[Nature Girl]

So the whirlwind with my daughters was fabulous, fun, filled with laughter, and completely out of control eating wise. DD#2 only lives 110 miles away, but rarely gets home due to her intense school and work schedule. So when she gets here, we try to do all her favorite things and it’s just a crazy intense time full of fun and her favorite meals, etc. I let go and didn’t try to monitor or stick to my plan . Don’t think the damage was too bad, but I’m not going to beat myself up over it, I’m going to move forward with 4 days of healthy eating limited by the foods in our camp trailer, and unlimited opportunity for walking and hiking in Mt Rainier National Park. I will be ready to report on my success on Wednesday, when we return.
NationalParker: You sound ready to do this, and your preparation is going to start you off well. I’m excited for you!
Maryann: Your report on the first days of school has me all excited…I’m suddenly looking forward to those important first days instead of seeing them as the end of my wonderful summer.

[karenrn]

Good afternoon coaches,

I'm in need of Monday. I'm allowing a little too much food and a too little exercise. Today is a little better though.

This morning dh left for the golf course and I got all the ironing caught up so any clothing we might want to pack for CT is ready to go. Dh is so excited to get to golf twice while we are gone, so I'm hoping he has a really good game today. Golf is as much his passion as hiking is mine.

Nature Girl I hope you're having a great time at Mt. Rainier. I think the weather is really nice up there right now. Last year I backpacked the Wonderland Trail around Mt. Rainier. That was plenty of work and was great for weight loss.

Nationalparker Sounds like you are getting well organized for FMD. I'm going to try to be very careful until we leave and even while we're gone and then hit it hard for the 12 days I'm home before the next trip. Famous last words!

Onebyone I hope you're having a productive decluttering day. I think it's always easier to stay on program when things are in order around the house.

Maryann It was such a joy to read your note about the start of school. Your students are so fortunate to have you. I'm so glad it got off to a good start and was like riding a bike. I hope you're enjoying yourself at Tahoe.

Bill Where are you? Did I miss something? Hopefully you're just fine and enjoying yourself doing something.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend everybody!

[BillBlueEyes]

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Alas, we took an overnight trip for a friend's birthday party and my morning routine at the hotel managed to fail to include 3FC.

At the party, we each ordered from the restaurant's full menu. It's specialty was LARGE steaks. I watched the young men order them big and bigger and finally chose halibut over ratatouille - a terrific choice. I also didn't order an appetizer or a dessert. However, a 'group' appetizer of a two layer platters of iced oysters, clams, lobsters, and crab meat was placed directly in front of me and I seemed to the primary consumer. I enjoyed the raw oysters while others had fried. I actually walked out having consumed a reasonable sized meal, including one bite of a young lad's ten-layer chocolate cake. Apparently, his eyes are regularly too big for his stomach. About ten adults and kids all had a bite of his monster.


onebyone – Ouch for the loss of a selling day at the farmers' market. Good luck with your decluttering goals.

maryann - Thanks for a lesson about modern high schoolers. Kudos for being centered on the kids more than the grammar.

nationalparker – Neat to see that Victoria's Secret gift card as a motivator. My take is that a four week plan is just a 28 day plan to be executed one day at a time.

Karen (karenrn) - Ouch for a water leak that takes time to diagnose. I HATE water's ability to find any weak spot in a place.

Readers -

Chapter 6 Family Traps

#5: The Unreasonably Strict Eating Plan Trap

A plan that is too difficult to follow can give rise to sabotaging thoughts: "It's too hard. I'll just eat whatever I want and get back on track once I get home." But if you develop a new plan that includes extra food, you may not gain any weight at all (if you're exercising more). Or you may gain a little weight but far less than you would with an overly restrictive plan that you eventually throw out the window entirely.

Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., Deborah Beck Busis, The Diet Trap Solution, Train Your Brain to Lose Weight and Keep It Off for Good (Blue book), pg. 145

[nationalparker]

Good to hear, Bill - I was worried that you took sick today. I sure hope the Beck quote isn't for me with this plan. We'll see.

