a week of good decisions

Let me put it this way:

I'm drafting this blog entry as I sit and watch my husband make dinner (which he almost always does ... I'm lucky!), and I'm drankin' an entire beer to eat up the last of my bonus Weight Watchers points.

Not even my activity points (I earned 33 of those this week, by the way). No. Just the standard 49 extra points that Weight Watchers doles out to, I think, everyone.

I'm also indulging in a simple and decadent dinner: some Patrick-made tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich (on homemade spent-grain bread!). Even with all the cheese and butter in the meal, I had to make sure to include a little dessert (bittersweet chocolate and a granola square) to finish up those extra points.

You know what else? I exercised a lot this week: four trips to the gym to hop on the elliptical (plus some stretching and crunches), one visit that included a 55-minute body flow class, and a 20-mile bike ride up a mountain and along the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Not only am I working hard to use up my extra points, but it's on a week I would have assumed I'd need them most.

But I haven't needed them. It's interesting ... every time I've come home from a hard workout, I've maybe wanted a piece of fruit, but that's it. It's usually at least an hour before I eat a real meal (and I've been returning from my workouts around mealtimes).

The reason I'm working to use my extra points? I suppose if I left them on the table, I'd technically be eating fewer calories and possibly speeding my weight loss. But I've always thought of the Weight Watchers allotment as an indication of a healthy intake. Under-cutting my allotment, consequently, has seemed like a bad accident waiting to happen.

the week and its accomplishments

What you read above is just an indication of how good my week has gone. Some other things I think were pretty brilliant include:

» I was as sugar-free as I aimed to be and I saw the results that I thought I might. Namely, I didn't experience my typical end-of-week doldrums. My cane-sugar consumption was limited to the granola squares I made last week, bittersweet chocolate and a single indulgence in three Fig Newton's (on a day I was desperately hungry for I-don't-know-why). Otherwise? Fruit and honey.

I'll keep my low-sugar goal for the week ahead. I only anticipate breaking it when I know there's a good reason to enjoy a super-sweet treat.

» One pound, lost. I'm not *worried* about losing weight as much as I am about getting in shape, but it was getting ridiculous that I was making some fairly good decisions and not budging an ounce. Sometime earlier this week I wondered if I was eating too muich "zero points" fruit. Which, of course, still has calories.

So I checked out the USDA's guidelines for daily fruit: 2 cups. Umm. I was eating a load more than 2 cups.

That day I decided to cut back to 2 cups of fruit, and since that day I've felt less full ... and I'm finally down one pound on the scale.

» I got the gym four times, as hoped! The previous week, I'd only found my way to the gym twice. This week, though, I headed to the gym three times before work; then I headed to the Saturday body flow class at 9:30 AND followed that up immediately with 50 minutes on the elliptical; AND AND did a 19-mile training bike ride with Patrick today.

I've felt able and willing to do all this exercise. If my good mood and high energy continue, I think I might have another week like it ahead.

» That bike ride ... It felt pretty good. Patrick and I rode 19 miles. We started by heading straight up Mill Mountain. At the top, we headed left (away from the (Star) and connected with the Blue Ridge Parkway. We rode that until we hit Vinton, at which point we headed back into town and headed home.

We averaged a little better than 10 miles an hour and my top speed on the toughest part of the ride (the final climb on Mill Mountain) was 4 mph. Those are both numbers I want to improve, but I'm happy just to have established a precedent for myself.

And this is what I looked like upon my return ...



Just so's you know.

» Spreadsheets! Oh wait ... this deserves its own blog entry ...

a week of food ... almost

Two weeks ago I set out to improve my photo habits my committing to a week's worth of food pictures.

I did it, nearly.


(see the full gallery on flickr)

I forgot my camera a couple of times; I ate my meal too quickly others. But I think the images I did capture are a good representation of my food life.

some changes i've already made

I've decided that 2 + 2 = don't eat sugar. So no more of these blueberry muffins, or cake truffles (which were admittedly a seasonal treat: Patrick surprised me with them on Valentine's Day). No more danged delicious scones for breakfast! (OK, that's only a little harsh: treats are fine occassionally, and if I'm going to have a sweet for breakfast I absolutely must pair it with a protein).

You'll also see a lot of fruit in those pictures. I was kinda stuffing my face with fruits, because Weight Watchers no longer assigns points values to them. But my weight hasn't budged since I started counting my points several weeks ago, and I was often feeling pretty stuffed at night. Answer? Cut back fruit to 2 cups per day. One cup would be about 1 banana or three clementines or 1 apple.

have these changes made a difference?

