November 12, 2013 - Lunch

Okay, so my cortical self just lost the battle. I had pizza for lunch and followed it with sugar. It's cold, I'm stressed (deeply stressed, if I'm honest), and so I went into a sort of blurry zone of carb consumption, well outside of my cortical self.

Michael writes:

Yes: Carbohydrate mania. On Sunday you had cereal and then a pretzel (?) with lunch. Why a preztel? Why not an apple or a pear, even a banana? At diner you had bread, (a baguette), cereal again, and a muffin with your baguette and your cereal? Wha?

I'm glad you are beginning to "internalize" what I have been saying about you consumption of carbohydrates. One reason for your carbohydrate lust may be is that carbs have a lot of sugar. It likely that your emotional self is slipping past your higher cortical self, and it's sneaking in sugar in the form of carbs, which only results in craving more carbs. At this point I hardly eat any "unnecessary" carbs. I will enjoy roasted potatoes with pork loin, or wild rice with ground turkey and egg plant, (Katja can wipp up some wonderful, nutritious and simple meals for diner. It's that Slovene heritage. Cooking with food gathered in the woods, or in your own little vegetable garden. You and Maureen probably have an open market that will serve just as well). I don't go for the muffin or the doughnut. I haven't had a doughnut in ages. That is why I'm stocked at home with fruit and bananas. When I want something sweet I have some grapes or a banana. It fulfills my craving for something sweet, and it's nutritious. It must be working cause I'm loosing weight.

I said a while back that you have won the calorie intake war already. You finished Sunday at 2,406 calories. That is great! Now let's win the war with carbs. Yes. There are underlying psychological pattern that contribute to this behavior. But we are not going to wait for some epiphany or earth shattering insight to alter your behavior. Insight follows behavioral change in most cases. Use that higher cortical self to alter your behavior. It's the application of plain, vanilla cognitive therapy to alter an unwanted behavior pattern, using the higher cortical self.

You will succeed in eating less carbs and in a more nutritious way.