No regrets

I do not regret having the best BBQ of my life at the The Pig in Memphis. I don't regret all the beignets at the Café du Monde. I don't regret the mufuletta or the red beans and rice. I don't regret ordering iced tea so sweet you could stand a spoon up in it every day for a week. I don't regret the chips and candy road food. Furthermore, I don't regret not getting up to exercise because I've been staying up late with my husband watching True Blood, drinking red wine, and eating brown sugar ice cream.

So, I guess I can't regret that this morning I weighed 134.6 pounds.

Knee trouble

My knees have been bothering me for over a year. Writing that down it seems crazy that I waited so long to see a doctor. I spent a lot of time thinking it'd get better when I lost a little more weight. Then I thought I was just getting old. Gillian helped me get good shoes for running and told me how to stretch properly, but still my knees hurt. At first only when I was running, but then more and more often going up stairs, and then most recently my left knee started hurting whenever I use the clutch in my car and sometimes when I'm not doing anything at all. I thought taking a whole month off exercise might fix the problem, but no.

I finally went to see my doctor, who diagnosed it as Patella Femoral Syndrome. This is a pretty vague "knee pain" diagnosis, she referred me to a physical therapist to get a better idea of what's going on.

I saw the physical therapist yesterday and the problem seems to be that my hips are both too tight and too weak. My knees can go out of alignment because the hip muscles aren't holding them in place securely enough, and also the tight IT band across my left hip is pulling on my left kneecap. I have stretches and exercises to do twice a day and physical therapy for six weeks. The therapist seemed to really know what she was doing, so I'm hopeful that this is going to work.

Track-O-Rama

This week I've tracked almost everything I've eaten, which in some kind of way that I'm sure can be classified as OCD, makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Also I'm sticking with mostly plants and meat, with a bit of dairy thrown in for good measure. The exception is breakfast - that meal will continue to be oatmeal until I buy a nonstick pan to make omelettes. (I'm pretty sure both Ken & I are now at high-risk for Alzheimer's given the state of the pan we currently have.)

God knows what's in store for us in Brazil in terms of eating, but apparently there's a lot more fresh fruit, and Ken is already teaching me how to order the chicken & pineapple sandwich (in Portuguese, natch).

Oh, and I made this crazy promise to myself to work out every day in June. So far I'm 4/4, and leaving for the gym as soon as I post this!

Reality Bites

I'm still here, and I obviously need to be here more than ever.

This morning when I went to the gym, Adrián made me get on the scale, even though I broke out in hives and a cold sweat as soon as we got near it.

It turns out eating more veggies doesn't work so well if you slather said veggies in dulce de leche.

"Last time," Adrián announced, pointing at the 71kg mark, "you were here." He slid the weight across the top of the scale and I waited very impatiently for it to level off. 72. 73. Nothing. Finally the scale was level, at 74 kilos.

SEVENTY FOUR KILOS, which means I have gained 3 kilos, or 6.6 lbs, since we arrived in the land of meat and alfajores. Which also means I have to get back into the 150s before I can even think about the 140s.

My Five Stages of Weight Gain:

1. PANIC: Oh shit oh shit oh shit.
2. DISGUST: Argh.
3. DESPAIR: In three weeks I'm going to be a fat 35-year-old.
4. DESPERATION: How little can I eat for the next three weeks?
5. HOPE: Could any of that be muscle?
6. OPTIMISM: At least it wasn't 5 kilos!

I'd bargain (there's always anorexia and bulimia!) but I love food and hate throwing up, so unfortunately those are out. I definitely haven't been walking much around here lately (especially since Spanish classes come to us now) and with the weather getting colder (oh hello, Southern Hemisphere) I just want to sit around in track pants eating cookies. Instead, I'm going to try Sparkpeople for a few weeks to track what I'm eating, and hopefully add a couple more stages to the list:

6. ACCEPTANCE: It's all a project.
7. HOTBODY: 'Nuff said.

Back on track, over and over again

I found out that the bright side of stress and insomnia for me is weight loss. I spent a month not exercising and freaking out about papers and projects and finals and my weight went to 127. Then I turned in the last paper and my appetite came flooding back and I gained 5 pounds in 2 weeks. We took a trip to Chicago and ate lots of deep dish pizza and cheesecake so I'm sure that didn't help. I'm back at 132 and trying to focus again on healthy and sustainable.

You all around?

Ideal body

I've been thinking a lot lately about goals. I never imagined I'd be a size six, but still I'm dissatisfied with my body. Much more so than I was at size sixteen. Objectively I look pretty fit, but there are still parts that are squishy and I still don't have much visible definition in my arms. I'm not sure what to do now, though. It seems almost disordered to want to be a size four?

Skwigg is a fitness blogger I love and she just had a great post about her changing definition of an ideal body.

