Orginally, I was gonna tell the scale to fuck off in this post, just like Weight Watchers, but then I realized that all the harm the scale has caused really isn't the scale's fault. The problem is mine/ours: we keep trying to get it tell us info it just isn't designed to tell us. (And it could also be related to the fact that WW, who needs to fuck off, uses that scale so much. Hmm. Still mad.)
I think we've already more or less covered the story of the WW scale weigh in: the nervousness, the lightweight outfit...getting a star if the lady thinks you did good...did we talk about pooping beforehand? Here's another story for you:
In the spring of 2011 when I first started seeing a nutritionist, she did a baseline body composition test on me. I'm not talking about a test with calipers, unkindly applied to your fatty fat by a gym teacher or a sophmore kinesiology major at 24 Hour Fitness. I mean a sophicated, many thousands of dollars machine that measures your body fat, water, and lean mass including bone and muscle by sending some electricity...to...do some...stuff. We like to pretend that all that matters is monitoring the fat, but in reality we know that we are made up of all of these things, and that the water and muscle also fluctuate in ways good and bad. Body comp provides ALL the information.
So after doing a food based cleanse for about two weeks, where I felt great...if a little starved, I went back in to check and discuss my body's response. Carly always has you get on the scale first. I'm not totally sure of her purpose for that, but for me it was interesting proof of the utter lack of relationship between the two sets of numbers. Anyhow at the first check-in, the scale said I was down 7lbs! A WW leader would have done a cartwheel. Doesn't that sound fantastic? Doesn't that mean you should keep eating exactly the same thing since it is WORKING?
You know me too well...the answer is no. When we did the body comp, it revealed that I had actaully lost 5.5 lbs of muscle and only 1.5 lbs of fat. As you may know, Miss Lady is made up of many proud muscles and lots of glitter. Since I didn't want to lose any muscle, because I need it, and because muscle loss looks unpleasant to me, and because the point of nutrition is not to become weak and jiggly, we knew we had to change this. She ordered me to eat more MORE protein, up to 8oz per meal, and though we still haven't gotten to the bottom of the lack of fat loss, I have never lost any more muscle, and I generally can at least maintain my weight without feeling starved.
What strikes me too about this story, is how the converse would have played out at a WW meeting, or, to be fair, in any situation where the scale is the only real measure: If you work your ass out, let's say doing something badass like roller derby or boxing or powerlifting, you will gain muscle. Muscle weighs more than fat, so even if you lose fat too, your overall number might be larger. Its my understanding too that muscle retains water while it is building (or somesuch, no need to belabor the science if it holds up) so it is also possible to have the water number increase. In a scenario like this, you could have your muscle go up 5lbs, your water go up 1lb temporarily, and your fat decrease by 3lbs. Even though that is actally a kick ass situation for your body, if you only look at the scale, you will think you have gained 3 damn lbs of badness. If you are in a weigh-in situation, you will get a pitying head tilt. You will stress and wonder how to change your diet and if you will ever lose weight and if the world is fair at all, when you should be congratulating yourself.
So, what to do? I'd say throw out the scale, but it is one of the cheaper, more widely available ways to evaluate your body mass. The body composition tests are not everywhere and are not cheap, though I do think they are worth the money and time at least a few times a year. Of course, I am a big fan of measuring. For two dollars, that damn thing tells me plenty...though I do have to be careful to remeber that my measurements can vary for reasons like sneaky gluten bloating or lady cycles.
The solution really seems to be in not asking too much of the scale. I know, as well or better than anyone, how much you want it to tell you whether or not you'll ever lose weight or if people think you are pretty...or even just what the numbers mean that week, but it can't. Yes, if you weigh 20 lbs less on a scale after two months, you can probably say that some of your choices are producing fat loss. Or if you weight 20lbs more and can't find any new bulging muscles, you might make some assumptions from there. But on a week to week or day to day basis...all it can tell you is what your muscle and bone and water and fat add up to be. Nothing else.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
News: "Ahead of the curve"
In foot/ankle/leg news, I visited the doctor today. After a very scary weight-bearing x-ray, the doc pronounced that my leg looked good, and that I am, in fact, "ahead of the curve."
What do I attribute being "ahead of the curve" to? You guessed it: nutrition. Avoiding processed foods, which are inflamtory to all kinds a people AND taking up space in your belly while being anutritional. Avoiding foods that are inflamatory to me, such as copious cow dairy. Eating plenty of calories-- not like Seymour gave me any other choice. Eating all the protein I could. And taking fish oil.
So there you have it. My doctor indicated that it was a good plan and definitely one I should stick with if it seems to help. He also said I should write a book, which is something people say to me here and there. Hmm...
What do I attribute being "ahead of the curve" to? You guessed it: nutrition. Avoiding processed foods, which are inflamtory to all kinds a people AND taking up space in your belly while being anutritional. Avoiding foods that are inflamatory to me, such as copious cow dairy. Eating plenty of calories-- not like Seymour gave me any other choice. Eating all the protein I could. And taking fish oil.
So there you have it. My doctor indicated that it was a good plan and definitely one I should stick with if it seems to help. He also said I should write a book, which is something people say to me here and there. Hmm...
Saturday, October 13, 2012
Look out your damn window for unicorns...
or to see if hell froze over or something.
So this needs its own separate post, just to highlight it: I lost a small amount of weight, seemingly fat, while not able to exercise, or even move around that much.
Yes, people it can be done. No, it isn't drastic. Yes, my metabolism is probably still jacked in some way. (Side note: I have blood test results waiting for me, but my gyno is located on top of one of the biggest hills in Austin. No, I'm not going there in a wheelchair or on a kneeling scooter. Soon though.) I haven't had a body comp done, but I am pretty sure I lost fat along with the inevitable loss of muscle that comes with this--seriously, I have one bird leg.
My current measurements are something like this:
Overbust: 45
Waist 34
Hips 45
And my clothes don't be bothering me like they were. It's also possible that a lot of this is getting rid of BLOAT, which seems to have partially returned once I started up with the bourbon and coffee, but even if I actually didn't lose any fat...I didn't gain any, which is a miracle*. So now you should look for a unicorn.
*Not God, people--my friends, who have helped me eat right despite not being able to prepare much myself. Special shout out to Joan Jolt, who preps the food ALL the days.
So this needs its own separate post, just to highlight it: I lost a small amount of weight, seemingly fat, while not able to exercise, or even move around that much.
Yes, people it can be done. No, it isn't drastic. Yes, my metabolism is probably still jacked in some way. (Side note: I have blood test results waiting for me, but my gyno is located on top of one of the biggest hills in Austin. No, I'm not going there in a wheelchair or on a kneeling scooter. Soon though.) I haven't had a body comp done, but I am pretty sure I lost fat along with the inevitable loss of muscle that comes with this--seriously, I have one bird leg.
My current measurements are something like this:
Overbust: 45
Waist 34
Hips 45
And my clothes don't be bothering me like they were. It's also possible that a lot of this is getting rid of BLOAT, which seems to have partially returned once I started up with the bourbon and coffee, but even if I actually didn't lose any fat...I didn't gain any, which is a miracle*. So now you should look for a unicorn.
*Not God, people--my friends, who have helped me eat right despite not being able to prepare much myself. Special shout out to Joan Jolt, who preps the food ALL the days.
Friday, October 12, 2012
Meal Planning FTW
So, if anything good has come out of my otherwise fairly shite experience breaking my leg, it has been the relative mastery of several distinct types of organization-- work clothes, house shit, and eatins preparation aka meal planning.
So, it turns out that if you plan out some meals, and then make a grocery list, and then go to the store (or send your friend), and then make those meals (or have your friend do it), and then eat those meals (with your friend), you'll be totally organized in the eatins arena. Make all the meals! Oh, you have to make time to do all this btw, instead of doing other no-so-adult stuff non-stop, which is probably where I was going wrong before.
Weekend schedule before leg break: Breakfast, yoga, park, lunch, shop for sparkly things, hair, bourbon, breakfast, derby, lunch/dranks, park, yoga, laundry--maybe, sleep.
Weekend schedule now: Breakfast, park, lunch, shop for sparkly things...oh wait. This is almost the same. Well anyhow, I make time for meal planning now.
If you are curious, basically I brainstorm meals based on what I already have and would like to have, like any good writing teacher. Then I plug those meals into a umm...quick graphic organizer/rough draft wherein I plug meals in for dinner and plan to have the same thing for at least one more meal, most likely lunch the next day. Oh jesus...then I write a final draft.
Eatins, approximately anyhow:
Tues Sept 25th
Eggs + bacon
Lunch: Maybe Vindaloo? Not sure.
Dinner: Fresa's chicken with beans, two tortillas, and street corn. AND a side of Junot Diaz, the Pultizer Prize winner, who kissed me. That's right.
Snacks: Beer
Wed Sept 26th
Day off from work: Tacodeli and coffee!
Elevation burger-- lettuce wrapped burgers...with a few fries...cooked in olive oil.
Maybe something else.
Chicken Vindaloo...cooked for the next day...but I'm pretty sure I had a bit at night, as the burger was kinda early.
Thur Sept 27th
Egg Cups with chicken sausage and carrots and yellow tomatoes
Chicken Vindaloo
Tarka-- Chicken Korma with brown rice I brought there my own self. Why no brown rice world?
Fri Sept 28th
Sat Sept 29
Tacodeli-- 3 Ottos
Dinners: Sweet chili chicken with basil and brown rice, small portion. Then, rice paper sushi rolls from Whole Foods.
Sun Sept 30
The DAY OF EIGHT TORTILLAS...I see now that this week has way too many corn tortillas in general.
Tacodeli
Lunch: ?
Dinner: Fresas chicken with uh...tortillas, plus rice and beans, and street corn.
Mon Oct 1
2 eggs cups w oatmeal
Lunch:
Dinner:
Tue Oct 2
2 egg cups w oatmeal
Lunch:
Thai beef salad on greens--beef, sweet chili, basal, mint, greens.
Snacks: Larabars
Wed Oct 3
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries almonds
Thai Beef Salad with brown rice-- beef, sweet chili, basal, mint.
Thur Oct 4
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Thur Oct 4
Egg cups?
Lunch: chicken and greens?
Dinner: Chicken salad with Latin Quinoa Salad from Central Market
Fri Oct 5
2 Egg cups with oatmeal
Lunch: Crazy salad with chicken strips-- I think.
Dinner: Zen stirfry stuff
Snacks: Four Roses bourbon-- Eff You Teaching Career!
Sat Oct 6
Tacodeli Ottos--2 w coffee
Lunch: Big Daddy's bacon cheeseburger salad--meh
Dinner: Chicken salad with carrots and hummus and latin quinoa salad
Snacks: Bourbon and beer!
Sun Oct 7
Tacodeli Ottos--2 w coffee
Whole Foods Brown Rice Salmon Sushi
Mon Oct 8
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Lunch: Can't remember...the schedule says it was supposed to be Chicken Vindaloo...but the dog ate that, so it can't be right. I think it was a crazy salad with salami.
Steak, Aspargus, Fingerling Potatoes
Tue Oct 9
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Steak, Aspargus, and Fingerling Potatoes
Crazy salad-- Curry chicken salad, tomatoes, almonds, hummus, erething, greens, the kitchen sink.
Wed Oct 10
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Lunch: Curry Chicken Salad with hummus and tomatoes and greens and berries- aka crazy salad.
Dinner: Beet salad with pork belly and one beer from Black Star Coop.
Snacks: Larabars
Thur Oct 11
Breakfast: Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Lunch: Curry Chicken Salad + Quinoa salad (both courtesy of Lushie aka The Duchess) on a bed of greens with tomatoes. Pickle.
Dinner: Half- serving of Zen, double chicken on brown rice with veggies and peanut sauce.
Snacks: Larabars
Friday Oct 12-- This was a weird, disorganized eatin day actually.
Breakfast: Eggs and bacon, iced coffee
Snacks: Two thunderbird bars
Lunch: Chicken salad and brown rice
Dinner: Latin Lushie Quinoa, Slice o brisket
Dinner: salami, hummys, Latin Lushie Quinoa
Sat Oct 13
Breakfast: Tacodeli--2 Ottos on corn, 1 Otto no tortilla
Lunch: uhh...breakfast was lunch
Dinner: WF pork loin, sweet potatoes, aspargus
Snack: Almond Delight smoothie
Note: I don't always note it, but a crazy salad could include any or ALL of the following: baked chicken, turkey slices, salami, avocado, boiled eggs, panchetta, bacon, hummus, tomatoes, greens, other hummus, berries.
Leftouts: It seems that I left out many Larabars, some bananas, some sweet potatoes, and some chicken tenders. And a whole bottle of bourbon. Actually, I know where that goes...so I'll edit. Well, I didn't drink it all myself, but I had a good amount.
Also, sometimes we follow the plan exactly; sometimes we don't...but we are always better off for having it.
So, it turns out that if you plan out some meals, and then make a grocery list, and then go to the store (or send your friend), and then make those meals (or have your friend do it), and then eat those meals (with your friend), you'll be totally organized in the eatins arena. Make all the meals! Oh, you have to make time to do all this btw, instead of doing other no-so-adult stuff non-stop, which is probably where I was going wrong before.
Weekend schedule before leg break: Breakfast, yoga, park, lunch, shop for sparkly things, hair, bourbon, breakfast, derby, lunch/dranks, park, yoga, laundry--maybe, sleep.
Weekend schedule now: Breakfast, park, lunch, shop for sparkly things...oh wait. This is almost the same. Well anyhow, I make time for meal planning now.
If you are curious, basically I brainstorm meals based on what I already have and would like to have, like any good writing teacher. Then I plug those meals into a umm...quick graphic organizer/rough draft wherein I plug meals in for dinner and plan to have the same thing for at least one more meal, most likely lunch the next day. Oh jesus...then I write a final draft.
Eatins, approximately anyhow:
Tues Sept 25th
Eggs + bacon
Lunch: Maybe Vindaloo? Not sure.
Dinner: Fresa's chicken with beans, two tortillas, and street corn. AND a side of Junot Diaz, the Pultizer Prize winner, who kissed me. That's right.
Snacks: Beer
Wed Sept 26th
Day off from work: Tacodeli and coffee!
Elevation burger-- lettuce wrapped burgers...with a few fries...cooked in olive oil.
Maybe something else.
Chicken Vindaloo...cooked for the next day...but I'm pretty sure I had a bit at night, as the burger was kinda early.
Thur Sept 27th
Egg Cups with chicken sausage and carrots and yellow tomatoes
Chicken Vindaloo
Tarka-- Chicken Korma with brown rice I brought there my own self. Why no brown rice world?
Fri Sept 28th
Sat Sept 29
Tacodeli-- 3 Ottos
Dinners: Sweet chili chicken with basil and brown rice, small portion. Then, rice paper sushi rolls from Whole Foods.
Sun Sept 30
The DAY OF EIGHT TORTILLAS...I see now that this week has way too many corn tortillas in general.
Tacodeli
Lunch: ?
Dinner: Fresas chicken with uh...tortillas, plus rice and beans, and street corn.
Mon Oct 1
2 eggs cups w oatmeal
Lunch:
Dinner:
Tue Oct 2
2 egg cups w oatmeal
Lunch:
Thai beef salad on greens--beef, sweet chili, basal, mint, greens.
Snacks: Larabars
Wed Oct 3
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries almonds
Thai Beef Salad with brown rice-- beef, sweet chili, basal, mint.
Thur Oct 4
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Thur Oct 4
Egg cups?
Lunch: chicken and greens?
Dinner: Chicken salad with Latin Quinoa Salad from Central Market
Fri Oct 5
2 Egg cups with oatmeal
Lunch: Crazy salad with chicken strips-- I think.
Dinner: Zen stirfry stuff
Snacks: Four Roses bourbon-- Eff You Teaching Career!
Sat Oct 6
Tacodeli Ottos--2 w coffee
Lunch: Big Daddy's bacon cheeseburger salad--meh
Dinner: Chicken salad with carrots and hummus and latin quinoa salad
Snacks: Bourbon and beer!
Sun Oct 7
Tacodeli Ottos--2 w coffee
Whole Foods Brown Rice Salmon Sushi
Mon Oct 8
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Lunch: Can't remember...the schedule says it was supposed to be Chicken Vindaloo...but the dog ate that, so it can't be right. I think it was a crazy salad with salami.
Steak, Aspargus, Fingerling Potatoes
Tue Oct 9
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Steak, Aspargus, and Fingerling Potatoes
Crazy salad-- Curry chicken salad, tomatoes, almonds, hummus, erething, greens, the kitchen sink.
Wed Oct 10
Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Lunch: Curry Chicken Salad with hummus and tomatoes and greens and berries- aka crazy salad.
Dinner: Beet salad with pork belly and one beer from Black Star Coop.
Snacks: Larabars
Thur Oct 11
Breakfast: Three Eggs, Three Bacons, Oatmeal with berries and almonds
Lunch: Curry Chicken Salad + Quinoa salad (both courtesy of Lushie aka The Duchess) on a bed of greens with tomatoes. Pickle.
