My story:

I want to be absolutely transparent with you–no fluff, no BS, just Christy pure and simple and honest.  My life has been pretty much great for the most part, and I certainly have nothing to cry about.  I have had to overcome challenges along the way, and I am stronger and better for them.  I want to share those with you, so you can really get to know me and that I can hopefully inspire you to push through your challenges, no matter how hard they may seem at the time.

I was raised on a farm, and we grew all our own vegetables and many fruits.  We have a beef cattle farm still to this day, we raised watermelons commercially, and my grandaddy ran a sawmill.  And boy did we eat the country diet–biscuits and gravy, bacon, fried everything, etc etc.  My usual breakfast was four slices of white bread, toasted, slathered in Squeeze Parkay and coated heavily with white sugar!  Oooohhh, it gives me chills to think about that now and what horrible things I was doing to myself.  Unfortunately, my parents didn’t know any better and let me do it.  Country people don’t think much about good nutrition at all.  They just work so hard that they don’t get fat.  But they tend to die young with heart attacks, diabetes, and cancer, and my family was no different.

I was always very athletic and in high school I was pretty much the MVP of every sport I played.  I was honored in basketball, softball, volleyball and track by being part of state championship teams in each sport, sometimes multiple times.  I excelled in track, in the sprints and long jump in particular, but basketball was always my first love.  And since they wouldn’t let me play football (I wanted to–remember the TV movie Quarterback Princess with Helen Hunt?), I was a football cheerleader, but in the other sports I let them all cheer for ME!    So I had a great base of physical fitness and strength to build on, which has served me well in the ensuing years.  (Note to parents—physical fitness as a child/teen will carry so much importance later on and establish ‘muscle memory’ making it easier to get back in shape in later years.)

When I got out of high school, I had several offers to play sports in college, but I felt that I would be better off concentrating on academics.   There was no WNBA or anything for women back then, so I couldn’t see the point of sacrificing my academics for a non-paying dead end in sports.  I also was my high school valedictorian and a National Merit Scholar, so academics were always important to me, and I especially loved sciences.  But I went into business school, thinking that would be the most prudent way to go.   I set and achieved the goal of earning a Master’s degree, and in fact I earned a dual MBA in Marketing and Sport Management from the University of Georgia.  (Go DAWGS!  Sorry…couldn’t help myself!)

I was always a big horse girl.  I bought my own horse at an auction when I was 9 years old.  His name was Bits Misty Bee and he was 16 months old.  He and I grew up together.  The first thing I did was crawl up on him, and the first thing he did was toss me over his head.  I landed on my knees and tore them up.  They are still malformed to this day.  Bee and I went on to become champions in the show ring, winning many, many ribbons and trophies.  He was the most wonderful friend and an incredibly beautiful spirit.

In college, I won the title of Miss Rodeo Georgia 1988.  I was so honored to compete in Las Vegas for Miss Rodeo America.  During a practice for the pageant, Bee and I were doing reining patterns in a muddy arena.  Reining is where the horse runs really fast, do slide stops, spins, and other agility moves in preset patterns sanctioned by the American Quarter Horse Association.  Well, we were running a pattern and had to make a quick turn, when Bee’s feet slipped in the mud and he fell on top of me–all 1300 pounds of him.  Fortunately he didn’t struggle to get up and step on me, which would have been devastating if not deadly.  He waited for my father to run across the arena and grab his bridle, and then he rolled up on his knees and I was able to crawl out from under him.  And I swear this is the truth–he stood up and took his head and started rubbing it on my shoulder like he was apologizing.  I didn’t think I was hurt too badly.  Nothing was broken, so I got back on, like they always say to do.  If you fall off the horse, get right back on–right?  I was very badly bruised up but since there were no broken bones or severe lacerations, I didn’t go to a doctor.  I just finished the practice!

Not long after the accident, I started having horrible back, hip and shoulder pains plus debilitating migraines.  I finally went to a chiropractor, and when he took an X-ray he was astounded.   He said I was a ‘train wreck’ and that there wasn’t a bone in my spine in its intended position.  My neck was curved the wrong way, several ribs were out of place, my vertebrae were all over the road, and my pelvis was twisted off to the side.  He couldn’t believe I was functioning.

