Expectation

Suffering is the result of attachment.

This is something my therapist reminds me of a lot, and he freely attributes it to the writings of Buddhism. He's an equal opportunity user of religious tenants in our session and has mentioned, among other things: Buddhism, Christianity, and Judaism. (It's kind of nice to sit on a couch that welcomes science and logic, feelings and things that are less than rational, and world religion in equal measure.)

What he's really saying though is, when you get attached to something, you place expectation on it. You make plans based on the idea of counting on something that will hold those plans up. And since each thing you build on top of this foundation is contingent upon the thing before it, and since the foundation may or may not live up to the expectation, if any of this goes against the grain of the wood you're laying on this foundation or if the foundation itself wobbles . . .  the expectations come crashing down. Unmet. And then what you have on your hands is a mess to clean up, and something akin to a bruise on your ego with a healthy dose of disappointment. Frustration, kicking yourself, sadness for what could have been but wasn't. Suffering.

Expectation leads to suffering.

And I am the queen of expectation. Mostly, I hold myself to painfully high standards, which is another way of saying I create expectation and the accompanying suffering for myself. I owe a lot of what I've accomplished to setting the bar high, and then going above and beyond to get there, but along the way I also have signed up for more than my fair share of being hard on myself. In fact, just today I was telling a story that I often tell when I'm remembering how hard work-life balance was for me in my old job (or alternatively if I'm looking to make fun of myself) about a time when I was trying to support an entire branch's worth of centers by my lonesome and working well over 80 hours a week. It meant eating a lot of Subway and being on the road from 7 am until often well past 8 or 9pm. It meant that this chic, the one who hates speaking out loud (to anyone if I can help it) before 8 or 9am, and has low blood sugar (especially in the mornings) was trying to work out at 5am and then on the road for 10-14 hours a day. I was saying how I came home on a Wednesday at 10pm and realized my choices were to stay up until past 1am doing laundry or get up at 4am to do laundry.  Orrrrrr secret door number three: iron and re-wear my pants and drive 4 blocks to Walgreens and buy new underwear. I took secret door number three but as I was driving the 4 blocks there and back I was mentally consumed by the feeling I was (and I quote) failing life.

That's right: not working too much, or sacrificing for my team and my job, or going above and beyond for the clients and centers I supported. But failing basic life 101. It's funny, but it isn't. 20/20 hindsight took so long to sink in that it was literally more than a year before I looked back on that night (which I have vivid memories of) and realized that if there was any failure it was in the planning that left me as the only consultant in a territory covering three states, or on the part of the expectations set by my employer.

This is related to, but not the same as my musings on failure. Abstractly, I understand the uses of failure. The importance of failure. Even the necessity of failure. But I see it in terms of how successful people (Ali, Steve Jobs, JK Rowling, and Einstein come to mind) carved a path, picked themselves up, and learned what not to do. Even my own failures are best viewed from a safe distance. The time I didn't get cast in a show, but discovered my passion for stage managing as a result, the time I failed a class at a college that didn't have grades (oh, yeah. It takes someone really spesh like me to fail even in the absence of grades), the time I moved across the country for my fiance only to find myself alone knowing no one at the worst, most emotionally raw moment I've ever experienced. Sitting where I sit now, 20 years, 14 years, 4 years after those hard, weak, disappointing moments and outcomes I see how those hardships, those mistakes, those speed bumps opened my eyes, made me grow, bent me in a new or even better direction. From this safe perspective, I can be grateful for my expectations not being met, for those failures, and I can even see how they lead to successes.

From here. But never ever from the moment. Really. Never.

A lot of people SAY they're their own worst critic. But for me in the moment of defeat, I become a poor, abused child. I don't just beat myself up, I beat myself up, followed by kicking myself while I'm down (from the beating), then, while I'm lower than low (from the beating followed by kicking) I bring on the flogging and torture, and then I ask my wounded, limping, inner self to write "I am a terrible, miserable failure. I am not worthy" on the proverbial blackboard 100 times. Then I ask that poor child to write an essay about what she's learned from all of this  ( . . . hence this blog).

It's ironic, because I'm told I'm a good person to have on hand when things aren't working out as planned. I'm compassionate and I often even say things that aren't just supportive, but are smart and understanding. I get it, I let people feel their feelings, but then I also help them see the road ahead. this is what I'm told. So . . . why can't I tell myself these things?

