For Lent I gave up bread, pasta, sugars, rice, legumes, and all the major forms of complex carbohydrates. I do still eat fruit (limited to two a day) and I also have a bowl of plain oatmeal with a teaspoon of honey and nuts in it for breakfast each morning. I didn't change this because it took me a long time to learn to love this breakfast and make it work as my Ironman training breakfast and I don't want to have to find something else. I also didn't count vacation, the food we had access to was limited and expensive! We were on a small island where fresh vegetables were tough. I didn't order carbs unless there weren't other options. We had to stick to a budget and that meant sandwiches for lunch. The moment I was back on US soil I was back to no carbs though.
Now, you've probably said to yourself "this girl really isn't following lent very well" and you're right. I'm an episcopalian. We don't technically do lent like catholics do. I am also not really a church goer anyway. I'm not to prepared to get into my religious beliefs in this blog at this point so that's all I'm going to say about it.
There are a few things that were hard about this: Sweets. For the first week I had a really tough time and I craved sweets ALL THE TIME. The mornings were the hardest. I would walk past people eating doughnuts in the train station and had to use all will power to keep from tackling them and stealing their sweet treat. Worst part about this is I'm not even a doughnut person. Before all this I never craved them.
I also get headaches in the afternoon and sometimes at night. I've noticed that if I drink lots of water the headaches aren't as bad. I never had to drink this much water when I was eating carbs. I'm fine drinking tons of water.
I'm not sure how it feels yet. Part of me likes it, I don't feel as bloated or lethargic after meals. I also feel like i have a ton of energy in general. I don't know all the science behind the whole glycemic index and how it drives energy and being tired.
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