David Gillespie - Just starting out

02 Feb 2012 9:19 AM

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Message # 814483

Deleted user

I think I've been coming to the personal conclusion that sugar is a poison to me for a few years. When i read David's book it was the information I needed to actually do something about it. I was a fat child and grew up to be a fat adult. I've always loved sweet foods and have eaten my way through vast amounts of confectionary, cakes, biscuits etc etc. I always felt bad about it afterwards. A couple of years ago I went on a low carb diet and lost heaps but I couldn't sustain it. I went on a couple of cruises and most of it went back on. Im not quite back to square one but nearly so. Before I retired a year ago I was a GP and thought that I had a good knowledge of good nutrition but a fructose free diet was never discussed. I have been as heavy as 113kg and am now 91 Kg. But 2 years ago I got down to 78kg with the hope of reaching 62 kg. I never got there because I couldn't sustain the discipline of being on a low carb, low calorie diet. I've been on the Sweet Poison diet plan for four days and I feel pretty good. I don't feel hungry and don't really crave the sweet things very much. I do depend on diet coke and splenda in my porridge and coffee at the moment during the withdrawal stage. I'm 2 kg down already a d I know it's only fluid but it's a good start. I know I can do it this time. I have MS with paralysis in my legs and being so overweight makes mobility hard so this is a great opportunity to really help myself. At 62 yes its taken me a long time but I know I am about to do something really stunning for myself. I'll let everyone know how I'm going but I feel very positive at the moment.

Liz

03 Feb 2012 1:11 AM

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Reply # 815086 on 814483

Deleted user

Hi Liz

Congrats on your great start, just a couple of things You must stop drinking diet coke and also splenda or any other sugar substitute these are dangerous products splenda and all sugarless, sugarfree foods are made that way by using aspartame. Please google aspartame dangers. Also these aspartame can cause MS along with many other medical problems, so please do not believe anyone from the MS society who encourages you to drink or eat any diet product using this stuff. A great book for you to read is Elaine Hollingsworth's "Take Control of Your Health and Escape the Sickness Industry" just google her name and you will find her website you can purchase the book from this site. A wealth of info is on this site and in her book. I regard her book equally as important as David's book.

Spend time researching. There is soooo much Info on the net some not so good but heaps of great stuff to help you in your endeavor to regain your health. Start with Elains's book it is a real eye opener.

Good Luck

Deborah

03 Feb 2012 3:41 AM

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Reply # 815128 on 814483

Anonymous

Congratulations Liz,

Keep at it; the effort is worthwhile. Sounds to me that motivation may be a problem for you. Being a medico I'm sure you will resonate with the lecture by Prof. Robert Lustig http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM It is also available as a free eBook on Amazon. Please let me know if you have any difficulties with this. Dare I say that he explains the whole thing even better than David does. But of course he does have a visual presence and a Power Point presentation, which improves the impact considerably :-)

"Splenda" is not aspartme it is based on sucralose. See page 170 of the SWQP. It is David's "Your Call" list. Hopefully your sugar craving will diminish with time. Mine has.

Someting you can do without much willpower, is to read the labels. Reject anything over 2% sugar (5% for yoghurt) and don't worry too much about the fat. It's the fructose that makes you fat, not the fat. But watch out for "low fat" products - they are a con, as Prof Lustig explains so well.

Photocopy David's "10-best" & "10 worst" lists until you get into the routine of reading labels. A copy of his good and bad sugars (Page 54-55 of SWQP) and sweeteners (Page 170) can be useful too as many of the names are confusing and similar. Now that you are retired you don't have to rush the shopping - you have time to read the labels :-)

The old saying that you are never too old is even truer for you at 62. In training people to quit smoking we used to tell them that it would add 10 years to their lives. The trick is that it's not added at the end, but NOW! I suspect the same is true for cutting fructose out of your diet.

Do keep in touch, and if you are not already "subscribed" to this list I suggest you do so. That way you will get from David daily summaries of, and links to, all the posts.

John Neilson [80yo, 185cm, 75kg, 95cm waist]

Last modified: 03 Feb 2012 3:54 AM | Anonymous

04 Feb 2012 1:55 AM

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Reply # 815823 on 814483

Deleted user

Great Post John, Very informative and encouraging I will have a look at the youtube topic as well.

Thank you

05 Feb 2012 12:28 AM

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Reply # 816257 on 814483

Deleted user

Hi,

A few of us who have given up fructose/sugar, have migrated towards Primal, and thought you might want to read this thread on this Forum http://www.marksdailyapple.com/forum/thread7454.html
It is concerning MS

Good luck with the weight loss, and a new life style.

13 Feb 2012 8:42 AM

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Reply # 823900 on 814483

Deleted user

Thanks for all your posts!

I feel virtually detoxed after two weeks. I've stopped the diet coke - I don't fancy it any longer. I never had that much anyway. I'm not using any artificial sweeteners at all now apart from some in a fruit tart I made when we had guests over weekend. I had very little of it. I'll use glucose next time we entertain but I noted David's warning about eating foods sweetened with glucose in the detoxing period. I'm definitely eating less and am not missing the sweet things. I'm amazed. And I feel better in myself as well. I'm hoping that there may be some improvement in the MS. From what I have read and discussed with specialist colleagues, I don't think there is any evidence that Equal(aspartame) causes MS although it is possible that large amounts can cause some neurological symptoms that may mimic MS. There are no abnormalities on MRI. The symptoms get better when the sweetener ceases. Unfortunately MS rarely resolves completely.

