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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 25 September 2006 07:01 pm |
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I'm still here, and as of this Monday morning still not back to sensible healthy eating (hot chocolate drinks, bacon, pastry, 150g of beligian milk chocolate etc.).
However one positive step is that I have arranged to see someone about my binge-eating and/or underlying issues this coming Friday, which seems like a positive move.
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Hisgal
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 26 September 2006 02:12 am |
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Nir,
So glad to hear you are doing something positive about the bingeing
I feel so sad when I read that you are on a binge and not stopping. I guess it's because I've been there so many times, and I know how awful I feel about myself when I do it. I had 2 mini-binges this weekend.....is that possible? I had 2 "cheat" meals, and couldn't stop after them. One was Friday after pizza, and the other was Saturday night after a wiener roast. I guess I call them "mini-binges" because I got right back on track Sat. morning and stayed on plan all day, until the "cheat" meal. And I got right back on plan Sunday morning and have stayed there. There was a time when I wouldn't have.....maybe couldn't have.
We're rooting for you! You help so many of us on this site....thanks for being there
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OWF
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 26 September 2006 03:40 am |
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Nir,
You are an inspiration and motivation to all of us here.  You always help others and give advice. What you are doing is a good thing, getting help. It takes a lot to admit you have a problem and I think that is half the battle. You seem very healthy overall and just remember, you WILL get through this!!!! If you need to vent or rant and rave -we are here for you, just like you have been for all of us!!
 OWF
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Skipperdox
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 26 September 2006 04:57 am |
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Ditto what OWF said!
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Chocoholic
Senior Member
| Joined: | 29 April 2005 |
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| Posts: | 341 |
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Posted: 26 September 2006 06:49 am |
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Ditto to the above comments. I really hope that seeing someone helps!
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Peter
Founder, caloriesperhour.com
| Joined: | 24 May 2005 |
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| Posts: | 4178 |
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Posted: 26 September 2006 07:23 am |
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I helped me a lot, and sharing at OA meetings.
Peter
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 27 September 2006 01:33 am |
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It really helps to know that people are reading.
Tuesday
12pm Student welcome fair: lollipops, small chocolates, one medium-sized chocolate bar, 1/3 packet potato crisps (American: chips).
9.30pm IKEA: sweet samples, 35p ice-cream cone, 50p hot dog (but not much of the dry bun it came in)
10pm ASDA: 200g luxuary chocolates (£1.00). That so wasn't worth the 1000 calories to tip me over from an OK day to a setback day. But I wouldn't listen to reason would I? And to make things worse, I'm plotting to buy some cheesecake tomorrow (and I'm finding it hard to talk myself out of that idea!).
On the plus side, I had more vegetables and fruit today than the last few days.
I also joined a small low-cost gym today. I don't know how long I'll stay with this one. It is part of my school. Classes are not included (there's hardly any classes in any case). They do a thorough induction which includes a custom program - a gym instructor is spending 3 one-hour sessions with me (had the first one today: Workout #1: Chest and Triceps). So at least I'll have a solid plan for my workout objectives.
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Skipperdox
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 27 September 2006 01:36 am |
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Congrats on the little gym...a step in the right direction.
Resist the cheesecake...Resist the cheesecake. You don't really want it. Does that help?
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OWF
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 27 September 2006 08:22 am |
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| Cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory-at least I am pretty cure that Craigs Crazy Carrot Cake Cheesecake has 2,000 calories a slice and 89 grams of fat!!!! Do you really want that? Last edited on 27 September 2006 08:23 am by OWF
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 27 September 2006 02:37 pm |
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Oh that reminds me, I don't even post all my sins anymore. Monday late night included a brief visit to ASDA. I spent £1.00. 40p was vegetables, and then the other 60p broke up as follows:
10p: 2 x sponge puddings with raspberry jam.
10p: 2 x chocolate toffee crisp doughnuts
10p: 2 x chocolate toffee crisp doughnuts
10p: very large sponge cake with heavy buttery icing and fudge cubes for decoration
10p: large carrot cake (not cheese)
With the carrot cake (not cheesecake though), I pretty much ate 90% of it and it was indeed close to 2000 calories. The fudge cake proved too sweet and too fatty-tasting (the icing) and too boring (the sponge) so I left it after picking off the fudge pieces.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 29 September 2006 04:35 pm |
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Wednesday
very big cooked breakfast. I thought you could get 3 breakfast items for 50p but at the till I was told it was 75p (3 x 25p) so instead I had the 6-item breakfast for 95p (a bargain, but a lot more food than I originally planned on having) and then came back with an extra (1 x 25p - a large serving of scrambled eggs). so altogether ended up spending a lot more than originally intended and ate a lot more than originally intended.
Went home on train, bypassing temptation!
Thursday
good day of eating until 9pm when my eating escalated:
- ASDA: packet of 10 choc ices for 37p. (860 calories)
- IKEA: one 'luxuary' ice-cream cone for 65p
- ASDA (yes went back - they are right next to each other): that 1000-calorie cheesecake I've been resisting for 48 hours came back to haunt me! Got home and divided it into 8 portions (so each would be 125 calories). Froze them. Then one by one they came out of the freezer until I had eaten them all. Cheesecake is not a safe food at my home - who would have guessed?
(so that's about 2000 unwelcome extra calories. and yes I was already pleasently full on protein and over 2kg of vegetables at that point - eating sometimes has nothing to do with whether you're hungry. But then we knew that anyway!)
Friday
It is a good day so far, and really do hope it can stay so till the end and perhaps finally pull me out of this unwelcome period [which started last Wednesday so already numbers 9 full days!]
I've been with the new gym for 4 days. This is what I've done so far:
Tuesday: induction for day 1 of my program (Chest & Triceps)
Wednesday: induction for day 2 of my program (Back & Biceps)
Thursday: repeated day 1 by myself
Friday: repeated day 2 by myself
Tomorrow (Saturday) I'm scheduled to have the last induction - for day 3 of my program, which will target Legs and Shoulders.
My gym is 4.4 miles away from home. Today and yesterday I've been wearing my Heart Rate Monitor while cycling there, to ensure I'm getting a good cardio workout (i.e. at least 65% of max heart rate once I'm warmed up). It has made me feel more positive about having to cover the distance!
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 1 October 2006 12:21 pm |
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Satuday
IKEA: freebies, including sour-cream crisps ("chips")
ASDA: 100g of chocolate raisins for 35p. Actually I was looking for chocolate-covered peanuts but that product is apparently only available in 200g packets, or you can weigh any amount you want (but it costs at least 52p per 100g, in fact more because you pay for the 5g paper bag and the balance seems to round things up to 10g increments...) so in short I had it because it represented a bargain rather than because I wanted it particularly. Naturally I finished the entire packet in double-quick time. 444 calories.
ASDA: Tried buying a single piece of chocolate from the pix-and-mix without the paper bag. To get away with it, I was planning to use the self-service till (so there will be no-one to complain about lack of paper bag). The 17g caramel-chocolate was a sale at 20g. I still don't know for sure whether those scales weigh to 5g but always round up, or to the nearest 10g. I think another experiment will be performed in due course! about 75 calories and I didn't even like it particularly. I needed to get out of there before I was going to spend £1 on that 200g-box-of-luxuary-chocolates!
IKEA: slice of pizza at 75p. Weighed at 85g so probably 200 calories. I was curious as to whether it was tasty and whether I'd think it was value for money. This is actually a sensible decision - I'm paying over the odds (£1 would have bought me a 300-400g pizza elsewhere) but I'm getting portion control.
IKEA: ice-cream cone 35p. Same logic: portion control, probably under 200 calories.
Written down it looks bad, but I considered that day rescued because it could have been much worse.
My overall strategy is still to promote consumption of heavy fibre-rich fruits and vegetables by adopting a no-counting approach towards these [after all, I'm not calorie-counting those freebies, why discriminate against the healthy foods?]. I am counting the protein (but to make my life easier, only from protein-rich foods, which generally means eating more of these than I would if I was in "full counting mode", which I just can't take at the moment).
I thought I sorted this counting business in late June. Yet it is late September and it is proving to be an issue again??
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 1 October 2006 09:52 pm |
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For a change, let me talk about exercise.
Battle of the fitness instructors:
Greg [an instructor with years of experience across a wide variety of disciplines, from my old gym] recommended starting with 15 reps and gradually reducing to 12, 10 and finally 8 reps. I asked him why 15 and he said that had I not already been a Body Pump regular he would have advised starting from 25!
Then I read BFFM and Tom Venuto recommends working in the 6-12 range, ideally 8-12 range, for muscle building.
Mark, the instructor who did my induction at the new gym, has started me off on sets of 15, with a possible review in one month.
Ian, who teaches other people to become fitness instructors (including myself!) has suggested that I should be starting on 10 reps and moving to 8 ("and if I was short on time, he'd tell me to just do 6 reps").
So that's two votes for starting at 15, and two votes for starting at the 8-12 range. One possible argument for 15 is to protect my joints or tendons/ligaments from injury with unfamiliar movements or heavy weights. But haven't 2.5 years of Body Pump already prepared and conditioned me for Hypertrophy (=muscle building)?
The other issue I'm confused about is REST. We all know that muscles are broken during weight-training and need time to recover and rebuild. My program has three scheduled days: day 1 (chest and triceps), day 2 (back and biceps), day 3 (shoulders and legs).
For maximum rest, I could insert plenty of 'OFF DAYS' for example only train every other day, so each muscle group gets 6-7 days of rest before it is exercised again.
On the other side of the spectrum, I could rotate days 1/2/3 so that I revisit each muscle group after 2 days of rest (i.e. it gets 3x24 = 72 hours of rest between workouts). Initially I thought that this might be too soon - now someone has suggested I'm actually not working optimally and ideally I should only rest 48 hours between workouts on the same muscle group. Anybody feeling like an expert on this subject? [incidentally Tom Venuto of BFFM has four 'levels' (from beginner, which is a '1-day split' i.e. workout includes all muscles, to advanced which is a 4-day split. each of the 4 levels has two variations, the one labelled 'agressive' has less off-days than the one labelled 'conservative'. For example a beginner could be working out on 43% of days (each muscle group only get 48 hours rest), a 3-day-split person could be working on 66% of days (each muscle group get 96 hours rest). He doesn't have anybody working on 100% or even 85% of days though...]
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 6 October 2006 05:10 pm |
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Hi people.
I continue to make poor food choices. For example:
Wednesday - dining in style?
'The Chef In Waiting' is a training restaurant for Chefs, Waiters and other personnel. It is part of college campus. I've been curious about it - I knew how much it would charge (about £7) but wanted to know what the service and food quality would be like and today was eventually the day my idle curiousity got the better of me.
Carrot and Corriander soup for starters; Chicken Kiev; Cauliflower cheese; Meringue with cream.
Thursday - chocolate theme
Morning: 100g dark chocolate
Afternoon: 200g box containing 20 luxuary chocolates
Night: 150g bar of Aero 'chocolate with bubbles'
(an ice-cream cone also gets an honorary mention)
Looking ahead, Saturday is a party where alcohol and food will be flowing (out of town, in Wolverhampton). If I get back into town early enough on Sunday then I might have a restaurant meal with some buddies from the old gym. Otherwise the meal still happens but perhaps the week after.
Other problems (medical and financial in nature) have overshadowed food this week. I have been keeping on top of my course and my exercise though, at least that's something.
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OWF
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 10 October 2006 04:25 pm |
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Nir,
HOW WAS YOUR WEEKEND? Its ok if things are totally going as planned. We are all human and we all make mistakes. Its not the mistakes that will ruin your plan, your overall progress over the months and years will get you there. Hang in there! We are here for you and we want you to succeed!!!
Your cyber friend,
OWF
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 10 October 2006 06:35 pm |
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I was in party mood (or should that be binge mode) hours before the party started. Somebody needed to go and buy a tub of margarine before the party started. I joined them and returned with a 2 litre tub of toffee flavour ice cream! Had to finish the lot as their freezers were completely full, of course.
Because of the icecream I barely had room for the food and drink provided at the party. I literally had to stop and start several times due to being too full.
