Photo credit: Natalie Puls Photography
I have always been interested in the fundamental basics of health – eating good food that isn’t out of a box and exercising on a regular basis. At least that is my view of health when you break it down to its core. However, even though I’ve had this interest for most of my life, something was missing in my overall personal health that I never realized.
My story starts as a kid who spent several years of his childhood as the chubby kid before I hit a growth spurt and grew out of what I like to affectionately call my “husky” phase. I know that a lot of kids go through this phase in life and it is a normal part of growing up for many people. For me, this phase in my life shaped me in several ways. First, it gave me the normal self-image insecurities around how I looked that you would expect. I was never all that comfortable and confident with my shirt off because of how I looked and felt as a kid, I guess I never really grew out of that phase mentally even after I lost weight and was relatively fit. Also, I developed a relationship with food that I wouldn’t exactly define as healthy. To most people I probably appeared to eat well and take care of myself, but it could be very up and down. I would tend to either be super strict and eat “healthy” or binge on a bunch bad stuff all at once. I was very all “on” or “off” in my version of eating healthy. When I did binge on bad food it was usually when I was alone and I was immediately regretful.
A pivotal point in my life came in my late twenties when my dad suddenly passed away of a heart attack at the much too young age of 56. The heartbreak of this loss caused me to re-examine how I was living my life and the choices I was making. Health-wise, this turned in to me exercising more to maintain my physical health. I vowed to make exercising a habit that I would never drop and I pushed myself harder inside and outside of the gym using what happened to my dad as motivation to strengthen my heart and body. While this worked to make me feel better physically and mentally because I was working hard and taking care of myself, I was missing a big piece of the equation – what I was eating.
It was only after a long time of working out harder and more consistently than I ever had without seeing any physical change that I realized that I had to change what I was eating. I wasn’t satisfied with how I looked and felt and wanted to find a better way to eat to support me being healthy and happy in the long run. I first decided to cut down on carbs consistently and switched out the daily sandwich I was having for lunch for a salad with grilled chicken. I soon began seeing some results physically and began to discover the paleo diet through getting to know Erica and seeing how she had changed her diet and was feeling much better because of it. Soon enough I was eating paleo myself and really enjoying it. I connected with the simple philosophy of the diet and also re-connected with my love of cooking food, spending time in the kitchen, and trying new things.
I think I connected with the way of paleo eating so much because of how I was raised. I grew up in a small town on a small farm in rural Oregon. My parents raised cows (and chickens and pigs at times) so we always had home-grown (grass-fed) meat in the freezer. As a child I was raised on quality, home-cooked meals using meat we raised and fresh vegetables from the garden. I learned all about cooking from my Mom growing up and as I struck out on my own in life I discovered that I really enjoyed cooking and trying new recipes. I love to share good food with people and show them that creating delicious meals can be simple and very gratifying.
I now feel very satisfied with where I am at in my journey to live a good, healthy life. I have a confidence I have never had before and feel completely satisfied with what I eat and how I feel about myself. No ups and downs, just consistent good food and healthy eating.
My goal now is to share the confidence and satisfaction that I have found with others. It is my hope that I can help to inspire you to eat well, stay healthy, and feel great.
Bottom line, I like to make quality homemade food and enjoy keeping it simple. I hope you enjoy the recipes and other items we share here and if you do, please share our site with others to show people how to make a real simple good life.