Yes, I haven't exactly been posting lately. Or weighing myself, or much of anything else, although I've managed to stary pretty religiously low-carb no matter what else has been going on. And what's been going on has mostly been stress and exhaustion... Michael's been sick, partly a cold of some sort, partly a worsening of the breathing problems that he's had for a while. And we have been extremely tired and stressed and unhappy with each other and the world. It's not been a good few weeks at all.
But at some point, you just have to start over again. I say that like I've been doing something bad, which I really haven't although certainly the volume of food I've been eating is too much and the amount of exercise I've been getting is too little, and it's all been compounded by something I did to my neck/upper back on the last Baltimore trip, which has meant that it's extremely painful to lie down, and thus hard to sleep, which absolutely Does Not Help. But I haven't much been focusing on my weight, or health, or anything else... not for a long time, really. This last six months has been all about my mother and about Michael and about everything that's wrong. Is it any surprise that I get up every morning with some Dorothy Parker-like "what fresh hell is this?" sort of feeling?
It's time to refocus.
It's time to think about taking care of me a little.
It's time to think about getting things done rather than obsessing about how little I want to do them.
So we decided, by way of incentive, that starting Monday, that traditional diet restart day, we are challenging each other to lose 5% of our body weight. This started out as Michael saying that he could lose 30 lbs. faster than I could... which I didn't argue! I mean, besides the fact that I haven't exactly been losing a lot of weight anyway, 30 lbs. on him is a lot lower weight % than it is on me. And then we said, ok, he would lose 30 lbs. and I would lose 15. And that seemed ok, but the more I thought about it, the more it makes sense to me to think of this as a body weight percentage... that's fair; that's even for everyone. So we're weighing in tomorrow, and then figuring out what 5% is. And we'll see what happens. I'm not sure what Fabulous Prizes the winner gets, other than bragging rights, but I'm positive that Michael thinks he can do this faster than I can, so I have that spirit of competitiveness going, which is not a bad thing. Oh, and the rule is, you cannot starve yourself. Which doesn't work anyway.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Dieting for Couples
Ever since we've been married, we've been on a diet.
Ok, not a diet, a change in lifestyle, a way of eating... but whatever you want to call it, we've been trying to lose weight. This has not, on the whole, been a happy thing for us, as you might imagine. Actually, frustrating beyond words might well be a whole lot better way of putting it. There are so many reasons why, but I think that the bottom line comes down to a combination of different styles and issues about control. Both of which seem to be worse when you have people with food issues anyway.
Me, I'm a rules-oriented person. I love rules. I love rules because there's no ambiguity, and I can just say, THIS is what we're doing. Exceptions? Of course not. That would be just wrong. (Obsessive? Yes! A tad too rigid? Well, yeah, probably.) But I am brilliant at rules. Tell me that you want a cup of coffee in the morning, and it will be there every day. Forever. And if you say, "I don't feel like coffee today", I'll be all disconcerted. Because that's what the rule was.
Michael, not so much. All you have to do is tell him that he cannot have something, and that will be the number one most wonderful thing in the universe. And the reverse is also true... he has a pretty low tolerance for anything that is easily accessible and Just No Problem if you eat it. That last bit's not entirely fair... I think it's more that he simply gets tired of things extremely quickly. And I can't say that I think he's ever bought into the low-carb thing heart and soul, even though it's been really successful for him.
All of this leads to, as you'd imagine, more than a little conflict. And it's more and more clear to me that something about this dynamic has just got to change. This is the hard part. He thinks that I want to control what he eats... or part of him does anyway... and so he sometimes gets just furious if I mention that it's necessary to keep an eye on the carb content of what he's eating. Hm. Ok. Yeah, as I type that out, I can see certainly why it's annoying to be reminded of that. But... I don't know, what's the option? I really have a hard time with this, in part because I'm so worried about him and because I can see how poor food choices impact both his rate of weight loss (or lately, not losing weight) and his blood sugar. And then he lies in bed at night and frets about not losing weight, and it's hard not to say, maybe you should have thought about that when you were eating X earlier in the day... (not that I would ever say that!).
The other part is that left to his own devices, he doesn't eat at all half the time. And then he gets really hungry and grabs crackers or something like that. (Side note: an economist friend of mine is doing some really interesting research on how mortality rates change after the death of a spouse. His conclusion at the moment: statistically, there's not much impact on women's probability of death, but a fairly big impact on men, probably because at least some men just don't do the "caring" things for themselves that their wives did... proper nutrition, seeing the doctor.) So it's hard to feel like the caring thing to do is just to get out of the way and let him make his own food choices... especially since I shop and cook these days, because he's really not able to.
Sigh. I am really not sure how to change this, although it seems to me part of a big lesson that life is trying to teach me these days, that it is ok for people to handle things in ways that are different than you would.
Ok, not a diet, a change in lifestyle, a way of eating... but whatever you want to call it, we've been trying to lose weight. This has not, on the whole, been a happy thing for us, as you might imagine. Actually, frustrating beyond words might well be a whole lot better way of putting it. There are so many reasons why, but I think that the bottom line comes down to a combination of different styles and issues about control. Both of which seem to be worse when you have people with food issues anyway.
Me, I'm a rules-oriented person. I love rules. I love rules because there's no ambiguity, and I can just say, THIS is what we're doing. Exceptions? Of course not. That would be just wrong. (Obsessive? Yes! A tad too rigid? Well, yeah, probably.) But I am brilliant at rules. Tell me that you want a cup of coffee in the morning, and it will be there every day. Forever. And if you say, "I don't feel like coffee today", I'll be all disconcerted. Because that's what the rule was.
Michael, not so much. All you have to do is tell him that he cannot have something, and that will be the number one most wonderful thing in the universe. And the reverse is also true... he has a pretty low tolerance for anything that is easily accessible and Just No Problem if you eat it. That last bit's not entirely fair... I think it's more that he simply gets tired of things extremely quickly. And I can't say that I think he's ever bought into the low-carb thing heart and soul, even though it's been really successful for him.
All of this leads to, as you'd imagine, more than a little conflict. And it's more and more clear to me that something about this dynamic has just got to change. This is the hard part. He thinks that I want to control what he eats... or part of him does anyway... and so he sometimes gets just furious if I mention that it's necessary to keep an eye on the carb content of what he's eating. Hm. Ok. Yeah, as I type that out, I can see certainly why it's annoying to be reminded of that. But... I don't know, what's the option? I really have a hard time with this, in part because I'm so worried about him and because I can see how poor food choices impact both his rate of weight loss (or lately, not losing weight) and his blood sugar. And then he lies in bed at night and frets about not losing weight, and it's hard not to say, maybe you should have thought about that when you were eating X earlier in the day... (not that I would ever say that!).
The other part is that left to his own devices, he doesn't eat at all half the time. And then he gets really hungry and grabs crackers or something like that. (Side note: an economist friend of mine is doing some really interesting research on how mortality rates change after the death of a spouse. His conclusion at the moment: statistically, there's not much impact on women's probability of death, but a fairly big impact on men, probably because at least some men just don't do the "caring" things for themselves that their wives did... proper nutrition, seeing the doctor.) So it's hard to feel like the caring thing to do is just to get out of the way and let him make his own food choices... especially since I shop and cook these days, because he's really not able to.
Sigh. I am really not sure how to change this, although it seems to me part of a big lesson that life is trying to teach me these days, that it is ok for people to handle things in ways that are different than you would.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
The Non-Weigh-In
You were really checking for stats, right? Well, in a gesture of defiance (or stupidity!), we're not doing that this week.
This isn't much about food/low-carb/fitness either.
It was a terrible week. I spent my LAST weekend in Baltimore, cleaning out my mother's apartment. It's not done, really, but all the things that I had to be there for are done. I simply can't do it any more. It's putting too much of a strain on everything else in my life, and besides that, it's like ripping the scab off an open wound every two weeks. Just as soon as you get somewhere that feels like a little healing, you do it again. I've had enough. I am absolutely emotionally raw, and there just has to be some point where you stop doing this to yourself.
But this whole experience has made me think a lot about some things. My mother was a saver of everything, and she was also a writer, and so, even without really trying to spend a lot of time reading things, going through files and so on gave a pretty good snapshot of a life. And it confirmed something I always knew anyway... my mother was a deeply unhappy woman most of her life. I knew about the later parts, especially the very unhappy marriage to my father, but the thing that never crystallized until now was how unhappy she was even before then. And this is sad... an endless black hole of unhappiness, really... but it also makes you think. At some point, when all of your life is unhappy, you have to stop thinking about the circumstances that make you unhappy and start looking at how you interface with the world. My mother always thought, in a simple kind of way, that her problem was the way that the world treated her... that she was basically ok but that everyone else had a problem. (Actually, in one of the most staggering statements of denial that I've every heard, she once said that she wanted to take Prozac only when other people were around "because other people seem to deal with me better when I take it.") But everyone else in the world is not wrong. When all of your interactions with other people are problematic, at some point, you have to examine what you are doing, how your attitudes and expectations may be creating the problems.
Don't get me wrong. My mother was a wonderful person in any number of ways, and she was unique and extraordinary and very special. But also very unhappy and very damaged by both her childhood and the choices she made after that, and she did a good job of passing on the pain. Sometimes you can see people a lot more clearly in their absence. And I see the difficult relationships with my sisters getting better. I see my own hand in my own unhappiness. I see a lot of previously-hidden things... many of which I'd just as soon skip, really. But avoidance just lets the cycle continue.
And this feels like one of those rarest of life-moments, a point where you can feel everything changing, and you know that you have a choice about where to go.
This isn't much about food/low-carb/fitness either.
It was a terrible week. I spent my LAST weekend in Baltimore, cleaning out my mother's apartment. It's not done, really, but all the things that I had to be there for are done. I simply can't do it any more. It's putting too much of a strain on everything else in my life, and besides that, it's like ripping the scab off an open wound every two weeks. Just as soon as you get somewhere that feels like a little healing, you do it again. I've had enough. I am absolutely emotionally raw, and there just has to be some point where you stop doing this to yourself.
But this whole experience has made me think a lot about some things. My mother was a saver of everything, and she was also a writer, and so, even without really trying to spend a lot of time reading things, going through files and so on gave a pretty good snapshot of a life. And it confirmed something I always knew anyway... my mother was a deeply unhappy woman most of her life. I knew about the later parts, especially the very unhappy marriage to my father, but the thing that never crystallized until now was how unhappy she was even before then. And this is sad... an endless black hole of unhappiness, really... but it also makes you think. At some point, when all of your life is unhappy, you have to stop thinking about the circumstances that make you unhappy and start looking at how you interface with the world. My mother always thought, in a simple kind of way, that her problem was the way that the world treated her... that she was basically ok but that everyone else had a problem. (Actually, in one of the most staggering statements of denial that I've every heard, she once said that she wanted to take Prozac only when other people were around "because other people seem to deal with me better when I take it.") But everyone else in the world is not wrong. When all of your interactions with other people are problematic, at some point, you have to examine what you are doing, how your attitudes and expectations may be creating the problems.
Don't get me wrong. My mother was a wonderful person in any number of ways, and she was unique and extraordinary and very special. But also very unhappy and very damaged by both her childhood and the choices she made after that, and she did a good job of passing on the pain. Sometimes you can see people a lot more clearly in their absence. And I see the difficult relationships with my sisters getting better. I see my own hand in my own unhappiness. I see a lot of previously-hidden things... many of which I'd just as soon skip, really. But avoidance just lets the cycle continue.
And this feels like one of those rarest of life-moments, a point where you can feel everything changing, and you know that you have a choice about where to go.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Weekly Stats, September 15
Michael: -0.6 lbs, 453.8, total loss since January: 89.5 lbs., total overall loss 160 lbs.
Nina: -0.8 lbs, 278, total loss since January, 24.2 lbs.
Well. What can I say? At least my weight was fractionally lower and hopefully after this weekend's trip to Baltimore, I can get back to Really Serious. Because, let's face it, I have not exactly been putting everything in the world into this for some time. Michael's weight loss slowed this week, but he still lost some after bouncing around a bit throughout the week. That's fine, too, though unexciting... he's been doing so very well throughout the summer that the occasional slow week is only to be expected.
Last night, the power went out about midnight... leftover winds from Ike, I gather... and didn't come back on until 4, so I tossed and turned until that happened. Then had to get up at 6 to make sure that my son's alarm went off (yes, I am a bad mom; I usually don't get up with him unless I have an early class. He is a grumpy boy in the morning, and more than capable of toasting his bagel.). Back to sleep for a few hours of weird dreams, and then up... result, we are all a little groggy today except for Son, who is delighted because in the end school was canceled, giving him a mostly-free day with the New Big TV.
We're trying a slightly new regime this week, or Michael is, anyway. I sort of cringe when I say this, but I think that he's not eating enough carbs. Every little low-carb bone in my body shivers when I say that, because I know that technically, there is no carb requirement. But for him, at just above 450 lbs., just moving is exercise. And he's been exhausted all the time lately. Some of this may be something unrelated (and I'm still wondering if the endocrinologist will find something when we FINALLY get to see him/her in January), but I think that part of it may be that he's not eating that much, rich fatty foods aggravate the stomach issues caused by his hernia so he doesn't eat that much of them, and he's not eating something extra to compensate. Result: fatigue all the time. Possibly slightly low blood sugar all the time. So what we're going to try by way of experiment is supplementing his diet with soups and legumes for maybe a 10-15 carb boost per meal. He's still going to be well in the low-carb range, but not in that 30-40 carb range. We'll see what happens.
Nina: -0.8 lbs, 278, total loss since January, 24.2 lbs.
Well. What can I say? At least my weight was fractionally lower and hopefully after this weekend's trip to Baltimore, I can get back to Really Serious. Because, let's face it, I have not exactly been putting everything in the world into this for some time. Michael's weight loss slowed this week, but he still lost some after bouncing around a bit throughout the week. That's fine, too, though unexciting... he's been doing so very well throughout the summer that the occasional slow week is only to be expected.
Last night, the power went out about midnight... leftover winds from Ike, I gather... and didn't come back on until 4, so I tossed and turned until that happened. Then had to get up at 6 to make sure that my son's alarm went off (yes, I am a bad mom; I usually don't get up with him unless I have an early class. He is a grumpy boy in the morning, and more than capable of toasting his bagel.). Back to sleep for a few hours of weird dreams, and then up... result, we are all a little groggy today except for Son, who is delighted because in the end school was canceled, giving him a mostly-free day with the New Big TV.
We're trying a slightly new regime this week, or Michael is, anyway. I sort of cringe when I say this, but I think that he's not eating enough carbs. Every little low-carb bone in my body shivers when I say that, because I know that technically, there is no carb requirement. But for him, at just above 450 lbs., just moving is exercise. And he's been exhausted all the time lately. Some of this may be something unrelated (and I'm still wondering if the endocrinologist will find something when we FINALLY get to see him/her in January), but I think that part of it may be that he's not eating that much, rich fatty foods aggravate the stomach issues caused by his hernia so he doesn't eat that much of them, and he's not eating something extra to compensate. Result: fatigue all the time. Possibly slightly low blood sugar all the time. So what we're going to try by way of experiment is supplementing his diet with soups and legumes for maybe a 10-15 carb boost per meal. He's still going to be well in the low-carb range, but not in that 30-40 carb range. We'll see what happens.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Life and TVs, sort of
I haven't exactly been posting a lot lately, not for lack of thoughts but due to general life chaos, I guess. Every time I think about the thoughtful, insightful thing I'd like to write, life sort of takes over, and it seems pretty unimportant.
These are the things that I really want to write about: body image, hunger, diet and emotional state, the challenges of eating a high-quality diet in a world of junk, cooking that works because it's great cooking and not because it's low carb.
Here are the things that are actually happening in my life: dealing with watching my spouse in pain all the time and not coping well, a whole lot of work and work-related issues, a looming (and hopefully final) trip to help clear out my mother's apartment, and a computer that totally crashed yesterday, taking all day and a lot of stress to repair.
