Friends Friday - Guest blogger

Happy Friday friends! I love Fridays. Even though I don't have a normal Monday through Friday job, there's still something fun about Friday.

Speaking of "normal" jobs. I have a guest blogger today whose job is anything but. Her name is Kelli Bedway and she is a 911 dispatcher in Arizona. She's been telling cops where to go for about 20 years. It's a job that can really take its toll on you. Keeping healthy is important in order to help your body deal with the stresses of the job. I've asked Kelli to share her thoughts on a paleo diet. Her recipe at the end sounds super yummy!

 I’m a sugar addict.  That is the first step to recovery, admission.  Right?? I learned this about myself about 3 years ago. I always would joke about being addicted to sugar, but then I had an article pop up in front of me that said, “Are You Addicted to Sugar?”.  I clicked on it and what I read was shocking.  

Our brains react to sugar the exact same way they react to cocaine.  The way our brains make our bodies crave cocaine is exactly the same as when our brains make our bodies crave sugar.  Whoa…that hit me hard. I truly am a sugar addict.  This is no longer a joke.  I have a family history of diabetes and heart disease and I sometimes would get hypoglycemic (low blood sugar).  That is scary stuff.  I don’t want to be dependent on insulin for the rest of my life if I can prevent it. 

I am not really a research type person, but I started reading articles and books on how to combat sugar addiction.  To make a VERY long story short, I learned that chemicals in our food are killing us, sugar is very bad and wheat is not good either. My youngest sister told me to research Paleo. 

The more I read about Paleo, the more overwhelmed I became, but I also knew that was the path I needed to take for my body.  Everybody is different.  Paleo is not for everyone, just like being vegetarian or vegan is not for everyone.  I started on the path to Paleo.  It was very hard to kick the sugar habit.  I truly mean it when I say this, I went through some serious withdrawals kicking the sugar habit.  Just like a drug addict, I had the shakes, I craved it so badly and I was sick.  Ridding my body of those toxins I took into my body was not easy for sure, but after about 3 weeks, I started to feel better.  It was the same with the chemicals.  Also like some drug addicts, I fall off the wagon.  I see a piece of chocolate or decide I need to eat a tortilla and it is all over.  I eat bread, sweets and chemical filled processed food.  After several weeks of that, while in my food induced coma, I realize what I have done and I have to start all over again.  The key is, I do start over again because I remember how good it feels when I eat the right food. I lost 35 pounds eating Paleo and had a lot more energy. When I fall off the wagon I gain it all back and I feel sluggish and tired all the time. 

I will break this down as simple and general as I can.  Paleo is also called the caveman diet.  I don’t like that it is called a diet because it’s not a diet, it truly is a way of life.  It is changing the way you eat…forever.  The premise is to get back to eating the way cavemen ate.  They didn’t have sugar or chemicals then.  They were hunters and gatherers.  So the foods that are Paleo are grass fed and hormone free meat, nitrate free pork, free range and hormone free chicken and eggs from free range chickens, seeds, nuts, veggies and some fruits.  In other words, basic.  No sugar, no grains, no legumes (including peanuts because they are not nuts, they are legumes), no food dyes, no chemicals.  There are so many books and websites out there with amazing recipes to help be creative.  That is how I got started, now I have learned how to modify my favorite recipes to make them paleo. 

No sugar is for obvious reasons, sugar is BAD! And by the way, so is artificial sweetener.  The very words artificial is the dead giveaway.  Also, those artificial sweeteners make you crave sweet even more.  Why can’t we have grains?  That goes against every version of the food pyramid out there.  The simplest way to say it is, grain is not the same as it used to be.  At the end of WWII there was a serious food shortage and people in Europe were starving.  Scientists found a way to modify wheat and other grains like corn, to make them grow faster so they could feed more people much quicker and they did it with chemicals.  Now, there are very few places in the world that don’t modify their grains.  It is filled with pesticides and chemically modified to make it grow faster.  Because of that, more and more people have a gluten intolerance and food allergies.  Why no legumes?  Our bodies don’t digest legumes well and that is why when we eat beans, we have more gas. Some articles say that dairy is not Paleo and others say it is.  My feeling is, if your body can handle the dairy, then go ahead and have it, in moderation.  Just make sure it is full fat dairy because the process of taking the fat out of dairy is not good.  Also, beware, dairy has sugar, which is why we consume so much dairy.  When I eat cheese, I try to eat all natural like Tillamook brand.  They are a farm that has grass fed and hormone free cows so their cheese is natural. 

