Silencing the Siren Song of Sugar*

Katy Perry may have thought that she liked kissing a girl because of her soft lips (or because it got her attention from men who like to watch two girls kiss thereby relinquishing the power of her sexuality for the voyeuristic enjoyment of others) but it turns out there may have been another reason the Teenage Dream star enjoyed the smooch: y'all Cherry Chapstick has sugar in it. How do I know this when their website only lists the vague "flavor/scent" ingredient?

Because I've been there. Hot Chocolate Bonne Bell Lip Smackers is where the love affair began for me. My friend Liz and I each ate a tube one day while we were on a ski trip in middle school. Why? I don't know, middle schoolers are weird. At any rate, it was delicious. A little waxy but no more so than a Hershey bar (reason #210 why I refuse to eat Hershey's). Ever since that magical day I've been pretty loyal to my Lip Smackers. Yes I'm a grown woman with three different flavors of lip gloss in my purse (Skittles - the yummiest, Dr. Pepper - gives such a nice hint of color, and Burt's Bees regular flavor - my nod to adulthood although I gotta say it's pretty tasty too.).

One day, curious about my decades long addiction, I googled every chemically sounding ingredient on the tube and underneath some of those fancy names I found, yes, sugar. The White Satan lives in inauspicious tubes of beeswax masquerading as a health product. And who doesn't love Chapstick?

I am a life-long sugar addict. And when I say addict, I mean that sugar has been shown in research to operate on the same neural pathways in the brain that narcotics do. So I realize that it's a little hard to take advice about quitting sugar from someone who used to routinely strap on a 12-ounce bag of jelly beans like a nose bag as I wandered about my house performing my various duties. (True story: I used to bribe myself to get up with my babies in the middle of the night with jelly beans. As in, "if you go and nurse the baby again you can grab a handful of sour-ized sugar pellets!") But it turns out that all of this struggle with sugar means I've learned a few things. Plus we're coming up on the High Sugar Holidays and I figure I can use all the help I can get so I hope you guys will chime in with your tips in the comments!

Tip #1: Get Educated. Sugar is in friggin' lip gloss! That's the main problem with sugar: it's everywhere! Even in places you don't expect, like Katy Perry's boobs - she shoots whip cream from her knockers in her California Gurls video which is inexplicably set on a life-size Candyland board. We all know we should eat less sugar but it's hard when it's almost unavoidable. This is why you need to get into reading labels. You don't have to go over the ingredient list with a fine-tooth comb unless you're a science nerd like me but just look at the "sugars" line of the nutrition label. It's not perfect but it's a pretty good gauge.

Tip #2: Avoid Sauces. This is more of a shortcut for tip #1 as sauces are a major source of hidden sugars. Spaghetti sauce, salad dressings, ketchup, relish, barbecue sauce, marinades, gravies and even flavored rice vinegars are all loaded with sugar. If you have the time, make your own - it'll taste better anyhow - or just limit your use of them.

Tip #3: Eat enough protein. I'm stealing this one from Geneen Roth (the Intuitive Eating lady whom I routinely worship on this site). She says - and I've found this to be true in my own life - that intense sugar cravings are really your body craving protein. I know it sounds counterintuitive (hee!) but if you eat a yummy piece of salmon or steak you will probably discover you're not craving those chocolate-covered cinnamon bears anymore. I find it helps to prepare ahead for this one. I cook extra servings of meat and beans and keep them in single serving packages in the fridge so all I have to do is microwave one rather than fight off the talking cinnamon bears for 20 minutes while it cooks. Also, those little cans of sardines are perfect for this! Just eat the bones. I'm serious. You will get used to it.

Tip #4: Get Enough Rest. How many times have I tried to compensate for a lack of sleep by going for the quick hit of ice cream eaten off a fork standing in front of the freezer (that's so I can pretend I'm not really eating it, see)? Too many to count. Just remember when you're tempted by the quick lift, that it will inevitably be followed by a quick crash leaving you feeling worse than when you started.

Tip #5: Alcohol is all sugar. But you knew that already right?

