Have you radically changed your diet or is it more exercise?
The only way I can lose weight is to remove the association of pleasure with food.
I love sitting down at the weekend with everyone to break bread and enjoy dips and chicken and olives and nachos and salsa dips then have cake and ice-cream for afters with coffee and chocolate biscuits after that. But I don't lose weight.
I love 4 slices of jam on toast and a cup of coffee (few biscuits after) on a Sunday morning. But I don't lose weight.
I love cooking a hot chicken curry and rice and onion bhajis that would feed a family of 6 and then sharing it all with Jo. But I don't lose weight.
I love raiding the chocolate vending machine at work if I'm having a bad day. But I don't lose weight.
I love take-aways on the beach. But I don't lose weight.
I love cooking cookies with the kids. But I don't lose weight
Now I know I could incorporate all of these into a healthy diet and lose weight at the same time but I know I won't. I was explaining to Laura why they had to shoot and kill that white tiger the other week because the argument goes that once it's tasted human it's wants more. She said 'what like you and chocolate' ... smart ar$e!
I'm thinking that I will be able to incorporate all of the things I love into a maintenance plan once I get to goal weight but until then I'll get my pleasure from other things. Seeing the weight go down is one way. Being able to ride up Reid Rd easier (which it seemed to be last week) is another. Even running my undulating run course last night seemed a bit easier. I loved that!
The only way I can lose weight is to get boring with my food. I do not need new delicious wonderful flavoursome dishes to keep me on a diet. I need boring regular food that I know will keep me full until the next feed. We have to keep a food diary for this Weight Loss Challenge and I am waiting to get told off for not eating a variety of foods. My plan looks the same almost daily but certainly weekly.
Breakfast since the start of the challenge has been porridge and honey. Keeps me full till a bit of fruit (usually apple) at 10am. The only difference in the diet is at the weekend when for lunch instead of my banana, peanut butter and honey sandwich (which is nice but not so nice that I want to eat 4 more rounds of bread) I have a LARGE bowl (think large dog bowl) of chicken salad, nuts, seeds and vegetables with hot lime pickle. Lots of goodness in there.
When I get home from work I used to raid the cupboards for food but I have stopped that and now wait till dinner. Such a good boy now! Dinner is either a 'Laura sized' portion of whatever Jo is cooking or my standby of a large bowl of cornflakes if I get home late or miss the 'family' dinner for whatever reason.
Once the kids are in bed me and Jo get really naughty. Out come the nuts and dark chocolate. A handful of (healthy) walnuts and a few squares of dark chocolate with a cup of tea watching trashy TV with the kids asleep in bed. Life don't get any better (in the relaxing stakes) than this. I read on a blog that one lady has a treat in the evening of a square of dark chocolate. $h!t, ONE square! We have 8 each!!! IT'S MEDICINE PEOPLE!!!
I think another thing that has helped with the weight loss is that I am not having any energy drink/gel/food for any exercise under two hours. An hour run for me would normally involve a bit of food before I went out (banana) a 750ml sports drink on the way and usually a gel at the half way point. Now it's just water and there's no problem. I'm not going to die from lack of food.
Oh ... and another thing. The challenge being for money has certainly helped. I've had a few work buffets in the past weeks and I would normally attack them with vengeance. In the past I would have been embarrassed to explain my lack of eating with the usual 'I'm on a diet' BUT I feel different (and people's reaction has certainly been different) when I explain that I am doing a challenge to win $$$. The usual reaction is 'you don't need to lose weight, an extra muffin/cake/brownie won't hurt' but now it is 'good on ya, good luck, stay away form the cakes'. Much easier to deal with.
At the end of the 12 weeks if i haven't reached my goal of 80Kg then I will draw out $600 put it in an envelope and set a time to lose the remaining.
If I do, I get the $600.
If I don't, Jo and the kids get it. I need short term incentives.
Medium term is to be faster at a lighter weight.
Long term is to live healthier and longer.
Short term I need MONEY!!!
