Doctors Without Baggage
My new favorite doctors, authors, scientists, and pioneers Ray Strand M.D. a pioneer in the new medical specialty Nutritional Medicine his website has extensive information how the powerful nutritional products made by USANA Health Sciences can and did change my life.

Dietary pioneer Neal D. Barnard M.D. also has an extensive website advocating the new four food groups grains, legumes, vegetables, and fruits. He believes that meat and dairy lose their food group status, and fruits and vegetables no longer share a single group. His straightforward proposal sets in motion the most powerful dietary policy ever, one charged with the potential to save tens of millions of lives, including your own.

I have now used the powerful nutritional products from USANA for two full years the greatest measurable change in my health is that my blood sugar is normal a long way from the edge of the diabetes abyss I was teetering. I have an amazing vitality and zest for life that I cannot explain and look forward to the challenge of exercise and the benefits it will provide every day.

The foolish belief that I can't build muscle without eating meat is gone. Plants are the only source of food I should be eating. Plant based proteins are superior for building muscles without the unhealthy fats that just go to sugar and are stored on you body as fat again. It will be hard to remove meat and cheese from my diet. I have abstained from processed white sugar for a couple of years now and the smell of a big sugar frosted cake is actually offensive. I hope prime rib becomes as offensive.

The independent information provided by both of these medical professionals is based on science not the powerful political and economic forces of the big drug manufactures and the meat, cheese, sugar, and food processing industries. They are truly pioneers.
- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 8:23 AM 1 comments

 
Unhappy Meal
Happy meal, really, they even forgot the toy. Thinking smallest portion at McFats is the best approach, besides leaving, but after I am still unhappy. Guess I will go to Amazon for a copy of Fast Food Nation that might help.

We are the most marketed to children of a Fast Food Nation indeed! Those of you saying no are my heroes.
- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 11:15 PM 2 comments

 
Shame on Me
NO. no. no. No. Noooo. NOOOOO! Why is that word so easy to say for a two year old and increasingly harder as life goes on. Food choices too many bad choices out there.

Can't see the Doc until the 28th for a new round of reflux medication so I am really working on the diet issue. This weeks meal plan was to eat boiled Kashi with yogurt every day at breakfast the only meal goal I accomplished. USANA Health Science's meal replacement powders for lunch four days out of seven not bad. Steamed vegies on a bed of Kashi or side of chicken or salmon for dinner no onions garlic or spices. Wow dinner was not happening like that but I feel good about the other meals that I am not going to beat myself up over the weeks bad behavior.

Only one restaurant meal during the week in it I ate the only meat. Boiled Kashi doesn't sound appetizing but there is so much you can do with it I am amazed how much I enjoy eating it. I've made up six portions for next week with black beans raisins pumpkin, flax, and sesame seeds. Perhaps warmed over a bed of lettuce for dinner. If I do most of the cooking before dinner I am more likely to warm it up after work. A convenient choice is better if it is a healthy one. And after eating that much Kashi I have a feeling that I can't explain but it is good.
- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 11:24 PM 0 comments

 
Obesity an Observation
Your fitness level is far more important to your health than how much body fat you have. With a Dr.'s permission an obese person can focus on gradual daily fitness goals eliminate the unhealthy behaviors they may have and begin to see results in their blood pressure and blood sugar levels. Far more important results than what the scale or BMI or fat percentage is.

When the mirror slowly becomes your most favored honest friend good food choices and meal planning become much more easier than when you avoided a mirror like a vampire. That is why so many "Diets" don't work.

Just some thoughts from a guy going through it.
- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 4:49 PM 0 comments

 
If Only Good Sense Were Common
"It's really common sense. Do you want to look better? Do you want to feel better?" Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said. "You lower your calorie intake, you lower your carbs, your fats. You eat more fruits and vegetables, and you exercise. That's as simple as it can be. That is not too hard." Oh so Secretary Thompson knows he is on the way out so now it is all so simple? He is no longer subjected to the powerful forces of the Processed Food Industrial Complex(PFIC) ie the Sugar, Meat, Milk, and Cheese lobby. His boss found that it was equally as simple to find WMD'S in Iraq. Because common sense tells us they are there!

Yes, daily incremental changes in your behavior embracing all that the outgoing secretary suggests is a must for most of us. But don't be fooled it is simple to get all of your meals handed to you through your car window. To ride the elevator, to park as close as you can to the door of your destination. To give in to the poor food choices produced at great profit by the PFIC.

No, it is hard persistent daily work.




- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 7:30 AM 0 comments

 
Television's Reality Unplugged
Sitting idle in front of a TV makes you fat walking burns it off, wow imagine that. A study in the April 9th 2004 Journal of the American Medical Association shows that television watching significantly increased our risk of obesity and type II diabetes.

Those in the study who watched more TV were more likely to smoke and had higher intakes of calories, saturated fat, red meat, and refined grains and that each two hour per day increase in TV watching will increase the risk of obesity twenty-three percent, and a fourteen percent increase in diabetes risk. Those who work up to a brisk walk just one hour a day show a twenty-four percent decrease in obesity. Any added moderate activity will decrease your risk.

