I'm exhausted. I'm not really sure why either, which is the most annoying part. I suppose it's because I've been working out again recently, but is that really enough to make me barely able to keep my eyes open at 8:30pm? I need to do a few things around the house before bed, but I just don't feel like I have the energy right now. Sometimes I'll feel this way, and when I actually start doing the thing I realize that I was just being lazy, but it's different tonight. I got over 8 hours of sleep last night, sat in a truck all day, and had coffee about 2 hours ago, but still all I want to do right now is go to sleep.
I have a strong feeling this is in no small part due to my recent dieting. Or rather, my lack of a dedicated diet. We haven't had any groceries in the house since I started working again, and I haven't had the time nor the inclination to put together a list for someone to pick up the necessities. So I've been eating terribly. It's why I've been gaining weight, why I've been sleeping poorly, and why I've been feeling even more down than usual. It's actually pretty amazing how much diet affects not only your health but your mood as well. Sure, when I'm eating crap it feels great in the moment. It's delicious and sweet, but 4 hours later when I have a stomach ache and can't get comfortable, that's when it takes it's toll.
So you would think that I would learn from these experiences, right? Nope, I always return to eating like crap. I like to make excuses about how we don't have any food in the house and it's just more convenient to eat junk food for the time being, but that's a load of shit. It's true that I don't have any groceries to cook with right now, but that doesn't immediately give me the right to go scarf down a dozen chocolate bars. I can still make half decent choices when it comes to food I have to buy. I just don't. Because I'm already at the point where I need to buy food, why not spend that money on something I'm going to really enjoy eating. There's a big difference though between enjoying eating and having enjoyed eating. I enjoy eating Kit-Kat's. I enjoy having eaten roasted chicken breast with broccoli and rice. I feel way better hours after eating a prepared meal than I do from snacking on junk.
It's amazing to me that I can write all of this down, really show that I know what's going on, and still do it. Within the next week or two I bet I will buy something I shouldn't and eat it. It wouldn't be so bad if I do it just maybe once a month, and account for it in the rest of my day's calories, but it won't be like that. I'll eat one junky thing and figure my day is shot, so I might as well pig out. I've used literally those exact words in my head this week! It's easily one of my biggest weaknesses, and until I can get on top of it I won't be able to have all the things I want in life. So much of what I want to do revolves around being fit. It should be my number one goal right now, but for some reason I just can't seem to make it so.
Maybe I should look into getting a different calorie counter. I've been using My Fitness Pal, but a lot of the time if I don't eat something pre made or pre packaged with a barcode, I find it super annoying to have to put in the details of the meal. Maybe this weekend when I get groceries I should plan out my weeks meals and that way I can spend a half hour or so putting them all into MFP at once, so I don't need to do it on the fly.
No matter how I do it I need to start counting my calories again. That's how I lost the weight before, and that's how I'll do it again. Well, I suppose I could just not pay too much attention to what I eat and walk 30km every day like I was doing in Europe, but that seems a bit unreasonable. I enjoy cooking and eating good, healthy food, so I just need to get some more discipline and stop myself form eating the crap. I'll make a set in stone goal right now. For the next week, starting tomorrow morning, I will religiously log everything I eat with MFP and stay under my calorie goal each week. Next Thursday I'll make another blog post about food and report back with how I did. I'll even take some screenshots of MFP, and I'll make sure to take pictures of everything I cook.
Does anyone have some good recipes I should try? I need to come up with something good I can make in advance for my lunches. There's a microwave in the truck, but I really like making cold lunches so I can just pull them out of my cooler on the road and eat without stopping. I don't want to add an extra 30-60 minutes for lunch in an already long enough day.
What are your tips for sticking to a diet? Kicking those sweets cravings? Let me know, I'll need all the help I can get.