Menstrual Cramps, Bloating, PMS, UGH!

Goodbye Cramps, Hello Energetic Living!

My friend writes: "I'm sorry to say I have to use Advil once a month for my cramps or I'm in complete agony. I have a tilted uterus and have been told my cramps are child-labor contractions like." Can you relate?

I sure can! I also have a tilted uterus. I used to be out of commission for three days a month. In high school I wondered, "How do women hold a job when they clearly need to take of several days of work each month to handle this pain?"

I often thought my degree of pain was abnormal, but I'm beginning to think it isn't uncommon. Leg cramps, nausea, bloating, overall body tiredness that makes it hard to move, low energy, foggy thinking, sudden loss of ability to move or think or do anything but clutch one stomach in agony... Yeah, every month.

I tried various pain relievers and none of them worked. I tried walking it out, sleeping it off, even vigorous excerise. Surprisingly, that seems to he help a bit, but it is nothing like real relief.

Now, after years of experimentation, I've finally found a way to eliminate cramps and bloating, reduce my period length to only three days (instead of eight!) and even feel energetic on my period.

Eating all raw brought my period down from eight days to three by itself, yet the cramps were still often brutal, leaving me curled up in a ball, sometimes crying from pain. Often I'd fill up the bathroom with hot water and just stay there for hours, not daring to move lest I increase the pain.

Then, I began to observe a trend... There were months where the pain was less, and months where it was crippling. The times where it was really bad were times when I had a fancy raw dessert the night before, like a coconut curry soup (yes, those can be made raw in your blender) or a zucchini-noodle dish with a rich cashew sauce. The times where it was hardly there at all were times when the previous night I had mostly greens.

I began to make it a routine to drink a green juice the morning I got my period. This would reduce pain by about 60%, which is nothing to sneeze at, but if your cramps are as bad as the ones I used to get, then you know that even 40% of the pain is still enough to keep you from living your life.

Times where I combined eating "light" the day before and drank vegetable juice the day of the pain would be down to about 30% of those "full strength" monster cramps.

So I finally got this fantastic idea... What if I did a nearly fat-free cleanse starting three days before I expect my period to start? To my delight, I found this to be incredibly effective.

Why does it work? The severity of cramps has a lot to do with what is going on in your intestines and colon. If you're at all backed up, the cramps are much worse. Fat takes the longest to digest, so the more fat you eat, the more stuff is hanging out in your colon at a given time. This isn't to say fat is bad. We actually need healthy fats for every cell in our bodies, but cleansing and eating a very low fat diet for several days out of the month gives you digestive system a break. It is good for men as well as women, but for women, we have that motivation of a shorter, less painful (or pain-free!) period.

The fertile female body is always cleaning itself. During your period you are shedding away blood that is no longer suitable for feeding an embryo. Many women, while retaining their fertility, lose their period entirely when they become cleansed enough. It is no longer necessary to shed the blood because it is still perfectly good the next month.

Following my protocol, I actually experience a lift in my mood, a boost in my energy, and a spirit of enthusiasm that I don't have the rest of the month. Raw food has made me a generally happy and energetic person, but this little cleanse causes my motivation, endurance and spirits to sky-rocket. The mild inconvenience vegetable juices and enemas are so worth it. So what exactly do I do to make my period go so smoothly without PMS symptoms, menstrual cramps, bloating and so on? I've compiled my best advice, my best tips, my best protocols all into one comprehensive article on having a moon-time of relaxation, rejuvenation and restoration.

Wishing you a more fulfilled moon-time. Interested in learning more ways to streamline your life and experience more pleasure and less pain? Sign up for my e-letters below.

How I Have Two Husbands

Lytenian and I have always had a very open-minded stance on love, romance, intimacy, and relationships. I asked him in our early days how he felt about cheating. I'd cheated before.1 My first love left me for cheating after we'd been together for nearly two years. At the age of fifteen I felt like my life was over. I tried very hard to conform myself to monogamy.2 I committed myself further.3 I resisted the urge.4 But it was painful, and it didn't feel natural to me.5 Before reading more of this article, you may want to read my post about our imagined boundaries where I define what I mean by “love,” and by “romance,” and by “intimacy” which I believe are very important terms to define in relationships. My Relationship With Lytenian Lytenian has helped me a lot.6 He helped me release stagnant energy from my lower chakras that was causing me to fixate on sexuality.7 He helped me heal from previous traumas8 that reduced my more kinky desires. Lytenian accepted me so unconditionally that I stopped being the clingy, needy girlfriend/partner that I had been in the past with my previous loves. In other words, he helped me move through a lot of my developmental trauma – no small feat!

1Are you interested in the story of how I fell in love for the first time, and how I ended up moving in with my first love when I was fifteen, how I cheated on him, and why, and how he left me? I learn best from stories, which is why I write my own. It is so enjoyable to enter another world through a book, article or journal! If you're interested in my autobiographical novels, personal diary, and/or more of my photos, artwork and revelations, then come get exclusive access as one of my patrons here. Also, as one of my patrons, you'll be able to ask me personal questions about my life and get entirely authentic questions. 1-8There are so many stories here. Come share them with me.

Raederle and Lytenian, 2014, in Florida (on a trip).

Lytenian listened to me talk about men and women I was attracted to. He forgave me when I did not-so-monogamous things, even long before we knew about polyamory. In 2011 I started begging Lytenian to let me sleep with my ex. He told me "no" at first. Not on the basis of jealousy, but on the basis that he believed it would be bad for my emotional health. Finally, I argued (after months of bringing it up on a weekly basis or so), "I just want you to trust my judgment completely." Lytenian chewed that over, and then finally said, "Okay."

Sleeping with my ex was over-rated, but it gives context to how easily we declared ourselves polyamorous in 2012, which you can read about here: How Lytenian & I Became Polyamorous.

But despite Lytenian being such an unconditionally loving sweetheart, we were really struggling by 2015. We spent more and more time arguing. I thought the solution was to travel more. Every time we traveled before, it helped. So from May 2015 to August 2015 we had a very long trip. We spent five weeks doing a permaculture internship, we spent months visiting friends and dog-sitting for friends out of town. It was during this time period that I almost gave up on him and then decided I didn't want to leave after all.

Chemical Sensitivities: Curse or Blessing?

In August of 2015 we came to an Eco Village in central New York on the way back to Buffalo, NY. Lytenian and I were visiting a polyamorous couple we had met at a polyamory gathering roughly a year ago. Lytenian decided he could leave me at the Eco Village for a week and go work on our apartment in Buffalo, which needed a lot of work. Due to my chemical sensitivities, I couldn't be around for the construction, so this posed a great solution.

But also due to my sensitivities, the arrangement had difficulties. On day three I was wandering outside with my neck-warmer pulled up over my nose and mouth looking for some way to escape the migraine that was coming on due to the barbecue occurring two houses down. The next door neighbor was outside working on building a covered bridge. I'd met Greg the night before. We'd played my card game, A Voice of Conscience, and we'd gotten along very well.

Greg saw the pained expression on my face and came quickly over to me asking me what was wrong. I asked if his windows were closed, and if so, could I stay in his house until the smoke dissipated? He rushed me inside, surprisingly understanding. I'm not used to people taking me so seriously, so quickly, so kindly. I was immediately touched. He led me to his guest room. He'd mentioned that he had a guest room the night before, and alluded to the possibility that I could stay with him if my friends’ futon wasn't comfortable.

