On caffeine, mornings, health, and wise choices

My sweet new puppy has changed my life by helping me get on a schedule and a structure. As I used to stay up until all hours of the night and then sleep until late in the morning, now I'm on a somewhat normal schedule, if you will. I still hate mornings though and will probably always be a night person. I wake up so tired. I used to drink 3 or 4 cups of coffee in the morning. There are different teachings by surgeons regarding caffeine, but mine says no caffeine and no carbonated beverages after surgery. I have started weaning myself off of coffee by drinking a Coke Zero every morning when I wake up. Not quite the jolt of coffee, but is all I got for now.

As I sat down this morning to begin working and was sipping my Coke Zero, I thought to myself, you know, my body probably needs an Atkins shake right now with protein in it rather than this nutritionless soft drink. Then the other part of me said, but this is what I want, this tastes so much better, this is more enjoyable for me, and makes me feel better.

That was a huge light bulb moment for me. Isn't that how I got in this position? By giving my body what it wants rather than what it needs? In so many ways we have to learn to parent ourselves. We would teach children that they need nutrition rather than junk. But how do we treat ourselves?

This responsibility sucks! But I realized that I only think the caffeine will make me feel better. Oh it may, but only for a moment, not longlasting change. If I focus on my health, and on making wise choices, then I WILL feel better period. And it will be longlasting. The health and good feelings won't come from a can. They will just BE. And they will stay with me.

God, help me to take good care of this body you've given me and feed it in a way that is for health and performance.