Weigh in - Thanksgiving Gain

Apparently, I'm addicted to Thanksgiving. After two separate turkey dinners (one Thursday, one Friday), I brought home leftovers from my mom's and made more mashed potatoes and gravy (from Mama Pea) tonight to round out my leftovers of turkey, dressing and desserts.

Oy vey the Thanksgiving weigh-in!

Last week's weight - 240.8

This week's weight - 243.8

3 lbs GAINED

85.6 total lost since June 2010

Let's not act surprised. I ate way more than just two Thanksgiving dinners. There were cookies, pizza, ice cream, burgers and fries and did I mention left over dessert?

I am on the fast track to gaining weight. The good news is, I haven't gained anything in my last 8 weeks of eat-whatever-you-damn-well-please phase. The bad news is I weigh the same as I did eight weeks ago.

The worst news is I'm trying to get back on track during the worst time of year to try to eat and live healthy. I want to give up until 2012, but that's no solution.

I don't have an answer for myself right now. I am perfectly capable of calling myself out, but I can't seem to find what I need to stop stuffing my face.

Maybe I'll come up with something after the Thanksgiving leftovers are gone?

Diary of an overweight runner - Disney half marathon training check in

After having a little nervous break down a few weeks ago over my half marathon training, things have been going better on the training front. I have missed one mid-week run because I had to go buy new tires two Friday nights ago and thus I did not go to the gym.

After writing that post, I did 7, then 8 miles and this week I did 9. And I have survived!

The 7 and 8 milers were pretty nondescript. I did them within my 15 min per mile training goal and I didn't collapse after either of them.

The 9 miler on Saturday wasn't bad either but trying out a new unfamiliar (unmarked) trail combined with the Garmin Fit app on my phone freezing at 2.5 miles, I had that horrible sinking feeling of having no idea whether I was actually completing 9 miles since I just did it by time; figuring I run about 15 min mile. I also turned around a little earlier b/c I didn't want to cross a 4 lane busy road towards the end and I ran out of trail. I mapped part of my run afterwards (it was too tedius to do the whole thing) and I at least came within .2 of 9 miles. If I can do 8.8, I can do 10, right???

I did like the trail, so I would use it again if I pre-mapped my run and knew where I was going.

A couple good things did come out of Saturday's run. 1) I was definitely running more than walking, I would run approximately a 1/2 mile and then run a 1/4 mile. (Or run 2 songs and walk 1). Also, after my Garmin app froze, I ran for 15 minutes straight or 1 mile without stopping.

I've always ran intervals with the longest run interval being 8 minutes when I did the 5K in August. So this left me feeling accomplished.

10 miles is up next. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous, but I know I can do it. It may happen this weekend, but with being in St. Louis for the holiday I may only do 6 or 8 and do 10 the next weekend.

The race is less than 7 weeks away!

Weigh in

Last week's weight - 241.4

This week's weight - 240.8

0.6 lbs LOST

88.6 total lost since June 2010

Any loss I'll take at this point. If you saw this post you know I've been struggling with my food choices and Friday and yesterday were not better. I need to go back to sticking to a healthy plan when eating out.

I don't really have much else to say about this weigh in. I hope to blog later about my run yesterday, which was 9 miles!

Owning up to it

So THIS happened yesterday:

Click to see larger version

In case you are too lazy to click or need me to spell it out for you: that's yesterday's calorie total ~1,000 calories over my normal limit. Let's discuss what happened...

A slice of cheese and mushroom pizza at 3pm - approx 285 calories
2 packets of Nestle hot chocolate at 4pm - 160 calories
1 black and white cookie at dinner - 130 calories
Baked Potato with cheese and sour cream at 9pm - approx 440 calories

This was all eaten over and beyond my 3 meals and 2 snacks for the day. What is wrong with me!?!

And I ate half a homemade pizza for dinner (570 calories). But even with that, had I not eaten the above my day would have been fine.

WTF?!

