I’ve not done so great the last 2 days.  I baked brownies and zucchini muffins.  What possessed me?  The dark, grey ice-covered days?  A hormonal surge?  Who knows?  But I’m fessing up to it and moving on.  I did exercise—yoga, and go for a walk but I did eat a brownie and 2 muffins.  Thankfully, my sweets deprived kids are going crazy and eating most of my guilt away.  I have kept up with chopped up, washed veggies ready to go in the fridge, which inspires me to much them when I open the fridge during the day.  Still, hoping for spring and some fresh resources for fruits and veggies. 

We had a “moms’ night out” last night.  We bring food and drink and get together to talk, and breathe, without the voices and hands of our little people.  I brought cut up veggies and a dip I made with plain yogurt, which actually got compliments!  I just drank my mug of tea and ate veggies, but had no usual guilt over how much or what I was eating.  I just focused on my much deserved “mommy break”. 

One pound Monday—I’ll take it.  Maybe I’m physically unable to lose more than one pound in a week.  Maybe I have to admit that that I’m not exactly killing myself to lose more.  I’ve only done very simple changes to my lifestyle and had a couple (Ok a couple hundred) slip ups.  For now, I’ll take the one pound and continue to ponder on what’s holding me back from just letting this weight go. 

So my brother and sister-in-law came for dinner—a fairly typical Sunday early dinner.  I made lasagna and bread and a big salad.  I also made a strawberry rhubarb pie for dessert.  Sunday dinner with family is one of those food “events”, where it is about eating and appreciating the food and companionship.  The meal is big, and we do frequently have a salad with it, but always dessert too.  It’s just one more of those aspects of our life that we need to either accept that a couple times a month we will have a big family meal, or try to somehow change the meal to make it healthier.  Or incorporate a wrestling match or dodgeball tournament after to burn off all those calories?  I’m just not sure yet how to find a balance between the big family meal and the “diet”.  Usually I just say f*** it and eat, with little regard for what or how much.  Tonight I tried to at least be mindful, eating more salad than lasagna, and a smaller amount of dessert than I really wanted.  I just am not sure if that is enough.

If you love food, and I do mean love, then you will be forever incomplete   until you read Michael Pollan.  I read The Omnivore’s Dilemma when it came out and totally changed what I was feeding my family.  Last weekend I picked up In Defense of Food and I am preparing for another food revolution in my kitchen.  Because I may be fat, but I am nobodies corporate pawn!  I just so hate being a statistic.  I hate being fed scare tactics and nutrition jargon, when in reality, it’s not making me any skinnier.  I was born in 1975 and totally had a “typical” 80’s childhood, complete with divorced parents, life with the TV as my parent and countless fast food meals, coupled with microwaved mac&cheese, ramen noodles, and Chef Boy RD.  Is it any wonder that now I have to relearn how to feed my body?  No time like the present I say, and armed with a little more information, I hope to do a better job. 

I knew Paul was going home the second I saw that plate of chicken wings.  Is it weird that they all had family get-togethers full of unhealthy food?  Obviously their families know that they’ve been on a super strict diet for the past 7 weeks, and that they would be very challenged.  I guess when you personally don’t have a weight issue that you are working on maybe you don’t obsess about healthy vs. unhealthy food constantly.  It just didn’t seem very supportive.  I thought it was great that people lost weight and stuck to their diets at home.  Bernie’s cupcake looked awesome.  My 3 year old said “WHAT is THAT?”  with awe and wonder—I was totally there. 

So I didn't have a great week. No, I didn't get out of control with food. I have some type of injury to my leg. Shin splints? I am not sure but, it hurts. I haven't been able to walk on the treadmill since last Tuesday. I still lost almost 2 pounds but, I know I would have done better if I could have been more successfull with the cardio.

 

Oh and I ate out yesterday at my favorite brewpub in Madison. They have the best bacon cheeseburgers ever. I had a salad and an iced tea. Man, it was tough when they brought the food and my co-worker was diggin into boneless buffalo wings.

