Hi again chaps of the universe!
Last time we talked a bit about some of the foods I eat, and about eating and drinks at restaurants.
I thought today I'd elaborate a little on what I eat daily.
Recently I had shoulder surgery, so the diet has been a bit odd since I've been stuck at home; however, usually I work in the City/CBD area of my home city, Adelaide. Its a pain to lug a lunchbox in everyday and there are loads of food options, so a lot of the time I end up buying lunch in town.
Something I noticed though was that almost no fast food joints were doing lower carb optioned food. In fact, I had one Chinese Stall under David Jones's server almost yell at me for asking for no rice. She wanted to me to pay more for the same portion size without rice; and couldn't understand that I wasn't actually asking for more meat; I just didn't wantthe rice.
But I digress.
I realised something important shortly after that. And that was when I began going to the supermarket on my lunch break. This is a seriously great option for those working in close proximity to a supermarket. I walk in, buy a quarter of a hot chicken (About $3) and pick up a nice bottle of either Waterfords Soda or Diet Iced Tea. We don't have a fridge at work yet, but we will soon, and this makes things a great deal easier.
I'm sure someone out there is thinking: But what if I'm not in close proximity to a supermarket; what if I either have to bring it myself or buy it from a deli/cafeteria?
My answer to that is simple. Forward planning.
Y'all gotta buy groceries sometimes. Plan out your meals for a week, two weeks. Purchase enough chicken or meat or meat substitute or vegetables that you can cook at home so you can section it into portions and take it along with you. Its a pain in the ass, but like I keep saying we're trying to achieve something here.
And in the even that you DO get stuck eating at say; KFC or Macdonalds, remember that /you don't NEED to eat those chips/, you can leave them. They're a meal stuffer, and you're not starving any Ethiopians by not eating them; you're just treating your body with the respect it deserves. Sure, you're stuck with only having water or Diet Cola to drink in those places, but there ain't no gain without sacrifices here. Or should I say there ain't no losses without sacrifice ;D
Anyway- If you really, really hate water, you can always pack a small bottle of undiluted diet cordial to take with you to work/wherever it is you go every day. Cheap, effective.
I also often snack on plain cheese. And plain bacon, especially at home. Its a really quick, easy snack that has no carbs and doesn't make me feel like a bloated doughy buffoon. If I were a vegan, probably I'd substitute that with straight vegetables such as lightly sauteed Pak Choy or literally eating a cucumber like it was a banana.
Speaking of Fruits... They're actually pretty sugary. Try not to eat more than two peices of fruit a day. Sure, they're "good sugars" (lol) but they are still sugars, and if you're losing weight you need less of them.
Well, I think I've rambled enough for today. Any questions? Shoot. And don't forget that nothing is a substitute for you doing your own research and talking with your local GP or Health Professional, I insist, you can't just take my word for it! Everyone is different and has different needs which should be assessed by a professional. <3
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
What I eat and when.
Aloha, carb counting folks of the universe!
So, this time around I promised to talk about some of the things I eat, in a day, and when.
I was thinking though that it might be more useful to simply talk about some of the foods that I eat that are lower in carb, that I often use to replace typical carb-filled foods for meals. I also thought to mention about Drinks, and eating at Restaurants.
I want to re-stipulate that I DO in fact, eat carbs. This isn't a ketosis diet. I eat between 70-100 grams-ish of carbs in a day, usually. I don't eat any breads if I can help it, but honestly that's a thing about me and wheat, and how we are no longer friends ;D
So, here are some of the foods I replace with:
Bacon
Chicken
Broccoli
Cheese
Eggs
Sausages (Specifically those nice canned hot dogs)
Salad foods such as Lettuce, Avocado, Cucumber
Actual protein-centric products such as Low-Carb brand food bars, and shakes
Steak, and other plain meats
I admit, I'm not very creative with it, but you can also use fish, cooked or uncooked, and there are a myriad of other great vegetables such as pak choy and water chestnuts, google is a great tool for finding out more on that. Its less expensive to buy these things fresh and cook them yourself, and buying meat from a butcher can sometimes be a lot less expensive than buying meat at a supermarket.
I also eat a remarkably large amount of chocolate. S'not as bad for you as you think. Read the packets, take note of the serving sizes in the description vs the carb %.
