400 Days of Dieting

I chose to title this post dramatically to remind everyone that losing weight is not a short-term experiment but a very long-term commitment. If you give up after a few days, you won't have any success. Also, even when you have reached your goal and think you are done, you still need to be vigilant.

Being about 15 pounds from a personally acceptable weight for my height and age, I am still quite actively dieting, counting every calorie and averaging them daily. My current average is 1541/day. My current weight is 175, and I still have the "love handles". I spot them when I look in my "rear view" mirror. I suppose, though, that when (I don't say "if" but "when") I reach 160, I may try for another ten pound loss or so!

The pounds are dissolving very slowly; however, I don't feel frustrated because I can see the results in my mirror daily. It's a good feeling to put on clothing, look in the mirror, and realize that how baggy it is. It goes right in a box of donations to Goodwill. This works out well too, since one of my sons works there!

I've made mistakes along the 400 days by letting myself go and then having to suffer to get back to where I was before the mistakes. I find that I "prime the pump", so to speak, if I fill myself too early in my day. I tend to lose management of my appetite too easily if my tummy empties when there are still several waking hours left. That's odd, but that's how it works for me. I can resist food more easily if I'm running more empty than full. The last meal of my day is the biggest by far. Then I go to bed full, and fall asleep before my appetite tells me to grab a sweet or a fatty thing. I will certainly have to be cautious for the rest of my life. You can't go up and down the scale repeatedly without hurting yourself. It's very easy going up and very hard going down.

Using the technique of mindful eating must continue as well. As for the Celiac Disease, I must admit that I dearly miss toast, sandwiches, pizza, crackers, and the occasional cookie or small piece of cake. I suppose I will always miss them.

Take care. Here's to the next 400 days. Time to get more little pads of paper for my calorie counting.

Today Is the One-Year Anniversary of My Diet

What a long haul it's been, and it's not done yet! I've lost 56 pounds. I must say that I expected to  lose more than that in 12 months. Yet--I'm being told by people, who include my doctor, that I should not lose weight too quickly in any case. The tendency for about 90% of all dieters is to gain back the weight (which I have done several times in earlier diets), and that's more likely if the weight loss was very quick rather than very slow. 


My appearance is quite different. I'm wearing much smaller clothing of course. Also, for people my age, the wrinkles are appearing rather quickly, but when I was 56 pounds heavier, I often heard remarks about my lack of wrinkles. Sure, they were filled in by fat. Now, though, with my face so much thinner that the new wrinkles are becoming more obvious as the weeks pass. Disappointing, but better wrinkles than diabetes or worse. At least the hair hasn't gone grey yet but that's thanks to genetics, not diet.


Speaking of diabetes, recent bloodwork revealed that I am no longer pre-diabetec. I'm so very happy about that. Also, my cholesterol is way down. Another positive change is that the intense pressure is off my knees and hips, so my arthritis is not as strong. It's remarkable how much difference it makes when your hips and knees don't have to move all that weight. I recently had my left knee replaced and my healing, I believe, has gone well in some part because I can move around and do my therapy more easily than if I still had the extra pounds.

A question I am often asked, particularly by people who are thinking about dieting and really NEED to lose weight, is about my appetite. They always (and I do mean always) seem to think that I don't have the appetite I had a year ago. They think that I have gotten so used to not eating all the sweets and fats I used to eat, that I no longer crave them. Not at all true! I still love them and I must be very careful when exposed to them that I do not have more than ONE small piece of whatever it is. I cannot eat two pieces because if I eat two, I'll eat ten. It is a real addiction to me and I must be most careful. As I've mentioned before, this is not a real deprivation diet. I do eat things that I crave; it's just the amount that is greatly different. Who said "It is easier to avoid temptation that to resist it"? That person was right. If you are invited to an event that has snacks or free meals, be very very careful. Avoid going there if you can. An occasional huge meal won't make a big difference in your daily average, but if you have too many of them, your average will raise so high you might be discouraged and fall back into the enchanting, mouthwatering trap of gluttony. 


Now I can reveal what I weighed one year ago today. It was 234 pounds. Now I weigh 178. I am continuing the daily averaging of my caloric intake. It stands at 1536, and it barely moves from day to day, because I would have to consume 365 calories more, or 365 calories less, in any one day to raise or lower the calorie average by just one! Therefore, if you do cheat badly and your average jumps by just 3 calories, it will take many days of eating well under the average to get the average back down. Be careful when you cheat. I want to reduce my weight to 160. If I can get it lower, great, but my weight loss has slowed down so much, it may take me another year of calorie averaging to get to that goal. 

Mindful eating is still something I practice daily and am teaching my son, who is developmentally disabled, to do. He is grossly overweight.


Good luck with all your own weight loss efforts. I hope everyone can get healthier. I hope that my efforts have at least been informative. I will continue to post occasionally.

