Back from El Salvador

sarakenna1

So, I've been traveling for a couple of weeks and it hasn't helped my diet much. I spent 8 days in El Salvador working on a Habitat for Humanity project (through their Global Village program), came home for a couple of days, and then went to Montana for a week. While in El Salvador, I ate three small meals a day (a typical day consisted of toast and beans for breakfast, chicken and rice with a thick tortilla for lunch, and chicken, beans and rice for dinner... seriously, I never want to eat chicken beans and rice ever again). I usually had one or two servings of fruit each day for a snack. I worked about 6 hours a day in 90 degree heat, digging, stacking cement blocks, hauling buckets of concrete around the work site, and filling the brick walls with mortor. I drank water constantly throughout the week, and although I was really really careful, I ended up with a little montazuma's revenge. (Didn't feel like eating much). I thought for sure I would lose some weight while away in El Salvador. No luck! My fat is so damn stubborn that even a crazy El Salvadorian diet and excersize regime won't make it budge!

When I got back from El Salvador I was pretty depressed, mainly because its really difficult to go from a place where poverty is everywhere to the US (which honestly seems like a paradise to me now). The depression plus living without much food for a week lead me to crave junk food, and for the first time in a really long time I let myself have it. Taco Bell and Dairy Queen to be exact. Then I was off to Montana with a bunch of friends and we spent the long weekend boozing it up and eating whatever we felt like.

I've gained 4 pounds in the past 2 weeks. :sad: I'm hoping some of it is water weight.

Talk me down from the ledge people!!!

sarakenna1

So, I've been traveling for a couple of weeks and it hasn't helped my diet much. I spent 8 days in El Salvador working on a Habitat for Humanity project (through their Global Village program), came home for a couple of days, and then went to Montana for a week. While in El Salvador, I ate three small meals a day (a typical day consisted of toast and beans for breakfast, chicken and rice with a thick tortilla for lunch, and chicken, beans and rice for dinner... seriously, I never want to eat chicken beans and rice ever again). I usually had one or two servings of fruit each day for a snack. I worked about 6 hours a day in 90 degree heat, digging, stacking cement blocks, hauling buckets of concrete around the work site, and filling the brick walls with mortor. I drank water constantly throughout the week, and although I was really really careful, I ended up with a little montazuma's revenge. (Didn't feel like eating much). I thought for sure I would lose some weight while away in El Salvador. No luck! My fat is so damn stubborn that even a crazy El Salvadorian diet and excersize regime won't make it budge!

When I got back from El Salvador I was pretty depressed, mainly because its really difficult to go from a place where poverty is everywhere to the US (which honestly seems like a paradise to me now). The depression plus living without much food for a week lead me to crave junk food, and for the first time in a really long time I let myself have it. Taco Bell and Dairy Queen to be exact. Then I was off to Montana with a bunch of friends and we spent the long weekend boozing it up and eating whatever we felt like.

I've gained 4 pounds in the past 2 weeks. :sad: I'm hoping some of it is water weight.

Talk me down from the ledge people!!!

TNTPete

Oh it's okay.. you just put your body in shock while you were in El Salvador and it probably is just water gain... even if it's not it's just a response from an odd diet. Don't think negatively you did such a positive thing and made a sacrifice not everyone is willing to make. Think positive and keep going - you did a good thing here.

shorerider

I love El Salvador!

Got to go there for a mission project a few years back and want to return so badly!

Beautiful country, beautiful people!