Category: Romance Biggest Winner

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RBW: 5-0 Edition

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Romance Biggest Winner

This last week I hit a significant milestone.  Since Jan. 5th, I’ve lost 50 pounds!

I’ve been on a lot of diets in my time, but I’ve never lost 50.  40, even 45, but I always gave up for some reason or another before I hit 50. 

I’m not giving up this time.

I think what’s different this time is that commitment I talked about earlier.  I’m not “interested” in losing weight — I’m committed.  Even if that means the scale is not cooperative.  I’ve battled 3 extra pounds off and on for the past two weeks.  It’s weird, but one day I’ll be up, and the next, I’ll be down the entire amount.  The next day, up .5 or 1 pound, then back.  It’s like my body isn’t sure about this new place and is fighting just a little.

What’s different this time around, too, is I’m taking a more realistic approach to dieting.  It’s not an “all or nothing” battle for me any more.  Weight Watchers allows for and even encourages occasional treats with weekly points above and beyond the daily points.  I typically eat well within my daily points, but hardly ever dip much into the weeklies.  Until I want to eat at Mythos, say…

And I can do that without guilt, because I have the points.  In the overall scheme of weeks and months and years of living healthier, a planned splurge isn’t going to kill me.

I do still get a little anxious about losing daily points, but I’m working on it.  It’s a good thing to eat less as I go, because my body doesn’t need that much fuel any longer.  I think as I get lower, I’ll be more dependent on dipping into weekly points, which might mean even slower losses, but that’s okay.  This isn’t a race.  I just have to stick the course.

I’ve had to buy new smaller bras and I found a stash of brand-new underwear (still with the tag) stuck in a drawer that fit now.  Yay!  I’m wearing jeans just about every day, when I owned only one pair before I started this journey.  And those jeans are getting big enough I have to wear a belt to keep the waist from gaping open.

The road is long and hard at times, and I’m never going to “get there.”  The journey will go on forever.  I’m always going to have to be mindful of what I eat.  So I might as well enjoy the scenery and plant flowers as I go.

This week:  .81% lost!

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RBW Week 8

Romance Biggest Winner

I’m still up nearly 2 pounds from my low weight, although I am heading back in the right direction this week with a .24% loss. 

It’s incredibly frustrating.  In the past, this kind of “unfair” gain would have derailed me.  If I’m dieting and following my plan, I “deserve” a loss.  Right?

Wrong.  Well, yeah, sure, I’d love a loss.  But a woman’s body can be just as fickle as the scale.  I’m eating the right things and making good choices, but there’s more I could be doing.  I need to return to my exercise program.  Excuses, like getting the monsters back to school, making up some time during the day for work (because I have to pick Princess up everyday since we don’t have bus service this year) instead of working out, Revision Xibalba instead of working out…

I have to make exercise a priority or it won’t happen.  So that is my number one goal this week:  return to exercise in some shape or form.  Find the time, plan the time, and do it.

I can’t allow lack of progress on the scale to derail me.  Someone said on the WW forums the other day:  Just because you trip on one step doesn’t mean you throw yourself headlong down the stairs.  I’m only going to succeed long term if I learn how to deal with these scale droughts.  It’s just a number.  A meaningless number.  If I’m eating healthy and moving my body, then I just have to be patient.

A new food I’ve eaten this week is a quick and easy sort of “peach crumble” that’s really healthy.  Peaches are in full season here and readily available.  I dice up a nice peach or two (if they’re small) in a bowl (no need to peel unless you don’t like the skin), sprinkle with a little Splenda and cinnamon (or nutmeg), and microwave for about 60 seconds.  If I need to get a healthy oil in to meet the WW guidelines, I add a little coconut oil to the warm fruit.  Then I sprinkle old-fashioned oats on top (1/4 c = 2 pts), stir, and optionally heat a few more seconds.   It’s not quite as decadent as real peach crumble but it’s very good, warm and sweet and fruity.

