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Oh boy, was the SF Bay Area potluck at Vanilla Orchid's & her DH's home -- fabulous or what. I gleaned an amazing amount of motivation from that - and met people I have posted back and forth with and people who lurk too! I wish I had met everyone there - but was deeply engrossed in talking to each of the few people I actually got to chat with - so cool to meet Robin - Quinoamania - we will do lunch, yay and the rest of you all. Oh and I was so happy to meet couple who are both on Mcdougall - we read so much on the board whee one memeber of a family is going it alone - so I was really happy to met folks who are both happily committed to this - kudos to them!!!

I also got motivated to jump start a Mary's mini - from talking to our hostess - who also used the sweet potato based mode. Serendipitously, I stopped at one of our extremely expensive groceries on the way home and found that on their "farmers market walk way" into the store - that the first display was a few huge bins of .99 cent/lb. red yams. I pretty much bought them out single handily - I think I gave my check out girl a moment of pause to see bag after bag of nothing but yams on the conveyor!

So, I start tomorrow and hopefully this will get me on the loosing streak again - I have no doubt that the prediction for a rainless week will help me with my recent awful water retention issue. Somehow, even though I completely ate vegan and the family gathering this and at the potluck this weekend - I think I probably gained today - too much to taste test! Oh so good - every recipe a keeper!

I am so jazzed having met like minded committed folk - what a complete blessing to have this gathering. Big thanks to our hosts and organizers!!!!

Anyway, I will log food and exercise here again and plan to go sweet potatoes and heavy on greens or a full 10 days.

My plan for tomorrow is keep it simple

b: nuked sweet potato w/ cinnamon/flax meal/wee bit of maple syrup
l: nuked sweet potato and steamed baby brocoli w/lemon juice
d: nuked sweet potato w/black beans and tomato salad topping
s: pear and apple

I got to say - I am both stunned and happy that I am down another pound this morning, after all I ate ate the Mcdougall get together Sunday. I probably had 4 platefuls of food - so it's astonishing I lost anything. I really think it's more of a loosing the water retention now that it stopped raining. And though I was very careful to Mcdougall after the family funeral, by eating just brown rice dolmas, veggies and fruit - I am certain the dolmas had oil in them! Still I didn't gain that day - so since the rain stopped without being strictly on diet I have lost 3 pounds in 3 days - it's water retention drops for sure.

I realize to that there may have been some big slips on gluten avoidance yesterday. I know for certain that I zeroed in on Quinoamania's great salads which she made gluten free and Tina made some wonderful mock tuna salad w/ rice crackers, yum also.

But I didn't read all the recipes for each offering, and I know at the last monute I sucuumbed to Vanilla Orchid's wonderful chocolate cake - which I asked the recipe for later (tell me I didn't know better, seriously). Gee -fist ingrediant wheat flour, opps. I knew that was most likely in the back of my brain, but OMG chocolate cake.

So, I still lost, but I am foggy and headachy today and it's gluten that has got me. Shame on me! I think the cake was worth it though

I also plotted out whether if I was exemplary from here until my birthday - could I loose all the weight and get to my goal. Pretty doubtful, but I can get in normal BMI range - and that would e fabulous, I think!

I am pretty pleased too how much I am learning about how my body works on food and weather. Before my focus was on the scale - now it's more on health and what I can and can't control. I give myself slack on the things I really can't, but I have to work on not giving into temptation and I really have to get back on board with exercise!

Really, when the fibro is terrible - it's not possible, but today it was sunny and I got a 15 minute walk in - not ideal, but I was dragging to get even that little bit accomplished. I know tomorrow will be better and I'll do more

My Weight Chart:
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So, this is day two of my Mary's Mini and my weight didn't plummet overnight again. That means that the sunny good weather isn't going to solve any more of my fibromyalgia water retention issues. Now, I just have to bite the bullet and realize that I did gain 4 pounds by not being MWL compliant recently. EVEN THOUGH right after I was being off program I remained the same weight or lost a pound - that just meant I was sloughing off the excess water still and not loosing actual weight!

So now on to Mary's Mini and see what eating sweet potatoes three times a day will do for me. Some how the simplicity of this confuses me - so I am going to post my plan for the Star McDougaller's to see if I am actually compliant on this.

I already know the left over bean salad I had after the get together is being used as a potato topper and its too bean-heavy and caloric for the mini - maybe not? Still I will replace that with salsa for a lunch potato topping. Maybe that peach/mango salsa No let's make that probably!

Now off to the Star McDougaller's section to publish my menu for critique.....

