Almost three weeks!

At some point, I would like to write much, much more on this topic. But for now I will just say that I have gone almost three weeks with no soda and no junk food!

My whole life, food never owned me. I had no trouble moderating my food and never struggled with my weight.

However, in the last few years, since having a fourth child and moving back to the States, I got fairly addicted to soda and junk food (primarily anything chocolate). I didn't gorge on them. But I would have a soda/junk snack a few times a week at minimum.

There are many reasons that I decided to give these up. My health, the example for my children, and my weight just for starters. However, I also was pretty convinced that the sugar was contributing to my chronic migraines.

I started on a new medicine and gave up the junk, and I have now gone nearly three weeks with a migraine! Amazing.

My goal is to go 66 days without cheating on these items. They say that's how long it takes to break a bad habit. At that point, I hope to be able to have these in moderation -- for special events or celebrations -- but not to reward myself anytime I get in my vehicle.

I tried many times to change my bad habits. I did it once a year ago but not having experience with dieting, I thought I could return to my previous behaviors. Now I understand, and I am trying to practice what I preach to my children. Soda is the one thing my kids have never been permitted to have, and yet I was drinking it nearly daily.

As a physician, John has become more and more convinced of the role that bad sugar is playing in our diets and lifestyle. In fact, there is new research indicating early dementia may be brought on by this terrible sugar addiction we have in our world.

I actually believe I was addicted to this sugar. I craved it and thought about it and hid it and had trouble saying no to it.

I'm excited to work toward my 66 day goal!

Today is the day I give up Soda

From the time I was a teenager until I was 36 years old, I didn't drink much soda/pop/coke* at all. I cleaned up eating and drinking majorly as I worked out to prepare for my college scholarship. And not drinking soda was top of the list. I rarely drank it. Maybe once a month. Maybe a few times a year.

And then, following Hannah's birth, I started having terrible migraines. I had always had them now and then, but hormonally, they got really bad after she was born. Like debilitating. They started with blurry vision and ended up leaving me sick to my stomach. Trying to avoid narcotics (and yes, I tried nearly every migraine medicine known to man with no help), I started a cocktail of Tylenol, Ibuprofen, and Caffeine during the week each month that I would be plagued by these terrible visitors.

It didn't keep me migraine-free, but it allowed me to function through them and continue being a mom. I didn't have the luxury of lying in a dark room for hours.

However, at the same time, I stopped being able to nap regularly. Up until Hannah, I had napped every afternoon. (I called it my wipe-your-own-butt-time.) But four kids had prevented that possibility. So I started using the Caffeine to get me through my mid-afternoon hump as well. Now I was using soda for migraines and lack of sleep.

For the last two years, I've been going on and off soda. I'm not drinking a ton, but I am probably, on average, drinking 4-5 Mountain Dews a week. I have always prided myself on not drinking my calories.

And now I am doing just that.

This part of the country has a terrible problem with obesity. And when I go shopping, people have soda just exploding in their cart. They are drinking it all the time. I don't want that for myself or my kids. And so I have decided that as of today, I am done.

I would really like to lose the last ten pounds that has not come up since Hannah. I am getting tons of exercise. But I can't get it off. And I know that these extra calories are to blame.

I have decided that no headache or fatigue is going to allow me to keep doing this. We do not allow our kids to drink soda at all. It is actually one of our only hard and fast parental rules. We decided to do this because soda seems to be a learned taste and because we truly believe, unlike junk food, soda is addicting. So every time I drink it, I have to justify to them why it is okay that I do it this time but not okay that they do it.

This morning I told the kids I am done with soda. And if I drink one, I have to pay each of them FIVE DOLLARS out of my personal blow money envelope. I've also set up a reward system for myself. If I make it a week, I get a reward. If I make it a month, I get a really great reward.

So that's it. I am blogging about it because I want accountability. I am going to do this.

Stay tuned.

*I have found that you know what people call soda/pop/coke by how they describe a machine used to buy it. Do you call it a soda machine? Then you use the word "soda". If it is a pop machine, then you are a "pop" word user. And of course, then there are the coke machine people who call it all Coke even if they mean they want a Mountain Dew.

First sunrise for color blind son

We recently splurged and purchased glasses for Sidge -- who is color deficient. (Just like my maternal grandfather, brother, and male cousin.) We did not record the first time he wore them as we wanted to be "in the moment" and not recording for that event. However, this morning we had a beautiful sunrise out of our breakfast window, and Sidge went racing to get his glasses. It was obvious that he was seeing the sunrise in a whole new way, and it was so precious to watch!

