Today February 16, 2011

This morning I weighed in at 162.6.  I guess I have shed some of the water weight that I took on because of the weekend spent indulging in Mexican food and chips and salsa.  The past 2 days, I’ve solidly stuck to my plan. 

One thing I haven’t mentioned is that a few weeks ago, I purchased a Body Media armband and have been kind of entertaining myself with its daily readouts.  The Body Media (or “BodyMedia”) system involves wearing a device that has a bunch of sensors that somehow get readings on things like how many calories you’ve burned, how many steps you’ve taken, and how many hours you’ve slept. 

I’m always looking for something new to keep myself motivated, and when I saw the Bodia Media thing at Costco the other week, I was intrigued.  I didn’t buy it immediately – I was put off by the $149 price tag, which even included a $50 instant rebate.  I debated about buying it for a couple of days, and then I decided to go back to Costco to give it a second look.  That’s when I found, to my dismay, that the display was gone.  Eventually I asked a Costco employee if they’d sold out completely, and she was able to direct me to where they’d moved the remaining stock.  Only a handful were left. 

Somehow, the idea that so many of the devices had sold in just a matter of two days pushed me over the edge.  I bought the Body Media system that day. 

When I activated my subscription to Body Media’s online service a few days later, I wasn’t sure how I was going to like wearing the device, which must rest snugly against one’s skin, necessitating a velcro-adjusted elastic armband that feels too tight every time your arm muscles flex.  It took a few days for the thing to stop really bugging me (and now I’d say that, at best, it’s just mildly annoying), but so far, I’ve found it interesting to see how many calories I’m burning. 

I’ve also found that the readouts about exercise intensity have been motivating me to seek out more intense workouts.  I was surprised to discover that the calories-burned calculations on my treadmill and elliptical machine are pretty accurate.  The treadmill will show that I will have burned about 340 calories after running 3 miles.  The elliptical shows around 200 calories burned after 25 minutes and 2 miles.  I’d always thought that the two workouts have felt roughly the same in terms of intensity, but according to my Body Media readings, I only do about 10 minutes of “intense” exercise while on the elliptical machine, and the other 15 minutes or so would be considered “moderate,” which is the same rating as what I do while cleaning the house or just walking around.  Jogging on the treadmill, on the other hand, shows up as “intense” exercise for the full 30 minutes. 

So does jogging around my neighborhood.  And here’s the weird part – it shows up as “intense” for the full 40 or 45 minutes that my usual 3.8-mile route takes me, even when I’m just walking briskly, as I do for segments of the last piece of that route.  I was VERY surprised by this – to me, my elliptical machine feels like a much more intense workout than plain old walking around the neighborhood.  Go figure.

My one huge disappointment with the Body Media system has been that their food-tracking system is severely lacking.  Considering that Body Media would appear to be a fairly new thing, the nutritional information offered would appear to be frequently outdated or inaccurate.  Of the few foods that I’ve tracked – I tend to eat the same things pretty often for breakfast and lunch – almost all the information that comes up in Body Media’s program is incorrect!  For instance, I’ve been eating South Beach bars for breakfast each morning.  Body Media doesn’t even have an exact listing for the type of South Beach bar I like, and the one that comes the closest is something like 30 calories off of what the label says.  Likewise their listing for Slim-Fast shakes.  And every single one of the Lean Cuisines I’ve looked up in their system.

If these were recently introduced foods, I’d say (in Body Media’s potential defense) that maybe the system just hasn’t had a chance to catch up yet.  But these are NOT new foods.  Nutritional information for my favorite Slim-Fast shake has remained exactly the same for years!  And I know the Lean Cuisines I’ve attempted to look up have been around for a long time.

Even more disappointing than the inaccurate food readings, though, has been the discovery that unlike some other sites I’ve used since starting my diet 3 years ago (such as www.thedailyplate.com) the Body Media food database contains little if any nutritional information for restaurant meals.  I was so bummed when I found this out!  Considering all the information out there on sites like dailyplate, it’s ridiculous that a paid site like Body Media wouldn’t have included restaurant nutritional information in their database.

