THM – Mama Needs Coffee

Trim Healthy Mama hacks: cheap and cheats

November 7, 2016

One of the most frequent questions I’ve gotten about THM since I first mentioned it back in August has been “can you do this on a budget?” And to that I answer a hearty “yes,” yes you can. I did buy a couple of the recommended “specialty” ingredients when I first got started (and I bought the THM brand of them because having it land on my porch 4 days later was easier than hitting up Whole Foods or Natural Grocers, and cheaper too) and I’ve been happy with them. But, aside from the collagen powder, I actually don’t think they’re necessary to do the plan well.

I have fallen in love with the collagen stirred into my black espresso in the morning and it has made my nails fantastically indestructible and long. Like pregnancy long. My hair has yet to be impacted, but I have big dreams. Big dreams, I tell you.

Anyway, in retrospect, were I to do it over (and when I do reorder in a couple months) I will probably only get the collagen again. I also bought their gelatin, the super sweet stevia/xylitol blend, and their whey powder. I do use the whey powder in my smoothies occasionally, but I can’t detect a real difference whether or not I do. The sweet blend is fine for sprinkling into drinks or adding to aforementioned smoothies, but I don’t like it in baked goods and my kids don’t like it in everything. The gelatin I just find to be redundant when I am already using the collagen so much. And since it “sets” when cooled, it makes leftover stew turn (temporarily) into jello when refrigerated, which is kind of entertaining but also kind of gross.

Some of my real staples for doing this plan, however, are just regular grocery store items that haven’t impacted our budget bottom line at all. Here are some of my absolute necessities for making THM work for me:

Frozen okra. This one I was majorly skeptical about, but it actually does have the magical, thickening quality they talk about in the book and it actually does make smoothies taste like milkshakes and gives chilis and soups a restaurant-quality mouthfeel. It is completely tasteless to me, so I use it with reckless abandon in white chicken chili and chocolate peanut butter smoothies alike. My King Soopers (maybe Kroger to you) sells it for $.99/bag in the frozen section, and I go through about a bag every 2 weeks. It’s dirt cheap.

Peanut powder. This was one of those ingredients I rolled my eyes haaaaard over when reading about it in their encyclopedic book. Because come on, live a little. Peanut butter is awesome.

Well, peanut butter is awesome, but in THM world it’s also always a crossover food because it’s loaded with fat and carbs. So it’s not a good weight loss option. (Duh? But what can I say, I have the palate of a 5 year old.) I found this Jif brand pressed peanut powder that has about 80% of the calories and really most of the flavor of peanut butter. Allegedly you can add water to it and reconstitute it to approximate something spreadable, but since I don’t hate myself I’ve kept to stirring it into smoothies and yogurt.

Which brings me to my next favorite: Oikos triple zero greek yogurt. I’m late to the greek yogurt fan club because frankly, what’s the big deal about yogurt? Well, when ice cream is off the table, yogurt suddenly looks pretty dang good. This stuff is on plan and tastes great when mixed with either the peanut powder I mentioned or straight dark cocoa powder (I prefer Trader Joe’s brand). It’s a satisfying “dessert” kind of thing after dinner, or it’s a good standalone snack in it’s own right. I can find these for about $3.50 per 4-pack at the store, so they’re not dirt cheap, but they’re a sight more affordable than Ben and Jerry’s or anything at Starbucks.

Speaking of the green monster. Listen, I try to use my consumer dollars to advocate for truth and justice and the American way as often as I can, but when fall rolls around I am putty in the hands of the PSL. But the PSL (that’s pumpkin spice latte for you non basic b’s out there) is emphatically not THM approved. I actually can’t think of a diet or wellness plan that artificial pumpkin sauce does fit nicely into, come to think of it…but, BUT. Sometimes you need a PSL. And so I give you:

“Poor mom’s PSL” (also works great for peppermint mocha!)

-order a short (that’s child sized but trust me, it’s plenty of caffeine and sugar) dark roast. Right now Thanksgiving blend is my jam

-add one small (definitely emphasize to them the smallness) pump of pumpkin puree

-ask for room for cream and top off with milk of your choice. I like half n half because I’m not significantly motivated to get to a size 8.

