Hello Maintainer Lovelies!

Finally our turn for winter weather with a little (comparatively) 6" snow today. Kids had a blast sledding. I got in quite a work- out shoveling mine and part of my elderly neighbor's (along with some other neighbors)driveway. Biggest bummer was that my fitbit wasn't on tightly, and it recorded NO vigorous exercise for my shoveling OR my trips up the hill near our house lugging up sleds. Grrrrrrrrr.

Had a great meeting with a potential realtor on Saturday. She doesn't think we need to do as much to the house as we thought. Lots of packing to do....with all my free time, lol. My son has a snow day tomorrow (yes, we're pretty wimpy) which is messing me up with clients. Ah well....time to sleep!

Hi everyone, hope everyone dealing with snow is making it out ok. We got about 4 inches last night, which is nothing compared to Boston, but for us mid-atlantic folks you might as well shut the whole state down.

So I'm starting the Alternative Phase 1 plan today for diabetics to see if that makes it easier to stick to. If I can make it through the week I'll stay the course, if not I'll move to Phase 3 so at least I won't be spending a bunch of $ on all the IP products. How is P3 working out for you Chip and darth? I'm back in my original goal range and thrilled about it. Just want to take off another five pounds or so before I start adding fun days back in.

Hi Jenny, Slip, Evemomma, Hawaii, mars, catlady and everyone else. Have a great Tuesday!

Hi Posh - As another mid-atlantic native I had to laugh. I'm working from home and the kids are off school with our 4 or so inches of snow. But, it is REALLY cold which for us is a big deal I suppose.

I've been having some troubles in P1 so I think I'm going to switch to the alternative p1 also. Maybe today! (I already had to eat my lunch and it's not even 11:00. Which in the past means the rest of the day gets messed up because I've skewed everything so early. So, today if I have an issue (feeling dizzy) at the real lunch time or in the afternoon I am going to add in some cheese. See how I feel and go from there.

Morning all. Well, 2 hours of shoveling snow and I could eat a horse! My vita top muffin with PB, banana and a plant protein shake served me well for that much exertion but I was ready for lunch! Just had albacore tuna in water with sunflower greens, a little lemon infused olive oil and salt & pepper, yum!!! Had a great weekend IP wise, even tho we had a nice VD dinner, every course was small and mostly on plan - dessert was small and definitely off plan, as were the hot toddys !!! But P1 day Sunday with time at the gym and some neighborhood walks and I'm back at 135 lbs today. It's an everyday thing now, playing with the macros, learning when to push it and when I've gone overboard.

shasta10 - the Quest chips are yummy and very much IP - they are a great treat. I also substituted 'real' food for my lunch when I felt I needed more. Overeating IP compliant protein while on P1 when I really felt I needed something more seemed to work for me and not screw up my progress. You are very close to goal, good luck with the homestretch!

Have a great day ladies. E

Happy Tuesday Maintainers!

For all you snow bound peeps - I hope things get better for you soon. I have never had to shovel snow but I bet it's a workout and a half. That stuff is heavy.

eve: Good news from the realtor. It's always discouraging when you think you have a chance to sell only to be told that you have 10's of thousands of dollars to spend before you can even think about it. I hope it goes smoothly for you.

Pish: Hope your move to Alt. P1 works out for you. You're so close to goal weight again with your reboot.

Shasta: I had some very hungry days at the very end of P1. I would usually add in a extra packet and that took care of it but I never experienced the dizzy feelings that you have. I hope it gets better for you.

Liana: 12 hour shifts sound killer. I have trouble sometimes getting through an 8 hour day and I sit at a desk. You're one tough lady! And yes, the blue cheese salad is a favorite. I tend to find things I like and eat them over and over until I get bored and then I try something new. That comment about the food/health industry really struck a chord with me because it's so true.

Jenny: Sunny flat Florida. What a treat. Enjoy it before you have to go back to all that cold weather. It's 30 degrees here today. That's pretty cold for us Texans and I officially protest.

Hello to Hawaii, Rayze, Mars and any others out there. RuthAnn, you've disappeared again. Everything ok?

