Lava

Fabulous time in lava hot springs.  I don't think it's changed from what I vaguely remember almost 40 years ago.  Population is 521.  Our hotel was old and delightfully shabby with old world charm. The pools were hot hot hot!  One of them so hot we couldn't even get in.  It felt wonderful on my poor sinuses.  I have definitely caught something.  Not that it's interfering with my appetite at all.  This is the first time in 37 days I've been completely off plan. We left Ogden about 5:30--and let me tell you there isn't much by way of food between here and lava hot springs!! We were almost there when we finally found a restaraunt at 7:30!  I was starving AND on vacation.  I didn't even look at the part of the menu for "lighter appetites."  I had a bacon cheeseburger with tater tots, a side salad with blue cheese dressing (a rip-off at $3.29) and an order of hot wings. Felt fabulous.  We found our hotel, stewed in the hotpots then went out for late night ice-cream.  I had a small sundae--at least I didn't eat the hot-fudge.  It had been cooking all day and wasn't even liquid anymore--it just came off in one thick skin.  For breakfast this morning I had a really good quiche with sundried tomatoes and spinach--I'm sure the piecrust was loaded with fat, and then for lunch I had a gyro platter at the mall (surprisingly great greek food there), the best I can say about that is that at least I didn't eat all the fries.   Mother's Day is tomorrow and I feel totally without energy.  I'm supposed to walk for three hours this weekend and I want to, but the thought of doing a three hour walk, THEN going to church ,THEN going to Salt Lake is completely overwhelming.  I'll see how I feel I guess. I doubt I'll be roaring with energy, but maybe I can do a little wii or walk the 5k if it's a nice day.  I'm not especially inspired to  behave myself with food tomorrow either. But whatever happens I'll be back on the core plan on Monday.  Dave is shopping right now for some core-friendly recipies.  One glitch on the core plan is that it's difficult to track on the ww site. Going on that site everyday and logging in all my food and exercise is a big part of staying accountable.  However, fun as it is to eat off plan, I'm actually excited to get back on track on Monday---I like success!!!  In diets past I've NEVER been very successful, mostly because the diets were so horrible (the old ww plan!) that I couldn't stay on them. I still don't get why going off plan even a little completely killed the weight-loss, but it did.  This time I've already lost 10 pounds!  I felt great at lava---I'm still way too heavy to wear a swimsuit well, but the important thing was that I felt sleek and slim.  I can't wait to see where I'll be when we go to Aruba at the end of June.  Right now I feel like I'll lose 20 pounds in sinus discharge alone.

Down 10 pounds!

Hey!!  Down TWO pounds this week for a total of 10!! I'm almost down to what I think I weigh anyway. Actually, anything after this point is exciting--and it feels really good even now.  My clothes fit again and I think my legs feel a little sleeker.  Only 43 pounds to go.  That doesn't sound too bad.  At the one WW meeting I went to they showed an anatomically correct pound of fat.

 I've seen it before, but this time it hit me more forcibly-losing (or gaining) just one pound or even a half of a pound is a BIG deal.  Every one of those 43 pounds will have a noticable impact on my appearance, and on my overall body function.  So!  Carry on I will. 

I'm still under the weather today, but I'm pretty sure it's allergies.  I slept much better than I expected to and don't feel quite as exhausted.  Unfortunately, I have my annual check-up this afternoon which means fasting for the blood work.  This is probably a bad day to fast when I already feel low energy, but I'll survive.  At least, unlike a religious fast, I can have water. Thank heavens it's Friday.  Tonight just me and Dave are driving up to lava hot springs---sitting in a hot mineral tub sounds fantastic just now.  We'll have a nice dinner somewhere--WITH dessert!  Man, I hit a sugar wall yesterday. The core plan is distinctly lacking in sugar and refined foods.  It didn't bother me much until yesterday. I had wanted to save points for dessert after dinner, but was dying for a dessert--I looked through the cookbooks and decided I was too tired to make anything anyway and just had a snickers egg which I'm calling two points.  It did the trick.  The other really helpful thing is diet hot chocolate.  Love that stuff--25 calories and I add light whipping cream.  It's super helpful because it takes a relatively long time to drink it, so I'm "engaged with food" for a satisfying amount of time.  I won't pig out after the fast today, but I will have what I want for dinner.  Tomorrow breakfast and lunch might be off-plan, but dinner can be on.  I have to get a three hour walk in this weekend and it'll probably be Sunday--which is good because that is Mom's rouladen dinner.  After that it's back on the core plan for the rest of the week.  Here's to success!!!

Cold

I have officially caught cold. I have an eye appt at  10:00 and I think I might wimp out and go home after that.  I've got loads of sick time. It's not that I feel so bad, I'm just so tired.  Maybe if I go home I can throw it off more quickly--maybe I just don't feel like being at work. 

