Friday, August 17, 2012

Shark Week!

My daughter has had a loose tooth forevvveeerrrr!  I kept expecting it to turn stark white and become a gaping hole any day but it has stayed the same since late May.

At about 4 AM this morning, she came into my room and was crying because her tooth hurt.  I assumed it was about to fall out as I stumbled out of bed to turn on the bathroom light.  She opened her mouth and what I saw definitely woke me up.  My daughter has shark teeth!  Not only had her loose tooth not fallen out, her permanent tooth had poked up waaayyy behind the baby tooth. 

I quickly recalled the years of braces that my husband and I went through and figured that if anyone was going to have kids with messed up teeth, it would be us.  As dollar signs flashed in front of my eyes, I turned to google which is  my expert on call medical opinion when my friend "Nurse Jenny" is asleep. Thank God!  Children turning into sharks are not only common but nothing to be worried about.  Luckily my dentist confirmed this a few hours later.  So, if you see this, calm down.  Now, if you see horns growing out of your child's head and it's the end of summer... I've heard this is also normal.  Cheers to September!

Monday, August 6, 2012

Live to eat? No more!

“Everyone in my family has died of cancer so I might as well enjoy life now, eat what I want and not kill myself exercising.”

“Everything causes cancer. If you try to eat healthy, you eat too many pesticides. If you eat meat, you are eating hormones. Drink wine, one week it’s good for you the next week it isn’t.”

“Food is too important to me to give up. If my life is shorter but I can eat what I want, so be it.”

“I’m on cholesterol drugs so I can eat whatever I want.”

“I worked out today so it’s okay if I have a burger, fries and a shake... again.”


Over the past week, I’ve heard these comments. What a slap in the face they have been. I’ve said the majority of them myself. I woke up.

I have many friends that embrace the paleo lifestyle. They work out routinely, eat their fruits and veggies and take care of themselves. I’ve always envied them... never thought it was for me. I woke up.

I’m fat. I have been fat since I was 9 years old and first went on weight watchers. I’m not fat because I’m covering up some pattern of abuse... unless you count the way I have been eating as abuse. I’m fat because I love food. Nothing more. I love food and I’m not one for the gym. I woke up.

This past January, I came down with pneumonia and pleurisy. I had no choice but to seek out a doctor closer to home. I found one within a couple miles that happens to share my beliefs and passions. I thought he’d throw some antibiotics at me and send me on my way. While he did put me on a strong dose of something, he loaded me up with vitamins. What? Vitamins? Yes... a novel idea I know. Guess what? They work... if you take them.

A couple months later, I was having some strange symptoms that sent me in a tailspin worrying about uterine cancer. Turned out I was okay.. praise Jesus! I thought I was done... my doctor had other ideas. A few weeks later, I had 6 pages of blood work staring me in the face. A full lipid panel was what the doctor ordered. This thing not only told me my total cholesterol but told me if I was eating often enough... shockingly I was not. The numbers were colored green, yellow and red. It looked like someone had bled all over my report. Tons of numbers in the red. I’m no doctor but my background in business tells me that numbers in the red are never a good sign.

More vitamins... lots and lots of vitamins. Add a statin to my list and another drug or two and I swallow 26 pills in a day. Not fun but completely worth it. A new addition to my list of prescriptions? “Read the book, “Eat to Live by Joel Fuhrman,” my doctor told me.”

“Oh great, another book about willpower. Something to tell me to dip my fork into salad dressing instead of pouring it all over my salad. Something touting how great eating off of a smaller plate really is because it tricks your mind. I get to read about how great exercise is and how a little bit will make a difference,” I thought.

Reluctantly, I downloaded the book and started to read. What I read shocked me. Maybe I shouldn’t have been that surprised. It’s not like I’ve never been told to eat more fruits and veggies, less fat and to move more. The book went into further detail.. I can’t give the book justice so you’ll have to read it yourselves. What I found was that the majority of cancers out there are directly linked to the diets we are eating that are rich in animal proteins. A study done called the “China Project” explained this in great detail. I kept reading.

At the end of the book, I was fired up... ready to take on a healthy lifestyle. I started trying to plan meals and freaked out. I was becoming vegan! What?! I’m a republican...I can’t be a tree hugging vegan! I panicked and started my search for vegan recipes. Even more discouraging news. Everything I found was pasta and bread based... don’t these people know anything?


Now, I was searching for low-carb vegan recipes. Who was I kidding? I couldn’t do this?

I persevered and followed the plan: 1 lb raw vegetables a day... oh boy was that new to my digestive system! 1 lb cooked veggies, 1 cup of beans, 1 oz of nuts and 4-6 different fruits a day. Thank God it’s summer!  No processed foods, NO white flour (no bread are you kidding me?!!!), no animal protein, no fats...

Have you ever sat down with a bag of Salt and Vinegar chips? They’re so good it’s ridiculous. A saving grace for me is that they usually pickle the roof of my mouth and I can’t handle eating more than half the bag before I have to put them down. As I made room for the cans of beans I had just purchased, I found a bag of these chips! OH CRAP! I freaked out. Then I started thinking about what they would taste like... I didn’t want them!! They didn’t sound good to me. I continued sorting and came across chocolate. Didn’t want that either! What in the world was going on? Was I sick? Yes, very sick. Sick with cholesterol, high glucose levels, low levels of fitness and a heart that can’t keep up. I finally connected these horrible foods to cancer. I connected them to heart disease, to diabetes, to health problems that have sent me to more funerals than I can count. These foods could have been the ones that sent my children to my funeral too early. They don’t sound so good now do they? I woke up!

I have been on the plan for 6 weeks and I have dropped 20 pounds.  I have added lean meats like chicken, fish and turkey but in small quantities. I’m nowhere near where I want to be but it’s a start. I can pass on things that used to be my red light foods. I allow myself one cheat meal per week. Read that, ONE MEAL, not one day. I find that the cheat meal usually doesn’t taste as good to me as it used to. I also find that I am so full, I often can’t finish the meal or just don’t want to.

Thank you for reading my story. I hope this serves as motivation to those that need it. I also hope it will create a more supportive network than I am already blessed with.