I'm all set with all the dang prep and food. It is definitely not something I'd do if I had a bunch of people here and couldn't use the fridge for just two people. Typically we eat pretty clean - fresh veggies and fruit but not all this meat. DH is thrilled with that. No oils until phase three, which is Fri-Sat-Sun, so we can make it to there. We should be able to make it to there haha.

Karen - I'll swap you my Monday for another Sunday over here! I keep wanting a three-day weekend. Our temps are finally cooling off but humidity is at 95% on our thermometer. Raining now, or we were going to hit the trail for a relaxing walk. DH must be glad - he's heavy into a book on his kindle to the point of reading it on his phone while I was driving on errands. I should have asked for something expensive while he was giving the routine, um hmmms.

NatureGirl - How wonderful your time with your daughters sounds. Are her fave dinners ones you especially enjoy as well? Have a fantastic time in MRNP! I LOVED it years ago when I went. I was alone and stayed in a room in a lodge (not an $ one) with a rustic bed that I absolutely loved. Thankful that I enjoyed traveling alone as I got to see a lot of the country that way for years.

I confess I've not been on a super light plan today... We've drank up the diet pop (a splurge is the diet IBC root beer), and ate the rest of the cheddar cheese - luckily it wasn't a lot - as well as the black bean burgers and OreIda fries that were in the freezer for the nights I couldn't spend the hour to soak real potatoes to make my own. We threw out the leftovers and will start fresh.

Found a hotel in Siena that I want to stay at -here is the room I want. DH is good with it - but I'm hesitant on the cost. but I think... life's short. Pick this place! We're saving up for all expenses on the trip (for a while now... a few years) but this is one that's hard for me to justify.

[BillBlueEyes]

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Even a one night trip (of 4.5 hours each way) feels like I've been gone for a while. The body needs to recover just from the traveling, as well as the hotel. Not surprising, I noted that the hotel bathroom fixtures were of unusually solid quality. Normally, I don't even notice bathroom fixtures.

We seem to have skipped lunch yesterday. We usually pack a sandwich for the drive home because we often stay with a relative. Alas, the hotel didn't offer that service. The bag of baby carrots I took served as my snack for both drives. We avoided the chocolate candies that were the party favor - CREDIT moi for that.


onebyone – Kudos for "I have a strategy in place as to how to proceed." You sound busy.

Nature Girl – Yay for keeping your perspective that joyful time with your DD was the key goal.

nationalparker – Neat name, "Fast Metabolism Diet" - good packaging is important for a new scheme. That's quite an impressive room in Siena. Is it in a castle?

Karen (karenrn) - LOL at "I'm in need of Monday" - that's a new one.

Readers -

Chapter 6 Family Traps

#5: The Unreasonably Strict Eating Plan Trap

When Karen and I discussed what she wanted her vacation eating plan to be, she initially said, "I guess it should be the same as when I'm home."

"Can we figure out how realistic that is?" I asked. "Didn't you say you'd be eating in restaurants most nights? And that you'd be in and out of the kitchen all day? And that you want to eat some special treats you can only get at the beach?"

Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., Deborah Beck Busis, The Diet Trap Solution, Train Your Brain to Lose Weight and Keep It Off for Good (Blue book), pg. 145

[maryann]

Good Morning, Coaches.

Wedding seemed like a good excuse to go crazy eating. That felt familiar and awful. I might actually have had a bug because my stomach hasn't been right since. Weigh in today is a miracle on ticker. Super good hike balanced other things.

My food is packed and I am ready to head out to school. Credit for a week of no sweets at work. I am defineitly stretched between meals and that is a good thing. 105 degrees here means a late night walk needs to be late late night but I will commit to one.

Naturegirl: Have a great school day. There is a freedom to working was I get started.
karenRN: I love getting all the ironing out of the way at once.
nationalparker: All this prep will be worth it. It will be an eyeopening process for you.