Clearly it's come to my attention that my demons of overeating have reared their ugly heads. This is how I used to eat. All. the. time. I would eat Oreos by the sleeve full and not even think twice about eating half a pepperoni pizza. It appears I've been too confident about overcoming these demons over the last year and a half and deep down inside they are still there ready to take me down.

This has to end now. I've come too far and I'm way too close to what I think to be a comfortable weight for me to let those demons win this time around.

Midweek Ramblings

So, I may have given up daily posting of my food log (to protect you from boredom, dear readers), but I am still tracking over at Sparkpeople.

I'm still struggling with my food choices. Yesterday I was really snacky, so I ended up at Starbucks at 3 pm for a Peppermint Mocha. I got the skinny version, but that was still 290 calories un-needed.

Sometimes it's just easier to go back to basics and with the holidays coming up, that's where I'm going to head. Back to eating my staples: whole grains, complex carbs, tons of fruits/veggies, low fat dairy and lean meats. This basically means I eat a variety of whole wheat bread, potatoes (white & sweet), whole wheat pastas, brown rice, lentils, Oats, beans, eggs, 2% cheese, 1% milk, shrimp, fish and chicken, apple, bananas, berries, brussels sprouts, broccoli, spinach and carrots. Oh, and the occasional nut butter!

It's boring, but this worked for me for the first 88 pounds, so why steer away from it?

Weigh in - what happens after you gain 7 lbs in a week

Last week's weight - 246.2

This week's weight - 241.4

4.8 lbs LOST

88 total lost since June 2010

I have been putting of posting today's weigh in subconsciously, I think. Because I don't see it as good enough.

Sure, 4.8 pounds in a normal week would be great. But I had a 7 lb gain to deal with from last week and I ALMOST was back to 239 as that is what I weighed in at yesterday morning; however, I ate too much last night knowing it would affect the weigh in and I didn't care.

Food log from Saturday:

Egg and cheese sandwich & banana (breakfast); a few samples at Christmas Village (not a lot since sharing a bowl of cheese dip with 10,000 other people's dirty hands wasn't too appealing to me); 1/3 of 12" pizza and salad with balsamic vinaigrette (late lunch); Apple dumpling with ice cream (snack); Another slice of pizza, romaine salad with blue cheese and 2.5 cups of popcorn (dinner); 3-4 pumpkin molasses cookies

Total calories: No idea, way too many (2,100+)

Food log for today (so far):

Peanut butter sandwich (breakfast); 3 pumpkin molasses cookies (after run); slice of leftover pizza; 1/2 order of General Tso's Chicken, egg roll and 4 crab rangoons; Ice cream sandwich

Yeah, so today isn't much better.

My long run today was 8 miles. I started 2 hours later than I originally planned. I REALLY didn't want to do it. But once I was out there it went great. The weather was perfect (a little sunny the 2nd half), and I was able to stay within my 15 min per mile goal.

Hoping to try and figure out how to stay on track this week (with a better weekend next weekend) to lose another 5 lbs next week.

Food log 11/11/11

I'm posting this now because then maybe I won't eat anything else tonight ;)

Banana and fiber one bar (breakfast); 1/4 cup 4% cottage cheese w/4 ak-mak sesame crackers (snack); Homemade Potato soup and an apple (lunch); 6" Subway turkey breast on wheat with 2 slices pepper jack cheese, all veggies and spicy mustard with 14 tortilla chips and salsa (dinner); three Mama Pea's Pumpkin Molasses Dough Balls (dessert)

I also had 2 lifesaver mints & 1 jolly rancher throughout the day at work.

Edited to add: Another pumpkin molasses cookie and 2 cups of popcorn

Total Calories: 1,440 1,594

One thing I've learned over this week is that 1 jolly rancher has 25 calories! I don't know why I didn't think about this when I popped 4 into my mouth yesterday and wasted 100 calories, but it just goes to show you how many un-needed calories we could potentially eat in a day.

Also those white lifesaver mints? Those are 15 calories each and the ingredients list (in this order) is: sugar, corn syrup, artificial flavors.

Goal next week? Stay away from the candy jar!