The Tough Stuff and The Easy Stuff

The Tough Stuff

Hello .... my name is Heidi and I am addicted to sugar.

It seems that over and over and over again I fight this war but never seem to get anywhere.  I try to kick at it from different angles but never seem to knock it down. 

I've challenged myself from certain things (sweet coffee, licorice, bulk candy), and succeeded for the short term, but never the long term.  I've learned to enjoy things like tea without any added sugar, but still crave sugar.  I've even given things like the South Beach Diet an attempt.  This does help, but that sugar monster always comes creeping back in.

Sweet treats have been removed from my grocery lists ... but I'm far from the only sugar addict in my house and even if I don't buy it, it still ends up in my house.  Not having it around is not a solution.  Somehow I have to tame this on my own and with my own control.

About a week ago I spent some time going over my old journals ... from years and years ago until now.  I've kept journals for the majority of the last 10 or so years, so finding patterns is not too hard.  Almost EVERY day I have a little somethin' somethin' and some days I have A LOT o' somethin' somethin'.  It is my biggest weakness.

Last night was another bad episode.  Of course yesterday the hunger monster raged it's ugly head and I just could not feel satisfied, even with a good amount of protein and veggies throughout the day.  After dinner my MIL brought over some blueberry cake and somehow I ate 3 pieces.  Then in the office there was a box of Toffifee and four pieces of that called my name until my stomach hurt and I wanted to hurl the box across the room.

Of course I was tired yesterday, and I hadn't drank enough water.  After consuming the above I had a half hour nap then woke up with incredible thirst and drank 4 glasses of water (definitely thirsty!).  I should know the signs.  I can give the advice.  If this were anyone else I'd recommend having the nap and the water BEFORE consuming the junk.  Somehow that doesn't compute in the moment and I don't know why.  Very frustrating!

The Easy Stuff

Tonight begins the first run of my training plan.  It's 1/11/11 ... somehow that's fitting for a new beginning, isn't it? 

The plan calls for some speed intervals and I'm very much looking forward to it.

1. .75 miles @ 8:46 pace (6.8 mph)
2. .25 miles recovery
3. .50 miles @ 8:12 pace (7.3 mph)
4. .12 miles recovery
5. .50 miles @ 8:12 pace (7.3 mph)
6. .12 miles recovery
7. .12 miles @ 8:00 pace (7.5 mph)
8. .12 miles recovery
9. repeat steps 7 & 8 four times total

Total Distance 3.2 miles
I'm going to add in a 1 mile warm-up and possibly a 1 (or half) mile cool-down at a steady, easy pace.

The running & training is the easy part.  If I could do only that and have success in losing weight it would be a snap.  Exercise is a very important key in loosing and maintaining weight, but you gotta have the diet on board as well.  I know this all too well from experience ... sigh.

Keep Active!

Heidi

♥♥♥♥♥

Case of the Lazies

I kinda feel like a slug.  A busy slug, but a slug. 

I have not ran since my 14 mile run on Saturday.  I had anticipated Sunday to be a rest day, but things kind of got away from me.

Sunday both my kids had soccer games in away locations.  I probably spent over 3 hours of driving that day.  And kind of all for not.  There was a mix up with my daughter's team and even though they won the game, and played great (she's improving so much!) ... they likely will record a loss on the scoreboard on a technicality because they didn't have a required item with them (sub coach who isn't experienced in this stuff - not his fault).  It sucks, but it is what it is.  The other team's behaviour was disgusting though.  After the game, which score-wise our team won, the other team started jumping up and down screeching "We Won! We Won! hahaha You lost!".  I would smack my child to the heavens if she acted like that. 

Afterwards, in another location, my son had his game.  It was another very physical game, very intense.  One of our players got kicked out for foul language ... he's had it coming for a while.  We were a man down and playing hard, but loosing.  Right near the end, my son, who is defense, attempted a bicycle kick and landed wrong - flat on his back.  After a good 5 minutes down, he was able to walk off the field and we left the game.  He was in a lot of pain.

Monday was spent at doctors and x-rays, followed by filling a prescription for pain.  Luckily nothing is broken or misaligned, but he is still very, very sore.  This zapped any energy I had for exercising on Monday.

Tuesday I just plain didn't have it in me.  This coming home in the dark SUCKS!  And it was raining and cold (4°C/39°F).  Normally my son makes a fire in the woodstove when he gets home, which he can't do right now, the house was cold when I got home.  I had plans to meet with a friend for a run, but one of her cat's died and she wasn't into it.

