This sort of thing is typical.  Planning a diet, dreaming about the results — that’s the fun part.  The reality is that there is always something coming along to interrupt those plans.  And (it seems to me) interruptions are much more common during this time of year – The Eating Season – than the others.

So . . . Just 4 Today, I’m going to pick myself up and take a nice long walk (and another one later in the day) – measure all my portions – take my medication & supplements & drink 2 liters of water.

What are you going to do today?

More important than a single large meal, I managed to ride the exerbike every evening, Monday through Saturday! The display said I burned roughly 100 calories with each ride, but there were side benefits that I consider more significant:

1. I felt warmer the rest of the evening. Where I might have been chilly without a sweater before the ride, after I was comfortable just wearing the t-shirt and pants (a couple nights, the shorts I wore on the bike were fine).
2. Sleep came quicker. I tend to have a hard time getting to sleep, always have. This worked as well as several drinks, without the hazardous side effects.
3. It had a noticeable effect on my blood pressure.

It wasn’t a difficult thing to accomplish, once I figured out how to work it: I streamed the AOL Trance station on my iPhone and read a magazine while pedaling away. How often can you get two things done at once that you want to do?

All in all, it’s been a positive week for me. I didn’t blow up my calorie intake too much, and I’ve been getting a decent amount of exercise while figuring out how to turn it into a healthy habit. I tweaked a tendon in my left ankle a couple weeks ago, not sure how, and if walking was the only thing I could have done to exercise, I’d be in trouble. Fortunately, the exerbike doesn’t work that joint and I can pedal comfortably. So I’m in pretty good shape to get through the next five weeks of Eating Season, as long as I keep up my end of things.

How did your week go? “I decided not to worry about it” is an acceptable answer; after all, letting go for one day is fine — as long as it’s only one day! How can you apply what you did this week to the week ahead?

I had to systematically go through every nook & cranny in my bedroom and closet — but I finally found it!! I’m hoping this effort has an impact and I stick with my daily charm.  (I guess it already has since I’m writing this post)

Anyway…. I had a lot of time to think while I was plowing through my stuff.  And I decided that in addition to watching what I eat during this eating season, I will also do my shoulder exercises everyday.

I can’t remember if I’ve shared the fact that I have a painful bone spur in my shoulder.  It’s been affecting my sleep dreadfully (AND Mister’s sleep too.) I’m almost at the point of begging for surgery or amputation.  But, as a last-ditch-effort I’m going to focus on doing the exercises I learned at great expense last spring.

And to prove it — I’ve already done the ones I can remember today!!

Now, I’ve just got to find the packet of exercises I put in a safe place last summer…..

What are you going to do today?

Here in the US, many of us are looking forward to a four-day weekend… unless you work in retail, and then it’s All Hands On Deck for the annual Black Friday feeding frenzy.

Speaking of feeding frenzy… that’s the centerpiece of Thanksgiving weekend. Some of us will be “lucky” enough to attend two or more feasts! You might be getting started as early as tonight, in fact.

Now might be a good time to review your coping strategies — and your Daily Commitment. Katiebird, as we all know, uses “don’t take seconds and don’t eat between meals.” I tend to store (rather than process) cholesterol, so I limit my meat and other animal fat intake.

At the same time, stressing out isn’t going to help. Stay calm, do what you know works for you, and enjoy the long weekend. Hey, you’ll have time to walk off some of those extra calories anyway!

So… Just4Today, I will drink 2l of water, take my fiber supplement, eat only one serving of meat, and take 20 minutes on the exerbike.

What are you going to do today?

What do holiday dinners mean to you? Stress? Fun? A day to forget about the diet? When I was a kid, it was Grandma’s Parker House Rolls (for which I got the recipe), ham, and a big ol’ after-dinner game of tackle football with my many cousins while the dads watched the Lions on TV and the moms talked (and incidentally cleaned up). Ah, to be a kid again… well, not really.

“Football is 80% physical and 40% mental.” (Little Giants) Yeah, and so is dieting. Combinations can complement each other, in both football and dieting, adding up to 120%. The stress of preparing for a holiday get-together is the perfect opportunity for old, destructive habits to reassert themselves. Calories are only part of the equation; keeping your mental focus during this time of year can truly make you a 120% performer. I lost weight during last year’s Eating Season — I’m not doing so hot so far this year, but I know I can get back on track and get the trend going in the right direction. I just have to get both my dinner plate and my head in the right places.

