Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Not So Fat Tuesday

So this week has been different.
At the advice of the Dr. I began eating a more "diabetic-like" diet. I told her I had South Beach at home and she told me to go for it.
Holy Cow.
Did you know sugar withdrawal has very similar side-effects as quitting smoking?
I didn't.
I do now.
I have been a tad grumpy... or aggressively wishful for the foods I "can't" have. It's mainly been the bread. I said before I noticed I was eating a lot of carbs but really didn't understand how they were affecting my body.
So I will share.
All food gets broken down into sugar for the body to consume. The denser the food (think protein and fiber options) the longer it takes to break down. The lighter or more processed the food is means less time to breakdown. Why is that important? Because the more sugar that is dumped into your system at once the harder your pancreas has to work to make insulin so your body can use it. If you are "out eating" your pancreas then that sugar gets stored. If you are causing your pancreas to use it's NOS boosters for every meal you eat then that poor little bugga's gona get worn out and quit making insulin altogether. And then you know what happens?

DIABETES
go ahead click the link

So my main focus this week is to EXTREMELY cut back on the carbs. Even though I make all our breads and bread-like foods I have opted not to indulge (or TRY not to indulge... much) in the attempt to let my body level itself out. Also I read that if need be, pairing a carb with lots of fiber rich foods will help slow the process a bit (so that means you can eat the croutons on your salad IF you actually eat the salad!). So when tortilla night came up on our menu this week I threw in quite a bit of ground flax seed to my tortilla recipe to help me out. Flax seed (especially fresh ground) has some killer fiber quantities.

The results of my efforts?

I feel better. I'm a little tired to be honest but I blame that on burning the candle at both ends a bit this week. I am a lot less bloated and have noticed a dramatic decrease in the bubbly feelings in my belly. I have been sleeping a lot better when I actually make it to the bed, and have noticed my jeans fitting better in the waist. That has to account for something.
The biggest challenge I have had so far is adjusting our family meals to make them edible for me. Meats are the simplest thing to grab when on this diet but we have opted to stick with our 1-2 meat dishes per week regime. I'm learning as I go. I have found it easiest to have 2 meals a day where I have pretty much the same thing each day and save a third for something different or even new. This way I am not trying to come up with 3 new meals each day that fit this plan. I would get extremely burnt out.
I will again resist the urge to hop on the scales this week and maybe after next week I will see more than just my perceived results.
Fingers Crossed!!

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Yey! Glad you're finding something that's working and hang in there as I'm sure there will be a big learning curve as this is a huge adjustment!!

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