Kudos and Catastrophes

It was the day after Thanksgiving, the Day of National Gluttony, that I conceived of this page. Many of these people are long time Zoners, and I decided that you needed to know what WORKS for some of us, and what WEAKNESSES some of us still maintain. So here in their own words, are the personal KUDOS we have given ourselves, and the embarrassing Catastrophes we experienced. But whatever, we always remember you are only ONE MEAL away from the Zone. So don't give up, don't get discouraged, and come LAUGH at some of the silliness we get ourselves into. Laughing burns calories and promotes good digestion!!!

Karen

Great idea, Karen! I'm very pleased at the outcome of my day, so I'm happy to share.

1) I planned. I decided ahead of time that the one thing I wanted to have "as-is" - in the traditional way - was stuffing. (Well, I have to make my own gluten-free bread for it, but other than that, it's traditional.) Even so, I put more onion and celery, and less bread in it. And I planned to allow myself a cup of it, but then changed, and only had about 2/3 of a cup, deciding I'd have a little today with leftovers. I also planned not to have fat be an issue at this meal.

2) Made sugar-free cranberry sauce. I used plain Splenda syrup, boiled the cranberries in it till they popped, mashed them a bit with a potato masher, and boiled until thickened (cranberries have natural pectin). Very simple, and the family agreed it was much better than the canned stuff.

3) Skipped the potato in favor of a small piece of yam (baked plain in the oven, but I put butter on it at the table). 4) Turkey and veggies were fine, just had a little gravy.

5) Made low-carb pumpkin pie with a nut crust, which everyone liked. (For the sweetener, I used a combo of maple, plain, and caramel Splenda syrups, which worked out really well!)

Next: Hannukah starts tonight! However, I have made an executive descision that the Annual Latke Feed will be Sunday (3rd night). 2 days of extra fat and carbs in a row (and today will be a mini-one as well because of leftovers) is too much. Tomorrow night we're going to a Hannukah party, but thankfully the host's traditional latkes have matzo meal in them, which I can't eat because of the
gluten. So on Sunday I plan to have 2 latkes, and that will be that. (However, I will make a lot of them and freeze them for others to eat for the rest of the holiday.)

Laura

P.S. After reading Karen's I should add: we ate the meal around 4:30, and then the dessert around 9. I haven't blocked it out, but the pie may have been pretty closed to balanced except for the fat.

And my husband and I took a walk together earlier in the day. Ah, the advantages of having an 11-year old! Freedom!

Katastrophes: I honestly have no regrets about yesterday, so I'll share that at our homeschool group celebration Tuesday, which was a "only bring things they could have had at the original Thanksgiving" dinner, I definitely overate the carbs. Delicious succotash, corn chowder, squash....ooops.

Ewwwwwww, what a MEAN question you have posed for us Ms. Karen, but in the
spirit of good sport, here goes:

There was a feast at my son's consisting of one baked turkey, one deep fried
turkey (too much garlic so I only had a bite), mashed taters w/garlic (I made
them with skim milk and light butter), candied yams, sweet potato casserole
(stupendous!), green beans cooked with bacon, homemade bread, rolls, corn,
cranberry gel, stuffing, pumpkin pie, chocolate chip/peanut butter bread (no
folks, I only had a teeeny slice, really), chocolate pecan pie (ok, NOW we're
talkin food). The kids (all over 30) had alcohol, we oldies refrained.

Here's what I did. First, I made sure I ate a balanced breakfast so I wasn't totally empty for dinner, which we had about 2:30. I also exercised before eating by walking/jogging with two huge dogs (90 and 100 lbs, one still only 2 and rambunctious). When we ate I put dabs and I mean dabs (maybe a tablespoon, heaping) of everything. A slice of turkey, a slice of homemade bread with butter. Iced tea to drink. I went back for another tablespoon of the sweet potato casserole. Now here's the very bad part. I had a minor sized piece of choc. pecan pie. It was SO good.....I had another, a bit larger. Now being totally honest here.....while I was making the mashed potatos I had a homemade macroon (shared with the rottweiler) and a couple slices of one of those chocolate balls that you WHACK and then peel off the aluminum and 2 homemade truffles. A few hours later I did the same exercise.....walked/jogged with the 2 puppies.

I did really well in the portion size of the real food. As anyone on this list that has been on for a while knows, I adore sweets and that will be my downfall every time. But it was that one day. I brought nothing home so there are no leftovers to munch on, 'cept that chocolate candy ball thingy. My grandsons are coming over today so I'm sure that will be gone quickly.

Did I have too many carbs.....absolutely! Has if affected me, i.e. lethargy, fogginess, etc......no it hasn't. Will I do it again in a month....most likely. But until that time I'll be zoning best I can and exercising as often as I can force myself to.

You wanted honesty.....you got honesty. I'm sure I gained at least a pound yesterday but it will come off....it doesn't stay unless you feed it. Besides, I ate alot of that stuff standing up.....and we all know THOSE
calories don't count. :-)

Katt

I have to say I am pretty proud of how my Turkey Day went. Since we are in
the deep south alone <all of our family is either up north or out west> it was just us...me, hubby and 4 children. Our Thanksgiving consists of: Turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, sweets, green bean casserole, broccoli, cauliflower, corn and cranberry sauce. Everyone ate a bit of everything with the exception of hubby and me. We had the safe food: Turkey, broccoli, cauliflower 1/2 cup of stuffing, one spoonful of green bean casserole and a half a slice of cranbury sauce. We felt good, satisfied and even left a slice of turkey for our very small sliver of apple pie (made with splenda)

Hope everyone had a blessed day!

