Update on weight loss (and) is cereal a drug?

I'm just going to update you on my weight loss for the month.

I wasn't really weighing myself but on Thursday I weighed 7 lbs more than I do today. I must be doing something right. Oh so that means that I'm at my lowest yet for the past couple months. 

I should be more excited but I know what I did to get here. I am more nodding in achievement. I'm not surprised. I know what it took to get here - mind you it wasn't THAT hard. I mean, a good hearty salad with homemade dressing and all the protein fixings and vegetables you could want... or try an egg bacon cheeseburger with a salad (instead of french fries)... or a big juicy steak with garlic spinach... Later this week I'm considering making seafood gumbo again. yeah, this "diet" is painful *scoffs and rolls eyes*... Sorry, I agree with Jimmy Moore (of livin' la vida low-carb) - this is definitely a lifestyle and I can't imagine doing anything else. I really hate being hungry and I'm not when I eat low-carb.

Now on to the inch loss measurements from T-Tapp:

Right Arm: -.75

Left Arm: -1

Bust: -1.5

Waist: -1.75

Abs: gained .5 (but that's ok. it's coming off too!)

Hips: -.75

Right Upper Thigh: -.75

Left Upper Thigh: -.75

Right Lower Thigh: - 1.5

Left Lower Thigh: -.5

Right Calf: -.5

Left Calf: 0

I know the inches look all over the place. However, I am actually more balanced on both sides. We'll see if I can continue. This past week was really rough for workouts. When I get stressed I want to laze around. I don't know what anyone else's response is... I don't have a problem with eating habits changing though. Anyway, I would like to try my hand at Tabata cycling or something once a week and then work up to sprints twice a week. I would also like to start walking the stairs at work... and doing sandbag training... and kettlebells... but really Holly, one thing at a time. I like to go ALL or NOTHING... and I really need to temper that. I see this as a small scale science experiment... What will work best for my body? I'll let you know what I'm working on soon enough...

Is Cereal a drug? (wanna know my real opinion?haha probably not.)

["Based on claims made on your product's label, we have determined that your Cheerios Toasted Whole Grain Oat Cereal is promoted for conditions that cause it to be a drug," the FDA said in a letter to General Mills which was posted on the federal agency's website Tuesday.]

I never liked cereal. I don't think my family understood that. Derek and little man sure don't understand why we don't have any in the house. When I was little, I would complain about having to eat cereal before school. Sunny side up eggs with toast (slightly brown so its chewy on the inside but crunchy on the out with butter spread all the way to the corners and laid on really thick) and some bacon was always my choice breakfast. That way when you break the yoke you can soak up the rest with the toast... I'm really not that picky! I just love eggs. Now I don't eat my eggs with bread - my body just doesn't do well with most breads. Cereal and oatmeal always made me feel hungry before lunch. Don't even get me started on cinnamon bread (did I mention I hate being hungry?!). Maybe I have a discerning palate; but, that's highly doubtful because I loved Velveeta when I was younger. I always had better health when I ate eggs for breakfast anyway. I have the medical tests to prove it. Go ahead and make any kind of cereal you want a drug. I wouldn't mind D.A.R.E. going against cereal. And I wouldn't mind if my son stayed as far away from cereal as possible. It's just not that good for your brain - as say, bacon and eggs. And finally someone else agrees... sorta.

One of my favorite meals...

I've read about Chefs talking about what their last meal would be. It's not so much a morbid idea if you think about it. I think it's more like they talk about what the best food they've ever had... Um, ok, it might be a tad morbid too... It might surprise people to know, most chefs talk about their mother's cooking or their grandma's cooking. Even after eating at really nice places and eating with trained Chefs. I don't blame them. I would really have to sit long and hard to decide what I would want MY last meal to be - but I'm sure it would be something my mom made and probably something ethnic. 

My mom's family is Polish. The only people who aren't, married into the family. The foods she cooked when I was growing up were the foods she ate when she was little. My mom didn't even have spaghetti until middle school because my grandma never heard of it! Some of my cooking I learned from my mom, some I learned from reading cookbooks. (It's weird that I read cook books and I don't expect other people to do that.) I wouldn't really classify my mom's cooking as ethnic because I grew up on it, therefore I thought it was normal American food. But if you didn't speak ANY Polish (I know a few words) or eat the stuff at home, it would be. This goes for a lot of my friends' who's families aren't Polish.