To add to all the actually serious stuff, I spent most of yesterday evening and all of today (and expecting to spend all of tomorrow) totally rearranging much of my house, a move spurred by my son's desire to have a Huge TV to play Playstation games. I told him he could have this thing if he earned the money for it (the other condition being that he had to put half of any money that he earned into his college fund), and he actually did it, working mostly for his grandfather this summer, doing hard labor getting clam seed ready to ship (don't ask!). So the Huge TV arrived, and now we have to find somewhere to put the thing plus we had to rearrange the room that the adults sit in to accommodate the Not Quite Huge TV (although still pretty ridiculously large, if you ask me). I am still in the middle of that part, and haven't even gotten to the Huge TV part, although I'd better before he comes back from his father's on Saturday or there will be one disappointed kid. And he did really work for this, even though his mom admittedly thinks that the whole thing is silly.
These are the things that I really want to write about: body image, hunger, diet and emotional state, the challenges of eating a high-quality diet in a world of junk, cooking that works because it's great cooking and not because it's low carb.
Here are the things that are actually happening in my life: dealing with watching my spouse in pain all the time and not coping well, a whole lot of work and work-related issues, a looming (and hopefully final) trip to help clear out my mother's apartment, and a computer that totally crashed yesterday, taking all day and a lot of stress to repair.
To add to all the actually serious stuff, I spent most of yesterday evening and all of today (and expecting to spend all of tomorrow) totally rearranging much of my house, a move spurred by my son's desire to have a Huge TV to play Playstation games. I told him he could have this thing if he earned the money for it (the other condition being that he had to put half of any money that he earned into his college fund), and he actually did it, working mostly for his grandfather this summer, doing hard labor getting clam seed ready to ship (don't ask!). So the Huge TV arrived, and now we have to find somewhere to put the thing plus we had to rearrange the room that the adults sit in to accommodate the Not Quite Huge TV (although still pretty ridiculously large, if you ask me). I am still in the middle of that part, and haven't even gotten to the Huge TV part, although I'd better before he comes back from his father's on Saturday or there will be one disappointed kid. And he did really work for this, even though his mom admittedly thinks that the whole thing is silly.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Weekly Stats, September 8
This is a two-week weigh-in, as last week I was in Maine with my family at my mother's memorial service.
Michael: -5.72 lbs, 454.5, total loss since January: 89 lbs., total overall loss 159 lbs.
Nina: +2.5 lbs, 279, total loss since January, 23 lbs.
Don't know what to say, really. Kind of the usual... Michael continues to do well; I continue to do not so well, fluctuating around the same base point that I've been at for a long time. Part of me says, it's been just an awful time, and you really should be ok with pretty much maintaining. Part of me says, yes, but when do you stop babying yourself and say, it's time to do something different?
I feel more like the second thing. I am so tired of feeling wretchedly awful, so tired of waking up every morning depressed as hell and then weighing myself, which makes me even more depressed. I feel like I'm giving into it all. And beyond everything else, I'm tired of feeling sick and anxious and unhappy. It's like all the stress of the past year and a half since Mom was diagnosed with cancer has all consolidated into now... all the things that I didn't feel then, because at least then there were things that I could do for her... all of that is compressed into this intense sadness that I can't seem to shake.
I know it hasn't been that long really. Not even two months. I know that a lot of this is kind of normal. But life has to go on; you have to pick up the pieces and do something different. I have to put me back together, somehow.
And maybe this isn't an appropriate topic for a blog that's meant to be about low-carb stuff. Or losing weight, anyway. But you know, losing weight isn't something that happens while the rest of your life is on hold. The whole process of losing weight is about the every day things, the days that are bad, the days that are good, and how this affects what you actually do. Part of the process of losing weight is not losing weight, of having weeks and months sometimes when nothing works, for whatever reason (and there's a good post on The Divine Low Carb about this, sort of, too).
But I still don't know where exactly I'm supposed to go from here... in the same way that Michael sees the scales go down but gets frustrated because he's still injuring himself all the time, still in so much pain, and still waiting for some day to be really better.
Michael: -5.72 lbs, 454.5, total loss since January: 89 lbs., total overall loss 159 lbs.
Nina: +2.5 lbs, 279, total loss since January, 23 lbs.
Don't know what to say, really. Kind of the usual... Michael continues to do well; I continue to do not so well, fluctuating around the same base point that I've been at for a long time. Part of me says, it's been just an awful time, and you really should be ok with pretty much maintaining. Part of me says, yes, but when do you stop babying yourself and say, it's time to do something different?
I feel more like the second thing. I am so tired of feeling wretchedly awful, so tired of waking up every morning depressed as hell and then weighing myself, which makes me even more depressed. I feel like I'm giving into it all. And beyond everything else, I'm tired of feeling sick and anxious and unhappy. It's like all the stress of the past year and a half since Mom was diagnosed with cancer has all consolidated into now... all the things that I didn't feel then, because at least then there were things that I could do for her... all of that is compressed into this intense sadness that I can't seem to shake.
I know it hasn't been that long really. Not even two months. I know that a lot of this is kind of normal. But life has to go on; you have to pick up the pieces and do something different. I have to put me back together, somehow.
And maybe this isn't an appropriate topic for a blog that's meant to be about low-carb stuff. Or losing weight, anyway. But you know, losing weight isn't something that happens while the rest of your life is on hold. The whole process of losing weight is about the every day things, the days that are bad, the days that are good, and how this affects what you actually do. Part of the process of losing weight is not losing weight, of having weeks and months sometimes when nothing works, for whatever reason (and there's a good post on The Divine Low Carb about this, sort of, too).
But I still don't know where exactly I'm supposed to go from here... in the same way that Michael sees the scales go down but gets frustrated because he's still injuring himself all the time, still in so much pain, and still waiting for some day to be really better.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Arrgh
Every so often, it all just seems so damn unnecessarily complicated. There are about 20 types of cough drops/throat lozenges in the drug store. How many are sugar free? THREE. There are about ten or fifteen types of frozen meals. How many are low carb, really low carb? ZERO. And how many aren't stuffed with preservatives and things that you can't pronounce? ZERO. (Ok, maybe there's something in the organic section, but most of those aren't a lot better, and they're all high carb.) How can you get food that's actually worth eating? Make it yourself. That's really about the only choice. And be careful to read the label on everything, because you'll find that vitamins contain colorants, Aleve gelcaps contain tons of colorants, and so on... except that you mostly can't tell unless you carry a magnifying glass. Or, sometimes, phone the company to find out what the inactive ingredients that they don't list actually are. And you will have to pay even more to purchase things that do not have unnecessary additives.
Does this all have to be so hard? Do there really have to be so very few alternatives?
Yes, I'm just tired and annoyed, and it's all a little too much.
Conversation at the bank:
Teller: This money order that you are trying to deposit was not signed by the purchaser. You can't deposit it.
Nina: Ok.
Teller: Would you like me to adjust the amount of your deposit since you can't deposit this?
Nina: Are there any other alternatives?
Teller: *absolute dead blank look*
Teller: *moment of complete silence*
Teller: No.
Nina: Then, yes, that is what I would like you to do.
(I mean, is it ME? And would she have noticed if I'd just driven out of the drivethrough, signed the damn money order since you can't tell who purchased it anyway, and then driven through again? Which is what I will very likely do tomorrow since it's far too time-consuming to track down my tenant who forgot to sign this...)
Does this all have to be so hard? Do there really have to be so very few alternatives?
Yes, I'm just tired and annoyed, and it's all a little too much.
Conversation at the bank:
Teller: This money order that you are trying to deposit was not signed by the purchaser. You can't deposit it.
Nina: Ok.
Teller: Would you like me to adjust the amount of your deposit since you can't deposit this?
Nina: Are there any other alternatives?
Teller: *absolute dead blank look*
Teller: *moment of complete silence*
Teller: No.
Nina: Then, yes, that is what I would like you to do.
(I mean, is it ME? And would she have noticed if I'd just driven out of the drivethrough, signed the damn money order since you can't tell who purchased it anyway, and then driven through again? Which is what I will very likely do tomorrow since it's far too time-consuming to track down my tenant who forgot to sign this...)
Monday, August 25, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 25
Michael: -1.75 lbs, 460.2, total loss since January: 83.16 lbs., total overall loss 153.76 lbs.
Nina: +0.66 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.75 lbs.
Michael continues to do well.
I continue to do not so well, although that's partly monthly bloating. But I'm actually ok with that, short-run ok anyway. The good bit: I did keep my promise to set up racquetball, played today, won all three games, and my thigh/hip/whatever I hurt last spring didn't bother me particularly. Now I just need to get through this week and find someone else to play with, too... I'd like to be playing at least twice a week, and I'm thinking that my regular partner is really only interested in playing one day, this semester anyway.
But this is the tough week. My classes start tomorrow, and Friday I fly to Maine. My mother's memorial service is on Saturday, and I won't get home until Tuesday. So next week's weigh-in will be Wednesday... and here's hoping to just maintain through this (and that Michael, who's staying home, does too). And then maybe the emotional wreckage that's been a feature of nearly every day this summer will have a chance to die back, settle down, subside. And we can get our lives back a little, and focus really hard on these health issues.
Nina: +0.66 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.75 lbs.
Michael continues to do well.
I continue to do not so well, although that's partly monthly bloating. But I'm actually ok with that, short-run ok anyway. The good bit: I did keep my promise to set up racquetball, played today, won all three games, and my thigh/hip/whatever I hurt last spring didn't bother me particularly. Now I just need to get through this week and find someone else to play with, too... I'd like to be playing at least twice a week, and I'm thinking that my regular partner is really only interested in playing one day, this semester anyway.
But this is the tough week. My classes start tomorrow, and Friday I fly to Maine. My mother's memorial service is on Saturday, and I won't get home until Tuesday. So next week's weigh-in will be Wednesday... and here's hoping to just maintain through this (and that Michael, who's staying home, does too). And then maybe the emotional wreckage that's been a feature of nearly every day this summer will have a chance to die back, settle down, subside. And we can get our lives back a little, and focus really hard on these health issues.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Jamie Oliver Cookbook Review, Part II
Just in case anyone's been waiting with eager anticipation to see what snarky comments I had about Jamie Oliver's cookbook after I actully cooked something from it (rather than after I just read most of it and looked at the pictures), here you are...
I've cooked several things from this book now, and I have to say, this is a good but weirdly idiosyncratic, in my opinion, book.
The GOOD:
1. Perfect instructions for pan-searing salmon, a cooking method that I invariably screw up, usually overcooking the salmon until it's pretty nasty. Same thing for pan-grilling steak. Just absolutely perfect. So, ok, I take back some of my previously snippy words; this did teach me a couple of skills that I was terrible at.
2. Absolutely awesome recipe for lima beans with leeks. I know, half of you are going, "lima beans, ick", and the other half of you are going "but Nina, that's not exactly low carb, is it?" I love lima beans; they're great if they're cooked properly. And, no, it's not the most low-carb thing in the universe, and you have to be very careful with portion size. Regardless, this recipe is just beyond good. Also a wonderful recipe for lamb shanks, simple, easy to adapt to other things, and really, really good.
3. A lot of these recipes involve simple sauces. If you make these in a little extra quantity (or if, like us, you're really cooking for 2 with a recipe for 4), you end up with a bunch of sauces that can be used for other things, making a lot of quick and sloppy food look like you actually spent some time on it.
4. There are many recipes in this book that need little or no adaptation for a low carb diet. I have to say that I've mostly given up on low-carb cookbooks... well, let me put that another way; I prefer cooking real food and leaving out the carb stuff to adding a lot of low-carb substitutes. So this kind of book, which has sections that are certainly unsuitable (skip the pasta, obviously) but probably 2/3 of the book which is fine without adaptation, are my idea of a good cookbook.
The BAD:
1 (and only): Proportions, proportions, proportions. The first part, the inexact measures. How much rosemary is in "a bunch?" Less than I used, evidently. How much olive oil is in "a glug?" How much butter in "a knob?" (Ok, that last one is actually a sort of standard term, although it has a great deal of inexactness, too.) Yes, these things are kind of charming, but they're far better after you've made the recipe once. But the bigger issue is that the proportions in many of the recipes are just wrong. Most wrong was the rosemary-anchovy-lemon sauce for the salmon, simply FAR too much lemon, not enough anchovies, and I think I just didn't put enough rosemary in since I hadn't figured out that his bunch idea is a lot bigger than mine.
I think that once you realize that the proportions are likely to be wrong, it's ok... you can work with that. It's the part where you're thinking that these numbers have some meaning that are really a problem. I do understand that this is partly what I call the professional chef problem... my sister is just like this; you ask her how to make something, and she can usually tell you the ingredients but not the proportions.
I've cooked several things from this book now, and I have to say, this is a good but weirdly idiosyncratic, in my opinion, book.
The GOOD:
1. Perfect instructions for pan-searing salmon, a cooking method that I invariably screw up, usually overcooking the salmon until it's pretty nasty. Same thing for pan-grilling steak. Just absolutely perfect. So, ok, I take back some of my previously snippy words; this did teach me a couple of skills that I was terrible at.
2. Absolutely awesome recipe for lima beans with leeks. I know, half of you are going, "lima beans, ick", and the other half of you are going "but Nina, that's not exactly low carb, is it?" I love lima beans; they're great if they're cooked properly. And, no, it's not the most low-carb thing in the universe, and you have to be very careful with portion size. Regardless, this recipe is just beyond good. Also a wonderful recipe for lamb shanks, simple, easy to adapt to other things, and really, really good.
3. A lot of these recipes involve simple sauces. If you make these in a little extra quantity (or if, like us, you're really cooking for 2 with a recipe for 4), you end up with a bunch of sauces that can be used for other things, making a lot of quick and sloppy food look like you actually spent some time on it.
4. There are many recipes in this book that need little or no adaptation for a low carb diet. I have to say that I've mostly given up on low-carb cookbooks... well, let me put that another way; I prefer cooking real food and leaving out the carb stuff to adding a lot of low-carb substitutes. So this kind of book, which has sections that are certainly unsuitable (skip the pasta, obviously) but probably 2/3 of the book which is fine without adaptation, are my idea of a good cookbook.
The BAD:
1 (and only): Proportions, proportions, proportions. The first part, the inexact measures. How much rosemary is in "a bunch?" Less than I used, evidently. How much olive oil is in "a glug?" How much butter in "a knob?" (Ok, that last one is actually a sort of standard term, although it has a great deal of inexactness, too.) Yes, these things are kind of charming, but they're far better after you've made the recipe once. But the bigger issue is that the proportions in many of the recipes are just wrong. Most wrong was the rosemary-anchovy-lemon sauce for the salmon, simply FAR too much lemon, not enough anchovies, and I think I just didn't put enough rosemary in since I hadn't figured out that his bunch idea is a lot bigger than mine.
I think that once you realize that the proportions are likely to be wrong, it's ok... you can work with that. It's the part where you're thinking that these numbers have some meaning that are really a problem. I do understand that this is partly what I call the professional chef problem... my sister is just like this; you ask her how to make something, and she can usually tell you the ingredients but not the proportions.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 17
Michael: -3.5 lbs, 462, total loss since January: 81.4 lbs., total overall loss 152 lbs.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 275.8, total loss since January, 26.4 lbs.
Not bad all things considered. Michael is just doing really well, I think, and I suppose that I'm happy as long as I'm losing something and not gaining something, but really I'm a little tired of this weight. Apparently not tired of it enough to actually move around a bit more and be more careful, sigh. But school will start next week, and that will help. And here is my public commitment; I will email my racquetball partner and see if she wants to play this week.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 275.8, total loss since January, 26.4 lbs.