Dinner: Half- serving of Zen, double chicken on brown rice with veggies and peanut sauce.
Snacks: Larabars
Friday Oct 12-- This was a weird, disorganized eatin day actually.
Breakfast: Eggs and bacon, iced coffee
Snacks: Two thunderbird bars
Lunch: Chicken salad and brown rice
Dinner: Latin Lushie Quinoa, Slice o brisket
Dinner: salami, hummys, Latin Lushie Quinoa
Sat Oct 13
Breakfast: Tacodeli--2 Ottos on corn, 1 Otto no tortilla
Lunch: uhh...breakfast was lunch
Dinner: WF pork loin, sweet potatoes, aspargus
Snack: Almond Delight smoothie
Note: I don't always note it, but a crazy salad could include any or ALL of the following: baked chicken, turkey slices, salami, avocado, boiled eggs, panchetta, bacon, hummus, tomatoes, greens, other hummus, berries.
Leftouts: It seems that I left out many Larabars, some bananas, some sweet potatoes, and some chicken tenders. And a whole bottle of bourbon. Actually, I know where that goes...so I'll edit. Well, I didn't drink it all myself, but I had a good amount.
Also, sometimes we follow the plan exactly; sometimes we don't...but we are always better off for having it.
Thursday, October 11, 2012
Reality Check: The Day of Eight Tortillas
Dear Self,
Eight tortillas in one day is not nutritionally sound for any style of eater. It doesn't matter how delicious the items inside be, or how wonderfully convenient the tortilla is for transporting things from the plate/bag/basket/napkin to your mouth. It is not right. Be advised.
Thanks,
Self
Dear Self Who Talks to Me Like We Have Multiple Personality Disorder,
See, what had happened was...Tacodeli. And Fresa's. And how I didn't want to inconveinence Jeffery. And we was shopping! And then we got tired!
Shut up and stop judging,
Self
So, what actually had happened was that I got a little ambitious with my coffee and taco treats one weekend. So I know that I have previously posted about avoiding "treat thinking" but that turns out to be pretty hard, especially when you are super broke leg bored. So I've just tried to come up with less harmless treats, such as: Betsey Johnson purses from the discount store, tacos with organic ingredients, and a spot o coffee--on most of the days.TREAT YO SELF! So far, I'm still down an inch or so in the waist, and not too broke, so it's worked out okay. Actually promises of shopping and Tacodeli on the weekend, keep me pretty honest during the week.
However, sometimes I feel sad when the Ottos from Tacodeli are done. And then, I remembered this one time when my friend, let's call her Kottie Darate, had three tacos from Tacodeli and she wasn't fat afterward or anything, so I thought of a solution: Three Ottos! I eat two right away...and one more later. Later means anywhere from 5 mins to 2 hours as it turns out. Its a fine plan except that Tacodeli doubles up those corn tortilla and sometimes I confuse gluten-free with calorie free or carb free.. Like when I asked Jeffery to bring us dinner later that night, and I suggested that he bring us the chicken and beans and tortillas and street corn from Fresa's. I hadn't planned to eat any tortillas, but then TREAT YO SELF! By the time I was smart enough to count up the day's tortillas, I had done already had 8 tortillas, hence the Day of Eight Tortillas.
It actually was a good thing (I guess) because it reminded me that I need to watch the damn carbs, gluten free or not. Now that my bone is presumably (x-rays next week) healed up or close to it, I don't seem to be FOOT HONGRY anymore, so I've cut back a bit on the brown rice. I don't think I've had any in a week (except for the brown rice immabout to eat right now) and I haven't missed it. I'm pretty sure that weight isn't going to just fall off of me, STILL, but it will help.
Anyhoo, that was what had happened.
Eight tortillas in one day is not nutritionally sound for any style of eater. It doesn't matter how delicious the items inside be, or how wonderfully convenient the tortilla is for transporting things from the plate/bag/basket/napkin to your mouth. It is not right. Be advised.
Thanks,
Self
Dear Self Who Talks to Me Like We Have Multiple Personality Disorder,
See, what had happened was...Tacodeli. And Fresa's. And how I didn't want to inconveinence Jeffery. And we was shopping! And then we got tired!
Shut up and stop judging,
Self
So, what actually had happened was that I got a little ambitious with my coffee and taco treats one weekend. So I know that I have previously posted about avoiding "treat thinking" but that turns out to be pretty hard, especially when you are super broke leg bored. So I've just tried to come up with less harmless treats, such as: Betsey Johnson purses from the discount store, tacos with organic ingredients, and a spot o coffee--on most of the days.TREAT YO SELF! So far, I'm still down an inch or so in the waist, and not too broke, so it's worked out okay. Actually promises of shopping and Tacodeli on the weekend, keep me pretty honest during the week.
However, sometimes I feel sad when the Ottos from Tacodeli are done. And then, I remembered this one time when my friend, let's call her Kottie Darate, had three tacos from Tacodeli and she wasn't fat afterward or anything, so I thought of a solution: Three Ottos! I eat two right away...and one more later. Later means anywhere from 5 mins to 2 hours as it turns out. Its a fine plan except that Tacodeli doubles up those corn tortilla and sometimes I confuse gluten-free with calorie free or carb free.. Like when I asked Jeffery to bring us dinner later that night, and I suggested that he bring us the chicken and beans and tortillas and street corn from Fresa's. I hadn't planned to eat any tortillas, but then TREAT YO SELF! By the time I was smart enough to count up the day's tortillas, I had done already had 8 tortillas, hence the Day of Eight Tortillas.
It actually was a good thing (I guess) because it reminded me that I need to watch the damn carbs, gluten free or not. Now that my bone is presumably (x-rays next week) healed up or close to it, I don't seem to be FOOT HONGRY anymore, so I've cut back a bit on the brown rice. I don't think I've had any in a week (except for the brown rice immabout to eat right now) and I haven't missed it. I'm pretty sure that weight isn't going to just fall off of me, STILL, but it will help.
Anyhoo, that was what had happened.
Monday, September 24, 2012
Foot HONGRY!
Anyhoo, while I know that this is partly a result of eating whole foods with a specific focus on low carbs, I also suspected that it had to do with trying to regrow my bones. According to a very reliable source known as the internet or Dr. Google, this is true. You do, in fact, need to increase your intake when you are making broke shit whole again. At least I do. Eatin for two!-- me and me leg.
More anyhoo, I'm gonna ask my doc and my nutritionist (who is still mine even though I don't pay her or see her anymore) about this so my knowledge is more legit. Anecdotally though, dis true.
Eatins Mon the 17th-- Mon 24th
So, super good news--I'm eating healthier and more efficiently than ever. Menus, grocery lists, bulk cooking, yes! I only have an exact record from the 17th, but pretty much everything has been like this.
Mon 17th
Breakfast-- Eggs cups and oatmeal. WTF is an egg cup? If I haven't been over it, it's a mini-crustless- quiche cup.
Lunch-- Jeffrey's stirfry-- Oh so, I have a BF and he made me a stirfry with pork, brown rice, and assorted veggies. Wasn't half bad for some shit a boy cooked. Ahhahaha!
Dinner-- Chicken and Kale salad from Laura. Also balsamic vinagrette on berries and almonds.
Snack-- 2 bars probably-- Thunderbird or Larabars.
Tues 18th
Egg cups
Jeffrey Stirfry
Steak, with sweet potatoes--mashed, and aspargus drizzled with oil.
Snacks-- probably bars, also some figs
Wed 19th
Bacon, eggs, and oatmeal. I think this was the day of many bacons.
Steak salad with greens and mashed sweet potatoes
Zen-- double chicken, peanut sauce, buddha veggies, and brown rice.
Snacks--bars and bananas
Thur 20th
Eggs cups and oatmeal
Lunch: Beef stew
Dinner: Chipotle-- chicken double, black beans, guac, brown rice, pico, corn.
Snacks-- bars and bananas
Fri 21st
Eggs and bacon and oatmeal with nuts and shit
Chicken vindaloo w brown rice, chick peas, broccoli, and carrots. Mmm.
Salty Sow-- Sangria cocktail, truffled deviled eggs, and split entree of beef cheeks and crispy chicken.
Snack-- 1.25 beers, bars
Saturday
Tacodeli-- 2 Ottos plus COFFEEEEEEEE! Iced with a dropletttte of cream.
Lupper-- Fresa's Mutherfucking Achiote Chicken-- Have you been here? Up on Lamar, y'all. We got-- a whole damn chicken, bunch o beans, rice (that I didn't eat, why world don't have brown rice?), new potato salad, STREET CORN, corn tortillas and delicious sauces. I'm glad no one could see how fast or how sloppily we ate that chicken.
Snack-- Bourbon! It was scary to let go of a little bit of control at this high stress time, but I did it and I'm glad.
Sunday
Tacodeli-- 3 Ottos spread out across the morning. As in I ate one of them a half hour later. What's better than 2 Ottos? Yes, 3 Ottos. Coffee was done had out on the veranda.
Lunch: Starbucks ice tea and Larabar.
Dinner: Chicken Vindaloo with brown rice and veggies and all that.
Late night HONGRY snack-- hummus, carrots, and salami.
Monday-- 3 eggs, 3 bacons, and the shit-ton of oatmeal.
Snack: Larabar
Other snack: banana
Lunch: Fresa's chicken leftovers
Dinner: Zen Seared Tuna salad with a side of STILL HONGRY
Snack: Larabar
Snack: Fake banana based ice- cream ala Joan with high cocoa/low sugar dark chocolate shreds.
So anyhow, or anyhoo, if there's been any blessing to a broke leg, and that's a big IF, it's that it came at a time when I was already eating well, so that I don't have to be stressed AND that I've had to learn to be more organized with the food. If I can keep this up, happy forever.
PS-- I forgot to say that I am taking lots o fish oil, and plan to add in a multi-vitamin. Also Dr. Google said that the silicon in moderate beer consumption could be good, so yeah.
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Treat Thinking
Treat thinking. I'm sure you know it, even if you're like so awesome that you don't participate in it (hey...that's me right now...except let's see if I can last till the end of this post) or it doesn't seem to cause a problem for you. Here's a common scenario: I just ran 3,7, 22, or whatever miles; I deserve a treat.
There's two ways of thinking about that. Here's some healthy attitude bullshit that can be hard to sustain in the course of putting up with life's additional bullshit: "Running and the health benefits I receive from it are treats all by theyselves! I don't need to have a chocolate covered chocolate cake."
Another way to think of it is that you do, in fact, deserve a treat. I'm mean, hell yes, you deserve a treat. People are out there having treats without even having gotten off their couch. You burned like 80zillion calories, so you can have a treat. You ran. Despite what you might hear at a Weight Watchers (fuck off) meeting, I think this is okay enough thinking if you are actually willing to do the math. If you really did burn, say 2000 calories, you actually are going to need to take in some additional calories to sustain a healthy consistent metabolism that continues to both burn and fuel your workouts. If you want to position some of these calories as a treat or post-workout reward, I think that's fine as long as it's one of MANY reasons why you did that workout. If every workout is just a path to enchildas, that's probably going to break down at some point. Not that I know from experience or anything.
The real catch is that you actually have to do the actual math and then actually stick to it. Everybody who knows Miss Lady knows Miss Lady is math adverse. I find a million ways to not do it, including..umm eating whole foods exclusively so that I don't have to worry so much about calorie math-- I never do it, except as a part of occasionally troubleshooting my trouble with weight loss. A perfect example of when I effed this up was when I gained fat while marathon training. Bourbon and queso and math adversion plus a failure to be reasonable (another option actually) meant that I gained 5 bad pounds-- not muscle-- during the holidays. While running up to 40 miles per week. Though I also know that distance training is not the ideal way for me to lose weight, I also know that is some BROKEN ASS treat thinking. For another example of BROKEN ASS treating thinking, see Weight Watchers-- "I was so good today and I still have 8 pts left because I ate from the 4pts boxes all day and now I can have cake so I can live another day!"
So treat thinking is a real danger right now. Because I so could. Accomplishing pretty much anything with a broken leg is a pretty good workout. There also might be some temptation to feel, somewhat justifiably, sorry for yourself. And then just have a treat. Here's an example that may or may not have driven me to the computer to write this: Cat litter. You can't change it on one foot. But you also can't let it just stink, because its Tuesday and you smelled it on Saturday and the cat has left a warning poo outside the litter. Some images: a pee and clay slush, Miss Lady balancing on one foot cursing herself for not be adamant that liners should be purchased, Miss Lady tossing the whole slushy pan into a bag after trying to unstick what was stuck, Miss Lady cursing everyone who was here and didn't change this litter-- dammit-- even though they were helpful in a thousand other ways, Miss Lady learning to mop on one foot, and then having to wash that one foot for reasons I dont want to talk about. Also, Miss Lady trying to explain to the friend who will buy her a new box that regular size is oddly labeled "jumbo" and then hating the whole cat litter industry. HATE.
I could really use a treat right now, but I don't want to get into that type of thinking. If I do though, fortunately the only thing in the house like that is Larabars, which ain't so bad. AND its lunch time now, so I can just go have the food I need to eat anyhow.
Wait...and there's cold brew coffee. Always a totally healthy and excusable treat. Problem solved.
There's two ways of thinking about that. Here's some healthy attitude bullshit that can be hard to sustain in the course of putting up with life's additional bullshit: "Running and the health benefits I receive from it are treats all by theyselves! I don't need to have a chocolate covered chocolate cake."
Another way to think of it is that you do, in fact, deserve a treat. I'm mean, hell yes, you deserve a treat. People are out there having treats without even having gotten off their couch. You burned like 80zillion calories, so you can have a treat. You ran. Despite what you might hear at a Weight Watchers (fuck off) meeting, I think this is okay enough thinking if you are actually willing to do the math. If you really did burn, say 2000 calories, you actually are going to need to take in some additional calories to sustain a healthy consistent metabolism that continues to both burn and fuel your workouts. If you want to position some of these calories as a treat or post-workout reward, I think that's fine as long as it's one of MANY reasons why you did that workout. If every workout is just a path to enchildas, that's probably going to break down at some point. Not that I know from experience or anything.
The real catch is that you actually have to do the actual math and then actually stick to it. Everybody who knows Miss Lady knows Miss Lady is math adverse. I find a million ways to not do it, including..umm eating whole foods exclusively so that I don't have to worry so much about calorie math-- I never do it, except as a part of occasionally troubleshooting my trouble with weight loss. A perfect example of when I effed this up was when I gained fat while marathon training. Bourbon and queso and math adversion plus a failure to be reasonable (another option actually) meant that I gained 5 bad pounds-- not muscle-- during the holidays. While running up to 40 miles per week. Though I also know that distance training is not the ideal way for me to lose weight, I also know that is some BROKEN ASS treat thinking. For another example of BROKEN ASS treating thinking, see Weight Watchers-- "I was so good today and I still have 8 pts left because I ate from the 4pts boxes all day and now I can have cake so I can live another day!"
So treat thinking is a real danger right now. Because I so could. Accomplishing pretty much anything with a broken leg is a pretty good workout. There also might be some temptation to feel, somewhat justifiably, sorry for yourself. And then just have a treat. Here's an example that may or may not have driven me to the computer to write this: Cat litter. You can't change it on one foot. But you also can't let it just stink, because its Tuesday and you smelled it on Saturday and the cat has left a warning poo outside the litter. Some images: a pee and clay slush, Miss Lady balancing on one foot cursing herself for not be adamant that liners should be purchased, Miss Lady tossing the whole slushy pan into a bag after trying to unstick what was stuck, Miss Lady cursing everyone who was here and didn't change this litter-- dammit-- even though they were helpful in a thousand other ways, Miss Lady learning to mop on one foot, and then having to wash that one foot for reasons I dont want to talk about. Also, Miss Lady trying to explain to the friend who will buy her a new box that regular size is oddly labeled "jumbo" and then hating the whole cat litter industry. HATE.
I could really use a treat right now, but I don't want to get into that type of thinking. If I do though, fortunately the only thing in the house like that is Larabars, which ain't so bad. AND its lunch time now, so I can just go have the food I need to eat anyhow.
Wait...and there's cold brew coffee. Always a totally healthy and excusable treat. Problem solved.
Friday, September 7, 2012
Miss Lady's Resolve: Tested
Remember how I wrote that blog about not falling of my regimins for a year, no matter what came up? Well, I was thinking that my challenges would be things like a music festival where I really wanted to drink alot or perhaps a really yummy chocolate cake somewhere. I didn't think that anything like breaking my leg would come up.
Can I just say that it is worse than I ever thought it would be? The break hurt, yes, but the interupption to life, and the dependence this causes is crazy. Before I got my kneeling walker with basket, I attempted crutches, which I am really bad at. To demonstrate the dependence that this causes, I had my friend boil me some eggs, so I could keep my protein up and have breakfast ready. When I got to the kitchen in the morning though, I realized that I could not carry the eggs anywhere or stand up for long enough to peel-n-eat them. It would be so easy to just flop down on the sofa and order pizzas.
