The Diet Naked Blog

Bad News and Good News

First, the bad news.  I stepped on the scale this morning (just a preview of tomorrow's official weigh-in) and found that I am stubbornly stuck at 173.6.  Sure, I had a birthday dinner this week, plus I saw two movies and ate two medium popcorns.  But still.  The scale has not changed much over the past month or two.

Now, the good news.  Apparently, I have figured out how to maintain my weight.  Maintenance is harder than losing weight, they say, right?  I am doing a terrific job maintaining 173 pounds.

But the bad news is that I don't want to weigh 173 pounds.  I want to weigh 150 pounds.

The good news is that I will reach my goal.  I am determined. 

The bad news is that I need to cut out some snacks.  While I haven't gone back to eating sugar and processed snacks, I have been snacking too much for a person who wants to lose more weight.

The good news is that I can zip up smaller jeans and wear my wedding ring and pick up toys off the floor without gasping for breath.  That is good news, indeed.

I'm Old(er)

My birthday was yesterday.  I turned 42. 

My husband bought me a birthday cake.  I ate one bite. 

Lest you be overly impressed, be assured that later, I ate a fancy dinner at an expensive restaurant.  I tasted all the appetizers (prawns, teriyaki beef, crab dip with white bread), ate French Onion soup, a Seafood Louie salad and this for dessert: 

I did not lick the plate.  But I wanted to.

Then, I went home and rode my exercise bike for forty-five minutes and stood at the counter and ate the chocolate frosting off another cake someone baked just for me.  But only five spoonfuls. 

And today?  I'm back on track.  And forty-two years old.

Does weight loss equal happiness?

Will losing weight make you happy?

Not necessarily.  I know plenty of unhappy normal-sized people.  However, losing weight will improve your life in countless ways.  Here are just a few ways losing weight has improved mine:

1)  Everyday tasks are easier, from bending down to pick up toys to carrying a big load of laundry up and down the stairs.  I can walk without becoming breathless.

2)  My feet don't hurt anymore.  I used to wake up with aching feet.  Two feet can hardly be expected to carry an additional fifty pounds without feeling the pain.

3)  I look better, thus I feel better about how I present myself to the world.  I am less inclined to hide and more inclined to take risks.

4)  I don't snore anymore.  My husband appreciates this fact perhaps more than I do.  However, I suspect I had developed obesity-related sleep apnea, which, in itself, is dangerous to your health.

5)  I feel happier.  I know.  I just said that I know plenty of normal-sized people who are unhappy, but the truth is that living inside of an obese body had become pretty depressing for me.  I am happier now that I can zip up size 12 pants than I ever was when I had my hand deep into a bag of barbecued potato chips. 

6)  I have reduced my risk of developing diabetes and heart disease.  This article, describing a woman who wishes she had lost weight when she was young, illustrates the health benefits of losing weight while you are young enough to do so more easily. 

7)  People treat me differently.  In some ways, I hate that this is true because it means that people treat fat people a particular way, based entirely on appearance.  But that's the way it is.  People look me in the eye, they notice when I walk by, they are friendlier. 

For those of you just starting to lose weight, how will losing weight change your life?  Are you ready for the things that will change when you shed some pounds? 

For those of you who have already reached your goal (or are near it), did anything surprise you when you lost weight?  How has your life changed?  Are you happier now than when you were fatter?

Thinking About Summer

Summer's coming.  In four or five months, depending on where you live.  It'll be here before you can turn around, touch the ground and yell "hooray!"  Are you ready?

Last year at this time, I realized that summer was coming . . . and I meant to get started on a diet.  Then New Year's came and I didn't stop eating french fries.  My birthday came and I didn't stop eating cake.  Valentine's Day came and I couldn't stop eating chocolates.  Why couldn't I get started on a diet? 

I think there are two reasons. 

The first reason is that I just wasn't ready.  I thought I was ready.  I wanted to be ready.  I was desperate to be ready.  But I had yet to see The Picture (click and scroll down) that shocked me into reality.    

The second reason is that I hadn't discovered that sugar and its evil twin, refined flour, had me imprisoned on a roller coaster of spiking blood sugar, flooding insulin, crashing blood sugar and increased cravings.  When I realized this and accepted that I could no longer eat sugar with abandon, no matter how many "points" it was, my relationship with food changed forever.  Instead of food being the boss of me, I became the boss of food.

So, summer is coming and for once, the sight of my legs in shorts will not make me cringe.  I won't mind if people see my upper arms.  (No word on how I'll feel about wearing a swimsuit at the pool, however.  I'm working up to that.)

I have to buy an entirely new set of summer clothes, which will be fun.  Nothing from last summer or from the last ten years still fits. 

Summer's coming.  Are you ready?  I'm becoming friendly with those ten pound dumbbells I bought and plan to resume my relationship with push-ups and crunches (we were on a break for a while). 

Official Thursday Weigh-In

Today I still weigh 173.  I thought about lying and saying that I weigh 172 since earlier this week, the scale reported that I had reached 171.2 (I forget now, but it was definitely in the 171s), but the truth is that this morning, the scale said 173.  Still.  So, 173 it is.

