I’m a bad feminist

My man’s love language is physical touch. And often times, as he’s nuzzling my neck in the kitchen or stealing a quick grope of my butt cheek when I pass him in the hallway, I wonder to myself “how can he love me when my body looks like this?”

As if my body is all there is of me to love. As if my worth is based on my attractiveness alone. As if my “fuckability” is all that matters.

#AllInForAugust – Week 1

Days 1-7 are in the books for my 30-day carnivore challenge. It hasn’t been without its low spots but there have also been some significant reasons to celebrate.

Successes:

• After 5 days back on this loose carnivore diet, the toothache that had been ruling my life for over two weeks, as well as the severe tooth sensitivity for the 2 months prior, completely disappeared. I can’t say that the diet is the cause, but it sure is coincidental timing, especially considering the countless testimonies I’ve read about improved dental health. I’ve been pain-free for 48-hours and can barely believe it. I had been researching crown extractions and trying (unsuccessfully) to find a naturopath/biological dentist. Fingers crossed the cause of the pain has been healed and I won’t need treatment after all.
• I logged (and enjoyed) 3 heavy weight workouts and moved as much as I could every day. My average daily steps were 7,500, which is adequate considering the time I spend feeding my baby and getting him to sleep.
• I didn’t see any decrease in breastmilk as I have in the past, which is great. That said, we are starting a slow weaning process because this little stinker does NOT want to quit biting me. It’s been months of pain and irritation, and I find myself getting very frustrated with him to the point that I need to walk away so I don’t scream.
• I wasn’t going to weigh myself until the end of 30 days, but I caved and stepped on the scale. Last Thursday it read 174.4. Today, one week later, it read 168.4. Six pounds gone. I’m aware that it’s water-weight that goes first; regardless it’s nice to see it headed in the right direction.
• I made it through a mini road trip, my band gig, a community festival, breakfast out, a fishing trip, cooking non-carnivore dinner for guests and several full days at home without incident. Time at home tends to be my biggest trigger so I’m purposefully not replacing pantry and snack items that get eaten up. I can’t wait to get to the point that I can clear out all unnecessary kitchen ‘schtuff’ after I’m successful on this way of eating for a certain amount of time.
• I was not 100% zero carb/carnivore, but I’m pleased with my resolve overall. Here are the non-carnivore foods I ate over the last week:
  • Couple Tbsp’s of heavy whipping cream
  • Spices
  • Couple Tbsp’s of Primal Kitchen unsweetened ketchup
  • Atkin’s shake
  • Brats have 3 carbs each
  • Bit of ranch dressing
  • Some fresh dill and chives in a homemade herb butter
  • Sriracha, apple cider vinegar and squeeze of lemon in my bone broth
  • A few zero calorie flavored sparkling waters
  • 2 cups of coffee over the course of the week
  • 1 spoon of natural unsweetened peanut butter
• Daily food choices consisted of 2-3 of these options
  • Ribeye steak
  • Bacon
  • Chicken thighs and drummies
  • Bone Broth
  • Brats
  • Meat and egg waffles

 

Challenges:

• I had a carb/sugar withdrawal headache and a bit of brain fog on Day 2, but I had been staying drugged up on Advil because of the terrible toothache, so it didn’t bother me very much.
• I noticed that when I didn’t start my day with a filling meal I was peckish and craving all day. Ribeye in the morning is the way to go for me.
• The first day of my period coincided with an accidental morning fast and that was the hardest day for me. Later that day, I let myself have the Atkin’s low-carb shake and decided to pay close attention to any further cravings the sweet taste might cause. It didn’t seem to impact me negatively that I could tell.
• Terrible cramps accompanied the start of my period, which is unusual. I gave birth only 8 months ago, so hormones … yeah.
• I haven’t had a solid bowel movement since Day 2. Sigh. I know this will pass as I get fat adapted, but in the meantime, it’s so unpleasant.
• My fuse was pretty short on days 3-7 of this week but I haven’t experienced much of the sadness or hopelessness that has been my norm lately.
• Feeling the desire for variety, I wander the house now and then looking in the fridge and the pantry to see if any carnivore foods might have magically appeared. Think I need to food prep for this next week! This is also a symptom of my carb addiction, I’m sure. I’m used to eating out of boredom and when I have stressful parenting moments. It’ll get easier, I’m sure.

All In For August

I’m not usually one to use or follow hash tags, but for the past week I’ve been looking for just the right motivation to help push me back on the health track I followed with some success over the past few months. Brute force will-power alone rarely works for me; I seem to need a whole program of sorts. Fortunately, in my perusing the interwebs yesterday, what should I behold but #AllInForAugust.

I do love alliteration.

What’s Next

It occurred to me as I was cleaning floors this past weekend that though I count myself as a compassionate progressive, I can be quite oblivious to the pain of others at times.

I wrote last week about doing “hard things”, like community projects and letting my natural hair color grow out. Can you hear the eye roll? These are NOT hard in the grand scheme of things, especially compared to what many people go through on a daily basis just to survive. The fact that I have hair to grow out or time for extracurricular ideas or even a forum to voice them publicly is a tremendous privilege for which I ought to express more gratitude.

I thought and I thought about it. My floors were sparkling.

It would have been easy to berate and hate myself, to see the cleaning as punishment for how I behave instead of worship for who I am and what I have, but I resisted. As Marianne Williamson says, “It is tempting to proceed without love; hatred is always looking for recruits.”

Doing Hard Things

I kept track of my time on a recent day, just as I would if I were billing a client. I wrote detailed entries about what I accomplished (or attempted to) down to each fifteen-minute interval. It was a pain. But it made me see that I’m not idle in this stay-at-home time and have no cause for guilt, as my over-bearing ego would have me believe.

An Honor and a Privilege

At nearly nine-months pregnant, I recently made the 8-hour trip to Minneapolis/St. Paul to stand before an amazing group of people and nervously stammer out a Thank You speech. NAMI Minnesota (National Alliance on Mental Illness) chose my series on mental health in rural America written earlier this year for its Media Award.

On Rabbit Holes and Doing Hard Things

Dreams and memories have been hitting me with a rushing force lately. Wounded animals, babies, difficult physical feats like mountain climbing and surviving barrages of gun fire. I wake with every sleep cycle, adjust my pillow and press-on, back into my dark world of wonder.

But every few weeks something calls me up and out of bed, and I’ll wander the house until I realize the moon is full and my eyes needed to rest in it, my shoulders needed to square-off with it, the soul batteries needed its quiet recharge.

Choosing to be Authentic, Even When it Costs More

A long-held dream of mine is in motion.

I’m pursuing an illustrator for two children’s books that I’ve written. The process is all new to me, but it’s amazing what will happen when you put yourself out there. I made a simple ask on social media to see if anyone I knew had experience in this area. The response was more than I expected: