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Can you Moderate? Or must you Eliminate?

March 4, 2013 by 16 Comments

The three little words that almost killed me:

“Everything in Moderation”

For me, these words are an utter lie, an impossibility, and the height of denial.  They made me try and fail and try and fail more times than it is possible to count.  As such an accepted part of our lexicon, “Everything in Moderation” must be true!   Therefore, I, incapable of eating certain things in moderation, must just lack willpower.  Right?

Years ago, when I was suffering from obesity and high blood sugar, my doctor sent me to a dietitian to help me lose weight.  After the first week, when I returned to the skinny, perky dietitian’s office with my chocolate-smeared food log in hand, she asked incredulously “But you are trying to lose weight!  Why are you eating boxes of cookies??!”  I answered, through my tears of shame, “I don’t know!  That’s why I am here.  It’s like I am an addict and I can’t stop.  I need help!”  To which she angrily replied “There is no such thing as food addiction.  Just follow the diet.”

I never went back to her office.  I went home and ate another box of cookies.  There is no such thing as food addiction.  Just have ONE cookie, Emily.  One.  everythinginmoderation

But what I found, once again, is there is no such thing as “one cookie”.  Not for me.

I honestly and truly owe my life to the angel in women’s clothing, who came along and said “Food addiction is a real thing and I too, am a food addict.”  She introduced me to the concept of Elimination of Trigger Foods and taught me the importance of recognizing and having a strategy for handling Trigger Situations.  She told me to read a book called Thin Tastes Better by Dr. Stephen Gullo.  I read it, mouth agape, one hundred times.  There are foods that render certain people utterly devoid of the ability to stop eating.  I might be crazy, but I am not the only one!

In his book, Dr. Gullo asks you to remember every diet you ever went on.  Then he asks you to remember every time you fell off the diet and what food you fell of the diet with.  In 99% of the cases, we fall off our diet with the same handful of foods.  For me: cookies, candy, cake.  Every. Time.

So, if the same handful of foods lead you astray, those foods are your trigger foods and your life will be so much more peaceful without them in it.  Tada, Elimination.  As I have written many times before, when we stop negotiating with the terrorists in our minds and on our plates, we finally achieve that sought-after peace agreement.

Now, I do recognize that if this were not my own personal reality, I would probably think it’s nutso, just like that dietitian did.  So if you are the type of person who can eat one cookie and stop, then keep on with your “Everything in Moderation”.  BUT, know that there ARE people who CANNOT do moderation.  They are not weak-willed and they should not just “try harder.”  They can’t do it.  In fact, you may even be living with one of these people!  They may be your own children, or your partner.  So when you buy cookies to have in the house for when guests come, and your food addict child or spouse drags the box back to his or her room like a fresh carcass on the savannah, the answer is to:

a.  Lecture this person about “everythinginmoderation”

b.  Stop buying cookies and leave your loved one in peace

the answer is “b”.

And if you really want to know what it is like inside the head of a food addict, read this most amazing description over on the Disease Proof blog.  Then get a copy of The End of Overeating by David Kessler where you will learn why some people get addicted in the first place (brain chemicals and food chemicals oh my!), and that even the former head of the FDA considers himself a food addict.  We’re in good company.

So the next time you find yourself looking up from an empty packet of whatever, after promising yourself you would just have ONE, open your eyes and see your trigger food for what it is: a life robbing, self-esteem sucking, lying terrorist with a bomb strapped to his chest.  Do not even try to negotiate!

Elimination is not as hard as hard as Moderation.  I promise, promise, promise  you.

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Filed Under: coaching exercises, Growth, health coach, Rants, Recommendations Tagged With: , , ,

Nine Questions That Changed My Life

January 8, 2013 by 3 Comments

What readers familiar with my story may remember, is the tipping point I reached in order to turn my back on unhealthy eating, living, and the overweight that came as a result, was a Tony Robbins book.  As you can read in this post HERE, I had stumbled upon the book quite by accident, opened to a page most randomly, became captivated by a writing exercise within it, and basically changed the course of my life on the very spot.

The kicker is that I left the book on the desk in the library, not even checking it out or reading any farther than that one exercise in the middle of the book!

Now, I am not one to believe in accidents of fate.  I know I was guided to the info I needed the moment I was ready for it.  Once the message had been delivered and received, I guess I had no need of the actual messenger.

To tell you the truth I actually began to wonder if that entire day hadn’t been some sort of dream?  I mean, if the book had been that important, how could I not remember what it was?

Recently however, as I faced a similar challenge in my life, I began wondering about the magic of that day.  If I found the book and re-did the exercise, could I get as wonderful a result as I did that day back in 2001?  I decided I would find the book and try!  Unfortunately for me, Tony has been prolific with his writing and it was seemingly impossible for me to choose THE BOOK from the dozens he has written.

So, doing as I had on that fateful day, I went “eeny-meeny” and asked a power greater than myself to guide me to “miney-mo”.

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 I found it on the very first try.

(Skeptics among you are certain my subconscious remembered the title or the cover even though I didn’t think I had.  That’s fine too).

And now, with the book in my possession, I understand that the entire lengthy and jam-packed tome is a life changer.  No wonder this guy is famous!  Wow!

The exercise that launched me on an altered course is tucked right in the middle of all this amazing content.  Although it is not exactly as I had remembered it, it’s still powerful and profound.  I have been sharing it with my clients, but today wanted to share it with all of you as a New Year’s present.

This is not an exercise to be read passively.  You must take out pen and paper and write, write, write!  What better way to begin a new year than with some soul searching?  So get your writing tools and I will wait here until you get back…

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You’re back?  OK, the actual exercise is an entire chapter of the book, so here I am going to paraphrase a bit.  Basically, the set up is to spend some time imagining what you would do in life if you knew you couldn’t fail.  Then, after you have fantasized a bit, with that wide open, happy, frame of mind, answer the following questions.  Write freely without thought to grammar or spelling.  Do not edit yourself with “oh, I could never do THAT!” or anything resembling limits or “realistic thinking”.  You will get to that later, I promise.

(Whatever I put in quotes is directly from the book.  Unquoted sections are me paraphrasing).

