Week 2- Eat to Perform begins
Day 8
Today has been the best I’ve felt since we began the challenge. It was also my first day of Eat to Perform. I found it challenging to hit all of my macronutrients today, and came short of my daily goals for protein and carbohydrates. I found myself feeling starved throughout work today, which tells me I need more protein and complex carbs throughout the day. Although I planned well last night (i.e. cooked so much food) I failed to pack the lunchbox appropriately. Who does that?!?
I was excited to add back in almond milk and oatmeal today! Oh, and BACON. I love me some bacon! I cooked up a mighty fine breakfast scramble this morning with bacon, of course.
For lunch, I made tacos! I chose to season the meat with salt, pepper, and some Mrs. Dash table blend. Instead of taco shells, I used a head of lettuce and approximately 3-4 full leaves as the ‘shell’. I added some mango peach salsa for flavor. It was tasty!
For dinner, I ate pot roast, potatoes, and carrots. Another delicious meal.
Snacks today consisted of too much fats as I may have overdone it with the bacon and almonds, but I felt energized and full throughout the day. I just need to get in the groove of pre-weighing everything and logging it into MFP to see where I have wiggle room.
Day 9
I feel better daily, like a normal human being. The feeling is glorious. My food is working for me instead of against me and I feel it. Although delicious, cutting out the processed garbage makes me feel more alert and less zombie like. With new additions allowed back into my diet and the caloric intake increase, I’m feeling satisfied yet slightly bloated, which I was forewarned about. I’m slowly trying to increase my carbohydrate intake to 200g/day and in a few weeks increase it again to 253g/day. Seems like a lot, huh? It is. Yesterday I didn’t eat enough, period. I barely consumed 100 g of protein and less than 100g of carbs. I did, however, consume 10 glasses of water and paid for it as I woke up hourly to relieve it.
I’m currently on a better plan of attack today and hope to be closer to my macos by the end of the day. Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day, which probably explains why I’ve been taking the time to come up with such delicious options.
Lunch was spectacular, consisting of organic lemon pepper chicken breast, sweet potatoes with cinnamon and bacon! YUM! I will say the one nice thing about utilizing my fitness pal is it shows you where you have wiggle room and where you don’t so you make better eating options. The numbers don’t lie! For example, I really want some more fruit right now, but after my breakfast, lunch, and snacks thus far, I only have 12g of sugar left in my daily allotment and if I eat this strawberry banana chia seed smoothie, there goes 10 of those 12 remaining sugar grams. Sadly, I’m opting out of that delicious strawberry banana smoothie today.
Instead of choosing that smoothie, which I know for a fact is delicious; I chose a road less traveled: GT’s Organic Raw Kombucha. I’m not quite sure what I expected, but:
It was the MOST DISGUSTING THING, EVER. EWWWWWWWWWWWWWW! I pawned it off on my old boss who was thrilled to receive it. Gross.
3:45PM: Feeling a little crash right now and literally counting down the minutes until I’m off work. I’m not craving any sugar though, which is a first in 9 days! Woohoo! Small victories!
5:00pm: I never eat a ‘pre-workout meal’ but for the sake of the macros, I figured today I should try. I whipped up a smoothie:
- 1 small banana
- ½ cup organic oats
- ½ cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
- 1 scoop SFH chocolate protein powder
It was yummy! I felt full and ready for my 6pm WOD. I was shocked by how I didn’t seem to ‘run out of gas’ during the workout tonight and think I should keep doing something like this.
7:30pm- Post-wod I whipped up a taco dinner:
- 4 oz lean ground beef 93/7 with chopped onion (1tbsp)
- ¼ cup mixed bell peppers (red, green, yellow)
- 1 medium tomato, sliced and diced
- 100% white corn tortillas
- 5 tbsp Peach Mango Salsa
Prior to ETP (when we were not allowed tortilla’s) I used lettuce leaves from a head of lettuce as the ‘shell’. It was very good!
Day 10
I wasn’t in the mood for a hot breakfast this morning, so I chose a smoothie, instead. I blended together the following:
- ½ cup fresh blackberries
- ½ cup organic oats
- 1 scoop SFH vanilla protein powder
- ½ cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
I like the taste and consistency of adding oats to the smoothie; also it helps keep me full longer.
Of course, working in an office environment, there’s the constant temptation of terrible food choices- someone brought in Panera bagels today. Luckily for me, I’m full from the smoothie so the appeal of simple carbs isn’t there. WINNING!
