She fumbles again, folks...

...(She gasps in disbelief) "Oh no, it CAN'T be true...Oh God....how could I not have seen it coming?....How could I not have known...why, why, WHY??!!!!" (and all that drama) is basically the discourse in a nutshell that has been running through my head the last several days, hours, minutes, seconds...(sigh...)

You see, in all the wonderment and magic of our new found vegan lives and leanings toward raw food, I ceased to remember my previous issues with food...issues I've dealt with my whole life!  I was moving right along, feeling pretty balanced since my last major cleanse (minus, of course the smoking habit which I am proud to say I STILL have not returned to!--maybe its because I don't have to deny the guilt of eating animal flesh anymore--thank you my darling friend Ciera for being part of my transformation here) and so I didn't stop to think that there are healthy foods that maybe I shouldn't be eating.  

For the last 3 weeks or so I've been breaking out, I've felt dizzy, weak, had migraines, my stomach bloated, unable to get out of bed in the morning, problems focusing my vision or remembering things on a short term basis, constant nausea.  At first I thought it was just detox.  Then it got so bad that my ankles were rolling constantly, my muscles felt like they were atrophying all over my body.  All this, and I was still doing vegan, organic, a lot of raw foods.  I couldn't figure it out.  I spoke to one of my alternative doctors and deemed the culprit to be one of my vitamin supplements.  I thought I had solved the problem!  Two days later all my symptoms came back with a vengeance.  Every time I ate a meal I felt like I was on speed, heart racing, head racing, unable to pinpoint anything at all.  So in classic Katherine style I ruthlessly researched...

I questioned my protein intake, my iron intake, my nutrient intake, so frustrated and feeling horrible but other than the breakouts, looking fine.  Then, by sheer miracle, my sister emailed me an article on the controversy surrounding agave nectar, and in the article there was a mention of Candida Albicans--

DING!  DING!  DING!!!

That's when it hit me like a 90 mile an hour locomotive.  How could I not have seen this coming?  Ah the joys of being human and fallible. (another sigh)  I was in the midst of a major Candida Albicans issue, and these were all the fun little symptoms.  For those of you (lucky bastards) who have never faced this devious elfin opponent, here's a little info on the subject:

Candida Albicans is a yeast that occurs naturally in the human body. Normally it lives in harmony with a variety of other microorganisms and actually performs a couple important functions.  The problem occurs when something upsets the balance of bacteria in the body and this allows the yeast organism to proliferate and take over all the healthy microorganisms. 

Take this quiz to find out if you have Candida too.

I've had this lovely little problem on and off my entire life.  It is believed that it can be passed from the mother onto her baby in the womb if she has it.  Since I recall symptoms of Candida from the age of 5, I think I may have been one of those lucky ones.  Once you get Candida, the only way to effectively get rid of it is to starve it out.  That means, ugh, another change in diet.  You can't hear it but I'm moaning on the inside.  Candida yeasts feed on sugar and love moist conditions, so anything that converts to sugar in the body or harbors mold must be eliminated to kill off the excess yeast.  I KNEW this.  I've done the candida "diet" before, the first time at 21 (that was a wild year...me and a bunch of vegetables)  I KNEW that I was prone to Candida overgrowth, so I can't have large amounts of fruit like some people can, or dehydrated fruits (they tend to have hidden mold) or partake in lots of those wonderful treats, mushrooms (because mushrooms are in truth a fungus).  

Somehow when we went on our 21 day turned 5 week cleanse, I denied it.  I ate MASSIVE amounts of fruit.  Lukas and I bought up bags of fresh mushrooms from the farmers market every week.  It was AMAZING!!!  I basically ate my way into this, even though I thought I was being the healthiest person EVER.  (you can laugh now)

So now I begin healing myself from healing myself.  I'm waiting for a book I ordered on Amazon  called The Body Ecology Diet by Donna Gates.  I've had a friend follow that book and it really helped her.  Meanwhile, I'm sticking to the basic Candida diet I followed in the past and in 48 hours, I already feel better, my heart isn't racing (except when my husband walks in the door but I'll keep that symptom), I don't feel faint, and I'm not anxious.  I found the root of the root. 

There is a lesson here.  

