Nutrition and Beauty: I'm pretty sure they're related.

A few reasons...

Firstly, whenever I eat a lot of sugary foods, I get pimples. Usually I have fairly clear skin, but when I OD on junk processed chocolates (ie, around Easter Time) I break out. All over. Chest, shoulders, face. It's not acne standard, we're talking 3-4 at a time, but it's still very very annoying. Especially when you went and got fake nails the other week and can't pop the damn pimples because crazy thick nails are next to useless for all the things you need them to do.

Secondly, when I eat processed crapola like too much bread, or (non eggplant crust) pizza, I start to get fat in a really odd spot. Well you know, as well as in the usual spots that fat loves to hang out. It's my neck. I get a fat neck. Like my chin would like to be much better friends with my chest, or multiply, or something. But this is a particular "I'm only doing this for processed carbs" spot. It doesn't matter how thin I am on the rest of my body, if I'm eating wrong my neck stays flabby. And if I put on weight eating too much GOOD stuff, I just get a curvy butt but my neck stays slender. Bizarre. It runs in the family too, but my other siblings are pizza/pasta addicts and refuse to experiment with giving them up.

Lastly, alcohol. Alcohol is shit. It dries me out so badly, no matter how much water I drink to balance it out. And it makes me gain fat in a specific spot too. Which is my midsection. If I'm super healthy in all other ways, but drink too much, I start looking like an egg on legs. Wine waist is not a good look for me. Even more so when it comes with flaky skin and frizzy hair. Humpty Dumpty as a mad scientist, that's me.

So anyway, my point is, the things you put into your body don't just affect you in a linear, calories-in-calories-out, way. They have particular unique effects, that are different not only between types of food (or other ingestible substance), but also different between people. Maybe the sugar and the alcohol effects might be similar for most, but I bet processed-carb-turkey-neck isn't a mainstream affliction.

Good nutrition changes your body in more ways than one.

Watch what you eat, yo.

Day 1 and 2

Day 1:

Got up at 6:30, had two black unsweetened coffees
While drinking them did :-
40 lifts each leg, front and back
40 knee lifts (this is really hard on my left side)
30 half depth squats

Gym at 9:30
Did 28min on the elliptical, it told me I burned 256 calories (based on weight and age)

Small pesto chicken salad from Sumo Salad and water at 10:30

Iced coffee at 12pm

Frozen pizza at 3:30pm, I know that's terrible. WildChild was desperate for food and the fridge was not very well stocked because I've been away. I could have just not shared it with her, but I did. Oh well.

Dinner was meatballs and salad. The salad was delicious :)

NO Wine!! :-D

Day 2:

Got up at 8:30 (Lazy!)
breakfast was a black unsweetened coffee

Lunch was chicken and avocado sushi and an iced coffee

Gym at 2:30
28min on the elliptical, it told me I burned 311 calories and walked (strode?) 4.49km. Pretty damn good I say for a girl who's got an injured knee!
Iced coffee for afternoon tea, after I picked up WildChild from daycare.

Dinner was spaghetti (lol joke! it's julianne peeled carrots) bolognese, with a little side salad left over from last night.

see?

My food and exercise Journal...or Fooxernal!

So I'm going to journal what I eat and do with my body for the next week. Maybe two. We'll so how fun/interesting/crap it is first.

I injured my knee at the start of the year, and it's still not better. This has caused me to lose all semblance of muscle tone in my left leg, and about half of it in my right. I don't like it!
But the thing is, that it's really difficult to exercise with a knee injury. Can't squat, can't run, sports are definitely out, and I can't even swim properly! UUGGHH there goes everything I ever did for fitness!

I also drink way too much wine. It's my way of relaxing of an evening. And when it's the weekend. And when I'm celebrating. Or commiserating. And when I'm bored... But I think it's giving me wine-waist and that is just not acceptable. I'm going more for the hourglass shape than the wine glass shape.

So anyway this Fooxernal is just to help me reflect on and be more aware of what I'm putting in my body, and what I'm doing with my body.

It's kind of an experiment too. I want to see how easy or hard it is to change parts of myself, and whether I feel like the changes warrant the effort involved. I'm not calorie counting, or measuring food or anything crazy. I have tried that in the past and it is waaayyy more annoying than helpful. I know what is healthy and what is not, I don't need to know every kilojoule to work that out.
Mainly I'm just going to limit my alcohol intake, increase my cardio output, and see whether it helps. And how much.

Here's a picture of me. I'll take another one next week :)

aand, clothes ON this time. Think I got my facial expressions mixed up.

