whole30 – TectonicDraft

A couple nights ago I shared with Chris my ribcage. Years ago (2014) I weighed much less and my ribcage was a great source of pride. I had worked hard for that weight loss.

I had worked hard to overcome a crippling binge eating disorder. I had worked hard to find truth behind the lies of body dysmorphia. My success was evident in my body.

Then I consumed sugar (an orange, to be specific) for the first time in years and my eating disorder reminded me it was alive and well. Then I got pregnant and miscarried (2015). Eventually I got pregnant and had a baby (2016). Then postpartum happened. And sleep deprivation and stress and unhealthy eating patterns.

Life spiraled.

I gained and lost weight. I did Whole30 multiple times (2017). And keto a few. But something that strict felt like overkill. I wanted to learn to navigate healthy while not restricting sugar.

Previously (2010-2014) I had lived a strict Whole30 lifestyle for three+ years. Never touching any grains or fruit. Only consuming meats, healthy fats and the vegetables that didnt bother me. I felt good and never wanted for more.

I had been content never again consuming sugar, processed or otherwise. It felt safe. Sugar was my heroin. I had said it so many times.

But then suddenly (2018) life felt so different and “staying clean” with food was so freaking hard. I wanted sugar all the time. I was a fiend for it and I chased the rabbit hole in search of rock bottom. I’d hoped rock bottom would neutralize sugar for me. I’d hoped drowning in terrible coping mechanisms would give me time opportunity to learn safe ones.

I’d hoped it would do that before I caused irreparable damage and insurmountable weight gain.

It felt like a gamble. But it felt like a gamble that was worth it.

Last November I committed to Rachel Martin one food related change. Six weeks before everyone else was making New Years’ resolutions, she challenged me to dive head first into a headstart. I began with a food window. Much like intermittent fasting, except I wasn’t logging anything except the time. I needed permission to stop eating after dinner. I needed safeguards to not eat the moment I woke up.

Days turned to weeks turned to months. I was doing it. I could eat full on crap all through my window if I wanted. I didn’t want this time around to be about the food. I wanted it to be about the time. I was committed to clawing my way toward a healthy relationship with food by exhausting unhealthy. Only two things were required: food window from noon til 7pm and the first thing I eat is always a healthy, nutrient dense meal.

Enter a long season of a healthy breakfast at noon followed by hours of ice cream and chips and muffins and cookies and whatever the hell else I deemed in the name of “no restrictions”. Months later I called it quits on many of those things. Not out of fear or a need to restrict, but because I felt crappy. I wasn’t getting the physical results I wanted. Most importantly, I felt worse instead of better emotionally. I was looking for comfort and safety in the nonstop eating, and finding overwhelm and instability instead.

Enter Rachel and Dave Hollis and their next90 challenge. This centers around five principles tended to daily.

Pen to paper five things I’m grateful for.
30 minutes of moving my body.
Getting up an hour early for “me” time.
Drink half my weight in ounces of water.
Cut one food item you know you shouldn’t be eating.

I stopped eating cough drops, which had become a huge crutch. I had appreciated that I had found a hard candy made with sugar instead of corn syrup. And I abused the fuck out of them. For months. I ate them instead of eating, even tho I was still eating so much. And it was ridiculous. Next90 was just the excuse I needed to stop eating them. It was a relief in fact. Two and a half weeks later I committed to no more ice cream as well. It felt good to not rely on the familiar, destructive habits. It felt good to give myself the opportunity to find positive, constructive ones.

Here we are now in May and I’m noticing my ribs. For many days I noticed my ribs and I would touch them and play with them and feel the way my skin feels against them. I’d contemplate how in years past feeling thinner would be a huge trigger for me. How losing fat was the awesome success that turned into my downfall.

I showed Chris.

Chris got that adorable smile on his face. That smirky smile that is part turned on and part beaming with pride. And then he asked me how it feels. Because we ask each other stuff like that.

And I said that it feels weird.

And then he asked me this: how are you going to celebrate your accomplishment?

I was stopped in my tracks.

My accomplishment.

Suddenly it was all a different perspective. No need to get wrapped up in triggering thoughts or fear. No need to feel consumed by fear failure or success. No need to borrow trouble.

I can feel my ribs and know my body speaks for my hard work. I can take pride in my accomplishment and celebrate it. I can reap the benefits of fat minimizing and muscle maximizing.

I can allow my brain and my mindset to catch up with all the healthy, just as I allow my body to. It’s another reminder from the universe that I’ve got this. And the universe has me.

So I want to talk about all of my weekly goals. Delve a little into what they look like and what they mean to me. How it all came to be. I should probably do this before I have weeks and weeks and weeks of thoughts that I can’t catch up with. (Newsflash: it’s been weeks and weeks and weeks already.)

First, I want to say that the precipitous to all of this was a workshop of sorts that Rachel Martin held on her Finding Joy page. She posed the questions, (I’m paraphrasing and filtering through memory and self here) “What is it that you’re waiting til 2020 to do? Why are you waiting 8 weeks to get started? What would it mean to have 8 weeks of progress come the new year?”