Not bad all things considered. Michael is just doing really well, I think, and I suppose that I'm happy as long as I'm losing something and not gaining something, but really I'm a little tired of this weight. Apparently not tired of it enough to actually move around a bit more and be more careful, sigh. But school will start next week, and that will help. And here is my public commitment; I will email my racquetball partner and see if she wants to play this week.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Dealing with injury
I just haven't been able to get it together to post anything this week, and I look back and try to figure out why... busy? No, not really. Nothing to say? No, not really. I think it's just this lingering emotional exhaustion that takes over half the time. I am hoping this will go away soon, although I am sure not holding my breath. There are still a ton of emotionally exhausting things yet to do... my mother's memorial service at the end of the month, and at least one more trip to Baltimore to clear things out, not sure when. I know that it's reasonable for these things to wear me out, but it's still not what I want, and it's going to get even harder when the semester starts in just over a week. No, I am not ready.
But the really hardest thing has been Michael. His leg injury from last spring seems to have recurred... it was getting a lot better, but it's now much worse, so much worse that it's difficult for him to move at all; he's in a lot of pain, and he spends a great deal of time just worrying about it. The physical therapist says, this will get better, keep with the exercises, and we're going to try to get back to the doctor as soon as possible, hopefully next week, but this has just been so endless and grueling that he loses heart. The fact of the matter is that while he is an awesome 150 lbs. below his top weight, he is still more than 200 lbs. above his goal weight, and its been a lot of years since he's been close to that. The continual skeletal stress has taken its toll, and part of the problem is that he just keeps injuring himself again and again because nothing really heals. I know that this will eventually get better if he can just hang in there... I really believe that... but the waiting is interminable, and the worst thing is that every day he goes through this long cycle of worrying about it and talking about it and worrying about it, and so on. I think that this is doing less good than anything else, because it accomplishes absolutely nothing... he doesn't go through this head exercise and then feel better somehow; he just feels worse. And he makes me unbelievably anxious in the process. I say, we would both be better off if we could stop this cycle, and he seems to think that what this is about is me not wanting to be worrying about him. Well, yeah, this anxiety is not doing me any good, but that's not the point... it's that it's not doing him any good, and it's not progressing toward something better.
I know that he is frightened. I know that he is afraid that he will never walk normally again. I don't think that this is the reality, unless he stops losing weight, stops trying, but I can see why he would be afraid.
I don't know what to do really. I think that what he seriously needs is a commanding, reassuring person. Someone to say, I have seen a thousand people like you, I know how this progresses, do X, Y, and Z, and this will be perfectly fine in 6 months. Someone he could believe in. And we don't have this person; the doctors and the physical therapist are all ok, but frankly they give absolutely no impression that they have ever dealt with the issues presented by someone of his size. If I could find a physical therapist or personal trainer with that kind of experience, that would be fantastic, but I simply have no idea where to even start. So I don't know what to do to be supportive, to be helpful, other than listen... but this endless worry is not doing any good. I know that it's hard to disconnect from this when you're in constant pain, but somehow I think he has to try.
I don't know. That's the big thing. And it soaks up all the air in the room, and I sit here and know that I am not doing what I should to take care of things, to take care of myself, but right now, I have no idea how to start the process of doing that again.
But the really hardest thing has been Michael. His leg injury from last spring seems to have recurred... it was getting a lot better, but it's now much worse, so much worse that it's difficult for him to move at all; he's in a lot of pain, and he spends a great deal of time just worrying about it. The physical therapist says, this will get better, keep with the exercises, and we're going to try to get back to the doctor as soon as possible, hopefully next week, but this has just been so endless and grueling that he loses heart. The fact of the matter is that while he is an awesome 150 lbs. below his top weight, he is still more than 200 lbs. above his goal weight, and its been a lot of years since he's been close to that. The continual skeletal stress has taken its toll, and part of the problem is that he just keeps injuring himself again and again because nothing really heals. I know that this will eventually get better if he can just hang in there... I really believe that... but the waiting is interminable, and the worst thing is that every day he goes through this long cycle of worrying about it and talking about it and worrying about it, and so on. I think that this is doing less good than anything else, because it accomplishes absolutely nothing... he doesn't go through this head exercise and then feel better somehow; he just feels worse. And he makes me unbelievably anxious in the process. I say, we would both be better off if we could stop this cycle, and he seems to think that what this is about is me not wanting to be worrying about him. Well, yeah, this anxiety is not doing me any good, but that's not the point... it's that it's not doing him any good, and it's not progressing toward something better.
I know that he is frightened. I know that he is afraid that he will never walk normally again. I don't think that this is the reality, unless he stops losing weight, stops trying, but I can see why he would be afraid.
I don't know what to do really. I think that what he seriously needs is a commanding, reassuring person. Someone to say, I have seen a thousand people like you, I know how this progresses, do X, Y, and Z, and this will be perfectly fine in 6 months. Someone he could believe in. And we don't have this person; the doctors and the physical therapist are all ok, but frankly they give absolutely no impression that they have ever dealt with the issues presented by someone of his size. If I could find a physical therapist or personal trainer with that kind of experience, that would be fantastic, but I simply have no idea where to even start. So I don't know what to do to be supportive, to be helpful, other than listen... but this endless worry is not doing any good. I know that it's hard to disconnect from this when you're in constant pain, but somehow I think he has to try.
I don't know. That's the big thing. And it soaks up all the air in the room, and I sit here and know that I am not doing what I should to take care of things, to take care of myself, but right now, I have no idea how to start the process of doing that again.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 11
Michael: -4.5 lbs, 465.2, total loss since January: 77.8 lbs., total overall loss 148.5 lbs.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.7 lbs.
Not bad. Michael says, we could be trying harder. I certainly could be trying harder; let's face it, since Mom died I've been kind of on autopilot. It will be a month tomorrow. I could try harder. I think he's doing pretty damn well, though.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.7 lbs.
Not bad. Michael says, we could be trying harder. I certainly could be trying harder; let's face it, since Mom died I've been kind of on autopilot. It will be a month tomorrow. I could try harder. I think he's doing pretty damn well, though.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Changing What You Do
This morning, I was reading this discussion over at Half of Me. It's really about using pants rather than weight as a measure of change, but what struck me more was the discussion about food habits, about the kind of weird little justifications that we make... "I can eat anything because it's Christmas" "I can eat anything because I'm in California" and so on. Times when there are no rules. Now, I am perfectly willing to believe that the vast majority of the world has food habits that are less screwed up than mine, and that for some people, "day off" dieting is fine, and that some people can be trusted to go on vacation without coming home 50 lbs heavier. I don't think that I'm one of them, not yet. The link listed above talks about exactly the same kind of thing that I'd do... searching for an ice cream (that I didn't necessarily really want) because I was still in L.A., and I'd just have to cram it in, because I could. It's all-or-nothing thinking, and I'm a pro at it. Really, really good. And Michael is even better.
I am not sure that it is possible to change this kind of behavior completely. (I'm also not sure that it absolutely isn't.) But I'm fairly certain of one thing... a huge reason why so many people successfully lose weight but do not keep it off is because they lose weight using a specific set of "rules", and then they stop following those rules, because they've lost the weight. But the food behaviors that caused them to gain the weight are still there, and now there's nothing to stop them creeping back.... which they do, inexorably, and there you are, back at the weight that you said you'd never reach again.
Some years ago, I was... oh, more than 50 lbs thinner than I am now, down from a staggering 340, my top weight ever (ok, I was pregnant at that weight, but I really didn't gain a lot of weight when I was pregnant). And I was very fit. I got this way by (1) eating almost nothing except salmon, salad, and potato chips with Olestra. No, this is not a good way to eat, and (2) working out absolutely constantly. Walking and racquetball in the morning, weights and aerobics classes in the afternoon, karate in the evening. I was in the best shape of my life, and I was pushed there by a kind of obsessiveness that partly feeds on itself, and partly by a lot of emotional crap that was going on at the time. I thought I was fabulous. And I was, in a way, but the fact of the matter was that I got there by replacing one obsession with another, and when the big drivers of that obsession went away, I was left with the same behaviors that I always had. And I gained back most (though, fortunately, not all) of the weight.
Over the last two+ years, I've been trying hard to lose that weight again, and, let's face it, I haven't been brilliantly successful from a numbers point of view. Moving to a low carb diet has helped tremendously, both in losing weight and in causing my body to reshape, so it actually looks like I've lost considerably more weight than I have. But the one thing that I have done with some degree of success is work on the food behaviors. I no longer buy everything in the store because... oh, I don't know; I think that on some level I used to think that if I didn't get it then, it wouldn't be there when I came back. I am getting a LOT better about portion size. I am getting a lot better at stopping eating when I am no longer hungry. I am getting, slowly, a lot less weird about food. And I am very, very proud of myself about this.
But I'm also afraid because, let's face it, a huge amount of the effort that I've put into this and the reason why I've gotten so much better with this is because of accountability. Mostly Michael. A little because I write here. A little because... well, maybe a growing, small commitment to myself. But I always worry that if anything happens to change the current situation, all that careful retraining will fall away. Which why I know that I can never, ever say, you can eat all you want because it's Christmas. Fundamentally, I can't be trusted, and I know that.
I am not sure that it is possible to change this kind of behavior completely. (I'm also not sure that it absolutely isn't.) But I'm fairly certain of one thing... a huge reason why so many people successfully lose weight but do not keep it off is because they lose weight using a specific set of "rules", and then they stop following those rules, because they've lost the weight. But the food behaviors that caused them to gain the weight are still there, and now there's nothing to stop them creeping back.... which they do, inexorably, and there you are, back at the weight that you said you'd never reach again.
Some years ago, I was... oh, more than 50 lbs thinner than I am now, down from a staggering 340, my top weight ever (ok, I was pregnant at that weight, but I really didn't gain a lot of weight when I was pregnant). And I was very fit. I got this way by (1) eating almost nothing except salmon, salad, and potato chips with Olestra. No, this is not a good way to eat, and (2) working out absolutely constantly. Walking and racquetball in the morning, weights and aerobics classes in the afternoon, karate in the evening. I was in the best shape of my life, and I was pushed there by a kind of obsessiveness that partly feeds on itself, and partly by a lot of emotional crap that was going on at the time. I thought I was fabulous. And I was, in a way, but the fact of the matter was that I got there by replacing one obsession with another, and when the big drivers of that obsession went away, I was left with the same behaviors that I always had. And I gained back most (though, fortunately, not all) of the weight.
Over the last two+ years, I've been trying hard to lose that weight again, and, let's face it, I haven't been brilliantly successful from a numbers point of view. Moving to a low carb diet has helped tremendously, both in losing weight and in causing my body to reshape, so it actually looks like I've lost considerably more weight than I have. But the one thing that I have done with some degree of success is work on the food behaviors. I no longer buy everything in the store because... oh, I don't know; I think that on some level I used to think that if I didn't get it then, it wouldn't be there when I came back. I am getting a LOT better about portion size. I am getting a lot better at stopping eating when I am no longer hungry. I am getting, slowly, a lot less weird about food. And I am very, very proud of myself about this.
But I'm also afraid because, let's face it, a huge amount of the effort that I've put into this and the reason why I've gotten so much better with this is because of accountability. Mostly Michael. A little because I write here. A little because... well, maybe a growing, small commitment to myself. But I always worry that if anything happens to change the current situation, all that careful retraining will fall away. Which why I know that I can never, ever say, you can eat all you want because it's Christmas. Fundamentally, I can't be trusted, and I know that.
Friday, August 8, 2008
Summer and Cookbooks and Whatever
For some reason, this week seems to have been impossibly busy even though really I have gotten almost nothing done. Or it seems like it. Haven't even been able to do the one thing that I really wanted, try to get up a racquetball game (ok. I am able to do this. I haven't gotten around to it.). And we're on Day Whatever of pouring down rain, so the yard is totally going to hell, which normally I wouldn't car about but since we had Overpaid Student Minion working on it for the first part of the summer, I slightly care about at least trying to keep it tidy. Tidy-ish.
What I've mainly been doing lately is cooking. Here's the thing about eating low carb for me... it used to be that I would really crave food. If you asked me something like, if you could eat absolutely anything, and you could have all you wanted of it, what would you eat?... well, there would be lots of answers. In carb-laden, butter-dripping, detail. These days... I don't really even know. Mostly I'd like something that I hadn't had before that someone else made. There used to be all these things that I always felt that I wanted MORE of . I never felt satisfied.
It's taken a while, but these days, I mostly feel satisfied with a whole lot less. Of course, this is a constant battle with the head gremlins who think that my stomach is far larger than it is or that we would derive some intense pleasure from stuffing our (collective) face for a few hours. And the boredom gremlins, who think that food is entertainment. But a lot less is just fine, and it makes me feel better, and, well, normal. But the "bad" thing about this is that there's nothing much I want to eat. I get bored with everything so easily. And then I end up eating things like... oh, nothing but cold chicken, or something like that, which isn't exactly what you'd call nutritionally balanced.
So I've been investing a lot of time lately into fussing with food. Making new things. And reading cookbooks. And, of course, since I'm pretty much intrinsically grumpy, getting annoyed by cookbooks. So I have two selections to complain about today...
The first one is Jamie Oliver's Cook With Jamie, which is subtitled, "My Guide to Making You a Better Cook." I bought this book partly because I like Jamie Oliver, and partly because quick flip-through yielded a bunch of things that looked worth trying, but partly because it claimed to be a book that would improve your cooking technique no matter what level of cook you were. Now, this is not by any means a stupid book, and I am a pretty good (though not what I'd call high-level) cook, but this book is really basic. I read the whole book... not every recipe, but all the technique parts... and I have to say that the only thing that I actually learned from it is one new word, spatchcock, which is apparently what you can call it when you butterfly poultry. So I think that the idea that this will improve your technique is not all that likely if you are already pretty competent. Which is ok, but, hey, don't sell it that way if it's not going to do anything for me, all right?
There are a bunch of great-looking recipes in this books, and I really should save comment until I've made some of them, but I have two really specific complaints about this book.
1. Someone did kind of a weird job of translating this for the American market. I speak pretty fluent British, and it's obvious to me that someone did some editing. Rocket has been changed to arugula, courgettes have been changed to zucchini, that kind of thing. But otherwise, the general buying advice in this book is really not at all suitable for most people in most places in the U.S. Yes, if I were in the U.K., I would probably buy my produce at the local farm market, and I would probably go to the local butcher, and I would have a FAR better chance at getting seafood that had recently been near the sea, and so on (although I admit to a lingering fondness for Waitrose). But in the U.S, in most areas, that is Just Not Possible. The nearest "butcher" to here, for example, is about 35 miles, and it's really not what Jamie has in mind, either. Farm markets are easier, this time of year... but only from late June through September. Food realities in the U.S., although getting better, are not what you'd like them to be. (By the way, what on earth is Jamie thinking of when he says "a chilli?" Roy? Anyone? I mean, if you go into the store in the U.S., there are about 10 kinds of chili peppers of different kinds, each with different properties.)
2. Editing. You cannot use the words "lovely" and "brilliant" in every sentence. They kind of lose their punch.
I'll report back after I actually cook something. The pictures are nice!
And for my next set of complaints... José Andrés, Tapas: A Taste of Spain in America. I bought this book because I've been enjoying the PBS series, Made in Spain. José Andrés is a chef of considerable charm and enthusiasm, and I don't know that much about Spanish cooking, which looks yummy, and the companion cookbook is not out yet. This is a nice cookbook with great pictures and lots of interesting stories and cultural information. BUT. Thing #1 is that quite a few recipes contains ingredients that are not easy to find, and there is no list of acceptable substitutions. Certainly substituting isn't ideal. But sometimes it's necessary.
My other objection is kind of philosophical. Michael and I argued about this, sort of, the other night. Cooking is an art. I rarely, if ever, measure things that I've cooked before, I modify recipes freely, and I appreciate how difficult it is to write down a recipe when really you are doing most things to taste. But, hey, when I buy a cookbook, I want what I make to come out looking exactly like the picture if I follow the directions exactly. On the program, it's pretty obvious that José Andrés is a "little bit of this, little bit of that" chef, but unfortunately, that doesn't translate all that well to a cookbook that is trying to teach a kind of cooking with which the reader is probably not familiar. Example: two days ago, I made the recipe for Rabbit with Cherries (p.248). I'd never had rabbit, and they have started carrying it at the not-so-local store, and so I thought, what the hell, let's give it a go. Since I'd never made this before, I followed the directions pretty exactly until I realized that if I continued that way, I was going to have rabbit soup. The proportions on the sauce are way off, easy to fix if you're aware of it, but I see no way in hell that following the directions gets you to something that looks anything like the picture.
