Low Carb Diet

Amongst acromegaly patients, it is relatively well known that the symptoms can be greatly reduced by maintaining a healthy diet. When I first joined the facebook group, I could find posts about diets that helped and methods that worked for people. It was already apparent to most that carbohydrates (pasta, bread, rice, potatoes, but especially sugars) had a negative effect; the symptoms would become more prevalent (for example water retention, joint aches, tiredness, headaches…).

Slowly, but steadily, western medicine people (doctors and such) come to realize that food may have a bigger impact on health than previously thought. (When I first came to the hospital specialized in this disease, they told me there were no diet recommendations…). Currently, my doctor is researching the impact of a low carb diet (ketogenic) on blood values that are typical for acromegaly patients. She is aiming for a proof of concept: showing that a low carb diet has positive effects on the short term.

So when she asked if I wanted to join her study, I agreed. I have been experimenting with what to eat and how to make myself feel better. This study wouldn’t be too hard. Just two weeks of eating no carbs. No chocolate, no chips, no fries, no bread, no fruits, no rice or beans, obviously no sugar: a purely ketogenic diet. Meaning: with this diet, my body would have to make energy out of fats and not out of carbohydrates. Two weeks. How hard could it be? To make matters easier, my sister decided to join in on the diet. Thinking shared pain is half the pain.

Turns out, although it wasn’t particularly hard, it got boring quite fast. From my experience with intermittent fasting, I already knew that not eating could be confrontational. But this eating without taking any carbs was more torturous than not eating in my opinion. Eating got boring, the fun was taken out of it. The first few days are supposed to be the hardest, as your body adjusts to burning fat instead of carbohydrates. This switch was harder for my sister than for me 🙂 A week was doable, but halfway through the second week, I was fantasizing about what I would eat once I was done. By then my sister quit altogether. This mostly had to do with a weekend getaway with my parents that contained a lot of my sisters’ favorite carbohydrates. I persevered.

At the end of the two weeks I was asked to join a study to take less than 80 grams of carbohydrates a day. But this turned out to be too hard for me. Additionally, in my regular diet I don’t eat too many carbs anyhow, but the ones I do eat, are mostly found in chocolate… oops 😉

As far as blood values go, at the beginning of the study, I already had a new all-time low value (IGF-1) without starting the study. Which indicated to me that intermittent fasting is working for me.  During the study, this value increased slightly. This indicated to me that it didn’t do anything different (values tend to rise towards the end of an injection period).  The value also didn’t decrease. And since I know that for me intermittent fasting works and is fairly sustainable in my lifestyle, this has my preference. (It needs to be mentioned though, that I didn’t stop my 16:8 regime during these two weeks. To maintain a similar eating pattern for a fair comparison.)

Still, it was fun to participate as a form of experiment. And I am still curious as to some other findings. When I  find her article on this study (I suspect it is not published yet) I will include a link to it.

Intermittent Fasting

Ever since my diagnosis, I have had the wish to be cured. Obviously. According to the hospital though, there is no cure. If you are lucky there may be remission. But already responding so well to meds, is considered a very positive outcome. Regardless, I want to find out how I can make myself feel better, experience fewer side effects from the meds and the disease. Sooooo, one of the things I’m doing is adjusting my diet. Either on orders of an orthomolecular health practitioner or on my own, I’m giving everything a shot.

Currently, I am in the middle of an intermittent fasting schedule (16:8 mainly: 16 hour of not eating, 8 hour timeframe to eat). Intermittent fasting has been proven to have health benefits. And is therefore interesting for anybody who’s reading this.

I got to intermittent fasting because some of my online personal trainers are doing it and one of those actually gathered around a group of people to try out IF (intermittent fasting ey) whilst supporting eachother during the month we were going to try it. Since I started a little before the commencing of the group, I have now intermittently fasted for the whole month of April.

The challenge isn’t the not eating part, but the part where other people think it’s weird and you have to defend yourself. But the biggest challenge is overcoming the patterns that show themselves way more clearly when you cannot numb yourself with food.