The Mary's Mini is fine and I have been using the CHRON-O- meter every day to check the meal plan. There have been little variations in the types of greens I am having with my sweet potato for dinner and what not, but all in all its about the same each day. Today the CM said I was spot on for loosing 2 pounds a week at 1010 calories. That is pretty cool, but it doesn't seem to be happening. I haven't lost a thing yet - no problem - at least I am not gaining anymore, which has been the bane of my recent existence!

So as of today the Mary's Mini is this:

b: Nuked sweet potato/peach mango salsa/cinnamon/flax meal
l: Veggie green salad w/ steamed sweet potato cubes/tomato salsa/cilantro
d: veggie green salad w/ sweet potato cubes/ stir fried greens/mushrooms/onions/garlic
s: banana and nuked desert sweet potato/cinnamon & maple syrup

Greens - swiss chard, broccoli, collards, chinese brocoli, bok choy & whatever is cheapest

I have another issue that I am researching just now as well: Gramma Jackie posted a new technology that replaces the CPAP for some. so I started thinking about that and realized I better pay attention to this issue again.

I have been using a CPAP on and off for about 3 years. Unlike some I don't find it impossible, but I am having problems with a dry throat and realize now that the model I have is really out dated. Mostly because it doesn't have a water reservoir and this would probably solve the too dry throat issue that makes me yank it off many nights.

Also, people on the forum have mentioned different pillow configurations - I thought they meant modified sleeping pillows that better adapt to the CPAP mask. Nope, they mean that there is an entirely new mask that just has pillow nostril inserts and is about half as intrusive as a mask. so I did some web surfing and OMG I have an Edsel of a CPAP machine!!! Given, all of this it's time to go back to my HMO and get an upgrade.

I mention all of this because for me the CPAP had a lot to do with my initial weight loss. My high was 250 ( I am now 207.5). I think I described that I have two sleep disorders both of which have the exact same symptoms - pain and fatigue. The first being fibro and the second being upper area resistance symdrome (UARS).

My great new doc was the one that got me tested for the second one and she was extremely distressed to find that no one had tested me for other sleep disorders before just diagnosing me with fibro and calling it done! Essentially, it was kind my hope that it would just be a CPAP treatable disorder and not fibro. No such luck, its both.

The thing is the CPAP controls the UARS and also the weight that had been going on often a pound a week. Even though I was on a national weightloss plan! Once on the CPAP, that weight started slowly coming off, and I was having less fatigue and pain (which had been so diblitating I really was home aspleep most days). Eventually, I was able to start swimming aerobics in the morning. This was HUGE for me.

I had been doing light swimming in the late afternoons, but I would come home from that, nap, get up eat and call it a night right after eating. Then I couldn't wake up until about 9 or 10AM the next day. With the CPAP my life completely changed - enough that I could do more than just the afternoon exercise and call it a day.

Here is a weird aside: I seriously think the only reason I was on the nationally known diet plan was because I could pick up my food in bags every Friday for the week and do a fast veggie shop and call it done. I was living on nuked only food trays and the few veggies I could pick up in a 15 minute grocery shop. Doing anymore than that was out of the question!

Anyway, a lot of folks here are on CPAPs and no one has nice things to say about them. Everyone hopes that when the weight comes off, so will the CPAP. As far as I can tell UARS is a collapse of the throat muscles not a weight issue. I may have to stick with the CPAP forever, maybe not -- but I am not going to complain about it because I got my life partially back because of my CPAP.

Still I need to get on the ball and get an upgrade because I know I am not wearing it full nights and that may be part of why the weight is not coming off.

Promise to self: tomorrow I make a concerted effort to get back to my HMO on this CPAP issue. I think I have done all the diet and exercise tweaking I can and something else may be contributing to why I am not lossing that I just haven't been taking care of!!

Happiness: the scale has a smaller numbers than the one I have been stuck at I am down a pound on Mary's Mini day 3. My chart shows downward movement again. It's territiory I been in before. Between the massive week long rain storms (which are the two upward blips on the chart) I was down to 203.5. That was hard to see it going up again - because I was really close to being out of the obese category. If I'd lost .5 more I would have been. but I guess it would have been harder to go back to obese then just miss getting there

January 01, 2012 - 212.0
January 06, 2012 - 210.5
January 13, 2012 - 209.5
January 20, 2012 - 208.0
January 27, 2012 - 210.0
February 03, 2012 - 207.0
February 10, 2012 - 207.0
February 18, 2012 - 208.0
February 24, 2012 - 207.5
March 02, 2012 - 206.0
March 09, 2012 - 205.5
March 16, 2012 - 206.0
March 22, 2012 - 204.0
March 29, 2012 - 208.0
April 05, 2012 - 203.5
April 13, 2012 - 210.5
April 14, 2012 - 208.5
April 19, 2012 - 206.5

My Weight Chart:
>

Good luck with the weight loss with Mary's Mini. And hope you get enough sleep also. You can also try cooking a bunch of sweet potato at once and then you'll have them on hand. Not sure if they'll taste as good, but they're always really yummy when they're baked. I like salsa and cinnamon with them, it's a good combo, sweet and salty.

