Jen~I don't think I could have thrown out the letter--I'm just too curious that way (even if it could be detrimental). But it is sad that she does that to you.

Susan~congrats on the full time job!

Yuppie~you're taking your indiscretion well and planning very well to overcome it! WTG!

michelinwoman~congrats on the loss (both the MIL and the weight!)

donut~sometimes we have to give in to our cravings. Just get back on track today.

Jane~I hope you were able to get some sleep.

hikerchick~Hi!!

As for me, I had come in at 1196 calories yesterday, but since I had an early dinner before a dinner-time meeting, when I got home I had the munchies. I've plugged it all into Fitday and it came to 1334 calories. Not terrible. But since I've gone 3 days now with no wine, I am seeing changes!!!! The scale rewarded me with 139 this morning, but I'm not changing my ticker until I register that for another day or so. Tonight I have another dinner meeting with snacks included. I'll eat something healthy before I go and stick to only the healthy stuff at the meeting (last meeting they had this fabulous dip--but I only dipped twice!).

Everyone have a wonderful day!!

Susan a belated congrats!!! paid days off are nice (and I can attest from yesterday, despite getting all sorts of calls from co-workers & boss -- it's nice to feel that I'm needed, but when I'm off - I'm off! )

Allison Oooh, I know how tempting it is when there are catered meals/events at work. I'm not a big dip person, but our catering service makes these hors d'oeuvres that are irresistible (fried goat cheese wontons with a mango-honey glaze & seared steak cubes with a horseradish dressing.)

As noted, yesterday I took a personal day off work and pretty much ate out the whole day. It was a planned splurge so I don't feel too bad about it (and I tried to stick to healthful options), but of course, I can't do an accurate calorie count, so here goes:

Breakfast/Lunch:
Steak panini sandwich /w avocado & cheese, mixed greens salad, 1/3 of a peach cobbler

Snack:
1/2 a cupcake

Snack 2:
Frozen Yogurt topped with fruits (kiwi, mangoes, blueberries, strawberries)

Dinner (my mom & I splitted 2 apps and an entree):
1 pan-fried crabcake with light cole slaw
3 charbroiled oysters
1/2 a filet of roasted salmon with horseradish mashed potatoes & broccoli
1/2 a chocolate souffle (VERY WELL WORTH THE CALORIES! )

Exercise yesterday:
25 minutes of DDR
25 minutes of cardio with resistance bands
10 minutes of abs workout



My plan for today:

Breakfast:
Low-fat muffin (100)

Snack:
Whole-wheat toast with peanut butter (300)

Lunch:
Will be at a meeting, not sure if lunch will be served there, if not -- having a LeanCuisine & Apple/Blackberry sauce (350-400)

Snack 2:
Yogurt (110) or Mashed fruits (120-160)

Dinner:
Pork loin, applesauce, sweet potatoes (550)

Planned Total: 1410 - 1510

Exercise:
15 minutes abs & buns workout with dumbbells/stability ball
90 minutes tennis (class: so about 30 minutes practice/warmup, 15 minutes of drills & 45 minutes of competitive play, approximately)

Hope y'all are having (or going to have) a wonderful day too. Weekend's around the corner

Warlock~sounds like you had a great day! You must work at a great place to have such a great catering service!!! Reminds me (kind of) my corporate days....now the events are charity related, so it all depends on which member brings the refreshments! One day it might be chips and salsa--another a full blown meal! You just never know. The dip that one brought last month, it was more of a torte--if I remember correctly, cream cheese layered with roasted red peppers and something else. It was purchased from a store, and didn't look all that appetizing, but wow! when you tasted it! I wanted more!

Susan congrats on the job!!!

OK I am officially on the stress diet. I had trouble eating yesterday I am so stressed out. On the upside I am quickly shrinking. I hope I am not loosing muscle. Better go lift something heavy.

Susan, congrats!!

I've been miserably behind in posting, though I have a good Monday - Thursday after my terrible-for-my-body-but fun-food-filled weekend! I am trying to figure out how I can have a good weekend (with an exception for Easter dinner), without driving myself crazy. It is so hard to make good choices when I'm with DH (especially because we eat out so much) -- luckily, I don't have any events planned this weekend where lots of good food will be served. And we'll have our dog this weekend, so we probably won't eat out as much so as not to leave her alone.

My struggles continue with (a) creating a good strength training plan and (b) figuring out how many calories I should be eating each day.

Many of the sources I've consulted say I should be around 1,200, but that sounds so low when I'm working out for 1-2 hours six days per week. I can stay comfortably in the 1200-1300 range for a few days, but then I just feel so FREE when I have a big dinner or eat whatever I want over the weekend. It's not necessarily that I'm hungry, just that I feel so much more light-hearted!