And now, about Drinks: you can get a surprising amount of diet drinks that taste pretty amazing- you can get diet iced tea, too! I want to reiterate that Juice and Juice Drinks are BAD FOR YOU, though. Very bad. Don't drink juice if you want to loose weight. In fact; if I am gonna go so far- don't drink anything that isn't water or sweetened with a sweetener.
I want to re-stipulate that I DO in fact, eat carbs. This isn't a ketosis diet. I eat between 70-100 grams-ish of carbs in a day, usually. I don't eat any breads if I can help it, but honestly that's a thing about me and wheat, and how we are no longer friends ;D
So, here are some of the foods I replace with:
Bacon
Chicken
Broccoli
Cheese
Eggs
Sausages (Specifically those nice canned hot dogs)
Salad foods such as Lettuce, Avocado, Cucumber
Actual protein-centric products such as Low-Carb brand food bars, and shakes
Steak, and other plain meats
I admit, I'm not very creative with it, but you can also use fish, cooked or uncooked, and there are a myriad of other great vegetables such as pak choy and water chestnuts, google is a great tool for finding out more on that. Its less expensive to buy these things fresh and cook them yourself, and buying meat from a butcher can sometimes be a lot less expensive than buying meat at a supermarket.
I also eat a remarkably large amount of chocolate. S'not as bad for you as you think. Read the packets, take note of the serving sizes in the description vs the carb %.
And now, about Drinks: you can get a surprising amount of diet drinks that taste pretty amazing- you can get diet iced tea, too! I want to reiterate that Juice and Juice Drinks are BAD FOR YOU, though. Very bad. Don't drink juice if you want to loose weight. In fact; if I am gonna go so far- don't drink anything that isn't water or sweetened with a sweetener.
Giving up the sweet soft drinks is, I hear, the hardest part. Most restaurants don't stock anything diet that isn't Diet Coke, Coke Zero, or Water. (As a diabetic, this has been consistently frustrating. What if you want something nice and don't feel like bloody cola?) Just remember that you're trying to achieve something here, don't lie to yourself and tell yourself that just one, or a little bit is ok- you'll end up just drinking that stuff again.
But anyway. If you're out to lose kilos, don't expect restaurants to cater for you. You ARE going to have to make sacrifices in this piece. When you order, realize that yes, you're going to have to not eat most of the chips/potato/bread that they serve you. And that it doesn't matter if you don't eat it, you don't have to. Those things are meal stuffers things that fill out the plate so you feel like you're getting a bigger meal and better value; when the expensive products such as meat and veggies come in far smaller serves. And for the love of god, don't order the pasta, lol! Pasta is the WORST for that kind of treatment.
Remember that this isn't forever. You don't have to not eat these foods forever. You just have to give yourself long enough to lose the weight you want, and then gently ease SOME of those foods back in.
But if I were you, I'd give up the full strength soft drinks and juice more permanently ;D that stuff is evil.
As always, please research these things for yourself. I don't know everything and my talks with you are limited to my own research and experience. I could be wrong! Or not. But you need to make your own mind up :) See your Doctor! ;D
But anyway. If you're out to lose kilos, don't expect restaurants to cater for you. You ARE going to have to make sacrifices in this piece. When you order, realize that yes, you're going to have to not eat most of the chips/potato/bread that they serve you. And that it doesn't matter if you don't eat it, you don't have to. Those things are meal stuffers things that fill out the plate so you feel like you're getting a bigger meal and better value; when the expensive products such as meat and veggies come in far smaller serves. And for the love of god, don't order the pasta, lol! Pasta is the WORST for that kind of treatment.
Remember that this isn't forever. You don't have to not eat these foods forever. You just have to give yourself long enough to lose the weight you want, and then gently ease SOME of those foods back in.
But if I were you, I'd give up the full strength soft drinks and juice more permanently ;D that stuff is evil.
As always, please research these things for yourself. I don't know everything and my talks with you are limited to my own research and experience. I could be wrong! Or not. But you need to make your own mind up :) See your Doctor! ;D
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Hello again everybawdy!
Last time I talked about how I gained weight, what was the actual cause of it.
This time, we're talking about what happened after the first three months of baffled weightloss, after I began training as an acrobat in those first three months.
