Lessons learned from a month (mostly) sugar free

For the month of may, I agreed to take part in what quite possibly may have been the toughest 30 day challenge around. I went sugar free. I cut out all sugar and things from the sugar family tree and some stuff that, while not really sugar, is just as junky, like potato chips. I entered this challenge with zero confidence (actually I bet a tenner that I'd be back on the sweet stuff with in 24 hours) and no strategy on how I would approach my love of snacking. I just jumped in with both feet and hoped for the best. The result being that I may or may not* have eaten my own body weight in salted cashews.

In the interests of full disclosure, there were three slip ups, day 2 I put vanilla syrup in my coffee without thinking, I realised soon after but I pretended I didn't and drank it anyway. Day 16 had me sampling some Yarra Valley dark chocolate (it was litterally handed to me on a platter, what am I going to do?!?) and then there was a regrettable honey soy stir fry incident around day 20. I decided not to exclude fruit, but did limit how much I could have to a single serving per day and no fruit juice. 

I was told that it takes three days for the body to withdraw from sugar, HA! By day 15 I'd almost lost the will to live but somewhere around 10pm as I was desperately sucking the last drops of toothpaste out of Lil' Edges tube of Dora the delicious explorer, it occurred to me that I had hit the half way point. There was now more sugar free days behind me then ahead. The end was nigh. 

It never got any easier. Every day I woke up and thought "Screw this, today I'm eating a box of Lindor balls and washing it down with a slurpie." It was like giving up smoking all over again. I'm moody and a little deranged at the best of times so as surprised as I am that I made it 30 days, I'm even more surprised that nobody got killed or divorced in the process. 

So here's what I've learned:

1. Everything has sugar in it. Even the sugar free stuff has sugar in it, they just call it honey or agave nector or maple syrup or fruit juice. While you could argue they're better for you than sugar, it's still just sugar when you break it down, nothing more, nothing less.

2. Being sugar free does NOT improve concentration. Or judgement. Or mood. Or motivation.

3. Don't go to a chocolaterie on day 16. 

4. Just as it's not healthy to overindulge in any one type of food, neither is completely omitting it. I think it throws off the balance and you just end up overindulging in something else (hello salted cashews). Sugar, carbs, fat, salt, wheat, these things aren't the enemy. Eating m&m's like they've just become a banned substance on the otherhand...

5. Artificial sweeteners, stevia and anything else you want to pretend is just as good as sugar are all bullshit. I suggest the truth is more like '600 times sweeter than satan's backside' and 'made from sugar but it tastes like arse'. 

6. There are actually some pretty good low or no sugar recipes out there but you have to wade through a boat load of really shit ones to get to them. Just taking the sugar out of something and replacing it with fat (or a different kind of sugar) doesn't actually make it good for you, no matter how many pins it gets on pinterest. I saw a no sugar recipe for cake that had lemonade in it and choc chip peanut butter cookies that only had 2 ingredients (I'll let you guess what they were). 

Pumpkin, feta & rosemary bread

7. This one probably shocked me the most though, I realise I don't actually NEED sugar in my coffee. 

So 30 sugar free days done and dusted. I struggled through each and every one of them and now that this madness is over, let us eat cake. 

No seriously, somebody bring me some cake.

  

* I totally did! 

Food for thought

For a Crohn's blog, I haven't really talked about Crohn's much in the last few months. Mostly because there was nothing to say. Until yesterday, when the shit hit the fan. My thoughts are a little all over the place due to fatigue and pain associated with a partial blockage so I may divert on a few tangents before arriving at my point, if I arrive there at all. Bear with me.

I've spent a lifetime trying to make sense of the intricate relationship between diet, food, body image, self-esteem, exercise, health and illness. Reconciling what you want (cake, being 'skinny', lounging around) with what you need (balanced diet, healthy body, exercise) knowing that they're almost never complimentary. It's a complex balancing act even before you throw in complications like health conditions, allergies or intolerance's and preconditioned ideas. I'll probably spend the rest of my life trying, in vain, to wrap my head around it.

As a kid I had Asthma. I learnt very early on to associate physical exercise with pain, discomfort and fear since every time I exerted myself I wound up struggling to breathe for hours. Despite the Asthma now long gone, those early lessons are so well ingrained that as an adult I have to consciously and deliberately work at reprogramming my thinking. I almost always choose the path of least exertion.

The party line in the medical world consists of sentiments to the tune of: The cause of IBD is unknown and there is no evidence that dietary factors play a role. No role at all, although "What have you eaten?" is among the first questions medical staff ask in Emergency after a blockage or extreme flare-up and they always wind up referring to a dietician.

