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Visualization for Weight Loss

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Visualization for Weight Loss

The Beach

Visualization has been a thing for years now. Athletes imagine themselves breaking world records. And then they do. Golfers see themselves making the perfect swing and  … Wow! … they get that magical hole in one. Okay, some golfers just visualize themselves hitting a fairway and that, for me, would be an achievement! But can that stuff be used for health & weight loss?

In an effort to motivate myself to walk more, I’d lie on the couch first thing in the morning (often catching up with news that mostly does nothing but stress & depress me!), and then I’d try to visualize myself walking. Our waterfront is a magical place to walk in the morning. A long expanse of sandy beach, with a cobbled walkway at the back for those who don’t want to feel the sand between their toes. Or for when it’s -10°C with a swirl of white fluffy flakes in the air! Catching a sunrise there, summer or winter, is an almost mystical experience. Not a difficult place to walk.

In any case, there I am, lying on the couch … visualizing! I visualize myself walking, and I’m a hundred pounds lighter, with a youthful spring in my step. My sore knee and aching back are miraculously relieved of pain. Perhaps I’ll have my earbuds in. And maybe I’ll even do a few salsa steps along the way. I’m wearing off-the-rack jeans, and not some baggy anti-style statement thing that I have to hunt down on the discount rail in the fat-boy store. And a tight fitting red t-shirt. Why red? Because it’s in the closet, the new tags still attached, a constant reminder of days past! And I’ll be wearing those matching cool red sneakers that I bought five or six years ago. But that I haven’t felt cool enough to wear yet. I’ll be meeting people’s gaze as I trip along, smiling bright and breezy good mornings to all. They can’t help it, they smile back and wish me the same.

Then I come to. And carry on watching the news. Next, I’ll probably grab a coffee and head to the deck for a smoke.

So why has visualization never worked very well for me? I think, perhaps, that I’m doing it incorrectly. Or maybe I’m so good at it that with the mission accomplished in my head, why bother doing it in the real world!

How we handle our dreams can be challenging stuff sometimes.

Rice is a Killer Carb!

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Rice is a Killer Carb!

Sunrise Zen Moment

But only in a good way! And now that I’ve now figured out how to eat it.

When I was a little kid, my Mom often told me that my eyes were bigger than my belly! She was right, I always went for the biggest piece. The biggest cup, bowl or plate. The largest slice of anything I thought was nice. Oh boy, if only I’d listened to my Mom!

I have the same problem today. When I filled that tiny pot with just a small serving of rice a few days back, little did I realize that, when cooked, the stuff would grow into three days worth of heavy-duty glycemic load. Though only very occasionally threatened by blood glucose numbers that might suggested I was heading towards prediabetes, I’ve always changed my eating pattern to, hopefully, avoid any consequence. Nowadays, I use a glucose meter to monitor the varying effects of the foods I eat while testing dietary patterns.

The Glycemic Index ranks foods, all with an equivalent glucose content, in order of their impact on blood sugar levels. The Glycemic Load goes one step further, ranking foods by more realistic serving size. The Index, for example, might suggest that we ought not eat carrots. While the Load, recognizing that there is far less sugar in a reasonable serving size, suggests we can.

Except in my case!

Because, sometimes, I have no concept of serving size.

Now, the Glucose Meter helps me see the impact of my eating. Today, my finger tips look like pincushions. After three days of monitoring things, while I was gorging on rice. I couldn’t help but prick my finger every time I sat down, just to see how things stood. It was fascinating.

My blood sugar never went into dangerous territory over the course of the past three days. But it did stay at a higher level than I would like. I don’t buy the theory that says older people should have more relaxed guidelines. I want my blood sugar at or below 5.4 mmol/L (97 mg/dL) most of the time. It’s been above that for most of the past three days, and today. After eating “well”, and with a lot of variety, since July 1st, I think my body is generally handling the glycemic load better. And remember, I had that bread too when I kicked off this carb-loading binge!