[karenrn]

Good morning coaches,

Credit for an on plan food day yesterday and no beer. It was good to get the week started right even before the week started. I'll be heading to the gym within the hour to get my steps in on the elliptical and treadmill. If I'm feeling energetic it will all be on the elliptical.

Maryann Glad to hear you had a great hike to balance things out at Tahoe.

Bill What, you skipped lunch? Boy that is a miracle when it happens to me. I always say I eat on the clock. I wish I didn't, but it seems like I do. We're going to be back in your hot, humid weather soon. Could you please turn down the thermostat before we get there Wednesday afternoon? We fly into JFK (which was on the news last night) on Delta (who just had the whole computer system shut down). I hope we make it and then we're renting a car and driving to Westport, CT. I will be the navigator because I am better at it and dh says he is not concerned about driving. I'll ask him again after we get in the traffic. We're pretty used to Seattle traffic, but not NY traffic.

Nationalparker I love the room in Sienna. I vote "Yes". We went there in 2002 with another couple. She drove, I navigated and the dh's were in the back seat of a small car. Somehow we got into the area of Sienna where there were essentially no cars, except us. We were in a parade of people. All we could do was laugh. Another place I love in Italy is Orvieto. Have you ever been there?

Okay, better get the gym clothes on. Have a great Monday all of you!

[millie56]

Wow!! Thanks for that I am only on Week 2 and trying to figure out what and how much exercise to commit to. Chapter 6 Family Traps

#5: The Unreasonably Strict Eating Plan Trap That is a great quote. I am planning to go to Santa Cruz the last weekend in August and then two camping weekends in September but REALLY want to get down to the low 150s before month end.

Re-reading and re-doing each day in the pink book has been very helpful for me. I have had totally on-plan eating yesterday and today. Saturday night we went to the drive-in and I had a couple of wine coolers (alcohol isn't on my plan) but still lost weight when I weighed in on Sunday. I am now weighing in once a week instead of once a month as I think it helps me to focus better.

[nationalparker]

Hello, all! Back to the evening check in, I guess, as work is getting super busy already. I have one major project to wrap up today, and another one I'd like to finish tomorrow, but other things keep arising that need handled. Cubicle environment is absolutely NOT conducive to productivity, no matter what some office organizer tells upper mgt.

Day 1 is done and in the books. Survived with some dang plain food. I need to learn to season different food, apparently. I think when I get a week under my belt I can adjust more on the run. With every two days the required/permitted foods being changed up in amounts and what's allowed, it takes a while. DH ate his portions today, as well. I can honestly say I"m surprised that he's in on it. Weighed in this morning closer to 175 than 174, but I'm sticking there. I normally would want something - even something small like a few strawberries now.

Just off the bike and DH is already in bed. I'm thinking I'm going to relax with my book for a half hour or more. His younger daughter wanted to stop by. Not really sure WHY because it's been two years since she's been here, I think. I expected her to ask for money, honestly.

1 Down, 27 to go

[onebyone]

Coaches

I got thrown today by working unexpectedly at the ceramics guild. I stopped by just to see what was going on and to get a feel of what I'll do there next. Instead I'm now tied to being there the next two days. I need to get to my new prints, especially before my sister comes which will probably be next week. Once she's here all my plans get shelved.

Foodwise I just held the line. Weight is 272.6. I am improving my choices but tonight at dinner I was possessed by the feeling that I was still hungry and went on the hunt in the kitchen and found leftover nacho chips. I did not resist them. I just ate them wishing they were something better. Poor behavior there. I was mad I didn't get any decluttering done today though the dishes are up to date. Credit. I also emptied two bags. Credit. And a laundry basket. Credit. And I brought work home to do but I can only rarely work into the evening when I have worked all day. I need a hard deadline to do that and I don't have that (with ceramics) right now. In fact we're working ahead now. I'm just annoyed at having plans change. Sigh.
One day food will not be the solution to feeling uncomfortable feelings.

Bye for now.

[BillBlueEyes]

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Most fun trip to a hardware store ever: my belt buckle is held on by tiny tiny set screws; one fell off. To my delight, in the wall of screws and fasteners, the smallest set screw they carried was the exact one that I needed. Most fun $0.25 purchase ever (of course I bought two since only having one would mean that I'd drop it and it's really tiny).

