Victory Number One

Last night wasn't nearly as bad as I had anticipated.

I had time between work and the dinner to exercise, but not shower. I decided to go ahead and work out, but not to full intensity so that I didn't sweat!! I thought that would be better than not exercising at all and far better than getting all sweaty and then trying to be fancy!

Upon arriving, I discovered that there were lots and lots of good food options and I took advantage of most of them! All of the food was that little teeny tiny stuff. Since it was sort of a fancy event, it seemed proper just to take one or two. There was a table with fruits & cheeses, so I got two chunks of watermelon off of it. The 'main course' was some sort of bacon & tomato thing which I skipped; mini roast beef slider-type sandwiches. I ate the meat out of one and tossed the little bun. I also ate one shrimp. It was huge. There was also a vegetable table. I got three asparagus spears off of it. The plates were little and mine was fairly full at this point, so I stopped.

Then there was the demon dessert table. My choices were mini strawberry shortcake, white chocolate macadamia nut cookies (regular size), brownies (about 1" x 1") and strawberries. I grabbed 3 strawberries and one cookie because those are one of my very favorites and got away from there ASAP. The strawberries were some of the best I'd ever eaten. They were sweet & juicy and such a pretty, pretty red, almost like they weren't real. After I'd eaten mine, and a few people nearby commented as to how pretty they were, I began to wonder what had been done to them. I wondered if they'd been soaked in some sort of sugar concoction or something. I savored the cookie as much as I possibly could. My instincts were telling me to scarf that puppy down and get a handful more and pile those in too.  I squashed it as much as I could, after all I couldn't embarrass J-boy in front of his colleagues. I finally caved and ate one more cookie and a brownie.

It was a bit of a challenge to figure out how to put all of that stuff in sparkpeople, but I managed. When it was said  & done, I was a little surprised to see that I was actually under my calorie goal for the day. I decided that was OK, particularly since I had to guess as to how much roast beef was on that little bun, and stuff like that.
 
I'm calling this a success and am planning to build on it.

And So It Begins...

About three weeks ago I blogged as to how I had three weeks with no big challenges on the horizon. I was determined to make the best of the situation and really drop the pounds. I didn't. It isn't that I wasn't on plan. I was. It just didn't happen. During that time period, I have gained 4.8 lbs!!!! Stunned is the word I'd use to describe how I feel about this. It was definitely not my expectation.




Now, my three weeks of freedom from eating challenges is over. I am looking down the barrel of the busiest party season of the year rivaling only the Thanksgiving/Christmas season.

*Tonight is the university wide faculty reception for J-boy's employer. It is a fancy stand up dinner. That means little bites of food that you can eat with your fingers, and generally does not mean healthy things. I'm hoping for a fruit plate that I can use for the mainstay of my meal. BTW, I hardly know these people, so it is hard to mingle. Academics are a little weird too.

*Wednesday is my birthday, which means various birthday celebrations with family. Those will probably be the easiest since my family is hugely supportive and will go eat or prepare whatever I want.

*Friday is the college of business faculty reception once again for J-boy. This will be BBQ at a fellow professor's house. I'll have to save calories to accommodate that meal. That will be relatively easy since I know the exact menu.

*September 5 is J-boy's birthday, which once again means various birthday celebrations with family. See above for my planned coping mechanism.

*September 11 is our anniversary. Generally, we go out for a very nice restaurant meal, one that we ordinarily wouldn't spring for. We haven't decided yet.



So...in a little more than 3 weeks, I will have at least 7 occasions to indulge, or over indulge as the case may be! I know myself well enough to know that if I make up my mind not to eat anything I shouldn't I won't. Then if I don't lose weight,or at least maintain, I'll be all frustrated. It is so easy to think that a particular food is reasonable, and eat it, only to learn later that is wasn't for some reason. That really frustrates me, and I begin to think things like "I could have eaten that ______!" Fill in the blank probably with something sweet. Once again I am afraid and this time a little angry because of my performance these past three weeks.



I have a difficult road to travel for the short term. I want to do well. I need to do well. I want to succeed. I need to succeed. I have to know that I can make this work for the long haul. I think if I can stand firm now, I can do it. I need all the support I can get right now. Hang on for the ride!! I hope this doesn't get ugly.

