I think I might have discovered the reason for all these headaches and sudden drops in energy levels halfway through the day. The main keywords being sugar and caffeine. For the past 2 weeks or so I've been marking off a little dash each time I drink a glass of water. The aim is to drink about 6 glasses per day, although the lowest I ever drop is 4, with the exception of one day where I only had 3. The reason for all of this effort is due to one of the resolutions I wrote up in January. While it's unlikely that 6 glasses of water equals 1 and a half to 2 litres, it's still a start. A side effect to having all this added liquid sloshing around in my body, is that I'm constantly running to the loo, so surely I'm drinking more than enough for now.
Before I started glugging down copious amounts of water, bringing healthy snacks and a packed lunch to work each day, I used coffee as a way to warm me up and / or to fill me up. It got to the stage where I would be drinking about 5 or 6 mugs of coffee in a day, two of which I would have at home as my morning coffee, and then another one as soon as I got home from work. Surely all that caffeine can't be good for the system. So for these past 2 weeks I've been replacing all those mugs of coffee for cool, crisp fridge water, except of course for my morning coffee, which I refuse to give up.
But during this mini-detox I'm almost certain that the headaches have been more frequent, and that my energy levels have been dropping quite drastically. For some time I was confused as to why I've been feeling like this. I mean, I exercise, I've been eating fairly healthily (aside from the occasional take away on the boyfriend's insistence), and I've been drinking what I consider to be a good amount of water each day, so why should I be feeling as tired, headachy and generally blah, if not more, than if I wasn't doing all these good things for my body? It just doesn't add up.
Yesterday on the way home I voiced an idea to my boyfriend about why I might be feeling this way. I had heard from an acquaintance at Boot Camp, (which, by the way is now over - sniff-, but more on that later), that caffeine in small doses can be quite beneficial in terms of giving a quick burst of energy and alertness, which I think is true if you aren't overdoing it. I think my tiredness and lack of energy might have something to do with the fact that I'm not drinking as much coffee as I used to. Of course I don't need to, and in fact shouldn't go back to 5 - 6 mugs of coffee a day, but possibly one coffee in the middle of the day might do me some good. Besides the caffeine effect, it could possibly be the fact that I'm not having as much sugar as I used to, considering that I had 2 heaped teaspoons of sugar with each coffee.
Another find to support my sugar theory is that today it is one of the attorneys' celebrated his birthday. You might be wondering what this has to do with sugar levels, when in actual fact the link is quite obvious really. What are birthdays if they don't mean cake? Hmm? There was lots of it too. While I recently turned down a slice of cake that was bought for the office "just because" by the Conveyancer, one look at this cake and I thought, "Oh, what the hell, eh!" I only had one slice, but it was a very rich, very dreamy chocolate cake, which I'm sure was packed with sugar galore, and voilà! I'm still sitting here at my desk as alert and alive as ever.
So it would seem that the logical solution to an energy depletion crisis would be to keep a good supply of yummy cake on hand, which does wonders to pick you up. It's great! You should all try it!! And I think I might have overdone the sugar intake a bit!!!
But seriously, I think I might have to work on a more balance diet of some kind as I would hate to see what I look like after a month of eating cake every day.
Boot Camp, as I mentioned earlier, is sadly at an end, and I am entertaining all kinds of jealous feelings when I think about the people from the Boot Camp that I attended, who have signed up for the next one starting on Monday, and the Conveyancer here who will also be attending from next week with a group of friends.
Of course I will be attending another one in the future. (Once I've paid up my dentist bill - or rather repaid my boss for lending me the money to pay my dentist, but its pretty much the same thing). But knowing that I will be taking part in another one some day doesn't stop me from being a little envious about it.
I'm almost tempted to pitch up at the Boot Camp venue in my gym gear, copying all the exercises and stretches that they do, but with a little bit of distance between myself and the legitimate Boot Campers of course, so that they can't quite complain that I shouldn't be there. Hey, its a free world, and if I want to practice what I've learnt at Boot Camp and I happen to be at the same place at the same time as a Boot Camp session is taking place, then who can blame me really. I think it could be very comical actually. I just wish I had the guts to pull a stunt like that to see what their reactions are, although I'm sure it won't come close to the time when three pale, skinny guys ran up to our class, each wearing shocking pink speedos, who proceeded to stretch and pull muscleman poses right in amongst us without a hint of a smile on their faces while being filmed by a buddy standing off to the side, but anyway, it would still be a laugh, I'm sure.
One thing I'm quite proud of in terms of Boot Camp, is that besides the certificate of completion that everyone gets, I was given one of the special certificates which were being handed out with small gifts from Boot Camp's sponsors. My special certificate was for being the fastest runner at that particular Boot Camp, which made me feel pretty good actually. And on the certificate of completion a gold star had been stuck in one of the corners with "Perfect Attendance" written on it. Such simple things really, but they made me feel proud of myself for deciding to do something for myself, and going at it alone.
