Carrie Fisher dead at 60 - what role did weight-loss pharmaceuticals play???

http://www.dailymail.co.uk

I'm so sad. Carrie Fisher died today, she was only 60. I loved Carrie Fisher, especially as she aged, she seemed to grow ever more more fabulous, more accepting of her body, her life, her choices...she was outrageous and wonderful, her scorching honesty seemed palpable.  Did you see her one-woman autobiographical show 'Wishful Drinking'? There's short clips on Youtube but try and see the whole thing - it's worth your time (and possibly $9.99, lol). It's hilarious, and thoughtful and sad. And she is so wonderful, so funny, but clearly has been at battle with her weight, her celebrity parents, her depression, her drug use and mental instability for like, ever. 

No stranger to pharmaceuticals, did she turn to 'weight-loss aids' to shed the weight to play Princess Leia again? It was clearly a 'lose the weight or lose the movie' kind of deal. 😣

Carrie Fisher spoke about the Star Wars franchise only wanting to hire 'only a portion' of her for the 2015 Star Wars movie 'The Force Awakens':

"They don't want to hire all of me, only about three-quarters," she told Good Housekeeping last year.
"Nothing changes, it's an appearance-driven thing. I'm in a business where the only thing that matters is weight and appearance. That is so messed up. They might as well say get younger, because that's how easy it is."

This is why I talk about HhCG, because I understand being desperate to lose weight. Some people think surgery is the answer, other people turn to pharmaceuticals. Because when weight is locked on, the age old advice to "diet and exercise" does not work. If you are overly heavy, you know what I'm talking about. And just the fact that you are heavy - that's proof that your body is malfunctioning on a hormonal level. And the Dr Simeons protocol with the HhCG spray can fix that, can reset your metabolism and can give you the 'magic' transformation you are desperate for, without the strain on your heart that classic 'fat pills' (aka speed) are known to cause. When I shed my weight I used the TrimYou HhCG spray. I shed 65 lbs - basically lost a pound a day! - and never felt healthier or more energized, and there was no speeding and no surgery. Which I thank my lucky stars for every single day.

I don't know what she did to shed her weight. I have no idea if she had a doctor's supervision and prescription pad at her disposal or if it was Jenny Craig's pre-made meals were what finally worked for her (doubt it)(though she has been a JC spokesperson since 2011) but what I do know is eating clean while on Simeon's protocol with HhCG heals, and it doesn't hurt your heart.  

It hurts my heart she's gone. Gone too soon.
Dammit.

If you want to read more, this link has clips and more info. As I write this, not many have ventured to blame weight loss pills...but I just don't think she would have ruled that out, given her history - and doctors DO offer those pills as an option. Too bad it's an option that can kill you.

And then there were 7!

I'd like to introduce my 7th little one: Theodore John Robin Sousanis! Oh, babies!!!
6 months old now, and time for me to start losing the baby weight! (Again!)
:)

(wearing him in my awesome new Didymos Baroque wrap, custom dyed by the Pink Willow Tree)

Why NO ONE should ever even consider Bariatric Surgery

Because food is not the enemy.
But if you have Bariatric Surgery, food will become your enemy.


If you are considering Bariatric Surgery, (surgically creating a tiny stomach) no doubt you ALREADY feel that food is your enemy.

That was me.  I regretted every morsel I ever ate because I kept getting fatter and could not lose an ounce, no matter what I tried - and I tried everything, except Bariatric Surgery - and I'm so thankful I never tried that!


Listen.  It's not your fault you are fat.  It's your hormones' fault.

If your hormones were working properly, your body would have used the food you ate as fuel.  Instead, your body stored it as fat.  Not your fault.  You feel you overate and 'deserve' to be fat?  Well, why did you overeat?  Because you were still hungry.  Hormones control hunger levels, not stomach size.  If you surgically shrink your stomach, your hunger will remain and then you will waste what's left of your now miserable life mashing and drinking tiny quantities of food, never eating normal food, never able to share normal meals with loved ones.

As Dr Simeons wrote in his 'Pounds & Inches'; "to accumulate...fat...is a very definite metabolic disorder...I have always held that overeating is the result of the disorder, not it's cause."

If you are fat, you have a metabolic, hormonal disorder.

WHY are your hormones working against you?  Some say 'metabolic disorder' can be traced to all the processed 'food' we eat, filled with chemicals, additives, and excess sugar.  But trying to stop eating that way cold turkey is difficult, as a lot of those chemicals and additives are not just unhealthy but actually addictive! 

With Dr Simeons' Protocol, you eat real food, food with only ONE ingredient (chicken, spinach, eggs, strawberries, etc), and with the help of the HhCG spray, you feel so much less hungry, you're able to break free of old bad eating habits like eating chips or drinking soda pop.  People joke that chips are addictive - well, check the label! If you see monosodium glutamate, then you are seeing an additive put there to make you finish the whole bag and crave more.  Or soda pop and 'juice', check for high fructose corn syrup, it's designed to make you crave more, buy more, and consume more!  

