19 July 2014

sugar town

I remember when I was a teenager and would party all day and night, fall asleep with all my makeup on, eat McDonalds and feel totally fine. I've unfortunately lost my powers of invincibility as the years have gone by and at twenty one years old, I'm no longer a beacon of shining health. The upside however, is that I'm a lot more attuned with my body and what I need to do take care of it. I've suffered from eczema my entire life and have tried countless steroid cream treatments and antihistamine medications. They've always worked for short amount of time and then when I would stop using them, my skin would flare up with a vengeance. I finally put my foot down two years ago and swore off any chemicals, steroids, manmade treatments for my body because the body is a natural thing and if you give it the tools it needs to function, it should be able to heal itself and operate at optimum level. The only hurdle with this decision was figuring out what the right tools for my body were.
After years of trial and error I finally figured out the main culprit of what triggered my eczema along with a whole host of other issues like fatigue, mental fog, etc. --SUGAR. Thats right, s u g a r spell it out, it was the one factor in my diet that was basically slowly killing me from the inside out. Naturally, I was completely devastated because I am a self proclaimed cake connoisseur and carb addict. I always say if I was more neurotic, I'd be a pastry chef because I love cakes so much. After numerous attempts at weaseling around my NO SUGAR NO CARBS EVER AT ALL diet, it bore the same painful inflammatory reactions in my body and even made it worse. Turns out, sugar, no matter how raw vegan, natural, or organic all ends up breaking down into glucose once you put it in your body. It's been almost eight months and counting on this I guess you would call it Ketogenic Diet and my skin and insides feel a lot better but not a day goes by where I don't miss eating delicious gooey artichoke pizza. 


Along with cutting out sugar, its impossible to get all of the vitamins and minerals you need in a day from the food you eat these days, so it was crucial for me to supplement my diet with vitamins, especially because of my iron deficiency and strict dietary restrictions. I experimented with different vitamin supplements and scrambled for a while trying to figure out what I should be taking. I finally was introduced to Shaklee Vitalizer which is a daily blister pack that includes a spectrum of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, anti-aging phytonutrients, omega-3 fatty acids, and probiotics. This literally changed my life! I noticed I had more energy and mental alertness during the day and was able to focus on work longer than I had previously been doing. 

The last thing I declare crucial to my physical wellbeing is drinking a ton of water. I constantly sip on the good stuff all day long and wouldn't be caught dead without a water bottle. Keeps your insides running nice and smoothly and improves your skin! Totally a win win situation. 



The whole NO SUGAR thing might be a blessing in disguise though, it's nice to know that I'm not addicted to the stuff anymore. Plus it forces me to figure out creative and inventive ways to eat the things I miss like pizza and noodles without it hurting me. I look forward to sharing my recipes with you!