| TGIFwithKel | member since September 2009 |
 | February 4, 2010, 8:55 pm TGIF with Kel 2/5/10 We are Having a Party! I'll Bring the Girl Scout Carrots! Cue the Wayne’s World music please. …doodly doo doodly doo doodly doo... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I walk into my office. Sitting on my desk is a bag. My Girl Scout order has arrived! I open the bag and take out my Girl Scout Carrots, Girl Scout Spinach, and Girl Scout Peanut Butter. Today is going to be a good day! At lunch time, I head to the team pot luck. Making the right choices are so easy! I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the ingredient lists and nutritional stats that everyone provided on 3x5 cards next to each item. Mid afternoon, I break into my Girl Scout Carrots and Peanut butter. My desk is suddenly surrounded. The sound of my crunchy carrots must have rattled everyone. Back off! Get your own carrots! Ben and I head out for dinner. Having the NM seal of approval for restaurants now makes me feel so much better these days! When I get home after a quick trip to the grocery store, I will find exactly what I had ordered off of the menu and easily log my dinner choices. We head to the grocery store after dinner. I am able to find all of the great new grains Lynn has mentioned… ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Have you had similar fantasies? Those little uniformed pixies show up at your door, or sit waiting at the grocery store, smiles glued on to their precious faces. How can you NOT buy something from them? I am able to “just say no” by knowing that I still have 6 boxes I bought last year that remain unopened. Pot lucks, dinner at restaurants, making choices outside of what you cooked in your own kitchen, and life in general present challenges. How will I log this? How do you choose the right foods from all of the “yummy” options? Do you wish sometimes that you could hibernate? Remain in your house in your weight loss phase for several months, ready to emerge only when you have reached maintenance? That is not going to happen, and really, what fun would that be? This is a journey for life. It is not a journey of weight loss that will change when you move into maintenance. No now and after remember? This is one continuous journey. This is life. Years of bad information and the diet industry would have you believe that calories are your enemy; that there are parts and pieces of foods that you should not have if you want to lose weight. A recent commercial for a “light” soup shows various women (all tiny, mind you) reading frozen entrée labels and saying “wow, 310 calories? 8 grams of fat?” Their faces grimace in pain. While I am no longer a consumer of those frozen entrees, I want to know what the heck is wrong with 310 calories and 8 grams of fat? Since when did 310 calories become a lot? They just want to sell their soup. They are deceiving you! In this maze of confusing messages and questions we have had to answer for ourselves in the past, you stumbled across an answer in NM. The road map to great choices is laid out for you if you follow the guide. We talk about striving for a green log. This, ultimately, means striving for a healthy body. So, how do we learn, and ultimately teach others, that calories, carbs, fats, etc are NOT our enemies. High calorie does not mean BAD. You have to look at what comes “packaged” with those calories. I am not talking about just “prepackaged/processed” foods here. I am talking about all foods. Look at a food not just by its calories, but the sum of all of its parts. You need to learn how nutrient dense is that food you are choosing. Because I believe that calories equal fuel, I know that calories are my friends. I would recommend you choose your calories like you would choose your friends. Carefully, yes. Let’s have a party! I am going to invite some of my friends to join us. My guest list has some great, close friends. They are there for me, day in and day out. They make me smile, they keep me energized, they entertain, and they bring great things to share to the party! I care not what these friends weigh or how much money they have. There is no numeric value assigned to our friendship. Spinach is a friend. Look at 35 calories of spinach. If I was to consume 35 calories of spinach, it would bring this to the party: 5 filling cups of 571% of Vitamin A, 53% of Vitamin C, 13% of Calcium, 25% of iron, 3 grams of fiber, and I would be darn full! Is a rice cake my friend too just because it is only 35 calories? What does a rice cake bring to the party? Nothing. Zero. Zip. Nada. No vitamins. No fiber. It is like a good driver, though. It may be a good vehicle to bring other good friends to the party. Like peanut butter or hummus! But, Kel, peanut butter has so many calories and fat!! Calories, schmalories! With the natural brand of peanut butter I choose, 190 calories of peanut butter in a 2 tablespoonful serving would provide me with 3 grams of fiber, 2% of calcium and 4% iron. It brings good fats to the party. My peanut butter has no sodium. In an appropriate serving, it is a friend. Add that peanut butter to a serving of Girl Scout carrots, and you would have a healthy snack that would provide 40 calories, 3 grams of fiber, 579% vitamin A, and 8% vitamin C. Good friends for sure! I have had carrots and peanut butter rescue me from many a potential emotional crisis. The crunch of the carrots help me when I am stressed, and the peanut butter is a comfort food. Now, let’s look at 200 calories of one of those previously mentioned fat free soups. Let’s choose Homestyle Vegetable & Rice soup, light, weight watchers 0 points by Progresso. WOW! 200 calories of this soup would be a LOT of soup! With 0 points, some weight loss programs would say I can eat an endless amount! It is a free food! 200 calories would be 3.3 cups. I actually get a lot to make my logs green. Yes! 13% of fiber, 212% Vitamin A, 7% calcium and 7% iron. Uh oh; 119% of my sodium, and that was without eating anything else for the day. It is like a very entertaining guest that came to your party and decided to insult your dress, your furniture and drop a glass of wine while they were there. There are some friends that I just don’t invite to parties anymore. At first, I really liked them. They seemed so sweet, but over time, the relationship had to be ended. They make me feel badly about myself, and sometimes now even make me feel sick. Our relationship is just empty. I may be able to keep them around, but can only take them in limited quantities. Take the beloved Girl Scout Thin Mints. From a calorie standpoint, a serving of 4 cookies is 160 calories. However, in those 160 calories are 28% saturated fats. They do have 6% iron and only 6% sodium. If you can only eat 4, you may choose to do so. To me, however, they are like a guest that overstays their welcome. Something about this treat is so unfulfilling that you continue to eat cookie after cookie, and before you know it, half a sleeve is gone. I think the Thin Mint is the definition of an oxymoron! There are options for sweet friends that you turn to just for a little entertainment. For me, that friend is dark chocolate. For roughly 160 calories, I can have a very flavorful, fulfilling 3 pieces. I choose a 90% dark chocolate that is very rich. Eat it slowly and savor it. Enjoy it cautiously. It does have 38% saturated fats, but I also enjoy the 4 grams of fiber and the 19% iron. I find one or two pieces is plenty to satisfy my need for a chocolate sweet. Sometimes there are friends that you only get to encounter once. They are a fleeting yet at the same time lasting moments in the many days we call life. Thursday night that friend for me was Buttermilk Pie. I had never had it before, and was not going to pass up the opportunity to try this amazing dessert. I don’t have the stats for you. Quite honestly, I wasn’t the least bit concerned about the impact on my logs. I shared it with my friend Tricia, and it was a delicious finale to a great meal at a restaurant recommended by our friend ErinATX. I may only get to meet friends like jamztoday and ErinATX once as well, but it is an opportunity I won’t pass up. Hopefully you consider me a friend. From one friend to another, I ask you to stop listening to the diet industry. Calories, carbs, and fats are not your enemies! Select calories like your friends...Surround yourself frequently and most often with those that are most supportive; they bring great things to the party, those nutrient dense foods. Limit the time you spend with those that are only there for entertainment, like the dark chocolate. Reach out and meet new special once in a lifetime friends. The others? They call themselves your friend. Because of how badly they make you feel, you may have to completely end your relationship, or limit it to a once a year treat. I am trying to give the Girl Scouts a break! Do What You've Always Done, Get What You've Always Gotten. Thank Goodness It's Friday! xo Kel
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