Whenever people talk about pigs in a blanket and I think of golabki, also known as stuffed cabbage. When I was younger I was always confused when other people would show me hot dogs wrapped with biscuits and call those pigs in a blanket. "Those aren't pigs in a blanket! These people are weird." I would scoff, in my head of course. After a while I caught on. That wasn't the first time I realized everyone else didn't grow up the way I did. Ask me about the babushka story one day, you might get a kick out of it.

My parent's house still smells like fresh baked bread when you walk in - even though they don't make bread anymore (since I was in middle school). But on those lucky special days I could smell the Polish food cooking while I was taking my shoes off at the back door after school. Certain smells remind me of home and the comfort of my parents' house in Michigan. Speaking of which, some day I'll post my family's Polish Sausage recipe. It's not low carb because it requires baked beans but everything else in it is. 

This recipe has nothing to do with Polish food or what I grew up on. For 2 and a half years I dated a man who was as much Italian as I am Polish. I learned how to make my own spaghetti sauce. I also heard about tripe for the first time (never had it). His mother's cooking was to die for! So I found a recipe with Italian Sausage and Peppers - minus the onions because I'm allergic - off we went. It's still one of my favorite meals to this day.

Ingredients: 

As much Italian sausage as you want (I used two packs with 5 sausages/pack in them)

A combination of green, red and yellow peppers - diced (I find these frozen, precut kind at the grocery store, they're not in season right now)

Lowest carb pizza sauce you can find (or make your own) - I used 1/2 can Muir Glen but probably should have used less I'm sure.

Method: 

Heat the sausage through on the stove. I cut it up into bite sized pieces while I'm cooking because I still don't have a decent knife set. So I can't give everyone their own knife at the table. Once the sausage is heated through throw the peppers in. You could also add some butter or coconut oil at this time. Sometimes I do, today I didn't. Once both the sausage and the peppers are done cooking, put the pizza sauce in. That should thin and cover both the sausage and the peppers. Once it's heated through - food's done! I served in bowls. We're messy. :)

Simple, easy, tasty. You could also put onions in, but like I said, I'm allergic. 

Growing kids...

This morning I gave Little Man (LM) his Cod Liver Oil (cinnamon tingle) and apple cider.

Even though I’m “vertically challenged” the rest of my family isn’t. My son is no exception. He was born at a whopping 9 lbs and 1.8 oz and 21” long! So, he was in the 90th % for height and weight. I breastfed him for a year and a half… Then his dad and I broke up when he was 2 and I continued down the low-fat path. I read the parenting magazines. (Another factor probably was that he was on WIC during this time too and he was at a daycare all day now instead of just with me.) He was sick all the time. I was tired of constantly taking off work and I just couldn’t afford time without pay and the doctor’s bills. It was frustrating. He also ended up being in the 50th % for height and weight. 

The last straw was the day LM came back from his dad’s really, really sick. His dad hadn’t taken him to the doctor yet because he said he wasn’t that sick. I had taken the day off.  LM couldn’t breathe. He was crying because he couldn’t breathe. I took him to the doctor, had a chest X-ray and the doctor was shocked he didn’t have pneumonia… but if I waited he would have. I was angry. Something had to change. I knew I could help him. I refused to let his immune system stay so low that any small bug could wreak havoc on his body.

So I started researching more holistic health things. I took two herbal classes. I started looking into how to grow healthy babies and children. I started reading more Weston A. Price stuff… cod liver oil was important to all sorts of indigenous societies. In addition to the cod liver a couple times a week, he gets plenty of healthy fats. I cook mostly with butter and coconut oil. Occasionally I will cook with lard. (I shouldn’t get so much pleasure from freaking out the low-fat people but I’m smiling right now! Haha!) When fall comes around I really start pushing the bone broth during dinner (we eat bone broth all year around though). This continues through the fall and winter. Also, after his bath I make sure that he uses coconut oil as a lotion. 

My son is rarely sick. Now he is also in the 75% for height and weight. He only sees the doctor when it’s time for his check ups because he never gets sick now. His doctor is a friend of the family. Last check up he said he didn’t know what I was doing (and didn’t want to know) but Little Man was super healthy.

Super healthy and now he has a great report card from the school this semester to boot! Right now, since he’s 6, I really can’t ask for more than that.

As promised: How to make your own butter.

