Thoughts on cravings

As I’m sure you all know, I am a self confessed sugar addict. 100% addicted to the white stuff. Often in the evening and throughout the day I’ll get a craving for a big bar of Cadburys, or Galaxy, or biscuits, just something sugary. Often I think it’s because I’m hungry. But, I heard an interesting thing on Jillian Michael’s podcast a couple of weeks ago and it really got me thinking.

She was discussing weight loss, calorie deficit, and exercising making you feel hungry, and she said,

‘Ask yourself, when you’re hungry or craving something, could you eat a steak? Could you eat some salmon, some chicken, a spinach salad? Because if you couldn’t, you’re not hungry’.

I found this to be really interesting, as often I will be sat there thinking I’m hungry, when actually I’m just craving sugar, I’m not hungry at all, as I know all I want is chocolate to get my fix.

She also discussed treats, and how everything has a consequence. So yes, whilst it’s fine to have treats in moderation, they all have a consequence on your body. I don’t suppose I’ve ever really thought about it in that way, I often find myself thinking, oh it’s just a one off, diet and sugar detox can start tomorrow, but as always, they never do! Don’t get me wrong, I think treats are good, the whole 80/20 rule, but sometimes I don’t quite keep the 80/20 balance.

I think getting myself to think in this way will really change my eating habits. So from now on, whenever I think I’m hungry, I’m going to picture a spinach salad. And if I’m still hungry, I’ll eat. If not, maybe I’ll shed a few pounds!

What are your thoughts on listening to your bodies hunger and cravings?

Image source

Another juice detox

Last week I did another 5 day juice detox, following Jason Vale’s 5 in 5 plan using his app. As I’ve posted previously, my family and I have had some good successes previously. I decided to do another 5 in 5, as after three weeks working away from home and indulging on an almost daily basis I can definitely see the difference in the scales too. Two of my other buddies decided to do it for the same five days too, so we had a bit of a back up support for each other.

The first time I did the 5 in 5 I stuck to the plan almost religiously, bar a couple of hiccups. The following few times I did it I wasn’t quite so strict with myself, and still lost some weight. This time round I decided I was going to be pretty strict, exercise, but eat when I felt I needed it.

Monday I stuck to juice all day until the evening where I had to have a couple of slices of small low carb toast after my evening run. I felt good throughout the day though.

Tuesday daytime I snacked on a banana before another 3 mile run. I was up at 5.30 for yoga in the morning, so by the time my first juice rolled around at 10am I was hungry! Tuesday evening my sugar levels felt so low, I couldn’t resist a kitkat chunky, oops. Not strict in the 5in5, but part of the 80/20 rule maybe??

Wednesday I had a couple of macarons at work a colleague bought back for me from Paris. They were so disappointing I wish I hadn’t bothered! In the evening I was feeling a little sick so I had two more slices of bread with a little salted butter. All I could think about whilst I was making it was crisps, salty crisps! I don’t think it helped that someone on my floor at work made sweet popcorn in the afternoon, absolute torture!!

Thursday I was good all day at work, a banana before my run club where I did a pretty hard session. I juiced the rest of the day, because I knew what lied ahead for my evening – bake club! I sampled a small piece of each cake, to make a total of four – brownie, lemon and blueberry drizzle, carrot and walnut, and an Anzac. I felt so bloated afterwards and all the sugar made me feel absolutely buzzing, I couldn’t sleep for hours!

Friday I took the remainder of my cake into work and when I saw everyone else tucking into it I couldn’t help but have a piece. It kept me so full!! In the afternoon I had slumped big time and a colleague offered me a small M&S sausage roll. Real proper food never tasted so good. I felt really guilty by the evening though and ended up going out for a 5 mile run. After my run I ended up having a small bowl of cereal and a couple of slices of toast – ooops!

Saturday The big weigh in. Even with eating in the evenings and a lot on Friday, I still managed to lose 5lbs, which I’m really pleased with. On Saturday I went out for the morning shopping, indulged in a slice of lemon drizzle as I had a voucher. For lunch I had a small bowl of marmite pasta, post to come, and then in the evening I had left over roasted chicken in red wine, plus some popcorn. I felt so uncomfortably full by the evening, I think I tried to go back to normal portion sizes, oops! I was surprised I couldn’t finish all the popcorn, which normally I think I could have polished off!

