Gwen always told us how David enjoyed coming with her to the "healthy eating classes” and always wanted to try the new foods she made. She also told us that David was worried about her and was afraid that she would get sick or die and wouldn’t be able to provide him with a home. For Gwen, taking care of her health was not about taking care of herself but about being able to continue to take care of her grandchildren.
Gwen had to be introduced to a whole new way of eating that was very foreign to her. Being on a fixed low income, she fed herself and her family with the cheapest packaged, processed and fast food she could buy. Making sure that her family had a full stomach took precedence over making healthy and more expensive choices. The women in her community were a great resource and helped her with suggestions on transitioning to healthier food on a budget.
Here are the changes that Gwen made:
~ Less white flour, white rice and white sugar. More whole grains. Gwen had never had quinoa, barley, brown rice and other whole grains. She started by buying whole wheat bread instead of white, mixing 1/4 cup of brown rice with white rice and slowly increasing and switching to whole grain pasta. When her grandchildren resisted the changes she told them about her poor health and asked for their help. David was a great support and was willing to try anything to help his grandma. With time she started trying other whole grains that I and the women in the group bought for her.
~ One of her biggest hurdles was the price of fruits and vegetables. Getting her supermarket’s sales of the week leaflet and joining a neighborhood CSA program transformed her experience with fresh produce. She learned how to shop for more affordable but super healthy vegetables like cabbage, carrots, celery and sweet potatoes and integrate them into crowd pleasing recipes like chilis and soups.
~ I learned a lot from Gwen about working with people where they are and taking small steps forward. Not everyone I work with is going to shop at health food stores and eat only organic. What’s important is that they make consistent progress in improving their health. Gwen was not willing to give up artificial sweeteners and still consumed sugar free treats, but she was willing to switch to stevia to sweeten her drinks and ate less sweets overall.
~ Another big change was not going to fast food chains with her grandchildren so often. She discovered that making baked chicken and oven baked fries was not more expensive and she learned to flavor the foods the way her family enjoyed with the many recipe suggestions she got from the group.
~ Gwen walked into the first group with a walker. After a couple of months she was walking with a cane and after a couple more she was walking without any support. The women in her neighborhood started a walking team and Gwen joined them. She would walk slowly and for short distances at first but every week she would improve, get stronger, walk taller and cover more distance.
I will never forget the day Gwen walked into the meeting after seeing her doctor again. He was amazed at her progress and reduced her diabetes medication, telling her that if she kept on doing what she was doing she could get off the medication completely. We all clapped and cheered and then, little David ran to me, hugged me and told me “thanks for helping my grandma.” There was not a dry eye in the room, and for me, it was one of those moments where I knew exactly why I do what I do.