10:45am: Mid-morning snack time! Since oats and granola have been allowed back, I’ve found a new love for oats which I’ve NEVER experienced before; however, I despise warm ‘oatmeal’ due to its regurgitation-like texture. More power to you if you can consume that. It puts the T in NASTY for me! Here’s what I’m doing with oats:
- ½ cup dry oats
- 1 small banana, chopped up
- 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
- 1 tsp cinnamon
Mixed together cold, it’s like crunchy cereal. I dig it. The downside to this sweet treat: Since grains were allowed back into our diet, I’ve noticed it really f*cks with my stomach- I feel bloated and have stomach cramps within 30 minutes of eating the oats. Add it to the list of $h*t my stomach is sensitive to. It’s getting rather long.
I just input the remainder of my meals for today in My Fitness Pal and I’m happier with where my macros are landing. Although not entirely up to par with my carbs and fats, my protein is spot on. I think the only way to get my carbs and fats up today would include a Scratch cupcake, or brownie. I threw that idea out at Meghan today; we’ll see what she says. A girl can dream, right?!?
…5 minutes later… SHOT DOWN– well for this challenge anyway. Since the goal of the challenge is to eat clean, no brownies or cupcakes, boo hiss! I get it. The good news: after the challenge, TOTALLY ACCEPTABLE! WOOT WOOT! The awesome part about ETP is you can eat whatever you want as long as it fits into your macros. BOOM! I love food. That is all.
I think I am going to take Meghan’s advice and start pre-planning my meals in MFP. I plan out every other detail of my day so I may as well make a plan for this. It seems to have helped me today, as I’m sitting SPOT ON at my grams of protein (131g), 15g shy of my fat goal, and exceeded my goal of 175g carbs by 8g(out of my 253g allotment), which for me is HUGE! It’s been a struggle trying to consume at least 200g of carbs per day, so I lowered it to 175 and that has proven to be attainable. 200g….I’m slowly coming for you!
2:00pm: Late lunch for me. I am currently eating:
- 4 oz. lemon pepper chicken breast, oven baked, delish!
- My new favorite concoction: baked, cubed sweet potatoes with cinnamon and….BACON! Oh.Em.GEE. To die for. Give it a try!!! Shout out to Sarah for the idea!
I can’t believe I’m saying this, but…I think I’m starting to fall for sweet potatoes. If you had asked me this 10 days ago, I’d have thought you were nuts. They’ve grown on me. I think the cinnamon helps, a LOT. And the bacon…mmmm. Whatever the reason, I’ve found a new love.
10:00pm: I’m up later than I want to be and although I’m physically exhausted from competition class tonight, I can’t seem to turn my brain off. Class was ridiculously challenging: I’m not sure what my deal was tonight, but I felt weak as f*ck. I felt like a whale, bloated from the diet changes this week. Bar muscle ups were NOT happening, not even with a band! Pull-ups felt like I had anchors attached to my feet and cleans felt incredibly heavy when the prescribed weight was only 68% of my 1RM. I was irate. We’ll just say tonight’s workout didn’t go as planned.
Day 11
Felt a bit rushed this morning as I went into work early. I quickly threw together an egg scramble with:
- 2 organic eggs
- ½ cup mixed peppers (green, yellow, red)
- 1 cup kale
It tastes good and must smell good because everyone at work has been commenting on it.
I tossed my food bag together in a few minutes and completely forgot my almond milk for my mid-morning snack. Bummed! Come to think of it, I really hope I didn’t leave the almond milk out on the counter this morning! GAH! I should have packed my bag last night, but was discombobulated from my performance at the gym that I spaced off.
One good thing about today so far, is I’m feeling less bloated, yay! As I’m sitting at my desk, eating my lunch, I’ve noticed something: my taste buds are changing. I had some sweet potatoes with cinnamon and bacon again today and it’s glorious. It only took 11 days of force-feeding me sweet potatoes to actually wanting to eat them. I’m shocked! I noticed this change last night as I ate my pot roast and regular potatoes and as I took a bite of the regular potato, I was slightly disappointed at the lack of flavor it held. Perhaps I never noticed that previously as I used to douse it with butter, salt and pepper. As an Irish girl, I absolutely LOVE regular potatoes; however, now I think I’m starting to prefer sweet over regular.
2:30pm-Post lunch sleepiness. Feeling a bit sluggish at the moment and still crave/want my afternoon coffee. I’m not sure that will ever go away.
The positive side of today- I’m off in about an hour and don’t have to return to work for the next 4 day. With that said, I’m going to do my best to stay on track and consume the adequate amount of nutrients.
Day 12
It’s Friday and I don’t have to work today! Woo-hoo! It is 8am and I am up and working, though, preparing my merchandise for next weekend’s competition. I have so much to sew, it’s crazy! To start my day off, I cooked up another incredible breakfast. Come to think of it, maybe I’m biased- I haven’t cooked for anyone else in a long time so perhaps I just think my breakfast is the bee’s knees. Anyone want to come be my taste tester, let me know. I’d like some validity to my statements here.
