Losing weight while working nights always reminds me of the quote about Ginger Rogers: "Remember, Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, but she did it backwards and in high heels.” Losing weight is hard for nearly everyone but shift work just makes it extra special.

I hated giving up my free and easy food at work. But I hate being 100 pounds overweight too. And I know which I hate more... You're worth it Jeannie and I bet eating well will speed your recovery too!

I thought I'd report in on the ftflops. I wore them around the house all night last night at work and I'm wearing them now as well. I can definitely feel it in the back of my calves tonight, that they are getting a work out. My regular shoes are sneakers and I usually go barefoot (or in socks) inside and these are very different than sneaks or barefeet.

They are comfy to wear. I still prefer barefeet but for now I'm committed to wearing them while inside and seeing what happens.

Glad you're liking the fitflops. I've been wearing them when I want to just slip something on and I'm wearing my Earth shoes like I would wear my regular tennies. I love the feeling I get from both of them.

Here you all are!!!
I had forgotten to subscribe to the other thread so it got lost in the shuffle of my brain and then when I went looking for all y'all I got REAL confused!
I'm still chugging along here at the hotel. In the weeks to come we're going to be getting busier and busier leading up to the students coming back in a month (we're on a pretty big university campus -- they actually own our franchise). Food's been going well ... exercise is still pretty much non-existent, though.
I was debating getting the fitflops and still am debating it, but for right now I splurged on a pair of really cute mary-jane MTB's instead. The whole negative heel thing threw me for a loop the first couple of days with hills a especially stairs, but I think I'm getting the hang of it and I DEFINITELY feel it working my legs & butt. For $250 they'd BETTER!
Well, I hope y'all are willing to let me come back to play. This time I'll actually make sure I don't forget where you are!!!

Backwards and in high heels! That's exactly what we're doing! Awesome quote Vlad! And hang in there, Chances. Whenever you feel set back just refocus and keep on plugging away at it. It will happen.

Glad you found us again Karen! (Should one of us go bump the other thread with a link again, in case anyone else cares to re find us?) You sound like me, with the good food / no exercise plan. I'm about to change all of that, and I've been doing pretty well just trying to maintaining my 8 pound loss.

I had my arm x-rayed today, and what I have is a frozen shoulder. TTG it is the least of what it could have been. Basically your shoulder joint is surrounded by a sac of air, they don't really know why, but it is. Sometimes that sac goes flat. It's not punctured or anything, it just collapses. That's what mine did. So my joint is essentially locked in a small space. They gave me steroids and a list of exercises to do that should bring the sac back up, and I go in for a recheck on the 19th. He also okayed me for the treadmill, so yay!

New boobs will have to wait. Oh well...

I weighed today, at 190, and even though it's TOM that's the weight I'm posting to start at. I hope to make my 10% mini goal when I go back in to see him on the 19th. My meals are easy to tackle. I'm hoping to get an hour on the treadmill every day, 1/2 gallon of water in, and my execrcises I've been doing. I'll pick up the yoga again when I can move my armness.

And I forgot to go by the bookstore and get Twilight! AUUUUUGGGH!!!!

Maybe tomorrow, if I leave the bat cave.

Okay, I'm gonna go set tickers, etc. Smoochies all round!

oooh Jeannie, the shoulder sounds painful!

I did add a link at the end of the old thread pointing to this one back when we first moved. I haven't checked recently to make sure it's still there...

I wanted to share this excellent (in my opinion) food pyramid I found on the web. The USDA one (the old and the new) are crap (again, IMO) but I thought this one was pretty well thought out. I printed it out and have it on my fridge.

The problem I'm having with my diet right now is stuffing enough calories into a day. Yes, I could meet my 1600 goal by stopping at Burger King or with the help of Ben & Jerry's or Cheetos but I've found that when I'm eating healthy I have trouble. I can stirfry up a pile of veggies the size of my head, and add 6 ounces of turkey or shrimp and toss some nuts on top and it's waaay more than I can eat and not all that many calories. And on days I work I have trouble managing to eat more than a couple meals a day. Often I'm just too tired to be interested in food. Or the food I've eaten is so filling and satisfying that I'm not hungry.

Honestly, I never thought "not hungry" or "gee, I should eat more" would EVER be a problem for me. It's kinda novel.

I love the cool bat graphic... let's see if I can figure out how to add it...

Ooooh that's us Vlad! We is bats, babes!

That pyramid does make more sense to me. A much more thought out plan in my opinion. However, it seems to be a good plan for someone who is already maintaining a healthy weight. And I am not. If I were following this pyramid while losing I would definitely cut to a fraction, anything that is not touching one of the outside sides of the pyramid. Some foods just burn faster.

I got curious about the WW points, I have so many friends doing that. So I googled the system. Couldn't really find it of course, but I did access enough lists to realize why the plan we did some years back worked so well. The WW plans assign every food a point. Our old plan didn't do that, but kept only the healthy foods from those lists on their list. THEN they took those healthy 0 point foods and called them free foods. THEN they broke the remaining foods into A, B, & C categories, A metabolizing fastest. Then you follow a portion controlled diet, mixing and matching your own portions from the list.