Even if something is healthy for the planet on a whole, it may not be healthy for the individual.   We all can and should move towards more earth/body friendly diets and lives, but what is good for my neighbor may not be the best solution for me.  Once again, I'm letting go...  Amen.

Adventures in Vegan Sushi

I'm five weeks in now, and things are getting crazy.  As of Saturday, our kitchen has been completely converted from the average American kitchen (minus the microwave, we've been without that for years), to an exciting new version of what I'm guessing is the not so average American VEGAN kitchen!!  Our fridge has had a complete makeover and now is stuffed with veggies, sprouts, fruit, nuts, seeds, coconuts and my friend Ciera's all time favorite...Kombucha!

Even the sneaky little not so healthy pizza on the second shelf is completely vegan!  It feels so good to know that no animal or plot of land was harmed in the stuffing of my fridge or my face!


 My husband Lukas has been wondering about alternatives to the plastic containers we use for extra food, and we've thought about maybe glass but don't know how well that will seal or if there are any good size options out there so let me know if you have any ideas about that!

After our weekly Farmers Market trip we stopped to pick up a new food processor, so now with our Vitamix (generously donated by my mom) and our dehydrator, we are off and running.  In honor of all this new beauty in our lives, and as a gift for Lukas cause he's been SOOO with me every step of this transformation; I decided to step out of my fear and try one of the recipes that has been freaking me out ever since I got Juliano's RAW: THE UNCOOK BOOK.

RAW was my first raw cookbook and I got it halfway through our cleanse when I was running out of ideas.   I was so excited when it arrived at my house I screamed and did a little dance around my kitchen...(you have to understand the state I was in, having given up everything only 1 week before and needing to feel like I was eating MEALS, not carrots!)  Needless to say, RAW came to the rescue and I've made so many versions of his recipes since then.  But...dunh dunh dunh.... here comes the scary one...

RAW VEGAN SUSHI

Yikes!  (I loved real sushi when I ate fish, but this?--and making it myself??)  Could I do it??  I was damn well gonna try!  (And ignore the fact that I really, really dislike the taste of seaweed.  Yuch.)  So with Lukas' encouragement, I pulled out all the ingredients I've been slowly gathering together, opened up my trusty RAW uncookbook, and set to work...

I had already prepared the mac cream the day before for "cheese" and crackers, so that was one less step!

Mac Cream

1 cup raw macadamia nuts

1 cup raw cashews

1/2 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice

1/4 cup shoyu (soy sauce) or 1 1/2 tsp. sea salt

1 tablespoon garlic

Blend above ingredients until creamy.

Keeps 2 days in fridge!

 Now for the sushi:

Cream Sushi

2 sheets raw nori

4 carrot sticks, sliced thin

4 cucmber sticks, sliced thin (leave skin on)

4 horseradish sticks, sliced thin (I couldn't find this, so I skipped it)

6 whole chives

1 recipe of mac cream

1/4 cup marinated portabelo mushrooms

4 apple slices, sliced thin

lettuce leaves, enough to cover (we used red leaf lettuce from our garden)

On a sheet of nori arrange a few horseradish, cucumber, carrot sticks and chives along the edge of the nori closest to you with the ends sticking out of each end of the roll. Gently spread half the mac cream on top of the vegetable sticks, being careful not  to allow the mixture to touch the nori.

Add a layer of portobello mushrooms, apple slices, and lettuce leaves (cover any wet ingredients with leaves so the nori doesn't get wet). 

Roll, slice into bite-size pieces and...eat it all up!!!

  

The rolling part got a little tricky, so that's Lukas above, helping me finish the job!  The recipe didn't say how to seal the nori, but Lukas figured out that if you get it a little wet on the end and rub it gently together it sticks.  Voila!! 

Now this time it took me about 40 minutes from start to finish, but I made them again yesterday for lunch (with my own little variation) and it took me 15 minutes!  Who said good food can't be fast!  The best part is I can now say that I have actually made sushi in my own home.  Way cool.

Just another exciting day in my little vegan life.

With a very full and happy belly.

PIZZA!!!!

I want to share with you my handy dandy new cyber tool that I LOVE....

