Not dead yet

Still here, reading y'all behind the scenes and just taking a break.  It's been nice.

I've been reading and researching and RESEARCHING the whole wheat thing.  Wheat and sugar.  And all I can say is, if you think it might help, give up wheat and sugar for let's say 2 weeks.  And see.

I know maybe it sounds all airy-fairy or hocus-pocus - but honestly, you aren't ADDING something.  Just taking something OUT for a while.  If it doesn't help, you can always go have a sammich or fix a box of mac & cheese.

I've become sort of fanatical about how incredible this has made me feel.  I went on a 7.5 mile bike ride yesterday!!  This from someone who had to struggle last summer to get off the couch.  Although, I was in Maryland and the humidity almost killed me...  but I was riding 7 miles every other day last summer.  AND hitting the driving range on the between days!  And I couldn't feel better, I still had to force myself outside, I was still achy and fat. 

From what I'm reading, wheat has the special ability to really hurt you.  It's been horribly genetically modified from our 'amber waves of grain' into 3 foot stubby stalks of hybrid 'fiber'.  The SAD (standard American diet) has been recommending high fiber/low fat for how long now?  And all of us are chugging along, TRYING to lose weight by eating fiber bars and frozen diet meals and multi-grain sandwiches and munching on wheat thin crackers and low fat cottage cheese and it did not work for me, what about you?  How is that diet going?

I remember writing a post about how I couldn't lose weight on a 1200 calorie a day diet and I was SO PISSED!  Here, it's right here and jeebus.  I have been trying to lose this weight following the advice of doctors and magazines and BULLSHIT for - well, since 2006 at least!

I WEIGH LESS THAN I HAVE SINCE 2006

I had STRUGGLED to get this thin, this was my step-daughter's wedding, 2009.  I was about 160 pounds here.

 

And it started fucking falling off of me when I quit eating wheat.  Now, granted, I quit eating sugar too.  Here is a list of what I don't eat:

sugar
sucrose
fructose
high fructose corn syrup
corn
potatoes
wheat
any grains whatsoever
no fruit whatsoever.  NONE.
pasta
rice
crackers/pretzels/bruschetta
beans
peanuts
canola oil (rapeseed oil, it's HORRIFYING)

Here's what I DO eat
meat
steak
ribs
butter
olive oil
avocados
eggs (sometimes 4 a day)
chicken
sashimi (raw fish uh mah gah so delicious)
bacon
bacon cheeseburgers (sans bun)
all veggies, sometimes raw, sometimes sautéed in butter/olive oil

Here's what has improved:
weight:  down 29 pounds since June 20, 2013.  just under 30 pounds in 2 months.
inches:  25.5 inches lost over my body.  TWENTY FIVE AND A HALF.
JEFF has lost 22 pounds by proxy - he eats what I eat, lol.  And he drinks beer every single day (carbs)
I sleep
My energy is KAPOW
I don't HURT in my joints
no gout attacks
sex drive is back (Jeff nods vigorously)
Memory is back
Give-a Crap is back
Happy IS BACK
Hardly ever hungry. 
Hypoglycemic attacks GONE

Look.  Like I said.  Just try it.  All you're doing is removing something from your diet.  I'm not saying to take a supplement, or a pill, or buy a book or join a cult.  And it's easier than you think.

Jeff and I in 2002

Jeff and I in 2011

 

The difference in the two pictures above is fucking horrifying.  I was so healthy and happy in the first one.  I remember that second picture - in Sweden.  I felt like crap, I was SO FAT and ugh.  I wanted to FEEL healthy again, besides the vanity of wanting to be smaller.

December 2012 - no smaller even though I'd been trying like hell

READ.  read read read.  I've given you links, I will give you more.  YOU decide.  But it seems to me that the link between Monsanto and big agriculture and the US Govt food pyramid and obesity in this country and the rise of things like celiacs and asthma and skin rashes and inflammation, and rheumatoid arthritis, and PCOS and thyroid issues and hormone imbalance and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome - it all seems so fucking fishy to me.

