Now that my birthweek is over, I've been able to get back to normal eating. I did well this week, having a lot of vegetables and few sweets. I was very disapointed because the health food restaurant from which I usually order my lunch has stopped offering their brussel sprouts! Instead, they've switched over to their winter veggies, cauliflower and carrots. I ordered them and they were tasty (the cauliflower is grilled with ginger and the carrots have some kind of spicy marinade), but it's just not the same. I guess I'll have to get some brussel sprouts from the store and figure out how to cook them so that they don't taste like feet.
Yesterday, I ordered in from a different place and got a slice of spinach quiche with a side salad. I felt so bloated afterward! I've been eating less bread and fewer carbs and I could feel the difference when I had a heavy thing like quiche. I was ready to take a nap right at my desk. I'm going to stick with the "cleaner" foods that aren't made with flour and sugar and oil, or whatever else.
I still have a long way to go with walking, but I am getting faster and am able to move better. On Tuesday, it was about 40 degrees F in the morning, so I went out with my denim jacket. I have a heavier coat that makes me look like an Eskimo, but I only like to wear it on very cold days. It's big and bulky, and pretty annoying. Scott says that I look like that little kid from A Christmas Story who was so bundled up that he couldn't put his arms down.
Anyway, the temperature dropped about 30 degrees during the day so when I went home that night, I was FREEZING. I seriously thought I was going to be flash frozen as I waited for the bus, and no wonder, it was literally about 10 degrees F outside. Once I got off the bus, I was only a block away from my home, but I wanted to get there as quickly as possible. I walked SO fast. I mean, I didn't even think I had it in me, but damn it, I wanted to be inside. When I got there, one of my neighbors saw me coming and held the door for me. I guess she last saw me in the wheelchair because she said, "Wow, you can walk -- and you're walking fast!" I was like, "Yeah, it's a miracle!" But I now know that when pushed, I can speed walk, at least for short distances. I don't think I'd be able to escape a monster if one were to chase me, but I'd at least have a fighting start...
Showing posts with label vegetables. Show all posts
Showing posts with label vegetables. Show all posts
Friday, February 11, 2011
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Sweating To The Oldies
Who knew that you could work up a sweat simply by singing? That's what I discovered last night when I went out for karaoke with friends. We were there for three hours and by the time we finished, I realized that I had built up a sweat.
I know that this was because I was active, even though we were sitting. But was moving around, dancing in my seat and waving my hands the whole time. When we sang "Stayin' Alive," we did the classic hand movements; when we sang "Piano Man," we swayed from side to side. I guess for me, it was somewhat like the aerobic programs that they often for the elderly or wheelchair-bound people, where instructors have patients concentrate on moving their upper bodies. So I got a little workout in and I didn't even know it! I was too busy having fun singing and dancing the whole time.
I also didn't eat too much last night. We ordered Japanese food at the karaoke place, but it's hard to eat and sing. I had some miso soup and veggie tempura, but by the time my chicken came, I was too busy enjoying the karaoke. My husband and his friend ended up finishing my dish. Today I had lunch with my parents, but I was really on plan; I had veggie fajitas with broccoli, cauliflower and zucchini.
I've decided that I would like to join a gym. There's one right by the bus/subway stop so it's convenient, and the online price is reasonable. I'm a little nervous about getting back into that, but I know that it will be good for me. I've been doing well with my eating for the past couple of weeks and need to take the next step. Now I just have to get up the courage to sign up.
I know that this was because I was active, even though we were sitting. But was moving around, dancing in my seat and waving my hands the whole time. When we sang "Stayin' Alive," we did the classic hand movements; when we sang "Piano Man," we swayed from side to side. I guess for me, it was somewhat like the aerobic programs that they often for the elderly or wheelchair-bound people, where instructors have patients concentrate on moving their upper bodies. So I got a little workout in and I didn't even know it! I was too busy having fun singing and dancing the whole time.
I also didn't eat too much last night. We ordered Japanese food at the karaoke place, but it's hard to eat and sing. I had some miso soup and veggie tempura, but by the time my chicken came, I was too busy enjoying the karaoke. My husband and his friend ended up finishing my dish. Today I had lunch with my parents, but I was really on plan; I had veggie fajitas with broccoli, cauliflower and zucchini.
