Good morning!

Diane - Yay for a successful holiday weekend hike! That sounds so fantastic. I am from Wyoming, so I super miss the Rocky Mountains. It's crazy that hunting season is creeping up like it is, but I have no doubt you'll be ready. You have worked through injury after injury, and you are going strong!

Amanda - I love that you're doing the veggie thing. It can challenging, but it can also be incredibly rewarding. Not only can it be very healthy and animal-friendly, it is also super good for the environment. Yay for you! Glad you're hanging in there post-hurricane. I hear nurses are very much in demand right now, and that they're paying nurses something like $52/hour to go down there to help. I thought of you, and wondered if you were thinking about scooping up some extra cheddah.

I am up to 149.8. I did my laundry last night to have running gear ready to go, put my gear together and in the bathroom ready to go, and was ready to go for a run. But my daughter would.not.get.up. So instead of using my time to run, I used it to talk/fight/cajole. Ugh. So then, I didn't want to get dressed or go to work, etc. I hate how one thing going wrong can throw my whole day off. But. It is what it is. I finally got myself dressed (which is much tougher than it used to be some days, since I care more about how my clothes fit/look) and got my butt in the office. A morning semi-wasted. And that's okay.

I'm not setting goals today. I want to just let today play out and see how it goes. I do hope I don't go up over 150 again, though. That's the wrong direction.

Have a great day, everyone!

Hey guys, how's it going? I'm glad everyone seems to have had a pretty good holiday weekend.

Laurie: Yay romantic staycation getaway with your husband, boo having to deal with your plans being scuppered this morning. I would've been SOOOOOO mad if I got up that early and then couldn't go exercise in the end. Boooo!!! But I guess that is life and sometimes the best laid plans don't always pan out and it's awesome that you're trying to push past that and get on with your day. That's what's really inspiring- the keeping it moving when things don't go as planned.

Amanda: The vegetarian life seems like you've got a great handle on it so far. I like the idea of "flexitarian" too. I don't do very well with all or nothing anymore so the flexibility certainly appeals and it's cool you can eat the same things as before just without the meat.

Diane: I'm sooooo with you on alone time!!! I hope you had a wonderful day. I'm glad your hike went well even in spite of the heat! Do you have any more hikes planned before hunting season? I've actually never in my entire life been hiking. Was it a tough kind of hike that required specialty boots and thick socks and a hiking stick (?) like on tv or was it like a trail run sort of course? My ignorance about hiking must be showing but in my defence, I grew up below sea level in a coastal city with beaches and nary a slope-y street to be had so hiking is not really a thing here but I've always wanted to do it.

For me, yesterday went alright. My stomach was still acting up but after ALL the plain starchy carbs and ALL the antacids and anti-nausea medication and A LOT of prayer, I felt better this morning. I stayed within my calories and hit 6600 steps which was (1600) more than my goal so I'm not mad at that. However, I didn't write out my food plan and I didn't do my gratitude exercise, so 50-50 on that. Work is a little busy and I have a lot of things I need to finish before I leave for a cruise at the end of the month for my parents 35th anniversary but I'm trying not to procrastinate and stress about that. Other than that, everything is going alright today.


Goals For The Rest Of The Day
1.) Hit at least 6000 steps
2.) No extra food or snacks that aren't already logged into MFP
3.) Think of 3 things I'm grateful for and thank God for them.
4.) Complete today's to-do list for work so that I can start fresh tomorrow.


Wishing everyone a fabulous rest of the day.

Dread: Good for you for going with vegetarian. I think everyone should choose what they think is right for them, and what is good for their bodies! I would not be able to do it, but I will be here to cheer you on!!! Glad to see so many are helping out after Henry. I just hope that Irma stays away from Texas, at least. Another hit would be awful.

Laurie: You know, that is the worst when you have something planned, you're plugging along and then you get sidelined from something beyond your control. I struggle with that all the time. If something isn't good for the day, I have trouble bouncing back. Even if workouts are disrupted at the beginning of the week, I have trouble keeping on track for the rest of the week. UGH!

For me, I didn't get as much done yesterday as I thought I would, but I also was ok with that. My legs are still pretty sore this morning, although I do have my stuff to go running after work. We'll see how that goes. I need to run some errands, so I may not go after all, but we'll see.

