CIAO and CHOW: A month of saying goodbye to crap foods and shoving veggies down the gullet instead

We are doing it. For a month. Sweet deprivation   Clean food indulgence.  Did I mention for a month? Starting April 21st. 

Let me explain. Joshua and I have been learning more and more about nutrition and how the food that we eat can drastically help or hurt our bodies and also just how modified almost all of the food we eat is (GMO).  After much research and some experimentation in the past, we have come to the conclusion that almost everything we eat almost is killing us somehow and we should go into a deep depression about it.  That was sarcasm, a bit of dry humor (ha ha?)...but for real...minus the depression part.  I won't go into all the science that we have learned but I will jump to the experiment we are going to do as a result of our learning.  

GOALS for the experiment: 

OUR HEALTH:
Joshua and I both have been suffering from some really debilitating health issues (which I will list below) that we want to track as we eat clean, and at the end of the month, see if any of these issues improve.  We are aware that eating clean may not "fix" a more serious problem going on in our bodies, that we may require medical help, but we know it can't hurt our bodies to treat them well, nor make the problem worse.  

Joshua's Symptoms:
-Fatigue 
-Fatigue
-Fatigue
(yes, clearly I'm saying he is tired.  All the time)
-Lack of quality sleep
-Leaky gut symptoms
-Irritability
-Brain fog/inability to concentrate
-Forgetfulness

Sarah's Symptoms:
-Fatigue
-Joint aches combined with "burn" like sensations to touch on random parts of skin (scalp, arms, leg, fingers)
-Swelling (inflammation)
-"Zingers" shooting pains up neck into head
-Extreme bloating (aka like board flat stomach in the morning to 3 mos prego immediately after eating...I kid not people). 
( a lot of my symptoms seem to be autoimmune and inflammatory responses and sugar is linked to inflammation issues, so I would expect to see positive changes in my symptoms by eliminating most sugar).  

WHAT WE HAVE ALREADY BEEN DOING:
Just to clarify, we have already been primarily eating organic produce and try whenever possible to eat organic meats.  We have also done stints of gluten free, dairy free and sugar free eating.  However, we feel that we have allowed too many "exceptions" and been often inconsistent.  

WHAT WE WILL EAT:
-Organic veggies
-Organic fruits
-Quinoa (organic)
-Organic beans
-Balsamic vinegar and Organic Olive oil (yes, not quite "clean" but will help us maintain sanity in cooking)
-Coffee (in moderation) (Heh!) ( yeah right) (but really)
-Herbal teas
-Nuts

That's. IT.  
Please people, if you have some awesome recipes that work with these ingredients, please message me or comment on this blog with them!  :) 

PREPARATION FOR LIFESTYLE CHANGES
Our goal isn't just to eat this way for a month, but to incorporate some major changes into our lifestyle while giving provision for cheats out of necessity or the occasional treat. 
Given the culture we live in, eating healthy is almost a novelty and seems unattainable unless you get blessed by the Whole Foods fairy who delivers free produce at your doorstep daily (of course by way of the eco friendly hybrid car she drives), and honestly, I'm starting to believe this fairy doesn't exist. :(  Therefore, I want to track how much eating strictly organic whole foods will cost our family so we have an idea of a budget we can handle (or need to modify).  Currently (not including eating out) our family can easily put $600 in the grocery budget and just make it to next paycheck before spending more on food.  I am well aware that may be really high for some of you families but please understand our family consists of 2largestomachcapabilitiesMEN plus a healthy nursing girl who loves to consume her momma's calories so rapidly that momma has to eat just a liiiiiitttttllleeee extra to keep up. I plan to track how much this month of revised eating costs and strategize how to incorporate the lifestyle changes without upping our budget.  

Another complication that comes with our culture (food loving fatties fraternizing over foods), is that eating a purely organic diet around social gatherings or during our occasional family foodie movie nights will be impossible to maintain without cheating sometimes. So, we will learn to cheat and being ok with it.  #heckYEStohavingaCOOKIE!



Nonetheless, with all we have learned about nutrition, and especially if this diet produces positive changes in our health, we can't justify going cold turkey back into our current way of eating.  We are also aware that once you take foods that irritate your system out of your diet for a period of time, introducing them back into your diet can wreak havoc on your body like never before.  I have friends who could tolerate dairy until they got off of it for a few weeks.  When they tried to go back, they had horrible stomach issues etc.  Thus, we know that doing a month of this eating puts us at "risk" of making some of the foods we now eat, impossible to bring back without really drastic effects.  Anyway. We shall see, shan't we? 


GOALS of blogging on the experiment: 

I would love to use this blog as a bit of education for others, motivation for us and others, accountability for us (b/c really, I will want to "cheat" in the first 2.5 seconds of the experiment).  SO, I plan to post weekly updates on how we are doing, recipes for you readers, and finally, again, we would WELCOME any yummy recipes you peeps may have successfully tried that fall in line with what we are going to eat/not eat. 

So...updates to come after April 21st! 

Ciao and CHOW!