Getting Lean, Strong and Healthy

How about a monthly weigh-in?

2012-01-28T23:03:00.001+11:00

I had thought I might try giving up the scale for a whole year, but this year it's especially important to me to get healthy. You see, I'm hoping to fly home in November, and I remember what it was like sitting in an airplane seat at this size. It was much easier when I was at 200. And I'll be seeing people from home again, so of course I'd like to look my best.

Hubby recently decided to help me by hiding the scale, but I told him I'd already decided to stay off it for a year. He suggested once a month instead, just to see if his methods would work. We figured it would be slowly as is His methods consisted of two changes in my daily life. Walk 30-45 minutes most days and eat healthier foods. That's it. Nothing drastic.

That's what I've done for the past month. While it's not quite February 1st yet, it's easier for me to do my weigh-ins on Saturday, so I'll just pick the closest Saturday to the start of the month. I lost 1.1 kilos. That's it for the last 4 weeks. Not very encouraging, but I'm not going to stop with the small changes I've implemented this month. Instead I might try to get in a bit more exercise, and keep a closer eye on the types of foods I'm eating. Not dieting, not freaking out over portion sizes too much, just ensuring as much as possible I'm eating whole, plant-based foods, not processed or high-fat foods.

Dieting increases your risk of gaining MORE weight

2012-01-23T00:06:00.003+11:00

Very interesting article from Intuitive Eating Pros and something I've heard before but it really made me think. When I was a teenager I weighed 165 pounds and was very unhappy with that. I felt fat and started dieting to lose weight. Over the years, and many, many diets later, I once found myself at 296 pounds - my highest weight ever. How can you spend your life dieting to lose weight and only grow larger? This article explains it very well.

Today I planned a variety of low fat, plant-based, healthy meals for the coming week and we went on a 40 minute walk. I've been walking 40 minutes most days anyway for the last week or so, but this time we drove to a place we used to walk before we moved. It's got more challenging inclines, so I felt sure it would take me 50 minutes or more. It didn't - but I definitely felt I was working harder. I'd like to do that at least once a week I think. It's bound to help make it easier tackling the hill at the end of the walk we usually take.

Another warning sign, and my awesome hubby

2012-01-21T10:56:00.000+11:00

I now have another reason to get healthier, as if I didn't already have enough of those! You may recall I posted a recent trip riding in a friend's vehicle and I couldn't get the seat belt on! That was bad enough. Then Thursday night I went to sleep as usual but woke in the middle of the night to find my husband missing from our bed. When I went looking, I found him sleeping on the couch. I asked him why and he said he couldn't sleep due to my snoring. Seriously!? OK I know he's told me lately that I have been snoring, and it's keeping him awake but I didn't realize it was bad enough he couldn't sleep with me! I went back to bed and cried myself to sleep. So Friday I was looking for solutions online - you know, those nasal strips, or even these allergy filters you wear in your nostrils. Both of these items are supposed to work by keeping your nasal passages open so you're less likely to snore. But hubby came to me and said these weren't the answer. He asked if he could be completely honest, and I said yes. Then he told me it was my weight. I didn't used to snore but I've gained back the weight I lost and that's when it started. I said I'm the same weight now as when I first moved to Australia - did I snore then? He said yes! I never knew that.

Shortly after arriving in Australia, since I wasn't working yet, we started going for long walks every day. That combined with joining Jenny Craig got me down to just under 200 pounds, but then I plateaued and quit the expensive program and maintained for the next several years at around 240-250 pounds. But now that I've gone back up over 270, I've been snoring again, apparently. I had no idea. But hubby was really kind and caring and supportive as we talked about this, and he said we'd already started doing what we needed to do - we've been walking most days a week for the last couple of weeks. He wants to keep doing that, and he also said he'd support me by not bringing any more junk food in the house. Most days when I come home I find he's picked up a bag of chips, cookies, etc. and we tend to snack on them at night while we watch our favorite shows. He's promised to stop that, and said instead he'll stock up on fresh fruits so there's a healthier alternative.

He also said I should stop buying books and visiting websites having to do with weight loss, and just focus on making small changes that move me towards a healthier weight. Walking is one - we'll keep doing that for sure. But no wacky diets - he just wants me to make healthy meals, and we won't keep any junk in the house. He's confident that's enough. I said I've tried that - I've tried everything before, and I worried it wouldn't be enough. But he said the goal didn't have to be getting skinny, even losing 20-30 pounds will make a big difference, and he's right. Obviously I want to be slender and healthy, that's always been the goal. But I've pursued that goal for 30 years now, and even achieved it once or twice only to lose it and end up heavier than I was before. So he wants me to stop. He wants me to just make healthier choices in general, most days, and he thinks that's enough. Maybe. Dieting certainly hasn't accomplished anything. And if I'm making healthy, plant-based meals and walking most days, maybe that is all I can really do without losing my mind. In any case, I was touched by his concern and support - he genuinely loves me no matter what my weight, and I know he just wants me to be healthy and happy. I love that man, he's pretty awesome.

I've improved my time!

2012-01-17T07:43:00.002+11:00

In a couple of ways, actually. First, I've increased my walks from 30 to 45 minutes. Then I've also improved my time climbing the hill at the end. I live on a crest, so the last few minutes are an incline, which was very difficult for me in the beginning, but has gotten just a bit easier. I wish i had timed myself from day one, but I only thought of it last week. As I round the bend that begins the incline, I timed myself. It's not that far really, just difficult when you're out of shape. So last week it took me just over 3 minutes 30 seconds from the start of the incline to when I was standing on my front porch. Well yesterday hubby timed me again and it was 3 minutes and 16 seconds. Not a big difference maybe, but still - it means I'm improving. I'll time it again next week and see how we go. My goal at this time will be to improve it to 3 minutes, if I can.

I haven't been dieting, just making healthier meal choices as much as possible, but not counting calories or worrying about portion sizes. Actually after watching 'How to lose weight without losing your mind' again by Doug Lisle, Ph.D., he insists you needn't worry about portion size if you're eating the right foods. There's the problem though - getting myself to eat the right foods! Basically he's referring to the type of diet recommended by Dr McDougall, which I do basically follow much of the time. It's the evening snacking that's my problem most of the time, because it's often foods that don't fit that plan at all. Hubby and I tend to watch our favorite programs in the evening and there's usually something around to snack on that definitely is NOT the right foods. Cookies, chips, muffins - that sort of thing. A friend brought me a monster zucchini from her garden the other day because she didn't know what to do with it - I made heaps of zucchini bread and muffins from it, used some in my pasta bake last night, and the rest will go into a stir fry in the next day or two. And while the muffins are vegan, they do have oil in them so it's not McDougall approved in that sense. I did substitute half the oil for applesauce to reduce the fat, but I just don't like the texture if I substitute all the oil. So while I did take some to work because there was so much of it, we do still have some of that zucchini bread left and we've been munching on it at night. I guess right now I'm more focused on getting active again. Anyway, better rush off to work. I've got a lot to do in preparation for a business trip to Sydney this Thursday.

I've already improved my endurance!

2012-01-12T22:59:00.001+11:00

OK when I posted the video 23-1/2 hours on 4th January I said it had motivated me, and that's still true. After posting that, I started walking just half an hour nearly every day - that was 8 days ago and as I hadn't been very active in the last 6 months, those first few days were hard! I know - it's only half an hour. But when you're obese and sedentary, and live on a crest, that's enough to work up a sweat. At the end of each walk I have to climb the crest again to get home - and I'd be puffing and wheezing for a short while after that. Well the last couple of days, hubby and I have both noticed it's already gotten easier on me. Not only the whole walk, but that climb up the hill at the end as well! Now that's after only a week -- so I'm thinking next week I'll try to shoot for longer.

I've also been trying to eat healthier, but as I said in my last post, that would be so much easier if I didn't have to figure out what to cook all the time. If I have to cook, I tend to make things that are quick, easy, and delicious - but not necessarily low calorie. To stay vegan means cooking a lot, as there are not really any healthy vegan convenience foods in Australia, and I am not someone who loves to cook. So I am not doing quite as well on meals just yet, but I'm working on some ideas.

Anyway, for now I'm just happy to be getting more active, and to be able to see an improvement in my endurance already just one week in is great!

The Power to Choose

2012-01-08T23:24:00.002+11:00

I've been reading The Spark by Chris Downie of Sparkpeople.com, and I came across this on page 52 -- I felt I had to share it because it moved me very much.

I had discovered a truth - that the choice to rise to the occasion, to create yet another small victory, or to vegetate and live passively was mine.
Taking control of our lives doesn't mean we will simply sail through our days with our hands on the tiller. As with any great adventure, challenging outside forces will appear along the way. Our challenge is how we handle them.
Consider the example of Christopher Reeve. A near-fatal 1995 horse-riding accident left him paralyzed from the neck down and confined to a wheelchair. Yet weeks after becoming a quadriplegic, he began advocacy work, fighting to increase public awareness about spinal-cord injuries and raising money for pioneering research. Though doctors held no hope that he would ever regain function below the neck, he committed himself to maintaining his body through a five- hour-a-day exercise program, strapped to devices that moved his limbs. He battled infections, broken bones, and blood clots. And for seven years, his body remained motionless.
Yet through steady work and perseverance, by 2004 Reeve had regained sensation in 70 percent of his body, had moved one of his fingers, and had moved his arms and legs in water.
"You can do anything you think you can," Reeve said. "Either you vegetate and look out a window, or activate and try to effect change." Reeve's inspiring story reminds us that we always have the ability to choose how we respond to life's circumstances - no matter how challenging.

Reading that really made me think about how I live my life, and it's not by 'rising to the occasion.' I wanted to share that passage with you all, and say that while I'm only in the early chapters, I'm finding this book inspirational indeed. Chris Downie's mission in life seems to be helping others. It's as good a goal as I can think of in life -- I always feel like I have no idea what my purpose is, or what I want most to be doing with my life. And that got me started thinking.

As far as eating as healthily as possible, it still feels like if there were some Jenny Craig or Lite n' Easy type of program that offered a low-fat vegan plan, I'd be ON it. I so wish there was an easy, convenient way to have prepared healthy options to make eating right and portion control so much easier. Even with the amazing plant-based plans that Lindsay has created, I still have to find the time to prepare all those things -- and time is one thing I don't have a lot of, especially in the morning before work, and I don't have cooking options at work, I have to bring prepared meals. What I really want most is a home delivered healthy low-fat vegan meal plan so I don't have to think about what or how much to eat. That's what would help me the most. I think that would help others as well. I think people would eat a low-fat healthy plant-based diet if it was easier and didn't seem so time-consuming -- if only it was more convenient. I've always got to cook, there are very few vegan options in Australia when eating out, and even fewer where there'd be no added fat options. If there were a local restaurant or a home-delivery program that could provide every meal for me, it would be easy to eat right.

Maybe that's my purpose? If I had the money to start such a business, that's what I'd most love to do. Ah well -- pipe dreams I guess, as I haven't the money. But helpful insight into what I would like to be doing with my life. But one thing's for sure -- just like Christopher Reeve, I need to persevere and be more proactive -- not just vegetate and live passively.

"23-1/2 hours" has motivated me

2012-01-06T12:44:00.004+11:00

I hope you all watched the video in my previous post called "23-1/2 hours" -- it has truly motivated me, and for the last 3 days I have in fact reduced my sitting and sleeping to 23-1/2 hours per day at most. Wednesday and Thursday I walked half an hour, and today I went 45 minutes.

I was exercising regularly with a personal training studio for the first half of 2011 and really built up my endurance. Then we bought a house and I couldn't extend my membership. We've had so much going on that I let exercise take a back seat, and that was truly evident this week. I live on a crest, so starting the walk is easy because it's downhill. But coming home I face an uphill climb that has left me a bit breathless. It was easier today -- that's right, just the third day in and it was a bit easier.

There's another change I'd like to implement -- finding meals I love that also happen to be healthy, low-fat and plant-based. And thanks to Happy Herbivore I'm getting some great ideas. One very cool thing Lindsay has implemented recently is 7-day meal plans. You can download them for a small donation and they are healthy, low-fat, plant-based 1200 calorie meal plans which you can adapt to suit your own caloric needs.

There's no leftovers at the end of the week (meaning the plan doesn't ask you to make recipes that serve 6 when you'll only be using 2 servings that week). And the foods look really good, too. It's all part of making healthier choices this year - in exercise as well as diet. It has to become natural for me to make healthier choices -- that's the only way it will last. Any time I've felt like I'm on some restrictive plan, I've failed. But if I can find foods I really like and enjoy making that are also healthy, low-fat and plant-based, then there will be no sense of deprivation. I'll start naturally choosing healthier more often -- and that's really the goal.

A very important message I needed to hear ...

2012-01-04T17:06:00.004+11:00

It is a very important message, presented in a very cool way - and really made me think. This is something I needed to hear right now. It's worth a few minutes of your time to check it out as well.

Today's Words of Inspiration

2012-01-04T01:16:00.000+11:00

Keep on beginning and failing. Each time you fail, start all over again, and you will grow stonger until you have accomplished a purpose -not the one you began with perhaps, but one you'll be glad to remember.

Ann Sullivan (Helen Keller's teacher)

Could I actually give up the scale for a year?

2012-01-03T12:10:00.003+11:00

I don't know - but I'm willing to give it a try. I read Hollie's post and was inspired to give up the scale. Why let it have such power over me? What if instead of focusing on the number on that scale I focused on eating healthy and exercising? It's not that I don't focus on eating right and exercising when I'm trying to lose weight, but then that weigh-in comes and if I stay the same or, God forbid, gain, then I feel like an utter failure and use it as an excuse to give up. Why give myself that out?

If instead I focus on eating right and exercising as much as possible, then I'll consider that a success. No crazy diet that I can't live with. No number on a scale to make me feel bad so I give up on achieving a healthier lifestyle. I can't be perfect all the time - but I can do my best MOST of the time, and that's enough. I may not be able to go a whole year without weighing in and that's OK - the intention here is to take the focus off the scale and put it on making healthier choices.

So come on 2012, bring it on. I'm going to do my best to make this the year I STOP obsessing about my weight. There is so much MORE in life than what we weigh. I've made my weight the focus for 30 years now, and it's only gotten me fatter. Dieting doesn't work. But making healthier choices MOST of the time just might. It's just a shift in focus, really -- and it may be just what I need.

My last weigh-in was Saturday, December 31st and I weighed in at 125kg (275.58 lb) - let's see what I can achieve with my focus on health instead of weight.

A week left of my vacation ... how will I spend it?

2012-01-02T23:29:00.004+11:00

Yes, the relatives have gone, the holidays are over, but I still have the rest of this week left of my vacation. How will I spend it? I keep thinking I'll start an exercise program but then there's that part of me that says 'you're on vacation, work is busy and stressful and you finally have a few days where you don't have to DO anything! So relax and enjoy it because it will be over so soon!" And that's true enough. But at the same time, if I can't find time to workout when I have nothing to do, how will I ever find the time when I'm back to work?

I should be starting off the new year by building a new, healthy habit. It could be as simple as going for a walk or putting in a WATP video. Here's to starting that new habit THIS WEEK.

Because really -- what other motivation should I need but my reflection in the mirror? There's no hiding from that, it's brutally honest.

What if you met a healthier version of yourself?

2011-12-18T18:21:00.000+11:00

I've been struggling with making healthy choices as the holidays draw nearer. Treats abound, and it's not easy to resist. But I had a rude awakening the other day. Hubby and I went to meet a friend to carpool to a party we were going to. We've done numerous times before, but something was different this time. It was the same truck, and I sat in back like I always do. But this time the seatbelt wouldn't close. Hubby kept saying to pull it out a bit more, but there wasn't any more. Hubby and I just switched seats since I was 'having trouble with the seat belt' and we were off, and no one said anything else about it. But I couldn't help but dwell on it. It was a real kick in the tush. There was simply no escaping the fact that I need to do something about my weight -- now.

When I'm losing the battle of the bulge, I'm less confident and less likely to spend time and money on my appearance. I won't buy new outfits, I can make do with what I've got, though most of what fits comfortably isn't exactly high fashion. I won't get a new hairstyle because it's so expensive to go to the salon (hubby gets his hair cut for $5 at the club!) and we're trying to pay off a new mortgage so I shouldn't be spending money on myself. I don't wear much makeup or jewellery. It's like I want to fade into the background and draw less attention to myself. I suspect it has the opposite affect. I've needed a haircut for some time, and I really wanted to do something different. Last week I walked over to the salon on my lunch break and booked an appointment for a cut, perm and colour. I nearly cancelled the appointment the day before -- $180 is a lot of money, and expenses are high this month anyway, what with Christmas spending and all. I shouldn't be spending money on myself. But a friend said, "You never pamper yourself, you deserve this, you'll feel bad if you cancel it. You've got in-laws coming up and it's Christmas, why shouldn't you look and feel your best?" Why not, indeed!? It could be my Christmas present.

It occurred to me that what I look like on the outside is a direct reflection of how I feel about myself on the inside, and that maybe the way to reverse it is by starting with the outside. So I kept the appointment and I must say, I feel so much better. When I look in the mirror I see a better version of myself (at the risk of sounding like one of those Bupa ads). I do want to get healthier -- and yes it's SO hard, but I could do it if I saw myself as a priority. If I valued myself enough, I could and would take better care of myself. So my goal is to find time to exercise next week in the privacy of my own home, either putting on a WATP video or cranking up the jukebox and dancing, either way. I don't want to wait for the new year, I want to start NOW. Anyone with me?

Crazy busy but that's no excuse!

2011-12-16T08:14:00.000+11:00

Look, my work life is often crazy busy, and lately that's certainly been the case. I work late most days and by the time I get home I just want to make dinner, and curl up with hubby to watch one of our favorite shows before bed. I keep thinking when work eases up a bit, I'll find time to add exercise to my daily routine, but it never seems to let up! Still, I can't use that as an excuse - if work is always going to be busy, then I must find a way to work around that. Getting up earlier to exercise before work is an option, but I'm not a morning person so getting up earlier will definitely be a challenge! But I'm considering getting up just half an hour earlier -- and therefore starting work earlier! That would mean I could leave earlier too, but as I'm often held back I'm afraid that would just make my day even longer (meaning I'd still stay back just as late). But if I could pull it off, starting at 8 would mean leaving at 4, and if I could make myself do it more often, that would leave time for a workout before dinner.

I've got one more week of work and then I'm off for 2 weeks. Obviously there will be family gatherings and what-not due to Christmas, but being off of work will certainly give me time to start an exercise habit. So that's the plan for now. I haven't been tracking my food this week as I haven't been following a meal plan, but that will change again soon. Happy Holidays to all of you out there, and whether you're trying to stay on plan during these tough times, or plan on getting back on track after the holidays, I wish you luck - and I'll be here, so we can support each other. :)

I found a way to print off my menu for the week!

2011-11-27T18:14:00.001+11:00

I'm loving SparkPeople. I thought it was way cool that you could print a grocery list for the week, but I didn't see any way to print your entire menu for the week - I like to have it hanging on my fridge so I know exactly what to have and what to pack for lunch each day - it just makes things nice and easy. But I didn't see a way to do that here - until I started looking around through the various reports. Using the Daily Nutrition Report, You can choose a start date and enter the number of days for the report - so just pick Sunday and run it for 7 days for example - and you can export that report to Excel! Once you open it in Excel you can manipulate it however you want (shade rows to separate the days, delete any columns you don't care about, adjust it to fit one page in the page setup, etc.) and voila - a printable menu for the entire week. Very cool, indeed! Thanks SparkPeople.

Family health worries finish up a bad week

2011-11-26T21:51:00.001+11:00

Sorry guys, I'll be back posting again tomorrow or Monday. It's been a rather bad week, not only food-wise but my FIL had an operation and has been having a tough time of it, so that's been weighing on us a bit. Add to that it's just been a crap week with nothing but RAIN - they say we've had 45 minutes of sunshine since last Sunday! It finally let up today, and I hope tomorrow will be good again as well.

I always plan my meals for the coming week and make my list for Sunday grocery shopping. I get everything I need in one trip (except for some fresh fruits and veggies that I get later in the week so they don't go soft in the fridge waiting to be used). I will be back soon to share my plans for the coming week. And I'm going to plan workouts this time as well. I had hoped to start daily workouts last week but only got one in because I hadn't really planned for them, and because the rain kept me from my regular walks. I didn't get any feedback on buying a treadmill, so I'm still not sure whether I want to consider that, but I'd still like to hear opinions from those who have one - do you use it or is it just taking up space in your house?

Processed crap just makes you want more processed crap!

2011-11-23T18:47:00.003+11:00

Well the anniversary dinner is over and I thought I could just jump right back on plan. I always tell myself I should be able to eat the occasional meal off plan and then just get right back on track afterwards. And in theory, it's true, I should be able to do that. But in reality, that's not how it works. Last night we went out for our anniversary, and we had a $100 gift certificate to use. Sounds like a lot, but this is one of the fancier restaurants in town so it isn't too hard to spend that much even with just the two of us. I had chosen my meal by viewing their menu online first and I'd entered those nutritional guesstimates into SparkPeople ahead of time, so it was looking like I'd maybe be at about 1800 calories for the day rather than my usual 1550. Not too bad, right? Only when we got there of course hubby was determined to spend the entire gift certificate, so of course we had a loaf of hot bread brought out to us first with flavoured dipping oils. I didn't care for the flavours so I really only ate the bread, but it was really GOOD bread, one of my weaknesses, so we each ate half of it. I hadn't planned for that.

Then he had tempura battered John Dory fish fillets with hot chips and a salad. I had a stuffed mushroom and a roasted red pepper filled with rice pilaff - not a vegan meal as there was some cheese in the mushroom, but I do make occasional exceptions. That's why I don't call myself a vegan - I eat a plant-based diet, and once in a while I may have a bit of dairy or egg, but not often and certainly never meat. Anyway, the meal was OK - not fantastic, and when you're spending that much you really want it to be fantastic. Anyway, when that was done hubby was counting up the bill in his head and figured we had enough left so we should get dessert. I didn't need it, but he won me over with his logic … he only takes me out to dinner once a year on our anniversary - and as expensive as it was we'd likely never come back to this place again, so as it wasn't costing us anything we should get dessert and use up the gift certificate. It wouldn't be hard to do - his piece of cheesecake and my sticky date pudding were each $10.50, and they were really good.

