Tough day

We got news today that our insurance will not cover Nate’s eye treatments – the only thing, by the way, that is keeping him from total blindness at the ripe old age of 32 – and so we will need to pay $400 out of pocket every month.  $400 that won’t apply to our deductible or annual out-of-pocket costs.  And being that Friday is his last severance check and there are no jobs on the horizon, you could say that I’m stressed.  I actually had to leave the office for a minute today to go cry in the bathroom.

And yes, I’m totally craving sugar.

But somehow, I powered through.  I didn’t cave in.  I don’t really feel any better, but I’ve now been sugar free for 5 days.  Honestly, I mostly feel like I picked up where I left off.  The cravings are a little stronger now than they were in the end, but my overall mindset has picked up in pretty much the same place.  In looking at my earliest blog entries, I’m not really going through the same grieving and anger I did last time.  I don’t know if that’s good or bad.  On the one hand, maybe it’s really as I’ve suggested it is: picking up where I left off.  On the other hand, I worry that I’m not taking it seriously enough yet.  I’m not grieving it because I don’t really believe it yet.

But I’m probably getting ahead of myself here.  One day at a time.  If I made it through today, I’m doing pretty darn well.  I’ll deal with tomorrow, tomorrow.

Resurrection

So a lot has happened since I last posted in January.  None of it is good – at least not as my eating is concerned.  That one blackslide turned into a few days of backsliding turned into a few weeks turned into….you get the picture.  I have not been sugar free in over 7 months.

And in those 7 months:

• I learned my son has Von Hippel-Lindau syndrome, a devastating genetic condition that his father also has.
• I accepted my first full-time, permanent position since 2000.
• I moved halfway across the country (Detroit to Denver) to start said position.  In less than two weeks.
• I brought the kids with me, but left my husband behind to try to sell our house and secure employment here in Denver.
• I discovered my new job entailed a minimum of 50 hours a week, so I was essentially a single mom working full time plus from April until mid-June.
• I found that my job is very, very high stress.

So between the stress and the extreme fatigue from how long my days were, my eating went completely to hell.  Not only was I back on sugar, I was bingeing again, I was eating out all the time, and when I did occasionally eat in, it was always high-fat, highly processed foods.

Long story short: I put on about 30 lbs in the last 4 months.

And the worst part?  Maggie has put on weight, too.  We went back-to-school shopping last weekend, and nothing fits her.  She’s still very muscular, and the fact that she is so short complicates things, but NOTHING at Justice fit her without going up two sizes – which made them way too long.  We ended up walking out without buying anything, and when I got home, I cried my eyes out.  (Not in front of her, of course!  All I told her was that she was “between sizes.”)  I feel so terribly guilty.  MY lazy habits have caused this.  A big contributing factor was the fact that she was no longer doing 6 hours of gymnastics and 2 hours of dance anymore.  (Though she is now doing 5 hours of dance per week!  But that just started up last week.)  But I knew she was less active, and I could see the weight beginning to creep on, and still, I did nothing to change our direction.

In any case, that shopping trip was really a catalyst for me: I HAVE to get back to eating healthier, along with my children.  And the first step I must take is cutting out sugar.  So we went and had one “grand finale” splurge at Cheesecake Factory.  But then Monday, I ate some sugar by mistake.  Tuesday, I ate it on purpose after a long day.  And yesterday, I ate it b/c it was offered to everyone in a meeting, and I didn’t feel like I could say no.  (And truthfully, I didn’t want to.)

So today is my first day 100% back on the no-sugar wagon.  Last year, I marked 6/23 as my anniversary date.  This year it will be August 13th.  This year – and FOREVER.

Off to re-read my old blog entries to try to find some inspiration…

My first true backslide/defining “forever”

I’ve flirted with backsliding a bit over the last couple of months, eating foods that were in a gray area – but pretty darn close to black.  The worst one was about three weeks ago when I was SUPER stressed, and I was making some cornbread to go with dinner.  I do allow myself a little cornbread.  It’s a rare indulgence, I skip the jam, and it’s a side dish, not a dessert.  However, as I was making it this time, I got a phone call that just pushed me over the edge.  I don’t even remember what it was about anymore, but it was the last straw that day.  Almost without thinking, I started shoveling raw batter into my mouth – just like I used to do with cake batter.  I stopped myself after about 4 big spoonfuls, but in that moment, I had relapsed.

