Beyond Willpower

Blood work. My cholesterol is high, my triglycerides are ridiculous, my sugar (A1C) is 6.1, all as of last October. I have an appointment for my yearly physical on January 26th. I've been doing all I can to improve these numbers. I'm eating between 7-13 servings of fruits and veggies daily. More on days I'm off and can stay home and munch, and less on days I work. I've decided to start prepacking baggiges of fruits, veggies, and nuts, to snack on while I'm at work so that I can get as many servings in a day as I can. I wasn't going to weigh myself for 3 months, but then realized I need to weigh myself NOW so that if what I'm doing isn't working I can adjust it somehow. I've lost 5 lbs so far on this particular Way Of Eating, and I've lost a total of 25 since my high weight. Woot! Nothin' to sneeze at! I feel like my body is so sick, and I am doing what I can to make it well again. That means eating ALL the fruits and veggies, whole grai...

We got a new cookbook ! Eat like you give a fuck is right! This book is amazing! We've already tried 4 different recipes and talk about impressed! So far I've made the spiced chickpea wraps, the biscuit and lentil gravy (which is my absolute fave so far!), Joey made the sriracha cauliflower and peanut dipping sauce and today I made minestrone! Pics below! *Clearly there are pics of the food and plenty of them! Prepping: The delicious finished product!   I'm going to be honest here and say this isn't a 30 minutes or less cookbook (nor does it make any claims as such), and it does take a little work, and you do make everything from scratch. Although I would be sorely disappointed if I bought a cookbook and it said "Now take the chipotle mayo out of your fridge and slap it on that sammie."  BUT to be fair I absolutely love cooking, that means I love all the prep and 'extra' (the meat of the meal if you will) work. So, there...

Okay, so I've been posting a bit stealth lately, here and there with little promotion. I was sort of waiting for the new year but at the same time I had things to say. Now, regardless of what your ideas about new year's resolutions are, I ask you to please watch this video, it goes over the findings of a study on new years resolution behaviors, it's quite interesting: Now, what am I doing here? I almost never make new year resolutions. I'm always worried about letting myself down, but hell, I have to try right? So, here it goes, I resolve to: Eat a 90% whole foods diet Lose 95 lbs before this day next year Start exercising, (this is a goal that will progress over the course of the year) Juice regularly As I expressed in my first post back in awhile , I've been gone due to medication related weight gain and my inability to get a handle on it. Circumstances were dire in October, and they changed my meds and added a new medication, w...

So, I'm having a holiday party this coming Saturday. I have a bunch of friends who all have different dietary restrictions/choices. I'm trying to cater to my vegan and dairy free friends as well as my high protein diet friends who are trying to cut out carbs! I have decided to make two different types of cookies, Lazy Samoas and mint chip and I'm making peanut butter blondies and also buckeyes. I'm super excited. All of these recipes will be coming from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar Food wise, I'll be making vegan chili, and roasted ham to be sliced for sammiches. I have a cocktail style dip and vegan buffalo chicken dip. I've made the vegan buffalo chicken dip twice, once with seitain (this did not turn out well, sorry T.J) and once with smart strips 'chicken'. That came out FANTASTIC! We did buy some groceries for the house today as well, and we are making veg choices when eating out, and then eating the left over meat that's in t...

So tonight I was talking with my cousin, who also struggles with food issues. She said that cooking something different for herself than what the rest of the family eats was a challenge, because she would just pick off the kids plates anyhow. This is something I never really understood. My mom did this same exact thing when I lived at home. Making herself some small bland dish and watching us chow down on more fatty fare. I said to my cousin, "They should eat what you eat." Now I'm not a parent, never will be, so maybe I'm entirely wrong here. It SEEMS....especially coming from OUR family where most of us have struggled with our weight to varying degrees, that you would want to nip it in the bud so to speak. Get those kids eating healthy before they become a parent making a separate meal for themselves down the line, picking off their kids plates. But then the question becomes, how do you get them to eat this bland boring food you've been making for yoursel...

So, I'm giving beyond willpower a little face lift here, there is a bar along the right hand side of the screen with all your navigational doodads. I'm not really paying attention to my weight until the new year, but I'm not binging or anything, I've lost 3 lbs this week just by reducing the Abilify from 30 mgs to 15. I have a confession...Augh, this makes me really angry. Back in the day our friends would come over and open our fridge and freezer and say "Wow, you guys eat really healthy!" Well, a friend came over recently and looked in our fridge/freezer and said "Wow, you have a lot of bachelor food!" MY. GOD. That was some sort of MOMENT for me. I was SO embarassed and SO upset. So, I've realized what we need to do over the course of the next few weeks. We need to eat all the frozen crap that we have and either eat/give away whatever meat is left in the end and then go SHOPPING! And get some of THIS! It's a process. W...

