Our Story: Part 1

Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead? No. Not quite.

Fat? Yes.

Sick? Yes

Nearly Dead? Well, I guess we are all one breath away right?

In 2008, Jennifer and I were definitely fat and sick. According to America's least favorite calculator I was definitely "moderately obese" and had been since 1991.  Jennifer was definitely sick. And as her husband, I can safely say Jennifer was at least overweight, er, chubby, uh, wait, plump? I'm getting a stare and an elbow to my side. I'll stop.

Our third child was 6 months old. We also had a 21 month old and a three year old.

We were enthusiastically moving at "Ludicrous Speed" to start what many would call a "big family."

Well, one day we were visiting a fellow, picking oranges from the small grove he and his wife had in their back yard.  Suddenly we had a book in front of us that became one of the top 5 books that changed our life.

You see, Jennifer was suffering from a few ailments besides being plump…uh…curvaceous. She had been on anti-depressants since late high school. Her thyroid was dead, killed by some guy named Hashimoto. She had terrible allergies and weekly subjected herself to allergy shots, which caused her arms to swell like pustules. She was tired, needing at least 10 hrs of sleep a night to keep up with the fatigue that had set in. Finally, she had been to a doctor and offered "Prednisone" a steroid for her up and coming "rheumatoid arthritis." In other words, her hands hurt.

This 20-something young mother of three was already feeling broken.

"Breaking the Food Seduction" spoke to her. It challenged our thinking about diet, nutrition, and our overall health. Summed up, the overabundance of animal products in the typical American diet was the source of many of the ailments we face: diabetes, obesity, heart problems and auto immune diseases.

Suddenly we were in the middle of a 21-day Vegan Kickstart. At least, Jenny was.  I was a supportive husband, maintaining a flask of chocolate milk hidden in the toilet tank for a rainy day. We found our vocabulary expanding to include words like quinoa, millet, tempeh, seitan, tofu, spelt, amaranth, and texturized vegetable protein.

A month later our fridge got a makeover. No more home made bacon egg-mcmuffins for breakfast. Cheesy Chicken? Haven't had that in years. We were "veganizing" favorite meals and creating a brand new "make again" list. I continued to cheat and when Jennifer did, the pain in her hands came back and lasted for 2-3 weeks. Every time she "cheated" her resolve to completely abstain from dairy products and her beloved cheese increased.

The result? Jennifer began dropping a lot of pounds. Apparently I enjoyed the whole grains and legumes a little too much and fattened up some more. But at least for our family's "Early Adopter" Jennifer was already on the road to feeling Less fat, less sick, and much more alive.