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It's my 39th birthday today and I wish I could say I'm feeling upbeat, but I'm not. I'm feeling down, anxious, scared, unsure . So many thoughts going on at once - like, "wow, next year is the big four-oh!" "How is my health really???" "What have I done with my life?" "Where am I going?" "How much time do I have left to make my life mean something?" and so on and so on.

One thing I'm determined to do is give myself a gift this year - the gift of vibrant and creative health. And that's why it means so much to me to begin raw tomorrow (I pretty much knew that this weekend would be a dud in terms of starting out...) I still want to do a 7-day fruit and veggie fast, but this first week is not the week to do it. I'm putting it off for a week or so and focusing next week on beginning raw and keeping it simple. I am changing a few things from the other times I have done raw. I'm focusing more on fruits and veggies and less on nuts/seeds and avocado (although I'll include these as well for variety). I'm also going to try and not use added oils for dressing but stick with citrus and let the natural fats of nuts or tehina or avocado carry the fatty flavor.

Here's my general menu for the week:
Morning: fruit salad with some celery to balance out the sweetness of the fruits, maybe a dash of fresh lemon juice; lots of water
Mid-Morning: Green smoothie or more fresh fruit
Afternoon: Big green salad with other veggies, lemon juice and/or apple cider vinegar, fresh herbs, avocado or some nuts or tehina
Mid-Afternoon: Fresh fruit or green smoothie if hungry
Evening: Salad made with apples and celery (my favorite way to end the day), maybe a dash of lemon juice and honey to sweeten
Night snacks (if hungry): fresh tropical fruit (pineapple or mango) and/or raw fudge made from ground almonds, carob, and a dash of honey

I'm continuing to exercise, since that really helps me with stress and anxiety and just makes me feel good (God bless Leslie Sansone!) I'm also getting in yoga for stress release, which I love.

I also want to continue giving up watching TV at night and stick with reading books (which is actually a ton more relaxing for me than TV) and start to write again in the evenings, even if just for a half hour or an hour.

I went shopping today and bought a bunch of fruit. Some of it I've never bought before (like fresh whole pineapple - now I just have to figure out how to cut it up ) and some I haven't bought in a long time (fresh mangos, melon). My fridge is stocked with fruit (so thank goodness I cleaned it out well yesterday!) But ironically, even though I bought a lot of the more expensive fruit like the tropical fruits and kiwi, my grocery bill was even less than it usually is on a regular whole foods vegan diet (so that kills the theory that a raw food diet is more expensive than a regular vegan diet - for me at least )

I'm anxious to start and feeling very positive about it. I know it's going to be tough for the first few days because I've been eating crap the past 3 days trying to get myself out of the birthday blues . But I'm taking it one day at a time and doing a lot of reading (pulled out Gabriel Cousens' "Conscious Eating" again).

Tam