My Love Affair With Coffee

“Joe” has been my constant companion and best friend for nearly 40 years, except during my four pregnancies when simple smells would send me running to the bathroom.  But “Joe” is an acidic friend who has been deceiving me all these years, he and his creamy buddy.

Every time I feel down, agitated, tired, or hungry I get my “Cup of Joe” and “Voila” – I feel fine. Between the caffeine and the cream my world would right itself. Then I met his cousin, “Cappuccino”, in Italy and another love affair began. I would sit at a café in Florence - smelling the rich aroma of coffee and savoring the smooth taste of frothed milk, sometimes with a touch of sweetener. What could be better?

But also while in Italy I was continuing to experience strange symptoms – leg cramps, extreme fatigue, inflammation, stuffiness. Something wasn’t right – my coffee and milk had betrayed me. I didn’t know it yet, but I was intolerant to milk and my “Joe” was pulling me down (my pH that is). The human body needs an alkaline environment (pH of 7.35) to survive and my “Joe” was an acidic relationship (bringing me to a pH of 5 or 6). It was hard to break. After all, I was in love. My body told me I had to break it off, but my emotions said, “No”. What would I do every morning without my “Cup of Joe”?

But I had finally had enough of the pain of this toxic relationship and I gradually stopped meeting with “Joe”. First I took out one of my morning cups, but kept the afternoon ones. Then I left off the lunch cup. Then I was down to one cup in the morning and one cup in late afternoon. Then I left off the afternoon cup. I literally cried when I realized that I wouldn’t be seeing “Joe” anymore. The first morning I didn’t meet with “Joe” I was depressed. I felt I was losing my best friend, like I was a traitor. And “Joe” didn’t want me to go either. He lingered in my head giving me a dull migraine the whole day. I did a lot of sleeping that day.

“How did you deal with the fatigue”, you ask? I was replacing “Joe” with my new love, “Juice”. You see “Joe” was giving me a false sense of alertness - one that would quickly leave, making me dependent, causing me to reach for another cup. But “Juice” was filled with nourishing vitamins, something my body was screaming for - for years. I was finally listening. Now a cool refreshing “Juice” with carrots or kale and apples; or beets, pineapple and cucumber come to my rescue. My alkaline system, now full of oxygen allows my cells to purr and do the job they were designed to do, to keep me alert, give me energy, and fight off disease, stuffiness, fatigue and inflammation. And no inflammation means no more pain.

 

I no longer need to abuse my body with the damaging effects of caffeine or milk.  Now when I’m tired and need a boost and “Joe” tries to nudge his way in, I turn my back and reach for my juicer.

From a "3-Letter Word" to a "5-Letter Word"

“They” say that as your body gets older it breaks down and falls apart; you should expect it. It’s the process of getting “OLD”. When I hear someone express that philosophy I think of my mother who hated that “3-Letter Word”. She truly believed that you were as young as you felt, and she always felt great. It was her mindset. She lived her life to the fullest, even to the last.

So as the chronological clock ticked on and years were added to years, my body seemed to “fall apart” with sinus issues, forgetfulness, achy joints, and bad knees – you know how it goes. I wondered if the inevitable "3-Letter Word" had come to pay a permanent visit.

 

The first thing I did was pray and ask my Heavenly Father to heal my body; then I went to the doctor. Doctors ask their typical questions to find where the pain is and then relieve symptoms with pills and surgery; and my doctor did not disappoint. After the question period, the poking, and the x-rays, he told me I had “chronic” tendonitis of which, of course, there was no cure; “chronic” being the operative word. Because you see, once something is dubbed chronic, the patient is at the doctor’s mercy since “there is no cure”. I was told I must learn to live with it. He actually used the dreaded “3-Letter Word”. He assured me, however, that there were things which he could prescribe which could ease the pain.

Really!!! For the rest of my life? I’m not sure at what age you label someone with the dreaded “3-Letter Word”; but I considered myself still pretty young. I wasn’t even a grandmother yet! At that moment in the doctor’s office I realized I did not want to spend the rest of my life fighting pain, limiting activity, and taking myriads of pills, with surgery the only thing to look forward to. So, I began one of my favorite hobbies – to educate myself.

A friend of mine introduced me to the book Clean, by Dr. Alejandro Junger. As I read his book I was intrigued by the philosophy that toxins caused us pain and weight gain. The weight gain was caused because toxins were stored in fat. Without getting rid of toxins, one couldn’t get rid of fat. Seemed simple enough; but what were the toxins? According to Junger, toxins came from four different areas: 1) the world at large; 2) the environment in which we live; 3) personal hygiene and home products; 4) and what we put into our mouths. In fact, he said certain foods could be toxic to us; things like high fructose corn syrup, white sugar, gluten and diary, even caffeine. He encouraged his readers to go on an “elimination/detox diet” eliminating many of these allergenic and toxic foods for 21 days. So, I decided to give it a try. After all what could it hurt, and maybe I would even lose a few pounds.

First, I needed to eliminate the “no-no” foods: things like gluten, dairy-including cheese and yogurt, caffeine, the night shades, anything pre-prepared, wheat products (pasta, bread, muffins, donuts) etc. Once I was cleaned out, I started the actual juicing part of the diet where you juice breakfast and dinner and have a sensible lunch with lots of greens. Amazingly after only 10 days or so, my joint pain vanished, I had no more mucus/sinus problems and I had an amazing amount of energy. At that point I realized that my health issues were, in fact, food related.

Once I finished the three weeks of juicing, I began to add back one food at a time to find out which ones were the culprit. The first one I added back was gluten. Sure enough my joint pain immediately resurfaced. I eliminated it again and waited a few days for the pain to subside; then I tried dairy. Again, the mucus and sinus pain returned. I continued with other foods, one at a time; but some foods I have permanently left out - besides the gluten and dairy - such as white sugar, high fructose corn syrup, and processed foods.

During those first few months I kept motivated by four factors. One was that I was losing a half a pound a day (total of 42 pounds). Even though pain was my main motivation, it’s amazing how finally being able to lose weight keeps you pressing forward. The second factor was how many other pains and discomforts also vanished from my body in such a short amount of time – I counted a total of 20. My energy level increased, the foggy brain disappeared as well as allergy symptoms, and I feel and look younger. Another factor which helped to keep me motivated was watching documentaries such as, "Hungry For Change", "Forks Over Knives", and "Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead". These films helped to make me aware of the food industry - Big Pharma, Big Agriculture, The Dairy Industry, and Meat Industry and how much of the food industry works - not for our well being and health - but for their profit. Once you see the big picture, it helps to keep you going on the daily level when sometimes you want to revert back. But the most rewarding to me was watching those around me - my family, friends, and even acquaintances - see what had happened to me and want the change for themselves. After just a few months, I witnessed numerous others not only lose hundreds of pounds collectively, but drop unnecessary medications, and once again pursue active healthy lifestyles.

As I reflect back over my journey so far, I'm first of all amazed that my Heavenly Father did hear my cry and heal me. What I've learned from this is that He had already provided for the healing in creating an amazing body full of cells which knew just what to do to eliminate fat, toxins, and disease. It was me who had not allowed my body to do its job because of what I was feeding it. I am very thankful that He answered my prayer by opening the door of knowledge which allowed me to more fully understand how His system worked so I could then take back my health and allow my body to do the job it was designed to do. 

 

Now I have to get on with the job of living out my new favorite saying, "You're as YOUNG as you feel" - which, by the way, is a "5-letter word".