Why am I writing this down now?
I decided to start this blog to keep track of my progress on the Ketogenic Diet, or Keto as it is also known. My sister-in-law, Dana, was my inspiration to try this lifestyle. We have both struggled with our weight over the years. I've tried most of the diet plans out there: Atkins, Weight Watchers, Low-Fat, Sugar Busters, calorie counting, and even a church support group. I've lost weight on many of these only to gain it all back and then some. Dana started this over the summer break and lost a considerable amount of weight before going back to school. I thought if she could do this, then so could I. I started researching this in late July on ruled.me and decided to give it a try. Unfortunately, a try is all I seemed to accomplish. Once the kids came back to school, my plans derailed quickly.
Past Successes and Failures
My first reason to change my eating habits was the fact that I'm tired ALL OF THE TIME! My favorite past time on weekends and school breaks is taking a nap. I have no energy left after my school day ends. Once I drive home from school I don't want to do anything in the evenings, including cooking dinner. I must confess that I have become a take out queen. I know that fast food isn't good for you but it is too easy. We grab something on the way home (or I have something prepared in the freezer to heat up) several times during the week.I think this is where I failed miserably this summer. When I started tracking my weight and progress again in July, I weighed 177 pounds. Yes, I just put that number on the internet. Ugh! The only good thing I can say about that number is that it is not the heaviest I have been. In August of 2016, I topped out at 194 pounds. A group of teachers at school were doing Weight Watchers Online, so I re-joined with them.
I knew from my past experience with Weight Watchers that their program works for me if I have support. I was a meetings member several years ago and had great success until WW closed our local meeting. I live in a rural area, so the nearest meeting was 30-45 minutes away from my home. I traveled for a while, but it became more difficult when school started to leave in enough time to drive an hour to my preferred meeting location, then another 30 minutes home after the meeting.
My fellow teachers and I shared foods, recipes, etc. over lunch time, but that just wasn't the same as attending a WW meeting for me. I fell off the WW wagon, but maintained a modest loss of 15 pounds for a while. Even with that, I still felt tired all of the time. I know what I need to do, but finding the motivation and energy to do it is hard. I spend all day giving myself to my students, but I have nothing left for myself. I'm one of those people who goes all in to something new. I feel like I have to give it my all, and I give up on myself if I don't make perfect progress.
Wake up call...
When I saw my sister-in-law at Thanksgiving and Christmas, she was still losing. She felt good and felt good about herself. You could see it in her face. I felt ashamed that I couldn't keep it up. I do pretty well in the mornings with my coffee. I still use heavy whipping cream and sugar free flavored syrups. I was eating a low carb breakfast on the way to school and trying to find low-carb options for lunches, but dinnertime is where it fell apart. Somewhere between Thanksgiving and Christmas I just gave up. I ate most of the Christmas treats that students and teachers brought to school. By the time Christmas came around, I weighed over 180 pounds. I was well on my way to an early grave. My family has a history of heart disease on both sides. I'm not doing my body any favors by eating the way I did. I made a decision to go back to living a Ketogenic lifestyle. Notice that I did not say diet. I don't want to diet, lose weight, and gain it all back again when I've nearly met my goal. I want to change the way I live and think about food. |
| Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash |
Teacher on Keto
I know that there are other teachers out there that are going through the same things that I am. I am writing this blog to help myself be accountable to myself, but if I can help even one other teacher out there I will feel like I have really accomplished something (without being selfish). Why do we feel selfish about taking care of ourselves? If we don't take care of ourselves, how can we be effective in our classrooms? Our students deserve to have teachers who are well-adjusted, healthy, and happy.I made a decision on Christmas Day 2018 to change the way I live and how I think about food in general. I already had some knowledge from my research in July. I discovered Suzanne Ryan's website and YouTube channel Keto Karma this summer. Her journey is inspiring! She lost over 120 pounds following this lifestyle. She chronicled her progress on her YouTube channel. Her success and practical approach to led to her publishing her book Simply Keto. I set out to find my copy the day after Christmas. I had already tried several of the recipes she had posted on her website and liked what I tasted. Her success inspired me to start this blog.
Teachers depend upon planning on a daily basis. We plan our days, we plan our lessons, and we even plan when we go to the restroom. It should only be natural that we plan our meals, right!?! How many times have you stood in front of the refrigerator trying to decide what's for dinner? If we don't plan our meals, then we plan to fail. My goal this week is to plan and prepare at least a week's worth of Keto-friendly dinners to put in the freezer for next week. The first week back after a long school break is often stressful. I want to reduce this stress as much as possible by having dinner ready to pop in the microwave, oven, or pressure cooker when I get home.
Tracking my progress...
I use a hybrid of analog and digital tracking. I use a bullet journal to plan out my weeks. I have posted some spreads on my Instagram page. I'll try to keep this more up-to-date with my Keto progress as well. I plan on using this to plan out my weekly meal plans and grocery lists. There is something about writing down something on paper that just makes me feel good.
I've used My Fitness Pal (MFP) for tracking my weight loss, food and water intake, and fitness for many years. Their free version works well for me. I am able to link both my activity tracker and scale to keep everything in one place. I love my fitbit Charge 2, and their app tracks all of these items as well. However, the scale I already own is not compatible to link directly. MFP also acts as a bridge between my scale and my fitbit app to keep track of my weight loss. I primarily use the fitbit app to view my step progress and sleep log. I chose the Charge 2 because in addition to tracking my activity, it also registers heart rate and sleeping. Part of living a healthy lifestyle is getting enough sleep at night. I try to get at least 7 1/2 hours of sleep at night. I thought I needed more, but through trial and error I found that I feel good with this amount.
This summer, I decided to try the premium version of MFP. The free version allows you to set your goals by percentages. The premium version allows you to dial it down to the grams. You can also show your carbs, protein and fat by meal. After a while, I didn't find this especially helpful, so I went back to the free version.
I also downloaded another free app called Carb Manager. Since I was already paying the premium subscription for MFP, I decided to only use the free version. The basic (free) version allows you to log your foods, exercise and weight, and allows you to add friends. The premium version allows you access to recipes, meal plans, shopping lists; tracking for glucose, ketones, sleep, fasting, and body measurements; as well as access to a variety of reporting and analysis. For my current tracking, I have decided to try the premium version. They have monthly, three-month, and annual billing options. I started with the monthly to see if it is worth the annual price. I will let you know next month whether I chose to stay with the Carb Manager premium, or go back to MFP.
I didn't track my ketone levels this summer to determine when I was in Ketosis, so I've decided to track this as well. According to several sources (including Simply Keto), blood testing is the most accurate form of testing. I found a ketone meter that I could purchase with my flexible spending account card online, so I'm waiting for that to arrive. I have some urine test strips to get me started until they come in. This one wasn't recommended by any of the blogs I read, but it was the only one I could find online that I could use my FSA card to purchase. I'll let you know how it works. The meter itself was fairly inexpensive at $12.95, and the ketone strips (different from glucose strips) were under $13 for 10 strips.
Link Disclosure
I am not receiving any affiliate income for the links provided in this post. These are simply the things that I have used and liked.
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