Eat Small To Be Small

I just returned from vacation where I was fairly active - hiking almost every day - but I ate a lot of restaurant meals, which is not the norm for me. Because of that, I'm pretty sure I gained weight on this vacation rather than getting fitter... which was the original plan.

In any case, I bought a size 12 pair of pants when I returned because I'm tired of my pants being too tight. This is truly disappointing since I was a comfortable size 8 for most of my 20's and 30's. Slowly over the past five years I've gained weight - partly to blame on getting older and having a desk job, but also partly to blame on not controlling my meal portions better.

And sadly, many of our pets suffer this same issue of being overweight because they are at our mercy for controlling their portion sizes. 

Charlie is lucky that I feed her a high-quality diet and limit her treats. Every meal is weighed on the kitchen scale to make sure she's getting the right-sized meal and her treats consist of Kanine Kitchen treats, freeze-dried meat treats, fresh fruits and vegetables.

For this reason, she is a very lean dog and able to run very fast! If she were overweight, she would most definitely be slower and do more damage to her joints from the excess weight. Hopefully she'll live a very long life from the combination of a healthy species-appropriate diet and tons of exercise.

I get quite a bit of exercise keeping up with Charlie, so that isn't as much of an issue for me, although I do need to start incorporating some weight-lifting into my routine to counteract the loss of muscle tissue that happens when you get to middle-age.

I also only drink water, tea and coffee - no soda or juice, so I don't "drink" my calories; I eat really healthy food, especially a lot of fruit and veggies; I don't eat a lot of meat, but when I do it's very lean; and I don't eat a lot of bread.

But pizza used to be a BIG problem for me - I loved it and I could eat a lot of it. Since I found the Cauliflower-Crust Pizza Recipe, I feel like I can enjoy pizza again without the guilt - and I really love it.

For me, I need to work on limiting my portion sizes. So along with the size 12 pants, I also purchased some really cute SMALL plates and got rid of all my old plates.

I read somewhere that your stomach is the size of your fist. This is really helpful in visualizing how much food to eat without counting calories all day long. Basically if you eat mostly whole healthy foods and visualize your fist over your plate every meal, you should start seeing some results!

Summer season is just around the corner and this time of year always inspires me to eat a lot of healthy colorful fruits and vegetables. They're available almost everywhere (even airports!) and because they're in season now, the flavor is awesome. Here's to healthy eating!

...and remember to limit your dog's calorie intake as well by consulting with your vet or pet nutritionist. Keeping them lean will help them live a longer and healthier life - what more could you want.