But I said it and I meant it. For a year. No matter what.
I should also mention that a part of how I am able to continue with this, is the willingness of my friends to bring me brown rice and chicken instead of comfort casseroles, that I know would be easier. I need healthy food for my healing more than ever now, and it is nice to have so many people invested in this goal with me. Extra special thanks to Nora for starting my food tree.
Eatings have included:
painkillers
brown rice with chicken and salad
various chicken salads
chicken sausage and lentils
rotisserie chicken
egg and sausage cups
Tacodeli
800 Larabars
hummus, carrots, and tomatoes
Delicious lemony chicken with zucchini and Morracan carrot salad
coffee
chicken vindaloo
plus other stuff I cant remember
I've never eaten so well, or felt so loved.
Can I just say that it is worse than I ever thought it would be? The break hurt, yes, but the interupption to life, and the dependence this causes is crazy. Before I got my kneeling walker with basket, I attempted crutches, which I am really bad at. To demonstrate the dependence that this causes, I had my friend boil me some eggs, so I could keep my protein up and have breakfast ready. When I got to the kitchen in the morning though, I realized that I could not carry the eggs anywhere or stand up for long enough to peel-n-eat them. It would be so easy to just flop down on the sofa and order pizzas.
But I said it and I meant it. For a year. No matter what.
I should also mention that a part of how I am able to continue with this, is the willingness of my friends to bring me brown rice and chicken instead of comfort casseroles, that I know would be easier. I need healthy food for my healing more than ever now, and it is nice to have so many people invested in this goal with me. Extra special thanks to Nora for starting my food tree.
Eatings have included:
painkillers
brown rice with chicken and salad
various chicken salads
chicken sausage and lentils
rotisserie chicken
egg and sausage cups
Tacodeli
800 Larabars
hummus, carrots, and tomatoes
Delicious lemony chicken with zucchini and Morracan carrot salad
coffee
chicken vindaloo
plus other stuff I cant remember
I've never eaten so well, or felt so loved.
Sunday, August 19, 2012
No Free Lunch
Did y'all know I like to write about things that irritate me? No? That's not possible, because I barely write about anything else. In fact, I'm pretty sure I exist so that I can tell the world what's irritating me and thus make that world a better place.
So as a part of my new job (btw life challenges/changes = nutrition challenges, but I bet you knew that) I have to go to a lot of trainings, curriculum sessions, etc. For instance, I got to go to new teacher training even though I'm not new to teaching at all!! The district wide day of new teacher training occured at a campus that some of us refer to as North San Antonio, in one of those bizarre parts of Austin that seem like suburban, where there are practically no bike riders or people wearing a jester hat for no reason. So because the campus is surrounded by houses and apartments and 900 teachers drove into the little parking lot that morning, the district provided us "lunch." The conversation I had about that "lunch" is what is inspiring this rant.
In exchange for not paying us what we are worth, and so that it seems like our jobs contain semblance of the perks sometimes provided to professionals, they often feed us in education. Donuts provided by student councils or dance teams, bagels and cream cheese paid for by the administrative team, occasionally breakfast tacos which teachers devour like raptors. Side story-- this one time, they brought us these little chicken mini biscuits from Chick-Fil-A and nobody could really tell how many you were eating so some teachers who are not me ate a bunch cause...yeah. What? Where was I? Anyhow, I used to eat all the crap, because it is very nice of whomever in a way, and we are supposed to be super-grateful, and we are usually broke around this time. At some point though, I started charting how much my weight changed at the beginnings and ends of school years-- the heavy free food times. Average weight gain was 5 lbs. So that's 10 lbs a school year if you don't do anything about it. Have you seen a teacher's butt lately?
So I finally decided that free wasn't really free of costs to me, and I stopped eating that shit. Its easy enough till I get trapped where I'm expected to eat what they provide. On district wide day at the North San Antonio school, I got thrown off by the email that said "lunch provided" and forgot to prepare. I thought they meant lunch, but they meant "lunch." Grr...It was a box lunch from Scholtzky's that included a sandwich with their gigantor bread, chips, a pickle, and a cookie. Or as I like to call it "gluten, carbs, sugarcrack, and chemicals." I ended up eating the inside of the sandwich and the pickle and then making a decision to go to Starfucks and get a protein plate, even if it made me late for my next session. I spoke to one of the Teacher Induction Program people hanging out near the sandwiches and she told me that they "can't possibly think about each person's special nutrition." Pfft. First, what nutrition? There are very few people, especially in the big butt world of teaching, that are ideally nourished by a meal of bread, cookies, and chips with a tiny amount of protein. I'm gonna say, that based on the average American butt size, never mind teacher butt size, that many people see detrimental effects from that, ranging from getting the yawns to the 'betes. I'm not saying that everybody has to be doing something about it during that exact meal time, but I don't think it should be outta the question to replace one of those things with an apple for crying out loud. I mean we can think about who wants turkey or roast beef, but not who wants a salad?
Rant over. I should have prepared better. I've had a few other situations like that in the past week where I was prepared when I showed up to a bagel and juice breakfast or donuts, and it was fine. Nonetheless, here are a few guidelines I'd like to offer the world:
Do tell people what kinda lunch or breakfast is provided. So not "breakfast provided" but "shitty stale bagels" or "semi-drinkable coffee provided." Even "box lunch" is somewhat informative.
If you are a big organization that prides itself on technology integration, why not send out a survey? Then you can order close to the right amount-- rather than running out of roast beef and having dozens of veggie sandwiches left. And then you could order up some chicken salads because I could have told you on the survey that I would indeed eat that.
Get with the times, dammit. Never mind the many fallacies of dieting fads, the past decade or so has included Atkins and South Beach and paleo eatins-- plenty of things that advocate protein. Are people really missing this? Some people prefer protein and veggies. Some people prefer veggies and no gluten. Especially in a place like Austin. Gah.
Donuts are not breakfast. Please indicate that morning dessert will be provided instead of calling this breakfast.
Thank you. Carry on.
Eatings:
August 13th
Breakfast: Eggs w/ ?
Snack: Larabar
Lunch: Bowl full of turkey, hummus, guacamole, carrots, tomatoes
Dinner: Salmon burger with gorgonzola and cranberries...actually based on how sinful it tasted and how it made me feel...I describe it as more of a salmon cake...definitely more bread crumbs. On top of greens with tomatoes.
Snack: I suspect I had a banana with peanut butter. I feel like a nectarine happened on this day as well.
August 14th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, steel cut oats with blueberries
AND COFFEE with a drop of cream
Lunch: About 1 oz of turkey from the inside of a sandwich with a lame tomato and some shredded lettuce. Pickle. Miss Lady MAD! Then coffee happens again.
Snack: Starbucks protein plate sans muffin or sugary pb (ooh future rant!) so really just the cheese and egg and fruit
Dinner: Cranberry gongonzola salmon business on greens again.
August 15th:
Breakfast: Tacodeli Otto with the tortilla. Yes, I'm starting that again. It gets me outta bed? AND COFFEE.
Snack: None really, but this lady in my training gives me her coffee because they forgot to give her sugar.
Lunch: Central Market Cafe Hatch Chile burger with avocado and bacon, no bun. Side salad with many colors.
Dinner: Chicken with Dona Sauce (from Tacodeli) and hatch pico, baked. Served on green with tomatoes and guacamole.
Snack: Two whole beers.
August 16th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, steel cut oats with blueberries. Coffee.
Lunch: Turkey and cranberry salad from HEB (came unprepared and was loaned lunch. Delicious but full of chemical ingredients. Why HEB?) Apple. Coffee.
Snack: Peanut butter and banana. Turkey and hummus with bananas and carrots. Maybe guacamole.
Dinner: Taco in a bowl from Cherrywood: Eggs, avocado, bacon.
August 17th
Breakfast: Tacodeli Otto. With the tortilla? Fraid so.
Lunch/Snack: Chicken with guac
Dinner: Salad from Black Star Coop-- Beets, Chicken, Greens, Candied (yeah) pecans, goat cheese
Snack: Beers, 2 giant Waterloos, 1 Lonestar. Lots of water!
August 18th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, steel cut oatmeal with blueberries
Lupper: Chipotle bowl with lettuce, chicken, pico, brown rice, guac, black beans
Snack: Brown rice salmon sushi from WF, some cocktail from Highball. Sugar was not listed as an ingredient on the menu...but I saw it go in the drink. Grr.
August 19th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, and steel cut oats with blueberries. Yes it is good. Why do you ask?
Lunch: Double Carnitas Chipotle bowl. The usual otherwise.
Dinner: Banana with PB.
So as a part of my new job (btw life challenges/changes = nutrition challenges, but I bet you knew that) I have to go to a lot of trainings, curriculum sessions, etc. For instance, I got to go to new teacher training even though I'm not new to teaching at all!! The district wide day of new teacher training occured at a campus that some of us refer to as North San Antonio, in one of those bizarre parts of Austin that seem like suburban, where there are practically no bike riders or people wearing a jester hat for no reason. So because the campus is surrounded by houses and apartments and 900 teachers drove into the little parking lot that morning, the district provided us "lunch." The conversation I had about that "lunch" is what is inspiring this rant.
In exchange for not paying us what we are worth, and so that it seems like our jobs contain semblance of the perks sometimes provided to professionals, they often feed us in education. Donuts provided by student councils or dance teams, bagels and cream cheese paid for by the administrative team, occasionally breakfast tacos which teachers devour like raptors. Side story-- this one time, they brought us these little chicken mini biscuits from Chick-Fil-A and nobody could really tell how many you were eating so some teachers who are not me ate a bunch cause...yeah. What? Where was I? Anyhow, I used to eat all the crap, because it is very nice of whomever in a way, and we are supposed to be super-grateful, and we are usually broke around this time. At some point though, I started charting how much my weight changed at the beginnings and ends of school years-- the heavy free food times. Average weight gain was 5 lbs. So that's 10 lbs a school year if you don't do anything about it. Have you seen a teacher's butt lately?
So I finally decided that free wasn't really free of costs to me, and I stopped eating that shit. Its easy enough till I get trapped where I'm expected to eat what they provide. On district wide day at the North San Antonio school, I got thrown off by the email that said "lunch provided" and forgot to prepare. I thought they meant lunch, but they meant "lunch." Grr...It was a box lunch from Scholtzky's that included a sandwich with their gigantor bread, chips, a pickle, and a cookie. Or as I like to call it "gluten, carbs, sugarcrack, and chemicals." I ended up eating the inside of the sandwich and the pickle and then making a decision to go to Starfucks and get a protein plate, even if it made me late for my next session. I spoke to one of the Teacher Induction Program people hanging out near the sandwiches and she told me that they "can't possibly think about each person's special nutrition." Pfft. First, what nutrition? There are very few people, especially in the big butt world of teaching, that are ideally nourished by a meal of bread, cookies, and chips with a tiny amount of protein. I'm gonna say, that based on the average American butt size, never mind teacher butt size, that many people see detrimental effects from that, ranging from getting the yawns to the 'betes. I'm not saying that everybody has to be doing something about it during that exact meal time, but I don't think it should be outta the question to replace one of those things with an apple for crying out loud. I mean we can think about who wants turkey or roast beef, but not who wants a salad?
Rant over. I should have prepared better. I've had a few other situations like that in the past week where I was prepared when I showed up to a bagel and juice breakfast or donuts, and it was fine. Nonetheless, here are a few guidelines I'd like to offer the world:
Do tell people what kinda lunch or breakfast is provided. So not "breakfast provided" but "shitty stale bagels" or "semi-drinkable coffee provided." Even "box lunch" is somewhat informative.
If you are a big organization that prides itself on technology integration, why not send out a survey? Then you can order close to the right amount-- rather than running out of roast beef and having dozens of veggie sandwiches left. And then you could order up some chicken salads because I could have told you on the survey that I would indeed eat that.
Get with the times, dammit. Never mind the many fallacies of dieting fads, the past decade or so has included Atkins and South Beach and paleo eatins-- plenty of things that advocate protein. Are people really missing this? Some people prefer protein and veggies. Some people prefer veggies and no gluten. Especially in a place like Austin. Gah.
Donuts are not breakfast. Please indicate that morning dessert will be provided instead of calling this breakfast.
Thank you. Carry on.
Eatings:
August 13th
Breakfast: Eggs w/ ?
Snack: Larabar
Lunch: Bowl full of turkey, hummus, guacamole, carrots, tomatoes
Dinner: Salmon burger with gorgonzola and cranberries...actually based on how sinful it tasted and how it made me feel...I describe it as more of a salmon cake...definitely more bread crumbs. On top of greens with tomatoes.
Snack: I suspect I had a banana with peanut butter. I feel like a nectarine happened on this day as well.
August 14th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, steel cut oats with blueberries
AND COFFEE with a drop of cream
Lunch: About 1 oz of turkey from the inside of a sandwich with a lame tomato and some shredded lettuce. Pickle. Miss Lady MAD! Then coffee happens again.
Snack: Starbucks protein plate sans muffin or sugary pb (ooh future rant!) so really just the cheese and egg and fruit
Dinner: Cranberry gongonzola salmon business on greens again.
August 15th:
Breakfast: Tacodeli Otto with the tortilla. Yes, I'm starting that again. It gets me outta bed? AND COFFEE.
Snack: None really, but this lady in my training gives me her coffee because they forgot to give her sugar.
Lunch: Central Market Cafe Hatch Chile burger with avocado and bacon, no bun. Side salad with many colors.
Dinner: Chicken with Dona Sauce (from Tacodeli) and hatch pico, baked. Served on green with tomatoes and guacamole.
Snack: Two whole beers.
August 16th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, steel cut oats with blueberries. Coffee.
Lunch: Turkey and cranberry salad from HEB (came unprepared and was loaned lunch. Delicious but full of chemical ingredients. Why HEB?) Apple. Coffee.
Snack: Peanut butter and banana. Turkey and hummus with bananas and carrots. Maybe guacamole.
Dinner: Taco in a bowl from Cherrywood: Eggs, avocado, bacon.
August 17th
Breakfast: Tacodeli Otto. With the tortilla? Fraid so.
Lunch/Snack: Chicken with guac
Dinner: Salad from Black Star Coop-- Beets, Chicken, Greens, Candied (yeah) pecans, goat cheese
Snack: Beers, 2 giant Waterloos, 1 Lonestar. Lots of water!
August 18th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, steel cut oatmeal with blueberries
Lupper: Chipotle bowl with lettuce, chicken, pico, brown rice, guac, black beans
Snack: Brown rice salmon sushi from WF, some cocktail from Highball. Sugar was not listed as an ingredient on the menu...but I saw it go in the drink. Grr.
August 19th
Breakfast: Eggs, bacon, and steel cut oats with blueberries. Yes it is good. Why do you ask?
Lunch: Double Carnitas Chipotle bowl. The usual otherwise.
Dinner: Banana with PB.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Eatings
August 6th
?
August 7th
Breakfast: Eggs + oatmeal and blackberries
Snack: deviled eggs
Lunch: WF salad bar with chopped beef
Dinner?
August 8th
Protein powder, peanut butter, banana.
Meatloaf + salad
burger with tomatoes and real sugar ketchup
August 9th
2 eggs + bacon, coffee
Chipotle: barbacoa, brown rice, lettuce, pico, avocado. Coffee
August 10th
Breakfast: Eggs + bacon
Caveman Cuisine: "Chinese" "Fried" "Rice"-- meh on their chicken, yay on the cauliflower rice
Salami, sweet potato hummus, tomatoes, greens
Paramount movie: wine, Makers on the rocks
August 11th
Eggs, oatmeal plus blackberries
Lunch picnic on San Marcos river: Hatch chile chicken salad, plantain chips, strawberries, tomatoes, WF lemon hummus
Snack: coffee, beef jerky, plantain chips
Snack: Sample from Peruvian trailer-- arroz con pollo, aji de gallina
Dinner: Arroz con pollo sans arroz. Yes I know I mixed up my languages. 1 Pearl Snap beer.
August 12th
Tacodeli: Refried black beans, avocado, bacon, and chicken in a cup--no tortilla
Snack: Coffee, Kind bar
Lunch: turkey, tomatoes, hummus
Book club: beef, chicken, >10 tortilla chips, lettuce, tomatoes, mango and jicama salad, 1 glass red wine
August 13th
2 eggs, oatmeal with blueberries, coffee
Cherrywood Coffeehouse: 2 egg taco, avocado, bacon, corn tortilla. Coffee.
Peanut butter w banana
Hopdoddy: Salad with burger patty, spinach, argula, apples, beets, goat cheese, pecans.
San Jose Hotel: 1 Pearl Snap Beer
Hmmm...these days must be off. Minus 1 on all dates?
?
August 7th
Breakfast: Eggs + oatmeal and blackberries
Snack: deviled eggs
Lunch: WF salad bar with chopped beef
Dinner?
August 8th
Protein powder, peanut butter, banana.
