Vegan Hope

When we tell people that we travel full time the first question they ask is if it is hard to stick to our vegan lifestyle on the road. Sadly, there have been some authors/celebrities who have claimed that being vegan on the road is hard – I could not disagree more.

We have been in the most remote parts of the country and have never had a hard time getting a vegan meal or vegan foods. First off, I like to remind people that every grocery store has a Vegan section – it’s called the produce section.

Last week we drove from Boulder, CO to Oklahoma City, OK with a stop over in Wichita Kansas. Granted, most people don’t think Vegan when they think of Wichita, but low and behold we went had fantastic meals at two places in Wichita – and one was ALL vegan!

Zen:

This is a fabulous vegetarian/mostly vegan  restaurant in Wichita! There are even a few very healthy options on the menu. We had been traveling all day – including getting pulled over by the police and having our car searched for drugs, yep – on a Wichita highway. Apparently our story sounds like we’re trafficking drugs – not kale chips. Needless to say, by time we got to Wichita we were completely exhausted and ready to get something to eat.

We were pleasantly  surprised to find Zen. The waitress was very helpful in suggesting some of favorite vegan menu items. The salad menu has a lot to choose from and I enjoyed the “Emerald and Ivory” with tender tofu.

You can’t go wrong with Zen, you will have tons to choose from and to enjoy. We were only in town for a night, but I can assure you that you would have plenty options for as many times as you wanted to visit.

D’Sozo

Who knew we would find one of the BEST vegan restaurants in the country – in Wichita, Kansas? D’Sozo is an all vegan spot open Sunday-Friday (closed Saturday). The menu is fantastic, tons of gluten free, vegan options and all on the healthy side of things. We really enjoyed every thing we tried. We started out with green smoothies (which can be custom made) and we both had crepes. My husband was very excited about the crepes – it was one of his favorite foods before going vegan, and he hasn’t had any since going vegan. We also grabbed a couple of gluten free wraps for the road and a couple of vegan muffins (no sugar!). The menu is really amazing and the chef is a French trained chef that came up with a diverse and whole-foods menu. They also have a well stocked and diverse salad bar.

The staff was so kind and friendly! They were quick to greet us at the door and help us look through the menu. They were also sure to check every ingredient with our food sensitivities. I was genuinely impressed  by D’Sozo, and wish that they could spread their vegan love in more parts of the country.

So, if you happen to be going through Wichita or visiting – or if you happen to be lucky enough to live there, you have some great options!

Stay tuned – this Wednesday I will be posting a full review of 105 degrees in Oklahoma City – complete with photos!

We recently spent two months in Utah, Park City, UT to be exact. We met some amazing vegans in Salt Lake and really fell in love with Utah. We had no idea what to expect and were delightfully surprised by the vegan community and the really great vegan options.

Let’s start with Park City:

Cafe Trang: 1811 Sidewinder Dr, Park City, Utah
This is a Chinese/Vietnamese place with a separate vegetarian menu. Most of the dishes are already vegan or can be made vegan. We enjoyed our dishes, and were really happy with the number of choices.

Squatters Roadhouse Grill: Doesn’t sound very vegan, right? Well they have a few vegan dishes including some breakfast tofu scrambles! Not so bad.

Whole Foods Market: There is a small Whole Foods in Park City and if you are lucky you can get the vegan breakfast burritos in the morning. If you are visiting you can call their deli department and ask for some to be made – we did this on our last day in Park City for our drive and they made an awesome quinoa based burrito! It’s a great place.

Salt Lake City:

Sages Cafe: We visited Sages with Krystina from the VeganSalt blog! I loved this place – the food was fresh and they had a lot of healthy options. I had a vegetable crepe that was amazing and my husband enjoyed a tofu scramble. It is an all vegan place – so be sure to support it when you are in SLC!

Vertical Diner: Another ALL vegan spot in SLC. It’s pretty awesome for that vegan-diner experience. It’s not really healthy vegan food, but if you are wanting that vegan french toast with vegan ice-cream piled on top, this is probably the place you’ll want to go.

Omar’s: Absolutely gorgeous all vegan raw cuisine. You must go. And pretty much every vegan in SLC loves the owner.

Cakewalk: If you don’t go here, I don’t think we can be friends. The owner of Cakewalk is amazing and has created some of the best vegan desserts on the planet. The inside of this place is cool and fun and they have a small vegan grocery store as well! Every thing looked amazing and everyone in the group we were with had smiles on their faces

There are A LOT more vegan options in SLC, so if you are wanting to visit the Park City/Salt Lake city area, you will be well fed.

As for vacations go – I highly suggest taking a trip to Park City in the summer. It’s cooler in the summer and a beautiful small town. There are tons of things to do if you love being active. We were hiking every weekend! We really enjoyed Olympic Park, mostly so we could watch ski jumpers – jumping into a giant pool:

And as for Vegan life – there wasn’t a huge Vegan scene in Park City (that we found anyway), however there is an awesome vegan scene in Salt Lake City.