And although I was proud that I stopped myself, I have to admit that it really got the idea of consuming a bunch of corn bread batter stuck in my head.  It had tasted GOOD, and I’d been fantasizing about it.  If I’d been smart, I would’ve thrown the remaining packets of cornbread mix out.  (It was a big box from Costco.)  But no, I kept it around, constantly tempting me.

Tuesday night, I finally gave in to the temptation.

I waited for Nate to head to bed, on the pretense that I was going to stay up and read for a bit.  (Which I actually do do quite often, so it didn’t seem suspicious.)  And as soon as I knew he was in the room and sound asleep (I could hear the snoring!), I set to my task.  Once the batter was made, I devoured about half of it, until I started feeling sick to my stomach.  It was exactly like old times.  I didn’t even attempt to savor it.  I just spooned it in as fast as I could…while I read my book!  What a waste.  The only good thing is that I forced myself to stop before I felt really sick, which is better than I used to do.

The funny thing is, I didn’t really even give in out of stress.  It wasn’t an emotional binge in that sense.  However, it WAS an emotional binge in this sense: my birthday was coming up (it was yesterday), and birthdays/celebrations are tied to sweets in my mind.  I spent probably 30 minutes rationalizing my choice to do this, about how I “deserved” it as a birthday treat.  

I still don’t entirely know how I feel about what transpired that night.  Actually, I AM disappointed in myself for such a stupid, not-even-that-good backslide.  But I keep going through my reasons for very deliberate(this was not heat of the moment, like the spoonfuls of batter a few weeks before) choice to do this.  Let me take you through the main two:

1. The big one: can an addict indulge once per year and be OK?  I kept thinking, “I ought to be able to have a treat just on my birthday.  That would be the ONLY day I would allow it.”  Because, in the past, I used to use EVERY holiday/bit of good news/day ending in -day, as justification for a “splurge.”  And those fed off each other.  But if I knew going in that it was just ONE TIME until next year, could I do it?  Or would I instantly be thrown back into needing a regular fix?  To be honest, so far I haven’t seen any ill effect from my backslide.  I haven’t craved sugar any more than usual.  (That might be impossible.)  And I haven’t started plotting a way to backslide again.  (Sort of – more on that in a minute.)

2. I’m starting a yeast elimination diet on 1/19.  I’ve been told that there is a very good chance this will actually kill my cravings altogether once I get my gut in balance and the taste of sugar fully out of my mouth.  (There’s no fruit even for 4-6 weeks.  It’s 100% sugar free.)  So I thought, “Why not let myself have this one final indulgence?  What better time than my birthday?”  I think this hit home for me particularly because I never had a true “final splurge” before I started this new life.  At the time, I had NO IDEA of the journey I was about to embark on.  I was just planning on going sugar free for a few months; it took about 3 days before suddenly clicked inside my head that I was never going to be able to go back if I wanted to succeed.  So in the weekend leading up to my change of life, if I’d thought then that I would be doing it permanently, I might’ve indulged in some different things.  Of course, the corn bread batter was not on that list – but since the house is sugarfree now, and I was craving it, it still seemed like a good idea.

And so here I sit, 36 hours later, regretting totally my choice to binge and to binge on something so stupid and unfulfilling.  But I’m actually still on the fence about the once a year thing, and it’s actually a fairly relevant question because we haven’t truly celebrated my birthday yet.  Nate’s birthday is the 13th, and we’re having a nice night out for both our birthdays on the 17th.  And I’m thinking realllllly hard about if I want to have dessert that night.  I start the yeast elimination diet two days later, in which I hope to kill my cravings outright.  And although it’s not technically my birthday anymore and I did already have my supposed once-a-year splurge – I count that one out as more of a backslide.  Can I have a considered, rational, non-binge indulgence to celebrate my birthday?  Honestly, if I DO have a celebratory treat that Saturday night, it may truly be my last one.  Because if I kill the cravings with my yeast elimination diet, I will NOT be going back.  I really will be done forever.  If I can release myself from this hell, I’m certainly not gonna walk back through the door!  But right now, while I’m still in hell, can’t I do something to make it a little more pleasant for a few minutes….