I expected Greg to go back to working outside after showing me in, but instead, he stayed and talked with me. First about my chemical and smoke sensitivities, but then rapidly on to many other topics. He had been moved by things I said while we had been playing Voice of Conscience. He impressed me with his intelligence and perception. He offered me the room, and I gratefully accepted. When he finally left the room for the night, we'd been talking for seven hours.

Trust In Relationships . . . And Jealousy

Lytenian and I agreed over the phone that the longer I could stay away, the more work he could do on the apartment. He asked my opinions about various improvements he was making. I finally just said, "Use your judgment. I trust you." These words fueled his flame to life. His phone conversations with me carried a hint of his enthusiasm and joy each day. After we'd been apart for about a week, I'd met Greg's girlfriend. I exclaimed to Lytenian over the phone, "I didn't know she would be so young and beautiful! I expected her to be middle-aged and frumpy – like him."

Lytenian said, "It sounds like you're jealous."

"I feel jealous! But how can that be? He's twenty years older than me, and I don't find him attractive."

Lytenian directed me to breathe into my feelings. Finally, in tears, I said, "I thought I was the smart, pretty, young woman in his life."

I was confused. I didn't tell Greg about this. We just continued to talk each evening that he was not spending with his girlfriend or otherwise busy. He started giving me massages somewhere in there. He bought me a board game. He took me to the farmer's market. After two weeks, it was impossible for me to deny that I had feelings for him.

Greg's young girlfriend wrote him a break-up letter a couple days after that. Greg laughed it off. They'd only been together for a few weeks. Now I really was the woman in his life – and I was living in his house. I admitted to possibly having feelings for him, beating around the bush. I was nervous, and unsure how to handle the situation. I knew he was open to the idea of polyamory. We'd talked about it at length (among dozens of other subjects) in the couple weeks we'd known each other.

Negotiations & Novelty

Lytenian and I negotiated how to handle this development over the phone. I came back to Buffalo with him for a time, but then went back out to be with Greg for another two weeks. Lytenian and I saw each other for roughly one week a month all autumn in 2015. Each time Lytenian and I were together it was sweeter than ever before. I appreciated him as I hadn't in years. Greg gave me a comparison that showed me the things that were unique to Lytenian that I loved so much. Lytenian reveled in how happy I was, how energetic and exuberant I was. He felt more loved by me than he had felt in a long time.

Greg lost his excess weight from my positive foodie influence. He started looking more and more attractive to me. I moved many of my things from Buffalo into Greg's home. Greg spent Thanksgiving with me and my family in Buffalo. (There was a raw vegan Thanksgiving potluck.)

In January 2016, Lytenian moved in with Greg and I, changing a room that had mostly been storage into his bedroom. The previous guest room became my bedroom. Greg struggled some with these adjustments. Heck, we all did. I suffered from a terrible fear that to "chase two rabbits" was to "lose them both" as the old adage says. (I allude to this difficulty in one of my most revealing and astonishing articles: I've Been Really Anal Retentive . . . Curing Chronic Constipation.)

Lytenian & Greg, 2016

Greg and Lytenian get along beautifully.

In April 2016, Lytenian and I attended the poly gathering again for our fourth time. This time, Greg went with us. Lytenian reflected that he found himself actually interested in finding a girlfriend, whereas before, he'd always just gone for fun. Because I finally have my emotional, physical and mental needs met, he feels freer to seek out his own highest truth, and highest joy.

Raederle, Lytenian & Greg, May 1st 2016

And May 1st 2016, Greg and I had a commitment ceremony. Friends and family came from all over, most of them driving three to seven hours to be with us for the weekend.

We exchanged vows. Greg added some humor to his at my suggestion, as a commitment ceremony is really a performance as much as it is anything else.

Greg's Vows

Raederle, I vow:
To trust you, as I have from the start, with both my lightest and my darkest selves
To give you, if not the fruit of my loins, at least the fruit of my looms,
and, perhaps someday, some forgeries from my forge
To plagiarize from you, even as I make these vows,
hoping that you'll recognize imitation as a form of flattery,
or, perhaps, in other words,
To strive to make you feel seen
To be open to loving all the parts of you, even the ones I have yet to meet
To seek new love between us whenever old love falters or dies
To be present with you when you express a desire to communicate with me
To strive for authenticity and transparency in all our interactions
To give you the benefit of believing that your actions are guided by your love for me
To allow myself to be softened and forgive even when I feel distressed or hurt by you
To keep trying to grow, and to let you remind me when I forget

Raederle's Vows

Greg,
I vow. . .
To always strive for complete authenticity and transparency in all of our interactions.
To consider your feelings and best interests in my decisions.
To honor and validate your grandest vision of your life, and yourself.

When I feel hurt by you, I vow. . .
To give you the benefit of believing that you would never intentionally wrong me.
To give you every opportunity to explain and make amends.
To allow myself to be softened and forgiving.

When love between us falters, I vow. . .
To let you know.
To listen.
To seek new love between us.

When we are apart, when we have new partners, when we feel distant, I vow. . .
To keep a space for you in my heart, and in my life.
To continue to build our love through compassion, creativity, honesty, and shared experiences.

I vow. . .
To lend my strength and support to you when you are feeling weak or overwhelmed.
To say "yes" to your fantasies, and desires, at all times that it does not conflict with my health.
To always listen when you express a desire to communicate with me.
To ardently seek the most complete, loving, and profound understanding of you.
To hold your priorities, values, and dreams as equally important to my own.

Greg, Raederle, Lytenian, April 2017

Lytenian and I can both honestly say, in full sincerity, that Greg has saved our relationship. He filled the needs that Lytenian was not fulfilling for me. He made it possible for Lytenian and I to continue to share our connection – without resentment! This has been miraculous and beautiful.

Many, many times Greg has helped "get in the middle" of my arguments with Lytenian and helped us see each other more clearly. And, in turn, many times Lytenian has mediated for Greg and I.

And that is the story of how I have two husbands.

If you enjoyed reading this post, you may also like:

I've been really anal retentive . . . Curing Chronic Constipation
Why polyamory? What's wrong with monogamy?
Why I Almost Left My Husband
How We Became Polyamorous
Recognizing, Understanding & Treating Developmental Trauma
Does being more spiritually evolved make you a better person?
I am Multitudes, Not Monolith
Where is Spiritual Evolution taking us?

If you enjoy reading about my life, then you'll enjoy my detailed, novel-style, online diary which you can get exclusive access to as one of my patrons on patreon: www.patreon.com/Raederle. As a patron, you'll see photos, recipes, personal journal entries, and daily realizations from me that aren't available anywhere else.

How We Became Polyamorous

Before you read about how my husband and I came to be polyamorous, I recommend reading this post where I laid the groundwork for understanding this topic completely. In order to discuss polyamory, we first have to get on the same page about love, romance, intimacy, friendship, relationships, sexuality, and monogamy. Having a semantical misunderstanding about any of these concepts makes communication on the subject of polyamory virtually impossible.

After reading that post, you may want to go on to read about why I almost left Lytenian, my husband, in the summer of 2015.

And now, let me go back to the beginning . . .

We Met Online, 2,500 Miles Distant From One Another

Lytenian and I met on OKCupid. We had both answered over eight hundred match questions and we mutually had a 92% match rating at the time we met online, November 2009. Our first skype call lasted twelve hours! We literally talked until he had to leave for work the following morning.

Lytenian and I in 2010 in Walnut Creek (at home).

