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3 Commandments For Losing Weight and Keeping It Off

August 27, 2009 By Leave a Comment

If only there was a magic weight loss wand that would instantly remove all our extra weight without the hassle of watching what we ate or having to exercise.

But as much as I wish there was one, wishing never made anything happen (unless you were lucky enough to have found Aladdin’s lamp and got your three wishes).

And even if there were a magic weight loss wand, one of the big companies who make billions of dollars a year selling their diet products would have bought it, locked it away in a closet, and thrown away the key.

The cold hard truth is that if you want to lose weight you have to eat less calories than you burn. Sounds simple, but for most of us (myself included) it’s not that easy.

I learned that, for me, successful weight loss boils down to three important things – what I call the “3 commandments for losing weight and keeping it off.”

1) Stop wishing and start doing
I spent a lot of years wishing I could lose weight. If I had a nickel for every time I uttered the phrase “I wish I could lose weight,” (usually said while I was shoveling candy, chips or cake into my mouth), I’d have a whole lot of nickels!

It took me a long time to realize that I actually had to be willing to work at getting the weight off instead of wishing, hoping, and waiting for that “magic skinny pill” to arrive.

One day my husband (who, like me, would never be accused of starving himself), said to me while he was shoveling chocolate cake (with chocolate frosting – my favorite!) into his mouth, “I wish I could lose weight.”

I suddenly saw myself and realized I had been doing the same thing – wishing I could lose weight but literally shoving loads of fattening food into my mouth while saying it.

I’m not going to get all “high and mighty” on you and say that seeing my husband act the same way about “wishing I could lose weight” as I had been motivated me to instantly go on a diet and start exercising 2 hours a day (as if I plan on ever exercising 2 hours a day).

But I have changed in one important way. I’m now actively working on losing weight (successfully!) and am no longer wishing it will happen.

2) It’s not a diet, it’s a lifestyle change
I can’t even count how many times I’ve gone on a “diet,” only to get so bored or so hungry or so frustrated by the deprivation of it, that I quit and then gained back all the weight I had worked so hard to lose (plus usually a couple extra pounds just to make things more insulting).

My old mentality was “if I can just stick to 1,000 calories a day (or eat 9 grapefruit a day, or purge all carbs from my life or whatever current diet craze I was trying), then I’ll lose all the weight I need to. Then I can stop dieting and start eating normally!”

What was the problem with that mentality? It was that I didn’t know what eating “normally” was. I could do 2 things really well – lose weight and gain weight. But maintain my weight? Never.

It wasn’t until I realized that I had to change my lifestyle for good (and that’s a scary thing to accept) that I finally was able to lose more than 20 or 25 pounds before quitting my “diet” and gaining the weight back.

I’m not successful with healthy eating and maintaining the lifestyle change I’ve adopted every day. I spent a lot of years honing those bad habits and they don’t go away overnight.

But I’ve finally accepted that if I want to be “normal” sized for the rest of my life then I have to adopt a healthier lifestyle for the rest of my life.

3) Become a food snob
Have you ever caught yourself eating something you didn’t like or eating after you were full just to get rid of the food?

Personally, I can’t even begin to count the number of times I finished a donut or a huge restaurant meal or an ice cream sundae just to get rid of it and not waste it even though I was well past the point of being full.

Nor could I begin to guess the number of times I ate something I didn’t like just because I had paid for it or because I didn’t want to hurt someone’s feelings (like a favorite Aunt who is a wonderful person but a terrible cook).

One day my daughter asked me, as I was complaining about how the candy bar I was eating tasted stale, why I was eating it if it didn’t taste good? I literally didn’t say anything for 30 seconds because I had no idea why I was eating food I didn’t like (and it was fattening food too!).

Then I started to see past events in my head such as the one where my daughter pushed away a $4 cinnamon after two bites saying it wasn’t that good and wasn’t worth the calories; and seeing a dinner companion push away a $6 creme brulee after one tiny bite; and having my boss push aside her deep fried chicken meal after a few bites because it “wasn’t worth the calories.”

At the time those things happened, I thought they were all being wasteful and too picky, but then I thought about how they were thin and I wasn’t. Yes, they were being picky and yes they were throwing away food but I realized those options were better for them than eating something they didn’t like and possibly having it permanently attach to their hips (or stomach or wherever they were most prone to show excess weight).

