Tuning In

Listen To Your Body

Alrighty, so last time I talked about my confusion over the different views on not only what are the best foods for you, but also in what form – cooked vs. raw.  I got the book that I ordered, Healing with Whole Foods by Paul Pitchford, and it’s literally a text book.  It’s definitely more meant to be a reference book as opposed to a casual read, so I’ve been reading bits and parts of it over the last couple of weeks.  Very interesting stuff – again, it focuses on the Asian traditions and diagnoses of the body and translating it to modern nutrition. 

The main conclusion that I got out of all of this, and I mentioned it in the last blog, is that every body is different…pun intended.  To follow up, some say that a primarily raw diet is the best, whereas some would argue the opposite.  Regardless of what you try, the main thing to do is to listen to your body. 

Your body is going to tell you if something is wrong.  

If you read the last post, you’ll know that my sister tried drinking raw green smoothies everyday and her body told her, “No, this is NOT working.”  The symptoms that she was experiencing weren’t just signs of detox (as I had first assumed), for her they were signs of imbalance.  These symptoms were not going away.  So now it’s been a few weeks since she stopped drinking the smoothies, and including more cooked vegetables and food into her diet.  Within days she was already feeling much better!  Despite the green smoothie FAIL, she is much more conscious of her and her family’s diet, and has been adding more fruit and veg to their everyday meals. 

On the other hand, I’ve been drinking raw green smoothies everyday for almost two months, and my body is telling me that this is a good thing.  I experienced the typical signs of detox the first few days, i.e. headaches, fatigue, breaking out, and it went away after a short period of time.   Overall, I feel like I have more energy, my skin is starting to glow, and I just feel plain healthy.  I also stopped taking synthetic vitamins as an experiment for the last three weeks, and so far I haven’t gotten sick (knock-on-wood).  I work in a school – perfect place to test my immune system! 

I do recommend that everybody at least give the raw food thing a try – either starting with green smoothies, or even as simple as adding one green salad a day.  No one out there will argue that eating more fruits and vegetables is bad for you. 

I believe that the key to making this change is adding raw food to your diet, not replacing.  Add a salad a day.  Eat an apple or some carrot and celery sticks for a snack.  Drink a green smoothie sometime during the day.  Any of those things plus what you’re usually eating is a good start. 

I’m not trying to preach, but I can personally attest to this method of adding more nutritious food – something weird happened after I reluctantly started drinking green smoothies…like a weird switch went off.  I started to crave salad.  Dude, this a big deal, because anyone who knows me knows that I have always hated eating and wasting my time chewing on salad.  I suddenly didn’t want to eat a lot of the stuff that I used to eat….like rice!  Don’t get me wrong, I still eat it, but no more than half a cup at a time.  I used to say that if I were stranded on a deserted island with nothing to eat but white jasmine rice, I would be happy.  I don’t feel that way anymore.

Adding the healthy stuff makes you think twice about the unhealthy stuff.  I will admit that this past week, I had massive cravings for sweets – I found myself in the bakery section of Costco and picking up bread and desserts (like those massive apple pies!).  Thankfully, I only got as far as smelling them before I put them back and tore out of there!  Now as much as I could’ve taken that experience as a fall from grace, I reminded myself of my success:  I put everything back.

I personally don’t think that one should go into this with the sole intention to lose weight.  I feel that the best intention to have is to do it for your health…and for your loved ones.  I want to be having kids one day – I want to be healthy when I have them, and be healthy for them.

And honestly, once you buy into the whole idea of being healthy, the bonus is that you WILL shed the pounds.  You will keep them off, and love doing it. 

Losing weight is the side-effect of eating and living for your health.  I’ve heard the saying, “abs start in the kitchen.”  I agree with that, but I would venture to say that abs start in your brain. We see the results of those fad diets out there – people do them because they want to lose weight fast.  It works, but only a small percentage of those people maintain it.  Once your mindset changes to, “I want to be healthy,” your whole world changes. 

I don’t care if my brother-in-law calls me a hippie, but I’m totally happy with buying my organic foods, eating my fruit and veggies, and drinking less coffee…and beer (this made me sad at first, but not anymore!). 

I’m pretty sure that my body is telling me that it’s happier….I feel pretty good for the most part and I haven’t experienced any major problems.  I’m still trying to find the balance between raw and cooked foods that’s right for me. 

If you do try eating more raw foods, look out for the common signs of detox – headaches, fatigue, acne…and these should only last a few days to a week.  If you are getting bloated, phlegmy, and just feel pretty lousy for more than a week, then you need to stop adding raw foods and eat them cooked.  Depending on who you are, too much raw food can weaken your “digestive fire” and cause your spleen to be deficient.  Traditional Chinese Medicine explains that your spleen works with your stomach to turn your food into energy for the rest of your body.  Too much raw stuff will weaken the spleen, thus inhibit its function.

Just remember that there is no one diet out there that will work for everyone – listen to your body.

However, exercise will benefit everybody!  Exercise played a huge part in the successes that I’ve experienced with my weight loss and maintenance.  My sister and brother-in-law just started the workout program that I am using, and I hope that they stick to it! 

I’m actually going to Italy and France in a few days for a week and a half….it will be interesting to see how I fare out there because I love food – definitely going to scoop up some French pastries and croissants.  Aside from that, I’m going to do my best to make healthy choices, but I’m okay with enjoying myself on a holiday – might be doing a travel blog!

