It’s the most wonderful (and busy) time of the year!

December 4, 2012December 4, 2012 / ktbuchs87

Most people fall in to two categories when it comes to the holidays. They are either Buddy the Elf (I just love smiling. Smiling’s the best) or you are Ebenezer Scrooge (or the Grinch… your choice). And there are a few people who fall into that middle category that are just lukewarm about all the festivities. Sure the lights and cookies are nice but they aren’t that thrilling when you really think about it. Me? I am Buddy the Elf to the 10th power. I love everything that comes with Christmas. The lights, the songs, the family, the movies and shows, the food….

Oh the food. We all know that this time of year is when we tend to over indulge. There are big family meals and office Christmas parties. I already talked about the holiday overeating in a post a few weeks back so I won’t beat a dead horse. You know that this time of year is a calorie-laden war zone, and we all handle the extra food grenades that are thrown at us in different ways.

For me, it is easiest to make healthier versions of all the food available this time of year. In fact this weekend I made “clean” versions of eggnog and hot chocolate as well as some pumpkin bars and a loaf of ginger-cocoa bread. They were all delicious and tasted just as fabulous as any Christmas goody. Now, just because these are clean and healthy doesn’t mean that I can eat as much of them as I want. Calories are still calories and you just can’t gorge yourself on healthy food and expect to not gain weight.

It is so easy to make small concessions when it comes to eating this time of year. All those small concessions add up to one big regret later and compromised health. In my last post I talked a little about the history of the RDA and while I do disagree with some of the aspects of the RDA, it does have at its base a very important message. We all need to get a certain amount of nutrients, vitamins, and minerals. While it might not be the same amount or the same type for every person, it is vital that you fuel your body properly. It will help especially this time of year when temptations are lurking behind every Christmas tree. A well fed body will function better and be able to handle all those little temptations. When your body has all the proper nutrients, it is more satisfied and less likely to gorge Christmas treats!

In the next posts I am going to break down the different parts of the RDA and help you sort through what you need to know to feed your body properly! In the mean time enjoy your holidays and don’t fret over every single piece of food that you eat this season. A few cookies will NOT kill you!

Our first married Christmas tree! SO PRETTY!!

Hello everyone!!

November 14, 2012November 14, 2012 / ktbuchs87

My two week hiatus has come to an end and I am ready to jump back into blogging headfirst. I had an amazing wedding this past weekend and still find it hard to believe that I am a wife now!! After our wedding, we spent the weekend in Chicago because our actual honeymoon isn’t until January. So we have something else to look forward to!

Now, let’s get onto the reason you are reading this blog. As much as I would love to relive every single detail of our wedding and write pages and pages about it, I suspect that you would get VERY bored fairly quickly. That being said, I do want to talk about some things I learned health/nutrition wise these past few weeks. Hopefully my experiences can help you to avoid some of the problems I ran into.

Stress is BRUTAL. I know that I am stating the obvious here, but man did stress kick my butt the past few weeks. I knew that stress was not a good thing and that it should be avoided, but what I didn’t realize was how much it can really wreak havoc on a person’s body. I told Adam that is was a good thing we finally got married because I was sure that I would not survive another week of planning the wedding. I was shocked to see the toll that stress put on my body. I couldn’t sleep through the night, I had no energy during the day, my workouts felt 20 times harder than they should be, and I felt cranky most of the time. But even more than all of that was how my appetite was affected.

I have never really had a problem with eating food before. I like food. I usually have the problem of eating too much and having to control my appetite. So I was very surprised when I suddenly did not want to eat at all or would just miss meals because I would be too busy with something else. I have never had the problem of having to force myself to eat some type of food. Maybe this is all old news to you, but I was a little out of my element. I had been eating so well for such a long time that I did not even think that that would somehow disappear. It was rough and I admit that I didn’t always choose what would be healthiest for me. Fortunately the whole experience did help teach me, so it wasn’t a total loss.

First of all, never think that because something has never happened to you that it never will, especially when it comes to your body and your health. You just never know how you will respond to a certain situation or how your body will react to something you put it through. I think that was a little part of my problem with this whole loss of appetite. I wasn’t prepared for it and so along with the stress of the wedding I had the shock of something else that had never happened to me. My body just didn’t know how to handle all of that. I know it is impossible to be able to prepare yourself for every single type of reaction that you could have to a given event, but you can be prepared that anything, even something that has never happened to you before, could happen. If you’re even a little prepared for that, your body won’t be totally shocked.

