Who Else Wants Dimple-Free Thighs?

Raw Food For Health: Improving Cellulite

- by Stephanie Gadsden

Let’s step back in time to the 1600’s.  Back then, French painters would capture the true beauty of women, cellulite and all. In this era, the more cellulite a woman had, the more beautiful she was.

Unfortunately for us Divas out there, societies’ opinions have changed.  Just remember that cellulite is a cosmetic condition, so keep true to yourself and be happy in your own skin, loving all your lumps and bumps!

Okay, so I’m guessing if you are reading this blog it’s not for a history lesson. Here’s the hard truth on cellulite and how to banish it for good!

Read more »

Emotional Detox and Releasing Toxic Emotions

~ by Rachelle Fordyce

As I mentioned in my introductory post last week, I’m currently undertaking a personal 30-day raw challenge.  Today is day 20 of my challenge.  And let me tell you, a challenge it’s been!

Some days are easy breezy and I absolutely love the energizing raw foods that I’m eating on a daily basis — especially my green smoothies.  On other days, though, I might intensely crave some type of cooked food. And on some other days, I might feel like I just don’t want any kind of food at all, cooked or raw.

Surprisingly, I have no craving whatsoever for chocolate — and I’ve been known to be a chocoholic!

Read more »

What Are All These People Doing In My Fridge?!

Okay, so they’re not really in my fridge, but it sure feels like it.

Every time I go to take something out of my fridge, the words of a dozen different gurus race about in my mind. Feeling the way I do about food, the environment, animals and such, you can imagine what a conundrum I find myself in when I open it to see liver pâté staring me back in the face, or mozzarella cheese strips, or *gasp!* porc products!

I believe in communication more than carbohydrates, and I would rather focus on love than lunch meats, but I will admit that a fiery volcano erupts within me every time my loved ones choke back a chicken nugget.

*sigh*

I know I am not alone.

There are hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of women who are facing the same situation. It’s the “Raw Mom, Cooked Dad” scenario and it’s got my knickers in a knot, so I decided to do something about it!

For the last few years I’ve been recording my thoughts, ideas, impressions and suggestions on the subject of how to survive as a “raw foodist” in a cooked food family. Over the last few months I’ve been calling upon some of the people I respect the most and asking them to chat with me about their thoughts, ideas, suggestions about this particular topic.

Then Fiona came on board and we decided to survey Read more »

A “Diva” Dude Discovers Green Smoothies!

It’s true!  heheh… My Queenly powers of green persuasion have managed to encourage my new friend Tim to venture down the road of green smoothies!  But I can already see that Tim’s a pretty smart guy.  He’s already figured out that it’s important to experiment and listen to your body… to do the work and find out what’s best for you.

Keeping a food journal and trying an elimination diet for a period of time to find out what your food triggers are is a fantastic way to take more control over your health.  And then of course, replacing meat, milk, and gluten-containing foods like wheat with more raw food, fruits, and veggies will go a LONG way to turning you into the energetic person you were meant to be.

So, this is a challenge to other men out there! Take a page from Tim’s journal and see how you feel!  You’re already invited for free to our 7-Day Summer Slurping Sensation.  Just find a loved one to sign up and send you the coupon!  But I’ll let Tim tell you more! Read more »

NEW Green Smoothie Program: The 21-Day Green Smoothie Detox!

Spring!  It’s a time to get out!  To burst into summer with sparkles of energy!  To feel a surge of life coursing through your veins that makes you dance and delight in the joy of each day!

Or… maybe not so much.

Maybe you’re just lucky to keep both eyes open at the same time.  Maybe the bags under your eyes and the heaviness in your limbs attests that your meal preparations lately may have more to do with opening bags of chips and driving up to windows.  You want a change. Maybe you just need a VACATION.

Can’t manage the time or the cost?  heheh… what if you just made travel arrangements for just one organ?  I never said that ALL of you had to go.  You can send your liver on a 21-Day green smoothie detox trip to the tropics!

