"Nothing Will Ever Taste As Good As Being Thin Feels"

Ahhhhh, sounds so good, doesn't it?  Now if only I could make myself remember that when I'm pouring butter on a huge bowl of popcorn!!!    LOL
(I borrowed that quote from my Mom today; thanks, Mom!)

Kristin here -  hope everyone is having a successful week!  Mine has been fairly decent.  Since re-vamping everything (eating plan & exercise schedule) on February 7th, I've lost 6 pounds.  I am beyond thrilled.  After 2 1/2 years of yo-yoing, every pound I lose is going to make me want to celebrate.  (And as long as I don't celebrate with Cadbury Creme Eggs, it's all good.)

A few things that are helping me immensely are the 1100 calorie goal; I start my day with a cup of tea and don't eat anything until I'm truly hungry for it, then I spread out only 600 calories all day following that same pattern, alternating first a food item, then a beverage, etc.  So my day looks kinda like:  Cup of tea, apple, glass of iced tea, serving of almonds, can of diet 7-up, plate of baby carrots, etc. etc.  Once I hit 600 calories, I stop until my 500-calorie, 6:00 p.m. "reward supper."  (The "reward meal" concept comes from the "Carb-Addict's Diet," and it works like nothing else I've ever tried.  It completely eliminates my late-night cravings!  This is a MIRACLE!)

I'm also now working out 5 days a week - alternating the following, to combat boredom:  Tae Bo Basic workout, 45-minute treadmill walk, 45-minute elliptical workout, "Yoga For Weight-loss" DVD, and "Wii" Zumba.  I'm actually looking forward to trying the Zumba for the first time this weekend.  Fun!

Happy battling, soldiers!

I'm doing good, but getting shallow

Hi Ladies!  Sarah here.  I've been doing pretty good lately!  I've been keeping myself to 1100 calories or less a day, and I've been exercising almost every single day!  And I'm actually starting to like it!  I'm not hungry or particularly tired any more.  I'm getting used to it.  But this makes me wonder if my metabolism is changing in horrible ways and now if I go out for pizza some night I'll gain 6 pounds.  I had a friend in college who was anorexic and she had to go to the hospital and in order for her to gain weight all she had to eat was 600 calories a day.  That's messed up.  Not that I'm anorexic by any means, but it would be just my luck to get the metabolism of a hardened, life-long anorexic.

I'm down a total of six pounds, four of which I've lost since Feb. 1.  Unfortunately tonite during my workout I got a bout of diarrhea, which normally would not be good news but when you're dieting it's great news!  Just kidding.  Diarrhea is never good news, you know with people in the third world still dying of it and all, but still; I'm looking forward to getting on the scale tomorrow!

(Dieting is making me so shallow.  I hate myself just a little.)

The Accidental Donut

Hey!  Sarah here, Great news (said sarcastically), I gained half a pound this week!  But I'm still down five pounds, and that's something right?  I know it's real weight loss because my forearms are thinner and my bras are starting to pucker.  As I was getting ready for work this morning and I put on my ill-fitting bra, and my watch slid up my spindly forearm, I had to ask myself, "Is this really worth it?"  I'm kind of used to being a size 14 with healthy (popeye) forearms, and a full bra.  Do I really want to change that?  I don't hate my bod that much.  I want to get in shape because that's just smart, so I can see how the exercise thing is a must, but do I need to keep starving to death?  My pants are no longer fart-inducingly tight, so I'm starting to lose my major motivation for weight loss.  Must keep focused...

or do I?

Oh, and I accidentally had a donut this morning.  A delicious one with white icing and sprinkles.  A kid I know was passing out treats for her birthday at school and I took one because I didn't want to hurt her feelings, but I was just going to give it to the college student who was working in the class today instead of eating it myself, but before I knew it, half of it was gone and my mouth was full.  What happened?  I don't know.  I do know it was delicious.  Almost worth a quarter of my daily calorie budget.  Almost.

Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket.

