UPDATE - COOKED VEGAN & BOOKS 22Dec11

I love this PETA card from some years ago.

An update.  I am on combined cooked & raw vegan - trying to stay low fat - & so, so happy!  Even going into the Christmas holiday without gaining, staying on this program (in the New Year, perhaps the first of January, hope I will embark on something that will help me shed that last 15-20 pounds).

During the day I generally have just tea (oh, but it’s Genmai - a green tea with roasted rice & I put agave syrup & Silk coffee whitener in it), juice (orange, sometimes with pomegranate, & always with powdered greens - just a cup of in a.m.) & a huge smoothie thru the day (VitaMix full, with powdered superfoods, fruits, agave syrup & a many greens as I can stuff in there - about 6-8 cups' worth) - then I have a simple but filling meal in evening, usually rice with a bean mix I make (about 6-8 sauteed onions, a package of sliced mushrooms also sauteed, perhaps add a whole sweet pepper, & lots & lots of tomatoes - added last because of all the juice - sauté until juice is evaporated - then throw in 3 cans of Amy's vegan baked beans - oh yum!  The hubby loves this mix also - we have it for days, weeks on end - by itself or with rice).

I am also making soups - bean, rice, tofu, etc. to share with a friend who is very sickly but does not fix food for himself - make a huge pot & share with him.

& I am doing very well!  my urine remains alkaline - I think because of the smoothie - & I am maintaining my weight - I do want to lose more, but at least I'm not gaining back what I lost.

I went to our yearly Christmas vegan dineout - spectacular!  & found I ate what I wanted & the next day followed my routine of liquids during the day, especially the smoothie - & have not gained.

Also went to the Denman Island vegan solstice potluck - oh, god, so fantastic!  Held in a big wooden hall, a wood-burning stove, rough-hewn tables & a great wooden table, bedecked in huge wooden candelabra, evergreen bows & so filled with homemade vegan foods of every kind. 

I'm at this rather lovely - & perhaps a bit strange place - in which I so love my cooked vegan food & without guilt.  Amazingly, I have a bit of dessert & am happy to do with one helping (not the old me!) - & I have no cravings for those dairy-laden baked goods (bads!) from the grocery stores which I would buy compulsively & devour in the secrecy of my car in a parking lot. 

Another very important thing is that I was trying so hard not to eat in the evening when I watch videos - that has always been my weak spot.  Somewhere along the line, I have succeeded.  As soon as I have my very filling supper of rice & beans or soup - I brush my teeth to get the taste of food out of my mouth.  If I am tempted to pick at something, I think about getting bits in my teeth & that helps.  Over time of not eating after supper is over, I am hoping that I will just be in the habit of not eating once supper is done.  That makes a huge difference to me.  Part of it, also, is being satisfied & full - & the cooked vegan is helping with that.

I am reading Alicia Silverstone's The Kind Diet - which is also helping me (got thru the library) - she advocates cooked whole grains & beans in the diet - a bit macrobiotic - i.e. going with the seasons, gently seasoned, eating grains & not eating exotic fruits that have to travel far (not that I am going to resist those fruits when they are in the grocery stores - ripe & tempting) - but to think about being on a mainly fruit diet in this (cold) weather simply doesn't appeal & perhaps that's why I went off my 'diet' so drastically in the past.

There are gazillions of terrific books out there right now that advocate low-fat cooked vegan.  This is working for me - I am so happy right now!  I look forward to the dineouts that are coming up & when I go to a vegan buffet or potluck, I enjoy it fully - guilt-free compared to my anguished self-chastisement of the past while trying to be 100% raw.

(Victoria Boutenko is bringing out a book in January that apparently justifies (rationalizes?) some cooked food.  I've ordered it - tho I am expecting that it might advocate only steamed greens....  I am a huge fan of Boutenko - she is brilliant & has contributed crucially to our present understanding of nutrition & the introduction of greens, along with smoothies, is world-shaking.)

Here are some other books I am reading (& loving) right now:

Flying Apron Gluten-Free & Vegan Baking Book by Jennifer Katzinger, as well as her Gluten-Free and Vegan Holidays (gorgeous, gorgeous, innovative books full of pictures);

Healing Foods Cookbook: The Vegan Way to Wellness by Jane Sen (some of these books, apparently outdated already, are available very reasonably thru Chapters bookstore);

KANSHA: Celebrating Japan's Vegan and Vegetarian Tradition by Elizabeth Andoh - wow, what a book this is!  hardcover, big & so full of information & expertise.  I love this approach - simple, appreciative of spare flavourings, concerned with the whole notion of conscious, careful & loving preparation of food (I have always been drawn to the whole ethos of Japanese cuisine).  She has so put me onto pickles!  quick, easy ones full of probiotics & freshness, to eat with every meal (forgot to say, before I eat my cooked food, I try to eat a 1/2 to one full cup of pickles & or sauerkraut).  Andover points out how a Japanese tradition is to have pickles, soup & rice for breakfast...hmmm.

