Sugar Fasting – Recap and 90 days challenge by Mark Lauren - First week

Thank God it was Easter last weekend! It wasn’t that bad, but the great the whole sugar-fasting started, the more difficult it was during the last days of the fastening. Initially, I was really proud how well I managed to stay away from candy of every kind. After a while I ate chocolate from time to time, but only with alternative sweeteners and very mindful.

Once I went to see my grandma. She had made a cake for just the two of us and I told her that I had eaten no sugar since Ash Wednesday, but that I would make an exception for her cake. I could not have lived with disappointing her that way. As it was in the end still my decision to eat those two pieces of apple pie, I could deal with it. There are more important things than diets. It was interesting, how my body reacted to the sweet stuff. At first I was really happy and content and then on the way back home I got lost on the way to find a gas station and when I was finally in the station I was so tempted by the candy bars lying there in front of me, it was peculiar. My blood sugar had dropped apparently and especially in the stressful situation of driving in an unfamiliar neighbourhood, my brain cried for sugar. Interesting. And it felt oddly liberating to finally see and feel very consciously what sugar can do to our brains.

Last weekend we had an absolutely lazy chocolate evening, Mr. Schön and me. I went to the Kiosk and bought a whole bunch of caramelly, nutty chocolate. It was gorgeous to finally eat them again. And I had some nasty ways afterwards. But you know what? I do not feel bad about it. It was a time when I needed some chocolate and it is ok. I know I can fast again, I know I can quit sugar if I want to and that is fine.

Sports have basically not happened this year so far. I am doing some Yoga, sometimes I switch on the Wii for some Zumba, but we have not been running often and apart from the above mentioned, taking the dog for a walk is the most exercise I get. Until now. I am not a big fan of fitness studios and I am lazy, so even though I love swimming, packing my stuff, driving to the pool, changing, swimming, changing again, drying my hair, etc. is just TOO MUCH effort. Workouts have to be as efficient and as homebased as possible. Running is great, because you do not need much equipment and can basically start at your own door. But – here kicks the laziness in again – I am a sunny weather runner. When it is gorgeous outside, I often get motivated to run. If it isn’t (like most of the time in Western Germany) I do not.

A trend that fits my priorities is the whole “Be your own gym” movement, which is weight training without any equipment, but your own body / home. Strolling through a bookstore (one of my favourite leisure time activities of all times), I found a whole bunch of books that introduce workouts only using your own body weight that you can basically do everywhere. And as I like a challenge, I got the 90 days challenge for women by Mark Lauren. (Find it here on amazon. I don’t like the design of the book much, but you know the saying…

In the book you find a lot of explanations why HIT-High Intensity Training – works best for muscle growth and which kind of nutrition helps with the challenge. Mark Lauren is rather critical of cardio training like running, but I think a combination of both should be what makes us super healthy. A typical week in the 90 days challenge consists of three (later four) workouts in different levels of intensity. (So far level 1 is my friend). Between the days of workout there are days of recovery, where you can find tips for your general health, nutrition, well-being, and so on. They are easy to read, informative and a nice change if your body hurts from the brutal work-outs. Lauren used to be a trainer in the US military and the workouts are not easy. But very efficient. Saturday, after I had done the second training session, I was barely able to walk. The muscle pain was really bad. Sore muscles of course always give you feedback on how something is changing in your body and I was surprised at how sore my body got from a few lunges and push-ups. No training so far has taken more than 20 minutes, which is great, because even the hardest training goes by fast in 20 minutes. Today is one day of recovery, but I can already feel how tempted I am to do at least a little bit… I want to take before-pictures and maybe even measure my belly, arms, etc. because I have the feeling that this training can have a lot of effect. And don’t get me wrong, I like my body and I don’t have a weight problem, I just feel that everything could be just a little more toned. Especially my arms, they consist of pudding mostly. But you know what? Even after just five days, I can not only feel but see the effects on my body. My arms have already gotten a bit of a bump. Can you believe it? I had thought I wouldn’t see any effects before two weeks or so. I only just managed to take the "before" pictures or rather "after one week" pictures, but trust me, they count as before. You see that there is a lot of work to be done. I also took my measurements, as weight does not really count if you build u muscles, My measurements in the first week of the 90 days challenge are: 
Breast: 92cm
Waist: 75 cm
Hips: 92 cm
Right upper arm: 27 cm

