Standard

I remember the last time I did Weight Watchers, my "standard" weight loss was 2.6 pounds per week. For some reason, I saw that number a lot. This time around, it's been very schizophrenic--down 2, up 2, down 6, no change. But this week I got into the groove--I ate a ton last Sunday, including a burger and fries, spending all my flex points. The rest of the week I was right on track, for the most part. And then today my loss was 2.6 pounds.

I am happy with that, of course, but I am more focused on what's going to happen next week. I am going on vacation, to Weetacon, and there will be much eating and drinking, I am completely aware of that. I've already decided that my goal is to maintain my weight loss--I am not going to try and lose any more. I am also going to go to a meeting while I am there, as I did with the Disneyland trip. It kept me on track then, and it will keep me on track now. I also am going to write down what I eat, even if it's a horrorshow of epic proportions. And of course, I am going to try and keep the focus on fun and friendship, and not food. And I will dance a lot.

I originally wanted to lose 10 pounds before Weetacon--well, I've lost 8.6, which is pretty good. My next goal is to maintain this weight loss during my vacation. And my goal after that is keep going to Weight Watchers no matter what happens.

If you guys have any other suggestions for keeping weight off during a vacation, I am all ears. In the meantime, I bought smaller jeans for the trip, and they totally fit me.

South Beach vs. Weight Watchers

In the comments to this post, composer asks:

I know you've done a bit of South Beach too. Can you tell me what you think of each and why you chose WW again? I've been a WW, done well, and then had a baby and it just doesn't seem to work for me anymore. It's like a game, but I know all the ins and outs and so I cheat. I was wondering if South Beach may be a good alternative, even if just to jump start me into better habits. Just curious of your thoughts. Thanks.

Well, good question! I read the South Beach book and the logic of the diet made a lot of sense to me. When I started the diet, the first phase was really difficult but it did indeed help jump start me—I lost about 10 pounds in those first two weeks, and learned some good habits about cutting down carbs. I still eat far less bread than I did before I did South Beach and it has changed my life regarding sugar (see below).

However, I learned some bad habits also. Once I was out of the first phase, and could eat whatever low-carb foods I wanted, I found that there were no built in controls, like the points in Weight Watchers, to tell me when enough is enough. Probably my downfall was low-carb ice cream, but I also ate way too much cheese and other fatty, high-calorie foods. I began to gain weight again and in the meantime, had developed a liking for things like 2% milk (when I'd only had nonfat before) and an addiction to cheese that also I'd never had before. Ultimately, I decided that I needed the structure and accountability of Weight Watchers. It worked for me before; I assume it will work again. And so here we are.

One thing that South Beach did for me was to teach me that my body reacts badly to sugar. In fact, when I cut down on sugar for that diet, my chronic, constant cystitis completely cleared up. This is the only thing that has ever helped me, apart from antibiotics, which I'd been taking for at least five years on and off. As a result, I have continued to eat a low-sugar diet. I still love sweets, but I eat them in very limited quantities, or Splendafied. If I spend a day eating a lot of sugar, I have to take my antibiotic again. This is not something any doctor predicted and I did get my blood sugar tested for diabetes as a result of this strange phenomenon. I did not have elevated blood sugar, but obviously a low-sugar diet is better for my body, and so I've stuck with it.

I hope that answers your question! Again, I can only speak for myself; you might find South Beach to be just the diet you need. I found it to be on the whole a very logical, sensible, and liveable approach to changing your diet. It just wasn't for me.

Mental Floss

At today's meeting, we talked about the key to weight loss being one's mentality. I think that's absolutely true of long-term success on something like Weight Watchers.

We've all been there: We think we're only going to eat one cookie, but we eat the whole package. We go way over on points for lunch and think "well, there goes the day" or "there goes the week" and eat whatever we want from then on. We know we've gained weight one week and we don't want to go back to the meeting, we don't want to weigh in. We go on vacation and eat the world, feel like we've irrevocably blown it, and we stop going to meetings at all, we stop writing things down, we give up.

I've certainly been there; my lowest weight was 211 pounds, and now I weigh 240 pounds, and that's not the world's happiest thought. But I have to keep going forward anyway, even though I am "re-losing" weight that I already lost. The key to that is totally mental. It's as simple as not giving up.

This week I did not lose weight and I did not gain weight; I am still exactly 240.6 pounds. I stepped onto the scale sure that I'd lost weight, just wondering how much. (I was hoping for 2 pounds.) And I stepped off thinking, well, maybe it's that "fluid in the joints" thing someone mentioned to me a couple of weeks ago--is that even a real thing? Maybe it's the fact that I have my period. Maybe it was the glass of wine I had last night.