Following Dr Simeons Protocol you'll eat REAL food, and, using the HhCG spray, you can look forward to losing weight at an average of a pound per day(!), without being hungry(!!!), without exercising(!!!!) plus you can heal your metabolic disorder(!), and feel better than you have in years!  You will NOT need to exercise while you are losing weight - you can be a sedentary (or as active) as you are accustomed to being.

If you are really fat, you know exercise is out of the question, nearly impossible.  My knees ached just thinking about it and, at my fattest, I knew I would look pathetic, trying to jog down the street.  I was not in the mood to look pathetic.  I was in the mood to hide.   I probably would have considered Bariatric Surgery myself, if I had not found HhCG first.  I thank my lucky stars every single day that I found out about HhCG before any more of my life slipped away, and now, food is my friend!

Let me say that again: Food is my friend!
I'm not on a liquid diet, I eat really delicious food all the time!!! I cook my eggs in butter, with cheese, I add in a bit of salsa or fresh basil, I have toast and sausage and coffee loaded with cream - and that's only breakfast! Would you want to drink that breakfast in a smoothie?!!! Heck NO.  You will, if you have Bariatric Surgery.  Or you can have two bites before your surgically cinched stomach rejects the food and you throw it all up.  Good grief.

I eat SO WELL, I want to yell from the heavens: "You can too!!!"  (You can buy the same spray I used here.)

Last night my family went out to eat at a lovely Italian restaurant.  It was a warm summer evening and we were seated outside on the patio.   My youngest sister was visiting from New York.  (Yoga teacher, always been thin, very pretty, no children) She commented on my cute outfit and I had to smile - I felt like I looked just as cute as she always does, finally! -  I ordered a Salata Caprese  which is a whole plate of fresh mozzerella, layered with tomatoes and fresh basil, drizzled with olive oil and vinegar - and ate it all myself.  I also ordered a Ceasar salad topped with grilled chicken (the chicken was really tasty and moist, sooo delish) and I ate it all- including the dressing(!).  I also had several glasses of iced tea with lemon, that I sweetened with stevia that I'd brought along.  

Notice I had no desert.  Sweet (w/stevia) iced tea quenched my sweet tooth anyway and all the healthy fat in my meal had left me feeling deliciously sated and perfectly full.  
The children were reasonably well behaved and even adorable, my sister seemed charmed and my husband looked so handsome across the table, I could see he was proud of his brood - it was a meal worth remembering.  

In other words, I am 65 lbs less than I was just this past spring, and I love my life.  I am able to share wonderful meals with my family, whether we eat out, or in. I get to wear cute outfits, I enjoy my children more and we had a lovely time.  I do avoid sugar, because I know now that sugar messes with my metabolic hormones, but by that simple omission, I am able to eat like a queen and this morning, my weight had dropped 2 tenths of a pound.  Ha!  Take that, metabolic disorder!

I have friends online, on the TrimYou site and on the Protocol2Health site, all of whom are following Dr Simeons Protocol with the help of the HhCG spray, who have shed much more or less weight than I have, and many more who are in the midst of shedding.  I am so happy and proud of all of us, but I am so sad for those who don't know about this protocol and how they too can get the help they need to change their lives so quickly into the life that always felt out of reach, so I'm commited to writing this blog, to try and help get the word out.  

Please please PLEASE do not have surgery until you at least try Dr Simeons Protocol and the HhCG spray.  There is a whole community of people who can help you and I am just one of many who feel this is the BEST thing I ever did for myself and for my family as a result.
Please feel free to contact me if you have questions!  Let me help.
All the best to you!
Autumn

My story thus far...with lots of pictures!

If you're new to this blog, let me introduce myself; 

Hi! My name is Autumn and I am a 43 yr old mother of 6, my eldest is 9 and my youngest is nearly 6 months old.  

I'm writing this blog for YOU, because if you have found this blog, you must be interested in the things I am here talking about (weight loss, HCG, pregnancy, family, motherhood, diabetes, and pathways to health and ultimate vitality)...and I'm writing this blog for ME, because I need somewhere to vent all this great information, because not everyone wants to listen to me talk about this subject as much as I want to...and I am motivated because If I can make these positive changes and shape my life into the life I want, then you can too!

I was terribly worried that I was following in my mother's footsteps in that I gained 60 lbs or more with each pregnancy and could not get the bulk of that weight off, no matter what I tried, and then gained more weight with the next pregnancy.  My mom never was able to lose her pregnancy weight gains. I saw myself following in her footsteps to a future of ill health, and for some time it seemed unavoidable.

