Life is Healthy

OK. OK. I've been gone for awhile. I still have a lot on my plate this week. But nothing like last week. Hmmm. I wonder why I chose to use "a lot on my plate" to explain how busy I am? Anyway, I'm still taking the vitamin D. And I do feel better.

Goals
Today I decided to write down some of my life goals, not just weight loss goals. My ultimate goal is to be retired and loving it. That's far and away number one. OK. So I haven't thought much beyond that. But when I am retired, I intend to do all of things I've always wanted--like have a farm. I know I've talked about that before. So I'm speaking of this goal as "when" not an "if."

Prayers
As far as weight loss, I still can't get myself in the right place to even begin. I'm not sure what it's going to take. I think a positive state of mind for starts.

Promises
Anyway, all I really need is a lot of money. And who doesn't?

So this was quick and sweet. I guess I want my life to be my life. How's that for a goal?

Yes, it's that time of year again: November 30th, when my sister and I would make an advent calendar for our parents. I don't know exactly how old we were when we made this one, but we did it for several years, and I still have two of them. We signed our work, so this is probably the last one that we did together, as the other one (which I will do next year, unless someone manages to stop me) only has my initials on it. I have redacted our signatures to protect the guilty, which is a shame, as mine contained both a highly affected arrowhead and a smiley face instead of a dot over an 'i'. How much more fun it would be signing cheques if I still did that.

I vividly remember us getting together every November 30th, then getting two pieces of A4, Sellotaping them together, and trying to think of what to draw that year. Then the annual problem of trying to think of 25 Christmassy things to go behind the doors, before the fiddly issue of cutting the doors open, drawing in the tiny space, then closing the doors again with tiny pieces of now-yellowing Sellotape. Welcome to the 1970s, when we had to make our own entertainment. It was rubbish. If only we'd had an Xbox.

So let's take a closer look: we've got Father Christmas on board the SS Santa, that well-known form of festive transport, off to deliver the presents, though presumably only to children who lived in coastal communities. Which was odd as we were brought up in the Midlands. Perhaps neither of us could draw reindeer.

And have a look at what is in the crow's nest: a crow! With the words 'crow's nest' and an arrow pointing to it, just in case someone doesn't get the joke. (It is a crow. In a crow's nest. It's like alternative comedy never happened. Or indeed any form of comedy. Also, it's got a yellow beak, so is actually more like a blackbird than a crow.)

We've got an angel and a big star in there too, though Santa is symbolically sailing away from these into more secular waters. There's also a lifebelt, though with only one person on board, it's unclear who could throw this in to save Santa from the shark. Perhaps the elves are all below decks behind the tiny portholes. In which case, it's probably something to do with elf and safety. Ah, how far I've come since those crow's nest days.

We'd take the completed advent calendar and give it to our parents, who would then have to spend the next 25 days working out what the heck we'd drawn inside each of the tiny little doors. Which is what we're going to do, starting tomorrow...

You don’t have to be a Weight Watcher’s member to know that change may not always be welcome, but it might be for the best.

The new Weight Watchers PointsPlus program puts protein and carbohydrates on the center stage with fiber and fat, and calories are not technically factored. It’s the company’s effort to encourage members to eat more fiber-rich whole foods. I pretty much figured out how to do that as I was losing weight on the old program, but I can see how this new program makes it even easier to do.

As I began tracking all the individual foods I ate yesterday, I thought about the question I posed a few years ago: Which do you prefer: eating a full portion of one thing or eating small portions of several things? Or does it usually depend on what day it is, how creative you’re feeling, and what foods you must use up in the fridge before they grow legs and walk away?

I tend to eat several little things all day, and I also think of food in terms of time. I like to eat slowly and in volume. How long will it take me to eat soup or salad or to drink a latte? It takes me two minutes at most to eat a tube of manicotti (which is the same number of Points as my big salads or hearty soups), and that’s savoring it. It takes me 15 to 20 minutes to eat the salad or soup.

When people ask why I became a vegetarian, I tell them it’s because I get to eat more. And at the end of the day, by eating more I’ve eaten less and I feel better. Of course there are always times when a small piece of something sweet or carby or a half-cup of real ice cream is just the right thing – satisfying and eaten in a matter of a minute. It’s the memory of the taste that lasts so much longer than the actual flavor in your mouth.

