1 week and a potluck down

First week of elimination diet down! Only some unintended cheating (tasting while cooking for Oli and Jeff) and 1 intentional cheating at a potluck (1 small potato latke and 1 spoonful of noodle kugel); I would say it's been a successful week. Wish I could say progress in terms of weight lost too, but remember how I was made to put my best friend away? So, I won't know if this is making any change in the digits till Thursday.

But, I will tell you I am proud of myself and would pat myself on the back if I could without hurting myself. I sat at a potluck and watched folks eat, while I drank water for 4 hours!!! I didn't know I had that kind of willpower inside me. I went, totally expecting to cheat on the diet and regretting it in the morning. Like so many of those college mornings .. uhh what? Forget I said that.

Have you been to a potluck? Nobody brings healthy, green vegetables, with protein dips made with PB2 powder and face cream cheese that's fluffy and has negative calories. No, the tables are laden with yummy, good smelling, hearty, comfort foods ... mmmm. And I consider it a big step towards a healthy and right choices future if I was able to get through a potluck without shoving my face into the whole container of latkes. Now, I won't be this restricted forever, but for the 7th day of the diet, I really wanted to be good and I was. I stayed on the wagon ... only leaned over to lick the wheel a couple times.

Weighing on my mind

How often do you weigh yourself? Who cares. I do it daily. That;s how I stay sane. For some, it's a curse but for me, the not weighing myself daily in the past has led to some serious lack in judgment and a serious gain in pounds. So, when the nutritionist said to not weigh myself for a week ... you cannot imagine my trepidation. What? I am supposed to wake, brush my teeth, get dressed ... while the scale looks at me from the corner. Beckons me to tap it's sleek glass face, wait for the 0.00 to flash and then step on it, then wait with bated breath to see if a smile will light up my face or tears will slowly drip down my eyes.

How am I supposed to give that up for an entire week?!?!? I need the daily cry, I mean check in to keep myself on track. To keep the momentum going with the eating right and exercising and all that good stuff. The scale is the yin to my yang when it comes to my dietary habits. It's the Bonnie to my Clyde ... ok this doesn't work.

It's the scale to my pounds, bottom line. But for now, I've put it away in the bathroom on the other side of the condo, so I'd have to run across our bare living room windows in the morning to get to it to weigh myself. At least today, laziness and lack of pants won over the obsession with the scale. Just need to stay sans pants for a week now. I can do it ...

Don't worry, coworkers, I am not planning to leave the house sans pants. Not yet.

Day 4 of the wonderful vegetable diet

yeah, yeah I skipped day 3. There was nothing of note, nothing major, nothing to see.

Shake in the morning, quinoa tabbouleh in the afternoon and veggie juice in the evening.

Flavor is what I miss right now, not sweets, not breads, flavor. Just garlic and lemon is not doing it for me. I seriously hope I can go back to something spicy after all this is done. My taste buds are dying for a hit of habanero, won't somebody hide a jalapeno pepper inside a shank and deliver it to me?

The tabbouleh wasn't too bad, it was actually delicious and I think I"ll keep the recipe for a side salad with dinners. Parsley, mint, cucumber, celery, onion, lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper ginger, all chopped up together into a nice salad. Add cooked quinoa enjoy.

Now, the veggie juice, not so much.Once again, some of the same things, cucumber, celery, spinach, mint and water. My Vitamix couldn't even take the grittiness out of it. So, it's ok and I pour it down my gullet like Drano going down your kitchen sink.

That's what's for lunch today too, I'm enjoying it as I type this out. YES I SAID ENJOYING! If I don't convince y'all it's enjoyable, how am I going to delude myself? But, I have something to look forward to tonight!!! Chicken fajita salad. Yummy cabbage, onions, cooked with garlic, cumin, served with chicken. Over greens for me, without salsa (SOB). In tortillas for the boys.

I think the best part about this is that the dinners are mostly edible by Jeff and Oli as well. Except for the juice, they outright said no to that.

What? I sound a little bipolar in this post? YOU WOULD BE PSYCHOTIC if you had to give up your hot sauces too. Or something you love as much as I love my hot sauces. Like your first born. Or something.

Day 2: a bit better

Yes, I am going to talk about this everyday. I'm going through it, I don't have the option to ignore it. You can NOT read the posts.

Wait, am I already getting nasty? Am I on edge? Nah, not yet. These headaches are starting to get old though. They start about mid day and don't go away till I go to sleep.

Today started late since it was a holiday; I didn't get my morning shake in till almost 10. Same shake as yesterday, veggies, almond milk, spirulina. I didn't finish that till almost 12, so I didn't have any lunch.

Snack was almond butter with some veggies.

Dinner was another great recipe that even Jeff loved. It was rainbow trout baked with just some fresh lemon. Served on greens with some unsweetened coconut flakes and macadamia nuts. It also had some homemade basil pesto on top that was delicious. Steamed broccoli was there too, except I used my steamer for the first time and I overcooked them, but the mush was yummy.

I made shepherd's pie for Jeff and Oli, I took a couple bites and it took great self control not to eat a whole bowlful of it.

It's not hard or easy, it's just different. 

Day 1

It's the 1st day of the rest of my life ... isn't that what they say? Well, everyday is the 1st day of the rest of our lives, but this is the first day of mine on the new restrictive diet. Now, the word diet gets a lot of bad media, and it really shouldn't. By definition, a diet is the sum of food consumed by a person or other organism. So, I am not following a vegan diet, or a 4:3 diet (whatever that might be), or the Southbeach diet. I am following my nutritionist's diet plan. So, as of today, these are my rules:

Now, I know when I looked at the rules at first, I was horrified. WHAT CAN I EAT? But, then I got my first week's meal plan and I feel better. There are so many fresh veggies and meat options that I am not sure I'll feel too limited. 