By the way, review on the rabbit... yummy but not worth the $30 I had to pay for it. I think that I could make this recipe in a pork tenderloin variant; I'm going to try that later in the week and post it if it comes out well.
If you want a cookbook that is absolutely fantastic for recipes that do come out exactly right, I always recommend Jacques Pépin, Fast Food My Way. Excellent book.
What I've mainly been doing lately is cooking. Here's the thing about eating low carb for me... it used to be that I would really crave food. If you asked me something like, if you could eat absolutely anything, and you could have all you wanted of it, what would you eat?... well, there would be lots of answers. In carb-laden, butter-dripping, detail. These days... I don't really even know. Mostly I'd like something that I hadn't had before that someone else made. There used to be all these things that I always felt that I wanted MORE of . I never felt satisfied.
It's taken a while, but these days, I mostly feel satisfied with a whole lot less. Of course, this is a constant battle with the head gremlins who think that my stomach is far larger than it is or that we would derive some intense pleasure from stuffing our (collective) face for a few hours. And the boredom gremlins, who think that food is entertainment. But a lot less is just fine, and it makes me feel better, and, well, normal. But the "bad" thing about this is that there's nothing much I want to eat. I get bored with everything so easily. And then I end up eating things like... oh, nothing but cold chicken, or something like that, which isn't exactly what you'd call nutritionally balanced.
So I've been investing a lot of time lately into fussing with food. Making new things. And reading cookbooks. And, of course, since I'm pretty much intrinsically grumpy, getting annoyed by cookbooks. So I have two selections to complain about today...
The first one is Jamie Oliver's Cook With Jamie, which is subtitled, "My Guide to Making You a Better Cook." I bought this book partly because I like Jamie Oliver, and partly because quick flip-through yielded a bunch of things that looked worth trying, but partly because it claimed to be a book that would improve your cooking technique no matter what level of cook you were. Now, this is not by any means a stupid book, and I am a pretty good (though not what I'd call high-level) cook, but this book is really basic. I read the whole book... not every recipe, but all the technique parts... and I have to say that the only thing that I actually learned from it is one new word, spatchcock, which is apparently what you can call it when you butterfly poultry. So I think that the idea that this will improve your technique is not all that likely if you are already pretty competent. Which is ok, but, hey, don't sell it that way if it's not going to do anything for me, all right?
There are a bunch of great-looking recipes in this books, and I really should save comment until I've made some of them, but I have two really specific complaints about this book.
1. Someone did kind of a weird job of translating this for the American market. I speak pretty fluent British, and it's obvious to me that someone did some editing. Rocket has been changed to arugula, courgettes have been changed to zucchini, that kind of thing. But otherwise, the general buying advice in this book is really not at all suitable for most people in most places in the U.S. Yes, if I were in the U.K., I would probably buy my produce at the local farm market, and I would probably go to the local butcher, and I would have a FAR better chance at getting seafood that had recently been near the sea, and so on (although I admit to a lingering fondness for Waitrose). But in the U.S, in most areas, that is Just Not Possible. The nearest "butcher" to here, for example, is about 35 miles, and it's really not what Jamie has in mind, either. Farm markets are easier, this time of year... but only from late June through September. Food realities in the U.S., although getting better, are not what you'd like them to be. (By the way, what on earth is Jamie thinking of when he says "a chilli?" Roy? Anyone? I mean, if you go into the store in the U.S., there are about 10 kinds of chili peppers of different kinds, each with different properties.)
2. Editing. You cannot use the words "lovely" and "brilliant" in every sentence. They kind of lose their punch.
I'll report back after I actually cook something. The pictures are nice!
And for my next set of complaints... José Andrés, Tapas: A Taste of Spain in America. I bought this book because I've been enjoying the PBS series, Made in Spain. José Andrés is a chef of considerable charm and enthusiasm, and I don't know that much about Spanish cooking, which looks yummy, and the companion cookbook is not out yet. This is a nice cookbook with great pictures and lots of interesting stories and cultural information. BUT. Thing #1 is that quite a few recipes contains ingredients that are not easy to find, and there is no list of acceptable substitutions. Certainly substituting isn't ideal. But sometimes it's necessary.
My other objection is kind of philosophical. Michael and I argued about this, sort of, the other night. Cooking is an art. I rarely, if ever, measure things that I've cooked before, I modify recipes freely, and I appreciate how difficult it is to write down a recipe when really you are doing most things to taste. But, hey, when I buy a cookbook, I want what I make to come out looking exactly like the picture if I follow the directions exactly. On the program, it's pretty obvious that José Andrés is a "little bit of this, little bit of that" chef, but unfortunately, that doesn't translate all that well to a cookbook that is trying to teach a kind of cooking with which the reader is probably not familiar. Example: two days ago, I made the recipe for Rabbit with Cherries (p.248). I'd never had rabbit, and they have started carrying it at the not-so-local store, and so I thought, what the hell, let's give it a go. Since I'd never made this before, I followed the directions pretty exactly until I realized that if I continued that way, I was going to have rabbit soup. The proportions on the sauce are way off, easy to fix if you're aware of it, but I see no way in hell that following the directions gets you to something that looks anything like the picture.
By the way, review on the rabbit... yummy but not worth the $30 I had to pay for it. I think that I could make this recipe in a pork tenderloin variant; I'm going to try that later in the week and post it if it comes out well.
If you want a cookbook that is absolutely fantastic for recipes that do come out exactly right, I always recommend Jacques Pépin, Fast Food My Way. Excellent book.
Monday, August 4, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 4
Today would have been my mother's 79th birthday. I'd hoped that she would have made it at least to today, that there could at least have been this last birthday to celebrate. It all went so fast and so soon. Happy Birthday, Mom. Wherever you are.
Anyway. It just kind of hit me when I typed the date.
Michael: -7.7 lbs, 469.7, total loss since January: 73.7 lbs., total overall loss 144.3 lbs.
Nina: -5.7 lbs, 276.9, total loss since January, 25.3 lbs.
Not bad at all. :-) Although for me, it's mostly loss of water weight a crap from the last Baltimore excursion. But Michael is doing so fabulously fantastically well! It's taken so long for him to really get focused on this, but now it seems to be going so very well... (yeah, ok, I'm a worrier... it's going so well that it makes me nervous). Anyway, maybe I can stop focusing so much on him and maybe start doing some of the things that I need to do, like start playing racquetball again, which would make me feel a thousand times better all around.
Anyway. It just kind of hit me when I typed the date.
Michael: -7.7 lbs, 469.7, total loss since January: 73.7 lbs., total overall loss 144.3 lbs.
Nina: -5.7 lbs, 276.9, total loss since January, 25.3 lbs.
Not bad at all. :-) Although for me, it's mostly loss of water weight a crap from the last Baltimore excursion. But Michael is doing so fabulously fantastically well! It's taken so long for him to really get focused on this, but now it seems to be going so very well... (yeah, ok, I'm a worrier... it's going so well that it makes me nervous). Anyway, maybe I can stop focusing so much on him and maybe start doing some of the things that I need to do, like start playing racquetball again, which would make me feel a thousand times better all around.
Sunday, August 3, 2008
Butterflied Lamb with Herb Cheese/Asparagus
This is kind of a recipe in progress because I haven't quite worked out one big issue, but it's so good that it's worth posting anyway.
A note about the meat: my local grocery store sells a butterflied leg of lamb that has clearly been heavily trimmed... it's a rectangle, essentially. Other stores trim this differently, or if (the cheapest, freshest way) you butterfly it yourself, it's obviously not going to come out into a nice little square. But it does need to be reasonably flat, because you're going to roll it, so if the meat is thick, it's probably better to cut it into two rectangles and score any very thick sections.
You will need....
1 butterflied leg of lamb
1 package herbed soft cheese (I used Boursin. A goat cheese mixed with herbs would be good. Something like Alouette is too soft.)
4 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
about 1/2 t. oregano (more if using fresh)
salt, pepper to taste
olive oil
asparagus
2 tablespoons butter
Spread the butterflied leg out flat. Season the inside with salt and pepper, and then smooth the cheese inside (all in a column in the middle, not all over the leg. You are going to wrap the leg around the cheese.). I used 1/2 package Boursin for a "leg" that was probably a 5"x 8" rectangle. Wrap the meat around the cheese and then tie the whole thing up with string. (Here is a video guide to tying a roast. Here are written instructions.)
Toast the roughly-chopped garlic and the oregano in the olive oil, to lightly brown, in a heavy sauté pan. Season the outside of the lamb. Then sear the outsides of the roast, to brown. Put in a small roasting pan (note: this is the part that I haven't worked the bugs out of yet. The cheese is going to ooze out, so you really want to put the roast on something like a rack with a piece of foil over it. Pole holes in the foil. This way, the soft cheese with stay with the roast, not drop into the pan juices and fat.). Place in a 325 degree oven for approximately 30-45 minutes, depending on the thickness of the meat (test with a quick-read thermometer; I cook lamb to 140 degrees). Let rest.
Steam the asparagus in another pan or asparagus steamer, until not quite done (about 5 minutes, if you start cold). While the asparagus is steaming, add the butter to the pan that you seared the lamb in... which still has toasted garlic, etc., in it. Drain the asparagus and add to the sauté pan, sauté lightly for a minute or two.
Remove the string, slice the meat, and use the soft cheese as a little sauce or garnish for the meat.
A wonderful meal, very simple really, and minimal carbs (actual carb count depends on how much asparagus you eat; there's virtually nothing in any other part of this meal except the cheese, which is 5 carbs for the entire package, so maybe about 1-2 carbs per serving).
A note about the meat: my local grocery store sells a butterflied leg of lamb that has clearly been heavily trimmed... it's a rectangle, essentially. Other stores trim this differently, or if (the cheapest, freshest way) you butterfly it yourself, it's obviously not going to come out into a nice little square. But it does need to be reasonably flat, because you're going to roll it, so if the meat is thick, it's probably better to cut it into two rectangles and score any very thick sections.
You will need....
1 butterflied leg of lamb
1 package herbed soft cheese (I used Boursin. A goat cheese mixed with herbs would be good. Something like Alouette is too soft.)
4 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
about 1/2 t. oregano (more if using fresh)
salt, pepper to taste
olive oil
asparagus
2 tablespoons butter
Spread the butterflied leg out flat. Season the inside with salt and pepper, and then smooth the cheese inside (all in a column in the middle, not all over the leg. You are going to wrap the leg around the cheese.). I used 1/2 package Boursin for a "leg" that was probably a 5"x 8" rectangle. Wrap the meat around the cheese and then tie the whole thing up with string. (Here is a video guide to tying a roast. Here are written instructions.)
Toast the roughly-chopped garlic and the oregano in the olive oil, to lightly brown, in a heavy sauté pan. Season the outside of the lamb. Then sear the outsides of the roast, to brown. Put in a small roasting pan (note: this is the part that I haven't worked the bugs out of yet. The cheese is going to ooze out, so you really want to put the roast on something like a rack with a piece of foil over it. Pole holes in the foil. This way, the soft cheese with stay with the roast, not drop into the pan juices and fat.). Place in a 325 degree oven for approximately 30-45 minutes, depending on the thickness of the meat (test with a quick-read thermometer; I cook lamb to 140 degrees). Let rest.
Steam the asparagus in another pan or asparagus steamer, until not quite done (about 5 minutes, if you start cold). While the asparagus is steaming, add the butter to the pan that you seared the lamb in... which still has toasted garlic, etc., in it. Drain the asparagus and add to the sauté pan, sauté lightly for a minute or two.
Remove the string, slice the meat, and use the soft cheese as a little sauce or garnish for the meat.
A wonderful meal, very simple really, and minimal carbs (actual carb count depends on how much asparagus you eat; there's virtually nothing in any other part of this meal except the cheese, which is 5 carbs for the entire package, so maybe about 1-2 carbs per serving).
Friday, August 1, 2008
Expectations
Habit is a bitch. Really. We don't even think about the collection of stuff that populates our head, all the billion things that make up who we are, all the habits that make up the way we perceive the world.
Ok, not all those things are habits exactly, but this is my profound thought for the day, so I get to put it that way. And when you try to make lifestyle changes, all those little habit gremlins pop out from under the bed and scream, NO, this is WRONG, I am not supposed to do this that way.
Michael has not been eating very much lately, particularly of the sort of things that he used to really love... proteins, mostly. Which is fine. I mean, I figure that if this were a Bad Thing, he'd be hungry, right? He's not hungry, he is losing weight, and he feels ok (well, actually, he doesn't, but I don't think that these things are connected; this is mostly structural stuff). And just about every day, he asks me... "am I eating enough? I don't think I'm getting enough protein but I just don't want any more." I think that this is just all about expectations and perceptions and the loss of something that used to give him pleasure, however "wrong" that might have been. Ill-judged, maybe, more than wrong. Anyway, he expects that food will give him the kind of pleasure that it once did... which I really think means, "food will allow me to turn off my head for a while and comfort myself." Something that we both used to be fabulous at doing.
But things change. The role of food changes. Tastes change. The thing that doesn't change is all those habit gremlins, the things that make me think that there should be twice as much food on the plate, the things that make him think that he should be eating more even though he's not hungry and he doesn't actually want anything else.
I don't have any solution to this, of course, except maybe awareness... the more you think about the patterns, the easier it is to let them change. Which means, still unbelievably hard but maybe just one notch or two less.
Ok, not all those things are habits exactly, but this is my profound thought for the day, so I get to put it that way. And when you try to make lifestyle changes, all those little habit gremlins pop out from under the bed and scream, NO, this is WRONG, I am not supposed to do this that way.
Michael has not been eating very much lately, particularly of the sort of things that he used to really love... proteins, mostly. Which is fine. I mean, I figure that if this were a Bad Thing, he'd be hungry, right? He's not hungry, he is losing weight, and he feels ok (well, actually, he doesn't, but I don't think that these things are connected; this is mostly structural stuff). And just about every day, he asks me... "am I eating enough? I don't think I'm getting enough protein but I just don't want any more
But things change. The role of food changes. Tastes change. The thing that doesn't change is all those habit gremlins, the things that make me think that there should be twice as much food on the plate, the things that make him think that he should be eating more even though he's not hungry and he doesn't actually want anything else.
I don't have any solution to this, of course, except maybe awareness... the more you think about the patterns, the easier it is to let them change. Which means, still unbelievably hard but maybe just one notch or two less.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Tomato Madness (aka Stupid Things I Should Have Known)
Here is the wrong way to grow tomatoes. Think, oh, tomatoes, those are easy. Order some heirloom tomato plants. Don't read anything including the growing instructions that came with them. Put them in pots. Don't bother with cages... tomatoes are vines, right, so they can just wander, right? Put fertilizer in immediately. Water intermittently.
Sigh.
Here are some things that I really should have known if I'd just bothered to look.
1. Don't fertilize right away. Fertilize after the fruits have set or whatever it's called. Otherwise you will get TONS of foliage. Why is this a problem, you ask? Because tomatoes are heavy and at the same time the vines are remarkably brittle, and that leads me to point #2...
2. There's a reason why they sell tomato cages. Tomatoes need support. Remember those heavy foliage vines with the huge tomatoes that you've got because you fertilized too early and besides, it seems to be a great year for tomatoes? Well, they're going to split at the base or at the tips because you have given them no support, and you're going to drive yourself absolutely crazy trying to cage or stake something that is both really big and prone to breakage. All the while wondering if you're totally wasting your time because they're already kind of split. Also, if the fruit is on the ground, bugs are likely to eat it. And/or, it's not going to look very tasty.
3. Just accept the fact that you've got to water every day. Containers dry out fast, even if you fill them with that magical Miracle Gro stuff that retains water. Yeah, it would have been a good idea to mulch, too.
