It's all about me

Oh please be shameless...I want to see! I can't wait for a pretty back. My sis has a gorgeous back and I'm always oohing and ahhing over it.
 
Well, I gotta see it myself first -and I don't mean me twisted around in the mirror:rotflmao: But you know how when you lose weight (especially if you were a short little O shaped thing like I was) and everybody always compliments your appearance? Well, I've always taken that with a great big grain of salt because in the back of my mind what I was hearing was "compared to how you used to look"...as in "oh, you look so pretty...compared to how you used to look - body dysmorphia rules!:) I think last night was the first time I can remember that anyone's given me a compliment and I didn't repeat it to myself with that little tag line.
 
But you know how when you lose weight (especially if you were a short little O shaped thing like I was) and everybody always compliments your appearance?
Click to expand...
I'm not all familiar with that... very few people notice anything or say anything for fear of being insulting or whatever... so the fact that you are getting compliments says a lot :)

the pics you do have posted you look fabulous... show off that back lady
 
Mal: are you kidding me???? You have lost 165 pounds and "very few" people have noticed??? said anything??? Okay, enough with the ???'s but I'm seriously shocked!!! Are your friends/family/co-workers blind? You have got to look like a totally different person...heck you have lost an entire person! I think it's insulting and rude to pretend (and it has to be pretense) to not notice and comment favorably.Shit. Sorry, but I'm annoyed for you - just in case it doesn't annoy you.
 
I can't wait to see you bringing "sexy back" so to speak. HAHAHA Oh and I have Heels, skirt, sweats and weights, I'm ready to travel too.:) I wanted to stop by before I leave in the morning. I can't wait to get back and see those new pics you will have posted. I'm SURE they will look fabulous, I thought your older pictures looked great, so how do you perfect, perfection?? Later girl! Have a great rest of your week also!!
Kim
 
So, decided to weigh this a.m. (not really sure why) and down a little over a pound since Monday. This never, ever happens....I always go up a pound or two depending on TOM, and then come back down, I'm totally used to that fluctuation - but I haven't gone below my bottom weight in so long I'd have to look it up to make sure - but I think it's been about 5-6 months.

I'm 99% this unexpected drop is due to mild dehydration because, even though I've been sucking down water like crazy and including a small amount of sea salt 2x day - I'm also sweating like a fiend everytime I walk outside my house - plus nearly 5 days of driving around with no car a/c - a mobile sauna. At least that's fixed now.

Also had crappiest work-out in the world -- totally pumped in mind and spirit but no matter how light I kept dropping the weights, my body was going "nope...not gonna play today" Think I'm gonna give up a.m. coffee for a couple days to see if there's any chance that's also a factor.

foods selected in bold:

fruits: 4-5 daily servings chosen from
apples, apricots, bananas, blueberries, canteloupe, cherries, figs, grapefruit, grapes, lemons,limes, papaya, pineapple, prunes, [Braisins[/B], strawberries, tangerines, watermelon
***swapped blackberries for blueberries
mango for papaya
plums for prunes

veggies: 5-6 daily servings chosen from
artichokes, avocado, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, califlower, chili pepper, daikon, garlic, ginger, mushrooms, onions, spinach, sweet potatoes, squash, tomatoes
***added turnip greens

grain/nuts/seeds/legumes: 4-6 daily servings chosen from
almonds, black beans, black eye peas, buckwheat, bulgar, lentils, flax, oats, pumpkin seeds, rice, walnuts, wheat bran, wheat germ, whole wheat
***buckwheat in form of soba penne,
whole wheat in form of flat out wrapper
***swapped pumpkin seeds for sesame seed oil

dairy 3 daily servings chosen from::
yogurt, whole, skim/2% milk, cheese (any type)
***cheeses: cottage cheese 2% and 4-cheese Italian

meat: 3 daily servings chosen from
chicken, turkey, fish
*** 2 chicken breast, 8 oz talapia

other: 1 daily serving each
olive oil
green tea

not on list:
sf/ff pudding, 1 serving
 
Hmmm..just read a post on tummy size that adds another piece to this puzzle I've been trying to piece together....have neither the time, energy or inclination to pursue this today but I'm going to list it out and come back to it for reference on day (or most likely days) in the near future 'cause I have a feeling if I can connect the dots I can improve my odds of long term (ie. lifetime) maintenance.


1. Hunger. Maybe 70% of the time it's an underlying feeling. Expected it, know it's "normal", know that co-existing peacefully with the feeling is gonna be a fact of life - possibly for years - but...keep thinking maybe not...maybe I can circumvent it

2. Dopamine receptors. Know obese people have fewer of them, one of the reasons it takes more food to get same sense of pleasure/satisfaction when eating - but overeating itself further downregulates. Question: if I'm no longer obese do I still have fewer receptors What's the effect of my years of big gains and losses?

