Know Any Literary Animal Lovers?
Hi there PureJeevan readers! We wanted to let you know that Jim's new novel CHROO is available on Amazon. It's a crazy adventure involving a billionaire heiress, her Chihuahua BFF ("Chroo") and a host of human and animal characters. Find out more on Amazon! Here are some links:
Below, you will find a copy of the journal I kept during my transition into, and my first year of, a 100% raw, vegan diet. Some of it is quite personal, but I still wanted to share it with all of you. We may never meet in person, but I feel we are all connected in this world.I want to share my story with you, in hopes that you may learn something about yourself by reading about my journey into the raw lifestyle. Perhaps you'll be inspired (that's my wish), or learn to not make similar mistakes.
The journal begins in July of 2006 and continues into October 2007. If you are interested in reading something from the beginning, please use the archive feature at the right side of this page. If a month has more than one page worth of entries, there will be a "previous entries" link at the bottom of the page to view the rest of the entries for that month.
I have not edited my entries at all. Any entries that were originally marked private have been made public (with the exception of one that included personal information about people other than myself). Even though the entries are old, you are still welcome to add comments or ask questions. We will be notified of any comments that are left.
Again, I hope that I am in some way able to offer something positive to your life by sharing my personal Going Raw Journal.
Lots of love and peace to all of you,
Wendi
XOXOXO
I was cleaning out the rest of the pantry today and putting things back, arranging things, etc. I also emptied the freezer of everything that I didn't want anymore (like soup bases that I've made, but didn't label, ice cream, frozen herbs that were a bit older than I'd like, etc.). Then I sat down on a kid's chair that my daughter had from when she was younger, but we seem to have kept it around for some reason. As I sat there, looking up into the beautiful cabinets, my goal came to me. I decided I will transition for the rest of the year and then go for 100% raw (or as close to 100% as I want to go) on January 1, 2007. I may have days of all raw foods before then, days of only some raw foods, but I will continue being very conscious of what I'm eating and why I'm eating it.
Waiting until January to go fully raw will give me time to work on something that I want to do. I'm not going to write about it, but I did tell my friend Medamoso and she thinks it's a great idea. If I end up succeeding (or failing) in my attempt at this project, then I'll certainly post about it here (since it involves raw foods).
This is a busy week again for me. I have a lot of running around to do. Since I don't like to waste gas, I'll be away from home most of today, Wednesday, and Friday. That means I have to think hard about what to bring with me for eating. Last week I brought an apple, some walnuts, a cucumber, a raw snack bar, an avocado, and maybe something else that I'm not remembering. That was enough for the time I was away (about five hours). I have this morning to think about what I'll take with me today, before I leave.
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FEELING:
Yesterday I was retaining some water in my ankles and feet (just a little bit). Could it have been from the extreme heat and humidity yesterday? I was stuck in a hot garage, breathing in nasty fumes, for 2 1/2 hours in the heat. There was no a/c or breeze, so I was sweating a lot. Also, there was no place for me to sit, so I was standing in that heat for the 2 1/2 hours. I don't know if that will make your ankles and feet get a little puffy, or not. At the end of the 2 1/2 hours, though, my heart started doing the flip-flop thing that it does sometimes. I think I was just tired at that point--tired of the heat and of standing around with nothing to do.
Anyway, this morning my feet and ankles look okay. I stepped on the scale and I'm down one more pound (after losing that water weight from the Indian food last week). This isn't about the pounds, though--it's about getting to a healthy point where I feel more alive. The weight will come off naturally as I get to that healthy point, so I'm not focusing on it--just checking it sometimes, since it's an easy way of seeing some progress on days when I might not be feeling like things are changing.
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Is my husband now supporting me in my journey to health? Yesterday, as we both sat at our computers for a little while, he called out, "Hey, did you see this site by a woman named Alissa Cohen " (Don't know if I spelled that right.) I said yes, of course. Then he said, "What about this site...rawfoods.com " (I think that's the one he asked about.) I said, "yes." Then he asked about another site and I said yes. He said he guessed I probably know about all the sites out there. I told him if he's interested, I'd send him some links for sites about guys who are eating a raw diet. He didn't reply. ;-) Anyway, it looks like he's trying to be supportive, maybe?
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FEELING:
Can it be ! I think my period is starting on day 29! For those who don't know me, it's a big deal because my cycles have never been regular my entire life until I was on that Metformin medicine all of last year. This will be my first menstrual cycle on a regular schedule, without that medicine. I hope it continues to be this way for me! It could be because I've learned that with PCOS/insulin resistance my body works best if I always have protein with complex carbs in a certain ratio.
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FEELING:
I love that we are a member of the local CSA. We picked up our fresh veggies yesterday and then headed to the food co op to get the rest of what we'd need. I think I bought too much, though, because the refrigerator is packed full. What I wanted most of all were the lettuces. We got a bag of mixed greens, but I knew I needed more so I bought two huge heads of green leaf lettuce. When I was packing the veggies into bags for the refrigerator last night, I wasn't hungry but I wanted to eat, anyway. Of course, I didn't, though.
From the farm we have: swiss chard, collards, kale, turnip greens, beet greens, mixed lettuce, green beans, kohlrabi (someone put this on the trade table--and I didn't even see them offered anywhere else, so I picked them up and traded half of my herbs because I have more than enough herbs growing in my own backyard), a small summer squash, leeks, scallions, very small cabbage, beets, blueberries, lime basil (I took half my share of this since I don't have this growing in my garden), parsley (even though I have this growing, you can never have enough parsley!), fresh flowers.
On top of that we bought all kinds of things at the food co op. I guess we were hungry when we were shopping, though, since we really do have a lot of food in the hosue now. We bought lettuce, tomatoes (ours aren't getting red, yet, in the garden), baby coconut, ginger, celery, green peppers (ours aren't big enough to pick, yet), onions, garlic, lots of fruit, zucchini (green and yellow), lots of bulk nuts (these are the most expensive things I think we buy), and miscellaneous other things that we were either out of or running low on.