Almost three months

I'm done counting the days. Frankly I lost count! But I know it's been awhile. There's lots to tell. Read on.

Bill and I went on a cruise with my sister and her husband and that became and interesting experience for my food adventure. While the cruise was just ok, the exercise in self control taught me a lot about myself and food. I told myself that I would have anything I wanted on one night, and that for my birthday I could indulge. So out of eight days, I basically said that I could splurge twice. And I almost made that.

I must admit that I did have alcohol three times, and I did have some chocolate covered strawberries more than twice, but hell, I really think that's pretty amazing considering all the food and alcohol around me. Thankfully there was a lot of great salad stuff and an Indian bar that served hummus and lentil chips and that pretty much saved my bacon. Plus, there is nothing like looking around and seeing 300 pound 20 year olds in bikinis with their belly button pierced to motivate one to stay true to themselves.

Amazingly enough, the night that I splurged taught me the most. Eating whatever I want has now become something that my body cannot tolerate. I had steak, I had bread, I had a few drinks, I had desert, and then I had a bucket in front of my face while I puked for the rest of the night. SO NOT FUN! The combination was just way too much and I spent most of the night on the deck paying for it. That really sends a clear message to me and has made it even easier to avoid the things I should avoid.

A few notes on the cruise.... If you enjoy being around polluted people that are so overweight that they need scooters to get around, you will love a Carnival Cruise. If you enjoy seeing 300 pounders stuffing themselves at every single opportunity, you will love a Carnival Cruise. If you are inclined to lay around and do absolutely nothing, because there is nothing to do, you will love cruising. If third world countries that are so dangerous that your life is at risk and the police need to escort you back to the boat, you will LOVE a Carnival Cruise. I can't say that I did. Don't get me wrong, I had fun with Bill and my sister and her husband and that was AWESOME! But the cruise itself gets a 6. Bill gets a 9 .5!

So what are the numbers you ask.....

Sadly, they are not that great. I have been eating more vegan and less raw and it shows. I seriously cannot deviate from raw at all, and very restricted raw at that, if I want anywhere near normal blood sugar levels. Yes, they are much improved, and I only need insulin a few times a week, but they are far from normal. I fear if I don't want to eat raw forever, which I can assure you I don't, then I am stuck with insulin and vegan. I also want to add that I have given up sugar, caffeine, dairy, wheat, and rice. No bread, no pasta, no rice. Plus, consume no alcohol except on very special occasions like my birthday and the cruise, for example. Add to that working out about 3 miles a day on the treadmill with an 8 percent incline, 45 minutes of weight lifting, FIVE TIMES A WEEK, plus my usual gardening, riding, etc., and that's a lot of sacrifice. Even with all that..... I have not achieved normal blood sugar without insulin.

I have to admit I feel a bit discouraged. The thing that has kept my chin up is that I bought another size 10 shorts the other day. Although they are surely tight, I can fit into any normal size 12 bottom. (I fear the top of me will always be a large. Thank GOD FOR BOOBS! SO no worries there.) I am fit, tanned, and can out energy almost anyone I know. I feel fine and have lost many of the annoying health issues I had before. No more pain in the joints, no more sleepless nights, no more headaches, or bowel issues. So that is all good. Now if only the diabetes would notice my huge efforts. Sigh. I remain, a vegan, a raw foodie most of the time, and most certainly healthy as this diabetic can be.....

Guess..............

The good, the bad, and the ugly

I do not think that I could be more disgusted right this very second. It is now day 53 and although I am much thinner, my blood sugar is not so great. I admit that I have been eating less raw and more vegan, a person has to live, and that is obviously not going to happen if I want to be permanently off insulin. Slowly but surely I have been experimenting with new food. I have not eaten any meat, dairy or grain, with the exception of Dawn and I going out to a vegan restaurant in Phoenix. There I had brown rice and vegan carrot cake. But I have had some vegan food here and there. After all, I figured that as long as it does not raise my blood sugar, what's the problem.

The good.........I am much thinner. I look pretty damn good and I can't wear hardly anything in my closet. Very exciting. It's great to look in the mirror and that feels great. Plus, I consume no caffeine and I take very little insulin, no drugs, and basically have abstained from alcohol for 52 of the 53 days. (It was my anniversary after all!) So that part is good to go. I feel good, my attitude is good. Life is good.

