I had deleted this blog in favor of our wonderful (wonderful because of loving family support) blog about losing weight. It is truly everything I hoped for, but I think the message of what I believe is best for most of us to one DEGREE or another is about carbohydrate restriction.

I am extremely carbohydrate intolerant. I have family genetics against me and I did a turn believing in the rage of diets in the 1980's (Thanks Susan Powter ) that fat was making me fat and the bad dumb luck of losing a lot of weight on that diet the time I did it. I lasted a year. Just a year and my body and mind and soul were falling apart at the end of it. I also knew I could never, ever do it again once I was off of it. Before you say I wasn't make sure I was mixing my carbs to make a whole protein.. ah.. no. I was doing it fine. You know, wheat and beans and the whole nine yards.

Talking about the damage the sugar and yes folks carbs are sugar did to me is hard. It is personal. But I have things that will never fix because of it. If only-if only- if only, I could go back and be a smarter child and say no to the sugar sweets I loved, and no to the carbohydrate items like potatoes and corn I didn't care about. I can't. I can't make my children's lives better by giving them veggies with nice fatty home-made ranch dressing rather than chips or make sure they had cheese chunks, peanut butter on celery and other such treats to make sure they could snack often- my Jay might not be having the health problems he is currently struggling with if I could. I can't.

Then I looked at the REAL science behind carbohydrate restriction. You see people like Powter will quote the 9 calories per gram of fat until you are about choking on your dry cardboard toast. It would be okay if our bodies were machines like a car, but they are not. We need that fat. Our bodies use it for fuel and making important and critical hormones. Our brains actually run more efficiently on ketones than sugar. Insulin, which is raised higher and higher by all that carbohydrate makes sure that many of us are storing all of that carbohydrate as fat. The carbs for us is much higher fat than .. well fat.

Now here is what is important: I do NOT believe that going as low in carbohydrate as I need to go is appropriate for all. We are all different. And example: My son Sean and his gorgeous wife Brynn are slim and healthy. While I would certainly at times LOVE to be the nosey mom (only because I am nosey and not because they are doing anything wrong - in fact Brynn makes a great dill pickle dip I love with veggies great low carb treat for me and one they eat with chips!) and suggest a few things to them, but it would NEVER EVER be to cut carbs out of their life as low as I have to. And frankly as cute as they are it would be silly as I am the fat mom, and they are the healthy and active pair. If they wonder and ask I will suggest a few things, but until then I will respect them for the smart, wonderful adults they are.

Tigersue does the Schwarzbein Principle as much as she can. It's a great way to live in the world and try to plan eating around te different needs of her family.

My husband Randy has issues that I truly believe would improve dramatically if we could figure out how to help him go low carb. The hard part is that while he is not hard to feed- he just has very set ideas about what he wants to eat and different green veggies are just not on that list. I am still trying to work ideas, but it might come with time. I think some ideas will happen as I get healthier.

I started this last round of low carb in January- I wasn't too strict until March. This had in part due to a new position at work. When I wasn't on the phones all the time, I could start what seems to be necessary for me- exercise- and a little more emotional energy to try to deal with figuring out what would help me. I have had time to adjust what I am doing to actually lose weight, and I realized today that I have so much energy! I do stuff in the home that used to "hurt" without even giving it a thought. You know. like cleaning out a cupboard, or just putting away the dishes, or going up and down stairs. Exercise does help, but I also believe that ninety percent is the food.

I hope to presents ideas, studies, and other ideas here. I think..I hope Tigersue hops in as well.