Week1 Sucked: Anemia, Insomnia and Clean Eating..

This week was hard. Let me re-phrase... Ahem... This week... BLEW. This whole post turned out different than I both wanted and expected. So let me explain.

Monday thru the weekend, honey was really sick. I consequently forced myself into a plateau. But in all honesty it was probably good to load up on some fattier foods for multiple reasons: 1-once I start eating better again and working out it shocks my body into losing weight and 2-since having a few foods I was craving I won't feel so deprived the next few weeks. Forced plateaus are the shit.

The first few days of eating clean are always difficult. But today, its gonna happen. I haven't wanted my goal more than after eating bad for a few days... the bloat and laziness makes me realize that this feeling isn't wonderful. I adore the strong feeling my body gets after a workout.

Anyway! Thursday, I went to yoga and was a mess on the mat. It felt like I was dealing with some anxiety in the room. It probably wasn't related to the heat, but more due to an emotional anxiety. Which lead to my next issue..

Insomnia.

Thursday night. I don't know if this was completely due to some kind of emotional anxiety or stress... Or if it was me being upset that I barely did my yoga practice, but I woke up staunchly at 2:30 AM and did not sleep. The rest of the night.

Iron Deficiency?

Okay... So in the last few weeks (and I am keeping in my mind diet hasn't been what it was, meaning clean eating- low sugar, high protein), I've noticed a few things going on that were bugging me: Insomnia...  (at first, I attributed this to my honey sleeping over quite a bit more and I'm a super light sleeper... but it has really become more than that), very tired during the day although I'm well hydrated, often very cold throughout the day, very tired during even light exercise mostly feeling very heavy on my way to work which is a short 20 min walk mostly uphill, and very random headaches.

Luckily (In a number of ways)! I happen to work at a hospital... I ran into a sports medicine doctor today who I had told about my weight loss quest months ago. He commented on how good I looked in my weight loss (as I've lost a good 25 lbs since I saw him last) and I told him that I only have a few lbs left but had been feeling extreme fatigue which ultimately causes issues in trimming those last few. He probed a bit more into my diet and symptoms. He informed me that it sounded more like an iron deficiency... To which all of those symptoms could be explained. He said for a very active woman who is of childbearing age, even if my multivitamin said 100% for my daily intake, I really should be getting in about 36-40 mg a day. After speaking with him, I zoomed to my computer to check out what my multivitamin contained. Only 18mg!

The science of it makes sense: Hemoglobin which is a protein in your blood that helps carry oxygen throughout your body needs iron for blood cells to be made at all. If you are deficient in iron, it is going to prevent your total body, every cell, bones to skin get enough oxygen and consequently making you very tired and fatigued.

Something that can help this is: increasing your iron intake in your diet. But for someone who has a restricted diet, this can be more difficult. You need lots of fish to continue this (which can also get expensive). OR you can take iron supplements. Key factor here, is to take vitamin C with the iron supplements, as vitamin C helps your body absorb the iron - Kinda like Vitamin D to Calcium. :) I just started iron supplement on Thursday night. I have slept better (but I always do on the weekends), we'll just see how yoga works out for me tonight.

Week 2: (August 30th-Sept 6th... Accounting for Labor Day and possibly being out of town)
Monday:
PM: Yoga
Tuesday:
PM: Yoga
Wednesday:
PM: Run home from WW.
Thursday:
PM: Yoga
Friday:
PM: Run to the gym, 60 mins cardio & 30 mins weights (arms & abs).
Saturday: Run to the gym, 60 mins cardio & 30 mins weights (back & legs)
Sunday: Rest.
Monday: Yoga