Carol Sue, that's really interesting about the cold cooked potatoes! So with the sugar added to the store-bought coleslaw and the fact that you've done well with potato salad, does that mean that potato salad is the healthier choice for you?

I love fudgy brownies also. As much as I love chocolate though, some chocolate is actually two sweet for me. For instance I don't like hot fudge cake or devil food's cake. It's just too sweet. I can take a couple of bites of devil's food cake if I overpower it with vanilla ice cream, but I can't eat hot fudge cake at all. In fact, sometimes I can't even eat chocolate fudge. I think it's so odd that I love chocolate so much, but some of it I don't like at all! Chocolate mint, though, that's my downfall! I could eat an entire bag of the candy cane Hershey's kisses!

I know it's frustrating to be eating so well while the scale continues to be so stubborn. I'm facing that myself right now. We just have to hang in there!

Mars, yay on the drop back down! I hope it keeps going!

I jumped up a lb today! My weight likes to go down in half lbs but doesn't mind jumping back up in lbs, lol! Who knows what's going on? I ate smoked sausage last night, so maybe it's sodium. I suspected I might be in trouble when I drank a whole one of my bottles of water (over 24 oz) with dinner and didn't have to rush to the bathroom like I normally do. When I woke up this morning, my joints were all achy, so I knew it wasn't going to be good news on the scale. It probably didn't help that I only did 20 minutes of exercise last night, but I just was not feeling the CardioGlide last night! Anyway, those are my guesses!

My eating schedule has been thrown off today, so I'm going with it and see what happens. Hubs had a dental appt this morning and he wanted me to wait to make breakfast, but he didn't get home until 11:30. So I ate yogurt while I waited for him and we had eggs and bacon basically at lunchtime, so that's how I'm counting it. If I need to have a string cheese before I go to the gym this afternoon, I will, but I'm not having a whole separate lunch. I'm never hungry for lunch anyway. My breakfasts, which I usually eat around 10:00, are so large that I'm never hungry for lunch and only make myself have a salad, usually at 2:00, so my blood sugar won't drop while I'm at the gym. Right now I am absolutely stuffed!

Week 14: High 194, Low 192
8/2--193.5
8/3--194
8/4--193
8/5--193
8/6--193.5
8/7--192
8/8--193 Carb Day

Week 15:
8/9--193.5
8/10--194.5
8/11--
8/12--
8/13--
8/14--
8/15--

Today's Meals:
Breakfast:
Fage Greek yogurt with Mio
Mio water

Lunch:
2 fried eggs in coconut oil
2 slices of bacon
Mio water

Snack:
A tsp of coconut oil (It's not exactly a "snack," but I have to include it somewhere on here, lol!)

Dinner:
Large field greens salad, topped with turkey, walnuts, and ranch dressing
Fage Greek yogurt with Mio
Mio water

Today's Exercise:
2-mile walk around the track, 3 sets of 12 reps each on 5 leg machines and 3 waist and back machines

Good afternoon all! I spent the weekend with my kids at my best friend's house about 3 hours away. It was a lot of fun. No exercise but my abs did cramp from laughing so that's good

They don't actually eat on a schedule. I bring food for the kids or go shopping to have things for them to eat...I suggested safe restaurants and then I cooked one night and helped cook another. As a result I didn't get a lot of dairy which I missed (no fridge room) and I did not get any coffee. We found a detox tea and slimming tea - NOT a laxative or stimulant, it's called pu'er and apparently speeds metabolism and is drunk after meals in China. I'm trying it. Detox tea is just liver supporting herbs. I will let you know if I magically lost weight on it. I fixed a plate of huevos rancheros when I got home. I missed having my own kitchen! Dieting is so hard when someone else is in charge of your environment.

