I would like to invite you to follow me on my journey of health and wellness! I'm sure many of you can relate, as I hear complaints like these all to often, "I'm too tired," "I just need some caffeine," "I can't get enough sleep," "I crave chocolate, coffee, salty....," "If only I could feel good," "where does your energy come from?" "I am so sad." As I said, this is a journey for me that I am constantly adjusting along the way. I feel strongly that our society is moving in a direction of concern with unmanageable amounts of stress, long hours of work, genetically modified foods, fast, easy, cheap, and quick! Well...there is an old saying "you are what you eat!" I can attest that this is true.
In this lifestyle journey of mine, I'd like to emphasize the word "holistic." By definition it holistic means: "Emphasizing the importance of the whole and the interdependence of its parts" or "concerned with wholes rather than analysis or separation into parts" (The Free Dictionary, www.thefreedictionary.com). In other words, what I often tell my clients and families (www.peakinterventions.com) is that a WHOLE child is more than just the sum of his parts.
As I've struggled with my own personal health since I was 13 years old, being diagnosed with toxoplasmosis (www.cdc.gov/parasits/toxoplasmosis- more about that later) and hypothyroid shortly after being treated with prednisone, a synthetic steroid, to fight the parasite that somehow made its way into my eye at the ripe time of adolescence. Initially this journey was no big deal, or so I thought. Doctors gave me medicine, again synthetic, to treat my thyroid and off I went. Although, I didn't know it at time, I did fairly well through high school, only a few bouts of my thyroid jumping around. College was a different story, no longer having my mother fix every meal homemade, I often relied on food that was bagged, boxed, or microwavable (or being fixed in the cafe) because it was quick and easy. My weight shot up 20-25 pounds during these years, and somehow miraculously I functioned off of little to no sleep along with my poor health habits. At one point, after an ACL reconstruction surgery, I dedicated a summer (and most of the year) to eating only "real" foods and limited my processed food intake significantly- my energy reappeared, weight dropped off and I was feeling better than ever (I even decreased my dose of medication), but as refined sugar slowly crept it's way back into my diet, so did all the others as well- disappearing energy, weight gain, lethargy, unhappiness, hair loss, etc, etc, etc! It was some time again before I would jump back on the health bandwagon, and I have to say eating "real" food has it's advantages!!! I have to thank my talented and enthusiastic husband who has inspired me to be healthy and who stands by me almost every step of the way. I am on my way back down, no longer carrying the college weight but NO cakewalk, there is repair to be had in the gut by the damage that was done (eating processed foods, allergens, antibiotics, etc) and the habits that were created. This isn't easy work but it leaves me here, hoping I can guide you not to make the same mistakes or... if you have, to start the healing process now. We only get this body once, we need to cherish it, respect it, and take care of it.
By looking at food, health, & life through a more holistic emphasis is hard, but if we can recognize that what affects one part of our system, will indeed affect the whole body, we are on our way to making improvements one small step at a time! We have to be mindful of our habits and actions (this isn't always easy)! I can tell you one thing, it is time that we, as citizens in Ameria, take control of our not-so-perfect health/eating habits (more on statistics of autoimmune diseases, obesity, gi issues, and developmental disorders later). It is time we demand safe, healthy, real foods; no more GMO, hormones, pesticides, steroids, etc! I hope in this blog to be able to share some of my processes, successes, and challenges to create a supportive community of health and wellness.
"People who are in control of their health are in control of their destiny, able to work harder and more effectively to fulfill their wildest dreams." ~Leslie Kenton