From Eating for Slimming to Juicing For Health - A New Journey for Me!

I'm sad to say that I abandoned the Unislim plan a few months into it.  While I continued to eat a lot more healthily than I had in years, I found it wasn't quite the plan for me.

I managed to reduce my weight by half a stone or so and didn't really revert back to my terrible habits. I continue to read Unislim magazines, websites and tips and the Facebook community is terrific too. If anyone is considering joining them, go ahead as it's a great plan for some people. However, subsequently I decided that it's not the plan for me.

The combination of yoga and healthy eating without watching every morsel felt more my thing and has sustained me for the past while.  However, I am still bigger than I should be and my cholesterol levels are sky high.  While some of this is hereditary, the doctor could apparently tell by my triglycerides level, that I need to make some more dietary changes.  I made a decision to focus more on my health and what nutrients I am putting into my body, rather than what weight I am.

In 2013 I cut down hugely on animal proteins and sugar and I started to include more fruit in the form of smoothies.I also included porridge, seeded bread and plant sterol supplements.  I found that all this helped with my energy levels which are a big concern for me.  I often struggle with lack of energy and the older I get the more tired I feel. I am almost 48, the mother of a six year old and will soon go back to working outside the home. For these reasons, I feel I need to up my game and find a way of eating that I can sustain for a lifetime.  The natural progression from blending smoothies and making fresh soups seems to be juicing. I had heard that juicing can help with reducing cholesterol levels and risks of heart disease, diabetes and cancer. It can also elevate mood and inspire feelings of mental wellbeing. This would also be a big thing for me. I had already been doing some food and juicing recipes from the brilliant Dale Pinnock. He is known as 'The Medicinal Chef' for good reason and I like his whole way of looking at food.

I was toying with the juicing idea, when I came across a book by Bernadette Bohan called 'Eat yourself Well' on my Kindle.  Shortly afterwards, I happened to see her being interviewed on television.  When I heard her mention how she turned her health around and what a big fan she is of juicing, I knew I had to read the book. And boy, am I glad I did.  I learned so much from it and because it was so easy to read, I was able to start putting some of the ideas into practice.  The book has acted as a springboard for me to find out more. I learned a lot about juicing but I also learned some other things and I have not been able to look at Dairy milk since! I now use almond milk in smoothies and have converted to soy based yoghurt and cheeses.

I knew from Bernadette's book that there were different types of juicers and so I put out a message on Facebook asking for suggestions.  A few friends came back with ideas and one suggested I watch the documentary by Joe Cross called 'Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead'.  I noticed I had it on netflix so I watched it that night. I think it can also be found on you tube now and watched for free. I found it very very inspiring and while I don't feel ready to exist on only juices for a period of time, I have incorporated them into my daily life.  Juicing is a terrific way of getting much needed fruit and veg nutrients into a person. From someone, who only ate one type of veg at dinner a few times a week and virtually no fruit, I now have both daily.

I then watched a few more documentaries for inspiration.  Look at 'The Joy of Juicing' with Gary Null, 'Food Matters' and 'Fork over knives' and you'll see what I mean.

Other inspirational suggestions from my facebook friends were to look at Dan the Regenerator (check out his Lemon Ginger Blast, when you're not checking out him!) and Jason Vale.

I feel it's a matter of finding something that resonates with a person before the change can be made. For me, I need something that combines mind, body and soul and for exercise, I find yoga does that. It's the first exercise I have ever stuck at and I have now been practicing since 2010. I'm on day 12 of incorporating juices into my diet and I find that the creativity involved in making them and the leraning how to combine things is keeping me interested.  I find it fun!

I bought myself an Andrew James Power Juicer.  It's a basic centrifrugal type of juicer but it's adequate for a beginner juicer like myself.  I toyed with buying a Philips 1861 or 1871 but they were quite a bit more expensive and when I looked at the juicers in the shop, the Andrew James juicer looked quite similar.  After washing your fruit and vegetables, you can put them through the juicer whole without any need for chopping and cutting.  Ideally, I would like a twin gear masticating juicer but this type is way over my budget at the moment.  I spent 69 euro on my juicer and so, if I don't stick with it, I won't feel too bad at how much I have spent.

