Back to my tempo run. I did 4 miles, with the inner 2 miles at roughly a 8:00 pace. My 5k time clocked in at just over 26:00, which is a good sign because it included my non-tempo portion! But I do the tempo part on a slight downhill. Overall, I felt good though! My next 5k is February 7 and while I may not be gunning for a PR, I’m hoping to place! I won my age group 2 years ago and I missed placing by a few seconds last year (it’s a quite small race).

I have some fun food to share, so I’ll scatter that throughout my thoughts on the aforementioned topic of today’s post—the Whole30.

I actually have fairly strong feelings about the Whole30. This year, it feels like everyone is embarking on the new year with the Whole30. As a disclaimer, I’ve never done the Whole30. I vaguely tried at one point, but lasted 3 days. So if you want to take my contemplations with a grain of salt, feel free to.

One of my favorite ways to eat Mexican food is in salad form. I love the fresh veggies+guacamole!

Disclaimer #2: I could never actually do the Whole30 or Paleo in general with my eating restrictions. I don’t eat red meat, and I’m allergic to nuts and coconut. That severely limits my options, especially for healthy fats!

If I’ve learned anything about health over the past years, it is that health is a journey. Different knowledge and experiences have drastically shaped my view of what is healthy. I think longtime readers will probably see this shift. I think my views have been to the moon and back since I started this blog.

If you read my early posts, it’s clear I was passionate and knowledgable about nutrition, but maybe not in a practical sense. I viewed sugar as the devil and always felt like I was poisoning my body by eating it. I did several no sugar challenges. A year into my blog, I did a real food challenge.

Pizza made on GF bread.

Then last winter I got sick. I no longer viewed food in terms of what was healthy, but rather in terms of what wouldn’t make me ill.

And now, I finally have a diagnosis, which brought even more changes. And guess what? My view of healthy changed again.

Here are my thoughts now. I still think sugar is the devil. I think overconsumption of sugar and processed foods leads to many of the health problems were are dealing with today. I think that eating 100% unprocessed food is probably pretty healthy. But here’s the thing. It’s not necessarily sustainable. When I cut out all processed foods, I felt fantastic. I looked fantastic. I was glowing. But I was also CRAZY. I felt so restricted. I couldn’t eat anything, and therefore I craved everything. I would eat large quantities of healthy food to try and stave off the cravings. And when it was over? OF COURSE I went back to the sweet stuff. So much.

I actually slept in until 8:30 this morning which I considered a victory. I rewarded myself with chocolate chip cranberry orange bread—the last piece. Plus some amazing turkey. I ended up not eating the broccoli—too early for spicy!

While my project wasn’t nearly as restrictive as the Whole30, it still made me crazy. And honestly? I like sweets. I don’t want to deny myself of them forever. And in the society we live in today? Honestly it’s not practical.

I got a 6 month fruit and cheese club for Christmas and this was part of shipment #1! Yay!

In the past couple of years, I started getting a better idea of what moderation is. And overall I was probably at least a little bit healthier. And now with my new style of eating, I really am understanding and practicing it. I honestly feel like I’m a different person now, and I can almost sense myself transforming. Maybe it’s because I was ill for so long and now feel so much healthier. Part of me wonders if gastroparesis is something I’ve always had a little bit before it flared up really badly and now I’m finally dealing with it. This is sort of unrelated to the subject of healthy living in general, but one of the symptoms of gastroparesis is blood sugar issues and I’m wondering if now that I’m eating in a way that seems to keep flare ups at bay, this is going away too. When I’m respecting my stomach, I’m not craving things like I did before, and I WANT to eat more healthy foods.

Flourless chocolate cake. Amazing.

I think that was a convoluted way of saying that unprocessed food is fantastic, and should make up most of a healthy diet, but we should also include some fun foods because life without flour less chocolate cake is just not a life I would want to lead. When we allow ourselves to eat “unhealthy” foods, we regain some of our sanity, in my opinion. When no food is off limits, it’s easier to build a healthy relationship. For me, this permission has allowed me to see my diet as a whole, and not just one food in isolation. This has made it easier for me to balance my diet. Am I always perfect with moderation? Definitely not. I’ve never been consistent with it but I honestly feel that with the way my stomach is forcing me to eat, I’m going to be much more successful.

Eating in moderation is one of the most cliche saying out there right now, and it’s more complicated than it sounds. It’s not just a practice. It’s a mindset. On the other hand, eating in moderation doesn’t mean eating lots of junk food in moderation. It means stacking your diet with the good stuff and allowing room for more decadent cuisine. And as I stated early, health is a journey. You will have lots of successes and lots of failures, and it’s messy, and there’s no “perfect diet.”

But right now I’m happy, so I’ll go ahead and call it good enough.

Have you tried the Whole30? What are your thoughts?

Anyways, that was quite a long winded way of saying it’s Wednesday-yay! WIAW! Thanks as always to Jenn for hosting.

You want to know why I’m loving WIAW right now? Because when I’m posting less, or posting about specific things, I don’t get to share what I’ve been eating as much, so I get this accumulation of pictures that somehow seem silly to post if not on a Wednesday. WIAW is an excuse for a foodie photo dump, right?

Pancakes+eggs+mandarin oranges at breakfast. I think I’m officially no longer a syrup on pancakes person. Butter all the way-it may have something to do with the fact that I’m a syrup snob and really don’t like the dining hall corn syrup/maple syrup. Yuck. On another note, I just bought a vat of Grade B maple syrup at Whole Foods. More on that in a minute.

Pumpkin bread. This is from last Wednesday-my Wednesdays are long days so I needed a little pick me up between studying and my last class!