Sure, my stomach is empty and I feel like I’m hungry ever once in a while, (particularly at times where I’d usually have had lunch or dinner). But it only highlights the patterns I usually follow. The fasting forces me to take another look at those patterns.

In my case I am also curious as to how I would feel in a physical sense, to experience what it would do for me from a hormonal point of view. I was in a 36 hour fast when I received my latest injection, and I can tell you I have never had this few side effects.

I’m happy to inform that I feel good doing IF. I can’t eat as much as I could in the sense of poison size, I feel more stable mood-wise and I notice better what foods work for me and which don’t.

I can recommend it.

As a final challenge in the online program I’ve have just now started a fast that should last for 48 to 72 hours. Of course I will see how I will feel and take proper care if I need to. The two 36 hour fasts which I’ve done last week and the week before that, went very smoothly, so I’m not too worried. 🙂

For the time being…

2017!! And I have some job interviews lined up. So things are going okay. Still, I have a lot of spare time. So I decided to equip myself with yet another set of new skills. Mainly because I decided I wanted a job in data analysis, and each and every job vacancy in that field requires some sort of programming skills. Therefore, I am now learning how to program (here and here). My main focus is Python, but I will also take a look at Ruby, JavaScript and HTML and CSS 🙂 so who knows, perhaps in time, I will have created my own website 🙂

This is not to say that I am solely looking for data crunching jobs because all the interviews I currently have, are for jobs similar to process engineering (if not completely process engineering 😉 ).

I still have about a million plans for the future, which is nice. But they all need to start with a single step. And those tiny little single steps are taking too long for my liking 😉 But of course, the only one that can make a significant change in my life is me. Therefore I am staying patient and taking it a day at the time. And I have gotten it in my head that I first need a steady income (not in the least to finance all of my ideas 🙂 ), and take things from there.

Perhaps in time, I will share some details about my plans for the future, but for now, I am not sure of them myself yet. Whenever I am ready to share, I will let you guys know.

Back in NL once again

Since the moment the plane touched ground in the Netherlands, it took a week for the sky to show me the sun. The greyness was overwhelming and had a severe dampening effect on my mood. It took some getting used to… The contrast with Portugal couldn’t have been bigger. The nights here were literally freezing cold, as opposed to the sunny, warm and windless days in Portugal.

Yes, I was (and am!) missing Portugal, more specifically I mostly missed the light (and yes the waves too of course, but my body is now very happy to not do a lot of physical exercise for a while). The sun remains higher in the sky there and still has warming power. And I suppose the trees here around my parents house don’t help. That is why my very first job application I send out was for a job as an English teacher in Portugal. Haven’t heard anything yet, so I am not holding my breath.

Job interview face (helloooo mascara!). Most of my tan already gone. Still have the blond hair though!

But it seems my system is enjoying the colder weather. I loved seeing my brother and sisters again (and yes, my parents too) and cooking a typical Portuguese meal for them. And in the meantime I have regained my positive disposition and applying it on all the various obstacles I now encounter. Like finding a suitable job and enjoying living with my parents again. The suitable job being the obstacle I am focussing on at the moment. So I gathered all my courage and after some light editing I have put my CV online again last Tuesday evening. To both my joy and my dread the next morning the first recruiter called (at 08.45 hours… and luckily I was awake). So today I have had my first interview with a recruitment agency. It was nice enough I suppose. Had to practice with my Too Faced Better Than Sex mascara again 😉 But it seems I haven’t lost my skill 🙂

I’m still unsure of what my coming year will look like precisely and what items I should give priority (waves, friends, location, money, job). But for now I am still free enough to apply wherever I want, and that’s what I intend to do.