Anyways, I’m going to share a recipe for an Asian salad dressing that I like to use on almost any fresh vegetables that I have on hand.  I usually use it for my favourite – seaweed salad with kale ribbons and julienned carrots.  Hope that doesn’t gross you out – seaweed is really good for you and is delish!  Anyways, this dressing is really light and tasty – hope you try it!

Melissa

Asian Sesame Salad Dressing

• 3 tbsp rice vinegar (unseasoned)
• 3 tbsp light soy sauce (I use gluten-free soy sauce)
• 1 tbsp 100% pure sesame oil
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tbsp sesame seeds
• 2 stalks thinly sliced green onions
• Grated ginger (optional)
• Combine all ingredients and dress your salad!
• Possible combinations besides your basic green salad:

Seaweed Salad

• 1 oz of dried seaweed (reconstituted and sliced into ribbons)
• Kale – sliced into ribbons.  Rub the leaves as you’re washing them to get rid of the bitter taste.
• Carrots – cut into matchsticks. 

Cucumber Salad

• Baby cukes sliced on the diagonal
• Carrots – cut into matchsticks

*After dressing the above combinations, let it rest for about ten minutes in the fridge to “marry” the flavours.

Raw or Not

What should I eat? Err…Or how do I eat it?

Melissa here again!

So lately over the last month, I’ve been engrossing myself into books and websites on what the healthiest foods I can put into my body are. After all, I’ve been working out pretty hard over the last eight months, and I was starting to get really paranoid about what I was eating everyday…wouldn’t want to “undo” any of that hard work! So after a month of “healthy” additions to my diet, I’m hearing different schools of thought about what’s good for you and what isn’t…and to be frank, I am so confused.

So it started out like this about a month ago:

I decided that I probably wasn’t getting enough servings of fruits and vegetables, and I settled on making green smoothies everyday – raw fruit and veg…there’s a lot of great recipes out there. I even signed up for Young and Raw’s 30-Day Green Smoothie Challenge and I’ve been loving it. I’m not sure if it’s just a placebo effect, but I feel like I have more energy…teaching my eight o’clock in the morning classes don’t seem that bad anymore, that’s for sure.

Anyways, I decided to delve deeper into the Young and Raw website (and many more), and was fascinated about the action of adding more raw foods to your diet, as opposed to eating mostly cooked/processed foods. They say that when you cook your vegetables you can lose up to 85% of their nutritional value. You lose valuable enzymes that aid in the digestion of your food, and cooked food makes your body work harder, therefore tiring out your organs. Hence, your organs are never working at full capacity, and that’s why we often feel sluggish, have ailments like inflammation (arthritis, eczema), cancer, etc.

SO in a nutshell, raw foodists say that eating more raw foods will essentially help your organs return to their full capabilities because fruits and vegetables are cleansing and will detox your body. You wouldn’t even have to go 100% raw to get the full effect (some people do three-week 100% raw food detoxes), even just adding a green smoothie or a big salad everyday will make a difference. Everything feels better, your skin will look better, and so on.

This made a lot of sense to me, so I even convinced my sister and brother-in-law to try the smoothie challenge everyday. They seemed to like it! My brother has actually been drinking green smoothies everyday for the last two years, and a recent blood test had the doctor telling him that his health was pristine. My brother-in-law noticed a boost of energy for sure, and recently told me that when he thought about it, he really didn’t eat vegetables before very often, and would sometimes go two days without them, so he seems content with this smoothie idea.

And here’s when my head started spinning a bit – my sister, on the other hand, was liking the smoothies, but was feeling worse… in fact, the crappiest she’s ever felt in a long

time. This is actually happening in real-time, and I hope she will forgive for sharing her symptoms. She was so bloated this past weekend that her tummy looked like a balloon. She had caught her son’s cold, and is very phlegmy and coughing like crazy. Not only that, she’s been feeling really anxious and has basically been a ball of stress. I thought that maybe it’s her body detoxing that she’s manifesting all these crazy symptoms.

So she goes to her acupuncturist today, pretty much desperately hoping that he can “fix” her, and he takes one look at her tongue and is surprised that her spleen is out of balance. (In Chinese traditional medicine, the tongue is an indicator of the condition of many of our organs and what not.) He asked her immediately if she was doing something differently. After she told him that she started drinking green smoothies over the last couple of weeks, he told her to stop immediately! According to Chinese medicine, eating raw vegetables is bad for you because it’s harder on your digestive system – especially in our northern climate. So now you can see why my head is spinning, right? Completely contradictory to what I have been reading up on lately.

Chinese medicine is based on balance in the body’s energy, the main ones being “hot” energy and “cold” energy. It’s a little hard to explain, but I truly do believe in this stuff. Food itself is categorized as “hot” and “cold” foods – as in heat-inducing foods, and cold-inducing foods. Here, I took this from Wikipedia…pretty decent explanation here:

The idea being that one’s imbalance of natural “heat” and “cold” in a body can cause disease or be more conducive towards sickness. Although, in this belief system, it does not necessarily mean one’s internal “heat” or “cold” balance is directly related to being physically hot (to the point of sweating) or cold (feeling chilly from cold weather).

As an example, if one had a cold, or felt he was about to get a cold, he would not want to eat any “cold” foods such as a lemon, melon or cucumber. If one had a so-called “hot” disease, like Eczema, then he would not want to eat “hot” foods such as garlic, onions, or chocolate lest the “hot” disease is worsened.

