I'm in awe of the sheer number of people in a recent post who said it's cheaper and easier to be an omnivore than it is to be a vegetarian. While there are a select few instances of extreme conditions, such as being disabled in a food desert where you rely on meals prepared by others, the majority of people are able to eat for much cheaper if they eat vegetarian.
Living in developed countries has led to an abundance of meat products available, however, this is a luxury. Vegetables grow from sunlight, water, and soil. This is basically free. Animals need food, water, space, time, and fancy processing to not get you sick. This inherently makes it more expensive to grow meat compared to growing vegetables.
The universal stable diet is rice and beans/lentils. You can survive on this. You can survive on potatoes and butter. You can survive on a lot of things you wouldn't realize are enough. These things aren't glamorous, but they're just as glamarous and easy to prepare as meat containing dishes. You don't need refrigeration for beans or rice, and it has an extremely long shelf life, either dried or canned. Again, these are universally available and universally consumed by even the poorest.
If you want a cheap and easy vegetarian diet, you need to start with these staples. Meal prep, plan ahead, find a system that works for you. Do you need canned beans and a rice cooker? Go for it. Dried beans are honestly just as easy, but they do require an hour or two on the stove after soaking overnight. I have a pressure cooker and rarely use it because when you make beans as a staple of your diet, you can start soaking them at any time. It makes no difference if they won't be ready for tonight, because I'll just cook and eat them tomorrow.
Pressure cookers are also getting increasingly affordable, and things like instantpots can be used for tons of different things besides pressure cooking. There's a great market of secondhand kitchen appliances that are still perfectly good, so check Craigslist, check Facebook market place, check with relatives and friends who might have an old machine they are willing to sell. Also, they make non-electric pressure cookers that go right on the stove, so look for those too.
Also, remember that beans exist in many forms. Black beans, red lentils, black lentils, kidney beans, chickpeas, red beans, adzuki (sp?) beans, besan, and more. Hummus, refried beans, dessert bean paste, sambar, daal, dosa (which also contains rice), tofu, and soy milk are all made of beans. You don't always have to have them in their whole form.
Once you've gotten that down to a good system, you're set to build off it. Buy what's available and within your means to enhance the staples. The general rule is to prioritize nutrition and then focus on the flavor. Most of the time, just adding basic proteins and fats will naturally enhance the flavor.
The first add-in tier is eggs, dairy products (ignore if vegan). Eggs are easy and cheap, I add them to any meal for increased nutrients. Sour cream is cheap and tastey. Cheese is a vegetarian's closest cousin to meat if you miss the flavor. Cottage cheese, paneer, ricotta, and yogurt are also awesome and can be made at home just from milk and a one agent (either an acid for the first three or from existing yogurt for yogurt). Egg/dairy products can really enhance both flavor and nutrition (animal fats for healthy hormone production, B12 for energy and metabolism, and certain amino acids for general life functions), and are usually a quick add-in. The best part is they're still cheaper and easier than meat.
Next is vegan proteins like tofu and seitan. I don't recommend putting it this high in the priority if you are ovo-lacto, but I do recommend if you're vegan. Get tofu at an Asian market and it'll be dirt cheap, like $1.50 for a brick which is enough for at least two meals. Look online for the cheapest wheat gluten powder, mix with oil, water, and spices (especially soy sauce, besan/chickpea flour, mushroom powder, and nutritional yeast for the amino acids and B12) and MSG for that umami flavor, then boil or steam until cooked. It takes time, but it's so cheap and tasty.
I also strongly recommend building up an arsenal of spices. The first things I'd get are iodized salt, sugar, vinegar, oil, and MSG. These are cheap codes for your taste buds and are very cheap and shelf stable. Also, some sort of broth base or bullion. I use "better than bullion vegetable broth base" which is $5 for like 76 servings. It drastically elevates flavor for cheap.
After that look for spice blends you like. They're more expensive than the individual spices, but you can recreate it once you like it. Adobo, garam masala, curry powder, five spice powder, and a good chili powder are great starts. I recommend anything with little to no salt so you're just paying for flavor and not spiking your sodium intake.
The next thing to get is flour. It's cheap and can be made into infinite forms. Wheat flour can make tortillas, roti, bread, pasta, you name it. Make a roux and turn that into various sauces for dishes. Perfect for if you either get bored with rice or if you have extra time and want to make a meal special. Don't forget about other grains as well. Chickpea flour has good nutrition (and is dirt cheap at indian stores under the name besan), rice flour can be made into mochi, and there's plenty of others than may be cheap in your area. Even potato flakes are practically as cheap and easy to store as flour.
Next, get you some long term vegetables. These should be available everywhere without question and can keep for weeks. Onions, garlic, ginger, potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, cabbage, certain squashes, dried peppers (learn how to use them, ask me if you want to know more). These can add cheap nutrition and bulk. They can also serve as the basis for many homemade sauces and soups.
The next level is canned and frozen vegetables. This is a fast easy way to add nutrition that's available everywhere and will keep a long time. One great meal is a stir fry with all frozen vegetables, a stir fry sauce, and tofu. Get the stir fry sauce and tofu from the nearest Asian market to cut costs, then sprinkle in MSG for authentic flavor. Serve with rice or noodles for a super quick and cheap meal that will be on the table faster and cheaper than ordering takeout.
I'm also a huge fan of pickling my own vegetables. 1 cup boiling water, 1/2 cup vinegar (white or apple cider), 1 tablespoon sugar, and 1 teaspoon of salt. This is the pickling liquid recipe I use, then just toss in chopped vegetables that are close to going bad. Cabbage, carrots, peppers, cauliflower, and onions are some of my favorites. Add a few whole mustard seed and whole black peppercorns for even more flavor.
The next tier is cheap sauces. Salsas of all different kinds, tomato sauces, stir-fry sauces, ketchup, mustard, simmer sauces/curries/gravies. Look for things in a can, as they can be cheaper but still really tastey. These are all enhancers and don't add a ton of necessary nutrition. However, they tend to last a long time and can transform the flavor of these same old foundational items. Once you start to like a certain sauce, learn how to make it at home for cheap.
The next tier of add-ins are the mid-tier stable vegetables. Peppers are in a league of their own, and are almost necessary for flavor. Tomatoes are as well. Then there's virtually anything in stock and on sale at your local market. Learn how to prepare things and remember the recipes from year to year when that vegetable is in season. I'm hesitant to put this so far down the list, as you should probably try to get a least one of these each time you go shopping, but it's technically not necessary.
The next tier is short term items, strictly for flavor, like fresh herbs. Cilantro, green onion/scallion, parsley, basil, mint, etc. Buy these only if you have an immediate use because they'll go bad faster than a cop with a complex given some power and immunity. I personally but cilantro every week and green onion every other week. It costs like $0.50 or $1.00 each at most, but I also cook almost everything fresh because I have the time, and these really transform a dish.
The penultimate tier is meat substitutes. These are an expensive luxury, but they're fast and tastey. Add to a dish to really elevate it. Tbh, I rarely buy these (except a pack of frozen veggie burgers once a month for a really quick meal) because once you learn how to cook with spices, these no longer taste that good.
The last tier is supplements. If you're not getting enough of something from your diet, get a supplement. They're not usually as good as getting it from food, and you should try to change your diet to increase the amount of that nutrient you're getting. For example, use cast iron pans to get more iron or just eat more beans and lentils (I know it's obvious, but look into the specifics for whatever nutrient you need). Protein powders/bars can also be a very cheap source of protein, so don't think they're just for body builders!
In a separate category are fruits and nuts. These are optional, but are great for added nutrition. I'm blessed to have some good money, so I eat dried fruit and nuts with yogurt everyday for breakfast. There are cheaper options like bananas and apples with peanut butter. Some other options are mixing peanut butter, hoisin sauce, and sriracha in equal parts for a delicious asian peanut sauce, mixing peanut butter with milk (dairy or non-dairy substitute) to make a dessert peanut sauce, or grinding cashews into paste and adding it to sauces to make them creamier.
For fruits, frozen fruit can be a good way to introduce otherwise expensive fruit into your diet for cheaper. They can go in smoothies, be turned into sauces, or even just eaten. Frozen fruit doesn't go bad quickly (unless you keep thawing it), and it's usually fully prepared. I personally love making mango lassi with yogurt, milk, frozen mangos, and green cardamom or cinnamon as a cheaper alternative.
Fresh fruit can also be very cheap when in season if you're in a place that offers this. It's not a necessary part of your diet, but it introduces variety and some good antioxidants. You can even freeze your own for cheaper than pre frozen if you find a good deal.
I could go on about this forever, and I may even release a meal plan and shopping list (although be warned, I cook everything from scratch and a lot a ton of time because I love it).
My point is that it's far cheaper to eat vegetarian if you're eating a vegetarian diet. Don't eat a substituted meat eater's diet. It's like buying clothes at a big and tall shop and tailoring them down to your size. Of course it's going to be harder and more work. You may live in an area with 90% big and tall stores, but you need to take a little bit of time to find the other 10% of store that you may not be familiar with that do have clothes in your size.
Look for Indian markets, Chinese/Eastern Asian markets, Latino markets. These tend to have lots of foods based around vegetarian diets, and they have them cheap. You'll quickly find shortcuts like gingegarlic paste and premade spice mixes at Indian markets. Suddenly, it's super cheap and quick to make things like chana masala, stir fry, lentil soup, and other dietary staples from other countries right at home.
As a follow up, I'll say to not try to eat the exact diet of these other countries. Sure, you just found cheap lentils, but don't think you can suddenly just make fully meals with fancy chutneys and dosa for pennies. Use these stores to find what's cheap, and easy and then add just that item. Fusion meals are your new lifestyle.
Unfortunately, there's not a shortcut, and it will take a full day to go shopping, learn a new recipe, and cook. However, there are tons of resources online like this sub and /eatcheapandhealthy, with people going through this also. Learn from their hardwork, and within a few months, you'll be an expert.
Finally, you can have this lifestyle at home and still enjoy eating with your friends. Don't stress if a couple meals a week are just side dishes at a restaurant or at a friend's house. Not every single meal needs to be a fully sustainable complete amino acid source blah blah blah. Just make up for it the next meal, and you'll live.
TL;DR - if you think being vegetarian is classist and a privilege, you're doing it completely wrong

0️⃣Section Zero: Background
Hello, MD! I hope you're all doing well, and are safe and healthy. I've gone back and forth for a while about whether I should share my money diary. I signed up to do one last year to chronicle our home buying process but chickened out (I'm so sorry mods!). I was worried I'd be judged for what I spent money on, not having a college education, or what might be perceived as frivolous habits. I don't know. Internet strangers terrify me. But I'm finally sharing this money diary because I want this to be a data point: you can have a career (or two!) without a college degree.
Was there an expectation for you to attend higher education? Did you participate in any form of higher education? If yes, how did you pay for it?
I moved to the US right before entering elementary school. I spent half my childhood in a simple four room shack with no running water or electricity (mom's side of the family) and the other half in a large house with a nanny and domestic help (dad's side of the family). From a young age I was told that college was chance at a better life and I believed it -- not going to college wasn't an option. My mom completed a healthcare related degree in our home country but she couldn't practice in the US. My dad dropped out of college in our home country due to his work as a student protester. Both of them worked blue-collar jobs to support our family and were always working. As with just about every parent, they wanted more for me.
I was accepted to a top ranked private university but didn't get a sizable scholarship so my parents and I took out loans, separately, to fund my tuition. I dropped out halfway through my sophomore year due to poor mental health stemming from an assault. No one knows (except for my fiancé and now, internet strangers) the real reason why I left school.
Did you worry about money growing up?
Yes. My parents never talked about their money struggles with me, but I knew money was always tight. After my youngest brother was born, I remember how excited I was to find a jar of peanut butter in our cupboard. We hadn't had any for a while. It had a "WIC" sticker on it and I didn't know what it meant at the time. My parents never talked about receiving government support but I'm thankful that we had a safety net available to us when we needed it most.
At what age did you become financially responsible for yourself and do you have a financial safety net?
I started paying my parents rent to stay in my childhood bedroom when I moved back home. I didn't pay for groceries or to use one of their cars, which was nice. I was about 21 when I was completely on my own. My parents and I had a falling out over me dating a much older man who I'd come to learn was very abusive. There were a few months where I slept on a friend's couch because I barely had money to feed myself. My early 20's were rough. But if I were to go completely broke now, my parents would be there to help me. They're doing much better financially.
Do you or have you ever received passive or inherited income? If yes, please explain.
No. I've never received an inheritance or any other passive income.
Finally, a note on Erik: he also doesn't come from money or finish his college degree. He immigrated to the US less than a decade ago and does not receive or provide monetary support to his mom or dad.
1️⃣Section One: Assets and Debt

Combined net worth:	$3.7M
Combined brokerage balance:	$2.14M	$317,587 (mine) + $1.82M (Erik)
Combined retirement balance:	$195k	$116,300 (mine) + $78,700Erik). We're behind on funding our 401ks. I finally convinced Erik to take advantage of his employer match program two years ago. He was concerned about the ease of withdrawing funds since we plan on living outside of the US when we retire.
Joint checking account balance:	$111k	We have a lot of cash on hand right now because we need to prepay income taxes, and will be furnishing our place.
Equity:	$1.42M	We put 40% down on a 2 bedroom/2.5 bath condo (<1,200 ft²) in a new construction last summer. Our down payment came from the sale of some of Erik's RSUs.
Mortgage:	$1.61M	For our financial situation, an interest-only mortgage made sense. We have a 2.35% APR 7/1 ARM since we don't intend to stay in NYC longterm. Our plan is to pay off the remaining mortgage in full after five years and either sell the condo or hold onto it as rental property.
Combined credit card debt:	$0	We pay off our credit cards in full every month. We put between $6k - 20k on our cards every month in a typical year. He's also the authorized user on my credit cards; I added him to my accounts about six years ago to help him build his credit file since we knew we'd eventually buy a place together.
Combined student loan debt:	$0	I finished paying my student loans two years ago. Erik received free tuition as an EU resident but had some cost-of-living loans which he's paid off.

2️⃣Section Two: Income My fiancé and I ended 2020 with a total cash compensation (base + bonus) of $493,750 but with last year's vested RSUs, our overall compensation is:

	Mine	Erik
Base	$131,250	$268,750
Bonus	~$13,125	~$80,625
Vested RSUs	$121,500	$835,500
Total Compensation	$265,875	$1.18M

Income Progression I don't recall my salary increases so I'm listing my starting base salary for each role. I'm also not including additional compensation such as bonus or RSUs.

HS and into my early 20's: minimum wage. I started working when I was 16 as a hostess for a restaurant and worked there throughout high school. In the summer before and after freshman year of university, I worked at a department store on commission. After I left university, I worked there full time and also picked up two part-time jobs (restaurant hostess, receptionist) to make ends meet.
Job 1: $30,000 as a business development manager for a staffing agency in a HCOL (rent was $600 for a room in a 2bd/1ba). I worked there for three months.
Job 2: $50,000 as a recruiting assistant then promoted to recruiter for a large non-profit in a HCOL (rent was $1200 for a room in a 3 bd/2ba). I was there for three years.
Job 3: $75,000 as a recruiter for a large research institution in a VHCOL (rent was $1600 for a 1bd/1ba shared with ex-bf). I was there for three years. Looking back now, I didn't realize how burned out I was at the end. I fully believed in our mission to save lives and was so grateful to have that job. I was working directly with these world class physicians and scientists, and I had no college degree. I felt like I had to prove I belonged there. To me that meant staying in my office until 2-3am some nights (mornings?). When an opportunity to change industries, I took it.
Job 4: $90,000 as a recruiter for a tech company in a VHCOL (rent was $1400 for a room in a 3bd/2ba). I was in that role for 2.5 years. When I joined the company, there were less than 5,000 employees. It was an amazing experience to have a hand in building teams of incredibly bright and kind people, many of whom now are now leading global teams of their own. But, I was traveling non-stop. It was exhausting and I experienced burnout (again). I had turned in my notice to HR and started letting people know. It was in one of those "goodbye" conversations that a director I closely worked with asked me if I'd be interested in joining her group as a PM. That opportunity changed the trajectory of my career. I stayed and switched roles.
Job 5: $110,000 as a program manager for the same tech company in a VHCOL (rent was $4400 for a 2bd/2ba with Erik). I was in that role for 2.5 years. I worked on public-facing initiatives, built some awesome programs, and partnered with senior leadership daily. By this time, the company had grown 10x and had no signs of slowing down. But I needed to slow down. I didn't really take time to decompress after my two previous roles. Erik saw how unhappy I'd become. He supported me leaving the workforce for a year and I'm grateful I had his support, the opportunity, and the ability to do it.
Took a year off. –$20,000 withdrawn from my brokerage accounts in a VHCOL (rent was $4000 for a 1bd/1ba with Erik). I didn't do anything remotely awesome during this time. I was coming out of a pretty bad depression so I took it easy on myself. I watched a lot of Investigation Discovery, cooked, napped, went down many Wikipedia rabbit holes, and joined Erik on all his business trips.
Current Job: $125,000 as a program manager at a tech company in a VHCOL (mortgage + common charges is ~$4400 for a 2bd/2.5ba with Erik). I've been in this role for almost two years.

