what gets me through...

This was one my least favorite weeks I've had at work in a long time. Last night I really, really wanted to give up on my 2 month break from wine/alcohol/merriment (just kidding). Instead, I made us low carb pizzas and drank a coke zero I stole from the work fridge. The 'crusts' were made from two 6-oz bags of that diced pre-cooked chicken you can buy in the meat or deli dept; plus about 2/3 of a bag of shredded italian mix cheese. The one on the left is your traditional pepperoni and the one on the right involved homemade pesto, sliced tomato, and burrata. To get the crust recipe, go here. To make pesto, throw a few handfuls of basil leaves, 1/2 c olive oil, 1/2 c pinenuts, 1/2 c parmesan, 3 cloves of garlic, and a squeeze of lemon juice in a food processor. Was doing all that from scratch worth it on a Friday evening? Yes, yes it was. Adam and I finished both pizzas and felt almost too full by the time we were done. There was no late-night snacking or post-pizza need for 'dessert'. I looked over at the calendar and decided that I could go another day without wine or booze.

In my heyday of single-gal-early-2000s binge eating/carb addiction, I would order a Domino's pizza along with an order of cinnamon bread sticks and eat all of it by myself. After maybe an hour break from eating, I could very easily kill a pint or more of ice cream and then snack all night on things like cereal, fiberone bars, wheat thins, graham crackers, or whatever was in the cabinet. I know that I have the capability to eat and eat carbs and sugar until I am quite literally full up to my esophagus and still...not...stop. I don't like to think about the fact that I can eat so much, but I think it is important to remember how I can get on a standard diet so that I don't ever go back to it.

In the meantime, I'm trying to enlist Adam into a 'Dry February'. Since today's the 25th of Jan, I'm sure I can get through the first one here on my own, but another month is going to be tough. He's given me a tentative yes, and we both talked again today about hitting some serious weight-loss milestones by July. If you're also having a white-knuckle week, I recommend making yourself a chicken/cheese crust pizza and then spending some time looking at reddit's keto forums. We can do this.

Weigh-in No. 2 (and not-hungry happiness)

20 days in ketosis and not a drop of the sweet sweet fermented grape juice and all I got was this stupid tee shirt- oh, and 9 pounds gone! I lost three more lbs over the past 10 days. Full, gross, old-underwear disclosure, I am on the very CUSP of my period so I am in fact pretty happy. Hopefully ten days from today on my Day 30 there will be a bigger drop, but, hey 3 lbs every 10 days is still good times. One of my favorite drive-to-work and fall-asleep-at-night meditations is to multiply pounds and time in my head and now I'm thinking about what 9 lbs in 20 days times 10 would look like- 90 lbs by July 20th!!  Even if I slow to 6 lbs every 20 days, I will still be down 63 lbs- how wonderful is that?

Meanwhile, I'm used to eating this way and I'm ready to start moving more. I belong to a nice, non-crowded gym about a tenth of a mile from my apartment-but I haven't been since September. Adam is also gearing up to start 'hitting the gym' (we are officially old) a few nights per week, and if he starts going I will follow. We both have serious goals for this summer and we're coming up on the end of January so it's time.

To get into a little more detail..I'm eating very low carb but this time around I am solidly in ketosis and have not allowed 'carb creep' via things like extra almond butter, 85% dark chocolate, red wine, Atkins snack bars, or anything else questionable. Here is a pic of a recent ketostick for proof:

Typically everything I eat with the exception of salad greens and other non-starchy veggies is either carb-free or has 1-3 grams per serving (like cheese, cream for coffee, olives, a packet of truvia). Because I'm losing and I have a long way to go, I'm not officially tracking but I would estimate my daily carb count is between 20-30 grams. On very 'snacky' days it might go to 40 but that's not often. I was getting a little bored over the weekend so I made my own coconut oil chocolate-macadamia candies- just a slightly tweaked version of this Chocolate Bark recipe.  They don't taste just like the real thing but they're fatty and smooth and I added macadamia nuts.

The really crazy part is that there are still candies left over in the fridge (four days later) BECAUSE I STOP EATING WHEN I'M NO LONGER HUNGRY.

