So my 30 days of no sugar, no grains, no dairy, no booze has come to an end. I figured I’d be saying, “hallelujah!”. Truth is though, that I haven’t felt this good in years! I’m leaner. I am at peace with myself. Doing this I didn’t feel deprived or sad – shocking for life with no treats! I have slept better than ever, all of my clothes are fitting great, my skin is crystal clear and I feel very proud of myself for sticking with it. In short, I feel really, really good about what I just did. So now what? This project was meant to do a few things: jump start my fat loss (Check! I lost 7cm off my waist, I was shocked – fat and water, but still!); show me what I was capable of; restore my faith in myself; and be an inspiration to myself and all of you. But now it’s over. What’s next? Do I binge on all those foods I deprived myself of? That’s certainly one option and I can see the temptation. Instead of that, I’m going to go back and mine this experience for gems that I can continue to do to sustain my success. What I’ve learned from this: Not eating enough throughout the day sets me up for overeating at night. I get busy with Lola and work around the house and I don’t eat enough. I get busy at the office and don’t eat enough. Come 7 or 8PM I’m completely foggy headed, nauseous and looking for food – and a lot of carbs. Eating more regularly through the day when I’m home works better. Eating regularly and adding a snack before I leave the office around 8PM keeps me in a better place to eat a sensible protein + veggie dinner when I get home. The meat and nuts breakfast works soooo much better for me than eggs and veggies. We discussed this in Ultimate You as a very low insulin breakfast option for us insulin resistance types. I works great for me yet, I haven’t done it in years. I still do not drink enough water, but if I put lemon in my water especially first thing in the morning I drink more. How simple is that? Why I fail to do this for myself is beyond me. I have a way easier time giving up any sugar, desserts, treats, chocolate, carbs, bread, pasta, etc. than I do giving up being able to have a glass of wine or a drink once in a while. Surprised? Yeah, I am a little too. I’ve had such great success in just this short time and I didn’t work out once. Yup you read that right. My neck and back were so out of whack so I focused on foam rolling, stretching, rolling my feet on a Lacrosse ball, and seeing my chiropractor. I did go for some long walks but for the most part, all of my success these past 4 weeks was from diet alone. Great reminder that, at least for me, diet is about 85% of the battle. Like my fellow fitness experts always say: “you can’t out-train a crappy diet.” So while I would love to work off every treat at the gym – I like it there – it doesn’t work for me. When I have 100% integrity with myself, a whole bunch of awesome stuff happened unrelated to me dieting and fat loss. I got clear on a few mental snafus that were holding me back and I feel like things are really taking off! I learned a few things that really work for me and I just need to keep doing more of that (hint: same will work for you). For example, it works much better for me to eat earlier at 6 with Lola, get her to bed and if I need a little something before bedtime I will have a piece of fruit. This gave me a little something to look forward to (causing me not to overeat at dinner) and I didn’t go to bed stuffed or hungry. I know typical advice is to not eat after dinner, and if I hit a plateau or this stops working that is one of the first variables I will look at. Also, on my workdays dinner is very late. Nothing I can do about my schedule those two days right now, but something I may need to reconsider soon. This was a stricter plan than I’d been on but there is a lot of room for me to up the ante if I want to. I did not restrict healthy fat so I could cut back on nuts or nut butters for sure to get more progress – I ate a lot of peanut butter this past month! I did not cut the coconut creamer I splash into my tea in the mornings (there is 1g of sugar in there and of course, fat from the coconut). Something else I could play with reducing if I got stuck. And while I said my intention was to only use protein bars and shakes in place of real food if I absolutely had to, I ended up using them almost daily. This did keep me on track and kept me from over eating by not getting too hungry, but I would do even better if I kept up the meal schedule that worked (not going more than 3 hours without a little something) and did it with real food instead. And most importantly…I realized that if I want a better body, I have to have a pretty damn clean diet. Just a fact for me, I knew this and I railed against it because, it’s not fair! But it is true. I can do it and feel like crap or I can do it and feel good. I felt great about what I was doing this entire time, although I had a few cravings I did not feel miserable, punished or restricted. I felt calmly in control. The best part of this experiment was that I regained confidence in myself. I know that I can do what it takes…should I choose to. What now? 30 days with no cheating is a drop in the bucket compared to what I’d need to do if I were to enter a body building or bikini contest. It would likely take me 5 months of this level of strictness get into that kind of shape. But 30 days was tough! I don’t think that’s likely sustainable for me for the long term – a strict program like this was a great kick start, but now time to think about what I can keep doing so I can keep getting results. A planned splurge once a week is the new plan. Not an entire meal full of carbs, topped off with dessert and washed down with a drink but rather one of those things. Again, this is what I think will work for me and I’ve been playing with my diet for years. If you need more or less, listen to that – and more importantly, trust that! I need to take what I learned this past month and keep doing what works like eating dinner earlier and avoiding getting overly hungry. I also need to transform the behavior of “had a rough day I need a treat”. I simply need to not make a glass of wine the reward because let’s face it, there are several rough days some weeks!! I need to make a glass of wine a special thing for myself vs. a routine stress buster. This is the idea of taking something we enjoy and making it a special, fun, enjoy the heck out of it indulgence vs. a reward. Using food as rewards is dangerous territory – and a topic of a future post! How do I feel today after having some hooch and some sugar?
Pregnant bride and all the booze. Whether I could partake that night or not, our intimate little wedding in a beautiful (and very special) West Village apartment was perfect for us 🙂