GPS to a Joyful Marriage

While shopping at the grocery store this past weekend, Rick grabbed numerous bags of candy for Trick or Treaters on Halloween.  I looked at the candy in the cart and said, “Hmmm.  It seems you only bought candy that you can eat.” He looked at me and replied, “Of course!” “Maybe I want some,” I quietly whined. His look displayed shear panic as he responded, “But you hate me after you’ve eaten too much sugar!” “Ha ha ha ha ha!” I cackled (much like the Wicked Witch of the West), but then I immediately winced at his abrupt candor regarding my sugar issues. Almost two years ago, I changed my eating habits and have had phenomenal improvements in my health.  While fasting from sugar for a forty day period, I discovered that I had no depression during that time.  I have struggled with bouts of depression all of my adult life.  I always chalked it up to PMS or life’s circumstances.  In spite of PMS and the same circumstances, that deep pit of d...

I feel compelled to share a little, again, about my food journey I’ve been on this past year.  I just came back from the grocery store and marvel at the ease and speed in which I traveled down the aisles looking for my items.  Only a year and a half ago, going to the store was a major chore for me.  I would have hip pain and leg pains that would often keep me from going to the store.  When I did go, I might start out feeling alright, but after an aisle or two, I would wonder if I could make it to my car because of the pain.  The pain in my legs prevented me from sleeping on my side at night, and I had to sleep on my back. Sometimes even lying on my back hurt, but I learned to live with it. I’m amazed at how we put up with pain and learn to live with it.  Standing hurt, sitting hurt, walking hurt.  I lived like that for over ten years. For the first five years or so, it would come and go but became constant after that.  No one knew the ex...

I’m getting off the path of marriage this week, but I feel compelled to share with you a recent experience that changed my life.   I know some of you out there may be affected the same way. I didn’t grow up in a church that talked about fasting, and so it’s been a new concept for me in the past eight years since first attending a church that practiced it.  I did the Lent thing as a child occasionally, but that usually meant giving up something I wasn’t going to miss anyway.  (I didn’t know the significance of Lent back then.) The church I now attend has been promoting a forty day fast. (Check out their website www.gwocag.net for Pastor Bob’s excellent “Forty Days With the Holy Spirit” daily devotional.)  After some discussion with other members, I jumped on the bandwagon and decided to give it a try.  In the past I’d fast for a day or two but never forty.  “My name is Sandee Lester and I am a sugarholic”.  I knew exactly what I needed to fas...