Summary The week of juicing really made me realise quite how reliant on sugar I am. I really, really want to kick my sugar habit but I’m a bit scared about how difficult it’s going to be! I’m intrigued by the Whole30 a lot of people have been doing, I think that actually eating food and filling and fuelling my body so I’m never given the opportunity to be hungry would make it easier kick the sugar habit. What do you think, any opinions on this?

Resolutions 2014

This year I didn’t publish any resolutions, so looking back on the year I can’t say how well I did or not. For 2014 I’ve got a few things I’d like to achieve, so by posting them here, I hope to make myself a bit more accountable, and have regular check-ins to see how I’m doing.

1. Complete London duathlon with a good time. I have all summer to train for this race, and with just two elements, I should be able to practice the full distance with transitions, to make myself feel fully prepared and confident when I cross the start line in September. I haven’t really given thought to a time yet, but I want to complete it in a time I’m proud of.

2. Continue racing. I love racing, because I love receiving medals. Racing is expensive, if you enter the big ones, but I’m hoping to enter smaller races and get some more medals for my display!

3. Sub 30 mins 5K, and sub 60 mins 10K. In 2013 I managed 5K in 30 mins, and I completed Brighton 10K in 63 minutes. I want to work on my speed a bit more, and try to crush those times.

4. Continue to juice regularly. If you’ve read my blog for a while, you’ll know I’m new to the juicing world. However, I think it does work for me, and so I’ll be kicking off the New Year with another go at 5 in 5. I’d like to keep juicing at least one day a week, and to try new juice recipes, and make some up of my own.

5. Cut back on processed sugar. This is probably going to be the toughest one for me to do, because I’m a ginormous sugar addict. Hopefully with the help of regular juicing and a couple of juice detoxes I can cut back massively on how much processed sugar I have.

6. Complete my quilt. I started my quilt back in April/May last year, and have been working on it on and off since then. With the arrival of my new sewing machine, I hope to make some real progress on this, so that by next winter I’ll be able to use it.

7. Hit that number on the scale. We all have a number, I know what I’d like mine to be. I’m hoping that with regular exercise, and regular juicing, and cutting back on processed sugar, I’ll get closer to that number in 2014. It’s all about #teamhealth.

8. Cook a new recipe at least once a fortnight. I’m setting myself a challenge to make more use of my extensive cook book collection, so I’m planning to cook one recipe from it each fortnight. I’ll do a separate post on this, as I’m planning to make it a regular feature on the blog.

9. Save, save, save. I need to budget better, save harder, and spend less in 2014 so I can get the things I want in life long term. This may mean some budget/thrifty posts, making do and using up cupboard basics, and exploring more free/cheap days out locally.

10. Have regular pamper evenings. I love nothing more on a Sunday evening that getting into clean, ironed bedsheets, and lighting a candle with a book. I’d like to expand on this, pampering myself more by painting my nails, and having regular face packs etc.

So there you have it, hopefully not too ambitious, but some challenges too! Have you set any resolutions or challenges this year? Did you set any last year, how did you do?

Image source: Oh so beautiful paper via Pinterest

Juicing | a catch up

As you may know, back in November I attempted Jason Vale’s 5 in 5 juice plan. You can read my catch up for days one, two, three, four, five, and a summary. Since the first five days finished, I have continued to juice on and off. For the first couple of weeks I juiced throughout the days and then ate dinner in the evenings. However, as it got closer to my birthday and there were more and more social engagements to attend, my juicing has become less. Whilst juicing I’ve had so many people come up to me and ask me if I’ve lost weight and to say that I’m looking well. I have to say, I do feel well when I juice. When my juicing slipped, the week before my birthday, as well as having some out of control hormones, I felt more bloated, my skin felt worse, I didn’t sleep so well, had less energy, and I was grumpy! I think it’s probably an increase of sugar and refined processed food and carbs and a lack of good veggies that’s made me feel so blerugh.

So, I’m back on the juice wagon. I won’t be doing it full time, just for two out of three meals. I will continue to juice at breakfast, and then juice for either lunch or dinner. I think eating a lunch is better for you and juicing in the evening, as your body has longer to digest it before bed, but it’ll be as it fits round my schedule. As we all know, Christmas is a busy time for people full of dinners and parties, but if I continue to juice and exercise around this, I think I’ll be helping my body to feel and look it’s best.

Lent–One week in

(source)

I have to say, despite saying every few months that I’m going to give up chocolate, this is definitely the longest I’ve gone. One week and still going strong!!

