breakfast for dinner

Since I had a big cheesy spicy chicken burrito for lunch, I really wasn’t in the mood for leftover Indian food. I was craving something sweet and filling. I had an apple and some quinoa, and with a little help from Google, I figured it out nicely.

I ended up making Apple & Cinnamon Quinoa from Green Lite Bites (cherry juice instead of lemon and brown sugar instead of honey ’cause I gotta work with what I got!) with a little chunk of Irish cheddar and a cup of Lady Grey tea. Normally I am not a breakfast for dinner kind of girl unless it involves eggs and bacon, but this was pretty much exactly what I was looking for.

As I am writing this, I am thinking to myself, “you should wait a few hours to consider it a success because you are probably going to get really hungry and eat something as a late night snack!”

Oh, my brain! I am not going to listen. I am going to enjoy the afterglow of a nutritious and delicious meal and give myself bonus gold stars for doing some of the dishes while I waited for it to cook. GO ME!

ETA: Also? I did not turn the TV on while I ate. I put on some mellow music and tried to just focus on enjoying my meal. I wasn’t quite able to cut the cord to the laptop but baby steps!

planning, preparation, panic, pain, pathetic, peaceful?

I had this for lunch today:

And I can honestly say that I was extremely surprised and pleased by how good it was. It’s rare that I eat a frozen dinner where I am actually sad when it’s gone instead of struggling through the last bites. Also, beans and I have a strange relationship wherein sometimes I adore them and sometimes they make my tongue sad. These were delicious though and perfect with the crunchy sweet corn. With a nice tart Granny Smith apple for dessert, I am quite satisfied. I will definitely be stocking up on these babies!

I share this positive thing first because now it’s time to talk about my weekend. *SIGH* Saturday, as you may have read, was a good day for the most part. But I must confess that at about 11pm, I started to get pretty miserable and then had a very difficult time trying to sleep. My whole body just didn’t feel….right. I am not talking about pain or anything. Just off in some way. And I started to wonder if I was feeling “normal” and I just didn’t recognize it. Whatever it was, I didn’t like it, dammit!

So of course when I got up on Sunday, my first instinct was to stuff myself to avoid whatever I experienced the nigtht before. I started okay with pizza made with whole wheat pita. I mean, I ate two of them, but all things considered, not a huge tumble from the wagon, nutritionally. On the emotional eating scale, however, I hit about an 8.

However, I avoided going to the grocery store like I wanted and this left me with not a lot in the house to munch on that would be tasty enough to distract me from sliding further down the emotional eating rabbit hole of doom. I made it to about 8 o’clock before I started jonesing for those greasy chicken things I talked about the other day and not even the hotness of Alexander Skarsgård could distract me from my fix. They tasted pretty good in my mouth but my soul was not really feeling it. I don’t want to say I felt guilty, because that wasn’t it. Just sad, mostly, that sometimes food and emotions control me so strongly. I hate that whole saying “nothing tastes as good as being thin feels” or whatever, mostly because it’s true! That 15 minutes of greasy carby delight was not worth what it does to my body or my progress toward being healthier. Gar.

And then yesterday, I did okay. I got a tall non-fat version of the pumpkin spiced latte and small fries with my Chik-fil-a and again tried to ease my way through the evening with another whole wheat pita pizza but that ended up with me eating an extra helping of ham with sauce and cheese because I wasn’t “full” enough.

I am not even going to pretend that it wasn’t another emotional-eating moment for me. Some friends and I went to see the Capitals rookie camp practice earlier in the day, which I enjoyed very much. But as we were leaving, we ran into one of the players and the horrible little troll that lives inside of me filled my head with nasty stuff about what he thought of me (like he even really noticed that much!) and blah. I can’t even articulate it properly without embarassing myself, honestly.

Mostly, I am just very very tired of not feeling at all comfortable in my own skin. Which makes me sad. Which makes me want to eat. Which makes me fatter. Which makes me feel less comfortable in my own skin! How do I get to where I am more tired of feeling like this than I am of doing the work that is required to change it? Is that where my peace is?

are you ready for some spinaaaaaaaaaaaaach?