Everything you think you know about a healthy lifestyle doesn't apply when you have Crohn's Disease. Fresh fruit, green leafy vegetables, high fibre cereals, three squares a day, these things will kill you or at least make life pretty intolerable. Walking stimulates the bowel and is something you really want to avoid during a flare-up. It's a topsy turvy world where the right thing is all wrong and the wrong thing is ok.

Now that she has started solids, I have to somehow teach Lil' Edges about healthy eating and I am the least qualified person to do this. Aware that she's more likely to take in what she see's rather than what she's told, I've been attempting to role model a more healthy style of eating. Consuming fresh fruit with her in the morning seemed ok for a week or so until the tell tale stomach pain arrived Saturday night.

Sometimes you eat something and you know all about it before you've even put down the fork. It's that way for me with full fat milk. Other times the offending food is a lot more cunning. Fruit for example, eat a peeled apple once, even twice and I'll probably get away with it. Everyday for a week and I find myself here in doubled over town. Then there is food that will be fine this time and completely kick my arse the next time, like eggs or cheese. Other things, which by all rights, should be completely off limits like chocolate and coffe I have no issues with.

There's other stuff that comes from not getting all the vitamins and minerals your body needs. Multiple bowel resections have left me perpetually low in iron and B12. No amount of eating red meat or oily fish will ever replenish the stores and it leaves me with regular headaches and tiredness and difficulty with concentration.

Because none of the normal rules apply and 'diet plays no role' there's no guide to managing Crohn's Disease. Sure, there are books about it and there are individuals stories about their experience but at the end of the day we each have to figure out our own disease management ourselves mostly by trial an error. I learnt most of my lessons the hard way. This week I was reminded that I am not normal and my system will never be normal no matter how much I think I am in remission.

I am (mostly) ok with that.

Postpartum exercise and keeping the Crohn's monster away

"I'm sick and tired of always being sick and tired." Anastacia, US singer, Crohn's sufferer.

So whatever magical protective hormones that were racing around my body during pregnancy to keep the Crohn's at bay have left the building and the result is a Crohn's monster that's more than slightly acting up. All the usual symptoms have rolled in: stomach pain, urgent need to go, diarrhoea, fatigue, loss of appetite.

I had my Infliximab transfusion earlier this week which will go a long way toward taming the beast, but I know from experience medication alone only goes so far. Diet and exercise is a huge factor in what keeps me well. Sounds easy enough, you'd think. Except with no appetite I forget to eat. Most nights dinner time arrives and I've only managed a cup of coffee and cupcake (they go together, what can I say!?!) and exercise, well apparently after giving birth you're not supposed to do anything physical, or so say the experts.

Physiotherapist: No lifting anything heavier than the baby. You shouldn't be doing any cardio for three months and don't even think about running for 6 months.
Midwife: Try light walking at first and then ease back into it with gentle yoga and relaxation exercises after the first few months.
OBgyn: No strenuous exercise for at least 6 weeks. You just gave birth, you need to take it easy.

Sigh. At least we're getting closer. The frustrating thing is that I feel like I can exercise. I'm not sore or stiff. I was quite fit prior to becoming pregnant and exercised well into my pregnancy. Since the delivery I've been doing all the Kegal exercises and lower ab exercises they recommended. I was told it would take at least six weeks to reach the target repetitions, except, I've reached them now at two weeks. Surely, there must be some exceptions to this no exercise rule?

The key to defying medical advice is to keep googling until you find a website that endorses exactly what you want to do (er... don't try this at home kids and if you do, always, ALWAYS ignore everything said on yahoo answers). So after careful perusing of the interwebs I stumbled across this page which states "General guidelines are as follows: If a woman exercised regularly for 8 to 12 weeks before delivery, she can safely resume moderate aerobic exercise 10 to 14 days after an uncomplicated vaginal delivery, or approximately 21 days after a cesarean delivery."

Hallalujah! 14 days after delivery was yesterday. Let's go! I did jump on the cross trainer today. I did 20 minutes and it felt GREAT! I was originally only going to do 10 minutes, but I felt ok so I did another 5 minutes and that felt ok, so I did another 5. I've really missed cardio. I've decided to (try) and be sensible about it. I will aim for 5000 steps per day, that half what experts say we should be doing, with 10 to 20 minutes on the cross trainer every other day and see how that feels. Obviously I don't want to do myself any damage by going in too hard too fast, but at the same time, sitting around doing nothing while the Crohn's Monster runs rampant in my guts isn't going to work either.

Thoughts?