Cuz it's just that kind of day.  Anne here.   I went shopping with Corine this afternoon to find her some jammies to wear on our Florida trip, and I wanted to look for a swim suit for myself.  First suit I picked out was in my size, black (the only color suit that I'll wear!), and I had a coupon, which essentially put it on sale.  I had no idea what size to get, but this suit has a built in under wire bra thingy, so the size of the suit was the size of the bra.  Easy enough.  Fit like a dream!  Even Corine said "Wow Mommy!"  Sold.

I had lost a nice amount of weight (just over 5 lbs) then I got sick, so I wasn't as careful with the diet and who can exercise when you cough up a lung after climbing a set of stairs?  Much to my surprise, I didn't gain any of my weight back!  I do jiggle a little more, so now this weekend I'll be back to Zumba.

Of course, I might just think that I look OK because I want to go on this trip so bad!

Update

Hello ladies, Sarah here, I have been doing pretty good the last few weeks.  I have lost a total of 5.5 pounds and I'm starting to notice changes in my bod.  FINALLY!  My pants are a little looser, and I have gone down a notch on my belt.  That's good huh?  Last week I did excellent.  I had lots of protein so I wasn't very hungry but I was SO TIRED.  This week I'm having less protein (gotta go to the grocery store) and more carbs and I'm very hungry but I'm not so tired.  I don't know what's worse, being tired, being hungry or being fat.  Only hungry also makes me crabby, but tired is annoying, and fat is just fat.  I'm starting to think I'm okay with being fat.  Dieting sucks.  I feel like a fat anorexic, which has all the disadvantages of the dreaded disease, but none of the thinness.

How's Everyone Doing?

Looks like a quiet week in Blog Land.  How's everyone doing this week?  
Kristin here, eating an apple, trying to convince myself it tastes like a Cadbury Creme Egg.  Initially I lost 5.5 "water weight" pounds about a week ago, but gained 5 of them back between Thursday of last week and yesterday.  (Lake Avenue Cafe dinner with the teenager last Thursday, Guadalajara dinner and movie with hubby last Friday, Lia Sophia Jewelry party Food-Extravaganza last Saturday... then a fair amount of what I like to call "Dieter's Remorse Eating" on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday.  (Mountains of jewelry party leftovers, Zhong Hua Chinese lunch, Erberts and Gerberts lunch, etc. etc. etc.    HORRID.) 
Today, I've managed to reign it in somehow.  When the hubby called me from Perkins and asked if he could bring me anything, I somehow told him I was "fine."  Otherwise it would have been one of those giant, gooey cinnamon rolls with 1/2 stick of butter smeared on it.    <sigh>

FINALLY.

Howdy ladies, Kristin here.  Well, it's taken almost 5 months, but this week my scale is finally going DOWN, instead of up or going nowhere.  Today I'm down 5 pounds since Monday morning, which is bizarre.  I've been following Sarah's advice:  NO more than 1100 calories, no matter what, no white flour carbs (at all), and I'm trying to work out as much as possible.  I did about 20 minutes of crunches and stretching on Monday morning, and 45 minutes (200 calories burned each time) on the treadmill Tuesday and Wednesday.  I've been eating nothing but super-lean protein, veggies, fruits, a little whole grain, low-fat milk, Greek yogurt, nuts, and lots of herbal tea.  I've been following the "don't eat unless you're hungry" rule 24/7.  When I feel hungry, I eat ONE thing, and I alternate a food one time, and a beverage the next.  So my day looks kind of like, "coffee, almonds, tea, yogurt, ice tea, fruit, water, veggies...etc."  I'm eating a total of only 600 calories between 7:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m., and then at 7:00 p.m. I eat my favorite 370-calorie frozen dinner and 8 oz. of 2% milk (130 calories), which rounds out my 1100-calorie day.   It's working!  And better yet... I'M NOT HUNGRY all day!!!  It's been so long since I've had anything positive to report, I had to share.  Hope everyone out there is having a great week!!! 

Success???

