A food addict's travels on the road to recovery.

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Too Close For Comfort

The most bizarre thing happened to me tonight...right in the midst of my newfound attitude towards healthy eating for life, crucifying Obesity, and gaining optimum health.

I almost ate an entire casserole. It was so close.....too, too close.

Here's the bizarre part....I have NO idea why. I had a good day. It was productive with cleaning house and packing more boxes for the move. No bad emotions going on...no major stress...heck, I wasn't even celebrating anything. No binge feelings, no plans to go over my calories...in fact I'm so in sync with my calorie limit now that I've actually been thinking about dropping them, but decided that's better left for when a plateau hits.

I almost always have around 800-900 calories left by dinnertime. I had the desire for a casserole...something a little creamy and a little cheesy. I had bought some 98% fat free cans of cream of mushroom, cream of chicken, and broccoli and cheese a couple of weeks ago, and decided to finally try them. I figured with almost no fat that they would taste like crap. Boy was I wrong. Turns out the broccoli and cheese one I used was entirely too good.

I sauteed (3) 6 oz. chicken breasts, cut into bite-size pieces w/ my Pam Olive Oil cooking spray. I covered them in all kinds of yummy spices....a touch of salt, black pepper, Adobo, garlic powder and onion powder. I added them to my casserole dish along with 1 c. of instant brown rice, 1 can of the broccoli and cheese soup, some water, 1 jar of mushrooms, and 2 c. of broccoli. I baked it in the oven on 350 for 45 mins and then raised the temp to 400 for the last 15 mins to make sure it was good and done and heated all the way through. When I removed the foil I added 1/4 c. of reduced fat finely shredded Colby Jack cheese on top and watched it melt. I was already starting to salivate.

I went to the computer and added everything up on my nutrition website, SparkPeople, to see exactly how much I could have....I'm ususally pretty darn hungry by dinnertime. And even after nearly 7 weeks of reducing my calories from 4,000 a day to 1550, I'm still amazed at how much volume I can hold and not feel sick afterwards. The entire casserole ended up being 1150 calories, half of it being 575. I decided I needed to eat half the casserole, lol, and I did. Of course I shared some with my puppy dog, so I didn't eat the whole whopping plate full, but probably 80% of it.

Here's the problem. It was TOO good. Just creamy enough, just cheesy enough (I do NOT like a ton of cheese in my food), and the chicken had just the right flavor. I wanted more. I took my plate back to the kitchen, set it down, and stared at that beautiful casserole. After what I had already eaten, I had 289 calories left for the day. I could have had a little more, but I wanted ALL of it.....another 575 calories which would have sent me way over, not to mention probably would have sent me to the bathroom puking my guts out once the entire thing hit my stomach.
Who eats ENTIRE casseroles in one sitting????? Good grief.

I stared at it...my eyes glazing over as if I were in a deep trance...food trances are the worst kind. I could just barely hear Skinny Tammy screaming at me in the background....very, very faint....barely audible.

nooooooooooooooo fat tammy....don't do it!....think of destin....think of the 21 lbs you've already lost....think of how much you're going to hate yourself....it's the day before weigh day for God's sakes......step away from the casserole.....save yourself!

It was so faint...so far off in the distance......I could just barely hear it. The casserole was winning out. I took a bite. OMG it was sooo good. Why do I have to cook so good? Why didn't I eat egg whites for dinner on the night before weigh day? I took another bite. And all of a sudden I was jolted out of my trance like Skinny Tammy was standing right beside me screaming in my ear with a megaphone....

GET YOUR FAT A$$ AWAY FROM THAT DANG CASSEROLE!!! WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING??? THIS IS YOUR AMAZING MENTAL CHANGE???? THESE ARE THE GREAT STRIDES YOU'VE MADE??? THIS IS WHAT YOU CALL "FINALLY" HAVING YOUR MIND IN THE RIGHT PLACE??? YOU IDIOT!!!!!!!

