Collards and $ense

I was just reading an article from Woman’s Day by Michelle May, MD about eating and exercising ideas that are popular but don’t necessarily work. Here were the two points I felt aligned best with my own ideas:

“Myth #4: Exercise More When You Cheat

I hate this one because it has caused millions of people to equate physical activity with punishment for eating. As a result, many people either hate to exercise or use exercise to earn the right to eat.

 

While it’s true that your weight is determined by your overall calories in versus your calories out, exercise is only part of the equation and it has so many other important benefits. Instead of using exercise to pay penance, focus on how great you feel, how much more energy you have, how much better you sleep and how much healthier you are becoming. In the long run, you are more likely to do something because it feels good than because you are forced to.

 

Myth #5: Follow Your Diet Six Days a Week, Then You Can Have a Cheat Day

 

This is absurd! What if you were a harsh, overly strict parent six days a week, then completely ignored your kids every Saturday? How would this approach work for your marriage or managing your employees?

 

It just doesn’t make sense to try to be perfect (whatever that is) Sunday through Friday while obsessing about everything you’re going to eat on your day off. Then on Saturday you overeat just because you’re allowed to, so you end up feeling miserable all day. Huh? Personally, I would rather enjoy eating the foods I love every day mindfully and in moderation. I call this being “in charge” instead of going back and forth between being in control and out of control.”

Going back to Thursday’s thoughts about “good” and “bad” labels for food, I also believe that exercise should be about a more holistic goal than simply losing weight, maintaining weight, or achieving a certain look. Enjoyment should be part of the equation. Strength and health should be part of the equation. The concepts of “earning food,” making up for food with exercise, or “cheating” strike me as tapping into the “good/bad” or judgmental and–as May said–punitive part of ourselves.

As a recovering perfectionist, I work every day on this goal, which is harder than it sounds to achieve:

In all of your actions, be self-loving and kind.

I call it the reflexive golden rule.

That doesn’t mean being overly permissive, either. As May implies, we have to be good parents to ourselves–and that means setting limits. Dragging my sleepy self to the gym at 6AM is self-loving, just like taking particularly disgusting medicine is self-loving. Overeating is not self-loving; even if I think I want to eat a pint of ice cream, I wouldn’t let my (hypothetical) child do it and so I shouldn’t allow myself. The same goes for overspending.

I still have a long road ahead of me, but I am happy to be on the road rather than standing resolutely with my back to it.

I’d love to hear reader’s thoughts on this expanded topic: Why is it often so hard to be nice to ourselves, forgive ourselves, and/or go easy on ourselves? Why is there sometimes a double standard for the way we treat others and the way we treat ourselves?

That is what my coworker (with whom I have a great relationship) interjected when I paused in my sentence while adjusting my scarf. “I was going to get a candy bar, but-”

“Yeah, you should eat something healthy.”

What I was going to say next was that I was only mouth hungry and would save my treat for later. His evaluation of my chosen treat as unhealthy did not escape my attention.

“There’s nothing wrong with a candy bar,” I replied, I am sure failing to hide the prickliness I felt.

At this point, he said something else to the effect of his first statement–in a friendly way, I must add.

“There’s nothing wrong with a candy bar,” I repeated. He clammed up. Then to save our relationship, I explained what I had wanted to say in the first place. That was the end of that.

This brief exchange brought one of my concerns about the U.S.* mentality on food and exercise to the front of my thoughts. Why do we assume that an indulgence is a negative thing—that a candy bar can’t be part of a healthy lifestyle?

In a comparative study on food mentality (I think I read this in In Defense of Food), people from France and the United States were asked to give word associations for “chocolate cake.” The most common French answer was “celebration.” The most common U.S. association was “guilt.”

Is it any surprise that my coworker labeled a candy bar forbidden rather than exciting? Until very recently, I would have too. I used to call days when I avoided sweets entirely “good” and those when I overindulged in them “bad.”

I was the kind of person who ate dressingless salads during the day and then splurged on two Weight Watchers ‘ice cream’ bars at night. I never allowed myself the real thing, like, say, Ben and Jerry’s Chunky Monkey, which is what I really wanted to eat. But I didn’t feel I could allow myself. Being an extremist somehow felt safe, even if it meant lessening my enjoyment or nourishment, eating tasteless or additive-stocked ‘food.’

“Good” and “bad”: really, they have no place in my pantry—or my body. After much struggle, I have banished critical judgments from my kitchen, instead embracing the relative judgments of “too much,” “too little,” and “just right.” Call it the Goldilocks approach to wellness.

What did I end up getting at the corner store? A Snickers Almond bar to eat when I actually did get hungry for a treat. Let me tell you, it was delicious. I think I’m going to try the new Snickers Fudge next time.

Incidentally, Dima and I will be moving to the land of “chocolate cake celebration” in January so that he can spend a semester abroad. Despite my nerves regarding the transition, I am very pleased to have this opportunity to immerse myself in a society with values—at least where health is concerned—more closely aligned with my own.  I hear the yogurt selection in French supermarkets is mind blowing.

*I have ceased using the term “American” to refer to citizens of the United States after listening to a talk on history textbooks. There is a growing movement to reevaluate the term “American,” which really refers to people from Chile through Canada and not just the United States.

I am a stereotype. 10 days or so out of the month, I am a raging lunatic for sweets. Undeniably, part of a healthy lifestyle is fulfilling your desires. Another part of a healthy lifestyle is not consuming too many calories or overeating. When your hormones step into the driver’s seat, it’s hard not to give up, plop down in the big chocolate handbasket, and go straight to you know where.

Noting the date, and realizing the strong possibility I would inhale the bag of Snickers bars that was the sole chocolate item in the house, I needed a plan. It had to be cheap, because I splurged on produce this week. Enter: Whole Foods 365 brand chocolate chips. Remember the pancakes?

Even better with 2 teaspoons of creamy chocolate nuggets each. Yes, that’s me you see on the subway at 8:30 AM, savoring a tablespoon of peanut butter–or goat cheese–and half a sliced banana between recently reheated, fluffy, oaty, chocolatey clouds.

The ingredients are cheap and natural; per 2 pancakes, it’s 1 egg white, 3/4 oz yogurt, 1/2 tsp oil, flour, oats, and negligible amounts of baking soda/powder and salt. The bag of chocolate chips (safe in the freezer from hormonal hands) cost $2.99 and will last several months.

Chocolate chip pancakes work because they are built right into my existing grocery list and also my daily allowance of calories. Were I to go for a Snickers bar each day, I’d be adding over 200 calories of sugar and fat to my diet without adding much nourishment. If I ate the chips by themselves as dessert, I’d be left feeling deprived: only 2 miniscule teaspoons! .

Working them into breakfast makes the whole meal seem like a big treat. And what fun it is to eat one of those to start your busy day–rather than late at night, half-secretly or else unwisely brashly, when you’re feeling crabby or upset.

Pancakes may not be the answer for you, but permitting yourself to have a little treat, and building it into your days, might be just the helping hand you need to pull yourself out of the basket.