What a scam!

Well, maybe not totally a scam, but you really need to read your labels if you're worried about food-related health issues! And I've felt it my new personal duty to share the real truth out there for people struggling to make good choices in this confusing world of food and health issues! So, listen up to what I've discovered recently...

As you know, I've been working really hard to make good food choices so that I can feel better and take charge of my health again. Yea, I'd love to lose about 100 pounds, but right now I'm more interested in getting through a day without a headache, getting my insulin levels under control and having more energy. I've been saying no to cookies and other desserts (Although the cookie withdraw may do me in faster than the health conditions! Man, I had no idea how much I liked cookies until now). I never have been a huge snacker, but I've even been avoiding the occasional indulgences and searching for other just-as-satisfying options. I'll share some of those in a minute... but first, I want to warn you of the "scam".

I was so proud of myself for this little find during my most recent grocery trip:

Boy, was I wrong to be so proud!
You see, I'm not much of a meat-eater, yet I've found that I need significant amounts of protein with each meal and snack in order to help my body digest & use food properly, to avoid headaches, to feel full, and to feel better overall. So, in my search for alternative protein sources, I was thrilled to find a whole-grain waffle with flaxseed! Yea, protein! It says it right there on the front of the box, 4g of protein! Add a glass of milk and I'll have enough protein to get me through the next 4 hours!

Here's the scam: where most of the time we're disappointed to see the serving size ("only 10 grams of carbs in these chips... oh, did we forget to tell you our serving size is one potato chip?"), in this case a serving size is THREE waffles! Well, crap, that means there's only about 1.3 grams of protein in a waffle! That's less than a regular Eggo waffle! So much for my big protein find! Liars! (they're not really liars, just hid the truth well enough I didn't see it until later)

Oh, there's more, only this one I caught on to the scam before I made the purchase... of course syrup would ruin my healthy waffle snack, so I bought raspberries, blackberries and strawberries to top off my whole-wheat flaxseed waffle... and of course what is a fruit-topped waffle without whipped cream?

Yes, Cool Whip comes in all kinds of styles... there's Cool Whip Free. And Cool Whip Lite. And Cool Whip Sugar Free. Let's compare... Sugar Free & Lite only have 20 calories and 1 gram of fat each. Cool Whip Free only has 15 calories and no fat. That's good, I guess. But, fat isn't really the issue for me, it's carbs and calories. Regular Cool Whip does have 25 calories... BUT, it is the lowest in carbs! Yea, even the "sugar free" variety has 3 grams of carbs while regular has 2! What is the point of being sugar free if the carbs are still doing to do the same damage? I guess just speed up the cancer, I don't know. (I'm afraid of artificial sweeteners). So, I'll gladly take the extra 5 calories in exchange for one less carb and 100% more taste! I'm beginning to think it's all psychological! I mean, aren't people going to have a tendency to eat more "Free" Cool Whip if they think it's healthier than the regular stuff? I'm telling ya, it's a scam!

So, back to my waffles. While it's true that De Wafelbakkers may be organic (boy, that's become another buzz word and another scam itself, hasn't it!) and may have other health benefits, I'm really focused right now on getting the most protein and fiber to balance as few carbs as I can get on a small calorie budget. So, I can have Eggo Wheat waffles and save about 40 calories and still get the 4 g of protein, for reals (I don't have to eat the whole box and the carton to get the proclaimed amount of protein!).


Now I want to share with you some of my new friends.

Cheese is good. Protein with a satiating quality, no carbs, so perfect snack. But, unless it's string cheese, I don't really want it without a cracker. What to do? Meet my friend Keebler:

These multi grain crackers are absolutely delicious!! For only 70 calories of my budget and 3 grams of fat and only 9 grams of carbs (8 net carbs because there's even a gram of fiber), I can have 4 crackers with my cheese and get a bonus gram of protein! It's too good to be true! I'm full and it was delicious! Yea me! I love these little victories. I can only eat so many nuts, you know. Gotta have some variety.

Arnold is another new friend I'm very fond of. Sissel introduced us.

These whole wheat sandwich thins are SO yummy! They make the BEST sandwiches! Cold cuts; grilled cheese, bacon & sauteed onion; grilled chicken; ham, egg & cheese... anything tastes good on these babies! They'll only cost ya 100 calories, just a single gram of fat, only 17 net grams of carbs (unbelievable for bread! 22 carb-5 fiber=17 net carbs), and a bonus of 4 grams of protein!! Yea!!! It makes me happy! Food can be fun again!

