Three Months Later...New Numbers

I should post here more often, I know...problem is that work is keeping me busy, plus trying to come up with stories for my Examiner writing gig have been keeping me busy.

Okay, so now it's three months later.  I've had another round of blood tests.  And....these are the numbers:

Total Cholesterol: 197
HDL: 25
LDL: 139

Triglycerides: 167

a1C (Blood sugar numbers): 5.5
Mean glucose: 97

Liver numbers: Normal

TSH (Thyroid): 0.08

The only number that my doctor has a concern with right now is the TSH number, because it's still too low -- it's supposed to be between 1.0 and 2.0.  I was given a lower dose of my thyroid medication three months ago, but it might need another adjustment in three months, so we will see.

But I'm proud of myself at this point.  My numbers are good, and I'm feeling pretty good.  Even my weight is continuing to go down -- I only have a couple of more pounds before I reach my current 10 pound goal, making me 50 pounds lighter altogether.  I think I'm going to try to find ways to get my HDL numbers up like adding more exercise into my routine.

Americans Exercising More, But Not Weighing Less and Other Health News

This has been going around all day yesterday in different publications, but honestly I think over the years our sense of what we are supposed to know about weight loss has been warped.

Americans may be reportedly exercising more, but they're still eating like crap. To lose weight, the most important component is diet. And it's not as simple as "calories in/calories out."  If it were, the weight loss companies would go out of business.

Recently, the CDC admitted that there were no adverse health risks from eating too much salt. Maybe we can get the USDA out of the business of giving us dietary advice and admit that 300g of carbs a day is way too much.

Speaking of which, The Atlantic has a dumb, overly long article titled "How Junk Food Can End Obesity." The author's main points seem to be the following:

1) Those who believe in promoting "real food" are wrong because it's not sustainable in the long run.
2) Poor people can't afford real food, so their only hope is processed.
3) Those who object to processed food only are only objecting to the fact that it's processed.
4) Real food also contains fat and carbs, so why bother?

And to each of these points, I say the following:

1) People need education on what's good for them in their diet.  and I think it can be sustainable.  You don't necessarily have to go organic, but just making wiser choices will go a long way towards better health.
2) You don't have to go organic to eat "real" food.  Right now, I can't buy grass fed beef because I can't afford it, but it doesn't prevent me from buying a steak when it goes on sale.  Better choices will go a long way towards your goals.
3) I object to processed foods because most of it has wheat in it (which I no longer eat) and because of the number of carbs in the food.  Because I'm diabetic, I can't even purchase "gluten-free" baking kits because they replace the wheat with starch, which is also a no-no.
4) He likes to demonize fat in the article, whereas I welcome the fat in my diet because it's one of the keys to me losing weight. The author is using outdated information on calories and fat to make his arguments, which is unfortunate.

Thankfully a lot of the comments on the article call him out on his cherrypicking of facts and outright misinformation.  Processed foods are not the answer, no matter who tries to tell you differently.

Update to my numbers dilemma

Had an appointment with my doctor yesterday.  The bad news is that my doctor won't switch my thyroid medication -- she said that the one I want to switch to is not approved by the FDA, so no doctor in the area would prescribe it to me.

However, the good news is that she's holding off on prescribing any cholesterol meds for at least three months to see where my new numbers are.  She told me that after she got off the phone with me earlier this week, she looked at my last numbers and saw that I was improving on this diet, despite the LDL numbers going up.  She was the one that suggested that it was most likely because my triglycerides went down so much.

After that, I received these articles from people on the Fat Head page on Facebook confirming it. So now my mind is at ease.

Until the next major health crisis comes along, anyway.

But I think the next time I go in I'm going to go in with my research printed out.  I'm against taking a statin because of the side effects, but the non statins have as many side effects, to them, as well.  My mom, who is currently taking a statin and had the dosage reduced recently, is going to be going off the med in about three months because her doctors want to be sure since she had a couple of mini strokes in April. My doctor said that if I go on, she wouldn't take me off because she wouldn't know if it was because of the meds or the diet.

So, if I do get prescribed a med in three months for the cholesterol, I won't take it, even if it's a non statin.  I refuse to get into that trap of my computer desk turning into an alternate medicine cabinet.  Right now, it's just the stuff that I don't mind dealing with -- one for my thyroid, one for the diabetes, and a vitamin supplement that is completely of my own choosing.

So, it looks like the diet change is helping.  I just made some changes to my routine, such as adding fish oil supplements to my morning routine, and hopefully things will improve when I get my next blood test in October.

