Tomatoes: Still on the Fence
Well, I’m sad to report a 0.2 pound weight gain this morning after testing tomatoes last night. I’m sad to report it because I really enjoyed last night’s dinner and would have loved to include that recipe in my rotation. I don’t eat tomatoes all that often as it is. Ever since working for two summers in Tuscany, I haven’t been able to find tomatoes in the USA that even come close to comparing to that big luscious flavor, so I’ve just stopped trying with American tomatoes.
Recently, I had heard that cooked tomatoes are very good for men’s health because they contain lycopene which supports a healthy prostate. But then I also read other studies that concluded that tomatoes and lycopene don't play a significant role in prostate health.
Nevertheless, despite my conscious efforts to include more of them, when I see them at the store, they always look all pale and pink and they don’t smell or feel quite right, so I never buy them. I guess if I grew them myself, they might be adequate for my expectation.
After dinner last night, I was flatulent. I jokingly said, “Oh No. This doesn’t look good for tomatoes!” Anyway, my body didn’t react strongly to them, as indicated by the smallest increment of weight gain that my scale can measure. Which also might have to do with the fact that this morning, before my weigh-in, I wasn’t able to have a bowel movement. In the past, I’ve weighed myself, then had a bowel movement, and then re-weighed myself and registered a whole pound less. So the extra weight this morning could be due to fecal matter in my intestines waiting to come out.
And I don’t know if this is related but I’ll mention that this morning I woke up with a pain in my back. It’s as if the injury that I was complaining of two weeks ago, which had cleared up last week, is now back. Also today I feel a bit groggy and sluggish and a touch moody. I hate to pin all of this on tomatoes, but it sure is a marked difference from how I’ve been feeling ever since I started on the experiment. Another factor that could possibly be playing into all of this is the weather. Today is grey and raining, and every other day in the past two weeks since I’ve started doing this, have been bright and sunny.
One more thing I should mention is that I experimented with a brown rice hot cereal this morning instead of my usual flax seed granola. I didn’t really notice myself being tired until after eating the rice cereal. Rice has already been cleared to the friendly list, but I suppose it’s possible that ground rice, cooked like hot cereal, might react differently.
I also may have screwed up my water intake yesterday. At one point, I noticed that my water glass was empty and I couldn’t remember if I had already removed a rubber band or not. So I basically lost count of my glasses and decided that I’d err on the side of too much water rather than too little. So I may have had 16 ounces too much. But I know that either too much or too little can have a measurable effect on my results. I also found that I had half a glass of water left and drank it about thirty minutes after my deadline of 7:30 pm. The thinking is that without giving my body enough time to process and eliminate my water, it could show up as weight the next morning.
So, taking all that into account, I’m actually putting an asterisk beside tomatoes in the unfriendly column, meaning that I intend to go back at some point and give them another chance to test friendly under more ideal circumstances.
This is sure a fascinating adventure.
I’ll take another rest day today, sticking to all friendly foods so I can get back to my baseline, and then the next day, I plan to have some eggs for breakfast. I’m really hoping eggs are friendly. This is the first food I’m going to test that I have to say, I will be really disappointed if they’re not friendly. I do love my eggs in the morning.
But for today, I’m back to carrots, broccoli, chick peas, spinach, zucchini, butternut squash, ginger, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, chia seeds.....etc.
After dinner last night, I was flatulent. I jokingly said, “Oh No. This doesn’t look good for tomatoes!” Anyway, my body didn’t react strongly to them, as indicated by the smallest increment of weight gain that my scale can measure. Which also might have to do with the fact that this morning, before my weigh-in, I wasn’t able to have a bowel movement. In the past, I’ve weighed myself, then had a bowel movement, and then re-weighed myself and registered a whole pound less. So the extra weight this morning could be due to fecal matter in my intestines waiting to come out.
And I don’t know if this is related but I’ll mention that this morning I woke up with a pain in my back. It’s as if the injury that I was complaining of two weeks ago, which had cleared up last week, is now back. Also today I feel a bit groggy and sluggish and a touch moody. I hate to pin all of this on tomatoes, but it sure is a marked difference from how I’ve been feeling ever since I started on the experiment. Another factor that could possibly be playing into all of this is the weather. Today is grey and raining, and every other day in the past two weeks since I’ve started doing this, have been bright and sunny.
One more thing I should mention is that I experimented with a brown rice hot cereal this morning instead of my usual flax seed granola. I didn’t really notice myself being tired until after eating the rice cereal. Rice has already been cleared to the friendly list, but I suppose it’s possible that ground rice, cooked like hot cereal, might react differently.
I also may have screwed up my water intake yesterday. At one point, I noticed that my water glass was empty and I couldn’t remember if I had already removed a rubber band or not. So I basically lost count of my glasses and decided that I’d err on the side of too much water rather than too little. So I may have had 16 ounces too much. But I know that either too much or too little can have a measurable effect on my results. I also found that I had half a glass of water left and drank it about thirty minutes after my deadline of 7:30 pm. The thinking is that without giving my body enough time to process and eliminate my water, it could show up as weight the next morning.
So, taking all that into account, I’m actually putting an asterisk beside tomatoes in the unfriendly column, meaning that I intend to go back at some point and give them another chance to test friendly under more ideal circumstances.
This is sure a fascinating adventure.
I’ll take another rest day today, sticking to all friendly foods so I can get back to my baseline, and then the next day, I plan to have some eggs for breakfast. I’m really hoping eggs are friendly. This is the first food I’m going to test that I have to say, I will be really disappointed if they’re not friendly. I do love my eggs in the morning.
But for today, I’m back to carrots, broccoli, chick peas, spinach, zucchini, butternut squash, ginger, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, chia seeds.....etc.
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