New beginning

I now have two post-baby runs under my belt. Wow, is it different. Spencer's schedule has still been changing every month, so I haven't even tried to come up with a regular schedule for running. Mostly it's when it works out easily. That's not going to cut it, though. I am working on finding the motivation to get serious again. I saw one friend who did 30 miles combined of exercise the week she turned 30 last year. I really like that idea - maybe spread over the whole month. 21 July is not that far away. But with the 27 miles of trails that go throughout the city of Plainfield, IN (just outside Indianapolis where we are moving at the end of June - more on that later), it may be a great excuse to get out and explore the city. 

I am improving, though. My first run at the end of April was one mile and just over 10 minutes. Today I did a mile in 9:45. Far from where I was a year ago but it's something and I'll take it!  

Here's to many more miles!

Running

Honestly, I'm not running as much as I would like to these days.  However, with Spencer's schedule, that is to be expected.  I could take advantage of our YMCA membership and go during the day (the kids actually love the child watch there, anyway), but between it being sick season and not wanting to feel like the whole day is taken with me trying to run, I feel like it's better not to.

Twice in September I actually got up before 5a to go to the YMCA and was able to get back just as Spencer needed to leave for the hospital.  The first day I did that went great!  I did not feel tired at all (that was a Friday).  The following Wednesday I went again and felt like I could barely function the rest of the day.  Unless I'm going to bed at 8p, I think that option has closed itself.

October has been a little bit nicer.  Spencer only had to work the first weekend and in addition, one of his chosen weeks off was last week!  That was so nice in so many ways.  I was able to go running three or four times.  I only go 2 miles each time and I am getting slower each time, but I don't mind.  The weather has been wonderful for running and I love being able to get outside.  I'm looking forward to Saturday.

Unfortunately, November's schedule will be back to hopefully one day off per week for Spencer, so unless I want to get up before 5 again, it looks like things will slow down even more.

I think I was 18-19 weeks in both of these pictures.  Definitely getting up there!

And, no, we're not going to find out the gender before-hand.

 

Some 'Splainin to Do

July 2009

As Faith has mentioned before, we have made some pretty significant changes in our home. (Here, here, and here.) We spend a lot more time and money at Whole Foods, wear toe shoes, and are keeping the chickpea industry afloat.

All this may or may not be some sort of early mid-life crisis, possibly brought on by the fact that we will both be 29 soon and still in school. But mid-life crisis or not, we both feel like we are in a very good place physically, emotionally and spiritually.

I have considered writing this post for a while, not to brag, but in the hopes of helping to motivate someone else to make changes. Just looking at that picture of us in 2009 makes me realize how far we both have come. It is embarrassing for me personally to think what I let happen to my health.

For me, the change started in July 2010, when rotations began. The first 2 years of medical school are just books and lectures with very little clinical experience. Rotations, for years 3 and 4, are mostly clinical with some lectures here and there. My first rotation in July '10 was Internal Medicine. I spent 10-12 hours a day in the hospital. The majority of the patients were sick in the hospital because they did not take care of themselves. Most of them were overweight, if not obese. Years of neglect and food abuse brought them to that point. For me, it was a wake-up call. My family history is not riddled with Octogenarians. My Dad will be the first Cotterell man to see the age of 63 in 3 generations. I felt like a hypocrite talking to these patients about their health when I was not exactly taking care of mine. These feelings started small but grew until I decided to do something about it. So on August 18, 2010, I began paying attention.

I started with what I knew. (When considering it was after 2 years of medical education, it is sad to see what little is taught in medical school regarding nutrition and health.) Conventional Wisdom says that in order to lose weight, you need to decrease your intake and increase your output. I decided I needed to limit my food portions. I made a conscious effort to eat less and just by paying attention, I started to lose weight. Soon after my decision to do something, I read this and it helped solidify my commitment. I lost 10 pounds in 2 weeks. It was amazing to see how much weight I was maintaining just by overeating.

At this time, I didn't so much change what I was eating, I just changed how much I was eating. I was eating what I thought was a "healthy" diet. Lean meats, whole wheat bread/cereal/pasta, low-fat everything. I of course was also eating desserts and treats and whatnot. I just ate less of everything. Instead of eating 4 cookies, I would eat 2.

This tactic worked for 30 pounds. I tapered off by April and thought I was in a pretty good place. I had more energy and started exercising more. I started running and was running about 9 miles a week. People I hadn't seen in a while were complimenting me and, though it was embarrassing, it was nice to know I had changed enough for others to notice.

In the back of my mind I thought I could do even better, but I had hit a wall. I didn't lose much if any more weight from April to July.

Then in July Faith read the book Eat to Live and made changes outlined in this post. I was a little skeptical (because, hey, I am going to be a doctor. I know everything.) at first. But I read the book at the urging of Faith and started eating humble pie. Humble pie and lots of fruits and vegetables. I recommend the book to everyone because:

1. It is not a "diet" book. It is a book about how to live a more healthy life. The "problem" is that even though it is not a diet book, if you follow the principles in it, you will lose a ton of weight as you improve your overall health.
2. The book teaches well and the knowledge gained from it is incredibly empowering. You gain tools that allow you to filter out all the mis-information that is out there in regards to health and nutrition.
3. There are a whole lot of studies cited in the book. Dr Fuhrman manages to sort through a lot of data and presents it in a way that is clear and easy to understand.