My chocolate cravings have been intense at times. But I’ve found even one week in I often want chocolate when I’m stressed, bored or lonely. Like on Friday nights when I’m home alone I’d normally gorge on some chocolate, so now I’m finding I need to be creative! I can see popcorn featuring pretty heavily until Easter! I’ve also noticed that nearly every biscuit out there is chocolately, my word!

If this continues well I’m really tempted to try and cut out sugar completely. I’m not ready to do that just yet, I need to get over the rest of this week and find some sugar free breakfast ideas to eat at my desk!

Any suggestions? How are you doing on lent? This is the best I’ve ever done!

Sugar Detox – Day 2 (again)

Hello everyone! How are you this dry Tuesday! I woke up this morning with a heavy nose and feeling a bit belurgh. There’s been a lot of germs going round the office and sadly I don’t think I’ve been strong enough to avoid them!

I started off as with any morning and had a lemon and ginger tea whilst getting ready. Porridge was eating for breakfast, my current usual of 1/2 cup of oats, 1 cup rice milk, 10 frozen raspberries and 4 fresh strawberries. Yum! This made me feel a bit better about myself.

No snacks this morning, just plenty of fluids in the form of green tea and water. For lunch I was so tempted to get a baguette from the local deli to cheer myself up but I’d already bought a packed lunch so I decided to ‘be good’ and save the baguette for another time.

Lunch was couscous, leaves, tuna, pepper, sweetcorn and some munchy seeds. This was very filling and combined with some fresh strawberries I felt stuffed!

As the afternoon progressed I started to feel worse and worse. My eyes and nose felt really heavy and I just felt all belurgh. I was really craving something chocolate so instead of having full on chocolate I broke the detox and had a Highlights hot chocolate. Only 40 calories but full of sweetners etc I’m sure it did the trick and made me not feel so bad for not having chocolate!

Straight from work I headed for another sports massage. After 2 weeks off my shoulders were feeling sore again, but the therapist said it’s probably combined with me feeling under the weather that my shoulders didn’t feel great. The massage today was pretty painful, but I feel so much better for it now. Love the pain so good it hurts!

I got home, did my 30 day shred and 10 minute Spark people video, showered and made myself dinner. The shred was really tough today because I was feeling so awful but I managed it, that’s the main thing!

Dinner was plain pasta with a little oil and lots of chilli. One of my favourite comfort food recipes. No veggies, all carbs but so so tasty!

After dinner I’ve had some lemsip and I’m still feeling pretty sorry for myself. I’ve stocked up on orange juice, berocca, lemsip and echinacea so hopefully tomorrow I’ll be fighting fit!

 

Any tips on staying healthy when you’re feeling under the weather?

Sugar Detox – Day 1 (again)

Today has been pretty good in terms of my detoxing I think!

I woke up and had a lemon and ginger tea and got ready, as always! For breakfast I had half cup of oats with a cup of rice milk, 10 frozen raspberries and then 4 fresh strawberries on top. This was yum! The fresh sweet strawberries really balanced out the tanginess of the raspberries.

Around 11am I had a small Graze box of dried cranberries and raisins with almonds. Yum yum! I love dried cranberries so much, they’re so delicious!

At 12.30 I had my lunch which was very filling. 2.5 tbsp of couscous with lots of leaves, half a red pepper, half a tin of tuna, sweetcorn, cherry tomatoes and some munchy seeds. This lunch kept me very full! I’m making a conscious effort to try and have more protein at  lunchtimes, hence the tuna, as I think that will help keep me fuller for longer and reduce my cravings! For after I had 10 fresh strawberries as something sweet.

Mid afternoon I had a pink lady apple, yum yum! It’s normally in the afternoons that my willpower starts to crumble, and I have to admit I was very close to getting some chocolate but I fought the temptation. 1-0 to Emma!

When I got home from work I had a couple of Jacobs High Fibre Crackers with lactofree cheese as a snack before starting my work outs. It did the trick and held me over until 8.30pm. Workouts were hard and sweaty,including Level 1 of the 30 Day Shred, 40 min spinning class, 1.6 mile walk and a crunchless core workout courtesy of Sparkpeople.

Dinner was a 2 Happy Hen omlette with lots of fresh spinach, some frozen veg and half a tin of baked beans. Very filling and so quick to make. Sometimes I think there’s no excuse for pingping meals when you can make an omlette in 3 mins!

After dinner I was really craving something sweet, perhaps out of habit more than anything else? I went and had a shower, did the washing up etc and this seemed to curb the craving. The saying is true of waiting out a craving for 20 minutes to see if you really want it! I made myself a Sleepy tea just before bed and called it a night!