If you've eaten low carb or Paleo you know what I'm talking about, but I just want to clarify that if you have ever had any kind of binging issues or insulin resistance history, eating this way is truly different and liberating. The 'not hungry' you think you are when you have had an apple and a turkey on wheat is NOT THE SAME as the 'not hungry' you are when you eat like this. Overeating is typically not about willpower; it's about insulin flooding your system- in spite of the fact you have 'enough calories' and you 'shouldn't be hungry'. It certainly takes willpower/drive/intent/focus to plan for, prepare, and commit to eating this way but once you get past the 'low carb flu' and/or withdrawal from sugar and carbs, it is very much worth it. Here is a recent success story from the Diet Doctor. Adam and I were talking the other day about how we cannot wait to lose 100 lbs or more because we'll officially be low carb success stories and we can start evangelizing. I think we're cute enough to get into at least one magazine spread. Ha.

17 days of keto, plus oopsie roll success=LowCarb Gold Star!

Unfortunately there is no official judging committee to which I can submit my accomplishments, so I have reward myself by crowing about it here.

First, because recipes- I made the famous Oopsie Rolls and they came out really good! Lumpy and golden and bread-y and they held together a nice egg, cheese, and bacon breakfast sandwich and survived being CUT IN HALF like a normal roll or a piece of toast.  I've known about the rolls for a long time but I was scared that I wouldn't be able to make them work; they'd flatten/leak or crumble/fall apart or be a 'huge mess' like they were for many of the low-carbing interwebs people out there. I also don't have any cream of tartar and never remember to buy it because, yeah, cream of tartar AND I tend to avoid the baking aisle for obvious reasons. Well, friends, my oopsie rolls came out lovely without the cream of tartar (may I never again write cream of tartar so many times in one paragraph) and here's the proof:

PRE-OVEN:

 AND POST-OVEN:

In case you don't like clicking links or googling like a grown up, here's how real quick: Preheat oven to 300F, take two bowls out. Get 3 eggs and 3 oz cream cheese out of the damn fridge (almost half a bar of regular philly). Separate whites from yolk into your two bowls; be careful not to get any yolky stuff in the whites bowl. Take out your electric hand mixer/beater thing and GO TO TOWN on the whites first; stand there for many minutes making loud noises as the whites turn into a big lofty mountain. When you take out the beaters, the whites should make 'peaks' and be like a mousse or very thick whipped cream. THEN, move over to your yolks and cream cheese and blend that. I also added a pack of splenda and a small pinch of salt during the yolk mixing. Again, no C of T. Now use a spatula and 'fold' the yellow goop into the snowy whites; just incorporate-don't use the mixer again; just very lightly, in an egg-white-supporting way, fold until you have puffy light yellow undulating mass. Now grease a cookie sheet and BLOP BLOP BLOP BLOP!  Bake them up for 30 min. Each piece has maybe 1-2 carbs.

Many recipes say to do 6 rolls but I ended up with 4 big 'uns and we were very happy.

Meanwhile, I'm trucking along and I've been in ketosis for over two weeks straight which is a first. I still feel very satisfied, rarely hungry, and only occasionally 'snacky' at night which I attribute more to habit and/or boredom. My next weigh-in is this coming Wednesday and I am really hoping for 5+ more lbs and I'm motivated to stay the course. Eggs/bacon for breakfast, take out salad for lunch while at work, and then for dinner usually a low carb casserole or quiche- Linda's old school recipe site is the best- or I make basics like chicken, beef, or fish with stir-fried veggies. At night, the new Keurig I got Adam for Christmas has been a sanity-saver; especially with the not drinking. Decaf tea or coffee with splenda and cream is such a nice evening treat. I stocked up on like 7 different types of k-cups and it's totally worth it. I haven't totally abandoned eating at night; I've done the natural almond butter/whipped cream cheese little ramekin of 'cheesecake' a couple times but dinner plus a coffee is typically enough.

