Okay, SilverBirch - I'm envious of your Dutch airer (thank you for the names of them!) and your view of the sea. I lived close to the sea in Italy and in Spain, and again close but not AS close when in Florida. Now I'm so landlocked here that I miss it terribly. Few things relax me as much as my four favorite S's - sun, sand, surf and seagulls.

I am reminded again of the peace that seems to come with being on track. It's a feeling that has not settled on me much here lately. I am journaling to try to get to the root of why, when I had to lose weight before, I committed to it and did it ... then kept my weight in a five-pound range, when I got near the top of that, I took immediate steps to get closer to the bottom of that range. It seemed so blasted logical and I followed through. Now I'm working this into something bigger/harder than it needs to be.

98 days until New Year's Eve. Where do you want to be when you're thinking of the new year ahead of us?

Bill - Ladies in Lavender was enjoyable ... a cozy movie. And a few cups of tea were in order, of course. Adding one more thing, albeit a pleasant one, to your ever-growing to do list. Good luck with solving the case of the leaking freezer.

ForMyGirls - Credits for checking in when you're snowed under. Good luck working things out.

JoyBeNimble - I like that image - avoiding temptation, sneaking around snacking...

Lexxiss - TOO cool on the moose! I would have loved that - what a gift. I still love to see the deer around us - and the coyote - I love it all :)

Hi all,

I've not been posting and not been planning and didn't even pre pack my lunch every day--those two seem to go together. We went out to dinner tonight because I didn't feel like cooking--even though I did have something planned. I was mostly on plan the last few days--and the scale showed an even 180.0 -- 50 lbs down -- for the first time.

I'm off to bed now--but will be back on track food and planning wise in the morning.

Hello coaches,

Managed to get a bit more back in balance today. Committing to walking last night really helped. And came up with a viable theory on why I was out of whack - I haven't been setting and alarm to get up so have been losing time in the morning that allowed me to do everything I need to do and still have enough hours left in the day to parent and do my job. So - the alarm is set for tomorrow and I will be putting my lights out on time tonight. Credit for all that good thinking and credit for a 100% OP day with food and exercise/ Wellbeing.

Beth - it sounds like you and I have been hanging out in the same place. Hope your recommit brings you the joy and peace it has brought me.

National Parker - glad to hear that the serenity of "on track" has found you. Your tenacity and determination are inspiring.

Gardener joy - what great news that you are back in maintenance. How brave you were to turn things around so quickly. Loved the image of being nimble in response to changes to your routine.

Silver birch - I am likewise jealous of your Dutch airer - what a great contraption!

BBE - LOL on Sisyphus :-)

Lexxis - yay for your moose - made me think of Northern Exposure (which begs the question - is life in Alaska really like that?)

Maryann - pleased to hear the drop 7 foods is making being on plan easier / achievable for you. Not tasting brioche is seriously impressive. Best wishes for relief from back pain soon.

Good Morning, Coaches.

Up early this morning for work (5:30) but I did want to check in. OP again at work. I can't believe I haven't been chocolate foraging there. Finally found the drop 7 book because I need the recipes for the next cycle when I start adding things back. Lunch is packed, weight is under ticker, food in MFP.


Have a great day.

Wednesday
 

Diet Coaches/Buddies – Did gym, CREDIT moi, including the exercise class. We had a substitute leader who worked muscles that even she admitted would never have been worked before - the ones we'll have to work if we injure our shoulders. OK for me. I hope they appreciate their new movement.

Food was only OK. We had our first spaghetti squash for the season - a real treat. I love that stuff. Hard to believe it's good for me.


Joy (gardenerjoy) – "Nimble" rules.

silverbirch – Royally jealous of your view of the sea. Eating sitting down can be a challenge for someone always on the go.

nationalparker – Can't lose with, "so blasted logical and I followed through."

Beth (bethFromDayton) – Hearty Congrats on 50 pounds gone forever.

ForMyGirls - Happy Day of the Walk. Keep the faith working out what the issues are. Good luck with your plan to take back the morning.

