Friday Foodie: Lies Your Govt Tells You

In my continuing research for what is truly healthful for the body and doesn't put unnecessary stressors on the organs and cells to receive their nutrition, I have run across Fat Head and this article from Lew Rockwell.  Amazingly enough, I hadn't actually been trying to put this all together, it just all happened to fall right in my lap and what astonished me was how similar this two sources were.  Paired with what I know already, I just thought that I would share the info with you.

I really can't do either of them justice with a summary.  If you're low on time, start with the article, then plan an evening to watch Fat Head, the documentary rebuttal to Supersize Me.  The importance of this film is not that Naughton proves you can lose weight on fast food.  I am not a proponent of fast food and rarely ever eat it.  Part 2 of the documentary discusses how and why our government (FDA) lies to us about what we should be eating, the destruction of pertinent research, and how to get off your current medications if you have diabetes or cholesterol issues.

Just because a doctor has a doctorate doesn't mean he shouldn't be questioned.  It is your body and the quality of your life is at stake.  I'm not accusing doctors of purposefully lying to you and steering you in the wrong direction; I'm just saying that important information has been covered up so others can make money.  That means that medical residents are being taught the information the FDA and pharmaceutical companies want them to have.

Read and see for yourself - have an open mind.  It can be difficult to believe that these things can happen, but the powers that be no longer care about the common people - just take a look at what's happening in Washington right now. 

Fat Head is available on DVD and streaming from Netflix.

Friday Foodie: Organics on a Tight Budget

So you want to start buying organic and farm fresh food, but you're on a tight budget. Let's face it, the convenient organic foods sold at your local grocery store are typically much higher in cost than their preservative and chemical filled counterparts. This falls into one of my many conspiracy theories to keep the little and middle people down, but we won't go there right now. If you bought all organic products at your local store, it is likely that your weekly grocery bill would increase significantly - possibly by as much as 50% in some areas.

What's a poor girl to do? There are a few ways to incorporate more organics into your diet without breaking the bank. Here are a few:
Farmer's Markets: There are farmer's markets everywhere. Some even travel to a location near you! If you have no idea where to find your local market, just check out Local Harvest and Eat Wild. By entering your zip code, you can find what's available near you. If you are in Virginia or Montana, you can also take a look at Lulu's Local Food. They connect farms within a region with a customer base through online ordering. Your order (which may have items from several different farms) is picked up and delivered to one of several nearby central drop-off points. How's that for convenience!
Join a CSA: CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) is a wonderful way to begin your organic adventure! Through a search on Local Harvest, you may find that there are farms in your area (within a 30-mile radius) that are looking for loyal customers. You purchase a seasonal subscription, maybe $300-$500 for a six-month time period, usually payable in installments. That money is then held in an account in your name for you to draw upon at a local drop off point. For example, week 1 I go to the drop-off point, do a little browsing, fill up a basket, go to checkout, and (since I have a big family) $30 is deducted from my account. I've bought enough produce for a couple of weeks, so I don't need to go during week 2, and that's just fine - no penalty or lost money. Each CSA is run differently, so you'll have to check with the various ones in your area to see which one is right for you. The good news is that the pricing for produce is typically the same as or slightly less than what you are paying for non-organics in the grocery store. Your money stays local (helping the local economy); you are keeping a farmer gainfully employed doing what he loves so he doesn't have to convert his farm into an ethanol field to get government subsidies; and, you know where your food has been (many times the farmers have family parties at the farm or ask for volunteer harvest help) and that it was grown without chemicals and has not been irradiated for preservation. This is win-win-win.
Stock up: When organic dry goods or frozen foods in your grocery store go on sale, stock up. It does happen - look for it.
Read labels: If you can't buy pre-packaged organic foods, or your budget is especially tight this week. Read the labels carefully of the non-organic selections. The Kroger/Fry's family of supermarkets offers their Private Selection store brand for very reasonable pricing and many times doesn't contain some of the big no-no's. Try to avoid: high fructose corn syrup, monosodiumglutimate, carrageenan, partially hydrogenated anything, and any words that have 4+ syllables that you can't pronounce.

