When I turned vegetarian at aged 13, it was due to making the connection between the sweet lambs I would help bottle feed on my dad’s friend’s farm, and the (delicious) lamb chop on my plate. I decided that I didn’t want to kill an animal if I could survive without eating them. I remained vegetarian for over twenty years until it became clear that eating that way was compromising my health. I was originally only going to add in fish to my diet, but I went to Uzbekistan shortly after ending my vegetarianism and was confronted with a (delicious) lamb kebab and that was the end of pescatarian me. Despite realising that I needed to eat meat to be healthy, the ethics around meat eating have not left me. This is why I refuse to buy cheap meat: not only for my health (no thanks to all those antibiotics and Omega
It has now been one month since I started this carnivore diet experiment to see if I could resolve all the histamine related issues I was experiencing. So I thought I would continue with my dietary oversharing in case someone finds this experiment useful and needs encouragement to try. To start with the downsides, I still haven’t resolved the part where I am obsessively meal planning, but I am definitely getting better at knowing how much to eat. My main problem was breakfast as, other than fry ups at the weekend, I have only had smoothies or amaranth porridge for breakfast for years. Given that I can’t eat egg whites and don’t seem to tolerate huge amounts of pork, I was really stuck for breakfast ideas until I a) discovered bresaola, and b) decided to just be wasteful with egg whites. So, now I have 3 or 4 x soft boiled
I read something the other day which I thought was arresting in its simplicity: ‘there’s no such thing as a healthy weight, only a healthy person.’ It gets at what I often struggle with when talking to people about whatever diet tweak I am doing at that moment. People often assume I am doing it to maintain my weight, when my weight has barely anything to do with why I dick about with my diet so much. I do it to try to control the various symptoms of ill health I have: IBS, eczema, asthma, allergies, mood, etc. It also points to the erroneous assumption that if you are generally slim, or have a healthy BMI, then you don’t need to worry about your health. That somehow you are genetically predisposed to health, unlike overweight others. From my own experience, I always knew this was bollocks. People have always remarked on
It has now been 18 days since I ate any fruit or vegetables, except for the occasional use of olive oil and some experimentation with seasonings (e.g. thyme or paprika). Everything about this experiment has been delicious and my only regret is blueberries. As I said a couple of posts ago, I started on this experiment because I was sick of feeling sick all the time: heartburn, indigestion, stuffy sinuses (and corresponding face puffiness), insomnia, low mood, eczema, and asthma. I wanted to see if this ultimate of elimination diets would help, and it has! The indigestion and asthma cleared up the minute I stopped eating fruit and vegetables, and the eczema soon after. The heartburn was markedly better immediately, but it took about ten days to fully dissipate. My sleeping and mood have mainly been good, and my nails are significantly stronger. Finally, my blood pressure and resting heart rate are
I watched Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale last night. I had no idea what the film was about before watching it: I chose it simply because Samantha Morton is in it and because Aronofsky directed it. Be warned: this review has major spoilers. I should say off the bat that I generally like Aronofsky’s films, even if they are not always quite realised, and even though the endings sometimes seem rushed and weird, as The Whale’s did. That said, I found The Whale to be incredibly moving; it even brought me to tears a couple of times, which is a very rare occurrence. In sum, the film is about a reclusive, obese teacher who is attempting to reconnect with his estranged teenage daughter. I did some review reading after watching it, and I was surprised to see how many people hated the film and accused it of fat phobia. Whilst I agree that perhaps a genuinely