Una ragazza magra

Today went well:

Breakfast:  MRC cheesecake, HNS

Lunch:  Broccoli bowl with taco meat and cheese, natural sugar free applesauce, HNS

Dinner:  1/2 pita with 2 oz. deli roast beef and .8 oz. pepperjack.  I missed my veggie at this meal because I am just too lazy to fix it, and I don’t want to eat it, so how’s that for an attitude?  I usually let myself skip the veggie on Thursday nights because my class doesn’t end until 9:00, and I’m usually wiped out from the week, and tonight is no exception.  At least I have the prospect of a long weekend.

water: 64 oz– still drinking 4 glasses all at once to get it in, and it’s working so far

]Just back from WI……… down three pounds since Monday the 6th!  They also took my measurements and a body fat analysis (that happens once a month), and here are the stats:

MRC scale weight:  199.5  (yea!! Finally below 200)

Total inches lost since beginning of program:  53

Body Fat:  40% (47% at start date)

Muscle/organ/water weight:  117 lbs.

I’m pretty happy with the results.  To reach my goal of 145 by the expiration date of my program, I need to lose 3 lbs. every week.  So far I’m averaging 3.5 lbs. every week, and I’m hoping I can start adding some exercise to boost it up a bit.  I’m very happy about my pace, but I know that I might hit a plateau here or there, and Thanksgiving and Christmas are also in the middle, so I want to make sure I allow a little leeway for that.  I’m planning to just eat off plan on Thanksgiving and Christmas, but ONLY on those days (i.e. no binging for a week on holiday food).  Also, I will eat what I want, but I’ll try to limit the amount, and I’m not having any pumpking pie– not my favorite, but for some reason I always feel like i should eat it since it’s kind of a tradtion thing– well, not this year.

Anyway, since those holidays are a ways off, I’ve made a new goal:  Lose 10 lbs. by Halloween.  I think it’s a bit ambitious, but if I stay OP and really watch it, I should be able to make it.  That should probably put me in a size 12 by the end of the month…here’s hoping.

On a brighter note, my jeans fit very well today.  I think it was just the initial shock of trying them on yesterday and them feeling different than my baggier pair.  I actually think they look really good.  I’m going home to visit my parents this weekend, and I can’t wait to show my mom.  She’s doing this same diet in another city, and we haven’t seen each other since we’ve started.  I’ve lost 27.5 lbs. and she’s lost almost 40 (she’s a lot heavier).  We’re both looking forward to seeing a difference in each other.

Today went fairly well again.  The only issue I had was that I couldn’t eat lunch until two hours after I was due for it, and I’m supposed to eat every 5 hours to keep my metabolism up.  Not a huge deal, though, I suppose.  So here’s the menu:

Breakfast:  MRC cheesecake, HNS

Lunch:  Broccoli Taco Bowl (4 oz. broccoli, 2 oz. turkey taco meat, 1 oz cheese), 1 all natural sugar free applesauce

Dinner:  Taco in 1/2 pita (from Walmart, only 60 calories per pita), 4 oz. broccoli, HNS

water: 64 oz.

The broccoli bowl was actually quite good, and i might start doing this more often.  It does help the vegetables go down when it’s mixed in with the good stuff. 

Tomorrow I am going to be brave and wear a “new” pair of jeans.  They are my second smallest size 14s (the smallest is actually a Junior size 15).  I got highlighter on my ones that fit really well, so i can’t really wear those again without washing, so that means I have to fall down to the next pair.  I really think they look fine, but I don’t want to deceive myself into looking like a stuffed sausage.  They feel tighter (of course), but I think that’s just because I’ve been used to looser jeans lately.  I wish I could ask my roommate if they looked okay, but at a size two (yes, very depressing), she thinks they’re too tight unless you have a baggy butt with room to fit a nerf football in there, too, so she’s not much help.

WI is tomorrow, and I can’t wait because they’re due to take my measurements and do a body fat analysis, so I’ll have details to post tomorrow.

weight on scale at home, in the morning:  194.5  (that’s down a full pound from yesterday– looks promising!)

About two years ago– I know exactly when because I bought them for a special occasion– I got a pair of black dress pants from TJ Maxx in a size 16.  I was desperate for black pants, and they were the best I could find on short notice  (and without venturing into the plus size section, which I stubbornly refused to do).  Even when I bought them, I could not “technically” fasten them and instead used a safety pin to hold them together and wore a long shirt to cover up the quick fix.

Fast forward to two weeks ago.  I found them in my “too small” boxes, tried them on, and while I could just fasten them, they were not comfortable, and showed some crazy panty lines.  I still put them in my closet for a later date, though.  Tonight I tried them on for work, and they’re perfect.  I’m just shocked that in only two weeks there’s such a size difference.  It’s really incredible.  I thought my jeans were getting a little looser, but I thought it was just my imagination or that they were stretching out the more I wore them– guess not!  Talk about a NSV!  If there’s this much progress in just two weeks, I can’t wait till next week!

Breakfast:  MRC cheesecake, HNS

Lunch:  meal replacement bar, HNS

Dinner:  1/2 pita (30 cal), 2 oz. roast beef, 1 oz pepperjack cheese, 4 oz. cooked broccoli, HNS

water: 64 oz.

Today went very well–I think I’ve mastered the art of getting in 64 oz. of water.  The key is to drink 4 glasses at once and make sure you have plenty of time to pee afterward!  Seriously, this is what works for me, so I guess I’ll just do that from now on.  I can never remember to drink during the day if i try to do it slowly, and I am on the move from classroom to classroom and back home and then back to campus all day, so it’s a pain to carry around a water bottle all the time.  I’m also very proud of myself for packing broccoli for dinner tonight.  It was tempting to just take the sandwich (I teach a 4 hour class at night on Tuesdays), but I took the extra time to weigh it and take it, and I put pepper on it because the shaker was right in front of me, and it really added a nice kick!  I think I’ll eat it with pepper from now on.  It really wasn’t that bad. 