Know what these are?  All excuses!  I got a case of the lazies.  Unfortunately, I also have a case of eating crap. 

I don't know if it's just the mental idea of running more miles - you know, the excuse that if you run that much you can eat what you want.  But it doesn't work that way.  Especially when you take 3 days off.

This morning I somewhat rectified it.  I got my weekly swim done.  2000 Meters today.  However, I followed it up with breakfast from McDonald's (which my body apparently did not like and let me know it!).  I gotta turn this bus around.  My schedule is all mixed up this week, which is throwing off my runs, but there's no reason I can't at least keep my eating in order. 

I have big plans for tomorrow ... kinda scared, kinda excited, kinda ready.

Keep Active!

Heidi

♥♥♥♥♥

Sugar Overload

One thing I really noticed on this last little mini trip is how excessive we've gotten with our sugar/crap food intake.  I've mentioned many times in the past that my husband has a major sweet tooth.  I do too, but can usually keep it in reasonable check.  Recently it has been growing and I'm having more and more cravings.

However, after the wedding, we had a long, boring 4 hour drive to our friends house.  After a couple of long days and late nights we were all exhausted.  Halfway through the drive my husband started asking what there was to eat.  Well, I .... being the good healthy-living person I am ... did not pack ANY cookies or such and relatively little in the way of junky snack foods.  My husband needed a fix like a drug addict.

So we whipped into the next Walmart (in the not so lovely town of Edson, Alberta) and the stuff we got was insane!

• chocolate covered almonds
• chocolate covered raisins
• Oreo
• Chips Ahoy
• chocolate covered butter cookies
• 8 pack of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
• 2 boxes chocolate covered caramel granola bars
• dried cranberries
• dried pineapple (injected with a ton of sugar)
• 4 boxes of juice

As horrible as this is, what's worse is that 3 days later all of this was essentially gone .... GONE!  Even between 4 people this is still a ton of junk.  That's just crazy.

To my credit about the only thing I ate out of that was pretty much the whole bag of chocolate covered almonds, 1 Reese cup, and a few of the dried pineapples ... but still, too much.  I told my husband that we seriously need to make some changes.
 
On our long drive home, while feeling VERY toxic, I decided I needed to make some changes.  Something I've thought about before, dabbled in, but never really fully embraced.

Tomorrow I'll let you know what it is, and how it's going so far.

 June 1 - 5 mile/8K run

June 2 - 30 Day Shred Level 1
June 3 - 4 x 1 mile treadmill intervals and core
June 4 - 30 Day Shred Level 1
June 5 - 2.5 mile walk and 1.5 mile run
June 6 - 3 Hours heavy clean-up

June 7 - 5 x 10 minute treadmill intervals and some core

June 8 - Shred Level 1

June 9 - 45 min run/walk

June 10 - lifting & walking

June 11 - lifting & walking

June 12 - 30 min run & dancing

June 13 - 30 min hike

June 14 - run & walk

June 15 - 2+ hours walking

June 16 - swimming & stair climbing

June 17 - 7 mile treadmill run

June 18 - walking

June 19 - stairs & walking

June 20 - 8 mile run (pretty fast)

June 21 - 6.2 mile steady run

June 22 - 6 mile run

June 23 - 7 mile run

 Keep Active!

Heidi

♥♥♥♥♥

Food Thieves

The other day I posted that I was going to do some prep work on the weekend for the week ahead.

This is what I had planned and how it worked out:

• ♥ Another fruit salad - done, and nearly gone (see below)
• ♥ Raw veggies - done
• ♥ Teriyaki Chicken Stir-fry - postponed
• ♥ Another pasta dish - postponed
• ♥ Hard boil eggs - done
• ♥ Double batch steel cut oats - half done
• ♥ Chop peaches for morning oats - done

Mostly a success, some issues.

I decided to postpone making the stir fry & pasta dish because I looked at my week and realized that I had time to do that mid-week.  Plus, I decided to make a huge batch of Black Bean Soup, which will last me for a few days. 

I ran into a bit of a problem making a double batch of oats as I found I was ... almost out!  So I made what was left in the container and that will have to do until next shopping day.

