In 2002, I got a message on the phone from my doctor, "in the morning go to the pharmacy and take the prescription immediately". A little rattled, I opened up the Good Housekeeping Medical Guide. Wrapped in a blanket, yawning, I scratched my head and a dozen hairs came out. I read the symptoms. One was constipation.

Here is a guide to how I lost 20 lbs. I did not make huge changes all at once, just added them as I discovered them.

1. This is about a life style, this is not a diet.
2. This is about losing weight slowly, it took time to gain it.
3, This is about feeding your body, not your eyes or tongue.
4. This is about trying new foods, this is not about eating crap.
5. This is going to change your taste and sense of flavor.
6. This is going to save you money: prepackaged food has a poor nutritional value to $ ratio.
7. This will save you time: preparing several meals at once is more efficient than driving to the burger joint 5 to 10 days a week.
8. This is about getting off your butt; to clean or see that doctor.
9. This will improve your memory, clear up your skin and provide energy.

Did I mention I am not a doctor? I just suffer from this condition that no endocrinologist seems to remotely understand.

These days we are bombarded with imagery for yummy food everywhere we drive and entertain our selves. We eat in response to these visual cues and go on to the next one. It is cheap too, two extra large candy bars for buck, a hamburger for 75 cents, super-size it for 25 cents more!

In reality we were designed to eat like a caveman. Nuts, berries, root vegetables, and on special occasions (when we caught the animal) we ate meat. If we were lucky, we ate meat more than once a moon phase.

Yes it is hard to translate that into our social environment. In some ways it is easy. You don't have to collect beans, wash them, dry them and store them, heck you don't even have to cook them! Buy a can or better yet buy a bag.

As hypothyroidics we need to eat more than the average fiber. Tons of veggies and fruits, all you can eat in fact. Certain cereals such as Mini Wheats and All Bran have lots of fiber, a good start for us. In fact stop counting calories and start counting fiber. You will find a good balance for your personal comfort.

Notice those cereals are whole grains, no refined food for us! The nutrients that are replaced after the processing are not the same. Even sugar is refined! You can use agave syrup or suranat instead, they have micro nutrients you need.

Buy fresh! Canned veggies are better than none but do not compare to real carrots or green beans steamed with some sea salt and maybe a touch of butter or olive oil. Really, canned green beans are awful! The fresh ones even microwave the next day better. Before I started this new life style I had never eaten a real beet. They are delicious! I had never bought a leek or fennel. My favorite soup now. On vacation, I was craving some veggies. My host knew of an excellent salad bar. It was full of canned beets, mushrooms and beans both yellow and green! Canned onion bits, bacon bits, olives, pickles, pickled eggs, and those thick dressings. Not quite what I was looking for.

Be aware of what you eat. Make it fresh, unprocessed, not pre packaged.
Make your own lasagna don't buy a salt packed-been frozen for 200 miles & one month convenience pack.

These are guidelines, not rules, life is full of situations unique to each of our habits, location and personalities.

1. 75% of your food intake should be fruits and vegetables.

2. 20% of your food intake should be beans, nuts, whole grains.

3. 5 % should be more of 1 or 2. But will probably be meat or cheese.

4. That meat or cheese needs to be of high quality.
No cheeze individually wrapped in plastic, no three-for-a-dollar deli meat.

5. Nothing pre-processed, pre-packaged.
If it was not available to a cave man, do not eat it.

6. Do not go hungry. Eat some nuts, fruits or veggies. Drink some water.

7. Eat breakfast, break that fast!
This lets your body know it is not is a life or death situation (think tiger at door of cave).

8. Try not to eat before going to bed.
If you have been out since dawn, dinner was 5 hours ago and you won't be home for another hour and your stomach (not your eyes) are hungary.... eat some nuts, fruit of veggies.

Thats it as far as eating.

Tools you will need.
1. A good knife, you will be chopping.
2. Large cutting board.
3. Plastic storage containers, the semi-disposable (glad/ ziplock) ones work fine.
3. Carrot peeler.
4. Sense of adventure.

Things you might want to grab at yard sales.
1. Vegetable steamer
2. Food processor and/or blender
3. Food dehydrator

Books I have read so far, in order of influence...
1. Slim for Life by Dr. Gillian McKeith
Host of BBC America's "You Are What You Eat" Show. (must see)

2. Skinny Bitch in the Kitch by Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin
Liked this recipe book better than the first which had a rather militant tone. Has good salad dressing ideas. Did pick up using vanilla soy milk from first book.

3. French Women Don't Get Fat by Mireille Guiliano
Common sense, entertaining read. Trying to implement the 50% technique!

4. Living Well with Hypothyroidism: by Mary J. Shomon
This one I read first! Did lose 10 lbs then gained it back. Heavy on the vitamins and supplements not to mention the 75$ fiber drink.
Was good for information on getting your own blood tests.

Endocrinologists follow the book. The book, which ever one it is, says a person's blood test should be 0.5 to 5.5. In Europe it is a lower range. How you feel is irrelevant. I have gone to a second endocrinologist only to be told that the exact same symptoms as hypothyroidism must be due to another condition, which was undetectable by any test.

I feel best when my test result is close to 0. Since that is less than the range (0.5 to 5.5) my doctors freak and cut back on my meds.

Thyroid medicine is powerful stuff, but if you increase your dose slowly over several weeks you will notice the symptoms of overdose long before it is fatal.
I go to Mexico every year and stock up on a years supply. I could order it over the internet from Canada. I have even changed doctors and told the new one my dosage is higher, then filled two prescriptions for a few months. I even had one prescription from my regular doctor and another from the endocrinologist. Pain in the butt, but do what you have to, life is short.