Okay, my recent numbers...

Because I have hypothyroidism, I have to have regular blood tests done to keep my thyroid in check.  On top of that, they check my cholesterol, a1C, and other factors at the same time.  So here is a comparison of my numbers from between April and today.

Update

Okay, it's over 2 months in since I started low carb.  So far, I've lost.....

**drum roll**

29 pounds!  Yay!

I've gone down from 297 to 268. The weight loss is just an indicator, to me, how healthy I am becoming.  I'm going to the doctor's office tomorrow for my son, but I'm going to ask about my lab results from over a week ago to see where I am there.

But so far, I've noticed two things:

-- No monthly heartburn.
-- No acne in awhile. This was also monthly, around that "time of the month," but I noticed my last period that I had no acne whatsoever.

So I know it's working.  It will probably be awhile before I see other changes, but right now that's the two that stick out for me.

I'm also going to be starting "The Gabriel Method" soon.  Right now, I'm reading the book, so once I'm done I'm going to implement that into my routine, as well.

After a week of being wheat-free...

I'm not suffering cravings at all.  The only suffering that I'm doing right now is all due to my allergies -- what felt like just general stuffy nose issues is now almost feeling like a downright cold. My head is achy and my nose is aching and runny.  So I think my body is fighting me for completely different reasons.

Yesterday, I bought coconut flour and almond flour/meal for the first time and started to look for recipes for its use.  I found a few I might try, but I did this recipe last night and thought it was great.

Gluten-Free Chicken Fingers

5 skinless chicken thighs, cut into strips
2-3 eggs beaten
1/4 cup coconut flour
3/4 cup parmesan cheese
salt and pepper
coconut oil for frying

(Note: This is modified from this recipe -- I used whole eggs instead of just whites, and chicken thighs instead of breasts)

Cut the chicken thighs into strips.  Sprinkle salt and pepper onto both sides of the chicken.

Break the eggs into a bowl and whisk together.  Then mix coconut flour and parmesan cheese together, taking out all the lumps.

Dredge the chicken through the egg, then through the flour/cheese mixture.

Cook coconut oil to 375 degrees, and fry up the chicken in batches of 3-4 for 4 to 6 minutes, turning at the halfway point.

I'm definitely going to be making these again.

Now completely wheat free!

Okay, I've been wheat free since Friday, when I discovered that my last few slices of light wheat bread had actually gone a little moldy.  The past three days have actually been pretty easy for me so far.  I have a little bit of a headache today, but I don't think that's from the wheat deprivation as much as my allergies acting up again.

I've heard people talk online about getting serious withdrawals from not eating wheat.  At the moment I'm not feeling it when I'm awake, but I think I had it when I slept last night because I had a rather vivid dream about accidentally eating a cracker, then getting my hands on all the crackers I can have.

So far, the past few days I've just been trying to make it so that most of my carbs come from vegetables, with very few starchy exceptions such as rice crackers (no wheat -- checked the ingredients beforehand, and I only eat half the serving size since the crackers are so dense) and sweet peas (again, going by serving size).  For example, my salad this afternoon was made with Romaine lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, dill relish (for "bite"), Mexican blend cheese, cooked chicken breast, and sugar-free sesame ginger dressing.  So no really big carb sources in there, which I am going to save for my snack.

I was proud of myself yesterday, because I faced one of my biggest challenges and passed with flying colors.  My cousin's son graduated yesterday, and she had a big party to celebrate.  There was a LOT of tempting food on the table that wasn't very low carb friendly.  So this is what I grabbed:

Chicken with no sauce (I asked my cousin's husband to leave one with no sauce for me, and he obliged)
Salad with full fat Thousand Island dressing
Strawberries and blueberries
Veggies from a veggie platter with dip
Hot dog
Water

That was what I stuck to the entire time I was there, and didn't have anything else.  If I weren't on this diet, I would have grabbed everything else on the tables and overstuffed myself.

Now the next step: getting exercise back into my routine when the school year ends on Wednesday.

Biography presents....Dr. Robert Atkins

This is a fascinating look at Dr. Robert Atkins, who was known to have been the leader in leading those to a low carb lifestyle.  Although I am not on his diet now, his push to improve people's overall health by telling people to cut out the fruits, starchy vegetables, and wheat products has been vilified in the past few years by studies showing that low carb lifestyles improve cholesterol and overall health.

It's in five parts -- part 1 is below. 

Is It Really "Cheating" If You Eat Kielbasa At Night?

