Month: May 2010

by

Quotations : Eleanor Roosevelt

“I could not, at any age, be content to take my place by the fireside

and simply look on.

Life was meant to be lived.

Curiosity must be kept alive.

One must never, for whatever reason, turn one’s back on life. “

Attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt

I must get hold of a biography about her. As far I know in my ignorance, she seems to have been a remarkable woman.

Advertisement
by

Laziest cook on earth . 5 Divine soup to warm you up in this miserable weather.

If you live in Cape Town as I do you will be shivering in the current cold spell which is, I am sure, now here to stay for the winter. Cold, wet, windy with dark early mornings making the commute to work really miserable; with the same scenario when you travel home in the evening.

Makes me truly grateful that I can earn living from the comfort of my own home.

We love soup in the winter and we have a few favourites that we never get tired of. This is a recipe I discovered last winter and it is taken from the great book:-

South African Cookbook for Diabetes and Insulin Resistance.1 Second edition 2009. Tafelberg Publishers. Hilda Lategan  RD ( SA)

I started buying ‘ diabetic’ cookbooks years before I ever became diabetic/pre-diabetic. The recipes are always great and very healthy.

This soup is really delicious. The first time I made it, we sat down and finished the whole lot at one sitting!

Try it! I mean a portion – not the whole damn lot! 🙂

SAVOURY POTATO & SWEETCORN SOUP. Yield 1.25 litres (5 servings). Serving size 250ml.

500g (4-6) medium potatoes * 2 celery stalks with leaves, chopped (50g) * 1 small onion, peeled & chopped (50g) * 1 beef stock cube, crumbled * 500ml boiling water * 420g can cream style sweetcorn * 375ml low-fat milk * 100g lean ham, cubed * 25ml chopped parsley * salt to taste.

  • Place the potatoes, celery, onion, beef stock cube and boiling water in a saucepan. Bring to the boil and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes, until potatoes are tender and cooked. Mash the potatoes. Stir the sweetcorn and milk into the mashed potatoes. Bring the mixture to the boil and cook for 2 minutes, stirring.
  • Stir the ham and the parsley into the soup and season with salt, if desired. Serve warm.

Comments: The carbohydrate content of this soup is high and for this reason the soup usually replaces the portion of bread for that meal. Instead, depending on your dietary prescription, rather add more protein to the meal e.g. a slice of ham or a little grated cheese. The soup tastes best when freshly prepared but it can be cooled successfully for 48 hours and reheated. Freezing is not recommended.

250ml = 2 starch + 1 low-fat protein; Glycemic index: low (51); Glycemic load: 18

Per portion: Energy 921kJ;  CHO 34.8g; Protein 9.8g; Fat 2.9g; MUFA 1.0g; PUFA 0.3g; Chol. 15.5mg; Fibre 3.2g

by

I am really upset … 3 Poor self care and diabetes complications

Those of you following this blog will know the story about my friend T who works for a friend/client of mine. At Christmas time he scraped his foot while swimming and by March his foot had been amputated.  He is still getting around on crutches while he awaits a prosthetic foot.

I was upset once again yesterday when I was told that T was admitted to hospital last Thursday with deep vein thrombosis in the remaining ‘good’ leg. He remains hospitalised at this time and I will contact his son later this morning to get the latest update. The grave danger and possible consequences in this situation do not have to be spelled out.

What really, really gets to me is that this whole unfolding crisis could quite probably have been avoided completely. It need never have happened.

T really needs to supplement his pension income, his employer wants to accommodate this but also has to deal with T’s lengthy  absences from work. It has placed my client in a  difficult situation which will have to resolved one way or another.

When we blithely ignore the warning signs that our lifestyle is causing our bodies to deteriorate, we are literally toying with our  lives. There are thousands of medical conditions that can befall us over which we have no control whatsoever. Surely it makes sense to take charge of what we can control and influence? But we just don’t do it.

I am relentlessly driven by a number of things to continue on my odyssey back to optimal (optimum?!) wellness. I cannot just let it go. I cannot just let things slide – much as I am so often tempted to do. I deviate from the path – badly sometimes – and yet I cannot throw in the towel.

  • I value my financial independence and the lifestyle that this affords me.
  • I dread the day my children have to step up to the plate and provide for me financially.
  • I fear being dependant on others to care for me physically. I cared for my dying mom-in-law for over a year before she died and it was a harrowing experience for both of us. Well do I remember the two of us crying bitterly in each other’s arms as I changed her filthy disposable nappy yet again. The anguish she suffered from the pain and loss of dignity is something that still lives with me  26 years later.
  • I am angry at myself for the stupidity I exhibited over many years in not looking after my health and lifestyle.  I still exhibit this same stupidity ; work and stressful deadlines still predominate in my life.

