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My blood pressure is too high.  This is a recent phenomena directly attributable to my stress eating since M. was diagnosed with breast cancer in Feb.  Now there is no choice – I must lose weight and get my blood pressure under control.  There is stroke and heart disease and diabetes in my family.

This is negative motivation.   Negative motivation can be interpreted in two ways.   It could be construed as negative emotions or behaviors. For example, a coach who motivates by pointing out flaws or belittling.  Negative motivation is also a term which refers to the negative consequences which will result from not changing behavior.   Health problems are this type of motivation.  Negative motivation can be a useful thing.

In this case, it’s certain that I can’t continue doing what I’ve been doing.   I need to eat and exercise in the ways I know will improve my health.

The program really emphasizes goal setting and life-balance. The provide lots of tips on how to organize one’s life to incorporate this eating style as a permanent habit.  Plus, it’s a spiritual mission.  I’m planing to renew my long-stagnant meditation practice and spend lots of time cycling (moving meditation).  You can bet I’ll be in the hot tub a great deal too. Knowing I get to do two weeks worth of extremely cleansing eating is a big motivator for me.  I’ve been doing the 11 week initiatives at Raw Food Rehab since April.  Consistently! So far I’ve lost a few pounds and I’ve made biking to work a daily habit and I’ve increased the number of days I spend 100% vegan per week.   I’m more psyched about sticking to it now that I’m going to OHI.  I’ll experience less detox reaction if my diet before the trip is clean.

My long term goal is to reduce (or eliminate!) my use of prescription medications.  The program will be an excellent launching point for that. Only 6 weeks until vacation time! I’m counting the days.

Spinach garden

I’m going to an L.A. raw foodie potluck this upcoming Saturday hosted by Dhru (We Like it Raw), Courtney Pool (Radical Radiance), and Puki Freeberg.  I’m nervous! I suffer from the shyness & insecurity when it comes to meeting strangers, especially when they’re famous (at least in the raw world).  I know it’s ridiculous.  I’ll be repeating self-love mantras all week. I’m sure it will end up being wonderful and it will help keep me motivated on this high-raw path.

I’m going to make carrot & currant salad from my all time favorite raw culinary book:  Living Cuisine by Renne Loux (Underkoffler). Simple, healthy, delicious and my non-raw family love it.   I need to keep this as low-stress as possible.  I’ll be sure to take my camera and let you know how it goes.

Speaking of stress, I’ve got a lot less of it now that my wife’s garden is producing.  No need to go to the farmers market and fight the crowds.  Check out the spinach patch!  Guess what I’m using in my green smoothie today!  Going to be a brown smoothie though. Spinach + orange = brown.  Ah well, it’s still good for me.

I’ve put my goals and intentions out for the world to see on this web site, but that hasn’t really kept me accountable. Despite the commenting facility on this blog, it really is a one-to-many broadcast-type medium. There isn’t anybody out there willing to kick my ass if I don’t do what I promise to do. Enter my friend K.   When I complained about being on-again off-again with my goals, she suggested partnering up.  Wow! How nice! I can’t refuse an offer like that.  So I didn’t.

We’re going to check in every two weeks to see how we’re doing.  If we’ve sustained our commitment, we get to have a reward.   Mine is a new bag to carry my work gear around.   To get it I’ve got to exercise 30 mins per day at least 5 days per week.  And eat Phase 1 ETL style.  Religiously.

So far so good.  It’s yet another “first day” of eschewing addictive foods.  I’m home with a cold and haven’t felt like eating much.  A blessing in disguise: I can’t feel detox because I’m already feeling cruddy!

Breakfast was: a big shot of E3 live and a fruit salad with 1 tbsp ground flax seed (1 banana, 1/2 cup blueberries, 2 mandarin oranges)

Lunch was: 14 oz of salad (yes, I weighed it.  yes, I am a dork).  Mixed baby spring greens with shredded carrot and red cabbage.  4 tbsp of Newman’s Own Light Honey Mustard dressing.  I take my Fuhrman supplements after eating.  2 Osteo-sun and 1 Gentle Care multi-vitamin.

The dinner plan is to do black bean burritos.  The family gets to have flour tortillas.  I’m wrapping my fillings with a big old romaine lettuce leaf.   The beans are my wife’s specialty – done Cuban style with lots of cumin, onion, garlic.  I’ll be adding shredded lettuce, avocado, and salsa fresca.  Plus hot sauce, naturally.

If I’m up to it, I’ll walk the doggies later to get in my 1/2 hour.

I’m going to write up a separate post about rewards.  I’m trying to figure out things which will entice me to carry on with the two week reward/check-in cycle.  I’m especially interested in free and low-cost rewards.  Most of the things I’ve thought of so far require cash outlay.