After about three months of training, I started to have problems with my right shoulder. To begin with and for a long time, I thought the injury was a result of my training, but it turns out it was a result of RSI injury from my job at the time. I was told by a few doctors that I'd have to give it up if I wanted my shoulder to improve. (I did give it up, and have shoulder surgery on my birthday as those doctors were wrong and it didn't improved. I am please about this, as I've now been living in daily pain for well over a year =/)
So at that point, I stopped working out completely. Not even jogging or lower body, since everything seemed to hurt it. I stopped doing everything but going to work every day.
This is important, and significant- because I didn't stop losing weight. At the time, I had already realised that the change to my diet was having significant effects on my weightloss, but had really believed that it was my daily regime of muscle workouts and exercise that had effected it the most. I now believe that this was not the case.
I'm actually pretty convinced that exercise isn't that essential to weightloss.
Maybe that's not the healthiest long term view, but not everyone has time to work out every day. Its pretty hard to get up the motivation to change your diet, let alone change your diet and work out every day too, so I think it helps to know that you CAN still lose significant amount of weight without lifting a finger. Besides, just walking around your home and workplace everyday uses a surprising amount of energy. Using your brain does too.
I'm going to mention Ketosis at this point, as I think its relevant. Ketosis is a state in which your body releases a substance called Ketone, which allows your body to rapidly break down fats to use it as energy when the body is starved of it. Diabetics go into a state of "Ketoacidosis" when they don't get enough insulin, since their body can't produce it.
Ketosis Diets are often used with heavily obese persons, in order to assist them with losing their bulk fast.
Here's the important part: Ketosis is dangerous. Everyone will tell you this. Using it long term can have disasterous effects. But you don't NEED to use it long term.
Asides from that, being heavily obese is also dangerous- and I don't think I've ever heard of anyone dying of a ketosis diet, I've sure heard of people having obesity complications and dying from those though!
My point there is that fat loss can be dangerous, but it is worthwhile for your long term health. I know people who've used the ketosis diet to lose rather significant amounts of weight. If you're below or just above the line of "obese" for your height range, you probably don't need to use this kind of diet, lowering your carbohydrate should be enough.
The average recommended daily intake of carbohydrate advertised on Australian food labeling is about 4 times the amount I'd say I needed in a day. At most, double that for a larger boned person, say a man or taller woman. We're mostly interested in the insulin production here, so that doesn't mean starving yourself- it just means eating more of other foods. And that really isn't so bad!
The other thing I wanted to mention was something I noticed when I moved over to higher protein/fats. I stopped feeling hungry all the time. I'd have a big protein shake, low carb, in the morning, and wouldn't feel hungry until well into the afternoon, like 3pm- and I'd have had the shake before 8am. It took a little while for that to really sink in, but when I realised, I did some more research. Apparently if you sate your hunger with Carbohydrate, you will be hungry sooner than if you'd sated it with mostly proteins and fats. They just last longer, take longer to digest. You stay fuller longer and end up needing LESS food in total than you use to. Stomach shrinks, you feel hungry less. Can't see how that's anything but win!
Thats all for now. Next time I think we'll talk about my actual diet, what I eat and when, and why. I'll probably include information about diabetes too, because I think it helps to understand that stuff. Diabetics are used to questioning everything we eat, because we have to, so I wonder if a normal person applying the same theory of "what am I eating" every time they eat, would help them control what was going on.
As always, please do your own research and discover for yourself what you believe and if I'm right, or just a super skinny betch talking it up ;)
Last time I talked about how I gained weight, what was the actual cause of it.
This time, we're talking about what happened after the first three months of baffled weightloss, after I began training as an acrobat in those first three months.
After about three months of training, I started to have problems with my right shoulder. To begin with and for a long time, I thought the injury was a result of my training, but it turns out it was a result of RSI injury from my job at the time. I was told by a few doctors that I'd have to give it up if I wanted my shoulder to improve. (I did give it up, and have shoulder surgery on my birthday as those doctors were wrong and it didn't improved. I am please about this, as I've now been living in daily pain for well over a year =/)
So at that point, I stopped working out completely. Not even jogging or lower body, since everything seemed to hurt it. I stopped doing everything but going to work every day.
This is important, and significant- because I didn't stop losing weight. At the time, I had already realised that the change to my diet was having significant effects on my weightloss, but had really believed that it was my daily regime of muscle workouts and exercise that had effected it the most. I now believe that this was not the case.
I'm actually pretty convinced that exercise isn't that essential to weightloss.
