Cupcakes & Bakasanas

Anyone who is overweight and tells you they don't have a problem with binge eating is probably lying or in denial. Yes, there are medical issues that can cause weight gain and a tendency to eat poorly or not process food correctly, but most anyone who is over normal weight is dealing with psychological issues as well. Or maybe they're just "too busy" to eat healthy and exercise. Regardless, just as being too thin is generally a sign of malnutrition in most too-thin people, obesity is a sign of eating too much.

Today was a bad day for me. I'm admitting it because I promised myself I'm going to document this process for better or worse. The funny thing is that while today was "bad" I would have been a lot worse had I not thought to myself how I'm going to have to embarrassingly admit to what I ate later. It could have been a lot, lot worse.

Skipping Breakfast and Lunch is a Bad Idea

Duh.

Sometimes when I wake up I'm just not hungry. The longer I wait to eat, the less hungry I get. Then I don't want to drink water either. I didn't eat or drink a single thing until 2:30pm today. That was major mistake #1.

Then at the office to celebrate a coworker there were cupcakes and champagne at 2:30pm. While I had planned on a late lunch (there were sandwiches and small salads available at the office) this was a surprise. I wasn't planning on eating anything sugary today or having any alcohol, but here I was, presented with temptation. In short, I have no will power. I'm trying to fix that.

Two full boxes of beautiful, tantalizing Sprinkles cupcakes sat before a rather small group of employees not on vacation this week. Not only were there cupcakes, but there were cupcakes in all sorts of exciting flavors -- sea salt and chocolate, s'mores, red velvet cake, carmel coconut chocolate, vanilla with a mile-high pile of sweet chocolate frosting, vanilla with sprinkles, vanilla without sprinkles, carrot cake, java chocolate, and more. I wasn't craving cupcakes or sugar at the time. But I hadn't eaten anything all day. And regardless there they were. Sitting there. I had to just - try - one.



The flavors weren't all that exciting, actually. But I rationalized that I had 0 calories so far and the glass of champagne was tiny (prob 2oz) AND I was probably going to yoga in the evening. What harm could a half cupcake do?

As I eyed the cupcakes attempting to convince myself not to eat them, another coworker went for the vanilla cake chocolate icing one -- not particularly unique but my favorite traditional combo. She stated clearly she wanted half of it, and I took the other half.

It took less than 10 seconds to eat the half of the cupcake, even though I did it in about four bites. As I haven't been eating much sugar at all and I hadn't eaten anything for the day, the sugar rush hit me immediately, and made me feel sick in my stomach. I then looked up the calories online and found out this tiny half cupcake was 240 calories and 31 grams of carbs.

Ok, so a half cupcake isn't the worst thing in the world. But this set off a series of unfortunate food events throughout the day. No longer did I want healthy food. All I wanted was carbs. Carbs. Carbs. And more carbs.

Shortly after the half cupcake, I decided I should eat some real food. One of the sandwiches brought in from lunch was chicken salad - which turned out to be mostly chunks of chicken on a large, white sourdough buns. I don't even LIKE white bread but I was so carb crazy that my plan of eating only the chicken was foiled. I ate the ~6oz of chicklen first and started to pick at the rolls. Carrrrrrrrrrrrrbs. Refined sugarrrrrrrrs. A few minutes later I gave in and ate half of the roll (it was a big sandwich so it's pretty much one full roll.) So much for will power. So much for half a cupcake.

It gets worse. I'm still hungry. Or thirsty as I only had one glass of water for the day. But I don't feel like drinking. I'm being productive and getting a lot of work done. The end of the day nears and about 12 cupcakes are still sitting out on the table. Most everyone has gone home for the day. There have been cases like this in the past where I would have eaten three or four cupcakes quickly (ahem this is why I'm fat.) I wasn't going to do that today. Or was I?

I had one more glass of water and tried to stop myself. I apparently didn't try hard enough.

Eying the cupcakes and craving carbs, I stood over them for a good two minutes deciding what to do. I should have walked away. But what does the carrot cake taste like? That can't be THAT unhealthy... it has carrots in it, right? I don't like the frosting. I'll take off the frosting and just eat the cake. I'll eat half of the cake. I'll throw the rest away.

So I ate half the carrot cake cupcake and the frosting that I didn't actually like. I felt sick again.

The Redemption

Maybe knowing I was going to an hour-and-a-half hot yoga class nudged my brain into thinking it was ok to be a little bad today, even though I knew it wasn't. But when I drove to my 7 o'clock yoga class, I was angry at myself, and knew I'd have to push myself to make up for all the crap I ate. I started fantasizing about going for a half-hour run after yoga to burn off more calories. Maybe I'll run and then bike. And then swim. I'll burn off ALL the sugar. I won't eat any more sugar forever again.

Just don't put cupcakes in front of me without a taser to keep me away.

Yoga was challenging as always. Since yoga relies a lot on supporting your own weight when you're heavier and have not that much muscle it's extra hard. But there's also something about it that feels good. The teacher at the studio on Tuesday evenings is really good about balancing out our muscle use, so if we do something one way we'll do it the other. It brings me back into my body so I can approach the next 24 hours in a healthy way again.

Tonight, Dan and I are making low-carb, low-cal bison burgers without the bun (4oz).

At the end of the day I will have eaten about 1200 calories, most of them refined carbs (not deducting any for yoga class.) So I didn't completely mess up my diet, but it just wasn't good. I know I need to eat breakfast... to get up early and start the day right. That all starts with going to sleep early. Sleep is the only thing I can really focus on to help make myself healthier, so I'll start with that.