Tag Archives: food

My Food, My Choice

31 Jul

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One of the things you’ll notice on your weight-loss journey is the way people nitpick at your own food. After you’ve lost a significant amount of weight, friends and family will pay more attention to your diet.

Once upon a time, you’d eat half a pizza and a dozen wings by yourself. Now you’re fine with a slice or two and some water. You used to be the one who’d order the giant steak with a side of butter and dab of potato. Now a shrimp salad and dressing on the side suits you just fine.

Your diet has changed; good for you. One if the hard parts now is getting the rest of your peeps to accept that when you decided to go on your weight-loss journey, you made a life decision. You changed the way you live your life, and that’s difficult for others to accept.

You may have heard: “You’re eating half your dinner? I could never do that. That must be why you’re so skinny.” Or even: “You’re making me feel bad. I’m ordering the lasagna while you’re just getting the salad.”

The thing is your food choices are yours alone. You’re not eating to make others feel bad. If your dinner companion is hungry for a pound and a half of steak, then that person has every right to eat it, just as your salad with a side of sweet potato fries are your digestive right.

People who try to make you feel guilty for not eating the way you used to are only projecting their own issues with food and weight-loss onto you. Don’t let them get into your head and make you regret all the good work you’re doing.

I’ve been told several times that the way I eat isn’t  for another person. That may be true, but actually I eat what I want. I just don’t have a strong desire for bad things anymore. 

That all goes back to the concept of perception versus reality. The memory of how you used to be doesn’t quite jibe with what your friends and family see before them. It’s a hard concept for some people to grasp. To many, being mindful of your health means giving up everything. Not only is that untrue, it’s bad press.

When I began my weight-loss journey, it was like being in training. When you’re training, you cut out some things altogether. When you’re maintaining, you can add a few indulgences back into your diet. You’re just more mindful of what you’re eating. I can mentally estimate how many calories I’m consuming versus the amount of exercise I’ve done to burn them. But that took years of practice.

If that’s not for you, try a food journal. If you know what you’re putting into your body, you’ll know how much work you need to do to maintain or work off the pounds.

So enjoy your small plates of food. And remember, no one else is fueling your body but you.

How have you changed the way you eat? Have those close to you been positive about it?

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Just Cycling Through

16 Jul
Repeats to self: I don't need this. I don't need this.

Repeats to self: I don’t need this. I don’t need this.

I’m going on vacation soon. Just like with any other vacation prep, I want to keep my workout routine consistent—if not amped up a smidge—before I go because I enjoy vacation brain.

However, this prep session has hit a bit of a snag and that’s because it’s about that time. The time when I ache from my navel to my knees. The time when someone calling my name more than twice a day will set me off. The time when all I crave is a brownie sundae.

Every woman goes through this rite of passage that will make her want to tear out her uterus. I cannot stand it. For at least a week (yes, sometimes it lasts longer), I become even more irritable than normal. I’m an asshole on a good day. On my cycle, steer clear.

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One of worst things about this monthly tradition is the amount of food of which I can’t seem to get enough. I don’t even know it’s happening until I’m midway though the early stages. I do know that Haagen Dazs vanilla milk chocolate almond bars are everything heaven should be.

In the back of my mind I know this feeling is just temporary and when I’m back to normal I’ll regret that Five Guys burger. But in the moment I’m all

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So how can you stay on track when Mother Nature is being…herself?

1. Snacking is key. Dairy is no good for your cramps, no matter how good two-fer Tuesday is at Baskin Robbins. So instead of indulging the things that will set you back, keep some sweet snacks at the ready. It’s summertime, so grapes and cherries are ripe for the picking. A tip for grapes: freeze those suckers. You’ll thank me later.

2. Take your aggression out at the gym. I know you’re irritable. I’m sure your co-worker did side-eye you when you asked her for a pen (I told you that chick’s crazy). But instead of snapping off on her—and endangering your livelihood—make  good use of that anger on the treadmill. The endorphins you build up and will calm you down. Plus it helps with cramps, and nobody wants those.

3. Think logistics. This comes as no surprise to any woman, but sanitary equipment is not the most stable. When you’re exercising, things move…a lot. When you’re in beast mode, I guarantee you things have shifted exponentially. Take caution and have backup equipment (and underwear) at the ready.

4. It’s only temporary. When you’re in it, this time seems like it lasts forever. That’s the crazy part of your brain talking to you. Tell her to shut the hell up because it’s almost over. Take comfort in the fact it will soon be over and your hormones won’t make you cry at baby elephants (not that I know anything about that).

5. It’s better than the alternative (for some). Hey, at least it came. If it didn’t you’d be reading a different blog right now. There, aren’t you happy?

6. No excuses. Remember: Excuses are what people use to justify the reasons why not. For most of my readers, they’ve been going through this for a while. Saying, “I just started my cycle,” is a rookie move. Athletes like Venus and Serena Williams, or even the entire women’s U.S. soccer team, can’t just clock out because it’s that time of the month. You’re still going to work, aren’t you? Then can still make time for your health.