You will spend around $2 and you will consume around 1/4 the calories of a traditional handcrafted beverage, depending on what milk you choose. This is not strict THM by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s a lot closer to “on plan” than bombing through a grande PSL with 600 calories and 19 grams of sugar in it.

A few more must-haves for getting through the day and feeling full and satisfied:

avocados

nitrate free turkey/ham (Trader Joe’s has this for about $3.99/pack, which I can stretch about 5 lunches)

mustard and mayo (and ranch because I’m a forever cheater)

romaine hearts for making lettuce wraps (as low as $1.99 for a 3 pack and will make endless lettuce wraps)

eggs. Just so many eggs.

your favorite cheese.

old fashioned GF oats (I eat small portions of this when I eat it so it’s still considered on plan)

sweet potatoes

chicken thighs or breasts, baked ahead of time (thighs would be considered S meals most of the time)

a pot of chili or chicken tortilla soup (minus the tortillas. Sob.)

And that’s basically it. I eat pretty similar looking meals from day to day, and I don’t feel hungry. I also cheat a lot. Like, maybe I’m on plan 75% of the time? Some days are more cheat-y than others, but this still seems to work. I think the biggest reason is that when I do eat “off plan,” I just acknowledge that “you know, this Chipotle taco is off plan” and then I go back to eating the fats/carbs separated way at my next meal time. Usually I bomb off of restrictive diets after a bad date night or birthday party or event…you know the shame spiral of doom of which I speak?

I hope this is helpful to someone out there thinking about giving it a go. I would strongly encourage you to try it now and don’t worry about Thanksgiving and Christmas because guess what? I am going to eat a pound of mashed potatoes and gluten free pumpkin pie and not give any cares. And then on black Friday/boxing day? Back to the plan.

I do want to say that I think one reason this has worked so well for me is because nothing is outright “illegal” or “bad,” except for white sugar and white flour (which I can’t eat anyway, and which I acknowledge to be harmful in the first place.) I’ve struggled with weight and body image issues for most of my life, and a big chunk of time was lost to the abusive demands of an eating disorder. For that reason I tend to not do well with super restrictive diets for the sake of diet, like the Whole 30. It puts me back into a mental place of “good food/bad food,” and I almost always end up rebelling by eating something naughty around day 20 and then just blowing it.

For whatever reason, THM has clicked really well in my brain and has actually helped to repair my relationship with food. I have self control and moderation that I’d kind of given up ever feeling, and best of all it’s really easy to derail the shame spiral of “oh no I ate something I wasn’t supposed to” by just shrugging it off and starting fresh at the next meal.

Here’s a little progress snap from trick or treating last weekend, when I want dressed as these fine ladies

and nobody in my family got it, so I untucked my shirt and took off my belt and just looked vaguely middle aged and haggard. But in pearls.

I don’t think it’s magical. I think it’s about blood sugar control. And I think the weird carb/fat separation rule essentially keeps your blood sugar in check more than anything else, because by nature you can’t really overdo it on carbs and eat the foods they recommend you eat. But I’m not too sure that any of us – food sensitivities or not – should be eating white flour or sugar every day, let alone at every meal. I’ve talked about it with a friend who’s also dabbling in the plan and we think what it comes down to is “eating like a grown up.” And grown ups don’t get to eat french fries every day. Or pancakes. Which is admittedly sad, but then again, once a week french fries are still good!

I’m down about 19 pounds since starting this in August (and more than 50(!!) since Luke was born, incidentally), and I think I have about 20 to go. I’m holding out on Old Navy until I can comfortably rock the size 10 jeans and making do with some questionable jeggings from Rome and baggy 12’s for now, but I did buy a handful of size M tops at a thrift store last week, and fitting into a Gap medium feels huge. Yuge, I tell you.

motherhood, self care, THM, Trim Healthy Mama, Women's Health

Trim Healthy Mama: a {sorta} quick low down

October 6, 2016

So there’s this book that is about the thickness of a local phonebook, at least in it’s first edition. Which I did not read, because the revised second edition is what populated on my Kindle after no library wait at all (mysterious, for a friend tells me she is 50 out of 70-something on her library system’s waitlist. Guess I got lucky). And I read this book, in about a day or five, and it seemed to be sensible advice, if a little magical in thinking.

riiiiight, keep fats and carbs separated by at least 3 hours at mealtimes, and shoot for lots of protein and add a little collagen or gelatin to these smoothies and above all AVOID THE SUGAR.