BUTTER!!!

Ingredients: I use fresh heavy cream. But if you can't get fresh you could use heavy whipping cream. Try not to get ultra pasteurized - in that case regular butter from the store would probably be best. Ultra pasteurized anything really just has no real nutrients in it. You'll also need salt. 

Tools: You can use a blender if you don't have a food processor. I have 2 food processors. I love them! Only except for my big J.A. HENCKELS knife, they are my absolute favorite tool in the kitchen. Ok, I'm getting side tracked... 

Method: Put the heavy cream in the food processor and a sprinkle of salt. This is to taste. If you want "sweet cream" you don't salt it but the butter will go bad quickly. As it is, this homemade salted kind only lasts a week in the fridge. You'll know when it goes bad. It smells when you open the container! Speaking of which, you should keep the leftovers in a glass container. You can also freeze excess in a glass container if you'd like but I always prefer using it now. Did I mention I like butter?  

Turn the processor on and pulse in 5 second intervals. Oh, and as you start the cream will become nice and fluffy. If you add some sweetener to the heavy cream instead of the salt (NOT SUGAR... like some Splenda or something natural) - that's whipped cream! Ok, so you keep going until the cream starts getting this yellow color and its hard to get the blades to turn. Turn off the food processor and take a taste... mmmmmmm..... creamy buttery goodness!

Losing it... part 2

 This is me now...
August 2007 comes around... and I find Derek (my current BF who was my former BF - the one before my husband... it gets worse if I keep explaining. There is a reason for the name of this blog!)... 

I take one look in the mirror and I want to start crying. I am not pregnant this time. I am just plain fat. In fact, someone at work asked me if I was pregnant. "Nope, sorry, just fat." Yes, that's how I answered. I was wearing a 22 but it probably should have been a 24 because the pants were getting REALLY tight. I ripped a pair of pants. Nothing - and I mean NOTHING - will ever prepare you for that feeling of your stomach sinking through the floor if your pants rip at work and you share a cubical with someone of the opposite sex. I wanted to die right there. Or at least close my eyes and open them to find myself in the basement of the building and go home and change clothes. The worst part was I started that job about 2.5 years prior wearing an 8. 

Something had to change. I was reading Sally Fallon's Book "Nourishing Traditions" and started linking two and two together (Atkins and Weston A. Price)... Then I stumbled on T-Tapp. I ordered the tapes and in 3 weeks I went from a 22 to a tight 18. I ate whatever I wanted those weeks - which I'm sorry to say, included doughnuts. But I got there. 18 was a magic number for me because it told me I could lose weight. Then I didn't exercise as much, watched what I ate and ended up dancing around an 18 and a 16. Barely. But I kept reading studies and blogs about low carb and basically devouring information.

At the beginning of this year I decided to really start applying myself. I went low carb and lost 15 lbs in about 2 weeks. I'm also doing T-Tapp consistently and now I'm wearing a 14/16. I just bought a dress in that size and it fits!!! Yeah, I can't stop grinning.

I'm going to start posting what I eat. It might not always be low carb - but sometimes I forget my lunch or we have a busy day. I can tell when I have too many carbs - I feel sooo tired. I'm definitely making an effort to be better. I'd like to just quit sugar cold turkey but so far it isn't working. I figure by the end of this year I will be sugar-free. I'll post my workouts too but sometimes I'm super tired so I just don't do them and I opt for sleep instead. Hey, mom's need sleep too! We're not super women.

Every day I take a multivitamin, Cod liver oil (for Omega 3s), CoQ10, and calcium. Once or twice a week I consume organs. In pill form. You don't have to do this. I do it because it makes me feel super strong about a day or two afterwards... also my periods have been super when I take it. I also like liver but my BF hates it so we don't eat it as a family. My son likes it too but if BF won't eat it, little man usually won't either.

This isn't the end, though. This is just the beginning.

pictures to follow...

Losing it.... part 1

I'm not kidding - it's not that hard.  The losing weight part. No really, I swear.

The mental part is what always gets me... I'm mostly doing this to be accountable. I'm sorry if it's not the way you would do it. I'm probably going to stumble a few times so, please forgive me in advance.

See, the bacon at the top represents something I love. Fat. Not the kind that is attached to me and squishy... The kind that I eat. OMG. It's lovely! You know, that taste that you just can't get from the fake stuff. I *DO* know... I make the real stuff in my own kitchen. (I'll have to post that part another time because I can already tell this is going to get long).

