What The Health? A Lifestyle Change For Me: Day 1
Good Morning & Happy Wednesday!
Before I get into my post of the day, I wanted to first share my new favorite LBR (little black romper), the new LBD, and these earrings from Hermosa Jewelry. This romper is perfect because it is long enough to cover everything, but the gold details on it bring out the perfect pop of classy & dressy! I paired the green pair of these earrings with this because it's probably one of my favorite color combo's! I now have these earrings in green and navy & you can use code: KATHRYN20 at checkout to receive 20% off ANY tassel earrings from Hermosa jewelry!
green earrings | Hermosa Jewelry // romper | Blake House Collection // handbag | SheIn // pink earrings | Kendra Scott
Now, onto today's post...
It's so weird to think that it's Wednesday already. We just got back last night from being gone for what was supposed to be 10 days but ended up being a bit longer due to cancelled flights. This is my first official blog post back from our trip to London for Harry's cousins wedding, and let me tell you, I have not had that much fun in a long time. I had never met any of his dad's family, and they were all so welcoming and fun, I can't wait to see them again! I will have a full post up about our trip to London soon, but I wanted to start off by talking a little bit about a movie I saw while I was over there: What The Health.
What the health? When I first heard the title, I thought it was going to be another one of those food documentaries that never really seemed relevant to me and confused me. But this one was different. This movie hit me hard. I sat back and realized that the food industry is seemingly lying to us and that they are all working together, from what it seems, to not treat the root of the problem of diseases, cancers, etc. but are more interested in creating medicines that may or may not work so that everyone can keep having the $$$ roll in.
I will have a full post on the movie and my thoughts soon, but the main point I wanted to talk about that the movie did for me was it had me start thinking about what exactly I am putting in my body. Do we really know where this chicken is coming from? Do we know for 100% fact that it has no injected liquid fillers? What are the cows and pigs being fed to create massive quantities of milk, meat or eggs that are supplying all of the people on the planet? Without seeing the cow or chicken or anything else for myself, I can't believe and trust that it is 100% safe.
Over the final 6 days of our trip after I watched this documentary, I couldn't stop thinking about it. Every time I took a bite of my chicken or ate cheese, had cereal in my milk, what exactly was I putting into my body? That terrified me. Left me speechless in my own thoughts of what I had just ingested. Is it really "helping" my body to be the best it can be? Is it helping me to be able to fight off viruses or any kind of illness? I don't know. I just don't know.
So when we got back from the trip, I decided I was going to make a change. Not go on a diet, but I was going to make a lifestyle change. When I was growing up I developed a dairy intolerance that I had for about 9 years. No one could figure out why or how, no doctor could give me a straight answer of what exactly was wrong with me. After hundreds of tests being run, an allergist visit that left me with 100+ needle marks where they stuck me with every different allergy to see what I would react to, endless nights of crying because of the pain I was in, we finally started keeping a food journal that helped us to narrow my food intolerance down to dairy. This was a major turn around because as long as I kept dairy out of my diet, I was fine.
Now, this isn't meant to be a "poor me", sob story, so let me change the tone around for you. Once I cut dairy out of my life, I was a new person. I was happy, healthy, strong & going on to play Division 1 Varsity Volleyball for USC. Fast forward a few years and I accidentally ate cheese one day, to which I had no reaction. I have always heard that you can grow out of your allergies and intolerances and I had. So for the next 5 years, I ate dairy pretty much every single day. I eat chocolate, candy, cheese, pizza, milk, cream in my coffee, pretty much everything I ate had dairy in it, it was AMAZING, a whole new world. But also, I realized that my mood began to change, I was anxious, very very anxious, always seemed to be on edge, lethargic. The list goes on and on, and after watching this movie, I started putting together the pieces of the puzzle.
Now, will this change be an end all be all fix my problems? Probably not, who knows? But why not give it a try if it is going to make me a healthier and happier person? If I can make small changes in my life that aren't too difficult, then why not just give it a try? So that's what I'm doing.
Now onto the purpose of this post.... the change!
I wouldn't say I am going vegan, nor would I say vegetarian. But what I am doing is trying to feed my body more of what it needs: fruits and vegetables. I have never been a huge meat eater, I never really cook it either. If I eat chicken, I typically buy one pre-made that is rotisserie, so this won't be difficult to cut back on. There are so many other ways to get protein, like beans, quinoa & even vegetables.
I want to take you through this journey with me, sharing recipes, failures, struggles, everything that comes with making a lifestyle change like this. Follow along, because you won't want to miss the realities of what it's like dealing with label reading, restaurants & how to cook with new substitutes.
Enjoy!