I’ve counted Points using the old program for nearly six years. It made sense to me, it worked, it sustained me. Now I’m learning the new PointsPlus system, and while the plan makes a lot of sense (even though it’s going to take me a long time to convert six years of recipes), I wonder if maybe I’m relying too heavily on someone else’s plan rather than the one I’ve morphed into my own. I’m comfortable with how I eat and it won’t change just because a corporation tells me fruit is zero points. I know me, I know my body. If I eat more than two or three fruit servings a day, I will gain weight. Having a glass of wine or two doesn’t derail me. I know that at certain times of the month, simple carbs really are necessary for my mental health. We all learn our needs and our thresholds through trial and error.

Having said that, I still believe in WW and I give the new plan a great deal of credit for encouraging people to eat a more clean, healthy diet. Still, in the end, we all have to do what is right for ourselves, to walk out on the edge and use any plan as a guideline and not the absolute truth for our body mechanics.

Whichever plan you’ve chosen to use, how, the further you get into weight loss or maintenance, has your eating plan changed from the time you started?

I've been writing about non-alcoholic fatty liver disorder (NAFLD) since the early days of this blog, because it's an alarmingly common disorder (roughly a quarter of Americans affected) that is typically undiagnosed. It often progresses into its more serious cousin non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), an inflammatory condition that causes liver damage and can progress to cancer. In a number of previous posts, I pinpointed excess sugar and seed oil consumption as culprits in NAFLD and NASH (1, 2, 3, 4, 5).

Chris Masterjohn recently published two very informative posts on NAFLD/NASH that add a major additional factor to the equation: choline (6, 7). Choline is an essential nutrient that's required for the transport of fat out of the liver (8). NAFLD can be caused, and cured, simply by removing or adding dietary choline, and it appears to be dominant over other dietary factors including fat, sugar and alcohol. Apparently, certain researchers have been aware of this for some time, but it hasn't entered into the mainstream consciousness.

Could that be because the richest dietary sources are liver and eggs*? Choline is also found in smaller amounts in a variety of whole animal and plant foods. Most people don't get the officially recommended amount. From a recent review article (9):

Mean choline intakes for older children, men, women, and pregnant women are far below the adequate intake level established by the [Institute of Medicine]. Given the importance of choline in a wide range of critical functions in the human body, coupled with less-than-optimal intakes among the population, dietary guidance should be developed to encourage the intake of choline-rich foods.

I've dubbed beef liver the Most Nutritious Food in the World, Nature's Multivitamin, and I'll probably invent other titles for it in the future. Add yours to the comments. Learn to love liver! I think it's an excellent food to eat on a weekly basis.

Head over to Chris's blog and read about the classic studies he unearthed. And add The Daily Lipid to your RSS reader, because there's more interesting material to come!

The Sweet Truth about Liver and Egg Yolks
Does Choline Deficiency Contribute to Fatty Liver in Humans?


* For the brave: brain is actually the richest source of choline.

An update to the list my niece came up with:
1. Chicken nuggets
2. Macaroni and cheese
3. Broccoli
4. Yogurt
5. Apples
6. Ketchup

It did, at least, have a couple of healthy items. I was really amazed at the broccoli. I forgot that when she was about three years old, she preferred salad to chicken nuggets. I took her to McDonald's one time, and I got chicken nuggets for her and a salad for me. She refused to eat the nuggets. I asked her what she wanted, and she pointed at my salad. Seriously. That really happened. So I gave it her and she ate it—without dressing. Because that's the way she liked it. Where did this kid come from?

I hope you like the images - chosen image can be seen HERE

Chances are very good that you've already heard of the It Gets Better Project, which was started in response to a series of suicides. Young people (some as young as 13 years old) are choosing to kill themselves rather than continue to deal with being bullied or shamed.

I love this powerful, touching and often funny series of videos aimed to give hope to young (and older) teens who are feeling depressed or alone because of their real or perceived sexual orientation.

This one from Pixar is the favourite in my house.




A day or two ago, The Maven shared this video on Facebook. These kids are saying that things need to get better now, not just in the future. It's brilliant and I am in awe.

Reteaching Gender and Sexuality from PUT THIS ON THE MAP on Vimeo.

Spanish Police have detained Pakistani man Imran  Firasat Sulaeman, pictured, who is accused of stabbing  a man to death in Indonesia and then chopping his  body into pieces. (Photo courtesy of Minutodigital.com)

Millions of hajj pilgrims praying in front of the  Kabah in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. On Friday, an official  confirmed that an Indonesian pilgrim died from  the H1N1 virus. (Antara Photo)

I have devoted my life to caring about the biodiversity and health of our planet and will continue to do so until the day I die. This Earth, this beautiful amazing orb in a vast universe, the source of all life, is what I am most thankful for today and every day.