A small gesture towards sensibility: like a scout I came to the party prepared
- 100g tortilla chips
- 200g bombay mix
- 150g nuts
- 175g hard sweets ("milk chocolate eclairs")
- 2 x 200g chocolate boxes
this stash was supposed to be what I'd eat if the food at the party turned out not to be enough, or not served until later etc. As it happens there was enough food and I was too stuffed. The morning after though, as a small gesture towards sensibility, I gave my two boxes-of-chocolates (one to one of my sisters; the other to the girl who was driving us to the party and back)
The hard sweets were gone on the way home, the bombay mix is 2/3 gone, there's still the tortilla chips, some bombay mix and all of the nuts left.
Unprompted, my mum emailed me a link to Overeaters Anonymous. I opened the link in the background not realising what it was a link to. When I got around to it - it was a case of double-checking how I got there. I associate OA with Peter (the only one who has ever mentioned it so far!) so I was surprised. There might be a meeting in my area and I am curious about it so I may try to attend.
Saturday and Sunday were my first rest days since joining the gym (late September) but now I'm back.
My homework this week includes creating choreography: a 10-minute warm up for an aerobics class, to include both mobilisation for the joints and pulse-raising components, and performing this warm-up (with queueing and teaching points) on Saturday morning. I'm working on this right now.Last edited on 10 October 2006 06:36 pm by Nir
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 12 October 2006 03:23 am |
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Wednesday
Yesterday mum delivered a kilo of chick peas (American: Garbanzo Beans) which I asked her to cook for me once upon a time, when I actually cared what I was eating. Just why she thought to get around to this now, I do not know.
Well it was too late to do anything about them when I got home last night but this morning I portioned them into 41.7g portions (that's 50 calories and 3.5g protein), put in little bags and froze. Why? because there's always tomorrow and although I'm not into counting now, it is inevitable that I will be at some point. We live in cycles.
I'm drinking a lot more in fizzy lemonade than I would any other drink. Since Sunday afternoon I've drunk more than 6 litres of the stuff. I have another drink-related plan: my fridges don't seem to lend themselves to chilling drinks, but I'm making some ice-cubes. (these were extensively used on the Saturday party so I decided I must have them at my home too).
The 'enemy' - binge-worthy foods I have at home, those snack foods I took to the party and brought back (bombay mix, tortilla chips, dry-roasted nuts): I opened those packets that were still sealed and had small amounts of each. All three are loaded with salt/sodium. So is the Golden Pork Crunch (which is Best Before the middle of November so it is time to start digging into it).
Protein sources I have which have short dates: the Pork Crunch, some cottage cheese, and some low-fat yogurt. That was this morning. I now also have 288 eggs which have 7 days till their Best Before date. More on that later.
Set off for college campus around 3.30pm after a mixture of cooking, paperwork, planning a warm-up and studying for a quiz. Pit stop around 4pm at IKEA (briefly again: IKEA is a flat-pack furniture superstore which also boasts a small 'taste of Sweden' food supermarket). Walked around to see what samples were available - today it was sandwhiched biscuits (American: cookies which are not soft-dough). These are about 20g and therefore 100 calories each. It was a case of eating one while putting 3 in my pocket, and repeating the process... The damage therefore was in the hundreds-of-calories!
Arrived at college campus, used the printer to print my "warmup" (I don't have printing facilities at home) and then focused on cramming for my BOnES AND JOINTS quiz. Tutor was delayed in traffic, and so was the quiz but everyone just socialised in the extra 40 minutes. Got 15 out of 15 in the quiz - and now we've moved on and are studying muscles. Never heard of Tibialis Anterior before.
Cycling homewards involved, at 9.30pm, another IKEA pit-stop. Exactly the same biscuits - even more of them. I should say that on Tuesday (or was it Monday?) I got 5 large soft-dough chocolate cookies (250g - 1250 calories) reduced to £0.18 at Tesco, yet decided to remind myself that Chocolates are better than Cookies (indeed, my "X is more worth it than Y" hierarchy) so I comitted myself to not purchasing any more cookies - even if they are reduced or on sale. I didn't commit to not having them when they're free though!
ASDA supermarket is open 24 hours a day and is next door. Picked up some healthy stuff (a few salads at £0.10). Picked up some reduced price ready meals which are currently in the freezer (half-sized pizza; chicken curry; Quorn slices), also got a few things which I ate as soon as I was home: 3 sausage-roll type things, 300g (!) of Humous (3 varieties - 100g each type), salad with pasta, mayo and chicken breast (mayo discarded). Items in freezer are so because I was stuffed after eating the other items...
Today was 3rd non-workout day in 5 days (Saturday and Sunday I was away in Wolverhampton, today I was late into campus, had my course encounter and wanted to do some last-minute cramming too - so no time for workout). Still I did weights on Monday and Tuesday so I guess a rest day is OK (if not positively encouraged) and I got my 8.8 miles of cycling in.
Earlier in the day I had a call about OA returned to me - useful information, meeting is one hour earlier than the listing says. So now if I turn up I'll be on time rather than turning up just as meeting finishes.
It was barely practical to carry half of my 'bargain' items in my racksack as I cycled home for 35 minutes from ASDA supermarket. It would not be practical to cycle with any eggs. Yet they were just £0.05 for 6 (that's less than £0.01 per egg!). Mum said a lift was out of the question but dad was about to leave work (gone 10pm!) and it wasn't out of his way. So 288 eggs went in his car and I was free to cycle home.
So: bad behaviour in the present and ever-hopeful that I'll be a reformed character tomorrow.
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Sugarfree
New Member
| Joined: | 23 September 2006 |
| Location: | |
| Posts: | 28 |
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Posted: 12 October 2006 12:29 pm |
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Hie nir, i know it sounds weird but i am glad there is a fellow binger at the moment, kinda makes me feel i am human after all. Hope we will get out of this phase soon. Btw your diary is a great read, binges and all!
Oh, I just discovered this british comedy on BBC Prime -The thin blue line, with Mr Bean. I know its a bit old, and I am not a very big fan of british comedy, but it always gets me in stiches.
I hope you will snap out of your current eating habbits soon and eat healthy, I am really trying. Good luck !
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paperdoll
New Member
| Joined: | 4 October 2006 |
| Location: | |
| Posts: | 30 |
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Posted: 12 October 2006 08:03 pm |
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Hey Nir -
I've sort of been lurking the last couple of days, but I've kept up with your journal for awhile now. I'm sorry you're going through a bingy time. I was 11 days binge-free until last night. So maddening! It was only a 3000 calorie binge, but it takes a toll on your head more than anything. I don't really know a whole lot about your "eating issues" from your past, so would you mind sharing? It seems like I've delt with a lot of the same things you have, as far as the obession goes, and the cycling goes. I was bullemic at nine, and anorexic by 15...I'm 21 now. I don't know if you've ever been diagnosed with an eating disorder, but I'm curious. So if I'm prying, I apologize...but I think your experiences could bring me some insight. Thanks for taking the time to write in your diary of (more or less) shame!
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 13 October 2006 03:11 pm |
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Sugarfree,
Yes, The Thin Blue Line is a bit old. That means I still remember it (as a good comedy) from the days I still watched TV. About 2.5 years ago I gave up TV cold turkey and haven't looked back since. I wish I could say the same about that binge-eating habit.
paperdoll,
I don't really know a whole lot about your "eating issues" from your past, so would you mind sharing? It seems like I've dealt with a lot of the same things you have, as far as the obsession goes, and the cycling goes. I was bulimic at nine, and anorexic by 15...I'm 21 now. I don't know if you've ever been diagnosed with an eating disorder, but I'm curious.
I'm not sure I am fully aware of what my "eating issues" are in the present. That's why I'm seeing a counselor once a week. Maybe together we'll figure them out.
My eating history, briefly: mum didn't let us have much in the way of junk food and sweets, but I still got by. At 17 I was 30" waist so I wasn't slim but neither was I fat. At university 18-21 I exercised every day and couldn't afford too much junk food. Then ages 23-29 I gave up every form of exercise and had more money so I ate all the junk food I wanted and was at my highest (Overweight but not Obese). Then did Atkins (read the book cover to cover and I can honestly say my journey towards learning about nutrition started there). Since 2004 I've been losing and gaining the same weight. This morning I was 60.5kg (133lb), yet 3 weeks ago I was at a healthier weight of 56.5kg (125lb) so I'm up 4 kilos/8 pounds. I'm 1.66m (5' 5.5"). So I'm still a healthy weight, but only because of an advantageous starting point. Never had anorexia or bulimia. I think I have got binge-eating disorder, but my counselor says he cannot diagnose eating disorders.
Today (Friday), just after seeing the counselor I went via the Cafeteria (had to get a signature for something) and decided to look at prices. The subtext was "I think these dishes are overpriced, but I wonder how they compare to prices at the IKEA restaurant for value". Looked at today's menu. One item in particular stood out. £0.70 for an item entitled "hot cookies and ice-cream" (hi PudgyPoodle, if you're reading). So of course I had to have it. Damage was limited: 2 cookies maybe 150 calories together, ice-cream another 150 (Also had a banana for £0.25.) Then reflected upon how it is always high carb/fat desserts that are reasonable price, while real food isn't. So decided to also evaluate "today's special" (the budget meal). This was beef chili, rice and tacos for £1.45. Not a massive serving either so I'll survive. Meanwhile a kilo of vegetables I am carrying with me remain largely uneaten! 
Rewinding a little (Thursday)
- lots of free 100-calorie biscuits (cookies) at IKEA (~1000 calories)
- found a packet of potato/maize chips (200 calories)
- late-night binge which eventually demolished the last of the tortilla chips (~500) nuts (~900) and Bombay mix (~250). I wasn't going to eat them - my original thought was to have some popcorn! but it is funny how the mind works...
Today my weight was 60.5kg. I recorded it. Yesterday however I didn't record my weight, because I didn't like it (it was too high!)
Maybe I'll be in an OA meeting in 5.5 hours. I wonder if it is a catered affair 
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OWF
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 13 October 2006 06:43 pm |
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NIR,
 This is not your mother or your counselor speaking, this is your caring and concerned American cyber friend who understands what you are going through completely, OWF, and I am telling you to GET BACK ON TRACK!!! YOU CAN DO IT!!! WE ARE ALL ROOTING FOR YOU TO SUCCEED!! I know you care about yourself! Nir, well, the binge is over!! Back to healthier options. Please make a promise to yourself to make better choices this weekend!! PLEASE?? 
I love IKEA too, but maybe ONE of their free items is good enough, not pockets of biscuits? Whatever it takes. Stay out of the store. or go in and grab ONE and leave immediately.  Or, dont go in when you are on an empty stomach.  ??? Do any of these sound helpful or like they could work for you? I know what you are going through. I had to stop baking on an empty stomach cause I would binge too. I cant have certain junkfoods in the house, I lose control around  ice cream, cakes  and cookies, and good chocolates too. The point is, it is time to get back on track!! As another instructor, people will be looking up to you as a role model and you need to respect yourself and take charge! YOU CAN DO IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Go to the meeting tonight. See what they have to say. You know what to do. I have faith you will be just fine and the best darn aerobics instructor there is!
(Where did THAT come from???? I have no idea. Sorry if it was too much. I am apparently feeling like I am not only motivating you but trying to motivate myself in the process...but the point is, I do care and I want you to get better and feel good about your choices!)
...P.S. That part about the OA meeting being catered was pretty funny though!
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 14 October 2006 10:24 pm |
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hi OWF. it means a lot to me that you (and many others on the forum) are concerned about me and want me to go back to normal, sane behaviour. I am trying to use this [just as I'm trying to "use" many other things to this end - like a magic number on the scales, reciting my 'goal' of healthy eating, listening to the hypnotherapy CD, going to counseling, reading the forums (very little time for this of late, though), eating my protein and ETL-quantities-of-vegetables and even going to see what OA are like]
You're right, OWF, an instructor is supposed to be a role model. Incidentally, I had my first 12-minute 'performance' today, doing a warmup (joint mobility exercises and pulse-raising moves) with 6 participants (fellow student instructors) and the teacher who was marking my efforts. My good points included staying with the music and cueing moves ahead of time. I was principally marked down for including slightly "complicated" moves (so I have to replace them with simpler ones) and for leaving plenty of speach gaps instead of cramming in those TEACHING POINTS (you know, tummy pulled in, chest proud, shoulders back and relaxed, back straight, knees soft etc.) To be honest, 1/2 the problem is to know what the teaching points are (we have to research them ourselves) and the other is that so much is going on and you have to fit them it at the same time. Early days though - I'm sure practice will help me. I was quite nervous about today so I practiced a lot during the week and I'm sure it would have been pretty bad if I hadn't! I did better than some of the other girls (er, I'm the only guy on this course.).