And to top it off, at a three day indoor rodeo shortly thereafter, I caught an infection from some sort of parasite or bacteria–the emergency room doctors thought it may have been in all the dust and animal feces floating around in the indoor arena–and it collapsed my right lung.  After that, breathing became very difficult and I couldn’t do any kind of aerobic activity without coughing so hard I thought I would burst a blood vessel, and my lungs filling with mucus. I suffered in pain for the next twenty years.  I had to ride around even in the summer with heated seats on in the car, just to ease my lower back pain.  Some days, I couldn’t lift my left arm, and my legs and knees hurt badly as well.  I lived on Arthritis-strength BC Powders and Aleve.   If it weren’t for my physical fitness through weight training, I probably would have been completely disabled.

Bee died in 2006.  He was my loyal friend for 27 years.  It was like losing a member of my family.  I am getting tears in my eyes now, just thinking of him.  I loved that horse with a passion, and still do.

After high school, I really began to study nutrition and changed my eating habits completely, but I still was eating mostly cooked food and a low-fat diet.  My mom and I went to see the Juiceman, bought a juicer, and that was a great gift in our lives.  All through college, I made money by competing in pageants and swimwear competitions like Venus, Hawaiian Tropic, and local contests.  Hey—$100 or $200 bucks cash to a college girl in 1990 for a couple hours ‘work’ was good money!  I missed sports and competing so much, though.  And in the more mainstream pageants I would always lose the big titles because they would say I was ‘too muscular’.  Well, I LIKED my muscles and was frustrated.  Then I discovered weight lifting and my prayers were answered.  I took to it like a duck to water.  I idolized Cory Everson, Rachael McLish and the early women bodybuilders–you know, the ones that looked like sexy women, not men.  When the new-fangled ‘fitness’ competitions appeared and I knew I had found something I wanted to do.  My new idols became Marla Duncan, Sherry Goggin-Giardina, Alfie Newman and the pioneers of fitness.  I loved the look and knew I could look like that.  There was only one problem–I couldn’t do all the gymnastics required for the routines, because of my injuries.

I moved to Knoxville, TN after grad school and worked for Golds and Worlds gyms, and did personal training.  I married a personal trainer and worked together with him.  He put me on the Atkins diet which really worked for me from a fat-loss and muscle-building standpoint.  I just wish I had known the damage I was doing to my body.  Because of personal issues my husband developed with extreme jealousy and possessiveness, he didn’t want me to go to the gym anymore.  He was always accusing me of flirting.  Even if I just lifted my eyes off the ground he would call me a ‘ho’, in not-so-nice terms.   I couldn’t move, breathe, or talk to anyone without ’suffering the consequences’, so I turned to another natural talent I have and opened my own garden design, landscaping and floral company, called Creations by Christy.  I was fortunate to become very successful and really enjoyed creating beautiful gardens and floral designs.

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The Downward Spiral and Rediscovering Myself:

Unfortunately, my marriage didn’t work out and I became very depressed. I was eating so badly and didn’t go to a gym for years. I ballooned up to 155 pounds and hated myself & my appearance. With no self-confidence and a horrible self-image, after my divorce I ended up in an even worse relationship that required police protection to break away from. But I met some wonderful business people who introduced me to self-improvement and motivational tools, and I began to devour them. I still had that old fighting Christy spirit but it was buried under fat, depression, and self-loathing.

As my old spirit began to resurface, I made a vow to change my life. I joined a great gym, and as fate would have it, the new kickboxing craze was just starting. It turned out to be the best exercise I had ever done, and what a great stress relief and confidence-builder! I would look in the mirror in every class and picture my exes and punch as hard as I could to knock them out. It was great.

I soon started seeing great results and lost bodyfat much faster than I expected. That great muscle memory from high school and college was a Godsend! I decided to revive my long-lost goals of competing, especially since the new figure category had just been launched. I began working out in earnest in December 2000, and by August of 2001–nine months later–I won first runner-up in the Miss Tennessee Figure Competition! I didn’t even have the right kind of swimsuit, and didn’t know what I was doing, but I was so proud of myself, and it changed my life.

