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Vitamin D Deficiency

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I heard back from my doctor about my test results. I originally posted about the weirdness I saw in my Blood Work Protein Levels before I left for California. I was concerned that I had a problem with my thyroid or maybe Celiacs or something. All those results came back OK. My doctor did let me know that my Vitamin D was on the low side so of course I turned to the internet.

Vitamin D Deficiency

Vitamin D DeficiencyVitamin D Deficiency is a common problem found in many people and it really shouldn’t be ignored. There are some common causes of this deficiency and its very easy to reverse. If Vitamin D Deficiency is left untreated it can also lead to very serious problems in people of all ages. Vitamin D also helps the body use calcium properly.

Vitamin D Deficiency Symptoms

The symptoms of Vitamin D Deficiency may be different form one person to another from from research these are some of the most common.

  • Fatigue
  • Achy bones
  • Muscle cramps
  • Joint pain
  • Lack of energy
  • Weight gain
  • High blood pressure
  • Restless sleep
  • Poor concentration
  • Headaches
  • Bladder problems
  • Constipation or diarrhea

What Causes Vitamin D Deficiency

The most common cause of Vitamin D Deficiency is lack of sunlight. That’s right, Vitamin D is actually produce by the body when your skin is exposed to sun light. Vitamin D Deficiency is very common among people that live in areas where it isn’t practical to be outside often. Also sunlight has different strengths in different parts of the world which would make you require an even longer exposure.

Vitamin D Deficiency can also be found in people with diets that lack vitamin D.  This is common in vegetarian diets where food containing vitamin D just aren’t consumed.

Obese people are also known for being Vitamin D deficient. This isn’t only because obese people don’t go outside but actually because they are just to fat. Vitamin D is absorbed from the body by fat cells so if you have a high BMI those fat cells are drawing all of your vitamin D for themselves.

There are other health problems related to Vitamin D deficiency such as kidney problems, Crohn’s disease, Celiacs or Cystic Fibrosis.

Foods With Vitamin D

If your low in Vitamin D you can increase your levels by increasing your intake of Vitamin D through foods that are known to contain it. Here is a list of some foods that have Vitamin D.

  • Fatty fish
  • Fish oils
  • Oysters
  • Caviar
  • Egg yolks
  • Cheese
  • Fortified milk
  • Beef liver
  • Mushrooms

Vitamin D and Weight Loss

If you search around the internet you will read many articles saying YES Vitamin D helps with weight loss, and you will read the same amount that say it doesn’t. Another popular subject you will find is the correlation between obese people and lack of Vitamin D.

There have been a few studies in the last few years that show signs of increased weight loss in people that have had increased levels of Vitamin D while dieting.

I felt the best feedback I could get on Vitamin D and Weight Loss was by reading through some of the weight loss forums like the MFP community.

Majority of what I’ve read from actual people that have been diagnosed with low Vitamin D and had doctors give them supplements to increase their levels have not lost weight. Many of these people have read the things I have in hoped that adding high doses of vitamin D to level them off would help them shed the pounds. I couldn’t find any stories of people that were losing any more or faster than the had been on their original diet plans.

Vitamin D and Me

After reading all the symptoms I could see how this may have been effecting me. My doctor has prescribed me a three months supply of 50,000/IU vitamin D capsules and wants me to report back when I’m finished. I have to take these once a week.

I discussed this with my mom and she says that she was given the same prescription and after a few weeks she felt much more energized. That’s probably the biggest symptom I could see myself having but I just took my lack of energy as the norm.

I guess its also good that this was caught so I don’t risk any of those diseases that can happen after not having enough of the D in my body for so long. I will just keep pushing forward with my diet but I thought this was a good subject to update the site with. If taking this Vitamin helps me lose some weight I will just consider that a bonus!

 

Dieting in California

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To be honest I wasn’t exactly dieting in California. My original trip was planned from a Wednesday night and I was coming back on the red eye Sunday night. This would of been about four days where I planned to eat what i want and exercise in the form of hiking with my brother and walking around Hollywood.