So, how did today (Saturday) go? Well, I cooked some vegetables and hard-boiled 18 eggs (for the egg whites - pure protein) and set off for my course (above) and then stayed behind to do my weights workout. I wasn't particularly in the mood for it but I've had Saturday and Sunday off, then I was too busy cramming for the exam on Wednesday to get a workout in AND problems relating to printing my homework and the OA meeting meant there was no time to work out on Friday, so that meant that I had 4 days off during a 7-day period. So I worked out today (4 days off in 8 days - looking better). It was Chest and Triceps day, which means: 3 sets Pectorial Flies, 3 sets Smith Machine Bench Presses, 3 sets Cable Crossovers, 3 sets Tricep Pushdowns, 3 sets Triceps kickbacks(each arm separately), 2 sets of crunches with legs on a Swiss ball (Abs sets are 20+ reps, other sets are 15).
So assuming each set takes 1 minute to perform, that's roughly 20 sets. Factor 60 seconds rest between sets and we have 40 minutes. How long was I in the gym? er... 2 hours. I'm really lazy. I get it all done but I'm taking reading breaks (partly inspired by Peter) today I was reading some leaflets from the OA 'welcome' envelope. The only requirement for OA membership is a desire to stop eating compulsively. I'm pretty sure I had that desire around 2pm. I'm not sure I had it later in the afternoon though - it comes and goes!
So I visited IKEA on my way home (naturally). I did try to just pick ONE of everything. For example there was a bowl of oat cookies (of a kind I had never sampled before). There were 2 left. I took one and tried eating it slowly. I stood there knowing what would happen (i.e. some other people will go past, see me eating a cookie, notice there was a bowl, and pick the remaining cookie) and sure enough this happened within a minute. However I did continue to walk around and found an abandoned cookie elsewhere and I did have it.
This is a diary of shame, so I am going to confess something that I'm sure some of you are going to find disturbing, which is why I haven't shared anything like this before. I call it "food scavanging". Here we go. After picking some freebies at the 'sweedish food market' I went upstairs to the restaurant. When people are finished with their trays they're supposed to put them on this trolley that can hold maybe 20 trays. These troleys then get wheeled off periodically. I spotted a coffee mug, poored out the little bit of coffee it had at the bottom, took it to the machine for a "free refill" of hot chocolate. Later on I spotted some leftover cake on another tray. Later on there were 2 meetballs. I also refilled "my" mug with Lemon/Ginger flavoured tea, diet cola and finally another hot chocolate. During this time I also ate some cooked vegetables I had with me, and was sitting there trying to read some more OA leaflets. On my way out I went for another "swoop" of the food market. I estimate total damage to be around 1000 calories. Total spend £0.00. I really wasn't going to share about the food scavanging because the internet is such a public forum and I've previously referred friends and family to this page [and I certainly hope they won't find out] but I wanted to share with you what this "low" that I am experiencing is like. Money isn't plentiful at the moment but I could afford 75p for a refillable cup of hot chocolate if I wanted to. I just get a buzz out of having it for nothing.
An hour later I found myself in a supermarket. At the bakery there were some broken Meringue pieces on a tray. It is difficult to say exactly what a "single serving" of sample is meant to be, but I had about 3 handfulls.
Tomorrow (Sunday) I have a Restaurant lunch scheduled with some buddies from the gym I used to belong to. You know I can't pay £11 (around 20 dollars) and restrict myself to salad.
And the punchline. Why am I unable to attend the OA meeting next week? I have been invited to attend a Free Dinner [at Cambridge University, where I was a student - I'm hardly going to say no!]
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 15 October 2006 11:40 pm |
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Sunday Good and Bad
I needed to be back in town relatively early, so decided to be at the gym at 9am sharp (that's when they open on a Sunday). Rode there with a heart-rate monitor, keeping my heart-rate at 65% or over (using Kravonnen) for most of the journey. Later on I asked for a blood-pressure test [yes I know you're not supposed to do one directly after exercise, but the device was right there and I decided I was curious] and the numbers were more acceptable than when I last had it read late September.
Training: I did my BACK+BICEPS day, with a minor increase here and there. Had a chat with a couple of people who were also motivated enough to work out on a Sunday morning (one an obese dad bringing his son/daughter to watch him do a 1/2 cardio 1/2 weights routine - I was intrigued because he was told to do sets of 12 by the _same_ person who designed my 15-reps program, and clearly he's no body-buider yet, what's going on??? the second person was a person getting back to body-building after a break, so I was trying to leach useful information out of him. He's doing some sort of pyramid on the sets/reps, for example with bicep curls he does 2 "warm-up sets" followed by 4 "heavy sets", using progressively heavier weights and smaller number of reps. He goes down to as few as 4 reps (so I quoted the BFFM guidelines, 6-12 reps for building, 1-5 for strength, back at him for some debate). He also swears by Creatine and in general regards highly supplements and that 'Market guy'. He wasn't endorsing MarketGuy's ultra-high protein suggestions though. He gets minor points knocked off for thinking that the nuts that he was consuming were high in carbs (we checked: 18.3% protein, 76.7% fat -> 5% carbs). It was fun to compare notes though...] so obviously I let myself down again by taking 2 hours to complete my sets.
IKEA: I restricted myself to the food market today. I tried eating one cookie (it was 'Vanilla Dream' today) but went back for more - and then some more. There's a lesson in there somewhere - I need to start having IKEA-free days if I can't handle this place. 500+ calories.
Continued cycling back into town and got there with 20 minutes to spare. We walked over to a cash machine and then to the L&K restaurant (which I had not been to for 2 months). It was interesting to see they've made a few cut-backs. For example I recall being rather impressed with their selection of fruit - there was NO FRUIT AT ALL! (this means the Pizza Hut buffet now technically has more fruit than L&K) Another one: the previous two times I had dined there back in August, I chose Tap Water for my drink (so as to not make an already-expensive dining experience even more expensive) but this time they gave some excuse about no longer having a water cooler and not trusting their taps [in other words, they wanted to charge me £1.50 for bottled water]. I decided to go without, hoping that my VEGETABLES would contain sufficient fluid - and indeed I wasn't thirsty during the meal. It has to be said that I wasn't treating this particular dining experience as an attempt to fill-up-on-veggies ETL-style. My only nods to common sense had been to have SMALL portions of everything (always sensible in a buffet situation) and to completely avoid the potato fries, noodles and rice - thus stick to salads and protein-based main courses on the whole.
One thing that hasn't changed was the range of cakes available for dessert. I was talking to my friend about over-eating whilst simultanously stuffing myself with chocolate cake, cheesecake and profiter rolls. These things truly don't make you "full" (let's face it though, I don't think I was actually "hungry" before starting the meal anyhow - it was "social eating" rather than eating-to-live). Meanwhile one of my friends was avoiding the desserts completely as he's finally on a diet, and good on him - I've been gently suggesting he should be going that way for a while, so I'm glad he's found the light, even if I have temporarily lost my marbles (so to speak).
What else? unexpectedly found I had a bit more in common with the other friend. Long-time readers might recall me making comments about having to go the toilet during a gym studio class, or not looking forward to some hospital procedure etc. Well it turns out my friend was also seen, in the same hospital and by the same medical consultant for similiar concerns. Small world.
Despite clearly eating a lot less salad and a lot more slices of desserts than previous visits to the same restaurant, I was not feeling too stuffed. I even congratulated myself on this (though in retrospect, I don't know what for). Having cycled home I decided to indulge in some CHILLED water (one of my favourite things of late - and truly a guiltless pleasure, I hope you'll agree). I had about 2 and half glasses. Boy was that an eye-opener!! The water, in combination with what was in my stomach, suddenly made me feel bloated and stuffed - EXACTLY the feeling I would have previously had right there in the restaurant. I guess if I had access to water or consumed more salad, I would have been at that 'stuffed' stage during the eating, rather than effortlessly eating a helping of dessert after another. I had to take a nap to recover from this over-stuffed feeling.
It didn't take too long before feelings of guilt about the silly over-consumption of desserts came into my mind. How pointless. It has been said before. I need to get a sodding grip! Tomorrow is another day.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 17 October 2006 10:26 am |
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Monday
Got up at 6am and hard-boiled another 18 eggs. Out shortly after 7am and made the weights room by 7.45am (I thought I'd be kicked out of there by 9am but in the event it didn't happen). I only had protein before my bike ride. I maintained my HR at 80% of max (Kravonnen) for at least 1/3 of the journey. I only ate a bit of protein before the ride (arguing that my glycogen stores are surely still full after yesterday's lunch buffet) so it was "fasted cardio". My weights workout extended from 7.45am till about 9.15am (shoulders, legs, abs) - increasing weight on legs but curiously decreasing weight on some shoulder exercises.
Rushed off to IKEA to beat the 10am deadline (if you turn up between 9.30am-10am on a weekday you get a complimentary re-fillable hot drink, 'legit' as it were). Beat the deadline by 2 minutes.
Had numerous low-calorie drinks (Cranberry-flavoured tea, Filter coffee, Lemon-Ginger-flavoured tea, Diet cola) but also one HOT CHOCOLATE which I'll estimate at 100 calories.
Ate some of my vegetables alongside.
The Swedish food market then opened. I wanted to restrain myself. As it happens today proved to be no challenge: the only goods to sample were ginger-flavour breadsticks. I passed on them.
I spent a good couple of minutes deciding whether to have the ice-cream. I got the money out. Then I was trying to persuade myself to put it back and walk away - but that didn't happen. I got the ice-cream. Let's estimate it at 200 calories.
Then a break of at least 3 hours as I do other things including a visit to the public library. It is then time to go home. What do I do? I get on my bike and cycle THE OTHER WAY towards M&S. There are samples of chocolate tort. I pick one. (It would have been difficult but not impossible to have had two, but I decide to be sensible). Let's estimate at 100 calories.
4.5 hours later I'm at Sainsbury's supermarket. At the bakery there are broken-up bits of some pie crust. They are unguarded but on the other hand there isn't much left so it isn't a real challenge. Estimate = 100 calories.
Overall, junk food total is 500 calories, maybe that is an overestimate - might be just 400.
What else? two lots of popcorn (say 300) and helpings of raisins. Probably overdid the raisins a little.
I also counted at least 91 grams of protein from 600 calories of protein-rich foods.
Reasonable amounts of vegetables and fruit also consumed - not included in protein count and not calorie counted.
How did I do on the over-eating front? Not too bad, but you could argue that lack-of-freebie-opportunities has made it a better day than it otherwise would have been. My habits of visiting those freebie-locations (at IKEA, at M&S and at Sainsbury's) are still entrenched.
I can't make the next OA meeting this Friday but I still wanted to do more on that front. To this end I popped into the library. Of course they didn't have any OA literature but I'd asked them if they'd get some. Meanwhile I found the 'Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book' (well, the 1976 edition anyhow) and had a brief read of the preface and first chapter, to see what it was like. Later on in the afternoon I discovered that there are some real-time online OA meetings. That is one easy way of finding out what OA is all about from the comfort of your own computer. One IRC channel has a one-hour meeting every 3 hours. That means it carries meetings for 1/3 of the time, day and night. (online meetings are listed on the oa.org website.)
Was going to post this last night but my #%@&! dial-up connection wasn't letting me connect (obviously I'm not paying enough for priority service). In about 3 weeks or so I shall be having broadband at last. I'm looking forward to that.
Overall calories about right making this technically the best day I've had in weeks. A step towards sane behaviour? I sure hope so.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 18 October 2006 01:29 pm |
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Tuesday
Some success and some failure in the over-eating department.
Eavesdropped on some online OA meeting in the morning.