I've decided that I would like to join a gym. There's one right by the bus/subway stop so it's convenient, and the online price is reasonable. I'm a little nervous about getting back into that, but I know that it will be good for me. I've been doing well with my eating for the past couple of weeks and need to take the next step. Now I just have to get up the courage to sign up.
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Eat Your Vegetables...
I think that everyone was told by his or her parents to "Eat your vegetables!" at one point and that's what I've been telling myself all week.
I haven't had the easiest time getting back on track for the past couple of weeks, but I made a deal with myself that I'd do at least one thing right --and then keep adding to that week after week. This past week my goal was to eat more vegetables. Which I did! I had veggies and fruits at almost every meal, and had a big spinach salad with broccoli, carrots and onions each day. I even found myself craving veggies and that I had to "hide" them less often, such as in pasta or a pizza. Instead, I enjoyed them raw with just a little bit of low-fat dressing or olive oil.
This next week, I have two goals for myself: to stick to my POINTS and to drink more water. I've been drinking way too much diet soda, which just isn't healthy in its own right. So for this week, I'll have diet soda when I go out to dinner, but not at home. You'd be surprised how difficult this is for me. I don't drink many alcoholic beverages, but I really like low-calorie flavored drinks like Vitamin Water or Diet Snapple. But plain, old water really is the best so I need to get into drinking enough of it each day instead of those other things.
I know that I need to do more exercise, but I've decided that I'm not going to be too hard on myself and make a million changes at once. What I REALLY neneed the help with is my eating. Well, that's always what I need the help with and I want to see if changing just one thing at a time will allow me to stay on track. I still don't know why this is so hard for me -- to just eat less, I mean. But I just LOVE food. Last night, I went out for Italian for my friend's birthday and ordered lasagna. I didn't finish it, but my God, it was wonderful. Definitely not part of a weight loss plan, but I enjoyed it and not even in a "filling my emotions" way. I just fucking loved the lasagna. And that's my main problem. I'm 5'3" and have the appetite of a 6'4" football player. Frankly, I wish I can have it both ways: I wish that I can eat whatever I want and be in shape. If I met a genie and he gave me three wishes, I wouldn't even ask for money or world peace or power or anything like that. I think this is what I'd wish for.
Some days like today, when I have PMS and want to eat everything, I get so frustrated because eating should be such a simple thing. You eat for fuel, you eat to live and that should be it. Why couldn't I be born that way? Why couldn't I be one of those people who's naturally thin and just doesn't care that much about food? I mean, my gradmother is like that so it's in my genes -- and she's 94! It seems to be so unfair that I had to be born without an off switch for eating and a body that wants to be fat. I hate feeling like I'm not allowed to eat, that I eat half a serving of lasagna and the pounds are going to pile on.
Which brings me to another decision that I've made about myself: I no longer care if I ever get to be thin. It just ain't gonna happen, unless I starve myself, which I can't do. Hell, I can barely last a week without going off plan. So my goal -- for now; it might change -- is to simply get to under 200 pounds. If I can be 198, 199 and be in decent enough shape -- decent enough so that I can walk around without having to take breaks -- I can deal with it. I just think that my dreams of being at my ideal weight of 125 or so are an impossibility.
I don't know why I'm so disciplined with some things and just can't get my act together when it comes to eating. I mean, I'm obsessed with getting things in on deadline at work and always do; I made a goal to create 100 pieces of jewelry before opening my online store and I'm already at 71 items; I write in this blog fairly frequently. So it's not beyond me to come up with a goal and stick with it. In fact, 95 percent of my life is pretty goal-oriented, I'd say. I'm the person who said, "I'm gonna write a novel!" and "I'm gonna record an album!" and actually did both. And when people ask me how I did these things, I usually answer, "I just DID it rather than talking about it."
