Determined To Succeed

How many of you went to your 20-year high school reunion? Show of hands…anyone…anyone…Bueller…Bueller… Two years ago in August was my 20th anniversary of graduating high school and I didn’t go primarily because, one, it was expensive, and two, because of Facebook. Yes, that nifty little thing called Facebook connected me with so many wonderful people from those days I thought it would be unnecessary to attend.

Well, that was then and this is now.

Recently I learned that good ‘ol Kenwood Academy was hosting an all-class 40-year reunion today, actually held at the school. You know, just like in the movies. In “Superman III,” “Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion,” “Zack and Miri,” and so many more the heroes go back to their respective high schools and the wackiness ensued from there. I always secretly thought that was cool since I was nerdy enough to like certain aspects of my schooling particularly the bricks and mortar that made up my “homes away from home.”

So it was with (mild) reckless abandon that I quickly packed a bag and headed to Chicago today to attend tonight’s festivities. Another thing that is making me happy is the fact that the monies collected actually go to programs at the school, not some cheesy banquet hall, hotel or other facility (and it’s cheaper – God, I am getting old).

Now as you guys know, Chicago food hits you as soon as you get off the plane, but I was good and avoided the temptations of my sweet home Chicago Chicago-style hot dogs (and no offense intended toward my friends in and around Philly. Hot dogs, Italian Beef sandwiches, pizza and Chinese food is all different – and better – here, like when you guys get a cheesesteak from your favorite places). However, I didn’t avoid that temptation for long and had a couple, with everything, fries and (sigh) a Coke.

But it was goooooooooooood!

OK, with the craving for hot dogs out of my system I have to both go for a workout today AND avoid over-indulgence. The latter shouldn’t be too hard, although I do want to eat before I get to the reunion which is tonight because I need to avoid the sweet food temptations of my old neighborhood (Harold’s Chicken or Valois anyone?) as well as the foods being served at the reunion, itself. While I am sure the food will be good, I get in trouble with all-you-could-eat situations like that and want to avoid that if I can.

So where is the middle ground?

Middle ground (and I don’t know why but Middle Earth somehow came to my mind – my PRECIOUS!!!) comes in the form of egg rolls from my favorite place in the world right now for Chinese food. It’s on Michigan Avenue downtown called Sixty-Five Seafood and they have egg rolls, bbq pork noodles, kung pao chicken and pepper steak to die for. They are PRECIOUS!!!!

This means I will be swinging by there later today for a combination late lunch/grab some hometown egg rolls/stave off the other bad foods run. I am so looking forward to it. Then I will be off to the reunion.

I am feeling a bit goofy today. I feel younger. I think about so many things from those many long-put-away days from 1984 – 1988 especially food, when I ate whatever I wanted seemingly without consequence. I think about what I wanted to do in life. I think about where I’d thought I’d be…

…I think about my mom, JoAnn (and you can bet your bottom dollar I will be swinging by the park where I spread her ashes to say HI).

Most of all I think about time and how precious (no reference intended…this time) a gift it is. I may be slightly more than two decades removed from gym period, english class, history, driver’s ed, biology and (ick), trigonometry, but I nowe have a grasp on one thing I didn’t back then – myself and how I eat. I want to be around for a good, long time and losing the weight I did has dramatically helped me prolong my life. It helped me not goive into the self-fulling prophecies of obesity – poor quality of life, immobility and potential sudden medical “episodes” like strokes and heart attacks. It also helped me become more active so I can enjoy things I never could before – like even sitting on a plane, in the middle seat (it was what was available) and not have to worry if I’d be making people uncomfortable on either side, and dancing and bopping to my favorite 80s songs from time to time (I hope they play some tonight).

That is why I am no longer worried about food when I come home. Sure it’s better (it’s always better in your hometown) but nothing – NOTHING – is better than the taste of adding years and quality to your own life.

Now, bring on that reunion and let’s “Wang Chung” tonight, and I will tell Clark Kent, Romy and Michelle, Zack, Miri and Ferris you say HI.

It’s usually not my style to be a bummer on weekends, especially since I have taken to writing just one blog to cover both Saturday and Sunday, but I learned of something rather disturbing and I wanted to share it with you.

