eating | BulgingButtons

February 2, 2015
by BulgingButtons 6 Comments

Week 4 Challenge – Quitting the Drive-Thru

Well, so far, so good.

I still haven’t set foot in Starbucks (or gone through the drive-thru) since I issued myself the week 1 challenge. I still have managed to eat fruits and vegetables every day since I issued myself the week 2 challenge. And I survived an entire week of drinking no more than one soda per day. In fact, yesterday I didn’t even have one.

I like these challenges. Each one gets easier as time goes on, which is really the point. Hopefully they’ll become habits, replacing the poor habits I spent years developing and honing.

Of course, just because I’ve been doing these things doesn’t mean that all of a sudden I’m living a fit and healthy lifestyle. My sweet son was the first to point out that simply skipping Starbucks or passing on a soda means nothing if I pull into McDonald’s for a shake instead. Which I did. Once. So that leads me to the week 4 challenge.

I don’t even want to type this one. I’m afraid I’ll fail. But I won’t know until I try, and I won’t try until I issue the challenge. So… the week 4 challenge is to stay out of the drive-thru. Any drive-thru. Even if it’s only for my son. If we want fast food that much we’ll have to park and go in to get it. I don’t see that happening often, but I’m not ready to swear off fast food entirely.

Wish me luck this week. It means that I have to plan ahead for breakfast. That’s where I usually trip up. We rush out the door feeling like there’s no time to eat, but then I zip through BK, which takes just as long as breakfast at home would have, and for less money and significantly fewer calories, not to mention sodium and fat grams.

I can do this. Of course I can. I’m Wonder Woman. I’m powerful. I’m strong. I’m hungry. I’m off to find some breakfast and head to work. Let me know if you’re joining me this week in boycotting the drive-thru.

December 1, 2014
by BulgingButtons 2 Comments

Building Habits

It’s December 1, which means that I’ve officially succeeded in posting every day for the month of November, making me a NoBloPoMo winner! Of course I don’t think there are actually winners and losers for that particular challenge, but since I missed my 50,000 word goal for NaNoWriMo by a long-shot, I’ll take what I can get.

I’m actually pretty tickled that it’s December, and I still feel like I have plenty to write about. Rather than feel drained, I feel energized. I’ve gotten into a daily blogging habit, and I’m feeling the need to keep on going. Yay me. Too bad I’ve had so much trouble establishing other good habits.

I always seem to take one step forward then two steps back. At least as far as my health and fitness go. I want to lose weight. I want to move more. I want to get off my medication. But apparently I don’t want it badly enough.

Oh sure, I’ve been walking more, and I really am enjoying it, but it’s not enough.

I’ve also been trying to include more fruits and vegetables into my diet, but that’s not enough either.

My situation calls for more drastic measures. Measures that I don’t feel like I have at my disposal at the moment, like strength and determination and willpower.

I’ve heard so many times that you just have to decide to do it, then make the changes. For some reason this approach is generally offered by men. Maybe we really are wired differently in this aspect? Or maybe we’re all individuals and we each have our quirks and hang-ups. For me, it’s my weight.

It seems that for each good choice I make, I make five poor ones. I’m working hard to balance that out a bit. I’m going to try to keep on moving. Today I tracked my steps with my phone (which means not all of them since I don’t carry it around all day), and I had more than I’ve had in the past week. The walk before work got me off to a good start. I have to thank my son and my dog for allowing me to join them.

If I can sit down and conjure words every day, then sure I can lace up my sneakers and take a walk around the block. I may even just walk myself into a new good habit.

November 26, 2014
by BulgingButtons Leave a comment

How Close Are You to Your Food?

With Thanksgiving approaching and my trips to the grocery store increasing, I’ve been thinking about how connected we are (or aren’t) to our food.

In my Facebook feed I have friends from many different stages of my life, and those people form an interesting patchwork. Some are highly educated, others are not, some are quite politically conservative, others are extremely liberal. I have friends of different faiths, and friends who don’t indentify themselves as any faith at all. There are young and old and in between, gay and straight and who knows what else, and a variety of ethnicities represented in my daily feed, and I respect and care about all of them. They are my community. They are my tribe.

In a group that diverse, it’s no surprise that there are differing points of view on just about everything, right down to the way we nourish our bodies. After all, isn’t that what food boils down to? Simply put, it’s our fuel.

I heard a random statistic on the radio that stated that 91% of Americans will eat turkey on Thanksgiving. Naturally that means that 9% won’t. Immediately I thought about vegetarians, and figured they were most of the 9%, but then I rethought it. I’m sure there are those with health issues that prevent them from eating turkey, and I’m also sure that there are plenty of people without the means to provide a turkey. My conception of the 9% expanded greatly with just a moment’s reflection.

Then, as I thought more about Thanksgiving dinner, I considered the various food related posts I see everyday on Facebook. I have friends who are masterful chefs (including those who are actually paid for that talent) and others who rely on fast food more than anyone really ought to. There are those who shop in gourmet markets, and those who grow some or most of their own produce. And of course, there are the lucky ones who have the privilege of shopping at Wegman’s, but that’s a post for another day.

I wondered if there were reasons why some people seem to be so intimately linked to the foods they eat and others seem to have so much distance from them. I mean, if I hunted my own meat I would be extremely aware of where it came from, but if I buy it at the grocery store I don’t give it as much thought, and if it comes served to me in a restaurant I’ve even more disconnected from the source. I think that each step away from the source that we take, the more tenuous our connection becomes to our food.

I also think that if I were in charge of providing my own food I wouldn’t eat so much or be so taste driven. If I had to grow or kill everything I put in my mouth I would pause before eating my whole supply. I would have been one skinny pilgrim. I would also choke down foods that I currently dislike, rather than go hungry. Like my Weight Watchers leader says, if a can of green beans will fix it, you’re truly hungry. I would be munching on kale and cabbage, nibbling cauliflower and cucumbers. Veggies would be my friends.

As things stand, I have to remind myself to eat fresh produce, and I have to battle the urge to fill my mouth and belly with processed foods that I know hold no nutritional value for me. I’m trying to simplify my life, and I think I need to start with my food.