Hmm123: Try a little shopping at nice consignment or thrift stores. Much cheaper while you are in transition, and a decent but not overwhelming selection. That way you can save money and ease into a 'regular' shopping experience.
Hmm123, you might try steering clear of department stores for a little while and opt for individual stores just to narrow the field and feel less overwhelmed. I've found a lot of things pretty heavily discounted at at Banana Republic and J.Crew (work clothes) this winter, and at outlets for other things. There are new outlets at Assembly Square in Somerville, so you don't even have to drive that far out of the city!
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I'm feeling a bit like I've been riding an emotional roller coaster this month. I weigh in, lose very little (or gain), get bummed out, then spend the week trying to pick myself up only to weigh in again and lose even less than the week before. It's exhausting. I'd hoped to be out of Phase 1 by early April. At this rate, it'll at least be mid May. (I've lost 2.8 lbs in 3 weeks. So much for my 8-10 lbs/month average. Ugh.) Sounds like some of you are in the same boat as me. Do you think that our bodies are getting used to being fed this way and adjusting to the diet, e.g. not losing as fast?
Last edited by MaPetiteChoux; 02-26-2015 at 11:04 PM.
MaPet -- I am in the same boat with you. My average has been 1lb/week for the last month. But my fat percentage has been dropping. I remember that you started exercising, so I would suggest you focus more on the lean mass change instead of the scale. Sometimes before or after your TOM , your weight fluctuates as well because of water retaining. Did your fat percentage drop?
I recently started heavy weight training, I am prepared that my loss going to be slow but hope that it will speed up later, I'll let you know my experiment result.
I'm in the same boat as you guys! Been getting a bit discouraged for sure...but Fluffeifei you're right, we're working out which will slow the losses. I had a chat with my coach on my last appointment about when I should phase out. I'm going on a 12 day trip to Bermuda in May and I know there will be a lot of drinking involved so I need to be phased out by then, regardless of where I'm at. My original plan was to phase out at the end of March but it doesn't look like that will get me to goal. It would have been perfect because it would have gave me a few weeks in maintenance prior to the trip to get into the routine...I'll see how I feel as it gets closer. She offered to print me off the phase 2 and 3 protocol a few weeks before I start into it so I can wrap my head around the phases, which will be nice.
I'm hoping this is a phase and will pass for us. Though they do say as you get closer to goal the weight loss will slow down so who really knows. All I know is that at the end of the day, we ARE losing, which is better than I was doing prior to IP, busting my butt in the gym (which I actually enjoyed) and tracking every morsel of food I ate. The feeling of doing everything right and now losing a single pound was definitely worse than this feeling of doing everything right and only losing small amounts at a time.
You only got 13 lbs Kimo, I am pretty sure you will be very close before you leave for your trip. Maybe phase out 2 weeks before ur departure, so you are at least in phase 3. Even if there is a cheat day allowed in phase 4, I think you have to recover in the following 3 days. You probably still want to enjoy everything in moderation.
Hmm - that sucks that shopping wasn't fun for you. I guess you are maybe at an inbetween funny size, but it will get better, I am sure!
MaPetite - I am sorry you are feeling kind of bummed. I have been as well, but simply because I am getting so jealous of all these delicious things that people around me are eating and I feel like I'm deprived. I know in my head that it's for a darn good reason, and I likely won't ever be able to eat things like that, but it's still annoying. My husband made a sandwich last night, and I almost cried of jealousy! A silly sandwich! LOL! You are darn close to your goal, and quite small so I think that could contribute to the slow losses (maybe think of them in percentage of your weight, instead of pounds?) Hang in there! We are here for ya (and likely feeling the same way!)
Kimo - sounds like you had a good chat with your coach, I think you are prepared and planning, which is the most important! How's date guy?!?
Fluffy - hello! How's the pup?
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I am SOOOO glad it's the weekend. Work is stressful (as always) and I'm looking forward to spending time with my family this weekend. I won't make it to spin class tonight, too much on the go, but I am still really hoping to see a nice loss tomorrow regardless. I do feel thinner today, so that's good (I hope!).
