As the challenge continues, I am reminded that each day is a chance to make a better choice. I have also been thinking a lot about how much stress can physically harm our bodies.
This weekend I was faced with some additional stressors and didn't follow my diet the way that I had been. I let the stress derail me from the challenge. In fact, I was so stressed out that I didn't eat for almost a whole day. This is very contrary to eating healthy and only slows down metabolism! This one day threw me off for the next day and it took until Monday to kick myself back into gear. There is no excuse for this type of behavior but I learned a valuable lesson.
"Stress happens when the mind resists what is." This quote, by one of my favorite authors, Dan Millman, is completely profound in simplicity. Stress is a useless and harmful emotion. When challenges come our way, we must simply face them. Allowing our bodies to react physically only hurts us. While this is easier said then done, remembering this quote has helped me greatly over the years. Even recognizing that you are stressed and making harmful choices can stop you and bring you back.
While I will become derailed at some points, I can always climb back on! I believe the more quickly I can come to realize an outside circumstance that is affecting my health, the easier it will be to return to healthy choices. Please don't let too many hours pass by without getting healthy food choices into your body. This can be almost as damaging as overeating, in my opinion.
On a really exciting note...I discovered the power of KALE. At night when I am starving, and it is too late to eat dense foods, I have been eating kale, cooked in a small amount of olive oil and sea salt. I noticed having left it in the frying pan for a little too long makes this spinach-like vegetable taste almost like chips! I then learned that you can make kale chips, which I will attempt tonight! Future posts will describe this experience!
The other correction I need to make is that while I have been abstaining from coffee, I have been getting some caffeine. This has been coming in the form of SPARK, an energy drink by Advocare. This drink is loaded with vitamins and has 120 mg of caffeine.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Sunday, March 4, 2012
Day 8: Containers! Containers!
It's Day 8 of the challenge and it is going well. I have slept harder then I have in my entire life (that I can remember) and have begun to feel a little lighter. It is certainly a challenge NOT making my coffee each morning. It is my first thought upon waking!
The hardest part has definitely been making sure I am eating a healthy snack/meal every 2/3 hours. With a crazy busy schedule this sometimes entails inhaling hard-boiled egg whites and blueberries! (I recommend not mixing the two!)
There have been some ups and downs but it is getting easier to make sure I have all of my needed food prepared and ready to go before a busy day out and about.
This evening (Sunday) I began preparing food for the week. One of the things that I didn't do last week was to make sure any fruit that needed to be cut up (strawberries, etc.) was ready. This was a mistake because, as we all know, fruit doesn't stand the test of time, or even a week. I really hate throwing food away so this week I made sure to have all that type of fruit cut and into containers for easy access.
I also switched from brown rice to quinoa, for something different. I roasted carrots, sweet potatoes, chicken and asparagus, hard boiled eggs, cut up peppers and celery for snacks. chopped fresh garlic and scallions (to add to fish/chicken and kale cooked during the week), and made a turkey and bean soup.
My refrigerator is also stocked with mixed greens, hummus, egg whites, bananas and oranges. All of this preparation will PAY off and I will be able to attack this clean eating challenge! Each morning I will grab containers (yes...more containers) and make balanced meals from the food I already prepared. For dinner, when I am home, I will most likely make a fish and vegetable. All you need to do is put in the work Sunday to get ready for at least the first 4 days of the week. I definitely had to force myself to do it because MAN I am tired! It is totally worth the effort though.
As for how I did after my "prepared" food from last week ran out... let's just say I ate A LOT of egg whites! I think I had about 8 per day Thursday, Friday and Saturday! Remember this is all trial and error. I also did make a grocery trip Friday because I had a friend over and couldn't serve her egg whites! I made steamed kale and chicken sauteed with onions and peppers. She loved it and felt great that it was SO good for us.
I will admit that I had a glass of wine Saturday with that same friend but after eating my best all week, I made peace with that decision. It is all about living life. We can't be perfect all of the time and no one ever asked us to be. We can only move forward, one day and one moment at a time.