I flew out from Buffalo (New York State, U.S.A.) to visit him in Walnut Creek (California State, U.S.A.) for the first time January 2010. I stayed for three weeks which included my twenty-first birthday. April 2010 I flew back and moved in. June 2010 we had a personal hand-fasting ceremony – we married. I made a raw vegan pie in the shape of the words "I do" and surprised him with it.

April 2011 we moved from Walnut Creek to my home city, Buffalo. In that first year together we had embraced raw foods and veganism together. We had made friends together, traveled together, and stayed very much in love. We had never fought or argued at the time that we moved. There had been tense times, but never more than a few harsh words before we were already talking kindly and apologizing. Moving in with my parents seemed like a good idea at first, but as I wrote about in the aforementioned post ( about almost leaving Lytenian), he never found steady work again, and I built up increasing resentment about supporting him financially.

Lytenian and I in 2012, near Boston (on a trip).

In the winter of 2012 I received a letter from a girl on OKCupid. I was amazed to discover that she wasn't just cute and smart – she was also local. After several long letters we agreed to meet at a nearby vegan restaurant. She brought her boyfriend. That is, one of her boyfriends. She had two.

I was very, very curious about this. I'd heard of open relationships. I'd even tried having an open relationship with my third love (in 2007-2008), but it turned out that he couldn't handle the jealousy, and I wasn't good at handling it either. Besides, an open relationship was still commitment to one person. It just meant you could have sexual encounters on the side.

But this girl was doing something different. She had two relationships, not just two sexual partners. I liked her so much that after we finished eating we went for a walk. That was enjoyable too, so I invited her back to our apartment. I introduced her to my husband, Lytenian. The four of us talked late into the evening. When it was getting close to midnight she expressed that she was tired. Her boyfriend had already fallen asleep, and he was her driver. We shrugged and kept talking the majority of the night.

This amazing girl, one year younger than myself, told me all about the etiquette of "polyamory." I'd heard of polyamory before, but I didn't really know what it was, or if it was any different than polygamy. I'd heard of people having multiple wives. After all, that's in the bible. But I never thought about people doing it today – much less in America! And much less the other way around – two men with one woman!

She explained to me that she had a separate bedroom from her boyfriends, and that that was important. After all, what if one of them brought home a new girlfriend? She wouldn't want to have to sacrifice her space to give them privacy. She explained to me about making sure that her partners talked directly to each other so that she wasn't a go-between for them. She told me about having dates reserved each week for each of them, as well as time for all three of them to hang out together, and days for friends or for herself. Her social knowledge – polyamory included – was extensive.

"What do you think about this?" I asked Lytenian.

"I think we've both always been polyamorous, we just didn't have a term for it yet," he said.

And just like that, we both declared ourselves polyamorous. I've always been amazed that Lytenian has never shown a shred of jealousy, even when I gave a guy a hand job on an airplane in our first year together. (I felt stupid for having done this. It was not connecting, thrilling or delightful.) Lytenian always just wanted to know that I was safe.

Lytenian & Raederle, 2013, on Kaua'i island (on a five-month trip).

I don't know if the said girl (who introduced me to polyamory) is comfortable with being named, so I'm not naming her, but she remains my friend to this day. In April 2013 she invited me to come to a four-day polyamory gathering. Lytenian and I agreed, even though it was very hard for us to come up with the money. (Remember my book "Living Big & Traveling Far on $8,000 a Year or Less!"? Yeah. I was living on less then!) The gathering was spread over two mansions and housed fifty people.

The girl brought her two boyfriends. I brought Lytenian. The second day at the gathering I did some yoga with a friendly blue-eyed guy while most everyone else was out hiking. He then suggested we get in the hot tub together. We did. Nude is the norm at the said gathering, and when I saw him naked, I was impressed. I also enjoyed his knowledge of psychology, polyamory, relationships, and people in general. I fell for him. We slept together that night.

We made plans for that summer, but I ended up ditching the plans to visit him in favor of following a (literal) dream that told me I had to go to Kaua'i island the summer of 2013. My relationship with the guy didn't last, but it was a learning experience. Lytenian handled it all very well and was very sad for me when it ended. He held me while I cried. He was a bit stunned himself. He liked the guy too.

May and June of 2013, on Kaua'i island, we stayed with a triad – two women and one man. I had actually discovered them originally through a polyamory website, and they invited me to their farm. It was interesting to see polyamory in action first-hand. But the novelty quickly wore off. They were just people, like most people. They had their strong points and weak points like everyone else.

Later I realized that the intention of the dream that took us to the island was to save my relationship with Lytenian. It worked. My resentment dwindled to nothing while we were there. He was in better health from all the exercise, sun, fresh air and incredible vibes. Quality water also helped. (We bought a reverse osmosis system as soon as we got back to Buffalo – we were so done with drinking poor quality water!) The island experience brought us mutually to a strong space of faith in the universe. I've written about that at length at many times, in many places, so I won't get into that here. One place you can read more about that is here: Curing Chronic Constipation.

Raederle and Lytenian, 2014, in a park in Buffalo NY having a renewal-of-vows ceremony.

I had a couple different brief lovers in the summer of 2014. I learned that it wasn't someone's age, shape, relationship status or how good they were in bed that mattered to me. Those things varied, but the consistent frustration remained the same: Not enough deep connection.

It is hard to compete with the depth of connection I share with Lytenian. We've done mind-reading meditations where we pulled images from each other's mind. He's helped me face severe health challenges, and I've done the same for him. We've done many forms of consciousness alchemy together – hypnosis, neuro linguistic programming, reading The Mastery of Love, watching Teal Swan, moving meditations, co-counseling and more. He read aloud to me books by Terry Pratchett. I read aloud to him Conversations with God.

Lytenian and Raederle, 2015, during our five-week permaculture internship in Maryland.

By the end of the summer of 2015, I'd given up on polyamory. Nobody was going to be good enough to be worth adding to my life. Not while I still had Lytenian. And with all the resentment I'd harbored about supporting him financially, I thought perhaps I'd just try the single life for a while. And if you have not already read about that, you can click here to do so now.

The story continues in the autumn of 2015 . . .

If you enjoy reading about my life, then you'll enjoy my detailed, novel-style, online diary which you can get exclusive access to as one of my patrons on patreon: www.patreon.com/Raederle. As a patron, you'll see photos, recipes, personal journal entries, and daily realizations from me that aren't available anywhere else.

Curing Chronic Constipation

The saying that someone who is heavily bound by strict rules is "anal retentive" is absolutely true. I am my own primary study of this. I've suffered from chronic constipation my entire life. I could define constipation at the age of four, much to the discomfort of adults at my daycare.

I know all the tricks. Here are some . . .

Chronic-Consta-Cures!

Chia-Prune Pudding

• ½ cup chia seeds
• 6 minced prunes
• 1 cup water or distilled aloe juice
• 2 pinches cinnamon (recommended), organic vanilla powder (fun for variety) or raw cacao powder (extra consta-cure kick)

Directions: Stir all ingredients together and let thicken for five to ten minutes or leave in the fridge until you're ready for it.

Note: Stays good in the fridge for four days.

Chocolate-Aloe Smoothie

• 1-2 bananas (fresh or frozen – I recommend one of each or half of each)
• 2-6 tablespoons fresh aloe vera (cut from a house plant, spines removed – you can leave the skin on for extra consta-cure)
• 2 tablespoons raw carob powder (recommended for flavor, nutrition and intestine-soothing properties)
• 1 tablespoon raw cacao powder
• 2 cups water or distilled aloe juice
• 1 pinch chia seeds (optional)

Directions: Put all ingredients into a high-speed blender and blender until smooth. (This recipe will still come out good in a regular blender.)

