Nine Things I Didn't Do and Now Do

I ran across a list of called Nine Harmless Habits That Age You posted on Yahoo Health.  I am guilty of violating more than a few of them. Well, most of them.  A quick run down of the harmless habits that are not good for you.

1. You keep your college bed time. I wish.  In college, if I got five hours of sleep, I was good to go. Now, if I don't get seven hour, I finish the day doing a fine impression of a zombie. 
2. You have a soft spot for sweets.  Yep. Guilty.  Never met a candy bar or desert I have not liked.
3. You're stressed more often than not.  Not really. I have worked to to train myself to leave problems at the front door.  
4. You only exercise to lose weight.  Yes, guilty.
5. You blast your iPod.  Yes, but I can't always hear it.
6. You never see your girlfriends. True.  SHMBO would kill me if I did.  I do try to keep up friends from the past, however,which is what I think the author meant. 
7. You eat veggies, but not everyday.  Yes, guilty.  Do french fries count?  Trying to fix that now.  Lots of veggies now. Even beginning to look forward to them now. 
8. You've shunned all fats from your diet.  No, and I ate a lot of the wrong ones, the ones that really taste good. I am supposed to consume the ones that contain omega 3 fatty acids and monounsaturated fats that are supposed to raise HDL cholesterol and lower LDL cholesterol.  Unless you follow the advice of Drs. McDougall and Ornish who say to avoid fats as much as possible.  
9. You can't recall the last time you had sex.  I am good on this one,which one reason I don't bother with number six.  

The numbers for today:

• Blood Glucose:  128 mg/dl.  At least it is under 130 mg/dl.
• Weight:  185.  Down a pound. 
• Exercise:  45 minutes on trainer. 
• Mood:  7.5.

Menu:

• Breakfast:  Banana, oatmeal flavored with craisins and herbal blackberry tea, orange
• Lunch:  Left over tofu lasagna and butternut squash with a few dark cherries for desert. 
• Dinner:  Hors d'oeuvres at some client of SWMBO
• Snacks:  Baked Sun Chips.

When I found out I was a type 2 diabetic, my doctor reviewed my two choices to fix the problem with me.  The first was medication. The second was diet and exercise.  I chose the second and so far it seems to working well.  Certainly the work so far has been worth the effort and just taking a medication didn't really solve the root cause of it all, bad eating habits and a lack of exercise.  Since obesity is the problem, stop being obese.  Lose the fat, lose the problem. 

It is also a lot cheaper. 

I received an email the other day from Nutrition Data News with an article about a medication used to treat type 2 diabetes, rosiglitazone.  It's often sold under the brand name Avantia.  A bad side effect of the drug is an increase in cardiovascular disease.  Cardiovascular disease is biggest killer of people with type 2 diabetes.  Anyone notice the problem here?

Makes me so glad I chose the course I did. 

This article also talks about the problem of sleep and type 2 diabetes.  That was my problem.  Now I am getting the best sleep I have had in years, just as if I were a teen again.  I think I am sticking with the diet and exercise approach. 

My numbers for today:

• Blood Glucose:  124 mg/dl.  Creeping up again. Significant?  Don't know.
• Weight:  186 lbs.  I think I am in a drop phase.  
• Exercise:  45 minutes peddling. 
• Mood:  7.5.  Noticed I still have a belly, still considered overweight and still a too high BMI (28.4).

Menu:

• Breakfast:  Banana, oatmeal flavored with blackberry herbal tea and craisins, kiwi fruit.  
• Lunch:  Barely pilaf, butternut squash
• Dinner:  Grilled catfish fish tacos and a small salad. 
• Snacks:  Last of the fat free artichoke dip and one pita bread.  

Probably too many carbs, but it's all low fat.

John Goodman Did It, So I Can Do It.

Last week I read this about actor John Goodman and his weight loss and exercise.  He does a combination routine of riding a recumbent bike and an elliptical trainer and resistance bands.  It was inspiring to say the least that he could lose so much weight without surgery.  It's the right way to do it.  It takes more time, but it is the way to learn to be thin and he talks about this. It's a life long thing, a way of living.  Plus, it tells me that my approach is, my own combination of riding my bike and resistance bands is a good way to go.

In this article he has lost 100 lbs, 30 lbs of them after he gave up drinking for good.  He mentions that he is an alcoholic and that partially responsible his being overweight. Happily that is not one of my problems.  He also likes the gooey sweet stuff, which is one of my problems. 

My numbers for the day:

• Blood Glucose:  113 mg/dl.  A smidgen above normal
• Weight:  187 lbs.  Well, more like tickling 186 1/2 lbs.  I think I have left 190 behind for good. 
• Exercise:  Forty five minutes on the bike and 15 minutes with the bands. 
• Mood:  8.  Could be a 9, but business sucks. 

Menu:

• Breakfast:  Banana, oatmeal infused with vanilla/blueberry herb tea and craisins.
• Lunch:  A small blob of artichoke dip, small blob of hummus (both fat free), one pita bread, cucumber slices, yellow pepper slices. 
• Dinner:  Mary & Dave's salad with grilled chicken.  (Mary & Dave's salad is whatever we have around that is generally considered a salad type vegetable.  
• Snacks:  Soy yogurt mixed with applesauce and pumpkin granola stuff (it really does taste good).

A Long Weekend and It's Time to Stop Goofing Off

Spent an enjoyable weekend in Dallas visiting my sister-in-law.  Enjoyable for me any how.  She is scrambling to sell her old house and get into a new one.  Me, I was just along for the ride, offer some sage advice (it's worth exactly what it cost) and generally kick back and enjoy some good company and good food.  Dallas has some fine places to eat.

I was really proud of myself.  My big splurge was Saturday night.  Had a couple of glasses of wine and chance to really pig out at an event called the Kessler Krawel, which is an excuse for the locals in a Dallas sub-division to meet, eat, drink and gossip.  I was a model of probity and restraint.  I only had two small glasses of wine. We had dinner at a place called Enos. I had a martini made from a Texas made gin, which was wonderful.  (Sadly, I don't remember the name of the gin, but I intend to find out.)  After the cocktail we had a the fig and fennel salad and a their version of a margarita pizza called Mom Pie.  Check out the menu at Eno's Pizza. 

After a good weekend for me I was afraid to test my BG and look at my weight. It was pretty good, considering.  Same weight as when I left and the BG was good.  I also got a lot of compliments on how much weight I had lost from people there who had the before image of me in their head.

Numbers for today:

• Blood Glucose:  122 mg/dl.  Not bad
• Weight:  190 lbs.  Could have been worse.
• Exercise:  45 minutes and I really rode hard.
• Mood:  7.  Not lower vitals, but not higher vitals.

Menu:

• Breakfast:  Leftover waffle from last week, banana, cantaloupe. 
• Lunch:  Left over pizza and a peach
• Dinner:  Left over meat loaf 
• Snacks: Hummus and Sally's Pita Chips.