This dinner was 50/50. Tilapia with mango and cucumber was on point, as were the roasted carrots. I wasn’t a fan of the lentil puff pastry though.

More breakfast. I was across campus at the track and decided to stop somewhere different. While it may look very similar to the other breakfast, the pancakes there are far superior. They’re sort of vanilla-y.

Dining hall lunch-balsamic chicken salad, veggie flat bread, and broken rice with scallions. Plus roasted butternut squash.

This was dining hall chicken masala. And I have to say, they nailed it. The chicken was SO tender and flavorful. Well done.

Whole Foods dinner-hihglights were the mushroom polenta and various colors of roasted sweet potatoes.

So…I’m kind of over the whole “eat a specific diet” thing (like Paleo, 100% real food, no sugar). One thing I’ve learned over my 2+ years of blogging about food is that 1. I don’t have time or energy for that and 2. It makes me freaking crazy. That being said, I wanted to shake things up a little and get more creative so I decided to roughly follow a new plan (note the word roughly-it’s very low key)-whole foods + unlimited chocolate. So to start my new healthy eating endeavor I went to Whole Foods and stocked up on mass amounts of quality chocolate. And Grade B maple syrup for homemade chocolate. Spoiler alert-the “plan” is going well. I like chocolate.

This is one of my favorite soups-and it’s really good cold the next day too (or maybe I’m just used to eating cold food out of tupperware at this point in my life). The best part is it has chunks of sweet potato!

On Superbowl Sunday, my eating schedule was bizarre. Lunch at 10:30, pizza at 3:30 (what meal is that even? Dinner?). I was a little hungry towards the end of the game so I went to the dining hall for a chicken fajita salad. This was quality guac.

Dining hall dinner-salad, stir fry tofu, sweet potato fries. Plus a mini corn and potato casserole. The reason for no picture? It slid off my plate and exploded on the floor. It took my a little time to gain the courage to grab another one!

And finally-one last breakfast! I brought back the berry compote! This is just cherries+blueberries boiled down. Full fat yogurt+berries+sunbutter. I missed this!

Wow guys, that was quite the roundup. I should get on here a little more often, shouldn’t I? I feel like this has been an eventful week in terms of life stuff, so I really should do more updates! Also I’m realizing as I grow up (…and that makes me sound young again) I’m gotten so much more introspective so maybe we’ll have some more reflective posts. That being said, everything is going well over here right now!

What is your favorite kind of chocolate (and where can I buy it??)?

And you know what? It worked. In just two weeks (AKA the two weeks I actually really stayed with it), I lost 7 pounds and my fasting blood sugar dropped from a bit on the high side of 93 to 75. (The 93 reading was actually taking a week in). That’s some pretty substantial change, it just two weeks!

But as you all know, I didn’t make it four weeks. And there were some serious hiccups along the way. 

Week 1

I was doing great! I had all my food waiting for my in the fridge. (This was key!) I was motivated, and already starting to see results. If you want to see the totally sleep-deprived delirious post about how great it was, check this out. That Sunday, I was feeling great, lean, and fast after a tempo run. But for some reason out of nowhere, I fell off the wagon and had a few sweets at the dining hall. I felt awful. But the worst part was the next day. The next day, I was completely on edge, and incredibly anxious. I think it had something to do with leftover sugar shock after a week without. The feeling lasted a while, and a hard treadmill run the Tuesday after was the only thing that was really able to make it go away. 

Week 2

Things were a little rough during this week. I started out feeling off given the above, plus I had eaten through pretty much all my prepared food and didn’t get a chance to prepare more. I was saved by a magic food delivery from my parents, but it was still kind of rough. Road block #2 came later in the week when I was plagued by awful, unexplainable stomachaches. Every time I ate, I would get the worst stomach pains and feel sick. There were a few times I had to force myself to eat because I knew I needed it. Plus, since I couldn’t eat much, I had the worst hunger pains, but at the same time I couldn’t exactly eat because I knew it would make it worse. I thought it might just be my body adjusting to completely unprocessed, high fiber foods. Luckily it went away after a few days, but I was very concerned since this was just days away from my 5k. Nevertheless, once the stomachache was gone, I felt good and ran a good race depute the weather. 

Week 3

I don’t think I technically cheated over the weekend, but I definitely started to abuse the loopholes, including lots of homemade chocolate. Since the previous week after overeating sweets over the weekend and the anxiety hit late Monday night, I decided to be proactive and do a little spin workout at about 10pm, and it was fine. Overall, I felt pretty good! I had avoided SO many sweets. I never realized how many free cookies exist in life! That was a big eye opener for me. However, the major struggle this week was once again lots of homemade chocolate. We didn’t have the greatest food selection, and we ended up eating lots of nut butters (or sun butter in my case), and seedy crackers, and just overdoing things in general that weren’t the best en masse. We were starting to feel like the restrictions were leading us to make worse food choices. Plus, we were less strict than the beginning. I definitely ate some dining hall foods that probably had small amounts of the forbidden items. As a result of all this, I didn’t feel quite as good. Another issue I had at this point was the restriction. I felt like it was starting to make me obsessive. 

Week 4

I didn’t make it this far. We officially called it on the Saturday of week 3, thanks to the amazing ice cream sandwiches brought to an even tee went to.

Plus, the next day we went out to dinner for my sister’s birthday, and the Ethiopian foods didn’t exactly fit my “no-processed grain” requirement. And neither did the cake…I wanted to get as much as possible going after the weekend, but it just didn’t happen. Valentine’s Day cookies and candies basically sealed the deal and launched me back into the sugar eating realm. 

During the project (especially the first week), I did like some of the ease that came from making decisions. Of course I couldn’t take the cookie-it wasn’t even a choice! I was concerned what would happen afterwards, when it was a choice. I have a very hard time saying no to sweets! 