The Chicago Sun-Times media wire has reported that a woman with a history of obesity died Thursday after collapsing at a popular eatery in Oak Lawn. Cheryl Varnado-Turner, 44, of 7259 S. Seeley Ave., collapsed at the Portillos restaurant in Oak Lawn and was pronounced dead at 5:59 p.m. Thursday, according to a Cook County Medical Examiner’s spokeswoman. Varnado-Turner has a history of obesity, the spokeswoman said. An autopsy determined Varnado-Turner died of coronary atherosclerosis and dilated cardiomyopathy, and her death was ruled natural.

I learned of this story from a dear friend of mine in Chicago and it really disturbed me on a few levels.

One – The original article didn’t list the name of the restaurant which is weird given that most stories  pull info from the police reports. I knew it was Portillos because my friend told me (she’s from that area). I’ve eaten and enjoyed many-a-meal from Portillos. It’s the place I keep telling you guys about with the delicious Italian Beef sandwiches and Chicago-style hot dogs. I’ve eaten Portillos hot dogs for years, particularly from their downtown Chicago location, and have been guilty of DUIPHD (driving under the influence of Portillos hot dogs).  Shame on the Sun-Times news wire for not saying the name of the place and for giving people enough credit to know it wasn’t their food that killed this woman (but more on that later) but her bad health.

Two – I did that kind of eating at 400 pounds and this woman’s tragic end could have been my own. It could have been me who died in this restaurant, or any restaurant, particularly the Chinese food restaurant I love. I still eat what I want but when I was that weight all it would have taken was one egg roll, hot dog, burger, Italian Beef, or stick of carrot to push me over the edge.

Three – Why is this news? The story made me mad because I doubt a story would have even been written if the woman was thin. It’s because this woman was obese and just happened to pass away in a fast food restaurant that it was news worthy, which leads me even more to think Portillos wanted to disassociate itself not from a tragedy but from obesity since so many fast food chains are feeling the backlash of the obesity epidemic in America. Again shame on the paper for not saying the name but also shame on Portillos for that disassociation.

I understand how easy it is for people, thin people in particular, to misinterpret and misunderstand this situation. I can see how they’d think it’s 100% lack of eating self control without even giving a thought to whether or not  it is sometimes the emotional side driving that eating, or a medical issue, etc.  Many people, yours truly included, don’t use tobacco, alcohol or drugs when bad things happen. We chose food. I still choose food sometimes. I am an emotional eater. It’s not that I don’t have self-control it’s that I eat when I am frustrated or scared or have anxiety. However now I try to do the right things – exercise, eat properly and recognize when I am weak.

It so could have been me.

Do not get me wrong, though. This story also disturbs me because this woman had to have known Portillos wasn’t the best choice for food. O.K., that was a nice way of saying she should have known better (if, indeed, it was just about overeating/eating bad foods and not an undisclosed health or injury problem). If you read this blog you know I firmly believe that we have a responsibility to ourselves as big people to “own the problem” we have. We are obese and we should do something about it instead of waiting for others to solve it for us. But nooooo, thanks to infomercials and other faster, quicker options we get snookered into thinking our weight issues can be solved by others and without the hard work of changing a diet for the better and exercising. It is hard work and it does take time…period.

I am sad for this woman and her family today, not just because they lost a loved one and a woman lost her life but for the ways in which this story will be interpreted. On one hand, some will say “see, she got what she deserved being that big.” And others will say “wow, I need to do something so I don’t end up like that.” And on this weekend I sincerely hope someone of size sees this story and thinks the latter and it helps save a life or two.

This way, Cheryl didn’t die in vain or as a joke like Elvis and his fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches on the toilet. People need and deserve more dignity than that.

Happy Monday, everyone. Did you all have a good weekend? I have to say my weekend was good, and yes, I resisted food temptations and did exercise (even though the temps have consistently been in the 90s and continue to be so). I even resisted the awesomely wonderful smell of movie popcorn and had a Coke Zero (COKE ZERO – BAH!). I wanted a regular Coca-Cola so bad but I resisted, trying so hard to be good. It seems the food binge of a week ago cured me, at least temporarily, of eating like that again.

I woke up kind of late this morning (something that’s getting to be an annoying habit) and realized I have a speaking engagement to do this evening. I always feel pretty natural in front of crowds or on TV but I always feel the excitement, anxiousness and anticipation of speaking in front of a group, especially when weight loss is the subject.

Losing weight is truly one of the most personal things I have ever done and sometimes it hurts to remember and talk about things associated with my weight gain because a lot of it has to do with my mom and how we lived. I think back to when I was a fat kid and how all we had in the house was crap to eat. The guilt comes when I think about stuff like that because my mom, JoAnn, always did her absolute best to keep a roof over our heads and food in our tummies. For that I will always love you, Mama, and thank you. It wasn’t the best food but it was food, however it is part of what made me a fat kid.