Tip #6: Eat What You Want. Fact: I have a bag of Halloween candy sitting in my cabinet right now and I haven't eaten any of it since it first was toted into my house by three little gremlins. As a person who used to throw bags of candy in the garbage because I couldn't handle them calling to me 24/7, I am beyond shocked. And this is where the magic of Intuitive Eating comes in: teaching myself that if I really want a treat, I can eat it. Guilt free. The only rules are that it has to be exactly what I want and I stop when I'm sated. So every time I've gone and pawed through the bag of candy swiftly growing stale, I find that it doesn't really appeal to me. If I'm going to eat chocolate I want the real deal - these days I've been really into making my own Almond Joys (from Heather Eats Almond Butter). They're not health food but they are delicious and they are exactly what I want. I know this sounds crazy. A year ago I would have rolled my eyes (and then blogged about it) when someone said "Eh, I don't really like candy." But if I can get to this point of peace with sugar then you can too.

Tip #7: Know Your Limits. Now that I've just told you to eat what you want, I'm going to tell you that successfully doing #6 requires you to really know yourself. I don't keep ice cream in the house anymore. If I want some, that's fine but I'm going to have to go get it. It's too easy for me to go into mindless eating mode with it. Other things like Halloween candy don't have the same effect on me but you need to find out what your triggers are and then set yourself up for success. Remember, Intuitive Eating is eating mindfully in a way that makes your body feel good - not eating whatever you think you want until you're sick. It's a fine line but it gets easier to discern with practice!

So, now that we're in Sugar Season - what's your strategy? Do you abstain completely? Do you have just a little of the really good stuff? What kind of lip balm do you use?

*By golly I love a good alliteration.

New Research: Jelly Beans Will Kill You (Giveaway!!)

I don't want to start your day off on a bad note but the health and fitness research this week has been, well, a downer.

Item the first: Turns out your gut instinct was right - scientists (at Princeton, no less!) have discovered via our favorite furry rodent test subjects that high fructose corn syrup actually does make you gain more weight than the same caloric amount of table sugar. Not only that, but HFCS causes scarring on your liver, childhood obesity and early death. But don't worry, you still have to show ID to buy a single box of Sudafed! So we may die early with scarred livers from all that unregulated Coca Cola but if we're over 18 at least our noses won't be stuffy.

Item the second: Jelly beans are made 100% out of high fructose corn syrup.

Now you see why I'm bitter. I adore research if it tells me do something I'm already doing - like the research this week that found that women need an hour a day of exercise to maintain their weight - it's an exercise addict's dream come true! But: IT'S JELLY BEAN SEASON, PEOPLE. How do I love jelly beans? Let me count the ways:

1. SweeTart jelly beans - the gold standard of chewy sour deliciousness and they are only sold now. Also only sold now, their HFCS-laden sister in crime, Gummy Bunnies.
2. Mike N Ike jelly beans - regular Mike-n-Ikes ain't bad but for some reason the jelly bean version is 100 times better.
3. Sour Starburst jelly beans - yummy but they make my tongue hurt if I eat too many. It's like a little tongue seizure.
4. Nerds jelly beans - they have this amazing bumpy crispy sour outer shell and a gooey tangy middle. Weird to look at but man they go down easy!
5. "Spice" jelly beans - are disgusting. I wouldn't touch them with a pair of Lindsay Lohan's leggings much less eat them. They're cheap and the black ones taste like fake black licorice. That's just wrong.

I had to throw #5 in there in case you thought I unabashedly love all jelly beans. While we're on the subject, I'm not a fan of the much-ballyhooed Jelly Bellies. Some of them are yummy (ripe pear!) but then you accidentally get a popcorn or cappuccino one and you realize that Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans are a concept that only works in the fictionalized halls of Hogwarts and is horrendous in practice. (And "top banana"? Retch.) My point: I'm a connoisseur of HFCS.

Clearly I am in need of a snack intervention.

Like manna from above Fruit Not Fat's Galaxy Granola* showed up on my doorstep. I don't know about you but granola is one of the very first things I eliminated when I started healthifying my diet. I haven't had a bowl of granola in probably 6 years. Which is sad because I really do like granola - all those crunchy rolled oats and nuts and fruit! It seems like it would be good for you, right? But then most companies (even my beloved Kashi) smother all that whole grain goodness with buckets of oil and sugar and, yes, often HFCS thereby turning a healthful breakfast into a nutritional horror show.