The photos are from week before last. I've applied my two changes in the past week, and I've absolutely seen a difference.

happier I still can't believe how much energy I have and how positive my attitude has stayed through the beginning of the weekend. In weeks past, I'd invariably find myself in a slump by Friday night or Saturday morning. My early bet is on my having reduced sugar this week. The only sweets I've indulged in are my homemade granola squares (which come in at about 1/10 oz. of sugar per ounce of square) and the bittersweet chocolate I nibble on daily (minimal amount of sugar there). I'll keep this up for as long as I can do it. I'm even getting excited to brainstorm a good, healthy Sunday brunch that'd satisfy my sweet tooth ...

a tad lighter Not terribly lighter so far. Maybe 1/2 lb. But it's still something! And I haven't felt overstuffed or bloated this week. And I've found myself perfectly happy with 2 cups of fruit a day.

excited about this weekend

So many things to look forward to on a Saturday morning!

» Firstly, I'm excited that I'm excited on a Saturday morning. I can't tell you how many weekends I've started totally down in the dumps, despite the fact that the preceding weeks were productive, successful, happy-making. The culprit? I'm guessing the end-of-week sugar indulgences and Saturday-morning pancake-breakfasty habits. Score one for making a healthy decision (the week in review & its lessons) and sticking with it!

» Yoga! Actually, Body Flow at the Y, which is apparently a mix of pilates, yoga and tai chi. I'm looking forward to the stretching and core workout I expect I'll get out of this class. Also, it's this morning (I'll finish this blog entry and head out the door!), and I have a feeling it'll be a great start to the weekend.

» Making more spent-grain bread, which I think Patrick and I should do our darndest to document so we can share it with you all in detail (and pretty pictures). This stuff is so good, I think we'll make a double batch and freeze the finished loaves that will be in excess. Also? I'll make some malt syrup from his leftover, unboiled wort! It's earthy and sweet and I plan to use it in an upcoming batch of buttercream frosting for god-knows-what.



» A "real" bike ride. Patrick's gonna lead me through my first "real" training bike ride. Meaning it'll be long (I've asked him not to tell me how long until we're done), and that I should attempt to pedal continuously (Patrick observed in a previous, casual ride that I coast a lot, which is a no-no for group road rides and if I plan to ever compete, which maybe I do ...). I'm so looking forward to the challenge, and to spending quality time with Stinger.

» My first "follower" through blogger that I don't know in real life! Liz Loses! I can't tell you the little thrill I got at seeing that someone was following my blog who lives in Ohio (where I have never been), and who's doing the kinds of things with her food and exercise that I aim to do. Thanks, Ms. Liz Loses, for making my day!

cookin'

"cookin'" » Looky my husband in the kitchen, where I often find him after my long bus ride home. I'm a lucky lady.

Originally uploaded by lindsaybeeson

This, by the was, was orginally posted using the Flickroid app, which gave me the option of posting my photo directly to this blog. If you saw it lookin' a bit strange, it's because the app doesn't provide options for how the photo renders. I may or may not use this option in the future, but it sure is nice to know it's there.

the week in review & its lesson

The past week was ... pretty good. I didn't reach any of my goals from last week (I didn't hit the gym at least four times, only two; I didn't wear my heart rate monitor once, because I still haven't found it; the closest I came to waking up at 5 a.m. -- regardless of my intention to go the gym -- was the morning I got out of bed at 5:55. "Yay! Still the 5 o'clock hour!").

The thing that makes this all kinda OK is that the weekend was great. Seriously.

Patrick and I, as I mentioned earlier, rode our bikes up a mountain and made our first trip to a Star City Brewers Guild meeting. We met a ton of great people who brew beer. Additionally? The food spread included a lot of healthy options (I ate fresh greens, hummus, tabouli, flat bread and some spinach dip). And, AND ... how many different versions of homemade lifestyle did I hear about? Among them: compost worms in someone's house, homemade kimchi, other folks' versions of beer breads, home-cured ham, homegrown mushrooms, hop gardens. This group meets once a month and I expect I'll learn something new about beer and about scratchmade living at every meeting.

So that was how amazing Saturday was.

Sunday was pretty great, too: a hike halfway along Tinker Ridge; homemaking an Italian loaf, granola bars*, granola cereal; and a delicious dinner of that fresh bread, toasted and accompanied by sliced pear, tomato, roquefort, fresh mozzarella and honey.

Are you f*cking kidding me? The weekend could not have gotten much better. And it's one I want to replicate again and again. I want a bike ride every weekend, a hike, homemaking, and good tasty nutritious eating.