Note: If you've never consumed fresh aloe before, start with one tablespoon and see how you respond. For some people, even a small amount (like a teaspoon) will cause intense diarrhea. For people with chronic constipation, usually it takes a lot more (like a quarter cup) to get things moving.

The Constipation Blues

The above two recipes have been enough at times to force my body to move stuff out. Symbolically, I couldn't figure out why I was so anal retentive when I let things go so much more easily than others. I've given away so many possessions. I've given away much of my time, attention, and affection.

So why was I holding on to so much shit?

The Cause of Constipation

Rules. That's the key. I've lived a life of ever-growing rule systems. I came up with rules (roles) for my relationships. I came up with rules for how to keep my apartment/house clean. I came up with rules for exercise. I came up with rules for my diet. And I followed these rules religiously. So much so that I have trouble breaking them.

How could I possibly eat breakfast if there are any dirty dishes in the kitchen? This is a rule I created when I was eighteen to finally force myself to keep a clean kitchen. I created this rule to protect myself from becoming disorganized like my mother. I often used "food rewards" as the basis for my discipline.

At times I've had rules like:

• If I get up at dawn, then I'm allowed to spend the morning playing video games.
• If I do one-hundred crunches, then I can make myself a fancy raw dessert (almonds, dates, apples, cinnamon, dried apricots, etc).

At times I've had rules without rewards like:

• I must create at least one page for my website each week. For each page I make, I must promote it through at least four different avenues (facebook, e-mail list, stumbleupon and twitter, for example).
• I must contact my extended family and old friends at least once a year via e-mail, snail mail or in person.

I found the latter sort of rules (those without rewards) much harder to stick to, and often they just died out. But the rules with food-rewards have stuck with me. Particularly when they actually make sense. For example:

• Before doing dishes, first empty the drying rack of all the dry dishes.

If I don't do that, I might run out of space for dishes, and then have dishes piling up on the counter, and this might cramp my style if I'm trying to make a fancy meal or make several dishes at once.

Other rules that have stuck with me are ones that I created for myself to protect myself from pain, such as:

• Don't call someone every single day.
• Don't pick at my lips when they're chapped.
• Don't ever eat bread, refined sugars or meat.
• Don't combine any kind of grain (rice, quinoa, millet, oats, etc) with any kind of fat (milk, oil, avocado, etc).
• Don't handle micro-fibers or dusty clean-up jobs without first thoroughly coating my hands in jojoba oil.
• Don't leave the house without a neck-warmer (in case of cold, and in case of fumes and needing to cover my face).

The above rules are some of the most sticky, convincing rules I have. Doing otherwise has caused so much pain, so many times, that the idea of breaking these rules is painful. Other rules I've created for myself are easier to bypass because they might cause pain, but I'm not sure because the outcomes have been inconsistent. For example, sometimes eating any cooked food at all has caused me pain, and sometimes it has caused me enjoyment, or been neutral, or given me a little extra constipation but no serious pain.

Hence why I've spent two full years of my life eating completely raw (2010 and 2015) without any exceptions, but have had other years where as much as half of my diet was cooked food. For example, in 2012 I ate a lot of potatoes and steamed kale because they were "unlimited" through my Thorpes Farm C.S.A. while living in Buffalo, N.Y. and in 2013 I ate a lot of cooked breadfruits, papayas, green bananas that I harvested off of the land while living on Kaua'i island. In the first of those cases (lots of cooked potatoes and kale) I noticed that I was less energetic and having more health problems, and at the time I blamed it completely on the cooked food. Yet while on Kaua'i island I was eating as much cooked food, or more, but I was much healthier. Later, I realized that raw food helps compensate for environmental and emotional challenges as well as other bad lifestyle habits. While I was on Kaua'i island I was getting more exercise, sun, fresh air and fresh food, and so even with a high proportion of cooked food, I was doing quite well.

Changing Climate For Curing Constipation

And now I see even further into the truth of the difference between the summer of 2012 and the summer of 2013. The summer of 2012 (in Buffalo, New York State) was dominated by rules, routine and efficiency The summer of 2013 (on Kaua'i island, a Hawai'ian island) was dominated by adventure, growth, spirituality and change. It wasn't just a different climate externally, it was a different climate internally!

Thus, despite many clever rules designed specifically to prevent constipation (daily chia-prune pudding, daily half-gallon of water, daily this, daily that) it has still been a chronic issue for me, even as a raw foodist. When I first went raw, I stopped having digestive problems for the first year or two. Then I developed a digestive sensitivity to bananas, and I stopped consuming smoothies, which had been one of my magic tricks. Even after I regained my ability to consume bananas (years later), the smoothie magic was gone.

My Rules Protect Me

Then I met someone in 2013 who used the phrase, "Oh, yeah, so-and-so is very anal retentive," and it got me thinking about it. Then in 2016 I met someone who opened my eyes to how rule-based my life is. They pointed out how rigidly I hold myself to my rules.

Well, what's wrong with that? My rules are to protect myself!

"But why do you need protecting?" he asked.

"Because how else could I trust myself to do things that avoid pain and bring me joy?"

"Why don't you trust yourself?" he asked.

"Because too often I get caught up and do stupid things that hurt myself," I said.

"Why don't you just listen to yourself in the moment, find out what is really best for you, and do that?" he asked.

"Because too often I don't have enough time for all that. It could take me hours to uncover what I really want and need most. I have to make decisions in less than a minute in order to coordinate with other people. If I can't do that, then other people will be impatient," I explained.

"Why does that matter?" he asked. "Isn't your well-being more important?"

"My well-being is important, but so are my relationships with other people. That's why I've created rules to protect myself," I said.

"And your rules never hurt you?" he asked.

"Sometimes they give me stress, but generally, they protect me," I said. And I believed what I was saying.

But then, through a series of social interactions with this man and his girlfriend, I came to see another pattern in me: I've chosen many of my rules for the benefit of others. I've defined my role in relationships based on what society taught me was desirable, rather than based on what I really wanted. And even the rules that I made to protect myself from pain ignored my deepest desires and needs.

I started asking myself: "Who was I before I began changing myself to make other people happy?"

I couldn't find the answer easily. Another difficult question was posed to me by the above-mentioned girlfriend: "Have you ever had anything in your life that wasn't a source of fear or anxiety?"

I found myself searching through my memories for times where there wasn't even a hint of fear and anxiety. There were times, but they were rare. But one thing was consistent in these memories: Complete trust in my environment mirrored with complete trust in myself.

Meditate on that for a moment. When in your life have you felt complete trust in your environment mirrored with complete trust in yourself? Come up with at least three times. It is a very illuminating exercise.

Contemplating trust brought me back to rules. Why did I create these rules in the first place? Why did I need protection?

I created rules for myself because I didn't trust myself. Ever since my first-love broke up with me when I was fifteen I have hardly trusted myself at all. If I couldn't trust myself to keep the person I valued most at the time, then how could I trust myself with anything?

I chose then that I would – instead of being myself – hold myself to higher and higher standards of what it meant to be a girlfriend, to be a wife. Can you imagine having extremely high standards for what it means to be a wife and then having two husbands? I've hit some breaking points. And then I just developed stronger rule sets for myself. It worked before, didn't it? More rules! More rules to the rescue!