1. “Start by making an inventory of your dreams, the things you want to have, do, be and share.  Create the people, feelings, and places you want to be a part of your life,” how you want to look, feel, dress, the things and people you have in your life, your surroundings, smell it, see it , feel it all … “write for a minimum of 10 minutes.”

2.  ”Go over the list you made, estimating for each goal, when you expect to reach those outcomes:  six months, one year, two years, five years, ten years, twenty years.”

3.  ”Now, pick out the four most important goals for you this year.”  For each one “write down why you absolutely will achieve them… and WHY it is important that you do.” (emily:  I would actually use the word “necessary”, rather than “important” as it has much more power attached to it).

4.  Review your 4 goals:  ”Are they stated in the positive?” Can you see the achievement of the goal in your mind?  Can you feel what it feels like, what you see, hear and smell when you achieve this goal?  Are they goals that are attainable by you and not dependent on the actions of someone else?  ”If they violate any of these conditions, change them to fit.”

5.  ”Make a list of the important resources you already have at your disposal to help you achieve each goal: character traits, friends, financial resources, education, time, energy, etc.”

6.  Recall and write down three to fives times in your life when you used those same traits successfully to accomplish some other goal.  ”Describe what you did that made you succeed, what qualities or resources you made effective use of, and what about the situation made you feel successful.”

7. “Describe the kind of person you would have to be to attain your goals..”  ie: a great disciplinarian, free thinker, time manager, brave, bold person with magnetism and great impact, etc etc.?

8.  (emily: HEADS UP:  This is THE question on which my entire world reversed it’s spin!)  ”In a few paragraphs, write down what prevents you from having the things you desire right now.  Dissect your personality and see what’s holding you back from achieving what you want.”  (emily: I could have sworn Tony asked the next part, but it’s not here, so I will ask the thing that landed this whole exercise for me:  Is it worth it?  Is what you are doing now that is keeping you from achieving your goal, worth living without this thing you want so badly?  Yeah, I didn’t think so either.)

9.  ”Take the time now to take each of your four key goals and create your first draft of a step-by-step plan on how to achieve it.  Remember to start with the goal and ask what would I have to do first to accomplish this or what prevents me from having this now and what can I do to change this.  Make sure your plans include something you could do TODAY.”

Those are the main steps of Tony’s “Ultimate Success Formula”.  He goes on with a few more advanced steps:

10.  Come up with models – people who have already achieved what you want to achieve and copy what they do, how they think and what they say.

11.  Set up your ideal day, hour by hour, as the person who accomplishes these goals of yours.

12.  Brainstorm your ideal environment – home and office.

13.  Write a gratitude list expressing how grateful you are for all that you already have in your life.

So, that’ll keep you busy for awhile.  I really hope you do the exercise and that it brings the kind of magic to your life that it has to mine.  As always, know that I am here as a coach to help you through those questions if you are stuck.  Turning your goals into your reality is what I do for a living, woohoo!

Again, you can read how I answered the questions originally 12 years ago HERE.  As for how I answered them this time around?  Too tender to share quite yet, but it goes something like this:

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The above questions have been excerpted from Unlimited Power by Anthony Robbins, pages 202-215.

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Filed Under: coaching exercises, Goals, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Positive Thinking, Recommendations Tagged With: , , , ,

30-Day Vegan Challenge Give-Away

December 11, 2012 by 20 Comments

Colleen Patrick-Goudreau, of Compassionate Cooks, with a rescued cow at a farm sanctuary. Photo: Courtesy Of, Colleen Patrick-Goudreau / SF

For many years, I have been a faithful listener to the podcasts by vegan cookbook author and animal advocate, Colleen Patrick-Goudeau.  Colleen’s podacasts, called Vegetarian Food for Thought, available on itunes and her website, cover every single topic you could think of concerning veganism.  

In fact, before I made the switch from vegetarian to vegan, I pointedly ignored the episodes that concerned eggs and dairy!  Colleen is so clear and true that I knew if I listened, there would be no going back.  When I was finally ready to let eggs and dairy go, I then listened to those episodes to educate and motivate myself.

I was delighted when Colleen gave me an opportunity to review her new membership program!  I was even more excited when after I had tested the program and given my feedback, she thanked me by giving me a free membership to hand out to one of my readers!

We are going to raffle this free membership off right here, right now!  But first allow me (and Colleen herself) to tell you about the program.

Here is a list of topics that are covered day-by-day in The 30-Day Vegan Challenge:

Day 1 – Taking “Vegan” Out of the Box (turns out veganism isn’t as fringe as you thought!)
Day 2 – Stocking a Healthful Vegan Kitchen
Day 3 – Reading Labels 
Day 4 – Getting to Know the Grocery Store
Day 5 – Eating Healthfully Affordably 
Day 6 – Trying New Foods 
Day 7 – Making the Time to Cook 
Day 8 – Starting the Day off Right: A Bevy of Breakfast Ideas
Day 9 – Eating Out and Speaking Up
Day 10 – Packing Lunches
Day 11 – Rethinking Meat Cravings: Fat and Salt Taste Good
Day 12 – Discovering there IS Life After Cheese 
Day 13 – Cutting out the Middle Cow and Getting Calcium Directly from the Source
Day 14 – Plant-Based Milks
Day 15 – Putting to Rest the Great Protein Myth 
Day 16 – Better Baking without Eggs
Day 17 – Strong Like Popeye – Increasing Your Iron Absorption 
Day 18 – B12 – A Bacteria-Based (Not Meat-Based) Vitamin
Day 19 – Finding Abundant Options while Traveling 
Day 20 – Skipping the Middle Fish: Getting Omega 3s from the Source
Day 21 – Keeping Things Moving with Fiber
Day 22 – Demystifying Tofu: It’s Just a Bean
Day 23 – Special Considerations for Particular Groups 
Day 24 – Eating by Color
Day 25 – Eating Confidently and Joyfully in Social Situations
Day 26 – Finding Harmony in a Mixed Household 
Day 27 – Compassionate Fashion: It’s Cool to Be Kind
Day 28 – Understanding Weight Loss – Part One – Calorie Reduction
Day 29 – Understanding  Weight Loss – Part Two – Calorie Expenditure
Day 30 – Keeping it in Perspective: Intention Not Perfection 
Day 31 – Wrap Up and Reflection 

Seriously, Colleen leaves no stone left unturned here.  Material is delivered entirely online.  You can log into the website at any time day or night and read the material, listen to audio, watch video, and interact in the member forums.