Second, food is important. Duh, you all know this. But it is especially important during times of high stress and it is crucial to eat well. Junk food will make all of your problems worse. You’re already going through enough, why add bad food on top of that? You have to eat regularly too. I cringe thinking about the amount of times that I missed a meal because I was just too focused on something else or the thought of food just didn’t appeal to me. I am thankful for the times that someone made me eat or I forced myself to put something in my stomach. While it might sound cruel to force yourself to eat, in my case it was the only way to get that fuel in my body. If you know that you are going to be going through a stressful time soon, take some time to prepare meals/snacks for yourself. This might sound time consuming but trust me, when that stress hits you and you think about all you have to do, you will be glad that you thought to prepare food. It will just be one less thing that you have to think about.

Lastly, we all need some type of support holding us up during tough times. Again, I know that I am stating the obvious on this one, but you can NOT do it all alone. Trust me. I tried and sadly that just made all of my problems worse. I didn’t want to burden anyone with the million problems/thoughts that were running through my head 24/7. I knew the chaos they had brought into my life, why would I want to give that to people I care about? Finally, though, I knew that I could just not take it anymore. I knew I needed help or I would literally just fall apart. To my surprise, people stepped up and helped me when I asked. I shouldn’t be shocked because my friends and family are amazing, but I was blown away by how much they wanted to help me. Once I had other people behind me, helping me, some of my stress and problems were alleviated I kick myself for not asking for help sooner, and possibly avoiding the train wreck of a person that I had become.

This post makes it seem like planning a wedding is along the lines of pure torture. But it isn’t, I just didn’t know what to expect and I let the stress get the better of me. On the bad side of things, I really let my stress dictate my life and I didn’t like that at all. I felt out of control, sad, and just plain old tired. On the good side, I learned how to not let this happen again and I can maybe give some helpful advice to others so they can avoid it entirely.

Everything turned out fabulous and by the end of the whole ordeal I was married to the man I am in love with. That was the most important thing and I get to spend the rest of my life as his Mrs.! Pretty great reward if I do say so myself! Have a great day and I will see you all on Friday!

We interrupt your regularly scheduled program for this important announcement….

October 30, 2012 / ktbuchs87

Hello Everyone!

I hope that you had a fabulous weekend and are enjoying your last few days of October! I just wanted to write a quick post to let you all know that I am going to be taking a short break from my blog. Now before you start rioting in the streets ( I know this is a super important blog to all of you 🙂 ), it will only be about a two week break. And I have a really good reason too: I’m getting married in a little over a week! With all the planning and organizing that comes with a wedding, some things have to be put aside and unfortunately for me that means my blog. But I would rather be giving you guys quality information rather than just quickly throwing something together at the last minute just for the sake of putting a post up on time. So with all that being said, I will be back to talking nutrition with you guys on November 14th. I know you are all running to mark that date in your calendars so that you don’t miss it! Thanks for being understanding and I will talk with you guys soon!

You’ve got the power!

October 26, 2012 / ktbuchs87

What do you think of when I say willpower? Maybe resisting temptation, overcoming adversity, or maybe a specific person comes to mind. Whatever the case, some form of strength comes into play, the word power is right there. A lot of you may believe that you have absolutely no willpower, especially when it comes to food. When you see that plate of cookies you know you are going to cave and have one, or six. What gives a person willpower? Why does it seem like some people have greater amounts of it? How do you tap into that?

Willpower is a tricky thing. You can’t see it, only its effects. Willpower also means different things to different people so it is hard to give it an exact definition. But I do believe that we all have willpower, no matter how weak you might think yours is. I think there are a few important aspects to a strong willpower that makes it seem as if some people have great stores of it while others are just trying to muster up a few drops of it.

The first one is the desire to change. It might seem obvious, but this is so often overlooked or not given much credit. People have a strong willpower really and truly WANT to change some aspect of their life. Let’s take nutrition and eating (this is a nutrition blog after all folks). If you really want to eat better you have already taken the first step to having more willpower. But Katie, I do really want to eat better, I just can’t resist those “bad” foods. Then no, you don’t want to eat better, you want to eat the same garbage you have always eaten. Sorry to be harsh, but saying you want to change but then turning around and downing a pint of ice cream is a bit contradictory. You almost need to be at a place where you are disgusted with the way you are eating and the only place you can go is in the total opposite direction. There is a point where you will WANT change and act on that want, there is the first little hint of your willpower.

