Planning!

I'm like you - if I let myself get too hungry I'll eat everything in sight. So I plan. I posted another thread this weekend about what I do on Sunday to prepare for the week. I boil anywhere from 6 to 12 eggs on most Sundays. I make 5 or 6 1/2 peanut butter sandwiches. I slice and cut veggies and pre-bag them. I always keep wasa crackers in the pantry and Laughing Cow cheese in the fridge. I always have apples in the basket on the table.

And I never really allow myself to get *starving* hungry. If I am hungry I first make sure I'm *really* hungry and not just bored or wanting to eat. If I'm really hungry, I have an apple. Or a wasa cracker with cheese. Or I pop some popcorn. Or I eat a 1/2 a pb sandwich. Any of the things I already have available.

ANd sometimes I think that I don't really *want* an apple or a pb sandwich, so I tell myself that if I'm still hungry after I eat an apple, I can have something else. And lo and behold, after the apple, I'm not really hungry any more.

But planning is key. On the days that I haven't planned, those are the days that I wind up eating over my calories and regretting it ... because I let myself get hungry and then ate stuff I knew I shouldn't have.

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I am calorie counting, exercising, and writing down everything that goes into my mouth. I am on 1400 cal.. I at first was having a hard time making the 1400! Now I am doing better. I drink mostly water. I am also eating clean. My best tip: I bought a George Foreman grill. Awesome!! I keep chicken breasts, turkey breasts and turkey burgers stocked. I throw them on the grill and in no time they are cooked and delicious. I am also eating a lot of salmon. I always eat breakfast and have a small snack every three hours. I read somewhere that it helps to keep your metabolism going. Snacks could be: celery and 1 tbls peanut butter, small LF activia yogurt, Cottage cheese, cut up veggies..etc.
I eat a well balanced lunch and dinner...protein, veggies, fruits, some wheat bread occasionally. I used to eat a lot of red meat and pasta. (the pasta now is only wheat and small portions.) I never thought I would eat things such as a turkey burger! Now I have turkey burgers, turkey meatballs, turkey bacon, chicken sausage..etc..
I also will eat salads with almonds or sunflower seeds. I really try to keep it mixed up so that I don't get bored.

I started Aug. 11th and have lost 25 lbs. I would say that it is working for me. Planning and exercising are key for me. I really feel that I can live the rest of my life eating this way and being healthy. I hope I am right!!!

I luuuuuurve my GF grill. I swear it's one of the best things I have in my kitchen. I think my MIL got it for me and I was skeptical but it's been a lifesaver. A cooked chicken breast in just a few minutes is wonderful!

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My best weight loss was using Atkins. I saw my doc every 6 months and all blood work was great. Then, my husband's diet got changed by the doc for his results weren't as good. Need I say more...my major problem with Atkins - I really love all the things I could no longer eat. When you start those up...the weight comes back really quick.

This time, I am very active at the gym. I usually have oatmeal w/raisins for breakfast - homemade soup (I'm a waitress not a cook-lol) with chicken, and at night a big salad. I try to keep my calories around 1200 depending on whether I'm working out with the trainer.

I believe that WW is a wonderful program (I like it because it allows all foods to be accounted for-you miss out on nothing).

Good Luck to You! You've come to the right place for friends!

Photochick and Suenami,

Sounds like both of you could teach me a few things. I have tried the lean cuisine meals and they are good. I have taken those to work when I was on WW before. They work well. Portion size is one of my biggest weaknesses. I have trouble with my sugar dropping too, I work in a hospital and cannot always take a full lunch so work seems to be an issue. My co-workers keep goodies in our break room so I have that to deal with too.

Darlene

Chunkymonkey,

How do you feel today since going to the trainer yesterday? I admire people that exercise. I have never got that endorphin rush that people talk about. Atkins works well but it is hard to live on for a long time. WW is probably the best overall diet because you can have anything. Good luck with the trainer.