Today, I started the morning with a veggie shake full of green veggies that took me 2 hrs to finish the serving suggested. By then, it was almost time for my huge salad for lunch that had avocados, pecans, a bunch of fresh crisp veggies with a fresh lemon lime dressing. And dinner tonight is lemon rosemary chicken with roasted asparagus. Whats good about the plan is that most dinners are things Jeff and Oli will eat too. 

I even have allowances for snacks but I haven't felt hungry today. It might be first day nerves, and I might be chewing on my desk later this week. Who knows. But, I am hoping a first day great beginning signals a good run for this. I really want to figure out what foods are fighting my body. 

But, just in case you notice corners of my cube walls bitten off ... it won't be the mice.

1st dental appointment!

& he was a champ! 20 great looking teeth, a lightly smaller jaw than the teeth need (might need braces sometime in the future), and a pleasantly surprised dentist ... that's what we came away with from Oli's first dental appointment. He was such a trooper, he did everything the dentist said, he even asked the dentist questions about the equipment, and demanded his toy prize at the end.

Suggestion for parents before their toddler's first visit, based on what we did:

• take him to a visit for your appointment; we took Oli to Jeff's appointment a few days prior and it helped
• talk to him about what the dentist will do - count your teeth, brush them, wash your mouth out etc. 
• promise him a sticker or a small gift at the end, it's surprising how much my kid is motivated by the thought of a prize, even if it's a sticker

Here are some photos of Oli at the dentist:

Taking charge of my health

Once again, I find myself fighting my own body. 1200 calorie diet? check. Crazy workout classes? check. Go to the gym everyday? check. Lose weight? hahahahahaha. No, instead I gained weight the last few months. Now, I am no saint, I drink beer, I eta chocolates. But, I did all that within my calorie constraints, most of the time. There might have been 1 bad day per 2 weeks. I don't think that deserves a weight gain of 20 lbs, do you?

So, tired of fighting my own body, I am consulting an expert. A nutritionist who deals with health issues that are a direct result of your diet. So, she starts you off with a clean diet - no dairy, no gluten, no caffeine, no sugar, no alcohol, no soda, no a bunch of other things. I don't have my plan yet but I decided to start it off myself. Since, I don't want my body to go into super shock on the 18th when I actually begin it.

• Last Friday, I went off caffeine cold turkey, no coffee, no tea, no soda. You don't realize how dependent you have become on something till you give it up. And, till you get stabbing pains behind your eye, like some tiny ice pick being jammed into your brain matter. 
• Now that I am over that, today I am giving up straight sugars. So, candy, chocolate, etc. Not the hidden ones yet, I need to learn how to read labels first. I froze all my favorite See's chocolates that I brought back from CA. To be opened sometime this summer mmmm.
• Next will be dairy, starting tomorrow. I say tomorrow because I already had cheese on my breakfast sandwich this morning. And, that's pretty much all the dairy I eat besides the creamer for my coffee. And I already gave that up. I don't like milk or yogurt. And I eat 1/4 cup of ice cream every 4-5 months.

So, by the time the nutritionist sends me the meal plan and my grocery list, I think gluten will be the major thing to give up. I was so sure that would be easy, in my head I thought oh I can give up pasta and bread. I don't eat much of it anyways. Then, I happened to read the label on my soy sauce ... gluten. So, remembering to read every label and finding the hidden gluten will be hard.

Oh, and I think the red meat will be hard too. I like my beef y'all. I could have it for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

So, my apologies if I am a raging wildebeest (which I just found out is a gnu, so where did this phrase originate from but I digress) the week of January 19. It's all for better health and finding out which foods are affecting my body negatively.

It better not be beef.

How to have the worst vacation ever

Please take this with a grain of salt. This was our experience but after the amalgamation of everything that happened, please don't blame us for never, ever, EVER wanting to go on vacation again.

• book flights through credit card points since well 2 FREE FLIGHTS? WHO'D be crazy not to? Have the airline change the flight schedule half a dozen times. Because you love surprises.
• have the airline (coughcoughUNITEDcoughcough) switch you from your direct return flight to a red eye layover. Because that's what parents with a 3 year old want to do. Not on yours? Well, seriously, it was on my bucket list. So, thanks. Thankfully, they changed that without charging us, but that meant flying back from SFO at 6:25 a.m. Which meant waking up at 3 am.
• build up meeting his cousin so much (who he hasn't seen in 2 years), that when that cousin doesn't want to play with your child, your child cries everyday on vacation. Christmas vacation. Your 3 year old sad cries everyday for EIGHT STRAIGHT DAYS because he doesn't get why his 2 months older cousin won't play with him. Totally your fault.
• get a weird cough and runny nose ... no fever, just a constant cough and runny nose in 81 degree weather.
• then attend a series of Indian wedding ceremonies where you did not prepare your husband for the fact that printed times on invites mean nothing. Everything runs on "ho jayega" time. You who need to understand will understand that.
• have your rental car break down on the freeway and spend 3 hrs getting the replacement car. 
• which then leads to the kid missing his nap which nobody but you know is a precedent to ... an evening full of tears and sadness. And then the child might cry too ;-)

Don't get me wrong, there were moments of non-despair. Our sedan ride from home to the airport and back was on time and helpful. We took Oli to Disneyland and he had an absolutely wonderful time. My cousins, who are so much older at late teens and older, took him under their wings and just became toddlers along with him. He got all the Darth Vader related gifts he could have wished for. His aunt, his CA  nanu, nani, his mamus, even their  friends ....  everyone spoiled him.

But, overall, this was easily the most tiring and emotionally rollercoastering vacation ever. I'm scared of planning another one on one hand; on another hand, I want to plan the next one so we can overlay this one.