I am not a fan of horror shows, nutritional or otherwise. (Just ask my students in Seattle. They discovered they could actually get me to run screaming from my own classroom by the merest hint of telling me the plot line to any of the Saw movies. Gah. I just got a full body shiver. There - again! Okay, must stop writing about it now. Back to granola. Ack - another shiver!! Stop it!) Fruit Not Fat's concept is simple: they took out most of the sugar and all of the oil and replaced it with apple puree. It's delicious. And not just in a I-can't-have-real-granola-so-this-substitute-is-decent kind of way. In all honesty I like this granola - especially the raspberry flavor - better than any "real" granola I've ever had. They sent me three bags to try and they were gone in as many days. I couldn't walk past the cupboard without sneaking a handful.

The nutritional profile is pretty impressive. Just 115 calories per 1/4 cup serving, 1g of fat, 5g of sugar (compared to Kashi Go Lean Crunch's eye-popping 12g - that's the same as Cap'n Crunch), and 4g of protein. The ingredient list is so simple it's a work of art. Whole rolled oats, barley flakes, spelt flakes, evaporated cane juice (yes, that's sugar), wildflower honey, apples, raspberries, crisp rice, oat flour, oat bran and vitamin E. No weird stuff! The only downside is the price. At $5.29 a bag (that's from their website - I don't know how much it costs in stores as there aren't any near me that sell it), that's a bit steep for cereal. Especially cereal that I may or may not have eaten an entire bag in one sitting. Ahem.

Want to try some yourself? Fruit Not Fat wants to give one of you a free bag - you can choose your flavor but I heartily recommend the raspberry (it has little freeze-dried raspberries in it!). Everyone else is not left out in the cold - you can order a free sample off their website.

What's your favorite kind of jelly bean? (And if you say the black licorice ones, I'm not sure we can be friends anymore. Sorry, mom!) What do you think about the HFCS study??

*FTC disclaimer: Fruit Not Fat provided me with free samples of their granola. I was not paid for this review.

The Weirdest Tip for Managing Cravings - And it Just Might Work

The things I do for you people. Seriously. Everyone around me thinks I'm one tinfoil hat short of an alien encounter. And I did it for you.

EFT
Pronounced "fffffftttt" (kidding - it's actually pronounced "I spit a lot"), Emotional Freedom Techniques is, in brief, a series of body movements, singing, tapping and eye rolling that you perform in a specific order to achieve emotional freedom.

Lest you say, "But I did not know I was in emotional bondage, Charlotte!" I must point out that everyone has some binding emotions. Think of this as an emotional laxative. Plus it will really make those holiday dinners a lot more entertaining once the Aunts get a load of you doing this.

Gary Craig, the founder of emofree.com, and one of the most ardent supporters of EFT explains, "Based on impressive new discoveries regarding the body's subtle energies, Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) has proven successful in thousands of clinical cases. It applies to just about every emotional, health and performance issue you can name and it often works where nothing else will." (emphasis his, actually if you go to his site you will discover he is very fond of The Bold.)

He asserts that this technique will help with everything from pain management to addictions to eating disorders to weight loss and everything in between. For my studies though, I was particularly interested in how some people use the technique to help manage cravings.

To be completely honest, I was pushed into this experiment by my overly aggressive bag of Halloween candy (I hate you Willy Wonka and your CandyLand house of HFCS horrors). A junior mint here, a nerd there, pretty soon I was pooping green food dye and getting sugar hangovers in the mid afternoon. The neighbors were starting to talk.

Full of good intentions (and you know where those lead), I downloaded the free EFT instructional manual. First thing you should know - it's not a manual. It's eighty-freaking-seven pages. It's an e-book. As if your butt isn't already squished into the shape of your (very uncomfortable IKEA) office chair. I skimmed. A lot. Okay, so I just read the bolded stuff. But there was a lot of bolded stuff!

