Showing posts with label binge. Show all posts
Showing posts with label binge. Show all posts

Friday, December 13, 2013

Food Friday: Results of the 45 day Paleo Challenge: Week 4!

There has been some serious shake ups in the leader board this week folks.  What seemed like a mostly harmless bottle of wine has proven to be a potential game changer.  This may not be college football, but I'm kinda excited!



Here are the current standings of the 45 day challenge as of yesterday, the end of our 4th week.  Again, I would like to reiterate how amazing this has been for me to watch my family and friends get healthier.  And if I'm going to lose, I can't think of anyone I'd rather see take the victory lap more than the person currently topping the charts.

Inspiration comes in all forms.  Sometimes the trainer needs to be trained.  Well done, grasshopper.

543      Trish
542      Chad
531      Karn D
523      Nick
512      Colby
505      Jen
484      Amy
468      Lisa
442      Isadora
432      John D
427      Christina
397      Kerry 
389      Trae
138      Wendy

And now, to my dismay in terms of excess data entry, we get to keep track of a sub-challenge.  A little birdie with good connections offered 2 tickets to see Cinderella on Broadway to the winner of the last 30 days of the challenge, only if they could beat me.  As it turns out that my trip to Montreal proved to be more tempting than it should have been, I think our little birdie will be coughing up some tickets.

Check out this race.  A tie for first place!  Not that I'm biased or anything, but KICK HIS ASS, MOM!!!  (Trish is my mom, btw...)

237      Trish
237      Colby
233      Karn D
233      Nick
230      Chad
230      Amy
212      Jen
212      Christina
207      Lisa
200      Isadora
184      Kerry 
178      John D
173      Trae

For review, here are how the points are calculated:

Rules:

Do not consume added sugars of any kind. No Splenda, Nutrasweet, xylitol, agave nectar etc. Read labels carefully. For the purpose of this challenge Natural sugars such as honey and 100%maple syrup may be used in moderation. 

Do Not consume sugary alcohol drinks like wine and sugar based cocktails. You MAY have simple cocktails with clear liquors (it's the holidays for God's sake). IE: vodka or tequila with lime and seltzer. No dark liquors like Rum - too sugary.

Do not eat grains. This includes but is not limited to wheat, rye, barley, oats, corn, rice, millet, bulgar, sorghum, amaranth, buckwheat, sprouted grains and all pseudo grains like quiona. Note: read labels, many unexpected products include grain.

Do not eat legumes. Legumes are beans and more... Black, red, kidney, lima, white, navy, kidney, peas, lentils, peanuts, peas, chickpeas, and all soy products ( edamame, soy beans, bean sprouts, soy sauce,miso, tofu, etc. Read Labels!)

Do not eat dairy. The strict paleo Gods say none, ever. This challenge, only grass-fed butter is allowed. No milk or cheese of any kind.

Root vegetables are good, white potatoes are bad. Although some articles say different for the sake of the cleanse we are going to ditch these too. Try subbing every potato recipe with sweet potatoes, and if your eating yams or sweet potatoes add more grass-fed butter!

Comment below with your daily record with your name, date, and score, or on my Google plus page.

Scoring:

When you wake up you have a fresh 15 points, you can win and loose points depending on your day. You gain points based on the quality food you eat, your sleep (yup, you GAIN points for sleeping), working out and mobility training. Here's the breakdown:

15 points-wake up every day with a fresh new day ahead of the game.


Add points
+2 points for 60 minutes of working out (30min workout=1 point)
+1 for 7+ hours of sleep
+1 for 2 grams of quality fish oil (2 pills/day)
+1 point for mobility training (stretching/yoga) outside of workout hours.

Max allowed points per day is 20 pts. Kudos to you for putting in a 3 hour workout, but you will only be awarded the 2 pts for that time.

Deducting Points
-1 point for every serving of: deli meats, sausage (only if not fully meat/veg), legumes (ie: hummus, peanuts, peas) salad dressing, red wine, tequila, GF Beer or Cider

-2 points for every serving of dairy with the exception of grass-fed butter (milk, yogurt, cheese, soy products) 

-3 points for every serving of cereal, oats, grains, corn, flour, rice, pasta, noodles, quinoa and all things derived from above 

-4 points for every SERVING of soda, juice (not fresh squeezed or 100% juice), sports drinks, fried food, chips, pizza, cookies, ice cream, ketchup, processed foods, beer (and all alcoholic beverages other than "1 point beverages", sugar added sweets(cake, sorbet, pie, you get it, don't eat it!)