My lap

I’m still here.  Not doing so well, so I haven’t posted in a couple of weeks.  I’ve got some posts in reserve from the bounty of the South Central Farmer’s CSA box.  The amount of produce was overwhelming for this family of three and I did end up returning some of the bounty to the mother (that’s what they call composting at Living Light).    My compost may be expensive but the nutrients it returns to the soil will be superior!!

I’m a bit discouraged by that.  I treat it as a learning experience.  Next box we get will be shared with another family.  Or we’ll forgo boxes and purchase our South Central Farm produce from the farmers’ market in smaller batches.

I’m also a bit discouraged with my attitude.  I haven’t felt like exercising or eating well so I haven’t.   I suffer from a mood disorder — I’m hesitant to use the labels the docs have applied over the years.  Let’s just say that I’ve had many many many bouts of major depression over the years.   Exercise and eating well are the best treatment.  I know it.  Yet I go through periods where I can’t dig myself out of  my navel gazing rut.   I am under medical care for this.  My dream is to someday get off of medications and treat this condition with healthy living food.   It.is.just.so.effing.difficult.

I’m very interested in how some people can decide to make a change and then they just do it.  Bang! Done! One day you’re eating a typical North American Diet and the next you’re not.  See for example Philip McCluskey or Terrence Lavin.   Then there are the people like me – utterly convinced that a high raw vegan diet is capable of miracles — yet still struggling to embrace it after five (yes 5!!) years.

I don’t know what to make of it.  Perhaps its a factor of the condition.  It’s a dark blanket that suffocates any motivation and replaces it with persistent despondent thoughts.  Why bother?  Perhaps its a factor of the time it takes to see any major changes.  If you’ve got significant health issues it can take awhile to feel better.  Indulging in addictive dairy, sugar, or caffeine provides instant gratification that trumps the fact that putting that stuff in your body will actually make you feel worse longer term.

It’s a perpetuating cycle.  Negative thought loops lead to bad diet chemistry lead to more negative thought loops and the worsening of the condition.  The only way I’ve ever done the healthy thing is  by hanging onto a strict eating and exercise regime with pure white knuckles.  Obviously willpower doesn’t work.  If it did, I’d have five years of clean living under my belt.

I start doubting myself.  I don’t want this space to be filled with on-again, off-again, reports.  I don’t need self-flagellation.  I don’t need a public confessional space.  It’s tiresome to read journals from people who repeat their behavior over and over and over again.  I stop writing rather than fill this blog with reports of my failures.

I suspect there are more of us who fall into the camp of gradual change with many set-backs.  The type of person who does sudden, complete, and sustained change is a rarity.  I shouldn’t doubt that there is an audience of fellow healthy wanna-bes.  I just can’t bring myself to keep telling everybody that I’m not doing well.

I will be spending some time thinking about new ways to motivate myself.  I’ve got my bag of tricks like doing  another 30 day challenge, reading ETL or  raw vegan books, using online support groups.    I could use those, but I feel very half-hearted about it. I suspect bio-chemistry is at play here and if I force myself to eat right and exercise for a week or so that I’ll feel so much better that I can implement other forms of motivation.  I’ve lost my will though.  I need help.  I’m seriously considering a retreat.  Perhaps if I get away from my usual surroundings I can re-set my body chemistry.  If I get a jump-start I might be able to find the motivation to carry on.

South Central Farmers

Color me ignorant. I had heard of the South Central Farm.  I didn’t realize that the South Central Farmers’ Cooperative CSA had emerged from its ashes, based out of Bakersfield, CA.  I just signed up for our first weekly box.

The South Central Farm story is about a brouhaha between a community garden and a developer.  Protests were had, celebrities spoke out, and the developer won.  The gardens were razed in 2006.  I confess, I was so busy with planning my wedding in ’06 that I didn’t pay proper attention to the story.   I was sad about it, absolutely.  And then it faded from memory.

Turns out my local Whole Foods market has been supporting the co-op.  It stocks the produce and it is a pick-up point for CSA boxes.  In fact, I’m surrounded by opportunities to partake. There are pick-up points at farmers markets in my neighborhood as well as the extremely near-by Figueroa Produce.  I’ve got no excuses for not supporting the SCFCSA coop.

The wife and I are pretty excited about it.  We’ve looking into CSA before, but the only near-by one we found was a purchase-by-the-season dealio and we just couldn’t make the cash outlay.   There’s no membership with the SCFCSA.  You can purchase by the week, month, or season.  And there are different levels of payment.  For a few extra dollars you can support the cooperative’s administrative expenses or sponsor a box for a needy family.

I’m especially excited about have super-fresh veggies to play with. I’ll need to be creative to use up the box.  An excuse to make new recipes!   The freshest food means we get the best possible nutrition.  It’s local so there is less environmental footprint.  It supports a community.  Really, I couldn’t be more pleased.  It increases my motivation to eat a plant-based diet.

