01/23/2010 18:10

21 Days to Create a New Habit

"Just use it 2 minutes a day, and it will transform your life!!!"

"Just 20 minutes a day will burn the fat and keep the pounds off!!!"

"Just try our system for 1 week, and we guarantee you will see a difference!!!"

Just give me a break already. Who are they kidding? Well, us of course. We delude ourselves into thinking that there is a quick fix, a magic bullet, an easier way to dump the fat and achieve "smoking hot 6-pack abs."

Helllooooooo!!! There isn't. I hate it really. I want nothing more to wake up one morning and be the thin girl I know is inside. I want to be able to "eat your favorite foods all the time and still lose weight."

But it is what it is. It takes cutting 3500 calories to lose a pound of fat. It takes movement and sweat and some discomfort to burn 200 calories in 30 minutes. And it takes 21 days to create a new habit.

I keep saying, "This time is different." But this time really is different. I can feel it. Something has changed, and I think for once it is me.

Since my dad died almost a year ago, my life truly has changed in so many ways. His absence left a gaping hole in my life that I have tried to fill with so many other things, including my good, longtime friend...food. I've paid the consequences on all of them. Unfortunately, the signs of food abuse stay around a lot longer than a hangover.

Now I must try to undo the damage I have done. I must begin again to whittle away at the physical armor that I have created that was never really going to protect me from the hurt or make the magnitude of the loss go away...for the physical armor was merely a manifestation of my need to protect my heart and my psyche from what I was going through.

That's always been the pattern with me. My life changes, I'm thrown a curve ball, I move, I change jobs, people move in and out of my life. Every obstacle has sent up the mental armor, and I begin to eat so that I can hide. Eventually things settle down, and I begin to drop the weight. But then there is always something to send the pattern sprialing into motion again.

So this is where it begins. It has been one week since I started changing my way of thinking about food. I lost 7 1/2 pounds. That's a huge accomplishment, but I know it is short-lived if I don't continue to be vigilant and start to incorporate exercise into the equation now. Besides, we all know that the first week is all about water weight anyway, so that is not even a realistic loss. I'm ignoring it. I'm pretending that yesterday's weigh-in was day 1. I'm good at pretending. It's how I got here in the first place.

So here is my plan: I eat healthily with an occasional treat, I get up off my ass and sweat, and I live my life. It doesn't get much simpler than that. I keep mini goals and do my darndest to reach them. Last week my goal was to lose 9 pounds, and I lost 7 1/2. That's still pretty darn good, so it's good enough for me. This week's goal is to exercise every day in some way, shape, or form...I just need to get up and sweat.

I have set a weight goal for February 12th. I will lose 15 pounds. I know that is only three weeks away and that is a lofty goal, but I believe that I can do it. It takes 21 days to create a new habit. Today is day 2, and I'm going to sign off and go downstairs and excercise.

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01/21/2010 18:42

Butternut Squash Apple Soup Recipe

I've had a few people email me about posting the reicpe that I mentioned in yesterday's post. Please keep in mind that this is only an approximation...I was just kind of playing with some ingredients to see what would happen!

1 medium butternut squash, peeled and diced into 1" cubes (an annoying process)

2 gala apples (medium), cut into 8 wedges each (I didn't peel them becuase I like the extra fiber)

1 sweet or yellow onion, peeled and cut into wedges (break apart the wedges a little for even cooking)

4 garlic cloves, whole and unpeeled

1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1 quart vegetable stock (If I don't have homemade, I try to buy the stuff in cartons so it doesn't taste like a tin can)

1/2 teaspoon apple pie spice

2 tablespoons sherry

kosher salt to taste

Preaheat your oven to 475 degrees. Place the squash, apples, onion, and garlic on a lined or sprayed sheet tray. Drizzle olive oil over and sprinkle with kosher salt. Toss gently until coated. Roast in oven for 20-30 minutes or until cooked through. They should get some nice caramelization on them...this is good flavor...but try not to burn them!!!

Meanwhile bring the vegetable stock and apple pie spice to a low simmer in a saucepan. Once roasted, add the squash, onions, and apples to the stock. The roasted garlic should be soft and easy to peel or squeeze out of its skin, so peel it and add to the saucepan. Simmer for 5-10 minutes to blend the flavors together.

Either use an immersion blender (the stick kind) and blend the soup right in the pot, or puree the soup in batches in a regular blender. (If you use a regular blender, please puree small batches because the pressure of the steam can build up and blow off the lid causing injury or at least a big mess!)

Add the sherry and remaining kosher salt to taste. If the soup is too thick, add a little more water or stock. You can strain the soup if you want to make it smoother, but you'll be straining out the good stuff!

