>>From reading your blog it’s evident that you invest a great deal of time and energy into feeding your family in the most healthful way you know how.  I’m hoping you can help me naviagte a social situation to enable me to do the same.

I’m presently 8 1/2 months pregnant with our first child, and have been married about 16 months.  Eating organic is something I feel strongly about, and something my husband basically goes along with for me.  When hearing of our organic preference, a well-meaning friend excitedly reported that her family also eats organic.  After we accepted the invitation and the hostess did her cooking, she informed me that, actually, she used some mayonnaise that wasn’t organic because she didn’t want to make a special trip to Whole Foods, and the eggs in the (dish) weren’t organic because the organic ones have more blood spots, and then there was the non-organic mazta meal in the kugel, and the challot were from a bakery–not organic.  She reiterated that the chicken and vegetables were definitely organic.  I would have preferred not to have eaten there.

My husband is concerned that my dietary preferences will socially isolate us.  I’m hoping that once we live in that neighborhood and can reciprocate … by having people over, not eating by other people won’t be such a big deal.  There’s also the possibility that once in the neighborhood, I might find at least a couple families similarly committed to eating organic.

What do you think?  How do you handle Shabbat invitations from families that don’t sprout their grains, etc.?  How can we best manage Shabbat invitations that I’d rather not accept?<<

I can see how this is a challenging situation for you!

I have a few thoughts on this. The first issue is to determine how flexible you're willing to be for the sake of developing relationships.  There are things I prefer to do in my own home but don't impose on others – we'd never go anywhere if I did!  I don't have an absolutist attitude about food even in my own home – life is very full and busy and it takes more  time and energy than I have to insist on always having something a certain way.  That means I myself don't always sprout my grains, soak flour, or whatever else, so if I myself don't do it 100%, I certainly don't expect it of anyone else!

Practically speaking, because dh and I both have health protocols that we need to follow that don't allow for sugar or flour, that's where we draw the line when we go to someone else's home.  I basically stick to vegetables and simple proteins from whatever is served, and bring my own whole wheat matza.  The kids eat whatever is served, and I'm fine with that, even if it's all white flour and lots of sugar.  I prefer not to give them fluorescent popsicles and allow only a minimal amount of soda, though.

I'm comfortable with this approach because I don't think there's a big issue with periodically having non-nutritive/non-ideal food.  My thoughts are that a strong foundation is important for health, but if that framework is in place, there's room to wiggle a bit and allow for things that are less than ideal.  Even when my kids went to camp for a month, aside from giving them guidelines about how to make the best possible choices food-wise, I accepted that they would eat whatever was served.  (In fact they did choose to stay away from most white flour products and stick mostly with proteins and vegetables.)

Having said that, we all have to draw a line somewhere, and if you feel passionately that you don't want to eat anything non-organic, it leaves you three options:

1) Prepare food for yourself (not your husband) and take it with you when you're invited out.  I think this is the best option, and have done this at times in the past when I didn't want to inconvenience my host to prepare foods without sugar for me.  I recognized it was hard for someone used to cooking in a certain way to adapt for me.  My message was never: "I have to bring my own food because what you cook isn't good enough"; rather "I know my food limitations can be challenging for someone not used to it, so I'd like to save you the work and will bring my own."  The former approach would clearly rub a host the wrong way and leave them with a bad feeling, the latter doesn't.

The focus on being at someone's home isn't about the food, but the fellowship, and you can enjoy that whether you eat their food or your own.  I've had guests bring their own food and I'm glad they are honest and have a way to meet their needs while we are able to enjoy one another's company.

2) Have guests to your home – this is a great choice but realize that it starts to be challenging to only have people over and then refuse their reciprocal invitations.  It makes a relationship inequitable when one side is always in the position of giving and one of taking, and most people aren't comfortable with this long term.

3) Socially isolate yourself by not accepting invitations and not be in a position to invite others over.  Obviously this isn't a good option!

My main concerns based on what you wrote are: a) be careful that you aren't giving off vibes to people that you feel they are below you in some way because their food standards aren't up to your preferences; b) it seems your husband doesn't share the strength of your convictions, so you'll need to be careful not to polarize the situation or turn this into an issue that you argue over.

