Life Update: Breaking Veganism + Sobriety

I live for the summertime 🌞. Maybe it is because my sun is in cancer 🦀♋️ (vedically) or my inner child forever categorizes summers as been fun and full of free spirited energy, but this summer was no exception 👙. 

I kicked off pre summer season travelling in Europe with my family to France and Italy and was filled to the brim with decadent, farm to table 🧀 meals crafted with pure love💕 and passion. There are many qualities I love about Europeans, but I adore how they anxiously wait to hear how your meal was after. They ask, of course, with total confidence, trusting that their creative hands truly made a masterpiece 🙌🏼. It comes with absolute ease sharing how exquisite the pistachio souffle was or how the lemon zest pici 🍝 was the best I ever had. My heritage is 100% Italian as my Dad was born in Italy and my mom's side of the family was from Sicily and Naples. To say I feel at home in Europe is an understatement. I feel like I come most alive indulging in life's pleasures like the breathtaking art at the Louvre (the Versailles room was my fave!) or the awe inspiring, emerald green hills of Tuscany 🌳.

It is very clear that the Europeans are absolute allstars 🤩 when it comes to connecting to their Venusian energy. They know how to have fun, enjoy 🍴, create🎨, flow and beautify 💄. As a cosmic laugh, I couldn't help but notice Venus shining bright as ever in the starry sky wherever we were.

The trip filled my cup physically 🍷 (more on this soon) and metaphorically and had me officially enter my Joy era 🦋. As a spiritual entrepreneur who takes her business, dharma and goals very seriously, I can easily disconnect from enjoying this beautiful life here on planet Earth. Maybe it is my fiery nature 🔥 that can be laser focused on goals and forget everything in my periphery or maybe my childhood trauma of feeling guilty for experiencing pleasure😣  (probably a combo of both!), but I really had dismissed just how sweet this life is✌🏼. This trip was the catalyst for explosive changes in my life that led me to have a summer of sweet fulfillment 🍦.  Here are all my mini transformations.

One major transformation was breaking veganism and incorporating all types of animal products 🥩 into my diet. I had not eaten meat or dairy 🥛 for 10 years prior, until last summer when my body was CRAVING fish 🐟 again. I denied it for a longgg time, because the guilt of eating animals was too hard to bare. Until, I actually started to dream of salmon (LOL!) and realized my body was sending an 🆘. Then earlier this year in 2023, the same cravings occurred with chicken🐔. This seemed wild to me, because even in my meat eating days, I rarely ate chicken. But I will never forget how grounded and satisfied my body felt the first bite of organic chicken I took from Erewhon.

For those of you who do not know about my healing journey, I chronically experience amenorrhea. This is a lack of menses for at least 3 months. I started this healing journey, because I hadn't received my period in 3 years 😟. However, introducing Ayurveda and healing the power of reiki at the time, my period returned.

Since becoming Vegan, I had lost my period again. I had tried everythinggggg physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually to receive it regularly for years 🙃. While certain herbs and Ayurvedic practices like yoni steaming and castor oil packs helped, it was not consistent. I remember feeling so powerless not knowing how to heal my body as an experienced intuitive healer 😇. The answer was actually so simple and right in front of me. However, my resistance and beliefs about being vegan were putting a veil 👻 over this easy solution.

I had to come to terms with the benefits of eating meat and a higher protein diet for my hormones🍗, which took reading lots of resources learning the science 🤓behind having certain amino acids in my diet. I also had to come to terms with the morale issue of consuming animal based products. What I found was that this was an issue of receiving and holding on to power💥, which are both themes I have been improving on with my business. What turned me off from the meat industry was seeing how humans exploit their power over animals and practice in inhumane ways. I similarly see this in the entrepreneur space when companies use sleazy sales tactics to generate revenue 🙅🏼‍♀️.

The truth is that, yes these realities do occur. However, there is a conscious way to hold on to power which is necessary for survival and a healthy lifeforce energy ✨. I remembered that I can consciously consume meat by understanding what farms I buy from and their moral and environmental practices and initiatives ✌🏼. I also learned that I can create marketing strategies that feel authentic to me and release guilt when I receive payment from clients. This is the cycle of power and consumption, which are necessary for humans to thrive.

I had another mini transformation of breaking my 2 years of alcohol sobriety 🍾. When I first gave up alcohol, it felt like a huge relief and totally aligned for my journey as a healer. I was constantly judging myself every time I drank and felt like it really disconnected from my persona as a healer. I knew alcohol had zero benefits to the body, so why would I partake?

I actually did a whole episode on becoming sober on my podcast, you can listen here. I loved those two years as they taught me a great deal about myself. The main highlights were learning how to have fun without alcohol 🕺 and feeling free of guilt from indulging in a substance that was not benefitting me.

I had no intention of ever drinking a sip of alcohol again and had gone quite comfortable with my lifestyle. However, my sister, who knows me very well, knows that I have a willpower that can run me over to the deep end sometimes 🤪. I can become hyper-fixated on being a perfectionist when it comes to my health (point in case, veganism 🥬) and I was actually doing this with a substance that I had no problem consuming on occasion.

Now I KNOW this is a veryyy sensitive subject and by no means am I promoting alcohol here 🙅🏼‍♀️. But for me personally, when I explored the root of why I gave up alcohol, it came back to my childhood wounding of feeling guilty for experiencing pleasure and wanting to be a 'perfect, good girl'.

I needed to come to terms that an impactful and powerful leader does not come from abstaining from everything that is viewed as evil in the world. It comes from being honest and true to your authentic journey.

Although, I loved the way my community celebrated me in my sobriety 🥳 and being seen as this 'pure healer', in reality, I also love going out for a decadent meal in Italy and enjoying a glass or three of biodynamic, organic wine 🍷. There still is a part of me that likes to drink tequila on special occasions with family and friends and dance the night away. Do I wake up the next day feeling like a million bucks, always? No. Is it better for my body to abstain from alcohol? Absolutely. But does it feel honest for me to be wild and enjoy this on occasion and connect with people I love? Most definitely.

So my joy era right now looks like consciously consuming animal products consistently 🥩. I have been particularly trying to incorporate red meat as my intuition has told me that iron is super important for receiving my period again. I also am introducing dairy products that are easy to digest like goat milk 🐐 and greek yogurt to build soma in the body, which means sweet nectar of life in Ayurveda. This particularly is building for the reproductive system in Ayurveda, the shukra dhatu. I have felt suchhh a shift in my hormones these past 3 months!  (I will be updating all of you with my successes soon!)

It looks like trying local organic wines 🍷. I really avoid drinking wine that is not either biodynamic or organic. Sometimes, I can feel an immediate headache after just one sip of wine. For me, that is when it is not worth it. Luckily, natty wines are having their moment, so it has been fun exploring cute lil bars and restaurants with natural wine menus. 

If you too have been feeling guilty about your diet and lifestyle as a healer, check out my latest podcast episode for the full download.

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Angelica Rose

The Divine Feminine Healer