Well, hey, this is what therapy is for, and so we've come full circle to where I started - my therapist says attachment leads to suffering. There's a multifaceted idea he and I are working on . . . ways to notice how much I judge myself, ways to work on it without setting the expectation of banishing it too high . . . leading to more judgement and suffering. Ways to pick myself up when I do find myself rolling on the ground taking kicks.

But, I've had a lot of speed bumps this year. If I'm honest, my expectation was that I would have a job long before now. That my feet would be back on the road of figuring out how I want things to align in my life, and what I'm going to be putting my passion and energy and drive and killer work-ethic towards. I truly never expected to be just a few days away from turning 35 still wondering what opportunities I might have, and how the pieces would fit together.

I've realized lately that standards are one thing, and judgement, expectation, and self-flogging are completely another. I was in the process of discussing a job that, frankly, had more liabilities than assets. It very likely would have held me in place, for not enough money or challenge, while making it nigh to impossible to job hunt for anything else. We mutually reached the conclusion that when she moves her business forward, she will be ready for my higher skill set, but until then, she needs to hire to fill the need she has now. It was perfectly reasonable, and more than that, self-preservational (even, gasp, hopeful and optimistic of me) for me to reach the conclusions that this job didn't meet my standards and might create as many issues as it solved if there wasn't a clear path for me to move onto greater things (and there wasn't). The problem that I avoided was getting attached to this interview as the solution to my rapidly scary problem.

I've learned this lesson the hard way a few times over this year. I've worked so hard to apply only for jobs I really want, so this means that when I get an interview, or worse, a second interview, I feel, well, attached. And what follows is expectation. And over and over, that has lead to disappointment and suffering.

My therapist is of the opinion that when I figure out how to let go, when I stop white-knuckling, when I can be truly and authentically OK without slotting everything into a plan, a design, a structure (all disguises for expectation, by the way) that is when I will find and land the right opportunity.

I have some significant reservations about attaching my job search results to something mystical. Of the jobs I've been most excited about and not gotten, one of them was really hiring from within. Another changed the details of the job as well as the salary after I had already interviewed several times. A third turned out not to have the budget for another full time employee. A fourth re-wrote the position significantly around another candidate, and that wasn't the job I had applied for so I was just not in the running anymore. I'm not sure that not getting any of those jobs had to do with the cloud of judgement and expectation I let mushroom around me.

But I can't deny the fact that I have this desire for all of the struggle and emotional work and mis-steps to lead to something amazing. Some job that is better, less commute, better for my life outside of work, contributing to the greater good, thrilling, worthy of my passion and skills. You know, all around SHINY. And If I can't deny that desire, I also can't ignore that that is expectation setting me up for pain again.

That is the truth, though. I want things. I want to know if I am going to be able to swing it to go to my dear friend's long overdue wedding celebration in August.  I want to have the ability to feel secure enough on my own path that I have some sense of how I would walk that way with my person . . . if it turned out we both wanted that. I want to fly to New Jersey and meet the beautiful happy baby some of my best friends' had. I want to work out with my trainer again. I want to not have to tell people, "I'm not sure I can do that. We'll see what I can afford." I want to go hiking without worrying what would happen if my knees blew out again and I had no insurance. I want to not have my answer to almost everything be, "I have NOOOOOOOOOO idea what my life will look like in three months so . . ."

I want things. I want them two months ago. and I think what I really want is a smidge of stability and some predictability. I think I want some safety and I want some relief from doubt. It's like my favorite Toad the Wet Sprocket song,"I spend too much time seeking shelter. World without end couldn't hold her."

I don't know if getting better at free-falling will help me get a job, but as long as I'm out here, falling fast without a chute, it probably pays to get better at it anyways. Lord knows I'm not working, soooooo, if not now, when?! (A little unemployment humor goes a long way.)

A week without logging

I have been aware that food logging is a valuable tool for managing not only my weight but any issues I face with food for a long, long time. It was mentioned to me as a calorie tracking tool when I was (well, this is shameful) 10 years old. Like most people, the idea of counting all calories consumed, every day, forever, failed before it ever began. As in Benny and Joon, "The answer is in the question." Can I successfully count calories forever? No. For lots of reasons. It's tedious and daunting, and so without my emotional buy in, it will not help me feel helped. It's also really, really easy to miscalculate, because most people don't have a lot of training on judging what a serving is, and carrying around a food scale is impractical. And, I was TEN.