So.... I've got six mega-tomato plants with enormous but very green fruits on them and a serious weight problem. There's some kind of humor in this somewhere.
Next year, I want to do a full-scale garden with raised beds. Maybe I should actually READ something first rather than assuming that vegetables can't really be that complicated.
Oh, and one more tip. Make sure that you know where the sprinkler is relative to you before you turn it on...
Sigh.
Here are some things that I really should have known if I'd just bothered to look.
1. Don't fertilize right away. Fertilize after the fruits have set or whatever it's called. Otherwise you will get TONS of foliage. Why is this a problem, you ask? Because tomatoes are heavy and at the same time the vines are remarkably brittle, and that leads me to point #2...
2. There's a reason why they sell tomato cages. Tomatoes need support. Remember those heavy foliage vines with the huge tomatoes that you've got because you fertilized too early and besides, it seems to be a great year for tomatoes? Well, they're going to split at the base or at the tips because you have given them no support, and you're going to drive yourself absolutely crazy trying to cage or stake something that is both really big and prone to breakage. All the while wondering if you're totally wasting your time because they're already kind of split. Also, if the fruit is on the ground, bugs are likely to eat it. And/or, it's not going to look very tasty.
3. Just accept the fact that you've got to water every day. Containers dry out fast, even if you fill them with that magical Miracle Gro stuff that retains water. Yeah, it would have been a good idea to mulch, too.
So.... I've got six mega-tomato plants with enormous but very green fruits on them and a serious weight problem. There's some kind of humor in this somewhere.
Next year, I want to do a full-scale garden with raised beds. Maybe I should actually READ something first rather than assuming that vegetables can't really be that complicated.
Oh, and one more tip. Make sure that you know where the sprinkler is relative to you before you turn it on...
Monday, July 28, 2008
Weekly Stats, July 28
Michael: -2.4 lbs, 477.4, total loss since January: 66 lbs., total overall loss 138.3 lbs.
Nina: +4.4 lbs, 282.7, total loss since January... oh, let's not even talk about it this week.
I spent the better part of the week in Baltimore again, doing endless sorting of stuff. (A word to the wise: if you're a collector of stuff, think seriously about what kind of a mess you're leaving to your children.) And it was just a terrible week for food... I'd get up and have a latte and then get nothing at all to eat until dinner... by which time I was starving. And I had a couple of the worst restaurant meals of my life, I have to say... last trip everywhere I went was good to great, even the chain sort of places like Red Robin were ok. This trip... well, I went to places that everyone recommended, and maybe it was an off day, but, well, just ugh. And too many carbs, either because of the restaurant type or because after not being able to eat the food, I had whatever could be found in the apartment... and paid for it, both in terms of weight and just absolutely feeling like death. I swear, eating a low-carb diet religiously for a while just destroys your body's ability to handle much of a carb load. Which is probably a good thing. I can't understand how people who have sort of a "day off" every week do it. I just absolutely feel terrible.
Michael, on the other hand, did really well. And got to stay at home, lucky boy!
I'm hoping that this is my last trip for a while. I have to go to Maine for the memorial service at the end of August, and then probably back to Baltimore in October, but if I'm really lucky, there will be no more trips in the middle. I just can't take much more of this, physically or emotionally.
Nina: +4.4 lbs, 282.7, total loss since January... oh, let's not even talk about it this week.
I spent the better part of the week in Baltimore again, doing endless sorting of stuff. (A word to the wise: if you're a collector of stuff, think seriously about what kind of a mess you're leaving to your children.) And it was just a terrible week for food... I'd get up and have a latte and then get nothing at all to eat until dinner... by which time I was starving. And I had a couple of the worst restaurant meals of my life, I have to say... last trip everywhere I went was good to great, even the chain sort of places like Red Robin were ok. This trip... well, I went to places that everyone recommended, and maybe it was an off day, but, well, just ugh. And too many carbs, either because of the restaurant type or because after not being able to eat the food, I had whatever could be found in the apartment... and paid for it, both in terms of weight and just absolutely feeling like death. I swear, eating a low-carb diet religiously for a while just destroys your body's ability to handle much of a carb load. Which is probably a good thing. I can't understand how people who have sort of a "day off" every week do it. I just absolutely feel terrible.
Michael, on the other hand, did really well. And got to stay at home, lucky boy!
I'm hoping that this is my last trip for a while. I have to go to Maine for the memorial service at the end of August, and then probably back to Baltimore in October, but if I'm really lucky, there will be no more trips in the middle. I just can't take much more of this, physically or emotionally.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Food Musings--The Choice Part
This is the 2nd thing that I was thinking about while watching that TLC show (see last post). A lot of people in this show said, "I can't.... ." I can't control my cravings for food. I can't change my food behavior. I can't lose weight.
This is my particular soapbox, and I've said this before, I'm sure... but I think that "I can't" almost always means, "I am not willing to do this thing." In case I'm sounding either unsympathetic or preachy or self-righteous, I should say that there are a thousand choices that I've made that have had this aspect to them. I'm not any better about this than anyone else, and this applies to work things and relationship things and food things. I have spend most of my life not losing weight because I, on some level, chose not to. Because I was not willing to do it... not willing if it meant that I had to give up certain things that I didn't want to give up (like eating for comfort or entertainment or whatever). On some level, the costs exceeded the benefits, at least in the short run. And in a weird kind of way, I think I'm at peace with that. What I have a hard time with is the notion of powerlessness. There are things in my life, mostly relating to other people, over which I have no power. But I do have power over my own choices. I can choose not to eat. I can choose to eat. Sometimes these choices will be incredibly difficult, but at the end of the day, for everyone, they are choices. No one is stuffing the food into your mouth. And if you let it be, that thought is pretty empowering.
It's a whole big future over which you have some control. You get to choose. And if it's your choice, it's the right choice for you, whatever it is.
Caveat: there are situations in which we make choices that are not fully informed, and that's one case where people should step in and say, have you thought about?
This is my particular soapbox, and I've said this before, I'm sure... but I think that "I can't" almost always means, "I am not willing to do this thing." In case I'm sounding either unsympathetic or preachy or self-righteous, I should say that there are a thousand choices that I've made that have had this aspect to them. I'm not any better about this than anyone else, and this applies to work things and relationship things and food things. I have spend most of my life not losing weight because I, on some level, chose not to. Because I was not willing to do it... not willing if it meant that I had to give up certain things that I didn't want to give up (like eating for comfort or entertainment or whatever). On some level, the costs exceeded the benefits, at least in the short run. And in a weird kind of way, I think I'm at peace with that. What I have a hard time with is the notion of powerlessness. There are things in my life, mostly relating to other people, over which I have no power. But I do have power over my own choices. I can choose not to eat. I can choose to eat. Sometimes these choices will be incredibly difficult, but at the end of the day, for everyone, they are choices. No one is stuffing the food into your mouth. And if you let it be, that thought is pretty empowering.
It's a whole big future over which you have some control. You get to choose. And if it's your choice, it's the right choice for you, whatever it is.
Caveat: there are situations in which we make choices that are not fully informed, and that's one case where people should step in and say, have you thought about
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Food Musings-- The Way We Grow Up
I caught the tail end of some program on TLC the other night called, I Eat 33,000 Calories A Day. Or something like that. It was another program of super-obese people... I have mixed feelings about these things, a combination of interest and horror and some resentment, because there always seems to be a "look at the fat people in the zoo" element to them. I didn't see all of the show, but I did see most of the last segment, which was about a 640-lb. woman called Lisa, I think. And there were two things that really struck me.... one that I'll write about now, and another that I'll save for tomorrow.
The first was what she said about her family... she said that her mother had had a thing about sweets, that she'd buy things like that and hide them... but that Lisa knew how to find them. I listen to things like this and muse about the complexities of food behavior, about where these problems start. For both Michael and me, there were echoes of that same kind of thing. My mother never bought "good" stuff for general consumption... things like cookies and chips and so on. But she would buy things like that and "hide" it in a cupboard that no one was supposed to go into. Stuff that was essentially for her. Michael reports the same kind of thing... that his father would buy things like cheese and cakes and hide them in the wardrobe and measure how much was there. Besides being a little weird all in all, I wonder how this kind of thing plays into food attitudes.
I look at my son who has, in my opinion, no food issues at all. He eats until he is not hungry and then stops. He's a teenager, so he sucks down milk like there was a direct line to a cow, and can eat a staggering amount of various things... but he will have things like Doritos and candy around forever. I finally threw away the last of his Halloween candy from more than a year and half ago. He has never been denied food. He has never been told that he could not have certain kinds of food... and he's always been fed a variety of food, both of the very healthy and the more junk sort. He prefers the good stuff although he loves a lot of the junk, too... but the point is, he could have these "forbidden" foods around forever and totally ignore them, especially if he was told not to eat them. Even these days, we'd have to throw it or eat it within a relatively short period of time. The compulsion remains.
Would we have been different if we had grown up in environments in which food wasn't some kind of prize? Was this true for you, and how do you think that it affected your interaction with food?
The first was what she said about her family... she said that her mother had had a thing about sweets, that she'd buy things like that and hide them... but that Lisa knew how to find them. I listen to things like this and muse about the complexities of food behavior, about where these problems start. For both Michael and me, there were echoes of that same kind of thing. My mother never bought "good" stuff for general consumption... things like cookies and chips and so on. But she would buy things like that and "hide" it in a cupboard that no one was supposed to go into. Stuff that was essentially for her. Michael reports the same kind of thing... that his father would buy things like cheese and cakes and hide them in the wardrobe and measure how much was there. Besides being a little weird all in all, I wonder how this kind of thing plays into food attitudes.
I look at my son who has, in my opinion, no food issues at all. He eats until he is not hungry and then stops. He's a teenager, so he sucks down milk like there was a direct line to a cow, and can eat a staggering amount of various things... but he will have things like Doritos and candy around forever. I finally threw away the last of his Halloween candy from more than a year and half ago. He has never been denied food. He has never been told that he could not have certain kinds of food... and he's always been fed a variety of food, both of the very healthy and the more junk sort. He prefers the good stuff although he loves a lot of the junk, too... but the point is, he could have these "forbidden" foods around forever and totally ignore them, especially if he was told not to eat them. Even these days, we'd have to throw it or eat it within a relatively short period of time. The compulsion remains.
Would we have been different if we had grown up in environments in which food wasn't some kind of prize? Was this true for you, and how do you think that it affected your interaction with food?
Monday, July 21, 2008
Weekly Stats, July 21
Michael: -6.4 lbs, 479.8, total loss since January: 63.6 lbs., total overall loss 134 lbs.
Nina: -4.62 lbs, 278.3, total loss since January: 24 lbs.
These numbers are a bit inaccurate since we didn't really weigh ourselves last Monday; they're a guess based off of weights a few days earlier... but the totals are right, and Michael is doing absolutely wonderfully!
But the weekly losses are kind of arbitrary, and they also make me look like I've lost weight when really I just keep bouncing around the same 3 or 4 lbs. I'll be happy when I get a few pounds lower and really have something to show for the last couple of months, but all in all, with everything going on, I think I'm doing ok. I'm going back to Baltimore on Thursday, just for a couple of days, to help my sister sort things out, so it's probably not going to be a great food week. I did a pretty good job of staying the course when I was down there last, but we will probably eat out in the evening, so it's hard to be perfect. I'll be so glad when all the apartment sorting out is done... and when my mother's memorial service, which is scheduled for the end of August, in Maine, is over. I feel disrupted and scattered all the time, and it's hard to adjust to the new "normal"... to the rest of my life, I guess. I am so sad.
Nina: -4.62 lbs, 278.3, total loss since January: 24 lbs.
These numbers are a bit inaccurate since we didn't really weigh ourselves last Monday; they're a guess based off of weights a few days earlier... but the totals are right, and Michael is doing absolutely wonderfully!
But the weekly losses are kind of arbitrary, and they also make me look like I've lost weight when really I just keep bouncing around the same 3 or 4 lbs. I'll be happy when I get a few pounds lower and really have something to show for the last couple of months, but all in all, with everything going on, I think I'm doing ok. I'm going back to Baltimore on Thursday, just for a couple of days, to help my sister sort things out, so it's probably not going to be a great food week. I did a pretty good job of staying the course when I was down there last, but we will probably eat out in the evening, so it's hard to be perfect. I'll be so glad when all the apartment sorting out is done... and when my mother's memorial service, which is scheduled for the end of August, in Maine, is over. I feel disrupted and scattered all the time, and it's hard to adjust to the new "normal"... to the rest of my life, I guess. I am so sad.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
The Worm Turns
I decided to skip the dysfunctional family post for the moment. Can't work up the energy.
And in the meantime, back to the previously scheduled low-carb programming... the big news this week, of course, is the Israeli study... see here for Dr. Eades' writeup, if you haven't seen a billion articles on this already. It's pretty easy to note that (1) no one on any of the diets lost a ton of weight, and (2) the "low carb" diet wasn't really all that low carb, since the researchers picked an arbitrary and quite high 120 carb limit (which I'd call a maintenance maximum, not a "diet" level). But still... even with this, the low-carb numbers came out just the way they should... improvements in triglycerides and HDL, comparable on LDL, and a little higher weight loss.
But the striking thing, in my opinion anyway, is that it seems to me that the world is beginning to change. Maybe this is just hope, but when we started low-carbing, only about 8 months ago or less, it was pretty hard to find any current, mainstream medical references that didn't pretty much dismiss this as an unhealthy fad. There was (and is, of course) a low-carb community of the converted... but it's not something you talk about much, is it? Like politics and religious preferences, it's been something better practiced in the privacy of your own home. But just over this relatively brief period of time, there have been a number of distinctly positive changes... some in things like acceptance by the American Diabetes Association of low-carb as an acceptable diet, some in studies like this recent one. It's not the only thing going on, but there's considerably more positive stuff out there than there used to be. So, while it's still obvious from the reporting on this study that the media retains its customary low-fat bias, the sheer quantity of coverage, mostly in a positive way, is really encouraging.
And in the meantime, back to the previously scheduled low-carb programming... the big news this week, of course, is the Israeli study... see here for Dr. Eades' writeup, if you haven't seen a billion articles on this already. It's pretty easy to note that (1) no one on any of the diets lost a ton of weight, and (2) the "low carb" diet wasn't really all that low carb, since the researchers picked an arbitrary and quite high 120 carb limit (which I'd call a maintenance maximum, not a "diet" level). But still... even with this, the low-carb numbers came out just the way they should... improvements in triglycerides and HDL, comparable on LDL, and a little higher weight loss.
But the striking thing, in my opinion anyway, is that it seems to me that the world is beginning to change. Maybe this is just hope, but when we started low-carbing, only about 8 months ago or less, it was pretty hard to find any current, mainstream medical references that didn't pretty much dismiss this as an unhealthy fad. There was (and is, of course) a low-carb community of the converted... but it's not something you talk about much, is it? Like politics and religious preferences, it's been something better practiced in the privacy of your own home. But just over this relatively brief period of time, there have been a number of distinctly positive changes... some in things like acceptance by the American Diabetes Association of low-carb as an acceptable diet, some in studies like this recent one. It's not the only thing going on, but there's considerably more positive stuff out there than there used to be. So, while it's still obvious from the reporting on this study that the media retains its customary low-fat bias, the sheer quantity of coverage, mostly in a positive way, is really encouraging.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Baltimore Wrap-Up Part II-- The Mom Part
I really feel like I should put some kind of a spoiler in here. This is not a low-carb post, and it's all about dying. If you want food, go to yesterday's post. If you want dysfunctional family dynamics, that's the next one.
I think that you can know perfectly well that someone is near death, but it's still a hell of a shock. Even more so in this case, because it was all so (mercifully, I suppose) fast. I don't think that any of us expected the actual way that this went. I'm writing this partly because I need to, but I'm also writing it because I just didn't have any expectation or knowledge about what would happen here, and I really wanted to know that... really wanted some notion of the process, and it was the thing that I simply couldn't find anywhere. Everyone, every thing is different, but maybe this will be helpful to someone else.