Hi, Sarah here. I think I've finally found what is going to work for me that will actually produce weight-loss results:  starving and exercising to absolute exhaustion.  Actually, it's not all that bad. (yes it is) This week I'm not eating any more than 1100 calories no matter how much I exercise.  Previously I would take into account how much I exercised in a day and I could eat to make up for the exercise deficit by eating that many more calories.  I only lost a pound and a half.  Not too impressive.  This week 1100 is the max I'm eating every day and I've been weighing myself every day (I know, stupid rookie mistake) and it's working!  Actually on Monday I was a little discouraged because on Sunday (official weigh-day) I weighed 173 and on Monday I weighed 173.5.  I attribute this to the massive amounts of fat and sodium I ate on Sunday when I blew it with my fried shrimp feast. (No regrets!) But on Tuesday I was down to 172.5 and today I was down to 172. 

This is what I've been eating:  A glass of water and a couple of boiled eggs for breakfast.  160 calories (and wonderful breath all morning!) This is instead of my tiny bowl of raisin bran that was around 270 with the milk.  I figure that is too much to have in the morning when I'm not all that hungry and protien is better to start the day than carbs, right?  RIGHT!

For lunch a Lean Cuisine.  I really like the tortilla encrusted fish (290 calories), or the pecan chicken (310 calories)

For a snack an apple which is about 100 calories.  That brings me up to about 550 calories and that leaves 550 for the rest of the day.  Not bad!  Monday I had a stupid salad and a tiny piece of salmon for dinner and a tiny red potato and I can't remember how many calories that was but it wasn't 550 so I ended the day with calories left so I had a piece of string cheese for 80 calories in the evening when I was starving.  I'm trying to eat more protein than carbs which is so sad because I LOVE carbs almost as much as I love my children. 

I've been doing the worst workouts this week too.  On Monday I went to the Y and did a half hour on the elliptical and did it hard enough so that my heart almost exploded about five times.  Then I did a half hour on the treadmill and even did about ten minutes of that running!  No, YOU shut up!  Last night I did my least favorite hour-long DVD workout.  I hate it because it KILLS my legs and I'm completely out of breath for most of the workout and I can't do some of it without collapsing so it makes me feel weak and old. 

I hope the weight loss keeps up. Think thin thoughts for me!

Dreading Tomorrow's Weigh-In

I SHOULD just skip tomorrow's weigh-in, but I probably won't.  Kristin here, typing with a glass of sangria to my right and a glass of 2% milk (next to a home-made peanut-butter-chip cookie) to my left.  My whole week wasn't this ridiculous; I did manage many many hours of successful starving and suffering.  The past week I've been loosely following the general "guidelines" of the "17-Day Diet;" that is to say that I have not yet purchased the book, but found enough reviews online to kind of "piece together" the rules of the first 17-day "cycle."  In short, I've been trying to keep my calories to 1200 or less, and have those calories be 99% lean meats, such as venison tenderloin, chicken breast, tuna, imitation crab, shrimp, etc.... combined with tons of no-starch veggies, two servings of low-sugar fruit, two servings of plain Greek yogurt, and a blob of olive oil (I'm assuming to cook the meat in...?)  I don't know whether the seafood is supposed to be OK, but it's low-cal and protein, so I'm going with it.  I've been trying to eat little or no processed "meat," such as cooked/pressed/smoked/cured turkey lunchmeat and turkey hotdogs.

It's interesting to me that suddenly, now that I'm trying to eat healthier, I have a ridiculous sweet tooth.  I've NEVER craved chocolate before now.  Now, it's all I can do to avoid the ice cream bars that have been in the freezer for weeks!  I assume it's because I'm restricting my carbs over-all, and my body is craving carbs in general, and sweets fall into the carb family.  I can't figure it out otherwise.

I realize the ludicrous-ness of the fact that I am sitting here, typing on this diet blog, while baking huge, gooey cookies.  I've had the bag of peanut butter chips in the cupboard since last summer, and I wanted them gone.  My husband likes a cookie occasionally with his coffee, and he's more than satisfied with the generic Oreo-types with lard-based "cream" sandwiched in between two cardboard-tasting wafers.  I thought these would be a nice "Super Bowl treat."  I got the thumbs up from both him and the teenager, so I'm glad I went ahead and purged our cupboard of the offensive, diet-killing chips now.

