Phase three: Learn about food and track what I’m eating

Ok now we’re getting into the weight loss aspects of things…BUT even if you don’t need to loose weight this is important. Skinny people can be unhealthy too ya know?

Let’s get it out there – who wants to track everything they eat raise your hand…is this thing on? Yeah I thought so, either did I. And I fought it like I was fighting the hounds of hell. But ultimately I was excited that I was loosing weight and I knew I could loose more, I really wanted to loose more!! I felt better, I felt lighter, I could work out easier than before, why wouldn’t I keep going. And therefore I needed to KNOW what I was eating and how much.

Let’s get real, calorie counters

Calorie counting calculators are a pain in the ass. There I said it! Here’s what you do – add your height, weight, goal weight and how much you want to loose a week (1lb or less a week is healthy), easy enough…then!!! THEN!! How active are you. Sedentary? Well no I don’t sit all day so that’s not me. Lightly active? Well maybe I don’t know. Moderately active? Well ok how is that different from lightly active, which am I? Extremely active? Well what does that mean, I’m not training for Ironman or anything like that??? Then there are these descriptions by each one – which are kinda maybe somewhat helpful…????

FitBook, I love this little guy! Found at Target and Online

I still don’t have it figured out, I’ll be honest. At this point I work out about an hour a day for 5 days of the week and then do some kind of low activity the other two, but during the day I’m up and about fairly regularly. I do sit and I do sleep so lightly vs moderately???? I don’t know. So go with the one you feel fits the best, I think if you workout like 3-5 times a day at a moderate pace lightly active maybe helpful for you, if you super hard then moderately active may be the one. If you have a physical job and you are working out like a maniac then the extremely active is for you. If you sit at a computer all day, then sit at home and aren’t working out – sedentary – which you have bigger problems than your calories so….

So I can’t say I am a fan of calorie counting – GASP – I know, stone me later ok let me get through this post. But it does help in the tracking and I am a fan of tracking my food, seeing what I ate and how much. It helps bring awareness to what you are doing. Most of us can easily delude ourselves or honestly think we are eating pretty well. And yet we don’t feel any better, we aren’t loosing weight etc. So then you go the feast and famine route and still no change – it’s frustrating, amen?

There are several ways to track. Pen and paper (yes those items do still exists in obscure stores across America) and that works great – there is a book called a Fit Book that I love (I mean LOVE)- you can find it online or target in the fitness section. You can write out your goals, your workouts and your foods. It’s very handy and fun!! You can write notes all over the place, track whether you earned your reward you set etc. And no internet connection required. There is also MyPlate by Livestrong, and MyFitnessPal and several others. If you like the pen and paper method there is a book called the Calorie King that may help if you want to track those. I think they have an online tool too but I have no experience with it.

When we discuss macro-nutrients I’ll talk more on these calculators (you just wet your pants with excitement didn’t you), for now any one will do. You can find free ones on your phone, Ipad etc.

But just start with something, I don’t care what, and try it for two weeks, just to at least track what kind of food you’re eating.

You won’t have to do this forever, remember this is one phase of changing who you have become, this is a tool to help you incorporate all kinds of awesome habits. I can literally look at something now and gauge what’s in it, how much calories sugar and fat and what a portion size REALLY is, I wasn’t able to do that before taking this step!

Learning about Foods

So when I started writing things down I started learning about foods and labels. Things like whole wheat isn’t the same as whole grain isn’t the same as sprouted grain. I got a cold hard look at how many calories were in my beloved maple syrup I was putting on my oatmeal, and how much fat was in that half and half that went into my coffee. The biggest eye opener was I was eating a lot of sugar!!! I mean I’m not even a sugar freak, my sweet tooth is pretty small, give me salty any day. But between whatever I added to foods and what already was in certain foods, it was adding up.

I also noticed what kind of crap was in seemingly “healthy” foods. Like some protein bars, they have ingredients that I don’t even know what it is and I don’t care! Skip them, they aren’t worth your time. I also noticed how much soy is in certain foods – ugh, it’s most likely been created in a lab then and I don’t want it. So just because it’s a health food doesn’t mean its REAL food. This is called clean eating, eating foods that are as close to its natural state as possible. This is why the only bars I can say taste great and are good in the label department are Larabars and Kind bars.

You’ll hear some fitness and health bloggers talk about clean eating then they rattle off all kinds of packaged foods they ate that day – well that’s a different kind of clean eating. That’s really called “eating on program” as they are eating according to whatever nutrition guidelines they are following at the time, not eating junk food basically. Real clean eating is eating foods as close to their natural state as possible – like veges, meat, fruit, etc.

How does all this affect weight loss and health

Well once again you are nourishing your body. You are also getting rid of refined foods, sugars etc. You are more aware and in control of what you are eating. That stubborn middle that wont go away is melting because you aren’t eating processed foods.

