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Tuesday, February 24, 2004
Yup, it's been a while. So - I've continued on with ww for over five weeks now. I'm happy with myself that I've stuck with it this long consecutively, but I'm not happy that I really haven't lost any weight. But - I'm not so unhappy with no weight loss that I'm going to stop. I'm going to try to work through this and really discover what my limits are and what I need to be doing to get what I want.
So - for these first five weeks I haven't been doing any extra exercise - only basic stuff like my classes and PT. But this week my goal is to do at least 10 30-minute exercise sessions of one form or another while doing ww and see if this makes any difference. It'll be interesting to see what happens. I'll be surprised (but i really won't) if I don't see any change.
What I think I'm seeing now is why it's so hard - and always has been - for me to lose weight. It's not just that I have to eat less - it's that I seem to have a lot of 'elasticity' in the numbers of calories that I can eat and not gain weight. Meaning, that at least for short periods of time (1-2 weeks), eating in the range of 1200-1800 cals / day means I won't gain or lose weight. When I gain, it's because I have some "spike" days or weeks where I eat a lot of cals, probably don't get enough exercise, and gain 5-7 all at once. When I lose, it's never that dramatic - but I'll still see a loss of 1-3 lbs in the course of a day or two. Or at least that's the way it's worked in the past. I've got to realize that as I get older, this will change.
They say you really notice the big drop in what you can eat at ~30. I haven't noticed that I gain any more easily, and I'm not sure that it's harded to lose. I have a sense that my metabolism is so screwed up that I won't notice much difference as I get older from how it's always been. In other words, I think I had the eat/weight issues of a 30-year old when I was 12 - how much worse can it get?
Can I get to the point that I don't eat ANYTHING yet don't lose any weight?
I saw something on tv recently - a show that chronicled morbidly obese people that decided to have gastric bypass surgery done. There was one guy that they showed that was over 350 lbs, but this guy ate food that I can't even imagine. He would have at least a dozen eggs a day, two gallons of juice or milk and a ton more. His daily food intake was more than I probably eat in a week.
Why can't be like that guy? I think if he just ate normally, he'd be able to lose all the weight. Same with me - but honest to god, my food intake isn't that unreasonable even when I'm not monitoring it. I'm just now proving it to myself - where as it's always been a pseudo-fantasy maybe? that I've told myself that I eat normally but am still fat. It's really interesting, though.
So - for these first five weeks I haven't been doing any extra exercise - only basic stuff like my classes and PT. But this week my goal is to do at least 10 30-minute exercise sessions of one form or another while doing ww and see if this makes any difference. It'll be interesting to see what happens. I'll be surprised (but i really won't) if I don't see any change.
What I think I'm seeing now is why it's so hard - and always has been - for me to lose weight. It's not just that I have to eat less - it's that I seem to have a lot of 'elasticity' in the numbers of calories that I can eat and not gain weight. Meaning, that at least for short periods of time (1-2 weeks), eating in the range of 1200-1800 cals / day means I won't gain or lose weight. When I gain, it's because I have some "spike" days or weeks where I eat a lot of cals, probably don't get enough exercise, and gain 5-7 all at once. When I lose, it's never that dramatic - but I'll still see a loss of 1-3 lbs in the course of a day or two. Or at least that's the way it's worked in the past. I've got to realize that as I get older, this will change.
They say you really notice the big drop in what you can eat at ~30. I haven't noticed that I gain any more easily, and I'm not sure that it's harded to lose. I have a sense that my metabolism is so screwed up that I won't notice much difference as I get older from how it's always been. In other words, I think I had the eat/weight issues of a 30-year old when I was 12 - how much worse can it get?
Can I get to the point that I don't eat ANYTHING yet don't lose any weight?
I saw something on tv recently - a show that chronicled morbidly obese people that decided to have gastric bypass surgery done. There was one guy that they showed that was over 350 lbs, but this guy ate food that I can't even imagine. He would have at least a dozen eggs a day, two gallons of juice or milk and a ton more. His daily food intake was more than I probably eat in a week.
Why can't be like that guy? I think if he just ate normally, he'd be able to lose all the weight. Same with me - but honest to god, my food intake isn't that unreasonable even when I'm not monitoring it. I'm just now proving it to myself - where as it's always been a pseudo-fantasy maybe? that I've told myself that I eat normally but am still fat. It's really interesting, though.
Friday, February 06, 2004
Okay - so I *did* get in that workout! I haven't been back execpt yesterday to see the PT, but I have had some measure of exercise each night this week (except Weds - guitar).
So - I was on the WW boards and there are apparently a *lot* of people that just don't loose weight that easily - like me. So - I saw one plan that I might try - she calls it "Wendy's Plan" and it seems to be similar to the rotation diet, only applied to WW points instead of cals per day.
So, an example, with my 30 ppd:
Day 1 - 30 points
Day 2 - 35 points
Day 3 - 31 points
Day 4 - 45 points Super High Day (SHD)
Day 5 - 30 points
Day 6 - 34 points
Day 7 - 32 points
So - it this week is equally disappointing - I may try this. I'm also concerned b/c SO is coming to town this week. I'm very excited and I can't wait to see him, but I also don't want to get to badly off track.
It's also good to hear that there are other late-night eaters out there. I've always heard that it's better to eat most of your calories earlier in the day. Based on my averages on WW this go around - I eat 50 - 70% of my cals after 5pm. Which maybe isn't good - but I've noticed that I'm not doing the starving-I'll-eat-anything-including-cardboard-boxes-in-the-cupboard-hunger these past few weeks. True, I've been going out with gem for late night teas, etc. but mostly it's been social noshing and I've been able to keep it under control.
So - I was on the WW boards and there are apparently a *lot* of people that just don't loose weight that easily - like me. So - I saw one plan that I might try - she calls it "Wendy's Plan" and it seems to be similar to the rotation diet, only applied to WW points instead of cals per day.
So, an example, with my 30 ppd:
Day 1 - 30 points
Day 2 - 35 points
Day 3 - 31 points
Day 4 - 45 points Super High Day (SHD)
Day 5 - 30 points
Day 6 - 34 points
Day 7 - 32 points
So - it this week is equally disappointing - I may try this. I'm also concerned b/c SO is coming to town this week. I'm very excited and I can't wait to see him, but I also don't want to get to badly off track.
It's also good to hear that there are other late-night eaters out there. I've always heard that it's better to eat most of your calories earlier in the day. Based on my averages on WW this go around - I eat 50 - 70% of my cals after 5pm. Which maybe isn't good - but I've noticed that I'm not doing the starving-I'll-eat-anything-including-cardboard-boxes-in-the-cupboard-hunger these past few weeks. True, I've been going out with gem for late night teas, etc. but mostly it's been social noshing and I've been able to keep it under control.
Monday, February 02, 2004
god I don't want to exercise...and I really need to. For my daily activity, so I can sleep, for my knees. I've just had a long boring day at work and my energy is just gone. And it's freezing outside and I don't even want to be out for a few minutes to go to the gym. Whine whine whine - but I just don't have it in me tonight. I have to find the strength somewhere because once I go - the more I'll keep going. If I could just walk around the neighborhood I wouldn't feel like it was such a big deal - but it's like 25 degrees out. I wish there were some sexy guys at the gym - like tom. Oh baby - too bad he's in another city and doesn't go to the gym :) - that would make it warm enough to see the icicles hanging from my nose. Maybe a little gazelle - just a little. Arrggghhhh...maybe if I just take off my work clothes - the draft in this room will make me want to put on my sweats at least. I wish this gym had a hot tub like the last one - *that* would get me down there!
So - I've been doing WW for about three weeks. I don't think I've lost any weight. But my SO was visiting from out of town last weekend, so I let things go a bit. But- I was still well within their points and flex-points range. So - even if I'm not accurate every day, I'm still basically not using the 35 flex points I've got each week. Which means - this is still too high a number of cals for me each day. That's rough - because I'm not sure I could eat significantly less for long periods of time. But - one of my main goals is to really stick with this for a while and get a baseline of how many calories a day I need to eat to either maintain or loose weight. It's frustrating. I need to get more exercise - gem's been holding me back. She's mumbling about wanting to get more physical exercise. We went dancing this weekend - she was out of breath just walking from the car to the club. After barely dancing for just a few minutes she was completely winded. I don't consider myself to be in the best shape - but it was a bit alarming.
I can't make her help herself- and I think trying to get her to go the the gym will be more trouble than it's worth. But I keep hoping - I have this whole 3-dimensional breathing walking list of thing I want to do with a smaller self. It's not just smaller - I'm fat and I can't stand it. I have this big belly that drives me nuts- and I'm all squishy and icky all over. I want to have a firmer less squishy body. I want my knees not to hury when I walk down a flight of stairs.
I can't make her help herself- and I think trying to get her to go the the gym will be more trouble than it's worth. But I keep hoping - I have this whole 3-dimensional breathing walking list of thing I want to do with a smaller self. It's not just smaller - I'm fat and I can't stand it. I have this big belly that drives me nuts- and I'm all squishy and icky all over. I want to have a firmer less squishy body. I want my knees not to hury when I walk down a flight of stairs.