Indeed, it is thought by some that these “hot” or “cold” properties of foods are so intense that merely the eating of too many of one or another can actually cause diseases. For example, the eating of too many “hot” foods like chili peppers or lobster could cause a rash, or the eating of too many “cold” foods such as watermelon, or seaweed could cause one to develop stomach pain or diarrhea.

If you want to see a list of “hot” and “cold” foods, you can check out this link: http://www.benefits-of-honey.com/heaty.html

Like I said before, I do believe in this stuff – I know that for me, eating certain “hot” foods cause instant canker sores in my mouth…I know…that’s gross, but it’s true. Every time that I’ve gone to a Chinese doctor, I’ve always been diagnosed as too “hot.” I’ve always been out of balance that way. I’ll come back to me in a sec…

As for my sister, the green smoothies are causing too much cold energy, and are triggering another symptom – dampness. This means that the digestive system is slowed down by foods that are damp in nature. Are you zoning out yet? This is hard stuff to wrap your head around if you’re mostly familiar with Western medicine. She is exhibiting many symptoms of dampness like fatigue, bloating, excess phlegm and sinus infection, anxiety, and more. AND there is a clear link to the raw green cold smoothies that she has been drinking.

Now…back to ME. (Haha, I pictured an Old Spice commercial just now.)

Why aren’t I displaying the same symptoms? Well, my thoughts are that since I’ve always been chronically “hot,” (teehee, I don’t mean like that of course)..ahem, “hot energy,” I should say, the green smoothies packed with cooling foods like cucumbers, greens, and pineapples are actually balancing me out and I feel pretty good. For example, I noticed that my eczema is coming down.

My sister has been going to acupuncture regularly, so before the smoothies, she was actually “balanced.” The green smoothies everyday was too much of a shock on her digestive system and messed up her balance.

On the other hand, my brother is healthier than ever and literally drinks his salad everyday.

My sister’s acupuncturist isn’t completely against the smoothies – he believes it would be better to cook and eat warm foods during the colder months, and then pull out the green smoothies once summer comes around to help cool down. If you really want to eat a salad, eat it at the end of your meal when your digestive system is warmed up. (The raw foodists would say the opposite – eat your raw foods first). People who are inherently grounded and laid-back (like my brother), can probably benefit from green smoothies year-round.

So…now what? To summarize:

Raw Foodists say:

• Eating raw fruits and vegetables is healthier for you because cooking them destroy many of the enzymes that your body needs to heal itself.
• Eat your raw food before your cooked food so that your stomach has the enzymes to digest everything better.
• Adding more raw foods will help your body detoxify and heal itself

Chinese Traditional Medicine says:

• The body needs to be balanced – yin and yang, hot/cold energy
• Too much raw food will cause spleen deficiency – the spleen’s job is to break down the food and turn it into energy for the body; too much raw food is hard on the digestive system and causes “dampness.” Picture throwing a wet towel on a fire.
• If you must eat raw, eat it after your cooked food. Otherwise, cook all of your vegetables and eat them warm.

Two school of thoughts, both which make sense to me, some parallels, and some contradictions. Obviously there is a whole lot more to both than just the bullets that I outlined above, but as you can see, I’m pretty long-winded, so I’ll let you look up the rest on your own if it intrigues you.

The only conclusion that I could come to is that different people have different compositions. What works for one person could be seriously detrimental to another.

My sister recommended a book to me (since I love reading up on this kind of stuff), called Healing With Whole Foods: Asian Traditions and Modern Nutrition by Paul Pitchford, which her acupuncturist recommended….it’s basically an “east meets west” approach to nutrition. I just ordered it, and I’m pumped to read it. I hope that I find more enlightenment on this topic, so stay tuned! I’d love to hear your thoughts are.

In the meantime, since I can’t really make up my mind right now, here are two of my favourite healthy recipes that you can try – one cooked and one raw! 

 

Curry Ginger and Butternut Squash Soup (adapted from http://www.oxygenmag.com)

Ingredients:

• 1 butternut squash
• 4 cups water
• 2 tbsp canola oil
• 1 cup chopped sweet onion
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 1 tsp curry powder
• 1 tbsp fresh ginger, about 2”, grated
• Sea salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
• 1 cup low-sodium chicken or vegetable broth

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350°. Cut squash in half, lengthwise. Scoop out seeds. Place face down in a baking pan with water. Bake for 45 minutes or until soft when pierced by a fork. Let squash cool and save the water it was cooked in.

Heat oil in a large skillet or soup pot on medium-high. Add onions and garlic and sauté until golden. Stir in curry powder, ginger, and a pinch of salt and pepper and simmer on low for a few minutes.

Pour the water in which the squash was cooked into the skillet and heat. When squash has cooled scoop out the meat, leaving the skin, and add to the skillet. Remove from heat and

let cool. When room temperature, puree the vegetable and spice mixture in a blender or food processor with the broth.

Nutrients per serving:

Calories: 125, Total Fats: 5 g, Saturated Fat: 1 g, Trans Fat: 0 g, Cholesterol: 0 mg, Sodium: 26 mg, Total Carbohydrates: 20 g, Dietary Fiber: 1 g, Sugars: 6 g, Protein: 3 g, Iron 1 mg

 

Apple Blueberry Milkshake (adapted from http://www.youngandraw.com)

Ingredients:

• 2 handfuls of greens (like spinach, kale, or any mixed greens)
• 1 apple, cored
• 1 cup frozen blueberries
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 cup almond milk, coconut milk, or water

Instructions:

Blend everything together and enjoy!