I’m no hypocrite. I have to remember these tips myself every month. And as I ready myself for vacation, despite the ache in my thighs, I know the time spent on the treadmill was much better for me than throwing my stapler across the office.

How do you maintain your fitness lifestyle when Mother Nature has decided to make you her enemy?

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Rewriting Your Grocery List

4 Jun
How I get down at the grocery store

How I get down at the grocery store

When I began my weight-loss journey, working out was the easy part. I knew how to walk and run. I’d seen people use gym equipment like treadmills and elliptical machines. I’d ridden a bike before, so a stationary one wasn’t going to be that much trouble.

What I wasn’t prepared for was the dietary change that came with my new outlook on life. Several times in this blog, I’ve mentioned my love of Wendy’s spicy chicken sandwich and Popeye’s biscuits. Like every red-blooded American, Chipotle is my friend.

But even that wasn’t my biggest problem. I know how to cook. Growing up, my family didn’t eat out much. My parents prepared meals. Sure, every other Friday we might order pizza for movie night. But we usually had chicken or pot roast or chili or something else ready to eat in the fridge. Hell, my friends have even told me they frequented my house not to visit me, but my refrigerator.

So I took those culinary lessons with me into adulthood. I don’t mind cooking, I just don’t like doing it all the time. But with my new weight-loss plan in full effect, I had to adjust my thinking about meal preparation.

It wasn’t just cooking more often for myself. It was also cooking different food for myself. I can hook up a lasagna, but that’s not ideal when you’re trying to shed pounds. I discussed before the changes that came with eating vegetables. But I’m also a meat eater. My go-to meat dishes were perfect if I were trying to become a linebacker. Pot roast, roasted chicken, fried wings, etc., aren’t the best menu options when you’re trying to become svelte.

What I appreciated about the “Extreme Fat Smash Diet” was that it still allowed me to eat meat. I just had to cut down on my intake. Most important, the lesson I had to learn quickly was how to cook it differently. Cooking a whole bird is great if you’re cooking for a family, which I used to do. It can be hard to break that habit. But the weight-loss journey is traveled alone. And because I was living alone, my meals had to be prepared for one.

I was fortunate enough to find the American Heart Association’s “Low-Fat, Low Cholesterol Cookbook.” High blood pressure and high cholesterol are big in my family, as are heart disease and diabetes, so finding that book became good for more than just weight loss.

With the guidance of those two books, I started looking at my meats differently. I could still eat meatloaf, but I was using lighter fare to prepare it. A little tomato paste, some quick oats and tiny molds and you’ve got individual mini-turkey meatloaves.  A little butter, salt, pepper and lemon juice and you’ve got some pretty tasty sauteed tilapia fillets.

It’s not that eating meat was a necessity. It’s just that I like having the option. Just as finding the great vegetarian recipes that I’ll prepare over and over (pepper and white bean soup, spinach and black bean enchiladas), having meat options keeps my palate from getting bored and my cabinets interesting.

My regular staples of chicken wings, spaghetti, sauce and ice cream have changed to chicken breasts, spinach, chicken boullion and apples. My cupboard is always stocked with canned beans, tomato sauce and paste and a box of rotini, which I don’t even use that often. My freezer has tons of frozen spinach and broccoli, fat-free frozen yogurt and frozen fruit.

One of the fun parts of this journey was exploring new tastes. When doing your shopping, take the time out to try something different.

What do you like to prepare now that you’d never had before?

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Eating (and Shopping) to Live

21 Apr
Go ahead and fill your cart up with the good stuff.

Go ahead and fill your cart up with the good stuff.

One of the biggest lessons I had to learn on my weight-loss journey was how to grocery shop. Sure, I’d spent what felt like hours at the store with my mother as a kid, like we all did. I went up and down the aisles looking for cookies and crackers while she spent what felt like an eternity in the produce section looking for the perfect bunch of greens and fruit.

Before I began this journey, I shopped with the mindset of most post-undergrads: What’s the easiest thing to heat up? How can I get out of here quickly? It wasn’t that I didn’t know how to cook, I just didn’t want to. I knew the easy staples: spaghetti, chili, fried chicken, macaroni and cheese. I could even hook up a lasagna if the mood hit me.

Taking a bigger interest in my health required me to take an even bigger interest in what I was putting into my body. I was never a calorie counter. It just made eating depressing. Who wants to think about how many calories are in a spicy chicken sandwich from Wendy’s (510, by the way)?

I started off with fresh vegetables. I was the kid adults never had a problem with eating her veggies. It was no biggie as an adult. I had to give up putting cheese on my steamed broccoli, but that wasn’t so bad. Shopping for fresh vegetables was too scary for me, so I began with the frozen food section. It’s easy to heat up and you don’t have to worry about picking what’s right. The problem is that frozen veggies left in the freezer too long taste horrible when cooked. I liken it to frozen metal. Do you want to eat this?

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Didn’t think so.

