New Month, New Me

After years of yo-yo dieting, I am just fed up! I am ready for a real life change that will improve my health and my waistline. I have a family and want to do what is best for their health as well. I have been slowly moving to a vegetarian lifestyle and have dabbled in it off and on for the past few years. Unfortunately, although I feel it is a great choice, I have had a hard time committing. In trying to adopt this lifestyle, I have read many books and watched many documentaries. I was amazed by Forks Over Knives and I absolutely love Joel Fuhrman I have read many of his books). I am constantly looking for more motivation and support to  keep me moving in this direction but I am truly addicted to food and have struggled with cravings and always caved in. Recently, I stumbled upon some youtube videos about Raw eating. It really seemed to make a lot of sense to me and I had just read in one of Fuhrman's books that it is best to eat at least 50% raw so I began to watch vlogs of folks who eat mostly and only raw diets. After watching several of the videos on Freelee the Banana Girl's youtube channel, I decided it was worth a go. She has a plan she calls Raw til 4, which sounded like a good compromise to work myself up to eating a healthier diet. Freelee eats a mostly fruit based diet. Raw til 4 was really working for me, I was feeling  better and enjoying raw fruits and vegetables more than ever. I also found that I had less cravings for junk and comfort foods. However, I was not really losing weight on the Raw til 4 yet, which was just fine since I was feeling better. Since then, I went away to work at summer camp for the month of August (this is an annual tradition for my family). I fell off the vegetarian wagon and the Raw til 4 plan while at camp although I did find myself making much better choices than previous years at camp. I only gained 4 pounds this year which is much less than I usually gain while at summer camp. While away, I started to read the book 80/10/10 by Douglas Graham. This is a book that Freelee talks about so I decided that I needed to read it. I am only half way through the book but have already decided that I must attempt a Low Fat Raw Vegan Diet. I am so excited about it and so ready to make a permanent change in my health. Today is the day....New Month, New Me!

I have been juicing and mostly eating raw the last few days so my cravings have already begun to diminish. I started my first official Raw day with a juice of pineapple, oranges and spinach blended with banana. It was delicious and the kids enjoyed it as well. For lunch I had a large bowl of spring mix with 1/4 of a watermelon....very satisfying. Since Graham states that he feels it is better to eat a low fat cooked diet than a high fat raw if you must choose between the two, I have decided to cook for the rest of the family tonight. I have concerns with the growing children getting in enough calories on just raw yet. They had baked potatoes with salsa, black beans and guacamole. I stayed raw for dinner and had a fruit plate of 1 mango, 1 banana and a quart of strawberries.I logged my food on My Fitness Pal to see what my percentages would come out to be. I ended my day with 91% Carbs, 3% Fat and 6% Protein and just 871 calories. I am happy with the percentages, however I fear my calories are low. I have read that eating enough calories is the hardest part of this raw vegan lifestyle, however I feel stuffed and unable to eat more tonight. I will give myself a few days to adjust to eating this way and for my body to get used to this type of fuel. I will also try to add in a bit more each day and see where I fall by the end of the week. Tomorrow I am going to the pool for the day, so I worry about having access to enough raw food to sustain me through the day. I will have to make sure I take an extra bunch of bananas with me just in case.

Looking forward to sharing my experiences as I embark on this adventure :)