The Epilogue from Becoming Slender For Life is again this weeks reading. It’s been almost 3 years now since I wrote the second edition. My Mom is almost 92 and still lives alone thanks to my sister who lives 2 doors away and a caregiver who comes several days each week. For being 92, she’s doing OK. At Slender For Life™ hypnosis for weight loss I know that you are never too old and that it’s never too late to make health care reforms. Remember, healthcare reform begins with you being responsible for your health care.
EPILOGUE
“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.”
~Hippocrates, 460 B.C.It’s not too late!
So here it is late May of 2011, and this second edition is way behind schedule. Last fall my intent was to have this published in February! Still, life happens and we must adjust. The good news is that I haven’t had to turn to food to deal with the challenges and opportunities that life has provided these past few months.
The biggest event to occur in my personal life recently was having my 88-year-old Mom move in with us for a few months. In December I flew to Colorado to spend the weekend with her. Monday morning (the day I was to fly home) I woke up to the smell of smoke. Sure enough there was an electrical fire in the attic crawl space. On December 8, Mom flew home with me while her house was being repaired. (You can read my weekly blog posts about Mom at www.hypnosishealthinfo.com. Type “Mom” in the search box on the right.)
Over the next four months I received a profound education on many levels: family, relationships, caregiving, aging, exercise and healthy eating. For now, I will focus on aging, healthy eating and exercise.
For years my Mom has suffered with rheumatoid arthritis. It runs in our family and she has been in constant chronic pain. She’s had both knees replaced and walked hunched over a walker. Prior to moving in with us, when I’d call Mom in the morning and again in the evening I could often hear the tears of pain in her voice. To make matters worse, she had gained more than twenty pounds in the year and half since my father’s death.
Mom ate lots of dairy products—especially cheese and ice cream. Nearly every week Mom and my sister would stop at DQ or McDonald’s for a hot fudge sundae. Mom also ate quite a bit of meat and poultry. Consuming animal proteins and dairy products is like pouring gasoline on the fire of arthritis. As much as I talked to her about how changing her diet would help alleviate her arthritis pain, she would placate me with words of agreement, but she and I both knew the lure of a sundae would always win out over intentions.
When Mom agreed to come home with me, she said she wanted to lose at least twenty pounds. Not wanting to assume anything or force anything on her, I asked Mom what plan she had in mind and about the type of support I could offer her. She said she wanted to eat like we eat: “like how you say to eat in Chapter 5 of your book.”
I replied that I would love to support her goal of losing twenty pounds, but I refused to play food police. If she wanted a cookie, I wouldn’t comment or try to stop her. What transpired was truly amazing!
For the continuance of Mom’s long-term care insurance, we had to hire an in-home caregiver for at least ten hours per week. We found a gifted young woman who was skilled at exercise for seniors. Most of their time together was spent exercising. They did arm and leg strengthening exercises and crunches on the bed to build Mom’s core muscles. Mom started gaining strength and stability and was practicing walking without the walker. Mom stood straighter and was able to walk further distances and faster.
Even more amazing, Mom changed her way of eating. She mostly ate vegan meals and rarely ate sweets. She started losing weight. Some weeks she lost one pound, some weeks three pounds. We kept talking to her about the importance of frequent small meals and that she should eat five or six small meals throughout the day. Mom didn’t believe us, and for a bit her weight loss slowed. We convinced her one week to eat more—meaning a breakfast of whole grain cereal, a mid-morning snack of fruit, a lunch of grains and veggies, a snack of fruit and/or veggies in the afternoon and for dinner back to the veggies and grains. And guess what? She lost two pounds that week!
Mom listened to the Slender For Life™ weight loss CDs and she learned self-hypnosis. The changes in Mom were transformative. She lost almost twenty pounds in four months and has continued to lose weight since arriving back in Colorado. Within the first month of cutting out the dairy and other animal proteins she stopped hurting so much. It became rare to hear her complain about body aches. Her mind sharpened and her spirits lifted.
When Mom left to return to her own home, she looked and acted the best that she had for several years. She was more mobile, felt better and she was happier. It is amazing what four months of eating a plant-based diet, exercise and self-hypnosis can do! As much as I knew all this intellectually, I now realize I did not KNOW it at the deepest level. We are never too old to improve our health. We are never too old to take responsibility for our own healthcare. We are never too old to change.
From Becoming Slender For Life, second edition,
pages 240 – 242
You may remember that it’s only been a couple of months since I posted It’s not too late, but I have witnessed so many conversations recently about being too old to change or that “radical lifestyle changes at my age won’t do any good” that I thought it important to repeat this again. IT’S NOT TOO LATE! Healthcare reform begins by you being responsible for your own health care.
Speaking of it’s not too late, ….. register now!
Free Weight Loss Class February 2014
This one hour class will give you free Slender For Life™ weight loss skills and tips on how you can lose weight and this time keep it off.
John McDougall’s Starch Solution online course with Roger Moore
If you want to improve your health, lose weight or just want help to clarify the confusion about just what is healthy nutrition, this class is for you.
Hypnosis as a Resource in Cancer Treatment
Hypnosis is a tool for cancer patients and you can learn the strategies that professionals are actually using with clients. In this online CEU course, you will learn:
- Pre-surgical applications of clinical hypnosis
- Evidenced-based approaches to mind body healing
- Techniques for pain control during radiation treatment and post-surgical recovery
- Strategies to reduce symptoms related to the side effects of treatment
- Processes to end anxiety, promote healing and provide comfort and strength
Free Mindfulness Techniques Class
You will learn a holistic combination of:
- A series of acupressure points
- Mindfulness stress reduction tools
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This is an amazing and wonderful story about your mother’s health. Thank you so much!
Thank you Maile!