That’s when I made the decision to become a food snob and it’s also when my weight loss efforts because a little easier.

Seriously, it’s a whole lot easier to deal with eating less calories in a day when every calorie being ingested is one that is tasty.

If I don’t like something, I no longer eat it. I either throw it away or feed it to my dog (yes my dog eats people food). If I’m at a restaurant I’ll cover the unwanted food with a napkin so I don’t pick at it without thinking (yes, mindless eating is another one of my many food issues).

My husband has a hard time with me doing this and he will often finish my food so it doesn’t go to waste but that’s okay. If he wants to continue to eat food that he doesn’t like and continue getting fatter, that’s his business.

Become a food snob and stop being a garbage disposal! If you are going to have bread dipped in olive oil, then have good artisan bread and good olive oil. If you are going to have dessert, have a dessert you really love. You’ll be more likely to be satisfied by a smaller amount of it than of something that you don’t really like. And you’ll be less likely to go looking in fridge or pantry for something later on because the craving you had wasn’t satisfied.

But, and this is a big but (and could save you from having a big butt), just because something is super tasty and delicious doesn’t mean you should keep eating it after you are full. If you love the food but you are full, then get a doggy bag. Tomorrow is another day! You can eat it then.

So, that’s the three commandments I am following to help myself lose weight and keep it off: “doing” not “wishing;” “lifestyle” change instead of “dieting;” and being a “food snob” instead of a “garbage disposal.”

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The Best Diet To Lose Weight

August 22, 2009 By Leave a Comment

The best diet to lose weight?

It is the one that works for you.

That sounds like a load of bull, right?  It is true, though.

Here’s why: just like people are different and aren’t cut from the same “cookie cutter” mold, no one diet will work for everyone.  But, keep in mind that every diet boils down to the same basic principle of “less calories in than burned equals weight loss.”  The various diet plans, programs, surgeries, and pills just have a different way of getting there.

For me, after more than 25 years of trying practically every diet out there, along with several different “miracle weight loss pills” (the end result of which I became fatter than ever), I finally walked through the doors of a Weight Watchers meeting on the advice of my nurse practitioner.  I’ve now kissed 57 pounds good-bye, which is more than twice as much weight as I ever managed to lose at one time in the past (although I would now weight a negative number if I had kept off every pound I’ve lost over the years).

Why is Weight Watchers working for me?

1) No food is off limits. The food choices are completely mine.  There are no teeny portions of cardboard tasting foods or specific meal plans containing foods I hate (say the words “cottage cheese” and I’ll say the word “icky!).  Nothing makes me want a food more than when someone says I can’t have it.

2) Support via weekly meetings. It’s where I can ask any question I want and get all the help I need to stay motivated.  Plus for me, seeing other people losing weight makes me competitive which makes me work even harder to keep going.

3) Accountability on the scale. Believe me, that darn thing doesn’t lie (If I choose to eat 3 pieces of wedding cake, eat a huge plate of pasta, and have 5 margaritas the scale is completely willing to let me know!   And yes, I may have chosen to do this on at least one occasion…and the results weren’t pretty)

But Weight Watchers didn’t work for a friend of mine because she couldn’t handle making all her own food choices which resulted in her eating candy, chips and any unhealthy carb she could get her hands on every day.

She switched to the Curves weight loss plan because it limits carbs and has less food choices overall.  She found it easier to follow at first, but now she’s getting bored because she says “there’s only 5 menus I really like, so I keep rotating them and now I’m getting really sick of them.  I used to like chicken.  Now I almost want to run away screaming when I see it.”  It looks like she hasn’t found the right plan yet, but hopefully she will.

But while I like Weight Watchers and recommend it because it’s helping me get great results, I’m not going to wax poetic and say it’s the greatest thing in the world because I hate these things about it:

1) I absolutely loath writing down every bite of food I eat. It’s almost as bad as writing down every penny I spend, which I’m also doing in an attempt to get my spending under control (just think of any word that is the opposite of “fun,” multiply it by 10, and you’ll know how I feel about writing down what I eat and what I spend)

2) The weight loss is slow (like watching paint dry, but 20 times worse).  Yes, experts say people who lose weight slowly have the best chance of keeping it off (blah, blah, blah).  But, seriously, who wouldn’t want to take a magic pill before they go to bed one night and wake up the next morning skinny and looking great?

