How Sweet it is to be Loved By ME

This is me and Michael Stipe in 2003. Doesn't he look happy? HA! Seriously though. Every time I see this pic, my eyes zero in at my midsection.

I think: We're two vegans. But one does not look like the other. Why?

A couple weeks ago, Carbzy blogged about the 15 grams of sugar a day diet. I decided to try it out. Since then, I have had a revelation.

I have been eating a shitload of sugar.

It was all unrefined. But it was still sugar. When excess sugar and carbs go into the body, they stick. They stick to the belly.

And man, do I have some excess.

Personally - I think sugar is addictive. You can read about the debate here. All I can do is add my own testimony.

Summer, 2007

Five years ago, I thought I was hypoglycemic. Once I went off refined carbs and sugars, the hypoglycemia disappeared. I got a little thinner.

Winter, 2008

(That's my little sister copping a feel on my curves...)

Then I went off gluten. A celiac friend told me that gluten can mess with your blood sugar. I knew I had blood sugar problems, heart palpitations after I ate anything with sugar in it. Plus I thought it might help my guts.

It did. And I got a little thinner.

Winter, 2009.

The Mom Jeans help, trust me.

For a while now, I have been using unrefined sugar. But whether it's maple syrup, raw honey, fruit, or agave - a little taste and I agg for the stuff. Mornings after long nights of drinking? I WANT PANCAKES. All the sugar from the night before is starting to leave my body. My body is addicted and wants more.

One thing I've learned from nutritionist Megan Telpner is that when your body craves a food, it's often not good for you. Cravings are also signs that your body is deficient in some nutrient. For example, chicks crave chocolate and sugar before their periods, because their bodies need more iron and protein.

Interestingly, there is a substantial amount of iron in raw cacao.

I've had it all - the hypoglycemia, the heart palpitations, the cravings and the fat bloated gut. Even as a vegan, gluten-free, refined sugar-free health food nazi, I've been eating too much sugar. Want to see?

A Day in the Life of FG

Breakfast

OJ with Hot Cereal and Almond Butter

(24 grams of sugar)

Elevensies

A Vita Coco Coconut Water with 1/2 cup of Edenblend

(24 grams of sugar)

Lunch

Greens with Mushrooms and Nut Butter Sauce

(I'm okay here!)

3 PM Snack

Larabar

(18 grams of sugar)

Dinner

Sweet potato and roasted veggies with 2 glasses of vino

(20 grams of sugar)

HOLY CRAP!

I was consuming one and a half soda's worth of sugar BEFORE LUNCH.

By the end of the day? Four sodas.

No wonder I got a big belly.

www.proteinpower.com

This past week, I started a revolution! I looked to siphon the sugar out of my diet, meal by meal. And man, I LOVE a challenge. It was super fun.

Instead of OJ...

www.fertilehealthy.com

... I had a glass of lemon water with stevia!

Instead of 1/4 cup of applesauce in my raw oatmeal...

... I made it with 1 Tablespoon of applesauce

and 1-2 Tablespoons of raw almond butter!

Instead of coconut water...

missionmission.files.wordpress.com

... I had Kombucha!

OR...

www.choosingraw.com

... Gena's chia seed puddin with almond milk and stevia!!!

Instead of making smoothies with Edenblend...

www.turtlemountain.com

... I had Original-flavor Coconut Milk Kefir!!!

Instead of vino...

www.crescentcitynutrition.com

... I had Dandy Blend.

Most days, I clocked in at under 15 grams of sugar.

Some, I ate around 20 or 30. Those were the days I felt a little under the weather and wanted to pimp my immune system with a Vita Coco. But still - 20 sugars? That's progress!

I don't wanna knock the high sugar foods that I mentioned above. There are so many wonderful benefits of some of those sugary foods. Like I've said - NOTHING cures a cold like coconut water.

BUT...

Right now, I'm at the end of my rope. I work out almost every single day. I'm on a vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, high raw, high fiber diet. And I'm still not looking the way I want to. I'm searching for optimum health here. Healthy people look healthy.

I don't look as healthy as I should for how I eat.

It's gotta be the sugars.

What about you guys? Are you as self conscious as me? In what ways are you trying to feel better, healthier? I wanna know!

