OK, seeing as how Christmas is just past us and I got back from the doctors today with a new set of blood numbers, time for an update I think.
Holiday season was reasonably kind to me -- I didn't lose any weight to speak of during the last couple of weeks, but I didn't pig out on holiday food, either. I've been fighting sinus infections and winter colds, dealing with a lot of holiday and medical and caregiver stress among the extended family, running more than my share of other peoples' errands, getting worn out and run down, and making more food compromises than I like. (Food compromises for me means stuff like, vegetables in restaurants that I suspect of being lightly oiled, snacks like wasabi soy "nuts" that are more energy-dense than is ideal, a few oil-rich nuts, a memorable slice of fresh hot SAD white bread with jam, that kind of thing. ) But, a few minor bobbles aside, I managed to keep at it.
Christmas Day 2011 was the 1-year anniversary of me getting a scales. That was 3 months before I started eating plant-based, but I'd been "eating more fruits and vegetables", I'd gotten off Avandia some months previous, and on Christmas 2010 I weighed 511 down from some unknown peak north of 550.
This year on Christmas: 375.
Weight loss in a year: 136.
Christmas 2011 was also 9 months plus a week from the day I stopped eating meat, dairy, and added oils. Weight on March 19, 2011: 482. On Christmas: 375.
Plant-based weight loss over nine months: 107.But the fun part was today's visit to the doctor to go over the latest blood numbers. (I already wrote about some of this
here and will be repeating myself a bit if you saw that post.)
Long story short -- my doc is enormously impressed with the amount of weight loss and improvements in my bloodwork numbers. He even told me that he "feared for my life" when I first started seeing him, and no longer does. He says he wishes all his diabetic patients would do what I'm doing -- ironic because he never suggested it to me. But as we were discussing in the linked thread, what we are doing is rare enough that some docs probably never see it happen. And they are only human -- they
like seeing patients who are getting better instead of steadily worse, as most patients do who suffer from "chronic" diseases like diabetes and hypertension. I actually dare to hope that we may sometimes inspire our doctors, and encourage them to try harder at selling the "nobody will ever do it, it's way too radical" dietary approaches to better health.
The fun part of today's doctor visit -- and this was probably the first doctor visit in my life I'd call "fun" -- was that my doctor seemed engaged and interested in my progress on a more personal level. He was genuinely marveling at my progress, wanted to know more about how I was accomplishing it, grabbing people on his staff to tell them about how much weight I'd lost -- it seemed that I finally broke through his reserve of skepticism and (too strong a word, probably) despair with respect to his diabetic, hypertensive, obese, soon-to-be-dead patients (or at least, me).
Oddly enough when I went in, I expected to see worse blood numbers (especially blood sugar). My "upon waking" blood sugars have been up a solid and steady ten points for the last six weeks or so; previously stable in a 95-100 range, they've been stable recently in a 105-110 range.
So you can imagine my delight when my A1C came back as 5.3, down from 5.4 two months ago. I'm actually not sure how that happens -- I guess even though the lows are higher, my spikes must be shorter or fewer in duration? In other words, blood sugar more stable generally.
My lipid numbers were all notably improved, too:
1) My total cholesterol came down 19 points, from 152 to 133 -- a record low # for me.
2) My HDL came up from "less than 15" to 27 -- another record!
3) My LDL came down 6 points from 75 on August 30 (could not be calculated in Oct. due to immeasurable HDL) to 69. Lowest ever for me...
4) My triglycerides dropped 15 points, from 200 to 185. Doc says not to worry about that level; his target is 150, but he expects it to keep dropping as I keep losing weight.
Possibly the funniest moment came when he was asking me about the specifics of my diet, which he had not really done before. He looked a little concerned when he heard "no meat, no dairy" and said something cautionary about me needing at least a little protein. Of course, armed with my knowledge about protein in plant foods, I was ready to answer him back, but I spent several seconds marshaling my thoughts, because I wanted to be able to answer him without having a "you idiot" tone in my voice. I like this guy and he's
not an idiot, he's just fairly mainstream, conservative, and has a rural practice of very poor and very unhealthy people. So I wanted to say something informed and polite about the sufficiency of protein in plant foods.
Luckily, however, he used my pause to think over what he'd said, and before I could speak, he asked me "No, wait... are you eating at least a few beans?" I said "Oh yeah, I'm eating a
ton of beans" and he smiled with relief, and said "Oh, good, you're fine on protein then." So I didn't have to try and persuade him...
Next visit and blood labs in three months. My doc says he wants to take a hard look at my blood pressure meds next visit with an eye toward reducing or eliminating some of them -- which is a sharp turnabout from his discouragingly conservative words on that point two months ago.