Weather Problems

The first problem was the fact that Los Angeles and much of the west coats was completely rained out. Apparently the day I arrived LA was expecting to get more rain in that weekend then they’ve gotten in total over the last couple years. It was cold and wet until Sunday making it impossible to get out and do anything. Most of the trip was spent in my brothers apartment watching Netflix.

The other problem was that NY was expecting a super snow storm Sunday Afternoon into Monday afternoon. I wasn’t sure if I was going to have a problem with my flight until I woke up Sunday morning to an email from Virgin America letting me know my flight was cancelled. Check out the weather report!

Longisland Snow

I spent hours on the phone with Virgin America trying to reschedule the flight but couldn’t talk to anyone. Amy was pretty pissed knowing that Id have an extended vacation and she’d be stuck home pregnant with a driveway full of snow.

Low and behold the weather was wrong and we pretty much got a dusting. My new flight was scheduled for Tuesday night giving me an extra to days. This was OK but my brother had to go back to work Monday leaving me by myself for two days.

Dieting in California

Lets talk about the food part of the trip. Before I went I knew that this would be a problem because LA has great food but my brother was also doing paleo. For the most part I did my best to track calories but ate whatever I wanted within my range. It started when I got to the airport…. I didn’t eat anything that entire day and opted for a #2 from Mcdonals. Not my best choice but it was foo and i was on vacation. I didn’t super size it or anything. I counted the calories which still put me under 1,000 for the day. I grabbed two Kind Bars for the flight in case I got hungry. I’m not going to do a food play by play here.

For the rest of the trip I either ate food my bro cooked which was mostly breakfast or we’d go out to eat. We didn’t order appetizers and I got whatever Id want. Restaurants ranged from Sushi, Brazilian BBQ, Sandwiches to Burgers. I didn’t have dessert anywhere or snack on anything but grapes in his apartment. I stuck with diet soda, unsweetened Iced Tea and water. We only went out drinking one night which consisted of Captain and Diet coke for me. I tried to log everything.

I even took pictures of some of the meals to share on the blog….

Food Pics

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This is the typical Paleo breakfast my brother eats every day. It consists of two eggs, bacon and half a baked avocado.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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This is a salad place we went for lunch. Its just a giant all you can eat salad bar but they had soup, macaroni and desserts. You can see my salad blow but I didn’t take a picture of my mini muffin.

 

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This was a homemade Paleo dinner with steak, roasted tomatoes and mashed cauliflower loaded with garlic and parsley.

 

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Another Breakfast.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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This was my sandwich from Mendocino Farms. Its grilled chicken with prosciutto and candied walnuts on cibatta.

 

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This is a personal pizza and a sugar free soda I got at a place called EVO. Pizza was really thin and about 10” across with pepper, sausage and onion.

 

Fitness

I didn’t go to the gym while I was away that’s for sure. But… yes my bro has dragged me to the gym with him when I visit. I figured being outside and walking around would be more than I needed. Unfortunately because of the rain and being stuck inside for the beginning of the trip there wasn’t much walking.

As soon as it was nice out I wanted to hit the streets. I walked around Hollywood in the morning to get my coffee and run some errands. Later that day my brother and I walked up to Hollywood Boulevard to see where they shot the Academy Awards. This was all just casual walking around and lots of fun. Surprisingly I blew away any day I was on the treadmill according to the Fitbit.

Check out these stats:

Hollywood Walking

Hollywood Walking

Over 21,000 steps!! I got a notification from my Fitbit when I hit 15,000 and again when I hit 20,000 congratulating me for the achievement.

Look at the calorie burn of just being active and looking around and stuff. This is so different then living at home stuck at a computer!

I only ate over my calories one day on the vacation and this day surely made up for it. Its like completely backwards as to watching how much food you take in and trying to exercise it out. This way you burn loads of calories and would have to eat them back.

My brother walks to work every single day which is about 3+ more miles. Each way takes him less than 20 minutes and his body loves him for it.

Sharing this pictures makes me think how much people walk around when they go on vacation and visit places that require them to walk around and site see. I think this is why I didn’t do so much damage on the cruise ship buffet on my honeymoon! We walked from the time we woke up until it was time to get back on the ship.

