Should parents lose custody of super obese kids?

I say FUCK all these people to hell who want to take fat kids away from their parents!!

I was a fat kid since the day I was born and was ALWAYS on restricted food diets, even as an infant. I spent my childhood and adolescent years on a strict 1000 calories a day, all meals served by and eaten in front of my mother. All my relatives, friends' parents, and teachers knew so I was supervised when in front of them. Still I grew up to be a fat adult with hormone and other problems, and NOW all the science is saying I'm having those problems BECAUSE my food was restricted my entire life.

Thanks, Doc. Thanks fat-phobic mom!

And again, fuck you, all you people who want all fat people, especially fat kids, to just die already and not come into your line of vision. Fuck you all!

(click this headline to go to the article)

Should parents lose custody of super obese kids?

Why Were's Still Fat, Explained Again

Another study, reported by Associated Press:

Not your fault! Hormones linked to weight regain

Oct 26, 5:10 PM (ET)
By MALCOLM RITTER

NEW YORK (AP) - Any dieter knows that it's hard to keep off weight you've lost. Now a study finds that even a year after dieters shed a good chunk of weight quickly, their hormones were still insisting, "Eat! Eat! Eat!"
The findings suggest that dieters who have regained weight are not just slipping back into old habits, but are struggling against a persistent biological urge.
"People who regain weight should not be harsh on themselves, as eating is our most basic instinct," Joseph Proietto of the University of Melbourne in Australia, an author of the study, said in an email. The research appears in Thursday's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
Weight regain is a common problem for dieters. To study what drives it, Proietto and his colleagues enrolled 50 overweight or obese patients in a 10-week diet program in Australia. They wanted to see what would happen in people who lost at least 10 percent of their body weight. Ultimately, only 34 people lost that much and stuck with the study long enough for analysis.

The program was intense. On average, the participants lost almost 30 pounds during the 10 weeks, faster than the standard advice of losing 1 or 2 pounds a week. They took in 500 to 550 calories a day, using a meal replacement called Optifast plus vegetables for eight weeks. Then for two weeks they were gradually reintroduced to ordinary foods.
Despite counseling and written advice about how to maintain their new weights, they gained an average of 12 pounds back over the next year. So they were still at lower weights than when they started.
The scientists checked the blood levels of nine hormones that influence appetite. The key finding came from comparing the hormone levels from before the weight-loss program to one year after it was over. Six hormones were still out of whack in a direction that would boost hunger.
The dieters also rated themselves as feeling hungrier after meals at the one-year mark, compared to what they reported before the diet program began.
Experts not connected to the study said the persistent effect on hormone levels was not surprising, and that it probably had nothing to do with the speed of the weight loss.
People who lose less than 10 percent of body weight would probably show the same thing, though to a lesser degree, said Dr. George Bray of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La.
A key message of the study is that "it's better not to gain weight than to try to lose it," Bray said.
Why would a dieter's body rebel against weight loss? It's an evolutionary holdover from earlier times, when weight loss could threaten survival and reproduction, says Dr. Rudolph Leibel, an obesity expert at Columbia University in New York. So "it's not surprising at all" that our bodies would fight back for at least a year, he said. "This is probably a more or less permanent response."
People who lose significant weight not only gain bigger appetite but also burn fewer calories than normal, creating "a perfect storm for weight regain," Leibel said.
He said avoiding weight regain appears to be a fundamentally different problem from losing weight in the first place, and that researchers should pay more attention to it.
The study was supported by the Australian government, medical professional groups and a private foundation. Proietto served on a medical advisory board of Nestle, maker of Optifast, until last year.
---
Online:
New England Journal of Medicine: http://www.nejm.org

Who Can Survive on THIS??

I found this while browsing on-line. I wanted to make something other than potatoes for a change and bought some Gardein fake chicken breasts and thought this recipe looked pretty good. I would use the vegan chicken and nooch instead of parm. What I saw at the end of the recipe shocked me, though. Here's the basic recipe:

(The exact recipe has been altered to protect the (not so) innocent. The original listed name brands for every item, including the chicken.)

