Boredom

Almost everyone I know who is on a diet, attempting to diet, wanting to diet, etc becomes bored with their meals.  Boredom makes it so much easier to justify making bad nutritional choices and if you haven't noticed I'm a master of that mentality.  That's why mu hubby requested that I introduce a few new recipes a month so we don't become so bored with eating the same things week after week.  We've been together 8 years (married 2) this summer and when I think about all the times I've made our "staple meals" week after week its extremely easy to see how and where the boredom started. 

When I met my hubby I was 24 and could barely cook.  I didn't understand what flavors went together, why they were good together even really the concept of "good food."  At that point I was eating just because I was hungry without considering nutritional value or flavor quality.  Of course at my first real job right out of college I went up 2 pants sizes...talk about embarrassing.  Well I held onto those 2 pant sizes until I got pregnant.  Now I'm definitely above those 2 pants sizes and desperately wanting to go back to them as quickly as possible..that's goal #1.  Goal #2 is to eliminate those 2 pant sizes and get back to what I consider my "happy weight."  I'll consider myself at my "happy weight" when I'm not embaressed to wear shorts or just above the knee skirts and dresses out in public.  

Anyhow, I say all that to say that learning to cook for yourself is extremely important.  Everytime I hear anyone, male or female, announce proudly that they don't cook, it makes me very ill for them.  I turn into one of those ranting know-it-alls who lectures the youngin's on the value of cooking, and cleaning - this rant is for another day, for yourself.  Do yourself a favor and spend 5 minutes researching new recipes with flavors that you're curious about.  You have no one else to blame if you are bored with your diet...you have full control over everything you put into your body.  With millions of web sites, cooking blogs, cook books, magazines, tv shows, podcasts (you see where I'm going) there's no excuse not to feel free to experiment!  If you are using a small budget as your excuse then you should take some time to evaluate how much money are you spending on the foods that you don't enjoy and reallocate that money for foods that you do.  My opinion, if you enjoy it and it has nutritional value then its a much better investment since you won't be throwing food, or money away.  Just be reasonable and stay within your grocery budget.  

Some of my favorites:
www.foodnetwork.com
www.allrecipes.com
www.onceamonthmom.com
www.realsimple.com
www.tasteofhome.com

Monday, June 20, 2011 - last days of pregnancy

Truth be told I am sick to death of the diet that I'm eating and with some meals I do fine and others I do not.  Today I was a little over my allotted 2,000 calories and could have remedied that with a walk after work.  Fortunately/unfortunately the nap that I desperately needed won and I slept on the couch for a while before cooking dinner.  I only say unfortunately because I could have really used the exercise.  Anyhow, the day's breakfast was deplorable (remember what I said about not letting yourself get too hungry). I also skipped my morning snack, which I do quite often when I eat breakfast late.  I planned my afternoon snack badly and forgot my cheese stick so all I had was the ice cream. Today, Tuesday, I have my little red lunch bag packed and I'm ready!

Sunday, June 19, 2011 - the final pregnancy days

I'll finally meet my girl at the end of this week...SO EXCITED!!  I spent Saturday cooking a few freezer meals to so we won't starve for the first week or so.  I made 2 meatloafs, spaghetti sauce 4 bags, meatballs to go with the spaghetti sauce, and a chicken dish that we'll probably eat for supper tonight.   My husband and I suck at eating leftovers so its my goal with pretty much every meal produce as little food as possible.  Sometimes I'll leave 1 or 2 portions for lunch the next day depending on the meal.  That being said when I engage in freezer cooking I bag everything into single meal (single meaning enough for both hubby and me) portions. My sister shared this web site with me and its become my new obsession.  www.onceamonthmom.com  I don't subscribe to a particular meal plan.  I basically just read all of the recipes and save/print the ones that I think hubby and I will enjoy.  Like everyone else, we have our staples that we eat every week but I like to throw in a new recipe a few times a month.  This week I cooked a recipe that was clipped from Taste of Home Magazine.  Certainly not the healthiest meal I've made but it was pretty tasty and oddly enough didn't effect my blood sugar at all.

http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/RWOP-Finalist--Joy-Bundles-and-Rice

Yesterday's calorie count:
Breakfast notes: My morning coffee (very carefully measured - 2 tbsp of half and half, 3 tsp sugar..I don't use artificial sweetners anymore watch "Sweet Misery" on hulu and you'll question it yourself).  I drink it every morning and it RARELY effects my blood sugar so I keep the carb count the way it is.
"Sweet Misery"   http://www.hulu.com/watch/162709/sweet-misery
warning its an hour and half long so be sure you have time to watch it. 