I'm also a new fan of protein shakes (maybe I'll post some recipes later) and Stevia.

Stevia comes from an herb in the Chrysanthemum family (I'm pretty sure this is the same family as our fall Mums) that grows wild in Paraguay and Brazil. It's an extremely concentrated sweetener, so you only need a few drops to taste the effect, which is why it has NO calories, NO carbs, nothin'! AMAZING! Why haven't you heard more about it? Because NutraSweet and Splenda have paid big bucks to lobby the FDA and make sure you don't know about this much healthier option. The compromise the FDA came up with is that Stevia can be called a dietary supplement as opposed to a sugar substitute.
It's not new. It's been used in countries overseas for many, many years. How good is it? Well, let's face it, nothing can taste exactly like sugar any more than salt substitutes can taste like salt. However, my first protein shake with natural yogurt (GAG!!) needed 3 tablespoons of sugar before I could choke it down, whereas my second shake with about 5 drops of Stevia was quite good with only one teaspoon of sugar. And no cancer or man-made chemicals. Pretty dang cool.

I have a friend who is a food scientist and we talked at length about food. Let me just give you the short version and tell you that the FDA is not primarily interested in keeping you healthy. It's easily swayed by money and is just as political as any American government operation. So, be careful for buzz words and food fads. Read your labels. Educate yourself. Do your own research and go with your gut feeling... and what makes the hunger, insatiable cravings, and headaches go away while bringing those insulin levels back down.

Don't get sucked into the scams. They're not interested in helping you with your health issues. They just want to sell their product and make money. The only person who is interested in your health is you, so take charge--measure and weigh your serving sizes and read those food labels!

They grow up too fast

The cliche is right.
Today they're a baby, tomorrow they're all grown up.
It's going way too fast for my taste.

But, here she is, Miss Bridget, at her Kindergarten Graduation:


And here is Victoria with her 4th grade teacher:

Bridget is Awesome

So, we had to make yet another trip to the pediatrician yesterday. And Bridget has strep throat for the third time in two months. So, we go to the pharmacy that is across the hall from the pediatrician (in the same building) because it's cheaper than CVS and we're $826 short of meeting our $6,000 medical deductible...

We're sitting in the waiting area, waiting for the prescription to be filled. My girls are sitting quietly. Next to us is a father and two kids. Dad is on the phone discussing sports and travel for the summer. Baby sister is on his lap playing with a sticker (she looks to me to be about a year old). Older brother (who looks to be about 4 or 5) is a total punk and keeps taking the sticker from his sister. She cries, he gives it back, then he takes it away again.

I'm trying to ignore the situation, pretending to read a magazine, trying to hide the fact that I'd love to spank this little boy and teach him a thing or two, and then bop the dad upside the head and tell him to pay attention to his kids.

After a few minutes of this, out of the corner of my eye, I see Bridget take the backing off the Iron Man sticker she just got from her pediatrician moments ago.

Then, quietly, without saying a word, Bridget gets up, walks over to the baby, and gives that baby her own sticker to play with.

The dad said thank you. The baby stopped crying. Bridget quietly returned to her seat, again without saying a single word.

I just wanted to scoop her up and hug her and kiss her. I fought back the tears. She is amazing.

I love my Bridget!

FaceBook Tag: ABCs About Me

ABCs About Me Tag

You've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with the ABC's of YOU.

A - Age: 33 (I'll be 34 in 6 days!)

B - Bed Size: Queen

C - Chore you hate: cleaning bathrooms & mopping

D - Dearest friend: Aaron

E - Essential start your day item: Shower

F - Favorite color(s): when it comes to clothes, Black & White. Everything else: blue, purple or pink.

G - Gold or Silver: silver

H - Highest level of education: Bachelor in Music

I - Instruments you play: flute mainly. I also took saxophone and piano lessons in college.

J - Job title: Mommy

K - Kids: 2

L - Living arrangements: two-story home in south Indianapolis with hubby and two daughters.

M - Mom's name: Patricia

N - Nicknames: I don't really have any.

O - One regret from your 20's: I wish I'd worried less and enjoyed motherhood more. It goes too fast.

P - Pet Peeve: lies

Q - Quote from a movie: Sam Witwicky: "Fifty years from now, when you're looking back at your life, don't you want to be able to say you had the guts to get in the car?"

R - Religion: LDS

S - Siblings: Angela & Matthew

T - Time you wake up: depends on the day and how I'm feeling

U - Underwear: clean

V - Vegetable you dislike: I like veggies

W - Workout style: housework, DDR, Rock Band, gardening, shopping, anything that doesn't feel like a sweaty workout and keeps my mind busy enough I don't realize it's a workout.

