So why farming? On a food page? On a medical page?
My journey here also began when I was a young wife and soon to be mother. I got married young and did not really know what I wanted to do. I loved to read so began reading about growing food. I picked up a book called Ruth Stout’s No Work Garden by Ruth Stout. My new husband and his family were big gardeners as many country people were. They owned a large plot of land and all the family lived on their own parcel. I was pretty much a city girl when I married and had never really grown anything. They taught me how to pick food and sit on the porch and shell peas! I felt like I was part of this large family and it felt good. They did not garden organically. The family all gardened traditionally with a rototiller, a hoe and chemicals to kill bugs. They also used 8-8-8 fertilizer which is potassium, nitrogen and phosphorous.
It turns out that gardening became a necessity at times due to lay offs and not easily finding a new job or becoming self employed. I had begun to have children and was not really able to work with small kids at home. So my contribution to our budget was to grow our own food. Because I used mulch I was made fun of quite a bit. But one year in the 1980’s there was a drought that lasted for 5 months. I had mulched my garden heavily and as we drove by all the dead gardens coming up our road ending at our garden which had potatoes, tomatoes, hug amounts of okra on only a few plants, corn and other vegetables my husband stopped making fun of me!! I was in love with the dirt! I loved shoveling cow poop! I loved rolls of hay anywhere I saw them as we drove by the fields where they were rolled! I loved tasting such fresh food such as I had never really done in my city girl reality.
Over the years I was not always able to have a big garden as we moved to a new house but my dream became one day moving to a piece of land and learning how to homestead. I stayed home and homeschooled my kids so I wanted to do anything I could to save money and live inexpensively. I met a friend who would work to become a homesteader as well and use solar panels. I wanted to have solar panels so I would not have to pay an electric bill. I met more and more people who lived off the land. It really appealed to me. I loved to sweat and get dirty. I wanted to have some small animals so I could grow my own meat. I did not know at the time that doing so would make me healthier. I did not know at the time I would become a single mom and go to school to be a doctor!!
My life has brought me all that I dreamed of. I want to share the journey with my patients. My life has morphed into a life of teaching how to be healthy. I made it my goal to live on a piece of land until I die so I can remain active and healthy. I wanted to live on the side of a mountain so I would have to walk up the hill to get to my bed! And now I want to learn regenerative farming and teach regenerative food and regenerative health to all the folks who come to me.
This story has brought me to this place on this web site. There are more twists and turns that will be in the blog posts as to how we got here on this page.