The plan is to measure again from time to time and take new pictures with the same outfit in the same position to see progress. As mentioned above, even after only one week, I can see the effect in my arms and a bit also on my belly.

It feels really great to actively form the shape of your body and I think Mark Lauren is right when he says that the 90 days challenge can also tone your mind and make you more focused and happier in general. It feels as if that effect is already on it’s way. Let’s see how it goes, I will keep you posted. 

Recent Reading, recent Knitting

Spring is on it's way...

Tomato Plants slowly emerging

As if having a job and doing a PhD wouldn’t give me enough to read, I have been reading like crazy during those last weeks. Maybe, because it has helped my dealing with my sugar addiction to read again and again why it is so bad for you and what you can do to eat healthily instead.

One book that was a good read, but definitely no life-changer for me like “Thrive” was “Pretty happy” by Kate Hudson. I have noticed her wellness / health-approaches through all the ads for her company “Fabletics” that was shown to me on facebook due to my interest in Yoga and wellness I guess. “Pretty happy” focuses around self-love and how to attain it. Sports and nutrition are – not surprisingly – two key elements of feeling great for her. Her nutrition is based on some ideas from Ayurveda, the idea of keeping the level of acids in your food low. I do not completely agree with her concept of nutrition, but she basically says what I hold true: eat mostly vegetables, reduce intake of meat and dairy and keep your fingers from processed food as often as possible. Most interesting for me and what I will definitely take out of the book for myself is her inspiration to put your thoughts / progress / ideas into a “drawing board” or in my case, a journal. I used to write into my journal a lot during my teenage years and it has always helped me a lot. Thanks to Kate Hudson I want to make journal writing more of a priority again. I have started to write into my journal again and there are so many topics I still want to cover. Like everything about our LeanIn Circle and the massive development we have seen there... So many thoughts! Journaling can really help you to cluster your thoughts and see connections where you haven't seen any before.

Catching Ball in Grafenberger Wald

The other book I recently bought is “The Stash Plan” by Laura Prepon and Elisabeth Troy. I have always liked Laura Prepon and admired her work. We have a quite similar body type I think which is why her story of finding a good way to eat to help her to feel awesome spoke to me. Her coach, Elisabeth Troy, a wellness coach, something quite unheard of in Germany I think, impressed me with her concept of integrating Traditional Chinese Medicine into our Western world and applying it to all kinds of clients. Some people might believe the ideas of Meridians as energy pathways inside the body to be humbug, but as I have been relieved from my weekly migraine attacks by acupuncture, I cannot not believe in the concepts of TCM. Troy believes the liver and goal bladder to be crucial to our health and it makes sense if you read about the liver’s task in your body. To make a long story short, I recommend you read the book or check out some of the interviews with Laura and Elisabeth on Youtube to get an idea of what the book is about. I have been making my own beef broth only yesterday and I can definitely say that at least one member of the household absolutely loves it, which is Lisek as he gets to eat leftover bones.

We had another LeanIn Circle meeting the other day and this time I had prepared a kind of workshop on attentive listening, which had been such an eye-opener during my mediation course that I just wanted to share this “gift” of listening. People might think it is easy, but if you are a very outgoing person, always used to share a lot about your life, it can be tricky. The “rules” for it are easy enough, (give the other person your full attention; do not interrupt, ask open questions to get a better understanding of their problem, and that’s it. Do not talk about yourself, just listen.) but it can be a challenge, I can tell. It gets easier after a while and last session’s conclusion was: you always have to “tune in” consciously. Do not get used to it and do not do it all the time, or you and your point of you will get lost, but use it as a tool to make others feel better and to relax a situation. I loved how the others reacted to our little exercise and how much all of them also took out of the workshop.

