Self Control

In 2005 Morgan Spurlock’s documentary Super Size Me got me thinking about the way I eat.  For 30 days, Spurlock ate only McDonald’s food—breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  He had a few rules: all meals, everything he eats, must come from McDonalds; he must try every menu item they currently offered; he must maintain a walking routine consistent with the average American, about 5000 steps a day; and, eponymous to the film, he must SuperSize his meals whenever offered by a McDonald’s employee, but only when offered.  In that 30-day period, Spurlock gained 24 pounds and suffered a range of obesity related health disorders.  As Dr. Daryl Isaacs pointed out, Spurlock’s experiment was masochistic: he was Nick Cage in Leaving Las Vegas, purposefully, willfully killing himself bite by bite.

                The criticisms for his film are valid.  Obviously, when you eat 5000 calories a day, you’re going to gain weight.  If your diet is high in saturated fats, your cholesterol will rise.  As well, frankly, your liver just isn’t prepared to handle that much cleanup.  The problem isn’t necessarily about McDonald’s poisoning its customers.  This is about our intake.  Spurlock’s point was that people go to McDonald’s presuming that the meal provided is of an appropriate size.  It is, after all, labeled a “meal.”  But is it McDonald’s fault?  Could they better educate their clientele?  Maybe.  However, there is a point at which we have to take personal responsibility.  So why, then, do so many of us presume that we’re being provided with appropriately sized meals at a fast food restaurant?

Maybe I can answer that question.  I was 230 pounds a month ago.  I’ve been that weight for roughly three years, with minor fluctuations.  My Body Mass Index was 35.  When I stepped onto my Wii Fit, it reminded me, every time, that I am obese.  Obese!  I would have to lose 34 pounds to stop being obese, only to then be classified as overweight for 32 more pounds.  I felt ashamed of my weight… I’ve felt that way ever since my community college graduation, when I saw pictures of my bloated face squeezing out from under that graduation cap.  Oh, but I just love food so much!  For me, there’s rarely such a thing as too much of a good thing when it comes to food.  At night, while cleaning up after dinner, my children’s plates still full of food, I imagined myself a fat little piggy slurping up scraps, eating the leftovers I couldn’t stand watching go to waste.  All I think about is food!  What delicious thing could I make for dinner?  And desert!  So much time consumed imagining what treats I could concoct.  So rather than alter myself, I altered my environment to suit my new self.  I bought bigger shirts and experimented with a girdle to hold in my bouncing gut.  Eventually I bought jeans that I could lift up over my stomach to hide my girth.  What had I become?  I always swore I’d never get fat.  I’d go as far as to say I’ve even been prejudice against fat people.  I hated being fat, and yet, as a fellow foodie pointed out, “clearly, however, not enough to do anything about it.”

                So how did it get like this?  Why had I become a slave to food?  How had I lost so much self control?  Why did I, too, essentially presume that a McDonald’s meal was as appropriate a meal as any other?  In finding the answer, I came back, over and over again, to education.  I certainly had no idea how many calories I ate.  Hell, I didn’t even know exactly what a calorie is.  How is it measured?  What does it mean?  How many should I have?  This food intake matter nagged at me, biting at the back of my mind.  So, here and there I’d read an article.  I’d catch a little blip about healthy eating tips and weight management ideas.  More and more I started to feel that I am woefully under informed.  I began to evaluate what I ate.  I started to feel that I needed to move away from boxed foods.  In fact, I needed to know what foods were going into my meals.  I needed to have more control over what I ate.  I need to start to control myself!

                Having tried to diet here and there over the last three years, I finally decided to try again, this time well armed with nutrition information, metabolic transfer rates, body composition and adaptation, and ultimately I found resources on how to count calories.   So this time I decided to lay it all out on the table, this time I’d blog my diet and make it public; there’s nothing I hate more than failing in public.  So here we are.  This blog is an attempt to right years of personal neglect.  However, I also wanted to point a spotlight on the very real obesity issue, highlighting that I am among that 30% of America that is obese.  In Utah over 21% of us are obese with another 56% of us overweight!  Many of you reading this blog are, like me, obese.  Join me!  If you’re not, there’s a very good chance you’re overweight.  Join me!  Moreover, if you’re neither of those, then I need your encouragement!  Let’s address how difficult dieting can be and show that personal will can overrule unhealthy living.

                There, then, is the impetus behind my experiment.  It is just as much about showing the power of will as it is losing weight.  If I can break the vice-like grip my food addiction has had over me, and yes I have most of these symptoms, then you can do it too. Nevertheless, as with Morgan Spurlock’s 30 days of bad eating, I too have rules:

1.       All food purchased must be as close to base ingredient as possible; no prepackaged, boxed, or frozen goods may be purchased whenever possible.

2.       I must follow Harvard’s modified food pyramid guide to regulate which foods I ingest in what percentile quantities (modified per caloric restriction).

3.       I mustn’t modify my exercise behaviors.  I am limited to whatever activity I would regularly have during the course of an average day.

4.       I am restricted to 1000 calories a day.  Period.

To ensure my own physical safety, I will supplement my food consumption with a daily multivitamin, focusing on achieving proper calcium and protein intake according to a 2200 calorie diet.  As well, over the past month I’ve been prepping my mind and body for this rather extreme diet to better my chances at success: I’ve slowly moved my food intake down, beginning at 2300 calories until I got to around 12-1300 calories.  In the process I’ve lost 10 pounds.  I’ve also altered my diet during this time to fit within the modified food pyramid's recommendations so I wouldn’t suffer too many simultaneous withdrawals. 

Most of these changes have made the days seem brighter.  Fresh fruits and vegetables have utterly transformed the way we cook, and monitoring our sugar intake has made baked goods more subtle with hints of new flavors and pleasurable textures.  In addition, I still find that I think about food all day because tracking calories requires a lot of time and food ingenuity, so I’ve turned a crutch into a weapon.  Therefore, I’ve become accustomed to counting calories. There’s a calorie counter at the bottom of the page (I use Diet Analysis + to help me count mine) and I’ll update daily with recipes, instructions, and brief thoughts, with weekend posts about health and food related concerns.  Watch me try to better myself and let me know about your progress as well!  Join me in my experiment!