You read that right. Take your cleanse or your extreme diet and shove it. But I guess if you did that, then you’d have a colonic and I wouldn’t want to be seen as pro-diarrhea on this site.
My mother-in-law is firmly pro-diarrhea. But firm is not the right word. She went to India and she the was only one in her tour group who actually gained weight. She was very disappointed that India involved no diarrhea for her.
I, on the other hand, structure all my meals around avoiding it. What can I say except that women are never satisfied.
What was my point again? Oh yeah. Cleanses and extreme dieting–’tis the season. I keep reading these lists of inadequate food intake from people trying to be the new them this year and it makes me want to binge eat.
Here’s a sample diet I read (and embellished a bit):
- Breakfast: an apple and a banana. 1 mug coffee, black.
- Lunch: cracker. enema. IV with saline solution.
- Dinner: air. alfalfa sprouts with salmonella on the side.
- Nuts. Figurative and literal.
Do I have words of wisdom here? Well, maybe not, but I don’t really struggle with my weight these days. Why? It could be:
- a side benefit of IBS
- good genes
- lifestyle
I need to mention that after my second child, I returned to work seven months later weighing 30 pounds more than I do today. I didn’t lose the weight until that child started sleeping through the night about two years after she was born.
Here are some of the things I’ve learned along the way:
Sleep
Get some. That’s rich coming from someone who started this post at 12:19 a.m. Do not as I do. Only as I say. Yep. Yoda is your personal trainer. Sleep is your first priority. Try to figure out how you can sleep an adequate amount EACH night. Sleep can be the achilles heel in the best laid plans. How’s that for mixed metaphors?
Exercise
I’ll do a separate post on this. The short version is: Find something active that you like to do and do it. Don’t keep sweating it out on a treadmill if you hate it. Do THAT FUN EXERCISE THING often. To really optimize your exercise time, add a tiny bit of the stuff you don’t like, but do it intensely for a short amount of time. For example, weights in 1 minute bursts and not resting for a total of 10 minutes, twice a week. Sometimes being a grown up means doing some crappy stuff you don’t like, but knowing it will benefit you. Here I am giving you conflicting advice.
Diet
The Dessert-After-Every-Meal program wasn’t working for me. The less I slept the more sugar and carbs I wanted. I like adding good stuff instead of removing all the bad from my diet. I think by now, we’re all aware of our little foibles–maybe you eat really healthy, but your portions are too large. Maybe you don’t count the chocolate bars. Maybe you’re a late-night snacker. I’ve found that tweaking my diet to add healthy options causes the not-so-great diet choices to drop like tails off frightened geckos.
The deal I make with myself is:
- oatmeal porridge for breakfast five mornings a week.
- more fruit (I love vegetables, but don’t eat enough fruit, preferring instead to substitute cake for apples)
- one yoghurt a day
- plan meals and healthy snacks to reduce impulse eating
- if, after eating the food I’ve planned, I still want a treat, then have a small treat (I’ve found though that the sugar in fruit lessens my cake craving)
- one day off we call Junk Food Day where just about everything goes
I defer my rewards instead of telling myself I can never eat them again. I’ve found that playing hardball and saying I can never have cake ever, ever again just makes me slip up, eat a cake, mentally berate myself, get defeated and add a can of Pringles to the mix. Then it’s eat it and weep time.
It’s hard to look elegant while crying and jamming Big Macs into your maw.
The other option is to like ourselves as we are and forget this whole thing. I think that’s probably easier, but impossible.
The good news is: If you’re not happy right now, you’re not going to be happy when you’re skinny.
I’ve decided that I won’t be happy until Stephen Moyer steps out behind Anna Paquin‘s gorgeous back and takes me out to dinner. Until then, I’m going to be miserable, miserable, miserable. But I may still jog a bit and eat the occasional apple, even though I hate apples. Just not at the same time. Jogging while eating is very dangerous.
Basically.
My issue has been with the extreme dieting which has always without fail ended in some tear-soaked binge eating. Not so much for me now. I’m trying to eat better, cram more vegetables into my diet and sleep more. The whole chugging water like it’s Nuvo thing is working for me too (why hello there, clear skin!)
I just need to find the exercise that I actually like to do. I TRIED to book a Zumba class at my gym but that bad boy was full. Onwards.
That crying while eating website is beyond amazing.
If your diet suggestions lead to my looking like the central figure in the picture I may hesitate a little
You are hilarious and full of good advice. I know I must kick my sugar habit. I’m winning on the more sleep and exercise thing (mostly). I’ve lost a few pounds in the last week and intend to keep going until I’m a wisp, a willow, Audrey Hepburn.
That site was all kinds of awesome…and so was the rest of this post!
It must be wonderful to be you, because you sure do ooze good cheer and pizzaz in your writing.
I don’t know if yoghurt was a typo or not, but it WAS pretty damn funny.
I dance in my basement to KMFDM. Twenty-year-old music gets my blood flowing. I have a treadmill but it’s terrible and makes my knees hurt, so dancing it is. And because this is my chosen half-hour-to-forty-minutes of sweating, I will never, ever have a workout buddy. There is no one on the planet who needs to see that.
I. Love. This.
Thank you for the chuckles today, much needed!
Ok, I’m with your mother: I’m grateful for any and all diarrhea, but then again, I battle against chronic constipation…aren’t you glad we’re becoming friends? Now I can confide in you
All you’re advice was bang on.
And I agree, I’m sick to death of all these blogs about what to do to get into shape. I’m sort of like, if you weren’t in shape last year, I highly suspect you won’t be again this year. Stop blogging about what you’re going to do to lose weight and go for a run.
What the fuck is wrong with those people?! And Mark, on first read I thought you said she oozed pizza and I thought that was pretty messed up.
Oh and the Stephen Moyer thing? I’m willing to do whatever it takes to steal her away from him just for YOU. Man the lengths I’ll go for my friends is ridiculous…
“The good news is: If you’re not happy right now, you’re not going to be happy when you’re skinny.”
You’ve met my mother. I know you have. That line is her ALL OVER!
“Jennifer,” she used to say as I went for my third ricciarelli in the pile of Christmas goodies on my grandmother’s table, “Nothing tastes as good as thin feels. Put that DOWN.”
I am a gym fanatic to this day. You’re both right, of course. But only slightly. Those almond paste cookies are pretty close to heaven….