The second thing this makes me think is how much of an inactive lifestyle I live. If I walked to work everyday or even ran some errands without my car Id be more active and burning way more calories. Its too bad that where I lie has crappy weather and most amenities are too far to walk mainly because of the time it would take.

More than site seeing

If you think those stats are inflated just because we were seeing sites your wrong!. The next day I walked my brother to work, walked to get all my meals, walked to the post office to send a package home and I still blew my treadmill days off the charts.

Here is that screen shot:

California Lifestyle

California Lifestyle

This shot gives you a good idea of how active my brother is. He lives an urban lifestyle and does lots of walking.

Would I be skinnier if I lived in LA? Who knows, but I do know Id be much more active naturally. California especially has no rainy days (except for when I visit) so you have nearly 365 beautiful days a year to be outside enjoying life.

I was really impressed with my Fitbit too because I left with it fully charged and the battery lasted the entire time. The only complaint I have is that it didn’t recognize the 3 hour time difference. This isn’t the Fitbits fault but it kind of sucked that my stats would reset at 9:00 at night and all the walking we did after that registered for the next day.

 

Back to NY

Now that I’m back home I have to get back on the wagon and start counting calories and eating better. I also have to get myself back into a gym routine. I really hoped to be in the 230’s at this point and wanted to start weight training but my weights pretty stuck in this range. I’ll keep you guys updated.

 

 

 

Can I lose weight on vacation?

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Next week I’m planning on visiting my brother in LA for four days and Id like to stay on track with this eating thing. I like to visit my little bro once or twice a year because he lives all the way across the country. The only other time I get to see him is Christmas or if he has to come back home to New York for an emergency.

New York is a great place for food but when I go LA its even more of a food Mecca. When I originally discussed my trip with my bro we talked about sampling some of the most popular food trucks in LA. I even did some homework and read the reviews to find the most popular ones.

LA VacationOn most of my trips I fly in on a Wednesday night and we walk down to Cabos Cantina on Sunset Boulevard. This place is awesome for cheap, delicious Mexican food and huge margaritas. This is usually followed up by some bar hopping on the walk back to my brothers place. My stay is filled with sampling some of the great LA food and binge drinking the nights away. It’s always an awesome time!

Not so much this trip

This trip is probably going to be a little different. My brother switched to full Paleo Diet in the beginning of January. He’s really been sticking with it and has no intentions of going off anytime soon. I thought “why should my visit have any impact on his new lifestyle change“? So, I called him last week and told him that if he was concerned I would fuck up his Paleo he didn’t have to go off it just cause I was coming. Surprised by his answer he said “no worries, your eating Paleo too!” Apparently his roommate (my best friend) also started eating 100% Paleo. He told me that this trip would consist of all paleo eating and lots of hiking in the Hollywood Hills.

This was actually kind of a relief for me. I’m sure I will still indulge a little here and there but, eating at my brothers place and adding in lots of exercise would be great to keep me on track with my own goals. Los Angeles is a great place for being outdoors and enjoying outdoor activities. There are so many awesome hiking trails and I’m really curious to see what its like. My brothers in way better shape than me but with all the treadmilling I’ve been doing I’m sure I can keep up.

What Exactly is Paleo?

Briefly, Paleo is one of the oldest diets known to man. Sometimes referred to as the hunter gatherer diet because it only includes things that are natural. Paleo eaters don’t eat anything that’s processed. Most Paleo meals consist of meat and vegetables. After I spend a few days with my brother I’m sure I’ll have some more to add to my brief definition.

Can I lose weight on vacation?

Sounds like I can! Just as long as I don’t go overboard and we keep active I don’t see it being a problem. Last year I found myself sitting by myself in the airports Carl Juniors trying to sample everything on the menu. This time around I know I have way more self control.

 

My Blood Work Protein Levels?

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In the beginning of February I had some blood work done for some life insurance I applied to. The results came back fine by the insurance companies standards, but I looked over the results myself and noticed something strange. One of my protein levels came in on the low side. It was just below the acceptable range but still low?

These were my blood work results

Blood Work

 

Whats Globulin?