The second part of willpower is motivation. Wanting to change your eating habits is great but you are going to have to have motivation to keep that change going and to strengthen your willpower even more. Motivation is another tricky idea; here is the technical definition of it. I’m going to simplify it because I think that it doesn’t need to be super technical. Motivation is personal to you and is what gets you revved up and going. What motivates me probably will not motivate you in the least. That’s fine, what isn’t fine is when people use what they are fighting against as motivation. Let’s use eating again. If you are trying to eat better and maybe lose weight and decide to motivate yourself by promising yourself a piece of chocolate cake if you lose five pounds, how is that helpful? That’s the equivalent to trying to quit smoking and rewarding a smoke free week with a cigarette. Find other means of motivation for what it is you are trying to change. By using food to reward yourself, you’re just slowly weakening your willpower as well as your motivation to keep going.

One other thing that is important to willpower is the perception of gaining something from your use of willpower. In this article, the author talks about how when people see results from the use of their willpower, it actually gets stronger. That makes a lot of sense; if you see the fruits of your labor, aka willpower, you are going to continue to use it. And as a result of continuing to use your resolve, you’re strengthening it. And that right there will motivate you to keep up your change (see how it’s all tying together!?).

I can’t tell you how to get willpower. It’s not as simple as that. I can tell you that you already have the willpower you need to change right inside yourself. You just need to find it. You have to truly want that change, and you will need to find the proper motivation to keep going. Take a look at your life and see where your weakest area is. Ask yourself if you are ready to take on the job of turning that behavior around. If you are then you have the tools within to make that change. I believe in you, do you?

How far is too far?

October 24, 2012 / ktbuchs87

A few weeks ago I wrote about a disorder called orthorexia. Simply put this disorder is an obsession with avoiding foods that one perceives as unhealthy. It is not a diagnosed disorder, but it is becoming more prevalent. I wanted to come back to this topic after having a few interesting discussions about it.

After I wrote the post, I talked with my dad and Adam about the disorder. In the talk with my dad he asked a legitimate question: how is the way that you eat not considered orthorexia? For those of you just joining, I eat based on the eat-clean principles. I do not eat anything processed (no white flour, rice, sugar or brown sugar), I do not eat anything with preservatives or chemicals or artificial ingredients. I also limit my dairy intake but that is more because of a developed intolerance. Basically I eat whole foods like fruits and vegetables, lean meats like chicken and fish, and whole grains such as brown rice or quinoa. At first when my dad asked that question I was offended. Of course I don’t have an eating disorder. I choose to eat healthy and not put harmful things in my body. I talked about it later that day with Adam and he told me that sounds exactly like something someone with orthorexia might say. Now, he wasn’t accusing me of having orthorexia, but he did make me see my dad had a point in asking.

Yes, my eating choices are probably considered über healthy and possibly even extreme to some people. The fact that I don’t eat potato chips or cereal or candy might blow some people’s minds because unfortunately those foods have become part of our everyday diets. But how do I know that my food choices haven’t crossed over into the unhealthy obsession area of a possible disorder? How do I defend my lifestyle without sounding like I’m defending a problem? I’m sure that I am not the only one who has struggled with these issues, especially when it comes to eating healthy in an ever increasing unhealthy world.

The conclusion I have come to for now is this: I might be slightly orthorexic. Now you’re thinking, great! The person who is giving me health and diet advice has just admitted to maybe having some eating disorder that SHE herself warned me about! Calm yourself for a minute and listen up. Yes, I avoid foods that I perceive are bad for me but I am not obsessed with it. I don’t sit at home and avoid social situations just because I might come into contact with unhealthy food. I do not constantly worry about eating food that I have not made myself because it could be unhealthy. And I have not limited my food intake that I am to the point of malnutrition. I have made a choice to eat the best things for my body, and I am fully aware that if not monitored, it could become a problem like I just described. I can’t tell you when the way you eat has gone from a healthy choice to an unhealthy problem. You will have to set that line for yourself, or enlist a trusted friend or family member to keep you in check. I believe that is one of the keys to knowing how far is too far: knowledge of a potential problem and having the accountability to deal with the problem should it arise. Health, like many things in life is a delicate balance between just right and too much. Your job is to arm yourself with knowledge and keep your balance on that fine line. It’s tough but oh so worth it!