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chelsea_morning

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- buttermilk biscuit, butter, jam, banana, glass of milk
- clam chowder, banana



The biscuits are not a normal thing - we had them for a dessert the other night and had a few leftovers. This morning was the last buttermilk biscuit morning :nopity: My flabby arms will thank me. Back to yogurt tomorrow! Even if it is the very sugary but also very full of protein Chobani. I love that stuff. The plain stuff is good on mexican dishes and in cream sauces too! Or with some honey. I'm not chic enough to eat it plain yet; too tangy for me!

Just had lunch at work, going for my daily lunch walk in a few minutes. I go for about 30 minutes, which equals out to 1.4 miles on the loop I walk. I'm still kind of slow after my surgery, but hopefully I will get faster. I also do some stretching. It helps to break up the day!

When I go into the microwave room to heat up my lunch, there is ALWAYS a box of donuts looking at me. I have been really good about not having any of the goodies they keep in there lately (salted nuts, chocolates, donuts, etc). Props to me!!:cool:

Not sure what I'll have for dinner tonight. I have an appointment far from home and probably won't get back until 8pm or later. Ugh. Maybe just skip it; I hate going to bed with a full stomach.
 
hidden sugar!

I don't know how anyone (chic or not) manages to eat plain yogurt, or why anyone would do it more than once! I used to eat yogurt but I've cut it out due to carbs/sugar. My nutrition group says that the Greek yogurt products are good. I tried one with honey and it was like a tolerable version of plain yogurt...and still didn't motivate me to re-introduce it into the rotation.

But what I really wanted to say is beware of bananas! They are healthy, you know that of course, they are natural, but they are one of the worst fruits for weight loss efforts.

It's shocking - 1 medium banana (7 inches to 7¾ inches long) has 24 grams of carbohydrates which is the equivalent to 6 teaspoons of sugar! Horror! Would you eat 6 teaspoons of sugar when you are trying to reduce? Yeah...neither would I. Grapes are a killer too... gotta watch those hidden sugars! Berries, which taste good with yogurt, are a dieters best friend! Strawberries are practically free food!

Good luck and keep posting!
 
I know that about bananas... every time I peel one I think, this is straight glucose, blood sugar crash is coming! I usually try and pair it with a handful of almonds or chopped up in some greek yogurt or if I'm having it for dessert I'll do a couple tbsp of peanut butter to add a little protein. But my boyfriend likes bananas as a snack and they are SO CHEAP right now in the summer time.... I will stop buying them! You have motivated me to put them down in the grocery store next time, even if they are 49 cents a pound. :)

For dinner I made tilapia fillets in a low-calorie/fat and low-salt indian masala sauce with some zucchini, onions and bell peppers sauteed in oil on the side. We had some left over creamy potato salad on the side (weird combo, I know), but I only had a couple spoonfuls on the side. We got home super late and I'm exhausted, so I only walked a couple miles today, but I will make up for it tomorrow.

Thanks for your post! You are the only one to reply so far! I like reading people's conversations, they are so motivating.

Have a good night, or morning, maybe it is morning where you live. It seems like there are a lot of people from the UK/Europe on here. That's awesome!
 
Going bananas!

You're so sweet - I was up late last night & well into the morning, I'm in Germany (but I'm from California). I like that I found an English language forum that it's entirely comprised of Americans. I like reading the blogs too, and last night I was motivated to write to you because I used to eat bananas, en mass, without knowing they were packed with sugar. I'm glad you are aware, awareness is so important!

I TOTALLY hear ya when you say they are cheap (I'm a huge penny pincher!)! I love bananas, generally speaking and it took me months and months to come around to the idea that saving a little money on fruit wasn't worth the caloric expense of their sugar content. But the calories add up so quickly in a day I just couldn't spend them there and eventually, more or less happily, gave them up.

I live alone and I don't know how you (and others) manage to stick to your eating plan when you share a home with someone not on a diet! I can't imagine it! I eat more carefully than I use to, and with portion-control under control, I spend less money on food overall, so I don't fret about the price of fruit (anymore). Training yourself to eat right is a process, so if you guiltily eat bananas, it's just a matter of time before they work their way out of your diet. It's nothing to panic about, at least it's bananas and not chocolate ice cream with a side of Kettle chips, am I right?!!

I'll give you a tip that worked for me. I read an article about how most people don't eat enough protein and how this deficiency makes us crave sweet things (feel lethargic, etc). It said that when a person is nutritionally balanced the craving for sweets goes away. I was completely skeptical! I thought, seriously? How can protein affect cravings for something sweet?! I have a sweet tooth and 70g of turkey isn't going to change that! But when I increased the amount of protein in my diet, it took less than a week and my "need" for a sweet treat everyday went away. I still like something sweet everyday, but if I don't have it, I don't go into a panic feeling deprived.

And I discovered that I like cottage cheese, of all things! Cottage cheese, with avocado and tomato is my most favorite protein rich snack!

Everyone's different of course, but maybe you can give it a try and see how it works for you, especially if sweets are an important part of your day.

Oh, and if you're not into melons, give them a try, when they are in season, they are really cheap, not as bad as bananas, and super sweet!

Keep up the good work and we'll see you around the boards!
 
