Yesterday I had a cold and it was totally my fault.
I admit—I had a week of eating pretty badly. I ate pizza. I ate doughnuts. I ate breaded chicken. And I put (gasp) real milk in my tea. Normally I am a total advocate of having balance in your life. Unfortunately, I am sensitive to gluten and dairy and my immune system did not agree with this sentiment.
Gluten messes with my sinuses. If I have one piece of pizza in a week, my nose gets stuffy, but it usually clears up the next day. Dairy makes my skin feel tight and if I have too much of it, I get hives. When I eat it as frequently as I did last week, it also increases the congestion in my sinuses.
After one week of being lax about what I ate, I got a cold. Not only that, but I also felt like I had fluid in my left ear. Before I realized I was sensitive to gluten, I used to feel like that all the time. Now I can’t even handle feeling like that for a day.
Luckily, though, my immune system was able to rally quickly and my cold only lasted for a night. I had not gotten sick for months before this brief cold. The last time I still ate gluten regularly and I was sick for two weeks. So I will be grateful for this hit-it-and-quit-it-cold.
The idea of eating healthy can really mess with your mind. If you go into it thinking that you’re depriving yourself or the world will end if you eat something “bad,” you will eventually fall off the wagon. I really believe that.
If you have a more positive attitude about it, though, and think of healthier foods as rewards for your body, eating better food becomes a part of your lifestyle. I’m definitely not saying to purge your cabinets of unhealthy foods (unless that’s something you need to do for yourself), or to avoid going to restaurants, or to run away screaming if someone brings a box of pastries to work. I am still a big advocate for balance, but that means enjoying the occasional treat in moderation.
I’m not even mad at myself for eating so poorly last week. It is really hard to be so careful about what I eat all the time and sometimes I just need a mental break from it. I am kind of disappointed that I chose to eat so many things that disagree with my body, though. I can still indulge every now and then without eating bread. There are pizza places that have gluten-free crusts, for example. And there are plenty of “bad” foods that don’t have wheat.
This week really taught me that I don’t want to feel crappy anymore. And all I have to do to avoid feeling crappy is to stop eating certain foods. If I stop thinking of these no-no foods as “rewards” for watching what I eat the rest of the time, they will lose some of their appeal.
At least I hope they will!
That does not mean that I’m never going to eat another piece of real pizza again, though. I just have to do it when I haven’t also had a sandwich on regular bread, doughnuts, and breaded chicken nuggets.