Other than that, not much else happening with my IP world. As I said I am also getting a bit tired of it, but will keep trucking for a few more months regardless. I just really want 20 more pounds and then will see from there. The good news is that I am not sick of the food at all, if it wasn't $30 per box I could see myself eating it for a long time!
Fluffeifei - We're both pretty close to the same amount away from our goals which is great. I'm going to play it by ear and see what happens with my weigh ins. I figure if I phase out a month before the trip and just go into maintenance as soon as I'm on the way to Bermuda I should still be fine. I'm staying at my friend's house so at least I can cook my own meals instead of eating out. I do want to be in maintenance for this trip though. I'm not going to be in full maintenance mode because I want to be able to enjoy the time with my good friends and experience all the island has to offer. I'm just going to try to limit carbs as best I can and exercise everyday to minimize any damage.
Teags - Date guy is a bit of a flake, haha! I feel like he might be a bit of a player so I'm just going to steer clear of that one. I hear you about the fact that you would keep eating the food if it wasn't so expensive. I think I'll always have a few boxes of IP products hanging around my house for maintenance, but I won't be using them often I don't think just because of the price tag. Hope you had a good weekend with your family!
I went to Kelowna this weekend to do a bit of shopping and hang out with one of my really good friends. Just a spur of the moment thing since I was a little restless to stay in town! I had a lot of fun, bought a few things (MEDIUM SHIRTS!! WHATT?!) and stayed mostly OP the whole time. We went out for sushi and I cheated a bit but I didn't go overboard and I went right back to 100% after so we'll see what today's clinic weigh in tells me. I weighed myself at my parents house this morning (I'm dogsitting while they're in Mexico so I'm staying there all week) and it looks like the little cheat didn't throw me off. Fingers crossed that's the case.
I had a bit of a mental fight with myself yesterday about IP. I feel pretty good right now and I want to phase off, but I know I still want to lose that last little bit. So I thought about maybe going on P2 to lose the rest, that way it's only a 2 week phase out on P3 when I decide it's time. I was feeling really down actually. Though today when I stepped on my mom's scale and saw 159lbs it got my mind back into it! The lowest I had seen on a first thing in the morning weigh in was 162 (different scale though) so here's hoping I lost some weight this week!
Sounds like there's been lots going on while I've been away!
Last week was a pretty rough one for me. My mom was admitted to the hospital, where she stayed in the ER from Monday to Saturday because they didn't have any beds available for her. She was diagnosed with pneumonia for the second time in 6 months. As a result, my emotional eating/drinking was running rampant. My husband also got into an accident at work and was laid off for a day - so that added to my stress.
On a happier note, I had my 50th birthday party on Saturday and had a fantastic party with friends and family at our favourite pub! I continued to go off the rails a wee bit, but I figured that I'll only turn 50 once. Everyone thought that I looked amazing and it made me feel so good! Nose back to the grindstone tomorrow before this gets out of hand.
Hope you are all doing well! Going to go back and read a bit...
Happy belated Bday vzuvie! Sorry to hear about your mom and husband, hope both of them are doing ok now.
Kimo - My last 15 lbs will be a long stretch I think because I decided to start weight training. So to reduce the cost, I did some research on the alternatives. I am replacing the peach mango drink with a ISO-Zero protein powder which has 100 calories 0 sugar 0 carb and 26g of protein. I also bought some quest bars to replace the IP bars. Based on the label, the strawberry cheesecake, double chocolate chunk are ok to use restricted. I am trying them out for a week or 2 see if it works. if they do, they would save me a lot in the long run.
Last edited by Fluffeifei; 03-02-2015 at 05:34 PM.
[B]Fluffeifei
I went to Kelowna this weekend to do a bit of shopping and hang out with one of my really good friends. Just a spur of the moment thing since I was a little restless to stay in town!
How's everyone else doing?
You must be not too far from me, kimo88.... I'm in the North Okanagan area.
Happy belated birthday vzubie!! I'm sorry to hear about your mom and husband. It's all too easy to emotionally eat in hard times. Good on you for being self aware that you were doing that. It's a tough battle, that emotional eating/drinking - I fall prey to it too. Sending lots of thoughts and prayers your way.