And some of the recipes you receive:

Creamy Leek Polenta
Simple Bean Burritos
Lentil Mushroom Barley Stew
Panzanella (Bread Salad)
Tofu Scramble
Black Bean Squash Quesadillas
Southwestern Quinoa Pilaf
Mexican Chocolate Cake 
Green Smoothies 
Lemon Artichoke Tapenade
Tofu Cacciatore
Coconut Red Lentil Dal 
Spicy Red Bell Pepper Soup
Soba Verde Salad
Truffle Popcorn
No-Bake Apple Crumble
Un-Split Pea Soup
Lemon Poppyseed Muffins 

By and large, Colleen’s recipe are simple and use easy-to-find ingredients, even for those of us outside of North America.  

While I felt that The 30-Day Vegan Challenge, was probably best for a new vegan just learning the ropes, I did listen to every single day’s material and even learned a few new things, such as the trick to making the tastiest tempeh and how to make fluffy vegan biscuits (which I will eagerly save until Israel gets healthy vegan margarine!  Speaking of which, I did find the grocery store tour a little depressing.  American vegans, you have some seriously amazing choice of food products!)

Here are some of the FAQ’s from the website:

I’m vegan already. Will I get anything out of The 30-Day Vegan Challenge™?

Absolutely! The vast amount of information provided in this program is perfect for vegans who want to arm themselves with the knowledge they need to answer questions, debunk myths, and guide others. Colleen is continually told by long-time vegans that they continue to learn through her work, which encompasses so many aspects of living thoughtfully and well. Colleen’s no-nonsense approach will quite literally have you walking away each day with succinct, relevant, compassionate responses to the typical questions and challenges vegans hear. In addition, her nutrient-dense recipes and resources and tips for eating as healthfully as possible are helpful for everyone, whether they’re vegan or not, brand-new vegan, or long-time vegan!

I already own the book, The 30-Day Vegan Challenge. Is the content of the online program different from the book?

All of the recipes are completely different from the now out-of-print book. They are brand new, created for The 30-Day Vegan Challenge™ online! Though some of the content is similar to the out-of-print book, it has been re-worked to suit different mediums: print, video, and audio, making it very fresh and new. For instance, the online program enables Colleen to share video cooking demonstrations and messages, which is impossible to do in a book.  

 

So, if you’d like to save yourself the $20 sign-up fee, you can enter to win the free membership here!  Just leave me a comment below telling me why you’d like to win The 30-Day Vegan Challenge.  Then check back on Sunday, December 16th, the last night of Hannukah, when I will announce the winner!  Contest is open to anyone with a computer and internet access, anywhere in the world.

If you’d prefer to skip the contest, The 30-Day Vegan Challenge can be purchased directly HERE.  

(This is not an affiliate anything.  Colleen is just generous and I love helping her spread her work.)

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Filed Under: Events, Holidays, Inspiration, Product Reviews, Recommendations, vegan, vegan challenge Tagged With: , ,

The View from Here

November 19, 2012 by

beach tel aviv

(Tel Aviv, Israel)

You are all waiting for me to write something.

I can feel it.

It would be far easier and undoubtedly better for business if I mentioned nothing of our current conflict.  But I know who my readers are and that I am the only Israeli and in many cases the only Jew that many of you know.  I recognize that I have an opportunity here to share a viewpoint you might not hear elsewhere.  I understand that most of you listen to standard media outlets who I can tell you are not even making the simplest of efforts to get their facts straight.  Yesterday the BBC showed footage of people running from missiles and identified it as Gaza City when in fact it was Tel Aviv – and in front of one of Tel Aviv’s most iconic and easily recognizable hotels, the world-famous rainbow facade of the Dan Hotel!  If they are messing up simple shit like that, trust me, they are not even getting close to the facts on the ground, nor do they even try.  There is so much you don’t know that it makes my head hurt.

My country is doing what it has to do to take care of it’s citizens and protect our free, democratic society.  There is not another country in the world who would put up with the kind of terror and hate we have had directed at us for the past 6 decades of our existence.  It is enough to me that I know we are a just people; that we try harder than any other nation has ever tried to fight  a war while limiting civilian casualties even while Hamas is trying to maximize them!  I know that my tax dollars go to providing Gazans with electricity, aid, medicine and food at all times, not just during the current conflict.  I know that injured Gazans are sent to Israeli hospitals where they receive top of the line care and compassion.  I know that in other parts of the country, like my town for instance, Arabs and Jews live side by side with no strife.  My kids play with Arab kids in the park.  My doctor is Arab but it was two years before I even knew that because guess what, Arabs and Jews look exactly the same.  When I go running in the morning, Arab women in hijab often speed-walk right past me (which tells you how fast I run).  There were 3 Arab women in my last Hebrew class who had come to Israel from other Arab countries because here they can study and have careers  that are prohibited to them in their home countries.  These Arabs are citizens of my country enjoying the same rights as me and suffering the same terror.

We are fighting Terrorists, not Palestinians.  I would be quite happy to have Palestinian neighbors in a country under their own control IF and only if, they would agree to stop trying to blow me up.  I don’t think that is too much to ask.

How this war effects me personally? Where I live is about 13 miles from the farthest missile strike in Tel Aviv.  We have not had any air raid sirens in my city and we have not had to run to our safe rooms, although we were instructed to ready them.  The fact that we go about our day normally while 13 miles away people are running for cover is beyond weird.  We hosted some of our family who live in the South over Shabbat and when a car alarm across the street went off, they rose robotically to head to the shelter like some sort of twisted Pavlovian PTSD.

In a country as small as ours, pretty much every person I know has a husband or child serving in the IDF.  We literally dodged the bullet on that one, but in 4 years it will be my son’s turn.  Of course by then, all wars will have stopped and my son’s job will be to plant daisies and sweep the porch, said every Israeli mother for the past 64 years.

