Round

I got on the scale this morning and was down one pound from last Monday.  Great, I’ll take it.

Especially because for the first time in a long time I’m feeling like what I’m doing now is decreasing the stress in my life and is enjoyable.  If I can live like this and lose weight, I can’t complain.

I ate generally healthy this week - not much meat as our beloved butcher closed forever, and what I did buy I stuck in the freezer when I realized I’d be solo for dinners most nights of the week.  I cooked a fair amount, and some of my old favorites and new one as well - I made chopska salad (Bulgarian), spring rolls (yum yum - that’s the new fave), last night I even made fish for myself, which is a shocker since I rarely eat fish, let alone make it, let alone by myself, but there was a small piece of my favorite fish (monkfish) at the market yesterday and so I grabbed it.

I had normal food during lunches (working ones) and ended up eating a fair amount of bread, as we had sandwiches 3 days running.  Plus one of the evenings a work dinner where I had pasta w a cream sauce (a mistake on my part, I should have asked more questions of the waiter, it wasn’t even very good for all those calories)…

Of course, quite likely the real reason for the pound of fat feeling free to leave me is the exercise.

Here’s how I did on exercise for the week :

• Monday July 7 : Swimming  45 min plus walking 40 min
• Tuesday July 8 : rest day
• Wednesday July 9 : 15 min light walking plus swimming 40 min
• Thursday July 10: 60 min light walking
• Friday July 11 : 40 min light walking
• Saturday July 12 :60 min serious walking, 120 min light walking
• Sunday July 13 : 40 min Swimming

I am not making a plan for this week because I don’t know what I’ll be able to do.  I am motivated to do a lot, but this week that might not be smart.

I will need to be more careful with diet if I don’t get in as much exercise, that’s for sure…

Planning, planning, planning.

There is nothing that can take it’s place, is there? Without a plan things rarely take the form we’d like - even with a plan it can be hard.

There is no way I’m going to be able to get in exercise if I don’t plan it.

So here’s the plan for the week, written down, visible, committed and able to hold myself accountable.

• Monday July 7 : Walk to and from appointment (40 min) AND either swimming or elliptical
• Tuesday July 8 : Some form of serious cardio
• Wednesday July 9 : 15 min light walking (get off metro early)
• Thursday July 10: 15 min light walking (get off metro early)
• Friday July 11 : cardio
• Saturday July 12 : cardio
• Sunday July 13 : cardio

At least one, maybe more, of these days towards the end of the week might be rest days.
And just to report in on this past week - I made my focus coming back to exercise and I did a pretty good job of it.

• Friday June 27 : swim
• Saturday June 28 : walk
• Sunday June 29 : swim
• Monday June 30: none
• Tuesday July 1 : 15 min walk
• Wednesday July 2 : 45 min walk
• Thursday July 3 : 15 min walk
• Friday July 4 : 15 min walk
• Saturday July 5 : 75 min walk
• Sunday July 6 : 40 min elliptical

All in all it adds up to something that would not have me thinking I was a complete slug 2 weeks ago… Plus I’m down 3 pounds today.

Well, I did my weekly wrap-up assessment that usually precedes a weigh-in, and all I can say is YIKES! Last week was hard, and not only did I miss a lot of my goals, most of the solid forward steps I’ve made in recent weeks went AWOL on me.  On the goals check in :    

I had a good and focused week, really profiting from a heavy workload and traveling husband. Here’s how I did with my goals for the week :

1. Create daily intentions and keep it in mind all day - progress! I finally wrote a good intention statement and have been writing it out daily “My life expands as I take good care of my body”
2. Consistently make good food choices - yes yes yes!!! This is getting easier!
3. Keep daily track of the number of fruit & veggie servings - tracking this helps keep it in focus, my average for the week was 9 per day
4. Investigate your resistance to exercise. Make yourself a deadline to try the public pool and a date by which you will either be in a new plan or re-join the gym. - haven’t done it, it remains a goal for the next week
5. A four-day challenge : use my daily diet planning sheets TWICE a day to see what that double-dose adds - did well at this all week except the weekend — will keep it a goal

I’m going to stick to these same goals for next week, and try to make progress on the exercise one.