6 comments:
Everything you've posted makes perfect sense. One of the things I'm most sensitive about is liquid calories. I won't touch a sports drink unless I'm running for over two hours. It took me a long time to learn to eat and drink on the bike because I almost resented having to replace the calories I'd just burned off! Obviously I was still in a weight-loss frame of mind, and weight gain was NOT an issue, at least during training for the Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge.
I'm with you on the porridge for breakfast. I use half a cup of skim milk, half a cup of water, a few raisins and a sprinkle of brown sugar (I really don't like honey). I eat heaps of fruit, so morning tea is fruit. Lunch is usually noodles with chicken, or some form of lentils and beans with a complex carb. I have been eating fruit for afternoon tea as well, but writing down my food over the last few weeks has taught me I'm not eating enough protein, so I've been replacing the afternoon fruit with some low fat yoghurt. It works really well to fuel me for the evening workouts as well! Dinner is, again, some form of lean protein with a carb. I struggle to get enough veges in at work, so try to have a huge amount of salad at night.
I'm not a dessert person, so after dinner I'll usually have fruit, or a few squares of dark chocolate. My biggest weakness is the glass of wine or bottle of cider!
We have takeaways once a week and I'm a little less strict with my diet on weekends (obviously, given the amount of status updates about pies). It all seems to work quite well for me because my weight stays fairly stable. I''m a little heavier than I was at my lightest, but only by a couple of kilos and, in all honesty, I was probably TOO light back then. Plus now I have more muscle!
My one real weakness is fresh, crusty white bread. If I'm going to go mad on the weekend you can pretty much guarantee there will be bread in there somewhere!
Too much information coming up ... so be warned!!!
mmmmmm Fresh crusty white bread mmmmmmm .... why did you have to mention that!!! :)haha I used to bake bread (when we first came to NZ) but me and Jo would eat the whole loaf in one go ... nothing better than freshly baked crusty bread with olive oil, nuts, seeds and lemon pepper. I am salivating as I type and its still an hour or so before dinner. Better have an apple!
Bread used to be my big downfall ... almost an addiction. The more I ate the more I wanted to eat. No bread at the weekend for me now. Too dangerous! Sad but true. I could easily (and did) eat 7 or 8 slices of toast with THICK jam after a ride and justify it by saying that I'd ridden for 3 hours so I deserved it. Then I'd eat some chocolate or biscuits and still be hungry for more an hour later. Now its porridge with honey that I love and it fills me up and I don't feel like eating anymore afterwards.
This is a very cathartic (is that the right word) post. I re-read NZTrichick's post about crashing at McDonalds and I could associate too much with it. I do have a lot of food issues but I believe I'm overcoming them or at least dealing with them (one day at a time) ... Today I have my compulsive overeating under control.
I can't associate with the 'higher power' notion of OA but I like a lot of their ideas. I hear a lot second hand and pick out what I like and use that. All common sense stuff really but it works.
This blog entry just got toooo heavy.
That doesn't sound like much food! I eat more than that- bloody hell, no wonder I gain weight!
I haven't felt hungry at all since the start of the challenge so it's not that I'm starving myself. I think my blood sugar levels are just staying more stable and I'm not craving too much sweet stuff.
Sounds like you have a real good attitude on this challenge. Nice one!
My current weakness is the biscuit container at work at morning tea time, and crackers and cheese at home. All pretty uncontrolled.
Porridge sounds like the way to go for breakfast - might help kick that biscuit habit.
The Uni course I've just been on says we should have enough glycogen stores in our muscles and glucose in our blood, to last 90mins of exercise without needing to replace it. So, that's my big thing - no gels and sports drinks!
I re-read my own entry recently too. It helps to know tht I'm not the only one..... Mostly I have it under control too, but there are times when mindless eating and stressed out situations are abit too much and it seems like I go back - but these days I can see it for what it is and hopefully pull out of it quickly. Like you, I take what I need and work with it. The "one day at a time" thing is probably the best. We want quick solutions, but that just doesn't happen does it?
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