The Weight

My father was thrilled that the "physcial therapist" helped me make so much progress after only one session.
I didn't go into details regarding the actual methods of care in the Integrative Manual Therapy center.
Let him just be happy that I'm improving.

The mobility in my leg is significantly improved.
I can bend it all the way up so I can kick myself in the butt with my heel.
I no longer have to shake the leg into place before I put weight on it.
The pain is decreased.

Then I went on to talk about stuff on my job,
my positive evaluation from my department,
future prospects
and how grateful I am to be working over the winter break.

I reported all this to my father who said it sounded like good news.
Then he asked,"What about the weight?"

The weight.
Suddenly all my buoyancy over regaining the use of my leg and my expanding career faded.
I was no longer up and coming.
I was a fat lady in a side show.

I felt like I needed to explain myself.

I stammered something about

needing to get the muscles in my leg strong before I could start walking again

and how the physical therapist is also a phys ed teacher and tai chi instructor (he is).

Then I sealed off the subject by saying something like "I'm working on it."

I am working on it.

But part of me wanted to say,

"The stress of worrying about the weight is diminishing the quality of my life

so I've decided to do nothing about it whatsoever and just concentrate

on health in a more holistic way."

Why didn't I?

I came home and slept it off.

At 8:30pm I was awakened by a dramatic phone call from my mother who claimed she was afraid to go to sleep lest she asphixiate.

She had a bad sore throat and wanted to be taken to the Immedicenter.

At 8:30 on a Saturday night?

Nothing was open except the Emergency Room at the hospital.

My 80 year old father was iffy about driving at night so I took her.

Suddenly the weight was not an issue.

I was not a fat person taking my 86 year old mother to the hospital.

I was just a woman taking my 86 year old mother to the hospital.

I sat there with her in the ER, propped up the bed for her, dressed her in her hospital gown, covered her up in her blanket, entertained her, kept her from fussing too much over having to wait, dealt with the nurses and doctor who thought she was cute and generally handled everything.

Dad called on my cell phone to see how we were doing.

He felt guilty.

He apologized for not taking her to the hospital himself.

I reassured him that everything was fine.

As I sat there in the chair next to her gurney in the ER I thought about the weight.

How absurd that I should have to explain myself to anyone regarding my body.

I watched women my size and heavier walk by in uniforms.

Nurses, techs, EMTs big as me or bigger were going about their jobs.

Some saving lives, some administering medicine, cleaning up spilled bodily fluids, walking around with perfectly functioning knees, living, not freakishly standing out. We were all just people.

How ridiculous that I should even have to think about the weight as an issue,

or be asked about it,

or lose a second's worth of sleep over it.

What if I just decided to be ok with my shape as is and get on with my life?

Maybe it's not my problem to take on what other people see as my problems.

Maybe I'm just me.

*Lisa's Video Pick of the Day*

"Dear Mr. Vernon,

We accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it is we did wrong, but we think you're crazy for making us write an essay telling you who we think we are.
You see us as you want to see us, in the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions. But what we found out, is that each one of us is a brain,
and an athlete,
and a basketcase,
a princess,
and a criminal.

Does that answer your question?

Sincerely yours,

The Breakfast Club."

click here

 

Splenda is not splendid

"Why can’t we encourage people
to just overcome 
their sweet tooth?...

...Perhaps it would help, 
but of course there is 
no money 
in that...

...We have the sugar industry, 
the chemical sweetener manufacturers 
and the processed foods 
and drinks industry 
making sure that does not happen...

...But people do pay the bill 
– some with their lives, 
others with suffering and illness, 
others simply with obesity, 
and all of them with their weekly grocery bills, 
not to talk about hospital costs
that hit every one of us."

- from The Center for Science and the Public Interests

Warns of Aspartame But Advocates Splenda/Sucralose

Did you know that there is no clearcut evidence that artificial sweeteners aid in weight reduction?