The fruit is almost a funny story!  I cut up:

• two HUGE cantaloupes
• a large honeydew melon
• a pineapple
• 5 POUNDS of strawberries 

This went into two massive containers, plus I filled up a container for Monday's lunch. 

Later that evening, my son was searching for food and I told him there was some cut up fruit.  He is a MAJOR sugar-holic and we've been a bit on his case lately.  So he grabbed the fruit and made a yoghurt-cool whip dip.  Much better than anything else he would have had.

In typically teenage boy fashion ... he ate almost half of what I had prepared.  Then my daughter came home from swimming with a friend and ate some.  Then my husband came home and got into it.

On Monday morning all I had left was:

• 4 strawberries
• 3 - 1" x 2" slices of honeydew
• 6 - 1" x 2" slices of cantaloupe

On one hand I'm ecstatic that my family is eating all this healthy fruit.  But on the other ..... so much for my prepped meals.  The other food I prepared is safe though because they won't touch it.  I stopped at the produce store on the way home last night for restocking. Guess I'll have to cut up alot more.

I'm feeling icky today.  Last night my sister's BIL was supposed to come into town for work and I had agreed to make him cookies (there's a back story to this).  So I made up 3 batches last night.  Only to get a call saying his work schedule had changed and he wouldn't be in town. 

If you've been reading this blog for a while you know that I have issues with binging on cookie dough while baking.  I did pretty good last night and just had a taste of each dough to make sure it was OK.  But this morning .... breakfast was 3 chocolate chip cookies (they are pretty small) and a peanut butter chocolate no-bake oat cookie.  I feel gross!  I skipped regular breakfast because I just couldn't have something else on top of that.  It surprises me a little how full that made me feel.  I'm going to remember this feeling when I get home and they're facing me again.  The good thing is my piggy family will consume what's left within the next 24 hours so the temptation won't last.

REMINDER....

Today is Jen @ Prior Fat Girls Challenge

If she can get 500 people to commit to doing 60+ minutes of activity on April 20th, Tony the Anti-Jared, will donate $250 to YMCA Activate America.

I'll be doing 60+ minutes today to support this cause.  I'm not even an American, but still, I think this is a good cause worth supporting and really it couldn't be any easier.  A healthier world benefits everyone!

Will you????

PS - If you aren't a blogger but you do 60+ minutes of activity today, sent me a note and I'll let Jen know you've helped out her cause.

Heidi

 ♥♥♥♥♥

Confessions

I can go on and on about how my running is going.  For me, that's the easy part.  It's just one foot in front of the other ... One Step At A Time.

My eating however has been sliding down a slope at breakneck speed and I fear I'm getting out of control.

Confessions of what I have consumed since last Thursday, when the slide began:

Thursday

• Didn't pack lunch so had a Subway sandwich for lunch - that's not so bad.  But then had a sweet craving and walked across the street to the store and got a 227g package of Twizzlers red licorice = 750 calories.
• After work I had a crunch craving and ate a huge bowl of popcorn, plain, but still way more than a serving.   

Friday

• Oatmeal for breakfast with WAY too many toppings
• Mexican for lunch - huge bowl of bean soup and green salad not so bad, but most of a basket of deep fried tortilla strips

Saturday

• Woke up feeling stupid full.  Decided not to eat until I actually "felt" hungry.  That wasn't until about 5:30pm.  I had a bowl of mini wheats cereal. 
• An hour later my husband called and asked if we wanted to meet him at a restaurant for dinner.  Had chicken lettuce wraps.  Not a horrible choice, but alot of sodium and I felt pretty full afterwards so I must have eaten too much.

 Sunday

• Had a late breakfast of toasted buns (two) topped with peanut butter and jam.  This day actually wasn't too bad.  My "friend" arrived in the afternoon which led me to believe that may be the reason behind my excessive and unhealthy choices. 

Monday

• Didn't pack lunch again for work, got Subway again - this is my go to.  Knew that wouldn't be quite enough to sustain me so walked over to the grocery store with the intention of getting a piece of fruit and a yoghurt.  Instead I left with a baggy of party mix (pretzels, nuts, etc.) and some swedish berries. 
• Went grocery shopping after work and somehow ended up with another bag from the bulk bin with chocolate covered almonds.  Ate most of them on the drive home, then left the last few in my car - which I ate today. 
• Made a mexican bean soup for dinner (VERY good).  Then hubby came home with more junk again and right before bed I had a Reese's peanut butter cup, a Chips Ahoy chocolate chip cookie, and a Riesen (never need a reason to have a Riesen!).
• Tossed and turned all night from a bloated, sick tummy - plus the feelings of guilt about my eating habits as of late. 