Which put me onto another book:  Quick Pickles: Easy Recipes with Big Flavor by Chris Schlesinger, John Willoughby and Dan George.  Lovely, lovely, lovely.  The whole world of pickles, quick & with every meal;

The Veg-Feasting Cookbook: Favourite Recipes from Local Restaurants and Leading Chefs in the Pacific Northwest by the organization Vegetarians of Washington.  Oh this book is marvelous!  All vegan after all (I don't bother with ‘vegetarian’ books that contain cheese, dairy, eggs, etc) - fabulous recipes (many raw) that are really good, simple, traditional meals by all kinds of chefs (including our own Bryanna Clark Grogan of Denman Island).  This is one of my favourite books - I love to buy such specialty books because I know they have traditional, tried & true recipes & also that they are collector's items & will not always be available;

Another specialty, traditional fare, collector's book is The Veganopolis Cookbook by David Stoweell & George Black.  From the Veganopolis Cafeteria restaurant in Portland Oregan (from 2003-2008) - now closed.  Wonderful, wonderful book - sumptuous recipes that are so easy.  Another of my favourites;

And finally - tho I do have other books piled beside my bed & browse thru them with love & drool - Bryanna Clark Grogan's World Vegan Feast - just out & I don't think there is quite anyone else who does such research on international favourite dishes & replicates them so amazingly into vegan food.  No one.  Grogan is a tireless, avid researcher.

Whew!  Pat, quit!  Perhaps here I am still obsessively focussed on food - but, the reading (even while salivating) is not the same as eating wildly & compulsively.

cheers & holiday greetings,  

DAY 100. Afterwards. Update. Hernia(s). 137.6lbs.

I'm still counting, not sure what.  Definitely not a juice feast - more smoothies than juices.  Smoothies are so much easier & faster - & I always seem to be flying out the house &  just don't have time to do a juice.  (Tho I am generally doing a hand-pressed orange juice with some powdered greens in it first thing upon arising.)

Love the juice when I do it - but a juice definitely takes the best part of an hour to do, counting the essential cleanup.  When I do finally decide to do a juice, it makes more sense to make a lot - hence more vegetable prep; if I did a small one, I still have to clean the juicer.  Anyway - I end up doing a huge smoothie most days, 7 or 8 cups for me to sip thru the day & 2 cups for the hubby (he refuses to drink more than that, as if he's saying no to chocolate layer cake).

I am still keeping my log book - everything that goes in & comes out.  Feelings, physical ailments, changes, time I get up, get mobile & go to bed.  Perhaps this is why I am still counting.  Keeping a log book imposes a kind of order, organization, mindfulness on my life.

Oh yeah, I am eating cooked food - every day!  when I swore I would just do it once a week.  That alone makes it feel like failure. 

BUT! so far the cooked is pretty moderate - vegan, low fat.  I have been making large soups & pass along some to a friend who does not eat well, should be eating well, & who loves my soups.

Amazingly I am doing quite well, even with the cooked food.  I am able to eat a cracker or a slice of bread with nothing on it; a gift of this whole business seems to be that I am able to enjoy one food at at time, on its own - revel in the flavour without 'gussying' it up.

I am maintaining my weight so far.  I do need to lose more - about another 20 pounds.  So, not losing, but not gaining.  I am weighing myself every single day because it is the first couple of pounds that can break me - send me reeling off onto a flat-out bender.

BUT!  I am experiencing the effects of cooked foods nonetheless: encrusted nose, tiredness, waking up & feeling I have to sleep more, rather than waking up & feeling ready to rock.

Continuing to count the days & keeping up the log book are helping so far.  I'm not off the path yet; every day is the possibility of keeping on track.  Actually, I do just great during the day - it is, as always, the evenings that are a challenge - when my cravings to devour devour me.  

One other benefit of my 92 days of - whatever I am going to call my journey - is that I am able to have my supper, albeit later than it should be (I'd love to not eat beyond 6 p.m. - that will be mastery!) - & once my supper is done, I am able to watch a DVD movie - which I do pretty well every night - without eating anything else.  THAT is mastery for me at this stage.  I suppose in common with many people, my cravings are worst at night.  So, I've accomplished a small victory when I can have my supper, brush my teeth, & that is it till next day.

Hernia(s)

I think I got caught up in the exciting notion that once I got rid of my psychic 'shit' the other real stuff would follow - that it was mind over matter.  That my hernia, as representing my psychic 'shit' extruding & intruding into my life, was more about my emotional healing; that the physical represents the emotional rather than its own reality.

Well, whatever, my hernia is here, real & hurting whenever I am on my feet for a while.  Not only that, but it seems that a second one is beginning on the other side of my groin!  In my imagination, I see my ruptured stomach muscles extending right across my belly - my guts spilling out willy-nilly!

I finally went to a doctor - who noticed right away that 'something is going on' on the left side of my groin as well as the right.  He recommended me to a surgeon who has - I hope - got me on a wait list for surgery.  It will probably take at least two months to receive surgery - so in that time I can heal or change my mind more easily than beg to be put on a wait list once I am immobilized from pain.  The waiting gives me opportunity to think & to change my mind while at the same time presenting a possible solution of the medical kind.

