Enlitened Life

I recently did a posting called 12 organic veggies where I listed the 12 fruits and vegetables The Environmental Working Group recommed that you buy organic whenever possible because they contain high levels of pesticide residue when conventionally grown.

Apparently the “Dirty Dozen” as they call it was quite popular this month.  It also made an appearance in the magzine Vegetarian Times.  I bought the magazine specifically for the article they teased on the front; “How To Buy Organic: Save Money Aisle By Aisle.”  Basically, their method of saving money was buy organic only on the most important things.  There are plenty of food that don’t have any natural predators or parasites, so they usually get small, if any, doses of pesticides and such.

After reading their article, I’ve decided to add one more veggie to my own personal dirty dozen - making it a Baker’s Dirty Dozen?  A Dirty Baker’s Dozen?  Eww.  Nevermind. More…»

Occasionally my recipes call for a little bit of half-and-half.  Being their WW recipes and have the points calculated in for regular half-and-half, I never really worried that putting something that was half milk and half cream into my food.  Until I went shopping one day and needed some.  While searching the self for it, I discovered “Fat Free” Half-and-Half.  Well, of course I figured that it would be better.  All of the flavor and texture, with none of the fat!

There’s a blog that I read called Get Fit Slowly.  It’s two guys, Mac and J.D., who are changing their lifestyles one change at a time to become healthier.  Apparently Mac also recently discovered fat free half-and-half.  He actually pondered it though: “How can half and half, which is supposed to be half cream and half milk, be fat free?” More…»

So I didn’t loose as much as I was hoping this week, but hopefully this is the beginning of my turn-around.  I lost 1.2 lbs. this week.  I kept very careful track of my points, even when I went over so I could see exactly how much over I went.  I had two really, really bad days, so that’s probably why I didn’t loose as much.  So hopefully once my metabolism readjusts to loosing weight, I’ll be back on to my old schedule.  While we were pretty much off of the plan, I noticed that I was really craving vegetables and good, homemade food.  I didn’t want any more crap and hated the way it was making me feel.

I still have quite a ways to go.  I would like to get down to about 220 lbs.  If I feel that I look good there, then that’s where I’ll stay.  Hopefully I can get that low.  I don’t really know if that will be reasonable for me or not, but I’m going to try to get there.  I remember, probably my junior year of high school, weighing 280.  That’s the last real weight I can remember.  I’ve set that as my next mini goal.  True, it’s still 20 lbs. away, but at my lowest weight since starting WW I was 296.  So I know I can get back to 296, then that leave 16 lbs. to go from there.  The hopefully I can drop 40 more by June.  That’s when I figure I’ll have my final fitting and all, so by June I hope to be just about done.

I came across this recipe a while back, and wanted to post it.  Well, unfortunately I lost track of it.  Last week I finally found it again.  So here’s the recipe see if you can guess what it’s for:

• 45 gallons of fresh water
• 1/2 gallon of gasoline
• pesticides to taste
• some preservatives: sulfur dioxide, sodium benzoate, ascorbic acid, alpha tocopherol
• corn syrup, dextrose and/or honey
• 6 oranges More…»

I was expecting a pretty big gain this week.  I’ve noticed that every four weeks, no matter how good I am I have a gain.  Then the following week, I’ll have a loss that is usually about 2 to 4 lbs.  So I’ve come to realize that I put on a signifant amount of water weight just before “that time of the month.”

Luckily for me, I only gained .6 lbs.  So I’m really looking foward to my weigh-in next week.  Now that I’m back on track with actually writing down my points instead of estimating and we’re back to going to the gym, it seems that I may have lost some weight this week, it’s just being masked by the water weight.

The last few posts I’ve made have talked about organic foods.  Like I’ve said, buying organic is not easy price-wise.  I’ve noticed that if I can’t spend the extra money on organic, my next choice is “natural.”  I figured that natural products would be exactly that, natural.  I assumed they would have less pesticides and hormones and would be better for you than the regular mass-produced products.

Yeah, well, you know what happens when you assume!  Come to find out, the FDA has NO regulations for the use of the term.  They have no definition of what type of food and products are natural, whereas “organic” has very strict rules and restrictions that must be adhered to in order to bear the organic symbol.

Luckily, many consumers are pressuring the FDA to incorporate “natural” into it’s system and regulate what exactly can be deemed natural.  Even the Sugar Association has been lobbying the FDA to make the change.

If you want to send a message to the FDA asking them to make the change, here’s the contact info:

Food and Drug Administration
5600 Fishers Lane
Rockville, Maryland 20857

1-888-INFO-FDA (1-888-463-6332)

If you do send a letter or make the call, let me know how it turns out!

So Ben and I have been making the switch to organic food as much as we can afford in the past few months.  Just the though of all the pesticides, growth hormones and fertilizers that are in the plant grosses me out.  I know the FDA claims it’s all safe, but my thought is, why expose yourself to chemicals if you don’t have to?

I found a post at one of my new favorite blogs Green Daily about organic produce.  It states that as reported by CNN, the University of Copenhagen has released a study that found that “five organically-grown foods contained no more nutrients than their conventionally-grown counterparts.”  The five foods they looked at were carrots, kale, peas, apples and potatoes. More…»

I was fairly surprised to hear this past week that the FDA has approved producers of fresh iceburg lettuce and spinach to irradiate their products in response to the massive E. Coli outbreak in spinach about two years ago.  Irradiation is basically zapping the food with low-level radiation to kill off any harmful bacteria.

Then I was absolutely shocked when the news report mentioned that many meats have been irradiated for years.  I had no idea.  Since I’ve been buying organic food whenever I can find and afford it, I am rather upset.  In my mind, this means that I’ve been consuming radiation without even knowing it.  My immediate thought was, how does all this radiation affect me?  It can’t possibly be good for me. More…»

I understand that they come from a time where looks were everything, but I really do think my mom and grandmother are prejudiced against fat people.  All I’ve heard from them the past few weeks has been basically that I should spend every single spare second I have at the gym.  My mom told me several times now how one of her co-workers daughters lost 40 pounds in just 2 months by walking 5 miles a day!  I can’t imagine that that’s very healthy for the girl, and I said that to my mom.  Well, never mind, she lost a lost of weight - she’s a better person now! More…»

Against my better judgement, my mom and I have been wedding dress shopping.  If you remember, our impeding nupitals were the main motivation for Ben and I to change our lifestyle and start loosing weight.  My original plan was to not start looking at dressed until January or February when I was closer to my goal weight, but we were concerned that a bridesmaid dress we liked wouldn’t be availble if we didn’t go looking for it until then.  So of course, when you take a bride and her mother into a bridal salon, you can’t expect to get out of there without trying on some dresses. More…»