Day 187

Whew. So it’s been a trying past few days. Not in the being healthy department...that’s going great! I even made a tasty dinner tonight:

But more on that in a minute. First, last Sunday was Easter, and holidays tend to be times when I struggle more with eating well. But even though I splurged a little with a twice baked potato and a few jellybeans, I did something really big...

I left my chocolate bunny behind.

That’s right, folks. Mom and Dad gave me a chocolate bunny in my Easter basket (yes we still get an Easter basket...you are never too old for an Easter basket), along with a little bag of mini Reese’s cups, jellybeans, a stuffed possum toy (don’t ask), and a pretty mug. It was sweet of them to put candy in mine, as they didn’t want me to be left out of the festivities, and so the decision was left to me about what to do with it.

I noticed an interesting, though slightly disturbing, behavior upon receiving my basket. I was possessive of it. It’s a difficult emotion to explain...I guess I was excited about having some candy, and was afraid that someone would say, “Oh, you’re dieting Campbell, let me eat that for you.” Not that I don’t mind sharing, but for some crazy, irrational reason I was worried that it was all going to get taken away. Even though the candy had been freely given to me, I was scheming about how to get it up to my room without anyone noticing. Although that was more due to the fact that I didn’t want anyone to see me eat it than the possibility that someone might take it away.

Then I noticed the way my sister handled her candy, immediately opening her bag of Reese’s and passing it around the table. It was no big deal. It was just a bag of chocolate, freely available at any gas station, grocery store, drug store, movie theater, you name it. I’m so glad this caught my attention, because it clued me in to how wrong my own behavior was.

Frankly, it was a little frightening that even after six months of habits-changing, my brain could immediately revert back to the old food-hoarding behavior. But it was also encouraging, in that I noticed the behavior and put a stop to it. In the past, I would have done whatever I needed to smuggle that candy out of the house and back to Athens with me. Which is silly, as I have a car and money and am free to go to the store and get candy whenever I want...but like I said: irrational.

I'm so cute...don't eat me!

This time, however, as I was packing up my things and preparing to stow away the chocolate bunny (happily, Daddy had finished off my Reese's cups for me at that point), I thought, What if I left it behind? The answer to that was, It wouldn’t really be that big of a deal. After all, I know what chocolate tastes like. And because I was having somewhat troubling behaviors towards this particular chocolate, I felt that it was especially important that I just walk away.

So I did. And it was way easier than I thought it would be. I never even missed it! It was so much more rewarding to have control over that behavior and ignore the urge to sneak the bunny. So that was a huge win for this weekend! Headline: Campbell Triumphs Over Chocolate Rodent!

In other news, I made a SCRUMPTIOUS dinner tonight, and it was so super simple I couldn’t believe it. The recipe is Healthy Baked Chicken Nuggets from Skinny Taste, one of the new blogs I've found. It was absolutely to die for. Crispy and moist with incredible flavor, thanks to the parmesan cheese and Italian style panko bread crumbs. Despite the fact that they are technically breaded, these nuggets are surprisingly low in carbs and fat, especially because there are no eggs involved in the breading process. That was seriously the best dinner I've had in a long time!

Beats Chick-fil-a hands down!

It made my night, as I've been pretty drained between end of the semester school stuff and lack of sleep (owing, I'm quite sure, to my lack of exercise. I've got to get back on track with that!). Hopefully I can get to bed early tonight and recharge. The nice thing is that I have all week next week to get all of my projects done, so I can take it somewhat slow. 17 more days and I'm a college graduate!

Almost forgot! Here's the calorie count:

Breakfast

Low-fat nutrigrain waffles — 140

1 tbsp honey — 64

¾ cup Puffins cereal — 101

Skim milk — 43

Coffee w/ cream — 60

Lunch

Apple slices w/ reduced fat peanut butter — 222

Dinner

Baked chicken nuggets — 230

1 tbsp blue cheese dressing — 65

Green beans  — 26

Snacks

Sugar-free Jell-o pudding — 60

Total: 1011