So zero pounds today.  I really expected as much, and was grateful that it wasn’t a gain, but it still sort of makes you feel like shit.  Last night a commercial came on TV and Tim said, “you know, it’s been a month and a half since I had a cheeseburger…or a doughnut.”  We have made a lot of changes, and I am proud of those changes.  Those changes are changes that will help us maintain a weight loss, but not quite enough to help us lose the extra weight we already have.  It’s about letting go of all of those habits that are killing us, which seems dramatic, but true.  Tim has shin splints and so is having a hard time with exercising right now.  I’m trying to get him to do some yoga, but he feels let down by his body.  Just another realization that it’s only going to get worse if we don’t lose this weight now—not another resolution for next year, this is going to happen for us this year.  We just need to believe.

OK, so I took a small break, but I’m back!  Valentines Day was a treat fest at our house, so I’ll only go into the briefest of explanations.  The 13^th was the day I had to make cupcakes for our daughter to take for her school party the next day.  I did lick the frosting bowl, because, well, I just love frosting, which is wrong, but honest.  I did manage to not eat any cupcakes, so felt OK about the whole bowl-licking thing---UNTIL the 14^th arrived.  Our daughter brought home a few cupcakes that were leftover after her party and it was Valentines Day, so I ate a cupcake.  Still, one treat, I was feeling OK—UNTIL Tim got home and brought me a box of Godiva chocolates—my favorites, and a pretty standard gift of love from him, but still, I am dieting, so maybe a little hateful too.  So while I did not eat an entire box of chocolates by myself, I was very generous in my sharing.  I did eat many chocolates over the course of the last couple days.  They are gone now, and I am refocusing.  Our meals haven’t been too bad, though Friday night we did have pizza—chicken ranch—which is one of our long time favorites.  We need to regroup a bit, recommit to what we’re doing here.  I know we can’t totally, constantly deprive ourselves, but it’s so easy to fall back into unhealthy habits, it’s a little scary.  I feel like right now, it almost has to be an all or nothing mentality.  So I can stay focused, so I can stay committed to changing my life. 

Thus far losing a couple of pounds a week hasn't been to difficult. When you eat as unhealthily as I did in the past, simple changes are big. Not going to fast food restaurants, staying away from chips and bread, cutting out deep fried cheese curds ( a Wisconsin favorite) go a long way to reducing my daily calorie intake. We have been eating much healthier at home thanks to Carli's dedication to helping our family live healthier. Heck, I even hit the treadmill almost everyday.

 

That being said, I think I need to step it up a notch. Mainly because I am in a community weight loss competition and as one of the "big guys" I should be losing more in the form of sheer pounds. The average is around 1% of loss a week. I am closer to 1/2%. I am losing weight at a steady pace of about 2 pounds a week but, I am going to need to be closer to 6 pounds a week for the next six weeks. It's the only way I can catch and surpass the group.

 

So the new plan, at least for the next six weeks, will be as follows:

Back on track, with one pound lost last week.  I was hoping for 2, to make up for last weeks zero, but I’ll take one above zero any day.  I’m still eating too much.  I’ve been consistent with walking on the treadmill every day, and doing yoga at least 3 days a week, but I’m still eating too much.  That’s going to have to be my goal for this week.  I think I’m going to try doing 5 mini-meals, and see if it helps me to eat less.  The 3 meal and one snack thing isn’t really getting me the results I’d like, so on to a new plan. 

So here’s my problem.  OK, here is ONE of my problems.  I really love food.  Yesterday was grocery shopping day.  Lest you fear I filled my cart with cookies and chips and soda, no, that is not one of my problems.  I just buy a lot of food.  I like to buy things that look good.  So I go to the grocery store and fill my cart with staples—milk, yogurt, cottage cheese, bread, eggs, oatmeal, raisons, etc..  Then I go to Whole Foods, because well, the meat and produce there is better than anywhere else, especially in the dead of winter.  So there I fill my cart with spinach and kale, oranges, apples, bananas, avocados, tomatoes, mangoes, kiwi, … and then to the fish and meat counter—lean beef, whole chicken, chicken breasts, salmon fillets.  Oh, and they had these sausage links with blueberries—see here begins my problem.  They also had this really yummy looking cheese with cranberries, and then I had to find some whole grain crackers to eat with my cheese, and bottle of organic wine…and well, you can maybe see where I ran into problems.  I love good food.  A lot. I love to buy food, I love to cook food, I love to eat food.  When they cooked meals on Biggest Loser this week, I was really excited to try to make some of the things they did.  Didn’t that steak with blue cheese look SO good?  Yes, I bought steak and blue cheese crumbles at Whole Foods.  So, ONE of the problems I’m having is to downplay the MAJOR role food has in my life.  Is this even possible?