Visit #1 to IKEA went well. bread stick sample: 0. marshmallow sample: 1 (about 25 calories). Muffin sample: broke off a tiny piece. Quit while I was ahead - didn't go upstairs to the restaurant.
(workout = chest, triceps, abs)
Tesco supermarket: a bunch of vegetables at bargain prices. Also a 9" bacon/mushroom pizza for £0.32. Great price but what about nutrient density? full-fat cheese is 3 and refined grain is 2 so it may not be sweet but it is junk food. Will I be able to portion-control it? stay tuned.
Visit #2 to IKEA. Not quite so good. As soon as I entered I found some abanadoned chocolate moose. Through the clear plastic container it appeared untouched. So this falls under scavanging behaviour I guess. I opened it and used my finger to scoop mouthfulls of mouse. Notable is that I ate the moose quickly - not good. Ok, that got me a bit excited. Toured the freebies. Again had one marshamllow and one small bit of muffin and left.
ASDA supermarket: reduced vegetables still overpriced. same applied to refrigerated goods like sandwiches and meats. However, cream-cakes were at a price I haven't seen for a while. £0.10 for a packet. There were two packets (4 x vanilla slices, 2 x large chocolate choux). At those rarely-repeated prices I could not resist. I paid for the items (total: £0.20) and sat at the restaurant. Ate one Vanilla Slice. nice and slowly. then ate one chocolate choux - a bit too quickly stuffed down my throat. I knew each of those cakes was about 300 calories. I closed the boxes that the cakes were in, tied the bag and left it at the supermarket, saving myself from another 1200 calories.
Home: divided the pizza into 4 portions, each portion is 190 calories and 9.0g protein (19% - about as good as peanuts and peanut butter that everyone keeps raving up as a protein source).
First quarter around 8pm. (ate some vegetables, did some reading etc, eventually went to bed) Second quarter when I was briefly awake at 2am (gone back to bed) Third quarter when briefly awake at 6.50am (yes, went back to bed after that slice too). Fourth quarter will be at some point today, and then this Pizza won't be hanging over me anymore.
I didn't do well with the cream-cakes, demolishing 600-odd calories within 2 minutes (and only about 10-15 minutes after eating 200-odd calories of chocolate moose and other rubbish)
I did better to not eat the 760 calories of pizza all at once but instead divide it into smaller meals. It also makes a minor contribution towards my daily 100g-of-protein target (which none of the other junk does). To be honest though, I don't feel safe around Pizza and I'll be glad when it is gone and I hope I won't spot any such bargains for a while.
I have whole-wheat bread and grated cheese in the freezer. Have had them for ages. It is a miracle that I don't do my home-made pizzas on a regular basis. Last time was around June. The ready-made pizzas just feel too tempting at the moment.
I focused on not overindulging in freebies, limiting myself to "one". That went well. However, how about that 'random' scavanging of that chocolate moose? And those really attractive bargains that were just too good to pass? I vowed a week or so ago to not PAY for cookies again - not even if they are luxuary cookies and are reduced to practically nothing. These were not cookies, but still bad.
Total damage for Tuesday? maybe 1000, overall calories probably maintenance.
I've been thinking about what my short-term GOAL should be. On the one hand, back in September I had said I should switch to gaining-muscle-mass. However
1) I've gained some fat since then due to over-eating
2) the program I'm currently following at the gym is high reps (15 per set) targetted at muscular endurance
-> so perhaps my goal for the moment should be getting leaner (again) at least until I see some positive results or the guy at the gym wants to review my program towards a building objective.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 18 October 2006 06:05 pm |
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Wednesday (part 1)
Had the last quarter of that pizza for lunch (190 calories, 9g protein).
Left for gym and college course at 2.45pm.
First stop M&S. Freebie was a slice of Tiramisu. But it also counts as scavanging because it was a serving that somebody had picked up and placed on a shelf instead of eating. Still in its paper cup. Between 75 and 100 calories.
Second stop was IKEA. Put my scales in my pocket so they'd be handy (ate my food at M&S so quickly there was no time for weighing). Surveyed what was available. Calmly at first. Noticed my favourite cookie was again available. Quickly put one cookie in my pocket. Continued walking: oh dear, two more things I really like were there - both have got chocolate cover and a soft white inside which is either cream or marshmallow, one of them has a thicker chocolate cover the other is covered in dessicated coconut. It turns out that both of those biscuit/filling/chocolate combinations are around the 125 calorie mark, wheras the cookie is 100. Total damage here about 350 calories. (Can I have some credit for only taking one of each of those items? I could easily have taken 4-5 of each!)
Third stop - parking my bike at college campus, noticed a packet of chips. Yes, I scavanged the end of the packet (so not too much) but again too much thrill and no calm rational behaviour (and no weighing). Probably 50-75 calories.
All of that and it is only 4pm as I type! How proud do you think that makes me?
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Frankie
Senior Member
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Posted: 19 October 2006 04:09 pm |
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Hi Nir,
So far no one has addressed this "scavenging," but I hope you don't mind if I do. This makes me feel really sad. I have to admit, I have more of an emotional reaction to your diary than to most of the stuff I read on this board. For example, sometimes I feel jealous of you because you are always eating things I want to eat, but deny myself. Also, your weight sounds pretty low (did I read right, that you weigh about 133 lbs? That's less than me.) Other times I am impressed by the quantity of food, and energy you put forth in your quest for freebies. Other times I feel depressed, because you seem to be in a rut. And yet, by cataloging it all, you are not totally giving up. You are still fighting all this self destructive behavior.
The scavenging seems to me to be self-demeaning. Is that what you mean by "thrill?" Or if not, what is thrilling about it? That someone might see you? This is a separate thing from just eating too many cookies. It makes me worried.
I also read, I think, that you are going to start seeing a psychiatrist or psychologist? I hope you will address this with him or her. I don't know why it troubles me so. I have binged so many times that hearing about someone else's binge may simply not trip the mental alarm because it's familiar. But reading about the scavenging really makes me think: uh-oh!
Frankie
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OWF
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 19 October 2006 05:07 pm |
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Hi Nir,
I too, read about the "scavenging" and I kinda "get it" but then I don't. It is confusing. Is scavenging just picking up other people (strangers) scraps of food AFTER they have eaten some of it? If so, it reminds me of the episode of Seinfeld when George Costanza grabbed a half eaten chocolate eclair out of the trash because in fact, it was, "sitting on top of the clean magazine" anyway, I am not making a joke of your issue, I wouldn't do that, it just reminded me of that episode. My concern for you is mostly about the "ethical" stuff like, isn't that considered STEALING or theft? I read that you get free "refills" of drinks that you did not pay for, so I think you mean you are stealing? I can relate to your sense of "thrill" because (I am going to share some pretty embarassing news here, in your diary, so I hope you don't mind) : I got caught stealing bras and underwear when I was 16 years old shoplifting with a friend and we did it not cause we "needed" the new stuff but because we got some sort of "high" from it. It was weird, but we did, until we got caught. Well, to be honest, SHE got caught and they said I could go home, but I turned myself in. Guess I wanted to be punished for what I did, and I was. I was no longer allowed to compete in the cheerleading competition in Dallas for Nationals. That killed me, as cheerleading was my life!!!! Plus, they called the police AND my mother. Bad news, I don't know who I was more afraid of.
Anyway, my other concern in this department, being that you are eating food that was left is GERMS. I am concerned for your health. You are drinking out of cups that strangers drank from and eating leftovers that they had in their hand and maybe, mouth. Does that bother you at all? Maybe I am a germaphobe but I can not imagine picking something up half eaten and putting it in my mouth, mostly because there are so many things you can catch, colds, flu, herpes, infections...whatever.
Well, I agree with Frankie, that you are still battling against your issues and staying strong here. You are not giving up, and you are doing well, maybe talking about it will help the battle. If so, we are here to listen, as we all have our own set of problems (well, I can't speak for everyone else, but I sure have a set of my own) so, we are not here to judge. I think the OA meetings will be good for you. I also think going to see a therapist will really help.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 20 October 2006 12:14 pm |
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Hi Frankie and OWF,
I did notice there were no replies for a while after I mentioned scavenging.
I do now have a regular counselling session on a Friday morning (That means in 1 hour from now, I'd better keep this short!) it was supposed to be about my binge-eating but as it is talk-therapy it seems to be about whatever I want to talk about. I don't know how it is going, objectively. I guess I want to get more out of it!
The OA thing is a lot more focused on not-overeating. The contrast is, instead of the counsellor's position "I will not diagnose you as having an eating disorder, or not" like not labelling me, the OA is a group of self-labelling people "My name is Nir and I'm a compulsive over-eater" where they view this as a problem that doesn't go away but needs to be kept under control for your whole life.
I agree that scavenging has both health/hygine and moral, and practical implications. If somebody paid for the cake or the meatball, it is already paid for, but the refills are a bit more dodgy. [yesterday, Thursday, I went in for a legitimate (i.e. properly free, before 10am) drink - altogether 5 cups including the original and the 4 refills]. the practical element is about what happens if I got 'caught' - either by staff (if it is a restaurant) in which case I might get banned from there (which might have its upside, but I don't think I concsiously want to get banned) or the embarassment of somebody else (e.g. another customer) seeing me. As far as I use the word thrill - I don't do it because of the thrill or danger, I think I do it because it fits within the rules of my game.
Game?
First, the game was to maximise taste and pleasure, but the rules were relaxed. I could spend whatever I liked within reason. So £1 for a box of chocolates, £1 for luxuary ice-cream, £1 for a cheesecake. Money was no object.
Phase 2: I could have whatever I wanted so long as it was inexpensive. Less than £0.50 per item.
Phase 3: I can only have it if it a special bargain i.e. not the normal price but especially reduced, or free.
Phase 4: I can only have it if it is free ("because I don't want to spend money on things that are bad for me" - "there's plenty of free stuff anyway")
As I moved up through those phases, scavanging seemed to increase (because it is yet another way to have something for free)
Of course, I'd like to cut it out!
I'm hoping at some point I'll remember that I'm supposed to be on this one:
Phase ???: Aim to maximise please and fullness and nutrients per calorie (as opposed to per currency). That is the healthiest game to play
Frankie, yes, I took a short break from here but I decided that I have to write it in, even if it is bad, because sharing it might help me be accountable, and want to improve (even, and this is silly, to save face in front of the other readers). The thrill is that if I'm doing it I don't want to get caught but there is a danger that I would.
OWF, I remember that episode too (vaguely, have been 'clean' as far as TV goes for over 2.5 years, but Seinfeld was a favourite). I also once had a friend who practiced scavenging in restaurant environments (let's say I'd go somewhere with him, and he'd pick stuff from other people's plates after they have gone but before the tables got cleared) so perhaps I was slowly softned.
There is a very slight positive for scavanging - it is usually portion-controlled sorry couldn't resist.
Ok, how did I do?
Wednesday night: unexpected binge with home-made pizza (or as my friend said: cheese-on-toast, she has a point). Some of my grated chese fell on the floor so that saved me from some calories.
Thursday (and it is Friday now) actually went well. Seriously. Visit to IKEA: 5 hot drinks (legit) and made a friend (well I don't expect I'll see him again but we had a long chat - he served in the military during WW2, in 1942 so he must at least have been 16 then and therefore at least 80; Return visit to IKEA I tried to practice the "just take one" rule. I think damage was around 300 calories. But overall eating was good and it didn't trigger a binge.
Today (Friday) is challenge day: I'm travelling to Cambridge, and dinner is beyond my control, and access to food throughout the day is problematic. We'll see how it goes.
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Be A Cow
Senior Member
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Posted: 20 October 2006 09:15 pm |
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The fact that you named it "scavenging" cracks me up!! It makes me think of hyenas and vultures :)
I remember "scavenging" once--it was after a birthday event at the dance studio. I was left behind to clean up. And almost an entire home made cake went right-side up on top of the trash--still on it's tray!! So, I took the cake out and ate a massive hunk of it. I'm sure I've scavenged more--but I don't think I happen to come upon abandoned food as much as you!! And I've bypassed abandoned samples/freebies--just think if some nasty sticky child had touched it--yuck.
I've been to IKEA once--there's one in Seattle, Washington. But they didn't have food samples--I want food samples!! That's my favorite part of Costco (bulk/wholesale store). But I don't take more than one--you're not allowed, and I would feel too guilty.
