My accountability log

[slesca]

Day 3: so far so good

I'm starting my Day 3 and decided that logging is something I really need to do so that I'm making a very conscious decision to stay compliant every day. I don't know that I'm going to write about food that I eat but rather challenges and how I plan to deal with them or victories I have in dealing with them.

I've mostly followed a paleo diet for about 3 years now. However, I've never been 100% and I've always included lots of dairy and weekend junk food/wine. I'm very close to feeling like I've reached my physical performance and appearance goals but I have this laaaaaast bit that I'd like to work on. Mainly, my energy level could use a bit of a boost and I suspect that I have a few lbs of fat that aren't really necessary.

I'm a person who forms habits very easily and I have a long standing habit of putting my head down and working hard during the week but then taking all rules off the table on weekends. What I would prefer is to separate this connection of relaxation->junky food/alcohol/laziness and remake the connection to be relaxation->tea drinking/leisurely walks/something else.

Even deeper, I'd like to stop living for my weekends. I'm in a tough (for me) career and I want to be able to enjoy my weekdays and not try cramming everything that makes me happy into a 1 or 2 day weekend. I want to enjoy the moments of my life more: whether it's dinner on Tuesday with my kids and husband, the car ride to daycare with my son, or my lunchtime workouts. I don't know that completing the Whole 30 will necessarily change this, but I think the effort involved will keep me self-aware.

So, in the spirit of examining my challenges, here goes:

1. I have terrible seasonal allergies right now. This is making me feel sorry for myself and want some sort of "reward" to counteract the yuckiness. Coping strategy: Go to bed early whenever possible. This will make me feel much better than junk food.

2. I have a social event on Sunday where I will be eating other people's food. While I'm usually good when I cook for myself, I'm terrible with self control in these social/grazing sort of circumstances. Also, weekend socializing always = alcohol with everyone we know. There won't be much pressure at this one but it will still be there. Coping strategy: Bring some food that I love. Eat before I go. Drink a lot of water. Bring some sparkling water. Make jokes about being pregnant if anyone notices that I'm not drinking.

3. I have to do my end-of-month stuff at work tonight. This is usually made better by getting some junk food (candy, popcorn) so that staying at work until midnight isn't completely awful. Coping strategy: I have no idea. This will just have to suck. I suppose I could pretend that a larabar is delicious popcorn. Hope that maybe the new, more focused me that will emerge at the end of this challenge will be able to do a little bit of this work at a time during the last week of the month and I won't have to pull this late night crap anymore.

[Derval]

Good strategising! You can do it.

[Renee Kosowan]

Good luck on your journey!

Maybe you can keep nutritious foods at work for your late night snack?

Or make an awesome playlist and pump up the jams when you are working late?

[slesca]

Music, yes! That is a good substitution idea. I always wish I had more music in my life.

[Derval]

This is one of my fav running tracks, I bet you could apply it to your workload

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SIRpKa5ZMA

[slesca]

Day 4

Getting here was pretty easy. My work session went well last night because...I worked remotely and did it at home. I'm getting a lot better at being productive at home and not needing to be in a work like setting, I guess. I'm still not done but should be able to finish my end of month in the next hour or so and not have to deal with it...for another month.

My hayfever seems a little better this morning. I really need to get more sleep and will focus on that this weekend.

I looked up a bunch of W30 approved appetizer recipes and plan on making a few and bringing them to the party on Sunday. This should give me something to eat and feel like I'm participating in the food sharing. So, overall, I think I'll make it through this first weekend pretty easily. I'll start planning for the second right away!

I had forgotten to weigh myself so I did that last night. I also measured my hips, waist and thigh. I won't peek at anything until the end of my Whole30. I will also take a photo of myself today, as well as a close up of my face to see if I have any changes there.

Finally, I'm hoping that after I make it through this first weekend that I can start really honing my focus. Another goal I have for myself is to include more nutritionally dense food in my diet: liver, shellfish, kale, avocado, etc. At the same time I will reduce the fillers like lettuce, cucumbers, chicken breasts, deli meats and sausages. Baby steps, though: I have to resist the urges for cheese/wine/chocolate/popcorn first.