The good news is that there are a lot of weight loss books, plans, pills, and surgery options (if you are overweight enough to qualify) available to help a person lose weight.  The bad news is that there are a lot of options which can make the choice overwhelming.

Try to not get discouraged.  If one plan doesn’t work for you, try another one.

To help you, because we all have different needs and different lifestyles to take into consideration, ask yourself the following nine questions before choosing a diet for yourself:

1) How much time am I willing to spend preparing meals and snacks for myself?
- If you have zero time to shop or cook, consider a service that delivers meals to your door (Nutri-System and Jenny Craig are two popular programs)
- If you are willing to do at least some cooking and shopping then consider Weight Watchers – especially if you have a family and don’t want to have to prepare separate meals for yourself (just load your plate with more fruits and vegetables).

2) How much, if at all, am I willing to exercise?
- Exercise is a key part of health, but if you’re in poor health or extremely overweight, exercise can be difficult, at least at first.  I lost my first 20 pounds without doing any exercise at all (and I personally know someone who lost 50 pounds without exercising), but I started losing at a lot faster rate once I started exercising.
If exercise is really hard for you, don’t think you’re going to lose all your weight by signing up for a gym membership and working out for 2 hours every Start with a program that doesn’t require exercise, and then start exercising slowly once some of the weight comes off and you are feeling more energetic.   And, so exercise doesn’t seem so much like work, try to find something you enjoy doing (for example – did you like riding bike or going swimming when you were a kid?)

3) Do I have health issues, such as diabetes, which can make some diet plans dangerous?
- It is always recommended that a person consult their health care professional before starting a diet, and it is crucial to do so if you have health issues so that your diet isn’t further endangering your health (because losing weight is supposed to make you healthier, not sicker).

4) Do I have time to attend meetings or to meet regularly with a counselor?
- If not, then don’t choose a diet plan/program that requires it.  You’ll only be setting yourself up for failure. If you have a crazy busy schedule, consider a program that has online support.

5) Am I motivated enough to go it alone without the benefit of meetings and regular weigh-ins on the scale or do I need that accountability?
- If yes, then buy a weight loss book or join an online program.  If you need accountability then choose a program that provides it.  It’s not bad to need accountability.  It’s just how some of us are (I completely need accountability or I go off the deep end and eat all the junky food I can get my hands on.  There’s nothing like the thought of weighing in the next day to get me to pull my hand out of the chip bag).

6) How fast do I think I need to lose weight?
- If you think you have to lose 20 pounds in the next month so that you look great for your class reunion, stop and think about why you want to lose weight.  You’ll have the best chance of success if you do it for yourself, not for someone else and not because of a specific event.  Also, keep in mind that the faster you lose weight, the less likely you are to keep it off.
If you are determined to lose a lot of weight very quickly, consider a medically supervised program, such as Medifast

7) Am I willing to consider surgery or diet pills to help me achieve my weight loss goals? (Keep in mind that surgery and pills can have serious risks.  According to Web MD, 1.5 percent of people who undergo gastric bypass surgery die from the surgery itself or from complications of the surgery)
- Thousands of people have weight loss surgery every year with many people being able to lose the weight and keep it off.  It’s not a magic elixir though.  If you have your stomach made smaller, you will have to eat small meals.  If you don’t you’ll get sick and run the risk of complications.  I have a friend who had gastric bypass surgery several years ago.  She lost the extra weight and has kept it off, but she has to take a handful of supplements every day, cannot drink liquid at the same time she eats solid food (because her stomach fills up too fast) and has to eat very small meals.  She says it was really tough at first emotionally because she still wanted to eat for comfort and not only when she was truly hungry.
- Diet pills work for some people, but they are obviously not magic.  Otherwise everyone would have taken them by now and nobody would be overweight.

8 ) How motivated am I to stick to a diet to lose the weight? Hint: Wishing you could lose weight is not good enough.  You have to want to lose weight more than just about anything else in your life because it’s hard, especially if you have more than 20 pounds to lose.
- Don’t start any diet, NONE, unless you are 100 percent committed to losing weight.  If you don’t want it really bad then don’t start because you’ll only fail.  You have to be ready to undertake the task because it may very well be the hardest thing you ever do in your life (and no, I am not kidding).  I’m not trying to discourage you or be mean.  I’m talking from personal experience.