My weight over the course of these four days? Stable!

I think this means that I can safely include some rice, & even some bread, in my long term diet. With the odd binge, of course. If you’ve been following this story for any length of time, you know I’ve already “qualified” potatoes as a health food! But it’s really good news that I can now add these additional, almost forbidden, carbs to my regimen too. Not in these crazy quantities, and maybe not on a daily basis, but I can have them. Now that’s starting to feel a little bit like some kind of dietary freedom! 🙂

I think I need a Zen moment, by the water, to contemplate the sheer magnificence of it all!

Crazy Keto Contrarian Day

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Crazy Keto Contrarian DaySourdough Bread

You’re going to love this one. Wait ’til you hear what I did yesterday!

In my typical hardly-scientific way, I thought I’d try something way off the charts.

Despite eating a good low-carb regimen for the past three or four days, my mood wasn’t great when I woke up yesterday. However, it picked up as the morning progressed. A lot. And I decided to do something a little crazy!

Lunch: Two sandwiches that included 4 slices of heavily buttered sourdough bread, 4 slices of Jarlsberg cheese, topped with real sauerkraut and a squirt of Dijon mustard. Oh, I had the heel with a big splodge of butter too!

Dinner: A curried fried rice with red kidney beans. Lots of oil in the pan to brown the garlic and onion, before adding the rice and beans. Added a cup of cream at the end for a little more lubrication. I ate ‘til I was stuffed and even had leftovers that I had to stick in the fridge.

Dessert: Totally shameless cherry ice cream with 5 squares of Caramel Sea-Salt dark chocolate.

I know, know! What on earth was I thinking? I was thinking to challenge how much my body had changed over the course of the past two & a half months. Was my blood sugar control any better? Despite my reservations about the impact the bread might have on my mood, would it be okay to do the bread thing every now & again?

Today … I only went up 0.4 lbs!

That’s great on a number of counts, and here’s why …

  • It is a pre-bowel movement (sorry!) weight.
  • I woke up really early this morning, so I weighed in two hours sooner than is usual.
  • And I pigged out on tons of pretty bad carbs (from a low-carb or keto viewpoint) yesterday.

What can I say, bread isn’t depressing me today!

I was monitoring my blood sugar throughout the exercise too. From morning to lunch time yesterday, I was low-normal (fours & low fives) courtesy of the lower carb days leading into this. My peak after lunch hit 6.9 mmol/L (124 mg/dL). My post dinner and dessert peak was 7.8 mmol/L (140 mg/dL). My overnight (I woke up at 3:00am) and very early morning readings were 6.9 mmol/L (124 mg/dL) or lower. The overnight & early morning numbers were still green on the app log but they are higher than I prefer. And they are not numbers that I would want to see on a regular basis. But since this is only likely to happen very rarely, it’s a great result.

I’ve seen weight loss on potato days before. Now, I think I could achieve weight loss on rice, or even bread, days too. Might have to skip that 1600 calorie dessert though! I know day by day measurements are pretty meaningless in the great scheme of things. But it is nice to know that I can go a little wild every now & again. Without paying the psychological price that a big jump on the glucose meter, or on the bathroom scale, brings.

The bottom line is that my diet seems to have improved my ability to handle sugar & starch. I’m not “cured” in the sense that I can go back to eating the way I used to. Not without consequence. And certainly not every day. But it looks like I may have brought still more flexibility back into my diet & my life. And that’s a good thing.

Now what crazy things can I do today!?!

Let’s Get Fat!

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Let’s Get Fat!
Doughnuts

Today, if you ask me if I have a sweet tooth, I will say no. In fact, I have always totally denied any leaning towards sweet things.

“Give me a rib steak over dessert any day!”, I would assert.

My history might suggest otherwise!