Then, 2 yrs ago I discovered HCG and Dr Simeons Pounds and Inches Protocol, (actually using HhCG, the homeopathic version of the hormone) and was able to shed 65 lbs in 4 months.  For that spray go here.

It was life-changing in the best way. Through following that strict, healthy protocol of only eating certain wholesome and healthy foods while completely avoiding anything processed, or anything 'not on the list', I learned that my body was capable of burning off a pound of fat each day, and that my body was not broken, and that it was NOT MY FAULT that I was overweight.  I also learned that vitamins can actually work, that magnesium is vital to my body's ability to function properly, that unprocessed sea salt is very different from the pure white stuff, that we don't need to be afraid of salt, or of fat, and perhaps most importantly, that I was capable of creating a positive, transformative change with each and every accumulative step I took each day.

I also learned that the spray made my body exquisitely sensitive to certain foods and that even a small taste outside protocol could have big consequences, but that knowledge helped keep me on the straight and narrow.

On the website that supports the particular spray I use, I read hundreds of personal stories, and made new online friends by the dozen, with all of us going through the same transformation, all using the same protocol and spray - I learned so much, and was profoundly changed.

If you'd like to as me questions about this homeopathic HhCG spray, send me an email and I'll respond right away - just scroll down and look for the link with the blue hydrangea flower picture on the right hand side of this page ---->  You can also order it here.

After the birth of our 6th child I had another 50 pounds to lose, and by using the HhCG and following Simeons Protocol again, I have only 10 more pounds to go till I reach my goal.   It is SO empowering and exciting to know I have control over my weight; it is a real departure from the feeling of hopelessness that used to hang over me!  I think I actually enjoy my children more now, which is so sad really, because I did not know I was resenting them or blaming them for my inability to lose weight, but I must have been.

One big reason my weight was in 'locked-on' mode was because of the hormonal changes that occur with pregnancy and breastfeeding.  Happily, I no longer feel like my pregnancy weight gains are 'locked on', because I have HhCG to 'unlock' my fat stores.

Another reason my weight was 'locked on' was due to eating too many sugars/starches and  avoiding fatty foods. Now I try to keep sugar and starchy carbs to an absolute minimum for me and my family. AND, I eat fatty foods!  All the time! Every meal, in fact! Ha! I feel absolutely devious and yet eating fats with your low carb/hign protein meals is the best way to feel sated and get your body into 'un-locked' mode.  It's a pretty delicious way to live too.

During Phase 3 I learned a lot about metabolic hormones such as insulin and ghrelin and adiponectin and leptin - all the known metabolic hormones (more is learned all the time so you need to stay tuned-in!) - and these days I'm reading about our medical community and issues that my mom is dealing with...I've only started reading about thyroid and iodine, inflammation and arthritis, and potentially devastating statins and how CoQ-10 can help...I read a LOT and I will include sources whenever it's applicable.

Dr Mercola's site and newsletters are filled with good natural health info; I'm always learning something there that leads me to new ideas and information - for example now I know when Nature offers up vitamin D and now I get my family outside to soak it up!  Before, I was doing it all wrong- sigh.  Before reading Dr Mercola's articles I usually had us outside at peak UVA times, which increases skin cancer risks(!) instead of peak UVB times which increases Vitamin D! -  Yikes.  Well, now I know. 

Mothering magazine is a great source for information and articles about parenting, breastfeeding, co-sleeping, etc. I was sorry to see them go out of print, but their online archives are fantastic and founder Peggy O'Mara is still involved in making it a relevant and reliable source of good, solid and up to date information.

Pathways to Family Wellness, a printed magazine with an online presence, is another wonderful source of information about achieving natural health and vitality for everyone, with a focus on family.  Recently there were several articles on homebirth and interviews with midwife Ina May Gaskin that were just wonderful.  I discovered this wonderful magazine in a chiropractor's office.

I hope to help my mom to regain her health, and help my father-in-law avoid knee replacement surgery, help my kids grow up healthy and strong, help my husband and I to live in health and vitality forever, and really, I wish health and vitality for everyone(!)  

So, I'm writing this blog for YOU and me, because if I can make these changes and shape my life into the life I want, then you can too!

All the best to you!

xox 

Autumn

Mom and Dad on their wedding day

Mom and Dad some 45 yrs later, before statins and before 'official' diabetes diagnosis

John and I on our wedding day

Mom and my 5th baby Lucy

Me and my 4th baby Olivia...

Me turning into my mother, standing with my slender sisters...(one of which was pregnant at the time, and still looked great, while I looked Big!)

Me and my family in 2002, before Mom's health crisis, before I had kids

Me now, with 6th baby Veronica, half-way back to my ideal weight - photo courtesy of 4 yr old Olivia

:D

Should we weigh in every single day?