Well, it's been about ten days since I've been gf and vegan and watching what I eat, I'm still gaining. I went to the dr, and she said that anti psychotics like abilify can cause metabolic disorder and that people have been successfully treated for such a thing with metformin. Luckily, I do not have diabetes, but this drug is a diabetes drug, she says though that it should help with my weight loss. She is also going to check me for cushings disease at a later date. I guess that is an overproduction of cortisol, which is a stress hormone, and it makes you gain/unable to lose. So we're checking everything. I'm so happy with this new Dr. I feel like she is very thorough. I've seen her twice now and she really listens. I was also put on something for chronic migraines as well. I'm having pain around my liver area when it's pressed as well, she is checking my enzymes and we'll go from there. Also, checking me for celiac and lupus. It was a busy day!...

Wow. It's been since MAY. and before May, I was already struggling. I've had some issues. For one, I switched birth control. I was trying out one of those ones where you only get it every 3 months. I was getting mine every 6 weeks. It just wasn't working. It also gave me the worst PMS style cravings every minute of every day. If I could have eaten a deep fried, chocolate covered, ice cream topped pizza every day I would have. It was pretty awful. Then, to make matters worse, I went back on lyrica (weight gainer). I stayed on it way past the point where it actually worked. I stopped being gluten free and I even ate dairy because my pain had gotten better. Now my pain is back, the drug isn't working, and it never EVER worked as well as being gluten free and vegan did. Also, I was searching for my first full time job since 2005 when I went on disability. I have now worked my way OFF disability and have gotten a new full time job as an optician. I'm VERY happy at ...

Well, I'm still losing!!!! I will update my ticker once a month after my study appt. But just wanted to let you know that I'm back in the game and still going strong! Tonight will be about a week and a half on Lyrica. I'm feeling good. I plan to do yoga tonight. It will be my first time doing it in a long time. But once I get off here I am going to go ahead and get to it! Tonight for dinner I made gluten free, vegan spinach alfredo. Yum! Be sure to check out my recipe here: "Nothing to say but Mmmm", vegan alfredo There is a strange peace in not struggling with your emotions and motivation (or lack thereof) or you're willpower or whatever it is you want to call it. I feel truly hopeful for the first time in over a year. I just can't believe the difference coming off that bc made. Thank you portia! It's much better.  Anyhow, I'm off to do some yoga! Might go for a walk later too if joey doesn't get home too late. ...

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...

What kind of holiday traditions do you have?   Every year Joey and I put up the tree the weekend after my bday, while he sets everything up to be decorated and puts out the stuffed animals, I get the holiday plates out and make us a goodie tray of cookies and hot chocolate. Every year we also watch bad santa while decorating. :) This year it was sugar cookies, chocolate chips and thumbprints : Also, be sure to check out www.gluuteny.com Thumprints are my all time favorite cookie! Also, yes, all vegan and gluten free! So in order to save myself from sabotage I gave cookies away at work and to my landlord. What's on the plate was all that was left for us. It was probably still too much. We put up the tree, out little charlie brown xmas: Here are some of my fave ornaments: This is what we have under the tree: Then, we torture Fuzzy The Cat: I had a good time, I love putting up the tree and of course eating homemade goodies, but I feel sugared out! I'm having a bd...

So, other than the fact that I'm on plan and exercising and not losing a single ounce, my week has been pretty good. You know why? Because I'm on plan and exercising. I know the weight loss will come once I reduce the abilify, but I missed my last appt, so that hasn't happened yet. I'm trying to just be positive, and relax, knowing that even without the results I so desperately want, I'm still doing what's right for my body. I've been doing yoga almost every day. I find it helps my fibro so much that I don't want to stop doing it. It's amazing the difference adding yoga along with my physical therapy has made. Anyhow, yesterday was my birthday, I meant to take some food porn pics, but even though my camera was with me most of the day I entirely forgot until my last meal. We had rice with chopped portabella mushrooms and tiny potatoes, gold, red and purple. It was drizzled with truffle oil and blueberry balsamic and it was fabulous!: I also mad...

So my mom bought me a cookbook called: Vegan Fire and Spice I made my first recipe from it tonight. It's separated by country, and I had Nigerian Peanut Soup. It was amazing! The flavors were just...bold. That's the only way I can think to put it. Fabulous! I also made the blackened tofu from Appetite for Reduction . Here's some crappy blurry pics from my phone, ha.: I was talking to someone today about how beautiful colorful food is and how it's so healthy. When you eat a lot of prepackaged crap, we were saying -- it tends to just be brown. Blackened tofu ready to go into the broiler: Blackened tofu and Nigerian peanut soup The soup was truly the star of this show, but I think maybe the tofu didn't come out as well as it did last time because of my own error in prep. Anyhow, I can't wait to check out more recipes from this book, lots of yummy looking things, I recommend checking it out.  Also all the recipes in both of those books pretty much serve 4. ...