So today I figured I'd be right back on plan, no worries. Only I had to leave work today to run an errand and while I was out I got hungry. I mean crazy hungry where you just want to binge on anything in sight and of course my prepared lunch was back at work. I don't know what came over me but before I knew it I was stopping at Hungry Jacks (what Burger King is called in Australia) and having a veggie burger and fries! What the hell!? Sure, you could argue that I didn't have to stop there - but this wasn't just a little craving, it was an overwhelming urge that took over; one I truly felt I couldn't resist, I had to have that food! I now think it's because of the meal I had last night.

When I was on the Rice Diet eating bland plain food every day, I truly didn't have any cravings. I didn't have any urges to pig out on food I know I shouldn't have. While I couldn't eat bland rice and sweet potatoes every day forever, I must admit not eating processed crap made it much easier to not WANT processed crap. I guess I've always known on some level that processed food is designed to make you want more of it. Manufacturers know the crap they put in it isn't healthy, but they also know it will make you come back for more and that's the problem. It's not true that everything's OK in moderation. We tell ourselves that with food, don't we? But you wouldn't say that about cigarettes or drugs, would you? You wouldn't tell your kid it's OK to do cocaine in moderation, right? Of course not! And it's not true with processed food either, at least not for me. It has a powerful affect on me, and it's just not worth it. I don't ever want to feel that out of control again, like I have to eat junk. I actually do like and enjoy healthy food, so why consume something that's going to mess with that and work against me?!

On the exercise front, it's done nothing but rain here for the last couple of days, so it's hard to get out and walk. It's made me rethink buying a treadmill, but they are so expensive! And I know lots of people buy them and quit using them so they become just another thing taking up space in the house. I'd be interested in hearing from anyone out there who's bought one - do you use them? Was it worth the money? It's not only rain that spoils a good walk - I'm in Australia, so fly season is nearly here. Oh, I guess folks around here call it summer, but really it's all about flies. I remember a few years back when I was complaining about them, my sister-in-law said, "What, don't you have flies in America?" I said of course we did, but I don't remember them specifically attacking your face like Aussie flies do. I mean that literally, you can be walking from the parking lot to the store and 5 or 6 of them will have already flown in your eyes, up your nose and in your ears and mouth. It's so annoying, and one of the reasons I hate walking outdoors in summer. I prefer to use the Walk Away The Pounds and other workout videos inside with a huge fan on me to keep cool. I never had the room for a treadmill when we were renting, but now that we've bought a house, I actually do have room for one, so I'm just wondering what the pros and cons are. I'd appreciate any input you'd care to share.

Mapped my route right in SparkPeople - how cool is that?!

2011-11-21T19:28:00.000+11:00

I was trying to add my walk tonight in My Fitness at SparkPeople and the choices are like 15 min mile, 30 min mile, etc. (and every increment in between) and I don't know how long it takes me to walk a mile. Then I noticed a little 'map my route' button and clicked it and found it was just like those "map my run" sites - I easily clicked my start and end points on the map and it told me how far I walked. Then I told it how long it took me to walk that and it gave me my speed and how many calories I'd burned. How cool is that!? Oh, and my 42 minute walk burned 309 calories - the goal for the day was 300 so that worked out well. I'm kind of looking forward to trying tomorrow's strength training exercises, though I'm not sure how easy it will be to follow demos online as opposed to a video. We'll see how we go.

Menu today was exactly the same as yesterday. And I know I shouldn't weigh every day - especially right now because it's frustrating the hell out of me to see the pre TOM weight gain, but hey - that's life. Anyways, tomorrow is my wedding anniversary, so we're going out to dinner to use the $100 gift certificate we got when we bought our house. Then it's straight back on plan. Lord, I can't believe I've been in this country and married for 8 years now!? Wow, time flies. That's 8 years that went by where I yo-yo dieted up and down the scale. Lord, I really want to end that cycle! Wish me luck.

First day with SparkPeople and I feel really good.

2011-11-20T16:25:00.001+11:00

So I've gone and planned my first week with SparkPeople, and it did take a little while to get set up - but that's only because I customized my meals. They give you free meal plans, and that's great - but they don't have a vegan plan, only vegetarian. They also have a massive list of foods you can select from, and you can easily swap one food for an equivalent if you don't like it. I love that feature. You can also add your own custom foods and recipes, which is fantastic, because products available in Australia aren't always in the main list. I already have a massive custom meal database at FitDay so a lot of it I just copied or entered over again. In the interest of throwing together a meal plan for the entire week rather quickly (and having minimal cooking to do throughout the week) I repeated the same meals on multiple days. As I add more meals in, I can vary a bit more - but one of the problems I have with most meal plans available is they tend not to use a meal over again in the same week, thus wasting food. Like you make one of their recipes and it makes 6 serves, but you only eat it once or twice that week. I don't waste food, and I don't mind eating the same meals several times a week, so it works for me.

After entering my information on SparkPeople they suggested a range of 1200-1550 calories a day. They also suggested I start at 30 minutes of cardio 3x a week and 30 minutes of strength training 3x a week. Since I haven't been doing much other than occasional walks lately, 30 minutes is probably a good starting point, but I think I'll try to add daily walks on top of that. I could do both on the same day but I've chosen to alternate days, leaving Sunday open - so I didn't have any workouts for my first day. I'm going to try getting up a bit earlier tomorrow and get a walk in before work.

So what I did was leave their suggested meal plan showing and then found suitable exchanges for the non-plant foods (e.g. soy milk rather than skim, soy yogurt rather than regular) and where I couldn't find suitable exchanges I just swapped to one of my custom meals. I like using their suggestions as a base because it helps me keep within the nutrient goals - I could easily see I needed a bit more protein so adding a couple Tbsp of peanut butter fixed that right up, and still stayed within my calorie goals. So here's what today's menu looks like (hopefully it's not too small):

Oh, I've also got 4 glasses of water in already, and the goal is 8 for the day.

Now, I've started today anyway, even though Tuesday is my wedding anniversary and hubby is planning to take me out to this very fancy restaurant - we have a $100 gift certificate to use up! But there will always be events happening in life, and I'm determined to make the healthiest choice available and just get right back on plan afterwards. That's life, after all. Oh, and next weekend's trip is now cancelled, so I won't have to work around a weekend off plan after all -- while I'm bummed I won't be visiting my friend, I'm glad not to have a weekend off plan to cope with.

The Bad, The Ugly, and The Good

2011-11-19T08:30:00.000+11:00

Lest you think I've got that out of order, I'm not referring to a movie here, but rather my life for the last couple of days. When last I checked in it was Wednesday and I'd reported being exceptionally hungry, so I ate more portions than I should have (The Bad), but they were at least allowed foods, so I was otherwise on plan.

But come Thursday I got up to make lunch and pulled out the rice and sweet potatoes and just looked at it. I thought about measuring some out for my meals for the day, and the thought of eating rice one more time literally started to gag me. Why now? Why was I ok with not only eating these things but having extra portions just yesterday? Well in truth I've been wanting to eat other things all week, but I haven't given in. But Thursday I just couldn't bring myself to eat rice any more. I ate my oats for breakfast and went to work feeling I'd sort out lunch later.

When lunch time came, I went to Subway - I can get a nice healthy veggie sub there, and that will satisfy me until I can figure out what to do. But waiting in line I found myself grabbing a bag of chips to go along with it, and before I knew what I was doing I added cookies as well! Subway cookies! Those delicious morsels are amazingly high in calories and fat, and I know that! But I wanted them. I had stuck to this rice plan for 3 weeks and while I'd lost a lot of water the first week, I had seen no loss since. Dammit, I'd earned those cookies. (You'd be amazed what I can tell myself when I really want something I know I shouldn't have. And this was just part of The Ugly - there was more to come!) After work I stopped at the store to get some things to make a pasta dish and in addition to the veggie mince, green pepper, onions and mushrooms I'd felt compelled to grab a tub of Tofutti vegan cream cheese to mix through it as well, so it was nice and creamy. If that wasn't enough, I grabbed a huge loaf of garlic bread as well! OK I didn't eat that all by myself, hubby had his fair share -- but still!

Now if my food choices weren't ugly enough for you, let me just add that I paid for this all later. After 3 weeks of clean eating with only low-fat, low-salt whole foods, and then you suddenly cram down a couple of high-fat, high-salt meals -- let's just say my guts made me pay for it later.

Friday I had my soaked oats for breakfast, leftover pasta for lunch, and for dinner I stopped and picked up some falafels and hummus to make a couple of wraps. So much better than Thursday, but I was still mad at what I saw as another failed attempt to lose weight. I clearly wasn't going back to the Rice Diet, but I didn't want to give up either. I truly want to get lean, strong and healthy -- I just haven't found the right path yet. And today's results on the scale? 119.7 kg (263.89 lb) which is a gain of 3 kg (6.61 lb) since last week. So my total loss to date is now just 3.2 kg (7.05 lb).

Now despite my indulgence, I certainly didn't eat enough calories to gain 6 and a half pounds in 2 days - I've clearly put back some water weight. But I needed a new plan and I needed it fast. I was wracking my brain last night - do I go back to Jenny Craig? They have a vegetarian plan, but not vegan. And now that we have a mortgage, do I want to spend so much on diet meals when that could be going on the mortgage? Our goal is to pay the house off in like 12 years, and that ain't gonna happen unless we really hammer it with any extra money we have. So I started researching vegan meal plans online again - I know there really aren't any structured programs available that have vegan plans, but I thought maybe I'll find some I can modify to suit.

Well I stumbled upon SparkPeople again. I haven't been there in a couple of years I'd say and they've really changed. They provide complete meal plans and there is a vegetarian one, but you can also modify the plans - either by substituting one or two items, or an entire meal. You can even enter your own recipes and it does the nutritional calculations for you and adds them to your meal plan. I think I can work with this! I've already downloaded copies of their first few week's meal plan and I'm going to go through them and find suitable substitutions where necessary and add a couple of my own meals as well. I'm feeling good about this, actually.

So The Good is that I haven't used the last couple of days as an excuse to throw in the towel and quit. I have a new plan. In the coming week, I'm going to keep up the meditation, increase the exercise, and work with the SparkPeople meal plan to come up with something I can live with for the long haul. I'll report back tomorrow when I've got some meal plans worked out and share them.

Extra portions today as I was hungry

2011-11-16T20:05:00.000+11:00

By and large I don't get hungry on The Rice Diet, but today I did. So as promised, I'm going to share my good days as well as my bad -- today wasn't really BAD per se as I didn't eat anything that wasn't allowed on the plan, but I did add some additional portions. It started off with forgetting to put my oats on to soak last night, so I didn't have breakfast ready this morning. Instead I had some rice and sweet potato, with a medium peach. Come lunch time I had more rice and sweet potatoes, with some stir fry veggies - and I wasn't hungry enough then so I didn't eat the apple, thinking I'd save it for later.

By the time I got home from work, I was ready for dinner but we had company stop over. I put some oats on to soak since I hadn't had my soy milk serve today, but because I was hungry I increased the 1/2 cup oats to 1 cup. When our guest left, the oats hadn't soaked long enough yet but I was famished. So I had my stir fry veggie portion, with 2 medium and 1 small potato that needed to get used as they were starting to soften. I even had some ketchup on the potatoes.

I still was very hungry after that and didn't really want my fruit - so I then ate the soaked oats for dessert. So again, I didn't eat anything that wasn't allowed, though I was sorely tempted today -- but I did increase portions because I was so hungry. So my nutritional stats for today are as follows:

1697 calories total, with percentages of carb/protein/fat being 74/12/13 according to FitDay. Also, my sodium was at 1386mg, so that was a bit higher than it should be for The Rice Diet, but not overly alarming either. I'm not sure why today I was so hungry, or why I had thoughts of stopping at Subway on the way home, but I didn't do it, so I guess having extra portions of allowed foods was a better choice. Hope things are better tomorrow.

I went back to the soy milk & veggie day today

2011-11-15T22:55:00.001+11:00

I decided to add back the soy milk and veggies today - after doing all the calculations, I found the sodium was really too low to do the basic rice day every day without medical supervision. And instead of taking weekends off as originally decided, I should probably just break for Saturday lunch with hubby then get back on track the rest of the weekend. I think that will keep hubby and I both happy. While I didn't binge over the weekend, I was off plan and did regain a bit, so having a whole weekend off plan isn't such a good idea for me.

So I won't take the entire weekend off, except for the weekend of the 26th as I'll be out of town with friends -- I'm not bringing rice and potatoes with me. I'll just make the best choices I can. She's already emailed me that she's worried about what I'll be able to eat - I sure don't want to seem even more difficult to feed! You might think it's a bad idea to go off plan at all, but one of my biggest problems has always been if I stray off plan I tend to think, well I've blown it so may as well eat whatever I want now. I'm not going to allow myself that out any more. Life happens - lunch with friends happens - you haven't blown anything, just get right back on track, right? Well -- that's the plan. :)

Sweet potatoes have how much sodium?

2011-11-14T21:06:00.002+11:00

Just did a basic rice diet day today because I forgot to put my oatmeal in to soak before bed last night. So it was just 1/3c brown rice, 1/2c baked sweet potato, and 2 fruits for each meal.

Breakfast I had a few leftover blueberries and 2 small peaches.
Lunch I had an orange and a pear.
Dinner I had a whole banana (counts as 2 fruit)

Just for fun I put it all into FitDay to see where I'm at and I was surprised to see my sodium was actually at 1,145 mg for the day. What the?? So I examined each item I'd added to the list and the only one with any substantial amount of sodium was the sweet potato. Now this is just baked sweet potato, nothing added - baked in the skin and then mashed. Nothing in the description on FitDay indicated that anything else had been added, so what gives? So I consulted a few other websites and they tended to put it at between 36-45mg per half cup. So I am going to customize that entry on FitDay and adjust accordingly. As soon as I can get back in, that is -- FitDay has been having some down time lately, don't know what's going on there. Anyway, a good day today and I enjoyed the baked mashed sweet potatoes for a change. I'd been roasting them with garlic and rosemary, which is really nice - but baking them in the skin and mashing them makes them taste sweeter and it mixes in with the brown rice nicely.

Anyway, with the revised sodium my nutritional stats looked like this today:

912 total calories (83% carb/5% protein/12% fat) and 119.7mg sodium.

PS: I just went and added a variety of cooked veggies to my menu on FitDay just to see what would happen and my sodium skyrocketed again - they have separate entries for lots of foods to specify, e.g. raw, cooked without salt or fat, cooked with salt or fat, etc. But none of these veggies had that disclaimer, it just said, for instance, broccoli cooked. Carrots cooked. And yet when I clicked on each of those entries there was this huge amount of sodium. Do they just assume we all dump salt on our cooked veggies?? I will just use the raw entries - nutritional stats shouldn't change just because I cook them if I don't add any salt or fat. Weird, though! Come on FitDay, what's up?

I've come to a decision about how to move forward on The Rice Diet

2011-11-13T09:08:00.001+11:00

There is a way I can do The Rice Diet and still have my weekend routine with my hubby. A way I can still eat normally part of the time, but still enjoy the benefits of The Rice Diet as well.

I finished reading the book yesterday - and in it there was a section about making the diet work FOR YOU. She sited examples of how people have modified it to suit their life so they could stay with it for the long-haul. Now she was mostly talking about people who were on the maintenance phase (Phase 3). In one of her examples, she referred to a man with a new girlfriend. He wanted to be able to take her out on the weekends and not have to worry about what he ate. So he basically did The Rice Diet during the week, and ate what he wanted on the weekends. It worked for him. I think I've found a way I can do that it in the weight loss phase (Phase 2) and still lose weight.

Firstly - each week, no matter what phase you are in, begins with a Basic Rice Diet day - 2 serves of starch and 2 fruits for every meal. The other days of the week you can add 1 cup of soy milk to your breakfast, cut down to 1 fruit at each meal and increase to 3 starches, and also add 3 serves of veggies. Lastly, in Phase 2 you also get one protein day where you're supposed to add fish - but I still hadn't figured out a way around that being as I don't eat fish.

If you go to Durham, NC, and do the live-in plan with them, they keep you on the day 1 basic rice diet menu for about half the time you're there - so just 2 starches and 2 fruits at every meal. The reason you can't do that at home is the sodium level is too low so you have to be medically supervised. So what I've come up with is a modified basic rice day -- that I can do every weekday. I've combined the breakfast option (adding soy milk) from days 1-5 with the dinner and lunch options of the basic rice day (day 1) and I'll do it every weekday. Then on the weekend instead of having a 'protein day' I can eat what I like. Note I didn't say eat as much as I like - that's not what I'm talking about here. This is not a binge! I'm talking about have my one lunch out with hubby and eating healthy foods the rest of the weekend, but not being on The Rice Diet. Then if I do find myself wanting foods that are off plan during the week, I can just say hang on until the weekend. If you still want it then, you can have it.

So this is what my modified week-day menu looks like:

Breakfast:
1/2 cup rolled oats
2T raisins and some cinnamon
soaked in 1c lite soy milk

Lunch:
1/3c brown rice
1/2c roasted sweet potato
2 fruits

Dinner:
1/3c brown rice
1/2c roasted sweet potato
2 fruits

Normally on the basic rice diet day you have about 850 calories and the sodium is less than 500mg. However, if you're not being medically supervised, the book recommends between 500-1000mg sodium daily. The nutritional stats on my modified weekday rice diet are 950 calories and 992.8mg sodium. My calories fall somewhere between the basic rice diet day and the other days of the week (normally about 1100-1200 calories) and the sodium levels are good. I think this is a compromise I can do, and it should result in weight loss.

Of course, I'm also going to have to add in the other things suggested in the book, like meditation / time for myself, and daily exercise. I started already yesterday with a 40 minute walk with hubby and the dogs. I'm going to mix it up I think -- mornings are my favorite time to meditate, but it's also good to get workouts done in the morning. I'm not sure I can get up early enough to do both in the morning, so I will play it by ear and see what works, but as long as I get at least 10-15 minutes meditation each day for now, that's good. The book says to work up to 1 to 1-1/2 hours of exercise a day as well, so that's my goal.

Look, if this doesn't work for me then I'll go back to planning healthy foods, exercising daily, and hope for the best, but for now, this is a compromise I think hubby and I can both live with.

I think hubby is tired of me always dieting

2011-11-12T18:59:00.000+11:00

It was hard enough on my beloved hubby when I first switched to a plant-based diet because he didn't want to, so we were always cooking our own separate meals, and when we were invited over for dinner with family, they all worried about what they could possibly make that I would eat - either that or there just wasn't anything suitable for me unless I brought something myself. He saw it as a hassle, I'm sure. Then of course I'm always on some new diet trying to lose weight - hence my recent Rice Diet attempt. Today as I mentioned previously I went out to lunch at Subway with him. We have a normal routine every Saturday where we go out to lunch together. After lunch we run any errands or do any work around the house that needs doing. It's just become our Saturday routine, and we were already limited to 3 or 4 places where I could get something vegan. Now I'm on what is to him some kooky new diet again and can't even go to lunch with him. He doesn't like it.

Don't get me wrong, he's supportive, not at all like some of the spouses depicted in this article about how your dieting affects your spouse. We have a very secure, loving relationship - one I really never even thought possible before I met him. He really does want me to be healthy, but is not otherwise concerned with my weight. He loves me just as I am. In fact, he would say the problem is that I don't - because I'm forever trying to change how I am. Now I'm living on rice, potatoes and fruit!? Good lord! He's got a point. I've been 'dieting' for 30 years now, and it's gotten me no where but fatter. He's tired of seeing me beat up on myself for failing, and he really just wants us to be able to eat together normally or go out to eat now and then without it being some major struggle.

So what do I do now? Truth be told, I'm sick of dieting too. I think 30 years is enough time to spend focused on your weight and not getting anywhere! But I want to be fit and healthy, I really do! It just seems no matter what I try it doesn't work, or it's too extreme. How I wish there was some 'test' that could be run that would tell you what you personally should be eating for YOUR body (picture Dr McCoy from Star Trek using that gadget he has to scan your body and it automatically tells you what you should eat for optimum health.) But until that's available, I just read as much as I can and make the best decisions I can. That's why I initially went vegan to begin with, but that in and of itself did not help me lose weight. The Rice Diet made a big impact in week one, then nothing in week two. Obviously that big drop was mostly water weight, as it is with any diet - eliminating salt just enabled me to lose a LOT of water weight.

I don't understand why it's so hard for me to lose weight. I see success stories all over the net and wonder why I can't find the system that's right for ME so I can be one too. Is it the PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome)? True, having PCOS is a bit of a vicious circle in that it both causes you to gain weight and is made worse by gaining weight. And many with PCOS do well on low-carb plans, but how do you go low carb AND stay plant-based? So do I continue with this diet? Or do I go back to making the healthiest choices I can, exercise every day and just being the best me that I can be, and don't worry about the weight?

Sorry guys, please forgive this long ramble, but I said I was going to put everything out here -- the good and the bad. Right now I'm just feeling confused and disappointed and frankly not sure what to do.

Day 12 - very small loss this week

2011-11-12T12:27:00.000+11:00

A loss is a loss, right? I'm only down .2kg (.44 lb) from last week, and I'm trying not to let it bother me but it is. You know if I'd lost 6 pounds last week and 5 this week, I'd be thrilled -- but losing 13 last week and next to nothing this week feels different somehow. I guess I'm worried about my longevity on this program because when it stops working, or when I feel like it has anyway, that's when I tend to throw in the towel and give up. I don't want to give up! But I also don't want to keep eating the same things every day which are bland and boring, and not be losing weight.

Having read further in the book it does have a one week menu for phase 2, and in it they are not just eating the same boring things I eat every day - they use recipes from the back of the book. Now these recipes are still pretty bland, but at least it's something different. But the problem with this menu - same problem I've seen with nearly every other weight loss weekly menu I've ever seen - is it would require me to waste food, and I don't do that.

For example - on one day you make JR's Lasagna recipe from the back of the book. It makes 8 servings. But you only get to have that twice during the week in this menu. So what am I doing with the other 6 serves? Sure, I could probably freeze them (there's no way my hubby is going to eat this kind of food) but that's not the point. I also get 2 of these special blueberry banana muffins, from a recipe that makes 6. I've never frozen muffins before, but I suppose you could - then again I'm not sure how 'muffin like' these will actually be given the only ingredients are bananas, pears, cinnamon, vanilla, blueberries, oatmeal and 1 tsp oil. Sounds to me like they'll be some sort of oatmeal lumps.

