Nurse Cindy Whoosh Effect on Keto Diet
I am so excited that I had the pleasure of interviewing Nurse Cindy about the Whoosh Effect on the Keto Diet! I remember watching her viral video more than 2 years ago.
Nurse Cindy lives in San Antonio, Texas. I live in Austin, Texas which is about 2 1/2 hours from her. We never had the chance to meet in person until we both attended the Low Carb Denver conference. It’s kinda funny to think that we both live in Texas but we traveled to Colorado and met there!
We ended up going for lunch and spending more than 5 hours together. She is so easy to talk to and we have so much in common. The main thing we have in common is KETO! I adore her and I know you will too. Below is a replay of the Nurse Cindy interview so you can watch it in full if you missed it. It’s worth a replay!
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Here’s the interview transcribed if you prefer to read about it.
Nurse Cindy Whoosh Effect on Keto Diet
Jennifer Marie: Hey guys. How are you today? It’s Sunday night. We have a new guest on. Dr. [inaudible 00:00:08] is traveling, and I have asked Nurse Cindy to join me.
Nurse Cindy: Yay.
Jennifer Marie: Yay. Welcome Nurse Cindy. Now she has the page Ask Nurse Cindy on Facebook, and let me just tell you, we met… Okay, so she lives in San Antonio, I live in Austin, we both live in Texas, just a couple of hours from each other, but we let in Denver at the Low-carb Conference.
Nurse Cindy: Probably the best part of the whole conference as far as me was to meet a new friend who I feel like I’ve known forever.
Jennifer Marie: Yes. Yes. And we have so much in common that I invited her on. She has an extreme love for helping people, just as I do. It was what? A week after we met, and I happened to be in San Antonio. Called you up and said, “Hey, have lunch with me.” And you’re like, “Yeah, not really hungry. But we can go to lunch.” I’m like, “Oh, funny because I don’t really eat lunch either. Let’s go have coffee.” Next thing you know… weren’t we there four hours?
Nurse Cindy: It was more like five by the time I dropped you off and got to meet your daughter and John. It was like the time just went like that. It was amazing.
Jennifer Marie: Hey Nancy. Hey Andrew. Oh, we have Andrew watching from Australia. How fun.
Nurse Cindy: Hello mate.
Jennifer Marie: I know.
Nurse Cindy: Put some shrimp on the barbie.
Jennifer Marie: And Nancy’s from Virginia Beach.
Nurse Cindy: Where I grew up. I went to Kempsville High School.
Jennifer Marie: Oh fun.
Nurse Cindy: So tell, that’s in Virginia Beach. She’ll know exactly where that is.
Jennifer Marie: Oh, fun. And we have Mary Ford from Iowa. Proud. Nice. Well, you guys might to… If you have any friends are interested in keto, or maybe have some questions, you might want to share this out because we’ve got some information from you. I’ve asked Nurse Cindy to come on because just like Dr. Boz, Nurse Cindy has a very simple way to explain certain things. If you’ve been part of the Facebook group Low-carb Inspirations Plus Keto Friendly Recipes, you’ve already seen the video that I’ve shared over and over again with her balloon video that has gone viral and has explained the fat cells.
Jennifer Marie: Do you want to, just in case, I mean I get new people all the time. Do you want to go through and explain what that video is?
Nurse Cindy: Sure. Sure. First, I’m a registered nurse for those of you that want to know. I’ve been a registered nurse for 41 years. I’ll be 62 next month. And I have been obese my entire life until I started the keto journey. So my sister, Debbie Sokes, this is all her fault. She encouraged me to start it. She sent me that Dr. Sarah Hallberg video about Type 2 Diabetes, the TED talk. We started it in May of 2017. And I was at her house in July, and by then, of course, you start to… At first, when you drop from… I was probably over 400 grams of carbs a day. I was 75 pounds heavier than I am today.
Nurse Cindy: When you drop that much from your carbohydrates from over 400 to down to 20 or less, what happens is for every gram of carbohydrate you’re consuming, your body holds onto four grams of water. You go from holding onto 1600 grams of water to 80. You’re going to diurese. That’s the medical term for go to the bathroom a lot. You’re going to go potty a lot. And so we lose a lot of weight at first. That water weight. But then we hit a stall.
Nurse Cindy: I want anyone that’s new to this, you’re undergoing a stall right now, it’s normal. It’s natural. It’s one of the body’s methods to make sure you’re not in a famine. We did this video from Debbie’s front yard out in the woods on July 31st. I’d been keto for about two and a half months and I’d lost about 20 pounds. I was stalling. And I’d read about what causes a stall. And you can Google whoosh and fat loss. I saw this series showing how the fat cell, at first, is full of the triglycerides. And then as you start to lose weight, some of them dump out right away. And others, sort as that water… And I saw the drawing, I thought, “That’s a water balloon. That’s what a balloon is.”
Nurse Cindy: My brother, Steve Davis, who’s lost over 100 pounds, and my sister Debbie, I think she’s done about 80. My family is down over 940 pounds-
Jennifer Marie: No, that is.
Nurse Cindy: In these last two and a half years.
Jennifer Marie: Oh my God.
Nurse Cindy: Unbelievable. Yeah.
Jennifer Marie: That is awesome. That is awesome.
Nurse Cindy: Thank you. It’s a life changing way of eating. But I wanted to try to explain to people because I’m a very visual person. And so I think if you can see an explanation or something that gives you something to lock into your brain, it helps you through those tough times. There’s one horrible thing that people do when they hit a stall. And that’s they quit.
Jennifer Marie: I know. Yes. Yes.
Nurse Cindy: It’s normal.
Jennifer Marie: They think it’s not working. The scale is your enemy. You don’t see you’ve lost one pound in two weeks and you’ve given up all of your favorite foods, all of the comfort foods, you think that it doesn’t work, and you’re ready to dive into ice cream or whatever your comfort thing is, right? It works.
Nurse Cindy: It works.
Jennifer Marie: It’s just the scale lies.
Nurse Cindy: Yes. Yes.
Jennifer Marie: You said in your video, you said, “Don’t go by the scale.”
Nurse Cindy: Don’t trust them.
Jennifer Marie: You said, yeah, you said, “Take a piece of your favorite clothing, and not elastic, take a piece of clothing-”
Nurse Cindy: That buttons.
