Raw Vegan Apple-Pie Bites (gluten-free)

Welp.  Just pulled these out of the dehydrator.  Did a little photo session with them.  They weeeerrrrked it *snap*.  A taste test was done (no, not by my little fasting bottom) ---the review?  "These are dangerous, I'd eat a whole plate full."  .....but they're basically just fruit, a little coconut, a little almond, and spices ----healthy mama!  Healthy!  I think I can market these.  Omgggggg I wanna eat one!  They're so cute!

Raw Delight

This morning, May 10th 2012 -- 134.0 lbs.
...that means I lost 4.4 lbs. in the 1st day of my fast.  

Now, I don't plan on weighing myself every single day ----but it IS really rewarding to see that number fall.  I haven't been 134 lbs. in quite a long time.  I know that was mostly water release, but that's fine - I don't need to carry that extra water around all the time!  Makes me tired!  4.4 lbs. is heavy all day long! :)

So, I'm feelin pretty good this morning.  It's 10:30. I'm starting to get a little hungry.  I've just had a little water and tiny tastes of the raw 'baking' batters I've been working on this morning (nothing that amounts to even a whole bite combined, just dabs of the flavor).  I'll have some juice as soon as I finish this text.

Something I realize about ME... if it's creative, I like it.

During this juicing process, I really wanted to be efficient and try to use as much of the produce item as I can - so I'm trying to use the pulp from the juicing process in other recipes.  I have all the great kitchen gadgets to do this with.  My food dehydrator came out the other day to make some fruit leather (roll-ups) .... but it's not stopping there.  I am using a lot of apples and strawberries in these juices (because strawberries are SO cheap at the farmers market right now, and apples just go great in juice recipes).  So, this morning I decided to experiment and make a few new 'gourmet' raw food dessert items.

What's great about this, is it gives me the ability to be creative in the kitchen.  It also gives me the ability to be efficient and not waste half my money in the juicing process.  It allows me to cook and have a relationship with HEALTHY food, even though I'm not preparing actual meals to eat right now - but these treats are dehydrated, so I'll be able to enjoy them later!  These are raw foods, which I believe greatly in.  I have no guilt about eating raw foods.  They make me happy.  It makes me happy to share these things with my children, vs. store bought junk food cookies or cookies baked with white flour and sugar.  ALSO ~ this is really propelling me in the business mind.  I can sell these things.  I CAN.  If I come up with a good plan and market them, I CAN!  I can sell them near and far too, because they're dried and don't go bad.  I can SHARE HEALTH.  I can SHARE LOVE.  I can bring in some money to support my family (which brings the love right back).  AND it makes me happy to FEEL the health in it, and can keep me around my goal of living WELL.

I'm feeling inspired today.  I'll post a photo of at least one of these treats later today <3
Now... time for juice. xoxo

 

Raw Strawberry Fruit Roll-Ups

So here's the healthy treat I made today... so easy... so flipping delicious... and HEALTHY.  Healthy.  Sitting here with my friend today, talking about all the options of making money flow into this life ---- this type of thing definitely seems to be an option.  I know how to present it, advertise, create word of mouth.  Start small, local and with friends and family - venture into the RAW and VEGAN communities - sell to Moms or people just loving tasty things.  Unlimited avenues.  EVEN protein bars for the athletes.  I love this stuff, and it's TOTALLY possible.  This is just one way to make some money and stay in the focus of health ~ and help others... make people smile... healthy smiles...

I'd really love to get my @ss going on some things world -----gosh... it IS possible.

DAY 1 ~ JUICE FAST

I weighed myself this morning, in all my glory.  

I was actually less than I thought... that wasn't a bad feeling.  However, the bad feeling WAS all through my digestive track.  I woke AGAIN with a terrible tummy ache and abdominal pain, soreness everywhere.  Of course I did, I indulged and binged on my drive-thru faves last night ~ as something of a "farewell-sending-them-off party".  I definitely hid it and behaved in a way that I just don't want to live.  Didn't even enjoy it, but felt the need to make sure I did it. ...........

So yeah, after my little bit of a recent weight loss, I'm no longer close to 150 lbs. ---which, at my stature of 5'1'', seems quite frightening, considering that weight had every chance of climbing higher and higher every single year, if I let it.

This morning, May 9th 2012 -- 139.4 lbs.