So for fun and to keep me motivated, I'm constantly planning out my second-half-of-2014 excursions and picturing that feeling of being 50,60, 75 lbs less than I was on January 2nd.  Disneyland in May and my feet will hurt less and I will fit on the rollercoaster! Swimming in the lake and sitting outside in July with less sweat and chafing! A summer trip to Vegas when I will fit into the courtesy robe! The seriously 20-odd pieces of tags-on, never-worn clothes in my closet will finally be used!! I will have ankles and a neck again! My face will be mostly eyes and nose and mouth and chin rather than all CHEEK! I will feel good and proud and comfortable and enthusiastic. Life will not be perfect, but I know from experience that it will be better at a lower and healthier weight. I'm maybe 1% there but I can feel the momentum building which keeps me on track.

Reading blogs and even Pinterest also helps so thanks for posting your stuff. I don't comment enough but I read a lot. Have a good weekend!!

First weigh-in of 2014...

...And I've lost 6 lbs in my first ten days back to low-carb/high fat. This puts me on track with my projection from the start of the year- I plan to lose about 15 lbs per month the first three months and then things will slow little by little. Was I hoping for a little more since it was my first check-in? Of course I was. I'm a greedy, results-oriented person and I had visions of the more attractive numbers 8 or 9 dancing in my head. That being said, 6 is sweet; 6 is something to smile about; 6 is a number to celebrate; 6 is a number that invigorates and inspires me to KEEP GOING.

Just for a visual reference (you guys know I love the image search), this is a random person holding what 5 lbs of muscle and 5 lbs of fat look like:

I'm sure that lady is like 98 lbs, but that 5 lb chunk is nothing to ignore. So I'm pleased and ready for another 10 days. I have a pork shoulder in the crock pot right now and I'm practically drowning in  ketosis-themed youtube videos and grain-free blogs. If you're looking for low-carb recipes, I Breathe I'm Hungry and Your Lighter Side are beautiful, well-done sites. 

The only weirdness I've experienced in the last 10 days happened to be last night when I decided to slurp down a big honkin' dose of coconut oil around 11pm. I had just read several articles that made it sound like the oil is basically responsible for making alzeheimer's patients and neurologically damaged 6-year-olds look like extras from High School Musical so I figured I should take a spoonful before bed. Bad Idea Jeans. I have cooked with coconut oil, and I've added it to coffee on occasion-but never 'straight'. My stomach was upset all night and I couldn't sleep. I've found some data saying that coconut oil could cause adverse effects when it's killing yeasty old wheat-belly fungus in your gut, but perhaps I just shouldn't take a spoonful of fat just before bed. Lesson learned.

10 days in and 6 lbs off tells me to stay with the basics- high fat, moderate protein, low carb is my plan for 2014.  Have a good weekend, friends!

Scale tomorrow; feeling antsy

 "What a beautiful way to say Merry Christmas"- with damn scale. No. No. (no). Google image search is so wonderful. Also, I would break that scale in half. Moving on.

Cheese/spinach omelette with bacon for breakfast and I actually did some exercise today- intervals on the x-iser for 8 minutes and then did arms/shoulders with free weights. Lunch will be something leftover from the fridge and then tonight will be sauteed brussel sprouts and chicken cordon bleu (or sort of- breasts stuffed with Canadian bacon -eh- and some cheese). 

Yesterday was day 9 very low carb/high fat. I've been in dark pink/purple on the ketostick pretty much all week and I am eating like a CHAMP- assuming you consider butter, meat, bacon, spinach, blue cheese dressing, eggs, and chicken wings to be the food of champions. I actually do, and if you're into low carb and have some time to kill, this video from the FatHead movie guy, Tom Naughton, which happened to be shot in my hometown of Springfield, is worth watching:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=KzPnnDDCIjo


We watched it on the TV screen via chromecast the other night and there were a few parts that were equal parts fascinating and frustrating. Naughton hits on all the ways that fat consumption actually DOESN'T cause heart disease and then talks about how as recently as the 50s/60s/70s everyone from the characters on the Andy Griffith show to your grandma knew that bread, grains, and certainly sugar make you fat. It is interesting just to ruminate for a second on how as a country everyone was basically slim when we were drinking whole milk, eating salisbury steak, and making eggs cooked in real butter.

Anyway, tomorrow will be the first of many eye-poppingly-successful weigh-ins for the year. Every ten days.