Overall, I’d say that so far I’ve enjoyed using my Body Media system.  I don’t have the watch-like attachment that provides instant readouts – I wait until certain points in the day to download the information onto my computer with the USB cable that came with the armband.  I’ve liked being able to see how many calories my body burns throughout the day, and it’s been downright fascinating to discover the different levels of intensity in activities that I’d thought were equal but actually aren’t.  I’ve found that when I’m wearing the system, I am definitely more motivated to move around and to seek out more intense workouts.

I just wish they’d improve their database of nutritional information!  And if there’d be a way to create a system that somehow automatically sensed and calculated caloric intake, that would be the most amazing motivator of all.  I’d be in line to buy a system like that in a heartbeat.  As it is now, though, Body Media relies on the honor system when it comes to recording your food intake.

Just Doing It February 15, 2011

Yesterday I followed my plan, except for a couple of minor bungles.  As one of the room moms at my kids’ elementary school, I helped put on yesterday’s Valentine’s party, where Krispy Kreme donuts were served.  One of the other moms was splitting a donut in half and offered half to me.  I really wasn’t tremendously tempted to eat a donut, but I really like this other mom, and it was such a gesture of comraderie that I didn’t want to say no as she handed it to me. 

So that was one thing – half of a Krispy Kreme donut.  The other thing was a piece of candy from the box my mother-in-law sent.  She was on the phone and we were all passing the box.

I figure, half a donut and a piece of candy aren’t going to derail my efforts.  I worked out yesterday, and I basically followed my plan.  I even switched to nonfat half and half in my coffee, which – once again – really isn’t that bad or that dramatic of a thing once I just do it.  It’s a small change, of course, but because of how much coffee I drink, I think it probably adds up considerably.

Today I need to figure out a way to deal with controlling myself if I make a family dinner.  I feel guilty about not cooking, and yet I still really need the structure of tools like Lean Cuisines, since I need to build some momentum.  Lean Cuisines help me a lot because they remove the issue of portion control.  At the beginning of an attempt to take off some weight, portion control is a huge issue.  Once I get used to eating less, it’s a lot easier to automatically restrict myself to a “normal” serving.  At the beginning of a diet, Crazed Addict Fatgirl finds it easy to swoop in and whisper her lies as my hand goes for a second heaping serving of potatoes (or whatever).  I’ll simply be hungry, and the food will be there.  That’s all there is to it. 

So it’s SO MUCH EASIER to get momentum going and retrain myself in portion control if I don’t have to deal with this temptation.  But, I feel like I’m letting my family down by not cooking a family dinner for them.

I guess one solution would be to cook something that is diet-friendly.  Of course that still requires me to exert portion control.  But today I’m going to see what I can do.  Maybe I’ll try a new recipe.

Or maybe I’ll just plod along and do my Lean Cuisine.

Whatever the case, I do feel a new sense of renewed commitment to taking off the pounds I’ve gained, BEFORE the task becomes overwhelming.

I weighed in at 164.6 this morning.  That’s better than 167, of course, but it’s still significantly higher than the high 150s, where I’d managed to hover for the past couple of years.  Taking off 5 pounds shouldn’t be so terribly difficult.  I just need to focus on the “just do it” mentality and keep plodding along.

Breaking Crazed Addict Fatgirl’s Hold…Again February 14, 2011

Well, it’s coming up on three years since I started my weight-loss journey, my battle against what I’ve come to think of as “Crazed Addict Fatgirl.”  She’s the person who lives inside my thoughts and swoops in and takes over when I’m in the early days of trying to make healthy food choices and/or demonstrate some portion control.  There’s a part of my brain that really desires to eat right and feel like I’m in control of food (rather than having food control me).  There’s a part of me that is actually fairly self-disciplined, a part of me that actually enjoys how I feel when I don’t overeat.

When I am trying to diet, the Fitgirl part of my thoughts will start out strong.  But somewhere along the line, usually around dinnertime (if I’ve cooked a family dinner) or while we’re watching TV in the evenings (if I’ve somehow managed to hold it together and eat a Lean Cuisine and veggies rather than pig out with my family), this other voice – Crazed Addict Fatgirl – will start speaking to my thoughts.  Often, she starts with a whisper caused by hunger.  Or sometimes, boredom.  In the first few days of a diet, her words will be along the lines of, “This is just too hard.  You’ll never be able to keep it up.  Truth is, you don’t even WANT to keep it up.  You don’t need to lose weight that badly anyway – you’re not really that fat.”