As for your therapy (not the support group) do you mind me asking what does the therapist say?? I think this is what my doctor is looking into--and I think I will have issues talking to a therapist. I might be mute for an hour. And it's not that I don't have things to say . . .
Good Luck getting back to Phase ??? :)
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 21 October 2006 11:41 pm |
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I think we've now got a costco where I live but it costs money to become a member, so as yet I've never been.
Be A Cow wrote:
As for your therapy (not the support group) do you mind me asking what does the therapist say?? I think this is what my doctor is looking into--and I think I will have issues talking to a therapist. I might be mute for an hour. And it's not that I don't have things to say . . .
That's a good question. He says very little. He asks open questions. Rarely he might mention how something I've said makes him feel or a connection he's made, or ask another question. Every session starts with complete silence and I have to start talking about whatever I want to! (if you've ever seen The Sopranos, perhaps it is a bit like that. Yes, I've not watched TV for over 2.5 years but I'm still using TV for cultural references). Obviously the sessions are confidential i.e. they're not supposed to share anything I've said with anyone.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 21 October 2006 11:51 pm |
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Friday
Normal eating till 10am, including some fruits and vegetables.
Limited space in my racksack meant I could carry some protein and some legumes (carb/protein) but no room for fruit, veg or other fibre sources for the next 10 hours or so.
7.30pm Formal Hall at Robinson College (Cambridge) consisted of:
Water melon carpaccio
Lime, ginger and mascarpone terrine with crushed hazelnuts
Seasonal berry compote
*
Baked salmon with cilantro salsa
Caramelised new potatos
Oriental vegetables
Cauliflower and Spring onion puree
White wine sauce
*
Green apple and grapefruit mousse with whipped cream and cherry sauce
*
Coffee
You got everything listed above (as you can imagine, only a tiny bit of each was on your plate). Portion control was no issue as it was a (quality food in small amounts) format. You choice extended to how much white wine sauce and cherry sauce to pour on your plateand how much brown sugar to put in your coffee, I guess!). Let's be honest here, I think I compensated for the small portions by being quite generous with those sauces.
So, was it worth it? Well, dinner was free, I paid £6.75 for transportation. The food certainly wasn't anything I see everyday. The quality was certainly higher than, for example, the £11.00 buffet from last week. I don't know how much I'll be paying in the real world for food this interesting. It was also very intersting to hear how other people have been doing (this was a meeting of people who had also studied Computing, before or after my time - mostly strangers but with something in common). The major downsides were the long trip and being a bit sneaky about staying within the college buildings overnight (and unfortunately I fell asleep but only for a little while - kept myself occuppied by reading printouts, catching up with OWF and ClarinetGurl's diaries amongst other things).
I did not know this, but apparently I am entitled to go a free dinner every year at a date of my choice! No associated social ocassion, just the food. Might be worth doing on a Friday if I ever need to be in Cambridge the following day [there is an annual music festival in May - I'm already scheming ]
Saturday
[AM]
I didn't really sleep on Sunday night / Saturday morning because it was difficut to relax as I was still in Cambridge, not in my own bed. But despite not getting more than an hour's sleep, I didn't eat until the morning (5am). I had limited amount of food with me (eggs, golden pork crunch and chick peas) so it was mostly proteins with a bit of carbs and probably low on calories.
I made my Fitness Instructor course (coach 5.40am Cambridge to 8am Milton Keynes, popped home to unload and reload racksack, cycle on to my course) but didn't stay to do my weights workout as I needed to go home asap to catch up on sleep.
[2pm]
IKEA and ASDA on route home: Sampled a total of 5 things:
chocolate-covered, white cream inside 'treat', estimate 125
half a cookie (broke it in half myself!), estimate 50
orange-flavoured chocolate, estimate 50
half a cookie (samples were pre-broken by demonstrator), estimate 50
one square fudge from the pic-n-mix, estimate 50
I would have to say that the fudge and the two chocolate items are 'better value' than the two cookies. I need to remind myself that cookies always score low in comparison testing. 325 calories may seem high for this meaningless stopover, but I'm trying to foster a pattern of control, of damage limitation.
[7pm]
My friend texted to ask if I wanted three roast-beef sandwiches with short dates that she didn't want (her bf gets them free where he works). When do I even say no to free foods? I figured I'll sort out what to eat and what not to eat later on. Besides collecting them meant being active again, popping to the supermarket to scout for bargains.
Got about 160 satsumas for £1.50 at the supermarket, best fruit deal in quite a while so well worth the outing (even though it now gets remarkably dark by 7pm). If you can imagine the weight involved, shifting these with a bicycle was fun (two very heavy plastic bags balanced either side of the handlebar makes for virtually impossible cycling).
Got home and looked at the sandwiches. One was a baggete. Step 1 at the tomato and rocket. Step 2 removed all roast beef and placed in plastic container (so I could repeatedly fill up with water and rinse off the mayonaise). Step 3 decide what to do with the triangular slices of bread and the baggete.
Usually I'd just take one bite and throw the rest in the bin, but at the moment I have a thing for toast (made by placing under the Grill - not in a toaster oven). I used some paper to try to absorb excess maynoaise first. Then started the grilling process, stopping every minute or so to see if ready and trying some. Sogginess was a slight problem. In the end I was able to throw out some bits, because they were properly black-burnt.
Total calories from bread could be 400-500, and even though the bread was 'Malted' I looked into the ingredients basically it is no better than white! A step better than cookies though.
I'm not going to be too harsh on myself regarding Friday and Saturday. Both involved eating relatively little in the AM and eating a bit more in the PM but I think calories were reasonable, which is something!
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Chocoholic
Senior Member
| Joined: | 29 April 2005 |
| Location: | |
| Posts: | 341 |
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Posted: 22 October 2006 02:25 am |
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Hi, I've been meaning to write in your diary for awhile but have done well to find time to write in my own... (actually that has not changed but I am procrastinating at the moment, which may come back to haunt me).
1. Scavenging~ I don't find it any more "disturbing" than any of the other irrational eating behaviours displayed by most of the members of this forum, myself included. Yes it is unhygenic (so is eating off the floor and out of the bin, both of which I've done in mid-binge), and there are ethical issues (mostly with the refills--as you say the food that's paid for is paid for so that's fair enough!) although obviously you know this and if you were making calm, rational choices you would choose differently. I have done so many preposterous things in the course of binging that I truly do not remember if scavenging has been one of them. I know I've eaten cookies from an open bag which I found in the stairwell, if that counts. 
I understand the inability to turn down free food. I am slightly better now, but there was a time when I felt obligated to take free food. However, I decided that my health was worth a little extra money, not that I was saving much anyway, as the free stuff usually triggered expensive binges.
So--does your scavenging actually save you money? If so, is it enough money to be worth selling your health? I know you know this, and I've done similar things so I do understand and am not trying to be harsh, but maybe thinking of it that way would help?
2. Good job at Cambridge! Those tiny-bit-of-really-nice-food dinners are usually major triggers for me at least, so good job not running out afterwards to buy cheesecakes or something!
3. Step 2 removed all roast beef and placed in plastic container (so I could repeatedly fill up with water and rinse off the mayonaise).
Haha! A good idea... I would have just used it as an excuse to eat the whole thing, mayonnaise and all. Your diary is, as always, quite entertaining!
Sorry this is so long, and good luck returning to "normal" eating. 
Last edited on 22 October 2006 02:32 am by Chocoholic
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 22 October 2006 08:13 pm |
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I'm not quite done scavenging just yet. Arrived today at the ASDA-Walmart supermarket. There was a trolly outside which had a bunch of empty soft-drink bottles, a banana peel and a packet of potato chips. I picked those up and it was still about 1/4 or 1/5 full. Yes, mostly crumbs and small bits that somebody didn't think was worth finishing. My point of view: 1) portion control (I'm not eating an entire 180-calorie packet here, just 1/4) 2) yes, they've handled it. hopefully they haven't spit in it etc.
Ok, today probably has the shape of a curve: a very good start, a bit of a poor middle and hopefully a good finish. Late wake up at 10am (still catching up on my sleep following Cambridge trip) and some focus in the kitchen (boiling some eggs, cooking broccoli and cabbage, sorting out and throwing out some expired produce etc.).
12.20pm decided to get going, aim was to make the gym [no, I didn't make it - read on]. Pit stops at ASDA and IKEA (which are next to each other). ASDA: leftover potato chips (as above) and tiniest sample of ice-cream (the sampling lady obviousoly doesn't like me!). "Never mind", I think, "there's always plenty of samples at IKEA". Boy am I wrong though, I've been going there practically every day for a month (since September 20th) and today's the day they've decided to have no samples at all (!). "Oh well", I think and I head for the lift - I'm running as the doors are closing. Doors re-open for me (much to the irritation of the people in the lift who thought they'd make a quick get away). "Nir!" I hear a shout. It is my sister! I step out of the lift (once more triggerring the door-delay-mechanism ). She's with mum. My sister lives in Oxford but she is in town for the weekend as her dentist is in this town and she has an appointment tomorrow. They've just arrived so I have to inform them about the lack of samples.
Instead we all go to the top floor, to the restaurant. My sister pays £1.00 for a large plate of couscous-with-vegetables and £0 for 3 cups of tap water. Mum and my sister have water while I'm being immoral straight away by filling my paper cup with diet cola instead. We find a table and I go back for a couple of spare plates. There's so much couscous that we share it, some on each plate! £1 to feed 3 people. My sister's not impressed with the fat that remains on the plate (so couscous was fried in oil?). I take my and sister's cup for a re-fill. This time it is hot chocolate. My sister thinks it is very naugty, but eventually relents and drinks up. I promise her I'll pay for her to have some ice-cream. We are to make a short stopover in the shop to look at a rug mum intends to purchase at some point in the future.
Fast forward 1.5 hours later. We're still in IKEA. These things always seem to take longer than they should. We're now buying the rug today instead of just looking at it. Choice certainly makes life difficult - there are suddenly two candidates, so which one will it be? the cheaper one or the expensive one? the softer one or the other one? The one which is blue so it'll go with the existing curtain, or the turcoise one? The one that'll fit or the one that's actually too large? The darker colour or the paler one?... IKEA has a 90-day returns policy, so they go with the darker, smaller, less-soft, turcoise one. Oh, and a kind-of matching bed-spread for the sofa.
We have the ice-cream. It is quite late and if I head for the gym I'll barely get 30 minutes there, so I go with them to ASDA (I have the advantage of being on the bike so I get there before them).
At ASDA we go to the same demonstrator again. She serves my sister and my mother ice-cream - larger portions than the one I've had from her earlier in the day. She even tries to argue about whether she'll be serving me before she realises she's embarassing herself because I'm with the 2 people she happily served a second ago. The portion is slightly bigger this time, but portion control is never an issue when eating food that is so well guarded
I blame them both for the interest in cream-cakes. I wouldn't have found myself there otherwise. As I'm there, I pick up a selection box: 4 cakes (a vanilla slice, a scone, a jam doughnut and a chocolate eclaier - the last 3 all with fresh cream) - total cost £0.10 (I also buy £0.90 of vegetables). I go through the express checkout as I only have 6 items. I then sit on a bench and demolish my cakes. There's hardly anything left by the time they emerge out of the checkouts. It is just as well that I only went for the one item from the cream-cake area as I could have had several things - there was plenty of choice (they left with about 5 items...). Still, well over 1000 calories by my estimate.
Ok, I've had some potato chips, couscous-with-vegetables-and-oil, 200-calorie ice-cream and 1000+ in cream-cakes. But it is time to be sensible again. Fruits, vegetables and lean protein until the end of the day - that would be the sensible choice.
It took quite a while to get back home from ASDA. It was raining pretty hard so I stopped a few places in the hope it would pass. I caught up with a couple of outstanding topics from Zenobia's diary [which makes me remember to add: on Friday I did have plenty of red and white wine which is a bit outrageous as I didn't pay the £5 top-up fee they suggested for those who would like wine with their meal. In fact no-one seemed to like the white wine, I might have had 4 glasses, it is all a bit of a blurrrrrrrr now]
Last edited on 22 October 2006 08:47 pm by Nir
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 22 October 2006 08:22 pm |
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Chocoholic wrote: So--does your scavenging actually save you money? If so, is it enough money to be worth selling your health? .. good luck returning to "normal" eating.
hi. well, scavenging doesn't save any money unless it happens to satisfy a craving and prevent me from spending money. So - maybe, possibly. Same position as 'genuine' free samples. I can certainly identify times when I would have bought something but a sample relieved my boredom and I ended up not purchasing anything.
