Month: May 2018

It’s true. Many people still cling to the outdated and oft disproved notion that bacon and eggs are bad for you and persist with thinking that fruits like bananas, pineapple, and drinking orange juice is better for you. They couldn’t be more wrong.

Let’s take a look at the government’s own nutrition facts for a banana.

How about a look at a glass of orange juice in comparison.

So. From a calories standpoint, a medium banana or a cup of orange juice EACH has nearly the same calories as a can of Coca Cola. When we look at grams of sugar, it gets even scarier:

• Medium banana: 27g
• Glass of OJ: 26g
• Can of Coca Cola: 39g

To put that into perspective, when I’m doing the Keto diet, I take in between 20-30g of sugar FOR THE ENTIRE DAY. So, if you have a banana and a glass of OJ, you’re at over 53g of sugar, and you’re just getting started!

I’ve talked extensively in the past about how sugar is metabolized by the liver with help from the pancreas to turn it into energy the body can use. The excess sugar is turned into fat to store for later, and when we get these shocks of excessive energy, we tend to gain weight through the fat storage. The body is only doing what it’s designed to do. It’s up to use to use it properly.

Oh, I know what you’re thinking: “What about bacon and eggs?” Here are the nutritional labels for each.

I typically eat two eggs and two slices of bacon which gives me roughly a calorie total of 270 calories. Contrary to what we’ve been told, I don’t worry about the cholesterol intake because I know that:

1. Cholesterol imbibed orally does not “stick to your arteries.” Our bodies are far more complex than that.
2. If I eat too much cholesterol, the body gets rid of it. Have you ever had the runs after eating too much fatty food? I have.

So, it’s worth looking at the food you currently think is healthy and really look at what that food is doing to your body and how your body uses it. Bacon and eggs is 100 times better (by my count) than eating a bowl of bananas and pineapples with orange juice.

It doesn’t matter what you’re doing, as long as you can get some activity, your heart will thank you for it. I wrote yesterday about exercising when I was obese versus being at a healthier weight, and how much easier it is for me now. With that said, one of the greatest quality of life improvements I made for myself was after I began exercising. I noticed that things just became easier physically, and I began wanting to be more active and doing more.

No, I didn’t set out to run marathons or do an Iron Man (and I still don’t!), but I did endeavor to get out and do things like go zip lining, go on trail hikes, and to go to carnivals, fairs, and museums where the main activity included a lot of walking. These were things that were difficult for me before but now, since I began with some walking and then worked up to light jogging, were easy for me. Fast forward nearly three years, and I’m running 8-ish minute miles consistently and pushing past 60-80 push ups in two minutes regularly.

I am not someone who LOVES exercise. That’s my sister. She loves working out, and I wish that I did, too. I do it because I feel it’s necessary and because of how good it makes me feel afterward. I also do it because I have to: I need to stay in shape as a soldier in the Army National Guard. However, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I derived some sort of enjoyment out of it. I’m competitive with myself, and I’m always pushing for better times and sometimes even for longer distances.

How did I get into running? Oddly enough, by doing push ups. I started by doing the most I could without straining, which as I remember it, was around 7. I then waited a day and tried again. 7. Took off another day and tried again: 10. And so on until I got to around 60 push ups. Then, something strange happened. I felt like doing push ups just wasn’t enough. After I finished doing my push ups one day, I felt like I needed to do more, so I went out for a walk. I continued walking every other day after my push ups until one day, I felt that the walking just wasn’t doing enough for me, so I tried a light jog. It felt great! It’s as if shackles were removed from my feet, and I felt free! Eventually, light jogging turned into jogging which then turned into running. Now, nearly three years later, I run regularly and I’m striving for a consistent sub-8 minute mile pace on a three mile run.

Once you’ve lost some weight, give exercise a chance. You might find you like it. It’s definitely easier when you’re lighter.

When I weighed 312 lbs, I tried in vain to exercise away my bad diet and to lose weight. Needless to say, the attempt was a miserable failure for two reasons:

1. I didn’t change my diet. I continued to eat carb-rich foods and foods with lots of sweeteners in it that continued to activate the cravings/appetite.
2. I wasn’t able to exercise effectively due to the discomfort of being obese and a lack of motivation.

The first part is what I finally changed in 2015 when my wife and I did our first Whole30 in August of that year. The second part is something I finally tackled in September of 2016 when I began running.

The fact of the matter is that trying to do strenuous exercise when you are obese is not only dangerous, but extremely difficult and uncomfortable. I remember the simple act of climbing a flight or two of stairs would leave me winded and sweaty. Running, or even jogging, was completely out of the question. Walks would leave me exhausted and drenched in sweat. The sad part is that I thought that the sweat meant I was losing weight. Unfortunately, weight loss has no correlation to the amount you sweat while working out.