3. grehlin. Great big factor in feeling hungry and/or wanting to eat sometimes regardless of calories consumed. Produced in tummy cells which is reason people with g/b surgery have higher chance of maintaining than just dieted down people like me...any specific foods affecting?

4. tummy size. Way bigger in bulimics who binge/purge; way smaller in anorexics. Despite low sacle weight and decent bodyfat, suspect mine is still bigger than "norm" because I'm only truly "full" after consuming higher volume of food or way more freqent meals than the average bear. Am I aggravating/prolonging problem by keeping stomach at same size - would it be short term uncomfortable but long term beneficial to keep same calorie density but manipulate volume/frequency so tummy actually eventually gets physically smaller? Will a physically smaller tummy result in positive effect on factors 1-3?
 
Isn't it great to see CG smiling with that glass of wine in her hand?

I'm having a slow morning spending it on forum with coffee, protein shake and first jug of water. At least I'm getting hydrated.

But I need to up the exercise. I enjoy getting on the bike so will go for a ride. I know I could be working so much harder and that it would speed things up for me. Its the choice I am making.

But one good thing is that since I have been riding my bike I have been walking more, like the little things that add up. Its cool going places under your own propulsion. (is that the right word?)

My you think a lot about this stuff.
 
CG: you're a sweetie!
Kelly: sounds like a relaxed afternoon....me, I'm off to work. And yep, at least once or twice a week I sit down and go "hmmm, what can I learn today about fitness/health/nutrition/the way my body works" and pursue that particular train of thought till my curiousity is satisfied and/or or I've found something I can adapt in my life that benefits me. Beats watching soaps before work!
 
I suspect cals are a bit low because -as much as I whine about having a super-duper giant appetite - I'm really not all that hungry these days...in fact my appetite really hasn't returned since I did the 4 day hi pro/low carb thing. Not that I'm complaining, it just feels a little weird. Sadly, my poor kitty suffered for it yesterday...and this is probably a good reason I'm not responsible for feeding for small children.....

I got in the routine of filling up the kitty food bowl everyday at the same time I fix my own lunch..yesterday I wasn't hungry and just scarfed an apple and some nuts before rushing off to work. About 2 hours later I remembered...um, kitty's home with NO food.

Ohhh, I gotta admit, I'm lovin' not doing the fitday thing right now. Loving it! I'm also seeing (and feeling) the benefit of limiting whole wheat servings to one daily....but explaining why would be just a bit TMI:doh: This is super easy right now cause DFH is on the road again so 1) I'm not being pressured/coerced to "eat out" all the time and 2) I can just cook a big pot of someting like buckwheat penne and mix it with different veggies every day and have it for my "no muss/no fuss" post work meal.

foods selected in bold:

fruits: 4-5 daily servings chosen from
apples, apricots, bananas, blueberries, canteloupe, cherries, figs, grapefruit, grapes, lemons,limes, papaya, pineapple, prunes, raisins, strawberries, tangerines, watermelon

veggies: 5-6 daily servings chosen from
artichokes, avocado, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, califlower, chili pepper, daikon, garlic, ginger, mushrooms, onions, spinach, sweet potatoes, squash, tomatoes

grain/nuts/seeds/legumes: 4-6 daily servings chosen from
almonds, black beans, black eye peas, buckwheat, bulgar, lentils, flax, oats, pumpkin seeds, rice, walnuts, wheat bran, wheat germ, whole wheat
***buckwheat in form of soba penne,
***whole wheat in form of won ton wrappers
***swapped pumpkin seeds for sunflower seeds
***added peanuts

dairy 3 daily servings chosen from::
yogurt, whole, skim/2% milk, cheese (any type)
***cheeses: 4-cheese Italian

meat: 3 daily servings chosen from
chicken, turkey, fish
*** 2 chicken breast, 1 thigh

other: 1 daily serving each
olive oil
green tea

optional:
honey
 
Happychubette said:
Isn't it great to see CG smiling with that glass of wine in her hand?

I'm having a slow morning spending it on forum with coffee, protein shake and first jug of water. At least I'm getting hydrated.

But I need to up the exercise. I enjoy getting on the bike so will go for a ride. I know I could be working so much harder and that it would speed things up for me. Its the choice I am making.

But one good thing is that since I have been riding my bike I have been walking more, like the little things that add up. Its cool going places under your own propulsion. (is that the right word?)

My you think a lot about this stuff.
Click to expand...