Maybe that's not the healthiest long term view, but not everyone has time to work out every day. Its pretty hard to get up the motivation to change your diet, let alone change your diet and work out every day too, so I think it helps to know that you CAN still lose significant amount of weight without lifting a finger. Besides, just walking around your home and workplace everyday uses a surprising amount of energy. Using your brain does too.
I'm going to mention Ketosis at this point, as I think its relevant. Ketosis is a state in which your body releases a substance called Ketone, which allows your body to rapidly break down fats to use it as energy when the body is starved of it. Diabetics go into a state of "Ketoacidosis" when they don't get enough insulin, since their body can't produce it.
Ketosis Diets are often used with heavily obese persons, in order to assist them with losing their bulk fast.
Here's the important part: Ketosis is dangerous. Everyone will tell you this. Using it long term can have disasterous effects. But you don't NEED to use it long term.
Asides from that, being heavily obese is also dangerous- and I don't think I've ever heard of anyone dying of a ketosis diet, I've sure heard of people having obesity complications and dying from those though!
My point there is that fat loss can be dangerous, but it is worthwhile for your long term health. I know people who've used the ketosis diet to lose rather significant amounts of weight. If you're below or just above the line of "obese" for your height range, you probably don't need to use this kind of diet, lowering your carbohydrate should be enough.
The average recommended daily intake of carbohydrate advertised on Australian food labeling is about 4 times the amount I'd say I needed in a day. At most, double that for a larger boned person, say a man or taller woman. We're mostly interested in the insulin production here, so that doesn't mean starving yourself- it just means eating more of other foods. And that really isn't so bad!
The other thing I wanted to mention was something I noticed when I moved over to higher protein/fats. I stopped feeling hungry all the time. I'd have a big protein shake, low carb, in the morning, and wouldn't feel hungry until well into the afternoon, like 3pm- and I'd have had the shake before 8am. It took a little while for that to really sink in, but when I realised, I did some more research. Apparently if you sate your hunger with Carbohydrate, you will be hungry sooner than if you'd sated it with mostly proteins and fats. They just last longer, take longer to digest. You stay fuller longer and end up needing LESS food in total than you use to. Stomach shrinks, you feel hungry less. Can't see how that's anything but win!
Thats all for now. Next time I think we'll talk about my actual diet, what I eat and when, and why. I'll probably include information about diabetes too, because I think it helps to understand that stuff. Diabetics are used to questioning everything we eat, because we have to, so I wonder if a normal person applying the same theory of "what am I eating" every time they eat, would help them control what was going on.
As always, please do your own research and discover for yourself what you believe and if I'm right, or just a super skinny betch talking it up ;)
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Why I gained weight.
Hello again lovely folk of the interwebs!
Last time, we were talking about how I gained weight. Lets continue from there.
I talked about being a diabetic, and how that affected my diet and insulin levels. Now lets discuss how that actually made me gain weight.
Insulin causes fat growth. There's a lot of articles and research abut it, but one of the first things I learned as a diabetic, and have the growth to prove, is taht when you inject often enough in the same place, you get a fatty deposit in that place. Mine is now a LOT smaller than it used to be, but you'd think at some point I might have twigged that the insulin was the cause of the weight gain- I didn't though, its not the sort of correlation you'd really think of when you're so over-focused on what you're eating.
And I was eating a LOT of carbohydrate. Why shouldn't I? I could just take whatever insulin I wanted to compensate for it. I had already figured out that it didn't really matter what kind of carb it was, be that sugar or something more starchy- science had told me it all ended up as sugar in my blood in the end anyway.
For whatever reason, having higher carbs and insulin levels made it much easier to hypo- mainly through misjudged dosages for the amount I was eating. Because I was taking so much, if I didn't have enough I had a blood sugar low much more serious than if I'd had a lot less insulin- you get the idea.
So I'm eating whatever I want and slowly gaining more and more weight. To someone who might be bigger, maybe you're thinking "A size 12!" That's nothing! That's still thin!", But to me, I had ballooned. I was uncomfortable. I had started to have trouble bending over and was frightened by how tight my clothing had gotten. I didn't want to get any bigger, but I also had no idea why.
So now we know how I got fat, and why. For a non-diabetic person, you'd be experiencing the same things. You eat carb because you are hungry and need energy. Your body sends out a lot of insulin to deal with it, and then you find yourself hungry again because its all gone too fast. So you eat more carb to satisfy the cravings, and end up producing more insulin again than you need.