There's been a lot of talk about obesity and what "causes" it and sometimes I wonder if I'm really just born this way. I've been obsessed with food since I was a kid. I didn't come from a family where we ate unhealthy things so I wasn't raised on fried food or candy. And yet, the desire for food has always been in me -- I've always been a fat girl dying to escape --and finally did when I was an adult, despite trying to get rid of my urges with anorexia and bulimia. It's weird. I honestly don't understand why people feel the need to get very drunk. For someone like me who's creative and whose mind is always going, I just don't GET that urge to drink until you're so out of it that you can't function. I guess this is somewhat similar. Many people don't GET my craving for food, why I always have to have it, how it makes me happy and numbs pain, boredom, sadness, etc. It's easy to say, "Oh, just don't eat that," but I challenge those who just can't imagine a Saturday night without booze to stay completely sober when everyone around you is drinking beer after beer. See, for me, I can take or leave alcohol and don't care. I just don't crave it at all. Then there are those who can take or leave a plate of fries and just don't care.
By the way, for those folks out there who keep crying about the "obesity epidemic!" and for the Maura Kellys who think that seeing happy fat people means that obesity is being promoted, here are some TV shows that really do deserve the notice:
America's Favorite Pig Outs: This Travel Channel show -- yes, it's on the Travel Channel -- was all about restaurants that offer ginormous portions ofgreasy, fatty food. There was one place that had mozzarella sticks and french fry sandwiches; another offered 20-scoop sundaes! The worst offended was this restaurant called Heart Attack that was designed to look like a hospital. Inside a "doctor" would "prescribe" dishes like hamburgers and fries dipped in lard (blech) and the dishes had names like "The quadruple bypass." (I swear I'm not making this up). There was one dish that had some name like "The coronary," which consisted of about seven pounds of crap -- and if you could finish it, you got wheeled out of the restaurant on a gurney. Oh, and they have a scale there and give special bonuses to people who weight more than 450 pounds. Holy cripers, this is just so wrong on so many levels.
Man Vs. Food: This is also on the Travel Channel. The host, Adam Richman, who's rather portly, competes in various eating contests around the country. He often eats up to 10 pounds of food in a serving and looks like he's about to die while doing so. He's chunky, but not quite obese; I don't get how he's not 450-500 pounds.
I honestly don't think we can blame the media on anything -- it's up to PARENTS to help their kids learn about nutrition -- but if we have to point fingers at anything on TV, these two shows are a great place to start.
I haven't had the easiest time getting back on track for the past couple of weeks, but I made a deal with myself that I'd do at least one thing right --and then keep adding to that week after week. This past week my goal was to eat more vegetables. Which I did! I had veggies and fruits at almost every meal, and had a big spinach salad with broccoli, carrots and onions each day. I even found myself craving veggies and that I had to "hide" them less often, such as in pasta or a pizza. Instead, I enjoyed them raw with just a little bit of low-fat dressing or olive oil.
This next week, I have two goals for myself: to stick to my POINTS and to drink more water. I've been drinking way too much diet soda, which just isn't healthy in its own right. So for this week, I'll have diet soda when I go out to dinner, but not at home. You'd be surprised how difficult this is for me. I don't drink many alcoholic beverages, but I really like low-calorie flavored drinks like Vitamin Water or Diet Snapple. But plain, old water really is the best so I need to get into drinking enough of it each day instead of those other things.
I know that I need to do more exercise, but I've decided that I'm not going to be too hard on myself and make a million changes at once. What I REALLY neneed the help with is my eating. Well, that's always what I need the help with and I want to see if changing just one thing at a time will allow me to stay on track. I still don't know why this is so hard for me -- to just eat less, I mean. But I just LOVE food. Last night, I went out for Italian for my friend's birthday and ordered lasagna. I didn't finish it, but my God, it was wonderful. Definitely not part of a weight loss plan, but I enjoyed it and not even in a "filling my emotions" way. I just fucking loved the lasagna. And that's my main problem. I'm 5'3" and have the appetite of a 6'4" football player. Frankly, I wish I can have it both ways: I wish that I can eat whatever I want and be in shape. If I met a genie and he gave me three wishes, I wouldn't even ask for money or world peace or power or anything like that. I think this is what I'd wish for.
Some days like today, when I have PMS and want to eat everything, I get so frustrated because eating should be such a simple thing. You eat for fuel, you eat to live and that should be it. Why couldn't I be born that way? Why couldn't I be one of those people who's naturally thin and just doesn't care that much about food? I mean, my gradmother is like that so it's in my genes -- and she's 94! It seems to be so unfair that I had to be born without an off switch for eating and a body that wants to be fat. I hate feeling like I'm not allowed to eat, that I eat half a serving of lasagna and the pounds are going to pile on.