Jennifer Marie: That buttons.
Nurse Cindy: Or your belt, or a tape measure. That’s the best gift you can buy yourself is go to your favorite Dollar Tree and buy yourself a cloth tape measure. Because the way the body… So I filled up these water balloons, put them in a bowl, put them on a little TV tray out in my sister’s yard. My brother Steve was video taping. It was hilarious. The whole family was involved in it behind the scenes. And I was talking about the whoosh effect. I was trying to explain it. And this is not necessarily a published study, randomized control trial scientific. It’s just an explanation to help us get through the tough times, because as certain fat cells start to collapse down, they don’t go away. They just sort of deflate like a balloon might.
Jennifer Marie: And they’re stubborn too because they hold that shape, and so you have it all filled with water, but then they want to hold on for just until the last minute until whoosh.
Nurse Cindy: And then they whoosh. So you’ll go to the bathroom a lot. And it’s not all the cells do it all at once, all the fat cells. It’s like you’ve got… I’m basically still a billionaire. If every fat cell was a dollar, I’d be… Maybe I’m a… what is it trillions worth or more? Anyway, at least a multi-millionaire still because I still have about 25 pounds to lose. The important thing is to realize that our body, especially if you’re a female, especially if you’re menopausal or perimenopausal, or still having your menstrual cycle. You’re going to have peaks and valleys. You can fluctuate two to five pounds a day in water weight. And then as you start to lose the weight, and these fat cells really like the shape they are. They just really adore this shape. They don’t want to collapse. They’re like, “Oh, she’s done this before. She’s just kidding. She’s going to start eating the carbs again, don’t work too hard changing shapes.” Some of them will start to release water right away, and others all of a sudden, they tweet each other, and they say, “Okay, tomorrow’s the day.” You go to the bathroom maybe a couple times during the night and you get up in the morning and the scales are down.
Nurse Cindy: That water balloon video was… I was… Ask Nurse Cindy had just started. I really I think I had maybe 200 people following me. And it’s got a million and a half views on Facebook and about, I don’t know, close to half a million on YouTube. Yeah.
Jennifer Marie: Well, it’s a really good explanation.
Nurse Cindy: Thank you.
Jennifer Marie: In fact, Mary says, “I remember that video!” I remember it vividly because I shared it over and over again. It was just the best explanation and there’s no way that I could explain it any better. I was like-
Nurse Cindy: Thank you.
Jennifer Marie: I mean I started February of 2017, so I had been in it a little while. You do hit a stall, everybody hits a stall, and you wonder, “What am I doing wrong? I’m doing everything right. I’ve ditched the sugars.” You’re so frustrated. This is where that term comes, trust the process, right?
Nurse Cindy: Trust the process. I think the biggest thing that I want people to take away, and feel free to share this to your page, is be of good cheer. Be encouraged. The science is there. And when we reduce our carbohydrates and we start burning fat stores as our energy instead of that quick sugar that I used to take in every hour or two, your body, especially if you’re 59. I was 59 when I started. And if you’ve been obese your entire life like I was, you have broken metabolism internally. Especially if you’ve yo-yo dieted like I did. Especially if you’ve lost weight and then gained it back plus some. And one of the things I want folks to really grab is that to stall, I would have been happy back when I did all these other weight… You know, you name it. You name it. Grapefruit diet, soup diet, you name it. Vinegar diet. If I could have lost the weight and “stalled” and never gained it back, I’d be twiggy.
Nurse Cindy: A stall is a victory for those of us that have been obese. So stall is a victory. I’m maintaining. I never maintained before in my life. I always kept going up.
Jennifer Marie: I have never. I have tried every diet out there. I hate calling keto a diet because I do not see it that way at all. Any other diet I’ve tried, I’ve failed horribly. And you know what? I can see why. We were setup to fail. This way of life, when people get it and they can stick to it, and just maybe don’t even look at the scale for a while, which is hard, because I’m a scale watcher. I know the fluctuations.
Jennifer Marie: I was at the lake this weekend. I’m sunburned. And I know when I get sunburn and when I’m at the lake sweating, I will go up three pounds. But I know-
Nurse Cindy: Because you’re retaining. It’s inflammation.
Jennifer Marie: Yes. It’s inflammation, and I know it. Every time when I come back, I’m like, “It’s going to…” And you just start to know what happens. It’s not that you overate, it’s not that you overindulged. I may have had an alcoholic drink or two.
Nurse Cindy: Maybe. Maybe baby.
Jennifer Marie: It goes away. I mean, you go back to normal and it’ll come off. I’m so happy about that.
Nurse Cindy: Well good. Well, I was thinking about stall. Just the word stall because I knew that was going to be one of our topics today. We passed a car and it was stalled on the side of the road. It was sort of broken down. So there is that situation with an older car. I’m a 1957 model. No one else has to know that, but don’t tell your friends, I’m going to be 62. More likely that I woulds tall than maybe someone younger with a lot of muscle mass. The older your car is the more likely you might have a stall. And sometimes it’s an easy fix. Maybe there’s been some carb creep. Maybe you’ve been eating when you weren’t hungry. I think one of the things I’ve really learned from listening to you and Dr. Boz for the last month, or two, or three, is that the longer I can go without putting calories in my mouth, the more I’m demanding, I am like telling my body, “Pull out the fat.” She’s a multi-millionaire. She’s got tons of money there. There’s dollar bills sticking out you know everywhere.
Nurse Cindy: I just want to encourage all of the folks that are on your page that this is, for me at least, and for my entire family, it has been the only thing. And for us, there’s three S’s. It needs to be simple. It needs to be satisfying. And if you get those two things, then it’s sustainable. That’s where the Keto Friendly Recipes Cookbook comes in. That’s where the cookbook that you wrote comes in.
Jennifer Marie: Oh yeah, let me show people. Hold on let me show you.
Nurse Cindy: Yeah. While you’re picking that up. I can’t wait, I’ve pre-ordered it. I need… I was so excited because-
Jennifer Marie: Simple.
Nurse Cindy: Because people say, “I’ve given up this. I’ve given up that.” Make a list of the things you miss and then go to this page that we’re on right now, and search it. You’re going to find multiple recipes that are going to be able to let you have that comfort food that you were missing without the sugar spike.
