Monday, September 19, 2011

Hello, Food!

Scale Victory
One week of eating real food doing Weight Watchers down. Also down was the number on the scale. Down 9 lbs!! Now, I should preface this by mentioning that when I weighed in last Monday after 3 weeks of on again off again Medifasting, I was up 13 lbs from my previous low. But, I'm glad to know that Weight Watchers allowed me to take off that excess water weight and bloating just like Medifast had. Now, I am only 4 lbs away from my previous low!


Non-Scale Victories
Due to craziness with getting ready to move and two birthday parties this weekend, there was a lot of eating away from home and/or eating carry out. I was able to reasonably do this and still get the stuff I really wanted. Here are a few examples. 

  • Pizza Hut: house salad with lite Italian dressing and 3 slices of cheese pizza from a medium thin-n-crispy pizza
  • Chipotle: chicken burrito bowl with 1/2 portion of rice, double fajita veggies, no cheese, and lettuce, tomato-corn salsa (HOLY DELICIOUSNESS)
  • Kids Birthday Party: snacked on fruit/veggie tray and one slice of pizza (didn't eat the crust, so I counted it as thin crust)

Weight Watchers Modification
Many days, it was hard for me to eat all of points, especially since fruits and veggies are "free". I have incorporated a tip I learned from another blog. Sarah from Watch Sarah Shrink said she felt like she wasn't losing like she wanted to or should with all the free veggies/fruit, so she started counting each serving of fruits and veggies as one point. That is what I did, too. They are calories, after all. This is something that I may change as my daily points target gets lower, but I think I'll stick with it for now.


Going Forward
I'm looking forward to continuing to eating real food and losing weight at a reasonable pace until I reach my goal. Now that I don't have such a huge amount of weight to lose, losing a pound or so a week will keep me motivated. When I first started, one pound seemed like such a teeny tiny step down a never-ending path that would surely lead me off a cliff before I got to the finish line.


I am going to try my best to post once a week for the next couple of weeks, but if you don't see a post from me, don't worry. We are moving in a week, and it just means things are too busy! 


Weight Loss
This week: 9 lbs
Total: 64.4 lbs

Monday, September 12, 2011

Weight Watchers Day 1 (a photo journal)

Breakfast: 
Omelet of Egg Beaters, spinach, feta, MSF crumbles

Lunch: 
Salad with romaine, bell peppers, cucumber, salmon, and balsamic vinaigrette 

 Snack:
Grapes

Snack:
Light Microwave Popcorn

Dinner:
Spaghetti Squash Casserole with broccoli, canned diced tomatoes, chicken sausage, light mozzarella

Dessert:
Medifast Brownie with 1 Tbsp Natural Peanut Butter
(looks gross but tasted good!)

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Time for a Change?

Generally when a weight loss blogger hasn't posted in awhile, you can probably guess that she has hit a setback of some sort. Yeah, that's what's happening to me. I'm in a rut. Stuck in a pattern of eating like crap for a few days, getting back on track for a few days, eating like crap for a day, getting back on track for 3/4 of a day, only to be off track by dinner time. It's frustrating. 


Earlier in the week, I was very focused on beating myself up for this setback. There was A LOT of really negative self-talk happening. Want a snippet of the endless stream of verbal (in my head) abuse I was lashing myself with? "What the F are you doing?" "Do you want to get fat again?" "What is your problem?" "You are so pathetic."  "What, you think what you  have done is enough? You're still overweight." So, you get the idea.


Now that I am done beating myself up (not to say I am happy with myself, just done punishing myself), I am trying to focus on what is going on with me, assessing where I am mentally, emotionally, and most importantly, where am I going from here? And, the conclusion I'm beginning to come to is that maybe it's time for a change. 


When I started Medifast, it was always with the intention that it would be a short term plan to get most of the weight off. Then, I would transition to calorie counting or Weight Watchers or something along those lines. I just don't feel like the rigidity of the plan is working for me right now. Actually, it's probably more accurate to say that I am not working the plan. But, if something is not working, whether it's because of you or the plan or something else, isn't is time to re-evaluate? After all, that's what I did 6 months ago when I decided to start Medifast. Now, maybe it's time to shake things up again.


I have been thinking a lot about this for the past few days, and I have hesitated to post about it because I feel like people will think that I am doing this just because I want to take the easy way out. But, I stopped thinking that around the same time I stopped beating myself up. This is why. I have essentially wasted almost 3 weeks, probably gaining 10 lbs. For me, right now, Medifast is not working. I am not giving up. In fact, I kind of feel like I am doing the complete opposite. My destination is the same, I'm just changing the route I am taking to get there. 


I have to say, I am excited. Just as excited and optimistic as I was when I started Medifast. More later on all the details of making this transition...

“The key to success is often the ability to adapt.” ~Anthony Brandt