Which brings me to another decision that I've made about myself: I no longer care if I ever get to be thin. It just ain't gonna happen, unless I starve myself, which I can't do. Hell, I can barely last a week without going off plan. So my goal -- for now; it might change -- is to simply get to under 200 pounds. If I can be 198, 199 and be in decent enough shape -- decent enough so that I can walk around without having to take breaks -- I can deal with it. I just think that my dreams of being at my ideal weight of 125 or so are an impossibility.
I don't know why I'm so disciplined with some things and just can't get my act together when it comes to eating. I mean, I'm obsessed with getting things in on deadline at work and always do; I made a goal to create 100 pieces of jewelry before opening my online store and I'm already at 71 items; I write in this blog fairly frequently. So it's not beyond me to come up with a goal and stick with it. In fact, 95 percent of my life is pretty goal-oriented, I'd say. I'm the person who said, "I'm gonna write a novel!" and "I'm gonna record an album!" and actually did both. And when people ask me how I did these things, I usually answer, "I just DID it rather than talking about it."
There's been a lot of talk about obesity and what "causes" it and sometimes I wonder if I'm really just born this way. I've been obsessed with food since I was a kid. I didn't come from a family where we ate unhealthy things so I wasn't raised on fried food or candy. And yet, the desire for food has always been in me -- I've always been a fat girl dying to escape --and finally did when I was an adult, despite trying to get rid of my urges with anorexia and bulimia. It's weird. I honestly don't understand why people feel the need to get very drunk. For someone like me who's creative and whose mind is always going, I just don't GET that urge to drink until you're so out of it that you can't function. I guess this is somewhat similar. Many people don't GET my craving for food, why I always have to have it, how it makes me happy and numbs pain, boredom, sadness, etc. It's easy to say, "Oh, just don't eat that," but I challenge those who just can't imagine a Saturday night without booze to stay completely sober when everyone around you is drinking beer after beer. See, for me, I can take or leave alcohol and don't care. I just don't crave it at all. Then there are those who can take or leave a plate of fries and just don't care.
By the way, for those folks out there who keep crying about the "obesity epidemic!" and for the Maura Kellys who think that seeing happy fat people means that obesity is being promoted, here are some TV shows that really do deserve the notice:
America's Favorite Pig Outs: This Travel Channel show -- yes, it's on the Travel Channel -- was all about restaurants that offer ginormous portions ofgreasy, fatty food. There was one place that had mozzarella sticks and french fry sandwiches; another offered 20-scoop sundaes! The worst offended was this restaurant called Heart Attack that was designed to look like a hospital. Inside a "doctor" would "prescribe" dishes like hamburgers and fries dipped in lard (blech) and the dishes had names like "The quadruple bypass." (I swear I'm not making this up). There was one dish that had some name like "The coronary," which consisted of about seven pounds of crap -- and if you could finish it, you got wheeled out of the restaurant on a gurney. Oh, and they have a scale there and give special bonuses to people who weight more than 450 pounds. Holy cripers, this is just so wrong on so many levels.
Man Vs. Food: This is also on the Travel Channel. The host, Adam Richman, who's rather portly, competes in various eating contests around the country. He often eats up to 10 pounds of food in a serving and looks like he's about to die while doing so. He's chunky, but not quite obese; I don't get how he's not 450-500 pounds.
I honestly don't think we can blame the media on anything -- it's up to PARENTS to help their kids learn about nutrition -- but if we have to point fingers at anything on TV, these two shows are a great place to start.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
How (Un)Sweet It Is
Well, folks, this is my 100th post! Woo hoo! Funny how long it takes to lose 100 pounds, but 100 posts can be churned out pretty quickly.
As a writer, I am proud of myself for keeping up with this blog and being disciplined enough to write in it 100 times. As a weight loss warrior, I'm proud of myself for putting my feelings on paper (on computer, anyway) and using this blog as a tool to help kick my bad eating habits. Though I don't have many readers, I really do feel as if my writing has helped me with my weight loss and I thank those of who do read me for following my journey so far.
I figured that in honor of this milestone post, I'd write about one of the biggest changes I've noticed with my weight loss, to date: I no longer crave sugar like I used to. Don't get me wrong, I still LIKE sugar. I still love sweets and chocolate ... but I don't feel as if I HAVE to have dessert or as if my day won't be complete without some kind of sweet. For someone who's always described myself as having a major sweet tooth, this is a really big deal.