And the weight will drop off.

But then, imagine my surprise when things indeed did start to move south on the scale. Though if you’re familiar with Dwija’s instagram, perhaps you already knew the punchline. #wow.

I’m not saying this is the simplest eating plan in the world to follow, because there is definitely a learning curve for how to properly combine (or rather, to not combine) fats and carbohydrates, but it does hold a significant advantage over, say, the Whole 30 because it doesn’t cut out entire food groups, nor does it require Draconian adherence to the rules. My favorite line of the sister-authors is “you’re only 3 hours away from your next slimming meal.” because I’d wager I’m not the first one to have ever blown a diet by letting a french fry or two slip through and then WELP, GUESS WE’LL START OVER ON MONDAY (shovels McFlurry into mouth.)

I like the balanced, this-is-how-a-grown-up-eats approach, and above all the lack of a starvation or total depravation angle. And the constant refrain that you are choosing to eat this way, and if you choose to “cheat,” it’s simply that: a choice. And one that doesn’t need to be filed under “shameful failure, do not proceed.”

One of the sisters is more of a natural foodie/purist who delights in fermenting her own sourdough and cultivating her own scobys (scratches head over spelling) for home brewed kombucha. The other one eats movie theater popcorn when she’s on a date with her husband. And then moves on.

That concept is the one I really like. The “make-the-choice-that-works-right-now-because-it’s-a-Christmas-party,” but that doesn’t careen into a spiral of shame and late-night burrito choices just because you “cheated.”

In other words, I think this must be what it’s like to eat like a grown up. And as a woman who was once, for a very prolonged period, a girl and then a young woman with an eating disorder, that has been a tricky balance to achieve. And continues to be. But I love the freedom THM gives, since you can eat pretty much all good food. Just not all at the same time.

Let me explain in a few quick paragraphs the basic parameters of the plan: (and this is as much for my own benefit as anyone else’s, so if your eyes are glazing over, feel free to disappear.)