My amazing Portuguese meal! With (from left to right, top to bottom) cheese from serra da estrela, salad, migas, requeijão with abóbora jam, bolo de bolacha maria, bacalhau a gomes sá, mango mousse and tuna salad. It was a big success 🙂

Tired & Emotional

I wasn’t aware that I could get so tired working like this. Between the teaching and the table setting, the dishes, the vacuuming, the surfing and the cleaning, there is little time to actually catch my breath. And then there are the guests, which means being sociable all the time. Although I do like people a lot, this is mentally quite exhausting (hello mantra “this too shall pass”. I use this one both for the good times as well as the bad times, it makes me appreciate everything that much more). The month of August was interesting, with 7 consecutive weeks of work (this includes parts of July and September for those of you who are counting). And although I have Sundays off of teaching yoga (our so called day off) we do clean the house top to bottom since it is our change-over day. Add to that the physical effort that is surfing, the living according to the tides, which includes dinnertime at 22:00 sometimes (so no early nights on two surf session days)… and you may understand that this rythm totally wears me out. And that place of tiredness, is an interesting place to be in.

To lighten the mood: our beautiful hibiscus that at the moment holds 5 flowers on its small frame 🙂 (the fifth is on the other side of the plant, and you may notice another bulb about to open 🙂 )

Because any and all emotions surface really easily, which forces you to deal with them too. And that is a good thing because normally I am really good at numbing myself down (chocolate anybody?) in order not to deal with those things. So any type of negative emotion (let’s face it, the positive emotions aren’t really an issue, are they?) – dissappointment, anger, sadness, envy, guilt – needs to be dealt with swiftly, quietly and efficiently. But did it happen that way? Of course not. I am an expert on dealing with sadness quietly, so that was the easy part. But in anger it would seem I am less quiet. Although I do try to reserve it for the one who I feel is the target/cause of said anger (as to not bother anybody else with it). Which is really not the best way to deal with it anyhow. But in order for me to feel like I am setting boundaries (a personal point of focus) and sticking to those boundaries and having other people respect them too, confrontation every once in a while is necessary. And people who know me, know that I am not that great with confrontation. And no, apparently n0t every idea I have about my boundaries is that reasonable. This has lead to some of my worst moments here, for the dude (who handles this like a boss btw) but more so for me. I bother myself the most with this sometimes less than grownup behavior. On the other hand, it did also lead to some insights about myself, so they were valuable experiences nonetheless.

Recently I came across this quote on facebook (A Course In Miracles):

When I am upset, it is always because I have replaced reality with illusions I made up.

This one struck home for me. Because all the anger, all the envy and consequently disappointment, guilt and sadness I have come across, were of my own making. This was a pretty valuable lesson.

All this I wouldn’t have realised when I hadn’t been that tired. So I am grateful for that too.

And I want to thank everybody who has helped me through the more difficult times here 😉 It is really comforting to have people that care. Every message/skype attempt/phone call is highly appreciated.

 

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Now on a totally different note: If anybody has any questions for me, about my time here or my own personal journey, please let them be known to me (in which ever way you feel comfortable with). Since I am running out of things to write about (or sometimes it feels that way at least 😉 ), I thought perhaps you guys could inspire me 🙂

 

Growing things

The house we are staying at, the house that is the surfcamp, is rented for half a year. The gardens are being kept very nicely by the dude (cutting grass, weeding and making little borders to various flowerbeds, making sure the rabbit can’t escape…). To put in my two cents, I was appointed small scale farmer for two patches of bordered soil in the garden. Here I try to grow things. And I say “try” for a reason

Pumpkins and small green pepper sprouts, plus the pineapple crown.

When I first got here the place reminded me of Costa Rica; very green, loads of fruits, and it seemed that everything just grew and grew and grew without too much effort. And for the first couple of months that was exactly the case, because of rain and a comfortable temperature. Now in the middle of summer, rain is a rare occurence and the temperatures are not so comfortable anymore. This has a huge impact on anything that would like to grow.

We planted the seeds in the beginning of June, which I admit, is quite late. But in our defense, we wanted to fertilize the ground by composting fruit and vegetable waste. We put some fresh soil on top of that and then planted the seeds. Almost all of them sprouted. But they aren’t doing too good.

Because of the strong sun and high temperature during the day, it is really important to water them either in the early morning while the plants are still in the shade, or late in the evening. If you water them in the middle of the day (because you forgot in the morning and the evening before…) the plants will burn to a crisp. This I knew, because this was the very reason why our mom didn’t let us water the grass in the middle of the day in the Netherlands in summer (and let’s face it, the summers there aren’t nearly as warm as here, and the sun not as strong). Nevertheless, watering them once too late in the morning was enough to let some of my plants die.

