My Food Journal

To read my daily food journal, click here.

Monday, September 29, 2008

Yep, it was the caffeine.

I had a Diet Coke first thing this morning, and no headaches all day. Go figure... I really suspected that yesterday's misery was due to a lack of caffeine, but this confirms it. So, do I go back to coffee? Try to taper off slowly? (I've tried that before and always wound up right back in my old habits.) Ignore caffeine for now and work on other areas? ::sigh::

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Sunday

I've had a headache all day. All day. It's 6:50pm and I'm already counting the minutes until I can put the kids to bed and relax. I think a bubble bath is calling my name.


Now that I'm counting DD's carbs, I'm definitely more aware of my own eating. I've always liked Weight Watchers points and that's how I've lost weight before, but counting carbs is definitely easier... hopefully it will help with my weight, as well.

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Crazy Month

It's been more than a month since I've blogged here, and what a crazy month. My five year-old daughter was diagnosed with Type I Diabetes (AKA:Juvenile Diabetes) and consequently hospitalized. She's fine now, just adjustting to life with a chronic disease. If you're not familiar with Type I versus Type II, Type I means that the person will be dependent on insulin for the rest of their life. Nothing she ate or did caused this- it just happens.

This change also means that my entire family now becomes carb counters. For my daughter's diet, we have to track every gram of carbs she eats. Obviously, this means that I'll have a pretty good idea of what the rest of us are eating, too.

So, I'm still here. Still making efforts to improve my own diet, made much easier by the need to carefully monitor my daughter's.

Positives and Negatives so far today:
- I couldn't resist the two leftover yeast rolls this morning and had them for breakfast. Yeast rolls and sourdough bread are almost irresistable to me!
+ We went to Target, where sometimes the kids and I get a fountain drink as a treat. I was happy to see that they have a "light" lemonade, which my daughter can have.
- I still got myself a large Mountain Dew. I really didn't need it, but I wanted it pretty badly!
+ We found that mini fruit roll-ups are a great low-carb treat (9 carbs each) for DD.

Saturday, August 9, 2008

Positives and Negatives 8/9

+ I resisted fast food completely today.
- I had a huge helping of loaded mashed potatoes for supper tonight.
+ Went for a long walk with the kids in the park today.
+ No more bad reactions to the new medication today- I feel fine.

Friday, August 8, 2008

Still here.

Still here. Still working on a better me. Just haven't had a spare moment to blog.

My blood work finally came back. After umpteen calls to my doctor's office, they finally gave me the results. Negative for rheumatoid arthritis, triglycerides were high, something else was high, and my thyroid levels (?) were normal. The Dr. put me on a diabetic medicine for a while... in the back of my mind I knew it was quite possible that I've moved into full-blown diabetes, but I was still a little surprised. She's also sending me for a thyroid scan- I go once, take a capsule, go six hours later for some kind of scan, then go 24 hours after that for yet another scan. Sounds delightful, doesn't it? Ugh.

Positives:
+ I went through a drive-thru for breakfast today, but I only ordered one breakfast burrito instead of my usual two.. and I skipped the greasy hash browns. Celebrate the small steps, right?
+ I'm on a new medication and I'm having more tests done. Hopefully soon I'll know why I've been feeling so crappy and what to do about it.
+ I see from my Feedjit below that this blog is picking up some traffic. If you're visiting and have your own diet blog, drop me a comment so I can come and check your blog out, too!

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Lazy day.

As is typical, the kids and I have just been bumming around the house today. We often do this on Saturdays- it's our day to relax.

I've been surfing around various diet blogs and trying to motivate myself. Thus far, nothing is really hitting me. I think I'm too focused on getting my bloodwork back and finding out what I'm dealing with... it's hard to push myself to do anything until then.

Friday, July 25, 2008

TGIF

Still here. Still a work in progress. Just no time to blog these last few days.
One blog I read (not related to dieting) ends posts with positive and negative things that happened each day. I like that idea, and I'm going to adopt it here:

  • - Ate fast food for breakfast and lunch today and made no effort to pick healthier choices- I just didn't care today.
  • + Took the kids and myself for a walk last night around the neighborhood- we'd stopped those lately because I am always so tired and stiff. It was nice to go walking again.
  • + I also took some Aleve before bed last night and I woke up today for the first time in weeks without any pain or stiffness.... whoo hoo!

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Day 3. Hopeful.

I went to the doctor. I waited two hours past my appointment time to even get to a room, then another half an hour or so to actually see the doctor. I seriously need to find another doctor-- the waiting problem happens every single time I go there. But, I like my doctor, and I go so rarely that I usually manage to forget about the horrible waiting until it happens again.

At any rate, the first thing she said was that it's very likely that I have a thyroid problem. That, and rheumatoid arthritis, which as I said before was one of my big fears. But, she said the thyroid problem would explain everything that's been going on with me lately- insomnia, fatigue, depression, weight gain, the works. She did bloodwork today and will call me next week to decide the next step. As for the possible rheumatoid arthritis, she basically said she wanted to check out the thyroid problem first, and that it's possible that it could also explain some of my pain.

I'm feeling both relieved and hopeful, which I don't image most people feel after being told they may have two medical problems to deal with. Even though a diagnosis will mean medications and other treatments, it's a start. And, if that one diagnosis explains all the things that are dragging me down lately, that would be great- we can start with treating one problem and the rest will start to get better, too. ::big sigh::

Monday, July 21, 2008

Day 2.

Still feeling like crud, still in pain, so still no great motivation to change what I was doing today diet-wise. The kids and I ran errands, washed the car... pretty typical at-home day. Tomorrow I have two medical appointments for my son, and, here's how bad I'm feeling... I feel rotten enough that I also made one for myself. I'll probably have to take both kids with me, but, right now I don't even care.

I decided to use my food journal to see just how bad it is that I'm eating these days. So it's not pretty, not leaving things out so they'll look good for others... it's just there. Truthful. Seeing it in black and white is already opening my eyes, which is just what I need.

Sunday, July 20, 2008

Day 1.

OK, so after some thought, I've decided there's no point in repeating my entire food log here and at Fit Day. (I love Fit Day, by the way, because they make it so easy to enter your foods and they provide the nutritional info for you.) So, the link to my food log is above. There's also some journaling there. So there's a possibility that I'll just use that and abandon this blog all together. Or, I might use the food journal there and use this blog for the mental stuff. We'll see.

I'm in a lot of pain today. I woke up (after another bout with insomnia- didn't fall asleep until nearly 3am) feeling stiff, sore, and incredibly dizzy. I'm not sure where the dizziness came from- that hasn't happened since I was pregnant, over two years ago. The stiff and sore parts weren't surprising, though- that's happening a lot lately. I am a actually afraid that I have rheumatoid arthritis, which is probably a giant leap and not logical, but the daily pain and stiffness in my hands, hips, and legs is enough to scare me.

And no, I haven't seen a doctor yet. I want to see if losing some weight helps first. I know that's not smart, but that's where I am. And the whole point of starting this blog under my alter-ego's name is that I can be honest... so there you go.

Starting Over

Who out there hasn't started a diet a million times? I'm writing this blog to publish my food diary. When I post it online, I feel like I'm more accountable... like you people out there in blog land are going to hold me responsible for what I eat. Maybe you will, maybe you won't... either way, I'm going to test the waters with this blog.