Thank you for watching! I hope this video inspires you to take your own health journey and to find healthier ways to eat. It is really amazing in how the food we put in our bodies impacts how we feel, it truly does. Comment on the video if you have any questions or if you plan on following a similar journey, I would love to hear from you!
are you
struggling okay okay okay sweet
girl hello and welcome to my channel my
name is Amy and I am jump starting my
2024 goals um two weeks before Christmas
and what I’m doing right now is Weight
Watchers but what I actually wanted to
talk about in this video is what I plan
on doing in January as I really need to
decrease my inflammation and I really
want to detox my body um and what I plan
on doing is following this book fix it
with food by Michael Simon um and so in
this video I kind of wanted to chat
about the book um and go over some
things because I actually followed the
book in May so I wanted to go over my
results as well so I wanted to start off
by saying I am not a nutritionist I am
not certified in anything I’m just going
over what I am doing in my weight loss
Journey so just take everything that I
say with a grain of salt um but if you
would like to hear more I would love if
you subscribed gave me a follow um and
follow me on this
journey in this video I plan on going
over five different things the first
just being an outline of the book and
going going over kind of the premise um
of who Michael Simon is and what he did
and why he wrote this book um the second
I plan on going over what I did in May
because I did follow with the book for
30 days so I’m going to go over what I
chose to do and how I followed the book
and then three I’m going to go over my
results in what I saw and what I noticed
in my body um from when I did it in May
four I’m going to go over what I wish
the book would have done and how I could
have made my journey a little bit better
so I am not doing it here again um and
then five um I am going to be following
the book again in January so I’m going
to go over what I plan on doing in
January and then finally number six I’m
just going to go over some tips in what
I recommend you doing if you plan on
following this
journey if all of that sounds
interesting I would love if you
subscribe and like and follow me on this
journey okay so an outline of the book
number one um Michael Simon is the
author of the book he is a chef you can
see him on the Food Network and then he
was on I think the chew or something
like that one of those shows um but
anyway so he actually has two autoimmune
diseases sorry side note if you don’t
know um I actually have celiac disease
and autoimmune disease so that’s one of
the main reasons why I picked up this
book um sorry this is a big side note
but back in April I guess of last year I
went to the doctor and I had some blood
work done and I was having a lot of
inflammation um I was having some skin
irritation and actually one of the
things that they thought I had was lupus
and so one of the things with celiac
disease is it can lead to other
autoimmune diseases and lupus is an
autoimmune disease
so that’s obviously not good um and so
that’s why I kind of started following
this book um is to get rid of those
toxins and get the inflammation down um
I actually did not have Lupus um which
is great so but I still I do have Celiac
Celiac will stay with me for life um but
anyway so that’s why I picked up this
book um so anyway so Michael Simon he
has two autoimmune diseases he has
rheumatoid arthritis as well as um lupus
Discord um I’m not really familiar with
any of those but they are autoimmune
diseases and so he decided to one was
actually a New Year’s resolution he
decided to get rid of toxins and kind of
see if he could um fix his symptoms with
food um some symptoms that he had he had
a lot of skin irritations he had
inflammation a lot of joint pain um and
and so yeah so one of his New Year’s
resolutions was to he eliminated
sugar she’s going to pop in a
lot especially if I’m sitting down sorry
um so he eliminated sugar he eliminated
Dairy he eliminated all of the the
highly
inflammatory um foods that you put in
your body including all processed foods
um and what he he did he did it for 20
days and what he found was within the
first four to 5 days he like joint pain
was gone he felt like really good the
skin rash started to go away um and it
just it food really like kind of healed
his body so what he did was he created
this book and in the book there are it’s
a whole shopping list and a pantry
staple list of things that you should
buy in in order to follow your journey
um and he outlines a 10-day meal prep um
that is breakfast lunch and dinner and
it’s all like Whole Foods um so no