It was Christmas one year, and my family was living in a small apartment. My little brother had a lot of health issues, and the house was really cold. I don’t think that I really understood poverty at that point of my life. I knew we didn’t have a lot, and I knew I couldn’t just ask my parents for new things, but that was about it. That Christmas, there wasn’t that much in the way of gifts, but we kind of understood that was how it was going to be.

I remember my Mom being startled when someone knocked at the door. The next thing I knew there were 2 men dressed as Santa with huge bags, unloading tons of gifts under the tree. They also brought bags of groceries and lined the kitchen with them. It was one of the best Christmas Day’s ever. We got to eat fancy cereal (by fancy, I mean sugary name brand stuff). It was a really amazing day (well what I remember of it).

There were so many people in our lives growing up that pitched in when we needed it, people who let us live with them when we were homeless, people who gave us food and clothing, and for those people I am so grateful.

It’s interesting – in the past few days I’ve had some really awesome people email me, totally on board with doing this challenge, but I have had some people who were really upset and even offended by my post. I was not expecting to strike a nerve at all, more so, I was expecting that people would realize one of two things:

1. That it is hard to live on a very restricted budget when it comes to food, and something needs to be done.

2. We need more resources for people living on a budget, websites with inexpensive healthy recipes and ideas and so on.

There were some that realized those things, but a very big majority of people ended up asking me really strange questions and became offended by the challenge. I got e-mails saying that “this is impossible and not healthy” or “I am NOT giving up (fill in the blank) just to do this” or people who were asking about a specific spice or oil or appliance or any number of specifics – what if you take the bus to work and don’t have a car? What if you walk? What if you can’t get enough calories?

What I was reminded of, is that a lot of people have never had the reference point of living in poverty. This is not something I am judging anyone about, it is wonderful that so many have not had to go through things like choosing between medicine or groceries or feeding your children before you can feed yourself.

I think that this is part of the problem when it comes to understanding poverty – many people do not have a reference point, and many people make assumptions about how people got there, and what people could do differently.

The truth is that when you are living in poverty you never think about if you can use a certain spice or oil, it doesn’t matter if you walk/bike/take the bus or drive to work, because you still in the end have a certain budget.

This challenge was meant to help people who are living on a budget for  food of less than 21 dollars a week and to bring awareness to the vegan community about the difficulty of doing so. It is not meant to help you budget with your very specific set of circumstances. There is no bargaining when you are living in poverty, or when your weekly groceries in part come from a food pantry of a church.

The entire goal of this challenge is to become aware of how difficult it can be to live on a restricted budget and for all of us, as a community to help find solutions.

I can assure you that people who have to worry about if their children will get their medication or food that week, are not concerned with if you can use your special salt, even if it was on sale at the time. They are not concerned with buying organic produce or things with out GMO all the time, because the alternative is that their family goes hungry. They are not concerned with if they are getting enough healthy fats from nuts, if they have to clothe their children for school in a few weeks.

In order to do this, I am going to ask you that you truly sit down and think through your day to day life and the things that you might take for granted, no matter how small they might be. Perhaps you have land for a garden, which is awesome and saves lots of money – but maybe think of the family who lives in a tiny apartment with no land to grow a garden. Perhaps you ride your bike to work, which is great and saves money – but think about the Dad who can only find a job doing day labor 40 miles away. If you have a blender, dehydrator and mixer – all awesome things, think about the mom who has 2 pots and a spatula and could never think about buying an extra appliance over ten dollars. If you shop for organic foods all the time, think about the family who struggles to buy a loaf of bread. If you shop at a organic grocery store, think about the family who has to go to the church food pantry to get some of the basics for that week.

What I would love to see more than anything is, hope. Let’s start thinking of ways the vegan community can help those in need. What if we all committed to dropping off 1 bag of vegan groceries to a food pantry or soup kitchen?  What if some of the big vegan communities (like in NY or LA) started vegan soup kitchens or volunteered to make one meal a month for a local soup kitchen. This would not be vegan outreach as much as it would be providing healthy meals to people in need.

I worked in a soup kitchen for a while, and I can tell you they use whatever is donated, and people are very appreciative. You don’t have to advertise the meal as vegan (I would actually advise you do not do that) but instead you are just providing a meal to people who might need one.

My goal in all of this is to foster understanding and hope.

I’ve had so many questions regarding this post that I thought I’d answer a few of them here.

First I want to clarify – this is not to judge people who like to splurge on a pint of organic blueberries or container of chia seeds, this is to raise awareness about a very real problem in our country (and beyond our country). You do not have to participate, but I would encourage you to look at your grocery budget and ask yourself where you could save money if you had to and what meals could be made more affordable.

