Life in Bangladesh has been a significant adjustment, a shock if you will to my diet system. Things like Bangla Cha (tea with sweetened condensed milk), biscuits (cookies), rice, nan (flat bread), potatoes, pumpkin, and other snack foods made with flour and potatoes have become common place and a way of life. As I have previously mentioned, it is important in this culture to thankfully eat what the host has served (within reason) and with discretion. I have tried to do that. Finding a new normal for myself has proven to be difficult, but certainly not impossible.
There are a few things I have learned about myself and they are as follows:
1. Rice and chicken curry has become my favorite meal. Even if I were in Wakarusa, Indiana today and I had my choice of all the places I could eat within 1/2 hour, I would still choose curry!
2. I love curry, but buyer beware! I greatly enjoy the taste of chicken (Morgir Mangsho, in Bangla) curry with rice (bhat), vegetables (shobji) and potatoes (alu) but along with that comes a price in calories. I cannot get enough of this great food and that has always been a costly problem for me.
3. Fruit has come alive! After a year with very little fruit, I have found myself to be a fruit lover. In Bangladesh, we have bananas (cola), apples (appel), oranges (comala), watermelon, pomegranate and apples readily available. We will also have fresh mangos, lichees and pineapples coming into season. Fruit is one of the major food groups and when I got here I went crazy on that group. Fruit is good for you, but one banana is 5 times the carbs that I used to take in for an entire day.
With this new knowledge I have of myself, I have done the following:
1. Eat the foods that I love (and even some that I don't) but eat them in moderation. I have gone to taking a very small serving of rice if eating at home. If that does not quench my appetite, I will have a very very small second serving.
2. When I am in a Bengali person's home I ask them for a reduced portion. I eat what they give me (which is far more than I eat at home), but when I am finished, I refuse seconds. On the days that this happens, I am also very careful about what I eat for other meals.
3. I have integrated regular exeercise in my daily routine for the first time in my life. Three weeks ago, I downloaded the Get Running (Couch to 5k) application. I have never been drawn to running, but I have to say that it is not as bad as I have always made it in my mind.
4. Pray harder than ever! This one is by far the most important of any of the activities. I have found myself praying now more than ever that God would continue to change my heart and draw me nearer to him, in this category of my life especially. I confess to Him when I take more cookies or rice than I should. I ask Him to let me burn more calories than I consume on a daily basis. I ask Him to reveal more to me about my gluttony so I can better fight against it. I ask him to help me battle against temptations and not succumb to them. More than once, I have found myself praying Psalm 51:10 "Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.
Some days, when I weigh myself, I get frustrated that I am not losing weight as quickly as I would like to. I must keep in mind though, that I am still losing weight after a dramatic life change. On those days, it is important to choose joy and press on!
Monday, April 2, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Back on Track (264.5 pounds)
It has been just a week shy of two full months since I have posted to my blog. Wow, has a lot happened in the last two months. As most (if not all) of you know, my family has moved to be missionaries in Bangladesh. We arrived at our new home in Malumghat, Bangladesh on 1/14/12 and we are thrilled to be here.
In my life, few temptations have beset me the way gluttony has. To be quite transparent, I arrived in Bangladesh with more than just the contents of my totes containing my personal belongings for living for the next two years. In addition to my families personal belongings, I also carried with me other heavy baggage; the baggage of fear, doubt and dissapointment. As I have detailed in this blog, God has done a miraculous work in my body, but that was in the US where I could have a strictly regimented low calorie and ultra low carbohydrate diet. Now I was moving my family to Bangladesh where they drink tea (with sweatened condensed milk) at least twice every day and the main staple in the vast majority of meals is rice. In my heart and in my mind I knew that I could not be offensive to the people of Bangladesh. They are a very hospitible people and I many relationships would be built and fortified around a cup of tea. The fear of how my body would react towards the re-introduction of carbs in my diet crept in. Next, I started to doubt that I could keep the weight off that God so graciously helped me to lose. Next, I progressed to the advance feeling of dissapointment that only comes with being defeated. What is it that I could do? My feelings were that I was in a going into a place where I was setting myself up to thrive in what I have been called to do in life, but to fail (miserably) in my continued goals towards losing weight.
For weeks leading up to leaving and in the weeks since I have been in my new home, I have done much introspection. I have come up with a few thoughts and they are:
1. My feelings are not what matters sometimes, but rather the facts are what matters. The facts are that just because the low carb diet is the only diet I have succeeded on, that does not mean that it is the only diet I can succeed on. Another fact is that I can be confident in "...he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ." God is not done working with my heart and with my weight just because I reached a few goals.