Yet when I see recipes on blogs and support groups that are "WLS friendly" I see that they include Sucralose (brand name Splenda) in their sugar-free versions of what used to be recipes for actual food now diet-ized by replacing the fat with starch and replacing the sugar with artificial sweeteners.

Why the emphasis on sugar-free?

According to what I read from pre-ops, post-ops and no-ops who are trying to lose weight

the idea is to cut calories by any means necessary.

Sugar has calories.

We've also been conditioned to believe that sugary sodas, baked goods, candies and desserts are the main cause of  obesity and that by simply making these same items Low-cal, Low-fat or Sugar-free, but continuing to eat them, we are doing something wonderful for our health.

 

According to Dr. Janet Star Hull, author of Splenda: Is it Safe or Not? and Sweet Poison,

"Splenda, or sucralose as it was named when it was invented, comes from a sugar molecule, yes, but it is so mutilated and transformed in the lab, it has merely 1 atom of sugar remaining after 3 atoms of chlorine are injected into the sugar molecule. So in laymen's terms, sucralose, or Splenda, is 1 part sugar and 3 parts industrial chlorine. You might as well drink from your fish aquarium or swimming pool." (click here for the complete interview)

What is it about us
(I was once an artificial sweetener junkie)
that makes us prefer to put poison in our bodies rather than just eat better?

Are we (and I was one of the "we") so addicted to sweetness that we'd willingly endanger our health just for a flavor fix?

I know that I for one like sweetness.

I used to use the pink packets (saccharine).

Then when those were determined to be cancer-packs I switched to the blue packets (aspartame).

When aspartmate was discovered to be toxic I switched to the yellow packets (sucralose).

Now sucralose is in question.

Today I use the green packets (stevia).

The difference with the green packets is that it's not an artificial sweetener.

It's the powdered version of an herb.

It IS a processed food so I use it sparingly but it's nothing like the pink, blue or yellow packet devils.

I also use good old raw honey,

organic molasses,

real maple syrup

and Agave nectar.

I'm looking into acquiring some Rhapadura.
Yes they have calories.
No I don't care.
Real food has calories.
I'll deal.

I'm more afraid of harsh chemicals than I am of calories.

I think it's easier and safer to train my taste buds to like things that are less sweet than to tax my body with a toxic substance.

But I warn you,

DON'T try to talk about this topic on a Weight Loss Surgery support group anywhere online.

Either you'll be attacked, insulted or told that artificial sweeteners are "safe in small amounts"

and that the side effects of obesity are far more dangerous than the side effects of Splenda.

The WLS "cheerleaders" (a term coined by Dani Hart, author of I Want to Live) who wave their pom-poms for a post-op way of life that includes artificial sweeteners and low fat diet foods

will not tolerate dissent.
They regard Splenda-eating as one of the many adjustments one must make as a post-op if one wishes to be part of the weight-losing in-crowd. Question thier methods and you'll be told you're just not committed.
I know. I've been cheer-led right off of these support forums and asked not to interfere with those who are truly on the road to success.

Or I've been told that what works for one person may not work for another so I should just leave the Splenda-eaters alone to do what they have to do in order to obtain glorious thinness.

Do I sound bitter?

I'd rather be bitter than artificiually sweet.

*Lisa's Video Pick of the Day*

Sweetpoison, written by author Dr. Janet Starr Hull, is a book exposing aspartame dangers. SweetPoison.com provides a variety of aspartame information including nutritional advice on aspartame detoxification, aspartame side effects and up-to-date information on aspartame dangers.

click here or click below

Chocolate Please

I'm not perfect.
Sometimes I eat things that I know are less than nutritionally optimal.
See how I worded that?
Rather than say "eat things that are bad for me" I said something less condemning.

I've done the condemning thing.
It isn't helpful.
If naming things as "bad" was helpful I would have solved my health issues a long time ago.
Bad and good are judgment calls.
When it comes to food
I need to be sensitive to my psyche as well as my body.

Health comes in layers.

Healing from an eating disorder happens in layers.

