Getting Healthy - Jills Adventure

9/17/2014 
My journal/menu thing has been hit & miss, though I am still trying to get it going full force.  In my Sugar shock book, she's going over more things to help break the habit.  She's pretty much wanting me to go completely sugar/simple carb free, which isn't going to happen.  But I'm still working to incorporate her ideas so that I can cut way back.  I'm buying whole wheat pasta now & eat whole wheat tortillas.  I'm trying to add at least part whole wheat flour in desserts as well.  The other thing I'm doing is drinking more water.  I really didn't think that would make a difference.  I felt like I was already drinking quite a bit.  But I've started measuring it & found that I drink much less than I thought.  Right now I'm up to about 5 cups a day & am trying to increase that to 6-8 cups. I add a little lemon or orange to it & find that it goes down better first thing in the morning or when I'm not really that thirsty.  I've also found that even drinking 5 cups a day cuts back on my hunger & I crave sugar less often.  I really think that a lot of times when I feel an insatiable need to eat, I'm just thirsty.  

I'm also allowing myself to eat all the dark chocolate I want, but limiting my treats to that.  2 reasons for that:  I eventually get tired of the chocolate, & 2, it keeps me from making a bunch of worse for me junk that I binge on.  I'm hoping that as I progress, I'll naturally just want less of it.
Unfortunately, I found out that my favorite chocolate isn't all that great of a choice, so I will be working on finding chocolate with more cocoa in it in the future.  Also, I learned that you want to get chocolate that hasn't been processed with alkali, because that takes a lot of the flavanoids (or however you say that) out.  :( Who knew?  


8/19/2014
Survived my first day of the menu/journal thing.  Went pretty well.  Currently, I can't imagine living my life this way, but we'll take it one day at a time for now & see how things go.  I'm going to start exercising again today as well.  Weighed myself yesterday.  I've gain 5 pounds in the last 2 weeks, officially making me heavier than I've been since my initial weight-loss after having Alex.  I don't know what's going on that I've started gaining weight in the last month or so.  Super obnoxious.

8/17/2014

I've started reading my sugar shock book.  So far it's focusing on getting your mind in the right place & starting to find healthy feel good alternatives to eating junk food.  
Tomorrow I'll start implementing some of her ideas, & I'm also heading back to making a menu including 3 meals & 2 snacks starting tomorrow.  I'm also going to start an eating journal to record what ever it is I eat for the next few weeks.  I've had a hard time doing a journal in the past because I... well... I lie.  Yeah. I'm lying to myself, I know.  Pathetic.  But I hate admitting that I'm such a junky.  I'm going in this tomorrow with a renewed attempt at being honest & hoping that the menu will help simplify the journal stuff.  Wish me luck! 

8/14/2014

A depressing amount of time has passed without me being able to really even put much effort into kicking my sugar habit-- & losing those 20 lbs I'm still hanging on to.  I know it sounds pathetic, but I really feel like I need help-- like going away to a rehab for 3 months.  Since that's not going to happen, I've done the easiest other thing I can think of:  I bought a book.  "Beyond Sugar Shock", by I don't even know who.  I'm 30 pages into it & so far the information is good, but I'm still at the phase where the idea of giving up or even reducing sugar sounds like a not-so-funny joke.  The part of the book I'm in right now deals mostly with how sugar is used by your body & how refined sugars and especially high fructose corn syrup is used by your body differently than sugars found naturally in food. White flour is apparently just about the same as processed sugar when it comes to how  your body uses it (along w/ white rice, potatoes, etc).  

The main thing that I've found myself realizing lately (not because of the book-- it's just something that I've slowly started accepting) is that I am going to have to learn to cook different meals or modify the ones that I keep using.  I've fought that idea forever, telling my self that that's just what we eat!  It's the food I know how to cook & that I like.  How could I possibly change that?  Well, the truth is that I'm going to have to.
     Recently I've learned that 4 grams of sugar is equal to 1 tsp.  I never knew that before.  I also learned that it's recommended that women don't eat more than 6 tsp (24 grams) or men more than 9 tsp (36 grams) of added sugar a day.  You'd think that wouldn't be to hard, but I just found out that the yoplait yogurt I eat has at least 4 tsp of added sugar in a little 6 oz cup.  Other yogurts that I've found aren't any better, especially since I don't believe in artificial sweetners (poison. totally don't get how people would think their a good choice).  Pretty much EVERYTHING I eat that I didn't make completely from scratch is the same. All with various types of added sugars & simple white flour type carbs.  :(
Makes me want to cry.  I'm going to continue with the book.  She's supposed to have a 6 week program to help break sugar addicition, so soon I'll see if it's doable & if it works.  Wish me luck!  

I'll try to post quite regularly to talk about my progress.