I don’t know.  I’m really am on the fence about this.  Dear readers, please help me out.  Shall I allow myself this one last (or perhaps, once per year) indulgence?  Or is that just the Sugar Devil sitting on my shoulder, telling me what I want to hear???

New Year’s resolutions

Of course, I have non food- and weight-related resolutions and goals, but I’d like to take a moment in this blog to address those ones.   I actually haven’t thought about them too deeply yet – the past few weeks have had me preoccupied with other things – so I may finesse these later.  But for the time being, this is what I’m hoping for 2009:

1. Continue living sugar free.
2. Kill the yeast imbalance in my system.
3. Eat out less, cook from scratch more.
4. Try more new recipes.
5. Start going to the produce market every week and stocking up on fresh fruits and veggies.
6. Save money for a Vitamix, although it may even be 2010 before I can afford one.
7. Exercise 4 times per week.
8. Use the Wii and the treadmill regularly as part of my weekly exercise goals.  
9. Complete the Couch to 5K program.
10. Walk in a 5K.

In a way, this seems like a lot.  But really, they could be condensed into three overarching goals: remain sugar free, eat better overall, get moving regularly.  I just think it’s helpful to have some specific goals written out or it can be easy to get overwhelmed or, alternately, too lax.

And I suppose all of these could be condensed even further into one meta-goal: end 2009 a healthier me than I started it.

Holy wow

I can’t believe I missed it.  One week ago on Tuesday was…6 months of being sugar free!

So why don’t I feel better?  This is in many ways just as hard as it was on Day 1.  I don’t feel like I’ve come to accept this at all yet, lost my cravings at all yet.  I spent the last several days in Chicago at my parents’ house, and I can’t tell you how many times I had to fight back the urge to go pilfer some sweets.  In fact, the only thing that stopped me one night was actually the realization that it had been 6 months.  I told myself that I couldn’t waste 6 months of hard work.

I have to admit, though, that I’m sure some of this has to do with my overall mental health right now.  I’ve been running on sky-high stress levels since about a month into this journey.  That’s when we found out Nate needed another eye surgery, and it’s just been downhill since then.  Between his worsening eye problems, the discovery of this growing kidney tumors, the anxiety over Gus’s VHL test results, and now my mom’s recent illness, and all of that topped off by continuing financial strain – well, I’m a wreck.  However, I’ve made it a New Year’s resolution to take better care of myself, and not only am I looking into some support groups for caregivers, I’m also going to see my midwife in a week to talk to her about adjusting and/or changing my anti-depressant.  This is something I probably should’ve done for ages but haven’t.  It’s been clear for awhile that the dose/brand I’m on right now isn’t working.

Finally, I also know that I have a yeast overgrowth, and I understand that intense sugar cravings often go hand-in-hand with this.  Although I had sugar problems long before I had a clearly identifiable yeast issue, I’m wondering how much this plays into the difficulties I’m experiencing.  However, I’m also taking that bull by the horns in a couple of weeks by going on a strict yeast-elimination diet.

So 6 month is up, and I don’t really feel that different.  But I AM hopeful that in another 6 months (or maybe even less!), I WILL be feeling more positive.

Ouch

Oh, so THAT’S what it feels like to get a good work out in!  Yes, I am quite sore today, but it’s a good kind of sore – I played on Wii for about an hour and a half yesterday.  I got some cardio in with step aerobics and a few rousing rounds of tennis, and I did a LOT of balance games, which are surprisingly challenging.  And it was FUN.  I seriously don’t know the last time I exerted myself for an hour and a half in a single day.  A “tough” workout for me is probably 45 minutes long.  Sure, not all of that hour and a half was high intensity, but a good portion of it was.  And the point is that I was up and moving my body, whether it was low intensity or high.  It feels GREAT!

I am, however, taking a bit of a break today.  For one, Gus is not at daycare, and I can’t really use Fit around him, or he’s trying to get on the balance board.  (Yes, I am terrible – I used far too much of Gus’s day at daycare yesterday playing games rather than working or getting ready for Christmas…)  Plus, I am really sore, and I know my body needs a small break.  There is definitely such a thing as overdoing it!  I don’t want to burn out.  So I did a bit of step aerobics and a few balance games, but that’s about it for today.  I’m definitely avoiding tennis, because although it’s a blast, I’m having some shoulder issues, and I’m really paying the price today.  So I’m going to have to take it a bit easy with the tennis.  

