Dear Shirley,
dear Lisa,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Happy New Year!

Dear Shirley and Lisa, I saw your kind posts on the other thread and thank you very much. To really leave the past year behind I decided to start the new year with a new thread.

The holiday was magnificent and as a side effect I may now experience the joyous feeling of loosing Kilo 95, 94, 93, and 92 once again. 95 and 94 have already been lost again over the weekend so I am pretty much convinced that 93 and 92 will follow soon (The New Year's buffet lured me off my track and once off the right track it was very tempting and easy to complete the failure with a few of the famous Dutch (very high carbohydrate) dishes. Once again I was able to actually feel inside my body that at present carbohydrates do not do me good.
Well, full of new resolve, determination and will power I am starting again to achieve my only goal for this year: to normalize my insulin level and thus heal the PCOS as far as possible.

This is a list of all the positive changes that with your help I have made and which I started to stick with again since Saturday (I never went off most of them except for the carbohydrates and the exercise):

Margarine is banned.
I am following the Protein Power Diet by the Doctores Eades.
I am taking 300 mg of GLA contained in Evening Primrose Oil Capsules daily - spread out evenly in three portions over the day.
I am eating one tablespoon of freshly ground golden flax seeds almost every day.
I am drinking at least two liters of fresh clean water each day.
I am using pure sea-salt without any additives.
Every few days I am taking a few capsules of Salmon (fish) oil because I do not manage to eat fish two times a week.
In my household almost all processed ready to eat or easy to make food has been banned and been replaced by fresh or frozen genuine foods.
Every egg we buy was laid by a free range (hopefully happy) chicken.
Most of the meat we are having is organic meat (I hope this is the right word). (Chicken meat is the only problem we still have to solve).
I went off coffee almost completely (cheated only twice since the first of December, both times around Christmas.)
Menthol and Camphor have been banned completely from our household (unfortunately I ran across a food that contained Menthol last week but I took it out of my mouth as soon as I realized it and I hope it has not done any damage to the remedy that is still working in me).
I took Thuja C 200 on December 2nd as a repeat to a first dose taken in Summer 2001 and am convinced that it is still working inside me.
Tomorrow will be my first day back at work after two weeks of vacation and also tomorrow morning I will return to my daily workout routine (which is: 30 minutes of Health Rider riding on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, 30 Minutes of weight lifting exercised on Tuesdays and Thursdays).

I have never felt more confident in my life that I am going in a right directions towards more health and happiness and positive changes have not only happened to me but also noticeably to my mother maybe a little bit induced by my learning and telling her about the new books and ideas. She bought a cross trainer in Autumn (and uses it regularly!!!) and went to a modified low carbohydrate diet and tells me she feels much better. This in turn makes me feel better and I often wonder whether I played a tiny little role in her positive changes?

I do not feel helpless anymore because with your help I found a cause and a name for all my health problems (= PCOS and too much Insulin in my blood) and - most important - a way out of this dilemma.

At present I feel well balanced.

Currently I am waiting for a regular period (and technically am prepared for the worst with any hygienic device the German hygienic industry has to offer - so in this field there is no negative anxiety, only curiosity about the future developments in my body).

I saw the comments on prescribing over the Internet and I, only for my own self, want to let you know that I have never felt more secure than with the kind, generous and knowledgeable people here and even if the internet stopped existing today it (= your help via the internet) would have made a most important change towards the better possible for me. I do not even want to imagine where I would be today if there had not been the outstanding 'internet'-people helping me.

Now my short term goal is to stay on the diet (and weigh 88 Kilos at the end of February )

I will keep you informed with weekly updates and am eagerly and curiously heading towards my future.

Thank you very much for being there.

Bettina

You have done brilliantly and it is so good that you can see the positive changes that have been made and that you are in a great positive frame of mind for the future.
If you have time go to www.emofree.com and read the relevent case history pages and consider learning how to "tap" yourself. The manual is there but it is better to be shown how to do it first.

__________________
RSHom - Registered Homeopath

Hi Bettina,
Really nice to hear your update. It was inspiring for me - since, as you know, I'm also following the same way-of-eat as you ...and erm, ate like a pig at Christmas. But the encouraging thing for me, was that I only gained about 1 kg back! That is astounding to me...because before, I'm quite certain I would have packed on more weight gain than that!

