A Journey To Better Health

Have you ever calculated your BMI?  When you calculated it, was your first thought, “Whoa!  That doesn’t seems right.”  That’s what I remember thinking.  There are 4 simple categories for BMI: Obese, Overweight, Healthy, and Underweight.  I will share my journey with you and tell you the things you can incorporate or look into for your own health. 

When I first began my journey to better health, I was in the “Obese” category.  When I looked in the mirror, I didn’t really believe that I was obese.  When I look at old pictures I now realize I was in fact obese.  It’s amazing how long I let myself go and the things I told myself to make me feel better about the situation.  One of the things I told myself was that the BMI calculation is not accurate for every body type.  I no longer believe that after what I have seen myself losing weight.  When I began, I knew I was at least 50 pounds overweight, possibly closer to 60.  That is a lot of weight to lose, but I didn’t really look at the weight.  I just wanted to get healthier, and I was so tired of diets.  I had just turned 40 and somehow was extremely motivated to get this weight off.  The longer you keep it, the more wrinkles show up when you finally do lose it, and after a certain age, your skin just doesn’t tighten back up. 

I love sugar!  Most people do.  If you say to yourself, I don’t really eat a lot of sugar.  The next question to ask yourself is, do you love carbs?  Carbs are things like bread, noodles, rice, potatoes, etc.  Guess what?  Carbohydrates are converted to sugar and stored in your body’s fat stores.  I remember one time asking a registered dietician how to stop my cravings for sugar.  She told me to stop eating sugar and the cravings would stop.  At the time, it did not seem like practical advice.  I wanted a pill or a supplement to help me stop craving it while I was still trying to wean off.  Unfortunately, there is no such thing.  I watched some really cool documentaries on sugar and carbs that motivated me to kick the habit.  So the first thing I dropped was sugar and cut the carbs way back.  The dietician was 100% correct.  My sugar cravings stopped!  I was able to drop around 15 pounds in the first month because of the sugar and carbs alone.  I changed nothing else. 

I will let you in on a secret.  If there are people living in your house that don’t want to change their habits with you, that will make it harder because there will still be food in the house that you must fight the temptation of eating.  Praise the Lord that my husband was on board with me, so I just stopped buying sugary and carb-loaded snacks.  I love sugar and carbs, but I am not motivated enough to get in the car to go buy it when I am hungry or craving it, so that was helpful.  My husband started slowly by giving up his soda once a day.  He saw a video that said if you drink one can of soda per day that it is the equivalent of eating a 5 pound bag of sugar each month.  Yikes!  In case you were wondering, that is a very, very bad thing.  He lost 5 or 10 pounds just giving up sodas.  We basically just drink water or unsweet tea and indulge in other things on occasion.  Don’t be fooled by fruit juice.  It is loaded with sugar too.  Think of how many oranges it takes to make one glass of orange juice.  That’s a lot of sugar!  One thing we both noticed is that when we started eating healthier, unhealthy foods (and drinks) tasted bad.  For example, sodas tasted like pure syrup and chemicals.  Do you know why?  Because that’s basically what they are!

Reading labels is important.  Try to keep the sugars as low as possible.  If the label says 30g of carbs and 5g of sugar, your body is converting way more sugar than just the 5g.  People think they are doing right by getting fat free products, but instead of fat they are getting more sugar.  Don’t do it!  There are also all sorts of products that are sugar free.  I would say use caution in getting those types of foods.  Sometimes the chemicals used in sugar free foods are worse for you than the sugar itself.  Some even cause, what my brother-in-law likes to call “the screaming mimies”, otherwise known as diarrhea.  The best idea is just to cut those things from your diet.  It is okay to enjoy a cookie or some ice cream every now and then, but it should not be a daily occurrence.  I found that sometimes having ice cream once a week was enough to derail me.  Once I start it’s hard to stop.  Sugar is literally an addictive chemical that makes you crave more.  When you eat sugary/ carb-loaded foods, you release endorphins that make you feel good and make you crave it more.  The more you eat, the more you want.  You will also feel hungry a short time later because it interferes with the hormones in your brain that tell you that you are full or satisfied.  So you eat more sugar and carbs. 