Questions:

Q: Oil: Your estimates of $3.00 per week seem really high, why is that?

A: If you have ever shopped on a very limited budget, you know that buying one big thing of anything is really hard. If I were to buy a bottle of oil that cost 6 dollars even if it was just for one week (and lasted a month), that would mean I would have 6 dollars less to spend on other groceries that week.

We do not need oil to cook or bake, so I see it as a luxury item. If someone was on a budget I would recommend cutting it out to save money (and their health for that matter).

If you are fortunate to live near a place in which you can buy bulk liquids, you could do that for the week, and only buy what you would use.

Q: Your estimates for spices seem high, why?

A. Same reason as above really, I want to closely simulate for people what it would be like to really be on a lower budget for groceries. If you bought one spice for 3 dollars in one week, that would probably mean you would be going with out bread or some other staple for you and your family.

Q: What about salt and pepper?

A. It’s really up to you if you want to include things like this. We used to get salt and pepper packs from salad bars. But again, I want you to think in terms of  living on a very restricted budget. If you are buying rare pink sea salt, chances are it would not be something you could easily budget for on a restricted budget.

Q: I live in Europe/Malaysia/Australia/Canada/Mexico  what would my budget be?

A:

Europe: 15.9055

Malaysia: 66.3495

Australia: 23.0439

Mexico: 264.6315

Q: My (insert kitchen appliance here) is really an investment, it saves me so much money! Why can’t I use it?

A. I agree that some kitchen appliances are investments. However, if you are living on a very restricted budget, chances are you don’t have the luxury of purchasing anything that is more than 15 dollars every so often. If you wanted to go all out you could look at thrift stores and on the free stuff on craigslist.

Q: What about kids? What is the budget for them?

A. I’m going to leave this up to you a bit – but most budgets would not allow for $21.00 extra for each child. In real life parents on a budget have to choose feeding their children over feeding themselves. When I was young, my parents would live on crackers in order to make sure we could eat. I don’t want people to starve themselves doing this, so just be aware of your budget and stick as close to it as possible.

Q: I can’t do this right now, but I would still like to help people out, what can I do?

A. If you can’t participate for some reason, but would like to help, you could do something like a post on low budget meal planning, or plan on tweeting about low budget meal plan.

Q: Is there a hash tag for twitter?

A. Yes! If you are tweeting use the hash tag: #21dollarvegan

Q: I can’t do this! It is impossible!

It’s ok if you can’t do this, I dont expect everyone will be able to, again, this is to raise awareness. Millions of people are living on very restricted budgets – in fact some would say that 21 dollars per week is high! My goal is to help people who are on limited budgets who want to go vegan.

Q: How do I sign up?

A: Just send me an e-mail: natala dot constantine at gmail dot com

Be sure to include your blog/twitter account so I can include you on the page!

I grew up in a family where we didn’t exactly have a lot of money. To be more accurate we were homeless for some of my childhood. We just never had money in our family. My Dad, a college graduate took any job he could, liquor stores, shoe stores and construction. My Mom was a stay at home Mom with 3 kids, and all of us had various health problems that meant my parents could never really dig out of poverty.

People have very skewed views of poverty, frankly it sickens me some of the stereotypes that are perpetuated by the media, certain news outlets and simply bad information.

Being in poverty does not mean that someone did something wrong. It can happen to ANYONE. I know this first hand because I worked a lot with the homeless in a previous job. Sure, were there some people who were addicts? Yes. But were there former professors, hard working mechanics, school teachers, military men/women? Yes.

I’ve heard people in all communities put down people who live in poverty, and it really saddens me. Behind many of those people begging on the street is a story, a family, a history.

And because you might have seen a few ‘bad seeds’ in the poor community, does not reflect on the community as a whole – just like every other group of people in our country, there are the good and the bad. Just like you would not want to be judged for the worst people in the community you are in, neither do people living in poverty.

I say all of this because I believe that many people think that being Vegan would be far too expensive for them. And I believe that in part can be blamed on some of the stigmas (fair or not) about Vegan eating. Let’s face it, some of the equipment and ingredients some of us use are on the expensive end. Let me say this now, I am in no way judging you for having a fancy blender, food processor, dehydrator or for using raw cacao made from a rare cocoa plant only grown in the northern region of Argentina. I’m saying that it can be intimidating and can come across in the wrong way to many people who struggle to just buy a box of mac & cheese every week, and who have to struggle to feed their children.

My parents lived on crackers when I was born because they could not afford my healthcare and food for themselves.

But my parents are nowhere near alone. Millions live in poverty. The saddest part of this is that so many living in poverty believe that they have to eat the worst foods, because they can not afford to eat healthy. This perpetuates even more problems.

Because most people who are struggling financially  end up becoming ill, because of that they end up going into severe amount of debt because of healthcare that they can not afford to begin with. (I will be the first to say that living with out health care is near impossible, and yes hard working people can not get it for themselves or their children).