Today is the first official Saturday of college football season! *\o/* When I got up this morning, one of the first things I wrestled with was, “what to eat while watching all this glorious football?” I have to say that even at 10:30am I was so tempted to reach for the phone and just order a big pizza to eat on all day. I had to take a lot of deep breaths, think about my current favorite happy place, and mentally review the contents of my kitchen to keep myself from a pre-planned carb coma.

I went with some scrambled Egg Beaters and diced ham and a pinch of cheese with salsa, a half a slice of whole wheat pita and some cantaloupe for breakfast instead. So, victory! Then, for lunch, I had a spinach salad with goat cheese, cranberries, sliced almonds and homemade balsamic vinaigrette dressing. And then a little yogurt with almond butter for dessert.

I ate spinach. That was not in a cheesy fatty dip. While watching football. Please, mark this date on your calendars!

I am not going to lie, though. It was fucking difficult. I do a lot of looking at the clock still instead of listening to my body. I feel hungry? confused? all the time if I am eating non-greasy non-starchy things.  So a day inside with nothing to do but hide the phone to avoid takeout is actually pretty difficult. I feel kind of silly saying that but there it is.

Of course, while watching the games, I’ve been browsing Healthy Yum, which is just fantastic. It’s a nice way to get a variety of healthy things to consider. I found some good stuff to add to my delicious. (You can see whatever I’ve added lately on the right sidebar there! *points*) I think maybe that was a little too much obsessing about food for the day but I got some good out of it, so I am not going to beat myself up about it.

And now for dinner I am experimenting with adding more veggies to things I already like! I am making my favorite comfort food: macaroni and beef! But without macaroni and with the addition of 2.5 cups of broccoli slaw to bump up the veggie quotient (a trick I learned from Hungry Girl). So far, it’s tasting pretty good. I am debating on whether or not to add a little bit of whole wheat penne.

Tomorrow, there may be leaving the house to go hiking. Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?

okay, so it’s like this

Five months. Huh. Well, it’s not the longest I’ve gone without posting to this blog (in it’s many forms) but it’s not exactly ideal, no?

I had a bit of a spell where I ate these greasy fried (I typed fright first, ha!) boneless chicken wing things that were delivered hot and fresh to my house at least twice a week. Just typing that made my mouth water, so maybe I shouldn’t even be talking about them. Ya’ll, one time? I dipped them in chocolate.

Anyway, point is, I wasn’t really paying that much attention to taking care of myself. However, at the same time, I was walking to work every day, therefore I somehow broke even, weight wise. I’ll try not to sit here and cry over lost opportunities (I am lying!) and move on.

I’ve been eating better lately, though it’s been a severe test of wills. I’ve created a crazy (no, seriously) way of dealing with it mentally and it’s working, so I honestly don’t care if it qualifies me for a little white coat or not (plus, the book I will write about it is going to be stellar).   I even went for walk yesterday morning and I plan to do it again tomorrow. (Please tell me when the “exercising will give you more energy!” part kicks in because it really just makes me want to sleep instead of work!)

As I say every single time I try to make positive changes, I am doing my best to take it slowly and not beat myself up for misteps. It seems so very simple yet it never is. I mean, today, I couldn’t even figure out if I was full. I was eating lunch (a salad and a bowl of Amy’s Organic Cream of Tomato Soup – Light in Sodium (to which I ended up adding sodium!)) and I literally could not figure out if I was full or if, I don’t know, I had gas or something. I had food left, therefore I should eat it! Like I was mad at my stomach. I mean, this isn’t an issue when I am eating something I really want (the lunch was decent, rather be having a cheeseburger!), as I don’t fucking care if I am full, I am eating it all. Sometimes, I feel like I should just eat things I kind of don’t like to save myself the trouble. But then I get really cranky and want to kill people, so I am not sure that is the best strategy.

Basically, I am at the same place I am usually at in my cycle of crazy, but maybe with a few more tools in my arsenal to break through.

back to the future

I just emailed the therapist I had when I lived in Houston to see if she’d consider counseling me over email or something. She was really really awesome and I swear I considered not moving because I didn’t want to stop seeing her.  I found her using the Eating Disorder Referral and Information Center which I highly recommend. It’s comforting to know going in that the person you are seeing at least recognizes that being overweight is an eating disorder. I tried to use it to find someone here but none of the therapists listed are covered by my insurance. SHOCKING!