This question, the question of whether or not to weigh in every day has come up a few times in my HhCG community over on Suzannes site: Protocol 2 Health.  And, well, NOT weighing every day does seem to help some people to keep their spirits up, and I 'get it', because I sure can get gloomy if the scale shows me a stall for several days - (Booo!)

However, weighing yourself every single day IS part of Dr Simeons protocol.  It's what he told us to do.
Why?  Well, I think because it keeps us on track, gives us accountability, and let's us know when there's a problem.

Just a few days ago I was shocked to see a +2.8 lb spike in my weight and if I had not been weighing every day I would not have known I had a serious problem in what I had eaten.  I would have no clue why on earth I only shed 1 lb this whole week, and would not have known there was anything wrong or that needed fixing.  It actually took me 3 days to figure it out, that I'd mistakenly eaten the kids's full fat cottage cheese. I only realized it when I opened their container and saw I'd portioned it out as if it was MY fat free container! Yikes.  So, it has taken about a week away from my 40-50 day shed to recover, but that's Ok, because now I FULLY realize the consequences of eating 1/2 a cup of full fat cottage cheese and can be EXTRA careful about checking which container I'm reaching for.  The same sort of thing happened when I was eating a wee bit of unsweetened baking chocolate, thinking I could sneak it in without consequences - but nope.  Good to know!

So, for me, I'm weighing in, like Dr Simeons suggests, at the same time every day, unless I totally forget and drink a bunch of tea first, which I've done too :), and then I just will wait till the next morning.  But there really is a reason and a purpose for everything he has as his protocol and I do best when I follow it to the letter.

Today I weigh 155, and I'm feeling good, but I'm already more than half-way though this round, so I don't want to lose ANY more days to slip-ups!  I'm really hoping to get a lot closer to my goal before the clock ticks down to phase 3, so wish me luck!

If you want to check out my true daily weigh-in, click here.

Happy shedding everyone!

Down 13 lbs in 15 days!

13 lbs in 15 days! And I might have shed even more if I hadn't made that unsweetened chocolate mistake which caused a 3 day stall.  This protocol works!  I spray twice a day and I'm not even slightly hungry except at mealtimes!!!  I know I'm burning off my reserves, my fat stores - and I'm feeling pretty great, lots of energy, and for some reason, lots of inspired cooking for the kids - like I recently made homemade flour tortillas AND corn tortillas from scratch, and hosted a birthday party, cake and all, and yesterday I made a kugelhopf (like a brioche cake/bread, pictured there on the right) among other yummy things for my family, and I didn't have or want even a taste of any of it.  I mean, sure, I was curious how it all tasted, but I wasn't really hungry plus I am determined to get as close to my goal as I can! (50 lbs off !)

On this spray, I know even a nibble can cause weight gain, so I'm not nibbling, and the spray gives me the power not to nibble.  It's amazing.  Normally I would crumble into itty bitty pieces and eat.  But not on the spray! It really works 100% if you follow protocol 100%!!!  And you can live your life and still shed weight like crazy!

In fact, today I plan on making peanut butter cookies and another Kugelhopf, but I'll be fine, I have tools! What tools? My spray, seasalt, stevia, green tea, lemonade, apple cider vinegar and my meals.  I'll be just fine.  See you tomorrow!  :D

Feb 15, 2012 172.2 lbs

Happy Valentine's Day! (ok, a day late, but I was BUSY!)  2nd day on spray and had to make Valentine's Day special for my family!  A love note for each kid, a love note for Mr (who I adore, btw, those are MY Valentine flowers he brought me there behind the cookies!  Primroses, my springtime favorites!), a big lasagna dinner, cookies with everyone's initial, and, oh gosh, an enormous heart shaped tin of chocolates for Mr and mini heart-shaped boxes of chocolates for the kiddos.  Sweets for the sweet!  And the kids all brought home candy from school too.  We were swimming in sugar - funny, because my Mr and I both know sugar is the enemy - but we're willing to allow the kids a sugar rampage a few days each year - Halloween, Easter, and Valentine's are our big sugar blitzes - and now, the day after, all that has not been eaten has been whisked away - either to Daddy's workplace or to, er, the bin.  :) Gotta protect the young'uns from themselves!
Here's the thing, I'm only on Day 2 of Phase 2, and I had only been spraying for 4 days, yet I was able to cook basically all day without even being tempted.  Cool, huh?
I did not indulge in even the tiniest taste of all that Valentine's feasting, instead I had my P2 meal (tomato salad with vinegar dressing, and a cottage cheese and strawberry smoothie, sweetened with stevia) and relied on the spray to dull my appetite.  It did.  I'm SO proud of myself, but really, it wasn't that hard.  I just made the decision not to taste anything, and the spray allowed me to stay on course.  I will only eat protocol foods, and I will do what Dr Simeons says and I will be nearly to my goal of 50 lbs off by late spring.  Gosh, maybe even by Easter (April 8th).  If not, then by Mother's Day (May 13th).  Won't that be awesome?!  Oh I am so excited!!!
If you want to drop weight yourself, email me for the link to the product I'm using and I'll email you back lickety split and we can lose this weight together! :)

Feb 13, 2012 Let the shedding BEGIN (again!) with HhCG

Hello and welcome to my third round of HhG!