I'm strangely still motivated to start a new dieting week tomorrow.  I want to do everything right this week; I want to eat lean meats and no bad carbs and lots of fruits and veggies, only whole grains, fat-free dairy, minimal sweets, minimal pop, minimal sangria (waaaaaaa)...  I want to walk on the treadmill at least 3, hopefully 4 times by next Sunday.  And then, I want to do all of that again, every week, until I'm dead.

At least I know what I SHOULD be doing... right?

The Results

Hi, Sarah here.  Today was weigh day and I lost 1.5 pounds.  I feel like that is not equal to the amount of starving and exhausting workouts I did last week.  I am really hating my metabolism lately.  I've lost 3.5 pounds since the beginning of January.  That blows.  But I will keep it up, I guess.  This week I plan to avoid as much sugar as I possibly can, and white flour.  I'll focus on protein and vegetables (barf) and do more cardio than strength training and see where that gets me.  Today I blew it.  I dropped Sam off at his grandparents house then I was planning on going grocery shopping, but instead I found myself in a bit of a fugue state and ended up at Applebees and I had ordered a plate of fried shrimp.  It was DELICIOUS.  I needed a splurge and now I'm motivated to do another week.  Then I went to see the movie The Rite and did NOT order popcorn (yay for me!)  I wrote a review of the movie on my regular blog.  Check it out here.

Soldier on, ladies!  Good luck on a new week!

1100 Calories

Hi, Sarah here.  It's been almost a week on the calorie counting version of the super-vigilant diet.  I found a great app for my iPod called Lose it! that has an enormous list of foods with the amount of calories in them all, and you can track your weight and calories and activities.  It's pretty cool.  When I was filling out my info for my individualized program, I put in my weight and that I wanted to lose 2 pounds a week.  So it did its little calculations and said that my intake needs to be 1,124 calories a day.  That is NOTHING.  I have eaten 1100 calories in Oreos standing at the kitchen counter because I was bored before.  I have eaten an 1100 calorie appetizer, and then gone on to clean up a giant entree.  I've eaten 1100 calories in movie snacks.

I've actually been pretty good about hitting that tiny target this week.  My hip is feeling much better so I've been doing the hard workouts.  Last night I did one that focused on upper body strength.  Everything above my waist is sore.  It hurts to breathe.   Tomorrow morning will be the moment of truth.  I hope it was all worth it.  Cross your fingers for me!

Another question...

Hello from the land of cheese!  (mmmmm....cheese...)  Anne here, and my question today is something that I could probably Google and find out.  But is it feed a fever, starve a cold or the opposite?   I"m catching a cold and I have been scarfing down everything in sight, so I'm just looking for a good excuse.

I am in the pissiest of moods.  I hate getting sick, and I want to be left alone - but I really don't want to be left alone.   I'm not really hungry, but I'm eating anyway....  like a viral pms.  PVS.  

I think I'll take the bottle of NyQuil, pop in a straw and one of those little cocktail umbrellas, and lock myself in my room.  

Good luck to the rest of you this weekend!  Don't over do-it at any Superbowl parties.

Cycle 2...totally sucked ass!!

Hi fellow bloggers....Susie here.  OK so I'm doing the 17 Day Diet and did VERY well on the first Cycle.  So I'm thinking that maybe I found the diet that works really well for me and was totally excited going into the next cycle.  Let me recap....first cycle you eat a lot of lean protein (chicken, turkey, egg whites), fresh veggies and fresh fruit and lots of water.  You exercise at least 17 min per day.  So we ended the first cycle with a weight loss of 14 lbs.  So I start planning my menu and grocery list for the next cycle and my husband and daughter both start COMPLAINING about eating MORE chicken.  So just to make them happy I made a couple of dishes without chicken....spaghetti, enchiladas, tacos, hamburgers & pizza.  Are they happy, probably, am I.....NO.  I started cycle 2 and ended up gaining 3 freaking pounds.  I don't know how anyone else is but once I trail off I have a hard time getting back on track!!  So I started over & told myself cycle 2 sucked ass!!  So today I stepped on the scale and I'm back down to 14 pounds gone.  What really gets me is it takes forever to come off but so quickly to come back on!!  Hopefully this next week will be better and I will have another loss.....not gain!!  Good luck to everyone :)