Thursday, January 28, 2010

Day 292

Not much to report. Still eating ribeyes and 80/20 ground beef along with a little cheese and cream. My weight bounced back up into the 171's after being in the 169's over the weekend. That isn't unusual for mid-week, though.

I am finding that dairy is a two edged sword for me. I feel much better and have more energy. I had hit a wall last week with my pushup routine and absolutely blasted through it this week after adding dairy back in.

All that is great, plus I like it, but on the flip side, I am more stuffed up and sneezy. My weight loss also seems to come to a halt, at least temporarily.

If I knew what was 1. causing the energy and strength boost and 2. causing the sinus distress, I would know what to do. The energy may come from an increase in fat but when I don't eat dairy, I eat undrained 80/20 gb and untrimmed ribeyes. I would think I am getting plenty of fat. Maybe it's coming from the very slight increase in carbs? I wouldn't think so but don't know. I don't think it is from the increased calcium.

As for the sinus stuff, is it caused by the milk protein casein, the milk sugar lactose or something else inherent in dairy? If it is lactose, aged cheese should be okay because it is supposed to be low in lactose. If it is casein, cheese is probably out but cream may be okay because I believe it is low protein. If it's something else, I am screwed and will have to figure out how to keep the energy level without it.

I think the cream is more of a problem for me. For one thing, I like it best in coffee and black tea (unsweetened). The caffeine may be why the weight loss stops. It also messes with my hunger if I have it earlier in the day. For now, I think I will drop the cream once I run out and see how it goes.

Monday, January 25, 2010

Day 289

I hadn't had any dairy since Jan 3 but have really been wanting some cheese lately. I ended up eating some cheese with some burgers Saturday night and on my hamburger bowls yesterday. It really hit the spot and didn't seem to cause any problems. It's funny how some times I can take it or leave it and other times, it is something I really want and tastes really good. I don't go crazy with it when I do it eat, so I don't think it's  big deal to phase in and out of my diet.

My weight has finally been dropping a little, with it going back into the 160's a couple of times over the last few days. I was 169.4 lbs on Saturday and 169.8 lbs this morning. Hopefully this trend will continue.

My hunger has been acting really strange lately. Instead of the familiar sensation of hunger that I usually get, I will just get tired and a bit light headed. I have also been extra tired lately and kind of dragging around. I think I am getting enough fat, so it just may be because it's late January (a bit of SAD).

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Day 283

On Sunday, while doing our weekly grocery shopping, I was in the meat dept, checking out the pork shoulder steaks. It seems like a lot of folks here eat them. They were fairly cheap and looked very fatty. However, the thought of eating them turned my stomach. I just can't get my head back around to eating large slabs of pork.

That said, dinner last night was pork riblets. These are long time favorites and very fatty. I used to love them but they were pretty much "meh" last night. They upset my stomach a bit, too, though that might have been the Frank's sauce they were marinated in. Pork is way cheaper than ribeyes; I wish I could get myself to eat it.

The other weird thing that happened at the store was a sudden craving for Oreo's when I walked by a stand of them. That actually brought me up short because, for one thing, I couldn't eat them even if I wasn't ZC because of the gluten. The other thing is that I don't even really like Oreo's. The cream filling was good but the cookie part kind of sucked. The cookie part always tasted chemical-ly to me. Just a drive-by craving, I guess. I went home and ate a ribeye.

I started week three of my pushup routine. The numbers I had to do took a big jump. I made it through (barely) though the last set had to be broken up a little to get them all done. I am thinking that I am hitting the wall of being up to adapt to the increases each day that I do it. I don't think that has anything to do with ZC. I think it has to do with being 45 and out of shape. Still, I am amazed I have kept up so far.

Friday, January 15, 2010

Day 279

After thinking yesterday that I might only be hungry once that day, I ended up getting first hunger pretty early - about 9:30. I had a hamburger bowl at that point. I wasn't really hungry the rest of the day until around 7 pm. K was cooking dinner for her and the boys and the smell and thoughts of food triggered my hunger.

K had bought some steaks for the boys. J didn't want his so that is what I had. They were cross rib steaks, which I think must be some form of round steak. They were way too lean and not very tasty. We have used cross rib roasts for stew meat and they work very well in that capacity. However, plain, they aren't so good. It actually kind of bothered my stomach, so I had two small chicken thighs to add some fat. That worked, though I felt kind of out of sorts the rest of the evening.

The scale is still moving in the right direction. This morning, I was down to 170.4 lbs. That is still 1.4 pounds higher than my low in December, but better than the 172 I have been at since New Years'. Adding in the uncertainty caused by the resistance exercises I am doing and everything is working well again. The funny thing is that the little extra bulk I am getting in the shoulders and chests is making me feel fatter than I look in the mirror.