One suggestion to you Bettina:

Take the Evening Primrose ONLY at night. It doesn't work during the day.

I can't recall the specifics but it has to do with GLA only working at night while one sleeps... I don't have time to look up the specifics, but just know if you take it during the day, it is of no benefit. And, I also know it is expensive, so it is a waste - literally.

Perhaps someone else will remember/recall why and post it for you .

Happy New Year and HANG IN THERE ,
Lisa

__________________
"The significance of a fact is measured by the capacity of the observer."
Carroll Dunham

Dear Ricky,
dear Lisa,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

thank you for your encouraging and kind comments.

This is my weekly update.

I changed to taking the Evening Primrose Oil only in the evening before I go to bed and only three capsules (= 150 mg of GLA) - I hope this is enough, the label on the container states to take two or three capsules each day and since I am taking them all at once now and since I cannot judge the effects of a very high dose taken at once I chose to go the safe way until you advise differently (before I was advised to take 300 mg GLA spread throughout the day).

An aphtae appeared close to the tip of my tongue, I cannot remember ever having had one there before and another one showed up on the left lower side again.

There are no signs of a period, so I am one week late again, already.

I only managed to exercise two times this week. It is the old problem: I am full of good ideas and good plans and only manage to accomplish a fraction of what I had planned. This week the problem was that I could not get out of bed early enough to have enough time to finish (even to start) my workout. I did work out on Monday and was so proud about it and failed on Tuesday already. At present nothing is more difficult than leaving my nice, cozy, warm bed in the mornings (and my friend has the same problem so we are not of much assistance for each other ...).

It was super hard to get back to the regular low-carbohydrate diet and I cheated and strayed till Thursday. Yesterday (Thursday) was the first day without cheating after Christmas. Here the name of the problem is Chocolate (with a capital C, it is a huge problem). Everything went fine during the days, my willpower started to fail after I got home in the evenings. I told a friend about this and she called me yesterday evening and talked to me on the phone for more than three hours and thus kept me from cheating ... so I can not even say whether it is my credit or hers that yesterday was the first really good day, as far as correct eating was concerned.

Even though all of the above sounds quite gloomy I still feel balanced and calm. Still I am convinced that I will achieve my goals.

At present there is only one great worry that really puts me down: My friend is suddenly (since Sunday) developing a very strange health problem (small lumps or knots start to appear under his skin on his head). He seems to be very uneasy about this development and went to see a doctor yesterday ('because of the family history of cancer'). The doctor ordered his blood to be tested. My friend stated that he, too, would like to seek help on this forum and this statement eased my mind a lot. (I kept him informed on how you were communicating with me and helping me.) So most probably on Saturday or Sunday he will answer all the initial questions (the same that I answered when I started to contact you) to seek advice here. Unfortunately he does not speak English so I will be translating all the time (and I do hope that this (me knowing everything) will not develop into a problem for him or for me). My friend will start his own thread under his own (virtual) name.

My weight (I feel ashamed): it went up to 95 Kilos on Wednesday and down to 94 again today. Lisa, I respect you for having been able to escape Christmas with only one Kilo! I know that my weight is not the main issue and I know that, apart from the Kilos, the elevated insulin level is the problem that needs to be solved. So today, again, I will do my very best to stay away from any unfavorable carbohydrates.

I did visit the web-site you suggested, Ricky, and keep going back there whenever I have time to do so. It caught my interest and I thank you very much for suggesting it (I remember you suggested it before but I never got around to looking at it before). Thank you very much for suggesting it again.

I am happy to be in your hands here on this forum.

Bettina

[ 11 January 2002: Message edited by: Bettina ]</p>

Hi Bettina,

Please don't be so hard on yourself!

Did you know that the average person gains over 10lbs ( more than about 4 kilos) over Christmas? I personally gained 7 pounds, which came off almost immediately when I came home from visiting my mother in law. So please keep in mind that the weight gain is purely seasonal, and temporary. No one expects to lose weight during Christmas unless they become food poisoned, or sick with a stomach flu. Give yourself credit for celebrating well!