I need to catch up on this thread but a quick glance looks like summer fun is over and the chickens are coming home to roost.... Plus some new (to me) names.

Good news / bad news / bad news / good news from me:
I kept up with MFP all of august (236 days of tracking!)
But I didn't always make healthy choices
And I wasn't weighing in! At all. My weigh in window is only Friday, Saturday, and Sunday morning and either I knew that day would be horrible or I just forgot because I was out of the habit (some of each)
But I weighed in today and i'm at 196
So... still in Onederland, didn't gain, kept tracking, and using my will power again

I'm come back tonight to catch up and do shout outs!

oh poop.... i lost my long post.... so a quick recap

Amanda - i'm glad the hurricane mostly passed you by. The news has been both heartbreaking and heartwarming. Texans are amazing. And your news about becoming a vegetarian is just Wow! I look forward to regular progress reports on that.

Laurie - my goal is to get even just half as many steps in a day as you. Just so inspiring.

Diane - Glad your knee healed up so you could get that hike in. That sounded delightful!

Lilion - glad your pup is doing better! I hope your vacation is great!

And Toasted - Greetings! My time losing last time must have ended about the time you showed up since I don't recognize your name at all. But I can see you are a fantastic re-addition to this group.

and like Toasted, I'm going to steal a page from Laurie's book....

Goals for the day
1 - Go for a walk. Any distance. Just do it.
2 - no sugar or salt snacks
3 - less time faffing about online (3FC doesn't count!)

Hey Everyone,

Vladadog, it's good to meet you. Yay maintaining in spite of a summer of fun. I've had a summer of all over the place, plan-wise, so I have nothing but admiration for maintaining without being beholden to the scale. I think in summary, your news was good news.

Diane: Ouchy about the soreness. That was me after my first week back running (mid-August). It hurts but in a way that you feel alive, if you know what I mean. So worth it. Hopefully, you're feeling better now.


I don't have to much to say between yesterday evening and this morning. I accomplished all my goals with food, gratitude and my work to-do list but I was nowhere near my step goal. In the interest of full disclosure and so you can imagine just how sedentary I am without exercise, I only did like 1800 steps yesterday. Sigh. I got THE WORST headache yesterday on the way home, like a migraine and I never get those, I felt nauseated and couldn't bear to see any light or hear any noise. It came up pretty suddenly too and for no apparent reason. I'm hoping it was low blood sugar related because I didn't eat anything between 1pm-ish when I had lunch and 9pm-ish when I started to head home from work but I don't know. Anyway when I got home, I crawled into bed and took some Tylenol and turned out the lights. I couldn't even bear the sound of the air conditioning so I turned it off. I slept nearly 10 hours and was late to work this morning which was fun. The important thing is that I feel a lot better but I also wasn't able to go for a walk yesterday or a run this morning so I missed hitting that target.

Goals for Today:
1.) Don't eat anything not already pre-logged into MFP
2.) Eat snack mid-afternoon not right after lunch
3.) Hit 5000 steps today
4.) Complete work to-do list for the day
5.) Go to bed before midnight

Good morning!

Vladadog - Good to see your post! I love that you're still in Onederland, even with a bit of a lull in your interest in compliance with your program. I am in awe of your tracking. I'm contemplating doing it again, as I know I am lying to myself about the calories I am eating, and I really, really need to figure out maintenance calories at some point. If you can do it for 236 days (!!!) in a row, I can muster up a week or two. Right?

Diane - Hope you were able to go for a run yesterday, and that your soreness had dissipated to the point where it wasn't too uncomfortable. And you were prophetic yesterday. I did have a huge challenge this morning in sticking to plan. In point of fact, I did not stick to plan. But that's why we have new opportunities every minute to get back to the plan. Yes?

Toasted - Glad your stomach troubles are behind you, and that your headache seems to be gone. One-two punches are the worst. Just when you think you've got it handled, something else changes your mind. I hope that the stomach and head troubles are behind you -- at least for an extended period of time. Going for a cruise with your family sounds awesome! It might even give you a focal point for just getting stuff done that you might have otherwise pushed off. (At least that's how it works for me. Sometimes.)