We knew it was only a short time, that her body was riddled with cancer, that there was no real hope. But a short time can mean months. But this was so fast.
I got there early Thursday morning, and she looked, all things considered, ok. Frail. But I brought her some roses from my garden, and she could actually smell them... a surprise in itself, because she's barely been able to smell anything since an illness about 15 years ago. We sat for a while, and I tried to make her more comfortable. And there was a merika lily blooming... they bloom for only a day, and usually not this season. My youngest sister and I decided to go out to get some different pillows and to give my other sister, who was clearly way overtired, a chance to nap in peace. Everything seemed ok, within the constraints.
My sister called while we were out to ask us to get something else and said that they'd gotten her up for a minute... she'd pretty much not been standing for days... and bathed her. And she was tired but all right. But as we walked in the door... well, just that minute, really, something had happened, and she slipped into this coma. There was some thought that she may have had a stroke, but there's no way of knowing... she was on anticoagulants and prone to clotting, so standing up could have released something. But perhaps not.
And so, for a little less than two days, we watched. We tried to keep her comfortable. We held her hand... and it seemed like maybe there was a response. I whispered to her things that she probably couldn't hear... but you never know. Things that I could not otherwise say.
Friday night, I went to bed, and I was called at 7:30 in the morning to come now. And it was clear that she was leaving. She was white and pasty and almost immobile. But her heart was still beating, and she stayed until everyone was there. And then she slipped away.
And so it ends.
A year and a little of heart-stopping fear mixed with a time of hope... a time I started breathing again, a time that I stopped calling her every day. And then it all turned around in a heartbeat, and there was nothing to be done.
I am so sad. Sad for the loss, sad for the tragic ironies of it, sad for the things that went so wrong with my mother and me, early on, and that really never could be repaired. This isn't a "wish I'd said whatever" kind of thing... there was nothing else that I was capable of saying. I do wish that it had been different. I do hope that the reincarnation that she believed in is true, and that someday we'll have a chance to do it over again, better.
I think that you can know perfectly well that someone is near death, but it's still a hell of a shock. Even more so in this case, because it was all so (mercifully, I suppose) fast. I don't think that any of us expected the actual way that this went. I'm writing this partly because I need to, but I'm also writing it because I just didn't have any expectation or knowledge about what would happen here, and I really wanted to know that... really wanted some notion of the process, and it was the thing that I simply couldn't find anywhere. Everyone, every thing is different, but maybe this will be helpful to someone else.
We knew it was only a short time, that her body was riddled with cancer, that there was no real hope. But a short time can mean months. But this was so fast.
I got there early Thursday morning, and she looked, all things considered, ok. Frail. But I brought her some roses from my garden, and she could actually smell them... a surprise in itself, because she's barely been able to smell anything since an illness about 15 years ago. We sat for a while, and I tried to make her more comfortable. And there was a merika lily blooming... they bloom for only a day, and usually not this season. My youngest sister and I decided to go out to get some different pillows and to give my other sister, who was clearly way overtired, a chance to nap in peace. Everything seemed ok, within the constraints.
My sister called while we were out to ask us to get something else and said that they'd gotten her up for a minute... she'd pretty much not been standing for days... and bathed her. And she was tired but all right. But as we walked in the door... well, just that minute, really, something had happened, and she slipped into this coma. There was some thought that she may have had a stroke, but there's no way of knowing... she was on anticoagulants and prone to clotting, so standing up could have released something. But perhaps not.
And so, for a little less than two days, we watched. We tried to keep her comfortable. We held her hand... and it seemed like maybe there was a response. I whispered to her things that she probably couldn't hear... but you never know. Things that I could not otherwise say.
Friday night, I went to bed, and I was called at 7:30 in the morning to come now. And it was clear that she was leaving. She was white and pasty and almost immobile. But her heart was still beating, and she stayed until everyone was there. And then she slipped away.
And so it ends.
A year and a little of heart-stopping fear mixed with a time of hope... a time I started breathing again, a time that I stopped calling her every day. And then it all turned around in a heartbeat, and there was nothing to be done.
I am so sad. Sad for the loss, sad for the tragic ironies of it, sad for the things that went so wrong with my mother and me, early on, and that really never could be repaired. This isn't a "wish I'd said whatever" kind of thing... there was nothing else that I was capable of saying. I do wish that it had been different. I do hope that the reincarnation that she believed in is true, and that someday we'll have a chance to do it over again, better.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Baltimore Wrap-Up Part I-- The Food Part
I'm finally home, as of yesterday afternoon, and just so happy to be here. Best of all (well, really best of all is being with Michael, who couldn't come with me) is sleeping in a bed that doesn't kill my back and in which I actually sleep. Between Maine and Baltimore, I think I've had three good nights of sleep in about three weeks. Happiness is a comfy bed.
In the midst of a lot of chaos, though, I thought off and on about what I was eating, even under this really stressful circumstance. And the interesting thing is that its really solidified in my mind how much low carb and high-quality, largely unprocessed foods have become a way of life for me. That apartment is just filled with... oh, everything that I don't eat these days, cookies and chips and bread and so forth. Carb paradise. And I didn't eat any of it. I look at it, and I think , this is not food.... in the same kind of way that you'd look at something you totally disliked and say, ick, eggplant (or whatever); I'm not putting that in my mouth.
But a second facet of this is the truth that you can eat very low carb and still eat pretty badly. And that calories do count. In all the chaos, there wasn't a lot of time to eating. I cooked exactly one proper meal, and the rest of the time, we mostly all grazed or went out to dinner. For me, grazing is cheese and meat; and it's easy to eat a lot of calories without a lot of nutritional value when your primary food is cheese. I haven't weighed myself yet, but I'd be beyond surprised if my weight wasn't up, at least a bit.
If it is, one culprit is eating out. We did eat out a few times, and that's where the carb load, such as it was, happened. But that's kind of my third point about all of this, and it's back to my favorite issue of late, portion size. One night, we ate a what I'd call kind of a standard restaurant... not so standard in that it makes sort of American diner food plus an Indian selection, but the big point is that the portion sizes were HUGE. Although what I ate was relatively low carb (a chicken Caesar salad and Saag Lamb, no rice), I felt unbelievably stuffed, and yet I didn't really finish either of those things. The size of things that everyone else got was even worse. (Actually, I have to say that the food at this place was pretty bad in my opinion, too... oversalted, and the salad drenched with dressing). The next night, we went to a fantastic sushi place. Although I did, of course, eat rice, the difference was that portion size was reasonable, and the quality of the food was wonderful. (I was bloated as hell the next day from the soy sauce, which always happens, but it passes.) And the last night we went to a restaurant that I highly recommend, Meli, which was fantastic. Anyway, I didn't try hard to eat religiously low carb; I had a little toast with the cheese selection, a little crispy tempura batter on the onions and so on... a few bites of dessert... but the lesson here is again, portion size. A few bites of dessert, a toast point, etc... these things are not going to kill you. These things are probably not even going to cause you to gain weight, eaten on a rare basis. What kills you is the mounds of toast and pasta and rice and so on... and that's just as true, in a way, about mountains of meat and cheese and whatever, low carb but it packs on the calories. The big secret, the one that I just can't quite wrap my head around consistently, is that less is more. A little of something of perfect taste and quality, not a heap of junk.
If I could just master that, it would make a lot of difference.
In the midst of a lot of chaos, though, I thought off and on about what I was eating, even under this really stressful circumstance. And the interesting thing is that its really solidified in my mind how much low carb and high-quality, largely unprocessed foods have become a way of life for me. That apartment is just filled with... oh, everything that I don't eat these days, cookies and chips and bread and so forth. Carb paradise. And I didn't eat any of it. I look at it, and I think , this is not food.... in the same kind of way that you'd look at something you totally disliked and say, ick, eggplant (or whatever); I'm not putting that in my mouth.
But a second facet of this is the truth that you can eat very low carb and still eat pretty badly. And that calories do count. In all the chaos, there wasn't a lot of time to eating. I cooked exactly one proper meal, and the rest of the time, we mostly all grazed or went out to dinner. For me, grazing is cheese and meat; and it's easy to eat a lot of calories without a lot of nutritional value when your primary food is cheese. I haven't weighed myself yet, but I'd be beyond surprised if my weight wasn't up, at least a bit.
If it is, one culprit is eating out. We did eat out a few times, and that's where the carb load, such as it was, happened. But that's kind of my third point about all of this, and it's back to my favorite issue of late, portion size. One night, we ate a what I'd call kind of a standard restaurant... not so standard in that it makes sort of American diner food plus an Indian selection, but the big point is that the portion sizes were HUGE. Although what I ate was relatively low carb (a chicken Caesar salad and Saag Lamb, no rice), I felt unbelievably stuffed, and yet I didn't really finish either of those things. The size of things that everyone else got was even worse. (Actually, I have to say that the food at this place was pretty bad in my opinion, too... oversalted, and the salad drenched with dressing). The next night, we went to a fantastic sushi place. Although I did, of course, eat rice, the difference was that portion size was reasonable, and the quality of the food was wonderful. (I was bloated as hell the next day from the soy sauce, which always happens, but it passes.) And the last night we went to a restaurant that I highly recommend, Meli, which was fantastic. Anyway, I didn't try hard to eat religiously low carb; I had a little toast with the cheese selection, a little crispy tempura batter on the onions and so on... a few bites of dessert... but the lesson here is again, portion size. A few bites of dessert, a toast point, etc... these things are not going to kill you. These things are probably not even going to cause you to gain weight, eaten on a rare basis. What kills you is the mounds of toast and pasta and rice and so on... and that's just as true, in a way, about mountains of meat and cheese and whatever, low carb but it packs on the calories. The big secret, the one that I just can't quite wrap my head around consistently, is that less is more. A little of something of perfect taste and quality, not a heap of junk.
If I could just master that, it would make a lot of difference.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Friday, July 11, 2008
Time
My mother would be 79 this year. Not so young, but not so old, either. Her mother lived to 86; her father well into his 90s. Same thing on the other side of the family, where both my grandparents lived into their 90s. I feel robbed of time that there should have been… at least another 5 years. Five years for my son to graduate from high school. Five years of holidays, five years of time.
I always thought that there would be more and different time, one day. I realize that this isn’t the way that life works, that people are what they are, and that expecting miraculous changes is a fool’s game. But I thought that sometime, something else would happen. When I was a child, my mother was always busy. Busy with my sisters, busy with a thousand things with which she occupied herself as respite from a difficult marriage. I understand that. I did the same thing, thirty years later. But there never seemed to be time for me. I would come home from college and wait. And wait. And when I left, she’d say, “We never get to spend any time together!” Well, I was there. You weren’t.
Things began to change after my son was born, as he gave us a common ground, one free of anger and resentment and reservation. But then, my parents divorced, and I was so angry. I still am, for the too-late betrayals of my childhood, for her willingness to bail when there was a safe alternative, rather than when her children needed respite from fear. But we do what we can when we can, I suppose. I feel like I should say that these things do not matter now. But they did, and they do, and I doubt that anything can change the way that they hurt. Forgiveness is far easier than forgetting.
And the new marriage… not so long later, her new husband had a stroke, and then there was a decade of caring for him. Again, a choice. A choice that you could not blame her for making, but a choice that meant, again, little time for others, ever-shrinking time as his conditioned worsened and his care became more difficult. Certainly not an easy choice for her, not an easy life. And in the final irony, his death only a few months ago, freeing her… and I thought, maybe now there will be time. Maybe she will be well enough, and she’ll come and look at my garden and admire the rose I planted for her. Get to know my husband. Spent time with my little family, time undistracted by the care of others. It’s not going to happen.
It’s selfish, I suppose, to be focused on how this is a tragedy for me. And when you get right down to it, would that time ever have happened like that? Wouldn’t there always have been something else to get in the way, a thousand things… and not the smallest is my own resentment, the barriers that I put up over the years, the solid wall that keeps me from saying what I would. Now isn’t the time, and there never will be a time.
Life is filled with these inane ironies. The second cancer death in a family with no history of cancer. The second cancer death of women who lived in her apartment (and that seems coincidental, but maybe not, especially since there have been only two). The thing that starts your cells growing and colliding and eating you from inside… what is it? What malign combination of chances coalesce into this thing? You start noticing it after a while, the sisterhood of women with this killer disease, the related brotherhood of people with pancreatic cancer, another killer. The possibility that you, too, contain some ticking time bomb. Wondering what would have happened if only…
And sometimes time is even shorter than you think.
I got here yesterday morning, and she seemed, in some relative sense, fine. So happy that we were all here, looking forward to my son coming tomorrow. Actually able to smell the roses I brought from my garden... a small miracle since her sense of smell has been bad for years. I stayed here for a while, and then my youngest sister and I decided to go out and get some things that were needed... better pillows and so forth... in part to give my other sister a break from all the people, a chance to sleep. She called us while we were out, and Mom was doing ok; they'd gotten her up, but she was exhausted. We walked in the door an hour later, into crisis. Mom has fallen into what I suppose would best be called a coma. A deep, unwakeable sleep. My sister thinks that she may have had a stroke, that the standing released a clot in her leg or something... but in a way, it doesn't matter what exactly the cause of this is. The odd are that it's just waiting now. Waiting and watching and trying to keep her comfortable. Wondering if she can hear you. Looking at all the scraps of her life around you, the scraps of her handwriting, still so vital. Wanting to do something, anything... but there is nothing to do.Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Update on Many Things
We're back from Maine as of last night... and it was truly the trip from hell, I have to say. We should not have gone, not this year, not until Michael's weight is lower and his legs are better. But such a lot of things pushed us into trying... the hope that my mother would go, the desire for just a change of scene, wanting something to break out of the routine that we've been in for so long... wanting to see my sister... Lots of things. And so we forgot all the things that would be problems... and they were, pretty much every single thing. Michael was miserable the whole time; I was so worried about him that it was impossible to relax, and all in all, it pretty much has to go down as among the worst vacations of all time.
I'd also like to throw in a review of the Hilton Garden Inn in Springfield, MA, where we stopped off for a night. Overall, Hilton Garden Inns are a nice chain; we stay there a lot in transit. But this one should have come with a huge warning label... it is about 50 yards away from I-91, an extremely busy road which NEVER gets quiet, and the traffic noise is appalling. Otherwise the staff is nice, the hotel is ok, the rooms are reasonably clean... but there were no instructions on the cooling system, which didn't work quite right, and the floor in the shower in the handicapped-accessible rooms is lethal. It's also a long walk to where those rooms are... fine if you're actually in a wheelchair, but a different matter totally if you're walking.
So... back for a while on the actual supposed subject of this blog, FOOD.... how did we do? Very good and then kind of bad would probably be the best description. We did an excellent job of traveling low carb on the way up to Maine, due mostly to bringing our own food, and then a trip to Whole Foods in Massachusetts. And then we did reasonably well for a few days. However, as the misery started setting in, we started going out for lunch (crab rolls, in a bun) and an ice cream (not the thing to mention on a low-carb blog, but if you're in Damariscotta, ME, Round Top Ice Cream has been making their own since 1924, and it's fabulous. I am not really an ice cream fan, but the Ginger flavor is to die for.). Except for the last night, when my sister cooked and made potatoes, we had consistently low-carb breakfast and dinner. So, overall, not bad... although yesterday, on the last day driving bad, we were both so exhausted from the miserable hotel sleep and everything else that we just kind of bailed, had toast for a breakfast, a few fries with lunch, ice cream later... not good at all, but we'd reached such a state of exhaustion that I think it was only the carb blood sugar rush that was keeping things going.
We both feel physically awful from the higher carbs, too, I have to say. My stomach and digestive system haven't been happy in days. I don't think that we did so badly all in all, but the thing that I most learned from this is that, for me, there's no going back. I can't eat these things. I don't want to eat these things. And I've become even more extraordinarily picky about the quality of food than I'd thought.