Avivah

Over a year ago, my dd15 (then 14) complained about foot and ankle pain.  Thinking she’s probably twisted it, I suggested waiting it out, since that’s usually what the doctor recommends, along with ice packs, rest, and elevation.  She didn’t complain much (she’s not a complainer at all), but three months later when she returned from her month at sleep away camp, she told me it was still hurting.

That obviously was way too long for a strain to still be a problem, so I took her to the pediatrician, who recommended rest, cold, and elevation. I told her we did all that and together we determined that a referral to a podiatrist would be in order.  I spent the next five months taking dd to the podiatrist.  He tried a number of things – taping her foot, wrapping her foot, uniboots – but nothing improved the pain.

At one point he said said the inflammation was the problem, so I did some research and prepared some herbal capsules dd was able to take to reduce that, rather than take steroids.  (I wrote about that here.)  Her foot stopped hurting but when we returned, the podiatrist said if we hadn’t reduced the inflammation with medicine he was familiar with, he couldn’t trust that the swelling was actually gone.  He said pain was the only indication that there was swelling, and just because the pain was gone it didn’t mean anything – maybe the herbs I gave her had an anti pain effect.  So she’d still need to take the anti-swelling medication he recommended before he could determine what else he could do to address the situation.

In short, dd decided she didn’t want to, and we never went back – after five months and a number of visits, we were no closer to figuring out the problem and I didn’t have confidence that it was going to be figured out.  I did take her to our chiropractor, who did an adjustment as well as energy work, which improved the situation. But the pain was off and on, and I felt there was something physiological that had to be dealt with.

Several months later, a fantastic orthopedist was recommended by a friend, and I was very impressed by him and grateful that we met someone so knowledgeable and competent.  In our first and only visit in the beginning of June, he determined that the pain was caused by slightly fallen arches – her walking pattern had changed to compensate for this, which was what was causing the pain.  And this could easily be taken care of – all she needed were orthodic inserts.

I met the orthodist there, made an appointment for the next day, and went to get dd fitted for orthodics.  The orthodics she needed were $500 for a pair, and my insurance company recently stopped paying for these.  (I found it ironic that they’d be willing to pay for visits to a podiatrist for months but not a one time outlay to alleviate the need for future visits.)

I asked her about options if we didn’t go with the orthodics, and she mentioned cork bottom shoes were good since they mold to the shape of the wearer’s foot.  The brand she particularly recommended was Teva, which are very pricey.  However, the factory is located in Israel and if you go there, you can buy them at half the price – and the factory is fairly close to where my daughter will be for the coming year. So I told dd we’d wait for her to go and she could treat herself to a few pairs when she got there.

But then at the end of the visit the orthodist said something that I wondered about – she said that for dd, the worst thing possible for her feet was to go barefoot.  This seemed counterintuitive to me, and got me thinking and then learning more…..

(Since this is getting so long, I’ll share the rest of my research in another post.)

Avivah

What a beautiful, beautiful day I had!

First of all, it’s been gorgeous outside.  I love the spring, which is appropriate for someone whose name means ‘spring’, isn’t it?  🙂

Secondly, I went on a guided herbal walk in the afternoon.  Just me, no kids.  It was the perfect weather for something like this – to do something that I love, outdoors, in the season that I love – ahhh.  I literally feel my soul being nourished when I’m outside surrounded by natural beauty.  I had a wonderful Passover but there was a lot of work leading up to it and throughout, and this herbal walk was the perfect balance to help me shift mental and energetic gears before getting back to our regular schedule. It was led by an experienced herbalist at an institute that offers graduate level studies in herbalism.

