Monday, October 13, 2008

Angry Fat Girl

Yo. Yo. Yo.

No, I'm not trying to be hip. This is the sound of my dieting life.

I've been up and down so many times, I feel like one of those blow up punching things we had as kids that you could punch and would come right back up again. They usually had Bozo's face on them...which is also apropos.

Long story short...if you haven't been here before... I, like a million others, struggle with my weight. (I know you are SHOCKED). Last year, I went on a very drastic low fat/low cal/low carb diet and dropped 40 lbs in 4 months. It was a beautiful, albeit, somewhat stupid thing. I went from a 12 to a 6 in the blink of an eye.

But realistic it was not because the bad habits crept back and now...a year later, I'm back in that size 12.

And I am pissed!

I hate how I look in my clothes...God forbid out of them.

I'm angry that I let it get to this point. But I suppose that getting here is the thing that will get me to jump or limp into action.

Just exactly what that action is...is indeed the question.

Low carb has worked in the past (but is often inconvenient).
WW has worked in the past (but I just cannot to the points thing again).

So, as I set out on the next leg of this journey...AGAIN, I'm setting smaller goals.

This week, I'm giving up sugar, white flour, and the worst high carb culprits. No pasta, no white bread, no potatoes.

Beyond that...I'm just going to try and eat healthy and see how it goes.

I have some new favorite blogs that I'm reading. Check them out on the right. I'm feeling especially inspired by Pasta Queen and love the Habit-a-Week Challenge over at Escape from Obesity.

Join me on the journey. And stay tuned for less of me.

Monday, July 28, 2008

Exercise or else


The funny thing about writing a blog, is that if you write that you will do something, well, then gosh darn it, you better do it. So out of fear of being ridiculed by those folks nice enough to have read my last post...

Yes.

I did it.

I got up early today and exercised. (can I get a "woo hoo" from the crowd?)

Granted, it wasn't a lot. But I did manage to squeeze in 20 minutes of vigorous kick boxing this morning before racing into the shower. (still waitin' on that "woo hoo").

It was one of those workouts-on-demand on cable and to be honest, I wasn't all that thrilled with it because the "instructor" was more than a tad annoying but...Gotta start somewhere, right?

I will try something else tomorrow.

Stay tuned for less of me.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Making slow and steady progress on Weight Watchers

First a thanks to Miz Fit for the little kick in the butt this week for not updating in a while.

It wasn't intentional. I swear.

I'm a little frustrated with the slow pace of Weight Watchers despite knowing that it's better to lose it this way.

Five weeks in and I've lost 5 pounds. (Hurray for me ???)

The funny thing about weight loss programs though is that in order for them to work, you have to work them. Profound, I know.

Some days I'm better at it than others. I find it impossible to stay on program every day and I know that I am my own worst enemy if I fail to write stuff down.

Some slip ups are obvious....like the piece of cheesecake I HAD to have to celebrate my friend's birthday. What kind of friend would I be to go to Cheesecake Factory with him and not have "something"...right? Yea, Yea, I know.

In the immortal words of Bugs Bunny... "what a maroon!"

Other slip ups are not so obvious or maybe just unavoidable. Weekends are just deadly for me lately as I have found myself in social situations where food I shouldn't be eating in ANY quantity has found itself in my gullet. And of course, I'm instantly sorry and kicking myself clear into the next day.

But aside from the obvious and not so obvious stated above, my biggest challenge continues to be...exercise. It's not the how, or even the what (since, like most everyone I know, I have a plethora of bands, balls, weights and dvds to get the job done). Instead it's just the WHEN?

Every day, my alarm clock goes off at 5:30. Every day I have the intention of getting up and doing some form of exercise before I have to start getting myself and two 7 year olds ready to start the day. And more times than not, I find myself hitting the snooze enough times to make those intentions worthless.

So if any of you have any great suggestions of how I can get over this hurdle, please speak up. I KNOW that if I can figure out a way to make exercise a regular and permanent part of my daily routine, that the weight will melt away.