There will be a lot of food to play with in this week’s box: several varieties of chard and kale, a couple of varieties of beets, lettuces, broccoli, red onion, and new-to-me tatsoi and kohlrabi.  I suspect it will be so much food that this family of three may only need to get a box every other week.   Then again, raw foodists and ETL adherents do tend to eat a helluva lot of veggies.   One big rule: no compost! We’ll need to figure out how to get it all eaten.  Worst case scenario: juice baby juice.

I’ll be sure to let you know how it goes.

“You have to put in the time of abstinence up front to get the results.  If you’re always jumping back and forth due to toxic cravings, you won’t build the strength and sensitivity in the taste buds that make natural foods so delicious.”

I agree completely. I do have a wee quibble, however.  Total abstinence is incredibly difficult.  We live in a society that is not geared towards eating for health.  SAD food abounds at every restaurant and grocery store.  We are bombarded with messages in the mass media that glorify SAD food.  You just don’t see commercials extolling the virtues of bok choy, sorry.  Living in opposition to our surroundings requires much conscious effort.  And as I’ve said before, willpower is not enough.  It takes time to move beyond willpower into the unconscious habitual action.

It’s true that jumping back and forth won’t give your taste buds new sensitivity nor will it help you overcome heavy duty cravings. I don’t think it helps us yo-yo’ers to keep telling us that though.  We know what we’re supposed to be doing.  How about some tips for making it through the difficulties?

I think there is some benefit to increasing the amount of veggies and fruit in your diet even if you don’t refrain from the addictive stuff.  Yes, you will continue to suffer through the addiction.  But – and it’s a big but — the nutrition you get from the healthy food doesn’t disappear because you binged on Nutter-Butters.

In my experience, my desire for unhealthy stuff does decrease as I increase the proportion of green leafies in my diet.  I think we should recognize that and encourage people to keep up the good work.  Telling folks they won’t build the strength to overcome their taste buds unless they are totally abstinent is only going to discourage people.  Yes it’s true. But it’s hard enough to make good choices while living within the dominate culture.  How about recognizing the benefit of doing every little bit you can? Every small step does make a difference.  The encouragement is way better for motivation than implied admonishment.

That said, I’m about to take a vow of ETL strictness for Lent.  I’ve been doing the yo-yo thing since Christmas time.  It’s time to re-commit.  It was too easy to fall back into comforting myself with pastries and salty fried things during my most recent bout of stress with a capital “S.”  I know the first three days are going to be hard.  Please wish me well and say a prayer for my family: they will bear the brunt of my crankiness as I come-down from Mt.Sugar.

Sticking to healthy habits is incredibly hard during a crisis. It’s true that SAD is no more convenient than high-raw. In a pinch, it’s easier to go with the familiar.

I have to devise some strategies for managing my nutrition under duress. I’m sure it will make a lovely post once I figure it all out.

I’ve been eating a lot of oatmeal. Too much for me, really. I am sensitive and oatmeal brings on carb cravings with a high intensity. Even when I do it raw style (soaking groats, blending the resulting sprouts in my Blend-Tec).

The best piece of advice I’ve gotten is to grab a bag of greens and hang on.   Sooner or later the beans’n'greens will win out over the starchier carbs.   Or the weather will get warmer and it will get easier.

I’m a huge fan of Eat to Live as I’ve mentioned before.  Dr. Fuhrman is not a big fan of detoxes.  He says there is no scientific back-up to the claims many detox programs make.  The human body is very efficient at detoxing itself without the need for supplements or super-foods.  All it needs is good nutritious fuel.  Amen to that.  Furhman published his very own 5 day detox protocol on his blog in response to the other programs.

I think it’s a great way to kick off my renewed commitment to Eat to Live (or ETL as its ardent adherents like to call it). And wonder of wonders! My lovely spouse says she wants to do the detox too.  That will be helpful.  ETL breaks down into two parts: the “Six-Week Plan” and the “Life Plan.”  The link to the Six-Week Plan explains it.  The gist is that it’s low fat vegan with a limited amount of starchy veg or grains.  The Life Plan is the Six-Week Plan with a little more leeway.  One can add flesh foods back into the diet if they are into eating that stuff.  One can also had a limited amount of dried fruit, a bit more starch, etc.

The Six-Week Plan reminds me very much of a 30 day raw challenge.  The only difference is that one eats some veggie dishes cooked and one eats a least a cup of cooked beans/legumes a day.   I can live with that.  It’s still pretty freaking cold here in L.A., and it’s still gray and rainy.  A nice pot of soup/stew and/or some steamed veggies go a long way towards making me happy.

I just found out about an online support group for ETL so I joined it to get further inspiration.  I’ve committed to doing 6 weeks. I start tomorrow – no better time than now.  No need to wait until 2010.  I’ll let you know how it goes.