Chicken Parmesan Noodle Bake

1/4 c chopped onion
1 3/4 (one 14 1/2 oz. can) stewed tomatoes coarsely chopped and undrained
1 1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning
2 tsp. sugar substitute
1/2 c. (one 2.5 oz. jar) drained sliced mushrooms
1/4 c. (3/4 oz) grated fat free Parmesan cheese
1 1/2 c. (8 oz) diced cooked chicken breast
2 c. hot cooked noodles rinsed and drained

~~~~~
If you're like me, aside from the amount of cheese, this would make a nice lunch or dinner for one person, right? Everything would neatly fit on one dinner plate. I was going to double it when making dinner for my husband and myself tonight.

The details say this recipe serves 4!! FOUR? 4 what - cockroaches? Certainly not 4 adult humans! It also said it was 250 calories per serving. Since when is 250 calories a decent dinner? Even when I was a kid and on a 1000 calorie a day diet I was told to eat 500 calories for my main meal for the day.

Am I totally off base here? Has "eating to satisfaction" of McDougall-approved meals done something to my perception of what a healthy amount of food is? I don't think so. I read the daily menus of other McDougallers and they eat way more than I do on any given day.

I Drive My Husband Crazy, Too

I know nobody reads this blog - my counter service tells me so - but the few people who have managed to find this place over the years probably quickly run away as soon as they see the posts. They haven't changed much over the years - Dieting for weight loss versus size acceptance. The debate still rages today, but it's leaning more towards eating the healthier lower fat vegan foods and getting some fun exercise in than obsessing over the numbers on a scale.

We were recently "on vacation," in quotes because we're probably the first couple in NJ to have never gone away for any vacation in our 31 years of marriage, except for our 5 days in the Poconos for our honeymoon. Instead of going away we spend our money on such "luxuries" as a few extra goodies in the weekly grocery basket, or replacing broken or worn out/outdated items with more modern ones. This vacation we bought a few CD's (on sale) to replace those that was still had on vinyl (most from the 1960's) but were so worn and scratched we didn't dare play them any more for fear of ruining our 32 year old diamond needle on the turntable. We replaced the broken digital camera (only 2 years old) with a better Canon Powershot and broken Singer serger sewing machine (24 years old) with a newer Singer model. We bought 7th Heaven season one on DVD to replace the home-taped VHS version I had (the remaining seasons are in my Amazon shopping cart for future splurges). Now we can use those old tapes for the upcoming summer season of tv.

And we bought books, which brings me to the topic of this post. When the Amazon package arrived my husband had a good laugh at my expense. Included in the order was Kate Harding and Marianne Kirby's size-acceptance book Lessons from the Fat-O-Sphere along with Kip Esselstyn's Engine 2 Diet which pushes the same very low fat, high starch strict vegetarian food plan as his parents and Dr. McDougall. Yeah, at first thought they are extreme opposites, but if you look back on this blog you'll see that the times I felt my best, physically and mentally, were the times I was following the vegan food plan and avoiding all dairy. My husband unpacked the box and just shook his head when he saw the titles and said "We're in for another bumpy ride, aren't we?"

During vacation we ate a lot of crap - fatty meats, bakery goodies nearly every day, as well as almost every lunch from a fast food restaurant, then a chocolate cream pie with three inches of whipped cream on top for the finale on Mother's day. My son and husband really don't like chocolate pudding so the pie was all mine, and I devoured the entire thing in 2 days. Yesterday was my first non-goodies day in a week and a half, and I was in agony! I could barely sleep, my snoring and snorting, as well as hip pains, kept waking me up every hour or so. My head was ready to split open, and when I described the pain to my son he said it sounded like his typical migraine headache. It was the worst headache of my life and didn't go away, even with three doses of extra strength Tylenol. Usually one regular strength tablet taken only once gets rid of any headache I get, but this one was a killer, and the first time I ever had eye pain to go along with it. I never want to go through that kind of pain ever again!

So, with that in mind, yesterday was day 1 of no sweets or any other crap foods. I know the dairy in those things is causing the sinus problems, and I know yesterday's headache was probably a sugar hangover. I'm now going to make a strong effort to avoid all things dairy, have only a little bit of sugar (In iced tea or lemonaide), and continue to make dinners the whole family enjoys, which will save not only my sanity but a few bucks at the grocery store, too. Most meals will be low fat vegan, but not all. I already made one of the soups in the Engine 2 book and see a lot more recipes I'll be trying, just as I'll be making a lot more McDougall recipes, but not only very low fat vegan ones. In fact, yesterday Isa's newest book, Vegan Brunch, went on sale and I ordered it.