I wasn't a fat kid. I was a scrawny kid before puberty. After puberty started I was bulldozing head first into full on womanhood. I recall none of the girls looking like me in high school - I looked more like a woman and less like a prepubescent boy. Or as one of my aunts calls it - "a popsicle body with a bobble head." I didn't end up tall. 5'4" is about as far as I got according to the US Army. I was classified "overweight" before I joined the Army; I was power-lifting because I wanted to do body building contests. I had to stop lifting weights and do gobs of cardio for about 2 months straight before I could join the Army. I started basic training weighing the exact same amount as when I left for AIT.

Then I was on my own to eat whatever I wanted - sorta. The chow hall = free food. I picked what I thought was low-fat. I didn't want to get fat. My training was rough - not because what I chose to do for the Army. Now I look back on it, if I knew then what I know now about nutrition, I would have ate everything that contained the most fat I could find and no sugar. I would have had truckloads of bacon and butter. Fresh seafood when they had it swimming in butter but no bread, rice or grains. My brain would have been in heaven and I probably could have appreciated a different part of the country more - and been a lot less sick. I was constantly sick.

In fact, when I went home after AIT I was so sick that I would pass out in the car from a 5 minute car ride. I was pale and my endometriosis was peeved at me. The funny thing about this was that I did end up fatter than before. At the time my dad was "doing Atkins." I watched what he ate which was kinda like what I ate before - "a body builder diet" but with a ton of fat. Due to the Army pay, I was basically eating whatever my parents put in front of me. Plus, I didn't feel good and I figured eating at home would make me feel better. When I ended up at my permanent duty station they wanted to weigh me and measure me once I got there. I panicked.

No exercise. Eating fat for 30 days...

Omg. I have to be huge! - that's all I could think.

Then something happened that surprised the stuff out of me. I weighed in 19 lbs lighter than when I joined the army. Which means, I lost 30 lbs in 30 days eating what my dad ate. In fact, I hadn't weighed that amount since 10th grade!!!

Then I did something stupid.

I went back to eating what I was eating before and going to the gym twice a day. Fast forward through several months of my life - I end up married to a man 9 years my senior cooking at home. I try low-fat again and don't have as much time for the gym - gain a lot of weight in one month. Several more months go by I gain more weight. I end up trying to lose it through the Army but I try doing low carb. I shock everyone who weighs me in by dropping about 30 - 40 lbs in less than a month through low carb and exercise... and then I find out I'm pregnant. SURPRISE!!

My whole entire pregnancy I craved only two things - MEAT and STRAWBERRIES.
What did I eat my pregnancy? MEAT... lovers pizza.
I weighed 100 lbs more than when I joined the Army when my son arrived. I was soooo miserable throughout my pregnancy for so many reasons. I just look back and wish I had listened to my body because it was being smart. I went through a cauliflower and broccoli with full fat dip phase that lasted about a week. I didn't gain much weight during that week. I would have been happy with that. I would have been really happy with dip and veggies and meat or strawberries and meat, or a big fat steak and eggs with a side of bacon. I didn't care - I wanted fatty meat... and strawberries.

After my son was born my weight did the yo-yo game for a while. I did fit into my "fatigues" as civilians call them (BDUs for military folks) when I went back to work. But there were a few uniforms that I had no hope fitting into.

I left the military and my husband and I moved to VA. I visited Michigan for a month, went strictly low-carb and went from a size 22 to a 14 in 4 weeks. Then it was a constant struggle to lose more weight when I went back to live with my husband. We split about a year after that.

Fast forward to June 2007. I thought I had an "awakening" and tried to go vegetarian to "save the planet" from pollution and my carbon footprint. Instead I felt extremely sick AND tired (not such a cliche when it's happening to you), couldn't sleep, couldn't concentrate, had no appetite (or was hungry all the time), my hair started falling out and I had acne galore. Of course, I had some other stressful things going on in my life, but I was not dealing with stress too well and I was making my own by trying to go meatless.

I'm saying vegetarian isn't for me. If it works for you and you can keep your B12 and iron up even though you're consuming huge amounts of soy - awesome. I have endometriosis so soy is bad. They say milk and red meat is bad for endometriosis too. That I can laugh at due to personal experience.

so that's the first part of my story...

