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Thou shalt not give up all caffeine and sugar on the same day cold turkey. I wondered why I was getting a headache when I felt sooooo good. I only figured out minutes ago that I’d gone from two to three large cups of strong black tea in the morning to none. But interestingly without the sugar or the caffeine I actually feel more energized, and almost frenetic. I know that caffeine is a downer rather than an upper for me, as it is for my husband, Jon, and our daughter Trinity. We all have some level of ADD, and Jon scored higher on the ADHD than either of us combined. Trust me you want the three of us on caffeine so we’re a little calmer. But apparently just because caffeine isn’t an upper for me doesn’t mean my body isn’t addicted to it, thus the headache. I’ve now taken something for it, and am sipping a cup of tea. I think a gradual withdraw from the chemical is the wiser choice. I put a lot of sugar in my tea, and as I’ve tried to cut down on the sweetener I’m beginning to realize maybe I don’t like black tea. I like sugar. But without any sugar this morning I felt more energized than I can remember on any morning. It was an amazing difference. I wonder if just as caffeine acts opposite for my body chemistry, if sugar does the same thing? What if instead of giving me a boost of energy it drains energy from me?

I woke at 5 AM today in the pitch dark and since I knew I couldn’t sleep anymore I got up, put on my exercise clothes, and hit the treadmill. I’m about to start with a new trainer and a new nutrition plan. I’ve already started to try with the nutrition which explains the lack of chemical sweet goodness in my morning food. You never know when you start with a trainer if he’ll be good for you. He may be a great trainer for someone else, but it’s very personal what motivates someone to exercise. An evaluator took the tests for BMI, body mass index, and talked to me about what my goals were, and my time-line for them. He’s now chosen a trainer for me to start with when we get back from our business trip. But in talking to the evaluator and the nutritionist I gleaned this bit of knowledge that if I did major cardio before eating anything in the morning my body would burn more fat. Now I’m a wee-bit hypoglycemic or was in the past, so I make sure I put some fuel in my body pretty quickly. Otherwise I start feeling bad. A cup of sugary, creamy tea is a good jump start for me, or so I thought. The alternative to the morning exercise was to eat lunch, then wait long enough for the food to be mostly out of your system and do major cardio before dinner. It was, again, supposed to burn more fat. Well Carri, my exercise partner, and I did the after lunch cardio. The next day I was three pounds lighter and our high-tech scale took all three pounds off of the fat side of the scale. Now I don’t give a damn what I weigh. I care about how I fit in my clothes, how I look out of them, and how strong and healthy I am, but weight is a convenient starting point for judging an exercise method. Please, note that I say weight is a starting point, not the be all end all. Too many people obsess about their weight and ignore the fact that you can be skinny and terribly unhealthy and weak. I want to be strong and healthy. Muscle weighs more than fat and I want more muscle, so it’s not about weight, it’s about inches. I want to lean down and lose some fat so I can see all the muscles I’m building. I have twice had really good abdominal strength and each time that layer of flesh kept me from seeing all the work. I want to see the muscles not have them camouflaged with fat, so . . . I got up this morning, threw a small bag of almonds in my exercise bag, got my large bottle of water, and headed to our treadmill. We have one in the house, but I usually prefer to use one at the gym just so I get out of the house at least once every few days. As a writer sometimes you can feel a little housebound, or I do. But the trick for the nutrition is to eat breakfast no more than a half hour to an hour after waking, if I went to the gym that wouldn’t happen, so our treadmill was dandy. I wasn’t honestly sure how I’d feel with only a little water on my stomach and hard cardio, but I was willing to try.

I did an hour on the treadmill at a sustained speed of 3.4 walking. That speed is one that a few years before I’d have had to jog to keep up with, but now I can walk it. My orthopedist says jogging is not allowed as exercise with my ankle which I injured a couple of years back, but that hitting the gym with the weight lifting and the cardio has put enough muscle around the joint that there won’t be any need for surgery. That’s what originally made me hit the gym hard this last time. Surgery or exercise, let me think. Exercise was definitely the lesser evil to me, and now I just need to keep building up the muscle and getting healthier all the way around, and I’ll be fine. Very good news.

When the nutritionist made noises about me getting rid of sugar and caffeine in my diet I was really unhappy, but this morning let me know that if I do it gradually rather than cold turkey, maybe there really is benefit to giving up two of my favorite food groups. What if without both of them I’m more alert, more energetic, and healthier? Nutritionist is also talking a raw diet, and I was really dubious about that, but after this morning’s amazing surge of energy I’m going to try. What if everything they tell you is good for you really is good for you? Wouldn’t that be a bitch?