By the doctor's recommendation I went to a home medical store to be fitted for a truss that should help to keep the hernia in.  I met with a lovely woman who was helpful in many ways.  I was expecting to have to get naked to try the truss on - the beginning of indignities I will have to endure - but this woman tried it over my outer pants; she did not even feel the hernia.  In about a minute the truss was deemed a lucky fit.  She suggested that surgery for hernia is major & if possible to be avoided - to learn to live with the hernia,  She told me I will have to 'change my life' - never lift anything heavy again (!!!!!!!!).  The truss apparently cannot be put on by myself!  I need to have someone adjust it for me from the back!  (Yegads, could it not be designed to have all the adjustments on the front?)  I have to accept feebleness?  I cannot live on my own?  I cannot carry my groceries anymore?  Bring on the walker & the nursing home! 

(By the by, this bit written after I took the truss home & finally tried it on myself over my underpants - to see if I could manage it myself.  I realized this truss is not going to work.  It needs to curve over my belly because the hernia extrudes right over my pubic bone & right in the crease where my thigh joins my body.  $100 I paid for it.  I knew the policy is that underwear cannot be returned for fear of germs, disease, whatever.  Then I realized the fitting had been way too quick & incomplete.  Nonetheless, I phoned the store back, spoke to the woman.  She confirmed that she could not take my word that the thing had not yet touched my naked body - that the truss is mine, whether or not it fits.  Wasted money.)

I lay around for a couple of days thinking about accepting a state of feebleness.  To go from a very active, self-sufficient, independent lifestyle - someone who has looked after Great Danes for 35 years, walking miles every day, lifting & carrying everything, snorting with the ridiculousness of it every time a cashier asks if I need help with a little bag of groceries just because my hair is white & I am obviously over 50 years old.

I still have not resolved this - still thinking on it (there is an appealing component to this of being forced to lay abed most of the time - then I might finally get the writing done full time - have my beleaguered hubby bring me tea & biscuits in bed... Oops, make that herbal tea & smoothies.).

I have been talking to people & have discovered that hernias are very, very common - & they occur in people of all ages, though mostly men (& boys).  I thought my excess weight & even my age were components - & they might be - but a number of people I have been talking to have been children & are not overweight.  (The woman in the home medical store told me hernias are caused by lifting heavy things from the ground without bending at the knees.  My husband, who has done all manner of heavy construction over his 72 years & never had a hernia, verifies this.)

I am for sure carrying around baggage/shit from my childhood (who isn't?) - but I accept that putting that harness with the rubber handle on the back end of, first, my 165-lb Spanish Mastiff for a couple of months & then, shortly after, on my 150-lb Great Dane for 5 months & hoisting them up from sitting positions & from inaccessible corners into which they had slid, was enough brute lifting (not to mention devoid of bent knees) to give anyone a hernia, perhaps two.

And surgery?  so far everyone I have spoken to has had surgery - not that that necessarily defines the best path.  Several surgeries have not 'worked' the first time - perhaps because of older methods of surgery, putting strain on the stomach muscles too soon, or perhaps not being healthy enough to heal within the 'normal' parameters.  One young guy, who had his first of two hernias at 10 years old, told me that surgery has come a long way - that nowadays a very small incision is made & a piece of gauze placed over the ruptured hole in the muscle.  He figures it is "a piece of cake".

One woman pointed out to me that hernias were even so common in the time of Pythagoras that he invented the surgery for them.

She also said she did not know of anyone who had self-healed, although we both know of a couple of people who have slight hernias that they are able to live with, one being a woman who has one around her belly button that she says was caused by giving birth.  This woman told me it's no big deal, she just shoves it back in when it comes out.

My hernia is almost live-able-with.  It is just that when I'm on my feet for too long (& that time seems to be getting shorter) it hurts like hell & I have to sit or lie down.  I'm grateful that sitting down seems sufficient.  I have got myself a small secretarial chair with good wheels on it so I can do stuff around the kitchen, sitting down, & wheeling myself about.  Not a perfect solution - kitchen activities involve so much standing & moving around!

So, apart from keeping up my logbook, this hernia is further incentive to be mindful of what I consume.  I'm sure that keeping my colon functioning & as clean as I can is necessary for keeping the hernia at bay.  As well, eating a healing diet with lots of fruits, greens & superfoods will give my body what it needs to heal itself - just don't know if I'm going to be patient enough to wait for healing rather than take the "quick" fix of surgery.

I would love to be doing regular colon hydrotherapy sessions - but just can't afford it.  I must get over my reluctance to do enemas (silly, silly, I know!) - that would be something positive to do.

Day 90 & 91. Failure?

DAY 90. 29nov11. 140.2 lbs)

Mixed emotions on this day, so close to Day 92. I'm not at 'the end' because I know I have to go on - incorporating the water, the juices, the smoothies, into my everyday life. It has so become habit over three months that I think I can do it. Drinking a cup of warm water just whenever - whenever I think about it, whenever I am at odds or nervous or contemplating eating something I would rather I didn't, before I eat - whenever. A great suggestion from Angela Stokes in Raw Emotions.