You get the two-minute rundown: basically there are points on your body that are supposed to be emotional release points. Using your index and middle finger you either tap or massage each point. Craig gives a very lengthy explanation and list of steps with various different formulations. Some would say I have a short attention span, I would say I'm built like a hummingbird, but however you look at it Paul McKenna is more succinct:

The Tapping Technique

1. I want you get the biggest desire for a food that you can right now. If you don’t have a big enough craving, put this technique to one side and come back to it when you’re really feeling it.

2. Focus on this craving for a moment, and when you’ve thought of that I’d like you to rate your desire for a food on a scale of 1-10, with 1 being the lowest and 10 the highest. This is important, because in a moment we want to know how much you’ve reduced it.

3. On a scale of 1- 10, how strong is your craving? Remember, if you’re not really craving a bite (i.e. your craving is not at least a 7), come back to this technique later.

4. Now take two fingers of either hand and tap about ten times under your collarbone while you continue to think about eating.

5. Now tap under your eye ten times.

6. Now tap under your collarbone again.

7. Place your other hand in front of you and tap on the back of it between your ring finger and your little finger. Continue to think about your desire for food as you do this and each of the steps which follow:

• Close your eyes and open them.

• Keep your head still, keep tapping and look down to the right then down to the left.

• Keep tapping and rotate your eyes round 360 degrees clockwise, and now 360 degrees anti-clockwise.

Remember to keep thinking about the food you were craving as you do this!

• Now hum the first few lines of ‘Happy Birthday’ out loud.

• Count out loud from 1 to 5.

• Once again hum the first few lines of ‘Happy Birthday’ out loud.

8. Stop and check – on a scale from 1 to 10, what number is your craving at now?

If it hasn’t completely gone yet, just repeat this sequence again until it does.

PS> There's a video if you follow the link to Paul McKenna's site.

That's right, you will be systematically tapping yourself in strange places whilst chanting happy birthday and counting like an over caffeinated preschooler. But other than your pride, what could it hurt to try?

For the last 3 days, every time I have gotten a craving for one of those nefarious little bars I have, much to my children's amusement, got down with the tapping, singing and eye rolling. In fact, it got so bad that the younger one really thought it was his birthday and the older ones were starting to imitate me. ("You can't do that sweetie, Teacher will think you have strange tics and send you home early and then I'll never get my workout in. Plus Teacher already thinks mommy is crazy because mommy missed your randomly assigned "birthday" - since you were a summer baby - and left you bereft of peanut-free cupcakes and/or smelly erasers.")

The end result? I ate less candy. For reals. I don't know why. Gary Craig would say that my negative attitude is making me skeptical. I personally think my negative attitude makes me fun at parties but I digress. Whatever the reason - whether it was just distracting myself long enough for the craving to pass or that I "set my emotions free" - it seemed to work. In fact, during one rebellious moment I consciously argued with myself about actually doing the technique:

Me: I want the Swedish fiiiiiisssshhhh!
Other Me: Do the EFT!
Me: No! Because then I won't want to eat the Swedish fish anymore.
Other Me: Well, huh.

I didn't do the EFT and I ate the Swedish fish, feeling marvelously defiant. Take that - ! Um, who am I rebelling against exactly? Me? Oh. Take that, me.

Like I said, I don't know why it worked. I don't even know if it will keep working. But there is a surprising body of research supporting this as a valid technique beyond just the power of positive thinking. Check it out. In the end, what do you have to lose? Except a little bit of credibility but who cares what those homeless people in the alley think. You shouldn't be shooting up smack anyhow. Besides, they're just jealous of your nifty hat.

Any of you have experience with EFT? Who's willing to do a mini-Experiment of their own? What holiday is your food downfall? (Mine's Easter - darn jelly beans.)

PS> Look for baby news coming soon! It is imminent!

Sugar Bombed: The Cheat Day Debunked

Hot on the heels of the American Heart Association's recommendation that all Americans drastically reduce their sugar intake - women are now recommended to limit added sugars to 6 teaspoons a day (for comparison, one serving of soda has 8 teaspoons) - comes more bad news about junk food. Scientists have discovered that not only can bad eating derail you in the moment but it also sets up a chemical chain reaction in your brain that blocks the hormones that signal satiety for up to three days, giving new meaning to a "weekend bender."