But on October 20th 2016, that all changed. I came home from a trip where I had visited some highly empathic, influential individuals. My first full day back I developed a high fever coupled with intense pain in my spine and throughout my body. Yet I felt deep, personal faith as the fever was coming on. I said to Lytenian: "I'm supposed to have a fever. It is going to get much, much worse. It will lead me deeper." This scared him a little at first, but after a few minutes of silent integration he accepted it.

The fever got worse and worse. Any time I looked at Lytenian or Greg, the pain became unbearable. When I thought of things I ought to be doing, especially anything I ought to be doing for them, the pain became worse. If they spoke to me, the pain became so intense I began to cry. I asked them to be quiet.

I also noticed that any touch hurt. This was particularly startling. Touch is one of my primary languages of love and communication in an intimate relationship. How could touch – (affection! love!) – hurt? Yet it hurt in rippling pains throughout my body, so I asked not to be touched.

I couldn't go downstairs, so I asked for food. Astonishingly, I hardly wanted anything (which is very, very rare for me, even when sick).

Over the course of several days (Thursday evening through Sunday evening) the fever grew worse whenever I paid attention to anything that was not myself. Any touch or contact with my husbands immediately transferred a reflection of their pain and baggage into me. I could feel all of Lytenian's chronic back pain in my body. It was overwhelming.

During that time I ate only things I felt truly inspired to eat, and on Sunday evening I wrote a log of what I had eaten in that time period:

• ½ cup apple with cinnamon (raw)
• 16 dried schisandra berries (raw)
• Tea made from raspberry leaves, 2 chaste berries and a pinch of licorice root (cooked)
• ¼ cup watermelon (raw, yellow)
• ½ package Brad's "Nasty Hot" kale chips (raw)
• 2 Tablespoons cranberry juice (pasteurized)
• 1 bottle Garden of Flavor Aronia probiotic tea-juice (raw)
• ½ cup elderberry kombucha (raw)
• 1 head iceberg lettuce (raw)
• 2 Tablespoons cauliflower (raw, yellow)
• 6 spinach leaves
• ¼ of a pomegranate (raw)
• 6 romaine leaves

And the above felt amazing. Each nibble, each sip, was a process. I discovered that food is loud. What I take into my body screams messages at me and about me. It becomes me on more than a physical level. Food becomes me at an emotional and vibrational level. What I feel about myself is deeply linked to the messages I put into my body – books, movies, environments, people and food.

Using Food To Drown External Messages

I realized that I often have used food to drown out other messages I was receiving. At a sub-conscious level I was protecting myself by drowning out music, or subliminal messages from other people through chewing, tasting, swallowing, and digesting. It was my intention (subconsciously) that the division of attention would keep some of my focus inward. Instead, it numbed me both externally and internally. And contributed to my chronic constipation.

Through the isolation that my body and subconscious demanded in October 2016, I spent a lot of time in meditation. I learned to ask for alone time for the first time since I was twelve. I didn't think I needed or wanted alone time, but apparently, I do. I've been one of those clingy, never-wants-to-be-alone kind of people. In fact, Lytenian and I didn't spend more than six hours in separate buildings at a time from April 2011 to August 2015. Most of the time we were in the same room as I worked from home and he was my stay-at-home-husband.

Yet during this transformative, fever-awakening in October 2016 I found myself desiring and developing healthy boundaries; I started to hear my own quiet voice speaking from the inside.

Sensory Deprivation As A Tool For Looking Inward

Without food, light, conversation, movement, activities, books, videos, music, or even much sleep, I found my self in the stillness. And while I was there, really with myself, I honestly did trust myself. Presence. This is my new definition of presence: to really be there with myself. Not mindlessly cramming food in my mouth. Not nodding and agreeing to what others are saying. Not impatiently driving myself from one activity to the next. Not chasing the next dose of feeling accomplished. None of that.

Just presence. Focus. Allowing myself to experience my primary relationship: the one with myself. Allowing my selves to speak from all the different versions of Me that I have been.

The Me that just wanted to play with my Barbie dolls.

The Me that admired Sailor Moon.

The Me that was angry and listened to Limp Bizket and raged at my parents.

The Me that wore black lipstick and dyed my hair black.

The Me that swore in every sentence, drank alcohol and smoked pot.

The Me that had the faith to go to Kaua'i island.

The Me that loves snow.

The Me that loves the tropics.

The Me that hates doing dishes.

The Me that is obsessed with cleanliness.

All of these versions of myself are present within me. All of these selves have a voice, a place, a purpose. The Me that measures time and food, and the Me that just wants a big plate of French fries. Both are valid, true, authentic parts of myself that deserve my attention, love, and compassion.

So, in November 2016 I threw rules and roles out of the window. I ate French fries. I ate out at farm-to-table restaurants. I ate a lot of cooked food. I let the kitchen be dirty. I let Lytenian take over organizing and cleaning the kitchen. I spent hours upon hours meditating in my bed, not doing any of my usual "productive" things. I stayed indoors even when the sun was shining. I went outside in my socks and without underwear to admire the snow. I broke commitments to social events, allowed myself to be flaky, stopped answering e-mails and facebook messages, and went days at a time without touching my computer.

I let myself rediscover who I really was beneath all the rules.

• I like cleaning my floor . . . with my hands. Just one little bit of floor at a time, sweeping every little thing up with my finger-tips. Until November 2016, I had not done that since I was eight.
• I like jumping for joy.
• I like laying on my back with my palms facing up in complete darkness.
• I like writing by hand, feeling the pen moving across the paper. Since I learned to type at the age of ten, I've spent as little time as possible writing by hand, only doing so out of desperation. Yet from October 29th to November 17th – in 26 days – I've filled up an entire notebook cover-to-cover.
• I like trying new things.
• I like getting old tasks, projects, obstacles, etc, out of the way.
• I like cleaning out stuff I no longer use and giving it away.
• I like coloring in a pretty coloring book with colored pencils.
• I like playing with different kinds of art supplies.
• I like tap dancing. (This was something I revisited for the first time last week after completely dropping off with it after my classes ended last winter. And last winter was the first time trying it again in fifteen years.)
• I like dreadlocks. I've been fondling the dreadlocks I cut off my head in February (on Valentine's day, 2016) and thinking about putting four dreadlocks along the bottom of my hairline.
• I like dreaming up things in my head and visualizing them in as much detail as I can.
• I like making wraps, especially for Greg and Lytenian.
• I like touching the leaves of plants.
• I like letting my period just flow without any barriers, so I've taken to putting black towels on my bed and washing periodically in the bathtub instead of using any sort of method for collecting the stuff.
• I like vanilla sex, sweet foreplay, and gentle caresses. (Gasp! This is a huge change for me.)
• I like waking up before first light and watching the landscape slowly illuminate until the dawn breaks over the horizon. (Which I did almost every morning from October 18th 2016 to the new year and many, many mornings since.)
• I like revisiting my past selves through my old journals, recordings, videos and writing.
• I like being blindfolded and focusing on what I can hear and feel. It is amazing to discover how well I know the house. How easy it is to get from my room to the bathroom and to use the bathroom without ever peeking at anything. Not having my vision is a fantastic tool for leading me deeper into presence.
• I like eating alone so that I can fully attend to the flavors, smells, textures and internal changes at play within me as I eat.
• I like using the sun as my clock, letting go of what time it is, and sleeping when I am tired, and waking whenever I am ready.
• I like intuitive "body work" that is based on presence with myself and empathy with the other person's body. No rules, no concepts. Just feeling myself and compassion for them.
• And much more! There is so much me to discover!