Introducing, Melissa!

I shape me!!

Those three words are an incredible statement. I’m so excited to be a part of this blog and was pretty pumped and honored when Tricia invited me to do some writing, so I’ll do a little background “bio” per se for my first post.

I’m thirty-one years old, and am a full-time high school music teacher. On the side, my friends and family have always known me as a foodie – always looking for good places to eat in my travels, using my spare time to surf the web looking up new recipes, cooking, taking food pictures, all while running the Food Network channel 24/7 in the background. Throughout most of my life, I’ve always been able to eat what I wanted without gaining a single pound – I always attributed that to my Asian genetics! My friends would always joke that I had a hollow leg…that’s where I fit all of that food and still be skinny!

Well that was great and all…until the day I hit thirty! Literally. It was like it was as if my metabolism hit a wall as soon as I woke up that morning. Actually, perhaps it was REALIZATION that hit me…I suddenly noticed that I wasn’t as slender as I had been in years past. Don’t get me wrong, I never really got “fat” – but I definitely put on enough weight to show on my barely 4’10 petite frame. You know it’s bad when your parents start mentioning that you’re looking “a little round.” Chinese parents ALWAYS tell the truth. And it always sounds la little worse when they say it in Chinese!

Well, instead of fighting it, I decided to accept it…to be apathetic if you will. I just told myself that having some extra weight on me was a good thing – I know now that part of the reason that I was so skinny before was because of some serious bouts of stress and depression related to my job and relationships. I just have to interject that I am SO thankful for strong Christian parents who put up with my crap and my moods during this time. Anyways, I was a “sick” skinny…not a “healthy” skinny. My sister even went far enough to tell me that I was a skinny fat person. Skinny on the outside, but so unhealthy on the inside. And she was right – unhealthy in mind, spirit, and body.

So fast-forward a couple of years… I used that as an excuse – I took having extra weight meant that I must be happy. Happy and fat go together, right?

Uhh…not so much.

I didn’t like what I saw when I looked in the mirror. I didn’t FEEL any better than before. And most of all, what’s more depressing than having to buy new clothes when your old ones don’t fit?? I had to buy fat pants!

Last summer I decided to try Couch to 5K – a running app on my phone to get me somewhat active…I ended up being able to run 5 km, running three times a week. However, I didn’t shed a pound. My endurance was better, sure, but I thought that I’d be burning way more calories. I was even tracking what I ate on a calorie counter app. So one night I was lamenting about it while having dinner with my parents, and I had a conversation with my dad that went a little something like this:

“You know, you should really look into the after-burn effect.”

“Wazzat?” I replied.

“Short, high intensity workouts that make you burn more calories after you’ve worked out.”

Intriguing! So to make a long story short, I scoured the internet about this phenomenon, and read tons of articles and websites – it’s nothing really new, but it completely changed how I worked out. There are a lot of workout programs out there that are very similar in structure, and I settled on one called Turbulence Training and bought the e-book. Essentially you work out three days a week for about an hour each time – weight training and interval training, with light exercise on the “rest” days. The workouts are pretty intense – I feel like garbage afterwards! But that’s a good thing! The whole idea is that you want to throw your body into disarray so that it takes more time for it to recover – and it burns fat to do that! Hence burning calories even when you are sleeping!! In my opinion, if you feel energized after your workout, I don’t think that you’ve worked hard enough!

I can personally attest to this method of working out – I’ve lost about 10% of my body weight in the last eight months, and I look and feel better than ever. I am now a “healthy” skinny, and my body is toned. I’ve also just gotten into having green smoothies everyday and incorporating more raw foods into my diet, but that will be another blog post!

I’m excited to share how my journey is going – I’m at the point where I am maintaining my weight now, but I want to encourage you to start yours, too. To give you an idea of what part of my workout looks like, I usually do HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) after my weight training – this is something you can pretty much try right away if you’re nervous about going to the weight room where all the beef cakes are hanging out:

1. Choose a stationary bike or treadmill (I choose treadmill because I feel like I’m working harder). All treadmills are different, so I will be referring to intensity level on a scale of 1-10; 1 will be the lowest intensity, and 10 would be the highest. You set the speed to how you perceive that intensity.

2. Set the incline to 1.5, and walking speed of 3, and here we go! (Adapted from Turbulence Training For Fat Loss)

Minute by Minute Type Intensity Level

• 1 Warm-up 3 out of 10
• 2 Warm-up 3 out of 10
• 3 Warm-up 3 out of 10
• 4 Warm-up 5 out of 10
• 30 seconds Hard 8 out of 10
• 90 seconds Easy 3 out of 10
• 30 seconds Hard 8 out of 10
• 90 seconds Easy 3 out of 10
• 30 seconds Hard 8 out of 10
• 90 seconds Easy 3 out of 10
• 30 seconds Hard 8 out of 10
• 90 seconds Easy 3 out of 10
• 30 seconds Hard 8 out of 10
• 90 seconds Easy 3 out of 10
• 30 seconds Hard 8 out of 10
• 5 minutes Cool down 3 out of 10

You should feel like garbage after this! If you don’t, you need to up the intensity!

Also, Mike Chang of “Six Pack Shortcuts” has a great video explanation of the afterburn effect here: http://www.sixpackshortcuts.com/

Can’t wait to share with you more! Let me know how the interval training goes! 🙂

I shape me!!!