Ultimately, after listening to the things that were said at the meeting, I realized that it doesn't much matter whether I lost weight this week or not. I know I ate well and healthily this week. Yesterday we went on a wonderful long bike ride on a trail I'd never been on before. I felt good about myself walking into that meeting--I felt stronger, leaner, positive I'd lost weight. And why should that positive feeling go away? I had a good week. I feel good.

My other blog, Big Fat Deal, is all about emphasizing health and happiness above body size. Today I remembered to practice what I preach. And of course, to keep writing things down, keep riding my bike, keep eating well. The weight will come off eventually. I'm not in a hurry.

Boring Entry About What I Eat

I am a creature of habit. Weight Watchers for me this time has been all about finding things that are low point that I like to eat, and eating them every day. I am lucky enough to have a grocery store three blocks from my workplace, and I go there every Monday and stock up for the week. If I run out of anything, it's easy enough to pop over there on a lunch break.

So what do I buy? I get a loaf of Orowheat Light bread (two slices for 1 point) and a banana. Every morning I slice or mash up a banana and eat it on the bread. (People find this weird, but my mother picked it up when she was a child in South Africa, so in fact it is a reflection of my multicultural heritage! Which, if you know my mother, is a heritage of weirdness.) I've actually been eating this breakfast every weekday for months, and I haven't even begun to get tired of it.

I also buy some kind of deli thing for lunchtime sandwiches. I enjoy Safeway's tuna salad (I put a couple of scoops on my Orowheat bread and call it 6 points) and sometimes I will get deli meats such as turkey or chicken. As my friend Laurie Mac pointed out to me, though, there is a lot of sodium in those deli meats. You have to choose your battles and all –which is why I generally choose to disregard sodium as an issue—but I try and alternate the tuna (more fat and uncertain nutritional values) with deli meats (very lean and low point but less filling, high sodium). Six of one, half dozen of the other.

I also buy five containers of light yogurt, and I usually eat them with ¼ cup of "Nutty Nuggets," which are store-brand Grape Nuts that are only 1 point rather than 2. I know that Fiber One would be way better, but I love Grape Nuts so much that it feels like a real treat. I look forward to eating my light yogurt (usually key lime) with the Fake Nuts every day. Plus, the yogurt is supposed to be good for the gastritis, which is why I started making this a habit in the first place.

The other stand-by 2-point snack I have is Quaker Oatmeal Instant Light Maple Sugar for 2 points per package. It's not very good, but it's a snack that doesn't go bad, and it's sweet, and it's there if I need to eat something, and I am in no danger of binging on it.

Those are my staples. I also buy fruits and vegetables (yesterday I had a nectarine) to snack on or some lettuce, tomato, onion, etc. to put on my lunchtime sandwich. Those 100-calorie packs of Doritos are pretty good too, but I have a hard time eating just one pack. I love the 100-calorie packs of cookies (especially the fudge stripes), but I will eat the whole box if I buy it, so I have to stay away. I buy soda sometimes, too—either diet root beer (my new addiction) or yesterday, for the first time, Cherry Coke Zero (yum).

I also have to give a shout-out to Ian for making the most awesome dinner last night. He often cooks, and he will be very careful about making sure I use the right number of points and get some nutrition in. Last night we had whole wheat pasta with garlic, oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper, and steamed broccoli. I think it was the perfect meal; so delicious. He also makes the best salmon I've ever had. I think the secret ingredient is rosemary.

Anyway, if you have any other suggestions for things to eat, I'm all ears!

Real Numbers

I was in a negative mood as I headed on over to my meeting this morning. I don't know why. I felt as if I'd tried so hard this week, and it was so hard, and I wasn't going to lose anything, or not much, or it was in some other way going to end badly. Maybe I was mentally preparing myself for the worst.

Well I shouldn't have worried! I lost 6 pounds this week! (I suspect that many of you were right about last weeks 2-pound gain and that it wasn't real for some reason, either the scale was off or I was retaining water or something, which means I still lost 4 pounds of real weight, which means hooray.)

I also keep changing the clothes I am wearing for weigh-in, which probably only makes a slight difference but for the record, to control for that variable, I am going to stick with my tank top and gray yoga pants from now on.

6 pounds feels like a real number of pounds to have lost, for some reason. It is well on the way to 10 pounds, and then I'm 20% of the way there, if I want to lose 50 pounds, which would be nice. Every 5 pounds is 10% of what I want to lose, and that feels significant also. It feels like something I can build some real weight loss on. It feels better than last week when I was back at square one (or thought I was).

