Conquer my Food Issues

No, I don’t have an eating disorder. I have a disorder with eating. I did have a food allergy/sensitivity test done about a year ago and through my own denial. .well. .that’s a strong word. Ignorance? Forgetfulness? The feeling is between denial and ignorance with a dash of forgetfulness.

Let’s review what I need to avoid at all times. The scale is 1-5, 5 being the highest.

Oh. Right.

Moo-ve Over
Anyhow, I have been eating a lot of dairy. A lot of dairy for me is about a tablespoon of Greek yogurt a couple times a week coupled with cheese at least once a week. I was getting into Greek yogurt as a way to get some more protein into my NutriBullet shakes and totally forgot I needed to avoid dairy.

Why? Because I normally don’t do anything with dairy - I don’t drink milk or eat cereal or use a dairy creamer in my coffee. I only like to snack on artisan type cheeses with wine, so, I don’t put cheese on any foods I make. Unless it’s really a slight amount.

Enter the issues.

Weed-whacker in my tummy plus fun-runs to the bathroom, brain fog, body pain - all this had me worried until I double checked my card and realized I was doing it all to myself.

Reasons
Most of this is my fault. I actually just went off living as a normal person because I thought I could.

I evaluated why – you know, in my brain. Since, in my world, a lot of people make fun of whatever health issue I am going through or look at me like it’s impossible I have the  issues I have, it becomes very easy for me to convince myself I’m completely normal and nothing is wrong. A lot of this has to do with making other people feel ok to be around me and the other half is people trying to be “supportive” and telling me I can do anything. The truth is, I can’t. Sometimes, when everyone is convinced nothing is wrong with you, you start to believe it since no one is actually looking out for you.

I do my best to keep my sense of humor about being difficult but I know I’m a major bummer.

The Test
Not completely convinced – I did an experiment.

This is about 1,040 calories

I should add, I thought maybe I was lactose intolerant even though my symptoms do not match up with it. My brother is lactose intolerant and responds to the tablets. I did not take any tablets. Some of this is because my blood test shows the issues with milk as a whole which is not the same as a lactose intolerance.

Anyhow - for science I ate an entire quart of Zhwahels Ice Cream – which is some of the best ice cream around. Additionally, it was the Black Raspberry Krisp that my friend Tee and I feel in love with 5 years ago that was never produced after. It delicious blackberry ice cream with these chunks of sweet oatmeal crisp clusters.

*drool*

I communicated to Zwahlens Twitter that I missed Blackberry Crisp and they said they can’t make it because of the lack of blackberries. However, black raspberries are pretty good, too, and Tee bought us like a gallon of the Black Raspberry Krisp.

So, I ate my quart.

Aftermath
I do not want to eat dairy anymore. Ever.

I think that was the fastest anything has ever moved through my system. Parts of my dinner didn't even get their full time in my digestive tract. I even had the awesome green stuff coming out my back-end - which is actually bile - proving:

1. I eat a lot of greens (less likely, by the way).
2. Gastrointestinal Malabsorption: Cow's milk being one of the causes.

Eww, Manda, that's so disgusting. You wrote about poop!

You know what, padre? Everyone poops and those who do not poop probably wish they did. People are all supportive and happy about what goes in the front end but never pay attention to the back-end. I am here to educate you - your body can send you thousands of signals through poop in how it is processing food, using food and if you have anything from dehydration to an allergy to cancer.

Ever seen undigested food in the bowl, paco? That means your body is revolting it back-end style and can't digest it. That tells you a lot.

Respect the poop! Learn about your body. Make poop you are proud of!

Anyhow. . .

Lucky, my foster cat, summed up how my soul felt the rest of the night and into the next day.

Shame

Future Plans
Cheese will have to be sheep's milk from now on. It's ok, I like cheese and sheep's milk cheese. I just have to be careful and check it to make sure.

I will miss ice cream (not for a little while, though) so my friend Tee gave me tons of thoughts about coconut milk ice cream, sheep's ice cream (I wanna try it, but, hard to find) and other types of ice cream. I might have to give them a go.

Anyhow, lesson learned.

I will be sticking to my little chart and avoiding those things that bother me. I have a feeling I will be much happier in many ways. Since my totally desirable man-friend, Bob, also needs to avoid some food after he had the same test done, we can do this together.

Be Part of the Adventure
Do you have a suggestion or want to see me attempt something? Drop me an email at AdventuringAmanda@gmail.com with your suggestions.

Diet Challenges Again

Mission Level
Fail-ish

A while back, I stated I was going to try three separate diets to expand my horizons. I succeeded in being a vegan for 7 days - you can find that in my Vegan Challenge post.

Why Fail?
I originally wanted to try three types of diets. I really struggle figuring out the two others ones I stated I was going to do. If you remember, they were:

• Vegan: No animal products or by-products allowed.
• Locavore: Food only can come from the local area where you live.
• Islamic: Diet derived from commandments found in the Qur'an, the Hadith and Sunnah.