But listen, here's the hardest thing to accept. Carbohydrates are not the only way to get energy to your body. The other way is Proteins and Fats. Yes, Fats. Fats are actually good for you! And before anyone goes "Oh, there are good and bad fats", I want you to go and talk to your doctor about whether or not differentiating between them actually, ACTUALLY does any good, or even has any point at all. I call bullshit on the "bad fats". Just like I call bullshit on the healthy eating Pyramid. It's following that dogma of grains, starchy foods and fruits at the base of that stupid pyramid that has resulted in an obesity crisis that no-one seems to know how to actally fix. Well, I do know, and its all fairly simple.
You're not probably even fat because you eat too much, and certainly not fat because of eating fatty foods. Fat does not beget fat. Causing too much insulin production in your body is how you beget fat. And the only way to cause insulin production is to eat carbs.
As always, I do expect you to do your own research. This is your health, your own body at stake, and you need to take responsibility for it as though your life depends on it- because it does depend on it.
Start with your GP. And if your GP doesn't have time to chat about this with you, get a new one. And even then, scrutinise what your GP says and do your own research!
That's all for now kids, next time we will talk about what happened after those first few months of baffled weight loss, and what happened after that.
Last time, we were talking about how I gained weight. Lets continue from there.
I talked about being a diabetic, and how that affected my diet and insulin levels. Now lets discuss how that actually made me gain weight.
Insulin causes fat growth. There's a lot of articles and research abut it, but one of the first things I learned as a diabetic, and have the growth to prove, is taht when you inject often enough in the same place, you get a fatty deposit in that place. Mine is now a LOT smaller than it used to be, but you'd think at some point I might have twigged that the insulin was the cause of the weight gain- I didn't though, its not the sort of correlation you'd really think of when you're so over-focused on what you're eating.
And I was eating a LOT of carbohydrate. Why shouldn't I? I could just take whatever insulin I wanted to compensate for it. I had already figured out that it didn't really matter what kind of carb it was, be that sugar or something more starchy- science had told me it all ended up as sugar in my blood in the end anyway.
For whatever reason, having higher carbs and insulin levels made it much easier to hypo- mainly through misjudged dosages for the amount I was eating. Because I was taking so much, if I didn't have enough I had a blood sugar low much more serious than if I'd had a lot less insulin- you get the idea.
So I'm eating whatever I want and slowly gaining more and more weight. To someone who might be bigger, maybe you're thinking "A size 12!" That's nothing! That's still thin!", But to me, I had ballooned. I was uncomfortable. I had started to have trouble bending over and was frightened by how tight my clothing had gotten. I didn't want to get any bigger, but I also had no idea why.
So now we know how I got fat, and why. For a non-diabetic person, you'd be experiencing the same things. You eat carb because you are hungry and need energy. Your body sends out a lot of insulin to deal with it, and then you find yourself hungry again because its all gone too fast. So you eat more carb to satisfy the cravings, and end up producing more insulin again than you need.
But listen, here's the hardest thing to accept. Carbohydrates are not the only way to get energy to your body. The other way is Proteins and Fats. Yes, Fats. Fats are actually good for you! And before anyone goes "Oh, there are good and bad fats", I want you to go and talk to your doctor about whether or not differentiating between them actually, ACTUALLY does any good, or even has any point at all. I call bullshit on the "bad fats". Just like I call bullshit on the healthy eating Pyramid. It's following that dogma of grains, starchy foods and fruits at the base of that stupid pyramid that has resulted in an obesity crisis that no-one seems to know how to actally fix. Well, I do know, and its all fairly simple.
You're not probably even fat because you eat too much, and certainly not fat because of eating fatty foods. Fat does not beget fat. Causing too much insulin production in your body is how you beget fat. And the only way to cause insulin production is to eat carbs.
As always, I do expect you to do your own research. This is your health, your own body at stake, and you need to take responsibility for it as though your life depends on it- because it does depend on it.
Start with your GP. And if your GP doesn't have time to chat about this with you, get a new one. And even then, scrutinise what your GP says and do your own research!
That's all for now kids, next time we will talk about what happened after those first few months of baffled weight loss, and what happened after that.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
An Introduction.
Hi there!
If you're reading this, probably you know me already- or maybe you've stumbled across this blog because you're trying to lose weight and have been googling like a mofo.
Either way, here we are.
My use-name is Heaven Descending. I'm about to turn 28 years old, and I'm writing this blog to share with you all my experience with losing weight.