It is especially alarming when you see how my personal story matches up with data just released in June in the report “F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America’s Future 2010.” Adult obesity rates increased in 28 states in the past year, and declined only in the District of Columbia (D.C.), according to the report from the Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). More than two-thirds of states (38) have adult obesity rates above 25 percent. In 1991, no state had an obesity rate above 20 percent.

That’s a helluva way to wake up on a Monday morning.

The report also highlights troubling racial, ethnic, regional and income disparities in the nation’s obesity epidemic. For instance, adult obesity rates for Blacks and Latinos were higher than for Whites in at least 40 states and the District of Columbia; 10 out of the 11 states with the highest rates of obesity were in the South — with Mississippi weighing in with highest rates for all adults (33.8 percent) for the sixth year in a row; and 35.3 percent of adults earning less than $15,000 per year were obese compared with 24.5 percent of adults earning $50,000 or more per year.

To put this into personal terms, and from what I remember from my mom’s paycheck, she earned an estimated $19,200 a year. Wow. That’s the first time I did that math in my head and figured out how up-against-it we were in terms of income, bills and health. Of course being lower income we were heavier. All the foods we could afford were bad-for-you foods but foods we could get to carry us from one week to the next.

It was what we had, but it helped make me fat. That is part of the vicious circle. That is part of my guilt in talking about it. But I have never hidden from it and have always been honest with you about things like that. How can I when nearly one-third of children and teens are obese or overweight. I am trying my best to help in any way I can and say we have to do better.

I am lucky, I know that. I am lucky because I bottomed out and realized I had to do something. I am lucky because I had support doing it. I am lucky because I now know my triggers and can stop myself if needs be. Not everyone has that. Some people have others, even loved ones or family members, trying to sabotage them. And some people unfortunately just don’t have safe places to play or workout and can’t afford healthier food.

Tonight when I speak to this group I’m going to do what I always do…tell my story and hope it helps inspire people to lose weight or others in their lives to lose weight. I wish, though, I could send money via Western Union to me and my mom way back then. Like instead of sending it anywhere in the world I would send it anywhen so I could help us out. I always wanted to help my mom, she worked so hard. I guess the only thing I can do now is honor her by staying as healthy as I can.

It’s not easy at all resisting the smell of warm, buttered popcorn popping in a theater lobby before a movie. Hell, it’s part of the movie going experience. But when you consider how many calories are in that popcorn, and how many people (including yours truly) are overweight and eating that stuff, choices at the concession stands are made simpler.

I want to be around for a good long time, no matter how jarring waking up on Mondays can be.

They say ignorance is bliss and I totally agree.

Take for example celebrities like that ultimate asshole Mel Gibson, whose tirade against his girlfriend – laced with racial epithets – showed the darkest sides of human beings. Who would have ever known he was one of the biggest angry, sexist racists on the planet? Not only has he offended Jews, Blacks, women and Hispanics but he is also a misogynist of the worst degree who will never again receive one thin dime of my money or one fleeting minute of my time watching anything he is a part of.

Sad to say that extends to films so much a part of my movie-going past (”Lethal Weapon,” Mad Max”) but who cares. I ain’t going to patronize someone or something that has, at it’s core, evil. Was I better off not knowing about this side of him? Debatable. On one side I could still have those wonderful movie memories of him saving his black best friend, Danny Glover from racists in “Lethal Weapon 2″ (oh, irony, I feel thy sting), him challenging Tina Turner to the ultimate road rage duel in “Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome” or him talking about freedom in “Braveheart.” Hell, I would also still be cherishing the moment I actually met him years ago when he was out promoting “The Passion of the Christ.” On the other, I would rather know so that I no longer line his pockets with my money – money he is obviously using to further his own hatred.

That said, I can say the same about the restaurant chain Friendly’s. In all the hype over KFC’s Double Down sandwich (the infamous one that features two fried chicken patties as bread to bacon, cheese and a “special sauce”) I didn’t hear much about Friendly’s new monstrosity that makes the Double Down look like diet food. It’s called the Ultimate Grilled Cheese Burger Melt and it replaces the traditional bun with two grilled cheese sandwiches and totals – sit down for this one – 1,500 calories!!!!