OK, enough of that.  I am happy to answer individual questions you may have if they are respectful and something that I, as an Israeli citizen, would be able to answer. I have been having email exchanges with a few of you who wanted to understand some things better and that was really wonderful.  I am closing comments to this post though, so you will need to email me if you want to ask anything.  However, if you just want to share your opinion, don’t bother writing as I will delete it without reading.  I have had opinions up to my eyeballs!

If after reading this you wish to stop following this blog, go right ahead and click the unsubscribe button at the bottom of your email.  This is who I am. You don’t have to like me.

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Next:  People keep asking me if I am training for the Tel Aviv Marathon.  The official answer is yes, but don’t tell myself as I am trying to keep it a surprise.  From myself.  Otherwise I won’t do it.  I’m in my 6th official week of training with 17 weeks left to go.  My long run is up to 13 kms so far.  My husband is actually training with me, although that doesn’t really mean anything as he takes his first few steps with me and then bolts off way ahead.  But when I hear him tell people how he never liked running before he watched me finish 42.2 kms and was inspired him to try it himself, I feel pretty darn proud!  I am still undecided if I will run a Full or Half Marathon at this point and have given myself the early registration deadline of December 15th to decide.

In order for me to register for the full marathon, I have determined that I need to drop another 5kgs between now and December 15th.  I am down 4kgs from the steroid gain, but it’s not enough to run 42kms with.  To that end, my last tidbit of news today:  Starting today, Dr. Fuhrman is running a 6-week Eat to Live Challenge, based on his book by the same name.  It is free to register and for the 6 weeks you get free access to his member forums at the Gold Level.  I had a Silver membership which was upgraded for the challenge, in which I will be participating.

Eat to Live is a program of eating called Nutritarian.  The main tenet of Nutritarianism is to eat the greatest amount of nutrients for your calorie buck: tons of veggies, fruit, limited fats, measured nuts and seeds, limited starchy veggies and grains.  Most Nutritarians are vegan, but some include 10% of daily calories from animal protein.   I have been an Eat to Live dabbler for years, but I am committing to a 6 week challenge to see if I can’t get down to fighting weight.  Running weight.  Whatever, smaller, you get it.  If you’d like to join me, the link to the challenge is HERE.

And now, to confound those of you who read this and concluded I am “right-wing”, here is a little song I like.  Hm… am I left-wing?  Darlings, I have two wings right there on my back.  They do not define me in one direction or the other!

Filed Under: Rants, Recommendations, Running, Tel Aviv Half Marathon, Tel Aviv Marathon, vegan Tagged With: , , ,

Meal Planning 102: The Next Step in Kitchen Organization

July 22, 2012 by 1 Comment

I wrote all about my basic meal planning strategy in this post HERE.

I have a free blank meal planning template give-away HERE.

I wrote this post for another website about meal planning, with sample menus and recipes HERE.

And I have a new post coming out on TheVeganWoman about Your Healthy Vegan Kitchen, which should be up later this week.

That’s a lot of blah-blah about cooking and planning and stocking, no?  As I looked at the editing room floor scraps of text that didn’t make the final Vegan Woman cut, I thought “But maybe my readers want to see things in ACTION more?”  Like, less theory – more DO.

I know it is helpful to actually see what other people do in their day-to-day lives, so right now, in this hot summer weather, this is how things have been going down in my kitchen.  Hope it’s helpful!

Morning:

I’m up before the sun these days!  Partly I am just excited about my new apartment and cannot wait to have a cup of tea on the balcony with my morning pages and the sunrise.

I don’t have to pack kids’ lunches because they are at home this summer, but I still pack a lunch for my husband.  While I’m at it, I do two other things:

  • Make a salad
  • Cut up fruit

The Salad:

It’s hot and really I don’t want much other than salad these days.  I basically take this large glass bowl and just FILL IT.  I put in lettuce, spinach, cabbage, cucumbers, kohlrabi, carrots, tomatoes, green onions, parsley, chopped fresh mint, sun-dried tomatoes – just really whatever we have.  Then I cover it with plastic wrap and put it in the fridge.  It will stay fresh and crisp all day like this.  I do not toss it.  I do not dress it.  Sometimes I even make segments of what each person likes, like this:

I serve it at both lunch and dinner – topped with different things like:

  • toasted sunflower seeds and pumpkins seeds
  • cooked beans
  • cooked corn
  • crumbled veggie burger
  • leftover cooked grains
  • salsa*
  • hummus*
  • tahina

*I am totally grooving on  the combo of 1 Tbsp salsa and 1 Tbsp hummus stirred into my salad instead of dressing.  I imagine I will get sick of it, but right now it’s the wind beneath my wings.

The fact is, if this salad were not pre-prepared, when it came to meal time, I might not get around to making it.  Kapish?

And the fact that it is not tossed and not dressed, makes it easy for picky children to pick around certain elements they don’t like.

The Fruit:

Sometimes this ends up being a fruit salad.  That usually happens when all the fruit becomes suddenly over-ripe at the very same instant.  Other times, I just cut up a bowl of watermelon or mango or whatever is ready.  Again, if it weren’t chopped and chilled in it’s nice bowl, do you think it would get served quite so easily?

My dears, doing salad and fruit prep in the morning before I go to the gym, is making it possible for me and my family to eat healthy this summer.  If it sounds to you like “Oh woe!  That is too much chopping in the morning!”, I promise it takes 20 minutes and is one of those things you will thank yourself for later in the day.  You could also do it at night before you go to bed if that’s how you roll.

Be strong and chop on.

The Smoothies:

At some point during the day, smoothies get made.  This is usually our afternoon snack.  Getting up pre-dawn means I’m ready for bed at 4pm. That won’t do so I have been making this Coffee Frappe to perk me up:

Coffee Frappe

1 frozen banana

1 date, pitted

1 tsp espresso powder (cafe shahor if you must know the truth)

1 Tbsp ground flaxseeds

1 1/2 cups water

Blend all until smooth and creamy.  Drink and wake up.

The kids’ smoothies are usually more like banana-flax-peanut butter-dates-and cocoa powder affairs.

The Entrees:

Basically whatever you see on this blog is what ends up on the lunch and dinner table.  (Recipe Index HERE).  But in the spirit of keeping it simple, I can tell you there are sandwiches and quesadillas or burritos normally for lunch and that dinner is a more organized cooked food deal with some sort of casserole, noodle/pasta dish, or bean/grain dish.  Plus the salad and the fruit at both meals.  Sometimes I pick up a really fresh bread at the bakery near my gym and center the meal around that with veggie dips and spreads.

