How my journey began...

Dedicated to Don... 

This is my first entry, and frankly, the trigger for it was not good. I should have woken up this morning feeling sympathy and certainly empathy for an individual that will remain nameless here. Who he is, is not important, just that he has been a lifelong friend, and now that life is hanging in the balance.

Many of us say we are pro-life without understanding the breadth of that statement. We often lament the lives we have little or certainly no control over, while simultaneously and sometimes fatally ignoring the one life that we have some amount of control over, that life being simply, our own. That life is just as precious as anyone else, it is unique and has never been repeated and will never be repeated in the entirety of history. Each of us has a very unique DNA makeup that has never happened, nor will ever happen again.

5 years ago on March 15, 2018, I was driving down state street in Salt Lake City, Utah. I don't recall exactly where I was going, nor where I had come from. Suddenly without warning, I was unable to take a breath. I gasped for air and was starting to panic, the process of suffocation is unpleasant at best.

Luckily I was able to drive myself to a nearby emergency room and collapsed on the way in the door. I don't know what happened very much after that except somehow my car was parked for me and I woke up in a bed in the ICU.

Fast forward and when I was walking out the door I was handed the following life-changing scenarios as follows.

• I was sent home with oxygen tanks and an oxygen concentrator. I was told I would never again be without them and would have to remain on oxygen until my last breath.
• Diagnosed with severe obesity. This was already very obvious to me.
• High blood pressure
• imminent renal failure
• CLL leukemia
• NAFLD (Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver disease)
• Out of control type 2 diabetes.
• Wacky cholesterol numbers
• Triglycerides were off-scale high (3,999).

I was told to return asap, but not there, I was to go to my primary care physician, which at the time was actually my cardiologist. I was able to see him about 10 days later. When he walked into the room, he was obviously a changed man. The last time I had seen him, he was a very tall very fat doctor that lived a vegetarian lifestyle. The man that walked in the room was recognizable, but MUCH thinner, so much so that I was in shock. I remember asking him what gym he attended... His response was to spend the next 15 minutes starting me on a new path.

He told me to eat a maximum of 20g of carbohydrates daily. He told me to eat MORE fat, not less. He told me to eat a moderate amount of protein. Later I learned that, although he refuses to use the word KETO, that's in effect what he was suggesting. Much research on my part resulted in a permanent change in my life. That change was started on March 30, 2018, and I have never stopped. I will go into the results in future blogs because I don't want this to get too long.

Back to the original statement, I am angry. Some of the details of how and what I did in relation to other people will be documented in future blogs. There is one family in particular to whom I tried to introduce the low-carb lifestyle too. They started doing it with some amount of good success. In particular, my friend lost 50 pounds quite rapidly. 

Now, I received a call from his wife last night. She was in tears and panicking. He had apparently gone back to his old habits and weighs over 400 pounds now. When the paramedics came to pick him up he had been eating a double quarter pounder with cheese, a bag of fries, and a regular soft drink. 

My friend is now in the ICU on a special ventilator. They cannot get his oxygen level above 88 and they pump him full of the stuff. His lungs are having a difficult time releasing CO2. This is a life-threatening case and his wife will have very little means of support if he passes.

Today I will be visiting him. I started this blog as a way to settle myself because I know if I don't I will go in there and barrage him with "I told you so". That won't be good for his condition. I am venting here instead, but as soon as he is able to listen to me again, I will never relent in my preaching about health. I don't know exactly how to end this post, but I am certainly angry at him right now, not because he didn't listen to me, but because he fell back off the wagon and let himself get so far gone. I on the other hand have been in ketosis since 2018 and I will NEVER return to the lifestyle I had before. The funny thing is, I still eat McDonald's... I just throw the bun and fries where they belong, on the next poor sap's order. (Meaning I don't get a bun or fries in the first place). Going to the hospital soon and lord help me to not get angry.