Starting weight (7/15/08):    279.8    (1/8/08):    285.2
Calories/Carbs Goals (limits):       1400  / 30.0
Yesterday’s calories & net carbs:  1232 / 29.6
Yesterday’s exercise:  1 1/2 hours shopping/walking
Weight Yesterday:  253.8    Today:  253.6
Change today:  -0.2 lbs.   Loss-so-far:  26.2 lbs.  /  31.6 lbs.

I decided to watch “Biggest Loser” on the NBC website tonight (I thought maybe it would inspire me) and I got so caught up watching the first two episodes that I forgot to watch Dancing with the Stars!  I can’t believe I missed my show!  Eh, it’s okay, I’ll watch it tomorrow afternoon on the ABC website.  I did see a clip of tonight’s show, the part about Misty Mae and her injury.  Bummer!  I was really rooting for her (and was really enjoying seeing Maksim dancing again)!

Anyway, so I watched TBL (and even though they do portray a method of weight loss that is pretty unhealthy), I couldn’t help but get caught up in everyone’s stories.  I never really watched the show before (just caught a couple portions while channel-surfing) so it was interesting to me how it all works.  The weigh-ins are so suspense-filled, I found my heart racing as I waited for the outcome.  Ha!  So caught up in the drama of it all!

I was doing some math tonight and found out some surprising results.  Kevin and I have three favorite meals - hamburgers on low-carb buns, pizza made with low-carb tortillas, and chicken tacos also made with low-carb tortillas.  We have these three meals every week, at least once, without fail.  So for the heck of it, I decided to add up these meals and see how they compare with each other as far as calories and net carbs.

I was actually surprised at some of the results.  Okay, not surprising was that the hamburger was the highest in calories (676).  This was including the bun, cheese, mayo, ketchup, onions, and pickles.  Next were the tacos (2 for 518) which for me included shredded cheddar cheese and sour cream.  What surprised me though was the pizza (for two pepperoni pizzas, each on 7″ tortillas was only 368).  Also surprising to me was that all three meals totaled about the same number of carbs (hamburger 10.5, chicken tacos 10.2, and pizzas 11.6).

So tonight for dinner I had a nice-sized romaine salad and two tortilla-pizzas… and it was enough, more than enough!

Tomorrow I will try DDR again… only I will skip the jumps for now.

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Starting weight (7/15/08):    279.8    (1/8/08):    285.2
Calories/Carbs Goals (limits):       1400  / 30.0
Yesterday’s calories & net carbs:  1702 / 25.5
Yesterday’s exercise:  2 hours shopping/walking
Weight Yesterday:  253.4    Today:  253.8
Change today:  +0.4 lbs.   Loss-so-far:  26.0 lbs.  /  31.4 lbs.

Ya know how dieting has its ups and downs, especially if you weigh in every day?  It’s what you expect, those mysterious UPs, those days when the scale reflects a gain instead of a loss.  Well, I’ve certainly complained about my UPs often enough in this blog… but…

Ever since September 18, I’ve been tracking DOWNs every day - every SINGLE DAY, except ONE… the day that I splurged on a yummy bunless cheesesteak sandwich.  The day I went 400 calories over my daily goal.  Yeah, that day.  Well, this morning makes two days, and golly guess what?  I went over my calories yesterday again.  By 300 calories this time.  Yeah yeah there are so many factors that could cause a temporary weight gain on the scales — and those extra 300 calories didn’t necessarily contribute to an overnight gain but…

I really like the daily losses!  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I got the DDR game on September 6th and so soon afterward my daily losses accelerated, and so I therefore don’t think it’s a coincidence either, that while I’m unable to play DDR, my losses slowed again, even to the point of showing a gain.  I want my knee back!!!  *Sigh*

I was out and about all day today again and did a couple hours worth of walking - again.  The knee is getting stronger and I can *almost* walk normally.  I’m still not going to push it though, I’m gonna let it heal.

Okay so yesterday the reason I went over on my calories was because I ate out twice and was just estimating the carbs in my head, and so I didn’t add it all up until I got home late last night and surprise!  The carbs were right on the money, but the calories were definitely too high.  Oops.  So today I ate out twice again (lucky me! hehe) and was much more careful about monitoring and estimating both.

