Friend of Julie: No Vanilla

I talked about vanilla in my last post, Plateaus and Condiments, but I have a little more to say about vanilla. After reading the comment "Julie told my group no vanilla," posted after one of my recent recipes (a pumpkin drink with vanilla), I paused. What? Is this true - no vanilla? Yes, it's true: no vanilla.

Vanilla is not on program.

A week later at my refresher, Julie told us "no vanilla." I hadn't been to my refresher when I read the comment, so I turned to my key friends and asked them questions about vanilla. An interesting thread followed. Based on their feedback, I no longer post dessert-like recipes to this blog. I  also pulled the recipe for the pumpkin drink.

Why can't we have vanilla? We are heading for trouble when we have "dessert" type foods. After a summer of treats last year that I thought were "on program," I pulled a recipe that pushed the envelope: it contained half and half. I was so sure that was on program; half and half is not on program. I heard this directly from Julie too. I'm sure these kinds of treats put me into a plateau last summer. The key word here is treats -- we are not allowed treats. We're either hungry or we're not hungry. There is no snacking or treats.

Vanilla seems controversial among us, but since I heard "no vanilla" from Julie last week, I'm tossing my bottle right now. I did not toss it out with my condiments a few days ago, because it wasn't in the refrigerator. But I saw it on the counter while making coffee this morning and said to myself, take a photo for the blog and then toss it!

BTW, I reviewed my recipes, but if you find one with vanilla or any ingredients that you question we can have, please post a comment to draw my attention to review it.

Here are some of the responses from my key friends about vanilla and a few more things for you to think about:  

• Julie told our group not to use it; something about the mind thinking it was a sweetener. 
• Julie's assistant told me no vanilla. She said I was searching for a way to get my drink sweetness back.  
• It goes back to "do what you heard directly from Julie." I remember her talking about the whisper game, where someone whispers a sentence into the first person’s ear, and that person tells the next person, etc. until it comes full circle. In the end, it's never the same sentence! 
• Think about it: if we didn't have these groups or refreshers and were on our own, we would only be following what we heard in our first three sessions. Some of us go to refreshers and find that changes have been made. I believe that it's at that point when you need to do it differently. If you hear Julie say it's been changed, then it has to change. 
• I have been to many refreshers where she changed things up a bit. I think the reason is because so many people push the limits and get into trouble. 
• I believe that there has to be some level of self- honesty involved. If you are abusing ANY “allowed” foods, you are only hurting yourself and need to change that behavior, or it will lead you on a path of destruction.

So, I ask you: vanilla or no vanilla? Do you go with what you're hearing about vanilla now or what you heard at your session? Have things changed or has Julie just clarified things she's heard we are eating that we shouldn't be eating? We each have to decide for ourselves.

For me, I'm not letting a little thing like vanilla get between me and my goal size. Not anymore! It's the little things like this that may have slowed me down on my journey and I'm not willing to be slowed down any longer.