I am thankful for its mighty water that is its lifeblood and ours
I am thankful for its soil that preserves and sustains the miracle of our sustenance
I am thankful for the sun that warms us body and soul
I am thankful for the wind that reminds us of its fury and power
I am thankful for all creatures who live in harmony with man
I am thankful for the seed, the most miraculous wonder on Earth.
From one tiny seed we can cultivate life for millions.

May we as humans truly see how much we have to be thankful for every day and come together now to understand that in order to show that thankfulness and to be one with this living Earth, we must treat her with kindness and respect.

I bailed on National Novel Writing Month on the first day, having written just under 700 words.

I felt like there were too many other interesting bits of writing that I wanted to do, including continuing to edit last year's novel.

And then my life became insane. I've been really hard on myself for all the things I'm not doing lately. This week, though, I've had two people who are very important to me (my coach/therapist and my friend DM) listen to me unload and then tell me that I would have every right to feel overwhelmed with a fraction of what I've got on my plate.

I tend to be hard on myself because I don't work outside the home right now. If I don't go to a job I feel like I should just sail through my other commitments. It felt really good to list everything going on in my life and have two women I respect offer support and sympathy. I've decided that I need to cut myself a lot more slack.

I can do NaNoWriMo next year. I'm OK with that. But I did feel a pang when my son sent me this video:



NaNoWriMo was a fun kind of crazy. I just couldn't let the rest of my life go to do it this year.

Once inside the room I saw the machine, and I was immediately warned that if I had ANY metal to remove it as it would act like a MISSILE once the machine was turned on - OK, if I wasn't panicking before, that did it. I quickly double and triple checked my body and pockets. Then once strapped into the machine I was asked to perform simple tests so they could see how I handled pressure etc. The machine was a little claustrophobic and very noisy. The tests took around 2 hours in total. Below you can see what they saw of my brain. Yes, I was surprised not to see a big empty space too.

Of the four women being made over, two of us picked our clothes and shoes in the morning and then had our hair done after lunch. I was grateful to be in the afternoon group and have someone else do the work for a couple of hours.





Actually, I did have to do a bit of work. It took concentration to separate those little papers.





You can't really see all of them, but there are THREE little bowls of colout being applied to my head.





This is my favourite part.











And this is why my hair will never again look the way it did when Tony was finished with it. How does anyone do the back of their own head like that?







Thanks so much to Tony from L'Elégance Salon (they don't have a web site or I'd provide a link), the St. Laurent Centre and the Ottawa Regional Cancer Foundation for making all of this possible.



(All photos by S. Sioufi except the last which was provided by T. Vincent)

“Oh twice as much ain’t twice as good
And can’t sustain like one half could.
It’s wanting more that’s gonna send me to my knees.”
John Mayer “Gravity”

Greetings Thanksgiving and your party potatoes and sweet potatoes and crescent rolls and stuffing and pumpkin pie and Cool Whip and “salads” fluffed with white stuff. Your chips and crudités served with insanely fabulous buttermilk and blue cheese dips. Your drinks and smells and family. Your knowing expectation that we’ll debate whether to play Apples to Apples or Cranium. Your magnetic pull to the table to light candles and place napkins on the lap and contemplate what truly makes us thankful. Oh…and of course, the traditional “olives in the eyes” photo.

I’ve been hearing the song “Gravity” in my head for a few weeks now. It’s ripe with comparisons to all the things I’ve been thinking about these last several weeks, and god knows too much of a good thing, any good thing, can smack us all between the eyes emotionally, or we feel it in our stomachs and muscles and promise to never do it again.

I’ve been in a year-long transition period from mega exercise to low-key exercise, and from being so spot-on plan that Mr. Clean wouldn’t find a speck of dust on my food journal to finding foods that fit more readily into my budget and more hectic lifestyle. And what I’ve found is that twice as much ain’t twice as good.

As many of you know, I didn’t start exercising until I’d lost 110 pounds. I was content to just lose weight and not move. But when I hit190 pounds, I wanted more. I wanted to use the body I’d created and do something – anything – so I began walking. Slowly at first – 1 mile, then 1.25 miles, then 1.5 miles. Then I added some speed until I was up to walking a 5K in 38 minutes. I was stoked. I was unpeeling the possibilities and it built my self-esteem like nothing had before.

From walking I went to working out regularly at the gym, adding strength training to my routine. My weight loss accelerated and before I knew it, I was at goal: 138 pounds. I believe it was exercise that brought my weight down ever further to 128, where I stayed for a few years.

