Goodbye 150+l bs

Okay, of course I would have liked a bigger weight loss number for the month BUT I'll settle for BARELY moving from the 150s to the 140s. Barely. But 8 lbs lost in July? I'm not ashamed, I'll be thrilled if I can repeat the results next month.

What I'm doing:

~ Simple math = calories in vs calories out for weight loss
~ Raw fruit for breakfast
~ Raw veggies for lunch
~ whatever I want for dinner - keep overall calorie count for the day in mind.
~ Cheat day! Golf Guy is off on Monday & we eat like fools on that day. I can track it but I don't try to control it.

UPDATE and afterthought: I think fiber and calories, are the key. The more that I spend my caloric allowance on raw fruit & vegetable fiber the more easily I lose weight AND I feel more full while doing it.

I'm not OBESE, I'm just overweight

While posting my weight on Fitday.com this afternoon I noticed my BMI. I'm no longer obese, now I'm merely overweight.

I know it's silly being excited over a BMI of 29.57 bet heck I'll take good news where ever I can get it. Wee!

[Starting BMI 30.86]

Starting health stats with updates

Before I started trying to lose weight (on July 1st) I spent a week monitoring some health stats.

Here's where things were when I started :

Blood Pressure 130 / 84 ( ideal BP according to Wikipedia 112 /64)

Resting Heart Rate 65 (normal 60 to 80)

Fasting Blood Glucose 103 (above 100 is considered pre-diabetic)

Weight 158 (ideal weight for my height - 5 ft - is 97 to 128 lbs depending on what chart you use)

Waist 41 (I haven't set a goal for this yet)

And here are where things are as of this morning (18 days later):

Blood Pressure 113 / 78

Resting Heart Rate 55

Fasting Blood Glucose 96

Weight 151

Waist 38

So things are looking up though I still have a long way to go.

7/17 Food Diary

The last few days have been busy crazy and I've been logging my food on Fitday just at the end of the evening. I've found that not writing things down as I eat them has made me lazy about my food choices. Though the scale is holding steady at 152lbs I'm disappointed in the lack of weight loss progress and of course I have no one to blame but myself.

Anyway at least for today I'm going to post what I eat here. Accountability, people!

[Post updated through out the day.]

Breakfast

cafe cubano with whole milk (6 ounces) - sorry, I'm just not a skim milk person and normally I don't do coffee but this was just one of those days.

pink grapefruit (8 ounces)

Fruit Smoothie
2 apples (8 ounces)
2 plums (6 ounces)
blueberries (4 ounces)

Lunch

Veggie Smoothie
1 tomato (5 ounces)
1 lg broccoli floret (1 ounce)
1 lg cauliflower floret (1 ounce)
1 carrot (3 ounces)
2 lemons (3 ounces)

572 calories and 20 grams of fiber so far for the day. I completely forgot to eat any lean protein but I'm full and feeling good at the moment so I'm not going to worry about it for now.

Dinner

Homemade spaghetti with whole wheat pasta
1/2 bread stick

Final Totals

922 calories with 28 grams of fiber | 72% carbs 17% fat 12% protein

Okay, obviously I shouldn't have skipped that protein during the day. Tomorrow I promise to start the day with a protein shake instead of the Cuban coffee and I'll try to fit in a few ounces of chicken breast here and there. The complete lack of veggies for dinner is shameful. I was going to make a salad but Golf Guy showed up early and said that he was starving. He said he didn't care about the salad so I didn't take the time to make one.
:: hangs head in shame ::
I promise that if I'm the slightest bit hungry before bed I'll shovel in some fresh spinach! But honestly, I'm absolutely stuffed right now.

So that's it, I think it's a pretty typical day for me except for the complete lack of more veggies for dinner and maybe a Greek yogurt for desert. I usually manage to get all my RDAs of vitamins and minerals EXCEPT for Vitamin D, E, calcium and iron. I have a real problem with Vitamin D and iron. I guess that should be the next thing I try to fix.

How about you? Do you have any tips or tricks for getting in all of your nutrients?

Progress Update - 152lbs

Start 158 Current 152 Goal 108

Still on track, scales still moving in the right direction.

You would not believe how insanely healthy I've been eating. It's scary, really.

The amazing thing is that I am FULL all day long and pretty much eat whatever I want for dinner. And yes, even have the occasional brownie or piece of candy. I'm not following any particular diet plan, at least not one that's written in a book somewhere. At the moment I'm just following my own ideas about what's good for ME.

Maybe when I get a month or so into this (successfully) I'll sit down and write out exactly what I'm doing. For the most part though it's just A LOT of fresh fruits and veggies.

Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Progress Update - 154lbs

Start 158 Current 154 Goal 108

4 pounds lost in 11 days. Not bad I guess but of course I wish it were more.

Dieting around family

Women who are trying to diet around their families have my sympathy. I have only my husband to deal with and I find that difficult enough. I can't imagine how hard it must be once you add children to the mix!

I do just fine on days that GolfGuy works. I get up, walk or work out and prepare and eat my smoothies just fine all day long. When he gets home in the evening I have a halfway healthy meal ready, we eat and then I head out for another walk.

But on GolfGuy's days off :: sigh :: I think it would be much easier to just give up. GolfGuy wants to eat out for at least one meal (and he does deserve a treat!) so there's temptation. He has to have all kinds of snacks and pastries around, and he's not into my smoothies so I'm cooking, cooking and cooking. Temptation, temptation and more temptation...it can be hard to resist. And even if I do resist it can get tiresome cooking for him and making smoothies for me.

It would be much easier if GolfGuy would just decide to jump on the bandwagon and eat healthy with me, wouldn't it? He says that he will IF I can find a diet book/program that we can both agree on. Of course, we've been looking for that "perfect" book for at least two years now!

I could get discouraged but I think I'll reach my weight loss goal for the week tomorrow. The falling numbers on the scale - they're keeping me going!

Blueberries, blueberries & more blueberries

Publix had a sale on fresh blueberries so guess what kind of smoothies I had today? They were pretty tasty but I miss the strawberries & mangoes from a few days ago.

GolfGuy & I went to Longhorn for lunch (I had a $5 off coupon) so I had half of and 8oz steak and steamed veggies. Not too bad there but I was bad and had a little of the fresh baked bread. Yum! Dinner was a Florida avocado with a few saltines. Very tasty & surprisingly satisfying.

Even with the steak I managed to stay under my calorie limit for the day. I'm proud to say that I'm on target for hitting my weight loss goal for the week!

Happy 4th of July!

My "diet"

I don't actually believe in diets. Not that they don't exist (in fact there are far too many of them) but I just don't think that they work. Being "on" a diet means that you eventually go "off" the diet, usually in some unplanned way. Just by starting a diet you're just setting yourself up for failure eventually. I think instead you have to make up your mind to adopt healthy eating and exercise habits for life.

If only it were that easy, right?

Anyway, here's my daily plan (based on nothing but my own limited knowledge and personal preferences):

1. 5 to 6 small meals per day
2. The majority of those meals will be raw fruits and veggies
3. Limit meat consumption in all except the final meal of the day
4. Walk, walk, and walk some more
5. 30 min of exercise
6. 8 hours of sleep

Of course I reserve the right to tweak the plan as I go.