Food-wise I'm going strong. Open house at work featured platters of loft-house cookies and fruit.  I had a little fruit. I think I'll stay on this core plan for one more week.  I'm liking feeling full.  I like having a bowl of cream of wheat cereal with milk and then also having a glass of milk on the side.  Yesterday was nice--Dave and C fixed dinner which gave me a chance to mow the lawn (I'm weird, I like mowing the lawn and shoveling snow--vacuuming, not so much).  Then I saw Sis. Mead which was a nice start to easing my guilt about the neglected people in my life. Maybe someday soon I'll start doing something about my neglected family--that's where the real guilt lies.

I just told Jennifer I'm sick. I can't wait to go home and just sleep.

Fake cheese and fake brownies

AAAck!! ICK!! The nachos I've been so looking forward to were a MAJOR disappointment last night!--This is largely due to the fake fat-free cheese I tried to make it with.  I was so so enchanted with the idea that I could have as much cheese as I wanted that I actually bought a bag of shedded mozzerella fat-free cheese.  It doesn't melt, it doesn't taste--it only glued the chips to the plate.  Never again.  Are there really people out there who think this stuff is good? I feel sorry for them---how sad to lose real cheese!  It's my favorite food.

It's the number one thing I miss whenever I try to lose weight.  I haven't yet figured out the way to deal with cheese in a reasonable way.  I have 3 pts (just one ounce) of the real thing cut up on my salad today, but I miss having chunks of losts of  kinds every day.  I guess I can save up points and have cheese and crackers, but I don't always feel free to save points for something like that because I need them for those darn exceptions that keep popping up.  This week for example, has our anniversary celebration (going to lava hot-springs on friday and staying overnight) and mother's day on Sunday (mom's rouladen).  I'm not going to go diet-bananas on our mini-trip. I'm going to try and eat like any person who weighs my ideal weight would eat---so to my mind that means if the continental breakfast features doughnuts or muffins I'll have one--especially if there isn't anything else available.  Rouladen-wise---there is no help for this dish, I'll make a stab at moderation, but these have the perfect fat/salt combo that will trigger every physical addiction that I've got.  Do my best and back to the plan on Monday is about the best I can promise.

In the meantime I have a sore throat (no wonder I was feeling tired and unmotivated yesterday), and I'm feeling guilty about chuch work. I'm in the RS presidency and I've been sitting like a bump on a log doing as little as possible, and not even that very well. I'm afraid of being overwhelmed, and I've let people down.  I hate contracting obligations that I'm not prepared to follow through on and so disappoint people.  I need to learn to do small acts of service without giving the impression that I am going to be there forever.  I need to see Bonnie---struggles with major suicidal depression--I know it, and I still haven't really seen in her over 2 months, Verna Mead--heart problems will likely die in this next year--I did great seeing her in the nursing home, but haven't seen her since I've been home.  Call Lindsey--she's the new head of the 'friendship committee' and should have had some direction from me two weeks ago.  See Tammy--mom of the boy who killed himself, and THEN I should do my visiting teaching--I WANT to see Kay, she's a talker, but I really enjoy her and would love to get to know her.  Sigh.  I ought to go to the temple too. This just clears out the personal obligations.  Church work begins after I get this stuff in order.  I need to just chip away at this like the Aruba stuff (I did manage to do some Aruba chipping yesterday).  Today I can drop in on Verna and call Lindsey.  Catherine is graduating and there are parties and family to organize and the stupid green car is on the blink again--not an expensive fix, but everything is more than we can afford just now.  So, I'm feeling overwhelmed--probably more so than usual because I don't have food as a fall back.  Maybe this is a good thing though.  Visit-wise I ought to feel guilty and not mask the feeling so that I will actually DO something about it.  So, I will do my best to repent---but not with the "aid" of fake cheese!

stress eating

 Today's challenge is going to be stress eating.  I've got to get this presentation together for Aruba and I feel really lost as to how to go about it. On the one hand it seems sort of simple--I only need to speak for half an hour on the other hand Dave keeps telling me I need to do all this research and figure out my statistics (no IDEA how to do that!).  It's important to me not to embarrass him--also be nice not to embarrass myself.  But I don't want to burden him too much with this because he's also doing Catherine's presentation as well as his own.  Dr. Fowler, my advisor on this project, is on sabbatical--and I'd be reluctant to bother her anyway because she already went way beyond the call of duty to get this thing approved in the first place and to help get the IRB approval for the survey (a collosal pain in the behind).  Plus, at this stage with the trip next month, I'd be embarrassed to confess how little I've done.  SO--today I will do.....SOMETHING!!  When I feel this way food is the number one thing I use to relieve anxiety.  Well, the number two---happily the number one thing is to do something about what's causing the anxiety.  SO--really, what will I do?  I'm going to call some of the people for interviews.  I'm going to look up the articles Zsuzsi suggested, I'm going to read at least one other article that's on my desk. I can begin to do some simple statistics---what percentage did this or that.  Ok.  There is plenty I CAN do.  Course, I don't want to do any of it, but I'll feel a whole lot better when I do. Just do a little bit every day right?  Finals are over.  The mural project is in (have I mentioned that one? much more on that topic if it comes through.)  I've got the carrots going--but it's not going to be enough.  I'll need the microwave popcorn too.