Although, I've only been using Happy Cow for a few incredible weeks, Happy Cow is the internet's most widely used and longest operating free worldwide vegetarian restaurant guide!!  It doesn't matter where we are, all I have to do is open my phone's browser, pull up the Happy Cow website, type in the city or zip code and presto change-o I have a full list of all the vegan/vegetarian restaurants and stores in the area.  

This is one more thing that makes being vegan SOOOO  EASY!!! 

Just last night we went across town to take my sister-in-law out for dinner and I wanted to make sure we all had a great meal!  So what did I do??  I went on Happy Cow of course!!  I found this awesome pizza place called Tomato Joe's that makes regular and vegan pizza!  We stopped in (It's not really an eat in place, mostly take away), ordered up two giant vegan pizzas (more for later), and my sister-in-law ordered her own non vegan pizza.  Once we got the pizzas back to her place, the feasting began and let me tell you....holy moly this pizza was GOOD!!  My S-I-L even tried the vegan pizza and kept coming back for more!  She liked it better than hers!!  Go vegan!!  A tip: The micro-brew crust is amazing and a must!

Thank you Happy Cow, thank you Tomato Joe's and thank you God for opening my eyes to veganism!!!

VICTORY!!!...and other things

Well, it's way past 21 days. I feel bad for not writing on Day 21, but, well, life got in the way. I got busy, then my dog passed and I couldn't write, let alone speak without sobbing for quite a few days. That's life. This is life. So... Where were we?..

Ah, yes. The cleanse. I'm happy to report that I completed the 21 days! Not only that, but technically we're still on the cleanse and now in day 29. We decided on the eve of day 21 (after realizing that we were doing this whole thing during lent-- to keep it up until Easter.) We're not just doing liquids anymore ( I think I might die if that were the case--that was NOT the fun week). We've basically gone back to the week 1 system, and are eating cooked and raw foods, just no animal products/alcohol/stimulants/processed foods/sugar (except maple syrup in our celebration cookies after day 21--which ps were so freaking worth it).

The best part...I HAVEN'T HAD A CIGARETTE IN 29 DAYS!!! GO ME!!!

My hubby and I spent a lot of time talking in weeks 2 and 3 about the things we had cut out of our diet, and thanks to the book The Kind Diet by Alicia Silverstone, we decided to commit for GOOD to a vegan diet. Huge Change! And I have to say probably the most difficult one for me. This decision was actually more difficult than giving up cigarettes if you can believe it. After making the decision and stating it out loud I craved meat for a week--hamburgers--oh-juicy-wonderful-summertime-food-hamburgers. BUT...I just can't go back to eating meat, dairy and cheese knowing what I know now. Having learned that my decision to eat a hamburger is playing a part in extreme cruelty to animals and to our planet (I won't go into detail here, but it's not pretty), I just can't do it anymore.

Wow.

Big statement. It's hard to even write it, but I'm taking a stand and making a choice about my character as an individual here. I learned that according to the United Nations, adopting a vegetarian lifestyle is the quickest way to bring about change in the fight against global warming. Seriously!!! It does so much damage to our planet to produce mass amounts of milk, meat, poultry, and fish. I'm originally from southeast Texas, down near the Gulf, so when I read that agricultural waste from factory farms along the mississippi had leached so much bad stuff into the river that there is now what's called "the Dead Zone" at the mouth of the river in the Gulf Of Mexico, where NO LIFE can sustain itself, it crushed me. Worse, "The Dead Zone" was almost 8,000 square miles in 2008. I can't even think that large, and that's my home. I didn't want to know this but I had to find out the truth. I guess its part of becoming more of an adult. Owning up to the responsibility and consequences (whether good or bad) of our actions in life. ALL of our actions.

So that's lifestyle change #1. We're vegan.