Week Four : Day Thirtythree

MY NEW RED HAIR = awesomesauce.

You guys! I have been the worst blogger ever! I haven’t blogged since my last post about my grandfather dyeing. Its been a strange few weeks. But I have SO much to share with you!

I know its not as much as I was hoping for at this point, but I have lost TEN pounds! I am so excited! SO pumped that I had to go and do some self-portrait shots! Thus, the header photo for today!

So on the docket today: 1, my dog is seriously the coolest dog ever. He RUNS on the treadmill with me! 2, I have a delicious new healthy recipe to share with you. 3, my long term plans.

So its no secret that I have broken this detox almost completely. (What a failure I am!)
But the truth is, I have learned how to eat healthy. This detox has given me the stepping stones into health that I never had before. I know what I’m putting in my body now, I limit how much of everything that I eat, and each day I am feeling and looking better.

I’m not going to sit here and preach at you about how diets dont work. They ALL work if you stick to them. But ultimately they aren’t longterm enough. What I have done is allowed this detox to teach me how to eat for the rest of my life. Limit my sugars to 30g a day, really try to limit the carbs, eat as many fruits and veggies as possible, etc. So that is what I am doing.

I will tell you that I have been craving zesty cheese doritos like a madman and as soon as Feb 15 is up, that is the first thing I am going out to shoppers to buy. (Oh boy!)

Anyways, here is my super awesome recipe for you guys!

So THIS, my friends, is the best thing to happen to you since french fries.

These are sweet potato spears (from Costco) that are whole and nutritious and delicious. Absolutely NO preservatives or bad things, this is just the raw vegetable in its purest and healthiest form! You are supposed to eat at least one orange coloured veggie a day, and if you’re as sick of carrots as I am, these are a perfect alternative.

Ingredients: 

Olive oil
Red pepper flakes
Fresh garlic

What you do: 

Put a bunch of spears out on a shallow cooking sheet. Add some olive oil. Add some red pepper flakes. Crush some garlic cloves. Spread around with a flipper so that the ingredients are separated equally, then put it into a preheated oven (at 375 degrees) for 15 mins. Stir and flip, then put into the oven for an addition 10-15 minutes or until the spears are browned.

Now, I ungefähr every ingredient. (Ungefähr, btw, is my favourite german word and it means to “throw together without recipe”.) So I just guess at how much I would like. I LOVE garlic, so I usually use about 5 large cloves.

And as a warning, these are quite spicy! (Good for your bowels.. 😉 Add a little ketchup to these bad boys and you are all set for a healthy and delicious snack that will leave you saying, “this shouldn’t be healthy, it tastes too good.”

I am going to leave you with a video of my dog running/walking on the treadmill with me. He is seriously the coolest dog ever. He defines the word “companion”. ❤

Day Fifteen : Week Three

But seriously. WHY?!

So its been a rough week. My grandfather passed away on friday and I just haven’t really felt up to much of anything since then – blogging included. For the most part I stayed true to this detox, but I wont lie…I did cheat a few times. (ie – one breadstick at the olive garden and some croutons. Maybe one chocolate…)

Either way, I’m down a total of 7 pounds as of this morning. Yay.

I’ve been walking everyday, except for today, as today we buried my grandfather. Ugh.

Yesterday was really tough. I wanted to kill myself trying to maintain this way of eating. I could have gone for anything carb related. Or even an apple. (Seriously, WHY can’t I eat apples?! Is my six weeks up yet? >.< )

I may have already talked about this, but its worth talking about again just in case. I was watching the Miss. America Pageant and I watched the special that 20/20 had right before and seriously felt so good knowing that other women in the world are on super strict diets and its not super easy for them to be as thin as they are.

My husband made a good point a little while ago. He pointed out the fact that most thin girls say that they never work out and they eat whatever they want. Like, almost ALL of them do this. Its like they dont want to take credit for eating right and exercising. At first I thought he was on crack, but then I realized its SO true! What the heck! Why on earth would women not take credit for KILLING themselves over eating the right foods/portions?!

I know one thing is for sure, when I get my weight down – Imma be braggin’ like no tomorrow about how hard I worked!

Okay so this is SUPER cheesy…but this new Toyota Avalon commercial really resonated with me. It was like they made a commercial with the car as a metaphor for what I’m doing and the changes I am making.

Its really beautiful, actually.

Anyways, about my grandpa being buried today…I’ll be okay. As I said on my facebook status today, “I rejoice for the day and I am glad in it. Excited envy for where he is replaces my tears. I see his sweet and smiley face with those who have waited for him on Heaven’s shore and I am reminded that this is not the end for him. It is only the beginning. He is finally home.”

My faith sustains me.

Day Eight : Week Two

Lea Michele = Umm, seriously? Frig is she ever beautiful.

I dont even know where to start. I guess I should start being completely honest with you guys.

This detox is awesome. And it sucks. And right about now I want doritos. Badly.

On sunday, I was on worship at the church and the band gets together early before the service starts to practice. Well, during practice my sugars got so low I nearly passed out. I was a hot mess. I had to run to the cafeteria there and grab tea with honey and two $0.05 candies. I felt better almost immediately. So I said to this detox right then and there, screw you for not letting me have sugar. And I started eating berries the next day. (Actually, I added yogurt too. Women need calcium for their bones. And unless you’re planning on going vegan, dairy is something I think is necessary in your diet. Just not a TON of it.) But you only need about 30g of sugar a day (for women). SO I’m just watching my sugars like a hawk and only consuming 30g’s of sugar a day max.