I guess a lot of the above was explaining the difficulties and why I didn’t make it 4 weeks (plus, it was really hard!). But despite all that, I really did feel awesome most of the time! And the changes were definite. Most amazing to me was the improvement in the pain in my foot when I run! I really do believe that cutting out processed food is the way to health. But it’s also really hard. I think if I was living at home and was cooking all my own food, I would have definitely been able to continue. Being in a college environment made it that much more difficult!

So…where am I now? I’m struggling to eat well again! I can’t seem to find the restraint to pass up the giant cookies. 

I’ve always had odd reactions to sugar, and I’ve always had trouble stopping once I’ve started. If I have a little, it ignites a drive in my mind for me. So, at this point, the physical changes from the project have vanished. I have been eating a lot of sugar lately, and what’s scary is that it’s really making my heart race. Another issue? I’ve bought Quest bars a few times now, and actually have developed a taste for them in an attempt to curb my sugar cravings. But they have nuts. I don’t think it’s a lot, but my skin is definitely rebelling so that’s something I need to reduce! 

So what’s next? My current plan is the project 2.0. Which is eating, real, wholesome food and avoiding the sweet stuff so I don’t give myself a heart attack. I think for this week what I’m going to try is to build a bit of sugar in my day so I don’t feel deprived. I picked up a few granola bars over the weekend, and I’m hoping that will help my mid-afternoon sugar cravings. 

Overall, I really did like the project. I wish I could go back to eating that way, but at this point I can’t bring myself to do it. Like I said in my delirious post, you have to be ready. I’m ready to improve my health back to where it was, but I’m not ready for the restriction and discipline required. I guess I’m not really sure where that leaves me!

First-the food. Breakfast was plain yogurt, fruit, granola (mine was gingersnap!) and coffee. The granola wasn’t crazy sweet either!

Lunch was an amazing salad-some type of green and creamy dressing, chicken, giant white beans, carrots, and lentils. What was really great about this was that the veggies were all actually seasoned!

There were also plenty of snacks. This bar was a favorite of mine:

Plus some other little things.

As a college student, you know there’s no way I’m saying no to free food-especially good food!

There were also some people doing a blender-bike demo outside!

So let’s get into it, shall we?

The first speak was Dr. Robert Lustig. He’s the guy fighting against sugar as the cause of obesity, and his book is was my whole project was based on. So I was super excited to see him speak!

He didn’t go super into the Biochem, but he did talk about one specific chemical reaction that I thought was super cool, and I’m so glad I learned about sugars in OChem this week because it made so much sense! I was actually going to nerd out and use my chemical structure drawing software to show you guys the reaction but I’ll spare you that. The gist is that the browning reaction that happens when you cook meat? That happens in your body as you age. And sugar makes it happen faster. If anyone loves Organic Chemistry or Biochemistry and wants me to go into more details, let me know!

One interesting point he made about scientific studies is that you really need to look at the funding source to get a sense of the study. A lot of studies are funded by the food industry, and the results are often different. Out of some of the studies he discussed of sugar on weight gain, only 1 of 6 studies funded by the food industry reported that sugar had an impact on weight gain. On the studies NOT funded by the food industry, 10 of 12 reported that sugar had an impact on weight gain. So much of our food policy and governmental nutrition recommendations are tied up with the food industry. One interesting thing is that if you look at the currents nutritional guidelines, when referring to what you SHOULD eat, the guidelines discuss specific foods such as fruits and vegetables. But the foods you shouldn’t eat are listed as general food groups, such as “bad fats.” Because the meat industry would have gone crazy if the government had recommended eating less animal fat!

Here’s something else that is scary and relevant about the national health problem we currently have. 30% of our population is obese. However, obesity does not equal disease-metabolic dysfunction equals disease. Metabolic dysfunction (such as insulin resistance) leads to things like type 2 diabetes, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, heart disease, and cancer. Of these obese people, 80% are metabolically ill. Fair enough. But get this: of the normal weight people, 40% are metabolically ill. Which means they have the same high risks of disease as those 80% of the obese! A general indication of metabolic disease is liver fat, and lots of sugar (or alcohol like the more traditional fatty liver disease) directly leads to liver fat. 

I’m sure we all know I like to rant about sugar, and while it’s definitely not THE ONLY problem leading to obesity and metabolic disease, it’s a BIG one! What compounds this problem is besides just the metabolic dysfunction, we have sugar “addiction.” I use that in quotes because whether it’s technically an addiction is debated, but I’m sure everyone here can think of a time when they just could not stop shoving sugar down their throats. And it becomes an even bigger problem when sugar is the norm. Heck, I couldn’t even stick to the project for a month! But the changes in my body after JUST TWO WEEKS without sugar and processed food where dramatic. My fasting blood sugar dropped almost 20 points! It was at the upper range of healthy, and after just 2 weeks, it was lower than it’s ever been as far as my records. I also lost 7 pounds, and looked noticeably different (although it should be noted that carbohydrate holds onto a lot of water). And that’s just 2 weeks! And I’m reasonably healthy! It’s crazy. 

I had the chance to quickly talk with Dr. Lustig between speakers, and I asked him for resources about the mechanisms of the metabolism of sugar metabolism, since again, as we all know, I’m kind of in love with it and think it’s the coolest thing ever. There is NOTHING out there! He suggested a book that is coming out sometime within the year, but other than that, there is nothing! This got me thinking-if there are facts out there that could guide public health policy, as well as nutritional studies, we need to be using them! And I guarantee that when the people in charge of public health make decisions and statements, they don’t look at the Biochemistry. I’m totally biased since I’m a scientist, but if we can explain a process, why not use that information to guide us? To find a solution, to predict an outcome? Ok, rant over. Moving on!

