By the time you get this, I should be settled on the Emerald Isle. I have been looking forward to going home to my grandparents’ land. Actually I have dual citizenship because of it. I will take pictures, and you can see what is there. There will be no new classes for the next two weeks because of the seminar in Ireland: I have posted a new class schedule on line. Click here to see what is planned. A number of you have asked me how the classes work. Check the class list page for more information on this. The classes are done online with one lesson each day. You do not have to be at your computer at any set time. And please go read the questions and answers before you write to me. If you have trouble getting through the process, write the tech forum. Please feel free to pass this week's newsletter on to your friends and family. Don't forget to let me know what you like and would like to see me cover. Be sure to visit our Radiant Recovery® website and Community Forum regularly. Warmly, Kathleen **********************************************************************
September 11, 2006 ** Quote From Kathleen **
Your body will start to cooperate. It will give you information earlier, more efficiently, and more joyfully. You and your body will become partners. *********************************************************************
** Testimonial for the Week**
The course was great. It was exactly the right action to learn on a structured basis and to get into posting and interacting. I see that doing the actions of the steps exactly as laid out, the courses, the interacting, and helping others are all integral. There are no huge profit margins in getting people to stay healthy by eating sensibly. No vested interest in researching or proving the simple theory of sugar sensivity. Quite the contrary. But it is obvious to anyone who would look, sugar sensitive or not. I know Kathleen and everyone involved are true friends. It's just something you know. I am grateful. I knew it driving down the road tonight listening to my CD player (I just installed myself). I was enjoying myself and I thought, Kathleen, what kind of music do you like! Such friends are rare in life. I am starting to go through the newsletters chronologically since that seems to be the wealth of (unpublished?) data. I plan on doing courses, reading the remainder of the published books, easing my wife into this, and of coures the steps. And I finally found something useful to do with a computer! Tim ********************************************************************
**Recipe of the Week**
This is a great dip for vegetables or to spread on Ryvitas. CHUMUS
Variation: a) you can add 1/4 cup of cooked chickpeas to the blended mixture before drizzling the oil and topping with the garnishes b) you can add a few tablespoons of roasted peppers and omit the garnish of parsley and paprika ********************************************************************
**Your Last Diet: More Than What You Think**
Ok, while you are waiting for the classes to start, go back to the YLD site at yahoo and read some of the old chats. Get a sense of what we do and who we are. You will love the chats, as goofy as they are. And then, please remember to go over and check the schedule to see when your weight loss class gets started. There will be 4 classes: Weight Loss Readiness is the class for those of you just starting out. This gives you a jump start by shifting your mind starting right out the gate. Settling the Emotional Pieces of Weight Loss is a terrific adjunct to your process. Find out what gets in the way and heal it. This class lets you come to the main part with a clear heart. Weight Loss in Action is the specific how-to piece of your program. You have your body balanced with the steps, are ready to rock. Learn how with efficiency and grace. Weight Loss for Stubborns is a problem-solving group for people who have been working the program and have found it hard to lose the extra weight. If you are not a YLD member, come and join us. Click here if you are ready to change your life or just plain ole have fun. It is not too late to get into the classes if you come right now. ********************************************************* ***********
**David's Corner **
 I know that Kathleen has been talking about supplements in the class she is doing. I thought you might like to order some of those:
Please send questions and suggestions. I love hearing from you and truly want to help you do your program better. ********************************************************* ***********
**Our Online Groups**
Hello. My name is Stacey. I'm the volunteer liaison for RadiantParents. I have 2 children, girls ages 6 and 3. I have known since I was a teenager that I felt better without sugar and whites and that still didn’t stop me from being the Queen of Dessert. I loved my sugar and couldn’t dream of a life without it. It wasn’t until reading Potatoes Not Prozac in 1998 that I understood why. It took a few more years of battling with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Fibromyalgia while still dealing with lifelong allergies and mood swings and trying all different diets and ways of eating until I was able to really do the program. I finally picked up Potatoes Not Prozac and Sugar Addicts Total Recovery Program for the 10th time and said “I have to really try this and stick to it.” I am so glad that I did. I was already doing parts of the steps, but I looked at all seven steps with a beginner's mind and gradually reached step 7. My CFS/FM is unbelievably improved as are my allergies. And best of all, I am much calmer, steadier and happier and a better mother and wife. When my older DD was a few years old we realized that she had mood swings, tantrums and night terrors that were all somehow related to when she ate sugar. She was stubborn and I always had to plan extra time in for meltdowns. We started being careful about what she ate and noticed a difference. I had read Little Sugar Addicts and I started to follow this with both of my children too. Wow what a difference it has made. Both DDs are happy with smiles and fewer tantrums. Now they are angels. I have realized how important it is for me to share my experience with others. I love helping sugar sensitive parents and children find what I and so many others have found through doing this program. On the list we discuss ways to get our children to buy in to the program which can be hard and frustrating at times, but it is fun to listen to the other parents and get advice while hearing about what other parents are doing. We also share recipes and success stories. It’s a great list and I feel honored to be a part of such a caring and wonderful group of parents. Come join us! ********************************************************************
