The rabbit hole....

So, yes, the rabbit hole. We are going to start our trek down the nutrition rabbit hole. And a rabbit hole it is. What do you choose to do? How do you decide which nutrition program to jump on? What foods do you avoid because they are bad for you? Or their company is corrupt? Or ???? The list goes on and on and on. Nutrition can be so overwhelming at times that I completely understand why some people just give up and drive through McDonalds! But, GROSS! There is a happy medium and I hope to help find it with you. There are so many options but what makes the most sense? I LOVE LOVE LOVE all of this so am willing to go further down the rabbit hole than most. 

Let's go back a few years though. To get to the point I currently live has been a LONG progression. So, meet yourself where you are and make changes that make you uncomfortable, not completely freak you out. I think back to when I first got married and had my first baby. I remember making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch everyday while taking care of my baby. I don't really remember cooking dinner. I think we did really basic things . .. chicken, pasta, salad. This was also during the low fat/non fat time. When fat was bad! I remember in college eating pasta and nonfat snack well cookies. Go take a look at some of that food, could it be worse for you? The amount of sugar I was consuming was horrific! No wonder I struggled with my weight. So then what? 

Slowly, over time, I learned to cook. Thankfully I met a dear friend who was a few years ahead of me with the kids, mommy, wife roles and was a great role model for learning all these things. As the years went on, I cooked more and more. I learned what flavors worked together. Brad learned to become an amazing BBQ king so we did a lot of bbqing with salads and rice. 

3 kids and a few years later, we wanted to lose a few pounds so started doing P90X. We followed the nutrition program strictly and both lost almost 20 pounds. We felt good and learned more about better eating. Of course, the past few years there has been so much research and understanding about nutrition. Since I love researching it, I keep learning more and more about it. 

We live in the most obese society now. Our children are beyond overweight . . .they actually are considered obese. Jamie Oliver has an incredible Ted talk on this. We cannot blame many of their parents because they were raised in this low fat/high sugar generation and were never taught how to cook nutrition food. Something has to change. Our healthcare system will soon be bankrupt trying to care for all of the obese and overweight people who have many diseases stemming from their weight and less than healthy eating. We need to teach our children how to eat and how to cook. 

The question now is what do you do? Well, what are you currently doing? A general rule of thumb .. .shop the outside of the grocery store. You will notice that most of the store around the outside contains foods without labels. Those are the foods we need to eat. Look back a few generation....people ate bacon and eggs, steak and potatoes, veggies, and fruit. They grew their food, worked hard, ate healthy fat. This food was not genetically modified, it was not fed hormones and it was organic. The diseases many of us are battling today were just not prevalent back then. Of course we could debate about the details in this until we are all blue in the face but the basics are true. People were healthier when the food was basic. 

Today we have aisles and aisles of convenience foods. How often do you read the labels? We have been reading more and more labels in our house and I am disgusted. My daughter read labels to me the other day and could barely sound out many of the words. She determined on her own that it was a food she was not interested in eating again. Many of these convenience foods are really easy to make from scratch and avoid the chemicals. Pancakes for example...they are so easy to make from scratch but so many people use mixes. Read the ingredients. We use the better crocker recipe. It takes less than 5 minutes and uses 6 ingredients. Then there is the syrup . . .Mrs Butterworts and others. Have you read those? The first ingredient is generally high fructose corn syrup. The only syrup in these is corn syrup. Costco carries real maple syrup for reasonable prices. This meal is a treat for my kids when Brad is traveling. Not the healthiest but at least it is chemical free. In many cases, it is less expensive or similar price to make from scratch and make healthier. 

What to buy organic? Look up the dirty dozen list and start there. We do our best to buy meat and chicken that is organic and hormone free but are not totally there yet. But fish that is wild vs farm raised. Just some simple things to pay attention to. We are very lucky that places like Costco carry so many of these foods now at much better prices. 

The simplest and healthiest approach . . .. shop the outside of the store, eat foods without labels, avoid refined sugar and white flour. You will be shocked how amazing you feel just following these steps! As we continue down this rabbit hole, we will address more specific topics. Choose what you want to do . . .remember, it is a journey and it is your journey! Each step is part of your journey to wellness. Please throw out questions you have so we can address them! Have a wonderful week and happy shopping!

Trophies and keeping score!