Feb 13, 2013  -  175.8 loaded and ready! (ready? YES!)
Today is Day 1 Phase 2 (P2D1)  I'm so excited, gonna get my body back and fit into the clothes in my closet, gonna feel better in my skin and I'm gonna set the best example I can for my kids.  If something is bothering you, you can fix it!  Be the best you can be!  I'm going to be the best I can be, taking it one day at a time, moment by moment.  I can look great by spring (with the help of Dr Simeons Pounds and Inches Protocol)! YOU can do this.  If you are looking for HhCG spray (the homeopathic version of HCG), go here and sign up with Suzanne.  I think you need to email her to get invited onto the site.  She's lovely, the people are lovely, and her site is new, but she has several years of experience from the other site (which shut down) and she has helped hundreds, if not thousands lose weight.  She helped me so much during my first 2 rounds and I'll be popping over there for this third round, to talk with Suzanne and my ol' buddies - if you come by, please say hello! :D

Feb 8, 2012 172.2lbs and a note on breastfeeding and a question of when to start the spray

Gee whiz.  This is some slow going weight loss. :(  It's been a week of Jorge Cruisin and I'm sure not moving downward as fast as I'd like!  If I was on HhCG I would have shed about 10 lbs by now, not 3-ish.  Ho hum.
At least it's downward!  I'm tempted to start to spray, I really want to see some progress before spring!  There's Veronica - she likes to see her Mama happy! :)

A note about breastfeeding - I've been waiting to start the spray because I am breastfeeding my now 3 month old baby.  No formula, no bottles...and I'd like to continue exclusively breastfeeding her even after I start spraying with the HhCG.  I did just fine before with my baby Lucy, who was 8 mos old when I started the HhCG spray, my milk did not seem to diminish at all...but that's the thing - I don't really know.  (Please don't tell me I would have 'known' if I was pumping into bottles - the pump never extracts as much milk as baby does, so that is a completely misleading way to measure.)  What I do know is she never seemed extra fussy or hungry, had zillions of wet and poopy diapers and I still had enough milk to occasionally soak through my shirt if I went too long between nursings (ugh) ...and she grew and grew and grew.  And I shrank and shrank.  Gosh I'd sure like to shrink like that again(!).Got a bottle just sitting here, waiting for me to be ready(!!!)...

Another concern some people have about breastfeeding while on HhCG is that one's fat stores are also where toxins are stored and that to release fat means to release toxins into breastmilk and thus 'toxify' the nursing baby with the weight-shedding mother's milk.  Well, bah, I say.  My body, however 'toxic' it may be, made a baby - and then it fed a baby for nearly two years, and she is big and smart and talkative and sweet - she's a good one, and I did not poison her by losing weight while breastfeeding her.  Not that I didn't worry and do a bunch of research and have her weighed at a bunch of random well-baby visits, I did.
Dr Jack Newman convinced me I was doing the best for my baby AND myself when I read his article about toxins in breastmilk.  Ultimately, he says that a baby's best defense against toxins is to be breastfed.  And I knew it was in my best interest to lose weight for all the usual health reasons - my blood pressure was high after the birth of Lucy, my mom and grandpa had diabetes, etc, but also because my 'mental health' was suffering and my family was suffering in that I was really unhappy fat and felt stuck at 200lbs - because I was stuck at 200 lbs! Anyhow, you know that story if you read around on this blog.  So I felt like, for me, I needed to lose the weight and baby Lucy was old enough to be ok if my milk dried up.

So now, I wonder...I did ok before...should I try?  I feel healthy and strong, been eating good, wholesome and organic foods...fruits AND veggies (yay for veggies) and taking vitamins...maybe I could,...and it wouldn't just be for me, but also an experiment for all you moms out there whose weight is stuck fast...hmmm.  I could lose weight for the greater good? Hahaha maybe!

Ok, lastly, I wonder if my body is even sensitized to the HhCG yet since I'm only about 3 months post partum...?  Dr Simeons would have his patients on the actual HCG hormone and they would become immune or de-sensitized to it over time and so he'd have them re-sensitize by taking longer and longer breaks between rounds...I think 90 days was the longest break he'd prescribe...

