Prologue
Read Week-1 update: Week-1 update
The story so far …
Right. So, half a month done. Another half to go. Almost everything I read online told me that the worst has passed, and that things will only get better. They have to some extent. My body’s coping well. I guess it has switched to some sort of auxillary power now that it knows that sugar is not coming in droves as it used to. But the mind is the monkey. It is the weakest link. Working in Shoreditch, there are temptations galore. Everyday, there are sweet treats kept in the office. Today, some cruel person had kept some scones from Albion and a whole block of butter on the kitchen table! Those bastards. And there were Reese’s buttercups and some Hershey’s kisses too. Did I mention this was just today? Everyday is becoming an excercise in self-control. Somedays, I just want to go home and cry. Sigh.
Publicising the intent
I’ve told almost everyone I interact with on a daily basis, that I’ve undertaken this challenge. Most confronted me with an expression of utter ridicule, some threatened to break up with me, and even others were appropriately sympathetic. But this helped. The stakes have gotten higher now. I am more motivated to see this through, because failure would be so much more publicised. Nothing drives me like the fear of public shaming. (ツ)
Shut your mouth
No. I mean literally shut your mouth. I’ve found that I am most tempted to snack on days when I don’t stick to the usual routine and eat whenever I want. And on days that I do eat at the usual meal times, my metabolism is better, I don’t suddenly feel hungry, and overall my stomach’s a happy place. There’s a fine paper on this if you do wish to read. It is almost like defining your schedule according to your meal times. And the study claims that meal times have more impact on the circadian rhythms than light and dark. Define a period during which you can eat during the day: a nine/twelve-hour slot. And beyond this period, do not put anything in your mouth. I enforce this by brushing my teeth almost immediately after dinner. The lingering flouride in my mouth makes most food taste bad and so I don’t feel like eating anymore. This prevents me from succumbing to that post-dinner snack or a midnight fridge raid.
Running
Anyway, on to brighter stuff. I have been able to get back to my running. Last year, I was averaging around 85 kms per week. A large chunk of it was a long 30 km run on saturdays. And I used dextrose tablets to get me through the run—popping one every 15 km. But since that was out of the question now, I had to cut back on my weekly mileage. I’ve been able to slowly make my way back to my usual 10 km per weekday schedule, but the long saturday runs will have to wait. It is simply too draining without some sugar.
To aid the everyday runs, I fell back on the time-tested P-F-C breakfast formula—Proteins, Fats, and Carbs. Before my run, I eat 1 banana (carbs), 1 boiled egg/2 egg muffins (proteins), and 1 tbsp of peanut butter (fats). I’ve found that this breakfast combo can sustain a 10 km run quiet easily, and so I am going to stick to this even after January. The peanut butter I speak about is not really butter. I just roasted a bunch of them, skinned them, and blitzed them in a mixer. I layout the resultant paste on pieces of a banana. After 15 days of no sugar, even this banana laced treat tastes like a slice of heaven. I’ve found Carley’s Raw Almond Butter at a nearby As Nature Intended store, which contains no added sugar/salt/oils. And I plan to use it once I run out of my home-brewed peanut butter.
Awards time
Every week, I am going to award some made up title to someone who either helped/harmed my endevours in fulfilling the no-sugar goal. And this week’s award for Intolerable Cruelty goes to … drumroll … my wife! She made me feed her a gulab jamun (a deep fried Indian sweet fit for the gods) and buy her chocolate brownies from Pret. Let me just show you what a gulab jamun looks like, so that you understand the nature of her crimes:
How is any mortal to excercise self-control when faced with that!