So… Just4Today, I’m going to drink my water (2l) and remember my fiber supplement. I’ll limit my fat intake by limiting myself to one serving of meat. Finally, I’ll get 20 minutes on the Evil Exerbike.

What are you going to do today? It doesn’t have to be food- or diet-related!

Okay, while I start dusting, I’ll start talking about what I have in mind. My daily commitment has definitely slipped here; I’ve gained back 20 of the 25 pounds that I managed to lose. I need to get back on track… but that’s what I’ve been telling myself for a while now.

The daily commitment is important — I think all the long-time readers agree with that. Our primary focus should be on the day ahead of us. After all, it’s pretty difficult to see in advance what’s going to be possible in the day ahead of us; how can we expect to plan for weeks or months ahead? But not all daily commitments, obviously, get fulfilled.

Again, the daily commitment is important — it’s really the baseline of how we roll here. But just like weighing yourself each morning (“oh cool, I lost a pound” … “oh rats, I gained a pound”) looking at each data point doesn’t tell us anything about the trends. As KB often points out in the Hacker’s Diet, it’s the trend line, those weigh-ins plotted over weeks or months, that matters.

So last week, I wanted to get a walk (or some other kind of exercise) at least four times. I managed two. Not good, but infinitely better than the week before that, in which I got no exercise at all. Doubleplusungood when peak Eating Season is closing in fast.

So what went wrong? Well, regular readers of my own blog, Tales from FAR Manor, know I have a new grandson spending a lot of time with us. Taking care of a baby can be time-consuming, and cut into exercise time, but at the same time the warmest November I can remember has given me the opportunity to drop him in a stroller and get my walk in while not leaving the kid unattended. We didn’t have the usual crazy-running-everywhere kind of October we usually have, but now we’re doing it in November. We’ve been eating out far too often. I’ve been pounding hard on a new story (also being posted on the blog).

I’ve managed above to identify several things that get in the way of my daily commitment, and one thing that actually helps with it. Now the question is, what am I going to do about it? You might know that too much sodium can run up your blood pressure, but if you keep unscrewing the salt shaker and dumping it on your meatloaf, what good has it done you?

I know that I can work taking care of Mason into my exercise routine; he likes getting outside. I know that even if I can’t stop the eating out madness, I can exercise portion control. I know that if I’m pressed for time, I can walk away from the computer for a little while and jump on the Evil Exerbike.

What has gotten in the way of your daily commitments over the last week? What has helped? How can you use this information to improve your commitment score this week?

I’ll do this Sunday mornings from now on, unless KB tells me to quit. Maybe I’ll get a chance to post through the week until she can get back into the swing.

The Healthiest Foods On Earth

What is the best diet for human beings?

Vegetarian? Vegan? High-protein? Low-fat? Dairy-Free?

Hold on to your shopping carts: There is no perfect diet for human beings. At least not one that’s based on how much protein, fat or carbohydrates you eat.

. . .

The only thing these diets have in common is that they’re all based on whole foods with minimum processing. Nuts, berries, beans, raw milk, grass-fed meat. Whole, real, unprocessed food is almost always healthy, regardless of how many grams of carbs, protein or fat it contains.

All these healthy diets have in common the fact that they are absent foods with bar codes. They are also extremely low in sugar. In fact, the number of modern or ancient societies known for health and longevity that have consumed a diet high in sugar would be … let’s see … zero.

Truth be told, what you eat probably matters less than how much processing it’s undergone. Real food–whole food with minimal processing–contains a virtual pharmacy of nutrients, phytochemicals, enzymes, vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, anti-inflammatories and healthful fats, and can easily keep you alive and thriving into your 10th decade.

Obesity health risk cause ‘found’
Scientists believe they may have uncovered a key reason why obese people have a raised risk of health complications such as type 2 diabetes.

They blame a specific protein – pigment epithelium-derived factor (PEDF) – which is secreted by fat cells.

In tests on obese mice, the researchers found that treatments designed to block the action of PEDF lowered the animals’ blood fat level and reversed some of their insulin resistance.

Fat cells are known to play an important role in regulating the body’s metabolism by releasing hormones and other chemicals.

. . .

The researchers took particular interest in PEDF because it was already known that levels of the protein were raised in people with type 2 diabetes, and metabolic syndrome – a collection of risk factors including too much belly fat, high cholesterol and high blood pressure.

They found that of all the molecules secreted by fat cells PEDF was among the most abundant.

They also showed that PEDF levels fell in obese mice when they lost weight, either by using diet or drugs.

When lean mice were injected with PEDF they showed signs of developing insulin resistance and inflammation in both muscle and liver.

