Tag: dad

Kathy & Katie

Hi Katie,

I really enjoyed your article on the battle with sugar. I can relate to so mayn points in your story and would really like to give up sugar and get healthier.

You mention cutting out carbohydrates,sugar and grains, so I was wondering if you could give me a sample of what you eat over a few days?

Thanks and regards,
Kathy

Kathy,

Good luck with your plan!

A typical day for me would be as follows:

Morning – protein shake or a banana

Lunch- baked chicken and vegetables (steamed or just cut up raw veggies)

Dinner- Steak with vegetables and a salad with dressing (be careful of the dressing – check for carbs and sugar)

I limit the red meat each week so dinner could be chicken or pork or shrimp. There are good recipes in the Paleo cookbooks out there. I eat cheese so I’m not 100% Paleo but close.

I make sure my portions fill me up. If you need to snack, pick vegetables or a fruit. Your body will adjust to this and not crave anything else within a month if you really stick to it. I don’t want any of the junk foods that I used to eat. They don’t taste good to me.

I hope this helps get you started. Reach out anytime.

Julie & Katie

Well Katie….with a few supportive words, your columns, books/articles on No Sugar lifestyle changes, and a bit of soul searching as to why I’m putting junk/poison in my body, I’m on my way to transforming my eating habits/health. I’ve always been very healthy as to how I treat my body especially the last few years, so this is the last, most crucial part. Plus my birthday’s on Monday…what could be a better bday gift?!?!?

I had my first colonoscopy this morn and decided that since it’s all cleaned out and pristine (I know TMI), 🙂 I’ll keep it healthy from now on. I cleaned out cupboards, fridge, and freezer and purged and resupplied with good healthy foods.

I’m keeping a small journal on highs and lows of the journey. Being a teacher and on Fall Break is helpful stress-wise so I can just work through this this week. I started a few days ago in terms of reading and wondering about it all so I’ve done lots already. Yesterday I really started due to the fact that I couldn’t eat anything. They said I could have jello and Gatorade but those are just full of sugar and that’s not part of the plan right??

Anyway thanks for your words of support. Looking forward to reading more columns. Plus since I’ve read you’re a financial adviser, that’s the next area of my life to improve (it’s not bad mind you, but certainly could use some tweaking!!)

Thanks again

Julie 🙂

Julie,

Post a colonoscopy seems like a good place to start! I did something similar.

The first few weeks are the hardest and then I was just pumped up to keep going. I so rarely think about the foods that used to draw me in. I just know they were killing me. Glad you have the week off so you can really take the time to eat clean.

Keep me updated on how it goes. Would enjoy meeting you if you ever need help with your financial plan.

As I’m writing this I just ate a hard boiled egg to hold me over until after my 1:00 appointment! I didn’t use to like them but really enjoy them now.

Take care!

Katharine & Katie

Hi Katie,

I just read your article about your life change. I live in Portland Or. I have many of the same “symptoms” as you said you had and my A1C this month was at 7.4. I am only 34 and pregnant with my first. My fiance and I are both morbidly over weight according to BMI.

I am wondering what you did for your mornings. I love carby sugary stuff in the morning with sugary coffee creamer. I believe starting the day out steong can help. I just don’t know how to add variety and satisfaction.

Also, How did you begin and stick with it with others in the house? I would need to be 100 in charge of all food and cooking if I wanted us both to do it and I dont want to deal with that.

Do you have any literature to recommend.

Thanks for sharing
Katharine, Portland Or. But Reno native.

Katharine,

The mornings also were why I had to make my biggest adjustment. I started by walking or running for 30 minutes before eating and then would do a protein shake. That was filling and kept me full until lunch. If that isn’t enough at first, I would add a banana and some scrambled eggs. You have to make sure you get enough calories to keep that baby fed! Once you get the sugars out, you will be amazed at how great coffee tastes plain. I always used to add cream (lots of it)!

In my house it is impossible to get all of the kids on this diet. You have to commit to this being your own journey and just avoid the foods that you know are poison for you. It took me some time and I slipped a few times but I got there. You will have to resist these temptations everywhere so if you can count on yourself at home then you can succeed anywhere. Keep chopped up veggies ready to eat always!! I use those as a substitute for chips, cookies, or anything I might grab just to be eating something.

All of the Paleo literature is helpful. I read articles on the Internet all of the time. I have a Paleo cookbook but I still eat a little bit of dairy (but not much). Be patient on healing your body. My stomach upset took 9 months to resolve but it is cured from this. That was very exciting after that long wait.

Good luck! Make sure to get permission from your obstetrician before making any a rule decisions.

Please reach out anytime if you need extra motivation!

Flunking the Rules of Civility

When I first started doing my radio show about two years ago, I had a panel of guests of various ages who discussed the Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior that George Washington had copied for a school assignment at the age of 16. The 110 rules were originally written by French Jesuits in 1595 and at their core really describe a life focused on other people rather than self-interests. How far we have come in 419 years, and it’s not a road well-traveled.

In the last 20 years, the emphasis in the schools, and now at home, has been on self-esteem and self-worth, and the value of learning to focus on others has slipped away. Teachers and parents alike are tip-toeing around kids and their unruly behaviors so that they don’t feel shamed by manners and discipline. Is it working? If we look around we see spoiled disrespectful brats in most restaurants, schools and on athletic teams. These kids wouldn’t lift a finger to help their parents without arguing about it first or proclaiming how unfair it is to have to help support the daily grind of operating a house. Parents are exhausted and overwhelmed by these children and know they have created monsters but don’t know what to do. If that is your household, then I would suggest establishing the rules of civility in your home.

