Smoothie Time

As a kid, I was a big fan of chocolate milkshake.  I remember how I would always look forward to going home after school so that I could get my tall glass of yummy shake.

As adulthood stepped in, my fondness for milkshake waned gradually as hot and cold coffee drinks began to rule my heart.  It was during my stint as a newspaper reporter that my addiction to coffee started.  I was fresh out of college then and I noticed that everybody in the office had coffee mugs on their desks which concealed heaps of instant 3-in-1 coffee mix in drawers.  Even if I wanted to have my dose of milkshake from a small tumbler, the feeling of embarrassment hampered me.

I thought drinking coffee would make me appear more mature, responsible and capable of handling the toughest field assignments.  So I started drinking coffee until I eventually let the culture swallow me.

For many years I have been a slave to coffee beverages but when I got into macrobiotic two months ago, I noticed that my addiction to this caffeinated drink just decreased.  Instead of getting my usual morning cup, I would opt for a fruit smoothie or combine a fruit with a vegetable.

Apple-carrot for the ones that I love.

Cucumber-celery smoothie

In the afternoon, I would usually spend my smoothie time with my daughter and husband.

They cannot get enough of the apple-carrot variant, papaya, and cucumber-celery smoothie.

My personal favorite is the cucumber-celery with a dash of ginger. Jon tasted it once and said it’s better than John Smith’s.  This remark made me love him even more:)

Fruit and vegetable smoothies apart from my other macrobiotic meals have helped me eradicate the recurring eczema on my right hand .  I plan to keep these in my diet forever.  Though I still get my occasional cup of coffee, I no longer see it as a staple in my life but a once in a while treat.

 

 

Reunited with the Healthy Me

Being reunited with a relative or friend who has been away for a long time brings inexplicable happiness.  Being reunited with my old self, though, resulted in ecstasy.

I lost my old self more than a year ago when I started working from home.  I jumped ship (again).  Moved from my old job to the current one which allows me to work from home; not for professional reasons.  I wanted to be able to supervise my daughter who was then about to start school.

Working from home was fun in the beginning but when I kicked the nanny out of the house after discovering that she is a lesbian who watches porn, that’s when I realized that juggling my writing with running the household is not something that I’m good at.

At the onset I did okay until I noticed that my health was gradually deteriorating and a clear sign of it was the break out of my eczema in the right hand.  This disease is hereditary but for more than a decade I’ve been free of it so its manifestation really came as a surprise.

My eczema cleared up in 2001 and I congratulated myself because I can finally stop spending a chunk of my hard-earned money on tubes of hydrocortisone cream and ultra moisturizing lotion.  When my skin started to break out again last year I realized I must be doing something very wrong for this to be happening.  I went to the derma a few times until I decided I don’t want to do it anymore because those skin specialists do not have what it takes to cure my illness forever.

Since my job requires me to be constantly online, I thought it would be best to research on the real cure for eczema and in the process I stumbled upon eczema–natural–healing.com.  The owner of the said blog used to suffer from eczema on her lower legs and ankles which was far worse than mine.  Hers was not just itchy and bumpy but had lesions most of the time. 

Unlike me who only relied on what dermatologists say, she went to  all types of health specialists. She went to a Naturopathic doctor, Chinese herbalist and even a homeopathic doctor but all her efforts turned futile because she did not find the cure that she needed.  So, she paused and took a break and voila! It was while being in the state of rest that she found the cure – change of diet.

She went on a macrobiotic diet, which is another term for cleanup or detox diet, that constitutes of organic fruits and vegetables.  In just a matter of six months she succeeded in renewing her skin cells and her eczema disappeared.

I started the macrobiotic diet two months ago even though I was not sure if it’s going to work for me since my eczema stems from the genes.  Surprisingly, it did! I feel like a real human being now without the redness and itchy blisters on the palm and fingers of my right hand. What’s more, this change in diet made me realize that I am not a slave to white rice, white bread, and processed meat.

My staple now constitutes of fruit smoothie, wheat bread and organic jam for breakfast, vegetable (raw) smoothie, fish and brown rice for lunch, and a combination of fruits and vegetables at night.

Boring? Not at all because I still get to eat my favorite chocolate and have my dose of coffee every day, but in moderation.

Now I truly believe that the human body is  capable of fighting any disease.  However, one has to be equipped with good bacteria first to make this possible.