It is June 25, 2010 and I have been on a high raw and green smoothies "diet" since January 2010. The results speak for themselves and a picture (see below) is worth a thousand words. Get on the green smoothie and high raw lifestyle if you really want true health care. Back off of the dairy, meat, sugar staples of the SAD (Standard American Diet) and embrace leafy greens and fruit, as much as you want! Yes, I still back slide on occasion, but now I feel my body is getting the nutrients it needs and is able to handle the occasional slip up. Scroll down below the pictures if you want to read a little more of my story.
Before Penni Shelton's Raw Food Rehab Vault 1.0 http://rawfoodrehab.ning.com/
After Penni Shelton's Raw Food Rehab Vault 1.0 and 2.00 (22 weeks)
My story is similar to a hundred other stories of women just like me even though I often feel like I am the only one going through some of the things I go through. Which, mentally, I know I am not, but emotionally, it sometimes feels that way.
I woke up one morning about a year or so ago and realized that I was no longer a young, thin, girl, but had somehow morphed into a middle-aged, overweight, woman with aches, pain and premenopausal symptoms. When did that happen?
I repeatedly gained and lost the same 10 to 15 pounds for 16 years….I’d lose it at the first of the year with my new year’s resolution and then after I lost it, somewhere around 3 months into the year…I would then breathe a sigh of relief that I no longer had to starve myself on the diet so I would slowly, steadily, and surely regain all the weight back over the balance of the 9 months that made up the rest of the year only to start again on a diet in January…..except last year, the pounds would not budge! Truthfully, for the past 2 years, I couldn’t get scale to move, plus it seemed as if I was ALWAYS hungry. Even after I had just eaten a meal. I wanted to give up!
A friend recommended Gillian McKeith’s book “You Are What You Eat”. So last fall I read it, borrowed my mom’s old juicer that she never used anymore and tackled a three day detox. I started juicing and did that for a couple of months. My husband even purchased a new (quieter) juicer as a Christmas gift for me because he was tired of listening to the racket of the old one. However, I wasn’t really losing any weight. I was feeling better and just as importantly…I had stopped gaining weight. I didn’t gain anything over the holiday season.
During the Christmas break I started surfing the web and came across a ton of info on juicing and raw food. I joined another raw food site (Penni Shelton's Raw Food Rehab) and discovered the green smoothie and committed to 11 weeks of mostly raw. Eleven weeks high raw, no meat (of any kind) and no dairy (of any kind), no refined sugar or white flour, etc. and 18+ lost lbs later, I was hooked. Actually, I was hooked by the end of week one. I also got my cholestrol checked. It had gone from 257 to 181 in 11 weeks with no medication - only explaination is the change in my diet.
When the 11 weeks were up, after losing 18+ lbs., I didn’t exhale and say, “Whew! Now I can go back to my old way of eating” like I had done on so many previous diets. Instead I said, “Man I want to tell everybody about this and never want to go back to the old way of eating!” I joined Penni's Vault 2.0 for another 11 weeks. I only lost another 5 pounds, but I solidified my high raw lifestyle and it is no longer a "diet", but it is the way I want to eat.
Now in month 6 of 2010 I am NOT on my way to gaining it all back, instead I have actually lost a few more pounds.
There are a lot of websites devoted to the High Raw lifestyle. Here are a few of my recommendations, but there are many, many more. Research it for yourself, try it for just a week or two (especially the green smoothies). If you don't like it, you can always go back to the SAD diet. It is all up to you!! Good Luck and God Bless.
Penni Shelton's Raw Food Rehab
Green Smoothie Girl
Blend It and Mend It
Russell James The Raw Food Chef
High Raw Life
Dara Dubinet