Main Job Monthly Take Home

Deductions	Mine	Erik
Retirement	15% of paycheck to Roth 401k	7% of paycheck to 401k
M/D/V	under Erik's employer; my employer also provides free M/D/V but we would have different providers	covered by his employer + $~250 for mine
Life insurance and AD&D	covered by my employer	covered by his employer
Short & long term disability	covered by my employer	covered by his employer
Net monthly take home	$7,000	$10,00

3️⃣Section Three: Expenses This is what our YNAB budget roughly looks like (for annual expenses, I set aside an amount per month towards the expense):
Housing

Mortgage: $3,155
Common charges: $1,260
Property tax: $27,509 annual
Homeowner's insurance: $837 annual
Utilities: $300
Staff bonus: $1,200 annual (1 super, 5 FT front desk, 2 porters)

Transportation These would be significantly higher in normal times. We rarely leave our place and if we do, we walk.

Public transportation: $20
Rideshare/taxi: $30

Entertainment

Books & Magazines: $50 (Audible, Readly, news+, NYT)
Music & Podcasts: $25 (Pandora, Spotify, Patreon, Blinkist)
TV & Streaming: $120 (Hulu, Netflix, Masterclass)

Donations: $10,000 annual We donate to Children International on a monthly basis. The remaining amount is donated throughout the year to different causes. Last year, we supported AIDS research, mental health and addiction support, food banks, and international food programs.
Hobbies:

Fitness: $176 (Aaptiv, Future, Whoop)
Flowers: $125
Photography: $10 (Photoshop)

Fields

Pet insurance: $1,500 annual
Veterinary care: $1,500 annual
Pet food & medication: $500

Savings & Finance

Backdoor IRA: $6,000 annual
Acorns: $250
Betterment: $500
Credit card annual fees: $1,890 annual

Food & Drink Pre-COVID, we'd budget $3,000 to a "Restaurant", increase "Cafes & Bars" to $1,500, and decrease "Delivery & Takeout" to $1,000.

Delivery & Takeout: $3,000
Cafes & Bars: $700
Groceries: $300

Wedding: TBD Our original budget was $75,000 (international, <50 people). We've had to reschedule it twice now and have already spent $10k in lost deposits and rescheduling fees. We'll re-evaluate our budget later this year when we start planning again.
4️⃣Section 4: The Diary

Day 1: Monday | Total: $111.84

8:00am - First day back from holiday break for both Erik and me. He's still snoozing so I turn on the bedroom TV to see if our dog is still sleeping too. We adopted a senior dog, Fields, over the summer and quickly became one of those dog owners that installed cameras everywhere so we can watch him anytime, anywhere. Fields is still asleep so I check my work accounts and respond to anything urgent.
8:30am - Normally, this is when I'd take Fields for his morning walk while Erik makes our coffee. But our espresso machine is broken so we can't use it until the replacement parts arrive next week. Erik and I both start getting dressed to take Fields for a walk together. Before that happens, I take the dog outside to relieve himself and we quickly head back to the apartment for his breakfast.
9:30am - We walk to our favorite coffee spot in our neighborhood and get our usual: cortado with whole milk for Erik, cold brew with a splash of oat milk for me, and a breakfast BLT to share. We walk back to our apartment and get to work. $23.69
12:30pm - I take Fields with me to pick up our lunch at Sweetgreen: a kale caesar salad (hold the tomato and swap for the blackened chicken) for me, and a hot honey chicken plate for Erik. $27.71
4:30pm - Erik and I are dire need of coffee. We take the dog for another walk, this time to our other favorite coffee shop. The decor is very IG-friendly and their coffee is fantastic. I get their matcha latte with oat milk, Erik gets a cortado with whole milk, we split an avocado toast with smoked salmon, and Fields get a whole lot of snacks for being a good boy while he waits for our order to be ready. $29.95
4:45pm - We walk past a cute mochi ice cream shop that I've been meaning to try. I pick up eight mochi ice creams: ube, chocolate hazelnut, passion fruit, mango, and some seasonal flavors. $30.48
5:00pm - We get home just in time to feed the dog. His food is laughably expensive but we think it's worth it and most importantly, Fields is worth it! He's the best dog and we want to spoil him during his final years. Especially since the poor pup was returned to the shelter twice within a year. I can't imagine giving up this sweet old guy.
9:00pm - I log off work and head down to our building's gym to workout. I've been working with a trainer through the app, Future, and like it so far. Pre-pandemic, I was in really good shape as I was training for a half marathon and our now-postponed wedding. Since the lockdowns started, my healthy eating habits and will to workout has gone down a very messy spiral. I do a mile run on the treadmill followed by a set that includes split squats and deadlifts. Ouch.
10:15pm - I walk into the apartment to find Erik's made dinner from yesterday's leftovers: tacos! I quickly eat two tacos, then tidy up the kitchen while Erik takes Fields out for his last potty break before bed.
10:45pm - I rinse off in the shower and start my nighttime routine. Erik won't see me for another 45 minutes, at least. Tonight, I use a dermaroller on my arms and legs before rubbing in vitamin C lotion. While the lotion dries, I start on my face: facewash, essence, serum, niacinamide and azaleic acid, eye serum, and all topped off with a nighttime cream cream. This is a typical nighttime routine for me.
11:30pm - Finally in bed. We put on a Netflix comedy special while I finish my routine in bed: foot cream, hand cream, and cuticle oil. Erik is browsing on the iPad looking for pots and planters. We call it a night just after midnight.

Day 2: Tuesday | Total: $199.41

8:30am - We're both really tired. I want to lay in bed a little longer but Erik has a call at 10am and we need coffee. Since his pants are on first, I convince him to take the dog outside so I can get ready. He agrees. I put on sweats and prepare Fields' breakfast.
9:15am - We walk to a cute Australian coffee shop and order: a cortado with whole milk for Erik (it's the only thing he drinks), a cold brew with oat milk for me, and share one of my favorite breakfast sandwiches. It's got prosciutto on it and a perfectly runny egg! $23.58
12:45pm - I lost track of time and forgot to order lunch. I place an order at Chop't: avoketo chicken club salad sans tomatoes for me and a kebab cobb wrap for Erik. Once it's ready, I take Fields with me to pick it up. $25.67
1:15pm - While eating lunch, I order Ess-A-Bagels to be sent to two girlfriends across the country as very belated Christmas gifts. I meant to send them their gifts earlier but they've had family visiting them and I wanted to make sure they got to enjoy their gift. I know they both really love Ess-A-Bagels and wouldn't be too keen to share. $213.90 - $100.00 AMEX offers credit = $113.90
3:00pm - That salad was not enough. I pull a Daily Harvest mint + cacao smoothie from our freezer to make a smoothie with oat milk and split it with Erik.
4:30pm - Ok, we really need coffee. We head back to cute IG-friendly coffee shop we went to yesterday and order the same drinks but skip the sandwich. $12.74
4:45pm - On the way home, I tell Erik that I need to eat something more substantial. I was feeling hangry. We stop by our favorite mediterranean cafe. I order a kebab bowl and Erik gets the kebab sandwich. $23.52
5:15pm - We get home just in time for me to get ready for my last meeting of the day and feed Fields his dinner. Today, he gets lamb and red quinoa.
8:45pm - My trainer has a run scheduled for me today but I'm so tired; I don't think I slept well. I message my trainer to tell her I'm taking the day off but will make up the run tomorrow!
9:30pm - I catch up with some girlfriends on the west coast over text while watching an old Dateline: Secrets Uncovered episode. I remember we have mochi ice cream and eat two of them. This is a great night.
10:30pm - I need to sleep earlier tonight since I need to get a run in tomorrow morning. I have a Morpheus8 appointment at 11am and I can't workout after that.

Day 3: Wednesday | Total: $290.44

8:00am - The alarm goes off and I yell at Siri to stop. I roll back over and snuggle Erik. The run isn't happening.
9:00am - I receive a call from the clinic where I get my Morpheus8 done. My esthetician has a family emergency and can't make the appointment. I'm secretly excited to reschedule for a later date since I have a face lipo, neck lipo and buccal fat removal procedure in exactly a week. I know, I know. Scheduling procedures so close to each other isn't the smartest idea, but I wanted to finish my Morpheus8 series before more invasive procedures. To get the kind of results I wanted, I needed three Morpheus8 sessions booked about a month apart. Today was supposed to be my last one.
9:20am - Walk Fields with Erik to get our usual coffee order and split a bagel with smoked salmon, alfalfa sprouts, picked red onions, chili and dill. $27.85
3:00pm - During our team meeting, my director asks me if I've seen the news. I grab my phone to look at the news and feel my anxiety spike as I learn that the Capital is actively being breached. I know my mental health is going to take another hit after this. Instead of working, I doom scroll the rest of the day. I also realize that salad isn't going to cut it for lunch. Not today. I need something more comforting and warm. We decide on Chinese food: ma po tofu and black pepper beef with a lot of fluffy white rice. $64.52
4:45pm - It's time for my sort-of monthly nail appointment. I go every three weeks to this amazing salon that specializes in nail art but they're also superb at taking care of your nails. I pick a sunny yellow color to offset the shit that happened this afternoon. They're pricey ($75 + $20 tip) but my nails and cuticle beds have never looked healthier. I also buy a ceramic cuticle pusher tool ($15). $114.40
7:15pm - I convince Erik to meet me at our neighborhood pizza spot to pick up dinner. We order: a pepperoni Sicilian slice, Hawaiian slice, ham and cheese calzone, and four slices of cheese, root beer and diet soda. $46.65
8:30pm - While scrolling through IG, I see a dermatologist use snail extract for her NuFace. I've been meaning to buy more NuFace gel and this seems like a good cost-effective replacement. I find the same bottle on Ulta and add an eyeshadow brush to get free shipping. I'm project panning my eyeshadow palettes so this will be a fun new tool to play with. $37.02
12:00am - Bedtime.

Day 4: Thursday | Total: $112.13

8:00am - Same routine as the days before: get dressed, take Fields out, give him breakfast, and head out for our family walk.
9:00am - Another day, a new cafe. We order our usual coffees, and split a breakfast sandwiche: herb omelette on a toasted baguette slathered with spicy aioli and topped with bacon. $27.22
9:15am - I realize that I dropped Erik's credit card somewhere between the cafe and our apartment (I didn't bring my wallet so I asked Erik for his card at the cafe). I call the cafe and ask if they'd seen it; they hadn't. And just as I'm about to call the bank to cancel the card, the cafe calls back -- someone found it on the sidewalk and turned it in! We thank them for following up and tell them we'll pick it up tomorrow.
1:00pm - I wake Fields up from his nap so we can walk to get our usual Sweetgreens order. $27.71
7:00pm - Erik and I take Fields on a walk to pick up Thai food for dinner. We order beef pad kee mao, shrimp tom kha soup, chicken pad thai, and mango with sticky rice. $51.75
9:00pm - While reconciling this week's expenses, I see that my Sephora credit card payment was returned and I was charged not only a late fee, but a finance charge! I signed up for the Sephora card over the holidays to take advantage of their cash back program and this was my first payment to them. I go on the website to investigate what happened and find that I missed entering a "0" to my linked bank account. I call their customer service rep to explain everything. I ask her if she could waive the late payment fee ($35) and the finance charge ($5.45) if I paid the balance in full. She said she's able to waive the late payment fee but not the finance charge. I thank her for her help and hope this doesn't affect my credit score too much. $5.45
12:00am - Zzzzzzz.

Day 5: Friday | Total: $245.56

8:00am - Same morning routine as yesterday.
9:00am - Same breakfast routine as yesterday but add additional tip since they held onto Erik's card. $28.67
12:00pm - Wake Fields up from his nap for a quick walk to Just Salad. I get a chicken caesar salad while Erik gets a chicken poblano salad. $23.70
7:10pm dinner - Friday's are our date nights. Before the pandemic, we'd get dressed up and go out for a nice meal and spend quality one-on-one time. These days, we usually order in fancy sushi and watch a movie. Between us, we order 19 pieces of sashimi and nigiri like uni (my favorite), zuke, wagyu, and tamago. $193.19
10:30pm - As soon as Erik gets back from taking Fields out, we pile onto the couch to watch Jurassic Park.
1:00am - Sleep.

Day 6: Saturday | Total: $375.24

9:00am - It's a late start to the morning. After feeding Fields, we walk to pick up breakfast. We get our usual coffee order, a bagel with smoked salmon and a chocolate croissant. $34.12
1:20pm - I saw someone post in a cooking subreddit about seasoning that a local restaurant uses on their wings. Of course I google the restaurant and get hungry from looking at their photos. I end up ordering lunch from them: wings (of course), coconut crab curry, shrimp chips and chili jam, thai iced tea, and khua kling. It was all delicious but holy cow everything was so spicy. Definitely will order from them again though! $93.40
3:45pm - I see a notification pop up for a charge on our card. I assume it's something for Erik's current house project (building our custom closets). I ask him about it and it's actually a router extender. $125.85
8:00pm - We've been missing Mission-style burritos lately and haven't found a good replacement in New York yet. But we did find a restaurant that makes delicious Mexican food. I get two spicy pork tacos and one al pastor taco, Erik gets a spicy pork burrito and a mandarin Jarritos, and we split a large chips and guacamole. $49.87
10:00pm - While browsing Reddit), I see someone post decants for sale of fragrances I've been meaning to try. Fragrances were a serious hobby of mine for a while, to the point that I hired a fragrance "fixer" on a Paris trip to take me around the local shops. I've since scaled back my collecting and have been focusing on learning to differentiate scents better. $72.00
11:00pm - Goodnight!

