(Big thanks to Belvoir Fruit Farms for sponsoring this post!)

Mother’s day is this weekend! I’d say you’re welcome for the reminder, but Lord knows you’ve been seeing it all over social media! What can I say, moms have never been ones to let us forget anything… 🙂

Part of the lifestyle I’m currently embracing is being less wasteful and ensuring my purchases are coming from healthy, natural, plant-based, less-wasteful sources. I remember thinking these focuses were just too far out of reach and unrealistic not too long ago, but then I realized I can never be too picky with how I spend my money, because with every dollar spent you’re voting for your values. I.e., when I spend my money on a zero-waste vegan gift instead of a plastic-wrapped, milk-filled chocolate bar, I’m voting for compassion and brand responsibility instead of speciesism and waste.

Gift giving is probably the last aspect of my life to have this concept implemented, but it’s better than never implementing it at all! I’ve rounded up a few gift ideas to make this process easier on you and your schedule… Everything here can be purchased before Mother’s Day! There’s still hope! 😉 Hopefully you find it valuable, if you buy anything from this list tag me in it on social media so I can see your finds!

• My favorite item on this list, something I’m thrilled to share with the moms in my life this weekend, is Belvoir’s Elderflower & Rose Lemonade. It’s plant based, bubbly, and perfectly sweet. It’s made of 100% natural ingredients like spring water, elderflowers, rose petal extract and lemon juice. Pick up a beautiful bottle of Belvoir at Whole Foods, World Market, Target, Total Wine, or Kroger on your way to mom’s!

• Keep mom stocked up on her fave CBD! If she doesn’t have a favorite, try a medium-strength tincture, a CBD-infused balm or lotion, or CBD bath bombs.
• Potted flowers- It’s pretty common to gift a flower bouquet, but I find there’s a lot more value, enjoyment, and versatility in gifting living plants instead. Lucky for moms, their day comes smack in the middle of spring, so live flowers will thrive!
• Clay travel mugs, plates, bowls, and serveware make beautiful gifts!

• Framed pictures are always a hit, but instead of the common recent photoshoot, dig deep to find a meaningful picture from your childhood of you and mom, 3 generations with you mom and grandma, or a picture from mom’s childhood of her own mother.
• A smeg juicer is low waste and high quality. Plus it could result in some fresh juice for yourself, right? 😉

Drop some of your gift ideas in the comments and inspire the rest of us!

I’m feeling fantastic!

I haven’t had coffee in a week and a half. Insert shocked emoji here…

That is, until I went to Starbucks this morning and got a decaf with soy milk and sugar free vanilla…. THAT was my first, though! LOL I guess I should say I haven’t been caffeinated in a week and a half.

I tried flavored water and smoothies and mushroom coffee and sitting with the craving until it passes and I just haven’t kicked the craving for the real deal yet, although I do feel it slipping away because I can go days without no problem-o. Thank heavens for decaf espresso *claps*.

In all seriousness, I haven’t felt this good in a really long time. It’s been 1.5 weeks since I kicked majority of the foods from my diet and replaced them with candida-cleanse-friendly options. I’ve lost 3 lbs, regained most mental clarity, and (knock on wood) haven’t felt sick.

On my first or second day, I thought I’d be fine to eat two matcha key lime bars (sweetened with maple syrup) and I’m not sure if it was the caffeine or the sweetener, but I went to bed with a stomach ache, regretting it for sure. The only other time I truly broke the cleanse guidelines was Sunday evening; we were not in the right mind for cooking so we went out for vegan burgers… I skipped the burger and just had fries with no issues. Griffin said he respected my commitment but besides coffee I truly haven’t had cravings for anything but greens and quinoa. It’s easy peasy to say no to anything else, especially knowing they’re going to make me feel terrible. I told Griffin I’m going to see how long I can live on a strictly quinoa diet :’D

How I’ve actually been following the dietary guidelines

I’ve followed the diet guidelines pretty closely besides the addition of one extra serving of easily digested low-glycemic fruit a day such as blueberries, green apples, peaches, or plums. This is because a typical candida cleanse basically calls for certain meats and greens… but being vegan and not eating meat I’d essentially be living on greens for at least two weeks, and I wanted to swap in some nutrient variations.

(Disclosure: I received the following Probiogen probiotics free so I could share my honest opinion of them with you.) If you follow my Instagram stories, you’ve seen I added a vegan collagen builder, digestive enzymes, digestion support probiotics and stress/mood support probiotics to my daily regimen. I’m madly in love with these. It’s really hard to find plant-based, non GMO, soy free, gluten free probiotic capsules with no artificial binders or fillers!