Next to reading, writing, workshops I have also done some knitting. One of my favourite presents of my 30s birthday was definitely the burgundy red supersoft Merino yarn that some friends gave me for it. Up till now I did not dare to make anything from it, as it no project seemed special enough. And you know what I am doing with it? A plain beanie. Dah! I could have started much earlier. 

Don't you just love that colour?

But to have still some of the great looking yarn for more special projects I ordered some online, so that I do not have the feeling to “waste” all of this special yarn. I am crazy, I know.

To follow the pattern more easily, I adjust Washi tape to the part I am currently knitting.

I also started some stockings in a Norwegian pattern, but I just found out that I do not have enough of the same yarn to finish them. I love the pattern though, so I started the pattern anew and took more of the beautiful red merino wool. The pattern takes me some time to knit it, which is why I have only started, but I am looking forward to owning two beautiful warm knee high socks I made myself. 

The first attempt, I didn't figure  I had not enough of the orange yarn to finish at first. Plus, the pattern is not very well distinguishable,,,

So, I went back to the beuatiful red yarn. The pattern comes out much better.

International Women's Day

A woman is like a tea bag

 – you can’t tell how strong she is until you put her into hot water ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

A little while ago – it has been over a year now – a good friend of mine founded the “Lean in” Circle Düsseldorf. I have written about “Lean In”, it is a book by Sheryl Sandberg, COO of facebook, in which she describes the pitfalls for women in the workplace and the reasons women often don’t make it to top positions in companies. Instead of only blaming the patriarchic system of our society, Sheryl shows that a lot of reasons for the way the world is what it is today lie in our behavior as women. And it is true. I have read the book and I don’t know how many times I nodded and thought “True, this is exactly what I do.” By reflecting, I slowly realized how often I turn myself into the inferior at the workplace. 

Furthermore I have always been someone who preferred to work with men instead of women. Why is that? I used to have a horrible female boss, but have gotten along fine with all the male bosses in my life, which led me to the conclusion that I didn’t want to have a woman as a boss again. Utter stupidity. Plus, I now understand my former boss much better and regret how I used to judge her.

Women in the workplace (or wherever, even on the streets) judge each other. All the time. I am no exception. Either I feel superior – by the way I talk / dress / even about the stuff I shop at the grocery store compared to other women – or I feel insecure by the way the other women talk / dress / buy great stuff  - and then I feel an even bigger distance between us. “Lean In” opened my eyes here. If we do not work together as women and appreciate one another, how will we ever change society and make it more equal? It shook me to the core and made me see a lot of conflicts and insecurity around me in a different light.

While I was at university I had the feeling that there was no gender gap that would concern me. Naïve as I was I saw the female professors, leading our department, being just as powerful as the men, never thinking about the fact that, e.g. all of the secretaries were women. Once I was out in the business world, I started to feel that something was not right. Men, even my superiors in the jobs, could make sexist comments and it seemed to be tolerated by everyone. It felt very much 1960s to me. Disillusioning. 

I am deeply grateful for the change my friend Amanda brought into my life and actually the life of all of the women who have joined the Düsseldorf Circle. We meet on a pretty regular basis and the appreciating atmosphere, the sharing and the feel of support for each other can be uplifting and make me feel quite powerful. It feels like this could be the beginning of something new and important and although I am often tired when I go to the events in the evening, I always take so much out of them that it is worth the effort every single time.

We are covering topics from as broad as happiness to as narrow as attentive listening. It’s all in there. And all of the women attending have their own special skills, ready to share them and to learn from one another. It feels a little bit magical. Even if this sounds weird to you, you should go and try to join a Circle in your city and who knows, maybe you will have the same amazing experience. Maybe you won’t. And you know what? This would still be ok.