Every once in a while I like to have some peanut M & Ms.
Not often.
Just once in a while.

I'm on campus right now.
Had I planned ahead I would have brought some organic dark chocolate with me.
I didn't.
I could have gone to the convenience store here on campus and bought some raisins or a piece of fruit.
Maybe I should have.
I opted for the Peanut M&Ms instead.

Maybe I needed the extra sugar rush.
Maybe I just needed the comfort of that particular food.

Like I said, I'm not perfect.
Right this second I choose to eat a Peanut M&M.

So be it.


*Lisa's Video Pick of the Day*
I MUST get this book!
I love Lisa Lampanelli.
Hey SHE has chocolate when she wants it!!
Click here or click below

Thank God I get to teach

I'm sitting here in my classroom while my students take their fnal exam (the Fall trimester ends tonight and the Winter trimester begins November 30th).

The computer is up on a high podium so I pulled a desk over to it and am using the desk as a chair so I can sit up at podium height.

The words I'm typing right now are up on the large computer screen in front of the classroom.

My students are too busy to notice.

They're writing dilegently.

Also, since the classroom lights are on the screen is not as clearly visible.

They're writing.

I'm writing.

I'm looking over the top of the computer at them as they write.

Do they have any idea how much I adore them.

My eyes are filling with tears.

I'm glad they're too busy to notice.

When my energy bottomed out and I wanted to crawl into bed on Wednesday afternoon

and  just "die" I thought of them and I was able to keep going.

It's an evening class. They've all worked today.

I began my teaching day at 8am.

Many of them began their work day just as early.

We're tired but we're toughing it out.

 together.

We all just took a freak out break.

There was a dust-millipede crawling near one of the students.

Unable to contain her bug-anxiety she shrieked and got the other students to pick their feet up off the floor

to avoid being crawled on.

Much eeking and shrieking.

Our one and only male student came to the rescue.

He wouldn't kill it.

He said that in some parts of the world bugs like that are sacred.

He scooped it up on a plate and carried it to safety outside the classroom.

Now we're all back to work.

I do this for them.

I push myself to be a better teacher every semester because

no matter how tired

or irritated

or time-strung

or stressed

I care too much about them.

 to give less than my best.

I could take the easy way out and read powerpoint slides to them every week.

I could bore them (and myself) with lectures straight from the book.

It would be so much easier to teach that way but I can't.

I need to give them something of value, something entertaining, uplifting, relevant to real life, memorable and well-prepared.

It's hard.

If it were easy...

how would I grow?

They're my proving ground.

They teach me patience.

They let me know what works.

They inspire me to be better

and do better.

A student just came up to me with a question.

The final essay on the exam is always a reflective one.

She wanted to know if I wanted her to express her opinion.

Yes.

That's why I make them handwrite their essays and hand them to me to keep.

I treasure their opinions.

I wish they really knew how much I love them.

*Lisa's Video Pick of the Day*

She wants to write about a clip I showed from the film "What the Bleep Do We Know?"

where we say how neueral pathways are created and reinforced.

Good choice.

click here or click below

Speak It Out Loud!

I woke up from my nap and cried.
"You should have given me a chance!"
Then the tears stopped and I felt relieved.

Issues are popping up for me,
in my thoughts, randomly,
and
in my dreams, vividly.

I dreamt about my boyfriend, Bill who got married and moved to Michigan
...gosh...15 years ago?
I've lost track of how much time has passed.

We had been together for 9 years starting when I was 14.
In the back of my mind I figured we'd end up together,
 you know, married by default.
In the meantime I lived my life, kinda took him for granted,
dated other guys.

I was a terrible girlfriend.
My logic was that since we began seeing each other at such a young age I "deserved" to experience life by dating other guys. He tolerated it but it must have hurt him.

We never actually broke up.
I moved in with another guy, the ne'er do well boyfriend (who is also married and now lives in North Carolina) still with Bill in the back of my mind as the default, still with Bill coming over to visit on occasion.

