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Food Blogs: Yum Yum

Good Day

I had a good day today, foodwise. I really did not struggle at all. I had a small breakfast then went up to visit the camp site where the camp I coordinate will be held this summer. It’s a new place, and I needed to check it out. One of the many reasons we switched sites is that the food at the old site was terrible, healthwise. It was basically pure, heavy carbs most meals with few options, iceberg lettuce, Kool-Aid… etc. This camp is the pinnacle of my year, both in terms of how exciting it is but also with stress. It’s great, but it’s also 24/7 stress for 6 days. Normally I eat like a HOG at camp, piling up the food just so I can stay grounded and not explode. Last year I think I gained 4 lbs at camp. I always gain weight there.

We were invited to have lunch at the new site today. First there was a big “buffet” (not a massive one, just for the lunch offerings). The main entree was grilled chicken breasts (how perfect is THAT) which you could make into sandwiches, so there was a big pan of chicken with really nice spices, then it had rolls and lettuce and cheese. I didn’t make a sandwich. Also, big pans of grilled veggies (NICE!!!) and other stuff. THEN an enormous salad bar with spring mix lettuce! not just iceberg!! and a huuuuuge array of salad toppings, real high quality stuff like garbanzos, kidney beans, cucumber, broccoli, tomatoes, onions, shredded cheeses, olives. It went on and on. They also had a soup bar which they say is available at every meal.  SO in the event that they do not have a good choice for the entree, I can always have soup and/or salad. I am so psyched. Because even if I am a stressball at camp, I can make decent choices and not just hog out on Sloppy Joes.

I am one of those people who actually does not mind gross high-school cafeteria style food. I love Sloppy Joes, and mac and cheese (of course) and all manner of stuff that most people would never touch. Well, no more. I’m not touching it any more.

So I had a very lovely warm grilled chicken salad for lunch, and I was very happy!

THEN I went to a big parents’ meeting for my daughter’s sports team. I gave a brief presentation and was all full of adrenaline. I saw a bunch of old friends and was all buzzy with energy. There were FOUR TABLES of DESSERTS at this thing. Just piled HIGH: brownies, cookies, dips, chips, cake, you name it. Normally I would have hoovered through this thing, especially being all wired up from speaking. But what did I have, folks? Nothing! NOTHING! I was very proud of myself. I wasn’t even remotely tempted or feeling resentful or sad about not being able to eat anything. I just sailed on past.

I was hungry by the time I got home. I didn’t want to cook. My family and I went to a fancy-ish Italian restaurant nearby. I ordered a bowl of mushroom soup. It had cream in it, was really rich, and so delicious. I had like 1/3 of the bowl and then gave the rest away. I was starting to feel full just from that small amount. Then I had a beautiful salad of crabmeat, red peppers, papaya, onions, lettuces and a tiny bit of avocado. It was insanely good but again, I felt full (!!! shrinking stomach!!) and only ate about half. My mother kept giving me concerned looks. “Is that all you’re going to eat??” “Is that your DINNER?” but I just smiled serenely. I was really happy with the whole thing. The food was yummy but I never got uncomfortably full. I drank a couple glasses of water.

So that was my eating day. I felt really happy about it. Maybe I am getting the hang of this, a little bit!

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The Company We Keep

I was thinking about the fact that I ate more than I should/wanted to when I was on that boat, and my husband was not around.  When he is with me I worry about what he’s thinking and end up eating less, or more healthfully. To impress him? That’s not good.

On the other hand, when I am with my mom I tend to give myself permission to eat everything in sight and to make the worst choices, because that is what she does.  She definitely played a large role in my habit of eating to squelch emotion, eating to celebrate, eating when sad or bored or tired or depressed or angry. I’m not blaming her, I’m just saying… this is where it started, and how I learned to pass it on to my poor unwitting next generation as well. Even now (or maybe especially now) she will always choose the richest, meatiest, chocolatiest, thing on the menu. Maybe because she is in her 80s and she thinks, why deprive now? She has never been on a diet as far as I can remember, except right after her open heart surgery when her cardiologist made her go on a diet. My father pretty much administered it and she was very angry and resentful about the stuff she couldn’t eat.  After a few years she just kind of ignored it and I think ate even more as a bounce-back.

