So my confession is that I was hoping that I would not have to exercise and lose weight quickly. Not working out too well. So I start on Wed. Tomorrow we have all day plans. So Wed. it is.

Sabotage. I thought I might be using too much Splenda, so I bought the liquid form online. I went to the store and bought sugar-free vanilla creamer for my coffee. Then at the check out line I picked up my usual Coke-zero. Then I read the label and it has aspertame in it!! So no more Coke-zeros for me. The good news is that I found sweet sugar-free iced tea and it is sweetened with sucralose. Yay! I would rather drink iced tea than soda any day.

Yep. Uses sucralose from Splenda.

I bought the vanilla and the caramel. The caramel does have 1 carb per 2 Tbs. so I will use that sparingly.

It is "Torani" sugar free vanilla. I bought it at Wal-mart. I think it was about $4.50 for 12.7 oz.

Confession and Sabotage: I forgot to take meat out of the freezer for dinner and my day wasn't as well planned as I thought - I was so hungry when I got home that I had leftover Chinese food

Lesson learned for tomorrow. I obviously need to bring more food with me to work - hard cooked eggs and some cheese maybe.

Have you heard of Stevia? I believe its calorie and fat free... its a sweetener thats way sweeter than sugar but no fat and calories and its not that horrible chemical aspertame!

Is it powder or liquid? I have been reading that in order to make the powder form they need to add something called Maltodextrin and that adds carbs. Not sure if has that in it, but worth looking into.

Maltodextrin is made from corn or wheat - hence the carbs. My doc thought I was gluten intolerant so for months I was always checking for the corn version in my foods. I've never heard of it being used in Stevia though. Food for thought. I don't use sweeteners anyway - even they'll set off cravings for me. Horrible!

So I had a friend come and visit last week and I was so good. She wanted to eat out both days and I had steak, broccoli, and salad. Then the next night we went to Chili's and I had the chicken fajitas - no tortillas and only ate half of the onions. (there are soooo many) She was a little upset that I wouldn't share a bloomin onion, but I don't like them anyways. So it didn't affect us going out at all.

So same friend meets me at Six Flags today. I bring leftover cheeseburgers (no bun) and a salad. She brought her own lunch. She offered me some of her grapes and I said no thanks, i shouldn't eat those. She gets this disgusted look on her face and says "WHAT CAN YOU EAT?"

Why does she care? We each brought our own lunches, we still got to go out. Jealosy? Whatever. It just makes me want to stick with it that much more.

Confession: I am worried that this isn't going to work.

Normally I would say "no thanks" but she stayed here for 2 days, explained to her what I was doing, and I thought she understood.

Is your friend a former "eating buddy"? Is she overweight or is she one of those lucky people who burn up all they eat? Most people are threatened by change...I have a very close friend (5' 120 lbs) who I lives off of junk at home and "fried," pasta, and bloomin' onions when we go out. I noticed the last time we went out to eat, she was a little snippy when I didn't want to split the awful appetizer. I ignored the snippy and ordered philly cheese steak and scooped out the meat, cheese, and onion/peppers to eat.

She's seen me "diet" unsuccessfully many times in the past couple of years, so it's no wonder she isn't taking this seriously. But she doesn't suffer the consequences of what I eat. I do, so I've said, "I'm off carbs and sugar for a while..." I realize we don't owe anyone an explanation, but as in your situation, it's logical you'd explain what you're doing. Also, those who are close to us or live with us can help us if they know what what our goals are and what we need to do to reach them.

I don't know how often you see your friend, but if she continues to be negative or annoying about what you eat, maybe I'd arrange to get together and do things that don't require food. I have a couple of friends who pressure me to drink. I have no idea why it bothers them that I'm not drinking half a bottle of wine in the evening...I just say, "I don't drink much any more." Because it's true and it's none of their business why...they're both super-thin. I think they cut carbs during the day and drink wine at night.

You're committed to doing what you need to do to be healthy, and you're doing great! Plug up your ears..."Nah, nah, nah...I can't hear you!"

I don't know why our friends/ family have to give us crap about what we are eating or not eating.... When I first started this, I saw my sister and my niece at chilli's, walked over to say hey, and when I was walking off, she asked if I wanted her leftover chili cheese fries!!!! I said no thank you, and was pissed at her for about 3 days... I had only been on Atkins like 4 days when she did that, and she knows how I struggle!!! After I got over being mad, I talked to her about and pointed out that it wouldn't hurt for her and her husband to take the way they eat a little more seriously, we are not getting any younger!!!!!! She has not said another word since!!

I am sorry your friend is being difficult!! It's to bad as human we can't just encourage each others choices, what ever they are!!

Aren't family and friends just the funniest. I offer no explanation when I eat out .... I had fish taco's while out with a friend and I could tell from the expression on her face that she found it odd that I was scooping the filling out of the taco's and putting the taco's aside ..... but I said nary a word, just carried on.

I find that family and friends are more pushy about alcohol than about the carbs and I honestly cannot figure out why it bothers people that I do not drink that much. Even while in France for 3 weeks I had very little wine, what I had was great and enough for me, but every night I was bombarded by everyone about why I wasn't drinking ... felt like I was at the therapists being questioned about why I wasn't sleeping, there was that much genuine concern over my lack of drinking that surely something must be wrong with me!!! Annoying at best.