I can’t believe how great this Wii is!  And to think that just a week ago, I would’ve told you I didn’t even wanta  Wii.  Now I’m an additct!  I’ve spent quite a bit of time compiling a list of more games I want to try.  I believe Nate said his mom is also sending Maggie Outdoor Adventure, which is great because that’s at the top of my list!  I also want Dance, Dance Revolution and World of Goo.  

Well, I should stop blathering on about this.  But clearly the Wii has re-energized my fitness desires, and I have to talk about it SOMEWHERE.  What better place than my blog?

Wii are getting Fit!

We got the Fit set up this morning, and it’s so much fun!  I’d forgotten how much I actually enjoy step aerobics.  It’s a good aerobic workout, but because the step itself provides much of the intensity, it doesn’t require lots of fancy footsteps the trip my somewhat uncoordinated self up.  (Although among the things I’m not loving – the fact that the routine seems to be the same each time and that you can’t do more than 5 minutes at once.  Sure, you can restart it, but that means pausing to press the right buttons, and your heart rate goes down some.  Maybe I’m missing ways to get around these things?)

Anyway, I’ve done 40 minutes today already!  Of course, about half of those were balance games, which often run under a minute mark and then get rounded up.  And they definitely weren’t 40 contiguous minutes.  But I was off my tush and doing something, and that’s more than I’ve been able to say for awhile!

Wii got an early Christmas present

And I bet you’ll never guess what it is!

My very generous mother-in-law gave us not only a Wii (believe it or not, but the last gaming system I owned was the original Nintendo, back in the late 80s or early 90s), but also Wii Play with the nunchuck controller AND…Wii Fit!

I have to admit that I’m not much of a gamer – hence the lack of gaming systems in my life – but I really liked the Wii when I played it for the first time last Christmas.  And I’ve especially been intrigued with Wii Fit for obvious reasons.  So I was super excited to open it, and I can’t WAIT to give the Fit a try.  Nate’s going to set it up tonight, and I’ll take it for a spin tomorrow.

I must say, though, I am nervous about the Wii Fit Mii, or whatever it’s called.  I’ve heard they are far too realistic.  I’m not sure I want to see fat, blobby me up there!  But I guess maybe that will be an added incentive.

Here’s to a Fit new year!!!

Yet another test

As if the holidays and a stressful time at work weren’t enough.  Yesterday was very nearly a snapping point for me.  

My mom has either had a stroke or has lupus or has an infectious disease – one of the above is likely causing inflammation in her brain that is causing numbness on her left side.

And I’m telling you, I’ve just about had it.  Yesterday was the first time in awhile where stress broke me down and made me want to stuff my face with sugar.  In the end, I didn’t have any sugar – but I can’t say that I didn’t stuff my face with good ol’ numbing non-sugary food.  But at least no sugar is progress, right?

2009 has to be better.  It just has to.  I can’t take another year like this one.

Still hanging in there

259.2 this morning.  I have been 258-262 for probably 2 months now.  Never above – but never below either.  I know I need to further modify my eating habits and/or start working out more regularly.  But I’m still struggling SO MUCH with the sugar cravings that I fear trying to add anything else is what will end up breaking me.

However, I AM doing a yeast elimination diet after the new year, no matter what.  I’ve been battling clear signs of yeast imbalance for over 2 years now, almost certainly caused by the massive dose of antibiotics I was given during my labor with Gus because I was Group B Strep positive.  So I know that doing that for 4-8 weeks will cause some weight loss.  (If it doesn’t, I will be going to the doctor, because that would be a clear sign that something is up.)  From there, I hope to gradually add more diverse foods back into my diet and hopefully get myself to eating a healthier diet than I am right now.  

I also really do want to start the Couch to 5K program.  I have to admit that I’ve just been feeling super unmotivated lately – about everything.  But I really want to break this plateau.  Still, it’s not something I’m going to bite off now.  Even though I’m not indulging in Christmas cookies and I have no holiday parties on my calendar (fun life I have, eh?), it’s still just a bad time of year to undertake something like that.  So once I get through Christmas and Nate’s and my birthdays (the 13th and 7th of Jan, respectively), I’m going to have to shake this lackadaisical outlook off somehow.  I’m hoping the yeast elimination diet – which I MUST do, for reasons that have nothing to do with my weight but should have a positive impact on my weight nonetheless – will help do that.

