I’m studying for upcoming test on labor and delivery! Yay! And I have to say that the more that I read in our book and the more that I listen to our wonderful midwife turned instructor the more I realize that there is a discrepency in evidenced-based research and how mothers are typically treated in hospitals during labor.

So, I’m typing verbatim some great info from my textbook: Maternity Nursing by Lowdermilk and Perry

“Traditionally the laboring woman has been offered only clear liquids or ice chips or given nothing by mouth during the active phase of labor to minimize the risk of anesthesia complications and their sequelae should general anesthesia be required in an emergency.  These sequelae include the aspiration of gastric contents and resultant compromise in oxygen perfusion, which may endanger the lives of the mother and fetus.  This practice is being challenged today because regional anesthesia is used more often than general anesthesia, even for emergency cesarean births.  Women are awke during regional anesthesia and are able to participate in their own care and protect their airway.

“An adequate intake of fluids and calories is required to meet the energy demands and the fluid losses associated with childbirth. The progress of labor slows, and ketosis developes if these demands are not met and fat is metabolized.  Reduced energy for bearing-down efforts (pushing) increases the risk for a forceps or vacuum-assisted birth. This is most likely to occur in women who begin to labor early in the mroning after a night without caloric intake.  When woman are permitted to consume fluids and food freely, they typically regulate their own oral intake, eating light foods (e.g., eggs, yogurt, ice cream, dry toast and jelly, fruit) and drinking fluids during early labor and tapering off to the intake of clear fluids and sips of water or ice chips as labor intensifies and the second stage approaches.  Common practice is to allow clear liquids (e.g., water, tea, apple juice, clear sodas, gelatin, broth) during early labor, tapering off to ice chips and sips of water as labor progresses and becomes more acive.  Food and fluid consumed orally during labor can meet a laboring woman’s hydration and energy demands more effectively and safely than fluid administered intravenously.  In addition, the woman’s sense of control and level of comfort are enhanced (Scheepers et al., 2001).  The CNM Data Group (1999) found that a woman’s culture may influence what she will eat and drink during labor.  In addition, women who used nonpharmacologic pain relief measures and labored in nonhospital settings were more liekly to eat and drink during labor.

“Withholding food and fluids in labor is a form of care unlikely to be beneficial, and offering oral fluids is demonstrably useful and should be encouraged (Enkin et al., 2000; Hofmeyr, 2005).  Nurses should follow the orders of the woman’s primary health care provider [A BIG REASON TO DISCUSS YOUR DESIRE TO EAT WITH YOUR HEALTH CARE PROVIDER] when offering the woman food or fluids during labor.  As advocates, however, nurses can facilitate change by informing others of the current research findings that support the safety and effectiveness of the oral intake of food and fluid during labor and by initiating such research themselves [Don't worry, us doula turned-nurses will!].”

There you have it folks, the secret is out.  Take this knowledge to your Ob. and request to receive treatment that IS beneficial for your labor.  If you have a health care provider that will not be your advocate EVEN WHEN Evidence based research supports your desire to eat and drink in labor… get a second opinion.

I was so thankful for my amazing midwife who called the shots when I delivered baby #2.  My dad brought gatorade to the hospital at my request during my active stage of labor.  I needed to hydrate to continue in my labor.  The nurses at the admissions desked stopped him and told him that he couldn’t take it to me.  But my midwife was calling the shots on my labor and was I hydrated and had energy for my long and unmedicated birth.  Please email me if you would love a suggestion on a Ob or midwife that will listen to your requests!!!!!

I realize that it’s been several days since I officially finished my week in the raw and there was no update! Life got chaotic last week but alas, I’m back to update you.

The final day of my week was easy, I had smoothies and nuts and fruit and salads and for dinner I decided to eat with the family to initiate my new lifestyle: incorporating raw into my life without extremes.

I made pad thai  (I had be lusting after pad thai since one night during my week of raw when my friends made it and I had to pass it up!)

Basically a salad with a side of pad thai!

This wasn’t the best start to my moderately raw new lifestyle but it was tasty.  My belly wasn’t delighted at the heaviness of the pad thai.