My most wonderful life-changing event happened in February 2001. I attended my first Chamber of Commerce networking function and met a man named Michael Seguin. I thought he was the most beautiful man I had ever seen, but I was so gun-shy from my previous relationships and still had such a poor self image that I wouldn’t even accept his requests for dates. I didn’t know it at the time, but I had met my Soul Mate. Again, fate was working for me, and we ended up in a business networking group together, where we became friends and I got to know him slowly, and saw what a wonderful man of integrity he was. During this time, I also was working out like crazy, lost 30 pounds, and reshaped my body. So I started to feel attractive again, and like I was worthy of someone like Michael. He was so gorgeous, I thought he would be a playboy and a heartbreaker, but he is the diametric opposite. He is fiercely loyal and a family man. Finally I agreed to go out with him, and after that it was a whirlwind. We just knew we were meant to be together.

You know, sometimes we are allowed to experience severe pain so that we can truly appreciate the pleasures in life. If I had not been through the horrible times in my past destructive relationships, I wouldn’t appreciate what I have now so deeply. I know I am the luckiest woman in the world, and I thank God every day for Michael. He is the love of my life and my best friend. I wouldn’t appreciate him as much as I do if I didn’t have the perspective of knowing what it’s like on the ’other side’.

Only about a month after we began a serious relationship, he was recruited out of state to a new company. He moved to Columbia, South Carolina, to a place I knew so little about I had to look it up on a map. I drove from Knoxville to Columbia every weekend for several months–500 mile round trip and 4 hours each way. I knew I was in love with him, but I also fell in love with the Columbia area and spectacular Lake Murray, where Michael was living. Finally, he asked me to move down and marry him. That was no small task for me, as I had to sell my company and a wonderful, but half-finished 1883 Victorian home that I was in the middle of restoring. (I am one of those crazy people who is enamored with historical homes.)

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Figure Competitions:

With Michael’s support, I worked very hard on my physique and kept competing. I always did well, but never took a top prize. My best contest was a top five finish in the Monica Brant/Bodyrock Figure Competition. I had begun a real estate career which took off unexpectedly well, and I became one of the top agents in my company very quickly. My last competition at that time was the NPC Junior Nationals where I didn’t place well at all, and the girls that were winning were very over-developed and obviously on drugs. The figure winners were bigger than some of the body builders. I became frustrated with that, as I have always steadfastly refused to take any kind of drugs. I decided to stop competing because I was too busy with my career to waste time trying to compete against those kinds of standards. They would use the same judges to score the Figure Contestants as the male bodybuilders, and in my opinion, they just can’t switch gears like that. Their mindset was looking for the biggest muscle-freak on stage, and they just couldn’t seem to get out of that mindset to judge a mainstream figure look. They are only human, after all.

So I stopped training to compete, but I always made sure that exercise was an ‘appointment’ in my schedule every day. With real estate, you can easily let every hour get sucked up into working, even during the middle of the night there are things you can be doing–like updating websites, sending emails, searching for homes, etc. If you don’t put personal things like exercise or time with your family on your calendar and stick to it, the most important things in life will go right out the window. Plus, Michael and I work out together, and that time is precious for us to connect and talk, as well as challenge each other to better health and conditioning.

As you all know, unless you have been under a rock, real estate has drastically dropped off in the past year. We are fortunate here in Columbia, because we have a very steady market and we haven’t suffered nearly as badly as other places. But it is still much, much slower. I see this as a Godsend in a way, because it has given me time to breathe and to explore other interests and passions that were crowded out of my life by real estate. As much as I love real estate, fitness and nutrition has always been my ‘dharma’. In my heart, that is what I love the most. Helping people change their lives through excellent nutrition and fitness has always been my passion.

Now, the pendulum has swung back and the figure competitions have very specific guidelines of what they are looking for. The judges want to see a sleek, feminine, more mainstream look with full round muscles, but not the striations and size of female bodybuilders. Thank goodness! Now that it right up my alley!