And it is awesome that it is ok…

Listen to Sheryl Sandberg in her owns words here 

Check out Emma Watson’s approach to the topic. Such an amazing woman! 

Knitting is a great way to keep you busy while craving chocolate...

You can never have enough puppy pictures...

Yesterday it has been three weeks of no sugar. I am holding up quite well, although I have experienced some craving those few last days. I often suffer from PMS and this time it hit me especially bad. I am proud that I didn’t give in though. I just ate a lot. And I mean a lot! But not the sugar that my body was craving. Usually I have no self discipline whatsoever on those days, I basically run to the supermarket and put everything into my shopping cart that is loaded with sugar, chocolate and caramel. I managed to stay away from the stuff this time, but it was hard. Saturday morning I did not only have the worst kind of cramping, but felt really sick and could not eat at first. It was worse than usually, but maybe I had some kind of infection at the same time.

Yesterday, while at the supermarket, I was tempted by the “industrial sugar free” isle and took home with me those two babies. They cost a whopping 3.50€ per piece, but I wanted to give myself a treat, so I did. The chocolate is sweetened by coconut-blossoms, so not really sugar-free, but at least no processed sugar. I ate a little piece of the coconut flavoured one and it was MAGICAL! The good thing was though, I was satisfied after the little piece and did not need more of it.

Ombar you get it in German drugstore dm. Yummie!

I have noticed several things about my brain and mind while being without the usual candy-dose: they are working much better! I am less tired, less moody and my memory is much better. Furthermore, I am motivated to move, to run, to do Yoga, to take the dog on a long walk. (Ok, I won’t deny, the awesome spring weather those last days has helped big time, too.) In one movie I have seen they tested the effect of sugar on the brain. The hippocampus, responsible for memory function and personality has been proved to be damaged by too much sugar intake. I used to be forgetful all the time, I forgot things that I had said and done, events that should have had a huge impact on my memory. My memory loss proved to be so profound that Mr. Schön was sometimes really worried (and also annoyed) about living with someone having the memory of a goldfish. Maybe it is just wishful thinking and knowing about the effect on the brain, but I have the feeling that my memory has gotten much better and I am more able to focus on one thing at a time. (By the way, Mr Schön got infected with the idea of sugar-fasting, but he has decided to indulge on weekends. I am proud to say that so far I have not been tempted, even when he was sitting next to me, enjoying chocolate.) A nice side effect, I have lost a pound per week since I started sugar fasting, without ever going hungry. To further motivate me, I read all I can about sugar and nutrition. This new German book is a lot about the body chemistry while digesting. Very interesting, but not always so easy to understand for a laywoman. 

Knitting is a great way to keep yourself busy in front of the tv if normally you were snacking. I don’t know about you, but I am terrible with all my projects, I almost never finish them at once, so you can find a lot of UFOs in our flat, Unfinished Objects. Elephant socks almost finished for our neighbor, a big shawl, a half-finished cardigan… Finally I took up the work on one cropped cardigan again that I have knitted ages ago. The back seemed to be way to broad, so I got frustrated and let it rot in a corner of my knitting basket. A few weeks ago I found it again and a friend suggested to knit a collar on it, tightening it. I did that yesterday on my way to work and hey, it doesn’t look too bad. The colour is a really beautiful deep red, and the fabric is surprisingly soft, so it would have been a pity not to finish it. On the way back I started with the missing sleeve, the last part of it and by tomorrow it is going to be finished. I like the style of Bernadette in the Big Bang Theory and wanted to have a small cardigan to put over dresses. Voilà! My next project (new project, ahem…) is going to be a Miette. (http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/miette) I have always wanted to make one, but so far was too lazy to follow the English instructions. A friend of mine, she is Australian, has bravely started to knit a German pattern, as though it is really hard for her, all the abbreviations of the German knitting terms, so I feel like an idiot, shying away from an easy English pattern. Miette it is. Then I will have one more nice cardigan to wear on my dresses.