I Think It Is The Exercise

I am continually trying to figure out why I haven't lost any weight at all while doing sparkpeople. It is like a little tape running in the back of my head all of the time. The more I consider/appraise/assess/whatever the more I think I am eating the right way. I know there is room for improvement, but I still think the way I am eating should lead to weight loss. That leads me to the other major component of this journey, exercise.

The sparkpeople workout routine has me lifting weights, and doing new exercises three times per week. I think that is a very good thing. It also has cardio only three days per week. I was doing it at least 5 days per week. I thought the trade off with strength training would make up for the lost calories burned, but now I'm rethinking that. I'm fairly certain that is isn't the old muscle weighs more than fat thing. If it was, I think I would have broken through the barrier and started back down the scales. So, starting today it is back to 5 days per week cardio. I'll still do the 3 days per week strength training too.


We'll see if this works...stay tuned...

A New Plan

So, I threatened to stop counting calories if the weight doesn't start coming off yesterday and this morning I lost 0.4 lbs. This is at least the third time, maybe the fourth time, that I've threatened to find a new weight loss method because calorie counting wasn't working only to wake up in the morning and have a small loss. So now, I've decided that every day I'm going to post about how I am going to stop counting calories and do something else. That seems to lead to the loss better than anything I've tried in recent weeks. SHHH...don't say anything, I don't want the blog to find out, I'm on to it.




Actually, inside of me, I know this is the right way to eat. I don't feel deprived. I even at cake a little while ago. (More about that later.) Sparkpeople has made me more aware of all nutrients not just calories & carbs. I've focused on those things, and carbs in particular so long, that I've vilified certain foods. If ate something like white bread, I felt like I was cheating. I'm still not making white bread my first choice, but I know eating it isn't the horrible tragedy I once thought. I want this to work. Some tweaking is still in order. I almost never make my protein range, and have to be careful about going over with fat. I'm learning and that is always a good thing.



BTW, does anyone know if there is a way to look up foods in a certain category on sparkpeople. For instance, if I wanted a high protein food could I do a search and get a list? I plan my meals out for the day and enter them. I get the feed back and make whatever changes I need to, but sometimes I'll see that I need several more grams of protein and calories. If I could put in those search criteria someplace and get a food that matches those needs, I could just add it rather than guessing. Most of the time, I change the portion size to get things the way they need to be. Don't worry, though, I'm not getting all upset about getting all nutrients just so every day. If I'm close, I'm good. If there is an easier way, I'd like to know.



Now for the cake...every month we celebrate the birthdays of those in the office having a birthday that month. Generally, my practice has been to wish the celebrants a happy birthday and slip out. I really have developed a distaste for store bought bakery cakes. It hasn't been much of a hardship to pass up the cake. This month, however is my birthday and those with birthdays get the first slices. I had been prepared to graciously accept the cake, take a small nibble or two then need to go back to my desk to discreetly toss the vile matter. The precious lady that volunteered to bring the cake this time actually made a cake from scratch. She's good too! She even made two cakes, one with fruit in it and fat free topping. She did this especially for me!! It was a very, very considerate thing for her to do. I couldn't pass it up. So, I had a very small serving and added it to my calories for the day.



I really don't feel bad about it. It tasted good, and easily fit in to my calories (or so I think). I like the freedom calorie counting gives me to have a small piece of cake every now & then and still be on plan. That is how I want my life to be. I don't want to live the rest of my life without cake every once in a while.



If this doesn't work though, I'm quitting, I mean it!!

Perhaps This Is the Problem...

I've moaned and groaned, whined and complained on this blog for a couple of weeks about not losing weight and using sparkpeople to count calories & nutrients.  I felt all along that I was consuming more calories that old sparky was saying.  I even considered looking at another calorie counting website to confirm.  I decided not to, because I'm trying to work on the control/perfectionism issues in my life.  Who am I to check up on sparkpeople, particularly when so many people have had success with them.  Now, I am reconsidering the whole thing yet again.