OK even if you can freeze portions, they also have you having 1/3 cup of strawberries one day -- then 3 days later another 1/2 cup --- then a few days later another 1/3 cup. Strawberries I buy at the beginning of the week are not going to last all week without getting bruised and rotten. Hubby won't eat them, so I'd be buying them for one portion and throwing the rest out! No way. I don't know about you, but I don't waste food.

When I do my own meal plans, I make 2-3 recipes per week, and each might make 4 serves. So if I make tofu jambalaya then I have it for dinner, and also for lunches for the next few days. I don't mind eating the same thing every day if I like it, and I definitely don't like wasting, so that's how I do it. So it always amazes me when people set up menus like this that require you to waste food. Do they assume your entire family is eating the same way you do? How nice that would be, but it ain't gonna happen.

Then another chapter in the book is about making this work for YOU - so if you need an extra veggie portion here or there, or need a bit of meat, go ahead - but they're talking about when you're in Phase 3 which is maintenance. Once you've lost the weight. I'm beginning to think I will need to make it work for me NOW. I haven't felt cravings or overly hungry, I'll give this plan that much credit. But that doesn't mean I haven't wanted other foods, especially when sitting next to hubby eating his pizza and ice cream. And I'm going to have to find a way to cope in a couple of weeks when I go on that trip with my friends. I will have a hard time finding such bland foods eating out. So I've decided I will stick to the Rice Diet as much as possible, especially during the week because it works for me when I'm at work. But today I am going to go out to lunch with hubby, because that's our thing - we've always gone out to lunch on Saturday and I can see he's frustrated because he's got nothing to eat here, and my plan won't let me eat out with him. One meal out hopefully won't hurt - I didn't really lose much this week anyway. And if I can get right back on plan, then I guess that's a way I can make this work for me. We're going to Subway, so I will be getting a veggie sub, and I can ask them to hold the added salt - but I love pickles on my sub, and I generally have it with a bit of mayo. I don't care for any of the other dressings, and even if I did, they have salt anyway. But I'll do the best I can, and get right back on plan. Wish me luck.

Still here, still sticking to the program ...

2011-11-10T23:12:00.000+11:00

I haven't posted every day because I'm not sure you want to see a repeat of the same menus over and over again LOL. But I'm still sticking to the program and still doing well. I did change up my breakfast today - making my favorite overnight oatmeal (using 1/2 cup oats, 2 T raisins and 1c soy milk with some cinnamon) and it's fantastic. I was worried that using half the oats I usually do would result in some pretty soupy breakfast, but it soaked up most of the excess just fine and made the oats plump up even more, so it was very satisfying. I haven't decided yet what do to when protein day comes - Saturday seems like as good a day as any. I do have some vegetarian mince in the freezer so while it isn't mentioned in phase 2, I don't eat fish and I don't want to just have 2 more serves of soy milk in its place. I could just have beans, but those are also a carb, so I'm thinking I should use some of the veggie mince. I'm not sure how I'll determine the portion size, but I'll just refer to the book I guess.

I've been reading more of it, and I'm at the section on making time for yourself and including things like meditation, so I'm looking forward to reading that. It's something I've really wanted to make time for in my life, but never seem to. If the weather would cooperate, I think I would be best trying to fit that into the mornings before work. Since we bought our house a few months ago, I now have a pergola out back next to the pool (which isn't useable yet) and a cane lounge set out there that's nice and comfy. I've sat out there a few times admiring the view and thinking how lovely and peaceful it is, so it seems to me that would be a great place to start. We'll see how I go.

I've also looked ahead at some of the recipes and I'm hoping to get through the book this weekend so I will know how I can incorporate them into my plan. I'm doing fine with what I'm eating for the most part, but I don't want to get bored and just want to have other options at hand. As long as I ensure I have potatoes and rice on hand and ready to eat, I've been able to put meals together quickly, but there are recipes for things like lasagna (albeit a rice diet version) that I'd like to give a try. Only there was a roasted potato recipe in there that confused me. It said it made so many 1/2 cup servings, but then said to count it as 1-1/2 starch allowances. Half a cup is generally 1 starch allowance, so I hope that's explained better as I get further through the book.

Not this coming weekend but the next I made plans with a friend to take a trip down the coast to visit another friend of ours - it's a 5 hour drive and we'll be staying in a motel near her. I'm not sure yet how I'll deal with this eating plan. I have avoided eating out so far - seemed wise being just shy of 2 weeks into the new plan -- but it'll come up when we head down the coast for sure. I'd like to stick to the plan 100% but I may find I have to just choose the best options wherever we go and get back on plan 100% after I get back. We're only talking 2 days - we leave Friday night and come back Sunday afternoon. I guess any dieta / way of life has to fit into your REAL life or you'll never stick anyway, and real life involves spending time with friends and family, eating out or at other people's homes. So I'll figure it out I guess. I'll check in again soon.

No sweet potatoes left! Oh my!

2011-11-08T22:55:00.000+11:00

That's right, I didn't plan ahead yesterday - I should have been roasting more sweet potatoes last night, but I forgot about it. So this morning I had the usual cereal and soy milk, with blueberries as the fruit. Lunch was 1-1/2 cup baked potatoes with a little ketchup and 1-1/2 cup cooked mixed veggies with half a banana as the fruit.

Then I got home after work and remembered I'd bought a big bag of mixed salad greens featuring kale, so I whipped up a huge salad. Now if you have raw veggies, you're allowed 3 cups instead of the 1-1/2 cups of cooked veggies, so it was a big salad full of the salad greens, green bell pepper, broccoli, tomatoes and salad onion. But what to dress it with? I had to search online for oil-free AND salt-free recipes, and didn't have all the ingredients for any that I found, so I just mixed a bit of dijon mustard with some balsamic vinegar and watered it down just a bit to a dressing consistency. It was OK. I do love mustard, but it needed something more - so if anyone has any good salad dressing ideas that would suit this program, I'd love to hear them.

Anyway, after that I was ready for my starch servings, so I pulled out the rice and looked for beans or sweet potatoes to mix with it -- and lo and behold there were none! Damn! Roasting a pan of sweet potatoes was going to take a while - I'd need something else for tonight, but they still had to be roasted for tomorrow.

So after I got that cooking I nuked some potatoes with ketchup again. I must remember to check ahead for the next day and ensure there's always something. I do love rice, but I couldn't imagine just eating it plain and dry - when it's mixed with rosemary and garlic roasted sweet potatoes, it's OK. So that was today's menu.

I had hoped to get in some exercise but it was pouring down rain tonight and I got out of work late, so it was straight to dinner. The book recommends eating at 7:30 am, 12:30 pm and 5:30 pm. Of course you can tweak if you like, but they suggest that those who eat earlier in the day tend to lose more. I rarely eat as early as 5:30, it's usually closer to 6:30. I must make an effort to get out of work on time, though, as I'd really like to start walking again, especially as it warms up.

I must say, I'm still feeling good and still very satisfied on this program. I'm not craving anything off plan, which is not the same as saying I wouldn't like to have something else, but normally when I'm restricting what I eat it's hard because I crave my favorite foods. Maybe they've got something with this salt thing - maybe that is what makes us crave those foods, because weaning myself off it has definitely made a difference as far as cravings go. I've always said, diet plans that claim to make you not hungry don't necessarily help me because I have no problem eating when I'm not hungry - I love food, especially my favorite foods. But when you don't crave them, it's much easier to avoid them.

I'll check back in tomorrow.

Basic Rice Diet day - and a video from Kitty Rosati

2011-11-07T19:51:00.000+11:00

Hey everyone - no change in weight today, but then after dropping over 13 pounds in 6 days, I'm not altogether surprised to see it go up a bit yesterday and hold steady today. The body needs to adjust. I'm sticking to plan and still feeling good, so I'm just not going to worry about it.

Here's a great video that's both interesting and informative if you're interested in learning more about this plan. Kitty Rosati, co-author of The Rice Diet Solution (the book I'm following) sat down with Dr. John McDougall at the Sept 2011 McDougall Advanced Study Weekend in Santa Rosa, CA and talked a bit about her experience teaching the RICE DIET.

Today was Basic Rice Diet day, which means it's an all grain and fruit day. The first day of each week in all three phases of this diet is an all grain and fruit day, so all three meals consist of 2 starches and 2 fruits. Remember a fruit is 1/2 a banana, 1 medium fruit or 1c cut fruit, grapes or blueberries.

Breakfast:
1/3c brown rice
1/2c roasted sweet potatoes with garlic and rosemary
1c blueberries and 1c chopped fresh yellow peaches

Lunch:
1/3c brown rice
1/2c roasted sweet potatoes with garlic and rosemary
1c kiwi-fruit and 1 medium orange

Dinner:
1/3c brown rice
1/2c roasted sweet potatoes with garlic and rosemary
1 banana

I'm still not sure what I'm going to do when I hit the protein day this week - I'm waiting for some ideas from the forum on The Rice Diet website as to whether I can use tofu or something else in place of the fish. I've seen some information in the book about substituting eggs or tempeh, but it doesn't say how much and I don't eat eggs anyway. I don't care for tempeh, but I'm hoping I can use vegetarian mince or tofu. They also seem to allow substituting beans, but as beans are also considered a starch, I'm unclear if I need to adjust the number of starches I have if I do that. And I'm sure I read that tofu can't be added until Phase 3. I know if you actually go to Duram and enroll in the in-house program they keep you on the basic rice day (2 grains and 2 fruits for each meal) for half your stay, which I think is weeks or even a month. So we'll see -- I don't think it would adversely affect my plan if I didn't have a protein day, cuz I can't see adding enough soy milk to make up the protein serves - I only have that on cereal as it is. I guess I need to keep reading and keep asking for advise on the forum. Hopefully I'll figure out what to do by Saturday

End of Day 7, with some food shifting

2011-11-06T19:33:00.001+11:00

Today was a busy day for us - we had a lot to do so we got up and walked the dogs in the morning, and boy was it getting hot already! I haven't added exercise yet because I wanted to give the first week a go, and then as weight loss slowed, which it naturally would, I would add exercise in to help it along. But this morning seemed like a good time to start walking again. It was only a half hour walk but it was so hot today that it really got to me. I'm still glad I did it, I need to get used to exercising again. It's amazing how quickly you can build your endurance when you do regularly, and how quickly you can lose it again when you stop exercising. Anyway, I had my breakfast rather late.

We had to go shopping for an 8 year old's birthday present, get our grocery shopping done, and then family came over for a visit as well. So anyway, I had breakfast late in the day (the usual cereal, soy milk and fruit), so while we were waiting for family to stop by at 3:30 I had some lunch. But I didn't have time for (nor want) everything on the menu, so I basically just had a cup of sweet potatoes, so that left another starch serving, 1-1/2 cups veggies and a fruit left over to add to dinner.

For dinner I realized we had some tortillas in the cupboard that needed to be used (leftover from hubby's meals last week). Since I had a full 3 cups of cooked veggies available to me I chopped up some fresh broccoli, bell pepper, onion, carrot and capsicum into a lovely stir fry with ginger and garlic. I had 4 serves of starch available to me, but I only put 2 serves of rice in with the veggies, and used the other 2 for tortillas. Then I rolled up the rice and veggies in the tortillas. I had one fruit serve after dinner in the form of the last baby banana, so I still have one left for tonight. There's an orange in there from last week that needs to get eaten, so if I may have that.

I haven't had any bread yet on this program, and I'd prefer a nice whole grain or multi grain bread if I did, so hopefully the white tortillas won't mess me up too much. Anyway, tomorrow is back on the starch and fruit day - so each meal tomorrow will be 2 starches and 2 fruits. I'll check in again tomorrow.

Note: I just read further in the book and it appears corn tortillas are OK but it didn't list the white ones. Oops! Hope I don't pay for that later. :(

The basics of The Rice Diet

2011-11-06T12:59:00.000+11:00

Someone asked me what this diet consists of, so while I have posted my menus I thought I'd also give you the portion sizes and daily allowances. It’s best to read the book because it goes into much more detail, but it’s basically a low-fat and low-salt plan, as they claim the high salt levels in the processed foods most of us eat is what causes the cravings to keep eating more and more.

Portion sizes for this diet are:

1 Starch	· 1/3 cup rice or beans · 1/2 cup cooked grains, pasta or starch vegetables (potatoes, corn, green peas, yams) · 1 slice of bread · 1/2-1 cup cereal (depending on the cereal)
1 Fruit	· 1/2 banana · 1 medium fruit · 1 cup cut fruit, grapes or blueberries
1 Vegetable	· 1/2 cup cooked or · 1 cup raw veggies

PHASE ONE is the first week:

FOR DAY 1
Breakfast: 2 starches and 2 fruits
Lunch: 2 starches and 2 fruits
Dinner: 2 starches and 2 fruits

FOR THE OTHER 6 DAYS:

Breakfast: 1 starch, 1 non-fat dairy (or soy milk) and 1 fruit
Lunch: 3 starches, 3 vegetables and 1 fruit
Dinner: 3 starches, 3 vegetables and 1 fruit

In phase 2, which I’m starting in the coming week, I think the only difference is you have a protein day where you can add fish, if you’re not vegetarian. Or you can add additional dairy (or soy milk/yogurt) if you don’t eat fish. I don’t think tofu is allowed until Phase 3, which is maintenance, but I haven’t read that far in the book yet. I'm hoping that's not the case, as I definitely don't eat fish.

Day 7, I resisted temptation in my first challenge

2011-11-06T10:35:00.000+11:00

Starting day 7, and let me say I did resist temptation last night! Then again I really wasn't tempted at all, so I guess there was nothing to resist after all. Despite being left home alone while hubby had his gig, I did not find myself wanting any of the chips or cookies he had left in the pantry. I knew they were there, in fact he'd left some of the cookies sitting out on the microwave cart, so they were in plain sight, but I didn't want them. So way to go me!

Secondly, my usual weigh-in day is Saturday - I was only weighing in daily in my first week because I was excited to see the quick drops, but of course that will stabilize and I'll see ups and downs periodically so I'm going to switch to Saturday weigh-ins as I usually do. In fact I saw a gain this morning. My weight was 117.7kg (259.48) which is a gain of .8kg (1.76 lb) from yesterday. I was baffled at first, I mean I'm not eating salt so it couldn't really be water weight. But I'm also reminded that any weight loss journey has its ups and downs, and where I've always faltered before was in giving up when I gained or plateaued for any length of time. So I'm going to stay strong, keep going, and remember what Lindsay Nixon of Happy Herbivore had to say about success ... which is really illustrated well in this graphic from her blog.

Starting day 6 and I've dropped over 13 pounds!

2011-11-05T10:02:00.000+11:00

I can't believe it, will you look at that ticker up there? OK it's doing that strange rounding up thing again - my total loss to date is actually 6 kg which should be 13.23 lb, but they've rounded it up to 13.3. Who cares!? I can't believe I've dropped over 13 pounds after only 5 days on this plan. To say I'm stoked would be a major understatement! And for the first time -- I've told hubby what I'm up to. He knew I bought the book, he's noticed me eating fruits (which isn't normal for me really, I'm not much of a fruit fan), and he's certainly noticed me cooking sweet potatoes this week but he didn't know anything else. I suppose he's used to me tweaking my diet all the time, and I guess at my size given he sees me every day I can understand a 13 pound loss might not be noticeable. Nevertheless, he's happy for me, too. I showed him the pictures from the 1960s patients that followed the Kempner Rice Diet, and while they were in the medically supervised plan where you have to stay with them for the first couple of months, I have done very well with the in-home program. And there are plenty of success stories much more recent than the 60s which you can read here.

I know there are those who would say you can't keep up this way of eating forever. This diet isn't a fad and has been around and successful since the 30s. They also boast high success rates even years after the program. You'll find this on their website:

63% of patients who could be contacted after one year reported weighing the same or less than they did when they left the Program. After 6 years, 43% of patients who could be contacted reported weighing the same or less than they did when they left the Program. These success rates are far higher than are reported by others. We believe long-term success is due to the Diet and the approaches and skills that you learn during your stay when you attend the Rice Diet Program.

So I'm thinking I'll keep going this way. My main concerns are how it disrupts our normal weekend routine (we go out to lunch every Saturday) and how it will affect social gatherings in the weeks leading up to Christmas. A friend contacted me the other day to take a weekend trip with her to visit another friend who moved 5 hours away. I would so love to see her again, and it sounds like fun - but what will I eat? Do I want to tell them I'm on this new plan they might see as extreme? Do I want them to feel like they can't eat what they want in front of me, or can't go where they want to eat because I wouldn't find anything suitable there? Or do I just go and hope any restaurants we attend can make me a plain baked potato, steamed veggies with no oil or salt, and a piece of fruit?

Tonight will be my first real challenge - I'll be on my own as hubby has a gig. Alone is my favorite time to binge, and I certainly don't want to do that. But I mean what I said, I am NOT hungry on this diet and don't have any cravings, so it's been easy to ignore the bikkie box at work (bikkies or biscuits are cookies in Australia) and it hasn't bothered me to sit next to hubby watching TV at night while he snacks on Cheetos, Doritos or chocolate. So really, anything off plan I eat would simply be because I chose to do so, not because I was hungry or craving it - so I should be OK. And I've got a game plan -- should I be even remotely tempted, I will go for a walk, read a book, or play with the dogs. So wish me luck today!

Day 5 menu, and really not hungry!

2011-11-04T19:35:00.000+11:00

It's weird - not only have I not really been hungry, today my breakfast of 3/4c cereal and 1c soy milk was all I had at about 8:45 this morning. Normally I eat before work but I was running late today so I took it with me and ate at my desk. I was really busy today, so I tend to not stop for lunch until I'm actually hungry ... but today I actually had to make myself stop working and just eat! It was getting late in the day and I realized I hadn't even had my fruit from breakfast yet, so I made myself stop work and take a break. I slowly ate my potato and veggies, and later I ate the apple and orange I'd brought in for today's fruits.

I stopped at the store after work to pick up some more fresh fruits to get through the next couple of days, and instead of frozen veggies again, this time I decided to pick up some fresh broccoli and a nice orange bell pepper. I chopped them up and when the sweet potatoes were nearly done roasting (with garlic and rosemary) and the brown rice was done, I quickly stir-fried them in water with some minced garlic and ginger. Tossed with the rice, and sweet potatoes on the side, it was lovely. I will confess I thought it would be even better with some soy sauce, but of course that's high in salt so I didn't add it.

And since bananas count as 2 fruits, and I don't like leaving half a banana sit around, I picked up the cutest little baby bananas! That way I can have one as one fruit. So here's the menu for today:

Breakfast:
3/4c Be Natural whole grain cereal (with apple and flame raisins)
1 cup soy milk
1 medium apple

Lunch:
1-1/2 cup baked potato (1 larger potato, slice in 1/4" intervals not all the way through, then microwaved 5 minutes) with a small amount of ketchup
1-1/2 cup cooked mixed veggies
1 medium orange

Dinner:
1/3 cup cooked brown rice
1 cup rosemary roasted sweet potatoes with garlic
1-1/2 cup stir fried fresh broccoli and orange bell pepper with garlic and ginger
1 baby banana

I must say today I had more energy and I've felt really great all day. Tomorrow night hubby has a gig, so I'll be on my own. That's usually the time I indulge in things I wouldn't normally eat in front of him, so I guess it will be my first real test on The Rice Diet -- although I do walk past the bikkie box at work every day and truly am not tempted, so I should be OK.

So that's my day -- hope you all had a great one.

Day 5 just beginning, and a smaller loss yesterday

2011-11-04T07:48:00.000+11:00

Obviously the large drops are going to get smaller, I knew that - and today's is still a very respectable loss for just one day, so I am not the least bit upset - only half a kilo this morning, which is 1.1 lb. That brings my total since Monday to 4.4kg or 9.7 lb. Not too shabby!

I'll be repeating the breakfast and lunch from yesterday because I need to use up the potato, but tonight I'll be making more rice and sweet potatoes. I'll save that leftover pasta for Saturday or Sunday - I'm just finding the rice and sweet potatoes easier, in that I don't feel like I need to put anything on them other than the bit of garlic and rosemary I roast the sweet potato in. Whereas with the plain white potatoes I tend to use just a little bit of ketchup, and on pasta -- well that just needs a sauce of some kind. I found the rice and sweet potatoes more satisfying, as well, though I still haven't been hungry.

Just for fun, I put yesterday's menu into FitDay to see where I stacked up calorie-wise, and it came to 1324 calories, 80% carbohydrates, 13% protein and 6% fat. (It must round off because it often doesn't total 100%) And some might say it's just reduced calories that are working, but I don't think so. I've reduced my calories that low before and for one thing I was always hungry. For another, I didn't drop this fast. This plan reduces salt dramatically, and the authors claim that is why you're not hungry and don't crave other foods. It's true, I haven't had any cravings this week at all, or really wanted something off plan, even when my hubby made his dinner, or sat next to me eating chips or chocolate. Usually that would make me grab some as well, but I didn't have to resist, I really was fine not having any. I didn't really want them.

So here's to the start of day 5 in what's bound to be an impressive one week loss.

Day 4 over, and not sure pasta works for me

2011-11-03T20:24:00.002+11:00

I'll be interested to see what happens on the scale tomorrow - pasta is allowed on The Rice Diet, so I thought I'd mix it up a little, but because you can't have sauces that have salt in them, that pretty much rules out most anything store-bought I could put on it. So I opened a can of diced tomatoes, measured out my 1 cup serving and heated it up with a bit of garlic, oregano and basil, then tossed that through the pasta. It was still pretty bland. Yeah, I know - that's the point of this diet, and everything else I've been eating is bland too -- but somehow that just doesn't work for me with pasta. I didn't mind the rice and sweet potatoes or beans, plain potatoes microwaved with just a touch of ketchup is OK, but for some reason the pasta wasn't as satisfying for me. I mean, it filled me, I'm fine and not hungry, I just didn't enjoy eating it as much as I did the rice or potatoes. I cooked enough for 2 meals, so I'll have to have it once more, but I think I'll focus on rice, beans, potatoes and sweet potatoes as those seem to be the most satisfying for me.