I tried and failed to lose weight using exercise when I was morbidly obese. I remember how hard it was, and how defeated I felt. I was in my mid-40’s and bought a mountain bike in an attempt to take up something to help me lose weight. I tried to ride that bike around the neighborhood, but every time I did, I felt horrible. I couldn’t keep my breath, my legs hurt for days afterward, and since I was so heavy, the act of pedalling tires that were bulging under my weight (which makes it hard to move) was all just too much for me. Fast forward three years. I rode my mountain bike on trails for the first time since I was 15 last week, and it was glorious. I grinned like an idiot for the entire 33 minutes, not only because it felt so good to be back out in the woods on a trail again, but because it felt so easy. It was effortless to get moving. I could pedal so hard that I actually did burn outs in the dirt!

Exercise for me now is actually all about my heart health, getting some good cardio, and making sure I can run fast enough to pass my APFT’s in the National Guard. I don’t exercise to lose weight or for weight control: I eat carefully to maintain my weight. I understand that diet controls weight and exercise controls fitness. I wish I’d have had a better understanding of that 15 or even 30 years ago. My life would have been very different.

Exercising now is a joy. Exercising when I was obese was a dangerous and difficult proposition. If you are obese, consider changing your diet and waiting until you lose some weight before attempting strenuous exercise. You will feel so much better exercising when you’re lighter that you’ll actually be able to stick with it and continue your workouts. Sure, exercise leaves you a little sore if you did it right, but it’s a “Good” kind of sore versus the pain of injury. As I write this, my legs are feeling the burn of last night’s run. The funny part is that now, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

And that’s okay.

We are all made up of different genetic backgrounds, and for some of us, it’s unrealistic to think that we’ll ever be skinny or thin. And that’s perfectly fine. What is not okay and fine is to accept being obese, overweight, and unhealthy. Those are very different things from being thin.

Our culture fixates and celebrates being thin. Look at our most famous models, actors and actresses and whose who we look up to in our society. They are mostly thin. There are the rare exceptions, but for the most part, how often do you see a pop star who is overweight? Not often.

I am in pretty good shape. I’m not thin, but I’m not overweight, either. I’m what I would call at a healthy size and weight. My body fat is pretty low, and I wear mediums or smalls when I buy shirts, and my pants are between 30″ and 32″ depending on manufacturer. I am within the Army’s height and weight standards, but what matters most to me is that my body is healthy. I have extensive physicals annually due to my military service and my age, and so far, I’ve been found to be very healthy. But I’m not thin.

People ask me all the time what my goal is, and honestly, for a long time, I used to answer that I want to be thinner. Now, I say that I just want to be healthy. I know I’m made up of Eastern European genes, and my forebears were not thin people; they were mostly stalky. I cannot go against that without becoming unhealthy, and I’m not willing to do that to myself.

Set realistic expectations with what your end game is, and be happy with who you are. Once you get to a healthy weight and your blood work results are that you are healthy, then you are probably at the right size for you. Don’t try to make yourself into something you cannot be in a healthy manner, and don’t think for a second that you need to meet someone else’s or society’s standard for what is considered beautiful; you already are. You just need to be healthy.

The most difficult time to eat right is when going on vacation to a foreign country where you have no control over the preparation of the food you will be eating. Fortunately, most foreign countries have healthier options made from whole ingredients, but that doesn’t mean everything on the menu is going to be healthy or good for you.

I find that for the most part, eating in foreign countries is easy enough with a little planning and understanding what is in the foods you’re looking at eating. Most better restaurants will have healthier options, and many will even work with you if you discuss your concerns with them. I’ve not yet run into someone being offended when I explain to them that I need to avoid grains.

Sometimes, it’s just not possible to avoid the foods you’re trying to stay away from; it’s inevitable. In those cases, I do my best to mitigate the impact on my health by limiting the amount I eat or making the best choices possible given the options. This has served me well in Spain, and I’m hoping it will do the same in Ireland and Scotland.

I hope to be posting some of my culinary experiences soon, as well as experiencing running in both countries. I’m taking my running shoes and running gear, and I plan on sticking to my running plan while we’re there.

As I’ve said many times before, however, you can’t out-run a bad diet, so I will be ever-vigilant and doing my best to mitigate the damage through better choices.

I had some cake and alcohol last night. I even ate a roll and something called a blondie. These were all filled with carbs, sugar, and grains, and while I enjoyed these foods for the moment I ate them, literally as soon as the food was swallowed, any joy I derived from them was gone. What remained was the calories, the sugar, and the guilt.

I know: life is full of experiences, and sometimes, those experiences are through food and drink. The event my wife and I went to was a gala for the Habitat for Humanity, and it was a fundraiser with lots of great food. Surprisingly, everything but the dessert was either Paleo or Keto friendly. Had I stopped at dessert and avoided the alcoholic beverages, I would have remained true to my diet. However, being a special event, we decided to enjoy the food and drinks.

What ensued was a night of fitful sleep and sweats and a few pounds of water retention-related weight gain. While I know the effects will not be long-lasting, I prefer to not have to go through the 2-5 days of recovery after I do something like this. It’s in those days afterward that I’m reminded of the fact that the pleasure I derived from those foods and drink were very short-lived while I have to deal with the after-effects for a much longer period of time.