9) How much money do I have to spend on a diet plan?
- You can spend zero dollars on a diet plan and you can spend more than ten thousand dollars on a diet plan/program/surgery.  If you have no money to spend, check diet books out from the library or use online resources to help you.  Otherwise, tailor your plan to your budget.  Currently, it costs me about $40 a month for Weight Watchers, excluding the gas it costs me to drive to weekly meetings.  It’s well worth the cost to me.  You may have more or less than that to spend.
Keep in mind that the more services provided, the most the program is likely to cost.  Meal delivery services easily run into hundreds of dollars a month.  But, it might be just the thing you need to get that extra weight off which will likely save you thousands in medical costs down the road.

I wish I could make it easy for you and say that “X” is the best diet for everyone but unfortunately I can’t.  We all have different needs, different budgets, differing amounts of free time, and different levels of health that are factors.  Take the time to consider what yours are so that you can find the best diet for you, which is the one that helps you get rid of the extra pudge!

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I Was Afraid To Weigh In This Week

August 21, 2009 By Leave a Comment

I didn’t weigh in at Weight Watchers this week even though I talked smart about how I was going to “face the ugly truth and get on the scale,” accepting that nobody forced me to overeat.   But, when it came right down to it, I couldn’t go into the meeting and face my leader, even though she is completely non-judgmental.

Why?  Because my warped mind was sure that even though she would be completely supportive out loud, that in her mind she would be thinking “how could you be such a pig that you gained 12 pounds in 3 weeks?”    Yes, 12 pounds.  It’s horrible.  A pound is 3,500 calories which means I ate 42,000 extra calories during those 3 weeks or an average of an extra 2,000 calories a day.  Is it any wonder that I’m fat?  Talk about complete lack of self-control

How do I know I gained 12 pounds?  Even though I couldn’t face the scale at Weight Watchers I got on my scale at home Monday morning when my “skinny” pants felt tight.  That’s when I snapped out of the food induced fog I was under and remembered that I can’t eat anything I want without consequences (it was also when I resolved that I would go to Weight Watchers Tuesday morning, which I then changed to Wednesday evening, which I then changed to Thursday morning, and which then became “not this week”).

I got on the scale again this morning even though I almost never weigh myself at home and was happy to see I’ve lost 6 of those pounds, which is a lot to have lost over the last 4 days but I was really bloated on Monday morning so I knew I had several pounds of water weight hanging around on me.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that I still have 8 more pounds to lose to get back to where I was a month ago.

It’s pretty depressing but at least I’ve put a stop to the backsliding before I gained back all the weight I lost (plus an extra 5 or 10 pounds just for it to be more upsetting).

Why am I telling you this?  It’s certainly not because I’m proud of what I’ve done.  Part of it is selfish.  I hope that by writing about my struggles and putting them “out there” for everyone to see, that it will help motivate me to finally get all the extra weight off.  The other part is that I’m hoping I can help at least one other person see that even if there are bad days (or bad weeks) of overeating, it doesn’t mean a person should give up.

Yes, I lost the “battle of the bulge” (not funny, but true) over the last several weeks.  But I’m determined to not lose the war I’ve declared on my fat.

I know I have to get my butt back at Weight Watchers next week even though there’s no way I’ll have all that extra weight off.  I’m hoping I can keep my resolve and get there.

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Eggs and Weight Loss

August 19, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Eggs seem to make the news a lot.  First they’re good for you; then they’re evil and cause heart disease; then experts decide they were a little hasty with the “eggs are bad for you” announcement.  It’s enough to make a girl dizzy trying to keep all the “facts” straight!

The truth is that eggs are a good source of protein.  Plus eggs contain a bunch of essential vitamins and minerals (read more about it here in an article written by Margaret Furtado and click here for the complete nutrition information on eggs) and they help a person feel full (music to the ears of a person trying to lose weight!)

But, eating only egg whites is boring.  And egg substitute?  I think it tastes nasty unless it’s hidden in a pastry!

I personally eat eggs several times a week and my doctor tells me my heart is fine (but…that it won’t stay that way if I don’t lose weight).  To make sure I’m not eating too much bad cholesterol but yet have flavor, I eat 1 whole egg with 2 egg whites.  That’s my rule of thumb whether I’m am making an omelette, frying eggs in olive oil, or making an egg salad sandwich.