I have dropped lbs again. The last two days I've been at 136.4. Again, not sure if it's the meds or upping my calories. The steroids are done and now I'm taking the anti-inflammatory pills. I'll see how it plays out. I gave blood a few weeks back and went online to check my stats since they run tests and I was shocked to see my cholesterol number. It was way higher than it should be. How can that be after being on such a LF/LC diet for 10 months? I don't get it.

I lost my internet last night. Stupid modem. I felt so lost and disconnected. This happens at least once a month and I can usually fix it with a phone call to Time Warner but not this time. I have to leave work early to go wait on the technician. Hopefully they will give me a new modem to fix this ongoing issue. First World Problems.

Hi, just started maintenance last week. I'm a little confused as to the fat, carbs, protein ratio. Coaches a little vague. Any tips? Also, since Christmas I've gone down in weight but gained inches in the tummy area. What do you guys suggest?

I am out in the country and sometimes there are issues with the Internet connection out here (and the phones to be truthful) but since we run a business from a home office we have a dedicated service line and they are awesome to work with. Sometimes I feel sorry for people who are just residential customers because they get shunted to the bottom of the repair/troubleshoot list and we get booted to the top. I laughed about your 'First World problems' statement... but thinking about it I guess it would be a major 3rd world prob too since many times cell service & internet is the only way remote populations can connect with the 'outside world.' Thinking about the pastoral herder who needs to know how much his cattle will be fetching at the larger town several days' walk away. Should he start moving them in that direction or will the price be up in another week?

Time to make sure you are getting in the habit of exercise if you haven't started yet.
Also the ratio is officially 3:1 - one meal has approx. 3x as many net carb grams (carb minus fibre) as fat grams... the other meal is the reverse - 3x as many fat grams as net carbs. I find if I use my fatmeal at my 'hungrytime' I feel more satisfied and less snacky. For me that's the evening dinner meal, since I mainly work nights. Some people may need it earlier in the day if they are more 'morning people', but that's just my opinion and seems to work for me. Welcome to maintenance - a constant work in progress, lol.

Liana

I am doing well with P3. It's so much easier to live here! And I finally started exercising, something I didn't get started when I started maintenance beyond walking the dog and the dog won't walk once it I'd beyond about -10. And if there is snow his feet get cold. Hard to believe he used to live outside before we adopted him. We were his first couch at 2.5 years old and now he won't get off it!

Welcome! I see this was your first post!,

Liana described the ratios well. Check out the maintainers what are you eating thread to get ideas. I didn't follow the ratios because I thought I could maintain with portion control. That didn't work out so well!

In terms of the the tummy inches, are you bloated? Did your pants shrink? I really have no idea how you can lose weight but have your size be bigger.

Hi everyone,

Back on track tomorrow. I am sure that I will have UP pounds to pay for my stay-cation, but I am ready.

Had another 4 inches of snow today, but it was light and fluffy. The sun made the snow just glisten- pretty. First sunshine in weeks this afternoon.

Jenny, hope you are having fun in Florida.

Chip-glad phase 3 is working for you!

Pishposh, finding what works takes time. Hope alternative Phase1 works for you.

Ecdc- your lunch sounds delish. So does the hot toddy!

Andrea- hope your modem issues get resolved. I hate going without wifi.

Eve- Did you have a fun snow day?

Modem back up but now router needs to be reset. My resident nerd (son) is going to come by and fix that for me tomorrow night. So I feel connected again.

Liana: It was a total #on the cholesterol. I'll get a full panel done in April when I go for my annual physical. I should have remembered what you said about the "good" and "bad" I just saw the total number and kind of freaked out. But I'm sure it will be fine. I just need to be mindful and stay away from transfats and PUFA's and I shouldn't have a problem. Most of my fat intake comes from nuts, oils, avocado, and yes, cheese. I may have to cut back some on that.

I am really looking forward to my PT appt tomorrow. I need to get back on the exercise bandwagon and this will be my first step. Off to take a hot bath and then start a new book. Good night all.

Hello Everyone,
I'm just catching up on posts. I hope the snow is not too bad for everyone affected.

We came back yesterday from Chelan. It was a fun, ten person trip with a lot of wine tasting, socializing, meals, and a short hike. The weather and view of the lake was fantastic.
I definitely indulged, and will weigh myself tomorrow. Today I kept to about 60 net carbs and will tomorrow too so the glycogen goes down. I'm feeling kind of puffy!