Meatloaf + salad
burger with tomatoes and real sugar ketchup
August 9th
2 eggs + bacon, coffee
Chipotle: barbacoa, brown rice, lettuce, pico, avocado. Coffee
August 10th
Breakfast: Eggs + bacon
Caveman Cuisine: "Chinese" "Fried" "Rice"-- meh on their chicken, yay on the cauliflower rice
Salami, sweet potato hummus, tomatoes, greens
Paramount movie: wine, Makers on the rocks
August 11th
Eggs, oatmeal plus blackberries
Lunch picnic on San Marcos river: Hatch chile chicken salad, plantain chips, strawberries, tomatoes, WF lemon hummus
Snack: coffee, beef jerky, plantain chips
Snack: Sample from Peruvian trailer-- arroz con pollo, aji de gallina
Dinner: Arroz con pollo sans arroz. Yes I know I mixed up my languages. 1 Pearl Snap beer.
August 12th
Tacodeli: Refried black beans, avocado, bacon, and chicken in a cup--no tortilla
Snack: Coffee, Kind bar
Lunch: turkey, tomatoes, hummus
Book club: beef, chicken, >10 tortilla chips, lettuce, tomatoes, mango and jicama salad, 1 glass red wine
August 13th
2 eggs, oatmeal with blueberries, coffee
Cherrywood Coffeehouse: 2 egg taco, avocado, bacon, corn tortilla. Coffee.
Peanut butter w banana
Hopdoddy: Salad with burger patty, spinach, argula, apples, beets, goat cheese, pecans.
San Jose Hotel: 1 Pearl Snap Beer
Hmmm...these days must be off. Minus 1 on all dates?
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Not Falling Off the Regimens-- for a year.
Uh...so my new plan is this: Instead of cleansing up my eating for 10 days or eating well until a special occasion comes along, I'm just going to eat well for 365 days, pretty much without exception. I know I don't have to explain myself, but I don't mind. See: this blog.
August 4th
Breakfast: 3 eggs with onions, tomatoes, and red bell peppers. Someone else cooked before I could tell them not to use milk or cheese...so there's milk and cheese too. Failure already! But I'm not worried.
Snack: Larabar-- Peanut Butter and Jelly
Lunch: Carrots with guacamole. Greens with sausage, tomatoes, and berries.
Snack: Peanut butter with banana
Dinner: Catfish panfried with olive oil. Mango pico de gallo, greens, tomatoes.
August 5th
Breakfast: 3 eggs with mango pico de gallo..
Snack: Larabar-- chocolate something?
Lunch: Chipotle salad with brown rice, black beans, guacamole, pico, and barbacoa.
Snack: Fake ice cream: Frozen bananas, coconut milk, blackberries. Delicious...but a tad sugary.
Dinner: Catfish panfried with olive oil-- except actually microwaved today. Mango pico, tomatoes, guac.
- 80/20 rule works for most people, but has been remarkably ineffective for me.
- I still plan to investigate medically for further reasons/solutions concerning the above.
- Yeah, I'm probably not going to drink...or will only drink a bit of wine here and there. Eating less carbs makes every drink super potent anyhow, so its for the best. This might suck too much, such I'll let you know.
- So it's the usual: little/no gluten, little/no sugar, lots o protein, veggies galore, not so much processed, little/no cow dairy. No undereating.
- A few concessions to make life manageable: Not worrying about small amounts of sugar in condiments, wine (yes I wrote this again), coffee for now, 1 smmalll dairy item per day...like a drop of cream or sprinkles of cheese in a salad...also goat cheese! Also, if some BBQ happens,and that meat is sugary, that's okay. (I'll revisit this, if somehow I have BBQ everyday).
- I'm starting a new job, that's somewhat in a food desert relative to the amount of time I have for lunch. I have a fridge and a willingness to burn through plastic containers though.
- Don't worry if you are really attached to having a lot of Miss Lady to love. I'll always have muscle. And this may not work!
August 4th
Breakfast: 3 eggs with onions, tomatoes, and red bell peppers. Someone else cooked before I could tell them not to use milk or cheese...so there's milk and cheese too. Failure already! But I'm not worried.
Snack: Larabar-- Peanut Butter and Jelly
Lunch: Carrots with guacamole. Greens with sausage, tomatoes, and berries.
Snack: Peanut butter with banana
Dinner: Catfish panfried with olive oil. Mango pico de gallo, greens, tomatoes.
August 5th
Breakfast: 3 eggs with mango pico de gallo..
Snack: Larabar-- chocolate something?
Lunch: Chipotle salad with brown rice, black beans, guacamole, pico, and barbacoa.
Snack: Fake ice cream: Frozen bananas, coconut milk, blackberries. Delicious...but a tad sugary.
Dinner: Catfish panfried with olive oil-- except actually microwaved today. Mango pico, tomatoes, guac.
Falling Off the Regimens
Here's my obligatory apology for not posting in a while: oops.
I recently had a visitor in town. A fellow healthy eating hopeful from the land of the north. (Crap, I've been watching too much Game of Fucking Thrones.) Anyhow, since I had been eating pretty healthy after a spell of not eating healthy after a spell of eating healthy, I was determined to continue to eat mostly healthy for my sake and the sake of my visitor. So when I picked her up I told her that I would need her help in this. She looked at me, puzzled as to what could possibly distract such a determined person from her goal. "Austin," I told her, "is basically a series of falling off of your regimens."
As in, whatever your regimens be, Austin make it easy to eff up. One minute its "I'm gonna cut back on drinking" followed by "oh, but there's a bloody mary bar at this brunch place that we are going to tomorrow because my friend who used to live here is going to be in town. Oh and she wants us to go out and see this band tonight and they might be bad, so I'll probably wanna drink, but after this weekend I can stop, unless we get tickets to Blah Blah Blah fest cause they will have free Golden Zipper beer which is this microbrew that my friend who used to be in a band makes. Do you wanna go right now and also later to this awesome food trailer that's behind this bar that used to be cool?"
Speaking of food trailers, eating plans are even more subject to revision in my experience. One minute I'm like "blah blah paleo diet, ethical meat, oh and dairy causes inflammation, and I don't eat carbs, and I'm working on being a locavore because industrialized food business is what's wrong with America. The Western diet is bullshit and so is high fructose corn syrup and other redundant things." But then. Twenty hairdos and five nights later, and I've forgotten to go to the grocery store, and I need to go to this other benefit show so there's no time to cook anyway, which is okay because they opened a new trailer yard near my house and the menu at this one trailer was designed by the last winner of Iron Asshole. And Willie Nelson will be there so it's okay if I eat there just this once. "Mmm pig anus with enriched bleached flour and rotten high fructose corn syrup tomatoes sauce!"
If you are curious how it turned out, regimens got falled off of.* We started off the week with Whole Foods and by cooking whole foods, with a few planned exceptions for Tacodeli and Indian food, but before we knew it, there was queso, and Whataburger, and pants not fitting. It was a lot like what I described above, but with no Willie Nelson.
I'm not saying it's impossible or even that it's Austin's fault, but I'm pretty sure that if I lived in a town where my own cooking was the most exciting thing, or where I'd already done all the good stuff a million times, it would be easier. I have a new(ish) plan though, that involves NOT falling off my regimen. I'll write about it in my next post, provided I don't fall off that again. Or again again. Crap.
More Game of Thrones!
*How do you like that Joan Jolt? Double prep ending, passive construction, and...also something wrong with my verb, all in one clause. It actually requires more talent than good grammar.
I recently had a visitor in town. A fellow healthy eating hopeful from the land of the north. (Crap, I've been watching too much Game of Fucking Thrones.) Anyhow, since I had been eating pretty healthy after a spell of not eating healthy after a spell of eating healthy, I was determined to continue to eat mostly healthy for my sake and the sake of my visitor. So when I picked her up I told her that I would need her help in this. She looked at me, puzzled as to what could possibly distract such a determined person from her goal. "Austin," I told her, "is basically a series of falling off of your regimens."
As in, whatever your regimens be, Austin make it easy to eff up. One minute its "I'm gonna cut back on drinking" followed by "oh, but there's a bloody mary bar at this brunch place that we are going to tomorrow because my friend who used to live here is going to be in town. Oh and she wants us to go out and see this band tonight and they might be bad, so I'll probably wanna drink, but after this weekend I can stop, unless we get tickets to Blah Blah Blah fest cause they will have free Golden Zipper beer which is this microbrew that my friend who used to be in a band makes. Do you wanna go right now and also later to this awesome food trailer that's behind this bar that used to be cool?"
Speaking of food trailers, eating plans are even more subject to revision in my experience. One minute I'm like "blah blah paleo diet, ethical meat, oh and dairy causes inflammation, and I don't eat carbs, and I'm working on being a locavore because industrialized food business is what's wrong with America. The Western diet is bullshit and so is high fructose corn syrup and other redundant things." But then. Twenty hairdos and five nights later, and I've forgotten to go to the grocery store, and I need to go to this other benefit show so there's no time to cook anyway, which is okay because they opened a new trailer yard near my house and the menu at this one trailer was designed by the last winner of Iron Asshole. And Willie Nelson will be there so it's okay if I eat there just this once. "Mmm pig anus with enriched bleached flour and rotten high fructose corn syrup tomatoes sauce!"
If you are curious how it turned out, regimens got falled off of.* We started off the week with Whole Foods and by cooking whole foods, with a few planned exceptions for Tacodeli and Indian food, but before we knew it, there was queso, and Whataburger, and pants not fitting. It was a lot like what I described above, but with no Willie Nelson.
I'm not saying it's impossible or even that it's Austin's fault, but I'm pretty sure that if I lived in a town where my own cooking was the most exciting thing, or where I'd already done all the good stuff a million times, it would be easier. I have a new(ish) plan though, that involves NOT falling off my regimen. I'll write about it in my next post, provided I don't fall off that again. Or again again. Crap.
More Game of Thrones!
*How do you like that Joan Jolt? Double prep ending, passive construction, and...also something wrong with my verb, all in one clause. It actually requires more talent than good grammar.
Friday, June 1, 2012
Salad Dressing-- Free at Last.
No, not like fat free or stolen. I don't do that shit anymore. I mean free from the damn salad dressing, which at some point, had placed a chokehold on like my entire nutritional system!*
Giving up salad dressing has been awesome for my lifestyle. Here's why:
Here are a few salad combos that I love without dressing:
*You know, some of my students from this year, told me that I'm dramatic about everything. I was like, "whatever, I just speak with flair," but I'm starting to see their point. Also, "speak with flair"-- who says that?
Giving up salad dressing has been awesome for my lifestyle. Here's why:
- No salad dressing shopping. So, though I don't do fat phobia diets anymore, as you probably know, I did. Trying to find a low-fat or fat-free (almost impossible) dressing that tasted passable consumed a large portion of my food thoughts in the 1990s and beyond. Way too much. Do you ever hear people speak in hushed but excited tones about salad dressing? Like, "You have got to try this new vegetable glue dressing. It only has 7 grams of fat per droplet and you can always just dip your fork in it!" Ridiculous. Plus who the fuck wants to eat something passable? "Mmm...this food is so passable!"
- No fatty chemical sauce concerns. As much as I don't want to avoid fat, I don't think I can get on board with the blantant sluttery of say...ranch dressing. I certainly know there are dressings that avoid this, but most of them are just the worst ills of industrialized food all concentrated up in a bottle. I want fat in my diet, but I'd rather get something of substance, like a whole chicken, out of the deal. Maybe that's why I put it on pizza in college? (In addition to the reason of being drunk.)
- No salad dressing transport logistics. Thank God. I remember that for many years this was a significant barrier to taking a salad for lunch. Since you generally can't put the dressing on the salad hours ahead of time (see what an asshole dressing is?) due to wilting, matters get complicated. Over the years I tried keeping extra bottles at work (quite a financial investment), putting dressing in little baggies inside the salad dish, placing the bottle at home on top of the salad so that I wouldn't forget it even though I always did, and even buying plastic lunch containers with a built-in salad dressing cup-- which is cool till you lose the little lid, and various other bullshit. It was all way too much trouble. Not to mention the general logistics involved in having fresh salad dressing in general. WTF does spoiled blush wine vinegar dressing smell like? I dunno. Anyhow, the net result was a reduction in salad eating.
- Tasting vegetables. Here's what happened. At some point, I realized that I didn't need dressing if I had other items, like salsa or guacamole. Somewhere between 1-2 years ago, during some sort of cleanse, the acceptable other items started to be fruit and meat or almonds. Before I knew it, I was enjoying the taste of the vegetables alone. It's fucking amazing! Some veggies taste better than others, but they all taste good. Raw and on their own. My nutritionist even advised me that she wanted me to use some sorta oil dressing, but I still mostly don't bother.
Here are a few salad combos that I love without dressing:
- Green stuff (spinach, baby greens, whatever) with strawberries, blueberries, and/or black berries (whatever is on sale), turkey or something, almonds. Oh I also do this with smoked salmon sometimes.
- Green stuff, salami, olives and other items from olive bar. Sometimes hummus.
- Green stuff, black beans, salsa or pico or just tomatoes, chicken.
*You know, some of my students from this year, told me that I'm dramatic about everything. I was like, "whatever, I just speak with flair," but I'm starting to see their point. Also, "speak with flair"-- who says that?
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Adrenal Exhaustion
So I'm gonna write about this, just so people know this is possible...because I didn't. You could easily just google this (I'm actually about to so I can be sure to get the details right) but how would you know to if it isn't even on your radar.
Well...getting a straight story was harder than I thought...so I'll just do my best to capture my understanding. If I have a detail wrong, please forgive. So, your adrenal glands make a few hormones to deal with stress of various sorts. One of them, cortisol, you may have heard of on those commercials where they scream about STUBBORN BELLY FAT, because an overload of cortisol causes STUBBORN BELLY FAT. Anyhow, it is supposed to be released intermittently as a response to stress, but if you have too much stress...side effects occur like STUBBORN BELLY FAT. Yeah. Adrenaline, another hormone, problem isn't a surprise to anyone, but if you find yourself calling upon the flight-or-fight hormone too often, the glands wear out and you can't make it when you need it. My understanding too is that cortisol and adrenaline operate in balance, so if too much cortisone is released, adrenaline will be driven down lower. According to my understanding, DHEA also steps in here somewhere to try to fix the problem. When it gets called on too often...yes, its gets worn out. Side-effects of low DHEA can be high LDL, decreased energy, and a reduced ability to deal with stress...which just contributes to the cycle.
In my quest to figure out why weight loss is so much more difficult than it should be for me, I've had a FEW hormone tests. My adrenals turned out to be low, and I was given a supplement. I haven't had another blood test done, so we will see if it improved. However, I also took a few steps to reduce stress in my life.
So, there was the normal American pasttime of job stress. The problem with my job as a teacher is that it is a maze of deadlines, with every possible way out blocked by understaffing, high-stakes, and fucking guilt over never doing enough. At key times, like the end of the year or a particulary full grading period, I now realize that the crazypants feeling that I had was probably a flood of adrenaline or cortisol. Sometimes I was in the state for weeks at time. I don't have perfect control over it, but I have worked to arrange things so that feeling doesn't happen, either through making different instructional or assessment choices, or by just damn relaxing when I feel it coming on. Anyhow, that couldn't have been healthy.
Other types of stress weren't so obvious to me. One was undercalorie dieting, which I did for like a lifetime. I didn't think of that as stress, but to my body it was ill and needed to work hard to buffer me...even though it was often just a matter of a few hundred calories. Anyhow, this is part of why I won't do that again ever.
The last was over-exercise. So for all kinds of reasons...like loving a challenge...and wanting to lose weight but finding it difficult...and having an active dog...I became the sorta person who does marathons, half-marathons, and triathlons. The sort of endurance exercise I engaged in, only sometimes with appropriate rest periods, is exactly the sort of thing that can lead to adrenal exhaustion, especially when you aren't fuel properly.
So, I still haven't figured out what role this is exactly playing in my body chemistry, though it seems clear that it somehow effects my metabolism. It makes sense that I would be affected now that I see that I triple-fucked myself. I wrote this blog so you wouldn't triple fuck yourself.
Well...getting a straight story was harder than I thought...so I'll just do my best to capture my understanding. If I have a detail wrong, please forgive. So, your adrenal glands make a few hormones to deal with stress of various sorts. One of them, cortisol, you may have heard of on those commercials where they scream about STUBBORN BELLY FAT, because an overload of cortisol causes STUBBORN BELLY FAT. Anyhow, it is supposed to be released intermittently as a response to stress, but if you have too much stress...side effects occur like STUBBORN BELLY FAT. Yeah. Adrenaline, another hormone, problem isn't a surprise to anyone, but if you find yourself calling upon the flight-or-fight hormone too often, the glands wear out and you can't make it when you need it. My understanding too is that cortisol and adrenaline operate in balance, so if too much cortisone is released, adrenaline will be driven down lower. According to my understanding, DHEA also steps in here somewhere to try to fix the problem. When it gets called on too often...yes, its gets worn out. Side-effects of low DHEA can be high LDL, decreased energy, and a reduced ability to deal with stress...which just contributes to the cycle.
