Today is going well. I started off with a green smoothie with:
1 bag frozen strawberries 2 small bananas 4 dates 1/2 bunch spinach 1/2 cup unsweetened soymilk 1/2 cup water
It was great! The dates are the key for me. In the past when I've had green smoothies, I've used a lot of water without replacing the lost sweetness. I could have easily eaten the whole bunch of spinach too. What I'll probably end up doing instead is halving the recipe, using only 2 dates, 1/2 bag of strawberries and 1 banana but still using the 1/2 bunch spinach. I also ate my flaxseed for the day mixed into a small cup of this. The only problem I had with this smoothie was that I am going to try to eat around 4-5 pieces of fruit per day, and keep it at that. This used four right off the bat. Cutting the recipe in half will help with that.
I later made the Golden Austrian Cauliflower Cream soup from Dr. Fuhrman's website. I made a few changes - I only blended in 1/4 cup of cashews instead of a full cup and I also added a can of no salt garbanzo beans to make it a little more hearty. It was so good!
I also had a salad with half a head of romaine with lunch. Since I had already used nuts in the soup, I was worried about using my favorite dressing, Casinera's Caesar. It calls for around 1 cup of raw cashews, though I always use just 1/2 cup. It occurred to me to try it with 1/4 cup and what do you know? It was even better! It was less thick so it coated all of the leaves more and it was all drippy and gooey and delicious. That kept me within the one ounce of nuts per day guideline. An ounce of cashews is 1/4 cup and in total today I will eat half of the soup and half of the salad dressing. Perfect!
I got really hungry at around 4 so decided to make myself "ice cream" with:
1 bag frozen cherries 1 banana 1 cup unsweetened soy milk 1 tsp vanilla 2 tbsp cocoa
Mmm! Fuhrman recommends eating three square meals per day but I'm having detox symptoms from eating SAD over the weekend and I figured adding in a fourth meal wouldn't be too bad, if I ate it and then stopped until dinner. I am also not crazy about using that much soymilk in a day - I'd like to keep it under 1 cup but today was 2. Oh well.
I've got a chemistry final in a half an hour that I know is going to go horribly. Afterwards I'll have another big bowl of the soup and another big salad. Mmmm.
Well today didn't turn out so well for lots of reasons. In the middle of the night, my boyfriend started clutching me in bed and shivering. I felt his skin and he was just burning. I took his temperature and it was up around 102. Poor guy. He's feeling a bit better now.
I knew I wouldn't stick to a plan today but I do think I had some successes. I didn't go into full binge mode. I did eat way too much but my mindset wasn't "Cram it in, cram it in!", it was more like "Ooh, this sounds good and ooh that sounds good too." I ended up eating some sushi, a hot chocolate and some pasta which I'm eating now. On a more positive note, I shared a big strawberry-banana smoothie with my boyfriend this morning and ate an entire head of lettuce after that. I've also got everything ready to get myself on the right track tomorrow.
This story with the Kim family getting lost in Southern Oregon is really affecting me. I don't know how much it is covered in other parts of the country, but here in Portland it is covered a LOT. I'm mostly affected by it because for one, the dad, James Kim, works for CNet and I have on several occasions watched video reviews of electronics done by him. Also, the place where they were last seen is a Cafe a few blocks from my boyfriend's house. At this point, the mother and the two children have been found but James is still missing. I really hope they find them.
One of my (many, many) problems with food has to do with perfection. I'm really bad at accepting a slip and continuing on. I want to binge and then start over. My problem today was with my goal. I have six months until my birthday...plus two days. I'd been doing great since the first of the month but the fact that my birthday is on the fourth and that I had given myself four extra days was nagging on my mind too much. So I gave in and got a vegan burrito. Not the worst choice, though lots of salt and white rice. Then I ate some M & Ms. I don't feel too bad. This is when the worst depression usually strikes me. So far, it's not that bad. However, if I want to give myself 6 months, I would start on Tuesday. That means another day of eating badly. Right now that makes me cringe but I'm sure I'll be very glad tomorrow. Ah well. Just writing it out is new. I've never done that before.