So, a few months ago I had gotten myself pretty much 'over' hunger. I allowed myself to feel hungry without it making me cranky or it being the end of the world. I didn't have to eat asap and pig out, I could come home, absolutely ravenous, cook a nice healthy meal and then eat it and be fine. Today, things are different. I've gotten unacquainted with hunger and it's time I got acquainted again. Now, I get hungry and I feel like I have to eat, even if it's something unhealthy or downright BAD for me (Fried/includes dairy or gluten) because I need to make that feeling GO AWAY. Well, enough of that. I've done it before and I can do it again. Today at work I was hungry. I had a protein shake for breakfast and it was black Friday so there was no going for a break to grab a banana and some nuts, which I normally do around 1ish.  (It's a total waste of calories). If I would just wait until I got home a measly two hours later I'm sure I"d be fine...

There are some things in my life that were once priorities that have been put on the back burner. I feel like due to this medication it's pointless to try and lose since I can't seem to. But that is ridiculous because I need to be healthy whether I'm losing or not. So I need to get on track with the gf/vegan eats and exercise in a big way. (I've eaten dairy some lately and it's ADDICTIVE. No joke.)  So starting today, gf/vegan all the way. I need groceries, but I'll just eat tons of rice if I must just because I can really FEEL a difference in my body when I eat gluten. It aggravates the living hell out of my fibro, I've been feeling so inflamed lately that even just sitting here has been burning my legs and back. I need to exercise. I KNOW that it helps my fibro. Like my pain doc says, if you don't use it, you lose it with fibro. It's a vicious cycle. You lay down because you're in pain but in the long run laying around just causes more p...

So I feel like my struggles are finally coming to an end (for now!) Today a friend took me grocery shopping, we went to whole foods and I got lots of 'essentials' and not much 'extra' or processed stuff (like sauces, etc) I have recently slipped up due to not really having much of the food I need to eat. I've eaten dairy and gluten and my body is telling me to stop. So, I'm listening. I did buy some daiya and some tofutti 'sour cream', for tacos, and to help me get off the dairy, I bought plenty of gluten free pasta and a giant bag of rice, along with lots of salad veggies and some spinach and potatoes. So, my friend who took me grocery shopping expressed some interest in watching Forks Over Knives, the plant based way of eating documentary. It really got me excited to be eating healthy again. My goal is to lose 5 lbs by November 11th. (I'm going to a party and want to look a smidge better in my dress ;) My doc has also agreed to lower my dose ...

So, there has been some ruckus around here lately. I was cooking for a friend recently and the carbon monoxide detector went off a bit after our meal. It was a reading of 77 in the hallway and 256 in the kitchen. (It should be 0 at all times.) So, I called the fire department. They said it was coming from the kitchen and might be the stove. I was told to open all the windows and that the gas man would be coming. Let me just say, I rent. I've lived in this place, with this stove from surely 1970 (it was that awful goldenrod color) for 13 years. The gas man said it wasn't the stove, but that the gas line needed to be replaced anyhow. It may have been the carbon build up on my pots and pans burning. The landlord's son in law came to replace it and saw what awful shape the stove was in. It's always been crooked and the oil in a pan will all fall to one side, and the feet on it were so rusted there was nothing that could be done to even it out. The oven never worked righ...

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 ...

Where has my spark gone? So the other day I commented on a blog post written by  Rejecting 300  that was about, where do you find motivation once it's fizzled out? Basically, I am committed, I keep plugging along, whether I'm motivated or not. It's not as fun when you're not motivated, but it still gets the job done. I haven't been to the gym in forever, I've been lucky to have one day off a week. BUT, this past week I had some time to relax and this coming week I will have two days off IN A ROW! (I'll be out of town staying at my moms since last week didn't work out, but it's okay, she has a treadmill!). I told Rejecting 300 that I was going to go to bed, and wake up the next day and hope that spark had returned. It didn't though. But, I stayed on plan, I tracked, and at the end of the night when Joey asked if I wanted to go out to eat, I said no, I'd had my cals. I must say I made myself proud. :) Getting it back Then today, I woke ...

Unfortunately, Forks Over Knives did not come to my city when it opened, but we did go to Cleveland   to see it. For those of you who haven't seen it (or who have and want to learn more), here are some goodies for you to win! If you've ever been curious about what a more plant-based diet can do for you this is a great way to get started! *US residents only* Forks Over Knives DVD The China Study, which is often referenced in the film  Companion book Here are the rules: (When posting this graphic plz chose "large" so the type can be read) The winner will be announced September 3rd and will be chosen at random. Deadline is September 2nd at midnight. Once a winner is chosen they will have 3 days to contact me with their shipping info and if I don't hear back another winner will be chosen at random.  U.S residents only. Sorry! Thanks for entering and good luck! NOTE: If you do NOT have a blog, you can post the link to this contest on your facebook/google...