When you put it that way

I've already read Why We Get Fat: And What To Do About It by Gary Taubes, the layman's version of Good Calories, Bad Calories, so the following sentence from Paleo 2.0 A Diet Manifesto should have come as no surprise to me:

My own diet, due to hubris and the belief that I had “good genes”, had thankfully never been deficient in eggs, red meat, butter or bacon. They had tried to teach us that “cholesterol” was something to fret about when I was in medical school, but even my undergraduate and medical school biochemistry at the time made that seem only vaguely plausible. Hadn’t humans been eating meat for millions of years?

Oddly enough however, this was the first time I'd seen a defense of cholesterol approached from this angle. Typically the argument points to the relatively new addition of grains and refined carbohydrates to the human diet as the culprit for skyrocketing rates of Type Two Diabetes, Obesity and Heart Disease which, by implication, clears saturated fats and cholesterol of guilt. But it wasn't until I saw this other side of the coin that the safety of dietary cholesterol was finally settled in my mind. Of course this safety comes with a caveat; if healthy fats are consumed along with grains, sugar and starches, all bets are off.

The mission, should you choose to accept it...

Is to Blog every day for the next seven days...starting...NOW!

The amazingly creative and ever witty Trish, of JustChickenScratch.com, and I have decided to Blog every day for the next seven days, even if all we have to say is that we really don't have anything to say. :) Why on Earth would two busy women with husbands, children and jobs make such a pledge? It's quite simple you see...we both happen to be brilliant and passionate about the people and places in our lives and we decided that it's about time we got busy sharing that brilliance and passion with anyone that we can entice, trick, cajole, nag and/or force to read our Blogs!

Step one (of our evil plan) is now complete...

See you tomorrow!

Tooth Chips are on the way!

I was inches away from making my own toothpaste using Virgin Coconut Oil, Baking Soda, Organic Peppermint Oil and Stevia from a recipe that I found here, but once I saw the whites of the Coconut Oil...I lost my nerve.

SO, it's back to my original plan; trying the Tooth Chips with Neem Bark and Xylitol from Rose of Sharon Acres.

My Peppermint Chips shipped today and I am breathless with anticipation. No pun intended. :) Stay tuned for a review...

Wellness Mama - My new favorite Blog

My new favorite blog, Wellness Mama, is hosting a give-away for a cookbook that I would LOVE to get my hands on! If you've been converting your household to a more natural/whole foods based way of eating, check out both the Blog and the giveaway!!

First Week of Modified Atkins Diet (MAD)

What a rocky weekend!!

History: Maddy started MA on Monday 03/14. Monday night and Tuesday night, seizures were up.

Wednesday-Friday night - NO SEIZURES!
Saturday night - Stopped counting seizures at TEN. :(

Sunday morning: I was depressed because even though I'd said we were keeping our feet on the ground and our expectations low because we'd seen seizure honeymoons before, my hopes WERE high.

BUT...when Maddy looked at her medication box, what did she find? Her Saturday morning medications UNTAKEN. Whenever she misses a dose of medication, she has a 'bad day' or a 'bad night' and this alone could explain the return of the seizures. Hope returns.

Sunday night - ZERO SEIZURES!!!!!!!!!!

So...I'm not kidding myself anymore. My hopes are high and so are Madeline's. But the diet really does seem to be working!!!

The Long and Winding Road

Madeline, March 2011

It doesn't seem possible but it's been ten years since we started this journey through Epilepsy with our precious Maddy May.

In those ten years, she's been through daily seizures, countless EEG's, three VEEG's, more tests beginning with the letters 'MR' than I can possibly recall, every scan known to magnetic and nuclear science, a SISCOM, IVIG therapy, VNS implantation, two surgical consultations and a dozen different medications and yet, we're still just about where we started.

Now that her Doctors agree that we're at the end of what they can do for her, though they're still willing to re-run a test or two and throw in a new one for good measure, they ask us a question that we asked them almost ten years ago; have you ever considered the Ketogenic Diet? I can't tell you how it grieves my heart to hear those words. What happened to your initial assessment that she 'was not a candidate for Keto'? I go over it and over it in my mind and I wonder how different things might have been if only we'd pushed a little bit harder or asked just one more question.

But, the past is the past, and since it's our experiences that make us who we are, we wouldn't be the same people that we are today had things gone differently. I also take great comfort in the knowledge that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. And so, we move on.

As God would have it, almost two months before Madeline's last VEEG hospital stay, I had begun researching the benefits of a low carbohydrate way of life for myself (for weight loss) as well as educating myself on the dangers of sugar, refined carbohydrates and processed foods (for the whole family) so when the question was asked, we were nearly ready to go low-carb as a family. This would no doubt make Madeline's adjustment an easier one because she wouldn't be surrounded by her parents and siblings eating foods that she cannot have. God is an amazing planner, is He not?

