First week’s results are in -yikes. Day 8

One week weight-in results: -1 pound (loss)

 

Breakfast: 4 egg white scramble with asparagus. Apple

Snack: banana, pear

Lunch: chicken pasta with lettuce. Cucumber.

Dinner: hot vegetables mixed with a low cal. sundried tomato and oregano dressing. So simple, yet it tasted extremely good. Probably the best tasting meal I have had since starting this blog. I should make this more often. Also had a banana.

 

Exercise: none.

Day’s evaluation: I could have done without the pasta. It was only 300 calories, but still -not the healthiest option I had. Oh well, I am happy with how I ate the rest of the day. I only wished I had gone for my walk today as planned. I kept saying to myself “let me just finish this one thing and then i’ll go.” I have to get used to setting a time and just going.

My seventh day. Lazy Sunday

Well it was time for my weekly grocery shopping and it did not look like I was missing much in the fridge. I still had more than half of my fruit and vegetables. I went anyway -I thought maybe some more variety would entice me to eat my veggies.

Breakfast: 2 bananas, 1 orange.

Lunch: lettuce mix salad with carrots, 2 pears.

Dinner: from a restaurant -white fish filet, rice, side mix of vegetables and 3 slices of tomatoes

Exercise: none

Day’s evaluation: Not perfect, but ok.

My sixth day. Does not feel like a diet.

 In lieu of my day’s description I offer these weight-loss jokes:

- I gave up jogging for my health reasons. My thighs kept rubbing together and setting my pantyhose on fire.  

- “Inside me lives a skinny woman crying to get out. But I can usually shut her up with cookies…”

- A great diet tip: A great way to lose weight is to eat while you are naked and standing in front of a mirror. Restaurants will almost always throw you out before you can eat too much.

- “At my gym they have free weights, so I took them.” — Steve Smith

- The only exercise I get is jumping to conclusions.

 

Breakfast: 2 oranges and 2 pears

Lunch: same as yesterday

Dinner: black beans, tomatoes and rice. Orange.

 

Snack: bran square crunch cereal -about 1 cup

Exercise: 1/2 hour walk/jog (interval)

Day’s evaluation: Not great.

My fifth day. Awoken by a voracious appetite

 I still felt sleepy and had several hours before I had to get up but all I could think about was breakfast. Starving I got up and straight for the chopping board I went, vegetables just flying. I wanted something hot and filling. Not having had dinner nor any snacks last night I knew I needed to go for volume with my vegetables today otherwise my ravenousness might lead to a binge day -the last thing I need right now.

I had a hearty breakfast and lunch (see descriptions below) and only AFTER that I got a call telling me to save up some “starch/meat” calories so that we could go out to eat tonight. Oh great!! Just marvelous timing. Tell me after I have already eaten chicken AND rice for both breakfast and lunch. Duh! Ok, so it is my fault in this case -who told me to eat such heavy meals so early in the day on a Friday. Like I don’t know there is a high chance of me going out. Plus it was nice to see that my friend was considerate of my diet and actually made the effort to warm me early so I don’t have to sit there feeling all deprived as superb but off-limits-to-me food is served all around me.

I knew I should have picked the grilled chicken salad, but we went out late and I was very hungry by the time we got to the restaurant so I went for my regular chicken lettuce wrap. I asked the waitress if I could have a side tossed salad instead of the fries.  She said no problem and wrote down my dressing choice in her little pad. When she brought us our food she quickly ran off, I think even before the plates touched the tables, not giving me a chance to complain about the fries on my plate. Argh! Why write anything in the little pad if they won’t bother checking it once they get to placing the order?! Well with the fries in front of me I could not just leave them there, right? A very determined and focused individual maybe could, but little me? Luckily my friend helped me with them, but I still ate more than I should have. (I should not have had any period, but I chose to ignore that little tidbit.) Next time I will set aside a portion of them that I am ok with eating so that I don’t go overboard with them constantly taking the “last one.”

I know it is ok once in a while to go outside of the main guidelines, but I have only been trying to follow this diet for 5 days now and I have yet to have a regular on plan day. Needless to say I am not happy with my progress. I have to get more disciplined. I mean do I want to constantly indulge myself or would I rather feel good about the way I look.  And what I am I really “treating” myself to when I indulge in unhealthy foods like mounds of french fries? A restrained life due to self-consciousness?

The way I look has such a great bearing on so many other parts of my life because it alters how I feel about myself. I need to start feeling better about myself. Therefore I need to work harder at my fitness and health.

———————————————

Breakfast: I was deciding whether to add fresh bell peppers, a little tuna or carrots to my unfinished dish when I got a strong craving for what I already had in the fridge -last night’s dinner.  Hmm. It was calling me. Problem was I did not want to forgo the nicely hot broccoli and onion (which surprisingly tasted good on their own) I had already prepared. I opted for mixing in a bit of the “dinner” food into my halfway prepared breakfast so that for lunch I could have last night dinner the way it was meant to be served.

