Jac's Countdown to 50! page 16

[Jac]

Yeah, I was gutted to realise how unfit I was to be pulling weeds! Hurt to sit down for days after that .

So, I'm feeling like a total failure right now. I cruised through most of winter eating mod-high carb paleo, but got the sugar creep thing happening to the point that it was more a regular behaviour than an occasional cheat. I didn't actually gain weight, though. Don't know how that happened!

Then I tried ketosis. I know I messed it up by starting for a week or so and then travelling and going off it - however, I never really got in to ketosis. I'd get occasional energy boosts, and I lost weight, but it was hard going. I know I ate too much protein some days, and getting to high fat with no dairy or nuts meant that I focused on coconut. Then I had 2 IBS flares in a row that were down to coconut milk. At that point I pretty much gave up. It's too damn hard. I think I'd had minor fodmap issues with coconut before, but not a week of pain like this. How can I possibly be getting WORSE!!!!????

I started to feel hungry and deprived. Enter Carb Nite! I loved the first one, and got back to VLC without too many problems. Didn't lose weight that first week, and I'm not quite sure the bloating resolved before I had the next one. The second carb nite, Tony was really concerned. I tried to explain it, and although he said he understood it, I felt very watched and judged for eating things I'd been avoiding for the last weeks. That didn't help. And from then on, I became the sugar monster. I didn't eat any more sugar for 2 days, but on the third day I went crazy. It seemed that from the moment I decided to try carb nites, all I thought about was what I'd eat on that night.

Today is Thursday. I did carb nite on Saturday, then binged on Tuesday. I'm still bloated. However, I had the best sleep in weeks last night, and today I feel more focused than I have for a while. I've had carbs at dinner for the last 2 nights, and have completely relaxed about portions and macros. It wasn't until I stopped counting carbs that I realised how tense I've been about it.

So here I sit, having bombed out at ketosis and carb nite, and now I have yet another food removed from my diet. I'm so fucking over this, I can't even explain it. How can I have horrible gut responses to healthy food, and none whatsoever to white sugar or white flour?? Yeah, I know about insidious and invisible damage, but that doesn't stop me from whining . I'm eating a restricted diet, and not losing weight. Restricting it more has made me crazy. Is it so unreasonable to want to get out of size 18 clothes???

ARRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

[NourishedEm]

I had a similar day yesterday. I woke up with the start of a head cold, having only just recovered from a cold two weeks ago, and I never get sick. All I could think about was the stress that I'm putting my body under by restricting this or that in order to try and lose weight and why it is so damn important to me that I'm willing to put my health at risk to wear smaller pants and how I'm just so fucking sick and tired of thinking about what I put in my mouth!!!!

Sorry to rant all over your journal, just trying to let you know that I feel your pain.

The problem is, when I relax and eat for health and don't worry about counting or restricting, I put weight back on and I don't want to get fat again. I just don't seem to be able to find a middle ground and I don't even have the IBD issues that you have!

Sigh...

[Jac]

How sick am I that your rant made me feel better??

[NZ primal Gwamma]

Jac, Norished Em - I so hear where you are both coming from. I too have just been through an horrendous few weeks, really REALLY down. But I have gotten back up on that horse, actually I didn't do anything naughty......... have taken a few extra suppliments, and am getting that wow again. I so hear you about the sugar. I have started making DH some scroggin, 85% + chocolate, good nuts, and apricots. I wonder if a small handful of this when feeling sugar depraved would help ????? or carrots and that aioli mix ?
This is so just a weeny teeny hurdle that you w-i-l-l cross
Keep at it guys
G x

[NourishedEm]

How sick am I that your rant made me feel better??

Misery loves company.

[Jac]

Feeling better today. I really think I start to lose my ability to reason after a while on low carb - it happens slowly, and it comes back slowly. I dunno.

Deliberately thinking of the good stuff - it's Friday, I'm wearing jeans to work (loose top, since the belly overhang isn't pretty, but I don't need to change to elastic waistbands most days), I have on both rings, and one I forgot to mention is that I can wear long earrings again. For a while there my neck was too short, lol.

I'm not quite as clean in my eating as I plan to be - I had sugar yesterday, and a hamburger bun - and it wasn't even nice. However, I'm moving back to the primal fold. Today I have leftover hamburger stuff, minus the bun, for lunch. I also have a small press of Crio Bru on my desk to have for breakfast with a banana. We're going to the movies later, to see Taken 2 (I adore Liam Neeson ), so a quick dinner of bacon, eggs and tomatoes is planned.

Busy weekend ahead - I used to never have weekend plans, but now it's all the damn time. It's good, but I'm looking forward to long and lazy times over summer! This weekend we're going to see Mary Poppins (the musical), and also have another load of bark being delivered that will need to be spread as soon as it arrives. Next weekend we're having the nearly 4 year old granddaughter to stay! I can't wait . Last time she came, the poor thing got her first ever ear infection. So we had an emergency run to the Dr, and then took her home early. Better luck this time!

[seaweed]

i find my mental state and my ability to fit into my pants are coincidentally linked. i dont mean it like i am sane if my pants fit me coz it means i am thin. more if i fit into my pants due to nutrition and exercise, i am also co-incidentally in a good mental state. people do get it mixed up and you get alot of veiled comments about vanity but meh. i definitely understand where you are coming from. Jac have you tried any of those gut healing protocols like GAPS or the SCD? and also what does the crio bru taste like? where did you get it from and was it really really expensive?

[Jac]

Yeah, my mood and pants are linked too! For me, it's that I never used to be able to tolerate wearing solid waistbands - even the feeling of slight constriction would lead to IBS spasms and bloating. So being able to wear actual jeans for more than an hour (and being brave enough to commit to them for a full work day followed by a movie) is absolutely huge . I've been doing primal for 20 months now, and that is my biggest achievement. Losing weight deliberately is the next stage, but it's not been a complete success just yet, lol. I'll stabilise back on carbs and then see what comes up as a new way of trying.

GAPS and SCD both include things that are triggers for me, so using them minus the triggers = deprivation! I did start there, though, when I first started figuring things out.

I go the crio bru from Oz - it's about $14AUD for a bag (probably the same size as a large bag of coffee). I'm not sold on its taste. I can't drink it with any additives like cream, so it's a watery chocolate taste with a hint of bitterness.

[seaweed]

i will stick with my organic fair traded yirgacheffe coffee beans then. and maybe add a tsp of cocoa powder to it if i want chocolate bitterness added. i do know a woman who got diagnosed with crohns i think it was and they told her she needed a colostomy with a bag. she googled and found the SCD. she told me she lived on nothing but chicken for the first however many weeks. she never had to have the colostomy either.

[NourishedEm]

Did you try boiling up the bru billy style Jac? I got the tip from Robin, although the yanks call it cowboy style of course.

It makes for a much stronger, chocolatey flavour and is delicious if you bulletproof it, which is how I drink it.