Moving on… I’ve fallen trap to the busy weekend routine, again. In my sewing room, also referred to as the ‘sweat shop’, I put on Netflix and got to work. It’s now 12:30pm and I need some lunch. I’ve realized I’ve done a terrible job hydrating myself thus far, so I’m making a point to stop on occasion to refill my glass.
2:00pm: Taking another break. Eating a snack before I run a few errands. Although it makes my stomach a hot mess, I absolutely love this snack:
- ½ cup dried, organic granola
- ½ cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
- ¼ cup blueberries
- ¼ cup blackberries
- ¼ cup banana
Sure as $*%t, within 30 minutes of consuming that delicious treat above, my stomach was angry. Of course, I was mid fabric shopping and just had to deal with the pain. There was no time to acknowledge my body’s symptoms so I just kept moving.
4:00pm: I’m back home and frantically trying to prepare dinner as Alyssa is coming over at 6:30 to help me cut fabric. I’m making one of my favorite crockpot recipes tonight from another favorite food blog, Paleomg. From here, I went to the crockpot section and made the Enchilada Chicken Stew which is TO DIE FOR. If you like spicy food like I do, MAKE THIS ASAP. One word of advice- wear gloves when you chop the jalapenos. No matter how much I scrubbed my hands after chopping them, the jalapeno juice seeped into my skin; which became problematic later in the evening when I took out my contacts – it effing STUNG my eyeballs. Not recommended for a very good time.
8:30pm: Alyssa and I take a break from cutting fabric to enjoy Enchilada Chicken Stew. I forgot to mention, I omitted the garlic and avocado, because, I HATE GARLIC and unfortunately I’m allergic to avocado. Sad news, right? Sans 2 ingredients, it’s still ahh-mazing.
Day 13
It’s Saturday morning and I’m up early again, because, who sleeps in anymore? Sometimes I wish I could but sleeping in anymore is 8am; which I accomplished today Up and at it, it my 12 day streak of cooking myself breakfast. I’m enjoying a cup of coffee and taking my dog for a walk. Did I mention it is January 17th, 8:00am and 49 degrees outside? It feels like a heatwave!
I need to figure out a system of drinking enough water and eating on the weekends, because I get so busy and kind of forget. *Side note* Maybe I should set some alarms on my phone for the weekend, reminding me to eat and drink water, lol. Silly idea, but it just might work.
We had our gym holiday party tonight. It was nice to be surrounded by others’ doing the challenge as we aren’t allowed to drink. There were a good chunk of us sipping our H20 out of Dixie cups, with limes, looking lame, but in this TOGETHER! I don’t miss drinking but I miss the social aspect of it. Only 6 more weeks… 6. More. Weeks. That is 42 more days, or March 1st, to be exact. At that point, the Open will be in week 1 and who wants to drink or eat badly during that 5 week span? I’M ONTO YOUR PLAN GUYS!
Day 14
Today marks my 2 week span of eating CLEAN: no sugar, no bad carbs, and no processed garbage. I feel focused, alert, and energized. My sugar cravings are minimal and I no longer crave chocolate 24/7. Don’t get me wrong, there are still times I really want a cookie, brownie, or chocolate, but my willpower is stronger than the desire to give into food which will ultimately make me feel bloated and lethargic.
I really enjoy cooking for myself DAILY. Prior to this challenge, I cooked for myself but not every meal. I’d rely on a salad from Palmer’s deli a few days out of the week, protein bars (which I REALLY miss, Quest bars in particular), and protein shakes (I miss using Muscle Pharm protein powder). I will say that using SFH protein powder is the cleanest protein out there, and you can taste the difference. The first time I used it, I mixed the chocolate SFH protein powder with only 8 oz. of water. It literally tasted like I was drinking chocolate grass. Get creative with what you add to the protein powder- almond milk and fruit helps masks the taste a bit until you get used to it.
Sundays are my time to sew and meal prep. I’ll be hitting the grocery store later this afternoon to prep for the week to come. This is a big week: The Crossfit Circus is upon us! I’ll be competing with my gym wife and selling my products through the gym. I have a lot to prepare for, so my meal game and macros need to be on point!
Well, instead of grocery shopping and meal planning, I spent the ENTIRE day in the sweat shop. After a productive day, my roommate insisted we try out Flix Brewhouse, a new theater which serves food and drinks. It reminded me of the days I used to live in Kansas City and go to the AMC theaters. I’m stoked that concept has come to Des Moines! The downside of the roomie/movie night was I’m on this challenge and I couldn’t eat or drink what I wanted there. That was rough! They serve 2 of my favorite beers on tap, which most places don’t, and you can even get them by the PITCHER. Say whaaaaaaaaaaaaat?!?! I’ll most definitely be going back after this challenge is over.
Three, 2, One GO! 