As always, we’re sure to have a lot of fun getting healthy together!  There’s a complete green raw food menu planner, a detoxification journal, and daily e-mails from moi! AND you’ll have opportunities to participate in LIVE teleseminar calls where you can have your questions answered.  Oh… and did I mention there’ll be green smoothies!?  Green smoothies, green juices, green salads, and more… even some cooked food options for those of you who are maybe more interested in a ‘close to home’ vacation experience.

The program is being offered for a special spring sale price for its first time through!  So if you sign up by Saturday, April 10th, you’ll be able to take advantage of the sale price!

April’s the perfect time my friends… you’ll be ready for summer and full of energy to enjoy your holidays!!

The 21-Day Green Smoothie Detox

Click Here to Sign Up!

Getting Onboard a Raw Food Detox

I’ve been writing a lot lately, but most of my love notes have been directed to participants of our 6-Week Deep Tissue Detox. We’ve been immersing ourselves fully into the process and it’s been quite the learning experience. You’re welcome to read one of my posts on the 6-Week Detox blog. I thought I knew a few things about food and my relationship to it, but I’ve still got lots to learn.

Today I’m starting a week behind the others, because I just simply was not ready. I had a few more steps to put in place for myself to get to where I’m settled and comfortable enough to put my focus and attention on simple, cleansing, GREEEEEN food.

I haven’t forgotten about our 21-Day Challenge. I just decided that they might not be 21 consecutive days. In spite of all the best-laid plans and good intentions, sometimes life has a way of prioritizing what you need most when you need it. We had been working on a 21-Day challenge to put new habits in place for the year 2010. I can see that putting changes in place gradually has really been helpful for me this time around. In the past I used to just declare a bunch of resolutions on January 1st and break them by noon the same day. It’s happened more slowly this year, but I can really feel clarity and control (the good kind) moving into my life in an empowering way. Already, I can see really clearly that:

• I am putting new habits in place to help me with organizing my finances.
• I’m being so much more disciplined about taking time to read, to learn, to study and to improve things.
• I finally made it to a yoga class after SIX MONTHS of saying I would, should, could. I DID IT and I’m going again tonight.
• I’m better about scheduling and writing battle plans for the day. I’m learning how to let go of things, delegate and delete when necessary.
• I’m prioritizing in a healthier way.
• My love life is SOOOooOOOO amazing and supportive and just keeps getting better and better.

The upcoming W.I.S.H. Summit is really going to take the areas of life we addressed and focus on them for about 10-days. We’ll have 4 speakers on each topic touching the most intimate and pressing questions on womens’ minds. I’m so excited about this happening and we’ve been working on months to get it this far.

I mentioned on the 6-Week Detox blog, that my children are making some fabulous compromises to the way they eat in order to accommodate my new detox regime. It has been fascinating to put new discipline in place and see the improvements in their health and attitudes. I’ve experimented with different levels of intensity before, but they’re older now and a bit more autonomous, so it feels more significant that THEY are choosing to cooperate and support me in this adventure.

After just one week of gluten-free, high-green foods, my daughter’s psoriasis has really improved!! They both seem a lot nicer to get along with, too, but that’s probably because I’m being pretty careful about gluten and other foods for myself. (Not such a crusty mommy.)

One decision I made recently, in light of the changes I’ve observed in the kids and myself this last week, is that I am going to be securing myself a cacao-free home. After my consultation with Dr. Ritamarie, I need no more convincing. Having removed it from our menu plan for a few days, then put it back in, I really got to see that this is NOT a food I need or want to include in my diet anymore. I flushed all soy-based products down the sink, too. I’m not saying I won’t ever eat them again, I’m just saying I won’t keep them in my home and for the duration of our 6-Week Detox, I’d like to avoid them wherever possible.

Cleaning out my cupboards was a big part of my being able to clean up my family’s diet this last week. If the cupboards are full of junk and tempting treats, then it’s a lot more difficult to put discipline in place. There’s also something spiritually cleansing about clearing out your cupboards–as though the space we’re in affects the space within us. You know what I mean? I’m really working on being more disciplined about putting the laundry away before it stacks on my bed. I’m trying to keep the receipts sorted, the dishes washed, the counters and ledges clear. It’s a sort of dance, really. Especially with two kids who sprinkle, splash and spill wherever they go! We have a fantastic program for helping clear out the clutter and get organized. You can check it out here, if you feel the tupperware is spilling from all corners of your kitchen.

