Well this was supposed to be a blog post about bread making...and we’ll get there, but as it often goes these days, God had other plans for this one. (Okay, perhaps this should be three separate posts, but I've got a household to run people!) Since my last post a month ago (I don’t space them out on purpose that way, I just get to work when the spirit moves me ;-) A LOT has happened. A whole bunch of personal stuff, the kind I am not super comfy sharing on the world wide web. BUT after I prayed about it and realized that the big guy was asking me to share this, I say YES. So here it goes.
Anybody who knows me, knows that once my Maggie was born- I fell in love with her in a uniquely special way. She was my sweet girl from day one. Sweet Mags. I even posted a pic of her last summer captioned ‘this is Maggie’s resting face’ as she beamed ear to ear with her infectious smile. It took nothing for her to smile, laugh, and babble- she was the sweetest, most bright eyed, most content baby I’d ever met, let alone birthed! I’m hoping I could hold it together here as I tell you what transpired in the following months.
The short of it is that my sweet Maggie changed...seemingly overnight. Her eyes went dim, her smiles disappeared- no more laughter, no more adorable blabber. Period. I have to tell you that after I realized she wasn’t just having a bad day, or 60 in a row, I would literally stand on my head for this girl just to get a peak at a Maggasmile; to prove that my sweet girl was still there...but all my efforts were to no avail. Now when you’re in it, as in a period of time such as this, when your world is being turned upside down, you go through a few steps. Starting with asking yourself if you’re imagining this distinct behavior change, or maybe you’re doing something different in her bedtime routine, or maybe she’s just not feeling well, or perhaps she’s just going through a phase, developing differently- but for goodness sake, normally...and a slew of about a million other thoughts. Maggie would scream 3/4 of the night, arching her back and squirming about until she became so exhausted that she finally would fall asleep. There was little Joe or I could do to console her. When morning came she would wake up pretty miserable...and like that she would stay for most of the day. She earned the name Madgie which is still in constant use. And so life went on and Mags came with... mostly fixed to my hip with her sullen expression and strange infatuations. She especially hated crowds. At Mass and at family gatherings she would hang on tight to me or Joe and rarely, if ever, give in to people’s efforts to break her stern expression. (this fact is very telling as I have some real baby whisperers in my family). Forget about acknowledging, let alone playing with, her cousins or engaging in a game of see-saw with Nana. It was (and still is) a daily occurrence to hear comments about her grumpiness, her contemplative stare, her crankiness, and her quirks...of course all comments are punctuated with a joke on the end or a little note of ‘well she’s just shy’. These people mean no harm- they don’t know that each comment is a punch to the gut for me....because I know that something went wrong with my girl and, in a small way, they are confirming it. Despite Maggie being almost ready to walk at 10 months just like her older brother did, she just started walking last week at 17 months. Maggie has yet to double her birth weight. She has just started to respond to her name which is still a challenge if she’s focused on something else and has just learned to hold her own bottle. Though she's still serious most of the time, it does not go unnoticed that I can get her to smile when I put in some extra and persistent effort. I am thanking God for these milestones and His guidance as I am confident that if I went ahead with her scheduled 15 month round of vaccinations, she would not have hit them.
