I Did the Kiki Math

What are your best healthy eating habits?

I think I’ve had a weight problem since I was ten years old.

That was probably the last time I remember feeling “light.” From that point on, I knew I was taller and chunkier than most of the girls around me. I was also reminded to watch my weight often—okay, daily—through the occasional not-so-subtle, passive-aggressive comment from my parents.

That, my friends, is another blog for another day.

Stay in your lane, Kiki. Do not let the Squirrel Brain take this exit.

There were decades of diets, plans, lifestyle changes, challenges and, let’s face it, starvation.

Before the World Wide Web could somehow crawl inside your brain and determine that you had briefly considered losing ten pounds, there were magazine ads and late-night infomercials. They promised that some fabulous new plan would not only help you lose weight but practically melt 50 to 100 pounds off your body while you slept.

Enter the “Rice Report.”

Kiki lost 44 pounds in 11 weeks.

Forty-four.

Was I thin? Yep.

Was I happy? Nope.

I was miserable. I crashed every afternoon and by 9 p.m. I was crawling into bed like someone had unplugged me from the wall.

Then came Weight Watchers.

Weight Watchers actually taught me something that stuck: how to structure my meals and how to eat the foods I wanted as long as I planned for them. There were no “good” foods or “bad” foods. There were choices.

That concept stayed with me.

The problem was that sometimes my emotions were louder than everything I had learned. Food could make a bad day feel better. Or at least I thought it could.

I knew how to eat healthy.

I just didn’t always choose to.

If you’ve been hanging around Kiki’s little corner of the Internet for a while, you know that I started training daily in 2014. The first day I walked into that boot camp, I weighed 264 pounds.

At first, I changed absolutely nothing about the way I ate. I just worked out.

A few months later, my trainer approached me about meal planning and properly fueling those workouts.

Apparently my ears were open that day.

Something clicked.

I listened.

Meal prepping became my new best friend. My involvement—okay, obsession—with Pinterest suddenly became useful. I pinned high-protein, lower-carb concoctions like it was my full-time job. I traded recipes with people in my Spartan Facebook group. I found ways to keep meals fresh, interesting and, most importantly, yummy.

And it worked.

I was shedding pounds while gaining muscle. I tracked everything I ate.

Everything.

Even that little handful of M&M’s I grabbed while walking out the door.

Nice try, Kiki. The M&M’s still count.

But there was a problem.

Sunday meal prep became a flipping chore.

Four or five hours every Sunday chopping, measuring, grilling, portioning and packing little containers. Eventually, I started to resent it. I began cutting corners just to save time.

I tried supermarket frozen meals for a few weeks.

Bad idea.

Between the sodium and whatever else was hiding in those little plastic trays, I blew up like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Then last year, a meal prep company showed up at my gym with samples.

Hello.

I brought the idea home and discussed the cost with Ernie. I added up what I was spending at the supermarket, factored in the hours I was losing every Sunday and performed what I lovingly refer to as Kiki Math.

Ernie looked at me and said, “Try it.”

I placed the order.

Happy to report: It’s a hit.

Every Thursday, I order my lunches for the following week. That’s it. Breakfast is usually Greek yogurt or cottage cheese. Snacks are green grapes or chunks of cheese. Dinner is one cup of whatever deliciousness Ernie happens to whip up.

And yes, I still eat ice cream.

I just log it.

I plan for it.

Because somewhere along this very long road, I finally realized that healthy eating—for me, anyway—isn’t about never eating ice cream again.

Dear God. What kind of life would that be?

It’s about knowing myself. Planning ahead. Having food ready when I’m hungry. Eating enough to fuel the things I ask my body to do. And leaving room for the foods that simply make me happy.

Are there days when I wish I could throw the entire plan out the window and eat absolutely everything I want?

Of course.

I dream of calling my favorite chef, the Barefoot Contessa, and saying, “Ina? Kiki here. I’d like three of everything, please.”

But until Ina answers my call, I’ll keep doing what works.

Greek yogurt. Grapes. Cheese. Meal prep. A cup of Ernie’s dinner.

And a little ice cream.

Because after decades of diets, deprivation, measuring, weighing, counting and trying to become some magical “new me,” I finally figured something out.

I don’t need a new me.

I just need to take care of the one I’ve already got. And if that occasionally requires a scoop of ice cream?

I did the Kiki Math. It fits.