I decided with my newly-found health and the great look I was able to achieve through my raw foods lifestyle, that I wanted to compete again. I tried a couple competitions on my own, and found I needed help. As destiny would have it, I met Shannon Dey of Team Bombshell (www.bombshellfitness.com) at one of my competitions, and decided to work with her. It turned out to be the best decision I possibly could have made, and she and Rob (her husband and coaching partner) have changed my life in so many ways–all for the better!

I was completely raw vegan for two years, but when I started working with Shannon and Rob this past August, and competing seriously on a national level, I found I had to incorporate animal products in to my nutrition program. I do eat lots of raw fish–sushi and sashimi–and I eat my eggs raw, too. I do blend them with smoothies and my famous ‘muscle building raw cake batter’, because I don’t like plain raw eggs either! I have found that my health, and especially my muscle building and fat loss, improved with these careful additions. I also eat some ‘cooked’ vegan proteins–LOVE Gardein, Amy’s burgers, seitan, etc.

I would guess I am about 80-90% raw, although I am not sure how you measure that. My coach was very hesitant about my diet at first, and we agreed that I had permission to substitute raw foods & vegan proteins for their suggested foods, and I was to accept all responsibility for the outcome if it didn’t work. The result: I progressed faster than they ever expected, won my first show I competed in, and placed 12th in NPC Nationals after only 3 months of training with Bombshell! I attribute that to the raw foods! (As the added edge on top of the AWESOME Bombshell program–of course!!!)

There is a great book called The Primal Diet by Aajonus Vanderplanitz. He makes very compelling arguments for including raw meats and eggs in our diets. I haven’t been brave enough to venture beyond sushi, however!

I am competing against regular-diet girls, as well as plenty who take things that aren’t exactly natural, if you know what I mean. Yet, I am holding my own so far, and I am about to turn 41.

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My Education in Nutrition:

In February of 2006, my mother suffered a massive heart attack. It’s a long story, but I won’t go into detail at this time. She didn’t realize she was having a heart attack, as the symptoms in women mimic a severe stomach virus, so she didn’t go to the hospital in time. In fact, I was talking to her on the phone and she was telling me what was going on, and I was the one who figured it out. Thank God I had done some work with the Heart Association and knew the symptoms. That education is priceless. Learning to recognize the symptoms of a heart attack is invaluable. At the emergency room, the doctor refused to believe she was having a heart attack, saying it was ‘just gas’ and probably nothing. Unbelievable! We lost many precious hours without him providing her the treatment she needed. And this was in a heart-specialty hospital!

My mother coded on the table just before she was scheduled to go into surgery. The doctors shocked her 13 times before they stabilized her. The hospital chaplain actually came in the waiting room to pray with us because they thought she was gone. Then the surgeon came and told us that she had a huge amount of fluid around her heart and the fluid contained blood. They thought her heart had ruptured, so they rushed her into open heart surgery. Just a short time later, the surgeon came back into the room and said ‘Well, I opened a pericardial window and drained the fluid. The heart had not ruptured but much of the tissue was damaged and had died in the heart attack. I closed her back up. There is nothing more I can do.” And he turned and walked out, leaving us in shock. Great bedside manner!

She was on machines for 9 days, first on a heart pump and breathing machine, but then her kidneys failed and she was placed on kidney machines as well. Miraculously, she woke up and started trying to pull out all the tubes and get out of bed! (Now you know where I get mine!) She remained in CICU for 28 days, and the doctors were not able to work through the blockage of the posterior artery to enable them to do an angioplasty. So they sent her home with tons of medications. Two months later, they were finally able to perform the angioplasty and she made tremendous improvements.

And so my mother, who had always hated my working out, especially with weights, now had to do physical therapy including lifting weights! Ironic. And she ended up loving it. Even more ironic! But the medications she was on were brutal. One we had to sign waivers for her to take, and my father looked at me and said ‘well, if the heart attack didn’t kill her this drug will.’ The side effects listed were horrendous. But in that situation, it is desperate and we did what they said.