On the good side, my body is starting to crave all of the right things -- lots of fruits, whole grains, water, and veggies. Some things, like French fries and pizza, seem downright unappealing, while others, like chocolate and baked goods and anything buttery, are still a struggle.

My plan is to just fake it 'til I make it and keep trying to find a plan that works for me in the long-term!

I've really been having trouble getting back on track since I got back from vacation. I guess you could say that I'm practicing my own form of IE, but not in a good way. I guess I got used to eating too much food while on vacation because now I am hungry all day. I just had a cup and a half of cereal for breakfast (my normal breakfast) and it seems like it barely took the edge off. I also have been craving nuts and twice now have given into the cravings big time in the afternoon. I threw out the cashews, but there are still other nuts around house.

Yuppiegirl--I'm so excited to hear that I'm insprirational to you! You just made my day! I can sympathize with your shock about how many calories are in restaurant salads. It's amazing that they often aren't much lower in calories than regular entres. Most of these salads are a lot of lettuce--where do all those calories come from?

2Frus--you go girl on that poisen pen letter! It's hard to let stuff like that go, but sometimes you just have to.

Poppins--Based on my own experience and given that you are I are similar in terms of height and goal weight, I definitely think 1200 calories is too low with your exercise level. When I was exercising for only 1/2 hour to 1 hour per day six days a week, I did 1200 calories per day for a couple of months, but had no problems continuing to lose when I increased to 1300 calories per day. When I increased my exercise to 1 hour per day for seven days a week, I stalled out and was not able to lose any more weight until I increased my calories to 1400 per day (I was also hungry all the time). So I think 1200 might be dangerously low, given your level of exercise. Many of these websites just don't take into account your exercise when they recommend a calorie level, so if you are exercising a lot, you do need to add some calories.

congrats to susan and allison!

today is my last official day of school for the year! i've a test later on today and one next week though. i am getting a rash on my face from stress, though.

Congrats susan!

Dont stress Carey It will be over soon!

Hey all!

Congrates on the full time job Susan!!! It's always nice to go up to that next level at work.

Allison, congrates on the little scale victory, I hope that it stays there for another couple days.

Poppins, I have to agree with Barbara, if you're exercisin 1 to 2 hours a day, eating 1200 calories will probably hinder your weight loss efforts. If you don't eat enough your body will hold on tight to it's fat because it's afraid of starving. And you will probably get so hungry that you'll binge at some point.

My day so far:
I had my last class. I went for a bike ride this morning, and then later I was biking to class... and I fell and I think I might have bruised a rib. It hurst if I breath in too deep or if I move a certain way. So I'm a little worried.

I'm bummed about the rib because I really wanted to do a lot of exercising today, like a swim and a run, but I'm not sure if I'll be able to. We shall see, maybe in a few hours it will be fine... Maybe it's just a little swollen or something.

On another note I need to work on lowering my sugar intake. Any ideas on how to do it? Should I go cold turkey or slowly lower it down? I basically eat it so many times a day that I want to lower it down to once a day.

Cats I think you should go to your doc or the student health center to have it checked out if you're having rib pain from breathing and otherwise painfree movements.

For sugar intake, how much do you think you're at right now and how low do you want to go? I personally prefer the gradual route, making habit changes such as getting sugarless drinks, or eating sandwiches open-faced, or asking for double the veggies instead of the starchy side -- and being very careful with the pre-restaurant meal bread.

Barbara Happens to me too when I take a break from calorie counting! But I've always managed to ease back into the habit and so I'm sure you will too!

Carey Early congrats for finishing the year! You've endured months of it, just gotta hang on for a little longer!

My day so far:

Actually ate less calories than planned, had to skip the morning snack because of endless meetings during the day, and because of a late lunch, I don't feel like an afternoon snack right now. But I do plan on a little something before dinner because I am NOT about to go play an hour and half of tennis on an empty stomach.

Cats: I had something like that and went to the emergency room for the chest pain. Turned out I had "chostocondritis" - basically an inflammation of the cartilege or something between my ribs. Of course they did an EKG and b loodwork to rule out other things, mostly b/c I was so concerned that it hurt to take a deep breath in. They t hought I did it from exercising hehe which will tell you how little I was moving before!

Blue The consistency with which you stay on plan is always amazing to me. I have trouble some days to be sure - and it's hard for me to mentally stay in the game all the time. It seems like you're always right in the zone.