I lost one pound this week, bringing me to -9 pounds from my re-start. It feels like a drop in the bucket, but at the same time 9 pounds and several weeks is starting to feel like I’m on my way. I am looking forward to crossing the 10 pound mark and even more looking forward to kicking the 200’s to the curb. I’d like to do that before summer vacation, although I am really not a fan of time-based weight goals.

This coming week will not be an easy one. My team has a huge presentation on Friday which will keep me hopping until then (lots of meetings in hotels, lunches and dinner meetings too). Despite the conditions, I’m confident I can make good food choices during the week.

Friday night the pressure ends, but the weight-loss challenges begin. Dinner with a dear friend from out of town on Friday, and then we’re going away to the Champagne region for our 1st wedding anniversary - with quite a focus on fine dining and wine. We’re going to be staying at a chateau that has a top-rated restaurant, and we have a tasting scheduled at a fabulous small champagne producer. This will not be a weight-loss weekend (nor will it be a free-for-all).

My plan is to have a focused week on diet, try to walk some over the weekend, and to make decent choices this weekend. I have decided to skip next week’s weigh-in and weigh-in instead on the following Monday (June 16), when I will have had a week back on track.

I try to think of my weight loss efforts a week at a time.

And I try to focus on changing my behavior in ways that will make me healthier and ways that should eventually pay off at the scale. Unfortunately, our bodies don’t always cooperate by losing in a straight line, and sometimes a few bad days won’t register any change on the scale… My approach is about putting the scale in perspective — as only a piece of the information I use to assess how I’m doing.

So each week before I weigh in (and usually the night before), I review my week. What I ate, how I exercised, did I keep up my motivation, etc. The progress made on goals if I had any. I congratulate myself with ies when I did well, and I look for how I could have done something different when I made poor choices - especially in situations that could repeat themselves.

That assessment of how I did becomes the REAL valuable information for the week. I then know, with certainty, how well I’ve done and what I need to work on. The scale becomes only a small, secondary piece of info. If I lose and I know my week was full of errors, I don’t get too excited, and if my week was great but the scale doesn’t move I know the scale will catch up w my good behavior down the road and I don’t take it too seriously. I cannot overstate the importance this has had for me, as I’m usually a slow loser with many plateaus, and if I were to just go by the scale I might just give up in frustration. Focusing on what I am doing - not what the scale is saying - keeps ME in control, and the motivation high.

At the same time I also think through the week ahead - what days or meals will be challenging, how will I deal with them, etc. What things can I work on to stay motivated, eating well or exercising regularly? What days and when can I plan to exercise? I try to keep my goals for improvement to no more than 5, and I generally keep the goals in place until I’m pretty sure they’ve become habit and I can keep that going easily and add something else in.

I used to do this in a spiral notebook back in the day when I lost from 250 to 167 — I did it for about 2 years almost never missing a week. I’ve come back to it at some point on almost every serious weight loss attempt I’ve made since then, and seeing it come back these past couple of weeks has been really encouraging, as for me it’s a sign that I’m serious about this and that I’ve accepted to be in this routine for the long haul.

I reviewed last week and it was really good.

I did great at my 2 day meeting, which was NOT an easy task. I went on to have a good week, preparing lots of healthy stuff, and not letting a stomach bug be an excuse to overeat when I felt better. I managed to stay on track this weekend, which I think is the first time I’ve done well on a weekend since I started back.

