Food and Scarcity

*** This was in my drafts folder since Feb... gosh time has flew! ***

Today has been a great day. Woke up early and cook my beef stew before running over to J & G's house to help them pack. And squeezed in a morning workout as well. I tried walking at 6 km/h and realized that if I want to do the JP Morgan run walk, I will be walking at this speed for 1 hour since I could cover 2 km within 20 minutes.

It was a fun and yet tiring day. I could feel myself nodding off in the afternoon since I woke up 5.30 am today!

I haven't been very compliant today either. And that's on top of attending yesterday's cooking class where we ate yummy stuff including scrambled eggs with lavender (there was heavy cream inside), chicken, mushroom and sun dried tomato tarts (so so yummy!) and semolina cake *drools*.

It's ok. This is for the long haul and while I may have put on a kg, I am sure it will come off later on eventually.

91.5 kg - hooray hooray!

The skies have cleared, the sun is shining and I am the king of the world! 91.5 kg whoo hoo!

Maybe it's because I went back to exercising after my shoulder healed up. Maybe it's because I avoided the avoids for the past few days like a good girl. Though I ate some yesterday during my colleague's farewell party. Hmm.

Hubby is so amused that I'm jumping for joy. But wow I have never track my weight and know that I have shed 8 kg! Hooray hooray!

Well I'm going off for my gym workout now. Then it's cooking fish and beef for lunch and an afternoon class of cooking! After that, hubby and I will be hunting for my red sneakers, hehe. Wonder whether I can sneak them in to work on Monday.

The day never started off better. :)

Gained a kg, ah god no!

So yesterday my hubby asking me to step on the weighing scales. And for once, I felt confident since I have been losing weight all the way. C'mon, I dropped from 98.5 to 92!!

So it was to my horror that I weighed a kg heavier - 93. Big bad stinking 93. Nononono!

At first I felt neutral about it. As in I feel ok. But the more I think about it, the worse I feel. So this goes to show that too much thinking leads to nowhere good.

Joking aside, I did keep brooding about it. Why why why did I ate those chips?! And the luncheon meat? And the... *the list goes on*

To be honest, I really didn't eat a lot of avoids. Well it's not a lot as compared to how I would eat before the O BTD. Still, I guess control is a new thing to me and like any other new gizmo, I have to learn to wield it with grace.

I wonder what actually happen? Given that my weight is pretty constant, something is up when I weighed a kg heavier. Or lighter.

It could have due to my strained shoulder and me not exercising for the past 5 days. It definitely was because of the avoids.

I texted my sis and hubby and whined to them. They were very nice and said that I made such good progress in such a short time, so don't be disheartened and carry on the good work. Sis urged me to be kind to myself. Hubby said that weight can fluctuate up and down (I didn't think so for mine... it's like sticky glue, needs a good shaking) and we just need to be consistent in our efforts.

I realized when I am disheartened about the weight gain, I turned self destructive. What a harsh word to use! I know but it's true. After learning of it yesterday evening, I went to eat more chips. Today I ate my breakfast of chicken and veggies AND then lunchtime (ok, it was kinda late, 2 pm actually), I went to the food court and ate chicken rice! With an egg and chicken liver.

To compound that, I went to Chick King and ate one fried chicken. I wanted to order more but quickly walked away from the place, grief sodden I was. Ok ok I know, I'm dramatic.

Thanks to a busy busy afternoon, I soon got distracted by work. By evening, I feel better and reading an article from Tiny Buddha comforts me. I feel more resolute now to lose that weight.

Because of the weekly (or even more) weigh-ins, I have been focused, perhaps too focused on the numbers. I hinged my happiness on it (hey alliteration!).

But I forgot that the exercising, the healthy eating is about a far grander thing than how heavy I weigh. It was about my health, my skin, my stress, my blood pressure and of course, my adrenal score. I forgot how good and tiny I feel in my clothes. How pleasant it is to waif into the office in slightly too baggy clothes.

How much energy I have. How tranquil I feel. How work seems manageable now and even if there are stressful stuff to deal with, it's not that bad viewed from the gym.

How my skin glow (like Rudolph's nose) after a good workout. How gooooood I felt. The satisfaction, the achievement. My pride in myself.