Well, if I were to get pregnant right now, I'd start making my own massive amounts of HCG anyhow, right? To nourish the growing fetus, right?  And I'd still be nursing baby Veronica of course, as I've nursed all my babies while preggers with the next, with no complications and with my doctor's approval? Hmmm.  I know when making your own HCG while pregnant, you make a whole lot between week 7 and week 16 (peaks at millions of units) and then it tapers off, but at week 40, full term, you're still producing between 3400-117,000 thousanth international units per millileter (mIU/ml) (check out the chart here)...so that's a lot to de-sensitize from...but we do, right? To sustain the next pregnancy? Oh, I'm sure I'm over-simplifying the science...
...but I think I just talked myself into starting my spray!!!

Oh my goodness!
:D

Feb 1, 2012 = 175.4 lbs

Feb 1, 2012  - 175.4  =  +1.4lbs
Felt too sick to eat really 'well' (meaning low carb, I felt like I needed some fruit), after eggs and (veggie) sausage for breakfast I didn't feel so well and snacked a bit through lunch...cheese and salami and an apple, and 2 tangerines, and later a spoonful of peanut butter (no sugar) with a banana and then a cottage cheese and banana and yogurt smoothie for dinner...and about 50 almonds over the course of the day. Carbalicious.  And so I'm up today.  Well, today's a new day, and I'm feeling a bit better - wonder if it's all the Vitamin D I've dropped on my tongue these last few sniffly days?...

Jan 31, 2012 174 lbs

Howdy.  Here I am again, fat again. 174 at 5'5".
Yup, that's me last week, bringing in the cake for my 6 yr old's birthday.  Sorry it's blurry but if you think you're gonna see me standing still to get my picture taken - think again. No way.  More likely to get a shot of my rear as I hustle out of the frame. (Sheesh.) (Could be worse, but could be better!)
 It's my bodies fault, I can't seem to make a baby without making myself fat (see our new baby here) - I'm sure it's a hormonal thing - so, I'm trying to control my metabolic hormones with food, instead of with HhCG, for now, while the new baby is exclusively nursing.  Ok, so right now, since December 2011 I've been trying to follow Jorge Cruise's tenets: eat low low carbs, avoid sugars like the devil, and eat high protein and high fat.  But my weight is not dropping.  (Click to see my chart here.)  Alrighty.  So, I'm going to start tracking my foods on Fitday and then report back here with my calories - because I must be eating too many, or getting too many carbs or some such thing that I can't 'see' without getting more specific about it all.
Wish me luck! (and time and patience, and stamina, and health!  I need it!)  :D

The new baby :) and the baby weight :(

So, hello again.  I am delighted to announce the arrival of our newest family member, Veronica!

She's lovely, sweet and reasonable for a baby! Really, she's delightful.  A gift.  I'm so happy. About her.
I am less happy to acknowledge the lingering baby weight that accompanied her gestation.  Sigh.  It seems that I cannot make a baby without making myself fat.  Ok.  Happily, my baby is healthy and jolly and breastfeeding like a champ, no formula, no pumping here, her weight keeps climbing and she's outgrowing all her clothes - yay! - ...but my weight is stable.  Ugh. Ok, not exactly 'stable' like a rock, but  looking over my chart, I can see I've been losing and gaining the same 5-6 pounds for about 2 months.  Baby Veronica is now nearly 3 months old and I've been trying to 'Jorge Cruise' my eating every single day for these past 2 months.  That basically means I've been keeping carbs, sugar and hidden sugar completely out of my diet and keeping protein and fat high.  I've not eaten candy, cookies, ice cream, pizza, potatoes, bread, mac-n-cheese, or milk.   I will lose a pound and then see it come creeping back for no reason I can understand.  SO Frustrating.

Ugh.
I'm waiting to start another round of Ketomist HhCG spray till baby is 6 months old, because then I will be introducing solid foods, and though I imagine my milk supply will remain just fine, like last time with 8 month old Baby Lucy (who is now a delightful, super healthy 2 yr old!), I just don't want to risk it with such a young baby who depends on me entirely and I do not want to be forced into having to supplement her diet with formula - not that I would be, but I just don't want to take that chance.

Ok, so, yay I have Ketomist to bail me out of this fix, but why-o-why isn't Jorge's method working for me???????????? My suspicion is that I'm nursing and my hormones have 'locked' the weight on.
I'm going to start blogging on here my day-by-day progress to see if I (or you) can figure it out.
Hope to see less of me soon, but for now, I'll be here, all 173.8 pounds of me. :/

Dr Oz, you're wrong. HCG weight loss is REAL. No controversy.

Dear Dr Oz,

I did lose a pound a day. I lost 40 pounds my first round, just like many many many others have before me.  I did it by making a purchase on the internet! (gasp!) and by following the 500 calories per day diet! (second gasp!)  I KNOW IT WORKS.  I especially know that the particular product I bought and used works and works well.  It's a spray, it's homeopathic, which means you do not need a Dr's prescription, and it works.  it is made and shipped with exquisite care and the support site is immensely helpful too.  In fact, without the support site fielding all my questions in the begining and throughout, and having other HhCG spray users to talk to - I wonder if I would have come so far or met my goal so easily.  In any case, Dr Oz, thanks for the warning to only do this protocol under a Doctor's care - but I disagree.  There ARE alternatives to the HCG injections that work and I for one am living the happy outcome of such an alternative route.