I should preface this by saying that I still have a bit of a sweet tooth.  When I went out shopping today I bought some snacky things for this last full week of school before it ends for the year.  The snacks I bought were sugar free pudding cups -- Boston Cream Pie flavored at 12g of carb a cup, and Mousse Temptations by Jello Dark Chocolate flavored at 10g of carbs a cup.

I had one of each tonight (probably a mistake on my part, but I wanted to try them and it didn't go over my allowed snack carb count).  And now, I was feeling hungry again.

So, I took a small piece off the end of some kielbasa and just had it to put protein in my belly so that I wouldn't feel so hungry.  Working so far -- feeling fuller now.

This brings up a good point, though.  I was watching a documentary show that the BBC did on low carb diets, in particular Atkins, where they did all kinds of tests on different aspects of the diet.  One of the more interesting points made is how come those on Atkins and other low carb diets actually eat less calories and feel fuller than those on higher carb diets.

Watch the show below and make up your own mind on this.

"The Battle of the Diets"

This video is an hour and 30 minutes long.  Because there are a few instances where he mentions copyrighted materials in his slides, those are blacked out while he has his discussion.

Christopher Gardner led a study on weight loss comparing different diets, from high fat/low carb to low fat/high carb.  And the results were interesting, to say the least.

If you want, skip ahead to the end where he talks about people's ability to lose weight on low carb vs. low fat.  I won't spoil it for you, but even though I was already diagnosed with the diabetes at the time I watched this, it kind of cemented my reasons for going low carb.

What Happens When You Challenge Stringent Vegetarians

I don't know if you've ever heard of Jimmy Moore, but he is a podcaster/blogger who has become popular among low carbers online with his show, "The Livin' La Vida Low Carb Show."  most of his guests are also fellow low carb advocates, but on occasion he will feature someone who doesn't hold this position.

This week, it was a doozy.

Dr. John McDougall is the author of a diet book that promotes a high starch/carb diet. The good doctor is also a vegetarian, so his advocacy is along the lines of getting rid of meat altogether. Now, I'm for choosing what works for you (like I said before, I'm an advocate for finding your right diet, not for pushing my low carb lifestyle down the throat of people), but some people are so stringent in their advocacy that they can't understand this.

Dr. McDougall is one of those people.  Listen to the podcast to see what I mean.  Moore is trying to be as polite as possible to this guy, but McDougall is having none of it.  At one point he insults Moore's struggles with his weight, which at this point is at its lowest point in his life.

It's very funny to listen to someone struggle with defending their beliefs sometimes when they are challenged.

Recipe: Mock French Toast

One of the hardest things for me in going low carb is eggs.  I can't stand them.  I don't know if it has something to do with the texture or the taste or what, but if I have them in a recipe I want to hide the taste.  I got this recipe from a Paleo diet site, and I thought it was brilliant.  I tried it this morning, and was just amazed as to how much this tasted like French toast.  Here is the recipe:

2 eggs
1 tbsp. cinnamon
1 tbsp. Splenda

Mix eggs together in a bowl.  Add cinnamon and Splenda and mix. Fry up in frying pan, serve.

My new favorite breakfast food!

The more I read and watch, the more I'm leaning towards Paleo

For those who are type 2 diabetic, one of the hardest things is the diet change.  Unfortunately, the medical community isn't making this easier.

My nutritionist, in our first meeting, gave me the following guidelines to follow:

• 1200 to 1500 calories a day (reasoning: up until I saw her I had started cutting my carbs down, and noticed that there were days where I wouldn't get to 1200 calories even though I wasn't particularly hungry. Her reasoning was that 1200 calories was not sustainable over a long period of time)
• 135 to 170 grams of carbs a day.  This meant about 45 grams per meal, and between 15 to 30 for snack.

Yes, I've been losing the weight on this, but I'm still not feeling particularly "healthy" yet, which is my goal.  Even with medication, I'm having a hard time most days getting below 100 (even though I'm considered at a healthy level according to American Diabetics Association guidelines).

One of the interesting things about going on the ADA boards is the number of diabetics on there that are fighting the ADA on their guidelines, in particular the dietary ones.  Buying a cookbook from the ADA is often not advised (most of the people on the boards recommend buying cookbooks that say "low carb" over "diabetic"), and some on the boards are questioning why the ADA is advising people to follow the food pyramid.