At the moment I chose to be oblivous to the hygine health argument - but maybe if I get sick I'll have second thoughts about doing it. Meanwhile, it can have the 'health benefit' of portion control (not always though! I recall finding one complete, unopened double packet of jaffa cakes (48 x 50 calories). More recently an almost-full packet of potato+maize snacks. In those cases portion control is still up to me.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 23 October 2006 12:31 am |
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For the last month I've easily been eating at least 300 calories a day at IKEA, most days. Today was the first visit when (like the IKEA that OWF visited) they didn't have any food samples. If this is their new policy, what does this mean for me? Is this good news? Will I be cutting down on junk food or will I just find some other way around it?
I could always beat the clock (arrive before 10am and claim my free re-fillable hot drinks, to include any number of calories in the form of cups of hot chocolate) or splash out on £0.35 cones of ice-cream .
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paperdoll
New Member
| Joined: | 4 October 2006 |
| Location: | |
| Posts: | 30 |
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Posted: 23 October 2006 07:26 pm |
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Nir -
Your diary is so incredibly honest, it really captivates me that you are so consistantly honest with yourself, enough to share it!
I had a thought while I was reading about your therapy sessions. It bothers me somewhat that your therapist doesn't say much. Thats what you are there for, to get counsel, and something I noticed as a trend in my years in therapy was, I only started to make progress, when I was pushed. When my behaviors were challeneged.
In regards to having disordered eating...I never made head-way until I realized what "needs" I wasn't getting met, and then tried to meet through food, or calorie counting, or scavenging, or whatever incarnation it decided to take that day. I really believe that behavior falls away last, and identifiying what needs aren't getting met for you, is going to be more fruitful than trying to quit the habits, and behvaviors. I'm sure your therapist is great, but I think maybe you should consider seeing a therapist who pushes you, challeneges your thoughts and makes you consider..."can I absolutely know that is true?" I spent years in therapy, making no progress, because my therapist entirely supported me...and I was not in a state of mind where I could make rational, forward-moving choices. So please consider your therapy, and the quality of it. Its a lot of money to spend, to not see any results! Best of luck :)
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 24 October 2006 12:15 pm |
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paperdoll, thanks for the insights. I'll have to monitor what I'm getting from my counselling sessions more closely.
Its a lot of money to spend
That sure made me smile - my #1 motivation for trying out therapy now is that, during the next few months (while I'm training to be an instructor) it is provided free of charge by the college. A bargain, if you will
Monday
Survived another day. Very clean eating at home (fruit, vegetables, protein from: chick peas, low-fat yogurt and hard-boiled egg whites) and 400-500 calories of entertainment food consisting of:
- 23g eccles cake - about 100 calories (that's 1/3 of a pastry: I bought a pack of 2 pastries because they were just 10p but then decided to be sensible about it and threw most of it away after offerring to gym staff, who weren't interested)
- Lemon Cheesecake Flavour Muller Light yogurt, 200g - almost plan food as 29.5% of its 130 calories were protein. Got it as it was on special offer (21p instead of 42p). This promotion is so popular that they didn't have any in stock when I wanted some on Sunday.
- 36.5g of some random cake, 13.5g sweedish meatball - yes, some scavangeing at IKEA (because it is their second sample-free day?). This time I was calm enough to actually weigh my loot! About 150 and 25 calories respectively.
- 3 items at the pick'n'mix - a sweet, a small piece of chocolate and a cube of fudge. About 125 calories.
All of these were consumed in the space of 1.5 hours, on the way from home to the gym (and at the gym). After 3 days of rest I finally got my weights workout (Chest, Triceps, Abs).
So, did the day go to plan? I guess my current plan is to make some room for non-plan food (by having my fruit/veg/protein not take too many calories) and then hope that I restrain myself and not go overboard with those samples and bargains and other junk-food opportunities. I don't count all my calories but I'm pretty sure I was below maintenance. It is progress of sorts!
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 26 October 2006 02:36 pm |
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Oh, it has been a couple of days since my last confession. (I'm using my paper notes to recollect - if I didn't keep paper notes, say like Jon Miller, this would have been a rather short entry!)
Tuesday
Transferring a Ceaser salad I bought the day before into a contrainer, a tiny container of parmesan cheese fell out. Was't expecting that. I could have used it with the salad, or kept it for later, but no - I had to eat it right there with a spoon. I did pause to weigh it first (10 grams - about 40 calories).
Free samples are back at IKEA. Nothing exciting. Passed on breadsticks, had a 25-calorie marshmallow. Up to the restaurant for my immorally-obtained drinks (did rinse the cup I found with hot water before using it) was there for 2 hours managing to resist the Hot Chocolate and just having drinks with negligible calories (diet cola, coffee and tea). Scavanged one meatball at 25 calories. Spent a fair while catching up with CPH, sipping my drink and telling myself I cared about my body. Then on one of my trips to the loo I scavanged some sort of pie/cheesecake-type thing (well it was sweet soft but can't be sure if it was cheese or cream...) I ate some of the untouched bit - 30.5g (weighing before and after) so 125 calories tops. Obviously that annoyed me as (at that point having forgotten about the paresan cheese from the morning) I thought the total unhealthy damage for the day was only 50 calories.
Continued on to the gym for back/biceps day. Was planning to participate in an Aerobics workout to gain a few tips for my course, but it wasn't the instructor I was hoping for so I skipped it and headed home.
Stopped at Sainsbury's: at the bakery they had full trays of mini-muffins and flapjack-bits. I weighed them. I stopped at one sample each. They still totalled at 150 calories. Didn't stop me from, er, immorally sampling a small piece of pink chocolate at the pick'n'mix (25 calories).
No bargains at Tesco; Skipped IKEA but popped into ASDA. Resisted some bargains (cookies at 10p, large apple pie for 20p) but had to grab the Chinese Chicken meal (50p).
Continued on to the other Sainsbury's (wow, that's 4 supermarkets on my treck home) where I got a pack of 5 bananas for £0.30 and 500g of red seedless grapes for £0.22.
As soon as I was home it was time to indulge in the Chinese meal. It was about 350g without its container, 96g of which was chicken breast (a rather elaborate and time-consuming procedure if you think about it: weigh everything, cook, transfer everything elsewhere and weigh empty container, fish out the chicken breasts and lick them clean, weigh just the chicken breasts and then re-integrate them with the sauce)
Decided to call the sauce 200 calories and stretch it by mixing with all the stir-fry-mix vegetables I had lying around. It was great and filling.
ETL would allow me to eat as many fresh fruit as I like. On the other hand, my behaviour was classic Compulsive Over-Eating, going back for more fruit because it felt good in my mouth. I was not hungry, I was greedy. Again I wasn't pleased even though there's nothing unhealthy about fruit.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 26 October 2006 02:38 pm |
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Wednesday
I went past IKEA on the way to the gym and on the way home. I did not go in either time. A first.
On the way there, it was perhaps due to guilt over what I had just eaten, though.
I have a tiny bottle of vanilla flavouring, which was running out. On Tuesday I was hunting for a replacement (couldn't remember which shop I got it from). I got my replacement Vanilla bottle, and also a Strawberry bottle (from the shop that didn't have Vanilla, before I located Vanilla). Anyhow today's project was to buy a one-litre bottle of sugar-free squash (I went for Orange) to see if it would also work for flavouring. The idea is that squash is cheaper and it already has the artificial-sweetner mixed in so less fiddly. Went for Orange flavour (£0.24).
While searching ASDA for the Squash bottles I unfortunately had gone past the wrong isle where I found Meringues (I'm into them - refer back to my attempts to bake sugar-free merignues back in March and April). They were on sale! just £0.59 for 16 luxuary strawberry-filled mini-Meringues. I was going to go for the chocolate ones (better bargain, more weight for same money) but then decided to go for Strawberry as they were 15 calories each instead of 25 calories each.
Had them in the ASDA restaurant immediately after purchasing. Eating them slowly(ish) but having every last one. And then having the yogurt (which I was already holding when I saw the Meringues - Apple Pie Muller Light, special offer £0.21).
Did I do anything right on that trip? Well, I went to check out the individual cheesecakes which I saw earlier on the internet (£0.35 for 90g) but didn't like the look of it close up and it was about 250 calories so I passed.
They were also reducing bread, cakes, muffins etc. There was plenty of choice at the 10p mark. About 5-6 different things I would have liked (generally mini-muffins, mini-sponge-cakes with icing, naan-bread etc.). Passed on them all.
So, Meringues 240 calories, yogurt 130 calories (3.2 and 9.2 grams protein respectively) that's why I skipped IKEA.
Workout was shoulders and legs. On way back skipped Sainsbury's, Tesco and IKEA. Popped into ASDA. No bargains worth having. Had a 14g cube of fudge, say 63 calories and a lack of scruples.
At home used my Orange Squash to try to orange-flavour some plain non-fat yogurt and to make orange-flavour oat cookie dough. I was feeling munchy but I realised I wasn't hungry so I quit.
In the middle of the night (3am) I felt more hungry so I had a small apple and some hard boiled egg whites.
Generally speaking I'm not mentioning the healthy foods I eat unless they're part of the story, in case you're getting confused and thinking that's all I eat. I think calories were maintenance on Tuesday and a bit less on Wednesday. I did wake up hungry ("throat hungry") on Thursday morning.
Thursday morning - I listened to the hypnosys CD a couple of times and hard-boiled 36 eggs. Any idea how boring the hard-boiling, peeling, cutting, washing away the yolkes, weighing 139 gram portions (that's 50 calories and 12.5g protein) is? *really* boring. (Of the original 288 eggs I now only have 36 left, so the end is in sight!)
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OWF
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 26 October 2006 08:21 pm |
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Nir,
I think you are making progress again!! Your writing seems like you are making small changes to your habits, which is a wonderful thing! By the way, what is this hypnosis CD you talk about all the time? I have a hynosis CD for anxiety, but I am sure it is not the same. I also have a meditation CD by Wayne Dyer, its a great one (when I actually take the time to listen to it-that is!)
Last edited on 26 October 2006 08:21 pm by OWF
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 27 October 2006 01:05 pm |
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The hypnosis CD is by Paul McKenna (known in the UK - has he made a name for himself in the US?) and is called I can make you thin. I've typed the text (except for the first bit that makes you sleepy) and you can read it here: nir.org.uk/downloads/hypnosis.rtf
Yes, I don't want to make any sort of announcement, or count the number of successful days etc. but I believe I'm heading in a more positive direction. Perfect it isn't. Today (Friday) I'm planning to attend my 2nd OA meeting.
Thursday
At home for most of the day. Playing in the kitchen included making oatmeal (or do I mean porridge? or are they the same thing?) most of the time I just use oats to create a cookie-dough, which has a rather different texture (the oats are moistened to the point where they have a slightly sticky quality). In fact I hated porridge (and cottage cheese) as a child, but porridge is interesting. I'm not saying it is a definite hit but it is interesting.
Had wholemeal toast. Notable because it has featured in a 'homemade pizza' binge in the recent past, and then again in the 'roast beef sandwhich scandal'. But I limited myself to one slice.
Had a cracker that was made from white flower (not wholegrain) at 4pm, everything up to that point was nice and healthy.
Made a batch of SugarFree jelly (vegeterian, lemon flavour)
Headed towards the gym at 6pm, via all possible supermarkets.
1) ASDA: bought Mandarin-flavoured Muller Light yogurt (110 calories, 8.8g protein, special offer 21p) and two packets of turkey-flavoured Quorn (107 calories, 14.9g protein, reduced to 10p). Kept shopping till later. Ate one small piece of white chocolate in the shape of a mouse (25 calories).
2) IKEA: popped in, had a look around - no samples. left straight away.
