Monday 22 August 2011

40 Hour Famine 2011 part 3.

I've now completed my 40 hour food/iPhone/house phone/laptop/desktop/internet famine!
In some ways it wasn't as hard as I expected it to be, as the hunger didn't really bother me so much, not as much as the effects of hunger did.

I had a fairly good and mildly energetic day of running around with the dogs and picking firewood at my parent's place, maybe not the best activities to do when running on empty, but it was good to get out of the house and keep busy.

I had planned to do all these wonderful things like organise my Tupperware cupboard, clean out my pantry, read my board, look through and organise my old course work to start to get a feel for what I will be teaching next year. None of this happened, I was just too lethargic. Instead I just hung out on the couch, watching TV, for about 8 hours. I couldn't concentrate on words on a page or anything even mildly physical from about 2:30pm.


Having said that, the first 24 hours were the easiest, even though I did feel a bit weak and tired, it was right around the 24 hour mark that my hunger pangs kicked in, for just a little while then they went again. It was around then that I started to feel a lot weaker and more tired.
I had a great "meal" of juice for dinner, followed by my 3rd and final barley sugar for the day.

I woke up this morning and weighed myself, I lost a whole 2kg (4.4lbs) in 48 hours, I know this isn't "weight" it's probably just fluid, and by tomorrow I will probably have put on a kilo again, but I was very surprised how much had gone. NO I WILL NOT STARVE MYSELF TO LOSE WEIGHT!! And neither should anyone else! This was not a comfortable experience, and nor should it be, it's supposed to make you feel crappy so you understand how people living in poverty around the world feel every day. Carl looked at me last night when I was looking woeful and said "Imagine feeling like this walking long distances to a refugee camp with a baby on your back." I could not ever imagine how horrible that could ever be!

I've eased my way back into eating as I actually felt too weak to eat. At about 12:30 I had a small bowl of Sultana Bran, around 2pm I had some gluten-free crackers with Nutelex and Vegemite and shortly I will eat an apple. This is so I don't make myself sick and to gradually get my energy back as I still feel really crappy! And now I'm just waiting for my veggie delivery, which is late(!), so I can figure out what to cook for dinner tonight.

Don't forget, if you haven't donated yet it's not too late just go to my 40 hour famine profile page, here you can see how much I've raised and who has donate.
Every little bit helps.

Saturday 20 August 2011

40 Hour Famine 2011 part 2.

Hello fellow bloggers,
just a reminder that I am doing the 40 Hour Famine from 8pm tonight (20th August) until 12 noon on Monday 22nd August.
Please help support me in my efforts go to my 40 Hour Famine Profile Page and just remember I'm not just going without food for 40 hours, but also my iPhone, laptop, desktop PC, house phone and INTERNET!!!

SO PLEEEEEEASE HELP ME STOP THIS:



thank u :)

Monday 15 August 2011

Lamyong Mini Steaks.


Small bite size pieces of soy patties marinated with a sweet and spicy sauce. Add to stir fries or simply add pineapple and serve on a bed of rice.
Whenever I find a packet of food that is vegan I instantly want to try it. This isn’t necessarily a good thing. I found this out with Lamyong Mushroom Chunks, which admittedly I didn’t taste, just opened the bag, thought they smelt like dog food and chucked the pack away!
I bought this pack along with Lamyong Mini Steak from my favourite online store Vegan Online.
Due to my unwillingness to try the mushroom chunks I was really hesitant to try the mini steaks, which is why I had the pack in my pantry for about 3 or so months.
A Couple of nights ago we realised there wasn’t much in the fridge or pantry, but I did have a pack of the mini steaks, reluctantly we decided to give them a go, here's what happened:

SJ’s Lamyong Mini Steaks


I sautéed some onion and broccoli in a medium sized fry pan.
Then added some:
Sweet and sour sauce
lime juice
mirin seasoning
rice wine vinegar
1 ½ pineapple rings, cut into small pieces
and the pack of mini steaks

I cooked it gently for about 5 minutes or so, until the steaks were heated through, then thickened the sauce with some corn flour mixed with water. Cooked it for another minute or two and served it with some steamed white Basmati rice.