The next speaker discussed intervention in schools in terms of food and health education and school meals. Kids today eat 35% of their calories at school, and many schools even serve up to 5 meals a day! She also discussed how in low income areas, the life expectancy is significantly lower. But what I think is really powerful to take away from her talk is this quote: “Facilitate change, but give up the illusion that you can direct change.” As my generation starts trying to change the world, I think this is important to keep in mind. People don’t always want to change, and you can’t just order someone to do something. However, you can guide them in the correct direction. 

One of the last things I want to discuss is the speaker who discussed child psychology in relation to the obesity epidemic. I think this applies to far more people than just children, and I think a lot of you guys will be able to relate to this. First-happiness and joy are not the same. All joyful moments are happy, but not all happy moments are joyful. Joy is that sense you get when you think of those you love the most-it’s the sensation that runs through your body when it’s a beautiful day and you’re off to see a loved one. Joy is created through love and deep connections with others. And when we don’t get joy, we turn to artificial, short term rewards such as screen time or ice cream. She described 5 brain states: 1 is joy, and 5 is the most absolutely stressed. In states 1-3,  which she termed the “homeostatic circuit,” we are capable of reasoning with ourselves are making rational decisions. But when we hit states 4 and 5, we are stuck in the “allostatic circuit,” or the “survival” circuit. AKA the fight or flight response. In the allostatic circuit, we are stuck in unstoppable drives with no shut off switch-it’s just how our brain is wired. Once this gets triggered, there’s no stopping your behavior, whatever it may be-such as binging. The cool thing is that you can change the wiring of your brain by having a different result come from times of stress-such as a loving connection, which while make you stop going to food for that artificial comfort. Her overall point behind all of this is that these behaviors happen because the way our brain in wired, and often times we replace love with food. Which is especially relevant for children growing up in a stressful environment. 

That’s all I have from the conference! I really, really enjoyed it and I definitely feel inspired and even more sure this is the area I want to work in. I would definitely attend this again next year! I hope you guys were able to get something out of the reviews, or at least not fall asleep! So let’s look at more food, shall we?

One of the speakers today discussed food marketing. He works for Bolthouse Farms, and they are trying to sell carrots as “the next junk food.” They came out with this cool idea of seasoning carrots, just like chips! These were ranch, and they were really good!

And after a day of eating VERY well, I was inspired to eat some veggies at the dining hall! It’s parent’s weekend, so they definitely stepped it up! I had a salad with olive oil and vinegar, plus HUMMUS. We never have hummus! And I discovered I like beets much better in salad form…Plus some herbed spaghetti squash-something else we never have!

And then at the end of the day my parents wanted to see me, so we went to my favorite ice cream place and I actually got something different-but equally delicious. Salted butterscotch with chocolate fudge. 

And yes, I realize this is after I totally ranted about sugar. But it was delicious!

Sushi bowl-again. But sadly without avocado.

My attempt at coconut truffles. Which didn’t really work out-the inside was just mashed banana and coconut, and it just tasted like not that ripe banana…but the chocolate was amazing!

Sloppy yogurt bowl with applesauce that still needed a few hours in the slow cooker.

Saturday I was going to go to the gym, but then brunch sounded really good so this happened.

Also in place of gym-we may or may not have swiped a carton of heavy whipping cream from the dining hall. Homemade chocolate with this? AMAZING. It tasted like the center of a lava cake.

Cinnamon tea made by a girl in my sorority-she boiled cinnamon sticks!

Highlight of the weekend-sorority retreat and getting to see a real, live cat.

Retreat food.

And the actual nail in the project’s coffin (for now-will definitely be discussed): fresh ice cream sandwich.

What am I wearing? On a side note, now I really want a tutu of my own. 

Applesauce 2.0-much better! Plus sun butter.

My innovative wrapping skills-tomorrow is my sister’s birthday so we went out to dinner! And wrapping paper was nowhere to be found…

And cake.

As for this week? I’m going to eat as well as possible with as little effort as possible. I went to Trader Joe’s and stock dup today. I have to say though, since doing this project, reading all the nutrition labels/ingredients was really frustrating because EVERYTHING had extra little ingredients, even at a place like Trader Joe’s! 

Another observation-as my eating habits deteriorated, so did the positive effects. My foot issues are starting to come back a little bit for one thing-so when I’m not so full of delicious food I’ll figure out a plan going forward. I will say this about the project now though-the biggest problem was being underprepared in the second and third week, and eating in a dining hall made things harder because the food was definitely lower quality. If I wan’t living at college and if I was cooking completely for myself, this would have been much easier. So expect a follow up post soon!

Let’s back it up a bit, shall we? 

Wednesday morning I went to the gym for a Crossfit-like workout (basically the one they did on Tuesday that I couldn’t make), plus 2 miles on the treadmill. The workout was working on hang cleans, and the conditioning part was 3 rounds of 500m row, 21 pull ups (assisted), and 21 push ups. The sad thing about this workout is it definitely made me realize my knee isn’t 100%. I had some trouble with the rowing! Also, I have a mystery bruise on the top of my foot, right along one of the seams…so that feels fabulous.

I went to the dining hall for breakfast-I really wanted a change of pace! Sadly they didn’t have just egg whites (which can be less sketchy), but I went with plain scrambled eggs and egg onion, spinach, and cheese. Plus a side of fruit!

Wednesday was a little crazy-I had an evening midterm, which needed to be studied for. Plus, I had lots to do for Thursday! I actually got 9 hours of sleep Tuesday night, and it was absolutely glorious. And I’m currently contemplating bed…

Anyways, here’s my randomly packed lunch-totally normal to eat turkey burgers and corn on the cob out of a bag, right??