The lowest you can get for one day is zero (thinking Christmas day here people) and the highest is 20.

Friday, November 29, 2013

Foodie Friday: Results of the 45 day Paleo challenge: week 2!



What to say about this week?  Looks like some folks roasted more than just a turkey!  The holidays are a tough time for any diet, but I have to say that I am quite impressed with this groups numbers so far.  Yesterday was a holiday centered on gluttony, and while a handful of participants have yet to report the damage, most have said there were small indulgences but few total blowouts.

That's what this is about people.  Learning to live, and love, in moderation.  I'm historically a disaster with moderation.  I'm either squeaky clean or shockingly gross!

My own results: I've been going hard for these 2 weeks.  Starting to feel good about what I see in the mirror and what notch I'm on with the belt.  14 days in and I'm down 1.75 inches from my waist.  So long, sucker!!!

Here are the results as of today:


274      Chad
269      Trish
261           Karn D
255      Jen
250      Nick
235      Colby
222      John D
221      Lisa
217      Amy
206      Isadora
199         Kerry 
189      Trae
152      Christina
138      Wendy

Still want to join in?  I am considering a secondary challenge for the last 30 days.  The main 45 day challenge stands, but having another goal might help get some folks back on track or able to join in.  Anyone interested?

For review, here are the rules again:

Rules:

Do not consume added sugars of any kind. No Splenda, Nutrasweet, xylitol, agave nectar etc. Read labels carefully. For the purpose of this challenge Natural sugars such as honey and 100%maple syrup may be used in moderation. 

Do Not consume sugary alcohol drinks like wine and sugar based cocktails. You MAY have simple cocktails with clear liquors (it's the holidays for God's sake). IE: vodka or tequila with lime and seltzer. No dark liquors like Rum - too sugary.

Do not eat grains. This includes but is not limited to wheat, rye, barley, oats, corn, rice, millet, bulgar, sorghum, amaranth, buckwheat, sprouted grains and all pseudo grains like quiona. Note: read labels, many unexpected products include grain.

Do not eat legumes. Legumes are beans and more... Black, red, kidney, lima, white, navy, kidney, peas, lentils, peanuts, peas, chickpeas, and all soy products ( edamame, soy beans, bean sprouts, soy sauce,miso, tofu, etc. Read Labels!)

Do not eat dairy. The strict paleo Gods say none, ever. This challenge, only grass-fed butter is allowed. No milk or cheese of any kind.

Root vegetables are good, white potatoes are bad. Although some articles say different for the sake of the cleanse we are going to ditch these too. Try subbing every potato recipe with sweet potatoes, and if your eating yams or sweet potatoes add more grass-fed butter!

Comment below with your daily record with your name, date, and score, or on my Google plus page.

Scoring:

When you wake up you have a fresh 15 points, you can win and loose points depending on your day. You gain points based on the quality food you eat, your sleep (yup, you GAIN points for sleeping), working out and mobility training. Here's the breakdown:

15 points-wake up every day with a fresh new day ahead of the game.

Add points
+2 points for 60 minutes of working out (30min workout=1 point)
+1 for 7+ hours of sleep
+1 for 2 grams of quality fish oil (2 pills/day)
+1 point for mobility training (stretching/yoga) outside of workout hours.

Max allowed points per day is 20 pts. Kudos to you for putting in a 3 hour workout, but you will only be awarded the 2 pts for that time.

Deducting Points
-1 point for every serving of: deli meats, sausage (only if not fully meat/veg), legumes (ie: hummus, peanuts, peas) salad dressing, red wine, tequila, GF Beer or Cider

-2 points for every serving of dairy with the exception of grass-fed butter (milk, yogurt, cheese, soy products) 

-3 points for every serving of cereal, oats, grains, corn, flour, rice, pasta, noodles, quinoa and all things derived from above 

-4 points for every SERVING of soda, juice (not fresh squeezed or 100% juice), sports drinks, fried food, chips, pizza, cookies, ice cream, ketchup, processed foods, beer (and all alcoholic beverages other than "1 point beverages", sugar added sweets(cake, sorbet, pie, you get it, don't eat it!)

The lowest you can get for one day is zero (thinking Thanksgiving here people) and the highest is 20.

Sunday, October 13, 2013

Weekly review 4: embracing weakness

What is it about struggle that triathletes find so irresistible?  Why do we find things that make us suffer and feel compelled to jump right into them?  How many of us partake in self-destructive behavior, just to make that goal even more glamorous when it is achieved?

