changing habits

Since I’m not completely stupid I already have known that my relationship with sugar is a little, um, intense. I remember sneaking sweets as a child, raiding the whole apartment for candy and eating glasses of honey and boxes of powdered sugar. When I was a child all I ever drank was soda and cocoa. When as a teenager I started drinking juice instead of soda for health reasons that was a hard transition. When I was in my twenties and was afraid that I had scurvy I cut back on sugar drastically. I stopped putting sugar in my tea. Well, mostly.

Back as a teenager when I was still very Christian I tried to give up candy for Lent every year, I only managed that (and it was real hard) when I still ate big amounts of cookies and cake every day. I don’t think I ever had a day in my entire life where I didn’t eat sugar at all.

In the past years I made a lot of changes: I never eat candy against hunger anymore. I don’t have something sweet after every meal. I restrict the amount of chocolate I eat. And I was very, very proud of myself to finally having that problem under control.
Only I hadn’t. After two years of making little rules around my candy consumption I had to realize that I still am not able to sit in the kitchen and read in the evening without eating much more candy than I intended to. When we visited my parents on Christmas my mother made a point of putting big bowls of candy and cookies right under my nose (she is a little jealous because I lost so much weight and she gained a little). I couldn’t resist. And not like “Oh my god, I ate TWO COOKIES!” But still like “I don’t know how and when but I just inhaled the whole bowl.”

So when I thought about addiction in my family I realized that maybe my biggest addiction might be to sugar. And that maybe ties in with my compulsive eating. There are other things that I turn to when I eat compulsively (and I do that less and less) but most involve sugar. In the past when I went on a binge I was after the sugar high. I didn’t mind throwing in some bags of potato chips and a couple of beers but if I had to choose I’d have taken the sugar.

So now I can report how it feels to have abstained from sugar for a whole week. And I haven’t even drunk much. It is the third time ever that I even tried. The first time I started after reading Christine Kane’s post about “How to give up coffee in 7 easy steps“. I don’t like coffee and avoid it wherever I can but in that post she mentioned sugar and so I thought, “Why don’t I try to cut back on candy?” Notice that I didn’t think “Why don’t I cut back on sugar?” Because I knew of former experiences that if I wanted to reduce my candy consumption there had to be cookies or cake in this. The first time I tried for a week I succeeded. The second time I cut the week short due to something really important I no longer remember.

Then suddenly a week ago on Saturday I said, “I’m addicted to sugar. I won’t eat it anymore. Period.” Immediately I begun to see how much sugar I really was eating. It’s not only candy or chocolate. It is yoghurt, it is ketchup, soda, sometimes even vegetables. And I began scheming: what would I tell people when I was invited in the afternoon (eating cake and drinking coffee is an integral part of German social life), what would I tell my mother, whom would I tell? All this was completely irrational and only showed how important sugar was to me. There was no need of a big declaration. No need to prepare for if I ever would be invited to a party, I’d just say thank you. But in my mind it was a very big thing.

That Saturday we had a party at our house, about fifteen people, some with children. The first thing was that my mother-in-law made cake. I love cake. Of the people that came three brought cake and three brought chocolate. Two brought fruit salad. It was potluck but usually people bring more salad. The whole buffet had only three salty things and all the rest was sugary. Never have I been to a party in my life where there were so many sweets. That was my first test.

I failed. I started with trying the cake at 3 in the afternoon and only stopped for sleep. The next day I continued with cake and chocolate until at 3 on Sunday my husband said, “What are you doing I thought you didn’t want to eat sugar because you are addicted to it. I’d like to throw that stuff away.” And I nodded and said, “Go ahead.” He put the rest of our candy in a hiding place that is hard to reach.

Since then I have stayed “sober”. The first days I thought about sneaking candy while running errands. Every single day after lunch and dinner I get this craving for chocolate. It feels like it’s sucking me in. How can one end a meal without eating a little chocolate-y goodness afterwards? The first days it felt like there was a little, furry predatory beast inside of me that howled, “Feed me! Feed me!”