G's Weigh-in: 71kg

71kg is not bad considering that I've eaten pretty much whatever I wanted and gone to the gym twice in the past three weeks. Note that "pretty much whatever I wanted" includes but is not limited to: ice cream, empanadas, provoleta, and lots of beer and steak. Not to mention vino tinto. ¡Dios mío!

I started working out with a trainer yesterday. We're going to meet 3x/week for the month of April at least. Then I'll make a call on whether to train for the Buenos Aires marathon in October!

C's weigh-in: 130.6

I got sick again and took another week off of exercise. I'm so used to fighting excuses that it was hard to deliberately not exercise for a week and not feel guilty about it. I'm also not counting points anymore, but somehow I lost three pounds in the last two weeks. When I was feeling sick and melodramatic I decided I was wasting away from tuberculosis and possibly also cancer.

I feel better now and started a new turbulence training workout yesterday (tk5). I can do spiderman push-ups now, I couldn't the last time I did this workout.



I don't know how much exercise contributes to weight loss for me, but I really need it for motivation.

C's weigh-in: 133.6

I'll try to remember that any damage that can be done in a week can probably be undone in a week. When I go off track for a day or longer it's hard not to decide that it's all ruined and I might as well just give up.

Also, I got about half way to a chin-up yesterday. I'm doing one of the Turbulence Training workouts for women and it says if you can't do a full chin-up you can boost yourself to the top and then slowly lower yourself for each rep. Instead of doing that I've been attempting a chin-up on the bar and then doing pull-downs on the Bowflex for the actual reps. I'm using 140lb of weight on the Bowflex for the pull-downs, and I'm not going airborne so the Bowflex is lying.

We're going to an indoor waterpark with a group of friends next weekend. I bought a new swimsuit yesterday and have strong motivation to stay on track this week. It'll be hard to eat well next weekend but there's a gym at the hotel and I'm looking forward to working out someplace that isn't my basement.

B Weigh In: 144.0

I should be mad about this but I'm not. a 1lb gain is nothing after spending 3 days at Disney World (aka "it's next to impossible to eat healthy here so hell, I'll have french fries for breakfast World") I'm just happy not to have gained.

I am however having some issues with the gym lately. My motivation to work out is all but gone. I have never had any luck incorporating exercise into my weight loss plans. Even though I know that scientifically exercise *should* mean I can eat more food and still lose weight I never see it working out that way. The treadmill is constantly claiming that I've worked off 250 calories but my body seems unwilling to recognize this exchange. I don't doubt that working out will make me healthier but I suspect it will never make me skinny. For that I need to eat less french fries and sometimes that feels super depressing.

C's weigh-in: 138

Yeah. I got sick and stopped exercising. It felt like I had bronchitis crossed with mono so not exercising was probably the right choice. Then around Thursday I decided it was a good idea to eat cannelés for breakfast and have been eating like that every day since. Probably not the right choice.

G's Weigh-in: 155.6

Holding steady. I'm not sure how (I was expecting a gain) but I'll take it.

Next week is detox week! Difficult because my Waterloo peeps want to feed me cheese all the time, but I'm laying down the law, at least today, in my head. We'll see how it goes.

C's weigh-in: 134.2

That's more like it. I guess I'm still vaguely targeting 128, but I can get there slowly from here. I just bought a few pairs of size six jeans, I would not have thought this was possible a year ago. So, I'm trying to be happy with where I'm at.

B Weigh In: 142.6

No real change this week which considering my Vday spread (which included at minimum 5 egg yolks) I can't complain. The really story this week is how I got weighed at the doctor yesterday and my nightmare scenario where I stepped on his scale and found out my scale was broken and that really I weigh 160lbs did not come true. Huzzah.

G's Weigh-in: 155.6

Don't even talk to me about it.

I did learn something, though, which is that it's pretty much all about how you eat. Sure the exercise is important, for "health" and stuff, but just to give you a sampling of my week: On Monday I worked out (TT), Tuesday I did a yoga class at lunch, ran home from work (4.something miles), THEN did a 45-minute spinning class, Wednesday I did a regular TT workout, and Thursday at lunch I did a spinning class.

I ate badly last weekend (more on weekends later, seeing as we're kicking one off!) but I definitely didn't go overboard during the week.

Mainly I'm blaming stress hormones.

Focus

Maintenance freaks me out. Losing weight is fine, I can pass up the ice cream or pizza or whatever because I'm losing weight, it's just temporary. It's the forever of maintenance that's a problem for me. Like all of us, I love food. But, I can't maintain this weight and also eat whatever I want whenever I want it. Settling in to maintenance is hard because a lot of the time I still have to choose something healthy that tastes fine but is not the Oh My God Delicious thing I really wanted. I think I'm going to try eating exactly what I want three times/week and eat for health and lower calories the rest of the time. Do you guys have strategies about this?