Keep it simple sweetie!  This is not the time for long, slow cooked meals that heat up the house and make you cranky.

One final tip:  I am using Pinterest for meal planning A LOT.  I have gone ahead and re-arranged my boards for different dishes, courses and cooking tips.  It is truly a thing of beauty.  I am on there every day and am cooking so many new and interesting things.  You can see and follow along HERE.

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Filed Under: beans, coaching exercises, health coach, My Favorite Posts, Picky Eaters, Pinterest, Recommendations, salad, vegan, What Was For Dinner Tonight Tagged With: , ,

The End of Milk

June 3, 2012 by 18 Comments

top of the food chain comic

As most of you know, I am currently a vegan.  I am a vegan for mainly ethical and environmental reasons but also appreciate the tremendous health benefits of a plant-based diet.

It has been a long journey to reach full veganism and I am still not perfect at it.  At around age 16, I realized that what was on the dinner table used to be a cute little animal and I no longer wanted to eat meats.  I gave up veal first, then all beef, then fish, and finally chicken.  It was not a straight path and there were many regressions to various levels of meat-eating over the years.

I kept dairy and eggs in my diet because I loved them, and at first I did not think they presented an ethical problem – the animals did not die to give us eggs and dairy, right?

But then gradually I learned the truth.  The truth that the dairy and egg industries are the MOST cruel and horrible and that by continuing to eat eggs and dairy I was participating in the absolute worst of animal agriculture.

Still, it took me a loooooong time to get to a place where I could give them up.  I mean, CHEESE!  I adored cheese and could not imagine a life without it.

But as I had done before with becoming vegetarian, I took things slowly.  I did a few days dairy and egg-free at a time.  I learned how to bake without eggs and how to make scrambled tofu and tofu egg salad that totally satisfy and how to make nut cheese and cheesy sauces without the dairy.  One day I was able to look back and not even remember the last time I had eaten either eggs or dairy.  Yay me!

My family however… not on board.

Over the years, I have stopped cooking meats, chicken and fish for my family.  My husband cooks those for them once a week.  The rest of the time I cook vegetarian food.  But it became increasingly uncomfortable for me to buy and prepare dairy for them knowing what I know about the dairy industry.

And then I watched Forks Over Knives and heard the scientific evidence that even a small amount of dairy each day activates cancer cells and causes tumor growth and I wanted me to get my loved ones off dairy immediately!

But when I would mention not buying milk anymore as a first step, children and spouse would stamp feet in protest.  ”Mommy, now you are going too far!”

That looks creepy and weird, right?  But it’s what we are doing when we drink their milk.  They make that milk for their own calves, but we take their babies away at one-day old and steal their milk.  Because apparently, we are not weaned.

Then…

One…

Day…

I saw some photos on Facebook of the Israeli dairy industry that stopped my heart.  It had been easy for me to distance myself from the horror that is the cow milking madness, because it was over THERE, in America.  Here in Israel, we thought, in order for food to be kosher, the animals have to be treated humanely, so conditions must be better than the States.  Right?  Right?

I mean, I had seen some cows on our cousin’s moshav and yes, their udders were horribly distended, but still…(denial, denial, denial…)

Then these photos and I could no longer keep my head in the sand.  Not only are the cows’ udders insanely and sickly distended, bloody, pus-y, and horrific, there is one photo giving instructions for milking cows who are “smelly with diarrhea”, “have a suspected infection”, are “limping”, “bloody”, and “sick”.

End of Story.  Last Straw. Tipping Point.

OK, even if you are the cruelest person on the planet and cannot muster a tiny bit of compassion for these MAMMALS, who in the world wants to drink the breast milk of a limpy, shit-covered, hormone-pumped, genetically-modified, bloody, pus-y, infected, postpartum cow boob??

I showed the photos to the kids and they agreed (sort of) and that was that.  It has been a couple of weeks now and everything is going well in my no-cow-milk home.  We have been experimenting with all different sorts of plant milks.  Soy tastes the best and is the creamiest, but too much processed soy probably isn’t a great idea either, so I am mixing 1/3 each: soy, almond, and rice usually.  I throw in a few drops of vanilla and a tablespoon or two of coconut milk and it is thick and delicious and YUM and no one is complaining.

plant milk

That is just milk and this is just our starting place.  No doubt they will still eat ice cream when they go out and we will still order pizza for my little one’s birthday party.  Those things may change someday or maybe not, but cow milk itself, we are done with, and I feel awesome about it!

Not to mention my older son’s teenaged skin is looking MUCH better and he said “I used to have a stomach ache everyday at school.  Now, not so much.”  You have no idea how hard I have held back my told ya so’s!

People often say “Just me, not drinking cow’s milk, won’t make any difference.”  In my opinion it DOES make a difference.  First, it makes a difference for YOU.  You feel better, you feel like you are making a compassionate choice, your skin clears up, your tummy doesn’t bloat, you don’t have all those hormones coming into your body and disrupting your own hormones, your cholesterol level comes down, your blood flows easier, you don’t farty fart fart all the time.

Then MAYBE one day someone will ask you why you don’t drink milk and maybe you will tell them.  Maybe you will show them these photos and explain about the dairy industry and maybe, just maybe, you will cause them to think twice too.  The ripple effect from just one person’s choices reaches far and wide.  I know, because I see it in effect daily.

There are so many delicious alternatives.  Just give them a try and see what happens.  You don’t have to commit to veganism or anything.  You don’t have to commit to ANYTHING.  You can choose what to eat and drink at every meal.  Just make sure you understand what you are choosing and what the cost of that choice is, for yourself, for the animals and for the planet.

There is no such thing as humane meat, dairy, eggs, fish poultry or pork.  Would it be humane if we were treating humans this way?  No, of course not.  I’m not going to get into the whole thing here – take an hour and watch the amazing Gary Yourofsky video for yourself and learn what is true about animal agriculture.  Video can be found HERE.

If you drink dairy or eat cheese or yogurt, you owe it to the cows to look at these photos. And this is Israel where we are mandated by religious law to treat animals humanely!  If this is happening here, you can only imagine what it is like in your country.