In mid-March we had a weekend long goodbye to sugar and carbs blowout and on March 14th, 2011, we all went low-carb and Maddy began the Modified Atkins Diet for Seizures.

Here's our first report:

Madeline (18) started Modified Atkins on Monday and we were getting a little worried as her seizures sky-rocketed Tuesday and Wednesday but then suddenly, last night, there were ZERO seizures!!!

I'm trying to keep my feet on the ground, knowing that for every step you take forward you sometimes take two steps back and remembering too that we've seen honeymoons before when new medications were tried but even so...it's been so long since she went a day without a seizure that I can't even remember when it was.

At any rate, she actually got some real sleep last night and I am overjoyed for her. :)

Lessons for Young People

Although I am 20+ years out of my teens, my memory of those years is still crystal clear. There's a myth among young people that older people, and parents in particular, no longer remember what it's like to be a teen but in reality, nothing could be further from the truth. Ask any parent about their most vivid memories and you'll invariably hear a lot about the joys and sorrows of their teen years.

So why do young people often feel as if their parents don't understand what they're going through? Because parents have had the benefit of many more years of life experience. The wisdom you gain and the lessons you learn as you move through life put things into a new perspective and the advice that you give and the lessons you try to teach your children are filtered through that gained perspective.

For instance:

• We remember the soul searing pain of lost love - but we know now that tomorrow always comes and as you stack tomorrows on top of one another, slowly the pain fades, life moves on and new loves come our way.
• We remember the all consuming stress of high school - but we know now that nothing compares to the stress of being financially responsible for other human beings and we long for the days when all we had to worry about was passing grades, avoiding bullies, and keeping our wardrobe up to date.
• We remember the frustration of 'others' (parents, teachers, etc) controlling every aspect of our lives - but we know now that those were the freest days of our lives because once we left our parents' homes, we gained new and much less gracious masters like employers, landlords, banks, spouses/significant others and law enforcement officers.

IMPORTANT LIFE TRUTH:

Despite what popular culture and romance novels teach, LOVE is a decision that you make and you are in complete control of who you fall in love with. Attraction and infatuation may be out of your control but love is not. Don't believe me? Take a close look at an unhealthy relationship that someone you know and love is in and you'll see evidence of them talking themselves into loving that person over and over again. You try to talk them out of it, they keep talking themselves into it.

Love is a decision.

• If you are happy, it's because you decided to be happy.
• If you are unhappy, it's because you decided to be unhappy.
• If you are angry, it's because you decided to be angry.
• If you are bitter, it's because you decided to be bitter.
• If you are content, it's because you decided to be content.

Emotions and states of being don't just come along and attach themselves to us - WE adopt them and make them our own. Don't believe me? Go do some mission work in third world countries where the people you're serving literally have NOTHING. No electricity, no running water, no shoes, no grocery stores on the corner to buy food from and no modern conveniences. From our privileged, pampered perspectives, if anyone has reason to be unhappy, it would be these people and yet what you'll find is quite the opposite. Yes their lives are hard and yes they suffer but somehow, in the midst of what we see as unlivable conditions, people find happiness, joy, love and satisfaction. They DECIDE to be happy.

You can't control what happens to you (car accident, illness, victim of crime), you can't control what other people do to you (let you down, break your heart, lie about you) and you can't always control your circumstances (rich, poor, employed, unemployed, homeless) but you can control how you deal with what life throws your way. You can learn and grow from these experiences or you can sink and wallow - it's ALL UP TO YOU.

If you can learn these things now, you'll be way ahead of the game. I know adults who have ripped their lives and their families to shreds because they have never learned that happiness is a decision and that you control who you love. One man left his wife and two children because he 'wasn't happy'. When questioned about why he wasn't happy, his response was "we always have to spend the holidays with her family - never with mine". WOW...really? How about you grow a pair and say to your wife "Honey, we're spending Christmas with my family this year"? Clearly, he was working hard to find reasons to be unhappy. Too bad he didn't work just as hard to find reasons to be happy.

Here's what really happened to that man: he found himself attracted to a pretty woman at work and she found herself attracted to him. They flirted with one another which fanned the flames of their attraction instead of smothering them. They put the commitments they'd made to their spouses and children out of their minds and pursued their own selfish desires instead. As they nursed their attraction into infatuation, they started the process of falling out of love with their spouses so that they could clear the way for a new romance. It was heartbreaking to watch and everyone on the outside could see it, but the two selfish people at the heart of the situation refused to hear the truth and justified their behavior by saying "I can't help who I love". That's a lie...I just watched you do it.

Your life really is what you make it. People don't make you happy or unhappy, you do. People don't make you angry and bitter, you do.

It's all up to you.