Whole30 Challenge - Ending Week 1

Day 6
I wasn't hungry most of the day.  I started my early day with some pumpkin "pancakes."  They are made with pumpkin, eggs, and coconut oil, so basically, they are pumpkin eggs.  But that doesn't sound so great, does it?  They're called pancakes because they are cooked like pancakes.  They were very good.
I spent the morning volunteering for an event, ate a few nuts, then went home, still not hungry, at 1:00. I had some leftover sage chicken and mushrooms.
In the afternoon, our whole family attended a Halloween event.  There were food trucks and candy galore, but I didn't crave any of it.  I still wasn't hungry.
When we got home around 7pm, I wasn't hungry, but made myself eat some salad and tuna.

 What I've decided: If I'm not physically hungry, I'm not going to eat.  My cravings are gone, so I'm going to start listening to my body and eat when I feel physically hungry.  As stated in the program:

The Whole30 takes you out of sugar-burner mode, and transitions you into being fat adapted—efficiently able to utilize fat as energy. This process starts in just five days, but can take weeks to really kick in to the point that you notice the effects. When it does, however, your body will begin to utilize fat as fuel more readily, helping you avoid between-meal cravings, energy slumps, and brain fog. In addition, once you’re fat-adapted, you’ll be able to start whittling away at your fat stores—something you are unable to do when you’re running on nothing but sugar.

• Sugar Burner = Energy roller coaster; “needing” to eat every two hours; cranky when you’re hungry; regular cravings for sweets or caffeine; dysfunctional hormonal response to food.

• Fat Adapted = Even energy all throughout the day; no need to eat between meals; stuck without food — no crankiness or raging hunger; reduced cravings for sweets or caffeine; improved body composition and hormonal response to food.

I'm not hungry because my body has 50 extra pounds of fat stores from which to draw!  Ha!  So, instead of thinking I must eat, I'll just listen to my body and eat when I'm hungry.

Day 7
Woke up at 6:00 am.  Not hungry at all, so decided not to eat.  I worked an early-morning shift.  Finally felt my stomach growling at around 9:00 am, so ate when I got home.  I spent an hour or so chopping, pre-cooking, and prepping food for the next day or two.

As day 7 comes to an end, I have to say I'm still not adoring the meat-eating on this plan, but, hey....isn't that kind of the point?  I don't crave eating.  I'm eating for fuel and it tastes just fine.  I love the veggies, fruits and nuts, but eat meat because I know that's what satiates me.  That'll work!  Anxious to see how the next three weeks go.

Whole30 Challenge Days 3-5

Day 3
Yuck. I felt pretty bad on day 3.  I was sick of meat.  Sick of eggs.  I wasn't craving grains or even sugar, but I was just tired of eating what I was eating.
Day 4
The results of my upset stomach wreaked havoc on me in the morning.  I had major stomach cramps and had the pleasure of running to the bathroom numerous time in the morning.   However, I wasn't craving food at all. When I felt physically hungry, I ate some of the more bland choices of foods. By mid-day, I felt much better.  I had my first chiropractor appointment in the evening, then did my grocery shopping at Trader Joe's.

I borrowed these two books from the library.  Practical Paleo was recommended by my doctor and I know it will give me good ideas for the "I'm sick of ____!" problem.  I just picked up It Starts With Food, the foundation book of The Whole 30, today.   After 5 days following the plan from what I read online and what a friend shared with me, it's nice to be reading the book.  Their approach is very balanced, even though the 30-day challenge is restrictive.  I have to admit, the recipes in It Starts With Food do not look very appetizing to me at this point.  I've not ever been a heavy meat-eater, so it's taking some adjusting.