Fake Shit

http://static.tvfanatic.com

Oh Flocke!!!

Was anyone else disappointed to discover the John Locke of Season 5-6 Lost is really the smoke monster?

I'm still pretty sad about it. He's such a pity case. He's got that my-life-is-so-pathetic-it-makes-me-cute thing going on big time. I'd totally nail him if I was like, twenty years older... Aaaand he was a real person, instead of a fictional character.

In the wheelchair.

Out of the wheelchair.

Who cares?!

But alas, Locke is Flocke. Old. Stuck on an island.

I'm FartyGirl, still shoveling out of the snowpocalypse.

Wanna hear about something else that's fake? High fiber processed foods.

This is info coming to you from another old issue of Nutrition Action. In their Fiber-Free-for-All, July/August 2008 issue, they define fiber from a new perspective. It's not soluble vs. insoluble. It's isolated vs. intact.

To lower cholesterol, fiber has to be both soluble and viscous. Isolated fibers like maltodextrin, inulin, oat fiber and polydextrose are not viscous. And these are the fibers being added to processed foods, whose labels proclaim in big cartoon letters: 100000% of your DAILY FIBER!!!

What processed foods, do you ask?

V8

Fiber One bars

And...

(sigh...)

my favorite...

365 Rice Milk

Yes, any info from 2008 is definitely not NEW info. BUT it is new to me. I drink 365 rice milk all the time. Now I know why I was guzzling cartons of it, but not feeling it's 35% of daily fiber in my guts.

Just another reason to shop at the farmer's market.

While we're on the topic of fake shit... let's talk about ME!!!

http://www.crescent-theatre.co.uk/

For the last two years, I've touted myself as "vegan, gluten-free, sugar-free." And you know what???? It was crap.

Every once in a while, I DO go out to breakfast with my girls and eat a hearty veggie omelet.

And when traveling to and from Florida, I ate Philly pretzels.

When it comes to sugar, for the last three years, I have been singing the angelic praises of agave. Now I know that it really doesn't matter. All sugar is sugar. Too much of it is bad.

No longer can I go on living with these LIES!!!

While my diet is going to stay generally vegan, gluten-free, and sugar-free, I don't want to publicize myself as one anymore. So I changed the heading of this blog to...

FartyGirl: The Queen of T.M.I.

I hope you likes it! And I hope tonight's episode of Lost isn't as boring as last week's was!

C'mon Hurley... crack a joke...

or at least a smile...

please?

http://intensities.files.wordpress.com

Colon Blow

Over the past five years, there were three stretches of time when I didn't feel sick.

1. My trip to Ocean City, NJ in August of 2007.
2. My trip to the UK in March of 2008.
3. My trip to my grandmom's in January of 2010.

These trips have a lot in common.

Let's recap.

Ocean City, NJ.

I ran on the beach every morning...

Every afternoon, I played frisbee with my cousin's kids...

I ate Amy's bean and lentil soups every night...

... And I drank A LOT of vino.

UK

I walked like, six hours every day...

I ate gluten...

... Like, A LOT of gluten...

... and drank gluten too...

... but ate chickpeas every night for dinner.

Florida

I walked around my gramma's development every day...

I did yoga too...

... since this was the closest I could get to the pool!

...And for dinner?

... The traveling mistress of easily accessible, healthy vegan food...

AMY!!!

More, more, more black beans and lentils...

See a pattern?

During all of these trips, I was constantly moving. I was also very relaxed. I was having fun with family and friends and myself. I wasn't worried about dieting.

And the most important thing?

... I was eating A LOT of beans.

Don't worry. I'm not going to sing the song. You know. THAT song. I hate it. The more you eat beans, the MORE you toot??? BULLSHIT! The more you eat beans, the more your digestive system adapts to the influx of fiber... and the LESS you toot. Duh.

That's how fiber works. It's like sending a scrubber brush into your guts. (Alexandra Jamieson's analogy, not mine). As fiber scrubs and scrubs and scrubs, it sets off bubbles of farts. Once you are all scrubbed out, the farts stop.

Don't argue with me about this. I have proof.

I've been stealing magazines from one of the schools where I teach. This past week, I stole like ten issues of Nutrition Action. I spent both part 1 and part 2 of the snowpocalypse curled up in bed with them.