Lunch notes: Hubby cooked Ruben sandwiches Butter - eek! side note: everything my husband cooks includes butter and I just try not to look to see how much he uses.  He's 6'2" and 180 lbs soaking wet with incredible metabolism, I so hope my daughter gets this in the genetic lottery, so gargantuan amounts of butter don't concern/effect his thigh quite the way they do mine.

Dinner notes: Joy Bundles Recipe with Rice link posted above.  Livestrong.com gives you the option to key in an entire recipe and then tell the counter how much of the recipe you ate.  Its one of their best features.  :)

Random note:  My calorie count according to the diabetic counselor is supposed to around 2,000 a day.  Livestrong won't let me key this in manually so it insists that I am well over my calorie count and that's not actually the case. 

Favorite Foods - LONG POST

As you can read in previous postings I have gestational diabetes which really just means that I'm diabetic in this pregnancy.  I can tell you after months of my assigned diet, sticking my fingers 4 times a day, and tracking my blood sugar obsessively that this isn't the life I want.  Losing the baby weight, and the other 20 lbs) is pretty high on my priority list.  That being said I'll probably stick to a hybrid of the diet I was assigned to help get this weight off.  Just as a reminder, the plan consists of 3 meals and 3 snacks per day.  The combination of foods that are eaten during those times are the key to making it work.  It goes like this breakfast (meal), morning snack, lunch (meal), afternoon snack, dinner (meal), bedtime snack.  Most diabetics do not eat a bedtime snack but gestational diabetics do.  My favorite food combinations are:

Breakfast: (2 oz meat, 2 carbs - NO FRUIT)

• 1 egg, 2 slices of sugar free toast with butter and a reasonable amount of jelly
• 1 thin bagel with ham (1 oz) and cheese (1 oz)
• 1 mozzarella cheese stick (1 oz) with ham (1oz) wrapped around it for my meat and my carb is Dannon Greek Yogurt (Vanilla) with 1/8 c. of my favorite granola

• Fast Food Faves: 
•   McDonald's Egg McMuffin..not the best choice but its lower in carbs than the other options I would prefer to eat.  

Lunch: (3 oz meat, 2 carbs)

• Ham sandwich - 2 slices sugar free bread, reasonable amount of lite mayo, ham (2oz), slice of cheese (1oz), and pickles.  I eat cut up carrots and cucumbers as a side as they are considered a "free" item.
• Carefully measured leftovers from dinner
• Cottage cheese (3 oz) with 30 grapes (equals 2 carbs)
• Garden Salads of any sort, no croutons and beware of creamy dressings, added fruits (those are carbs) and any fried meat (breading = carb) thrown on top.  

• Fast Food Faves: 
• Wendy's Ceaser Salad, small chicken nuggets with bbq sauce (this is a little indulgent in the carb department so I don't eat it often). 

• Restaurant Faves: 
• The Grill's Black and Blue Salad, minus the blue (not a fan) with wine and cheese dressing.  I never use a full serving of dressing because its a creamy dressing and that equals extra carbs.  
• Zaxby's Chicken Zalad - opt for the grilled chicken and avoid the huge chunk of texas toast and the croutons.  
• Veggies plates and carefully calculated blue plate specials from various local sources..just watch all the extra salt and fat added to them 

 * notice the trend with all the salads when eating out...its really the only way I can eat out with such strict limitations on my carb consumption.

