Week 3.3: Time to move my tail

I really need to work out today. I ran on Friday and walked on Saturday, skipped Sunday and Monday. My body is really feeling those two skipped days.

Breakfast:
1 cup steel-cut oats with syrup and toasted hazelnuts: 175
2 cups coffee: 130 (1495)

Morning snack:
cottage cheese w/strawberry topping: 130
part of a graham cracker: 65 (1300)

Lunch:
1/2 pork burrito @ Chango’s: 500 (800)

Snack:
dark chocolate: 159
2 Kim’s Magic Pops: 30 (611)

I had a hard time juggling work/research/reading this afternoon with exercise and dinner prep, so I did about 20 minutes on the Wii Fit and burned about 140 calories. Not great, but better than nothing.

Dinner:
chicken spaghetti: 450 (?)
bread: 100
salad: 100 (-39)

Week 3.2: Hunger strikes

Soooooo cussing hungry today, especially from about 3pm on. I tried to snack responsibly, but nothing helped. I’m writing this after dinner and I’m STILL hungry. Do you know the kind of hunger I’m talking about? The kind where you feel like your midsection has been scooped out with a melon baller? Hunger that makes you feel panicked, fuzzy-brained, desperate, and angry? Driving home from Costco, my hunger was a need so intense I can only describe it as the equivalent of having a full bladder but not being able to relieve yourself. Not pleasant.

Breakfast (phase one):
2 cups coffee: 130
1/2 grapefruit: 53
1/2 tsp sugar: 7

Breakfast (phase two):
poppyseed bagel: 300
cream cheese: 70
1 cup coffee: 65

Lunch:
Wendy’s grilled chicken sandwich: 360
12 nacho cheese Doritos (yes, I actually counted them out!): 150
tangelo: 47 (618)

Snack:
1/2 Chocolove dark chocolate bar with sea salt and almonds ($1.59 at Natural Grocers, y’all!): 238
Kim’s Magic Pop w/ 1 tbsp jam: 45 (335)

Dinner:
4 oz. rotisserie chicken: 226
1/2 cup rice: 85
salad w/spinach, carrot, tomatoes, sugar snap peas: 100
1/2 cup strawberries: 39 (-115)

Graham cracker, dish of icecream. Boo!

Argh. Just, argh. I hope I’m not this hungry tomorrow.

Week 3.1: Water, water everywhere

Weigh-in yesterday was disappointing, although I knew it would be. I could feel the fluid in my fingers and I could see it underneath my skin when I put my hands on my thighs. Curse you, water retention!

SW: 218.3
CW: 215.3
Lost: 3

So, that’s me up .8 from last week, which, considering I’m smack in the middle of Aunt Flo’s visit, isn’t too bad. I think I’ll cap each day’s calories at 1800 this week just to help take up the slack.

Very late breakfast:
3 cups coffee: 195
4 triangles French toast: 350
syrup: 100
2 slices bacon: 109
1 scrambled egg: 70

Snack:
Reese’s peanut butter cup: 80 (896)

Come 4pm, I was starving. We had a Super Bowl party to go to, and I knew they were serving fajitas, so I was trying to hold out for those. However, when I sat Laurel down for a snack, the brand-new bag of Sun Chips magically appeared next to me and I probably ate 200 calories of those in a sitting. Then we went to the party and I filled up on tortilla chip + 7-layer dip and King Cake. Good thing I had so many calories left for the day! By the time the fajitas were ready, I was so stuffed full of King Cake that I could barely manage two bites of my much healthier chicken taco. Boo. Back on track today.

2.7: aftershock

Today has been weird, meal-pacing-wise, as I was up at 5:30 but didn’t have breakfast until 10.

Breakfast (spread out over more than four hours):
2 cups coffee: 125 (I ran out of half and half and put 2% milk in one of the cups)
1 1/2 homemade graham crackers: 100
tortilla chips and salsa: 100
1/2 order migas (I ordered my migas with no cheese, but they came with cheese, so then I had to wait 15-20 minutes for the correct order, which I had no appetite for when they arrived): 150(?)
1 flour tortilla: 81
2 more cups coffee: 150 (1206)

When we got home from breakfast and the farmers’ market, I insisted on lying down for a bit since I’d been up dealing with the kids since well before 6am. Then I crashed for nearly two hours. When I got up, I grazed for the rest of the afternoon:

4 pretzel twists: 50
1 quesadilla triangle: 50 (1106)
kettle corn (1/2 cup): 25
peanut butter: 100
jam: 30
2 slices bread: 140
2 Kim’s Magic Pops: 30
jam: 30 (751)

43 minute powerwalk: 280 or 350 calories burned

Dinner was strange. Laurel was a basket case, so after I ate my salad and pasta, I stopped eating and gave her a bath and put her to bed. Then I didn’t really care to finish dinner since Matt and Harry had left the table and my sausage was cold. But I’m going to the movies tonight, so I’ll probably wind up getting a snack there (and will fight myself mightily to avoid going to Gourdough’s after the movie!).

