149 pounds After weight 125 pounds Total weight loss: 24 pounds Start body fat percentage: 38% After body fat percentage: 28.6% Start fat pounds: 56 After fat pounds: 35 Total pounds of fat loss: 21 Start dress or pants size: 16 After dress or pants size: 8 The future belongs to those who prepare for it! In 1999, I decided I didn't want to be 60, size 16, and unhealthy. The day before Thanksgiving I went on Dr. Markham's Total Health plan, and by Christmas was a perfect size 10. By my sixtieth birthday, in September 2000, I was a size 8. I believe it was Madeline, a coworker, who first introduced me to the Total Health plan. There were about thirty of us following the Total Health pro- gram at the time. I especially remember my coworker Jackie-she looked as if she'd lost half of her body. You couldn't even recognize her. I was really impressed with my coworkers who were losing weight, look- ing healthy, and smiling all the time. My middle-age spread was getting the best of me, and looking at pictures of myself was very depressing. What did I have to lose other than a few dress sizes? Feeling good and healthy was also a priority. My doctor was impressed with my yearly physical stats when I went in for my checkup, and she asked me what I had been doing. She thought it was wonderful. All of my numbers were perfect. FOLLOWING THE TOTAL HEALTH PLAN The Total Health plan maintenance is a way of life. I am not a slave to my diet because I simply put what I have learned about what I eat to work. The Golden Rule: Never eat a carb without a protein. Still feeling great in a size 8. It is the pharmaceutical (drug) companies' responsibility to educate the physicians about what popular herbs may cause adverse reactions when taken with certain medications. Physicians will also have to have better screening forms and processes to determine what kind of herbs their pa- tients may be taking before prescribing certain medications. GOT WATER? Why You Need to Drink More Are you drinking enough water? If you're like most of my patients, the an- swer is: not as much as you know you should. Water helps your body digest food, absorb nutrients, and transport those nutrients throughout your body. It's also a vital part of your body's waste removal system. Without adequate amounts of water, your body be- comes dehydrated and cannot function properly More acute cases of dehydration can cause fatigue, nausea, and de- mentia. Severe cases often lead to heat exhaustion, heatstroke, and even death. You don't have to run for hours in the summer sun to become dehy- drated. In fact, most of us live in a chronic state of mild dehydration. Sure, we drink water every day, but not enough. Or we think that drinking water-based fluids, such as coffee, tea, or soda, is the same as drinking water. It's not. Coffee, tea, and many sodas contain caffeine, a diuretic that dehydrates your body. Make no mistake: dehydration, however mild, can lead to serious health problems.