For years I have been using Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt, which is free of iodine and other preservatives. But at a recent nutrition workshop, I learn that most people, especially females, are iodine deficient because food preparers generally do not use iodized salt in fear that the iodine may cause a radical color change to their food products.

Iodine is an essential mineral for the thyroid to produce thyroxine (T4) to keep hypothyroidism at bay. Unless one consumes a lot of seafood or seaweed, a lack of iodine is just one of the ways that hypothyroidism can occur. The other two off the top of head are:

1) if too much thyroid gland was removed from a hyperthyroidism treatment

2) congential defect

3) There is one more, but I don’t remember at the moment.

Look in the mirror. Between your collar bone and your Adam’s apple is where the thyroid is located. If something appears to be bulging, this maybe a goiter. A goiter can occur in either someone who has hyperthyroidism or hypothyroidism. Your doctor can test how well your thyroid is working.

The answer is an astounding “YES”. Click on the link for the results.

my-cholesterol-glucose-testing1.JPG

Who’s paying for it?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/16/dining/16capi.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&sq=washington%20food%20pelosi&scp=1

January 16, 2008

More House Salads, Whether the House Likes It or Not

By MARIAN BURROS

Washington

IT should be no surprise that in a city where everything is political, the grumblings about the new selections in the cafeterias serving the House of Representatives have nothing to do with how the food tastes.

Last spring the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, mandated a plan to create an “environmentally responsible and healthy working environment” throughout the House. It was to include energy efficiency, recycling and composting in the four House office buildings as well as the House side of the Capitol.

When it came to the cafeterias and the other food concessions, it meant a revamping of the menus, to make them more local, organic and healthful.

The changes, instituted last month, would barely rate a mention in, say, Berkeley, Calif. But to some people here they represent an elitist misuse of public funds, and possibly a bit of anti-industry propaganda.

In newspaper articles and on blogs, the menu has been mocked for including sushi and brie, foods critics seem to regard as pretentious esoterica. Questions have been raised over whether the decision to stock a particular brand of organic yogurt was motivated by political donations. Writers have griped about allowing Ms. Pelosi to decide what they should eat. And some have expressed outrage at the notion that tax money is paying for all this frippery.

Whether or not sushi is too elitist for workers on the Hill, the cafeterias are not subsidized, said Perry Plumart, the deputy director of the House’s environmental effort, which is called Green the Capitol.

“In fact, we make money and Restaurant Associates makes money,” he added, referring to the company that runs the cafeterias. (It also has a cafeteria contract with The New York Times.)

Restaurant Associates has received some complaints from lobbyists here about how their particular commodity is presented to potential diners, and a trade magazine and several lobbying groups have had something to say about a sustainability Web site set up by the company and linked to from the House dining services Web site.

Agriculture committee staffers, reflecting concerns of the egg industry, challenged a statement about the cage-free eggs used in some cafeteria meals.

It had said: “In the United States more than 95 percent of the nearly 300 million laying hens are confined to barren battery cages, unable even to spread their wings or engage in many other natural behaviors, such as nesting, foraging, perching and dust bathing. Cage-free eggs means the hens have not been confined to a battery cage.”

An editorial in the Dec. 31 issue of Feedstuffs, a weekly newspaper for agribusiness, explained why the industry wanted the statement removed: “A check of facts demonstrates that hens housed in cages are less stressed and healthier and safer.”

Bowing to pressure, Restaurant Associates edited the statement so that only the last sentence remained.

Milk lobbyists called the Green the Capitol complaint line about a characterization of the hormone rBGH, which is not permitted in milk used in the food service.

The Web site had read: “Recombinant bovine growth hormone, or rBGH, is injected into dairy cows to artificially increase their milk production. The hormone has not been properly tested for safety. Milk labeled rBGH-free is produced by dairy cows that never received injections of this hormone.”

Milk lobbyists pointed out that the Food and Drug Administration considers the artificial hormone to be safe (although many scientists believe it may cause cancer).

The Feedstuffs editorial says rBGH milk is “as healthful and safe as milk from nontreated cows.” The Web site now reads: “Milk produced without synthetic rBGH is produced by dairy cows that never received injections of synthetic bovine growth hormone.”

The editorial says Restaurant Associates and its parent company, Compass Group, are “hooked by propaganda of animal rights groups” and are “advocates of vegetarianism.”

It is hard to tell that from the line at the barbecue station in the Longworth House Office Building or from the freshly grilled steak, salmon and chicken available in the Rayburn building.

There are veggie burgers too, but if they continue to be served at room temperature, the way I got mine, they may be a hard sell. If they were hot, they would have been quite tasty.

Hot dogs, French fries and onion rings have not been banished, though trans fats have left the premises.