Readers -

My plan didn't match up with my day, as I suspected might happen. I took my original planned lunch and turned it into a quick supper and ordered my normal choice at the lunch restaurant, so I still consider the day mostly on plan.

Today, I don't have a plan or enough veggies in the house. A busy morning will make it hard to remedy the situation until lunch time. Not the best situation, but I'll figure something out.

WI: +0.4kg, Exercise: +30 1085/1400 minutes for September, Food: 90% op, Read my Advantages and Responses: yes

bethfromDayton: congrats on seeing that 50 pounds down number -- that's a terrific achievement!

Hello! Trying to get back to checking in early in the day, but on the other hand, I liked being accountable during the day and posting at night :)

Baked two batches of double peanut butter cookies (they have a layer of peanut butter and conf. sugar in there) and one is packaged for DH to take to his work tonight, and I brought the other in here. I allotted myself one cookie last night and enjoyed it. I didn't eat it sitting down and wish I had in retrospect. I allowed myself one today in my plan, but am hoping they're gone before I think about it. Credits for taking the ONE and enjoying it last night. I was tempted to take another but recounted up my calories and was where I needed to be, so that created the "no" ...

I'm wondering if counting down to 0 calories left in the day would be better - I used to do that and it seemed to make it easier to wrap it up. Like ForMyGirls, counting down with the portions of dairy, fruit, etc. And by the way, you're doing so well! You are SO CLOSE to mini-goal #3! Kudos for realizing what had you off-kilter lately with lost time.

Beth - CONGRATS on 50 down. What an achievement!

Bill - Continued credits for the regularity with the gym! I'm looking forward to some planned longer walks/hikes with DH this weekend - that's the goal. (Of course, that, yardwork, landscaping project that has become the albatross in my life, some home repairs which includes trips to Lowes and Home Depot, and I'm not willing to allow our hikes to take last priority.)

Maryann - Good luck as you begin to add things back in. And many credits continue for the chocolate dismissal. I want that. :)

Today I have lunch plans with a friend, and dinner is planned to be light to balance. Boston lettuce with apple, pear, cranberries and a light dressing as the main course of dinner. Autumn salad!

Worker in a restaurant: We cooked up extra fries by accident - can I bring you some of those hot fries?
Me: Oh, wow - thank you but no.
Friend: Oh, wow - that'd be great. I'll take some.
And she is super, super slender and can't figure out how come she's dropping weight without trying.

And ... I was okay with my decision and didn't drool over hers. Left my whole bun from my sandwich, as well. Staved off my own peanut butter cookies which went quickly at work, and skipped all the donuts that were also brought in.

Had to report some credits since i always seem to forget them! And that resistance muscle work will help me tonight. Thanks for putting up with a few posts in a row.

Hi everyone,

Breakfast and lunch were as I planned (this morning). Dinner was not--DH suggested we go out and I went along with it (didn't even suggest otherwise). However, I made a reasonable choice, and cut my meal in half right away and boxed it up for Friday evening, so the quantity was under control.

As I wrote yesterday, when I don't plan as well the night before, I don't do as well. (Who'd have thought it?) So, I've got all of tomorrow entered into MFP--and that makes me more likely to mindlessly follow my plan than just having it in my head would--writing it down really does make a difference.

I didn't even pretend I'd want to wash and cut up strawberries in the morning--I did it tonight. (And loaded the dishwasher, which I hate doing) I have all the breakfast stuff out and my lunch and snack for tomorrow is in the lunch box in the fridge. It's a frozen meal day (and I forgot that one day last week and just brought the bag) so I left the top all the way open to remind me to grab the frozen meal from the freezer. (Sort of like tying a string around my finger)

Two days at 180.0 and I updated my ticker and SIG--I'm really pumped about the 50 lb point. It was my "have to lose at least this much" number--and I'm really feeling the benefits of having lost that much! Think what 20 more will do for me... (That's what I say to myself when I read each of my advantages each morning..This has come true already, and think how much more true it will be. For some reason, that's really encouraging to me.)