Today there is one of my favourite vegan buffets (Vera's - an Asian restaurant that puts on a spectacular vegan feast - Carol, owner & cook, brings all kinds of special ingredients all the way from Vancouver (thinking of the Leonard Cohen song, "Suzanne", in which she offers tea "all the way from China"). Carol likely spends days preparing about a dozen dishes for the buffet.


A few days ago I - perhaps compulsively in true addict form - decided to go. After all, I reasoned, I'm eating a cooked supper every evening, so what the heck. I emailed my friend Greta, who responded back suggesting it was too soon, that I would suffer dire consequences. I thought about it - played the tape out, as the saying goes in AA.

Finally realized that yes, I would likely suffer dire consequences, such as horrible indigestion that would hurt for most of the night. I have taken to eating a cooked supper every evening which is always the same - organic rice cooked with kombu, in a bowl with a bean mix I make (sautéed onions, mushrooms, sweet peppers, lots of tomatoes, & Amy's canned organic vegan baked beans), over which I pour enough hot water to make it into a soup. This sits very well with me, especially with the dreadful weather we are having.

But, despite this cooked supper, my system is not ready yet for full on, mostly fried, food. I'm not ready for high fat (in truth, I should never be ready for it!).

This made me realize that I am feeling as if I have already failed - the usual reason for me going on 'benders' - that feeling of, what the heck, I have fallen off so far I may as well really go for it.

And I have failed - at least with regard to juice feasting. Thinking that if I had juice feasted, according to protocol, from Day 1, imagine where I would be today - Most likely down 10-15 pounds more than I am right now (just got on the scales & see I have gained 3 pounds from about a week ago!). I might also be in an entirely different head space - perhaps not in a quagmire about whether or not I can include cooked vegan in my diet, perhaps ready to be all raw!

But this is where I am - not brilliantly successful, renewed, cleansed, minus my mucoid plaque, unrecognizably slender or even all raw. I suppose that at least I'm not where I was when I started this. I have accomplished something. A sort of half success, half failure (put like that, my whole being droops!).

I did decide NOT to go to the buffet. I can hold my ground at least. But what is this, gaining three pounds rather than losing them? This is the day - Day 1, Day 30, Day 60 & Day 90 - on which I take comparative photos. I cannot bear to do it today.

Continued 30nov11 - Day 91

Did not go to the buffet. But slipped around dinner time anyway. Had several slices of 'Manna' bread & then a slice of organic multigrain bread, toasted, with a coddled egg on it & sliced tomatoes. It has been years since I have had an egg. Tested my pee - very acidic. (whereas it has remained extremely alkaline after eating the rice & beans).

I am struggling here. The sun is shining outside - & I am embarking on a new day. I will consume lots of liquids & hope that will firm my resolve - liquid diet, firm resolve?

DAY 86 - HELP! TRAPPED IN A JUICE & SMOOTHIE FEAST!

Gotta post, despite what seem like setbacks.  On Day 86 of not quite sure what I should call it now, but still counting to Day 92 and beyond.  One thing I am learning is that this cannot quit on Day 92 - I'm into LIFE-style; I cannot go backwards - not after all this work.

But first, the good stuff, some warm & fuzzy pics:

The other day, 17nov11, a buck & some does appeared on the neighbour's lawn, the buck, his head lowered, kept approaching a doe.  The doe would skitter off & continue eating grass.  None of the does wanted the poor fella.  This is rutting season (& hunting season - the rut of the hu-males - using bows & arrows & guns for penetration - causing death instead of creating life).  I have never seen bucks trying to mate on front lawns before.  Someone said it was because they are trying to get away from the hunters (although three deer have appeared dead from arrows on lawns around here).  Anyway, here is a quiet moment I caught - before another buck showed up & chased this fella away - this guy obviously not a dominant buck.

Next, a picture of my sweet little Jack Russell, Maggi-May asleep very close to Misty, the pussy-cat:

Then, a picture of my friend Metta (mentioned frequently in other posts - Metta, my Mentor), taken in our local raw & vegan oasis, ZenZero, downtown Courtenay.  This taken 7nov11.

Lastly, my friend Marina & me, again at ZZ, 24nov11, celebrating her 50th birthday a couple of days early:

Marina & I were both at Victoria Boutenko's smoothie retreat this past 1-7 August 2011, held at Ocean Resort on Vancouver Island (a half hour drive from Courtenay).  This was a life-changing week for the both of us.  Marina has gone on (& is still going on) her own path to renewed health & sense of herself - she has lost somewhere over 30 pounds & has an obvious charisma of vitality about her - only the least of which is from her weight loss - she emphasizes her health & new-found power to make life-affirming choices over weight loss.