This week I have a challenge in that I like to prepare myself to use all my Flex points on one "cheat" night, and this week I have two potential cheat nights. One is Valentine's Day and one is today's birthday party for our friends' twin babies. I guess I'll see how the birthday party goes and then if we have to change our Valentine's Day dinner plans, so be it. But I will be looking for the veggie platter the second I get there, that much I can tell you!

I'll keep you posted. Stats in the sidebar.

Good, Bad, Ugly

I went to my Disneyland meeting, and they gave me a “bravo” star for showing up. I deserved it for my bravery in stepping on that scale, because I’d spent the day before eating. I had a churro, some ice cream, bites of this, tastes of that. Lunch was a delicious chicken Caesar (easily the best thing I’ve ever eaten at Disneyland) while Captain Jack Sparrow stumbled around nearby. Dinner was a giant chocolate chip cookie.

Although I did do a lot of walking over the weekend (my legs are still sore) it was not enough to mitigate the Disney foodfest, or the previous day’s In-N-Out burger, or the previous five days’ struggles. I’d gained two pounds. Yes, those same two pounds I lost last week. Stupid #$@% pounds.

All is not lost, however. The most important thing is that I began again right away on Sunday, and have had two on-point days so far. And I was able to begin again because I had gone to that meeting and stepped on that scale and faced the music. Maybe I won’t be able to lose 10 pounds in the next three weeks, but over the long-term, I am doing exactly the right thing: not quitting.

Damn You, Cookies!

It’s been a really challenging week.

On Sunday I planned to go out and use my Flex Points for the week. I usually just eat way over points on one night out, mark it as “all Flex used” and then go on with my week, trying not to go over points the rest of the week. I think this is a good system because it also allows for the whole “cheat night” principle, the idea that you should keep your metabolism guessing, and all that other good stuff. I lose more when I do that as opposed to spreading the Flex points out over the course of the week.

But then it came to pass that we are going to Disneyland this weekend, and maybe I would need my Flex points for that! So I counted to see exactly how many I had used on Sunday: 16, which means that I have 19 left. I have already written them in on Saturday, but I am going to try not to use them, because I feel like I am sticking to the program mathematically, but haven’t really been “on” this week. And I really would like to lose some more weight, because the 2 pounds last week was disappointing.

Flipping through my notebook I see that on Monday I was 4 points under. Yes, I had a good Monday. On Tuesday I was 2 points over because there were free pastries at work to celebrate the launch of a certain operating system, and then more free food at my eye doctor, of all places. The eye doctor food wasn’t even good, except the cookies, so I had a stack of cookies. After having one each of the stuff that wasn’t even good. It was so mindless, ugh. But nonetheless, only 2 points over for the day, because Ian cooked beans and chard, and that’s a 3-point dinner.

On Wednesday, my cubicle-mate brought in two dozen from scratch homemade chocolate chip cookies. Let us pull a veil over Wednesday and move on. (If I count those cookies as 2 points each, which I did, I hit my points target exactly. They were probably more, though.)

Yesterday I was 2 points under, although I had a big chicken Caesar salad for lunch at the pub across the street, and am unsure if it was really 10 points, as I guessed. (I eschewed a side of fries and a glass of wine, both of which are delightful with Caesar salad at the pub across the street.) I’m estimating, like with cookies or Caesar salad, I feel out of control a little. Which is why I feel so off this week.

Finally there is today’s trip, and I have saved 9 points for an In-N-Out burger on the road trip and I’m saving 4 points to split some fries. Which means I can eat basically nothing today, so it might not exactly work out that way. We’ll see. I’ve gotten really good at eating many small 2-4 point “meals” throughout the day in lieu of actual food. So far I’ve had a divine sugar free almond latte, a banana sandwich, a yogurt, and a turkey bologna sandwich. (Sandwiches on low-cal bread are a staple of my life right now.) And so it goes.

All of the above being said, I have accomplished a lot throughout this week. I am still tracking, obviously. I am sure if I hadn’t been writing everything down, I would have had plenty more than five cookies. According to my math—and I tried to be as fair as possible—I have had a good week. I still have Flex points to use at Disneyland, if I need them. I have had a ton of water. I have resolved to buy Dance Dance Revolution as soon as I can.

I found a Weight Watchers meeting near Disneyland for Sunday morning. I figure after the week I’ve had, I really need one. And then we’ll see what the scale has to say about all of this. But hey, I’m going to Disneyland!