Aside:  WW doesn’t really count coconut oil for the healthy guideline – the oil should be pourable.  But coconut oil is my go-to miracle cure for all sorts of things.  It’s anti-microbal and anti-viral!  (When I got a painful split in the corner of my mouth, I tried everything to heal it and it just got worse and worse.  Started putting coconut oil on it twice a day and it healed in a few days.)  Plus it tastes great and is very, very satisfying.  I decided to count it for myself as a healthy oil but I only use it at most once a day.  Really more like 2-3 times a week.

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RBW Week 7

Romance Biggest Winner

So much for hitting the big 5-0. 

Ugh, my first gain, -.97%.  No, it wasn’t “deserved” either.  I’ve eaten within my Weight Watchers points every single day, even though I had a few Doritos (a serving, carefully counted and allotted) and two tiny cheesecake bites over the weekend.  My PMS cravings were killing me, but I stayed in my daily point range.

It sucks to be UP when I’ve been on plan all week, but my body has a mind of its own.  I can only do what I can do, and the scale has been up for two days in a row.  I know next week will be better.  I’m doing all the right things.  Eventually it’ll show on the scale.

Last night I made what’s quickly becoming a family favorite:  Lasagna from the WW Just 5 cookbook.  I use at least 90% lean ground beef, lots of organic Bertoli pasta sauce (our favorite), fat free or part skim ricotta (depending on what I can find), fat free cottage cheese, and part-skim mozarella.  I also use the old-style “boil” lasagna noodles.  Maybe it’s all in my head, but they seem to cook up so much better (and taste better) than the no-boil kind, so they’re worth a little extra time.

I had a 5-lb pack of 90% lean ground beef in the fridge from our Sam’s Club run this weekend, so I browned up the entire pack.  I made two dishes of lasagna, one for dinner and a smaller one for lunches and leftovers, while the rest of the hamburger browned in my iron skillet for tacos tonight.

Kid approved and deliciously slim!

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RBW Week 6

Romance Biggest Winner

So far for this challenge, I’ve lost a total of 10.4 pounds, which puts my average loss at 2 pounds per week.  A little higher than my WW average (since Jan) of 1.3 pounds per week.  Pneumonia in July is all I can say.  I don’t expect these numbers going forward!

I am, however, at 41% of my goal I set for the whole six months.  Awesome!  Every pound going forward will be a challenge, so I’m glad I have a headstart.  (My goal is to lose just slightly over 1 lb/week.)

Food wise, I’m still pretty boring.  e.g. I haven’t tried any new recipes since last week.  I’m eating nonfat Greek yogurt daily to get as many probiotics as possible to counteract the heavy-duty antibiotics I’ve been on, and they’re doing their job.  With fresh peaches/nectarines in season…and a little Kashi Go Lean Almond Crunch (only 1/2 c. because it’s expensive in points, 1 c = 5 pts) sprinkled on top, YUM!  And a great source of protein too.

My oldest has been informally doing WW with me (as her doctor recommended), and one of the easiest things she does to keep her weight going down is to take her lunch to school everyday.  Even with all the new healthy guidelines they keep pushing down our throats, if she eats the school lunch, she’s guaranteed to slowly start gaining again.  Since school starts next week, I invested in some nicer cold lunch boxes for all three monsters so they can all take their lunch if they want.  (Middle is VERY picky about her sandwich and believes it “tastes bad” if it’s even the slightest bit warmer than ice cold.  She typically will only take PBJ as a result.  I hope these new “PackIt” bags work!)

Any ideas for interesting healthy kid lunches?  Because the whole sandwich thing gets old pretty fast…

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RBW Week 5

I’m inching closer to 50 lbs lost this year with another -1.2 today.  More and more people are noticing and commenting, which makes me grin from ear to ear.  I’m feeling really good (well, in spite of pneumonia!), but I can’t wait to get to my next goal (not my final goal weight which is still a ways to go).