Hey Kelly! I would have given you a better answer yesterday but I was getting ready to roll out the door when I saw your post. So....
1. yes, it is nice to see the smile and the wine...actually I'm drooling over the wine because my own ETOH tolerance has gone steadily down over the last year...once upon a time I sorta prided myself on being able to drink any man, of any size "under the table"...now one drink a month is pretty much my limit - for some reason my body can't tolerate it which sorta sucks.

2. There's no race, no competition and unless you a specific health related reason to need to drop x amount of weight in a short time frame, I think it's cool you know "well, doing it this wat would make it faster, but I'm making the choice to do it this way instead"...personally I think "all roads lead to Rome" in the end anyway, the key is finding the road you are happiest travelling down - straight, winding or loop-de-loop..which it looks like you're doing.:)
 
Good morning cym!

I find that I fill up faster now that I am eating smaller portions and less food...and I dislike that "full" feeling....when I feel that way now, I think that I should have either eaten slower or stopped sooner. Even last night after eating a dinner of salad, I felt stuffed after my meal, yet by bedtime, I was getting hungry (of course it was after 10 om and way to late for me to eat)

I think our stomach does get smaller, but can just as easily get bigger again if we start overeating again! For Bruce and I, before we started.... our plates would continue to get piled higher and higher with food and we were not feeling "full"...now, I know could not eat that much and it almost nauseates me to think about all of that food. I try to eat half an entree when we eat out. But I sure did not have an problem with it back then....

Hope you're having a great day, cym!

Beth
 
Hey Cym, I think that your new format is very cool, and a great idea! I've copied your old way of recording your nutrition I'm afraid. But I like it and it's nice to see the differences from day to day...haha so ermm...thank you! So what would happen if you did start eating below your maintenance level? If you accidentally began eating about 1600 cals per day or something, would you lose muscle since you already have a super low bodyfat percentage? Also, I know you said you list your workout elsewhere, but can I ask what do you do in general? Do you run each morning and then lift weights 3 days/week? Sorry for all of the questions, you don't have to answer em really cause I am being nosy. But I hope you are having a lovely day :)
 
Hey Lukewarm! Glad you like the new format...I'm most definitely lovin it myself these days. Really it's just a logical extension of the old format which was admittedly a pain in the ass...but it served it's purpose....after a year and a half of listing individual foods every single day I learned a whole lot about what/how I was eating beyond the obvious cals and macros.

If I eat below my maint. level for too long a couple of things will happen: 1, the obvious, I would start to lose weight again. Not something I have any interest at all in doing. No, it probably would not be muscle mass to any significant degree though cause of the way I eat and work-out...but if I got crazy and stopped working out and went into a deficit for a while, yeah, then I'd most likely see a pretty good loss of muscle. But, 2. mostly the reason I walk the tightrope between 1800-2000 cals (my maint. range) is because I've already lost about a third of my total body weight and I want my body to stabilize at this weight for a very, very long period. For a dozen different reasons, some purely physical, some purely psychological, the longer I stay at a stable weight without yo'yoing around, the better chance I have at not ending up slowly (or quickly) gaining it all back down the road.

In general my work-out schedule is pretty consistent. M/W/F I lift. T/R I run. Almost always in the very early a.m. I used to do Yoga on Saturdays, but a change in my work schedule screwed that up.

And I don't mind answering your questions...I don't think you are nosy...just inquisitive - a nice healthy trait.

Hey Bethan: I checked into the tummy getting smaller and a couple of other things with someone who actually knows the answer (like she went to medical school just in anticipation that one day I'd come along and pester her with this crap:) )...and yea, it is 'elastic' in that sense.
 
Hey 60-pounds-lost-Cym, how are you? You know those low cut jeans so popular today? Well I wore a pair to work cuz we get to wear jeans on Fridays, but my belly was being very rude about it. Just hanging over those low cut jeans with absolutely no shame whatsoever. I think I shall not wear these type of jeans until I've lost my last 10 pounds. When I got to goal weight one and a half years ago, I noticed my belly disappeared on the last five pounds. I was interested to read in one of your posts the last 10 took you a year and my god, I am quite sure that is me also. I'm sitting at 150 and want to get to 140 (maybe 135) but at 5'9" 140 would be grand. Met a friend for lunch and she lost 25 pounds since January and said maintenance is harder than weight loss (I remembered you said that too).
What I found particularly helpful in your posts of late, is the mention of hunger being an underlying feeling and to expect it, know it's "normal", know that co-existing peacefully with the feeling is gonna be a fact of life - possibly for years. That's a tough one for me. I associate the feeling of being full with the feeling of having all my needs met. Very bad assocation. Because it's possible to have our needs met AND co-exist with a slight feeling of hunger.
Anyways, I'm going on and on, but your posts always make me think, damn it! lol Have a great weekend!
 