There is part of me that doesn’t really see any value in continuing to go therapy. I mean, I know, I know what my issues are and where they come from and what my danger zones are and how I feel about my mother/father/4th grade teacher and what to eat and what not to eat and what my trigger foods are and how my body is addicted to carbs and sugars and how if I don’t exercise I am going to die young and have full-blown diabetes and so so so many other things that you learn in therapy. I’ve been doing it since I was ten. I have so much knowledge, I feel like my brain will burst with it. It’s the doing that I have a hard time with. I can (and do) talk about my problems for HOURS and type about them for YEARS and it doesn’t do any damn good if I don’t DO DO DO something.

Of course, now I am going to go stare at my email and hope that she emails me back soon.

Comfort Food

I made Macaroni and Beef (or goulash, as I prefer to call it!) (also, I highly recommend that recipe site) because I was craving comfort food and it’s ridiculously easy to make. I didn’t use whole wheat noodles or anything because I really wanted it to taste like I remembered it as a kid. I think I came pretty close. I made sure to call dad before I started to get the right tips. Maybe the dash of paprika did it.

He also said, “remember when I used to make it without the beef and serve it over bread?” I don’t think you need anymore info than that to see how I might have come to have bad food habits. Since he grew up in a household run by parents who survived the depression, he ended up with some interesting food likes that he passed on to me. Our favorite breakfast? Buttered toast dipped into tomato juice. Another bread-tomato staple that my grandfather liked to call “Depression Pizza” was basically ketchup on toast baked in the oven. And don’t get me started on the legacy of Polish food, okay?

Anyway, I am still struggling with eating and cooking at home. Not only is it important for health issues, it’s also financially necessary. Right now I am okay, but if I ever lose my contract freelance job, I’ll be in some deep water. Plus, I’d like to get some things paid off so that when my lease is up, I can afford to sign a new one here if they don’t raise the rent too much. I really love the neighborhood and walking to work!

Part of my love for the neighborhood is the Whole Foods around the corner, which sort of goes against the saving money thing. However, I’ve found that if you go in with a plan, it’s a little easier to come out with some of your paycheck left. It certainly makes it easier to dash over to get forgotten ingredients or fresh produce.

As with all things I attempt, I am struggling with my standard ALL OR NOTHING approach. Hence the goulash. It’s not exactly the whole grain-filled goodness that it should be, nor does it go beyond my love of tomatoes to encorporate any sort of leafy greens. But like I said, it’s easy to make and the ingredients are relatively inexpensive. I figure maybe if I start out as simple as possible, it will become a habit and then I can move on to healthier things later.

Obviously, I also need to look in to returning to therapy, as all the healthy food in the world isn’t going to help if I eat three helpings of it in one sitting. (Which, btw, I did not do. Even though it was very tempting!)

legacies

(Sorry to those seeing this twice. I wanted to get it down in this blog, as it’s very relevant to my food issues.)

I recently watched Girl 27, a documentary about a woman who was a chorus girl at MGM in 1937 when she was raped during a salesman convention, the cover-up that ensued and how it effected her for the rest of her life.

It was really interesting and kind of emotionally draining on several levels. First of all, the fact that shit like that still happens, that attorneys and the media still make the claim that a woman’s “morality” is somehow relevant and that women still take the blame onto themselves, more than 70 years later, and that these things will probably continue to happen for years to come.

But also, mother and daughters and granddaughters and the secrets that are kept for generations and how that shapes relationships. My mother didn’t know her mother had been married and divorced before she married my grandfather until my grandmother was in her 80s, and only then because someone brought it up at a family reunion.

My mom waited until I was in my thirties to sit me down (at the Outback, of all places, between the salad and the steak) to tell me that out there somewhere I have a half-sister that she gave up for adoption when she was in her early twenties. How my grandmother basically forced her to hide in the attic and wear wigs when she went to the doctor during the entirety of her pregnancy. That she never told me because she had somehow come to the conclusion that I was judgmental and would look down on her for it.

And then when my mother came to visit this last time, I brought up being molested by a neighbor when I was very young and she claims she has no memory of anything like that, something I personally didn’t even remember until I was in my late teens, even though my father swears she was there when I told him, a moment which I have still have no memory of at all.

