Another Boring Update

I'm sorry of my blog is beginning to look like it's just a collection of videos gathered from various web sites, but I really have nothing new to say.

Each day I debate over what food plan - if any - to follow, from Dr. Fuhrman's very restricted Eat to Live program to the very liberal and freeing  Overcoming Overeating's philosophy, and everything in-between. It doesn't make a difference on the scale. I've gained weight some days I followed Eat to Live and lost weight on days I ate everything not tied down.

I'm still getting in as much aerobic/cardio exercise as my sciatica allows, a minimum of a half hour a day. Out of the last 6 weeks I did not exercise only 4 days. Burn out? Possibly, but my doctors insist I exercise that much for heart health and their futile hopes I lose weight by doing more than they tell other patients to do.

A new injury to my every growing list is a tendinitis or ligament injury on my left hand from twisting it weirdly while carrying bags of groceries up the three flights of stairs to my apartment. It first happened a few weeks ago, and this weekend it happened again, and again with grocery bags. I feel guilty making my husband and son carry everything, but I guess I'll just have to sit back and let them do it all for a while.



Still not getting along with the elderly relative with early Alzheimer's disease. The last time we visited I walked out, telling my husband I'll meet him at the car, when every 2 minutes she would moan loudly begging Jesus for death, complaining she's so lonely, yet refusing to have people over, locking out the homemaker, and the few people who do visit her (us, mainly) she makes their lives a living hell. Yesterday again she refused to open the door to let the homemaker in (but still has to pay for the whole 3 hours), and before he even heard about it my husband was discussing with a co-worker that he's ready to just hand all her paperwork back to her, get our names off the bank accounts and power of attorney forms, and let her do what she wants, since she refuses to do anything that needs to be done or we suggest she have done.

And before I start getting nasty-grams about caring for the person-with-AD, let it be known that aside from her short term memory loss, this woman has been like this her entire life! Her own mother used to cringe when she heard she was coming for a visit and would sometimes leave the house rather than be home and let her in. Her sister (my m-i-l) would end every phone call in tears. Her own husband waited as long as possible to take his retirement (was forced to go, actually) then immediately got himself part time jobs so he would be out of the house when she was home because even he couldn't stand being with her for hours at a time. She has alienated every other family member and any local acquaintance she ever had. One woman, a bit younger than her but in bad shape medically, has complained that this aunt has the nerve to insist she do her shopping for her, that she take her places in her car at a moment's notice. She as happy when her doctor told her she could no longer drive because now she had an excuse to tell this aunt NO! It's the antics of this aunt that put me in the hospital 2 years ago with stress cardiomyopathy!

ARGH!

So, nothing new, just SSDD, as the gang in Stephen King's Dreamcatcher would say - Same shit, different day.

Longevity Soup

Five ingredient recipes are beloved by everyone, and if they follow the rules of The McDougall Plan, so much the better. Dr. McDougall has a nutritionist in his employ named Jeff Novick. Now, not everything Jeff says is 100% McDougall, like his insistence on people popping their daily foods eaten into something called the CRON-ometer, a nutritional information database developed by the CRON - Calorie Restriction for Optimal Nutrition, the people who believe that eating a super-low calorie diet prolongs life, which, ironically, is a higher calorie diet than what most doctors put their fatties on. He wants you to make sure your daily foods cover all those micronutrients, like selenium and folic acid, and that the calorie count stays fairly low - he insists normal healthy adults can live on 1200 to 1500 calories a day, even have enough energy to bike a few hours and do an hour or more of other aerobic exercise. Dr. McDougall, in every one of his books, tells us not to count calories or go bat-shit checking every little nutrient, that as long as we eat a diverse diet within his guidelines we have everything covered except for B-12, and for that he recommends a B-12 injection every three years.

But one of the things Jeff did that I do agree with is post his file of 5-ingredient recipes. Today's soup comes from that file. He calls it Longevity Soup.

Longevity Soup
1) 1 can whole tomatoes, 1 can pureed
2) Your favorite beans (I use kidney or garbanzo)
3) 1.5- 2 lbs of Your favorite frozen veggies plus 1 lb of frozen collards
4) Your favorite starch (potato, sweet potato, rice, barley) cooked separate then added
5) your favorite seasoning (I use fresh ginger, garlic)

I used a bit more tomatoes - 2 giant cans of crushed and a 15 ounce of diced. I added a small bag of mixed frozen vegetables as well as 2 giant chopped carrots and spinach instead of collards. Instead of adding a starch into the pot I'm making a loaf of bread to go with the soup. And garlic. Plenty of garlic. I also added 2 giant cans of water. It looks and smells fantastic!

The bread, on the other hand, has more ingredients than the soup. It's a new-to-me recipe and I'm making it for the first time, so let's see how it goes, shall we? I'm omitting the oil and using dried parsley and celery flakes and had to add a bit of liquid (I used water) to moisten the dough as it kneaded.


* Exported from MasterCook *

Veggie Bread

Recipe By :Sandra L. Woodruff
Serving Size : 12 Preparation Time :0:00
Categories : ABM breads Whole Wheat


Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method
-------- ------------ --------------------------------
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 tablespoon vital wheat gluten
1 teaspoon yeast -- instant, bread machine
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 tablespoon oil -- or lecithin granules
1 tablespoon honey -- or barley malt
3/4 cup buttermilk -- non-fat, OR
3/4 cup non-dairy milk and 1 teaspoon
vinegar
1/4 cup grated carrot
1/4 cup celery -- finely chopped
2 tablespoons green onion -- finely chopped
1 tablespoon fresh parsley -- minced

Put everything in your machine according to the manufacturer's
instructions, on the whole wheat setting if you have one.

Source:
"Smart Bread Machine Recipes - Healthy, Whole Grain, and Delicious"
Copyright:
"1994"
Yield:
"1 pound"

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Per Serving: 97 Calories; 2g Fat (14.8% calories
from fat); 4g Protein; 18g Carbohydrate; 3g Dietary Fiber; 1mg
Cholesterol; 178mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 Grain(Starch); 0 Lean Meat; 0
Vegetable; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 1/2 Fat; 0 Other Carbohydrates.


Nutr. Assoc. : 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0