#2...We shop at the farmer's market now, like, all the time. In our quest to live this cleanse in a somewhat economical manner (Cause lets face it- organic IS more expensive) we tried to figure out how to cut corners without sacrificing our health or hurting the planet. The answer: Shopping ONE day a week only, and doing it at Farmer's Markets (only purchasing odds and ends at big grocery stores like Whole Foods). Here in California the farmer's markets are especially amazing. Just this past Saturday we got leeks, green onions, broccoli, cauliflower, an entire tray of strawberries (for only 11 bucks) blueberries, blackberries, rasberries, potatoes, red onions, purple carrots (how cool!) portobello mushrooms, shitake mushrooms, rue, dill, fresh french bread and kalamata olive bread (from a crazy little bread man who we are falling in love with), apples, pears, HUGE grapefruits, tangelos, rutabaga (never cooked this before-exciting!), bell peppers, kalamata olives, an ENTIRE 36 OZ. JAR OF GREEN OLIVES FOR ONLY 10 DOLLARS, wheatgrass (my honey likes the stuff--yick), persian cucumbers, asparagus, and this amazing little fruit we just tried for the first time (its incredible and so sweet/custardy it could stand alone as dessert) called the cherimoya. The man who sold it to us said with a smile and an arm around his adorable wife that they eat them and then spit the seeds at each other. Love at the farmer's market. The coolest part--we got ALL of this for only 130 bucks. ALL of it locally grown and pesticide free. It would have easily cost me 400 or more at whole foods for all that. Plus-we got enough to eat for an entire week, plus more to dehydrate for snacks. So I'm helping my wallet and the earth at the same time. I'm a double winner. Here are the other amazing things about shopping at the farmers markets:

1. Fresh air. I spend an hour or so outside in the fresh air and sunshine.
2. Know where it comes from. I actually get to meet the farmers. Trust me, it feels way different when you buy direct.
3. I'm interracting with my community (which we all need to do a little more).
4. I'm supporting local agriculture, supporting my state and the people in it, instead of some factory farm in another state or another country.
5. It's fun. Period.
6. I feel like I'm on a date with my honey, and all we're doing is getting food. ( He gets points without even knowing it!)

So look in your area for local farmers markets and take a trip to see what its like, or if you already buy local (good for you!) take the plunge to commit more to it. I LOVE this lifestyle change!

I think those are the two most major ones. There's lots of little things, but really who has time to recount all the details of the last two weeks? ...One really cool thing... I MADE MY VERY FIRST NUT CHEESE LAST WEEKEND! Now, I know what you're thinking, I thought it too. I never thought in a million years I would ever be one of those nut-cheese-making-granolas. Sorry. That's really what I thought. So wasn't I surprised when I found myself making nut cheese all by myself in my kitchen. Just a little dose of how bout we don't judge others for me! Shockingly, incredibly, it was awesome! My hubby, myself and our friend ate almost the entire bowl right then and there. It was SO good and was like eating a really sharp soft cheese (which is good cause I love sharp tastes in cheese.

So, its not bad. Its really not bad at all. We're actually finding amazing things and cooking takes less time eating this way, plus I don't get all freaked out about whether or not I cleaned my cutting board well enough to get rid of all the raw meat microbial thingies anymore.

Yesterday, we went to a raw dessert class held by the chef and owner of our new greatest find, CRU in Silverlake. That's me chowing down on their out-of-this-world raw chorizo tostada on a recent night at CRU.  In the class we learned how to make and then got to eat Chocolate ganache, strawberry "cheesecake", and coconut macaroons. All vegan, all raw, all flippin orgasmic. You wouldn't believe how good this stuff tastes. We're definitely not missing out. That's for sure. Until next time...go with green.

I miss mastication

I do. I miss it soooo much. Oh how I'd love to put a nice, fresh, dark, beautiful piece of kale in my mouth and CHEW! It's day 19 now. This final week has been the smoothie/juice only week. The last few days have been spent aching for the act of chewing. The final stretch is so intensely grueling, it's mile 24 of a 26 mile marathon. You know that you are so close to the finish line, but it would be so easy to just GIVE UP! "I mean really, who would care? No one would know, its not that big of a deal. I made it this far, I'm proud of myself, I can just stop now!...."

NO!!!

I'm going to do this. I'm going to make it. I've never whined so much in my life, but as long as my husband doesn't kick my whiny bottom out of the house before day 21, I WILL MAKE IT!! Even though I'm at the point that I'd REALLY rather just have water than pour one more smoothie-fied salad down my throat, I can get through these last two days. (My honey just brought me the only soothing thing in the world right now--fresh coconut water--he's on smoothie duty this morning--and it's even hard to swallow that!) I wanna chew, da da da da, keeps playing in my head to the beat of the I gotta crow song from Peter Pan... We're losing her folks, she's going down! Somebody call the medic!