I love seeing someone (A REAL PERSON) that has made it to their ideal weight and is able to commit enough to their lifestyle to stay there. You are fascinating my friend, so I really do drink up all the good stuff you share with us.

My mind is blown that in order to stay as fit as you are, you only have to run twice a week. In addition to your 3 lifting days of course. I guess I've always thought that if I were to get to my goal I'd have to continue this daily cycle of exercising my ass off in order to remain there, even while eating at maintenance levels, at least whenever I work my caloric intake higher. In fact I'm not sure that I won't have to, I really hope that I'll be able to perform the way you do and still stay at my goal when I reach it.
 
2Skinny said:
What I found particularly helpful in your posts of late, is the mention of hunger being an underlying feeling and to expect it, know it's "normal", know that co-existing peacefully with the feeling is gonna be a fact of life - possibly for years. That's a tough one for me. I associate the feeling of being full with the feeling of having all my needs met. Very bad assocation. Because it's possible to have our needs met AND co-exist with a slight feeling of hunger.
Click to expand...

This is such a new feeling for me. The opposite of stuffing, the old way of eating and not caring. Its exquisite, really. This new way of caring for myself. Learning a new lifeskill. Conquering the heretofore unconquerable. Co-existing peacefully with an action (slight hunger) that feeds my self-esteem. All it would take would be one big splurge and we'd be uncomfortably full and full of negative feelings. So its a trade off, and, I'm proud to say, I haven't faltered since I came on board in January, so for six months I have co-existed peacefully with eating less. Mood and food. There's a connection, and I have a vested interest in controlling my mood. I never realized before how strong the connection is, how much food can influence my mood, and self-esteem. Hey, wow, maybe I will win this battle.
Even if the scale has not changed in a while, I am still enjoying this new peace with myself.
 
Anna/Lukewarm/Kelly:
Ladies, thanks for coming by. I am somewhat answering you guys...and somewhat (okay mostly:) ) following the ramblings of my own mind......

I recently had a very interesting e-mail conversation with the smartest woman in the world (that's how I think of her anyway) about the subject of hunger. One of the things she wrote (and I'm paraphrasing for brevity) was "people are not supposed to be hungry when energy needs are met".....and this is one of the few times that we agreed to disagree.:boxing:

The reason I'm trying to sort out, to my own satisfaction, the physical aspects of appetite suppression/stimulation right now is because I actually think this is one of the biggest reasons for my incredibly poor success rate of maintenance - 50+ pounds lost and regained multiple times in the past. And, I've observed a similar pattern in those around me as well as the endless "I'm back again...I've regained xxx pounds" type posts on every weight loss forum on the net.

I believe there's a million reasons (emotional/social/habit) behind overeating to obesity in the first place....and hopefully in addition to calorie counting, we sort those out during the weight loss process....if not the rest doesn't matter anyway. But, then comes the part where we reach "ideal weight" - new habits, thought patterns, behaviors and coping skills have been pretty well established and put successfully into practice....and yet, almost 9 times out of 10 (literally), despite our best intentions, and often without quite understanding why we are doing it, we start overeating again.

So, for the sake of succeeding, finally, in my own maintenance, I committed myself to take the time to try and figure out what's been going on with me besides the oversimplified (IMO) "just returned to bad habits". And I ended up with three things I never even really considered before.....

1. Hormones rule. And I'm female - so hormones friggin rule. And if you don't believe in the power of hormones to affect thoughts and therefore behavior, just spend some time with a woman going through PMS, post-pregnancy or menopause.

2. Despite being in a smaller outward package...my body is, only in different ways, operating as dysfunctionally as it was when I was obese. It doesn't operate the same way it did when I was obese - nor the same way when before I gained the weight in the first place. It's got it's own funky way of functioning (or dysfunctioning) right now.

3. The human body was designed to use food not just for energy or enjoyment, but to heal, monitor, and regulate itself.

How the heck does any of this relate to hunger? Okay, I know when my energy needs are met. I know when I'm operating or not operating under stress, strong emotions, peer pressure to "just have a little", whatever. So when I'm hit by a drive to seek food and/or overeat and none of these are an issue, I figure factors one and two are in force.

And, since it's really all I can do, I am just trying to "teach myself" to eat in such a way (for instance, fiber lowers leptin levels) that slowly, eventually will encourage my body to operate in the way, as my brilliant friend says "It's supposed to". And like she also pointed out, in order to adapt and heal, the human body requires time, consistency and continuity...... Hey, I can do that!:jump:
 
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