Plans for today include hitting the park with my new camera, and finally opening the box with the serger. All my fabric is washed and ready to go, and I've got a lot of sewing to catch up on. Once this headache is gone and I catch up on housework, the first thing to get made is a new Lazy Girls purse. I've had the patterns and fabric for over a year now and really should get started on them again. After that I have a few aprons to make up (Again, the fabric has been waiting about a year), and last week I bought more fabric for summer caftan shirts. I'm so glad I found her directions again after she moved them. I've been using them for almost 10 years now and just LOVE how those shirts feel and fit. I even wear them during the cold wintry days, layered with other shirts. They're best in the wildest fabric designs possible. For this year's batch I have a tropical print (Parrots!), ladybugs, multi-colored sprinkles (known as "jimmies" to some parts of the country), subdued beige butterflies, and my favorite (and the most expensive piece), Japanese fans. My apron and purse fabrics are wilder than these, so I really can't wait to get started. Hopefully now that I'm away from dairy again my arthritis and neck neuritis won't act up as much and allow me to work at the machines for more than a few minutes at a time without pain.

Expect photos. :)

R. I. P. Pushing Daisies, and Overcoming Overeating/HAES

I just read on a Disney-related mailing list that yes, it's officially canceled. Oh, well. At least Scrubs is taking half its place on Wednesday nights come January, followed by Lost at 9pm. Oh, happy day! I better get hustling re-watching the series. I'm only half-way through season 2, with Charlie set to discover Henry Gale's balloon in the next episode.

But I won't be able to do that next week. Vacation time! We're going to use those precious few days together to sleep late (hopefully), watch plenty of television, shop in at least one mall with a bookstore (I have a list!), and eat whatever we want, starting with a boxful of bakery products my husband will pick up on his way home from work in about 4 hours from now.

One thing I'm specifically going to work on is dropping the guilt from eating food. Already this morning I told my husband no less than four times (twice via email) not to buy the donuts, that I shouldn't be eating them, and each time he told to to shut up, he's buying them anyway, that there's no reason I can't enjoy them. I'm already packing up all my diet and weight loss and "healthy eating" books for the week and bringing out the HAES and fat fiction ones and will soon start reading the revised edition of Overcoming Overeating (Finally!) and have the Intuitive Eating book on reserve at the library. I must admit that I do feel better physically when I eat a more varied diet, one that includes meat and dairy and a wee bit of chocolate. Now to convince myself I'm not going to go to hell or get hauled off by the food police if I do. My son already told me he's hoping I make his favorite butter cookies for Christmas this year, that he misses them the years I'm on a diet and refuse to bake them.

Well, Maybe It's Not So Bad

I had some more of that Quaker instant oatmeal today, this time mixing the pumpkin spice in with my regular old fashioned oats. Much better!

Another thing much better is my foot. It still hurts a bit, but not like the past few days. Perhaps I mis-diagnosed myself this time.

Got some decent exercise in, too, Richard's Blast Off video, the original. Of course I had to revise it a bit for my foot and neck, as always, but still worked up a little sweat.

Not much else today.

I Love Oatmeal!

I have oatmeal for breakfast a minimum of 5 out of every 7 days of the week. Once in a while I'll make scrambled tofu, and every Sunday I have a vegan burrito. But every other day I grab my trusty old 4-Cup Pyrex measuring cup, dump a few raisins in the bottom, add a cup of filtered water and a half cup of old-fashioned oats, nuke for 2 minutes, then add either fruit or a spoon of peanut butter and cocoa powder, mix well, and yum, yum eat. This meal holds me until around 2pm most days, and that's pretty amazing for someone with hypoglycemia!

