More Fruit!

Protected: This is gonna be a long one!

Protected: It’s Just a Little Onion!

Protected: Progress, Progress, Progress!

Protected: Forget About Grapes!

Protected: Maybe it’s time…

Protected: Hiatus Broken

Protected: A Touching Moment

Everyone’s Favorite Subject: Emotional Cravings

Marjorie from Greenmama’s Raw Adventures left an interesting comment on my last post. It was in regards to the distinction between physical and emotional cravings. While I think I did a fairly good job of describing my personal experience with physical cravings, I chose not to address the emotional ones.

I have two reasons for this:
1) Most of my problems with sticking to raw were due to physical needs (greens, calories, etc.)
2) Emotional cravings are hard to consider…because their EMOTIONAL!

However, I do want to examine these particular cravings because I know my own emotional state made a huge difference in my (final) success with this diet.

For me, whenever I was upset, I craved anything and everything that was on my “naughty” list. I could be sad, mad, or just plain bored and I would immediately turn to food, whether I was hungry or not. Actually, I used to poke fun at “emotional eaters,” because I never thought that I was one.

Luckily, I don’t get upset very often. However, due to my busy schedule, I have experienced lots of stress. However, I want to be clear that the stress was not due to my schedule, but was in fact a direct result of my poor time management skills.

I think poor time management is something that almost every person on the planet “suffers” from, and it’s a shame. I see so many of my peers who are so stressed out, you would think they held a 20 hour work load! However, often times their main problem is that they spend WAY too much time “goofing off.” Basically, spending time on things that don’t benefit you and that are taking up time needed for more important/rewarding activities. For me, my goofing off time was spent on the computer (checking emails, going on forums, etc.).

To solve this, I made one simple thing a habit…daily schedules. It takes less than 5 minutes and I usually update it the evening before or the morning of. It has made a world of difference in my productivity levels. Of course, you have to actually follow the schedule for it too work. Right now, I have a 5-10 page paper, a 10 page paper, a 3 page paper, and two final exams, all due in the next two weeks…and I’m not freaked out!

Anyway, eliminating my stress has completely changed the way I feel on a day to day basis. This, in turn, has allowed me to focus much more of my attention on activities that I enjoy, which has further enhanced my state of being. Just the other morning my SO was telling me how great this past month has been due to my perpetual good mood (I have been making him breakfast almost every morning, which might have something to do with the comment)

So, that has been my experience…the happier I am, the easier it is for me to stick with this diet. Now I have absolutely no problem eating this way. In fact, I’ve never been so excited about food. Just the thought of a ripe, juicy cantaloupe makes me wanna dance!

Happy noshing everyone!

Everyone’s Favorite Subject…

Cravings! :0

Seriously, though, this is by the far the most important aspect of dieting, especially regarding strict dieting like 811rv. I hope that by providing my own experiences with cravings I can help some of my fellow bloggers with their own.

To start, here is what I was doing just late February when I still had massive cravings…
1. Citrus as my staple fruit, mainly oranges.
2. No greens
3. No consistency in meal time or calories per day

Though all four of these are important, I’ll start with numbers one and three. Before having a massive diet overall on March 3rd, when I started implementing the meal plans in 80/10/10, 80% or more of my diet was oranges and grapefruit. I think that was okay for a few weeks or so, but I definitely saw the effects after that. Even with around 2000 calories, I still felt ravenous. As a result, I continued to eat all day long to satisfy my hunger. Not only was this bad for my digestion, not too mention my teeth, it made it that much harder for me to make eating this way a habit. It just wasn’t consistent enough. I wasn’t going to the supermarket on a regular basis, either. I would wait until I was down to my last orange until I finally went. I was just asking for trouble.

Now, my main fruits are bananas, grapes, and strawberries. I do have oranges everyday, in my smoothies, but I do not rely on them like I do before. I also eat pineapple on a regular basis, but I limit to my evening meal and I eat it along with sweeter fruits.

My meals are limited to 3 meals a day, all around the same time, with each meal having around the same calories from day to day. My shopping days are Thursday and Sunday.

In regards to no greens, this had a HUGE impact on my cravings. I really cannot stress how important it was for me to start consuming large amounts of greens. Before I started including them in my diet, I found myself craving salty foods (chips & salsa) after dinner and oftentimes even in the afternoon. I found relief from cravings IMMEDIATELY after including greens in my evening meals.