So here's what I ate today:

Breakfast:
3/4c Be Natural whole grain cereal (with apple and flame raisins)
1 cup soy milk
1c fresh blueberries

Lunch:
1-1/2 cup baked potato (1 larger potato, slice in 1/4" intervals not all the way through, then microwaved 5 minutes) with a small amount of ketchup
1-1/2 cup cooked mixed veggies
1 medium apple

Dinner:
1-1/2 cup pasta
1 cup cooked tomatoes with garlic, oregano and basil
1-1/2 cup cooked mixed veggies
1 kiwi-fruit

I also had a glass of Metamucil last night for added fiber, though I couldn't find any information as to whether this was allowed on the plan. I'll be doing that again tonight. I've been a bit tired this week, but I don't think that's anything to do with the diet. My Halloween Party went until 4AM the next morning, and while that was Sat/Sun I just don't feel I've caught up on my rest since then. Other than being a bit tired, I feel great, and I'm still quite happy with the weight loss.

Another 2 lb drop as I start day 4

2011-11-03T07:49:00.000+11:00

Hi guys - weigh in this morning was 119kg (262.35 lb) so that.s a drop of .9kg (1.98 lb) from yesterday bringing my total loss since Monday to 3.9kg (8.6 lb). It's slowing a bit each day, but that's to be expected. Thrilled so far! Gotta rush off to work, just wanted to check in.

Day 3 on the Rice Diet - and doing well

2011-11-02T19:43:00.001+11:00

I'm still on a high after today's weigh-in, and just wondering how long the big drops will continue. They say that depending on your starting weight and other factors, women can lose 19 pounds the first month. I would love to keep dropping at this rate, but of course it will slow down.

Despite the bland foods, I'm not minding what I'm eating. Even tonight as I ate my rice, beans and sweet potato mixture while hubby was making himself some beef stroganoff, I didn't mind. Of course I haven't eaten meat in years, but still I thought it would be hard to eat my bland meal while he ate that, but it really wasn't. I actually liked the taste tonight as I did whip up some home made fresh salsa to top it with. Bland compared to things I usually eat, but still nice and certainly enjoyable.

So here's today's menu:

Breakfast:
3/4c Be Natural whole grain cereal (with apple and flame raisins)
1 cup soy milk
1 kiwi-fruit

Lunch:
1-1/2 cup baked potato (1 larger potato, slice in 1/4" intervals not all the way through, then microwaved 5 minutes) with a small amount of ketchup
1-1/2 cup cooked mixed veggies
1 medium orange

Dinner:
1/3 cup brown rice, 1/3 cup no-salt kidney beans and 1/2 cup leftover roasted sweet potato
1 cup lettuce and 1c diced fresh tomatoes pureed with a bit of green pepper, garlic and onion to make a fresh salsa
1c fresh blueberries

Again there were 1 or 2 times today that I felt just a little bit hungry - not much and it passed. I have only been drinking water, no soft drinks at all. I only drink diet anyway, but I really wanted to stay true to plan and drink water. And once again, I feel great!

Just a quick check-in as I start day 3 with another nice loss

2011-11-02T08:11:00.000+11:00

I had to stop in just to report another loss yesterday of 1.2 kg or 2.65 lb. That brings my total loss in just 2 days to 3 kg or 6.61 pounds. The ticker is rounding that higher for some reason, but either way I'm thrilled. I have to rush off to work so I'll check in later and report today's menu.

Day 2 on the Rice Diet - another good day and a good loss!!

2011-11-01T22:38:00.000+11:00

Yup -- see that ticker up there? You read that right, 4 pounds lost the first day (1.8kg), and I feel great! I've got to say, I still have not felt really hungry at all, maybe a tiny bit here and there but it passed after 15-20 minutes whether I ate or not. So I gotta say, all in all I am very happy with this plan so far. OK so what did I eat today?

Breakfast:
3/4c Be Natural whole grain cereal (with apple and flame raisins)
1 cup soy milk
1 small banana

Lunch:
1/3 cup brown rice, 1/3 cup no-salt kidney beans and 1/2 cup leftover roasted sweet potato
1 cup lettuce and 1c diced fresh tomatoes

Dinner:
1-1/2 cup roasted potatoes (no oil or salt)
Small amount of ketchup for dipping
1-1/2 cup cooked mixed veggies (broccoli, carrot, beans, red pepper and cauliflower mix)
1 larger kiwi fruit

Now, I had planned to heat up the rice, beans and sweet potato mix and serve it over the lettuce and tomato with some salsa, like Mexican without the tortillas basically - but I couldn't find any salsa in the store that didn't have salt in it. I didn't have time this morning to make up any home made salsa, so I just ate it all mixed together with no salsa. Truth? Yeah, it was a bit bland. But I'm not thinking that's necessarily a bad thing. One thing I've noticed, both yesterday and today, is I'm eating slower, even when I am feeling a little bit hungry. I think it's because when something tastes really good I tend to eat faster. Being bland made me slow down and eat it more slowly, and I think that helped me feel more satisfied when I was finished.

Eating this way IS enough to satisfy in that I'm never truly hungry - but I'm never full and satisfied like I used to be either, if that makes sense. It's a different kind of satisfied. A friend used to say after a good meal she was feeling "fat and happy" meaning stuffed after a delicious meal. Well I am not feeling fat and happy eating this way, but I am feeling good, and not feeling hungry. And to say I'm happy with the initial weight loss is an understatement. I'll check in again tomorrow.

Day 1 on the Rice Diet - and surprisingly not hungry.

2011-10-31T20:59:00.000+11:00

My idea for the sweet potatoes was a good one - they didn't need salt and oil, they tasted great, which was good being as the brown rice was rather bland. I mixed them together. For each meal today - day 1, phase 1 - I had 1/3 cup brown rice and 1/2 cup of the sweet potatoes, plus 2 serves of fruit. A serving is 1 medium fruit, 1 cup cut fruit or berries/grapes, 1/2 banana or 2T raisins. So my fruits today were 1c blueberries and an orange, 1 banana, and 2c cut up watermelon.

Those little cups of rice and sweet potato sure looked small - I felt sure I'd be hungry. But I can't honestly say I was ever truly hungry today. There were times I felt 'empty' for lack of a better word, as in not full and feeling like I'd like to eat, but not really hungry either. All morning I didn't get hungry, but about 4:30-4:50 pm I was a little bit - again not much, just a bit. I had the last portion of starch at about 6:00 or so, and the watermelon about 7:30 - but I had a hard time finishing the watermelon. Not because I wasn't hungry - I was a little bit. More because I'm not really a fruit person and I had a hard time eating 2 cups of watermelon. I saved about 2/3 cup and finished it up a bit later.

I've drank only water today, which seems to just pass right through me, and overall I must say I feel good. I wasn't planning to weigh every day but was reading the book again and she suggests you do so you know if you plateau or go up for a few days - not really a worry on day one but I did weigh this morning (still 122.9 kg or 271 lb) so it'll be interesting to see what tomorrow brings. I do get to eat a bit more tomorrow, and more variety, so I'll report back then.

I nearly made it, but then I slipped - and I've paid the price.

2011-10-30T22:18:00.000+11:00

I wasn't going to binge, I wasn't going to pig out on any of those last-minute foods just because I'm starting a healthy eating plan tomorrow. I knew better, after all. Those left-overs from last night's party were to be taken to work tomorrow so someone else could eat them up. There wasn't all that much left of that dip anyway, right? A bit of that with some tortilla chips - OK maybe it was a bit more than I thought. Best put that back away now that I've scarfed some of it. It was a bit rich, I'm really not used to eating that kind of stuff anymore. Then a bit later, there were those two chocolate bars laying there, and hubby had one. Well the other wasn't going to hurt, was it? It's just one, not really a binge, right?

Then a short while later I was feeling sick and -- well let's just say they didn't stay down anyway so I guess the binge backfired. I still feel kind of crappy. Partly my stomach, and partly disappointed in myself because I wasn't going to do that and because it didn't even taste good enough to be worth it. Ah well. I'm actually really looking forward to healthy, clean eating tomorrow.

Rice, sweet potatoes and fruits are going to be a refreshing change, to be honest. Though as I measured out the portion sizes for day one I must admit I was thinking, 'that really isn't very much.' We'll see how we go. I must remember, day one is the strictest. It may be hard, but each day will get a little bit easier. And I won't have to feel like this again - stuffing myself with junk hasn't felt good in a long time, I don't know why I thought it would tonight. I guess it was really just the thought that I'll be on some sort of 'restriction' from tomorrow that led me to it, but I regret it and my body rejected it and I'm just over it now.

A great idea for cooking my sweet potatoes for tomorrow ...

2011-10-30T19:24:00.001+11:00

I was going to steam some rice and throw some sweet potatoes in the oven - then I thought why not adapt my favorite sweet potato recipes instead? I love these Rosemary Roasted Sweet Potatoes. If I season them with the garlic and rosemary only, perhaps moistening them with water first to help it stick, I'm hoping they'll be just as tasty, but without salt or oil. That with some steamed brown rice and fruit will make up all three meals for tomorrow - day one off phase one, the most restrictive day. I'll post the entire recipe below, but of course I'll be leaving out the salt and oil.

Rosemary Roasted Sweet Potatoes
From The Good Carb Cookbook by Sandra Woodruff

5 cups (1/4" thick) peeled sweet potato slices (about 1-3/4 lb or 840g)
1 tsp dried rosemary
1-1/2 tsp crushed garlic
1/4 tsp salt
1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Place the potatoes in a large bowl. Sprinkle with the rosemary, garlic and salt, and drizzle with the oil. Toss well to coat. Coat a 9x13" pan with non-stick cooking spray and spread the potatoes evenly in the pan. Cover the pan with aluminum foil and bake at 400 degrees F (205 C) for 15 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for 10 additional minutes. Turn the potatoes and bake for another 10 minutes more or until tender. Serve hot or cold.

The party is over -- and what a success!

2011-10-30T18:00:00.001+11:00

Everyone loved the decorations, especially the "psycho bitch"- they were stunned! She turned out much better than I'd expected, actually -- seeing her in daylight I just didn't find her that scary - but turn out the lights, put the black light and strobe light on, scatter some severed body parts around and turn on the creepy sound track ... My husband did this video, creeping up on her slowly for effect (hang in there, you'll see her - he was timing it to the soundtrack, I think).

Anyway, the party is over and we've done the shopping for the coming week. I'm all ready to start on the Rice Diet tomorrow, I've got to cook up some rice and sweet potato tonight so I have it on hand for the next couple of days meals, and I've got plenty of fruits and veggies ready to go. I'll be posting my menus as well as how I'm doing from day to day, but I'm going to do my best NOT to weigh until next Saturday. Difficult for me, being a scale junkie, but I just want to focus on the foods for this week.

Halloween candy is bought -- and put away!

2011-10-26T22:54:00.001+11:00

Today I got a supply of Halloween candy in anticipation of actually getting trick-or-treaters this year. They don't really celebrate Halloween in Australia, but some of the young folk are trying to change that. Each year they go around and some neighborhoods will hand out treats - many aren't prepared and so they're pulling muesli bars from their pantry to hand out, while others just say 'this ain't America!' and shut the door on them. A friend at work the other day said she found it all very confusing and they didn't know where to go or how to know if people wanted to participate. I told them there is actually a system in place back home - at least in Central Wisconsin, where I come from -- if the house has their lights on, they participate. If not, pass them by. She thought that a brilliant idea -- hopefully people will catch on here, cuz there's no point bothering people who don't want anything to do with it.

Anyway, hubby wanted to immediately tear open one of the bags of candy but I said absolutely not -- no way are we going to sit here and eat it - I am confident we'll get trick-or-treaters this year, as we moved a few months back and there are lots of kids in this neighborhood. Since I'll be putting my decorations out in the next day or two, they're bound to guess we might have candy! We're having a party Saturday night, but the treats will be for Monday afternoon -- anything left after that he can have, but I don't want them out anywhere near me. Fortunately, most of the stuff isn't things I'd like anyway - it's safer that way. :)

I've got a few home-made props ready to go - an evil witch to hang outside, and a CD playing under her in a loop with cool witch phrases repeating over and over - next to her an evil ceramic pumpkin that goes off when you approach, lighting up the eyes, and spouting eerie phrases as well.

Once inside there will be plenty of spider webs, bats and such creepies hanging around of course -- and we're roping off one room with bloody sheet hanging, a slow-flashing strobe light and a black light pointed at a psycho chic sitting with blood all over her and a knife in her hands -- she'll also have some psycho things to say, so hopefully that will give everyone a good fright. I'll take some pictures and share once it's all set up.

Binge dreams that make you sick?

2011-10-23T10:54:00.001+11:00

Have you ever dreamed you ate way too much food, and then woke up actually feeling sick? I've done that -- in fact, it happened last night. I wondered why I would dream something like that, and now I think it's subconscious. Maybe I'm trying to tell myself not to do the pre-diet binge I usually do. You know -- I'm starting a diet next week, so this is my last chance to have all those favorite foods I shouldn't have. So I not only have them, I binge on them. I guess I've been doing that the last week, so whether it's the dream or the reality, I do feel a bit off today.

I was reading a blog where someone talked about obese people who claim they don't overeat, and it kind of made me do my own reality check. In my case it's not that I 'say' I don't overeat or eat only healthy foods, but rather I let people think that because that's all they ever see. When I first switched to a plant-based, mostly vegan diet, everyone saw all the healthy foods I ate, and they always marveled - she's so strong, always passes on the treats everyone brings in to work, never has a chocolate bikkie. Over time I found myself eating unhealthy foods again, but never in front of them. I didn't want people to see me as a failure. Maybe I didn't want to see myself as a failure. But really, who was I kidding? She only eats fat-free vegan foods every day and she's gaining weight? Must be the PCOS.

It's time to stop kidding myself though. When I got married in 2003 I weighed 278 pounds. Over the next couple of years I got down to 197, but after a long plateau I gave up. The regain was gradual and for a while I held at about 240, but there's no denying that at 271 I'm pretty much back where I started again. It's time to stop fooling myself. It's time for a real change.

I'd like to avoid the pre-diet binge this week (since I'm starting The Rice Diet on Monday the 31st of October) -- obviously with the big Halloween party coming up and all the goodies I'll be making, I'm not claiming I won't partake of any. But I'm NOT going to go out and binge on any foods while trying to convince myself it's OK because I'm starting the diet Monday.

Could I achieve such dramatic results as these?

2011-10-20T00:32:00.000+11:00

As I mentioned in my last post, I'll soon be giving The Rice Diet a try. There is a lot of information out there on the net about this program, and some success stories as well (some of which are on the website linked to above).

These particular photos are from the 60s, and show dramatic weight loss in just 10 months. I've been successful in the past on many different programs, but the weight loss always slows and stalls for long periods of time and that's one of the things that makes me quit. If I were to have results this dramatic in such a short time, I think that would motivate me to keep going - after all, the last 10 months have passed in what seems like such a short time indeed. The next 10 months will pass whether I give this a try or not -- so why not? Can I dramatically change my eating habits AND my body in 10 months? We'll see.

A Change is Gonna Come

2011-10-18T12:38:00.005+11:00

A big one, in fact - one that affects several areas of my life. It's time, really. Firstly, let me say welcome to the new followers -- I was surprised to see I'd hit 50 followers today, being as I've pulled away from blogging for a little while. I have a tendency to blog when I'm doing well and clam up when things aren't going so well. Who wants to write that they've failed yet again? No one wants to read about that, right? But I learned something today. I had to cull the list of blogs I follow -- I had amassed a rather huge list, way too many to keep up with, and found I barely had time to skim through most of them -- so I culled it down to the ones that are the most helpful, interesting or meaningful to me in my own journey. In the process I learned something. The bloggers I kept, the ones I go back to for inspiration and motivation time and time again, the ones I ALWAYS read are those that share everything, whether they succeed or falter. Maybe that's what helps keep them on the right track. Pulling away from blogging clearly isn't the right answer for me. At the time of my last post at the end of August I weighed 115.8 kg (255.3 lb). I now weigh 122 kg (269 lb). Not blogging for me means I don't have to be accountable, I don't have to take care of myself. Maybe sharing the ups and downs and really talking them out to figure out what works and what doesn't is the secret. So I'm going to stay here and check in regularly, no matter what.

This big change also includes an overhaul in my diet - for starters, I won't refer to myself as vegetarian or vegan - I never really was comfortable with the vegan moniker anyway because it means so much more than just what you eat. When you've made the decision to eat a vegan diet in a country where there are few vegan options, you'll frequently find obstacles in your path. Sometimes there are no 100% vegan option available. If you weren't able to prepare ahead of time and bring something you can eat, you'll either go hungry or you'll decide to pick the best choice available, pick out that bit if you can and it'll have to be good enough. I remember the first time I did it. We were at someone else's house having dinner and I was doing the best I could to find something suitable to eat, and made the best choice I could find. She pointed out to me that in the list of ingredients, way near the bottom there was a bit of powdered milk or something. I said it was fine and she said, "If you can live with that." At the time, it seemed to me like she'd meant that in a judgemental sense. You know like, "fine, whatever you have to tell yourself to live with your choice" or something like that. Like it wasn't a good enough choice. Like if I wasn't going to be vegan enough, why be vegan at all? The more I live this way the more I realise I DO have to be able to LIVE with my choice. I am not being graded on how strictly I follow the set rules about eating a plant-based diet. Whether you do it for ethical or health reasons, not using animal products wherever possible is really the goal. I do that. I make the best choice I can as often as I can, and that's good enough. I'm good enough. I've decided to believe she really meant "If you can LIVE with that. If that's the way you can make this choice work so it becomes a natural part of your life, not something you have to feel bad for deviating from when up against an obstacle." That's why from now on I'll say that I eat a plant-based diet. As long as I'm living in a predominantly non-vegan world, it works for me. I can live with it.

Lastly, the biggest part of this change that's coming will start at the end of this month -- I'm going to start The Rice Diet. For those who haven't heard of it, it's not the latest fad diet or some crazy eating plan, though some on the standard American diet might see it that way, and I admit the name isn't very helpful because you eat a lot more than just rice. But it is a very strict program, especially in the beginning. I first heard of The Rice Diet from Dr McDougall's books and website. And in truth, once you're in Phase 2 it doesn't seem a lot different than Mary's Mini, which has been successful for me in the past. It's based on the 1939 Rice Diet Program, where dieters checked info facilities in Durham NC for an intensive two to four week boot camp focused on treating obesity, diabetes, heart disease, hypertension and kidney disease. It's been very successful for many years -- hardly a fad diet. The plan consists of a very low calorie, high-complex carbohydrate, low-sodium, low-fat, low-sugar, low-protein, whole-foods diet designed to detoxify and prevent or reverse chronic diseases. It also causes rapid weight loss. Dieters are promised fast weight loss of 20-30 pounds the first month, followed by 2.5-3.5 pounds per week in the later phases. Ricers, the affectionate term for those following The Rice Diet, eat more than just rice. The plan allows for whole-grain starches, low-sodium beans, fruits, vegetables, nonfat dairy (or soy milk) and very lean protein sources. "Eating a diet high in fiber from whole grains, fruits, and vegetables will keep you feeling full and satisfied," says Kitty Rosati, co-author of The Rice Diet Solution, which is the book I'm reading to get started. I really like that the plan also incorporates stress reduction through mindfulness, yoga, and meditation as well. I'll post more soon about the specific menu plan and what I'll be eating. I'm starting at the end of this month because I'm recovering from one of the worst sinus infections I've ever had this past week, and because next week is my annual Halloween Party -- but after that, I'm jumping in, so be sure to stay tuned for more information -- and as promised, I'll report the good AND the bad!

No, I haven't disappeared

2011-08-28T15:43:00.000+10:00

I'm still here - my last post on 31st July was about going back to Mary's Mini again and I must say - it worked. After a week back on that plan I dropped 6 pounds. But work and family events came along and I had to eat off plan and once I did I struggled to get back on. So what do I do about that? I think the trick is finding a way to allow real life to creep back in here and there where it will without thinking it means I've blown it and may as well give up. If I'd been able to eat that one meal off plan here and there and got right back on again I think it would work. That would mean MOST of the time I'd be eating according to the McDougall plan with occasional meals with friends, family or work colleagues that didn't fit the plan. As it is, I find I do great on plan for a week or two and then the one meal off plan feels like I may as well have something else off plan and start again tomorrow - and then I have something else off plan tomorrow and may as well start again next week, etc. THAT's what I've got to fix. I'm going to go through the McDougall cookbooks again this coming week and select some basic meals to try to stick to for a while, and when I do have that off plan meal, just get right back on again after that. Wish me luck.

A return to potatoes, fruits & veggies (Mary's Mini McDougall plan)

2011-07-31T22:50:00.000+10:00

I'm looking for a simple, healthy meal plan and once again that brought me back to Mary's Mini. It worked a treat when I tried it back in 2007 I lost 9 pounds in 2 weeks. I did find it boring for the first 4-5 days, but then it just becomes normal and routine. I think she's on to something because most species on the planet eat a simple diet with little variety. And potatoes are delicious and so good for you. I love veggies - not so much fruits, but I can manage one each morning with breakfast I think.

I found this massive 6kg bag of potatoes at the store for $6 - and they were really nice big ones, like I used to get back home -- Aussie potatoes are different varieties than what I got in Wisconsin, and I haven't found one that tastes like the big Idaho baked ones mom used to make. Anyway, these were all nice big ones so I bought it and immediately threw four large ones in the oven tonight so I'll have some ready for the next few meals. I'll make some mashed ones tomorrow to serve with salsa over them. I'll let you know how it goes.

Is this a sign?

2011-07-18T20:31:00.000+10:00

It's been a LONG 3 weeks since we began our move. Not much has gone to plan and there was HEAPS more work to be done than we thought when we got into the new house. I fell and broke my elbow while trying to clean higher than I should have -- good idea that.

The battery in my scale died last week. Just a day or two before that I'd gotten on to find I was back to 115kg but of course TOM was on then. I was still depressed to see it. Hubby bought me a new battery for the scale but he had a hard time getting the old one out and now that he has, it isn't working, even with the new battery. I think he damaged something while trying to get it out. In any case, I have no scale now. Me, the scale junkie. I think maybe it's a sign?

I need to stop focusing on the number on the scale so much and just focus on eating healthier and exercising, right? Well now that we're finally a bit settled in and starting to feel at home, that's the plan. I also plan to spend some time each day meditating and focusing on my goals. Wish me luck.

