I find this very interesting. On my Fitbit, my top fat burn per day is usually 3-4 hours per day generally. Yesterday, when my family was here for Christmas I was in fat burn zone for over 8 hours!! I should have company more often. I know that was because I was busy preparing food, and serving throughout the day. My calorie burn during that 8 hour period was over 1000 calories, and my total calories burned for the day were 2100. I usually burn around 1700 calories for the day. Then this morning my fasting blood sugar was only 137, even though I had some bread and sweets yesterday. I guess this tells me it's really more beneficial for me to be busy and more active. I've been told that all along but I guess I had to see it for myself.

:wreath: :candy: MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!! :wreath::candy::wreath:

A quick fly by.

[B]Carol Sue[/B]Congratulations on the low FBS and the fat burn info. Every little lesson we learn helps us to do better.

I have decided to just count the calories and eat the way dietician suggested. This will cover how my family eats and keep me from eating way off. I will be careful today and start everything tomorrow. I can start exercise tomorrow and still get my 5 days in this week. I don't always want eggs for breakfast. Some days I want nothing and some times I just want a slice of cheese toast. I will go lowfat, low calorie because that is how I like to eat. No more diet rules. Taking away the temptations.

I have a few minutes before I have to get busy. Having a cup of coffee and then call Daddy then get busy. We moved everything up an hour to 2pm because it gets dark at 5 and we don't want Daddy driving at night. My husbands families always did fun things together like games or movies. My family never did those things. So DH and I decided that Christmas will probably always be my Sister and husband when Daddy is gone so we are going to start our own tradition of watching a Christmas movie like we did with his kids. My sister and I love Media so we are going to watch Media Christmas.

I better call Daddy and then get busy.

Enjoy your quite day.

Well, our Christmas is over. We had a very nice time with Daddy, DS and BIL. They left a little after 5 in time for Daddy to get home before it got too dark. It was nice, quiet and peaceful. I sent some food home with them, but I still have lots of leftovers especially of ham. Will be eating a lot of ham dishes this week.

I enjoyed doing it, but I am exhausted tonight so just sitting and doing nothing for the rest of the evening. Things go back to normal tomorrow and I will get back to eating sensibly.

Trish, I'm glad your holiday went well. It's terrible that we feel glad that it's over, but I do find that it gets more stressful the older I get. It makes me wonder how my MIL did it until she passed away at age 85. She did have 2 sons living at home who helped her, and I used to go over a little early to help her with getting the table set and dishing up the food. But she did all the cooking herself and it never seemed to wear her out like it does me. Her kitchen was even smaller than mine. I guess she did it for so many years it was second nature to her. She NEVER went to anyone else's house for a holiday and insisted that everyone came to hers. I was happy to oblige, and didn't realize how much work it was until I started doing it myself.

I didn't sleep well last night, probably because of the carbs I ate, even though I really didn't overeat that much. But I did have sweets. We always cut our ham in half before cooking and my step daughter takes half home. We started that when they were having financial problems and now DH feel obligated to continue it. So we only had enough ham leftover for sandwiches today, and maybe a bit for tomorrow. I just relaxed today and I enjoyed that. It didn't even feel like Christmas...yesterday did because of our get-together. I intended to exercise, but didn't because I was cold and so tired from not sleeping. I have to get back to better eating and definitely want to exercise tomorrow.

Good Morning. I had scrambled eggs this morning and they tasted so good. I've missed them. Glad to get back to normal after all the "different" foods I've been eating the past few days. DH fried up a little ham to go with it and I did eat a couple bites of that. Our ham is about gone. Right now we have a nice bone with a lot of ham on it that would be great for ham, green beans and potatoes, but even with the potatoes DH would not eat that, so no sense in making it. Not the best thing for me to be eating. I just want to get back to normal.

I slept better last night, even without taking anything to "help out." I think the stress is gone and I'm able to relax. I feel good today.