I like to mix it up with all different fruits, but now and then I just have a yen for something, well, different. The first cool day after a long summer usually finds me opening a can of pureed pumpkin, and for the next week or so, or until I get so sick of it I dump the rest of the can in the garbage, I have pumpkin flavored oats. Well, Quaker has done me one better. I found out on this and other blog posts that Quaker and Walmart are having a promotion of limited time only flavors of instant oatmeal, pumpkin spice and roasted pecan. I'm usually not a fan of instant oatmeal because of the sugar, and even if I had 4 packets of instant the meal doesn't hold me more than an hour because of that, but I couldn't pass up buying these yesterday at the tiny Walmart in Harrison, NJ. (I call it "tiny" because it's about a quarter the size of the Walmarts I used to go to when we lived in Kissimmee, Florida. God, I miss that place and can't wait to move back when hubby retires!) It's always jammed, filthy, aisles are over-crowded and the lines take forever to get through, but it's the only Walmart I've got so I'm stuck. It was worth the 15 minute wait on line to pay for my 4 boxes of oatmeal. Today was burrito day, but tomorrow morning I'll be diving into my first bowl of Quaker Pumpkin Spice Walmart-only oatmeal, and it better be good!

It All Comes from Eating Too Much

Remember that line from Winnie the Pooh? Rabbit says it to Pooh after he gets stuck in the rabbit hole. I, like Pooh, love to eat. I'm not that much of a honey-lover, but give me a ring of kielbasa and mashed potatoes and I'm in culinary heaven.

Mmmmm, kielbasa!!



(Gee, remember the episode of Scrubs when Dr. Molly Clock, played by Heather Graham, uttered those famous words?)


I think I know what I'm making for our anniversary dinner tonight. We pretty much decided against pizza last night. Right now we have so much leftovers in the refrigerator that we'll still be eating them over the weekend, so my husband suggested instead of making our traditional anniversary pizza tonight we'll work on the leftovers. At the time I agreed, but I don't want leftovers! Come on! 31 years of marriage and we celebrate it with leftovers?!?! If he doesn't want pizza, fine, but maybe phallic shaped meat would be more symbolic. I'll concede defeat with the leftover bread.

Yes, I am a food lover. I eat when hungry; I eat when happy or sad; I eat when nervous or relaxed; I eat to celebrate or to mourn. But mostly, I eat because I love the taste of the food. And what's so wrong about that?

So tonight we celebrate. If we're lucky, besides celebrating Thirty-one-derful years of marriage, we'll celebrate getting the kid's ultrasound results (Yep, still waiting) and getting our Rosie back from the garage without too big a dent in our credit card (Still waiting for that, too). Unlike 31 years ago, we'll be celebrating with our son and will most likely spend the night like every other night - watching Jeopardy, 21, then popping a DVD in the machine, maybe Kung-Fu Panda or hey, what about a Dr. Clock episode of Scrubs?

Half Asleep

I wish my doctor would believe me when I tell him my thyroid is low and I not only need another lab test but an increase in my meds. I'm so tired I'm napping every afternoon and still falling asleep in front of the tv, some nights as early as 7 pm. I can't do the amount of exercise I need to do, even want to do, because I get part way through and experience severe muscle aches and tiredness as well as loose my "umph." Exercise isn't effective if you're just going through the motions without putting any effort into it. But the doc says I've been stable for 3 months and he feels there's no need for a test, no need for a med increase. Although even LabCorp finally dropped the reference range, my doc is one of those who feels any TSH level under 10 is fine and dandy. It doesn't matter if a patient has a TSH as low as 1.x and still feels like shit. His prescription is to eat less and exercise more. He gave me the same orders when I first complained about my chronic fatigue and hypoglycemia 25 years ago. Ah, an old story on this blog, not worth rehashing again.

Our main car, a 1996 (?) Toyota Corolla, is still at the garage as they try figure out why the brake lights stay on even though the brake isn't being depressed and the headlights aren't turned on. They already changed all the fuses and did a few diagnostics, but I guess it's going to take a while. A few years ago our other car, a Toyota Camry Wagon LE, had rear lights that wouldn't light, the opposite problem. It took four different garages before the cause was found and even then it was only partially fixed - the lights now come on but the inside light doesn't. That was the car that was hit twice in the left front bumper as well as was involved in the fireball when it was parked next to the garage when the gas station we had it at (for those electrical repairs) exploded. Aside from a few minor dings and discoloration in the back tinted windshield from the heat of that of that fire in 2003 the car is going as good as new.

Soup and homemade bread for dinner yesterday and today again. Butternut squash soup and bread yesterday, minestrone soup and sun-dried tomato bread today. Tomorrow is our 31st anniversary - pizza!