I've forgotten all of these awesome things. And to be honest, no matter how much I weigh (within reason of course), I never want to forget these ever again.

Healing

I'm so glad that my left shoulder is a lot better today to the point that it's 90% normal. Hopefully I'll be able to exercise tomorrow, whoopee!

Pitfalls

So after eating virtuously for 6 weeks, I can feel my resolve cracking... because Chinese New Year is round the corner!

Pineapple tarts! Kueh Bangkit! Love letters! Bak Kwa! Omg omg... and unfortunately they are all avoids on my list. *falls flat on face*

Even seafood who usually like me, deserted me this time because I cannot eat abalone. Nooooooo! Now you see why Chinese New Year is fraught with perils and pitfalls for me?

This week I haven't been as compliant. Today it was eating some luncheon meat. And some potato chips at night. Oops. Why did I buy 24 packs of chips if I shouldn't be eating any of them, chili or bbq?! Am I setting myself up for defeat here?

But I don't regret chomping down on the chips. Or the luncheon meat. Or the luscious buttery pineapple tarts that my colleague baked. Or hmm... I think there's a lot of things I don't regret.

One side of me secretly thinks that I should be ashamed, I should count calories (or beneficials in this case) or something. I SHOULD HAVE BEEN IN MORE CONTROL.

The other side thinks, ah you have been such a good girl for a while, just live it up a little. Life's no fun if you just stick to the (O Blood Type) diet book. Which explains why I felt satisfied, not guilty when I finally put away the chips.

I'm sipping green tea now. And recalling that I had blueberries and cherries for fruits. And I ate a salad for lunch today! And a couple of hard boiled eggs for breakfast.

Please kick me if I ever become one of those "counting calories consumed and burnt" kind of girl. Please.

Listening to my body

I have been suffering from a strained left shoulder all week after my hip hop class. While it has been inconvenient at times and downright painful at others, I did learnt something from this experience. Well... part from that wearing clothes has now become the new modern torture!

Firstly, it is to listen to my body. When I first feel the strain, I ignored it and went along my daily affairs. That is to say, I did stuff that strained it further. From exercising even though it was painfully jolting my shoulder to propping on my shoulders while reading on the bed, boy, my poor body had to take all kinds of abuse from me.

Secondly it is to let others help me when I really needed it and trusting them to do it well. Wearing clothes, asking for a massage... I used to be silent and try to do it myself. However now asking for helping is essential to help me plod along in my daily life.

My naturopath got all annoyed when I bugged him repeatedly about the kind of exercising I can do. Running? No. Gym? No. How about cycling? No, no no! I don't understand why do people want to exercise when they are injured?!

I even thought I'll just go walking but after walking around in the supermarket, I began to understand why he said NO EXERCISING. The strain of carrying my left arm was too much for my poor shoulder and I spent half the time cradling my left arm to my chest. Sigh.

One good thing came out of this. Today I fried some fish for my dinner today. However after tasting it and being revolted by the soft mushy taste, I decided to throw it away and cook some beef instead. My body was so happy when it tasted the beef! I felt so energised that in the end, I have to eat everything up even though I originally wanted to leave some for tomorrow's breakfast. That's almost 300 grams of beef down my pie hole with lots of greens and some rice. Yum!!

So you see, I am now learning my lesson and pay attention to how my body feel. Also I am happy to report that I now weigh 92 kg!! I have lost 6.5 kg so far! Yay!!! To add on to that, I felt that I needed to sleep more last night so I slept for 12 hours last night. While it hasn't been a smooth night sleep with a lot of tossing and turning, I'm happy to report that my shoulder clicked back into place and half the pain is gone! I can even do arms akimbo now, hahah.

This point is written in honour of my body. Did you do anything today (or not do!) to honour your body too?

Why I do this

Given that Os enjoy vigorous exercise which is essential for managing their emotional health as well, I am proud to say that I have been exercising regularly the past 3 weeks.

So if you read my first post, I weigh in at 98.5 kg. Well given that now I am relatively unknown, I don't mind telling you that. Just do me a favor if you know me in real life and don't snigger behind my back.