Dr. Clegg, the lead researcher says, "What we've shown in this study is that someone's entire brain chemistry can change in a very short period of time. Our findings suggest that when you eat something high in fat, your brain gets 'hit' with the fatty acids, and you become resistant to insulin and leptin." She adds, "Since you're not being told by the brain to stop eating, you overeat."

While I find this news depressing, I am actually relieved that someone scientific (and by scientific I mean not just wearing a lab coat in a Hydroxy ad) found this connection because this is the number one reason why I have always had an uneasy relationship with the "cheat day" concept. A core principle in many diets, you are advised to eat perfectly clean 6 days a week and then go hog wild on the 7th. It has never worked for me. The problem is getting back on the wagon after a day of deli-fueled debauchery. I'd always end up the next day huddled over the tub of ice cream swearing I was only going to "finish up this last tub." Either that or I'd go back to clean eating but jones for sweets for days afterward.

According to this research, I'm not the willpower-less freak I'd always assumed I was! After spending six days clearing the crap out of my system I was basically undoing all my hard work by throwing my hormone levels out of whack for three days. I had a sugar hangover. By the time I finally felt good again, it was time to start the cycle all over!

So what's a healthy living girl to do? I am not one of those people that can just say, "I will never eat sugar, flour or processed foods ever again for the rest of my life." Therein lies the way to bingeville and angry self-recriminations. And yet the cheat day doesn't work. So what does?

I'm still trying to figure that out for myself - I'm really good at finding what doesn't work for me, not so good at the reverse - but I have noticed a few things about myself:

1. I need something sweet every day.
2. I can usually limit myself to one sweet.
3. If I eat it earlier in the day, it doesn't seem to affect me as much.

Knowing that about myself, I eat dessert after lunch. Every day. Most often it's some dark chocolate. Sometimes dunked in peanut butter. Or it will be ice cream. Or Extreme Sour Patch Kids (thanks Anna!). But whatever it is I enjoy it and don't feel bad about it. But I also know my limits and eating anything sugary at night is likely to send me on the 3-day round trip to the Isle of Insulin Hell. Which isn't to say I never go there, I'm just not buying lakefront property is all. It's a fragile peace but so far it's working.

Have you made your peace with sugar? Does the "cheat day" method work for you? Here's how some (seriously funny) kids deal with the temptation (click through to see the video):

Oh, The Temptation from Steve V on Vimeo.

Halloween Candy: To Give or Not to Give?

I am the official Halloween Grinch. Mostly it stems from a hatred of all things scary and icky. My theory is that between Iran's second nuclear facility and OJ Simpson still roaming free there is plenty frightening stuff in the real world stuff. Roman Polanski apologists, anyone? (Off topic but you really have to click thru that link and watch the video. Hilarious!) My point: I don't need a horror flick to make me pee my pants; I can do that just fine on my own. Although a trampoline helps.

Haunted houses, being the worst combination of scary and icky, are the bane of my existence. I haven't been in one since I was twelve and was chased by a guy in a Forever 21 S&M bondage suit with a glow-in-the-dark whip. Being still in my pre-Rave days, I kicked him in his magic 8 ball(s), ran out and have never been back since. One of the most ill-advised dates I ever went on involved me hiding under a blanket during the entire hour and a half it took whats-their-names (oops, spoiler alert!) to kill everyone in that stupid house in Scream. (A garage door? Seriously?? Where did these people get that door from because mine would go off its tracks if a mouse jumped on it much less an idiotic cheerleader.) I cried. Needless to say that guy never asked me out again.

Gummy eyeballs, spaghetti brains, slutty costumes, zombies, fright nights, faux front-yard cemeteries and yes, even sparkly vampires: I hate it all. Except for one thing. Twee little children dressed up in costumes going door to door and holding out plastic pumpkins with their dimpled fists. I adore trick-or-treaters. I only have two rules: they can't be old enough to grow real stubble for their hobo costume and also, they have to have a costume. As long as they meet those two criteria, I will pour sugared confections into their buckets all night long whilst cooing momisms like "Aren't you just the prettiest little princess EVER?!?"