Jennifer Marie: Look, this one is my husband’s favorite. Oh wait. Can you see that?
Nurse Cindy: Yes.
Jennifer Marie: It’s a Keto pull apart pizza bread. Can you see that?
Nurse Cindy: Oh.
Jennifer Marie: Oh, it’s delicious like… There’s just so many.
Nurse Cindy: I might need you to message me that recipe. I don’t think I can wait until May.
Jennifer Marie: There are so many good ones on there. It’s a tool, right? It’s going to be a tool to help you on your journey, just like so many other things. You’re right. It does have to be simple. It does. Because if it’s too difficult, or if we have to spend hours upon hours in the kitchen, it’s not going to happen.
Nurse Cindy: Not for most of us because most of us are either full-time employed outside of the house, or we’re full-time employed in the house. Whether it’s a young mother or whether it’s you have a business like you do. And meal prep for us is important. We try to meal pre. We try to freeze things. If we’re tired of eating something, it’s the second night, we freeze the rest, or we… And I travel so much, so I can’t spend the entire weekend when I’m home in the kitchen. I enjoy cooking, so thank goodness for that. But yeah thank you. I can’t til my order comes. My cookbook.
Jennifer Marie: Awesome. Awesome. Well, I’m glad you’re getting it.
Nurse Cindy: Yeah, and you’ve got freebies too, right? That come with it.
Jennifer Marie: Oh, that’s right. Yes. See, I’m so bad. I need to tell people.
Nurse Cindy: Oh, I’m going to promote the heck out of this book because I’m so excited. I think your freebies are at least equal to the price because Amazon, I don’t know if it’s still on sale, but when I bought mine-
Jennifer Marie: It is.
Nurse Cindy: It was under $16. It was like $15.87 or something.
Jennifer Marie: It’s $15. I just checked, it’s $15.17. Amazon marks that down. I don’t. I don’t have any control over that. That is a steal.
Nurse Cindy: It’s a steal.
Jennifer Marie: Let me tell you. Let me tell you. Let me tell you. This is some insider information as to how a cookbook goes down because this is published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This is a major publisher.
Nurse Cindy: It’s a big deal. It’s a big deal.
Jennifer Marie: I went to New York twice for photo shoots. You ever see the… Twice. We shot, oh my gosh, we took so many… We made so much food, and we photographed so much food.
Nurse Cindy: Oh my gosh.
Jennifer Marie: Have you ever seen a cookbook? You just open it up and it’s just written recipes.
Nurse Cindy: Right. Right.
Jennifer Marie: This book is not that.
Nurse Cindy: Oh, good.
Jennifer Marie: This book has the most beautiful, colored, bright, delicious photos. I told them when we were doing this. I was like, “This has got to have a lot of photos, and it’s got to be good photos.” So, we…
Nurse Cindy: Oh my God. So what happens if I drool on the paper?
Jennifer Marie: I know right.
Nurse Cindy: I’ll have to dry it off really fast. Oh, that’s so exciting.
Jennifer Marie: It was such an experience. It was such an experience. But the book is really good. It’s really pretty. I am the type that if I have a cookbook, I want to see what the end product looks like. I want to see what it’s supposed to come out to be. So this one has a lot of photos, which I’m super, super proud of. But yeah. Let me tell them about the freebies real quick.
Nurse Cindy: Yes. Yes.
Jennifer Marie: If you order, you can redeem to get the bonus freebies in a digital download of three months of recipes, shopping lists, and look, I printed it out myself. Look how thick this is.
Nurse Cindy: Oh my goodness.
Jennifer Marie: So what this means, I did this because I really, really, really want people to start keto. The book does not get printed until May 7th. But these you can use now. So I really just tried to think of a way that I could help people that if they did want the book, and they didn’t want to wait, there was just so many things you can get right now in a digital download. And you can go get this printed. I took this to a print shop and got it printed. It’s absolutely gorgeous.
Nurse Cindy: Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. I want it. I want it spiral bound like that and I want some thicker paper so as I turn it, it doesn’t tear out. That’s fantastic.
Jennifer Marie: So yeah, that’s the… Yep. Yep. I’m so proud of it. I’m so happy for the book.
Nurse Cindy: You should be.
Jennifer Marie: Just so I can have one in my own kitchen too.
Nurse Cindy: Which is why I was so nervous bringing you those pumpkin surprise muffins that day because…
Jennifer Marie: Oh my gosh. You guys, when I asked her to go to lunch she was so cute. She brought me these delicious pumpkin muffins with like a buttercream frosting. And of course, I think I ate two of them.
Nurse Cindy: Maybe.
Jennifer Marie: I think you brought me six.
Nurse Cindy: Six. Yep.
Jennifer Marie: My family is a family of four. We had spent four or five hours together. So by that time, I knew I was having dinner with my family, but by that time I was like, “Okay, I’m getting a little hungry.” I remember eating some and I was like, “Oh my God. These are really good.” I took them home to my family. They were devoured.
Nurse Cindy: That’s so sweet.
Jennifer Marie: They were like, “Oh, we got to make some.” Yes. Yes.
Nurse Cindy: I was so nervous. I looked at my husband, I said, “I don’t know if I should take these, but they’re in the hotel room and I don’t know if they have any food.” The mother in me and the nurse was like, “I should feed her.”
Jennifer Marie: Hey Crystal says, “Please hold up the book again so I can screenshot.” It’s called Keto Friendly Recipes. Easy Keto for Busy People. And it really is. It’s easy. I think that’s the most appealing. I’m a very simple person. I like quick easy, but I’m very picky, so they have to be delicious. So, there you go.
Nurse Cindy: There you go.
Jennifer Marie: Let’s see. Oh, Vicky is saying, “I pre-ordered the book from Amazon but how do we actually get the digital freebies.” Okay, so if you’ve already pre-ordered you can go to lowcarbinspirations.com/preorder, and you can redeem your receipt to get those downloads immediately. Okay.
Jennifer Marie: All right, so you will… Now, Nurse Cindy, you’re going to talk to us a little bit. You have another video. I hear the velcro.
Nurse Cindy: Yep, you hear the velcro. My high tech budget.
Jennifer Marie: I love it. I love it. You’re going to talk to us a little bit about A1C.