The other problem with food logging, is that without some training, some counseling, and a lot of introspection and self-knowledge, it can easily devolve into just counting calories or servings of food types. Here's the problem - not all calories are created equal and neither are all people, with respect to those calories. Diabetics need to concern themselves very closely with carbs. If making a trade off, protein and fat will always be better for someone with any insulin issues - this was illustrated when someone close to me recently made a birthday cake for a diabetic and told me that she had substituted apple sauce for oil in the recipe. I quietly informed her that I'm sure it tasted good but that she had added carbs to the cake. Meanwhile, someone like my brother who is almost entirely gluten free can eat carbs, but needs to carefully consider what kind (rice, amaranth, oats, and almond flour much better than wheat flour or wheat products). If you lined up my diabetic friend, my brother, and I, and put us all on an 1800 calorie plan, where we got those calories would make a huge difference to our successful eating, but I doubt any of our food logs would match. People have particular needs because of their pathologies, because of food allergies, because of preferences (I don't care how gluten-free and protein-full cottage cheese is. I just can't do it, folks.) and because we're all special and unique like snowflakes. (smile)

Calories are special too. For me, 280 calories could be over my discretionary calorie allowance, could be what my trainer is recommending as a small bump in fat servings for a week (a really good week of almonds, bacon, and some olive oil, I might add), or could count as a way to estimate two carb servings. In my case, I need to also be very, very careful where those 280 calories come from, not just because of my food allergies (which are weird, and more extensive than I'd like. I am lucky in that strawberries and peanut butter aren't off limits, and I have it all figured out as to how to eat dairy in a way that works for me. But, I do sometimes wish I could be a grown up and drink wine or eat dried fruit. ) or my suspected insulin resistance, but because food is my kryptonite.

Like most people, I suspect it would always be better to get 280 calories of broccoli than 280 calories of M&Ms, and yes, I'm gluten sensitive, so brown rice or spaghetti squash is always going to be better than bread. But I also have to think about if the thing I'm thinking about eating is going to set off a desire to eat something ELSE. I do eat bread, about twice a week. This is less than most people eat bread in a day. and I have to carefully place it in my path because if I eat it early in the day, I will metabolize it faster, but it might also fire cravings for other bad carbs. I do eat pizza, sometimes, but I have to decide ahead of time what the "rules" are for eating off plan, and if possible, store up some discretionary eating and extra cardio to "pay for it."

The real price I pay is when something sneaks up on me and clobbers me with its enticing smell, or beguiling voice telling me that popcorn for dinner sounds like a really good idea. I have to work very carefully to avoid these moments, much the way I see alcoholics trying to remove temptation from their lives, particularly early on in their sobriety. Those addicts can choose to seek out new friends and activities, so that they will find themselves confronted with their drug less and less. They can't live in a bubble forever and will eventually be offered a glass of wine or to go to a party, of course. But they can side step it for awhile - for long enough to log some time in a new normal. I've written about this before - I can't. I can't go to a wedding without being confronted with food, or most recently, a birthday party with a lovely funfetti cake. I can't go on a date or to a friend's awesome awards ceremony without food at least being a consideration. What I can do is decide that I'll have twice as much salad on my plate as pizza, on that date, and only eat two slices, to say no-thank-you to the cake, and then get busy doing something else, and to ask someone who is getting up to bring me ONE breadstick at the awards ceremony and then drink two bottles of water and remind myself I don't need to eat dinner twice. (Having someone else get the breadstick was key, by the way, because it meant I never had to be faced with any other food choices, or a plate to fill. I've said it before - I am lucky to have awesome friends). But here's what I can't do, even if I do all of that. I can't NOT bring food into my house, and I can't not eat.

I wish I could reach down and find some supernatural ability to not eat for, like, 28 days. Like the movie I imagine I would magically, and with heartwarmingly hard-won victories and new choices, find my feet on the path of recovery if I could manage this for a month of rehab. I also imagine that if eating weren't such a necessity I'd feel released. It would be a relief because it's actually exhausting to think this hard about food every day, every meal, every snack, every choice, from the moment I wake up (with my low blood sugar screaming in my head, "Wake up! Eat. ASAP!") until I go to sleep. The only thing more exhausting is the numbing, woolly-headed feeling and accompanying guilt brought on by NOT thinking about it and discovering I ate the whole box of Cheezits. So, I choose the lesser of two exhaustions but sometimes wish I had a less thorny, less insidious, less ever-present kryptonite.

