We’re a mix of everything when it comes to eating habits.  A Londoner and a Texan living in California… between us we dabbled with being vegetarian, vegan, eating raw, raising animals to eat, milking cows and drinking raw milk, frugal college days, energy drink and sugar high study days, eating no vegetables, eating nothing but vegetables, being overweight, being underweight…. we’re on a journey!  There’s no ideal at the end of the journey except for health.  I don’t believe in body health without spirit and soul health so it’s a journey that’s not about restriction and rules but about love and liberty.  When we truly love ourselves and love our bodies and love life, we’ll want to be good stewards of the bodies we have and do everything we can to love them well.  If we only have vision for what we don’t want to eat and what we don’t want to be, the journey is not a fun one but when the focus is on broadening life, on finding more energy and joy, on feeling healthy and amazing and investing in the healthy future that we want for ourselves and the people around us… it’s a fun journey!  It’s about what we get to eat, not about what we have to leave off the plate.  You begin to realise that every ‘no’ you say isn’t really a no but a yes to something even greater.  When you know why you are doing something, every choice becomes one you made to become who you want to be and then the whole health, food, fitness journey is a joy!

Before I got married, I ate meat about 3-4 times a year, I never touched sugar except in dark chocolate, I ate a very simple, vegan, predominantly raw diet.  Then I married a Texan… a pizza loving bachelor of a Texan who was trying to get healthier but still was a lover of meat, cheese and large portions.  I don’t blame him or judge him.  About 4 months into our relationship we went to eat pizza and he ordered a meat and veg pizza and asked if they could switch out the veg for extra meat.  I was happy, he was feeling free to be himself – he didn’t need to eat vegetables to impress me and he knew it.   Equally he wanted to get healthier, and that made me happy too.  I had zero desire to be a pushy wife who started confiscating things from his plate and never gave him a meal that was fun to him.  And, my diet wasn’t perfect either.  I didn’t always eat enough, I ate too much sugar even if only in dark chocolate, I wasn’t eating enough protein (I’m a workout addict!), and one thing he’s helped me with – I did not hydrate well at all.  We’re growing.

My goal hasn’t always been the right one.  I’ve had the goal of just looking good, just keeping off the weight… and I’ve experienced the misery that goes with it.  I’ve also experienced having no goal in eating, but mindlessly eating and then not loving myself.  That’s not so fun either.  I’ve been the weight I am healthily and unhealthily, though joy and through restriction and I can tell you that sharing freedom in food is one of my greatest goals in life.