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.