I didn’t. I haven’t felt withdrawal much. Yesterday we went on a walk and then into a café. I decided to give myself a treat. I ate a piece of cheesecake. I didn’t like it as much as I thought I would and it felt as if it was too much but of course I ate it anyway. And the little piece of chocolate that came with my latte. Yeah, I had it all. Milk which always sits very heavy in my stomach, coffee which I don’t like and cake and chocolate. We went back home and I thought, “That’s the way to go. Have sugar as a treat on Sundays.”

All was well. Only my PMS worsened. And I felt very moody. And I couldn’t sleep well. And I yelled at my husband. Of course that’s all the coffee’s fault.

Or not. Because during the week without sugar (apart from one cube of brown sugar in my enormous cup of morning tea) I felt calmer than ever before in my life. In the midst of my midlife-crisis there was a calmness inside of me that I have never known before.

So I’d say that I react sensitive to sugar. And I’d say my son does this too. He is devouring sweets and sugary yoghurts like crazy. And afterwards he is hyper. And in a bad mood. Angry.

Interestingly this week hasn’t been hard for me. It was a little weird when I went grocery shopping and realized what I couldn’t eat anymore but so what. I still don’t quite know what to eat for an afternoon snack. This week it has been nuts and raisins. (I don’t like fruit in its natural state.) But I’ll continue this. I feel better. I don’t want addiction in my life anymore. By the way I have been avoiding alcohol too. It just doesn’t appeal to me anymore.

Who would have thought that possible…

The way I have been craving sleep lately you’d think I had a 6-month-old in the house or were insomniac. But it is neither. I can’t say for sure, but it might well be that every single journal entry for the last, um, four years has started with “I am so tired.” (Paper journal, not online thingy, blog.) Maybe this has replaced my obsession with food and feeling fat, who knows. Maybe, and this really is the first time I’m thinking this, this problem I have with sleep stems from the same source as my former eating disorder.

So. Sleep. Just to think of it. Becoming oblivious to the world, resting, dreaming, nesting under warm duvet covers. Bliss. So why do I never sleep enough? I could blame my son; that would be easy. And for years he has been the source of my lack of sleep. But since he turned two years old he has slept beautifully, only disturbed when sick. And, for some reason unknown to us, he keeps on waking up an hour earlier than usual on Saturdays. But since I have heard of children waking up at 5.30 or something, I won’t say anything against him.

I really have no problem with the sleep itself. When I have the feeling of having tossed and turned for ages before getting to sleep, my husband (the official tosser and turner in our family) informs me that it took me all of five minutes to start snoring. (And yes, I really often snore, I am allergic to mold and thus have a year-round snotty nose.) No, when I go to bed, everything is fine. I’m that kind of sleeper who after a nighttime thunderstorm gets up in the morning all rested and when asked, “Wasn’t that a terrible thunderstorm?” says, “What thunderstorm?” I come from a long line of sound sleepers, my parents are famous for their never-disturbed sleep. I lay my head on my pillow and that’s it until morning. When I have a particular restless night, I might wake up and look at the clock, or maybe go to the bathroom. Then I go back and sleep again. This is a very useful talent to have. Especially when faced with a sick child. Wake up, tend to child, go back to bed, fall asleep. Rinse and repeat. (Hey, I should have posted that as my hidden talent in the meme I answered two days ago. Ability to sleep under all circumstances.) I used to be able to sleep in rooms full of people, light and noise, but that’s where I feel my age, that’s no longer possible.

The time when sleep was most precious was, of course, when my son was a tiny baby. When he was born I thought to myself how amazingly easy it was to cope with the lack of sleep. I need a lot of sleep and was very much afraid that I’d be constantly overtired when having him. Well, the real sleep deprivation kicked in a little later. When I was working three days a week, still nursing him around the clock, and then, when he was eight months old, the teething started and he woke me every hour to use me as a human pacifier. Fun was had. At that point I was so tired that I dozed off when my husband told me something and paused for about one second.

