I. Am. Starving.

My body is throwing a little temper tantrum.  Because my suffering is hilarious, I'm posting.  I'm seriously considering getting a small cup of butternut squash soup, since I have some.  In fact, I think I will, as long as my serving is under 100 calories.  Maybe 1600 calories was too ambitious for a start.  Although yesterday it was less than that.  I have a friend who is getting by on 500 calories and hormone shots for the next 3 weeks.  She's much smaller than me, though, if that makes a difference.  Do differently-sized people have differently-sized appetites to match their differently-sized caloric needs?  Or do poor small women just have to restrict themselves for life and big men get to pig out?

Yes, there was weight loss showing on the scale this morning.  (268.5)  I have begun.  I'm on day threeeeeeeee.  Plththt.  Remarkable - three days without cookies or candy.  I was pretty hungry last night - this morning's breakfast really lived up to its name.  Since I went a little under calories yesterday, I'm not allowing myself to starve myself today.  I used 100-calorie slices of bread (5 today!  a major sandwich day) instead of the 50-calorie slices I used yesterday, and added a half-tablespoon of mayo to my turkey sandwich because I've been a little low on fats and don't understand these dry sandwiches.  I mean, I've never been one to glob tons of mayo on a sandwich but you want to put a thin layer over both sides of bread!  THESE ARE THE RULES!  Anyway.  With that and the dairy additions to my coffees, I'll make it to 1600 today.  I have 7 hours left in my day at work and only dinner and snack.  I try not to purposefully convince myself of the unsatisfactoriness of my small meals when the fact is I'm doing fine and only feel a little hunger as the next mealtime approaches.  Like now - it's been 3 hours since lunch, and I'm thinking about dinner.  Just having a minor mental freakout in response to going on a diet.  Blogging reminds me I'm serious about it.  Hm, was considering having a taste of the butternut squash soup I have in the cabinet at home, but maybe I should stay down around 1600 for today - that is supposed to be my daily level after all.

La la la - I'm gonna make it.  What I should really worry about is whether I have all that I need for tomorrow, including the time and energy to prepare it.

New Whys

I'm gonna make it through the second day just fine, even though there were actually less than 1400 calories in today's total meals.  The question is, will I get up the energy to prepare all of tomorrow's meals before I go to work in the morning.  It is very cold and the barometric pressure is low and I'm gradually falling behind in my sleep.  Hopefully I can go to sleep early and wake up early enough to quietly make my meals in the morning - instead of what I fear may happen - waking up at 2 a.m. and not being able to get back to sleep - that's more my style and it's never a good thing.

Anyway - I have been checking out some of the old guard - people's old blogs and youtube accounts.  Seeing a lot of stuff about stalling and regain.  I guess it can be part of the whole thing.

The first time around when I started in 2009 I really didn't have anyone around me much losing weight.  I did it by myself because I was feeling very solitary at the time, and besides, my requests for weight loss partnerships with, say, my roommate or my Mom, were ignored and avoided.  Now, I think my roommate is dieting again, she might be losing weight.  A woman at work has been losing a lot of weight on this big program.  Several people I know who were really just skinny people who let themselves go a bit were able to lose weight and apparently keep it off (bastards.)  Meanwhile my weight gain continued and I just didn't think about it except when my clothes stopped fitting.

I did at least stall out at around 265-270 months ago, instead of climbing ALL the way back up to the 285 I started from initially!  And that last time, I also set an initial goal of just losing 20 pounds, which would have brought be down to 265, which is just a little more than where I am not.  Right now I'm aiming for 250 by the end of November.

Last time I started dieting, I was motivated mostly by the following:
- I hated taking face pics of myself for Myspace or Facebook, I couldn't look anything but awful
- I hated how the part of my belly above the belly button had pushed out over the top of the bottom part, making most jeans feel absolutely horrible on me.  I hate the feeling of my upper belly hanging out over my waistband, it feels like a rash or a hangnail to me.

This time around I have the above but I also have others.  Since I was so recently so much less fat, the change back has brought about icky feelings, like when I lie in bed and feel my chin fat press against my chest fat - it feels gross and I have to put a bandana or something between them.  I don't remember that being a big problem for me before I lost weight - but I do remember how cool it felt when my chin and chest fat started to stop being so connected, like how it felt when my belly fat started to sink away under my skin.  I would luxuriate in bed and feel the changes as they happened in my new body.  Similarly, sitting in chairs or booths that crowd you, crossing your arms over your large belly so as not to crowd those next to you...

My clothes - all those cute clothes I bought and felt great to fit into - don't fit me anymore.  I want to wear them again.