Anyway. We will all eat with all kinds of people with their own food issues, all the time. And the thing that is important is to keep grounded in our own plan, our own commitment to what we are going to eat or not eat.  In the past, I’ve been with people who ate like birds, and it made me nervous and panicky, and want to eat even more. Or else I would get in some stupid, silent “I can eat just as little as you!” competition.  That then backfired as soon as I was out of their sight.

I’ve been lucky that nobody has really tried to push food on me since I’ve started this. A friend came over for dinner and brought a beautiful looking pound cake but I wasn’t tempted and she was also really sweet and apologetic, and the people who could eat the cake enjoyed it. (guess who? Mom!) I think it’s a lot easier to say you are on a diet for medical reasons than for vanity reasons because if you just say you want to be thinner, people say, Oh you look just fine!

I am almost relieved that I have this medical “excuse” to fall back on. But really, we all do. We all need to be healthier and more conscious.

How do the people around you affect your eating habits? And how do you deal with it? (if at all) Foodie wants to know!

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Buffet: Learning From Mistakes

I made a bunch of ’em today, mistakes that is. I started out pretty well. I knew that I was going on a boat all day that included a lunch buffet. I took myself out to breakfast (I am on vacation, remember, so it’s hard to cook here) and got a really good spinach/olive/onion omelet. And only ate half. I didn’t want to let myself get too hungry because I had no idea or control what was going to be on the buffet, and I didn’t want to be in a situation where I’d be starving and just eat everything.

So the lunch buffet opened on the boat. (we were whale-watching) I had just done an hour of snorkeling which I would guess would be equivalent to about 20 minutes of stairmaster or elliptical. It was tough flippering through rough waters! I was pretty hungry.

The buffet had some yummy pulled pork, some grilled teriyaki chicken, rice, white rolls, macaroni salad, and a full bar of complimentary alcoholic drinks. I remembered that my book said that one of the key “sabotaging thoughts” or things that allow us to overeat is, “It’s free.” No, not really free, because we already paid an arm and a leg to COME on the boat.

It was easy to pass up the alcohol. I’d already made that decision, and the drinks looked not so great. That was easy. Ditto on the rice and rolls. I took a bunch of pork, and some chicken. Then (WHY WHY WHY?) I also scooped up a bit, maybe 1/4 cup max, of the macaroni salad. I am still trying to break down that moment. I have not had simple carbs since the day I started this blog.

I took my plate and ate the pork. It was delicious. Then the chicken. I thought for  a second, wouldn’t it be great if I just threw away the plate with the macaroni on it? YES, it would have been awesome! I would have felt so proud of myself! But I did not. When everything else on the plate was gone, I took a little bite of the macaroni. It was gooooood. Then I ate it all.

Then I went back and got 2nds on the pork and a little bit of chicken. Then I circled the boat and did it AGAIN. (I did not get any more macaraoni either time though) And then I felt mad and pissed off and disappointed and too full for the rest of the afternoon. I mulled it over and over.

It had something to do with this buffet mentality.

I think it also had something to do with the fact that my husband was not on the boat. If he had been, there is NO WAY I would have had thirds.  I mean just no way. I wouldn’t have even had seconds.  So I have to admit that part of what was going on was some sort of “getting away with it” thinking which just made me feel like CRAP.

Sometimes I make him out in my head to be the Food Police, and then I rebel against him. But it’s all imaginary nonsense.  I have to be my OWN Food police, or really Food Angel, doing right by myself. Because “getting away with it” did not feel like getting away with anything except feeling terrible.

Someone near and dear to me asked me, “Was it worth it?” and the answer is an unequivocal great, big NO. No, a thousand times no. And may I learn from that.