And guess what? It wasn’t too bad at all! A quick and easy no fuss meal with plenty of flavour :)

Monday 8 August 2011

Why Am I Vegan? Part 2 (Thyroid Update).

So I have previously put up a post kind of explaining why I am vegan.
What started off as an ethical issue about the plight of bobby calves and the cruelty involved in the dairy industry soon became a health issue. I researched becoming vegan before I took the plunge and found out that there is a lot of iodine in dairy products, which is bad for me because I was Hyperthyroid (thyroid gland was over-active and produced too much iodine and poisoned my body).
On MANY occasions I asked general practitioners, dieticians, and endocrinologists if there was ANYTHING I could do in my diet to help my thyroid. All everyone told me was "Keep away from iodine which is found in iodised salt and seafood, other than that there is nothing you can do." Which turns out is BULLSHIT!!!
THERE IS A TON OF IODINE IN DAIRY!!!!
Something I had to find out on my own about 5 years AFTER diagnosis!

Well, since I I became vegan (and quit smoking and stopped drinking Coke) I have only improved both my physical and emotional well being. I have lost a guilt that I had for a very long time, but was never able to figure out what this guilt actually was.
I have now lost 13kg.
But the most impressive, amazing, exciting part of it all is that I have lost my Hyperthyroidism!!
This of course was my overall (short-term) vegan goal, proving that I could cure myself of a disease that not only makes me very heat intolerant, an insomniac, depressed, anxious, hyperactive, soooo hungry, gives me heart palpations, forces me to be on 2 different kinds of medications, but also stops me from falling pregnant, goal number 2!
Very quickly after becoming vegan I felt there was no need for me to take my medication any more, so I weaned off, maybe a little quicker than I should have, but I had done it once before, so felt confident in what I was doing. Very quickly I started feeling better and non-symptomatic so I was extremely happy, yet nervous. I was nervous that it would only be a matter of time before I entered a state of total thyrotoxicosis.

I went to my endocrinologist a couple of weeks ago and not only did she agree with me that cutting out dairy was a good thing to do as she knew it wasn't good for somebody like me (another doc, some "wonderful" fertility specialist told me I had to go on the Atkins diet, fuck that!), but she RAN SOME TESTS!! A completely amazing and novel idea, I thought!
You see I have had MANY blood tests over the last 5 years, but it turns out, according to my medical history, that it has been a VERY long time since I have actually been attended too in a thorough manner.

Well when the results came back she informed me that not only am I not sick any more, but that I am in REMISSION! Far better than I expected, I knew I wasn't sick, but I didn't realise how not sick I actually was/am. I was blown away and so incredibly happy! Knowing that I had done the right thing, all by myself was amazing! I am still waiting for a couple of other bloods to come back to find out why I haven't fallen pregnant after NINETEEN months of trying, another thing no doctor seemed to give a rats arse about "Your young, don't worry about it....."  FFS how long did they want to let me go before taking a little bit of fucking blood to see if I actually even fucking ovulate?!! (a story for another time).

So in summary, I am happy, healthy, lighter, and getting lighter all the time, thrilled that I have found a doctor that actually seems to give a fucking shit about my health, and I've done it all by myself after getting sick of nobody caring (or at least that's how it seemed).
Oh, and I use WAY too many exclamation marks!!!

BUT PLEASE DO NOT JUST STOP ANY MEDICAL TREATMENT AND TRY A "NATURAL" TREATMENT FOR ANY HEALTH PROBLEM WITHOUT PRIOR CONSULTING MEDICAL PRACTITIONERS, AND DOING A LOT OF RESEARCH FIRST!
They might rip us off, give us the shits and leave us feeling bewildered and confused by not answering our questions or just see a disease and not a person from time to time, but they are the ones who went to med school, not us!

~SJ xo