It's hard to care so much about your current weight when you have reached a place where your body and your clothing size are acceptable to you, if not perfect.  (More about this later, I think.)  But I am still determined to lose another 23 pounds and get to 150. 

I bought ten-pound hand weights, which I left on the kitchen counter.  I don't know where to put them.  I want them to be convenient, but I don't want the kids to get them (I can just picture broken toes).  Yesterday, I used them while I was waiting for dinner to cook, so perhaps the kitchen counter is a good place for them to be.  I can work out in those spare moments.  Or not.

And now, I have to run and get my boys started on their composition lesson. 

How are you doing?  Any weight loss or gain to report?  Check in now!

On Exercise

Once you start exercising every day, it becomes such a habit that you don't have to talk yourself into it.  And if you start a streak--even a "five-days a week" streak, not necessarily a "consecutive days" streak--keeping the streak alive becomes a quiet obsession, propelling you to exercise even on those days when you are so tired that all you really want to do is watch television until your eyelids close.

Exercise makes you feel virtuous.  Exercise burns calories.  Exercise reminds you that your body was made to move.  Exercise improves your mood, helps you sleep better and gives you energy. 

I'm up to 162 consecutive days of exercise.  (I count it if I've ridden at least 30 minutes on the exercise bike--20 minutes if I'm in a real pinch, like on Christmas Eve--but normally I ride 45 minutes.  I ride at night, sometime between dinner and bedtime.)  I need to add weight training to my routine and I've come to realize that I really need a set of weights at home so I can work-out with weights at night because going to the YMCA just isn't happening on a regular basis for me.

Anyway, if you haven't added exercise to your life, do it today!  Figure out a way to make daily exercise an integral part of your day.  Make it convenient.  And then, just do it.

You can thank me later.

No Regrets

My husband said the other day, "Do you regret starting your diet?"  The question seems odd, except that he was asking while eating something that I no longer eat.  (I can't remember what.)  Surprised, I said, "No!"   

I don't regret the loss of 108 donuts I haven't eaten since last April.  (That's three donuts a week, give or take a cream-filled chocolate glazed or two.)

I don't regret the dozens of candy bars I didn't taste.  (Bye-bye, Peanut Butter Twix.  Who needs you?)

I don't regret the hunks of birthday cake I didn't inhale or the pints of Ben & Jerry's ice cream I didn't buy, even though they were on sale (2 for $5!).

My only regret is that I didn't relinquish those foods sooner.  I regret that I spent ten years stuffed into my clothes, padded with a fat-suit made of actual fat--no unzipping it at night like Vanessa Minnillo.   

But I absolutely do not regret anything I've given up in order to zip up a smaller pair of pants.  My life is infinitely better now without all the foods I never thought I could live without.

"What can I eat?"

The other night, an insistent voice in my head kept repeating, "What can I eat?" 

I ate a whole bag of fat-free popcorn.

"What can I eat?"

Then I ate a sugar-free tapioca pudding.

"What can I eat?"

Then I ate another tapioca pudding.

"What can I eat?"

I ate three Clementine oranges.

"What can I eat?"

At that point, I couldn't think of another thing I could eat, so I stopped eating.  Plus, it was almost bedtime.

If only I could figure out where that voice comes from and how I might shut her up for good.  She appears during certain times of the month, that's for sure.  She also pipes up when I've been stuck at home without a break for too long. 

In the old fat days, I would have eaten thousands of calories during one of those "what can I eat?" nights.  Instead of popcorn, I would have had potato chips and when they were gone, I would have turned to ice cream.  And rather than oranges, I would have reached for my hidden family-sized bag of candy. 

So, I guess I'm making progress. 

What do you do when that whiny "what can I eat?" voice speaks?  Or am I the only one hearing voices in my head?

Official Thursday Weigh-In

I weigh 173 today. 

You might have noticed that I have yet to update your weigh-in stats from last week.  I keep trying to empty out my email box without much luck.  Sorry about that!  But feel free to check-in again and this time, I'll update everyone sooner rather than later.

(Meanwhile, after one scheduled day off from school and two unscheduled--snow--days off from school, we are in the midst of our first school-at-home day this week.  Except for a trip to the to the grocery store Saturday night, I haven't been out of this house in over a week.  ACK!)

Smaller People Must Eat Less

The other day, the light dawned, only it was less like a dawning sun and more like a high-wattage flashlight shining in my eyes.  ("Stop shining that light in my eyes!")  I realized that the less you weigh, the fewer calories you require.  That explains why my weight loss has slowed even though I am eating the same now as I did when I began this weight-loss journey.

I weigh over fifty pounds less now and I'm going to have to adjust my diet to feed a smaller person. 

Drat.

This calls for . . . I've said it before . . . weight training because we all know that muscle burns more calories than fat.

And now, I'm returning to my recliner to watch "American Idol."  I'll think about weight training tomorrow.