Obesity linked to Severe Sleep Apnea

People who are overweight or obese are much more likely to have obstructive sleep apnea

Obstructive sleep apnea is a condition in which a person's breathing stops or becomes very shallow, sometimes several hundred times a night and sometimes for as long as a minute.


The soft palate in the back of mouth falls down and blocks the airway. The condition can lead to cardiovascular problems, including stroke, and can raise the risk for dying prematurely.


Any amount of weight loss brings about an improvement in sleep apnea. But those who lose about 10 percent of their original body weight see the greatest effect. "Any weight loss is good," says an expert.


Read the full article here
http://health.msn.com/health-topics/sleep-disorders/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100245626


Alkaline ionized water is a great weight loss tool. It neutralizes excess acidity that leads to a breaking up of stored fat in the body.
http://www.chansonwater.com/

Motivation to Diet

The title Motivation to Diet is deceptive because for me personally, I don’t want to diet, I’m looking for a lifestyle change. I used the word "Diet" because that is what people understand and are used to and also because in the truest form, any eating pattern that we choose is our "diet" regardless of if we are trying to lose weight or not.
I’ve been trying to lose weight for the last four years rather unsuccessfully. I’ve put effort in, and have had various motivations to do it, including wanting to fit into my wedding dress that had to be altered to fit me from the original size I was when it was created.
When I met Ronnie I told him that I was seriously under my normal weight because of grief, prayer and fasting, and not to expect that I would always weigh 120. Since I have gained beyond my normal weight of 138, my husband has hinted at his displeasure about my weight for some time. I have tried to loose it but I don’t think that it was a total priority in my mind.
Quite honestly, I think it can be hypocritical for men to gain weight and then criticize their wives when they do. ESPECIALLY if it’s like in my case, where its Ronnie, bringing the junk food home and in some cases quite literally feeding it to me!
Here’s an example from two nights ago. Ronnie: I feel like pizza, do you want pizza?
Me: No, I don’t want pizza, I’m on a diet and I’d like you to support me on it.
Ronnie: You’ve been doing so well I thought you’d like a "cheat day."
Me: I’ve only been on the diet four days, no I don’t want a "cheat day," I want results.
I’m not trying to rant on my husband there, I’m sharing it because I know that some of you have had similarly frustrating experiences.
What I do want is to share what has radically changed my thinking although that is something that has been in the process for over a year in terms of my health and well being. I’m going to quote from several sections of one chapter in Shaunti Feldhahn’s book For Women Only – What you need to know about the inner lives of men. She surveyed hundreds of men and this quote is from a chapter called The Truth About the Way You Look – Why what’s on the outside matters to Him on the inside. "This chapter is about something our men desperately want us to know, but feel absolutely unable to tell us…The effort you put into your appearance is extremely high on his priority list. Yet the chances that you know his true feelings are extremely low. What I’ve learned about men’s needs in this area has been life changing. It has jarred me out of a dangerous complacency. Call me naïve, but I just didn’t realize that the issue of appearance was such a big deal—such and imperative deal---for a guy. Of course, having learned just how visual men are, I should have gotten a clue. But somehow I assumed that if I was out of shape, I was the only person who was negatively affected."
Article continued, click here for full version.

By Nedalee Ruiz
Nedalee is the author of The Desperate Parents Handbook http://www.desperateparent.com/
Nedalee recommends http://www.healingwatermachines.com/ for more articles on health and healing.
Copyright © 2008 By Nedalee Ruiz Permission granted to reproduce in entirety only including links and author credits.

The Tortoise and the Hare

Well, I've stated eating healthier and making better food choices. Already my energy has increased. So Like the Hair in the fable, I'm out of the starting gate. The holidays have been hard for Ronnie, he seems to have been hit hard by depression over the loss of his Mother. He's putting off his New Year's resolution diet for a few days and comforting him self with food. I saw him eat an entire pint of ice cream last night which is not unusual.

So having lost my guinea pig for the blog, I will have to step in and post my own fat pic.

To summarize some of my last posts for those of you who haven't been following along, Ronnie lost 40 pounds last year drinking alkaline ionized water and eating a more alkaline diet. He gained it back eating comfort foods after he quit chewing tobacco and lost his Mother in the same month. He's vowed to lose it and more this year, but hasn't started trying yet.

My effort will include mild exercise, a more alkaline diet, and lots of alkaline ionized water. I am going to explore Vegan, Alkavarian, and Raw foods, but have not committed to eating them exclusively as I'm still an omnivore who loves Bar-b-que. Like any wise dieter, I will try to avoid the dreaded white foods, Rice, Potatoes, Sugar, Milk and Bread. But again, I not going to say never. As you will see from my food posts which will follow, I had Cream of Ham and Potato soup for dinner the first night of my diet and may have some more since the pot isn't finished.

What I am doing is a very public TEST diet. Raw fooders eat lots of high fat items like nuts and avocados but burn the fat and lose weight. I'm going to see if a fairly inactive over 45'er can get weight loss results.

So here are the current stats:
On January 1, 2008 I weighed 165.5 up about 3 pounds from before the holidays. I swear the new weight feels like it's all in my butt. It feels like I have a caboose waddling after me for the first time in my life. My weight is also up almost 30 pounds from my after baby weight from the second child who is now 23. I kept that weight for almost 20 years.

My weight can fluctuate even if I weighed 3 times a day, so I'll only weigh in once a week or so.

My measurements, (don't tell anybody)
Are a ghastly 41 - 35 1/2 - 38 1/2

What I ate:
Jan. 1, 2008
Breakfast- Blueberry Smoothie
Lunch- Fresh broccoli florets dipped in store bought humus. (Broccoli is high in protein.)
Snack Trader Joes Spicy Ranchero Egg White Salad -Low fat, high protein, low carb, cholesterol free and only 50 calories. Tastes like cottage cheese with taco seasoning. Defiantly not raw, not vegn, not alkaverian. I bet that if you soaked almonds in water and chopped them in a food processor with the other ingredient you could make a vegan/raw version.
Another Snack- Store bought salad
Dinner 2 cups Cream of ham and potato soup.

Jan. 2, 2008
Exercised 20 minutes on a rebounder. (I've worked my way up from only five minutes.)
Breakfast- Blueberry Smoothie I buy my blueberries frozen and organic at Trader Joes for under $4 a pound which will make me about 6 smoothies.
Lunch- Tuna wrap because my last avocado was rotten so I couldn't have the avocado wrap that I had planed.
Snack- Apple
Dinner- Pomegranate Salad- Don't freak out, it's not complicated, the pomegranate seeds were just a garnish on a purchased salad from Trader Joes. It had some goat cheese too so it wasn't vegan.
Snack- Celery with tuna and humus