Vileplume
Member
Update:
It officially makes a year that I’ve been consuming a dairy-based diet so after a decade of severe rashes, constipation, depression, brain fog, anaphylaxis and a few false starts, I think it’s safe to say that I’m finally tolerating dairy again. I’m really glad I didn’t give up on it. There are so many reason why I love it, but the main one is what it does for my bones. My bone density is improving so there’s a real possibility I may actually achieve my goal of getting this little lemon of mine up a mountain. ??
My health overall is excellent now. I contribute it not only to diet but the release work I’ve done, some major self-love and acceptance, and tapping into my intuition and playful side more and my mind and “adulting” side less. I realized that life doesn’t just happen to me, I happen to life and so I decided that I wasn’t going to wait until life was no longer difficult to be happy and have made it a priority to do what brings me joy. Suffice it to say that I feel pretty incredible and so at peace, most days now.
With that said, one of the loves of my life passed away last week and even though I’m happy she’s free, I don’t know this world without my grandmother physically in it so it’s going to take time adjusting to that and having her with me in spirit now. She saw and got me in a way few people have and I will forever be grateful for having the opportunity to love, and be loved by, that beautiful, accepting, unconditionally loving and wonderfully stubborn, little French woman. I wouldn’t be the same without her.
It’s times like this where I’m learning to embrace and honor the fact that I’m human. In a world that seems to reject our humanness for a perpetually numbed, photoshopped, filtered, surgically enhanced, living the perfect destination, Instagram life, I’m learning that it’s okay to not always be okay. It’s okay to be sad, lonely, insecure, anxious, frustrated, and God forbid even helpless, at times. It doesn’t mean anything is wrong with me or that I shouldn’t feel the way I feel just because it’s uncomfortable.
I’ve also been learning to trust my inner knowing that I don’t have to struggle or settle to have health, that it can come naturally and in a way that brings me joy and is, in fact, a byproduct of living my joy. I don’t have to chase it or resign myself to a life of raw meat, kale smoothies, meditating on a pillow for hours a day or living as a fruitarian recluse in some jungle, forced to forgo personal hygiene and cr*p in a dirt hole just so I can have access to good fruit. I can actually have health and indoor plumbing.
Speaking of fruitarians, I no longer worship the sun. Thankfully, I only require a minimal amount of it now, since I don’t care for it or heat nearly as much as I used to. I think in the past, because I was so tiny, cold and unable to keep my vitamin D level up, I was desperate for the sun and too much of a purist to just supplement. As a child, I was drawn to the shade and now that my temps are stable (average 99°), I find myself drawn to it again, and my fair skin is happier for it. My grandmother was right!
As for my diet, I no longer need as many carbs to prevent hypoglycemia. The majority of my calories come from animal proteins now and the rest from mostly raw honey and to a lesser extent fruit. Goat’s milk was a real game changer for me and I was happy to learn that the farm I used to get my raw cow’s milk from during my WAPF days, started raising goats and selling goat’s milk, too. They practice calf at foot, something that’s important to me. I go into more detail on the practice here if anyone is interested:
Impossible Milk Is Incoming
Sadly, with all the science and health advice I’ve accumulated over the years, I got so used to selecting foods based on what the “experts” deem healthy that it took trialing a wide variety for me to remember which foods I actually enjoy and not too surprising, they’re the same foods I enjoyed as a child when my mind was free of dietary dogma. What was surprising was discovering that I don’t actually care for most tropical fruit. The following is a list of my current diet and supplements:
PROTEINS (30%)
CARBOHYDRATES (60%)
- Local pastured raw skimmed goat's milk
- Local pastured soy-free eggs (scrambled, omelette, quiche, custard, egg drop soup)
- Goat’s milk gouda—made with rennet (Whole Foods [Spring Koe] and Trader Joe’s)
- Homemade fresh curds
- Local wild sea scallops (downeastdayboat.com and www.vitalchoice.com)
FATS (10%)
- Pastured goat’s milk
- Cherries
- North American pawpaw
- Figs—black, brown and green
- Peaches—white fleshed Saturn
- Melon—honeydew, canary and watermelon
- Grapes—black, cotton candy, jam and pink muscat
- Berries—black mulberries, black raspberries, boysenberries, goldenberries, golden raspberries, heirloom raspberries, heirloom strawberries, honeyberries, Idaho huckleberries, marionberries, saskatoon berries, wild bilberries, wild blue huckleberries, wild mountain blackberries, wild strawberries (home grown and nwwildfoods.com)
- Sweet corn—white sugar variety (grilled on the cob and in clambakes)
- Onions—Vidalias (for French onion soup)
- Dates—Sukkari (soaked in milk overnight then strained to remove fiber)
- Raw honey—(Altay Meadows’ acacia—amishhoney.com, Wendell Estate—wendellestate.ca, Eisele’s—eiseleshoney.com)
- Maple syrup (from my uncle’s trees)
SEASONINGS
- Goat’s milk gouda
- Local pastured eggs
- Avocados (occasionally)
MISCELLANEOUS
- Culinary herbs and spices—cinnamon, vanilla beans, orange peal, chives, dill, parsley, rainbow peppercorns, tarragon
- Refined additive-free kosher salt (Diamond Crystal)
SUPPLEMENTS (daily)
- Mushroom broth—a mix of varieties (used as a beef stock replacement for my French onion soup)
- Cacao nibs for brewed iced cocoa—mycotoxin-free (www.addictivewellness.com and supervitalfoods.com)
I still seems surreal that I’ve made it this far. To no longer be fighting to stand on my own, to walk, bathe, feed myself, counting down the hours until bedtime because in my dreams, I could run, I wasn’t broken. To no longer feel like a bystander in my own life, having mentally detached myself from my body because it was too painful to be in it, both physically from the injury and emotionally from the abuse. I finally feel in my body and it feels so light, like the weight of the world has been lifted off of it.
- NDT 2 grains (TyroMax)
- Vitamin D3 2000 IU (bio-alternatives.net)
This might sound crazy, but I’m so grateful I had the chance to fight for myself. Having kept silent every time I was abused and finally release the guilt and shame I felt, to no longer feel anything but compassion for all those involved, and make peace with it being a part of my story, is so freeing and healing. I now understand the damage caused by holding on to that kind of energy, and how the burden of someone else’s guilt, shame and lack of love was never mine to bear yet I bore it for years.
As a little girl growing up Catholic, I feared that I wouldn’t be accepted into heaven for having kept silent while being molested, and didn’t have the courage to tell my family. Had I not suffered the injury and broken my filter, I might not have found the courage to speak up and instead, taken that secret with me to the grave, likely an early grave. Breaking my back was one of the best things that ever happened for me. I found my voice. I hope I’ve made you proud, Mem.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcOkmShJG9Q
This was a beautiful post. Thanks for sharing your journey Jennifer, and way to go with having taken these steps forward.