This filled me up SO MUCH. This is the change I was talking about-when I get full, I’m SO FULL CAN’T EAT ANOTHER BITE. And when I’m hungry, I’m KILL ME NOW I’M STARVING hungry. I’m not sure if this is my metabolism changing? 

Fun fact-did you know that polyunsaturated fats get used as hormones that regulate metabolism? So maybe this is because I’m eating more fat?

Now I’m thinking it may be something else though-like my body adjusting to more fiber/different foods. Today, I couldn’t eat a ton without being TOTALLY stuffed.

But on that theme, I left studying to come back to my room and eat a snack-the last of the yogurt from the giant container, with berries and sunflower seed butter.

If you can’t tell, I’m running a little low on bowls. And utensils…I ate my soup off of a plate.

I have real, non-paper bowls but they’re really deep, and since the soup got thinner when it thawed, all the goodies on top sink to the bottom. So plate=problem solved…?

My test went fine. Which is good. And I was on top of things enough that I wasn’t up crazy late (5 hours of sleep-yay!). 

The next morning I went to spin, and studied for my morning midterm while eating. Breakfast was 0% Greek yogurt+mashed banana+cocoa powder. I poured everything onto a (you guessed it) plate, and it’s amazing how much yogurt comes out of a tiny container!

I ended up finishing my Nutrition midterm 30 minutes early-this stuff is my jam So I had plenty of time to do my pre-lab before my afternoon class. 

For lunch, I went with something small and more moderate-butter sage mashed sweet potatoes-but I didn’t want to waste the skin, so I stuffed them! Yum!

Look how it compacted after rolling around in the container all day!

After lab, I had a snack of sunflower seed butter (the last of it ) and an apple, plus corn on the cob (totally normal, right??). Then, Crossfit. We didn’t have strength today-just mobility. Which basically meant foam rolling for half the time. Since my race is coming up, I wanted an easier type of workout anyways! The WOD ended up being worse than expected-we did 10, 9, 8, 7,….1 thrusters, with 90 jump ropes between each set, followed by an 800m run at the end. My shoulders are still really sore from push presses on Tuesday, so that was kind of terrible. 

I pushed the run a lot at the end, and ended up feeling kind of sick, thanks to whatever changes are going on. I’m kind of concerned about this given my 5k is this Sunday, and that naturally has a tendency towards nausea. I think I may to stick to lower fiber/easier to digest foods or something! I think I’m going to have kombucha tomorrow morning too. 

I forced myself to eat something afterwards-what ended up working the best was the brown rice fried rice (not really fried rice, they just like giving their rice different names to seem fancier.)

Veggies weren’t that appealing (but maybe the veggies choices also weren’t great), and I ate a lot of the tofu. Plus this mini plate with more rice and chicken, and a little pineapple.

So hopefully whatever is going on resolves itself-this is really strange! But I guess your body will react when you completely change what you’re eating!

Oh, and I came back to my dorm to find this:

Yes, that is my door. (And by that I mean the door I always use to enter/exit my dorm). No clue how that happened. #collegelife

One story is someone was mad and kicked it in. Another is someone accidentally ran into it. Not sure how that is possible….

In fitness news-why is this half training different? Besides the fact that I’ll be doing more speed work than before, some of the longer runs may be a bit more…unconventional. Why? I’m doing a Tough Mudder! The weekend after my half…the timing isn’t ideal, but I’m doing it with my sister and her boyfriend. We’re trying to get up a bigger group as well! So some of my longer runs may incorporate more strength elements-like running 5 miles, doing Crossfit, running 5 miles. Or doing some type of strength move every mile. That would definitely break up the monotony of a treadmill run as well!

Can I confess something? I’m on week 2 of my project…and I don’t feel different. Maybe feeling good is my new normal (I think this is the case), but I want to keep seeing changes! I’m scared this project won’t work. That after 4 months nothing will be different. That my theories were wrong. And I understand that it’s really too soon to tell whether this will be life changing, but I’m impatient. I would just feel really silly if after 4 weeks, nothing happens. I mean, I’m definitely developing new habits and trying new things, which is great, but do you have any idea how many cookies I’ve passed up on? I never realized how abundant cookies are on a college campus. They even had cookies for us after the bio midterm! But I know I need to be patient. And I’m determined to stick with this. And get more sleep…I’m actually not sleep deprived right now thanks to Tuesday night, but I know it will happen again if I don’t make sleep more of a priority. One of my chem friends today was super sleep deprived, to the point it was amusing to witness. Remember last Thursday when I was running on 3 hours of sleep? I was flat out delirious. Inspired, yes. Very inspired. But totally delirious. I’m running out of energy here-and since no more work needs to be done today, bed sounds really nice right now. Maybe I am more sleep deprived than I thought?

Have you ever done any type of obstacle course race?

This morning I got in a quick treadmill run. The good news? My feet are still cooperating. I guess this ‘no processed food’ business really is doing something? The true test will come when I start half training soon!

Breakfast was leftover banana egg white oats with yogurt stirred in.

I apologize that everything I eat is in a cup. I then topped it with some berry compote.

Plus a little crockpot oatmeal-but more on that in a minute! 

Lunch was eaten outside in the beautiful weather-although I think we’re getting rain soon!

Brussels sprouts tossed in balsamic dressing plus a turkey burger.

And this:

I definitely thought this was a blood orange, so I packed it in my lunch. Upon further inspection, it was clear something was up. It was a Meyer lemon! Meyer lemons are a cross between oranges and lemons, and I was convinced to try it anyways.