Dinner:
about 1/4 of a 5oz. chicken sausage with artichoke and pepperjack: 60?
approx. 1 cup whole wheat linguine: 180
1/4 c. Newman’s Own marinara: 35 (476)
salad with greens, tomatoes, part of a carrot, about 6 sugar snap peas: 95 (381)

At the movie, I looked at the menu like 50 times. But I did not order any fried pickles or a basket of fries or a molten chocolate cake a la mode or a $5 milkshake. I had a glass of wine and called it good. Especially since I did a lot of sampling of the brownies I made for a Super Bowl party as I transferred them from baking pan to tupperware.

Day 2.6: Here comes the sun

Thank GOD there’s a break in the rain (until Monday, that is), because I have totally let Aunt Flo decide today’s menu. I’m starting this blog post at 2:48pm and after I add up my calories consumed so far, I may discover I have to skip dinner!

First off, I woke up hungry. And I wanted a bagel. The baby got me up at 5:15, but I was able to stay in bed until 6:15. Coffee was ready, but it was a long time before I needed to be anywhere. Ugh. I was soooo hungry, but determined to hold out for the bagel!

Breakfast:
3 Trader Joe’s mini biscotti: 140
1/2 grapefruit: 52
1/2 tsp sugar: 7
2 cups coffee: 130 (1502)

Second breakfast:
Einstein’s double chocolate bagel: 280
reduced fat plain cream cheese: 60 (1162)
coffee: 60 (1100)

This held me over for a long time. I was happy, and didn’t feel hungry for a good four hours or so. But then it got bad. Really bad. This is when Aunt Flo caught me in her grip and said GIVE ME MEAT, SALT, FAT, CARBS, and CHOCOLATE NOW!!!!!!

So I pulled into the drive-through at P. Terry’s. Gulp. The line was long. I had plenty of time to second guess myself. But I did not.

Lunch:
hamburger: 443
fries: 386
3/4 chocolate shake: 658 (-387)

Whoops. Yep, that’s bad. What an overshoot! I will say that my lunch was DELICIOUS and I enjoyed every single bite. I dipped my fries in that chocolate shake and relished the salty-sweet sensation. But this is where the weather comes in: I HAVE to exercise this afternoon, full stop. (I am proud to report that I’ve already logged 8 minutes on the Wii Fit, thank you very much!) And I have to rock it. Drop it like it’s hot. Go balls to the wall. I may have to break a sweat!!!! So, I will spend another hour or so thinking about chick lit and why it gets marginalized in the cultural imagination, and then I will pick up the baby, pop her in the stroller, then work very hard to undo some of the caloric damage I did at lunch. But I will not hate myself for what I have done.

UPDATE:
Went for a 50-minute walk/jog with Sally that burned either 600 or 900 calories depending whether you’re asking dailyplate or dailymile.

Dinner:
a beautiful and insanely delicious salad containing 2 cups spinach, 3 strawberries, 1/2 avocado, 5 cherry tomatoes, 1 tbsp slivered almonds, 1 tbsp balsamic dressing, and onions. And two croutons. I also snitched some cheese pizza from my children. Onward and upward!

Day 2.5: Into the lion’s den

Breakfast:
oatmeal: 150
blueberries: 10
blackberries: 10
splash of soymilk: 15
1/2 Tbsp: almond butter: 48
2 cups coffee: 130 (1468)

Morning snack:
graham cracker 75 (1393)

Lunch:
Mimi’s Cafe Balsamic Chicken Pistachio Salad: 340 (1053)
Did you know that they serve these GIANT muffins with your salad at Mimi’s Cafe? I did not. I met my stepsister there for lunch today and ordered this salad after careful research on dailyplate. I am proud to report that I declined the muffin, and was glad that I had when I saw the size of those monsters as they were carried out to other tables. (If I had opted for the Buttermilk Spice muffin, which was the one that sounded the best, it would have been worth 500 calories! Cripes!) Why do they need to serve a giant, calorie-bomb muffin with a salad? (Of course, according to Laura Shapiro in Perfection Salad, both salads and sweet pastries are considered feminine foods, and since it’s mostly women who order salads, I suppose that pairing makes sense to Mimi’s corporate menu planners.) At any rate, the muffin seems to defeat the purpose of the salad.