Plus one large whole egg with 2 egg whites is low in calories (17 calories and .1 grams of fat for each egg white, plus 70 calories  and 4.5 grams of fat for the whole egg).  Add 2 slices of Canadian bacon and 2 slices of whole grain light bread and it’s a tasty, filling, low calorie meal that’s good for breakfast, lunch or dinner!

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3 Things I Don’t Love About Weight Watchers

August 5, 2009 By Leave a Comment

I’ve been going to Weight Watchers since September, 2008 and have lost 57 pounds which is almost halfway to my goal.

While there’s lots I love about it, namely that it’s working for me, there’s a couple things I don’t love so much (there’s a downside to everything, right?).

What I hate most about Weight Watchers:

1 – “tracking” (writing down what I eat and assigning “points”
values to it based on calories/fat/fiber and portion size).  It’s a huge pain in the arse!  I absolutely detest tracking!

But I liken it to tracking money spent on a budget. I’m doing that too and hate it just as much as tracking what I eat, but tracking what I spend is helping my financial situation too.

Bottom line: tracking sucks but is worthwhile because it works.


2 – the cost (currently $12 a week or $39.95 for the automatic billing plan).  It’s not cheap but I know it’s a whole lot cheaper than medical bills down the road will be if I don’t lose these many pounds of “pudge.” I wish I could do it own on my own and save the $40 a month I spend but I need the accountability of weighing in every week and definitely need the support from my leader and fellow members.


3 – that all fat calories are the same. Bad fats rack up the points used just as quickly as good fats like olive oil which stinks. This might not seem like a big deal to you but I love salmon and those healthy fats in it mean that a portion of salmon with the same amount of calories as a piece of chicken costs me more points.

Filed Under: Featured, Lose Weight Naturally, My Weight Loss Journal, Weight Loss Articles, Weight Watchers

7 Reasons To Follow Weight Watchers Versus Other Weight Loss Plans

August 4, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Almost everybody seems to have an opinion about which weight loss product or plan works best.

I think my success so far (57 pounds and counting!) is testament to how well it works and here’s 7 top reasons why I’m following it:

1 – it’s working (insert happy dance here).

2 – no food is off limits so I can actually go out to eat if I want or have a bowl of popcorn for dinner if I choose to do so.

3 – there are no pills (which may later turn out to be more dangerous to a person’s health than the extra pounds of blubber).

4 – no dangerous “weight loss surgery.”

5 – no “liquid” meal replacements.

6 – not forced to eat prepackaged meals unless I choose.  (Sorry Nutri-System but those photos I see of your food on television do not look appetizing at all and those photos are meant to show the food in the best possible light! That ice cream looks exactly like frozen ice crystals with about a teaspoon of fat free milk in it – yuck!

7 – lots of support from my leader (called a “facilitator” now but I think that sounds dumb) and from other members at the meetings where no question or concern is too stupid or silly to ask (seriously).

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Does A Pig Out Day Help You Lose Weight?

July 16, 2009 By Leave a Comment

At my Weight Watchers meeting this week, there were several people who had really good weight loss (2.6 to 7 pounds) and guess what their common denominator was?

They all went to a party and used half to all their weekly point allowance on yummy stuff like wedding cake, wine, brats, ribs, and beer (I’m practically swooning and I think there’s  little drool running down my face).

It made the rest of us say “hot damn – time to party and pig out this week!”

The people that went out, enjoyed themselves, and dug deep into their weekly points were (scouts honor here) the biggest “losers” of the week.

But, and this is probably key, they stayed completely on track the rest of the week with healthy eating and stayed within their daily allotted points (we just knew there had to be a catch, right?).

Also, they didn’t go off the deep end and eat 5,000 calories worth of food in that one day either.  They all said they balanced out their high calorie choices with fruits and veggies (insert big “sigh”).

It’s making me think there’s something to the theory of having a “pig out day” or “day off” during the week helping to improve weight loss.

My weight loss has slowed to a crawl the last couple of months and it seems like the harder I work at staying within my points that the slower I lose.

So I’m thinking that Friday night my husband and I are going to call some friends to go out to eat; and instead of having broiled fish with steamed vegetables I’m going to have what I really want – a traditional Friday fish fry (very popular here in Wisconsin) which means some deep fried cod or haddock, fries, coleslaw and rye bread.  And I’m going to wash it down with a beer or two (yes I have enough weekly points to do it).

