It's been four weeks since I landed in this Garden of Eatin' and holy guacamole, the changes! No more fire-breathing dragon heartburn. No more debilitating headaches. No more aches and pains. No more popping Ibuprofen like M&M's. No more constant fatigue or mid-afternoon-I-have-to-take-a-nap-right-now syndrome.
Oh, and did I mention, I've released 27 pounds? Adios. Goodbye. See ya! Twenty-seven pounds without counting points, calories, fat grams, or carbs. No weighing and measuring my food. In fact, I eat waaaaaaaay more now than I did when I was consuming a "normal" diet.
So what convinced me to make the transition from a Standard American Diet (SAD) to a primarily RAW diet of fresh fruits and veggies? Well, besides feeling crummy from all the aforementioned symptoms and a host of others, I happily stumbled upon a wonderful book at my local library.
Kris Carr's Crazy Sexy Cancer Tips tells the inspirational and insightful story of a young woman diagnosed with Stage IV cancer and her journey to living a fully-awake, vibrant, healthy life. A significant part of that journey has been her exploration and transition into a raw vegan lifestyle. The back of Kris' book is loaded with helpful resources and here's where my own exploration began.
I scoured dozens of websites and started reading anything I could get my hands on, either at the library or the neighborhood Borders Books. It was when I read The Raw Food Detox Diet by nutritionist Natalia Rose that I thought I can do this.
Natalia, who's eaten a 100% raw diet for over seven years, took about six years to get there. She outlines a simple program that anyone, regardless of their present state of health or what they typically eat, can follow to safely and gently transition to raw foods (plant foods not heated above 118 degrees).
I say safely, because raw foods contain an abundance of live enzymes that pull waste matter out of cells. The more raw foods you incorporate into your diet, the more nasty stuff pulled from your cells that's now occupying space elsewhere in your body – the bloodstream, kidneys, liver, colon. Garbage in, garbage out as the saying goes.
If your over-burdened system is not strong enough to push those toxins out of the body, you'll basically just poison yourself all over again, recycling those bad boys into the bloodstream. Kinda defeats the purpose of choosing to eat healthier, you know?
Which brings up a really important point: it's not what we put into our bodies that makes us healthy, but the removal of waste matter that brings us into a state of glowing health.
I was an overweight vegetarian for years. I know plenty of vegans who look anything but glowing, with their sallow complexions and dark under-eye circles. But if we're eating whole, live foods AND eliminating toxic waste from our body, our skin tone improves, chronic health problems disappear, excess weight is released, our energy levels increase, we gain greater mental clarity and become more centered emotionally. I can certainly attest to that, after only four weeks.
Okay, here's the scoop... I've basically embraced a diet of 85 to 90 percent raw foods, essentially eating "raw till dinner" every day. Before noon, I only consume fresh fruit. I pay attention to proper food combining (more on that in another post). If I am going to consume meat, poultry or fish, I do it at dinner so my digestive system has a whole night to deal with it and I always eat my raw veggies first.
So far, so good. I know lots of folks just pass through looking for a quick fix, but I have a feeling I may be taking up residence in Raw Food Land.
Oh, and did I mention, I've released 27 pounds? Adios. Goodbye. See ya! Twenty-seven pounds without counting points, calories, fat grams, or carbs. No weighing and measuring my food. In fact, I eat waaaaaaaay more now than I did when I was consuming a "normal" diet.
So what convinced me to make the transition from a Standard American Diet (SAD) to a primarily RAW diet of fresh fruits and veggies? Well, besides feeling crummy from all the aforementioned symptoms and a host of others, I happily stumbled upon a wonderful book at my local library.
Kris Carr's Crazy Sexy Cancer Tips tells the inspirational and insightful story of a young woman diagnosed with Stage IV cancer and her journey to living a fully-awake, vibrant, healthy life. A significant part of that journey has been her exploration and transition into a raw vegan lifestyle. The back of Kris' book is loaded with helpful resources and here's where my own exploration began.
I scoured dozens of websites and started reading anything I could get my hands on, either at the library or the neighborhood Borders Books. It was when I read The Raw Food Detox Diet by nutritionist Natalia Rose that I thought I can do this.
Natalia, who's eaten a 100% raw diet for over seven years, took about six years to get there. She outlines a simple program that anyone, regardless of their present state of health or what they typically eat, can follow to safely and gently transition to raw foods (plant foods not heated above 118 degrees).
I say safely, because raw foods contain an abundance of live enzymes that pull waste matter out of cells. The more raw foods you incorporate into your diet, the more nasty stuff pulled from your cells that's now occupying space elsewhere in your body – the bloodstream, kidneys, liver, colon. Garbage in, garbage out as the saying goes.
If your over-burdened system is not strong enough to push those toxins out of the body, you'll basically just poison yourself all over again, recycling those bad boys into the bloodstream. Kinda defeats the purpose of choosing to eat healthier, you know?
Which brings up a really important point: it's not what we put into our bodies that makes us healthy, but the removal of waste matter that brings us into a state of glowing health.
I was an overweight vegetarian for years. I know plenty of vegans who look anything but glowing, with their sallow complexions and dark under-eye circles. But if we're eating whole, live foods AND eliminating toxic waste from our body, our skin tone improves, chronic health problems disappear, excess weight is released, our energy levels increase, we gain greater mental clarity and become more centered emotionally. I can certainly attest to that, after only four weeks.
Okay, here's the scoop... I've basically embraced a diet of 85 to 90 percent raw foods, essentially eating "raw till dinner" every day. Before noon, I only consume fresh fruit. I pay attention to proper food combining (more on that in another post). If I am going to consume meat, poultry or fish, I do it at dinner so my digestive system has a whole night to deal with it and I always eat my raw veggies first.
So far, so good. I know lots of folks just pass through looking for a quick fix, but I have a feeling I may be taking up residence in Raw Food Land.
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