Eating was good enough, CREDIT moi. Salmon on the patio with the temperature in a good place. A flock of some three dozen Grackles flew by heading north - maybe the heat has them migrating in the wrong direction, LOL.


onebyone – Ouch for new things added to an already busy schedule. Kudos for keeping up in the kitchen.

maryann - Yep, Kudos for avoiding sweets at work.

nationalparker – Kudos for "1 Down, 27 to go" - always neat to be starting out. Cubicles are the worst invention ever.

millie56 - Glad to read that drive-ins still exist. Yay for rereading the Pink book.

Karen (karenrn) - Yay for the good start to the week. [I find New York City traffic somewhat easy; they're predictably super aggressive and predictably good at not hitting me.]

Readers -

Chapter 6 Family Traps

#5: The Unreasonably Strict Eating Plan Trap

Karen thought this over. "Maybe it's a good idea to be a little looser than when I'm home. Because some years, I've started off being as strict as usual, but by the second or third day I ate off plan, and then it was no holds barred. I ate out of control for the whole rest of the week."

We decided that it would be a good idea to define looser, because Karen had already seen that being "looser" at home gets her into trouble. She recognized that looser shouldn't mean spontaneously deciding what she wanted to eat. Instead, she decided to plan extra food in advance and try to gauge how much weight she'd gain.

Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., Deborah Beck Busis, The Diet Trap Solution, Train Your Brain to Lose Weight and Keep It Off for Good (Blue book), pg. 145

[onebyone]

Coaches:

Check yourself before you wreck yourself. That's what they say at DH's work and it sprung to mind after reading this morning's Beck quote especially this part:

We decided that it would be a good idea to define looser, because Karen had already seen that being "looser" at home gets her into trouble. She recognized that looser shouldn't mean spontaneously deciding what she wanted to eat. Instead, she decided to plan extra food in advance and try to gauge how much weight she'd gain.

Emphasis here is mine. I do this all the time. Sometimes I plan to change it or keep it loose, but I don't write that down or write down my alternatives. I often go wrong or stray or eat too much or choose poorly because when I am going off track it's because I haven't planned well or realistically or I simply don't want what I planned. Sometimes I resist planning for the thing that happens everyday, like lunch! Lunch out when I could be caught not at home. Or Lunch late when I am working into the afternoon, maybe. My days are not so random that there isn't a pattern. I need to get a grip and stop acting like I can eat everything all the time "just know when to stop" cause sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't and most times it all contributes to me feeling "off plan" which helps me feel like "I can't do this. I can't follow a plan". That thought is very very ingrained. Couple this with a stubborn streak and a stubborn streak of perfectionism and rigidity, oy vey. I am seeing my rigid thinking in my decision to declutter the apartment again with a visit from my sister on the horizon and my attention being forced upon my mother and her situation (I've been ignoring/neglecting this as she is looked after) and then upon my father and his imminent burial. It's a lot to juggle.

And yet. I'm not alone in family pressures ad job demands and having to lose weight anyway. I need to find the happy medium. And I need to focus on that, on getting the job done.

Ok. Ranting over. I'm just frustrated is all. I need a workable plan.

[karenrn]

Good morning coaches,

Credit for both exercise and eating on plan yesterday. In the afternoon I saw the movie, Hunt for the Wilderpeople. It was very good. I want to see Florence Foster Jenkins, but since it just came out there is plenty of time and it's playing everywhere.

We pretty much got packed for our trip to CT. Our flight leaves tomorrow at 6 a.m. What idiot booked that flight? Oh, me. Well at least we arrive at 2 p.m. which will be good. At least we'll be driving in the traffic when it is light.

Today's plans include class at the gym, a trip to the hair dresser, my last until I return from the Camino, 10/19. Can you imagine how my hair will look by then? I think I'll book an appointment for the day after I get home. The hair salon is near REI, so I will swing by for a couple of items I want.