Then the only trick for me will be to behave the rest of the weekend and keep my head out of the ice cream bucket!

We’ll see how it goes.  I’ll let you know next week after my weigh in how I did.

Filed Under: Featured, My Weight Loss Journal

Top 9 Strategies To Lose Weight While Still Attending Social Functions

June 23, 2009 By Leave a Comment

It seems like food is everywhere when a person is trying to lose weight.  Today I came to the local library to write this post – - the library that doesn’t allow food or drinks – - and what did  I see on every table?  A full color flier advertising an ice cream social next week at said library with a picture of a luscious looking strawberry sundae!  Ugh!  Even when I go where I think there will be no food to tempt me I’m wrong! (Okay, it wasn’t actual food but the picture certainly looked good enough to eat!)

I completely understand why a lot of people say it’s harder to lose weight in the summer.  Yeah, you skinny people might think that’s crazy because of all the great fruits and veggies that are abundant in the summer but that means nothing when a fat person (me for instance) has food issues.

In the last 7 days I had an anniversary party (dinner out), birthday party (birthday cake), Father’s day celebration for father in law (dinner at their house), Father’s day celebration for my husband and my Dad (my house where I made sure salad was on the menu), and a movie night with my daughter (of course she had to buy popcorn with butter that I couldn’t resist digging my hand into several times).

If you weren’t counting that was 5 social occasions in the last 7 days that all revolved around food and the summer party season is just gearing up!

The good news is that I managed to lose 2 pounds this past week despite all the food that seemed to beckon and call out my name constantly.

My old strategy for losing weight during the height of the summer party season was to avoid going to those parties as much as possible.   That strategy completely stunk!  While the rest of my family was at the party enjoying themselves I was home feeling sorry for myself.  I always did one of two things:  went to bed and felt sorry for myself and then overate the next day because I was super hungry; or opened the pantry 5 minutes after my family left for the party and fed my sorrow with lots of junk food.

Can you guess how well those strategies worked?  Yeah, my bathroom scale will tell you they were stupid strategies.

That’s not to say I have everything figured out.  My weight loss has significantly slowed since the the weather got nicer and the endless parties started.  But, I’m still losing weight.  And I think I have some pretty good strategies figured out.

Here’s my top 9 strategies for losing weight while still going out and attending parties.  And, no, none of these strategies involve taping my mouth shut and not eating!  That’s not any fun at all.

1) Drink lots of water, before and during the party.  There are lots of times I think I’m hungry but what I really am is thirsty.  That hot weather is dehydrating.  Take your own water if you have to.  I do and I flavor it with those on the go sugar free drink mixes so I don’t feel deprived.  I get teased for bringing my own and not thinking what’s offered at the party is “good enough,” but I’m a big girl (right now both literally and figuratively) and I can handle the teasing.  So drink up!

2) Offer to bring food.  At last week’s birthday party I offered to bring a dessert.  I made a lower calorie carrot cake (I’ll get the recipe posted soon) and that’s what I ate.  I got to enjoy dessert instead of sitting at the table pouting while everyone else was eating cake.  I followed the same strategy at my in-laws house for their Father’s Day celebration.  I took a salad and ate lots of it, having just a little of the higher calories foods.
mgd 64
3) Stay Away From the Alcohol, or limit it.  I’m one of those people that after I have a couple of drinks, the munchies hit and I want to eat everything in sight – and usually do.  So I avoid alcohol at parties, most of the time.  Sometimes I’ll indulge but only if there’s MGD 64 around cuz it’s only 1 point a bottle and obviously pretty low in alcohol content so I stay in better control.

4) Plan Ahead.  If I know I’m going to be going out to eat at a restaurant I always go online to see if they have a menu posted.  Then I plan what I’m going to order.  If they don’t have a menu available I still try to plan what I’m going to have in general.  For example if we’re going to a restaurant that specializes in burgers I plan on having a burger without calorie dense sauces and cheese.  I usually have fries, but I make sure I have weekly points saved so I can indulge.  Otherwise a small portion of steak with a baked potato or grilled fish and veggies are my standbys.  Avoid most restaurant salads.  They are often the highest calorie items on the menu cuz they usually have breaded and deep fried chicken plus they tons of high calorie dressing (they gotta make them taste good, right?).