All in all, I’m pretty happy with how day 1 went. I learnt from last time I need to wait out my cravings and I know I just need to learn to have a bit of willpower!

 

Total calories today – 1443

Minutes of exercise – 110

Calories burnt – 669

All taken from my Sparkpeople log

Sugar Detox Update

Hello!!! Hope you’re all having a great weekend!

Just wanted to drop by and give you a quick update on my attempt at a sugar detox. Well, I’m going to be honest – after day 5 things just went down hill. This weekend has been a total binge fest! Pizza, chocolate, ice cream, chocolate, coke, fajitas, chocolate…..Need I go on!!

However, I KNOW I can do this and it’s exactly what my body needs. So it’s time for round two. Starting now. I’m going to up the veggies and out the crap. My first experience gave me a lot to go with, to make me stronger and better for next time.

I’ll get there and I appreciate all the support so far. xxx

Sugar Detox – Day 4

Day 4 started like any normal day with a hot lemon drink. Yum!!

For breakfast I made 1/2 cup of oats with water and 10 frozen raspberries with a lemongrass and ginger tea. I only drank half the tea though because I was running out of time!!

At work all was going well until around 11.30 when my tummy started grumbling!! I think maybe making the porridge with water instead of milk may have been the reason why?

My lunch wasn’t until 1pm today, so I opened a small bag of cashews to tide me over. I ended up eating 2/3 of the bag – doh!!! Probably more calories than a small chocolately snack would have been.

At lunch I had a small portion of my leftover bean and barley stoup (recipe to come) but it didn’t leave me feeling satisfied. I decided to try the trick of waiting 20 mins and seeing how I feel. So far its probably the worst I’ve felt since I started and I think I could easily crumble!!

I’ve also noticed two small sores on either side of my lower mouth. Could they be connected to my lack of sugar??

Managed to stay strong all afternoon and went to the gym after work. 1KM on the rower followed by 30 mins spinning and then a 5 min cooldown on the cross trainer.

For dinner I made Ryan and I sausage with leek and potato mash with beans. Got reduced sugar and salt beans. Meal was absolutely delicious, especially the mash!! For pudding I told Ryan I was trying to avoid sugar so he got a selection of cheeses with crackers and some chutney. It wasn’t until I had some of the chutney I thought how sweet it was and looked to see sugar was the first ingredient. D’oh!!

All in all not a bad day effort wise, managed not to have any slips until some accidental sugar in the chutney!

Sugar Detox – Day 3

Went to bed last night thinking I was going to be really strong this week despite my couple of slips at the weekend.

Had my usual hot water and lemon when I woke up, so refreshing!

For breakfast around 8.10am I had 1/2 cup of porridge with a cup of rice dream and 8 frozen raspberries. Came in to a tidy 275 calories.

Around 11 am I found myself getting the usual elevensies. Instead of reaching the biscuit tin I went and got myself a blackcurrent and vanilla tea. Nice and warm and stopped my hand going in the biscuit tin. It kept me going until lunch anyway!

For lunch I went to M+S and got the delicious ‘Nutty Grain and Vegetable salad with soy and ginger dressing’. This is only 300 calories and so delicious!! It has pistachios in, yum yum! For something sweet I had a pink lady apple which was juice and refreshing!

Mid afternoon I went and got another fruit tea but it didn’t quite cut it and I was feeling genuinely hungry, so I rooted around in my stash of treats and found a 100% natural fruit bar, much like the Nakd bars only 80cals too!! It definitely perked me up and stopped my tummy rumbling.

Despite the treat at 5.30pm when I got home from work I started to develop a headache. I know I drink enough throughout the day so it wasn’t dehydration. Either a storm is brewing or my body is getting some symptoms of a lack of sugar?? Maybe I’m reading too much into it…anyway, I got myself a few popchips and hoped that would remedy it.

The popchips definitely worked, and I headed to the gym. I completed 10 mins on the x-trainer, 2 laps of the weights room (20 reps each) and then a 40 mins spin class. Plus the walk to the gym was 1.6 mile round trip! Phew!!

Got home and had a small sweet potato with half a tin of reduced sugar baked beans and some lacto free cheese. Again my cravings for something sweet kicked in straight away! I read a tweet earlier today that said it takes 20 mins for your body to register feeling full so I headed for the shower to see if that would help.

The shower worked, and 20 minutes later my craving passed! It just took some willpower! To prevent any further slips I painted my nails. No snacking incase I smudged them!!

A great day and I feel so proud for going sugar free! Onwards and upwards!