The ones that did survive, don’t grow that well. I suspect being this close to the ocean (50 meters! which is awesome obviously!) has something to do with it. Still I water them every day, in hopes of them bearing fruit within the coming 2 months.

What plants are we cultivating you may wonder? Well, good question. I was fairly confident everything would grow. So besides the packages of small green pepper seeds and melon seeds, I put some nespera seeds in there (although I am fairly certain those were the ones that didn’t survive the late morning watering) as well as dried watermelon seeds and pumpkin seeds (that came from store bought pumpkins and watermelons…). Also, as you may notice in the picture, there is a pineapple crown in there. Perhaps it would have grown roots in Costa Rica, or even in the Netherlands, but here it seems like it’s not making it through the summer alive. Although I refuse to take it out of the ground until it is totally yellow. And the green stalks you see, with the small yellow flowers, are turnip stalks that we didn’t get around to eat but still had some roots. So I put those in the ground as well. And they are actually the ones that seem to be doing the best.

Turnips and melons (I think), plus on the right a small branch of our huge rosemary bush.

I sincerely hope there will grow something edible before the end of the season, but I fear it won’t happen. Still it is fun to try though 🙂

 

 

The food

This is something I can be very short about (but won’t be). The food is simply amazing!

Healthy snack fruits with yoghurt, goji berries, sunflower seeds and raisins

It is very very very nice to be living with a chef 🙂 First of all it feels really luxurious to not have to cook. Secondly it is great that I don’t have to eat alone. Thirdly, the food is healthy and delicious. Moreover, I do help out in the kitchen and in the process of doing so, I can memorize (and then write down) the recipes. So if this time doesn’t bring me anything else, it will bring me good food for the rest of my life 🙂 (and no, I will not share the recipes for they aren’t mine to share, but if you are lucky enough I may cook for you one day).

Spicy pumpkin pasta with pecorino cheese for lunch

The food is mainly vegetarian, and sometimes we have fish. It often involves loads of garlic, plenty of good olive oil and smaller amounts of even better vinegar. And somehow with seemingly simple ingredients an amazing dinner is prepared. Perhaps it’s because the vegetables here are quite honestly brilliant, or perhaps it is my head that’s in the clouds because of my current life style, but I enjoy every bite.

Luckily for me the dude has just as much of a sweet tooth as I do and Portugal has some amazing desserts and sweets. Fortunately because of the surf and yoga it isn’t bothering me at all 🙂 However, since the fruit here is even more amazing than the veggies, I find myself opting for the fantastic nesperas (mispels in Dutch I believe) more often than for the candy my mom send me (sorry mom, no more drop for me!) or even the pastries.

We should eat healthy he said, and then made us this dessert.

(Of course I still have a hard time refusing any chocolate or pastries when offered, so most of the time I don’t 🙂 ice-cream I find easier to resist, but after a surf session (5 minutes or 5 hours  afterwards…), it’s just too good!)

Hallelujah

The wrapper is dark, with some red, I don’t even notice what’s on there. I know the label says 75% and at the moment that’s all I need to know. It has been too long, almost 2 whole weeks. I want to feel it, taste it. Carefully I open the wrapper, it’s no nonsense plastic paper. Easy to open, and that’s what I need right now. I try to go about it patiently, but I feel like it may have looked a little more frantic than I intended. The dude isn’t looking at me funny yet so I feel like I’m doing a fine job of it.

Finally it’s open. Dark brown squares staring me right in the face, tantalizing me. I break the top part straight off, right along the indents that are meant for breaking. The top piece I break in half (also because it’s meant to be that way, so what if I’m a little bit of a perfectionist?).

The big moment is finally here. I pick the left one of the dark brown squares and place it in my mouth. Slowly it starts to melt and my taste receptors are processing the delicious information. Because I don’t hear any angels singing but feel like they should, I go for a hallelujah of my own. Which is hard to do with a mouth full of chocolate. The 75% is just the right balance between sweet and bitter to make this instant the most exquisite chocolate tasting moment I’ve had in a long long time.