I've been thinking about my party binges and wondering if I'm over-depriving and then once I open the floodgate, just going overboard. I'm considering adding in a few treats to rotate with my ice cream treats. The thing is, if I don't start, I don't crave cookies or any of the other things that I overeat at parties. Something to think about.

nationalparker: Turning down free fries--that's awesome and definitely credit worthy. It sounds as if your resistance muscle got quite a workout today! (And holding to one cookie last night is credit worthy, too!)

gardenerjoy: Sometimes swapping lunch and dinner keeps me within parameters. I think letting myself enjoy a lunch is enough to keep me motivated to have that light dinner. Is that how it worked for you?

BillBE: Credit on the gym--and I hope your shoulders aren't complaining today! It threw me for a loop when I checked the forum before work and you hadn't posted it yet.

maryann: What a great summary-food planned, weight under ticker...hope today was another great day!

ForMyGirls: As nice as it is to sleep in sometimes, I know that I always feel I wasted a chunk of the day. That doesn't stop me from doing it--just makes me feel annoyed with myself. I hope getting up earlier works out well for you.

Have a good day, all!

Hi coaches! :)
I haven't been here for a little while and there's a reason for that. I went on a trip to the other side of the state I live in ans stayed in a hotel because of my husband's work (he got to take me along). During that time I put on 3kg :( but luckily I've already lost a kilo of that.
I've decided I really need to get into meal planning and planning for trips like that so my weight doesn't fluctuate so much. I also need to plan a variety of meals so I keep satisfied with what I'm eating. So I've been working on that for a day or so.
I'm finding weightloss is a lot slower than it used to be. I remember a couple of years ago when I lost 14kg I would lost at least 1kg a week, which is 2.2lbs. These days it often is a loss of quarter of a kilo to half a kilo (half a pound to 1lb) weightloss per week. I think it may be due to a medication increase that I've had since but I'm not sure. I'm on two medications for mental illness and both of them can cause weight gain.
Soon I'll start working again. I'm hoping that I'll be able to stick to my diet while working. Hopefully the added physical activity from working will make it easier for me to lose weight. I haven't been working for the past 2 years due to recovering from mental illness.
So far I've been on this diet for a month and it means I reached a mini goal of mine. During that time I've only had one binge session, which is good because I was binging every 3 days before.:)

Thursday - Johnny Appleseed Day
 

Diet Coaches/Buddies – Walking, CREDIT moi, as usual on an overbooked day. There's a construction project nearby in need of my supervision. They've dug a trench, filled it in, dug it again, filled it in again, and seem to have started a third cycle. I've thought of offering the suggestion that they do everything at once to save time but held my tongue, LOL.

Food was OK at the first evening event - the pot luck that goes with my book club - CREDIT moi. Unfortunately I had another event afterward that held some tension producing expectations while I sat in front of dark chocolate and tree nuts in bowls. Ouch. I can take credit only for failing to eat ALL of the dark chocolate.


Joy (gardenerjoy) – When I run the world there'll be a veggie stand on every street corner and you'll have to drive to buy cigarettes and lottery tickets.

nationalparker – Your "Autumn salad" sound yummy - I do love both Boston Lettuce and cranberries. Kudos for each donut skipped.

VioletDolphin83 – Yay for the chance to travel with your DH. I hope he gets enough time off so that you can go do stuff together. Some medications do add a challenge to weight loss - requiring even more diligence in the planning part, I think. The rate of loss isn't that important for the body; the mind, however, does like its instant rewards so it needs to be reminded that slow but steady is just fine.

Beth (bethFromDayton) – Congrats, again, on those 50 pounds gone. It's OK to celebrate that one more than once. Interesting thoughts about not craving stuff until overeating.

Readers -

First up Beth - I don't know how I managed to read your post before last and not notice the 50 pound weightloss achievement - but somehow I didn't take it in - but now that I have - like wow! That is incredible!