Even with my past (brief) successes with losing weight, sweets were involved. I'd stock up on those Weight Watchers desserts like low-fat ice creams and diet brownies, and every night after dinner, I'd eat a couple. I'd stay within my POINTS range, but at least a few POINTS would be made up of dessert-type products each day. Now, however, I'm only having desserts or treats once or twice a week. Last Sunday, I had a low-fat fudge bar at my friend's house after dinner and then on Tuesday, at another friend's place, I had a small piece of homemade Hungarian cake and a spoonful of chestnut puree that she'd brought home from Europe. Other than that, though, I've had nothing sugary, unless you count fruit and the two cups of diet soda I drank. I've even tried to limit my intake of sweet, low-calorie water-like beverages like Crystal Light because I'm finding them too sweet, as well. Instead, I'm just having water.
It's interesting to me how my taste buds have changed. Before, I lived on salty, processed foods and overly sweet desserts that were filled with artifical sugars. But now I'm finding that I prefer my foods to be cleaner and simpler. I don't want meat drenched in cheese or sauce or for my vegetables to be fried beyond recognition. Again, I still like that stuff, but I'm prefering dishes where I can easily taste the flavors of what I'm eating. A touch of garlic sauce goes a long way when eating chicken breast; for me, it's just not as good when it's sauteed, fried and then drowning in butter and wine sauce.
Tonight my husband is making me his homemade vegetable soup with cauliflower, zucchini, turnips, parsnips, mushrooms and kale. I'm getting so hungry for it, the same way I used to get so hungry for pizza or Chinese food. I'll definitely eat that stuff again, but I like that vegetables and plain meats are now taking center stage. In only 100 posts, things have certainly changed.
As a writer, I am proud of myself for keeping up with this blog and being disciplined enough to write in it 100 times. As a weight loss warrior, I'm proud of myself for putting my feelings on paper (on computer, anyway) and using this blog as a tool to help kick my bad eating habits. Though I don't have many readers, I really do feel as if my writing has helped me with my weight loss and I thank those of who do read me for following my journey so far.
I figured that in honor of this milestone post, I'd write about one of the biggest changes I've noticed with my weight loss, to date: I no longer crave sugar like I used to. Don't get me wrong, I still LIKE sugar. I still love sweets and chocolate ... but I don't feel as if I HAVE to have dessert or as if my day won't be complete without some kind of sweet. For someone who's always described myself as having a major sweet tooth, this is a really big deal.
Even with my past (brief) successes with losing weight, sweets were involved. I'd stock up on those Weight Watchers desserts like low-fat ice creams and diet brownies, and every night after dinner, I'd eat a couple. I'd stay within my POINTS range, but at least a few POINTS would be made up of dessert-type products each day. Now, however, I'm only having desserts or treats once or twice a week. Last Sunday, I had a low-fat fudge bar at my friend's house after dinner and then on Tuesday, at another friend's place, I had a small piece of homemade Hungarian cake and a spoonful of chestnut puree that she'd brought home from Europe. Other than that, though, I've had nothing sugary, unless you count fruit and the two cups of diet soda I drank. I've even tried to limit my intake of sweet, low-calorie water-like beverages like Crystal Light because I'm finding them too sweet, as well. Instead, I'm just having water.
It's interesting to me how my taste buds have changed. Before, I lived on salty, processed foods and overly sweet desserts that were filled with artifical sugars. But now I'm finding that I prefer my foods to be cleaner and simpler. I don't want meat drenched in cheese or sauce or for my vegetables to be fried beyond recognition. Again, I still like that stuff, but I'm prefering dishes where I can easily taste the flavors of what I'm eating. A touch of garlic sauce goes a long way when eating chicken breast; for me, it's just not as good when it's sauteed, fried and then drowning in butter and wine sauce.
Tonight my husband is making me his homemade vegetable soup with cauliflower, zucchini, turnips, parsnips, mushrooms and kale. I'm getting so hungry for it, the same way I used to get so hungry for pizza or Chinese food. I'll definitely eat that stuff again, but I like that vegetables and plain meats are now taking center stage. In only 100 posts, things have certainly changed.
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