I am in a downward spiral right now. I did okay until about 2:00, when my husband and I were supposed to have counseling and it was canceled. He suggested lunch. I planned on going running after, so I suggested we get the free cookies available at the furniture store. I had not planned on eating any cookies, but for some reason, I could not just watch him eat them, so I ended up eating FIVE. Then, of course, I felt too nauseated to run, so the plan was to go for a short walk, then do a bit of work, then run. Instead, I ate way too much for dinner, ate some more cookies, and then ate some chocolate. I did end up with 26,477 steps yesterday, so I wasn't a complete failure. But I didn't run. Nevertheless, I patted myself on the back for having adjusted the sleep schedule of the entire house (inadvertently - I started going to bed earlier so I could run in the mornings, and my husband started joining me, and the kids made the decision to go to bed earlier than their required bedtime), set out my running gear for the morning, and set my alarm. I woke up in plenty of time, got dressed, and then talked myself out of running. My toes are sore. It's cold outside. I have procrastinated too long. UGH. So I ate some more cookies instead.

But now is a new opportunity. I have my to-do list, and it includes a 5-mile run. I am going to check everything off of the to-do list, and I am going to try to be "mindful" instead of "white knuckled" when it comes to food choices. I wonder how it will work.

Goals -
1 - Make "mindful" food choices.
2 - Run 5 miles
3 - Get 15K steps
4 - Cross off everything from my to-do list.
5 - Weigh in the morning.

Hope everyone has an adventurous and fruitful day!

Hey everyone, good afternoon! Yesterday went well in terms of hitting my goal number of steps (ended up doing over 10,000 ) and staying within my calories () and I woke up this morning to go running and just as I got off my street, it began to rain heavily so I had to go back home, but then I didn't give up and instead did an hour long intense weights and cardio circuit video that I never do because I thought it was too hard but in the end it was really enjoyable. I had a promising weigh in also. The only things I didn't do was meet my work target and my sleep target. I went to bed at 12.30am instead of pre-midnight, and I definitely want to be doing better than that, ideally going to bed before 11pm actually, but baby steps to get there. If you can't tell, I'm on all the highs today- post-workout high, good weigh in high, God is good high, all of them. I'm enjoying it whilst it lasts. It's good to have highs and lows because it makes the highs all the more enjoyable and praiseworthy.

Laurie, the spiral isn't so bad, as you say. For one thing, you did like TWENTY SIX AND A HALF THOUSAND STEPS!!!! IN ONE DAY!!! Excuse me!!! That is victorious in every way. Sure, maybe some of it was cancelled by a mini cookie meltdown but I doubt all of it was. And even if it was, you're already back on track game-planning it to succeed in the new day. Perfection is boring and robotic, it's the ups after the downs that are inspirational and Disney-movie worthy. I don't know if I'm the only somewhat bad person that (jealously) eyerolls a bit when you read someone's success story that is like "in 9 months I lost 200lbs by keeping my diet clean and exercising for an hour twice a day and the weight literally just fell off and left me with this super toned bikini model body because I never cheat and I've been maintaining that for 5 years. I can't even eat cookies anymore, they taste disgusting. All I eat is organic kale salads, no dressing, and occasionally some purple sweet potatoes after my monthly marathon." Isn't it more inspiring and real and more like life when someone is like "I lost weight and it was literal blood, sweat and tears but I did it anyway and fell down many times but picked myself up more times than I fell and so I succeeded. And sometimes, there are cookie meltdowns but it's okay, because there are fewer of those than on-plan days? Well to me, it is anyway. And I'm really looking forward to hearing about and learning from your mindfulness journey.

Okay, I've got to get back to work now but I wanted to check in and wish you guys and awesomely blessed Friday.

Goals for the rest of the day
1.) Hit at least 7500 steps for the day
2.) Stay within logged calories on MFP
3.) No second helpings of carb at dinner
4.) Complete work to-do list

Ok, this has to be one of the most well written and helpful things I've ever read! Thank you Toasted for putting this all into words. I am with you!! And I kind of needed to see this today! Wow!

Not much to say here. I'm a little buried at work, but looking forward to the weekend. I'll be ready to go on Monday!!