The bad.........There is very little variation allowed in my diet. I can eat the vegan chili at the Lovin Spoonfuls in Tucson. THANK GOD FOR THAT!! I can have eggs, even though I don't want them, and they don't raise my blood sugar, and I can have grapefruit, blackberries, and blueberries in small quantities. BUT I cannot have much of anything else that isn't raw vegetables and those few fruits. For example, I can have about four strawberries, and that's it. I cannot have brown rice, even though it's low on the glycemic index. I cannot have any raw food snacks that contain figs, raisins, bananas or anything of that order. I cannot have raw, that's right, raw granola with almond milk even though almonds and granola are "allowed" on the raw food diet. I am exercising at least an hour and a half 5 days a week with little exception and it hasn't lowered my blood sugar one bit. Plus, I lost a bunch of weight, and contrary to my doctor's opinions, it hasn't helped me a bit in the blood sugar department.

The ugly.......During this experimentation phase I have worked hard at being a human guinea pig and trying things to see what can be tolerated. Therefore I have had to take insulin here and there to keep my blood sugar lower when I try something that doesn't fly. IT beats taking it six times a day, but it sucks because I can tell you right now I do not want to eat raw forever. I surely do not. Nor do I want to take insulin every single day of my frickin' life either. ARGH! So tonight, not knowing how things would be, I bought some gluten free bread and thought I'd give it a try. The squares of bread couldn't be 4 inches square, more like 3 1/2 and I had some soy turkey with a salad with oil and vinegar. Well, the blood sugar was off the chart. SO THAT'S NOT HAPPENING!!!! UGH! Talk about defeating. That is the single most debilitating feeling when you work so damn hard and have blood sugar in the 300's.

So this pity party is this......I am going to have to eat only raw, only raw if I want to not take insulin. This does not seem like a permanent option to me. I never have any inclination to go back to meat or dairy, etc., nor do I want to eat sugar or caffeine or any of the other things that I used to suck down. I just would be happy being a vegan for cripes sake. And that's a vegan with no grains. NO WHEAT!!!!!!!!! NO pasta, no rice, no bread...... so what the hell? I'm eating the best I ever have in my entire life. In 53 days I have cheated 2 times. Once I ate vegan and once I had a few drinks for my anniversary. Come on, that's pretty damn good. AND still my body betrays me...............................I am crestfallen. DO not worry. I have no intention of stopping, but I must seriously consider that there may be insulin in my life if I want to eat anything besides raw food. For the rest of my life. And that is a heavy burden to me. Please, if you have comments, suggestions, thoughts. Throw me a bone. I need the help.

I do not know what is for dinner........you guess.

Day 38 and fruit comes into my life!!!!!

Singing!! I am singing! Fruit! Thank GOD! I am eating fruit! Hold on to your seats, yes, it's true, I actually ate blueberries and blackberries and my blood sugar was under 120!! Yessirreeey. That's what I'm talking about.

So I went to the Earth Day Celebration at the Farmer's Market on Saturday and there they were. Blue, round, beautiful and delicious blueberries. Could I chance it? What would happen? Would I blow it all on some delightfully sinful blue delectables?? Worth the risk, I thought. Grabbing the berries and paying an astronomical price, I stuffed them into my bag and prayed I wasn't making a huge mistake.

As I ate almost the entire box of them, I patiently waited the two hours to see what the results would be and beat the band, NORMAL BLOOD SUGAR!!! YES! Talk about thrilling. Then I went to Sybelle's party and, God forbid, ate blackberries. Again, as soon as I got home I got out the blood monitor and........119! Can it be? Can it possibly be that I my blood sugar is normalizing?

When I began this the raw food adventure, I guess I never really realized how much I would have to focus on myself. All this exercising, all this testing, all the worry over what I eat, all the reading and certainly, up until now I have been completely and totally unaccustomed to thinking about myself and my health with this kind of intensity. I do hope that I will not have to continue on in this manner forever and that there will come a time when I am able to be more relaxed and natural about food. But it has been an adventure, that's for sure.

On another note, I ate my first hot food in 36 days the other day in Tucson. As you can imagine, I've pretty much had it with eating only raw/cold food. Chloe and I went to a vegan restaurant and I broke down and had vegan chili. Now for those of you wagging your finger, that isn't cheating. The definition of a raw food diet is 80% raw. So obviously with this being the first hot thing I'd eaten in 36 days, I think I have filled the 80% quota. You have absolutely no idea how wonderful that tasted. I am planning on having something hot/cooked about once a week now and see how that goes. In my food bible, once I have stable blood sugar, I can have some hot food as long as it is vegan. I live for it.