Out of curiosity I went to the Google and did some research on Globulin. The results I found were interesting. Globulins are proteins in the blood that regulate the function of the circulatory system. According to Wikipedia the normal concentration of globulins in the blood is about 2.6-4.6 g/dL. Mine were lower than this and slightly lower than the insurance rating of 2.0 g/dL.

Whats Low Globulin mean?

Low globulin levels can indicate liver disease, an inability to digest or absorb dietary protein, malabsorption, inflammatory bowel disease or Celiac disease, some sort of cancer, anemia or kidney disease. I’m thinking this is something Id probably want to look into.

After further research I discovered that you should also have a specific ratio of Globulin/Albumin. Albumin is circled in my blood work results and comes in at 4.8 g/dL.

Albumin / Globulin Ratio

You get your Albumin/Globulin ratio by dividing your albumin by your globulin. My ratio is approximately 2.52. Its suggested that the ideal A/G ratio be somewhere between 1.7-2.2. A level higher than 2.2 can indicate decreased thyroid function, low globulin, an excess of glucocorticoids or a variety of other problems.

My Thoughts

People say you shouldn’t freak out when you self diagnose yourself by reading stuff on the internet. I don’t, but I do think I should get checked out. My weight isn’t coming off as easy as Id like to these blood proteins point directly to weight related problems like hyperthyroidism or Celiac. My younger brother has Celiac but he has issues gaining weight. I think the best thing I can do is make an appointment and get checked out by a doctor, its been a while anyway.

 

I Still Can’t Stop Over Eating

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Last night I was reminded how I’m an addict and I haven’t overcome my desire for food. Even though I’ve been doing so great I actually embarrassed myself. The hardest part about me eating better isn’t changing what I eat but, limiting the amount I eat, especially when it comes to take-out.

Pizza Self ControlThis Friday night we went over our friends house for dinner and ordered in some pizzas. They had some chips out and my friend offered me some beer. I thought to myself, “I got this”. I ate pretty good all day so some pizza and beer wouldn’t hurt. I sat down with my bud light and started munching on a few chips. I kept noticing that I was the only one eating the chips and my hand wouldn’t stop reaching into the bowl. Finished beer #1 and started working on another. Luckily it was time to leave and pick up the pizza.

There were four of us and we got two pies and probably two dozen wings. My friends really don’t eat to much. I started with two meatball slices, four wings and I could have been content. I knew the pizza was going in the garbage and a little voice kept saying have another slice. So, I grabbed slice #3 and dropped in like 3 more wings. Another beer….. and now I realized control was gone. Everyone was done eating and there was so much left. Figured I would clean off the table and when I went in the kitchen I saw the boxes of pizza sitting on the counter. This is where it was kind embarrassing because I grabbed a paper towel and walked out of the kitchen with slice # 4. WTF was I doing? I also knew that we had brought little ice cream cups over for dessert and I polished off one of those too.

I was pretty disappointed in myself and don’t know why I feel the need to finish EVERYTHING. Even when I’m at someone else’s house. In our house the temptation isn’t there because I restrict everything that comes in and the amount that’s cooked. I know I’ve been doing good and limiting my calories all week but a slip up like this really isn’t acceptable.

I felt really bad when I forced myself to log everything into MFP when I got home. I totally killed all the exercise I did that morning just to big out on some beer and take-out. My biggest hurdle will be learning how to stop overeating.

 

 

 

 

Mixed up my Weeks

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I was getting a little upset because I thought I’d been doing this for 5 weeks and should have made more progress.

I looked over my stats on Myfitnesspal, Fitbit and my Weigh Loss Spreadsheet. I realized that I started the spreadsheet with Week #1 when it should have read Week #0. Only because the start of that first week was a weigh-in and I wouldn’t lose weight until the following week would be more like a first week ending.

Hope it doesn’t get confusing but luckily I realized this now. I went back and changed the blog titles to read for the appropriate weeks.

I’ve been a little bit busy the last few days to make some posts but I have some upcoming thoughts id like to add to this site. I also just got my sweet header for the top of the website so now it looks like a much more professional weigh loss blog!

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