Gotta go get my Amazon order in. MXC discs 4 and 5 finally came out today, as well as Scrubs season 7. I still didn't finish watching season 4 on DVD. As soon as those discs were delivered the episodes started playing in constant rotation on Comedy Central. But MXC - a.k.a. Most Extreme Elimination Challange? We've been waiting for these discs for ages and will watch them at least a dozen times, then start with season one and watch them all over again.

Thanksgiving Already?

It's coming very soon. The first harbinger was all the sales in the grocery store and the "seasonal" aisle filled with pumpkin pie fixings and stuffing boxes. Then yesterday's newspaper had photos from the annual testing of the Macy's Parade balloons. And of course, all the Christmas commercials on tv and songs on the radio. Last night my fingers got twitchy and I almost pulled out my Brian Setzer Christmas album! Ack!

All this means I have to seriously start thinking about what we're going to eat that day. My husband said pizza, the kid prefers burgers or mac & cheese, I wouldn't mind a traditional turkey dinner but nobody wants dried out meat, so I suggested Bryanna's soy and seitan vegan turkey loaf, but my son wants nothing to do with either tofu or seitan and my husband reminded me that it makes a three pound loaf and only 2 of us would be eating it.

So, I may just do what I did other years and make up a bunch of side dishes. Everyone enjoys mashed potatoes, mashed sweet potatoes, roasted carrots and Brussel sprouts, peas, stuffing, and biscuits. I might even make up that mac and cheese. Yeah, who needs a dead bird.

The previous post asked if I will ever get back to 100% McDougall compliance, and I can honestly answer "No."

Life is too short, food tastes too good.

I live to eat, not eat to live. If all I wanted to do was eat to live I would eat the protein/enzyme slop they fed Neo in the Matrix movie. I go out of my way to find new recipes, to try new foods, to avoid repetition in my meals. If I'm served a bland meal, I'll finish it, but look around for something different to eat also, Dr. McDougall recommends eating bland foods and chosing the same 5 or so meals to serve over and over, to avoid stimulating the taste buds. I go bonkers eating the same things three days a week - pizza on Friday, spaghetti on Saturday and burgers on Sunday. I purposely make my pizza different every week, choose a different sauce and protein addition to the spaghetti, and different burger toppings, just to mix it up a bit. I don't even like eating the same "holiday" foods each year and have had Thanksgivings where we had mac and cheese and pizza on Christmas, just to avoid getting into a food rut.

I've found that no matter what food plan I choose to follow, my weight stays about the same. Looking over my off-line journals I've been within the same 10 pound weight range for almost 20 years. One year I was up 20 - that was the year I first injured my neck and had foot problems, both of which resulted in not being able to exercise or even *move* without pain. Two years later I was down 20 from where I am today, but that was the result of a starvation diet, eating 800 calories or less each day and still not being able to exercise as much as I had prior to my injuries. To this day I still can't do much exercise without injuring myself, aggravate an old injury, or cause a CFS flare-up which would put me in bed for a week. My weight isn't back to my all time high, just to where it was before I hurt my neck. I go up and down 10 pounds, sometimes within the same month. It's not going anywhere so I really should just accept it and not obsess over it, but after 55 years of weight loss diets, it's hard to stop.

Spending Like There's No Tomorrow

Unfortunately, it's all stuff we need. Fortunately, all of what I ordered helps lower my grocery store bills.

First was my twice-yearly Mail Order Catalog spending spree, where I bought more vital wheat gluten, nutritional yeast, cHreese, and a few pieces of Primal Strips. This replaces all the meat and cheese (and boxes of mac & cheese) in our house. I know Dr. McDougall is against soy-based meat substitutes because of the isolated soy proteins and plain old protein itself, but with my hypoglycemia I need to have readily available protein foods when the shakes hit, something that can be carried in my purse or coat pocket. It's better than grabbing a Slim Jim, right?

Next was Spices, Inc., where I stocked up on dehydrated tomatoes, peppers, and a few other items. Great for tossing into pizza dough to add flavor and nutrition, and some times the only veggies I get into my boys.

Then came something for mama that would help her eat less, further reducing grocery store bills. Another exercise video from Richard Simmons, Sit Tight. On days my arthritis and sciatica act up I use that as an excuse not to do any workout, not even Mindful Movements. Now I'll have a workout specifically designed to be done from a chair for those painful days.

