So, that was me in 2006. I weighed over 300 pounds. I had triglycerides of 500, and I had just been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.
Now, type 2 diabetes is when your body doesn't use insulin properly, and I like to imagine it as this sugar sludge going through my bloodstream to the soundtrack of "Jaws." Like 29 million other Americans, I was sent home with a diet, a prescription, and a little booklet about my disease. As I dug into it, I learned a dirty little truth – two, actually.
The first says that in America, if you're diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, you carry the same health risk as somebody who's already had one heart attack. The second is that the object of the game, unlike cancer or anything else, is to manage your diabetes, not cure you. So, your doctors will work very, very hard to try to prevent complications that might ruin the quality of your life or kill you.
I knew that this was not going to work for me. I was a hard-charging type-A global executive, and managing my diabetes was not going to be an option. So, I enlisted the help of the people at Canyon Ranch in the medical department, who I knew were a little bit more ambitious.
And here's what we learned on a lesson on a journey that actually took us five years. I learned that even though I was 300 pounds and had type 2 diabetes, my body was absolutely perfect the way it was – for the way I was feeding it, the way I was moving it, and the way I was resting it. Quite frankly, if I wanted a different body or I wanted different health, I had to change the equation somehow.
The second thing I learned was that if I imagined my future healthy self and started living that life now – what kinds of foods I would eat, how many calories I would need to maintain a healthy weight for a lifetime – that would be the way I would achieve my goal. I had to come up with strategies that I could live with for two days, two weeks, two months, two years.
Now, when you do this and you live this way, interesting things happen – like magic. You wake up two years later and you're almost at your goal. I learned that I had to keep track of everything. So, I used iPhone apps like "Lose It!" and I used my UP band to track how much sleep I was getting and how much exercise I was getting along the way. And this really helped me to keep the game kind of rational instead of emotional the way it can get.
This was a big war. I had to break this down to the smallest battle I could win every day because I have a short attention span. I had to take it down to the cellular level – what would make my cells happier and healthier every single day. And with every drop of glucose or every drop of blood I fed into my glucose meter, I could tell immediately if I was moving in the right direction. I became my own science experiment, and I learned a lot.
For example, when I didn't sleep or I jumped time zones or took a red-eye, my blood sugar was 20 points higher the next day and I craved carbohydrates. Well, I didn't need to eat; what I needed was a nap. Portions were always my biggest downfall. I come from the land of all-you-can-eat shrimp and endless platters of pasta. When somebody showed me what a real single portion of something was, it was a huge disconnect for me. So, I needed to really figure out how to do that.
I started eating with smaller plates, eating with chopsticks to eat more slowly, and I promised myself I could have anything I wanted as long as I ate it with a knife and a fork. Trust me, it feels ridiculous to eat a Snickers bar like this, but it helped me be more conscious of what I was eating.
I learned to be in perpetual motion all day, every day – looking for ways to move and to fidget because fidgeting can burn 200-300 calories a day. I counted steps, I got a standing desk, and I learned that my one hour of walking every day was as good for my head as it was for my body.
And finally, life's too short to live without ice cream. When I was first diagnosed, I made a list of all my favorite foods, and I went and did a glycemic index with my glucose meter of each one. Then I went back to each food and I tweaked it, adding a little fat, removing a little sugar, until everything fit in my plan. And now, I plan for a perfect scoop of premium ice cream every day. What I learned is that, given half a shot, your body will recover. It's an amazing adaptive machine, self-healing. Mine did.
I lost over 110 pounds. I now have a perfect lipid profile. I have had a healthy, normal blood sugar without medication for more than five years. I am no longer a type 2 diabetic. [Pause for applause] So, thank you very much.
So, if any of you have a health issue that you need to deal with or a life change you need to deal with, I urge you to imagine your healthy future self and start living that life now. Break your journey down into little battles you can win. Become your own science experiment and come up with strategies that will last for two days or two years. And most of all, you need to start eating like your life depends on it because it does.
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