A Cariad Life

January 19, 2025

Happy New Year! Yes, it’s a few weeks into the year, but we are still very much in the introductory chapters of this new season. I did not make any concrete resolutions as we started the year…I chose to savor how it ended and reflect on what is ahead, and I have chosen my word for the year ahead and how I want to lean into it (more on that in a moment.)

As we began to wrap up 2024, I found myself slowly recovering in my self-directed respite from an incredibly challenging experience with my previous employer here in Cary. Around the first of November, I got a call from a small, for-profit, women-owned business in education assessment and analysis that was offering a completely remote position to lead their administration and operations. edCount LLC has been around for over 20 years and is highly respected in the education field. I learned quickly in the interview process that it is also highly respected by their employees–they spoke consistently of great work-life balance, trust to do their work, and their high regard for the CEO. It did not take me long to learn it would be a great fit, and I have been there now for 2 months. I love it! I am energized, cared for, and every night I look forward to going back to work–no dread or stomach aches.

Darrell and I enjoyed the Thanksgiving holidays with his sister and our nephew, and then we traveled to Seattle to spend Christmas with Noah and Chloe and Caleb and Tobi. Chloe hosted Christmas Eve and Day at their house–it was so warm and cozy and we indulged in great food! Then, we all traveled to Seabrook with Coco and enjoyed four days at the beach–making more great meals, playing games, and taking long walks! Caleb and Tobi then traveled back to Raleigh with us, and stayed with us for another week. It was so good to spend time together, and I continue to be astounded at not only how, wise, cool, and kind our boys are, but they also have really good partners–women who are strong, smart, capable, and love to cook with their guys! We are blessed.

As the holidays began, I read a book, The Way we Eat Now; watched a documentary about plant-based eating, and bought a cookbook, The Plant-based Eating Cookbook that began to inform my word for 2025: Nourish. Before you worry that I am going to launch into a vegan rant, relax–I am not vegan, nor am I interested in diving headfirst into that world (I did live in France where cheese, butter, and yogurt are arguably the best in the world). This reading (and watching), however, did cause me to take a step back and consider a few things about food and my relationship with it:

1. We get to choose every day what we eat–it is our choice (as adults anyway) if we will choose things that nourish us or not.
2. Much of the food we are offered now, doesn’t really reflect actual food–some cannot even be recognized as food. We could never recreate it in our kitchen and the ingredients are not something we could even buy–much of it didn’t even exist 50 years ago.
3. As a society, we have begun to disrespect the purpose of food (nourishment) in our lives–we eat on the go, we “drink” our food in the form of protein drinks and bars, and we don’t insist that what we ingest is really good for us
4. Whole fresh in-season foods, prepared with care and served on a table in real dishes, is a form of love and offering nourishment for our bodies and souls.
5. We are worth eating good food–I’ve shared before my struggles with depriving myself of food to look a certain way; eating a well-balanced diet of good foods honors what my body needs to run as it should.

I remembered too some things about growing up. In our home, we very rarely had soda. Only a 2 liter (remember those!) on Friday nights that my family would share over popcorn–not even drinking all of it. We drank water for dinner. We didn’t have bread with dinner; there was one portion of meat and several vegetables. There wasn’t dessert, except on special occasions…and here is the real kicker, we didn’t really snack (my mom would make chocolate chip cookies and we could have 1 after school.) We weren’t hungry and meals were usually eaten sitting down at the table. Just typing this seems a bit “old-fashioned,” but we were healthy–we ate nourishing food and had a healthy relationship with food. Thanks to my mom who was raising us as a single mom and had very little money to ensure we ate well.

So what does this look like for me as I go into 2025? Well, I want to nourish my body, mind, and soul this year. In this post, I’m focusing on body, but I’ll share more later about how I will nourish my mind and soul. I am intentionally choosing every day as an opportunity to nourish my body. Reducing (not eliminating) empty calories and ultra processed foods-I will still enjoy a tortilla chip, a glass of wine, and a piece of dark chocolate. I have begun introducing more foods into my daily diet that are composed of healthy grains (try red lentil pasta–full of protein and fiber), fats (eliminating seed oils), vegetables, and fruits. I’m reducing meat and choosing to be a lot more picky about what I eat when I eat it (we seriously have issues with chickens and pigs in the US and how they are raised). Finally, I am choosing to move every day–sometimes just a 30 minute walk, but it feels good to stretch my legs and breathe in a lung full of fresh air.

This may sound like a list of resolutions or a depressing new fad diet, but for me it is a renewed approach to self-care. As I listen to my body, I know the truth…I feel better when I give it what it needs, not what is convenient and super tasty (much of food is engineered to make us crave it). I sleep better, maintain a healthy weight, and my skin looks better…in short, I feel nourished. Also, I take “one day at a time–it’s not about perfection and eliminating everything “bad,” but the overall trend is a respect for food and its purpose: nourishment.

Soon, I’ll share some of my favorite new dishes, and I would love to hear from you what you have learned about nourishing your body.