Maybe it’s because I’m nearing the three-year point in my journey of eating well, but I’m beginning to realize that even the enjoyment I experience from eating foods that have lots of sugar, carbs, or grains in them isn’t nearly as great as it used to be. I’m getting more and more accustomed to the Paleo and Keto foods, and I prefer them more and more. I can’t even drink any alcoholic beverage with Coca Cola in it anymore; it’s too sweet for me to even swallow.

The next time you’re about to go off-course, think about what you’re really getting out of it. Will it taste good? Perhaps, but what are you giving up long-term for that very little bit of pleasure? Is it really worth it? Most of the time, I decide that it is not, and I end up feeling much better in the long term for having made that call.

Every day I wake up starts the first day of my diet. What I did yesterday doesn’t matter so much as it set up any success I will work toward today. Today could be the day I eat well and make some more progress toward getting back to my all-time lowest weight, or it can be the day I throw away any progress I’ve made and eat whatever I want. The point is, where you are today is a product of the work you’ve done to this point, but it doesn’t determine where you will be tomorrow: today does that.

I find this to be helpful to my mindset literally every day. I make the day, good or bad. I make decisions, good or bad. I will determine how much success I will realize, or how much failure I will experience all based on decisions I make throughout the day. I choose, the majority of the time, to succeed and to make progress. At a minimum, I don’t want to back-track.

Most days, I succeed. Some days, I fail.

I don’t dwell on the days I fail. I take stock of what didn’t work, I try to find what did, and move forward with the lessons learned.

My point in this is don’t beat yourself up for yesterday or last week or last month. Hell, definitely don’t beat yourself up about the times you’ve failed sticking with a diet in the past. Learn from those mistakes, feed upon the successes and what worked, make a new plan, and execute it.

Today is the first day of my diet. Yesterday is gone and done. I’ve set myself up for success; it would be a shame to lose that momentum.

The problem with cheating on diets is that there’s typically no-one there to call you on it. It’s not like you’re taking a quiz or a test and have a teacher or professor in the room with you watching to make sure everyone looks on their own work. As an adult, we are responsible for ourselves, and unfortunately, many people don’t hold themselves accountable to their actions when it comes to eating.

The funny thing about cheating on diets is the more you do it, the easier it gets to do. That’s why I avoided any sabotage meals or cheats as much as I could when I was doing my Whole30’s or when I was in weight loss mode. Now that I’m in maintenance, I’m allowed a little more leeway, but even so, I don’t stray off the beaten path often. I don’t want to make it too easy for me to eat anything and everything.

Cheating is like a snowball that is rolled down a mountainside. At first, it’s not a big deal, but the more it rolls, the more it picks up more snow, gets larger, and it gets harder to stop. That’s why I find it’s best to not start that snowball rolling at all.

What are some real penalties for cheating on a diet? Aside from the loss of forward momentum or further progress, there’s the aforementioned ease with which one can cheat again. Add to this the fact that when people go off a diet, they tend to gain more weight than they originally lost. For me, there’s another penalty that is worse than all of the above, and I go through it every single time I eat anything that’s not Keto or Paleo: guilt.

I experience guilt as soon as I finish eating whatever it was that I wasn’t supposed to be eating, and it’s frankly more uncomfortable and disappointing than anything else. I feel disgust with myself for not having the strength to just say no, and to skip eating whatever it was that is bad for me. Sometimes it’s irrational, like when I decide to go ahead and eat some birthday cake or a roll before a fancy dinner. Other times, it’s well-deserved: I totally just ate something I am not supposed to for no other reason than because it was there (this usually happens if I drink alcohol, which is another topic entirely).

Since I hate feeling disappointed and disgusted with myself more than anything, I find that an amazing motivator is keeping myself from experiencing that immense guilt by avoiding foods I’m not supposed to eat. It’s how I keep myself accountable, and how I keep myself from experiencing the penalties for cheating.

My wife and I have been eating solely home-prepped foods for the past week, and we both noticed that we’re losing weight again. It’s not that the food we eat in restaurants is bad for us; we always eat Keto or Paleo options, and we are very particular about the places we eat and the choices we make. However, it’s the portion sizes that usually get us, and we both eat pretty much whatever is put in front of us out of habit.

Portion control is one of the things you learn when you do a Whole30, and it’s frankly one of the lessons I need to learn and re-learn from time to time. It’s not enough to eat good food; you can’t over-eat it. Due to the eating disorder I suffer from, if I’m not thinking about it, I can slip into over-eating very easily. Restaurants are a prime example.

So, this week, and next, we will be very good and do our best to eat solely at home. With the exception of a gala Sherry and I attended this past Saturday night and a birthday party Saturday afternoon, we ate all homemade food in the right portion sizes. We are both trying to slim down as much as we can prior to our vacation to Ireland and Scotland because we know that we will both be eating and drinking a lot of food that is likely not going to be Paleo or Keto friendly.