Lastly, my annual SAF yeast order from the King Arthur catalog. I adore this yeast and nobody in my city even sells it in those expensive little packets, much less in bulk. Our city fathers banned warehouse stores, too, so even the cheaper brands are unaccessible without an hour's drive, so each year I order 2 pounds and keep them in the freezer.

With winter rapidly approaching, not to mention another Depression, I'll feel much better once my pantry is stocked up again.

November Menu Is Set

November Menu Is Set

It's been a crazy month so far, between the kid's job interviews and medical problems, the election, 3 doctor's appointments, lab and radiology (some for me, some for my son). Then the gloomy weather - I don't remember the last time I saw the sun. Oh, wait - it was as I was coming home from the opthamologist with my eyes fully dilated from the drops he gave me, and because it was raining when I went in I didn't bring my sunglasses so I was in pain for the next few hours.

And it's not over yet. My son is still waiting for the doctor to call him back with the results (He was out of the office at the time my son was told to call), and he still hasn't heard back from the job interview, but in that case she did say in 3 weeks and it's only been less than 2. I hope he hears something soon - his first student loan payment is due in 2 weeks.

And I'm still jerking myself back and forth between vegan foods and SAD (Standard American Diet). Don't get me wrong - I do love the healthy vegan foods that are available. It's just that some of it is so darn expensive! Rice milk is more than twice the cost of powdered skim; a batch of scrambled tofu costs about ten times more than 2 scrambled eggs; vegetarian sausage is more than twice the price of real sausage and sometimes has the same amount of fat, unless I make it from scratch. And I miss dairy cheese and yogurts. Not only are they much cheaper than vegan versions but they taste so much better.

But I really should avoid them. Tonight we were supposed to have this mushroom and barley thing, but my mushrooms turned fuzzy, so we're having burgers instead. I have no veggie burgers made right now so we'll have the turkey burgers that I have in the freezer. At least I have plenty of stone ground whole wheat burger rolls. I have plenty of fruit for snacks, especially bananas and apples, but have to get used to not putting peanut butter on them, or in my morning oatmeal. I made a tofu scramble this morning and felt guilty because of the price, but I was just so sick of oatmeal and needed a change.

And the dinner menus are not just chosen but printed out and hanging in the kitchen for all to see for the rest of the month. I have December's planned but not printed, too. Out of all these meals, every one is McDougall legal, as long as I eat cheeseless pizzas on Fridays, that is. :) This month we have 2 birthdays, and in both cases they want pizza, so again, a cheeseless pizza for me, with cheese for the birthday boys.

Our 31st anniversary is also this month. On the day of our wedding, my husband and I never got to eat dinner. As soon as the meals at the head table were served we were called by the photographer to get the cutting of the cake pictures. While we were gone the waitstaff cleared our plates! We complained loudly, even calling them idiots - Didn't they notice that every plate for the entire bridal party was untouched? They had no food left in the kitchen (Even the band ate their meals while we were getting snapped) so we were to go hungry. The kitchen helpers felt sorry for us and did give all of us a larger piece of cake each, but we were still going table to table asking our relatives if there was any FOOD. Our best man's mother and an usher's wife had some leftovers that they ate up, but the rest of us had to make do with some candy from the machine in the bar.

My husband and I were almost the last people to leave the reception. What the heck, we were paying for this party and not leaving for our honeymoon until the next day so why not?! As soon as we got to our apartment we popped a frozen pizza into the oven, put Tom Waits on the stereo, and started counting the money and signing the checks from the envelopes, as my mom was going to deposit it into the bank for us while we were gone. Every anniversary we go through the same routine - we eat frozen pizza while Tom Waits is playing on the stereo, and since we have no money we just count our blessings.

How much does it really cost to eat a healthy diet?

Money Is Tight, and Junk Food Beckons

By TARA PARKER-POPE

How much does it really cost to eat a healthy diet?

Economists, health researchers and consumers are struggling to answer that question as food prices rise and the economy slumps. The World Bank says nearly a billion people around the world live on a dollar a day, or even less; in the United States, the daily food-stamp allowance is typically just a few dollars per person, while the average American eats $7 worth of food per day.

