Three of the four Ws are going pretty well.
Drinking my water is the easy part. There is something about breastfeeding that makes me feel like I'm dying of thirst.
The walking isn't happening yet. A cold bug has been moving through my house and it's my turn to get it. Even when I'm not sick, I haven't figured out yet how to fit exercise into my day.
I knew I wasn't ready to jump into a diet yet, so I decided to start making some observations about how I'm doing and what needs to change. This is what I've discovered so far:
- My portion sizes are way off
- I'm eating more calories than I thought. On Monday, I recorded what I ate on an Excel spreadsheet and tallied up the calories...OUCH. I was shocked at the results. The trip to McDonald's for dinner did not help matters.
- I'm completely addicted to sugar.
- I eat at night when I don't need to.
So as I've prayed for wisdom and willpower, I started looking at these observations. Obviously, if I'm going to lose weight, I've got to scale back my portions, eat less calories, and stop eating so much sugar. Ugh. How easy, right? Not! I felt so discouraged as once again I was reminded that I am so weak in the willpower department.
An interesting little twist happened this week, though. I had a blessing in disguise.
I'm nursing my baby, and I've been dealing with thrush (a yeast infection on my nipples and in his mouth). It has made nursing painful, and I've struggled to get rid of it. In my search for a cure, I've learned that the thrush has moved inside of my milk ducts and dietary changes would be necessary if I ever want to get rid of it. Guess what has to go? You guessed it- sugar. Dairy products, too.
Beginning Tuesday morning, I've been sugar free. Not from willpower, just from sheer necessity. I almost cried Monday night when I thought about giving up all milk and sugar. It felt too hard. But it has been so good for me. I think going cold turkey was the only way I would have been able to break this sugar addiction, and it took the thrush being more painful than the sugar withdrawals to get me to do it.
It has been interesting to see how I'm eating differently now that I can't have milk or sugar. I'm eating healthier because I have to. I actually ate fruit and veggies today. It's a miracle! : )
I know getting the sugar out of my system will help in the willpower department. Interesting answer to prayer!
Stats:
Goal: -50 lbs
8 pounds gone so far! : )
42 to go
Chicken Impostor(s) - Part One
12 years ago
7 comments:
I'm with you girl! Also postpartum and determined to lose weight.
I have a cooking blog that I startedd after changing our diet 3 years ago. Sugar was a huge issue. I have an article on my blog about different white sugar substitutes. You can check that out at http://cookhealthyfun.blogspot.com/2007/10/sugar-substitutes.html.
I'm so glad you added my blog page to your side bar. Glad I can help. Changing our diet made such a difference in our lives, I love to share.
Great job so far!!
Wow! I totally need to go cold turkey with sugar but can't quite seem to do it. I struggle with "after the next birthday/holiday/special occasion I'll cut out sugar". Yeah right. Any ideas? The only other time I managed to do this was because of gestational diabetes. I promised myself not to go back to eating sugar after that but here I am again. I want to do it but I'm so addicted.
I really think the only way for me to get rid of the sugar was to go cold turkey. (I've only gone two days though, so I'm not an expert) : )
Getting it out of my system is helping with cravings and with overeating in general. It's weird how sugar makes me hungrier. I have tried so many times to cut back on the sugar but I just ended up eating it. When I was at Z's birthday party, I knew it was bad when I had to hold myself back from eating his whole cake by myself. : )
You should also read Felicia's blog post about sugar substitutes. I think I'm going to try Stevia.
http://cookhealthyfun.blogspot.com/2007/10/sugar-substitutes.html
Hi Becky! I'm Laura, a blogger friend of 'Mrs. MK',
I just had baby #5 and have been working at trying to work off those extra pounds too.
This has helped for me:
I dropped the sweets entirely and tried to cut back on the breads (not entirely, just some). I give myself one day off at the end of the month (e.g. last month I had a bridal shower, this month Reformation Party, next Thanksgiving, etc...).
I also bought an eliptical machine from www.craigslist.com for 75 dollars and I do that for 20 minutes a day, either before the kids wake up or while they're doing school.
We nursing mothers have burning calories working with us! I read that we burn up to 2000 calories a day just nursing so now's the time to cut back some, but not totally, to maintain the extra for the baby!
Hope that helps...
Running that race beside you,
laura.
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