Vegan Day 3: Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead

Bet that blog title caught your attention!

Last night, Dan and I watched a documentary on Netflix called Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead. I actually watched it on Monday night too while Dan was at work, but he wanted to check it out so I watched it with him again. It's only 90 minutes long. If you don't have Netflix, you can also watch the film free on Hulu right now too. I highly recommend it! Wikipedia has already done a fine job of summarizing the film for me, so I'll just credit them and paste the summary here:

Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead is a 2010 American documentary film which follows the 60-day journey of Australian Joe Cross across the United States as he follows a juice fast to regain his health under the care of Dr. Joel Fuhrman, Nutrition Research Foundation's Director of Research. Cross and Robert Mac, co-creators of the film, both serve on the Nutrition Research Foundation's Advisory Board. Following his fast and the adoption of a plant-based diet, Cross lost 100 pounds and discontinued all medications. During his road trip Cross meets Phil Staples, a morbidly obese truck driver from Sheldon, Iowa, in a truck stop in Arizona and inspires him to try juice fasting.

While Joe's journey is a pretty extreme one - nothing but juiced fruits and vegetables for 60 days! - the film does provide a lot of valuable information about nutrition and health in an entertaining way. Clearly I didn't find it boring at all, since I watched it two nights in a row. The film has a lot of short interviews with people Joe meets along the way. It was very interesting to hear all the excuses people gave as to why they can't or won't eat healthier. It was also interesting to hear one of the doctors in the film say that 70% of all disease in this country is due to a lifestyle choice - either smoking, alcoholism, overeating, and/or lack of exercise. 

At one point in the film, Joe says, "I love how people automatically say, 'Oh I could never do that.' You haven't even tried. Let's say you try a 10 day juice fast and you quit on day 7. Good on you for trying! Good on you for trying." He also says, "It's not about perfection, it's about moderation." I could not agree more and that has always been the message and purpose behind my blog. Do your best to be your best self and accept that not every day is going to be a perfect day of eating. However, if you take care of yourself by eating right most of the time and exercising regularly, it's going to go a long way. While I know everyone has their struggles - I certainly have - overall I am shocked at the blatant disregard so many people have for their health.

The film struck a chord with me because some of my reasons for doing this vegan challenge are in line with why Joe decided to do the juice fast. He hoped to cleanse and detox his body. He hoped to retrain his taste buds. He hoped the challenge would pave the road to a more healthful lifestyle and more fresh, whole foods. 

Today when I came home from work, I made a Cajun pasta dish with white beans and kale. I was a little nervous about this one, because I don't like spicy food. However, it seemed like the rest of the ingredients in the dish would balance out the Cajun spice enough that I'd be OK with it. I was right - it was flavorful and peppery, just the right amount. It was also incredibly easy to cook!

Dan added more Cajun spice to his plate to kick it up a notch. He thought it was very tasty and very filling - he couldn't finish all the pasta he put on his plate!

I had originally planned on making a tofu stir fry tonight after dinner because I'm working both jobs the next two days and wanted to have enough meals. Tonight's recipe made a TON of pasta though, so I have plenty of leftovers! I also still have an eggplant burger leftover too, so I held off on the stir fry for now. I'll probably make it on Saturday. One thing I have to be careful about in my meal planning is buying too many vegetables before being able to use them. I was worried that my broccoli for the stir fry was no good anymore, but it seems to be just fine. It definitely needs to be used soon, though!

I'll probably be MIA from blogging for the next couple of days. Thank you to everyone who has been reading and thank you for the support and encouragement you've given me so far!

Wednesday 4/3 Food & Exercise Log

Rest day from working out

6 AM
-1 cup Multigrain Cheerios with 1 cup Almond Breeze unsweetened almond milk

8:30 AM 

-Thomas's 100% Whole Wheat Bagel Thin with 2 tbsp Skippy Natural Peanut Butter - creamy style, 1/3 less sodium and 1/3 less sugar

-Coffee with Silk French Vanilla creamer (forgot to include this in my log yesterday. The Silk coffee creamer is just OK. I do miss regular coffee creamer.)

            

12:45 PM 

-Spinach salad with cherry tomatoes, almond / pomegranate mix and balsamic vinaigrette

-2 vegan tacos, leftover from last night's dinner

6:30 PM

-Cajun pasta with white beans and kale (definitely overserved myself on the pasta. Had a pretty large bowl. Whoops...)

7:30 PM

-Craving something sweet, so I had a bowl of Multigrain Cheerios with almond milk