Calorie Counting in Wisconsin

Today is day #100 of my “Average Advantage” diet. Reaching this day is monumental. I have been tempted too often to indulge my hunger in gluttonous ways. A few times a week I still awake midway through the night with hunger pangs. I’m guessing all of us who diet experience that. I still resort to eating my 4-minute crackers, and somehow Betsie always knows I’m doing so and she joins me for her share. I suppose that means I'm actually eating 7 calories fewer than I'm counting.

My most recent weigh-in of May 6 showed a weight loss of 22 pounds, but that was 11 days ago. Going by my average weight loss of one pound every four days, it is likely that I now have lost close to 25 pounds. My average calorie count as of yesterday is 1555 per day. It jumped up after a Mother's Day buffet, but it is slowly going down again. 

Yesterday I went to a meeting of one of my art groups, and people who had not seen me for a while noted that I lost weight. My shirts and pants are looking a bit baggy. That makes me feel good. I gave my art buddies my blog address. I’m also taking my older, smaller clothing out of storage because I’ll be able to wear it again soon! (I’m not a fashion maven.) To show you the power of positive thinking, I’ve been holding on to smaller clothing that I have not worn for decades, thinking that some day I would lose the weight I packed on. Now I can look retro right out of my storage boxes.

One might feel that it’s useless to count calories since various sources report different calorie counts on the same foods. However, you need to make a decision on which you will follow and then stick to it rather than change the count according to your feelings. An example is skim milk. That’s the only kind I’ve drunk for several decades and at this point, even 1% milk is too rich for my taste.

• On most of my boxes of dry cereal, ½ cup of skim milk is valued at 40 calories, making it 80 calories a cup.   
• The skim milk I buy from a Wisconsin-based gas station, Kwik Trip, is valued at 90 calories a cup.
• Another milk distributor values it at 100 calories a cup.
• The Nutrition Facts reference book values skim milk at 86 calories a cup.
• Caloriecounter.com values skim milk at 83 calories a cup, and so does newcaloriecounter.com.
• Various other web sources value skim milk at 85.75 calories, 90 calories, 91 calories, etc., per cup.

So, should you count the calories according to whichever you feel like counting for the day? That would increase insecurities about the inaccuracy of your daily totals. I simply always count skim milk as having 100 calories a cup, no matter which brand I drink. Although that is a relatively small overestimation, I would much rather overestimate than underestimate my calories. I think that makes it seem like I’m losing too much weight—I’m probably eating fewer calories than I am accounting for.

Another thing you’ll notice is when a calorie counter gives you three different counts for the same food, as when you see that pears are graded as small, medium, or large, with mildly differing counts. You may feel confused by the size of the pear, so it may be good to just go for the medium count in any case. It will even out in the end. That’s the “Average Advantage” again. However, if you feel that overestimating is the way to go, always use the largest calorie count. There is a definite advantage to that as well. 

According to the calendar, spring has been here for nearly two months. Even my bulbs are saying it's here; nevertheless, the last two nights have seen frost, and I've had to take many potted plants back into the house for frost-free nights.

The Magnificent Cold Potato

Potatoes have long been my favorite food. I enjoy them most mashed, then baked, as French fries, hash browns, pancakes, scalloped, kugelis (with bacon and sour cream--oh my!), in casseroles, potato salads, and just about any other way. But all these methods add more calories. I don't need that. That leaves me with another way I've always enjoyed potatoes. It's a way that adds not a single calorie to the potato. From the title of this entry, no doubt you have guessed this way.

Boil the potato in its skin. Cool it off; they are okay refrigerated but most flavorful at room temperature. Keep the skin on; it's loaded with fiber. Cut the potato into small slices and eat it slowly in order to prolong the pleasure. Salt lightly if you wish, and savor the saltiness combined with a sort of sweetness that you would not expect in a lowly cold potato. It's a treat you will want often, especially when you need a small snack. And think of this: it has only a few more calories than an ordinary cookie. Yet, think of the nutrition you are absorbing; think of how it will satisfy your hunger much more than a cookie would. It is truly a magnificent food. 

Oh, and by the way, it's a very CHEAP treat/food too. You can't argue with that!

The lowly potato is a worthy diet food. Its history goes back 7,000 to 10,000 years. See its story at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potato.

Today I saw my cancer doctor. He gave me a very good report and said I don't have to see him again for a year. I'm due to see my cancer surgeon soon, though, and get a mammogram on both sides.

I weighed in at the doctor. I've lost 18 pounds, so I'm still losing at a rate of one pound every four days. I finished a painting of the aurora borealis a couple of days ago. I'm painting five signs for my garden club's plant sale in May. Also began a new painting of the Mississippi River and surrounding bluffs last night. I'm so glad art is in my life again. I missed it. I need it.