Nurse Cindy: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yes, you’re hemoglobin A1C. I think any of you who are pre-diabetic, or you’ve listened to any of the Dr. Boz videos, she talks about the A1C, especially about [inaudible 00:18:39], the Type 1 Diabetic that she’s working with, and what her A1C was. Which I don’t remember. I think it was somewhere around 10, and what that averaged out her blood sugars were around 300, or what does that mean? Well blood sugar, medical people will call it your blood glucose level. What it means is the circulating amount of glucose in your bloodstream at any given time. And our body is amazingly uber smart. And it must maintain that blood sugar for as long as it can in this very narrow window of about 60 to 80. What happens, if you’ve ever been hangry, and your blood sugar is dropping, maybe 70 to 100 is a more normal range. If you get down in the 60s, or even the lows 70s, or down in the 50s, you get sweaty, you get shaky, you get very ticked off. And this feed me now, get in my belly.
Nurse Cindy: We used to only, and when my daughter was diagnosed Type 1 Diabetic, Rachel D., if you’ve ever seen any of her videos, she was three years old when she was diagnosed. She’s like 37 or 38 now. We didn’t have an A1C measurement, we only had her blood sugar testing that we could look at. But here’s what an A1C is. This is your red blood cell with velcro on it. It’s from the Dollar Tree. I don’t know why there’s a paw there. But we have to pause to explain. This is your red blood cell. Now your red blood cell tumbles through your entire cardiovascular system, and what it does, its job is to bring in the groceries and take out the trash. It’s job is to bring in oxygen and nutrients to drop them off, and then to cellular debris and waste products, carbon dioxide, and carry them out.
Nurse Cindy: So that does that by… If you see there’s four. So this red blood cell, I’m now going to make it a hemoglobin molecule. Hemoglobin is part of the structure of a red blood cell, and there’s many thousands of hemoglobin molecules per red blood cell. But each hemoglobin molecule has four seeds. All right. I want you think of this as a bus. People get on the bus. Oxygen gets on the bus and it travels through the blood stream, and it gets off the bus. Okay. It brings in the groceries, the oxygen, drops it off and leaves empty. It picks up the carbon dioxide.
Nurse Cindy: We’ve got these four… Everybody with me? Does that make sense Jennifer? Should I explain it again?
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. No, that makes sense.
Nurse Cindy: Okay, and on the back… there’s lots of seats on the bus. It really tries to, if you take a nice breath, you’re bring in so much oxygen, you’re filling up all of these seats on the bus, and all your hemoglobin molecules. Well, what’s interesting is that these little seats on the bus can also hold glucose. I want you to see how. I know. I find myself amusing. The seat on the bus, this receptor, actually allows the glucose to fit. And so where the oxygen is getting on and off, on and off, once glucose attaches to your red blood cell, to the hemoglobin molecule, it stays put. It is a permanent resident of that bus. It sleeps on the bus. It does its business on the bus. And the life of the red blood cell is three months. The average lifespan is 90 days.
Nurse Cindy: What they do, when they draw your blood work for your hemoglobin A1C, they are measuring the percent of seats on the bus that are taken up by glucose. If you have something under a six percent, just to make this some of the terminology easy, if you’re six percent or lower, especially if you’re under like 5.5 or lower, you do not have Type 2 Diabetes, or you’re well controlled with medication if you’re a Type 1 or even a Type 2 on it. However, if you are up higher, for every couple of percent points that you go up, you have more glucose taking up… And I could only find one yellow. But imagine three of these seats get taken up by glucose instead of oxygen. Now this red blood cells, it’s going through the capillary, is big. It doesn’t drop off the passengers and then pick up carbon dioxide on the other side. So now it sort of sticks in the capillary, and it causes inflammation.
Nurse Cindy: Sugar is sticky. That’s why it’s so tricky. Sugar sticks to proteins, and it sticks to the proteins on our tendons and our nerve endings. If you’ve ever had a kid and you’ve given them a lollipop and they fall asleep in the car sleep with it, I was a guilty mom back before I understood this. It will stick to their cheek. They’re looking around wondering where their lollipop is and it’s stuck. Because sugar is sticky and that’s why it’s so tricky. And that’s why it’s so important that as we reduce our carbohydrate intake, especially those of us that were eating hundreds of grams a day, and we allow these red blood cells over time… And every three months. They don’t all die at once and then all get born. You have some dying, some at their 59th birthday, some at their 32nd day of life. As this turnover happens, at the end of three months, you’ve got a better idea of how much blood sugar you had on average, if that makes sense.
Nurse Cindy: It doesn’t do any good really to test it more frequently than every three months, unless you’ve really intervened like Dr. Boz is with Lochlin. Lachlin? Sorry. Lachlin. And maybe testing it more frequently to see if they’re headed in the right direction. That’s why you can have your little book, if you’re a diabetic, and they come into the doctor’s office and everything was 72, 80, 74, yet their A1C is 11. That’s the truth. That’s what a hemoglobin A1C demo is, and that video, and more explanation is one of my videos from a couple years ago, so.
Jennifer Marie: I love it. I love the explanation. There’s lots of comments. You’re very-
Nurse Cindy: Okay, any questions? Oh, you’re so sweet.
Jennifer Marie: It’s easy to understand. Oh, Donna says, “Who is Dr. Boz?” Oh, well tune in next week. You’ll get a chance to meet her.
Nurse Cindy: She’s incredible.
Jennifer Marie: Yes, she is incredible. She’s an internal medicine doctor. Let me just talk. We get new people on here all the time. I just want to talk to the new people for just a minute. If you are getting ready to start, you need a cheat sheet with all the information in one place. I remembered when I started, I needed that. I needed just not information overload, but just like a one pager, how do I do? Where is this? All the resources. If you need that cheat sheet, you can type in switchtoketo.com. It is my email list. When you email your email there, you have to confirm your email and I will shoot you over the cheat sheet.
Nurse Cindy: Nice.
Jennifer Marie: Even if you’ve been keto for a while, you might get on there because not only will I send you the cheat sheet, but I’ll put you on my Friday email list where I send you free meal plans as well. Yeah. Yeah.
Jennifer Marie: Great explanation.
Nurse Cindy: Thank you.
Jennifer Marie: What is your favorite… I mean, what is your favorite thing about keto? What do you like the most about it?