**After Indian Country** Kathleen DesMaisons, Ph.D. This article is going to be a little different from what I normally write about. As you all know in the past few months, I have spent some time in Indian country. In both cases, the time in Hopi and the time in Minnesota have really affected me deeply. That is saying it lightly – more like rearranged my molecules. When I went to Hopi, I couldn’t speak about it for a month. After Minnesota, I got sick. So I know it is important and I think that telling the story will help me make sense of it. I went to Fond du Lac to the 25th Annual Institute on American Indians and Chemical Dependency. The institute is designed to give continuing education credits to people working in the field. It included a combination of major keynote talks and series of classes on things like ethics and making sure that clients do not beat UAs (urine screening). It is an extremely well-organized meeting and about 200 people came this year. There were 4 outside keynote speakers: one on historical trauma, one on the psychobiology of drug addiction, me and one on psychodrama. The first day had a panel of elders speaking on spiritual diversity. These were not light topics. The first presentation was by a native woman who has a PhD and has collected historical information on what is euphemistically called 'historical trauma'. She was raising the issue of what is the collective impact on native people on losing the land, losing the language, losing the religion, losing the children, losing the stories and losing identity. She gave this information in a power point presentation that was quite academic, reading from many of the slides. At one point she presented a clip from a movie about taking Indian children away to boarding school. I was particularly struck by one image of the agent enticing the kids onto the pontoon boat with candy canes. The movie really shook me. When I talked later with my friend and colleague who was on the planning committee, she said, “I wished the speaker had said more from the heart rather than being so academic.” Then she said, “You know, Kathleen, we all know this stuff.” "Yes", I thought, “you do.” For me, however, I had a very different experience. My intellect has known some about native disenfranchisement. It is why I have committed to working with the reservations. But when I was sitting in that auditorium, my molecules got it on a different level. My molecules said, “dear god, my people, my people like that Irish catholic priest in the movie who spirited that child away to be ‘properly educated in the name of god and civilization’, set out to systemically wipe out a culture.” The coming of age of a white person about genocide and racism is a painful task. My coming of age is a painful task. Guilt and shame, rage, horror are hardly easy feelings. They are jumbled up and come flooding in. Collective denial tends to be way easier to manage. Or pseudo glamorization of Indian culture into new age distortion is easier for white people to cope with. Both are far away from the truth. I came to this awakening as a 60-year-old white woman who has done a lot of reflection about what it means to be a woman in our culture. Women have experienced loss of respect, value and identity. I have actively engaged with that story. My molecules are not horrified by it; they live in a state of reconciliation and openness to standing with, to mutuality and hope. My molecules know which men have committed to make sense of sexism. They know good hearts, even hearts that do not have clue of what women are about but are willing to say, “I want to understand. Will you share your story” and then really listen. That is standing with. From that experience, I come to my experience in Indian county with a heart that says, “Yes, my people did this.” And that asks what I will do in response. I know that our work in sugar sensitivity is an important piece of the story. We gave Indians the gate to addiction. Some of my work is to say that was wrong. It was a sly seduction to disempower you. Changing how you eat will help restore the balance. So I will keep doing what I do. I will make quiet time to integrate all that came up from my last trip. I will make space to tell my story. I have learned that it is in the stories that we make the deepest connection. If I am willing to share my story with you on a deep level, then we can connect in that place. It is not the information that heals us; it is the connection and mutual respect. It is feeling known, supported and valued that allows us to change old patterns, to walk away from destructive behaviors and want something else. Much will come in the next year. It will take at least that long to reweave what got unraveled last week. ©Kathleen DesMaisons 2006. Here are the folks who are helping put the newsletter together: Gretel, the liaison for the recovery list and the webmaster puts it all together Naomi, liaison for Food and Cooking gathers the recipes. David, who runs the Radiant Recovery® Store talks about what new products we have. You are getting the weekly newsletter from Radiant Recovery® in response to your signup. A copy of this newsletter may also be found posted on the web at http://www. radiantrecovery.com/weeklynewsletter.htm. ©2006 by Kathleen DesMaisons . All rights reserved. You are free to use or transmit this article to your ezine or website as long as you leave the content unaltered and use this attribution: "By Kathleen DesMaisons, Ph.D. of Radiant Recovery®. Please visit Kathleen's website at http://www.radiantrecovery.com for additional resources on sugar sensitivity and healing addiction." Please notify me at kathleen@radiantrecovery.com to let me know where the material will appear. Banner Photograph by Geraint Smith |