Maybe I’ll start blogging more regularly again

This entry is going to be a little off topic, but I just found the COOLEST new browser – and, of course, it comes from Google.  Not only am I finding it to be lightning fast, I have discovered one super cool feature: you can set it up to open multiple websites when you launch, all in separate tabs of the same window.  So not only have I put all my usual suspects, the stuff I remember to check each day anyway, in my list, I’ve also added a few sites I WANT to check but never remember to…including my blog page.  So maybe seeing it open everyday will be a reminder to me to actually post more often.  Of course, I have to have something to say, but if I look long enough, I usually find something.

Success

I can’t say that it was FUN, or that it was my most enjoyable meal ever, but I made it through Thanksgiving without eating any sugar.  And even more importantly, I made it through the days AFTER, when leftovers were lurking when I wasn’t expecting to see them.  In some ways, that was harder than the holiday itself, when I had steeled myself to be strong.  It was opening the fridge to get a drink and seeing the leftover sweet potatoes (my recipe, made w/coconut, marshmallows, and a pecan-pie like topping – so, basically a dessert) staring me in the face, or grabbing a banana off the counter and catching a glimpse of the leftover pumpkin pie.  You get the gist.

Thanksgiving day actually was not as bad as I’d feared.  We were so busy that I didn’t have much time to think about what was to come.  And there were so many other yummy offerings at dinner that I didn’t dwell too much on the sweet potatoes that were only a few inches away.  (In retrospect, I wish I’d reserved just a little plain mashed sweet potato for me, so I could’ve had some with butter.  Oh well…it’s not like I wasn’t stuffed when I was done.)  Plus, Gus decided to have a total meltdown which, at the time was very stressful, but I must admit – it kept me distracted.

I did allow myself one small concession.  I’d read about Lara Bars recently, which are truly just nuts and dates – no added sugars or binders or grains or anything.  (Well, a few have unsweetened cocoa or ingredients like cinnamon, but many are just nuts and dates.)  So although I think bars, no matter how healthy, are a bad habit for me because they’d be too easy for me to binge on, I think they’re an OK substitute on a holiday.  I got a Pecan Pie and a Cashew Cookie, intending to eat the Pecan Pie when everyone else was having the real thing.  But I accidentally ate that first, right after I bought them.  (I wanted to make sure they weren’t horrid.)  So in the end, I had Cashew Cookie – and it was really quite good.  It allowed me to sit at the table with everyone else while they had their pie and actually partake of something, so that I was a bit distracted and didn’t spend the whole time trying not to gaze wistfully at everyone else’s confections.

I also survived the trip to and from Chicago with no treats.  This is my 3rd road trip since going sugar free, so I’m starting to get used to that, and it’s really not bad.  Again, we had plenty of healthy and/or sugar-free snacks onhand, and that makes all the difference.

All in all, it was a success.  I wouldn’t pretend to say it was the best holiday ever.  It was REALLY hard not partaking in any of those sweets.  (And my grandma, as usual, brought all kinds of other junk food with her.  Most of it wasn’t even all that appealing – cheap wafer cookies, mini Heath bars – in comparison to the really yummy homemade treats available, but even junk like that is hard for me to resist.)  But in the end, it actually preoccupied my mind less than I’d feared.  Part of that was being really sick on Wed and just recovering on Thur and Fri.  But the bigger part was that the most important element of a happy holiday didn’t change – time with my family.  I still had a wonderful time with all of them, and that was much more than enough to compensate for my food struggles.

Scared

It’s Thanksgiving in 3 more days, and I’m very grateful for the rare opportunity to spend the whole week with my family. 

But I’m dreading the holiday nonetheless.

I’m sure it’s no huge surprise why: this is my first real test of my life without sugar.  There’s going to be pumpkin pie and pecan pie and I’m even making myself a sweet potato casserole that I can’t eat (it’s got marshmallows and coconut in the filling and a pecan and brown sugar topping).  I’m afraid I’m going to be miserable all day long. 

