Hi there! I just wanted to let Sarah know that I too was starving 24 hours a day after giving birth. I too breastfed my baby - every 1-3 hours. I starved for several months! Whatever it takes, I recommend she get the help she needs to be able to eat enough. I recommend she not follow portions or frequencies until she has gotten over the starvation. Some women do not gain lots of extra weight during pregnancy - for instance, I was back to my pre-pregnancy weight by 8 days after the birth! I know I lost muscle tissue because I just could not eat enough. Besides avoiding wheat/dairy if she suspects a Type O baby, eat a wide variety of foods - frequently throughout the day and night. I do not think the recommendations in Eat Right For Your Baby hold true for mother's who fit this starvation profile until they find the extra high calorie level that is right for them. I ate a lot of fat but it really did not help as much as I'd hoped. One good meal was turkey burgers (Cook Right For Your Type recipe) and avocado. As a non-secretor, I started eating at least one sweet potato every day also. Sarah, Good luck! I wish I could have gotten the help I needed to eat enough after the delivery--it would have been so much healthier! Lynn

Well, Sarah ~~ a highly respected authority has spoken!! Thanks SO much for stopping by to help, Lynn! I'm sure that baby boy is joyfully filling lots of your time, but I'd love to hear from you more often! :-D thanks again!!

Dear Heidi, Finally.....here's at least part 1 of my long question! I have suffered from "fatique" for years, and had come to believe it was simply my constitution. Well, I had an appointment a month ago with a supposedly very good French doctor, as I have a bizarre thyroid problem. I have been taking Armour thyroid for several years, and my Bev Hills doctor doubled my dose from 2 to 4 grains about a year and a half ago after my blood work showed very low thyroid levels. Did practically nothing as to how I felt or to the blood levels, so I finally sought help here after a long search to find a good doctor. The French doc has added Cytomel (T3) to the 4 grain Armour, and I have done blood work and a 24 hour urine test for thyroid, cortisol, DHEA, etc. (I also have been taking 20mg hydrocortisone for several years for adrenal exhaustion, and take DHEA as well.) This doc also had me do a urine test with a special lab in Paris to check for heavy metal toxicity. He speculated that this might be my problem, and that if it was the case, that it could be cured, and that very possibly my thyroid might repair itself, and I would not have to take thyroid medication all the rest of my life. (He actually said that many Americans have heavy metal toxicity....)

Well, I got the test results last week and it shows a very high level of mercury toxicity, and a somewhat high level of arsenic. No results yet on the other tests, and I do not see the doc again til May 22. I had my amalgam fillings removed over 2 years ago, and took several courses of Thorne's Captomer DMSA, though maybe not enough. I have now been reading on the internet on mercury toxicity, and have a multitude of the listed symptons: low blood pressure, high pulse, low thyroid, adrenal problems, fatigue, muscle soreness, difficulty concentrating, etc. (I also learned that, duh.... other things I did exacerbated mercury problems - such as gum chewing alot in my teen years, bruxism, picking up mercury from a broken thermometer, using an ultrasonic toothbrush, and working one summer as a dental assistant in high school and mixing amalgam fillings.)

These symptoms/problems could not possibly be due to my diet, as I have been on the type O diet basically for 20 years. I saw a "psychic" nutritionist around 1982, who put me on what was basically the O secretor diet, though even more restrained. I modified her diet somewhat around 6 years ago when I bought "Eat Right for Your Type," and further modified it last December when I found out I was a non-secretor. I have "cheated" normally one meal per week in these last 20 years, and hardly at all since I changed to the non-secretor diet.

I can only guess that if I did NOT eat like this, I would REALLY be sick! Instead, I am just basically tired, so obviously I do not follow the other important part of the LR4YT - exercise. (That subject will be part 2, as it is also long...). Obviously, I do not know what my new doctor will have me doing to detox the mercury, but I imagine it will be massive DMSA. (By the way, my Bev Hills doctor tried pregnenolone, glandulars, and Isocort on me before going to Armour thyroid and hydrocortisone - to no avail.) Soooooooo, do you have any words of wisdom on this??? I don't think I have ever seen heavy metal toxicity addressed by you or Peter. Do you think it is possible that this could be my underlying problem? And does Peter have any recommendations for detoxification?? (I do not have the enclyclopedia, so please let me know what the protocals are, if there are any). As always, I greatly appreciate your advise, and send you love from France, Abby

Well, Abby, what a journey you've had, eh?

