Finding Sarah

by Sarah Ferguson

  While working on the docuseries, I was determined to get fit, inside and out. I did not want to turn into a big fat mess. I would abide by the Latin mantra “Mens sana in corpore sano.” Translated, this means “a healthy mind resides in a healthy body.” To do this I would address my body, with all the intensity of a golfer addressing a ball.

  A chef called Angella Cole is a handsome, lovely lady I met when I was filming the docuseries in Malibu. She came every day with her magic wand in the shape of a wooden spoon! Angella has a store called Picky Eaters in Los Angeles, and she gave me all her delicacies. I was able to enjoy and eat them. They were gluten free, with lots of goodness, full of vegetables and protein, too.

  I am still constantly looking for ways to enjoy my favorite foods while counting all the fat, calories, and carbs that have become my nemeses. So when I find a healthier alternative to a food I used to be able to enjoy without consequence, it’s nearly akin to winning the lottery.

  My latest jackpot was lamb lasagna. When I was a little girl, we’d often have roast lamb for supper. Afterward, the leftovers would be put into a mincer, pushed down with a wooden instrument, and ground finely enough to cook into a shepherd’s pie. Angela made lasagna that way, with eggplant and tomato sauce, but no cheese. She came through, and her lasagna was to die for.

  The best cleanse for the kidneys and for detox is what I call “green sludge.” I have been drinking this for many years. I asked Angella to try the recipe. Adding her brilliance, she proceeded to toss bits of fresh apple, celery, asparagus, and other veggies into a blender and liquefied them.

  Mostly I ate a fiercely healthy diet in California, and often dined on vegetables and fruits. I began to find ultimate joy in slicing a big, juicy tomato and eating it with just the right amount of salt.

  I’m sure you’re thinking, “Poor girl, I guess this is what the contemplative life has done to her.”

  My little happy friend who trains me, Sherri Cobb, jumped on a flight to Montecito, all at her own expense, to stand loyally by my side. She is based in New York and a talented artist. My Sherri Berri, as I call her, has the most golden heart, and I am so fond of her. What loyalty to drop everything to help me!

  Sherri knew that the psychological trauma of the scandal had apparently manifested itself in my body. Sherri kindly told me that my muscles had certainly seen better days; they were as stiff as old bleach bottles. She suggested something called Muscle Activation Therapy, or MAT. It pinpoints which muscles are underperforming or not performing and stimulates them back into action. Through MAT, I’d stay agile enough and get better results from exercising.

  She put me in a position and applied resistance against a particular muscle to see if it was active or inactive. She asked me to concentrate on my body, to experience it, something I usually try to avoid. If a muscle was jerky against the resistance, that meant it wasn’t working properly. She’d then massage it to get the blessed thing pliable enough and less jerky. It was strange how I could feel a difference before and after. Inactive muscles came awake all over my body, most of them complaining and trying to go back to sleep.

  I now actually like exercising better than ever. My body moves more fluidly, and doesn’t creak as much. I’m moderate about exercise though. I don’t believe we should all look like gladiators. We are meant to be active and strong so that we can perform tasks in our lives. That means walking without having to bring an oxygen mask, and maintaining a reasonably strong body. I’ve promised myself I’ll stay on the path of moderation.

  And I’ve done so. As I wrote in my diary one day: I rushed to the paddle courts today, in desperate need of a lesson from Manolo, the paddle coach. He kept telling me that the whole point of the paddle is to be consistent, not to lose but be beaten, relax, and use your mind—and do this in your regular life, not just on the paddle court.

  I’d love to weigh 140 again like I did during my Weight Watchers days. But I’m not going to do it by subsisting on three lettuce leaves a day and swimming to France and back.

  One important element in my health regimen is taking five omega-3 capsules a day. We don’t eat enough fish in our diet, so I believe this is the key to my health and well-being. My hair and nails are growing strong, my cholesterol levels are good, and I feel strongly that omega-3 fatty acids are the key to keeping my veins and heart healthy.