Holy crap!!!! Are they kidding me? Are they kidding us all? The answer is no. This is a real menu item that, sad to say is three times the caloric intake of a KFC Double Down. In other words I COULD EAT THREE KFC DOUBLE DOWNS TO EQUAL ONE ULTIMATE GRILLED CHEESE BURGER MELT! Who in the hell thought of having grilled cheese sandwiches (delicious by themselves, just one of them, with a cup of tomato soup) serve as bread to a burger?! This during a time when obesity rates have increased in 28 states over the past year. In Pennsylvania and Delaware, 28 percent of adults are obese, in New Jersey the number is 24 percent.

Egads! I know that restaurants are not in the business to make people healthy by policing what we as consumers choose to eat. They are in the business to make money by offering “foods” that appeal to people, younger people especially while not necessarily keeping you guys aware of how bad these things are for you. Like that dirty little secret a certain actor had been hiding all these years, taking our money while we consumed his “talent.” Well, my friends, just check out the “talent” of the Ultimate Grilled Cheese Burger Melt:

1500 Calories
870 Fat Calories
79g Total Fat
38g Saturated Fat
180g Cholesterol
2090mg Sodium
101g Carbs
9g Dietary Fiber
4g Sugar
54g Protein

That is horrendous! And believe me when I tell you THAT’S NOT THE WORST THING ON THEIR MENU! Don’t believe me? Check out Friendly’s Mushroom Swiss Bacon Burger, Loaded Waffle Fries or their “Create Your Own” Chicken Strips Entree. Their menu can be found by CLICKING HERE. See for yourself how heinous this place is.

I am not saying that every restaurant chain doesn’t have their own dark and dirty menu secrets. They do, I am sure of it. But that’s why I do my best not to have them. One of the coolest things the State of New Jersey did was compel all chains to actively display (both drive-thru and in-restaurant) basic nutritional info so you can make more educated choices about what we consume.

Was it better not knowing how much sodium was in Friendly’s Loaded Waffle Fries? Debatable. I loved ‘em and they were a great snack food. But now that I know that they have over 4,720 mgs of sodium I will not ever let Friendly’s receive one thin dime of my money or one fleeting minute of my time eating or indulging in anything they are a part of.

When restaurant chains create foods that “one-up” another chain’s food by simply making it bigger and nastier, like Hollywood blockbuster movies in the summer movie season, it’s time to say no more. I will not consume what you are throwing out there just because it’s out there.

That goes for you, too, Mel Gibson. You and Friendly’s are dead to me.

P.S.: Unlike the KFC Double Down which I tried to take a bullet for our team, I sure as hell won’t be doing that for this new Friendly’s concoction. Not in a million years. I’d rather see another Mel Gibson movie first.

Last night I had the hell scared out of me.

I had the occasion to do some catch-up with a friend of mine over dinner last night. It was a cool and casual dinner, and a few delicious happy hour pineapple martinis and mini-burger and egg roll appetizers were consumed. It was great, that is until my friend told me about a friend of theirs who had recently had a stroke, two of them, in fact…

…and he is only 38.

That news hit me like a ton of bricks. A guy who is ONE YEAR YOUNGER THAN I AM has had two strokes and is now dealing with the realities of recuperation and recovery from them, and he’s only 38.

“A year younger than me,” I thought to myself, ““My God, that guy could have easily been me by now.”

While the evening continued on for at least an hour past that piece of news it never left me. It sat next to me the rest of the night. It made me put down the appetizers and the martinis. It sobered me up and followed me home when the catch-up was over. As I lay in bed I thanked God, my lucky stars, guardian angel, mom, fate, destiny, karma and everyone and everything else I could that I was alive and well enough to be able to do the things I do these days. It is not news to you guys that I firmly believe my quality of life would have suffered severely if I didn’t lose weight and had remained 400 pounds. I had high blood pressure that would have kept going. I had arthritis that would have gotten worse with age. I had sleep apnea causing me to stop breathing during sleep. I might even be dead.

When I got up this morning I was still very troubled by the news I’d heard. I was also curious about obesity and the roll it plays in strokes.

For those of you lucky enough to never have known what a stroke is, a stroke occurs when there’s a problem with the amount of blood in your brain. The cause of the main type of stroke — ischemic stroke — is too little blood in the brain. The cause of the other type of stroke — hemorrhagic stroke — is too much blood within the skull.