This in turn leads to the government having to step in (some of the time) and that is why our debt and our health care in so out of control in this nation. We spent 143 billion dollars on diabetes last year, and close to 170 billion on heart disease. Two disease in which are completely preventable and reversible.

It’s an issue of epic proportion.

So why am I writing this ?I want to ask all of you bloggers and tweeters (twips)? To join me in helping a lot of people.

This is what I’m asking:

1. For one week you agree to live on a $21.00 food budget (per person in your household). This is the food stamp budget.

2. Do not use any equipment that costs more than $15.00, with the exception of the following: oven, microwave.

3. Spices that you currently have can be used, but you should subtract $3.00 from your total food budget per person.

4. I personally use no oil or spray oil (nor do I recommend anyone use it) However, that is not the purpose of this challenge, if you are someone who uses it I will be asking you to deduct $3.00 from your food budget.

(to be clear if you are using your own spices and if you use oil you would be on a $15.00 food budget)

5. Write about the dishes you make including ingredients and the cost per meal.

6. Include a shopping list.

7.  Send me a link to your blog or twitter account, I will be setting up a special page on my blog so that people can see who is participating.

What I am hoping to accomplish:

Let’s help people who are on a very limited budget by showing them that not only can they be Vegan, but they can do so in a healthy way and have enjoyable meals.

It would be awesome to  have references for people outside of the Vegan community on how to eat a cruelty free diet. I want people to be able to look up your blogs/twitter accounts and learn how to shop and make meals.

It would be great for  those participating to understand  some of the challenges that people who are struggling financially go through.

If you would like to participate please send me an e-mail: natala dot constantine at gmail dot com

Please  pick any week between now and the end of August. I will be putting links to your blogs/twitter accounts up on a special page starting this Sunday.

I am really excited for all of my vegan blogger/twitter friends to participate! I think that it will help so many people in their quest to live a cruelty free life despite any financial troubles they might have.

Thank you so much ahead of time – you are all awesome!

When I first became vegan I had a friend who was a doctor and she told me “You must want to get and stay off all your meds if you are vegan now!”

I was puzzled, what do my medications have to do with being vegan? Of course I wanted to get off my meds, but I wasn’t sure what it had to do with being vegan still. She went on to tell me that ALL drugs that are prescribed are tested on animals, most (if not all) are tested on at least 2 species of animals. Not only that, she pointed out that 2 of my medications contained animal biproducts, and that the most prescribed heart medications and diabetes medications have animal biproducts in them. One of my diabetes drugs had lizard saliva in it.

*Just a note, that I was able to get off a lot of my medication right away, like insulin from switching from an animal protein based diet to a plant-based diet, but it took me a few months to get off of all 13 medications that I was on.

At first I dismissed it. I thought to myself – I can’t really do much about medications, after all, some of those were keeping me alive. I argued with myself, that I’m already doing a lot for animals, after all I got rid of my leather products, I stopped eating all animal products and biproducts, and I tossed every thing in my house that had gelatin (like in my vitamins) or things that were tested on animals (or didn’t say they were NOT tested on animals).

Back up. I got rid of all of the vitamins in my medicine cabinet that had animal biproducts AND I got rid of anything that I was not absolutely sure were not tested on animals.

Yet, I was willing to be on medication that was not only tested on animals, but most of which had animal biproducts in them. My values were all of a sudden not reflected in my medicine cabinet.

First I will say that I could not just get off my medications right away, that would have been dangerous and would have jeopardized my life. However, the truth was that I could get off ALL of my medications if I decided to completely clean up my diet. Not that I was eating horribly, but I still had oil in my diet, some vegan junk food, and some high salt and the occasional high sugar food.

I found out that if I completely cleaned up my diet – eliminating unnecessary fat from oils, eliminating ALL sugar and taking out salty or unhealthy vegan foods, I would more than likely be able to get off of all my medication.

At first this notion of practicing nutritional excellence seemed like that much more of a sacrifice. I already felt like I was sacrificing. But I kept asking myself, did my medicine cabinet line up with my values? And the truth was, it did not.

Even as vegans we can get disease if we are consuming a vegan S.A.D. (standard american diet). If we’re consuming foods with lots of oils, salts, sugar and processed junk we still run the risk of obesity which will lead to heart disease and diabetes. We run the risk of certain cancers, when we are not filling our cells with healthy whole plant foods. Let’s face it, just because Oreo’s and french fries are vegan, does not mean they will not add to your belly fat.

And so there is a dilema. If we eat in an unhealthy way which leads to things like obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and certain cancers, are we doing a disservice to animals?

The medical industry is reliant on animal testing and animal biproducts to supply our nation with the drugs it needs to cover up the multitude of eating sins we commit. Thousands of innocent animals are tortured every year on behalf of our eating habits. The top diseases which are completely avoidable, produce the most amount of medication.