I lost 2 lbs at weigh in so it looks like my little sushi snafu didn't mess me up too badly! Thank goodness for that. So I'm going to keep trucking this week and see where I get. When I was in Kelowna I went to costco and bought a huge pack of boneless skinless chicken thighs so I'm going to make a big batch of lemon herb chicken for dinner (and so I have dinner for the next few days) and roast some brocolli. I already made my rhubarb "pie filling" last night (thank goodness I had a pack of frozen rhubarb in the bottom of my freezer because I went to 3 grocery stores and they were all sold out!) so I think I'm ready to go for this week!
Kimo - awesome loss lady! Big congrats on the shirts too, that's exciting.
Vzubie - I am so sorry to hear about your Mom. Don't worry about your 'reset'. Sometimes I think we need to have a little off plan days to feel good about being back on again! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!
Fluffy - So are you going to stay on the program in terms of seeing your coach, etc? I like the idea of replacing the peach mango drink, I use that as my extra packet on gym days so would be nice to have something a little less expensive. Where do you get it from?
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Long story short, I suck. I had weigh in Sat and lost one pound which I was mad about and proceeded to promptly stuff my face and go off the rails for three days. I am back now, and I feel really happy about that. I just felt like total crap, and it really made me step back and look at the fact that I just can't eat like that anymore. I honestly feel like the paleo way is going to be it for me when I am done. But I'm scared about my strength to do it! Anyway, it sucked, and I'm over it and back on track.
Oh Teags, 1lb is not bad AT ALL. 3 days off the rails was not a good idea but I am glad you are back on track. I think you just gotta accept it that it's going to be a long run and pay more attention to the inches and fat percentage change instead of the scale reading. You CAN do it!
I am still going to see my coach to get the measurements and percentage readings and I am only replacing 2 meals so I still have to buy one from the clinic. I got the ISO-zero from Poppy's and it is the most clean protein powder. I think it has even less ingredients than the IP one. The vanilla flavour one isn't that bad at all. I paid $70 for the size of 50 serving which would otherwise cost me $200 if I buy IP packets. Try it out you might like it.
Good morning gals! I've been traveling and not checking in as much as I'd like (too hard for me to go through posts on my phone but am glad to be back and catching up on you all. It sounds like it has been a challenging time for many of us. Thank you all for sharing -- it's so nice to see all the mutual support.
Happy 50th, vzubie! Feels so good to get compliments on progress, doesn't it? That's what keeps me going. So sorry about your mom -- hope she improves soon.
Teags -- Good you're back on track! Just look forward now. Thank you for asking me how maintenance is going . . . but I'm not there just yet. I've been nervous about even moving into P2! I am about 2-3 pounds past my goal but wanted to be 5 pounds past before P2. However, I've been stuck at the same number on the scale for the past couple of weeks -- my fault as I've been having wine on weekends and snow days and when we've had company, etc. My body fat percentage, which has regularly been going down 2-4 pounds a week, did not really change at last WI. Even with the eating on plan, the wine has likely pushed me out of ketosis. So not worth it and I do wake up with a headache. Need to stop thinking it's OK.
By the way -- love the cucumber tuna boat recipe!
Kira -- Reading about your Bermuda trip planning is helpful, as we are going away again for spring break, and it would be good to be at least in P3 by then. Another reason to push through these last few pounds without any more cheats. Thanks for the info re dermarolling. MaPetite -- let us know if the silicone strips work.
Fluffy -- I've been switching over to alt products as well -- ordering some from Nashua. Still have not figured our how many of those products, if any, I'll be using on maintenance. Or will we be eating all "normal" food?
Hmm -- shopping can be so frustrating when you're trying to buy for an event, but try to keep reminding yourself how thrilled you are to be in the smaller sizes. Were you able to find something wonderful for the gala? Gotta show off your terrific progress!
Saw a friend last week who did IP about a year ago. She said she gained all her weight back (though she did not look like it actually) after going off plan and returning to regular food, again reminding me of the importance of recommitting now and into maintenance. It's hard, and doesn't seem fair sometimes, but it'll be worth it. Stay strong all.