Our mothers hung out together.

While I was living with the ne'er do well, Bill met his current wife.
We still spoke.
I was happy for him.
Bill and his wife had their wedding "reception" in my parents' dining room.
I quietly ran out of the room and cried while they cut their wedding cake.

I've been holding some serious regrets in my heart over how that all went down.
 
Before he proposed to her he called me for advice.
They had a fight.
Things weren't going well with my ne'er do well cheating-low-life-boyfriend that I was living with
so hearing that Bill was having relationship problems was timely for me.

He was still living with his mother in his parents'' old house.
He was contemplating marriage because he didn't want to be
a 40 something year old loner living with his mother.

I told Bill that he and I should get a house together, maybe a two family.
He and I could be landlords on the first floor and rent the upstairs to tenants.
It would be his house. I'd pay him rent that he could put toward the mortgage.

That was my solution.
Live together in a business style relationship with me still "free" to do what I pleased.

Looking back it feels paltry and selfish of me to have offered him a non-relationship
as an alternative to making up with his soon-to-be-wife.
He said, "No, I love her..." and the next thing you know they were cutting their wedding cake in my parents' dining room and moving to Michigan.

A few times a year I'll have a dream about him leaving her and moving back to NJ.
Today's dream was one of those dreams.
In the dream I told him how hard it was for me to live alone, how hard I worked and struggled to support myself.
I told him that I regretted not talking him into staying in Jersey and giving me a chance to be a better girlfriend.

When I awoke my face was hot from crying in my dream.
Then the real tears came
and I yelled
"You should have given me a chance!"

Then I felt better.
Not totally better.
It's still an issue for me, the whole Bill thing.
I'm crying as I'm blogging this right now.

In real life would we have been happy?
I dunno.
Logically I know we may or may not have been happy.
Perhaps having a work-horse for a husband (he's a mechanic who always worked 6 days a week plus overtime) would have made me lazy.
Who knows?

Practicality, logic and reason are not what make our bodies hold onto things.
Emotions do.

Issues in the tissues.

Whether we belonged together or not I have regrets.
I feel anger.
I feel abandoned.
I feel bad.
I feel repentant
AND
I've blogged about this before!
But blogging wasn't enough.
I needed to SAY the words out loud
in order to feel some physical release.

That these issues are coming up now, after receiving issue-relieving Integrative Manual Therapy (IMT) yesterday is not surprising.

My cousin Maria, a Reiki Master (click here) always says
"What you don't deal with emotionally, you will deal with physically."

It's true.
It's just plain true.

What IMT taught me is that you need to SAY it to release it.
We need to HEAR OURSELVES SAYING IT in order to feel that relief.
In order to set our cells free of the tyranny of unexpressed emotions we have to speak the words.
The blogging is good
but I'm learning that in order for the body to heal something physical has to occur.

My body needs to vibrate with the actual sounds of the words.

Will I ever have my Bill-regrets dream again?
Not sure.

The road not taken is a helluva regret.
But for now some of the pressure has been taken off.

*Lisa's Video Pick of the Day*
Water.
Kidneys.
Chi.
We have to keep them flowing.
Sound helps.
Did you know there are sounds just for kidneys?
click here or click below

Integrated Manual Therapy: Issues in the Tissues

"Integrative Manual Therapy (IMT) is a unique compilation of diagnostic and treatment methodologies that assess and treat pain, dysfunction, disease and disability. Developed by Sharon Giammatteo, Ph.D., I.M.T.,C. over the past 30 years, IMT is a new approach to health care developed to address the needs of complex patients. IMT practitioners identify and address the underlying causes of dysfunction using a comprehensive and holistic approach...

 

...While IMT diagnostics and treatment modalities are predominately hands-on, IMT also integrates a wide range of diagnostic and treatment technologies, nutritional programs (i.e. natural supplements, diet, and herbs), and IMT body based psychotherapeutic approaches to develop a customized solution for an individual patient's needs. "

- Center IMT: Integrative Manual Therapy and Diagnostics

They had their hands on me for 45 minutes before they started "fixing" me.