The short of it is that my sweet Maggie changed...seemingly overnight. Her eyes went dim, her smiles disappeared- no more laughter, no more adorable blabber. Period. I have to tell you that after I realized she wasn’t just having a bad day, or 60 in a row, I would literally stand on my head for this girl just to get a peak at a Maggasmile; to prove that my sweet girl was still there...but all my efforts were to no avail. Now when you’re in it, as in a period of time such as this, when your world is being turned upside down, you go through a few steps. Starting with asking yourself if you’re imagining this distinct behavior change, or maybe you’re doing something different in her bedtime routine, or maybe she’s just not feeling well, or perhaps she’s just going through a phase, developing differently- but for goodness sake, normally...and a slew of about a million other thoughts. Maggie would scream 3/4 of the night, arching her back and squirming about until she became so exhausted that she finally would fall asleep. There was little Joe or I could do to console her. When morning came she would wake up pretty miserable...and like that she would stay for most of the day. She earned the name Madgie which is still in constant use. And so life went on and Mags came with... mostly fixed to my hip with her sullen expression and strange infatuations. She especially hated crowds. At Mass and at family gatherings she would hang on tight to me or Joe and rarely, if ever, give in to people’s efforts to break her stern expression. (this fact is very telling as I have some real baby whisperers in my family). Forget about acknowledging, let alone playing with, her cousins or engaging in a game of see-saw with Nana. It was (and still is) a daily occurrence to hear comments about her grumpiness, her contemplative stare, her crankiness, and her quirks...of course all comments are punctuated with a joke on the end or a little note of ‘well she’s just shy’. These people mean no harm- they don’t know that each comment is a punch to the gut for me....because I know that something went wrong with my girl and, in a small way, they are confirming it. Despite Maggie being almost ready to walk at 10 months just like her older brother did, she just started walking last week at 17 months. Maggie has yet to double her birth weight. She has just started to respond to her name which is still a challenge if she’s focused on something else and has just learned to hold her own bottle. Though she's still serious most of the time, it does not go unnoticed that I can get her to smile when I put in some extra and persistent effort. I am thanking God for these milestones and His guidance as I am confident that if I went ahead with her scheduled 15 month round of vaccinations, she would not have hit them.
So what happened to Maggie? Well, we’re still piecing it together, and I hesitate to say as she has not been diagnosed. But we’ve got an idea and we’re working on the remedy. I just want to say that Maggie is healthy and, Praise God, she doesn’t have a life threatening disease or anything...and in the grand scheme of things, she’s okay. I really think she’s going to get past this as we’ve caught it early on and I’m already seeing signs of progress. Once again, I find myself marveling at God’s timing and of the divine orchestration of my life- He loves me as He loves you- and He guides me as He’ll guide you if you ask and ‘stay tuned’. He’s there even when I’m trembling, even when it seems too big to tackle, and even when the rest of the world thinks I'm nutso. God is so good and so merciful all of the time even though we humans always mess things up. Note: If God does permit my Mags to regress further, OF COURSE I will welcome, care for, and love her as I love all my children unconditionally. I would continue to thank Him and praise Him for blessing me with her- regardless of her needs, albeit I would persist in finding therapies and remedies to reverse the symptoms as much as possible. God is ALWAYS good even though He permits (does not punish us with)some difficult things for us to endure; since he's a merciful God and has given us free will- it makes sense for Him to allow for a culture to "reap what it has sown." (BTW that unique love for Maggie has never swayed or diminished, it has only grown).
This was one of the readings at the Vigil Mass tonight....
They strengthened the spirits of the disciples
and exhorted them to persevere in the faith, saying,They strengthened the spirits of the disciples
“It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships
to enter the kingdom of God.” (Acts 14)
Example of her eyes in every picture before the change.
Example of her eyes in too many pictures after the change.
I’ve grown to love social media...sure I’ve had to tweak it on more than one occasion to make sure I’m getting what’s good for my soul and blocking what’s not, but now since that’s done, Facebook has been especially good to me! One of the many blessings from it is that I have one Facebook friend that posts on vaccine related issues. For years I would scroll past her posts as I could not even fathom delving into that topic as I have small children getting vaccinated on the regular. To be honest, I resisted looking into vaccines because my intuition told me that I would not be psyched on what I found out. So I ignored them...I would rationalize that it’s a lose-lose topic, that I, along with all my siblings, were vaccinated, and that I had a few other hot button issues on my plate that I had to conserve energy for ;-) But as I’ve said before, God puts the right people (or posts) and the right circumstances in your life all at the right time. Today, right now, I am beyond thankful for this person’s avid posting on the subject. Without her bringing awareness to this issue I would’ve been starting from scratch, or not at all, in one of the most overwhelming and serious topics of the day. The moral of this little story is to please post what you’re passionate about even if you don’t FEEL like dealing with differing opinions!- you can truly change the game (or in this case, someone’s quality of life) in that way. So if you’re reading this Ms. Avid Vax Poster- thank you for your courage and persistence.
