Day 8: Grocery Shopping on Empty

Today was an interesting day. I had to go grocery shopping in the morning, and stupidly didn’t eat breakfast before I left. One of the biggest mistakes you can make when trying to diet is to go to the grocery store on an empty stomach. Everything looks much more delicious, and you end up opening a package of cookies in the car. Thank goodness for being on day 8, so I had a little more control then usual. I stuck to the grocery list, and only ate one string cheese in the car.

I bought some more sugar free jello, which is for when I am really wanting something after dinner. Which is how I felt tonight. I will post some more research about carbs + sugar tomorrow.

Day 7: Slip-ups

8 Grams of Sugar and take a look at the ingredients. Fructose arghh

I am only human, and yesterday I ate something I shouldn’t have. I was super hungry and stressed from the traffic jam I had just come out of. (emotional eater alert!) Once I reached my hair salon (20 minutes late!) I inhaled a rice crispy treat they had out in the waiting room. HORRIBLE I KNOW! I actually didn’t feel that good after eating it. Maybe my body is already getting used to low sugar.

Even with that mistake, I still managed to stay under the 16-32 grams of sugar (added sugar, not natural sugar) for the day. Definitely getting easier.

Day 6: Gluten Free Will Set You Free!

Must..Look..Away….!

NO I am not going to start eating gluten free. Well not today anyway, But doing  research is fun!

Here is a webpage about living gluten free and refined sugar free. I am more about the refined sugar free thing as this point, and there are some great recipes on this site.

I knew a girl in college who could only eat gluten free food and it sounded horrible. She could pretty much never go out to dinner because the restaurant couldn’t say it was completely gluten free and they didn’t want to be the cause of her getting sick. This was almost 5 years ago, and now I see gluten free sections of menus and grocery stores popping up all over the place. I have also heard about how everyone should eat gluten free because it is a lot healthier. It is something to consider trying.

Day 5: Breakfast Quandaries

mmm plain

I am struggling with breakfast. I have been eating low fat plain Greek yogurt every day with plain almonds and frozen unsweetened fruit. I don’t really feel like egg whites everyday either…What I would like is some easy peazy cereal before work, but that may not be a good idea.

I know a lot of personal trainers. They know a lot about staying healthy and fit, and what foods one should eat to be healthy. I have learned a lot over the last few years, and I can tell you one thing for certain.. cereal is the devil.

Day 4: Working Does The Body Good

Here I am at the end of day 4. I gotta say, as much as going back to work after a long weekend sucks, it is very helpful when trying to diet. There are no temptations at my job. Sometimes we have a big container of nuts, but besides that there is only water. So today was a very successful day. I did have some tortilla chips with salad tonight for dinner, which wasn’t sugar, but made me feel gross. I started to feel that need for something sweet afterwards, so I went for a run and eventually it went away. Each day gets a little easier!

Here is a link about the “Sugar Busters! Diet” Which tells you which foods to eat and not eat. I must say they have a lot of protein choices that I do not eat (kinda a vegetarian).. According to this diet sugar is toxic!

Day 3: This Is Going To Be Hard!

I came across another blogger last night, and found out the following:

1 teaspoon of sugar is 4 grams.  Current recommendations are for no more than 6-8 teaspoons of  added sugars each day, that is 16-32 grams per day of sweeteners. 

So I am going to shoot for 16-32 grams per day, and that is nearly impossible. Everything is loaded with sugar! Between my yogurt and almonds yesterday, I was already at 10G, now with everything else I had yesterday, I had to have been close to…2060G of sugar! OK, that is an exaggeration, but bottom line counting sugar grams is going to be intense. I will keep track all day today and see what I come up with for a total. 

Now, to keep me motivated,here is another piece of info courtesy of the blog” Food Diary of a Dietitian, Everyday Ideas and True Confessions” 

“One practical concern with excess sugar consumption is that it is rapidly absorbed, quickly elevates blood sugar and leads to further sugar and carbohydrate cravings. Sugar is a viscous cycle, the more you eat the more you want. Elevated blood sugar stimulates the release of insulin; insulin loves to store sugar; guess how it is stored? Thats right- as fat! As well, insulin prefers to store that fat in the waist area, nestled right in there with our vital organs. This is called “visceral fat” and is the most metabolically active and dangerous type of fat as it interferes with our metabolism, hormone balance, and organ function”

 

Day 3 Continued: Cookies,Cake,Cupcakes, and a Pinata?!

Now that is one big pinata!