In April of 2007, my friend told me about this new superfood called Mona Vie and how many people were seeing amazing improvements in their health. She was so excited about how much her pain had lessened and how she could now do things that she was unable to do before, like ride horses for two hours without back pain and play tennis without knee pain. I lived in constant, serious pain stemming from the horseback riding accident, and I would panic if I ran out of my arthritis strength BC Powders. I took at least one a day, for my back and also for the migraines that I suffered frequently. So I told her to bring me some, and if it would just help with my shoulder pain (I was having trouble lifting my left arm that day) that I would be a client for life. So she did, and within a week my shoulder was better. By May, I was no longer taking any pain medication at all, and I have not taken a pain medication since! Plus my lung issues began to clear up, allowing me to run and do cardio exercise again without all the coughing and mucus.

I was so impressed, and I am naturally skeptical. I have been heavily involved in the body building and supplements industry for a very long time, so I always assume it’s a scam until proven otherwise. Most of the health products are not only a scam in that they don’t work, but they are downright dangerous. So I researched heavily, expecting to poke holes in it and prove it worthless. Instead I became more and more impressed and excited. Then I stumbled across a testimonial where a heart patient with a congenital heart defect completely recovered and had a pacemaker removed after drinking Mona Vie for 6 months. Wow! That blew me away, and I realized it may help my mother. So I dived into serious research and immersed myself in the nutritional findings.

For her birthday at the end of May, I took her a case of Mona Vie (4 bottles) At this point, she was still very weak, her voice was raspy and it was hard for her to talk and breathe. She had terrible sores in her mouth, and when she was able to eat anything through the pain of the sores, she was so nauseaous she couldn’t keep it down. She couldn’t walk very far, and her true love of working in her gorgeous gardens was impossible. I had to do some serious convincing, but she loves juice and finally agreed to drink it.

Fast forward two months: the sores and nausea are gone, her voice is back, strong and bold, and she has plenty of lung function. She is back out working in the garden. She came over to my house with my sister and her family, and we went walking around the zoo in 105 degree weather for five hours, and she held up better than my niece and nephew! And she was down to taking only 3 medications, instead of 14. And her diet still wasn’t much better: she brought powdered doughnuts and apple turnovers to eat for breakfast. Aaaarrrrrgggghhhh! So the only real change at that time had been the Mona Vie and the intense antioxidants. Now, I am in NO WAY saying Mona Vie cures or treats anything. It is simply a powerful food with intense antioxidants. And antioxidants enable the body to repair and heal itself as God and nature intended.

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Nutrition is the Key!

This incredible turnaround really convinced me that nutrition is the key. Nutrition really counts! If simply adding one supplement of powerful antioxidants to the diet made this big of a difference—then what was actually possible? The realization boggled my mind, and I have since devoted myself since to studying nutrition and the effect on our bodies. I thought I knew alot before, with my years in personal training and fitness. But I discovered that there is a whole huge world out there that is hidden from us. The internet is opening up the secrets of nutrition that had been held by only a few natural practitioners for so many years. Now the information is free and open to everyone. The FDA and conventional medicine can no longer squelch the information and keep us in the dark about how powerful natural foods are in our fight to stay healthy.

We do not suffer from a lack of drugs and surgery! If we have a headache, we are not suffering from a lack of acetominiphin or aspirin. If we have cancer, we are not suffering from a lack of chemotherapy! These are unnatural, damaging things. No, we suffer from a lack of nutrients that our body needs to repair itself. Our soils are depleted, our foods are processed beyond recognition and filled with horrible chemicals, our food is genetically modified and sprayed with all types of harmful chemical pesticides and fertilizers, and the organization that is supposed to protect us is funded by drug company money. We are in a fight for our lives.

Any ailment we have, whether it be a headache or cancer, is a SYMPTOM of the underlying problem—damage from oxidation and aging of the organs and internal systems of the body. When the damage is greater than the body can repair, then these symptoms appear. The key is controlling the damage. How do we do that? By eating fresh, whole, unprocessed foods that provide the body the building materials it needs to repair the damage. Did you know that each of your one trillion cells is attacked approximately 10,000 times daily by free radicals? Think of the massive amount of antioxidants we need each day just to keep up! The FDA recommended daily allowances are such a joke! We need huge amounts of protective antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients, essential fatty acids, and amino acids to combat the damage. Our bodies are engaged in all-out warfare and we need to fortify the troops!