Stay tuned for less of me.

Friday, July 4, 2008

Watching the Scale Go Down-Week 2 on Weight Watchers

This week, I lost another 1.5 pounds for my second week on Weight Watchers. Slow and steady wins the race.

This week I was a little concerned though. My regular routine was disrupted by having to attend two days of training in NYC. I knew this was going to mean having to make some hard food choices since these things are never an opportunity to eat well...just to eat whatever is handy. I did better than I thought I would, though. I skipped the bagels they provided in the morning and the cookies they set out in the afternoon. Ate breakfast before I left and made sure I had some fruit handy. But maybe because it was weighing so heavily (no pun intended ) on my mind, I felt like I was STARVING the whole day. It could be because my day started so much earlier. I had to eat breakfast at 6:30 before leaving the house to catch the train instead of my usual 8:30 (at my desk) And I'm certain that I drank a lot more coffee than I usually do (It was not what you'd call a "sit on the edge of your seat" kind of training so I needed a little help.) The good news is that it forced me to do a lot more walking that I typically do in my suburban life.

I've been wearing a pedometer lately so I can tell you that from my house to the World Trade Center where I got off the train... it was 1700 steps. But between walking to the building where my training was down near Wall Street and getting a little turned around on the first day trying to find the entrance to the train on the way back...I logged over 10,000 steps each day.

I guess that's one of the pitfalls of living a "get-in-your-car-to-go-everywhere" kind of life. When we lived in the city, I wouldn't have given it a second thought to walk anywhere. Now, it's a different story completely.

I also found this week that if I'm really good about eating the right things, drinking water and overall, staying on plan 95% of the time, then when I'm faced with those situations that cause me to stray, I don't have to feel like I just sabotaged my entire week.

This week could have been MUCH worse if I had just given in to temptation and convenience. But I am really proud of my restraint in choosing bananas over cookies and a hot pretzel (in the train station on the way home) over a Haagen Daz ice cream pop.

Happy 4th of July and stay tuned for less of me.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

First Weigh In on Weight Watchers

I went to my first weigh in tonight and I'm proud to say I am down 1.8 pounds. I was really hoping it would be more. Every other time I've done Weight Watchers there's been this great jump start at the first weigh in.

I know. I know. One to two pounds a week is the best way to lose.

But I was pretty sure this first week was going to be more.

WAIT. What am I whining about? I followed the plan and it worked! Right??

So what did I do right and what could I have done better? I used WW's eTools to track everything I ate. It's a great tool and recording everything is truly key to keeping track of everything that goes in my mouth. I also found a great tool for looking up anything I don't find in the WW database. Check out www.nutritiondata.com to look up any food you can think of.

Write it down. It'll make a difference.

The goal this week is to get a little more exercise and see if I can step it up for next week.

Stay tuned for less of me.

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Surviving McDonald's on Weight Watchers

Every dieter I know struggles with how to get through the weekends. I do ok through the Monday to Friday routine of eating at pretty much the same time every day. But with two small children at home, the weekends are typically a whirlwind of errands and social/ family engagements. Eating on the run and feeding the kids wherever we happen to be that will cause the least amount of drama often means choosing things that I would never choose if I was by myself.

Today...one daughter had a birthday party to attend so I promised the other one that we would do something together (of her choosing). This included lunch out and a trip to the park. So of course she picked McDonald's for lunch which sent me into a mild panic over how many points I would have to spend on lunch.

Much to my surprise, McDonald's is not the enemy. I chose the Southwest salad with grilled chicken and Balsamic dressing which I later learned was only 7 points. Slightly more than I might have normally spent on lunch but certainly not the off the chart point count that, say, a quarter pounder with cheese might have been. McDonald's is even nice enough to provide a handy little chart of nutritional content for the most popular items and a link to their web site to check out anything else on the menu. If you are curious, check it out here. Similar charts exist for Wendy's and Burger King.