I'm typically happiest and feeling my best when I'm around 110-115 ... fluctuating up to 120 here and there, but naturally falling back down to 110 without thought.  That seems to be my bodies normal HEALTHY functioning range.  I've occasionally fell to 105 as well ---but that's no kind of 'goal' in my mind.  I'd love to have a little muscle weight as well, and tone, strength.  ENERGY.  But today, one step at a time.  I'm going to focus on clearing out my system of everything I've been clogging it with.  Detoxing from my continual binges.  Starting with a juice fast.  I've fasted before, but this time it will be a little different.  I'm certainly not going to starve myself.  I will get plenty of nutrients from my variety of fresh juices - and if I'm ever at a point that I feel I NEED a break - I may incorporate a light, raw, meal in the evening.  I'm almost anticipating that on the 3rd-4th day.  I don't want to be hard on myself, that's not what this is about.  It's about mental and physical healing - hand in hand.  Not about deprivation ~ about GIVING.  I hope to enjoy it (even though, I realize entirely that the symptoms of detox aren't comfortable).

I ended up just deciding to go with a juice that Natalia Rose shares in her RAW DETOX DIET book.  I've loved this juice in the past.  I made enough to last all throughout today.  Tomorrow I'll go for a new flavor.  Today, savor this one :)

Green Lemonade:
2 Sweet Apples
1 Lemon
2 heads of Romaine
5-6 sprigs of Kale
1 inch of fresh Ginger

ALSO ~ as a fun little tidbit, I broke out the dehydrator yesterday.  There's some fruit leather drying right now ------ but I saved the pulp from the apples (which was kind of chunky) --and am going to come up with a fun 'Raw Apple Pie' recipe ---- really excited.  I'll share pictures ;)

Oooooh.  Speaking of pictures.  Gawd help me, but I'm gonna have to post a starting point shot of me ----dreading the thought, yet TRYING to embrace it.  I'm gonna put on my bathing suit... eek.  Photos.  I'm gonna let it all hang out too, no suckin it in, lol!  Gotta be REAL WITH YA, you know?  Andddd gotta be real with ME, most of all.

Alrighty, here we go!  Day 1, juice only.

SMARTYpants.

"...don't forget, things are only hard when u lack the confidence to understand how easy they can be..
duh dummies.. " ---quote the arlo

My very smart friend is... very smart... right? (plus it's his birthday, holla!)

Mind over matter.... ... ...

Each morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most.

This morning I'm feeling REAL rough.  My digestive system has been going through a lot, based on all the food terror I've been putting it through.  I've been drained, tired, wanting to constantly sleep.  I've definitely been feeling, the past few days, like my body has been clogged with food.  I'm really sensitive to my digestive process - I can feel when things are moving through my system and when they're just stuck there.  I was real sick a couple weeks ago.  I lost about 15 lbs.  I wasted no time in gaining 8 of that back, of course.  That's what the scale mentioned this morning.

This morning I was sitting in my car, waiting in the parking lot for it to be time for my kids to enter their school.  I was talking with my father on the phone.  All of the sudden, I got this hot, burning pain - all through my abdominal area ----all around.  I needed to find a restroom REALLY bad.  I was either going to vomit... or... well, #2.  Eeeeeee.  Sorry for the disturbing content, but heck, we're talking digestion.  I felt so sick.  I felt like I may not make it to my house (15 minutes away) before something awful happened.  I just wanted to cry.  I've never done this  before, but I left my children 5 minutes before they were actually allowed inside the building.  I felt like a wretched mother.  All that was going through my mind was - "Help me, God.  Please just let me make it home ---- and why did I do this to myself?  I did this.  I did this."  It was hurting SO bad.  Traffic seemed to be moving slower and slower.  All the worst scenarios crossed my mind.  "What if I got in a wreck right now?  That would be the most embarrassing moment of my life... or a terrible moment to die.  A gross, yucky, moment." ... "What if I don't make it to my house on time - how is it going to be to get myself from my car to my bathroom - and not see anyone along the walk from the parking lot."  ....I was envisioning all the worst, most embarrassing, yucky, yucky things.  I was ashamed of myself in this moment, because I was not only in pain, but I KNEW that I'd inflicted it on myself.     ........I did make it.  Even after spending quite some time in the restroom, I feel like my system is still coated in this burning, toxic, sludge.  You'd think this would teach me something, right?  But ya know what thoughts have crossed my mind even NOW?  "I just want to go through the drive-thru and grab those tacos."  It's sick.  I want this plague to leave me.

 Yesterday I did have one success.  I barely escaped the drive-thru trap... but I DID.  If I hadn't been late already to pick the kids up from school, I may have had those few minutes to roll through the drive-thru.  So glad I was late.

My friend made me a wonderful fresh juice immediately before it was time to pick the kids up.  I was SO delighted.  It made me SO happy.  It was SO fresh and SO clean and BEAUTIFUL - and as I enjoyed it, I knew I was giving myself health and energy.  I crave to be juicing right now.  I feel as though it's the only way I can kick these habits and fight back against this addiction with any hope.  Within 15 minutes of finishing my juice (took me a while to drink it, and it definitely had me full), I was STILL fighting the urge to hit that drive-thru ------even though I had SUCH healthy thoughts about juicing. 