I had a yummy dinner at Chili’s tonight.  It’s interesting because if you look at Chili’s online nutritional menu, their food is REALLY REALLY high in calories!  But I got creative and was able to put together a yummy and delicious combination of foods, low in carbs and calories.  I told the server I wanted:  one plain grilled chicken breast, a side order of broccoli, a caesar salad with no croutons (dressing on the side), and a little side of alfredo sauce (less than a 1/4 cup).  The chicken, broccoli, and alfredo together were awesome!  (This is the alfredo that they use on the Cajun Chicken Pasta, which is very yummy but definitely off-limits to me!)  I left with a full belly - and my wallet didn’t hurt.  The server charged me for a kid’s chicken dinner (with the broccoli as a side) and then a side caesar salad, so for my meal it came to like only about eight bucks altogether.  Woohooo!

Hey I was looking for a dieting cartoon and I came across this one. 
This is my washing machine!

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Hit counter web design gallery.

Starting weight (7/15/08):    279.8    (1/8/08):    285.2
Calories/Carbs Goals (limits):       1400  / 30.0
Yesterday’s calories & net carbs:  1211 / 17.5
Yesterday’s exercise:  injured - none
Weight Yesterday:  253.8    Today:  253.4
Change today:  -0.4 lbs.   Loss-so-far:  26.4 lbs.  /  31.8 lbs.

Tonight was the Homecoming Dance.  Both my daughter and son were going and so the day was kind of dedicated to getting them ready.  We took Kevin out shopping for clothes because he had absolutely nothing to wear - and he doesn’t exactly fit into his older brother’s size 38 pants anymore.  He was not wanting to wear a suit and tie but finally agreed that he’d look good all in black - black shirt, black pants, black shoes. 

Paige was going to wear a dress she had already, but I surprised her with a new one - a sexy-black-lace-over-beige thing that amazingly fit her like a glove.  She didn’t even complain that she wasn’t there to pick it out.  I french-braided the back of her hair and curled little tendrils around her face and she looked, as usual, stunning.  I don’t have pictures yet because Paige has the camera with her and she’s spending the night with a friend.

During the dance, Hubby and I went out to dinner and enjoyed a leisurely game of “10,000″ (a dice game) while we sipped coffee and ate our desserts (he had pumpkin pie, I had a small bowl of fresh strawberries).  The restaurant wasn’t very busy so the server didn’t seem to mind us hogging one of her tables.  We stayed there almost two hours!

With all the shopping and other running around today, I did a bunch of walking.  My knee was better, but kept doing its ouchie thing, oh about every 20 steps or so.  It’s annoying as hell.  I found that if I walked a certain way with my knee slightly bent, it didn’t happen as often, so I walked like Igor the whole time.  That was lovely.  All I needed was a hump on my back.

By the end of the day my knee was feeling pretty sore so right now I have one of those icy-hot patches on it.  Cold would probably be more beneficial but hot just feels really good.  *Sigh*  I’ll take an ice pack to bed with me.

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Starting weight (7/15/08):    279.8    (1/8/08):    285.2
Calories/Carbs Goals (limits):       1400  / 30.0
Yesterday’s calories & net carbs:  1241 / 20.8
Yesterday’s exercise:  injured - none
Weight Yesterday:  254.8    Today:  253.8
Change today:  -1.0 lbs.   Loss-so-far:  26.0 lbs.  /  31.4 lbs.

I went to work today but definitely took it easy.  I was supposed to go to the high school football game tonight (which I really enjoy, plus this was Homecoming) but I still really didn’t feel up to that much walking on my knee, so I stayed home. 

And I didn’t exercise, not even Total Gym stuff.  It’s driving me crazy.  I want to DDR!!!!

I think it’s prudent, however, to let my knee rest for another day.  It’s not gonna totally kill my diet to take a couple days off from exercising.  I mean, it’s good that I’ve become that driven and rigid about my daily need to exercise, but I think the reason I’m so edgy is because I’m worried that a couple days off will turn into longer… I have a history of slacking off after a short period of time, usually because I become bored with whatever.  That’s what happened with the Total Gym… as soon as Kevin (son) got bored with it, it wasn’t fun anymore, exercising by myself, so it didn’t take me long to slack off.  Now with the DDR, Kevin’s bored with it already but it didn’t matter, I continued on my own.  The DDR was challenging and fun.  I’m just hoping I heal quickly so I can get back to it quickly.