Advice given by my chiropractor:
- Drink more water.  It's a natural pain reliever.  So, today, I had two glasses of water before my coffee. She also suggested I drink water during each of my 15-second breaks between calls.  That was tougher to do than I thought.  That 15 seconds goes by in a blink.
- Exercise consistently, as opposed to with intensity, for now.  I've been wanting to just jump right back to where I was 3 1/2 years ago, running 3 miles with ease, looking forward to long runs, killing it at boot camp 3 times a week.  But I've put on 45+/- pounds over the past 3 1/2 years.  Yes, you read that correctly.  So the truth is, I will not be jumping right back into the same intensity I had when I had 1/4 less weight and was working out consistently.  So for now, my new goal is to get out and walk 20 minutes every day.  Beyond that, I may walk/run, stay out 45 minutes, do yoga and some weight training, but at least...I will be out walking 20 minutes.   Knowing myself and how I like being athletic, I'll add intensity soon after the habit of getting out is formed.

Day 5
Today was better.  No cramping.  No strong aversions to food.  But I didn't really want to eat much of anything, either.  When I was hungry, I ate eggs and fruit; salad and tuna; chicken and mushrooms and a few bites of a Lara Bar.

Even though I'm not loving it just yet, I already am losing sugar and grain cravings, so I'm going to stick with it.  Here's to day 6!

Whole30 Day 1 & 2

Days 1 and 2 have been completed!  The program outlines that these days will feel fabulous and easy. I can attest to that.

I've mostly been eating arugula, spinach, fish and beef (all organic or wild or grass fed).  For breakfast, I've been eating eggs and veggies, so will soon need to experiment with some recipes for "Paleo" breakfast items that aren't all eggy.   For snacks, I've had raw nuts or fruit.

I'm looking forward to Thursday, which is grocery day.  I have been reading a book recommended to me by Dr. Dicky called the Practical Paleo.  There is a lot of good information in that book and I hope the recipes will give me some variety so that I don't get sick of eating the same few dishes over and over again.  Tonight, Ken bought dates so that I can make a Paleo coffee creamer that has no sugar, no artificial sweeteners, nor dairy.  I am thinking I will either video or photograph the process and share it here on my blog, especially if it's a success.

Now that my back/neck is healing (I'm at about 80%. In fact, right now, I am entering this blog by using speech dictation on my MacBook. It hurts too much to sit down for a long period of time and it's getting late, so I'm lying down and speaking this out rather than typing.), I'll be able to get back out and exercise in the mornings.

Here goes day 3...

30 Day Challenge

Over the weekend, one of my co-workers challenged our team to take on a 30-day challenge, The Whole 30.

When I read the outline of the plan, it's exactly what Dr. Dickey told me to do when I saw him back in May.  So why have I waited so long to make these changes?

Fear.  Fear of:
- giving up grains and sugar
- going it alone
- grieving the loss of the foods I like so much: chips and queso, laceys, tortillas
- failure

Why I'm doing it despite my fears:
- I have support. Thanks, Scott for inviting us to join you and Matt.  Hannah is also wanting to join the challenge.
- The plan is reasonable.  The 30 days are fairly restrictive, but then you can add back in foods you like.  The way I will add in the foods, I'll be able to test to see what foods, if any, are causing problems for me.  This means I won't have to say goodbye to laceys or queso forever.  Like Dr. Dickey had advised, I would just reduce the number of times per week I have certain foods.
- My weight.  I just keep gaining weight.  The extra weight is uncomfortable and will start giving me all kinds of health problems. It hinders my activity level and energy level and simply makes me feel bad about myself.
- The foods I eat affect inflammation.  With my pinched nerve hurting so severely, I figure this is a great time to eliminate foods that could be aggravating it.
- I can do anything for 30 days.

Today is my "Day 0."  The 30 days will end on November 12.  30 days is an attainable, manageable goal for me, but I have a BIG goal:  To be in good physical condition by my 40th birthday. I would like to start my 40th year in good physical shape, so I have exactly one year and two months to work really hard to get to a place, health-wise, where I really want to be.

Oh, the Irony!

Apparently, there was no resurrection, but a girl can get a second (and third, and forth...) chance, right?  Just read my latest post from 6 months ago to see basically how I feel today.