Rediscovering Childhood Selves

At first I went back to my earliest years and searched for those things that were precious to me before anyone changed me. I searched for the body postures, mannerisms, and delights of two-year-old Me, and four-year-old Me. I went back to my favorite childhood foods (ice-berg lettuce, watermelon, French fries). Last week I had lima beans for the first time in over ten years, another of my childhood favorites.

Symbolic Foods

And I've been eating popcorn and oatmeal. I've discovered that I personally symbolize my father's love as popcorn, and my mother's love as oatmeal. And my self-love as rice. This makes perfect sense when looking back through my history. My father used to watch movies with me and make popcorn for us with creative seasonings. My mother used to make oatmeal for me for breakfast.

When I first began to cook for myself (at the age of seventeen, as a result of necessity after developing stomach ulcers), I discovered that I truly enjoyed cooking and eating rice. For a period of time I cooked long-grain brown rice in broth several times a week in addition to eating rice cakes, rice crisps, rice milk and other rice-based foods (all unsweetened). This period of my life (2007-2009), looking back, symbolizes self-love because it was the first time I began to take a care-taking role for myself.

Thus, in the autumn of 2016 I began eating rice cakes and rice. I savored the symbolic feeling of self-love in association with rice. By being present with it, and giving all of my attention to the rice I was eating, I lessened the association between specifically rice and self-love. I began to re-attach food to self-love – an association worn very thin over the many years of tromping all over my childhood cravings in the name of healing myself. Yes, I was protecting myself – at the cost of slaying myself.

Later Fever-Awakenings

In June 2017 I had a third fever-awakening experience. Again I was confined to my bed with a fever that went up when I had certain thoughts and melted in to a sweat-down when I had other thoughts. This third experience is another story for another time, but I realized the one major common theme in these awakenings is trust. Each one can come upon me at a time when I was heavily relying on rules instead of relying on self-trust. Each fever and its accompanying symptoms has only left me fully when I came into a vibration of self-trust.

A New Tool For Analyzing Food Cravings Intuitively

Each time, food has been a large part of the journey. In June 2017 I was on a new mission with food – not to recapture the past, but to embrace the present. Now what would be the most delicious and satisfying food I could have? I found that by asking myself, "How much do I really want that on a scale of one to ten?" I could get answers from my internal committee about my integrated desires for a food. Often I would be hankering after something and ask myself that question only to find that the answer was merely a "two"!

I began to realize that many of my food cravings have to do with remembering how I felt the last time I ate it rather than feeling in my body what I actually want now. Yet somehow, by asking myself this question ("How much do I really want that on a scale of one to ten?") I get integrated answers. It is working for me because I have no legitimate way to come up with an analytical answer, so my intuitive, feeling-based answer emerges instead – in the form of an entirely understandable number!

Many times I've found my highest desires ('eight!") to be for for foods that caused me pain in the past. But I'm not afraid of that anymore. I will be present with the pain, and if I'm never called to eat it again, then I won't. I'll be okay. I can trust myself. What a revelation!

Constipation Free!

Through all of these fever-awakening food patterns – hardly eating at all and gorging myself on oil-rich foods (like "fried veggie chips") – I have not been constipated. Through the month of November 2016 I had regular bowel movements, including my ten days in England. Through long air-port waits, through dolmas and falafels, through French fries and Indian food . . . The worst I had is some bad-smelling gas. This, from the woman whose bowels have been so sensitive that even a single boiled potato would have me blocked up for a couple days! This from the woman who wouldn't be able to poop because I hadn't consumed at least a half-gallon of water in the last twelve-hours! What a dramatic change!

Profound Presence

My conclusion is that profound presence with myself is the only answer or rule I need. Yet, even that is limiting. Trying out various rules, roles and regulations for my life has allowed me to experience a great many things that make up the Me that I experience myself as. Trying out other people's perspectives and allowing them to invade my internal reality, violate my boundaries and overall leave me feeling raped has been a series of powerful growth experiences.

Taking Ownership of Past & Present

I chose all of it.

I choose this now.

Much love and blessings to you!

From a truly inspired place where I've been typing for the joy of typing,

Raederle Phoenix

Moving Forward!

What to read next? You can find more recipes great for a stuck digestive system in my article about preventing menstrual cramps. Also, learn more about how we got to be this way – segmented, rule-based and out-of-touch in my article on developmental trauma. If you're interested in more of my personal story, you may enjoy reading why I almost left my husband

Consciousness Alchemy Questions to ask yourself:

• Who was I before I began changing myself to make other people happy?
• What rules do I impose on myself on a daily basis?
• What in your life is never a source of fear or anxiety?
• When do I feel most free and liberated?
• When in your life have you felt complete trust in your environment mirrored with complete trust in yourself?

Why I Almost Left My Husband

In July 2015 I almost left my husband, Lytenian. We married in June 2010, so we were starting out sixth year of marriage. We'd been traveling for months, and we'd shared many transformative experiences together. Despite being the best of friends, I was feeling increasingly resentful.

Lytenian & Raederle, 2010, outside our apartment in Walnut Creek, California (U.S.A.)

When we got married, it was my intention to always be a stay-at-home wife, and eventually, a stay-at-home-mom. When I insisted that we move across the country (from California, where we'd lived together for our first year, to Buffalo, NY, my home city), he moved away from his job.

Raederle & Lytenian, 2011, on a roadtrip with my father to North Carolina from western New York (U.S.A.)

I had a small gig working for The Vegetarian Health Institute and a small amount of income from my business (Raederle.com). But at the time of the move, it only amounted to $100 to $200 per month. I started working a lot more over the course of that first year (2011) and even more in (2012). Lytenian sometimes worked odd jobs, and his parents sent us Christmas money, but I was bringing in 95% or more of the income.

Raederle & Lytenian, 2015, dog-sitting for friends in Vermont, U.S.A.

By 2015, I'd had enough. I was sick of paying for all of our expenses. And not just because I was sick of working or sick of earning money. I was sick of the fact that he couldn't seem to uphold my ideals about what a house-spouse should be. My idea of a house-spouse is someone who keeps the house in perfect order all the time, prepares all the meals, and is also entirely emotionally available to their provider. He was able to do the latter of these three.

Lytenian is on the autism spectrum. He's brilliant, beautiful, and always emotionally available to me. But between his extreme anxiety, autistic tendencies, tendinitis, and severe adrenal fatigue (all of which date back to childhood), he is neither cut out for a typical day job, nor the traditional house-spouse role. Especially when I tried to commit him to my personal vigorous standards for myself.

I came to understand these obstacles over the years. By the end of 2014, I knew it very well, but it didn't stop me from having a lot of resentment. I would do my own dishes, make my own meals, earn the money, manage our social lives, plan the trips, and still find time to create board games in my spare time! Meanwhile, he found it difficult to handle his emotions, to prepare food for himself, to bathe himself, and to keep on top of laundry.

To be fair, he also made apartment upgrades and did a lot of technical maintenance. After I bought a car, he did all the driving for me (since I hate driving). He often ran errands and did the shopping for us.

Still, I felt I was carrying more than my fair share of the labor in the relationship. I couldn’t accept it anymore. And so, in July 2015, I was listening to a motivating talk. The talk told me to go get my needs met somewhere else if I wasn't getting my needs met in my current life or relationship. The talk was powerful. It led me deep into my own sense of lack, my own sense of my unmet needs.

From that vibration of utter lack, I told him it was over. Yet after I told him it was over, I felt devastated. Immediately.