Nurse Cindy: I promise you I will not cry as I say this. To be set free. I was in bondage to food. I thought I was a food addict. I was really a carboholic because of what it does to light up the pleasure center in your brain. Consuming food was consuming me. It was basically every waking moment, and even if I woke up in the middle of the night, I was always trying to think about what could I eat next. And I was never really satisfied. I might be full, but I was never satisfied. With this, I’m… The whole world, the word satiety, meaning to be satisfied, has been liberating and I can not ever imagine going back to chasing that never ending hunger. I don’t think I ever felt my stomach growl. It was this hunger. And so for me, that’s my favorite thing is that I can say to you, “Oh no… You know, I’m okay if we don’t eat. You want to just go have some coffee?” That would have never… I came home and said to my husband, “Do you realize that that’s a major?” Consuming food is consuming me.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. And I can so relate to that. We have so much in common. And I can totally relate to that. I called myself the sugar addict. I have a major sweet tooth. Sugar was my cocaine. I’ve never done a drug in my life, but sugar was my drug. I can relate to that. Every trip we’ve planned, every place we went. I had sugar lows to where hypoglycemic, to where I passed before. If I didn’t have something… I’ve had it installed in my brain to eat every two hours. I vividly remember one day picking up my child from daycare and I was sweating, and I was low, and I was like, “Oh my God.” The lady is like, “What’s the matter with you?” I was like, “I need some sugar. I don’t have my glucose tablets. I need something.” She ran back to get the baby’s apple juice. I just remember downing it. And every time you go through a fit like that, you just feel you have no energy, you have no drain…
Nurse Cindy: Yes. Yes. Yes.
Jennifer Marie: Yes. I just think if I would have known then what I know now, I wouldn’t have had to suffer through that stuff. I’m so angry that I didn’t know that. Then again, I’m grateful too. I’m really grateful that I’ve learned this and I know because guess what? I can teach my children, and I can teach the people… I spent an hour at the deli station talking to a girl about keto. An hour. She’s like, “Oh, I just don’t think I can do that keto stuff.” I said, “Yes you can, and here’s why.” We spent an hour. I didn’t even get her name.
Nurse Cindy: Bless your heart. But you know when you have been in bondage and you’ve been set free, how can you keep it to yourself? That’s why Ask Nurse Cindy was started. It was just a way first to just be personally accountable. That’s all I thought it as going to be. And then people started sharing it because it was must have resonated. And then I went from my personal page to Ask Nurse Cindy so I could use it. I’m an educator as a nurse. I educate on wound care. I work full-time. I travel most of the U.S., but I do Canada, U.S., and some South American. A little bit of Europe, a little bit of Asia. But I’m on the road a lot, but I want people to know that there is freedom.
Jennifer Marie: There’s a better way.
Nurse Cindy: A better way.
Jennifer Marie: It’s a little bit of a transition in the beginning. And I can speak from being a carboholic, or a sugar addict. It takes you three full days to detox from that. And I really feel like it’s a drug. I feel like you have to detox from that. And you will sweat, and you will…
Nurse Cindy: Cranky.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. You’ll be okay. There is light at the end of the tunnel. It’s okay.
Nurse Cindy: Yes. It’s only a couple of days. I started on a Friday around noonish because I knew I didn’t want to be around work when I was… I’d heard about how cranky you can get. And so, my poor husband, bless his heart, did not divorce me that weekend. Because he’d look at me I would like… But I would encourage you, if you are starting, that’s the time to really have your kitchen ready. Have some good fatty cuts of meat. Well if you can eat cheese, if you’re not lactose intolerant, be prepared so that if you got to eat something, you’re eating something that’s really low in carbohydrates. I ate more scrambled eggs and bacon. Just get over the hump. Start producing ketones. Then you can start out touring around with if you’re a macro tracker, which I’m not. I track carbs only. And then I’ve really learned a lot from you guys at Dr. Boz, especially in the videos you’ve done with her about really paying attention to your eating window and your non-eating window, really.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. Yeah. I always tell people to start real simple. If they’re hungry, I tell them to eat.
Nurse Cindy: Eat.
Jennifer Marie: It’s just eat the real food, and I never tell them, even if it’s at night, even if it’s right before they go to bed. I remember having a bowl of frozen blueberries, and I would drizzle heavy cream over it, and I would sprinkle just a little Stevia, because that’s… I was so used to eating every two hours, and it was like a habit more than anything. But I didn’t want a sugar crash. I was so afraid of it. I just remember having that.
Jennifer Marie: I lost my first 40 pounds not worrying about what time I ate, but eating the right foods. And it didn’t even matter how much. When you get to a point to where you stall, then I think you go to the next level, you worry about your eating window, you’re battling a little bit of insulin resistance, you gotta really-
Nurse Cindy: That’s down the road.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. But I hate… and every time I try and coach somebody that way, I really want to start them off… You can’t dive too far in. You’ll get overwhelmed and then you’ll quit. And I would rather you not quit. You talked about the reason why you started your page. I started this page and the group simply because I didn’t want to talk on Facebook with those who weren’t battling with weight loss like I was. I wanted a private place, but I wanted somebody who understood. And then I also wanted to share recipes that I could create because there weren’t many out there. I started both of the pages and the group for that reason, and I tell you, that group has saved me… I mean, I’m in the group every day. It’s the one place I’m active in. And it is because it keeps me going, it keeps me accountable, and now I’m finding I am helping more people, but I never, ever, ever imagined. Never. Never.
Nurse Cindy: It’s amazing. Well, do you know why I think, Jennifer, is that A, you’re real. You’ve struggled like I’ve struggled. You’ve had weight problems for a long time. You’re a good cook apparently. You should invite me over someday. Many of these people that are keto advocates have never struggled, and they have great messages, and they have important messages, and I’m not taking anything away from their message. But I think many women our age, you’re younger than I am, I could be your mom, but the ability to say, “I’ve been there. I’ve lived it. I know it’s like when you go in and a restaurant and they say would you like a booth of a table.” I always chose the table because I couldn’t fit inside a booth well. Movie theaters were hard. I was just at the point I almost had to get a seatbelt extension on the airplane. But I couldn’t go down the aisle straight. I had to side step down the aisle.