Oh, and it's wrong to say you're never hungry.  You are a little bit hungry. You know when it's lunchtime and you know when it's dinnertime.  And the 500 calories are satisfying enough that you eat your meal and your hunger is sated.  It's really very comfortable.  Any other calories you need to live on are taken from your fat stores - including stores of nutrients and vitamins.  Sure, you end up depleting those stores by the end of the 6 weeks, and that's why it's limited - 6 weeks of weight loss per round followed by 6 weeks of maintainence and replenishing your nutrients.  People, it WORKS. I am living proof, as are the thousands of other happy HCG users.

To view some of what Dr Oz has to say about this click here.

Since it mimics pregnancy, there is some hairloss involved for some people at the end, myself included, but you can't tell to look at me, only my hairbrush knew. And once I took my multi-vitamins again, the hairloss stopped within 3 days.  Also, since it is a pregnancy hormone (not really, if it's homeopathic, but for the sake of arguement, let's say it is) it may also increase your fertility.  My own mom conceived me with the help of actual HCG injections.  Lastly, any feelings of weakness or fogginess or overall crumminess are easily dealt with by adding sea salt to the diet.  You can add it to your food or even make a broth with it if you are feeling especially crummy - and it works instantly.  I wish the 2 women who did not like the way they felt while on the diet would have known about the sea salt. It would have made a world of difference.

Some people are so in the habit of eating proccessed foods and sugary soda pop, that they actually experience a 'sugar detox' headache in the first week. It's ok, it's detox, and you'll be better for it - meanwhile, take Excedrine, not sugar-coated Tylenol.

How do I know so much? Because I learned so much on the support site - hundreds and thousands of people all using the same product - all experiencing the same things, all talking - it's a goldmine of information! Dr Oz, next time you want to look into this amazing way to rapidly lose weight comfortably and healthfully, please check out the Ketomist homeopathic spray.  Ask for Rob. 

On blood sugar and weight...

 

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Weight gain, weight loss, and maintainence: It's all about blood sugar.

Is eating fruit really equal to eating candy? Well, no, not really.  But the fructose in fruit and the sugar in candy really do affect blood sugar in dramatic ways. 

Blood sugar, blood glucose. Phase 3 and beyond is all about maintaining the happy levels of blood sugar and metabolic hormones such as insulin and leptin and ghrelin that we were able to achieve by following protocol for 6 weeks, eating no table sugars, and 'eating' (or, really, "re-eating") all those stored calories released by the spray from our own fat stores.

If a person were to eat meals designed to continue to keep blood sugar levels stable, that person will have great success in P3a+b and beyond. I think some people are stumbling onto that way of eating because it works - and if you start out P3 with level blood sugars and stable metabolic hormones, (and in finishing P2, that's exactly what has happened) then it is amazingly easy to continue eating foods that keep our blood sugar levels stable - for example, the people who report back that the nibble of cake tasted 'nasty!' to them - because we don't need the cake anymore to bring us up from a low sugar drop - we no longer ride the sugar rollercoaster! :)

Now, if a person goes into P3 with the idea that 'I am used to eating tiny amounts of food now and I'll just eat a tiny bit more - maybe a salad- and maybe I'll lose even more weight!' that person's body will sense the lack of calories right away and that person will GAIN.
Why?
Because that person's body will go into 'starvation mode'. What does that really mean? Going long periods without eating causes a dip in blood sugar. And then when some bite of food is eaten, the body overreacts with a big insulin surge. And since insulin is a fat-storing hormone, you end up storing whatever calories you just ate, instead of burning them as fuel. NOT what we want.
What we want, because it will allow us to maintain our LSW, is called glucose homeostasis— a constant blood-glucose level.

I believe that Dr Simeons, had he lived to see all the nutrional information available to us today, I believe he would have concluded that all of us were in a pre-pre-diabetic state, and over-sensitive to carbs and BECAUSE we were able to effect such drastic lifestyle/food choice changes while on the HCG hormone, we were able to stop the raging internal floods of insulin and leptin and ghrelin among others which work together to control hunger and appetite and metabolism.
(Leptin wasn't discovered until 1994, and ghrelin not till 1999. Obestatin, another hunger hormone, was even more recently discovered in 2005. All play key roles within the hypothalimus and are key factors of metabolism. Do we understand these fully yet? I doubt it, but we're trying.)