I made a decision a couple days ago which made Kevin very happy.  I told him that I’d decided to take Thanksgiving Day off.  Completely off.  I’m not gonna count calories, I’m not gonna count carbs.  I’m just gonna enjoy the day and then deal with the consequences afterward.  Kevin felt like this was my permission to him to do the same and was so relieved!  He had anticipated that this Thanksgiving was going to be the worst ever!  He shared with me that he’d imagined sitting next to one of his cousins… staring at their dinner roll… asking them… “How is it?  How does it taste?  Would you just describe it to me?  Please?”  LOL, he was cracking me up!

Well, I’m gonna go slap an icepack on my knee and watch a movie.  To you — yeah you!  The one reading this!  Hey, ya have a great weekend!

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Starting weight (7/15/08):    279.8    (1/8/08):    285.2
Calories/Carbs Goals (limits):       1400  / 30.0
Yesterday’s calories & net carbs:  1433 / 25.2
Yesterday’s exercise:  45 minutes DDR
Weight Yesterday:  254.8    Today:  254.8
Change today:  -0.0 lbs.   Loss-so-far:  25.0 lbs.  /  30.4 lbs.

I didn’t go to work today, which is way out of the ordinary.  I laid in bed and babied my knee and watched movies and snoozed.  And tonight my knee is still swollen and still hurts with that icepick pain about every ten steps or so.  Rutzafutzakutzarutz.  Grrrrrr.

I didn’t even get up to get myself something to eat, so I had weird food today.  I snacked on nuts (baaaaad Eileen baaaaad) and then finally ordered food from the pizza place down the street.  I ordered myself a sub which had ham and cheese and pepperoni plus lettuce and banana peppers (mmmm love those) and of course I ate all the insides and discarded the outer bread part (their subs are like calzones).  Yummy but ultimately unsatisfying.  Two slices of low-carb bread and some peanut butter helped.

What sucks though is not being able to work off the fuel.  I know my body is doing important work all by itself and I would just interrupt that process if I was stupid enough to jump around on that knee, but… *sigh!*  If my knee isn’t significantly better by tomorrow then I’ll pull out the Total Gym.  I can just work out my upper half, like getupnow suggested.  I suppose I could have done that earlier today, but I didn’t even want to be up and around that much.

I talked to a friend on the phone today and she got all frustrated with me because I wouldn’t go to the emergency room or to my doctor.  Finally I started to cry and so then she was like OMG Eileen what’s going on?!?  So I explained to her that it’s a total waste of my time to go seek medical advice over this injury - and I know this because it’s not exactly the first time I’ve been here.  “Remember about eight years ago when I limped for almost a year?”  Yeah, she remembered that.  Well, I tore my miniscus in my left knee back then and went through all the emergency room visits and the doctor visits and the specialist visits and the xrays and the MRIs and was told that I had two choices:  1) surgery which would have about a 50-50 chance of helping or 2) letting it heal on its own which would have about a 50-50 chance of helping.  I opted for #2.  And after about nine months of limping around, my knee healed on its own.  Then last December I had a car accident and injured the same knee again.  It healed faster this time.  I knew what to do.  Just like I know what to do now. 

I felt like a big baby for crying but it’s just frustrating.  She thought I was just being stubborn and uncooperative and here she was just trying to help by badgering me into going to get medical attention and I just already know that it’s useless.  I wish someone could help me but they can’t.  And that’s what made me cry. 

I’ve had plenty of time to think today and I started thinking that maybe the DDR is too risky with this knee injury because there’s so much jumping which is so high-impact.  But then — I thought — bullshit!  I have felt stronger in my legs AND in my knees, stronger than I have in years, since starting the DDR/exercise.  Just a couple months ago I tried jumping rope and couldn’t do it at all.  Couldn’t jump.  Just a couple months ago, I couldn’t sit cross-legged.  My left knee wouldn’t bend that way.  And since starting DDR I’ve become much more limber and flexible - in that leg.  Yeah I should probably be a little more careful, but no, I don’t think I need to give up a source of exercise that I find fun and fulfilling. 