When I cut sugar, there were other benefits that I didn’t realize.  I was having some trouble with Rosacea on my face.  That went away.  Look at that before picture above!  My face was so red!  I was having problems with Psoriasis in my hair line and it looked like dandruff.  That went away.  I had little bumps on the back of my arms.  That went away.  I was getting frequent minor headaches.  That went away.  And I didn’t realize how much my joints were aching until I came off sugar.  I felt so much better overall and my skin looked great. 

After about a month of no sugar I decided to exercise.  I am the type of person that needs to join the gym to be motivated to work out, but that was not an option for me.  So I started walking.  My child was still small so I couldn’t just leave the house and walk down the road.  I figured if I walked around my yard for 30 minutes that it was probably about 2 miles.  So I started walking every day.  I figured that I could handle 30 minutes a day.  That’s about the length of one TV show.  That’s doable!  I didn’t need any equipment, just some decent walking shoes.  Walking is free and it is so good for your brain!  I’m just going to be totally honest here.  I was so out of shape that walking for 30 minutes a day made me really tired by the end of every day for a couple weeks.  But that’s a good thing.  It made me sleep better.  Bonus!  Eventually I decided to add some running with the walking.  I walk a lap and then run a lap and just keep alternating for 30 minutes.  The benefits were amazing!  I started dropping weight like crazy.  I lost a pound every 2 days that I ran and kept to healthy eating habits.  Of course that didn’t last forever, but I also had a drop in blood pressure and a drop in heart rate.  I have a theory that sugar is as bad for blood pressure as salt, but more on that later.

I was eating healthier, but still noticed a problem with digestion.  Now, I’m going to get really personal here, but my hope is to help others and not gross people out.  My bowel movements were very irregular and I had trouble with certain foods.  They weren’t exactly food allergies, but food sensitivities.  Gut dysfunction plays a major role in neurological and overall health, so I wanted to get the root of the problem.  A major problem was with my gut flora.  I had been on strong antibiotics within the last year and was having a lot of problems.  It actually caused what is known as leaky gut.  Leaky gut explained simply is leaks in your gut lining.  When the things that should be inside your colon leak to the outside, your body starts to react badly to them and it can causes inflammation, food sensitivities, food allergies, and can even look like an autoimmune problem.  When the gut flora is not in balance, one thing that can happen is leaky gut.  I did not get a test done for leaky gut because of the expense of the test.  However, there are several things I could do to rebuild my gut that would not hurt me even if I didn’t have leaky gut.  Step one for me was taking probiotics.  I did a lot of research and found one that I thought would work for me.  I ordered it and took 1 capsule per day.  Just a tip… good probiotics should be refrigerated.  Yogurt was not something I wanted to do because I do not like yogurt and it is really high in sugar.  I took probiotics every day for about 2 months and I noticed a difference. 

After that, I decided to try intermittent fasting, not for diet reasons, but because it helps heal your gut.  I would wait to eat breakfast until about 10 am and then go about the rest of my day like normal.  Then by 6:30 when I was done eating dinner I wouldn’t eat anything else until the next day at 10 am again.  The reason I did this is because the longer the time during the evening hours and into the next morning that you can avoid eating, it gives your gut time to heal.  Healing processes take place at night as we rest.  The longer you keep food (and drinks except water) out of your gut, the more healing can take place in your gut.  Many people use this method for diet and metabolic issues like Diabetes.  I’m happy to report that it didn’t take more than one or two weeks to notice a difference in digestion and overall feeling of health.  I still do intermittent fasting for a few days a week.  The other beautiful benefit of intermittent fasting was regulation of hunger and satiety (feeling of satisfaction after eating) hormones.  I no longer had cravings and felt hungry all the time.  This is key in losing weight and trying to keep it off. 

