Getting Rhythm

The Slow Down Diet is arranged in chapters that are intended to be considered and practiced for a week. I've written about Week One and Week Two chapters, but now I'm going to skip to the fourth week. The third week has plenty of good information in it, and I'll return to it later.

The Week Four chapter discusses the metabolic power of rhythm. I'm a person who likes to eat on time. My folks worked for the railroad. Everything on the railroad runs on a strict schedule, and that spread to parts of their personal life. Meals, like much of the rest of our life, happened on time. I have tried to be flexible about mealtimes for years, and the results are not good. If I skip a meal, I snack on junk, ruining my appetite for good food. Sometimes, I become famished and eat everything in sight, usually sweets, but I'll also inhale cheese, nuts, and breads. Potato chips are a particular downfall when I haven't eaten on time. Not surprisingly, David discusses this as a pattern that causes obesity.

Many people skip breakfast and this does bad things to their rhythm. By the time they eat lunch, their bodies are desperate for nourishment. I always eat breakfast, but it's hard to find easy food that is healthy and tastes good. Breakfast is a good time to eat some whole grains, but grocery stores seem to have a knack for making whole grains in one of two versions: too sweet or bad taste. Raisin bran is a perfect example. The raisins, which are very sweet to begin with, are coated with sugar, adding unneeded calories. The excess sweetening found in so many foods starts what I call "the blood sugar rollercoaster." Consumption of large amounts of sugar, much of it hidden, often triggers the release of insulin that makes one feel hungry well before meal time. So-called "whole food cereals" like granolas may be very tasty, but they are usually very calorie dense and sweet.

On the other hand, there are the whole grains like shredded wheat and all-bran that have no sweetening in them at all. These often taste like sawdust unless you know what to do to help them along. I like shredded wheat with a little sugar, but I haven't been able to find unfrosted shredded wheat at the store for years. It doesn't matter all that much, since no one else at my house will eat it that way.

I finally gave up on all of it and turned to oatmeal. Not just any oatmeal, delicious oatmeal . I buy quick-cooking oats and add things to make it tasty. This oatmeal is delicious, and it does not get old, because I can vary it quite a bit. It is what the flavored instant oatmeals try to be, with about the same amount of calories and much more taste.

I've never been one to skip breakfast, but I have often forgotten to eat lunch until 3 pm, leaving me starving. Then I eat too much junk food, ruining my appetite for supper. David claims that the human body metabolizes food most efficiently at midday. The best time to eat one's main meal turns out to be the time when my folks ate their main meal-noon. I decided to change the time of our main meal to midday. We are fortunate in being able to be at home for lunch.

Changing the time of our main meal to noon turned out to be a little more difficult than I expected. The trouble was that between fixing breakfast and lunch, I was spending the most productive hours of my day cooking. It took a few days to realize this and do something about it. Now I cook in the evening, after a light supper that resembles a snack or lunch. When the food is ready, I am not hungry (and therefore, not tempted to eat it), and I can warm it up the next day easily. Some foods won't stand this kind of treatment, but I don't eat those things on weekdays.

We have a salad almost every day, with homegrown greens, sprouts and sunflower nuts. I discovered that the ranch dressing mix that I use has MSG (a giant no-no for dieters and not very healthy for anyone) in it, and have turned to making Good Seasons' vinaigrette instead, because I could not find any ranch dressing that did not have MSG. It is taking a while to get used to a new salad dressing. We generally have a substantial entrée and sometimes soup.

The discussion of the results of eating a heavy supper late in the evening really nailed it. I can't count the times I've eaten a heavy meal at 8 pm, then have gone to bed a few hours later, slept badly, and usually had heartburn. Then I would wake exhausted. Indeed, when our bodies are digesting food during sleep, they can't regenerate or detoxify.

At dinner, we have much lighter fare, like a can of soup, or some cheese and crackers and fruit. We don't eat after 6 pm.

We've been eating this way for three weeks. Since we started, I've noticed that I don't have heartburn as often, and I'm sleeping a lot better. I've also been able to exercise a little more, and I've lost a pound. Eating is becoming a pleasure, and I look forward to it and don't do it unconsciously so often. Next time, I'll talk about awareness, the focus of week three.