Monday, June 26, 2006

Making progress

Comments from Stretchy about natural peanut butter have me on the hunt for both Adams and Smart Balance brands. I think Tiny Kroger might be carrying the Smart Balance brand – I'll certainly look for it, especially after Stretchy's personal recommendation. Adams [made by Smucker's] is available to order online, but even I'm not worth four bucks a jar plus shipping. And you have to buy six jars at a time; I'd rather taste it before I make that kind of committment.

Peanut butter isn't a trigger food for me. It's a much bigger temptation for the Spousal Equivalent, who considers it a major food group. It's much more difficult for me to have peanuts around. Next time I'm at Sam's I'm going to get a box of the individual serving sizes and put them in the freezer in the garage.

Working at my neighbor's barn has been so fun for me. I'm sure that sounds weird to some of you, but I definitely enjoy exercising with a purpose – in this case, two clean stalls every day. I come home wondering what kind of regular, muscle-building household chore I could and would do every day. So far nothing has come to mind. Perhaps this is like not minding doing someone else's dishes, even though you loathe doing your own night after night. [And we all know mine get tossed in the dishwasher!]

Drumroll, please …

Two more pounds gone! That's a total of 35 since January 1. This week's geek stats:
  • An average of 1050 calories eaten daily
  • An average of 91 minutes activity daily
  • An average of 553 calories burned daily
  • Total miles walked: 30.5
I'm not counting cleaning stalls in my minutes of activity. I thought if I reported it I might slack off on the walking.

I know it's not good to eat fewer than 1200 calories per day, and I don't recommend it. I had three very low-calorie days this week, because I forgot to eat breakfast. I could have eaten more later in the day, but I'm trying not to eat after dinner, and wasn't hungry anyway.

I think it's becoming more important for me to pay attention to whether I'm hungry or not. If I'm bored, anxious, restless, angry, happy, sad or lonely, then I shouldn't eat unless I'm also hungry.

And as I've said before, I probably haven't been truly hungry since I was, oh, say 11 years old.

Lori at angryfatgirlz asked a couple days ago, regarding motivation, "what do you do when you have a lot of weight to lose?" The comments have been helpful and thought-provoking, although the more recent ones are turning into a discussion of thyroid disease. Pop over there and add to the motivating thoughts already posted.

It's been helpful to me to throw away too-big clothes and replace them with newer, smaller things. I'm also pulling out smaller things I've saved from three years ago. I tried on some dresses I've saved that I've worn for special occasions over the years. There's only one that I might ever wear again – they were all worn for weddings, either my own or those of mine and the Spousal Equivalent's children. My daughter was married 13 years ago, the last time I started losing a lot of weight, and that mother-of-the-bride dress fits perfectly. The lace at the yoke is disintegrating, so it's unwearable, but it was a very flattering style and I wish I had another occasion to wear it. The most recent wedding was two years ago today; that dress is far too large – another Goodwill donation. I hated the dress, thought I looked horrible in it and bought it only because it fit and I was running out of time.

Yesterday when I got in the car I had to scoot the seat forward to be comfortable – my big gut wasn't in the way any more.

Now that's a non-scale victory!


5 comments:

Anonymous said...

We do tend to discover things about the same time. My discovery in the car yesterday was that my gut isn't getting in the way of making the seatbelt fit more comfortably. I never had a problem using a seatbelt until I gained all this weight. Then it started hitting me almost across the neck. Now without the big belly it is almost back in the right place to be comfortable.

Anonymous said...

Eating a bit less than 1,200 calories won't kill ya, especially if you "zig zag" by eating more the next day--
Or you can fill in missing calories with some fruit. Don't worry about it. you know your body better than others do, so do what feels right to you. Lots of people fast one or two days a month without any ill effects whatsoever, so a low calorie day once in a while is fine as long as you are watching your nutrition. I knew an old man who never ate anything on Fridays. He sipped hot water, or black tea, and that was it. well, last time I saw him he was mowing his big lawn with a push mower, and he stopped to tell me how great his birthday party was (his 97th). The guy was thin and muscular--but he told me he would be "as big as a house" if he hadn't stopped with the potatoes an gravy (in midlife he had been quite heavy--he ate 3 meals a day in restaurants and it got out of control, & he used to huff and puff when he walked. ) I couldn't picture him heavy, but I think he was telling me to stay active and not make food to big a deal, or it would take over my brain! Good advice, wish i had taken it! But I understand him NOW ...that i am older.

I don't think you are on any slippery slope when you don't feel like eating and you lisyen to your body.

Anonymous said...

LISTEN to your body, i meant!

Jack Sprat said...

Debbi: Way to go on fitting into the seat. That's a huge milestone (or a little one, depending on the perspective! =) ) Good for you for keeping such meticulous records about energy intake and expenditure. Chances are if you do it long enough, it'll become second nature.

Its great that you don't eat just because you have left-over points/calories. Wish I had a better handle on that one. But you're probably right that you don't want to shock your body too much by undereating. Hope that works out.

I'm really interested in the motivation issue, so thanks for the link to angryfatgirlz. I "only" lost 50 pounds, but many of the members I work with have much longer journeys to go on, and I don't want to be presumptuous and simply assume I know what it takes.

I will say this, because of my work, I know a number of 100+ losers, and every one of them is a very nice, ordinary, regular person. It doesn't take a martyr or a saint or even an athlete. Just a hell of a lot of patience!

-J

Unknown said...

Hi, thanks for linking to angryfatgirlz -- the site seems to be picking up a bit since your links!

I like Smucker's natural peanut butter but my true love is still Jif -- you never forget your first... I find it less tempting to overdo on the Smucker's, though. I also love almond butter as a treat now and then. Our Kroger's carries that in their health food section.

Congrats on the milestone -- you look terrific and happy!