One important fact that you must wrap your head around, and I know it will be difficult, is that foods advertised as low fat, non fat, or diet foods will be filled with all the no-no's. I know you've been told for the last 30 years that this is the way to be healthy and lose weight. It's a lie. The human body is meant to easily process animal (butter, cream, bacon) and plant (vegetable, canola, peanut oils) fats. As a matter of fact, animal fats work in harmony with certain vegetables to bring more of their nutritional values to your blood stream. This means that bacon and spinach were meant to go together - that's why they taste so good together! The animal fat helps your body extract and keep more of the vitamin A from the spinach - it's the same with broccoli and cheese (not low or non fat).

That's enough for today, we'll talk more later. I know that's a lot for you to digest :)

Weight Loss Wednesday - Changing the Essentials

Okay, so this really is Part III in my series, but I'm not going to keep numbering them since these are likely to go on forever, so I'll try to subtitle them with a relevant subject pertinent to my ongoing journey. I last left you with meeting my friend Jenny, who gave me a book to read. That book was "Animal, Vegetable, Mineral" by Barbara Kingsolver. I have already posted on this blog about the impact that this book made on my life. I immediately went out and began buying local farm foods and whatever organic products I could find at a reasonable price (for a one-income family of 6).

I've always been a cook-from-scratch girl, so it wasn't too much of a switch for me - only ingredient-wise. I've always spent an hour cooking dinner, thinking about what I'm going to make right after breakfast. As I was making this food source change for my family, my children were at the ages of 12, 9, 6, and 3. I was very happy that they all embraced it well. We began buying pasture-raised meat, and joined a CSA. We started a home garden in our very regulated sub-division.

At this point in my constant weight loss journey, I just became concerned with eating locally and healthfully. My brother-in-law told me about Dr. Douglass' website and I started reading that and putting together what I knew about how people ate in pre-industrial times. It all began to make sense. Eliminate the preserved, enriched, and chemical additive foods, and simply make whatever you want from wholesome, fresh ingredients. "What does that mean?", you ask. That means that low-fat margarine is so much worse for you than real butter ever would be. I'll get into those things in future posts, so don't go away :)

Anyway, back to the present, it's been about 3 years since I went strictly natural, organic with my food ingredients. During that time, I have actually gotten so busy with homeschooling, teaching classes for the outside world, and managing my online dress shop that exercising has become a non-existent factor in my life. So what do I weigh now?

185 lbs.

Not perfect, by any stretch. I'm still 5'4", although those heels in the picture make me 5'8" - heehee! However, I hadn't stepped on a scale in over 3 years because it's my enemy and I get obsessed with it. My scale doesn't even have working batteries. I used my mom's scale last month while visiting for a museum trip. I was stunned! I was fully expecting 210lbs since I don't exercise. I don't eat less, I just eat food that I know where it's been, where it was grown, how it was grown, and what I did with it once it got to me.

So now that my hectic school schedule is over for now, I'm on the exercise bandwagon. I want to be 165 lbs or less. I'm actually more concerned with inch loss than a number on the scale - especially because I'll have to go use a scale at a store to check it. I began exercising on May 17th, but only did one day that week because I forgot hubby took the next 2 days off work. I don't exercise when he's home - I feel self-conscious and he makes the occasional failure type of comment. But that probably worked out okay, because I sort of eased into it. Starting stats:
Bust: 43.5"
Waist: 41.5"
Hips: 49"
Arms: 15"

Ask me how I'm doing beyond the posts I'm going to make. I won't lie to you. If you know me personally, you know I'm brutally honest, even with myself. This is my constant struggle - weight loss. The one thing in my life I don't do well but I'm not afraid to try. Let me know I'm not alone, comment with your failures and successes. If a friend of yours is going through this same struggle, invite them to read along and comment on what works for them.

And by the way, I want everyone to know, that I truly believe beauty comes in all sizes. I love making dresses for plus-sized women because I think the world thinks we should all be in muu-muus. We have a sense of fashion and want to show off our assets - and yes, everyone has a least one. Stay tuned, walk with me, I promise it won't be all bliss :)

High Fructose Corn Syrup

Seriously, by now, pretty much everyone knows about the evils of HFCS. But when did they start putting it in sandwich bread?! What? Seriously?! Sugar is listed as an ingredient, but HFCS comes before it. Are they intentionally trying to kill every last person in the nation? "They" can't even use the excuse that it's just sweetening if sugar is an ingredient and the product is SANDWICH BREAD.

Not sure what I'm ranting about or why? Food for thought, click here.