It's not always easy to make the healthiest of food choices when out. And don't get me wrong. I am NOT suggesting that we should all run out and eat fast food every day and still expect to lose weight. But what I am saying is that on Weight Watchers, you can eat anywhere and still stay on plan.

Stay tuned for less of me.

Friday, June 20, 2008

A New Dieting Path

Yes, it's been a while.

Have you wondered where I've been?

Standing in front of the fridge stuffing my face is the obvious answer. But wait...I'm jumping ahead. Let me back up and get the new folks up to speed.

Once upon a time, a beautiful but plump girl went on a diet. OK, she went on a lot of diets and had a fair amount of success on each and every one. Until she grew bored and slipped back into old habits. And before long she was slipping back into the larger sizes in her closet.

Then one day, she went on a low carb/ low fat diet (yes, it is a contradiction for those doing the math). The diet (which shall not be named) was somewhat controversial but Scalemistress lost nearly 40 pounds in 4 months. Which all the experts will tell you is too much too soon. But she didn't care because she went from a size 12 to a size 6 in time for a big family vacation.

That was 10 months ago. And in these past 10 months I have struggled to regain (pardon the pun) the glory of being that single digit size that I was so happy to obtain last summer. And also in these 10 months, I have tried to resume some healthier eating habits and exercise more. But ultimately, all I've achieved is gaining back nearly 30 of the original 40 pound loss.

It's horribly depressing.

What to do. What to do.

Well I tried a few things on my own. but if there's anything I know for sure about all of the diets out there, it's that they all work...if you work them.

Some universal truths to dieting are:
Write it all down
Drink a lot of water
Move more

What you put in your mouth may vary but those things are always true. And one more truth for me is I work them best when I don't do it alone.

So when a few of my co-workers decided to do Weight Watchers, I battled the inner demons. You know the ones. The voices in my head that said "But Scalemistress, you've been swearing by the low carb life for so long. Are you switching teams? Are you going over the dark side?"

But I know that Weight Watchers works. It's worked for me before. Just like low carb worked for me before. The bigger question is...what will work for me now?

So yea.... I took the plunge. I joined Weight Watchers....again. Went to a meeting. Stepped on the scale. And now I'm two days into counting points...again. So far so good. I'll step back on that scale each Wednesday....in between stepping on the one at home more than a dozen times before then.

So join me in this next chapter on my weight loss journey.

And stay tuned for less of me.

Thursday, February 7, 2008

When Dieting Boredom Sets In

What do you do when boredom sets in? And I don't mean just plain old "I'm tired of eating salads" boredom...I mean sheer unadulterated "why the hell should I bother" boredom.

I've been following a controlled carb diet for nearly a year and admittedly, I weigh 10% less right now than I did at this same time last year. So despite the fact that I have gained back some of the weight I initially lost last summer, I think I can safely say that this way of eating really does work for me.

But I'm so darn tired of thinking about it all the time.

Why wasn't I born with that ability to just eat whatever my heart's desire was instead of having to plan and think and all that other nonsense that goes along with dieting?

ah..."to sleep, perchance to dream."

or more accurately... "SNAP OUT OF IT."

OK, I'm back now.

Perhaps it is that I've been playing around with the same 6 pounds for about 2 months now. It would be SO easy just to say "screw it" and go back to eating a big bowl of ice cream every night but then I'd have to face those size 8 pants in my closet just mocking me.

Rationally, of course I know that stalls are temporary and that I just have to stick with it...not cheat and this too shall pass. The goal of the moment is to drop these stinkin' 10 pounds by April 4th. That will be the one year mark of starting on this low carb journey. If I can lose those 10 pounds (or more) by then...then I can mark the anniversary 30 pounds lighter. That's only 2 months away... 10 pounds in 2 months. I can do that

If I can just get past the boredom.

Thursday, January 31, 2008

Surviving Temptation in a High Carb World

Today's tip: Don't give in to eating peer pressure.

Yesterday, the women I work with all decided that we needed to go out for ice cream at lunch.

Uh-oh. Visions of creamy chocolate ice cream danced in my head.

