Well, it is sort of good news..I did have one good day last week before I fell off track again and finished eating all the candy, nuts, and Christmas goodies that were dropped off at my house during the holidays. I even ate the Ghirardelli salted caramel chocolates…and I don’t really like caramel. So, now they are all gone! I actually felt really good about that and went to the grocery store last night for food that is actually on my eating plan. I got a rotisserie chicken, ground turkey, fruit, spaghetti squash and Fiber One honey wheat wraps (2 points). I ate fresh carrots and tomatoes. For dessert I had fruit – grapes, blackberries, blueberries, pineapple and chocolate hummus. I cooked spaghetti squash, sweet potatoes, and roast vegetable to put in the refrigerator for side dishes. I took popcorn and oranges to work for snacks this morning. I tried. I really tried.
Then I go to work and someone has cleaned out their house too….only they did not eat 
their own Christmas goodies, no, they brought their leftover candy to work and put it in the kitchen across from Kelly and I….who are going to Weight Watchers. FOUL! TIME OUT! PENALTY CALL. Is that allowed? It should not be allowed! This is totally unfair – Lindt Chocolate? Come on…Now I have to walk past the Lindt Chocolate to get to my oranges and tuna…that’s painful. Meanwhile some skinny do-gooder is patting themselves on the back and thinking how generous they are…which is a total distortion of the facts. You are a saboteur! You don’t get any brownie points!
We should get extra points from WW for all the things we avoid eating when they are right there on the table…rolling towards us in shiny wrappers. In fact, today I was able to avoid them all day. I had chicken on a wheat wrap, sweet potato and an orange for lunch. I did not unwrap anyone else’s leftover candy….And for dinner I had ground turkey stir fry with spaghetti squash, snow peas, and macaroni because tomorrow is weigh in day…and it’s going to be ugly enough. So, that’s two good days and that is twice as good as last week…so that’s something, right?
The Christmas train was not the only thing that got derailed over the holidays…The graph of my weight loss has gone from great, to okay, to non-existent, to “oh boy, wrong direction!” I started this eating plan in August of 2018 and in 7 months, I lost 50 pounds. After a year, I was down 60 pounds. In July of 2019, I joined Weight Watchers. Since then I have been gaining weight. I can’t really blame Weight Watchers as I am not following their plan very well, either on blue or the new purple. There were very few weeks – okay maybe two that I actually was able to stay within my points budget. In my defense, they gave me the lowest possible point budget but considering I don’t exercise and my metabolism is VERY slow, that is probably right for where I need to be to lose weight – only I am NOT losing weight.
eat healthy but don’t worry about losing weight until after the holidays. That did not work out all that great as I actually gained weight. I think it is like cleaning house – if you take a break from cleaning your house does not stay clean. I had the house all cleaned up for Christmas, spent Christmas Eve getting food ready and then took Christmas Day off to visit, open gifts with my husband, relax, read a book, and after two days of not cleaning, my house was filled with wrapping paper, dirty dishes, empty boxes, shoes and jackets to be put away and just generally a mess. Two days. Only two days.
house, I am not going to sit back and forget about it. I am putting the house and my eating plan back on track. I went back to my cheese and crackers for breakfast today. I had egg-salad on one slice of toast, avacado, strawberries with a shot of whipped cream, and snap peas for lunch. I am making whole-wheat spaghetti for dinner with a salad. I am at day number 506 and I have been going to Weight Watcher meetings, writing in my journal, tracking my food (some days), and writing this blog. I have not been perfect, but I have not quit. Day 506…not bad….not bad at all. Happy New Year and my resolution is to be at goal by 8-8-2020 (two year anniversary)….that would be 80 pounds…I am at about 52 pounds down so far (after putting some back on) so that is 28 pounds to go….time to get that train back on track!
In horse racing, the triple crown is the Belmont, Kentucky Derby, and the Preakness – in dieting it is Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. Let’s just say that I am not in contention and that a poor showing in the first two is not making me all that excited over potential results for the last one…In the non-food portion of the events however, all is well – family, friends, good times and lots of love. Can you be too distressed over that? I am giving thanks that my over-indulgences were a result of joy and abundance and not sadness or loneliness. It is way too easy to forget that for others the struggle is much more difficult. My heart goes out to those who find this time of year a struggle for reasons that have less to do with food and more to do with loss and disappointment.
or success you might achieve this season. Let’s not set the bar too high – let’s celebrate the little moments of the Christmas season that is starting today – December 1. Isn’t that a wonderful day? We know the end of the story, but poor Mary and Joseph were still in the middle of it. What a joyous day for her when Joseph did not spurn her or call for her to be humiliated, divorced or even stoned, but instead protected her and took her as his wife. And then they took that uncomfortable journey, poor Mary, starting off pregnant without any female family around and riding on a donkey. But maybe there were a few moments when they were just happy to be together? When they forgot about their troubles and laughed together over something silly that happened?
So, today! December 1! I had my regular breakfast – I did not attack the pumpkin roll that is in my refrigerator, a gift to my husband from our dear friend, Sue Seymour. And, I have come out of my Thanksgiving haze and recorded my food in my food log. And today is day 471…not any special kind of milestone except it is today. May your today be blessed with joy and a moment of thanksgiving and gratitude for any success you achieve – small or large!