I had to learned how to pick out fresh vegetables like asparagus, Brussels sprouts and green beans. I started steaming, sauteeing and even roasting. Spritz a little lemon juice on them, and they’re quite tasty. Who knew?

Finding fresh veggies is going to be one of the hardest things you do at the grocery store. But here are some tips that can make everything else a little easier on you.

Plan ahead. If you know what your meal plan is for the week, it’s best to make a list. I scour every cabinet before I leave the house for the grocery store. The second I see I’m running low on a spice or ingredient, it goes on the list I keep hanging on the refrigerator. I’ve said many times on this blog that preparation is key, and grocery preparation is vital because…

Eat before you leave. This is true no matter where you are on your journey. Never, ever, eva, eva, eva go to the grocery store hungry. You will walk out with two roasted chickens, a Sara Lee cheesecake and none of the things you intended on buying. Hunger is mind game. Hunger will have you thinking that an entire spot of spaghetti with four slices of cheesy garlic bread is a good idea. Keeping the hunger heifa at bay will make your shopping experience so much easier

Try something new. Planning your meals for the week can be fun, especially if you’re trying something new. Look in your cookbook and see if there’s some new way to bake your chicken. Look for something that uses an ingredient you’ve never tried before. Who knows? You may see something else in the aisle that tickles your fancy.

Have an exit strategy. A grocery store can seem like a carnival (especially Saturday at Trader Joe’s). There are always samples out. You’re going to have to walk past the ice cream to get to the frozen vegetables. The universe dictates that your favorite snack go on sale at five for $5 the day you decide to go into beast mode. The best way to avoid these temptations is have a plan of escape. Cross everything off your list as you go. Allow yourself a couple extra items that weren’t on your list, but limit yourself to just a couple. And try to avoid checkout aisle snacks. Sure, a Kind bar isn’t so bad. But it’s sitting right next to the Hershey Almond bar. What would you choose?

“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” This is true of everyone. But at least if you have an idea of what you’re going to do, you can be prepared for the things that will definitely go awry. Like a sale on pita chips and hummus (or is that just me?)

How do you prepare for grocery shopping? And what’s your go-to item at the store?

photo credit: Skakerman via photopin cc

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It’s a Sabotage

24 Mar
Look at that. Isn't it glorious?

Look at that. Isn’t it glorious?

Throughout life, you learn a few things about yourself. I’ve learned that I hate when people are late. I love any activity that allows lounge time. I’m also a bit of a self saboteur.

It’s not something I do on purpose. I don’t seek to hinder my progress. However, I end up doing it anyway, knowing when I’m in the middle of it that I’m headed down the wrong path. For example, I’ve found that I can talk myself into not eating, thereby making my cravings for, say, a three-piece spicy chicken strip meal from Popeye’s that much stronger.

Self sabotage can happen when you’ve gotten complacent in your routine. When you know the rules of weight loss, you know how to break them. What ends up happening is you eventually get complacent in your complacency, leading you to self sabotage. You know this cookie won’t hurt in the grand scheme of things, so you have two more. You know you didn’t work out today, but you’re going to work out extra tomorrow.

Hunger and cravings are two different things. It took a while for me to learn that during my weight-loss journey. But when that clicked—hunger means you need to eat; craving is what you want to eat—it changed the way I looked at food. A spicy chicken sandwich from Wendy’s will always seem like a good idea when you haven’t eaten in eight hours.

And that’s my problem—taking a long time between meals. Like most people, I can get very busy at work. There have been days where I get to the office at about 10:30 in the morning and don’t leave until about 9 that night because I’ve been doing my daily work and other stuff. It’s a thing that happens to a lot of folks. When those days occur in succession, it can be hard to keep up with any type of meal plan and workout regimen. If you’ve been strapped to your desk for six hours, all your body wants is to not be hungry. Your mind, however, is telling you that there’s a Five Guys down the street that will have your Cajun fries ready in a jiffy.

I know from routine and practice that going to the nearest fast-food spot isn’t in my best interests. But somewhere in the back of my mind, I’ve talked myself into waiting to eat so I can go. I’ll tell myself that having a few chicken nuggets isn’t so bad because I hadn’t had anything else and it will still count toward my calorie count for the day.

The problem with that thinking is I’m not doing myself any good. I’m getting in some calories to fuel my body, but they’re the wrong ones. I’m loading up on useless carbs and fats that will be even harder to work off. It’s not that I can’t ever have these kinds of foods ever again (that’s not going to happen because I love Wendy’s so much). But I can’t keep promising myself that I’m going to do better tomorrow while loading up on Popeye’s biscuits today.

One of the lessons I’ve learned to avoid self sabotage is just to be prepared. Have a box of granola bars in your desk. Don’t leave the house without an apple or a pear. Drink water. Know where the healthy-food options are in relation to the fast-food ones. If there’s a salad shop next to your fave McDonald’s, try the salad shop.

When cravings hit, it’s hard to drown out the sounds of your head and your stomach. But only one is also speaking to the people around you, so why not give it something useful.

What do you do when you find yourself veering off track.

photo credit: _Fidelio_ via photopin cc

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