I did my exercise! Finally got back to it. I feel so good about it...I hope I'm not sorry tomorrow. LOL I didn't really overdo it. 45 minutes of gentle exercise. When I got up this morning my BS was 135. I don't take Glimiperide when it's that low, and didn't take it when I ate breakfast either. After exercising it was 178. I don't know if that is from breakfast, which was all protein, or from the exercise. I will test again in an hour or two to see where it goes from here. If it gets to 200 I will take the meds to bring it back down. I'm hoping that over time the exercise will help lower it. Now to keep doing it, 5 days a week.

I didn't want to get up this morning, but this is Tuesday and we go to Daddy's to do his meds. Plus we need to mail a package to FL. So I got up showered and dressed. Made coffee and called Daddy while drinking a cup.

My weight is back up to 218.6, but would have been worse if I hadn't taken a fluid pill. I'm drugged from eating too many carbs. I actually threw out the rest of the cornbread dressing last night so it wouldn't call me today. Better down the garbage disposal rather than on my waist.

I took my berberine with my coffee and then did 30 minutes on the bike. It helped. I did FBS but didn't have much blood so wasn't sure about the reading. It was 202. That was what got me on the bike. Intended to do only 20 minutest and the next thing I knew was I had done almost 30 so just went with it. Checked my bs just before eating about 10 minutes after the exercise and my bs was 143. I am very pleased with that. Didn't eat until a little after noon. I had 2 eggs, 2 sl center cut bacon only 50 calories for 2 slices and 2 sl of the Multigrain 45 cal Sara Lee bread. I ended up with 300 calories. This will go along with my having Taquito when DD, DS and I go out to Whataburger for breakfast.

I am back on MFP. Counting the calories and keeping up with the exercise is made so easy on there. This makes dieting much easier. I do want to try to eat within 8 hr window or less.

We will have ham, potato salad and a regular salad when we get back home this evening. I have plenty of veggies to eat with it.

Carol Sue DH wants to take our ham bone cook it in Great Northern beans. He also likes ham cooked in green beans, but he doesn't like the little potatoes cooked with it either. So I won't do that either. The problem we have is that he does like them cooked without the potatoes but he wants to make enough for an army and I don't have a freezer big enough to save them. Besides I don't like them after frozen. LOL

Got to get going. DH is getting ready to get in the shower which means we are leaving in 15 minutes. I've got to go change clothes.

Have a great day.

I am so angry with myself because after exercising yesterday I offset it with eating junk. I hate when I do that. I am not really exercising for weight loss, but more for blood sugar control and strengthening muscles, but still, I don't want to be eating this junk food. It is DH's, so I can't throw it away. I just have to learn to stay away from it. He will get out some candy and then walk over to me and hand me some...and I eat it. I need to just say no! LOL

I won't get on the scale. I know I'm back up in the 200s. Just can't stay below for some dumb reason. Blood sugar was so high last night I was dozing off. I took Glimiperide and went to bed early, around 8 PM. Watched TV until I fell asleep. I forgot to check BS when I got up and now I'm eating eggs and ham. I will check after I eat. I have a lot of healthy food left over, like cut up veggies, celery, radishes, but instead of eating that yesterday I finished off the cheese ball with crackers. I won't eat the crackers without the cheese, so DH can finish them off. LOL We gave most of the leftover cookies to step-daughter, so they are gone. They don't really interest me as much. I understand how you feel about the corn bread dressing. Dressing is a favorite of mine, too, and I usually send it home with guests to keep myself from eating it. DH doesn't eat it. He is not really much of a bread eater. He doesn't like sandwiches or dressing. But he eats a lot of baked goods, and started with candy after he stopped smoking. It has really not affected his weight, but that's because he does not eat a lot at meals. I think after he separated from first wife he lived on donuts and fried potatoes until he met me. But never gains.

I really wish I could get back to eating for nourishment, not pleasure. I was doing so well with that for a while. I was losing some weight and blood sugar was great. I feel so terrible after eating the junk food, so I don't understand why I do it.

Carol Sue I got on the scale yesterday to see the damage I had done. Just decided I needed to see it to get myself busy. I just don't want to be where I am on the scales or the bs level that I am now next year at this time. I want to do a better job in 2018. I've learned a lot through my Daddy's illness and I don't want to go there. That means I have to change some things.