Exercise..Yuck!
I am not an exerciser. If you are, that is great and you will see results much sooner.

Trick yourself!
I prefer to do things like vacuum, walk the dogs, dig holes for trees, take the steps, even go for a hike. If you add small activities to your daily life, they add up.

Any movement is helpful.
I love the show "you are what you eat" on BBC America. That is sorta how I got started on this new lifestyle. It is a half hour long. I have the mini trampoline and bounce on it during the show. If I start to sweat, I slow down, just shift from one foot to the other foot.

Stiff and achy
Hypothyroidics have aches and pains. I sit on the floor and stretch out those achy places at my own pace.

I do however want to encourage you to lift weights? Jog? Dance class? Yoga?
or Join a gym? What ever floats your boat. When you hit that weight loss wall after a few months, exercise will get you past it.

Got to have in your cupboard:
1. Beans.
Red, kidney, black, mung, lots of beans and lentils too!
This is the one area I buy canned, for time crunches. Remember to rinse those beans after soaking them! Still won't toot as much as the average hypothyroidic does. Beans are cheap get lots.

2. Whole Grains: Brown rice, Quinoa.
Nice to have under stir fried veggies, the binder in some bean burgers, yummy in cold salads. No processed grains!

3. Nuts
Keep an eye out for sales. I snack on Brazil nuts, put almonds and pecans in salads, bake with hazelnuts, stir fry with cashews.

4. High fiber cereal
What goes in, must come out. Digests slowly so you don't feel hungry.
At some point you may want to cut back on dairy products, Vanilla Soy milk is pretty good.

5. Spices
Different combos make your meals distinct and flavorful. They also have trace nutrients. I prefer garlic and ginger in jars, I use alot and it saves time.
My grocery (Frys) has a Kroger brand spice sale every 4 months, 25% off.

6. Cooking helpers
Olive oil, sesame oil, rice vinegar, red wine vinegar, cider vinegar, soy sauce, Bullion cubes (chicken and/or beef), Coconut oil (solid when cold instead of butter), Tahini (sesame paste), Agave syrup or honey.

Buy every week:
1. Fruit
A fruit smoothie is perfect for breakfast. I must have a ripe banana, and one other fruit in mine. Most of the time I start with ice and water, blend then add fruit. If fruit is not flavorful, I use vanilla soy milk or add vanilla.
I also dehydrate fruit to snack on and store it for the winter months.

2.Veggies
I must have salad, so lettuce and spinach. I eat a pound of carrots each week.
I peel the strings off the back of celery to munch on as a snack. Love sweet potatoes in fact, dehydrate them and tomatoes which I prefer to fresh on my salads. Got to have leeks for soup. Then onions, broccoli, beets, what ever is on sale.

3. What ever your recipes need. There is always some weird ingredient required.

1. Measuring loss
Instead of watching my weight I could have lost inches! Take your measurements and track your progress that way. If you drink lots of water one day you can gain 2 or 3 pounds but your waist would not necessarily increase 2 or 3 inches. Of course getting into the skinny jeans is a real marker of success!

2. Recipes
A good place to buy vegetarian cookbooks is at used book stores. I don't need new ways to prepare meat, but wasn't real sure what to so with a leek.

3. An even better place to find recipes is the internet. Broccoli was on sale and I bought several bunches. Four days later I knew I had to use it! Did a web search and found one of my favorite recipes!

4. Stevia
Rumor has it that the most popular sweeteners turn into arsenic or formaldehyde in the body. Stevia is made from a natural plant and available in supermarkets. It is even more sweet, so don't use the whole packet for that cup of tea!

5. The buffet
Probably has a salad bar with thick dressings.
Try some soy sauce and lemon juice, really!

6. Eating out.
All this time there have been other choices I had not considered! At my favorite Italian spot: instead of cheese and sausage stuffed shells, I tried the roasted garden vegtables with pepper cream sauce, I loved it!
I tryed an all-veggie-no-meat pizza, that was tasty too! (It had cheese which becomes indulgently delicious when you cut back on it.)

7. Coconut oil
I have read conflicting information on coconut oil.
It is solid at room temp so many people think it is a "bad" oil. It becomes liquid at 90 degrees. It is suppose to have a short chemical chain making it easy to digest. All I know is that when I make my monthly brownies with coconut oil instead of butter, I don't gain weight and have even loss some.

8. Change in sense of taste
I use to think carrots were bland but they are rather sweet now. I can identify seasonings. Just a little cheese can be much more yummy than I remember when I had it almost every day.

9. Short term memory improved
I know that I locked the door and can leave a pot simmering on the stove. Can even remember a number or name now.

10. Skin has changed.
Cleared up, stays clear, and scars are fading.

11. Food is good for you!
The right food. vitamin and mineral packed fruits, vegtables, nuts seeds, beans, seasonings, all flavorful and nutritious.

I am not a doctor.

1. No soda pop, try iced tea or better yet, water

2. Nothing pre-packaged pre-proccessed.

3. Eat lots o fiber.

4. 75% fruits and veggies,
20% beans/nuts/seeds/whole grains
5% hi quality meat or cheese.
That means about one meal a week has meat.

5. Eat as much fruits and veggies as you want or can stuff in.

6. No hotdogs, no white bread, no refined sugar. Duh!

7. It is hard to make all these changes at once, just try and remember it is a life style so you can not fall off it like a diet.

8. I promise the weight will come off. Slowly, it took years to gain it! It might take a year or two to lose it. If you are not exercising it will take even longer, but it will come off. 4 lbs a month is good!

9. No excuses. It is less expensive, healthier and less time consuming to make your own meals from scratch.