In my quest to figure out why weight loss is so much more difficult than it should be for me, I've had a FEW hormone tests. My adrenals turned out to be low, and I was given a supplement. I haven't had another blood test done, so we will see if it improved. However, I also took a few steps to reduce stress in my life.
So, there was the normal American pasttime of job stress. The problem with my job as a teacher is that it is a maze of deadlines, with every possible way out blocked by understaffing, high-stakes, and fucking guilt over never doing enough. At key times, like the end of the year or a particulary full grading period, I now realize that the crazypants feeling that I had was probably a flood of adrenaline or cortisol. Sometimes I was in the state for weeks at time. I don't have perfect control over it, but I have worked to arrange things so that feeling doesn't happen, either through making different instructional or assessment choices, or by just damn relaxing when I feel it coming on. Anyhow, that couldn't have been healthy.
Other types of stress weren't so obvious to me. One was undercalorie dieting, which I did for like a lifetime. I didn't think of that as stress, but to my body it was ill and needed to work hard to buffer me...even though it was often just a matter of a few hundred calories. Anyhow, this is part of why I won't do that again ever.
The last was over-exercise. So for all kinds of reasons...like loving a challenge...and wanting to lose weight but finding it difficult...and having an active dog...I became the sorta person who does marathons, half-marathons, and triathlons. The sort of endurance exercise I engaged in, only sometimes with appropriate rest periods, is exactly the sort of thing that can lead to adrenal exhaustion, especially when you aren't fuel properly.
So, I still haven't figured out what role this is exactly playing in my body chemistry, though it seems clear that it somehow effects my metabolism. It makes sense that I would be affected now that I see that I triple-fucked myself. I wrote this blog so you wouldn't triple fuck yourself.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
True Confessions
Of an over-dramatic over-eater? Yep. Pretty much.
So I want to write down what I've been up to so that I can both see and change it, and so I can memorialize its awesomeness. Sick? Probably.
So, here's a victory. Part of the reason my daily nutrition blog has been not so daily is that I was closing out the school year. Always a busy time of year...and usually a stress filled time of weight gain. For a number of years I was gaining weight at the end of the school year and at the beginning a few months later. NOT good for dress fitting. Anyhow this time I managed to only gain weight right after school was out. Or maybe I'm just bloated. Who would know.
Anyhow, on Friday I ate at the Black Star Coop with the Duchess. I ordered a shrimp aguachile appetizer...but it came with bread and I ate it. Then had mucho dranks with her.
Saturday included my friend Laura's wedding rehearsal. I ordered the salmon dish, but the people next to me left before dinner, so I ate some of their frites and steak. Hmm...seems like I'm better at ordering than eating. I also ate Amy's ice cream in flavor "the dude" since it was their special dessert. How could I not?! Seriously.
Sunday was her wedding and it was awesome in all ways. Here's some stuff about the food: Passed apps like catfish bites and shrimp crisp deliciousness and eggrollish stuff. I drank some dranks. There were many lovely choices for dinner; I chose the snapper, which was delicious, but I'm pretty sure the cream sauce did me in. Or was it the cake or cookies? Doesn't matter, I have no regrets, but its important to remember that was special occassion eating...and right now isnt special.
Monday was special though. To memorialize fallen solidiers I had to have a cookout at my house...and eat all the gelato and sausages and potato salad.
That would have been fine, but I also ate inappropriately on Tuesday, and today I finished the gelato so that I wouldn't have to worry about it tomorrow. I feel sluggish and inflammed, and I plan to end it tomorrow. Dammit.
So I want to write down what I've been up to so that I can both see and change it, and so I can memorialize its awesomeness. Sick? Probably.
So, here's a victory. Part of the reason my daily nutrition blog has been not so daily is that I was closing out the school year. Always a busy time of year...and usually a stress filled time of weight gain. For a number of years I was gaining weight at the end of the school year and at the beginning a few months later. NOT good for dress fitting. Anyhow this time I managed to only gain weight right after school was out. Or maybe I'm just bloated. Who would know.
Anyhow, on Friday I ate at the Black Star Coop with the Duchess. I ordered a shrimp aguachile appetizer...but it came with bread and I ate it. Then had mucho dranks with her.
Saturday included my friend Laura's wedding rehearsal. I ordered the salmon dish, but the people next to me left before dinner, so I ate some of their frites and steak. Hmm...seems like I'm better at ordering than eating. I also ate Amy's ice cream in flavor "the dude" since it was their special dessert. How could I not?! Seriously.
Sunday was her wedding and it was awesome in all ways. Here's some stuff about the food: Passed apps like catfish bites and shrimp crisp deliciousness and eggrollish stuff. I drank some dranks. There were many lovely choices for dinner; I chose the snapper, which was delicious, but I'm pretty sure the cream sauce did me in. Or was it the cake or cookies? Doesn't matter, I have no regrets, but its important to remember that was special occassion eating...and right now isnt special.
Monday was special though. To memorialize fallen solidiers I had to have a cookout at my house...and eat all the gelato and sausages and potato salad.
That would have been fine, but I also ate inappropriately on Tuesday, and today I finished the gelato so that I wouldn't have to worry about it tomorrow. I feel sluggish and inflammed, and I plan to end it tomorrow. Dammit.
Monday, May 14, 2012
Fuck Off, Weight Watchers
So, I'm gonna assume that if you are the kinda person who reads what I write that you also watch Mad Men. Right? So you know that there were a few scenes on last night's episode, "Dark Shadows," that were set at a Weight Watchers meeting.
Just so it will be clear how I feel about this, I'd like to start with a little letter to Weight Watchers, since we know I often write letters to things that can't read, like tacos.
So...I knew there would be a WW rant on this blog, maybe many, but I wasn't quite ready to tackle the subject yet. Since I wrote about Fat Betty though, I feel like this Mad Men episode forced my hand...like when Biden made Obama publicly admit how he has probably felt about marriage rights all along!
I'll start by admitting that there are a few positives to WW, and that I have lost weight following their program at various points in my life, albeit temporary, and sometimes unhealthy. See how good I am at being positive?
Pros
1) Accountability-- There's nothing like having strangers look at your weight to make you think about what you eat. I love making food choices because I'm worried about shame! Shit, I suck at being positive. I suppose there were times when I felt accountable to only myself on the scale. Course, once I felt like that, I also didn't want to hear what the ladies had to say about my weight either way. Again, fuck off.
2) Support-- You can find a sense of community and share various tips with people at the meeting. Before I bitch about the volume of absolute nonsense that gets said at these meetings, I will say that some of the leaders did provide guidance in negotiating the low-fat, cheating your way to thin version of dieting that is prominent up at the WW. "If you put yellow glue substance on your sammich it's just like cheese. And with a side of diarrhea chips, you'll have tricked yourself into thin in no time!" No really, there was some good advice. I'm just not capable of saying anything nice.
3) Helping people who ain't got no sense-- One of my friends told me that her husband once tried to help her eat healthy by giving her a Hostess fruit pie...you know, a fried pie, presumably because the fruit was healthy. I also know that many people have lost perspective on what's healthy, thanks to our fast and fatty national cuisine. Case in point: I went on a date, with a man y'all may know as "Spite Fuck" to the East Side Kings (where I like to conduct all my life's affairs actually) and after we consumed our 3 fried items (albeit delicious, real, and whole fried items) SF said, "Wow. I haven't eaten that healthy in years!" My point is that there a whole lot of ways of eating worse than Weight Watchers, so for some people it really is a drastic improvement.
Cons-- Hell yes! I love cons.
*Full disclosure: Since I have sworn off the WW, I don't have much experience with their PointsPlus plan. My understanding from...discussing it with my mother, is that even though there is some focus on whole foods (aka Power Foods) the core of it, is really still the same. Other than that, I've had intimate knowledge of ALL of their plans since about...well...1980..81, somewhere in there. One of my earlier (but not the earliest) lessons in the shame of being out of control of your eating occurred when I accompanied my mom to a WW weigh-in at a creepy old church. I have a lot of nice childhood memories with Mom, but this isn't one of them. I remember leaving quickly, and I remember her being mad and disappointed. And I have 15+ years of personal weigh-in memories that mirror that memory, and the Betty scenes...which is why I wanted to climb of up my friend's living room wall during them. A room full of people basing their self-worth on their weight that week...yep.
On to the cons...
1) A lot has been written about the folly of the low fat craze that advocated choosing pasta over protein, so I won't go into it too much. If you want to read more about it, I'd start with In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan. But I will say how very detrimental this was to me. Probably for reasons having to do with genetics, I was only ever meant to process simple or complex carbohydrates so well, but following the Wisdom of the 90s and WW (which was of course based on the Wisdom), actually made me sick, and maybe broke my metabolism forever. I kicked ass at eating low-fat, which meant that when I loaded my body with carbs there was nothing to offset the sugar rush-- no emulsifying fat, no protein replacing part of the carbs-- just sugar. Which meant an insulin dump, excess insulin -- which I believe helps you make FAT, and a subsequent loooowwwwwwww. At which point I turned into the incredible hulk version of Miss Lady and/or cried because I couldn't decide what to eat. I eventually fixed this symptom with whole food and protein, but I'm still resistant to my own insulin after years of that. This, people is one of the ways that people become diabetic.
So...do I blame WW for that? Not entirely, as we were all guided by the Wisdom of the 90s...but WW does promote and, in fact, still advocate a one-size-fits-all nutrition plan, and that seems stupid as hell, given that some of their advice has been so detrimental that it could steer some metabolic types toward, instead of away from, the betes. Course, you can layer your own guidelines on top of WW, but after I did that enough, I wondered why the hell I was giving them money every week.
2) Which brings me to the next point of my rant-- undercalorie dieting. There's some shit I'm not doing again. Regardless of how suitable or not suitable WW is for how you metabolize food, you will lose at least some weight if you follow their plan, because it just isn't that much food. However, you might also be hungry...really really fucking hungry. You might also feed off your own glorious muscle...and be congratulated for your big weight loss as a result. You might hit a million really sticky plateaus. You might give yourself adrenal exhaustion. And you might...um...fall off the plan again and again because you are hungry and then spend ages 14-31 or so joining and quitting over and over and have a harder and harder time losing weight each time and write a really long rant about Weight Watchers even though some of this is surely your responsibility. Just hypothetically.
3) Here's my biggest problem, and one that it took me quite a while to spot. WW, with a little bit of help from other sources, cultivated the idea that I was a sick, broken eater. Somewhere along the way...sometime after the time of "exchanges"...WW seriously ramped up the marketing of their WW products. Between this, and the advice being dispensed and shared at meetings, the idea that overweight people needed a lot of shit to manage the task of feeding themselves lodged into my mind, the minds of my family members, and seemingly a lot of other people. At their meetings WW sells and often promotes, "low point" candies, cookies, and chip like things to get your through your day. There was an awful lot of talk about "needing" these items to get from meal to meal or in order to avoid cake at parties and such. Now that I understand a bit more about what causes cravings-- for me, but also for other, I know that the most insidious part though is not what we said about the food, but what the food does. All of it, of course, is highly processed, even more so than regular junk food. What response does a body have to being flooded with the chemicals of a low- fat ice cream sandwich? It wants more chemicals. Pretty sure a lot of junk food works this way, but when this happens to people who are not eating enough calories and probably not getting enough fat..and so they are often craving both of those too...and you tell them that for just.one.more.point they can have some more faux chocolate...
Here's what happens: 2..3...4 Skinny Cows in a day! If you've ever done this...or if you've ever cut down your REAL MEALS to budget for more diet junk food...I understand. Even though I once had the very reasonable attitude that desserts were for here and there, special occasions etc...when I first arrived at Weight Watchers at 118lbs (yep...be advised that I'd kill any one of you if I thought it would make me weigh that little now...actually I'd want more muscle than that...but its neither here nor there since killing doesn't make you thin) within a decade I was sure I couldn't get through the day without a faux dessert...or two. I know that the very last time I took a stab at WW, I decided to try to get through the week with just one 4 pack of desserts, and it was BETTER. Now I don't eat that shit at all, and I can't say I miss it. Turns out, I don't need it-- so yeah, WW you can fuck off again.
I haven't even touched on the fact that its easier to calculate points with packaged crap and the dependence that creates, but I think the implications can be inferred.
4) Other non-sense enabling ideas-- The one above fits into this category, but there were so many more. One that stands out, is the shitty attitude toward exercise. This can vary from leader to leader, and physical activity is certainly encouraged...but there was always this undercurrent of..."we know you defective fat people don't want to exercise, but you have to!" Fuck off again and again, Weight Watchers. I'm an athlete, bitches, and I love working out. I'm looking at 1..2..3...6 fucking race medals hanging on my door right now. And not for no pussy 10Ks either cause they don't give you medals for that. The fact that they be disrespecting me aside, this has other implications. First, because they rely on the scale, or because they don't really expect you to workout...a muscle gain will be read as a failure up at the Weight Watchers. A serious fucking flaw, that you have to have rock solid confidence to overcome. Imagine...you've been deadlifting fucking tractor trailers or hippopotomi all week and some flabby arm quasi-healthy geezer lady tilts her head to the side and says "aww" while you are standing on the scale in you damn socks (taboo at WW btw) and your cotton weigh-in outfit (story for another day)! Clearly, I'm still a little upset up this.
More important though, is that in their efforts to promote exercise amongst the feeble fat non-exercisers, I've seen WW enable people to not fucking get a workout. Favorite story like this: I was at a WW meeting here in Austin (which for some reason suck even more than in other cities) with my friend Jackie-- not the one you know, I have LOTS of friends named that. We were gonna like get thin for real or something. Anyhoo, this leader lady starts talking about how to get more activity/activity points in your life and asking for ideas from the group. I want to suggest marathoning or climbing Mt. Everest, but I keep my mouth shut and listen, cause I do know that's not for everyone. People name some reasonable stuff, like go for a walk. Then we talk about gardening, which is definitely harder work than I'm interested in at the moment...but isn't really a consistent workout for most...but I see what they mean. Soon we move on to talking about how making two trips from the car with your groceries is a really good way to get more exercise. Really? Is your car in Oklahoma? At this point, Jackie and I start to exchange looks, cause its kinda funny. But when the leader starts to champion this line of thinking and come up with other helpful workouts, like walking down to your mailbox instead of pulling the car up to it, or putting the remote over there...we start looking for the candid camera hidden somewhere. It was like an SNL skit, except, alas, no.
So basically, she just talked everyone out of exercising for real. It was not appropriate advice for anyone except the morbidly obese or limited mobility elderly. And maybe not even then. NOT my first time to hear that shit either. I believe Jackie and I ran out, debriefed, and promptly ended that round of WW.
So...um this has been a lot of cussing, even for me. Clearly, I have a few pent up feelings about WW and probably dieting in general. I feel like I should cut some of this, because of its volume, but I'll leave it, in case any one part of this is helpful to someone else or touches on their WW and/or dieting experience. Sometimes its nice to know you aren't alone in Skinny Cow addiction or whatever. And I certainly don't mean to ruin or dampen anybody's WW experience. I'm sure it has merit for some. Just for fucks sake, take it all with a grain of salt. (0 pts!)
I end with this: I clearly do not have it all figured out, as I haven't managed to achieve a lean body mass yet. However, since I told WW to fuck off, I'm not hungry, ever. My relationship with food has improved drastically-- in my brain and my body chemistry. I don't have many cravings (outside of ESKings) and I control portions naturally on a regular basis. I'm happy, though you can't tell it from the volume of times I used the f-u-c-k word here. It really is fucking awesome when you tell Weight Watchers to fuck off.
Just so it will be clear how I feel about this, I'd like to start with a little letter to Weight Watchers, since we know I often write letters to things that can't read, like tacos.
Dear Weight Watchers,
Firstly, fuck off. Also, no thank you to the helpful emails you send me (I know I can unsubscribe; I'm lazy like that.) and to the postcards that say how much you miss me. I can't come to a fucking meeting right now, because I'm eating olives, dammit. And planning recipes with avocado, bitches.
With bitterness that's only somewhat misplaced,
Miss Lady
P.S. What makes you so damn sure I still need to lose weight, hmm? I feel highly suspect of your business model that thrives off the great American failure to lose weight.
So...I knew there would be a WW rant on this blog, maybe many, but I wasn't quite ready to tackle the subject yet. Since I wrote about Fat Betty though, I feel like this Mad Men episode forced my hand...like when Biden made Obama publicly admit how he has probably felt about marriage rights all along!
I'll start by admitting that there are a few positives to WW, and that I have lost weight following their program at various points in my life, albeit temporary, and sometimes unhealthy. See how good I am at being positive?
Pros
1) Accountability-- There's nothing like having strangers look at your weight to make you think about what you eat. I love making food choices because I'm worried about shame! Shit, I suck at being positive. I suppose there were times when I felt accountable to only myself on the scale. Course, once I felt like that, I also didn't want to hear what the ladies had to say about my weight either way. Again, fuck off.