I didn’t eat my entire salad because Stepsis and her friend ate faster than I did and I could tell that they were eager to head back to Ft. Hood. Also, they are both young, tall and skinny and I felt self-conscious (they both had small dinner salads and cups of broccoli cheese soup, as well as an order of fried pickles). Of course, I was starving when I got home, so I had 2 slices of toast (140) with cherry-blueberry jam (40). (873)

Early afternoon:
ACK! So hungry! 10 vanilla wafers: 150 (723)

Later:
1/4 c. spiced fig granola: 125 (600)

Dinner:
2.5 oz. catfish: 128
3/4 c. wild rice from a box: 165
1/2 c. steamed broccoli: 22
applesauce: 50 (235)
ice cream: 150 (85)

Day 2.4: So-ho-ho-dium

Oh, man, that chicken pot pie had a loooot of sodium in it — my hands were sooo puffy this morning!

Breakfast:
1/2 grapefruit: 52
1 tsp sugar: 15
1 boiled egg: 70
2 cups coffee: 130 (1564)
I had the egg instead of oatmeal to see if it would last me longer. It did, but not in that, “oh, I feel so satisfied!” kind of way. More in a “uch, I ate an egg” sort of way. Maybe a string cheese would be a good source of mid-morning protein.

Morning snack, even though I wasn’t really that hungry:
1 ginger cookie: 300 (1264)
lg coffee: 70 (1194)
I don’t know why I did that. I felt mildly hungry and knew it would be a while until lunch (and it was), so I went ahead and ate the gorgeous cookie from Medici. It was delicious, but I wish I hadn’t eaten it.

Workout:
26 mins/500 yards at natatorium: approx 350 burned
It felt really good to get back into the pool for the first time since late summer. I felt strong (if slow) and tonight my legs feel like they got a workout, for sure. I might go back on Friday and try to add another 250 yards to my workout.

Lunch (nearly 2pm!):
Healthy Choice Mediterranean Pasta meal: 360 (834)
yogurt: 130 (704)
I won’t be buying that Healthy Choice meal again. I took one look at it after it came out of the microwave and I very nearly pitched it and went to Chick-fil-A (the grilled chicken sandwich there is so very good!). But I ate it anyway, and it tasted fine, but it just made me sad.

Afternoon grazing:
honeycrisp apple (about 3/4 of it): 60 (644)
natural Cheetos: 50 (594)

Dinner:
leftover beef stew: 140
leftover chicken pot pie: 160
1 cup steamed broccoli: 44 (250)
3 dark chocolate covered almonds: 43 (207)
1/2 c (approx) Dreyer’s Slow Churned Thin Mint: 150 (57)

Day 2.3: Kickin’ it June Cleaver style

Today I am baking graham crackers and prepping the ingredients for tonight’s chicken pot pie dinner while I am alone in the house and have no toddlers clinging to my legs or preschoolers badgering me to let them play Wii. However, it is apparently Yard Work Day on my street, so my bliss is somewhat hampered by the buzz of weedwhackers.

All my busywork in the kitchen has, surprisingly, allowed me to ignore my hunger. I was going to have a half-grapefruit with my oatmeal this morning, but the demands of the family meant that I didn’t have enough “me” time to enjoy a two-course breakfast. I was able, however, to work in a little fruit this morning as I remembered a tub of blueberries in the fridge. My goal for the day is to work in more veg, as I’ve really been coming up short in that department of late.

Breakfast:
1 cup steel-cut oats: 150
drizzle of maple syrup: 15
splash of soymilk: 10
1/8 c. blueberries: 10
2 cups coffee: 130 (1516)

Late morning snack/lunch appetizer:
Yoplait light Banana Cream Pie yogurt: 110 (1406)
I don’t think I’ll get these anymore, as I just can’t reconcile myself to the pronounced chemical-ness of these yogurts. I’ll stick to the fat-free Greek stuff I get at Costco and budget around the extra 20 calories.

2 homemade graham crackers: approx. 150 (1256)

Lunch:
1 slice mediterranean pizza at Bennu: 230 (1026)

I got home from working at the coffeeshop at 4pm and realized I’d had fewer than 1000 calories all day, so I had a protein-fat-carb snack to get me through until dinner.

1 slice bread: 70
1 oz. turkey breast: 60
1/2 slice havarti: 43 (853)

Dinner:
scratch chicken pot pie with whole-wheat biscuit: 475
salad w. 1 tbsp ranch: 100 (278)

I have a lot of calories left over tonight, but I’m feeling pretty full. I might have a glass of wine while watching Lost, or I might just let them ride since I haven’t been able to work out yet this week. I will definitely make it a point to go to the pool tomorrow, since it’s supposed to be raining.