So, for those keeping score, I am eating around the following limitations and restrictions:

• Gluten sensitive. In case you didn't know, gluten is hidden in absolutely everything. (Not just things with wheat in it! Tea! Mixed spices! Fruit bars! Protein shakes!)  For me I try to have this work out to one serving or less of gluten a day, or 7-8 a week. I sometimes am way under or sometimes a bit over. (Right now, it's a bit higher because while some things are easy substitutions - e.g. eat rice instead of bread - others are more difficult and things like gluten free chips, waffles, and granola bars are expensive and I'm on a tight budget these days.) But if I'm doing well with it, it makes a big difference in my energy level, skin, and allergies.
• Allergic to MSG - no Chinese take-out for me. Boooo.
• Allergic to preservatives - this means I can almost never eat dried fruit or off a buffet. It also affects me in certain cheeses, dried fruit, and wine. So, when I eat at your house and you make something cooked in a bottle of Merlot and garnished with Craisins I'll have to politely decline.
• I do much better with dairy if it is partially broken down and lower fat, such as yogurt. (Y'all can pry the greek yogurt from my cold, dead hands. I'm unlikely to EVER give it up even if it turns out it's not as miraculous as I think it is.)
• I can only eat 4-5 servings of carbs a day, and honestly, it is better if half of them were during or before lunch.
• I avoid most soy, because, let's face it, I don't need any more hormone issues. (But I love miso soup so I haven't completely removed soy. Also, in case you don't know, soy is secretly in everything too.)
• And I hate Dill and Mayonnaise with the passion of a thousand burning nuns.

Oh yeah, and eating itself is a problem, because it might set fire to the fuse and cause me to rapidly want to consume moremoremore.

This is where planning comes in. I can read all the books I want on strategies to beat cravings (and I do) and I can go to therapy and meditate (and I DO) but the very best thing I can do is to take charge of my food AGGRESSIVELY. This means a campaign of austerity including planning meals, planning what I will cook, and then shopping for that and only that. When shopping it means being thoughtful and ascetic and feigning ignorance of the existence of trigger foods. Then, as quickly as possible, I need to cook said food, because if it sits uncooked, popcorn for dinner starts to sound like a most excellent idea. Once the food is cooked and in my fridge, it should be idiot-proof, but of course there is the matter of avoiding temptation outside my house, and exercising a lot of control inside my house when it comes to portion size, added calories, and making sure I'm getting my 1-2 servings of fruit, 4-5 servings of vegetables, 4 servings of carbs, 2-3 of dairy, 7-9 of protein, and 2-5 of fats. It's a big job, and cruel task-master, keeping track of all of this. (Note: I measure portion sizes, and meet those servings, but only measure calories on certain items. I'm not against measuring calories anymore, but this works better for me to function and not feel overwhelmed.)

So, of course, this is where tracking my food comes in. I've been using various methods to log food for 4 years. FOUR!!!! I've done it online, carried a couple of different journals around, used logging tools created by my dietician, and all kinds of permutations of these activities. One of the best things I ever heard about the value of food logging came from Weight Watchers. I have to say, Weight Watchers should probably have a disclaimer that says, "does not work for those with insulin resistance" because they do treat all carbs as if they are created equal (4 points of M&Ms are just as good as 4 points of yogurt!), alas. Still and all, I would re-pay every cent I spent there to have learned this way of thinking about logging: Logging your food means acknowledging accountability as your best weapon. If you see patterns emerging, you can tackle them. If you find meals that are working for you, or food choices that help you with portion control, you have a record. But most of all, if you mess up, you write it down in full, and then you walk away with clean hands and a fresh start because you held yourself accountable. You don't have to keep beating yourself up about it. If it means releasing judgment, if it means not always hating myself for something I did three weeks ago then I. Will. Do. It.

So, I log food. Every day. At its best, its invaluable for not only accountability but for planning. Because as I'm writing down that I had some lovely (gluten free) oatmeal with breakfast, I'm thinking about what carbs would make sense in the rest of my day - a cup of rice at lunch gives me 2 carbs, and leaves one more for dinner, maybe a pita with some hummus to get a serving of fat in? Planning and anything I can do to support it is a great predictor of success for me, even if it also increases my control-freakishness. And even when logging is not at it's best, at the very, very least it lets me check in with my trainer and he can either nod approvingly, or he can say, "Umm, two beers? Two?!"

Why then, would I not log last week? Well, for one, I was out of paper. And didn't have it in my bank account to go get some. But, then, I started wondering . . . what would happen without my clipboard to keep me in line? This article suggests that logging is a way of evaluating ourselves, and thus, supplying our own behavioral modification. I became really interested to see what new patterns would be at work, and what old pitfalls would await me.

Here's what happened.