About 80 percent of strokes are ischemic strokes. They occur when the arteries to your brain are narrowed or blocked, causing severely reduced blood flow (ischemia). This deprives your brain cells of oxygen and nutrients, and cells may begin to die within minutes. The most common ischemic strokes are:

• Thrombotic stroke. This type of stroke occurs when a blood clot (thrombus) forms in one of the arteries that supply blood to your brain. A clot usually forms in areas damaged by atherosclerosis — a disease in which the arteries are clogged by fatty deposits (plaques).
• Embolic stroke. An embolic stroke occurs when a blood clot or other particle forms in a blood vessel away from your brain — commonly in your heart — and is swept through your bloodstream to lodge in narrower brain arteries. This type of blood clot is called an embolus. It’s often caused by irregular beating in the heart’s two upper chambers (atrial fibrillation). This abnormal heart rhythm can lead to poor blood flow and the formation of a blood clot.

“Hemorrhage” is the medical word for bleeding. Hemorrhagic stroke occurs when a blood vessel in your brain leaks or ruptures. Hemorrhages can result from a number of conditions that affect your blood vessels, including uncontrolled high blood pressure (hypertension) and weak spots in your blood vessel walls (aneurysms). A less common cause of hemorrhage is the rupture of an arteriovenous malformation (AVM) — an abnormal tangle of thin-walled blood vessels, present at birth. There are two types of hemorrhagic stroke:

• Intracerebral hemorrhage. In this type of stroke, a blood vessel in the brain bursts and spills into the surrounding brain tissue, damaging cells. Brain cells beyond the leak are deprived of blood and are also damaged. High blood pressure is the most common cause of this type of hemorrhagic stroke. Over time, high blood pressure can cause small arteries inside your brain to become brittle and susceptible to cracking and rupture.
• Subarachnoid hemorrhage. In this type of stroke, bleeding starts in a large artery on or near the surface of the brain and spills into the space between the surfaces of your brain and your skull. This type of hemorrhage is often signaled by a sudden, severe “thunderclap” headache. This type of stroke is commonly caused by the rupture of an aneurysm, which can develop with age or be genetically inherited. After the hemorrhage, the blood vessels in your brain may widen and narrow erratically (vasospasm), causing brain cell damage by further limiting blood flow to parts of your brain.

A transient ischemic attack (TIA, or ministroke) is a brief episode of symptoms similar to those you’d have in a stroke. The cause of a transient ischemic attack is a temporary decrease in blood supply to part of your brain. Most attacks last just a few minutes. However, in contrast to a stroke which involves a more prolonged lack of blood supply and causes some permanent damage to your brain tissue, a TIA doesn’t leave lasting effects to your brain. Still, if you’ve had a TIA, it means there’s likely a blocked or narrowed artery leading to your brain, putting you at a greater risk of a full-blown stroke that could cause more permanent damage. If you’re having a TIA, get emergency medical treatment and make sure your regular physician knows about it.

Why am I telling you guys this heavy stuff today? Because I want to scare the hell out of you, too. Why? The higher a person’s degree of obesity, the higher their risk of stroke — regardless of race, gender and how obesity is measured, according to a recent study published in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association who said the higher a person’s degree of obesity, the higher their risk of stroke – regardless of sex or race.

However, stroke is more likely among obese blacks than obese whites. Hiroshi Yatsuya, M.D., Ph.D., study lead author and visiting associate professor at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and colleagues followed 13,549 middle-aged black and white men and women in four U.S. communities from 1987 through 2005. Participants started the study free of cancer and cardiovascular disease.

During the follow-up period of about 19 years, 598 ischemic strokes occurred. The researchers calculated incidence rate — the number of new cases per 1,000 people per year — according to groups representing different degrees of obesity, using each obesity measure.

They found that incidence rates differed substantially between whites and blacks. For example, the stroke rate in the lowest BMI category was 1.2 per 1,000 person-years for white women and 4.3 per 1,000 person-years for black women. The rate in the highest BMI category was 2.2 for white men and 8.0 for black men.

“Black women had about three times higher incidence of stroke than white women in the lowest as well as in the highest BMI categories,” Yatsuya said. “But the correlation between increasing stroke incidence and increasing degree of obesity was apparent in both races and genders.”
“Since individuals with higher degrees of obesity tended to have higher blood pressure levels or higher diabetes prevalence, we further examined the relationship between the degree of obesity and ischemic stroke incidence by statistically adjusting for difference in blood pressure of diabetes status attributed to the degree of obesity,” Yatsuya said. “That significantly weakened the associations, suggesting these major risk factors explain much of the obesity-stroke association.”

