Dr. Simpsons newsletter phtograph your FOOD!

Photograph your food

In the last newsletter to our patients we brought the new idea for journaling your food -- taking photographs of everything you eat. Everything. In classic food journals you write down everything you eat. This has always been great method for people to think before they eat, and take personal accountability. Some even go further and keep track of the calories, or the fat, or the carbohydrates that they consume with each bite. In the newsletter to our patients, we changed this from simply writing everything down, to taking a photograph of everything they eat. It still causes one to pause when they eat, and it provides a good record of everything that is put into your mouth. It also has the advantage that you can see how much you eat. Most telephones have cameras on them -- making it easy to carry around. If you don't have a camera phone there are many inexpensive digital cameras available that are compact and easy to carry. If, for example, you go out to eat, you can photograph the plate when it comes, and the plate before it is sent back. You can see what you ate, and what you did not. It also gives you some perspective about the amount of food that you eat. Walk by a candy dish and take a piece -- take a photograph. At the end of the day you can transfer the photographs from your phone to your computer. There are a lot of great places you can put these photographs-- Picasa from Google is my favorite. Although, if you have a Macintosh computer, your iphoto provides a great place to see and store your photographs. You can then put comments about the foods. For LAP-BAND patients, you can see if a particular food has given you some trouble. Feeling queezy a few days after a restaurant -- you can see what you ate where. One of the great difficulties of calorie counting is portion size. Portion size is underestimated commonly. The beauty of the camera and modern technology -- it is cheap, it is available, and it allows you to record what you eat. Over time, you can see trends, you can see places where you can make substitutions, and - if you put something next to your food-- you will have an idea about the portion size you are eating.

Happy Thanksgiving Recently I heard someone say that they didn't think this was a good year for Thanksgiving. They were upset by the economy, by the war, by the election (not any particular candidate who won or lost, just the process). The first Thanksgiving, we are told, was by pilgrims who came to the New World, and almost starved to death. They had little more than mud and tree huts, and were starving until my ancestors (the Native Americans) welcomed them and taught them to grow corn, to hunt Turkey, and how to survive. Imagine, coming all those miles, losing friends and family, nearly starving, and disease wiping out most of population! But they were thankful. They were alive, they were turning the corner, and they were thankful. It puts in perspective the issues that we have. Instead of famine, we have obesity -- and the diseases that our country has are not as much infectious as they are diseases of an abundant lifestyle -- heart disease, diabetes, joint problems, strokes, cirrhosis, and so forth. It might seem different, and it is only in that we have abundance, even in times of economic downturn. So, when thinking of all we have - -and sometimes it might be too much, it is good to remember that there are those that have even less than we do. This is a good time to be thankful and to give to the organizations that mean so much to us. We have our favorites, and if you don't have a favorite charity, consider one of the ones we contribute to: Arizona Humane Society Dove-Lewis Animal Shelter St. Mary's Food Bank The Red Cross Those are just a few of some of our favorites because of what they do in our community, or the nation. Dove-Lewis is a favorite of ours because of their animal therapy program. So, remember this year, if things are a little lean, that there are those who would benefit from even the smallest bit of generosity.

OMG I love this idea....THANKS

Oh btw I wrote my FIRST step in my blog.....THANK YOU!

~hugs~