  In fact, I believe in it with such strength that I traveled to the north of Norway. I went to the Cod Liver Museum, and studied the benefits of omega-3 fatty acids. The brand I take is GO3, as it is so pure and comes from the north of Norway. I asked a spry, elderly gentleman who works at the museum why he looked so good. He had no wrinkles, not even on his hands. He attributed all to cod liver oil, which he had taken all his life. As a fisherman he handled cod liver all his life.

  In World War II, the Germans wanted to give omega-3 to their troops to keep them healthy. As they reached northern Norway, the British and Norwegians fought not to let them have such a valuable weapon, and burned the cod liver oil factories down to prevent the Germans from getting the cod liver oil. It is soothing gold dust for the body. I feel so much better taking it, and my skin feels naturally moisturized.

  I also drink grated ginger root with hot water; this is the oldest form of disinfectant for the body. I love watercress and have many cups of watercress soup during the day. I believe it gives me all the iron I need.

  For many years, I have been the ambassador of the heart for Dr. Valentin Fuster at Mount Sinai Hospital. He is the legend of the heart. There is NO greater heart guru than Valentin Fuster, and he is my friend. We have many discussions on the heart, and I love to sit and listen to his soothing Spanish voice telling me all of the latest information in heart health. He is my hero, and that is why I say I am his ambassador!

  I have to say that I love feeling healthy. Kate Moss was so right when she said that nothing tastes as good as feeling thin! I am not there yet, but I know my heart is in the right place.

  NUGGETS:

  • Free the mind and the weight will follow. By that I mean look after yourself. Drink plenty of water. Go for a run. Detox your body. Eat plenty of fiber. See sugar as an enemy. If you follow these simple suggestions, you will lose weight.

  • Find someone who’ll support you and provide motivation. My trainer keeps me committed by providing encouragement and guidance. I always call my trainer a buddy. If you haven’t got a trainer, get out there and do it yourself—which is what I do now. I also find it very important never to go grocery shopping when hungry.

  • Tell people you want to lose weight so that they don’t bring you tempting treats. Unless you do this, they become enablers, and you’ll feel guilty if you don’t eat what they give you.

  • If you’re a comfort eater like me, work on breaking the habit. Do a self-exploration to find out what’s triggering it psychologically. Keep a diary that includes information about how you were feeling and who you were interacting with right before a craving hit. Once you identify why and at what point you become out of control, mentally rehearse how you can handle this next time. Think of alternative ways to break your habit, such as walking out of the kitchen or having a glass of water.

  • I’ve had to work hard on not comparing my body to other women’s. Everyone is different. We all come in an array of pleasing sizes and shapes. Our job is to make the best of ours.

  • The next time you catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror, at least acknowledge yourself and don’t look away.

  From: Sarah S.

  To: Sarah

  Don’t give your critics oxygen. I know what happens with you when you are alone. You allow The Fear to come and occupy your brain. Your mind goes into overdrive and allows negativity to creep in. When you are busy and engaged with people and friends, you allow yourself to put the past behind you. You can’t rewrite the past and you have to stop torturing yourself. Those of us who know and love you know the happiness and fun and good you have brought to our lives. As I’ve said b
efore: To know you is to adore you … I know I do.

  Love you and miss you madly

  Sarah

  14 The Miracle Man

  The lighter you travel, the farther and higher you can go.

  AFTER MY SESSIONS with Dr. Phil, I met with Mark Nepo at his home in Kalamazoo, Michigan. An acclaimed poet and philosopher, Mark is the author of the brilliant books The Book of Awakening, Facing the Lion, and others. I found him to be a giant of humility, with profound kindness and wisdom, and one of the most spiritual beings I have ever met. I felt uplifted simply to meet him. We bonded through the amusing discovery that both of us trip over our own garbage.

  The purpose of our meeting was to share notes on what it means to be alive.

