Do you remember as a kid being afraid to do anything to stand out, being afraid to try something and fail where others might see you. As a kid, I moved so much I was perpetually the new kid. I did everything to blend into the background, not to stand out. To me the end result was that I was largely forgettable. But that is beside the point for the moment. Another result which I have never noticed before is that I was afraid to try new things and fail.
In sports, I never really gave it my all. I never tried. Because I figured I was probably no good at them and it was better to not try and not fail than to try and fail and have other people see me fail and laugh at me. In school, I had no doubt they would.
In computers, my brother was great at them, and I figured I would never be as good as he was. I would probably be laughed at for trying when he was so good, so I never tried. I spent my whole childhood convincing myself that I shouldn't try things I didn't think I could do. Convincing myself that never trying was better than trying and failing.
What a crock of crap! As an adult, I went back to college. I tried typing (something I had failed at in high school) and in college I excelled in it. I gave computers a try and found not only was I completely capable of using them but I had knack for them and I loved them. I ended up helping others with their computers.
My latest triumph is weightloss. I was always convinced that I was destined to be the fat kid. I had weight troubles my whole life and I had convinced myself that the only way a person with my body could lsoe weight was starving myself or other unhealthy means. And, I tried them all, eating disorders, diet pills, you name it, I tried it.
The only thing I didn't try was a good old fashioned lifestyle change. I never tried just eating less and moving more. I honestly didn't think it would work. So here I 47 1/2 pounds later and it is working. I am losing. I am not done, but I have come so much further than I ever dared dream I would before. I can be something other than the chubby girl with the "great personality". I can be the attractive person Prince Charming has always told me I was. I can one day look in the mirror and see someone I am proud to be.
I lost 2 1/2 pounds this week! Woohoo. That means that I am only 2 1/2 pounds away from One-derland! I can't believe this. This is the most weight I have lost in my whole life ever! This is the longest I have ever stuck out a diet plan and the healthiest way I have ever tried to lose weight. I haven't been this small since before I went to college.
I think in the past I honestly didn't think I could do it. I thought I was destined to be the fat girl and I looked longingly at the girls who managed to lose weight. Now, I watch those weight loss shows and think to myself, "I can do that". I get encouraged and motivated on this journey.
Food for today:
2 points--tortilla
2 points--peanut butter
1 point--jelly
1 point--sugar free/fat free yogurt
0 points--coffee
2 points--rice crispy square
2 points--bread
2 points--peanut butter
2 points--jelly
0 points--coffee
3 points--cookies
8 points--McDonalds chicken fajitas
5 points--kids french fries (shared with little Princess)
Tonight, for the first time since I can remember. I'm going to bed hungry. I used up my points for today. Tomorrow is WI day and I am not going to go over my points today. So instead of overeating, I'm going to bed. I really need to get some more no-point stuff in this house.
I am doing good so far today. I am wishing I had more real food more healthy snacks to use my points in, but I have what I have so I end up eating a few points in granola bars and crispy squares but I guess as long as I stay in my points and also eat the veggies, whole grains, chicken breasts, and tuna I do have I am doing okay.
I weigh in tomorrow, hopefully I am down a little bit. Wish me luck!
The information I have on the plan explains it like this:
Your body has this wonderful little thermostat inside of it. It regulates everything you do. If you feed it lots of food, it turns the thermostat up and burns it as efficiently as possible. This is why you have been able to eat as much fast food before WW and didn't gain the amount of weight that you should have. Your body became more efficient and was able to burn off much of the excess amount of calories. Otherwise, with the amount of food we porked in pre-WW, we should have been gaining 2-3 pounds per day!
When you go on a "diet" where you dramatically decrease the amount of calories that you consume, your body thinks "Oh-oh, we're going to starve to death here" and immediately turns the thermostat down to conserve energy. After all, your body will do whatever it has to do to ensure that you stay alive. It doesn't know that you don't want to carry those extra pounds around. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to convince my body that I really do want to shed those extra pounds through talking to it.
That is where The Wendie Plan comes in. If I can't get my body to shed the extra pounds by talking to it, then I have to trick it in to letting them go! The Wendie Plan is the trick.
If you are on WW, or even just counting calories, and you stick with a set amount of calories per day, such as 1400 or say, 27 points per day, your body will adjust to that. It will become extremely efficient at using just the amount of calories (energy) that you are giving it. You may lose fairly well at first, but after the first week or so, you will find that your losses may slow ... way... down, and even stop. Isn't it nice to have such an energy efficient body? However, the body isn't extremely fast. If you give it the same amount of food every day, it will adjust itself. But if you change the amount of food it gets every day, it doesn't have time to adjust itself! Which means on that day that you eat 10 points over your highest, it tries to adjust by turning up your thermostat, but it is unable to turn it down for the low points the next day. What you are doing, in essence, is keeping your body guessing. It doesn't have time to adjust the thermostat down, before it needs to turn it back up. What eventually happens is your body will never again feel as though it is going to starve to death, and it will never again try to shut down the thermostat, so you will continue to lose at a more rapid loss. This also means fewer plateaus.
I am gonna give it a go. I figure if I find it doesn't work for me I can go back to the way I was doing it before. I think I like the idea of changing it up a little. I am gonna do it like I had already lost the next five pounds because I don't see starting something new and then in a week or two having to adjust my points down a little. I switched day one and day two so that before I weigh in I have two low point days in a row. So here is what i will be doing:
I am considering looking at the Wendi Plan. Has anyone ever heard of it? Tried it? It is just a variant of WW where you spread out your flex points in a certain way really. I used flex points last night. I was so hungy! Finding out after supper that my supper was 9 points instead of 6 screwed up my whole evening and I ended up eating worse than if I hadn't known. Ugh. Oh well, live and learn.
Food for today:
2 points--whole grain bread
1 point--low fat cream cheese
3 points--cookies
0 points--coffee
1 point--yogurt
4 1/2 points--tuna wrap
3 points--skinless chicken breast and 0 point veggies
the ww book I have says that as long as your bread has more than 3 grams of fibre per slice, each slice of bread is 1 point. I just used a points calculator I have and I found out that my whole grain bread has TWO POINTS per slice! That turned my supper and snack of 6 points into a meal of 9 points!!!! I hate when that happens after I eat something!
I have decided I am only going to update my weight on Mondays. That is my official weigh in and I don't think I should record daily fluctuations.
I was able to get a few groceries today it was with my child tax credit so I spent almost the whole thing on things that my little princess would eat, but I did get me some egg whites, some low fat granola bars, and some more yogurt. That will help me come up with stuff to eat.
Food for Friday:
rice crispy square--2 points
whole wheat tortilla--2 points
hummus and cream cheese-2 points
tuna--1 points
granola bar--2 points
yogurt--1 points
3 slices whole grain bread--6 points
low fat cream cheese--1points
egg and 1 egg white--2 points
cookies--4 1/2 points
low fat yogurt--1 point
orange--1 point
low fat beef wrap--5 points
Total for Friday--30 1/2 points (4 1/2 flex points)
Today my neighbour brought over warm muffins to my daughter and I. I really really wanted it but I thought about it. I didn't know how many points these were and whatever it was it probably was more than I could spare anyway. So I put it aside and gave it to Prince Charming when he got home.
then later, I was over there babysitting and they had all kinds of snacks for the kids and a half a pizza sitting there. I was hungry and I wanted the pizza, but I know pizza has like a million points or something. So after checking to see if any of the snacks were low points, (they weren't) I then decided to wait until I got home and more control over my snacks. Yay me for having that self-control.
