January 10

Tonight we are going out to dinner for my birthday, a nice restaurant with close friends. I am familiar with the menu, and already know I will probably order the lamb. It is from New Zealand and grass fed. I am continually reminded how sharply my thinking and behavior has changed since I began the grass fed experiment almost five months ago.

January 5

I am running errands today and ran out of time before I got hungry and needed to eat. I just don’t eat away from home all that often, and certainly not on the fly. Eating mostly grass fed dairy and meat has impacted even the simplest food decisions. I stopped by a local market and picked up a piece of fruit and some chicken. What a mistake.

December 23, 2009

Bronchitis again. Every December it feels like I am destined to succumb. A simple sinus infection immediately invades my lungs and I am at the doctors for antibiotics. I don’t like this, but I haven’t quite figured out how to stop my life and not get exhausted.

I called my colleague, Susan Dopart, MS, RD, last week. I just reviewed her book, A Recipe For Life by the Doctor’s Dietitian and wanted to set up a time to meet. She shares my keen interest in insulin resistance and I wanted to talk about my experience with grass fed products. I told her, “My body is different.”

We met on Wednesday. She said, “You look really different.”

I have shopped primarily at farmer’s markets and Whole Foods grocery stores with minimum purchased from conventional grocery stores for almost three months.  Tonight I went shopping at Costco, getting ready for my son’s birthday party.  I feel like a traitor.  I opted for organic but grain fed hamburger meat.  I bought hamburger buns.  I am aghast that they contain high fructose corn syrup.  The cucumbers and red peppers were grown conventionally.  I sold out.

In a moment of indecision, I opted for what was convenient and what would save me another trip to the market on a Saturday.  I am truly stunned at how how bad I feel.  I don’t want to eat this food.  I am already scheming on a plan to maintain my own clean, and unadulterated food supply, leaving the kids to scarf down the cheaper and more convenient fare.

I have been thinking about my yogurt intake for a few weeks.  I eat alot of it.  Yogurt is a great way to satisfy the desire for something more–especially something sweet at the end of a meal.   My biggest gripe has been that yogurt producers in the US cater to the distorted taste buds of the masses.  They are too sweet–to the point of cloying.  But I am also concerned about the fact that all of the yogurts I have found so far use milk from grain fed cows.

Most flavored domestic yogurts add much more carbohydrate in the form of sugar or other caloric sweetener than their plain cousins.   Cheaper yogurts sweeten with high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), others may granulated sugar and some stretch to use dehydrated cane juice (sucrose) for a healthier appeal.  There is still far too much sugar added.   It is too bad.

November 11

I am preparing a presentation regarding the metabolic and nutrition advantages of grass fed beef for Frank’s business: higher omega 3’s and CLA, lower total fat, lower calories.  I think I have a good handle on the benefits.  Then I read a reference regarding food safety.  I’m intrigued and look for more data.

In August my blood test results showed elevated cholesterol levels.  My doctor immediately wanted me to take a statin, given a rich family history of CVD (my dad died at 44).  I rebelled.

I am dietitian and eat exceptionally well.  I am concerned that the knee jerk to statins is masking a more wholistic solution to our current concerns about heart disease in this country.  Despite exercising regularly and eating well, I knew there was at least one more thing I could change.