Ah Caroveggie, the saying great minds think alike comes to mind. I was just thinking to do a bunch of sweet potatoes ahead of time! Unfortunately, the oven has decided to go out on me, so I'll be nuking/steaming these. but the really funny thing is - I was pretty groggy this AM, no CPAP and the terrible Siamese twins (2 cats) kept me up (being too nocturnal) last night. I was so foggy I just made my dessert potato for breakfast and then thought, OMG for dessert I'll do the peach mango salsa ( Quinoamaina reminded me of that this weekend) with a little cinnamon and voila dessert. As soon as I finish breakfast and came back to the computer I see that you have recommended that to me. Funny !!

I just called Kaiser pulmonary and they are immediately sending me the reservoir and nose pillows to update my CPAP, yay! I actually love Kaiser, Santa Clara. Then I'll go in next Tuesday to see if I am still correctly calibrated. The technician thinks not because of the symptoms and I'll find out from the doctor at this weekly clinic, if weight loss will effect my UARS too.

So as of next Tuesday - I'll have got this all resolved. YAY! See what happens when you write down a goal in this forum, you think, "oh my someone may be lurking, and expect to see my progress on this goal. I best get this done right now!"

Maybe, I should also list the house chores I have been ignoring!

So, I put my Mary's Mini up on ask a s Star McDougaller - because I keep reading it's OK to snack on potatoes and then what happens to the starch/veggie ratio. Frozenveg responded and said my mini looks fine and she has been a potato snacker all along and gets the veggies in but not at that 1:1 ratio.

Michelle's Mary's Mini (hehehe)

B: nuked sweet potato w/ cinnamon/mixed fruit
L: salad and nuked/cubed sweet potato w/ salsa
D: salad and nuked/cubed sweet potatoes w/ greens
Snack & desert - fruit - nuked/cubed sweet potato with a tiny bit of maple syrup mapple syrup is gone and will do stevia - I reread the MWL guidelines and no sugars or maple syrup

I messed up breakfast this morning and forgot my fruit. So, I decided to add my peach mango salsa to my cubed sweet potato and toss on cinnamon. Oh wow, this is a great dessert. Not exactly the choclate banana ice "cream" but pretty close.

Tomorrow for lunch I am going to go with the regular salsa/sweet potato/cinnamon suggestion from Caroveggie that sounds yum too

January 01, 2012 - 212.0
January 06, 2012 - 210.5
January 13, 2012 - 209.5
January 20, 2012 - 208.0
January 27, 2012 - 210.0
February 03, 2012 - 207.0
February 10, 2012 - 207.0
February 18, 2012 - 208.0
February 24, 2012 - 207.5
March 02, 2012 - 206.0
March 09, 2012 - 205.5
March 16, 2012 - 206.0
March 22, 2012 - 204.0
March 29, 2012 - 208.0
April 05, 2012 - 203.5
April 13, 2012 - 210.5
April 14, 2012 - 208.5
April 20, 2012 - 206.5

Down 2 pounds

Hi Michelle, good luck on your Michelle's Mary's Mini! I'm going to follow you and see how you go because I too am doing a Mini (with brown rice) starting today. It certainly makes the whole food planning, shopping and preparing process much simpler. Good luck and enjoy!

Hi heatherjoy:

Great that you're doing a rice one, because I am going to do my next one rice, if the weight loss gets sluggish again. AND IT WILL

I am have put my mini in the chrono meter and it's amazing that it came out exactly the calories that I would need to loose 2 pounds a week, if I was doing calorie restriction -- AND WE ARE NOT - I am beyond stuffed, really!

Good luck - we will compare notes

OMG - I just noticed something very disturbing - except for January - each month of weigh ins I actually weigh more at the END of the month then I did at the BEGINNING. OUCH! Unless I loss like 4 pounds this week - it's going to happen again. Fat chance ( pun intended, hehehe) that's going to happen!

The Mary's Mini is really wonderful, I like being on auto pilot about what the next meal is and having the same starch through the day is such a time saver.

