So I had an odd experience two days ago. I've been eating on the Plan for about three weeks now, and so although I'm definitely still eating carbs and sugar (my lunch yesterday was a 250-calorie Healthy choice entree and 6 oz of frozen yogurt, because my favorite second cousin and I have an ice cream date tradition that will not be denied), I'm also definitely eating less of them than I used to.
Anyway, what happened was, I traveled overnight for work (to a larger college town about three hours away), and on the first day I went to a local café that I'm completely in love with. I had a very tasty veggie frittata for lunch, and got two scones as carryout. Now, these scones. Are. Freaking. Amazing. Otherwise I wouldn't have bought two. And I ate one scone before I went to bed (after a surprisingly healthy dinner at Outback with a friend, where I had My First Tuna Sashimi (freaking delicious) and a steak and All the Veggies), and the other scone the next morning with some scrambled eggs from the breakfast buffet at the hotel, and grabbed a skinny latté on my way in. I spent about half my weekly dots on those goddamn scones, and I can't say I regret it entirely.
And then, around 10 am on Tuesday, I experienced My First Carb Crash.
It probably wasn't my first, in retrospect. What I mean is, I'm pretty sure I've experienced them before, just haven't cued into the fact that it was carb- or blood sugar- or even food-related. But it was the first time I'd ever acutely noticed it, because I was having a really good trip with some great collaborative meetings the day before, but I was kind of socially avoidant in the morning and then gradually I couldn't focus for shit and a minor disagreement with my husband over instant messenger sent me into an anxiety attack, and I couldn't stand to be around my coworkers in case someone asked what was wrong, and I wasn't actually hungry at all but I knew I ought to be.
So after staring at things hopelessly for almost an hour, I headed out for lunch without talking to anyone, and walked up and down the nearby shopping district street in complete analysis paralysis for almost an hour. Too many choices! So many restaurants of fascinating cuisines I don't have access to in my town, but either they were going to be mostly noodles and rice or they were Mediterranean and I wasn't in the mood and because of switching meetings I was almost completely out of dots, and also I kept reflecting on all the little eclectic import shoppes and being unable to go into any of them because I didn't have much spending money and also my brain kept going into How Many Starving Children Could This Feed And How Many Of These Things Were Made By People In Sweatshops mode, and then I went and got a Jamba Juice because it was the only thing I could even vaguely convince myself sounded like it wouldn't make me feel tremendously full or make me spew, because by this time I was nauseous (nauseated? the kind where you just feel sick) too. And I drank my stupid smoothie, and voila, half a goddamn hour later, I felt completely fucking terrific.
So yeah. I think I learned something important about how atypical amounts of overeating, and feeding my body large amounts of carbs/sugar it isn't currently accustomed to, affects my body and my emotional state. Now, look, two large scones over a 12-hour period barely qualify as a binge for me. In fact, given that I have a history of binge eating that gets worse when I'm traveling for work (on account of someone else is paying and no one's watching), it was pretty damn minor. Last time I ate myself through half a bag of cheese curds *and* fast food on the drive home alone. But when I've been very carefully eating moderately, and then drop a big load of refined carbs on myself? Bam. Crash. Bang. Boom. (thud)
I rocked the fucking pants off my food choices the rest of my trip, incidentally. I grabbed a veggie tray and some (admittedly mediocre) sushi rolls from Trader Joes on my way out of town, and snacked on veggies literally the whole way home. I did grab a big froofy iced coffee because I was driving home late at night, so my dots didn't look great, but given the terrible start to the day, I'll take it.
And now it's a new day and a new week, and thanks to TJs I discovered the magic of sprouted grain bread (two tasty (if admittedly small) pieces of bread for 2 dots with no weird additives? fuck yeah). And my weight held steady despite less activity and using all my available points plus a couple. So I'm good.
[Edit: And what did I do? I fucked up my blood sugar levels again after lunch today. Right. More real food, more vegetables, less cheap-ass discounted Easter candy. No guilt, no shame, just learning.]
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