For 45 minutes the practitioners did something called mapping to assess the location of my imbalances.

Mapping is similar to scanning used by Reiki practitioners.

The difference is that the IMT (Integrative Manual Therapy) practitioners put their hands on me and kept them there for an hour. There was not a single moment where there wasn't a hand on me.

And their hands got hot.

The chi was roiling.

Three people had their hands on me.

Two students and one supervisor/instructor who came over to me twice to check up on the students.

The instructor asked me if I was eating gluten.

I told him I'd been off gluten since March.

"Do you cheat? Don't cheat," he said.

Then he turned to the students and informed them that

my gut was leaking into my knee.

My sacrum needed to be healed.

Let me say this to anyone reading my blog today.

This method of healing is not for the uninitiated.

The young man working on me was treating me

as a "charity case" meaning I paid nothing for my session.

With the professionalism dropped he was free to spend the entire hour healing me

rather than having to explain or sell me on IMT methods.

I didn't need to be sold.

I could tell I was being treated with compassion and expertise.

These people are energy workers of the highest caliber.

Their approach is  holistic.

Everything mattered.

At one point during the healing the female student said she felt a "still spot" in me.

She asked,

"Do you have trouble saying 'No' to people?"

I nodded.

As soon as I nodded

WHOOSH

a wave of pain left my knee.

"What happened?"

I asked.

They explained that sometimes just acknowledging an emotional issue brings it out of the tissues.

It's no longer stuck or still.

The body becomes free to heal.

"Your issues are in your tissues!" he joked.

As the kept their hands on me

and the heat penetrated my sore spots and "bone bruises"

they mentioned that there are layers of issues.

They fixed (or at least that's what it feels  like they fixed)

the physical issue.

They they helped clear a bit of the emotional issues

then gave me homework.

I am to place the back of my left hand on my lower back right by my kidneys

with my right hand on my knee for 20 minutes at a time.

I am also to place the back of my left hand on my lower back right by my kidneys with my right hand just below my belly button for 20 minutes at a time.

Chi is stored in the kidneys.

It needs to flow from my kidneys to my sacrum and my knee.

Making the connection with my hands will make the energy flow where it needs to go.

What did the session consist of?

A little bit of conversation.

An intake where I indicated my major complaint (the right knee) and gave a quick medical background of my major surgeries.

Lying down on a massage style table and practitioner number one immediately putting his hands on me: head, heart, knee, feet and belly to map me.

Some suggestions for diet (raw is better, avoid gluten, eat a small piece of raw cheese 30 minutes before eating a meal to absorb toxins from the belly).

Suggestion that I do chi gong and tai chi - from a sitting position till my knee can bear weight.

Two practitioners placing their hands on me mapping and then making motility return to my still areas.

A supervisor checking up on them, placing his hands on me briefly and giving them instructions on how to heal my knee and my sacrum.

Hot hands healing me just by having them, palms-down, on my body in different places for an hour.

A question about my ability to say 'no' and an immediate feeling of painless release.

Instructions for homework.

The whole session took one hour.

How does my knee feel?

Healed.

Like it was never injured.

I'm going down for a nap now.

I want this feeling of wholeness and wellness to last.

*Lisa's Video Pick of the Day*

Grandmaster David Harris demonstrates healing Qi gong techniques of the Shun Shen Tao for the sacral region. This video has been donated by Grandmaster David Harris to help massage therapists, Reiki practitioners etc. be more effective working with difficult problems with different sacral conditions.

This IS NOT what I experienced today. The IMT folks used their whole hand palms-down for most of the session, but the idea is similar.

click here or click below 

Healing WITHOUT Surgery??

"You truly DO become what you think about,
and this is not some new age 
utopian idea…it is very real! 
The 'self fulfilling prophecy' concept 
takes a different meaning here,
and it is one 
that is not so far fetched...