My cousin’s wife wrote to me yesterday, that they badly need a new hat for their son, as he loves the hat I made him so much, he refuses to wear anything else. By now the old one is pretty drawn already, plus too small, so I started with a new one yesterday. I had written the pattern myself, it is not complicated at all, but apparently, little Lukas likes it a lot, so I also tried to find matching colours, hoping he will like his new hat just like the old one. I also started a new one, in different colours, so maybe they can wash one while he is wearing the other one, but kids know what they want and maybe he does not fancy the new orange/yellow one, which I admit looks a bit crazy.  It is, of course, a big compliment that he loves my knitting so much J

A copy of the hat that Lukas loves so much

Will he like the bright orange? I don't know... 

The pattern is really easy. It came to me after talking with Mr. Schön about how digital "code" consists of only 0s and 1s. 

Two friends of mine on a stroll last Sunday

Lisek of the leafs

Sugar fasting week 4

Hey folks!

How have you been? Lisek and me we are pretty awesome. Lying on the couch (or - in his case- next to it) after a long morning walk in the sun. There is definitely spring in the air outside and I love it!

Wow, I just had to look it up, because I kind of lose track here, it has been four weeks without candy in my life and I am so proud and happy at the moment. I feel really liberated and not because I fight temptations, but also because I have the feeling, candy and sugary food have become a bit meaningsless in my life. I can be just relaxed about them.

Last weekend we were invited for a "perfect dinner" at friends of ours. We have done this last year as well, every couple of the four invites the others over once a year for a three course menu and gets points for the food, decorations, you name it. Not being a very competitive person I do not particularly enjoy the format of the meetings, but it is always fun to see everyone. They served flan and churros for dessert and I did not want to be the person who would not eat it, just because it contains sugar. So I made an exception on Satuday. It was ok, I just noticed how sweet everything tastes when you are less used to it. Other than that I did not have any problems. Sunday, I just went back to my normal eating routine and that was it . In a facebook group I joined about sugar fasting, people freak out when they "lost control". When I think about it, I can understand it to a certain extent. But by making it a big deal, you let sugar play an even bigger role in your life than it had before. The difference is choice of course. If I deliberatley choose to have some cake or a dessert at a restaurant, then I enjoy it and know that overall I live a healthy lifestyle. Sounds like a healthy approach to eating to me.

PhD reading goes on at the moment. Next week I am goint to have the first eeting with fellow students, where everyone is supposed to present their ideas. I will not lie, I am a bit nervous about it, bur I will manage and probably take a lot out of the opportunity.

This new mindset it quite extraordinary for me. In my twenties I used to have much less self asteem. I would be horrified by the event next week and be totally sure not to be prepared well enough and so on. You probably are familiar with that feeling. Maybe it is my age and my experience that tell me, most of the time, situations you fear are much less horrible than you imagine them to be. All the fretting and the nervousness in advance actually is often worse than the situation itself.

Sugar fasting - Second Week

Yesterday it has been two weeks of no sugar and no candy in my life. And what can I tell you? I feel great!
I had no idea that things would work out so well this year (At least so far...) A major difference to two years ago, when letting sugar go was by far less easy, is the stress level I currently have. Since reducing my officetime and my working hours altogether I am a much more relaxed person. Organizing breakfast everyday and getting up early enough to prepeare it does not seem such a big deal, which helps me a lot with reducing my cravings for anything sweet. Never having been a breakfast person, it can be tough to have breakfast everyday, but I just prepare it and take it on the train to work, so that I don't have to eat directly after having fallen out of bed. It might be weird, but the breakfast in the morning helps with cravings I usually have in the afternoon.

If you feel the need for a chocolate bar or anything, drink a cup of green tea first. It is a) one of the healthiest things you can put into your body and b) it helps with hunger attacks.