  This is a question that has puzzled saints and sinners and poets and philosophers since the beginning of mankind. It is a question that sooner or later is asked by each of us in our own lives. As I have grown a lot older and hopefully a tiny bit wiser, I have come to realize that this question has billions of answers on earth right now, because each of us has to find the meaning in our own life.

  Mark Nepo knows more about this question than most. You see, in 1986, Mark, apparently healthy and age forty-two at the time, was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer.

  I asked him to share his story.

  Mark had been in Rome, studying Michelangelo’s ceiling in the Sistine Chapel. He noticed a slight lump on his head. But he didn’t dwell on the bump, so fired was his imagination by Michelangelo’s artistry. But the bump continued to grow after he got home.

  Mark had a CAT scan and an MRI taken of his head. They revealed a large tumor that was pressing on his brain. The skull had deteriorated in that area. Mark’s doctor referred him to a neurosurgeon.

  “The tumor was on the right, the creative side of my brain. That didn’t help with my fears.”

  He was scheduled for a craniotomy.

  “I was all hooked up with IVs and was getting the antiseizure drug Dilantin in preparation for surgery,” he said. “They had shaved and shampooed my head.”

  But the neurosurgeon didn’t feel right about going through with the operation. He wanted Mark to see one more specialist and take more tests. The results: lymph node cancer. So instead of having brain surgery, Mark was referred to an oncologist.

  “I just plummeted. I was thrown into a state of constant uncertainty.”

  Treatment was prescribed: five weeks of daily whole-head radiation to be followed by an aggressive program of chemotherapy.

  “They told me the radiation could affect my higher cognitive function,” Mark said. “I’m a poet. That’s where I live. I was terrified. It could affect my memory, my writing, all my gifts.”

  Mark’s unusual tumor was reviewed by a board of specialists at the hospital.

  Then, a miracle.

  “At 8:00 AM, I was scheduled to have the spot on my head tattooed where they were going to shoot in the radiation. The board called at 7:00 AM and said to hold off because their review was inconclusive.”

  Just as quickly and as inexplicably as the fist-size tumor had mushroomed on the right side of Mark’s head, it had vanished without a trace, and, more incredibly, without any treatment.

  Surgery was called off for good.

  “In the end, what I have now is the delight, the awe, that for some reason I received a miracle and my tumor disappeared. That’s changed the way I perceive everything,” he said.

  Mark is Jewish, yet during his illness a Catholic priest prayed and laid hands over him, and he welcomed it. People brought religious icons to his house. He had Sufi friends who were praying for him. Other friends who were into holistic medicine sent him vitamins. He did intense visualizations. He tried everything and turned down nothing. Somehow it all added up to making him more available to God.

  “The lesson of the miracle was that all of the things we have in common, and not the things that separate us, are what is important. We have to be open to all forms of God. I can’t close myself off as a Jew because a priest calls on Jesus to help me. The miracle came from a place where all these endeavors meet and I was fortunate to be so desperate that I went there.”

  In the hours I was privileged to spend with this inspirational man, we talked of many things: God, healing, faith, and transformation.

  Toward the end, without my realizing it, he turned the conversation back to me. With his eyes trained on me, he asked, “Why do you let obstacles stand in your way? Whether we like it or not, obstacles in life are here to teach us.”

  Mark explained to me that our ability to live fully depends greatly on how we resolve and integrate our struggles. We talked about how a beautiful example for us exists in the metamorphosis from a caterpillar to a butterfly. Caterpillars don’t just wall up and sprout wings. Within the chrysalis they literally dissolve into a formless, undifferentiated puddle of goo. Then the cells of this puddle mysteriously reorganize themselves into a completely different creature, a creature capable of realizing hopes the caterpillar never imagined, a creature that knows how to fly. When this creature—the butterfly—is ready to break free, a tiny opening forms, and the butterfly must struggle to get through it. This is life’s way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly onto its wings so that it will be ready for flight once it achieves freedom from the cocoon.