I'm almost completely done. I only had four people to buy for and yet I'm exhausted. That really is the worst part of Christmas. Otherwise it's usually pretty low-key and loving and fun. I think I got good gifts for everyone too, including buying a gift for my stepmother for the first time ever. It's actually a joint gift with my dad but I know they'll both enjoy it. We've gotten a bit closer (They've been together 5 years or so, since my parents got divorced...in fact they're the reason my parents got divorced. Sigh.) lately and I finally feel comfortable enough to get her something.
I'm down another .7 pounds this morning, for an even 187. I don't plan to weigh myself every day, more like every month when I get into it but for the first week I might, just out of curiosity.
I went to Sears to buy part of my boyfriend's gift and got this little gingerbread tree kit. I am the most uncreative person but I LOVE putting together IKEA furniture, these little wooden puzzle things, and I know I'll love putting together this gingerbread house. I'll do it exactly as the picture is. That's MY kind of creativity. Hah.
Lunch today was salad with falafel and hummus. I made the hummus first and put it in a bowl with paprika and made it look all pretty.
Then I took a couple of tablespoons of the hummus and thinned it down with a couple of tablespoons of unsweetened soy milk and used it to dress my salad. I also put a few of the falafel patties (they're green because I added a handful of spinach), a big dollop of hummus, a few slices of cucumber and a few cherry tomatoes to the top. Mmmm. It's a bit bland but otherwise very good and I'm sure my taste buds will soon get used to the lack of added salt.
Actually, I don't know if that was down at all. I just guessed that I weighed 190 yesterday. I'm glad to see that I am actually under that today. My all-time high weight was 205, last winter. After that I lost about 20 pounds, a loss which I've basically maintained. I did get down to 175 (a 30-pound loss) for a few days but that was when I was fasting, so really my weight was around 180. My first semi-short term goal is to break out of the 180s with food in me. It might even be possible this month.
In order to reach my goal of 140 by June 4, I need to lose about 8 pounds per month, or a little more. I think this is doable, especially as I expect a slightly elevated loss in the first month. Really even getting to 150 would be great though. I would no longer feel overweight. Now Dr. Fuhrman, author of Eat to Live, actually recommends a weight of around 119 for me. I'll add a few pounds because of my definitely large bone structure and say that my ultimate goal is around 125. (When, not IF, I get to that point, I'll re-evaluate and see if I can pinch more than one inch of fat on my abdomen.)
I slept great last night. It's the weekend but not a usual weekend. Yesterday was the last day of classes before finals week so next week I just have three finals. Everyone is cramming, I guess, but I don't really understand why. I almost feel like I'm missing something. I've fallen a bit behind in math but it's mostly because of dumb errors I made on tests, one of which was forgetting to circle something and losing 10%. I don't feel like studying will make me any better though. Danish is fine, not a class I worry about as I can speak the language. And chemistry, well I'm so far behind that I don't think studying could make me any better. Right now I've got a C, and I will look at some things in the text book but there is no way cramming is going to let me do anything but stay right where I am. I just skipped too many classes due to depression related to my weight and compulsive eating. I also didn't do the homework and it's too late to try to understand it now. The professor said that anyone who scored 95% on the test or above would be given an A, regardless of previous scores. That's just not going to happen for me.
Ah well. Next quarter is another quarter. My goals are going to be to stick to an eating plan, not getting discouraged when I'm not transformed overnight, to attend every class, to do all homework, even homework that doesn't have to be turned in, and to watch no more than 1 hour of TV per day.
I'm just about to walk down to Whole Foods and get stuff to make falafel and hummus, ETL-ized. Also a bunch of lettuce and maybe a few pears. I was silly last time I went shopping. I bought six not-very-nice-looking-apples and only 3 great-feeling (they never look very good, do they) pears. I ate those pears up so fast and the apples are still there. Ooops.
All right. It's time. I turn 20 in 6 months and I don't want to be overweight. I keep trying to use quick fixes but I always binge and it isn't getting me anywhere. I just need to do it. I plan to follow Eat to Live, eating lots of greens, fruits, beans, a few whole grains and nuts, no added salt or oil. I know it will work for me, if I stick to it.
Today I didn't eat until 5 pm or so. When I did, I had:
Big bowl of vegetable stew with beans, no salt 1.5 tbsp ground flaxseed
