Heading into a New Adventure

Hello Friend ~ Welcome to my midlife crisis! 😊 I started this website to share my adventures from health hazard to health happiness and hopefully make it easier for you to navigate the journey!

One day I was informed by my doctor that I had some issues.  Issues that were leading me down the devastating path that I watched my parents, and so many others travel, that included prescriptions, fatigue, achy joints, obesity, high health markers, and getting, or at least knocking at the door of, many chronic diseases, like diabetes and heart disease. Ouch!  Granted, at 55 I was in mid-life, the time when I could have just accepted that things would naturally begin to fall apart and start that downhill slide into ‘old age’.  That’s usually when we stop living to our maximum fun potential and start doing less of the things that bring youthful joy, glowing happiness and wildly exuberant adventures! No way!  I was not going to have it!   

I set out to find a way to regain my health and take back my adventuresome self that still loves to eat great food, travel to new places, swim in cold lakes, walk my dogs, bike ride and find brand new wild and crazy ways to enjoy life!  I hadn’t seen that person for a while, but it was time to find me!

I’ve lived most of my adult life on a diet, trying every new fad that would promise weight loss, since after my teen years, my weight began to rollercoaster. Even while appearing to be a normal weight, the methods I used to get there were creating a volcano of problems inside of my body just waiting to erupt. 

And it did. 

After years of “low-carb/high-fat” dieting, I could no longer sustain the diet, or my weight, and when both my expanding waistline and declining energy served up a side of pre-diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, elevated liver enzymes and obesity, I knew it was time to find the real answer that could save me. Clearly all the meats, cheeses and eggs I could eat was not doing it.

Starting a new path can seem daunting, but with the vast amount of available knowledge online, I began my search to improve my health and energy.  I realize that online nutrition information is extensive, and I also realize that there is an argument to support every theory, sane or not, but eventually I landed on what I have found to prevent and often reverse, chronic disease and health issues. A whole food, plant-based diet.  Yes, more fruits and vegetables…bet you haven’t heard that one before!  This time though, I took it beyond just adding more salads to my diet.  I made a pivotal and life-saving decision that I wish I had made so much sooner!

I’ve always been a hardcore foodie and food-obsessed would not be a stretch to describe me. Never just an “eat to live” person, I’ve always lived to eat and that’s likely one of the traits I have that led me down the scary spiral. Happily, I can report that my taste buds have been jumping for joy and my food-obsession is still intact. I love to read recipes and cookbooks but rarely cook from them. Nothing against recipes, but I’m a wing-it-in-the-kitchen type of cook and love to sling together dishes from the creativity in my soul and the ingredients in my kitchen. It mostly works out well!

This is how Wild Plant Kitchen was born!