Our 6-Week Detox will be ending on March 7th, but the following session will be starting up right away. If you’d like to cleanse and detox this spring, I cannot recommend the 6-Week Detox highly enough. The next session will be starting on April 3rd! You can register now and reserve your place.

The preparations for W.I.S.H. are stepping up to full steam ahead. I’m very excited about what this program will do and decided that I’m going to do a 40-day countdown to the big day. Since we have about 40 speakers on the program, it will give me a chance to share a bit of the information on the calls and help get us all excited and ready for the big event. Speaking of which, I’ve got work to do.

Smooches ’til next time.

xo

Tera

Toilet Talk and Other Pertinent Poop Issues

Today is Monday and it feels like things are getting back into full speed ahead mode after the holidays. I’m certainly glad I’ve given myself these 21 days to put things in place. I know today is supposed to be the day that we buckle down and address fitness, but I need to interrupt your regularly scheduled 21-Day Challenge programming with an announcement about toilet talk and other pertinent poop issues.

Okay, so I need to get right down to the juicy stuff here because I’m just aching to share with you my big news. Brace yourselves, if you’re the sensitive type.

Around here it is to be expected that if you’re talking about food, you’re talking about poop. I have yet to meet a woman with whom I couldn’t have a great conversation about the pleasure of a satisfying bowel movement. Either we’re consitpated, gassy, bloated or just irregular, but without exception we all know that the pleasure of a productive bowel movement has been daringly, but not unjustly, compared to the pleasure of a sexual orgasm.

In the last few hours I’ve had four intensely pleasurable experiences of the non-sexual variety and I feel like a new woman!

The secret?

I’ll tell you in a moment.

As you know, I’m prepping for the 6-Week Deep Tissue Detox. It’s starting in just a week and today is the first day I’ve really been able to consider getting myself on track for food and prepping myself for the detox that’s coming. The timing is PERFECT for a detox. After the travel, irregular sleep, mashed potato indulgences and other chocolate-coated conditions that come with the holidays, I am so ready to clean out and clear up. But more than that, I’m ready to learn.

I’ve been at this now for seven years and am astonished still to realize to what degree I am the byproduct of the information I’ve been fed by other health enthusiasts. I can remember when I first jumped on board the raw food bandwagon, I was rubbing noses with a lot of friendly fruit-eaters and running about 30km on an average Sunday afternoon. I was doing my best to learn the ropes and ask questions and get the results I was hearing about.  Unlike many raw foodists, I didn’t come to this lifestyle seeking health improvement. I was simply curious.

I was following a pure path at first. Avoiding salt was a spiritual arm-wrestling match unlike any other I’ve ever had. The white-knuckling didn’t last long for me. The recommendations I followed at the time were probably better than what I’d been doing before, and so I got results. I still felt bloated and constipated and remember asking about enemas and colonics at the time and got a big ol’ resounding “NO!” That’s “BAD”. The ideas put out were that some people have had enemas and colonics and then never had a natural bowel movement again in their lives.

Last year after encountering a few health professionals that do recommend and use enemas and colonics themselves, I decided to call upon Michael Perrine and ask him to give me the “Scoop on Poop”.  Looking back at 2009, I can honestly say that one of the best things I did for myself was invest $20 in a rubber enema bag from my local drugstore! SUCH a good move. The reason I’m telling you all this is because I don’t think you should believe anything I say. I think you should find out for yourself.

With the 6-Week Detox coming up, this is the perfect opportunity to learn for yourself what happens when you really clean out your body and understand more about what’s going on inside it. We are so indoctrinated to avoid things, fear certain practices, etc. Inform yourself honestly and objectively, then try stuff. Listen to the teleseminar that I recorded with Michael and read some of the comments left by other people and have the courage to walk your own path. The reason I started all this toilet talk in the first place, actually has nothing to do with enemas, but is related to bacterial balance in the gut and my extremely productive morning on the throne.

