True Confessions

Time to 'fess up. I gained weight on the trip. :( I came back seven pounds over my "top out" (goal) weight, but actually I started out two pounds below so that's nine pounds, even in spite of the massive amounts of walking and biking we did. Oh, the horror!!! I'm currently kind of in a holding pattern with it. I got a little off then it bumped up again, and now I'm back down a little so I'm at five pounds over. Sigh.

It was worth every bite.

But now it's back to business. I definitely notice a big difference in how I feel, so somewhere along the continuum of that nine pounds I hit a tipping point. DH says I'm snoring again and I don't get cold as easily as when I weigh less, which is neither good nor bad unless you look at our electricity bill. I'm having more bad days with the fibromyalgia so my energy level is down and my aches and pains are up. My clothes aren't as comfortable. Maybe I'm being hyper-aware, but when I gained weight the first time I was in total denial of any negative effects along the way, so hopefully awareness will work to my advantage. ;)

On the plus side, I've continued my (almost) daily walks and I've added bike rides a few times a week. Sometimes I only bike, which is easier for me when I'm having a flare up of the fibro. Probably doesn't burn as many calories, but it's getting out there and sometimes it's more important to maintain the exercise habit than it is to burn the calories. I don't keep a food diary but that's because I know how much of each category of food (fats, carbs, dairy, protein, and produce) I'm going to eat at each meal and over the course of the day. I have breakfast (usually a cup of Kashi Go Lean Crunch, and I keep a one cup measure in the cereal container, a scoop of frozen blueberries, a few dried cranberries, and milk to fill the bowl), lunch with not more than two servings of carbs and 2.5 oz of protein plus some kind of produce, a snack which is usually a repeat of breakfast, and dinner which is usually a repeat of lunch. (Not the same food, just the same amounts of protein, carbs, etc.) (Although my snack is usually Kashi and fruit just like breakfast.) If I want an additional snack I usually eat fruit. I might munch on a few peanuts or nuts; I've started keeping a bowl of nuts in the shell on the kitchen counter. (You eat fewer if you have to crack them open; see "The Blue Zone" book review.) As for fat, we mostly cook with healthy fats like olive or canola oil in reasonable amounts. For dairy and protein I go for no or low fat, except for cheese which I use sparingly. We eat a vegan meal at least once a week, sometimes more, and I'm keeping an eye out for more vegan/vegetarian meals we can incorporate into our regular menus. We try to eat seafood a few times a week.

A couple of other things that really help me are keeping a journal about my weight where I've written about why I gained weight in the first place, my struggles with getting my eating under control, what I think went wrong when I let my eating get out of control, exercise challenges, and so forth. This post is similar to something I would write about, only when I was losing weight the first time around I wasn't blogging. I also WEIGH MYSELF EVERY DAY OF THE WORLD and record that weight in a little book I keep by the scale. I figured I gained the weight by burying my head in the sand and pretending I wasn't getting fat, so if I do nothing else but weigh in on a daily basis I'll stay aware of what I'm doing to my body and make healthier choices.

That's my diet plan in a nutshell! It worked to help me lose 45 pounds in 2007, so now I'm going to get focused and get back to it and lose the extra pounds I gained on my trip.