 

 

Lunch: yesterday’s dinner. Chicken, green beans, rice and yummy, but fattening sauce.  

 

Snack: a piece of Moritz’s ice square chocolate (…no not within the guidelines. Oh, be quiet!!)

 

Dinner: chicken lettuce wrap. Did not take a picture at the restaurant, but it was very similar to this (except it had hot sauce instead of the side beans):

Late Snack:

Exercise: Finally got that vacuuming and mopping done. It gets me sweating for about an hour or more and therefore counts as ‘exercise’ in my book.  Ironically I have been more active before I started on this “transformation” journey. The two weeks or so before I started this I have gotten used to going out walking and jogging quite frequently. I thought I would raise the intensity and instead my workouts are getting more scattered.

Day’s Evaluation:

Regarding Starving Concerns

Only on my 5th day and already causing a disturbance. Wow I am talented.

Ok, it looks like I need to clear something up with you guys. Instead of replying to individual emails, I will do it here because I am guessing the comments will continue to pour in for a little while.

So hear me loud and clear: I AM NOT STARVING MYSELF. Nor am I intentionally skipping meals in order to makeup for slip-up days.

(Yes, I have come up with ”make-up” days but the purpose of those days is to eat super healthy to help balance out unhealthy eating. I believe in moderation, but it is not always possible at every meal so if I overindulge during one meal I’ll try to eat lighter on my next meal.)

I am very appreciative of you reading my blog. However, you can not just look at something and take it out of context. Life is not all black and white and not everyone has the same lifestyle as you. You may be very regimented with your sleeping cycle whereas I am not. For me staying up all night till the next morning and then sleeping during most of the next day is neither rare nor catastrophic. I don’t love doing it, but I don’t see anything wrong with staying up once in a while if I want to go out or finish something I am working on and then taking a long nap during the day or simply going to bed early. Hence some of my days are very long and others are short. So I realize you may have been taught how many calories should be eaten in a day, but I ask that you keep in mind that not everyone’s days are always the same length.

Yesterday I happened to have one of those short days. I was not intentionally trying to skip a meal. I did not have dinner because I was tired and went to sleep early. 

So, thank you to all who have expressed concern, but I can honestly assure you that I don’t have an issue with starving myself -quite the opposite in fact.  I believe I have already disclosed this in my blog; I have a tendency to overeat. (ok, yes -binge.) That is why I said I feel quite proud for being able to just go to sleep (I was tired) because normally if 3-4 hours have elapsed since my last meal I would eat even if I knew I am going to bed very soon. I did not make that clear in my post so I understand people’s concerns. I am trying to stop eating at bedtime (no matter what time bedtime is) and instead giving myself at least 2-3 hours of no eating before going to sleep.

I want you to understand that as an over-eater starving myself is not really possible  -I don’t have the skills to restrain myself from food for too long. Lots of times I would graze all day long because I have a hard time waiting even just the 3 hours between meals. I now realize my post was not really clear about what I was trying to achieve that day and what I was proud of. Maybe I assumed you guys know me. I’ll try and be more specific next time.

Thank you for stopping by, I’ll visit (your blog) soon.

My fourth day. Make up day.

This slightly dreaded ”make up” day could not come any faster. I thought I went to bed quite early last night, but I felt rudely interrupted by the alarm clock at 6:30AM. I told it I need more sleep. It gave me another 5 minutes and then started screaming again. Oh, damn you…  I got up -HUNGRY ALREADY. Yikes.

I am kind of worried about my ability to “make up” but, as of breakfast time, so far so good. Almost reached for bread first in the morning to make a sandwich, using my lack of time as an excuse to not make anything healthier. I had to remind myself that today I need to make up for yesterday (royal screw up) by eating super healthy and lite. That means mostly vegetables if anything else. Remember I even had ice cream yesterday -a major no-no. I had it under the premise that I would behave today.

BREAKFAST: Egg white scramble with tomato and asparagus. Two oranges.

 

LUNCH: I was too lazy to think too much about what I want for lunch so I just made the same thing I had for breakfast except that I added an onion and broccoli. After all, for me, it is better to not have too much variety at each meal or else I get too many cravings for other things.

DINNER: Nothing. Yes seriously. I went to bed early tonight.

I don’t feel bad about it, actually quite proud. Especially since I never did manage to get around to doing any exercise today. I have been binging and overeating often last several months so the fact that I can now skip a meal and just go to bed when tired feels really good. I have to be very careful though -because normally this kind of behaviour would lead to massive overeating the next day. I kept telling myself “don’t worry you will have a good breakfast tomorrow morning.”

Exercise: hmm how about vacuuming and mopping the floor? Is that good enough for a rainy day?
–> Well that was the plan, but of course I never got to it.