Day 7: Sunday | Total: $134.57

9:00am - Another late start to the morning. We do our morning routine with Fields and walk to get breakfast. This time, we head back to the cafe that found Erik's credit card. We get our coffees along with the herb omelette baguette with bacon. $27.56
12:00pm - There's some leftovers from yesterday's very spicy lunch so we eat that for lunch. I think the food might actually be spicier today.
6:00pm - I FaceTime with a girlfriend on the west coast who shares some amazing life news. Her and her husband are moving from the west coast! While I'm sad they're not moving to New York, I'm thrilled that they'll be closer to us and that she has an amazing new role. This is a huge win for her career and I'm really proud of her.
9:40pm - We realize we haven't had dinner. We both want something much less spicy so we order in Italian: caesar salad, pasta alla gricia, and a spicy vodka pasta. $107.07
11:00pm - We owe a response to our wedding planners about our wedding date. Do we move forward with a summer 2021 (originally summer 2020) wedding or do we postpone another year? I have strong feelings about trying to hold a destination wedding in the middle of a pandemic. I don't want to put our friends and family at risk since we won't know when vaccines will be widely available. But Erik is worried that his dad won't make it to 2022 since his dad already isn't in the greatest health. We agree on a new game plan: we hold off on our wedding celebration until 2022. In the meantime, we'll travel to his dad as soon as it's safe and get married with him in attendance. I email the wedding planners our decision to postpone (again) and go to bed.
5️⃣Section 5: This Week's Total & A Brief Reflection

Food & Drink	$1,000.57
Fun & Entertainment	$0.00
Home & Health	$125.85
Clothes & Beauty	$223.42
Transport	$0.00
Other	$119.35
GRAND TOTAL	$1,469.19

This was a pretty normal spending week (during the pandemic) for us, minus all the coffee trips due to our broken espresso machine. I know we spend a lot on food and we're okay with our level of spend, for now. It gets us out of the house, gives us a reason to take Fields out for a walk and explore the neighborhood, and allows us to support our favorite spots. My goals for this year are to increase the amount we put into investments and learn more about tax-efficient strategies.
Apologies for any and all typos!
EDIT: typos and a few words

One day early. Buckle up, it's a long one!
Trigger warning: digestive & anxiety issues, medical procedures
Section One: Assets and Debt
Retirement Balance: PERA account $7,389.65
Equity: roughly $45,000 (house and vehicles)
Savings account balance: $523
'Secret' cash stash: about $800 between us which we pretend doesn't exist.
Checking account balance: $2,318
Credit card debt: $6404.47 🤯
Student loan debt: $30,593.72 for my associate's in nursing and one semester of my BSN which I have no plans to finish.
Current clinic bill: $814. I have about $620 left in my flex account from last year that I need to use so I'll probably pay this off this month.
Section Two: Income
Income progression: It's been pretty straightforward for me. I worked at McDonald's in high school (minimum wage) and came back after one semester of college. I was eventually promoted to shift manager in 2007 (I think $9.50/hr). I got my CNA license in 2008 and started working at a nursing home ($10.65/hr). Gradually increased over the years. When I got my LPN license in 2016, I bumped up to around $16.50/hr. Another bump for my RN license at the end of 2017. I started at $26.50 and now make $28.75 base. I work 12 hour nights so I get $.50 differential from 6p-10p and $1 for 10p-6a. This is considered a joke of a differential btw. We get time and a half on holidays. I do truly love my work but I'm so burnt out. I've been in long term care for so long that I'm not sure how to even do anything else at this point.
Main Job Monthly Take Home: ~$2700, more if I work a holiday or pick up a shift
Taxes: ~$700 Health insurance: $303 (family plan with high deductible) Retirement contributions: 6.5% of my pay HSA: $192.30 Flex: $46.16 Clinic bill payment: $100 Life/STD insurance: $54.42 Christmas account: $50
Side Gig Monthly Take Home: generally $0. I do sell some craft items on the side but I don't hustle.
Child support: supposed to be $531 but I get what I get most of the time.
I am married but we do not have a joint account. B's gross is $41,600/year. He recently started a new job and got a $4.50/hr pay increase. He's also a volunteer firefighter and gets paid once a year from that, although last year's check was only $750. He carries dental and vision insurance for us and has a flex set up, about $170/month.
Section Three: Expenses
Rent / Mortgage / HOA fees: $0. 2 bed 1 bath home we share with my daughter (Z, she's 8) full time and B's stepson (E, he's 14) part time. We own outright.
Property tax: $497 this year, B pays.
Car registration: $206 this year for my car, goes down a bit every year.
Home & car (3) insurance: $237, B pays. We just combined everything a few days ago so we might split this. ETA after getting the first bill, I will pay *$265/6 months* for my car and half of the SUV, about $175/6 months.*
Savings contribution: lol, whatever comes from my round up rule
Debt payments: CC bills $400, B's pellet grill $35 (was a Christmas present). B has no debt.
Electric: fluctuates with the climate, last month was $245!!! We are trying to figure out ways to reduce this. B pays.
Gas: $50 now on the yearly plan, B pays.
Watesewegarbage: ~$60, B pays.
Wifi: $59, I pay.
Cellphone: $290, I pay for 5 lines.
Babysitter: $180
Student loans: in deferment, not making payments
Meds: around $50, paid with flex money.
Monthly subscriptions: Hulu, HBO, Pandora, Design Bundles, razors, Netflix, Apple storage, NYT, Cricut Access, Disney+, Amazon subscribe and save items, my entire life, $250. I pay.
Amazon Prime: $124/year, I pay.
Pet expenses: averages around $100 between food, haircuts, shots and insurance for my youngest pup, I pay.
Car payment: $405.27 for my car. We paid cash for our used SUV in December, and B's truck is old and has been paid off for years.
Groceries: around $400, B tends to grab things here and there and I get the big hauls.
School lunch: free this year! Thanks USDA!
Extracurriculars: Z opted out of any extracurriculars this year due to COVID.
Regular therapy: nope
1/16 Saturday
3:30 AM: I'm awake but I refuse to get out of bed. Cruise Indeed and Facebook for jobs. I recently put in my 30 day notice so I need to find something ASAP. I've put in probably 6 online applications already. Print out two applications, three copies of my resume, and create two cover letters. Why do I have to fill out all my info on an application when they can find it on a resume? Get a year of a resume and cover letter making site for $24.99 because I'm terrible at both. Buy some new Brumates that I don't need $67.93 and see that my yearly Prime payment has been pulled. Watch YouTube and fall back to sleep around 5.
8:20 AM: B crawls into bed after work and snowblowing basically the entire yard. Cuddle for a while so he can leech my body heat before I go upstairs. I need to wash my hair. Fall into an internet hole of Facebook and NYT while lounging with the dogs.
Noon: B comes upstairs. I didn't wash my hair. We need some groceries so decide to drive the hour to the nearest town with a Walmart AND a Menards - it's the 15% off bag sale right now. Throw in some dry shampoo, brush my teeth and get dressed. Change the water jug in our machine (our tap water is sketch), let the dogs out and head out.
1:18 PM: Gas is up to $2.34/gallon. Cringe thinking about filling up the SUV. My car is a hybrid but doesn't like Minnesota winters. B and I debate bringing our cat to the vet during the drive. She has FIV and has been losing weight, but we decide against it as there's not much we can do at this point anyways. She's still happy so 🤷‍♀️
2:34: Check out of Menards. $99.15 on a new door lock with keypad, sanding blocks and paper, disposable condiment cups, and Armor All wipes after 15% off and B's $15 return credit that he forgot to use. B gets LED bulbs, grill brushes, motor oil, a door latch for our porch, something for his brother's toilet and a propane tank exchange. Only saw one guy without a mask, so I'd call that a win.
3:05: $15.98 after coupons at Joann's on more tumbler supplies (e-6000 spray, 5 taklon brushes) and one roll of clearance ribbon. Realize I have my Christmas money in my purse and forgot to use it. B goes to Harbor Freight for more tools he doesn't need and a sporting goods store for a gift card for his best friend's birthday.
3:32: We decide to go to Perkin's, hoping they won't be too busy in the off hour. The hostess is wearing her mask under her nose and I'm so annoyed. I have some weird stomach issue going on, so I just get two eggs and toast. B tells me he should be able to get the first COVID shot this week, and I tell him I still haven't changed my mind (we both already had COVID during an outbreak at our workplace). I've been 'not preventing' pregnancy for almost two years. At this point, I'm too anxious to get the vaccine, and there is just not enough data available on pregnant/TTC women to change my mind. My time limit is my birthday, so if I'm not pregnant by then I'll be getting the vaccine in August. $28.87 +$5 tip.
4:47: Check out of Walmart with wet cat food, pop, milk, butter, Mac and cheese, cereal, snacks for the kiddo, chips, ketchup, tator tots, Gatorade, Hawaiian Punch and deli meat. $88.65. Every time I ask B if we need something, he says we have it at home. Also, no grapes? Usually a Walmart trip sends me into an anxiety attack but the store is pretty empty today.
5:09: My favorite stop of the day: the liquor store. The store at home is so crazy expensive so this is a treat. I get Truly Iced Tea and two different kinds of hard coffee to try for $41.91. B picks up three cases of beer.
5:18: B stops for gas ($37 🥴) and we head for home. Buy some vape juice online, $86.59. Yeah yeah, I know. My gut hurts, I'm super bloated and I just want to nap. We talk about our options regarding my medical procedure that is coming up and decide to try and get it done while we're still on my work insurance. I had a positive FIT test so now I have to have a colonoscopy. I'll end up maxing out the deductible but I'll get it half off if we can pay the bill within 30 days. I'll get my PTO paid out at the end of my 30 day notice, so we should be able to swing it. Not really sure we have a great option at this point as B doesn't want me to take on another payment. He is so anti debt, and I have $6500 in CC debt. We are opposites in so many ways.
6:20: Get home and unload the SUV. The dogs are going WILD. I feel like garbage and immediately get into pajamas. Give the cat a can of wet food and she eats a few bites. I still can't find a type she really enjoys. I also hook up the drinking water fountain I bought for her a few days ago. B installs the new door lock and I'm thrilled to have a keypad again. The old one stopped working a few months ago. Pay an invoice for a bulk order of keychain tassels from a wholesale group, $19. Basically do nothing for the rest of the night.
9:45: I'm falling asleep in my recliner. I decide to do my nighttime routine (rinse face, No7 HydraLuminous Gel Cream, Algenist Complete Renewal Eye Balm) and go to bed in hopes of feeling better tomorrow. I skip brushing my teeth because I'm nursing a ginger ale. Watch some YouTube and fall asleep around 10:30.
Daily total: $478.07
1/17 Sunday
2:09 AM: I wake up for the second time tonight with nightmares. I rarely have them so I'm annoyed. B isn't in bed to cuddle with either. I go upstairs to use the bathroom and find him in his recliner. Realize I forgot to take my meds last night (antidepressant, probiotic, omeprazole, hair skin & nail vitamin, Lysine supplements, allergy pill) so grab those along with two Goli gummies and a lorazepam to help me calm down. My gut still hurts, and I'm so over this. Browse the internet and watch YouTube again to fall asleep.
3:55: Wake up to stomach cramps and know my colon is going to empty itself out. Park myself in the bathroom for half an hour and try not to pass out. I'm not sure if it's just IBS or something worse going on, but I'm glad I'm getting it checked out.
7:17: Still awake. I am stressed by the potential of not having a job for a few weeks, my health, and the current state of everything else in the world. Decide to compound this by opening my NYT app. I am so hopeful Joe can start turning things around.
12:17 PM: I must have finally fallen asleep because B comes down to ask if I want to go to South Dakota today. We check out local case rates by county and decide we are probably safe. We are about the only ones who wear our masks in public over there. I must admit that going through this pandemic feels much different out here in the boonies than it does in the city. We had a large surge in cases for about 4 weeks in November-December, and now we are back down to about 2-3 new cases a day. Our local businesses work hard to keep us safe, in part because they don't want to be known as the place so-and-so got COVID. Ah, small town gossip. We do our part try to support them as we really can't afford to lose any businesses in our area. I shoot a text to Z's dad to confirm I'm picking her up in the morning.
1:28: I finally get out of bed and wash my hair, which is my least favorite chore. I brush it out before my shower, use some Head and Shoulders 2 in 1 to combat my winter dry scalp, finish it off with SheaMoisture Purple Rice Water conditioner. I decide to heat style it today, so I use two heat protection sprays. To brush, wash, condition, brush again, dry and curl my hair takes 1.5 hours. Now I remember why I never do this.
3:30: We hide in the corner of the bar for the meat raffle. I really love coming here because the money they raise goes to local charities. We also have drinks and supper. I get a BLT chicken wrap, and we win 3 free drink tickets. We head out around 6. $50 + $10 tip, this comes out of my Christmas money. B goes to the drivethru on our way home and gets me a frozen hot chocolate. Yuuuum.
8:45: For some reason I can't keep all the school calendar changes straight. Z was supposed to be off tomorrow, but I just realized she does have school. I message Z's teacher to let her know Z won't be there, since she has her yearly physical tomorrow after being rescheduled 3 times. Do a quick nighttime routine, take my meds and head downstairs for YouTube and sleep. Hoping for a decent night of it!
Daily total: $60
1/18 Monday
3:05 AM: I'm awake, but for no particular reason this time. Working the night shift really messes with your sleeping schedule. I must have been snoring because B has gone upstairs to sleep in E's room. I clean the litter box and decide to fire up my laptop and Cricut machine to get some projects done I've been procrastinating. I finish a water bottle for B, a stash jar for a friend, create a couple Valentine's mock ups for my business page and seal some glitter signs. I grab a couple SVGs on Etsy $1.38. My mom sees my Snapchat and we message over the woes of insomnia.
6:20: I have come to the realization that buying craft items and actually using them are two separate hobbies. I lay in bed with the cat and doze.
8:40: Leave the house to go pick up Z. Her dad lives about 25 minutes away. On the way home we stop at Casey's for random snacks, $7.64. The clinic calls and we schedule my colonoscopy for Thursday. I have to get some blood drawn later this morning when I bring Z to her appointment. I also have to have a CT with contrast so I'll figure out when I can get that done as well. I take a quick body shower when we get home.
10:55: Bring Z to her well child check-up. I think they asked us about 100 questions, and some of them were super weird for an 8 year old. She finally gets her flu shot and only spills a few tears. No major issues so that's a win! She does miss a few sounds on her hearing test, but we decide to just watch it for now. I get my blood drawn when we're done with her appointment and talk to the radiologist about my CT. He says my prior authorization hasn't gone through yet and he'll call me when we can get it scheduled. We're both hopeful it can get done tomorrow. Then I talk to the surgical nurse to get my pre-op instructions. Finally leave the clinic around 12:45. Pick up my surgical prep from the drugstore, $52.06 (!!!) from my flex account. Z requests cheese pizza for lunch so I oblige.
1:17 PM: I get a call about a job and set up an interview for Wednesday afternoon.
4:10: I bring Z down to the local salon for a haircut. I can't go in (COVID restrictions) but Z loves the feel of a fresh cut so I don't worry. Her hair dresser is her classmate's mom and my old neighbor. $18 + $7 tip.
6:30: B has a fireman's meeting tonight, so Z and I have mac and cheese per our tradition. B hates it so we usually only eat it when he's gone. I make Z have an apple on the side so we can make at least one good food choice today. The Bachelor is on tonight! I usually hit the Reddit stream but I got a late start tonight so I skip it.
9:05: Make sure Z brushes her teeth and hug her goodnight.
10:20: My oldest (and crankiest) dog just cannot be pleased tonight. She keeps wanting to go outside, but it's cold and snowy and she doesn't like either of those things. Sigh. Do my usual nighttime routine, take my meds and go to bed. Fall asleep around 11.
Daily total: $33.99
1/19 Tuesday
6:45 AM: Success! Finally got some sleep. Good thing I woke up though, because I forgot to set an alarm. I wake up a very cranky Z at 7 and make sure she gets ready for school. We are very fortunate that our school district is small, and Z has been going to school in person, full time, all school year. She never complains about wearing her mask either. I drop her off at 8, then B and I bring our SUV to the mechanic. I think B is dropping me off at home but instead we go out for breakfast downtown. I have a pancake, scrambled egg and side of fruit. I hear the regulars (old guys who come in every morning for coffee) talking about signing up for their COVID shots. This is a good sign! B pays, $16.04 + $3.96 tip.
9:01: I get an email that a hospital position I applied for has already been filled. Dang. It's still snowing, so I plan for a lazy day. B goes outside to snowblow.
9:55: The radiologist calls and tells me we can get my CT completed. We decide to do it right away this morning. I run up to the clinic to grab my contrast drink and set a timer so I drink the right amounts during the right time frames. It tastes like flat, flavored water. My stomach doesn't seem to appreciate it much. Hopefully this doesn't become a problem when I'm in the CT machine.
11:00: Get my CT done. I get an IV in my arm and the radiologist pushes Lord knows what into my veins, but it makes me feel like I wet my pants 🤣 He lets me check out the images when we're done. It only takes about 15 minutes and then I head back home. I sit around with B for a while, then I go downstairs to make a few crafty things and fill an order. I put a couple more things on my business page as well. During this time B brings his truck out to the mechanic and brings home the SUV. They put in a 'Minnesota approved' battery, the repair cost was $220. I offer B half but he declines, saying "let's see what the truck costs first."
2:45 PM: I get so distracted crafting that I almost forget to go pick Z up from school. She gets in the car and tells me she had the best day ever! I ask what happened, and she says she didn't get strawberries at lunch. Oh... she was being sarcastic. She picks up her room and puts away her laundry when we get home. We don't do much this afternoon.
7:00: B makes supper tonight, nothing fancy. A chicken patty for me and corn dogs for him and Z. I'm staying away from roughage to make my life easier tomorrow. Z gets ready for bed and I tuck her in at 8:45. Shortly after, B leaves for work. I go downstairs to work on a Valentine's day order.
Daily total: $0
1/20 Wednesday
12:45 AM: I have spent far too long organizing files on my computer. I call it a night. I look up my CT report and it doesn't show anything urgent or explain why there's blood in my stool. Sigh. Normal routine and bedtime.
7:05: I'm up. IT'S INAUGURATION DAY! B is already in bed. He tells me he has the chills, is nauseated, and his arm is killing him. I tell him his COVID shot is working and bring him some ibuprofen. I wake up Z and she gets ready for school. While I'm waiting, I take a body shower, let the dogs out and feed them. Drop Z off at school at 8, deliver a Valentine's Day order (+$20!) and go home to watch the inauguration while eating mini wheats.
10:45: I watch Kamala get sworn in and I get tears in my eyes. Such a historic moment.
11:45: I make myself scrambled eggs and drink a Dr. Pepper. After this, it's only clear liquids until tomorrow afternoon. B helps me give my oldest dog a haircut. You'd think we were killing her the way she cries. She's been getting haircuts every 2-3 months her whole life and still can't sit still.
2:00 PM: I have a virtual interview. The job sounds so interesting but it involves a lot of travel, and I'm not sure that would work with my family. I pick up Z from school when I'm done. She tells me "happy Joe Biden day!" when she gets into the car. We talk about the possible new job and she's not into the idea of me being gone.
5:00: B leaves to go work on his brother's house. He's been there on and off all week. He also got the night off for his floating holiday. I take my meds early so they have time to get into my system. I mix up the colonoscopy prep: two packets of powder into one liter of water. I make dinner for Z while I'm in the kitchen.
6:45: COLONOSCOPY PREP IS NASTY. Like, the taste of the drink is so disgusting and it's making me nauseated. I know it's important to keep it down, but it's also important to drink it within the one hour timeframe. Uuggghhhhh. It ends up being one hour and 45 minutes. B comes home around 8:30 and gets Z into bed.
9:00: The best way to describe how I feel is early labor. The cramps come and go and are so intense I have to take deep breaths. It's so exhausting I end up falling asleep.
Daily total: $0
1/21 Thursday
12:30 AM: IT'S TIME.
6:00: I slept between bathroom trips, but now it's time to mix up my second liter of prep. Yes, I have to do this to myself all over again. This time, I have to make sure to drink it all within the one hour timeframe.
7:30: Everybody is awake and chaos ensues. Did I mention we only have one bathroom? Z is trying to get ready for school, B wants to shower and I'm, well, you know. I get my entire liter of prep down in 65 minutes. B is still not feeling well from his COVID shot.
8:45: I manage a body shower although I had to get out once for the toilet. I am basically a zombie at this point. B drops me off at the hospital at 9:10. When I get there, they are running behind so I have to wait half an hour before I get into my room.
10:05: My nurse blows my vein and I have a panic attack. We are starting this day off great. A second nurse comes in and gets my IV in right away, thank God. Things move pretty quickly from here. By 10:30, I'm in the OR getting the good drugs. By 11:20, I'm awake enough to remember what's going on and drinking water so they'll pull my IV. The surgeon comes in and tells me they didn't see anything abnormal, but they did take some biopsies so hopefully I get some answers. By 12:05, I'm walking out the door.
12:15 PM: I am absolutely starving. B takes me out for lunch. I have a tuna sandwich and a 7Up. Our total is something around $17. I throw him $5 for the tip.
1:00: We're home. We spend the afternoon watching movies and laying around. My stomach is still pretty upset from all the torture. B picks up Z from school since I'm not supposed to drive yet. When she gets home, she regales me with the tale of getting hit in the face with a hulu hoop in gym. She actually has a fat lip!
5:00: I get a jar of my favorite eye cream on a BST board, $20.
6:00: B heads out to work and I make supper. We have tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches tonight. Comfort food for the win.
9:00: Z has a quarter in her tonight. We play a couple games on her iPad before I stick her in the shower and then in bed. I promptly fall asleep in the living room.
Daily total: $25
1/22 Friday
3:30 AM: Move downstairs to our bedroom.
8:00: After work, B picked up E and they come home. The dogs are frantic. I eat a bowl of cereal and hang out with Z, since she doesn't have school today. We make funny drawings of each other and she reads me some knock knock jokes. I also get two more interviews set up for next week. I head back to bed around noon. I have to go back to work tonight. I have a block schedule: 7 off, 3 on, 1 off, 3 on, 4 off, 3 on. Our pay periods are adjusted for the night shift, so if I work the weekend that's my 36 hours for the week.
4:30 PM: I'm up. I take a shower and wash my hair. B makes pizza for the kids, another traditional meal timing in our house. He leaves for work at 5:30. I am dreading work. I have been exhausted after every shift no matter if it was busy or not. I'm not sure if it's my actual job, or just the night shift catching up to me. Either way, I'm looking forward to a new position. Also, getting ready for work is a chore these days. I use Fog Block on my glasses, then put side shields on. I hook my two masks up to my ear savers. Then I find two bottles of hand sanitizer and two pens to put in my pockets because I always lose one somewhere along the way. I pack my bag (water bottle, energy drink, iPad, shoes, snacks and supper) and start my car. I say bye to the kids and head out at 5:45.
6:00: Work is already a shit show and I just clocked in 5 minutes ago. I'm so annoyed and I just don't want to be here. But you better believe I'm going to suck it up and be happy for my residents. They are usually pretty happy to see me after my long stretch off.
11:45: I buckle up for what's going to be a very long shift.
Daily total: $0
Weekly total: $597.09
Food + Drink: $177.07
Fun / Entertainment: $60
Home + Health: $203.44
Clothes + Beauty: $45
Transport: $0
Other: $111.58
Reflection: This was a normal week considering its events. Obviously I don't usually buy a new door lock, and I typically only stock up on vape juice every 6 months or so. I'm heavily into my depression spending, but with everything going on in the world I've cut myself some slack. I'm only going to live once! *ETA our cat passed away this evening, 1/25. We are very sad but are happy we got to give her a good life for the last 3 years.