Doughnuts (or donuts!) are really cheap in my part of the country. If you buy them in a quantity of 6 or more, they are then considered food and are, therefore, tax free. The rough logic is that anything considered a snack is taxable, while anything considered food is not. A couple of doughnuts are a snack. A dozen are considered food for the family. We typically buy them by the dozen. Now it does make sense that a family pack of doughnuts would be tax free. But it’s not a family pack in our house, or at least not for me … they are nothing but a snack. All 12 of them!

As part of my “Let’s Get Fat” program over the years, the occasional box of doughnuts might find its way into our house. Everyone else would have one. I’d put three on a plate and grab a large glass of cold milk. The cold milk is essential if there are any chocolate doughnuts in play. It didn’t matter if I’d had a big breakfast, and lunch, and dinner that day … I always had room for three doughnuts after dinner. And then three more! After which I’d pray everyone would go to bed so I could have whatever might be left in the box. Without them watching me walk to the cupboard and fridge again. Well, in my defense … at least I felt guilty about it!

I consider myself pretty strong-willed. Capable of mustering the discipline and will-power necessary to accomplish most things I set out to do. And most folk who know me would probably agree with that. But not when it comes to doughnuts. Nor cookies. Nor apple pie. Along with a whole host of other products that have an addictive recipe of sugar, refined starch and fat. That modern blend is the perfect storm for getting fat. And I’m just one more outcome that proves the proposition.

It would be pretty delusional of me to imagine that I might ever lose weight by pandering to my addictions, wouldn’t it!?!

It might be even more delusional to think that I could maintain any weight loss achievement by going back there again.

Good thing I really enjoy my rib steak! 🙂

 

Fasting is Easy … NOT!

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Fasting is Easy … NOT!

Dew Drops

Today’s Diet is … Dewdrops!

Intermittent fasting is a big deal these days. The real beauty of fasting is that it can be blended with whatever your favourite dietary strategy is. There may be advantages to blending it with, for example, a low-carb or keto regimen. As opposed to eating junk food on eating days! The other great thing about fasting is that it requires no careful meal planning. And it costs less to boot.

It sounds so easy, doesn’t it? Nothing but good.

Why, then, do I find it so difficult most times?

I am a really big fan of fasting. I just don’t do it very well. There are many ideas out there as to what constitutes a fast. Some define it as a water only fast. Others think juice fasting is fine. Then there are those that say you can eat very modestly, like four, five or six hundred calories a day, depending on the diet, & the sex of the dieter. One of the latest is a fast mimicking diet that allows a very modest intake of some very specific prepackaged foods that trick the body into behaving as though it were not getting any food. The idea behind this is to have something nourishing to eat, while still promoting autophagy (cellular regeneration) for health. Sounds pretty good.

Fasting is also varyingly defined by duration. You can fast for one complete wake cycle, or you can do one meal a day for a twenty-something-hour fast. Some just skip breakfast & call it a 16 hour fast. Some love the alternate day fasting approach. There are longer fasts that run for days, or even weeks. These are typically only for those that are healthy & under medical supervision. One guy, in Scotland, fasted for 382 days & lost 276 lbs. I’m not touching that kind of challenge but it is pretty incredible. Fasts of short duration seem to be given a blessing for most healthy people but I don’t worry about it too much since I mostly can’t even make it through a full day anyway!

For no real reason that I can justify, I think a fast should be for one full wake cycle. And since I typically don’t eat breakfast, it would be a 40 hour fast if I make it to lunch the next day. In my case, aside from water, I allow myself coffee with heavy cream (35% fat). Should I ever feel a little off or light-headed, I may pop a few olives or a pickle for the salts. Mostly I fail my one day fasts & I find myself eating dinner in the evening. When that happens … I congratulate myself for completing a 22 hour fast!

While I like rules in many parts of my life, I’m not a big fan of dietary rules. My sloppy approach to dieting & weight loss has transferred to my half-hearted efforts at fasting.

Today, I’m going to try doing it correctly. I just had my first two coffees of the day … & both were without cream! Today, I am trying for one real, full wake cycle, fast!

Wish me luck!