At this point I am not anti-vaccine, but I am for safe vaccines- I don't think anyone in the safe-vax community wants to see vaccine preventable diseases come back. So if we’re gonna inject actual known poisons and toxins into our small children, let’s do it one dose at a time so they have less of a chance of incurring adverse reactions and/or instantly regress into autism or some other condition that can alter their lives and yours FOREVER. (About that single dosing...we have a ways to go in banding together and demanding them, as vaccines are no longer offered in that way here in America) I had no idea how many vaccines were combined together for a single shot...all for the sake of making a buck and for Dr./Nurse/Insurance/Healthcare efficiency. AND better yet, let’s find a way to make these vaccines green (without the heavy metals which are the main culprit in brain damage leading to Autism, SIDS, Allergies, Asthma, ADD, etc.) And PLEASE offer them WITHOUT aborted fetal cells listed as an ingredient.
The following will break your heart if you're pro-life:
http://www.rtl.org/prolife_issues/LifeNotes/VaccinesAbortion_FetalTissue.html
My goal in sharing this with you is not to convince you that all vaccines are bad, rather it's to share some undeniable links that I have seen with my own eyes. As usual, I’ll ask you to acknowledge truth and call things what they are, in this case the blatant corruption of the CDC and plenty other organizations that is sadly running amok beneath the guise of health, safety, and greater-good terminology. I won’t get into the current problems with vaccines too much here (as they are extensive), nor will I get into the year and a half I spent in and out of the hospital with my Sophie girl and the probable correlation of her own health issues to her vaccination appointments.
The following will break your heart if you're pro-life:
http://www.rtl.org/prolife_issues/LifeNotes/VaccinesAbortion_FetalTissue.html
My goal in sharing this with you is not to convince you that all vaccines are bad, rather it's to share some undeniable links that I have seen with my own eyes. As usual, I’ll ask you to acknowledge truth and call things what they are, in this case the blatant corruption of the CDC and plenty other organizations that is sadly running amok beneath the guise of health, safety, and greater-good terminology. I won’t get into the current problems with vaccines too much here (as they are extensive), nor will I get into the year and a half I spent in and out of the hospital with my Sophie girl and the probable correlation of her own health issues to her vaccination appointments.
By the way if you’re about my age, you received approximately 14 vaccines before the age of 5 and they were more spaced out and less combined. Now a child will normally receive 42 by that same age, mostly in combined doses, and less spread out over time. After lifting the veil and seeing how many more vax's are ‘coming soon’ just waiting for government approval, or worse, mandatory requirement...I am now, more than ever, joining the fight to protect our parental freedoms to choose how to vaccinate our own children as we see fit. These rights (as well as a bunch of other fundamental ones) are being stripped away from us RIGHT NOW. No doctor knows your child the way you do. Many docs and nurses swore to me there was no correlation in my girls cases...and I believe most of them believe that as that is what's in the script. Mama’s, you’ve heard it before-trust your intuition. We are given the task of raising our babes as best we can. It is of utmost importance to not allow the government to dictate to us what is best for our kids. That should have no place anywhere, especially here in America, in the 21st century no less. I think you’d be mighty surprised at what’s going on behind the facade in this area.
Megan, from livingwhole.org writes: “Are you aware that there are more than 23 vaccines that contain aborted baby DNA, cellular debris, cells, and protein? These include, Adenovirus, Polio, Dtap/Polio/HiB Combo, Hep A, Hep A/Hep B Combo, MMR, MMRV Pro Quad, Rabies, Varicella, and the Shingles vaccine, and there are more in the pipeline. A lot more...
We are talking about hundreds, if not thousands of aborted babies who have been and continue to be dissected in order to obtain the perfect cell line for the vaccines you just promoted in your article. It’s listed on the CDC’s vaccine adjuvants and additives list...”CDC website
Read more of what she has to say here: livingwhole.org
This link is to "Children of God for Life- The Pro-Life World Leader for Ethical Vaccines, Medicines, and Consumer Products" https://cogforlife.org/
This link is to "Children of God for Life- The Pro-Life World Leader for Ethical Vaccines, Medicines, and Consumer Products" https://cogforlife.org/
This trailer is for the movie Vaxxed, which despite being banned, boycotted, and slandered, continues to be screened in select areas because people are fighting for it to be shown. You should ask yourselves why they want this particular movie crushed and never to be seen by the public. See Vaxxed trailer here:
https://vimeo.com/159566038
https://vimeo.com/159566038
I’m linking some clips featuring celebrities, mostly because they’re a good intro into what the big hoopla is all about.