Here’s the secret to my high productivity:

The last time we did the 6-Week Detox, I learned SO much about the gut and healthy bacterial balance, but I didn’t really apply it all. Over the last few days I’ve been drinking LOADS of fermented Kombucha and may I just tell you that stuff works!! I could never be convinced that enemas are a bad thing because they have just done way too much good for me. And now I am most thoroughly convinced that drinking and eating fermented foods is a health-building habit to have and one I intend to keep for a long time.

Through Crudessence we’ll be offering a fermentation workshop very soon. You can access the Crudessence calendar for more details if you’re in the area.

As for you, my dear, and our 21-Day Challenge, please spend some time tonight dreaming of your fit, hot body and how you feel when you’re fitness is at its ideal. What do you want to do and how often? Set your ideal scene and tomorrow we’ll do some action steps and target setting to put things in place. I know today and tomorrow are devoted to dreaming of and putting in place our fitness goals for the year, but with my glorious gut adventures this morning, I simply had to tell you how excited I am about learning more, about deconstructing the myths that I didn’t even realize I was operating with.

I mean, I’ve heard all this bacteria stuff and people say it works, but holy smokin’ toilet seats, now I’m a believer. If you’re joining us for the 6-Week Detox we’ll make a believer out of you, too. Otherwise, start googling about fermentation, Sister!

Okay, back tomorrow with the fitness focus!

Love and laughter,

Tera

This May Be The Craziest Thing I Have Ever Done

Spring is here and I’m feeling… FRISKY!

Maybe it’s that I pulled all my short skirts out of the closet.

Maybe it’s the essential oils I put in my conditioner the other day. Mmmm… Rosewood and Lavender!

Maybe someone spiked my smoothies!?

I’m not sure what it is, but I’m in Spring Fling Mode and I’m going to let it loose on the upcoming teleseminar with Dr. Ritamarie.

Sometimes in life, you have to take a risk. You have to throw caution to the wind and take a chance.

Just you wait until you catch Dr. Ritamarie and I in action on April 16th! (That’s a Thursday, by the way).

I’m not going to tell you exactly what we have up our sleeves for this call, but I will tell you that YOU DEFINITELY want to be signed up and YOU DEFINITELY want to get EVERYONE you know who is interested in health and well-being signed up, too. What happens at the end of this call will NEVER EVER EVER happen again. And I would only let it happen on the phone call so that there is NO PROOF IN PRINT of how CRAZY I was to do it in the first place.

*Gulp!*

Just thinking it gives me goosebumps.

Anyway, just do yourself a favor and make sure you’re signed up and make sure they are signed up and we’ll have a great time!

Okay, so sign up already! What are you waiting for?

CLICK HERE to sign up!

*double smooch*

Special Guest Teleseminar #6: Michael Perrine With The Scoop on Poop

For as much attention as we put on the food going into our mouths, it’s a wonder we aren’t discussing A LOT more what’s coming out the other end. And what about the process as it makes its way through the pipes.

We blush in embarrassment, excuse ourselves for “passing gas” or feel apologetic when discussing constipation in public, but the fact is folks, there are some VERY important things to understand about bowel health and it’s time to lose the inhibition and start asking a few questions!!

That’s why we’ve invited Michael Perrine of Gravity East Village in New York City to come and talk with us about a few things. He’s given us an open invitation to ask ANYTHING, ANYTHING we want about bowel health and elimination.

How hard, how soft, how often, how much? What should we do, what should we avoid? What about enemas, colonics? What are the dangers, risks, if any?

There’s sooooo much to understand and so many opportunities for us to learn about what’s going on IN the body, by LOOKING at what is coming out of the body and we’re very excited to have the chance to hook up with Michael TONIGHT as part of our 90-Day Detox. You can access this teleseminar HERE! Please send in your questions NOW by clicking the link and writing your questions in the box.