But this is long past, we treated this with daddy on night duty for two weeks, teabottle at the ready; mama sleeping in the spare bedroom (soundproofed annex! hurray!) being off duty until 5 am. So after that I could have slept enough. Alas, I didn’t. What I do is this:

I go through my day tired, uttering frequently, “I’m so tired, I’m so tired! But today I will take a nap for sure.” Until it is time for the nap, then I’ll find something really important, like reading blogs, do that until my free time is over, then go through the rest of the day with glazed eyes announcing, “But today I will go to bed on time for sure!” every thirty minutes or so. After bringing my son to bed very slowly, because I’m so tired, I go off to my room, play a little piano or guitar, watch an episode of “Buffy” or two, talk to my husband, say, “Of course I will be going to bed on time today.” sincerely, then switch channels, watch some silly documentary about playboy bunnies or some such, get off the couch at 11, go to bed half an hour later, sleep until my alarm goes off at 6.45. Repeat.

You might say, what is she whining about, if I understand her correctly she gets a whole 7 1/2 hours of sleep. And nowadays everyone and her grandmother seem to think that six hours is enough and seven is plenty. I, on the other hand, do need at least 8 1/2 of sleep, better 9 to feel good and have a functioning brain. And from what I’m hearing and reading I’m not alone. A friend of mine recently told me, “I don’t know, why I am so tired, I am sleeping a full six hours every night.” Duh! I have a book (a good book) “Outsmarting Female Fatigue: Eight Energizing Strategies for Lifelong Vitality” (Debra Waterhouse) which say that most women need an average 8 1/2 hours of sleep. And that everything between 4 and 11 hours is considered normal. That doesn’t mean that it’s normal to sleep only 4 hours, it means that it might be normal for you. But if you’re tired, cranky, constantly hungry, forgetting things, and doze off in front of your TV every night, maybe you need to get more sleep. And maybe you’re somebody who needs 11 hours a night. Ever thought of that? Very inconvenient, but there is no fighting it. When you don’t get enough sleep, you’re tired.

That’s what I’ve been trying to teach my son. When you’re tired, you can eat all you want, it doesn’t help. Only sleeping does. Since having him, I know why people overeat when they’re tired by the way. Tired babies nurse to sleep. So eating provides everything good at once: company, cuddle contact, food, and help to get to sleep. When he was about a year old, he sometimes would literally eat himself to sleep. Fall asleep chewing. Stuffing tremendous amounts of food in his little mouth. That’s when I learned why I am constantly eating when I’m tired. And I like to eat more sugar in times like that, because with the sugar high I get a little boost too.

I’m a little older than a year, so I should know better. I do know better, I only don’t do better. So I’ve been giving myself stickers for going to bed before 11. For three years. Three years! I feel a little pathetic. Um, not just a little. I’ve invented a couple of little tricks. I clean my face and put on moisturizer when I have put my son to bed. I put on my pajama before sitting down to watch my show. I programmed my PDA to beep on bedtime. I have asked my husband to please remind me that it’s time. And for every evening that I have found my way triumphantly to bed before eleven there are two when I just stayed a little longer and went half an hour later. Or two hours later.

I fear I have to get my priorities right. Sleep. Is. Very. Important.

Or like I tell my son constantly: When you’re tired playing is no fun.

Go, have a nap on me.

Technorati Tags: sleep

This is the second part to my post about diet mentality:

First of all, I’m really not there, but still trying. And for those of you who didn’t read my too long series about non-dieting and weight-loss, this is how I look now:



(When I first saw this picture I thought, “That can’t be me. I’m not that thin.”

But here they are, 11 ways to get out of diet mentality:

1. Focus on what’s right with your body. Is it living? Breathing? Able to walk, talk, think, nurture? Good.

Jon Kabat-Zinn says somewhere (sorry, but I didn’t find it again) that as long as you’re living there’s more right with you than wrong.