My friends, strokes remain among the top five leading causes of death. The Archives of Internal Medicine published a study showing that people who are overweight by 20% or less carry a 50% increased probability of suffering a stroke. The study also explained that being more than 20 percent overweight carried a risk that was twice as high. Because of these statistics, it’s important to know how weight and strokes are related. The tell-tale effect is that extra weight affects arteries by narrowing them. With narrowed arteries, it becomes easier for blood clots to form, which could cause a stroke later on. The narrowing of the arteries can be compounded by hypertension, low exercise level and a diet that contains a lot of cholesterol. Unfortunately, some (but certainly not all) overweight people don’t exercise regularly and eat high-cholesterol diets, which increases their stroke risk dramatically. On the flip side, healthy eating habits and exercise can decrease your risk of a stroke later on.

As I sit here and type I am looking out of the stop sign-shaped window next to my desk. I am looking at the blue sky above (which has, at most, a very few whispy clouds floating through it) and I feel as though I’ve woken up from a nightmare. Losing weight has had a dramatic effect on my life to say the least. However, I realize I have been concentrating on the effects you mostly see and feel, not necessarily on the effects you DON’T see: like how much I’ve prolonged my life and like how much I’ve dramatically reduced the chances of strokes, heart attacks and diabetes all by losing the weight I did. Sometimes good can happen when you cannot see it and these positive effects are there the more you see your numbers come down on the scale.

Having the hell scared out of you may add grey hairs to your head, but sometimes being scared is a good way to avoid being scared to death. Know what I mean?

You guys know me and my fave beverage of choice – an ice-cold Coca-Cola. However I am not sure if I’ve ever told you guys about my extreme dislike for Diet Coke. Yes, as much as I love “regular” I can’t stand the taste of “unleaded.” I am also one of those people who will only drink certain diet sodas because of the crappy after taste. On my list of decent diet drinks: Diet Dr. Pepper, Diet Canada Dry Ginger Ale, TAB and Diet A&W Root Beer. Other than those few I’d rather drink motor oil (well, OK, I wouldn’t but you get the picture).

As we start having warmer days and want to get our bodies in shape for summer (mine included), my thoughts turn to diet soft drinks. So many people I know love – LOVE – diet drinks, especially Diet Coke. But as today’s temperatures climb to almost 90-degrees here in the Philadelphia/South Jersey area I am wondering exactly how (and if) diet drinks will actually help someone lose weight? Well, more and more studies show they aren’t helping. They also show they even hurt.

Some food (or drink) for thought today before you “hit the road:”

Diet soda isn’t the silver bullet to weight loss it’s often made out to be. Nor does it prevent weight gain. In fact, drinking diet soda is strongly correlated with obesity. When people drink sweet diet sodas our bodies get the message that sweet, high-calorie foods are coming to nourish it. However, when no sweets and/or calories follow the body gets confused: where are the promised calories we need? This may then stimulate your hunger for other high-calorie, sweet foods and drinks (sweeter cereals, snacks, breads and desserts) which may, in turn, lead to weight gain. Also, by getting ourselves used to so much artificial, higher-concentrated sweet, normal sweet flavors such as fruit become bland and so do other healthful foods such as grains and vegetables, thus reducing our willingness to consume them and ultimately the quality of our diet is affected

Further, some health experts speculate that, while diet soda doesn’t cause obesity, people who are starting to put on weight think choosing diet soda alone will stop the process. Meaning, you can’t go into a fast-food restaurant, eat a high-calorie, fatty meal and say, ‘Oh, it’s OK, because I had diet soda.’ If you don’t do anything else but switch to a diet soft drink, you are not going to lose weight. Also, drinking multiple cans of diet soda every day squeezes out from our diets the healthful beverages – juices, water and teas – that can best benefit and truly hydrate our bodies.

Finally, there is still some suspicion – not confirmed – that aspartame, the low-calorie chemical used to sweeten diet sodas, may have some bad health effects. Some animal studies have linked consumption of high quantities of the chemical to brain tumors and lymphoma in rodents. The Food and Drug Administration has certified the sweetener’s safety, but reported side effects include dizziness, headaches, diarrhea, memory loss and mood changes.

Eeeeeewwwwww! He said diarrhea….