I read something by a dietician on Yahoo yesterday about dieting and decide to take some of her advice. She says if you don't work some of your favorite foods into your plan that you will never be successful at staying on that plan. I think that is true. I think I over did on the carbs especially dressing is that I only make it 2x a year. That is why I had to throw it out because I knew that I would pig out on it if I kept it. Same with a lot of other foods. She also said that we go too low on our calories. Rather than eating quality, we eat low calorie foods which do not satisfy. She says we still have the fear of fats so we don't eat even the healthy ones which would keep us satisfied longer. One example she used is milk. She said the full fat milk would keep us more satisfied longer if we would use it instead of the skim or low fat versions of dairy. So true for me when counting calories.

I have a diabetic book written by Prevention years ago and it never said cook without sugar. It says eat less. It also teaches to eat enough throughout the day to keep blood sugar at a level instead of swinging up and down.

I don't want to add sugar to my plan or at least not very much, if any, but I do want to try some of the other ideas. I don't want to use whole milk, but I could go back to 2% milk and cheese. Although I use a lot of skimmed milk mozzarella. I did buy some nofat American cheese for cheese toast and I have to admit that it just isn't as good as the 2%. Burns before toast is done.

I also saw something about foods that are not bad for us like we have been told. In fact, DH and I really like the dark meat of a chicken and as the article says it has a lot more flavor and juicier. I can't remember the others right now.

Last night I decided to have a ham sandwich and eat some chips. I decided I didn't want all the calories in a little bag of chips. Knowing I am eating just what I want within a number of calories, I was excited when I found that I was actually able to eat only the amount I needed with the sandwich and I saved the rest of it for another time. That is how DH eats chips. I have enough chips out of that 1 oz package for 2 more meals. I've never been able to do that before. Quite an accomplishment for me.

We are having fish today. I saw how much sodium that was in 5 oz of ham yesterday and that is just too much. I went easy on sodium in my cooking Christmas day because of Daddy which worked. He had no problems with swelling so that was good. I've decided to freeze some of the ham in small bags and we can have a little at a time for ham and eggs or some in beans etc. We don't have to eat it all in one week. That is what freezers are for.

Down .6 lb from yesterday, but FBS was 164. Berberine definitely helps. I forgot to take it with my first cup of coffee and the coffee raised bs to 202 before breakfast. At least I learned that the Berberine does help lower it in the morning. Also I am trying the 10 minutes on bike after meals. May only get 20 minutes done today though. I'll see how that goes.

Better get busy. Need to cook lunch as DH is going to be hungry soon. Today is my Thursday. I didn't go any where today because we have to go to eye doctor for DH follow up at 9:45 in the morning. Since today was pay day, we will go shopping afterwards at Sam's and Walmart.

Have a good day.

Carol Sue, we will have a better 2018. :hug:

Trish, I eat full fat cheese. This last time I bought yogurt I bought the low fat and I didn't like it as much, so I will go back to the full fat. But I still prefer skim milk. I could maybe go back to 2%, but one time DH bought full fat milk and didn't realize it. He thought the milk was bad, and called me in the kitchen to see, and that's when I noticed that it was full fat. He doesn't like it anymore either. I already eat what I like. That might be why I have so much trouble losing weight, but if I eat things I don't like I'm not satisfied, and still looking for something. Having said that, there's a lot of things I used to like that I don't like anymore. My tastes have changed to healthier food, but low fat has never been on my list.

I have always preferred dark meat chicken and turkey. There are only certain circumstances where I like white meat, and this is why I cannot usually order chicken in a restaurant. It's usually white meat. Bob Evans has fried chicken tenders and fried chicken breast that I like. And so does Texas Roadhouse. Most others I don't like. I have ordered a crispy chicken sandwich from Wendy's that I like but I don't get it too often.

Today DH was throwing out our ham bone. I cut off some of the good meat that was on it and put it away. I am going to try making a small serving of ham, green beans and potatoes, or ham and cabbage with potatoes. I have had both and like them, but never made them myself. DH wouldn't eat it.