Daily
Macros and calories still on track.
I added back my 2nd serving of OVCO and 1 serving of OPB (mixed) with a little sea salt as my dessert/snack last night. It wasn’t terrible. I can lick the spoon after using OVCO (not wanting to waste the precious commodity), but I just can’t eat any more than that by itself.
Mr. Scale is still being friendly, but I sometimes see a 2 day uptick from things that I change. Maybe I’ll be back to my July low before August is over.
What else of unimportance that I can ramble on about? Still making a mess with my new hand blender, but am getting the hang of it. It is definitely worth it and makes my bulletproof coffee so much better. I just can’t give up the Stevia yet...and maybe never, but I limit myself to two packets per day. Better than Sugar in the Raw, hopefully.
I think I am finally adjusting to the new time zone. I can’t seem to go to sleep without the TV on/turned down low, but when I wake up during the night I’m finding that if I turn the TV off that I can go back to sleep and sleep later. The only bad thing is that I’m getting up too late to catch the 50’s and actually got my sweat on this morning walking in the 60’s then caught a little too much sun on my delicate flowered skin; I guess the 10am sun protection thing doesn’t apply on the West Coast?
Tonight’s experiment: I will try to turn the TV off the FIRST time I wake up and see if I can actually get more than an hour of sleep at a time. Who knows what kind of trouble I can get into if I ever get a good night’s sleep!?!

Week 1 - High 238.6 - Low 234.0 - Avg Daily 236.0
Week 2 - High 237.0 - Low 232.6 - Avg Daily 234.6
Week 3 - High 237.0 - Low 233.6 - Avg Daily 235.0

Week 4
8/08 - 236.0
8/09 - 235.6
8/10 - 235.0

Walked 4.1 miles

Mary, so glad you had a nice weekend! I hope the detox tea works the way you want it to.

Jacqui, time flies, doesn’t it!? You could be building muscle, holding water or having a delay from Carb Day? You know the drill, but I know it is frustrating. But, it seems like your body bounces back pretty quickly from just about anything so I’m predicting a new low this week! I’m the same way with breakfast being so filling most days. It seems like I rarely eat lunch until after 2 anymore and then I’m always battling with myself about eating dinner too late, skipping it or going lighter. I’ve always heard that the lightest meal should be dinner so maybe we are doing well in that regard.
I haven’t tried Coconut Oil in eggs yet, but the “good” stuff usually does have more of a coconut smell/taste and I have a hard time thinking that I will like that with eggs. But if I can eat bacon covered doughnuts, who knows!? ETA: Since you usually have bacon for breakfast, maybe you could throw a little bacon grease in with the new EVOCO to see if hubby likes that better?

Mars, Woohoo on getting back to your low!
Your Coco Oil gives a new meaning to washing your mouth out with soap, eh? Yep, they say when you reach goal and start the maintaining road that you can (again) eat so many more things and not gain. I wonder if that applies if your goal is to just not be obese? I guess I answered my own question after last week. Nothing applies to my bizarre body.
I know you are excited about the vacation. How long will you be gone? Will you still check in occasionally? Didn’t you say AZ and bird watching?

Carol, are you measuring? I wish now that I had because we could be losing inches instead of pounds? I know they say to go by your clothes, but I wear so much stretchy stuff that it is hard to judge. I am noticing my shirts aren’t as tight and I’m not overflowing my bras as much so maybe we really are getting smaller even though the scale isn’t reporting it?
We never use sugar in our slaw either. My mother would add dill pickles to hers which I didn’t particularly like, but no added sugar. I just like mayo and seasonings pretty much with maybe a little onion. I only started liking cabbage recently, but I prefer it raw although I will tolerate it cooked. I want to try it with bacon grease because people used to tell me steamed cabbage in bacon grease is fab or with bits of bacon cooked in it. I’m too stingy with my bacon to waste it on cabbage, but I want to try the bacon grease instead of EVOO for a change since I normally throw out the grease.
I think you may be the first person that I have ever heard of that doesn’t like bacon by itself. I had bacon between two slices of tomato for breakfast this morning. That is as close as I am to ever having fruit for breakfast. I cooked the last of my meat market bacon this morning because I didn’t want it to go bad. And I am here to tell you that I could easily have eaten all 4 pieces with nothing but a smile on my face.