3) Tesco: side-stepped some fantastic bargains on cookies and pies. Got some healthy bargains (carrots 7p mini-romain heads 17p). Free samples sirloin steak and mature stilton cheese (50 calories)
4) scavenging: cycling away from Tesco I found a packet containing two chicken nuggets (75 calories)
5) Nothing at Sainsbury's
6) Arrived at gym, had my yogurt and one packet of Quorn before workout. It was Chest/Triceps/Abs day. had 2nd packet of Quorn after workout. (Original plan was to get protein from hard-boiled egg whites - they're now left over for Friday)
7) Took the late-night train home, side-stepping all shops.
Total damage: 150 calories 'free', 325 calories 'protein bargains'
I'm still going out and expecting some entertainment in the form of food and/or shopping. The progress is that I'm not eating 1000s of calories. Integrating my mistakes into my calorie allowance, so to speak.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 28 October 2006 03:32 pm |
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Friday
Assuming everyting is OK is a mistake.
Day started OK. Cooked rice for first time in my life (I was using long grain rice. 25g yields 67g which is 87 calories and about 5-6 heaped teaspoons. I don't think it is particularly amazing value-per-calories.
IKEA: no samples available (again), two hot drinks.
ASDA: one yogurt on special offer with reasonable protein (110 calories); bought fat-free vinigarete for experimentation (special offer 59p, 100 calories for the bottle - say I had 25 calories); free sample mango-and-pineapple-juice (say 10 calories); scavange: piece of double-chocolate-chip-cookie: broke off 5g piece and threw rest away (25 calories).
OA meeting didn't feel same as 2 weeks ago. Left me disappointment. Decided to break the uphill cycle back home via parental home (new route - looked it up on the map). Technically I don't live far but I hardly ever go. I was hoping for some food entertainment and sure enough I got some. Apparently mum emailed earlier in the day asking for some help with the computer so I was actually a welcome presence rather than purely an uninvited guest (didn't catch up with email until some time afterwards).
Chicken soup with vegetables; Multi-grain wholewheat toast; ginger-snap biscuit; one piece sharon fruit; one square home-made cake (two layers pastry with apple in between); one slice supermarket-originated-lemon-pie (tarte-a-citron); 20-30g Lindt chocolate. Maybe I forgot someting. Cycle of eating broken around 9.15pm (mum wanted me to leave as she wanted to give some attention to dad who had just arrived home late from work)
Nothing worth having at Sainsbury's. Spent a few long minutes eyeing up some full-price chocolate options. Pulled myself away and left empty-handed.
Still munchy at home. Had a chunk of butternut squash for 50 calories; made a 110 calorie portion of oat cookie dough (double purpose here: one of the only "potential binge foods" I still have around the home AND a taste of childhood/home - tastes a bit like cookies mum used to make when I was a child). Same as the rice in the morning: doesn't go very far.
On the way to the supermarket and at home had to keep reminding myself that I WAS NOT ACTUALLY HUNGRY, that I've had plenty of calories, all the protein I needed for the day (and it was a bit late for a feast of vegetables).
Forced myself to stop.
Never underestimate the power of sleep, the power of a new day. You wake up realeased from the binge. It draws a line - the binge was the past and today is a separate day. Motivation to make good choices is overriding. If there are physical aspects to the binge (blood sugar?) they are resolved. Yesteday I wanted to continue eating for comfort and entertainment. Today I want to eat for healthy and practical purposes.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 29 October 2006 11:36 am |
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Saturday
Decided to take an exercise rest-day (I've worked out Monday-Friday, 5 days in a row, so it isn't a problem). Stayed home for most of the day, eating sensibly.
6.30pm outing to local supermarkets. Picked up some yellow beetroot slices (70 calories) and a mixture of pineapple, mango and 'tiger nuts' (175 calories), both were reduced prices and fit within my plan. Also had a small piece of pick'n'mix chocolate for 50 calories.
Back home, was thinking about the Pita bread and Crumpets in the freezer. Originally got both for very little (probably 10p) but a lot of work had gone into cutting these into little pieces, weighing 25-calorie portions and putting in little bags. They're both white (refined) flour products and I wanted to take the symbolic action of throwing them away. (This occured to me a few weeks ago and I ended up putting them back in the freezer, not letting go.) Ok, so on this ocassion I had one last portion of crumpets for 25 calories, 2 last portions of pita-bread for 50 calories, and I finally threw them away. They're gone. The only wheat/bread products remaining in the freezer now are wholewheat (nutrient density 22 instead of refined flour 2).
Of course, I still have white-flour products in the cupboards.
1) I have these flour-and-water flat crackers (no other ingredients. they're marketed as low-sodium). I'm not throwing these away but I might find a way to share them at some point.
2) chow-main noodles. unlike my wholewheat pasta which takes at least 10 minutes of boiling, these noodles are ready in 4 minutes. They're also completely different texture. If I saw wholewheat noodles I might get those instead, but for now they stay as well.
So that is one kind of cleaning-up I've done - getting rid of some less-healthy stuff. I also spent some time throwing out fruits and vegetables that had gone off before I got around to dealing with them. The more I was binging, the less I was concerned with those.
I was definitely doing OK on Saturday. Sane. I'd like to say 'Normal' but I need lots of precedents (i.e. lots of OK days like these) to be able to refer to this as the Normal state of affairs.
[Sunday morning] Cool, just noticed clocks have moved in my favour.
I do not like my body fat%. It has been hovering at 17-18%. I want to see 10% and eventually 7%. I know that I'll be waiting quite a while.Last edited on 29 October 2006 11:42 am by Nir
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 31 October 2006 02:11 pm |
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Sunday
(I'm sure I wrote something for Sunday but it isn't here, so a brief recap: basically I was busy all day at the gym; did some vegetable shopping by phone with the aid of my mother; had a couple of bananas as soon as I received them so they wouldn't be a problem later; went through IKEA on my way home and treated myself to an ice-cream; they had samples on offer earlier that day but all samples were gone by the time I arrived so I wasn't sure whether my non-binge was a credit to me or to lack-of-opportunties)
Monday
I'm going through a little phase of getting excited about dressings and sauces that I can put on my food. Not quite sure how it started. I bought a low-fat vinigarete the other day and yesterday I also got some hot chilli sauce. Then I remembered that I already had mustard and soy-sauce at home. I have lemon-juice as well but I'm not sure it counts. One of the food experiments yesterday was to take a spoonfull of cornstarch, mix it with some water and microwave until it boils (so it thickens the water) and then spice it up. Attempt one was with mustard (since I always feel the mustard is too strong) and experiment two was with this really strong Fajita seasoning mix. Ultimately though I don't like the texture.
Also, my twisted mind was thinking: Oh, I shouldn't really use cornstarch as it is refined flour (nutrient density 2) so then of course my mind turns to what else I have in that category: I had some breadcrumbs. They fall into the exact same category. I never use them because I don't know what to do to make them taste good. Obviously I've had them in other people's cooking - think about KFC-style chicken :) or even cauliflower mixed in with breadcrumbs. So I tried mixing some in with vegetables. Completely horrible. After wasting 50 calories on tasteless breadcrumbs I still woke up at 2am with the bright idea of toasting some in the grill (well, the grill part of the microwave oven). First time it wasn't brown enough but I was frustrated so I tried it. Second time (4 minutes in an already-hot gril) it burnt completely black and I had to figure out how to make the smoke alarm stop its noise before the whole building woke up. Third time was half-way, again mediocre. (Just got off the phone talking to mum - she fries it in a tiny bit of oil on a non-stick pan before combining it with the already-cooked, drained cauliflower. I think I might be tempted to go back to breadcrumb experiments soon!)
So that's 50 calories for cornflour, 75 calories for breadcrumbs, who knows how much for over 100ml of hot chili sauce (no figures on the bottle but they start from tomato puree and then use maize starch for thickener).
IKEA on the way home from the gym: one marshmallow; a couple of small pieces of potato chips; half a cookie (broke it myself - so tempted to have more but resisted); one ritz-style cracker (scavanged from one of those cracker-and-dip packets - somebody ran out of dip before using up their crackers!). IKEA total estimate: 100 calories.
So with the cornflour problems, I still don't know how to make my own sauce. Future experiments will feature sauce attempts based on low-fat yogurt, low-fat cottage cheese, low-fat soft cheese and passata (sieved tomatos). The problem with the dairy products is that I typically don't want to make sauces-for-veggies with them because I'd rather make "cheesecake" with them [well, the cheese part of the cheesecake, anyhow] even though logically I should focus on sauces, because sauces make it more fun to eat the vegetables.
Curry sauce: opened a tin of chicken curry today so I have one additional sauce option available.
Spices: I still have a ton of spices but I'm more excited by sauces at the moment.
CALORIE TARGET: I am currently aiming for a daily target of 1250. Now, before you fall off your chair or assume that I've hit my head on something, or try to ask for my statistics [male, 33.5, 1.66m, 58.5kg] to work out my unadjusted RMR [1460] I should point out that, in an attempt to encourage the vegetables to head towards my mouth, I'm implementing "vegetables are 0 points" (like Weight Watchers, I guess). One kilo of vegetables could be 200-350 calories (depending on whether the average calories per 100g is more like 20 or more like 35). More importantly I never add up the little things - chewing gum, instant coffee or cocoa powder, dash of milk or milk powder, a bit of mustard or other sauces etc. I just can't be bothered anymore. I seem to have a flexible fruit policy - I keep changing my mind about whether to weigh the fruit or not depending on whether I'm eating enough. Today I'm counting it because otherwise I'll be helping myself to too many fruit.
By the way I picked the target of 1250 calories out of thin air because I use my own 25-calorie 'point system' so that is 50 of my points. So I'm aiming for 100g of protein and 50 points. Makes it easy to see how I'm doing.
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NevD
New Member
| Joined: | 26 October 2005 |
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| Posts: | 1536 |
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Posted: 31 October 2006 05:25 pm |
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What to do with breadcrumbs for taste:
Put them in a bowl, crumble an OXO cube onto them, add hot water, stir - and eat.
I'd use a non-animal-based stock cube, but it's the same principle.
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 1 November 2006 02:21 pm |
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NevD, thanks for the breadcrumb tip. Threw the last of the stock-cubes away some time ago when realised they expired a few years previously - almost an entire packet thrown because it was very salty and not that great value-for-calories. May try it though - after trying the dry-frying thing. Neither of which I've had time for yet.
Tuesday
Ate lots of fruit early day - also took my protein in calorie-inefficient ways like Soy Milk. Soy milk has all the charm of Soy Protein Isolate dissolved in water, but without the protein. I'm drinking it because I paid for it and its 'Best Before' date is coming up - I'm not buying that again in a hurry.
Had some chicken breast from the freezer in the afternoon. With the exception of the L&K buffet 2.5 weeks ago, I have been vegeterian since early October. I really don't miss meat and fish (so long as there are plenty of protein-rich alternatives at hand) but I'm not an ethical vegeterian. Also, I'm determined not to waste my vast stockpile of meat and fish which is in the freezer and in the cupboards.
Did more shopping for sauces. I have 'Mint Sauce' - 71 calories per 100g and just £0.15 per jar. 'Hamburger Relish' is 50 calories per 100g and £0.39 per jar. 'Bolognese Sauce is 38 calories per 100g and £0.27 per jar. But the taste of Bolognese sauce is very subtle, hardly an imrovement on the much cheaper passata so I won't be getting that again. Love the other two.
Another winner is sugar-free jelly - used as a sauce. About 10 calories per 100g. Can't get any lower than that for anything resembling a sauce, can we?
That brings me to the sauce issue: there are lots of flavourfull things that can be used as sauces, but which I just eat with a spoon [hi OWF - I checked Nutella, I couldn't believe how expensive it was over here - I think it works out more than $5 a jar]. I was looking at this jar of Peanut Butter for a while. I wasn't best pleased with the hydrogenated fat in the ingredients list, but the real scary thing was that I was holding about 1800 calories in that little jar and I know that I can eat Peanut Butter with a spoon. Really scary.
It hardly ever occurs to me to use dry-roasted peanuts as a salad condiment.
Mixing low-fat yogurt with a spoon of strong mustrad makes a vegetable dip - strong enough that I'd rather use it as a dip and not spooon it into my mouth.