2. Learn to love your body the way it is now. And dress in clothes that feel and look good.

I know, that’s a tough one. But it works. Stand in front of the mirror each day (preferably naked) and say to yourself what you love. Be specific. Imagine that you just fell in love with this person. The least you can say is, “I love that you carry me through my day.” “I love that you gave birth.”

3. Focus on positive change. Set intent (Christine Kane says it better than I ever could.) Follow through.

When you fail (and you will), pick up yourself, and start over again.
Diets don’t work. Ever. Not for losing weight. Not for becoming happy. They do work, when you have a food-related illness like diabetes.

So the trick is to concentrate on things to do. Like when I’m hungry in the evening and crave chocolate, I’ll drink a cup of tea instead. (Well, that’s the plan.) Or I go to bed instead. My craving for chocolate is not a sign of hunger bur of tiredness.

4. Get rest. Sleep enough.

(And no, contrary to popular myth, not all adults can exist with a max. of six hours of sleep per night. I need 8 1/2 and so do most women.)

5. Do something nice for you every day. That’s an order. And nice does not mean chocolate every time.

Sit down with a cup of tea, read a book, do something different, smell the roses, nurture your sense of wonder and adventure.

6. When you find yourself thinking about being fat ot what to eat, think about something really important instead.

Like your music or your writing, your blog or your children.

7. Do the thing you love. The thing you really love.

For me that is making music. It works every time. I sit down, cranky, bored and not willing to play, and after some playing and working, and improvising – instant happiness.

8. Eat real food that tastes good. Geneen Roth adds to this that you should eat one warm meal every day.

Try to have quiet and enjoyable mealtimes. (I know how hard that is with children around.) Really taste your food. And be mindful of your body while eating.

9. When the meal is over, stop eating. No grazing, no stuffing leftovers in your mouth.

10. Focus on the life you want to live.

Do I really want to be someone who is stuffing herself with junk food all the time? Does it really feel good? No, it doesn’t. So until I become healthy and sane, I’ll fake it. Pretend until it gets real.

Technorati Tags: Debra Waterhouse, diet, diet mentality, FlyLady, Geneen Roth

(A friend of mine read my recent post about summer break and asked me how I’d define “diet mentality”. Here’s the answer to that. Part two will deal with ways out of diet mentality.)

• Diet mentality means going through your day thinking, “I’m fat. I’m fat. I’m fat.”
• And, “I shouldn’t have eaten this. Should I eat this? I shouldn’t eat this. Oh, what the heck. Now I’ve eaten it. I shouldn’t have eaten this. I’ll make up for it by not eating [insert food or meal of choice here].”
• Diet mentality means that you’re defining yourself and your worth by the number on the scale.
• Diet mentality thinks, if only this number were right, everything would fall into place.
• Dieting means, you’re trying to starve yourself or live on a restriction for a finite amount of time and then your life (and your eating) can turn back to “normal”.
• Diet mentality focuses on the number of the scale like, “Oh, I lost 2 pounds already. Now I can reward myself with ridiculous amounts of chocolate.” Or, “Oh, I gained 2 pounds. How could that have happened! I’ll eat only bread and water (or more likely vegetables, yoghurt and water) until they’re off again.” (Unless you believe in water-retention like I do.)
• Diet mentality means trying to fight for losing the same 5 pounds over and over again.
• Diet mentality means that if you’d only manage to be good for a few weeks, everything will be fine again.

But guess what, nobody’s going to give you a medal for “being good” or losing weight. (Well, apart from Weight Watchers, maybe.) And like Geneen Roth says,

“Thin people get cellulite, get sick and die, too.”

(I couldn’t find the source of this quote, but I can recommend all Geneen Roth‘s books. For starters try “When you eat at the refrigerator, pull up a chair.“)

And when you’ve finally lost that elusive two pounds, there will be the next goal:

• When I weighed 84 kg, I thought, “If only I were back at my pre-pregnancy weight of 78.”
• When I weighed 78 (before that) I thought, “If only I were back at 71.”
• When I was at 71 I thought, “I’m real fat, if only I were back at 69.”

