Hello internet!
So, this is my first post. This is new to me. I'm sure I'll get better at this as I go along.
So, bitches love produce. This is a blog where I'm going to discuss my love of produce in a politically-incorrect, candid sort of way.
For my first blog post, I want to discuss something kind of serious to give my readers some perspective about why I love produce so much. This is going to be long. You could probably skip to the end and get the gist of it. This is essentially my food journey. I've certainly gone through other processes in life, and food certainly isn't the most important thing in the world, but health has had a profound impact on my life, and it could on yours too.
My teenage years and vegetarianism/veganism
I saw some chickens in a truck going to a slaughterhouse when I was little, and I swear I looked a chicken in the eye and that little bugger was begging me not to eat him/her. My brothers, being obnoxious pre-teen boys joked about how that chicken was going to become chicken nuggets in a few hours. I vowed to never eat meat again.
I was a vegetarian from the time I was 12 to 15 and then I was a vegan from 15 to 18. I wasn't ridiculously strict. I never ate meat, but sometimes I would eat cheese even though I tried not to. There's something interesting about food cravings. You only really have them when your body is desperate for something. I was probably deficient in lots of things, likely B-12 and iron.
I was a depressed kid. I realize now that probably had a lot to due with diet. I was an insomniac and frankly, unpleasant to be around. Oh, veganism. I understand that there are plenty of healthy vegans out there, but I simply believe that some people can't be healthy as vegans. Repeat my politically incorrect statement: I cannot be healthy as a vegan. More on this later.
TL;DR: ate lots of vegetables/fruit/nuts/soy/wheat ... felt like shit
College: the shit hits the fan
My freshman year of college I started eating meat again, and I actually felt not depressed for a little while. Emphasis on 'for a little while.' It started as simply a little bit of depression, which seems normal when all you've ever known is depression. My sophomore year of college, I started getting stomach aches after every meal, and I started getting this rash on my hand. I had these blisters all over my hands that just wouldn't go away. It was really painful.
The depression I've known all my life got progressively worse and I developed extreme social anxiety. I'm not exaggerating the extremity of it. It was crippling socially, mentally, physically. Then I started getting bathroom problems. I'm not going to go into details of that. First I gained a lot of weight, so I was 5'3" and ~135 pounds, which may not seem like a lot, but I had a really high body fat percentage, so it looked like it.
Then, things got worse. I went from being extremely depressed with god-awful social anxiety and perpetual boil covered skin and being overweight while eating normal amounts of food to being ungodly depressed (nothing will ever be good! I'm such an awful human being! blah blah blah) with crippling social anxiety and all sorts of other good stuff plus some more awesomesauce.
I started losing weight rapidly. It wasn't totally intentional, but I noticed that when I didn't eat, I had comparative mental clarity, so I wouldn't eat until the end of the day, and then I'd throw it up anyway because my body was refusing food. I didn't understand what was going on, and the depression didn't help.
People are nasty when they think you're anorexic or a drug addict. People are ugly when they think that's what you're going through, when, that really wasn't what I was going through. I was desperate. I went to lots of doctors and got no answers. Someone suggested a gluten-free diet and I decided to try it.
TL;DR: I was a fucking mentally ill psychopath for most of college and it was largely due to fucking gluten.
Gluten free and not giving a fuuuuuuuuck
So I had celiac disease. Who knew? This was before it was super-trendy to be gluten-free, so it took forever to get a diagnosis. I put on weight. My skin looked better. I started sleeping at night!
I remember the first time I felt happiness again after three straight years of continuous depression. It was July of 2011. I was walking to my schwanky dorm room at NYU, where I was interning at the time. I had spent the day by myself at the beach becoming not-deficient in vitamin D and reading Vonnegut and avoiding suitors. I was walking home and I felt this internal relaxation. I almost cried. I realized I was feeling what I should have been feeling all along. It was fucking awesome.
TL;DR: gluten free was fucking magic for like 6 months
Gluten free isn't magic? whaaaaaat?
I rode the i'mnotdepressedanymoremygodthisisawesome train for a couple of months. I didn't look skeletal anymore and I stopped getting as anxious in social situations. Unfortunately, not everything was sunshine and rainbows. My blasted rash started coming back. I got stomach aches pretty frequently.
I bought all new pots and pans. That helped a lot. Cross contamination is a motherfucker.
I also got allergy tested. It came back inconclusive because I react to the saline solution (HAHAHAHAHA ... yeah, I know), so I was left on my own. I cut out soy, dairy, nuts, eggs, fish, and all grains.
...still no luck.
TL;DR: gluten free wasn't fucking magic for a few months
THIS BITCH IS CRAY-CRAY
I tried low-fat raw veganism for a while. It was good at first. I had remarkably stable blood sugar and my skin looked nice. I was eating like 3600-4000 calories a day from an assortment of sweet fruit, and I ate salads the size of my torso for dinner. This didn't last forever.
I started losing unnecessary weight and looking skeletal again. I had horrific blood sugar issues, and if you've ever had chronic low blood sugar, than you know what it's like to just be chilling and then need to cry your eyes out for no good goddamned reason. Fuck. This.
I'm eating some goddamn dead animals.
TL;DR i ate my body weight in fruit on a daily basis - it worked for a while, then it failed miserable
Paleo isn't necessarily a bacon circlejerk
Really. I've been wholly paleo for quite some time now. I eat produce and I eat animals. That's it. Sometimes I'll have seeds or something. I balance my omega 3/6 ratio like a motherfucker.
I fucking love produce.
I'm not sick anymore. I'll always be a little crazy/quirky whatever, but I'm not mentally ill anymore and that's fucking awesome! I've been accused of being too chipper. Bitches don't know about my gluten-induced depression turned elation.
before/after pics coming soon
/bitchesloveproduce
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