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Saturday, October 14, 2006

Spitfire Mad At Doctors For Making Us Fat


No, that's not Low-Carb Dave, but it could describe how he feels

There are many things that can just plain make you spitfire mad in this world. The senseless killing of innocent girls in an Amish community. Babies being born with incurable diseases or deformaties. A father who takes the life of his entire family. You know, the kind of stuff that makes you so upset and angry that you can hardly contain your emotions.

But, to a lesser degree, there are issues like the one my blogging friend "Low-Carb Dave" Koch wrote about today at his blog that can still get your blood boiling over when you stop and think about the ramifications of actions taken long ago. Especially when they are completely preventable from happening, but were not.

What is it? The overdrugging that goes on in our society.

Dave talks about back in the early 1980s being put on the steroid Prednisone which was used to treat his severe childhood asthma to reduce the inflammation in his lungs. He talked about the harrowing experiences he went through with this condition as a child and how it "was freaky" at times for him and his parents.

He recalled being given "bucket loads of these steroids" to treat his asthma rather than looking at more natural alternatives. At the age of seven, Dave got chicken pox and was not able to attend school for nearly two months because of the one-two punch that the chicken pox along with his asthma presented him. Actually, it very near killed him! Predictably, the steroid use increased exponentially as well because that's what the doctors thought was best.

But there was one side effect from taking all these drugs: OBESITY!

"When I went back to school, it was the day they were doing class photos," Dave recalled. "What I remember clearly was the different way that my classmates treated me. The reason? I was fat. I had become a fat kid. Before the chicken pox was the last time I remember having a flat stomach."

In addition to the weight gain, Dave experienced the loss of lean muscle mass and a huge boost in appetite that led him to eat and eat and...well, you know what happened (read more about just how big Low-Carb Dave eventually got by clicking here). In studying the impact of steroids on his body a little more as he has gotten older, Dave discovered that these drugs can actually induce a diabetes-like state of glucose intolerance. Yikes! Most amazing is the fact that none of his doctors who prescribed these drugs for him even batted an eye at what they were doing to his body.

But guess who they blamed instead for Dave's weight gain? They pointed the finger at his mother saying it was her fault for making him fat. The doctors constantly chastised Dave's mother about his growing weight problem and demanded she do something about it before the problem got worse. One doctor who Dave described as "a good guy" tried to help Dave with his eating problem, but he wanted to prescribe some Prozac to help. UGH!

Not surprisingly, Dave's cholesterol numbers were high and the doctors urged him to get on a statin drug to bring the numbers down. But that's right about the same time that Dave made the bold and wise decision to start the Atkins diet. In fact, one doctor he discussed his new eating plan with talked about how one person he knew had lost nearly 200 pounds on the low-carb diet. But then he revealed to Dave something that most of us already suspected.

"The Food & Drug industry was stopping people from finding out about [the effectiveness of Atkins]," Dave's doctor exclaimed.

Dave said that gave him every reason in the world to do this with confidence and he has never looked back since. Even after losing 66 pounds by livin' la vida low-carb, another doctor wanted him to try LAP-BAND surgery. This was what REALLY angered Dave and made him to decide to go it alone to "take the future of my health into my own hands!"

Because of all those years of steroids he took, Dave is still feeling the negative effects on his blood sugar from the glucose intolerance he developed. Dave has his own theory about why his doctors didn't warn his mother about this nasty side effect.

"The reason you don't hear about this is the same reason that the government promotes a low-fat diet," Dave noted. "It's because of the huge interest by corporations in having people eat plenty of carbohydrates."

Dave's right, you know. This is precisely why a low-carb diet is not promoted right alongside the low-fat diet. Too many interest groups would be up in arms lobbying for the government to stop hurting their business by pushing livin' la vida low-carb. Low-fat does not threaten them, but low-carb does. It's funny, you never hear any of the industries hurt by the low-fat diet whining and complaining about their profits being cut into by that diet, do you? Hmmm, I guess it should cut both ways!

Today, Dave has become a huge low-carb weight loss success story and he's STILL losing weight as he seeks to make himself healthier and healthier thanks to the amazing low-carb lifestyle. Here's what he had to say about his philosophy on eating carbs today.

"If you want to eat carbs, that is your choice. Please respect my requirement to not eat them," Dave remarked. "It's something I have no choice in. I have felt the best I have ever felt in my whole life being off carbs! The amount of misery, health and self-esteem problems I have experienced because of obesity is enough to fill volumes of books. Am I mad at the doctors? Yeah a little. Am I willing to take charge of my own life now? Hell YES!"

YOU GOT GET 'EM, LOW-CARB DAVE!!! I'm so proud to know you and the remarkable transformation that you have become right before our eyes in just this past year. The best part about your story is that you are STILL changing for the better to become that big stud of a man that you have always wanted to be--slim, trim, happy and healthy for the rest of your life and never returning to morbid obesity again. You inspire me as you encourage and educate others with your weight loss, Dave. Keep it up, my friend! I couldn't be prouder of you than I am right now.

Dave's story is yet another example of why I am always about providing you with information that you may not hear anywhere else. Doctors may not have an agenda, per se, but the people feeding them their information about drugs obviously want to make money. Getting people to start livin' la vida low-carb doesn't make them any moolah, so guess what they suggest doctors do instead? Do you see why so many of us are getting spitfire mad at doctors for making us fat?!

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3 Comments:

Blogger Lowcarb_dave said...

Thanks for the support Jimmy!

We need doctors to work with us, not to be combative with us.

The reason I don't visit doctors anymore (probably like many obese people) is that thye do not listen to you. They just see 'FAT!'

Dave

10/14/2006 11:09 PM  
Blogger Jimmy Moore said...

Preach it, Wanda, preach it! :D

10/15/2006 7:15 AM  
Blogger Jimmy Moore said...

Let me tell you, Dave, the scorn from doctors doesn't stop just because you are no longer fat either! When I lost my 180 pounds and went in for my checkup, I was excited about what the doctor would say about my low-carb lifestyle.

While he was indeed impressed with my weight loss, he brushed off my vastly improved triglycerides and HDL and only wanted to talk about putting me on a statin drug for my "high" LDL. Nevermind my LDL had DROPPED 100 points while I was on the Atkins diet.

So, the reluctancy to go see doctors is still VERY real even AFTER your low-carb weight loss has ended, too, Dave. It's really sad that doctors must be this way, but as I stated they are simply following the information that others provide them.

What we need are low-carb lobbyists willing to go to doctor's offices and conferences to share with them, like pharmaceutical reps, the latest studies about livin' la vida low-carb. We take for granted that the research is there, but who is getting it in the hands of the healthcare providers? NOBODY!

If I had a million bucks, I'd set up the "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb Foundation" to start a nationwide (and eventually WORLDWIDE) campaign to share the positive heath benefits of the low-carb diet. Somehow, some way these doctors need to hear the truth and stop buying the lies that drugs are the only way.

10/15/2006 7:25 AM  

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