Today I stopped in the grocery store on the way home to get some veggies for when my friend comes to visit. We are going to eat healthy during out visit. LOL I bought a couple artichokes. I want to learn how to cook them. I have seen recipes but I want to look up some youtube videos to actually see someone do it. I have to figure out how to prepare it and get the choke out. When I mention artichokes DH always says "It might choke Artie, but it's not going to choke me!" LOL

We went to the casino today and we ate the buffet. They had different things on there than they do on weekends and there wasn't a lot of my favorites. I had some prime rib, mac and cheese and scalloped potatoes, plus the only veggie they had that I liked was corn. That was more starch than I usually eat so I took my prescribed amount of Glimiperide. When I came home I tested BS and it was 116, so I guess I took the right amount for what I was eating, plus I did a lot of walking there, too. I have a hard boiled egg in the refrigerator so I am going to eat that and go to bed.

A woman won $11,000 there today. I know some people have won more than that, but that's the highest I have actually seen, myself. Very lucky!!

Trish, I'll bet if we look back at the posts from this time last year we said that 2017 was going to be better. LOL

This morning my FBS was 130 after the 116 at bedtime. Now that I've had my coffee it's 157. I never know if I should take my meds as soon as I get up, or wait until I eat, and whether I should be eating as soon as I get up. Some say I should, but I'm not hungry, and eating seems to ramp up my appetite. It seems that if you ask different people, you get different answers.

My friend is coming today at noon. I need to clean the veggies and get them ready. It will be a nice little lunch for us.

Carol Sue I got up early to go to eye doc with DH so I ate breakfast since we have a lot of places to go after. I only had a bowl of cereal. So I will see how the eating as soon as I get up does. Lots of walking today shopping 2 or 3 stores.

FBS at 8 am was 164 same as yesterday at 9ish. Weight is coming back down a little each day. Isn't it strange that the weight comes on so fast but comes off so slowly. :dizzy: It is down to 216.4 from 218? the day after Christmas.

Is the lady coming today the lady with cancer? When will she get the results of her tests? Praying it hasn't spread and can be successfully treated.

Got to get ready to leave. When DH is ready to walk out the door, I better ready to boogie. LOL

BBL

Yes, my friend with the cancer diagnosis is the one coming today. She called the doctor's office yesterday and they said they did not yet received the results of the biopsy, which will tell them for sure if it is malignant. The doctor was going by sight and symptoms. She has a follow up appointment with the doctor on Jan 3, so she is thinking that the doctor might wait until then to discuss the results. If it's bad news, they might not want to give that info over the phone, especially to someone who lives alone. You never know how a person is going to react. But it's so hard waiting to know.

I am wondering how the bowl of cereal held you over. Since it is mostly carbs, I would probably get hungry very quickly, as compared to something with protein and fat, like eggs/bacon.

I hope DH's complications he had with his eye have cleared up. I know I need to go for an appointment soon. I'm putting it off. I always have an excuse. The doctor I want to go to is new to me. My brother-in-law went to her and had good results. I recently saw an ad for her in a booklet I received. It had her picture and she is a young woman. It seems that she handles a lot of eye problems in her office. She might want to see my records from the eye doctor I went to when they diagnosed the hole in my macula, but I wonder how long they keep those records? It was back in 2011 when I had that done. She could always do another test, but would probably want to compare the two. I should be going regularly, I know.

Carol Sue It would be nice to learn that the biopsy is negative. I didn't realize he was going by symptoms and eyesight. We can pray for a good result. I will keep her in my prayers.

The bowl of cereal held me very well although, I have to remember the fact that we were very busy and I probably wouldn't have had any problem not eating. However, I have to admit that sometime when I'm extra busy when I don't eat for a long time that my thinking sometimes becomes fuzzy. So I'm sure the bowl of cereal and coffee was very helpful. The good thing is that DH decided to wait until 2 to eat when we got home so we wouldn't be that far off from out regular eating time, my bs reading was 114. Remember it was 164 this morning.

