Need More Butter

Maintaining weight! Yay!

I’m still 185 even though I’m doing heavy lifting sessions twice a week.  I’m not logging my food, but it seems like I’m eating more than I should.  

My wife’s guys coworkers are always wondering why she never gains weight even though she eats “bad” food and hasn’t formally exercised in 6 months.  There’s definitely more to this than diet and exercise. 

I’m still really focused on my business so we’ll see when I update this next time :)

I love you lard

Last night, I had sweet potato fries and chicken wings deep fried in LARD.  OMG it was heaven!

Some random thoughts

I’ve been focusing on my business and less on my tumblr (good thing).  I still have random thoughts and observations that I need to jot down somewhere.

Importance of low carb while working out

It’s a fact that you get hungry if you constantly work out.  I started up my training sessions recently and I’m eating more food than usual.  I believe it’s important that the extra calories you intake are not from carbs.  I’m trying to consume as much fat as possible to keep hunger in check.

Hormones in meat and fat?

If the cows, pigs, chickens we eat contain hormones to make them big, is it possible that these growth hormones are in us as well?  Is that why I’m so much taller/bigger than my fellow pinoys in the Philippines?

Uhh I think that’s it for now.  I thought I had a lot more observations and thoughts to post.

How do you turn Vegetable oil into milk?

I don’t know, but scientists did it with coffee creamer.

Ingredients of coffee creamer here:

http://www.nestle.ca/en/products/brands/Coffee_Mate/original.htm

GLUCOSE SYRUP, HYDROGENATED VEGETABLE OIL (MAY CONTAIN COCONUT, PALM KERNEL AND/OR SOYBEAN OIL), SODIUM CASEINATE (A MILK DERIVATIVE),  DIPOSTASSIUM PHOSPHATE, SODIUM ALUMINUM SILICATE, MONOGLYCERIDES, ACETYLATED TARTARIC ACID ESTERS OF MONO- AND DYGLYCERIDES, ARTIFICIAL FLAVOUR, COLOUR

I find it really amazing that chemists can do this stuff.

Current weight: 185.  I’m focused on not gaining weight since I’m working out.

WIW: 184

I haven’t been that focused on my diet, which might actually be a good thing.  I’m still eating really fatty food, however I’m just not logging and doing any calorie counting.  I’m still recovering from jet lag and also a cold.  I’m supposed to be meeting my personal trainer tomorrow, but in all honesty, I don’t really want to go.  I really liked not having personal training for a month now :). 

Update on Cholesterol

My doctor sent me a message while on vacation.  FYI, his first message was this:

Your LDL (bad cholesterol has gone up ) it was 92 on 3/14 (this was a good result) , now it is 144 ( a bad result)

Based on this response, it seems like my cholesterol is bad, and that I should take some steps to fix this.

I then responded with this:

Thank you for your response. I have read there are subtypes of LDL. Large, less dense pattern (good) vs the small, dense patterns (bad). Is there a way to see how much of the large, less dense LDL subtypes I have?

This was his response:

Andre : If your triglycerides are normal ,which yours are , checking the particle size doesn’t add much and if your triglycerides are high then would would pay attention to your non HDL cholesterol . The more important thing to keep tract of is the balance between your good and bad cholesterol . Your good cholesterol is very good.

This is a much better, in depth, and balanced explanation of my cholesterol numbers.  Based on this second response, I shouldn’t really need to worry as long as my HDL/LDL balance is good (which it currently is), and my triglycerides are low (which they currently are). 

I’m glad to see my doctor understands that it’s more complicated than “Your LDL is too high”, however I think he should have gave me that explanation in the first message right?  The average American shouldn’t have to know about LDL subtypes, particle sizes, exemptions when triglycerides are low, and the balance between good and bad cholesterol. Right?

Back from the Philippines

Here are some observations and thoughts I have about the eating/health habits in the Philippines

My assumption that Filipinos in the Philippines are skinny is false.  When I was in the cities, I saw Filipinos in all different sizes.  I even saw some really obese Filipinos.  I did notice that the Filipinos that lived in the province (rural areas) ARE skinny. 

I hardly saw any “buff” or “fit” Filipinos.  I only saw a few gyms, and those were in the major cities.  All the “healthy” Filipinos I saw were skinny Filipinos.  The “healthy” Filipino guys I saw were like skinny like manny pacquiao when he weighed under 110, but with less muscle.

I was one of the tallest people there.  Even though I’m only 5’8”, I was towering over everyone at the mall.  It’s a very weird realization to be taller than most.  