The key is avoidable. I know that not EVERY single medication is 100% avoidable. There are times in which we might need a life saving drug. However, obesity, type 2 diabetes, heart disease and a lot of cancers ARE avoidable and those are the disease that produce the most amount of drugs, animal  testing and fatten the wallets of the drug companies.

Often, I think it is easy to make the switch to being vegan because it is so clear what is right and wrong. Of course it is horrible to consume animal flesh or wear dead animal skins. We can look at a piece of dead animal flesh and know that it is absolute 100% not right to consume it. We can look at a leather coat and know that it is never right to wear the skin of another being.

But vegan donuts? They don’t exactly scream out “This could hurt an animal!”

Here is the thing, I think every so often it’s ok to consume something like a vegan donut. However, when your diet resembles a standard american diet made vegan, I think there are some things to think about.

We can avoid and reverse obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart disease (high cholesterol and high BP) if we are consuming not only a vegan diet, but a healthy vegan diet. Let me clarify what I mean by healthy. A diet that has low or NO oil in it, a diet with no added salt, no processed vegan junk food, and no added sugars.

The truth is, if we’re consuming a whole foods plant-based diet we are eliminating a lot of bad in our diets. Not just in potentially getting disease, but things like not using resources to ship or package the foods, not tearing down forests for palm oil (impacting 100′s of animals). The more our eating is based around whole plant foods, the better it is for everyone.

Not to mention, it does a great service to yourself. Respecting and loving your body means putting healthy nutritious foods in it.

I work with an amazing personal trainer, John Pierre who has been vegan for over 30 years. He has a compassion for animals that I am not sure I have seen in anyone else. He told me that as vegans, we owe it to animals to make sure we are healthy and well and that we are excellent examples of what respecting all lives looks like – including our own life.

Eating a vegan junk food diet does not respect the beautiful body that you have. We can make choices every day if we are going to eat in a way that can lead to more suffering, or not. And it’s a pretty simple decision, when you consume something ask yourself if what you are eating will lead to suffering.

Vegan junk food adds up in our body. It clogs up vessels, causes insulin resistance, and feeds poisons into our cells. Because it is vegan, does not mean that it is healthy or that we get some sort of free pass. We still have to think about our food choices, beyond not consuming animals.

I believe that treating our bodies well by practicing nutritional excellence, and by moving our bodies every day  is a way to help put an end to an industry based on exploiting animals in the way of testing.

I just want to add, I am not out to judge or put anyone down. I would just love to see vegans practicing nutritional excellence and respecting and loving their bodies enough to fill each cell with good, life giving food.

If you are interested in learning about what a healthy vegan life looks like, I highly suggest picking up any of the following books:

Engine 2 Diet – Rip Esselstyn

The China Study  - Collin Campell

Preventing and Reversing Heart Disease – Dr. C. Esselstyn

The Pleasure Trap (which talks about the addiction of junk food)

Dr. Neal Barnards program for reversing diabetes – Dr. Neal Barnard

Eat to Live – Dr. Furhman

Any book by Dr. McDougal or Dr.Barnard

The most important thing you can do is to base your diet on WHOLE plant foods. Consume foods from the best food groups: vegetables, fruits, beans and whole grains. If you stick to that you will not only feel a lot better, but you will avoid some of the diseases that go along with a vegan junk food diet.

A cruelty free medicine cabinet , is one that is empty.

First, I should really apologize for not posting. This month has been really amazing, the Vegan Hope Workshop has been going great! I’ll be writing more about that later.

I was reminded today that it was 2 years ago that my life started to take a major turn. It was the month that the neuropathy in my legs was at it’s worse. I had arthritis in both of my feet that was causing severe pain. My blood sugar numbers could not be controlled, no matter what I did. I would take 200 units of insulin a day and it wouldn’t do much. I would try to work out for hours a day, I was on what everyone said was a healthy low fat high (animal)  protein diet. I was on 13 or 14 medications at the time, one of those was for the neuropathy and arthritis, it was meant to deaden pain and make me forget that I was in so much pain all the time.

At the same time my depression had reached an all time high. Depression and diabetes go hand in hand, and in the years prior to this month depression and panic was just part of my daily life. But this month things got particularly bad. I would also get an infection in my leg that was not healing, and that the doctor I was seeing was afraid that I would have to have a partial amputation unless something drastic happened.

I would sit in my house sobbing for hours. I could not manage to get dressed most days or even take a shower. My husband would stay home with me, and the days where he could not he made me check in with him and he had some close friends and family call me to check in on me. He had to put the numbers of all of our good friends in his phone, because he feared for the worse.