A diet soda study, conducted by the University of Texas Health Science Center, studied data on 1,550 Americans ages 25 to 64. The participants were studied for 7 to 8 years. Results showed that total soft drink consumption was tied to increased rates of obesity, but – perhaps surprisingly – participants drinking only diet soda faced the highest obesity rate of all, even greater than that of participants drinking both regular and diet drinks. What exactly is the obesity risk for diet pop (as we say in Chicago and the Midwest) drinkers? The study found an obesity risk of 37.5% for those drinking 1/2 to 1 can of diet soda daily, 54.5% risk of obesity for those drinking 1 to 2 cans daily, and a whopping 57.1% risk for those drinking more than 2 diet pops per day.

Wow!

With so much to do today remember healthier choices abound. Start your day with a small glass of 100 percent fruit juice. Drink skim milk with meals. Sip water throughout the day. For variety, try sparkling water or add a squirt of lemon or cranberry juice to your water. Save diet soda for an occasional treat if you want to have it because, like anything and everything else, taken in moderation it’s OK.

Just not as OK as you might think (or drink).

Yesterday, I talked to a new friend of mine in Chicago who had recently told me about their extremely overweight friend, “Elle.” Elle is part of a lunch-bunch-like group of ladies who meet every week or couple of weeks and have fun, shoot the bull and, well, have lunch (or coffee or whatever).

Anyway, my friend, as well as others in the group, are very worried about Elle. You see, Elle is not just overweight, she is morbidly so. My friend guestimates Elle’s weight to be probably close to 400 lbs.  But moreover, Elle is having such bad health problems because of it she is in serious health danger. Elle is of fair complexion but her legs have turned dark thanks to lack of circulation. She has developed circulatory sores or ulcers on her legs for which she sees the wound center at the hospital. And she probably has more problems none of the others know about because Elle isn’t talking. Elle is floating down the river of denial (which ain’t just a river in Egypt). And she is floating closer and closer to losing her legs and, ultimately, losing her life.

Wanna know the kicker?

Elle works in a hospital, where she has access to all the health advice and care in the world, and her own brother is a doctor. When I heard that I couldn’t believe it. Here is a woman who is slowly killing herself by not addressing her growing health problems and SHE HAS HELP RIGHT AT HER FINGERTIPS!!!!

I asked my friend how the others feel and they are all concerned. Elle comes from a family that all but ignores the seriousness of the problem. Mom jokes “there goes my big girl,” but none of them address it. Apparently they are all bad at really discussing feelings and serious problems. Yes, it’s one of those families – just don’t talk about it and it will go away. Elle’s best friend, “Marney” is concerned but has given up on trying to help Elle. At this point she is more concerned with rocking the boat and losing the friendship than actually practicing tough love and risking that to potentially save someone’s life. Her excuse – if Elle wanted to do something she’d do it for herself. “I can’t make her do it.”

I sat and thought about that the rest of yesterday. It is very true that all of us overweight people, assuming we do not have health issues/conditions preventing us from losing weight, have a responsibility to help ourselves and take responsibility for our obesity. Absolutely. But I could not believe my ears when I heard Marney was more concerned about losing the friendship rather than stepping in. Doesn’t she understand that if Elle continues down this path she will lose her anyway? Whether it is piece by piece (amputations and surgeries) or all at once (stroke, heart attack)?

My friend is trying one last time to reach Elle and get her to see what’s going on. I am so keeping my fingers crossed that Elle WANTS help. Because if she doesn’t it’s over. It’s just a matter of time. And did I mention that Elle just got married last year after finally finding true love? What will he have to go through taking care of her? Why doesn’t he help?

There come times in our lives when we say the following tragic sentence: “I wish I could have done more to help…” How many times do we wish we could turn back the hands of time to help someone, or help ourselves, out of a situation that, with a little help, could have turned out differently? My friend, Marney and the rest of the group are at a time in Elle’s life when they could help Elle. At least try their best to intervene and save Elle’s life, not worrying whether or not Elle will be mad but worrying about Elle will be dead. But they turn a blind eye and a deaf ear. Tisk Tisk.

Why am I so passionate about this? I recently found out a dear friend of mine was mad at me – actually mad at me – for getting to be 400 pounds. She said “Bill, you  have always been this great guy but you were so big I was mad that you let yourself get that way. You were killing yourself.” Then I asked “Why didn’t you say anything?” And my friend said “Because it wasn’t my place.” Oh, but it was. Being the person I am, if my friends came to me and expressed concerns about my health and threatened to cut me off if I didn’t do anything I sure as hell would have. As it stands I was lucky. I bottomed out and helped myself. But Elle and her friends are at the crossroads.

