There's one thing I cannot stop talking about lately. It's this book I read called "Eat to Live."
It's a book about how to lose weight, reverse disease and eat as healthy as possible. You eat tons of fruits and vegetables--four whole fruits a day, 1 lb fresh raw vegetables, 1 lb cooked vegetables, 1 cup beans and legumes, a small amount of raw nuts and seeds (1 oz), only whole grains, no added sugar, very limited fat and no animal products. That's it in a nutshell. The author recommends you go completely vegan, but concedes that a little bit of lean meat and fish is okay.
If anyone asked me two weeks ago if I ever thought I would try a vegan diet I would have said no way. While I was reading the chapter that talks about how bad animal products are for you I had to put the book down and pray to discern truth because I was so resistant to the idea. I didn't want my preconceived notions to close my mind to truth. As I was reading, the Word of Wisdom came to my mind to eat meat sparingly. That never really made sense to me before. I mean, we need protein every day, right? As I kept reading and learned how much protein is in vegetables it all made sense. I don't think I'll ever go all the way vegetarian, but from what I read sparingly makes a lot of sense to me.
So I buckled down and put my money where my mouth is and started the diet yesterday. The amazing thing is I had already started making some changes to my diet last week, and before I even officially started the diet I had lost a couple pounds! Then after one day of really following the rules I lost a pound and a half. And the best thing is I finally feel like I have discovered the healthiest way to eat. I always knew to eat healthy you need to eat a lot of fruit and veggies, but this gives me actual guidelines to go by so I feel like I have more direction.
My only concern is having enough calories to produce breast milk so I make sure I get some fat in the form of avocados, olives, and nuts and some light dressing on my salads. Also I'm not limiting my carbs, I'm just switching to all whole grains. I lost my breast milk by dieting while nursing Jaden so I'm much more aware this time. Hopefully I can catch it if my supply goes down. I feel like it will be okay because I'm not counting calories, I eat as much as I want of the good stuff, I'm just cutting out the junk.
I'm gonna try to keep a diary of the diet so that I can pay attention to positive changes and the progress that I'm making. So hopefully I'll do a good job of keeping y'all posted! Here goes nothing!
1 comment:
Good luck! Big diet changes are hard, but if you feel good about it I am sure you can do it. I haven't read the book, but agree with a lot of what you wrote about. Sparingly is the key (Adam is always so excited when we go out and he can order something with red meat since I cook with red meat maybe 10 times a year); and whole grains, yummy and better for you! If you need incentive to not eat meat, get your hands on a little documentary called Food Inc. That'll do it! Trust me. :)
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