I have gone to the dark side – I chose the new Purple plan at WW. I have been struggling on the freestyle plan – floating back and forth between the 50 and 60 pound loss but not making any significant progress to the 75 pound goal. I do well in the morning and lunch, but evening and dinner time are a struggle. I add carbs that I made for Dave’s dinner to my dinner and I get the munchies later and start snacking – I had a great day and then I sat and blew through a whole bag of popcorn in one sitting – boom!
and popcorn! Only air popped pop corn, but it turns out you can make that in my new air fryer so I will be giving it a try. I am also going to try having fish a couple times a week – I made lobster the other night with a salad and other than the butter and the dressing for the salad, the whole dinner was zero points. I use Brummel and Brown yogurt butter and lemon for the lobster, and Bolthouse yogurt dressing for the salad which are less points than regular butter and dressing. I even used 1/2 plain Fage fat-free yogurt with 1/2 low calorie mayonnaise to mix the tuna for my bagel breakfast and I thought it was great. I think that is the key – if you can’t eliminate mayonnaise, butter, and salad dressing, at least try to minimize the impact.
It turned out great and other than the stock – no points. The stock was 8 points divided by 6 servings so about 1 point per serving. I added chicken breast and butternut squash fries from the air fryer – zero. Whole bag of popcorn later – not zero – unless I had air popped it which unfortunately I didn’t! It has been a long time since I bought popcorn kernels instead of microwave bags or pre-popped bags, but I can change – I have changed! I am a work in progress and now I am purple!
My friend, Mary Lou, has lost 100 pounds – Me? Not yet, probably never. You would think after more than 450 days I would look more like the skeleton but not so much…My goal is 75 pounds but it has been up and down between 50 and 60. The photo was taken at the Mutter Museum in Philadelphia last weekend. They had medical curiosities, medical specimens, and lost of diseased body parts especially of the colon and stomach. After about 30 minutes of skeletons and specimens, I sat out in the lobby. I will write about medical mysteries, but I don’t want to LOOK at them. I did enjoy reading about the medicinal plants and visiting the garden. The most interesting part of the visit? The exhibit on Alice in Wonderland and how the author may have been inspired by medical phenomena when writing about getting larger, smaller, and characters such as the mad hatter.
walking in so I did not feel so bad about the free breakfast at the hotel. The waffles were amazing and waffles are one of my favorite things recently (I even bought my own waffle maker and want to try making waffle mix that is low in weight-watcher points). We also went out for Thai food and it was the most authentic Thai Restaurant I have ever been in – including tendons, beef balls and tripe in their special house soup. I was glad Russell ordered that and I had Pad Thai….
Does it seem like the most difficult part of losing weight or being on a diet is staying motivated? Focused? On track? It’s not the eating. For those of us who struggle with our weight, eating is easy. We KNOW how to eat. But diets? Not so much. And I have been thinking about it quite a bit. What is is that makes it so difficult to stay motivated? It is not validation or support. I actually have a lot of people telling me I am looking good and asking me how much weight I have lost. I have people asking me if I am feeling better but honestly, I was never feeling bad. My blood pressure was bad and my knees were cranky, but I wasn’t sick. It would probably be easier to stay on track 
motivated? I think it is the solo nature of weight loss. You can diet with a friend or go to a weight loss group, but your results only effect you. You can’t eat for someone else, lose weight for anyone else, or cause them to gain weight. You walk this road alone. What you eat shows on your scale only. At my weight loss group they even shield the scale so no one but you and the worker can see it. 
It’s been a rough couple of weeks what with the broken arm, carpal tunnel, deadlines at work, a quilt show deadline, did I mention the broken arm? Makes it kind of difficult to sew although it has not impeded my ability to lift a fork in any noticeable way…But last year there were rough weeks and I stayed on track. I had deadlines at work and I stayed on track. Even Halloween! I know I can do this – I have done it. So?
But if you diet with someone, they help you make excuses. You’ve been busy, you’ve had a lot on your plate (literally!), no one’s perfect. They don’t say anything negative, make you feel guilty, or even look disappointed. Seriously, how is that helping? I need a little butt kicking here people!
And last weekend we bought a new stove. That should be pretty easy – yes? No. The new stove has a double oven so the back of the stove is flatter so it hits the electrical box and does not go all the way to the wall – so it sticks out and the bottom oven door hits the trim on the slider and won’t open all the way. 
Plus my spices that I keep on the oven edge will fall off behind there – uggh! I also got an over the stove microwave and range hood combo to replace my counter-top microwave (making room for my new air fryer), but even though the nice man at Lowes told my husband you could hard wire it in – like our old hood – you can’t. It has to be plugged in. The electrician who was coming on Friday got delayed and is coming next week…the spices and items from the cabinet where the new electrical box is going are all over the kitchen table and counters, the air fryer is on the kitchen table still, the new micro-range hood is in the man cave and I am cooking in the little teeny top oven – double uggh!
Starting today off with a healthy breakfast created amid kitchen chaos and a whole chicken roasting in a cozy rack of the top teeny oven…Arm’s good, life is good, God is good – May God bless you too!
This was me in September 2018, and this was me this year in September…same shirt – broken arm!
can work up some enthusiasm for exercising again and firm up some of these loose parts! My advice? Don’t wait as long as I did – 30 years – to get on track…your body bounces back and shapes up a lot better when you are younger! On the flip side, better late than never! And the diet food is so much better and the tracking is so much easier than back in the day! Who remembers Tab? Now there was a zero calorie drink that could curl your toes with the after taste! Seriously, with all the improvements in today’s dieting world 
Eat Diet Blog 