I felt so devastated that I lost myself entirely. I began weeping. I felt cold. I felt afraid. I clutched at him with obsessive, possessive fear. Within a couple hours I was screaming at him, "Please don't leave me," even though he never said he was leaving. We were at a friend's house at the time, yet I spared no thought for what they might be hearing coming from their guest room.

I waffled a bit in the months that followed, but a firm resolve came over me. In my almost-sacrifice of our relationship, I suddenly was able to feel how much it meant to me. I resolved that I would do whatever it took to make our relationship work, no matter what that meant.

After the close call, I found myself releasing old attachments, one after another. I let go of my identity, my hopes, and my dreams. I let it all go in favor of keeping the one thing that mattered most to me: Lytenian.

Lytenian & Raederle, May 2016, Ithaca, New York, U.S.A.

It wasn’t until the summer of 2016 that I could admit to friends and family that this had happened between Lytenian and I. Many of our mutual friends view us as a perfect couple. We’re honest and open with one another in a way that is rare. We dig up the hard truths about ourselves and then share those truths with each other. It is a highly conscious love.

This authenticity in our relationship has often meant admitting to him that I didn't feel in love with him, and working my way back to feeling that way again. This has often meant talking to him about attraction to someone else – even before we knew about polyamory. This has often meant saying very, very difficult things to one another.

And despite this incredible honesty and connection, I almost left. I almost left over money. But of course, it wasn't about the money. It was about my dreams, my hopes, my expectations, and my freedom. And I'm very glad I didn't leave. Our relationship has continued transformed and grow since then.

Next, you may enjoy my post: Why polyamory? What's wrong with monogamy?

If you enjoy reading about my life, then you'll enjoy my detailed, novel-style, online diary which you can get exclusive access to as one of my patrons on patreon: www.patreon.com/Raederle.

Heal Your Thyroid With Voice Consciousness

Do you ever notice your voice changing as you talk about someone you used to date, or a place you used to live?

Do you ever notice yourself speaking differently at work or at home?

Do you use a different voice when speaking to babies or pets?

Have you ever been under hypnosis and noticed a different voice?

Have you ever consciously used a different voice and then noticed it made you feel different?

If you can say "yes" to any of these, then you've experienced what it means for different aspects of yourself to have different voices. Consciously using different voices can be used as tool to explore different facets of yourself. This practice strengthens the health and integration in your throat chakra as well as creating more integration and freedom within your mind and emotional body. It is important to note that disorders involving the thyroid and lymph system along the jawline will always include a strong component of dis-integrated communications within oneself.

It is particularly good when these voices emerge naturally as part of consciousness alchemy. Allow your voice to match how you feel – that is the key. Bring your energy up from your heart through your throat and then over your tongue, past your teeth and over your lips. When you really allow your voice, you will notice that you will sound very different after a meditation, after yoga, during a co-counseling session, and while speaking from the perspective of your inner child.

These exercises may be out of your reach at first. In a situation where your emotional connection to your voice is entirely blocked, you may find any attempt at using a different voice feels fake and stupid. In these cases, it is important to start by coming to understand why this intense blockage has been created. You can begin by asking yourself the following questions.

Understanding What Blocks Your Authentic Voice

These can be done as a journal assignment or as an interview where your friend or partner asks you these questions and you answer aloud. (In the later instance they can ask these questions first-person or revise them to second-person if that makes it less confusing to you. First-person questioning sometimes gets deeper results, even when asked by an outside voice.)

• Why am I afraid to say exactly what I feel and think?
• Who am I afraid of being authentic with?
• When in my life did I use my most authentic voice?
• Who makes me feel the most able to speak freely? How does that feel?
• How does my voice change (or not change) when I'm around my parents?
• If I could have any voice I wanted, what sort of voice would I want?
• If I could say everything I always wanted to say, without consequence, what would I say?
• Do I ever sound like a child now that I'm an adult? How do I feel about that?
• What bad things would happen to me if I spoke with my most authentic self?
• What are the consequences for letting all parts of myself speak freely?

If speaking from your various internal selves authentically is an on-going struggle, consider taking each of the above questions one-at-a-time, answering one a day or one a week, giving yourself time to shift your awareness. If you're highly cut off from aspects of yourself – which we all are – then there is a good reason. These cut-off aspects were cut off because consciously or subconsciously you decided they threatened your basic needs, such as the need to feel loved and accepted. You can honor your valid reasons for creating blockages by probing slowly. Believe me, I know from much first-hand and second-hand experience what the whiplash of over-zealous spiritual growth feels like.

If you'd like to continue your growth process with my influence, please follow The Consciousness Alchemist on facebook (link below) and sign up for my mailing list (also linked below).

All Marjoram is Oregano, but not All Oregano is Marjoram

How can you tell the difference between oregano and marjoram?

Origanum Majorana – Sweet Marjoram

There are more than fifty kinds of oregano, and marjoram is just one kind. The genus name is origanum – all marjoram is oregano, but not all oregano is marjoram. Sweet marjoram (Origanum majorana) is just one variety.

While I was on Kaua'i island we had the delightful privilege of unlimited access to what was locally called "Mexican oregano" which had leaves bigger than our hands. It was easy to harvest, and rich in the chemical component that makes oregano taste like oregano – carvacrol. With a little research, I have found that it would be more accurate to call what we had there "Cuban oregano." Or perhaps it would make the most sense (since Kaua'i is a Hawai'ian island) to just call it "Hawai'ian oregano!"

This photo (below) is one I took while I was there. In the upper left of the photo you can see a plant with purple on the undersides of its leaves. That is an edible green plant called Okinawan spinach. The pointed green leaves with ruffled edges are a kind of mint. The variegated leaves (white on the edges and green in the center) that are somewhat rounded are the Cuban oregano. This photo was taken in my friends' greenhouse.

Lamiaceae – Mint

The Lamiaceae family – the mint family – includes oregano as well as basil, mint, thyme and sage. All of these plants are easily recognized by their square stems and opposing pairs of leaves. They also have whorled flower spikes.

This (below) is a photo of one of the many mints I have growing in my garden. In the upper right of the photo is giant clover which I intentionally seeded in many places in my garden to prevent the grass (the horrible weed!) from coming back.

Oregano Blooms

Recognizing marjoram in particular isn't easy. The color of the blooms isn't definitive, although marjoram tends to have white blooms, where oregano tends to have pink blooms.

Cross-breeding Oregano! Oh no!

Oregano and marjoram cross very easily when grown together, which means you may end up with some new half-marjoram variety any year. I've read that the calyx is the only definitive way to tell, which is that little swelling just below the petals of a flower; the petals appear in many cases to be growing from it. In some cases, as is often the case with oregano, the calyx is well developed and looks more interesting than the petals themselves.

When you buy your oregano, keep in mind that the original label when you buy the plant may not be correct. Just because it was labelled when you bought it doesn't mean they knew for sure either. I've bought some "sweet marjoram" – but I'm unconvinced that it is actually marjoram, particularly now that it has been in my garden for a year among many other members of the mint family. Also, sweet marjoram often doesn't live through the winter, not being as hardy as oregano, so I may not even have it anymore.

Here is some oregano from my garden (below). In the upper right of this photo you see some strawberry leaves of the ever-bearing variety (whose berries taste like strawberry jam) and on the left of this photo you see a dandelion leaf growing through the fuzzy oregano. This particular oregano variety is disappointingly mild, clearly very low in carvacrol.