Hey guys, daily check in. The weekend was alright. I went running on Saturday but I kind of got the Sunday blues really badly yesterday and a melancholic third-life-crisis attack which caused quite a bit of overeating yesterday. "Still eating our feelings, are we? Apparently so. Anyway, I prayed and read my bible a lot last night and early this morning and felt better and decided to therefore, do better, so I went for a run this morning and didn't let the fact that I left my earphones behind give me an excuse to go back home. Let me just say, running with your own unfitness as the breathy soundtrack isn't the business. It was a lot harder going than when I do it with music. I had my phone with me though so I just set up my Intervals app and ran sprint intervals till I had done 5km. And then in my last 0.5km on the way home, the heavens opened and the rain poured down on me in a dramatic the-streets-were-flooded-in-10-minutes sort of way. NOOOOOOOO!!!! I don't NOOOOOOOO!!!! for my hair which I'd carefully put up in an updo last night, nope. Nor do I NOOOOOOOO!!!! for my not-waterproof, out of warranty iphone which I had to hold in my hand as I was pocketless. Nope. I'm NOOOOOOOO!!!!-ing for my shoes. My beloved running shoes that took precisely 4.5 runs to break in. You may be like it's just shoes but no, first of all, if they're ruined it will take me ages to replace them because I'm 3rd worldly and don't live in an Amazon world, well I do, but it's the world that takes Amazon nearly a month and premium shipping to get anything to me. I baby my shoes, like I would literally take them off and run barefoot in mud. I have another pair that I don't mind getting wet and muddy, but these Asics are my preciousssss (Golum voice). They will hopefully dry alright (probably). I don't have a tumble dryer and so I'm going to have to depend on good old sunlight when it stops raining. Sighhh... They're still soaking wet. They're never going to smell the same again, are they? #LuckyFirstWorldProblemsInTheThirdWorld

Diane: I'm so happy that you found what I wrote helpful. I hope things ease up for you at work soon and that you had a great weekend.

So far today, my eating has been good and I'm feeling alright. I'm still not getting enough sleep and I want to do better on that so I'm going to try to not stay so late at work today so that I can have my evening routine start a little earlier and can wind down at a more reasonable hour. I don't know if anyone is in OR has any family or friends in Florida (or Georgia) but I'm thinking of you guys and praying for safety and restoration for all that has been lost. Take care everyone.

Goals For The Day
1.) Hit 10,000 steps for the day
2.) Stick to only foods logged in MFP- no extra snacks
3.) Complete more than half of work TO DO list.

Hi Ladies! I’m back! We had a lovely, tiring trip, a day’s drive to Colorado – Kansas is SOOOOOOO long! I had a friend write this little ditty about it:

This is the state that never ends.
It goes on and on my friends.
She starting driving not knowing it was
And now she keeps driving because, because…

But once we got to Colorado and the beautiful mountains – which isn’t until you’re near Denver, before that, it’s pretty much still Kansas – we had a great time. We got to visit my only child for the first time in almost a YEAR - and his lovely girlfriend – 1st time meeting her, and spend a day with my cousin who took us up to this lovely mountain town called Nederland or something like that. We also went to Estes Park to the Stanley Hotel (from The Shining) which was fun. We saw lots of beautiful country and had a great time!

As for food…the snacks helped. We over-packed, but it was good to not buy chips and candy at the gas stations. We pretty much quit logging the food the first day though, just sticking 2,000 calories on MFP and calling it a day. We did kind of try to make good choices, but there were plenty of bad ones too, eating in restaurants does that. Also, my son got me a birthday cake - which I ate the last of last night! Still, I was happy, had good food, and in the end, it’s one week out of our lives. A gain won’t kill us so long as we don’t keep eating that way. In fact, as of this morning, my vacation weight seems to be gone and I’m back to my last recorded weight of 274.5. I could be up or down come Friday when I log it again. We shall see. Nice thing about being this big, you get a LOT of calories to just maintain. Next time, I intend to spend more times actually hiking around in the mountains. We were mostly in the car so only once did I even get more than 5000 steps – but that day I got 11,000! Wow I was tired! My son says he’s never moving back…so I think I can plan on a couple trips a year out there! I like that idea.