So I'm two weeks along, 3 kg down in weight, feel better than I did and am not even thinking about eating anything sweet except the occasional allowable fruit. I feel really motivated and have eight months to lose 25 kg before our next cruise. I should be so in the groove by then, I won't be tempted to eat all the things that contributed to my putting on some of the weight I'd lost previously. At least that is what I'm hoping. I've also started looking up some of David's references to learn more. A dietitian friend however says that she doesn't aprove my giving up sugar completely because it is so hard to sustain. I have to persuade some of my medical colleagues as well that there may just be something to it and perhaps we are teaching the wrong thing to our patients!

Liz

13 Feb 2012 6:37 PM

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Reply # 824418 on 814483

Deleted user

Hi Liz and welcome.
Let me reassure you that now you have given up sugar, you will find it easier and easier to sustain.
I am 70 years old and gave up sugar, going cold turkey just over a year ago and have completely lost the taste for sweetness.
I eat fruit maybe twice a week at most and then, only berries.
When we have guests, I make one of David's dextrose sweets and eat only a little of it.

Congratulations on your brave step, do let us know how you get on with your journey and good luck for your cruise, by then I'm sure you will be able to pass over all the sweetened stuff on offer.
We are going to Europe for a three month holiday in April and I am already working out how I will be eating in Italy, France, Spain and England.

Like you, I hope to be able to sustain this way of eating when not at home. I know that my biggest problem will be explaining to old friends in England that I don't eat sugar any more when they are cooking their best desert to celebrate our visit.

I do find I only eat two meals a day now, breakfast and dinner, with nuts and an unsweetened mug of Cacao (organic cocoa) as a snack at about 3.00pm. I eat very low carb as my body does not deal well with carbs, I get bloating and can even put on weight if I have them, so I get my carbs from vegetables and salads.

cheers
Freda

14 Feb 2012 12:48 AM

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Reply # 824891 on 814483

Anonymous

Congratulations Liz! Great stuff :-)

Re your dietician friend:

A dietitian friend however says that she doesn't aprove my giving up sugar completely because it is so hard to sustain. I have to persuade some of my medical colleagues as well that there may just be something to it and perhaps we are teaching the wrong thing to our patients!

Especially in your job you will come across a lot of so-called health-professionals who are ignorant of the role of fructose in our bodies. I suggest you point them to Prof Robert Lustig's YouTube lecture &/or book; or David's first book which is an excellent primer in biochemistry for dummies :-)

Also, as you know from experience it is NOT hard to sustain. Even if that were true it's no reason not to do it. Malborough Man would still be riding high if that were the case :-)

And anyway you don't have to give up sugar completely . . just the fructose part of it. Glucose is sugar too.

Check David's blog for his comments about the attitudes of the Heart Foundation and the Dietitians' Association. They are rooly ignorant! None so blind as those that will not see.

John Neilson

14 Feb 2012 6:32 PM

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Reply # 825504 on 814483

Deleted user

Thanks for all that. I'm really encouraged by your posts.

My husband and I went out to dinner with close friends last night and I had warned our hosts that I was off sugar so they wouldn't be offended when I refused their usual delicious sweet. It was a great evening and I found I ate less than usual and had no difficulty refusing the sweet and even the chocolates and petit fours that were served up afterwards. I was amazed at myself. There was no difficulty at all. I avoided alcohol as well although I've never been a great drinker so I don't think that was even noticed. I've even persuaded my friends to consider reading Sweet Poison themselves when I said how logical it all was so I've passed my book around. All my friends have put weight on in their fifties and sixties and it's been a struggle to control it. They all have a sweet tooth. However I am the only one of the group who has been overweight all her life so my sugar addiction goes back to early childhood.

Keep the posts coming - they're great.

Liz

14 Feb 2012 9:12 PM

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Reply # 825608 on 814483

Deleted user

Well done Elizabeth, but John is right, you aren't giving up sugar, just the fructose part. It's ok to have a dextrose treat now & hen, once you're over withdrawals, just make it a now & then thing, not a regular thing.
I've decided I'm definiely like Freda, my body isn't dealing with the bread, mainly. I've almost given up potatoes, but Kevin is still cooking them and offering them to me. He says he's just being polite, his Mum always taught him to share!! Load of codswallop, in my estimation. Just his way of saying, see, you aren't serious, are you? Even after 18 months......sigh......

I can see I'm gonna have to put my foot down again, make him eat all the potatoes he cooks. He's already saying he's putting on weight, I'm not surprised, eating like he does. Choccy biscuits, cake, all those processed foods, yuk....

John, you made some great points, and Freda, I hope you enjoy your cruise. Maybe you can try for a loss of a couple of kilos before you go, so you can have a little leeway?

Elizabeth, John is right about the health professionals being un-informed, a lot just aren't open minded, they have done a course, and believe everything they were taught, not realising that things and life changes, new research is everywhere, good thing too, or we'd still be all falling off the edge of the world, it being flat!!

You sound pretty determined to me, I don't think you'll have much problems sticking to the low fructose way of life. Regarding your own dinner partiesor etc. , just cook low fructose, and don't say anything, unless someone asks for the recipe!! That'll vindicate you for sure!!

Don't ever give up!!

Sylvia

aka Silver Angel

SMILE!!