Finally . .. Get to sit down and write. Ahhh....my teenagers are upstairs doing homework and my precious, adorable 9 year old daughter is reading over my shoulder. She said, "Mom, do you just have to blog about food?? Can't you talk about your amazing family? You can talk about how pretty and awesome I am and how I just got grounded from watching a show.". Well, Grace, sure . .. I can talk about that too! You all know my eating blog is still coming. Nobody will get off the hook that easy. But, after just enjoying my Dark Chocolate (organic and no soy :) ), maybe I best keep my mouth shut . . .or you all know the truth which is Dark Chocolate is my vice. In the midst of this insane, incredibly healthy, strict eating, chocolate is my thing.

Back to my people . .. for those of you who do not know her, my daughter is confident. Boy do I envy that girl. She has the most sensitive and caring heart while not remotely caring what other people think of her. If we can figure out a way to keep her on this path, we will have succeeded. I'll get back to you during the middle school years. What I found really interesting was that she wanted me to share about her getting grounded. Sure, there were tears when it happened but she has moved on. If you cannot get your work done in our house, you lose privileges. No need to get our panties in a twist . .. you know the rule, you broke it so you suffer the consequences. Off to drawing and reading she goes. For me, this shows that confident side. She is willing to share the good, the bad and the ugly. Isn't that how we all want to be and aren't those the kinds of friends we want? Sister, I love that authentic and genuine person you are! Now I should probably take a quick break to make sure she is not sneaking one of those shows!

Not sure my boys would be quite as excited for me to talk about them! The past couple of weeks have been a little stressful in our house. High school golf team tryouts. . . oh my! Both boys started the tryouts and 1 made the team . . .after 11 straight days not including the weekends. So, the mom that is supposed to be keeping as low a stress level as possible...FAIL! Why in the world do we get so stressed out about these things? Of course I adore my babies and do not want them to miss out on the things in life that they really want and I hate to see them sad. But, it does built character .. .supposedly! For my son who came to the course ready to play every one of those days, we really got to see an incredible progression. He became calmer and more focused. Of course, he was nervous and really anxious but he channeled that into focus. As much as I hated how much the whole process dragged on, I do think a lot of good came out of it for him.

For me, I get an F with how I handled it. Well, maybe not an F but I certainly do not deserve a pat on the back. I get to the point where I rationally know everything is out of my control and that I just need chill out. But, emotionally . .. that is an entirely different story! How do you keep those emotions in check when it comes to your kiddos? There is that fine line of helping them grow and helping them grow from failing. I am a firm believer that we need to help our kids learn to fail...so that brings me to the trophies...Seriously . .. trophies for participation? What in the world are we doing with this? What are we possibly teaching our children? Then we could throw in the sports games not keeping score. Are you serious? Like our middle schoolers do not know how to count. And if they don't we have bigger issues. What have we taught our kids when they don't get the opportunity to learn how to lose, to fail, to not get what they want. You know those trophies? The 100's of dollars we have spent on the participation trophies . . .they are boxed up. My boys could care less about them. What they care about are the trophies that they EARNED. Those are on the shelf in their room. Don't we feel the same way as adults? We are proud and excited about those things we earned. Think about that first paycheck . . . you know how excited you were. You worked, you got paid and it felt good! Why do we rob our children of these experiences just because we don't want them to feel bad. I am thankful that we learned some of this early on. It has made the teenage years so enjoyable. The issues just get bigger and the consequences get more painful so fail young!

Anyway . . .rather random blog tonight! Do we all just care so much about our precious little people that we can't control our emotions when it concerns them? Or am I weird like that? Part of me wishes I could just enjoy the ride . .. good or bad. Then part of me feels like being invested in them is good. It is so hard to know the perfect behavior! I guess that is the journey . . .some days it works and some days it doesn't. Either way, we learn and grow and our kids do too. I am so thankful for the direction God has taken each of our kids. They are people I really enjoy. I love that my boys will come curl up with me in the evenings before bed and chat with me about their lives. It may get late and I know we all have to be up early but those are precious moments. I respect their thoughts and opinions. It is really incredible to me to get to the point where I want their advice in certain situations because they have great thoughts that I really respect. My heart is going to break when they leave for college though I will be so happy for what they have done to EARN that opportunity. Rational vs emotional. I don't know about you but do you ever feel like you have multiple personalities with the rational/emotional battle? Good grief!

OK .  time to hang out with my middle guy....the handsome golf team member! Time to talk about the fun classes he is going to add to his schedule next year. Work hard and EARN the fun class! What a journey. I guess this is all part of my journey to wellness....my people are a huge part of it. They keep me grounded and crazy all at the same time. I would love to hear how you deal with the rational vs emotional struggle! I am sure many of us can relate. Thank you for letting me ramble. I know Grace was excited to pick my blog topic. Whatever the topic, I am grateful for each one of you on this Journey to Wellness. Enjoy your week!