Ummm Lisa, didn’t you say something about bread making like a day ago on this post? Ahh, why yes, yes I did. Oh dear she’s really lost it. Fear not, I’ll begin to connect the dots real soon.
Some of you may know that in my previous life as a sort of agnostic I had a different passion for a little while. The subject was nutrition- learning all about food, where it came from, how it was made, which types had the best nutrients, where to get them, etc. True to form, I devoured books on the subject and coincidentally met an eccentric individual who put what I was learning into real life form. He’d take me to farms and we’d buy meats, eggs, and veggies there and he’d share his findings and truths about food. That’s pretty much all I ate for a couple of years- and I never felt or looked better. My newfound health wasn’t just because I was 23 and totally self-involved focused mostly on myself in looks and worldly pleasures- It was because the foods I ate were far superior to those that I had eaten all my life. Now I’m not saying they tasted all that much better than the meals I had eaten throughout my life (though they would’ve if I prepared them with any sort of effort). You see, I have a mama who could make a shoe taste good and she fed me the food of peoples dreams for many years. What I’m saying is that the foods I consumed during that time were as untouched, fresh, and whole as possible...just as God intended them to be. We’re talking traditional foods from animals that ate what they were designed to eat- mainly grass with some dirt and insects sprinkled through. Chickens, cows, pigs, etc were free to roam in pastures and their meat, eggs, and milk had all that nutrition gold built in. There was virtually no chemical/antibiotic interference except for the damage that had already been done to the environment and was simply not preventable despite the farmer’s efforts. (Think water and air pollution) The veggies had no pesticides sprayed upon them and the whole farm was as picturesque as you’d imagine. This is the proper way to grow food. It makes sense, not just on a nutrition level, but also on an ecological and ethical one. It doesn’t take much research to understand this basic agricultural truth but like any good subject matter, it is simple yet complicated when further studied. I can’t go into it further at this time, so let me just say that if you haven’t looked into why local farms are the cats meow, I urge you to do so. Of course, I’ll link some resources to get you started and will dedicate a post or two to just this topic in the future. If you’ve never bought local you might be hesitant to do so for a few reasons, one being you’ve heard it’s pricey. It’s true that quality food means more money, but you’ll save on medical bills for sure. And it’s more affordable than you might think if you do it right. For it to work on a budget you’d have to make use of most all the animal parts and even those veggies you’ve never heard of. You’ll have to eat less meat and buy in bulk (think ordering a half of a cow and storing it in your freezer- they cut, butcher, and package it for you silly!...you’ll be looking at packages of ground beef, ribs, etc. similar to what you buy at the store but without all those labels!) We joined a Meat and Eggs CSA and a Produce CSA this year and I plan to post how our ‘Eat Well and Eat Local’ experiment goes. I mean our family of 5 is getting by on one average salary and we’re trying our darnest to keep it that way! You'll still find me at Price Chopper each week, but I'll be buying less there. I will carefully keep track of the money spent on local foods and document the loot as well as share our difficulties and joys in storing, prepping, and consuming them in this upcoming 20+ week growing season. Most all local farms welcome you to come visit- they are proud of their work and rightly so. What a great way to spend an afternoon and get the kids excited about what they'll be eating this summer while educating them a bit more about food.
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| Think more of this... |
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| and less of this. |
| This excerpt is from http://www.franciscanfamilyfarms.com/: |
"Cows were designed to eat grass. They have a digestive system that is fine-tuned to convert grass into useful energy. As they wander about eating grass, they return a large helping of fertilizer to the soil, so that the next time that they pass through, that grass will have grown (along with water and the sun – no tilling, seeding, or herbicide required) to provide another wonderful meal. This process is as natural as can be. Any human lucky enough to eat such a cow will be taking in a portion of all that the cow has eaten in its life – that beef will be lean, delicious, and high in healthy fats.
But today, instead of working with that natural relationship, we take our cattle to feedlots and feed them large quantities of corn. On the surface, that would seem to be a more efficient way to get lots of beef… we can grow corn in massive quantities on the best land (of course, that requires lots of diesel fuel, synthetic fertilizers, and specially formulated herbicides), ship the corn to the cattle feed lots (more diesel), ship the cattle to the feedlots (likely with a subdermal implant of growth hormone already in place), feed the corn to the cows (which puts on lots of marbling – mostly unhealthy fat), and then find a way to deal with massive quantities of manure in one location (leaching into the water supply and requiring lots more diesel to cart away). The end result is a less healthy cow which required a great deal of human effort and nonrenewable resources to produce.
