And so it begins

I had my doctor's appointment on April 30th. Luckily my doctor, Dr. Kutz (with Meriter in Madison) is the best doctor ever and he decided he wanted to play along with my experiment with "the fast diet" by Dr. Michael Mosley and Mimi Spencer.

I finally got into the clinic this past Thursday, May9th to get my beginning stats done. The results of the blood tests are below.

The Good: My blood sugar, kidney function and electrolytes returned normal.  My thyroid function returned normal.  My liver function test were normal.  Triglycerides was 120 and the normal range is less than 1My IGF levels were normal.  IGF-1 is a measure of cell turnover and therefore of cancer risk. It may also be a marker for aging.  This 5:2 diet is supposed to drop the levels of IGF-1 and contribute to cell repair and elongate your life.

Now the bad and the ugly: 
My Cholesterol was 221 (Normal range 0-199)
My LDL (bad cholesterol) was 148 (Normal range 60-129)
My HDL (good cholesterol) was 49 (Normal range more than 50)

Dr. Kutz obviously recommended that I work on improving the above LDLs.  Luckily, this 5:2 diet is supposed to help correct all those things!

Why did Dr. Mosley start all this? Well, he read an article in New Scientist magazine by Dr. Mark Mattson of the National Institute on Aging in Baltimore. Along with co-author Edward Calabrese, Dr. Mattson introduced the idea of "a little poison is good for you". This is a colorful way of describing the theory of Hormesis, the idea that when a human, or any creature, is exposed to a stress or toxin it can toughen them up and improve their system.

Dr. Mosley looks at vegetables through the prism of hormesis: Many veggies taste bitter.  This is because they contain chemicals that are potentially poisonous to humans.  But these chemicals are present in such low levels that our bodies treat the veggies as a small amount of toxin and activate a stress response and switch on genes that protect and repair your cells, like exercise, or in this case, fasting.

The two fasting days cannot be consecutive.  I figured I would start the diet with a fasting day.  I began on Friday, May 10th.  On fasting days, as a woman, I am allowed 500 calories. I had tea and water throughout the day, 1/2 an apple and 20 almonds for breakfast.  Then I had a small chicken breast (3-4 oz) with sweet potatoes.  I did feel hungry.  I was really hungry throughout the day.  Even before I went to bed I felt hungry.  But not overwhelming by any means.

Yesterday was a normal diet day.  I find myself eating A LOT less and wanting less food on the "free" days.  I cannot go crazy.  As a woman I should be consuming 1000-1200 calories (energy) a day on these days.  I was going to my Mom's for Mom Day lunch and ran out of time to eat breakfast.  I would say I ate probably somewhere between 900-1100 calories for the whole day. I have decided to not eat sugar as much as possible.  This is not necessarily a requirement of the diet, but sugar has a lot of calories and very little staying power or nutrition. So I have chosen to take it out of my diet for now.  An unplanned positive side affect from this.  I have had NO, that is right NO heart burn since Friday.  For me, that is like a miracle in itself.

I was not intending, in any way, to make Mom's day a fasting day.  But all of the sudden it was 2pm and I had not had anything to eat and only black coffee for breakfast.  I had 1/2 a bagel and peanut butter for breakfast.  Then had a salad for dinner and it look like this.

Today has been tougher, hunger wise, for some reason.  Even after eating dinner, I feel HUNGRY.

The results so far: I have lost 5 lbs in 3 days.  No heartburn. 

There are other things going on in my life besides this diet, believe it or not ;)  
I *just* started a new documentary project (my cousin Tyler will be the cinematographer). I will be following the Vernon Hershberger case in Sauk County here in WI. On June 2, 2010, representatives of the WI Dept of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer protection (DATCP) conducted a raid at the Vernon Hershberger farm.  DATCP agents intentionally destroyed nearly 300 gals of fresh milk by pouring blue dye into the bulk tan, claiming the milk was "adulterated and misbranded"- even though there was no logical, factual, or scientific basis for this conclusion. The DATCP agents also placed a holding order on all the fresh, wholesome food in coolers on the Hershberger farm, most of which belonged to members of the Hershberger's private buying club and his family. May 20-24th will be when the trial takes place. I look forward to seeing the conclusion of the trial.  Depending on the outcome of the jury trial, the results could have a tremendous impact on non-corporate and other such farmers with food clubs.

I also continue to work on the Marilyn McIntyre Cold Case feature film project with Director, Mary Jo Oathout.  We recently received an incredible amount of information about the trial and investigation leading up to the trial of Curtis Forbes.  So we have begun work on the film's script. Updates to follow.

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there! My life has been made fuller, cooler, more fun, and more loved by my Finnman :)