So stand up sit down stand up walk to the TV turn it off sit down stand up, walk, run, skate. Soon you will be prying the edges of your smile out of your ears. I know because my TV is unplugged and gathering dust in my basement for three years now.

source: www.kashi.com

- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 6:19 AM 0 comments

 
Circle the House
Ok, curling might have a smaller audience than speedskating. But those curlers are a fit bunch that whole sweeping thing is hard and your best curling years really have nothing to do with your age. Another Olympic sport that anyone can continue for a lifetime.

Sports fan. Is that somebody that idealizes a sport or the champions of that sport talkes endlessly about it listens to sports radio at every chance spends the weekend and monday nights in front of the tube. Or are they active people who love a sport so much they participate in it at what ever level they can at any age. Hmmmmm


- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 6:40 PM 0 comments

 
Standing on the Edge of Two Ovals
Speedskating on ice is the most near perfect athletic endeavor there is. Motor sports racing has the largest fan base of all sports. Speedskating is the fastest one person can move under his or her muscle power on a flat surface. Motor racing is the fastest a human can travel on earth. Speedskating must have the lowest fan base for an Olympic sport. Motor sports racing is a gigantic all consuming money churning business.

AMERICA YOU ARE LAZY! Get up turn off the TV go to the door WALK!

Sit there and one day your doctor will bring news that you can no longer do what you want to. Do you really want that sugary snack? Is it really a snack or a regular part of your diet? Do you know everything you ate yesterday? Look in the mirror, and I mean your whole naked self, that is what you ate and didn't burn in your lifetime. Please stand up and sit down and stand up before it is too late. Some movement any movement daily. Keep a diary of what you eat daily. Do only those two things for a month and you will see results.






- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 7:48 AM 0 comments

 
The Center of the Middle
It lies there right in the middle of your chest lurking waiting to attack. Hey doc when I just started my skate workout after only 400 yards it suddenly felt like my lungs were on fire. Is this a heart attack?
"Do you have any heart attacks in your family history?"
Well no.
"Did anybody have reflux?"
Yea my dad took Tagament for years. That's HEARTBURN! I'm thinking I've never felt that before when he tells me that it's in my genes and with strict diet controll and the right medication I should be able to continue skating in a few weeks but for now stop any cardio excercise to keep from further damage to my esophagus. Ok , just shoot me now.

Diet-Guess what boys and girls you just can't eat and drink whatever you feel like. I know that is news to many of you because three years ago when I weighed 225 pounds with a body mass index of 33 I was obese. Every day I started counting the number of morbidly obese people, 100 lbs or more overweight, I saw through the course of my work day. After several days of reaching 25 by noon I'm so depressed that I need to sit down and have some comfort food at lunch. So into a fast food restuarant I go and count numbers 26, 27, and 28 standing behind the counter taking orders. You know hip shelves that would hold a six pack. Speechless is good when standing at that counter I've never felt less hungry in a moment. I went to a grocery store bought a cup of soup and an orange. A diet is not a temporary plan your diet is your life.

The reflux is not in controll I am not skating. Ok, don't shoot me yet.




- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 6:58 AM 0 comments

 
In the Middle of the Begining
"Jamie, you don't have diabetes now but you will."
Now, two years after my wonderful holistic wellness MD gave me the worst and best news of my life. I am 40 lbs. lighter, blood pressure and sugar near normal. How?

Nutrition, I found an amazing science based nutritional system that totaly changed my life. I haven't had a sick day off from work in over two years. For me that is a record that I never got close to in my first 50 years. I sleep better and have an awesome energy level to continue with an excercise program that fits my life.

Exercise, from my research I found that Dr. Bob Arnot considers inline speed skating as the best combination of aerobic and anaerobic exercise besides it is fun. I dug out the vintage '89 blades laced them up and started skating in left hand turns on a mile and a half oval doing the one thing that I have loved since childhood but forgot about for the last ten years.

I have worked through several weight resistance options and have boiled them down to a number of movements that I do several times throughout my day that use my own bodyweight as the resistance. Therefore where ever I am I need no equipment except skates and a helmet which are my constant companions.

Self esteem, wow I used to have a lot. It is amazing how life beats you down because you keep listening to your own negative loop of anger and fear playing back constantly in your mind moment by day by year. The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz is not a book that I read once but over and over and over. The same for the tapes by Dr.Denis Waitley The Power of Resilience, Empires of the Mind, and The Psychology of Winning in my car, at home, while skating, daily work instilling their wisdom.

This is only the middle of the begining because there is much more work to do 30 + pounds to loose and miles to skate. Looking back to my best moment of 2004 after months of training 12 hours of skate technique classes from wonderful teachers. I skated 26.2 miles finishing in the Saint Paul Inline Marathon. After 2 hours and 42 minutes of skating I slumped to the curb and cried and cried it was the happiest moment of my life.





- posted by Jamie Cowen @ 6:55 PM 0 comments