13 weeks out

Oct 26, 2010

Weight: 306
10/26/10

I'm at week 13 and no weight loss since last week.  Darn!  I would say that I'm in a stall except there's a lot of things I did not do right this past week. This past week I was having my Aunt Flo visit, but that finished several days ago, and still haven't dropped any more weight.  I always find it hard to stick to good eating around that time of the month.

Mostly I find myself eating a lot of my "gray area" foods.  I know the foods that work best for me.. fresh meats and veggies.  When I eat those primarily or especially exclusively I lose.  My gray area foods are the yummy foods that are still considered "low carb" and are very convenient, but also high calorie and don't work well for weight loss for me. 

These foods are primarily cheese or other dairy, nuts (especially cashews) and occassionally sugar-free pudding, chocolate or ice cream.  I've managed to stay away from the low carb sweets but last week was chock full of lots of grazing on cheese and nuts.  Partly due to my cycle and partly due to lots of running around and grabbing something convenient.

So today I cooked my fresh foods and I'm going to try to do much better this week.  I'm really wanting to get under 300 pounds and I'm beginning to feel much more like just having the VSG is not enough for me.  Since the beginning I thought it would be a helpful tool for me, but I have had little confidence that it would be the end all be all for me.

The great thing about the VSG for me is that even when I really try to do some damage by trying to eat frequently or in volume, I can't do as much damage as I could in the past.  So the VSG keeps me from doing major damage, but I'm still struggling with eating too frequently, hunger, etc.

So anyways I need to stop eating in the gray zone and stick to the really good foods for me.  I can only imagine what my weight loss (or weight gain more likely) would be like if I didn't even stick to low carb, let alone "gray zone" foods.

The other thing I did poorly last week is exercise.  I had been doing well with elliptical in the past few weeks, but slacked off.  Last thursday I had an appointment with a personal trainer which was kind of an assessment appointment and did mostly strength training, and didn't do any cardio that day.  I may be retaining water from the strength training, maybe not.

I really don't know if I can "blame" the lack of weight loss on strength training as I slacked off on cardio, ate too many gray zone foods, etc.  On Friday I was running around and didn't get any time to exercise.  On Saturday I was in class from 8am to 9pm so absolutely no time to exercise and not enough sleep, plus drinking coffee which is also bad for my weight loss.

Sunday I had to take a friend to the airport early in the morning, plus spend the entire day getting caught up on cleaning and homework, plus spend a few hours with my son playing.  Again no time for myself or exercise, not enough sleep and coffee.

Monday I did do my elliptical in the morning, but my husband went out of town so I wasn't able to do it until lunch time, and I did have coffee then too because I was so tired.  First thing in the morning is the most efficient time to do exercise, so I missed that opportunity.

Today I wasn't able to do my exercise at the prime time in the morning, BUT I am having green tea instead of coffee, and I have fresh meats cooked for the day plus some boiled eggs, and will not have ANY dairy or nuts today.  I will also do my exercise on my lunch break, and plan to do interval training and go for 30 mins instead of just 20.

If I can keep this up for the rest of the week I think I'll see a good loss by next week, but I'll just have to see how it goes.  If I am eating the right things and exercising, and I don't have a loss, then I will know I am in a stall.  However I *know* what I need to do, and I know that I haven't been doing as well as I can.

Too many gray area foods, not enough exercise, etc.  Also I have not been getting enough fluids in, and that's another thing I'm working on. I'll be glad when my husband is back in town so I can go back to prime time morning exercise which is the most effective, plus really starts my day on a good track.  I'm feeling better each day as I lose weight and get more in shape.

One really nice thing happened last week.  I received a $500 bonus for some hard work on a project at work, and I decided to use that money to hire a personal trainer.  I was able to get 10 sessions with her and I start them officially on Thursday.

Mostly I'll be doing strength training with her, which might put on muscle weight, but I am prepared for that.  Initially I was going to wait until I get below 300 to start weight training because I really want to hit that goal.  I decided to just go for it though.. I can't wait to start getting buffed up like I used to be.

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