Struggling

It's an uphill battle, learning to live with lower carbs and it's been total hit or miss.

The first couple of weeks I did okay. Made small changes like cutting out lattes and cokes, one less tsp. of sugar in my coffee (which I actually like better!), upped the veggie intake, and drank a ton of water. What I failed to plan for was that I'd get really tired, really quickly of salads, which was what I was eating every night for supper. I knew I would, but I was trying to go the quick and immediately easy route. Needless to say, it backfired. By the third week, I was so desperate for something other than salads, I started slipping. I didn't do much better with lunch, either. The sandwich wraps I as bringing weren't filling enough and I STAYED  hungry all the time. I got so hungry one day that I literally felt myself getting light headed...that's the day I reached for a Snickers bar with the justification that at least Snickers have protein, right? SMH

Then last week...Ugh...I started slacking on the amount of water I was drinking. That was the first mistake. Then my mother invited me out to lunch on Tuesday and she was so pitiful (she had a coupon for a free lunch) that I went. I scoured the menu ahead of time, looking for the best low carb options but didn't really find anything that wouldn't make me want to scream. I settled for the best choice I could make which was a half a sandwich and a side salad. My mother, the diabetic, got a whole sandwich and mac and cheese which did NOT help my feelings at all. haha But the half sandwich and salad was filling enough to keep me full through the afternoon and satisfied my craving for delicious food. My biggest failure that day was the tea...both financially and carb-wise. Even though I split the tea between sweet and unsweet, I could still tell that it pushed me over the edge into elevated blood sugar. I can always tell by the dizziness and the tightness across my forehead when my sugar levels are high.

Thursday was free tea day at McAlister's and my friends dragged me out with them--one of whom was the same friend who knows all about my latest struggle. I did okay ordering food...again, I had scoured the menu ahead of time and knew my best choice before I got in there...the scoop of chicken salad (which I normally get on a croissant) on a garden salad. There was WAY more garden salad than I wanted and not nearly enough chicken salad so I kinda resented that since the chicken salad was what I really wanted. I messed up and got full sweet tea and again, I could tell my sugar was elevated by the dizziness and tightness across my forehead. So when my friends all went for refills, I abstained and the friend who knows about my diagnosis still tried to talk me into a refill. "Oh, you can get it split with half unsweet." I ignored her and went on my merry way.

SO FRUSTRATING.

Then Friday, my lunch was sad and dismal, all I had waiting on me at home was a salad, and I was starving so I snuck over to Panda and got a medium container of orange chicken as a late lunch/early supper. Old habit from way back...sneaking over to the student union food court.

I also stress drank two cans of Coke last week. *sigh*

Anyway, Saturday was my biggest fail. I made the long trip south to visit my uncle's grave with my mother, aunt, and cousin (none of whom know about my prediabetes) We stopped at McDonald's on the way and I got an iced macchiato--full sugar. I didn't feel a blood sugar high from it, but I know it was not the best choice. Then we were so late eating lunch before heading back home that when we finally stopped at Burger King, I got a huge hamburger, ate both buns AND some onion rings. AND I drank two glasses of Coke. *facepalm*

Halfway through the burger I could feel my sugar spiking but I was so dang hungry I just kept eating. Bad decision, I know. I was probably full halfway through but having had to wait so long to eat, my mind was focused on filling that empty space.

I have to get better at making smart choices. Give up sweet/half sweet tea entirely. Give up Coke. Plan better. Carry high protein snacks to sustain when meals may be delayed. DON'T FALL INTO OLD HABITS.

I have GOT to completely change my way of thinking. It's the only way I'm going to keep from falling into full diabetes.

One mostly sustainable change I've made is switching to plain iced coffee with half and half at Starbucks instead of an iced latte. Winter may pose a problem since I won't want iced coffee and the temptation of a sugary white mocha will be strong. BUT with my financial goals taking shape, maybe by winter I will have given up Starbucks altogether. What I really need to do is find a sustainable way to bring my coffee to work from home. I've done that in the past but it gets really old after a while. Imma just hafta suck it up, though, and make it a routine to save me from the temptation come winter.

