How tall are you?

5′ 2″

You need to eat more (insert food items here).

I’m working to eat local, seasonal, real foods as much as possible. This means that you will see a lot of colorful vegetables during spring/summer/fall, and a lot of root vegetables during the winter. Meat raised in a manner I agree with is very expensive, so we try to limit our meat consumption. My skin is a lot clearer when I eat less meat so I know my body agrees with my choice! I did the weight management test through Inherent Health and based on my results I try to focus on eating minimally processed carbohydrates (avoiding things like white flour and white rice) while still trying to focus on local and seasonal foods. My overarching goal is to eat as our ancestors did, before industrial foods and when they didn’t have every fruit/vegetable/meat available to them all year round.

Why don’t you switch to low fat or fat free dairy products?

I switched to whole dairy products when I started learning about how ultra-pasteurization affects the taste and nutrients found in dairy products. Those interested in the real movement should check out http://realmilk.com/. I am also wary of the oxidized cholesterol found in the milk powder added back to reduced fat milks. For me it’s not only about pasteurization, but also avoiding milk produced by factory farmed cows, which are fed all sorts of nasty things, missing out on the grass and fresh air that make their byproducts better for us to consume. Grass fed milk/butter/cheese has more omega-3s than the stuff you find cheap at the grocery store. Plus, whole dairy makes me incredibly happy because it tastes so good!

Why don’t you try (insert diet type here)?

I grew up in a household that was filled with talk of this diet or that diet, surrounded by women who were so sure that Atkins or Weight Watchers or Lean Cuisine would have the answer for them. My sophmore year of college I read a book called Intuitive Eating (and even took a college course based on it!) and decided to give up formal diet programs altogether. Calories in versus calories out is king, and I’m working to incorporate my views on local/seasonal/real foods with the idea that I need to make my output greater than my input.

Regarding Weight Watchers specifically, I used to really dislike the program, until the changes they announced in 2010. I still dislike that they push so many “fake food products”, they are a business after all, but I like that the new PointsPlus system emphasizes fruits and vegetables more. Under the old system an apple had the same value as a bag of pretzels, but they are now working to emphasize fruits and vegetables and followers can see that eating an apple versus a cookie doesn’t meant the same thing (even if they have the same number of calories). As I said above though, I’m no longer interested in formal diet plans based on my past experiences with them. Weight Watchers would work for me because of the accountability, but my food blog takes care of that for me!

Is everything you eat pictured?

Yes, unless I say otherwise in the text of the post. I try to note whether I’m eating on salad plates or dinner plates if it isn’t obvious, but sometimes I forget.

Do you exercise?

It’s something I’m always working at doing more often. When I do exercise I try to note it in the post for that day. I also wear a Bodybugg and try to reach an average daily calorie burn of 2500 calories per day. I recently started the C25K program and I find myself actually looking forward to my runs on M-W-F! I use the iphone app and highly recommend it. I sometimes play Dance Dance Revolution, run up between 30-60 flights of stairs on laundry day, and I recently signed up for a Groupon that allows me to attend 10 dance classes at a studio in Chicago.

You aren’t eating enough.

This answer is the most complicated. I’ve been discussing this frequently with That Husband, and for right now this is what we’ve come up with. The set-point theory sounds very solid to me, and I believe that I am fighting with this personally. My body likes having fat reserves to depend on in times of famine, and calorie deprivation causes my body to hoard what little reserves it has saved up in case I am for some reason unable to get to food when I need it. If only I could convince my body that we now live in a time when food isn’t something to worry about, but that is not the case. Though I lost a significant amount of weight previously focusing on calorie restriction and not using exercise as much as I should have, that loss happened over a period of about 2 years and I would like to see dramatic results much faster this time.

I read Martin Berkan’s article Top Ten Fasting Myths Debunked several months ago, and although I realize that his blog has a body-building-training focus I like his argument that we are surrounded by a lot of myths when it comes to when to eat, how much, and how often because one person or a group of people suggested something and the idea stuck with us, even if the evidence doesn’t prove the hypothesis. To quote his thoughts on the idea that meal skipping causes “starvation mode”:

Looking at the numerous studies I’ve read, the earliest evidence for lowered metabolic rate in response to fasting occurred after 60 hours (-8% in resting metabolic rate). Other studies show metabolic rate is not impacted until 72-96 hours have passed (George Cahill has contributed a lot on this topic).

Seemingly paradoxical, metabolic rate is actually increased in short-term fasting. For some concrete numbers, studies have shown an increase of 3.6% - 10% after 36-48 hours (Mansell PI, et al, and Zauner C, et al). This makes sense from an evolutionary perspective. Epinephrine and norepinephrine (adrenaline/noradrenaline) sharpens the mind and makes us want to move around. Desirable traits that encouraged us to seek for food, or for the hunter to kill his prey, increasing survival. At some point, after several days of no eating, this benefit would confer no benefit to survival and probably would have done more harm than good; instead, an adaptation that favored conservation of energy turned out to be advantageous. Thus metabolic rate is increased in short-term fasting (up to 60 hours).

Source

After Christmas 2010 I felt awful. I was bloated, lethargic, and I craved insane amounts of fat and sugar because I had been eating insane amounts of fat and sugar for days. Beginning January 1st I really focused on eating absolutely only when I was hungry, and as the days passed I started feeling like I needed less and less to feel satisfied. I stopped feeling guilty about not eating breakfast and soon I wasn’t eating until two or three in the afternoon, and if I only felt hungry enough to eat one meal that day, that’s all I ate. I’m not going to worry about three square meals a day, or six small meals, or eat like a king/prince/pauper or any of the other sayings. I eat based on what I think my body needs. I admit I love to run with nothing in my stomach, it feels great!

It’s definitely a system that I’m refining over time, as there are days when I get a headache right before bed and I recognize that it’s because I didn’t eat enough that day. I take stock of how much I ate the day before and try to make sure that I don’t make the same mistake the next time. I’ve talked this over with TH countless times and we both feel comfortable trying to do things this way for awhile. Everything is going to be based on the way I feel, and as long as I feel good, I’m going to keep doing it.