2) Support-- You can find a sense of community and share various tips with people at the meeting. Before I bitch about the volume of absolute nonsense that gets said at these meetings, I will say that some of the leaders did provide guidance in negotiating the low-fat, cheating your way to thin version of dieting that is prominent up at the WW. "If you put yellow glue substance on your sammich it's just like cheese. And with a side of diarrhea chips, you'll have tricked yourself into thin in no time!" No really, there was some good advice. I'm just not capable of saying anything nice.
3) Helping people who ain't got no sense-- One of my friends told me that her husband once tried to help her eat healthy by giving her a Hostess fruit pie...you know, a fried pie, presumably because the fruit was healthy. I also know that many people have lost perspective on what's healthy, thanks to our fast and fatty national cuisine. Case in point: I went on a date, with a man y'all may know as "Spite Fuck" to the East Side Kings (where I like to conduct all my life's affairs actually) and after we consumed our 3 fried items (albeit delicious, real, and whole fried items) SF said, "Wow. I haven't eaten that healthy in years!" My point is that there a whole lot of ways of eating worse than Weight Watchers, so for some people it really is a drastic improvement.
Cons-- Hell yes! I love cons.
*Full disclosure: Since I have sworn off the WW, I don't have much experience with their PointsPlus plan. My understanding from...discussing it with my mother, is that even though there is some focus on whole foods (aka Power Foods) the core of it, is really still the same. Other than that, I've had intimate knowledge of ALL of their plans since about...well...1980..81, somewhere in there. One of my earlier (but not the earliest) lessons in the shame of being out of control of your eating occurred when I accompanied my mom to a WW weigh-in at a creepy old church. I have a lot of nice childhood memories with Mom, but this isn't one of them. I remember leaving quickly, and I remember her being mad and disappointed. And I have 15+ years of personal weigh-in memories that mirror that memory, and the Betty scenes...which is why I wanted to climb of up my friend's living room wall during them. A room full of people basing their self-worth on their weight that week...yep.
On to the cons...
1) A lot has been written about the folly of the low fat craze that advocated choosing pasta over protein, so I won't go into it too much. If you want to read more about it, I'd start with In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan. But I will say how very detrimental this was to me. Probably for reasons having to do with genetics, I was only ever meant to process simple or complex carbohydrates so well, but following the Wisdom of the 90s and WW (which was of course based on the Wisdom), actually made me sick, and maybe broke my metabolism forever. I kicked ass at eating low-fat, which meant that when I loaded my body with carbs there was nothing to offset the sugar rush-- no emulsifying fat, no protein replacing part of the carbs-- just sugar. Which meant an insulin dump, excess insulin -- which I believe helps you make FAT, and a subsequent loooowwwwwwww. At which point I turned into the incredible hulk version of Miss Lady and/or cried because I couldn't decide what to eat. I eventually fixed this symptom with whole food and protein, but I'm still resistant to my own insulin after years of that. This, people is one of the ways that people become diabetic.
So...do I blame WW for that? Not entirely, as we were all guided by the Wisdom of the 90s...but WW does promote and, in fact, still advocate a one-size-fits-all nutrition plan, and that seems stupid as hell, given that some of their advice has been so detrimental that it could steer some metabolic types toward, instead of away from, the betes. Course, you can layer your own guidelines on top of WW, but after I did that enough, I wondered why the hell I was giving them money every week.
2) Which brings me to the next point of my rant-- undercalorie dieting. There's some shit I'm not doing again. Regardless of how suitable or not suitable WW is for how you metabolize food, you will lose at least some weight if you follow their plan, because it just isn't that much food. However, you might also be hungry...really really fucking hungry. You might also feed off your own glorious muscle...and be congratulated for your big weight loss as a result. You might hit a million really sticky plateaus. You might give yourself adrenal exhaustion. And you might...um...fall off the plan again and again because you are hungry and then spend ages 14-31 or so joining and quitting over and over and have a harder and harder time losing weight each time and write a really long rant about Weight Watchers even though some of this is surely your responsibility. Just hypothetically.
3) Here's my biggest problem, and one that it took me quite a while to spot. WW, with a little bit of help from other sources, cultivated the idea that I was a sick, broken eater. Somewhere along the way...sometime after the time of "exchanges"...WW seriously ramped up the marketing of their WW products. Between this, and the advice being dispensed and shared at meetings, the idea that overweight people needed a lot of shit to manage the task of feeding themselves lodged into my mind, the minds of my family members, and seemingly a lot of other people. At their meetings WW sells and often promotes, "low point" candies, cookies, and chip like things to get your through your day. There was an awful lot of talk about "needing" these items to get from meal to meal or in order to avoid cake at parties and such. Now that I understand a bit more about what causes cravings-- for me, but also for other, I know that the most insidious part though is not what we said about the food, but what the food does. All of it, of course, is highly processed, even more so than regular junk food. What response does a body have to being flooded with the chemicals of a low- fat ice cream sandwich? It wants more chemicals. Pretty sure a lot of junk food works this way, but when this happens to people who are not eating enough calories and probably not getting enough fat..and so they are often craving both of those too...and you tell them that for just.one.more.point they can have some more faux chocolate...
Here's what happens: 2..3...4 Skinny Cows in a day! If you've ever done this...or if you've ever cut down your REAL MEALS to budget for more diet junk food...I understand. Even though I once had the very reasonable attitude that desserts were for here and there, special occasions etc...when I first arrived at Weight Watchers at 118lbs (yep...be advised that I'd kill any one of you if I thought it would make me weigh that little now...actually I'd want more muscle than that...but its neither here nor there since killing doesn't make you thin) within a decade I was sure I couldn't get through the day without a faux dessert...or two. I know that the very last time I took a stab at WW, I decided to try to get through the week with just one 4 pack of desserts, and it was BETTER. Now I don't eat that shit at all, and I can't say I miss it. Turns out, I don't need it-- so yeah, WW you can fuck off again.
I haven't even touched on the fact that its easier to calculate points with packaged crap and the dependence that creates, but I think the implications can be inferred.
4) Other non-sense enabling ideas-- The one above fits into this category, but there were so many more. One that stands out, is the shitty attitude toward exercise. This can vary from leader to leader, and physical activity is certainly encouraged...but there was always this undercurrent of..."we know you defective fat people don't want to exercise, but you have to!" Fuck off again and again, Weight Watchers. I'm an athlete, bitches, and I love working out. I'm looking at 1..2..3...6 fucking race medals hanging on my door right now. And not for no pussy 10Ks either cause they don't give you medals for that. The fact that they be disrespecting me aside, this has other implications. First, because they rely on the scale, or because they don't really expect you to workout...a muscle gain will be read as a failure up at the Weight Watchers. A serious fucking flaw, that you have to have rock solid confidence to overcome. Imagine...you've been deadlifting fucking tractor trailers or hippopotomi all week and some flabby arm quasi-healthy geezer lady tilts her head to the side and says "aww" while you are standing on the scale in you damn socks (taboo at WW btw) and your cotton weigh-in outfit (story for another day)! Clearly, I'm still a little upset up this.
More important though, is that in their efforts to promote exercise amongst the feeble fat non-exercisers, I've seen WW enable people to not fucking get a workout. Favorite story like this: I was at a WW meeting here in Austin (which for some reason suck even more than in other cities) with my friend Jackie-- not the one you know, I have LOTS of friends named that. We were gonna like get thin for real or something. Anyhoo, this leader lady starts talking about how to get more activity/activity points in your life and asking for ideas from the group. I want to suggest marathoning or climbing Mt. Everest, but I keep my mouth shut and listen, cause I do know that's not for everyone. People name some reasonable stuff, like go for a walk. Then we talk about gardening, which is definitely harder work than I'm interested in at the moment...but isn't really a consistent workout for most...but I see what they mean. Soon we move on to talking about how making two trips from the car with your groceries is a really good way to get more exercise. Really? Is your car in Oklahoma? At this point, Jackie and I start to exchange looks, cause its kinda funny. But when the leader starts to champion this line of thinking and come up with other helpful workouts, like walking down to your mailbox instead of pulling the car up to it, or putting the remote over there...we start looking for the candid camera hidden somewhere. It was like an SNL skit, except, alas, no.
So basically, she just talked everyone out of exercising for real. It was not appropriate advice for anyone except the morbidly obese or limited mobility elderly. And maybe not even then. NOT my first time to hear that shit either. I believe Jackie and I ran out, debriefed, and promptly ended that round of WW.
So...um this has been a lot of cussing, even for me. Clearly, I have a few pent up feelings about WW and probably dieting in general. I feel like I should cut some of this, because of its volume, but I'll leave it, in case any one part of this is helpful to someone else or touches on their WW and/or dieting experience. Sometimes its nice to know you aren't alone in Skinny Cow addiction or whatever. And I certainly don't mean to ruin or dampen anybody's WW experience. I'm sure it has merit for some. Just for fucks sake, take it all with a grain of salt. (0 pts!)
I end with this: I clearly do not have it all figured out, as I haven't managed to achieve a lean body mass yet. However, since I told WW to fuck off, I'm not hungry, ever. My relationship with food has improved drastically-- in my brain and my body chemistry. I don't have many cravings (outside of ESKings) and I control portions naturally on a regular basis. I'm happy, though you can't tell it from the volume of times I used the f-u-c-k word here. It really is fucking awesome when you tell Weight Watchers to fuck off.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Eatins-- April 23-29
Monday April 23--
Breakfast-- Chick-Fil-A sandwich
Lunch-- Salad with raisins, apples, and spicy turkey
Snacks: Apple, peanut butter with almond butter
Dinner-- salad greens, rotisserie chicken breast, edamame hummus, tomatoes
Tuesday April 24
Breakfast-- Tacodeli Otto on corn (2) + iced coffee
Lunch-- Zen-- brown rice, peanut sauce, buddha mix (carrots, squash,...and other veggies), double meat dark chicken
Dinner-- salami, edamame hummus, blueberries
*Good news-- thanks to also eating a lot of benedryls, my severe allergy reaction is subsiding. This is important to eating, because it severely diminishes my appetite. Some might think that is a blessing, but its not. The only problem I currently have with the actual volume of food I eat, is that sometimes I undereat-- in terms of calories, but also nutrients. When my system is inflammed and full of ...congestion, it makes it hard to have the appetite that drives me to be prepared and eat healthy flavorful foods. Instead, I put off preparing/eating until only convenient choices are an option, and furthermore I gravitate toward bland fatty comfort foods. At this time last year (you think I'd learn) I remember only wanting to eat mashed potatoes with butter, and sending my nutritionist a frantic email about that, since its a terrible food choice for me. So appetite= good.
Wed April 25
Breakfast-- Tacodeli Otto on corn + iced coffee
Lunch: HEB HFCS Sushi
Dinner: Lemon Chicken with brown rice
Snacks: Bobo's Oat Bar Peanut Butter
Thur April 26
Breakfast-- 3 eggs + 2 Pedersons Breakfast Sausages
Lunch: Turkey, Hummus, and tomatoes.
Snack: Can't remember, but I feel sure there was one.
Dinner-- Fake Chicken Karaage-- Involves a rotisserie chicken, mint, basil, cilantro,onion, and jalapeno sauce lightly sauteed. Ain't no East Side Kings, but I enjoyed it. And cooked it myself!
Friday April 27
Breakfast: Chick- Fil-A-- must get back in the habit of cooking at home, dammit! But mornings are clearly starting to wear real thin...or real fat, as the case may be. #Teachingmakesyoufat.
Lunch: Fake Chicken Karaage! I was smart enough to make leftovers!!
Dinner: Chipotle-- Brown Rice Barbacoa Bowl with Chips. Note to self-- this, even without the chips, makes me uncomfortably full.
Sat April 28
Breakfast: Starbucks Sausage Sandwich + Iced Coffee
Lunch: Brown rice and salmon sushi from WF
Snack: Spoonful of almond butter
Dinner: A long awaited East Side Kings-- Chicken Karaage (In this case, fried chicken thigh brined and served with basil, mint, cilantro, jalepeno, onion, and sweet chili sauce.) and Brussel Sprout Salad. They were sadly out of beets.
Sunday April 29
Breakfast: Two Ottos on corn tortillas.
Snack: Iced coffee and cake ball.
Lunch/ Dinner: Meatloaf with macaroni + broccoli
Snack: Guac + Red wine + carrots.
Breakfast-- Chick-Fil-A sandwich
Lunch-- Salad with raisins, apples, and spicy turkey
Snacks: Apple, peanut butter with almond butter
Dinner-- salad greens, rotisserie chicken breast, edamame hummus, tomatoes
Tuesday April 24
Breakfast-- Tacodeli Otto on corn (2) + iced coffee
Lunch-- Zen-- brown rice, peanut sauce, buddha mix (carrots, squash,...and other veggies), double meat dark chicken
Dinner-- salami, edamame hummus, blueberries
*Good news-- thanks to also eating a lot of benedryls, my severe allergy reaction is subsiding. This is important to eating, because it severely diminishes my appetite. Some might think that is a blessing, but its not. The only problem I currently have with the actual volume of food I eat, is that sometimes I undereat-- in terms of calories, but also nutrients. When my system is inflammed and full of ...congestion, it makes it hard to have the appetite that drives me to be prepared and eat healthy flavorful foods. Instead, I put off preparing/eating until only convenient choices are an option, and furthermore I gravitate toward bland fatty comfort foods. At this time last year (you think I'd learn) I remember only wanting to eat mashed potatoes with butter, and sending my nutritionist a frantic email about that, since its a terrible food choice for me. So appetite= good.
Wed April 25
Breakfast-- Tacodeli Otto on corn + iced coffee
Lunch: HEB HFCS Sushi
Dinner: Lemon Chicken with brown rice
Snacks: Bobo's Oat Bar Peanut Butter
Thur April 26
Breakfast-- 3 eggs + 2 Pedersons Breakfast Sausages
Lunch: Turkey, Hummus, and tomatoes.
Snack: Can't remember, but I feel sure there was one.
Dinner-- Fake Chicken Karaage-- Involves a rotisserie chicken, mint, basil, cilantro,onion, and jalapeno sauce lightly sauteed. Ain't no East Side Kings, but I enjoyed it. And cooked it myself!
Friday April 27
Breakfast: Chick- Fil-A-- must get back in the habit of cooking at home, dammit! But mornings are clearly starting to wear real thin...or real fat, as the case may be. #Teachingmakesyoufat.
Lunch: Fake Chicken Karaage! I was smart enough to make leftovers!!
Dinner: Chipotle-- Brown Rice Barbacoa Bowl with Chips. Note to self-- this, even without the chips, makes me uncomfortably full.
Sat April 28
Breakfast: Starbucks Sausage Sandwich + Iced Coffee
Lunch: Brown rice and salmon sushi from WF
Snack: Spoonful of almond butter
Dinner: A long awaited East Side Kings-- Chicken Karaage (In this case, fried chicken thigh brined and served with basil, mint, cilantro, jalepeno, onion, and sweet chili sauce.) and Brussel Sprout Salad. They were sadly out of beets.
Sunday April 29
Breakfast: Two Ottos on corn tortillas.
Snack: Iced coffee and cake ball.
Lunch/ Dinner: Meatloaf with macaroni + broccoli
Snack: Guac + Red wine + carrots.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Oh yeah...I have a blog--Eatings-- Friday March 30- Thur April 5
So, I sorta forgot about my blog. Its a symptom of how I keep overcrowding my life in general. You know...with 3 email accounts, 2 twitters, a facebook, oh and two blogs.
So below is where I made a point to log in and keep track of my eatins two weeks ago. And then I forgot about writing stuff down...and may nutrition in general. Full disclosure-- since April 5, while I have continued to fit in healthy meals like eggs,spinach, and tomatoes for breakfast, I've also eaten brisket sandwiches, 2 Chick-Fil-A homophobic biscuits of hatred, Tacodeli, and a fried guacamole pie. My waistline suffers along with my self esteem. Oh and one day, after a derby bout, and I had a burger with the bun AND fries and I ate it all. ALL...it was amazing.
So...soon I'm gonna write a post thats both uplifting and super dark that will maybe kinda solve the mystery about whether or not I'm fat. It should be a jem.
I know you all want to know where I got that fried guacamole pie. Some pink trailer called The Bomb (or something like that) that is fortunately located in Dallas most of the time.
--Whole Foods eggs, oatmeal with almonds, raisins, and cranberries
Snack: WF sushi
Lunch: WF Tuna Salad
Dinner: Sandwich with chicken sausage and 1 slice cheese
Baby Shower: cheese, crackers, some sort of pancake, cupcake, chips, Makers and Ginger Ale
Sat-- Tacodeli-- 2 Ottos on corn, Starbucks Iced Coffee
Titayas Vermicelli Lover + spring roll
Sunday-- Starbucks sausage sandwich
Tacodeli-- One Otto, one bacon+egg+cheese that didn't come with bacon!
