The Beginning of My Health Revolution

I've had an interest in health and weight control ever since I was 12 and bought my first diet book from one of those Scholastic Book Orders you get at school.  I was kind of concerned because I weighed more than 100 pounds and that sounded like a lot to my 12 year old mind.  I think I weighed 120 and was 5' 4" at the time and thought I should be 110.  And I have to smile about it now but again to my 12 year old mind the idea of losing 10 pounds sounded really daunting!  How I wish I could go back and talk to that 12 year old at that time!!  What would I say to that 12 year old?  Well first of all I would tell her that weighing 120 is perfectly fine for her!  It would take a lot of persuasion to convince her of this fact but I would keep at it until I had.  And then I would explain that if she wanted to do control her weight she should not worry about calories but eat as little as possible of processed foods specifically refined sugars, refined grains and highly processed oils and fats such as margarine, vegetable shortening and other vegetable oils.  I would tell her to eat REAL Foods like whole fat dairy, meat, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, fruits and butter, olive oil and coconut oil and if she has a treat every now and then, she'll be fine.  I would tell her not to eat when she's not hungry and that there is no need to finish your plate!  I would explain that eating that food is not going to help those starving anywhere.  How did I come to this advice?  Here on this blog I am going to collect the information that has gotten me to this point.  A lot has happened in between the time I was 12 and 51, go figure.  But a couple of months ago when my son Taylor came home from a day at college and told me about a lecture he had heard that day from Ben Bikman it has started a chain of events that I will be forever grateful for.  One of the most fascinating things Taylor told us that Ben Bikman had talked about was a man who had fasted for over a year and lost a ton of weight and remained at a healthy weight the rest of his life!  WHAT????  I thought you'd die in like 3 weeks if you didn't eat!!!  Clearly there was something to be learned...  Not able to listen to the lecture that Ben Bikman had given to Taylor, I listened to the BYU Forum Talk he had given the summer before.  I will publish the speech in the next blog post.