Also, I need a new goal to focus on. I still can't do chin-ups so I bought a chin-up bar, we'll see how this goes.

C's weigh-in: 135.8

Last week I exercised every day and ate 23 points/day except for Valentine's day when I had a good dinner at a brasserie and a regular serving of ice cream afterwards. I'm really, really discouraged that I gained weight. It's hard not to get all melodramatic and think that if maintenance means I can never eat ice cream then screw it.

B's Weigh In: 142.2 -- I'll take it.

Down one pound, good news, right? Yeah, it would be if my scale wasn't a huge dick. Here's what happened:

I wake up this morning 15mins before my alarm goes off and think "well, I might as well weigh myself." I'm even a little happy about it because I know I was super good all week. So I get completed naked and step on the scale (least my underwear be the 2 oz of weight that push me into the danger zone) and the scale blinks and says "146.3." I step off, begin reviewing everything I ate all week and wondering if it's actually possible that the oil I rub on my dry legs has been absorbing into my skin an creating a layer of lavender scented fat. I'm so baffled that I decide to step back on the scale where after a little more blinking it announces "142.2! hahahah wasn't that hilarious when I acted like you gained 3 pounds? I am the comedy master!" I stood still for a full 30 seconds to make sure the scale was sure this time and then decided to step away and accept 142.2 as gospel.

Time for a new scale?

C's weigh-in: 135 - goal!

Woohoo! It took a freaking year to get here and I really didn't think it was possible for me to be this weight again.

I've been wondering about the right way to keep going, though. It seems like lately I've been working harder for less results. I decided I'm going to let weight watchers switch me to maintenance. I have a hard time making myself eat more than the daily points target and this causes a really unhealthy cycle of starving and then going off points for a day or two and binging. Apparently being on maintenance switches my daily points target from 19 to 23, which, seriously? I'm pretty sure I'll keep losing weight at 23 points/day and hopefully it'll help ease me in to a more healthy way of eating over the long haul.

I'm also wondering how long to keep paying for weight watchers. I mean, it worked for me and I'm grateful. But, am I going to keep counting points forever? I guess if that's what it takes to keep the weight off I might be ok with that. Have any of you tried a free site like sparkpeople?

G's Weigh-In: 153.2

Chippin' away at that 10 pounds. I have to say, I love points reset day, but I often extend it into the weekend. Not this weekend, though! Just you wait, kiddos.

P.S. NICE WORK BRI!

Brianna Weigh In: 143.3

That's three pounds! Finally. I'd like to thank carrot soup, red pepper soup and a very expensive bag of cherries.

G's Weigh-In: 153.6

Wow, I'm super proud of you C! And I just realized that I didn't post my weigh-in last week: 153.6. So I'm almost back to the lowest point I hit in the summer, which I think was 152.9. Good times. I did pretty well on the weekend (even foregoing chocolate banana pancakes in favour of a poached egg at brunch on Sunday). I also ran a 4M race and finished in 38:30: better than my goal of 40:00 but not quite at my secret goal of 38:00.

The bad news is, I kind of fudged up my knee running so I'm skipping the gym tonight in favour of RICE (rest, ice, compression, elevation). And I'm not even going to snack to make myself feel better.

P.S. I also hate when Weight Watchers doesn't throw me a party when I lose a pound. Bastards.

P.P.S. WW's Hearty Turkey Chili recipe rules my world.

C's weigh-in: 135.6

I'm really happy about this, especially since I may have eaten chocolate bread pudding last night. With ice cream. My goal a whole year ago when I started WW was to get to 135, and I'm happy to be this close. One thing, though, the WW site has been telling me this every time I track my weight:

Thanks for tracking your weight. Are you satisfied with your weight this week? If yes, keep doing what you've been doing. If not, the suggestions below may lead you in the right direction.

What does it mean that I get annoyed when people comment on my weight loss but I expect my computer to shoot confetti?

On Being a Very Good Eater

My attempt to lose the 10lbs that I somehow managed to gain over the summer is not going so well. Oh sure I'm eating salads and going to the gym where I have been doing some RUNNING (Seriously. I have been running. Who am I?) but I'm not actually losing any weight. This is probably due to my love for food.

You see, I love food a lot. Often I'll find myself eating some food and excitedly thinking about the food I might eat next. It'll be lunch. I'll be munching on a nice crunchy salad with artichoke hearts and boiled egg and blue cheese and thinking to myself, "hmm what shall I eat for dinner? I could make spaghetti! Or order Thai basil chicken! Man tomorrow morning I get to have that yummy yogurt again, with the dried apricots, I CAN'T WAIT!" This cannot be healthy, right? Surely I must have some sort of hole in my heart that I'm trying to fill with food but when I try to recall being abused by the elementary cafeteria lady I quickly get distracted by thoughts of sloppy joes and chocolate malts. I think the hole I'm filling might just be my bottomless stomach.