Organic is very expensive, so if you can’t eat organic, at least eat natural.  Shop the outer edges of a grocery store.  The produce aisle and the meat aisle.  Sometimes you can venture into the inside aisles, but be sure to read the labels on the food.  If you don’t know what an ingredient is or can’t pronounce it, then don’t buy it. Eating right shouldn’t be more expensive, but sadly it is.  I shop for my produce at the farmer’s market.  I can get a lot more for my money. So many foods have sugar in them, so if you have to buy something that has sugar, just make sure the amount is minimal.  If sugar is in the first 5 ingredients, don’t buy it.  Example, Nutella’s very first ingredient is sugar.  That means the sugar content is very high. That is why it is best to make food yourself instead of buying it premade.  

I recently fell off the wagon again and I am trying to get back on.  Someday I will get on that wagon and stay on.  The way my body feels when I’m on the wagon is amazing.  If you decide to go Paleo, just be sure to do your research and happy healthy eating!

I love food and my food has to taste good.  So one of my favorite meals is super easy and good for you.  I buy Kroger brand spaghetti sauce.  I think it is called private selection.  It is in a nice jar with a black label. It is all natural ingredients, nothing scary.  I dice up some nitrate free kielbasa and brown it up.  I add the spaghetti sauce and add a bunch of veggies to that.  Veggies like mushrooms, olives, zucchini, bell peppers, tomatoes and whatever else I have in the fridge.  Cook that until it’s hot and then eat.  If you put enough veggies in it, then it is thick and chunky and you don’t even miss the pasta.  You also get 1 to 2 servings of veggies in one meal and it was SUPER easy which is the only way I cook!  Enjoy!

Bee nice!

The weather has been wonderful here in the Valley of the Sun. It's been fluctuating between the mid 70's to high 80's and will reach 95 degrees this week. And that has brought the return of my little friends to my backyard. 

I first saw them last year. Well, I really saw the birds. Quite a few birds actually. They kept swooping down to a small retaining wall separating some plants from my pool. I thought it was really odd behavior. And then I saw that they were snatching little bees that were flying around my lime tree. Is that normal? I kept watching, and those darn little bees were crawling in between the blocks of my retaining wall. They weren't aggressive. And they are very small. They just kept about their business of going out of the retaining wall, buzzing up to the lime tree and returning to the spaces between the blocks. I contacted two local bee keepers and they said because of the location next to the pool, they didn't want to extract the bees due to the possibility of ruining the wall and/or getting a lot of debris in the pool. Unfortunately, what they both proposed made me a little sad. They both said I should probably just spray a bug killer into the cracks in the evening after the bees returned to their "home". They weren't really bothering anyone. But it is a little unsettling with so many of them right there by the pool. Nobody wants to go swimming. I may try to contact another bee keeper. 

Anyway, this is the time of year when bees are very active. Here in Arizona we have a lot of Africanized honey bees. And every year there are reports of people and animals being attacked and sometimes killed. Those bees are known for protecting their hives and are relentless in their pursuit. So there's no wonder people are afraid. Sometimes people call 911 in a panic over a swarm of bees that have collected on a mail box, a street sign or tree limb. That is not always a cause for alarm.

Bees usually swarm because they are looking for a new home. They like space. So when their hive starts to become crowded, a group of bees will take the queen and go looking for a new place to set up residency, leaving the other bees behind to raise a new queen. They will usually fly to a spot not too far from their original hive and a few scouts will take off in search of the perfect home. Upon their return they each dance their home's description and try to get the other bees excited about seeing it. Whoever does the best dance, wins. This whole process may take a couple of days. During this time they are not very active and not likely to attack. Walk calmly away and if possible, let them be. No need to call anyone as they will be gone soon. Unless they are swarming on your car and you need to be somewhere. But be mindful. If there is a swarm, then there is likely a hive nearby. Maybe someplace you don't really want one. Like somewhere on your house.

So don't panic. Bee nice. Bee calm. And let them find a new home.