Lets start at the beginning.
Three years ago, I started to gain weight. I was an Australian size eight, then, and I weighed around 55 kilograms. I had thought to start with that this was a part of getting older, and let it go. My size 8 clothing got too small, so I replaced most of it with size 10 stuff. Then, gradually, my size 10 stuff started to get too small too. Again, I wasn't sure why this was happening, and resigned myself to thinking I would never get smaller again.
Then, in October of 2010, something terrible happened. I wouldn't usually trivialise by talking about it like this, but its integral to the journey I took and why.
So lets talk now about how I got bigger. Understanding how I got bigger was a key in understanding how I lost weight without meaning to.
Probably at this point, its important to note that I am an insulin dependent diabetic, and have been for the last 15 or so years. I count carbs. I count them because I have to, so I can calculate the amount of insulin I take with each meal, and in the mornings. Prior to the decision to become an acrobat, my diet was based like so:
Amount of food
decides
Amount of insulin to compensate
= Supposedly even sugar levels.
I had always thought that this was the proper way for a diabetic to go. Calculate the carbs which could be as much as I wanted, take insulin to compensate. My diabetes was consistently shit for the entire time I treated myself that way. As I moved into a higher protein, higher fat diet, my need for insulin lessened. I was taking less insulin with each meal because I was eating so much protein that I just didn't feel the need to eat as much carbohydrate. I took less every meal, and my diabetic control actually started to improve.
I talked to my doctor about it. She said she wasn't surprised, and that many diabetics who'd moved to a lower carb diet were experiencing incredible improvements with their health and wellness. She said I should stay on it, and I have.
So I was eating less than 70 grams of carbohydrate in a day. It wasn't because I really meant to be eating that little, it was just that there was no room in my stomach for more carbs, it was all full of protien shake and eggs, meats, veggies and such. Since I already only had diet drinks, don't drink juice because it is SO sugary (And no, there are no "good" sugars, they all equal the same thing in your bloodstream from a diabetic perspective :P) it was relatively easy for me to cut down the carbs to that level. A Diabetic is used to watching everything that goes in their mouth.
Since then, I've read an interesting article from the New York Times "What if its all been a big fat lie"which talks about the Atkins diet, whose threshold is also less than 70 carbs per day. Its a long but very interesting read about the history of the obesity crisis from a pro-carb counting point of view. I recommend any person who has struggled with weight loss read it despite the length.
Anyhoo- lets get back on topic. I was eating that little carbohydrate, my diabetes was excellent, and I started dropping kilos pretty slowly but steadily. After three months I was down to a 56/57kg weight and my clothes fit me again. Some of them were even a little big!
I was baffled.
So I started to investigate. I read up on everything I could find. That article I mentioned was one such thing I came across.
The things that I found most interesting though, were the medical journals about insulin interaction. According to the research I've done, taking less insulin allowed my body to use up the fat it had been storing. And Insulin was what caused the fat to store itself in the first place! Insulin was bridging the gap between my blood and my muscles, and when my muscles hadn't been using up everything I was feeding them, the insulin then turned the energy into fat cells, stored and ready for later. This is how the human body is apparently geared.
Its a unique thing for a diabetic, because we really can control how much insulin our body receives. A "normal" person can only regulate this through eating more or less carbohydrate.
On top of that... I found out that Fat is apparently good for you! And that you should never trust ANYthing that describes itself using a pyramid. NEVER.
I'll leave it at that, for now, since I think that's enough "Food for Thought" for one day. I shall continue from that point in the story next time, so I hope you'll read it again then.
I encourage everyone who reads this journal to PLEASE, PLEASE- do your OWN research. Don't just take my word for it. I've learned a lot of things this last year, but you need to learn it for yourself.
And don't believe the hype, calorie counting is BALLS and you probably won't lose weight long term using it. :P ;D ~waits for flames haha~
If you're reading this, probably you know me already- or maybe you've stumbled across this blog because you're trying to lose weight and have been googling like a mofo.
Either way, here we are.
My use-name is Heaven Descending. I'm about to turn 28 years old, and I'm writing this blog to share with you all my experience with losing weight.
Lets start at the beginning.
Three years ago, I started to gain weight. I was an Australian size eight, then, and I weighed around 55 kilograms. I had thought to start with that this was a part of getting older, and let it go. My size 8 clothing got too small, so I replaced most of it with size 10 stuff. Then, gradually, my size 10 stuff started to get too small too. Again, I wasn't sure why this was happening, and resigned myself to thinking I would never get smaller again.