I am learning more day by day but the things I have learned so far in my jucing journey are:


1. Juicers have come a long way and are actually easy to clean! Place a plastic bag over the pulping funnel before you start juicing so it gives you one less thing on your juicer to clean

2. Don't do as I did and be overzealous on adding the Wheatgrass powder to your smoothies and juices. I made the mistake of adding far too much to a pint of green juice and suffered with tummy pains and nausea afterwards. It wore off after a couple of hours but it wasn't pleasant. Read the instructions before you add any power greens or supplements to your juices!

3. Cucumber, Apple, Kale and lemon is my favourite morning drink and in fact, I could drink it at any time of day. I also love Carrot, orange, sweet potato and red bell pepper. It's terrific fun experimenting with all the combinations.

4. If you think it's difficult to find time to do all that juicing, make a big batch of green juice in the morning and store it in glass bottles or airtight steel containers in your fridge. I am saving large glass coffee and gravy jars to store mine. I also use insulated travel mugs to take in the car with me. Take some of your juice to work in a flask and have at coffee time and lunch time instead of your usual toxic coffee and pastry. Some say the quicker you drink the juice after making it the better, as nutrients deteroriate the longer the juice has been made. However, after a lot of research, and through my own experience, I have discovered the juice can last up three days. Even if some nutrients are lost, I figure, I am still getting far far more benefit than if I didn't drink it at all. At the current time, I have time to do my juicing freshly but if I don't I make it in advance in the morning or evening time.

5. Someone said to me that the fruit juice sugars are damaging to teeth but as Jason Vale says many people are doing this to themselves anyway consuming soft drinks, sweets, chocolate and most processed foods which all have huge amounts of added sugar. At least with fruit juice you are also getting nutrients and not just empty calories with no nutrients whatsoever. If people are over worried about this issue, they should dilute the fruit juices with water, use a straw and wait one hour and then brush teeth. Alternatively, mix one fruit with lots of veg. I usually mix a couple of apples with my green veg for my morning juice and mix oranges with carrots and other vegetables. There is always a way!

6. There is a wider range of fruit and vegetables out there than any of us even know! I am converted to things like fennel, kale, Afalfa sprouts and Shitake Mushrooms! I'd never even heard of them before I started juicing! I have discovered it's best to buy organic but if you can't, just buy what you can. You will still be getting huge quantities of nutrients that you were not getting before. Wash well with an apple cider vinegar solution before juicing.

7. Oranges cannot be juiced with the skin on, whereas apples, lemons and many other fruits can. Opinions differ on whether kiwis are better juiiced with the skin on or off.

8. Juicing makes using the toilet a more frequent occurence! I noticed this on day Four!!! This is a good thing as it's evidence that the body is eliminating toxins. Juicing helps the body's natural detoxification processes to become more efficient. The body is detoxing all the time through skin, kidneys, liver but sometimes we get clogged up for usually dietary reasons and juicing helps with this.

In the past I have been at optimum health and I have been slim so even though I am older, there is no reason why I cannot be that way again.  I have been slim and healthy sometimes in my life and I will be slim and healthy sometime again. And that sometime  will be sometime soon!

D Day -Beginning Of The Unislim Journey!

Well, today is D day!

No. It's not 'decision' day as in the original meaning of the D in the phrase.  The decision is already made.  It's not 'diet' day.  I am eliminating that word from this blog as it conjures up another d word, 'deprivation'! The D in my D day means 'DO'.  So it's 'Do' day for me!

When I woke up this morning, my negative 'monkey mind' started to chatter.  It started to give me all the reasons why I shouldn't bother to join Unislim.  It reminded me how I had started a weight loss programme before and given up when my friends did, only to pile on even more pounds.  It told me that I didn't need to lose weight.  After all there are people much larger than me out there. It told me that it would be dangerous to drive to the meeting as there is a gale and storm alert. It told me that it would be awful to join on my own.  The negative part of my mind kept on and on and the positive part tried to get a word in. What about your low mood, low energy and high cholesterol, it whispered.

So what did I do?  How did I quell the negative voice and feed the positive one so that it could come forward to motivate me? I went onto the Unislim Facebook chat page and 'spoke' to some of the amazing people there. I looked back on a post that I made the other day asking others if they had joined with someone else or alone?  Some had joined with others but most had gone alone.  Either way, everyone agreed they must do it for themselves and that only they themselves could do it. It is the responsibiltiy of each person alone, as Emma Dunne mentions in her last Unislim Blog Post. Emma asked me what advice I would give to a friend who was making excuses.  I said that I would tell my friend that if she was feeling that bad, had low energy and mood, she had a duty of care to herself to change things.  I said that I would tell her that if she was really sick and tired  of being sick and tired, then she owed it to herself to take action.  Emma suggested I tell that to MYSELF!