And then the bad news. When we were in Maine, we found out that they'd decided to discontinue chemotherapy for my mother... she is too weak to tolerate it. So we were looking, probably, at a couple of months, unless her strength could be built up enough to return to therapy. A tiny flash of hope. But my sister called last night and said that the fluid is building up around her heart again, and they have decided not to drain it. Which means that we are most probably talking about a matter of days. I fly to Baltimore tomorrow morning.
I'd also like to throw in a review of the Hilton Garden Inn in Springfield, MA, where we stopped off for a night. Overall, Hilton Garden Inns are a nice chain; we stay there a lot in transit. But this one should have come with a huge warning label... it is about 50 yards away from I-91, an extremely busy road which NEVER gets quiet, and the traffic noise is appalling. Otherwise the staff is nice, the hotel is ok, the rooms are reasonably clean... but there were no instructions on the cooling system, which didn't work quite right, and the floor in the shower in the handicapped-accessible rooms is lethal. It's also a long walk to where those rooms are... fine if you're actually in a wheelchair, but a different matter totally if you're walking.
So... back for a while on the actual supposed subject of this blog, FOOD.... how did we do? Very good and then kind of bad would probably be the best description. We did an excellent job of traveling low carb on the way up to Maine, due mostly to bringing our own food, and then a trip to Whole Foods in Massachusetts. And then we did reasonably well for a few days. However, as the misery started setting in, we started going out for lunch (crab rolls, in a bun) and an ice cream (not the thing to mention on a low-carb blog, but if you're in Damariscotta, ME, Round Top Ice Cream has been making their own since 1924, and it's fabulous. I am not really an ice cream fan, but the Ginger flavor is to die for.). Except for the last night, when my sister cooked and made potatoes, we had consistently low-carb breakfast and dinner. So, overall, not bad... although yesterday, on the last day driving bad, we were both so exhausted from the miserable hotel sleep and everything else that we just kind of bailed, had toast for a breakfast, a few fries with lunch, ice cream later... not good at all, but we'd reached such a state of exhaustion that I think it was only the carb blood sugar rush that was keeping things going.
We both feel physically awful from the higher carbs, too, I have to say. My stomach and digestive system haven't been happy in days. I don't think that we did so badly all in all, but the thing that I most learned from this is that, for me, there's no going back. I can't eat these things. I don't want to eat these things. And I've become even more extraordinarily picky about the quality of food than I'd thought.
And then the bad news. When we were in Maine, we found out that they'd decided to discontinue chemotherapy for my mother... she is too weak to tolerate it. So we were looking, probably, at a couple of months, unless her strength could be built up enough to return to therapy. A tiny flash of hope. But my sister called last night and said that the fluid is building up around her heart again, and they have decided not to drain it. Which means that we are most probably talking about a matter of days. I fly to Baltimore tomorrow morning.
Monday, July 7, 2008
Weekly Stats, July 7
Michael: +2.4 lbs, 487.5, total loss since January: 55.8 lbs.
Nina: +2.2 lbs, 280.9, total loss since January: 21.3 lbs.
Considering that we were in Maine all of this week, not terrible (although not great).
Nina: +2.2 lbs, 280.9, total loss since January: 21.3 lbs.
Considering that we were in Maine all of this week, not terrible (although not great).
Monday, June 30, 2008
Weekly Stats, June 30
Michael: -3.52 lbs, 485.1, total loss since January: 58 lbs.
Nina: -.0 lbs, 278.84, total loss since January: 23.3 lbs.
We we both higher mid-week, lower yesterday, so all in all, not bad, although I'm still pretty stalled.
Nina: -.0 lbs, 278.84, total loss since January: 23.3 lbs.
We we both higher mid-week, lower yesterday, so all in all, not bad, although I'm still pretty stalled.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Eat More Slowly. Watch Portion Size. Stop Screwing Around and Pack the Car
Words to live by, kind of.
I have been paying BIG attention to what I've been eating the last couple of days, and on my biggest food issue, mindlessly quickly shoving food into my mouth, not even realizing what I've eaten. And I've been rewarded a little; my weight is the lowest that it's been in a while. Let's see what it is tomorrow when I post stats...
The hardest thing for me, in a lot of ways, is to be mindful about food. I'll spend hours prepping food, and then I'll shove it all into my mouth in 10 minutes. That's not the way it's supposed to be, and I think that long-term weight control must involve retraining myself about this particular thing. It is really not easy.
Tomorrow we start on a two-day drive to Maine, where we'll spend some unknown amount of time, depending on how comfortable Michael is there. Originally we'd thought that Mom would come up, that all the family would be there. Seems beyond unlikely at the moment. So we will have this little bit of time there... it's the first time I've been to my family home in probably five years, maybe more... since I realized that there was no point to going somewhere that only made me unhappy. But that was a different time, a different set of circumstances, a different marriage. I'm hoping that this will be better.
I'm also hoping that I can make sensible food choices both on the way and when we get there. Weight is going well this week, and I don't want to screw it up for the sake of travel. It's just not worth it.
I have been paying BIG attention to what I've been eating the last couple of days, and on my biggest food issue, mindlessly quickly shoving food into my mouth, not even realizing what I've eaten. And I've been rewarded a little; my weight is the lowest that it's been in a while. Let's see what it is tomorrow when I post stats...
The hardest thing for me, in a lot of ways, is to be mindful about food. I'll spend hours prepping food, and then I'll shove it all into my mouth in 10 minutes. That's not the way it's supposed to be, and I think that long-term weight control must involve retraining myself about this particular thing. It is really not easy.
Tomorrow we start on a two-day drive to Maine, where we'll spend some unknown amount of time, depending on how comfortable Michael is there. Originally we'd thought that Mom would come up, that all the family would be there. Seems beyond unlikely at the moment. So we will have this little bit of time there... it's the first time I've been to my family home in probably five years, maybe more... since I realized that there was no point to going somewhere that only made me unhappy. But that was a different time, a different set of circumstances, a different marriage. I'm hoping that this will be better.
I'm also hoping that I can make sensible food choices both on the way and when we get there. Weight is going well this week, and I don't want to screw it up for the sake of travel. It's just not worth it.
Saturday, June 28, 2008
More Grim News
My mother's been in the hospital all week, heart issues (periocarditis) on top of everything else. And they drained off some of the fluid around her heart and found bits of tumor in the fluid. Which is really bad news.
I want to believe that there's a happy ending here, but I don't. They haven't even decided if they're going to continue the chemotherapy at this point. I really have no idea what's happening in the grand scheme of things, but it's looking increasingly like we're talking about a matter of months.
I don't know what to do, really. How to think about this. What I am supposed to be doing. I just hate it. And I know that on top of everything else, my role in this is already fixed. I'm going to have to be the strong one, the person who stays put together. I don't want to be. I want to be comforted. I want someone else to deal with this. I want to be someone else. And none of these things are in the choice set.
I don't think that there's any way to ever be ready for this kind of thing.
It's all not exactly a low-carb, weight loss topic, but in a weird way, it kind of is, too... I mean, sustaining weight loss is about doing it even when the rest of your life is happening, not just when all the things are lined up to make weight loss easy. Easier anyway. And that's part of the challenge here... how we are going to get through whatever happens next, while trying like hell to do the things that we need to do to save our own lives.
Michael is frustrated and discouraged, anyway. We went to the physical therapist last week, and she gave him a set of exercises to strengthen his legs... and apparently he overdid it, more pain, one more thing. I know that at some point this will get better, that the curve will reach a peak and things for him will get better rather than worse. But it is so hard to watch him, angry and frustrated and sad. I can't help him, and I can't help (apparently) being dragged into it... I mean, how can you watch someone you love being miserable and then just go on and do your stuff? I can't. I just don't know how to.
I want to believe that there's a happy ending here, but I don't. They haven't even decided if they're going to continue the chemotherapy at this point. I really have no idea what's happening in the grand scheme of things, but it's looking increasingly like we're talking about a matter of months.
I don't know what to do, really. How to think about this. What I am supposed to be doing. I just hate it. And I know that on top of everything else, my role in this is already fixed. I'm going to have to be the strong one, the person who stays put together. I don't want to be. I want to be comforted. I want someone else to deal with this. I want to be someone else. And none of these things are in the choice set.
I don't think that there's any way to ever be ready for this kind of thing.
It's all not exactly a low-carb, weight loss topic, but in a weird way, it kind of is, too... I mean, sustaining weight loss is about doing it even when the rest of your life is happening, not just when all the things are lined up to make weight loss easy. Easier anyway. And that's part of the challenge here... how we are going to get through whatever happens next, while trying like hell to do the things that we need to do to save our own lives.
Michael is frustrated and discouraged, anyway. We went to the physical therapist last week, and she gave him a set of exercises to strengthen his legs... and apparently he overdid it, more pain, one more thing. I know that at some point this will get better, that the curve will reach a peak and things for him will get better rather than worse. But it is so hard to watch him, angry and frustrated and sad. I can't help him, and I can't help (apparently) being dragged into it... I mean, how can you watch someone you love being miserable and then just go on and do your stuff? I can't. I just don't know how to.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Doctor Irritation
Yesterday was Doctor Day... a round of seeing just about everyone, I think. Only good thing about it was getting it over with all in one day... although we're having an unexpected trip to the physical therapist today.
First up was our GP, who I have to say is, on the whole, a lovely guy. BUT he's a huge cholesterol cop, and the thing that he's pushed from day one is treating Michael's high LDL. And so we did, in the days before low-carb. We tried a bunch of statin drugs that didn't do much at all but ended up causing such joint pain that Michael found movement just about impossible. This killed about a year for us. We tried some resin thing... I'm not even going to try to spell it because it's not worth looking up... with no particular effects at all. Admittedly, we did not do a good job of taking it regularly, but chugging tons of this stuff only seemed to make constipation an issue. And in the end, we decided, to hell with it. Diet and exercise will help. A low carb diet will increase HDL and reduce triglycerides, and that's the important thing, anyway.
So, yesterday, he again pushed this. I/we said, we have decided not to treat this at this time. And, wow, you could see the temperature in the room change.
Yes, I know that we all get stuck in our own paradigms. I know that he really believes that this is a mistake. I know that he is genuinely concerned about this. BUT it would be nice if he'd display a little interest in something other than this one thing. The slightly worrisome rise in Michael's A1C. Weight loss. The things he's actually having a problem with. Managing diabetes better. The awesome triglyceride drop.
We were both annoyed and dismayed.
I get a little tired of having to fight about this all the time. The most tedious thing about the whole low-carb lifestyle is that some days, you just feel like you're fighting everyone.
First up was our GP, who I have to say is, on the whole, a lovely guy. BUT he's a huge cholesterol cop, and the thing that he's pushed from day one is treating Michael's high LDL. And so we did, in the days before low-carb. We tried a bunch of statin drugs that didn't do much at all but ended up causing such joint pain that Michael found movement just about impossible. This killed about a year for us. We tried some resin thing... I'm not even going to try to spell it because it's not worth looking up... with no particular effects at all. Admittedly, we did not do a good job of taking it regularly, but chugging tons of this stuff only seemed to make constipation an issue. And in the end, we decided, to hell with it. Diet and exercise will help. A low carb diet will increase HDL and reduce triglycerides, and that's the important thing, anyway.
So, yesterday, he again pushed this. I/we said, we have decided not to treat this at this time. And, wow, you could see the temperature in the room change.
Yes, I know that we all get stuck in our own paradigms. I know that he really believes that this is a mistake. I know that he is genuinely concerned about this. BUT it would be nice if he'd display a little interest in something other than this one thing. The slightly worrisome rise in Michael's A1C. Weight loss. The things he's actually having a problem with. Managing diabetes better. The awesome triglyceride drop.
We were both annoyed and dismayed.
I get a little tired of having to fight about this all the time. The most tedious thing about the whole low-carb lifestyle is that some days, you just feel like you're fighting everyone.
Monday, June 23, 2008
Stats, Week of June 23, Breakeven
Michael: -1.1 lbs, 488.68, total loss since January: 54.78 lbs.
Nina: -0 lbs, 278.88, total loss since January: 23.3 lbs.
It's hard to call that really an inspiring result, but I'm not unhappy with it, given that I spent four days in Baltimore pigging out on dried fruit and too much cheese, and Michael spent four days alone here, just eating too much. Both of our weights were up considerably on Friday, and so pretty much a break even result is good.
We go to Maine a week from today, so this week needs to be a good week... we've already lost two summer weeks to travel and, I don't know, just not having a great food week. We're not going to make our June 480/270 goal... pretty far off that really. So... well, undaunted, let's think pushing that goal back a month, trying to be really careful about eating this week, and even more mindful on "vacation" or whatever this trip really is.
Nina: -0 lbs, 278.88, total loss since January: 23.3 lbs.
It's hard to call that really an inspiring result, but I'm not unhappy with it, given that I spent four days in Baltimore pigging out on dried fruit and too much cheese, and Michael spent four days alone here, just eating too much. Both of our weights were up considerably on Friday, and so pretty much a break even result is good.
We go to Maine a week from today, so this week needs to be a good week... we've already lost two summer weeks to travel and, I don't know, just not having a great food week. We're not going to make our June 480/270 goal... pretty far off that really. So... well, undaunted, let's think pushing that goal back a month, trying to be really careful about eating this week, and even more mindful on "vacation" or whatever this trip really is.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Low Carb in Novels
During my Baltimore trip, I rattled through two novels, both of which I enjoyed, but... the second one I read was Anita Shreve's Body Surfing. Now, I have to say, I really enjoyed this book on the whole; Anita Shreve writes beautifully and atmospherically... I think I've read and enjoyed nearly all her novels, and this one was no exception.
But right in the beginning, when she introduces the only character in this book who is pretty much totally unsympathetic... prejudiced and petty and pretentious would all be good descriptive words for her... she also characterizes her as being on a low-carb diet. Note the following excerpts...
"Unlike Mrs. Edwards, who counts her carbs religiously and seems to be hastening herself to an early death with the eggs and meats and cheese she eats in quantity. Even the low-carb ice-cream bars she snacks on at night seem, with their thick, viscous shine, to be depositing cholesterol molecules directly into her bloodstream." (p. 14)
"Ben attacks his lobster with relish. Jeff breaks the soft-shell claws with his fingers and eats the sweet meat without butter. Mrs. Edwards drenches even the smallest shreds in the yellow liquid. No carbs in butter." (p. 19)
"'Bread?' Sydney offers, picking up a basket.
Mrs. Edwards stares. Mrs. Edwards does not eat bread." (p. 23)
Now, possibly, these excerpts aren't really conveying what I'm trying to show, but... well, first of all, there's that media notion, so at odds with all the actual scientific evidence, that a low-carb diet is a ticket to high cholesterol and fatty arteries. That ignorance bothers me. It's like an acceptable prejudice... like, 150 years ago, people would say, oh, Negroes are lazy... and it would be, oh, well, of course they are.... because doesn't everyone think that? Of course a low carb diet causes heart disease. Everybody knows that.
The second part that bothers me is the clear association between a low-carb diet and a character who is implied to be gluttonous. The drenching of the lobster with excessive butter. The quantity of meats and cheeses. It's more "media Atkins", the notion that everyone eating a low-carb diet is pigging out on vast quantities of fatty food.... and that there's something wrong, something vaguely distasteful about it.
I don't think that I've ever read a novel before in which the diet that the person had chosen seems to be saying something about them... and the message was, someone you would like would not eat this way. It really bothered me, this casual, ill-informed perception. It offended me in the same way that I'd be offended if someone said anything that lumps all people together in their characteristics and choices... all redheads are bad-tempered. Wives always nag their husbands. Americans are ill-mannered overseas. Things like that. Things that group people into distasteful things, things that associate innocuous choices with not-so-innocuous behaviors.
As I said, I'm probably making too much of this, but it really bothered me.
But right in the beginning, when she introduces the only character in this book who is pretty much totally unsympathetic... prejudiced and petty and pretentious would all be good descriptive words for her... she also characterizes her as being on a low-carb diet. Note the following excerpts...