Right after I had our first monster (who will be 13 in Jan), I did WW at work and lost to the lowest I can remember in many years.  Right after that, we made a major move to another state, I started working from home full time, and we had two more monsters.  I tried all sorts of fad/craze diets and would lose 40-45 pounds, but I couldn’t get past that milestone before I realized I couldn’t live that way forever.

I never made it back to that low weight.

I’ve already passed that 40-45 lb milestone on WW and I know I can live this way.  Although I admit to getting a little anxious when I lose another daily point (lost another one today! ack!).  I rarely eat ALL my points anyway, at least on a daily basis.  About 1-2 times per week I eat the full points and go over a little into my weeklies, typically Friday or Saturday.  But in general, I eat less than I’m allowed (although I always try to get my healthy guidelines in–and I do splurge occasionally), so I don’t know why it freaks me out a little. 

I guess I’m worried that when I do finally get to goal that I won’t have anything left to eat.  Irrational I know.

So much of weight loss is a mind game.  I mean, in theory, all I have to do is eat less and move more.  In time, the weight will come off.  In reality, though, there are all sorts of stressors and mind games I play with myself.  Losing a point is only one of them.  Worrying about how far I still have to go is another.  That stress I start to put on myself — worrying about how long, when, how will I do this — can lead to overeating and general laziness (because I get depressed).

It’s the same with writing a book, though.  I always get to a point when I start to doubt whether I can actually pull off another book, even though I’ve written more than 10 now.  I have to concentrate on the journey, one day at a time, and keep my mind in the game.  FOCUS. 

I can do this.  I can.  And I will.

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RBW Week 3

Romance Biggest Winner

The scale absolutely shocked me this morning, bringing me into a new lower decade!  I don’t typically lose 4+ pounds in a week — on the contrary, I’m lucky to lose 1.  But I guess being sick does have some benefits, as long as I don’t end up gaining this back! 

4 more pounds will bring me to my lowest weight in 6-10 years — a weight I only achieved after surviving on the Rice Diet for 4-5 months (absolutely no salt, grains + fruit for nearly every meal, very little protein except beans) or the Atkins Diet a couple of years earlier (no carbs, high fat and high protein).  Gee, I wonder why my metabolism is so screwed up.

This time around, I’m much more balanced and healthy! (Thank you Weight Watchers)

After being sick last week, I am eating more normally but have not increased my activity yet.  I’m still coughing and have some pain/bubbling in my chest when I lay down.  Until that’s gone, I’m not going to be working out beyond climbing the stairs to work each day.

My total lost for this challenge:  1.8%

Total weight lost since Jan 5, 2011:  47 lbs

The new recipe I tried this week was Weight Watchers’ Dijon Pork.  I mixed together a couple of tablespoons of dijon mustard, sugar, apple cider vinegar, and red pepper flakes (light for the kids) for a marinade.  Since I was almost out of dijon, I added a little water to the bottle and shook out the last of the mustard, so it was a little thinner than normal.  I smeared the pork chops with the mixture and let them sit in the fridge for an hour or so, then cooked them in my iron skillet.  After searing on one side for about 4 mins, I turned them over and added just a little water to the pan so all that cooked-on goodness bubbled up and flavored the pork.

The monsters don’t like mustard or spice but they ate this no problem.  I had one leftover pork chop that I diced up and added to some zucchini and tomatoes sauteed in a little olive oil (with more red pepper flakes!) yesterday for lunch.  Yummo!

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RBW Week 2

Romance Biggest Winner

So I came into the second week not feeling the best if you’ve been reading for the last few days.  That helped push me into a little better numbers than usual.  Unfortunately, I’m now seriously behind on all my exercise goals for the month, but there’s nothing I can do about that.  I can’t walk to the bathroom without getting winded.  I’m certainly not going to be doing Power 90 for a few days!!

All in all, I was able to report a .94% total loss.  Not too shabby.