As far as the eggs, this is the first time I have tried them in bacon grease. I didn’t particularly care for it at first, but it has grown on me. I prefer butter and now especially grass fed. I found myself wanting to save the bacon grease this morning since I had batch cooked the last of my eggs. I don’t even know if you CAN save it? Or for how long? I refrigerated it just in case. I thought it might be good on cabbage, but I forgot that I ate all of that, too. IF anyone knows the “rules” for saving bacon grease or if you can save it, please report.

Mary, I'm glad to hear you had a good time! I'm glad you're back too! Let us know how the pu-ehr tea works for you, because it's something I'm interested in too, but I haven't picked it up yet.

Bewildered, yay! Your scale is moving back down! That bacon obviously agrees with you, lol! And great job on the walking!

As for me, well,, I seem to be facing the same uncomfortable condition I was facing last week before the Smooth Move tea. I've suffered with this off and on for years, but whenever I diet, it seems to get worse, which is baffling since I eat more fiber, drink more water, and exercise when I diet, all of which are the recommendations for avoiding/alleviating constipation. I've heard that too much fiber can actually exacerbate the problem, but I really don't think I overdo it. I just think I'm prone to this. My RA may be a contributing factor. Anyway, I'm bloated again, I have general discomfort again, and TMI but I have pellet-like stool, which is a classic symptom. It didn't just start today. It's been slowly returning to this each day. I'm going to try to up my coconut oil and see if that helps. I read an article today that says it does. I'm going straight for eating it with a teaspoon. Good thing I like coconut, and since I finally bought the good stuff, it tastes "coconutty." Another option I'm considering is to order this probiotic, VSL#3, which is supposed to be really good but is rather pricey. I'd rather try the coconut oil first. If nothing else, I still have a whole box of Smooth Move tea left!

Jacqui, I hope you get some relief! It might take you a couple of days to notice the smoothness of things once starting the extra CO. In my case, I am extremly regular and it took me 2-3 days to notice the difference. But, keep in mind that if you are already a bit backed up well, it is more a mtnc thing like probiotics so it helps more once you have established some regularity. I didn't mention it, but all of my extra fat caught up with me in a big way ysd and TMI, the stomach gurgling and a good bit of the afternoon catching up on my reading if you know what I mean or it could have been because I'm not used to eating so much red meat and pork. Anyways, also keep in mind that when we eat more healthy that things have a tendency to be more compact (told to me by a pharmacist that was a health nut) and we have less waste, too. AND without all that daily bunch of bad carbs to fluff things up, things do have a tendency to um back up or not be as much of what we are used to. Am I making any sense whatsoever?

Bewildered, yes, you are making a lot of sense, lol! And I have heard that meat can cause issues like this, so I can see how it would affect you since you have added more red meat to your diet recently. I'm glad that as a rule you are usually quite regular though. I don't eat a whole lot of meat, but I always try to include some for the protein with each meal. I think my rheumatoid arthritis is the major contributing factor for me (apparently it's a pretty common symptom of RA), and when I go on a diet and things become more "compact" like your health nut pharmacist said, lol, I am bound to end up with this problem, but I'm working on it!

Bewildered: Flash Back for me, my mother and grandmother use to save bacon grease in a small container on the stove top, and they used it for various things when cooking. I think the other thing they had was lard and not sure if shortening was available yet or too expensive. But I remember my mom making chocolate chip cookies using bacon grease, they were good I think (but her method only allowed three chocolate chips per cookie (but that is another story!). We didn't know any better than, but today, I think people would freak out about leaving bacon grease on the stove top for days. Crazy what we use to do and what we do now. Well, I feel old with that memory at least in my mind, because I am not old yet. (and I have had eggs fried in bacon grease when I lived in TX with my Texan(who I was head over heels for) for 3 months, and no thank you, they were just swimming in it, and slid right down!

