Cathy Healy

I have lost 21 lbs since my annual physical last March when I nudged the official fat rating. I now weigh what I did in high school. Yesterday I got my cholesterol results from this year’s physical. 176!  I have never been below 196, ever.  (Note: this number wasn’t dangerous because my good cholesterol has been remarkably high. It is still is. My good registers at double of “normal” good.

To my surprise, I have kept off the extra pounds for six months without feeling deprived, even though I have traveled often (including a lavish wedding), sipped wine most nights and often stuffed myself like a silly goose.

You might call this the oink-oink diet. ​

In fact, it’s Oprah’s new Weight Watchers system, which I’m told is easier to use. I have found that it is critical to use the system long enough to get your head around points not calories, to shift your habits and to trust the results.

Here’s why: Lots of foods that are healthy, torpedo you on the WW system. Example: I was allowed eat 30 points a day while I was losing weight. For years, I’ve kept bowls of raw, unsalted pecans, walnuts and almonds  on my coffee table — healthy snacking, right? However, until I started recording the points for everything I ate, I didn’t know that I was nibbling on 24-30 points of nuts a day. Or, wolfing down 24 points of avocado nearly every day, standing by the sink sprinkling Mrs. Dash (no salt) on one avocado half and then the other. I believed I was eating healthy.

Take heart — remember: this is the oink-oink diet. Remember too, I’ve lost 5 inches around my waist.

Tricks that work for me

Sugar cravings. I get them about 4 in the afternoon and sometimes an hour or so after dinner.

• ​ In the afternoon, I eat a syrupy, baked honey-crisp apple, or syrupy stewed apples with non-fat, plain Greek yogurt. (1/2 point.) Recipe: Core apples. Sprinkle with cinnamon. Bake for 40 minutes @ 350 F. Or, core apples, slice into pot, sprinkle with cinnamon, cover and cook on low for about 40 minutes.

• In the evening, I eat frozen, syrupy dark cherries like popcorn. A couple of weeks ago I gorged on three cups of cherries. (0 points)

Limit choice. Research shows that people lose weight best if at least one meal is always the same. (Says Dr. Oz)

• Breakfast: Either oatmeal + microwaved frozen blueberries (4 points) or a two-egg arugula omelet (4 points) with a sprouted wheat Ezekiel muffin (4 points). The muffin is tasty enough to skip butter. If you absolutely need to oil the muffin, use a quick squirt of Pam Olive Oil. Use Pam to spray your omelet pan. I often have half of the omelet breakfast left over to snack on later.
•  Lunch: I find it easy to not think too much about what to have for lunch, so I often stick to a salad with fish or meat. Vegetables for the salad = 0 points. For protein,  4 oz. of drained tuna packed in water = 1.3 points) or 4 oz. lean steak (2.3 points). I use the Dr. Oz salad dressing recipe: Double the amount of Balsamic vinegar to olive oil. (1 T. Balsamic = 2 points; 1 T olive oil = 4 points)

No need to get in a rut. Weight Watchers keeps you steady with a frequent supply of super-tasty recipes, which are heavy on flavor, so you feel satisfied. Also, I switched to the densest red wines so that I would drink more slowly. (5 oz. =  4 points)

Defend yourself from gas stops on long drives. Stop right away at a real grocery store and buy boxes of raspberries (0 points), bananas (0 points), cut carrots (0 points), sliced peppers (0 points). You get the point. (Advice from my WW coach that I’d talk with by phone once a week. Note: I didn’t go to weekly weigh-in meetings.)

Celebrate too. Simply watch portions. (Advice from my WW coach.)

Soup keeps you sane. If you’re home, eat a cup of low-point soup about a half an hour before dinner. A Dr. Oz suggestion. My favorite is his spicy lentil soup. (Recipe) I keep one-cup portions in my freezer. They can be thawed and boiling in about eight minutes. (3 points)
http://www.doctoroz.com/recipe/lovely-lentil-soup

Writer’s nervous nibblings. I keep roasted Brussels sprouts and/or roasted cauliflower in my refrigerator. (0 points) Recide: Aluminum foil on a baking sheet for no clean-up, spray lightly with Pam Olive Oil, season heavily with Mrs. Dash, pepper, Sumac (or curry or whatever).  Recently I’ve started roasting with the convection setting on my oven, which results in crispier, “air-fried” vegetables. Naturally, now I’m paranoid whether charred vegetables are carcinogenic. ;-(

Reason to gorge on 0 point foods. Then you can eat a baked potato (5 points) with 2 tablespoons of lite butter (6 points). Or key lime pie (22 points). (The WW system allows an extra 30 points in a week.)

