Day 21

Hello,

I want to thank AR for the good comments and encouragement and hope things are going along well for you. Nice to have confirmation that someone is reading along, too. From your comments, I think your program may be similar. What kind of results are you seeing? How does what you are doing, differ from what you see here?

As my recent posts have mentioned, I have had to go back to the phase one eating parameters -- meaning veggies and protein.  I am about to read "Day 21" in the program. I had a nice Wendy's Cobb chicken salad and cup of chili for lunch. Am cooking up the rest of the beans, this time without cinnamon which made them taste -- let's just say, "not good." I put in a couple of chicken tenders for protein and flavor. This is the half-pot that I had to pull out in order to cook the first half. I just wanted to get them cooked up. I am back on the veggies and protein and off the whole grains, but the jury is still out on the beans. Will keep monitoring and adjusting until I am seeing only regular progress, again.

I am praising and thanking God for all He has done for me, today and every day. Thank you, Lord!

I am in between morning and evening church. Have only a little time and feel the need for a nap, too. I did my 12 minutes this morning -- need to do another 12 this afternoon. I got out my pedometer but the battery is dead so I will have to stop at Radio Shack and get one.

One of the side effects of adding the whole grain (which I have now eliminated) and beans into my diet is that my plumbing had been moving much more often than normal. There were a couple of days when I must have gone every two hours all day long -- obviously, things got cleaned out. Oddly enough, I did not lose any weight, which I assumed would happen in a case like that. And even now the lower bowel seems to be a little "sensitive" -- but is calming down because I stopped the whole grains. (It  occurred to me that someone might think I have some sort of Celiac disease, but my doctor checked my blood and there are no markers for this disease in my blood at all. I just think that all that additional fiber really moved things along, so to speak, and my insides are not quite used to that and became a little sensitive.)

I shall continue to measure my progress while undergoing phase 1 again. Though, it will not be a "true" phase one, because I will be eating beans. I have been thinking that phase one is like the healing part, phase two is like a "maintenance" program and phase 3 may be the advanced "how to maintain the changes in the world." That is my assessment, not theirs -- and since I am on day 21, I have 9 more days to go, but, I have had to go back to phase 1 foods, and intend to stick with the healing part until I am healed. I will from time to time have a small amount of whole grains, but there is no way that I can tolerate them every day.

Between the last paragraph and this one, about 6 hours have passed. I went to church and then came home and tried a bowl of beans with chicken, after which, I was still hungry so I had a small salad of romaine, and broccoli sprouts, with 4 or 5 grape tomatoes, with herbs and olive oil as dressing. I then watched "Murder on the Orient Express" on PBS and then checked my blood sugar. It was 123. This is about what it usually is after I eat a proper meal of vegetables and protein. This is the first test, and the beans appear to have passed the test, meaning, they kept my blood sugar at a reasonable level and did not make it rise too high. The last meal that I checked that had beans and whole grain in it gave me a reading of 160. This was way too high for me to be comfortable with, which is why, I dropped the whole grains.

I feel quite happy with the reading of 123 but will continue to test my sugar levels after bean meals, for a while, just to make sure. What is strongly going through my mind, is the reminder from Dr Rip in the book that research showed that monitoring blood sugars and keeping them low does not heal a person of diabetes. He quoted a research study where this was proven and the scientists were in a quandary over what this meant. I have been monitoring my blood sugar through this experiment so I would have some sort of measurable results to share. A measurement that I could use to know where I stand. Yes, of course, I know this is not "scientific" and I have not kept any kind of strict records -- but I feel that I would not know the effect of the grain if I had not measured the sugar level numbers. So I am glad that I did. Beans are supposed to be the most high level diabetes super food, so I shall, as I said, monitor it a few more times and if all goes well, then I will be able to continue eating beans.

The only thing I don't like about eating the beans is that about 2 hours afterward, I seem to get heart burn. Not sure what that is about. If that does not let up soon, I may have to drop those out too, just to get the PH levels balanced again. Vegetables and protein, seems to keep me in balance. I might just have to use smaller servings of beans. Perhaps somewhat less than a cup or maybe a half cup will do. As I go along, I shall experiment with that, too.

On to day 21: Eating habits. This is a chapter that I was really interested in reading. It talked a lot about distracted eating. There is research that says that if we multi-task, such as eating while watching TV, or eating while reading a book, then the second activity distracts us from really savoring what we are eating, which tends to make people eat more food. If we also eat too fast, the "I'm full" hormone does not get a chance to kick in. So grandpa's suggestion to eat slowly and chew our food thoroughly still seems to be good advice.

You must know that I am barely scratching the surface of Dr Ripich's information in the book. I continue to recommend that you read "The 30 Day Diabetes Cure" for yourself, because it's contents are so much more helpful and informative, than what I have described here. Knowing the facts and details, first hand, will allow you to make more informed decisions concerning your own life and this program.

I also thought it was very interesting that at one point in this chapter he recommends that if a person has not gotten the eating program down pat or if you are still eating junk food, you need to go back to Day 1 and start reading and cooperating again. So there is my evidence that I am doing the right thing. He also says that we should not be discouraged if we do not conquer the new life style changes in 30 days -- it may take longer for some of us to do. Happy for the confirmation. I feel I am, again, headed in the right direction. Thank God.

Be back soon,

--Marcia