Before I tell you about our lunch at ZenZero, I should tell you the day was absolutely SKUZZY!  Pouring, pouring rain & winds that bent everyone at a 90 degree angle.  Dreadful!   Marina ate all raw.  I was going to stick to my usual - a very large orange juice with a double shot of wheatgrass juice (I try to make sure that any time I am in 'town' (Courtenay) that I have at least one shot of wheatgrass - & that usually in OJ because otherwise I hate the taste of the stuff).  I ordered that - but all the while, there was this (overpowering, obviously) fragrance of their cooked (vegan) chilli soup.  I ordered a bowl.  Oh it was so good - chock full of big hunks of veggies & potatoes.  It was so perfect for the day.

Marina & I had a wonderful get-together.  I brought her a wee bottle of a homemade sauerkraut I had made last week (white cabbage, beets, carrots - not too 'krauty' yet - I like to jar & refrigerate it before it gets to 'sauer').

I had brought Maggi-May in the car because - well, she wants to go EVERYWHERE with me, no matter the weather or whatever.  I had not taken her for a walk - the weather too awful.  I had piled quilts all over the back seat so she could burrow in.  After lunch I took her home - all the way back to Comox - & left her at home with my husband because I was going to be gone for ages & it did not look as if the weather was going to let up enough to walk her.

Then I drove back downtown to go for a doctor's appointment.  This is huge for me - the first time I've been to a doctor for about 15 years or so.

For any of you following me, you know I have a hernia.  I have been taking the time of this 92 day juice & smoothie feasting to figure out what to do about it - whether to let it heal on its own or whether to get it surgically corrected.  I have fluctuated about my decision.  Something that had spurred me onto choosing surgery is that someone asked me to cater a (combo raw & cooked vegan) food venue for an upcoming event:

"Hi Pat – Hello from the Fanny Bay!

I was wondering if you would be interested in selling your wonderful food at our Boutique and Bling sale, April 21, 2012. It will run from 10 to 2. It’s basically where anyone can rent a table to sell their clothes/shoes/jewelry, etc. It would be great to have coffee, tea and goodies. Not thinking that there has to be lunch stuff – but that would be up to you."

This is the poster:

I have said yes to this event, but if my hernia is the same or worse, I would not be able to put in the time on my feet that would be necessary.  So, I am going to try for surgery - hoping I can have it done in time to heal for the end of April (I have no experience with wait lists - we will see).

I sent out an email to my rawfooders' list asking if anyone knew of a 'veg-friendly' doctor, one who would be amenable, at least, to alternatives.  Got lots of response back - one about a doctor who is apparently 80% raw!!!!!!  Wow!  I got on the phone right quick.  The receptionist, however, told me, "Dr. So-&-So has not taken on new patients since he started in this clinic over 23 years ago."  I pleaded with her, told her to tell him I was a rawfooder (who is very healthy, rarely gets sick) & I had heard he was 80% raw - please, please would he consider taking me on.  It was news to the receptionist that this doctor was - what?  "What do you mean - you eat only raw food?  raw meat?"  No, I told her, raw vegan, all plant-based, no meat.  "No meat?  That sounds pretty boring."

She was going to pass on the message, but was positive he would say no.  She recognized my name (on my goodness, someone who had been there for ages & remembered everything!).  I asked, where is this clinic?  It turned out it was where I used to come to see my doctor, who had retired quite some years ago.  She told me that the doctor who replaced my old one is my doctor now.  I have a doctor!! I was inordinately pleased about this.

And, it turned out, I could briefly come & see him the next day (!!!!) because of my hernia.

My (grandfathered-in) doctor looks to be about 22 years old.  A very nice guy.  He affirmed that I do indeed have a hernia.  He is referring me to a specialist.  Now it is a matter of waiting for a date for surgery.  Hoo!  I have heard so much about this waiting business!  It takes so ridiculously long.  It may not be in time for me to heal for this catering gig.  Who knows, perhaps it will be healed all on its only by that time.

I was warned that if this hernia should extend & not recede (which mine does whenever I sit or lie down) & or if it seems plugged, or is painful in my gut, that I should immediately get to a hospital - that it might be ruptured, which could be a lethal event, like a ruptured appendix.  This is not common, but one needs to be prepared.

This made me realize - again - that the colon needs to be as clean as possible, not plugged up with crap food that cannot get out.  Being on a cleanse (ideally) or clean diet will keep the hernia under some kind of control.  

So, when I wake each morning I realize I must keep as clean as possible.  If I should come out of this juice & smoothie business & fall into my old ways, it will make things worse & painful.  

HELP!!  I'm trapped in a juice & smoothie feast!

Dream Journal & Clearing & Resolution?

Dream Journal.  Day 75 of Juice & Smoothie Feasting/Fasting  14nov11

[In this dream journal, I recall a dream & it then takes me way back into my childhood & a couple of major traumas.  Sheesh!  is this what Mette was talking about - clearing out childhood baggage (‘shit’)?  Seems more about dogs than my feasting/fasting.]

“Skeena is happy”

(Background:  Skeena, a Great Dane whom I rescued from Washington State in 2001, when she was 2.5 years old, died this past July 25th at the very ripe age of 12 years & 9 months old.  She & I were so very, very bonded.)

In this dream, I am visiting a small community - I think it is down-Island.  I am in perhaps a home-based business of some kind.  There is a large compound or hanger-like place attached - fairly cluttered with massive tools or machinery & other stuff.  Dirt floor.