These are the goals I set for myself for the week, along with how I did :

1. Create daily intentions and keep it in mind all day : took me a few days to get to this, but I did it on Thursday and have used it since
2. Consistently make good food choices : yes!
3. Keep daily track of the number of fruit & veggie servings : I did - my average was 10 servings a day!
4. Be careful with cheese : I was. Had cheese 2x, but both times is was AS the protein at dinner, not in addition to…
5. A four-day challenge : use my daily diet planning sheets TWICE a day to see what that double-dose adds : this has been hard, I did better than the previous week, but still have a ways to go.

Still to be addressed is exercise - I’m going to start thinking about my resistance to it, because it is multi-factorial and I need to understand the whys to get to the solutions. I had every opportunity to go walk on both Sat or Sunday yet I didn’t.

The scale rewarded me with a nice 3-pound loss (which includes the PMS bloat that drove me +1 the previous week). All in all, I’m down 8 pounds in 5 weeks, and while I still have a long ways to go, the number of pounds lost is starting to feel meaningful. I’m still in the Fat Clothes and will be until I’m at least 10 pounds lighter than right now, but at least I’m not busting out of the Fat Clothes anymore.

My goals for this week will be :

So, what are my goals for this week? Mainly I’m staying the same, switching out one, since my challenge w cheese is mainly when my DH is around (and he’s gone this week!)

1. Create daily intentions and keep it in mind all day
2. Consistently make good food choices
3. Keep daily track of the number of fruit & veggie servings
4. Investigate your resistance to exercise. Make yourself a deadline to try the public pool and a date by which you will either be in a new plan or re-join the gym.
5. A four-day challenge : use my daily diet planning sheets TWICE a day to see what that double-dose adds

I am going back to using a formula that worked for me for a long time several years ago : writing up a plan for the week with a limited number of goals for the week.  Next week I’ll check in on how I did on these and setting new goals.  The idea is that something stays a goal until it becomes easy, then it can be replaced w something else.  Baby steps meets accomplishments!

So, what are my goals for this week?

1. Create daily intentions and keep it in mind all day
2. Consistently make good food choices
3. Keep daily track of the number of fruit & veggie servings
4. Be careful with cheese
5. A four-day challenge : use my daily diet planning sheets TWICE a day to see what that double-dose adds

I have some ideas for future goals, including starting in on exercise w a 15-min a day goal for 3 days a week, and setting a standard wake-up time of 6:30am so I can find time to do it.  Currently my wake up time changes each day depending on my schedule, but I’m wondering if I’d be helped having more consistency in wake-ups where some days of the week I’d have a few extra minutes, other days I won’t.   For now, it’s just an idea brewing…

This week has one two-day meeting in Brussels, so less control of food for those 2 days, and 3 normal but busy work days.  Our weekend for the moment looks blissfully free of major committments, so I’m hoping to be able to really focus.  The fridge is stocked, the celery and radishes already cut up, a few healthy leftovers are available for a quick dinner, and enough other veggies to challenge my creativity in the kitchen. 

My weigh-in this morning showed the scale +1, which wasn’t a huge surprise nor disappointment, as last week’s -4 seemed surprising.  I’ve also got some major bloating going on (in part due to the carb-fest at yesterday’s brunch) so it was no surprise to be up one pound, and it was in fact a good signal to me.  If I want to lose without exercising I need to be really careful with my diet, not just ‘pretty careful’ as I have been this past week. 

Being away from home for a week gives one an appreciation of the simple foods of daily life. I am craving fresh veggies - as simple as possible, fresh fruit & lots of water.

I went to the market today and stocked up. Yesterday I didn’t have the courage to face shopping so we made due with what was in the house, which was basically carbs and meat - my husband is rather predictable!

But today, crisp apples, juicy pears and succulent clementines joined the lineup, as did brussel sprouts, leeks and carrots. I also bought the closest thing I could find to pinto beans at the market and some split peas, and I have a split pea soup simmering on the stove as I write this. I found a recipe online that used bacon instead of a ham hock, because I don’t have any idea how to say ham hock in French, and the idea of a big bone thing in my soup is not appealing - the bacon comes pre-chopped in little packages here, so no touching is involved… I’m a real wimp when it comes to handling meat.

