Food, Glorious Food

"Hi, my name is Dianne and I am a sugar addict. "

I often wonder if I had to completely abstain from anything with sugar the way a recovering drug addict or alcoholic has to abstain, could I do it.

Evidence from my past few days says no.  I don't know if it is because of the steroids I am still taking for my bout of pneumonia, or if it is because I am home and bored or if I do truly have a sugar addiction but I have been eating everything in sight and mostly sugary things. I know I said that my trip to good health would be taken slowly and sugar will be addressed at some point, but I felt that in my need to keep everything in the open I would talk about my eating habits.
I do not eat well. While some of the foods I eat are healthy, the portion sizes and other things I eat are not so good.
I did not blog yesterday so here is a two day listing of what I have been eating:
Nutribullet Fruit/Veg. drink in morning
GF waffle vegan spread pineapple
chicken broccoli cabbage colecannon
chicken patties(no breading) bread cole slaw colecannon
banana cream pie
fish sandwich roll sweet potato fries ketchup diet soda pickle tomato lettuce
Dairy Queen sundae with peanut butter and chocolate sauce

For those unfamiliar Colecannon is an Irish dish made of potato, cabbage and green onions. It is very good but very carb laden.

While this listing could be worse, it could also be better. That is what I am aiming for.
I hope in a few weeks to revisit this post showing that I have made changes to my eating habits.

Tomorrow I will return with more info about the Nutribullet.

The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

I knew I could go about this mountain climb to good health one of two ways; I could jump whole heartedly into the whole thing changing everything that I do or eat all at once, or I could take things slowly and adjust to my new way of life a little at a time. I of course chose door number two. While I may get to my desired results at a much slower pace, the likelihood of my following through are far greater.

So this week's step is the NutriBullet.

 At times I can be a little bit gullible about how well things will work - just take a look at my list of items and books purchased from Amazon and you will see what I mean. I really had not heard that much about the NutriBullet or its program. On Friday I had to go to the bank I had once worked at, a place that I avoid at all costs. The person who helped me was someone who I had known for a long time. She had always been overweight and had many ailments. This time she looked fantastic. She had lost 70 pounds, her arthritis was gone and she said she felt great. She attributed the change in part to the use of the NutriBullet and the shakes that she drank daily. The shakes are made with a combination of green leafy vegetables, fruits and extras like chia seeds and nuts. Different combinations will help different ailments. So I figured if it worked for this person I should give it a try. This morning I made a shake of baby spinach, celery, apple, banana, and pineapple. I was amazed how smooth it came out and it tasted fantastic. That was supposed to be all I had for breakfast, but I love breakfast and drinking it just did not satisfy me. I had a GF waffle with more pineapple and coffee with almond milk. Not the worse thing I could eat.
So stay tuned and see how my first week goes and the results I get juicing with the NutriBullet.

My title today is the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. It is my intention to stay honest with how things are going, so every Sunday I will post my stats and daily I will let you know what I did that was good and not so good.
This is me today. Definitely not my best picture.

Sunday Stats
Weight- 182 lbs
Clothing size 14/16
BP - 156/95
Exercise this past week - none

What I ate today: Fruit/Veg. Shake, GF waffle, vegan butter, pineapple, coffee, almond milk, salad, dressing, chicken cutlet(no breading) banana cream pie, chicken,broccoli, colecannon, cole slaw, ginger cookies

No Christmas for You

Two days before Christmas this past year I came down with the flu. The intensity of the illness equated to being run over by a truck. I later found out that I had the Swine Flu, one of the worst strains a person my age could get. I spent close to ten days in bed or on the couch. It really bothered me that I totally missed Christmas 2013. It was something I would never get back.

In mid-January we took a trip to Virginia. Our daughter, her husband and our two precious grandchildren came to Wash. DC from Seattle to visit and attend a conference for her job. We had a super time with the kids, playing with them wore me out. As soon as we returned home I was sick again, not as bad as Christmas but enough to wipe me out for another week.

In February I got a job offer to work part-time at a day care center, a job I had done when Mark and I were first starting out. At least it would bring some money into the house.
The director of the center asked that I come in and do sort of a working interview before she hired me. The day I was supposed to go in, I woke up sick again. That illness put things with the job off a whole week.
I finally did my interview and got the job. I really enjoyed working with the babies, but I came down with something almost every other week.

In March the truck came back. This time instead of the flu it was bronchitis and pneumonia and this time I landed in the hospital for six days. The doctor treating me says that my immune system is pretty weak. She wants me to stay out of work six weeks at a minimum and work on getting my immune system back.

I know I did not get here just because I had the flu a few months ago. I am overweight, have high blood pressure, am addicted to sugar and have not been taking care of myself for a while. I hope to change all of that.
Starting tomorrow I plan to do what it takes to get my health back on track. I do not plan to do it all at once, but add one new step each week.

I hope you will join me either by sitting on the sidelines and cheering for my success or participating along with me.