Lately however I've been having a crisis of conscience. With the obesity crisis growing (or at least the media coverage of it) and a child culture that is already inundated with treat-giving occasions, is it in the little Tinkerbells' and Pirates' best interests to hand out Pixi Stix, which if you really think about it are just straight sugar packed in a tube so you don't even have to bother chewing it?

If you've been in a grocery store lately you will note that alongside the 5,000 different bags of candy lining the shelves there are a few non-food options. Like really expensive stuffed animals, marginally expensive Play-Doh tubs and cheap pencil erasers. But what kid wants a pencil eraser at Halloween? At least when dentists give out toothbrushes its something that has a real use. Those "erasers" don't even erase! They just crumble! So every year I've just gone with the candy and tried not to wince when my own children came home with bags so full they break and then collapse on their loot an hour later in a candy coma.


This year my friend Beth - uber-resourceful mother of 5 - pointed out another option to me: the Oriental Trading catalog. This paean to cheap plastic wonders that many already know and love for their 6$ coconut bras has a wide selection of candy alternatives that make even my frugal heart sing. My favorites were the glow-in-the-dark and glittery tattoos but they also have neon bouncy balls, rubber snakes and lizards and those nifty finger traps that we always called Chinese handcuffs when I was growing up because we were un-PC like that.

I asked my kids if it was a lame idea and they loved it - so long as I got at least a few gummy eyeballs. So what's your opinion on dealing sugar crack to kids for a night? Am I making too big a deal out of "just one night so let them be kids already durnnit"? What are you planning on giving out this year?

Captain Obvious Says: Sleep Deprivation Causes Sugar Cravings

This comic is the first in a series drawn by professional comic and GFE reader N8 (sound it out) especially for The Great Fitness Experiment! I can't tell you how excited it makes me that I have my own illustrator - I'd put it on my business card if I had any. Look for more funnies from him in the future!

It all started with a bag of sugar-dusted gummi fruit and a handful of chocolate chips. Well, actually it started last night when I stayed up until 1 a.m. working on my book. Okay, technically it started last weekend when my son got sick and had me up five times a night. Or maybe it all began 6 months ago when I got pregnant and morphed into a sleep camel. No wait, I suppose it really started 7 years ago when my first child was born. Whatever. My point: I am severely sleep deprived.

Insomnia is not my problem - I'm practically a narcoleptic triggered by pillows - it's just that nobody around here wants to let me sleep. But today has been worse than normal. After clocking just four short hours of sleep, I was up for the day with a two-year-old who thinks just because dawn happens around 5 a.m. that that means the day starts at 5 a.m. Puberty will fix that, I'm sure, but in the meantime I'm stumbling around the house in a fog trying to remember if I have to cook Cheerios.

As I sat down to eat my totally unappetizing breakfast of oatmeal and egg whites, the first craving hit. I wanted candy. The straighter the sugar, the better. "Ah," my brain quickly observed, "you are exhausted and so you are seeking the sweet sweet love of simple carbs!" My brain is smart. My flesh? Not so much. I grabbed a gummi orange, licking the sugar off my fingertips. "Don't do it!" my brain screamed. "Don't fall for his slick come-on! He'll lift you up just to drop you like a rock once the fun is over! It's the carbohydrate version of a booty call!" My eldest smacked his brother who retaliated by throwing a fork. The baby cried. I bit into the candy slice. "It'll only make you feel good for a second! And then you'll feel like crap." What a rush! "Remember what happened last time you did this!" my brain cried frantically in one last ditch effort to save me from myself. "It doesn't have to be this way!" I ate the candy. "You slut."

Sure enough, I rode the blood sugar coaster of doom all morning long, barely making it through my body pump class and then home again where I decided I would atone for my confectionery transgressions with a healthy lunch. Plans changed however when a dear friend who moved out of the country last year showed up for a surprise visit. The afternoon quickly passed with much laughter but without food. By the time she left I was cross-eyed with weariness. I put the early-rising munchkin down for a nap and then crashed myself. Only to be woken up 20 minutes later by the elder two fully dressed in swimsuits, goggles and grins. "Swim lessons!" they screamed. They were right. Curse the teacher who taught them how to tell time.