They are the cutest little booklets, only a couple pages thick. Each issue covers the most recent studies done on food and examines the truth behind every health craze.

Nutrition Action has taught me a lot so far. But the most important? The fiber chart.

For the past five years, I thought that eating broccoli, spinach, cauliflower, and carrots would leave me in the clear for my daily allowance of fiber.

How wrong I was.

Those veggies do have fiber. But not nearly enough. In order to get enough fiber, you gotta eat beans, a couple times a week. You gotta eat sweet potatoes. You gotta eat... (gulp!) fruit.

Here are the highlights from the summer 2008 issue of Nutrition Action:

Fruit

Blackberries 8 grams

Pears 5 grams

Apples, Oranges, Figs, Dates 4 grams

Beans

Black beans 8 grams

Kidney Beans 7 grams

Lentils 7 grams

Grains

Bulgur wheat 6 grams

Oat bran 6 grams

Veggies

Peas 5 grams

Sweet potato 4 grams

Don't even get me started on why it's important to eat fiber. I mean, we all know that, don't we? It lowers cholesterol. It kills the chance of heart disease. It keeps you regular. The more regular you are, the more food moves through your system. When stuff stays behind in your system, it just sits there, turning into fat.

If that doesn't convince you, then ask the late, great Phil Hartman!

Ladies... Gentlemen... this week, I've started to do something I've never done before.

I'm CONSIDERING eating fruit.

If I could count all the times I've tried over the past few years to eat fruit - I'd be asleep by the time I finished. Why I can't eat fruit is a story for another time. If you want a head start, read a bit about synaesthesia. Quite a few of you may be synasthetic - it's worth checking out!

While I debate trying fruit again, I'm upping my intake of beans to see if it will help my digestion.

ALSO...

... Carbzy and I are on the 15 grams of sugar a day diet. I can't wait to see how it affects our overall energy and physique. As you know, Carbzy is already quite the hottie. If I can look half as good as her... well, that's pretty sweet!

Rawness Begets

A couple years ago, my brother started saying everything was "raw." He says it like most people say "cool" or "dope." When he says goodbye, he often adds: "Rawness begets."

I love my brother.

Ever since going vegan and gluten free, I've wondered if I was gonna go raw. It's the next step, right?

Buuuuut... I'd have to eat fruit in order to go completely raw. Thanks to synaesthesia, fruit makes me gag. Secondly, who would want to give up oatmeal and sweet potatoes? Not me.

Just before Christmas, I discovered the Pure2Raw twins. These are two lovely ladies who have digestive issues like me, and have been using raw foods to cure them for the past two years. They even started their own raw bakery. In reading only a few of their blogs, the girls schooled me in the plethora of raw goodness out there.

Guess what? You can eat oatmeal raw. Here's the recipe.

Raw Oatmeal

Soak 1/2 cup oat groats for 8-12 hours.

Drain.

Soak again for 8-12 hours.

Drain.

Pour oat groats into food processor.

Add 1/8 - 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce.

Add a pinch of salt.

Add cinnamon.

Process until smooth.

EAT!

It doesn't end there! You can eat sweet potatoes and other rooty veggies raw too! Check it.

Raw Rootys

Wash and slice up your sweet potato.

Put the slices in a bowl.

Boil some water.

Pour the water over the potato so it covers it.

Wait like five minutes.

Drain and eat.

The photo above is the raw rutabaga I ate last night. I liked it better than cooked. It was much sweeter and more filling.

What's the point in eating raw food? Raw foodies and nutritionists argue over this. Basically, raw foodies believe that cooked food loses nutrients. In an interview with Herb Mentor radio, brilliant and famous raw foodie Brigitte Mars puts it this way: "When we are tired, we say we are fried or zapped... so why do we do that to our food?"

We have to remember that when we eat, we are ingesting ALL of the qualities of that food. Or lack thereof.

Now I'm not eating 100% raw yet. I'm definitely around 85% there though. Why bother? Because other IBS-bloggers have found solace in going high raw. So I'm giving it a try too. Already, it has helped me with my #1 cause of flare-ups: Overeating. Often I overeat because I can't tell if I'm full. BUT - when I eat raw foods - I can ALWAYS tell when I'm full.

Rawsome.