Through my studies on nutrition, I discovered an amazing naturopathic physician named Dr. Lou Niles. I was part of a group that brought him to Columbia for a seminar, and I was so fortunate to be the one driving him around, and I got lots of one-on-one time with him. He is the one who introduced me to the raw food lifestyle. And I have never looked back. Raw foods is the most amazing journey one can take.

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My Own Health Issues

At the same time my mother was struggling with the heart attacks, I was reaching the culmination of years and years of unexplained female problems. None of the doctors I had been to and begged for an explanation to my intense pain had ever come up with a reason or solution. They just kept me on the strongest possible birth control pills to control the excessive bleeding.

Finally, my current OBGYN left and I got a new young girl assigned to me. I was hurting so badly, and had suffered from a horrendous bladder infection for nearly a whole year straight. It wouldn’t go away, despite stronger and stronger antibiotics being prescribed one after the other. And if you ever read the warning labels on antibiotics, I am a walking side effect. I get them ALL. so I was miserable the whole time.

She did a pelvic exam, and for the first time detected something–a large mass. She thought I had a very enlarged ovary and was concerned I had ovarian cancer. Scared me to death! I was only 35! She asked me if I had ever had an ultrasound, and I just looked at her with a blank stare. She was amazed and angry that such a simple test had never been ordered.

I went for my ultrasound, and as soon as the lady saw my insides up on screen, she said “Oh, my goodness!” That scared me, so I started asking “What? WHAT?!?!” She said, “You are full of fibroids, and there is one the size of a grapefruit between your uterus and your ovary, and it’s crushing your bladder.” So, the mystery was solved. My ovary was fine, but I had the huge fibroid tumor, plus 6 other large ones, both inside and outside my uterus. The tumor was what was causing the pain and bladder infection. I learned that fibroids have similar nerve endings as male testicles, and cause the same type of pain as a male being struck in the ‘private parts’. Oh yeah, I can attest that is true!

After discussing the options and much soul searching, I opted for a hysterectomy that would remove my uterus and fibroids, but allow me to keep my ovaries. I had my surgery in November of 2005. When I woke up from surgery, I was already in less pain that when I went in the hospital! It was instant relief.

So my research not only helped my mother, it helped me. I had a very swollen tonsil that had blocked half my throat for over 25 years. I don’t know if it was a tumor or just the tonsil itself. The doctors had always poo-pooed it, even though it made it hard for me to eat, swallow or breathe. After less than a year on the raw foods diet, the tonsil is perfectly normal. I think if I had known then what I know now, I could have easily shrunk the fibroids as well thorugh the diet alone, but I didn’t know that option at the time.

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Conclusion

So that is the story, believe it or not in the abridged edition, of how I came to be where I am today. I feel that my eyes were opened, and that I had been blind for so many years. Remember how science used to be convinced the world was flat? They were looking at a three-dimensional object with two-dimensional tools. As the tools evolved, it became apparent the world was round. The same thing is currently happening with nutritional research. Scientists are discovering that nutrition is actually a four-dimensional entity, and is actually based in quantum physics. What do I mean by that? Simply put, the nutrients in food work together in a synergistic way that is completely destroyed when one nutrient is taken out of context. For example, Vitamin C pills will never achieve the effect of eating a whole food that has all the supporting nutrients that enable Vitamin C to work properly. It is the synergy of all the nutrients, many of which are just now even being discovered, that is the key to proper nutrition. Everyone wants to ‘isolate’ each substance so they can patent it and make money from it. But when the nutrient is removed from its natural environment, all the synergy is lost.

The key is living foods, full of nutrients and teeming with synergistic energy that comes directly from our precious sun, air, soil and water. By consuming these foods in their whole, unprocessed state, you are actually consuming powerful energy directly from the earth and that energy will fuel you to heights of vibrant health that you have never known before!

I hope my story will help others to achieve the best health they have ever known, and to continually reach new heights of energy, happiness, joy, and love.

My love to you!

Christy

aka “Defiance”

Aging Disgracefully—and Proud of It!!!