But what can I do?  It’s not like I can just “not go,” and I would NEVER ask my entire family to not eat sugar for my sake.  So I’ll show up and be miserable, but try to hide it behind a brave smile.

Tired

Not just tired.  Exhausted.  Completely emotionally drained from the strain of wrestling with my own impulses and desires over and over and over and over and over and over again.  Everyday, I come thisclose to just throwing in the towel and stuffing my face with whatever goodie has flitted in front of my face.  It’s torture.  It’s depressing for me to imagine this as my reality for the rest of time.  Will this EVER get easier?  Will there ever be time when I simply don’t HAVE these impulses rather than having to overcome them at every turn?

I’m just feeling incredibly raw these days.  And I wonder if I really have the strength to make it through the holiday season.

Proud of myself

Since the day I gave up sugar, I’ve been dreading the holidays.  I KNOW this is going to be the hardest time of the year for me.  And although I’m dreading Thanksgiving and Christmas most (so many holiday pies and cookies I’m going to miss this year), Halloween isn’t easy either.  I’ve always picked through Maggie’s candy bag when she wasn’t looking and pulled out some of my favorites.  (Don’t judge – any parent who says they DON’T do this is lying!  Or that’s what I tell myself anyway…)

But I made it!  I have successfully cleared that first holiday hurdle.  In fact, I cleared TWO hurdles because Maggie’s birthday is Nov. 1, and I didn’t eat any of her birthday cake, either.  Also, she and my mom made cute little tombstone cupcakes (frost a chocolate cupcake with chocolate frosting, top with crushed Oreos and stick a milano cookie in it that’s been decorated with RIP or the like on it), which looked REALLY good, but I managed not to eat any of those either. 

If I’m being honest, though, I had one small slip up.  I did have one – ok, two – of the pumpkin muffins we made for Maggie’s birthday treat for school and gymnastics.  And a couple licks of leftover batter.  I justified it that these were savory muffins because pumpkin is a vegetable, but now with a clearer head, I know that was nothing more than a justification.  They were made with (organic, unrefined) sugar.  There was nothing savory about them.

So in addition to the sugared nuts I ate at my parents’ house back in August, this is my only slip up so far.  Both were kind of in a gray area for me since I haven’t disavowed sugar 100%, but in retrospect, I can see that both violated the spirit of what I’m doing.

Still, they WERE gray.  And there have been many, many, many days when I’ve wanted to eat something that was not the slightest bit gray, and I’ve managed not to give in to that overwhelming temptation, even though at times it almost broke me.  Even with a couple of slip ups under my belt, that’s still a fact I’m pretty proud of.

For all you Twilight fans

As I was laying in bed last night, a funny analogy hit me: I am just like the Cullens from the Twilight series, except that I’ve given up sugar and they’ve given up human blood.  (For those not familiar with the series, the Cullens are vampires who don’t feel right killing humans, so they get their blood exclusively from animal sources.)  But in reading about what the newborn vampires’ overwhelming desire for human blood is like and how hard it is to control it, I realized that those passages often seem to describe EXACTLY how I feel about sugar.  OK, maybe not the physical sensation of burning thirst, but really – the all-consuming nature of my desires is sometimes overwhelming, and it requires every ounce of my concentration and will to restrain myself.  And, like the newborns, if I get distracted, I can deal with it more easily, but as soon as something draws my attention to sugar, I have to fight it off all over again.  Also, they have to learn to be satisfied by the taste of non-human blood in the same way that I’m having to get used to food that doesn’t taste as sweet.

But the books also offer me a beacon of hope: Carlisle.  While all of the vampire heros have learned to control their desires to a certain degree, it’s imperfect.  In a scene early in the 2nd book, Bella (the non-vampire heroine) accidentally cuts herself, and one of the vampires almost attacks her out of instinct.  That’s about how I’d feel around a freshly baked…well, a freshly baked ANYTHING.  Howeve, Carlisle has managed to so completely desensitize himself from the allure of human blood that he can work as a doctor in a hospital.  I hope that one day, I’ll be able to be around sugar (at, for example, a holiday cookie exchange…), no matter how much there is or how good it smells, and not really even feel the desire anymore. 

And that concludes this morning’s odd, but oddly accurate, analogy.

