New Year's Status

I weighed myself yesterday and found that I'd put on an entire pound eating carbs during the holidays.  That's something I can live with.

Remember that I mentioned my headaches getting so much worse as fall rolled in and the clouds descended?  I realized that I'd switched to coffee and wondered if that had caused the pain.  I switched back to tea and within a day noticed a difference.  I am simply not getting headaches.

So to re-cap, the magic formula has been no carbs (elimination of both gluten and sugar) and no coffee.  I drink 2 or 3 cups of black tea each day.  And I feel great.

Oh, and there's a wee side benefit:  I've lost 13 pounds since July.

So what do you eat??

My biggest worry about eating no carbs (and let's clear one thing up right away:  I have been eating some low-carb fruit.  I'm eating *virtually* no carbs.  But it's extremely difficult to eat *no* carbs.)

Where was I?

Right--my biggest worry about this eating plan was that I didn't know what I'd eat for my meals.

Breakfast was a challenge.  I had been eating natural peanut butter on whole wheat toast for ages, and was reluctant to give it up.  A friend happened to mention that she ate frozen blueberries on cottage cheese, so I tried it.  I love it!  And eating it each morning is no more or less boring than eating peanut butter on whole wheat toast.  While they are in season, I'm adding fresh raspberries and strawberries.

I usually eat some leftovers for lunch, but worried I wouldn't have enough leftovers.  We keep frozen hamburger patties on hand, and these make the perfect lunch.  I cook mine in my Cuisinart grill (I love this thing), top it with cheddar cheese, and eat it with a sliced tomato or a packet of edamame.  This is so filling and satisfying that I often don't want dinner.

For our dinners, my husband and I are eating many of the same things night after night.  But that's OK for now.  We'll grill some steaks or some salmon (thank you, Costco) with sauteed onions.  Some nights, we throw chicken breasts in the Cuisinart and eat them with peanut sauce.  We are glad we can continue to eat my home-made Caesar salads (my dressing is lemon juice, olive oil, mustard, garlic, parmesan, salt, and pepper).  We keep field greens and tomatoes on hand to make salads with our leftover meat.  Recently I made Beef Stroganoff and served it without the noodles.  Wonderful!  There are other meals that we normally eat over rice or mashed potatoes or pasta that we can still eat:  Chicken Marsala.  Garlic Chicken.  The possibilities are endless, and I expect we will eat them when the weather cools.

If we're not particularly hungry at mealtime, we often make up a batch of tuna salad and eat it with celery.  Of course, celery and peanut butter makes a fine snack.  We eat beef jerky or cheese or nuts.  These snacks are so filling that we seldom find ourselves wanting more.

I still miss juice.  I haven't had soda in ages, and had turned to lemonade and apple juice (cut with half water) to quench my thirst.  Right now it's water, herbal tea, or coffee.  Once I've lost some weight, I will try to add this particular carb back in.

But that's really all I miss.  And I don't miss the headaches.

Can you really live without carbs?

I think many people avoid this diet because it's so hard to imagine life without that familiar bowl of cereal for breakfast.  It's hard to think of a lunch sans sandwich.  And so many wonderful dinner entrees sit on a bed of pasta or rice.  Finally, there's that dessert.  We love our desserts.  Giving all this up sounds hard.

But you know what's hard?  Giving up alcohol was hard.  It's a social activity.  Whenever I got together with co-workers after work, they sneered when I didn't order wine.  They'd ask why I was drinking water or juice.  It feels weird.  But I learned to be brief.  "I have migraines," I'd say.  Then, they'd ask about the headaches instead of my weird beverage choices.

When I confirmed that soy sauce and processed meats really do give me headaches, I thought it would be hard to give them up.  I live in the Pacific Northwest, where we love our teriyaki chicken.  Our family probably got some form of teriyaki take-out three times a month.  Or more.  And giving up processed meats meant giving up those healthy Subway sandwiches that my children loved.  Well, guess what?  Not having headaches is pretty fun, too.

Having my period without the associated migraine is also fun.  And that's what I get from eating no-carb.  Virtually no headaches.

Sure, I miss sugar.  I mainlined hot tea with sugar for years.  But I can drink it without.  I miss my square of dark chocolate after meals.  But I can live without it.  And I really miss fruit juice.  That's going to be the first thing I add back in once I have lost some weight.  But I'm full after each meal.  And if I'm not, I eat a piece of cheese.

I'm not getting headaches.  I can live without the carbs.

Healing is Such Sweet Sorrow....

Huh? Sorry to be healing? Did I say that?

Sad, but true. Now that my stomach is healing - I don't experience any more "stomach-ache" pain and have very little sore throat pain - and I am half-way through treatment, my appetite is back. So I'm hungry.....and can't eat much of anything.

Rice pudding is divine when you're in pain and can't eat anything else.....but once you're feeling better, you begin to wish for things like garlic and lemon and pickles and salsa. Oh, well.

On a happier note, I am down to a single cup of hot tea in the morning and perhaps one more later in the day. I try to make that later one herbal, though. Might as well take advantage of this opportunity to experience life without caffiene. If it's helpful, well, that's the cheapest migraine treatment ever. If it's not helpful, I can pretty easily stop treatment.

Tea!

OK, I understand giving up coffee. I live in the land of Howard Schultz (well, I guess, we all do now) and I'm sold on drinking the richest, darkest roasts. Given the migraines, I'd limited myself to one cup in the morning and adapted this routine to travel (pack insulated mug, know where the caffiene is before going to bed). It worked for me.

But tea! For me, tea is a sort of ceremonial ritual that gives my life form and structure. When I'm happy, I celebrate with a nice cup of tea. When I'm sad, I soothe myself with a warm mug of tea. When I'm trying to relax, I sit down with a cup of tea. When I feel a headache coming on, I detach from life and enjoy a break with a cup of tea. When the end of the world comes, I probably won't be the least bit worried until I run out of tea - then I'll know things are dire.

So I'm cheating on the tea. I'm not having my usual amounts - that would be counter productive - but I am having some for breakfast and maybe one more in the afternoon.