With the last weigh in, I happily clocked in at 92.8 kg. Yay! Very good for someone who has only done the Candida diet for 3 weeks and the O BTD for 2.5 weeks now and have only exercised 3 weeks out of that. Although I wondered whether the impromptu prune juice I've downed before the last weigh in affected my weighing somewhat. ;)

No matter. It is good progress! For health, my 2011 resolution is to slim down to 65 kg by end of the year. I think if I aim for 90 kg and below by the end of this month, I would be on track, yes?

Tonight I went running with the C25K iPhone program. It's for beginners who want to gradually work up to running 5 km in the future. According to the writeup, if I follow the program faithfully, 3 times a week, I should be able to run 5 km by 2 months' time.

Well all I can say is er I don't really like running and aiming for 5 km is not really my goal. However! My goal is to have as much fun and variety as possible during my workouts and that means doing an occasional run around the stadium if I feel myself getting bored with gym workouts. Not that I am. But I do want to prevent that from happening. Already my routine is taking on a set pattern in the gym.

I have also took on a dance class and every Tuesday, you can watch me groove to the latest hip hop songs in class. Fun! Come to think of it, I really should practice some steps now.

But I digress too much. Coming back to the original topic, why am I bothering to eat healthily and work up a sweat to lose all that weight? It's because of the health scare I had in November.

Realising that my high blood pressure was here to stay, seeing that my skin could not cope with the facial eczema anymore scared the bejesus out of me. I've learnt that if I suppress the body's natural reaction to purse toxins through my skin i.e. eczema, one day it might lead to cancerous tumors... because that's the last resort the body will do to keep the toxins out of the organs. Oh my god.

So yes you can say that I am doing it because I want to save my own life. I know it sounds dramatic, but it feels true to me.

And that's why I do it.

"As You Like" Curry

I came up with this curry and love it for it's flexibility. Basically it goes well with anything. Want an egg? Toss it in. Need some greens? Have some broccoli!

In this version, I've added a lot of beneficial food for the O Blood Type - pumpkin, beef, adzuki beans. Even curry is a beneficial.

And because I got some beancurd and tomatoes at hand, I've tossed them in as well. The end result? A yummy delish thick curry full of savory surprises. And it's not something I've slaved over the stove but just bunk them all in the crockpot.

I let it stew overnight and wake up to mouthwatering aromatic Er, stew!




The first version of this curry cost me blood. I accidentally skinned my thumb while trying to peel the pumpkin. Ouch for tough thick skin. I've learnt to pick an easier slice to peel next time.

This batch makes 2 nice lunches and one breakfast for me. For some reason I'm not tired of the taste. Yum.

Why I started this blog

Hello and welcome to my blog. I started this blog because of my facial eczema. Many years ago, I was using steroid creams to curb my eczema. It was by no means bad and as I got older, the eczema subsided till the point that it was only occurring occasionally.

I wasn't bothered by my eczema since the steroid cream was doing its job and I could live a normal life. At the same time, my career took off and though I love my job, there were more and more things to do and I was under loads of stress.

In early 2010, I went back to my previous company with a great pay hike and heavy responsibilities. I felt that since I was asked to come back, I NEED to prove that I am worthy, thereby beginning a cycle of poor diet, poor sleeping habits and no exercise at all.

Things came to a head when my facial eczema suddenly became worse and even though the steroid cream helped, the flareup of rashes happened more and more often, as though as a retaliation against the cream.

The dermatologist told me that I have developed an allergic reaction to my cream (horrors of horrors!) and have to switch to a non steroid one. This began a miserable time for me as the new cream didn't help at all and actually made it worse. The rashes spread and I became moody, upset and developed a fear of mirrors. The rash was unbearably itchy and there were times that I have to scratch or at least run a hanky across my face.

It all came to a head when I woke up one night, and scratched really hard. In the morning I was unrecognizable as my face has swelled up and there were red scaly patches everywhere.

I didn't dare to come in to office but chose to work from home for the next few days.

When I finally went in to work, everyone was so shocked at my appearance. My eyes were so swollen to the point that I couldn't even wear contact lenses. Someone even asked me (fearfully!) whether it was catching. The straw that broke this camel's back was when my buddy shouted at me in shock at my face. I broke down in tears in the toilet then went home.