Today was pretty good. My weekly weigh in this morning was no change - which I am actually pleased about. After a fortnight of being off plan quite a bit I actually needed the reinforcement that that isn't good enough and that sustained loss requires much closer to 100% OP. So today was OP except for stretching. Credit to me for finding a way to get my walk in eye spite time constraints. Credit to me for getting up with my alarm so I felt like my day was on track from the start. Credit to me for finding my way through some stressful stuff today without using food as comfort. Noticed myself mindlessly snacking on left overt cashews tonight. Credit for stopping. Nice to notice how shocked I was by my behaviour!

Maryann - good luck with next phase of drop 7

BBE - you have sent me off googling about spaghetti squash. What does it taste like?

Gardenerjoy - I hope you found some veggies OK

National Parker - well done for pausing to count your calories before embarking on the second cookie. And thanks for your encouragement :-) good luck with making the hikes the first priority on the weekend. And yay for the great workout you gave your resistance muscle today

VioletDolphin - hooray to you for reaching your first goal. That is a fantastic achievement. Looking forward to celebrating Goal 2 with you next :-)

I never made a plan yesterday. Credit for exercising my resistance muscle a lot to keep myself from eating things I would never have put on a plan. I did fine, but it was a good reminder how much better life is when I have a plan. Many fewer decisions!

Tonight's challenge is the potluck for my book club (BillBlueEyes, this seems to be going around) during our annual book selection meeting. I'm bringing my "famous" tabbouli using tomatoes, parsley, and mint from my garden. I'll use my normal potluck plan: focus on the veggies, tiny portions of everything else, three bites is plenty for a taste.

WI: +0.1kg, Exercise: +55 1140/1400 minutes for September, Food: NA op, Read my Advantages and Responses: yes

Challenging myself to work that resistance muscle today - frustrations at work this morning have me wanting to indulge in something. No choice. I've planned a lighter lunch and a heavier dinner today as DH is back home for dinners now. Even when I plan a more substantial lunch and a light dinner, I find myself eating more than I need to and then that's the double-whammy.

Personals later hopefully but Bill, that's hysterical on the construction project needing supervision. :) Years ago my dad was ALL up in arms when people came and painted the fireplug that was near their home. Green. Not red. He ended up taking a walk to see how many they painted the "WRONG" color. :) He took his supervision duties seriously - to the point that he wanted to call someone about it! ha

Hi Coaches!

The project is moving along well. I don't have houseguests..our guy came solo and is staying w/his DD in Denver at night. I'm still successfully negotiating my mom and DH's schedules and am being mindful with food. credit. I've managed my at home exercise both yesterday and today, too. Tomorrow I have to paint (at the project) then head back to work Saturday morning so I'm taking advantage of some couch/personal time.

BBE, whew...those double food events are sometimes just too much...especially when you toss in some tension. Kudos for not taking the last of the chocolate.

Beth(fromDayton), congrats on 50# down! You are a new person in many ways….I love that feeling! Great persisting with those strawberries knowing you wouldn't do it in the AM.

ForMyGirls, lots of great credits, especially finding your way through some stressful stuff without using food for comfort!

VioletDolphin, great that your hubby got to take you along on a trip! What a great idea to start planning ahead for trips like that! Kudos for reaching a mini goal of 1 month, too.

nationalparker, I echo the others Yay! for saying no to unplanned FF's! (reminds me of work)

gardenerjoy, I stopped for a few minutes and really thought through your comment about how you had to exercise your resistance much more because you didn't have that plan. How true. I like your potluck plan...simple and realistic!

maryann, lol at finding the drop 7 book. Credit for food in MFP and for resisting chocolate foraging.

:wave: silverbirch keep working on eating while sitting..thanks for checking in with us!

We had an unplanned lunch out w/DD today so I'm going to go light tonight AND this afternoon's "snack" will be a Ginger/Apple/Fresh Mint smoothie. Yum! I'm grateful when I can use my Beck skills to get right back on track after an off plan meal. Credit moi.