. . .

But when obese mice were given treatment to neutralise PEDF their sensitivity to insulin improved, reducing their risk of diabetes, and the level of fats in their blood fell.

Researcher Dr Matthew Watt, from Monash University in Australia, said: “In light of our findings, we believe that blocking PEDF will ameliorate several obesity-related complications.”

. . . Still (thinking of my knees and chin), it’s probably better to just lose the weight.

What will I get? Click on image to see the details

The interesting thing is that ALL the options seem to include out-of-pocket-caps on annual health care expenses. And that’s new to me — I haven’t seen such caps mentioned in any summary (and I’ve looked for ‘em) More information on THAT would be gratefully appreciated!

An interesting idea to help us stay (or get) thin

“When you see or smell food, you have an insulin surge, which drops your blood glucose,” she said. “Your stomach relaxes, so it gets bigger and you need more food just to feel full.”

It’s thought (according to this story) that the increase in food advertising is responsible for the fact that Americans eat an average of 500 more calories a day than they did a generation or two ago.  Now the people interviewed here skip over the “need more food just to feel full” bit to talk about how to get restaurants to reduce portion sizes.  And that’s certainly a worthy goal.

But, what about the part where a relaxed stomach makes you want to eat more to feel full?

Maybe we should dig those skinny jeans out of the closet — if only at dinner time.  That’ll tighten up the tummy!

Ezra Klein is discussing that experience in his post, Calorie Labeling In Action, today

All quite delicious. When I got back to the office, though, I decided to see what it added up to. First, I looked up the cookie. A solid 450 calories, with 19 grams of fat. Yikes. But what might have actually changed my purchase was knowing the content of my sandwich: According to the nutrition calculator, 525 calories.

The calories in the cookie weren’t startling. But their calories relative to my sandwich proved a bit off-putting. I could pretty much have ordered a second sandwich for the caloric cost. Buying them without the information, it was easy enough to just consider them a side dish. As it happened, the cookie was more like a second lunch. I wouldn’t have ordered a second lunch. Good to know.

I had that EXACT experience with a Subway sandwich and a cookie a few years ago. Their cookies are only in the 200 calorie range but, they’re puny. I got two that day (440 calories) and NEVER did it again.

When it comes to calories knowledge isn’t just power — it’s control. And it’s not just me:

The following table comes from a Health Impact Assessment prepared by the County of Los Angeles on calorie labeling laws. It shows how much of the whole county’s projected weight gain would be averted if calorie labeling got X percent of restaurant patrons to make average decisions that were Y calories smaller

Follow the links and take a look (Ezra has a link to a graph) — it’s pretty impressive! And since it’s likely you won’t find the label on the menu at your favorite restaurant, spend a couple of minutes looking at the nutrition information on their website before you go.

And boy-oh-boy no one is letting that information leak out!

How much will it cost me?

Then (from TNR, believe it or not) comes THIS idea:

A Moneyball Approach to Health Reform

Every time we mention the impact of a health reform proposal on the federal budget with a CBO score, we should also give an estimate of how the proposal impacts a family budget. Call it the Consumer Budget Impact–the CBI. It would indicate how a family’s premiums would go up or down–and how much their exposure to significant medical debt would decline.

True, no single number can capture this. So we may need to come up with a set of numbers and perhaps compile them into an index, the way Dow Jones uses a mix of stocks to demonstrate the performance of the market as a whole. Elected officials should know if John’s family at just over the federal poverty level will be able to get coverage–and if we are expecting too much for Alice the 60-year old who is around 400 percent of the poverty level.

Remember, the subsidies in health reform don’t simply help the uninsured get coverage; they also help people who already have coverage but are struggling to pay for it. Think of the early retiree who spends over $1,000 a month, and thus over a third of his or her limited income, to keep coverage. Or the underinsured young adult who can only afford the bare-bones, high-deductible health plan. Or the workers who would lose coverage if not for the assistance and new affordable options their employer is being offered.

All of these people are insured, but in a way that is inadvisable and/or unsustainable. Depending on their income, they and millions of others will get help, so they don’t have to pay over a certain percentage of their income for premiums to get a standard package of benefits.

And while we’re at it let’s Tell Rangel to Score HR 676 so we can properly evaluate the Consumer Budget Impact of that along with all the rest.

And what will I get?

Yesterday commenter Masslib at The Confluence said:

I guess I’m just not interested in access. I’m interested in actual high quality health administered health care.

And THAT’s a pretty good start.