Dinner: Cobb salad with chicken and quinoa
2 Gins
Monday-- Eggs with spinach and chicken sausage
Snack: Ham and Lentil Hummus
Snack: Apple + Almond Butter
Dinner: Salmon + Asparagus
Snack: Fancy iced cream sandwich
Tuesday--Migas from WF with oatmeal and potatoes
Lunch: Chicken salad
Dinner: Baked chicken, greens, avocado
So below is where I made a point to log in and keep track of my eatins two weeks ago. And then I forgot about writing stuff down...and may nutrition in general. Full disclosure-- since April 5, while I have continued to fit in healthy meals like eggs,spinach, and tomatoes for breakfast, I've also eaten brisket sandwiches, 2 Chick-Fil-A homophobic biscuits of hatred, Tacodeli, and a fried guacamole pie. My waistline suffers along with my self esteem. Oh and one day, after a derby bout, and I had a burger with the bun AND fries and I ate it all. ALL...it was amazing.
So...soon I'm gonna write a post thats both uplifting and super dark that will maybe kinda solve the mystery about whether or not I'm fat. It should be a jem.
I know you all want to know where I got that fried guacamole pie. Some pink trailer called The Bomb (or something like that) that is fortunately located in Dallas most of the time.
--Whole Foods eggs, oatmeal with almonds, raisins, and cranberries
Snack: WF sushi
Lunch: WF Tuna Salad
Dinner: Sandwich with chicken sausage and 1 slice cheese
Baby Shower: cheese, crackers, some sort of pancake, cupcake, chips, Makers and Ginger Ale
Sat-- Tacodeli-- 2 Ottos on corn, Starbucks Iced Coffee
Titayas Vermicelli Lover + spring roll
Sunday-- Starbucks sausage sandwich
Tacodeli-- One Otto, one bacon+egg+cheese that didn't come with bacon!
Dinner: Cobb salad with chicken and quinoa
2 Gins
Monday-- Eggs with spinach and chicken sausage
Snack: Ham and Lentil Hummus
Snack: Apple + Almond Butter
Dinner: Salmon + Asparagus
Snack: Fancy iced cream sandwich
Tuesday--Migas from WF with oatmeal and potatoes
Lunch: Chicken salad
Dinner: Baked chicken, greens, avocado
Sunday, April 1, 2012
Fat Betty
What are the chances that I'm not gonna post about "fat Betty" after this Sunday's episode of Mad Men?
That's right...none. Here goes.
On the one hand, I'm a woman who puts "fat curses" on ex-boyfriends and then looks them up here and there on the FB to make sure it's working. (Sorry if any of you suckers are reading this. And by suckers I mean fat suckers.) So insofar as I've joined in with the love-to-hate-Betty aspect of the show, it was a delight to see her struggling into that dress. Total payback thinking that being beautiful and accepted as perfect by society assure you happiness. (Sorry Betty! It's actually being a smart mouthed muffin topper that gets you everywhere in this world. Trust me.) Payback for belittling Sally, etc.
However, the reason I put my famous fat curses on the exes, is because I know just exactly how much it sucks to feel out of control of your body. I know there are technically worse things, but when I think about shitty shit that could befall you, I think of fat. Or maybe its more appropriate to say that I think being leaner could bring them some sorta happiness, which I wish to deny them. I say this as, and I know you might have to just trust me on this because of how I sorta just said that thin = happy, but I say this as a fairly well adjusted fat woman who loves herself. (Seriously, I was admiring my own curves in the mirror today in yoga. In stretchy pants.) However, most of the worst pains in my life have been associated with weight in one way or another, and sometimes it feels like my life's greatest failure with a bunch of smaller related failures inside it. Even while I will tell you that its not that bad and is no way to define yourself, I'll also tell you that its unbearably sucky. That's probably a paradox.
So my point is that, even while I, in some ways, enjoyed the latest fate of the character Betty in shallow ways, more than anything I just plain got why this was supposed to suck so bad for her. And is so...anti- Betty. Not being able to find a goddamn suitable thing to wear, even though they all fit last month...been there. The reality check that causes...let me tell you how a flow chart about that would go: Realize your "fat" dress doesn't fit. Two choices-- decide this is the bottom and take some healthy action...or descend further into food related madness until even your beach mumu doesn't fit at which time a similar choice must be made. The reason I call this the anti-Betty is that her character has always valued the sort of control appearance brings her...over herself...others...perhaps because it was the only kinda of control available to her. And now even that is gone, and she finds herself in a changing world that she just couldn't possibly be prepared for...not like Meagan, whose damn dress zips. Gawd, that dress moment! I know many others get this too, because dresses are evil, and you don't have to approach anything even near fat to have such a moment; you just have to be bigger than you were.
Then there was the phone moment. The other wicked smart people in the room with me, thought maybe that she got bad news-- that she had cancer-- during the interlude where she wasn't speaking yet. My quickness in reading that look though was shocking even to me. (Really, I didn't even need the look.) The look was: "Oh, so I'm just fat." I've had mirror image moments of that conversation, except that I'm a mouthy smart mouthy mouth, who will say exactly that to the doctor, and try to force him to explain why he's content with having an overweight endurance athlete who eats healthier than average for a patient. No, not cancer people. Just fat. The difference is that Betty is terrified to live fat--might as well be a death sentence for her, and I think I can manage it. I guess.
That's right...none. Here goes.
On the one hand, I'm a woman who puts "fat curses" on ex-boyfriends and then looks them up here and there on the FB to make sure it's working. (Sorry if any of you suckers are reading this. And by suckers I mean fat suckers.) So insofar as I've joined in with the love-to-hate-Betty aspect of the show, it was a delight to see her struggling into that dress. Total payback thinking that being beautiful and accepted as perfect by society assure you happiness. (Sorry Betty! It's actually being a smart mouthed muffin topper that gets you everywhere in this world. Trust me.) Payback for belittling Sally, etc.
However, the reason I put my famous fat curses on the exes, is because I know just exactly how much it sucks to feel out of control of your body. I know there are technically worse things, but when I think about shitty shit that could befall you, I think of fat. Or maybe its more appropriate to say that I think being leaner could bring them some sorta happiness, which I wish to deny them. I say this as, and I know you might have to just trust me on this because of how I sorta just said that thin = happy, but I say this as a fairly well adjusted fat woman who loves herself. (Seriously, I was admiring my own curves in the mirror today in yoga. In stretchy pants.) However, most of the worst pains in my life have been associated with weight in one way or another, and sometimes it feels like my life's greatest failure with a bunch of smaller related failures inside it. Even while I will tell you that its not that bad and is no way to define yourself, I'll also tell you that its unbearably sucky. That's probably a paradox.
So my point is that, even while I, in some ways, enjoyed the latest fate of the character Betty in shallow ways, more than anything I just plain got why this was supposed to suck so bad for her. And is so...anti- Betty. Not being able to find a goddamn suitable thing to wear, even though they all fit last month...been there. The reality check that causes...let me tell you how a flow chart about that would go: Realize your "fat" dress doesn't fit. Two choices-- decide this is the bottom and take some healthy action...or descend further into food related madness until even your beach mumu doesn't fit at which time a similar choice must be made. The reason I call this the anti-Betty is that her character has always valued the sort of control appearance brings her...over herself...others...perhaps because it was the only kinda of control available to her. And now even that is gone, and she finds herself in a changing world that she just couldn't possibly be prepared for...not like Meagan, whose damn dress zips. Gawd, that dress moment! I know many others get this too, because dresses are evil, and you don't have to approach anything even near fat to have such a moment; you just have to be bigger than you were.
Then there was the phone moment. The other wicked smart people in the room with me, thought maybe that she got bad news-- that she had cancer-- during the interlude where she wasn't speaking yet. My quickness in reading that look though was shocking even to me. (Really, I didn't even need the look.) The look was: "Oh, so I'm just fat." I've had mirror image moments of that conversation, except that I'm a mouthy smart mouthy mouth, who will say exactly that to the doctor, and try to force him to explain why he's content with having an overweight endurance athlete who eats healthier than average for a patient. No, not cancer people. Just fat. The difference is that Betty is terrified to live fat--might as well be a death sentence for her, and I think I can manage it. I guess.
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Shit: I just sent this link to my nutritionist. Thankfully, I've eaten some good shit!
Of course I haven't followed my new plan of logging in to post my eatins on a draft and publish it at the end of the week, so I have to recall all that I ate. So hard, but most of it was awesome stuff, so maybe that will help.
Last Thur March 22...wait no...I already posted all the good shit there.
Friday March 23
Eggs
Guac and carrots
Crap...I really can't remember. I can say this: It was a good day of eating. Later, when I went to book club, I splurged on purpose though. After the salad with chicken(?) and chips with avocado, I had some sugar...in the form of a donut and pound cake. I also had a glass of wine, and no regrets, since the previous days had been healthy.
Sat: I cannot remember again, except that it was healthy. I even had a paramour over and fed him organic hummus, salami, chicken (oh shit...I had some rotisserie chicken on Thur? maybe) legs, spinach, and beer. I ate most of that. I think it was actually my dinner, so I may have been under calorie this day. Oh wait...I think I had eggs from breakfast and...CM meatballs and quinoa for lunch. With spinach.
Sun March 25
Earl Grey with a touch of cream
Starbucks sausage sandwich
Lunch: Chipotle -- salad with brown rice, black beans, carnitas, guac, and chips-- my new guilty pleasure. Is it okay if they function as a lettuce delivery vehicle? No?
Snack during Mad Men-- because I was so excited I forgot to eat!-- Sun Chips + a MamaKaze (any gin drink made by PapaKaze.)
Dinner: PTerrys burger with the bun.
Monday:
Breakfast-- Eggs with spinach
Lunch: crap...why can't I remember...well, I ate well all day. Oh shit...maybe I didn't. Did I go to Chipotle? Anyhow I felt good about my eating all day.
Dinner: Chicken breast with spinach, tomatoes, and hummus.
Tuesday March 27
Breakfast: Eggs (Has anyone noticed that I broke my Tacodeli habit?...very important as I actually want to live there.)
Snack: Iced coffee with cream, protein plate with cheese
Lunch: Salad with ham
Snack: Brown Rice Sushi-- keeping that counter at the WF open by myself.
Dinner: with Joe-- grassfed burger with havarti (does anyone see that this is 3 dairys? I paid the next day with painful inflammation) and a buttermilk bun. Greens, tomatoes, strawberries. Portions of several Lone Stars-- how do you lose your beer in your own house?
Wednesday March 28
Breakfast: Eggs and chicken sausage and strawberries
Lunch: 2 grassfed burger patties (no bun), ketchup, and a ton of green beans
Dinner: Salami with hummus and mixed greens
Thursday:
Breakfast-- Chick-Fil-A Homophobic Chicken Biscuit-- Look, I'm fine with the fact that I occasionally eat politically wrong chicken that's bad for me. I just want to know why they can't get the biscuit right every damn time. Its industrialized biscuits-- make them uniformly good!
Lunch: Turkey breast chunks with mixed greens and hummus
Snack: WF Sushi wrapper things
Dinner: Impromptu, post-derby, EAST SIDE KINGS!!!!!!!!! Beet fries with aioli. Chicken Karage! Beer. (Note to self: purple poop tomorrow is normal. Don't freak.)
Hmmm...I didn't eat as well as I thought, though it should be noted (mostly by me) that I feel like I ate healthy. 80/20 rule? Anyhow, this proves the importance of writing it down, aroundish the time/day you ate it. Also, I know I forgot a whole pack of probiotic yogurt, some plain tuna, and a chicken and avocado meal.
Update as of just now when I found my measuring tape: My body is doing what I like. Waist shrinking, rest staying the same. World, please be advised that when my breast/hip to waist ratio is more than 10 inches apart, I be dangerous.
Current measurements:
Overbust: 45
Waist: 34
Hips: 45.5
Last Thur March 22...wait no...I already posted all the good shit there.
Friday March 23
Eggs
Guac and carrots
Crap...I really can't remember. I can say this: It was a good day of eating. Later, when I went to book club, I splurged on purpose though. After the salad with chicken(?) and chips with avocado, I had some sugar...in the form of a donut and pound cake. I also had a glass of wine, and no regrets, since the previous days had been healthy.
Sat: I cannot remember again, except that it was healthy. I even had a paramour over and fed him organic hummus, salami, chicken (oh shit...I had some rotisserie chicken on Thur? maybe) legs, spinach, and beer. I ate most of that. I think it was actually my dinner, so I may have been under calorie this day. Oh wait...I think I had eggs from breakfast and...CM meatballs and quinoa for lunch. With spinach.
Sun March 25
Earl Grey with a touch of cream
Starbucks sausage sandwich
Lunch: Chipotle -- salad with brown rice, black beans, carnitas, guac, and chips-- my new guilty pleasure. Is it okay if they function as a lettuce delivery vehicle? No?
Snack during Mad Men-- because I was so excited I forgot to eat!-- Sun Chips + a MamaKaze (any gin drink made by PapaKaze.)
Dinner: PTerrys burger with the bun.
Monday:
Breakfast-- Eggs with spinach
Lunch: crap...why can't I remember...well, I ate well all day. Oh shit...maybe I didn't. Did I go to Chipotle? Anyhow I felt good about my eating all day.
Dinner: Chicken breast with spinach, tomatoes, and hummus.
Tuesday March 27
Breakfast: Eggs (Has anyone noticed that I broke my Tacodeli habit?...very important as I actually want to live there.)
Snack: Iced coffee with cream, protein plate with cheese
Lunch: Salad with ham
Snack: Brown Rice Sushi-- keeping that counter at the WF open by myself.
Dinner: with Joe-- grassfed burger with havarti (does anyone see that this is 3 dairys? I paid the next day with painful inflammation) and a buttermilk bun. Greens, tomatoes, strawberries. Portions of several Lone Stars-- how do you lose your beer in your own house?
Wednesday March 28
Breakfast: Eggs and chicken sausage and strawberries
Lunch: 2 grassfed burger patties (no bun), ketchup, and a ton of green beans
Dinner: Salami with hummus and mixed greens
Thursday:
Breakfast-- Chick-Fil-A Homophobic Chicken Biscuit-- Look, I'm fine with the fact that I occasionally eat politically wrong chicken that's bad for me. I just want to know why they can't get the biscuit right every damn time. Its industrialized biscuits-- make them uniformly good!
Lunch: Turkey breast chunks with mixed greens and hummus
Snack: WF Sushi wrapper things
Dinner: Impromptu, post-derby, EAST SIDE KINGS!!!!!!!!! Beet fries with aioli. Chicken Karage! Beer. (Note to self: purple poop tomorrow is normal. Don't freak.)
Hmmm...I didn't eat as well as I thought, though it should be noted (mostly by me) that I feel like I ate healthy. 80/20 rule? Anyhow, this proves the importance of writing it down, aroundish the time/day you ate it. Also, I know I forgot a whole pack of probiotic yogurt, some plain tuna, and a chicken and avocado meal.
Update as of just now when I found my measuring tape: My body is doing what I like. Waist shrinking, rest staying the same. World, please be advised that when my breast/hip to waist ratio is more than 10 inches apart, I be dangerous.
Current measurements:
Overbust: 45
Waist: 34
Hips: 45.5
Thursday, March 22, 2012
More Food Diary
I finally managed to get to the store so I could clear out some spring break toxins!
Wed March 21
Breakfast-- two eggs, two chicken sausage links
Snack: Tuna cup with applesauce
Lunch: Smoked salmon (6oz) on a salad with blackberries and tomatoes
Snack: WF salmon sushi, hummus and guac with carrots
Dinner: Cowboy burger patty served on greens with tomatoes, ketchup, and baked sweet potato slices
Thur March22
Breakfast-- nutritional shake (WF Protein-- not my preferred mix, as it has fructose) w banana and coconut oil
Snack: carrots with hummus, Larabar
Lunch: Cowboy burger patty with baked sweet potato slices and ketchup-- forgot greens.
Snack: salami + hummus
Dinner: Roasted chicken 5 oz with guacamole, tomatoes, and greens
Coming soon: Forest of Nutrition Blah Blah Blah Part III
Wed March 21
Breakfast-- two eggs, two chicken sausage links
Snack: Tuna cup with applesauce
Lunch: Smoked salmon (6oz) on a salad with blackberries and tomatoes
Snack: WF salmon sushi, hummus and guac with carrots
Dinner: Cowboy burger patty served on greens with tomatoes, ketchup, and baked sweet potato slices
Thur March22
Breakfast-- nutritional shake (WF Protein-- not my preferred mix, as it has fructose) w banana and coconut oil
Snack: carrots with hummus, Larabar
Lunch: Cowboy burger patty with baked sweet potato slices and ketchup-- forgot greens.
Snack: salami + hummus
Dinner: Roasted chicken 5 oz with guacamole, tomatoes, and greens
Coming soon: Forest of Nutrition Blah Blah Blah Part III
Friday, March 16, 2012
Eatin ALL the Montana!
Here's the details of what I have eatens
Thursday-- 2 eggs, 2 chicken sausages for breakfast, Taco del Sol Alaskan cod taco + pork taco for lunch, banana and almond butter, Montana BEEF burger with a half-mountain of sweet potato tots from Al & Vics/ James Bar. (It came with a whole mountain, but it was too much!) Bourbon, beer, and sad casino beer...oh and happy couch beer!
