Our family has taken on a challenge where we focus on getting back to the basics in our physical and spiritual health. We thought it would be fun to document our journey and share it with our friends and family.
For those of you who haven’t had the pleasure of meeting our crazy family up close let me introduce ourselves. Brandon is 32 and a business banker who lovingly supports our family and makes all we do possible. I, Jacque, am 29 and a homeschooling, stay-at-home mom. I love what I do and wouldn’t trade it for the world. I have been homeschooling for 5 years now and plan on continuing, if that be God’s will, all the way through. I cherish every moment with my kids and love seeing them learn new things and have their own convictions about what they believe and do and say. Speaking of kids…our oldest is Jeremiah who is 8. He is an awesome kid who loves to learn new things, he plays guitar, basketball, and football. He love to draw and read and beat us in board games. He also has had type 1 diabetes for over 4 years now. We are currently working on getting him a diabetic alert dog. Check out our efforts here. Our little princess, Shiloh, is 5 and is the funniest kid ever. Half the time she in her own little world and it’s so much fun to watch. She has just started playing piano and cheers for Jeremiah’s basketball team. Levi is our 2 year old little miracle that we prayed and prayed for. He brings joy to every one of our lives and is so much fun. He calls everything “memo” (for elmo), even though he’s never watched Elmo! He loves balls and throws everything including Christmas ornaments, dishes, and things that hurt when they hit you. He’s a sweetie. All 3 of our kids, including myself, have gluten-sensitivites.
So that’s us! Hope you enjoy getting to know us more!
Our Plan: When it comes to eating we normally follow the whole9, or Paleo, eating plan. This means we eat only good meats and fish, fruits, veggies, nuts, and lots of good fat. Whole Foods…. During the months of October, November, January, and April we participated in a Whole30 challenge as a family. We “let our bodies heal and recover from whatever effects bad foods have caused.” We “pushed the ‘reset’ button with our metabolism, systemic inflammation, and the downstream effects of the food choices we have made.” It was challenging but as a family we did great.
When we are not doing the Whole30 we follow the Paleo eating plan 90% of the time with the occasional addition of cheese. Brandon and Jeremiah LOVE good cheese so we sometimes have to head over to Whole Foods for some yummy cheese. We leave ourselves the 10% wiggle room for those times that a food is really worth it. For instance, I always eat a few of my mom’s homemade tamales when we visit my family for Christmas and I occasionally make myself a bowl of gluten-free macaroni and cheese!
We have been unexpectedly amazed at what eating paleo has done for our son, Jeremiah’s, type 1 diabetes. His blood sugar numbers have been much better than they ever have been before. This is just one more reason we have for continuing to eat so well.
As for exercise, Brandon works out at Anytime Fitness and I do TRX , Crossfit, and running. Jeremiah and Shiloh participate in a P.E. class through our homeschool group, and we can never slow Levi down! As a family we make purposeful decisions to do something active daily. We just participated in our second Whole Family BP Challenge and had a blast.
As we focus on our physical health we also want to make sure we very much focus on our spiritual health and our relationship with Jesus Christ. We have committed to having a daily worship/devotional time as a family every morning. We are also studying the bible on our own. The kids and I are studying the book of Daniel in seperate personal bible studies. I am also going through a study on Respectable Sins. Brandon is focusing on reading the bible and exploring what God says about being a biblical father and husband. We very much desire to grow closer to each other as we grow closer to the Lord.
We have been blessed. We are excited to be on this journey and can’t wait to see how God will continue to work in both our spiritual and physical lives. Thank you for joining us!
October 18th, 2011 at 10:09 pm
Hi. Just found your blog from Robb Wolf’s re: Type I DM……would love to follow you on facebook as well
October 19th, 2011 at 3:18 am
So glad you found us!
February 28th, 2012 at 12:57 pm
I want to commend you on what you’re doing for your family. It’s no easy feat to abstain from what’s become the norm for feeding our children.
I am on a similar journey (although mine includes daily doses of our own goats’ milk and cheese, and as much of our own meat and produce as we can raise) and it can be very hard to stay the course.
Congratulations on making a fine choice for your family, and for being courageous enough to allow God’s word to guide you through it.
Well wishes
Jennifer
March 1st, 2012 at 9:28 pm
Thank you so much for the encouragement Jennifer. So glad to know we are walking together.
February 28th, 2012 at 1:04 pm
to say I’m excited to find another Christian Paleo family would be an understatement. Beautiful family and testimony!
March 1st, 2012 at 9:30 pm
I agree fully! It is rare, but here we are! Glad we are on this journey together.
March 25th, 2012 at 12:04 pm
Hello, I stumbled on your blog with a google search for Peleo and type 1 diabetes. I have a unique situation. Our family had been eating peleo for almost a year when my son was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.
To add to our unique situation, our family lives in Loja, Ecuador. We are missionaries here. THis adds to the confusion of the diagnosis. Not only do we have to learn all of this new stuff to keep our son alive, but we must do it in Spanish.
Our dr here sent us to a nutritionist who immediately put us on a new diet. This diet involves 40 grams of carbs for three meals a day and 20 grams of carbs for his three snacks. We now eat a cup of rice at every single meal (sometimes I exchange that for black beans or corn tortillas.)
Besides some sometimes erratic numbers, my T-1 son seems to be thriving. of course, this is in comparison to how ill he was before diagnosis.
The biggest problem is that my health has gone down the tubes. I have not gained any of the weight back that I lost with my whole 30 because every portion is carefully measured, but my body seems to be deteriorating by the day. I want my family back on the whole9/peleo way of living but I am scared to death that with the medical care provided for us here, that I will hurt my son.
I write this to ask if you would be willing to converse with me about your son and his diet?
Our dr here will NOT be supportive of this and as his wife is the nutritionist who changed our diet in the first place we may actually cause offense and lose the only diabetic specialist we have access to.
If you would be willing to talk to me, please send me an email. Thank you so much.
March 25th, 2012 at 2:09 pm
Absoutely. I’ll be in contact with you soon Becka.
April 7th, 2012 at 11:10 am
I have to agree about packaged GF foods. I never went crazy on them becuase they’re usually out of my budget, but the few that I’ve tried have been disappointing, and I didn’t feel well after eating them. In my own cooking I tend to focus on things that are naturally gluten-free without trying to mimic glutenous foods. Many of the ingredients used in GF recipes don’t even qualify as food, in my opinion.
May 16th, 2012 at 12:56 am
I would like to offer fundraising if possible! Please contact me if you would like more info.