I just…we take so much onto ourselves, as women, these things that are done to us, and hold it inside and find ways to keep it there. It makes me so sad, even as I continue to perpetuate it. My dad is always asking me why I am so angry all the time and all I can ever really say to him is that there is no way that he will ever ever understand what it’s like to be a woman in society and all the baggage that goes along with it.

I wasn’t expecting it to stir up these things. I was just indulging my dorky love for documentaries. Not exactly the happiest of Friday night viewage but interesting nonetheless. Also probably a reminder that getting back into therapy would probably be a good idea, as I have obviously not worked through a lot of these issues.

checking the gauge

I’ve totally given up on the cutesy “The Office”-related titles. Please forgive me!

So, The BFF requested an update, as is her due, so here we go. It’s been an interesting few weeks. I’ve been doing okay point-wise, as I took her advice and added a lot of positive-point things and avoided the negative. It is easier that way, so I’ll go on record to say she was right. (I know how much she digs hearing that!)

In the middle of this progress, I had a bit of a traumatic experience. I came home from work the other day and got on the elevator with this young boy, probably around 12, I guess? Anyway, I am sorting through my mail, minding my own business, and after I get off the elevator and almost get to the corner, I hear the little cretin scream out “GO TO THE GYM, BITCH!” and the elevator doors slide shut.

I stood there sort of stunned for a moment. I could feel my face heating up and I ran through so many emotions. Anger, embarrassment, confusion. I did my best not to let it bother me because, hello, stupid child. But it was difficult. It’s not fun having your issues trumpeted back at you by a hellchild that is for sure. And I was angry at society in general, that him saying that was something okay in his head, where he probably wouldn’t not have done so to someone else, you know? There really is a cultural norm that making fun of fat people is okay because we are somehow weak and deserve it. That really pisses me off. A lot.

It’s one of the hardest things for me to deal with, the inability to escape my weight issue, even for a moment. As soon as I do, I walk by a window or a mirror or someone looks at me funny or, jeez, says something and it’s like I’ve lost all over again.

The BFF&Co wanted to go hiking today and invited me along. I took some time to think about it and decided against it. I’d spent all of yesterday going to the grocery store and doing the dishes and my laundry and I knew that I wanted to prepare some of the stuff for much lunch for the next week today. And I knew that if I spent half the day hiking, I wouldn’t have the energy to do those things when I got back and if I didn’t, I’d be more likely to skip taking my lunch which leads to eating out which leads to bad food choices and spending money I shouldn’t. I realize that there are people out there who can do all those things, who have the energy, emotionally and physically, do all those things in a day, and more. I am just not one of those people right now. I aspire to it, believe me.

But it goes back to that issue of never escaping. It takes me so much energy to be anywhere close to normal because not only do I have to physically do things, I have to use so much mental energy to force myself to keep doing it. For me to eat relatively healthy, I have to focus so hard, I end up spending half the day thinking about food, what I am going to eat, how much of it I can eat, what I am going to make when I get home, etc. etc. etc.

I don’t know, maybe everyone is like this and I am just a wimp about it. I get a lot of “why don’t you just…” from people. I used to get it all the time from my dad, too, and it drove me crazy. If I could, I would? I mean, I don’t know how to explain it. He said to me later, after his own health problems and his wife leaving him drove him into a deep depression, that he was sorry for telling me that I just needed to do things, because he never understood how hard that was until he went through it.

I don’t want to be the type of person that makes excuses. I am frustrated by my seemingly small tank when it comes to emotional energy. And I can’t seem to explain it to people without it coming across as just being lame and weak.

Anyway, I wanted to make sure that I actually did the things I wanted to do so that the sacrifice of the physical activity that would have been good to me would not be in vain. So I got up and puttered around the kitchen. I trimmed the fat from a chicken breast and made up some marinate for it. Then I sliced up the strawberries I bought and I had a nice breakfast. Then later, I made some black bean dip and cooked up the chicken, part of it to take in my lunch and part to have for dinner with some sweet potato fries and some corn. In between, I found a neat recipe site full of lots of things I want to try. I even tracked my food and points, read some of my book and did the dishes! Plus, I am going to do a little meditating before I go to bed. So, overall, I feel like it wasn’t a wasted day. I know that Monday will go easier, which makes the rest of the week go smoother.