Dairy no meat no processed foods um no
sugar and um and so that’s the first 10
days and then afterwards what he did was
he started introducing those those Foods
right back into his system like he gave
them two days he
would like let’s say Dairy was something
he was reintroducing like he cleaned his
body and then for 2 days he would eat
dairy to see how that would interact
with his body um and then he would
reintroduce a meat red meat or something
like that um to see how that um impacted
his body and how he felt um and so after
the 10 days in the book he goes through
different chapters like there’s a um
dairyfree chapter there’s a meat-free
chapter there’s a sugar-free chapter um
and all of these different recipes for
you to build and to try
um now on to my results so the number
one result that I would say that I
didn’t even think about but I lowered my
food bill because I was only eating
vegetables and like beans and rice um
everything everything around the
perimeter of the grocery store if you
think about the cost of meat Dairy and
processed foods those are the most
expensive things on your grocery bill so
by eliminating all of that I lowered my
most monthly grocery bill which I didn’t
even realize that I was going to do so
that was one interesting um thing but
the other thing is is like I did not
crave sugar and I am a sugar girl like I
eat a meal and
I I instantly right after that meal need
to eat like a piece of candy a cookie or
something like that um I just crave
sugar and by day four I would say I did
not crave sugar at all it did not bother
me um I didn’t need it now I was getting
the sugar obviously from the fruits but
the added sugar didn’t need it didn’t
care and I could have gone on um a while
without
sugar the other thing is I enjoy coffee
I love a morning coffee I have creamer
in my coffee I have sugar in my coffee
it wakes me up cuz I am not I am not a
morning girl in the slightest um so I
would say the first three days that was
really really hard to not have coffee
but after that like I was awake I didn’t
need it um like my body got rid of all
those toxins and like essentially what
you were doing you are detoxing your
body body so I was I was completely
detoxing so one thing that I will say is
that those first couple days are hard
like really hard I had headaches um my
body kind of achd a little bit and I was
I was just like exhausted and tired
because your body is just going through
it by eliminating the toxins so you just
got to stick through it and stick
through those three or four days and
then after that like it’s like Smooth
Sailing um you will not realize like how
good or how bad you actually felt prior
to that um so anyway so that was kind of
like my tangent about coffee um my
inflammation was down like so I wish I
would have taken like side by-side
pictures of my face but I would I would
go to work and people would tell me like
your face is like really looking like
really good like you you look good um
and again like my inflammation
is a lot of it’s in my in my
face in fact I had one boyfriend post
College telling me I was at the
skinniest I had ever been I had lost
some weight and I had one boyfriend tell
me that um no matter how skinny I was I
would always have a double chin talk
talk about like why girls have issues is
like he really said that to me and it
stuck with me all this time but so yes I
will always have my double chin but my
fa face did Slender out so I lost a a
lot of inflammation by doing this which
is good that’s that was my whole goal in
this
process
um it was also like much easier to do
than I thought it was going to do and
that’s why I went from doing 10 days to
30 days cuz I was just really feeling
good um and so I just I just decided to
stick with it and that like I did not
think that it was going to be easy
the first 3 or 4 days again were not
easy but after that it it was pretty
easy to do um the other thing I will say
is I suffer from a lot of brain fog so
one of my big symptoms with celiac
disease is brain fog and it comes from
cross-contamination uh like when I eat
out at a restaurant when I eat at my
family’s house because they’re not
gluten-free um it’s just inevitable that
I am going going to get cross
contamination and as much as I try to
cut it out on my life like I also enjoy
living my life and um so I eat out and I
eat at my ha Sals and I suffer from it
and so brain fog is my biggest symptom
and so by doing this I was eating at
home every day I was eliminating the
toxins I was eliminating all the
inflammatory and it just it it cleared
my head and you can see now like I I do
struggle to say something sometimes and
um and so you’re probably going to see
that in this journey as well my videos