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Day 277

I am finally seeing some progress on the scales again. I was down about a pound and a half this morning. I am still close to two pounds over my low but I think I am heading in the right direction again.

I think part of the problem is that I have been seriously detoxing over the last week. It's almost like going back to the start of ZC again. I have had some breakouts and have smelled weird at times (TMI). I have also been "sneezy" like my hay fever has kicked in, which is odd for this time of the year. Yesterday, I also had a vicious headache that lasted all day. I went to bed early because of it but it woke my up at 2 AM. I had to stumble downstairs to take a handful of ibuprofen. That knocked it back but I can still feel the ghost of it.

Food is going well. I am eating ground beef at first hunger and ribeyes at night. I am still working out the night part as I am not generally in full hunger but getting close enough that I would probably be woken up at night by hunger so I tend to eat my steak later in the evening. I think what may eventually work out is that I won't be eating more than once every other day.

It almost worked that way yesterday. I wasn't hungry until almost 12:30 pm. I ate a hamburger bowl at that time and wasn't hungry the rest of the day. However, I ended up eating a small hamburger bowl last night because my stomach was unsettled from the migraine and I was feeling a bit run down because I had given blood at 3 o'clock.

What I would like to have happen is to be hungry early one day and then be hungry again late in that day. Then the next day be hungry later in the day and get hungry just once that day. It would make it more concrete on when to eat and not have these unknowns at night. But - whatever. I am not going to force anything and I'll just go with the flow here.

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Day 269

I'm getting back in the swing of things. I was hungry early yesterday for some reason and ate a hamburger bowl about 8 am. I was hungry by the time I got home and ate the last of my ribeye roast that I have been working on for the last week. Other than a slight headache, I feel pretty good.

I am bummed that my ribeye roast is gone and so are the holiday prices for them. I have several packs of cut ribeyes that I got on markdown ($3.78/pound) for the rest of the week but cutting the steaks off the roast as it air dried was pretty good. Also, 80/20 ground beef was on sale here for $1.58/pound. I have been using it for my hamburger bowls. However, it has been disappointing. It is very lean for 80/20 so it doesn't taste that great. I can't get any fattier ground beef unless I get the chubs. I like the fresh ground better so I'll just add butter to this to get through it and then go back to buying my ground beef at the other store (Safeway), which has much better ground beef.

I have been feeling antsy lately so have been looking for ways to be more active. The weather has been horrible, so I can't ride my bike. I have been doing some DDR on and off and will probably continue that.

I was thinking about getting back into some of the Physical Culture stuff and stumbled on to this website - 100 Pushups. On a whim, I decided to see if I could accomplish this. I have never been particularly strong or good at pushups (I have long arms, for one thing, which changes the leverage) so it will be a challenge. When I did basic training at age 17, the best I did on my PT test was 42 pushups in two minutes. I was in great shape then but ate horribly, so we'll see if ZC can make a difference to this now 45 year old.

Monday, January 4, 2010

Day 268

Thank God the holidays are over.

I don't think I was mentally prepared for eating ZC through the holidays. I wrote beforehand how holidays were so entwined around food and how different they would be without all of the treats. I thought I was ready for that and it wouldn't be an issue. However, when the rubber actually hit the road, I ate off plan way too much.

The strange thing was that I was fine in the day to day. The treats available at work or just around weren't a problem. The problem came with the "traditions", times when doing something with the family had always included treats. Those were the times I caved, unfortunately.

Well, the holidays and those traditions are over for the year and the good thing is that I have nearly a year to prep for them next time. I will also know what to expect and how to handle them different. It is time to come up with new traditions, too, I think.

Thinking back to before Thanksgiving, I think I have also pinpointed another culprit. I had been doing meat and water only for nearly three months and was feeling great and really slimming down. We went down to K's parents' place for Thanksgiving and I added dairy back into the mix because it made it easier to deal with the lean and tasteless meat eating at someone else's place. I pretty much instantly felt different and had more cravings after that.

It is pretty clear that dairy is a gateway drug to me. I do fine with it physically, except for my sinuses. However, mentally, I feel more on the edge. That great feeling I had before Thanksgiving I call my ZC Zen. Zero carb is just effortless at that point. However, add in the dairy, and that good feeling dissipates and ZC is a bit more of a struggle. I start thinking a taste of this or that won't hurt and then all bets are off.

So the dairy is finally gone again. I am back to the day to day normalcy like before the holiday season. Instead of being disappointed, I feel relief to flee back to the safety of ZC. Hopefully next year, I will be strong enough to get through the holidays without succumbing.