Bill What a great find at the hardware store.

Onebyone I hope you have better luck with your schedule today.

Nationalparker It is a bit difficult starting a new food plan. I often find I'm eating really plain stuff. I hope you sort out ways to make it a little more appetizing. Sometimes I just have to tell myself that food is fuel.

Millie56 Sounds like you've got some fun plans coming up. Keep up the good work.

Have a great day everybody.

[nationalparker]

Two days in and I'm sick SICK of meat. This could be long. No plant protein for the next two days, but then I can, so will definitely remember that! Learn as you go. At dinner I felt like a 6-year old chewing his meat until it was a blob. bleh. DH was excited because he liked his sirloin (?) with mushrooms/onions sauteed in beef broth, which is all allowed and none of which I'd eat. Thank you for being here to listen through this journey. I forgot to read my Beck chapter today. Will try to remember to do that when I log off here. I just finished prepping our breakfasts/snacks/lunches for tomorrow - a lot of veggie chopping.

But, that said, I weighed this morning (just one day in, so wasn't expecting anything) and was down 1.4 pounds from the day before, so maybe this could work. I told DH I'm weighing daily and he's weighing weekly. I wanted to see if I gained on the Friday/Sat/Sun period when others did. (Gained back some they lost.) Then I'd know to wiggle that a bit next week.

Another rainy day here ... no plans this evening other than relaxing and reading. I want to take a warm bubble bath and just relax. Three more days left in the workweek and it seems an eternity. The up side is that if I was home alone all day, the temptation to take something that isn't on plan and supposedly slows down the metabolic process would be great.

Bill - I forgot to say that garden room in Siena used to be the kitchen staff room - it's a couple of steps down from the garden. I've not reserved it yet, but will do that this week. I'm going along with Karen's "YES" and booking! Life's short.

Maryann - What was the plan that you followed where you eliminated so many foods from your diet - did it have a meal plan too? That is what I'm aving to really work on - and veggies with breakfast tomorrow - but only certain ones, not tomatoes, cukes, carrots the easy ones for me to eat haha ... and only egg whites, so no omelet for me as I detest egg whites.

[BillBlueEyes]

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Walked, CREDIT moi, to a presentation about installing solar panels on homes. The organizers were aghast that about 100 folks showed up when they expected only a dozen. Fortunately for me, their advertised snacks were sized for a dozen folks so I only took one chunk of melon and a bottle of water.

Dinner was from a potluck, conveniently located at my house to which I wasn't invited. I was encouraged to serve myself from their over-abundant food - all vegetarian. It came with a small slice of key-lime pie - not too bad.


onebyone – Yep, finding that happy medium is one of life's continuing challenges. I know about that "just know when to stop" only working sometimes.

nationalparker – Kudos for continuing with your plan despite being deprived of plant protein.

Karen (karenrn) - Waving toward Connecticut in the predawn darkness. A hair salon near REI is a great way to keep exercise in mind.

Readers -

Chapter 6 Family Traps

#5: The Unreasonably Strict Eating Plan Trap

Karen decided that she was willing to gain two pounds at most. We also calculated that she'd probably burn some extra calories (although perhaps not a lot) by being more physically active than she is at home. She made the following plan.

Vacation Eating and Exercise Plan

Breakfast: same as home

Lunch: same as home. If I'm at a restaurant, order something that's as close as possible to something I would eat at home.

Dinner: when eating at a restaurant, 1/2 to 3/4 portion protein, 1/2 portion carbohydrate, one portion salad, vegetables without added butter or oil, one glass of wine, taste of dessert. Request all sauces on the side; use sparingly

Snacks: high-protein snack, twice a day

Special treats: 5 times per week, one medium-size cookie from a bakery or one small frozen yogurt or about 2 cups of boardwalk caramel corn

Exercise: 30 minutes per day, walking or bicycling

Judith S. Beck, Ph.D., Deborah Beck Busis, The Diet Trap Solution, Train Your Brain to Lose Weight and Keep It Off for Good (Blue book), pg. 146