I dragged out of bed and changed into my suit. (Side note: hell is shopping for a maternity swimsuit. What is with all the skimpy bottoms? Do they think just because we can't see our thighs anymore that we'll somehow forget to look in a mirror? I hate you Liz Lange.) Then I dragged the baby out of bed which did not please him one little bit. By the time I'd gathered all the gear necessary to take 4 people swimming (incidentally also the same amount of gear required by the Swiss Army to invade Lichtenstein), I was ravenous and ready to sleep standing up. But we were late!

What's a healthy snack to grab on the go? Almonds? Fruit? Jerky? Gummi candies and chocolate chips of course! I guilty washed it down with a piece of cheese one of my kids had left on the table from lunch. My fate was sealed. Today had officially become a Jelly Bean Day. In case you missed the festivities last time around, the celebration of all things sugar lasts all day finally culminating in a grand symphony (candy bar pun intended) of screaming, crying and then a sugar coma.

I should know better. I knew exactly why I was craving all that sugar - everyone knows that being tired give you the sugar shakes. And I knew exactly what I should have done to remedy the situation - eat a meal with protein and healthy fat and take a nap). I even knew exactly what was going to happen because of my actions. So why didn't I do the right thing? Apparently being tired also makes me a poor decision maker.

Help me feel better - have you ever torpedoed your healthy goals, fully aware of what you were doing and yet you did it anyhow? What do you crave when you're tired? What do you do to avoid having a Jelly Bean Day?

Burn 1,000 Calories An Hour!

You've seen the workout program ads: in between shots of glistening, contracting abdominals and hyper smiling people who only sweat in socially acceptable places - your amped up cleavage if you are a woman, your shaved pecs if you are a man - comes the promise. What, you ask, can a DVD workout/exercise book/smiling B-list celeb promise me when it comes to cardio other than a perfect body, chiclet teeth and a spray tan so authentic that real sunshine is jealous? Why, the promise of amazing ultra-high superbad caloric burn of course!

I was reminded of this the other day as the Gym Buddies and I were sweating away on the elliptical machines (not our go-to workout but they were refinishing all the floors in the studios so it's what we were left with) and one of those ubiquitous exercise program infomercials came on. While we were giggling about watching people on TV exercise while actually exercising, large letters flashed up on the screen. "BURN up to 1,000 CALORIES AN HOUR!" flashed over all those heaving chests - the "up to" in conveniently small type of course.

This infomercial - may Billy Mays rest in peace - is not unique. All fitness programs, televised and otherwise, seem to make some kind of caloric promise. But how accurate are these claims? And does knowing the potential calorie burn of a workout help you make a better choice on how to sweat?

Can You Really Burn 1,000 Calories An Hour?
Anecdotal evidence first: According to my overly generous heartrate monitor of which I was once so attached to that I would turn around and go home to get the chest strap if I accidentally forgot it despite the fact that being small chested meant that it looked as if I was wearing some kind of strange back brace, I have burned over 1,000 calories in a single workout. The scene was "Holiday Turbokick" a special brand of torture that Turbo Jennie likes to put us through on occassions like the day before Thanksgiving, where we do 8 "turbos" (a high-intensity inverval lasting between 30 seconds and 2 minutes) interspersed with 4 finales or some such craziness. By the end I am turboing in a puddle of my own filth and can wring out my tank top like a Shamwow. It's enough to make a girl puke up her turkey before she even eats it, is what I'm saying. But by the time we hit cool down, I had burned just over 1,000 calories.

So it would seem possible - although unlikely (who wants to work out so hard you vomit every day?) - to attain that magic number. Except for two problems. 1) My heart rate monitor isn't terribly accurate. While I trust it's ability to read my actual beats per minute, its calorie burn function is apparently calculated based off a 6'6" male Russian Ice Swimmer. To prove this, I switched heart rate monitors with Gym Buddy Allison, who wears a Polar, and racked up 200-400 less calories per hour than my watch gave me.