Probiogen ticks all these boxes, is super affordable compared to so many probiotics I checked out before reaching out for this partnership, and is easy to find in stores like Target, GNC, Bed Bath and Beyond, and others, making it easy to grab one off the shelf when you’re out picking up other stuff. My favorite thing about the two probiotics I’ve tried from Probiogen is that they give a boost to healing my other gut health symptoms from stress and mood to digestion. This isn’t something they claim to support but don’t follow through with, I can genuinely tell a difference, and that is invaluable during this journey!

Where to go from here

Let’s talk about that, too… I started this with the expectation of cleansing and healing myself for two weeks and immediately picking up my old diet back up. I didn’t see that I could really break the habit of craving certain things regularly, and I thought these two weeks would be pretty strenuous. That’s the farthest thing from the truth though!

The new plan is to still finish the strict diet in two weeks, but implement a lot of it’s concepts for years to come. The thing is, when you feel freaking amazing on a certain diet, it’s the easiest thing in the world to maintain. You will not want to go back to what was previously hurting your health.

• These include remaining grain-free, gluten-free, refined sugar and mostly sweetener-free, and keeping the higher glycemic-index foods low, such as carrots, tomatoes, sweet potatoes and squash.
• I’ll try to steer clear of potentially moldy nuts such as peanuts and cashews and foods that definitely send gut bacteria balance out of whack like certain mushrooms and starchy foods like potatoes.
• I’ve also decided that gluten and tomatoes make me feel crappy, so I’m testing the theory that I might be allergic.
• I’m cutting back on coffee and switching strictly to decaf.
• I’ll keep the digestive enzymes and probiotics in my life for as far into the future as I possibly can! I’m in love!

Alllll of my research proved that majority of my symptoms matched candida overgrowth and leaky gut.

I really don’t like to say that term “leaky gut” and I hated saying it to Griffin in fears he’d not only be grossed out by it but would think this was some kind of fake term crafted for people to address problems they don’t actually have. I’ve since come to terms that if I’m going to get better I’m going to address EVERYTHING honestly, even if I’m wrong about it. It’s the only way I’ll learn what helps and what doesn’t.

I do believe I’ve battled candida overgrowth for a really long time, causing my itchy skin, brain fog, fatigue, etc. and I also believe that eventually led to leaky gut, which has only become prevalent as of this year. The leaky gut, a fairly newly-discovered disease, can be tied to the gastrointestinal problems, sickness, intestinal inflammation, inflammation causing extreme menstrual cramps, etc. Now, I haven’t the slightest clue what came honestly came first and what ailment is causing what symptom. However, leaky gut and candida overgrowth are proven to be most commonly tied to my biggest health concerns. All signs very clearly point to gut health.

The following excerpt is from my journal, and is a collection of notes I took from a variety of credible online resources, which I didn’t document because I never thought I’d be sharing about this. I’ll go back through eventually and try to locate sources. I didn’t take notes on candida overgrowth or candidiasis because I’ve been familiar with it for years.

“Leaky gut is when the lining of the small intestine becomes damaged, allowing food particles/toxic waste/bacteria to leak into the bloodstream. It causes an autoimmune response triggering inflammatory allergic reactions like headaches, irritable bowel, eczema, fatigue, food allergies, etc. Damaged intestinal cells don’t produce enzymes needed for digestion-so the body doesn’t absorb nutrients leading to weak immune system + hormone imbalance.

Can be caused by a diet high in refined carbs saturated fats and sugars, gluten, OTC pain killers, excessive stress, genetic predisposition that causes sensitivity to digestive changes, alcohol, processed foods, GMOs, environmental toxins, antibiotics, etc.

Candida overgrowth, parasties, and SIBO have been tied to leaky gut.

Candida overgrowth left untreated can lead to leaky gut.

Raw fruits and vegetables are difficult to digest and tough fibers are hard on the weakened immune system” / ((which could explain why I had such bad luck with the raw diet)).

I won’t go through and tie each of my symptoms to this individually, but I think you get that this is an obvious potential cause. Along with that, I’ve held an intuitive belief for years that my beginning symptoms were caused by candida overgrowth, so when I learned about leaky gut after experiencing it’s first trigger at the New Year, it seemed obvious to me.

What I’m doing about it

I believe that if I believe I’m healing, I will. I’ll believe I’m healing by paying attention to my intuition and what is resulting in relief and what’s resulting in discomfort. So far, this solution has provided nothing but relief, and I’m extremely grateful.

That being said, I’ve started baby-stepping my way into a candida cleanse tailored to leaky gut healing. I’m on a diet encompassing

• avoiding sugar including natural and artificial sweeteners and fruit
• no starches including corn, flour, wheat, rice, potatoes, beans or legumes
• avoiding potentially moldy foods such as peanuts
• no caffeine
• limiting nightshades

I’m keeping it high in big salads, low-fruit smoothie bowls, cauliflower, avocado, seeds and a couple nuts, coconut chia puddings, all the fermented foods (KIMCHI <3), asparagus, broccoli, cucumber, brussels sprouts, raw garlic, green beans, steamed/blended spinach, apple cider vinegar lemon water, almond butter, herbal tea, and gut-healing vegetable broth.

