It feels good to feel great

I have to make an honest confession -

Fruit stall in a market in Barcelona, Spain.
Image via Wikipedia

But first I want to share a little about myself and why I feel so strongly about my “diet discovery”.

When I was younger I ate whatever I wanted to and my weight was never an issue.  I was active and naturally thin without much thought about diet or nutrition.

And I certainly didn’t give any thought to what my diet or lack of nutrition would mean later in my life.

As I approached age 30 things began to change for me.  I’d always been prone to colds and mood swings but that’s just life.  “That’s just Amy.”  Isn’t it?

At a certain point I began to feel worse and worse physically – and mentally.  My body began to ache, I had regular headaches, my energy levels were sporadic and I was what a lot of people would call manic-depressive.

If you’ve never felt what I’ve felt that you might not understand what I mean when I say that I felt like an old woman in a young woman’s body.

Of course, since weight wasn’t an issue at that point diet wasn’t a concern for me.

I mean, only people who need to lose weight go on diets, right?

It could be fortunate that my poor diet, loaded with junk food, began to put weight on me that I’d never seen before.  It could be that saved my life.

Since I’d always been relatively thin my weight gain was a shock to family and friends (not to mention my husband).  This just didn’t fit with my picture of “Amy”.

There were fad diets that seemed like obvious fad diets to me, but I wanted to research them further.  I know there’s a ridiculous amount of hype and marketing that goes into the whole “weight loss” industry.

I wanted to know why a diet would work for some people and not others.  And as I read the research my eyes began to open to the fact that my weight gain was really my body’s final warning signal.  After all these years of feeling physically lousy my body simply could not stay ahead of all the garbage I was putting into my body.

Why We Acquire Love Handles – And Why Most Diets Can’t Possibly Make Them Go Away . . .

In short, what I learned is that weight gain is partly a way for the body to store excess calories for future use – a survival mechanism.

But here’s what I learned that really shocked me; weight gain can also be caused by the body being unable to process toxins at the rate we put them into our body.  As a result those toxins, like excess calories, also get stored for later processing – another survival mechanism.

Your body needs to get this stuff out but if it can’t then it needs to store it until it can catch up with the workload.

Which explains why some of the friends I’ve known who are absolute workout fanatics could never get rid of that gut.  It’s not just excess calories – it’s also excess toxic waste.

I’ve gotten a little ahead of myself, but I decided that I wasn’t going to just listen to marketing hype.  I wanted to meet people who were successful in losing weight.  And I also wanted to meet people who seemed to be not just fit, but also who had a glow about them and endless energy.

Those last two things I’d been lacking and they were just as important to me as being thin again.

I tried a number of diets in the process.

  • The Makers Diet
  • Weight Watchers
  • A vegetarian diet
  • Eat Right For Your Blood Type
  • The Macrobiotic Diet
  • Jenny Craig

The list goes on.  How many diets have you tried?

Each diet seemed to provide something positive but I still didn’t feel like I hoped was possible.  I lost a little weight with most except on the Maker’s Diet which really packed on the pounds, even if it did taste great!  I knew that meat and potatoes drowned in butter sounded way too good to be true.

The irony in all of this is that while my head was trying to figure out what to do, my body was telling me something all along.

Occasionally I would just absolutely CRAVE a carrot juice.  And although through all of these diets I had the hardest time eating my greens, I found that I really loved an occasional green juice from the local health food store.

As I continued on my quest for the ultimate feel good, look good diet, I came across a completely crazy sounding diet -

The Raw Food diet.

Now, I know the reactions I’ve received from friends over the years.  They range from mild curiosity to outright hostility.  I’ve learned that there really is something more controversial and hair raising than politics and religion – it’s what people eat.

You can believe that I have heard every possible excuse about why a raw food diet is wrong – B12 deficiency, food poisoning,  my stomach can’t handle raw food, protein deficiency, etc, etc, etc.

You must do your own research on all of the above to discover it’s a load of bunk.

But, what’s a great diet shake company to do when everyone knows all they need to do to achieve optimal health is just eat God’s creations as he created them for us to eat.

I know, unbelievable but true.

Isn’t it amazing that people spend billions of dollars per year on supplements when those supplements come pre-packaged in every apple, cashew and head of lettuce?

Or how about protein, because I *love* this argument.  A raw food diet has no protein in it.

Really?  The largest, strongest land animals on the planet all happen to be . . . vegetarian, raw foodists!

OK, so I’m not against meat if you have that impression.  I do eat meat on occasion although I admit that I don’t feel real good about it (or even good after eating it because it really makes a mess of my digestive system).

Anyway, if you really want to feel 1000% better, heal your body, improve your skin and hair, improve your brain function and so much more (like losing weight, fast), then I cannot recommend a diet that consists almost exclusively of raw fruits and vegetables more highly.

It’s possible you might be expecting this is where I try to sell you something.

Sorry, no diet plans for sale – yet!  :-)

I will tell you one thing though that is indispensable around the Skene household and that’s our blender.

We own a food dehydrator that we rarely use anymore.  And we also own a Champion juicer, which we love but we use less and less as our family has grown.  Not because we don’t love juices (kids too) but because of the expense and waste.  I just have a hard time throwing away fiber from the foods when I know it’s something our bodies need.

Our blender -

For years we’ve used a $50 Oester.  We’ve really gotten our monies worth out of that little champ.

A lot of raw foodists talk about their fancy blenders and I just couldn’t justify spending hundreds of dollars on a blender.

But you know, there are times in life when you discover something and you think “Why didn’t I do this SOOOOO long ago?!”

Let me tell you, our Vita-mix blender is not “just” a blender.  This thing is industrial strength and makes such an amazing difference in the food you prepare that you won’t believe it.

I like pineapple and we used to use pineapple in our smoothies a lot.  The problem though was the texture was awful – it was drinking a cup full of hair.  Truly just yucky.  Stringy, pulpy – yuck.

Same with things like blackberries and raspberries – love the taste but hated the little seeds.

With a Vita-mix, and I really couldn’t appreciate it until I tried it, all that is history.  Seriously, this blender makes the toughest things like pineapple totally smooth.

And all those berry seeds?  Blackberries, raspberries, strawberries – if you blend long enough they’re gone.  You get the nutritional goodness of them without the grit and annoyance.

It’s beautiful.  And I haven’t even touched the surface of what you can do with this machine.  I know consider it some of the best money I’ve ever spent on anything.  Because if you enjoy what you’re eating then you’re going to eat more of it – you’re going to stick with this diet.  And the outcome is something you simply MUST experience for yourself.  You must.  You’ll feel so great you just can’t even imagine – you’ll sell yourself on the benefits of it.

If you’re interested in a Vita-mix, I don’t sell them but I can help you get free shipping and handling when you order one from the company.  Here’s a link to their site:  Vita-mix

Or, if you prefer you can phone in your order at 1-800-848-2649.  To get free standard shipping ($25US/$35CN) just mention this code:  *** 06-004934 ***

*** 06-004934 ***
GET FREE STANDARD SHIPPING ($25US/$35CN)
USE ABOVE CODE
1-800-848-2649

If you have any questions or comments, please let me know.

Here’s to looking and feeling your best!

Amy

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