The best way I can describe the way I felt after snapping out of it is "frightened". I've read in other blogs where if people make a mistake or nearly do, they try to analyze it, identify trigger foods, certain emotions that set off bad eating, etc. I have no answer for mine and that frightens me. I very nearly ate that whole thing....1150 calories in one meal.....more food than any human being needs to put in their bodies in one sitting....would have totally killed all the work I've done this week to get off the sodium gain from all the birthday/restaurant eating LAST weekend.
And I just don't know why.

All I can say is that I hope it doesn't happen again...or if it does, I hope Skinny Tammy is a little more audible from now on. It's really, really bothering me. It's screwing with my mind. It doesn't jive with my decision to get this weight off at all. Yeah, I'm definitely frightened at what a close call that was, and having no reason to explain it.

Moving on....tomorrow morning is my weigh-in. I've drank enough water this week to float the Titanic. As I mentioned earlier in the week, after my 3 restaurant meals last weekend, I got on the scale Monday morning and saw a 5-6 lb. gain. Yikes. We'll see where it ends up. I can promise you one thing though....the following week WILL be a loss. The numbers WILL go down. How do I know that? Because I know what it takes to lose. It takes a decision to do the work, it takes daily consistency on staying within your calorie limit, it takes persistence with your daily exercise...pushing yourself as far as you're able to go. That's what I'll be doing this next week.

I'm really looking forward to the next 7 days. And there will be NO restaurant/Publix deli food this week. NONE. ZERO. I don't care what we're celebrating...I don't care if I win the lottery...we won't be celebrating it in SODIUM HELL!!! If I win, it will be more like....turkey burger and egg whites for EVERYONE!!! I'm buying. ;)

Quote For The Day:

"Endurance is one of the most difficult disciplines, but it is the one who endures that the final victory comes." -Buddha

8 comments:

  1. Hmm, that is odd that you don't know what exactly triggered it, but it is good that you were able to stop. Sometimes, I think, we have some pleasure center in our brains that just takes over and tries to get us to do whatever it takes to get that pleasure. So mabye that's what it was. Even though you were full and knew you shouldn't eat any more, it was really tasty and so your brain was trying so hard to get more of that pleasure. *shrugs* Guess that's not helpful as to what you can do to prevent it, just keep listening to Skinny Tammy.

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  2. Oh, so close! Well done for resisting it just in the nick of time - phew!

    What I do if I make a batch of something like casserole is portion it out immediately it is ready and put the extra portions straight away in the fridge or freezer. Then, when I have finished my single serving, the other servings are too cold to enjoy without reheating and I that is enough to stop me.

    Good luck for tomorrow's weigh-in!

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  3. Tammy & The Giant Casserole, in theaters soon! Sounds like a movie I'd go see. Those impulses seem to come out of nowhere and I'm not sure we really have much control over them coming up, but we definitely have control over how we respond to them, so good for you listening to your inner voice. It ain't easy, is it?

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  4. I always found it strange when those situations happened to me. I remember one time watching a television commercial for bread. I got the urge to make yeast bread!! I got up, made it, let it rise, cooked it and ate the entire loaf.

    Over time I finally conquered those cravings. Now I tell myself - "Girl, what are you doing in the pantry?"

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  5. Yikes! I know that temptation so well and it's so bizarre to me how all my motivation can just fade away when faced with certain foods. Great job in resisting!!!

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  6. I totally know what you mean by not being able to identify the reasons why you binge or overeat, etc. I'm the same exact way. It is scary and frustrating knowing that the brain can just take over like that with warning.

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  7. Good job resisting the temptation. Sometimes things taste so good we just can't stop eating them. Or something else I once heard; we keep eating to try and re-capture that first taste of the food, but it never gets any better than the first couple of bites. Something to think about.
    Love you, Mom O.

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  8. I can relate to what your saying. There are times when, for example, I really want to order pizza, or make tacos at home, etc, and it has NOTHING to do with some emotional crisis, it's more like a festiv feeling, wanting to have the fun of an excitng meal, just because. It's hard to deny your spirit from wanting to celebrate like that, but the connection to food is the question, like you said..
    Stay strong - you've got the raines - your warrior spirit is coming out.

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