After living through the past months and couple of years of steady weight gain, I feel I've finally hit my "this-has-gotta-stop" moment.  Last week, I started searching online for a holistic physician. Sadly, it's easy to find medical doctors who throw meds at each symptom, and it's almost as easy to find a quack who will sell you some "herb" or have you rub Buddha's belly. I was looking for someone moderate; an MD who knew diet was the major player in my health and could help me get on the right track.

Well, I found him!  After reading his reviews on Yelp, I had no doubts.  It's cool how I stumbled upon the reviews.  I began reading about another clinic in the area with horrid reviews, then decided to check out Dr. Dickey.  Like our midwife in Las Vegas, he doesn't accept insurance, so it costs us more, but is worth every penny.  I won't go into the fact that our good doctors are limited and stifled to practice how they see fit when they are under the thumb of insurance companies.  It's nice to have a medical doctor who is free to treat me to the best of his knowledge, not according to the preferences of insurance businessmen.  But I digress...

If you want to know how the office visit went, just read the reviews.  They pretty much sum it up.  He and his wife are both delightful people who truly care to know their patients and patients' families.

As for my health, I'm in good health.  I went in wanting to discuss my weight and fatigue, among other things.  Dr. Dickey visited with me for 2 hours!  He listened to my medical history, family history, and current concerns...for 2 hours (did I mention that yet?)... before even beginning the physical exam.  At the end of our visit, he gave me a written "plan of action."  For me, it's all about diet and exercise.  Whole foods.  Produce.  Organic, grass-fed, wild-caught, high-quality meats.  Nuts and seeds.  Moderate amounts of hormone-free (even raw) dairy.  Cut WAY down on grains.  One serving of either quinoa, brown rice, or steel-cut oats per day.  Otherwise, no grains.  That part won't be easy, but when I compare this to starting a regimen of chemical meds and staying fatigued and overweight, it doesn't seem so bad.   He gave me a lot of great advice that I won't post here, because it was advice for me;  his advice would likely be different for you.  If you're in the Austin area, I can highly recommend him.

Two documentaries are currently streaming on Netflix and are closed captioned.  I highly recommend them.  It all falls right in line with what Dr. Dickey told me about diet and health:
Hungry for Change
Food Matters

On the exercise front, I attended my first ever Crossfit Saturday.  My legs were sore for the next 3 days. I'll keep going to the Saturday free class.  The workout (WOD) mostly uses bodyweight and was heavy on legs.  If I want to see improvement, I'll need to keep up the same type of workouts at least a couple more times during the week.

I truly fell in love with yoga, but for budgeting purposes, didn't stay on at Lifetime.  I need to start back by simply watching the plethora of  yoga videos on YouTube.  I also love walking downtown on the Ladybird trails.  I'm committing to that once per week.  Dr. Dickey said that weight lifting burns fat best; Crossfit is one way, but I need to find one or two more days during the week that I can do weight training.   He also told me to get out on the trampoline as often as I can.

Since the appointment Monday morning, I've been focusing on the food part, knowing that's more than half my battle.  Next week, I'll work on adding the daily, purposeful workouts.  Mixing Crossfit, trampoline, yoga, walking/running trails, and various types of weight training should keep me interested and busy.  I just have to DO it regularly and with purpose.

Resurrection

It's time to resurrect this blog.  In the past, I've been a little harsh with this blog.  I consider it the "black sheep" of my social media.  Facebook is my way to keep connected to (at some point in my life) real-life friends and family. Instagram appeals to me because a picture is worth one thousand words; plus, I could go back and pour over old photos for hours at a time.  Signs of Life: The Brownie Chronicles is a fun blog to keep track of the boys' and our entire family's journey since beginning the adoption process.

Then there is the "Running Toward Freedom" blog.  Ugh.  I've started and stopped this blog over and over again for years.  I've left it unwritten for months at a time.  I've opened the "new post" page, staring at the blank page, only to shut the computer, unable to sort out what I want to post.

Three weeks ago, I started, yet again, for the umpteenth time, working out, logging my food on the My Plate app, and have lost 8 pounds: 5 the first week, 2 the second, and 1 this week.