Carey Hang in there!! You're almost done!!! Try to get as much fluids and rest as you can. There's something called Emergen-C, that you can pick up at a whole foods or nutrition type store - whenever I'm really stressed and get run down I mix one into water, it really helps to keep me well, give me some added nutrients too.

My day:
I am blessedly back on plan, thanks to ya'll.

Even with eating @ porters. I had the salad with the blue cheese and t he dressing on the side, dipped my fork, and had them put 1/2 their usual portion of salmon on it. And I didn't eat the bread that came with it either.

I made a wonderful Tilapia Piccata for dinner - it was aweome, about 450 calories per serving with the orzo you make to go with it. I added some steamed purple asparagus and baby squash too. It's a cooking light recipe. My boyfriend LOVED it, so kudos to me for finding something lower calorie for an entire dinner that was healthy and yummy to boot.

And I made it to swim aerobics! We used these weights in the water - the were like floating dumbells and I thought wow these are light.

Yeah - light that is until you try to hold them under the water! WHOA am I sore! We hung out in the hot tub afterwards. No going out dancing tonight though - I'm totally exhausted. Seven hours of activity this week is more movement than my body has seen in a long time.

HUGS to everyone, I hope you all had wonderful days!

Looking forward to another OP day tomorrow, that will start with Kashi honey puffs and some blueberries with a few slivered almonds. Yum.

for the featherweights!

intercostal chondriasis? .... I've had that. It was scarey! And painful.

You guys are sooo sweet and supportive. Thanks so much!

I tippled off into credit card land today and bought a couple of new scrub sets. Silly huh? being excited about new uniforms. And a new programable coffee maker for day shift

Ya think I can learn to get up at 5:10 and go for a quick run? DH thinks he might try it if I do.

It's not the same thing as a painful rib, but once I managed to somehow injure my shoulder by stretching. I have no idea what I did but it hurt to breathe for days. I didn't have health insurance at the time (it was just after I graduated from college and I was working as a temp) so I couldn't go to a doctor for it. I was quite panicked--I had no idea if I'd just pulled a muscle or if I somehow broken a bone (it was really painful). But just about the time I was ready to give up and tell my Dad he needed to cough up the money for me to go to the doctor, it started to get better, so I never did figure out what it was.

Yuppiegirl, I wish I were always in the zone! The last few days, since I got back from vacation, have been terrible. I'm way outside the zone; I can't even find it on my map. But tomorrow I start fresh and hopefully I can make this thing stick (to mix my metaphors ). Hopefully I'm not discouraging you by revealing my downfall!

I love Cooking Light; gonna have to look for that Tilapia Piccata recipe. They also have a Chicken Lemon Piccata recipe that is awesome!

Susan, 5:10 for a run! You go girl! I'll be sleeping. Even more power to you for motivating your DH to go! My SO was supposed to be going to the gym with me but that stopped a looooonnnng time ago.

I will not eat anymore nuts! I will not eat anymore nuts!

Susan - 5:10 . . . Is that AM ? I'm with Barbara, I'll be sleeping too.

Allison - Congratulations on your weight loss this week .

I too, lost 2 lbs. (down to 145) this week but, like Allison, I'm not gonna change my ticker for a few days to see if it sticks. I have been on a plateau for about 3 weeks. This would be my all time low on my journey if it does stick, so keep your fingers crossed

Not looking forward to this weekend. Going to the in-laws tomorrow for dinner and I am cooking on Sunday. I will really have to watch it if I want my new weight to stick. At least I have some motivation now .

Everyone have a nice Easter!

Well chickies, I'm moving my ticker to 139!! Actually weighed in at 138.5 this morning, but due to my weekly lunch out with DH, I'm sure that half pound is only temporary.

Susan, I get up before that everyday! But it's not to exercise--its to get me and the kids up and ready for work and school. If I were to exercise in the morning, I'd be getting up at 4:20 (did that in January--no thanks to repeating it). It's too dark for me to walk or jog, so I was doing the NordicTrak but that got so boring so fast......I know, my bad.

Oh, rib pain. Think about this one. I had the flu about 4 or 5 years ago and coughed so hard that I broke the cartilage in my rib cage! The doctor said it would take an 2 weeks longer to heal that than if I had broken a rib. So, not only did it hurt to breathe, but here I am with a bad, bad case of the flu (I was in bed for a week--totally not me) and then this. The coughing was horrendous. I was in pain for about 8 weeks.

abbyin~I hope you get to move your ticker!!! Congrats!

Yuppie~don't ya just love Cooking Light?!?! When I'm bored at work I go and check out the recipes! I've made some pretty incredible dishes and the family loves them all!