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The Plan: Day Three

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on January 15, 2013 – 11:04 pm -

126.2 – a rather disheartening start to a food disaster day. I had hopped out of bed at 3am after I remembered I needed to put my flax seeds for this morning in water, but that ended up being the least of my worries. It was a day care day for gma, and as usual, I was hustling to get there at a reasonable time. As I flipped though The Plan day 3, I saw I had NOTHING pre-prepared, and no time to make anything, so I packed up some of the sauteed veg w/rice and coco sauce for lunch and bunged it in the car and got a mug of granola ready to eat on the way. When I got to day care, I looked in my backseat and realized that I set down my purse and granola in the garage so I could help gma down the stairs, but I forgot to pick them back up. Thankfully, I at least had the veg to eat, though it made my belly blow up massively. When I got back home, I again didn’t have time to prepare food before play rehearsal, so I put some carrot ginger soup in a mug and grabbed my granola from earlier. I finally made it to Family Nutrition Center to pick up the probiotic,
but by that time I was starving and couldn’t make myself eat that cold flavorless crap again, so I went to Noodles & Co and picked up some Indonesian Noodles. And they were goooood. Though, of course, they made my belly blow up, like at every meal. I hope the probiotics help. Perhaps I’ll do day 3 again tomorrow. This food is miserable and boring. Lawd, give me the strength!!!


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The Plan: Day Two

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on January 14, 2013 – 10:32 pm -

Weight: 122.8. Roughly normal, and recovering nicely from the pizza, queso, and veggie burger that enflamed my body (6.6 pounds worth!) after the weekend. I left the blueberries off the flax cereal today and, though I wasn’t lethargic, my belly still blew up massively. (I consoled myself with a latte – FAIL.) Thankfully, Lyn Genet responds to tweets super-fast, and we determined after a few back-and-forths that I’ll need to add the add Renew Life’s Probiotic with 30 billion organisms.

Due to my usual dilly-dallying, I did not manage to eat dinner before my plasma donation appointment, and it sucked the life out of me. I couldn’t even stand up at play rehearsal and I thought I was going to either puke or pass out (or worse, a combination of the two!). The stage manager gave me her Subway chocolate chip cookie and some Sprite and I only hesitated for about a second before I devoured them. I was in the first scene and was still so woozy that I needed to use my book (for a part I’ve had memorized for weeks now), but did fine without the book for the second scene that I’d previously memorized, and actually went off-book for the first time on the third scene and did quite well.

I felt a little guilty about the cookie, but it saved the night. I still feel great hours later, so I guess I “tested” the chocolate chip cookie and have nothing to worry about there 🙂

Subway chocolate chip cookie

My savior.

Tomorrow I’ll hopefully have time to pick up the probiotic. Fingers crossed for a day less dramatic.


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The Plan: Day One

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on January 13, 2013 – 10:23 pm -

Day One was not a success by any account.  My starting weight was 129.4, meaning I gained about 6 pounds this weekend from the pizza, Boca Burger, and queso.  Not the greatest starting point.  Despite only having half a cup of tea, I felt great, chopping and cooking up veg for the next three days.  As usual, I didn’t want to ruin how good I felt by eating, but finally gave in at 2, not due to hunger, but because I didn’t want to mess up my timetable.  I had the flaxseeds w/blueberries and coconut milk without the dried fruit or nuts, but felt extremely lethargic as soon as I finished the bowl.  I didn’t have time to lay down because I had to go to work, so I was compelled to have my leftover half a latte from yesterday and snacked on pickled beet strips as I cut them for my carrot salad.  My belly then blew up as big as it’s ever been.  So were the flaxseeds, blueberries, or the coco milk the cause of the lethargy, and were one of those things or the beets or the latte the cause of the belly?  I find it hard to believe it was the latte, since I have one (or two or three) every morning (ok, into the afternoon) without problems.  It could be the beet; we were supposed to use fresh, but I didn’t have any on hand and forgot that vinegar could be one of the things I was reacting to.

Carrot salad with pickled beets.

Was this the big belly culprit?

I was so starved when I got home from work that I ate some potato cubes my mom made, but I figured that wasn’t the biggest of deals since potatoes are on tomorrow’s menu anyway.

So, epic fail.  A cereal that is supposed to be so low reactive that it’s intended to be our breakfast for every day of The Plan was as sleepifying as a Xanax, causing me to need a latte just to stay awake.  In addition, I experienced my usual pregnancy belly from a mystery source, which is not very helpful when trying to collect data.