Photo album is on Facebook HERE.

I know this is hard for many of you to think about.  I know there is major cognitive dissonance happening in your brain and heart.  I know, because I went through it all too.  Just keep your mind as open as you can.  Use your common sense.  Don’t drink the Dairy Industry Kool-Aid.  Try a few days without cow’s milk.  Experiment.  Allow your thoughts and opinions to change and evolve.  Thank you for reading this entire post.  Please share it if it means something to you…

This post is participating in Healthy Vegan Fridays HERE.

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Filed Under: Growth, health coach, Picky Eaters, Rants, Recommendations, vegan Tagged With: , , ,

Vegan Passover

April 2, 2012 by Leave a Comment

When we last left our hero Joseph, he was reunited with father Jacob and welcoming his brothers to come settle in Egypt.  Fast forward some 500 years and things have taken a turn for the worse. Thankfully, the Israelites escape their lives of bitter bondage and in memoriam we clean under our sofa cushions.

OK, so I wasn’t going to write about Vegan Passover because it’s a complicated subject and I am no rabbinic authority.  But many of you sent me questions and requests, so I will try.

I have a lot of non-Jewish readers and I am sorry but I just don’t have the time to explain everything.  Feel free to skip this post or just check out the links that follow:

What is Chametz HERE.

Explanation of Kitniyot HERE.

SO, if you do not eat kitniyot and you want to stay vegan on Passover, you will be able to eat fruits, most vegetables, quinoa, and nuts.  It’s only 7 days, you won’t become protein deficient or die of starvation or anything.  But you won’t be able to cook that much fancy food or enjoy much of what is on the family table.  At least you’ll probably get through Pesach without gaining the weight everyone else gains!

Me personally?  I’m planning on eating kitniyot.  I was already not fully on board with this kitniyot business since we made aliyah, but now that I am eating as vegan as I can, I’m not giving up my legumes.  

However, where it gets complicated is that I am making seder for 14 family members who probably don’t eat kitniyot.  That means that our seder won’t be vegan.  I don’t have the slightest clue how to make kneidelach or mock chopped liver without using kitniyot (actually, see below for a slight clue).   Therefore I don’t have many pre-tested vegan Passover recipes to share with those of you who are hosting vegan or vegetarian seders.

And yet, I do want to be of service, so here is a list of vegan Passover recipes I found online:

Vegan, No Kitniyot:

My Baked Nut Cheese

 

 

 

 

 

 My Moroccan Mushroom Salad

 

 

 

 

 

 My Carrot Red Pepper Soup (leave out the vinegar if that’s a problem)

 

 

 

 

My Pink Applesauce

 

 

 

 

 

My Matzo Toffee  

 

 

 

 

 

My Raw Chocolate Balls

 

 

 

 

Pineapple Crumble

Spinach Leek Potato Matzo Gratin

Quinoa with Cauliflower, Cranberries and Nuts

Vegan Matzo Brei using Quinoa Flakes (don’t know if we can find those in Israel)

Mock Chopped Liver   (no green beans or beans)

Matzo Balls (again with quinoa flakes)

  Healthy-ish Jelly Bean Macaroon Nests 

 

 

 

 

 

Vegan, With Kitniyot:

  Vegan Matzo Brei

 

 

 

 

 

Vegetarian, not vegan, no kitniyot:

A Delicious Variety of Mina (Matzoh Pie) Recipes

 

 

 

 

 

My Passover Almond Cake with Strawberry Sauce

 

 

 

 

 

  My Light and Fluffy Potato Vegetable Kugel

 

 

 

 

 

Cauliflower-Leek Herb Kugel (H.T. Andrea F)

 

 

 

 

So that’s just a smattering of what I found, but honestly, I’ve got sofa cushions to clean!

Have a happy Passover to those who celebrate. And a happy Easter to those of you who are still reading.

As always, let’s remember that Passover is not really about eating, although it seems to be.  It is about our physical and spiritual journey as a nation.  May we focus on that and not be consumed by our preoccupation with food or the crumbs in the sofa.

Filed Under: Holidays, Recipes, Recommendations, vegan Tagged With: ,

Preparing for Your Long Run

March 25, 2012 by 2 Comments

Today I wanted to write what goes into preparing for a long outdoor exercise session.  I have a checklist that I check before heading out the door.  Trust me when I say that forgetting your sunscreen or water bottle on a hot day is none too pleasant.

  • ID:  You MUST have some sort of identification on you.  Although most likely you will never need it, if something happened to you and you were unable to speak, you would want the paramedics to be able to notify your family and know your name and any medical condition you may have.  I have a pocket that attaches to my shoelace in which I keep my house key and a slip of paper with my name, my husband’s phone number and the suggestion that I might respond best to English not Hebrew.
  • Sunscreen:  I never wore sunscreen before this year when I began to notice brown spots appearing on my cheeks.  It’s too late to reverse the damage I’ve already done, but not too late to prevent future damage.  Don’t be cocky like me.  Just because you don’t burn, doesn’t mean you are not incurring damage that will show up years later.  I am seriously bummed out about those spots.
  • A hat:  Same reason as above, plus protection against heat building up on a dark head like mine.  A hat with a brim also keeps rain out of your eyes on a rainy day.
  • Sunglasses:  My husband and I are addicted to Native Dash XP’s.  We have been wearing them for years and would not wear anything else.  They are perfection.
  • Vaseline or other anti-chafing gel:  Anything that rubs – be it skin or fabric – will end up chafing.  That’s breasts, nipples, armpits, butt cheeks, testicles (so I’m told), and the elastic band of your undies.  Grease it all up!  I have used aloe vera gel and Vaseline.  Some runners use diaper cream.
  • Ibuprofen taped to arm:  This is one of the techniques I have worked out during this training period.  I tape two advils to my inner arm and one hour into my run, I pop them into my mouth.  One hour in and things are starting to swell, especially those knees!  Also helpful in case you fall or get blisters or chafing.  Goes without saying that I’m not a doctor so don’t take medicine advice from me.
  • Kleenex:  When I run, so does my nose.  Take kleenex to avoid wiping it on your shirt.  Stick it in your waistband.
  • Music/ipod:  If you want to listen to music or a podcast, don’t forget your mp3 player!  Sometimes I run with, sometimes without.  I am still trying to decide about this year’s race, but I think I will probably use it to dial in my desired pace at the beginning of the race.  Running too fast early on is the key mistake long-distance racers make.  I use PodRunner Podcasts to match my cadence to a pre-determined steps-per-minute:  174-175 to start the race.  Then, after the pack thins out (ie, I get left behind), and I am not tempted to try to keep up, I will probably take the music off and soak in the sounds of the surf, the city, the spectators, the entertainment and my own thoughts.
Polar RS300X plus foot pod
  • Watch and foot pod.  I have a Polar RS300X with a SD Foot pod.  This is my 2nd year with it and I love it.  It tells me time, distance, pace, heart rate, calories burned if I wear the chest strap (which I don’t for running, see chafing above), and all sorts of other cool features.
  • However, because last year I had a bit of a disaster with an inaccurate foot pod that led me to believe I should be finished with the finish line nowhere in sight, I now double check my mileage by logging my route into www.sportdistancecalculator.com.
  • Food and Drink:  Big topic, let me break it down.