Anyhoo – I’m down a total of 4 pounds. Which is nice. But I’m feeling so impatient. I just HATE feeling like this. (Feeling like I’m fat.)

Do any of you guys watch the Bachelor? I seriously live for that show. And it motivated me SO much to be thin while watching it. Tonight, though, I reaaaaaaaaaallly wanted Chocolate. And since I’m consuming milk and sugars now I decided I would eat this fat free almost sugar free chocolate mouse thing my husband bought. (Its freaking delicious…)

And now I’m feeling like a big giant failure. Because I had a little thing of chocolate.

You see, I’m a pretty strange person. I think I’m really quite good at feeling a certain way but then taking a step outside of that picture and viewing it logically. And right now, my logical view is telling me that I’m OBSESSING over my body. Which is SO not healthy.

But I want to be thin. And healthy. And continue to lose weight.

Right now, I feel like this diet has really taught me a lot about how to be cautious about sugars and carbs and whatnot. And for that, I’m very grateful. But, whilst wallowing in my self pity over how I have “failed”, I watched a 20/20 show I had previously recorded (thank God for PVR!) and it was all about weight loss! And this guy came on from the Biggest Loser and said, “its not about concentrating on today’s failure, you still have an entire week.” And then this other gal – who won some pageant and competed in Miss. America said something that really hit me. She said, “You cant say ‘no, I cant eat that’ or you’re just going to end up binging on it later.”

So here I am. Right in this moment. Wanting doritos. (And no, I wont be eating them…)

But seriously. Should I just make this diet about trying to eat lots of little meals in the day and really trying to cut down the sugars and carbs? And can I maybe just be grateful to this detox for leading me the way into healthy?

Am I really a failure?

(Dear Lord, its only been 8 days. I AM a failure!)

I haven’t made any final decisions about it. But maybe thats what I will do. And then let myself have a cheat once a week. Something to reward myself for being good all week. I feel like I’m going to go nuts. And, and, and – I’ll maybe consider going back to the gym…

Day Five : Week One

No Challenge = No Change

First off – I just wanted to let you all know that I started a facebook page for She Kills Apathy ( https://www.facebook.com/SheKillsApathy ) so you can get updates there, too. I will be posting some awesome recipes and pics and so on there. So go like the page! 🙂

A few things happened yesterday that I thought were worth sharing with you guys. My husband and I took our dog on a walk and decided we need to run into costco to pick up a couple of things after our walk. I didn’t even bat an eyelash at the prospect. Its a giant warehouse, I’ve been 1000 times before. No biggie, right? Wrong. It was reaaaaaaaally hard. They had all the best samples out, freshly cooked, ready to melt in your mouth, waiting on a silver platter. (Or a piece of white cupcake paper…) It was SO hard to walk by them and not eat them. They had the isle of chips and cheesies, crackers and granola bars… And then because of our walk, I started getting SUPER hungry. It was too much. SO I sat down on a couch in their furniture isle (away from the food) and told my husband I would just wait there. And while I was waiting, I noticed a book that someone had left, just sitting on the box beside me. So I opened it up to a random page, and this is what I found:

Preeeeeetty crazy that I would have picked up this book on this random isle in costco while struggling like crazy not to go and eat a delicious costco sample and open it to this page, no less. The Lord is good. 🙂

We bought some hummus and I have been nonstop eating it with carrots. Its just to DIE for delicious. I seriously cant wait for the day when my cravings stop, though. I just want them to go away. (But all I can think about is cheese!)

But it is getting easier. So I’ll hold on to that.

Today I wanted to touch base on the fitness side of things. Dieting/detoxing or not, you should be doing a minimum of 30 mins of physical exercise a day. It helps so much with weight loss and feeling more energetic. Its so important that we make it a priority. (I will be completely honest in saying I haven’t had much energy this week…I think that has to do with the low blood sugar. But next week I imagine I will feel much better.)

Here is this amazing video that should inspire you to move! Thank you to Jessica who commented with the link on yesterday’s blog!

Day Four : Week One

Pink = SO REAL.

Sorry I didn’t blog that last few days! Its been busy!

Day two was actually hell for me. I nearly gave up in the evening. I had all I could do not to eat a granola bar. But I somehow fought through it and reminded myself that this is only SIX weeks of my life and I WANT this. SO badly. And I NEED to kill the apathy that has lead me to this life of displeasure in myself and how I look/feel. So I didn’t cave! 🙂

And I wanted to tell you guys (who are doing this, or who is considering it) that yesterday was my best day so far (day 3). I had ZERO cravings. And I actually felt great! So it DOES get better! I was running around all day yesterday, so I may not have had the time to feel hungry or have cravings, but when I did have time, I still didn’t have cravings! And yesterday was the first day I didn’t need a mouthful of honey! Yay! 🙂

SO aside from losing 4 pounds in 4 days (and please dont think this is super amazing, people always loose quite a lot during their first week of dieting/detoxing and then get discouraged when they dont lose as much in the weeks coming) I have noticed a HUGE change in my metabolism. I am ALWAYS hungry. And I eat all day long. But the great thing about this is that my portions are so small now (which actually came naturally to me since I’m not a big veggie eater so I eat them in small portions at a time) that I am getting STUFFED super early! Here is a pic of my dinner last night: 

Mushrooms cooked with garlic, raw tomato and raw yellow pepper. A glass of David’sTea black tea on the right (with one pack of stevia and some almond milk) and water. The Franks RedHot sauce is actually AMAZING on bell peppers. Its like a crunchy, sweet, spicy mix of perfect flavour – I highly recommend it!