It is sometimes difficult to ascertain how differently he sees things with the glasses because he is a child and doesn't have the words to explain what he did and what he currently sees. But this morning it was obvious that the sky was much more red and pink.

So cool!

Smoothies

For the last two months, I have been making a concerted effort to eat better. I am about 15 pounds from my pre-Hannah weight, and I would really like to get back there ... eventually. But weight is not my main focus. I am not in a hurry to do it. I simply want to strive to be healthier and to get my body where I think it needs to be.

We have made a very purposeful decision in our house with two little girls to not focus on outward appearances. We do not talk about dieting or weight or looks in front of the girls. And I am not making this a big deal. We teach the kids that we are trying to make better food choices to make our body feel better.

I decided that a diet was not for me. And completely limiting foods I loved wasn't what I was trying to do. So I came up with a plan. Here is what I decided to do to be healthier:

• Breakfast: Eliminate boxed cereal from my breakfasts. I instead have two eggs every morning for breakfast with a glass of orange juice. I sometimes add a piece of toast or a waffle if I want to have a little bit of carbs. I was a cereal junkie and did not think I could live without it. But I've done it.
• Lunch: I realized that lunch was not an important meal to me. But because I didn't want to be hungry, I would eat something and it was usually cruddy food -- like a PB&J or Mac&Cheese. So I now drink a smoothie every single day at lunch. My smoothies include: yogurt, a little bit of juice, greens, frozen berries, bananas, and some honey. But I recently stumbled upon a blog post that had some additional things I could add to the smoothies: Nutritious Additions to Spice up Your Daily Smoothies. I hope to try some of these soon. The idea behind the smoothie was to get some fruits and veggies in me and eliminate needless carbs. I really don't worry about the calories in the drink as that is not my major focus.
• Dinner: My goal at dinner was simply to eat healthy and watch my portions. I have really felt my dinner portions getting too large. Blueapron.com really helps with portion-control for me.
• Snacks: I decided that I did not want to completely cut out sweets. I love chocolate. But I wanted to try to limit it. One of the things I have tried to do is buy a sweet when I am out and make it a good one. I don't buy cheap chocolate if I can help it. I will instead get something very high-end that is smaller but tastes much better. I also don't do this every day. Maybe once a week. We try to keep all snacks out of our house. 
• High fructose corn syrup: We have removed all products that have this in it from our house. If it has it, we don't buy it. We eat regular maple syrup and get organic and 100% natural peanut butter and jelly. We even found chocolate syrup and fig newtons free from it. We like Breyers natural ice cream or we make our own. And again, these are once-in-a-while things not all the time things.
• Caffeine: Up until Hannah was born, I drank no caffeine. I might have a soda once a month at a cook-out. But when she was born, I started dealing with migraines again and the Caffeine helps with that. Before I knew it I was drinking it more and more and having a Mountain Dew or Coke a few times a week. This must be eliminated. This is still my biggest struggle area, but I am definitely doing better and better here. 

Since I have started this, I have lost about 7 pounds which is great. But mostly, I just feel that I am doing a better job taking care of the body God gave me. I am still far from perfect but I am slowly getting there.

Migraine Recap

My migraines (which I asked for prayer for here) have been much better. I have given up on finding a medicine or figuring out what is up with me hormonally. JB fervently suggested a change in diet. So I changed. I gave up all processed foods. Not all the time. Not forever. But for awhile. I am not without cheating, but I have stuck to it very well. Sort of a Paleo type of diet. And wouldn't you know, the headaches have gotten TONS better. It's still to early in the trial to know if it is coincidence or factual, but either way, I feel better. And isn't that all that matters?

The free stuff

I stole this from a friend's blog. (Thanks Emily!) It has really stuck with me. I have always been a water drinker. I've always said: "I'd rather eat my calories than drink them." But while in Turkey, it got a little more difficult for me. Headaches and sleep deprivation were two culprits that gave me an excuse to go for caffeine-filled drinks. (Since I don't like coffee or tea, the only other way to get a good pick-me-up was through a soda/pop.*) And my favorite? Mountain Dew without a doubt.

Another excuse was paying for water. Ever since JB and I got married, we have always drank "the free stuff" when going out for dinner. I can only imagine how much money it has saved us over the years. But here in Turkey, water is not free. It is always bottled and always costs money. If I am going to pay a lira for a water, why not pay two lira for a Coke? And so it went. I started drinking more soft drinks for that reason as well.

But this picture returned me to my roots. Water it is. Whenever possible. I'll take the free stuff.

Even if, over here, it ain't free.
*Here's a blog entry I did long ago on the debate between whether to call it pop, coke, or soda.