—-> CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THIS TELESEMINAR!

Just to give you a bit more about Michael, he is a detoxification consultant, certified colon hydro therapist and the co-owner of Gravity East Village.

Here’s a bit more about Michael: (I suggest you read this before attending the call, because I’d prefer to spend my time asking him our questions than going over his history or experience on the call!) Read what follows to get a sense of Michael and his story:

By the age of sixteen Michael began to experience a “genetic” anxiety disorder. Subconsciously connecting the absence of symptoms to using alcohol he began to self medicate. Innocent teen experimentation very quickly turned into heavy abuse and rapid physical degeneration. “At a certain point I stopped getting sick from consuming large volumes of alcohol… I just kept going beyond the threshold until I blacked out. There was no longer a signal from my body to stop. I would have a terribly painful awakening with no memory of the night before.” By the age of nineteen, only 3 years later Michael hit bottom and found himself in need of rebuilding his life and his body.

His first teacher and inspiration came in the form of a book. One fateful night looking to pass the time, he picked up the autobiography of Malcolm X. Through the deep teaching of Malcolm’s life experience, Michael was for the first time able to see his own life clearly and found power, inspiration and a sense of spiritual life that he had never before experienced.

Within days Michael stopped drinking alcohol completely and in turn stopped smoking cigarettes and using other drugs. Over the next few months he began to turn his attention toward his physical body and through another life changing book Diet For A New America he adopted a vegan, whole foods diet.

—-> CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THIS TELESEMINAR!

Within months he lost over sixty pounds and began to experience some extremely intense detoxification symptoms as his body cleansed itself of the accumulated poisons of his previous lifestyle. The most amazing and unexpected part of his transformation was the realization that his anxiety disorder had disappeared completely. Battling criticism from his friends and family about “where do you get your protein?” and frequent “illnesses” Michael sought out Dr. Fred Bisci for guidance. Throughout those years Dr. Bisci has acted as both a mentor and friend. Michael now works with Dr. Bisci by offering services that support Dr. Bisci’s program and lifestyle recommendations.

Initially Michael studied food preparation and diet philosophy and for eight years, he worked as a natural foods chef at some of New York City’s premier natural food restaurants.

Working for the last seven years as colon hydro therapist and detox consultant, Michael has performed over 10,000 colonic irrigations and supervised thousands of people through various methods of internal cleansing including fasting, colon cleansing and liver flushing.

Michael is going to talk with us about his approach to cleansing which suggests that through “the consistency of leaving out anything that challenges the body we create an environment that allows the organs to purge toxins from the various tissues with it’s own innate healing wisdom.”

“As the body circulates toxins into the passages of elimination, we then assist the body in removing it as quickly as possible with various cleansing modalities. Remember, many stored toxins are stuck there for a reason. It only makes sense that they need a little help finding the door. In turn the body can “breathe” again and rejuvenate the tissues and restore a balanced and harmonious chemistry.”

Michael agrees with me on the point that there is no blanket method for healing and cleansing. Each individual needs to examine their own experiences and conditions to determine what’s right for them.

Michael says his mission is “to inspire people to connect to nature in a more enthusiastic, respectful and intelligent way as a path to spiritual evolution.” He encourages us to be challenged by our predicament and see it is an opportunity to push the limits of who we are and develop the character of our spirit. Michael says that the way we treat our bodies and what we choose to eat is just one aspect of this, but it says a lot about our intentions in this world.

P.S.

Here’s the teleseminar link again: —-> CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THIS TELESEMINAR!

Day 26: Stage Two: Avoiding Highly Allergenic Foods

Okay, my lovelies. We’re at Day 26 and it’s Friday the 13th. I admit. It’s been a hellish day for me. The kind where the carpet of life just whips itself out from underneath you and you’re left there stunned with sore buns.

*ouch*

Let’s talk about detox, instead, shall we?

First of all, I want to congratulate you. You’re almost a third of the way through this program. This is exciting. I’ve had a lot of great feedback from people about the gluten lecture with Dr. Ritamarie and just as soon as she gets back to me, I’ll forward all of you those juicy links and articles she was talking about on the call.

