WereBear, those are good points about perceived value due to sticker shock. Working at a grocery store for so many years, I would often see poorer customers remove what few proteins were in their order (even very inexpensive meats, such as a rock bottom priced value-pack of chicken thighs) because they didn't have enough money to pay for everything, but they'd keep all the breads, pastas, chips, cereals, and sugary sodas. Even though the package of chicken thighs cost about $5-$7, it was only about $1/pound, and had enough thighs in it to provide several meals. The price per pound for the cheap and sale brands of chips and cereal averaged closer to $3-$5 per pound, but each package cost so much less than that one package of chicken legs that they could only see the price per package, not the price for a full meal. They'd end up using 4 or 5 carb based foods for a meal, which left them desperately hungry again in an hour or two, so they'd fill up on more carbs, rinse and repeat all day long, costing them far more than a day's worth of non-carby food would have cost.
Just to give an example of how much more filling a protein based meal is, DH is not LC, not by any means. But occasionally, he'll eat the exact same LC meal I'm eating, without adding any carbs to it. But I'm preaching to the choir here...
As an example, the other day I made "pizza chicken" (chicken breasts pounded very, very thin, spread with a little tomato sauce, topped with mozarella, pepperoni, olives, mushrooms, italian spices, garlic and onion, with some parmesan on top, and baked. When I cut each pizza chicken breast in half, each half breast was approximately 6" across, so we each had one of those pieces for dinner. I served the leftover pizza chicken a couple nights later, and asked DH if he wanted anything else with it, and he admitted it didn't look like much (he's used to his plate being much more full (of carbs), but that it was "deceptively filling". Well yes, it's very filling - Since he doesn't normally eat LC, he's used to needing a lot more food to feel as full as that relatively smallish looking dinner made him feel.
Maybe some day he'll give up the excess carbs. Small light bulb moments, small steps....
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(originally posted by Bob)
I'm often amazed at the people who put so much effort into memorizing the plots of soap operas, sports figures and their stats from college to the present day, how to identify thousands of bird species, what the "royals" are up to, who wore what on the red carpet, what celebrity is cheating on who, what each Marvel character's super power is, and so much other relatively useless information but yet don't take the time to learn anything about their own body.
They take advice from those with letters after their name, it doesn't work, but they don't try anything else because the 'expert' said this was the thing to do.
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Bob -
The things that people take such an avid interest in - those are not life and death issues. Oh, they may be just as intense in their support of their preferred team/player, or their constant desire for more celebrity gossip, etc as if it was life and death. But none of that affects them at such a deep, personal level that it's a life or death matter. Sometimes, I think they feel comfortable being so intense about those interests, simply because it's
not a life or death matter for them, even though the way they talk about it sometimes, you'd think their very existence depended on those inconsequential matters.
I think the whole problem is that when it comes to your health, that really is a life or death matter, but they believe it to be so incredibly complicated that they could never handle it by themselves. They
know they couldn't get into med school, only the smartest of the smart kids in school had what it took to do that, much less make it through however many years of college, med school, all the testing and residency training to become a full fledged doctor. So they trust the "pro" to handle their health issues (just like the allegory of trusting a pro to handle the brake job on your car, as opposed to trying to do it yourself). They believe that the pro has the training that means they (supposedly) know what's best. They have heard the phrase "consult your physician" enough to believe only your physician will know what's best for you. Even when what the pro tells you to do doesn't work, or makes things worse, they still believe that the one who is trained in these matters will make a better decision than they possibly can.
People are often completely flummoxed when a doctor turns a decision about their health care over to them - should I have this treatment or opt for that treatment? They're suddenly faced with the need to learn something about the risks and advantages of each treatment choice... it's scary to them when the life or death decision is turned over to them.
It's even more complicated when there's a quality of life decision involved, such as when a diabetic is told by a doctor that they can either change their lifestyle completely by significantly cutting carbs out of their diet (assuming their doctor will even suggest LC), or they can continue to eat whatever they like, test blood sugar regularly, and inject insulin to cover whatever they've eaten, even if they're warned that they'll very likely experience long term diabetic problems (limb amputation, blindness, heart problems, liver problems, death). Which will affect their quality of life the most: Giving up the foods they've loved all their life (present and immediate
drastic change in lifelong eating habits, on top of the shock of a devastating diagnosis), or continue as they've been doing, but risk long term health consequences (a prognosis that might not happen for decades, and there's always the hope that there may even be a cure available long before any of those horrible things happen to him, while still enjoying the foods they've always loved).
I can't imagine going through decades of life happily consuming every carby food on the planet, and suddenly being faced with that kind of diagnosis at this time of year, considering that most newly diagnosed as T2 know nothing about alternative LC foods, much less how to prepare LC foods. Can you imagine going into the holidays with the sudden realization (a mere week before the feasts and parties start) that the only thing you can eat on the thanksgiving table will be the turkey (all the sides are full of blood sugar raising carbs! And you won't be able to eat any pumpkin pie either!), that there will be literally nothing at the parties you can eat and not drive your blood sugar through the roof (unless they have a cheese and meat tray, and that will probably be nixed as being too fatty and full of cholesterol - it'll take a while to overcome the low fat propaganda), and Christmas dinner you'll again be limited to a little meat again. That would be very depressing to a lot of people, because the traditional food and drink is so much a part of their holiday traditions. No wonder people opt to just eat whatever they want, and cover it with insulin.
So I understand in a way why they think the way they do - I'm not trying to make excuses for their choice to just allow the doctors to tell them what to do, never questioning doctor's orders, just offer an explanation for the rationale behind that decision, no matter how twisted that seems to us, who are seeing things from a completely different angle.
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