So I'm going back to this eating pattern.

Essentially, any given meal of mine is a portion controlled selection of A category foods, maybe some B. And as much free foods as it takes me to feel full.

Once I've made goal, or hit a plateau where I'd like to just relax and maintain for awhile, I will add back in some C foods, and not be so worried about getting a meal every 3 hours. I'm thinking with my half gallon of water, and treadmill action, that this should really give me some good results. Exercise is going to seal my fate. I have to get up or this plan of action won't pay off in cute clothes and new boobs.

That's my new mantra.

*** cute clothes and new boobs cute clothes and new boobs cute clothes and new boobs cute clothes and new boobs cute clothes and new boobs cute clothes and new boobs ***

Y'all might want to check out "Eat, Drink andd Be Healthy" by Dr. Willet of Harvard. It explains a lot of the science behind the new "unofficial" food pyramid. Then there is the follow up-"Eat, Drink and Lose Weight". BTW. Vlad, I believe the daily menus in it come to about 2000 cals, but he tells you what to drop to bring them down to around 1500 cals. I found these books to be very interesting.

I've been toying with such a mish-mosh of eating plans hoping that something will click and just feel right. Tried South Beach - found it too restrictive for my lifestyle. Went back to WW Online because I've done it before with good results, but don't really want to be tied to having to track my points all the time (and pay $17 a month to do so). Just reread my Biggest Loser books thanks to it being one of my greatest addictions (I'm currently watching Biggest Loser Australia thanks to YouTube) and think they might be on to something. They follow what they call the 4-3-2-1 pyramid -- 4 (minimum) servings of fruits and veggies, 3 (minimum) servings protein, 2 servings whole grain, and then 1 "extra" (which can be more than 1, but no more than 200 calories total daily).

Why can't this be easy????? Putting the weight ON sure was!

I just ordered "Eat Drink and Be Healthy" from my book swap club and put the "weigh less" book on my "wish list" since there wasn't a copy available right now.

As for eating plans - i'm just counting calories but mostly trying to stick to "whole foods" while I'm doing it. That part of it is going really well and easy for me. Finding time or interest for exercise is harder, but I'm working on it.

I've just reached excersise obsession. I have gotten to the point where losing weight isn't going to change my shape, just make it smaller. So, now I need to start muscle toning and sculpting.

I have been putting more effort into my walking and when I get back from Reno I'm going to get some free weights for my home gym. They had a bench on sale at Sears in Casper, WY, but when I got home the next day the sale was over. It should be on sale again in about a month, so I'll just do the standing work and use a chair until I can get one. I've even been using one of those grip strengtheners when I'm driving around on my haul truck and I got some pilates bands of which I'll put one in my lunch bag to use at work.

Well, gonna do my walking, shower and get to bed. Good Luck Everyone.

I'm mish-moshy too. Just trying to do the right thing every day and know that one day I will realize I'm back in shape! So far so good. I'm gonna have to go check out you tube for biggest loser now. Gawd I love the internet.

The doctor has me on a steroid anti inflammatory, which is ookey pukey. I know it's not the kind of steroid that bodybuilders use, but you know me and my "fat burning" soaps & lotions, etc. I'm gonna call these pills my "muscle building" pills. I'm also going to try to strap a book to the treadmill, so I can read while I walk. I'll let you guys know if I flop off it or not.

Exercise Vlad. C'mon, you know you wanna. I'm doin' it. All the cool kids are doin' it. Operator's doin' it. C'mon Vlad. It's fun. C'mon. I walked for 30 minutes last night. It was fun. We're all doin' it, Vlad. C'mon, you know you wanna.

I'm gonna go walk aroun de haus an tawk like Ahhhnold now, to ze if dis pills helps to make de muscles grow beeg and strong now.

Like Ahhhnold.

is it working? is it working?

I hear you on the exercise Jeannie, I surely do. I do take the dogs for walks in the woods - not terribly exercisic really but the whole trip home is uphill so I always get at least a good 15 minute workout right there. My co-worker has not brought his Wii in yet but he promised tonight he would on Monday. I am hopeful it will be my magic bullet.

Right now though, I'm losing weight really well without the exercise. Gives you an idea of just how much junk food I used to consume... I'm sure I'll plateau out in another 10 pounds or so and then I'll be more motivated to exercise. I guess I'll just enjoy the easy ride for now.

Vlad

The wonderful human being who runs the website realitytvfan.org is the one who has posted all the Biggest Loser Australia episodes and links to the proper youtube account through the website. I have to warn you -- they air it over there practically every night so each season has a LOT of episodes and you get a LOT more wrapped up in the contestants! (At least
I did!)

Gained .6 pounds according to the scale today. Not sure if it's because I did it at a different time than normal or if I'm just retaining water because my body fat % went down from last week and it just doesn't make sense to me. Ah well!

Once I finish the paperwork for the night I think I'll look into the Eat Drink books ... because lord knows I need something else to add to the mish-mosh!

Karen -

what do you think of the MTBs? They're out of my price range right now but I found them pretty intriguing. I think the fitflops, while fine, are a poor second to the MTBs.