In P3, if a person is having trouble maintaining, I believe it is one of two things; either they are not eating enough calories (starvation mode=insulin surge when some food IS eaten=weight gain), OR they are eating too many carbs(sugars) in the form of yogurt, nuts, and especially fruit (fructose) (sugars in the blood stream=insulin surge=weight gain). Some people are even doing a bit of both(!) -  hardly eating enough and then when they do eat, it's with too much focus on yogurt, nuts and fruit, not enough protein and fat or vegetables.  Eat your veggies.  The fiber keeps blood sugar stable.


You can enjoy eating your vegetables by making them calorie dense - put the calories on top -
Think brocolli with cheese sauce, asparagus with hollandaise sauce, artichokes too, eggplant and zucchini grilled in olive oil, cole-slaw made with homemade mayonaisse and stevia, not sugar, celery spread with peanut butter or cream cheese, zucchini in olive oil alongside chicken kabobs, etc. When you eat chicken, eat 'Chicken Piccata'! That sauce is 304 calories alone! Or make baked chicken with mozzarella on top! Yum! 170 calories for 2 slices!

Blood sugar. Eating protein and fat helps keep blood sugar stable, and slows down insulin's entry into the bloodstream. If you avoid sugar and starch, you almost totally avoid an insulin spike, almost. But if you also avoid starvation mode and eat less yogurt, nuts and fruits and more proteins and fats, then you WILL keep blood sugar stable. And you will NOT gain.

If you were to start your day without fruit, I think you would have a better day. Fruit contains the simple sugar fructose which sends the body a signal to produce insulin to deal with the sugar load. So you get a spike in insulin, and an insulin spike = weight gain! You can slow down the insulin response by eating fructose (ok; fruit) with proteins and fats, (like an apple with peanut butter) but the higher the insulin spike, the bigger the weight gain. Body builders avoid fructose almost entirely. If we really limit our fruit intake, and ONLY eat it with proteins/fats, such as an apple WITH peanut butter, or strawberries WITH whipped cream/stevia and vanilla - and limit the strawberries to 4 or 5, then I believe we'd do much better. (The best fruit for morning, if you really love it seems to be the ol' 1/2 grapefruit eaten along WITH your eggs and all.)

A large person requires a large amount of calories to nourish that person without he or she slipping into 'starvation mode'. However, it IS possible to eat a large amount of calories without gaining weight, overeating or even feeling 'stuffed' or bloated. Check out my  'Olive oil'  post - that's a plan for how to eat 3200 calories comfortably - and that's without coconut flakes, larabars, or creamy Piccata sauce!

So, that's my theory, based on my best efforts to try and understand the 'why' of it all - My sources are The Mastering the Zone: The Next Step in Achieving SuperHealth and Permanent Fat Loss books by Dr Barry Sears, whose original focus was on helping diabetics, and Jorge Cruise's Belly Fat Cure which is all about the hidden sugars in our foods that are making us fat, Gary Taubes Why We Get Fat and What to do About it (maybe my favorite), and Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food (also a favorite)
...and my own P3 experiences, and my husband's, and in participating and learning on the Ketomist support site and also now, as I am trying to learn as much as I can as I try to help my aged parents battle full-blown diabetes. I'm doing loads of homework daily and plan to keep on updating here to share my growing understanding.
I want to get an 'A+' in this. :)

Come watch me winnow, wriggle and whittle my weight back down to my LSW, and hopefully, beyond...

**************************************LSW 133.2*********************************
P4 D77 02/14/2011 - 136.6 (+1.0) Sheesh.  I'm thinking this is water retention I'm puffy, and only got 4 hrs sleep...wah.
Oh well.  Yesterday I ate only protein and fat.  No veggies, no fruit. An experiment.  Dumb? Maybe. Maybe not.  Today my plan is to have 1 serving veggies at every meal.  Breakfast was eggs, cheese, (butter) and asparagus.  And I plan on adding lettuce to my next 2 meals...see how it goes...
P4 D76 02/13/2011 - 135.6  (0.0)  Breakfast: Cottage cheese-n-yogurt-n-coconut-n-half-a-clementine, 7 almonds, Lunch: 6 oz tuna w/homemade mayo and celery and avocado on a bed of shredded romaine, -  Oh, and let me not forget the half of a sopresseta salami that I ate while driving kids around: 4 servings @ 0 cargs, 8g protein/8g fat each - so 24g protein and 24g fat - which means I ate 440 calories from that salami alone!  Also, 1/2 a banana and whipped cream, and half a date.  Funny, but that half-a-date tasted 'over-sweet' to me...ate 7 more almonds to counter the sweetess but was struck with a 'wow, why'd I eat that?' feeling. Funny. I used to eat dates 2 and 4 or more at a time and now 1/2 of one is 'too much'. Feels like my body chemistry is changed. :)
(still not enough sleep - maybe need more H20 as well...)