He had a good reason to be afraid. I was losing the will power to live any longer. Diabetes had taken a toll that was more than my health, it took who I was away from me. It made me a person I hated and loathed. I was told by doctors that I would be lucky to make it ten years if things progressed the way they were going. I was not going to be able to walk much longer with out assistance and I was looking at a partial amputation, and once amputation starts, it really just keeps going. In addition, I already had nerve damage in my eyes, and was told that there was not much hope at all in changing that.

Needless to say my life was not going all that well. I thought about taking my life every day. I thought that this would be the best thing for my husband as well – I did not want him to have to take care of his obese, diabetic wife who was blind and an amputee. What kind of life would that be?

I stayed up hours and hours every night, crying and hoping that somehow some drug or some injection would help. I had been on so many drugs at that point, for every thing including high cholesterol, high BP, hormone issues, diabetes, obesity, neuropathy, arthritis and more. I was taking a cocktail of drugs every day, and I took it with out asking questions, just popped the pills.

One day I decided to look up the arthritis and neuropathy drugs that I had been put on – I was having stomach issues, and thought maybe it was one of the drugs I was on. To my shock and horror I found out the drug I had been on for a few weeks was being “black labeled” because of the very alarming amount of people who had attempted or who had committed suicide since being on the drug. It turns out, that it wasn’t just deadening nerves in my legs/feet but it was doing the same thing to my brain. I called the FDA and talked to someone for about an hour, and she told me it wasn’t just suicide, it was reports of uncontrollable depression and panic, and that they were looking at a complete ban of the medication.

I called my doctor right away and told him about the severe depression and the call with the FDA – he told me he didn’t know about it, but maybe there was something else I could take.

It was one of those tipping points for me, I looked at the bottles of medication and was completely disgusted. I wanted to get rid of every single one of them, I wanted to throw them all out the window and just take my chances. Every single medication causes side effects, some worse than others, and I was tired.

But there I was with severe problems with my legs and feet and not to mention a really bad infection that was not healing or responding to anti-biotics. My legs would swell so badly, they hurt constantly and my edema was so severe that my legs literally were ‘weeping’ which meant liquid was coming out of my legs.

Most of you know my story from here. On one of the darkest days my husband told me it was absolutely mandatory that I get out of the house (lovingly of course). It was on that day that I happened to go to a water aerobics class at my gym, taught by a good friend of mine. And it was on that day where she told me something that would change my life – to look at food as medicine. It lead me down a path that I could have never imagined, a path that I would have told you was absurd and idiotic 2 years ago. I would have told you that doctors know what they are doing, and if they had the cure for type 2 diabetes they would have told me. I would have told you that I had tried every thing, and nothing worked. I would have told you that you were a crazy conspiracy theorist who needed to get their facts straight.

I found the answer in what I was eating and what I was not eating. I’d found out that eating with animal proteins, animal products was what helped me get diabetes, and what made my diabetes become as bad as it did. And I’d find out that eliminating these products would start to heal my body, rapidly. As you probably know, in a month I was off of all of my insulin. It took me a few more months to get off of all my diabetes and other drugs. (I stopped taking the nerve damage medicine the day I found out about the side effects) but in a month, my legs started to feel better, the infection went away and the edema has never returned.

Sometimes I still feel weird about writing or telling my story. I feel like it’s one of those crazy infomercials about some miracle hair shampoo or something. I don’t know how to tell my story any other way though – it was real and the outcome and answer was just as real. Every day I meet more and more people who have reversed major diseases through what they eat, it is something that is becoming the norm for more and more people. It’s so simple, it should be criminal that doctors do not inform their patient that there is another option that will result in reversing disease and getting off the dangerous medications that are pumped into their bodies for absolutely no reason.

Two years later, I could not be anymore happy in my life. My husband and I picked up every thing and left where we had been living for a while and started to travel full time, something we could have never dreamed of before. I am over 150 pounds lighter from my highest weight. I am on no medication at all, my blood sugar is completely controlled and my legs are still attached to my body. Most importantly, I’m alive.

I wanted to thank those who have helped me and inspired me in these past 2 years, those who cared and loved me through my darkest times and those who continue to do so.

My new plant strong family – the entire Engine 2 Diet team.. Rip Esselstyn, Jeff Novick, Pam Popper, Ann and Caldwell Esselstyn, John Pierre, Chef AJ, Adam Reiser, and the whole gang that was at the E2 Immersion back in August.

My friends who put up with a lot of my Vegan ranting Lindsay and Marc – who were there for me even when they didn’t know that I needed them the most.

My dear friend Suzanne who taught that water aerobics class that day and told me that I needed to look at food as medicine.

My good friend Mary who loved me and supported me and was my personal cheerleader every day.

My friend Grace who would talk to me and let me tell her anything, anytime.

Our Aunt Leisel (and Susie and Uncle Greg)- I can’t even say how much she has done for us in our lives. She has been an encouragement and light that I can not even describe. She has shown us love in ways that I did not think were possible.

