Goodness, it's been awhile...

...since I've written anything in this blog. I'd love to say I've been eating tons of rainbows and lean protein, exercising regularly, and meditating every chance I get. But no, that would not be true.

This week, however, I am eating tons of rainbows. My exercise is limited to getting out of bed and meditation looks a lot like sleeping. But let's stick to the good stuff:

Lack of money, lack of energy, and lack of creativity have led me to eat the same lovely super rainbow salad for lunch every day this week. I am not complaining. It is a mixture of romaine and radicchio with a handful of broccoli, red cabbage & carrot slaw thrown on top. I've added red, yellow, and green peppers & weird interesting toppings like walnuts, dried cranberries, sunflower seeds, and these sesame things on top. The dressing is orange something. Oh, yeah, chopped baked chicken pieces. It's great.

I've also been eating strawberry or blueberry Greek yogurt, because I like it.

I had a sleep study on Sunday night, and I hope to find out if I have sleep apnea or some other easy to treat disorder that is causing me to lose sleep which causes me to be tired, grumpy, fat, and wrinkly. (I'm sure I read somewhere that sleep apnea causes wrinkles. I'm really counting on treatment making me look like I did at 20 --- without the zits. Or the dazed expression.)

My darling husband went to the doctor a while back and the doc said, "Eat less bread and walk 30 minutes a day." He has been doing that (is that a man thing or what?) and has lost about 10-15 lbs (that is a man thing, I know.) I'd like to say I'm inspired by his dedication, but I'm only irritated. I need to get moving, or he'll weigh less than I do. And since he's six inches taller than I am, that would really really suck.

Eating well is the best revenge

We are trying to coordinate the meals, but right now it is playing out that no one is cooking. My son & DIL made sloppy joes at 3 pm, before we got home from work. Bob cooked Bangquet pot pies for us. Mark ate some sloppy joes and a sandwich.

I made a list of a bunch of main dishes & passed it around. I asked them to write "will eat" "won't eat" "will cook" and to come up with more ideas. The list is in the pipeline.

The bottom line is my bottom line... and my youngest son's healthy eating choices. Even if the rest of the adults choose to ignore our plea, we are going to reclaim the rainbow. I hope they join us. I am sorry they are angry. I want my freaking house back.

Sorry... can't imagine where that came from. Oh well.

Family Style Dining

How do you eat well when you are concerned not only with your own nutritional needs and tastes, but the rest of the family as well?

I have a particularly difficult situation right now. My son and daughter-in-love and their two very small children are living with us. In addition, we have a 20 year old and an 11 year old. Add my husband and me, and eight is more than enough.

Even a family with only relatively small children will have food issues. Unless you are a follower of the "I cook it, you eat it" school, you try to factor in various tastes and needs in planning meals. My sister-in-law berated a niece for not eating her cucumbers, acting as if a diet without cucumbers would be fatal. Ironically, when the little girl left the room, SIL said, "I don't eat cucumbers." I say "ironically," be she said it without irony.

As we know, vegetables are important. A nice mix of colorful (did I hear rainbow?) vegetables and fruits is important to eating well. Fortunately, there are lots and lots of fruits and vegetables, so you do not have to eat your spinach unless you want to.

I often hear parents lamenting that their child eats nothing but Lima beans and mac & cheese. I smile and say, I remember that phase. For my children it came right before they discovered salmon steaks and raspberry vinaigrette. My oldest was 10.

Salmon steaks were saved for Grandma's house, but our kids helped pick & prepare the meals at our house. We weren't always consistent & we ate a lot of tacos & spaghetti, but they learned how and why to choose a balanced, interesting diet.

One thing I have done well is to help my children become good eaters. They will try new things, they like variety, they cook, they eat their vegetables. We have done this by never forcing them to eat anything and never engaging in food battles. We offer a variety of food. We try to make healthier choices even though we can't afford the salmon steaks. My children often make better choices than I do. At least they are not prisoners of food like I have been.

So rule number 1: No food fights.
Rule number 2: Model good choices.
Rule number 3: Let your children participate in choice & preparation of the food.

But add new adults into the mix. I love my DOL, but her food culture is not mine. She eats very few vegetables and she fries just about everything. She won't eat a sandwich or a salad. A meal, breakfast lunch or dinner, is a huge undertaking. Every meal is Sunday dinner. I have never seen this much meat in my life.

As we tip-toe around each other, trying not to offend, we end up with hurt feelings and a lack of satisfaction in body and spirit. I know this, but I hate to talk about things. However, something has to give.