I know what it feels like to have organized, healthy thought.  I've spent most of my life LIVING that way.  Efficiency.  Organization in home, work and all my time.  In these past 3 years, I've gained 35 lbs. ...this is all while struggling to keep it off.  If I just hadn't cared at ALL, who knows, it would probably have been 75 lbs. by now.  It's been exhausting.  Physically and emotionally.  I feel that this period of my life, that gave me SO much 'freedom', sent me into a spiral of out-of-control emotional behavior.  I've lost control of my mind, and actions.  A person who previously found herself very successful in setting and meeting goals....... can't even get through the small goals of a single day now.  I feel like I set good, healthy choice goals, each morning.... and by night, I've destroyed every last shred of those thoughts.

Today, I want to have at least one 'small' success.  If I can keep myself from that drive-thru today, I will feel like I've conquered SOMETHING.  Honestly though, even as I say that, I'm thinking about what I'd want to be ordering - which is pulling me toward it.

I'm trying to devise a plan that WORKS.  I have some ideas.  But then again, I'm feeling a little pessimistic, because I have ideas pretty much every day, and can never follow through and FIX THIS.

I want to commit to a 7 day juice fast.
I think that if I can cut out the option of food -----KNOW that my nutrition WILL come from liquid form... or ELSE... well... I think I can wrap my mind around it.  Food is probably the hardest addiction, because you actually NEED IT every day to LIVE.  You have to eat.  Your temptations are everywhere and it's socially acceptable to gorge yourself anymore.  It's socially acceptable to 'celebrate' with food.  It's socially acceptable to saturate your body in chemicals and 'death food' with every meal---because it's just 'normal' society in 2012.  The obesity epidemic in this country is sickening.  Fat, sick & dying... the land of the free?  America?  Really?  No we aren't.  We're slaves.  So many people are slaves to the addictions placed in their laps - just like what I'm personally talking about here.  I'm not the only one.  The food presented to us by the corporate cash hoarders - it's purposely made to form addiction.  I KNOW this, yet I find myself weak and powerless against it.  I need to find that Superwoman in me.  I HAVE TO... or die miserable and having not lived.

My children, wonderful boyfriend, and I - were all at a comic book store the other day.  My daughter held up a WONDER WOMAN comic and pointed at the strong, powerful, beautiful woman leaping across the cover.  She said, "Hey, it's You!"  ... we giggled.  Truth be told, I kept thinking about it all day.  I feel like Wonder Woman, trapped inside a 35 lb. layer of impenetrable, jiggly, wiggly, steal.  D*mnit.

 From the outside, people may look at me and think I look pretty 'good'.  But, only YOU know your true health.  Only YOU can feel what's happening in your body.  Mine is like a war zone.  It's not fair to her (my body), and it's certainly not fair to her either (my mind)... and it's breaking my spirit every single day.  Every stomach ache.  Every frustrated moment of not being able to fit into my clothes.  Every time I try to take my children to the pool and feel my body jiggling as I walk... every time my thighs rub together and hurt as I walk.  I may not be super BIG - but for ME, this isn't me... and it's not comfortable.  Why haven't I been able to fix this?  This addiction has NO PLACE in my heart... I'm completely conscious that it's taking all of my energy.  I don't mean to be focusing on all the negativity and heavy thoughts......... that's not me, that's not the woman I am... .... ... but I'm sure struggling with every moment right now, and completely confused at why I can't bring myself to WANT IT ENOUGH... if I wanted it ENOUGH, I could just make the choice to FIX THIS, right?  Why haven't I?  I've become weak.  It's just not acceptable anymore. 

Mind over matter.  Strengthen your mind......its a muscle too.

SOoooooooo, after all that ramble. What I'd like to initiate as my battle plan, is THIS:

---Get to the farmers market and buy enough fresh produce (for as little money as I can, because I am BROKEeeeeeee).  I need to make a list with enough fruit/veg to make myself 3 juice batches a day.  I'll pick 3 recipes and have the same each day, for the next 7 days. I HAVE to stick with this.  I KNOW it's not going to be easy.  I KNOW I'll go through a lot of detox symptoms.  But, I seriously doubt it could feel worse than the torture I'm already putting my body through on a daily basis anyway.  I've fasted for 8 days before - but a much more difficult one.  It was all the same drink for 8 days.  It was awful.  No variety, and I became sick even at the thought of that drink.  This time, I can choose my flavors.  I think I'll actually start out with produce for just 3 days.... so I can decide if I'd like to change it up with different flavors after that.  If I have any urge to stray from my juice plan... I just can't.  I'm scared to let an alternative in, because I think I might run wild with it.  My mind keeps telling me to allow a small, light, raw dinner on the the 4th day... ... ... ... maybe I should.  I'm nervous though.  So nervous.  But MAYBE having that to 'look forward to, and plan', will help me to get in the habit of PLANNING again.  Maybe that would be beneficial?  OR maybe it's a terrible idea.  I'd like to keep juicing until I reset my digestion and food habits.  Maybe after the 7 day fast, I can do 3 days each week?  Then level off to 1 day each week?  I'd love to keep it regular though.  Or maybe I'll juice for breakfast and lunch each day?  Or maybe just breakfast?    ....it can get pricey to buy all of the produce needed.  I have NO money right now.  That's kind of what's delaying me.............. but... that's the lamest excuse.  I somehow always find a way to have those dollars for the drive-thru... so... what's my excuse?

 I showed this video to my daughter once.  She said that EVERYONE in the world should be REQUIRED to watch it.  She's a smart one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SjbHJ28iec

  -LoveJoy

Well, well, well... here we are.

Sooooo, this is me starting a blog.  Purpose?  Well... I'm in some trouble.  I'm in some physical AND mental trouble ~ and I'm gonna d*mn well dig myself out - and vent and cry and whine, and *document (through this here blog)!  Or, I'm gonna face life as a miserable 'living to die' kind of person.  I don't want that.  I don't want any part of that.  Yet, I struggle, sinking like quicksand, deeper and deeper.

It's like a disease, see.  An illness.  ... addiction.  ADDICTION.

I'm killing myself with food.

___________________________

I know my body very well.  I know various nutritional lifestyles very well.  I know addiction very well.  An addiction can be with anything from 'drugs', alcohol, emotions, unhealthy relationships... and even food.  Yeah.  Food.  I'm battling the latter of those.  I've struggled with my body and its relationship with food since I was 12 years old - or at least those are my first memories of it.  The sickness has ranged from anorexic behaviors, to 'hopes' of bulimic 'success', to obsession after obsession in 'diet' form... to complete chaotic obsession and ADDICTION.  It's definitely to the point that I can't go a day without it controlling me in some way.  Always on my mind.

When I started to realize I had an ADDICTION, it's because I was connecting my behaviors to that of other types of addicts behaviors.  I was hiding things, lying, trying to cover it up.  I knew I was doing something I didn't want to be doing, and not even happy AS I was doing it - not enjoying it - yet I couldn't stop myself.  I'd go out of my way to get it - sacrificing for it.  Miserable... just looking for the next fix.  Laying in bed at night thinking about how I'd get it or where I'd get it the next day.  Hating it.  Just hating it.  It was sucking the life out of me.  I'm trying to type in pastence right now, because I'd like to start living like it is a part of my PAST and not my present.

I KNOW that I have SO much to live for... and in millions of ways, this is killing me AND stealing the life out of my living years.  That's not fair.  It's not fair to me or my loved ones, OR the world that I'm supposed to share myself with.  I've got to finish it.

I KNOW what it's like to feel well.  I know what it's like to have energy, to sleep properly, to run and jump and play... I know what that feels like.  I want it back.  I NEED it back.  Faster!!!  It's baffled me that I haven't been able to pull myself out... ... ... ... ... but at the same time, when I realized that this is an addiction problem, I had to be gentle with myself and remind myself that it's pretty difficult to expect a drug addict to just come clean on their own - without help - on their own will power.  It's possible, but unlikely.  I've been very hard on myself... how is that helpful?  It's one thing to make the conscious choice to do wrong in your life - it's a completely different thing to be consumed by an enemy and controlled by it, overpowered... ... ... even if you were wrong in the beginning - there comes a point where simply changing your mind may not FIX IT or save you... ... ...

I'm going to do my best to organize and fight for what I want -
I also know that I need to utilize all tools available to me, to help me along this journey.

I Love Joy.
I'm going to reclaim her.

This is my LoveJoy Journey.
...and because I need to use those words often, to feel them, it's only fitting to have to repeat them over and over... .. .......what better way than to 're-name' myself within this blog.

Sincerely Mine (and Yours too, if You'll have me),
LoveJoy

P.S.  The video link I'm putting in today... ... ... if this man can do what he's done... you can too, and so can I ~ we can.  Don't tell yourself you can't and do NOT let anyone else tell you it will never be done.  You've just got to WANT IT BAD ENOUGH to FIND a way.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qX9FSZJu448