Window Dressing to the Soul?

I had my eyebrows threaded a week or so ago. Threading* is interesting because it sounded like she was crocheting on my head, but without crochet hooks. It looked like she was just rolling thread over my face (well, when I had my eyes open). It doesn't just have to be for your eyebrows, but that's all I needed. I'll probably go back because I've had a bruised eyebrow once or twice due to wax. Bruises are not my idea of beauty. Threading is either not supposed to hurt or it's supposed to hurt less. I think it was about the same pain as waxing but it was gentler on my skin. I know waxing pulls your skin (and hurts, and makes it red... and I get ingrown hairs or a bruise) and heard somewhere it'll give you wrinkles faster. I don't know if I believe that or not.

What weird things we do as women to feel pretty. I can't say that I do it to stay attractive to anyone but myself. Don't get me wrong - I want to impress Derek. But he has seen my legs in the middle of the winter... I hate to tell you, but if it's cold outside and I won't be wearing shorts or a skirt in public, I don't shave my legs. I'm busy and I want to do other things than sit in the shower shaving. It's ok because he still loves me.

Once, and only once, I've tried to wax my legs. Looking back, I'm really glad I started with my legs. My ex-boyfriend, Andrew, had a sister named Julie - both who I absolutely adored. Julie and I decided to wax our legs late one night while everyone else was asleep. I was 18 at the time and this was the summer after I graduated. So this wasn't a young high school teenager thing like when I would try to dye/highlight my hair... I don't know if Julie had ever waxed; it might have been the case of the blind leading the deaf. I had just stumbled upon Sephora earlier that visit with Julie... We kinda went overboard I guess. This was something new to try, and I'm generally not one to run from a new experience. I habitually try to use my thinking brain before doing things though... I can admit that doesn't always happen when you dive in head first. I can think of a few things that this is applicable to.

So we read the directions. My brain is saying "Hot wax dummy!" but I'm not listening because I want beautiful legs I don't have to shave for a while. We heat the wax up in the sink. The water is so hot I watch the steam rolling off the top of it, billowing toward the ceiling while we're standing in the kitchen with only the light over the sink on. Bravely we apply this hot wax to our lower legs. We pat the linen on where the wax was. I have her read the instructions again to make sure that we were indeed supposed to PULL our leg hair out. Come to think of it, we might have even pulled each other's strip of linen so the other wouldn't chicken out. Either way I remember thinking "OUCH!"... I probably even said it... muffled of course because we didn't want to wake anyone up. We continued this torture several more times on our own. We were bleeding like Steve Carell in 40 Year Old Virgin - except it was our legs and we were calmly trying to clean it up. Neither of us knew if that was supposed to happen. Like Steve's character, ½ way through we abandon the illusion we're going to have silky soft legs for weeks... the pain was too much. And now we had bloody patches among the sparse leg hair. I don't recall ever having legs as hairy as Robin William's or Steve Carell's chest. We both decided our razors were so much less painful than that wax. We cleaned everything up and snuck off to bed... our legs sticking to our pj pants.

The next morning we both had huge linen strip-shaped bruises that were hairless all over our legs. I remember Andrew looking at me like I was nuts when I had to explain those bruises. He was asking why I would do something like that. I'm really glad Julie and I hung out. She stuck up for our weird female ideas that he wouldn't ever get. I recognize that same look on Derek's face if I hurt myself. It was only concern and love, with a touch of concern. The plus side of all of that is once the bruises cleared up, I damaged the hair follicle so bad, that it never came back. Still I do not recommend anyone else doing the same thing. So I will be hairless on certain parts of my legs indefinitely?! Darn.

With threading there are posts on places like youtube where you can go and watch it for yourself and learn how to do it. I think I might learn so that I can try to do that with my legs. It's not like I could damage anything too bad like I did with the wax... I suppose I could pinch myself... whatever. If it doesn't hurt and I don't have to put chemicals on my body - it's probably good to learn. But for now I think I'll pay that lady to do my eyebrows. No one is going to stare at my legs while their talking to me. Eyebrows are important though. They're on your face and basically frame your eyes... so maybe they're the window dressing to your soul...?

*http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-eyebrow-threading.htm
http://www.eyebrowthreading.com/
http://www.spaindex.com/Lifestyles/Threading.htm
http://www.beautysurvival.com/threading.html