Well that's all the news that's fit to print. Wish it were more exciting. But if you are into the adventures of a wild red headed woman and her path to self healing, I guess this makes for ok reading. Until next time...........

Guess what's for dinner? (Now you don't know, because I can have fruit! YEA HAW!)

Day 29..........

I continue on! Yes, I made the Day 21 and made it off insulin. The bad news being that I had to go back on insulin, only 8 units, for about another week until again, I am completely off. You can't beat that with a stick, huh?? I ended up eating that heavenly grapefruit, and it was heaven, and my blood sugar went way up. But I ate other stuff with it, so I ended up eating the other half the other day, and guess what?!? Nothing! No bad reactions. I was so impressed!

Now I have gone down a full dress size, so that's pretty neat, and I can wear all my skinny clothes. (Honestly, I don't have that many skinny clothes, but the few I have kept for a long, long, long time all fit! Hee, hee!) Not that I am anywhere near skinny, but at least I am down some and it feels great to have that reward.

Being brave enough to have grapefruit, I feel like in the next week or so I will branch out to berries. I dearly love them, and with the grapefruit success, I think I will be fine. For the party tonight, THANK YOU MARTHA, I found a fabulous salad I am bringing and no one will be the wiser. Mango, pear, cucumber, and radish salad dressed with lime juice and agave nectar. Really excellent. No one will have a clue that it's vegan raw, and I will have something wonderful to eat! Unfortunately, I am pretty boring with food, although I did find a recipe for mushroom burgers, raw of course, and they were totally delicious. Dr. Cousens doesn't like mushrooms, buy hey, I can't be perfect. And they do not raise blood sugar. I have to live a little, don't you think?

Most days I eat a lot of tomatoes and not near enough greens. I have found them to be almost repulsive. My garden is thriving, so soon I will have super fresh lettuce and that ought to help me quite a bit. Thank GOD for the juicer as I put a bunch of greens in the juicer, along with the tomatoes, and make a fabulous homemade V-8. Love it. Looks awful. Tastes divine. I love V-8 anyway, so it's an easy one for me to drink down.

So I'm going to a party tonight and would love a glass of wine, but I am going to abstain as I feel it is too early in the game to be heading in that direction. I've done so well.......

Here are the numbers.......waking in the 150's. Still too high, but hell, no insulin, so no complaining. I've had after meal numbers from 119 to 160. All under 180 which seems to be the magic number for diabetics. Next goal is to get the morning down to 100 or under, and the afters consistently under 120. My doctor is going to shit when I tell him I'm taking nothing and have these numbers. It really does feel like an accomplishment. I know he'll never say I'm cured, but if I can keep this up for a year or so, maybe I'll never have to ever take anything again and just control it through diet. That is the goal.......

So on I go...... continuing forward......

Guess what's for dinner?

Day 22.... Now what?

More of the same. That's what! Nothing exciting, but some time this weekend I am going to have a grapefruit. I live for it. I will pick a time that my blood sugar is "normal" and see what the effect is. If it encourages me to have high blood sugar then obviously I won't be doing that again. But I am going to try it. I had hummus the other day and that didn't seem to hurt me. It's "allowed" but I had not ventured into the hummus world for fear I would goof things up.

I have discovered I am not a huge green fan. I like lettuce and spinach fine, but that's about it. I need to branch out. I have pulled out lots of raw food recipes and made a bunch of stuff, but it's not all that different tasting since it's all pretty much the sos. No complaints, but I need some different tastes, and fruit can be a life saver for me right now.

Having little to say, I'll make this one short and I'll check back in with more interesting comment. I am somewhat in a coma right now, it's early, and my brain is toast. TOAST? Did someone say toast?? Sigh.............

Guess what's for breakfast?

Tomorrow is the BIG DAY!

Tomorrow is day 21. Can you believe it?? I haven't cheated even one time and really, it hasn't been that bad. Blood sugar is way, way, way down, but I did have to add 8 units of the long acting. Seems after every little bit of insulin was out of me, my body kinda went crazy. But that's ok. Better than the 60 I was taking. So now I am weaning down again to see how it goes.

Went to Tucson to one of my favorite restaurants, even when I did eat meat I loved going to the Lovin Spoonfuls. It's a great vegan restaurant. LOVE IT! The kids went with me and were less than impressed, but hey, they are kids. I got to eat hummus for the first time in a month. I snuck in my own crackers, shhhh don't tell, and didn't eat the pita bread, and that hummus couldn't have been more divine if it was chocolate. Ahhhhhh. Loved it. And with that I had a big bowl of..................you guessed it! Salad.