• I still did 5 hours of cardio and nearly 3 of lifting
• I had two drinks
• I ate pizza, but only two slices
• One day I was really hungry and had 3.5 servings of dairy instead of 2-3
• I drank two diet sodas instead of one during the week
• I ate half a small bag of M&Ms but then got such a sugar-rush headache I threw them out
• I ate all the vegetables in my fridge. Like ALL of them.
• The two loaves of bread in my freezer remain there
• I did limit myself to that one breadstick at the awards banquet
• I yelled down a serious voice in my head advocating for for yo with reeses pieces on it and had half a mango instead.
• I was still anxious at each occasion where I ate food not prepared in my house
• My only big unplanned eating was a bowl of popcorn with some butter. 3 of the 4.5 cups of the popcorn count as one serving of carbs on a day when I was low on carb servings, but the rest, the butter, and eating them at 8pm were less than ideal

Now, the nature of logging as you go through the day means you have a tighter rein on what you actually ate. So, it's possible that in there, I ate an entire box of Cheezits and forgot, but I'm pretty sure that didn't happen. I ate off-plan, but not radically off plan in any given deviance, and most importantly, when I ate a big bowl of popcorn, or a breadstick, it didn't set off a chain reaction of eating everything in sight. Again, I could be mis-remembering, but since I also lost 2 pounds last week, I don't think I am.

I'm cured! Ha! Not really. Addicts are always addicts, and I will go right back to logging this week, but it's good to know that I'm headed in the right direction and building new habits in a way that is starting to take hold in my brain. New neural pathways are catching fire. They may not be able to burn faster or hotter than the old patterns YET but they are present. It took 10 weeks of grocery shopping carefully (eating healthy on a budget is the subject of another post coming soon), doing something like 95% of my own cooking, and lots, and lots of quiet time to myself to get here. (I would guess but don't know for sure that doing the cooking myself is almost as important as planning the meals and measuring the portion sizes - being intimately connected with my food makes it much easier to know what I'm eating and be very accountable but also to be very mindful when I'm eating our of my fridge.) But, there is a new consciousness taking root from all of this time I've had to do this thoughtfully, all this getting right with myself, all this meditation, reading, logging, and creating a new level of accountability for myself. It now seems like with enough attention, with enough mindfulness, and with enough professional supervision and input, I could handle birthday parties and banquets very differently some day. So, you know, check back with me in 4 years. (smile again)

Good trade?

This is a story you all know.

An addict walks into their 12-step meeting, and while talking about their addiction (coke, meth, alcohol, gambling) they are digging deep into a cup of coffee and something sugary. It's almost expected that when alcoholics start to seek sobreity that they will start smoking, drinking coffee, and seeking sugar. Likewise, the thing people always talk about when they are breaking up with their cigarettes is eating, eating, eating.

Heroine addicts seek chocolate. Smokers seek beer, wine, and food. Drinkers seek coffee and sugar. So I shouldn't be surprised to be reporting this, but I am.

Here it is. Drum roll . . . All of a sudden, in the last month, I am drinking a lot of coffee.

Let me qualify this. Normally, I drink a cup of coffee 1-3 times a month, usually when I'm traveling and am waaaay-haaayyy off my schedule. But you may recall that I traveled a LOT in November. Somewhere between flying to Orlando, driving to Williston, FL, flying back to CO, then jetting off right away to Utah, flying back, having my break-up disrupt my sleep, cooking all night for Thanksgiving, Black Friday the next night it became a LOT of coffee.

Like, a cup every day. Ok, ok, I know that most of my readers (aka EVERY adult I know) drinks 2-4 cups every day, but I don't. Except now I do. I find myself buying coffee, stopping for fat-free lattes, making coffee at home, thinking about coffee and finding ways to work it in almost every. day.

I've given up coffee twice. Once in college, and once in grad school. In college it was because I was disturbed by the reality that I was planning my schedule around free coffee stops at the college's various offices. Like, I would plan my route through campus based on where I could stop for a cup. I wanted to be unshackled from that need. I wanted to not have an addiction driving me around, ironically.

I recognized after a few years that the issue was really that I have an addictive personality. I can get addicted to Cheezits, coffee, popcorn, TV, almost anything. I drank a lot in grad school, and during my second masters, it was a daily activity (and a necessary one to keep me from violently rejecting my circumstances . . . more on that another time), but I actually think alcohol and drugs are among the few things I'd have to work to be addicted to. Because at the end of the day, I really hate not being in control.

