May 2013 Update on TBSS: The Blood Sugar Solution May Be My Final Solution

I think The Blood Sugar Solution is my final solution. I don't know if I started the program on March 5 or 10, but I'm through the initial round (two weeks of prep and six weeks of continuation). According to the book and the self-testing, I should need another six weeks to reset my body.

Still...I'm losing weight, albeit slower, even with a little cheating (I'm having two squares of 70% chocolate plus the allowed berries daily) and still no daily exercise (just weekly lawn work). Even with the stressors inherent in working freelance: lack of work followed by too much. Prefer the latter, please! Oh, yeah. And my car in the shop. Lord, make it a really cheap repair estimate.

And the biggest stressor of all: DIETING! But this doesn't feel like deprivation....

My flaky scalp has cleared up. Completely. Just halfway through the program, too. I'm not hungry all the time. The bad insatiable kind. In fact, I hardly eat two meals a day. Yet I feel actual hunger before I do eat.

Here are some other random thoughts:

• I'm still hung up on the guacamole with cumin recipe. When I'm working hard, I eat it as a meal in front of my computer. I add beans for more protein and LOVE adding pepitas on top for added crunch. Plus the green of the seeds looks pretty amid the black beans and the avocados. What can I say? I'm an artist. I appreciate these things.
• I'm recently enjoying deviled eggs. I was scrambling eggs for breakfast, along with my crisp sauteed onions and lightly sauteed mushrooms (which I prepared first), but then found I didn't want or need the eggs after my veggies. So, voilà. Deviled eggs. Ready to eat anytime. I took my fave recipe and tweaked it to fit within TBSS's parameters. I replaced the mayo with EVOO. I added more vinegar than usual to make up for the lack of moisture the mayo would give. And then just S&P and some paprika. Sometimes a dash of cayenne pepper when the mood strikes.
• I'm not eating breakfast within an hour of rising (gasp!). I'm eating it as a late brunch instead. So three or four hours later, if that soon. Works for me. Of course, coffee (decaf) fuels me until then.
• And I can see me eating like this forever. In fact, I have already moved into the lifetime event. I'm cheating occasionally but hopefully isolated within one day and not repeated for another week or so.
• I'm not worried about my cheats. I choose them carefully. Even with cheating, I'm eating probably 1% of the sugar (counting bread, rice, pasta too) than I used to eat daily. And I'm okay with that.
• My body is an MSG locator. And may be more sensitive to MSG now than it was before, and it was an automatic response before (well within one hour). I find that my itchy eyes is totally due to MSG. And the upset stomach.
• So while bread may not do my body good, I think my system tolerates Jasmine rice better. Just a hunch. Will test it more after this second six-week period.

Anyway, I'm loving the food plan. Never thought black coffee would taste so wonderful. Or that I could walk past artisan bread in the store or not have pasta every day or so. Well, I did. I have.

And I had none of the withdrawal symptoms I expected and had worked through on earlier plans before this one. No headaches. No tiredness. No fogginess. No irritability. No ravenous hunger.

Amazing. Just amazing.

Okay, back to work. Gotta pay for my car repairs—eek!

Denise Barker, author + blogger + copy editor

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More on TBSS

I really like that there is a two-week intro phase before starting the actual plan of The Blood Sugar Solution. It's brilliant because we are allowed to digress and yet not label it "failing."

And for some reason, this time, this book, this plan, is kind of merging all the great parts from other plans I've read of, if not tried, over the years since my hysterectomy-related weight gain.

Like for instance, this one line from somewhere among Suzanne Somers's books about her Somersize program that, if you want to eat French fries, eat the best ones you can get along with a great big salad so the fiber counteracts the sugar. Good advice.

And from Marilu Henner's Total Health Makeover where she focuses on the whole package and our emotions and other areas of life which can affect our health. This is mindfulness on a bigger scale, like Dr. Hyman teaches in his TBSS books about changing the world, one forkful at a time.

Even my best friend's mother back in my school-going years would stop between each bite to lay down her fork. She was probably practicing the thirty-chews-per-bite philosophy too. We really should take time to enjoy our meals, the food and the company.

From the book Why French Women Don't Get Fat, I gleaned that, yes, I can have what I want just in more Euro-sized portions. (Although this is more for after I complete TBSS's plan.) Plus I understand their foodstuffs meet higher quality standards abroad than ours do. Probably all more organic.

Not to mention the sensitivity diet proposed by J. J. Virgin. Having gone through her twenty-eight-day elimination diet helps me journey through Dr. Hyman's TBSS.

Other changes I've implemented are that I started exercising yesterday and wearing my pedometer again. I see a recipe elsewhere that entices me, and I automatically start exchanging ingredients to conform with TBSS plan—ha!

While I am enjoying my ginger tea daily, I must admit the honey I am adding to it has stalled the downward movement on my scale. Since technically the sweetener comes after the six-week main plan, I'm trying something new today. I'm brewing blackberry-pomegranate green tea to add to my ginger tea, to see if the fruity flavors give me the balance of sweet and spicy hot I prefer.

Sugar is my last frontier.

But I'm invested in this and having already given two weeks and three days to see it work, I'm willing to do my part. I've already seen a nice weight loss during the transition into the main event, my nighttime sinusitis is almost gone, I have more energy, and I'm sleeping less and eating less. Although with the advent of exercise, I may eat more at the start, to level off once my body gets over the shock.

My grocery bill has gone down a bit as well since I'm buying less meat.

Overall, I'd say this is a success even right now, today. Dr. Hyman talks of great changes going on in our bodies aside from any weight loss seen on the scale. My experience confirms that in my own layman's outlook.

And once my body has reset my sweet tooth, I can look forward to adding in rice and honey to my lifelong eating plan.

Works for me. Hope something from these posts helps others out there too.

Denise Barker, author + blogger + copy editor

http://bit.ly/DeniseBarkerBlog

http://bit.ly/AMAZONDeniseBarkerEbooks

http://bit.ly/BNDeniseBarkerEBooks

http://bit.ly/SMASHWORDSDeniseBarkerEBooks

http://bit.ly/KOBODeniseBarkerEBooks