Checking In - and my stupid mistake

2011-06-23T23:03:00.003+10:00

So much has been going on in my life lately that I haven't been focusing on weight or working out or blogging in a while. Besides the usual crazy-busy work schedule, we've settled on our new house, so we've been focused on cleaning, remodeling, painting, carpeting, and moving. In the process I did something really careless. I was standing on a kitchen chair trying to reach the highest shelves in the cupboards to clean them and I couldn't get quite high enough. Hubby is tall, but he was working outside so I had this bright idea that if I just stepped up onto the counter a bit and stretched just a bit more I could reach those last few inches. Dumb idea. I lost my balance and fell off the chair, landing on my left arm and hip with a terrible thud.

At first it didn't seem too bad, I mean my arm hurt but I could still use it, I just couldn't put any weight on it to brace myself. Probably just sprained, I figured. But within a few hours I couldn't use it at all. The slightest movement caused intense pain. It was late and I didn't want to spend hours waiting in the ER so I decided to ice it, go to bed and if it still hurt in the morning I'd see the doctor.

With no improvement in the morning I went in and they took x-rays. Turns out I have a radial head fracture and there is fluid built up around the elbow. They put me in a sling, told me to ice it 20 minutes each hour for 48 hours and take Panadol.

So now I've got only one arm in the middle of moving house. I'm not much help to my poor hubby but fortunately some friends have pitched in to help. I'm told after 2 weeks I can start doing some gentle exercises and eventually (maybe 6 weeks or so) it should heal itself.

So that's my update. I'll post again after the move once we're settled in and hopefully I'll be feeling better then and able to start focusing on my health again.

I am not fat! The fat is not me! I hate the fat!

2011-06-04T20:02:00.002+10:00

Just practicing a little yelling. I've stumbled upon "Yell at Your Fat" -- a weight loss podcast from someone who lost 139 pounds and started a podcast to help others. They're very good and I've already listened to 3 episodes since finding her yesterday. She set out to make 139 episodes, but unfortunately there are only 14. I wish she'd continued. In any case, one of the things she reminds people of is WE are not fat. Fat is a substance that's attached to our body, but it's not who we are. You can hate the fat, you can want to get rid of the fat, but you can't hate yourself or feel badly about yourself for simply having this tissue attached to your body.

Most of the podcast is actually her just talking to us, pouring out things she's learned and offering tips and suggestions along the way. But she does intersperse funny bits of actually yelling at her fat and a segment from the motivational monster and even a segment that her dad does to introduce cool products and other things to help you along the way.

What I found really encouraging is that she is vegan, and she offers her opinions on how it will be easier to lose weight if you cut out animal products, but she's not the least bit preachy about it and you certainly don't have to be vegan or even vegetarian to enjoy her podcast.

Anyway, I have been working out at least 3 x a week with the trainers, and during the day when I'm at work my eating has been really good and healthy -- but evenings are still a problem for me. Work is so crazy busy that I don't have time to even think about food -- it can be 3:00 before I even remember to eat lunch. But the time between dinner and bedtime is a real problem for me. I'm not sure what I should do, but I'm thinking I'll go back to having the same thing for two meals a day (breakfast and lunch) which is my blueberry banana oatmeal breakfast and a big bowl of home made veggie soup (very low calorie) for lunch. I can easily toss together a huge pot of it Sunday afternoon and freeze half so I've got it available for lunches. For dinner, I'll toss together a big pan of vegan lasagna or something that I can get a good 5 or 6 serves out of and just freeze portions again. I don't mind eating the same thing every day if it's something I like, and this way it will be portion controlled and easy to heat up after my workouts. If I can do this, then I won't always be planning and thinking about what I'm going to eat, so that helps. And if I enlist hubby's help to ensure there aren't snackable items available in the house then even if I do get a craving in the evening, I won't have anything but low-cal veggie soup available to me.

Wish me luck.

Not counting calories this week.

2011-05-22T16:31:00.005+10:00

I didn't sit down and plan out every morsel I'll be eating this week. I didn't enter everything in FitDay and try to get the carbs and calories low enough, so I won't be beating myself up if I go over that level. Like I said last week, I think it's time to stop dieting and start living.

My loving hubby hates seeing me so frustrated as well. He loves me just as I am, but of course wants me to be healthy. He sees me working out regularly and planning menus and cooking healthy meals, and he supports me in that, even helping cook. But he also sees when I eat off plan and beat myself up and gain weight and feel like a failure. He thinks I should just work out regularly, eat healthy as much as possible, and don't worry about anything else; certainly not the scale, he thinks I should get rid of that. Maybe he's right.

So this week instead of counting every morsel, I'm just going to make meals I enjoy, but adjust my portions sizes. If I could get 5 servings out of a dish I usually get 4 servings from, that will help. I'd not only get used to smaller portion sizes, thus naturally lowering my calories, but it would also mean having to cook less often. That would free up more time for walking the dog or hanging out with hubby. What could be better than that?

Why try?

2011-05-15T23:42:00.001+10:00

Maybe Homer's right -- so why do I keep trying to win this battle? And how do i forgive myself for continually failing? I think that's why I quit blogging sometimes. I don't know what to say when things aren't going well. When I feel like a failure I don't want to 'put that out there' - I don't think people want to read about failure. I don't want to BE a failure. But I follow other blogs - even from very successful losers who've dropped a hundred pounds already and they still struggle. This battle will continue as long as I fight it. Maybe I should stop fighting and start LIVING.

Hubby said I should throw away the scale. He hates that the number I see there each morning affects how I feel about myself. He loves me as I am, thinks I'm perfect, and that I should focus on eating healthy and working out in and of itself, not as a means to achieve a specific weight. I'll be healthier and happier. He's probably right. How do I do that though?

I feel like I focus on food SO MUCH and I'm tired of it. That's whether I'm bingeing or eating healthy. If I'm off plan I'm planning my next pig-out, where to have it, what to have, where to hide the evidence. If I'm eating healthy I'm planning every morsel I put in my mouth, counting the calories, keeping an eye on the carbs, etc. I can't ever just be like normal people who just eat what they want when they want and stay healthy. Because they don't want to eat abnormally. They don't want to binge. They don't continue to eat even if they feel full, or sick from all the crap they've already ingested. I don't know what it's like to never have to worry about that.

People keep telling me they can see a difference, that I'm losing weight. WTF. I know that's not true, the scale reminds me every morning. Still I suppose the exercise is toning me up some and that's probably what they see. It doesn't matter. I just need to find a way to cope with living life every day in the PRESENT. I gotta live now. And really LIVE, not obsess over food and exercise routines. Live as healthy as I can as often as I can and love myself in the process - just as I am. That's really all any of us can do.

Hubby is helping. One of the struggles has been finding the time to make healthy meals when I have to work all day and workout after that. I'm a little bit scared, but he's offered to cook for me this week. What have I gotten myself into!? LOL Wish me luck.

Moving Forward (or getting my ass back on track)

2011-04-17T16:14:00.002+10:00

It's time. We've had a bad few weeks, and we've been letting ourselves grieve hoping it would get easier in time. It is, slowly, and we've begun to focus on our new home and picking out carpet, furniture, etc. We've got about 10 weeks before we move, so we've got time to shop around and get ideas. We've been spending a lot of time together to help each other get through this, and I think it's time to put some of the focus back on myself and my fitness goals. I worked out maybe once a week for the last couple of weeks, and that's not good. Happily I didn't seem to have lost my endurance during those workouts - I cranked out sit-ups with the best of them, but I can definitely tell that I've not been focusing on diet and exercise lately, and it shows on the scale as well.

Last week TOM was here so I expected the slight increase I saw last Saturday. But this Saturday I was up again, and I'm not going to slip and ruin the good work I've done since the start of the year. Grieving the loss of a beloved pet is human; I'm not going to feel bad for shifting my focus these last couple of weeks, but now it's time to shift it back again. Last week's gain of 0.4kg (.88 lb) and this week's gain of 0.6kg (1.32 lb) have brought me back to 109.4kg (241.19 lb) this week.

The clocks have changed, we're officially in autumn now, and it's getting chillier. I've planned meals for the coming week that focus on warm, comfort food that's also low calorie, like these favorites:

Chickpea and Swede Stew
Rainy Day Lentil Soup
Spicy Lentil Chili

Tonight is the stew, and while Susan's original recipe calls for turnips, I prefer to use Swedes (rutabagas) instead and use my own spice blend which is a blend of cumin seeds, fennel seeds, mustard seeds, and fenugreek seeds. I'm looking forward to it. Hubby even eats that with me, though he enjoys slathering butter on some crusty rolls with his serve.

Until we meet again

2011-04-05T18:53:00.005+10:00

Putting our beloved dog down this morning was the hardest thing we've ever had to do. Goodbye beloved Amber until we meet again. You are deeply missed.

The news wasn't good; it's time to say goodbye.

2011-04-04T19:03:00.004+10:00

Our beloved Jack Russell went in for her x-rays today - the pills the vet gave us to get her through the weekend did their thing, and we saw a renewed energy in her, so we were hopeful. Sadly, the x-rays today showed a large pancreatic tumor and another smaller one in the throat area, so it has metastasized. They think one of her kidneys is shriveled as well. We talked before hand and had decided if the news was bad we'd put her down today. Keeping her going wouldn't do either her or us any good. But when we went to pick her up from the vet, she was alert, excited, and happy thinking we'd come to take her home. We wanted to spend an hour with her sitting outside in the grass before the time came, but she thought we were going, and started walking toward home. So we walked around with her a bit circling back to the vet and she stopped, resisting. She didn't want to go back. It broke our hearts, and my husband couldn't cope - he couldn't do it today. So I talked to the vet. He'd said she likely only had a few days -- the pills made her seem better -- was there a chance we could keep giving her the pills and she might die peacefully in her sleep? He thought it unlikely. She would deteriorate over the next few days to a week even with the pills, and it would only get harder on everyone. I said my husband was outside with her and couldn't do it so we'd decide again in a day or two. But when we got her home we talked about it again. We just couldn't bear that her last few hours were in a cage in the vet's office. He wanted her to have one more night in our home, and we'd take her in first thing in the morning. So we've made an appointment for tomorrow morning. It's going to be SO hard, I know that -- but you had to see her. She was SO happy to be going home, and so excited and wanted to walk home right then. We just couldn't. God give us the strength to let her go tomorrow. I've been through this before, so I thought I was the strong one, handling it better than him. But I've had my breakdowns when he's not watching as well. We can't imagine life without her, and are devastated she won't get to live in our new house.

So much to be happy about -- but I'm sad this week.

2011-04-02T17:16:00.001+11:00

I did have a nice loss this week. I was 108.4kg (239 lb) this morning, so it's nice to be out of the 240s. That's a loss of .8kg (1.8 lb) this week and a total loss of 7.6kg (16.8 lb) since the start of the year. That's certainly good news.

We're also happy to be moving along on the house purchase, having met with the broker and filled out a ton of paperwork. The building and pest inspection is done and there are no major problems to be concerned with. It looks like we'll be signing the contracts early next week. Hooray!

But there's been bad news with our beloved Jack Russell. You may recall back in December I mentioned she was vomiting in the middle of the night, and they took x-rays and did blood tests but couldn't find the problem. It seemed to go away for a while, but recently she's been vomiting small amounts here and there (mostly liquid this time, though) and not just in the middle of the night. She's not been eating much at all and has lost quite a bit of weight so we got worried. We took her to the vet again Wednesday morning and they ran some more tests saying we'd get the results the next day. She happily ran home from the vet, though, and her energy seemed better. But on Thursday they said it looked like it could be kidney disease, for which there's not much they can do. We were devastated and watched her very quickly deteriorate after that.

They asked us to bring in a urine sample Friday morning to confirm the diagnosis. When my husband came in with it Friday he spoke to the owner of the clinic, an older vet with more experience, and my husband started discussing it with him. If it's kidney failure, she would be drinking heaps of water and peeing a lot. But she's not! The vet studied her blood work, not only recent but the stuff from back in December to compare it to. He thought it might be something called Addison's disease, which can also be fatal but is treatable. We could do more tests to confirm, but because she was deteriorating so fast and we didn't know if she'd last the weekend, he sent home some pills to try. Just two - one for Friday night and the other for Saturday morning. He said if that's what it was we'd notice a big difference by morning.

Since Thursday night she could barely walk without wobbling around like a drunk, kept her tail between her legs, and wouldn't eat anything, though she did drink a little bit. About 20 minutes after he gave her the first pill on Friday she perked up, got up and walked around a bit (with minimal wobbling) and wagged her tail a lot. We were cautiously optimistic, not wanting to get our hopes up too high. He was supposed to give the pills 12 hours apart so he woke up just after 5am and gave her the other pill. After she took it she wandered over by her dish and then the garbage can, sniffing around for something. Thinking she might want food, he got out some cooked chicken from the fridge and she scarfed it, tearing bits of it out of his hand. It was so exciting to see her eat again! He did say the meds could make her want to eat, so we still didn't want to get too excited, but at the same time if it was her kidneys the pills shouldn't have made any difference at all.

She didn't want to eat earlier today, even the chicken and sardines he offered her. But she did come outside with us for a while, moved her bowels, and ran around the back yard a bit. You can't imagine our faces when we saw her run! We were ever so hopeful that this was the problem, it was Addison's and we could treat her! But about 11:30 this morning the vet called, having heard back from the specialist he'd consulted, and the specialist thought it possible she had a stomach tumour. In any case, the vet asked us to stop in and pick up more of the pills to get her through the weekend, and we can run more tests next week.

So we don't know what to think now - it's possible they can operate on a stomach tumour but she's nearly 12 years old now, and in her weakened state do we want to put her through that? It's so hard to say -- we don't want to keep her going just for us if it's really her time to leave us, but at the same time if it is something that's treatable we don't want to give up on her. We just love her so much. Of course our other dog is terribly jealous of all the attention she's been getting, so we're careful to give him some of the special foods as well.

We want so much to be excited about our new house now, but hubby just gets depressed thinking she's not going to ever see it. I just keep thinking positive thoughts. We can only love her while we have her. I keep telling him to BE with her now, while he can. Love her and cuddle her and focus on positive energy as much as possible. We may have a difficult decision to make next week, but this weekend is all about loving her. So that's what I'm going to do.

Looks like we're going to be homeowners!

2011-03-26T18:51:00.002+11:00

I haven't talked much about our house hunting for a while now. We started looking around December 2008 and for a while we were going to heaps of open houses. We came close to buying one in May 2009 but decided against it. We've continued to go to a few open houses here and there, but only when they really piqued our interest. Today we saw such a house, and I didn't really expect much to happen because even when we've been interested enough to make an offer, someone else has always snapped it up before we even had a chance. So imagine my surprise when today we not only made an offer, but it was accepted. That's right -- it looks like we're going to be homeowners! I'm so excited and nervous at the same time!

A nice loss this week ... was it the starch or the fasting?

2011-03-26T12:23:00.002+11:00

I did have a nice loss this week, but I can't say whether it was due to increasing my starch and decreasing my fat, as recommended by Dr. McDougall. It may have been from the forced fasting I had to do for a day and a half. It definitely wasn't due to training -- cuz I didn't go at all! Nope, not even once this past week. Before you think me a slacker -- let me explain. The week started off with torrential downpours flooding several suburbs around our home. There were reports of people getting stuck in the high waters all over the place, and due to all the road closures, they were recommending people stay with a friend rather than try to get home. I didn't want to risk getting stranded, so rather than stay to workout, I went straight home. Others that I work with weren't so lucky. Some I checked with 2 hours later still weren't home, though they didn't have to drive much further than me!

The next day I got a call from the doctor's office. I was on the list for a colonoscopy and had been pushed back to sometime in June. But suddenly they had an opening and wondered could I do it this week. That meant one and a half days of fasting in preparation (other than the disgusting stuff they make you drink on the day before). Afterward, I've been having a lot of cramping and discomfort, so I took it easy the rest of the week. I've had this procedure a couple of times before with no problems, but I've read that it's not uncommon to suffer cramps for a few days afterward. If it goes on longer, though, I'll have to notify the doctor, though.

No matter what the reason, I'm happy to report I'm down 1.4 kg (3.09 lb) this week, for a total loss of 6.8 kg (15 lb) to date. Woot! :)

Not enough protein!? Too much protein!?

2011-03-20T12:11:00.004+11:00

This week I was less than pleased with my results. I still kept my carbs to about 60% of my total calories, which I try so hard to do because of course my trainers think I'm having way too many carbs. Let me say that my carbs are all healthy carbs, not sugar and bread and such. In fact I rarely eat bread or pasta, relying mostly on beans, lentils, whole grains, fruits and veggies. I've been attending group training 4 times a week, and this past week my average daily calories was like 1450. With that number of calories and working out so much, I should be losing big numbers. But this week I lost .2 kg - yes that's only 200g (or .44 lb). So my total loss to date is 5.4kg (11.9 lb). It's been 2 months, I should have lost more than that.

I know my trainers want me eating more protein -- but this time I've decided to consult people who actually promote plant-based diets. I've sent out a couple of email inquiries to vegan dietitians (who think I'm on the right track with my diet) and a vegan body builders (no reply yet) and I even asked Dr McDougall directly for his opinion. I told him what my trainers advise, and asked if he thought athletes or people in training require more protein. In a nutshell, he replied:

You are getting typical but bad advice - and you need to follow a starch based diet better. Diet (not exercise) is the key to weight loss. My guess is you have not been following my recommendations closely enough (too little starch and too much oil).

Read my articles:

Sept. 2003 newsletter on athletes

High protein diets are dangerous

Protein needs are easily met

I appreciate his input and I love that if you write him he will actually write back. I do not use any added oil, but I do put a small amount of tahini in my home made hummus. Well no more. This week I'm going back to McDougall basics -- which means the percentage of carbs will go up in the coming week, but the percentage of fat will come down. I pre-plan my meals a week ahead, so my average daily totals for the coming week are 1365 calories, 73% carb / 15% protein / 12% fat. We'll give it try and see what works for me. Wish me better luck next week. :)

8 Week Measurements -- and Lisa Williams!!

2011-03-14T23:32:00.005+11:00

OK a late post here -- a friend and I just got back from seeing Lisa Williams, and she was awesome, just like on her show. Unfortunately, we didn't get readings, but some near us did and there were some very touching moments.

Anyway, because I had plans tonight, I didn't get to workout, but I did stop in for my 8 week measurements (that were due last week). I dropped in weight, and in most areas in centimeters as well. But once again my body fat percentage went up and my muscle mass went down. How is this freaking possible? Not only that but the centimeters I lost on my upper arm came back? Hmm -- maybe all those bicep curls and push-ups you've got me doing? I don't know -- but I'm not going to worry about it too much at this stage. Anyway, just wanted to share the results. Click the picture to view it larger.

11.5 pounds gone and my first Strength Training

2011-03-12T15:38:00.003+11:00

I had another really good week -- dropping .6 kg (1.3 lb) for a total loss of 5.2 kg (11.5 lb) so far this year. I also added a new training class to my routine this week -- in addition to the Fit Camp on Mon/Wed/Fri, I added Strength Training on Tuesday night. It was tough and I could definitely feel it in my chest, arms and legs the next day -- but by Thursday I could REALLY feel it! Wow, I was sore! Mostly my inner thighs (probably from all the squats and lunges with a barbell behind my neck) but also my arms (from lifting weights and tons of push-ups). The muscle right in front of my underarms was so sore -- I guess that's the pecs? Anyway, between that and my inner thighs, I was feeling it for days after! So with that addition I'm now attending group training four days a week. I'm due for my 8-week weigh and measure so I'll schedule that next week and share the results here.

I've improved a lot in nearly every area, though jogging is still hard for me. I'm getting more and more comments from others in class telling me how much I've improved and how well I'm doing. It's nice to hear. I joined early in January and there were people in class then that I don't see any more, so maybe they're surprised I haven't quit yet. It is hard, that's for sure, but I'm not quitting. Every small gain in strength or endurance feels so good, and I want to keep improving. Sure, I want to lose weight -- but right now, I'm just focusing on getting fit and strong.

The new female trainer conducted Friday's class -- I like her, she does a good workout. But after class some of the girls were asking her about nutrition. She said she'd been really studying nutrition lately, and she recommended consuming only protein (in the form of meat, eggs and dairy) for three days straight, then adding small amounts of veggies and whole grains for the rest of the week. She said this was the fastest way to lose weight. It is really hard to bite my tongue when I hear stuff like that -- I realize that in the fitness industry most of her clients want to know how to lose weight, and lose it fast. Sure, we all want that, right? So did I when I was her age. But much more important to me these days is my HEALTH. I kept thinking, 'yeah, they'll lose weight fast in the beginning, but they'll gain heart disease or cancer.' I wanted to help her nutrition studies by loaning her The China Study, but I've learned it's better to keep my opinions to myself. I'm not likely to convince them to go veg any more than they're going to convince me to eat meat. And that's OK, it's a personal choice; I'm not out to be a crusader. I've got enough to do just focusing on myself.

Nutritionally this week I averaged 1464 calories per day (66/16/18). I generally like to keep the carbs at or below 60% so it was a tad higher this week -- I'll try to get that down a bit in the coming week. That's it for now -- I'm off to read how you all did this week. :)

Hooray -- 4 pounds gone this week!!

2011-03-05T15:20:00.003+11:00

Yes, 4 pounds gone (1.8 kg) -- finally a good report. Seven weeks from last time, TOM has finally come and gone again. I figured I'd have a loss this week, but I didn't expect 4 pounds -- that's fantastic. I know some of it is the weight I was holding on to for the last couple of weeks, but I'm just glad to see it gone.

I appreciate the comments from a couple of friends that I just needed to focus on my goals and not let it get to me. Focus is exactly what I did this week. I made a plan, as I always do, only this time I wasn't trying to increase protein like the trainer wanted -- I just went back to my original formula as it was working for me. And I did make that pot of 'rainy day lentil soup' I talked about -- man, was that good! I love home made soup, and this is my favorite soup of all. I do make a couple of minor changes from Susan's recipe, and that is to add the garlic right away rather than at the end (it just gives a better flavor I think), I add the potatoes about 15 minutes before it's done so they don't get too mushy, and instead of red wine vinegar I prefer balsamic. But other than that, I follow her recipe. This stuff is YUM, so filling and low in calories.

