Supplements

My eating has been pretty terrible since I finished the Star Wars Half marathon and went on the Disney Cruise. I meant to get right back into healthy habits right after the cruise, but then my stepmom died and I was away from home for a while and I forgot to care about being healthy.

I go on these wild pendulum swings - able to commit to hardcore healthy eating like doing the Whole 30, only to go in the complete opposite direction for another month (or longer...). I keep thinking I have binge eating beat, but I don't think I'm truly ever going to kill this monster.

I can only hope to prevent him from making recurring daily appearances.

Anyway, I've been back home for a few weeks, but still can't seem to get on track. Especially when my husband makes Inception Cookies:

That's an oreo baked into a chocolate chip cookie-cupcake. If you've seen the movie Inception, you get the reference.

I was once told a few years ago about the Diet Cure. The theory goes that all of the diets I've been on and the stress I've endured has caused my brain to be deficient in certain chemicals it needs to feel good, so the urge to eat something that makes me feel good overpowers my will to not eat stuff that's bad for me. The solution is to supplement with those missing compounds - amino acids - so that I feel better and don't succumb to cravings. I read the book and stocked up on everything I thought I needed - glutamine, 5-htp, GABA, and DLPA.

I tried it for 4 or 5 months to no avail. Maybe it's because I was still overtraining and underfeeding myself, but who knows for sure?

I'm a skeptic when it comes to most supplements. So I was hesitant when someone emailed me that I should consider using this:

Gymnema is an herbal supplement that - so they say - supports elimination of sugar cravings. This particular brand gets mixed reviews on Amazon, but it's what my local health foods store carried, so I figured I'd give it a try. Everything I read about it online says there's really no risk in giving it a shot. I started taking it earlier this week and so far feel pretty good, but the true test will come next week when I'm travelling back to New Jersey for work again. That's another week away from home, and it's so much harder to stay on track when I've got family and friends to see who want to socialize over food.

I'll report back next week to let you know if it's still having an impact, as well as share some of the other supplements I'm currently taking.

Today's exercise: No CrossFit... my shoulder was too angry at me. But I did get a 3ish mile treadmill run in with only a little bit of grumbling from my foot.