Exercise is still going to be a problem for me for a good long while I think, at least so long as my doggy-girl is with us. She did fine at the vet, but really is going downhill fast. The myelopathy is going to be the thing in the end I think. She’s having such a hard time walking. So taking her for walks isn't going to happen and I'm going home for lunch every day, so my lunch walk isn't happening.

I forgot! I did manage to start the first day of vacation off with a bang! First, I took a long walk. Then hubby came home early and we decided to go on a bike ride!!! I haven't been on a bike in NINE YEARS! I'm sure I looked like I just got my training wheels off! OMG! Only 2 miles or so but I was SO tired! Then we took the bikes to a shop and had them serviced - yeah, probably should have done that before! But after spending money, I suspect we'll be hitting the trail every now and then. Finally, we went swimming that night and did laps. What a way to start vacation...then we sat our butts in a car for pretty much 6 days.

So…first day back at work and I have to leave early for a dentist appt. Sorry I’m not giving anyone any personal replies, but I’ll have more time later I hope to catch up on everyone’s postings. Later all!

Good morning!

Lilion - So glad to have you back! Glad that your trip went well, that you got to reconnect with your child, and that he has found a lovely companion. So many good things happening. PLUS - you rediscovered fitness activities. You did not come back with significant weight gain to combat. And - you are poised to have further successes. What a great post!

Toasted - I hope you appreciate just how fantastic your input is. Like Diane, I completely needed to hear your "blood sweat and tears" thoughts. I would surmise that there are three broad categories -- those who never need to lose weight, through luck of nature (which might be either metabolism or just a disinclination to eat too much); those who need to lose weight, but just need a little education (which is not as rare as I typically think, but it seems like the majority of dieticians/medical professionals believe that this is the overwhelming majority of the overweight population); and those who need to conquer both the "know how to do it" portion and the "figure out how to mentally make ourselves do it" portion of weight control. I am going to guess that all of us on this thread are in that final category. As such, I, too, am more inspired by those who have to fight the messy, difficult battles. And UGH on your shoe crisis. I actually LOVE running in the rain, which I discovered to my delight a few weeks ago. But I don't have the same hair issues, nor the phone issue, and not the shoe issue. In fact, I just bought new running shoes, and had to return them, and was mortified to think that I didn't have functional running shoes for a few days. I hope that yours dry stronger and fresher-smelling than ever.

Diane - Hope you rocked the weekend and this week is exceptionally good for you on all fronts. And that work finally eases up a bit for you.

Not a great weekend foodwise, but activity-wise, it was okay. I woke up to run this morning, and got sidetracked with kid drama. So, it's on my to-do list for this afternoon. I listened to a book about habits, so I'm trying this new thing. When I get the urge to eat for the sake of eating, I am visualizing the neural pathways that lead me to bad food habits, and trying to recognize that indulging in obeisance to that urge does not make me feel better. Instead, I am trying to create new neural pathways that cause me to do something different when I get the urge to eat for the sake of eating. I have not had great results, but that may be simply because I'm not good at it yet. After a lifetime of white-knuckling with mixed results, I am going to continue to try this for a bit. I am not confident I will succeed, but I think it's definitely worthwhile to try to find a better system.

Goals -
1 - Eat mindfully and nutritiously
2 - 3 sets of push-ups, wallsits, and planks
3 - Run 5 miles
4 - Get my work to-do list completed.
5 - Quit hiding from my weekend and get on the scale
6 - Get up early and have a decent weight-lifting session in the morning

Hope y'all have a great day!

Toasted: Ugh! Hope the shoes are ok! When you find something that is really good, you hate to have it ruined! Let's hope they just bounce back to where they were before.

Lilion: Glad you're back! It is so true about the eastern side of Colorado. So Kansas-like! It seems like you probably did just fine, and had a good time. Estes Park is really pretty, so glad you enjoyed it!

Laurie: I like your goal of not hiding from the weekend and getting on the scale. I avoided mine today, too. I don't really know why. I just didn't want to do it.