One small consolation is that sanity has now prevailed long enough for me to appoint a temporary office assistant. After only 3 mornings with us, the ‘advent of Nicky’ is changing my office landscape and I will talk more about this in a later post.

by

Eileen’s Odyssey : quotable quotes

Quotations that I come across often give me pause for thought, provide motivation to keep me headed in a chosen direction or focussed on desired outcomes. I like this one. 

Until I get through this deadline week, keep well, keep strong and see you soon!

 

"You don’t get to choose how you’re going to die, or when.

You can only decide how you’re going to live. Now."

                                                                         Joan Baez

by

Weight loss: we must know where we are headed

“One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. “Which road do I take?” she asked. “Where do you want to go?” was his response. “I don’t know,” Alice answered. “Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter.””

— Lewis Carroll, author

Reducing my weight and maintaining at goal weight is the single most important element of my journey to optimum wellness. With my weight at a normal level, the other ills I have will come right. Well, if not ‘come right’, they will certainly be the best results I can achieve given my specific circumstances.

Damn it all to hell! I have said it before and I will say it again. It’s all self inflicted. By upping the ante as I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I am placing a much higher value on self care.

By doing this, I will be better able to cope with a stressful, busy life and better plan for the more rounded lifestyle I yearn for.

The first thing I am doing, as of this morning, is re-looking at portion control. W & I have been eating far too much and this is one of the main reasons why our weight is not shifting as rapidly as it was. With W-L and the very comprehensive food list booklet they provide, I am able to instantly see what size my portions should be. So, I have no excuses. Period.

The other day, I saw a list of portion sizes compiled by Dr Ingrid van Heerden (DietDoc on Health 24.com). I am sure I made a copy of it. I’ll dig it out and post it later in the day.

Chow for now. Have a good one.

by

Weight Loss : I’ve got to up the ante

It’s now exactly two weeks since we returned from our wonderful break at Pinnacle Point. A fading memory I am afraid. 😦  We had to jump right back into the fray and catch up on time lost while we chilled out.

There’s something fundamentally wrong with the whole scenario; with the way that we live our lives in our house. This work, work, work is not a good place to be. We should be relaxing and I suppose I should be relaxing doing crochet or something or maybe gossiping with the other tannies in our quiet apartment block. Nah, just can’t see that ever happening.

I, for one, am right up there with my kids checking out the latest Blackberry, muttering about what in the cloud data backups are costing me, taking on new payroll work for small businesses. I would just like to have a more rounded life and in truth am striving towards that goal; without any notable success at this time!

What has happened since returning to Cape Town two weeks ago? Well, on the weight front nothing much at all and therein lies the problem. Having lost 23kg, my metabolism has settled down and decided that this weight is quite OK, thank you very much. So, another dreaded plateau. I have 7kg to go to the W-L goal set for me and I still want to go at least another 5kg down after that!

I feel good! I’m told I look good (but not when I am still working in my dressing gown mid-morning!) I am much smaller than I was, of course. I had the most amazing experience just before we left on holiday. I simply had to go to Woollies and find some denim pants to take on holiday – the old ones were all hanging like sacks on me. Great feeling actually! 🙂

Not having a clue what size to buy, I confidently took home two pairs of denim pants in size 18. Bearing in mind that I had been wearing size 22 stuff, this in itself was a major victory for me. Got home to find that the jeans as well as the pull on elasticised denim pants were both far too big!

As I hate trying on clothes in shop fitting rooms, I went back, changed the pants and came home with size 16’s. Tried them on. WOW!  The fitted jeans were fine – even a little loose. The elasticised pants were too big!  So back to the shop again to came home with size 14’s. Anyone who has worn size 22 clothes and now wears size 14 will know exactly how I felt!  I was and still am over the moon about this very tangible evidence of my progress so far.

SO FAR

Two very crucial little words for me. I have come so far and am justifiably chuffed with my efforts. But now the real test must begin. The last 7kg’s will be difficult to lose and hence the expression below :-

“ If you up the ante, you increase the importance or value of something, especially where there’s an element of risk as the term comes from gambling, where it means to increase the stake (the amount of money bet). “    Wikipedia

The element of risk for me is, of course, the real possibility of deteriorating health issues due to too slow intervention on my part. I must place a much greater emphasis on where I am heading and pick up the pace substantially.  I will have to worry about all the loose, wrinkled, floppy bits that will only get worse once I have arrived at my destination! The value of goal weight as the basis for optimum wellness has to be the most important element of my odyssey.

So, onward and downward again – are you joining me? You are most welcome!