2) Even the venerable Polar can't really tell you your caloric burn as metabolism is so individual as to render any mathematical formula at least slightly inaccurate. The research in this area is more prolific than one might think. Companies that make a living off of guaranteeing a good workout have invested a lot of energy into trying to figure out what number of calories people can expect to expend using their machines or programs. What they have discovered however is that while they can predict how many calories an individual, say Michael Phelps, is burning, those results are very difficult to generalize. In addition to individual metabolisms there are simply too many other variables. Therefore, the honest companies will give you a range of calories. The disingenuous ones will use that sneaky little phrase "up to" and then give you a Michael Phelpsian number.

Why Does it Matter How Many Calories You Burn?
Every fitness expert will tell you that weight loss, gain or maintenance comes down to simple math. It's all about the calories you take in through food in relation to those you expend through daily life and exercise. This over simplified truism often leads people to think things like, "If the treadmill says I burned 250 calories, then that means I can eat a 200 calorie muffin and still come out losing!" This, in turn, has made calorie burn the gold standard in assessing a fitness program's worth.

But dig a little deeper and you will realize that not only is calorie burn not the best indicator of a workout's power, it actually distracts you from other benefits of exercise. For instance, weight lifting typically doesn't burn comparatively as many calories as cardio for the same amount of time and yet it has many advantages like increased strength, muscle mass and overall functionality. Similarly, HIIT (high intensity interval training) burns a smaller amount of calories during the actual workout but causes a much greater spike in HGH (human growth hormone) than twice the amount of traditional medium-intensity cardio. Lastly cardio exercise is good for many things like increasing your oxygen utilization and building endurance, besides just burning off last night's dessert.

Is It A Good Thing To Burn 1,000 Calories An Hour?
Ignoring for a moment whether or not it's even possible to burn that many calories, one must ask if it is even a worthwhile fitness goal to strive to burn a particular high number of calories. To get that kind of calorie burn, one would have to push very hard in a high intensity type of cardio. Much has been said - and ignored - about the dangers of too much aerobic exercise in the highest heart rate zones. It elevates the stress hormone cortisol, causes systemic inflammation, necesitates longer recovery and increases your risk of injury, just to give you the short version.

In addition, an often overlooked fact by dieters and diet purveyors alike is that the more you exercise, the hungrier you get. From my personal experience the more calories I burn, the more my body wants to replace them - and fast. What's the quickest source of glycogen for our depleted muscular system? Sugar. I have found that after a long training run, it's almost impossible for me to stay away from the Jelly Bellies and other simple carbs for the rest of the day. However, when I strength train and/or keep my training volume low my sugar cravings diminish significantly (unless I'm PMSing but that's a different story entirely). Research backs me up by showing that dieters who create a calorie deficit purely from exercise don't lose weight - because their bodies eat to adjust. So, what's the point in burning (up to) 1,000 calories if my body is immediately going to want to replace (at least) 1,000 calories with whatever food is easiest for me to scarf down?

Conclusions
Calorie burn doesn't matter. First, chances are that unless you are an Olympic swimmer, you're not burning what they say you are burning. Second, it's probably not giving you the result you are looking for. If you are exercising for weight loss, then you aren't doing yourself any favors by torching excessive calories and signalling your body to go into eat mode. And if you're exercising for fun and/or weight maintenance then calorie burn is just another number.

All of which is not to say that exercise - even an occasional session of long, intense cardio - shouldn't be done. Ask any triathlete, marathon runner or Iron(wo)man if their race was worth it and most of them will give you an enthusiastic yes. But it isn't because they burned 3,000 calories, it's because they were having fun and it gave them a sense of accomplishment. Does it mean that I don't get a great workout from Holiday Turbokick if I don't burn quadruple-digit calories? No! I'm still increasing my endurance and having a lot of fun to boot. My point: When we are evaluating the merit of a particular fitness program, there are a lot of better factors to consider than supposed maximum calorie burn.

But enough about what I think! What do you think about the calorie-burn claims of fitness programs/machines/gurus? Anyone else ever get obsessed with their heart rate monitors? Anyone have a particular fitness infomercial that they just can't stop watching??

Possibly the best workout video I have ever seen. "Eurotrain!!!" is going to be my new motto.