With that in mind, I realized that general addictive tendencies were the issue; so,  when I had a lovely, wonderful, smart, talented roomate who made me coffee every morning, I thought, "Ok. One cup." And you know what, one cup a day was fine. (It was mighty fine, s'matter o' fact since she would get up and make it! in a french press! ) It didn't go further than that -  it was all good.

But, I was addicted to LOST, I went out and drank with friends at least once a week, I smoked socially (I know. So baaaad) , I worked out like a fiend . . . so, you know, my addictive energies went other places. I gave up that one cup because when it became clear that I had insulin and blood sugar issues, I did my research. And I found that lower glycemic foods were a good idea, whole grains, less gluten, and more protein. I also found out that alcohol, and caffeine have been known to affect blood sugar in some ways that are pretty gnarly. I thought, "Ok, if I'm going to really go for this I should take those out of the rotation." So, I gave them both up for 6 months outright. Then I decided I could have them in moderation.

Usually I think the phrase "in moderation" is a bunch of bull. It's a slippery slope that means different things to different people. For someone else, in moderation with sugar means one cube instead of two, but to someone like me it means I have white sugar only on special occasions. But in this case, it worked, for a really long time. I would have my 1-4 cups a month (mostly at airports and conferences) and if I went out I might have one or two drinks.

But, it turns out I'm like every other addict. If you take my substance away, I glom on to something else. So, here I have given up everything. Popcorn, Cheezits, pizza, white flour, chocolate, desserts of all kinds, sandwiches, extra servings of fruit, and eating non-vegetable sources of carbs after 5pm (this is to say, potatoes count as carbs, as do most squashes and I can have those with dinner, but oatmeals, rices, pastas, etc. are a before 5pm thing only). I don't drink, not because I can't handle it, but because alcohol is carbs too. That discipline is hard, hard, hard work. It is made harder by how busy I am, how often I don't get to stop and eat a meal like a real person at a table. And the discipline of working out on top of things is stressful.

So, here are these holes in my life. I don't get enough sleep. I don't get enough support. I don't get enough down-time. I don't get enough results. I definitely don't get enough popcorn, damnit!! So, along comes my new substance: coffee. And man, I gotta say, coffee is good. It's warm, and lovely, and creamy, even when it's skim or 1% milk. It makes it easier to get through the day with my pre-measured portions and not enough sleep. So, is that so bad?

I think I'm going to just have to go with it right now and keep it to once a day.

Vacation

Being away from routine and the known can be a difficult prospect for someone like me who has dietary restrictions that are both medical and by choice. Routine and predictability are often the watchword of anyone dieting or trying to combat food allergies. Beyond that, I learned in grad school that the best way for me to eat cheaply, but also with health in mind was to cook on the weekends and then choose from pre-metered out leftovers for the weekdays. Later, as I began making choices such as limiting carbs, doing “cleanses”, increasing my protein intake, and even going on a campaign to reduce gluten in my diet significantly it became very necessary to use the personal strength I have in planning to get the job done.

Yes, I’m a planner by nature, but I really did come by my tendency to be a detail-oriented, ingredient-reading fiend, control freak about food honestly and with good intentions.

It is both liberating and mildly terrifying to let it go. 

And then, of course I had to hand over my eating plan  in favor of seeing a nutritionist. This means that right now I have no plan other than to try and “eat right” (which has as many permutations as there are people who use that phrase) and exercise. Honestly, I don’t how to extend that to find the right fit for my mini-vacay.


To make matters worse, of course, my insurance doesn’t cover a visit to the nutritionist. So, I need to save up some before I go. So, I’m adrift on my own for a few weeks before that happens. Off in a sea of food choices, no lifeboat. I have to be my own lifeguard. Luckily, I’m a strong swimmer.


This vacation was ill timed in some ways, but perfectly timed in others. This is not an ideal time for me to take time off from work, but then on the other hand, I am beginning to think that with the month of non-stop, balls-to-wall, life in my car work I have ahead of me, some pre-emptive rest is in order. It’s not great for me to stare down the prospect of eating on vacation right after two months of eating-on-plan were suddenly brought to an abrupt stop, but on the other hand, being able to function around food is a pretty big deal. My dad felt it was important for me to be strong in math and able to use chopsticks. My mom made sure we could all swim by the time we were in Kindergarten. So, perhaps it is time I learn the skill live my life around food without fearing what will happen.