5) Eat Before You Go. It sounds stupid to eat before you go somewhere where you know you’re going to eat, but it helps me avoid overeating.  I’ll eat a whole grain mini bagel with peanut butter, a piece of string cheese, yogurt, or some raw veggies before I go so I’m not ravenous when I get to the party.  That way I can control myself much better.

6) Eat The Fresh Stuff. If the party you’re at has fruit platters and veggie trays, eat a plateful of that before anything else to help fill you up.  If there are cocktail shrimp, eat those to your heart’s content as well cuz they are low in calories.  Then head over to the high calorie foods and desserts.  I always do this now.  It really helps me stay in control because I’m not crazed with hunger by the time I get to that yummy high calorie stuff.

7) Save Calories/Points For The Parties. I follow Weight Watchters which is a points based system.  If you’re not familiar with it, the plan has daily points plus 35 weekly points that can be used as desired.  Those weekly points are what I save for parties.  Sometimes though, there’s so many parties in a week, like my last 7 days for example, that those 35 extra points don’t stretch very far.  That’s when I employ strategy number 8.

8) Up Your Exercise. If you know you have lots of parties and social gatherings coming up, increase your activity.  Work out longer and harder at the gym.  Take extra walks, longer bike rides, do more laps in the pool, etc.  Exercise helps build muscle and increase your metabolism which burns more calories.  Last week I went for a 25 mile bike ride one day and a 2 hour walk another as a buffer against all the “party food.”

9) Stay Away From the Buffet and the Kitchen.  At my family parties there’s always a dessert table and the kitchen is a favorite gathering place for the girls.  I eat my meal as far away from the dessert table as possible and I now help with cleanup (I’m the dish washer) rather than the prep so that I don’t pop all those extra “tasting” bites of food in my mouth while I’m helping to get it ready.

Following these strategies is helping me to continue to lose weight and to get out the summer “unable to lose in summer rut” I was in.  I’m not saying it makes it easy.  It’s still hard but it doesn’t seem impossible when I implement these strategies.  Getting this weight off may be the hardest thing I ever do but I’m determined to do it and it’s definitely worth the effort.

Filed Under: Lose Weight Naturally, Weight Loss Articles

Winning the Weight Loss War

June 18, 2009 By Leave a Comment

There’s no doubt that winning at the weight loss game is a war full of battles.  Some of the those battles, i.e. resisting those peanut M&M’s, I’ll win.  I’ll successfully resist them and they’ll survive to tempt me another day.  Other times, like yesterday, I’ll inhale them and wish for more.

I’m realizing the trick to sticking with my diet for the long haul is to forgive myself when I’m not perfect.  But, that’s oh so hard to do!  I tend to treat every bad food choice as a personal failure, and when I feel like I’ve failed I turn to food for comfort.

But, if I keep that destructive pattern up, this fat on my body will never go away.  And I became acutely aware of exactly how much fat I have hanging around yesterday when I decided to try and “jog” for a short time.  I could feel every ounce of my fat jiggling up and down – and it was not a pleasant sensation.

My biggest challenge is dealing with the negative thoughts in my head.  You know the ones I’m talking about.  It’s the voice that says “it’s too hard” “I can’t do it” “it’s not working” “why bother cuz I’ll never keep it off anyway” “I’m a fat pig so I may as well eat like one,” and so on.

It’s hard to sustain momentum when you’re like me and have a lot of weight to lose.  I’ve lost 55 pounds so far which is exciting but that’s not even half of what I have to lose.

Yeah, it’s feeling like it’s going to be the 100 year war.

BUT I WILL WIN IT!

I’m going to try and start thinking of my weight loss battle like a war because most wars are not won or lost in one day or in one battle.  It’s the overall momentum that counts.  If I can keep the general momentum of weight loss going, then I’ll know I’m winning even when I have bad days (or bad weeks) where I can’t seem to stop myself from shoving masssive amounts of food in my mouth.

I CAN DO IT – and if you have weight to lose, I know you can do it too!

Filed Under: Lose Weight Naturally

Weight Loss Plateaus

June 10, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Weight Loss Plateaus are about the worst thing to deal with and get through when dieting.  They are weight loss hell and a big reason why a lot of people “toss in the towel” on their weight loss efforts.

