Day Three

My weight is 181.5 today. I knew when I started two days ago at 187.3 that I was carrying a lot of water and food in my intestines from our weekend trip. Little did I know that is was 6.5 pounds! I am grateful to be rid of it, but I am more excited to start kicking in the fat loss.



My husband and I did a weight loss contest with several friends. We started in mid-January of this year and it ends tomorrow. My starting weight was approximately 187. In the last six months my weight has been like a yo-yo. I have lost and regained the same ten pounds about five times.



I remember reading a book on called Quantum Thinking ten years ago. My memory of the content of most of the book is very vague. It had to do with setting and accomplishing your goals. However one picture in the book has stuck with me to this day. Imagine if you will the goals you are trying to achieve ahead of you several feet. The more you think about them, the more you are drawn to them. It is like there is a rubber band around you and your goals and you are naturally drawn towards them. However, there is a big tree behind you. The tree represents all of your habits and limiting beliefs. There is another rubber band that goes around you and the tree. As the rubber band in front of you draws you towards your goals, the rubber band behind you connecting you to the tree gets stretched further and further. What does a rubber band want to do the more it is stretched out? You guessed it, it tries to shrink back to its original size, thus pulling you backwards towards your old habits and limiting beliefs. Thus, you "yo-yo" back and forth between your goals and your habits/beliefs. That physical representation of that zone is the ten pounds that I have lost and gained over and over. How do I cut that darn rubber band behind me? What is stoppping me? Hopefully writing this blog as I go on my journey will help me see what is stopping me and let it go.

Breakfast: Watermelon (of course!)

Snack: Two grapefruits

Lunch: Raw Oat Groats that I soaked overnight, blueberries, and raw agave nectar. I pulsed them in my food processor to "scarify" them. When you scarify them, the food processor blade nicks the hull of the oat groat so it soaks up water easier. This was very good!

Snack: Un-fried Rice--recipe modified from the one on Raw for Life DVD. It's made of 1 1/2 cups of soaked scarified wild rice, and one cup each of finely chopped carrots, celery, broccoli, tomatoes, and sun dried tomatoes. The sun-dried tomatoes I used were in olive oil, so I didn't add any more oil. I added Naman Shoyu (raw soy sauce), salt and pepper. Very yummy!!! I had one bowl full and had to come back for another bowl. Definitely a combination I will eat again and again. The rice was soaked for about 24 hours. I changed the water last night and this morning.

Dinner: Un-fried Rice

Snack: Bowl of cherry tomatoes

Day Two

Day 2

As expected, my weight was down today to 183.8. I loved seeing that number on the scale. I hope that I am on a continual downhill slide when it comes to my weight.

Today was not too hard. I ate mostly fruit during the morning and midday. I found myself wanting something more...but it wasn't a physical craving. It was a desire to eat. At no time was I hungry, yet in the afternoon and early evening I wanted the feeling of something heavy on my stomach.

Breakfast: Watermelon (it's a great time of year when the watermelons are ripe and juicy!)
Snack: Green smoothie--parsley (lots), spinach, stevia, and two bananas
Lunch: Watermelon
Late afternoon meal: Huge spinach salad with a whole avocado, juice from half of a lemon, grape tomatoes, basil from my garden, cayenne pepper, and salt. Note to self: go easy on the basil :)
Evening: Tomatoes

As I write this, I can see that I probably need to expand my food choices and the volume of food I am eating. I really wasn't hungry though. I didn't have much of an appetite, perhaps because I ate so much last weekend on my trip and I felt so gross. I did go to Costco today to buy more fruits and vegetables. I try to buy organic when I can. My local grocery store has a lot of organic produce, but I don't go out of my way to drive 15 minutes to buy 100% organic at the health food store. My garden is growing like crazy. Soon I will be enjoying my own organically grown vegetables.

My 30-day raw challenge is a result of becoming frustrated with my addiction to food. I have been eating about 50% raw for the past several months. Once I went ten days 955 raw and I felt amazing...totally amazing. My muscles just wanted to lift weight because they were buzzing with energy. I had never experienced anything like it.

I am sick of my extra weight. I went bathing suit shopping last week and felt like I looked pregnant and I'm not. My stomach protrudes just as if I were pregnant. Aaargh!

I know that eating raw, predominantly fruit and low fat is extremely healthy. I need to be healthy. I want to live a long and healthy life. I am 42 years old and my children are age six and under. I will be 60 when my youngest is about 20. I have got to take better care of myself now to I can experience great health in my later years.

So, here's the plan: 100% raw for 30-days.

Why only for 30 days? I feel like that is a commitment that I can make and keep. Longer than that and I don't know how committed I will be. After 30 days, I will re-evaluate and decide what next. I hope I choose to be raw for life.

Day 1

My weight this morning was a whopping 187.3. We just got home from a vacation last night. I ate whatever I wanted for three days. Not good. I am sure that I will drop a few pounds quickly because I am carrying some water weight from how I ate on the trip.

I was great at eating raw today.
Breakfast: 3 cups of watermelon and a banana
Lunch: 2 cups of watermelon and a green smoothie--parsley, kale and stevia leaves from my garden, spinach, banana, and frozen berries
Dinner: Spinach salad with avocado, tomato, basil, lemon juice, sea salt, and cayenne pepper
Late snack: Cucumber and cherry tomatoes with lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper

I spent the afternoon watching the DVD "Raw for Life". It is inspiring. I can see the value of seeking strength from others who have gone down this path ahead of me and have made it a lifestyle.