I discuss ordering something thru the people there - something that will come by bus & ferry (which makes it sound as if it's to come from Vancouver).  They have a dog - tho I cannot remember what the dog looks like.  They never let the dog off the leash except in the house - not even into the compound area that is enclosed by building & fence.  I am upset for the dog.

They go off somewhere, leaving me on my own.  In the large compound area I see Skeena lying down on her side, stretched out, intertwined with another dog - a large dog, tho I cannot now visualize the dog (again!).  I approach Skeena, so happy to see her.  She too is happy to see me, tho not desperately so.

When the people come back (no faces to them, but I think a youngish couple, a man & a woman - the man might be my brother Graham, now I think about it, tho he would never put a dog on a leash or restrict it's freedom), I ask them about Skeena.  They tell me who owns her, also telling me, with strong disapproval in their words, that the people let her sleep in the bed with them.  That is all I need to know - I am happy for Skeena - she is with people who love her (I believe it is crucially important to have dogs sleep near or with us in the same room, for they share our consciousness & are bereft when separated from us).

This is the first dream I can ever remember in which I do not feel the need to rescue one of my dogs.  (This goes back to when I was 17 years old & my family lived in the bush in the Chilcotin Mountains of British Columbia, Canada.  I went to school in Vancouver & while I was away my parents packed up from our home-built log house in the bush & left.  My dad apparently burned everything that was mine, including all my childhood diaries, poetry, writing, drawings, murals I had painted for school, letters I had received from friends in Iran - everything - in essence, my childhood, my identity.  They packed up everything that was left, including our dog, Keela (see the resemblance in name to Skeena?).  Keela was a huge shiny black dog, who, years after I realized was probably a Great Dane crossed with Lab.  He was absolutely bonded to me, although my dad would not accept that from what he considered a family dog & did dreadful & cruel things to both Keela & me to try to break that bond (which of course did not work).

Me with my brothers, taken during the summer before I went off to school in Vancouver.  I would have been 16, ready to turn 17 at the end of August.  (the photo would have been developed some time after it was taken)

Anyway, they packed up what was left after the burnings into the Land Rover Jeep, drove the rough six-hour trip to Williams Lake &, according to what my brother Graham told me years later, sold everything, including the Jeep & Keela to a junk yard dealer for $200.  Graham told me that Keela had been chained to a doghouse for the rest of his life & that he became utterly savage.  That was fodder for nightmares for most of my adult life - always trying to go back & rescue him (as I write this tears & grief re-arise).

In retrospect I wonder if that is why I am so drawn to Great Danes - my heart just goes out to them - I've never met a Dane I did not instantly love.  (Wow!  I am only this moment realizing that for the past 18 years my husband & I have had rescued Danes in our life!)

In so many dreams, I have come back from somewhere after having left my dogs with someone for safekeeping, or after having given them away to someone, wanting my dogs back & discovering they were in abominable situations (my complicity in Keela's fate - by leaving him behind?).  I have desperately tried to get them back, rescue them.  (Amazingly, in some dreams, I would come awake, feeling inconsolable grief, fall back to sleep, with intention, & manage to rescue my dogs.)

In one dream that has stayed with me, my mother was talking to a couple of other women & I kept trying to get her attention, trying to find out where the dogs were, while she kept brushing me off & returning to her conversation.  Whew!  As I write this I am for the first time realizing that at some deep, until now, non-verbalized, level I have ignored my mother's complicity in this terrible, terrible end for Keela - tho I realize she likely did not know what his fate would be.  In retrospect, I see that my mother turned away - both figuratively & literally, from terrible things my father did to dogs & to his three children.

(Christ!  A memory from when I was about 7 years old:  in Heliopolis, Egypt, on the street in front of a neighbour's house.  I remember a lovely, tree-lined & wide, shady street, gardens, fountains, houses with glorious yards (but see from a photo the street was barren although the enclosed yards were lush).  The Egyptian neighbour was taking my two brothers, me, & her children out for the day.  We were all rather dressed up.

The above photo was, I believe, taken on the very day.  Me & my brothers with the neighbour children.  Egypt, c. 1955

My mother was standing talking to at least the neighbour woman (I cannot remember if there were only two women or more - but the body posture - her back to me, animated in her conversation, is the same as in that awful dream!).  A street vendor approached the neighbour woman.  He was selling geese.  They likely would have all been tied together by their feet & hung upside down over his shoulder or the handlebars of a bicycle.  The neighbour woman bought one.  The vendor set his stuff down, chose one of the geese, set it down & slit the throat .  I watched as the goose, in shock & bewilderment, raised its wings, opened its beak wide, trying to get breath.  It took a suspended moment before the blood came rushing out & the death dance began, the goose, flapping & the blood spraying terrifyingly everywhere.  Is it my memory, distorted (probably!), that made it seem that I was the only one noticing this goose dying?  In my mind's eye I see my mother, her back to me & the dying goose, engaged in conversation (I know my mother was sensitive to animal suffering; she likely made a concentrated effort to not notice - aware that to the Egyptian woman this was normal stuff & that she was an invading English woman with her own ideas of 'civilization'.).  The goose died a gruesome death - imprinting me for life.  The neighbour woman had the cook prepare the goose & sandwiches were made to take with us for the outing.   I would not have any of the goose sandwiches so I was given a string-bean sandwich!