Throwing in the Towel
I'm just giving up on this. It's lent and I guess I lost a lot of steam when I comes to doing these things. I haven't been eating as much as I have been (I actually lost about 5lbs) so trying to fit into one of these diets would actually be pretty easy. The vegan thing was the hardest.

Being Healthy
The original challenge was to "eat a normal, healthy diet." I did re-join with MyFitnessPal with a couple friends, so, I have been tracking my food and making some good choices.

A not good choice was eating an entire box of Caramel deLites aka Samoas. I call them Samoas which I believe is not considered offensive. I never mean to offend - I just always knew them as Samoas. Anyhow, I would like to say I won that battle but I did spend a little time in the bathroom that night. Yep. Awesome.

Be Part of the Adventure

Do you have a suggestion or want to see me attempt something? Drop me an email at AdventuringAmanda@gmail.com with your suggestion.

Diet Challenge Research

Me eating a pear

First of all, the vegan thing is going pretty good. I am not sure, but, I am toying with the idea of maybe trying this for two weeks - I have a couple ideas I think I want to explore with the whole food thing. I'll let you all know on Monday.

The point of this post is to sort of outline what you should be doing and thinking about if you decide to change up your eating habits and diet.

When you are going to engage in some type of new diet, it’s important to get some of your facts straight.


What Is A Calorie?
I think most of us think calories are bad – unless you are trying to gain weight or you are in some type of training and know you need more fuel. Then calories are little bits of fear and evil, but, rather important building blocks of success.

In fact, that is what calories are – fuel. So much like fuel for your car, you want to make sure you have a nice, full tank but you don’t want to try to overfill it.

Calories aren't bad. You need them to live. The problem is getting enough or getting too many. This is over a long-term but can be managed short-term. After all, if I end up eating 2000 calories at an awesome party or in front of the TV, it’s not going to impact me that much. Doing it every night is.

Keep in mind, we only know the value of calories in food by setting the food on fire. In the case of very watery foods (like watermelon) scientist dehydrate the food then set it on fire. A calorie is then the approximate amount of energy needed to increase the temperature of 1 kilogram of water by 1 kelvin.

Goooo science!

Nutrition
Beyond calories, it’s important to get good foods in you. Good fuel, good calories – yum. I could easily eat all my calories in potato chips and ice cream, but, that’s not the best diet. It’s important to eat nutritional dense foods with vitamins and fiber and protein and carbs and all this good stuff your body needs for energy, tissue regeneration and, of course, pooping.

I also happen to take a good amount of vitamins because my body sucks those things up like a Dyson.

Calories, You and a Diet
Before you pick a diet you want to try or stick too, you want to make sure you know how many calories you need to function. You can find calculators online to help you – just make sure you know this is purely an estimate and nothing is set in stone. It’s a good place to start, not the end-all-be-all of your world. Things can change if you decide to workout more.

For example, at least 2 weeks a month I am in a classroom standing, pacing and doing some occasional soft shoe at work. The rest of the time, I am pretty much sitting at a desk. When I am biking in the warmer months (and going to pick it up again soon, now that the snow is off the trail) I’m going to be burning more calories.

I used this Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) Calculator to figure out how many calories I burn in a day just living.

So, as of right now, I am 5’6 about 140lbs. In the morning I weight about 135, by night I weigh about 137. It’s a normal flux, but, I call it 140.

Using the calculator, (and claiming I live a remarkable sedentary lifestyle right now) I estimate I need about 1710 calories a day to maintain my weight. In whatever diet I choose, I need to eat this 1710 calories in order to maintain my weight. I can break it up anyway I want, for example:

• Breakfast: 174.
• Lunch: 592
• Dinner: 542
• Snack: 402

Obviously, if i wanted to lose weight, I have to eat less than 1710 calories or I need to burn off calories through physical activity.

My Food Story
I have been fat and skinny – I actually weight the lest I ever did right now. I normally was in the 145-150 range but I have weighed as much as 185-195. Eating and food has posed extensive problems from me while sick.
Weight gain issues:

• My thyroid crashed a few times.
• Medications caused me to gain weight.

Weight loss issues:

• I puked. A lot.
• I developed OCD - I could not eat certain foods without anxiety, so, I avoided them.
• I lost the ability to feel hungry.

I learned the importance of food as fuel when I could not eat a lot. I found quinoa was easy on my digestive tract and packed full of good nutrition to keep me going and support my system.

In bike training, I ate more than I ever ate before. The idea that foods that people said were bad (pizza, Poptarts, etc) actually had a real and important place in my diet amazed me. I went from eating anything and everything to learning I could use this hunger to create better rides for myself. I discovered paella and my life changed.

Conclusions
Whatever you reason for trying out a new diet or taking on a challenge to learn something, be sure you are safe about it. Visit a registered dietitian or nutritionist to help you come up with a plan. Make sure you know what you need to keep you going, make sure you try new things when you can and find things that are delicious and good for you.

Be Part of the Adventure

Do you have a suggestion or want to see me attempt something? Drop me an email at AdventuringAmanda@gmail.com with your suggestion.