I was starting to feel quite excited until I spoke to my mother on the phone.  I know that she loves me a lot but she has a tendency to always give a negative answer to things first.  She never really thinks about what she is saying before she says it, although she often backtracks at a later time.  Sometimes the damage is done but trying to be a caring and enlightened person, I try to let it pass without argument. When I mentioned to her that I was joining Unislim this evening, she pah pahed the idea, pointing out that I had failed before.  She said it is a waste of time and money and I won't stick to it.  She also mentioned the storm warning today and said it would be too dangerous to drive.  All things that I have heard before from the negative voice in my own head with the excuses I had this morning why I shouldn't go. Instead of rowing with her, I took a deep breath and told her I am doing it anyway and there is no time like the present!

So that's what I am going to do.  Come rain or shine, storm or gale, I will be at my first Unislim meeting tonight!

Feel free to comment, join as a reader and offer words of advice.  All motivation gratefully received!

Time for Unislim!

Did you ever catch sight of your reflection in a mirror or shop window and wonder who that person was?

That was me a few weeks ago while on holiday in France.  I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror as I was raising an ice lolly to my lips. Suffice to say that I was horrified because it was not the reflection I felt I saw looking back at me in my own mirror at home. It struck me then that I was probably fooling myself about that. I probably should have realised when my holiday clothes, size 16s no longer fitted me comfortably.

I am forty six and up until recently always felt I looked reasonably good for my age, even if I was pleasantly plump. 'Pleasantly Plump', that is actually how I saw myself, until that fateful day recently, when I saw my reflection from side view. I have a large bust anyway, but seeing that my tummy was almost as large, in that position, really brought it home to me.  Even the fact that my husband mentioned that I am the biggest he has ever seen me didn't register. But, seeing is definitely believing!

I mentioned to a few people about my size and they made no comment about it.  This signifies even more that I need to do something about it.  If I wasn't getting bigger, they would definitely say it, but nobody wants to offend!

I am now fourteen stone.  To those who are bigger than that, it may not seem a lot. However, being five foot six inches, the fortysomething first time mother of a four year old energetic toddler and having no energy and recent bouts of low mood and general ill health, it's all relative to each person's own situation.

Catching sight of myself in that mirror in France, receiving no positive feedback on my weight complaints, low energy, low moods and seeing a photo of myself looking frumpy and fat, I think it is definitely time to take Action!!!

I have done it before and I can do it again but I feel that I need guidance on the food part. I need ideas and guidance to eat more nutritiously rather than just eating less calories. I also find that when I am practicing yoga, it helps me to be more mindful of what I eat and improves my flexibility.  I lost 15lbs before through using this method but sadly my classes ended in June for the summer and don't resume until end of September.  I lacked the discipline to practice much at home and I have piled on the pounds in a matter of months! I haven't put up any recent pictures of myself on my blog or facebook pages, mainly because of this.

I have been searching the weight loss groups and decided to opt for the Unislim plan.  I like their website and being a technology fan, I love the way various groups use their facebook pages to interact.  I also like reading the blog of Emma Dunne over at the site!  She has lost a whopping seven stone and her posts are so full of enthusiasm, they are really motivating.  I love the Eumom.ie website and through Emma's blog on Unislim, I came across the weight loss journey of Claire (same name as me) on her Unislimmer blog/diary.

I toyed with the idea of joining the Unislim group in the Donaghmede area and I love following Nancy's facebook page.  However, I have finally settled on joining up with the Drumcondra area.  It is local to me, the times suit and when I contacted Linda, the leader, I got a good vibe.

I hope that, in conjunction with yoga, walks and a little bit of skipping, Unislim will remind me to eat nutritiously, help me to lose weight and up my energy levels.  In fact, I more than hope.  I know this will work if I can motivate myself and do all these self caring things I am promising myself to do. This blog is part of my strategy of accountability!

I have called this blog UniSlimSometime(s) because I have been slim in the past and I intend to be slim again sometime! Also it has been in my mind to join a slimming group for sometime now!

So, wish me luck on my new weight loss journey.  I won't be starting officially until Wednesday 15th August.  I am nervous about joining a class on my own but the only one who can do it is me.  I can't blame anyone else if they are not going along one week and I don't go either.  I want to prove to myself that I can do it and I can!