And in that moment – even after spending an entire day directing a great deal of mental energy toward thinking about eating right, making good choices, and exercising portion control – Crazed Addict Fatgirl’s voice will seem logical, seem to be making the most sense, far MORE sense than Fitgirl’s sad little voice.  Fitgirl’s voice will basically go silent, and Fatgirl will take over.

Crazed Addict Fatgirl is an interesting character, because when she takes over my thoughts, not only does she seem logical, but she also produces extreme feelings of giddiness.  If I’ve made it through several weeks of my diet and if I’ve had a measure of success, Crazed Addict Fatgirl’s tactics seem to change a bit.  That’s when she will go shopping with me, and she will deliberately throw in, say, a bag of potato chips, with specific ideas about how “a few won’t hurt” and how “you have to live in the real world, can’t avoid chips forever,” and how “they’re for the kids anyway.”  At the very same time, she’ll also assure pathetic little Fitgirl that it will just be a one-time event, and after that Fitgirl will be able to take back over my thoughts and my choices.

In the moment that Fitgirl caves to Crazed Addict Fatgirl, giddiness will ensue, like I said.  I will feel a weird sense of elation as I plunge into the bag of chips – or, as was the case yesterday, a large Oreo Blizzard from Dairy Queen.  I will be convinced – in the moment – that whatever indulgent treat I’m about to consume will have no real effect on the scale numbers.

Crazed Addict Fatgirl is, of course, a liar.  Everything she says is a lie.  When she yells the loudest, when she’s the most convincing, that’s when you can practically know that what she says is the biggest of lies.  Like, at the beginning of a diet, that’s when she’s at her worst.  When she says that I’m “not really that fat,” well – that’s a HUGE lie, because when I was nearing 190 pounds, I was fat, FOR ME.  I could barely fit into any of my clothes and I was miserable about it.  I felt terribly self-conscious and sad every time we had to go out into social situations among people who were more physically fit than I was (which was pretty much everyone we met).

The funny thing, though, is that after I’ve had a measure of success and have taken off weight, that’s when it will start to seem like Crazed Addict Fatgirl is NOT such a liar.  Like, back a couple of years ago, after I lost nearly 40 pounds, I actually could indulge sometimes and it the numbers on the scale would barely budge.  If they did go up a little, it would take just a day of “watching it” and they’d go right back down again.

For about the past two years, I held my weight steady in the high 150s.  I’d hit a low of about 152, and then I gained 5 pounds.  But then I stayed at that number – the high 150s – for a long time.  Up until this past fall, I was able to manage Crazed Addict Fatgirl’s takeovers pretty well.  She’d swoop in, take over my thoughts and eating habits for a day or two, and then I’d de-throne her and put Fitgirl back into power and my weight would slide back down to the comfort zone of maybe 158 or so.

But lately.

Well, lately.

Lately, my weight has crept up to a number that never seems to go any lower than about 162.  This morning when I weighed in, I was 167.2.  GASP.  That is the highest number I’ve seen since about June of 2008.  And it comes after a weekend of total and constant indulgence.

I actually found myself looking at the Jenny Craig website today, because I feel like I need some help to vanquish Crazed Addict Fatgirl.  She’s got way too strong a grip on my thoughts.  I’ve allowed her to take over almost exclusively these days, where I will make bad choices nearly every day.  Even on days when I manage to make it through a full day of “food prison,” I will throw it all away for an hour of mindless pigging out on sourdough bread and a big glass of wine while watching TV.

It’s also included little things.  Like about 18 months ago, I quit using fat-free half and half in my coffee and instead began using the regular stuff again.  That didn’t seem to have an effect on me initially, but then of course everything adds up.  I also began spooning out several tablespoons of ranch dressing to go with my steamed veggies.

Anyway…

I’ve reached a point where I’m just tired of Crazed Addict Fatgirl.  I’m tired of listening to her lies and having the scale numbers continue to creep up.  I’m tired of feeling weak-willed and foolish after digging into a bag of chips or eating 4 pieces of pizza.

I remember how good it used to feel to grow stronger and stronger in my resolve, to feel like food had lost its power over me.  I want to have those feelings again, and I know they will come if I just ignore Crazed Addict Fatgirl’s voice for awhile.

So that’s what I’m going to do.