For me, I had a pretty good weekend. I went and lifted this morning since I won't be able to tomorrow morning. I think I can go after work tomorrow, and it is just easier to do cardio after work. At least I don't have to fight for weights! I continue to struggle with food somewhat. I keep trying to fight that fight. It was so much easier before, but I let bad habits trickle back in and now it is tough to combat that.

Good morning!

Diane - Hope your weigh-in this morning was awesome. It sounds like you had a good weekend? I am still trying to take the morning work-out page from your book, though it's not going as well as I would like this week. I was surprised to discover that it's much, much easier to get the weights I need in the morning than it is after work. Sounds like it's the same at your gym?

Since the children are no longer biking to school (sad, sad face), I now have to take them to school. I told them I would be taking them half an hour early (they can work on homework, etc.) so that I could have enough time to get in a work-out before work, but my daughter ran fifteen minutes late. UGH! Children are so difficult sometimes. So, I will be looking to escape from work at some point today to go lift weights. Truthfully, though, I'm kind of looking forward to it. It is a nice way to break up the day.

This "mindful eating" thing was more effective yesterday than it was this weekend. Not perfect, still. I need to continue working on that muscle. We are officially out of pop chips, though, so that will be helpful with the random cravings for those. I did find myself very hungry when I went to bed at 10, so made the decision to eat a bit before sleeping. It was a good choice, as I didn't wake up in the middle of the night starving. But I am always so uncomfortable when I eat right before I sleep, so I need to work on evaluating my hunger a few hours earlier, I think. I did weigh this morning, and I am at 147.0, so I am about where I was at the beginning of the month. I really do want to focus for the next week or so to see if I can get my weight down into the 140-145 range.

Goals
1 - Eat mindfully, including making sure I am not super hungry at about 8:00 p.m. Do not eat anything after that last evaluation and possible correction.
2 - Get in my lifting session today.
3 - 15K steps.
4 - 3 sets of wallsits, planks, push-ups. (I did wallsits for 1:45 this morning! I thought I was going to die)
5 - Stay hyper-focused on work.

Hi Everyone, I'm doing alright. Re: shoe-gate, my shoes aren't dry still and when I looked for my 2nd pair this morning, I remembered that I'd given them away in my most recent closet cleanout. Sigh. I didn't go running today. Just as well, it rained again. Instead I did a workout in what shoe sites oxymoronically call "fashion sneakers." I tried not to do anything too high impact because I have recurring issues with one of my knees caused by unsupportive shoes. It's okay- at least I got something done. Goals-wise, yesterday went averagely well. I had a late night mango popsicle which I suspected contained pineapple juice which hurts my stomach and surprise!!! It hurt my stomach and kept me up till very late which means I didn't get much sleep which also hurts my stomach. Sigh. Cycles.

Lillion: Your vacation sounds like a blast. I'm glad you had a great time. No one ever remembers "that time we went to Colorado and ate entirely our pre-packed food on plan" but everyone remembers "sampling the local restaurants and spending time with family." And you're right it's just one week and it sounds amazing in spite of Kansas. What's there to do/see in Kansas? I'm sorry to hear about your dog.

Laurie: I so agree with your post. I think being a "blood, sweat and tears"-type it's easier to identify with that for sure. The habits plan sounds intriguing (and difficult) and worthwile. I definitely need a rewiring as well. At the time, I'm eating something that I know will physically make me feel sick afterwards, I will for some reason despite acknowledging "this won't end well, this will make me ill," I'll still eat it, knowing how much it will hurt me later. What's the name of the book if you don't mind sharing? Ninja'd Edit: Yay getting back to the weight you were before! I totally believe you can get into the 140-145 range! Go go go!!!

Diane: The food fight IS hard. I have nothing else to add to that other than to say, I'm with you and struggling too. When I think of how "disciplined" I used to be able to be with food, I'm wowed by myself. I'm just trying to do the best I can now, and trying to make each day better, but I know my calorie deficits aren't what they should be if I had my game face on. Sigh..

Alright guys, I've got to get back to work now. I pray you all have a wonderful day.

GOALS FOR THE DAY
1.) Go to bed before 11.30pm
2.) Go to bed before 11.30pm
3.) No popsicles before bed. Or cookies. Or snacks. Go to bed early.
4.) Get at least 5000 steps today
5.) Complete at least 4 items off to-do list.