My calories for the week averaged 1602 per day (60% carbs/18% protein/22% fat) and I lost 4 freaking pounds. How good is that? Next week I have to do another weigh and measure at the fitness center so let's hope for another strong week ahead.

No progress still, but I just keep on keeping on

2011-02-26T17:38:00.003+11:00

Let's talk TOM again this week, because I'm so frustrated. I went in for a pap test today. They asked when my last TOM was and seemed surprised when I said nearly 6 weeks. I keep thinking it's going to be here any day because my weight's been up and down for the last 2 weeks. It's not fair -- either come and get it over with, or stop coming back at all, would ya? I have PCOS, I'm 47, and I have no plans to ever have kids, so I really don't need you visiting me anymore, OK TOM? In fact I welcome menopause, if it means I don't need to deal with your crap anymore. Bring it on. You don't even have to be here yet to mess with my appetite. In the week or two before your visit, you make me more hungry and more likely to veer off plan. I don't usually have a problem staying the course, but you make it so hard. So please don't go away mad, just GO AWAY.

OK -- got that rant over with. So I'm 113.2kg (249.56 lb) which is a gain of .88 kg (.4 lb) from last week. Not much, but not going down either. I'm definitely not on track for meeting my goals and really need to turn this around in the next 2 weeks before my next weigh & measure at the center. I may not have any control over my hormones or mother nature, but I can take better control of what I'm eating. In the summer I try to have meals that are easy to throw together without so much cooking, but I could make some soup this week. I can fill up on a large bowl of home made lentil soup, and it's like 230 calories and so delicious! So what if it's not winter -- all the rain we've had doesn't make it feel much like summer, either. So I may try that this week. Whatever it takes to get this stall moving again.

Let's talk TOM!

2011-02-21T22:44:00.003+11:00

No, I haven't disappeared -- just been SUPER busy, so just a quick post tonight. I reported a weight gain last week prior to my expected TOM, which STILL hasn't arrived, but the weight has come back off. So right back where I was the week before the gain. Ah well. It's very frustrating, to say the least. I know, I've got PCOS -- irregular cycles come with the territory. But for years I was on the pill to force regulate it, so when I suddenly quit taking them about 4 years ago, I was surprised to find myself relatively regular after that.

Except in the last couple of years or so, I sometimes hit a cycle that lasts 6 weeks, even though the weight gain that precedes it still comes at 4 weeks! I have no idea what that's about. I'll be 48 this year, so I know at some point I'll be in pre-menopause but when you've got PCOS, how would you know? I mean -- is it the PCOS or menopause that's wreaking havoc with my cycle? Who knows. I guess it doesn't really matter, it's just very frustrating when you're trying to have a consistent weight loss.

I'm still working out, and today I was getting heaps of encouragement from the other members, which felt good. Even the trainer singled me out and asked where I got my energy from, so I know I worked hard tonight. I guess it would be nice to expect a weight loss every week, but I've just got to accept that it doesn't work that way for me. Like it or not, this is where I am. Ah well. I'll try to check in again in a day or two. Hope you're all doing well.

Saturday stats -- vegan athletes and protein needs

2011-02-13T09:33:00.001+11:00

Alright, lets get the bad news out of the way right away. That TOM will soon be upon me, so I'm up in weight this week. Some months, like the last one, I just didn't lose anything, and other months, like this one, I gain a bit. I wish I didn't have to deal with that every month, because it is really discouraging, but there's no point wishing on things you can't change, so it's better to just accept it and move on. I'm 113.4 kg (250 lb) this week, which is up 0.6 kg (1.32 lb) from last week. I know it will pass in a week or so, but it still sucks big time.

As I said in my previous post, though I did well at the first official weigh and measure since I started training a month ago -- other than that pesky body fat percentage going up slightly, and dropping in muscle mass. The head trainer sent me a text message during the week to come in and talk to him about it. So I did -- he is concerned about my vegan diet. He says I need to reduce my carbs and eat more protein, preferably animal protein. Of course I told him that's just not going to happen. So then he said to use a protein powder, but I'm not sure how that will fit into my daily calories as he doesn't want me to use it as a meal replacement. I work hard to keep my carbs at or below 60% of my calories, but it's hard to do that without taking in too much fat. He's not concerned about fat, just getting those carbs way down. You can't convince him the body needs healthy (not processed) carbs -- in fact I know he's got some of the other girls basically eating a modified Atkins diet -- modified only in that it's probably lower in fat. He's really not supportive of the vegan diet, but of course ultimately it's up to me what I put in my mouth. Still I'd like to ensure I'm eating the right balance for optimal health, so I've been doing some online research.

Of course there are vegan bodybuilders and athletes out there -- and I did find a site with suggested calorie / carb / protein / fat levels for women, but it assumes you're a bodybuilder, and the recommended calorie intake was WAY above where I should be. And it didn't really suggest WHAT to eat. Then I came upon Thrive: The Vegan Nutrition Guide to Optimal Performance in Sports and Life. This looked interesting, and more along the lines of what I was looking for, so I've ordered a copy. I'm anxious to get that (though I'm already in the middle of two books, so I'd better get reading! LOL).

It shouldn't be this hard. We shouldn't have to count calories and obsess about food choices! Other than domesticated animals that live with humans, animals don't get overweight! They just eat what nature intended and stay a normal body weight. Maybe that's it -- eat what nature intended. I'm eating almost totally vegan and low-fat as well, but not always whole foods. I rarely eat bread, but I do have wholegrain cereal and tortillas. And at this time of the month, I also tend to give in to other binge-worthy treats that I know I shouldn't have (like last night) but I'm working on that. I don't know about you guys, but evenings are really the biggest challenge for me. That's when I tend to crave things I know I shouldn't have, and though I usually don't give in, some days I do. It's an ongoing struggle. I'm not perfect, but I'm doing the best I can most of the time.

I'm also finding more time to meditate and focus on positive affirmations. I know from experience that they work -- just change any negative thoughts that creep in from time to time to positive affirmations instead, and repeat them often. It really does need to be about improving in body, mind AND spirit. Hope you've all had a great week!

1st Official (4 week) Weigh & Measure at the Fitness Center

2011-02-09T19:42:00.007+11:00

Today I had my 1st official weigh & measure since joining the Fitness Center and participating in group training sessions for the last four weeks. The results were very good, but also confusing -- both to me and the trainer.

OK so Friday, January 7th was my initial weigh-in (training started the following Monday) and their scale actually said more than my home scale did at the time. So my official start weight was 116.1 kg (256 lb). But today their scale said less than mine did -- I came in at 112.9 kg (248.9) for a loss of 3.2 kg (7.1 lb) -- now that total loss does match the total I get from my home scale, so no big surprise there, but I'm not sure how accurate their scale is. Not only with weight, but other measurements as well.

It's supposed to calculate your % of body fat and water, and the weight of muscle, bone, etc. I remember thinking the percentages do not total 100%, which I commented on at the initial weigh-in. He said it was more to be used as a guideline to see if you're on track rather than worrying if it's 100% accurate. Fair enough -- so how did today compare to 4 weeks ago?

As you can see at left, there were two areas of concern. Despite having lost both kilos and cms, it says I went up in body fat and down in muscle mass? What the?? They've been working me pretty hard -- I can feel it getting easier to do sit-ups, push-ups, etc. I have more endurance to jog further. I know I'm getting fitter -- and having lost both weight and centimeters, how on earth could that be? The trainer couldn't make sense of it either. He just said as long as I'm losing weight and shrinking in size, just keep doing what I'm doing.

It's really weird though -- not sure what to make of it. I do recall, however, that he measured my height again and asked me for my age because they were not written down in the first record. So maybe he had entered the height or age differently last time? I think those would affect the results, because you have to enter those before the scale is ready to measure. Who knows.

I did 75 sit-ups!?

2011-02-07T21:35:00.003+11:00

OK another big day for me -- at group training tonight I got partnered with a nice young guy who was very fit -- I'm thinking I'm just going to hold him back! We're doing drills with boxing gear where you do 15 sit-ups, punching twice when you come up. Then your partner stands behind you with the pads overhead and you punch straight up, and then you flip over for push-ups and then back to the sit-ups again. You repeat the cycle for 5 sets. I went first, and I warned him right away I would likely get through the first set, but by the 2nd set my stomach muscles usually fail me. He stood on my toes for me, which definitely helped, and told me to just give it my best.

I got my first 15 sit-ups in, cycled through the punches and push-ups and got in position for the second set of sit-ups. I was struggling, it was definitely harder than the first set, and I didn't think I was going to get to 15. But he was encouraging me the whole time to push a bit harder, stay up a bit longer, and just telling me I could do it. It was like having my own personal trainer. I was definitely straining to reach him with those last few sets, but I did it, I got through all five sets. Not with the best form, and definitely not as well or as quickly as other, more fit participants, but I didn't quit, I didn't stop, and I didn't even change to crunches when it got tough. I struggled through and got all 5 sets. That's 75 sit-ups! Unreal -- I am feeling so great right now! Let's hope I still feel great tomorrow. LOL

I can do modified burpees!!! :)

2011-02-06T16:20:00.002+11:00

It wasn't long ago I reported that I couldn't do a burpee (squat thrust), and in fact I couldn't even do the modified burpee. So instead at group training I had been instructed to just reach up high, then squat down deep and touch the ground, then stand back up and reach high again. That is the beginner modification I've done throughout my 4 week trial membership.

So next week starts my official membership, and I wondered if I was up for a modified burpee yet. I decided to try at home first so I didn't fall flat on my face in training if I wasn't ready for it yet. I didn't expect much, given that I couldn't do it four weeks ago. But I can now! I did like 10 or 12 of them without too much difficulty! Seems like such a small thing to get excited about, but I really am! Now, at the time we do them in group training I'm not rested like I am now, it's usually after we've been going for a good 15-20 minutes that we start doing burpees, so we'll see how it goes. But I'm excited! Push-ups are getting easier too -- well, from the knees and not going all the way down yet, but my form's improving each time. It's cool -- it's like I can actually SEE and FEEL myself changing. I am changing, and it's an amazing feeling. :)

Saturday stats -- still moving steadily downward. :)

2011-02-05T10:54:00.002+11:00

So this morning I weighed in at 112.8 kg (248.68 lb) which is a loss of 0.6 kg (1.32 lb) since last Saturday and 3.2kg (7.05 lb) overall. I hoped for more, but as I've said in previous weeks, they've warned me that since starting group training I might not lose in the first few weeks, and might even gain due to building muscle. Does that mean I'm not building muscle then because I'm losing? I can sure feel my muscles, even just during everyday activities. Reaching for something, twisting or bending, I can really feel my ab muscles kicking in. Not really soreness or even discomfort, just feeling them working, which I'm not used to.

My four weeks is up now -- I have to officially join in order to continue group training, and we've already decided I'm going to do that. I also haven't had my official weigh and measure, which I'll have to schedule in early next week so I can extend my membership at the same time. I'm anxious to see how many centimeters I've lost.

I'm really proud of myself, because this is really tough for me, and yet I keep going, no matter how difficult and no matter the weather. It's been really hot lately! But I've gotten in at least 3 workouts each week, which is what they recommended in the beginning. I'd like to try adding a strength training class now. They only offer that one night per week (there is another class but it's during the day when I'm at work) but then there is both strength and cardio in the fit camp, and on Thursday the sweat camp does have a lot of strength training in it. So I'll either try that on Tuesday or another sweat camp on Thursday in addition to the M/W/F fit camp workouts.

Well, off to grab some lunch, then back here to try and stay cool the rest of the day, as it's another scorcher. I'll be checking in on some favorite bloggers as well -- hope you all had a great week!

Saturday stats -- another loss to report :)

2011-01-29T22:33:00.003+11:00

This morning's weigh in was 113.4 kg (250 lbs on the nose) which is a loss of 0.8 kg (1.76 lb) since last Saturday. Again, since they said not to expect any losses in the beginning, I'm happy with that. I had to get up this morning at 7:15 to get to the park for Fit Camp at 8, and it's my first time going to the Saturday morning class - but due to a public holiday in the middle of the week, I had to get in Saturday if I wanted to get my 3 workouts in. I'd hoped to do 4 this week, but that will now be the goal for next week -- the last in my 4 week trial. They say I've shown improvement in push-ups, and I can feel my overall endurance increasing a bit after just 3 weeks. I'm told I'll really notice a difference 8 weeks into training, so that's something to look forward to. During this morning's class I naturally modified where I had to, but did manage to do more than I expected. I kept up with the joggers for the first few times around the course, but I was just jogging while they were sometimes raising their knees up while jogging, or jogging backwards or sideways. Anyway, I will definitely be signing on for another 6 months of training after next week. :)

I've been doing a bit better the last few days at staying within my calorie goals as well. I'm generally pretty good, but sometimes give in to a snack or two in the evening, pushing my totals up another 1-200 calories. But I've done well the last few days keeping it at about 1650. Mostly that's because of something I heard on a podcast I was listening to -- she talked about feeling deprived when you're dieting, and said something that really made me think. Basically the idea was that you're deprived no matter what you decide -- you can either be deprived of the chocolate bar or deprived of a fit, healthy body. You make that choice every day.

I'm interested to get the results of that choice next week -- I didn't get a copy of my beginning measurements as their printer was down, but when I do the follow up ones next week I'm hoping to see a big difference, even if I haven't lost as much weight as I'd hoped. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go weed through my collection of DVD workouts. There are some I'd like to check out that I haven't tried in a long time. Wish me luck.

Play ball!!

2011-01-25T19:11:00.002+11:00

Well, they told me to get more active in general, so tonight hubby and I went outside to play catch. Well -- we intended to play with the dogs, but they were generally unmotivated. It's weird, they don't want to hang out outside unless we go with them, but once we're out there they go do their own thing and don't want to play much. So we had their interest for a few minute tossing a tennis ball around, but quickly lost interest when they realized they were supposed to give it back so we could throw it again.

So we started tossing it to each other, and let the dogs do their own thing. We probably spent 10 or 15 minutes tossing it back and forth -- and I put some oomph in it, and switched arms to keep it balanced. I reached and stretched to catch it as often as I could, and when I missed I had to run after it. Yeah, I did that a few times. LOL After a while it felt like we were actually getting a good workout. It wasn't a long one, but still felt very good after last night's fit camp workout.

Happy Australia day (Wednesday) -- I hope it's not going to be as hot as they predicted. We've got the day off, so I'm hoping it's not so hot that I can't enjoy some outdoor activities.

Yay me! :)

2011-01-23T18:57:00.003+11:00

Went for a walk at 8:30 this morning -- trying to beat the summer heat by going earlier. Hubby generally walks the dogs about 10AM but in summer it's already getting pretty hot by that time. So I thought I'd get up and walk earlier. I took one of the dogs with me and it was pretty good for the first half of the walk, but by the 2nd half it was already getting rather hot. I should have gone by 7:45 or 8 at the latest, but I hate getting up early on weekends.

I may try it tomorrow, though. I will be going to fit camp after work of course, but why not get in a morning walk as well? Is that too much when I'm just starting week 3? I've gotten in 3 workouts (not counting walks) for each of the first 2 weeks as instructed, and I wanted to step it up this week. I could do that by adding another class to the line-up making it 4 sessions, and maybe walking before work as well. Not sure what's best right now, just figured I'd play it by ear. But trying to get up early means getting to bed on time - I'm such a night owl, so that's hard for me, but I'll try to be in bed by 10. Then I should have no trouble getting up an hour earlier. Wish me luck. LOL

Saturday weigh-in -- a good week. :)

2011-01-22T12:49:00.002+11:00

Today was weigh-day, and TOM is over, so I expected a drop, but hoped it would be more. Then again remember the trainer said I should expect to gain in the first few weeks, and last week I held steady and this week I lost, so I really can't worry too much about that.

I weighed in at 114.2 kg (251.77 lb) which is a loss of 0.8kg (1.76 lb) since last week Saturday. I got in 3 group training sessions this week, and because I wanted to try something new I ended up doing two in a row with no rest day between. Bad idea. I already reported in my last post that Wednesday I walked for half an hour before the classes was to start, and then it started raining so I had to do the class in the studio, which was a half hour of solid ab work. The next day I did Sweat Camp, and that was more ab work as well as weight lifting, drills and relays. My abs have been rather sore since, especially on the right side. Like it actually hurts if I use my right side even the slightest, like to raise up out of bed. Is it possible to pull an ab muscle? Cuz that's what it feels like. But I'm still glad I did it.

I definitely didn't want to go again on Friday and make it 3 days in a row, and I didn't make it up early enough to go to the Saturday morning Fit Camp, so I'll have to do a workout at home this weekend. Probably tomorrow morning, I had too much else going on this morning to fit one in. But I will do it. I'm actually very proud of myself for DOING this. It's not easy. No only the work, but getting yourself to do it -- especially when I go to class and most of the people are very thin and fit already. There are others who are not there yet, but no one is as out of shape as me, I'm the fattest girl in the class. But you know what? People were very encouraging and helpful in Sweat Class Wednesday. One gal who was very fit and sexy -- the kind I would think wouldn't pay any notice to someone like me -- gave advise on using the weights and encouraged me while I was there. She was really nice. It makes it easier to do this when you're not made to feel like the fat kid in class.

I really am proud of myself even though it's only 2 weeks in right now. I know I'll get through the next 2 weeks, and I'm already confident that I'll purchase an annual membership and continue this journey. I have to. It's who I want to be.

You know, I used to dream about who I'd be and the things I would do one day when I was lean, strong and healthy. But I had it backwards. It's actually by doing the things a lean, strong and healthy person does that you BECOME lean, strong and healthy -- it's not going to happen the other way around!

If your dreams are always 'one day' I'll be healthy and I'll be active and I'll do all the things I want to do, then you'll never achieve it. It'll always dangle in the future somewhere, just out of reach. 'One day' will never come. But if you decide that TODAY you'll be healthy and active, and you decide that again tomorrow, and the next day and the next, then you will become that person. In order to BE a person who is lean, strong and healthy, I have to do what that person does. And I have to do it now, not wait for 'one day.'

Does a lean, strong and healthy person live a sedentary life and eat unhealthy foods? Or are they more likely to work out and eat healthy most of the time? They're probably more active in general -- not just when working out. Maybe they go for walks or bike rides or dance or play softball. So if what I really want is to be someone who is lean, strong and healthy, then I just need to act as if I already am. Think of it as playing a role if that helps, and really get into character. I was always a bit of a drama queen growing up. (Being a Leo how could I avoid it?) I wanted to act, but never let myself try because I wasn't thin enough. That was one of the things I was gonna do 'one day' when I was thin. Well here's my chance -- I can act as if I already am.

We waste so much time wishing we were something other than what we are, when all we really need to do is decide who we want to be and just BE that person. Act as if that's how we are, and we will be. I can be the kind of person who works out. I don't have to like it, I just have to do it. Soon, if I make it a habit, I will become the kind of person who is lean, strong and healthy -- naturally.

You know what to do. When life throws challenges in your way and you're tempted, or when you're not sure if you should have something you shouldn't eat or feel like skipping a workout -- ask yourself what would a lean, strong and healthy person do -- and then choose that.

Sweat Class

2011-01-20T23:02:00.002+11:00

I can feel every muscle in my body right now. Nothing is actually sore, I just FEEL everything. Well -- nothing is sore unless I try to actually USE that muscle! My stomach muscles complain rather loudly if I attempt to use them in the slightest. I think I maybe shouldn't have taken last night's half hour ab class and followed it with today's sweat class! Seems no matter which class I attend, they focus on the abs. He did say to get a days rest between, but I want to try the different classes offered. So I'm glad I did, I liked this class, it was tough. He had me alternating various exercises with the barbell and dropping to do push-ups or running across the room to drop to the floor and get back up again before lifting weights again. That was mostly the first part of the class, and during the second part we did a lot of ab work. We finished up with relay races where you had to drop and do one chest drop, one push-up or one burpee on the other side before running back and tagging your partner. It definitely held up to its promise to be a 'sweat class' I'd say. :) So tomorrow I'll rest, though I might walk. We'll see how it goes.

I did lose weight!

2011-01-17T20:40:00.002+11:00

I know, I'm not supposed to be weighing (at least, not worrying about what I weight right now), but I do. I weighed 115 kg last Saturday, and then last Thursday I saw 113.8. So naturally I was disappointed to find myself back at 115 kg on at Saturday's weigh-in. The trainer said I would likely gain in the beginning, but I held steady, so I guess that's good. But today TOM arrived -- wasn't expecting that for another week I thought. And that made me realize I always gain about a kilo before, so that would make a difference, too.

Anyway, I'm not worrying about it, I'm just eating right and going to fit class 3x a week at this point. And tonight's workout was good -- gets a little easier each time. The trainer said I could mix and match with other classes now, except of course for Boot Camp which I'm nowhere near ready for. So maybe I'll mix it up this week. We'll see how it goes.

They warned me this could happen

2011-01-15T09:45:00.002+11:00

Actually they warned me that at first I would likely gain weight when I started training. Well I didn't gain this week, but neither did I lose, despite eating well and working out three times. I've definitely got muscle soreness today - not pain or anything, I can just tell I really worked hard, and it actually feels rather good. Well -- until my dog jumped up on the bed this morning and I sat up to move her -- bad idea! My stomach muscles protested strongly, but despite that, I did sit up! Since Wednesday I couldn't do that to save my life, I'd say I recovered better this time.

So I'm where I was last Saturday, holding steady at 115kg (253.53 lbs) and about to go walk the dogs. I was tempted to wait until after the walk to weigh, but we've got to head out and look at a house today before lunch, so I won't have time. We haven't gone house shopping in some time, and we wanted to start looking again this year. Something interesting popped up, so we'll go have a look. After that we'll want to grab lunch, so we'll leave today's weigh-in where it is, and do as the instructor told me -- don't worry about it.

Friday's workout was KILLER!