Now I am experiencing a strange phenomenon. I am not loving salad. In fact, I am a bit repulsed by it. Hopefully that will not last. Tonight I decided to branch out more because my dehydrator came, thank you GOD!!! And I am making "neat balls". They aren't bad. Taste nothing like meat, but they are pretty good. Plus, since I got my dehydrator, I am going to attempt potato chips. Sounds good. I'll use sweet potato chips so that ought to be a new taste sensation.

So I read and re-read my book, and unfortunately, I do not believe I will be able to have fruit with any regularity for about 3 months. Sigh. BUT I am going to have one grapefruit this weekend. Yep. I am. Get over it! I don't want to cheat, cheat, so I'm going to have just one grapefruit. Being a low glycemic fruit, it ought not to bother me too bad, so I'm gonna do it. Think of it as preventative medicine to keep me on the straight and narrow. Better than chocolate or wine or God forbid, steak, right!!?!

So here are the numbers. Still hanging in the 150's in the a.m. sigh. and still hanging in the 150's after a meal. BUT I did get into the 140's a few times after meal and that's exciting. I continue to work out 4-5 times a week. Hard. Sweating hard. So Bill says I'm looking good. AND I even went to the gym when I was the only one going. No Bill, no workout buddy, (that means you, Dawn : ) and no curly haired son. Just me! So I guess a little pat on the back is deserved.

Anyway, there it is. OH, and I almost forgot. My neighbor saw my facebook and made a point of calling me to tell me how proud she was of me. Considering she thinks my husband is the anti-christ, I think that was pretty special.

Guess what's for .............breakfast!?

I can see clearly now the pain is gone...........

Yep, you heard it here! I am off insulin completely. 16 days and I did it!!!!! My blood sugar isn't perfect in the morning, but hell, it's 100+ points down from where it used to be and that's with zero insulin instead of 60 units of long acting. So frankly, I'm not about to take insulin just to bring it down more. With time I do believe that I will be able to get my fasting blood sugar down to under 100. Right now I'm at about 150, but hell, it used to be 250 or more. So.............I'm good with that!
; )

So now what? I'm a little nervous as this is all so new and I'm still worried I'll "fall off the wagon". Plus, the cruise is looming. Ahhhh, the cruise! Any thoughts on that would be welcome. I'm thinking that I'll pick one day, or one night that I eat whatever I want to eat and enjoy that and then go back to veggies and fruit. I understand that they have wonderful fruit and a terrific salad bar. The real challenge is alcohol! What is a cruise without alcohol?!? To go eight days and not drink, well I'm strong, but I don't think I am that strong. I'm not a big drinker, but on a Friday or Sat. night, I want to partay. And they have a disco!!!! So you know where I'll be. My only hope is that I will have lost enough weight and done this for 2 1/2 months, that my blood sugar will be stable enough to handle it. They also have a work out room and do aerobics and such. So I'll be in there.
Advice? Comments? Please! I need thoughts on this.

I knew I could do the 21 day thing. I only have 5 days left. Cake walk. But soon I'll be faced with some hard decisions. I desperately want to have fruit and if all goes well at the end of the 21 days I'll be well enough to have low glycemic fruits. But I have always been the Lays potato chip girl in the past. So that makes me nervous. (You know, one thing leads to another and you just can't eat one!)

So ...............the numbers and the results.

With no insulin I am running a bit high, nothing like before, but I'm in the 160's after meals. That is really not an issue at all. And still around the 150's in the a.m. I have gone down in weight. I continue to work out 4-5 days a week. I feel fine as long as I eat all the dang time. Seriously, I must eat all the time or I get a headache, which sucks. (By the way, Connor is cooking bacon and pancakes right now, God help me!)

I have no more heel pain. I do not ache anymore. I can actually see better. Which is a really neat benefit. Many times I can read the small print without my glasses. That remains one of the cooler side effects. Glasses are the enemy!

My energy level is great. Sleeping going well. Over all, no complaints. And missing the stuff I "can't have" is not a big deal most of the time. At least it seems that I am doing better not pining for stuff that makes me diabetic.

So............no more injections. No more meds. No more pain.....what's not to love??

I remain a vegan..............a raw foodie................and now that I have my juicer, I am a juicer as well. Dehydrator is on the way..... guess what's for dinner?