Darlene

I have used WW with great success in the past, but last time around I got stuck and wasn't losing well. Knew a friend who lost well on South Beach and she talked me into trying it. Well it blew me away! Lost 8# in the first 2 weeks (Phase I), then another 16 in the next 10 weeks (about 1.5# a week) on Phase II. Been maintaining for several months now, and I really like NOT having to count calories and points. I can honestly say this is the easiest plan I have ever been on. I feel more satisfied after eating and am not constantly thinking about food. My weight loss has actually exceeded my original goal which was always hard to maintain when I was following WW. I don't mean to knock WW. South Beach does have similarities with WW Core. This WOE just works better for me now. I still weigh in at WW once a month since I finally made it to Lifetime and don't have to pay anymore.

My problems with Lean Cuisines (or any packaged meal really) is that they have a LOT of sodium in them and I've found out that I'm particularly susceptible to sodium. Even the tiniest bit too much will cause me to retain water like crazy and it's even worse around my period.

I know they work well for some people and I know they can really help with portion control, but I just can't eat them.

Honestly anything I can help wtih, I'm more than willing to. For me it's been years of trial and error and learning what works for me. One thing I've learned since being here on 3FC is that everyone is different and everyone has things that work differently for them.

I've become a lot more serious about clean eating, and managing my "footprint" as they call it in the media. For me, eating clean is all part of larger environmental responsibility I have. It's also a way for me to really think about what I eat, how I eat, and how I live.

It probably helps that I started this journey at a time of huge turmoil in my personal and professional life. I could have, as I have in the past, used my stresses as an excuse to overindulge and quit being responsible. This time for some reason - and I honestly can't tell you why - things turned around for me. I found that as my personal and professional situations got worse, my need to control myself and my environment got stronger. And so here I am.

So for me, this journey has become not just about losing weight, or even about being healthier, but in total about who I am as a human being.

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Hattie,

Love your pic of your dog. I have a blue heeler that I have had for 17 years. Her best friend passed last winter at 14. Animals are the best, never judgemental and always glad to see you.

Darlene

I did read the South Beach diet but never actually tried it, I thought it was a little like Atkins. Am I not remembering correctly? They all blur. Have any of you read the Plum series of books? My friend swears I'm Lulu with all of the diets. I did take a pork chop to a basketball game once....you can't make this stuff up.

Have you read the Skinny ***** book, made me a vegetarian for about a month.

When I got divorced 4 years ago, the weight dropped like a rock. Would not recommend that diet but it did work.

When my mom got divorced years ago she lost over 30# really fast. She looked like a skeleton. Her doctor told her it was fairly normal. I agree...A really hard way to lose weight.

I lost 30# in a month. Could not eat a thing. That never happened to me before or since. I have put the weight back on now. I usually eat when I'm upset, happy, sad, bored but it was different then.

Darlene

I'm doing a lower carb exchange plan I modified from those I read about on the hillbilly housewife website and in the Duke Diet Book and JoAnna Lund's Healthy Exchanges cookbooks (my mother loves these, and I've borrowed them. I liked the flexible exchange option, but her cookbooks tend to rely much too heavily on processed foods). Rather than choose a calorie level, I chose the 1500 calorie plan as my minimum and then made six exchanges optional and interchangeable among fruit, milk, starch or protein exchanges (because they have about the same calories per exchange - about 70-90). Although instead of checking those boxes, I write a F, M, S or P in the box, so I know which I used (that's just my way of keeping track of how I'm spending my optional exchanges).

Books that really influenced my food choices are The Low Carb Bible (by Elizabeth Ward), Volumetrics, Several of the low GI books, South Beach, Atkins (though induction level is too low for me), Neanderthin, and the Paleolithic Prescription.

I am not a whole foods purist, by any means, but I'm making progress in my goal to make the best choices I can, most of the time asking myself whether my great, great grandparents would have recognized what I'm eating at least generically (they may never have seen an Ugli fruit, but they'd recognize it as a fruit/food - cheesey poofs - not so much - is it food or is it packing material). I do have a couple "unnatural" pseudofoods that I love, like Crystal Light, but I just work on making more and more progress in that area.