by Dan Winter
from Zayra Website
From Sumerian Anunnaki - to Ubaid Great Mother - to African ’Eve’ - to Maria Gimbudas - Goddess... What Links the Myth to the Biological Problem - Fusing a Soul Group - Compressed into an Egg...
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Sitting there last night watching the detailed BBC special on Israel’s Nuclear Coverup (ref 1, ref 2) - brought home again the ancient wisdom that those who ignore the lessons of history are condemned to repeat them. After hiding their nuclear plant contamination, their weapons of mass destruction, their new toxic gas weapon technology -already murderously tested against Palestinians - documented on BBC - preventing all inspection or accountability to the global community, Israel has decided they are NEVER going to release their nuclear whistle blower (Vanunu) from prison.
Both the Bible Code (1&2 - which have NEVER been wrong yet), and the Fatima letter tearfully opened by the sick Pope, independently confirm that the end of Rome will be the nuclear wind blown over from the nuclear destruction of Jerusalem. (Karma always employs symmetry). Failing in his urgently renewed motivation to patch up the Arab wars, the Pope by all reports from here is secretly relocating his staff to Sintra Portugal (Drago Rabbithole & ’TheCollective’s Fatima timehole...)
The history repeating - is clear - multiple translations of Sumerian (including Sitchin’s) confirm: the REASON Anunnaki (half Draco blood) Innana / Ninhursag (Goddess / ’mom’) moved to the East (India / China) to begin the Goddess legend, was her disgust after her half brother ENLIL (later called Yahweh by the Jews) made a Nuclear desert of Sinai (the nuclear meltdown from that time is historically documented by the fuse melted glass/ rock still there today).

Sumerian Ubaid GODDESS morphed to Celtic Goddess.(Drac) ASSA- RU (Ssa of Ra-sSarah mated with RA/Enki AbRAm from UR)

Left: Ibi-Uru (H’iburu /Hebrew)Blood Cross-This is Enlil.. (Interventionist Anuhazi - later AshKhan-azi) Right: Draco from Alpha Draconis - ’Dragon Queen’ / ASSA-Uru (UruShalaim / Uru-an / Din-Ass-ur / Asuras) MAG in Magalen is from Orion Culture

Draco from Montauk/Dulce Morphed to Sumerian Goddess Statue Face
In order to prevent this tragic repeat of history we MUST understand the story. The origin of the goddess myth is more than the moment Enki (ab-Ra) used his own sperm with a CroMagnon egg in his half sister (the Draco - aSSa of RA - Sarah - from Ur - Uru) Innana / Ninhursag (story below). It is the cultural urge older than Earth of this DrAGon line to produce an egg which COULD get a gene and memory line squirting (embedding) immortally back into stars.
This quest (for the grail, of charge embedding in DNA) was BOTH Enlil/Yahweh’s problem of how to ensoul DNA, AND the Dragon (Goddess) ancestor Queen Mom (Reverend Mother) urge to MAKE an EGG which could IMPLODE (turn inside out recursively/con-sciously) ...and MAKE a soul. It is WHY the reverend Mother’s in Dune sheparded blood lines for centuries - eggs-act-ly like the Essenes (Akhenaton’s /Enki money renamed Moses) planned the Tut / Jeshua birth - TO PLAN MUAB DIB / Avatar / Messiah. One who could STEER whole genepools into star inhabiting.

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The geomantic’s of creating perception by creating focus on the land... Dragon’s Egg...

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The charge map to turning inside out, is the electrical service required of a sperm to invaginate an egg... starting the (Golden) growth path.

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An ’Alphabet ’ of symmetric clues to the charge compression called EGG making & ensoulment...

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Ygg-drasil & the Draco’ns Egg :
This is the goose’s Golden Egg... this is Humpty Dumpty’s endlessly fractionated Egg... This is the implosive spherical capacitor’s ability to suck charge in from gravity, the definition and measure of ALL life force.
Almost everyone in the last 20 cities was able to FEEL the charge coming from the gold coated egg above... (some felt a ’cool wind’ from the inside cone of the sharper end - others a pushing..) NICE to watch science trained people recognize that WHERE this electrical force comes from - they have no clue. Therefore they have no clue what life is. Yet if we do not know the electrical source of life (biological implosion) how can we fabricate electrical structures which support life?

Update on the life force measurement project:
Thanks to Callum Coates and filmstream.com.au. Water research team in Byron Bay for their help in taking the Water Life Force measurements in the previous newsletter... --- Below- update July 3, 2003 - Team from the organic college in Witzenhausen Germany, found that straw or peak around the sensor spherical capacitor gold coated egg provided good isolation from ambient electrical noise... here we successfully measure the difference in life force between an onion JUST picked from the beautiful mountain garden versus a store bought older onion..

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and below - we are able to pick up the life force charge field around a bottle of potent essential oil: AUREA CENTO - a plant/flower oil essence found medically effective against AIDS - versus a simple perfume oil in an identical bottle a highly ’charged’ healing oil.

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Sacred architecture and hospitals need to be reinvented based on the new information that life only is sustainable in a biological capacitor which does not LEAK charge. Examples of life creating sacred architecture are bee hives and pine cones; these are implosive biological capacitive dialectrics. The way to measure life force and therefore success for a ’sacred architect’ is harmonic inclusiveness and coherence of electrical charge (buildings can be spectrum analyzed & measured for life force the same way we measure eggs, peaches, water ..etc)... see ’biophoton’.
Examples of architecture which makes ONLY DEATH by leaking electrical charge capacitively, are all metal buildings with sharp edges and electrosmog (& the death dealing capacitively depleted air which comes from the metal fins of air conditioners), which describes most of the modern abominations we currently call churches, hospitals and refrigerators.
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Prove to yourself how incompetent to advise on life matters - your local medical science is by asking them where does the 2-10 millivolts generated by a fresh egg come from? (why let them tell YOU how to LIVE if they do not know what LIFE IS!?) . then read: HARMONIC INCLUSIVENESS OF CHARGE-Can Life Force Be Measured in Capacitive Terms?
Structural Stability and Morphogenesis
Is the best wave biophysics we have for how membranes or eggs get immune systems. The physics tells us: all membranes are the musical summary of all the sine waves (Humps and Dumps) which nest on ’folded’ surface. Once an egg gets the musical recipe right ... then by the fractal foldedness of its surface, it creates a perfect ’spin’ record back to a relatively infinite past. (Harmonic INCLUSIVENESS - optimized by GOlden Ratio.. packing to a surface so well folded it can become fractal ... and inPHIknit). This is nowhere more evident than by the fractal folding in the mitochondria cell membrane, they tracked all women on Earth back to the first fertile female: ’Eve’ in Africa.
Marie Gimbutas writes the most famous series of GODDESS Mystery books on Earth, to conclude that the SHAPE of the GODDESS is the same in every continent on Earth, but fails to explain WHY. The answer is E.T. (ONE extra-terrestrial Draco). Laurence Gardner writes the most famous series of books on the Grail blood line - ending with "Realm of the Ring Lords" - to conclude that the universal origins of the Royal blood lines is Anunnaki Draco, but fails to explain WHY. THEIR hero ancestors are called SHINING ONES... ’Ringlords’ (more below) . The answer is DNA that becomes charge radiant (bliss) glows with UV fire and SHINES!

Mystery of ’LORD OF THE RING’
Explained - DNA becomes Source of Gravity!

Laurence Gardner and others of the Sitchin-Sumerian blood line studies (’Realm of the Ring Lords’ book) are clear - that the great mother - Sumerian goddess of the Ubaid (pic / morph above) - is none other than Innana / Ninhursag, the sister of the half Draco (Ibi / Uru) Sumerian ANunnaki family from Sirius - we later called - ’An’ (Dad - in Aboriginal: Biki) & sons - Enki (Adonai/Atun/Ea /Ptah/Merk/LucifeHermes/Quetzlcoatel in Aboriginal- "Dolphin or Fish God"), vs his more snake like (Levite) half brother Enlil (Yahweh/Michael/Michabo-Indian/Encoder in Bible Code/Amun/Ahriman to Steiner).
For more on what became of Enlil (Yahweh) - see Ann Rice - ’Blood and Gold’ - origin of the vampires - (whom she names ’Enkil’).
The REASON Enlil’s blood became the blood root of vampires - is the physics which this article explains. IF you use external sources (addiction - in Enlil’s case it was Gold Powder / Manna / Ormes / The Spice - The White Powder origin of ’holy’ communion’s white wafer) to get charge (bliss) into your DNA - then your blood becomes thick and electrically immortal.... BUT with no way of getting new and self-directing glandular passion of bliss into your DNA, that immortality is nothing more than a permanent astral prison (The St Germaine and ’ascended masters’ problem ... just because you don’t die anymore does not mean you have escaped being a parasite if you cannot attract your own charge..) Gold Powder vs Heart... Alchemy’s Darker Moments
complete story: http://spirals.eternite.com

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What exactly was SHINING Mr. Gardner? ... The Sacred Geometry of charge / bliss hygiene to ignite DNA into the (Implosive & Radiant) Grail Ring, Solving the mystery Laurence Gardner poses when he says the SHINING ONES, authored the Grail AND the Lord of the RING (from ’Realm of the Ring Lords’).
Dear Laurence Gardner (’Realm of the Ring Lord’): Why do you suppose all of the SUCCESSFUL blood lines at the very ROOT ORIGIN of sacred ancestry.. were called: "The SHINING Ones"
We wonder who understands what it takes for the blood to glow charge radiance?... The Magnetic X... Super DNA... when DNA braids densely into a RING in the presence of BLISS / charge density.