Is this some version of spring fever?

this is the tasty italian, made by patrick. i'm so glad we finally started making all the bread we eat ... so simple and yet such a feeling of accomplishment. below? the bread mid-mix, and a little saazie-face to get you all "awwww"-y. (this is what we see anytime we're in the kitchen: her trying to be as close to us as possible without getting in the way. ok, sometimes getting in the way.)

In any case, as good as the weekend was, I still want to take some notes from my less-than-stellar week ...

the lessons

1. I need to seriously cut the sugar out. And I need to give credit to my fruit & oat bowls for satisfying my sweet tooth.

I was pretty go-go-go all week ... until Friday.

I've tried to bring a certain tradition into the workplace (which I borrowed from Patrick's old job in Knoxville): #coffeefriday; celebrate payday with coffee and breakfast! It's brilliant and important and something to look forward to every two weeks.

In past weeks I've brought in homemade scones and biscotti, a co-worker brought donuts another week, and yet another everyone contributed to oatmeal breakfast (bringing spices, oats, fruit, coconut, etc.)

This week? I brought in some delectable treats from Bread Craft, a sweet little shop serving up European-style goods. I highly recommend it, and I will eat there on into the future (their salads are tasty, their sandwiches hearty, their cheese is housemade!).


But between my coffee Friday morning and my ginger scone from Bread Craft, I turned crabby instantly. And then I ate another pastry in the afternoon (danish).

I knew what was happening, but I was not able/willing to fight it. I knew that sugar is no good for me first thing in the morning (or in that quantity, or unaccompanied by protein and fiber). But I picked up the scone and ate it. I knew that the reason I wanted the second pastry was because I'd eaten the first. But I ate the second pastry.

I'm going to challenge myself this week: I'm going to limit my cane-sugar intake to the little amount that's included in my newly homemade granola-bar-squares (one ounce of granola square has about 0.1 ounce of sugar) and bittersweet chocolate. Otherwise, I'm going to look to fruit to satisfy my sweet tooth, or to forgo a sweet when I would otherwise indulge the craving.

What I hope to see is a week of me feeling full of energy and ready to take on all the challenges that await me.

here's a nonsugar dessert I enjoyed earlier in the week: chopped pear, plain old-fashioned oats, malted barley, semisweet chocolate & honey. it was delicious and it's the kind of thing i plan to reach for whenever i think "sweet!"

2. I absolutely must have all my morning stuffs prepped if I want to get my ass successfully and energetically to the gym. I lost my keys last week. Also, I have no idea where my heart rate monitor is. Some mornings my lunch wasn't ready and when as I was going to bed all I could think about was how rushed I was going to feel trying to fit in a trip to the gym, getting ready for work, eating breakfast and making my lunch. I'm pretty sure that anxiety kept me in bed some mornings.

So I want to remove all simple obstacles. I aim to have: my gym clothes folded and ready for me, my keys stored alongside them, my iPod full and charged, my lunch made.

I'll limit my goals to these two, but I think of them as very small, integral cogs in a very big machine. I hope to be running more smoothly one week from today.

* The recipe for granola bars (shown above cut into about 2-point portions) is from America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook. I recommend just about anything that this behemoth food brand creates (Cook's Illustrated, Cook's Country, the America's Test Kitchen PBS show, cooksillustrated.com). Their business model is built around being only mildly open source, so to speak. I'll respect that and post a recipe for the granola bars only after I've tweaked it enough to feel like I can call it my own.

a sunday of home work.

I'm excited for Patrick and me today. We have a hike ahead of us (Tinker Ridge to Hay Rock Overlook). We're going to bake and make (Italian bread, granola cereal, granola bars).

I'm going to find my camera USB chord so I can upload all the food photos I've taken this week. I'm going to write some blog entries about our beer-grain bread, about my meals throughout the past week, my goals for the week ahead.

day of indulgent productivity

I believe in a day of rest, but there's this interesting thing I've noticed my past few weekends: I'd much rather get my full-on restfulness out of the way on Saturday.

Yesterday we rode our bikes along the greenway and up Mill Mountain. Then we headed to our first Star City Brewers Guild meeting (for homebrewers and those interested in homebrew). We indulged in lots of scratchmade beer, good food and excellent company.

I suppose we didn't rest, per se, but we also didn't do anything that I'd consider work.

Today, though? After the hike, all that baking and making is what we need to stock our pantry for the week ahead. Maybe we should add hummus to the list, in fact. And we *do* have a lot of frozen blueberries on hand (Patrick woke up early this morning to start our coffee and make us delicious scratch muffins). I think I should turn the extras into quick jam.

