Lisa Curry's Wisdom......

Tonight I had the pleasure of seeing Lisa Curry speak in my small rural town. She made no apologies for the fact she was sponsored, there was full disclosure about who they were, and they were well represented. We listened to some stories from the road trip her and her partner have embarked on, in an attempt to help people find the motivation to improve their health.

I found her to be open and honest, really down to earth and I felt she had an honest desire to help change people's life. She didn't try to flog her program (she really only mentioned it twice) but she did talk of the heartbreak of seeing family members battle obesity, cancer and other disease. I truly believe her motivation for this trip is a desire to see the country, spend time with her spunky young man - and help as many people as she can along the way!

There was a lot of standard motivational spiel.... you can't want it to happen, you have to make it happen.....but delivered with good humour, and lots of dropped names (even Lady Di - I was impressed)... and with lots of great sporting stories. I enjoyed her take on self motivation.

Yesterday, I watched my first episode of The Biggest Loser in about 4 years. I saw Michelle Bridges screaming at and belittling morbidly obese people in a gym. I was upset and angered to see it. I don't care if she's told to do it by the producers, or if she's trying to change her brand to 'hard-ass' - yelling at a fat person, and trying to humiliate them will NEVER help them improve self esteem.

Lisa spoke of how it's possible to succeed with love, self-respect, and respect and love for team-mates or friends who are on the same path. She told a great story about how her rowing team's coach was asked instead of yelling at the team to get them fired up before an event,  could he tell them he loved them, was proud of them, and that they were amazing. He did - he told each woman he loved her, that she was awesome, and that he was proud of her. The team hadn't had any real success, and hadn't really trained enough - but when the coach gave them the talk, told them he loved them and that he believed they could do it - they went out and won!!!  - I loved that story!

Some of the most important things I took away from the talk were

1. Sleep. You must get good quality sleep - the lack of it will leave you unwell. (I'm currently very sleep deprived, and feel very ill - and that is after only 4 nights)

2. Make time for yourself. You are the most important person in the world. Not your husband, not your kids. YOU are the most important person in the world. You deserve time to look after yourself.

3. Your family is important. Take the time to spend with your family, do fun things, do silly things, do crazy things, make every day you spend with them count!!

4. 'Goal weights' are just numbers. Everyone's ideal weight is different - you won't know what it is until you get there. Instead of having a goal weight, aim to be the fittest, healthiest you!

5. If you have a choice  between fat, and 'low-fat' (which is ALWAYS sugar) choose fat. Fat can be burned, and doesn't affect blood sugar in the same way or contain chemicals.

5 Chemicals make you sick - the chemicals in our food and personal care products make us sick. From allergies to cancer things like shampoos, deodorants  spray tans, low fat foods, artificial sweeteners
  processed bleached flour - all make you sick!!! She suggested an app called Chemical Maze (which I'm yet to try) She then made her point by showing the artery of a smoker. It was in a state of severe arteriosclerosis  (hardening of the arteries and blocked arteries) - caused by smoking, and the chemicals in cigarettes.

6. PH and Oxidisation - These things I have spent a long time researching. I could go on about them      forever.

The body cannot work efficiently in an acid state, acidic foods create an excess of acid not only in the stomach and the entire digestive tract, but right down to a cellular level in the body. A body in an acidic state cannot fight illness, and people in an acidic state will more than likely be sick.

To change your body's state from acidic, you must ingest Alkaline foods - green juices, wheatgrass, spurilina,  vital greens, green vegies, fruits and vegetables the colors of the rainbow! The body's optimal level of function is a PH level of 7.36-7.46, with one being the bloodstreams desired level, the other the digestive tract. Measuring PH is easy, test strips can be purchased from any health food store for around $20. 

Simply tear off a strip of the paper from a roll (it's about the size of a roll of correction tape) and place it on your tongue. Don't do so until an hour after eating. If you want to ensure a good result, urinate on a strip as well. Sometimes the food you've eaten that day may have been particularly acidic and can give you a different result. Ideally, you'd like saliva and urine to match - which means that your diet is not too acidic. 

Today, I had 2 cans of coke at work. I decided to do a PH test just now to see how I am faring after some really bad choices lately. I know I feel like shit, which is a good indicator my PH will be off. I usually sit pretty much spot on between 7.2 and 7.4. I took a picture to illustrate how different the results can be if a lot of acidic food is ingested. The top strip is saliva. It is a PH of 5.8 which is VERY acid..... the lower one is urine and it's 7.0. Still slightly acid, but nothing a big feed of fruit and veggies and a green juice won't fix!

I highly reccommend everyone test their PH, and learn as much as you can about PH levels and alkaline eating. A fantastic rule of thumb is the 80/20 way of eating. If 80% of your diet consists of nutrient rich, anti-oxidant rich, alkaline foods - the other 20% can be whatever you like!

That brings me to the second part of part 6 - Oxidisation. 

Oxidisation is a chemical process of corrosion that occurs when oxygen and moisture cause a substance to corrode. The most obvious example is metal. If you have metal that gets wet, and is exposed to oxygen, it rusts (corrodes). Now think of an apple. In it's peel, it's perfect, moist, juicy..... but encased. Cut the apple, expose the moist part to oxygen, and what happens? It goes brown, beginning to oxidise quickly. What happens to the apple if you dip the apple in lemon juice - it doesn't brown. Why? Because lemon juice is an anti-oxidant! Internal organs of our body need oxygenated blood to work efficiently, which provides them with the perfect environment to oxidise. Eating anti-oxidant rich foods prevents this.