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What alphabet of symmetry on the ring torus... compresses the charge into this trick... which checks for which waves are shareable?

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Do YOU think it looks like a grail cup?
We congratulate Laurence Gardner on his scholarship to locate the unity between the Grail and Ring Lord traditions of the Anunnaki Draco Queen blood lines... All that is needed now is to understand the charge hygiene required to teach that as a science of bliss, to assemble the charge density necessary to ignite the DNA to that SHINING ONE charge radiance.
When the secret to ensouling DNA is lost (Yahweh’s essential problem) - the secret of HOW to attract your own charge (bliss - ECKstacy) / implode - then you become by definition a parasite. You won’t find a photo of a traditional Jewish person having bliss on the web because bliss requires setting DNA FREE, something Yahweh’s ancestors couldn’t do. (The physics of DNA here would then continue the hypothesis to suggest that traditional Jewish persons could not lucid dream or take memory thru death, lack of COHERENCE in genes is ironic after several hundred generations of only PLANNED gene crosses...).
Loss of the ability to initiate compression implosively in the EKG is the physics of loss of compassion which allows Jews to murder Palestinians. It is no simple reminder that the Jewish flag and Star of David - is the shape of the flag and starships of Alpha Draconis, the home of Dune’s ARRAKIS - the shape of the Arabic letter ’L’ AND the star map at Ankhor Watt.
The Jewish blood of the fallen (Nephilim) Seraphim (ASSA - REPTilian bloodline) tendency to parasite / vampirize their genetic experiment genepool (us), is the reason Thoth (Hermes /Enki) said:

"YOU NEED NO LONGER BE SPAWN OF THE NEPHILIM".

What he meant was IF you find a way to IGNITE your DNA, IF you have a SOURCE of bliss, you will not REQUIRE the industries of fear (changing public relations renames extortion and piracy - skull & bones - industries of fear as insurance and banking).
Yahweh’s ancestors are the REASON Luke Skywalker (Enki) wakes up to find his dad Darth Vader is half machine... and the reason Muab Dib in DUNE wakes up to find his dad Harkonon (SARK-dauer) is half machine. And the Frodo in Lord of the RING wakes up to find his ancestor SAURON - (Assa-Uru) is half machine. Yahweh’s line is the half borg central hive computer ASHTAR whose machine code for magnetic donut domain (Dominus) symmetry to achieve GOLEM genetic engineering is called the Hebrew alphabet.
For more on what became of Enki, we have (books):

God King Akhenaton -by Daniel Stewart Genesis of the Grail Kings - by Laurence Gardner Secret Places of the Lion - by George Hunt Williamson (Brother Phillip) Tutankhamen Prophecies - by Maurice Cotterell ’The Return of Enki’ - Daniel Winter’s 3rd book (supercedes Sitchin’s - Enki Return) to which this article is a prelude

This little family drama not only extends right from the time TutankhATUN had to change his name to TutankhAMUN - and the origin of the middle east (of Edin) conflict - it is ALSO a perfect microcosm of the Orion wars. The Orion wars are the history of which Earth story is a recent skirmish. And it is the conflict which our genepool in many ways was designed to be the ’vaccine’ for.
The philosophy of the 2 branches of the central galactic core cultures which administrate the propagation of DNA across galactic spaces, became the Christian ’War in Heaven’. The Ophanim (Lucifer & Enki’s MOTHER’s blood) believed you plant a genepool (on a planet like Earth - the Drac’s did at least 300 or so) or a forest in order to nourish it, set it free (Star Trek’s PRIME DIRECTIVE) and learn from it. The fallen SARAphim (Nephilim, Drac’s & Michael - ENLIL’s Mother’s blood) -believed you plant a genepool - or a forest- on planet, IN ORDER TO HAVE THE PRIVILEGE OF CUTTING IT DOWN (harvest it). (The Drac and reptilian parasite cult became Star Trek’s shape shifting bird of prey craft which became the Serbian ’ Field of Blackbirds’). This is quite a different philosophy (more of the philosophic conflict around DNA ’prime directive’ freedoms between galactic core culture’s in ’Defending Sacred Ground’ & other Alex Collier writing).
Genepools that do NOT learn bliss (ignites DNA’s implosive ability to make the gravity to bend stars) are perfect for harvesting. They NEED parasites (like the Nephilim- generally characterized by priests who tell you GOD is outside your body - example: the religious fundamentalism which elected George Bush).
Teaching BLISS (self empowerment - making DNA field effects self steering) is the ANTITHESIS of a parasite culture. Cultures which ENLIL started (Jews / most aboriginal / even most Oriental ) are places where the student is NEVER encouraged to surpass teacher and where the emphasis is generally: fear of change.
Historically for example the 12 tribes of AB-RA (RA was Enki) Abraham, the father of all religions, marries the ASSA-(Sara) from URu. But the Enlil family blood usurped Enki’s genetic experiment when Mongolian (line of Innana without Enki blood)became the Ashkanazi - the Bank of England - and took over the Jews. The real Enki blood (’lost’ tribes) became Scottish Highlander, red haired Taltos - that bloodline of Innana /Ninhursag is not badly represented by inannareturns.com where she apologizes for so cavalierly hacking up the DNA of our Cro-Magnon ancestors to make the gold mining slaves Takadam donkeys we later called Adam and Eve.

Ag and MAG-og. AG is the FIRE - AGnition of blood. MAG, DRAG, HAG. The MAG z TAK were the Melchizadek assassin priests of the Orion (TAK) wars.

We believe that our ancestor Draco Anunnaki / Enki who managed to extract (our first egg experience genetically has a rape feeling - racially) a Cro-Magnon egg into his half sister for him to impregnate - into Adam & Eve - were no more clever as genetic engineer than the soul less klutzes next to Rosslyn who made the tragic Dolly the sheep... history repeats... In fact - TAK-adama - Enki’s name for Adam and Eve means donkey or soul-less one, exactly similar to the Hebrew concept of genetics called GOLEM which ALSO means soul-less one. If today’s dead end genetic engineers had the LEAST clue of what makes DNA sustainable - the measurable coherence of the electrical field around it - which predicts whether your kids will survive death by propagating charge non-destructively, they would urgently stop the assinine disempowerment of the insulted gene and feed genes what they want in order to self-organize and self steer their fields electrically: genetic diversity, fractal charge density, freedom, and BLISS (how soul gets purpose / how intent steers waves).
Recognizing the emotion of our parents at the moment of conception helps us see the direction of the blown wind into the sail of MIGHT BECOME a soul purpose. The same is true of our race. The moment when promiscuous egocentric Enki (Ea / Merk / Ra / Abraham / Lucifer / father of Thoth / Hermes / Quetzalcoatl / Viracocha / Akhanaton later renamed Moses by lying priests) chose to use his own sperm to pop open a CroMag EGG he stuck in his own half sister to create his first fertile female.. (Eve /Ieve /Isis)
At that moment - several critical things happened:

1. a racial memory which begins with a test tube kind of rape.. 2. Enki’s mother’s PTAH (bird tribe) DNA starts an explosive bullet in the furnace of the Orion wars.. 3. Enki is doomed to fall in (pedophilic) love - with most of his genetic procreations.. 4. Enki becomes guilty of a crime: giving sperm without a permit from the Orion queen / MAGS, punishable by death in that culture. 5. Innana / Ninhursag (true origin of Goddess cult) becomes imbued with a curious kind of love guilt about her own children.. 6. Enlil now begins a murderous love hate relationship with the cyborg kids of his hated half brother whose red haired daughters constantly remind him of Enki’s mom who murdered his. The reason Yahweh’s religion today allows only sex thru a hole in the sheet and the priests Inquisition murder of 1/3 the women in Europe starting with the red haired (whose pile of gold the sick fat stupid Pope today sits dying upon).

Yahweh’s complete inability to make his own blood line interesting was the reason the Jew’s always had to lie about the true Egyptian origins of all their cultural hero’s (denying their Egyptian/Enki origin’s - see ’Out of Egypt’, ’House of the Messiah’, ’Copper Scrolls’ etc... Moses is Akhanaton, Abraham is RA-Enki). Solomon’s temple was is Cairo.
(Also - "Solomon-Falcon of Sheba: The Tombs of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba" by Ralph Ellis, Edfu Books. www.edfu-books.com, www.adventuresunlimitedpress.com - his final assertion: that the whole of Judaic, Christian and Islamic Belief and iconography were based on Egyptian antecedents.) 7. The best hope for the half Draco (Dr-AG-AN) blood (Ibi-URU) to finally rekindle the spark necessary to make an EGG able to start ENSOULMENT again begins. This Dragon’s egg dream is humpty dumpty. See the picture of the templar (Mag) priest in the chapel at Sintra Portugal (where the Drac queens staged Fatima) worshipping Magdalen (Aksenpahten the consort of Tut - with Thoth’s Nubian black madonna ’blue’/ copper Rigelian blood from Orion). That priest has a completely green and reptile face.
AND - all the KING’s horses and all the KING’s men (Yahweh’s priests) could NOT put that egg back together again (get a soul).
Let us review the penalties for not having a soul:

1. Loss of ability to time travel inside genetic field effects - without embarrassing heavy metal craft. 2. Loss of ability to lucid dream and take memory thru ’death’ 3. Loss of ability to radiate ensouling sustainability thru the thymus to create immune systems in children 4. Ultimate loss of ability to feel anything with deep emotion 5. Ultimate loss of all real long term memory 6. Loss of self-organization of DNA’s electrical field thus at the cost of ultimate ability to be truly self-steering - ultimate dependence on all addictive behaviors is the result

Note how these addictions to implosion / centers of gravity OUTSIDE self, describe most of western civilization, particularly those without a conscious bliss practice. In many cases the addiction includes going to church to have your bliss juice eaten (most churches are an astral milk house for lo grade parasites) to reduce cancer risk. (Necessary when there is no place to direct the bliss juice from within).
So what is the interpretation of the deep meaning of the Goddess legend and urge:

1. Innana cannot take total responsibility for the rape of our Cro-Magnon ancestor (the rhesus monkey RH that is missing in the RH-negative celtic /reptilian/eLIZaBETHan - I smell the blood of the An-gleish-m’an.) She even apologizes to us for raping our ancestors. We reprint below Inanna notes on Function of the Orgasm. This concept of the electrically critical role of orgasm in getting a soul into an egg for example is something completely unknown and foreign to the cloners, the rapers, and the American Medical Association which refuses to take the data to prove AUTISM linked to ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION (orgasm is a charge implosion event, critical to sucking in stellar capacitance/gravity).

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Innana or Ninhursag the lead Drac female children of Antu (Biki) family (which became the family of ’God’s’ described in most every culture on Earth) are CLEARLY the literal person today called origin GODDESS in all those same cultures (witness Gimbutas books). This lady (Goddess Dragon Queen / Mom - Innana - eLIZaBETH- from lizard born) is clearly telling us: she did not understand the insult to our native genepool implied when her half brother persuaded her to be the womb for an ape egg popped by Enki’s sperm.

She now feels the need to deal with the rape pain in the conception moment which effects every egg born since in that blood line (most of 4 billion ’souls’ here now). She was up to her ’tail’ in alligators having totally forgotten her initial intent was to drain the swamp (that is - redeem her fallen bloodline / genepool - humpty dumpty busted egg). HER ancestor Drac(g)o’s used the royal jelly of melatonin rich menstrual blood, later called Oil of Messeh / (crocodile juice) to make ’royal’ charge radiant child leaders (origins of the term MESSIAH as explained by Gardner who also calls this star fire from the flow-er). The skill to create avataric star navigators whose blood was fractal enough to make gravity was the ENTIRE STUFF OF LEGEND and cultural wisdom of the MAG / ASSURU / ORION QUEEN bloodline. (Study Dune’s Reverend Mothers - bee wings - ’Honey of the Queens’). The potential of a small surviving fragment of our genepool to be the vaccine in the Orion wars (older than Earth) lies specifically in the possibility we could become self-aware of the deep PRINCIPLES behind all those culturally ancient but largely unconscious legends about how to make kids immortal - hint: igniting DNA with biologically successful charge compression. That technology for fabricating successful genetic based star navigators is precisely what was on the line - the minute Enki / AbRAham telepathed back to his Dad ANTU on the home planet (Sirius was just an outpost for the home star Arrakeis in Alpha Draconis - with Thoth / Hermes son of Enki ancestry in Rigel). Enki said - hey Dad, I can genetically modify some local apes to be gold mining slaves, to feed our holy communion-spice-white gold powder, then life threatening addiction (since the Anunnaki staff carried expensively into Earth- named for EA/Enki - completely rebelled against the ghastly South African gold mining conditions).
Enlil / Yahweh was absolutely incensed that Dad gave Enki permission since he (Enlil) was a rule follower (later called Michael / Ahriman against Lucifer). The galactic rules were clear (and correct): IF YOU INTERFERE WITH INDIGENOUS GENEPOOLS ENDING THEIR FREEDOM, THE SKILL / GIFT of STAR NAVIGATING (bending gravity with ensouled implosive DNA) WILL BE LOST! What both brothers did not realize was that the potential did exist to make a genetic cross which would be an explosive combination of the best of ENKI’s winged Dragon ancestors because HIS mother was ensouled "Ptah Taal" lineage UNLIKE ENLIL. Clue: in the Sumerian where Enlil is informed only Enki (Akhanaton / Tut / Jesus ) line could be taught to bring people back from the dead... ensoul (which is really as simple as tieing the symmetry slip knot (ANU) which turns lightning into ball lightning. ) Enlil (Yahweh) like any good genepool harvesting businessman was very clear that the big dollars were made by the ones who could bend the gravity lines down the interstellar corridors. (Dune’s ’Guild Navigators’, Montauk’s "Time Empath". Jody Foster’s CONTACT Vehicle, DNA with gravity making implosion skills). BUT - Dad (ANtu) was willing to risk this intervention in the Prime Directive (Thou shalt set the characters in your dream free - if you are ever to learn from them). .. BECAUSE he felt his bloodline was doomed without the Gold Powder so abundant on Earth because of her self-embedded relationship to the gravity winds (fractality with respect to the projective geometry of capacitive charge squirted thru light speed - HOW stars experience gravity relations erotically).
The FALL of his bloodline (Nephilim: fallen ones) OUT of star bending implosive gravity making skill, was precisely part of the tragedy of the Orion Wars (humanoids ALMOST lost - when the Empire Strikes Back - for Empire read: BORG). This is what sent them scrambling for gold to Earth in the first place, Gold to fix (by fractal capactive field doping) home atmosphere - as Sitchin correctly interprets - AND Gold to EAT as Sitchin is afraid to admit, but Gardner deals with more openly (but ignores the cost to your soul of THAT addiction). So all the technology (all the kings horses and all the kings men) could not put this egg back together, a fractionated genepool precisely symbolized and contained in a broken EGG. In the course we deal with the fusing of soul groups into pods of sustainable bliss process and star navigating. This is called Amenti physics. AMENTI as Harmonic Implosion Bubble for Genepools... The Only Way Home? 2. We need to recognize, most of the human genepool was conceived out of a genetic engineering urge to fix a genetic disaster (the fall of the Nephilim is the loss of implosive ensoulment in the URU blood). The more advanced of the Draco line (the high winged Draco / ciakar / mothmen / true Saraphim - Cherubim ancestry) are correctly called SHINING ONES by Laurence Gardner. What he does not understand is what allows their blood to shine (be charge radiant) which we would suspect is very much the problem of the St. Germaine school Gardner represents. (Gold Powder addiction produces a parasitic technologically immortal but astral prison - no self-created gland juice= no accelerator ). The eggs-squeeze-site meaning of the Goddess Mothering EGG making urge is now to be the vessel or container for that perfect seed. She knows that when they came here, the reason Enki needed the ape egg was specifically because their family had lost the glandular capability to fire passion (something in EArth’s Ape ancestors they much envied). Today your government is genetically breeding your children to end the possibility of passion IF YOU LET THEM. The way not to let your government END the passion of your children (at the cost of their soul - and join the borg), is to TEACH a legitimate and scientific hygiene and practice of (immune building) BLISS! (ref 1, ref 2) The summary of this issue’s agony is that our genepool will mostly terminate here (between the solar compression called rapture and the nuclear repeat of Yahweh / Enlil history), SPECIFICALLY BECAUSE OUR SCIENCE DOES NOT EVEN BEGIN TO COMPREHEND THE PHYSICS THAT OUR DNA (genes) CAN AND MUST BE CHARGE IGNITED IN ORDER TO SUSTAIN / BECOME IMMORTAL. (much less even to create sustainable immune health).
The practice of this scientific hygiene for bliss to ignite our genes and aura - to blue fire - is specifically the subject of a course (Turin is full, Oslo, London, Amsterdam, Sydney Part 1’s - S. France, Mexico, Sydney Part 2’s) the manual in detail (particularly relevant to this conversation are the chapters on the electrical effect of bliss on climate and the environment).
The story called ’The 7th Seal’ has to do with the 7th spin symmetry of the tetra which from the sound of the heart in bliss - braids the DNA thickly finally (on the 7th recursive braid bending moebius back into ITSELF. Whom does the grail serve? A: Itself!) into the RING...(lord)
7 Arrows of the Heart and 7 Colors of the Rainbow, from the Hydrodynamics of the Perfect Ink Drop?
Even as the Montauk ’Deca’Delta time antenna could only be steered by the one (Time Empath) who’s DNA exhibited that ’boson 7’ spectral emission. In order to pre-see Nostre-Damus had to weep with feeling, in order to suck the future in to his presence.
The symmetry of what DOES ensoul / ignite DNA is precisely what eluded Yahweh/Enlil limited as he was to his genetic intervention software environment - tetra only symmetry for fields - called ’Hebrew alphabet’.
He did not FEEL well enough (prehend magnetic lines by his own blood emotion).
The frustrating limitations of his prescience, becomes painfully clear as he (Yahweh) later hides his identity as the ’encoder’ in Bible Code 2. He has the equipment to foresee tragic end to his genetic interventionism, but has not the being to change it (because genes not set free can never become self-steering that requires bliss/implosion). Everywhere we look the evidence is the history of Earth as a culture of external interventionist genetic engineers: witness George Merkel MD discovery (’Sumerian Elixir’ & the fractality of the mitochondrial ’chondriana’) that the Sumerian letter alphabet was merely the optical waveguide cookie cutter templates needed to focus coherent laser light to MAKE sub-cellular organelles. This too (like the Hebrew Alphabet) was a software environment for genetic interventionism.
The feminine urge now to track ensoulment back thru the fractal contiguous spin path to the first egg, is essentially correct, as the ensouling spin came from matematrix in every indigenous culture.
We might however note, in ceremonial magic you find your place of power by locating a slip knot of magnetism in the land just under where you underwent your later months in the womb. Or more accurately in aboriginal lore, mother runs to the shaman the first time she feels baby kick in the womb. They together carve a map of the magnetism of the land just under her body from that first moment. The stone on which they draw that shape of the lands magnetism just under, where she first felt him ’self-aware’ - becomes the title deed to the land the baby is later given custodial ’dreaming rights’.
By embedding ex-cathedrally the place of leverage (from the chair), a lens to the sun is born. The women who yearn to find Goddess... are yearning for the perfect fractal spin path home, which is by definition electrically perfect grounding, perfect fractality, perfect embedding, AND inPHIknit space in which to unpack spin/memory. U-be-quite-ous-ly eggs-qui-site.
We enjoyed Castaneda’s suggestion in ’MAGical Passes’ (Kinesthetic for Shamans: Tensegrity) that the REASON the womb in a woman functions as an organ of perception/for seeing, in a way that the more projective male sex organs cannot, is precisely the electrical suction (into the focus CALLED perception) which the fractality of female ’GODDESS’ EGG making invites!