And I'll come back to my blog and edit photos, think on the work I've done and the work I want to do. I get to steep in thoughtfulness about the lifestyle I'm trying to attain.

I like Sunday for this kind of work because it feels like I'm gearing up for a productive week ahead. I like the fact that restfulness is starting to feel like a chore I know I need to get done (if I don't take time for rest, I will crash after a few weeks and find myself useless for an entire weekend and in terrible condition at the beginning of my work week).

And I'm not sure how much better it gets than filling a home with the sweet and savory smells of scratchmade food.

another argument for whole foods

See this stuff? I think Dr. Lustig would approve.



I woke up Saturday morning to an episode of The People's Pharmacy called "Sugar Hazards." It featured this Lustig man, and later a Dr. Teitelbaum, both of whom were discussing how harmful sugar-laden (read: "processed") foods are to our metabolisms and health.

This radio program happened to be one of Those Moments ... when a few truths that were already hinted at in my life suddenly found the ground they needed to stand on, firm.

what i came away with
One of the audio clips you'll find in that link above is an extended interview with Lustig. He's coming from a place of science and medicine (he's a pediatric neuroendocrinologist).

Following are some of the points he makes (paraphrased by me), ones that resonated.

» lustig likes to say that when god gave us the poison, he packaged it with the antedote. In this case, the poison is sugar, or fructose, and the antedote is fiber. Think of fruits. Even sugar cane, which is a plant -- mostly stalk -- that contains a relatively modest amount of sweet. (He adds that the only time that's not true is with honey, "and that's guarded by bees.")

Our bodies are refined systems and, as with so many things in nature, they rely on a particular balance. The level of sugars that nature provides are low, in addition to the fact that our bodies have to work pretty hard processing fiber to access them. This setup is how we evolved and how our bodies, when healthy, function optimally.

» sugar is readily available to us now, and it's messing with our insulin levels. and this is contributing to obesity. and low energy. and hunger. Here's something I didn't know: Sugar is two things: glucose and fructose. Glucose, as Lustig says, is metabolized into energy immediately. Fructose, on the other hand, is metabolized only by the liver, which stores it immediately as fat and increases our level of insulin (which is "the energy storage hormone" ... something else I didn't know).

Basically, all the fructose we eat can never be anything but stored fat; consequently it can never be used toward our energy output, it's never given a chance!

So even if I eat as many calories as I burn, if some of those are fructose, those calories work against me in two ways by: 1) immediately turning into fat, and 2) putting me at an energy deficit. I've just gained weight but I'm still hungry. And I lack physical energy. And so I reach for more food. Which may contain fructose. And if this cycle goes far enough, I become a tired, hungry, fattened individual.

Lustig points to the sugars added to processed foods as a main culprit in the nation's increasing obesity problem. What's the best way to avoid them? According to him, shop the perimeter of a grocery store to buy produce and whole foods. If it's on a shelf, it's built for shelf-life by way of preservative sugars. ... Another argument for whole foods!

» don't exercise to lose weight. exercise because it makes you feel good. Lustig says "diet is about weight; exercise is about health. Diet is about pounds; exercise is about inches."

One incredible thing Lustig repeated throughout the interview: it is a false notion that if you *simply* burn more calories than you consume, you'll lose weight. One reason? If a diet continuously feeds you fructose, you'll immediately store it as fat and rob yourself of healthful, useful energy. Another: studies, he says, have shown that exercise does little in the way of "burning" fat. Instead, it converts it to muscle.

So, he says, "go out and get some exercise done, just don't look at the scale." Don't use exercise as a tool for weight loss, but as an absolutely necessary tool for good health. "The more exercise you do," he says, "the better you're gonna feel."

***
I've known that I wanted to stay away from processed foods, but I didn't have a full picture of why that was. I knew I liked the idea of eating things that came from the earth or wholly from animals (and I started a list of whole grains that are on my bucket list). It just seemed right. This radio program, though, put this idea in full focus.

I've known that too much sugar makes me feel off-kilter: hungry more quickly, irritable, tired. I even confessed that I needed to nix donuts from my breakfast options after a crabby weekend that should have been splendid. Now I know why, biochemically, I was right.

And I've just recently started understanding that activity can be a part of my life for the the damn *fun* of it. I'm determined to emphasize activities that bring me happiness (and aren't just an item on my list of daily chores). Now here's Lustig saying exactly that.

This radio show, man ... good timing.

but don't take my word for it!
There's so much more to get from this discussion. I truly think it's worth the hour to listen to it. The first ten minutes may require your undivided attention as they involve the most intense science, but if you don't have a full hour to spare, at least multi-task with this in the background.

... and let me know what else you get from it!