Against the doctor's advice, I reapply the steroid cream and the rashes got better... and then it got worse. I woke up 2 nights later to a swelling face to the point that my lips were stretched tightly across my chin. I have to rush to A&E then.

The doctors gave me prednisolone to bring down the inflammation and oral steroids to suppress the eczema. When I thought it was the end of my nightmare when my face starts healing, another sudden episode of swelling took place 3 nights later and I have to go to A&E again.

In total, I was on sick leave for 5 days, a miserable and depressed girl. And this is where things took a turn for the better.

Because of the itch, I couldn't sleep very well at night. One night, I got up and posted on Facebook... a plea you could say. I posted briefly about my rashes and how upset I am.

And angels answered! These are 2 very good friends of mine, who saw my message and called me up the next day. J & G spoke to me lovingly and told me to see their naturopath. Fearful that another course of medicines only complicate things, I only reverse my decision not to go when I heard about J's amazing story of how she was cured of depression, which she had suffered for 4 months.

It was my first time to the naturopath and he was very encouraging. He said that even though he couldn't treat me as much as he wants, he will first focus on my nutrition. Eczema, he explained, is a sign that the body cannot purge the toxins and have to expel it through the largest organ in the body - the skin. In this case, my face.

I was skeptical but I agree to try. After all, what do I have to lose? It was either using the steroid cream with increasing aggressive side effects or try something that will really help my body to hear.

I've always thought that eczema was just a rash but never knew that it was a symptom of digestive problems. The naturopath then told me to go on my blood type diet - in this case, the O Blood Type Diet. And come back to him a week after I have come off the steroids.

It was initially challenging to follow it and I broke after 4 days. I began to resume my poor eating habits and since my face was clearing up (from the residue of the steroids), why should I let a stupid diet deter me from what I like to eat?

3 weeks later, my rashes came back and I was desperate. I went back to him and the proper cleansing began. I was tested for allergies and was put on the Candida diet for 3 weeks where I cannot have any diary, sugar, fruits, wheat or soy. I could eat natural food and season with salt when I cook. In just that 4 days into the diet, I've lost 2.5 kg. The diet will help cleanse me of the allergens that were in my body.

Since the rashes were here to stay, I had motivation to stick to the diet this time. Even though Christmas was coming up, I was faithful to the diet. In the beginning, I had cravings for my usual snacks - chips, chocolate but they faded away after a couple of days.

On 27 Dec 2010, I went back to him for a follow up and was declared allergy free. However my rashes were coming back and on that day, there were large patches of rashes on both cheeks. Sigh. I was losing hope at that point.

Some tests revealed that my adrenal score was very low and the naturopath said that for some reason, I still couldn't absorb my nutrients very well. He doubled my multi vitamins and gave me a new adrenal supplement. He also gave me extra virgin coconut oil to apply for my dry dry skin. I have to go back to the O Blood Type Diet and follow what the sheet says including "O Blood Types enjoy vigorous exercise".

He told me that my rashes will start clearing up at this point. "The healing will be a spiral - it will get better then get worse but will eventually clear up." I took heart at his words.

And true enough, my eczema started clearing up! I was so relieved. While there is still a little eczema left, I have faith that it will clear up soon.

I have also been losing weight thanks to the diet and the exercise. When I started seeing him, I was at my heaviest ever, at 98.5 kg. Now I am 92.8 kg - a 6 kg loss in 6 weeks! I am heartened.

My darling hubby, seeing how miserable I was before, supported me by following the same two diets as me. We both lose weight, work out together and felt a lot better for it. Instead of being sluggish and lethargic, we have boundless energy now. With each kg lost, we became more motivated to work out more often.

I learnt to cook with the beneficial food in new ways and fell in love with cooking as a result. Without the O BTD (Blood Type Diet), I would have never discovered the delights of adzuki beans and quinoa. I really love cooking now and look forward to planning and cooking for my breakfast and lunch.

If you have come here by sheer coincidence, I hope you will cheer for me as I work on losing the other 29 kg. I want to weigh at 65 kg or lesser by the end of 2011.

If you came here because you have heard of my blog, welcome! Please leave a comment so I wouldn't feel silly talking to myself. Or pretend that I have an imaginary audience out there. I hope you will be inspired, encouraged, heartened and sometimes amused by my journey of wellness.