what i learned from the thanksgiving meal

a couple of weeks before thanksgiving i tried cooking a paleo pumpkin pie with pumpkin, eggs, pumpkin pie spice, and lots of coconut milk. at that time i was thinking that this pie is so healthy, it won't kill me to put some reddi-whip on top. it was so delicious, i kept eating and eating!!! then i was out like a light. i had to sleep from the sugar and insulin surge.

so i learned from that. on thanksgiving day i made the pie, but no cream on top. i also made some "paleo" yams with spice, apples, some butter, etc. these were desserts that were SO good, again i kept eating and eating!!!! at least i didn't go to sleep in the afternoon and my heart wasn't racing- so i count that as a win.

i didn't put any sweetner- no honey, no stevia, no maple syrup flakes- in anything. but- i overate because the cravings just kept building!! i even ate some candy!! that night when i closed my eyes, i didn't see the dark patterns that usually dance around on my inner eyelids before i fall asleep. i saw brighter swirly thingys. so that sugar/insulin response made its way all the way up to my eyeballs. i also had greater temp changes than usual with all those carbs, so i know that must play into my nightly temp changes. the next day i was in a bad mood. so were my daughters.

what i learned is that i will still cook the yummies, but cook much much less so that we can each only have ONE small portion and NO leftovers. the broccoli/cauliflower casserole i got off the everydaypaleo site was yummy- and i will start including that as a regular (not just holiday) dish. my younger daughter helped me cook, which made the whole experience better. she wants a paleo cookbook for christmas.

before thanksgiving i ate little (not much of an appetite), and the morning of thanksgiving was the same. maybe that semi-Ifing helped to mitigate the impact of the meal. so far the scale doesn't register any weight gain, but i know from experience sometimes the effect of damaging your insulin sensitivity doesn't show up for a couple of days.

remember the words of the prophet (Arthur): " there is no failure, only feedback".