A fair number of people were ordering couscous and tofu on one recent day. Sushi was not on the menu, but those who track the popularity of foods report that it is widely enjoyed in the United States, even in Washington.

There are also salads, made to order with an assortment of fresh greens, and stir-fries with or without meat.

Restaurant Associates says it tries to offer food grown within 150 miles when it is available. At this time of year that means apples, ice cream, hot dogs and baked goods including bread. Almost all of the food is cooked on site from scratch.

The coffee in all locations, supplied by Pura Vida Coffee of Seattle, is shade-grown, Fair Trade and organic. Fair Trade Starbucks coffee is available in the carryout shops. The seafood is sustainable, based on standards maintained by a program at the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California.

In lunchtime interviews a few diners said they thought the food had improved, but that prices were higher, so they might bring a lunch more often. Others said the food was worth the prices.

Items that were available before the change have not increased in price, Mr. Plumart said. New items, like freshly squeezed orange juice and steaks grilled to order, are more expensive.

Debbie Curtis, chief of staff to Representative Pete Stark, Democrat of California, likes the cafeteria in Longworth. “You get healthy choices and a better range of choices,” she said. “The brussels sprouts are cut in half and braised, not boiled to death and drowned in butter. I rarely ate in Longworth before. I used to look for the least offensive thing I could find.”

Jeff Hild, a legislative aide to Mr. Stark, who was eating lunch with Ms. Curtis, was impressed with the new compostable containers and the eating utensils made of cornstarch. Plastic and plastic foam containers have been banned, with the exception of drink bottles, which are being recycled.

“All of the food service items are 100 percent compostable,” Mr. Plumart said. “We’ve probably reduced stuff going to the landfill by 80 percent,” which also reduces garbage carting costs.

“The fork you are eating with,” he said, “will be dirt in 90 days.”

Later this year local farmers will be invited to set up tables with their products at lunch so they can, as Mr. Plumart said, “raise the level of consciousness of people using the cafeteria.”

So far, there are no plans to raise the consciousness of the Senate, where the food service is not noticeably greener than it was 10 years ago and continues to run at a $1.3 million yearly deficit.

Build more muscles. According to Dr. Sanjay Gupta of CNN, the more muscles you have, the higher your metabolism.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/health/2008/03/27/gupta.bellies.dementia.cnn?iref=videosearch

Here’s the catch though. To build muscles, you need to grow muscles as in muscle hyperatrophy. If you are constantly lifting the same weight, that is endurance training, which means you are just building more mitrochonrial (power houses) to utilize calories. To build muscles, you need your actin and myosin involved interdigitally and that means gradual weight increase.

Both are important to a healthy lifestyle and opting one over the other is not ideal.

For those on Buddyslim who are diabetics, here’s one weight loss method you should not attempt to do–skipping your insulin to lose weight faster.

“She calls it black magic. Every time her jeans start feeling tight, she skips a few doses of the insulin she needs to treat her diabetes. The pounds slip off - but there’s a price.”

“Damage from her uncontrolled diabetes is ravaging her stomach and her eyes. She was hospitalized three times in December and January when her blood became dangerously acidic.”

” Up to one-third of women with Type 1 diabetes skip or skimp on insulin doses in a dangerous attempt to lose weight, according to several studies conducted over the past decade. New research from the Joslin Diabetes Center suggests that women who skimp on insulin for any reason are more likely to suffer kidney trouble and foot problems - and more likely to die at a young age. Other studies have found higher rates of eye and nerve damage.”

“Medical professionals say it’s a sad irony that the very drug that can help a diabetic live a long, healthy life can also be abused to lose weight. People who don’t have enough insulin drop pounds because their bodies can’t absorb the nutrients in food and so pass them out in urine. “

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-080331-diabetics-weight-insulin,1,7097811.story

Diabetics skipping insulin to lose weight—at a price

By Alice Dembner

Boston Globe

4:19 PM CDT, March 31, 2008

She calls it black magic. Every time her jeans start feeling tight, she skips a few doses of the insulin she needs to treat her diabetes. The pounds slip off - but there’s a price.

Damage from her uncontrolled diabetes is ravaging her stomach and her eyes. She was hospitalized three times in December and January when her blood became dangerously acidic.

“I was disturbingly amused about how much weight I could possibly lose even though I was killing myself,” said the 37-year-old Marlborough, Mass. woman, who developed Type 1 diabetes after the births of her three girls. She asked that her name be kept private in part out of shame about her continued insulin manipulation.