Weekly Dinner Plan

Sunday - was BBQ with steaks, lamb chops and sausages, I made a cucumber salsa from the 21 Day Suagr Detox manual, and mum made a potato salad (which I did sneak a little egg and bacon from)

Monday - chinese spiced veal mince with thinly sliced cucumber and carrot in rice paper rolls. I know, not paleo, but I think white rice is a safe occasional indulgence and I had tried to replace them with steamed cabbage and it just didn't quite work out.

Tuesday - I made a sort of paleo cabonara that had bacon, chicken, coconut milk, a few herbs and garlic, and peeled zucchini noodles. Delicious! My sister made a non paleo one simultaneously which WildChild was interested in and I was expecting a meltdown, but I served her the zucchini noodles that had no green on and she thought they were pasta! Problem Solvered!

Wednesday - Making macadamia crusted barramundi tonight :) adpated from this recipe. With cherry tomato salsa and baked asparagus.

Will update with the rest of the week's meals soon!

Little Food for Thought

Children's eating habits are very very important.

The effect of nutrition on young minds and bodies is very well documented.
We know that food is the body's fuel, and who needs the best fuel more than people who are still growing and developing?

I cannot fathom how loving caring parents can come to hurt their children by feeding them the wrong things.

There are several reported cases worldwide of young children dying because of vegan or fruitarian diets, the latest in March this year in the UK. It really is heartwrenching to read the cases. In some of the cases the mother was breastfeeding, but wasn't getting enough from her diet for her milk to correctly nourish her child, and in some of the cases the infant had been weaned far too early (risky to begin with) and started on a diet that starved the child of essential nutrients. To me, this is terribly tragic, especially so because most of the parents thought that they were giving their child the best start. They truely believe in the value of veganism, and did not understand the damage that they were doing to their own child.

Then there is the other (much more prevalent) extreme of children being poorly fed into overweight or obesity. 25% of 5-17 year olds in Australia! I can only speculate about the reasons for children becoming obese, or on parents attitudes and motivations, so I won't. I believe the circumstances are too varied and plentiful to generalise about. What I do know, is that even though these children aren't dying as young, they too are having their lives shortened significantly. This is such a problem in western nations that there are diet books being aimed at 6 year olds.

My beliefs are:

• Children should recieve only breastmilk (or substitute) until they are at least 6 months old, and then (ideally for as long as the child desires) complimented with solids. Breastmilk is uniquely tailored to each and every child (and is very dynamic according to age, outside temperature, and even time of day), and anything the child needs is drawn from the body. HOWEVER if a mother's body does not contain a particular nutrient (such as the essential B12, which is from animal sources) the milk does not contain it either. A mother that insists on a nutrient deficient diet MUST take a supplement, or switch her child to a breastmilk substitute, like formula.
• Children are effected by food in very unexpected ways. Examples include: dairy causing colic, asthma, and skin irritation; or gluten/wheat causing behavioural disturbances. I have seen again and again on online parenting communities how many parents have had problems solved by eliminating certain foods.
• Full-fat dairy can be essential for some children in order to get enough protein, B12 (if there is no/not enough meat in their diet) and calcium (if they eat grains, which hinder calcium absorption).
• Grains and legumes damage bodies. They do not provide any nutrition that cannot be better gained from other sources. Fibre, vitamins and minerals are all more plentiful in fresh fruit and vegetables and protein (from legumes) in meat (or dairy). It is more than beneficial to replace any grains with produce. One positive to grain consumption is that beneficial bacteria like to feast on them, so cutting grains needs to be balanced with probiotics from another source, like yoghurt (coconut milk yoghurt for those who can't tolerate dairy) or fermented fruits/vegetables.
• Fat is not evil. Children NEED healthful fats for correct immune, eye and brain development. This is complex, because some foods turn potentially healthy fats into dangerous fats. Some fats that almost everyone agrees are healthy are from coconut, nuts, avocados and other plant sources. I personally believe cholesterol is an essential fat.
• I agree with the view that if food is not nutritionally dense, the body will demand more of it in order to get sufficient nourishment. It is the lack of nutrients in packaged, processed foods (and grains...) which cause overeating, leading to overweight and obesity, NOT fat itself. 
• Eating meat from pasture-raised animals, fresh (ideally organic) fruits and vegetables, spices, nuts and fats from natural sources is the best nutrition for growing bodies and minds.

With all that being said, I know that it is hard to keep children eating well at all times. My own family love to provide WildChild with peanut-butter on toast, muffins, cows-milk ice-cream, yoghurt and a myriad of other things that I consider less than ideal. It is impossible to give children a 'perfect' diet (if such a thing even exists). It is enough just to be aware of how food affects you and your children, and do your best with what you have.