Not only did I enjoy the walk and the weather and learn some new and interesting things (eg that I should be using much larger measurements of herbs for medicinal purposes than I currently am), I also met a couple of women there who were had a similar perspective to me regarding health and wellness.  Have you ever had an uncanny feeling that things are being orchestrated just for you?  That was how I felt today.  The timing in meeting them was really incredible, and I was taken aback that out of the three people I ‘happened’ to chat with, two provided me exactly what I needed right now.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking for a while now about becoming certified in some way to offer nutritional/health/wellness services.  Nutrition and wellness are topics that I love learning about, and have been using my spare time to continually build on my knowledge base for years.  I was researching a particular graduate program last night that had a strong appeal because of its rigorous science based foundation, and this morning was feeling particularly frustrated and despairing, not seeing how it was possible for at all for me for the next few years. And I was sent these two people just hours later to encourage me!

The first person I spoke to mentioned that she’s beginning exactly the program I was considering in the fall!  I’ve never met anyone who attended that university at all, let alone this exact program (it’s in another state, but they have distance learning options combined with the requirement to travel there at one point towards the end).  She gave me a lot of helpful information about it and other alternatives.

The second woman is already offering the kind of services I’d be most interested in providing, and she gave me some very helpful feedback on certification.  I love learning new things, but I’m resistant (to put it mildly) to the idea that I’d have to sit through years of classes where information is given over that I believe to be inaccurate and even harmful just to get a piece of paper stating that I know something (which is what would be involved if I pursued certification as a registered dietician).  Her perspective was very valuable and encouraging to me, since it helped me reframe my expectations and beliefs surrounding this.

There was so much synchronicity involved in the short time I was speaking with these women that it was like a direct message from G-d.  I really, really needed some outside perspective from people who ‘get’ where I’m coming from.  I haven’t come to any conclusions but I’m feeling a lot less pressured to squeeze more hours into the day than I have, and more optimistic and relaxed about the possibilities!  And I brought home some mugwort seeds to plant in my garden.  🙂

Avivah

I feel pretty strongly about the importance of high quality food as it affects our health in so many ways.  And when I learned that the first episode of Food Revolution, which was shown on Friday night on TV, could be viewed online (search at abc.com if you’re interested), I figured it would be interesting.  Since my ds16 was still awake, he watched it with me.

The theme of the program is that Jamie Oliver, a British chef, goes to Huntington, WV – the fattest city in the US to bring some change to the school lunch program in a particular district.  Since I have nine children, avoid virtually all processed foods, and believe that we all benefit from cooking from ingredients in their natural state, you’d probably anticipate I would embrace every aspect of this program.

Here’s the basic rundown of the first part of the program (101) – it opens with him showing his disgust of the food the kids are served and expressing that to the women who work there.  Then it shows a local pastor preaching about the importance of good health expressing support of Jamie in his goals.  Then he meets with an individual family (all obese) – this was the  best part of the program, in my opinion and I’ll write more below.  He then meets with the woman in charge of the school foods, gets an agreement from her for a week’s trial to prepare his healthy food in a local school, and prepares a healthy lunch that is mostly refused by the kids.  A newspaper article in the town appears in which he seems to have made some negative statements about the towns inhabitants (which he claims were taken out of context – knowing that this frequently happens with print media, that’s likely), he then gets all teary-eyed about how hard he’s trying, and then the episode ends.

I honestly was irritated within a few minutes of the program beginning when I heard how dismissively Jamie was speaking to the women who worked at the lunchroom, preparing the foods for the kids.  He spoke down to them and had an condescending attitude that anyone could pick up on – and then acts like, ‘poor me, these ladies are so mean to me’.  I thought that all the women who worked in the cafeteria were pretty tolerant of him considering how he was speaking to them – I’d have been less pleasant than even the toughest of them was if spoken down to like that, and felt they were unfairly portrayed as defensive and negative.

I really had to wonder what his goal in dealing with them was – it seems to me he got their backs up against the wall and made them defensive from the get go, which could have easily been avoided. I was wondering if he had the ability to effectively communicate the importance of healthy food, but when he got together with the family and I saw he certainly can be sympathetic and understanding one on one.  It’s a shame he didn’t take time to meet with the women who worked in the cafeteria and educate them from the beginning, treating them with respect and honoring their desire to feed the children they are responsible for good food, would have gone so much further – every one of them seemed willing to try something new and I’m positive if approached differently could have been very helpful allies for him in getting his ‘food revolution’ going.  I kept trying to push the thought out of my mind that it was set up like that purposely to create interest in tv viewers.