I’ve been dealing with a plateau for the past month.  The same 2 1/2 pounds has been plaguing me – down, up, down, up…..grrrrr!

I’ve been happy, mad, frustrated, sad, hopeless and completely ticked off.

Last week when I weighed in at Weight Watchers I let my frustrations pour out to my leader (yes, I know I’m supposed to call her a facilitator now but I think it sounds stupid).  She calmly listened and then suggested I quit trying to lose for a few weeks and instead try to maintain since my emotions were all over the place ever since I reached 50 pounds.

It made sense even though I resisted for a couple of minutes.  My emotions have been all over the place.  I was ecstatic when I got my 50 pound reward.  I felt as skinny as Twiggy!  Then I got depressed when I realized that I wasn’t even halfway to my goal (I want to lose 120 pounds). Maybe I did need a break.  So the next day I added a few points to my daily allowance just like anyone who was going on maintenance would…..and then…..I proceeded to pig out!

I decided since I was going to “maintain” that it would okay to drink a regular Pepsi (the full octane stuff with something like 15 teaspoons of sugar in it).  The first Pepsi was so good I decided to have a second..then a third, fourth, and fifth.  While in the middle of my Pepsi binge I got hungry for chips and found a half bag of stale Chili Cheese Corn Chips in my pantry so I ate (inhaled) all of them even though they were more chewy than crunchy.

Then, since I had blown the day anyway I decided to take a trip to McDonalds for a Big Mac and fries….can’t really tell you why – by then I was in a food induced haze and couldn’t stop myself from shoving my mouth full of fatty, high calorie food.

After my McDonalds binge I felt sick.  What a surprise, right?

A bike ride seemed like the right thing to do in an effort to burn off a few of the junk food calories I had just consumed.

The bike ride was hell.  Even though I had consumed enough calories and sugar to satisfy a small elephant I could barely muster up enough energy to get through my normal 10 mile bike ride.  Plus, the farther I got into my ride the sicker I felt.  I was gassy from all the soda and had to fight the urge to jump off my bike and “hurl” into the bushes.

Then and there I vowed to remember how eating that junk made me feel.

The next day, last Thursday, I got up and decided to get back on track with Weight Watchers.  I ate healthy the rest of the Weight Watchers week (I weigh in on Tuesday mornings so my “Weight Watchers” week is Tuesday through Monday), exercised, and drank a lot of water.  Plus I didn’t let myself get on the scale at home (no need to take the risk of further depressing myself).

At weigh in yesterday I was down 4 pounds!

My leader thinks my binge shocked my system all to heck.  She cautioned that I shouldn’t do the binge every week but she reminded me how she often tells people during our meetings to go ahead and use all their extra weekly points in one day when their weight loss is at a standstill in order to get their metabolism burning up calories again.  The problem is that most people resist that suggestion and are too horrified to even consider it cuz how can temporarily eating more mean losing weight?

It does work.   Of course, it doesn’t mean a person should eat the junk I did.  Healther eating is a better idea.

I’m officially down 55 pounds and have now made it through several plateaus.

What have I learned?

For me, the best way to get through those plateaus and start getting the weight off again is to do something different – to shake things up and kind of confuse my body.  During one I started drinking lots more water; then I upped my exercise; then I significantly upped my fruits and veggies; then I changed my exercise routine.  They all worked and got me through plateaus in two or three weeks.

The problem was that when I hit this plateau I didn’t know what to do differently.  I was drinking lots of water, eating lots of fruits and veggies, and had an exercise routine that I could change some – but didn’t see a lot of room for change (mostly because the weather is finally nice – no snow – and I’m working hard to get my “butt” conditioned for long bike rides).

I was so close to giving up but I stuck with it (such a change from the last 150 times I tried to lose weight – I was always giving up.  I just may finally have my head screwed on right).

The thing that helped me the most was continuing to go to Weight Watchers and not skipping a meeting or avoiding weigh in.  Being in that meeting room with other people who understand how difficult it is to get those pounds off and having an understanding leader made the difference for me.

Now it’s onward and forward for me…..working on losing that weight one day (and sometimes “one minute”) at a time.

Filed Under: Lose Weight Naturally, Weight Loss Plateaus, Weight Watchers Tagged With: , ,
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