A blog 'About Me'...Up Close And Personal...


About me:

So, here it is (nervous dun dun dubn…)  my first ‘personal blog’. Well, for the last 2 years my health has been becoming more and more of an issue that I could not avoid any longer. As a result, I have decided to eat fish. My explanation goes as follows:

Apart from the outward signs of my health depleting:
- Pale
- No energy
- Nails never growing, breaking so far down the nail bed it hurts
- Deep cracks in sides of nail and finger tips which sometimes get infected, inflamed, and sore
- Scarecrow hair (relevance, no natural oil to keep it healthy)
- Unable to put on weight, bit of a gaunt look going on without make up!
- Four root canal surgeries and 4 rotten teeth crowned in less than 3 months…
- Palpitations and adrenalin charging through my body as if I am every day about to sit a Degree…
- Insomnia

I have decided, initially for the sake of my kids, then thinking I needed to cut myself a bit of slack, for me, for my sake, too. I could go on no longer avoiding the signs-I was feeling so ill and exhausted, my memory and nerves shot to oblivion, two stomach ulcers and plunging to not quite 39 kilos (5 stone 10 lbs) several times has not helped either.
I needed my brain to function,
I need energy for my kids, for me, for my life and all its adventure
I need to sleep,
I need to chill out and take responsibility, shirk my ‘principles’ for a bit, and start eating fish.

I became a vegetarian nearly 8-years-ago, through mostly spiritual beliefs, and believing in karma. Also, personally when eating vegetarian, my body feels ‘clean’, guilt free…Thus from that day, through 4 out of the 5 pregnancies I have had, I ate a strict vegetarian diet. Twice eating a bit of meat given to me as a present (the bus driver with the chickens and the sheep?!) As I believe, for me, it’s ruder to refuse a gift, a meal, when that person has shown kindness, than to ‘not eat meat’.

I have been craving fish at insane levels for 6 months or so. Back around the time I suffered a peptic stomach ulcer.

I never had a healthy relationship with food when I was younger (maybe a blog one day, but no point going into it here), leading up to my first pregnancy, when everything changed. I had to eat for my baby. I was to be a mum.

5 pregnancies, 4 kids later, I have definitely put my body through some and back again…I have eaten well, though looking back, in the first 3 or 4 years, of little kids/breastfeeding etc, I mostly just remembered by about 3 pm I should eat something…the last 2 years I have been far more diligent about taking care of my health, eating well, exercising, but when roughly 8 months ago I started borking violently at meal times with the kids, I wondered what was up.

I ate my first ‘fish’ meal, Friday passed, and the relief I felt immediately, was overwhelming. Since, the violent borking has vanished, already my nails are growing, Alex commented how much colour I had in my face (no make up!) and I have not got that ‘wrought’ no energy, skeletal feel inside. I feel stronger already, it’s only been a week.

The borking was awful, imagine, sitting down to a meal with the kids, then spending your whole time trying not to puke up the ‘lovely vegetarian meal’ you’d cooked yourself. I was so worried the kids would be affected. I think in hindsight, my body subconsciously had been trying to tell me for a long time I needed something else in my diet. As I say, since eating fish, I look forward to eating, I do not fear bringing it back up on my plate at the dinner table!

Do not get me wrong, fundamentally, I fully believe a well balanced vegan/vegetarian diet can be extremely beneficial, and possible to be completely balanced and healthy.

In my individual case, after putting my body through what I did for nigh on 12 years, then all the pregnancies in as many years, breast feeding, being ‘busy’, my body had had enough.

I am now nourishing my body, already reaping the benefits. I did give it my best, I flogged it right till the bitter end, I really did, and part of me, a big part, is devastated that I am eating an animal. I am sad. But at the same time, a part of me is really, really excited to be exploring a life feeling healthy, not jumpy, scatty brained, sore finger tips, nearly puking at the dinner table. I am relieved I have made myself do it. It’s been 2 years in the decision process, everyone around me telling me to eat at least fish…One thing that really got me was what my mum said when she was over. She looked at my nails and said, ‘You know what Tamsyn? If that is what your nails look like on the outside, imagine what your bones are going through on the inside…’ The kids, I thought, I have to do this for them. I had disregard the external signs as ‘well if that’s all I have to deal with as a result, then so be it’…But my inside? Even Gwyneth Paltrow who has been a strict vegan for x amount of years, after a bone analysis revealing she had the bone density of an 80–year-old woman, has reassessed her principles, and added chicken and fish to her diet. So I am not alone!

So there you go, a little bit about me, and the things that go on in the background of my blog life...

Go easy on your judgements!! It's been an impossible decision, but I have to take responsibility.
Thanks for reading,

See you, Tamsyn x

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