New perspective-new tools

So with the assistance of my new iPad I have found all of these podcasts on raw and live food. WAY fun to hear all the perspectives. I had learned about raw food through limited sources and held myself to a dogmatic standard based on some od those limited sources. How fun to get other perspectives. One of the podcasts was about getting real about raw. It talked about all the dogma around raw food when in actuality it is just a different fun technology for living. Raw food is just a tool not a religion. It's not wrong or right and very few are 100% raw all the time. Most go in and out and experiment and play. It talked about it being fun. Yup, that is what I needed. I find rawkin so much fun and so exciting. I love to share the yummy discoveries and how it makes me feel. I am excited to separate out this sort of self imposed dogma I had thinking I had to live up to some standard. Imagine me a perfectionist (those who know me know how sarcastic that is because I am my own worst critic). What would it be like to just have fun?! I'm so excited to have sprouting almonds in my kitchen again. (I love those). I am so excited to have flax crackers in the dehydrator again thinking of the variety of yummy foods I get to top them with. I am so sick of the inflammation in my body and the fatigue and groggy fog. I am so looking forward to the fun of rawkin. Glad I found more resources to affirm my lighter spirit in this journey. Found a recipe for chocolate bomb too-way cool!

Good News Bad News

Well, it's been awhile. I have my reasons I swear. On the timeline, some horrible things happened that I won't disclose but suffice it to say I have experienced the hardest year of my entire life. On top of my personal challenges I found out that my children are horribly allergic to nuts of almost all kinds. Apparently going raw with my kiddos was like poison and making all of their health issues worse. We stopped raw kin and sought extensive medical care. In that time through battling depression and stress I tried the HCG diet to battle the weight I was gaining. I have to say the diet is somewhat successful except that it made me extremely loathing of food and paranoid about the number on the scale. I lost for awhile but eventually the depression and stress won the pounds right back on. Now that my children have been properly diagnosed and are on the path to doing better I am beginning to come to terms with my own needs.

So, my biggest problem seems to be that I put my own needs last. I know it is a common problem with Mom's around the world. I guess the gift in my children's issues are that they are pretty extreme and I can't make it better by food or natural means at the moment. So it singles me out in a way. I stand alone. They have to eat specific foods that I do not like so it leaves me on the sidelines. I have tried eating cheap, raman noodles, potatoes, etc but it makes me feel horrible. I tried frozen meals to save on time but they make me feel groggy. I tried eating on the fly in a sort of Kerouac way of whatever comes to me I will eat but it ended up being junk. Yesterday I sat here feeling uncomfortable in my body. I don't hate my body, I bless its journey and how it works so hard to take care of me, but I feel awful. I can feel the food in me like rocks and mud. every time I eat it weighs me down. A bagel for breakfast makes me feel cloudy headed. I try different forms of protein and they all make me feel gross and heavy, they don't digest well, they slow me down. I keep hoping to find a food or a vitamin that actually gives me energy. I become desperate for energy turning to caffeine and sugar and anything that perks me up even if for just a short time. Then it dawns on me as I sit in my rotting gut, when I ate raw I felt good and I had energy. I may not have had excess energy but the food I ate did not sit in me like an anchor.

So I have decided to venture back out on my own into raw food. I'm gonna do it just for me. Imagine that, selfishly making myself feel better. I'm gonna take time to just take care of myself and I can't bring my kids into it. I can't delude myself with saying it is for them and using them to keep me on track. I have to commit to doing something that makes me feel good. I have started reading my raw food books again. I am getting excited to feel better with every bite. I know there will be ups and downs but the shift of working to just feel better is all new for me. I am good at self sabotage and I am easily swayed by the pressure of the SAD diet as it is hammered into our culture. I don't know how this will go but I am stepping back out onto a new edge, a new path hoping to feel better. I am hoping to find energy. I am hoping to stop sinking. I am hoping that as my kids grow up and their needs change, I learn to care for myself. I will let this blog know how it goes.