Jennifer Marie: Me too. Yeah.
Nurse Cindy: I think that gives us a compassion for people that others may not have when they are struggling. It’s like, “It’s going to be okay, just don’t give up, just don’t give up.”
Jennifer Marie: Actually, I vividly remember. I don’t travel as much as you do, but I vividly remember the time I sat in a seat. Well, first of all, walking down the aisle to where you’re not like squeezing. But then when you sit in it and you buckle, and you have extra, and I remember taking the picture. I remember crying. I’m sure the person next to me thought I was crazy. And I took the picture down. He probably wondered what I was taking a picture.
Nurse Cindy: What are you taking a picture of?
Jennifer Marie: I’m holding up this belt, this buckle, this excess buckle, and I literally had tears. And I was so happy. And I was like, “This is just one of those non-scale victories.”
Nurse Cindy: Yes, it is.
Jennifer Marie: Those NSV.
Nurse Cindy: NSV.
Jennifer Marie: Mm-hmm (affirmative). That we talk about that are just so… And they hit you. They hit you right here.
Nurse Cindy: Yeah they do. They hit you there because you… I was at the point, the you know there’s a little fold over where they’ve sewn the end of that strap. I was just there. I have serial pictures, not pictures of cereal, but serial pictures of my seatbelt. And not it goes almost to my knee, unless it’s one of those older planes where people were smaller. It’s just so much fun. Here’s what’s I think… We don’t ever want to get looking down our nose at others that are still struggling. So I really consciously… I fly a lot of Southwest, so people get to choose. If I see someone that’s larger coming towards me, and it’s middle seats are all that’s left, I try to make eye contact with them and I say, this one’s open. And then when they sit down, I say, “I understand we’re going to touch. It’s fine. My arm.” Because I was that-
Jennifer Marie: We know.
Nurse Cindy: Yes. I was… I had my ex once say to me, “Why do you just not care?” I’m like, “Oh. Then you don’t understand.” Because he was very fit. I said, “I care every moment of every day. I just can’t seem to fix it.” And this is the first that’s ever worked. I eat delicious food and I make the keto treats. I don’t eat them every day, but they’re there if I want them. It’s set me free.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. I have a couple people here. Paula is saying, “What is the eating window?” What is your eating window? I’ll talk about mine, but you tell me yours first.
Nurse Cindy: Mine varies day to day. It depends a lot on my travel and when I’m taking off, when the flight is taking off, and things like that. I do what I can to not eat unless I’m hungry. Some days I have hungry days. And if my stomach is really make those really embarrassing feed me, then I go ahead and figure okay something is happening. Unless I start singing that song from First Wives Club You Don’t Own Me. Which is the song when they’re in white at the end. “You don’t own me.”
Jennifer Marie: Own me.
Nurse Cindy: I’ll sing sometime like, “You don’t own me.” Literally I play it on Amazon music. It’s unusual to eat sooner than every 12 hours. That’s unusual for me. And I try to extend to 14 to 16. Sometimes I do a 24 hour fast, but if you’re a newbie, don’t worry about that right now. Get your appetite under control, find the foods you like, and what you’ll notice, the first time I looked up, my husband had packed me some bacon to take to work. And I said, “I’ll eat it in the car.” And then I got on a phone call. I didn’t eat it in the car. I got to work, and you know how you get busy, and all of a sudden I looked down, it was like quarter to 11 and I had not eaten.
Jennifer Marie: Oh my gosh.
Nurse Cindy: I always knew. I always ate. I was always hungry. It’s just sort of almost natural that when you realize you’re not hungry, not physically hungry, I’m not saying you’re not stressed or irritated. Let it go. Just let it extend and just let it be natural because here’s what your body is doing. Your body is very smart. And if it doesn’t incoming calories, it goes, “That’s right. She’s a multi-millionaire. I can just take it. I can just take that little fat cell off of there and pop it open and I’ve got instant energy.” Because once you’re fat adapted, you’re keto adapted. Your body is very good at fueling itself with your fat stores. That’s why I don’t do as many fatty coffees like I used to at first. I’m starting to get into black coffee, which… But I’m getting better at it. Because I can either let my body burn the fat from my glass, or burn the fat from my… It rhymes with glass, ladies and gentleman. I’d rather it burn the fat from my…
Nurse Cindy: Now, that doesn’t mean that I don’t have cream in my coffee here and there. But I’ve really in the mornings… And one of the ways I’ve found that I can extend my fasting window, non-eating window, is to make myself drink that black coffee. And my husband is so proud because he’s Mr. Black Coffee. He’s Mr. Black Coffee. It used to be I always had to make my own coffee because I had a certain amount of what I put in there. He’ll look at me, he goes, “Do I get to bring you a cup of coffee today?” I’m like, “Well yes you do.” And he goes, “Yes.” He’s so proud. And I sit there, and I… He says, “Isn’t that delicious.” I’m like, “Mmm.” That for me, I get that caffeine, I get that nice warm, I get that time with him when I’m home. I guess I didn’t really answer.
Nurse Cindy: So what’s your eating window? I know she’s been putting you on stringent.
Jennifer Marie: Oh, well first of all kudos to you for staying keto with traveling because I know-
Nurse Cindy: Yay and Topo Chico.
Jennifer Marie: Topo Chico. That’s my husband’s favorite. I don’t do bubbly soda. I’ve never been a soda drinker, never been a bubbly, carbonated, so I’m happy with ice cold water. But my husband loves Topo Chico.
Jennifer Marie: My eating window, I find that… and here’s the thing, before I tell my eating window. It’s almost like you have to figure out what works best for you and this is why I am a big believe in keeping a journal. It can be just a cheap fifty, a dollar, composition notebook from the dollar store. Just write down stuff you eat, write down when you eat it, and just start playing around a little bit. Because I have found, if I have my eating window for… If like 12 hours window, but if I start it early, like… Well, my eating window is pretty much 7 AM to maybe… If I can cut 3, between 3 and 5 PM, my body likes that. I do very well with that. I was only doing a window when I first started realizing I needed a window. I was doing from 7 to 7, and my body liked that. And I did that for a couple of months and I was like, “This is great. 7 AM to 7 PM, and I can eat foods I need.” And then all of a sudden, it wasn’t working anymore, and then I had to eat… Your hormones are most active in the morning.
