What now? That’s certainly a big question for me.

Long time ago, I use to be a foodie. Both my husband and I love to cook and before we retired, we loved having people over all the time. Retirement, moving to a different, less social, neighborhood have changed our patterns. Less active while eating the same food, and getting older equaled weight gain.

In March of 2011, I became fed up with carrying around extra weight which was certainly aggravating my degenerative disk disease and arthritis. I had previously tried several diets none of which worked. First, here’s some background. In 2008, 09, and 10, I had issues with allergies including mysterious skin allergies. I went through many anti-inflammatory drugs, biopsies, internists, allergists, and dermatologists. I was on Prednisone off and on for years. The doctors all told me that I was having an allergic reaction to something, but they didn’t know what despite various tests and none of the drugs they tried worked. Finally, one doctor discovered that I was very low on Vit. D and began me on a prescription dose. It took a couple of months, but it worked. My skin cleared up. A few months later, my internist, discovered that I was Hypothyroid. Strange that after years, those two items showed up from blood tests that had been run by many doctors over many years and never showed up before.

All this seems to have nothing to do with my weight loss. But I believe it does. By March of 2011, I was relieved that I had solved one health problem, but was still over weight and suffering from back problems. My pain caused me to move less so I saw my weight creeping up even more. One night, I pulled out Dr. Joel Fuhrman’s book, Eat To Live and began to read it again. My husband encouraged me to give it a try but he reminded me that I needed to forget the word try, and just do it. Changing my way of eating meant that I was cooking for me and he was cooking for himself. He doesn’t mind that because he is an excellent cook and enjoys it. He also doesn’t mind eating a meatless meal from time to time.

I had already given up soy because of the thyroid issue and so then I gave up meat, dairy, and oil. To my surprise, I started losing the weight. This was great! I liked to lose weight and had always loved vegetables so it was win-win. I lost 22 pounds and did it fairly easily because I love vegetables. I really didn’t miss the meat or the dairy too much. Seafood on the other hand was occasionally missed but I handled it.

After one year, I had gained three pounds from not sticking strictly to a totally low-fat vegan diet. I wasn’t unhappy with that as long as I didn’t gain more. However, at almost two years, I have gained another five pounds making a total of 8 pounds and I am nowhere near being even vegetarian. I eat vegan maybe 50 to 70 % of the time and then have a dinner out of whatever I want or go to a party and snack on salty items or cheeses. None of our friends or social outlets even understand the concept of a vegan diet. And frankly, I am getting tired and bored with not being able to cook and entertain.

The food is not my only problem, I need to find a way to be more active that I enjoy, can do physically, and will continue to do consistently. I haven’t found that yet, at least nothing that I will do consistently.

Sorry for the long rambling post.