As a further motivation and to inform me, or also - let's be honest here - to feel awesome about myself, I like to watch documentaries about sugar and read all books about it I can get my hands on. I also joined a German facebook-group of People who are quitting sugar, the idea is to motivate and inform each other. My problem with it is, that the group is mostly used to share recipes of desserts and cake without sugar. When you want to give up sweets, no matter whether they contain sugar or another sweetener, it is not very helpful.

Sarah Wilson is also giving up fruit for 8 weeks, but I am not there yet...

I enjoyed "That sugar film" though (check out the trailer here), which was in cinemas last year. A documentary about an Australian actor, Damon Gameau, who had quit sugar a while ago and wanted to show the effects of sugar on a healthy body, by eating produced products again and including sugar in his diet. The interesting part about the movie is, that he doesn't eat candy though, but gets all his sugar (the average Australian amount of 41 tablespoons of sugar a day) from food often considered healthy, especially low fat producty, which usually contain a lot of sugar and cereals, granola bars, vitamin water, frozen yogurt, etc.  It is a very crazy, colourful and entertaining movie and it shows how bad all this food can be for your body. What impressed me most about it was, that it didn't stop with the message, that today's food is mostly bad for you, but on a positive note, that you have the power to change it. Damon goes back to his healthy lifestyle after his experiment and after a few weeks loses the weight and all his health problems. Even during the "sugar diet" he longs for his healthy lifestyle and feel good again. A scientist, interviewed in the movie made a statement that really got me to thinking: "If you have always lived that way (eating processed food), you have no idea of what life can be like." If you have always been drugged how can you know what it is like to be clean? Quitting sugar the last two weeks already had an effect on my energy level, I get up early, I feel motivated to do sports, I cook, spend qualitly time with friends, get my work done, read stuff for my PhD thesis - and it feels awesome. It makes me not want to start with sugar again. So this time I might stick to this way of eating.

I can also recommend a relatively new documentary about the problem of sugar made by the BBC (I love their documentaries!) called The Truth about Sugar.  and Globesity - Fat's new Frontier. Those help me to stay motivated and also to be informed about what contains sugar and how to avoid it. Just yesterday I watched a Ted Talk that Jamie Oliver gave on sugar and nutrition. It is very informative and I like how he uses his popularity to make schools healthier and inform people about food choices. In one of the documentaries I watched they said that about 80 % of all the school canteens in the US are sponsored by fast food or beverage companies, meaning the kids are surrounded by a lot of fast food even at school. I can only imagine how hard it must be to live halthily in the US.
One product containing added sugar Jamie Oliver talks about is milk. At least in the US. I found that appalling, but is there actually that much difference to the new apple varieties which have much more sugar in them than apples formerly had? We have a very good and big organic supermarket across the street and I am planning on getting my fruit from there in future, trying to find old varieties that contain less sugar.

Sugar and candy are considered such desirable products, that a lot of pet names actually come from that family: honey, sugar, sweetheart, a.s.o. I made myself a "sugar playlist" and those are only the songs that immediately came to my mind when thinking of candy related songs:

Sweets for my Sweets
Sugar Sugar - The Archies
Brown Sugar - The Rolling Stones
Candy man - Christina Aguilera
I'll take you to the candyshop - The Baseballs
Sugar - Robin Schulz, Francesco Yates
Lollipop - The Chordettes
Like Ice in the Sunshine - The Boss Hoss
Sugar - Maroon 5
Sugar Baby Love - The Rubettes
I want candy - Hop

Lisek is the sweetest Sweetheart anyway! 

Sugar is everywhere. Our brains react to it like they would react to other drugs as dangerous as cocaine or heroin. No wonder we want more and more and the food industry puts it into everything, always making us want more. They make money of our addiction. Imagine the uproar if we found out they put cocaine into everyday products to make us buy them. But the more I read and learn about sugar I feel that it is not so much different... 