If you are exercising for less than an hour, you probably don’t need to eat anything and you can just drink plain water.  However, if your workout is going to be longer than 1 hour, you will need to eat  something and to drink an electrolyte beverage.

Food during a workout:

Your body generally has enough fuel for about 60-80 minutes of strenuous activity.  I personally have found the best results by eating some carbs before I get hungry – at about 80 minutes into the workout.  I use a commercial gel called Gu, my raw cookies,  or just plain old dates.  Runners pin their food into their shorts, or buy shorts with built-in pockets like these big-butt beauties from RaceReady.

Race Ready pocket shorts

First of all, do I get major crazy points for putting a picture of my butt up in public??

If you are overseas and want to order from Race Ready, contact customer service for the lowest shipping option.  They shipped my shorts for about $12 USD and marked the package in such a way that it flew right through customs.  It also arrived 2 days after I ordered it.

Now, in my case, I have learned via many, many blood sugar crashes that I can’t just eat sweats during my runs.  Although I do not have diabetes any more, I do still have hypoglycemia.  I don’t eat any sugar in regular life and doing so on my runs doesn’t work well for me.  So I mix sweet snacks up with some sandwiches.   Yes, I run with two half-sandwiches tucked into my shorts!  I’ve been using peanut butter and salt, but a friend suggested marmite and I’m going to try that.  I know this is not as easy to digest as the gels and drinks, but it is the only way I have been able to keep my blood sugar steady.

For me, the timing is: 1:20 for the first snack and then every 30-45 minutes until the finish.  I expect to be out on the marathon course for over 5 hours, so basically I am a running buffet.  Smaller, faster runners with normal blood sugar don’t need to eat quite this much, in case you were wondering.  Some probably run the entire race without eating a thing.  Everyone is different and you need to figure out what works for you.  You will know when it has been too long without food because you will become cranky, tired, your legs will feel like lead and you will want to quit.  The classic Hitting the Wall symptoms.  It works best if you don’t let yourself get to that point in the first place, hence the buffet in my shorts.

Drink:

Exercise over an hour and you need to replace electrolytes.  You can use a commercial sports drink like Gatorade, or if like me, you want to avoid all that sugar, try Ultima Replenisher, which uses stevia.  I couldn’t find it the last time I was in the US and came home with Emergen-C instead.  I ran with that for a few weeks, but again, the fructose gave me trouble. So….

I made my own of course!

Emily’s Electrolyte Drink
Squeeze the juice of 2 clementines into your 750 ml sport water bottle. Add  1/4 tsp salt.

Fill with water and shake.  Sip during your workout, adding more water as when it becomes available.

I finish about 2-3 of these bottles over a 5 hour period.

BE CAREFUL!  Plain water can literally kill you when you are competing in an endurance event!!!  People have died from drinking too much plain water without any electrolytes.  You need the salt to keep things in balance.  Apparently you can buy salt tablets, but I haven’t used them.

OK, you’re all geared up and ready to get out there and RUN!

Five days until my marathon…

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Filed Under: Exercise, Product Reviews, Recipes, Recommendations, Running, Tel Aviv Marathon, Triumph Race Club Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

How to Dissolve Fear

March 18, 2012 by 1 Comment

I have a few recipe posts waiting in the wings, but first have some good stuff to share.

1.  The 2nd annual WISH Summit is underway.  WISH stands for Women’s International Summit for Health and it is founded and headed up by Tera Warner of the Raw Divas.  WISH is 40 days of amazing interviews with some of the top names in health, spirituality, finanial health, business, sexuality, and creativity.  Tera is an excellent interviewer and things rarely get boring!

I download the talks onto my ipod and listen while I am running or doing chores.  In fact, I am still listening and re-listening to some of the amazing talks from last year’s summit!  I keep hearing new things.  This year’s summit has also been wonderful and I have already had a ton of light bulb moments as I listen. My favorite speakers so far are EFT Master Carol Look, comedian Kyle Cease, and writer and physician Bernie Siegel.  The program is totally free and you can listen to past talks as well.  You can sign up HERE.  This is not an affiliate program.  I am just recommending it because it’s great.

2.  The Tel Aviv Marathon is in 11 days and I am in taper mode, which means short, easy runs to keep up fitness levels without tearing down muscles or courting any injuries.  I am as trained as I’m gonna be!

An amazing thing has happened in terms of my previous high level of terror and fear surrounding this race.  While listening to one of the WISH talks I mentioned above, new age comedian Kyle Cease described a technique he uses to beat stage fright and to allow himself to be more in the zone during performances.  Instead of doing affirmations like “I am running the Tel Aviv Marathon successfully”, you say “Remember when I ran the Tel Aviv Marathon and it was so fun and so inspiring?  Remember how the spectators were so great and there was so much camaraderie with the other runners?  Remember how the sky was so blue and the city and the sea looked so beautiful?  Remember how wonderful and strong I felt the whole way through and how proud and excited I was when I crossed the finish line?”

