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Posted in: Nutrition / Nutrition Talk

R3: Day 20 of Eating Out Less and Cooking More

Hello! A lot has changed! I stopped eating Doordash meals for a while, then got this horrific headache and light-headedness that lasted for a week and ended up having to get Doordash.

My blood sugar and blood pressure fell to abnormally low levels, and so I would start eating chocolate baked goods to increase the sugar levels, which then turned into cravings.

The culprit? I've apparently been allergic to coffee for years. And chocolate. And guess what I always crave? It's interesting because I started gaining weight once I started to drink coffee and increased my chocolate consumption. Black coffee affects me the worst, and that's what I had that led to over a week of feeling sick.

I've never felt that bad - I hate feeling nauseous and I was feeling that the entire week. Even with all that, I was still demanded by leadership to come into the office, so it was quite rough. I also found an injured stray cat and am allergic to it.

With all the life chaos, I lost weight. I haven't worked out for over 2 weeks and noticed a steady decline on the scale. It's interesting because I was eating horribly and drinking a lot of coffee and brownies, but technically I guess I wasn't exercising as much nor was I tracking food since other parts of my life became much more stressful.

I decided to start going to OA to stop using chocolate and coffee to cope with stress from work and family. I'm also trying YNAB instead of spreadsheets and it's MUCH faster and gives better insights - presentation seriously matters (at least to me).

I do need to figure out better coping mechanisms. I do enjoy exercising, but I can't always do that. I started with hot showers.

I tried journaling but that went on for hours. Still trying for time tracking, but need something that's very pretty, visually speaking for that.

I'd love any advice on visually appealing time tracking and coping mechanisms you use instead of food! I'm sort of cold turkey done with coffee and chocolate (didn't buy it in the grocery store, but I did feel like weeping the entire time when I thought of a future of no chocolate).

Outside of chocolate goods, I really don't care for regular sweets. I thought about getting scones or sugar cookies, but it's not the same.

It's so weird that I craved chocolate and caffeine so much, only to find out that I'm very allergic. Without those two, I guess I don't find extreme dopamine highs with food. It was very easy to make dinner and eat it - it was just leftovers Tikka masala, spinach, and rice. Very quick and easy. No thinking about chocolate and coffee. I'll be continuing to avoid it!