Yoga is a practice I've fallen in love with over the past three weeks.  I also tried Zumba for the first time.  That's certainly a fun way to keep up my heart rate for an hour!  Yoga is what I most look forward to doing.  My favorite is Hot Vinyasa Yoga.

Because of this "resurrection" of my road to fitness, I decided to also resurrect my blog.  So here goes...the good, the bad, and the sweaty.

The Funk that Won't Go Away

[This is an April post copied post from my other blog.]

It's hard to believe I posted this entry in November of last year, but I did!  I went looking for this old entry and figured I posted it back in February or something.  I was shocked that it was from November!

I had posted:

"Because of the season of life I'm in (nearing 40, newly-expanded family, major life-changing move, and weight gain that ticks me off greatly), I've been experiencing days feeling very low.  I've blogged before about how I don't like using the word "depressed" lightly, so I don't think I'll use it here.  But I've been feeling dark, low, melancholy, aimless, and tired."

Since November, those feelings didn't go away.  Oh, they might subside for a time, but would rear their ugly heads at any random time.  In addition to those feelings, I was experiencing an overwhelming feeling of failure.  

These feelings would manifest themselves by my simply giving up and doing nothing.  I felt so overwhelmed by everything I wasn't accomplishing that I felt I should be accomplishing, that I would want to just stay inside all day.  

By nature, I'm an optimistic person.  Even when I've felt "down" in the past, I haven't felt so paralyzed.  I'm also very social and outgoing.  So the fact that I was turning inward and hated leaving the house and being around lots of other people gave me a clue something wasn't right.  

In addition to my own feelings, I had two different girlfriends come right out and ask me if I thought I might be depressed.  One of these friends gave me a book about women and depression and the other just flat-out told me I needed to go see a doctor....the next day and said she'd watch my kids so I could go in.  (Might I add that these ladies are true-blue friends!! It takes guts to be so honest and I'm immensely grateful.)

I wouldn't have thought I was depressed, because I appeared to be functioning okay, but when I opened the assessment in the book "Unveiling Depression in Women," I cried for half an hour, reading through it and seeing myself in a majority of the descriptions.

I wanted to stay in almost all the time.
I dreaded going out and talking to or seeing people.
I was either sad or just numb for hours at a time.
More than anything, I felt an overwhelming sense of failure in every area of my life.
Reason, logic, nor "pep talks" would help me feel better.
In addition to the failure, I felt like I couldn't pick myself up and dig my way out of the pit this time.

What confused matters for me was that I still had a lot of joy in my life.  I love my husband and my satisfaction with him hadn't changed.  I adore my kids...they all bring me so much deep joy it's hard to put into words.  I like where we live and where we go to church.  There wasn't one thing I could put my finger on that would explain why I felt depressed.  Before I experienced depression for myself, I wouldn't have understood it.  It was just a feeling of oppression.  Lethargy.  Failure.  And I knew I couldn't function that way for very long.

One of my girlfriends had offered to watch my kids, so I took them to her house and went to see a doctor.  I'm so glad I did.  It took some humility, that's for sure.  I struggled with thoughts like:


If you prayed more, you'd not be depressed.
If you were a good mom/wife, you could get yourself out of this funk.
You stink at homeschooling. You used to be good at it, but not any more.
Only people unwilling to change end up taking meds for depression.

But I'm at the point in my life where I don't really mind admitting I need help and then asking for it.  The doctor was able to verify that I did need a bit of a "reboot" and, a month later, I'm feeling much better.   I still have some work to do just to get back into the groove of life, but I feel a lot better.

I considered not posting this.  There is some risk in airing very personal information.  People may misunderstand, misinterpret, or assume things that aren't true.  However, I've logged our journey this far...the good and the bad.  The stresses and joys.  This is something that hit me; I never would have expected it.  My hope is that if anyone reading this ever feels overwhelmed, even if not to the point of being depressed, they would seek help...from friends, church, counselors, and doctors if needed.  There