During the week of raw I discovered several things:

1. I CRAVED boiled eggs, black beans and hard cheeses.  I didn’t crave hot food, I didn’t crave junk food.  I wanted protein!  For the first time in a long time, after I ridded my body of it’s built up toxins I could trust that my body was telling me what it needed.  I read up a bit on raw diet and how people usually have to supplement their diet with vitamins and minerals.  Raw dieters usually lack iron, B12, protein.  These are essential to health and your energy level.  So, as long as I am a woman of childbearing years, I will either need to modify the raw diet to include these missing components or add supplements.  And since I love to eat food instead of pills… food it will be!

2. The key to success on any new diet is motivation and desire + loads of fresh foods.  In the past, our kitchen was always stocked with crackers and cheeses.  So if I was hungry I could grab a few chunks of cheese and crackers and be done.  But, when you do this several times a day, you are tipping your pyramid of nutrition in the wrong direction.  You fill up on fats and carbs and deprive your body of life-giving-nutrients.  When I looked at my old way of eating, although decidely ‘organic’ it was full of fillers and not whole foods!  This diet was a wake up call for me to rebalance my diet and my life!

3. Raw diet rocks because it means minimal dishes and cooking time.  Remember that cake that I posted?  It was 15 minutes from beginning to end… no baking and waiting. It was done! As long as you have a great blender you can blend a smoothie, pour into a glass, wash that blender and you’re done and ready for the next meal.  I also learned that I need a new food processor, for real!  My cheap little 2-4 cupper isn’t gonna cut it anymore… HA!  (No pun intended) We’re on the search for a new one.

4. After I ‘finished’ my week of raw, I began adding more cooked and processed foods (since this past Tuesday evening) and I have had times where I have felt bloated and very full but never very sick.  However, I have been craving smoothies and salads and raw food.  After a few days I’m back to searching this awesome blog for new raw recipes.  It’s almost like I have ‘seen the light’ and cannot go back to the old way of living.  Seriously… once you go raw and really start down a more balanced food trail, your body will fight you if you try to quit!!!! I’m thankful for my wise body!

So… in conclusion: Raw week was stellar.  I wasn’t hungry, I had great energy, I lost about 5 lbs and now I’m finding new ways to keep raw foods as a BIG part of my life.  Cheers to you this morning with my Green Smoothie:

To make enough for 2 hungry people:

1 mango

2 bananas

4-5 Tablespoons of Coconut “meat” and milk ( I used from a can)

1/4 cup of water and about 6 big ice cubes

1 Tablespoon of Agave Nectar

2 BIG handfuls of baby spinach leaves (through them in whole and blend blend blend!)

DELICIOUS and very FILLING!

After a long day of 2 tests, hospital paperwork and term papers I’m ready for this:

Pizza for the fam, salad and organic wine for me!!!

Sunday was a GREAT RAW day!

Breakfast was a banana/blueberry chocolate shake

Snacks consisted of nuts and fruit

Lunch was a salad… but not a special one and then dinner was…. FABULOUS!

Dinner: I made this awesome Mexican tomato soup. It’s somewhere between a gaspacho and salsa but it’s goo-ood!  But follow the recipe exactly so it tastes as good as mine did:

recipe from choosingraw.com

Dinner was followed up by a great Raw Chocolate cake that will knock your socks off even if you’re not interested in healthy cake.  The dough is a salty/sweet hazlenut and pecan with dates mixture… and it is very rich.  Perfect for after dinner treat!

Yummy cake from choosingraw.com

Saturday started out with a bang.  My kids woke up around 6.45 and after about 45 minutes of Sesame Street I decided it was time to get up and get some breakfast.  Our family has a little tradition of going out for breakfast when we’re having a lazy Saturday or Sunday.  We take the kids and we usually go to McGee’s bakery or to Sunrise.  Sometimes to Whole Foods or Good Foods Co-op where we finish up with grocery shopping.

Usually breakfast out means stuffing our faces with pastries, chocolate desserts and grabbing a fresh baked loaf of bread to take home.  No, I am NOT opposed to such a ritual usually… but this week I had to come up with something else.  I decided that while Papa was still sleeping, we’d sneak out and have a little girl time (me and the kiddos) so off we went to the Co-op.  I knew that I could get a raw/vegan smoothie there and it’d be delicious and that there was also breakfast for the kids.