In this next photo you can see more of the whole plant. This photo was taken in late April, so the dandelions were out in force, and the yellow-and-white blooms (in the lower right of the photo) are strawberries-to-be (which I've already eaten and enjoyed at the time of writing this).

The bright purple flowers to the right of the photo are grape hyacinths, a small bulb. There is also a dead-nettle beside/below the purple grape-hyacinth bloom. This, by the way, is my idea of permaculture – no monocrops for me!

Culinary Clarity

If you want to be sure for culinary reasons, sample all your different oregano plants in your kitchen side-by-side with dried versions from the grocery store. See if you can learn to detect the flavor of marjoram well enough that you recognize it in the fresh version. That is probably the most useful way. Even if you never do discover what sorts of oregano you have by name, you'll at least find out what sorts of flavors you have growing which will help you decide how to use them.

I've found this process particularly helpful with all of my varieties of thyme. I have one thyme variety that tastes more potently like oregano than more than half of my oregano varieties.

Thyme has a lot of taste overlap with oregano, containing overlapping phenols. Thymol and carvacrol, to varying degrees, are both present in both thyme and oregano. (Carvacrol can also be found in the oils of pepperwort and wild bergamot.)

In this last photo (above), you can see wooly thyme int he center of the photograph with its tiny, fuzzy leaves. In the lower right is wild, very-tasty purslane growing over and up the rocks. In the upper right is one of my many oregano varieties.

The colorful purple accents in this photo are sedums growing up through and around my thyme. The yellow stuff in the upper left of the photo is also a variety of sedum (which are not edible, but they're hardy and gorgeous). You can also see some dandelion and lamb's quarters in the upper (mostly toward the right) portion of this photograph.

Wooly thyme (Thymus pseudolanuginosus) is one of my favorites to grow because you can't get a plant any more low-growing this this tiny plant. It show-cases small flowers and plants (such as sedums and crocus) that are grown around/in it.

It is difficult to use woolly thyme in a salad because taking those little leaves off the tough stem is no fun, but it is great in juices made with a masticating juicer (such as an omega vert or the more traditional omega juicer). It also is delicious in teas.

What To Grow?

I recommend growing things of similar height together. Otherwise you'll learn the hard away that tall oregano will easily overtake your woolly thyme . . . in time! (Okay, I know that wasn't that funny.) Thyme is hardy enough to tolerate it for a while, but sage is more easily over-taken and sun-starved.

Because of the inter-breeding of these plants, I recommend spacing your oregano, mint, sage and thyme with other perennials such as strawberries, lilacs, comfrey, shasta daisies, hostas, and so on, keeping plants of similar heights together in the same bed. Strawberries make great companions for any of these herbs. Comfrey gets rather large, but can make a decent companion for oregano or mint.

Rock pathways can also be used as a separator between herb plots, but, of course, in a garden with many varieties of mint (in the general sense), interbreeding will eventually occur, given enough years. Enjoy the process and taste all your herbs again each year to rediscover and remind yourself of what you like each herb for.

~ Raederle Phoenix

I Am Multitudes, Not Monolith

In coming to embrace myself as a multitude (rather than a monolith), I've come to find myself resonating with many things that other aspects of me revile.

It is tough to teach consciousness alchemy through demonstration. Even my favorite guru, Teal Swan, a teacher of "AND Consciousness" and "the multitudes within" does not demonstrate these multitudes.

Why?

Because, after all, the followers still expect consistency within a personality. It is a strong social norm for people to remain the same person week after week. We even compliment people for being extremely "stable" or "like a rock."

What if we complimented someone for being someone different each day? It would be hard, because much of our sense of safety relies on people being consistent.

Marriage To A Multitude

Greg actually admits to me that he sometimes wakes up and wonders who he is married to today. I've been on a mission to embrace and express every forgotten piece of myself. It makes me a very changeable companion. This is one of the reasons why I argue that authentic monogamy already is polyamory. If you're honest and open with your selves, you've already got a complex relationship with yourself that you're navigating in addition to your relationship with this "one other person" – who has a complex relationship with themselves. (Read: Polyamory? What's wrong with monogamy?)

I used to value reliability above almost all else. Now I value presence and intuition more. I worry sometimes that this means I'm becoming some "new age flake" – as if the "new age" types don't have a bad enough reputation as it is. Worse, fears sometimes masquerade themselves as intuitive notions, and so sometimes I (and others like myself) think I'm choosing to step down from something because it is the best thing for me, but really I'm just too afraid to go forward.

But why so much fear? Because tapping into the multitudes within requires intense vulnerability. To see oneself clearly one has to let the old wounds be exposed to the open air. This brings up massive piles of shame, fear, anger, helplessness, resentment, and despair, some of it going all the way back to infancy. (Read: Developmental Trauma for more on that.)

Lately I've been tapping into aspects of myself that felt betrayed as an infant. I didn't feel well and I didn't yet understand I was in a reality where telepathy wasn't the norm. I couldn't understand why others were not doing for me what was needful. I was desperate, helpless, angry, and resentful. I needed to be taken care of, but nobody understood my wailing.

Tapping into this aspect of myself to find healing for it in my daily life now means falling into that same helplessness. It is incredible how real it feels. Sometimes I lose my ability to speak and my throat becomes so choked up that breathing hurts. I used to fear that symptoms like that were of some physical origin – germs or poor diet. Now I've finally unmasked enough of myself to dig into the undercover feelings that are becoming physical symptoms.

Shame

Shame causes my throat to hurt and makes it hard for me to speak. This shame is what leads specifically to helplessness and an inability to ask for help. It runs deep, causing my throat glands to swell, and often they stay swollen long after everything else has cleared up. This is because the shame has lived on in me – the original shame, and then the shame for getting sick. At least, that was the reality when I was a child and teen.

Anger

Anger causes my back to hurt, especially around my shoulder-blades. When trying to exert self-control over my anger, I feel my shoulder-blades clench tight, as if I'm trying to hold a pencil on my back. Anger also impacts my liver and the lymph channels around my eye-brows.

Fear

Fear stops my digestive system from working properly. I suspect the fear is actually causing the bacteria in my gut to become afraid, thereby causing it to attack the food rather than digesting it. Fear is what gave me stomach ulcers twelve years ago. (More about that here.)

Jealousy

Jealousy gives me nausea and dizziness.

Self-Denial, Lying & Inauthenticity

Denying myself (lying to myself or lying to others through omission of my authentic truth) gives me a fever. Extreme avoidance of myself gives me an extreme fever complete with shakes, muscle soreness, and chills. When the fever comes, only intense self-focus gives me the sweat-down; and the self-focus does this immediately. The sweat-down begins the moment I fully focus on myself. And the moment my conscious mind wanders away, the fever is back.

Stress

Forcing myself to be in "up time" where I am present with my external reality and with other people when I desperately want to just be with myself gives me migraines. (Yes, those headaches so bad where even a single L.E.D. light twenty feet away causes stabbing pain through my head.)

Multi-Dimensional Point . . . (Oxymoronic Pun Intended)

What's my point? Well, I believe I have many points – many planes – many aspects of self in three-dimensions and in four (or five, or six, or twelve). But really, what inspired this post is how difficult it is to be authentic when our culture doesn't recognize that every single one of us actually holds many contradictory beliefs. We're all walking contradictions.

Yet people will demand to know "how you really feel" and will tell you that you can't "have it both ways." But that's nonsense. Your real feelings absolutely will contradict each other. If you believe you feel only one way about a subject then you have relegated something to your unconscious where you can't consciously access it.

And you can, absolutely, have it both ways.

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