Friday, February 20, 2009

My Inspiration

My daughter inspires me. She inspires me to live a simpler life and not live beyond my means. She inspires me to reuse and recycle. And she inspires me to eat a healthy diet.

The first 2 inspirations haven't exactly taken hold yet, but the third has hit home. I want to eat in a responsible, thoughtful, healthy manner. I'm tired of my constant headaches. I'm tired of feeling gross after eating fast food. I'm tired of eating low-fat, low-calorie, low-taste foods and still gaining weight. In short, I'm tired.

After visiting with my daughter at Thanksgiving, and seeing her healthy attitude toward food, it got me thinking. I am a child of the '60's and '70's. Everything my mom cooked was made from Velveeta, cream of mushroom soup, Jell-o, or dry onion soup. (don't read their ingredients...) So of course, that's how I cooked; brain-dead, on autopilot, without considering if that stuff was really even edible.

I also heard Gov. Huckabee talk about his wake-up call to healthy eating. He summed it up like this: "
I often tell people a couple of basic rules of nutrition: One is, if it wasn't a food 100 years ago, it probably isn't a food today. Secondly, if it comes through the car window, it isn't food."

So I've decided to teach this old dog some new tricks. Each week, I'll add one new nutritious change to my daily diet. This week, I gave up caffeine. No more coffee, chocolate, or pop. I decided to do it this week because I had the week off from work and if I was going to suffer headaches, I figured I should be home. But, I'm happy to report, no withdrawal headaches!

Next week, I'll begin each day with 2 eggs, not cereal or a PopTart. Next, I'll cut out all refined flours and sugars. Along the way I'll add more fresh fruits and veggies, and try out one new healthy recipe per week. I baked an acorn squash yesterday (first time in my life), with NO syrup or brown sugar on it. Just real butter. It was delicious.

Will I lose weight? Beats me. That's not the main reason I'm changing my ways. (But if it's an added benefit, I won't complain) No, I just want to feel better and enjoy real food again. And taking Gov Huckabee's advice, I'd like to learn how my great-grandmother cooked real food 100 years ago.

One downside, I guess I'll have to change the title of my blog...any suggestions?

P.S. Thanks Jessie!!!

1 Comments:

Blogger Jessie said...

I'm crying right now. This is an answer to prayer.

Thank you for the kind words.

Also, congratulations on picking one thing a week and not getting all overwhelmed and depressed like I did at first. :-)

9:52 AM  

Post a Comment

<< Home