Just recently a research team tested popular hot beverages we buy at coffee houses nearly every day on our way to or from work and they had a rocking amount of sugar in them! I always enjoyed drinking my nice and cozy Chai Latte at the coffe shop in our main station and no wonder, it consists of almost more sugar than we should eat on the whole day! Check out the BBC report on it here. I will have to continue making my own chai tea at home...

A lot of sugar experts, scientists and journalists see parallels to the fight against the tobacco industry in the 1970s. From the 1950s onwards it got clear how bad cigarretes are for your health and still, cigarettes used to be everywhere around us. The industry reacted by trying to undermine science and even attacking scientists and paying lobbyists to make sure, they did not have to endure government regulations. The same is happening at the moment with sugar.   (My parents actually used to smoke in the house all the time, and that was in the 90s...) I am currently watching a lot of Mad Men, and set in the 1960s, they are smoking everywhere, even on a plane, or with a big pregnant belly, which nowadays looks so shocking and perverse, but that is only thanks to the rebellion of some scientists against the tobacco industry. I believe that the same might happen to sugar. Ok, cigarettes are not part of what our body needs, but the longer and longer I am sugar fastening, I realize that processed food with sugar in it does not count as food at all. They are non-foods and they increasingly feel like that to me. While I already feel sick, when I see parents filling the baby's bottles with coke (I have only ever seen that on tv, dealing with the US or Mexico e.g., but I bet people are doing this in Germany as well), maybe in twenty years time we will tach footage from 2015 and feel appalled by the vast amount of sugar offered for example at a kid's birthday...

The other day, I went through the station and saw those ads, for chocolate, showing big choloate bars, full of nuts and yummie stuff, promising coziness and happiness. Candy in our culture is connected to happiness, which makes sense in the short run, as sugar helps to rise your serotonine-levels, but they shatter afterwards and you feel worse than before you ate that cookie or the piece of chocolate. So, turning to candy as a moodbooster is quite shortsighted and can start a vicious circle of always wanting more. I used to be a total ad-victim. Whenever I would see chocolate on a screen I immediately wanted some. Not so yesterday though. I went through the station, noticed the ads  - and then just went on. Without having the desire to eat chocolate. That might not mean much to you. but it is a huge step for me and it felt so liberating to not be affected by this ad. It is a huge thing for me. Being too passive about my food choices is one reason, maybe even the main reason, I chose to quit sugar for Lent two years ago. So it might be not such a big surprise of how empowering it felt to not care about the great looking pictures of chocolate above my head. 

Living healthily has motivated me to do more sports as well- I have started with yoga again after having the flu two weeks ago. We have also been bouldering last week, which was so much fun that I regret how we have been not doing this for such a long time... And we went running tonight. 

I will keep you posted about the sports and fitness which is going to happen around here. Taking the dog for a walk outside in the spring sun is already pretty awesome exercise I think.

Take care :)

Sugar Fasting 2.0 First Week

Aschermittwoch ist alles vorbei (It's all over on Ash Wednesday)

Aschermittwoch marks the end of carnival season, a big party in the area I live in. We always celebrate carnival big, with lots of friends and nice costumes. And lots of sugar and alcohol, of course. The overly sugary food around carnival, following another very unhealthy time of year, christmas, causes the bad feeling we all know, the feeling of sugar weighing us down. It is no wonder that spring is a time for fasting. After Ash Wednesday, Lent officially starts. It is a very useful tradition, not only to prepare your body for spring, but to make you feel better after a time of sin ;-)

Lisek didn't understand what "Cheese" was supposed to mean...

We should be aware that Lent is no invention of the church, fasting is a much older tradition.
Two years ago I decided to give up sugar for the time of Lent. I am not a Christian, but it is a good tradition, found in many religions and cultures, to give up something that you feel has power over you, maybe something you do exceedingly. It is a time of empowerment. of regaining control over aspects of your life and can be very spiritual in itself. Sugar fastening was quite hard from time to time two years ago and all that kept me going was the longing for chocolate on Easter Sunday.