Tuesday

• Woke up exhausted from lack of sleep.  No time to prepare breakfast OR lunch, or even my morning tea.  Could barely keep my eyes open to drive to work.  Decided to pick up a fat free (wowie) French Vanilla Cappuccino - loaded with sugar and calories.  Then, I was still craving some sort of REAL food, so I went to McDonald's and got a Sausage McMuffin with egg & cheese.  We're looking at over 700 calories for my breakfast alone.
• Figured I'd just skip lunch because I had more than enough to sustain me.  But then hubby called and asked to meet me for lunch at my favourite place - The Olive Garden.  We rarely ever do lunch together (or a meal out) so I agreed to go.  Ate fairly light, but still felt stuffed.
• Came home after work determined that if I even felt hungry I would eat something very light.  Then, proceeded to dig into the junk still sitting on the coffee table - 2 Reese's peanut butter cups and 3 Riesens.
• Followed by a toasted english muffin with peanut butter and jam. 

I feel DISGUSTING!

And terrified!  So out of control and at this point I don't even know if I can stop it.  I'm only hoping by putting this out there that it helps me rein it in.  I can't remember the last time I felt so out of control, certainly not for so long.

After the english muffin tonight, I proceeded to clean out my cupboards & fridges.  Things were getting really disorganized and I had a ton of stuff to be cleaned out and reogranized.  Maybe this will help me????  Maybe it can at least get me back to packing my lunch and preparing more of my own meals.  If I don't need to go out for meals then I shouldn't be tempted to pick up the wrong thing.  I have lots of good food in my house and I need to use it!

Please, let me get things back in control! 

I don't like this feeling ... at all.

Heidi

♥♥♥♥♥

I'm Giving Up!

I'm feeling like a bit of a failure. :(  I've been trying to follow this Clean Eating Diet for almost 2 weeks now and have come to the conclusion that it's not for me.  Two weeks isn't long and maybe I'm a failure for giving up already, but it just doesn't feel right.  I still very much agree with the principles of this plan (eating frequently, eating fresh, unprocessed foods, eating protein with meals, but I think I have to scrap it.

I'm feeling way too constricted with what I'm supposed to eat and what I'm not supposed to eat.  I was getting to the point where I was getting ZERO enjoyment out of eating and there was a day when I wanted to throw out all my food because the thought of eating it was making me gag.  Plus, I found myself constantly thinking of foods not on my plan, unhealthy foods - which is strange because normally I eat pretty well.  I ended up reaching often for things that normally I'd rarely have.  And when I did eat outside of my plan I had this feeling of guilt.  Personally I don't think you should feel guilty for eating something, even if it is horribly unhealthy. 

As I mentioned before, in the first few days I had horrible bloat, which mostly went away - but not completely.  I had a couple days of high energy, but I noticed that I also had periods of extreme tiredness.  Sometimes this would come on suddenly and hit me like a freight train - other times I could barely pull myself out of bed.  Though generally my energy would pick up later in the day.

I think the real kicker is that 2 weeks in my weight is still up a little and I'm still feeling bloated.  I think the time has come to kick this one out the door.

So I'm going back to what has worked in the past - counting calories with a focus on eating healthy, clean foods.  I had gotten bored with recording every bite, but it does work.

Wouldn't this be wicked? 

Also, I have my next race (10K) coming up this weekend.  As soon as that is over I'm going to dedicate more time to weight training.  I'm going to have lots of races throughout the year and while I want to do well at them, if I really want to change the look of my body I know that weights is where it's at.  I'm just often worried that I'll be sore from a weights workout before a long run (you'd be amazed how hard it is to run with sore biceps).  But what I really need is to work those muscles more often so I don't get as sore.  Make it part of my routine again.

Last night I did 40 minutes of weights (full body workout) and then 2 fairly fast miles on the treadmill.  Tonight I'm going to dedicate to some speed intervals on the track.  The workouts are always the easy part for me.

I leave you with a very important lesson ....

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Happy New Year to all my blogging buddies.  Wishing you all the best for 2010!  You guys have been a big part of my life for this past year and I look forward to more of that this year.