Also...we're spending all this money on all this AMAZING organic produce from Whole Foods and it's just a travesty that I can't chew it. I can't taste each individual flavor all by itself, engage in every single bite. Feel the different textures on my tongue, and try to understand each flavor that hits me. Not fun for a foodie. Compared to this, weeks 1 and 2 were pure heaven. (Interestingly, though, in weeks 1 and 2 I craved cheese pizza. Thick, greasy, 2 pounds of cheese pizza. This week--I'm craving, drooling, desperate for some brown rice and beans. Is that too much to ask?)

I learned a lot in weeks 1 and 2. I actually spent a weekend in Vegas and managed to stay completely on this cleanse! That put some serious confidence in my willpower! Although I have to say I did NOT do this alone. Having my husband doing the same cleanse by my side makes it so much easier, I highly recommend having a partner in this endeavor. And more importantly--I started praying--A LOT! Pretty much every day, to get me through the day. No more leaning on food/caffeine/alcohol/cigarettes, so I found myself leaning on God. My definition of God. Which is so much better. I stepped back from my friends and work peeps, and spent a lot of time looking at what I put my energy into... not because I actively was trying to, but because letting go of all these foods makes you really sensitive. You just don't want to be around too many people. You realize how they affect you. Individually.

In a sentence... DOING THIS CLEANSE TAKES ALL THE MASKS AND MIND ALTERING THINGS AWAY, AND MAKES YOU EXACTLY WHO YOU ARE.

Scary.

It's funny how we're so afraid to be our real selves. To do something that would bring us closer to our real, authentic selves. Why does it seem so daunting? Why are we so scared of our selves? Maybe we think that our true selves are bad, or shameful, but I can say from experience now that our true selves are more beautiful than anything else on this planet. I'd rather be the unadulterated version of me.

Smoothie time...

The Cleanse

I've had a few peeps ask me what EXACTLY we're doing on our cleanse...so here it is. (ps-I'm not a doctor so don't sue me if you try it and don't like it--I say that with so much love!)

21 Day Cleanse


First let me say...Yayyy!!!! I'm so glad you're interested in doing this cleanse! We're on day 11 now and we feel so much better with each new day. Every day brings more clarity, focus, alertness and energy!!! If you decide to do it, don't wait too long or you'll talk yourself out of it. We decided two days before we took the plunge...

Here's what we're doing:

For 21 days we will eliminate all sugar, animal products, stimulants and alcohol. We will eat a plant based diet and supplement with green power. We'll drink 2 liters of water per day.

During the 21 days by eating simply and cleanly as a commitment to our health we'll:

· Feel lighter, more energized and alive.
· Sleep better and feel rested.
· Lower blood pressure and Lower stress.
· Clean out your system and give your metabolism a welcome rest.
· Discover intuitive eating that is in sync with your bodies needs.
· Change your patterns and attitudes about food as it relates to your body AND your psyche.
· Become more aware of everything going on
· Lose weight and develop lean muscle.
· Feel satisfied with REAL food without additives and processing.
· Eat clean, live clean and thrive

Our "cook book" will present a detox based on:

· Week one: Plant based food
· Week two: Raw food
· Week Three: Liquid Food

We'll also commit to:

· 1/2 hour minimum exercise every day
· 1/2 hour minimum quiet meditation



(Based on the 21 day detox developed by Richard DeAndrea, MD, ND and John Wood, ND)


Tips!! (Things I've figured out as we've gone along)

Get a good vegan supplement powder to add to your shakes, so you get all your vitamins/minerals. (We've found an AWESOME one called Vega, that is also Raw, so it works for all three weeks of this cleanse. It was created by a gold medal Ironman triathlete who happens to be vegan, and it tastes incredible too. But it's kind of pricey so look for one that works for you.) Click here to go to the Vega site.

Get a good B12 supplement. (I've learned that the one thing vegetarians don't get enough of is B12, so you should be supplementing. You get what you pay for in the vitamin department, so don't buy the 4 dollar bottle if you can swing it.)

Read The Kind Diet by Alicia Silverstone. (You won't be able to put it down and it makes doing the cleanse SO much easier.)