I’ll occasionally throw in tempeh, non-gmo tofu, a small green apple, a small amount of chickpeas, blueberries, small amounts of quinoa, and small amounts of squash.

I’m supplementing a probiotic, digestive enzymes, and plant-based collagen (woohoo for that one!).

As I mentioned, I’m already feeling really REALLY good compared to before. I can accomplish so much in a day now. I’ll talk a lot about this in my Instagram stories in the future and will share recipes, tips, tricks, and roadblocks. Basically, I’ll be as transparent with you as I am with myself in hopes of encouraging awareness and healing to whoever needs it.

I also just want to add: THANK YOU SO MUCH to my partner who exercises the greatest patience and understanding when I’m whiny and not feeling well and needed to be up in the middle of the night or rest all day, and just listens as I tell him my self-diagnoses and all my opinions. What a freakin’ gem!

The more troubling concerns that have recently been striking

We moved to the Pacific Northwest. HELLLOOO vegan junk food! For the past little while I’ve been eating a lot of refined carbohydrates and sugars. I still believe I’ve had a really good balance of healthy vegan foods thrown in there, so I do believe my gut problems are a long-awaited accumulation of past health concerns going ignored.

Diet aside, the past few months have been really taxing on my body. Starting in the late summer with crippling, excruciating menstrual cramps. When I was younger I’d get them so bad I’d black out and feel sick but for most of my life Mother Nature has been pretty easy on me. These recent cramps were so awful I could just mark a couple straight days off the calendar for feeling like vomiting from pain. Until I researched what I know now, I was pretty worried it was endometriosis.

The 2019 New Year is really when I was really hit hard with other symptoms. Of course like a normal American I drank the New Year away and was sick immediately afterward with what I thought was a hangover, but was also confused about because I never got hangovers from drinking the amount I did. I was never actually able to GET sick, either. It was like my stomach was constipated, honestly! It was like reaching to point where you know you’d feel better if you could just throw up and expel whatever is poisoning you, but not being able to do it.

I believe it was just a couple weeks later I was hit with what met all the criteria of being e-coli. This seemed to last a really, really long time but in reality was probably only a handful of days, followed by feeling off for another few days. Again, I was unable to follow through with my feelings of upset stomach, no matter how hard I tried to force it. My stomach was stiff and my instinct was telling me everything inside me was incredibly inflamed.

There were multiple occasions that I’d have to drive Bo an hour to his vet appointment and didn’t know if I’d make it, which was terrifying to me because his well-being is a top priority. It really wouldn’t have been OK to let his health problems go untreated because I was feeling sick. I knew I had to get him in ASAP when he had an enlarged prostate, and on top of being sick the roads were icy at the time. I took a puke bag or bucket, a water bottle, located all the restrooms along the route, and made a very very slow trek to the veterinarian.

From then on, I would have one excruciating menstrual cycle + one or two bouts of the stomach bug every month. Diarrhea was also common through the entire period of not feeling well. There are quite a few other small symptoms from brain fog to acne to depression to fatigue to migraines to more personal ailments we won’t talk about here right now. UUUUUUUUGH I felt completely useless and angry with myself for potentially being an absolute baby. I would remind myself that Griffin isn’t sick, and we essentially share food and an environment, and I was probably just handling these feelings with too much empathy.

Then I got to a point where mind over matter was not even SLIGHTLY working, and I started researching who could help. I believe western medicine only masks the problem or makes it worse, and seeing a doctor with only a handful of nutrition study hours and no focus on holistic practices was the last thing I wanted to do. I’d gotten to multiple points where I just wanted an ambulance to come pick me up, though LOL. I spent quite some time locating the nearest holistic practitioners, vegan doctors, etc. I was actually surprised to find my inner reassurance that a vegan doctor was only a phone call away here in the PNW was a little off. I could only find ONE holistic and ONE vegan doctor in my area, and only found another one or two when I expanded my search criteria to include all of the state, and my best option didn’t appear to accept my insurance. At one point I actually tried making an appointment with one of them and after multiple voicemails they never got back to me.

I would also like to throw in here, for those who may be wondering, I did try many many other solutions. I thought I was allergic to soy, wheat or tomatoes and tested that theory. I thought I had sensitivities to fatty foods like nuts, oils, and avocados and tested that theory. I thought going raw would be my solution (actually quite the opposite!). I thought it was something in my tap water or the new dry climate we moved to or mold exposure or from petting my cat and dogs or being in contact with the cows on the ex-dairy farm we live on (ironic, I know).

Just recently I decided it was time I handle this and address my beliefs and intuition about what it could be.

Go to part three here