X - X's you'd like to avoid: all of them

Y - Yesterday's best moment: being with my family.

Z - Zoo favorite: penguins

Finally on the Right Track

So, I've been meaning to get on here and post an update about my new medical developments, but I'm just now getting to it partly because I've been so busy and partly because I wanted to do more research before I started speaking up.

I still have much more research to do, but I'm learning new things and I'm now anxious to post what I've learned so far.

Here's the short of it for those of you who do not have the time or interest in reading my whole "dear diary" journal entry here and just want a quick update: My Endocrinologist (a specialist in hormonal medicine) determined from my most recent blood tests that I have Polycycstic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS). That was the big diagnosis. He also confirmed I have a severe case of Insulin Resistance, as well as a metabolic disorder (he did not elaborate on the latter except to say that my carb metabolism is defective). He also figured that my current version of Metformin that I was taking, which was no longer effective, was causing some of the horrible GI problems I was having and he prescribed a new drug called Glumetza (another brand of Metformin). The Glumetza seems to be working so far, but it's only been a couple weeks.

There is no cure for PCOS, but it can be treated.

The cause is unknown.

One in ten women have it.

I have a long road ahead of me. Dr. Lee only wants to change one thing at a time so as to be able to accurately determine what is working and what isn't. Taking Glumetza twice a day and keeping a food journal are the first steps. I have an appointment with a diabetic dietician in Dr. Lee's office in a couple weeks. I'm not especially looking forward to that next appointment because I know it will involve the words "reducing carbs" and me being hungry for a long time. I already eat whole wheat, don't often eat potatoes or baked goods... if I have to cut out fruit I might die. I'm not a big fan of meat or fish, so it will not be fun figuring out what I can eat. The joy of eating has been lost for me for some time now.

So, last night I bought this book called "A Patient's Guide to PCOS". I only had time to read the introduction and the foreword and already it has described my life for the last 5 years or so!!!

I've learned that many of my health problems are likely to be symptoms of PCOS, so I've just been treating symptoms all these years! Depression and anxiety, for example, are believed to be a part of PCOS.

Of course, weight gain, and even dizziness, are related to PCOS as well. IR & PCOS are closely related, although I'm not sure which comes first (the egg or the chicken)??? Some say IR causes PCOS, some say PCOS causes IR. Bottom line is, my body does not react to food and hormones the way normal bodies do.

Dr. Futterweit (the author of this PCOS book), mentions how so many women go from doctor to doctor without ever receiving an accurate diagnosis or proper treatment. Looking at the list of symptoms, it seems so obvious to me now, but my past doctors have been convinced it was a thyroid condition and/or bad eating habits. Thank you, Kelli Gary, for pointing me in the right direction in seeing an Endocrinologist! You may have saved my life!

Another thing I learned quickly in this book is that Metformin is given to infertility patients. I was irregular, probably not even ovulating, but that was the least of my worries when I got diagnosed with IR. That Metformin wasn't just helping me lose weight, I'd become regular again, and that is how I became pregnant. BUT, PCOS makes it nearly impossibly to stay pregnant. That is why I had a miscarriage. This IR, PCOS, surprise pregnancy, and horrible & scary miscarriage have turned my life upside down. I didn't know what hit me.

So, here are some of the symptoms of POCS that I have struggled with (there are more; these are just the ones I have had):
• irregular or no menstrual periods (nothing since June 2008; prior to Metformin last spring, nothing for a year then either)
• acne (not caused by eating chocolate! caused by having too much testosterone)
• obesity/weight gain/inability to lose weight, particularly around the middle
• breathing problems while sleeping (I never used to snore, but now the last few years, I even wake myself up)
• depression & anxiety
• oily skin
• hair loss
• pain in the lower abdomen and pelvis (I kept complaining of this with no concern from my doctors)
• skin tags (I got these after having Bridget--I have two in my right armpit, one on my hip and one on my back, and I HATE them... when I pointed them out to my doctors, they dismissed them)

What do I do now?

Well, finally being told what is wrong is nice. I'm glad I'm not crazy. I'm glad someone finally believes me and is interested in helping me get better.

I will continue the Glumetza for now. It's most likely I will be taking more drugs in the very near future, but just one addition at a time so we don't continue on this path of treating symptoms instead of causes.