And then 67, 65, 63, 60, 56. There it stopped, because I never weighed less as an adult or teenager. I was 16, I was love-sick, I was depressed, and I looked like a stick figure with ears for handles.

Look, stick-figure Susanne:

And here big Susanne:

Which one looks happier? (I know you maybe can’t see it, but big Susanne is much happier than stick-figure Susanne. Even though she feels fat all the time.)

So, the question is: How do you come out of diet mentality?
Stay tuned…

Technorati Tags: diet, diet mentality, Geneen Roth

I have something to confess. Maybe you remember my series of posts on non-dieting, and how I’m only trying to eat like a healthy and sane human being? Do you?
(It’s okay, just go and read it. And it’s okay, if you don’t read all the posts. You don’t have to.)

So, there I was, proud of myself, lost about 20 pounds, eating better; once again I thought I had made it. Only I hadn’t. Slowly my old habits started creeping back in. Only today, I thought as I followed chocolate with beer. Only this once I thought, as I ate without stopping from lunch to bedtime. I was fortunate this time, because I noticed it early. And I tried desperately to go back on track.

Then I read Moxie’ s training’ s blog, where she told about T-Tapp. Curious I clicked on the link: “Lose 2 sizes in 4 weeks.” You need only 15 minutes of exercise a day. And all the success stories. Have you read the testimonials?

Suddenly I found myself like “Losing and looking fabulous? Count me in. Where do I have to sign?” Duh. Mrs. “I’d never diet” and “This is only to overcome unhealthy eating patterns.” was all excited because she wanted to look “Fit and fabulous in 15 minutes”.

Of course I was skeptical. But on the other hand my new workout routine of walking and a little leisurely yoga did not quite help me to build more strength. So I bought the book.

In the course of the first two weeks doing T-Tapp Basic Plus (15 minutes) out of a book (!) I – gained two pounds. BUT: I lost between one and two inches everywhere from my bust to my knees. And I looked more defined, and my posture (not that I had cared about it before) looked way better. I was hooked and ordered the DVD (expensive with a big shipping fee to Europe). Having the DVD helped a lot, but things didn’t proceed quite as spectacular as they begun. Well, that was only to be expected. Recently I even upgraded to the “Total Workout” (50 minutes).

I love this workout. It’s flexible, I can do 15 to 45 minutes depending on my schedule, I’m doing it every other day. I feel good, I look better, and I’m still getting sore muscles doing it, even ‘though I started in the middle of May. It feels as if you’re building the muscles from the inside out. And I like doing the same exercises over and over again, and I have no problems that there is no music or anything. Just a middle aged woman (very lean middle aged woman, but there are other people on the DVD too) working out and talking all the while, “Tuck butt! KLT.”

No the problem I’m having with myself (Are there any others? Thank God these are the only ones right now.) I thought I was mature enough to feel good with myself regardless of my weight, but I’m not. And I’m watching myself getting back into diet mentality. Now, while I’m looking quite good and weigh 20 pounds less than 18 months ago, I felt fat again. ‘Though I’m not. (Last week, looking at a recent picture of me I thought, “But I’m not that thin!”) And I’m putting my life on hold again, until I’ll have reached a certain number on my scale. This is crazy. I so thought I was over this. Blah.

It was only after the new successful workout that my eating started going back to what had been “normal” for me for the past 25 years. It didn’t matter, right? I had the wonder workout. Who cared what I ate?

Well, my body did, obviously. That’s why I never lost weight on exercise. It’s really easy to refill on more calories than I’ve burned.

So there I was. Diet mentality again. Judging myself according to a number on the scale or on a tape measure. (You know how accurate a tape measure is? On the same day I measured myself twice and I could make the results differ by four inches.) But I won’t give in. I’m back on my eating guidelines. I’m back to giving myself stickers for going to bed on time. (Yeah, pathetic, I know.) And I’ll keep on doing it as long as it’s necessary.

Technorati Tags: eating habits, T-Tapp, weight loss