Don’t eat fats and carbs at the same time. Your meals are either E (energizing) or S (satisfying), and always built around protein. Now, this is an admittedly sad rule, because apples and peanut butter do not play nicely together in this universe. But! It’s for the sake of stable blood sugar, which, in turn, leads to pounds dropping off.
The authors purport that your body runs on a twin engine metabolism, burning either fat or glucose, and if you give it one of the two available fuel sources at a time, it will burn through that one injection of fuel and then look to your stored energy supply (read: fat) and start burning through that next. (This is the part that seemed a little wishful to me. But at 14 pounds lighter, I can’t be too skeptical.)
If you give your body both fats and carbs (glucose) in the same meal, your body will burn through both, never kicking into the reserve drive and burning your own stored fuel. If the meals are well-balanced, they’re known as an C meal, or a crossover. This is what pregnant or nursing women should shoot for to experience even, healthy weight gain (and then loss), and ensure a healthy milk supply. Is also a good template for growing children who are in no need of weight loss, but who can definitely reap the benefits of stable blood sugar. These meals look like more typical “healthy” meals: baked potatoes with butter plus steak or chicken plus grilled vegetables. All of those foods are good and healthy, but if you’re trying to lose weight, you’ll want to skip the butter on the potato (and swap it for a more glycemic-friendly sweet potato) and make sure the steak or chicken is a lean cut. Ooooor, swap the potato out entirely for a pile of broccoli or asparagus brushed with melted butter and loaded up with melted cheese and maybe some bacon. And maybe add a little crumbled blue cheese to the steak.
So, an E-meal might be: a bowl of oatmeal with a few berries on top + low fat cottage cheese + a sprinkle of a blood sugar safe sweetener (stevia or something like it. No fake sweeteners though, and no “natural” sugars like honey or maple syrup, since they’re still sugar once they hit your bloodstream.)
And a S-meal might look like a plate of bacon and eggs and a cup of coffee with cream (and a little collagen power mixed into it. Because it’s tasteless and mixes well into hot things, and adds as super punch of protein.)
And a Crossover meal might look like a Caesar salad with grilled salmon and a side of roasted sweet potatoes drizzled in olive oil and sprinkled with parmesan. Fats and carbs, but evenly balanced. Won’t make you lose or gain weight.
There are also things called Fuel Puels, which as best as I can figure, are super low calorie snacks to tide you over or to help move the needle if you’re really wanting the weight to come off quicker. These would include smoothies made with almond milk, clean whey powder, a little cocoa powder and some of their approved sweetener, and maybe with a little frozen okra (one of their favorite ingredients for gut health, and surprisingly wonderful at providing thickness in soups, stews, and smoothies) and a handful of frozen berries tossed in. Another good fuel pull option might be some celery with low fat cream cheese. Or an apple with a couple almonds. These FP meals/snacks are the part of this whole program that feel the most “diet-y” to me, and the authors emphasize that they are optional upgrades for people looking to move the needle quicker, or are experiencing major blood sugar resistance.
Eat every 3 hours during the day. And don’t eat much, as a rule, after dinner time. It sends a mixed signal to your body when it should be switching into a different metabolic mode for sleep, and it keeps your blood sugar elevated when it should be tapering off in a healthy way as your metabolism winds down.
If you’re having an E breakfast and are hungry again in an hour or less, you can have a snack, but it needs to also be an “E.” Same with S’s. Match your closely-spaced (closer than 3 hours) snacks to your meals, if you must have them, or else you’ll trigger that cross-over mode where you’re burning both fuels and therefore not losing weight.
Don’t get stuck in a rut. As a dyed-in-the-wool early adapter of Paleo/Whole 30/Atkins/Southbeach/whaterver high protein thing is currently popular, it’s a little scary for me to eat oatmeal for breakfast without accompanying fats. Or to eat a dinner that includes brown rice or sweet potatoes but not butter and olive oil. But my body (so I guess bodies in general, if I can make a wild inference) likes the variety. So even though it’s tempting to eat nothing but S meals (because cheese), it seems to work best if I mix in at least 5 or 6 E meals a week.
Don’t take it too seriously. Obviously I veered wildly off the rails in Italy and drank all the wines and slurped all the cappuccinos. But because I don’t eat gluten, I couldn’t go too wild, so no pastries at breakfast and no cones with my gelato. And GF pasta tastes like sadness the world over, so even dinner was a somewhat subdued affair. But, I still managed to return to America with an irritated sweet tooth that is having trouble setting down. La dolce vita not for nothing.
You can do this no matter what your eating/cooking style is. Like to eat Paleo? This works for that. Like buying a lot of pre made ingredients and hitting up the drive though? Works for that, too. Don’t want to cook separate meals for your people? Definitely works for that. I’ve been making lots of sweet potatoes and rice and quinoa on the side and I either eat it or I don’t, but the kids hardly notice I’ve been cooking differently. We already don’t eat buns with burgers or brats, and if it’s Mexican night I just offer them corn tortillas or taco shells and wrap mine in lettuce. Which is the hardest part of this whole affair for me, so 60% of the time, I eat the dang tortilla. It’s a long game.

My hope is that this kind of lengthy synopsis is helpful to someone getting started with THM, and to anyone (hi, Christy!) who doesn’t feel like slogging through the entire book. But this is by no means exhaustive. I’ve found a couple great blogs for THM recipes, and there’s a ton on Pinterest. Once you get the hang of it, it becomes very second nature, and it’s easy enough to reset after, say, 11 straight days of “cheating” in a foreign country. Or trick or treating, I’d imagine.

This is not a great before and after shot, it’s more of a progress shot. But you can tell in the (sorry, blurry) left picture from August that I still look vaguely pregnant and my face and arms are bigger. Everything has slimmed out a little bit in the picture on the right, taken earlier this week, and while I don’t look pregnant anymore (yay!), I probably have another 20-25 pounds to go. Which is fine. Piano, piano. (Oh, and Dave has also lost about 7 pounds just from eating what I’m serving. Which is a pretty awesome bystander effect.)