will hopefully get a little bit smoother
and probably a little hopefully less ums
and stuff like that and I can have a
full thought um so that was a really
positive thing that I found from
completing this
journey um the other thing is less aches
and pains so I when I get up in the
middle of the night to use the restroom
I feel like the hunchback of Notre when
I’m walking to the bathroom like I hurt
my ankles hurt my body hurts I’m only 40
I guess I’m 40 I’m 42 years old
sometimes I forget but I’m 42 years old
and like I feel like I am like 60 years
old when I’m walking to the bathroom in
the middle of the night so it did help
my aches and pains and I felt a whole
lot better which was
great the other thing that it did was it
introduced me to new foods that I didn’t
know really kind of existed or how to
use them or what they were um and they
were actually really good and they’re
good for me so one of those is actually
nutritional yeast um never even heard of
this before to be honest um but it is a
good source of B vitamins um and it
honestly has like a creamy flavor and a
creamy texture um and so this was one of
the way like the risotto that I was
talking about the mushroom risotto oh my
gosh I did not have any dairy or any
cheese you just kind of make like a
cheese sauce with this nutritional yeast
it’s like with this nutritional yeast
and um whole cashews whole raw
cashews and it’s creamy and delicious
and good so this has good
V good um vitamin B minerals um and it’s
also a good source of protein and then
I’m just reading the package and it says
it’s good on popcorn and I never tried
that before cuz I didn’t eat popcorn
when I was doing this but maybe I will
have some popcorn when I’m doing it in
January I don’t know uh but nutritional
yeast didn’t know about it now I know
and it’s
good um another thing coconut oil I had
never cooked or used coconut oil in my
life I know that sounds weird
um but it’s not something that I did and
I found that I really liked it so I
would make um oatmeal with coconut oil
and then um just if I wanted to like
sweeten any kind of thing up I would use
coconut oil and the other thing that I
started doing after the journey is I
told you I I really enjoy popcorn so I
love lesser evil popcorn but that sh is
expensive and so I would just make my
own popcorn at home I would pop it on
the stove and instead of using vegetable
oil which is highly inflammatory I would
use coconut oil and it would give the
sweetness um and I could just do it at
home so it was a lower budget in making
lesser evil popcorn at home so Co
coconut oil was introduced to me from
this book um and then I found that I
really enjoy like grilled like big
portabello mushrooms oh my gosh that was
also one of my favorite things that I
would make I would just get like from
Aldi they’re actually really inexpensive
is just big meaty portabella mushrooms
and I would like marinate them for a
little bit there is a recipe for a
marinade um in there and I would Grill
those mushrooms and they were so good
and then one other thing was grape seed
oil um so grape seed oil is I never used
it before either um but it’s kind of
like um it’s a higher point of higher
smoke point oil um it doesn’t doesn’t
really taste like anything too much but
in the book he would have you make some
like uh grape seed oil that you can put
over your eggs it would be infused with
um I think it was let’s see what was
it oregano he you would Infuse the grape
seed oil with one with oregano um and
then another oil with like cayenne
peppers so you would have one spicy and
then one kind of just very flavorful
that you could flavor your Foods um
and so now I actually make some of my
salad dressings with grape seed oil and
just it’s a essentially marinated grape
seed oil dressing and that’s it like I
could just dress my salad with grape
seed oil and oregano like infused and it
was
delicious another food that I was
introduced to was tahini I mean I
obviously knew what tahini was um but I
had never purchased it before in my life
and so I made my own homemade hummus and
you can make hummus so many different
ways and it’s so delicious um and very
easy to do and so it’s just obviously
it’s better for you it’s not processed
cuz when you do look at the label on a
hummus that you buy from the store there
is added preservatives in there um and
so yeah now I can make my own hummus and
Tahini and Tahini you can actually use
it in in different ways as well I
haven’t really ventured off into that
but um I do make my own hummuses now
another result from the journey was
obvious obviously my weight went down
because I wasn’t eating any of the
process I wasn’t eating bad things and I