[slesca]

Day 5

Starting my 5th day. I imagine this will be my last easy day for a while. I'm doing a late night 5k race, so luckily there will not be any junk food or alcohol temptations. But I imagine I'll confront both tomorrow.

Some changes I notice right away: smaller in the tummy and my rings are looser. Also, I can go forever without eating. On Wednesday I basically went from 8 p.m. until 5 p.m. the next day without even noticing it. This is good for me as I have to cram a lot into my work day and being able to skip lunch with no ill effect is great. Then I eat dinner with gusto. I'm curious to see what my next 5 days brings for changes. As I said above, I took a picture of my face to see if I will notice any different there. In scrutinizing it, I do have some faint fine lines on my forehead and dark circles under my eyes. My nose was really red but that (and possibly the circles) could be from my hayfever. For reference, I'm 31 years old. I'm not sure what my face "should" look like, but I do notice puffiness when my diet is bad and when both of my children were babies and I only slept about 5 hours/night, I had very distinct creases between my nose, around my mouth and on my forehead. Those appear to be in my past, now. Unless I make the poor decision to have another kid .

One thing I've done this week is use a menu planner from foodee.com. It was fantastic! Every night I had wonderful dinners to look forward to and never felt deprived at all. My family loved it too and they all ate nearly Whole30 dinners (they added sour cream to a mexican dish). I am definitely going to do this next week, though I don't need to plan for 7 different meals; I think with how satisfying all of the meals are, I can probably make 4-5 work for the week. Awesome resource.

Happy weekend everyone. Be well and be strong!

[Derval]

Well done on the meal planning and the fresh face

Also, I can go forever without eating. On Wednesday I basically went from 8 p.m. until 5 p.m. the next day without even noticing it. This is good for me as I have to cram a lot into my work day and being able to skip lunch with no ill effect is great.

Even though this suits you and your workload you should really not be doing intermittant fasting while doing your Whole 30. The ideal scenario is eat within an hour of waking and then eat solid meals , based on the meal planning template, spaced 4-5 hours apart. Such long gaps between meals is messing up the hormones you are trying to re-set during your w30.

[slesca]

Day 6

I'm starting my sixth day. Last night was nice. I went out to dinner with my husband and then hung out at an event downtown for a bit. Had a nice decent bedtime of 10:45 or so and slept until 7. I'm still sneezy in the morning and my eyes are still really watery but my hayfever isn't making me as tired as it has earlier this week.

I had a really successful day of going out to eat yesterday: both times I ate was at a restaurant and both were 100% perfect meals. It's been a long time since I've made such an effort to eat well at a restaurant AND enjoyed the result so much. I need to remember this: "good choices" at restaurants don't necessarily mean that the meal is going to be bad. Yah, I know, it seems obvious, but I've always thought that if I am going to pay for a restaurant meal I might as well make it worth my money. I've had some terrible experiences of paying a lot for a horrible iceberg lettuce salad with two slices of deli chicken or something.

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RE: meal frequency

Oh, really? I've never been a breakfast person and always found that I was rushing to eat at lunch because I'd feel off in the afternoon if I didn't. But I felt better than ever this week on the day I just ate a big dinner and nothing else. I'll have to figure something out about mornings, then, and see if I can switch to being a morning eater. After years of believing I had to eat every three hours (and always failing and feeling like it was so much work!) I've been so happy in the past 3 years to just eat when I feel like it instead of when I'm "supposed" to.

But it's never too late to start: off to make some breakfast!

[slesca]

So I sadly only made it about 8 days during my go earlier. These sorts of failures make me so frustrated with myself. Then, rather than get back on it, I just went REALLY off the rails for a while. Almost like I'm protesting something. But I'm back and will do it this time. I'm starting today and really have no foreseeable difficulties for at least a month: not one single party, holiday, etc. I think I'll even tell everyone in my life I'm doing this so they can poke fun at me/remind me not to fail.