I don't want to force her to eat like I do, but I cannot eat like she does. I am overweight and have high blood pressure. I'm very sorry, but I can't eat the fried fish or chicken, the ham soup, the hamburger helper. I can't eat a meal with an ingredient list that starts with "sodium" and then goes on for an inch and a half in Latin.

How do I say this without sounding like a food snob or a whiner? How do I insist on my choices without turning dinner into a food fight or at least a very cold war?

This is where knowing and doing separate. Like food and activity choices, I know what I need to do. I don't know how to take the step... to actually do it. And this is where I really need god & all the angels.

Another leaf another page another day

It's been a very long time since I've written, I know. You can look at my other blog & I'll explain my Facebook Farm Town addiction. I'd like to say I've been really good about eating well and exercising, but no... it's been spotty at best.

I have been eating a lighter lunch so that I don't feel like taking a nap in the afternoon. Well, I still want to nap, but it's not quite as bad. With fresh tomatoes in the garden, it's not hard to choose cheese and tomato on whole wheat flat bread instead of a Hardee's burger. I have pretty much gotten over fast food. And except for a birthday dinner at Applebee's where I managed to get the worst meal possible, I've made good choices in restaurants.

My new goal is to have Michelle Obama's arms. I'm hoping the Secret Service will understand. Arms are actually one of the easiest areas to tone up because the problem is more about flab than fat. At least, for now. My chicken wings haven't gotten to the full bat wings yet.

And to that goal, I bought (you knew that was coming) an exercise mat, an 8-lb. ball, a pilates miracle ring (think Suzanne Sommers), and this weird pilates contraption with a bar and some elastic bands.

And starting today (or tomorrow) I am going to use these things every other day.

AND I am going to walk every single damn day.

And I am going to eat at least a rainbow a day, and it won't be all fried. (Although I can't promise to completely forgo fried okra and fried squash.)

And that is all I have to say about that right now.

Reality Check

After complaining, sort of, about not losing weight, I decided to give myself a reality check.

Although I know the benefit of listing what you eat, at least in the beginning, I really suck at it. I think it may be that I don't want to face the music. And let's be real: if you eat two rainbows, two chili dogs, chicken nuggets, a half a bag of Doritos, and a bowl of ice cream, you are eating TOO MUCH. In fact, two rainbows can be too much if that rainbow includes a pint or two of each fruit. What did we say about moderation?

For today, tomorrow, and Saturday, I am going to write down everything I eat, including portions. I am going to put that list on an Excel spreadsheet (because that's the kind of person I am) and analyze, examine, and observe what, when, why and how I am eating.

Three days is probably not enough time, but that's too bad. Because I know I won't be able to keep it up longer than that.

In addition, I am going to take my medicine like I'm supposed to & move more. I'll see about the yoga class today.

This is my time to think.

Rainbow update

It is not hard to eat a rainbow or two a day in South Carolina in the summer. I think I've said that before. Many days I'll have a complete rainbow in fruits and another in vegetables. The blueberries are particularly good.

I brought home about two dozen tomatoes from my boss's office garden yesterday, and I'm trying to decide what to do with them. Salad and sandwiches of course. I thought about a tomato pie or a tomato sauce. Salsa, maybe. I have okra too, so I could make stewed tomatoes and okra if anyone would eat that other than me. Maybe I'll make gumbo.

I go about my life, eating rainbows and avoiding some of the things that don't make me feel good in the long run (although in the short run, they make me very happy.) I am not losing weight, though. I'm not sure whether it's padding to deal with stress or just stubborn fat.

I do know this: I need to move more. Yeah, it's 99 degrees in the shade at 8 am, but I need to get more activity in my life. That's where I'm going to put my efforts for now. Maybe I can dance with the babies. Or by myself. I'm not proud.

We'll see.

Fresh tomatoes and Havarti cheese

I am almost a vegetarian these days. Not on purpose, because I do like meat, but because that's not what I feel like eating these days.

I am eating a lot of lower fat dairy products. Skim milk, cheese (Havarti is my favorite at the moment), Greek yogurt (thank you Piggly Wiggly), cottage cheese. I had shrimp left overs, and I'm hoping that won't come back to haunt me later today. When in doubt, throw it out. But it's hard to throw out shrimp salad.

The tomatoes in my garden may be ready as we speak. If not, there will be a couple by this afternoon. We've had heavy rains for the last couple of days, and that is a good thing in the summer in South Carolina. Yesterday, I picked a half dozen tomatoes from the garden at work and used one to make a tomato and cheese on whole wheat Nan sandwich. It was yummy and so messy that I used eight of the cheap napkins.

It looks like it will rain all day today. I wonder what rainbows this will bring?