Okay..... Well I have officially blown my new way of eating (diet) all to and back twice. Granted I have had a lot of celebrating to do and well I can honestly say that I have done a good job of it. (I wish I didn't like my cooking quite so much)
Well last night was my last party for a while (until next Friday when my niece graduates from Highschool)... I have done a crap job of eating, I have been binging which in all honesty I haven't done in so long. I got up in the middle of the night the other night and ate cold pizza and french bread and butter and chocolate chips- and I had already eaten popcorn at the movies and had eaten out with DH for lunch... well you get the picture. I was eating for no reason, I can honestly say that I am more relaxed than I have been in two years, the muscles in my back do not feel like I have a vice squeezing them 24/7 and my hand has stopped going numb when I write and type. I am not sleeping real well but other than that I feel like a million dollars, so I don't know why I can't control my eating. I haven't been purging just binging, which in a way is good but in a way it is bad too. My old routine was to not eat and then to purge when I did, I didn't not have the habit of binge eating then purging.
I have got to get a hold of myself and start over, not necessarily from the beginning but start over, I will probabaly have few weeks before I start work and I need to get into some kind of routine before I get into the routine at the hospital of ordering out and eating out of the vending machine. I just don't know what do, or should I say what plan to follow or what groove to get in. I have done so many different diets, I can't take any supplement any more because of my heart, I have a decrease exercise tolerance and a really hard time meeting my target heart rate since I am on the medication I am for my heart. I am just wondering if anyone has any suggestions on what to do get in to a groove. I have to start over and I am almost starting back at my high weight, I have 35 pounds to loose and I know that it doesn't sound like a lot but with my decrease metabolism and the exercise/medication thing, I seem to be stuck behind an eight ball... I am looking at any and all programs - what has worked for you - what you may suggest for me - etc.
Hey Amy - sounds like you have a bunch of things to deal with all at once! When you say a "reduced tolerance" for exercise, does that mean you need to keep your heart rate low? I'm not sure I get it. There might be other forms of exercise which aren't as cardio intensive. Like pilates, or moderate weight lifting, etc.
As far as the eating plan .. I'm not sure what you have done in the past that has worked for you. Do you do better with a higher level of protein? A balance of protein and carbs? Do you need to watch your sugar, fat, or any of the above? I'm finding that a modified BFL program is working pretty darn well for me, at this point. Since this is a life-time commitment, I want something I can be happy with and not feel like I'm starving or depriving myself. That tends to bring on the out-of-control eating pattern for me.
Well Raven ~ I found out last fall I have Mitral Valve Prolapse, nothing terrible, not really life altering. It is mild but it explained a lot of years of very high heart rate with minimal exercise, I would go from 90 BPM to the high 180's in a matter of minutes with mild/moderate exercise. Well the MD put me on a beta-blocker my baseline heart rate went from 85-90 BPM to 50/60 BPM, I now have to work very very hard to get a heart rate of 120...
As for exercise intolerance... I have been in school so long and haven't been able to do a regular exercise program. When I started the nursing component of school I was able to easily walk 5 to 7 miles a day- now with the school implemented sedentary life and the medication I can barely walk a mile with out being completely exhausted. I realize I have to build myself back up, I have been out of the game so to speak for going on 5 semesters.
Programs that worked for me before.... Well I lost a good deal on Atkins... but I am just not a proponent for the diet since it is not so good for your kidneys and I lost the best on E-diets... but to be honest I don't want to go back to measuring my foods and cooking one thing for me and something else for the rest of my family.... I lost from like 190ish to 140 over the course of about 9 months but that is strict calorie counting and as I said measuring every thing. I was looking at Zone Perfect and I have looked at BFL, I am just confused about what I am going to be able to implement with out throwing a huge monkey wrench into the rest of my families life.... I already don't buy junk we eat alot of fresh fruit, veggies and salads.
Seriously eating like a Normal Person over the last two weeks or so, I have gained 10+ pounds... I am about to bust out of my clothes.
Amy...when you figure something out, let me know. I am eatting way too much sugar and it makes me feel like a whale! I need to get back to basics too. I have been gardening a lot, but my walking has been non existant. We went out last night and my cute black shirts don't fit anymore. That was an eye opener! I gotta get back to looseing and not gaining!
Yeah flower ~ I have been getting some real eye openers, so I can definitely understand that.
Raven ~ Thanks for the PM. I will be in touch, I am interested in the BFL stuff- thinking about picking up the book.
I have just got to get motivated : and I don't want the motivation to be DH saying hun don't you think you have gained a little weight. Which in translation means OMG you are getting a fat which in turn will mean I will get a really big and he will end up sleeping on the couch.
Hi Amy, I can totally relate to you saying how you can gain 10 lbs when you eat like a normal person -- me too! One week a few years ago I ate a few muffins, nothing else unusual, and I gained 5 lbs - from the muffins, I swear (2 or 3 muffins - they were very good though!). And even when I am fairly careful I sit at a plateau for MONTHS. It is really frustrating isn't it?