And then there's the problem of aches in my knees and feet.  The knee and the strain over the top of my feet (and some unpleasant bone- or cartilage-popping in my feet) started a few years ago I guess, but I can't help thinking it might feel better if I didn't carry this extra weight.  I know you don't have to be overweight to have bad knees.  I have an aunt who was a dancer, then - I'm not sure which happened first, bad knees or obesity.  Anyway, now she has both, especially bad knees.  I never wanted to be the person with bad knees.  I don't want to give into that.  I want to take good care of my knees.  And feet.

Yet I also want to run again.  But I'm far from that right now.

And energy.  I don't have any.  That might have more to do with exercise than being fat.  I've been taking medication to regulate my thyroid for over a year now and apparently it's at the right number.  My strength and verve has depleted noticeably even since the days before my start in 2009.  I may just be getting old, but that's not entirely a good enough excuse - other people are getting old too.

So there we are.  I probably missed some good reasons, but I must have forgotten them at the moment.

Oh, and another good point.  When I was thinner, I lost all the fat layer over my shinbones, and scraped perma-scars into the middle of both leg shaving, creating what I figured was scar tissue that I would then slice off again another time shaving.  I was feeling around in the spongy tissue over my bone last night and I don't feel those bumps on either leg, so maybe, just maybe, they've had a chance to heal.

Can't wait to stand on the scale tomorrow!  Start the downward trend!  Will report back in the morning.

Morning Report - No Loss - Disappointing

Blog title says it all.  Day 2 weight is the same as Day 1.  I really hoped for 2-5 pounds of water weight loss already!  After all those trips to the toilet last night, and this morning.  Maybe that pasta salad was terrible after all.  Ok.  Day 2.  My body will have to relent!  No pasta salad for me for lunch today.  Just a skimpy turkey sandwich and a pear.  A bit worried about getting hungry am I.  But what's a little hunger?  I'll tell you, it's the key to better results tomorrow morning!

Day One SUCCESS!

Day One Success!

I gave myself a starting weight of 270, but I want to get a new scale...  hm...  thinking...

Prepared all my food for today last night and put it in tons of little tupperware containers.

Ate breakfast a little later in the morning - cottage cheese and strawberries.  Not suffering yet.

Lunch was a huge pasta and veggie toss with goat cheese.  I had to force my way through it.  My skinny male friend saw my pasta salad and said it looked like lunch AND dinner, and part of breakfast.  I did a calorie round-up on the pasta, afraid it putting me over my caloric goals for the day.  Apparently tricolor rotini varies in its nutritional breakdown.  It turns out that particular lunch - pasta-veggie toss and a cup of canned pineapple, is an 877-calorie meal.  That doesn't feel like it makes sense for a 1600-calorie meal plan.

At work, doughnuts were offered, popcorn was popped and smelled tempting, but it was easily resisted.

I went out after the concert with my parents and they got two appetizers and I didn't eat any at all.  I told them "Today's my first day on a 1600-calorie per day plan."  "GOOD FOR YOU!"  Meh.  When I'm fat, Dad demonizes everything I eat.  We went out for Mom's birthday to a Mexican restaurant, and before we left I grabbed a chocolate pudding cup from their cabinet because they've always got them in stock and I love them.  I joked "I hope this doesn't ruin my appetite."  "Hallie!  You're awful!"  He was chastising me for Eating While Fat.  Meanwhile, at the restaurant, he pigged out on enough Mexican food to feed an entire Mexican family and I left half mine on the plate.  But it's okay 'cuz he's not fat.

I just finished off my dinner and my calorie count.  It was 1683 calories, give or take for estimation.  Clean, nutritious food.  I've peed twice tonight and hope that it means I'm already losing some water weight.  Down 20 pounds is 2 months!

I should do measurements too, since I hope to start exercising.

I haven't been hungry yet.  I figure that might start tomorrow, though, if my body starts to feel a little more starvy.  I remember when I started ediets in 2009, it was on the second day that I scarfed down my tuna-tomato-avocado rice cakes like they were the most amazing food in the world "SO DELICIOUS" I hissed like Gollum for my roommate to hear, but I think I was just hungry - later that particular meal never struck me as being all that good.

Ok, I've got to make all my food for tomorrow for a successful Day Two.