“So, what comes next, Tera?”

I know some of you are wondering what comes next. We said the first month we would focus on eliminating dairy and gluten. So that’s what we’ve been trying hard to do. It hasn’t always been perfect, but we’ve been working on it, haven’t we my dears? And I think we’ve done a pretty good job. Some of you have already reported all kinds of amazing improvements.

Well, well, well... it’s about to get a whoooole lot better. We’re going to step it up a notch and take this detox into STAGE TWO!

Now, since this is a DETOX, let’s discuss a bit about the importance of WHY we are eliminating certain foods from the diet. Dr. Ritamarie did a great job elaborating on some of the gluten issues, but let’s take it a bit further into our discussion of detox and why we should be avoiding other allergenic foods as well.

As we learned in yesterday’s teleseminar, some foods cause inflammation in the body. One of the things that this can result in is “puffy ankle syndrome” or an accumulation of water in our tissues.  Water retention. (I admit that I definitely suffer with this when I don’t get enough sleep, when I eat late, or when I eat certain foods. Hmmm… more to learn here, for sure!)

Water retention would not be helpful in the process of trying to detox. The whole point of a deep tissue detox is to ELIMINATE toxins in the tissues. If you accumulate water in the tissues, you’re not able to release the toxins that have been stored in your tissues, now are you? We need toxins to be able to drain into the circulatory system or into the lymphatic system where we can then eliminate them. So since we know that allergenic foods are the cause of inflammation, then we have some exciting possibilities that start to unfold.

Water Retention and Weight Loss

Simply by eliminating allergenic foods from the diet a LOT of people suddenly start losing weight. Sometimes the biggest factor in an inability to release weight is because of allergenic foods causing inflammation and water retention in the body. WOW!!! (Bikini season, here I coooome!)

Along with inflammation, eating foods you’re sensitive or allergic to creates a stress reaction in the body. This stress reaction makes you secrete stress hormones which affect your thyroid, hypothalamus, adrenals and hormonal balance. Your sugar metabolism is also affected by these things which means…

…CRAVINGS!!

Have you ever had the realization that you are CRAVING the foods you’re the most sensitive to? Perhaps you’ve observed this in others? Many parents of autistic or ADD-labeled children, upon realizing the dangers of eating gluten, are the first to slap their foreheads with the realization that the one thing their children are constantly eating is WHEAT! Same story holds true for dairy, folks! Chances are good that whatever you “just can’t get enough of” is causing you some distress and you may not be aware of it.

Here’s how it works: Think of that flight or fight response when a stressful situation arises. It’s like a buzz, a high, a feeling of being stronger or stimulated. THIS is part of the attraction people have to some of these foods. While the foods themselves are triggering stress responses in the body, including inflammation, these responses are accompanied by a rush of increased energy as the body prepares to “protect” itself from potential danger.

Stress temporarily makes us feel good… temporarily we feel stronger and stimulated. But then water retention, weight gain, gas and inflammation set in. That’s not so pretty, is it? There’s nothing I hate more than those puffy ankles I sometimes get and now I know a lot more why!! So I’m looking forward to the next stage of this detox.

In order to really be able to prepare for a proper detox, we’re going to hopefully be able to

1. Eliminate excess fluid in the tissues and handle the inflammation by eliminating allergenic foods!

2. Reduce cravings, stabilize blood sugar and stop the ups and downs that lead to cravings even after you’ve already eaten.

For the last 26 days we’ve been focused on eliminating Dairy and Gluten, so there’s no secret about that! The body’s response to dairy is very much like the response to gluten we heard Dr. Ritamarie discussing in yesterday’s call. Of course, we get to add to that the  additional toxins that the cow who sacrified the milk has collected in her lifetime. Any breastfeeding mother knows that toxins are passed through the milk. Well, just think of all that puss and the antibiotics and stress hormones running through the average dairy cow. Mmmmhmmm… that aint gonna make for tasty detox treats, my dear! Get OFF the moo juice and the Wheaties! That’s what we’ve done for the last 26 days.