Yeah, it’s still just like eating a lemon. 

So, yesterday, we made applesauce in my roommate’s crockpot. Since it was out, last night she put in the mixings for baked oatmeal, which I HAD to try this morning, as it smelled amazing. When I returned from class, she was fiddling with it a little more. She added all kinds of things-banana, raisins, cinnamon, dates, egg, pumpkin.

After cooking all day, the texture was more like a sticky pudding-very soft.

Then, we tried to make a quick bread type of deal out of it by adding more egg and coconut flour, and cooking further.

It baked a little on top, but it was just too wet for bread. The texture because a thick, stick to your rips custard type of deal. Definitely good, but not really resembling oatmeal or quick bread! But still a great snack on a cold (ish) afternoon!

Dinner was at the dining hall. After talking about fats on here yesterday, and talking this morning about how fish oil is the ideal type of fat, I was pretty excited to see fish at the dining hall that didn’t appear to go off my project!

Plus, I was ready to load up on veggies!

Tilapia, a simple spinach salad, cabbage salad, mushrooms, and some type of potato dish.

And a baby plate of cilantro rice, more potatoes, and green beans.

Plus a little bit of applesauce.

It was a good day of food! But not going to lie, there are only so many ways you can do oatmeal, bananas, and yogurt. I’m getting so tired of them! I think I’m going to try to go to the dining hall for eggs tomorrow, but still not the most exciting option!

Any good ideas for breakfast that have no sugar and are easy? (As in dorm friendly…)

I wan’t really feeling the posting today…but I’m keeping it real here on the ol’ blog. In terms of the project, things are a little hot and cold. 

Last night, I ended up making homemade chocolate-it was really good! Super rich, super dark, not that sweet. It was simply coconut oil, maple syrup, and cocoa powder. 

Last night was spend studying and hanging out with friends. And maybe singing to ’90s music at 1am. 

This morning I woke up and stabbed myself for the sake of science. 

I read the directions (yay) and successfully took my blood sugar! It was lower than last March, but still on the high side of healthy, so there should be some improvements, hopefully! My roommate’s blood sugar was on the lower end of healthy, so it’s unlikely she’ll see much of a drop. 

For breakfast, I tested out my pre-race breakfast.

Banana and egg oatmeal! This was a little different than how I normally make it-I used extra thick rolled oats instead of instant (so I soaked them overnight), and a whole egg instead of egg whites. Plus, I normally make this with almond milk, but that’s not technically allowed, and i don’t really want dairy before a hard run, so I just used water.

Remember how I was craving bananas so much?

I’m SO. SICK. OF. THEM. Banana overload!

Plus a kiwi.

For this morning’s workout, I wanted to do a pace run. I went to the track and did 2 miles at race pace. And it was doable! Let’s just hope I can push out another mile at that pace!

Plus the course isn’t exactly totally flat…and it’s never exactly 3.1…but I still have a week to get faster and stronger, right??

I followed the run with some weights-back lunges, single leg RDLs, and abs. 

And then-lunchtime!

Salad with oil and vinegar, mixed grain salad, and a garden burger with cheese cubes. Not totally sure on these ingredients, but I felt good after so we’ll go with it! Plus nonfat plain Greek yogurt with pineapple. Ignore the strawberry mess-I was hoping it would be without any added sugar, but a small taste immediately told me otherwise!

Later in the day is where things started to break down. I felt SO great. I kept thinking how I barely notice feeling great anymore because it’s my new normal! But then I was hungry. So I had a snack. 

Yesterday I talked about “fake” desserts-which for the record I should especially avoid because my stomach was not a big fan of all the coconut flour. Today, I’m talking about “real” desserts that don’t seem real. It’s science people! (kidding-that probably makes no sense.)

Over the last couple of days, I’ve had a decent amount of sugar. But it’s “natural” sugar, so totally doesn’t count, right? But here’s the crazy thing. In your body, sugar is basically just sugar. And if you’re sensitive to sugar anyway, and then you try to avoid it, you’re likely going to react to natural sugars as well. 

I’ve had a few too many dates and dried mangoes lately…and I feel it. And I react no differently than regular sugar. 

I feel sick. I can’t focus. I’m anxious. I want more sweet stuff. 

So I caved. It happened. I’m being honest with you guys. But I’m also learning from it. 

How did I feel? Gross. Sick. Panicky (this is probably not a normal reaction to sugar but it always makes me crazy). 

But what did I do about it? 

I learned from my mistake. 

1. Sugar tastes good. Desserts are great. But I’ve never been one of those people that handles sugar well, and I honestly should try to keep it out of my life. For me, the worst effect is mental. To be clear-the problem is NOT that I beat myself up over it, but I’ve always had bad reactions. My heart races, I get really hot, my hormones go crazy. Those physical responses lead to anxiety, lack of focus, feelings of panic. Which makes sense-those physical symptoms evolutionarily would indicate a reason for panic (like seeing a tiger).

2. Sugar is sugar. Sugar makes me crave sugar. Dried fruits (especially dates) are still sugar. And I need to be more careful.

3. I can’t wallow in self pity. Feeling bad about not being able to eat things is a recipe for failure-I need to focus on the delicious things I’m CHOOSING to eat (not just that I CAN eat).

4. I may need to take a step back. From the Internet world. Just for a little while-I love looking at pictures of froyo and chocolate and muffins, but if I’m going to finish this thing, I need to limit my exposure. But I have midterms anyways so there’s that distraction…

Oh, and here’s dinner:

Bottom line: I really want to finish this strong. The changes I’m seeing and feeling are amazing. My confidence is higher than I can even remember. And I’ll do whatever I need to do to finish this out. Depending on what’s happening 3 weeks from now, I may go an extra week to really do a full month. But given the changes I felt in a week, we’ll see. 