Welcome to newer maintainers!

More interesting stuff on cholesterol, saturated fats, etc. sent to me on Medscape tonight - just got my weekly email. How flukey is that?? Now you got me started on a little research project, Andrea, heheheh.

"Focusing on Foods: Is Dairy Different?

Does it matter which foods the saturated fats come from? There is increasing evidence that dairy fats do not increase CVD risk and may even lead to a better metabolic profile. The MESA study asked more than 5000 adults aged 45-89 years to complete a 120-item food-frequency questionnaire and followed them for 10 years.[14] A higher intake of dairy SFA was associated with lower CVD risk, whereas a higher intake of meat SFA was associated with greater CVD risk.

To explore the findings further, the MESA investigators measured baseline plasma phospholipid levels in more than 2500 participants. Plasma levels of the odd-chain SFA 15:0 (pentadecanoic acid) were inversely associated with incident CVD and CAD, while no association was found with the even-chain SFA 14:0 (myristic acid).[15] Self-reported whole-fat dairy and butter consumption had the strongest associations with levels of 15:0. Dairy intake also correlates with a lower risk for type 2 diabetes: The EPIC-InterAct investigators looked at plasma phospholipids in a large prospective case-cohort study and saw an inverse association between odd-chain SFAs and type 2 diabetes (the analysis included over 12,000 type 2 diabetes cases).[16]

Dr Mozaffarian observes that "we can't synthesize the odd-chain SFAs (15:0 and 17:0), so they're not in your blood unless you're eating dairy fat."

What You Replace the Saturated Fat With Counts

Cutting back on dietary fat typically means increasing consumption of other macronutrients. The spectacular failure of the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) Dietary Modification Trial, [17] which showed no reduction in coronary heart disease or stroke in the almost 20,000 postmenopausal women assigned to a low-fat diet, was a blow to the dietary fat/heart proponents. The saturated fat target for the WHI intervention group was 7% of calories; participants got down to 8% of calories by year 1 (from about 13%) but bounced back up to 9.5% of calories by year 6. The clue to the failure of the intervention may be in what they were eating instead.

A pooled analysis of 11 prospective studies by Jakobsen and colleagues[18] that included more than 340,000 healthy adults older than 35 years suggests that consuming polyunsaturated fats instead of saturated fat lowers the risk for CAD whereas replacing the saturated fat with carbohydrates may increase the risk.[18] There was no change in the ratio of saturated fat to polyunsaturated fat in the WHI intervention group.

The MESA trial showed that meat SFA was associated with greater CVD risk (hazard ratio = 1.26 for +5 g/d and 1.48 for +5% of energy, respectively), but before the vegetarians break out the champagne, the EPIC trial conducted in almost half a million middle-aged adults from 10 countries found that processed meats but not red meat per se were linked to CV mortality.[19] Processed meat included ham, bacon, sausages, and minced meat in ready-made products. Similarly, in a study in over 37,000 Swedish men, the risk for new heart failure and death from heart failure increased by 8% and 38%, respectively, for every 50-g rise in daily processed-meat intake.[20]"

Liana

Liana: Every time I think I understand what I am supposed to/not supposed to eat it changes. No wonder we are all so confused. For every study that supports what this one says there is another to refute it.

I know, Andrea.... crazy eh, but in reality they are coming around again to the scientific studies from the late 70's very early 80's and finding out that low fat isn't all it's cracked up to be... I always wonder how much of it is driven by the big food industries' lobbying... I'm starting to sound like a conspiracy theorist, lol.
Anyhow, that's the latest. Even the American Heart Association is upping their suggestions for fat in the diet (although the fact that they sell their HeartHealthy logo to companies to put on their products makes me suspicious of them too.)

Liana

Hi all,

Little quiet here. Today was a great Phase 1 day and a pretty good day at school too. Had my hair done too and I am liking it!

Hope everyone is doing okay with the winter weather. Expecting some more snow tomorrow morning, but not a lot supposedly

Murrcat- glad you had fun on your trip. Lot of puffiness here too! But it feels good to jump right back on track.

Andrea, how was PT?

Shasta, how are you feelng? Did you switch phases? Dizzy is not good! I had some episodes near goal. Turned out my prescription for BP was not needed any longer. Hope you are feeling better soon.