Then next foods you’re going to want to eliminate as we move into the second stage of this detox are:

Peanuts, Soybeans and Corn

Who doesn’t love a peanut butter and jelly sandwich? These days you even say the word “peanut” in a modern school and you’ll have epipens popping out at you from all directions. These little legumes are lethal for some and it’s no wonder. Peanuts and soybeans are VERY highly allergenic legumes that you will definitely want to avoid during this detox program. They create the same inflammatory and immunogenic responses in the body as the other two culprits already identified.

With all the other nuts you can choose from, just get over peanuts soy and corn because we’re trying to eliminate all highly allergenic foods from the diet to reduce inflammation, water retention and prepare the body for a deep tissue detoxification process. Eat other legumes like lentils, chickpeas and stuff like that.

Soybeans have been rumored for all kinds of nasty things, but the important aspect we’d like to address here is that it creates a very similar reaction in the body that casein (dairy) and gluten create. It snaps on to opiate receptor sites in the brain! Ouch! Add to that the fact that soybean and corn are both highly genetically modified crops, we have all the proof we need to choose to eliminate these from the diet. Foods that are genetically modified contain genetics that change the production of proteins.

In our call with Dr. Ritamarie, we learned why we should avoid soy sauce and now you have another good reason! Soy, for the next 6o days is out, out, out! Don’t you dip your sushi in soya sauce, my dear. Do your best to eliminate these foods and give your body the BEST chance possible to reduce inflammation and retention of fluids.

Some of these foods aren’t easy to avoid, I understand that. Let’s take corn, for example. Things like corn grits, corn flour, popcorn, corn syrup, etc. is in all kind of foods lurking when you least expect it. It’s in supplements in cereals and in all kinds of foods you wouldn’t expect to find it it. It’s also a highly genetically modified food, along with soy, that we should avoid because these foods create reactivity of the immune system.

Here are the other highly allergenic foods we’re going to eliminate for the duration of this program:

Yeast-based Foods

For the purposes of this detox, we’ll be avoiding all yeasty foods. Like breads and things. This includes sourdough, too!! While nutritional yeast could be eaten once a week MAX, I recommend avoiding it COMPLETELY!

The other things to eliminate are ANY FOODS you eat every day and any food you really have a hankering for. The kind of food that you CRAVE big time. We’re going to want to run with the possibility that these foods may be potentially allergenic for you.

Eggs and other nuts or seeds that you might eat every day.

Anything that you eat every day can create problems and sensitivities. We should rotate what we eat. If you’re going to eat it, eat A LOT, then avoid it again for a week. It’s probably better to avoid it during active detoxification.

As Dr. Ritamarie said yesterday, anything you eat every day is a potential source of allergic response. We should keep a wide variety of food in our diets and be willing to rotate foods leaving at least a week between potentially risky foods.

Anything you find yourself eating EVERY DAY, then for the purposes of this detox, let’s try to avoid them. Develop a rotational diet. Rice, almonds, sesame, etc. are potential culprits to be on the look-out for.

Other foods that cause you to react.

Be on the lookout for any food that you have a compulsive craving for, or, on the other hand, any food you KNOW you have a specific reaction to when eating. Strawberries, kiwis, potatoes, tomatoes etc. might be specific triggers for YOU personally. Anything that YOU know is a problem for you, should also be avoided.

Last but not least…

Flesh foods.

I know that nature could provide fish or foul and in some cases this may be acceptable to eat, but because of the degree of hormones, antibiotics and stress hormones that these animals are eating, it really doesn’t make sense for US to be eating their tissues while we’re trying to detox our own. The heavines of these foods isn’t ideal for our detox situation and so we also recommend that they be avoided.

So, now the BIG question is:

WHAT THE HECK AM I GOING TO EAT?!!!

Ah ha! For that my dear, you’ll have to wait for tomorrow.

Mmmmmmmuah!

Oooh! it’s 22:22 on Friday the 13th. Sending out love and snuggles,

Tera