So, speaking of food— I spoke too soon last friday. I wrote my friday post on thursday even– when I  thought I was doing great, but man oh man, this weekend was sort of a long nightmare for me. I have a few suspicions to what me going on— but no clear answers yet. I’ve been basically on a liquid diet since saturday— and I’m not still not hungry and I still look 6 months pregnant. The biggest thing is figuring out A. why my digestion stopped. B. How to light my digestive fire again. I’m trying, but not much seems to be working– which makes me scratch my head even more to the other possibilities it could be. Anyway, I’m still mostly feeling okay– it’s mostly my gut thats dragging me down, but I’ve dealt with his before and I’ll deal with again. When I first got c. diff I read forum after forums of people still struggling 5 and 7 years later– so for me to mostly be pretty good, with just some random gut issue flare ups one year later? Well, I’ll take it.

And Marlowe? Well, she’s a super trooper for sure. And overall, she’s just an awesome kid– and so on top of life. I mean, they gave her a lollipop at school the other day (I feel like they should ask about those things first, but whatever) and she asked if she could have it at home. I said, I would prefer if she didn’t have it at all, but since they had already given it to her, I wasn’t going to take it away– so maybe she could just have a tiny bit and then throw it away since it wasn’t good for her– and she agreed. She had a few licks, walked over to the trash can and threw it away no problem. At 5, she gets it. Healthy, real food feeds the good bacteria, and sugar and processed foods/bleached foods feed the bad bacteria. And she knows that she needs the good guys to be healthy to fight the bad guys.

This month I’ve personally realized the effects of white rice on my body– I hadn’t really eaten it in a while and when I tried it (two days in a row) I could really, really feel the effects of it. It was crazy— I’m either much more sensitive to foods now or I just realize my sensitive more. Or both, likely both. Either way, we’ve started cooking brown rice a whole lot more than white. For me, we would have always done this– but it’s been a bit harder to convince the other two white rice lovers in the family. Everyone seems to be pretty okay with the change though, finally.

Marlowe’s diet is great, but isn’t perfect— though my standards are really high these days. I still wish we could just cut out the store bought tortillas and things like that— but they’re so easy for lunch time food (she will happily bring a black bean quesadilla to lunch everyday—– it’s the bean recipe in cookbook, pureed and slathered on a tortilla). But at the end of the day, I know— or I try to rationalize that a wheat tortilla each day isn’t the worst thing in the world. It’s not great— but it’s not the worst thing. Sure, it’d be amazinggg if I could send her to school with a traditionally made, real tortilla everyday, but that’s not really happening, not yet anyway 😉


Her new favorite after school treat is homemade “ice cream” — which is really just frozen bananas and strawberries blended together. I’ve always learned that when we use red sweet plantains instead of bananas? It’s magic! It doesn’t even taste banana-y, just delicious. I’ll even happily eat it! Placed in a gluten free cone and the kid is in heaven. 

We’ve explained how it’s not that we wont let her have any sugar, there will be exceptions where we make her cookies for birthday parties or whatever— but processed sugar every day or every week is just not something that is needed, since it has zero positive effects on the body. She does eat a lot of natural sugar though. She probably has about 5-7+ servings of fruit everyday. I don’t know if I mentioned this, but I would personally like to make it so that she only eats fruit on an empty stomach (how it should be eaten), but that proves to be a bit more challenging since fruit is the snack of choice around here and snacks are obviously between meals or after meals. I’m sure things would be easier  if we could all be on the same diet– if I wasn’t so restricted still, but it’s how it is. And really, it’s not difficult now at all– but I do look forward to it all getting better with each passing day.

Since Alex isn’t around for dinner and my diet is still pretty restricted, her and I don’t often end up eating the same things– so most days I’m happy to let her choose her own supper. And she never disappoints. The other day when asked she said, “what about some tofu mixed with corn, peas, and black beans— and a little bit of spinach to make it healthy” okay, no problem. Thats exactly what she got. I then let her choose between cauliflower or cabbage to add to the mix (since we didn’t have corn) and she chose cabbage. 15 minute dinner made.

Her new favorite veggie seems to be broccoli. I rarely ever make it (I have a harder time eating it now) and I was always just happy using it in her favorite green soup (recipe in cookbook), but Alex sautéed some the other day and she fought to eat all of it— she was mad she didn’t get enough! Haha! So now she often asks for broccoli.

Her favorite spice has moved from sweet paprika to cumin. She loves most herbs. She loves the taste of ginger as long as it doesn’t make a meal too spicy. Her spice tolerance is LOW aka non exsistent. And she loves turmeric in soup— which reminds me that I still haven’t shared our turmeric soup recipe. (I should.)

Overall, I feel really happy and really proud of how food aware she is at 5. She eats food because it tastes good and because it makes her body and mind feel good.

tomato and veggie soup. 

kitchari with a bit of arugula and spinach. 

I used the leftover kitchari _ moong dal to make these lentil cakes— I never get to really photograph them tough because everyone eats them straight off the pan and they never make it to the plate. She had this with a side of broccoli. 

chickpea + veggie stew + sweet plantains. 

carrots from the garden— apparently. I found this in her room today haha. 

miso soup with brown rice noodles. 

That dinner she asked me to make^ (black) tofu, peas, black beans, cabbage, spiced with cumin. Side of avocado. She eats maybe half an avocado a day+ always with olive oil and salt on top. 


Kale chips, cauliflower mash, and she probably had some black beans on her plate. (I forget).

A bit of leftover saag missed with rice, peas, quinoa, side of avocado.

Turned leftover green lentil soup into a bowl with rice and greens. 

Breakfast is still usually avocado toast. Sometimes steal cut oats with honey. This time with blueberries too. 

kale chips, chickpea patties, baked potato + rutabaga fries.

a bit of a veggie fried rice (in cookbook) with a side of avocado. 
Well friends, I’m off to wash my face and tuck myself into bed. I hope you guys all had a great weekend– or a week that was at least better than mine 😉 And I hope you have an even better week ahead! Thanks for being here 🙂 

7 Comments

  1. I am so sorry for your problems, I hope they go away as quick as possible. I am so envy of Marlowe's diet and of course of her parents' way of making her get all those good nutrition facts at her age! A big bravo to you guys!!

  2. Love the no sugar thing! I kicked sugar out of my everyday diet a couple of years ago and dropped 20 pounds. I'm teaching preschool these days and it kills me that all the kid's snacks are cake, Oreos and pokey sticks. We have one student that brings fruit or rice with meat and veggies and all the teachers think she and her family must be some kind of health nuts. That's what kids should be eating!

  3. Just thinking about gentle digestion and brown rice – have you ever made congee? It's slow-cooked rice porridge, and it's great with fermented veggies and stuff. Maybe something you can enjoy together!
    Jo x
    (www.helloseedling.blogspot.co.uk) (reposted because I misspelled my own blog address – genius, I am. Facepalm.)

  4. Funny how children prefer white to brown sometimes isn't it. I make bread with locally grown and milled organic flour with whole grains in it, and my youngest gets excited about the day they make toast at school with processed, sliced white bread. Sorry you've had problems again, I hope it doesn't linger. I'm so impressed at how Marlowe knows what to choose to be healthy, she has had great nutritional education, it will stand her in good stead all her life I think. CJ xx

  5. You are such a great momma! Can't wait to have babies and learn them to eat alive foods! Thank you Drea! You are so inspiring ❤️ Stay positive and have faith that the problems will go away! One love, Gina

  6. Marlowe is an amazing eater, please don't beat yourself up over store bought tortillas! You're doing a great job, Mama.