2011-01-14T20:12:00.003+11:00

Well I wasn't sure how I'd go today -- after Monday's workout KILLED my abs, and I couldn't even do a single sit-up on Wednesday's workout, I was initially very glad that today's workout with the trainer focused a lot on the upper body. We did much more boxing exercises (with jogging spurts in between) than Monday's workout, so my arms are very tired right now. I imagine they'll be sore tomorrow! So we're like 40 minutes into the workout and I'm thinking wow, I might get away with no ab work! Silly me. LOL

You know what though?? I did it! I mean -- not as much as everyone else, but I did it. This time we paired up and sat with our feet together and passed an object back and forth each time we came up for our sit-ups. I thought, no way in hell will I get up, I tried Wednesday and even yesterday and couldn't do even one due to Monday's workout. Nope, not gonna happen. OK he wants me to try, so I'll assume the position and just get up as high as I can and try to grab the damned thing from him but I'm telling you it ain't gonna ... hey! I got up! And again! And again! I probably did about 10 this time, and I know it wasn't perfect form but I did them. He was saying to be sure to use your abs, not your hip flexors. Hell, whatever gets me up is what I'm using right now. I'll worry about that later.

OK -- finished those -- doubt I'll be able to do a second set. What's that? You want us to twist right then left when we're about half-way up to target our obliques? Yeah right, I laughed, I'll give it a try. Well -- I was past the half way point when I twisted right and left, but at least I did it. I was really proud of myself for getting through everything today. Obviously I modified again on the burpees and also on the plank, which was new for me this week. I did do it from my toes for about 20 seconds or so, then dropped my knees down. But I made sure to keep my knees way back, not right under my hips, so it was still pretty hard. And I made it almost all the way, collapsing about 10 seconds before he told everyone to stop.

So now I'm home, showered, and finished with dinner. Right now I feel fabulous. But tomorrow -- well, we'll see. And tomorrow is weigh-in day as well. Not sure what to expect, as they did say I might initially gain weight because of gaining muscle. Not sure if that would happen after only a week, but in any case, I'm going to try not to worry too much about the number on the scale right now. In fact, he didn't even want me to weigh at all in these first few weeks, but I'm a bit of a scale junkie. In any case, I'm feeling absolutely fabulous, so I'm not about to let some number on a scale change that. Hope you all have a great weekend.

Wednesday's Workout

2011-01-13T22:42:00.000+11:00

Wednesday's fitness class was canceled, with the option of doing the half hour ab class and the 45 minute card boxing in it's place. I wasn't sure I was ready for a half hour full on ab work. Had I skipped that and just did the cardio boxing, it would have meant starting later and I would have gotten home even later, and wouldn't have been having dinner until 8:30 pm. I don't like to eat that late, so I decided to go home and do a Turbo Jam workout. Remember those? I used to do them regularly a couple of years ago, and it's a good all around workout so I thought it would be a great substitute. Boy was I right!

It was a bit of a struggle, but I got through, modifying a couple of times where it was a bit tougher since I was still a bit sore from Monday's class. I was really disappointed that my class had been canceled on only my second workout with them, but I was very proud of myself for ensuring I got in a challenging workout after all.

After the workout, I wanted to try some sit-ups again, since I'd struggled with them so much Monday. I'd made it through the first 30 second set, but couldn't do any more when the next set came around. So I figured I should try a few more last night. I had hubby stand on my toes like the instructor had done and I tried to do just one sit up. No way in hell. It's like my stomach muscles were totally forbidding me from even attempting it. I was so frustrated! It kind of hurt to even try, and they simply would not let me even eek out ONE sit-up! So I did as many crunches as I could instead.

Throughout the day today I've been trying to do a few stomach exercises just to keep working it. Modified versions of course, like sitting on the edge of the bed and leaning back, then doing sit-ups from that position. Certainly easier, as it felt like half the workload was relieved. I figure it's kind of like doing a push-up from your knees instead of your toes -- it makes it easier to do them. Different positions make sit-ups easier too. I'm not sure how I'll go tomorrow -- hope the class isn't canceled, but at least I know that no matter what, I'll be getting a workout in.

Can you say STIFF and SORE?

2011-01-11T18:26:00.003+11:00

That's right, I went to my first fit class yesterday. How'd it go? Well ... there's a reason I didn't post about it last night. I got home, showered, had my dinner and ... well that's pretty much it, I was buggered! I mean I was tired and wanting to go to bed and it wasn't even 8:30 yet. Wow. I was still pretty tired this morning and slept in a bit late.

Fit camp was good. I did have to modify some of the moves as you'd expect -- everyone started off with a jog to warm up, and I didn't get too far before I had to slow to a walk. Then we grabbed partners and did a series of boxing exercises. Uppercuts, jab and cross, and punching up overhead. Then he had me doing a sit-up while he stood on my toes, and as you come up you punch left and right before lowering to the ground again. I struggled getting the first 30 second set done - when we came to it again on the full minute set, I couldn't even do it once. That's OK, he told me to just curl up as far as I could each time and don't worry about the punches. Next came push-ups! Believe it or not, I did get in two sets. No specific number, just do them for the full 30 seconds, so I'm sure everyone else got in more push-ups than I did. On the second set I didn't get as many as the first. Of course I was on my knees and only lowered myself about half way, but hey -- I did them! Then we jogged (and/or walked) to the tree and back another couple of times.

Then came burpees (aka squat thrust). He said to wait while he got the others started and then he'd come show me what to do. I thought he might suggest a modified burpee so I tried a couple of those while I waited for him to come back to me, but I couldn't even do the modified version. When he came back to me he didn't even suggest that, thankfully. He had me stand with my feet shoulder-width apart and bend down to touch the ground, then back up and stretch as high as I could, then back down again. We were to do 10 burpees and then jog over to the hill and back. Then 9 burpees and jog, then 8, etc. Some jogged to the top of the hill each time, others turned around at the base just before the steep incline -- I did that as well.

So I did everything he asked of me as well as I could. The one thing I did not do was quit. It was hard. I swear 10 minutes into it I was asking myself 'what the hell have you done?' But when it was over and I was walking back to my car I felt good -- I crossed over the walking trails where people were walking or jogging and I actually felt like I'd like to go for a walk. I guess my energy was just high at that point and I felt like I could do more. But I needed to get home to cook dinner, and I also didn't want to overdo on my first day.

I met a lady about my age or a bit older and asked how long she'd been doing this. She said 2 years. She's lost 86kg (190 lb), but 26kg (57 lb) of that was since she'd joined. She's had some injuries and joint problems, so she modifies the exercises as well. She definitely motivated me!

As the title of this post suggests, today I'm a bit stiff, a little sore. Not bad really, but I can definitely feel that I did something beyond my comfort zone yesterday. Today it rained, so I didn't walk -- and he said I should rest after each workout right now, so I'm OK with that. I do think I'll go do some stretches, though -- I think that would feel really good about now.

I thought I would do the fit camp Mon/Wed/Fri this week, but the other option is ab camp (30 min) followed by the boxing cardio (45 min) workout on Wednesday. I can't decide if I should stay away from ab camp until I can get through my crunches a bit better, or if maybe it's exactly what I need in order to get better? Looks like it might rain anyway, so either way I'll probably be in the studio tomorrow. I'll let you know how it goes.

So we've got a plan.

2011-01-08T17:53:00.003+11:00

I went for my consultation Friday at the fitness center. They weighed me, took measurements, and even produced the percentages of fat, muscle, water, etc. in my body using a fancy scale, and let me tell you, those numbers weren't pretty. He couldn't give me a copy, as their printer was down, but I remember figures like 48% fat and 56% muscle and 37% water and all that, and I thought -- that does not add up to 100%! He said something about it being estimates based on some sensor in the scale and not to worry about the actual numbers so much as how they would change in the next few weeks. He anticipated the fat to go down and the muscle to get higher. He said that it could possibly cause my weight to go up at first, because muscle is denser, or 'weighs more' as some people say. A pound of muscle takes up less room than a pound of fat, basically. So you'll be losing fat and getting smaller, but the scale might say you weigh more at first. I'm not to worry about that, and in fact he'd prefer I didn't even weigh in at all. Sure, no problem. I'm just kind of addicted to that, but OK if you say so. I'll try not to.

He then said I can participate in unlimited group classes for the next four weeks. He recommended I start at 3 days per week. He didn't want me to over do it and in fact if I felt tired or like it was too much during class I was to stop. I thought that was weird. Aren't you supposed to push me to do more? But he explained that it does neither of us any good to overdo the first week and be injured or giving up. I suspect he also wants to judge just how much I can do, as he said it was only for that first week or so. After that I suppose he'll know how much he can push me. But he's right. If it's too hard, it's easy to quit. He doesn't want that, and neither do I.

They have different kinds of classes but I can pick whatever ones appeal to me and just show up. They are often outdoors, but sometimes in the center. I just pick 3 sessions to attend next week and that's it. He didn't talk too much about diet other than to say obviously what I put in my mouth affects weight loss, but that from our discussions he thought I had a handle on what to eat. He said my BMR is like 1868 or something like that -- meaning over that number of calories I would start to gain weight. I said I was aiming for 1600 or so at this point, and he was fine with that. He didn't say what I should or shouldn't eat other than eat sensibly and don't eat things that obviously aren't good for weight loss - you know, most junk food, cookies, cakes, etc. And don't go out and have whatever you want for the coming weekend because you know you're starting Monday. Be sensible. Start slow. Do what you can. Sounds doable - certainly for a week, right? So let's see -- what classes are available at times I can attend next week.

I was thinking Mon, Wed and Fri - he wanted me to get in 3 times the first week. Monday I can choose from Fit Camp, Boot Camp or Zumba. Boot Camp says it's high intensity, and Zumba is held at a local club - not sure where that is. I think I'd rather try Fit Camp. Fit Camp says: Our most popular unchoreographed workout held at local parks (where possible) aimed at bringing all clients up to a good level of fitness and keeping them there. Fit Camp sessions involve boxing, running, core strength exercises, as well as upper body and lower body strength exercises. It also says it requires cotton boxing liners, and I have no idea what those are but I guess I'd better find out fast. I think starting with the most intense workout is foolish, and I've tried Zumba at home before -- so I think Fit Camp is where I want to start.

Oh, and my weigh-in this morning was 115kg (253.53 lb) meaning I'm down only 1 kg (2.2 lbs) for the week, but I'm fine with that. Will be interesting to see what next week brings.

OMIGOD I DID IT!!

2011-01-05T19:39:00.004+11:00

Yep. After work I pulled up out front of the fitness center and for a moment I was a bit hesitant to go in. I've never been the type who likes joining a gym, though I was OK with a Curves membership for a few years. There's always people at gyms who are WAY more fit than me, so I don't feel comfortable there. But this place isn't a gym, and while there are group classes it's more a personal trainer session that you share with 10-12 people. So I paid my $40, filled out the forms and left.

Because we've got family here another day or two for the holidays, my consultation is scheduled for Friday, and my training sessions start next week. I get 4 weeks of unlimited group sessions. Now if I like this and want to continue, then there will be an annual membership fee and monthly fees, and it's definitely not cheap. But if I like it and it gets results, then maybe it's worth it.

I must say, after I left and got back in my car I had a 'what the heck have I done' moment, but I got over that. It's OK to be a bit afraid -- the important thing is doing it anyway. And I'm also a bit excited, too. We'll see which emotion wins out come next week. LOL

Today's menu:
Special K (60g) with 1c lite soy milk
2 kiwi fruits
Small Salad with 2T ranch dressing
Baked Beans 220g can
Grain Waves 40g
Pizza Roll made with 2 Eatwell sausages
Heinz Italian Minestrone Soup 420g
Cocoa Banana Milkshake (1c choc soy milk & 1 banana blended)

TOTAL CALORIES: 1668 (64/18/19)

Ooh -- sugary juice drink

2011-01-05T00:11:00.006+11:00

I had forgotten I was scheduled to give blood this afternoon, so that meant I had one of their juice drinks when I'd finished. I sometimes get lightheaded afterward, so they don't like me to leave without having something -- and no way am I having a milkshake, meat pie or cookies -- so at 112 calories, the drink box seemed the best option.

Today's stats were pretty similar to yesterday:

60g Special K with 1c lite soy milk
1 medium apple
Leftover Samosa scramble (1/3 recipe, but no wraps)
1 medium orange
1 orange drink box
8 Mini Crustless Tofu Quiches
1 cup each broccoli & Carrot slices, stir fried lightly w/garlic & soy sauce
1c choc soy milk & 1 banana, blended into a shake
1 cup 1 Special K bar

1629 Total Calories (60/21/19)

By the time I got out of the blood donor center and ran my other errands, I had to start dinner, so I didn't get in an official workout or walk today -- but after dinner hubby and I played Wii for a while -- bowling and tennis -- and that felt pretty good. During bowling when it wasn't my turn to play I kept moving and doing stretches and exercises, so I'm sure that helps. And I heard back from the guy at the Fitness Center, so I'll be stopping in tomorrow to find out about that $40 certificate. I'll let you know how it goes.

Monday, and off to a good start with minimal hurdles!

2011-01-03T20:51:00.005+11:00

Yes, today is the day -- got the new eating plan all worked out and definitely sticking to it. And I did, really -- but we ended up at the in-laws house longer than expected and I was getting rather hungry and they had a platter of snacks out that everyone was munching on. Well, I had a handful of roasted, salted peanuts. But I counted them in -- so while today's calorie count was supposed to come in at about 1500, it's more like 1630 -- but hey, I'm still good with that. I did well with the situation only having the handful of peanuts, and it actually did tide me over so I didn't feel hungry. So here's today's actual menu, including the peanuts, which made it a bit higher in fat than I'd planned.

60g Special K with 3/4c lite soy milk
1 medium apple
Bombay potatoes & salad with FF dressing
2 kiwifruits
1 Special K bar
about 36 peanuts
Samosa scramble (1/3 recipe, but no wraps)
1 cup steamed broccoli
1 Soy Life blueberry yogurt

1628 Total Calories (54/19/27)

And I did get in a half hour walk with the dogs this morning before the rain started. Tomorrow it's back to work after 2 weeks off. That's always tough - but I'm actually looking forward to getting back to my normal daily routine.

Happy New Year!!!!

2011-01-01T11:28:00.004+11:00

Yes folks, I'm back and I've got a new plan for the new year. I had a lovely holiday break -- we went to the beautiful Blue Mountains! It was my first time there and I was awestruck! We rode a steam train at the Zig Zag Railway and that was very cool, I felt like I'd stepped back into the 1800s. We rode the Skyway cable car suspended some 270 meters above ancient ravines and waterfalls, with an amazing close-up view of the three sisters rock formation. We explored the Jenolan Caves and saw some amazing views at Evans Lookout. There was so much to see and explore there, and I quickly learned just how out of shape I've become. I couldn't keep up! I had to stop and let others pass me in the caves. I could barely do the 20 minute relatively level walking trail the Skyway took us to, so there was no way in hell I could even think about the Grand Canyon Walk, which is a 3-4 hour hike. In fact, at the 20 minute trail, I had to stop and turn back when it started climbing too much for me -- I told hubby to go ahead and check it out and meet me back at the rest area.

I was hoping that $40 certificate from the fitness center would have arrived while I was away, but it didn't. I won't let that deter me, however, I'll go in next week and inquire. I've got to do something. I am determined to go back there one day with hubby and I WILL be able to keep up with him! I know I could just start walking again or doing some workouts at home -- but I really want to give this a try. I was reading up on reasons to use a Personal Trainer, and one of them was getting results much faster -- it makes sense, with someone pushing you, you'll do more than you would on your own. At least, I will. I don't push myself as hard as I should.

But I need an eating plan as well. I was definitely eating more veggies on the Lunch Box Diet, but it doesn't dictate what you can eat for breakfast and dinner -- you're kind of on your own there. So I sat down and thought about when was the last time I was losing weight steadily? When I was doing Jenny Craig in 2006. They have a vegetarian plan, but it's heavily dependent on dairy or eggs and I don't eat those. So I studied the menu plans -- still had copies from when I was on the plan. I've been coming up with substitutes for their foods that I can buy right in the store for the most part -- but healthy vegan convenience foods are hard to come by in Australia so I'll still have to do some cooking. I want to keep it to a minimum in the summer heat. But I've come up with a complete Week 1 menu and I plan to give it a try starting Monday. We've still got family here until then, and I don't start back to work until Tuesday. Since we shop on Sunday afternoon it seemed like the right time. I'll let you know how it goes. Today I weighed in at 116 kilos on the nose, which is 255.74 pounds. That's a BMI of 43.9.

There's one last part of this plan -- making time to relax, de-stress, meditate, focus on my vision for my future -- whatever you want to call it, I need some serious ME time as well. So I'll be finding time wherever I can to tune into myself, get in the right mind-set and focus on my goals. I want to be healthy in body, mind and spirit. Here's to a healthy new me in 2011!

Sick and tired

2010-12-18T21:26:00.001+11:00

Things have been good with the dog. She hasn't gotten sick now since last Sunday night. We've gone back to feeding her at 4pm but give her a little something before bedtime just so her belly isn't empty. Whether because of that, or because whatever was making her sick has passed, she has not been getting sick all week and it's been wonderful. She's gone for walks and seems much more energetic again. I'm so happy. We never got a definitive answer for what was making her sick every night for a couple of weeks -- that bothers me a bit -- but we did rule out any major illnesses being the cause so that's a good thing. She has less appetite than she used to -- rather than gulping down everything in sight, she's been eating just enough to satisfy and then leaving the rest.

I wish I could say the same thing about me. I don't' know what's got into me. I was doing so well before she got sick. Then the stress of that, and the approaching holidays hit me. I didn't even weigh this morning -- I actually forgot because I had to visit the medical center right away this morning. I was sick a couple of weeks ago you may recall, feeling one of my sinus infections coming on, and for whatever reason the doctor I saw that day gave me a different type of antibiotic and only 5 days worth - no refills. That was unusual, but I took them and felt better at first. Then the last few days i could feel it coming back big time -- I've got some pretty severe chest congestion and now my ears are popping and my throat hurts from coughing. I feel so tired -- like in my eyes, if you know what I mean. I'm tired overall but my eyes feel really tired, like they don't want to stay open. So they've given me Amoxicillin and this time I got a repeat so I will get the full 10 days. And I've slept nearly all day and it felt GOOD.

Then I had to take hubby off to work and when I got back I needed to make dinner. What I'd planned to have was not in the cupboard like I thought it was, so I had to improvise. And before I knew it I was eating enough for two! I have no idea where that came from or why I did it, and now I feel so full I could burst. I have not been eating my lunch boxes for several days, telling myself I was out of supplies for it but because we're going away on holiday in a couple of days I didn't want to restock the fridge. So I've been eating up leftovers instead, and trying to use up all the perishable food in the house. That's OK, it makes perfect sense and it's still possible to do that in a healthful way -- but I definitely haven't.

The stress of the dog's illness is gone, though I'm dealing with my own -- and work has been busy and stressful, but that's nothing out of the ordinary. So what gives? I've made one good, healthy decision today and that was contacting the fitness place about that $40 gift certificate for 4 weeks to try their facility. I said I wanted to pop in Monday and buy one if they would hold it for me. He wrote back that they are not open any more through the holidays but if I was sure I wanted one he would mail it to me and I could pay before I used it. I sent him the address! This is the one Christmas gift I want to give myself. I think the certificate entitles you to try a bit of everything they offer for four weeks, not sure -- but in any case, I am determined to give it a go for 4 weeks. No excuses. I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.

The x-rays and tests showed nothing

2010-12-14T22:32:00.003+11:00

That's a good thing I realize -- I'm so glad -- yet it means we're no closer to knowing why our beloved dog is vomiting every night. The x-rays were clear, the blood tests showed no problems. So what now?

Any condition they can think of that might cause it has a ton of other symptoms that she doesn't have, and they likely would have shown up in the blood work. She could run tests for worms or parasites, but she said it's cheaper to just get the treatment for it anyway. Other than that they suggested a barium test (unpleasant for her and very expensive) or exploratory keyhole surgery. If the barium test showed anything, she'd need the surgery anyway. What to do!?

Hubby read somewhere to try feeding smaller portions throughout the day rather than one meal once a day as the vet has always recommended. Even just before bed it said to give her something. We tried that yesterday and miracle of miracles, she didn't get sick last night! She's energetic and happy today, which is great. It's so good to see that again.

So we're going to try that again and see how we go. If we can control it with changing up her eating this way it would not only be cheaper, but spare her any further procedures. She sure was happy to get home from the vet yesterday.

Diet-wise, my lunch box salads have grown smaller and I'm finding it hard to remember to eat every hour or two. I just am not hungry, or trust me, I would remember! Also, I get too busy at work to think about it, but as long as I'm still eating the salads, I hope it will still be OK. With working late several nights (preparation for my vacation next week) and worrying about the dog, I have not got in much exercise. That's going to change after the holidays.

I've been thinking about getting a gift card from the fitness place across from work -- normally their classes and personal trainers are rather expensive, but they're offering a $40 gift card to try all their services for a month. I am considering getting myself that for Christmas -- what better way to try these kinds of services without committing to a long-term contract in case it's not for me? I'll let you know if I get one (they're limited to the first 25 inquiries) -- I've pretty well over-spent this Christmas already, we have SO many to buy for!

Worst week ever

2010-12-11T20:56:00.002+11:00

So after a day of fasting, we were pleased to see the dog didn't vomit in the middle of the night. Hoping the day of rest gave her poor stomach a break we fed her a small amount the next morning, and another small amount at her normal feed time. Then she vomited again in the middle of the night. It's so weird, it's always after we've gone to bed that she gets up to vomit. Like between 12-4am usually, but sometimes as late as 6am. So we've tried an experiment today -- we fed her this morning, but she wouldn't eat much. Then we didn't feed her at her normal feed time -- it seemed that she was getting sick about 8 hours after meal time on average, so we wanted to see if she would get sick 8 hours after her morning feed. She didn't. So about 7:30 pm I put some more food down for her, and she ate it all, not stopping for breath. Now that's the Amber I know and love, food is her life! It was very encouraging. So now we wait -- will she be sick in the middle of the night again? I pray not.

We've done so much online research and everything major that it could be, like liver or kidney disease, intestinal blockage, etc. has a whole list of symptoms -- she doesn't have any other symptoms right now. She's mostly in good spirits, energetic most of the time (for an 11 year old dog) etc. The other symptoms listed, like listlessness, tenderness in the abdomen, frequent drinking and urination, constipation, etc. she doesn't have, so what could it be? If it continues we'll have her back in to the vet come Monday. They can do some tests to rule out any major illnesses. We've tried the fasting, and as I said, she didn't get sick then, but obviously we have to feed her. And that's it -- she's having no trouble eliminating, I mean not to be indelicate, but she's pooing just fine, so some of that food is getting digested.