*Side note. If you don't have time for the book, watch the documentary Forks Over Knives on Netflix. It is pretty much a 1.5 hour summary of the book.*

So after making these changes, I lost another 20 pounds from August to the end of the year. None of my clothes fit anymore. It is a nice problem to have. More than the weight loss though, I feel healthier than I ever have. Even looking back at the time I was playing Lacrosse at BYU, I feel I am healthier now. I have more energy. I am running a lot more than 9 miles a week (I ran 9 this morning). I have more energy to play with the kids and be the kind of dad I want to be. I have visions of a future where I will be keeping up with them and roughhousing the crud out of them.

Like I said at the beginning of the post. I do not want this to come across as bragging. I do this in the hope that at least one person will read and decide to make changes.

The picture at the beginning of the post is one we have hanging in our room. Before August 2010, I would see it next to our engagement picture and long to be "me" again.

Now I see it as a reminder that people can change.

As cheesy as it sounds, Faith and I decided to try to recreate the picture for an "after" picture. We wore the same shirts for effect. (Of course the above picture was taken by a professional. The picture below was our point and shoot with the timer set.) I still can't believe the difference.

Feb 2012

And here is a nice picture Faith's sister took of us last week.

Here are some blogs I have found recently that I like:

No Meat Athlete

Nerd Fitness

Christopher McDougall

iRunFar.com

The Science of Running

Barefoot Running University

Eating to live

I've had ideas for this post floating around in my mind for a while. It's something I've wanted to share and I think it's time. I just hope it's coherent.

Just over three years ago my mom bought a book for me and all of my siblings. The book is called Eat to Live. At that point in time I was not at all ready to change my eating habits. And I really wasn't interested in a diet. We had just moved to Tulsa, Andy was about 6 months old, and, although I should have, I didn't think there was anything drastic I needed to change. After all, there are times and seasons for everything and it was my time to be carrying baby weight. (4 kids in 4 1/2 years can do that to you.) And, thankfully, I hide my weight pretty well. Or so I thought. It's possible that's not as true as I would like to have believed.

Fast forward to early February of this year. Anne was born. My mom came to visit. My parents have been eating quite healthy for some time, but when my mom was here she made a ton of casseroles and other frozen dinners. It was wonderful. And right in line with how we had always been eating. One thing my mom got for herself while she was here was a bunch of Sobe Life Waters. They were quite tasty. When she left there were about a half dozen left over and she wasn't going to take them on her flight home. She suggested I save them for when I was ready for a healthier treat and wanted to stay away from ice cream but still have something that tastes good. Honestly, I never thought I would get to that point.

The day after my mom left a book came in the mail. My sister Bethany sent my mom a copy of Michael Pollan's Food Rules. Unfortunately, because of all the snow we got that week, deliveries were delayed. Bethany told me to go ahead and keep it - also that I should read it. That became another healthy-eating book that was going to sit on our book shelf and collect dust.

Fast forward, again, to sometime in the spring. Spencer had been watching portion size for some time. Somewhere around August 2010 he decided that he should no longer be eating like a college athlete and he has been doing very well and was looking much healthier. I started feeling like I wanted to "fit" with Spencer. He was a very good example to me of what could be done. Starting around July (or late June) I decided to start eating smaller portions. I didn't change so much what we were eating because I thought it was still pretty healthy. I just needed to eat less. And then the right switch flipped. I knew I wasn't really eating how I should and I needed to change that. Sometime in the second week of July I read Food Rules. This book is quite short and contains 64 rules about how we should eat food. Some of these include eat food, shop on the peripheries of the store, don't eat anything with ingredients your grandmother wouldn't understand, etc. This was a good start for us.

And then came the big change. And it was only a day or two after I finished the book. I read Dr. Joel Fuhrman's Eat to Live. Honestly, this book has been a life changer for all of us. This book contains the benefits of eating mainly a whole plant food diet. He doesn't say you can't ever eat any meat or dairy, but he cites the studies (The China Study in particular) that show the negative effects of eating too much meat and dairy: cancers, heart disease, diabetes, etc. It's amazing what you can avoid by eating the right things. It's not just about avoiding meat and dairy. It's about getting the right protection for our bodies from vegetables, fruits, seeds, nuts, and whole grains. I started to change how I ate immediately. Then I started changing what we were all eating. Spencer, wonderful man that he is, didn't complain about the changes I was making. He knew that he could get something else to eat if he really wanted it. I told him that I really wanted him to read this book after I was finished. I wanted us to be on the same page. This kids have complained at times but we have been able to tell them why we are feeding them the way we are. We want to give them every advantage we can and keep them healthy. They are now so much better at eating all the vegetables we give them. Benny and Andy have even said at different times: "I don't like vegetables, but I eat them because I know they're good for me." And just last night Andy said, "I love vegetables!" Hearing both of those things make me so happy!
I started writing this a couple of weeks ago, and honestly, I rarely hear complaining about all the vegetables they get on their plates. Lilia even knows to just eat what she's given!