I believe that exercise will help me to build up muscle in my legs - and around my knees - muscle that will help me to prevent an injury in the future, not cause one.  

So that’s what I thought.

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Starting weight (7/15/08):    279.8    (1/8/08):    285.2
Calories/Carbs Goals (limits):       1400  / 30.0
Yesterday’s calories & net carbs:  1216 / 27.2
Yesterday’s exercise:  1 hour DDR
Weight Yesterday:  255.4    Today:  254.8
Change today:  -0.6 lbs.   Loss-so-far:  25.0 lbs.  /  30.4 lbs.

I had another one of those can’t-believe-it moments this morning with the scale… another half a pound!  This is so exciting for me that I’m starting to really get nervous… when is the other shoe gonna drop?  Like I’m afraid tomorrow morning I’m gonna wake up to like a ten-pound gain. 

I was feeling really good this morning, first the weigh-in and then the jeans!  I put on a pair of jeans today that I haven’t worn in more than a year!  I tried them on just a few weeks ago and they were still too small for me to even get up over my hips.  This morning they just slid right on — even the zipper and button!  I did a little jig in the middle of my bedroom floor.

After lunch I was feeling strong and energetic so I plugged in the Xbox and did the DDR thing for about a half-hour.  Then this evening I went back to it, intending to put in another full hour — and I twisted something in my left knee.  It hurt a little but I kept going, thinking it would work itself out but then I got a *big* ouch so I walked away.  I thought maybe I could walk it out, but every few steps I got this stabbing pain in my knee — so I shut the game off.

I sat for a while tonight with an ice-pack on my knee and it helped a little but now I have this horrible crunch/pop thing happening whenever I bend my knee.  And every third or fourth step I get the ice-pick-pain.

Not good.

I had the car accident last winter that hurt my knee and it took me months to recover.  This is that same knee and so I’m so upset!  I need my knee to be okay so I can exercise!!!!!

=(

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Starting weight (7/15/08):    279.8    (1/8/08):    285.2
Calories/Carbs Goals (limits):       1400  / 30.0
Yesterday’s calories & net carbs:  1399 / 20.8
Yesterday’s exercise:  1 hour DDR
Weight Yesterday:  256.6    Today:  255.4
Change today:  -1.2 lbs.   Loss-so-far:  24.4 lbs.  /  29.8 lbs.

I have no idea why I’m suddenly dropping weight but I’m lovin’ it!!!  I stepped on the scale this morning and I was like, NO WAY THAT CAN’T BE RIGHT.  I stepped off, back on again… off again, on again.  Still it stayed there, a number which meant I’d dropped another full pound overnight!! 

Just eleven days ago on September 19th, I complained, right here in this blog, about the fact that it had taken me FIFTY-EIGHT days to get through the 260’s.  The last line I wrote in that blog entry was this: 

I am gonna work even harder so the next ten pounds WON’T take 
fifty-freakin’-eight days to lose!!!!

Here it is, eleven days later and I’m almost half-way through that next ten pounds!!! Wooohooooo!!!!!  (Knock on wood or whatever substance is knockable, I don’t wanna jinx the other half!)  I mean, I don’t expect to lose another five pounds in just eleven more days, but I think it’s likely that I’ll get through the 250’s in less than 58 days altogether.  Anything less than that will make me VERY happy!!!

**Happy Dance**

Yesterday and today were busy days so I didn’t get to have my DDR workout until late at night - yesterday from 11pm-midnight and tonight it was from 10:30pm-11:30pm.  Yikes!  Of course, besides my “busy days” excuse reason, Dancing with the Stars was also a factor in why it was so late.  Can you believe Cloris is still in the game?  Poor Kim, the girl just could not shake it.

Tonight I ate out at TGI Friday’s.  I’m gettin’ good at this eat-low-carb-off-the-menu thing, ha!  I had chicken and broccoli and a little bit of broccoli cheese soup (gave my daughter the other 2/3 of the serving so I wouldn’t be tempted).  Oh, and I ordered those fried green beans - only I stripped my beans naked!  (Took the deep-fried breading off!)  I only ate maybe ten of ‘em, but DD ate all the “outsides” for me (as well as most of the rest of the appetizer).  LOL, she thought that was a great arrangement since the breading is her favorite part!

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