Completed Day 9 of my 10 Day Challenge!!

well... tonight ends 9 days on nearly 100% raw food... i ate cooked beans occasionally... and saturday, although i continue to tell myself that this is about total health and not about weight loss, i got on the scale and it said 349.5 lbs... wow... like i said before, who in there right mind would be excited to be 349.5 lbs????... anyone who's been 350 or more... lol... as of saturday morning, i have released a total of 24.5 lbs!!!... thank you Lord!!!... my blood pressure has remained normal and my morning blood glucose levels continue to fall... they are STILL not normal at this point, but they are on there way to being normal... i have zero cravings now and i'm feeling great... i'm still not sure what i'm going to do for the holidays and i have people coming over this weekend for a potluck... so i'm going to have to devise a plan that i can stick with... playing it by ear in the past hasn't worked as well as i would have liked it to... i have to come up with something quick... i think i'll prepare some raw food for myself and eat it, and even if i decide to eat regular food i'll eat my raw stuf first so that i won't be hungry... maybe i'll even pass on the cooked stuff... who knows... i don't want this to be a religion, but i do feel sooooo much better when i'm eating this way... *sigh*... anyway, tomorrow begins day 10 and i will have officially completed the challenge by this time tomorrow... i'm so on the fence with this... Lord, please help me as i continue on my journey...

Feeling Great! :)

so i'm on day four of my extremely high raw 10 day extravaganza and i'm feeling fabulous... i've been making some awesome meals... yesterday i had green peas sprouts salad with tomato and avocados chopped up, tossed with sea salt, dried crushed basil, olive oil and some balsalmic vinegar... don't know if the vinegar is 100% raw or not, but this is not a religion for me... lol... the day before i made an awesome green pea salad with fabulous creamy sauce made from cashews... i was licking the "batter" after making the creamy sauce... had NO idea it was going to taste that good... i'm loving the healthy feelings, increased energy... it's not rocket science... every time i do this i feel better almost immediately (at least by day 3)... anyway, i'm doing probably around 90 to 95% raw since i'm incorporating some cooked legumes into my plan... but that doesn't happen every day (only had it once so far)... most days i'm at 100%... we shall see how i do... i'm still trying to decide if i'll keep going after the 10 days are up... i don't know yet... we shall see... i need a made up mind... my desire is to have the desire to do this for at least 6 months... i'm hoping that i can make it through the holidays without going on some crazy binge... Lord, help me...

One Successful Day!

so yesterday, i did well... it was a high raw day... actually it was a 100% raw day, but just not 100% organic... so i count it as a major success... i actually gathered up all the contraband items in my pantry (mini candy bars, chewy candies, etc) and carried them into the office... lol... handed them over to the office staff and made their day... i did offer them a taste of my raw food for the day as well, but they declined... lol... i knew they would, but it helped me feel less guilty about giving them that garbage... i felt like i'd offered them a choice... it's so sad really... anyway, in just one day most aches and pains are gone and any body part that had begun to swell has gone back down to normal... amazing... thank you Lord for helping me complete yesterday successfully... now i NEED your help for THIS day...

i'm still struggling with deciding whether to "allow" myself cooked food on the weekends and/or during the holidays... i don't know yet what i'm going to do... but for at least 10 days i want to be 100% raw... let me just stick with the here and the now and deal with all that other stuff later... i'm soooo grateful :)

The Journey Begins Yet Again...

ok... so the last time i posted i had done an entire day 100% raw... i continued on the path for 6 days and attended a phenomenal conference which helped me focus on my journey... or at least i thought it did... but that evening (the 10th) i attended a birthday party at mitchell's ocean club... it was fabulous and i decided that a beefsteak tomato salad and ginger salmon with mushrooms was a good healthy choice... it was awesome... but it was cooked... and the sauce on the salmon had sugar and butter and salt in it... the perfect combination of sugar/fat/salt to send me OFF the wagon... i hung on for about 2 or 3 days still doing raw, but began adding cooked foods like cabbage and greens and by thursday last week i was doing 100% COOKED food... in addition to this, i had a visit with my doctor on that same thursday to review my blood work... my blood pressure and all other labs were normal EXCEPT my blood sugar (182 she said)... she wanted to start me on some meds, but i asked her to give me 3 to 4 months and i'd let her do an HA1c test at that time... she agreed... needless to say i went home and made some seriously bad choices... i decided to have my own personal "farewell to toxic food" extended binge party... i went to the grocery store and bought WHITE bread (i don't even keep bread in my house anymore)... i bought turkey slices and egg salad... and i bought DIET root beer... lol... the insanity of it all cracks me up... but it's sooo sad really... i bought all kinds of soups--lentil, vegetable, split pea, chili (gotta have fiber to move the garbage along quickly of course LOL)... and 0h yeah... i also bought ORGANIC beef hot dogs... lol... over the last 4 or 5 days i consumed almost everything i bought and topped it off daily with the chewy candies and mini mars/snickers bars i'd bought a few weeks ago... but today i'm taking all the left over candy/candy bars to the office and giving them away... i'm throwing away any crap left from my cooked and seriously unhealthy food binge... i feel the negative impact from just 4 or 5 days of craziness... and now i have a support group of people who went to the same conference i went to who are going to start a 10 day raw challenge today... so i'm getting on board and beginning this journey yet again... Lord, please give me the power and the discipline i need to succeed on this journey... i need all the prayer i can get... i didn't realize what a roller coaster ride this journey was going to be... i want to and need to succeed at this... i want t0 and need to be able to achieve the TOTAL health that God intended for me to have... i want to feel ALIVE again... ok... so here i go... YET AGAIN!