New start tomorrow

Hey.  Timidly I reappear here, knowing this blog was intended to be instructional on how to succeed at a time that I was so sure I was losing the weight forever.  I've gained almost all of it back.  But I cling to that "almost."  It would appear I've been static at about 265-270 for over 6 months - that's pretty stable.  No particular eating plan, no dieting at all, as much food, candy, ice cream as I feel like, and no exercise.  When I start to feel my under-chin fat pressing against my over-clavicle fat while watching hulu in bed, things really are starting to get desperate.  I miss liking my thinner face.  And my body feels strained - my knees, ankles, feet - everything.  Yet for the past 3 days I managed to still not get any exercise.  I really want to start exercising again, and not just start, but keep at it long enough to feel a difference, if it's not too late, if I'm not too old, and knowing people who started running in their 40s, I think I'm not too old, I just FEEL too old.

Tomorrow I go on 1600 calories.  I printed up some 1600-calorie meal plans I found online and went shopping for them.  The meals seem a bit sparse.  I'm trying not to focus too much on the fear of not having enough to eat - I will live, I will be fine.  I'm focusing more on the joy of knowing that in just 2 months I should be fully 20 pounds lighter.  I have the groceries to last me this week.  I just have to get exercising and stick to the diet and deny myself ANY extras.

I've had a bunch of false restarts in the last entries of this blog - you know how it can go.  There is shame in promising to be adherent and then failing.  But it seems wrong not to acknowledge the start.  This time I do feel more motivated.  20 pounds gone in 2 months!

245

I seem to have settled around 240-245, haven't I?

My focus isn't on dieting so much right now. It's on money. Credit card bill came and I didn't have any money in checking to pay it. I had some illness earlier this summer and some unfortunate scheduling matters prevented me from getting much/any work for a few weeks. I also got health insurance and a new laptop so far this year. Somewhere in the mix, my financial situation has depleted, so I've gone on a financial diet. I pay my bills and allow myself $100 per week for groceries and other discretionary spending. I started this thing by calling a halt to restaurants (I was eating nearly every meal at a restaurant), coffee shops (I was passing time by going to coffee shops and reading, and I'd buy a beverage while there), movies and DVD rentals, the odd 16-oz soda (I can drink water for free) and even restricting my driving so that I don't use up gas unnecessarily. I've also been taking all the work that comes to me, which basically means I go and spend hot horrible humid days from 8 a.m. to 2 a.m. doing these rock and roll shows and its very physically taxing but the good thing is that they cater! Still, even as I try to hope that the money I'm making and not spending will make a difference the next time I have bills to pay, I face a car that needs repair (hopefully only $50), a laptop that needs repair (about $250) and everything is breaking and falling apart (need new frying pan, and new DVD/VCR player) and there's a beach trip coming up that I've promised to go to, before I knew just how bad things were going to be for me financially.

Anyway, the way this relates to my current relationship with food. A couple years ago I transitioned from eating out at restaurants and picking up candy and drinks from convenience stores and drinking out at bars, to eating on a meal plan which often called for me to buy more perishable foods than I was scheduled to eat, and pricey ingredients to fit whatever the meal plan called for. At the start I remember thinking I was willing to pay whatever they asked me to and I would submit to their plan. My roommate said "I don't know how you afford it" and I said "It's not ideal" but the truth is it didn't kill me. Berries are expensive but they were so worth it to me. I didn't go into the poorhouse. Although looking at the graph of my net worth over time, I've been gradually getting poorer all along, getting a boost in Jan 2010 from work or inheritance or something. Why did I not really notice it before now?

So now I'm living like most people already have at least once or twice in their lives, if not habitually. And I'm learning what to eat this way. The food may not be much different but the methodology is. Try to make sure I have some proteins and good carbs and fruits and vegetables to choose from. Then you can make a meal that mixes these things - eggs and grits with toast and fruit - fish and rice stew with celery and carrots. I have some cottage cheese in the fridge that needs to be eaten, what can I mix it with? Well I have some pineapples and some sliced almonds, that could be good. I've reconnected with the peanut butter and jelly sandwich and I haven't even checked to see how many calories it is, I just eat it sometimes. That goes for cereal too. Once a week I go to the grocery store and get myself something sweet (brownies or something) and a good special protein like chicken or steak.

I know this sounds funny to those of you who have always eaten this way. For me it sort of takes me back to my high school days, eating after school like I did. Bowl of cereal, can of soup, tomato sandwich... but with more protein, probably.

I have been quite inactive this summer except at work, which can be very active, or at least physically taxing. After three days of that mess, Thursday I soaked in the tub and applied lotion to my whole body (unusual in summer for me) and Friday I took my sore and limber body and did a very very gentle (wimpy) yoga session that limbered me up enough to do the warm-up section of my normal yoga DVD this morning. Miss yoga SO MUCH! And if I'm not trying to get all cardiovascular, yoga is SO GREAT!