Up to one-third of women with Type 1 diabetes skip or skimp on insulin doses in a dangerous attempt to lose weight, according to several studies conducted over the past decade. New research from the Joslin Diabetes Center suggests that women who skimp on insulin for any reason are more likely to suffer kidney trouble and foot problems - and more likely to die at a young age. Other studies have found higher rates of eye and nerve damage.

“We know that women in Western cultures are willing to do quite dramatic and drastic things to effect weight loss. In the context of something as complex as diabetes, it has the potential to have grave results,” said Ann Goebel-Fabbri, the Joslin psychologist who was the lead author of the new study.

The Joslin researchers tracked down 234 women with Type 1 diabetes who had participated in another study in the early 1990s. As part of the first study, the women completed surveys about aspects of their behavior, including whether they took less insulin than they should. Thirty percent of the women in the early survey said they had skimped on insulin at some point.

In the follow-up study, the researchers examined deaths and diabetic complications that had occurred since then. They found 10 deaths among women who had restricted insulin, compared to 16 among the larger group who had not. Those who restricted their insulin died on average 13 years younger - at 45, compared to 58.

“The risk becomes greater once ((insulin restriction)) becomes more entrenched and more of a pattern,” said Goebel-Fabbri.

Several other studies have found higher rates of eating disorders in women with Type 1 diabetes than in other women. Type 1 diabetes typically begins at a young age when the body stops producing the insulin needed to turn food into fuel. There are no studies of insulin restriction in Type 2 diabetics, who still produce some insulin and therefore less commonly need the drug.

Good diabetes care can intensify eating disorders, particularly the focus on food selection and portions, and the strict control of blood sugar with insulin that can lead to weight gain as patients struggle to balance food intake and insulin.

Medical professionals say it’s a sad irony that the very drug that can help a diabetic live a long, healthy life can also be abused to lose weight. People who don’t have enough insulin drop pounds because their bodies can’t absorb the nutrients in food and so pass them out in urine.

The number of patients who don’t take all their insulin is much higher than most physicians are aware of, said Dr. Paul Strumph, chief medical officer for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. Some people may skimp on insulin not to lose weight, but because they find their insulin regimen too complicated or they fear lowering their blood sugar too much, which can also cause serious problems.

Yet, he called the study “a wake-up call” to doctors, signaling that they need to talk to their diabetic patients about the dangers of insulin restriction, and in particular, “whether … it’s worth it to be thin and not reach your 40th birthday.”

Jacqueline Jean Walsh died a week before her 28th birthday in 2004, after what her mother now believes was years of deliberate insulin underdosing. Walsh was one of the women in the Joslin study.

Diagnosed with diabetes at age 13, Walsh began struggling with her insulin regimen while in high school in Westford. Over the next decade, after she and her family moved to Utah, she was hospitalized repeatedly for serious complications of high blood sugar, according to her mother, Jacqueline Lyons.

Lyons knew there were times when “JJ” didn’t take her insulin, but it wasn’t until after her daughter’s death that Lyons discovered diaries that laid out a pattern of skipping doses to lose weight.

“JJ was never … overweight,” said Lyons, who lives in Acton. “But she felt fat” and she wrote in her diaries about a pattern of binging on sweets and then avoiding insulin to purge the calories. As she did that, she began wasting away, forced to quit work and forgo college. Eventually, her mother said, “diabetes beat up her body so badly that she stopped breathing.”

Lyons is speaking out to warn other women. “We need to tell them to stop,” she said. “You will die, and it will be a slow and painful death.”

Future advances in diabetes treatment may help some people, Strumph said. For example, new drugs may allow people to attain near normal blood sugar levels with much less insulin, and automatic systems could monitor sugar and deliver insulin doses without the patient’s involvement.

What is also needed, said Goebel-Fabbri, are better ways to screen for the problem, particularly among women who may hide their behavior, and research on how best to treat it.

The 37-year-old Marlborough mother of three is eager for additional help. She sees a psychiatrist weekly for problems that include depression, and attended an eating disorders program for a while. But she hasn’t been able to stop manipulating her insulin.

She’s had body-image issues her whole life, feeling huge although friends tell her she looks fit. After her diabetes was diagnosed in 2001, she began binging and purging - starving herself, then going into a feeding frenzy followed by vomiting or avoiding insulin. There are stretches of days now when she takes all her insulin, but when the pounds creep back, she starts cutting corners.

At times, her average blood sugar level has soared to 19, triple the normal level, landing her in the hospital. Now, the medical complications are piling up. She has swelling and fluid leakage in her eyes, and her doctors say she may go blind in a few years. She often can’t keep down food or liquid because of nerve damage to her digestive system. Her kidneys are showing wear.

“I have skirted death a couple of times,” she said. “I’m hopeful there is some treatment that’s going to click.”

“My driving force is not wanting to be a burden on my kids.”