12/8/09 Katie's Healthy Eating Journal: Tuesday

I know that frequently my blogs are about alcohol and weight gain but that's because I battle it so much in my own social settings.  In the past three years it is easy to see that I am extremely affected by drinking.  My weight easily increases a pound or two based on a night of heavy consumption.  I watch many of my friends hit their late twenties and start to see the affects of weight gain as well.  They become depressed and disheartened by their week of healthy eating and working out only to find that they have lost nothing.  To me it seems like a no brainer, consume several hundred calories in beer or wine and that's been half of your recommended calorie intake for the day.  So...I went to Dr. Oz and another expert on his site, Dr. Michael Roizen (you know the Dr. that Oprah frequently refers to?) who wrote about alcohol inhibiting the hormone leptin which tells your body it is full.  This means that once you start eating while you're drinking it's going to be that much more difficult to stop!  This little fact really annoyed me that I also read on Dr. Oz's site:  Men actually have an enzyme in their bodies (that women have a lot less of) that metabolizes 1/2 the alcohol before it even goes into their bloodstream!  Of course this is why when a man and woman drink the same amount of alcohol a woman will be more inebriated because she has less water in the body as well as less of this enzyme.  This is unfortunate because this means it takes a toll on our bodies (liver, brain, heart, fat deposits) much faster.  So when you think it's a good think you are able to "keep up" with your hubby or boyfriend...it's actually not.

Weight - 119.7 lbs.

Exercise - None

TUESDAY

Breakfast - 

2 Kashi Waffles

1/4 cup sugar-free syrup

Banana

1 cup fat-free organic milk

Lunch - 

Carrots with fat-free ranch

sugar-free jello

fat-free yogurt

Michelina's Lean Gourmet Mac and Cheese 

Snack - 

2 clementines

Dinner - 

1 cup spinach and mozzarella ravioli's (8g fat, 260 calories) with 2 tbps. parmesan

Salad (mixed greens, mushrooms, tomatoes, croutons)

2 tbsp. light salsa ranch