{Our journey to eating healthy and losing weight}

Before we started our journey to eating healthy Shane was a few numbers away from high blood pressure. His last blood pressure numbers before starting to eat healthy was about 138/ 87. He has had prehypertension about our whole marriage.  He has recently been about 20 lbs. overweight, weighing in at about 210 lbs.  He didn't look healthy, and i was worried about his eating habits.  He had an addiction to sweets. I think most Americans have an addiction to food, which is something i realize now that our eating habits have changed. But i would say he had an addiction to most foods. He would emotionally eat, and often.

He has been eating plant based foods for almost 5 weeks.  I checked his blood pressure yesterday, and for the first time his blood pressure is NORMAL. It was about 115 over 75.  Amazing. Not only that but he is weighing UNDER 190 lbs. at about 187 lbs. He looks GREAT!!!  Seriously. Not only that, but his resting heart rate is 52, and he said before it was always about 80 beats a minute.  He feels good and i have NEVER EVER seen him have so much control over his food intake in our ALMOST 9 years of marriage.  I mean, if you know shane WELL, you know that if he has a donut in front of him he will most definitely eat it. No question. Not this new shane!  He has been OFTEN rejecting the donuts brought to him at work. Rejecting lots of sweets. It's amazing. Seriously. I couldn't be more proud of him. And he really enjoys eating this way. It's a new sight when i see him grab a handful of greens and shove it in his mouth like he is some kind of herbivore animal. haha! Seriously, i would say he just conquered one of the biggest struggles in his life. I am so proud of him.

When i started i felt sluggish. I hit a wall in the middle of my day and just felt wiped out and needed to nap.  I was struggling with my hormones and emotional state, which i felt like was just getting worse....blamed it all on my monthly cycle.  My stomach felt heavy, bloated and painful ALL THE TIME.  I was so sick of all of these things. I had been praying for months to somehow find an answer or to figure out what to do. I wasn't really addicted to sweets, but i would eat them if they were in the house, which was often because shane was very insistent on having them in the house what seemed like everyday.  I couldn't find the strength to resist the sweets if they were here. My blood pressure was always normal range. I was gaining weight. I was at 125 lbs. I could feel i was gaining. And i was struggling with my sleep at night.  I felt like i was waking often in the night, and felt every movement shane made.

After eating plant based foods for 5 weeks i no longer feel sluggish! Ever! I don't hit a wall in the middle of my day.  I sleep better at night time, hardly waking in the middle of the night!  I feel like my emotions are under control. I still have my moments of emotions, but not near what it was. I am crossing my fingers it stays that way. :) BUT 5 weeks of feeling this good is definitely a new thing for me. I hardly ever feel bloated, with a heavy stomach, and hardly ever get stomach pains. In those five weeks i have probably felt pain in my stomach about 3 times, and it didn't last long. Whereas before it was just about everyday. My blood pressure is lower than it's ever been. Shane took it for me last night and it was about 96 over 65.  Wow.  I feel great. I am no longer 125 lbs, but i am now 115 lbs. I don't think i have been 115 since before our marriage. 

This journey has been wonderful. It was hard at first because of the withdrawal symptoms from all those dairy, meats and sugars and processed foods, but it was so worth it. It's so strange how our hunger is so different than what it was before. And how our cravings are so different as well. We don't really crave....well , wait...shane does crave his new breakfast which is a blueberry, banana, walnut, and small amount of dried oats. He loves it. :) haha! Before when i would make a healthy salad for dinner we would all be hungry within an hour or two. BUT now, we feel satisfied and don't feel hungry so soon. It's such a different and new feeling to get used to.  AND another strange thing....shane came home from fast sunday saying that he didn't even feel hunger the way he used to on fast sundays. He didn't feel the hunger pains in his stomach, and it was so much easier fasting. I felt the same exact thing. It was not hard, i wasn't thinking about food, i diddn't get my hunger pains. It was awesome enjoying fast sunday without constantly feeling hungry.

Basically, for this plan you eat all the greens and fruits you want. You eat all the veggies you want, but limiting the starchy ones. You can eat a limited amount of nuts, avocados, dried fruits, and ground flax. You have a goal of 1 cup of beans a day, which is so easy for me to do. :) Your goal is 1 lb. of raw veggies, and cooked greens, and non-green nutrient rich foods. 4 fresh fruits daily and 1 cup of beans daily. You eliminate the dairy, animal products, fruit juice, oils, sugars and between meal snacks.  Of course, you can consume the bad stuff sometimes. :) We have one dinner a week where i fix whatever meal they want. And one baked treat a week that is allowed as well.  And you can eat no more than 150 calories per day of low-nutrient foods.

 I am so grateful an answer to my prayers came. It came at the right time, i am telling you. I have tried eating healthy before, or tried getting my family to do it, but it was so hard because they gave me a battle...particularly shane. :) Some reason this time around, he jumped on board and hasn't looked back. The book Eat to Live changed us. 

Also, i think it all goes along with the word of wisdom. If you know where to find scripture on the word of wisdom  then thats great. I remember praying at the beginning of this journey that my mind  could be enlightened as we studied the scriptures so that i would learn something new about the word of wisdom OR about the new way we are eating. As a family we are in Alma 46.  It was my turn to read and i finished the last few verses for us. In verse 40, i received a confirmation...it says "And there were some who died with fevers, which at some seasons of the year were very frequent in the land---but not so much so with fevers, because of the excellent qualities of the many plants and roots which God had prepared to remove the cause of diseases, to which men were subject by the nature of climate---"
You can imagine my excitement when i read this. :) I found a scripture about food! I wrote it down in my journal! I hope to continue to find these treasures as we continue to read. :) This is all very exciting for me. You know when you have found a truth? And you just want to shout it to the world? The way i feel about this new way of eating is the way i feel about the gospel and the Book of Mormon. It rings true. It makes sense.  It makes me feel GOOD. It makes me happy. And i feel passionate about it.