And you'll never guess what my particular gift from one of the sponsors was (because they are all different).
A box of tampons and a roll on anti-persperant. Admittedly the roll on smells really good and actually works, but I just cant get myself excited over a box of tampons. Sorry.
Before I started glugging down copious amounts of water, bringing healthy snacks and a packed lunch to work each day, I used coffee as a way to warm me up and / or to fill me up. It got to the stage where I would be drinking about 5 or 6 mugs of coffee in a day, two of which I would have at home as my morning coffee, and then another one as soon as I got home from work. Surely all that caffeine can't be good for the system. So for these past 2 weeks I've been replacing all those mugs of coffee for cool, crisp fridge water, except of course for my morning coffee, which I refuse to give up.
But during this mini-detox I'm almost certain that the headaches have been more frequent, and that my energy levels have been dropping quite drastically. For some time I was confused as to why I've been feeling like this. I mean, I exercise, I've been eating fairly healthily (aside from the occasional take away on the boyfriend's insistence), and I've been drinking what I consider to be a good amount of water each day, so why should I be feeling as tired, headachy and generally blah, if not more, than if I wasn't doing all these good things for my body? It just doesn't add up.
Yesterday on the way home I voiced an idea to my boyfriend about why I might be feeling this way. I had heard from an acquaintance at Boot Camp, (which, by the way is now over - sniff-, but more on that later), that caffeine in small doses can be quite beneficial in terms of giving a quick burst of energy and alertness, which I think is true if you aren't overdoing it. I think my tiredness and lack of energy might have something to do with the fact that I'm not drinking as much coffee as I used to. Of course I don't need to, and in fact shouldn't go back to 5 - 6 mugs of coffee a day, but possibly one coffee in the middle of the day might do me some good. Besides the caffeine effect, it could possibly be the fact that I'm not having as much sugar as I used to, considering that I had 2 heaped teaspoons of sugar with each coffee.
Another find to support my sugar theory is that today it is one of the attorneys' celebrated his birthday. You might be wondering what this has to do with sugar levels, when in actual fact the link is quite obvious really. What are birthdays if they don't mean cake? Hmm? There was lots of it too. While I recently turned down a slice of cake that was bought for the office "just because" by the Conveyancer, one look at this cake and I thought, "Oh, what the hell, eh!" I only had one slice, but it was a very rich, very dreamy chocolate cake, which I'm sure was packed with sugar galore, and voilà! I'm still sitting here at my desk as alert and alive as ever.
So it would seem that the logical solution to an energy depletion crisis would be to keep a good supply of yummy cake on hand, which does wonders to pick you up. It's great! You should all try it!! And I think I might have overdone the sugar intake a bit!!!
But seriously, I think I might have to work on a more balance diet of some kind as I would hate to see what I look like after a month of eating cake every day.
Boot Camp, as I mentioned earlier, is sadly at an end, and I am entertaining all kinds of jealous feelings when I think about the people from the Boot Camp that I attended, who have signed up for the next one starting on Monday, and the Conveyancer here who will also be attending from next week with a group of friends.
Of course I will be attending another one in the future. (Once I've paid up my dentist bill - or rather repaid my boss for lending me the money to pay my dentist, but its pretty much the same thing). But knowing that I will be taking part in another one some day doesn't stop me from being a little envious about it.
I'm almost tempted to pitch up at the Boot Camp venue in my gym gear, copying all the exercises and stretches that they do, but with a little bit of distance between myself and the legitimate Boot Campers of course, so that they can't quite complain that I shouldn't be there. Hey, its a free world, and if I want to practice what I've learnt at Boot Camp and I happen to be at the same place at the same time as a Boot Camp session is taking place, then who can blame me really. I think it could be very comical actually. I just wish I had the guts to pull a stunt like that to see what their reactions are, although I'm sure it won't come close to the time when three pale, skinny guys ran up to our class, each wearing shocking pink speedos, who proceeded to stretch and pull muscleman poses right in amongst us without a hint of a smile on their faces while being filmed by a buddy standing off to the side, but anyway, it would still be a laugh, I'm sure.
One thing I'm quite proud of in terms of Boot Camp, is that besides the certificate of completion that everyone gets, I was given one of the special certificates which were being handed out with small gifts from Boot Camp's sponsors. My special certificate was for being the fastest runner at that particular Boot Camp, which made me feel pretty good actually. And on the certificate of completion a gold star had been stuck in one of the corners with "Perfect Attendance" written on it. Such simple things really, but they made me feel proud of myself for deciding to do something for myself, and going at it alone.
And you'll never guess what my particular gift from one of the sponsors was (because they are all different).
A box of tampons and a roll on anti-persperant. Admittedly the roll on smells really good and actually works, but I just cant get myself excited over a box of tampons. Sorry.
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