I was so exhausted after walking all over Sam's and Walmart and then putting away all that food when we got home that I just heated up the leftovers from Christmas. We had ham and finished off the Candied Sweet Potatoes. Don't really know how to count the sweet potatoes because they were canned in Splenda and the only sugar on them were the few marshmallows I put on them and I used some brown Splenda sugar blend to cook them Christmas day. We almost finished the potato salad. I'll let DH finish those off tomorrow. I am tired of the ham for now and I will freeze some of it regardless of what he says so I can use them in beans later this winter. Tomorrow I will get back to cooking regular meals. I want some fried chicken, but I don't want fast food fried chicken. I want to cook it here at home where I can control the amount of flour and salt so it will be healthier. I don't plan to eat out that much this next year. I want to learn how to make healthier versions of some of the fast foods that we like.

DH right has healed up beautifully and the left eye is right on schedule of healing. We went to the Dollar Tree and got his reading glasses as this is what the doctor said for him to do. He said by the time he goes back in a month the eyes will have adjusted so they can test to see about reading glasses if he needs a prescription. However, most people from what I hear use the reading glasses from the Dollar Tree. Doctor told him what to get.

I tested my eyes while I DH was taking the eye test. The way they do it, I could test mine at the same time. My distance is about where his is with my glasses and almost there without. I decided to get me a pair of reading glasses for when I'm working on the computer because I noticed the last time I was working online with my checkbook that I needed the reading part of my glasses to read the check book, but I don't need the glasses to read the computer. I got a pair of reading glasses so I can set them on my face like granny glasses low on my nose and read the book through the glasses and then read the computer without glasses. It works beautifully. Now I can work faster without having to take my regular glasses on and off. At $1 a pair, I'm going to get a pair for the kitchen, bathroom and bedroom too for those times when I want to read directions on a bottle or fine print on something. I only need a 1.25 reading glasses.

Carol Sue I think 130 FBS was good this morning. I am going to continue eating the breakfast sooner after I get up for a while and see how that works for me. I'm not even going to worry about eating windows etc. I am going to work keeping my exercise at a minimum of 30 minutes a day to help keep the bs reading coming down. From what I have read, the exercise doesn't help with weight loss, so I will only use it for the bs control. I would like to eventually work the exercise up to 45 minutes, but that may take a while.

Trish, I hate putting all the food away after shopping. We come in through the garage. A lot of the food is stored down in the basement, the canned goods and dry goods. But we have to carry the perishables up the stairs to the kitchen. I can't carry much at a time because I have to hold onto the railing. I'm glad we go to the store often and don't bring home much at a time. My friend Carol has to carry everything up stairs too living in a townhouse. When we bought this house we were in our 30s and never gave a thought to all the steps when we got older. So many houses are like that in our area because of the hilly terrain.

When my BIL lived with his mother, his room was on the 3rd floor. He was up and down all those stairs all day and night and he was getting exercise. Now he lives in a trailer and get no exercise at all. He even drives up to the mailbox to get his mail, when he should be walking. His health has gone way downhill and he doesn't understand why. I try to get him to get out and walk around the trailer park once in a while but he doesn't listen.

I ate mostly veggie when my friend was here, and a couple cookies. Then for dinner I made steak and mash potatoes. But it was DH's birthday and we had cupcakes. I ate 1 1/2, and my blood sugar soared at bedtime. I just don't learn my lesson. So I took Glimiperide and this morning it is back in the 130s, and I try again to keep it in line, today. We will probably be going out for fish today.

It's true that exercise doesn't do much for weight loss, but we all need it, even if it's just day to day activity. It helps with blood sugar, blood pressure, lung function, muscle tone, digestion, sleep. Our bodies were made to move. It's good that you do your bike most days, and I like that we go to the store several days a week and I get that walking in. I do intend to continue with my exercise here, but I did it one day then skipped the next 2 days. We went to the casino, then my friend was here. Afternoon is the best time for exercise for me. It seems that once 5 PM comes along I turn into a slug. My energy for doing anything is gone. There for a while I was exercising around noon, then I would do a 10 minutes walk on the treadmill after dinner. My blood sugar was really good then, and it would be wise for me to get back to that. It's just something I have to MAKE myself do.

It is still very, very cold here, in the low teens, and we are expecting more snow.