Feeling Full after a 560-Calorie Supper

Yesterday was day 55 of my diet. Although I never went in much for pre-processed foods, now I am even more determined to cut down on salts, fats, sugars, and unpronounceable chemical additives in foods I consume. Therefore, nearly all my food is prepared by me. While shopping at Woodman's, my favorite grocery store (employee-owned), I searched the section that had the foods "on the cusp", as it were, or shortly about to expire. Most of it is still quite good. I bought a pound of mustard greens and 4 chicken sausages with cranberries and cognac. They had only 100 calories each and were exceptionally low in salt and fat, but high in protein. I put them together with other foods and created a new, nameless recipe. Maybe some day I'll make a recipe book of all these low-calorie meals I'm creating. Here's the calorie count I did on the recipe. You are welcome to try it.
                                                                                          calories
mustard greens, 1#                                                                  100
chopped tomatoes in their own juice                                       145
potatoes, 5 fairly small                                                             400
carrots, 4 small, peeled and left whole                                     45
chicken sausages, 4 left whole                                                  400
Italian seasonings 2 T                                                             miniscule
chopped onion                                                                        30
hot sauce I made  2 T                                                            miniscule
garlic, chopped  2 T                                                              miniscule

                                                                          Total calories             1120 / 2 servings=
                                                                                      560 calories per serving

I shared this meal with my adult son. It was not only extremely tasty with all those good things in it, but it needed NO SALT because of the seasonings, and I added no form of fat whatsoever. That hot sauce turned out really hot; I made it from water and hot peppers blended together. I used enough water in the pot to cover the food while it was cooking. I did not serve bread with the meal because I felt there was enough starch in the potatoes. We were completely satisfied after eating that great amount of food out of two large serving bowls. Later I ate a small scone to satisfy my sugar craving. I must admit that after having only 1316 calories yesterday, I awoke at about 4 AM terribly hungry and unable to sleep, so I ate three crackers mindfully and finally got back to sleep. Betsey got only a few pieces from me.

This is my calendar entry for the day:

Saturday, April 2, 2011
+ 1316 = 
85,379 / 55 =
1552 
(106,865) [total calories I would have consumed over 55 days if I had been eating only to maintain a healthy weight] 

On April 18 I'll be seeing my cancer doctor and I will have a weigh-in at a good scale. I'll let you know how many pounds I lost. I know it's going well because my clothes are getting loose. Now I guess I'm sorry that I donated 20 boxes of my old size 10 clothes. Many of them were brand new. Just think, I could have been WAY out of style if I wore those 20-year-old clothes again. I think I'd have some fun with that.

At last I finished the painting I was working on. It's not my usual subject. I do people portraits and landscapes, and I like for them to be quite dramatic. In this case, I painted flowers, but they are not done in a "feminine" style. (I've frequently been told that NONE of my paintings  look like a woman painted them. I guess I just have to figure out exactly what that implies.) I made a portrait of dramatic peonies in my garden. I photographed them in June, and the time of day was sunset, with the sun very low on the horizon.

The Four-Minute Cracker

Last night I awoke with tummy growlings. I needed something to stifle them. I had consumed only 1390 calories during the day. On the headboard/bookcase I keep a package of crackers that I open when I get these growlings. I don't want to eat the crackers suddenly. Frankly, I could put a cracker in my mouth and give it a couple of gnashes, destroying it in seconds and swallowing it. I would barely taste it AND it would not give me much satisfaction. I would probably dig a handful out of the package and might eat 15-20 crackers that way before I'd no longer feel the hunger pangs. 

I awake hungry during the night about three times a week. Rather than wolf down the crackers, I eat one tiny bit at a time. I practice "mindful eating" (after the book by the same name, authored by Jan Chozen Bays, MD) while I eat the cracker. With each bite, 

• I control my impulse to quickly swallow it; 
• I feel the crunch;
• I roll the cracker between my tongue and my upper palate while thinking of the texture;
• I taste the saltiness;
• I feel the crunchy texture slowly moistening and softening;
• I think about the reason I am eating the cracker;
• I feel the hunger slowly subsiding with each bit of cracker;
• I think about the process of making a cracker (and about the recipe for crackers that I found on a website--maybe I'll begin making  my own herbed crackers when I finish my current box of crackers);
• I think about the people who made the cracker;
• I think about the little bit of nutrition I get with each bite;
• I wonder about the fat and sugar that may be in the cracker, and I remind myself to check the box next day;
• I think about why I am eating in bed at 3 AM; and
• I wonder how many tiny bites I'll take before the cracker is finished.

During this process, little Betsey, my son's 7-pound adult Manx cat, is posted at my right shoulder, staring at my eyes quietly. She's asking for a piece of cracker. She's a silly little thing. I'll give her the next tiny bit and she'll eat it much more quickly than I ate mine. She does not practice mindful eating.

By the time we finish just one cracker, four minutes have elapsed. I wait a moment, then begin my next four-minute cracker. I may challenge myself, trying for a five-minute cracker, but I fail. By the time I am finished, I've eaten 2 1/2 crackers and Betsey has eaten 1/2 cracker. I remind myself to count the calories in 2 1/2 crackers in my next calorie total. I hope that the cat-lovers of the world will not berate me for giving a cat crackers.

I practice mindful eating during my meals too, but not to this extent. If I did so, meals would all go cold after the first half-hour of such mindfulness. By the time I would finish one meal, it would be time for the next.