I started eating greens by following Dr. Graham’s dinner plans in 80/10/10. I did that for a full week during my spring break. I learned what my favorite greens are, which ones really squash my cravings, and even that my favorite nuts are pistachios! I now eat a huge salad, about 25 ounces worth, every single night. I know that if I were to skip a night, the consequences would be dire. Seriously, though, I really look forward to my giant salad, as it is sooooo delicious…ten times better than chips and salsa!

Something else I want to add…it is super important to formulate a diet and stick with it. It’s hard, yes, but you will never see results if you continue to flip-flop. I used to do this, setting strict rules only to break them three days later and make new, even stricter ones.

Also, having a “plan of attack” when cravings hit is a really good idea. Whether it’s taking a walk, reading some motivational material, whatever, it’s better than wallowing in the “pain.”

I really never thought that I would get to this point. I truly believed that I would always have some sort of cravings for unhealthy foods. While many of the foods I once enjoyed still sound good to me, I can’t ever imagine eating them…I love my fruit too much!

I have never enjoyed eating as much as I do now. The fruit tastes amazing and I have absolutely no guilt about eating it. I have never, ever experienced that before.

So, anyway, it definitely is possible to be rid of cravings. Good luck everyone and I hope my bit of advice helps!

No Excuses!

I’ve been super busy with school lately, hence the no-posting. Anyway, no excuses!

My 90 days are up now and I’m feeling pretty good! I learned a whole, whole lot about eating the 811rv way. I’ve even experimented a little bit with my exercise methods (very fun and informative)!

Anyway, my weight at the 90 day mark was 109 pounds. I should have lost more than that. Instead, during these past 26 days or so that I have been completely “on track,” I have really just been focusing on healthy eating, rather than caloric intake. As a result, my calorie consumption has been a few hundred or so calories above what I actually needed. No biggie, I’m in no hurry.

My weight is now about 108 and I am losing a little over a pound a week. I’m just feeling really good right now because both my diet and fitness routines are really under control. I have no doubts about the effectiveness of either, which is new for me.

Speaking of fitness routines…I ended my bodyweight experiment March 23rd (my b-day, BTW). I enjoyed it, but was finding that on many exercises, I had to add weight or my reps would just keep going up and up and up. There was only so much I could do to increase the intensity of the exercise without adding weight. As a result, I am now on a weight training routine, very similar to one that I followed last year…

Monday - Upper Body
1. Barbell Bench Press: 4 sets of 6-8 reps
2. Bent Over Barbell Row: 4 sets of 6-8 reps
3. Overhead Barbell Press: 4 sets of 6-8 reps
4. Incline Dumbbell Fly: 2 sets of 10-12 reps
5. Barbell Curls: 3 sets of 6-8 reps
6. Lying Tricep Extensions: 2 sets of 10-12 reps

Tuesday - Lower Body
1. Squats: 4 sets of 6-8 reps
2. Split Squats: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
3. Good Morning: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
4. Calf Raises: 4 sets 6-8 reps
5. Side Bends: 3 sets of 10-12 reps
6. Weighted Crunches: 3 sets of 25-30 reps

Wednesday - Cardio and Stretch
1. 30-45 mins cardio
2. 30-45 minutes stretch

Thursday - Upper Body
1. Pulls Ups: 4 sets of 6-8 reps
2. Incline Dumbbell Press: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
3. Bent Over Dumbbell Row: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
4. Front Raises: 3 sets of 10-12 reps
5. Overhead Tricep Extension: 3 sets of 6-8 reps
6. Alternating Dumbbell Curls: 2 sets of 10-12 reps

Friday - Lower Body
1. Romanian Deadlift: 4 sets of 6-8 reps
2. Stiff-legged Deadlift: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
3. Single Leg Squat: 3 sets of 10-12 reps
4. Calf Raises: 3 sets of 10-12 reps
5. Hanging Knee Raises: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
6. Lying Twist: 3 sets of 8-10 reps

Saturday - Cardio
1. 60 mins cardio

Sunday - Stretch
1. 60 mins stretching

Each resistance session begins w/ a 10 minute warm up that includes dynamic stretching.

That’s it! The only flaws that I can see are 1) I don’t have any forearm or neck exercises and 2) I need to incorporate stretching after each resistance session.

I have seen some awesome gains just since beginning this program on March 24. Now that my calories are under control, I should really see some great progress.

Again, food is great. I’m still consuming salt and pepper on my salads in the evening. I’m slowly lowering the amount that I use on a weekly basis.

That’s it for now. Look for a post on cravings soon!