By writing this I am drawing so many threads together.  My mother's apparent indifference to the plight of animals or her children - though I realize she had her own inner struggles - she was besotted with my alcoholic father & was so worried about losing him & or being on her own that she allowed him to do dreadful things to us & to family dogs.  (My mother, like a disproportionate number of women who did not intervene on husbands who abused their children & animals, died of cancer at the age of 68.)

So, way back to the initial dream - “Skeena is happy” - seems like perhaps resolution - or at least confronting - of several childhood conflicts.  Way back when I took dogs into my life (I was about 30), I determined that I would not abandon them as my parents had abandoned their children (rather oddly, or perhaps not, I have no children of my own - my only children have been dogs; my father so abused my maternal capacities as a child, always with dogs).  And I have kept that promise.  All my dogs over the past 35 years have died with me.  But I still regularly had dreams in which I was trying to rescue various dogs.

This is the very first dream in which the dog in question did not need rescuing - Skeena is happy in this dream.  This is resolution.

Is this what my friend Mette was communicating to me - the need to go so very far back & confront those childhood traumas?  Egad!  So many years!  & where I was thinking I would ‘deal’ with all this someho, it comes in a dream, which hardly seems of my doing or within my control.  In fact, if that dream had occurred earlier in the night rather than just before I woke & was able to remember it, all that clearing would have been beyond my conscious mind.  Perhaps that’s how it is.  I suppose this might also be about simply letting go - which is not as simple as it sounds.  Letting go of blaming myself - perhaps of blaming my mother - although I doubt so long as I am alive I will let go of blaming my father, despite knowing he came from a traumatic childhood perhaps even worse than the one he inflicted on his family.

It was my mother, may she now be resting in peace, who said, “Pat, the subconscious is the true consciousness.”  In our conscious state, we are so rife with denial & defensiveness that we live bound by lies.

Day 73. ADDICTION & COOKED FOOD

Day 73. 13nov11 Day 73. Wow, I can barely believe I am here. Thank goodness I did not consider my few slips as evidence of failure and revert to counting from one.

I'm also grateful for having this span of time - I have needed it to work through things. For instance - and this seems to be such a huge issue for me - whether or not I will be able to incorporate cooked vegan food into my diet. Eating cooked food has been my downfall, my failure, my 'falling off the wagon'. I have proved over and over to myself that eating cooked food turns my urine acidic. An all-raw diet keeps my urine alkaline.

Eating a cooked meal once a week would not turn my pee acidic, but would I be able to only eat one cooked vegan meal a week? Would this be like suggesting that I, a recovering alcoholic (7 years sober), accompany that meal with my favourite booze? Of course, I would not consider trying the alcohol - would not take that chance - terrifies me even to contemplate it

Is it that I have simply not accepted that a meal of, say, organic brown rice topped with gently sauteed vegetables would be as deadly to me as a goblet of Grand Marnier over shaved ice? That is it, of course, I am not accepting that cooked vegan food is bad for me. Well, I mean, I absolutely realize that food transformed by heat is not welcomed by my body - that the white leucocytes increase with even a mouthful of cooked food - indicating that the cooked food is perceived by my body as foreign and toxic, causing my immune system to leap into defense mode

Yeah, yeah, I am convinced of that, but still! my body - oh, it seems every cell in my body and in my brain - loves and craves (oh, wrong word!) that food. It really satisfies me on so very many levels. Of course, it is the associated comfort and joys of like-minded people, of not participating in the suffering of animals, but it is also a perhaps inexplicable satisfaction, a deep love, of this food. It seems I am never quite convinced that it is bad. My brain, my capacity to reason, tells me that cooked food is bad - Cooked food is poison (the mantra underlying the book, Nature's First Law, remember?).

I have had the above argument tormenting me for many years. While on this juice and smoothie feasting (although it is a kind of fasting, removing me away from my normal habits and suspending me in a rather contemplative state for a while), I am realizing, no, more accepting (tough word for me), that eating the odd cooked vegan meal might not be optimally healthy, but it would not have to be considered a failure for me.

In addiction I see with myself that there is this line, this trick of the mind, in which when I have 'fallen', that at some very deep level I say to myself, Well, Pat, you have fallen, you have failed. The feeling of failure is a sense of finality - it's a fait accompli - the deed is done and is irredeemable. From there, I plunge into a 'bender'.

This feasting - fast - has shown me that although I have 'fallen', the situation has not been irredeemable - I have simply - oh, so simply! - picked myself up and continued on. Here I am on Day 73. It is definitely not failure. I have accomplished. There is weight loss, there are changes, shifts. I am definitely somewhere different. I have travelled some road I have not been before.