The seed was planted.

Then the universe kicked life into gear from there. And now I stand here telling my story.

Week one (Nov 11): Commit to an eating window from 9am til 7pm.

Eating is continually the thing in my life that I navigate. I used to live deeply inside a binge eating disorder. I have always used food as a friend, a connection, a coping mechanism, a stress reliever, an avoidance, an <insert thing here>.

Back in 2013 it was the worst it had ever been. I didn’t even know I had an eating disorder. I thought I was too fat to have an eating disorder. I thought I could only have an eating disorder if I was thin. Hell, I wished I had an eating disorder so I could be skinny! (I was sweet and naive…)

It wasn’t until I was back in school and studying nutrition and learning about eating disorders that I realized that I was drowning in one. I ate so much food it’s painful to think about now. And I never really gained weight because I ate so clean. I only ate proteins and fats and some vegetables. No grains, dairy, sugar of any kind, fruit, nuts. It was just about Whole30, but more strict, for three years. But a crazy obscene amount of food.

After acknowledging my eating disorder, I worked to navigate the things I was hoping to satiate with food and eventually ate mindfully and presently and satiated my pain in healthier ways. Or so it felt.

I lost weight and it was awesome and I felt great. And then I got the flu and after a few days of no food, I succumbed to an orange. Which feels really strange to say. I hadn’t had sugar of any kind in years and thought of it as my heroin.

Everything unraveled slow like molasses after that.

Fast forward six years: a pregnancy, a miscarriage, a wedding, another pregnancy, a newborn eventually turned three year old, a tween, a teenager, the rest of my family, and navigating lifetimes of….just..everything. And I was (am) still using food to function. (Far less destructively and dangerously as I once did, but still.)

I wrote, publicly (…with my name attached to it and everything) to another group I’m in that my goal would be to be healthier and have a healthy relationship with food, but that I’m terrified.

Terrified of not functioning. Terrified of not keeping up. Terrified of drowning. Of losing the comfort of friend, connection, coping mechanism, stress reliever, avoidance, <insert thing here>.

Rachel, the head of said group, told me to pick one small thing to focus on and I retorted my penchant for very much being an “abstainer” and not a “moderator” and referred her to Gretchen Rubin’s moderator vs abstainer, with the caveat that I believe the thought line, but not to my core per se and that life should be grey and not black and white, but in this case for me this one thing is black and white.

Which is obviously ridiculous in hindsight. And in regular sight as well, which is what prompted a quick reevaluation and remedy.

I do stand by the fact that some people are good to live with moderation, while others just aren’t. But I believe too that we don’t have to be pigeonholed to these things by chains or live our lives in paralyzing fear. I didn’t have to stand still just because I work better with abstinence than moderation. I can be afraid and move at the same time. I can moderate where I abstain.

So, I gathered up all my fear and all my brave and decided that an eating window was my next safe step.

I wasn’t going to stop eating this or stop eating that. I wasn’t going to limit food in any way, except by time. And also, the first thing I eat will always be a meal.

The first week took some balancing. Sometimes I counted down the minutes til 9am and other times it was suddenly 11 and I was getting lightheaded from not having eaten, but I hadn’t obsessed the time away. Some days at 9am it felt like I needed to eat in order to navigate anxiety/depression/stress/overwhelm and I would choose to indulge it. Other days I was able to recognize the anxiety/depression/stress/overwhelm and say “I’m going to wait until it passes” and employ other ways to feel all the things.

A few times teacher parent conferences or driving my kids around delayed eating until after 7pm and I carefully chose in those moments to eat dinner and then be finished with food, and it was always before 8. Some days even tho I hadn’t eaten dinner, I decided to forego it altogether because I wasn’t even hungry.

Week 2 (Nov 18): Commit to drinking seven glasses of water a day.

Hydration always feels better and also, by default, helps offset (perceived) hunger. There have been a couple days here and there I’ve only hit five, but it’s only interesting to note because I went right back to my plan the next day. No issue, no shame.

Week 5 (Dec 9): Commit to an eating window from noon til 7pm.

The next natural step for food felt like increasing real me time and limiting destructive eating time. Seven hours is more than a reasonable duration to eat. I rarely get hungry for real before noon anyhow.

There was one morning I was so wrapped up in emotional hunger that I was counting down the minutes til noon and didn’t even realize until 11:30 that I hadn’t done any of my regular morning routine. I was on an emotionally-depleted autopilot.

It was an eye opening example of how much control food can have and that I, solely, am the one that gives it power. For now the seven hour window gives me the reminder and opportunity to focus the rest of my time on experiencing life.

In the weeks to come, now that I have a solid foundation with time windows, my goals in regard to food will really be in regard to practicing positive coping mechanisms. I acknowledge I am not yet using food how I wish to be. I’m okay with that–it’s just not where I am yet. I need new, safe things squarely in place before I can take old, destructive things away. That plan feels like the best navigating.

Up next: weeks 3 and 4. Stay tuned!

Tag: whole30

The fire beneath my feet is burning bright.

To divide something so real.