Its actually a lot of food. And like I was saying, my stomach has shrunk so much from eating like this that I literally couldn’t eat more than the mushrooms. I was STUFFED. So yay for being full quickly now! (I ate the rest later as a snack!)

I’m feeling really good today. Each day is getting easier and each day I’m feeling better. And I am losing weight! Quickly! 🙂

But one change that I will be making to this detox is adding 1-2 slices of 100% whole grain bread (with the lowest amount of sugar possible in it) or one cup cooked long grain brown rice per day. I will be adding this once I complete 3 full weeks of the detox. The reason I decided to do this is because I am really truly doing this detox as a method to learn how to eat properly and healthy and realistically. And for me, its just not realistic to not eat rice or bread. But everything in moderation. And this way it will be like a reward to me. I also consulted a nurse about it, asking how much she thought this would affect my weight loss and she said that it (particularly the rice) will affect my weight loss in such a minimalistic way that I shouldn’t see much of a change at all. (Yay!)

So take heart! Keep on keeping on! You really can kill your apathy! ❤

On a personal side note – I died my hair red yesterday. I have been so afraid of change that I have been blonde for 25 years. I cant tell you how good it feels to finally have taken this plunge! It came at SUCH a perfect time! 🙂

Day Two : Week One

Rihanna = SO HOT.

I’m going to be picking “real” women for my blog headers. They will actually motivate me and me think that thin is possible. (Like my friend with two kids, for instance.) I have never felt self conscience while watching a Victoria’s Secret Fashion show because there is NO way on this earth I will ever look like them. I have short frumpy legs and I’m okay with that as long as I am at my ideal weight. Today’s woman is Rihanna. Speaking of Victoria’s Secret, I had a huge lady crush for Rihanna during her “Diamonds” performance in their December fashion show. She is so real looking. And sexy. Tomorrow is probably going to be Pink. Because she’s just so flipping awesome. I’d love to hear who your favourite ladies are!

Okay so today I want to share with you guys some of my diet plan – what I can and cannot eat and what I have been eating. I also want to share with you how my first day went!

I will start off with most of what I am allowed to eat.

V8 Almond milk – no sugar coconut oil cashews almonds flax/hemp/pine nuts/macadamia coconut coconut milk avocado NO HYDROGENTATED ANYTHING Bell peppers broccoli cucumber celery, carrots cauliflower snow peas mushrooms onions lettuce spinach kale spaghetti squash garlic IN MODERATION: tomatoes chick peas squash BERRIES: blueberry strawberry raspberry balckberry MEATS: (no more than 5 ounces per serving) chicken eggs beef (in moderation) fish SAUCES: Salsa hot sauces mustards hummus guacamole lemon/lime balsamic vinegar STEVIA – this is the only sweetener allowed

I’m allowed to have everything on the list except for the berries during the first week. I’m telling you right now – I cannot wait for tuesday next week. I’m probably going dive head first into my frozen blueberries bag first thing in the morning. You’re only supposed to have no more than two handfuls a day, but I may have a bit more. I think I’m probably going to modify a little bit about this diet for a few reasons that I will go into with you.

Yesterday was hell. (Of course.)

I ate off this menu like a perfect little student and by 7pm I started feeling the withdrawal effects that one should expect after not consuming ANY sugars aside from that which is available in two carrots. (I’m taking pictures of the meals I eat today so I can post them for you tomorrow.) Anyways, I felt like I was going to pass out. I couldn’t focus my eyes on anything or concentrate on much at all. Also, I craved every single thing in my cupboard. Like, I could have eaten flour straight out of the bag.

I was dog sitting for a friend who just so happens to be a nursing student and she came to pick up her dog right around 8pm and she walked in and told me (without me telling her a thing about how I felt) that I looked ghostly white and my blood sugar was way too low. She actually convinced me, after about 30 minutes, to have a mouth full of honey just to combat what was going on in my body. So I did. I cheated and had a mouth full of honey. And I have to tell you that I felt better almost immediately. Colour returned to my face and normal brain function came back right along with it. The cravings went away completely, too!

She actually told me about how its not good to eliminate your sugars so drastically like this. How you’re really only supposed to eliminate sugar in a slow way otherwise you can potentially head into a serious medical problem.

I did a little research (and most of this is from my friend) and this is what I found:

The pancreas produces the hormone insulin which helps control the amount of sugar in your blood. And from my understanding, what I did to my body yesterday was allow too much insulin in my blood stream which started up the symptoms of “low blood sugar”. Now, I fully expect this to be hard. To get grumpy and hard to be around, etc. But I read up on some of the reactions people can have to a low blood sugar and it is just NOT cool with me.

Symptoms of moderate low blood sugar

If your blood sugar continues to drop, your behaviour may change. Symptoms may include:

• Inability to concentrate.
• Confusion and irritability.
• Slurred speech.
• Unsteadiness when standing or walking.
• Muscle twitching.
• Personality changes, such as anger or crying.

Symptoms of severe low blood sugar

Symptoms of severe low blood sugar (usually below 2.8 mmol/L) include:

• Seizure.
• Loss of consciousness (coma).
• Stroke.
• Death.