Between me being sick for 3 days myself, worrying about the dog, our work Christmas party, etc. I have not had a good week food-wise, and it showed on the scale this morning. A gain of nearly 4 pounds. But right now I'm so worried about my baby that I can't focus on that. I'm not throwing in the towel, far from it -- we grocery shop tomorrow and I'll be buying lots of fresh veggies and getting right back on track, but where I'd normally be so discouraged, it's just not on my mind right now. I'm too busy worrying about my poor dog.

It's breaking my heart.

2010-12-09T18:29:00.003+11:00

The vet said to fast the dog for 24 hours to give her stomach a break and see how she goes tonight. If no improvement, then we're to bring her in tomorrow. Do you know how heart breaking it is not to feed her? She just looks at us with those sad eyes, like the one thing she's always been able to count on is us feeding her. Like we've forgotten something. She doesn't understand.

We have another dog, and while we took him outside for his feed, she knew what was going on. Then she stared at us as we ate dinner and it seriously broke my heart. I know this is for her own good, and it's just one day -- why is it bothering me so much? If she makes it through the night without getting sick, she can have some food in the morning, but it's really getting to me. I hope she'll be alright.

It's not been a good week.

2010-12-09T07:30:00.003+11:00

I don't hold out much hope for this week's weigh-in. Oh, when at work I've been doing just fine -- but I was off 2 days sick, and then up all last night with a sick dog as well. So I haven't eaten well the last 2 days.

We're so worried about her that it's stressing us out. I keep telling hubby it may be time to accept the inevitable -- she's a Fox Terrier and she's 11 years old. Yes, smaller dogs can live longer, but she's started vomiting in the wee hours of the night and it's gotten more frequent. He's switched up her food, even cooking her chicken, rice and veggies and pureeing it so it's easier for her to eat, but she's still getting sick. Today he's going to try to get her in to the vet, and I told him to go ahead, but not to be surprised if there's nothing they can do for her. I've been through this before with another dog years ago. When the vomiting increased dramatically, she died shortly after. I'm afraid I may be going through that again. It's so hard -- we both love her so much, but she's definitely his baby. They have a special bond and I know that no matter when it happens, he's going to have a very difficult time with losing her. So I hope he gets some encouraging news from the vet today, but I'm preparing myself for the worst.

John Robbins personal credo ...

2010-12-05T08:32:00.002+11:00

I have read several books by John Robbins, and they always move me. In fact, his book The Food Revolution and The China Study by T. Colin Campbell are the books that motivated me to make the switch to a plant based diet. But today I really wanted to share this, his personal credo as posted on his site, because it not only moved me, but I stand for it as well.

BEING HUMAN IN THIS WORLD

A personal credo --- John Robbins

I am someone who works and prays for world peace. Perhaps you are, too. But our society is spending a billion dollars a day preparing for war.

I believe that inner peace is found when you love the world as it is, rather than faulting it for not living up to your expectations. I believe in forgiveness. I believe in accepting others for who they are. But I am part of a society that is spending far more on weapons of mass destruction and producing far more toxic waste than any other in the history of the world.

I believe in bringing a positive attitude toward life. I believe that love is stronger than fear. But our country now has more gun dealers than gas stations.

I have stood with my hand over my heart, pledging allegiance to this country and reciting the words "with liberty and justice for all." I want this nation to be the land of the free. But today a greater proportion of U.S. citizens are behind bars than any other country in the world. Many states now spend more money on prisons than on education.

I have been stirred to my core by the words and example of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I believe in this country's promise of equal opportunity for all. But young black males now make up 6 percent of the population of this country, and 50 percent of prison inmates.

I want to uphold the brotherhood and sisterhood of all people. I believe that how we treat each other says a lot about us as people. But how do you honor the dignity and inherent worth of every human being when shoe companies are paying basketball players $20 million to endorse their shoes, while paying their workers 20 cents an hour to make them?

I believe that that every child is a precious treasure. I affirm that all children deserve to be nurtured and protected. But in this rich and prosperous country more than 25 percent of all children are living in poverty.

I have been proud of my country. But today, among the world's industrialized nations, our nation is number one in billionaires - and number one in children and elderly living in poverty. Number one in real wealth - and number one in unequal wealth distribution. Number one in big houses - and number one in homelessness.

I love the natural world, and do my best to honor the living Earth. Perhaps you do, too. But even as many of us do what we can, the tropical rainforests are being destroyed so people whose cholesterol levels are too high can eat hamburgers a quarter cent cheaper. Rainfall now often contains such high levels of pesticides that it would be illegal to sell as drinking water. And the tallest mountain on the east coast is a garbage dump.

I draw great strength from my kinship with animals. Some of my best friends have had four legs. Perhaps you, too, have had a relationship with an animal that has enriched you as a human being. But much of our food today comes from animals raised in factory farms that resemble concentration camps.

There is so much pain and death in our times. This is not an easy time to be a person of conscience and feeling. It can be terribly hard today to stay in touch with your deep soul. It can seem all but impossible to keep your love alive. The world has a way of blowing relentless hurricane winds at our little flickering candles of faith.

This is what I have to say at this time in history. I stand here in the face of the anguish of our time, and I affirm that it is possible to see it all, to gaze fully into the abyss, and yet not become bitter and broken.

I stand for this. We are not here to be defeated. Our hopes are not empty vessels holding no truth. I stand for this. Our dreams and prayers are rooted in something greater than the forces of death.

I stand for this. Our despair and fury at the world's brutalities are part of our awakening. There is something mysterious taking place in this world that is part of our healing.

I stand for this. This world is not a tragic and terrible mistake. With all its flaws, it is still a sacred path to our destiny as human beings. There is horror and agony here, yes, and it can be overwhelming. But there are also infinite opportunities for new life, beauty, and the learnings of love.

Bitter winds are howling. Let them howl. We can shelter each other and put our little flames together. Maybe then we will find ourselves better able to face adversity. Maybe then we will find that the pain we feared would destroy us rather brings us back to what gives us life.

I stand for this. There are sources of joy here, and we are here to protect them and cherish them.

I stand for this. If we meet the world with eyes that do not flinch and hearts that are open, we will find ourselves capable of what is asked of us.

I stand for this. We who are alive, with breath in our bodies and love in our hearts, have much to be thankful for.

I stand for this. In our connection with each other we are more than strong and brave. We are humble enough to be human in this world.

Weigh in day -- and I did some jogging today!

2010-12-04T14:20:00.003+11:00

So today's weigh in was -- disappointing, frankly. After sticking to plan rigorously all week, and averaging 1436 calories (64/17/19) this week, I guess I expected a bigger loss. But I'm not going to let it get me down. I lost 0.4kg (.88 lb) this week, and a loss is a loss. I could feel myself starting to get bummed when I saw that number -- thoughts of 'WTF, I've been so good all week, this sucks', etc started to surface. But I quelled them. I will not be a slave to the scale! No matter what that number says, there were other signs this week that were very encouraging!

First, I FELT great, I felt thin and healthy and had a spring in my step all week. My bum bag (I can't call it a fanny pack anymore; fanny doesn't mean your back side in Australia, but rather the -- um -- front side!) was a lot looser around my waist though I haven't adjusted it. My clothes fit better and my hubby said he can see I'm getting smaller, at least through the upper body. Shouldn't all of these things mean way more than the number on that scale? Yup. And they do. But I'm still disappointed. What I'm not, though, is defeated! It doesn't matter. I'm feeling great eating this way, so why on earth would I quit?

Just a few short years ago I had nearly a hundred pound weight loss under my belt, and after getting stuck on a plateau for a long, long time I gave up. I let the fact that the number on the scale wasn't budging give me an excuse to throw in the towel and go back to unhealthy eating. After all, what's the point? It's not working anyway, why should I bother? Why continue to deny myself? But with that kind of thinking, the only thing I was denying myself was a healthy, fit body. So the one thing I will NOT be doing this time around is quitting.

For one thing, I don't feel I'm being denied anything -- I'm truly enjoying what I'm eating, and I'm not getting hungry. I've actually reduced the amount of food I'm putting in the lunch box this week because I can't eat it all anymore. And after dinner, I never get hungry anymore. That in itself is a major accomplishment! I'm one who was always hungry, even just an hour or two after a meal. It had to be my blood sugar levels out of whack -- and this way of eating has corrected that. So if for no other reason than that, why wouldn't I keep doing this? And as hubby reminded me, I did have a big drop last week, so really, there's no reason to be disappointed with today's number.

On another note -- I'm quite proud of myself! I went jogging this morning! OK not the whole time -- I went on my normal walk that usually takes me about 55 minutes to complete, only I added jogging intervals. Now I've done that before, and only managed to get in 2 or 3 jogging intervals, but this time I got 7 of them in there. And while I can't jog for a very long period of time, all up I spent a total of 6 minutes 15 seconds jogging this morning! For me, that's fantastic. I think if I keep that up, I'll be able to make those intervals a bit longer each time. So I'm really proud that I did that, and my walk only took 45 minutes today, so I shaved 10 minutes off my time by jogging a bit.

Hope you all had a fabulous week -- off to read some blogs.

Regarding my previous comment about boredom ...

2010-11-28T20:33:00.004+11:00

Just an addendum to my previous post -- I didn't mean to suggest my meals get boring at all because they don't. I know people who don't like to eat the same thing for lunch or dinner that they had yesterday, but that's definitely not me. All my meals consist of things I really like, so I have no problem having them two or three days in a row. I'm not sure I'd ever get BORED of the breakfast and lunch choices I have because they're delicious.

My point was that if I had more variety I know I would want to eat more. Like our Saturday lunch ritual -- every Saturday hubby and I go out to lunch. We tend to choose from the same two or three favorite places, but because it's the one meal of the week I can get something different, something I couldn't make at home, I do tend to eat larger portions. While I don't have breakfast on those days, it still reinforces that when I have a lot of variety in my meals, I will eat more.

I've purged myself!

2010-11-28T09:48:00.001+11:00

Of clothes, that is. I needed to free up some drawer space so I did a wardrobe purge. You know -- where you go through all your clothes and pick out the stuff you haven't worn in the last two years and get rid of it. I took a large garbage bag full to the clothing drop off bin at the store. Hopefully someone can get some use out of that stuff, because I obviously don't.

I'm not sure why this is always hard for me -- I tend to hang on to more than I really should each time because I keep thinking I might wear it sometime. But realistically, if you haven't worn it in two years, you're never going to. Some things I had to ask, will I wear it once it fits? Sometimes the answer was no, so in the bag it went. I pitched a few of hubby's things in there as well. Just those pull-over sweatshirt type jackets. He always gets some for Christmas and never wears them. He wears normal sweat shirts, but the jacket style ones we both prefer the kind that you can unzip rather than the pull-over kind, so there's really no point in hanging on to them.

I kept a few things that were tight but that I definitely WILL wear once they fit. If I haven't fit into them by the next wardrobe purge, I told myself I would give up and get rid of them. I say that every time -- this is it, the last time I'm going to try to lose weight, and if I don't succeed this time then I give up. I'll just resign myself to being fat for the rest of my life. I think that's because I've been fat my entire life (except one period in 1984 where I went from 165 lbs to 125 lbs in like 2 months by only eating one small weight watchers frozen meal a day and jogging every day after work). So I've been battling the extra weight and trying to lose it pretty much my entire life as well.

That's what started the whole problem really. I was about 165 pounds in high school and of course I thought that was terribly fat. So I was always dieting and trying to lose it, but 30 years of dieting only made me fatter and fatter. So why keep trying? I guess I can't accept that I'll never get control of this problem. Seriously though, isn't 30 years enough? When is it time to give up? I don't know the answer to that, but I'm not ready to give up yet. So off I go to make this week's shopping list and plan my healthy meals for the coming week.

You know there's an aspect of my Lunch Box Diet that has evolved to something that was suggested by Dr Oz, and I'm pretty sure Dr McDougall has said it as well -- pick one or two meals each day and have the same thing every day for those meals -- only have variety in the remaining meal. The theory is variety makes you eat more. When your meals are always new and interesting, you want to eat more. But if you eat the same thing every day, you'll get bored with it and only eat what you need to actually satisfy your hunger. The desire to overeat that particular food disappears. Well I didn't set out to have the same meals every day, that's just how it's worked out. I'm having the same breakfast every day, but then I generally did. My lunchbox has kind of evolved into the one that's quickest to throw together and that tastes great, so I tend to have the same one most days. Only my evening meals vary, and even those don't vary a lot during the week because I choose meals that make several servings. Sometimes hubby has one of those servings, but I generally eat the same dinner two or three times during the week as well. I'm trying to plan low cal dinners that I really like and that are quick to prepare -- don't want to be running the oven for extended periods as the weather gets warmer.

So what's on the menu for the week ahead? Breakfast is toasted muesli (usually with a banana but I left that out last week to keep my calories lower). My new favorite lunch box is mixed greens and raw veggies with diced veggie roast, rosemary roasted sweet potato chunks and ranch dressing. And for dinner? Well I can't go past my new favorite Rainy Day Lentil Soup (makes 4 generous serves for only 253 calories each) and I think for the other meals I'm going to try something I saw on TV a while back called Orange Pasta. Instead of pasta, you use a peeler to slice carrots into thin ribbons, and then saute them for a couple of minutes just until tender, not soft. Serve with veggies and pasta sauce for a low cal, low carb 'pasta' dish. Sounds good, so I'll give that a try with maybe some other veggies added. If it turns out well, I'll post my modified version of the recipe. Here's to a great week ahead.

It's been a very good week!

2010-11-27T15:00:00.004+11:00

WEIGH IN DAY -- This marks three weeks on the Lunch Box Diet, and even though I only graze from the lunch box during the week days when I'm at work, I think I'm still getting great results. Today's weight was 111.8 kg (246.48 lb) which is a loss of 1.4 kg (3.09 lb) since last week, and 6.6 kg (14.55 lb) overall. Since I started doing the Lunch Box Diet, I've averaged about 1.2 kg (2.65 lb) lost per week, which isn't bad at all.

In my previous post I shared an article I've seen online and in the newspaper recently claiming that rapid weight loss is better because big losses help you stay motivated. That may be true, but for me, the drastic measures I'd have to take to lose rapidly would kill my motivation. Feeling hungry or deprived or having to do excessive amounts of exercise would definitely sap my motivation, and I'd be more likely to give up because it was all too hard. What I'm doing now is producing good results, and it's DOABLE for the long haul. I think that's more important to keep me motivated.

I'm also worried about excess skin problems, which are more likely if you lose too fast. Not that I'll need to worry about that any time soon -- let's worry about the short term goals first. Right now I want to get below 200 pounds (about 90 kg). Then the next goal will be to get below 175 pounds (about 80 kg) because that's the point where I'll just be overweight, and not obese.

I will say this program does work as he says -- I'm never hungry, and my stomach must be shrinking because I've already had to buy a smaller lunch box. I just couldn't finish it all in the last week or so. Even my evenings are without hunger, despite that I'm no longer grazing at that time. I'm having a reasonable size dinner at about 6:30pm and I don't eat any more after that. I'm used to cravings hitting about 2-3 hours after dinner, but I've had no desire to eat in the evening on this plan. And I'm satisfied with my portion size -- for instance I've had my jambalaya a few times this week, and I used to always have a couple of slices of bread with it. I haven't been having those, and I'm not missing them -- and not getting hungry later. So I'm really pleased with The Lunch Box Diet so far.

Oh, I posted earlier the average nutritional stats for the meals I'd planned for the week, and I stuck to the plan fairly well, but did swap a couple of meals. So the actual average for the past week is 1570 calories per day, 59% carb/15% protein/26% fat. And yes, I've been exercising, though not to excess. This week I went walking 4 times -- twice for half an hour, and twice for an hour. My feet are definitely feeling it today -- today was really hot but I got my hour in and it feels great. I think for Christmas this year I'll ask hubby for some new walking shoes -- just love the cushion and support of new shoes.

You may have noticed my blog sub-title, that this is an evolution in body, mind and spirit. Well I am a very spiritual person and I read a lot of spiritual/new age books but in the past week I've made it a point to find time for meditation -- I've always wanted to but never found the time. Well now I'm making the time -- it's MY time. When I come home stressed from work I just go in my room, close the door and put on my favorite music, whether that be my favorite artist, Jann Arden, or one of my favorite relaxation CDs, Escape: Journey of Self or Tranquility: Silence Follows Rain. I've really enjoyed that time and it really helped me relax and renew my spirit.

Well, that's all for today -- hope you're all doing well in your journeys. :)

Rapid weight loss is better than slow?

2010-11-22T21:41:00.003+11:00

There's so many conflicting ideas about weight loss, and every time something becomes the accepted truth, another conflicting story comes out. I read an article in the paper recently that claimed rapid weight loss is better than slow -- and it's confirmed on several online articles as well. But the conventional wisdom has always been slow and steady wins the race -- especially if you want to keep it off. What to believe now?

I must say I agree with the rationale in the story that when weight loss is too slow, you lose motivation. But is it healthy to lose weight rapidly? I mean -- what would you have to do to keep it coming off at a rapid pace -- restrict calories to extreme levels, or just work out heaps more? It's no wonder we struggle -- even the experts can't agree.

Averages for the week ahead

2010-11-21T19:49:00.002+11:00

OK so on the Lunch Box Diet, you don't count calories, which is kind of foreign to me. Normally with every weight loss attempt I'm on Fitday tracking everything I eat. I mean I use it so much that I've made it really quick and simple by adding in custom meals so I can just tick the specific meals I eat and it does all the calculations for me -- it's not been time consuming this way (after the initial set up, that is). For the past 2 weeks on the Lunch Box Diet, I've not counted a single calorie, and while I'm not doing the lunch box on the weekends, I still eat healthily as much as possible. So I wanted to know how it stacks up nutritionally.

I planned the breakfast and dinner meals for the coming week and what's going into my lunch boxes -- I'm still doing the veggie burgers or veggie roast with home made hummus for three days, and for the other two I'll be trying each of those protein sources with my fat-free Italian dressing and a handful of semi-dried tomatoes. Now when I calculated the calorie count I used sun-dried tomatoes but when I compared the nutritional stats on the jars, the semi-dried tomatoes had much less oil, fat and calories, so I actually bought those instead. So while the fat content looks a bit high in my weekly averages, it will actually be a bit lower.

So how did the totals look? My average daily totals came to 1,412 calories, 39.8g fat, 204.2g carbs, and 61.3g protein. That's 57% carbs, 17% protein and 25% fat. Not too far off from what i was doing on my own anyway, other than lower in calories. I'll be anxious to see how this week pans out once TOM is over.

Not a bad loss after all.

2010-11-20T11:02:00.002+11:00

Weighed in this morning at 113.2kg (249.56 lb) which is a loss of just .6kg (1.32 lb) this week. At first I was kind of disappointed. For the amount of veggies I've eaten this week, I hoped I'd earned a bigger loss. But then I noticed TOM was just arriving, and that changes everything. Since I usually don't lose much at all, stay the same, or even gain in the days and even weeks before TOM's arrival, this is a decent loss. I'll certainly take it. And hopefully it means a bigger loss later in the week, so here's hoping next week is even better.

Still doing very well on the Lunch Box Diet, getting lots of raw veggies to graze on throughout the week. Friday's box was a bit heavy on broccoli because I'd run out of some of the other stuff, but that's OK, I like raw broccoli. My favorite protein/fat combinations have been the vegetarian roast or the grilled veggie burger chopped up into the box with my home made hummus, but I don't want the same kind of box every day. So while I love hummus, I want to come up with other kinds of dressings for the 10% fat portion of the box. I have salad dressing in the fridge, but it's fat free. Maybe I'll look for a different salad dressing this week, we'll see.

No lunch box today -- hubby is taking me to one of my favorite Vietnamese places for lunch, and tonight we're having a small party at our house so we'll be ordering in pizza. One of the things I'm really liking about this diet is it works SO well for me during the week when I'm at work, and yet I can have normal dinners, and eat normally on the weekends with friends and family, if I want to. I don't have to feel like I'm going "off plan" or "cheating" or whatever. I'm just eating healthy most of the time and having the occasional dinner out. That's doable for the long haul, which is so important!

I'd love to hear from anyone else who is vegetarian or vegan and also doing the Lunch Box Diet, especially to hear what box combinations you've enjoyed. I'm always up for new ideas. Oh, I did get one new idea out of the book when I read it -- sun-dried tomatoes! I love those, and they do have fat in them, so maybe I can still use my fat free dressing and just toss in a small handful of those! I've never tried them in a salad box, but they should be very tasty! I think I'll grab some for next week.

Hope you're all doing well -- I'm off to read some blogs! :)

Today's eating confirms I was meant to graze

2010-11-17T22:32:00.003+11:00

So it was my final follow-up visit with the surgeon for my shoulder, 6 weeks on from the surgery. So I took the day off work and headed to Sydney. That meant a long train ride to and from the orthopedic clinic, so I couldn't really do the lunch box today. So that meant going back to three main meals rather than grazing frequently on small amounts of food. Oh I ate a healthy breakfast and dinner, and for lunch we went to a Thai place where I had a vegetarian stir fry with peanut sauce. And though it was only the lunch size portion, all afternoon I felt FULL! When grazing I never feel full, but I also never feel hungry.

Not only did I feel full today, but I also felt fat! You may recall in recent posts I've said grazing throughout the day leaves me feeling thin. Well not today, today I felt fat -- like the fat was actually who I am rather than just a flesh suit the thin me happens to be wearing temporarily. I know that probably sounds weird -- I really don't know any better way to explain it, but if you've ever FELT healthy and thin despite being overweight then you'll know what I mean. Eating three full meals a day makes me feel more like the image on the right, whereas grazing on smaller meals throughout the day makes me feel like the image on the left (even though the mirror still reflects the other image). I just like how I feel better when I'm grazing. So back to the lunchbox tomorrow!

Oh, and the shoulder? Progressing very nicely, no need for any further follow-up visits. Healing faster than predicted and he was happy with my range of movement. His final question -- can I sleep on the left side yet? Nope. I said I'm nearly back to normal in every other regard, but I still can't sleep on my left side, and I ALWAYS slept on my left side, so I do miss it. He said that's always the last thing to come back and it could take 3 months from surgery, so maybe around Christmas. Let's hope so, I want my side of the bed back!