The holidays already

Well, my first sugar-free holiday season is beginning already.  Not that there are any parties or anything yet, but it’s on the horizon nonetheless.  Today, my local moms group announced our 5th annual cookie exchange.  We do this every year in early December, and it’s so much fun, and I always came away with many yummy goodies.

I will not be attending this year.  Maybe in future years I’ll be stronger, and I’ll be able to go and socialize without actually exchanging.  But I know I’m not ready this year.  And it makes me sad.   It’s a tradition I really looked forward to.  And of course, I think about all the delicious treats I won’t be having – or making, for that matter.  Last year I made these peppermint brownies that were the BEST brownies ever.  They were LOADED with butter, and it made them richer and moister than any brownie I’ve ever had. 

OK, Michelle, enough about that.

In any case, I’m actually in a very precarious place lately.  I know I haven’t blogged in quite awhile, and I think that is in part because it’s seemed SO MUCH harder lately.  Now in addition to fantasies of bingeing, I have these fantasies of sneaking.  Like when we went to the Chinese buffet, I thought to myself, “I could pop one of those sugary biscuits into my mouth before I got back to the table, and no one would ever know.”  At the store, I think, “I could buy a candy bar and eat it before I got home.  One won’t kill me, right?”  And so on.

It’s disheartening.  I want it to be getting EASIER at this point, not HARDER.  I’m guessing it’s a pretty natural stage.  My thought process is that I could just eat one and walk away.  And maybe I could.  But I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that if I did, it would be the beginning of the end.  Then I would rationalize having a little “splurge” more and more often until I worked myself right back to where I started from.  And I can’t throw away the last four months of very hard work like that.

So for now, I have behaved.  I haven’t given in to the temptation.  But I’m being tempted more and more often, and I admit that I’m really scared that I’m going to cave in soon.  I just don’t feel like I have the strength to continue defying these overwhelming and increasingly frequent desires.  I’m so emotionally tapped out lately from all the other things going on in my life, that I feel like one of these days, my well of emotional strength is going to run dry.

Stress management

This isn’t technically an entry about sugar.  However, as I’ve noted several times, particularly yesterday, stress is one of the things that drives me to crave sugar.  And I know I’m not alone in that.  Emotional eating, stress eating, whatever you want to call it – it’s not uncommon.  And since I feel like I’m in the early stages of finding a method to help me really manage my life and reduce stress, I thought I’d share what I’m doing here, in the hopes that perhaps it can help someone else, too.

Yesterday, at the peak of my breakdown, I called my wonderful sister because I just needed to cry to someone.  She cried with me at first, and then she started giving me some advice to try to help me manage the various things I was so upset about.  One suggestion in particular really made sense to me as something both helpful and doable.

She said that during her first year of law school, when she felt completley overwhelmed and like she couldn’t do it all, she took to scheduling her day out in 30 minute blocks, even down to the most basic things like showering.  She told me that being able to cross things off the list felt really satisfying and gave her physical evidence of what she was accomplishing.

This sounded perfect to me.  I have this issue where I can stay on top of things pretty well when I start from a clean slate.  But as soon as things start getting messy and complicated, I start getting overwhelmed.  And eventually, I retreat into this world where all I do is play on the computer, read, and tend to my kids as they need it.  The house quickly spirals out of control.  And the worse it gets, the less capable I seem to be of handling it all.  I get absolutely paralyzed because I simply don’t know where to start – so I don’t.  It seems to me that if I can find a way to keep me on top of all the little things that, left undone, eventually lead to chaos, it will help.  Not only will it help me to dig out when things ARE out of control – like now – but hopefully once I get things back in order, it will help keep me from getting back to that chaotic, overhwelmed state.  I also have a bad habit of letting days slip away from me (my job is internet based, and it’s so easy for me to discover I’ve spent the ENTIRE day on the internet, even if I wasn’t actually working the whole time.)

I spent some time yesterday creating a spreadsheet (with one worksheet for each day of the week and one for listing any weekly chores I need to fit somewhere into those days) to use, and I filled out Mon and Tues.  The key was to make sure that I SCHEDULED free tim as well as work time, and that the work times be specific (wash the sheets, clean the kitchen, etc.).  I hadn’t initially meant to plan weekends because I like those to be a little more free form.  However, today Nate has to work, so it’s basically like a weekday, and I have a lot I need to accomplish because we have company coming mid-week.  I decided maybe I could use the guidance starting immediately.