Meanwhile, this:

Less Wheezy, More Weezy

Today is the 7th of January (for a few more hrs here in LA anyway) and I'm 6 days on low carb/high fat and feeling all the good things that go along with it. Just to remind myself of the benefits(and use this entry as a reference when I even consider slacking), here are some positive changes since Jan 2:

-my face is depuffing
-my nose is less wheezy
-my jeans are already feeling more comfortable
-i'm not mad at myself for overeating and/or drinking too much- because I'm not doing it.
-i feel better about who I am because I'm on the right path

I know this is a drop in the bucket, but I'm also stopping to congratulate myself on 6 days of not only the low-carbing but also on not drinking. I've claimed I was taking a 'break' from drinking in the past but it's been a long time since I've made it more than 4-5 days without a glass of red wine or a vodka drink. What am I doing with all these sober hours? Har. My evenings are more productive, but I've yet to get myself back to the gym. Over the weekend during the football game, I made wings and drank diet orange soda and then I took a walk in the neighborhood. Adam is fully on board with low carb but he's been quietly making himself some no-carb cocktails which gives me a twinge of jealousy- but then I find that I'm NOT seriously tempted to break down and have one myself. I'm on a mission.

For the next two months these are my non-negotiable terms: Eat low carb/high fat. Drink no alcohol. Weigh in every ten days. Write. Reflect. Repeat.

There are of course more things I want to work on but those first two will work some serious magic. Taking it one day at a time.

This is how 2014 is going to be...

2014:

Jan-March I will lose ~15 lbs per month

April-June I will lose ~10 lbs per month

By July 1st I'll be down 75 lbs

July-December I will lose an average of 8 lbs per month

By the end of the year I'll be down 115-130 lbs and about 75% of the way to my goal weight.

How:

1) I'm taking a two month break from alcohol to jump start the process. Even red wine. I can do two months. Boredom will be a small price to pay for a nice chunk of weight gone in 2 months.

2) I'm back on low carb eating. Yesterday I started and I already feel better. See links below for ideas and inspiration.

3) I weighed in on Jan 2nd and I will weigh myself every ten days and post my losses. For those of you who have been around since the start, I'm 7 lbs less(!) than my 'original' Chunky Rants starting weight in Sept 2012. However, I'm starting from scratch. Enough is enough.

4) Exercise will not be 'how' I lose the weight, but it will be part of my life. I bought a little fitbit that should arrive soon to help keep me moving and motivated.

People, Ideas, and Websites:

The theories and 'eating plans' (not diets, kids) of Gary Taubes who wrote 'Why We Get Fat', Andreas Eenfeldt at dietdoctor.com, The Eades, and Mark's Daily Apple are all inspiring to me.  Old school Atkins (not the packaged products) is also a good place to start if you want to kick a sugar addiction. Right now I'm doing a mix of the above- mostly fat, protein, and veggies, limited high fat dairy/cheese, and nuts.

Leigh from Poonapalooza is a recent, 100% legit success story. She lost almost 150lbs, she eats super clean/95% paleo and runs like a champ.

Kaki from 'Formerly Fit by 40' is a low carb/high fat eater and is down over 50 lbs. Plus, she's funny.

Carb Tripper has been at the low carb game since 2009 and she's a funny, prolific blogger.

Judy Barnes Baker from Carb Wars writes great cookbooks and is sort of like the librarian vigilante of the low-carb movement.

Primal Journey is a great site for low carb/primal/paleo recipes and general advice.

If you like cluttered websites, podcasts, and goofy guys who are REALLY into low carb, Jimmy Moore is legit.

JLovely is new to me as of today, but he lost over 100lbs eating low carb/high fat. I linked to his site today via Mark's Daily Apple's success stories.

Not necessarily into low carb but looking for inspiring, successful weight loss bloggers? Please check out my links to the side, and for the true 'before and after' experience, visit the blogs of these internet superstars who have all lost 100-200lbs:

Brooke, Kelly, RunsforCookies, Anti-Jared, and David

So yeah. I have some promises to keep. I thank everyone who inspires me and checks in here. I imagine due to the whole not drinking thing I'll be blogging more at night. Have a great weekend, friends!