Well, here is what has happened so far. A lunch upon my arrival in Seattle where I selected a plate of two small slices of pizza (about half the size of normal slices), and a salad. An emergency run to get food when my blood sugar was crashing and a smoothie. Some Indian food where I ate a quarter cup of rice. A cup of cereal (Special K). A few chocolate covered cherries. A seriously decadent dinner in Ballard (I want you all to know, I love, love, love my sibs. But this restaurant is so good I would recommend you go to Bastille even if my bro wasn’t an important fixture on the staff and management) where I enjoyed the free cocktail he sent over, as well as a taste of pate, some pork belly and some tomato salad appetizer, and then ordered of all things . . . a burger. It. Was. So. Good. Simple but good.

Then today, I cooked for three hours for a BBQ (So I damn sure was going to eat it). I made bean salad, kale salad and corn salad, fried chicken, shrimp kabobs for the grill, and asked my sisters to help me with a recipe for homemade ice cream sandwiches. Then I went for a run to clear my head and get out of kitchen mode. When I came back, the party was on so I had some of each of the three salads, chicken, shrimp, grilled veggies, half a brownie, a small ice cream treat, some angel food cake, a bite of watermelon, a small taste of chips, and two margaritas and three beers.

I don’t regret the burger. I don’t regret the rice. I certainly don’t regret (and will never regret) the Indian food. I’m pleased that I got a run in. (I thought I was so smooth. “Oh, this run will be easier than normal because I’m at sea-level here!” Um, hills, dear Christie. Hills.)

Of all the things I’ve eaten here in Seattle I second-guess only two things – the pizza and the emergency smoothie. I am fairly certain my blood sugar would have been low on Thursday no matter what I ate. I had not slept enough on Wednesday and done quite a bit of rushing, running, and dealing with anxiety when trying to catch my flight on Thursday (it was a Murphy’s law situation where anything that could go wrong DID). Fatigue, changed schedules, travel, and anxiety can all drastically change how “even” my endocrinology is. So, I might have been fighting with myself anyways. But, I’m sure the pizza didn’t help. And, predictably, by 7pm, my body was sending me siren wails of, “WTF! It’s been 6 hours! What did we do wrong? Are you made at us?” It got bad. So, being stuck in the cell phone lot at the airport I just looked at my peeps and said, “I need to eat something NOW.”


I’m all about the up-side since I’m on vacation, so I do think the positive is that I actually heard and identified true hunger signals and blood sugar crash auras. On the less positive, one bad food choice lead to another less than stellar one: the smoothie. I’m all for smoothies when I make them (real fruit, no sugar, Greek yogurt – because it has more protein and no fat – and almond milk because it is higher in protein as well) but I need to let y’all know, when you get a smoothie out in the world it is probably made with a metric shitload (scientific term) of sugar/corn syrup as well as prepackaged junk-fruit that probably has as many liabilities, chemicals and preservatives as it does nutrition.Mostly empty calories.

But want to hear something? Although I haven’t stepped on a scale I believe I’ve lost a couple of pounds. My shorts are looser. Ahh, the powers of de-stressing, Seattle walking, and sisters. Speaking of that . . . there is a lot of giggling going on right now, and a new sister coming in to tell me I’m a good person, hug me, thank me for cooking. And even better – she’s read my blog!

More to come. For now I'll say this. I don't think what I'm eating now is the version of "eating right" I will take home with me. But, for vacation, it is right to eat indulgently at my bro's place. It is right to eat fried chicken that I made. And it is right for me to enjoy my food without counting calories because I'm also walking more miles than I can count, and learning more from my sisters than I can possibly present here! For now, suffice it to say I will never look at a coke can the same way again, and if I should ever record and album I might seriously consider naming it, "The one-eyed bartender."

"cha-ching!"

What is this I see? Not one, not two, but three separate Starbucks in one terminal, as I walked through 16 gates. Bronzed fish bas relief type sculptures inset in the floor tiles. The skin color here is no longer predominantly pale (and my predominantly, I mean the 90-95% white of Colorado). Free wi-fi. Lots of people looking impossibly hip, and somehow still casual, modern, and yet individualized - not running in a pack when it comes to fashion. Oh, and lots of backpacks and comfortable shoes. Must be Seattle!

It's not so much any one of these things, but the collection of them that distinguishes this city from others. Yes, yes, free wi-fi is becoming more prevalent everywhere, but I remember when one of my best friends (and my personal Mac guru) used to have to carry his "airport" with him. (Oh how he loved sitting in the main admin office of the academic building where many of his colleagues worked. He'd plunk himself down on the couch most people used to sort copies or wait for the Dean and say he was in his "office." ) And here, wi-fi is pretty much taken for granted. Yes, I could go to NYC or just about anywhere in Cali and see diversity (or, I could go visit my peeps in Jerz!), but man does it calm my soul. I'm as white as they come, but one of the few things that sets me on edge living in Colorado is the glaring, blinding caucasion-ness of it all.