I have been completely MIA from blogland for quite some time now.  December ended up being an insanely hectic month for me.  I actually feel like I've been MIA from life for the past month and it's all a bit of a blur.

I finally got my bookkeeping nightmare for our business in order.  I had a deadline to file the GST (taxes) by December 31st and yesterday we drove out to the tax office to drop it off.  From Boxing Day on I spent almost the entire day until late at night everyday to get this done.  This meant no exercising, no real cooking and a lot of mindless snacking.

Earlier in the month (while avoiding facing my bookkeeping nightmare) I went into bakers overload.  This is just a minor portion of what I ended up cooking (and eating).  I made:

• 8 dozen decorated gingerbread cookies
• 14 dozen peanut butter cookies
• 6 dozen almond crescents
• 8 dozen mexican wedding cake cookies
• 1 - 8x13 tray of the MOST DELICIOUS cheesecake cookie squares
• 2 - 4 x 7 trays of sickenly sweet peanut butter fudge
• 1 cookie sheet of almond roca

I don't even want to think about how much of that I ate all by myself.  I know one day I had a "snack" or SIX peanut butter cookies!

Susan posted the other day about waking up in the middle of the night to have Tums and I can totally relate.  That's such a sick feeling to know that you've over eaten, and mostly with unhealthy foods, so much that it wakes you up at night.  Gross!

We also went to a couple of Christmas parties.  I bought this shirt a few weeks ago, a size 6 (though I think a large size 6), and I love the color.  This is my father-in-law, me & my husband.  Unfortunately since that picture was taken I've been eating like crazy and now have a little tire around my waist that isn't very appealing in that shirt.

Then an improtu trip up to the Okanagan that, while wonderful to get away and see family up there, really cut into my time that I needed to be doing other things.

Saw a little wildlife....

and my little girl got to visit with her cousins....

I created this crazy time crunch for myself and got majorly stressed out!  I haven't been sleeping much at all.

Throughout the month of December I did very, very little exercising and really didn't pay any attention to my diet at all.  At the end of November I was sitting at around 145 - 145.6 (that 143.6 was a fleeting moment unfortunately).  Right now I can be anywhere between 147 and 149, though mostly under 148.  I guess considering all that has gone on my gain isn't too bad, but I feel gross.  I'm very soft compared to where I was.  And I know I've lost some fitness.

I can probably count on one hand how many times I ran in December, and most of them were 5K or less and a very slow pace.

On December 30th at 11 PM I finished my bookkeeping, went to bed with the intention of forgetting about it all for a few days ... and didn't sleep all night. Then went out and about all the next day, then celebrated New Years Eve with friends (no alcohol though so that was good) and stayed out until 2 AM. Had to get up at 8 AM this morning. So at the moment I'm running on less than 8 hrs sleep in the last 48 hours. Way too little for me!

But January 1st marks a new start! 

And that .... I shall blog about tomorrow :)

Goodnight all.........

Attack of the 'Cereal' Killer

Ahhh, yesterday we had a serious problem in our house.  Very serious!  We had a serial killer there ... or, ummmm .... should I say "cereal" killer!

I worked a little longer than expected and just didn't plan out my meals throughout the day like I should have.  No protein in the morning, ate lunch too early...  The result was by the time I got home from work I was hungry - like NOW hungry.  I was also tired (partly the result of lack of sleep, partly due to an overly hot office that I can't adjust the temperature at).  I almost fell asleep at my desk in the afternoon.

When I came in the door the first thing I saw was a big ol' open box of this....

So in the hand went .. a few times. 



My plans for dinner was a Chicken Spinach Salad - pretty healthy right???  But after a bit of that sweet cereal I threw it all out the door and chose to have cereal instead.

To make it a little healthier I had it with non-fat milk and this...

That SOOO makes it better, doesn't it ☺(Not!)

And to make a bad choice even worse ... I had TWO bowls of this!  UGH!  Can you say binge?!  Half an hour later I felt just gross.  Too full!

After that the plan was to take my daughter to her dance class, then come home and run for an hour on the treadmill.  But when I came home I found Garry laying on living room floor, so I layed down beside him and fell asleep just around 8:30.  Apparently my body needed sleep, which I think is partially the reason for my indulgence.

Boy does this look comfy!

Today I have things much better planned out, and am not feeling nearly as tired.  Got a free evening and am definitely feeling the need to RUN!