Let's raise our WATER GLASSES to another great week to come! We are so lucky to have this life. Let's make great choices!
The hardest part has definitely been making sure I am eating a healthy snack/meal every 2/3 hours. With a crazy busy schedule this sometimes entails inhaling hard-boiled egg whites and blueberries! (I recommend not mixing the two!)
There have been some ups and downs but it is getting easier to make sure I have all of my needed food prepared and ready to go before a busy day out and about.
This evening (Sunday) I began preparing food for the week. One of the things that I didn't do last week was to make sure any fruit that needed to be cut up (strawberries, etc.) was ready. This was a mistake because, as we all know, fruit doesn't stand the test of time, or even a week. I really hate throwing food away so this week I made sure to have all that type of fruit cut and into containers for easy access.
I also switched from brown rice to quinoa, for something different. I roasted carrots, sweet potatoes, chicken and asparagus, hard boiled eggs, cut up peppers and celery for snacks. chopped fresh garlic and scallions (to add to fish/chicken and kale cooked during the week), and made a turkey and bean soup.
My refrigerator is also stocked with mixed greens, hummus, egg whites, bananas and oranges. All of this preparation will PAY off and I will be able to attack this clean eating challenge! Each morning I will grab containers (yes...more containers) and make balanced meals from the food I already prepared. For dinner, when I am home, I will most likely make a fish and vegetable. All you need to do is put in the work Sunday to get ready for at least the first 4 days of the week. I definitely had to force myself to do it because MAN I am tired! It is totally worth the effort though.
As for how I did after my "prepared" food from last week ran out... let's just say I ate A LOT of egg whites! I think I had about 8 per day Thursday, Friday and Saturday! Remember this is all trial and error. I also did make a grocery trip Friday because I had a friend over and couldn't serve her egg whites! I made steamed kale and chicken sauteed with onions and peppers. She loved it and felt great that it was SO good for us.
I will admit that I had a glass of wine Saturday with that same friend but after eating my best all week, I made peace with that decision. It is all about living life. We can't be perfect all of the time and no one ever asked us to be. We can only move forward, one day and one moment at a time.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
Day 5: Think before we eat
Just finished lunch! Spring Mix, 4 oz. chicken, 1/4 of a large sweet potato and some roasted carrots. YUM! Really, I swear!
So, it is day 5 of my cleanse and I have been able to maintain eating clean (nothing processed) because of the preparation that I did on Sunday. My refrigerator was stacked full of containers filled with all of the ingredients needed for a balanced diet.
Let me be totally honest and say that this is very HARD. It is NOT easy in any way to eat clean every 2/3 hours. You have to be totally prepared and seriously plan out your food each day. Without this preparation, there is no way that I would have been able to maintain this level of strictness. I have certainly been craving wheat products. You know you are cleansing when a wheat pita pocket is calling your name! While this has been difficult, what in life that is worth anything isn't!
I have been eating mostly the same things each day. While many would see this as boring (as I would normally would too) I am viewing this cleanse in a different way. When I am eating, I am thinking about how the food is nourishing my body, not just about enjoying the food. This is making me eat much more mindfully and really appreciate what these whole foods are doing for me.
Here is what I have been eating most days.
Breakfast: 3/4 egg whites, or 2 egg whites and 1 whole egg, scrambled. 1/2 cup cooked oats (that I made Sunday) with 1/4 c. blueberries.
Snack: 2 brown rice cakes with almond butter. Banana or Strawberries.
Lunch: Spring Mix, 4 oz. chicken (baked from Sunday), asparagus or carrots, tomatoes, Extra Virgin Olive Oil or Trader Joes Organic Red Wine Vinegar and Olive Oil Dressing (about 2 Tbl.), 1/4 c. brown rice or 1/4 sweet potato.