The fish represent something I love about this city. Seattle is devoted to not just good seafood, but good, fresh seafood. OmiGOODness, I love to eat fish. This is the good-food news about this vacation. I have the opportunity to truly enjoy my protein sources.

And oh, coffee. Starbucks in its natural habitat. I'm not much of a coffee drinker. I should qualify that. Coming from the family background that I do, and having discussed some of my personal struggles with food on this blog already, it won't shock any readers, methinks, to find that I have a self-diagnosed addictive personality. I've been addicted to a few things in my life time. Work, gum, and coffee top the list of past demons. I love coffee. Actually, what I love is the experience of really good coffee. I like the smell. I like sitting over a cup and talking with people. I like what my good friend and former roomate referred to as the daily "coffee ritual." (Life was fiiiiiiiine when she was dissertating because her internal clock was wound tight. Up every day between 6 and 7am she would creep around our tiny apartment being considerate of me, and then as I rose and began to shower would make freshly ground coffee in, yes, the height of luxury, a french press. I would arrive out of the shower to fresh coffee steeped and pressed for me. Ahhhhhh)

In college when I ran an office as part of my many, many jobs I easily drank 4-6 cups a day. But in grad school (of all the times to give up something that you actually have to detox from) I gave it up! And it was haaaaaaaaaaaarrrd. It was a tough three weeks, and I should thank my dear former roomate for still liking me after it and remaining my very good friend. I gave up coffee because I had done a lot of reading and self-education on hypoglycemia and blood sugar. I discovered that while many people focus on simple carbohydrates (table sugar, corn syrup, processed and "white" foods and junk foods) as culprits, there were a few that the masses had overlooked. For instance, maltose - the sugar in beer - has a glycemic index rivaled only by table sugar. And since beer is liquid and goes down faster than food, this means that in practice and in use, beer usually does more damage than eating an equal amount of table sugar.

Another way to look at it is what the source of energy triggers your body to do. In the case of coffee, one of the body responses is to release glycogen, a form of energy. This is one of the ways in which coffee makes people feel alert and energized, by actually giving them a burst of energy via glycogen/sugar jolting the system. The trouble is, for anyone with issue maintaining blood sugar this can cause the body to think, "Oh, sugar! I know what to do with that! Release the insulin." Since Glycogen can cause a real spike, the release of insulin from the body of someone like me is as though I just had a Thanksgiving meal by myself and instead of sending one maid to clean up the carnage, an entire cleaning crew is sent. This in turn can cause my body to crash like a train coming off the rails, if joined by other factors, and send my blood sugar to a lower level than when it started.

Since I do have an issue with over-zealous insulin, as I like to think of it, and since, at that time I was training very hard and wanted to do all I could to keep my blood sugar stable and at the ready, I gave up my coffee. (In truth, part of my thinking was, "Maybe if I give this up I can more easily work in the beer!") I realized over time that sleeping enough had its own rewards, and that on the days where I didn't get enough rest, there were more healthy ways to keep moving forward.

But when in Seattle do as the Seattle-ites do. Within one hour of coming to Seattle on my first trip in 2009, my cousin and I had steered into a Starbucks. And yup, I had some. I quickly realized that it had been so many years since coffee was a daily craving that I could now just enjoy it for it's own sake, not as a daily expectation. (So, there is some evidence that I can leave cravings behind and come back around in a different way.)

On the second day of my 2009 Seattle trip we went on the Duck Tour. And, by the way, it was awesomely, hilariously cheesy and a riot. On the way, the driver pointed out a Starbucks, paused and said "cha-ching!" and then went on his story of how Starbucks began in this area and then swept the country, how many Starbucks are here, and all things Starbucks. Then for the next four days, as my cousin and I traipsed all over the city, whatever we were discussing - kids, politics, books, family - if we passed a Starbucks we would insert into the middle of the sentence "cha-ching" and then continue on. As in, "Well, the thing about Obama is "cha-ching" that when he was elected . . . "

So, as I exited the plane and thought, "B2 . . . B4 . . . cha-ching . . . B6 . . . B8 . . . cha-ching . . . B10 B12 B14 B16 cha-ching!!" I knew for sure I had entered the land of sea-level city wonders.