So instead of making an affirmation that is off in the future somewhere, you put what you want to happen in the past.  Then your mind looks on it like it already happened.  When I started doing this, I found that 1.) much of my nervousness dissipated and 2.) I realized that my main goal in doing this race is to have fun!  Sure I have other reasons why I want to do it, but having FUN while doing it is really the most important thing.  I actually am thinking about bringing a camera along with me!

3.  black toenail

This is my toe.  It is half purple and the nail is contemplating jumping ship.  It is seriously cramping the having fun part of running a marathon!  Apparently this toenail business happens often to marathoners and it’s not a big deal except that it hurts like the dickens and I am a little worried about it coming off right before or during the race.  If just talking about this is grossing you out, do NOT google “black toenail syndrome”!  I hereby promise to not post any pictures grosser than this one.

Do you think it will help me to say “Remember when my toenail spontaneously healed before I ran the Marathon?”  I will try anything.

4.  One of the things I worked on with my coach Karen, is being brave enough to refine the direction of my business.  The thing I am truly most passionate about is eating compassionately without harming animals.  That has gotten lost in the shuffle of working with everyone no matter how they want to eat.  So as I slowly re-align myself with my core values, I am looking for writing opportunities that fit better than some of the websites I have previously written for.  Case in point The Vegan Woman!  This website is truly head and shoulders above the rest, with fantastic writers and an extremely talented and organized editor.  The amount of synchronicity that happened around this transpiring for me was truly stunning.  Remind me to tell you about it one day.

My first article for them is up and it’s all about why some people lose tons of weight when they go vegan and others don’t.  Why Did the Magical Vegan Weight Loss Skip Me? can be found HERE.  Please visit, look around, participate, comment, re-post and re-tweet whatever you find useful.  I greatly appreciate your support in this new endeavor!  If there is any vegan topic you want me to cover over there, just let me know.

Oh, and if you are a happy omnivore with no interest in plant-based living, and you have been on the fence about working with me, do it NOW.  I am not sure how much longer I will be working with people who are not in some way interested in vegetarianism or veganism.

“Remember when I started devoting my business to Plant-Based Nutrition and it was so wonderful and successful?”

I think I just said that out loud…

… and the fear is gone!

Filed Under: coaching exercises, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Positive Thinking, Product Reviews, Recommendations, Running, Tel Aviv Marathon, Triumph Race Club, vegan Tagged With: , , , , , ,

You Can Run But You Can’t Hide

March 12, 2012 by 4 Comments

Well, you CAN hide.  In fact, I am a bit of an expert in hiding.  But inevitably, the truth catches up and outs me…

As some of you may remember, in February I won a coaching scholarship to work with a life coach in Australia, named Káren Wallace.  My scholarship allowed me 4 weekly one-hour sessions via Skype.  Although I want to keep much of what we actually worked on private, I do want to share with you the process we went through and what I got out of it.

I have worked with many coaches and therapists in my life so I am familiar with the process, but I know that some of you have never worked with any sort of adviser, mentor, counselor or coach and wouldn’t even know what to expect.  For this reason, I want to walk you through the process.

The first thing Káren did was to send me an intake form to fill out prior to the start of our first session.  These were the questions on the form:

1. 

2.  

3.  

4.  WHAT DO YOU THINK IS YOUR BIGGEST OBSTACLE IN REACHING YOUR GOALS?

5.  

6.  AS WE WORK TOGETHER, WHAT DO YOU MOST WANT ME TO LOOK OUT FOR, TO KEEP YOU ON TRACK?

Wow, just by writing some thoughtful answers to those questions, I made major strides in my sense of clarity.  You should jot some answers to those questions for yourself and see what you come up with.

I wanted to work with Káren because I was feeling stuck on some pretty big questions concerning the direction of my business, our geographical location and lifestyle, and some more personal issues that I had been feeling discouraged and worried about.  That’s a tall order for 4 sessions!

I knew it wasn’t much time so I decided I would really focus and make the best of it.  In other words, I was a good client.  What was this “work” though?  Well, after talking for each hour-long skype session, Káren and I set goals each week and I worked my best to get them done.  Sometimes I did, other times I was stuck, but I explored that stuckness in writing and painting until I found it’s source.  When you are stuck, there is ALWAYS a good reason for it.  Your job is to figure out why, and when you do, it usually dissolves.  Many people see their stuckness and just turn away.  It seems too hard, too solid, too implacable…  but the whole point of hiring a coach is to have that support to explore your stuck spots in safety.

When I began with Káren, I wrote in my intake form that I had “lost the thread” of my life and my business and was floundering about lost and ineffective.

By the end of the month I had learned something amazing.  I had not in fact “lost the thread”.  The thread was right there with me all along, and I had already worked it all out in great detail as a matter of fact!  But then, because it frightened me and made me insecure, I tucked it away, forgot about it, and showed up “lost”.

Káren gave me the courage to uncover it, the support to share it out in the open, and the confidence to begin rolling it out.  The changes are already taking place for me.  You may notice them or maybe they will be too subtle to see.  They are basically an evolution for me.  It was time for me to grow but I was afraid to allow that to happen because my comfort zone had been working just fine.

Now, this is what is really interesting to me:  I took photos of both myself and my work space the day I began with Káren and then the day of our final session, 21 days later.  I am not going to share my work space photos yet because I still don’t feel “done” in that area, but I want you to see the difference in my appearance:

 

Same amount of makeup.  Same place and time of day.

Note:  Káren and I did not work on my appearance!  These pictures show the difference between someone who is avoiding what she knows to be true about her path and a person who has decided she will be bold and step forward on it.

This, my friends, is the Magic of Coaching.  If you are at all feeling stuck, fuzzy, confused, worried, or lost, hiring a coach is the best thing you can do!  But hiring the coach is only half of it.  You also have to be willing to do the work.  Your coach, (or therapist or whatever), cannot do anything FOR you.  However, the clarity they mirror back to you, the safe place they keep for you, and the gentle encouragement they provide for you, can give you the courage and strength you need to break through to your next evolution.

To hire Káren, you can visit her website HERE.

To hire me, well, you know because you are already here.  You can book a trial session with me by emailing Emily@TriumphWellness.com.

No more hiding, OK?  Not for me and not for you.

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Filed Under: coaching exercises, Goals, Growth, health coach, Inspiration, Recommendations Tagged With: , , , , ,
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