Spend 15-20 minutes every day looking for new recipes. (The quickest way to feel unsatisfied is to keep eating the same thing. Be creative, there are so many ways to make healthy food!)

Make sure you bring snacks with you if you leave the house so you don't get stuck starving with only McDonald's in sight!


Week 1

This week you can still cook your food, so eat as much brown rice, quinoa, barley, millet etc. as you can so you feel really warm and full while you are letting go of all the other stuff. We ate A LOT of super clean vegetable stews with wild rice, southern style beans and rice (without the sugar filled seasonings, but fresh or dried herbs and a little salt). Try to soak your beans for 24 hours before cooking. It really helps digestion. Also, you can have herbal tea.

There is an incredible vegetarian restaurant in Ithaca, NY called Moosewood that has great recipes you can use this week. Click here for an archive.

Week 2

Check out the raw websites and look for good, EASY recipes that you can make quickly without too much preparation. This is the key to not getting burnt out while detoxing. Also, be aware that raw foods can still be warmed over the stove. Finding that little gem out made me so happy!!! You just can't cook it so warm it on low heat just until its comforting... Once it hits 105 degrees it starts to cook and thats a no no. This week you can't have prepared tea because its been heated, but you can put fresh herbs in hot (not boiling) water. We just cut mint and lavender and chamomile right out of the garden. It's awesome.

Raw food recipes

Gourmet Raw food recipes -if you're really into it!


Week 3

We're not there yet so I'll keep you posted!!

NO MORE SADNESS

Seriously.

We were in the shower this morning...yes, WE...I am married people... and I almost dropped the soap when it suddenly hit me. I'M NOT SAD ANYMORE. Not that I was seriously depressed or anything (that was my teenage years), but I guess I just felt like life was a little dark before without even realizing it. But here, now, 11 days into this sneaky little cleanse, I'm HAPPY. Really Happy. And when I told my darling husband this revelation, he almost dropped the soap too. Cause he's not sad anymore either. Not that I don't get emotional or sob over stories of animal cruelty, cause let's face it, I'm still me, but WOW. This is different. No more moodiness. No more sadness. Life feels lighter. I feel lighter. We feel lighter. All from a heaping helping of fresh, amazing, God given food. As the old song goes..."Its a new dawn, it's a new day, its a new life for me...and I'm feelin good...

True Tales From The Rocky Road To Health

This is HARD CORE...

Those are the exact words I said to my amazingly supportive husband, looking at him wild eyed as I put the finishing touches on our brave new version of lunch. How supportive is he, you ask? How many guys do you know that would voluntarily join their lady friend on a 21 day high dive into the insanity of total body cleansing? Ok, so this is LA --Pasadena still counts-- you probably know a lot of them. Its pretty much par for the course that if you are lucky enough to live here, at least one of your ex's still wakes up half cocked at 4 in the afternoon after partying all night on the strip (or somewhere close by), heads to Robeks, downs a shot of wheatgrass, grabs a smoothie to go, then hits the gym so he can look hot tonight while repeating the cycle all over again. Or...maybe that's...you? Ahh, memories...

I moved to sunny Los Angeles 10 years ago to..here's the funny part...get sober. It's true. After years of traveling all over the world as a model...and getting my heart ripped out by one of those boys that are so pretty they look like they should be in a museum--behind glass--and a very good security system--I returned home for Christmas a shell of myself. Of course, I thought I was totally fine... I mean, doesn't every 18 year old write anthologies of angry love poems, smoke 2 packs a day and switch from hash to espresso to cocaine when the sun goes down? Needless to say, my mom didn't agree. At all. I'd received calls from my agent in LA a few months prior while I was still overseas, so, mommy dearest (I say that with so much love in my heart. Honestly.) made some calls and I flew to the City of Angels immediately after the holiday. Two birds with one stone. I got to keep working and she got to save her daughters life. Not bad.

Goodbye Milano, hello California. I packed up my smokes and my journals and moved in with two gorgeous older women, who literally taught me how to breathe again. With one I cried all night, every night, for almost a year. With the other, I exercised like a maniac, cruised around town talking about finding peace, swallowed so much sushi it should have been illegal, and learned to take it all one day at a time. I'm still working on that one. But...they got me through. They were...are...fabulous women, who also happen to be committed vegetarians and SERIOUSLY earth conscious.