was exercising I was motivated so in a
month period I lost 8 lbs um my body fat
percent went down because I do have a
Fitbit and I was able to track
everything that way so my body fat
percentage went down I think by like 6
or8 um and the other crazy thing
obviously without having alcohol or
anything like that my Fitbit tells me my
resting heart rate this is crazy my
resting heart rate went from 76 which is
pretty high right I was going through it
I was highly inflamed I was having some
issues and my resting heart rate was 76
and it went down to 64 in one month
period which is crazy um and that was
kind of like also one of my biggest ahas
and every time that I do drink
alcohol I see that and it just makes me
really sick and really sad to see um
what alcohol does to your body but that
was a really good benefit of following
this
book now for what I wish the book did um
so he has the 10day process right and he
does say in the beginning of the book
that what he does to reintroduce Foods
is just he every two days reintroduces a
new food what I wish he did was have
another kind of like 10day period or if
it’s a 15 20 day period whatever it is
and outlin different recipes on how you
can reintroduce the new Foods um because
I pretty much I did the 30 days of
cutting it out and then I kind of forgot
the process of what I was supposed to do
in reintroducing Foods because I also I
did it for 30 days and then I went into
vacation so in vacation I was eating
sugar I was drinking alcohol I was
eating Meats I was eating dairy I was
eating all of those things and I did not
reintroduce the food so I think think if
he would have had like a chapter after
the 10 days that’s like okay
so you finish the 10 days great now for
the next two days here are some recipes
to reintroduce Dairy and then do you
then re are you supposed to then reset
after you try Dairy and then try meat
are you supposed to then reset and then
try sugar or how is that process look
and so I think it would have been better
to have that separate chapter to help
guide you further along in this journey
um so that was one of my failures that I
did in January or sorry in May of last
year and what I plan on fixing when I do
this journey again in January of this
year um is the reintroduction of the
foods so that Segways me into what I
plan on doing this January when I follow
this journey again um I plan on doing
another 30 days now I will say that I’m
not starting in on the 1 CU I do have um
a New Year’s Day girlfriend’s activity
that I’m going to do that um I’ve not
decided if I’m drinking yet but I’m
definitely going to be eating some meat
um and things kind of outside the plan
so I’m starting it on the second um but
I’m going to do the full 30 days um and
eliminate everything again I’m going to
eliminate sugar dairy uh flowers coffee
um the whole nine
alcohol um and
then from there I’m going to reintroduce
I think probably starting with dairy
dairy because I can then like take the
same like eggs and stuff like that that
I was making and introduce cheese I can
introduce a Greek yogurt um and then do
it that way and plan on doing that for
like two days to see how I feel I don’t
don’t know if I’m going to like reset
for 2 days and then reintroduce maybe
like meat so if I make the eggs do I
introduce um like turkey bacon or
something like that um to see how my
body works with that I think that’s what
I’ll do but I I kind of figure that out
um as I go but I’m going to be mindful
on how I do it and not just go into
February eating the foods again and then
I’m also going to stick to the string
training again I’m going to strength
train three times a week and then try to
get my 10,000 steps and yeah so
essentially I’m doing everything that I
was doing in May but being more mindful
in how I reintroduced everything
starting in February and I will document
this whole oh so obviously documenting I
didn’t document before um so I’ll be
documenting the
journey now on to my tips if you do plan
on um following this book and following
along with with me um my tips so first
off I would say you have to be in the
right mindset um especially because
those first 3 to four days are very hard
um you’re not you’ve got to be able to
push through um and so you have to be in
the right mindset that you’re going to
do this and you have to be okay with it
um two you’re going to have to prep and
plan so he has the whole Pantry Staples
he has the grow grocery list he has all
of that for you um and so you’re going
to want to do some grocery shopping
ahead of time um but my tip for grocery
shopping is because don’t buy everything
at once um because you’re going to find
you’re going to have kale you’re going
to have spinach you’re going to have