I have been reading the discussion that around the variations nordgirl and her husband made to avoid his diabetic spikes on McDougall. This discussion interests me because I am (was won't know until the next lab tests) pre-diabetic and had a kind of disturbing conversation about self - testing with my Aunt's bf recently. He seems to be testing after every meal and then avoids the foods that cause him any spiking --- permanently.

So, I have sent him Dr. Barnard's book on reversing diabetes. That was kind of risky for me to do, as I haven't finished it myself and I am not sure what Barnard's stance is on the constant self testing. My gut reaction is that testing glucose is a very sketchy thing - but I see nordgirls point that there is a level at which spikes become dangerous and on some McD compliant food her hubby was going there.

So I re-read Dr. McD's article "How I treat Diabetes", to make sure I am understanding this diet and his recommendations on how to treat this disease of eating.



he also says to the extent possible and comfortable for his patients, he gets them off their meds and has them test just once a day - levels up to 300 are acceptable to him as he is monitoring daily. I think nordgirl was concerned with a level of 140, where she believes damage is caused. I think that number is uncertain as I have also seen several other numbers on health websites.

Anyway, I don't have diabetes, but I am clear from what I read that the starches listed above, which I am eating now - will improve my insulin sensitivity, whereas eating fats ( such as animal fats and vegetable oils) - will lower my insulin sensitivity. Further reduction in insulin levels will come through exercising.

My short term goal, which I am getting close to, is to get out of the obese category and get my tests run again. I am most concerned about the pre-diabetes and I want to get that off the plate first (pun intended), but I know for certain I have to get my exercise back to where I was or better.

Up until bad weather set in and my fibro went off the chart -- I was swimming 4 hours a week and walking 2x @ 30 mins. If I want the glucose numbers to go down, I absolutely must get the exercise back to that level. Starting tomorrow - no excuses the weather will be fine -- 90 degrees here tomorrow, it was 87 today! EGAD! where did spring go! Hmm, where will I go hiking?

I got a half and hour walk in this morning. It was PAINFUL and slow, really slow. My muscles are so tight from not being able to move these last few weeks, that it was really a push to do this. Plus, I am tired - that's the effect of no CPAP - actually the extra pain might be that too. It can't be due to weather anymore because that is stellar today. It ws completely beautiful out along the walk.

I go through some open space and developed land as well. It was gorgeous to see the wild flowers under the redwoods and all the green, green ferns. Focusing on that and the beautiful spring gardens is how I got off the pain part. I did center so well on that I actually walked 40 mins - come to think of it, hehehe - fooled myself!

So as I mentioned in the above posts - a couple of threads - really got me focused this week. The one concerning the diabetic husband and those concerning didi's heart attack and stent placement. I have take aways that relate only to me from both of those.

First - I think people focus on the weight loss and think once that is down or down enough the job is mostly done. Coming in to this program that was not my goal or my thinking. My thinking is still this -- I want the health armor of the best stats I can pull.

What that means to me is I am aiming for a colesterol reading that says I am less than 150 TC and less than 80 LDL. If I am there everything else will undoubtedly will have followed. I saw a chart of Dr. McD's and it listed all the diseases we associate with a poor arterial system and it's every thing I want to avoid, heart attack, stroke, kidney disease, diabetes and all the rest.

That said it doesn't mean that if I haven't dropped all the weight I should I won't keep going, but my main thing is never going back to the hospital again! This is what really hit me about didi's posts - I was just in the hospital and being treated just like I had probably had a heart attack. So when she is talking about her experience - I am having flash backs of that -- I got to say those are really motivating me now.

Because of these things I dug out the BP machine: it's been so long since I used it I had stolen it's batteries for some other thing around the house! On the way back from the walk I stopped in to get new batteries and when I got home I did a read. This is not my morning BP, this is my post exercise one and it's not at all where I have been most of my life 115/77 pulse 88. That's not on any meds of course, but I never had been above 110/60 until I got over 180 pounds.

I have new resolve today and I am going to run with it: I want health and I want to be the mover and motivator for myself. I don't want a day where I haven't done the most I could physically accomplish. Here's my resolve:

I will be compliant!
I will monitor my bp daily.
I will finish reading Dr. Barnard's diabetes book.
I will do some form of exercise 6 days a week or a total of 3 1/2 hours minimum.
I will check out a gym!

The gym thing is iffy - not much a fibro person can do but maybe enough to get by. I need an evening place if I can't do morning swimming or walking for some reason. I think I could do - tread mill, elliptical, rowing machines or stationary bikes. I CA NOT do weights - Iused to do weights religiously for like 10 years straight - but trainers and physical therapists will get realy barky at you if you have fibro and say you want to play with weights. Trust me it's not a good thig to mention to those folks - they will think you are crazy! Also, it will depend on cost and trip length- I can't afford much and the closest one to me costs $ 250 a month, no pool nothing fancy either - not going there obviously.