Food-wise---going well!!  Tomato sauce and tomato paste are on the core plan, but I wasn't sure about canned spaghetti sauce.  We went to Walmart (hate walmart) right after work, got Catherine's graduation pics, some flowers for the front so our house looks a little less like a war zone, and didn't get home until 6:45.  All of us hungry--but I had spaghetti from scratch on the table in less than 1/2 an hour!  Go mom!  Afterward I planted the pansys and practiced my neglected harp.  All productive and necessary, but I know full well I'm neglecting the Aruba research.  I'm also stressed about money.  C's graduation has been a money bleed and we're about bled dry. Still, she's my only child and I WANT her to have a new dress and a grad party and go out to a nice lunch for graduation.  I too was an only child for 10 years and I'm spoiled enough to want what I want and to heck with the consequences---also something I take out in food, because I really can't go completely crazy with money.

Anyway---wonderful breakfast--cream of wheat (love that) with fresh blackberries courtesy of Mom.  I would eat that breakfast whether or not I'm trying to lose weight, so it's an exceptionally good one for me.  Then a walk to work on a gorgeous morning---saw 7 new ducklings at the pond!  Leftover spaghetti for lunch and Nachos for dinner.  Hooray for comfort food.

Steak

Love fast Sundays.  Again, the point is not to be a glutton as soon as you get to eat, but it does feel good to eat and know that pretty much anything is ok.  Had a terrific "core plan" dinner----steak, two kinds of shrimp, grilled onions, corn and sweet potatoes.  The idea is that I can use my 49 pts for the stuff that's not on the plan like steak sauce and butter.  I'm sure I went over my daily 7 pts--I deliberately ate a scone (5)--that was planned---the 2 hershey's kisses, the extra cookies (they were small though!) were not,  Not worried about it though.  Like I said, it was fast Sunday.  Today I have first class leftovers for lunch and am thoroughly enjoying the idea of not being hungry---that said, darn it, I AM hungry right now!  And lunch isn't for two more hours.  It's ok though, I'll have a banana, and a BIG lunch (if I'm hungry enough to eat it all) and I can have seconds or thirds at dinner (spaghetti) if I want and have some popcorn tonight too.  Let's see...2 points for butter on morning toast and garlic wasa's, 1 pt for salad dressing, 3 pts for oil on the popcorn (olive oil is a ww idea that's really good--I'm a convert) and 2-4 for either a reeses egg or a snickers egg.  Total 8-10 pts.  Ok--I have activity points too---and I'm not at all sure I'll eat both the popcorn and the chocolate.  It's just nice to know I can. 

Two good comments about weight watchers for a change I love that they have two plans--I don't see the core plan being a very practical option for the long run, but at least it's here as a fall back and to mix things up a little. Also, kudos to them for rolling out a new program at all--they make bazillions of dollars and I'm impressed that even though they're the industry leader and could just sit back and say they have it figured out, they still spend the money to try to improve their program.

Lastly, my clothes fit again which feels great, and Mom asked if I'd lost weight---I guess my face is a little thinner.   

All hail the queen

Another sloppy finish to the week, but still overall not bad--perhaps even a good thing.  Perfectionism trips me up a lot and being a little imperfect without giving up entirely is something important to practice.  Wasn't very hungry for breakfast so ate lightly, had a good lunch then walked a 5K---wanted a snickers egg and had the points--but realized that an apple would be a better choice, especially considering that I didn't quite know what to expect later on.   Munched on the apple as I walked and was proud of myself.  It really is an actual and possible choice to choose an apple.  Strange thought! This will take a lot of practice.

The challenge for the day was William and Catherine's wedding (of royal fame).  I like British royalty and so does Dad. I wanted to spend a little time with him and told him I would come down with scones and strawberries to watch some belated wedding footage with him.  Christine said she'd make stuff too.  We got down there and as usual, nobody was prepared--Christine didn't get the message we were coming and didn't think to call us to double check, Dad had just gone to take a nap. Christine needed time to prepare---so me and C went to the church history museum for a little while.  We were both starving and didn't think there would be much by way of non-dessert food, so we had a 6 in Subway.  I think it was a good decision.  Christine did make some sandwiches after all but they were pretty high fat.  We both enjoyed moderate amounts of everything and had a good time.

Today is fast  Sunday--I'm really looking forward to tonight's dinner (steak and shrimp) and also this whole week--I'm trying the core plan---limited food choices but I get to eat as much as I want of them!  No hunger this week!!!