I want to point out that per calorie there is more protein in green leafy vegetables than meat. Also, more calcium per calorie than cow's milk. We are not lacking for needed nutrients. Dr. Fuhrman points out that there is no way the biggest animals (elephant, giraffe, gorilla) could get so big on a vegetable and fruit diet if there were not adequate protein.

When my sister Eden was working full-time at BYU she took advantage of getting her blood-work done and was amazed at the change after she had been eating more of a whole plant food diet. You can see her results here. I'm not sure how long she had been eating better then, but the improvement in her blood-work is amazing!

After I read Eat to Live, I re-read the Word of Wisdom that was given to Joseph Smith in 1833. The Word of Wisdom is a modern-day revelation on what we should eat (fruits in their seasons, herbs, grains) and from what we should abstain (wine, alcohol, tea, coffee, cigarettes, drugs). Since reading Dr. Fuhrman's book, I have been so grateful to have found something to help me to live the Word of Wisdom better than I did before. I feel so much healthier and I feel like Spencer and I are able to help our kids in ways I never thought about. It really has been a blessing to all of us.

Now I am reading Dr. Fuhrman's Disease-Proof Your Child. I highly recommend it. I'm not through it yet, but it is getting me more and more motivated to feed our kids well.

One of the most surprising feelings I've had in this whole process is a wonderful sense of control. I posted some time ago about discovering a lack of control. I wrote: "other than my own choices, I don't have control over anything." (See that whole post here.) I think my view of control is beginning to shift. I still remind myself that there are so many things I cannot control, but the overriding feeling these days is that I am in control of myself. Instead of thinking I only have control over myself, I think: I get to control who I am. I get to make choices that will determine the kind of person I become. I am choosing now to no longer be a slave to my appetites. By being in control of what goes into my body, I have gained more of a sense of power. I am choosing to take care of my body in the way God wants me to. It's a wonderful feeling to know that the choices I am making are going to impact me the rest of my life. And it's a nice feeling to have that sense of control visualized when I walk past a mirror.

I have gone through waves of focusing more on the weight I'm losing and just being grateful I'm being more healthy (even if the weight-loss slows down). I will tell you, though, that since I really started losing weight I have lost 29 pounds! 21 of those pounds have been since my birthday on 21 July. I am fitting into clothes that I haven't for a long time. It has been wonderful in a lot of ways. I've even started running. I've never been one to love running. Getting out and walking has been a major feat for me at times. But, after I lost the first 10-15 pounds, I started having more energy and I decided that I should be exercising to add that element of health. And if you're interested in another life-changing book, go pick up Born to Run by Christopher McDougall. I started with 2 miles and I'm now running over 4.

What I really love about these changes is that it's about a lifestyle. Spencer and I feel different. We want to eat better because it feels better. I love that Spencer was mistaken for a vegetarian his first week in Dallas this month. No, we are not vegetarians or vegans. We just eat mainly a whole plant food diet. It's not about the numbers. The fact is there are many people with a fast metabolism and can maintain a low weight even though they eat horribly. That is not a great way to live and it won't prevent illness in the future. It doesn't matter what size you are. By eating the foods we should, we are protecting ourselves from future problems.

If you interested in what we've been eating, let me know.

And now the current "after" picture.
I only wish I had a picture of Spencer. He looks fantastic!!

I love half of Anne down in the corner.

First run together

Yesterday Benny told us that his P.E. teacher took his class to the track to run. He told us that he won. From how he described it, he was only one or two who ran the whole way. One of those things I'm sure we'll never know.

This morning Spencer and I had plenty of time to get our runs in since General Conference didn't start until 11a here. Before I left I asked Benny if he would like to go running with me after I got back from my run. I showed him on MapMyRun.com where we would go around the neighborhood for a mile.

After I got back from my run, Benny, Andy, and Lilia were playing at our neighbor's house. I went over to ask Benny if he wanted to go. He wanted to stay and play, but Andy said that he would like to go. We came home and got him changed out of his long-sleeved shirt and his long pants (at the first hint of fall weather - read: below 90 degrees - he starts covering up!) to a bit more appropriate attire.

We ended up going about .6 miles and Andy jogged the whole way. It took us just over 10 minutes. We talked a lot of the time about how hard we were working and about how even though we get tired, if we keep going, we will get stronger and it will get easier. He is sure working at working hard. It's great to see!

Apparently he enjoyed going out because tonight at dinner Andy asked if he could go running again with me tomorrow. I reminded him we don't do that on Sundays, but he can again next Saturday. I am really grateful Spencer can come home on weekends this month (he'll be in Dallas during the week for his rotation down there). It will really help things be easier!

Andy. Just before his first run ever.

I had just finished my regular run so I'm already sweaty and red-faced.

*I had to create a new label for this post. I guess I'm no longer a walker. I'm a runner.