Nurse Cindy: Yes. Yes.
Jennifer Marie: You need to have most of your meals earlier, and I found, I really did try and do that. And then I stopped at 5, and then it started going again and I felt better. And I was like, “Okay.” It was a little more difficult because it’s… Eating in the evening is what I was used to doing. And then I would stop at 3. And stopping at 3 is really hard.
Nurse Cindy: That’s a tough one. Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Jennifer Marie: Your kids aren’t even home from school yet and you’ve already had your dinner. Or you’re making them dinner and you’re not even going to eat it. It’s hard. It’s hard.
Jennifer Marie: Here recently, Dr. Boz had challenged… I don’t know, is challenge the right word? Yeah. She… Yeah she-
Nurse Cindy: Encouraged.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. She encouraged me.
Nurse Cindy: Advised. She advised.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah, she advised. I was about to tell her “No, the channel, I can’t hear the channel, I can’t hear what you’re saying Dr. Boz.” I really… there are some people that thoroughly enjoy fasting. I am not one of those people. I didn’t like fasting.
Nurse Cindy: This is me with fasting.
Jennifer Marie: Yes. Yes. But I did do my first 36 hour fast.
Nurse Cindy: Wow.
Jennifer Marie: And let me tell you, it sounds way worse than what it was. Because in my mind, it’s still a 24 hour fast. Let me tell you how the 36 hours comes about.
Jennifer Marie: You stop eating, let’s say you stop eating at like 7 PM. That’s when your window starts. You 7PM, you go to bed at 10, you sleep for like 8 hours. Well, the whole next day, I wake up. I have a cup of black coffee. I don’t like black coffee. So I’ll have one cup. That’s it. And then I might do a tea with nothing. No cream, no sugar, just a hot little tea, something. Then I’ll munch on rock salt, pink Himalayan rock salt. Won’t eat anything all day. And then the next morning, I wake up at by 7, then I can eat again.
Nurse Cindy: You have 36 hours. That’s smart. Oops sorry. Yeah.
Jennifer Marie: Yes. It really was 36 hours. It doesn’t even seem, in my head, that’s not 36 hours. I know it’s 36 hours because I have the app on my phone that tells me it was 36 hours. But in my mind, it was just one day.
Nurse Cindy: What app is that? What app is that?
Jennifer Marie: Oh, it’s called… Well, let me see. Hold on.
Nurse Cindy: Is it a fasting app or it something that-
Jennifer Marie: Yeah, it is. It’s the best app. It’s called Zero. Sorry. It’s called Zero. It looks like that right there.
Nurse Cindy: I see. Yeah.
Jennifer Marie: Zero.
Nurse Cindy: Yeah, I see the zero. Yes.
Jennifer Marie: It counts down. Here it is. And you can set it, you can set it. So the last day I did my 36 hours was five days ago. I’m not so sure if I’m going to… I think, I think I’m going to do this once a week. I need a buddy to do it with me. I really need… I need like support. So yeah. Yeah.
Nurse Cindy: We should start a little, a little, yeah.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah, we should.
Nurse Cindy: Commitment group, yeah.
Jennifer Marie: Because I think… Well, me and my husband. Thank God he is my biggest support because if I’m sitting around the house, like I have this big kitchen with lots of food and I cook all the time.
Nurse Cindy: Oh gosh, yeah.
Jennifer Marie: And my kids want stuff. If I’m fasting and I don’t want to be in the kitchen, then he’ll be like, “Okay, let’s go for a walk. Or, okay let’s go to the mall. Or okay, let’s go bookstore.” I don’t know, whatever. We just go do stuff. It really is helpful. But, the 36 hours-
Nurse Cindy: That’s a great idea.
Jennifer Marie: It was awesome. It wasn’t that hard to me, which I really thought it would be. I thought I was going to die. I was not even hungry. Now, mind you, I talked to Dr. Boz after this and she texted me. She goes, “Did you make it?” I’m like, “I made it.” And John did it too. She goes, “Did John make it?” I was like, “Yeah.” She goes, “How’d you do?” I said, “I did great. I wasn’t hungry. I was not hungry.” When you understand hunger, I was not hungry. Now I drank a lot of water. I remember drinking just drinking, just constantly drinking water like I’ve never drank before.
Jennifer Marie: But my husband did not feel good. And I was like, “What’s up with that? Why did he not feel good but was totally fine for me.” She said, “Well…” She probably said this in a nicer way than I remember it because she’s nice that way. But in order words, she’s like, “Oh, it’s because he cheated.” I’m like, “Oh.” She goes, “Yeah, when you do a fast like that, and if you’re not full strict keto like I know you are, then it’s a little bit more difficult for those who need to get those extra carbs out of your system.” I was like “Oh.” She goes, “I can always tell however well your fast is, whether you’re really strict or not.” She goes, “I knew you’d be fine.” And she goes, “I kind of knew, I knew John would struggle a little bit.” I was like, “Oh, that’s so interesting,” right?
Nurse Cindy: Well, let me know if you decide you’re going to start doing that. I’m sure you’ll announce it. Because I think a bunch of us would be willing to try that. That sounds like… Early, early on in my keto journey I did a three day fast, and I felt like doodoo. But I don’t think I was really keto adapted. I think, and then someone… this friend of mine said, I think it was like a week and a half later. She goes, “Well, let’s try it again and see.” Oh, I felt even worse.
Nurse Cindy: I think now I probably could do…
Jennifer Marie: Really?
Nurse Cindy: Yeah. Yeah. I think I was just was too early in my journey to do a three day fast. Plus I didn’t understand the electrolytes like I do now, and the power of sodium, chewing on the rock salt, or taking those fasting drops, or whatever it is that you personally choose to use.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. It’s true. I have a group called intermittent fasting rules. I think it’s called intermittent fasting rules. If you guys want to join that work, that’d be a great-
Nurse Cindy: Oh yeah.
Jennifer Marie: [crosstalk 00:46:51] for us to do these little challenges together. I have somebody asking, “Why did you do a 36 hour fast?” I have been very, very slowly losing weight, and also having menopausal issues. One of the best ways to help our your hormones is to do a fast. It is to practice intermittent fasting, and you really want to balance out your hormones. Since I have been suffering so bad, and even though I hate fasting, I hate the symptoms of menopause more than I hate fasting. And, I lost I think two or three pounds.