Even middle-class people struggle to put healthful food on the table. Studies show that junk foods tend to cost less than fruits, vegetables and other healthful foods, whose prices continue to rise.

This fall a couple in Encinitas, Calif., conducted their own experiment to find out what it was like to live for a month on just a dollar a day for food. Overnight, their diets changed significantly. The budget forced them to give up many store-bought foods and dinners out. Even bread and canned refried beans were too expensive.

Instead, the couple — Christopher Greenslate, 28, and Kerri Leonard, 29, both high school social studies teachers — bought raw beans, rice, cornmeal and oatmeal in bulk, and made their own bread and tortillas. Fresh fruits and vegetables weren’t an option. Ms. Leonard’s mother was so worried about scurvy, a result of vitamin C deficiency, that they made room in their budget for Tang orange drink mix. (They don’t eat meat — not that they could have afforded it.)

Breakfast consisted of oatmeal; lunch was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Dinner often consisted of beans, rice and homemade tortillas. Homemade pancakes were affordable, but syrup was not; a local restaurant gave them a few free syrup packets.

One of the biggest changes was the time they had to spend in meal preparation.

“If you’re buying raw materials, you’re spending more time preparing things,” Mr. Greenslate said. “We’d come home after working 10 to 11 hours and have to roll out tortillas. If you’re already really hungry at that point, it’s tough.”

While he lost weight on the budget diet, Mr. Greenslate said, the larger issue was his lack of energy. During the experiment he was no longer able to work out at the gym.

A few times they found a bag of carrots or lettuce that was within their budget, but produce was usually too expensive. They foraged for lemons on the trees in their neighborhood to squeeze juice into their water.

Ms. Leonard said that after the 30-day experiment, one of the first foods she ate was a strawberry. “I almost cried,” she said.

The couple acknowledged that the experiment was something of a luxury, given that many people have no choice about how much to spend on food.

“People in our situation have the leisure to be concerned about issues like this,” Ms. Leonard said. “If we were actually living in this situation, I would not be taking the time to be concerned about what I could and could not have; I’d be worried about survival.”

Researchers say the experiment reflects many of the challenges that poor people actually face. When food stamps and income checks run low toward the end of the month, they often do scrape by on a dollar a day or less. But many people don’t know how to prepare foods from scratch, or lack the time.

“You have to know how to cook beans and rice, how to make tortillas, how to soak lentils,” said Adam Drewnowski, director of the Center for Public Health Nutrition at the University of Washington. “Many people don’t have the knowledge or the time if they’re working two jobs.”

Last year, Dr. Drewnowski led a study, published in The Journal of the American Dietetic Association, comparing the prices of 370 foods sold at supermarkets in the Seattle area. The study showed that “energy dense” junk foods, which pack the most calories and fewest nutrients per gram, were far less expensive than nutrient-rich, lower-calorie foods like fruits and vegetables. The prices of the most healthful foods surged 19.5 percent over the two-year study period, while the junk food prices dropped 1.8 percent.

Obesity researchers worry that these trends will push consumers toward less healthful foods. “The message for this year and next year is going to be affordable nutrition,” Dr. Drewnowski said. “It’s not the food pyramid, it’s the budget pyramid.”

The experiment in California was hardly the first of its kind, though the teachers’ budget was tighter than most. Last month Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm of Michigan and her family took a weeklong “food stamp challenge,” spending only $5.87 per day per person on food — the Michigan food stamp allotment. She told reporters that she ended up buying a lot of macaroni and cheese. Last year Gov. Theodore R. Kulongoski of Oregon lived for a week on his state’s $3-a-day food stamp allocation.

Ms. Leonard and Mr. Greenslate, who chronicled their dollar-a-day experience on their blog, onedollardietproject.wordpress.com, say they are looking at other ways to explore how difficult it is for people with limited income to eat a healthful diet.

“I challenge anyone to try to live on a dollar a day and eat fresh food in this country,” Mr. Greenslate said. “I would love to be proven wrong.”

well@nytimes.com