Then, in October of 2010, something terrible happened. I wouldn't usually trivialise by talking about it like this, but its integral to the journey I took and why.
One of my dear loves took her own life. This was devastating, and for a few months I was unable to function like a normal human being at all. Gradually things got better, and by the end of the year, I had resolve. I had purpose. I decided after a lifelong desire to become an Aerial Acrobat. It couldn't wait any longer, because all the reasons and excuses I had made to myself about why I couldn't become an acrobat melted away and there was no longer any reason not to. I garnered the assistance of a friend who runs a health store, and began to change my diet and excersise regime in order to build muscle.
I weighed 64/65kgs at that time, which was about a size 12, for my frame.
What I didn't expect was that over the first three months of 2011, I lost 8 kilos without even trying.
I weighed 64/65kgs at that time, which was about a size 12, for my frame.
What I didn't expect was that over the first three months of 2011, I lost 8 kilos without even trying.
So lets talk now about how I got bigger. Understanding how I got bigger was a key in understanding how I lost weight without meaning to.
Probably at this point, its important to note that I am an insulin dependent diabetic, and have been for the last 15 or so years. I count carbs. I count them because I have to, so I can calculate the amount of insulin I take with each meal, and in the mornings. Prior to the decision to become an acrobat, my diet was based like so:
Amount of food
decides
Amount of insulin to compensate
= Supposedly even sugar levels.
I had always thought that this was the proper way for a diabetic to go. Calculate the carbs which could be as much as I wanted, take insulin to compensate. My diabetes was consistently shit for the entire time I treated myself that way. As I moved into a higher protein, higher fat diet, my need for insulin lessened. I was taking less insulin with each meal because I was eating so much protein that I just didn't feel the need to eat as much carbohydrate. I took less every meal, and my diabetic control actually started to improve.
I talked to my doctor about it. She said she wasn't surprised, and that many diabetics who'd moved to a lower carb diet were experiencing incredible improvements with their health and wellness. She said I should stay on it, and I have.
So I was eating less than 70 grams of carbohydrate in a day. It wasn't because I really meant to be eating that little, it was just that there was no room in my stomach for more carbs, it was all full of protien shake and eggs, meats, veggies and such. Since I already only had diet drinks, don't drink juice because it is SO sugary (And no, there are no "good" sugars, they all equal the same thing in your bloodstream from a diabetic perspective :P) it was relatively easy for me to cut down the carbs to that level. A Diabetic is used to watching everything that goes in their mouth.
Since then, I've read an interesting article from the New York Times "What if its all been a big fat lie"which talks about the Atkins diet, whose threshold is also less than 70 carbs per day. Its a long but very interesting read about the history of the obesity crisis from a pro-carb counting point of view. I recommend any person who has struggled with weight loss read it despite the length.
Anyhoo- lets get back on topic. I was eating that little carbohydrate, my diabetes was excellent, and I started dropping kilos pretty slowly but steadily. After three months I was down to a 56/57kg weight and my clothes fit me again. Some of them were even a little big!
I was baffled.
So I started to investigate. I read up on everything I could find. That article I mentioned was one such thing I came across.
The things that I found most interesting though, were the medical journals about insulin interaction. According to the research I've done, taking less insulin allowed my body to use up the fat it had been storing. And Insulin was what caused the fat to store itself in the first place! Insulin was bridging the gap between my blood and my muscles, and when my muscles hadn't been using up everything I was feeding them, the insulin then turned the energy into fat cells, stored and ready for later. This is how the human body is apparently geared.
Its a unique thing for a diabetic, because we really can control how much insulin our body receives. A "normal" person can only regulate this through eating more or less carbohydrate.
On top of that... I found out that Fat is apparently good for you! And that you should never trust ANYthing that describes itself using a pyramid. NEVER.
I'll leave it at that, for now, since I think that's enough "Food for Thought" for one day. I shall continue from that point in the story next time, so I hope you'll read it again then.
I encourage everyone who reads this journal to PLEASE, PLEASE- do your OWN research. Don't just take my word for it. I've learned a lot of things this last year, but you need to learn it for yourself.
And don't believe the hype, calorie counting is BALLS and you probably won't lose weight long term using it. :P ;D ~waits for flames haha~
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