How do you make your bulletproof coffee?

Week 1 169.9 6/9/15
Week 8 High 167.4 Low 164.6 AVG 165.8
Week 9 High 167.2 Low 165 Avg 165.9
Week 10
8/8 163.8
8/9 166.2 (+2.4)
8/10 163.8 (-2.4)
8/11 164.2 (+.4)

B tomato/onion omelet whey shake/coffee
L salad, kidney beans, chicken, evoo
D 8hrs later Turkey chili, roasted butternut,cauli, red onion, basil, CO
S pear, shredded cabbage roasted in chicken dripping, a little CO on the side

2 L vanilla spice tea
ex steps at work about 3.5 mi

chickadeee I have the same memory of that bacon grease in a can sitting on the counter top. I don't know if it ever got used, or just finally tossed. I never cared all that much for bacon, but nowadays I like anything salty. I'll take sausage any ole time over bacon!

Jacqui I think you have most likely lost weight, the right kind, but it's just masked by the backup & maybe some inflammation. I'm sorry you have to deal with these issues! But it sounds like you are figuring things out. I hope the probiotics work. Another tried and true natural remedy is Senna. I think it's on the pricey side.

Mary Oh how I dread not having control over my eating times and menus! Well-done!!!!! Sounds like a really fun weekend!

Bewildered Yes I will definitely be checking in here--can't imagine not doing it. The only limiting factor will be connectivity and typing on the mobile! I'll be gone for 2 weeks. It seemed so far away and now it's right around the corner and i'm getting that feeling of having a gazillion loose ends to tie up.

So PB & CO don't mix--I would have thought they were perfect together! I love to eat Co by the spoonful, but actually 1-2 tsps is about all it takes before i don't want anymore. My co-worker uses it as a mouth wash, read that it somehow absorbs the mouth bacteria.

So your scale is a Mister? LOL, mine is a Ms! Jacqui, which is your scale? I finally started measuring in addition to weighing. Never too late! I plan to re-measure on the first of each month. Another thing is to keep graphs--MFP does it automatically if you log in your weight, & also has option for measurement graph. I am trying to focus on NSVs as I wait out the scale numbers that I'd like. I'll take anything! Today I noticed that my go-to bigger jeans and top fit nicely even after coming out of the dryer, not too tight. Next goal is to squeeze into anything at all in my closet that's a little smaller!

I'm dragging today & can't wait until I get home & go to sleep! I woke up about 3 times because I drank my fluids late in day. But didn't mind as I got a chance o look up for the Perseid meteor showers. But it's always cloudy here in Aug, oh well. This would have been a perfect time to be in SE AZ. Will aim for that next yr. Love those shooting stars!

My mother always had a container of bacon grease on the stove and used it for a lot of her cooking. She also used lard. For years I thought that her heart disease and that of most of her family was due to the lard, but from what I'm learning now, it was probably due to the high carb intake. From what I've been reading, fat is good for you, until you start to add carbs to it. It's the carbs that raise tryglycerides. I don't think my mother used shortening such as Crisco, ever.

The reason I don't care for bacon is the salt. I do not like salty things. When I was still eating potato chips and pretzels I bought the no-salt variety. I don't cook with much salt and most people who eat my cooking make good use of the salt shaker.

After my bowel surgery the surgeon told me to be careful not to get constipated. I never got around to asking him how long that advice applied, but I heed it to this day. I take my stool softener at the first sign...never let it get too out of hand. I hope you find relief, Jacqui.

ETA: Calories were fine afterall (around 1500), I forgot to log about 175 calories that I ate
Yesterday's calories were slightly lower than I like to go; but I only ate twice and wasn’t hungry in the middle of the day (fat rocks!). I'm really trying to not eat unless I am hungry except for breakfast because I know that will always hit me hard late morning. I think since I sip on the bulletproof that it is like a lunch substitute. I know people use it as a breakfast substitute, but for some reason that doesn't work for me and I get hungry if I don't have food. The unfortunate side of sipping on coffee is that it affects my water intake because I’m only getting about 20 ounces in the morning. I have to push the water hard in the afternoon and chug down 40 ounces of lemon water in between the regular to compensate and then I get the interrupted sleep to go to the Ladies. But, I think less water (more than the recommended 64ounces, still) is actually giving me more energy because I’m not washing away the stuff I need to function. That is the story I'm sticking with.