The main oil they use is Palm oil, the second most popular oil is coconut oil.  All their native snacks use Coconut, palm, or a combination of the two.  

The sugar they use is unrefined cane sugar, which is naturally raw.  This is the not the brown sugar we get in the US.  If you go to starbucks, it is called “sugar in the raw”. 

Filipinos love their sugar.  It’s in meat, snacks, peanut butter,…

Filipinos food has a lot of fat.  One of our first home made meals was pork belly adobo.  Pork belly is one of the fattiest (and tastiest) part of the pig.  The meal was heavenly.

Filipinos don’t shy away from simple carbs.  Filipinos eat white rice with every meal.  Drinking coke with each meal is the norm.  Eating pasties/cookies for snacks (merienda), is not uncommon.  I never, nor saw anyone eat complex carbs.  No oatmeal, brown rice, whole wheat bread, whole wheat noodles,…

My assumption that coke in the PI is made with sugar partially false.  They still have coke in the glass bottles, which I think is made with sugar.  If you get coke in the plastic bottle and probably also in the dispensing stations, you’ll see it’s made with “sugar or high fructose corn syrup”.  That’s what it says on the plastic bottle labels. 

Filipinos eat a lot of fish.  My aunt said 6 days a week they eat fish, and 1 day a week they eat meat, like pork.  In the US, it’s the opposite.  Fish in the US is expensive, so it’s not practical to eat fish 6 days a week.  In the Philippines, my aunt said they get so many fish that some days they just give it away. 

The yolks in eggs are bright orange.  It also tasted creamier and richer than our pale orange/yellow yolk eggs.

I saw no one jogging/running.  I did see some signs for 5k run events though. 

People walk a lot in the PI.  Everywhere you can see people walking.  People also walk to the market on a daily basis.  My cousin said it’s because they have time to do that. 

Drinking til drunk on a regular basis seems to be a big issue over there. 

Everyone is concerned about high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes.  My relatives would always make a light hearted comment about these diseases when we ate fatty/sugary foods. 

Even though fast food in the PI is like $1-$1.50 a meal, it’s still expensive for the average Filipino.  It’s still much cheaper for them to cook in. 

My wife and I have a church wedding there.  During our marriage counseling session, even the 60-70 year old speaker gave us diet advice.  He said avoid sugar and fatty foods because they cause diabetes and high blood pressure.  He even went out further to say that we shouldn’t eat anything that tastes good.  It might be me, but I don’t think diet advice should be giving during a marriage counseling session. 

You can still gain weight from overeating.  The last 4 days of my trip was nonstop eating and stuffing.  This was because of a number of reasons:

1.  I just had my church wedding, so it was a big party the day before, and the day of my wedding.  Lots of food.
2.  My US retired nurse aunt treated us all for our meals.  The US dollar goes a long way in the PI, so she made sure we were all stuffed every meal and snack.
3.  Airplane food is filling!  Not only did I eat every single meal on the airplane, I also had bulgogi soup on my stopover in Korea. 

When I came back from the PI, I gained 4 pounds, at a weight of 188.  Today, two days later, I’m back to my pre-PI weight of 184.

OK those are all my thoughts/observations for now :)

Losing Weight And Not Exercising?

It as been a week since I’ve stopped formally exercising.  I still walk around and play, but I haven’t done any running, jogging, or weightlifting.  

Today’s weight:  184 - 3 pound loss since I stopped exercising. 

During this time, I haven’t really stopped myself from eating sweets, however I have limited my intake of them.  I also made sure the sweets had a lot of fat in it (at least 50%). 

I assume a lot of this weight loss is water, but whether some of it is fat or muscle remains to be seen.

I’ll be going to the Philippines tonight for 2 weeks, so I’m not sure if I’ll be posting on here.  Over there, I’ll be walking and playing as well.  I’ll also eat like the Filipinos do over there.  Can’t wait!

My Doctor’s message regarding my high cholesterol numbers

I took the advice of http://joshsands.com/ and asked my doctor about his thoughts on my cholesterol results.  Here’s his response

“Andre: Your LDL (bad cholesterol has gone up ) it was 92 on 3/14 (this was a good result) , now it is 144 ( a bad result ). You need fat about 30 % but it should be good fat ( as much as possible ).”

I asked him about his thoughts on the LDL subtypes.  The harmless Big and fluffy types or harmful small and dense types. I’m waiting on his response…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-density_lipoprotein#LDL_subtype_patterns