I was so delighted to sit there sipping my smoothie and having my kids eat smoothies as well (with a side of ham and cheese croissant).  They were adorable and loved their fresh smoothies!

After said adventure where I picked up a few more raw ingredients I went home, spirits lifted and ready for Raw Day 4.  Then I ‘cooked’ an italian kalamata and pesto salad that was delicious, my favorite Banana Chocolate smoothie and the real recipe for the artificial Chicken Salad.  I ate as much as I wanted knowing that I was eating good food.  Then I  moved to studying for my 2 tests looming over my Monday schedule… and it hit… the LOW POINT.

There are times in my life that I have had very low iron and to be frank, I get really really really grouchy when I am hungry.  I get weak and tired and become a different person.  It’s so true (as my my poor husband!).  Usually I pop in something quick to eat and I’m 100% better but with this diet, there isn’t always something quick to eat.  It requires time and I didn’t have time today.

So, insert, my first failure on the diet: the PB sandwich… dum dum dum!  I, at least, picked the most natural PB that there is, because that is what we buy.  Ingredients: peanuts.  And two pieces of Country Whole wheat bread from Great Harvest.

It wasn’t delicious and it wasn’t overly satisfying… it was medicine.  It was protein and sugar and fat.

I’m glad that I had this low point because I was certain that if a diet was this easy that something was wrong! But alas, I am human… this diet is challenging and I’m so excited to get back to the rawness today!  So, I woke up after a good nights sleep and began researching today’s menu and I’m so very excited to make this… since it is Soup Sunday and all!!!!!!

Image and recipe from: www.choosingraw.com

Today was quite easy to eat well thanks to my busy day in the hosptial… catheters, cesareans, breastfeeding, oh my!

So, I packed my lunch for the day, grabbed a banana for breakfast and was out the door.

Breakfast: Coffee… it WAS 5.30 a.m. and banana

Lunch: Delicious romaine lettuce salad with seeds and broccoli and my favorite dressing (garlic and lemony from day 2 post) and blueberries with pineapple! Then an apple and some water to wash it all down.

When I got home, I snacked on some kalamata olives! YUMMY!

For dinner I whipped up a spicy, sweet asian salad and it ROCKED!  Here’s my ‘recipe’.  Sorry that I didn’t measure, that’s just how I cook:

Spicy Sweet Asian Salad:

1. Finely chopped into ‘sticks’ broccoli stalk, carrots, red cabbage, yellow cabbage

2. Chopped green onion

3. Dressing of: 1 lime, 1-2 teaspoons (?) tamari soy sauce, red pepper flakes, LOTS of shredded fresh ginger with olive oil and TBS of agave nectar (or honey, if you’re not going ‘raw’)

4. Mix together until veggies are coated with sauce.

5. Get big romaine lettuce leaves and pile up a spoonful of chinese salad on top, top with a generous handful of either sesame  or raw sunflower seeds (I had the latter) to give it more crunch!

6. Roll the lettuce wraps and and devour! The key is in the kick so make sure that the sauce is to your liking before adding it to the veggies.  I liked mine FULL of ginger and enough red pepper flakes to make me go… “ooooooooh doggie!”

For dessert: I whipped up another one of those chocolate banana shakes, only this time I did: 3 bananas (the whole fam wanted some) a bunch of ice, agave nectar, vanilla, blueberries and raw cacao powder and it was the BEST of all the attempts!

Morning feelings: This morning I woke up at 5.30 feeling rested and awake… for the first time since I began waking up on Fridays at 5.30 for clinicals back in August!

My stomach issues: seem to have almost vanished! My stomach isn’t cramping or hurting at all… even though I’ve continued moderate coffee drinking.  Really makes me think that foods that I chose before were to blame.

Cravings: I overcame my Friday clinical craving of coke for lunch! I’m pumped that I bypassed that poison and stuck with water!!! Whoooohooo! go me!