Dinner: (3 oz meat, 3 carbs)

• Chicken stir-fry that we make at home
• Caprese Salad with 2 oz of spaghetti and my homemade spaghetti sauce
• Homemade BLTs with ham, sugar-free bread and lite mayo
• Various baked chicken dishes with a veggie and rice, potatoes, fruit, whatever carb I have on hand.   A personal fave is half of a chicken breast pounded out flat and rolled up with a slice of ham and swiss cheese.  
• An artichoke stuffed pork tenderloin recipe that I found on http://diabeticgourmet.com/ with a veggie and a carb side.  
• Any of the fast food or restaurant faves

Daytime Snacks: (1 oz meat, 2 carbs)

• 1 mozzarella cheese stick and yogurt with granola
• 1 tbsp peanut butter with 1 apple
• 1 tbsp peanut butter with 1 banana
• 1 mozzarella stick and a plain vanilla ice cream cone from Sonic ** discovered this in the last few weeks.  The web site claims that the plain vanilla ice cream cone only has 30 carbs!! 
• 1 mozzarella stick and a granola bar
• 0.25 c. cottage cheese with 30 grapes or 1 c. strawberries
• mozzarella stick and fruit of choice
• sliced cheddar and 30 g worth of crackers or fruit of choice

*Guess which item I'm not going to be eating a lot of anymore.  The mozzarella cheese sticks will go on my "I Just Can't Eat Them Anymore List" next to Ramen Noodles, Hamburger Helper, and Easy Mac that I abandoned after college.  Hopefully they won't be there permanently but for right now the thought of another cheese stick kind of makes me gag. 

Bedtime Snack (2 carbs - NO FRUIT)

• 8 oz milk and a granola bar
• 8 oz milk and 6 vanilla wafers
• Dannon Greek Vanilla yogurt with 1/8 c. of granola 

My biggest lessons from this diet plan:

• Small portions are really all you need - Your stomach really is only as big as your fist and you don't need to overfill it to be satisfied.  If a pregnant lady can curb her eating then I'm convinced anyone can.  
• Do not let yourself get too hungry because you WILL make a bad nutritional choice and that's not good for you or your child or anyone for that matter.
• Motherhood means sacrifice and you'll do anything to ensure that your child is healthy..including giving up a life-long sugar addiction.  
• Sugar and fatty foods are a luxury not a need.  You're body doesn't NEED any of that stuff to survive, even though your brain will attempt to convince you otherwise.
• Going for a walk after a bad nutritional choice will always make you feel better and can even drop your blood sugar up to 30 points.  Just do yourself a favor and walk at least 30 minutes a day and you'll always feel better even if your blood sugar isn't out of whack. 

Foods I'm really looking forward to eating again..in moderation of course ;)

• CEREAL!!  I've missed it so much
• FRUIT!!
• Dessert of any sort..I have a ferocious craving for a double stuffed oreo blast from sonic.
• Half and half sweet tea
• Pretty much anything that is guaranteed to help me retain the weight I need to lose after baby.  I'm planning to eat my favorite foods again in moderation and am really just looking forward to the satisfaction of knowing that  I can have them whenever I want them again. 

Back Again..Hopefully for Good this Time

Someone reminded me today that I need to start blogging again so I'm back until my newborn takes me away again in a few days.  I am 38 weeks pregnant, 32 pounds gained (more than I wanted but still great considering), and growing more and more anxious to meet my baby girl.  My doctor says that my blood sugar readings look great, my blood pressure looks great, he's happy with my weight gain and my baby's growth.  Because of my gestational diabetes diagnosis he is absolutely going to induce me a little early and says that's 100% the only reason he's doing it.  If I didn't have this one complication then he would let me go until she came on her own or I went past my due date.  My only job currently is to be strict about my diet so baby girl doesn't gain too much weight in the next 6 days. 

Here's a peek at how I'm looking so far.  The first picture is from my wedding in June of 2009 and the second from today (June 2011).  In all fairness I didn't want to use a 2010 pic because I was pregnant last summer (almost through the first trimester at this point) and subsequently miscarried (sucked in the worst way but its okay I can talk about it fairly easily now) so it wouldn't be a fair comparison.  Not to mention I just felt beautiful and thin on my wedding day and who doesn't love a good wedding picture?  Oh and don't mention to my super private hubby that his pic is posted on my blog.  I just thought it would look stupid if you couldn't see the whole pic and my photographer's wordmark really needs to be present.