I have really needed this amount of time. A week or ten days is simply not enough - hoo! I have been on so many of those, careening out of the feast or fast - water, juice, raw foods, whatever - feeling, well, that period of abstinence, that diet, is over, now I EAT! And in short time I have been back where I was before I dieted.

I am realizing now, that what I am doing is something I need to do for life - and I think I accept this. I hope that one of the learnings I am going to take from this journey is that this will be the way I eat, that I will have the odd - once a week, no more - vegan meal - enjoy it fully - and return to this way of eating. If I am wrong, if I cannot eat one meal without falling into bender, then I will have to start over again. I hope that I will be able maintain the ground I have gained.

Years ago I finally quit smoking - for over eight years - and started up again. It took several more years before I was able to quit again. Whenever I was tempted to have one cigarette, I thought to myself, Pat, if you start up smoking again, you are going to have to go through the grueling business of quitting again; let us maintain the ground we have won with such struggle.

I also understand that perhaps if I was thinking differently, that I might (or might have) come away with no desire for cooked food. That would be the best, wouldn't it? Am I not allowing myself to be willing to reach that state? Or am I fighting myself about something in which I should be allowing myself leeway? Should I be fighting myself?

CLEARING

7Nov11  Day 68 of 92 Juice & smoothie feasting/fasting

I have been stumbling along with this juice feasting business – modifying & modifying until I sometimes wondered if I had fallen off long ago & did not notice that the wagon had careened off, leaving me wandering in a hinterland of my own making, no rescue in sight.

But, somehow, here I am on my 68th day – who woulda thunk? - & by gar, there’s been some kind of shift.  Don’t know exactly what, but it’s a shift – something’s happening.

I am feeling detached from eating.  Even the smells of my husband cooking meat, frying things, heating up beans, do not unleash cravings.

My stomach feels rather empty & detached from me – or me from it.

I visited with a friend on a Saturday morning in an empty college cafeteria where a series of tables was laid out with every manner of food, including fruit (apparently the potluck lunch of a gathering in the next room).  It was only later that day that I realized I had sat there talking & did not think or yearn about the food-laden table!

I am reading my friend Bryanna Clark Grogan’s wonderful new COOKbook, World Vegan Feast 

(http://www.bryannaclarkgrogan.com/page/page/3115952.htm & https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.184779704909777.50953.100001332474362&type=1&l=7cc139d565), &, even as I pore over the recipes & pictures, fantasizing over preparing dishes in the future, I am not craving them in the here & now.

My friend Metta is visiting from Victoria.  We go out for walks in the gorgeous west coast forest, beside the ocean & mountains, walking my Jack Russell, Maggi-May, & we talk & talk & talk.

I pound on about raw & vegan being the underlying, fundamental basis of health, that if our diet is optimal, everything will heal – body, mind & psyche.  (I emphasize vegan because that is about compassion & consideration for Other – other people, the animals, the planet.)

Mette is coming from the other direction – psyche first.  She believes that we have to get rid of the burdens of our childhoods – so many of us have come through traumatic childhoods.  Mette thinks that some of us cannot shed our extra weight, the extra ‘shit’ until we have confronted out childhoods & are ready to let them go.

Wow!  Here I am realizing – finally! – that I am bunged up with impacted fecal matter (ugghh!!) – mucoid plaque, which I have had for decades.  I have been lumbering around with my ‘meateater’s belly’ & in denial that I actually had that belly, even to criticizing others that do.  For a ‘Born-Again Vegan’, this is horrible for me to imagine how long I have been packing around my meateating persona.

The other thing – the great big trumpeting but unseen elephant in the rooms of my house – is the fact that I am a hoarder!  Oh my god!  I have long admitted that I do ‘collect’ things – that I am a thrift shop aficionado.  Oh I have such wonderful, beautiful, amazing things – some phenomenal bargains.  And books.  Many, many books.  But much of this stuff is packed away so I haven’t seen it in years.  Hoo, you can imagine how I have veered away from the topic of de-cluttering.

My hernia.  On one of our past walks, I theorized to Mette that my hernia was finally my ‘shit’ extruding, protruding into my life, making it impossible to ignore.  I thought this was about my mucoid plaque.  But Mette, in her gentle, diplomatic way, suggested that the mucoid plaque & my ‘collecting things’ were connected.  Why do I collect things?  Well, probably because I have gone through some times in which money has been critically scarce – I buy things so that if I am broke again, I will at least have the basics of civilization.  The other reason probably has to do with my alcoholic father, forever moving his family, who threw out & burned my childhood (we lived in the bush of the Chilcotin Mountains of B.C. Canada when I was a teenager; at 17 I went off to school in Vancouver & while I was gone, my family moved & my father burned all my murals, paintings, letters, poems, diaries).

Mette suggested that this is fear-based.  How would it be if I went forward in confidence that my needs will be met as they arise?  Hoo!  Does this mean, if I can let go of all that stuff, all that ‘shit’ – that the other will follow – as goes the psyche, so too goes the colon?  Not to mention the burdens & weights of my childhood.

Thank you Mette.  When the student is ready, the teacher appears?World Vegan FeastBryanna Clark Grogan