2. I have a problem (many problems actually.) I love to eat, and I am not talking about eating a little... I love to eat a lot of food. That is a big deal, because I didn't think I would really care for the food here that much, but boy was I wrong, the food here is great! My family eats rice and curry for lunch every day and it is the highlight food wise of each day for me.
3. I have a fair amount of resolve. While I love to eat a lot, I also know that eating a lot is no longer who I am. Yes, there are times that I have "fallen off the wagon" since I have been there and eaten 4 chocolate chip cookies in one setting (OK, it was 5, but who was counting? I had't had any in a year, so that is only .1 cookies per week over the last year...) While I laugh a bit about it now IT IS NOT OK! One or two cookies may be OK on occasion, but eating 5 cookies is slipping in to that habit that is gluttony. I am resolved not to give in. This is a minute by minute test for me, sometimes even a second by second test. I will not always win, but I am resolved to not go back to that evil, yet so familiar place.
So with those things said (and other things left unsaid) I have had very limited success at weight loss since arriving in Bangladesh. I weighed in the day that I arrived and I was 260.0 pounds. I then weighed in this morning prior to breakfast and I was 264.5 pounds. I have weighed in as high as 266.0 pounds since I have been here. My body is not operating as lean as it once was, but over the coming weeks I will be able to figure the new normal and then implement exercise to comeserate for the increase in intake and prayerfully, I beleive I will get right back on track.
In my life, few temptations have beset me the way gluttony has. To be quite transparent, I arrived in Bangladesh with more than just the contents of my totes containing my personal belongings for living for the next two years. In addition to my families personal belongings, I also carried with me other heavy baggage; the baggage of fear, doubt and dissapointment. As I have detailed in this blog, God has done a miraculous work in my body, but that was in the US where I could have a strictly regimented low calorie and ultra low carbohydrate diet. Now I was moving my family to Bangladesh where they drink tea (with sweatened condensed milk) at least twice every day and the main staple in the vast majority of meals is rice. In my heart and in my mind I knew that I could not be offensive to the people of Bangladesh. They are a very hospitible people and I many relationships would be built and fortified around a cup of tea. The fear of how my body would react towards the re-introduction of carbs in my diet crept in. Next, I started to doubt that I could keep the weight off that God so graciously helped me to lose. Next, I progressed to the advance feeling of dissapointment that only comes with being defeated. What is it that I could do? My feelings were that I was in a going into a place where I was setting myself up to thrive in what I have been called to do in life, but to fail (miserably) in my continued goals towards losing weight.
For weeks leading up to leaving and in the weeks since I have been in my new home, I have done much introspection. I have come up with a few thoughts and they are:
1. My feelings are not what matters sometimes, but rather the facts are what matters. The facts are that just because the low carb diet is the only diet I have succeeded on, that does not mean that it is the only diet I can succeed on. Another fact is that I can be confident in "...he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ." God is not done working with my heart and with my weight just because I reached a few goals.
2. I have a problem (many problems actually.) I love to eat, and I am not talking about eating a little... I love to eat a lot of food. That is a big deal, because I didn't think I would really care for the food here that much, but boy was I wrong, the food here is great! My family eats rice and curry for lunch every day and it is the highlight food wise of each day for me.
3. I have a fair amount of resolve. While I love to eat a lot, I also know that eating a lot is no longer who I am. Yes, there are times that I have "fallen off the wagon" since I have been there and eaten 4 chocolate chip cookies in one setting (OK, it was 5, but who was counting? I had't had any in a year, so that is only .1 cookies per week over the last year...) While I laugh a bit about it now IT IS NOT OK! One or two cookies may be OK on occasion, but eating 5 cookies is slipping in to that habit that is gluttony. I am resolved not to give in. This is a minute by minute test for me, sometimes even a second by second test. I will not always win, but I am resolved to not go back to that evil, yet so familiar place.
So with those things said (and other things left unsaid) I have had very limited success at weight loss since arriving in Bangladesh. I weighed in the day that I arrived and I was 260.0 pounds. I then weighed in this morning prior to breakfast and I was 264.5 pounds. I have weighed in as high as 266.0 pounds since I have been here. My body is not operating as lean as it once was, but over the coming weeks I will be able to figure the new normal and then implement exercise to comeserate for the increase in intake and prayerfully, I beleive I will get right back on track.
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