Your also visiting the porcelain throne more, let’s just get this out there. Yes you’ll get gassy and poopy, and that’s good. That’s how it gets out of your body. But I will interject something here. Your gut might be torn up from years of eating processed foods. Suddenly your eating well but you’re hurting a little. This happened to me, I found some supplements that helped me. L Carnitine , L Glutamine and Probiotics. All are found in food, but usually not the amounts you really need. L Carnitine and L Glutamine can help break down fatty cells – yay for cholesterol, but can also help repair your gut. It helped me, it may or may not help you – we’re all rather different in this aspect. If you need help here research!!

How does all this help? Well it helps you decide 1. do I really want to eat it knowing it is “xyz” or if I do want to eat it should I maybe have a smaller portion because it has “xyz” in it? It will also help you load up on some of the foods that you know will help you in the long run!

So that’s if for phase three, fairly straight forward. You can only evaluate your diet when you are 100% honest and aware, you can only learn when you actually take the initiative to do it! So go for it, why not?

Remember I’m not a dietician only sharing what helped me! If you are on medicines find out if supplements and certain foods will affect those medicines. Then one day you’ll hopefully be off those meds!!!

Phase One Here | Phase Two Here

This goes heavily with the first post – once you’ve cut out fast food what are you going to eat? Don’t sub one evil for the other by buying packaged foods at the grocery store.

So I’ll be honest, when I cut fast food out, I didn’t think ‘now lets start the weight loss journey’. I just wanted to be healthier. I watched a documentary called Food Matters. Basically it’s about how we’ve strayed and abused our food supplies, embracing medicine, chemicals and preservatives for our health over real food and how real food can cure anything.

So that was my goal – no processed foods only real food. I even went as far as baking my own bread rather than buying my own bread. I made everything, all meals, all snacks, all baked goods everything. I used butter and milk and cheese and wheat flour and brown sugar and maple syrup. I used it all and loved it. I do things a little differently now, I wouldn’t have been happy with the now though if it hadn’t been for this step in my journey.

Basically this is what processed foods are. They take some real food product, let’s say peanut butter, then they add flavorings and preservatives so that it will stay on the grocery store shelves for a LONG time and will actually taste better than that natural peanut butter over there which in comparison is really oily and a little gritty. They learn how to manipulate you, they advertise to you and sell you something that is cheaper and tastier than the real thing. Usually it’s not really cheaper, you aren’t satisfied with this one so you eat more trying to fulfill your craving or hunger. The real peanut butter would have satisfied that craving and hunger with one big teaspoon, the enhanced one takes two or three, you end up buying more. Think it wasn’t designed that way on purpose?

Real food satisfies, real food nourishes, real food fulfills hunger.

Now let’s talk about nourishing

Ingredients for Apple, Beet, Carrot Juice

How can we be such a fat nation and still mal nourished? These “food” products your buying, they don’t nourish your body. That’s why you are still craving food an hour after you ate!! Think about it – I’m craving something salty, oooh french fries, so I eat some french fries, well now that was too salty so I drink some soda to wash it down with. I’m still craving something I don’t know what, oooh a cookie that will do it, well that was too sweet now I need something salty and on and on it goes till your calories explode.

What’s the deal – well most likely your body needed something to begin with – like niacin or some other nutrient, so it cried out to you. Only you aren’t in touch with whats going on – sorry but I wasn’t either so don’t be offended. You think in terms of tastes and textures and cravings and all that. You’ve been programed to think with your emotions about what sounds good to you. When your mom asked if your hungry she usually said after that – what sounds good? When your friend says do you want to go to lunch, yes, well what sounds good? So here you are craving all these foods based on what sounds good.

When you nourish your body – I mean get rid of the crap and start putting in the good – those cravings will go away. That’s why I started with juicing, I don’t do it as regularly as I did then. Then it was twice a day every day then I went to once a day every day. I used to get CRAZY cravings at night – sausage, pizza – all salty foods. By morning I thought it all sounded horrible but at night the cravings would come out. Now I only want something when I’m hungry or looking at recipes online

When you buy real food – it should either be in its raw form or it should have just a few ingredients – and nothing that sounds like a chemical lab experiment. Bread should have flour, water, yeast, salt – done! It shouldn’t have a lab chemical you can’t pronounce much less don’t know what it is (yeah you’ve heard that advice before, for good reason).