In fact, more and more food is just becoming food for me, which is definitely a novel thought.  It’s always been a major source of pleasure for me, and I think breaking that association would cure a lot of my problems, especially my tendency to overeat.  Not that I’ll never enjoy food again, lol, but I think it would be good to realize that most of the time, food will just be food.

weight at home: 195.5– I think I’ve lost my water weight; that’s 1/2 lb. lower than on Sunday.  Yea!

I’m doing the Metabolic Research Center diet www.emetabolic.com

Basically, it’s a high protein diet, but it does not completely eliminate carbs– it *only* severely limits them.  I also drink 2-3 HNS (High Nutrient Supplement) drinks every day.  They’re basically protein drinks, but it’s like drinking crystal light– I rather look forward to them, especially the hot cocoa.  I also eat about three meal replacement bars per week (by choice– I like not having to pack a lunch sometimes).

So far, things have been working out for me.  My start date was about August 1, 2008, and I began at 227 lbs., putting me in the “obese” category for BMI.  My goal is 145-150, which puts me in a healthy weight range.  I haven’t been at that weight since I was in the second grade, so we’ll see how it goes!

My meal plan:

Breakfast: protein (4 oz.) and a starch (no more than 40 cals.), HNS

Lunch: protein (4 oz.) and vegetable (4 oz. cooked or 8 oz. raw), and fruit, HNS

Dinner:  protein (4 oz.), vegetable, and starch (less than 30 cals.), HNS

I don’t get any snacks, but that doesn’t bother me because I’m not a grazer anyhow.

Breakfast:  1/4 MRC “cheesecake” (mainly cottage cheese and the pudding supplement– surpisingly good), HNS

Lunch:  Meal replacement bar and HNS

Dinner:  2 oz. gr. turkey taco meat, 1 oz. cheddar, 1/2 pita (30 cals.), 4 oz. steamed broccoli with spray butter, HNS

water:  2L as of 8:00 pm

Surprisingly, broccoli isn’t really all that bad.  I’m definitely not a vegetable person (surpise, surprise– I’m more of a pizza person, which is what got me here in the first place), so eating all the veggies I’m supposed to has been one of the biggest challenges on this diet.  However, in light of the 1/2 lb. gain today, I am going to be super diligent, and hopefully I can hit 200 on the MRC scale on Friday.  I have also been getting a little loose on my cheese measurements lately– I eat my allowed cheese plus a little extra on my taco, and then I add some parmesan to the salad, too…not happening anymore.  I don’t have that much leeway anyhow because now instead of 3 oz. of cheese, I only get 2 oz.  Maybe if I’m a bit more exact when weighing foods/making meals, it will pay off in the end.  I’ve been at this for two months now, so there are some areas in which I’m getting a bit lazy.  I also should start back up with exercise again.  That was going well on a treadmill at home, but then the TV in front of it broke, and I’ve simply lost my motivation without my Friends episode on DVD.  So, this week I’m making it a goal to get the TV switched out with another one so I can start walking again.  Even if it’s just fairly light exercise, every little bit helps.  I’m taking the stairs to get to my office, and I can already tell it’s much easier than before.

Sheesh….so I’m back from WI– and I’m up 1/2 lb.  Yesterday we went to my favorite Mexican restaurant, and I got three soft tacos (tore off the tortilla tops– why did I ever eat those?  They aren’t even holding anything!) and *some* chips and salsa.  I’m a little foggy on the exact ammount of chips and salsa… I don’t think it was terrible, but more than I should have eaten for sure.  One problem was that i was super hungry when we got there.  I did at least take the carb/fat blockers (little magic pills that supposedly block 30 grams of carbs and 30 grams fo fat). 

In last ditch attempt to beat the WI scale, I guzzled water last night and this morning to try to flush out any held water, but alas, it didn’t work, and now instead of having a net loss of 25 lbs., we’re back to the bitter wasteland of 24.5.  However, never fear– I’m back OP, and I should be able to stay that way for the rest of the week, so hopefully by Friday I’ll have a nice big loss (including some water) to report.

Still, they did change my menu to the one for people under 200 lbs– yea me.  All that means is that I get 4 oz. of protein instead of 6 oz.  I’m not so unhappy about that since I generally eat less anyway, but they cut my cheese from 3 oz. to 2 oz.  Now that hurts!

weight (naked, in the morning, after using the bathroom, of course): 197.5

weight at my center:  202.5 (net loss of 24.5 lbs., loss of .5 lb. since last Monday)

BMI according to Wii fit:  30.47  —On a more positive note, I only have to lose 3.2 lbs. before I am no longer “obese” but “overweight”…ah, I can’t WAIT until I’m overweight! :)  Obese is such a dirty word.

Breakfast:  1 hard boiled egg, 1 oz. cheddar cheese, 4 melba toast rounds, HNS

Lunch:  1 meal replacement bar, HNS

Dinner:  1/2 pita (30 cal.), 2.25 oz. roast chicken, 1 oz. pepperjack, 4 oz. cooked asparagus

Today went well again, and I can tell my jeans are slightly looser than when I squeezed into them earlier this week!  I really hate eating vegetables, but I’ve found that it’s easier to eat them now than when I first started a couple months ago.  Perhaps this will get better as it becomes more of a habit.  One thing I’m very happy about is that although it’s been two months, I’m still super-motivated to continue and stay on plan, and it hasn’t been extremely difficult, and I haven’t had to battle the cravings like I do when I’m only counting calories.  This diet forces me to make better (i.e. healthier and more filling) choices than I would if I were only restricted by the calorie count.