Guess what, we went to a buffet for dinner too!! Agh. But this was easier. I was ready. I was dying of thirst because I’d ingested a ton of salt water on the ocean. I had three HUGE glasses of ice water, a cup of tomato soup (good) and a salad. I tried some fish and some chicken, but I didn’t like them so I left them after one bite. Still, I was sloshing full by the time we left. I think it was all the water.

I am not going to another buffet if I can help it, for a year. Or more.

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Relief, and Enduring Discomfort

I went back to the fitness center this morning and YAY the scale was the same nice, low number that it was two days ago. WITH clothes.  So yay, and a pox on that stupid mall bathroom scale!  (WHY do I do these things???)

Between our room and the fitness center there is an ice-cream shop right on the corner. I have to walk right past it a few times a day. They make those warm homemade waffle cones and the smell is overpoweringly enticing.  I don’t necessarily even want ice cream, but the smell of those cones is incredible. (one good thing to remember is that smelling doesn’t cost any calories)

I remembered something from this great book I’m reading, as I smelled the waffle cones on my way back from the gym. One thing they ask is to rate your discomfort in dealing with some weight-loss challenge. Ie, how uncomfortable do you feel on a scale of one to ten, when you have to avoid something that you want to eat. First, make your scale. One is sitting comfortably in a cushy chair, and ten is childbirth. (HA) I’d say, walking by that waffle smell is about a 2 or 3 on that scale. In other words, I can deal with it. Take about ten steps and it’s over.

Now I’m going to meet a buddy who has gestational diabetes and we can have a healthy luch and bemoan the state of our pancreases (pancreii?) together. Yay.

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Food That Works

Today was overall a good food day, after my bad start with the scary numbers (I haven’t re-tested). But I did have a bit of an internal tantrum when I went grocery shopping later in the morning. I almost cried when I saw a magazine cover with a luscious photo of macaroni and cheese (“the comfort food issue”). I found myself gazing longingly at the bread. I ended up buying a loaf of artisan olive bread to go with the soup I was going to make for company.

I made Brazilian black bean soup for friends who came for lunch. It disappeared INSTANTLY and we all agreed it was the best black bean soup EVER.  I topped it with nonfat sour cream and it was just so good. I did have a slice of the olive bread with some olive/walnut tapenade I got at the farmers market yesterday. I have no idea if this was a terrible thing to do, or not so bad.

For dinner, I made this sundried tomato/goat cheese/basil chicken from Kalyn’s Kitchen. I was a bit nervous about trying something new, and a little worried about Picky Eating daughter, but everyone in my family LOVED it. I also stir fried some asparagus with lemon/artichoke pesto. It was gooooood.

So everything tasted delicious today. My only “slip” was the olive bread. I felt grateful to find things that I could really enjoy eating.

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Scare Tactics

I love certain kinds of foods so much. Mostly carbs and dairy products. I could easily give up sugar, chocolate, alcohol, meat. But the combination of carbs and dairy – ie wheat and cheese – are like heroin to me. Macaroni and cheese. Grilled cheese. Quesadillas. Pizza. Any kind of bread-and-cheese combo is good. Potatoes and butter. And sour cream. Mmmmm.

I also love rice. My mother made steamed white rice nearly every day of my childhood, and continues now. It is hard to resist. How will I resist?

I’ll tell you how. I did not eat one simple carb today. I saw the bread sitting on the counter. I saw the rice cooker half full of rice, and the leftover phad thai in the refrigerator. How did I not even want to eat it? I scared the crap out of myself.

Everytime I looked at something that could possible raise my blood sugar at all, I visualized a needle. With insulin. Going into my soft, tender skin. When I felt the hint of a temptation, I raised the stakes and imagined amputated feet and legs. This was not hard because I used to be a physical therapist and was actually an expert at wrapping lower-extremity stumps. The cause for 99% of these amputations was diabetes. I could take it even further and visualize blindness, which is one of my greatest fears. I’d gladly give up my legs to save my eyes.

But hopefully if I can keep focused around these, none of these things will be realities in my life.

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