I’ve come to realize these last few weeks how often I use “treats” as something special with the kids, especially my youngest, who is home with me all day.  After playgroup we’ll stop at Culver’s to get him a shake, or after story hour we’ll walk over to the bakery for a cookie.  At the grocery store “If you behave you can get a treat at the end.” Always food, always sweet.  I think part of this is just how I was raised, the whole treats = reward thing.  So I’m trying to think of better ways to make things “special” or offer a treat.  Because all too frequently a cookie for my son is also a cookie for Mommy.  I’ve stopped buying junk food to bring into the house, but it’s harder when we’re out and about, just one more habit to break. 

Another snow day here in Wisconsin—anyone else tired of winter?  Thankfully, I’ve been working on lowering the fat and upping the veggies in some of my soup recipes, and have quite a few to choose from on a day like this.  Still working on the whole bread thing—but I have started making whole grain breads, whole wheat, oatmeal…I don’t really want to live in a bread free world.  But I can live without white bread.  I like making my own bread as well, which reduces all the added preservatives and chemicals in bread, and I can make sure that they fat is olive oil and the flour is whole grain and the sugar is honey, which I like.  But a snow day would not be complete without hot cocoa, so I made this with fat free milk, real cocoa powder, a little sugar and vanilla—yummy.  I’m not a huge fan of fat free milk.  I just don’t really like the taste, but I am buying it, to cut out some unhealthy fats.  Oh, and I only buy organic milk—who needs the hormones?  A snow day makes it easy to fit in a long walk on the treadmill and a yoga video too.  But, sorry, I’m making Tim shovel.

So, this morning was my weigh in, and I lost 0 pounds.  Yes, zero.  I didn’t gain any, but the scale did not go down.  I did eat unhealthy food yesterday, and a lot of it was salty, some chips, barbecue sauce on a pulled pork sandwich, pasta salad.  I didn’t necessarily over-eat, but I definitely did not eat healthily.  A handful of M&M’s, a small slice of chocolate cake, a handful of Chex mix—oh yeah, I did it all.  So, back to the real world and our healthy diet.  I did exercise on Saturday and Sunday.  I was back on the treadmill this morning, trying to prove that scale wrong.  Oatmeal for breakfast, veggies for lunch with a smoothie of yogurt, fruit and protein powder.  And water. Lots of water.  Back on track for a new week.

Old habbits die hard. My weekend duty is to wake early on Saturday morning start a pot of coffee and make breakfast. Most of the week we have oatmeal or peanut butter toast for before we run out of the house to engage our day. The weekends are meant for big breakfasts with the family gathered around the table. This morning was the same but with a few changes....

 

I made breafast borritos this morning. I used turkey sausage instead of pork and I contained myself from eating sausages as a prepared the eggs. I used water in the scramble instead of milk and I used a much smaller amount of cheese in each serving. I also used tortillas that are smaller than the ones we normally use. I am not sure how big of a difference it is but, there were certainly more sausages left over than there normally would be.

Well, as many of you know, the Super Bowl is this weekend.  We’re going to my brother’s house to watch, because he has a really big TV, and his wife makes the best snacks around.  So I am making no promises.  I will exercise on Saturday and Sunday and do my best to eat healthy the rest of the weekend.  I will be conscious of the fact that I am not following my diet, which will hopefully help me to just have a small taste of the few things I really want to eat and not just use it as an excuse to overeat.  I’ll let you know how it goes.