I was crazy for exercise, hitting it 6 hours a week, minimum. Then the joint issues started. I tore both my rotator cuffs within two years of each other, and tore my biceps tendons and needed physical therapy. My left knee had degenerated to the point where 30 minutes on the elliptical was 29 minutes too many. I worried that I’d gain weight, not trusting the math that if I ate less due to less exercise, I’d be OK. (See “I CAN Paint!”) It turned out that twice as much exercise wasn’t twice as good, and it couldn’t sustain like one half could. Experience taught me that, not a book.

In the same spirit of song lyrics, the other day I was driving down the road and I heard Blake Shelton’s “Who Are You When I’m Not Looking.” (Click the title for the YouTube link to the video. Wish I could embed it, but YouTube wouldn’t let me.)

My journals – which I’ve kept since 6th grade – contain all I am when no one else is looking. Food, exercise, emotions…journaling is the record of me. All of me. Keeping a journal keeps me honest. It tells me who I am when I’m not “looking,” when I think I’m doing things “right” or on plan or the way I want. I know how to hold myself together like a couple of bookends, but in private, I pour a little something on the rocks and leave a path to the bathtub and cry when my heart is broken and eat chocolate when my knee hurts and call my sister or sister-in-law or my daughters when it gets to be too much, those times when no one else is looking.

I get asked regularly what got me on this path and what keeps me going. Bottom line: journaling. Writing down – without wondering who’s looking over my shoulder – what I want, how I feel, and what my goals are. Exercise, food and emotions.

So when you face Thanksgiving and all its riches and family stuff, remember you and your intentions. Write them down. Maybe give a listen to John Mayer and Blake Shelton. Twice as much ain’t twice as good, and only YOU know who you are when no one’s looking.
-------------------------
Congrats to Julie M who won the “Pilates For Beginners” DVD!

In the next few weeks I’ll giving away a few more DVDs PLUS my second-annual Nutrition Action Newsletter subscription. It’s a great publication, one I trust to be on the front lines in nutritional information, no matter how controversial.

It's not that I don't have anything else to talk about. It's just that life has been really, really busy lately and when I finally get the time to blog, my brain is no longer working.

I thought I'd continue sharing my makeover photo-story with you. Please feel free to move right along if you're bored with this stuff. Let me know in the comments if you've read anything interesting lately.

Meanwhile, the shoe store was more fun than the changing room:

First I had to pretend to be shopping for shoes, so that A Channel could get some footage.

Check out the heels on these babies.


I threw on this dress so that I could be filmed without ruining the surprise. It hadn't even been among the outfits that I considered but I loved it so much that I thought about changing my mind. Or going back a few days later and buying it. But seriously - where would I wear a second fancy outfit? To the dog park? Buying groceries? To parent-teacher interviews?


Can you tell which shoes I came in with?


It just occurred to me that the ones I chose (#53) look a bit like my old Blundstones mated with the those sexy pumps I looked at when I was still wearing the diva dress. Little boots but with a ridiculous heel.

See that crazy grin on my face? I love shopping for shoes.


Here's a better view of the whole ensemble. The St. Laurent Centre even paid to have my top altered. The outfit is hanging in my closet. I may just decide that I will wear it to the dog park.

Google Apps users have been asking for Blogger and now, with our recently launched infrastructure improvement, they can use Blogger for free with their Google Apps accounts. We're excited to provide Apps users with this great tool to have their voices heard on the web.

Google Apps is Google's suite of cloud-based messaging and collaboration web apps used by more than 30 million users in small businesses, large enterprises, educational institutions, government agencies, and non-profit organizations around the world. If your organization hasn't gone Google yet, you can learn more about how to lower IT costs and improve productivity and collaboration at google.com/apps.

For those Blogger users who have a Google Apps account, if your administrator has already transitioned your organization to the new infrastructure, you can now use Blogger by signing in at blogger.com with your existing Apps account.

For more details, read the complete post on the Google Enterprise blog and follow all the updates on other newly available services from Google Apps users.

• CDC advice: www.cdc.gov/nchhstp/newsroom
• AIDS information: www.aidsinfo.nih.gov
• and http://www3.niaid.nih.gov/topics/HIVAIDS/
• Pill study: http://www.iprexnews.com
• Journal: www.nejm.org
• UNAIDS: http://tinyurl.com/krq7kr
• Prevention efforts: www.avac.org

The Saudi Investigation and Prosecution Bureau has formally charged and jailed the employer of tortured Indonesian maid Sumiati, pictured here recovering after surgery for her horrific injuries. (Antara Photo)