Hormones ... the crazy, crazier and craziest!

Happy Tuesday! Somehow I just ended up alone in my house for an hour. I am so excited to be able to sit in a quiet house and write! I have so many different things I have been wanting to talk about so will see what comes out today. Quick update....I am feeling better, slowly but surely. I got the results from the GI Effects test and much of it points to Celiac (rats!). Thankfully I was already gluten free but now it could be a new story. We will see.

I know some of you saw my Facebook post speaking to hormones in IUDs and birth control pills. I love the honest, real conversation that was shared. Thank you! I was completely blessed by your willingness to be so vulnerable in such a public way. I very much want to speak to eating for healing and health but I also need to process some of this hormone business so I think tonight we will go there. Stay tuned for the eating for healing blog...it is coming folks!

So the back history. . .. birth control pills made me crazy (first sign that hormones are not a solid option for my body). After having 2 precious babies in 3 years of marriage and being 27, I was not remotely interested in adding any other pleasant surprises to our lives. My doctor suggested an IUD so I went with the copper one. ..no hormones. All was well then we decided that sweet Grace needed to join our family so out with the IUD. After she was born I got another IUD until snip snip was completed. I asked all the questions about the Mirena. Would the hormones be a problem? Affect my migraines? I was assured that the amount of hormone was so small it would not be a problem. I read all the paperwork. Nothing about autoimmune diseases, etc. After 5 years I had it replaced and now, at the almost 10 year mark (2 different Mirena IUDs), I could not get that thing out fast enough. The more I learn, the scarier it is becoming.

I am making a very bold statement and I may or may not be correct but here goes . . . I believe that the Mirena IUD has caused the majority of my health issues. Synthetic hormones are horrible for our bodies and can cause a host of problems . .some of which are autoimmune diseases such as Hashimotos and Celiac. Not to mention mental struggles and migraines.

A blaring sign for me started 1 week after removing my IUD. The migraines started. Almost every single day, all day for 2 1/2 weeks. They got worse by the day and then finally started getting better. I am now on day 3 migraine free. That is what triggered more of my research. There is actually a published book called the Mirena Detox Diet. Seriously?! So, a hormone that is so minimal it should not affect me sent me into a hormone induced crazy world for more than 2 weeks. If removing it causes my hormones to be that out of whack, what in the world was it doing to them all these years? My belief? Wreaking havoc. When you end up with a testosterone level of 18 (this is really really low!), adrenals crashed and thyroid disease flared, you know something is up. Everything points to the synthetic hormones being used. Thankfully, I feel like I am on the right track now.

I know this is a lot of information and probably a bit too much but I really want to get the point across to everyone . . .get rid of those hormones! To be honest, I am not sure what I would do if I was back in my early years between kids and not ready for more yet. I would have to do quite a bit of research. What I do know is that the long term affects are not worth it. I will live with Hashimotos and Celiac (if that is the case) for the rest of my life. Yes, they can be managed with diet (see . . .you knew I would bring that up!) and the right natural supplements. But, they will be there and they will flare from time to time and that stinks. Plus . .. I live in a beer town with amazing beers and I cannot ever have one again. Yes, I know....things could be worse, just saying.

More than anything I am angry that a company (Bayer) has employees that sleep at night knowing what their products are doing to consumers. It is scary. So, my focus is to share and help others avoid this mess. I will keep researching and learning about this and many things in the health industry. The world has changed drastically in the past few decades. Some of it for the better and some of it for the worse.

We need to take things into our own hands. This applies in so many areas of our lives. We must be an advocate for ourselves. We must teach our children how to be advocates as well! It is our job to know the information. Know what you are putting into your body. If you are constantly putting chemicals in and you end up sick with disease, why in the world do you think adding more chemicals will rid your body of disease? Don't get my wrong . .. I believe there is a time and place for medication. If I had cancer, I would have a very hard time not trying everything to get rid of it. So, please do not think I am anti-medication. Sometimes we need something to help us get to a place to be able to tackle whatever the issue is more naturally.

So then the topic of hormones and menopause comes up....I have no clue. Not there yet and have not done the research. But, I can promise you, I am starting to gather data and thinking about hormone management. I am going to throw this out and maybe it will stick . . .eating to manage hormones. I believe there are foods that will help and those that will hinder. Something I will pursue more as the time comes. And this puts us on our path for the next blog! In the meantime, please look into what you are putting into your body. Be responsible for your own self and be healthy. So many of you have reached out and shared your journey with me. THANK YOU! I truly feel honored that you would trust me with your "Stuff". I appreciate each of you and look forward to hearing from more of you as we Journey to Wellness together!