I considered not going but I haven't been at this job long and didn't want to be standoffish. So, I decided to go with them and only get something if they had anything sugar free.

Of course they didn't. Plenty of "low fat" choices but nothing sugar free. UGH!

I got coffee instead (with Splenda!). And I'm damned proud of myself for it.

I decided that the idea of those size 8 pants in my closet was more exciting than the scoop of chocolate and peanut butter ice cream.

And that thrill carried me for the rest of the day.

The road not taken would have been me kicking myself for the rest of the day.

This tasted much better!

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Who Doesn't Love a Good Contest

I know what you are thinking.

Not a peep from Scalemistress in a month and now twice in one day??

Well, I had to pop in and tell you about a great find I stumbled on today.

Amber, over at That Bead Girl's Weight Loss Project, has a great contest going on right now. Prizes include The Biggest Loser workout dvds, Jillian Michael's DVDs or a year long subscription to some great diet and health magazines. If you remember, I am a big fan of the Biggest Loser DVDs. I have the 2nd one and I actually use it. Shocking but true!

Check out the complete rules and enter for a chance to win one of these fabulous prizes. I have entered so of course I hope that I win but I'm willing to share the love.

We can all use a little motivation. (Some more than others).

And who doesn't like to win stuff.

Listen to Your Instincts

Yes, it's true. It's been a solid month since I posted anything here. And I'm a little embarrassed about the reasons.

Basically, I'm a slacker.

And when you are a slacker, it's all about making excuses, isn't it?

The good news is that the scale has remained steady for the past month. But the bad news is that it's at a number I'm not happy with. Big surprise, right?

(As a little side note, I think the only thing that has kept the weight gain from being more than it is...is that I've actually been exercising fairly regularly this month. Do with that information what you will)

After I got done with my little pity party, I did what I always do. I started reading and researching...looking for some new answer to the question of my increasing waistline. And for a few days, I got sucked in by the lure of the glycemic index. With what I know about my own body chemistry it all seemed to make a lot of sense to me. Eat things that keep your blood sugar constant. I was all ready to drink the proverbial sugar free Kool-Aid.

But as I started studying the food lists and the glycemic index itself, I had a REALLY hard time wrapping my brain around the concept of being able to eat foods that I have not eaten in nearly a year (bread? pasta? bananas?).

I tried REALLY hard to talk myself into it. I went so far as to make a grocery list of things that would now have a home in my refrigerator.

And in the meantime, I kept looking for web sites and blog entries that would convince me that this was the right weight loss plan for me. There's an awful lot of promotion for a low GI way of eating but I wasn't finding the proof I needed. If you look hard enough, you can find anyone who will say anything. It's a matter of, who do you trust? Then I found this article on Regina Wilshire's blog and I came to my senses. So while I think that there might be some value to the glycemic index for people suffering from diabetes, I don't think its going to be any great shakes for me as a weight loss plan.

Now, what was I going to do???

Enter the voice of reason (aka my husband).

Last night as I rambled on about my findings and struggling with the part of me looking for answers and the part of me feeling more than a twinge of doubt about a new plan... he says,

"Why aren't you just doing what you know has worked before?"

DUH.

Good point.

How many times have we talked ourselves into something that our instincts knew was just plain wrong? It's like those driving directions you print out that has that one turn on them that seems to head you in the wrong direction. You KNOW it doesn't seem right but you follow it anyway because it says it...plain as day...right there on the page...that you should go THAT way. Only to find out down the road that you should have followed your instincts and stayed on the path you were on.

Well, I've obviously lost my way a bit the past few months. And while the damage is not horrible ...not irreparable... it does need to be addressed immediately.

A controlled carb plan works for me. Why did I consider straying? It wasn't that the plan wasn't working. It was that I wasn't working the plan.

AH.

Profound, huh?

This little exercise was the good kick in the pants that I needed. Today it was back to Induction for me. By the end of the week, I will have my confidence back!

Stay tuned for less of me.