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It happens one day…. You hit the wall…. Hard!  And you just realize you are out of options, and you envision living with illness for the rest of your life.  You know it won’t get better.  That’s when the struggle for a solution  becomes desperate. For me, that was last summer….for you?

People are always talking to me about my journey with Dr. Jack. All kinds of people, those that know me, those that follow me, those who find me through others, all kinds of people!!   I really should get some business cards made! I write his website and email address so many times in week, I can do it without looking.    Invariably people ask me exactly how Dr. Jack fixed my problems.  And when I answer that he worked to change my eating patterns  and helped me get healthy, I see that they are one of “those.”

“Those” people throw their hands in the air.  They roll their eyes. “I can’t change my eating habits! Doesn’t he have any pills that fix it so you can eat what you want? It’s too hard to cook separately for myself! I don’t have time,” and the list goes on.  Some of those are upcoming blogs.   But without a doubt the one that makes the hairs on my neck stand up?   “I lived with it this long, I will just live with it.”

Read moreThe day you hit the wall…

Most teachers dislike school photos.  The truth is our photos are almost as awful as student photos.  We hate the process.  Weird smiles, awkward positions, “turn your head a little, chin forward, look up, and smile naturally.”  Yeah…. sure…..  we are the profession whose aging is documented for posterity in yearbooks.

Last year when we took our school photos, I thought I didn’t look half bad.  I had been with Dr. Jack a few weeks and was starting to feel a little better.  One day, he asked me to write a little testimonial about my experience.  And then he asked for a photo to go with it, to put on his web page.

I groaned but complied, sending the best I had at the time, my school photo.  It wasn’t half bad I thought.  I had a few weeks under my belt so I thought, it was doable.  I had worn a really pretty size 3x pink sweater and matching shirt, and my signature hair bow.

Read moreA picture is worth a thousand words…..

Guess what? I am starting to feel normal!  Bet you think that sound so nuttty! Ha ha…

Once or twice a month, I visit Dr. Jack’s office, to see Kelly, who helps me with my skin issues.  I use the sauna and then she does a skin wrap for me to help with my ever changing, ever loosening skin.  The sauna is a great part of my visit.  I find it to be one of my best thinking spots ever.  I get my best ideas in there. After I get out, I need to cool down before she starts so I walk around, drink some water and just bring my body temperature down.

I always need to go to the bathroom, lol, because I drink a ton of water every day. The bathroom is in the back of their offices, down a hallway that extends to the back of the building. The first time i asked to use the bathroom, Kelly told me where it was.  I turned the corner and then I saw it right away.  Along that wall is what I like to call, the “Wall of Success.”

Read moreDr. Jack’s Wall of Success!

It happened every year… it was always the same.  Last year, like many before it, I attended the New York State Marching Band championships in Syracuse.  I go almost every year.  I have only missed a few, the year I had back surgery, once when I had another obligation.  My nephews and now my niece march with the West Seneca High school band and we would take the three hour road trip to see it. My sister and brother in late have six children so,we will be with the band many years.   I always went with my sister and her family. After all, our parents are all gone and I need to be there to cheer our kids  on.  Family is everything to me.   It’s a great day of fun, music and highly competitive.

And every year I would get all decked out in my band clothes and off we would go.  I would not do much the day before or there would be too much prior pain.  The trip was fine, but it was the physical aspect that was so challenging.  Post back surgery, weighing well over two hundred pounds and being less than five feet takes its toll.  As my Hashimoto’s raged on it got worse with prolonged physical pain and just how hard it all was.   If you have never been to the Carrier Dome, it as a lot of walking but the thing is it is all uphill.  You park and have to walk uphill to get in.  The stairs into the dome are steep and uphill.  Everything is a steep incline.  Everythinggggggggh….

Read moreAnd one year later…

ummm….. everything! I know I tell you all the time, but people are always writing to me.  They send me emails about things I post, and ask me questions, for advice, all kinds of things.

And most times, I have no idea who they are.  They come from emails I don’t recognize. I always answer. When you are at the other end you hope someone will care enough to answer. I know I always did.  Lucky for me, one day a great doctor answered a crazy email and the rest is still a story in process.