swiss chard you’re going to have um all
these different greens and for me it was
a lot of greens so another thing was
colar Greens um I had purchased the
collar greens and not the Swiss Shard
and I had a lot of collar greens so I
would like kind of swap out some of the
greens um cuz I didn’t want to be
wasteful and so um don’t don’t buy
everything you’re going to be going back
to the grocery store every couple days
cuz you also want things um for optimal
freshness so pre-plan your grocery store
trips um and just don’t buy
everything um and then meal prepping or
in snack prep so I on Sundays would be
in the kitchen like peeling carrots
cutting
vegetables um planning out the week and
it just made for a whole lot easier to
pick up like a carrot and do all the
kind making humus um for doing all those
things so plan on doing kind of like a
lot of prep one thing I do have now
though that I did not have before is the
vegetable chopper oh my God it’s going
to be amazing I’m so excited um because
it’s going to make my life a whole lot
easier um so yeah prepare to meal prep
and vegetable
prep another tip I have is kind of don’t
be afraid to go off script and not like
Off Script in the way of the foods like
eat the foods that he tells you to eat
but if you don’t have time or the energy
to kind of make a full meal um if you
like like beans and rice eat some beans
and rice and maybe throw in some
mushrooms um and some other like hearty
vegetables and just throw it together
with some olive oil or something like
that and uh and just eat it so don’t be
afraid to not if you don’t follow the 10
10day plan by like the
script my other tip for you is if you
are not a water drinker this might be
really hard um I mean unless you can
drink black coffee and plain tea um but
for your water if you cannot do water um
what I did was I infused my water with
like berries I would do strawberries um
and then I would also add some fresh
herbs um so what I found like I thought
I liked mint and I do like mint but what
I found more than mint was basil so I
would do some strawberry spr a little
bit of lemon and basil water and just
Infuse that with no added anything so no
fake sugars no regular sugar just Infuse
it and that helps spruce up my water a
little bit the other thing that you can
do is you can do like soda Waters um
carbonated waters but just make sure
they don’t have like natural flavors in
them a brand that I would recommend is
spr spin driff cuz it’s all 100% juice
um no added anything so you can do like
a spin driff if you you want to flavor
your water but I really did like infused
water so that helped me a
lot um and then lastly those first 3 to
4 days are going to be the hardest power
through because no you are going to feel
so much better on the other side if you
just complete the
journey oh sorry the other thing with
those 3
days you’re going to have headaches
you’re going to be tired and you’re
going to have body aches um so just kind
of be aware of that your body is ridding
of the toxins and just power
through one other thing I would like to
mention is the Weight Watchers thing
right so I’m doing Weight Watchers now
to just kind of keep track of what I’m
eating throughout the holidays um
January I’m still going to track my
points just because there is points in
um rice there’s there’s points in
potatoes and things things like that so
I’m going to follow that um but what
Weight Watchers is going to do for me in
February is once I’m reintroducing Foods
it will help me be mindful of how much I
am reintroducing into my diet so I am
not going to you know have like 6 ounces
of cheese or something like that because
of the points so it’s just going to kind
of help me keep on track that way um and
that’s how I plan on reintroducing
Weight Watchers into this whole
journey thank you all for following
along I hope that this may have inspired
you and maybe you pick up the book I
will link the book Below in case you
decide to purchase it yourself um it’s
Michael Simon fix it with food he has
two ones and it’s the yellow cover not
the blue cover um the one that I
followed um so what I plan on doing next
I need to do a pantry clear out um so
I’m going to clear my pantry in my
fridge and clear everything out so I
know kind of what foods I need to eat
next or during like the last week of the
year um to remove and get out of the
house prior to starting this journey so
give me a like and please subscribe if
you would like to see that video um I
know I am always so curious as to what
people keep in their pantry and how
organized and whatever they are um so
yeah that will be next on this channel
if you would like to follow that thank
you so much for watching and I hope you
um have a great New Year