Beginning of the end

Day 10- The sugar cravings are starting to fade. I am no longer craving sweets after meals and it is getting easier. I am trying to undo a lot of damage inflicted by lucky charms and nestle during my formative years and I think I am making headway.

Helloggs- Net Weight 666oz.

Also in my challenge to not eat after nine and before six, I failed but I also succeeded. I woke up twice and resisted the urge. Unprecedented. Then at 3 I walked down to the kitchen... not in my usual auto pilot... but fully aware of what I was doing. I was starving and as I opened the fridge Caitlin yelled, "Don't eat anything, Jape." Guilt-ridden, I thought about it but decided that I needed to take the edge off. I had a half a spoon of peanut butter and half a small banana. Tiny in comparison to my usual binges. I woke up hungry for breakfast which is something I haven't been in a while. Baby steps.

New challenge and getting back on track

Day 8- After a brief tumble off the wagon, I righted the ship. Coffee tests me every time but hasn't broken me yet. My workouts today were stellar after taking Friday super easy. I completed a track test workout with solid results and a strength swim in the morning. Went home and crashed then woke up and hammered out some big gear work on the bike. I was eating up the road and nearly ran over a very mangy looking dog and a not so mangy looking kid. I may have clipped the dogs tail it was so close. Diet was super clean today with oatmeal, bananas, chicken, and veggies.

Day 9- Feeling yesterdays workouts. My glutes feel like someone detonated them. Coffee was the prescription. No sugar. I went for a run which went pretty well. Cruised at about 6:40 pace which is too fast but felt good. Then loaded up for what was intended to be a big ride. Got out the door and couldn't turn the pedals over. I was absolutely blasted. I pushed for an hour to see if I would come around then had a gatorade for the first time in forever to see if I could jolt out of it... nothing. I pulled the plug to save it for next week and waddled home. I got my blood sugar up with a papaya shake at the Cafetera, an incredible local coffee shop... sadly it included a tbspn of added sugar... vows broken again. So today the failings include gatorade and a tbspn of sugar in a shake. I knew the addiction would be hard to break but I am making progress.

I'm now starting a new challenge as writing about my transgressions has been very effective to keep me honest.

The rules are no food from 9pm to 6am... I have been in the habit of snacking at midnight to 1 every night since training for Ironman Wisconsin (which did very odd things to my body) with very few exceptions. I am now trained to eat at that time as if it was lunch time. It has almost been two years of this stupid counter productive behavior. This will stop too.

OH AND STAY TUNED FOR A SCOTT MOLINA INTERVIEW... HA! You probably just peed your pants. Go change. You disgust me.

Shame shame forever shame

This pathetic bear needed another hit.

Day 6- I had a rough go of it today as I resisted adding sugar to anything but I broke and had a chocolate bar covered in peanut butter. Phenomenal but counter productive. Then Caitlin made pudding. I had that smothered in Peanut butter as well. To combat the chocolate binging I was on my trainer for a focused 3 hour session. It went really well given my legs were smashed. It was so hard that it monkeyed with my sleep cycle.

Day 7- Getting good with this no sugar in the coffee thing. The bees though were back and their fury was something to behold. I didn't back down and it quickly turned into a blood bath. 10 bees in total. 7 confirmed kills. One attempted a suicide mission of dive bombing me and crawling up my shirt. The shirt was off in half a second and his air space was invaded with poisonous gas. Forget it, terrorist.

Looks harmless. Not so fast....check his appendix for plastic explosives.

Fighting the good fight

What once was a beautiful and harmonious relationship has ended in a ugly divorce.

No one wins.

I think the bees in the dominican have excommunicated me and are out for blood. It is getting ridiculous. Every single morning several bees fly into our window and swirl around, obviously pissed. I have never seen anything like it. I am usually not one for violence but passive resistance is impossible with these creatures. We have bug killer and I go to town with it. I have killed 10-20 bees in the last week but some are quite clever and hijack me by sitting on my clothes for up to ten minutes before stinging me. They have an agenda. Caitlin thinks I am losing it but those bees know about the challenge and they aren't pleased. I'll keep you posted as I fight for my life.