I realize that the process of peeling the raw squash is annoying. You can certainly cut it in half and roast it that way, but it takes longer in the oven, and it tends to still be a little stringy after blending. Also it would be very easy just to dump everything in the pot without roasting and cook it all in the broth, but it would not have the depth of flavor that roasting the vegetables can provide.

This ends up being approximately 200 calories for an 8 ounce serving. If you want to cut down even more, you could use pan spray on the vegetables instead of the olive oil, but the olive oil provides a richness to the vegetables that the spray cannot. If you have a few calories to spare, you can always drizzle a little swirl of cream over the top before serving.

Let me know what you think!!! I liked it so much I'm making a second batch tonight...

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01/20/2010 21:10

Voices in my head...

Today was a difficult day. Let me clarify - today was a difficult food day, not a gremlin day! (See yesterday's post if you have no idea what I'm talking about...)

I teach food. I teach in a hands-on production cafeteria kitchen at a technical college. We had a 1950s theme in the cafeteria today. We made tuna noodle casserole, chicken pot pie, and salisbury steak. We made green bean casserole, creamy cheesy hash brown cassserole with cornflakes on top, and mashed potatoes and gravy. We made peach cobbler, apple crisp, and banana cream pie. Have I mentioned the malt and shake station set up during service so you could have one made to order?

I think sometimes that I am a product of the wrong era. I love these foods. I could drown my sorrows in all of them; they make the world and my problems go away. Well, at least until indigestion hits and my weight goes up. But seriously. Yum. It must have been nice to cook or grow up in an era of nutritional ignorance.

I had to taste some of the foods before they went upstairs to make sure that they were acceptable...these are still students making this stuff. The voices in my head were screaming for a whole bowl of this or a large side of that, <sigh> but I settled for my spoonful. I made it through.

I then settled in for a nice warm bowl (ha ha actually a tupperware container) of Butternut Squash Apple Soup that I made last night at home when I was experimenting. It was all-natural, organic, free of all oogy boogies like preservatives, and I know EXACTLY what went in it. Did I mention it was pretty damn good? It sure is good to cook in an era of nutritional awareness.

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01/19/2010 20:13

Leprechuans and Gremlins and Fairies, Oh My!

You've had them. Admit it. You know, those days when you wake up and actually get up before your alarm. Those days when you nod your head as you get up because you just KNOW that it's going to be a good day.

And then it begins...the predictably unpredictable series of momentary events that seem to spawn one another and spiral the day downward. Things aren't where you put them a moment ago...the grapefruit juice mysteriously jumps onto your work clothes...you swear you had plugged in your cell phone last night before going to bed.

You get to work and realize you left the house with your slippers still on....

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01/15/2010 19:45

And so it begins...again

Well, the weight is offcial now. I gained 19 lbs. since the last time I logged into this site in August 2009. That's not too bad in a few months, but that means that I weigh 9 lbs. more than when I STARTED this site back a month before that.

Ugh.

But today is a new day!!! I am ready. I am strong. I am moving forward. The past is the past, and nothing from the past matters. What I do today, what I do tomorrow, and what I do with all my tomorrows is what matters.

I did a juice fast today. It was difficult, but yet it wasn't. I drank juice and water all day with no solid food. The purpose of the juice fast is to flush, flush, FLUSH all those toxins and chemicals from my system. By drinking fresh juice (none of that over-processed sugar-laden stuff!), the body doesn't need to work so hard on the "elimination" process, allowing it to focus on getting out the "yuckies" that have built up over time.

My intention is to juice fast for three days, which is why I started on a Friday...that gives me plenty of time and freedom to run to the bathroom over the weekend!!! I've done it before, so I know what to expect. Day one I am usually overfull from all the juice, and I feel lightheaded sometimes because of the calorie restriction. Day two brings the urge to eat everything in sight, not from hunger, but from a psychological need to "eat". The lightheadedness is gone, and I am filled up even more quickly by the juice. Day three is the breakthrough day for me (but sometimes I need a day four). On day three I find that most of my cravings are in check...caffeine, sugars, starches...the need just isn't there. Then I gently break the fast by incorporating veggies and fruits in along with the juice, gradually increasing the solids and decreasing the liquids over the next few days.

I know people who choose to juice longer. I have not had the nerve to try it longer than four days. They say that a juice fast of 20 or 30 or (gasp) 40 days can do wonders for eliminating all the oogy boogies that have been accumulating in your body since birth. I'm not sure about that. It just seems unhealthy to go without solid food for so long. Hmm...but who am I to judge that which I have not tried.