I was studying functional neurology to add to my chiropractic practice and was learning about metabolic issues.  Metabolic issues usually stem from something you are eating that is a sensitivity for you, or something you are not getting enough of like certain vitamins and minerals, or even oxygen.  With metabolic problems, you struggle losing weight, getting rest, healing, energy, and many other important things.  One thing that keeps coming up in discussions on nutritional health in all my studies and research is gluten.  I know everyone seems to be on that bandwagon right now, but it is for a legitimate reason.  Most people do have some sensitivity to gluten due to the way it is produced.  The same is true of dairy.  The inexpensive way to test for gluten and dairy sensitivities is to stop eating them for a time period and then slowly work them back into your diet to check for reactions.  I first got rid of gluten.  I substituted some things like spaghetti noodles, but I found it easier to just eliminate bread altogether.  Swelling in my abdomen, which I thought was fat, began to go away.  I dropped some weight as well, but my stomach was really starting to flatten.  I eat a salad for lunch most days.  I was putting cheese on the salad and using Thousand Island dressing.  I sort of started to plateau, so cut those out as well.  I dropped more weight.  The reason I know these were sensitivities for me was not because I had weight loss, but because when I would eat them again, I would immediately get gas and cramping in my gut.  For some reason, it never occurred to me that gas is not a normal everyday thing that should occur.  That should be a red flag that something you are eating might be a sensitivity. 

This is what is amazing to me.  After years of dieting and exercising on an off, I never had a flat belly.  I could lose weight, but belly fat was still there.  Guess where sugar and carbs like to set up camp?  Around the waist line.  I was not only losing weight, but inches.  It didn’t matter if I had fat in my legs, feet, hands, around my organs, waistline, or butt.  It was coming off all those places by doing all these things.  So the good news is, no matter what your shape or where you carry weight, it will work for you too.  Fat is fat and no matter where I was losing, eventually even the hard places for me to typically lose fat were losing fat.  Think about it this way.  You may be a pear shape and think you can’t lose weight from your buttocks and legs, but eventually it will leave.  You cannot waste away to nothing on your top half while your lower half is still heavy.  It will eventually start to come off.  The trick is to stay with it.  This was never a diet for me.  This was a lifestyle change.  My goal is to keep going and if I lose I lose, if I don’t I don’t. 

I still enjoy holidays eating what I want for a day and then I get back on the wagon.  The longer you stay off the wagon, the harder it is to get back on it.  So splurge, but use self-control after.  You will find that when you splurge, you have a bit of a food hangover the next day.  That is a great way to know you were on the right track in the first place though!  It’s been a long road, and I still haven’t arrived, but I’m happy to report that I have lost 40 pounds over a 2.5 year period and have kept it off.  One thing I also noticed is that there are seasons in which I do better and lose weight very easily.  So I take note of the times and seasons and work them to my advantage.  When fall hits, I make sure to stay with it because the benefits are exponential for me. 

People notice that I am losing and ask what I am doing.  This is it in a very long nutshell.  Many people stop listening after they hear give up sugar, but I think it is worth it.  We have family members that have terrible problems with Diabetes.  Unless you take control and change your habits, Diabetes is a very long slow death sentence with a myriad of complications.  No one dies of Diabetes.  It’s all the other factors that come along with it.  When you are pre-Diabetic, you are already on a slippery slope.  There are many studies that show a low sugar and low carb diet can reverse Diabetes.  Don’t wait until things completely stop working. When I started losing weight, no one even noticed until I lost about 25 pounds.  That’s because I had a long way to go.  But don’t let anything stop you!  It doesn’t matter if people notice.  It only matters how you feel, and you will feel better.  For me, I felt like the clock had been turned back.  I still feel that way.  Until I wanted to get better, I wasn’t motivated to do what it takes to get better.  It was like being addicted to something.  My addiction was unhealthy food.  I had to break the habit and unhealthy cycles.  Until you want to get better, you won’t be motivated to do what it takes to get better either.  But when you hit that point, know that there is a way.  It just takes a change in mindset!