How many more times am I going to make that tea?!!!
I boiled water 5 times before I finally remembered to go make tea with it before it got cold.

I should take my measurements and some photos of myself (although I probably will not post the “before” pics.  –too shy.)

Totals for today:

Totals
Calories	Sugars	Carbohydrates	Fat	Protein	Cholesterol	Sodium	Dietary Fiber
390	44g	77g	1g	38g	0mg	462mg	16g

Day’s evaluation: Yay!!! Hurray!! I feel like I did manage to compensate for yesterday very well indeed.
Surprisingly it did not feel difficult at all nor did I feel deprived. In fact, I think I did so well that tomorrow will no longer need to be another “make up” day -I paid my dues, so back to my regular program.

My third day. Disaster

Some diet this is turning out to be. Funny enough though, even though I completely threw my eating plan out the window today, I don’t feel as though I have fallen off the wagon yet. I figure I did better than expected on my first day, which gave me some leeway for my next day and will eat lightly (let’s pray shall we) on Thursday and Friday to make up for today. Yes, it seems I can be very calculating when necessary… (hey, anything to help motivate and keep me on track.)

Today was spent outdoors all day and my diet sure suffered for it.

Breakfast: pear, orange

Lunch: halibut fish burger with side salad AND some stolen fries from my friend’s plate -Duh!! Why oh why…

Note to self: next time I deviate from my eating guidelines AT LEAST MAKE IT WORTH IT. This fish burger was definitely not worth the extra days it will take me to get rid of my surplus weight! It was breaded and fried -not something I was expecting. So the lesson of the day is: ask the server how something is made before making a selection. My next choice was the salmon burger which in hindsight would have been the better alternative.

Dinner: ice cream (what the h$#% ??) Well it was only 260 calories, but totally outside of my diet plan.

Exercise: Walk at the zoo. Yes for real -about 2 hours of walking around and looking at the various animals -very entertaining!! Also, an evening 1 hour (slow) walk at the local running track park.

One thing I was very happy with is that I did not eat anything after getting home around 10 in the evening. At that point I have not eaten for about 3 hours and so normally I would have come home and eaten the FRIDGE!! So I do get a little star for at least something today.

Day’s evaluation: [Failing grade for sure] Well today was a real test of my will and I failed miserably in adhering to my set food guidelines. Not all is lost yet however!! That is IF I manage to eat VERY sensibly tomorrow I will be satisfied with my progress so far; after all this is still better than my very common binge eating habits before the start of this diet (if I may call this a diet at this point).

My second day. Temptation knocks…

…and I race to the door to let it in.

Breakfast: 3 pears

Lunch:asparagus, broccoli and red pepper (same as first day but without the fish)

I tried to eat very lightly for my first two meals because I had plans for the evening -which usually means we end up at some restaurant where I have a very hard time resisting temptation. So this way, if I eat lightly the whole day before eating out I don’t have to feel guilty later on when I opt for something less than diet ideal. So my “sinful” dinner was from White Spot Restaurant:

Dinner: Chicken, broccoli and cheese oven baked in a creamy sauce with rice.
Came with the Spot’s side green salad (my favorite!!) which includes sunflower, pumpkin seeds and sundried cranberries topped with an Amorosa tomato, basil & red onion salsa. Honey sherry dressing.

Yes, I could have definetively chosen better. My excuse was that since I have been consuming a lot of vegetables lately, the cheese should help curb my sudden change in, uhhh, bathroom visit frequency.

Exercise: 1.5 hour walk with mom.
My mom is also trying to lose some weight and increase her activity level. Today she drove over to my place so that we can go for a walk with my dog.

Day’s evaluation: could have been better, but not thatbad in the end. Right?? Hmm.

My First Day.

Hello and welcome to my first blog post.

Today is the first day of my diet. It has been long overdue. I will use this blog to track my progress by uploading my stats, workouts and pictures of my daily meals.

Well, so far so good. I drank 3 glasses of water as soon as I got up. Interestingly I decided to make dinner type meal for my “breakfast” being that I got up so late in the day (that is a whole another story.) I made a fillet of fish (pan fried -hmm, maybe that was not such a good idea now that I think about it ) with a side of broccoli, asparagus and red peppers with 2 tablespoons of a new california (no fat, 20cal.) dressing I bought today. It was very good despite the minimal preparation. I only put a bit of lemon and roasted red pepper seasoning on the fillet.

Unexpectedly, this ended up being my only meal for the day, because I went to sleep about 4 hours after eating it; which is actually a very good thing because I overate last night (maybe in expectation of this new diet, in a ”yikes I am going to be starving soon, let me get in as much food as possible while I can” type of mentality).

I haven’t done any exercise for the day -unless I can consider my grocery shopping as such. I had plans to go for a very late evening walk with a friend, but we endedup cancelling because we both felt kinda tired (as opposed to the night before when we both stayed up late, talking on messenger till early hours of the morning).