Hey, I'm kind of disappointed that my advice to you closely paralleled your Bev Hills doctor's errors! Sheesh! You'd think I could do better than that! ;-)

The Encyclopedia has detoxification protocols, but they are aimed at "avoid"-food-related detox of the bowels, bloodstream and skin. For heavy-metal detox, I'd start using the harmless "chelating pesto" daily. The ideal recipe for an O non would be: 3 handfuls of cilantro (coriander leaf); one handful of parsley; six cloves of garlic; one handful of dried or toasted pumpkin (or winter squash) seeds in the shells; 1/2 teaspoon sea salt; 1/2 cup of olive oil. Whiz the garlic, seeds and salt in the food processor or blender until they're the texture of coarse sand. Add the olive oil, then the greens, and process till it's a puffy light-green thick paste. It keeps well for a week or so in the fridge. The size of your handfuls, cloves, etc. can vary, so adjust this recipe at will. I'd take a tablespoon in the morning and one in the evening. You can use it as a condiment instead of taking it "straight," and feel free to add enough oil to make a sauce or a dressing -- it's great on plain broiled fish, or thinned as a salad topping or a sauce for warm root vegetables. Just see to it that you consume two tablespoons every day. It's a great start, and it's gentle yet effective.

Now: Does anyone there in France do EDTA chelation therapy? It's a weeks-long series of intravenous sessions, done in the office. That is one option for you. Further, here is a website I recommend for reading, and possible purchase of their products: kitchen doctor's heavy-metal oral chelation page. The products are strictly up to you, and may be cheaper elsewhere (Sun chlorella, for instance), but the advice is spot on, and the anecdotes may ring bells with you. It's a very good site for information on the process and what to expect. For more general reading, do a search for the phrase "heavy metal chelation" and include either "EDTA" or "oral" as modifiers. Perhaps you've done all this already! ;-) but if not, that's where I'd start. I have a couple of other ideas which I'll review, and send to you privately if they pan out.

There's a young woman I know who's been researching solutions to heavy-metal poisoning for years now. I will get in touch with her, and see if anything she has might be useful to your situation.

Take GOOD care of our Abby, and I look forward to your exercise post, dear!

:-D

Thank you for all the good advices about O kids breakfast - I am sorry to bother you again Heidi- this time abour me: I´m B-,secr- and I need to loose about 15 kg -I´ve got most of Peters books but I still find it difficult to get the right balance for B-types- I Know I´m lucky-but it is still hard to get the right balance.

I´ve followed the diet more than a year (I´m afraid not 100% but getting closer and closer)I´m healthy a little bit dry skin and allegic, my bowel movements tell me every time I have eaten the wrong stuff, diareea, itchy and sore skin in the bottom! I´m so lucky that I will be staying home the next 3 months looking after my daughter,my garden and myself :I really need to be at home to change my lifestyle.

At the moment I´ve got 2 types of days:

1) Breakfast: eggs, cranberryjuice,banana, black tea.

midmorning:coffee with skimmed milk, and a kefirshake with fruit.

Lunch: kidneybean-salad, with red peppers, oniens etc and 1 slice spelt bread.

afternoon: Green tea, dried abricots, a few walnuts.

Dinner: Veal or turkey with broccoli and carrots.

Late night : apple and a glas of skimmed milk.

2)B: fruit, fetacheese, slice of bread, black tea.

m: Dried fruit: pineapple, raisin etc coffee with milk

L: Cold meat from dinner with veggies

A: Green tea and banana

D: Cod, veggies, some lowfat homemade dairy sauce

LN: skimmed milk and fruit

I ride my bike about 30- 60 min. a day when I take my daughter to school. I do a lot of gardening as well- seems both physically good and also very relaxing.

I do not take any supp. because of the very high price in Stacktheme-compaired to USprices. Could/should I change my diet ? I think I get about 600-1000 grams of veggies and 200- 400 grams of fruit a day, about 6 eggs a weeks, 2 x fish a w, 6 x meat a w, 3 x beans a w. What about exercise could I do more?- and should I do it ar specific times a day: like hard exercise in the morning and more relaxing stuff in the afternoon? Hope that you can give me and my fellow b´s a bit of advice to balance our diets. It is the most wonderful May day here in Denmark with cherrytrees blooming everywhere -so a very happy summer to everyone outthere - Thanks Henriette

Henriette, I believe your diet looks beautiful! ;-) Your idea of engaging in some strenuous activity in the morning, and calming exercise in the afternoon, is also very good. Perhaps a Tae Bo tape for the morning, or a session of weight training, two or three times per week.

Also, try to find time to take in about four liters of water per day -- an hour away from food, if possible -- to each liter, add a pinch of sea salt.

Sometimes weight loss takes a bit longer than we expect, especially when there are not so many kilos to be lost. And do remember to measure yourself at waist, hips and around each thigh & keep a record on a weekly basis. Often, muscle gain can obscure fat loss, and the scale may move little while the body proportions are changing significantly.

And perhaps other Bs can share their own techniques for boosting their slenderizing plan? :-> thanks for your note, Henriette ~~ we're finally enjoying Spring here in the Eastern U.S. as well! :-D