The same kinds of practices are true with other types of agriculture… and we’re just left wondering why we’ve chosen to move so far way from God’s original design. So many things that we’ve done to work against these natural systems have had ill effects – Do we know what the impact of growth hormones in our milk have on children? Are we creating resistant bacteria by feeding antibiotics to animals every day? Do we need to spray large amounts of chemical products all over our foods? The list could go on. Our ancestors managed to have a varied, healthy diet without all of these innovations. We believe that the time is now to go back to raising our food using the systems that our Creator set in place for this planet."
Weston Price
Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions
Dangerous Grains
Franciscan Family Farms
A local farm we use for grass fed meat and eggs
A local farm we use for produce
Dangerous Grains
Franciscan Family Farms
A local farm we use for grass fed meat and eggs
A local farm we use for produce
LISA, bread...remember? Okay, okay.
So during this optimal health (of body) period of time, I never ate bread (or any grains). They were off limits as the negative health issues that came along with that beautiful hunk of processed grain were just not worth it. Then I found myself married and unable to keep the perpetrator out of my pantry! So I indulged, gained weight..and felt pretty crummy (pun intended) most of the time. My hubby and I are gluten sensitive- like many who have spent a lifetime eating super processed grains are whether they know it or not. Then, like a light shining down from heaven upon my Netflix menu, I saw it. ‘Cooked’ episode 3 titled Air. Whoa. Watch it... and prepare for some good news. The main suggestion in that episode is that wheat, when fermented properly, that is, made in the traditional way (as in the kind of bread Jesus ate) was actually quite nutritious, filling, tasty, and affordable. Michael Pollan claims that a single grain of wheat holds most all the nutrients and minerals that we needed to survive...the key is to unlock them from it’s protective shell so that we could access them, digest, and absorb them. How? In short, by using a natural starter (not dried yeast) which aids in fermentation. This supposedly makes all the difference!
And so I started making my own bread. Note: We are at the beginning of this little bread experiment, but I promise to update you on our bodies reaction to it and overall health as the months go on. I aim to make 1-2 sizable loaves per week, but it is quite the process for this rookie bread-making gal, so we'll see. Locals, if you're interested in trying some real bread you can swing by Rock Hill Bakehouse as the owner assured me 80% of their bread is made with a natural starter. (Not sure how long it ferments for or what ratio the whole grain flour to white flour is). If you want a glorious day trip option where you can feed your soul and body with the best stuff...take a trip to the Divine Mercy Shrine in gorgeous Stockbridge, MA. Then head down the street to The Berkshire Mountain Bakery in Housatonic where the baker profiled in Cooked, Richard Bourdon, bakes his beauties!
And so I started making my own bread. Note: We are at the beginning of this little bread experiment, but I promise to update you on our bodies reaction to it and overall health as the months go on. I aim to make 1-2 sizable loaves per week, but it is quite the process for this rookie bread-making gal, so we'll see. Locals, if you're interested in trying some real bread you can swing by Rock Hill Bakehouse as the owner assured me 80% of their bread is made with a natural starter. (Not sure how long it ferments for or what ratio the whole grain flour to white flour is). If you want a glorious day trip option where you can feed your soul and body with the best stuff...take a trip to the Divine Mercy Shrine in gorgeous Stockbridge, MA. Then head down the street to The Berkshire Mountain Bakery in Housatonic where the baker profiled in Cooked, Richard Bourdon, bakes his beauties!
That brings me to my conclusion. We are living in really cray-zay times. We need to question most everything, especially when it comes to what we are putting into our own
The following is by Mark Mallett:
“During another concert tour through the United States after Hurricane Katrina, the Lord began to show me how corruption had entered into the very foundations of society, from the economy, to the food chain, to politics, science and medicine. The Lord described it as “cancer” that cannot be treated with medicine, but has to be “cut out” in what amounts to a Cosmic Surgery.”
If foundations are destroyed, what can the just one do? (Ps 11:3)
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