Rainbow Swiss Chard Absolutely Gorgeous

Start reading about foods- why do they say white flour is bad and so is white sugar? Well processed white flour goes through something like 80 chemical processes!! White sugar is usually made from genetically modified sugar beets – it’s processed down to what you see and it’s bleached, some bleach with your cupcake?!! No wonder we’re sick and fat. God didn’t make these foods. He gave us better than bleached sweet food like item. Yes God gave us better than fruit roll-ups and gold fish crackers. I truly don’t understand how we have gotten to the point where we care so little about our health and bodies that we are ok eating things that hurt them. - Soapbox rant over -

Just Focusing on Real Food

Here is the thing – a disclaimer if you will. I still wasn’t working on weight loss at this point, just health, the weight loss naturally came. However, I did hit a point where I wasn’t loosing and had to change my diet to get some fat off. Why? Well real food still had sugar in it, looking at you maple syrup, and you can still be eating a larger portion that you really need. But that’s not the point or focus in phase two. Phase two is about changing you from being a fast food slave to a real food goddess. It’s about embracing the foods God gave us. Which is why what I’m doing now wasn’t horribly hard, and I’ll be able to stick with it, because I taught myself about real food first! 

Real pizza mmmm that looks good

The great thing about this is there may be a day you aren’t able to workout hard or run etc. but if you are eating a diet with real food and nutrients you’ll still be healthy, well into your 80′s, 90′s etc. I hope I’m able to do a lot of physical activity when I’m in my 80′s I really do because I love it, but if I’m not I want to still be healthy and that comes from what I eat.

So to sum up – phase two is not about dieting, it’s not about anything but eating real food. If that means maple syrup on your oatmeal so be it, because maple syrup is BETTER than white sugar. If that means butter on your wheat toast, go for it because that’s better than margarine on your white bread (make sure that wheat bread starts with whole grain wheat in the ingredient list). Cheese in your lasagna – love it!

Doubt me? Try it!

Cut out the fast food – cut out the processed food – start putting nutrients into your body. Give it a couple of weeks to a month and see how you feel. See if Pizza Hut is still calling your name!

Remember, it was this and cutting out fast food that gave me so much energy and a glow that someone asked if I had a new boyfriend!!

Some REAL foods to incorporate

1. Grass fed beef – when you eat grass fed you are getting all the awesome nutrients that you can’t get from corn fed – like CLA, Vitamin D etc. It TASTE better and is just better for you.

2. Free range chicken and eggs – trust me on this, you don’t want to see what a caged chicken goes through. You’ll notice a difference in the taste

3. Veges and fruits galore – grapes, berries, apples, potatoes, greens and bell peppers should all be organic. Critters are attracted to them and therefore non organic is loaded with pesticides.

4. If you eat bread go for whole wheat grain or sprouted grain – sprouted is the best. No refined crap here.

5. Free range turkey – if you shop whole foods you can get a pound of free range ground turkey for $3.24 – so don’t tell me its expensive to eat well.

6. Beans, lentils etc – they are cheap cheap cheap

7. Greek yogurt – real yogurt – that activia crap is loaded with preservatives and added junk, and the light yoplait? please, fake sugars have no place in this life

8. Maple syrup, raw honey. I don’t like fake sugars, not worth it, they are sweeter than sugar and more addictive, plus the aftertaste – please, who needs it?

9. Butter – grass fed, love it – moderation

10. Salmon, fish, shrimp – love it – wild caught is best, farmed is freaky.

Like to bake, bake it up, but get rid of vege oil, that’s the ketchup of the oil world. Coconut oil is awesome for baking as it cooks at high temps. Also take a few apples, skin them, boil them, puree them – works like vege oil. Real brown sugar or raw sugar, maple syrup. And when it says two cups of sugar – do one and half then one – start phasing it out – we over-sweeten things. Ooops getting ahead of myself again.

Postscripts

PS a lot of my inspiration came from watching Food Matters – that’s where I started really digging in and learning things. Awesome documentary but it’s a little dry. They have a new one called Hungry for Change that I think most people would like a lot bettter.

But I’ll be honest my focus was just NOT to eat out, to start learning how to cook at home without getting bored or overwhelmed. I plan a lot, I lay stuff out a head of time, eventually practice is the key as now I’m able to just whip something up out of my head. When you do something enough you get better and better at it, this is no different. It’s really tempting to just think forget it, it’s 7pm and I’ve been showing property since 4pm or it’s late and I need a shower and I’m tired so forget it. Just push through, just get in the kitchen and start, next thing you know 20 minutes has flown by and dinner is done! With lunches and breakfast same thing, plan. I make an oatmeal dish the night before and have breakfast option all week, throw half an english muffin in the toaster, cook an egg it takes no time, boil eggs and keep them in the fridge. I hate packing lunches, I suck it up. I get a plastic container and just start throwing stuff in sometimes, I do like leftovers thankfully. You’ll get the hang of it. You’ll want to because you will feel so much better!!!

ENERGY BABY YOU’LL HAVE IT I PROMISE!!!

Phase One of Journey Here