I have hope. I can lose this weight and get my old body back. I can regain control of my life, my emotions, my health. I can become regular, maybe get rid of the random abdominal pains and everything else I've been suffering from for so many years now that I've forgotten what it is like to feel good. But, I will need to be patient. The changes are rough on me... for example, with the Glumetza, I'm no longer having the GI issues, but I've had two migraines. Messing with a girl's hormones is no pretty sight.

I have to keep this annoying food journal for the next few weeks and see the dietician. I have to see my ob/gyn for tests to see if I have cysts on my ovaries and scarring from my surgery last fall. I'm sure there are many more blood tests in my future as well.

But, at least I know what is wrong and am finally going in the right direction. Where before, my old doctors hadn't even caught the train, now I've got a doctor who is on the right track, and that gives me hope for a happier, healthier me.

Why Are You Still At Home?

This is the greatest article! It completely explains why I do what I do. And this week I have had to keep both my girls home all week long because they've been sick. I think that proves the point. My kids need me. School is just for a few hours 5 out of 7 days. Just enough time for me to help at school and keep the house in order so I can focus on them in the afternoons and evenings when they are home. I have the best job in the world. I am so blessed!

Subject: Why Are You Still At Home? Responses for Stay-at-Home Parents of School-Age Kids
Date: 2001-08-27

Why Are You Still At Home?
Responses for Stay-at-Home Parents of School-Age Kids
By Lucynda Koesters


So you're a stay-at-home parent of kids in school. It's back to school time and you just know you're going to get those questions and comments from people, some well-meaning and some not. You know: "What are you going to do all day now that the kids are in school?" "Are you going back to work?" "Can't you get a part-time job?" "Aren't you going to get bored?" "Don't you feel guilty not working?"

No matter how much you brace yourself for this onslaught, you still cringe when the questions arrive. Part of it probably is a little guilt you feel because you have no intention of returning to any work outside the home. That's ok, because it is societal pressure that makes you feel this way. Everyone is supposed to work at a job in this country. While we pay lip service to the at-home parent of small children, it is somehow wrong for a parent of school-age children to remain at home.

Responding to these inquiries in a pleasant and non-defensive frame of mind is very hard to do, but it is not impossible. What's required is a firm belief in your chosen way of life.

Why ARE you at home with children who are now back in school for most of the day? Why AREN'T you going back to work? What are the benefits of being at home at this stage of family life?

Sorry, but to successfully handle the inquiries, you must be able to answer these questions in your own mind. The first step is getting rid of the guilt and gaining a firm belief in yourself and your chosen lifestyle. To help you get started, reflect on these benefits of a stay-home parent:
A stay-home parent is usually the last person children see and talk to before they leave and the first person to greet them when they arrive home. Children derive a great sense of security from knowing a parent is available to them immediately before and after school. Children have a chance to get valuable words of encouragement in the morning and an opportunity to share their day in the afternoon. Children are also greatly supported in the knowledge that mom or dad is at home and available during the day in case of a problem at school.

A stay-home parent can get household chores, cooking and errands done during the school day, thereby freeing up the valuable afternoon hours to help with homework and creating true family time in the evenings.

A stay-home parent often has the freedom and flexibility to volunteer at the children's school during the school day. Seeing the parent's involvement, children learn to value their education. The parent gets an invaluable understanding of the inner workings of the school and how the children spend time there. Parents develop better relationships with teachers, school staff and other parents, increasing the children's sense of security.

A stay-home parent is often a less-stressed parent, fully available to support the needs of the family in the after-school hours. Having a calm and content parent to anchor the family is a great benefit to all members.
Now that you have reviewed a few reasons you are not going to work, what do you say to all these people who question your choices? Here are a few diplomatic and non-threatening responses:
I plan to remain at home to be available before and after school for the kids, and to volunteer at school during the day. Between housework, homework and school duties, I will keep very busy.

Our family really needs me to remain at home - it's worked out well so far, and I plan to continue as long as possible.

The children like the fact that I'm home. They like coming home after school instead of going to the after-care program. It gives us time to complete homework before going to soccer practices.

During the day, there are a million things to get done at home; I'm really very busy. But, I like to have afternoons and evenings free for the family, so I plan to stick to this schedule.
So, the next time you encounter some well-meaning, or maybe not so well-meaning friend or relative firing off questions about your lifestyle, remain calm and pleasant and answer them with quiet conviction that your lifestyle is best for you and your family.

Lucynda Koesters is a stay-home mom of two school-age kids and a free-lance writer, concentrating on family issues. Write her at: lkoestrs@venus.net