I recently observed that having few buddies at my new jobs means I'm much more likely to eat a healthy lunch to which my friend Lisa replied, "Good Point. If you [worked here] we'd be all 'hamburgers!' every day." This is not true, sometimes I would want mac and cheese and some other times I would want Chinese pork buns, and least you think I only want to eat food bathed in grease sometimes I would just want roasted broccoli covered in lots of red pepper flakes. Part of my problem with food is that I love healthy foods which seems like a good thing until you're eating a trough of it and gaining 5lbs JUST FROM BROCCOLI.

Sometimes I fantasize about getting really fat. Because sure, I would miss my toes and sexy underwear and living past the age of 50 but maybe all of that is a reasonable price to pay for unlimited ice cream consumption? Maybe once I got past being the woman that kids moo at in the grocery store I could cover myself in a yummy blanket of ranch dressing and dig my way out with a truck load of french fries. Perhaps TLC could do a show on me (Half Ton Blogger?), perhaps they would pay me for humiliating myself on national television not with a free gastric bypass surgery but with my own personal chef who will make me endless supplies of fresh pasta covered in spicy tomato sauce. Doesn't sound half bad, right?

This fantasy is partially fueled by my desire to succeed. I am not always successful at eating less than 5 servings of jalapeno corn bread or doing my personal trainer prescribed squats at the super slow speed that makes my thighs shake in fear. Despite past successes I am not at all sure that I can succeed at losing the 10lbs that appear to be cling wrapped to my thighs. But I know without a doubt that I could kick ass at being really fat. I would eat ridiculous quantities of grilled cheese sandwiches. I would lounge around in a muumuu. I would be very good at sitting in a very large chair.

New Blogger!

I've invited Brianna to join the party! She's trying to drop 10lbs (to get back into the 130s) and also loves All Things Food.

Wintertime... And the Eatin' is Clean

OK, let's talk about Clean Eating, the magazine, the philosophy, what have you.

The truth is, I love sugar. Well, I love baked goods, and I've found they're just so much more delicious when they're made of some combination of flour, butter, and sugar. And optionally, chocolate. That said, I've been trying this clean eating business, I'd guess about 50% of what I've eaten the past 4 weeks, and I really like it. And I'm going to try my damndest to increase that percentage while still counting points like nobody's business.

About the magazine, one caveat: Use Weight Watchers' Recipe Builder (WW) or another nutrition site to figure out the nutrition information for any of the recipes in there. I swear they haven't tested them all, or did so half-assedly, because some are just plain wrong. I'll post a few errors I discovered later when I have the magazine in front of me, but for now just take my word for it.

Here's my clean menu for today:

Breakfast: Mouth-Watering Oatmeal (5 POINTS) (+ a few blueberries)

Early Lunch (pre-gym): 1 scoop protein powder + 1 c skim milk (4 POINTS)

Late Lunch (post-gym): Weight Watchers' Hearty Turkey Chili + 1/4 avocado (6 POINTS)

Dinner: NY Times' Pureed Carrot Soup* + 1/2 T flax seed meal + 1 tsp olive oil (3 POINTS)

That leaves me 2 POINTS for hot chocolate before bed. Perfect.

*I modified this recipe slightly:
- 1 tsp butter (instead of 1 T)
- 1 tsp olive oil (instead of 1 T)
- sub brown short-grain rice for the arborio
When I Recipe-Buildered it, it came out to 1 POINT per 200g - I usually eat 300-400g in a serving.

P.S. I'm still hovering at 155. Will post after weigh-in tomorrow. My goal is 144 by March 1 - tough with Super Bowls and Valentines' Days and birthday brunches and baby showers and all that, but not impossible.

Rainbow

Gillian's clean eating post inspired me to work more at healthy food. So, instead of just getting in my fruit and vegetable servings today I'm going to try for as many different colors as possible:

Breakfast - oatmeal, protein powder, blueberries
Morning snack - orange and light string cheese
Lunch - Kashi chicken florentine (has a decent amount of spinach, red peppers, and mushrooms)
Afternoon snack - beets and an egg white with hummus
Dinner - pork chop with roasted cauliflower

And holy crap, all of that is only 17 points.

Worst weight-loss comment ever

One of my coworkers said "Wow, you've lost a lot of weight" today for the third time. Then she asked "You must feel so much better now that you're eating healthy food?". Aargh! I have always eaten healthy food. Just, too much of it maybe, or healthy food plus ice cream. I think the perpetual dieting is still making me grumpy.

And I am still dieting. I've been bouncing around between 139 and 135 for months now. Which is a fine weight to be, but I'd like to stay here (or 10 lbs less than here) without this cycle of being on points and then eating too much on weekends/holidays/vacations.