https://i.redd.it/f846pb50fad61.gif
And to transition this story back to our empowering if promiscuous and cavalier Enki / EA / Merk / Ptah ... bloodline he did not really need Earth’s genepool to survive as a whole, because that never might have been possible. But it WOULD be soul-redeeming for the enterprise he began by illegally using his own sperm (abRA) to make the first fertile Eve... IF... the PRINCIPLES of ensouling/immortalizing genepools in the fire of passion/bliss COULD be somehow extracted teachable from this very small but ELegant kindergarten far from downtown..
This ’genesis’ -genes of isis- effect / ’lazarus effect’ principle could be used effectively to turn millions of planets green to feed staangel birth all over the galaxy, which by the way was Enki’s family’s more context rich homework assignment when they came here with falling DNA to mine gold powder to feed their addiction... starting our present genepool. Genepools skilled in bliss ignition fabricate the gravity bubble which fertilize star evolution, precisely what our orgasming Sun demands of us these next couple of ’rapture’ years. The real survivors of the rapture will be those who understand the electrical biological bliss hygiene of non-destructive compression, this may be somewhat bad news for those who thought addictive & disempowering miracle worship and personality worship was the rapture recipe (let’s break the news as gently to George Bush’s religious fundamentalist constituency, as he was with Arab people).

Summary : Ran SuperSquats, Gained 30lbs,
DNP == Did not Practice during program

Stat	Before	After
Height	5’9”	5’9”
Weight (Low to High in Day)	158-162lbs	187-191lbs
HB Squat	225 × 10, 300 × 1	315×20, ??? × 1
Bench	3 × 12 at 135 (1rp at 205)	12 × 245, 10 × 245, 8 × 245
Behind the Neck Overhead Press (Standing)	3 × 12 at 75	12 × 135, 9 × 135, 8 × 135
Regular OHP (DNP)	135 × 2	195
Barbell Row (Supinated Grip)	3 × 12 at 165	2 × 15 at 225
Deadlift (DNP)	315 × 10	405 × 5

Legs: https://imgur.com/a/lYqGBtk
Front: https://imgur.com/a/TeLwszS
Back: https://imgur.com/a/s3Xfts0

Background:

The first time I went to the gym, I had no idea why anyone would “squat”. I grew up playing soccer, and yet somehow had divorced the concepts of lower body functionality and lower body muscle. In fact, I remember having an argument with someone who lifted, where I took the position that people couldn’t even flex their legs. One of my friends eventually decided to take me to the gym, give me a big cup full of pre-workout, and had me max out my bench (115lbs!) and my smith machine squat (205lbs!). The next week, it was 10 × 10 regular squats at 115lbs. Something about the idea of becoming an indestructible juggernaut took hold, and a new passion was discovered.
I started out with the buff dudes program (pretty standard PPL, though I think it had things like legs and shoulders on the same day?), which after a couple months got me to a 205 bench and a 275 squat. Then, I found fitness and nsuns, which is the program that finally got all my friends to notice that I lift. After a couple months of amazing bench gains and so-so squat gains, I started regressing in all my lower body lifts, likely due to the combination of school stress, too much drinking, an unfortunate sleep schedule, and the sheer volume of the program. I ended up switching to 5/3/1 programming, which I stuck to for a year and gave me a 315lbs bench, 405lb squat, and 510lb deadlift.
Then, I stagnated in all my lifts for about a half-year as I mentally checked out of the process, due to the stress and changing priorities surrounding graduation. I went on to serve in the Peace Corps, which meant a lot of things to me, but for the purposes of this write up meant that I didn’t have access to a gym. During this time, I kept at it to some degree. There was a nearby playground that allowed for dips (with rings!) and pullups, and I would try to go 2 or 3 times a week to maintain and talk to the cool Ukrainians who could do muscle-ups and other gymnastic tricks. Never got any good at fancy tricks, but worked my way up to 15 ring dips and around 30 one-legged squats (holding a pole for balance), and made a few friends to boot.
COVID 19, as it has for so many people, ruined everything. Peace Corps was evacuated globally, with barely any notice or chance to say goodbye. I returned home in March, unsure of my future, and abandoned exercise entirely save for jogging. I used this time to study for and take the LSAT, play the guitar, and distract myself on long, extremely slow jogs. Around August I managed to get a decent job which I could do from home. I convinced my dad to split the cost of a home gym, and we found a barbell and 300lbs of weights on Facebook Marketplace for just $400. By this point, I had lost 20lbs and at least 100 pounds off all my lifts (except OHP). Drastic measures were needed…

Enter Super Squats

I read u/MythicalStrength ‘s post about it several years prior. The idea had an appeal to my insane side, but dude, really? 30lbs in 6 weeks? A projected 85lbs 20rep squat gain? Do your 10rm for 20 reps? I could accept the fact that people have done this, that it must be possible, but it seemed so completely removed from the reality of what I knew worked. Still, if this program would ever work, surely it would work for me, young, previously muscular, stuck at home with no significant hobbies. And the idea took root and wouldn’t let go. Maybe I could do it, and become not only as strong as I ever was, but even bigger and stronger.
I bought the book. I decided to run the regular 3 day a week program, with 3 by 12(ish) Standing Behind the Neck pressing, benching, and barbell rows. I did the behind-the-neck pressing during my lunch break and everything else after work. Dad, 52, hadn’t been lifting since COVID 19, with a previous bench 5RM of 185 and squat 5RM of 225. It may be considered abuse to have convinced him to run the program with me, but he didn’t die, so I don’t feel too guilty.

Upper body progression scheme:

As long as I could hit 12 reps on my first set, and the drop-off in subsequent sets wasn’t too steep, I would increase the weight. Strength progressed linearly workout to workout for a while, then week to week increases in weight. Sometimes I would up the bench by 10 pounds, just because. Bench has always been my best lift, and I lost far more bench strength than squat strength (likely due to the form being something I needed to dial in) , so I wasn’t too surprised by my rapid gains in that area. Behind the neck overhead press made my shoulders look incredibly wide and seems to have a strong carryover to regular overhead press, and has yet to cause any serious issues, so definitely a fan. I use a slightly wider grip for it than regular OHP, and only bring it down to the middle of my neck vs to my shoulders. I use a supinated grip with barbell rows, since I can usually feel it better in my lats that way. Not sure it really matter though. The pull-overs I am not convinced actually do anything, but they provide a nice stretch and gave me a break after the squatting.

How to Squat: Super Squat Style

Take your ten rep max, maybe your 12 rep max. Now, how are you going to do this for 20 reps? Months of dedicated strength training? Performance enhancing drugs? Possibly, but there is a third option: breath. Do a rep. Take a few deep breaths. Do another rep. Take a few deep deep breaths. Then another. The aim is an average of 3 deep breaths per rep. Practically, that might mean you knock out the first 5,6, or 7 as you would in a normal squat, and take 10 deep breaths for the last 3 reps. As I did it more often, I would go through various strategies. Generally, the faster you are able to do reps, the more likely your muscles will fail, your rep quality will suffer, and you’ll get trapped in the hole. The slower I did them, however, the more I felt like I was going to pass out. The only true rule is that you get the reps DONE. If it takes 2 minutes, 3 minutes, 4 minutes, 10 minutes, GET. IT. DONE. If you think you can cheat and just let the bar rest on your back, think again. Try standing 3 minutes straight with 300 pounds on your back, after doing 10 reps with your 10 rep max. Every workout, my back and core desperately begged me to just squat the damn weight and get it over with, while my legs bartered and pleaded for one more breath, and my lunges, they were royally screwed either way. There is no way to squat a 10rm for 20 reps and not get an amazing workout. Just do whatever it takes to make it work.
In my experience, it was easiest to knock them out with only one or two deep breaths for the first eight or so, then gradually ramp up the deep breathing as my muscles got closer and closer to failure. The slower I did them the worse the headache was, but it is not possible to do it much faster than 2 minutes, and sometimes (especially as the weight gets heavier) 3 or 4.
Furthermore, make sure the weight you pick makes you afraid. If, you're not dreading it, you probably picked too light of a weight. Not to say that straight sets of 20 don't have their place, but it would be a different program if, say, you could confidently get them all done continuously.

How to Overcome Fear

Now, this might sound unpleasant. And it is. This is by far the most unpleasant workout experience I have ever had. And after I did it once, I knew I would have to do it 2 days later, 5 pounds heavier. And then 5 pounds after that, and 5 pounds after that….
There is an entire section of the book on meditation and positive thinking. First, I would recommend reading that, and practicing visualization techniques. I personally did not do this very well. I instead decided to look at lifting forums constantly and read as much as possible about other people who have completed this program, or who recommend something similar. This worked in a way, but I also found the idea of the set taking over every aspect of my thinking life.
I eventually developed two different tactics, one to get me to stop obsessing over it while engaged in other tasks, and another to get me to actually get under the bar, when face to face with the weight.
First tactic: Denial and mockery. Dad and I would joke about the weight in an attempt to trivialize it. “It’s gonna be 5 pounds more than last time, that’s statistically insignificant”, “we’re gonna use the light plates next time, it’ll actually be less weight”, and the famous “no one has ever squatted X weight before, all have died on the spot, I don’t know if you can do it”. The concept here is that it’s just a heavy weight, just like we did last time, just like we’ll do next time. What does weight even mean? I’m not really sure. Therefore, how do I know that I’m really squatting more weight than last time? Probably will be easier dude. Adopting this attitude helped me relax and get my much-needed recovery.
Second tactic: Stop thinking. I remember getting under the bar, my quads still sore from 2 days ago. 5 more pounds. Not so statistically insignificant now, sadly. For me at least, to get under the bar, it’s not a matter of positive thinking, it was a matter of not thinking. I would say, I just have to do 1 rep. Then, once I did that rep, I would just have to do 1 more rep. I let the thought of the number of reps and the weight on the bar vanish, and just concentrated on doing each rep, until eventually, there were no more reps, and only I remained.

Why subject yourself to this?

When all is said and done, the true value of the program, the thing that makes it work, is not found in the insane diet, the weight, or the rep scheme. For three days a week I did something I was genuinely afraid of, and for three days a week I overcame it. Things that seemed impossible now might be on the table. Maybe I could gain 30 pounds of muscle in 6 weeks? Or out-deadlift Eddie Hall? Win Mr. Olympia? Delusional, yes , but that state of euphoria granted through the squatting is the anabolic drive that makes this program unique, and far more sustainable that it appears at surface level.
Or maybe all the progress comes from the pullovers for “ribcage expansion”? Hard to say.
Furthermore, I have never in my life found it easier to scarf down tons upon tons of food. Sure, a little bit of force feeding here and there, but the protein shakes, late night burgers, and massive egg salads are simply nothing compared to the squats. And I say this as someone who generally has had a hard time in previous programs meeting the eating requirements to gain weight. I only resorted to a half-gallon of milk a day (minimum milk requirement as of the book!), but I have no doubt that should my weight gain have stalled I could have forced the other half-gallon down.
If your squat form is halfway decent, you have no outstanding knee issues, and you can afford to and are willing to gain 20 to 30 pounds, then you can run and succeed on this program.