Now, I knew about being healthy and all that jazz... I may not have acted like it, but I had my first wheatgrass shot at 14, while my mom was fighting cancer. I grew the stuff for years. I drank carrot juice and ate salads in between the joints and the cocaine, so its not like I was in the dark about all this, but... they were HARD CORE. We saved tinfoil and plastic bags. We composted. We ate organic and I wasn't allowed to cook meat in the house, ever. Weird. But I got used to it, and then I got into it. I learned how to make killer salads and smoothies, how to take time for myself in a good way, how to live a life that wasn't going to kill me. I have to admit something, though. I never got used to the water saver in the shower. I just can't hang with that one. Shower time is sacred to me. Its this precious time when the world can NOT come in, when you are alone with your thoughts and your self, warm and clean and wonderful. It's like being in the womb, except I'm full grown and I'm not hearing voices or being poked at to get me to move so somebody can go "OH! I saw her kick!". So, I can't do it with the water saver. Sorry.

I have, after 10 years, finally made it to that word though. Standing in the kitchen this afternoon, while shaking raw vegan Parmesan cheese onto raw "mashed potatoes", which are really not potatoes at all but cauliflower put through the Cuisinart and warmed (NOT COOKED!) on the stove, I looked up in wonderment, my man and I locked eyes, I felt the crazies come over me, and I said with a little too much fervor, "This-is-HARD-CORE-- Seriously. We're really doin this..." His response? "Yeah, babe." Isn't he delicious?

Today happens to be day #9. Nine days ago we embarked on a 21 day cleanse. Its my husbands first ever. He's a cleanse virgin. I however, have done a number of really strict cleanses in the past and have been on this health journey kicking up dust for 10 years. I've done the candida cleanse and didn't lay a finger on sugar or my favorite appetite quencher--pasta--for 4 months. Of course I smoked the whole time, but, hey, I tried, right? Then a few years ago I was feeling particularly disgusting so I went to a doctor who sent me home with a billion tinctures and pills and again restricted my diet--no sugar, no soy, no cow's milk, no preservatives, yada, yada, yada... This time, I actually quit smoking, which is really good because I'm the girl who goes around telling everyone else how they can get healthy and how DARE they eat food that's not organic and then sit on the porch smoking my heart out with my chamomile tea.

I lasted eight months. Eight amazing months. My skin cleared up. My lungs stopped hurting. My emotions were so much more available, which is also really good because now that I am an actor you'd think I want that. Then it happened. I booked a movie. A really BIG movie. Half way through the shoot I freaked and bought a pack of smokes. Old faithful. I told myself I'd only have one. Every time I had one. I threw away half full packs at night, only to buy new ones the next day. I prayed. I begged. I swore I wouldn't touch them. I couldn't stop myself. That was over a year ago, and until 9 days ago, I smoked more every day. So...this is crazy. I'm doing it anyway.

By most people's standards, my husband and I are REALLY healthy. (Other than that nasty little habit.) We already eat primarily organic. We stay away from ultra processed foods and white sugar. We go to alternative medical doctors. I haven't had a soda in years. I thought I was healthy. So did he. WE HAD NO IDEA. An a perfectly innocent Saturday last month I got a random email from my yoga studio about a 21 day cleanse they were encouraging friends of the studio to do with them. My schedule is busy now so I don't have time to do the group thing, but it sparked an idea, which sparked a fire, which electrocuted the psycho health nut within and compelled me to say "I'm in!". Not only that, but I took it a further step, and sitting by the fire I read my love the email, told him he had two days to decide, and either way I was doing it. He took the bait. Yayyyyy! Two days later, on March 1st, 2010 we began the first phase of 21 days without animal products, sugar, stimulants, or alcohol. No omelets, no pasta, no chocolate. Ouch. More importantly...no cigarettes.

So here we are. Day 9. Each day is so new I can't recall how many changes I've been through in the last 9 days. I can't even begin to imagine what the next 11 will be like, but I'm going to write it down, I'm going to tell the honest truth. Because some days its easy, but some days its really freakin hard, and we're all just doing the best we can...