100% Raw Day :)

ok... so today was my first 100% raw day in a long while... i'm going to sleep in a few minutes so i don't mess it up... lol... had a green fruit smoothie and fresh fruit for breakfast and lunch, then tonight i got home and made some "not tuna" and ate it wrapped in collard leaves... then for dessert i made a whole fruit sorbet which was awesome... i feel good... doing ok... my friends funeral is tomorrow and i've been dealing with my feelings and making much better food choices... i've fallen down, but i'm getting back up on the wagon... again... never give up... like the theme for the oprah show today, i won't stop believing... with God's help, i CAN do this...

Feeling sad...

this morning my friend lost the battle with breast cancer... i'm filled with sadness at a life cut short... she will be missed...

Still Hanging In There...

so how am i doing?... not so great... the month of september has been a rough one... i'm not complaining, not making excuses... simply documenting this journey i'm on... i'm so absolutely and totally convinced that raw food is right for me, but i'm struggling right now to even keep up my 80% raw food lifestyle... i have a good friend fighting breast cancer and these last few months were really rough... last week she coded, but was revived... this week she is expected to --- i can't say the word... i'm still praying and hoping for a miracle, but i'm asking God for the ability to deal with this whatever the outcome... food has always been my drug of choice... and these last few months i've been overdosing... i'm grateful that i've been at least able to keep up with my green juicing and although i have been making REALLY BAD CHOICES (like sugar filled snacks and candy), i've been able to hold back at least a little... i haven't had a full out binge so i know God is here helping me... and just when i thought i was going to lose my momentum, i found a book and dvd both called "raw food made easy" by jennifer cornbleet which is helping me tremendously... additionally God set up a conference JUST FOR ME (isn't He an awesome God?)!!!... it's taking place in a week and a half on october 10th... there will be a raw food chef there and i'm so excited about it i feel like a kid waiting for christmas... in the midst of this storm, God is here and i'm hanging on to Him... can't do anything by myself... praying for my friend and her family... feeling really really sad... i don't want her to suffer, but selfishly, i don't want her to go either... i know i'll see her again either here or.... i'm rambling... need to focus... blood pressure is holding steady and normal without meds... blood sugar is still high, but lower today than it has been over the last two weeks... if i can't get it under control within the next two weeks i'll have to start taking some meds to lower it... this minute it's 137 but it was up to 305 at one point this week!!!... i'd eaten a bunch of mini candy bars and crazy desserts on saturday at a potluck acting like i didn't have a problem at all... as much as food is my drug of choice, as in illicit drug use, i have also chosen to make food my drug of choice, as in medicinal healing use... i'm just having a little difficulty right now... but i feel a change coming... i've been inspired to continue my journey... to get back up again... get back up again... i won't turn back... i've come too far and i feel too good... did i mention that i'm not getting back on the scale for a while??... maybe i didn't.. well, after losing nearly 20 lbs. in the first two months of this journey, i had a 2 lb. set back and felt soooo discouraged that i made a decision... when i started this journey, it was supposed to be about health and my focus was NOT supposed to be about numbers on the scale... but i got caught up in the weightloss and my focus began to shift... so when i gained 2 lbs i had a moment where i felt like what i was doing was a total waste of time and for a fleeting moment i wanted to just quit... but then i reminded myself that this is NOT about weight for me... this journey is about HEALTH... and IF a byproduct of my healthy choices results in my losing weight, then so be it... but regardless of what a scale says, i'm continuing on my journey... my clothes definitely are saying that i'm taking up less space in the world than i was 4 months ago... lol... i even had a couple people tell me to get real and buy some new clothes... lol... not yet... i'll just stop wearing the ones that are falling off me now... anyway, this has been such a rambling post... can't stop thinking about my friend... guess i'll stop rambling now and go wipe my tears away... WAIT!... i just had a breakthrough... when i'm crying, i don't eat or feel hungry... when i DON'T allow myself to feel, i eat irrationally... guess it's ok to cry... lol... maybe i'll actually deal with how i'm really feeling today...