Day 2.2: Fiddling with the menu

My friend sent me some notes from the book Eat for Life, among which was an edict to eat fruit for breakfast. I had to laugh at that because if I were to eat *only* fruit for breakfast, I would not be able to be around people because I would be so hungry I would probably kill them. And then try to eat them. But I didn’t think that there would be an issue with supplementing my breakfast with fruit. Here’s what happened:

Breakfast:
1/2 grapefruit: 52
1/2 tsp.sugar: 7.5
I ate the grapefruit while the steel-cut oats were cooking, which took about 30 minutes. Strangely enough, by the time I’d eaten the grapefruit and had a cup of coffee, I was sort of full. But I knew that wouldn’t take me all the way to lunch, so I ate a smaller portion of oatmeal.
1/2 c. oatmeal: 75
1 tsp light brown sugar: 15
2 cups coffee: 130 (1551)

The verdict? I was starving by the time I got to campus at 9:30, so I went for another cup of coffee and ate half a lemon-blueberry muffin. D’oh!

Morning snack:
1 cup coffee: 65
1/2 lemon blueberry muffin: 180? (1306)

Lunch:
crockpot beef stew: 275 (1031)
yogurt: 130 (901)

Snack:
1 cup pineapple: 74 (827)

Holy crap, I was so hungry by the time I got home at around 5:30 or so, that I had a larger snack than I normally would have.

Snack 2:
string cheese: 80
pretzel twists: 110 (637)

Dinner:
1 1/2 turkey hot dogs: 60
1 whole-wheat hot dog bun: 110
sprinkle of cheese: 15
1 tbsp sauerkraut: 10
1/2 c. Annie’s Peace, Pasta, and Parmesan: 135 (307)
I had planned to have some veg with dinner, but the steam-in-bag “Bamboo Blend” my husband bought at the grocery last week was vile. It was like 50% pearl onions.

I’ll top off the night with a half-cup of the Dreyer’s Slow Churned. I love that stuff. And measuring it out reminds me that half a cup really is sufficient, that I don’t really need to gorge on it. Duh.

Day 2.1: Trash day

I was a little nervous about weighing in this morning because of my excursion to the wine bar last night. I had two generously poured glasses of red wine, and split an order of moules frites and a small cheese plate with my friend. I was certain that at the very least, all the salt from the moules broth and sugar from the bread and wine would make me hold on to excess water, but I bit the bullet after having a cup of coffee. I tried to replicate last week’s conditions, where I’d already had a couple of cups of coffee and a little grapefruit juice. Needless to say, I am quite chuffed with my first week’s results.

Just a few reflections on the past week: I felt very comfortable most of the time. There were a few afternoons where I was ravenously hungry, but I didn’t feel deprived or like I was on a diet. I didn’t feel compelled to weigh myself every day, sometimes several times a day like I did when I was following Weight Watchers. I don’t know what’s different, other than that I feel more … autonomous doing this than with WW. I think not having the false sense of security of the 35 extra points per week helps; with those, I would always overshoot my points every day. With calorie counting, I just stop when I hit the day’s goal. Speaking of, my weight loss brings my daily calorie goal down to 1,831.

Now then, when I was on WW, weigh-in day would be a free-for-all. I would eat anything and everything I wanted. I do not intend to do that with this project, mostly because I’m already eating whatever I want, although I try to skew more toward healthier, more nutritious choices. I have given myself permission to make the “wrong” or “bad” choice on any given day; I just add it to the calorie intake and make it up at dinner. That said, today was a weigh-in day and I made some pretty bad choices. It was bad timing. My husband has a huge work project that has consumed his every waking moment this week, both at work and at home, and I packed up the kids to Killeen for my nephew’s birthday party. The baby was up nearly every hour last night, and I would have been exhausted all day even without the single parenting aspect or the day trip to Killeen. My nerves are shot, and I’ve eaten garbage all day. In all honesty, I will probably overshoot my calories today by about 200. And I give myself permission to do that today.

Breakfast:
1 sausage kolache: 160
1 cherry kolache: 195
2 cups coffee: 130 (1346)

Morning snack (drive up to Killeen):
2 dark chocolate Reese’s cups: 210 (1136)

Lunch:
one DELICIOUS (*snerk*) slice of sausage pizza @ Chuck E. Cheese: 170
1/2 small slice Wal-Mart bakery cake: 150? (816)
Amazingly, dailyplate.com has nutritional information on Walmart bakery cakes.

Afternoon snack 1 (drive back from Killeen):
Cheetos: approx. 200 (616)

Afternoon snack 2 (arrive home):
6 Nilla wafers: 107 (509)

Afternoon snack 3 (after a 30-minute nap where spouse gave me a break from the kids):
1 slice bread: 70
1 oz. turkey breast: 60
1/2 slice havarti: 43 (336)

Dinner:
crockpot beef stew: 250 (86)
white bakery bread + pat of butter: 125 (-39)

Dessert:
1/2 cup Dreyer’s Slow Churned Thin Mint ice cream: 120 (-159)