Will I lose weight on my mini juice fast? Absolutely, but it is an artificial weight loss in my mind until I am actually eating solid food again. Anybody can lose water weight and do a system "flush", but the weight loss is not solid unless you can maintain or continue losing afterwards.

So I check off day one of the juice fast and look forward to another wonderful day where I have the opportunity to wake up and make my life better!

Everybody have a great night/day!!!

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01/14/2010 20:29

Emerging from the darkness...

Almost five months and 20+ pounds later, I have realized that it is now time to remove my head from my posterior and get back on the right track.

What happened to me? Where have I been? What have I been doing? The answers to all of those questions and more are merely excuses for the fact that I now have an even bigger hill to climb. The answers don't matter. They are in the past. The results of those choices are here and now.

I fell off the wagon. I lost my motiviation. I got lazy. I became complacent. I didn't care.

I got fatter.

That's all there is and all I need to say on that. What really matters is that I am back. I am here. I am moving forward again.

Fridays are my new weigh-in day, so tomorrow begins the reality of what my life is and will be.

Tomorrow is great day!

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08/04/2009 23:26

Greetings from Pennsylvania!

Well I survived the long travel day yesterday. In fact, at one point I realized my mother and I had forgotten to eat lunch! The biggest challenge was walking by the restaurants in the Milwaukee airport...the smell of pizza fresh from the oven was almost enough to drive me mad! I started drooling and twitching at the thought of the ooey gooey pile of cheese and tomato dripping off the warm crust...aaaahhhhhh!!!!!!! LOL

But I made it through. At the next airport we bypassed the yummy smells and grabbed some salads, bottled water, and some fresh fruit that we split. It helps so much that Mom is a healthy eater. If she were eating pizza or a burger, it might have been a little easier to "justify" a poor choice... Yeah! for Mom!

We got in to my uncle's around 10 last night, and they wanted to visit...and have a snack!!! Ugh! But then my uncle brought out a HUGE bowl of fruit that he had cut up!!! I was so excited! I went to bed a few hours later exhausted, full and satisfied with my willpower.

Plus walking through three airports definitely added to the exercise count!!!

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08/03/2009 13:21

The first weigh in....

Weeeeeee doggy!!!! Ten pounds down!!!

Okay, okay. I know the first week is mostly water weight, but STILL it's TEN pounds!!!

Must pick up my mother and head out to the airport now. Must continue to be vigilant on the calories while away from the safety of home, but at least my scale won't be stalking me!!!

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08/02/2009 21:20

A little bad with the good...

Okay. I think I'm a little twisted. My significant other (SO) and I just spent an hour getting SOs breakfasts and lunches together for the week, and I had a BLAST!!!

SO has decided to join me on my weight loss journey (YEAH!), and SO now has signed up for EP and has already logged food for breakfast and lunch for the week. Of course we had to assemble as much as we could before tomorrow morning...because I'm leaving for Pennsylvania for the week.

I'm so happy that SO has decided to join me! But I'm a little envious because I can't get my food together for the week. I don't know what culinary pitfalls my trip will bring. I'm travelling with my mother to PA to visit her brother. She wants to visit him and my cousin who has been ill, but since my dad died in January, she is nervous about flying so far alone. I have the time, so I'm going, too.

What I didn't anticipate when we planned the trip was that I would be starting week two of my new healthy life on the same day we fly out. Ugh. Will I be strong enough to stick to my new ways? I'm going to try to take each day one at a time...that's all I really can do.

Mom is a healthy eater. My aunt and uncle are healthy eaters, too, if I remember correctly, so that really helps. But there are still the meals on the road to and from the airport, food tempations at the airport, the day trips, etc. I will bring some little baggies of pre-portioned almonds in my carry on and my suitcase to snack on during the week in case I feel the urge to splurge. Hopefully that will nip any problems in the bud. Plus I want to start exercising this week, so I'm bringing my walking shoes. I will try to fit in time to use them.

Knowing that SO is back home trying to do the same thing helps, too. SO can't lose more weight than I do!!!! (A little healthy competition is a good thing!) Plus I have access to EP on my iPhone. So I will be able to follow your progresses even though my phone won't let me post on EP from it. Grrr... Maybe my uncle has a computer....

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08/02/2009 17:01

Water, water, everywhere!!!

Ugh. I've decided that water is the root of all evil. I'm sitting in my office at home trying to get some work done, and the automatic sprinklers kick on outside.

Off I run to the bathroom.

The first set clicks off after 20 minutes, and the second set clicks on.

Off I run to the bathroom.

I have another 3 minutes until the third set clicks on...

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Height:	162.6cm
Start weight:	234.00lb
Current weight:	223.00lb
Goal weight:	125.00lb
Lost to date:	11.00lb
Remaining:	98.00lb

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