 

Yesterday J-boy and I went out to eat at a chain restaurant after church.  I felt confident that I could find something within my calorie range for the day.  I'd had 314 calories at breakfast leaving me 882 to 1,236 for the rest of the day.  I poured over the menu looking for the best possible way to spend my calories.  I selected Baja chicken.  It was a grilled chicken breast served over black beans, with pico de gallo, rice, and a dollop of sour cream.  I thought that everything was a good choice, except maybe the rice.  It was probably the white stuff with a lot of carbs and not much else nutritionally.  I figured I could eat around it.  I was wrong.  Everything was served in a big pile on the plate.  The black beans were almost soup and could not be separated from the rice at all.  They were marginal taste wise.  I decided after a few bites they weren't worth the trouble, and thought I'd never order that again.  I ate the chicken and only some of the pico (since that has tomatoes in it).  I still thought, however that I'd made a good choice with regard to calories.

 

During the afternoon, I went to sparkpeople to log in my lunch.  I first did a search on the particular restaurant, but their info wasn't a part of sparkpeople, or at least it wasn't coming up the way I was searching.  I tried a couple of different ways.  Instead I entered each 'ingredient' in my meal, being very generous, I thought with portion size.  I entered chicken breast, black beans, rice, pico & sour cream, individually.  The calorie total came to 338.  That was good, I'd have another 300 calorie meal in the evening and an afternoon snack of about 200.  That would put me squarely in my range for the day.  Go me!!

 

Not quite.  I had the bright idea to go to the restaurant's website and see if they had the nutritional information listed.  They did, but it was not easy to find.  I was about to give up when I decided to look at the FAQs.  I thought I wasn't the only person in the world to want that information.  I found a link to the pdf there that had complete info.  It was cumbersome and hard to use, but I was determined at this point.  I was not going to let this defeat me.  I was astounded to learn that the calorie count listed on the website for my dish was 990 calories!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  With breakfast, I had already exceeded the 1200 calorie minimum and only had 246 to meet the maximum!!

 

I was glad that I was persistent and learned that little tidbit of information.  I would have exceeded my calorie limit for the day, by as much as 600 calories.  I know that is a long way from a pound, but good grief.  I can't lose weight with errors like that.

 

I've decided to give this calorie counting thing one more week.  If it doesn't work, I'm going back to counting carbs.  Although, I don't want to put unattainable deadlines on myself, I don't want to flounder on like this.  It is time to cut my losses (or gains!) and move on.

And the Winner Is...

Congratulations to:
First Steps
The winner of this blog's first ever giveaway.  Please send me your contact information at deepdarkweightloss@Gmail.com.  I'll pass the information on to CSN Stores to forward the $50 gift card to you.  Happy spending.

On to the scale report for the day.  This morning I weighed 174.6.  That is up 0.2 from last week, and 29.6 lbs from my ultimate goal.  I've weighed the same for three days now.  I'm feeling the difference in my body so I feel like one day soon, I'll see a big drop.  I like the way I'm eating right now.  It feels right.  It feels normal.  It feels sane.  I go to the grocery store and buy real food.  It feels good.

I am counting calories and exercise using sparkpeople.  I've been within or very close to my calorie range all week.  Only one day did I get all of my nutrients in the proper ranges.  That was the first day, so it was just beginner's luck!  Most of the time, my issue is getting enough carbs.  They've been taboo for so long it is a little difficult to wrap my mind around the fact that I can eat them.  It is freeing to be able to eat them in moderation.  I'll continue to tweak my eating so that it is healthy and I'm sure I'll see the results in my body in due time.



 

A Giveaway!!!

CSN Stores is sponsoring a give away through my website. I am so excited that I have a big enough readership that CSN approached me about doing this. The giveaway is for a $50 gift card to the store.   They have all sorts of housewares from dinnerware sets to exercise equipment.  Check out the site.

To enter just leave a comment this post.  I will select a winner randomly from all of the comments I receive on this post. The drawing will be on Saturday from comments received by midnight Friday. Be sure and tell all your friends. The more readers, the greater the likelihood of more great prizes!!

The drawing is open to US and Canadian residents only.

Thanks for reading!!