It's bye bye chocolate again!

This year proves to be a bit different. I have just started with the sugarfree time. but at least till now I do not miss my candy much. Two years ago, tomatoes and coffee with milk have helped me through the sugarfree weeks. In preparation I bought heaps of fresh and sundried tomatoes, so if I ever crave something sweet, I can just have some tomatoes. Banana with peanutsquish (without added sugar or salt) are a good snack if you feel like you need something sweet.

We have been quite good this year so far, when it comes to cooking. Mr. Schön and me we like to try all kinds of recipes and I have the ambition to eat more typical winter veggies, as long as they are still around. Brussel spouts, kale... Yesterday we tried a recipe with brussel sprout, fried in a pan, with pasta, mixed with parmesan and lemon peel and some cream. It was delicious! The other day, we made steak and guess who really wanted to have a piece of it. Or rather all of it...

Lisek watching Mr. Schön's every step...

Our food nowadays is loaded with sugar: ketchup, peanut butter, alcohol. juice, soda, you name it. I have no figures or number for you, but I guess that sugar addiction is the most common addiction there is in our times. Sweets are so present in our everyday life that everytime I almost ate something sweet during the last week, was when I was not paying attention to what I was drinking or eating. For example soft drinks on parties. While sugar used to be a rare good in the olden days, you can now find it almost everywhere- cake. joghurt, drinks, even salad, fast food, etc. If you are hooked on sugar like most of us are nowadays, maybe you want to give it up for a while as well.

Those tips might be helpful:

- give away all your sugary food, maybe take it to work, usually there are a few hungry people there.

- A.J. Jacobs writes in "Drop Dead Healthy" about how he wrote a cheque of I think 1000 $ to the American Nazi party, and if he failed to keep his hands off the mango slices he loved to eat, the money would go to those idiots. This is a good way to motivate you, even when the flesh is weak, it might help to make your spirit stronger, if in case you fail, something horrible happens.

- I just read about the suggestion to give up sugar step by step and to first write down a lot of sugary food you usually like to eat. Every evening, you mark the food you did not eat that day. I can imagine that seeing how the list grows you get motivated to eat better and better.

- Find the food you like to eat instead of candy. Sundried tomatoes work for me, plus everything containing milk, as milk has sugar in it as well.

- If you happen to eat a piece of cake or chocoate, don't stop the whole project. None of us is perfect and that's ok. Maybe you just really needed this piece right then. Keep up with the plan and don't think about the occasion.

- Reduce stress. It helps me big time that nowadays I work more from home, where I better control what to eat and when to eat. When in the office, often I do not take the break to eat in peace, ending up with really bad food choices. Try to avoid stress and eat early in the day, to not let you crave sugary food on an empty stomach.

- I am putting everything I eat into an app. It sounds like a lot of work. but the app is actually quick in finding all the ingredients, plus I always find time for it on the train or in the evening on the sofa. It motivates me big time to eat healthily and also to do some workout I can write down into the app. For this, I am using Lifesum, as I mentioned in an earlier post.

- A side effect of the sugar diet last time was my weight loss. It was not much for six weeks (six pounds) I think, but it was a nice side effect. Maybe I will have the same effect this year, but as it is the main goal to become empowered when it comes to food choices, it is not really important.

- If you do not want to give up sweet stuff, there are loads of sugarfree recipes online, for example check out pinterest for it. Natural sweeteners like dates or agave should be chosen over artificial sweeteners like aspartam, which I think is even worse than sugar.

- two years ago I wrote about a great recipe for Mousse au Chocolat. It was seriously better than the original sugarloaded thing. There are heaps of recipes on the internet, just check them out.

- We are in one boat: a lot of people use Lent to do sugarfasting and it is always easy if you share your battle with others. Find groups on facebook, pins on pinterest, etc. to make the time easier.

Bon Appetit!

Tonight's dinner. Yum!