and "This isn't nuturing to me, it will hurt me. Do I really want to eat something that will leave me hurting for far longer than it would give me pleasure?"

I am tackling the great (and difficult) emotional work and realizing that there is no wonder I was failing to improve my health the whole time.
-I could not access or make progress on locked-up emotional problems without moving and exercising my body.
-I could not exercise without tools and support in place to deal with the intense emotions released.
-I could not eat healthily because of emotional needs connected to food.
-I could not feel stable and happy emotionally because I ate food almost every day that made me subtly sick and ill.
-I could not exercise without pain when my body was full of toxins from bad foods.
-I did not have the energy for exercise when eating unhealthy foods, and without the invigoration of exercise, I had no energy to take the time to prepare healthy foods.

Every problem fed into one another. Buddhists have a word for this that translates approximately as the "interdependent co-arising" of phenomena.
It seemed so helpless, so pointless, doing little things when each little thing does so little toward improving the big picture of my health. But it's all connected through feedback loops, so a little healthier food means better emotional processing and more energy; more energy for exercise means less joint pain and sounder sleep; therapy for emotional issues gives the strength to make healthier food choices... etc. I have so far to go but after this long the progress I am seeing feels so wonderful!
And hard! Wow, this is exhilerating but also hard work! I am so grateful for all the ways I am blessed - especially, this week, all the loving support I am receiving from my husband.

Until next time, love and light,
Kasi