I’d like to say there’s nowhere to go but up, but in my case, unfortunately, that’s true – up on the scale, at least 🙁


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“The Plan” Elimination Diet

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on January 12, 2013 – 11:58 pm -

For several years, but especially since I’ve been in Wisconsin, I’ve felt like I have no control of my body.  One week my jeans are so loose that I make a mental note to pick up a new pair, but before I can get to the store the same jeans are so tight I can’t leave the house in them.  Most every meal I eat makes me sick, so I eat as little as possible, but still gain weight.  My least favorite and most prevalent reaction is an immediate pregnancy belly, equivalent to 8 months, which nothing can hide and sticks around for the majority of the day.  I’m sporting it right now, in fact, because I had frozen pizza and a Boca burger today.  It made an appearance after my Thanksgiving dinner, which was one serving each of mashed potatoes and green bean casserole.  It also appeared about every other day in between those days, and for most of the year before it.  Often, the belly appears after eating something I find particularly virtuous, such as homemade minestrone or a spinach smoothie.  After a couple pieces of deep dish at Old Chicago last year I staggered and slurred my words like my blood alcohol was .20.  After eating half a roasted zucchini stuffed with homemade bean & veggie chili, my sinus passages closed for several hours and my face was red hot like I’d broiled in the midday sun.  Underlying all the acute symptoms are general feelings of malaise: extreme lethargy, congestion, joint creakiness, PMS, and a general feeling of being aged.  I supposed it could be a side effect of Hashimoto’s, but I didn’t really believe it.

About a month ago, I saw a wee blurb from the new book The Plan: Eliminate the Surprising “Healthy” Foods That Are Making You Fat–and Lose Weight Fast by Lyn-Genet Recitas.  While working as a nutritionist at a holistic health center in Harlem, she recommended the usual superfoods to her clients, such as blueberries, spinach, beans, oatmeal, and salmon, but found many of her clients were actually gaining weight on them.  Lyn-Genet began carefully monitoring her clients’ food diaries and developed the food testing methodology outlined in The Plan.  During testing, she discovered shocking tidbits such as that 85% of people react negatively to salmon – who’d have thought?

I’d tried an elimination diet before but only had a bare bones outline of what I could and couldn’t eat and no real plan, so I was hOngray and ornery for the baseline period (which was 3 weeks vs. Lyn-Genet’s 3 days).  I introduced too many new things on my first test meal (a falafel salad, containing not only my test ingredient, beans, but also a few pita chips [wheat] and some yogurt sauce [dairy]), so when I developed an immediate headache, lethargy, and congestion after , but I didn’t know from which ingredient.  After being so dang hOngray for 3 weeks, I couldn’t bear going back to the drawing board, so I gave up.  But now I have The Plan, which tells me exactly what to eat, how to introduce new foods, and how to measure and record each day’s data.

Tomorrow is day one, and I’m scurred.  Scurred that I will react to every food I put in my mouth and discover that my digestive system is irreparably damaged.  Scurred that I won’t plan ahead and have the proper foods with me and will get so hOngray that I will take down a Subway sandwich and anything else that happens to be nearby.  Even scurred that I will follow The Plan to the letter and feel no better.  But I’m doing it anyway.

The Plan 2013: because you can’t take over the world when you’re sleeping 12 hours a day.


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This egg salad recipe is perhaps the best egg salad recipe ever

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on June 27, 2012 – 11:15 pm -

The whites weren’t as firm as I would’ve liked, but another minute or two off the heat would’ve done it.  I’m taking it easy on the bread, so I ate this atop a bed of romaine, spinach, and shredded zucchini.  Seriously, this may be the best egg salad ever.


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Like Caprese Salad, but different

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on July 22, 2010 – 8:42 pm -

I still can’t reach my stove, and it’s still a little hot, yet a girl’s still gotta eat.  I have a bowl of ripe tomatoes thanx to my BF’s garden bonanza, so I pulled up a recipe I was emailed from Lee Kum Lee a while back.

Like caprese, but different

Mine was not this pretty.

Ingreds:

4 Tbsp. soy sauce
1 Tbsp. sesame oil
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 pinch black pepper, to taste
2 Tbsp. seasoned vinegar
8 oz. mozzarella cheese, cut into 1/2″ rounds
1 hot house cucumber, peeled, cut into 1/2″ rounds
2 large tomatoes, cored, sliced into 1/2″ rounds
1 pack basil, trimmed

Soy sauce and sesame oil – starting to salivate.  Amazingly, I had all the ingredients on hand except for the cucumber, so I went full steam ahead.  If you are not a lazy ass like me, you will just walk down to the store and get yourself a cucumber.

Here’s what you do:
1. In a small mixing bowl, combine soy sauce, sesame oil, olive oil, black pepper and seasoned vinegar. Whisk well.
2. Assemble the mozzarella cheese, cucumber, tomato and basil on a platter.
3. Drizzle saucy mix on top of the vegetables and cheese before serving.

The verdict?  It’s f*cking awesome.

Incidentally, you have to get one of these:

I have killed every one of my basil plants except the one my man planted for me up in here. You can plant all sorts of things in it, not just strawberries. It’s totally righteous.