So I filled out a tab for today, and I have to admit – it’s really working.  I’ve accomplished SO MUCH more than I ever anticipated, and not only is it just 3:30, I just woke up from a 2 hour nap with Gus!  No, that wasn’t in my plan originally, but at least for now, I don’t see any reason not to be flexible.  I scheduled in lots of free time for today (basically I have 30 min of work followed by 30 min of free time all throughout the day), so I’ll just eliminate some of the later ones to make up for the extras I just took.  During those blocks, I’ll do some of the things I should’ve done during my nap instead. 

I feel rested.  I feel useful.  I feel positive.  And I DON’T feel like I need sugar.

Hurray for effective stress management!

Another crisis averted

I’m having a rough day.  That’s all I can really say about it.  It’s just rough.  The stress of the last two months – and the bad news we got Thurs that Nate’s retina is detaching again – finally overwhelmed me.  I spent most of the morning and early afternoon alternating between silent tears and outright sobs.  Not a fun day.

I decided I had to have a change of scenery this afternoon.  So I headed out to run some errands, namely getting some more stuff for birthdays and birthday parties.  (Gus’s bday is one week from today, and Maggie’s is four weeks from today.)  I was just looking for some very little things, particularly for the goodie bags for Maggie’s party.  That’s why I headed to a couple of local dollar stores.

And I hit the jackpot for party goodies.  But I also walked into a den of temptation.  It’s amazing how much cheap candy they can cram into those stores.  And with my stress levels through the roof, I had so many mini-fantasies of buying a whole bunch of that sugary nastiness and just stuffing my face.

But again, I perservered.  I really can’t even explain how I manage not to give in to the temptation sometimes.  It’s not easy, but I don’t have any particular strategy.  I just keep telling myself no, and I try to hurry into aisles where the sugar isn’t staring me right in the face.

So for now, I continue to remain successful.  And since today was about as low as I get, I think that’s a good sign.  But I don’t want to tempt fate, either – really, I don’t need any more challenges to try to overcome, m’kay?

My tastebuds are changing

My taste for sweetness is definitely becoming more sensitive.  Because I haven’t eliminated ALL sugars, I do occasionally eat things that are somewhat sweet.  In fact, I eat oatmeal almost daily, and this is how I make it:

Mix 1 egg and enough milk to be just a shade over 3/4 of a cup.  Pour over a packet of instant, UNSWEETENED oatmeal.  (I use Meijer’s organic version.)  Mix and microwave for 1 minute and 40 seconds.  Add about 1-2 tsp of coconut oil and 1 Tbsp of blue agave syrup.  Stir well, breaking up any eggy chunks.

This is DELICIOUS.  It tastes kind of custard-y because of the egg.  And it’s an almost perfect 30-30-40 meal, thanks to the milk, egg, and coconut oil.  Although ostensibly it has quite a bit of sugar - 29 grams – almost all of them are from the lactose in the milk or the blue agave syrup, both of which have very low glycemic indexes.  It’s quite filling.  And it’s only lightly sweet.

Well, when we got home from vacation on Sun night, I was hungry but feeling lazy, so I decided to make a packet of maple and brown sugar oatmeal instead of hassling with the coconut oil and blue agave syrup.  Maple and brown sugar used to be my very favorite flavor.  Imagine my surprise when I didn’t like it all that much!  I was thinking of it as an indulgence; instead, it was an eye opener.  It was simply too sweet and even kind of fake tasting.  (And this is the good stuff made with real maple syrup, not just maple flavorings.)  So from now on, I’m sticking to my blue agave syrup!

I had a similar experience while we were in Chicago.  My mom made scalloped potatoes and ham, which we ALWAYS eat with cornbread.  Usually, we top the cornbread with delicious – but loaded with sugar – homemade strawberry jam.  I figured I could splurge a little because the jam isn’t something I’d binge on.  But at the last moment, I thought, “Why not try it without?  Cornbread is already sweet.  You don’t really need jam.”  So I gave it a try, thinking I could add jam later if it was too blah.  But it was DELICIOUS!  Very sweet, and not in need of jam at all.

If those two things are sufficiently sweet for me now, I can only imagine how I would have reacted to that cake or pie!