the heart as it is | courage • grief • beauty

In the beginning of May,  I shared some recommendations from a Taipei in hospital and then said I would try to keep some level of accountability here on my blog. This is the third of my self-check-ins to see if I am keeping up with my goals, as well as some other things I’m learning about health & my body !

This month has been a bit more challenging in terms of my health. For the past week and a half, I got some kind of stomach issue which I’m confident came from a staff meeting. I have been mainly eating very plain foods that I usually would not eat at this extent. I’ve also had a few minor sprains almost injuries as a new boulder-er: head bruises, neck sprain, ab sprain, shoulder sprain; all of which have prevented me from going to the rock climbing gym as often as I would have liked. So I will try to give myself some grace for this month.

7,000 to 8,000 steps a day. I still have not been reaching 7-8,000 steps. 6,000 a day at most. Something I have been doing lately is use my standing desk at work more often. Walking around during my lunch break has gotten boring since I’ll opt to play the piano instead. Maybe I could do a mix of both?

Aerobic exercise three times a week for 30 minutes each time until you break a sweat – I had been doing this with rock climbing – climbing 3-4 times a week. Currently I am only climbing twice a week due to my “injuries”, but I hope to get to this frequency again !

A diet that emphasizes fruits, vegetables, fish and olive oil and less meat can help prevent heart disease and cancer. – I haven’t been able to implement this as much as I would like. Thankfully, I can still eat a lot of this stuff in spite of my stomach issues, but I have purposely been eating less vegetables because of how fibrous they are.

Eat protein and fat foods for breakfast, which can keep us full of energy for the day; Cut back on these foods at dinner to avoid weight gain. I’ve been trying to prepare hard-boiled eggs for the week, instead of eating fired eggs, for breakfast. Sometimes I still eat meat in the evenings, but I notice that unless there is some special event, I’ve sort of returned to more snacking in the evenings.

If you currently only eat 1 or 2 vegetables a day, please add 1 more to lunch and dinner. Unfortunately I’ve not been eating vegetables lately. I had been eating one kind of vegetable plus kimchi. Currently though, my stomach has taken well to boiled bok choy.

Eat as much brown rice as possible to get more nutrients like fiber, minerals, and more. I’ve switched to only white rice for now due to my stomach issues. I look forward to eating the purple rice again soon !

Switch to skim milk or low-fat milk, and reduce carbonated soda or other sweet drinks. I’m actually not drinking milk at all due to my stomach issues, but I plan to continue only buying low-fat, lactose-free milk. I continue to keep my sweet drinks to a minimum, and for my stomach issues, I managed to find a zero-sugar, no-dye Gatorade drink !

When buying food, pay attention to nutritional content labels and choose foods with the least amount of sodium or salt. I’ve been doing a little better watching my salt content. It also helps that soy sauce tastes way more saltier to me than I remember, so I’ve been diluting it more in my food. To remind myself, 1,500 – 2,300 mg is the daily maximum.

Have dinner before 8 o’clock, and do not go to bed later than 11 o’clock at the latest.  I’ve still been doing really good with having dinner before 8:00. However, I’ve still been going to bed close to 11:00 again. I still struggle with maintaining a consistent sleep schedule during weekends. I’m trying to remember what used to motivate me to sleep early on the weekends – and it was usually the excitement of going to a coffee shop and reading in the morning. I’ve been trying to save money, however, so going to a coffee shop every weekend morning might not be the best idea. However, maybe I can sometimes go to a coffee shop and sometimes go bouldering, as that has become a new favorite pasttime.