Best.Sleep.In.Awhile! I didn’t get to test my TV theory because I don’t remember waking up until around 4am. (Instead of every hour on the hour) Did my business, turned the TV off and slept for another hour or more, maybe 2? New record in years - I think maybe close to 7 hours total with only one bathroom break. Woop Woop! Brain power!

Week 1 - High 238.6 - Low 234.0 - Avg Daily 236.0
Week 2 - High 237.0 - Low 232.6 - Avg Daily 234.6
Week 3 - High 237.0 - Low 233.6 - Avg Daily 235.0

Week 4
8/08 - 236.0
8/09 - 235.6
8/10 - 235.0
8/11 - 234.2

Exercise bike 7.1 Miles - mostly humped it hard on Level 3 and 4; really got my sweat on!

Jacqui, I hope you are feeling better! Usually I start having regularity issues when I eat healthy for extended periods of time and when I try to have at least 4-6 ounces of protein at each meal; but red meat and pork does seem to make things worse. This time, the added fat has really helped keep my regularity and the smoothness of the whole process; Sunday it was a little too helpful, but I would rather have the too much than too little, I guess. I have heard people have issues with adding too much CO at once, but I just ignored it because I have an iron stomach and jumped in full blast along with the other things that I normally don’t eat. I was lucky I made it almost a week before things got rocky. My male friend says fat is the answer to everything and he is lean with great skin so I have no reason to doubt him. It is still hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that fat isn’t the enemy (I still get so much guilt eating bacon even) and I still have doubts as others (Mars?) mentioned. I guess I look at it that I’ve spent so many years eating low fat that if it is bad, hopefully all the fat in my later years will balance it all out.

Chickadeee, great to see you! I hope all is well with you!? If I use bacon grease in my eggs, I usually batch cook them so they aren't swimming. It also helps for reheating scrambled because they don't dry out. In my bulletproof I use 1T OVCO, 1T grass fed butter, 2T no hormone cream, 2 cups coffee and 2 packets of Stevia.

Mars, I forgot to say that I hope you got some rest and I'm glad you will be checking in on VayKay! 2 weeks is a long time to not get my Mars Fix. Woohoo on looser clothes, too! Go you! I keep forgetting to get my measuring tape out of the unpacked stuff. Yep, scale and vehicle are Misters. I gotta be different, yanno. My scale puts me through h&ll, but my SUV (knock on wood) is always reliable even after 6 years. I guess it is because I finally got rid of the husbands so they are my only “male” intimate relationships that get to see me at my worst. Hah!
PB and CO do mix well especially when the PB is completely organic and the only ingredients are peanuts. Individually I can't eat them but together they are tolerable with a little sea salt. I have added that back as my evening snack and it is apparently not detouring the weight loss (this week) if eaten in moderation (1 serving each)
I have read about the CO and teeth (oil pulling) but I don't know if I could swish it that long...1 T for 20 mins...

Carol, I agree that most of our parents and grandparents health issues and weight issues were probably related to the carbs. Homemade biscuits were a staple of every meal and flour was used in just about everything. Salt is my weakness over sugar but I like both too much.

Gotta love auto correct on cell phones. I need to start reading these things better before I post them, but I still miss things.

Have a great fabulous wonderful day everyone! Sleeping well is a glorious feeling!!!

Jacqui, a few posts back I noticed that you said you didn't make it to the Y so you used your Cardioglide. I have something similar, but it's called a Bodyglide, or something like that. I've had it for years. I like it most to strengthen my thighs above the knee. Strengthening those muscles helps my knee work better.