I’m hoping to get it together to go for a walk later today… no promises however, I’m pretty tired and my husband booked a massage for us in the late afternoon.

This week it’s back to a normal routine. The goal is to walk at least 3 times this week, and keep up with the paying attention while I eat, leaving something uneaten at each meal, and keeping the food diary. We are going away for the weekend on Friday morning, and I expect the weekend to be a pretty indulgent affair, food-wise. I’m going to try to really heavy-up the veggies all week in anticipation.

One of the things that’s always been helpful to me while dieting is PLANNING AHEAD. Thinking about the week to come, and thinking through how I’ll deal with the challenges I can identify.

I don’t think this approach is at all opposed to the Low Stress Weight Loss I’m trying to do, so here’s what’s up for the week :

I have a number of local meetings, and will have lunch out 3 or maybe 4 days this week. I also have the Pizza Test to do. Normally pizza test is lunchtime, according to Dr Hope, but we agreed in my case doing it at dinner this week makes more sense. I have 4 nights of pizza ahead of me : Monday - Thursday at least. I might have a dinner meeting on Thursday in which case I’ll have to add a pizza night on Friday. I’m guessing I’ll be pretty sick of pizza by then. Although I’ve often thought that pizza is a great food : mixing carb, veggie and protein…

Other than the pizza test, food goals are to plan healthy snacks I can take with me, as I probably won’t end my days until late.

Exercise will be more challenging - although Tuesday afternoon and Thursday morning should be do-able, and then maybe over the weekend. If I’m lucky maybe Monday night - but maybe not…it’s dark so early and so cold and rainy (ah, there are so many good excuses!).

I promised myself I would make a real effort to control my eating for two weeks, and then reassess. The key factor for me was to keep the stress of dieting to a bare minimum.

Well, my two weeks are up, and I need to decide what to do next.

How’ve the two weeks gone? I have been good about keeping a food diary. I have been trying to eat lots of fruits & vegetables. I have been drinking lots of water. Basically, I’ve done what I’d hoped to do — I am starting to re-build the healthy diet habits that will be necessary for me to lose weight. I don’t know that I’ve cut back enough to actually lose weight, but I’ve stopped gaining, and that’s a major step in the right direction.

I haven’t been so good on the weekends. The first weekend we were away for a romantic getaway, the second we had houseguests and a big wine-tasting dinner party, plus a brunch. I did better the second weekend, but not enough to lose weight. There is room for improvement on the weekends, but I’m not trying to be perfect here, I’m just trying to be better than I had been in the weeks and months before coming back…

Starting back, I also told myself it would be nice if I could exercise (walk) twice a week, but that if that was too much, I’d work it in later. I’ve exceeded the walking goal both weeks, and it’s actually been one of the highlights of my day a few times.

I decided to do this without a scale for a while. I know I weighed 202 on Oct 14th. I don’t think I’ve lost much weight since then (good weeks, but not so good the weekends). My body is still pretty messed up from the miscarriage and pregnancy hormones, and I am bloated and still not fitting into my clothes. Since right now I feel pretty motivated to keep going on this path, and I feel like the scale won’t add to that, I’ve decided that it’ll stay in the closet a while longer.

So, at the end of two weeks what will I do? I’ve decided I’ll do the following :

1) Keep on the same food plan (food diary, low starchy carbs, some cooking, and lots of water, fruit & veg)

2) Keep to exercising 2x a week but making it a formal goal now

3) Continue working w Dr Hope and maybe begin to work on a “prepare to lose” series of reflections & posts on this blog (I don’t want the two to conflict, however, so for the time being we’ll prioritize Dr Hope).

The key for me is still to keep it low-stress. I’m guessing this approach will keep me gently moving on my way through the holidays, and I will re-assess again sometime in January. Maybe I’ll be ready to have a real “weight loss” approach then.