I can’t report any new healthy recipes I tried since I haven’t had much of an appetite for days.  While sick, one of the best things I had regularly was the Weight Watcher Chocolate Smoothie — made with hot water.  It tasted like hot cocoa and was very soothing on my tummy, plus provided a nice balance of nutrition (counts as a serving of dairy even though I made it with water).  I figured it was better than nibbling on crackers!

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RBW Week 1

The Romance Biggest Winner

Well, today was our first weigh in.  I feel sorry for my team because they’re a little handicapped by having a member who’s already been dieting for six months.  No huge loss for me this week but I did lose *some* (whew, I was up a little yesterday and was really worried).  They need not fear that my little .23% loss will win the grand prize, but hopefully I’ll be consistent and steady!

I completed another Power 90 session today.  Pushups are getting a little easier.  I should have done it yesterday, but a short story clobbered me upside the head yesterday and instead of using my lunch to workout, I wrote instead.  *sheepish*  I’m a little behind on walking so I need to hit a couple of miles tomorrow.

My new recipe try today:  mashed sweet potato with Greek yogurt.  This is a huge step for me because I don’t really *like* sweet potatoes much.  Not even my mom can get me to eat her sweet potatoes at Thanksgiving.  But lately, I’ve been enjoying roasted sweet potatoes, so I decided to try it.  I went savory with chili powder and garlic instead of sugar and cinnamon as the recipe called for, and it was good.  Not yummy, OMG you have to try this, but good.  I’ll try it again.

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RBW Update

So three days into the Romance Biggest Winner…and I’ve exercised three days!  In a row!  I know.  I’m shocked too.  Woot!

I’ve survived two sessions of Power 90 sculpt (level 1).  Yes, I’m definitely sore, but not where I can’t walk up the stairs or anything.  Those pushups KILL me.  Even my stomach (core) is sore.

Yesterday, the monsters commandeered the Wii so I couldn’t do Walk It Out as usual.  So I threw in my old Leslie Sansome Walk Away the Pounds dvd on my laptop.  It’s the 1 and 2 mile version, but I’d never done the 2 mile before.  I thought, hey, what the heck.  I’ve been walking 2 miles on WIO.  Let’s see how bad it is.

Not bad at all.  I definitely broke a sweat but I made it all the way through without keeling over ded. 

Who knows.  At this rate, I might get up the courage to go back to Power 90’s cardio….  (I don’t know.  Those upward and downward dogs kill me every time.)

In the food arena, I made a new recipe tonight (Curried Quinoa with Chicken, about 7 p+ on WW if you’re tracking points).  I admit, it was a little risky.  I personally have not liked curry or quinoa before, but it just sounded good.  That Man is working late tonight, so it was just the monsters and I.  Chickens were on sale and I had two in my big stew pot simmering late afternoon.  I have chicken…  I have broth…  I figured worst case, if they all hated it, at least they could eat the dark-meat chicken before That Man devours it.

Wow, so good.  I absolutely loved it!  Although I did leave out the nutmeg.  That just sounded weird (although I love nutmeg on peaches).  I promise to try the nutmeg next time.  Even better, two of the three monsters loved it and went back for seconds!  Littlest Monster did not like the texture, but she did try it and ate about half.  Hopefully it will grow on her, because it’s definitely a dish I’d like to make again.

While waiting on the chickens to cool so I can pick all the good meat off (and then make a huge batch of broth), I decided to roast some chickpeas (kind of like this recipe only I modified the spices, didn’t use olive oil, and prepared the dried beans first).  I’ve been wanting to try crispy chickpeas for a long time — sounded totally up my alley.  All those yummy spices!  I pulled the pan out of the oven to cool and went downstairs to write a while. 

I came back upstairs…and nearly the entire pan was gone.  Gulp.  I guess the monsters approve of roasted chickpeas.  Who knew?!?

(Where’s my gas mask?!?  Because they just ate THREE CUPS of BEANS….)