So today I’m wrapping up day two in the raw… here’s what I devoured:

Breakfast: Chocolate Banana smoothie

Lunch: Romaine salad with seeds, tomatoes, green onion and my favorite salad dressing: 1 lemon, 1 tablespoon of agave nectar, two gloves of garlic in 1/4 cup of extra virgin olive oil…

**A small confession about today… after my wonderful salad with favorite GARLIC-Y dressing I had to have a piece of gum (Thanks, Lindsey).  I think that everyone in the nurse practice lab (which was like 30 people today) appreciated this minor setaback!!!**

I snacked on raw seeds and nuts in between meals and made up a beautiful Pesto with Zuccini shavings as pasta.  It was really Pretty:

And it was terrible! The only satisfying thing about this meal was that it was so bland and tasteless that the pineapple that I ate for dessert was OUT OF THIS WORLD!  But, I was full, and healthy and got some more veggies in.  For those of you that might know a good raw pesto recipe, please please please tell me! I’ve still got tons of basil and lots of hope!

Questions:

Morning feelings: This morning I woke up with a huge headache.  I think that it can be because of stress, being tired, my cutting back of caffeine or weather… but I dout it’s from food.  My stomach felt totally better.

Post-dinner feelings: Do you know how when you get some awesome warm home cooking in your belly and you just want to flop down on the couch and pass out afterwards… when you eat fresh food you don’t feel that way.  Instead, I had a super high after eating fresh food. I need energy and that is what I’m getting!

Hey folks!

So, if I can manage with all that I have to do, I hope to post each day a little entry about my raw diet.  I want to tell you the rules that I am following so that if you see me out in public sipping a coffee you don’t judge me:

I will follow a raw diet but will allow myself coffee and tea.  I feel this to be fair since this coming Monday I have two exams and a research paper due.  The world is not going to stop just because I want to spend extra time on my diet… so I will press on and allow myself the necessary items to succeed.

Breakfast: Small cup of coffee and Chocolate Banana Shake from the rawtarian: Banana, raw cacao powder, agave nectar, water! Blend then drink.  My kids also loved it!

Picture and recipe from therawtarian.com

Lunch: Guacamole with carrot sticks and celery and another chocolate shake… only this time with cinnamon!  Now I realize that a raw diet shouldn’t be raw and lack green veggies… and that is why dinner is full of fresh veggies! Besides, real cacao has a healthy ammount of magnesium.  So it is more healthy than a ‘treat’, though it tastes yummy!

Snack: A few times a day, I have to head to the kitchen to get food/snacks/water for kids and I grabbed a few bites of raw cashews to munch on.  They. Are. So. Completely. Delicious… seriously.  If you’ve never had them, go to the bulk section of your natural whole food store and get you some.  They’re the best!

Dinner:

Recipe from therawtarian.com

Also, I’ll try address some questions each day:

Morning feeling: Upon rising, I felt so completely and utterly bloated from last nights ‘Last Supper’ at Nick Ryans! My stomach was so hateful about this wonderful food… my husband felt amazing this morning and had no issues.  Nick Ryans has become our new favorite local restaurant and this morning’s tummy trouble was a sign that something has to change because my body is angry with me… and I was excited to start my new raw diet.

Cravings: I had a few weak moments today when I wanted to tear open a bag of chips and devour it… but I refrained and this feeling went away in 5 minutes.  The key was to grab a fruit full of fiber and juice and then I was no longer wanting to stuff my face!

Was I full?  I ate ALL day long, as much raw food as I wanted.  If I wanted two bananas, I ate them… and didn’t feel guilty about it.  There is freedom in knowing that everything that you are eating is necessary for your body and you can eat as much as you like… so at 11pm before bed I finished the rest of the ‘chicken salad’ from the above recipe… and felt great about it!

Alrighty, here’s some of my loot for my week of raw.  In the picture you see some of my groceries.  Here’s what I bought from our Co-Op in preparation:

-Couple heads of romain lettuce for green smoothies and salads

-Olives because they’re a great filling snack

-Avacado, Red Onion and Tomatoes for my guacamole dinners

-Dates for smoothies and such

-Raw Cacao nibs so I can survive… ahhhh… raw chocolate is high in magnesium and great for you!

-Raw Cashews and sunflower seeds for some raw dinner salads and to mix into smoothies for texture

-Agave Nectar for sweetening my smoothies

-Bananas, Apples, Celery, Carrots