"Unlike Mrs. Edwards, who counts her carbs religiously and seems to be hastening herself to an early death with the eggs and meats and cheese she eats in quantity. Even the low-carb ice-cream bars she snacks on at night seem, with their thick, viscous shine, to be depositing cholesterol molecules directly into her bloodstream." (p. 14)
"Ben attacks his lobster with relish. Jeff breaks the soft-shell claws with his fingers and eats the sweet meat without butter. Mrs. Edwards drenches even the smallest shreds in the yellow liquid. No carbs in butter." (p. 19)
"'Bread?' Sydney offers, picking up a basket.
Mrs. Edwards stares. Mrs. Edwards does not eat bread." (p. 23)
Now, possibly, these excerpts aren't really conveying what I'm trying to show, but... well, first of all, there's that media notion, so at odds with all the actual scientific evidence, that a low-carb diet is a ticket to high cholesterol and fatty arteries. That ignorance bothers me. It's like an acceptable prejudice... like, 150 years ago, people would say, oh, Negroes are lazy... and it would be, oh, well, of course they are.... because doesn't everyone think that? Of course a low carb diet causes heart disease. Everybody knows that.
The second part that bothers me is the clear association between a low-carb diet and a character who is implied to be gluttonous. The drenching of the lobster with excessive butter. The quantity of meats and cheeses. It's more "media Atkins", the notion that everyone eating a low-carb diet is pigging out on vast quantities of fatty food.... and that there's something wrong, something vaguely distasteful about it.
I don't think that I've ever read a novel before in which the diet that the person had chosen seems to be saying something about them... and the message was, someone you would like would not eat this way. It really bothered me, this casual, ill-informed perception. It offended me in the same way that I'd be offended if someone said anything that lumps all people together in their characteristics and choices... all redheads are bad-tempered. Wives always nag their husbands. Americans are ill-mannered overseas. Things like that. Things that group people into distasteful things, things that associate innocuous choices with not-so-innocuous behaviors.
As I said, I'm probably making too much of this, but it really bothered me.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Baltimania
Well, here I am in Baltimore. I'm tired and uncomfortable, and I've eaten too much. It's early morning on Wednesday, and every bone in my body aches after two nights on the sofa, and there isn't a chair in this house that I find really comfortable. I'm hoping that I remember this the next time I get some yen for leather furniture... pretty to look at, comfortable for a while, but after a while... sticky, and for me anyway, just not comfy. Some of this is probably my fault; there are sleeping alternatives to the couch, but they all seem like A Lot of Trouble, and so I go to sleep on the couch... and wake up with my legs cramped, and tired and grouchy. And there are these stupid wind chimes, which I am about 10 minutes from throwing over the balcony...
And I'm not eating right, not really. Too much food in general, but also sitting here late-night and reading and eating dried fruit... better, I suppose, than some other choices, but high in sugar, high in calories, definitely not on plan. I feel... well, stuffed and ready to roast. Like the pork I'm cooking today.
Mom is... I don't know. Nauseated a lot of the time; that's the chemo. Frail. It is frightening when you suddenly realize that your mother's hands look like your grandmother's. When did this happen? When did she get this old? It's hard to really know what's happening here, how much of this is the chemo and how much of it is the cancer. Hard to know much of anything. Hard to have any idea what to do, what to think, what to feel. She's more herself than she was last summer after the surgery, just sick all the time... but I have no idea what the next step on this path could possibly be.
And I'm not eating right, not really. Too much food in general, but also sitting here late-night and reading and eating dried fruit... better, I suppose, than some other choices, but high in sugar, high in calories, definitely not on plan. I feel... well, stuffed and ready to roast. Like the pork I'm cooking today.
Mom is... I don't know. Nauseated a lot of the time; that's the chemo. Frail. It is frightening when you suddenly realize that your mother's hands look like your grandmother's. When did this happen? When did she get this old? It's hard to really know what's happening here, how much of this is the chemo and how much of it is the cancer. Hard to know much of anything. Hard to have any idea what to do, what to think, what to feel. She's more herself than she was last summer after the surgery, just sick all the time... but I have no idea what the next step on this path could possibly be.
Monday, June 16, 2008
Stats, Week of June 16, Not Great
Michael: +1.76 lbs, 489.7, total loss since January: 53.7 lbs.
Nina: +0/88 lbs, 278.88, total loss since January: 23.3 lbs.
It's been a very strange week. Among other things, we were in Rochester 6 out of 7 days, and although we ate ok, relatively speaking, while we were out, it threw off our schedule, and we ate a number of things that, while not exactly off-plan, were not what we normally would have chosen. I've felt out of whack all week, tired and bloated, and Michael's still on the mega-dose of naproxen, which doesn't really help anything.
So, fine. You shrug and plan for next week to be better... and I really need it to be; I'm off to Baltimore this morning to see my mother, and it's going to be difficult all around, particularly making sure that the eating stays where it should be while I'm gone for 4 days... for Michael, too. The fact of the matter is that both of us do better from every point of view when we're in the same place. This is the longest that we've been away from each other since we've been married... and it's only 4 days, but still.
Nina: +0/88 lbs, 278.88, total loss since January: 23.3 lbs.
It's been a very strange week. Among other things, we were in Rochester 6 out of 7 days, and although we ate ok, relatively speaking, while we were out, it threw off our schedule, and we ate a number of things that, while not exactly off-plan, were not what we normally would have chosen. I've felt out of whack all week, tired and bloated, and Michael's still on the mega-dose of naproxen, which doesn't really help anything.
So, fine. You shrug and plan for next week to be better... and I really need it to be; I'm off to Baltimore this morning to see my mother, and it's going to be difficult all around, particularly making sure that the eating stays where it should be while I'm gone for 4 days... for Michael, too. The fact of the matter is that both of us do better from every point of view when we're in the same place. This is the longest that we've been away from each other since we've been married... and it's only 4 days, but still.
Saturday, June 14, 2008
It's not going to be a Good Week
I don't know what's happened to this week, really. As much as anything, it's just been incredibly busy, lots of errand-running and little things that have made it chaos all the time. Yesterday my son had his birthday party... we still have a bunch of 14 year olds strewn randomly around the place. And I've had a few college kids working odd jobs and so on... and I've been to Rochester every day this week, which is at least 4 days too many.
And food hasn't been great. Except yesterday when we did indulge in a slice of pizza (just one!) ordered for the party, it's nothing you can really put your finger on. Just a lot of days of eating not quite right, not quite often enough, not the right portion size, things like that. And I think it's all going to weight out to not good at all. I might be wrong, and there are still two days in the week, but I'm not optimistic. And bracing myself.
Everything I post these days seems to be stressed and dismal, but it's how I feel. Things have just been hard lately, lots of nagging things that need doing, the situation with my mother, and a persistent fight that keeps coming back up every couple of days, making us both feel bad without being able to get any kind of resolution on it. It makes all the food things hard, too. Easy though it is for me to maintain this way of eating, it's even easier for me to eat too much... and what I want right now is a kind of comfort that I can't get, that doesn't exist really... but yet that some part of me thinks can be found in food. I want to curl up with a book and... something... and shut out all the persistent negative and sad things in my head. No, it doesn't work. No, I'm not going to do it. But, yes, it seems like it would feel good. And maybe it would, until it was over and, as always, the piper has to be paid.
So we pick up and tidy up the pieces and go on. Make some tea, figure out what my student odd-job kids are going to do today, just move on with it all. And eventually it will feel better.
And food hasn't been great. Except yesterday when we did indulge in a slice of pizza (just one!) ordered for the party, it's nothing you can really put your finger on. Just a lot of days of eating not quite right, not quite often enough, not the right portion size, things like that. And I think it's all going to weight out to not good at all. I might be wrong, and there are still two days in the week, but I'm not optimistic. And bracing myself.
Everything I post these days seems to be stressed and dismal, but it's how I feel. Things have just been hard lately, lots of nagging things that need doing, the situation with my mother, and a persistent fight that keeps coming back up every couple of days, making us both feel bad without being able to get any kind of resolution on it. It makes all the food things hard, too. Easy though it is for me to maintain this way of eating, it's even easier for me to eat too much... and what I want right now is a kind of comfort that I can't get, that doesn't exist really... but yet that some part of me thinks can be found in food. I want to curl up with a book and... something... and shut out all the persistent negative and sad things in my head. No, it doesn't work. No, I'm not going to do it. But, yes, it seems like it would feel good. And maybe it would, until it was over and, as always, the piper has to be paid.
So we pick up and tidy up the pieces and go on. Make some tea, figure out what my student odd-job kids are going to do today, just move on with it all. And eventually it will feel better.
Monday, June 9, 2008
Stats, Week of June 9
Michael: -1.98 lbs, 488.4, total loss since January: 55 lbs.
Nina: -2.4 lbs, 278, total loss since January: 24.2 lbs.
All in all, a very good week. Michael was actually a few pounds lower mid-week, but the leg doctor has him on a course of naproxen that tends to make him retain water, so he's a little bloated.
Today is my son's 14th birthday!
What's for dinner? Either his favorite meal, salmon and asparagus, or perhaps we'll go out for Japanese food.
Nina: -2.4 lbs, 278, total loss since January: 24.2 lbs.
All in all, a very good week. Michael was actually a few pounds lower mid-week, but the leg doctor has him on a course of naproxen that tends to make him retain water, so he's a little bloated.
Today is my son's 14th birthday!
What's for dinner? Either his favorite meal, salmon and asparagus, or perhaps we'll go out for Japanese food.
Saturday, June 7, 2008
It's Saturday Already?
Wow, I just realized that I haven't blogged since Tuesday, so unlike me! It's mostly been just busy here, plus this sudden Northeastern heat wave that makes considering doing anything at all seem insane. And it's been another week of doctor's appointments, and since that always involve a trip to Rochester, it's also the chance to run all the errands that I can't so easily do in my little town. So that was Wednesday and Friday, and Thursday we had a work "retreat"... which is, I think, a polite euphemism for "all day meeting that no one could figure out how to schedule during the regular year." Oh, joy...
Anyway, the good news is that we went to the leg guy yesterday, and he can find nothing structurally wrong with Michael's legs... not even anything degenerative in the knees. The bad news part of that is that he also doesn't know what's wrong... doesn't know why he gets so much pain in that leg. Thinks that it isn't his back, probably... maybe inflammation of the lining of the kneecap... put him on a course of steady anti-inflammatories, come back in 3 weeks. Ok. Michael feels better and worse, I think... better that it's not a lot of things, but worse because... well, what is it? Plus the doctor pushed and pulled his knee around a great deal, didn't hurt at all at the time, became incredibly painful later. Probably the unaccustomed motion, I would guess, but let's hope it's better this morning. (Yes, he's still asleep...)
I don't know. I think that a lot of the bottom line on this is that the only thing that is really going to help a great deal is weight loss. And he is losing weight at a reasonable pace... but yet "a reasonable pace" takes a while when you have a lot to lose. Hard to be patient when its so incapacitating. Hard to be patient when you want to be more active, but more activity just hurts. And you read all these stories of people who lost a lot of weight, and at some point, everyone walks, everyone exercises... and how do you do that when walking for more than a few minutes is so painful?
I am just finding everything in my world so depressing lately, and it's hard to shake. Hard to pick up another day and do the next thing on the list. I have to, but right now, it all just seems like a lot of impossibly hard work.
Anyway, the good news is that we went to the leg guy yesterday, and he can find nothing structurally wrong with Michael's legs... not even anything degenerative in the knees. The bad news part of that is that he also doesn't know what's wrong... doesn't know why he gets so much pain in that leg. Thinks that it isn't his back, probably... maybe inflammation of the lining of the kneecap... put him on a course of steady anti-inflammatories, come back in 3 weeks. Ok. Michael feels better and worse, I think... better that it's not a lot of things, but worse because... well, what is it? Plus the doctor pushed and pulled his knee around a great deal, didn't hurt at all at the time, became incredibly painful later. Probably the unaccustomed motion, I would guess, but let's hope it's better this morning. (Yes, he's still asleep...)
I don't know. I think that a lot of the bottom line on this is that the only thing that is really going to help a great deal is weight loss. And he is losing weight at a reasonable pace... but yet "a reasonable pace" takes a while when you have a lot to lose. Hard to be patient when its so incapacitating. Hard to be patient when you want to be more active, but more activity just hurts. And you read all these stories of people who lost a lot of weight, and at some point, everyone walks, everyone exercises... and how do you do that when walking for more than a few minutes is so painful?
I am just finding everything in my world so depressing lately, and it's hard to shake. Hard to pick up another day and do the next thing on the list. I have to, but right now, it all just seems like a lot of impossibly hard work.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Of Fructose, Hares, and Darwin
Once you stop eating sugar for a while, the thing you really notice is how sweet a lot of things are. And if that sweet thing is a prepared food, you can just bet that one of the major ingredients will be either sugar or, far worse, high fructose corn syrup. I was making a salad dressing today, thinking Michael would be a little less bored with another salad lunch if it had a creamy dressing rather than my usual olive oil and a little balsamic vinegar. Put in some mayo, put in some sour cream, put in some crushed garlic, a little salt and pepper, a little dill, a little chipotle chili powder... yum! But I thought, this needs some bite. So I added some of a product I've used for years, Marukan seasoned rice vinegar. Never thought very much about what it was seasoned with, until my dressing turned sickly sweet. Turns out, right toward the top of the list is high fructose corn syrup. Sigh. Another product I won't be buying any more (at 5 carbs per tablespoon, and all of that from sugars).
The dressing actually wasn't bad on the salad, although it would have been better if less sweet. Reminded me, a little weirdly, of this horrible dish that my mother used to make, a sliced hardboiled egg with Thousand Island dressing over it. I think this is one of the things that people made in the 60s, along with Jell-O molds with fruit and whipped cream. It was revolting.
Anyway, I got this wonderful cookbook in the mail today. It's called Simple French Cooking, by X. Marcel Boulestin, and it was published in the 1920s as a guide to British cooks and their mistresses. That's mistresses as in employers, not the other kind! Back from the time when it was reasonable to think that a lot of people would have a cook. This book is just marvelous to read if you like old recipes. My favorite so far is the Lievre a la Royale, which I think translates to something like Royal Hare. The beginning of this recipe starts: "Bone the hare. Prepare a stuffing of truffled foie gras cut in slices, a quarter of a pound of veal and pork mixed, salt and pepper; arrange the minced meat between the slices of foie gras and remodel the hare." Remodel the hare??? Add an extra room and some wallpaper? The rest of the directions include cooking for 12 hours. I am dying to try this but I have no idea where I would get a hare. Or truffled foie gras.
The really interesting thing is that the vast majority of these recipes are rich but incredibly low carb. (And, by the way, just how big is "a good piece of butter?")
The preface to the book includes a quote from Darwin that I'd never heard before:
"Even the headless oyster seems to profit from experience."
The dressing actually wasn't bad on the salad, although it would have been better if less sweet. Reminded me, a little weirdly, of this horrible dish that my mother used to make, a sliced hardboiled egg with Thousand Island dressing over it. I think this is one of the things that people made in the 60s, along with Jell-O molds with fruit and whipped cream. It was revolting.
Anyway, I got this wonderful cookbook in the mail today. It's called Simple French Cooking, by X. Marcel Boulestin, and it was published in the 1920s as a guide to British cooks and their mistresses. That's mistresses as in employers, not the other kind! Back from the time when it was reasonable to think that a lot of people would have a cook. This book is just marvelous to read if you like old recipes. My favorite so far is the Lievre a la Royale, which I think translates to something like Royal Hare. The beginning of this recipe starts: "Bone the hare. Prepare a stuffing of truffled foie gras cut in slices, a quarter of a pound of veal and pork mixed, salt and pepper; arrange the minced meat between the slices of foie gras and remodel the hare." Remodel the hare??? Add an extra room and some wallpaper? The rest of the directions include cooking for 12 hours. I am dying to try this but I have no idea where I would get a hare. Or truffled foie gras.
The really interesting thing is that the vast majority of these recipes are rich but incredibly low carb. (And, by the way, just how big is "a good piece of butter?")
The preface to the book includes a quote from Darwin that I'd never heard before:
"Even the headless oyster seems to profit from experience."
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