Always, always, always have 0 point stuff ready to eat in your refrigerator. Last week I was low on food, going out a lot with friends and—among other traps— ate the frozen cookies in the freezer. Result:  I had gained three pounds by my weigh-in day. And what the hell were cookies doing there?!

Always, always, always have 0 point stuff ready to eat in your refrigerator. Last week I was low on food, going out a lot with friends and—among other traps— ate the frozen cookies in the freezer. Result:  I had gained three pounds by my weigh-in day. And what the hell were cookies doing there?!

RIO DE JANEIRO — Our lunch plans for Saturday just hit the skids. There’s a rumor that the police will strike this weekend. They haven’t been paid, so of course they’re angry.

Wrote Lorena, the friend of a friend, this morning: “I don´t know if you are following the police strike situation in Espirito Santo [state], but all my family and friends are from Vitoria and they don´t go out of their houses since Saturday because of the chaos the city turned into! “

“Chaos.” Understated? Yesterday, nephew Luke told me that one of the gangs shot down a police helicopter a couple of months ago.

A few stories about violence on my journey…

— Buenos Aires, Argentina. Maia, 33, IT management, has observed people going through garbage looking for food. “I haven’t seen that in a long time.” The economic recovery under the new president hasn’t trickled down yet.

— Montevideo, Uruguay. Gilda, mid-40s, won’t teach at night anymore and her husband changed jobs so he wouldn’t be out late at work. He was held up in his car at gunpoint last year. So was her father, in his car. And Gilda’s car was stolen.

— Rivera, Uruguay/Santana do Livramento, Brazil, a border city of 100,000. Gabriela, late 30s, left Montevideo after her husband was held up in his car. She is a lawyer specializing in criminal justice with a good government job. She transferred to a lesser job in Rivera, near her parents. Her husband, a dentist, travels to see her and their two daughters a couple of days a week between his clinics in his home town and Montevideo, which is six-and-a-half hours South from Rivera.

— Travel to Porto Alegre, Brazil. I was going to take the overnight bus from Rivera to Porto Alegre, seven-and-a-half hours away, but that plan died quickly. “You can’t arrive at 5 a.m. at the bus station—it’s too dangerous!!!!” insisted Fernando, mid-20s, a specialist in city planning and my friend since he was 10. Two men had been gunned down in one incident and another’s arm cut (off?) by a knife at the bus station last week. When I arrived on a summer evening, we hurried to his car.

— Porto Alegre, Brazil. This is a gorgeous, hilly city bounded by a river as wide and clear as a lake with sandy beaches, marinas and jogging trails in the city’s South. Lovely, oldish riverfront homes with bars on the windows are secured behind traditional, high enclosures. To the North, a riverfront park is being designed. This is the direction where those with money are escaping into 20-story condo gated communities in which two or three towers are surrounded by attractive fences. Inside the bars are armed guards, playgrounds, soccer field, tennis courts, pools and dog parks. Mostly the residents drive out from their underground garages to go where they’re going. They don’t walk on the streets, said Fernando, whose speciality is city re-invention. Gated developments are sealing off those with money from those without all over Brazil, he said. He and other city experts, worry this worldwide trend will destroy what makes cities thrive.

Fernando lives in a tower. When I got lost returning from the swimming pool to his apartment two nights ago, everyone I encountered was open, friendly and helpful. They also spoke English, which is uncommon in Brazil.

I get it about the beauty of non-violent life inside the gates. I really get it about the destruction of the mix of people’s that makes cities vibrant. The question is, how do you make these cities safe enough to thrive? Zero tolerance, like NYC did? These Brazilian cities and states are so broke they can’t pay the police.

Which loops us back to Rio and our desired Saturday lunch in a beachfront restaurant at the base of Sugarloaf. Will it be canceled? Will the violent take over the streets without the police? Will we hunker inside, waiting out the danger?

~~~~~
Facebook PS: PLEASE!!! Don’t let this article scare you away from traveling to Latin America. I have had an amazing time, been with friends in many circumstances. As my Grandmother Healy wrote to her best friend about their winter trip to Costa Rica when they caught the last Pan Am flight out when the revolution (of 1948) started: “I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.” That was after she described the pickups with armed men chasing the plane down the runway as it took off.

Nothing that exciting has happened to me.

​ !!!!!

BTW, my father, always cautious, esp. after WWII PTSD, denied that his mother wrote that. It is in one of the letters in my book, “Improbable Pioneer.”

2017-02-09 – There’s not going to be a police strike, so lunch is on for Sunday at my favorite restaurant, the Girl from Urca, which is near the Rio Yacht Club at the foot of Sugarloaf.