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Too hot to cook

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on July 15, 2010 – 8:09 pm -

It’s hot. You don’t want to turn on your oven, your stove, or even your toaster. (Or, you’re like me and you’re painting your house and everything from the living room is in the kitchen, so you can’t reach the stove anyway.)

What do you do? Do you get takeout, which means spending a lot of dosh and feeling like bag full of assholes afterward?

OR do you make like Smarty McSmartersons, dust off your food processor/blender, and whip up a batch of cantaloupe carrot gazpacho in less than 5 minutes?

1/2 cantaloupe
1 medium sized carrot
Handful soaked almonds/cashews
Freshly grated ginger (to taste – I added a lot)
1 T of lemon/lime juice

These ingreds are also in the original recipe, but I didn’t have coconut milk handy and I killed my mint plant:
2 T of coconut milk
1/2 bunch of fresh mint leaves (to taste)

I like Smarty’s choice.

cooling delicious "soup"

Eat this in the comfort of your air conditioned home.


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KomBOOZEcha?

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on June 21, 2010 – 4:09 pm -

I know some peeps who love to get their kombucha on.  It turns out that the fermentation process creates alcohol, so Whole Foods pulled it off their shelves.  Lame!: http://renegadehealth.com/blog/2010/06/21/whole-foods-pulls-all-kombucha-products-from-shelves-due-to-alcohol-content/

Do not despair!  You can brew kombucha yourself at home like I do.  Here’s the recipe: http://www.happyherbalist.com/kombuchaquickrecipe.aspx.  It’s so easy, it practically makes itself.  Get yourself a SCOBY and you’ll be ready to go.

Kombucha scoby in jar

Put your scoby in the brewed tea and you're ready to go!

I also belong to a Kombucha makers’ Yahoo group: http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/original_kombucha/?yguid=351881601

Did I mention brewing your own is cheap?  Like, making your own tea from a tea bag cheap.  So get on with it, ya hear?


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Happy healthy delicious orange creamsicle shake

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on May 21, 2010 – 4:57 pm -

I view my usual morning health shake as integral to rebuilding my health, but I just moved into a new place so don’t have all the fresh ingredients at hand. Whilst lacking ingredients for the shake, I am also lacking the counter space to get my cook on because I am still unpacking. I did, however, have some TJ’s unpasteurized OJ kickin’ it in the fridge. Thus, the idea for the orange creamsicle shake was born.

so good for you, you can have every day

So good for you, you can have one every day!

Ingredients:

It’s that freakin easy!  I should mention that I’m full right now.  This is actually a meal.  A tasty, tasty meal.  This is the fastest breakfast ever!

Anywho, some notes about the ingredients:

JUICE: I do not approve of conventional “pasteurized” juice.  Pasteurization is the process by which certain foods are heated to slow down microbial growth.  It’s this process that kills the enzymes in living foods, making them less useful for our bodies.  While pasteurized orange juice is little more than a sugar bomb, unpasteurized orange juice and all of its lovely vitamins and minerals are easily assimilated into our bodies.  How can you tell if the juice you’re buying is unpasteurized?  Usually, by location and price.  Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, and other health stores sell it (I get mine at TJ’s for about $5.69 for a half-gallon).  If you go to a restaurant or farmer’s market that is serving “fresh-squeezed” orange juice, you can be confident that it is not pasteurized.  Large chain supermarkets will not have it.

ISAGENIX: If you are substituting another brand of shake, make sure it has a similar nutritional profile.  I am an ardent fan of TJ’s, but none of their shakes have this level of vitamins, minerals, and amino acids, and its enzymes are active, which means they can be easily assimilated by the body.

VIDACELL: This is another product I use to speed nutrition directly to my cells, but it doesn’t change the flavor.

I think I’m gonna have one every day!  DANG that was delicious!


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Green Lemonade will cure what ails you

Written by The Thyroid Chronicles on May 13, 2010 – 1:19 pm -

I know many peeps who have been plagued by colds and flu lately, and I tell them, “fOk medicine, this stuff’s the bomb”. I recommend drinking this juice 2x/day, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. It is muy delicioso and well worth a couple of minutes of your day to make it.

Green Lemonade Recipe (makes about 16 oz):

* 1 romaine heart
* 5-6 large kale leaves
* 1 whole lemon – peel, seeds, and all (i cut in half so it fits in my juicer)
* 2 sweet apples, cored. that means no granny smith.
* 1-inch knob ginger
* one radish (supplies iodine for us thyroidal folks)

I also add these ingreds if I have them around. They don’t change the flavor much and add a lot of nutritional benefits. These items are:

a few sprigs of parsley for the chlorophyll
a few sprigs of cilantro to remove bodily impurities
one clove garlic for the antioxidant properties

If you have a juicer yet can’t be asked to make this at least once/day, well…you will just be sick and I won’t!

fOk what the doctor gives you

This is your medicine


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