On the plus side, I've found a sustainable breakfast routine...multi-grain English muffins with avocado and ham for breakfast...filling, low carb, healthy fats FTW! I do switch it up some and eat it with an egg instead of avocado a couple of days a week just so I don't get tired of it...and also, avocados can get expensive.

Now I just need to focus on figuring out the rest of my meals.

I did forgo the salad this week and bought some chicken breasts and beef strip steaks...bought plenty of low carb veggies...squash, zucchini, bell peppers, asparagus, carrots, and mushrooms. It's going to require some cooking and prep work (which is hard when I'm tired and why salads were so temptingly easy) but I'm just going to have to make myself do it. One thing I failed to do when buying groceries, though, was buy healthy snacks. I need to buy things like cheese sticks, almonds, etc. to keep handy at work to keep me from digging out coins for the vending machine--which I did once last week...bought a bag of kettle chips one day but I did eat them while drinking water instead of Coke, so that's a small step!

I haven't lost any more lbs since that first week but I haven't' gained any either...so...WIN. haha

I need to stay off the stinkin' scale, though. I have to remind myself that this is a marathon and not a sprint AND that this isn't even really about losing weight. It's about putting healthy things in my body, making sustainable changes, and reversing the prediabetes diagnosis. I HAVE to do this. I've got a year before I'll really know if any of this is working. I don't go back for lab work for another year unless I just can't take the curiosity anymore...but I also don't have the dough for that, either. We'll see.

I did hear some good advice on a podcast this morning. Sherry Petersik of Young House Love fame has recently decided to try going low carb/no sugar for a while. She's trying different "diet plans"/ diet lifestyle choices to help her clean up her eating for her health. She tried Vegan for a while but found it to not be sustainable. I'm not sure how long she's been low carb/no sugaring it but her advice was to just give it a week of eating sustainable low carb/no sugar for your body to reset. She said that you will feel hungry a lot but that it's just your body's addiction to added sugar making you feel that way. She said after the first week, she found herself being less and less hungry all the time and started to feel an uptick in her energy. SO! I need to give it a week of truly eating low carb/no added sugar to really let my body adjust. And once my body adjusts, I won't have those cravings and it will be easier to forgo the temptation of sweet tea, Coke, and Snickers.

Another helpful thing Sherry did, was to list out all her low carb/no sugar snack/meal tips on the show notes for the episode...things like string cheese, turkey and cheese roll ups, taco bowls with no beans or rice, roasted almonds (which I'm already eating), turkey with laughing cow cheese, Kalamata olives...all things I already like and kind of knew were good snacking/meal options, but it was good to see it in writing...and in such an approachable way.

All the internet research I've been doing for meal and snack ideas is so overwhelming. There's low carb recipes for everything! Don't get me wrong, that's great! But it's also a lot to take in...way too much info thrown at me.

Also, I may have to start backing away from my unsupportive friends who refuse to acknowledge that this isn't just me on a diet...this is me fighting for my life. It's not even that she's not being supportive...it's like she's going out of her way at this point to a.) make me feel bad about the changes I'm having to make and b.) goad me into failure. Never mind that anytime she's tried diet/exercise, I've always been supportive. Going for walks when the last thing I wanted to do was walk. Not going out to eat when I really wanted to. Getting coffee alone because she was banning it.

And what's even more frustrating is she has other friends who are going low carb to lose weight and she doesn't seem to be actively trying to sabotage them! I just don't understand it. I've always considered her one of my best friends but I'm not really feeling like she gives a shit about my health.

No friendship is worth having to stick my finger several times a day for the rest of my life! Or lose a limb or go blind or any of the things associated with diabetes.

At least it makes me mad enough to want to work at this even harder!

It's still early days and I'm sure there will be more fails, hits, and misses. I just have to celebrate the successes and work harder to come back from the fails.