...if you plant positive seeds
in your brain, 
your thought process 
becomes one of always seeing 
the proverbial 'silver lining' in every situation, 
spotting new opportunities 
and your productivity 
in all areas of your life
is uplifted. 
You become the 'glass is half full' person 
and 
you constantly improve."

- The Thinking Coach

in You Become What You Think About

We've all heard the idea that "What we think we become."

Buddha said it.

The Secret teaches it.

Visualization techniques rely on it.

Hypnosis uses it.

Our predominant thoughts about a thing have a way of manifesting in reality.

What's this got to do with my knee?

Everything.

My brain sh*ts out all kinds of negativity if I don't keep it under control.

Running on automatic, my mind keeps telling me
how much pain I"m in,

how fat I am,

how cumbersome my body is,

how I'm gaining weight,
how I'm crushing myself,

how I'm desperate, pathetic and weak.

This is understandable.

Every time I take a step and I feel pain in my knee my brain leaps to these negative conclusions

under the guise of being "descriptive".

Yet this description is keeping me prisoner
and it's not the whole truth about me
or my knee
or my potential
or what's really going on with my health.

How do I know?

Since that nice doctor examined my knee on Thursday
I've been feeling better.

The pain is still there but somehow it's easier to bear.
It's not as acute.

The knee is not as tender.

I'm not as hopeless about life every time I put my foot down.

Why?

When she described my probable problem -

torm meniscus aggravating the synovial lining of my knee -

I had wanted to get a picture of it in my mind.

I came home and looked up diagrams of knees.
I wanted to see the synovial capsule for myslef.

When she used the tem 'synovial capsule' I thought of a little pill shaped thingy that secretes synovial fluid.

But she was referring to the whole lining of the knee. The synovial membrane encapsulates and interweaves inside the parts of the knee as you can see in the diagram above.

Now I can SEE my knee in my mind's eye.

I can see the torn meniscus pinching the membrane.

I can see the arthritis causing the inflammation.

I can also see it calming down,
turning from red to pink,

easing,

healing,

becoming less inflamed,

bearing the weight,

becoming whole.

Without the picture in my mind all I had to work with was the pain.

All I could feel was the weakness and irritation.

My imagination filled in the blanks with

more pain,

feelings of failure,

anger,

sadness,

frustration,
irritation

and friction.

With the new picture

and a little certitude about what needs to heal,

I feel better.

stronger,

more hopeful.

The injury feels smaller, more manageable

more heal-able.

Nothing physical happened.

It all happened in my mind.

Tomorrow I see an Integrated Manual Therapist who will

help me get moving in a way that is conducive to healing my knee.

The mainstream way of icing and rest didn't fix me in the long term.

My acupuncturist friend told me that according to Chinese medicine:

Ice is for dead things.

Maybe ice is good if  you're in an ambulance on the way to the emergency room

but for long term care of a knee injury?

Not so much.

According to Dr. Ross Hauser, an expert in healing knees WITHOUT SURGERY...
"One of the first principles is to keep the area moving, while at the same time protecting the joint from strong stresses. Immobilization of the injured joint causes the repaired area to become weaker and thinner and often leads to a stiff joint. This is due to a combination of adhesions in the joint and/or shortening of ligaments, and weakening the site where ligaments and tendons insert to bone. This is why the R.I.C.E. (Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation) treatment protocols for soft tissue injuries are so detrimental to healing. Ligaments are especially sensitive to immobility, therefore it is not recommended for any type of ligament tear or sprain when the joint itself is stable."

Movement.
Go figure.
Good thing I know how to find experts who can help me.
I'll let you know how the IMT goes.

In the meantime I need to fix my mind!

*Lisa's Video Pick of the Day*
Osteopathic Physician (and expert rock climber!) Dr. Julian Sanders
shows us a technique for relieving synovitis in the fingers.
Who knew you could even move fingers that way??
Our bodies  really are miracles of healing.
Thank God for experts who understand and teach about our innate ability to heal.
click here or click below