When he got together with the family, he prepared all of their typical food for the week, and put it on the table in front of them at once.  I thought that was a powerful way to bring home to them what kind of garbage they were eating all day, and the mother’s emotional response showed that it hit her viscerally that what she’s feeding her kids is killing them.  Then it showed him speaking to the extremely overweight 12 year old (over 300 lb), who shared about being bullied for being fat, and poignantly got across how hard it is to be a fat kid, and he expressed how he really wanted to be thinner and healthier.  That’s the reality for so many kids in this country.

Jamie went on to cook them a ‘healthy’ meal from scratch, but I wasn’t extremely impressed with the food, though it was loads better than their typical diet of processed foods.  White pasta with salad and sauce – no protein, no high quality carbohydrate, and to be nitpicky, he sauteed the garlic in olive oil (which isn’t heat stable and shouldn’t be cooked).  Anyway, a family that unhealthy would be better off with his selection of food, but he seemed to be a proponent of low fat/high carb cooking, which I’m not a fan of.

He then met with Rhonda, the head of the food programs, who was very willing to give him a chance.  Actually, everyone there seemed willing to give him the chance to see what he could do.  He was told (reasonably, I thought) that his food had to conform to the government regulations.  He made some delicious looking chicken drumsticks and brown rice (never would I have thought it a good idea to start offering brown rice as the first new option for kids who are used to processed garbage 🙄 – he could have made oven roasted potatoes or something more familiar), and seemed to conveniently ignore that he needed 2 starches for his meal to fit into the mandated structure.  Okay, I think the rule about two starches is unhealthy and idiotic, but he agreed to work within the rules that everyone else had to follow so why was he bowing out of his side of the bargain in the very first meal? Again, I was left wondering how much about this was for tv – it would have been pretty easy to have prepared healthy versions of familiar foods (eg – whole wheat pizza, homemade chicken nuggets made from real chicken meat without all the preservatives) and to have eased the kids into healthier foods.

I was surprised that the kids were offered a choice between his healthy meal and the typical school pizza.  The vast majority of kids will stick with the familiar and anyone who knows kids could have predicted the outcome – that most kids chose the unhealthy foods.  My kids all enjoy healthy foods but if I gave choices of: a) fresh raw whole milk or b) pink strawberry pasteurized/homogenized milk; a) whole wheat sourdough bread or b) Pillsbury cinnamon rolls; a) a fresh apple or b) canned fruit in syrup – how would they ever have a chance to develop healthy tastebuds?  I’m confident that all kids can learn to enjoy healthy foods, but the choices offered have to be between two healthy food choices or no choices at all.

There were some other ways he interacted with people of the town that I thought weren’t appropriate and he didn’t express himself authentically, which affected how he was viewed by those who could or should have been his allies.  It’s hard for me to overlook his personal behavior – to me, character is very important, and having a worthy goal doesn’t make bad behavior okay.

Setting aside my negative feelings about some aspects of his personal interactions, generally the show is positive:  it showed the kind of garbage kids are being fed by well-intended people, food that meets government guidelines.  It shows how much food is wasted every day in schools.  And I think that it indirectly showed that people are serving this kind of food because they simply don’t know it’s bad for them.  I thought it was telling and sad that the six year olds asked to identify fresh vegetables couldn’t accurately label them – my three year old could easily identify any of what was shown.  Clearly the issue isn’t just what kids are being fed at school, but what they’re eating at home as well – it’s all the same kind of processed foods.

My ds thought that Jamie had a dynamic and engaging personality, which is true.  All in all this was an entertaining and enjoyable program, and I think that Jamie Oliver has a true passion to help improve the kind of food people are eating.  Taking on this project – to transform the food lunches in the school system in Huntington, WV – is a great goal and has a lot of positive ramifications.   I hope he’s successful; any step in the direction of improving the food that people are eating is a good step!

Avivah