This is why I am so glad I had a mouth full of honey. If I lose a few less pounds because I had to have a couple mouth fulls of honey during my first week to prevent a medical disaster, I’m okay with that. (Also, this is probably why they say you should consult with your physician before starting any diet…) I’m trying to learn to eat healthy. And in order to be healthy, I need to have NONE of the above happen to me. 😉

SO I wouldn’t shame a person for doing what they need to do to get sugar in their system if they are starting to feel pretty strong effects physically from no sugar. Dont go on the extreme and eat a chocolate bar though, that would just be silly. Be reasonable. Have a banana or apple or something. Or just do what I did. But only if you have to! I know that the first week is designed to form a brick wall around your normal cravings so I recommend sticking to this diet as close as humanly possible so that you can cut the cravings. Just dont kill yourself over it.

Anyhoo…I just wanted to finish off with tell you guys how completely overwhelmed I am with the response I got from yesterday’s blog. The number of women who reached out to me yesterday was so incredible, you have allowed me to have online-pen-pall-accountability-partners! I am so excited to know that I am not alone on this journey and that so many of you will be taking your own journey right along with me!

Lets continue to kill apathy together!

Day One : Week One

Apathetic = PATHETIC. 

So I have decided that I have had enough of being overweight. I’m not saying that I’m obese or anything…because I’m not. But I’m heavier than I should be by about 30 pounds. And those 30 pounds may have tasted really, really good. But they feel pretty dang horrible.

In 2012 I had such a strange transformation of body, mind and spirit. It started off with dealing with some really big body image struggles that could have sent me into a medical emergency. I had lost a ton of weight and looked phenomenal when I got married. But I gained it ALL back within three years of being married. Thus, my issues began.

I met with an incredible psychologist who helped me work out some issues and helped me look at the big picture. I walked away from my time with her feeling rejuvenated and ready to accept myself and love myself just as I was – 30 pounds heavier than I should be. I started researching about “girl power” and things that promoted “loving your curves” and became a bit obsessed with it. (What girl doesn’t become obsessed with body image in some form or other in our society?) I even went as far to pay a local photographer to photograph me in my “prime”. I wanted the photos to help me love myself more. (I sound so vain here I could puke!)

Anyways, I loved the photos. They turned out great and I felt that I had misunderstood beauty and had been born in the wrong era – I would have been just fine if Marilyn Monroe were still the icon of beauty that young men and women sought out 50 years ago.

And so began my journey of apathy. Sick, disgusting, apathy. It became acceptable to appreciate my body and all of the glorious laziness and lack of self will that it took to stay overweight. Don’t get me wrong – I actually paid a personal trainer and was working out two days a week and even started running (BIG mistake) to try and lose weight. But none of it worked because I had an attitude of complete apathy towards losing the weight. Why should I lose weight if I am supposed to love myself just the way I am? What difference did it make?

I honestly tried to not concern myself with my weight. I started thinking that dressing for your body shape was the appropriate response. And I kept right on eating whatever I felt like. (And I am a lover of food…) And so my shape and size never changed for the better, they began changing for the worse.

I had a few friends start and lose weight around me that I had sort of always measured my own image off of and that began to make me self conscience again. (One friend in particular has had two children. It is positively unacceptable for me to be fatter than my friend who has birthed two kids!) It was so difficult for me to be the “fat” one when I had always been the thin one. I recently watched a home video from back in 98 and I was Keira Knightley thin. KEIRA KNIGHTLEY. I may have only been 11 years old, but the point is that I have the same frame now that I did then. And I am NO Keira Knightley now. (Don’t preach at me about how she is unhealthy and other crap…unhealthy is being unnaturally overweight and approaching heart disease. Not a girl who is as naturally thin as a wall.)

Needless to say, clothing that I loved stopped fitting right and I became obsessed with covering up my body around friends and family. I would literally look for the baggiest thing in my closet to wear to hide myself in so people couldn’t see that I had regressed so completely from the bride I was to the wife I had become.

Oh my poor husband. Our marriage is something so personal that I am not  sure that I’m going to go into detail here other than the obvious…but if my husband found me unattractive it would completely break me. For those of you who are married or are in serious relationships, this isn’t something I need to explain. Also, its not something I’m going to justify for those of you don’t agree with this concept. It’s just a thing I have that I deal with.

Onto my health. Well I have never felt worse in my entire life. Ever. Every day I feel like I could take a two hour nap and sleep just like a baby for 12 hours in the evening the same day. My body is so lethargic and gross feeling. I have been sick approximately 5 times this year. My heart races after I eat. I have heart burn almost daily. My lifestyle this past year has purchased me a one way ticket to heart attack and to becoming another statistic that I don’t want to be a part of.

Lets summarize: Clothing doesn’t fit, I’m terribly uncomfortable in my own skin, I’m approaching a point where I risk how attractive I am to my husband, I feel like bag of garbage, and my friends are getting skinnier.

So I’ve reached my breaking point. Finally. And I’m GOING to lose the weight and keep it off this time. I want to be healthy for my future babies. I want to be healthy for my husband. And I want to be healthy for me.

I’m starting a six week detox today, Jan 1 2013. It essentially cuts out carbs and sugars. I can eat most meats and veggies and after the first week I can eat berries. I will post the foods I can/cannot eat on my next blog. But I’m supposed to lose 30 pounds if I stick to this cold turkey. I can do six weeks. I’ve been pumping myself up to do this for almost two months now. I am SO ready for this challenge.

If you’re reading this and wanting to join, PLEASE let me know. I’d love to partner up with people on this!

Lets kill apathy together!