Day 4- Massive struggle to not put sugar or fake sweetener in coffee... Got my sugar fix from bananas and peanut butter and peanuts and raisins. These are my sugar life lines. I think I'm doing ok so far but I am quickly becoming wildly addicted to Caffeine. That challenge might need to start very soon.
Day 5- Coffee without milk or sugar. Puts hair on your chest unless you are naked mole rat like me. Then it does nothing. Resisted honey in my peanut butter several times to the obvious displeasure of the neighborhood bees.

Breaking up is hard

It seems completely acceptable that a Bear fittingly named Pooh would be correspondingly addicted to honey.... Well the madness that is my sweet tooth has spanned all sorts of different sugars from candy to pie to dumping honey on everything within a 5 mile radius. But that stops today... with the elimination of added sugar from my diet.... including............ GASP......... HONEY!

Here are the rules. I am no longer allowed to add sugar, honey, or any other sweetener to any of my food. I must steer clear of recklessly sweet treats as well. This excludes molasses which you should google right now for its benefits. I will be using molasses very sparingly. No more sugar in the coffee, no more peanut butter and honey sandwiches, no more fun of any sort.

It is time to kick the addiction. I will keep a log of how this is going so you can all watch as I struggle.

Day 1- Mass cravings for sugar but I didn't break. Ate several bananas out of pathetic desperation.
Day 2- Three cups of coffee WITHOUT sugar (Sugar is only one of my many addictions... cough cough Heroine... kidding, mom). Resisted a delicious chocolate marble muffin. Ate raisins, apples, and bananas. Still crawling back to the sweets but at least they are real foods.
Day 3- Again coffee without sugar. Seriously eyed the sugar but didn't cave. My sweet tooth was satisfied by a fresh squeezed OJ. Usually the street vendors add sugar for no reason. Victory was mine as I had it without.

GET A JOB YOU JUNKIE!

Shaken not Stirred

First Hangover in a good while other than the prerequisite New Years day one. I thoroughly enjoyed last night. It was the last night in the country for one of our friends (Elizabeth) and six of us went out to celebrate. We ate at an awesome place where my meal consisted of 2 scrambled eggs and 4 vodka-waters. Vodka water was a brilliant drink in my mind before this night. I thought it was a trade secret of sorts and prevented hangovers as you take in water with every shot. It also tastes fine to me... sort of like bad water.

Careful James, I rufied your drink.

As I sit here waiting for my headache to subside, I am forced to take stock of this drink. In the DR drinks are incredibly strong. Think 2/3 vodka with a splash of water. Stateside, I recommend this drink. Here, you're better off drinking the chilled urine they call beer.

Hillary going after the coldest urine in the Dominican. BOTTOMS UP!

The three-four hour ride I was planning may have to wait until I rally from this miserable existence. In other news, I think I will hit about 17-18 hours of training this week. Cheers to that, Hillary.

What's your favorite posish

Today I went to bike on this flat spot and did 30 min of work at 26.5 mph average. Blitzing it and it was pretty controlled. I have messed with my position and now I am absolutely smacking it. Check it out. I have also lost a bit of weight so I am moving a bit quicker.




Also yesterday I did a weird thing. I walked on a treadmill... You may be saying. Listen JP, that is bullshit and you know it. But before you say that let me explain. I cranked the incline up to 15% and the speed to 4.2 mph. I did it for 60 minutes and watched my heart rate. I had no idea you could sweat like I did just walking. The Dominicans were seriously disturbed. I don't like going to the gym because I am constantly the object of judgement.

Anyway... try going to the gym and walking... not running... at 15% and 4.2 mph and see what you think. It is pretty tough.