Week 7

A few things on my mind this week. The first pertains to the purpose of this 60 day turn-around. I’ve said many times its not about the weight, but about pursuing health. Its hard for me to stay focused on that because, thankfully, I was not expressing any symptoms of my unhealthy lifestyle, besides being overweight. So, when I think about this diet, and its ability to to promote health and proper function, I always think about my grandma. She is 90 years old. She has type II diabetes. She had been on medication for it for quite some time. She started the diet though, and since doing it, she has been able to get off her medications (glucophage and metformin), her blood sugar has normalized just from her diet.

Her doctors are so impressed with her improvement, not only has her blood sugar improved, her cholesterol levels are lower, her blood pressure is lower, she’s lost weight, and on top of that she just feels better in general, and she’s excited about what she’s accomplished. Its really amazing (remember… she’s 90 and excited about health).

I’ve thought a few times, “when I’m that old, I’m going to eat whatever I want, you know, enjoy life.” But then I come back to, why do I equate food with enjoying life, when there are so many other things that are so much more enjoyable, like being with my family. Feeling good and having energy to enjoy being with my family, that is where I want to be.  So, for my grandma, this isn’t a 60 day turnaround, its her life, her diet, this is how she’s going to eat for the rest of her life. For her, she will give herself a treat once in a while, but her general diet follows the straight 60.  This is what really inspires me. I’m going to be doing the diet again with all of you starting Sept. 22. The idea of doing it again is hard to swallow, but looking at my grandma, definitely helps.

Speaking of doing the straight 60 again this leads me to the next thing on my mind this week. Something Eric said to me a week or so ago. “You don’t know what you don’t know” or I’m not aware of the things I don’t know about this diet yet. For example, I’ve been eating peanut butter. I knew almond butter was allowed on the diet, I checked the nutrition label for almond butter and peanut butter and they were essentially the same. I made sure it was straight peanut butter, organic, no sugar or other things added. Well, apparently peanut butter is not allowed on the diet, at least only in severe moderation. Peanut butter come to find out,  is highly inflammatory. One of the points of this diet is to reduce inflammation, most of this comes from omitting sugar, because it is also highly inflammatory. So, I wasn’t aware of the inflammatory nature of peanut butter. Well, I was, but just didn’t think about it. Now that I know, it is actually pretty obvious, peanut allergies are pretty common, which an allergy is a greater than normal inflammatory response.

This is just one example of something I don’t know. The point of saying this is that, I’ve been doing the straight 60 with some guidelines as to what to eat and what not to eat, but I haven’t gotten the full effect of being in the classes.  Amanda and I are looking forward to having the classes, the knowledge, and the support of the group for the second time around.

After 7 weeks on the straight 60, I’m down to 208 lbs. that’s a loss of over 20 lbs. This morning I had another great victory, my belt went to the 3rd hole (and its not uncomfortably tight). At the beginning of this I was on the last hole in the belt, barely. By the second week I think was on the second, but making the third hole was pretty awesome. I’m fitting into more of my old clothes that I’ve held on to for years waiting for the time when I could wear them again. Its all very exciting. Bread  and sugar are worth sacrificing for this. Thanks for reading.

-Dr. Mark

Nothing more to add today, well said – Dr. E