As for the big problem with Chocolate--here's what I did:

My mother in law lives in a town which has a huge chocolate factory as a main industry. I came home with 6 boxes of chocolate candies...hard centres, cream centres, chocolate covered nuts, chocolate covered ginger, and chocolate encased in cinnamon candy. While visiting, she made sure the house was filled with boxes of chocolate covered mint and huge (and I mean HUGE) boxes of truffles. Those boxes were over six inches in height, layered with truffle upon truffle. There are hundreds of them in a box.

I did not open any of the boxes when I got home, and after 2 days of visiting my MIL, chocolate became sickening (I have NEVER thought this thought in my life, nor experienced this feeling about chocolate before. Trust me on that).

As soon as the boxes were unloaded from the trunk of the car, I walked them over to my neighbour's, my parent's house, distributed them as gifts to visitors and strangers alike. It made me feel much better to give them away than it would have to have eaten them.

One of my father's gifts to us this year included a massive basket of imported Italian sweets--foods I normally love!! But that basket was dismantled as soon as it was presented and those cookies and chocolates were given away as gifts too. I kept the safe things--really good olive oil, and one small jar of very good preserved fruit. That's it! It was much more pleasurable to see people dive in to that food on New Year's Eve than to just have eaten it myself.

So this is how I'm going to handle the Eating Holidays from now on. It makes people very happy to receive gifts, makes me very happy to give them, and keeps me from overindulging altogether. It is really a very simple solution: get all that stuff out of your house, where it is tormenting you, and watch others derive pleasure receiving it.

I do hope this has made you feel a little better! And also hope your friend finds out some comforting news very soon.

Divina

__________________
...and deliverance has many faces<br />but grace<br />is an aquaintance of mine

Dear Divina,

what a great idea, thank you so much! I am sitting here at my computer now with a broad smile on my face. Thank you for making me smile.

This evening I will convince my friend to place his jar of Nutella (chocolate bread spread) into his safe, too, to keep it out of my reach. You may laugh, this is what we did: as a master-piece he once built a safe and this safe now has its place in the middle of our living room. Into this safe he agreed to put all his chocolates and sweets and I promised not to touch them (the key always remains in the door to ensure that - in case of a robbery - the safe will not be destroyed or removed). This does work, we started this in Summer and have just forgotten to go back to it after Christmas.

On all the other leftover 'goodies' he shall decide whether to put them into the safe or to give them away as presents.

Your post came on the perfect day: this evening we will be at a friend's house celebrating her daughter's birthday. That will give us plenty opportunity of making other people/children happy with sweets.

I am still smiling happily. And (this just crossed my mind and I came back to edit this post) can you imagine the potential robber's face when he opens the safe and finds Nutella ... now I am chuckling.

Thank you

Bettina

[ 11 January 2002: Message edited by: Bettina ]</p>

I personally would be a happy thief if I found Nutella in a safe!!

La Nutella!! La Nutella!!

Divina

__________________
...and deliverance has many faces<br />but grace<br />is an aquaintance of mine

Oh Bettina,

Maybe I posted too soon.

Does anyone know how long it takes for a couple of weeks of eating-what-you-want (but in moderate quantities, to be fair...I mean I didn't eat until I was sick-stuffed or anything - I just ate all the Christmas goodies that were available in moderation mostly ).

Okay..so it would seem now - two weeks after Christmas I'm 2 kgs over instead of only one.

So, I didn't get off as lightly as I thought at first (no pun intended!).

Hang in there Bettina...you have really made some strides in your progress since starting - please remember that at those low moments .

And I chuckled at the thought of a thief discovering his booty is only a jar of Nutella!!

All the best,
Lisa

__________________
"The significance of a fact is measured by the capacity of the observer."
Carroll Dunham

Hi Bettina,

Happy New Year.

Every thing seems ok to me. Let us move forward with all the positiveness you have.

I am going on a course in Ear Acupuncture for a week which I am studying for a long time. So I will be back on 18/19 of Jan. Till then goodbye to every body.

__________________
Dr. Shashi Roy
"Sarve Santoo NirAamyah"<br />"Sarve Bhavantoo Sukhinaam"<br /><br />Best Regards<br /><br />Shashi Roy

Dear Divina

Please, next Christmas remind me to send you my postal address!

Chocolate cholcolate chocolate!!!! Yummy yum yum!!!

__________________
Man, do not pride yourself on your superiority to animals. For they are without sin and you in your greatness defile the earth by your appearance on it and leave traces of you foulness after you. Dostoyevsky