Sunnee

This was my first Thanksgiving since starting to zone. The menu was

turkey on the barbecue
mashed potatoes & gravy
Faux-tatoes
Stovetop Stuffing
Jellied cranberry sauce
Sauteed root vegetables: carrots, turnip, parsnip, rutabaga, onion
Salad of red leaf lettuce, grapes, and pears with a lemon juice & canola
oil dressing with less honey than the recipe called for & poppy seeds
Zinfandel wine
Rolls, butter, jam

I took my full portion of turkey, skipped the potatoes, loaded up on faux-tatoes and gravy, a bit of stuffing, a very small portion of cranberry jelly, plenty of veggies and salad, and wine. Skipped the roll.

We ate at 1:30 and had dessert (pumpkin and mince pies, I ate small portions and not all the crust) at 5:30.

I felt pleasantly full and not groggy. We washed the dishes and went for a walk between the meal and dessert. It was a gorgeous day here in Portland, Oregon. Lots of our neighbors and their guests were out walking.

I ate a normal 3-block omelet breakfast. A small amount of appetizers at 11:30, just cheese and 1 cracker. No real dinner in the evening. Just two snacks at 7 and 11, both meat and veggies.

Next time, I would skip the honey entirely in the salad dressing and add the walnuts I forgot to sprinkle on top. I'm going to buy some nonstarch thickener at the Low Carb store and learn to make gravy with it. The nut crust for pies sounds like a good idea. I also clipped a pumpkin cheesecake recipe. Someday ....

Carla

The main thing I did that I feel good about was that even though I ate the traditional foods, I had moderate portions and only allowed myself to eat what I got the first time with no refills. Also the only leftovers I brought home was turkey and one slice of pumpkin pie.

Smurfi

My personal catastrophe was/were...

--the pumpkin pie. I ate the PERFECT amount for the meal. But the dessert just was TOO MUCH and I wish I would have put it aside for a left over. I just got "caught up" in the moment of everyone else eating it, when I should have gotten up and washed the dishes or just had a cup of tea. I didn't really even WANT the pie! It was just a social thing to do. I was saved from it the next morning when the ANTS got to it before we got up.

--Not getting up and going for a walk. The only exercise I got was looking at an online Thanksgiving card that I had sent to Katt, and we were doing AIM and laughing our heads off about this stupid card. Actually, it was pretty good exercise now that I think about it...!

My personal kudos was/were...

I knew that I was going to want more than a 3 block meal, so I planned my day around it, and ended up with five blocks BUT we ate at 3, so I didn't go to bed with a full tummy.

I made my stuffing MORE VEGGIES and very few bread crumbs and it still tasted right.

Fat free cream cheese in the mashed potatoes. Delicious AND raised the protein count! But next time I am going to do Fauxtatoes instead.

I suppose I'm a little late on this, but I thought about it and decided that taking the time to really THINK about my choices in the face of an "eating challenge" couldn't hurt.

I decided beforehand (upon receiving Tina's post - Thanks Tina!) that I would eat WHATEVER I wanted on Thanksgiving, but in moderate portions, stopping RIGHT when I BEGAN to feel full.

The idea of skipping my mothers green bean casserole or my Dad's candied yams (terrible for me though they may be) was too disheartening. Those are dishes that I truly DO only eat once a year - my mother makes that casserole especially for my brother and I - so I knew that there would be no disciplined "zoning" there.

Making this allowance for myself ahead of time made me feel like I was still sticking with my eating plan and not "cheating" - I have been working out very regularly, so I felt like this was a "reward" day.

Katastrophes:
*I did o.k. on eating moderate portions. We ate at 4:00 and I ate just enough to make me pleasantly full - but, by 9 we were still up playing games and everyone had set in on the leftovers - three kinds of pie, chocolate chip cookies - I was doomed. So I ate - not as much as I have in years past - but much more than I had intended and I got sick enough that I had to have some Mylanta. Yuck!

*I had promised myself only that ONE day of feasting - but the next day the leftovers were TAUNTING me! - I had a good healthy breakfast, but at lunchtime, I found myself really indulging again . . . DARN that casserole!! - - - The problem being that I was sort of "trapped" - I was up at my parents cabin in the Uinta National Forest (Utah) for the weekend - and there wasn't much at all to do up there except eat and watch t.v. - - - once I recognized that - I made the following GOOD choice:

Kudos:

*Ending my "holiday" a little early. My original intention had been to stay up at my parents cabin all weekend to "rest and read". - But it quickly became apparent on Friday that all I was really going to do was "nibble and nap" all weekend. - So I got my parents to drive me down to the base of the canyon and I went home early - with only TURKEY leftovers - the rest of the weekend was great- I got a LOT done, saw my boyfriend, went to a comedy show - AND ate right and got to the gym. 2
days with family was pa-lenty!

Other Kudos:
*Eating a balanced breakfast Thanksgiving morning. I spent the morning making pies for my boyfriend and for my family - so eating a balanced breakfast kept me from picking at the dough and other goodies around the house.

*The day after the FEAST I spent half the day sledding with my nephew and my brothers and sisters - up and down a really steep hill - was wonderful exercise! ( In years past I would have laughed at the idea, and sat around on the couch ALL day! - So I was very pleased that I have reached a level of fitness where that kind of thing is FUN to do.)

Man - this was like going into the confessional. But that's what's really wonderful about this group - you get things out of the nether regions of your mind, and into the arena where they can actually be USEFUL to you and to others. I am even MORE prepared for Christmas now - I had planned to spend FOUR days up there at my parents cabin for THAT - - but now I'm thinking two is plenty.

In the meantime, it's a beautiful Monday in Salt Lake City, I am quite on top of my game this morning, since I spent the weekend organizing, etc. - so I'm ready to ZONE ON until Christmas . . .

Zone on!!

Natasha