The other  day was no exception.  A nice lady emailed me and she told me a long story about all her life she has been a closet eater.  She didn’t sign her name at all and even when I wrote back she didn’t give her name,  She is constantly stopping at a fast food place, picking up goodies, buying extra Halloween candy and stashing it. She told me that she just can’t stop, and that she has so many life issues right now.   Did I know anything about that?

Read moreWhat do I know about “secret” eating?

Whenever I talk to people about my disease, I always tell everyone, “I used to be the poster girl for Hashimoto’s disease.”   People think I exaggerate that fact but literally, I am not kidding, I was the complete checklist minus a few.   I often can’t believe either that I had all those symptoms.

When I first met Dr. Jack, I told him that I had a lot of symptoms of Hashimoto’s and he asked, “Like what?”   And so I gave him a list.   I didn’t think much about it after that because my only goal on the day we started was to just lose forty pounds and to lose a couple of the symptoms I had.  I figured I couldn’t really hope for much more.   Dr. Jack, however, didn’t much care for that goal.  He assured me that in a year, I could lose a hundred pounds and to lose all the symptoms if I followed exactly what he told me to do.

Read moreThe Hashimoto Poster Girl….

It’s no secret that I think the world of Dr. Jack.  I could start a fan club for him!  I should make him a superhero cape! He is beyond amazing, everyone knows he has saved my life,  but yesterday I found  that my admiration meter doubled in size.

Last night, I hosted an evening at my house for people who were interested in hearing Dr. Jack’s presentation.  It was a great evening and my living room was filled with people I have known many years, new friends and acquaintances,  and even people who were friends of friends that I had never met before.  It was a great group of people.  They were a fun group, asking great questions and learning tons from my doctor, Dr. Jack Saia, the doctor who helped me fight off my archenemy, Hashimoto’s disease.

Read moreDr. Jack and children…..

So the other day someone asked me, “What are you planning for this year’s holiday season? I bet since you lost so much weight, you are really looking forward to a piece of Halloween candy? Why don’t you just go off this plan, until like January, and then pick it up again? ”

hmmmm… let’s start with the obvious one first.  So I go off, and eat bad stuff for three months, then start over?  Are you insane???   No way, nada, nope, no, forget it, never, not doing it, are you crazy, never everrrrrrrrrrrrr…..

Holy cow! I see every symptom coming back with a vengeance.  Why the heck would I everrrrrrrrrrrrrrr go back to that crazy life.  I say it all the time and I mean it! I am a lifer for this.  If Dr. Jack can live this way, so can I.  It’s not that hard really! Once you are in a groove it’s actually easy!  Whew…. glad that’s out of the way.

Now, onto the rest.   I guess until then, I hadn’t really thought about it too much.  Last year, people thought I was out of mind starting this program right before the holiday season.  But they didn’t know how desperate I was for relief.  I admit, I got through a lot by telling myself that next year, I would have reached the goal and it would be okay to have things.

Read moreThe holidays….

If you follow me on Facebook, you already know the first part of the story.  Last week,  I had Dr. Jack at my house.  I invited some friends who wanted to hear him talk, and meet him.  During the presentation he gave he started talking about organic coffee and of course, my little ears zoned right in on that.

Organic coffee?? We had not ever talked about that.   Now,  I have always loved coffee.   I like the taste of it.  I don’t care about the caffeine at all.  And Sunday’s and coffee? Well,  those are my favorite days.     Ahhhhh….. get up, because it’s the one day I don’t work both jobs, make coffee, crawl back into bed.  Read on my iPad, relax.  Not for long, just a half hour but it makes all the difference in the world to my outlook.

Read moreOrganic coffee, now I can have it…..would I go crazy with it?

As promised in my last blog, what makes this program different……

Well, if you read here frequently, you already know I was the poster girl for Hashimoto’s, but I  was also the poster girl for least results from the most dieting attempts.  Bet you think this is an exaggeration.  So name a diet… bet I have tried it!  Weight watchers? Paleo? Atkins? Yes,  new and old one.  South Beach? Mediterranean? Soup diet? American Diabetes Association? America Heart Association?  Gaps?  High protein? Low carb? Body for life? Zone? Hashimoto diet?  Scarsdale?  Richard Simmons? Suzanne Summers?? Diet workshop?  The little containers?  Autoimmune paleo? Spark people?   Seriously, those are only the ones I thought of off the top of my head! I am a diet pro!  Been there done that!

Read moreWhat makes this program different?