If you know someone who is risking their lives with a behavior you (AND THEY) know is bad, say something. It shows you care. It shows you give a damn. It shows you want them around for years and decades to come. It actually might help make a difference. Tough love is still love and, in most cases, is the love that is NEEDED even though it’s not necessarily love that’s WANTED.

I do not want any of you, especially those of you involved in a weight loss journey, to ever say “I wish I could have done more to help.” And you know exactly why…

…because we don’t say that at weddings, bar/bat mitzvahs or office parties…we usually say that kind of sentence at funerals.

All you can eat.

All of us have heard of that offer and most of us have taken advantage of it at one time or another taken advantage of it either at office parties, salad bars or restaurants like Old Country Buffet. I have friends who think buffets are great and others who think buffets are nasty and to be avoided at all costs. But no matter which way you slice your ninth dinner roll, “all you can eat” is one of the biggest problems facing our country today particularly in our fight against obesity.

My first experiences with “all you can eat” came when I was a kid. My mom used to take me to a small place in Hyde Park called the Cafe Enrico on 53rd Street. From what I remember it was pretty cool and being a kid I thought it was the pinnacle of fine dining. And on Friday nights this treasure from my childhood served an “all you can eat” fried perch dinner. Living without much money meant this was a wonderful option for us to not only eat out but also eat well, and we took full advantage of it.

Again…

…and again…

…and again.

I remember one time in particular when I got three helpings of that delicious deep-fried perch. Hell, I even think I pissed off the waitress at the time because I remember seeming annoyed she had to keep bringing me slices of this culinary delight.

As I grew older, “all you can eat” took on different forms. I loved (LOVED) my Chinese food “all you can eat” buffets. Oh My God, are you kidding? They are delicious to me. Deep-fried orange/spice chicken, rice, beef with peppers – yummy. I could eat all day. But most notably in my life was Old Country Buffet. My mom loved eating at Old Country Buffet for the exact reasons I loved eating at Cafe Enrico. If you have ever been to an OCB you know they serve lots (AND I DO MEAN LOTS) of foods that are not that healthy for you. But it was cheap and mom liked it (and so did I) so we ate there again…

…and again…

…and again.

As we have become the heaviest nation in the world I am reminded of the “endless bowl of soup” parable I heard while attending One Day University recently in New York. Amherst professor Catherine Sanderson told us about the study of people who were given a magic soup bowl which was rigged from the bottom to always fill with soup no matter how much the consumer ate. At the end it was found that people using this “endless bowl of soup” at  two- to three-times as much as people whose bowls were allowed to empty. This proves that not only the attractiveness of food but also portion size influences eating decisions in our country.

And in this economy I can’t say I completely blame us for wanting a “bigger bang” for our buck.

But you guys know as well as I do quantity does NOT equate to quality.And just because you can have three or four plates of crap doesn’t mean you are eating well. It just means that we, as a country, are eating to excess.

My mom always did the best for me she could and I know that. I actually feel horrible writing about these times with my mom going to Friday night “all you can eat” perch nights because they are treasured memories with my her (and some Pac-Man games were thrown in there, too). However,  it is part of why I became an obese child. I am sure that part of what drives families to places like Old Country Buffet on a regular basis is that want to provide food for the entire family but it is also part of what makes families and children in this country obese as well. But we need to stop. Eating so much is slowly killing us. We are sacrificing eating healthy for sheer size and that is wrong. I am living proof of it. Or should I say my high blood pressure, sleep apnea and aching joints were proof of it.

If I do eat “all you can eat” these days it is at a salad bar and I only have two helpings at most. Not just because I get fuller faster now but because I give my brain enough time to register that I have eaten and I am getting full. I make the conscious decision to walk away and not go for a third or, mom help me, fourth plate. And I know that making smarter choices like these equates to one thing…

…I know I will be living a much longer life.

Am I here to tell you never to eat “all you can eat” ever again? Certainly not. There will always be people in your life who love the Old Country Buffets of the world (I love you, mama). But if and when you can use the money you’d spend and go to a grocery store. But fruits and vegetables. Make meals at home. Create a yummy soup that could last for days. Put yourself at the top of your priority list instead of your wallet.

By doing that you’ll not only help your waist line (and our collective American waistline) but you’ll be able to enjoy life’s many wonderful foods for many more years to come.