Even with what my dietician has told me, I had to question it a bit.  I mean, why recommend ANY carbs to a diabetic to begin with?  My nutritionist explained to me that whole wheats don't raise blood sugar as fast as processed "white" foods, so they were "okay."  This didn't make any sense to me, because to me a carb is a carb.

Okay.  I tested that theory out one afternoon after lunch when I was diagnosed.  I had bought a double fiber whole wheat bread, and made a sandwich from it.  I tested my blood sugar before lunch, and then again an hour after I ate.

Blood sugar spiked much higher than it does on the light wheat that I'm eating now.  So no more whole wheat for me.

Right now, I feel like I'm slowly weaning myself off of wheat altogether.  I just used the last of my current batch of light wheat bread, so I probably won't buy any more of it.  The only carbs from my breakfast this morning were from my veggie juice, and my starches for the past two meals were from peas.

So, I'm not quite paleo at this point, but my habits over the past few weeks are leaning towards that direction.  I'm slowly working my way towards that goal, and I hope that I can eventually get hubby on board to it, as well.

First Time I started To Seriously Put Low Carb Into Consideration

Some of you might have heard of this documentary.  It's written and produced by comedian and nutritionist Tom Naughton, who went under the assumption that his audience had working brains and discussed the obesity epidemic and what he felt was causing it: high carb, low fat diets that have been advocated by the government for years.

The movie is called "Fat Head."

The film was meant to be a response to Morgan Spurlock's "Supersize Me," but ended up being one of the big advocates for low carb diets in general.  The film didn't advocate any particular diet, but mentioned that a lot of what had been taught to us as "common sense" is wrong.

Naughton didn't advocate for going as far as Paleo in the film (although he would go in that direction after making the movie), just some common sense when choosing your diet and that human beings had functioning brains.

If you're going to start, i would suggest you start here.

This is not an advocacy blog

In my early twenties was the first time I had ever heard of the idea of eliminating wheat from a diet as a way to feel better.  I was taking Tae Kwon Do classes at the time, and the instructor and his wife had told me that they were on a blood type diet, which advocated this practice.  Although I tried the diet, and I did lose some weight, I just gained it all back.  But I did notice something when I eliminated wheat from my diet -- my allergies were getting better, and I wasn't as stuffy in my nose.

When I mentioned this to a doctor some time later, their response was that I might have some kind of reaction to wheat.  But I didn't think anything of it at the time.

Years later was when I really started to wonder about low carb dieting and its effects.  Atkins was being rediscovered (which has since been followed by South Beach -- which my regular doctor advocates -- and Paleo and a few other low carb eating plans), and the idea of low carb eating was becoming more well known and advocated, despite reports to the contrary that going low carb was "dangerous."

My first time being low carb as a lifestyle came when I was pregnant with my son.  I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes, so I was forced to go low carb in order to maintain my health as well as my son's.  One thing I noticed while following this plan was that I only gained five pounds in the entire pregnancy, which I immediately lost once I started this new eating plan (I would joke with the nurses that the baby was eating the fat).  When my son was born, I was down 20 pounds from where I started before the pregnancy.

When I didn't have the diabetes anymore?  Stopped following the plan, and went back to my old ways.

Now, it's five years later.  After one attempt at Atkins (of which I lost weight then gained it back again after I went off the diet), and more years of gorging myself, I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in April.  So now, I have to go low carb again for my health.  This time, it has to stick in order for me to stay healthy and reverse the damage I did to myself.

My husband and I agreed on one thing -- if I slipped up at any point, I wasn't going to beat myself up over it.  Just get right back on the horse and continue on.

Since my diagnosis, I've lost 20 pounds just from changing how I eat and doing exercise when I can work it in.  Plus, with a new job that keeps me active (a lot of steep stairs and walking around the building) the weight has just been melting off my body.  Hubby's noticed a difference, and I'm noticing that t-shirts that used to be tight on me are now fitting me a lot looser than they have in the past.

So why am I telling you all this?  Because I want to start off by explaining my experiences with low carb dieting in the past and now just so that I can show you how it's working for me.

I'm not on any particular low carb plan (although I jokingly call it the "Eat the Foods That Won't Kill Me" Diet), but I am seeing some effects for me.  And I'm constantly looking at research on low carbs to help me get through this part of my life.

Although I want this blog to have a lot of information on low carb diets, I don't want to tell you what kind of plan to follow.  What works for you, works.  Low carb diets are not for everyone, but there is information out there on who would benefit the most from it (which I will go into in another post).  And if you decide to go low carb, do your research and hopefully links I provide here will help with that decision.

But overall, here's to health and a new lifestyle!