I have a confession to make. I did have some cookies yesterday. I can’t lie to my readers.

With that said, I just left another BBQ and did not eat any of the sweets they had. I did unfortunately eat some cheese doodles, but I managed to not taste any of the numerous desserts they had laid out. It was a Memorial Day BBQ/ Birthday party, so as you can imagine I was surrounded by a lot of cake and cookies. Once the pinata came out I knew I had to get out of that place fast. I heard the smashing and scattering of the candy fall to the ground as I ran to the car. Hopefully I will be stronger as the days go on. But, for now to play it safe, I need to remove myself from situations like that.

I was able to keep track of my sugar intake for half the day, not sure how the cheese doodles affected it.. I was around 20 Grams before I ate those.

Here’s to doing better tomorrow!

Day 2 Continued: Memorial Day BBQ

Well folks, it is only day number 2 and I am faced with a tough food challenge. It is Memorial Day weekend and like many other people this weekend, we are having a BBQ. Nothing too big, but there is plenty of food aka: temptations to be eaten. 

One of the toughest parts of being on a diet is making it through special events, parties, etc.. today is one of those instances. Not only is it a matter of self control, but when people ask you to try something or ask why you aren’t eating something, it can be hard explaining to them that you are trying to eat healthy/diet. I am used to people’s groans, or ” Oh c’mon it isn’t that bad for you, just have some”, and me being the one with very little self control will say, ” Oh you are right, why not just a few bites?!” BUT NOT TODAY! 

Here is the food situation I am dealing with right now. 

-Hamburgers & Hot dogs (don’t eat meat so, that was easy)

– Mozzarella and tomato basil salad ( acceptable for consumption, but not too much cheese!)

– Fruit salad with fruit dip. ( already had my fruit for the day, so going to have to avoid that..which will be hard.Fruit dip is amazing.)

– Chips and dip ( absolutely not.)

So I will stick to the special co-slaw I made which consists of co-slaw mix (plain cabbage with some carrot) and oil and vinegar. I also will be eating a veggie burger. Debating on whether or not putting it on a bun would be ok, but if the bun has more than like 2 G of sugar I will not. 

Ok, thanks for letting me fill you in on the trials and tribulations of the day. I will be sure to let you know how it went tomorrow.

 

Day 2: What Is The Deal With Fruit?

Desmond loves apples

It is day 2 of my low sugar diet and I am feeling great. Last night I hit up a Red Socks game where my self control was really tested. Everywhere I turned there were people with soft serve ice cream, and that ice cream was covered in rainbow sprinkles. It is funny because I told myself after my 21 days I would treat myself to something, and that thing would be soft serve with rainbow sprinkles. I didn’t cave though!

So I am still trying to understand the “rules” of this diet. I guess they are whatever I want them to be, but I don’t want to think I accomplished something if in fact I am still taking in way too much sugar. I will say this though, if I can go 21 days without eating candy or chocolate then that is an accomplishment in itself.

Anyways, I am going to try to cut back as much as possible. Started out the day with non-fat plain Greek yogurt, which apparently has 9 grams of sugar in a serving. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE? This is plain as can be and still they managed to shove a bunch of sugar in it. I would not want to know what it would taste like with 0 grams of sugar, blah. I did cut up a few (only 2) strawberries into the yogurt and had a packet of almonds. The almonds also plain still managed to have 1 gram of sugar in them. So as of now I am probably up to around 10 grams. Ah well, such is life. That will be my fruit consumption for the day.

Here is a list of fruits that are low in sugar:

-Lemon and Lime
-Rhubarb
-Raspberries
-Blackberries
-Cranberries

Fruits Low to Medium in Sugar

-Strawberries
-Casaba Melon
-Papaya
-Watermelon
-Peaches
-Nectarines
-Blueberries
-Cantaloupes
-Honeydew melons
-Apples
-Guavas
-Apricots (fresh, not dried)
-Grapefruit

What Are The Rules?

I have read a few different articles, and will continue to look into it more, but what are the rules for these sorts of things? Yes, I am cutting out sugar. As much as I can anyway. Sugar is everywhere. The main point of this is to stop eating candy obviously, but what about other foods we eat everyday? We don’t even realize how much sugar is in each thing, but there is always some.

I bought some sugar free jellos today as something to have when I am going into withdrawals. My boyfriend told me that was cheating. It is sugar free, but they must be putting in something along the lines of Splenda. So now I am debating whether or not Splenda and other fake sweeteners should be included in this 21 day diet.

Here is an interesting article I found on the Livestrong.com website.