My brother Roman – who would talk to me until 5AM, and get my mind off of a lot during the worst of it – and who has been so supportive of our vegan life and helping me learn how to cook some awesome meals.

Ryan and Huyen MacMichael – when I met them (doing a photoshoot) and they found out I was a brand new to this plant-based life they sent me books, and helped me get to the path of not just being plant-based, but being vegan.

The people we’ve met in our travels – like Michelle and Heather from Herbivore in Portland and Sue from Counter Culture in Austin. (and the MANY more folks who we have met on the road)

And Jen Lemen, who probably doesn’t remember the IM conversation we had one night where I said we should talk in a year and tell each other how much our lives have changed for the better. And how amazing we would be.

My Mom – for making me laugh, even when she does not intend to, and for jumping on board the plant-based life after listening and understanding how passionate we were about it.

My DGMS family – and all of the support and encouragement – and especially for ALL of those who have also jumped on board the plant-based life with me.

Elaine (who happens to be my sister-in-laws mother – I’m not sure what that makes her to me) who sent me an e-mail once at just the right time, and I don’t think she even knew.. she has been so encouraging and supportive and we are both thankful that she is in our lives.

My nephew Dylan – even though he was just 2 years old, when we’d hang out I would forget every thing, and just enjoy his tremendous joy and energy.

And most of all, my husband. I would never be able to write every thing that my husband has done for my life. He is with out a doubt the most amazing person I have ever known. He has loved me every single day, he has never complained, or become angry. His love for me is something that I am completely amazed by each and every day. And not only did he support me, he educated himself and learned about the plant-based Vegan life that I had jumped into, and did the same for himself. He had no idea that when we said “in sickness and health” how much that would be true – just a few weeks after getting married, when it looked like “till death do us part” would be something that could very well happen.

There are so many people – that have been there for us, who have supported us, encouraged us, and have been there for us – I am just so thankful for each of you who has been on this journey with us, and who have showed us care and love through all of it. We both appreciate you so much.

*If you are interested in health, preventing diseases like t2 diabetes, cancer, heart disease, stroke, dementia, Alzheimer’s and more, the best thing you can every do for yourself and your family is to educate yourself. Start with : The China Study, Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, Eat to Live, Dr. Neal Barnard’s Program for Reversing Diabetes, Breaking the food Seduction, or any other of the science based health books. You do not have to be a sitting duck when it comes to disease, become proactive in your life and your health.

At some point in the near future I will actually post something of substance. My workshop is going really well and has been keeping me very busy this week!

It is always exciting to see people who were eating fast food every day start to try things like kale. This group is just amazing and I’m really excited about the rest of the month.

Anyway – I decided at the very least I could post some 4th of July recipes. These are all close to fat free as well! (and all vegan of course)

BBQ “ribz’

BBQ baked lentils

Chipolte BBQ Tofu

Potato Salad

Garden Vegetable Potato salad (Nasoya vegan mayo has a fat free mayo)

Macaroni Salad (use whole wheat pasta)

Confetti Spring Salad (use whole wheat pasta)

Fat Free Squash Stuffed Peppers

Breaded Zucchini Sticks

Low Fat Guacamole

Vegan Crab Cakes (use fat free nasoya vegan mayo)

Mighty Muffins

Carrot Cake

Sorry this is so late! I decided to enjoy a very nice walk outside. We are currently in Park City Utah till the end of July, and the weather is perfect!

(sorry to all of you in parts of the country where the weather is NOT perfect)

Here are today’s recipes:

A-Z pasta salad (be sure to use a whole grain pasta!)

BBQ Pizza

Grape-nut bars

Lasagna Rolls

Sweet Potato Lasagna

Cucumber Salad

Also, a big thanks to everyone who has signed up for the workshop! We have a FULL roster – if there is anyone who really wants to sign up, send me an e-mail and I can see if I can fit you in this session. The next one won’t be until the fall!

I am going to be accepting a few more people into the workshop, and have decided to extend the early bird special for 25 dollars off till I close the sign-up.

I’ve had so many questions about the workshop, so I thought I’d take some time to answer your questions – just in case you are on the fence about it.

1. Are you going to make me give up all the food I like?

A. I will not make you do anything. My goal is to give you information, resources and support to make your own healthy choices. If you choose not to give up something, that is between you and yourself.

2. Will I lose weight?

A. I can not for legal reasons claim that being in the workshop will do anything for you. I can tell you what living this way has done for myself and my husband, I could point you to 100′s of others who have had success. I can help and support you in many ways if your goal is losing weight, but can I promise you will lose weight? No.

A big side note to that - this is not just about losing weight. Often our society only cares about weight. We don’t seem to care about preventing cancer, diabetes, heart disease and more. Weight is just a symptom of greater problems, but not all thin people are healthy. Because someone is thin does not mean they are eating in a way that is best to prevent disease.