Another thing I’m recognizing: just HOW MANY occasions come up that I would have grabbed a sweet at. Multiple cookie parties, giant cookies at late night, waffles and muffins for brunch. I now understand exactly where the Freshman 15 comes from! 

So-yes. I slipped up. But I’m not going to sit here and complain about it, because it’s an opportunity to learn. 

To be quite frank, the thing that worries me the most is life post-Project. After the difference in how I felt this morning vs. after sugar, I don’t know how I can possibly function in a life with sugar. Yes, I have the biggest sweet tooth, but I also have a really bad reaction to it. I don’t know how I can go through life functioning and feeling good with it. I feel like a lot of the stress I felt last year was a result of overconsumption of sugar. It’s crazy how things work, isn’t it?? I wish I understood WHY I’m so sensitive!

But-tomorrow is another day! Please don’t take this post as me complaining and feeling bad about eating sugar. I’m only posting because I want to be honest with you guys, and I do think it’s an important learning experience. And remember-the things my body responds to are completely different for a lot of other people! Some people can have a moderate amount of sugar everyday and it works for them-if this is the case for you, but all means go for it! These are just my experiences.

I think I’ve asked this before, but: any ideas on how to be get magically fast in a week??

For whatever it’s worth though, I am slowly catching up on sleep. Last night I went to bed fairly early and I took a nap today!

Let’s rewind on the food front a bit to last night first!

Nothing new here-I am still not tired of this!

Let’s pretend that this is an artsy shot and not just me being impatient. These pink ladies are from out CSA box, and they’re phenomenal! 

After dinner I took a quick nap before yoga-and then had some unsweetened chocolate to wake me up. 

Then-yoga time! I made up a sequence-with no clue how long it would take (it ended up being about half an hour but I cut it a little short).

Ignore my spelling and/or totally made up descriptions for things I couldn’t remember the name of.

It was SO MUCH FUN. I channeled my inner yoga teacher-I have one teacher who I’ve gone to for years, and can basically quote word for word. It was awesome-I felt strong and everyone seemed to enjoy it. I didn’t do anything that would reflect my lack of flexibility too much!

Kinda awkward picture but I’m the one facing everybody. This made me realize I need to do my own yoga practice! I’m totally capable of making a “class” for myself, and it felt so great! I just wish it were a little warmer so I could be outside!

Guys. I feel like I’ve made so many new friends already this quarter! It’s wonderful and it warms my heart. 

This morning, I went to the gym for a treadmill workout. I did the one where I do a mile at my goal pace, and then 10 intervals of 2 minutes at a faster pace (with walking in between). To up the challenge, I did the first mile and 2 intervals at a 1.0 incline. It’s interesting-I’ve done this workout a lot and it varies a lot based on how I’m feeling. The first time I did it was over break, when I would do it AFTER spin. My legs felt kind of heavy when I woke up this morning, and man was it hard today. I’m thinking that’s most likely due to sleep deprivation. But at the same time, I think my running has definitely gone downhill in the last couple of months-all my distance training is gone, so I’ve lost a decent part of my endurance base. The frustrating part is that I really can’t do any long distance runs with my tendonitis at this point. 

I had a few of my pre workout balls before the run, and then coffee after, plus this bowl of deliciousness:

Plain yogurt, pink lady apple, and sunflower seed butter. Plus a kiwi. I’ve eaten so many kiwis today! We’ve been getting them in our CSA box, but I never really ate them much! They’re super ripe, and definitely the best kiwis I’ve had. 

I also took some ‘abs’ pictures today to have some visual record of this project. I think I’d really need a 6 pack by the end of 4 weeks though to have my abs circulating the Internet…yeah I should probably do some abwork…But still, I probably won’t post these pictures-it’s just to notice differences. 

After class, I had every intention of working, but I ended up getting hungry early-weird because I ate a late breakfast. Since I was done for the day, I actually got to have a hot lunch!

Same old, same old with balsamic dressing on the asparagus. 

After my nap, I did a little banana experimenting. I have an idea for next week’s pre workout balls, and I used a little mashed banana to test that. I know they’ll taste fabulous, but not sure how they’ll feel pre workout!

I had the rest of the banana with cocoa powder and yogurt.

Something about this snack just unleashed the hunger in me! Before Crossfit, I had a nice little meatsicle, some sweet potatoes, and some dried mango.

file:///Users/stottler/Pictures/iPhoto%20Library/Previews/2014/01/23/20140123-163711/zSfuddS1QoO2JZS77Q690g/IMG_6331.jpg

Plus, I’ve been having handfuls of this:

I think I’ve been having a little too much coconut and sunflower seed butter these last couple of days though-I’m feeling a little bit off from all the fat/fiber in the coconut!

Today in Crossfit, the WOD was wall balls and toes to bar (which I can’t do fully). For some reason, lately my usual 14 lb wall ball has been feeling insanely light. Which is funny because my arms have felt a little week lately-I can’t even remember the last time I did pull ups! 

After Crossfit, I made a valiant effort to get the rest of the things I need for the blood sugar test, but I couldn’t find parking so I gave up!

I attempted my first dinner at the dining hall. I did reasonably well-the chicken rice soup said it contained wheat, which meant it was probably just a little to thicken so I let it go. Then I realized it was white rice, which is technically processed, but oh well. The real star was the black bean and corn salads-which I mixed together.