So mixing alkaline foods, with anti-oxidant rich foods, is the key to good health!

I really enjoyed Lisa's presentation, and I am going to take a good look at her KISS club. As many of you know, I don't love the idea of weight loss plans after doing 12WBT. I believe a program should foster autonomy, and give you the skills to succeed on your own. From what I can tell, this plan will teach me to put myself first, fit myself into my life, train despite a heavy work/study schedule, and help me love myself just a little more.

That's it for me tonight.....  I need some sleep. 

Facing my fear

So it's been ages since I've blogged, and in part, it is because life is now so hectic! I've commenced full time study at uni, working toward a Bachelor of Science, majoring in Environmental Science. It's a lot of hours, a lot of reading and it's almost a full day to listen to all the lectures - but so far, I'm really loving it.

I'd been keeping pretty on track with my diet, and had still been training twice a week despite the crazy hours I've been putting into study and chasing the kids around to sports and clubs.

Monday week ago, I got home from town after netball training, saw a message on the phone - that threw me into a tailspin. It was with that phone call - I fell off the wagon, and I did it in style! It wasn't what most people would consider a 'bad' phone call, it was in fact someone offering me an interview for a job that I hadn't actually applied for! I had applied twice for positions in this organisation last year, with no success. It seems they liked me, and they held onto my resume, and thought I'd be a good candidate for this position.

The reason it thew me into a tailspin, is because I had a plan - I knew what I was going to do for the next couple of years and I liked the stability of knowing where I was going. I have been busting a gut at uni, and working hard with the knowledge that I'd be around for the kids whenever they needed me, and that I could always fit study around kids. So with this phone call - I didn't know..... I didn't know if I would actually get the job - I didn't even know if I wanted the bloody job!

By nature I am an ambitious person, but not in the way most people are - I don't crave money, possessions or prestige. My ambition is to be the best mother I can be to my children. I dream of raising 2 people who will make the world a better place with their actions and attitude. That takes work!! Hard work - they need to know they are always my first priority.

In my mind, I've seen every one of my working mother friends have to make a choice between work and family, even if it's only missing something at school to be at work, or occasionally sending a child to school a little sick because they have a meeting or a busy day. To me, putting work before children is something I don't ever want to do - and it is my biggest fear as a mother.  So suffice to say, being a student, always accessible to my children was a wonderful and safe option to me. We struggle financially, constantly, but my children do not want for anything - they like me don't crave possessions. So to sacrifice things, or more money to spend time at home, was never a sacrifice to me.

As a lot of my regular readers know, I have 2 kids, and one is sickly. She's never been well, and while being on the mend, she still gets sick more often than most then there are the surgeries and school holidays to consider. Who will look after my baby girl when she is sick - she has never had anyone else look after her when she's sick but me. Will she think I don't love her as much if I 'fob her off' when she's ill? Who will take her? Will she resent me not being here for her when she needs me? I have an incredibly strong bond with my daughter, she is my youngest, and we've barely spent a day apart her whole life. In fact, the only other job I've had since she was born, was at the kinder she attended! The thought of prioritising something above my kids - is my biggest worry.....

So immediately after I got this message, I broke out in hives..... big splotchy hives. Itchy, hot, big, splotchy hives! Obviously I was stressed - this threw my certain future of the next couple of years into disarray. I got sick, that day - and nothing that went into my mouth was good for me. I mean I did not consume one single thing for about the next 10 days that did my body any good. As we all know, if we eat shit food, we feel like shit, and it's cyclic..... feel like shit, eat more shit. I have only done a couple of sessions at the gym in a fortnight, and to be honest, only for the social aspect of seeing friends. I certainly didn't work hard, and any calories I burned, were replaced with whatever I ate in the car on the way home.

I got the job, and tomorrow is my first day - and it turns out that my baby girl is sick. She has a fever and has felt like crap all weekend. I doubt she'll be at school tomorrow. On my first day at a new job, my biggest fear is being realised - I am choosing to go to work and leave a sick child. I feel like the universe is trying to tell me something! To put icing on the cake today, my 93 year old Nan, who is of ever declining health, had a little heart attack. She's in hospital, and they're not holding much hope that we will have her with us much longer. Going to work feels wrong when I have a sick child - a sick Nan...... and yet, I am still going......

The kids Dad has spent the last 11 years at the same job and fortunately has a lot of leave owing - he assures me the universe in fact isn't trying to kill me with stress, and that it's telling him he needs a day off with his daughter! His sister was kind enough to tell me today, she's only working 2 day weeks and would be happy to take the kids if they are sick.... so I am lucky to have them. So why does it hurt so much to go?

Anyway, long story short, yesterday it dawned on me, I have a job. It is a good job. The money is awesome and affords me opportunities that I don't have as a poor student single mother...... so I need to suck it up, leave the pity party and get my shit in order.

I am eating well again, which of course means I'm feeling better - and despite being petrified about this job, I'm going to face my fears, walk into the building, looking confident - head held high, and like my dear friend
Renée always says -  I'm gonna fake it till I make it!!!