Nurse Cindy: That’s fantastic.
Jennifer Marie: I can’t even remember. The weight doesn’t even matter anymore. It’s like I’m doing all this for health reasons, but I remember looking at the scale going, “Wow, that was great.”
Nurse Cindy: Isn’t it? Well, you know because once again, your body shifted into burning the fat on your chinny chinny hin, and your hippy hip hips. Because it’s not going to… It has to function. It has to, you know. The heart has to be, you have to breathe, you’re moving around. The body is just like, “Hey, no problem. I got some stores here.”
Jennifer Marie: Yeah.
Nurse Cindy: Yeah. No. Intermittent fasting rules. I’m going to go join that.
Jennifer Marie: The group is called intermittent fasting rules. Let me see if I can put this link in the comments real quick.
Nurse Cindy: That’s fantastic.
Jennifer Marie: Let’s see. Here it is.
Nurse Cindy: While she’s doing that, the other thing it helps you do is it helps your body… We have little used up, or partly used proteins, little damaged proteins and cells. Every cell in our body has a different life cycle. Our skin’s 28 days, our red blood cell is 90 days. We have these little sort of broken pieces, and when you fast for that period of time, or your ketones are high enough and you’re doing shorter windows, you end up engaging your body into this thing called autophagy. I want you think it like your Zoomba vacuum that goes around the room and picks up stuff, and it just has this seeking things, debris on the floor.
Nurse Cindy: Autophagy, auto like automatic, phagy means, in medicine means to chew up to eat. It also helps you engage in autophagy, which there’s a lot to be said for that. It’s a whole another subject, but it really does reduce inflammation, it helps your body clean up proteins and the mitochondria are just happy happy.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah, well that fast, as scared as I was of it… She had been talking of fasting for me for a while, and I’m like, “Yeah, lady. I’m not there. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.”
Nurse Cindy: Change of subject. Change of subject.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah, and she knew. She was like, “Look. I’m here for you. I’m doing this with you. I’ll be ready.” And then she just finally was like, “I think you’re ready.” I’m like, “Okay.” But, you know, it really is just getting over that first hump of something. And I did tell my husband. I said, “You know, it wasn’t that bad that I might it do it weekly.” I might do it once a week. And again, this is going to depend on what my body needs. Right now, I know I really need to boost up those ketones to help me with my symptoms. And it does help the scale, and I’m down to the last… I haven’t looked at the scale in a while, so I know I have… I don’t know, I’m going to guess 20 pounds left. I might just do that just to do the last 20 pounds. And I do battle with insulin resistance, and my body-
Nurse Cindy: Me too.
Jennifer Marie: Is very stubborn. My dad will tell you that. I am very stubborn. It wouldn’t surprise me that your body is stubborn and losing weight.
Nurse Cindy: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Mm-hmm (affirmative). Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Jennifer Marie: Oh, and Jamie says, “Yes. Plus you get the benefits of autophagy which helps tighten up loose skin.” Yeah.
Nurse Cindy: Yeah. Tell that to my chin.
Jennifer Marie: I know. I know, right? I know.
Nurse Cindy: 61 is not 31. But it’s… It’s been life changing, so if I have a little baggy skin life is good. It’s fine.
Jennifer Marie: Girl, you look great.
Nurse Cindy: Thank you.
Jennifer Marie: Most of the people have probably seen the video that I’ve shared, but you look… I mean, so different, even from that video. And you look great.
Nurse Cindy: Thank you.
Jennifer Marie: You have done wonderful. You should be very proud of yourself.
Nurse Cindy: Every morning when I get in the shower and I’m soaping my body up, I thought, well who’s body is that.
Jennifer Marie: I know.
Nurse Cindy: I’m less now than I was in junior high. I was 98 pounds in the first grade, so when I tell you that I was an obese child, I am not kidding. I was telling my husband, “This is…” When you’ve never been a size 8 or 10, it just depends on the manufacturer and the cut, and you don’t even remember that at all. In high school, I was like 16s and 18s and… When I was younger I had to buy in the husky department, which if any of you are my age, you understand the husky department was… It’s liberating, and so if it takes me a little two years to get this last 20-25 off, I’m like, “Yep. It’s good.”
Jennifer Marie: It is.
Nurse Cindy: Because I’m not really gaining. So it might be a stall-
Jennifer Marie: Exactly.
Nurse Cindy: But I’m not regaining. That’s a miracle.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I know clearly how to maintain. I know that I still have a sweet tooth, I still indulge in a lot of sweet things. But they’re not just not triggering that insulin, which causes that stall. Which is a big deal. Like we know, we have the power, which is so amazing. So amazing.
Jennifer Marie: Well, we’re just about at the top of the our. Is there anything that you want to add or you want to tell the audience? Anything you’ve got coming up? Or…
Nurse Cindy: It’s a process. It’s a learning process. It’s a mental game. The community that Jennifer has here is not to be underestimated, these videos that she invests in. Unless I’m drying my hair or using my electric toothbrush, from the moment I get up until I have to turn off, I am listening to podcasts. Because I figure if I… Input creates output. And so if I’m filling my mind with encouraging things like this, or understanding different types what of what the body does with inflammation when I reduce my glucose. I guess I would encourage your folks. It’s good. It’s all going to be okay. And I say this a lot on my videos. If you don’t give up, you’re going to win. You’re going to hit your goal. Just don’t give up. That’s the only mistake you can make. We learn. You might fall down, just fall forward, and get up and say, “Okay, that didn’t work. I didn’t go that party prepared.” But be of good cheer because this is just a game changer.
Jennifer Marie: Yeah, and you guys, go find her on Facebook. It’s called Ask Nurse Cindy. Follow her page. And yeah, so I want to thank you for coming on. I hope you come on again.
Nurse Cindy: I would be honored to, and thank you for inviting me.
Jennifer Marie: That’s awesome.
Here are a few other Keto articles you will find helpful:
Keto Diet: Intermittent Fasting For Weight Loss
Keto Friendly Recipes Cookbook is Available for Preorder!
5 Reasons to Make Perfect Keto Bars Your Go to Snack
Keto Simple Syrup (Vanilla and Mocha Peppermint Flavors)