  He was right, of course. Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our lives. Challenges, restraints, setbacks—these were all things to push against to grow stronger. The struggles are a part of our journey and are preparing us for what awaits.

  There is no triumph without struggle, no wisdom without misjudgment, no character without getting knocked down and picking yourself up again.

  If Mark could recover from his monstrous cancer, using the gift of a poet to turn into a healing force, how could I be consumed by my recent brush with infamy? It was time to stop castigating myself for every false step I took and connect with all the good inside.

  I take Mark Nepo with me everywhere I go. Not literally, but figuratively, by way of his inspiring books. If you picked up my personal copies of his books, you’d find dog-eared pages, folded-down pages, and frenetic underlinings. I always find myself writing excited margin notes—“yes, yes, yes!!!”—throughout every chapter. For example: If you wall up yourself against the world, then you wall inside yourself, then the light cannot get in … The word “courage” means to stand by one’s core, and then that means to heal … See the old habits as old habits and get a new habit to replace old habits… Befriend your own gifts… The word “vulnerable” means to carry a wound graciously … Sift through what is ringing true and separate what is not and don’t separate from your true self.

  Mark taught me that I had to grow as a person and stretch my soul in good times and bad, and that is precisely what makes the journey, no matter how hard, so important.

  NUGGETS:

  • No matter what you have to face in life, do it with courage and honesty. If you fall off your pony, dust yourself off and get back on. And it hurts.

  • Adversity does not have to destroy you. Your faith is there for you to rely on. You are not alone, but we always think we are—stop reaching out and reach in.

  • Miracles are not out of the question. No matter how many doors have closed, no matter how much bitterness and anger you feel, find the spiritual strength to keep an open mind and an open heart. The universe keeps back what you put out. Put out love and harmony, and you will get the compassion and tolerance and happiness.

  • KBO: Keep Battling On. The morning might be sunny, but soon the sun will set and rise again the following day. It always does; you can rely on that and your problems will too.

  • Dirty dishes get dirtier and hard to clean when you leave them out overnight. Meet your problems head-on, don’t leave them in the sink.

  From: Sarah S.

  To: Sarah

  Personally, I think you have been amazing. You have picked yourself up, faced the music, and have d
one all that basically alone. I couldn’t do it. You have an extraordinary inner strength which you mustn’t doubt and that does not mean you have to pretend to be strong when you feel vulnerable. At times of uncertainty, you must lean on your friends. That is what we are all here for. Try not to worry about what people you don’t know think. The people who are lucky enough to know you LOVE you. They see beyond human mistakes. Don’t judge yourself so harshly, and don’t despair … suddenly life will look rosy again, and you’ll be back on top.

  DIARY ENTRY

  August 17, 2010

  What on earth can be better than Mark Nepo’s words: “Then God enters us like a brilliant stone falling in a lake, and the past ripples behind us, and the future ripples before us, and we are breathing in eternity.” Thank heavens for Mark and his ability to ground me every day.

  Thank heavens I am breathing and that last night a huge rainstorm (the likes of which I have never seen) nurtured the parched trees and plants. It appears that the whole garden is singing in gratitude.

  From: Angela

  To: Sarah

  My dearest Sarah,

  You are remarkable … you are able to write as you live: straight from your heart … no stops along the way. You somehow breathe life into words, and as I read them, I can see your face, feel your surroundings, and get to experience the journey with you. What an incredible “sharing” and life lesson for your daughters. How wonderful for you! Enjoying the moments … living in the moment is what it’s all about. This discovery, I’m sure, will bring with it new insights and new avenues to pursue that will make so much sense going forward. I am so proud of you.

  Angela

  DIARY ENTRIES

  August 19, 2010

  I had a day from hell. I was again betrayed to the newspapers by a former member of my staff who was close to me and the girls. She painted a picture of me to the Sun newspaper that I was similar to Marie Antoinette, that I was completely out of control and almost demonic.