Need for Change (Part 1)

A few weeks ago I decided that I need to make a few health-conscious changes in my life. Not only do I  badly need to lose weight, but I'd like to take some measures to protect my health for the longer term.  This stuff is hard for me to talk about, because I've experienced so much failure in this regard; and I hate putting myself 'out there' only to risk failure again.  But...I am really trying for a level of authenticity in how I deal with things (and what I write on my blog), so I thought I'd share this stuff with you: my friends, supporters, and anyone else out there who wants to read this.  If I fail yet again, I'll need you to help me pull myself back to my feet, ok?

I'm always quick to run myself down when it comes to my weight, in particular when my effort at changing something has been short-lived and I've given up on it.  I have failed at this stuff so many times.  Been there, done that, bought about a thousand t-shirts.  Over the years, as the failures have accumulated, I've become tougher and tougher on myself - berating myself and thinking horrid things about myself...which, I know, I know, isn't helpful...my rational brain knows that, it's the other part I have to learn to manage.

So I want to try something a bit different.  I am hoping that I've finally figured myself out at least enough to know that the changes I need to make need to be gradual and, perhaps, introduced one at a time - rather than going hog wild with some crazy scheme of implementing ten changes at once, only to fail at all of them.  Don't they say that it takes about twenty-one days to incorporate a new behaviour into becoming a habit??  So maybe I need to introduce one change every three or four weeks, to allow the prior change to take root before starting something new.  I also want to learn how to be a bit more gentle with myself (you have no idea the amount of self-talk that goes on in my head...or can you relate??), because I think it's time...and because all of the self-directed negativity hasn't helped anyway.

In keeping with trying to be a bit more gentle with myself, I thought that perhaps I should make a list of things that I am already doing that are a great start in the direction of healthy living.  Believe me, please, when I tell you that I'm not looking for any commendation by making this list; nor am I looking to congratulate myself on this stuff.  I merely want to take stock on what's working well in the general direction of health, so that I can then look at what's not working in a more balanced fashion.

So here's what I've come up with - this is what I'm currently doing well:

• I don't use a lot of processed foods.  Virtually every meal I make is from scratch.  Not to say we don't ever eat junk or go out for restaurant meals (we do both), but I usually cook and, when I cook, the meals are virtually always made from the ground up.  So one thing I don't have to do a whole lot about is reducing a lot of processed foods from the house - we're already in pretty decent shape.  I'm not a great or a fancy cook, but I'm decent at it.

• The bread we eat is always whole grain...except when we're craving a nice crunchy french loaf to go with some delish soup I've made.  

• Most of the meat I buy is grass fed and organic (no hormones, no antibiotics, no vaccines, etc).  All of the beef we eat is purchased from a local, organic beef farmer.  In addition, as of 2009, all of our whole roaster chickens are organic as well, from a local farmer.  In fact, last spring, I did a lot of research into chickens and discovered that, even better than free range chickens are pastured chickens.  Let me explain the difference.  Most people (or at least, this described me) envision free range chickens to be in some sort of large enclosure where they have lots of space to roam about in - probably outside.  Well, did you know that in order to qualify as a free range chicken, a chicken barn merely has to have one open door at the end of the barn...through which any of the thousands and thousands of chickens are technically free to walk over the other ten thousand chickens in the barn and into a fenced yard?  Unfortunately, most of the chickens never actually see the light of day because they never make it to the barn door.  And yet, they are labelled 'free range.'  A definite step up are pastured chickens which, in this part of the country, are raised only in summer/fall because of winter weather conditions.  Pastured chickens are birds which are penned outside - there are a small number of chickens in each large coop; the pen is mesh on the sides and covered on top to prevent predators from getting in.  There is lots of room for the chickens to move about without interfering with each other. The chickens eat the grass beneath their feet, as well as the insects that live within or under the grass; the pen (on wheels) is moved throughout the day to provide the chickens with fresh grass, etc.. In other words, pastured chickens are chickens that are raised and fed the old fashioned way.  In addition, pastured chickens are not given antibiotics, steroids, hormones or any other medications - if they become ill, they are treated with medicine, but then moved out of the pastured chicken grouping and into the commercially-graded chicken group.  The ten, hand-raised, 8.5-10 pound pastured chickens that were delivered fresh (not even frozen yet) to us last fall (I ordered enough to feed us chicken for most/all of the year) are amazing in depth of flavour and so good for us.  This is something I'm really glad we're doing.

• We already eat decent amounts of fruits and veggies - we could do better (and we will be!) but we're certainly not starting at the beginning.  I'll merely need to enhance this area going forwards.

• I drink very little alcohol.  It's not a habit I've ever really picked up - in fact, I'm shockingly ignorant about wines and various alcoholic concoctions.  I sometimes enjoy a glass of wine when out with my 'Fab 4' group of friends, and I might have a special kind of drink for a special occasion, but that's pretty much it.

• Despite having had a coke to drink last Sunday, I actually drink very little pop and not much juice either.  Same goes for Matthew.

• During our trip to California, I started to drink green tea on a regular basis, and have finally acquired the taste for it - is is now something that I look forward to every day.  For those of you who are also green tea drinkers, did you know that Japanese green tea has 60% more antioxidant power than Chinese green tea (who knew)??  One of my favourites comes from Superstore - a lovely, mild, inexpensive, loose-leaf Japanese green tea - but there are many delicious varieties out there, including a wonderfully nutty green tea I tried at a friend's house last week.

• A number of months ago, I began to replace some of the added sugar that I consume with something called agave nectar.  Agave nectar is a natural (generally organic, as well), liquid, plant-based sweetener that is actually sweeter in taste than sugar; it has a much lower glycemic index than sugar.  One can use it in baking as well, though I haven't tried this yet (my sister has, with success).  I'm now using agave nectar where I need to add a bit of 'sugar' - for example, on top of oatmeal, or in certain green teas that I find need a bit of something sweet in it.  I'll be experimenting more with this in the coming months.

• I've resumed meal planning in recent months.  I did it for years and years, then dropped off in the past couple of years; I went back to it in fall.  In fact, about two weeks ago, I tried something for the first time ever - I created a three week meal plan, and did most of the shopping for it (recognizing that I'd need to make a couple of trips during the three weeks to supply the produce and dairy supplies for the second and third weeks).  We're two weeks into our three-week plan and it's worked really well so far - but I'll post more about it on a different day.

So there you have it...my list of what I'm already doing well.  I'm glad I just did that - I didn't realize until I actually listed it all out that there really are some good and healthy choices I'm already living. That felt good!

Sigh...but then there's the upcoming list of things I need to work on.  Clearly there some problems in some of the choices I make in my life...critical things that I need to change.  I'm not looking forward to Part 2 of this post...likely coming tomorrow!

P.S.  Sorry for the long post.