Snack: 10 almonds, 1/2 grapefruit or pear
Dinner: Same salad as lunch or 4 oz. fish, steamed spinach or kale, 1/4 tomato (cause I LOVE them).
The food that I prepared Sunday is almost gone, since I wouldn't want to be eating old food anyway. What is left and it totally fine for a few more days are the oats, hard-boiled eggs, lettuce and assorted fruit. I will plan to make some more chicken for the weekend and probably have fish most nights.
With the weekend fast approaching, I am sure I will have some major challenges and will share how I will overcome them!
One way I am going to combat any threats on the horizon is to make plans that don't revolve around food and drinking; yes, hanging out with pregnant friends works great (for the drinking that is)! I am also going to make sure I have plenty of snacks ready to go to have over the weekend.
I had a realization during this past week as well, thanks to Bob Harper of the Biggest Loser. He said during the latest episode that most people over eat/drink to avoid feeling emotions. This was a really enlightening to me. When I began craving unhealthy or just things not in my cleanse, I would ask myself; What are you feeling? It was amazing because almost every time I wanted to say "forget this cleanse" I was feeling unhappy, bored, lonely, etc. I then decided to just sit with that emotion and a while. It was HARD, but as it has been said, "This too shall pass."
So, it is day 5 of my cleanse and I have been able to maintain eating clean (nothing processed) because of the preparation that I did on Sunday. My refrigerator was stacked full of containers filled with all of the ingredients needed for a balanced diet.
Let me be totally honest and say that this is very HARD. It is NOT easy in any way to eat clean every 2/3 hours. You have to be totally prepared and seriously plan out your food each day. Without this preparation, there is no way that I would have been able to maintain this level of strictness. I have certainly been craving wheat products. You know you are cleansing when a wheat pita pocket is calling your name! While this has been difficult, what in life that is worth anything isn't!
I have been eating mostly the same things each day. While many would see this as boring (as I would normally would too) I am viewing this cleanse in a different way. When I am eating, I am thinking about how the food is nourishing my body, not just about enjoying the food. This is making me eat much more mindfully and really appreciate what these whole foods are doing for me.
Here is what I have been eating most days.
Breakfast: 3/4 egg whites, or 2 egg whites and 1 whole egg, scrambled. 1/2 cup cooked oats (that I made Sunday) with 1/4 c. blueberries.
Snack: 2 brown rice cakes with almond butter. Banana or Strawberries.
Lunch: Spring Mix, 4 oz. chicken (baked from Sunday), asparagus or carrots, tomatoes, Extra Virgin Olive Oil or Trader Joes Organic Red Wine Vinegar and Olive Oil Dressing (about 2 Tbl.), 1/4 c. brown rice or 1/4 sweet potato.
Snack: 10 almonds, 1/2 grapefruit or pear
Dinner: Same salad as lunch or 4 oz. fish, steamed spinach or kale, 1/4 tomato (cause I LOVE them).
The food that I prepared Sunday is almost gone, since I wouldn't want to be eating old food anyway. What is left and it totally fine for a few more days are the oats, hard-boiled eggs, lettuce and assorted fruit. I will plan to make some more chicken for the weekend and probably have fish most nights.
With the weekend fast approaching, I am sure I will have some major challenges and will share how I will overcome them!
One way I am going to combat any threats on the horizon is to make plans that don't revolve around food and drinking; yes, hanging out with pregnant friends works great (for the drinking that is)! I am also going to make sure I have plenty of snacks ready to go to have over the weekend.
I had a realization during this past week as well, thanks to Bob Harper of the Biggest Loser. He said during the latest episode that most people over eat/drink to avoid feeling emotions. This was a really enlightening to me. When I began craving unhealthy or just things not in my cleanse, I would ask myself; What are you feeling? It was amazing because almost every time I wanted to say "forget this cleanse" I was feeling unhappy, bored, lonely, etc. I then decided to just sit with that emotion and a while. It was HARD, but as it has been said, "This too shall pass."
Let's take a moment to think before we eat.
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