I wish I could post this with a 'really bad word' as the heading!

I really wanted to call this post "FUCK!!!!!" 

But I really wasn't sure how that would go over.

So I sweetened it up a little...

Sitting here, right now;  I am overwhelmed.

By what you may be asking?

Well, nothing in particular.  Except the pressure I am putting on myself.

That's all.

The pressure of finding something interesting and delicious to 'uncook' for dinner.

I have recently gone on a 'we need to eat more raw/vegetarian type foods' in the name of my husbands good health and today, I just don't feel like I have the energy to even Google a good recipe!

Plus, all of the good recipes on Google (the ones with the pretty pictures) require sprouted this and sprouted that and other things that I can't even pronounce.  And my black bean & chick pea sprouts aren't ready yet!

Fuck Fuck Fuckety Fuck! ACK!

I want to keep the momentum of this new food revolution going!  I really really really want to succeed...  It's been great to not have to cook anything over the past week (since I really don't enjoy cooking, as is clear by the wilted veggies and burnt meat I serve to my family each night),  it's super easy to throw a few veggies and fruits together in a salad or experimental casserole and hubby is already noticing a change in his body since beginning this endeavour.

As much as I want to keep it going and be successful, it would be so much easier to just throw a box of something on the stove and cook it into oblivion.  For old times sake!

I'm having trouble with the variety.  Presenting something new and exciting at each family meal.

I can see why all the raw vegan websites talk about how difficult it is to maintain this lifestyle and how most people will fail.  I can see my raw food plane going down already and we've only been in flight for a week!

This healthy raw diet is challenging me to change all of my beliefs about how food should be eaten and why.  It's challenging my entire family for that matter (the men think I'm off my rocker - they could be onto something there!) to try new things and have faith that we won't starve just because there isn't KD in the pantry!

In fact, what may be the hardest part about this experience (besides the finding of easy recipes to provide variety) is that the kids are too used to having 'ready to eat' food stocked on our shelves and right now, there isn't any.  There is nothing for them to open up and chew on or microwave.  There's no fast food in this house and it's driving them just as mad as not having a recipe for tonights dinner is driving me!

It's a house of madness.

Watching my 14 year old come into the kitchen, whip open the pantry door and scream "there's nothing to eat in this house"', reminds me of a drug addict going through withdrawals.  I swear if I looked more closely at the boy he'd be shaking uncontrollably.  I reminded him of the plethora of fruits and veggies in the refrigerator and he came back with "it's all just ingredients!  There's nothing to just EAT"

{laugh}

And therein lies the problem....  for all of us! 

A Raw Experiment

About a month ago I decided to omit the bulk of the wheat products I had been consuming from my daily diet.

I had been experiencing some discomfort in my digestive system that had me making way too many bathroom visits during the day and night. I was constantly fatigued and irritable. I couldn't focus on anything for long periods of time and found myself "zoning out" on a regular basis.

I also made the decision to eat as much raw food as possible throughout the day. Eating only a cooked meal at dinnertime (hubby likes his food cooked and I am too lazy to prepare more than one meal).

I was participating in this new way of eating for about 2 weeks when we left for vacation.

While vacationing we ate regular vacation type meals, lots of hamburgers, hotdogs and processed stuff (it's easier to travel with), since we don't have a proper refrigerator there isn't much raw food coming into camp with us as it seems to spoil quickly for some reason.

I packed what I could to get me through at least the first couple of days, sliced pineapple, apples, tomatoes, red peppers. Once that supply was exhausted however I was without raw food, save for the odd banana.

In the second week of the vacation I noticed I had begun feeling fatigued again, no amount of sleeping in and going to bed early was helping it.

When we returned home my body was such a mess. My stomach gurgled endlessly, and the picture of a highway came to mind, with traffic jams stretching the length of my intestines. People angrily shouting and shooting the finger and those ahead of them. It sounds silly and this is exactly how my stomach felt!

My pants weren't fitting me because the bloating had returned and again I was spending the entire night in the bathroom, popping Pepto Bismol tablets just to get some relief so I could sleep.

The next day I headed to the grocery store and loaded my cart with fresh fruits and vegetables.

It is really interesting when you have the opportunity to try something new and then experience living without it. To be able to see the contrast in how my body was behaving on the raw food and then with out it was a great gift and I recognized immediately what my body was asking of me.

It is very clear to me that my daily diet and the health of my body is no longer something I can compromise.

Witnessing the mess that my digestive system becomes when I consume unhealthy foods was a real eye opener. My father died of colorectal cancer. The odds are high that I will end up with the same fate. He didn't eat a very healthy diet and I can remember him having digestive difficulties similar to my own when I was a child.

Do I think I can change this for myself?

I absolutely know I can change this for myself. I have seen the difference in the feeling of my body when I consume raw foods and no wheat. I feel lighter, I am free from bloating and excessive gas sitting in my digestive tract, I have way more energy and I think more clearly.

On the metaphysical side, I see a great increase in my capacity to hear my intuitive guidance and my spiritual sight increases.

The other thing I noticed is that when I eat unhealthily I seem to develop black spots floating in my vision. When I returned to the raw food those spots disappeared. There are most likely many more things happening in my body that I can't see the results of at the moment, the prospect of that is exciting.

Most people would consider all of this a no brainer really. It makes perfect sense that a diet rich in living vegetables and fruits would make you feel more alive.

However, as a busy Mom of 3, Wife and Business woman I easily wandered into the path of whatever is easiest and most satisfying in the way of food. Whatever gets the troops fed, whatever they will actually eat is what I will prepare and happily.

How often do we stop and equate how we are feeling with what we are eating? We will however blame our life circumstances on how we are feeling. And most often the more stress we have the more junk we eat and the more junk we eat the more stress we have. They feed eachother and grow into something bigger than we can handle, showing up as chronic disease's in our bodies.

Maybe you experience the same symptoms as I did, maybe you've been to the doctor, poked and prodded and given a prescription to take care of the issue only to find you develop a host of other symptoms that would require more medication to control.

Maybe you just need an apple a day?