So-what does the future hold? Next week I want to try to go to the dining hall more-but it doesn’t always fit in my schedule and I still have an entire container of soup in the freezer-and I love soup for dinner! For breakfasts, yogurt or overnight oats with berry compote, or maybe dining hall food (eggs/fruit). For lunches, I still have a frozen meal, but I want to make quinoa fried rice-quinoa, tons of veggies, egg, leftover chicken, garlic, etc. Plus a new variety of energy balls. 

Also-look out for a post about fat. That’s this week’s topic in nutrition, and I think it helps clarify a lot about the different types of fat!

And I’m sorry-I’m a little behind on responding to comments because I normally do that on my phone, but I got the updated app and it’s a little funky! I will get right on it though  

Any suggestions on how I can get magically fast in the next week?

My race is next weekend! (5k)

My morning started bright and early so I could lead weight training to quidditch. I put together my breakfast the night before so it would be quick and easy in the dark.

This.

THIS. SO GOOD-I felt like I was eating a pb&j sandwich. Fun fact-did you know I ate pb&j everyday for about 3 years? It was sophisticated too-different peanut butters, ALWAYS two types of jam (each half was different). And somehow now my body rebels at nuts-go figure. ANYWAYS. This is plain greek yogurt topped with sunflower seed butter and mixed berry compote. The mixed berry compote? I hinted at it yesterday. So easy. So good.

Take a bag of frozen berries (i added a few frozen cherries to the mix as well).

Simmer on stove at low heat for a couple of hours-until the berries thicken. Or throw in the slow cooker-we have one in our room and that is going to happen at some point.

Result: deliciousness. No sugar needed.

Quidditch training went really well-today was the first week we repeated a workout, and the improvements were insane! I mean, there’s a lot of form improvement as well as strength, so the increase in the weights they used was huge. On back squats, most people moved up 20-30 pounds! One guy who lifts on his own couldn’t get very low on his squats a couple of weeks ago. He’s been working on it, and now his form was WAY better, and he lifted 30 pounds heavier! It’s so excited-I’m so proud!

One guy made me check that his form was good because he was using way heavier weights than last time, but it felt so much easier that he was sure he must be doing something wrong. And on top of just the strength, everyone did more rounds of the timed conditioning. 

The best part? We got through everything smoothly and quickly so I had time for coffee before my first class.

Lunch after class was prepacked-chicken, asparagus, and brown butter sage mashed sweet potatoes. 

Before my 4:15 class, I got an email that I needed to be somewhere at 7, so I had to reschedule Crossfit and rush straight form my last class, so before class I went back to my room to change and eat a quick snack. I had the biggest banana craving EVER. Like, I would have killed for a banana. Ohhh what eating well does to us. I ended up buying a banana on the way back. 

I also had a couple of squares of unsweetened chocolate, on with sunflower seed butter and the other without.

But banana and sunflower seed butter? Hit. The. Spot.

Plus a spoon of berry compote and a cutie.

Unsweetened dark chocolate is intense-it’s hard to eat too much. I now know my limit-not 2 squares. I was a bit wired/heart racing. Noted.

I made it to Crossfit on time-I could do everything in today’s workout with my knee, although I had to be careful to really get high on the box jumps so that I wouldn’t land in a deep squat. My knee is doing way better-I can squat if I’m SUPER careful, so that’s a good sign (although it feels a little stiff now, so I should ice!). I’m planning on going to weight lifting tomorrow, but instead of doing full lifts, I’m going to do power lifts instead. For those that don’t know, the difference between a full and a power lift is that full lifts finish in a squat, and power lifts catch the bar standing up. 

Dinner tonight was sort of late (and therefore from my fridge). I am going to make some attempts at the dining hall soon, but I didn’t get back from various things until late, and the dining hall would have been closing. 

While I heated my soup, I munched on some grilled chicken with homemade ketchup.

It’s totally normal to eat this as a meat-sicle, right? I mean, it saves a knife….

And then the main course-butternut squash soup with modified cranberry relish and creme fraiche.

I also had a small bite of the unsweetened chocolate to give the meal some finality. 

Overall, I’ve felt great these past 2 days. Better today than yesterday-maybe it was more caffeine, or maybe sugar withdrawals are over. I’ve leaned out a little in the last 2 days, simply because I’m not eating junk, and my body is flushing out all the cake/muffins/chips I ate over the weekend. In other words-the starting weight measurement from Monday really wasn’t representative of where I was, but we’ll go with it. In terms of the other data-my sister is sick so she couldn’t do blood pressure, and I decided that I am not sticking my finger with a sewing needle, because that is going to hurt too much, so I can’t take blood sugar until I get the lancets. And that is not a priority when I have schoolwork deadlines breathing down my neck!

It’s really interesting to me the foods that I’m seeking out-like bananas. I’m actually having less trouble eating like this because there are fewer options, and things are pretty much laid out for me. 

What’s also interesting is my macronutrient composition. I was thinking I was not eating enough protein, which was probably true, although it’s still in the healthy range.

But then eliminate sugars, and there’s more space for the good stuff-here’s what the past couple of days have looked like:

I’m on the low end of carbohydrate and the high end of fat (thanks Nutrition class for that knowledge), but I think that will probably shift as the week goes on-I tend to want more carbs later in the week, so I’m trying to make sure I replenish the carbs I’m using. That being said, despite the government’s macronutrient recommendations, people function very well on a wide variety of intakes-some cultures eat mostly fat and are healthy. Others eat mostly carbs and are healthy. (I’m not talking about the typical American diet). What I’m saying is people are really good at functioning well on diets with whole foods, despite the ratios-so the ratios really aren’t that important!

I also felt really good today in Crossfit-strong and fast (in terms of running). But this could also be because I haven’t lifted heavy much lately.

Day 2 done and I’m feeling good!

What’s the weirdest food craving you’ve had?