Someday, I want to be the person that spends her whole weekend gallivanting around doing lots of productive and fun things instead of using the time to recharge my emotional battery. It’s just going to take me awhile to get there, I think.

posting frequently – motivated – positive – me

One of these things is not like the others, one of these things does not belooooong!

Okay, I promised myself I wouldn’t get all negative up in this entry, even though it’s been TWO MONTHS since I have updated. Let’s just say I have been struggling and move on, shall we?

Yes, things have not been going smoothly, to say the least. There are many many issues at work here, many of which I have been dealing with for a long time. I have a hard time with delayed gratification. I generally do not feel I deserve to have nice things. I really just want a fucking iced coffee every damn morning which is not too much to ask!!!

Erm. Yes, so issues. I am resetting my goals and trying to be more positive. Going back to the basics. Baby steps. One day at a time. Blah blah blaaaah. I can even give myself a point for this rather ridiculous blog post.

But, hey, at least I still have my umbrella…ella…ella.

You tell me who this sounds like: slow moving, inattentive, dull, constantly snacking, shows a lack of motivation.

So, yesterday was a Bad Day. I don’t mean that in terms of what I ate or anything, as I am trying to avoid using such terminology. Positivity! Focus on the fun! I just mean I had a Bad Day.

I found myself crying for no discernible reason. There was just an ache in my chest that wouldn’t go away and all I could thinks was “God, I just want to eat something, everything, right fucking now!” I was convinced it would make me feel better. I resisted because, man, I want to keep those hockey tickets and I don’t want to let me friends down and I’ve wasted enough time already. So I sucked it up and just let myself cry. I curled up into a little ball on my bed, took some deep breaths, snuggled with the cats and waited for it to pass, which it eventually did. I felt a little ridiculous, lying there, but it was better than eating a bad of chips or whatever, and definitely had less calories.

It got me to thinking about food and addiction. I am pretty sure that cutting white flour out of my diet and avoiding sugar was part of what triggered it. Those are both things that I have used constantly in my life to soothe myself when I get depressed. I honestly believe I am chemically dependent on them and I need to remind myself of that when I start feeling crazier when I am eating healthier. I suppose part of it could be psychosomatic, wherein I miss those things and I assume that my crazy is related to them but it feels like a different kind of crazy, if that makes any sense. It’s almost a panic, like if I don’t have these things right now, I am going to…something. Break into a million pieces. Being hungry triggers that feeling sometimes, too. Simply letting myself feel things and not stuff myself with food freaks me out. That’s why planning out my food becomes very important because if I slack off and I end up feeling too hungry, that’s when I make unhealthy decisions.

I am desperately trying to take this slow and not be too hard on myself because I know it hasn’t worked in the past. But I also have to balance that out with making an extra effort to stay on track and actually start making some sacrifices or I am never going to get anywhere.

The BFF’s mantra, as I mentioned above, is that it’s All About the Fun. I think she got this from The Secret or whatever but I try to not think about how she is going to end up in a creepy cult someday if she keeps this up and focus on the part where that makes sense. Just about every self-help book/guru/website/whatever will tell you that focusing on the positives works better than bitching about the negatives. I am working on that, I promise. I made fun mixes to walk to and I got shiny shoes to wear while I am doing it. And I look at that picture of the hockey boys celebrating at least once a day. And when, like last night, I allow myself two cookies, I don’t get down on myself. I enter it into MySpark and move on.

And today, my fun thing was to walk over to Trader Joe’s at lunch. It killed two birds with one stone: I got my exercise and I bought some healthy staples for the pantry! Plus, it was such a beautiful day, I barely noticed the walk. Of course, my calves are now reminding me that I took it, but that’s okay. It makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something. I had to walk by the Bally’s on the way and I caught myself starting to think things like “okay, if you get up at 6am, you can ride the train in and get this much cardio in and still have time to shower and get to work…” and I had to stop myself because, seriously, let’s try to walk for 30 minutes a day three times a week first before we plan our trip down gym junkie lane, right? Right!

Also, thanks to Half of Me (which, if you are not reading, you totally should because she is AWESOMELY inspirational and I can’t wait to read her book!), I found the Couch-to-5k running plan, which I think I am going to try (eventually). It’s just the sort of easily understood, baby steps plan I can get behind.

And now that I have updated this, I can give myself another smiley face on my goals page! WOO!