The Joy of Cooking...

I have forgotten how much I enjoy cooking. The smells, the sounds, the harmony of ingredients coming together, I have forgotten how much these things mean to me and what they do to my well being. We are creatures of senses and, for me, cooking maximizes these senses.

During most of my pregnancy, I was tired and overwhelmed. I did not cook, and if I did it was often pastas, sandwiches and easy, stuff that would fill us up while we sat on the couch and watched tv. I kept promising myself, once the baby came, that we would go back to the family table, back to eating healthier and properly and back to moving once more. Well, during that summer, my husband developed a case of heartburn, was put on Prilosec, and he felt so crummy that we completely stopped doing anything we enjoyed. No more walking, no more playing with the dog, no more camping and hiking. Even our gorgeous vegetable garden went neglected and many of our prized tomatoes were left to rot on the ground or vine. The pounds crept up and we crept to the couch, faining illness, tiredness and exhaustion.

The baby came, the baby grew and so have our waistlines. When I was admitted into the hospital, I weighed 257. After Gerhard was born, I dropped twenty pounds and was so happy to see the numbers drop. I weighed myself today and I have gained a few more pounds since then to 239. I am not happy with this number, nor am I happy with the thirsty, still tired feeling I wake up with every morning, the lethargy, the fact that my jeans are three-quarters stretch material and one quarter actual denim. I long for my clothes, my beautiful, functional clothes that fit me so well last winter that now lie in a suitcase waiting for my waist to reemerge.

I said before that I am starting Clean Eating on New Years day, but it is now the third and I "kinda" tried yesterday. I hate the word trying. Trying is a half ass attempt at really doing something, either you do it or you don't. You can do it and fail, but at least you tried with all the fiber of your being. Trying is like sticking your toe in the water to see if it is warm, you try it out so you don't have to commit to really doing it. This blog is my commitment, my reality check. You people know my real weight (something I don't even tell my mother) and you will know my successes and my failures for the next year.

Here I sit with my bowl of oatmeal, laced with cinnamon, vanilla and chopped dates, a cup of unsweetened chamomile tea and two hardboiled egg whites to choke down. I hate egg whites, but I gather that if I am to make my body start losing some of this weight, I need to make some sacrifices and do what is best for my body. I also plan on swimming this morning. Here we go!