Diet, Sleep schedule

I ate likely 4000ish calories a day from the get-go, a full “see-food” diet.
Generally I'd wake up around 7:30am, prepare breakfast, and start work at 8:30am
Every morning I would have two or three fried eggs, each placed on a half-bagel and topped with salsa. I cooked the eggs with cheddar cheese and butter. Here: https://imgur.com/a/J67viRX
For lunch, 12:00pm, my dad would make a massive, massive salad, and fill it with vegetables, soft-boiled eggs, tuna, tomatoes, chicken and whatever else we could think of. No idea how many calories are in this, but usually probably around 40g of protein and loads of micronutrients. Example: https://imgur.com/a/JIo7Jjn
Between Lunch and Dinner, I would drink a quarter-gallon of milk with 3-4 scoops of protein powder and some peanut butter.
Dinner: Both my parents are great cooks. I can’t deny that I am a lucky individual. Chicken tacos and Beets Pasta were some of the best dishes.
Second Dinner: I would prepare a hamburger and after that would drink another quarter-gallon milk protein shake. Sometimes I would skip the hamburger if the first dinner was particularly satiating, but the milkshake was a constant. If I missed a meal, or ate too little that day, I would add a couple scoops of ice cream to the milkshake.
I added Second Dinner around week three after a bit of a stall in weight gain, and it did the trick. As in the lifting routine, do whatever is necessary. Some of the meals took 30 mins to an hour to eat do to being too stuffed but with an upcoming set of 20 reps it felt like there was a gun to my head, and the food managed to go down.
Honestly don't feel like I put on much fat at all till I got to 180lbs, which is fair since the most I've ever weighed prior to this program was 183lbs. Ab definition if anything got better from 160 to 170, maybe because of the muscle swelling up. Certainly did put on fat overall, but since I'm not fat and won't be going to a beach anytime soon, it's not particularly concerning.
After easing off the calories and cutting out second dinner for the week after the program finished, my resting weight is now closer to about 185lbs
No alcohol while running the program. I tried to get to bed by 11:00pm each night, and just let fate decide when I would actually fall asleep. People who are better at sleeping might see better results, but if I worry too much about sleeping I tend to sleep even less. Despite there being a couple of nights with only 5 hours of sleep, I was able to persevere.

Supplements

I take melatonin at night, Advil after some of the workouts, and a ridiculous quantity of protein powder. Besides that, nothing.

List of Aches and Pains

· Random and severe calf cramps, days 5 and 6 for me
· Terrible, Terrible quad DOMS (always), terrible ab DOMS for the 2nd and 3rd weeks
· Shoulders not happy, light BtN OHP day instead of heavy(me), regular OHP switch for Dad
· Light-headed, week 5 Friday Dad, had to stop at 17 reps for 200lbs
· Blurry vision, extreme nausea week 6 Monday me
· Knee pain, last 5 workouts (me). This was the only somewhat serious thing on this list that made me consider ending the program pre-maturely.

Additional thoughts and notes

I jogged, stretched, did Romanian deadlifts, and did ab work for the first 2 weeks. All of these were abandoned, though maybe a more dedicated lifter could find a way to fit them in.
We did bicep curls on a rest day sometimes
Random band work for shoulder mobility, rear delts, such as shoulder dislocations and face pulls. Didn't actually program this though, just did it when I felt like it.
Bought knee sleeves and wore them for the last 2 squat workouts.
Did a 10 pound jump for 3 plates, actually seemed easier than the previous workout due to it being the light at the end of the tunnel.
·Soreness reached it’s peak at week 2, then gradually declined. Friday week 2 was overall the most miserable of the workouts, and accomplishing that 20 at 250 made me feel happy for the rest of the evening.
Having a workout partner made this program far, far more doable than it otherwise might have been
I think there is a certain value to linear progression that I hadn't previously appreciated. When the program says that I MUST do 5 pounds more than I did last workout/week, it forces me to take factors outside the gym more seriously to accomplish that goal, and prevents me from using factors like mood, energy level as excuses. Versus most of the 5/3/1 programs, which gave me greater flexibility from workout to workout in terms of reps I had to accomplish. Less flexibility has some non-obvious advantages.
· Slept on average 7 hours a night, and was generally exhausted during the day. Didn’t impact my performance too heavily though.
· Had to get up in the middle of the night to pee several times. Unpleasant, but to be expected given the circumstances.

What comes next?

I feel obligated to keep all my upper body programming the same, since it appears to be working great and isn’t particularly miserable. Think I’m going to try and re-introduce deadlifts and jogging into my life and do a little less squatting. The 3-day a week schedule always made sense to me, because I like the high frequency and rest day combo. Only problem is 3-day full body makes incorporating movement variety harder. As for squats and deads, think I’ll move to a 5 scheme, maybe something along the lines of the Texas method. I believe my current maxes are higher than those that I tested, considering I haven’t practiced in the low-rep ranges in over a year, so there will be plenty of opportunities to express the strength I built on this program.
I’ll likely try and relax my diet at this point too, and just lift like a normal person for a while. While this program certainly worked, I am in no rush to try it again anytime soon. I think if I ever bulk to 200lbs or 210lbs, I’ll try the 2 day a week version and aim to go up to 405lbs for 20. For now though, I’d rather bring up lagging areas, improve my cardio, and if anything lose weight. My resting heart rate has gone up from the 50’s and 60’s to the 80’s while running this, and regardless of strength gains such rapid body recomposition certainly takes it’s toll. Any program recommendations will be considered and appreciated. It would be nice to figure out what my squat 1 rep max is, but I’ve been having some serious knee pain from squatting recently, which should be noted. I think if it weren't for the challenge, and it was just up to me, I would have taken a rest week after the third week and made this a 7 week program. But I didn't want to give myself any slack, in case that led to further deviations from the plan and the general abandoning of the program.
BONUS:
Dad Stats and Progress: Age: 52, Height 5'8"

Stat	Before	After
Weight	208lbs	215lbs
HB Squat	135×20	200×20
Overhead Press	5 × 95 AMRAP	3 sets of 5 × 135
Bench	3 set of 12 × 105	3 sets of 10 × 175
Chin-Up	1 regular, 6 if with resistance band	5 regular, loads with resistance bands
Deadlift (DNP)	235 × 1	3 sets of 225 × 5

Dad simply added a protein shake to his current diet (and, after further interviews, also sometimes secretly ate ice cream at night). He started out a bit heavier, and I think body recomposition is more viable with a higher starting bf %. His squat eventually ended up stalling around 195lbs, but he just started adding reps workout to workout until he got 200lbs for 20. Last week tried for a 1 rep max and hit 275lbs for a grinder, which is about 25 lbs. more than his pre-quarantine 1rpm. He also managed to bench 230lbs, 15lbs more than his highest bench total ever.
No pictures of him, but his shoulders are broader, his waist is slimmer, and his wife is happy.

Final Word

I did not expect this program to actually work, much less lead to a 30lbs gain in weight. I can't promise that there isn't some other program out there that wouldn't have given me similar gains, given that much of my effort was spent rebuilding previously held muscle. However, I am very, very happy with my results. I would strongly encourage anyone who can squat with good form and can afford to gain weight to run this program. In particular, if your gym has been or is currently in lockdown, and you've been out of action, this could be a game plan for quickly reclaiming any lost strength or size, and taking out all that aggression on a worthy foe.
N=2, I think if you're on the older side you might not be able to live the 90lbs dream, but 65lbs on a squat 20rm in 6 weeks accompanied by rapid upper body gains is still amazing. If anyone else wants to run this program, let me know how it goes! Just remember, you have to do what it takes to make it work.
Additional thanks to this community for being a resource to turn to for lifting discussions, and thanks to the people who encouraged me to post this review.

36 year old female Accountant, living in NW England with her husband H and dog.
All amounts are in GBP or AUD where applicable.
Section One: Assets and Debt
Debt- We have no debt thankfully.
Pension- I lived in Australia for 7 years on a very good salary, and I have $110k AUD in Superannuation (pension plan). I returned in 2016 and I have about £12k in pensions between my jobs since then.
Savings - £50k This is for our future house purchase. We were buying a bigger house when Covid hit and had to pull out, so I’m saving best as I can until the market settles.
Equity - We bought our house outright for £82k, and spent about £12k renovating it. We estimate it to be worth £100-110k now.
Section Two: Income
I am an accountant and I earn £2916 a month, however I pay £495 a month into my companies sharesave scheme as it was too good a deal to turn down.
H runs a small shop locally and we haven’t got round to completely pooling finances yet. As such I pay for most of the housing costs, and our weekly grocery shop. I also cover holidays, gigs, weekends away etc (when we could go) He then tends to cover more day to day fun stuff like eating and drinking out, and he also covers the horses. However I do tend to chip in too if we are doing a lot, as I do earn more.
Section Three: Expenses
Monthly Expenses:
Rent/Mortgage - £0. We own our house outright. The house we bought is a tiny two up two down terrace that doesn’t have an upstairs toilet. We bought it for £82k, and needed a lot of work. I am very ready to upgrade, but then Covid hit. Council tax - £119 - I pay Utilities (Water, electricity, gas) - £59- I pay TV Licence - £13 - I pay Wifi and TV- £35 - H pays Student loans - £0 - I had to pay them off when I moved to Australia in 2010 with my ex. That was for my bachelors degree in Accounting, my professional qualification my first employer paid for. Car payment - £0 - my employer has provided me with an electric car so I currently have no BIK Mobile phone - £10- I bought my phone outright. Netflix: £9.99- H pays Health, dental & vision - £0 My work covers medical which is included in the tax I pay Savings - whatever is left at the end of the month Gym - £75 Amazon prime - £7.99 Les Mills on Demand - £11.99 Simply cook- £7.99 Horse box tax - £20 - H pays Charitable Contributions - Nothing scheduled, however donate when things come up, and sponsor friends for events regularly.
Annual Expenses
D Car insurance - £180 (H pays) House insurance - £90 (H pays) Horse box insurance - £300 (H pays)
Christmas Day
5am- It’s Christmas! I wake up at 5am needing a wee, and decide to turn off my 7am alarm. I then wake up again at 8.45am! Eeek. I go downstairs and return with a cuppa for H and the dogs stocking (yes we are those people). He gets 10 tennis balls, 3 toys, 2 bones and a nice fleece blanket off us and his dog sitter so he is delighted.
9am - We make coffees and open our presents. We have a massive haul and I feel so incredibly spoilt. My highlight was a brand new fancy bridle for the pony I acquired in the summer from H, and I bought him a canvas print from a gallery we often walk past when we visit the coast.
10am - H goes outside to take the dog to the farm to do the horses, and it’s frozen solid. He finally leaves after a few false starts, and I crack on with the cooking. I make cauliflower cheese first, then assemble pigs in blankets, make Yorkshire pudding batter and then peel lots of potatoes, carrots and parsnips.
12pm - H and the dog return just as the chickens are about to go in and I shower, get dressed and pour a glass of champers. I find Turkey dry, and too big for 6 so I always roast 2 chickens. We are having H’s family round for lunch (the 4 live together). Unfortunately we had to cancel seeing mine as it was planned for Boxing Day!
2pm - Our guests turn up, H carves the chickens and I quickly knock together some gravy and boil some broccoli. We sit down and it’s all really good, we have a nice chat, and they head off, they really are easy guests.
4pm - H drives us down to give the nags their Christmas dinner of haylage and a few carrots. I check on a horse that belongs to a friend who had colic the other night and he seems fine, so we head home, it’s freezing!!! A Christmas evening of watching Sherlock, picking at roast chicken and slobbing out. Last dog wee and I’m in bed just after 10.
£0
Day 2 - Boxing Day
9am - Good morning from tier 3! Typical as I take time off to spend with H whose shop is closed for the period everything else closes too. We get up but can’t face breakfast so it’s coffees and a muesli bar then we head down the farm. We arrive to the incredibly sad news that the horse was found colicking again on a later check up (we all staggered our nightly feeding). The vet came out in the night and tried treating it 3 times but then had to call it a day. We are all so incredibly sad as he was a lovely kind boy, and I hide in my stable hugging my pony whilst he is collected.
12pm - I decide against riding but H helps me fit my bridle to the pony, and we head home to drop the dog off and heat up a bit of leftover cauliflower cheese. I bought H a months membership to the gym I go to whilst he is off, and I am so glad I did as it’s one of the only things that’s partially open now. We grab our togs and have a swim, followed by a very long soak in the jacuzzi. On our way out MIL rings to say that they have done the horses, so we head straight home.
4pm - I put on the fake oodie I got for Christmas, and we open a bottle of Lanson. We eat our body weight in nuts whilst watching the Hunger games.
6pm - A quick sandwich, and we follow it up with Catching Fire. Such good films. Whilst watching I browse Facebook and see that my favourite yoga instructors from the gym are back offering zoom classes as group classes have been cancelled in tier 3. I got into yoga in lockdown 1 as the gym offered it outside and I found that I didn’t hate it after all. I know the self employed gym instructors are really struggling right now, so I donate £20 to a charity class going ahead, as well as signing up to every class I can currently make. £24.5
Ridiculous squabble about the tv volume of all things, followed by bed.
Total - £44.5
Day 3- 27th December
8am - Wake up and scroll my phone for a bit whilst waiting for H to wake up, he brings coffee to bed and we let the dog up for a cuddle. We don’t bother with breakfast so head down to sort the horses. We feed, muck out and both ride, I have a lovely ride on my pony, whilst H rides his big event horse. Once done we head home before we freeze to death.
12.30pm - I quickly poach some eggs on toast for all of us, H and I eat them and I save the dogs for his tea! Afterwards we head back to the gym for a 30 min swim and a soak in the outdoor jacuzzi. On the way home I stop at Lidl just for some milk, cheese and crisps. £3.22. We’re off pony duty again tonight so straight home in the warm for us.
4pm - Once home I do 30 mins of yoga; and H watches the end of a film, then it’s pj’s, champagne and nuts/crisps whilst watching the first part of the Mockingjay film. During this my phone pops up with a reminder and it turns out that one of the yoga classes I signed up to is tonight. Funny thing is that H told me it was, but I was adamant it was tomorrow. Apparently it is indeed Sunday today. I’ve had half a bottle of champagne and I’m full of crisps; so I message the instructor to see if there is going to be a link to access. She saves my bacon and laughs at me a lot.
8pm - We don’t bother with a proper dinner again, just get out a cheeseboard we were bought from a friend whilst watching the last of the 4 films. I go on Moonpig and order our friend S a mug with photos of her horse to give her in a week or so when she is less raw. This cost £9.99 but I have an old PayPal balance. I’m now totally over sitting on the sofa, so the dog gets taken out, and we’re in bed pre 10pm.
£3.22
Day 4- 28th December
8am - I wake up needing a wee again and it’s snowed! I pinch H’s dressing gown and his crocs and take the dog out for a quick play as he’s barely seen snow before. He’s a bit unsure then jumps around like a loon. When I can’t feel my feet anymore I come in and turn my laptop on to check my emails. It’s a bank holiday today but I have stuck to my resolve of leaving it off so far (I’ve done a lot of hours lately). There is only one email to sort so I sort it, everyone else is clearly managing to take a break too.
9am - I take H a cup of tea and tell him we best go, snow and horses unfortunately do not mix well. We quickly make some toast, knock the snow off the car, drive down very slowly and arrive to the news that the weight of the snow has pulled down an old canopy roof over where the horses are shod, so we secure the area best as we can with barriers and cones, and I feed and muck out whilst H shovels snow in case it freezes again. A quick chat with his parents who have arrived and eat a few too many Haribo that someone has bought down, but it’s too cold for hanging around outside today!
2pm - We get home and make a sandwich each, and just have an hour to warm up, then we’re back down whilst it’s still light with a boot full of rock salt. Even the dog looks aghast at going out again so soon but needs must. H spreads this whilst I feed and water.
4pm - We decide as its still early to head back to the pool AGAIN. It’s really busy inside so even H who is a terrible wuss with a cold pool heads outside. Well it’s absolutely beautiful, I only get 25 mins out of him before he wants the jacuzzi but it’s stunning in the dark in a heated outdoor pool. We poach in the jacuzzi until I feel slightly lightheaded then shower, change at home.
6pm - Home James. I feel vegetable deprived, and also deprived of my favourite hobby - cooking. I have a simply cook pack of Sicilian roast chicken spices so I roast chicken breasts, mash potatoes and roast some leftover carrots and parsnips to have with sweetcorn and the left over Christmas stuffing (for H). We stick on a Sherlock and eat away! It’s lovely. I made enough for leftovers for lunch but H ate them! We watch tv for a bit longer but are really tired so a last quick dog walk and then to bed.
Total - £0
Day 5- 29th December
8am - So i’m not actually on leave today technically, but I’ve agreed I’ll log the hours worked and sort it out later. Check my e-mails but only a few bits to sort so do it right away. Scrambled eggs on toast and coffees and it’s off we go. It luckily hasn’t snowed further, but it’s very cold so very icy and slippy. All the family are down helping this morning so not loads to do. H rides his horse but the rest of us try to stay warm.
12pm - It’s time to do the supermarket shop, thankfully everything is in stock. I buy far too much stuff including tulips, toilet roll, beer for H, loads of chicken and as there are discounts on washing powder and cleaning products those too. 2 massive bags come to £64.73.
3pm - Once home and unloaded I do an hours work, then download the yoga class I got the link for the other day. When done I heat up some quiche. I did the yoga on our bedroom and the floor is really grotty so I grab H and we dust, hoover, change the bedding and put laundry away, looks so much better afterwards. H fancies a nap and I read my book.
6pm - We scrap the pool today, and I check my work emails again then potter about chopping veg for dinner. I’m making a SimplyCook recipe of linguine with chicken and veg. It tastes far more decadent than it is, as the sauce has reduced fat creme fraiche but tastes like cream!
8pm - We eat and watch Sherlock. I search on line for new lululemon leggings. I love them, and I can do everything in them, but I struggle with the nulux fabric as they slide down, so I have had rubbish luck lately (hence my PayPal balance from reselling). I ask a couple of questions and make a couple of offers on eBay, but I spot what I think could be the perfect pair on the lulu sale, so I pop in an order £64.99. I also book tickets for a local winter light walk that was recommended by a friend, £49 (this seems very expensive, but maybe the only thing we get to do in January. To bed we go!
Total - £178.73 (ouch)
Day 6 - 30th December
8am - Wake up naturally again. Going to struggle to bring this forward by 90 minutes before too long. Dog wee and check e-mails, still quiet. I got a counter offer off a pair of leggings but decide to hold off as I bought a pair yesterday. It’s my charity yoga class this morning so I set up in the bedroom, and H heads down for breakfast with the dog.
10.30am - Was a lovely class and for a great homeless charity. The mug I ordered for S has arrived and it’s rubbish, all the adjustments I made on the photos had reset, and I’m really disappointed as it looks so random, half the horses head gone and people in it sweeping the yard. I show H who says it’s funnier that way, and I should give it to her anyway! I make a coffee in my to go mug and grab a muesli bar and off we go. It’s snowed again and the yard is frozen solid. It’s the glamorous side of horse ownership when the taps freeze and you have to shovel horse poo all over the concrete to stop people slipping everywhere. Wouldn’t have it any other way but it’s rather cold! I find S and give her the mug, and she cries and laughs so I think the comedy mug worked. Not really safe to get the horses out on the ice so neither of us ride, and we come home for a warm up.
12.30 - I heat up a bit of the leftover chicken and veg from last night and H has cheese. We watch a Sherlock and are intending on doing very little. However, up pops Matt Hancock and we’re in tier 4 from midnight. That means no gym. And whilst it isn’t really swimming outside kinda weather, we are stupid so do it anyway. Half an hour swim then to the jacuzzi.
6pm - Get home and potter about doing jobs. End up accepting the offer on those Lulu leggings as it looks like I’m going to be living in them. £50. Also book onto another special yoga class, £7.50 and see that a Les Mills presenter is doing combat classes on zoom so book onto 3 of those next week £11. I do need to stop doing this now and use my Les Mills app but I do like the classes and know the instructors appreciate the income.
8pm - I heat up some chilli from the freezer, and we rent the new Roald Dahl Witches film on Prime. £4.99. We really enjoy it (nothing beats the original though). I text my best friend and brother who use my Prime, to see if they want to watch it. Straight to bed, read for a bit and then sleep.
Total - A rather unnecessary £73.50 but hopefully an enjoyable £73.50!
Day 7- 31st December
8am - Hello from Tier 4 (FML). I had a terrible nights sleep last night, just felt really flat. Emails checked. Dog taken out (he has access to our yard 24/7 but does he choose to wee there?! Of course not.) Toast and marmite for me (jam for H) and coffees from the nespresso machine. To the horses we go, bit easier today, we have a working tap. On the way past we see a car gone into someone’s front garden in the village. What a rubbish day they all must have had.
1.30pm - Home and a microwave pizza for me, and a sandwich for H. I do a little bit of work as what I have been waiting for has come through, and then just really feel the need to start cleaning. The dog moults a lot and us being in and out from the farm doesn’t lead to clean floors.
3.30pm - I mop us out of the house as we are on pony duty tonight. We’re done in record time and then it’s back home in the warm. We open a bottle of Laurent Perrier that work got me! Very nice indeed. Watch some more Sherlock.
7pm - We order Pizza Hut £30, and play cards. Make some resolutions including dry January, and fitness and weight for me. Make it just until midnight, then straight to bed and sleep. Happy new year!!
Total - £30
Definitely spent a lot this week considering we couldn’t really go anywhere. Still hopefully I have a couple of nice pairs of lululemon leggings on the way, and that the weather is kind enough for the light show. We’ll do nothing but work and the horses through January so should even it off a bit!