3. I don’t think I am ready to do this.

A. I don’t think we’re ever ready for big life changes. Just like you probably didn’t think you were ready for other changes in your life. If we keep saying things like “I’ll do it after…. ” or “I’ll wait till” we’ll never do it. This is not about being ready, this is about saying you are making the first step.

4. I have no will power, can I still do this?

You do not need will power – actually I don’t believe there is such a thing. I believe in learning information and becoming educated so you can make informed decisions. I also believe that you only need the power of one step to do this. You have to take the first step, that’s all.

5. Is this going to take a ton of time?

It depends on how much time you want to invest. Past participants have spent as little as 15 minutes a day in the workshop others have spent up to an hour. It is all up to you. If you choose you can sit back and just read, listen and watch and make changes slowly – again it is all up to you and what you want to accomplish.

6. I don’t have enough money to eat healthy.

I will help you learn how to shop in a way that will end up saving you money. I have many friends who spend less than 70 dollars per week (for 2 people) on groceries and people with children who spend less than 100 dollars per week on food. And if that is still out of your budget range, I will still help you with figuring out how to be on a tight budget and be healthy.

7. Money is really tight, I don’t think I could afford the workshop.

Please send me an e-mail, there are still a couple of scholarships left to give.

8. I don’t think I could ever be vegan.

Neither did I! Nor did my husband, nor do most people who are vegans. This is not about an overnight change, if you do not want it to be. Again, this is about you learning information about your health and your nutrition so that you can make better decisions for yourself. This is not about becoming vegan or not becoming vegan, this is about making the decision for yourself after you have the information.

9. I have failed a million times before, what is going to make this time any different?

I failed millions of times as well. Failing is not always bad, it teaches us a lot about where we are and who we are. You can not fail in this workshop. It’s about having some tools in your belt to help you go forward and change the way you live your life. It’s a life long journey, something that I work on daily. But you can not change the course of your health unless you take that first step. It doesn’t matter if you have taken a million wrong steps up till this point, let this be the first positive step in a long life of health.

I also go over a lot of the emotional sides of changing your health. We will discuss addiction, emotions and the pitfalls so many of us fall into.

10. I don’t know how to cook, will I still be able to do the workshop?

Absolutely! We have lots of cooking videos with step by step instruction, I teach you how to shop, what to look for, even how to eat out. You will be amazed how easy and fast preparing meals can be.

11. I HATE VEGETABLES.

My husband, Matt had severe food sensitivities to ALL fruits and vegetables. To the point that we ended up in the ER 2 times because he ate something with tomato in it. He was also featured in Veg News as someone who would actually have a hard time going plant based. He has been 100% plant based and vegan for a year now! And he now eats almost all fruits and vegetables with out any trouble.

Most people don’t have cases like my husband, but most people think they don’t like any ‘healthy’ food. I work with people where they are at. We find the things you do like and help you to discover some new foods. You will also find your tastes changing as the month progresses and an entire world of food will be opened up to you (hopefully)

12. I’m thin, I don’t need to lose weight should I do the workshop?

Just to be sure we’re on the same page – I have lost 150 pounds, but still have more than 100 to lose, so yes, I am overweight and teaching the workshop. As I’ve said before, this is not about losing weight – this is about making better decisions for the future of your health. Being thin is not a marker (all the time) for what is going on inside – things like: are you eating in a way that promotes cancer cell growth? Are you preventing future heart disease? The workshop is about overall health. For people who want to lose weight, there is definitely that side of it, but a lot of my past workshop participants have not had any weight to lose and still benefit from the experience. Generally people report things like more energy, better workouts, better sleep. (of course I can’t claim that those things WILL happen to you). The workshop is open to anyone who would like to change the way they look at food and their health.

13. Are there spots in the workshop left?

I am opening it up to a FEW more people, just because I’ve had some last minute e-mails asking about the workshop. I am going to cut it off soon, because I do not want to have an over-crowded workshop.

14. Where is the workshop held? Is it private?

I have a private network set up that is only accessible through signing up for the workshop. Every person who is in the workshop I approve. Anything you write in the workshop is completely private and will not be shared on the web. *private with in the workshop.

15. I’m going on vacation for part of the workshop and won’t be online. Will I still benefit?

Definitely – when you get back you can always catch up! And, I go over how to eat while you are on vacation – no need to be unhealthy on vacation.

16. I’m still afraid.

It’s ok to have fear in regards to making changes. However, I want to assure you that doing this is not something to fear, it is something to celebrate. You are making a first step on a really amazing journey.

17. Where can I sign up?

Just go here!

Hopefully that has answered some of your questions, please feel free to ask me anything! I’m really excited about the workshop. I’ve been putting together new videos all week on every thing from how to shop to how to make an oatmeal pie. It’s going to be a great month, and I’d love to have you in the workshop!