Recalibration

So the other day I stepped on the scale as I do each morning, and I saw a number that was an ALL TIME HIGH!!  

Of course, alarm bells went off and I had to stop and think. There is no mystery about why I've been gaining weight. I've been eating too much. I've been eating too much for many reasons, including feeling bad physically and being bored mentally, in addition to the existential angst of seeing the world I thought I lived in being savagely revised. Food has recently been way too big a place in my life. Taking up lots and lots of mental space, and turning into a crutch to salvage an otherwise not-so-hot day. I can't fix the whole world, but I can try to address the more personal issues.

To address the food, I decided to at least temporarily join Weight Watchers, to gain access to the their app to track all the food I eat. My thought is to recalibrate both food choices and portion sizes, which I think have gotten entirely out of whack. I ate a certain way at  home for decades: much meat, quite a bit of vegetables, using fats freely, and having the occasional treat without guilt. Very few carbs. I never bought bread, and rarely made rice or pasta. Never ever french fries. My choices modified to incorporate foods from my vegan girl, so I had more brown rice, beans, and sweet potatoes in my repertoire, without disastrous effect. But then, a couple of years ago, I threw away all of the old practices and started back into eating more mainstream foods. And then, my obsession with food grew and grew and I've been feeling very disordered in my food choices. I really was in a quandary, every morning waking up and deciding to "eat right" and every day along the way not sure what choices were "right". I was buying and eating a lot of packaged and prepared foods, many of them "healthy" enough in their ingredients but somehow helping with substantial weight gain.

I know a lot about food and nutrition, and the main thing I know is that almost all nutrition "science" is bullshit. The way I started eating in the nineties, low carb and higher protein and fat, was at the time demonized as the least healthy way to eat. Broad sweeping public health recommendations on what to eat have been made with very little rigorous science to back them up. Even to this day, by necessity most of the research is observational and short term, because it's not possible to accurately control what people actually eat over the long term. 

However, there is a growing consensus about a moderate way of eating, heavy on fruits and vegetables, sufficient protein, and moderate on carbs and fats. The Weight Watchers point system nudges choices towards that diet, without firm rules about having to eat, or excluding, specific foods.

I was last in WW about a decade ago, and the app has gotten so much better and easy to use. I think the weighting of the points has also changed, though that is less obvious to me. You are given a daily and a weekly budget of points, and each day and each week resets. You can track ahead or catch up later. The app not only shows points information, but also fiber and protein (for which there are minimum numbers suggested) and carbohydrate and fat grams (for which there are caps). 

Foods can be tracked on the phone or computer several ways. There is an extensive database, so you can type and search for the food you are eating ("fresh mandarin orange"). You can build a recipe using foods in their database, and it calculates points based on how many portions it makes. You can scan a package barcode on your phone. You can even scan the nutrition label on a package, and it will add the food and calculate points. Lastly, you can type in all the nutrition information for an entirely new food and it will calculate the points.  

Because the app is so easy to use, it feels right now a bit like a game, to build and execute a plan that stays withing the points budget. The first few days, I was shocked at how some of my staples would quickly use up a whole day's point budget. I immediately started buying more fresh fruit and also rotisserie chickens, both bargains in the currency of WW points. I was less shocked, but glad of the discipline of a budget, by seeing what my habitual evening treats were adding to the tally. I've searched for treats that satisfy my need to feel I'm getting a treat, but that have reasonable points tallies. Bonus if they bring protein or fiber along for the ride. Dried and spiced garbanzo and fava beans have hit the spot, a crunchy salty snack food that feels indulgent. And I want to be indulged! Dark chocolate covered almonds are about one point each, something to maybe reach for when craving a sweet. Just knowing the point count slows me down.

So, ironically, food is taking at least as much space in my mind and physical day as before. But this feels different, more like I'm in driving the bus and figuring it out rather than subject to random emotional whims and constant internal discussions and bargains. (A friend of mine noted the same effect.)  My hope is by getting used to different choices and smaller portions, it will eventually require a bit less constant focus. But I'm still getting used to scanning bar codes on prepared foods in my freezer and finding that the one package will take nearly every point I have! I haven't decided whether that means I exclude them from my diet for the time being, or is there some modification that makes them alright? 

Digressive anecdote:  I was sharing the joy of the fava beans with my girl, and later she sent me a picture of the Wasa rye crackers, above. "Do you know about these, fellow fiber enthusiast? They've got a lot!" It made me laugh, "Sweetie, these are a Norwegian heritage food! I was raised on these - I think I was teething on them. Grandma used to eat them with pickled herring. Yum! But I haven't had them lately" And they got added to my shopping cart the next time I was in the store. This morning I had a couple with smoked salmon and a very thin schmear of cream cheese. Yum! 

Now in my third week, I didn't sweat Thanksgiving but did track after the fact. Nearly twice my daily points budget. Hooray for a reset this morning, and another one tomorrow.

The reason I want to calibrate my eating is because I want to stop and then reverse the weight gain. Just three days after restricting my food to within budget, the scale had dropped four pounds from that shocking high! I knew the drop was no more reflective of my actual weight than was the one-day peak that sent me in this new direction, just a fluctuation of water and other temporary things. I weigh daily, and I focus on an average of several days, not any one day. Still, it was nice to see such lower numbers. Now, three weeks in, my weight has settled in around that lower number. I plan to continue to track via WW until I don't want to any more. I don't know if I'll lose weight this way, but the reset and re-calibration is worthwhile anyway.