by Paul Connett, PhD
November 28, 2002 from FluorIdealAlert Website

Water fluoridation is a peculiarly American phenomenon. It started at a time when Asbestos lined our pipes, lead was added to gasoline, PCBs filled our transformers and DDT was deemed so "safe and effective" that officials felt no qualms spraying kids in school classrooms and seated at picnic tables. One by one all these chemicals have been banned, but fluoridation remains untouched.
For over 50 years US government officials have confidently and enthusiastically claimed that fluoridation is "safe and effective". However, they are seldom prepared to defend the practice in open public debate. Actually, there are so many arguments against fluoridation that it can get overwhelming.
To simplify things it helps to separate the ethical from the scientific arguments.
For those for whom ethical concerns are paramount, the issue of fluoridation is very simple to resolve. It is simply not ethical; we simply shouldn't be forcing medication on people without their "informed consent". The bad news is that ethical arguments are not very influential in Washington, DC unless politicians are very conscious of millions of people watching them. The good news is that the ethical arguments are buttressed by solid common sense arguments and scientific studies which convincingly show that fluoridation is neither "safe and effective" nor necessary.
I have summarized the arguments in several categories:
- Fluoridation is UNETHICAL because:

It violates the individual's right to informed consent to medication.
The municipality cannot control the dose of the patient.
The municipality cannot track each individual's response.
It ignores the fact that some people are more vulnerable to fluoride's toxic effects than others. Some
people will suffer while others may benefit.
It violates the Nuremberg code for human experimentation.

As stated by the recent recipient of the Nobel Prize for Medicine (2000), Dr. Arvid Carlsson:

"I am quite convinced that water fluoridation, in a not-too-distant future, will be consigned to medical history... Water fluoridation goes against leading principles of pharmacotherapy, which is progressing from a stereotyped medication - of the type 1 tablet 3 times a day - to a much more individualized therapy as regards both dosage and selection of drugs. The addition of drugs to the drinking water means exactly the opposite of an individualized therapy."

As stated by Dr. Peter Mansfield, a physician from the UK and advisory board member of the recent government review of fluoridation (McDonagh et al 2000):

"No physician in his right senses would prescribe for a person he has never met, whose medical history he does not know, a substance which is intended to create bodily change, with the advice: 'Take as much as you like, but you will take it for the rest of your life because some children suffer from tooth decay.' It is a preposterous notion."

- Fluoridation is UNNECESSARY because:

Children can have perfectly good teeth without being exposed to fluoride.
The promoters (CDC, 1999, 2001) admit that the benefits are topical not systemic, so fluoridated toothpaste, which is universally available, is a more rational approach to delivering fluoride to the target organ (teeth) while minimizing exposure to the rest of the body.
The vast majority of western Europe has rejected water fluoridation, but has been equally successful as the US, if not more so, in tackling tooth decay.
If fluoride was necessary for strong teeth one would expect to find it in breast milk, but the level there is 0.01 ppm , which is 100 times LESS than in fluoridated tap water (IOM, 1997).
Children in non-fluoridated communities are already getting the so-called "optimal" doses from other sources (Heller et al, 1997). In fact, many are already being over-exposed to fluoride.

- Fluoridation is UNSAFE because:

It accumulates in our bones and makes them more brittle and prone to fracture. The weight of evidence from animal studies, clinical studies and epidemiological studies on this is overwhelming. Lifetime exposure to fluoride will contribute to higher rates of hip fracture in the elderly.
It accumulates in our pineal gland, possibly lowering the production of melatonin a very important regulatory hormone (Luke, 1997, 2001).
It damages the enamel (dental fluorosis) of a high percentage of children. Between 30 and 50% of children have dental fluorosis on at least two teeth in optimally fluoridated communities (Heller et al, 1997 and McDonagh et al, 2000).
There are serious, but yet unproven, concerns about a connection between fluoridation and osteosarcoma in young men (Cohn, 1992), as well as fluoridation and the current epidemics of both arthritis and hypothyroidism.
In animal studies fluoride at 1 ppm in drinking water increases the uptake of aluminum into the brain (Varner et al, 1998).
Counties with 3 ppm or more of fluoride in their water have lower fertility rates (Freni, 1994).
In human studies the fluoridating agents most commonly used in the US not only increase the uptake of lead into children's blood (Masters and Coplan, 1999, 2000) but are also associated with an increase in violent behavior.
The margin of safety between the so-called therapeutic benefit of reducing dental decay and many of these end points is either nonexistent or precariously low.

Fluoridation is INEQUITABLE, because:

It will go to all households, and the poor cannot afford to avoid it, if they want to, because they will not be able to purchase bottled water or expensive removal equipment.
The poor are more likely to suffer poor nutrition which is known to make children more vulnerable to fluoride's toxic effects (Massler & Schour 1952; Marier & Rose 1977; ATSDR 1993; Teotia et al, 1998).
Very rarely, if ever, do governments offer to pay the costs of those who are unfortunate enough to get dental fluorosis severe enough to require expensive treatment.

Fluoridation is INEFFICIENT and NOT COST-EFFECTIVE because:

Only a small fraction of the water fluoridated actually reaches the target. Most of it ends up being used to wash the dishes, to flush the toilet or to water our lawns and gardens.
It would be totally cost-prohibitive to use pharmaceutical grade sodium fluoride (the substance which has been tested) as a fluoridating agent for the public water supply. Water fluoridation is artificially cheap because, unknown to most people, the fluoridating agent is an unpurified hazardous waste product from the phosphate fertilizer industry.
If it was deemed appropriate to swallow fluoride (even though its major benefits are topical not systemic) a safer and more cost-effective approach would be to provide fluoridated bottle water in supermarkets free of charge. This approach would allow both the quality and the dose to be controlled. Moreover, it would not force it on people who don't want it.

- Fluoridation is UNSCIENTIFICALLY PROMOTED. For example:

In 1950, the US Public Health Service enthusiastically endorsed fluoridation before one single trial had been completed.
Even though we are getting many more sources of fluoride today than we were in 1945, the so called "optimal concentration" of 1 ppm has remained unchanged.
The US Public health Service has never felt obliged to monitor the fluoride levels in our bones even though they have known for years that 50% of the fluoride we swallow each day accumulates there.
Officials that promote fluoridation never check to see what the levels of dental fluorosis are in the communities before they fluoridate, even though they know that this level indicates whether children are being overdosed or not.
No US agency has yet to respond to Luke's finding that fluoride accumulates in the human pineal gland, even though her finding was published in 1994 (abstract), 1997 (Ph. D. thesis), 1998 (paper presented at conference of the International Society for Fluoride Research), and 2001 (published in Caries Research).
The CDC's 1999, 2001 reports advocating fluoridation were both six years out of date in the research they cited on health concerns.

Fluoridation is UNDEFENDABLE IN OPEN PUBLIC DEBATE
The proponents of water fluoridation refuse to defend this practice in open debate because they know that they would lose that debate. A vast majority of the health officials around the US and in other countries who promote water fluoridation do so based upon someone else's advice and not based upon a first hand familiarity with the scientific literature. This second hand information produces second rate confidence when they are challenged to defend their position. Their position has more to do with faith than it does with reason.
Those who pull the strings of these public health 'puppets', do know the issues, and are cynically playing for time and hoping that they can continue to fool people with the recitation of a long list of "authorities" which support fluoridation instead of engaging the key issues. As Brian Martin made clear in his book Scientific Knowledge in Controversy: The Social Dynamics of the Fluoridation Debate (1991), the promotion of fluoridation is based upon the exercise of political power not on rational analysis.
The question to answer, therefore, is:

"Why is the US Public Health Service choosing to exercise its power in this way?"

Motivations - especially those which have operated over several generations of decision makers - are always difficult to ascertain. However, whether intended or not, fluoridation has served to distract us from several key issues.

It has distracted us from:

The failure of one of the richest countries in the world to provide decent dental care for poor people.
The failure of 80% of American dentists to treat children on Medicaid.
The failure of the public health community to fight the huge over consumption of sugary foods by our nation's children, even to the point of turning a blind eye to the wholesale introduction of soft drink machines into our schools. Their attitude seems to be if fluoride can stop dental decay why bother controlling sugar intake.
The failure to adequately address the health and ecological effects of fluoride pollution from large industry. Despite the damage which fluoride pollution has caused, and is still causing, few environmentalists have ever conceived of fluoride as a 'pollutant.'
The failure of the US EPA to develop a Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) for fluoride in water which can be scientifically defended.
The fact that more and more organofluorine compounds are being introduced into commerce in the form of plastics, pharmaceuticals and pesticides.

Despite the fact that some of these compounds pose just as much a threat to our health and environment as their chlorinated and brominated counterparts (i.e. they are highly persistent and fat soluble and many accumulate in the food chains and our body fat), those organizations and agencies which have acted to limit the wide-scale dissemination of these other halogenated products, seem to have a blind spot for the dangers posed by organofluorine compounds.
So while fluoridation is neither effective nor safe, it continues to provide a convenient cover for many of the interests which stand to profit from the public being misinformed about fluoride.
Unfortunately, because government officials have put so much of their credibility on the line defending fluoridation, it will be very difficult for them to speak honestly and openly about the issue. As with the case of mercury amalgams, it is difficult for institutions such as the American Dental Association to concede health risks because of the liabilities waiting in the wings if they were to do so.
However, difficult as it may be, it is nonetheless essential - in order to protect millions of people from unnecessary harm - that the US Government begin to move away from its anachronistic, and increasingly absurd, status quo on this issue. There are precedents. They were able to do this with hormone replacement therapy.
But getting any honest action out of the US Government on this is going to be difficult. Effecting change is like driving a nail through wood - science can sharpen the nail but we need the weight of public opinion to drive it home. Thus, it is going to require a sustained effort to educate the American people and then recruiting their help to put sustained pressure on our political representatives. At the very least we need a moratorium on fluoridation (which simply means turning off the tap for a few months) until there has been a full Congressional hearing on the key issues with testimony offered by scientists on both sides. With the issue of education we are in better shape than ever before. Most of the key studies are available on the internet and there are videotaped interviews with many of the scientists and protagonists whose work has been so important to a modern re-evaluation of this issue.
With this new information, more and more communities are rejecting new fluoridation proposals at the local level. On the national level, there have been some hopeful developments as well, such as the EPA Headquarters Union coming out against fluoridation and the Sierra Club seeking to have the issue re-examined. However, there is still a huge need for other national groups to get involved in order to make this the national issue it desperately needs to be.
I hope that if there are RFW readers who disagree with me on this, they will rebut these arguments. If they can't than I hope they will get off the fence and help end one of the silliest policies ever inflicted on the citizens of the US. It is time to end this folly of water fluoridation without further delay. It is not going to be easy.
Fluoridation represents a very powerful "belief system" backed up by special interests and by entrenched governmental power and influence.

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