Beyond Willpower

Well, the ticker is finally moving in a downward trend and staying there. I've lost 3 lbs this week. I've been eating 1500 cals, doing 30 mins on the bike a night (would like to do 30 in the morning too. will do that tomorrow) and drinking water, green tea, and fresh juice. at the moment I'm drinking some pineapple, kale and spinach juice. It was so overwhelmingly sweet that after two stems of kale I added about 2 or 3 handfulls of spinach and it's perfect. Mmmmm. :) Trying to get more dark leafy greens in. So last year for me, was about weight loss. Now that I think I understand the whole weight loss process (whether I follow it all the time is another story altogether) I think this year the focus is going to be on whole foods and health. I do eat vegan (except recently I did slip up and have dairy a few times when eating out, but not since being back on plan.) and I do generally eat whole foods. BUT....not enough. I feel like more veggies could work their way into m...

Today is one of those days where I'm thankful to have an all or nothing mentality. It's one of those "all" days. On days where I'm more ' nothing', like I have been for the last few months, I'm not quite so thankful for such a mentality. How many of you have this mentality? You throw yourself into getting healthy 110% and then once you start to slip you don't watch at all? What causes this? Augh. I wish I could break this pattern. Although I must say my 'all' did last 10 months, and my 'nothing' only lasted 3 months or so. I'm spending more time in the 'all' than ever before and less time in the 'nothing' than I ever have. I've gone YEARS in the 'nothing' with only a few weeks in the 'all' zone. It's such an odd head space. But, here I am, just trying to make it work to my advantage. The other day Joey and I went grocery shopping. We are all stocked up on healthy food, and I have t...

So on Tuesday I went down home to visit my  mom, my sister came too, I'll be posting some of her pics on my blog, Never Quit Playing  tomorrow so keep an eye out. She took this pic of me in my apron above, as I made slaving over a hot stove look easy and glamorous ;) (Photo by Mara Pranzarone )  I had a great time, I am teaching my mom how to ease into a vegan/whole foods/gluten free/soy free diet to try and ease some of her health problems. Sooner or later I will get her doing physical therapy, because the temporary pain of therapy is worth the relief you get after. I am so thankful for Etty, my physical therapist who I used to see and I hope she's reading this since I gave her my card and I hope she knows how much she has changed my life for the better.  I made my vegan alfredo for my fam down home and it was a hit!  Even my stepdad who told me that grilling veggies and tofu on the fourth of July was unamerican liked it and came back for more!The ...

Okay, I know, it's been forever since I've posted a recipe. Honestly, I've just been busy with work and writing and other things and have been eating the same old and not making many 'new' things for the blog like I Should. Today I made two though! First things first, my Chickpea Walnut flax burger: Okay, honestly, these burgers are a PAIN to make. They make the kitchen an absolute disaster, but seeing as how they are the only burger I've ever gotten to STICK TOGETHER, I say make a big batch. I would've made 24, but my legs are flaring so I only made 12. :( Things you need: Preheat oven to 400 degrees 2 16 oz cans of chickpeas 1 cup ground flax meal 1 cup walnuts, whole .5 onion 2 tbls chili powder 1 tsp crushed red pepper 1.5 tbls garlic salt 1 tsp cumin 2 tbls steak sauce (make your own, or you can buy it vegan, I'll post a recipe for it eventually) 1 tbls earth balance vegan buttery spread Some type of blender/food processor and a c...

Some new challenges to overcome I've been doing less than stellar. I didn't lose this week, didn't gain, but didn't lose. Having too many of those weeks. While I was stalled for no real reason I could discern before, this week was all my fault. We haven't really had groceries, so eating out was happening quite a bit, even though it was relatively healthy, it's still most likely packed with sodium. I've also not been going to the gym as often as I should, honestly my pain has been flaring a bit and the fear of making it worse has kept me home.  I'm 226 lbs and I want nothing more than to hit 224, I know it's a dumb number, heh, but it'll be more than halfway out of this decade, which I am SO looking forward to. This week I plan to hit the gym today, Thursday and Saturday. I'm trying to pace myself, since going so overboard the week before last set me back with my fibromyalgia pretty badly.  I've decided to go back to physical therapy a...

I read a post on a weight loss forum today. It was a woman asking for help because she tracked her calories for one day, went way over and then gave up. I've been there. I know that everyone thinks there is a magic bullet and they have just yet to find it, you can tell by the way their eyes glaze over when they ask how you lost weight and you tell them eating healthy and exercising. But that just isn't it, there is no magic bullet.  People have asked me, what was 'the moment', that aha moment, where I knew that I was going to stick with it this time. Honestly, I'm not sure.  There was a day where I said I'd watch my intake, like a million other days I said I'd watch what I'd eat over the years. The only thing that was really different, was that I had admitted I was a binge eater. I watched that very first episode of ruby and realized therapy was where it was at. When I started addressing the binge eating in therapy, when I joined online support gro...

This is from Ani's Raw Food Kitchen Check it out of you'd like to increase the amount of raw food you eat, it has some nice recipes. :) I made the cabbage and kale slaw in simple greek dressing last night, and it was pretty good. I didn't have scallions but I did add sweet onions and it gave it a nice kick of flavor. It's basically what it sounds like. First you chop the cabbage into slaw type bits: I use my ninja, which I think I've professed my love for here before. A lot of people say it's a physical impossibility for the ninja to chop evenly due to the way the blades are spaced. The ninja pictured here is the newer food processor/smoothie making one and it has three blades in the big container, not just two. It does chop far more evenly than the old one, but I loved that one too. Just so you can see what it chops like, the pic below shows the finished results of my slaw, with one large piece of cabbage that didn't get chopped quite right, but that was...

So, I thought I'd attempt to make a burger today. I used quinoa cooked in veggie broth, lentils, mashed, seasonings and I totally forgot the tvp. :( So, the texture was a little off, but it was still totally delicious. For now I'm just posting a pic, but in the next couple weeks I'll be sure to add the tvp to the next batch and post a review: Lunch was yummay!

So, the last time we tried our 75% raw week it was about 50%, Joey was off work for vaca and it was our anniv and I was having fun cooking, so, meh. :( Before we get into that though, just want to provide these links: www.meatout.org and < here > is my blog post on the subject. Now back to your regularly scheduled blog posting... But, this week we've decided to do it again. We both need a jumpstart to our weight loss. I only lost 1 lb last week, which is fine, it's not a gain, but it's not on target either. I know some of it is my stomach issues. (Was recently diagnosed with ibs-c, the doc thinks the gluten intolerance was masking it.) I know the raw will help with my stomach as well. I think I need to be a bit more structured to keep me on track with the raw thing, I may be posting a daily raw journey on here for what I plan to eat to keep me on track. I know it helps.  I also got this raw uncookbook.  There seems to be way too much fat in it, even if it'...