I worked in the clinical trials industry.  I'VE heard first hand stories about all this crap.  And I can't imagine that taking more chemicals in the form of "medicine" is the way to go, when it would be so much easier to just TRY and remove a substance from our diets.

Do you know what causes diabetes?  Yes, insulin imbalance.  What spikes insulin?  Glucose.  What turns to glucose in your system the fastest?  WHEAT.  What doesn't spike insulin?  Protein.  http://www.marksdailyapple.com/diabetes/#axzz2dTwYv6ke

http://www.nffc.net/Issues/Corporate%20Control/USDA%20INC.pdf <-- PDF

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/definitive-guide-grains/#axzz2dTaUhwX1

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/simple-complex-carbohydrates/#axzz2dTaUhwX1

(three of the above links take you to MDA, but the articles link outside sources and I am not going to reinvent the wheel.  That Mark Sisson guy is pretty smart.  he also has a lot of detractors on the net - please do your own research)

http://www.wheatbellyblog.com/ I have his book.  It's written sort of badly, but his links are good and the info on the blog is good.  I just find the book sort of juvenile.

http://www.organicconsumers.org/monsanto/ - Monsanto has to be one of the most horrifying corporations I have ever heard of.  Did you know that any farmer who is government subsidized (which ones aren't?  ORGANIC FARMERS) are contracted to buy their seeds through Monsanto or another same-type organization?  The seeds these companies provide will not propagate.  Which means a farmer cannot harvest their own seeds for the next growing cycle.  They HAVE TO BUY more seeds from the same company, or lose the subsidy (losing the farm, so to speak).  Monsanto has genetically engineered the seeds to not reproduce.  They can come and take a DNA sample of the crop and see if the plant was grown from a Monsanto seed.  Wheat, corn, soy - HAHAHA you thought soy was the new protein??  It's all GMO and kind of a frankenplant.  And not good for you.  Remember how Pa Ingalls would buy seeds?  Or any story from that time, there was a 'seed man' coming around in a wagon, selling corn or wheat seeds?  Now it's Monsanto.  The same people who bring you Round Up poison.

OH HEY - the wheat is also called 'Round Up Ready'!  Cos it's genetically modified to be able to be sprayed with Round Up for bugs and not die!  How convenient for the maker of the seed and also the spray. 

What about the school cafeteria menus?  government schools!  It's state run, remember, just like Russia.  Pizza.  Spaghetti.  Oh, just look it up, you can find your kid or grandkid's school menu online.

My own kid suffered HORRIBLY from asthma.  Like, Mike was in the urgent care just about every weekend.  He also has hideous dermatitis rash on his skin, and as a kid it was so bad.  I was poor.  We ate a lot of mac & cheese and spaghetti and rice and fish sticks and hot dogs and frozen veggies.  I had no idea.  regrets?  Yeah, I got 'em.

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/concentrated-animal-feeding-operations/#axzz2dTh8Ke5z  Again with the MDA website, but follow the links.  We all know how horrifying the animal industry is.  Now I am researching a grass-fed organic farm here in Temecula where I can buy chickens that actually eat bugs the way they are supposed to, that scratch and feed in the grass naturally.  Cows that eat fucking GRASS.  I'm also going to start my dogs on all protein, since dogs don't need fucking CORN (read the ingredients on your pet food).

I eat almost ALL protein.  I eat fat.  Real, grassfed butter.  Bacon (uncured).  I'm lucky that we have no kids at home anymore, so we can still spend the same on our food budget and get better stuff.  But just cutting out wheat is SIMPLE.  It costs LESS.  I am making a dr appt and I will post my numbers when I get them.  Like my cholesterol and blood pressure and all that - but I'll betcha a hundred bucks they all GO DOWN.  Yes, even while I'm eating eggs (the whole thing, Omega 3's baby!) and steak and (healthy) fats.

And you will eat less.  You will spend less because you will eat less.  Because you wont be hungry every 2 hours.  (however, you will cook more...)

158 pounds, August 22, 2013.