So: jelly, yogurt, cottage cheese, and the various relishes, vingaretes, sauces, flavoured nuts (and even meat/fish) - I enjoy eating them on their own, but they'll be a lot more useful eaten alongside vegetables, to give them flavour.
Shopping observations: I seem to be happier spending £money£ on sauces than on spices. Not sure why. Also, seem to be more willing to spend more on vegetables if they come in a jar as opposed to a tin.
What else? I've been thinking about Compulsive Over-Eating and the Eat To Live plan. Dr Fuhrman would like to see me eat LOTS of vegetables (especially salad) and with good reason - they're low-calorie and nutrient-dense. However, when I "eat as much as I like" on the vegetables front, I _am_ exhibiting and practicing and perpetuating the Over-Eating habit. I'm stuffing my face! So does that mean that I'm not "abstaining"? Well, I have to come up with my own definition of what 'abstaining' means to me. But is repeating the same over-eating pattern (albeit with healthy vegetables) slowing down any 'recovery' that I might want to have? Food for thought! :) I certainly don't think I'm going to get on with one of the 'classic' Plans-Of-Eating which require you to plan your meal in advance (even plan all the meals you'll have in the day in advance) and then stick to that. I like flexibility and I will feel like a 'caged animal' if I had to stick to a plan this rigid (And then I'll rebel, of course).
So, I was walking through the shopping centre and stopped at Millie's for a cookie sample. up to 50 calories (I ate without weighing though, shame). A few hours later I was at ASDA. A shelf stacker had these clear boxes with flapjack-squares in them. He dropped one box which then opened and they went all over the floor. He picked them all up, trashed them and went away. He missed one. I went over, picked it up, thoroughly "rubbed" it clean (er, who knows how effective that is) and ate it (again, without weighing), let's say 50 calories. I then looked at a large, heavy piece of Quiche reduced to 20p. Good price but it was pastry and it was heavy and I walked away. I topped it with one chocolate-covered peanut (obtained immorally)
Had some TVP for the first time in ages. The savoury type.
I currently pay £15 for gym membership - that's like £3.50 a week (or 50p a day). Yet I paid an extra £2.50 for an Aerobics class yesterday (classes are not included). Obviously classes don't represent value compared to unlimited weight-training and cardio machines at the cheap price. Why did I do the class? To see a professional at work, cueing moves and dispensing teaching points, to get myself ready for my little performance on Saturday morning! (and then I went to do my Back/Biceps/Abs workout). They asked me at the gym if I was growing a breard! time to shave.
Enough ramblings. Basically I started my 'sanity' phase by trying to ignore and be disinterested with food. Now I am persuing an interested-in-healthy-food phase and enjoying my vegetables a bit more. I read somewhere that it takes 21 days to form a habit, and I was binging on Friday night, but I'll keep repeating my mantra: "I am in control / I must be in control". (Cheers for reading, by the way - my friend can't get his head around the idea that my diary has been viewed 15,000 times. That's just the 15 of you, reading it 1000 times each, I'm sure)
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 2 November 2006 10:45 am |
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Wednesday
Ok, so I need a zig-zag 'high day' once in a while? Well I wasn't planning on one, but it did happen. Let's review the day. Part one: day up to 10pm:
Good start: protein, vegetables and sauces, some fruit.
2.30pm: samples at Sainsbury's: 'mexican' cheese 40 calories, anchovies 25 calories (didn't realise I liked them so much), olives 25 calories
3.30pm: piece of white chocolate in the shape of a mouse. 50 calories. immoral.
3.50pm: marshmallow (IKEA free sample - the only type they had going) 25 calories
5pm: orange tango (scavange) 25 calories
8pm: banana, 90 calories - the only reasonably-priced item available in the college cafeteria (£0.25).
3 Ministrels (M&M-style sweets, 2.6g each), 40 calories. During a group exercise (on my college course) one girl was offering them to everyone. [The digital scales I used to weigh them are apparently the same model she used to weigh drugs with]
9.35pm: another marshamallow from IKEA, 25 calories.
So at this point 'food entertainment' stands at 345 calories, with overall totals for the day at 1000 calories and 73.3g protein (calories do not include vegetable consumption, though).
10pm, the fun begins, as I enter ASDA. My fate can be traced back to a decision I made at 9pm. I had the choice of staying in the college/gym complex for one hour and then catching a train which would shorten my ride home, or start cycling home at 9pm, looking for bargains and probably arriving home at around the same time. Pro of cycling is that it was more active (and I was hoping to get more vegetables - unfortunately slim pickings at both Tesco and ASDA) Pro of waiting for train was ability to use hour for reading. It was the coldest night yet. I cycled with gloves on for the first time this year and it was still freezing. Right, back to those ASDA bargains:
Cream cake: this one was a Meringue (I have a soft spot for those) with some chocolate, lots of fresh cream and topped with a couple of fresh fruit. I found a cake with the correct date, sought a member of staff and waited for them to put a reduced sticker on it (10p). Actually I had two different cream cakes in my hand but I decided to go with the Meringue which I estimated to have less calories. Weighed at 96g and no calorie information, I'm estimating it at 300 calories. I ate it immediately after weighing it, just out of the checkouts.
7 x salmon fillets at 10p each, safely in freezer.
2 x "beef in red wine" dishes at 20p each. This is my "restaurant-quality/takeaway-quality food at silly prices", a bit of a weakness for me. The beef steak weighed at 85g and there was about 75g of sauce. I figured it took care of my protein shortfall. I don't know what kind of 'beef' it was so I don't really know the calories. The other packet is in the freezer.
2 x "mushroom stroganoff" dishes at 20p each. Similar rationale. Again no info on the calories. I wanted to fish out the mushrooms while retaining the sauce for when I was going to have lots of vegetables [I tend not to have mountains of veggies last thing at night] but by that point I think I was in 'overeating mode' so having put the sauce in the refrigerator I then too it out again and spooned every last bit of sauce in my mouth. I did say I have problems with sauces and dips. Other packet in the freezer.
Aberdeen Angus beefburgers (2 of them, for 20p). I don't normally buy burgers! I'm not sure if this was a beefburger patty or a steak, no info on the calories. Almost 200g (about 7 oz) for the two burgers.
Ok, so I definitely had a "high" day, and probably we can also call it an over-eating episode. As I'm predicting a high-calorie day for Sunday, I'll try to have a sensible Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Not sure what can be done about Friday though, as I'm invited to offer some technical support at mum's house.
Oh. I have some things in the freezer!
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OWF
Distinguished Member
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Posted: 2 November 2006 04:38 pm |
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Nir wrote:
That brings me to the sauce issue: there are lots of flavourfull things that can be used as sauces, but which I just eat with a spoon [hi OWF - I checked Nutella, I couldn't believe how expensive it was over here - I think it works out more than $5 a jar]. I was looking at this jar of Peanut Butter for a while. I wasn't best pleased with the hydrogenated fat in the ingredients list, but the real scary thing was that I was holding about 1800 calories in that little jar and I know that I can eat Peanut Butter with a spoon. Really scary.
I currently pay £15 for gym membership - that's like £3.50 a week (or 50p a day). Yet I paid an extra £2.50 for an Aerobics class yesterday (classes are not included). Obviously classes don't represent value compared to unlimited weight-training and cardio machines at the cheap price. Why did I do the class? To see a professional at work, cueing moves and dispensing teaching points, to get myself ready for my little performance on Saturday morning! (and then I went to do my Back/Biceps/Abs workout). They asked me at the gym if I was growing a breard! time to shave.
Hi Nir!
Your diary is fun to read and I try to read it everyday if I can! Why is it so hard for your friend to grasp that you are a funny, witty writer with informative approaches and ponderings not only to weight loss, but life in general, that we (all 15,000 of us) find useful and entertaining? Tell your friend to bugger off!
Anyway, yeah. I hear you about Peanut Butter! I eat Smuckers ALL NATURAL (no partially hydrogenated oils) and its SOOO good, you just have to stir it up really good when you first open it to get the peanut oils mixed in there. But yeah, I can eat almost an entire jar in a day if I would let myself-right alongside NUTELLA!
I LOVE NUTELLA!! Sometimes I dream of eating it and wake up chewing!! It is always around $5.00 dollars a jar though and I am glad cause it keeps me from buying it...until it's on sale for 50% off!!!! Then I find myself getting weak and wanting to "stock up" and then I have to HIDE the jars in the cabinet so I dont go crazy and eat them with a spoon instead of having meals!!!!!!!!!!! Thats just crazy OWF for ya though!!
I started teaching aerobics and its a lot of fun. I am sure you will be wonderful this Saturday when you teach!! I have to record a session soon and mail it to keep my certification and I am nervous about it. I have to have a root canal this afternoon and then teach tonight...YIKES!!
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Nir
Senior Administrator
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Posted: 3 November 2006 03:54 pm |
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(thanks for the compliments)
Thursday
Had the beef/wine and mushroom/stroganoff from the freezer first thing in the morning (well it was a late start, 11am), estimating calories and protein, incorporating them in the day's plan, getting rid of them so they can't be a danger later on and eating as many vegetables with them as I could.
I'm running low on refrigerated vegetables so I'm supplementing from the freezer. Today, another 1kg bag of frozen spinach.
Left for college/gym campus complex a little before 1pm, arriving shortly after 1.30pm.
I have a 3-day split [Chest+Triceps, Back+Biceps, Shoulder+Legs] but I further split today's workout [Shoulder+Legs] into two workouts [Shoulder], [Legs] and spent the time between those:
(1) having an elaborate late lunch of vegetables, sauces and protein [this included the 1kg of frozen spinach, which worked out 600g when cooked, as well as raw carrots, chineese lettuce, cooked swede, cooked red cabbage, mackarell and some sauces to go with the vegetables: I had with me a jar of mint sauce, a jar of horseraddish sauce and a jar of hamburger relish. These are glass jars so they're heavy to cycle with, but it is nice to have the flexibility  ]
(2) going online (CPH) and word-processing some 'snappy teaching points' that I'll throw in when I'm teaching my 19-minute aerobic curve on saturday morning
(3) spent an hour in the studio, shouting my instructions [we don't get a Microphone] into the empty room
7.30pm event to welcome Year 11 students in the common room (that's 15 year olds but they've obviously all disappeared already and the food was going spare): one jaffa cake (50 calories) about a third of a cake-bar (50 calories, thrown rest in the bin) another jaffa cake, a few peanuts, a few potato crisps. They actually had healthy options as well: had a few cherry tomatos, purple plums and satsumas. Plenty of things I didn't touch: mini-muffins, breadsticks and other salty snacks. [I wish I made more of a play for the fruit before they took it away. I would have taken it home! instead they asked if I'd like to take home the nuts. I declined. I know myself better than that!]
Cycled home via supermarkets: Sainsbury's (Bletchley), Tesco, ASDA, Sainsbury's (Milton Keynes), picking up some vegetable bargains. Also 3 immoral pick'n'mix chocolate-related pieces (chocolate-covered brazil, caramel-cream 'kiss', chocolate/crispy-thing) and one chicken satay cube (from a package that got opened and would never get sold). Took almost 2 hours and my hands face and feet were freezing cold. Maybe I need a scarf. I'm already wearing a wooly hat and gloves. Home shortly before 10pm.
Got home and calculated that numbers were slightly high given that it was supposed to be a 'low' day, so took my remaining protein as efficiently as I could: 20g protein from 100 calories of chicken breast with a bit of salsa for flavour; 5.1g protein from 25 calories of banana-flavour whey-protein shake.
Ended up with just 4 'meals' for the day.
When I got home there was a shopping bag with some produce that mum has donated (because I mentioned on the phone that my vegetable situation is getting desperate - this is because my new routine isn't as conducive to snapping up produce bargains as the old routine which was based on being a member in the old gym which was near a supermarket). Anyhow she decided to give me one aubergine (=eggplant) some red pepper, some tomatos and 3 bananas.) Incidentally while I don't think about my mum as an over-eater, we do share the same inability to handle bananas so maybe she was doing herself a favour.
I woke up at 1.40am and decided to have a banana. Had another one the morning after (Friday) so there's only one left. Safer that way
Last edited on 3 November 2006 03:58 pm by Nir
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