I know my Sunday post is supposed to be all about how my week of training went, but this week went a bit deeper than that on a personal level.  My workouts were somewhere between tragic and triumphant: a gold-standard representation of mediocrity.  And while I strive to rip myself out of that unsavory status, this post is about one of the reasons I seem to stay there.  This post is about why, although setting lofty and impressive self-goals, I tend to gravitate towards the metaphorical middle of the pack.

Ladies and gents, I'd like to introduce you to my own struggle.  My beacon of self-loathing and symbolic, ego-driven, deprecation.

Ice Cream: The Enemy

How absurd, right?  What high level athlete repeatedly finds themselves crippled by such a kryptonite-like bowl of deliciousness?  Apparently, this guy does...

Now, let me elaborate.  It's true that I do try to write this blog with a current of humor to it.  There are few things funnier than the crap a triathlete does to himself in the struggle to cross that finish line.  How could a blog about being a triathlete not be funny?  And yet, the battle I am about to tell you about is anything but.

Some people are addicted to drugs.  Others find alcohol to be their weakness.  For that matter, you name any seemingly pleasure-inducing modality and there will be someone in the world who harbors a crippling weakness to it.  Mine is food.

Please read this thought provoking paragraph:

Binge eating disorder is defined as recurring episodes of eating significantly more food in a short period of time than most people would eat under similar circumstances, with episodes marked by feelings of lack of control. Someone with binge eating disorder may eat too quickly, even when he or she is not hungry. The person may have feelings of guilt, embarrassment, or disgust and may binge eat aloneto hide the behavior. This disorder is associated with marked distress and occurs, on average, at least once a week over three months. 

That text is quoted from the DSM-5, which stands for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (now in it's riveting 5th edition).  

Reading that paragraph invokes a few primal reactions for me.  The most striking being that it describes my relationship with food more articulately than I could have spoken aloud to any therapist. The second being the confirmation that my frequent "carb-loading" portion of my training is in fact more problematic than I had once justified.  It would seem that I now have a freshly diagnosable disorder.  Well...shit.

How can I demonstrate to you, the reader, my relationship with food?  Perhaps this image will carry across what I try to say with words:



Yep, that about does it...

And while I am no longer a preschool-aged female, I do still carry with me this horror-film-inspired love of food.  So what gives?  

Without bringing us down more than I already have (stupid DSM and its labels), I had some bumpy times during my childhood.  Who didn't, right?  There was the typical childhood and teenaged struggles that we all go through, with a generous peppering of some heavy caliber artillery mixed in.  My coping mechanism became food.  

Things were bad; food made it better.  I'm sure it's more complicated than that somehow, but that is as good a description as I can muster.

And yet, to my dismay, I seemed to have never outgrown this compulsion.  And that is what I am left with this week to tell you.  Not about my training or new hurdles I have cleared.  Not about milestones reached in my physical abilities.  Not about some seemingly impossible race that I just crushed.  This week was about an old enemy of mine.  This week was about the internal struggle that is my pathological, and don't forget diagnosable, reliance on food.  

This week has been hard.  

The optimist in me likes to believe that facing this struggle head on will bring me one step closer to closure.  That sharing with the world what I consider to be my biggest weakness will somehow break down a barrier.  That putting to words what I find to be my ultimate example of self-loathing and failure will somehow allow me to finally put it behind me.  

I won't spend the energy telling you what the pessimist in me believes.  

So now that I've had my big come-to-Jesus moment right here on this page, I'm left wondering how many of my readers share a similar struggle.  Maybe it's drugs, sex, food, attention.  Maybe it's something I've never even considered a temptation for weakness.  Maybe it's exercise.  I wonder how many of us out there, triathletes or otherwise, feel like they lose control of their will on a regular basis.  How many well educated, inspirational, successful, go-getters out there feel that same terrifying moment of complete lack of discipline and regulation.  Or worse yet, that moment of realization after a particularly damaging episode of failure; the proverbial hang-over after blacking out the night before.

More so than that, I wonder how they have learned to control those tendencies.  

I promise my posts will be back to their campy and entertaining antics soon, but for just this moment, I am grateful to you for allowing me to briefly share this bit of inner reflection.  For that matter, I would be even more deeply honored to read any comments you might be willing to share about your own struggles.

Perhaps weakness is not so rare?

With love to you and loathing to weakness,
Me