I think if you slowly build up with walking - something that worked for you in the past - that would be good. I have come back to walking as the safest (for my knee & joints), least jarring, most adaptable sort of exercise - you can slow down when you need to, can walk as little or as long as you like - well, you know all that!
Sometimes I eat a lot just because I get so tired of being careful & you have just come off a lot of stress, so it seems totally natural to me...you WILL get back into a diet/exercise routine & you WILL lose the weight you want to...in your own time frame. I have had plenty of times in the last two years when I just said to myself, I'm not ready to do this again yet, but I will be later on. And I was. And I'm just getting back along now after another break (you ought to see how many chocolate peppermint wrappers I have hidden in my backpack from the last couple of months).
You know it is a happy/sad thing that you can lose 3.5 pounds in a 24 hour period of time... I swear it makes me wonder why the heck I am retaining that much fluid because that has to be what it is, because I didn't do anything yesterday but pee. Well I guess I will be researching somethings this week- diet, exercise, maybe see about making a MD appointment and find out his perspective on my metabolism and what he thinks about me losing weight other than that he is for it. I swear even when I was bigger like closer to 190 he never said a word about my weight, I had to entertain the subject- makes you wonder...
Thought about it alot last night, even after I started nursing school... I didn't start gaining my weight back until I introduced processed sugar back into my diet... prior to nursing school I was not eating any processed white sugar, no sweets, no white potatoes, no white bread, no coffe, no margerine or butter or mayo but primarily no sugar.... prior to nursing school, I had not used a whole 5lb bag of sugar in a year now I am going through about a bag a month- mostly in coffee so if I cut out my coffee or find a sweetener that doesn't make my head hurt I may have ID'ed a big problem. I would basically say that coupled with my lack of exercise and my increase in not so good foods (not saying my diet sucks because I am stiill not eating alot of the above foods just some) would definitely add up to the wieght that I have gained back. I guess you could say I have done a lot of soul searching in the last day.
My goals for the week:
Increase my water intake.
Increase my activity.
Lower my processed sugar intake.
Journal(I hate to Journal- just because it is time consuming)
One Month Goal:
Lose 10 pounds by 6/19/03.
Work myself up to 2 miles a day.
Weights 3 times a week.
Six Month Goal:
Be at Goal Weight of 135.
Walking 4 to 5 miles a day.
Weight 5 times a week.
Cut out my processed sugar completely.
Does anyone have the problem of headache when they use sweeteners in hot drinks? EVERY time I use something like Equal, SweetNLow, or Splenda in hot drinks only.... I get a migraine... no fail... hence the reason behing the use of so much sugar because I have been drinking the devil out of some coffee. Any suggestions, other than don't drink the coffee- lets face it I am going to be working nights... I am going to have drink some kinda caffiene.
I can't use any of the artificial sweeteners, either, for the same reason. I limit my intake of coffee to three cups in the morning, and I use about a teaspoon and a half of sugar in each cup. That will not, in the foreseeable future, change. I figure it into my daily amount of food and go on from there. It took me a while before I could cut the sugar back from the three heaping teaspoons, but I did it gradually, and I'm still working on getting it less and less per cup. Eventually perhaps I'll be like my daughter, who insists that sugar and milk "ruin the taste of good coffee."
Amy, I hate those sweeteners. You'll probably hate my suggestion, but why don't you try weaning yourself off of sugar? That's what I did a couple of years ago... I used to take a rounded teaspoon full, and I cut back to a level spoonful. Then to 3/4, then a half, etc. It took me a few weeks, but I'm sugarfree! And now I HATE sugar in my coffee!
Okay.... well Lets put it this way.... I wish I just used a teaspoon or so in my coffee.... but then again maybe if I actually drank a cup of coffee instead of a travel mug at a time(big silver therma-mugs)... (averages out to about 9 cups a day)
Oh my gosh... a real coffee drinker like me.
I LOVE my coffee, Amy.
Well... even if you cut back a little on the sugar, it would make a huge difference in the long run.
I come from a long line of coffee drinkers... I think my mother put coffee in my bottle as a baby... (no I am serious- I had to keep her from doing it to my kids)- I don't drink that much every day but it is possible for me to do-
As much as I hate it I got out the measuring spoons, cups and the food scale this morning the things we do...
Starting Over
and back twice. Granted I have had a lot of celebrating to do and well I can honestly say that I have done a good job of it. (I wish I didn't like my cooking quite so much) 
That was an eye opener! I gotta get back to looseing and not gaining!
: and I don't want the motivation to be DH saying hun don't you think you have gained a little weight. Which in translation means OMG you are getting a fat 
and he will end up sleeping on the couch. 
but then again maybe if I actually drank a cup of coffee instead of a travel mug at a time(big silver therma-mugs)... (averages out to about 9 cups a day) 
the things we do...