The next time you all sit down to dinner (which needs to be quite often if you want to raise well adjusted adults), I encourage you to start reading from the following list and get your children to explain what these rules mean and how they intend to start implementing them in your home. These conversations can be useful for kids ages five on up and you will be surprised how much your kids want the structure that might be lacking in your home.

Here are some of my favorites from the Rules of Civility that can change your household and get your otherwise lazy and entitled children on the right path:

Rule 6 Speak not when others Speak, Sit not when others Stand, speak not when you should hold Peace, walk not on when others stop.

Ask your children what this means to them. This is a rule about showing respect and using manners. There is no shame in either of those characteristics. Have each of your children tell you one way they can practice this rule starting today that will make a difference in your home. Suggest to them that this rule means that all electronics are to be turned off when the family is eating together (and that includes yours as well!).

Rule 40 Strive not with your Superiors in Argument, but always Submit your Judgment to Others with Modesty.

Imagine a home where the teenagers actually consider that they don’t know it all and that they should be respectful when expressing their opinions. The tricky part about these rules is that we have to lead by example here so the adults have to follow them as well! Ask your children how they can get along better with everybody in the household by having them name one thing they can do differently each day.

Rule 52 In your Apparel be Modest and endeavor to accommodate Nature, rather than to procure Admiration. Keep to the Fashions of your equals Such as are Civil and orderly with respect to Times and Places.

Don’t we all long for a world where people dress appropriately and children are excited to look and act mature? I used to love getting dressed up to travel on an airplane when I was a child and miss that experience now. Ask your children to go an entire week without arguing with you about what they are wearing to school or out for an evening and show you that they understand modesty.

Rule 56 Associate yourself with Men of good Quality if you Esteem your own Reputation; for tis better to be alone than in bad Company.

Encourage your children to list three qualities that they believe are important to have a successful life and ask them to name three friends that have the same qualities. Encourage them to develop these relationships with people that will encourage them to make good decisions.

These are just a handful of the 110 rules and as I read them all, it is frightening to think about how badly our society has strayed away from them. We can’t be afraid to go back to them and start encouraging respect, manners, courtesy and modesty in order to get our children on the right path. Today we are flunking the rules of civility but we don’t have to be. Start with one rule at a time and get your children involved in the discussion. Write down what is important to you as a person and as a family and set a goal of implementing one new rule each week. A family without respect will fail and a society without civility will crumble…. It is only just a matter of time.

It’s Long Past Time to Portray Fathers as Leaders

Every year I dread the annual walk into the Father’s Day card aisle. I’m not the only woman who feels this way either. The aisle is loaded with cards about fathers who lay on the couch all day in a frantic search for the remote or spend hours every day fishing with their buddies. I stand there trapped as I look for a card for my husband, my ex-husband, my step-dad, my father in-law, my brother, and up until my Dad’s death in March, a card for him as well. Most of the cards don’t fit any of them or any Dad I know for that matter. There are always the gushy ones to choose from, but the ones with any humor mostly portray men as lazy and useless in the household.

I think back to my childhood and some of the shows that we watched back in the 1970’s – Little House on the Prairie, The Brady Bunch, Eight is Enough and The Walton’s. The fathers in those shows were portrayed as leaders of the family and they helped guide and shape their children. They treated their wives with respect and even though the male and female roles were more traditional in the 1970’s, couples worked together as co-leaders to run the household and help the children daily.

As time passed, and women continued to further their careers, television made a drastic switch and these older shows got replaced with sitcoms like The Cosby Show, The Simpson’s, Married with Children, and The Family Guy. These are all popular shows that ran for years and men are all portrayed as aloof and incapable of being a leader in the home. The American mindset slowly began shifting and believing that men are unable to handle multiple tasks and women are much more capable of handling work responsibilities and children than men can be. The media has been portraying it for years and Hallmark seems to support the notion as well. As a wife and a mother, I feel like we have to do all that we can to undo this mindset and teach our boys what a true Father is capable of.

Manners. Morals. Respect. Character. Common Sense. Trust. Patience. Class. Integrity. Love. These are just a few of the items that I believe fathers should list on what they are responsible for teaching their kids each day. Of course, women have the same responsibility but television and Hallmark already portray us as the ones capable of such tasks. It is the men that have been portrayed so poorly and they all don’t deserve it.

I know so many men that work all day and come home and handle all of the responsibilities of home just like their wives do. They are running kids all over town and participating in daily conversations with their children to help guide them down the right path. To all of those hard-working men, Happy Father’s Day (the card you get might not portray it as well as it should). To those men who look and act more like Homer Simpson or Peter Griffin, watch those shows again and remember that they are only cartoons. Those children in those shows aren’t turning out well at all and the lack of a leader as a father plays a significant roll. That father doesn’t have to be the biological father because life doesn’t always turn out that way. That leader can be any man that is family, or a friend, who wants to take the time to show children that men can lead at work and at home. Men can teach them how to show feelings and provide nurturing in a time of need. The media and the card aisles aren’t going to help you here at all men. You have to show this leadership one day at a time until society gives you the credit you deserve.

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