My dearly beloved works his butt off and has been dealing with chronic pain for years–so much that he barely sleeps but rarely complains. He’s been on a cocktail of meds that, in my opinion, only put a band-aid on the problem and are more reactive, not preventive when he has his debilitating rheumatism flareups. I really would love to connect with a doctor who specializes in not only traditional medicine but also alternative who is (brace yourselves for this) not a quack and is actually covered by Kaiser.

Does such a thing even exist? Ridiculous that I can’t find anyone like that in Colorado.

He’s been living in such misery and after he missed out on several weeks of commitments, I decided to take matters into my own hands. At Front Range Boot Camp, we frequently have month-long health challenges so I signed up to do the Whole 30 and somehow convinced Jamie to do it with me. Though we lead a fairly healthy lifestyle–both with food and activity–there are definitely a lot of things we should cut out. For me, it’s baking treats. For Jamie, it’s a pop addiction and nightly ice cream. Of course, he doesn’t need to lose weight but I’m a firm believer that food not only nourishes but it heals so I’ve been researching anti-inflammatory foods (and would love any of your advice!)

We’re a couple of weeks into the challenge and I’ve found Whole 30 ridiculously restrictive and have instead adopted a more Paleo approach, which seems to be helping by cutting out processed foods, dairy, carbs and sweets. There’s no way we’d survive this eating regimen permanently but it’s been good to clean up our eating habits and I’m crossing my fingers it helps him feel better.

Though he’s convinced there’s nothing more miserable than not having ice cream every night before bedtime.

Before we started the challenge, we had a ward BBQ and devoured the burgers and treats with a vengeance. There were a variety of fun activities, like this “blue bounce.”

Well, at least it was fun until they convinced Jamie and me to try it with our friends Kendra and Dave. Let’s just say we don’t bounce quite like we used to.

I was playing in the field when someone shouted to me, “Amber, you’ve gotta come over and see this. NOW.”

I raced back to the pavilion and there I saw my husband surrounded by cheering people. This is not uncommon because he is the highly celebrated Pumpkin Man! But the reason for the fanfare? My beloved husband had entered the Twinkie-eating contest.

If there’s anything to cure you of sweets forever, this is it (just see the disgusting ingredients)

It’s not something he’d normally do but my gosh, if he was going to be denied sweets for a month, he was going out in a blaze of glory. He started the strongest of the competitors but slowed down by his fourth Twinkie (the three plates of food he had prior may have had something to do with it). Someone handed him a water, which he said helped because “the Twinkies felt like concrete in my mouth.” Ewwwwww.

He ended up downing seven of them in three minutes and I didn’t know whether to be disgusted or proud.

Maybe I was a little bit of both.