Friday-- Muscle Milk protein shake for breakfast, Earl Grey tea, Sashimi Cobb Salad from Iron Horse for lunch, Hummus made in Bozeman, carrots, and a delicious fig, basil, and chicken salad from Good Food Store. Also yogurt and granola with fruit. I feel sure that I am going to eat something else and have some beer at a brewery as soon as my friend gets off work. I feel like I might be short a few calories, but I'm gonna eat it purely for enjoyment. In case anyone is wondering how I feel about today's eatings, I hope that the last two posts may have clarified that this is eating how I mean to. At least until I get to the brewhaus!
Also, I did yoga today and walked all over a modest sized college campus. I don't often post about workouts, though everyone should assume that they are happening, but I think it is notable that exercise is such a long standing habit with me, that I do it on vacation too. Without even thinking about it.
Update: During the rest of my stay, I had some foods that were good for me and some that just damn tasted good. Highlights in the first category include a ahi tuna sandwich (never mind that bread ain't my friend), some chicken and broccoli, and a breakfast sandwich from the Good Food Store. The latter category would include all the beers of Montana and some tequila at one point...oh wait...two points, a JJ Breakfast Special from the Oxford that included eggs, hash browns, chicken fried fucking steak, and a spicy cream gravy that was delicious. Also I had a couple of teas that included sugar and a thai coffee cause you need a hot beverage in your hand at all times in Montana. Oh yeah, I had a bison burger with more sweet potato fries.
Thursday-- 2 eggs, 2 chicken sausages for breakfast, Taco del Sol Alaskan cod taco + pork taco for lunch, banana and almond butter, Montana BEEF burger with a half-mountain of sweet potato tots from Al & Vics/ James Bar. (It came with a whole mountain, but it was too much!) Bourbon, beer, and sad casino beer...oh and happy couch beer!
Friday-- Muscle Milk protein shake for breakfast, Earl Grey tea, Sashimi Cobb Salad from Iron Horse for lunch, Hummus made in Bozeman, carrots, and a delicious fig, basil, and chicken salad from Good Food Store. Also yogurt and granola with fruit. I feel sure that I am going to eat something else and have some beer at a brewery as soon as my friend gets off work. I feel like I might be short a few calories, but I'm gonna eat it purely for enjoyment. In case anyone is wondering how I feel about today's eatings, I hope that the last two posts may have clarified that this is eating how I mean to. At least until I get to the brewhaus!
Also, I did yoga today and walked all over a modest sized college campus. I don't often post about workouts, though everyone should assume that they are happening, but I think it is notable that exercise is such a long standing habit with me, that I do it on vacation too. Without even thinking about it.
Update: During the rest of my stay, I had some foods that were good for me and some that just damn tasted good. Highlights in the first category include a ahi tuna sandwich (never mind that bread ain't my friend), some chicken and broccoli, and a breakfast sandwich from the Good Food Store. The latter category would include all the beers of Montana and some tequila at one point...oh wait...two points, a JJ Breakfast Special from the Oxford that included eggs, hash browns, chicken fried fucking steak, and a spicy cream gravy that was delicious. Also I had a couple of teas that included sugar and a thai coffee cause you need a hot beverage in your hand at all times in Montana. Oh yeah, I had a bison burger with more sweet potato fries.
The Forest of Nutrition and Maybe Other Metaphors, Part II
So, somewhere between the discovery of eggs and visiting a nutritionist, I *think* I locked down how I *think* I should eat. I'm going to attempt to get to the point, then back up and do it in my usual wordy ass way. Here's "how I mean to eat" :
Do--
Eat at least 1600 calories per day, more based on workouts
Eat protein-- with every meal, min 4oz, preferred 6-8 oz
Eat veggies with every meal
Eat some fruit
Eat at least every couple of hours-- snacks with protein preferred
Eat servings of good fats every day, including small servings of nuts and avocados
Eat gluten free grains no more than once per day, preferably only once every couple of days or as needed with workouts
Eat organic and ethical products when possible
Eat two "free meals" per week while still respecting my health
Drink 100 + oz water
Avoid--
Under-calorie dieting. Forever, always.
Fat phobia
Dairy
Gluten
Sugar, esp in larger quantities, esp in processed forms
Processed foods
Meats with hormones, antibiotics, inappropriate diet, etc.
Caffeine
Excessive alcohol
Cultivate--
A love of real food
A base of recipes for my life
A healthy attitude toward food, including enjoyment and excluding shame
Here is a sample day of such eating
Breakfast: 2 eggs and 2 egg whites with spinach and tomatoes
Snack: Natural peanut butter (ingredients-- just peanuts) with apple or banana
Lunch: Leafy green salad with tomatoes, berries, nuts, and 8 oz chicken-- should be an incomprehensibly big salad. I could have an oil based dressing, but I hate everything about dressing so I don't. Rant later.
Snack: 2 oz +hummus, turkey, and carrots
Dinner: Meatballs and asparagus cooked in olive oil
I'm going to leave it at this for now, but publish an explanation of why this is my eating plan later, hopefully tomorrow.
Do--
Eat at least 1600 calories per day, more based on workouts
Eat protein-- with every meal, min 4oz, preferred 6-8 oz
Eat veggies with every meal
Eat some fruit
Eat at least every couple of hours-- snacks with protein preferred
Eat servings of good fats every day, including small servings of nuts and avocados
Eat gluten free grains no more than once per day, preferably only once every couple of days or as needed with workouts
Eat organic and ethical products when possible
Eat two "free meals" per week while still respecting my health
Drink 100 + oz water
Avoid--
Under-calorie dieting. Forever, always.
Fat phobia
Dairy
Gluten
Sugar, esp in larger quantities, esp in processed forms
Processed foods
Meats with hormones, antibiotics, inappropriate diet, etc.
Caffeine
Excessive alcohol
Cultivate--
A love of real food
A base of recipes for my life
A healthy attitude toward food, including enjoyment and excluding shame
Here is a sample day of such eating
Breakfast: 2 eggs and 2 egg whites with spinach and tomatoes
Snack: Natural peanut butter (ingredients-- just peanuts) with apple or banana
Lunch: Leafy green salad with tomatoes, berries, nuts, and 8 oz chicken-- should be an incomprehensibly big salad. I could have an oil based dressing, but I hate everything about dressing so I don't. Rant later.
Snack: 2 oz +hummus, turkey, and carrots
Dinner: Meatballs and asparagus cooked in olive oil
I'm going to leave it at this for now, but publish an explanation of why this is my eating plan later, hopefully tomorrow.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
The Forest of Nutrition and Maybe Other Metaphors
As it turns out, I am going to post a little bit. I'm finally together enough to write about "what I mean to eat" and hopefully make this blog make a bit more sense.
I was once lost in the forest of nutrition, or adrift on the sea of food choices, or perhaps caught up in a cyclone of dieting. Anybody catching how I feel about nutrition sometimes?
After a youth of dieting, living enough years to go through some dieting trends, and just generally growing up in a world made of marketing that sees my every action, from hair washing to pooping to eating, as a site for marketing, I no longer knew what the hell to eat. There were years when I was extremely susceptible to "grocery store paralysis." A product of the fat phobic 90s, I didn't want to buy items that I perceived as high fat. This included ice cream and chicken nuggets, but also avocados, olives, salmon, eggs, and peanut butter. I also really felt that food needed to be convenient, and in fact, I WAS sure the vegetables and fresh meats would rot away as I failed to cook them, so I didn't buy too much of that. Later I also worried about transfats. And sodium. When low carb dieting was a fad, it further paralyzed me, even though its actually a decent choice for me. Most of the time I also wanted the food to be inexpensive and portable with zero preparation from me. So if anyone is keeping track, I needed low calorie (oh yeah...that too) , low fat, low carb, trans-fat free, food that came in its own container and didn't cost a lot. Or have a lot of sodium. Or later...HFCS...or more than twice the carbs as protein. I sometimes shopped for an hour or so and only brought home a few items, and a shitload of shame related to the competing nutrition ideologies in my head.
I swear that I will get to the eating in a second, but I feel I should give some clue first, as to how I got out of the damn forest. Let me try a list.
1) Mexico City Spa diet-- this was a ridiculously restrictive diet I did with my bosses in the late 1990s. Restriction or not, it did give me my first sense that carbs were dicking with me. Atkins followed not long after this and also confirmed this science for me.
2) Increased insulin resistance and its symptoms...which were lessened by the above.
3) Eggs- they make me feel great.
4) Rejecting Weight Watchers
5) Carly Pollack-- this is the nutritionist I don't see anymore. No, I don't know why. Clearly, I'm about to write about how she changed my life...so...
I'm going to post Part II of this tomorrow. Right now. It's time to go eat and drink all of Montana. Also, editing will happen then too. Don't judge.
I was once lost in the forest of nutrition, or adrift on the sea of food choices, or perhaps caught up in a cyclone of dieting. Anybody catching how I feel about nutrition sometimes?
After a youth of dieting, living enough years to go through some dieting trends, and just generally growing up in a world made of marketing that sees my every action, from hair washing to pooping to eating, as a site for marketing, I no longer knew what the hell to eat. There were years when I was extremely susceptible to "grocery store paralysis." A product of the fat phobic 90s, I didn't want to buy items that I perceived as high fat. This included ice cream and chicken nuggets, but also avocados, olives, salmon, eggs, and peanut butter. I also really felt that food needed to be convenient, and in fact, I WAS sure the vegetables and fresh meats would rot away as I failed to cook them, so I didn't buy too much of that. Later I also worried about transfats. And sodium. When low carb dieting was a fad, it further paralyzed me, even though its actually a decent choice for me. Most of the time I also wanted the food to be inexpensive and portable with zero preparation from me. So if anyone is keeping track, I needed low calorie (oh yeah...that too) , low fat, low carb, trans-fat free, food that came in its own container and didn't cost a lot. Or have a lot of sodium. Or later...HFCS...or more than twice the carbs as protein. I sometimes shopped for an hour or so and only brought home a few items, and a shitload of shame related to the competing nutrition ideologies in my head.
I swear that I will get to the eating in a second, but I feel I should give some clue first, as to how I got out of the damn forest. Let me try a list.
1) Mexico City Spa diet-- this was a ridiculously restrictive diet I did with my bosses in the late 1990s. Restriction or not, it did give me my first sense that carbs were dicking with me. Atkins followed not long after this and also confirmed this science for me.
2) Increased insulin resistance and its symptoms...which were lessened by the above.
3) Eggs- they make me feel great.
4) Rejecting Weight Watchers
5) Carly Pollack-- this is the nutritionist I don't see anymore. No, I don't know why. Clearly, I'm about to write about how she changed my life...so...
I'm going to post Part II of this tomorrow. Right now. It's time to go eat and drink all of Montana. Also, editing will happen then too. Don't judge.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Spring Break
So I know that some people might post more during SPRING BREAK, but that is not how I do life.
I'm not likely to post again for just a bit here, but fyi, I'm seemingly on more of a break from nutrition than I was before. In this town, beers and burgers really do jump into your hands, kinda in general, but because of SXSW specifically. However, I am escaping to Montana, so while people (such as me) typically don't eat the healthiest on vacation, I am going to a COW STATE with many STEAKS, which work well for me (up to a point...red meat every day = no.) Also, I don't know what's in Missoula at all, so I can't have any specific cravings.
I'm not going to do a full nutrition run-down of my break, which started on Friday at 4:05, and has included happy hours, dates, April time, Lushie time, Dottie Karate time, and a roller derby bout/brunch. But here are some things I remember consuming:
Spinach (see how innocent)
A Mint Julep (um...)
Other bourbon related dranks
Chicken and Waffles
Chicken salad with berries
Spinach and hummus
Salmon
P. Terrys with the damn fries
Chick Fil-A
Tacodeli Otto
Homemade (not by me, before anyone asks that dumbass question) Chicken Soup with Veggies
Shrimp salad
Micheladas
Coffee dammit
Something from El Chile
A million chips
Torchy's Democrat-- yes.
Small gelato
And best of all-East Side Kings- some Chicken Karage, Beet Fucking Fries, and the Brussel Sprout Salad For Winners
OK, this looks like I ate the whole world, but this is many days food. I promise.
I'm not likely to post again for just a bit here, but fyi, I'm seemingly on more of a break from nutrition than I was before. In this town, beers and burgers really do jump into your hands, kinda in general, but because of SXSW specifically. However, I am escaping to Montana, so while people (such as me) typically don't eat the healthiest on vacation, I am going to a COW STATE with many STEAKS, which work well for me (up to a point...red meat every day = no.) Also, I don't know what's in Missoula at all, so I can't have any specific cravings.
I'm not going to do a full nutrition run-down of my break, which started on Friday at 4:05, and has included happy hours, dates, April time, Lushie time, Dottie Karate time, and a roller derby bout/brunch. But here are some things I remember consuming:
Spinach (see how innocent)
A Mint Julep (um...)
Other bourbon related dranks
Chicken and Waffles
Chicken salad with berries
Spinach and hummus
Salmon
P. Terrys with the damn fries
Chick Fil-A
Tacodeli Otto
Homemade (not by me, before anyone asks that dumbass question) Chicken Soup with Veggies
Shrimp salad
Micheladas
Coffee dammit
Something from El Chile
A million chips
Torchy's Democrat-- yes.
Small gelato
And best of all-East Side Kings- some Chicken Karage, Beet Fucking Fries, and the Brussel Sprout Salad For Winners
OK, this looks like I ate the whole world, but this is many days food. I promise.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Dear Torchy's: It's Not Me, It's You
Wahaha! People, not unexpectedly, are hating on "Sheena" from my last post. I feel bad(ish) because she is a real person, that some might know, though she isn't really in my circle at all anymore. I (guess) I should clarify that I think she acted with the best of intentions and from her place of knowledge, which without knowing her entire life story, seemingly didn't include a lifetime defined by dieting/not dieting, eatin' wins/eatin' fails, and constant worry about size. There just isn't much of a way to know the full implications of that without living that awesome fairy tale of a life. (Except maybe by reading this, yes?) I feel sure that in this alternate world, that doesn't include past times like playing, "Am I The Fattest One Here, Again?", that you do, in fact, lose weight by like not eating cake for a while or going on a walk or some shit like that. (Does anyone think I sound bitter? I think I might seem bitter here. I'm...um...not...yeah.) I pretty sure that without living the full live version of this fat fairy tale, you could never get to a place where your favorite ice cream flavor is "low-fat." I feel sure that being reminded to just like not have cake (oh yeah...I never thought of that!) works great if you've never had to say...write a letter to cake in order to quit it.
I have never written a letter to cake...I don't think. But last year, when I started writing down everythang I eat, I did write a letter to a taco, from Torchy's Tacos, a delicious place to eat, in..you know...moderation. I paste it here for your enjoyment.
I have never written a letter to cake...I don't think. But last year, when I started writing down everythang I eat, I did write a letter to a taco, from Torchy's Tacos, a delicious place to eat, in..you know...moderation. I paste it here for your enjoyment.
Dear Torchy’s Tacos Democrat Taco,
So listen, this is hard to say, but we can’t see each other for a while. It’s just that, well…you’re no good for me. When I’m with you, it’s great, but then I’m left all emotional and needy, and later I just wish you were there again. It just isn’t healthy for someone to be with one taco that much.
What? No, don’t cry. It’s not you; it’s me. I’m the one with the problem.
Now what? You’re angry? Well, I take it back. It is you. I mean come on, outside of tasting great, what do you have to offer me? Your genetically modified corn tortilla? Some mediocre quality beef? Dipping sauce with transfat? Hmmm? Tell me, dammit, what’s so great about you?
Yeah…I know, the fun. Here’s the deal. Once I’ve had my time apart, we can probably hang out here and there. But not like all the time. And you can’t bring your friend Green Chile Queso, cause you know shit gets crazy with the two of you. Remember that time with Dr.Pepper?
Yes, I’m seeing some vegetables. Go on, call me a vegetable whore if you want. It’s true. It is a lot of vegetables, like all day and all night, yeah. Lean protein too.
I wish you could be mature about this.
Later,
Miss Lady...
It's supposed to be funny, but it's also sick too! It would be one thing if I was writing to their Trailer Trash taco with all the cheese and fried chicken and avocado, but I'm writing to a simple beef taco that I occasionally poured a sauce on, sometimes. (Gawd dammit, I want that taco now.) Also, to me, even worse...I can't write to cake, because I don't really eat cake. Do you see cake on my nutrition log? Nope, cause I don't eat cake.
Or well, in full disclosure, I did eat a "cake" last night after my postings of food. I decided to try WF's Fit Starts Here Carrot Cake because it was by the register and has only unsweetened applesauce rather than any true added sugar. I still feel comfortable saying that I don't eat cak...oh wait...I think I ate some cake on the first day of this blog, at that Oscar Party...oh goddammit, food.
So you see, we can't hate Sheena or the Sheenas of the world. (Right?) You really don't get to this place with eatins if you don't have to. No one can be blamed for that. Envied with bitterness, sure. But not blamed.
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