I want all of those things done by the end of next week! I am posting thee hear because I will be required to update that next week. worked for getting the CPAP order and appt one - so I won't fudge on these things either.

Day 4 of the Mary's Mini and I am up a pound - huh?? Could be the liberal dosing of soy sauce last night. I think I got carried away.

Weight - 206.5 down 1
BP 120/78 80

Well, I actually ended up walking another 30 minutes yesterday , for a total of over an hour of walking. I paid for it though, my knee and hips are killing me and I got little sleep because of it. I had no such problems when I was walking before - so I think it's due to the muscle tightening during this bad spell of fibro. I'll get back to the pool this week and that will help greatly. Oddly, nothing else does. I have a complete series of stretches from the "Pain Mangement" class I took and though these are tailored for me - they don't loosen me up at all. Only the hot water reverses the tightness after a bad flare.

I looked into a local Y here and called a friend to see how it works for her. Seems her program is mostly weights - which I can not do. I'll have to check the current thinking on that. Yet, I am encouraged by the virtual tour of the facility I am looking at lots of equipment I can use. I'll drop in after church today and take the real tour. April is a free intro month - wish I had figured this out sooner

Weight loss is stuck right now - I am down a pound but back to 206.5 (same as Friday's weigh in) - so much for the hour of walking! This is likely due to being off my CPAP now -- this makes a difference for me. Typically, when I am off it I gain weight - up to a pound a night. I have said that a thousand times here - but it still astounds me that I can't stop mentioning it.

I did wear the CPAPA and was loosing weight through Thursday, but it really caused me to feel unwell. So the Mary's Mini and the walk probably did help just to keep me at a stable weight. I am really looking forward to the new face mask and water reservoir - this coming week.

Later that same day: I did the Y tour and it seems to be almost ideal for me. I can start with the stationary bikes, rowing machines and ellipticals. There are tons of classes - many for people like myself who have conditions, like adaptive yoga - stretch & relaxation and a variety of others that will be just fine.

These classes are not at extra cost either. From the gyms I checked out online - others have higher membership costs, some lower monthly costs but the classes cost $10 to $25 per session. It's not unusual here to have to buy a class package for as much as $180 per month, separate from the gym monthly access cost.

Best is -- the trainer they hooked me up with is a kinesiology BA - muscles and joints that is. He'll have a good idea about what ails me - if not I can get my swim trainer to tell me what I should limit, as he has sports med and gerontology training in his BS - so I'm covered. Yay!

It's also right on the main connector that leads to my town - so it's on the way home from everything. If I have to pass it I will feel guilt and get drawn in on a daily basis. Guilt is pretty much my key mode of operation

So, I think I'll work up to it this week - try two swims Tuesday and Thursday & gym Wed, Friday and Sunday. Monday is food closet, which is workout and a half anyway and Saturday I'd like to keep open for hikes or down time if needed. When I get back up to conditioning I'll add in classes. I'll be dropping two swim days @ $15 a session 30 x 4 = 120 and save $50 a month doing the swim/gym mix. Oh boy, $600 a year savings. I am liking this

Now that I have gotten all excited and revved up - I have to do the reality check too - I just read the new recommendations about strength training for fibromyalgia. Essentially, Harvard did a study the results are it's OK at low weights and low doses - the thing is reps not weight and going ssssslllloooowwwwllllyyyy with any increases.

They caution that the fibro person may think they can do much more, but that they pay for it the next day. I kind of over looked that on my little wishful thinking schedule above. Like I don't know this - I hiked a total of an hour yesterday and today I am a complete couch potato and I occasionally whimper too. I loved the walking - it did't love me back.

Reminder to self - try new exercise, warn trainer to go really slow and remind myself twice. Just like eating it's best to stop before you think you are full. Look at the above schedule and divide by 2 and then divide by 2 again

Boy, I like posting this stuff here - I am getting it done too because of that. Pretty soon my daily do do list is going to show up here

I have been reading some of your posts, and it sounds like we are in the same boat in a lot of respects! I have fibromyalgia too, and although I have good intentions of exercising, I have to be really careful or I overdo it and then hurt for a couple of days afterwards. I am not new to McDougall, but have never really given it a good, honest try. So...here I am again, determined to really do this right.

I am so inspired by your posts - it really helps to know that there are others out there who are having the same struggles, but are pushing through and making a change. Keep posting, because you are doing wonders for my willpower!