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I had never thought about putting "savory" foods with cottage cheese. When I was little I always ate it with pears or peaches or fruit cocktail (packed in sugar water, of course). I do love cottage cheese though. I will have to try it with avocado. Unfortunately avocados have had a rough growing year and they're still pretty expensive - 2 for $4 - but I love avocado so much that I think I can make an exception.

It is hard living with someone who is not dieting, or who isn't as committed to it as you are. I tell him that I want to lose weight all of the time, and I have been really good about motivating myself to exercise after work. Sometimes he goes with us (me and the dog) but sometimes he doesn't. Honestly, when he doens't it's kind of nice to be out on your own for the day, just walking and thinking. But it's also nice to go with him because it makes the long, boring stretches of road go by faster. I need to get an mp3 player!

I buy all of the groceries and stuff, so it's not hard to buy healthy food (whole wheat v. white, no chips or anything, etc), but sometimes he'll come along after work (we carpool) and the bakery section, which doesn't even blip on my radar, becomes a circus and he says something like, "You know what would be really good? Strawberry shortcake after dinner." And then I'll already have put strawberries in the cart, and the little biscuits will already be there, baked and ready to be eaten... and I'm tired after a long day of work, and all I want to do is go home and cook dinner... and as soon as you know it, I'm buying a box of dessert biscuits. !!! But it's not his fault, I should have more willpower. Yes, it would be nice if he could hold back on his verbal dessert cravings for me, but we're human.

Melons - ohh melons. I love melon. Especially watermelon. I could eat a whole watermelon. I have actually. Not one of my proudest days. But not as bad as a whole batch of cookies or brownies... which I have done too. I'll just stop talking.

Today has been as successful as it could be, considering I've only been awake for an hour and 45 minutes.

Breakfast:
Chobani yoghurt (peach!) - 140
12 almonds (1/2 serving) - 80

We have a cookout at work today, which means burgers, brats, hotdogs, and heavy, rich picnic food. I will navigate the rough seas and hopefully find a fruit tray!
 
Well lunch was a semi-disaster. I did a good job with portion control, but my choices were limited. Of course, I could have nixed the cookouts all together and packed my own lunch and solved all of the problems, but I just started this job a few months ago and I would like to socialize and show people that I'm not a hermit who hides behind her desk all day.

So there were two cookouts, one that was university-wide, and one for the particular building that I work in. My boyfriend works in a different department, and he asked me if I would go to the cookout with him because he just started working here and didn't know if the rest of his department was going. So I walked up and got in line and had:

1 pre-made hamburger patty (~320 cal) (no bun!)
1 small scoop of baked beans (~200 cal)
1 small scoop of pasta salad (~100 cal)
1 small scoop of cole slaw (180)
lettuce
tomatoes
ketchup packet
bottled water

800! jeeeze o peets.

but THEN, I got back down to my building and they were having a cookout too, except it is for a charity and you make donations. So I donated my money and grabbed a small bag of cheetos (160) and a cookie (150). Which brings my total to 1110 calories for ONE MEAL. I could just about die right now.

My total for the day so far is 1330. I'm disappointed in myself, but not because I feel like I had huge portions or anything like that. I am disappointed because I had the cookie and the cheetos, which I normally would never eat but I felt obligated to hang out with my coworkers and make a contribution to the charity. I realize that I could have not eaten anything but... ugh. I also could have had less side dishes up at the first cookout, which might have kept my total under 1000 for lunch.

However, I am very happy with a couple of choices I made:

Small portions
No bun with my burger
No cheese with my burger
Water instead of diet soda
No dessert at the first picnic (They had brownies... yum.)

I will make sure to walk a full five miles tonight after work and have a very small dinner of only 300-400 calories. That should make up for my mistakes today at lunch. It will be hard, because I know I will get hungry tonight when I am relaxing for bed, but I will do it because I am strong and dedicated to my goals!
 
Last night for dinner:
3 pierogies (180 cals)
cream sauce, 1 serving (100 cals)
steamed spinach with red wine vinegar (20)
chopped yellow squash, zucchini, onion, mushroom, tomato and oil (75)
tbsp yogurt (20)

That gives me a total of 395 for dinner, and added to the rest of my day, I'm at 1725. I walked about four miles yesterday. So that's a burn of about 350 calories according to

Not terrible! I weighed myself this morning and was at 165.8, which is about three lbs less than what I weighed at the beginning of the week. But I am still pretty swollen from surgery so I think this is mostly water weight. I have been drinking a ton of water too, so hopefully the numbers will keep coming down as I heal.

This morning I had
1 whole wheat english muffin (134)
1 extra large egg (85)
1 piece of american cheese (94)
1 piece of canadian bacon (20)
1tsp butter (34)

Total: 367

I love making my own "McMuffins" - I call them that even though I've never had the McDonald's one. Although I'm sure they are significantly healthier and more filling from the whole wheat than the fast food version. Canadian bacon is awesome. The stuff that I get has a serving size of THREE SLICES with only 60 calories. So you get that kind of greasy-homemade breakfast food feel for only 20 calories a slice. I usually only eat one slice as I'm not a huge fan of lots of meat. I toss it in the pan alongside the egg and it gets all crispy and brown on both sides and then slap it on the bun with some cheese. Deeeelicious.

Lunch today is a microwaveable soup, which I'm not totally proud of but it's SO EASY and they're only like four dollars at the grocery store. It is a two-serving bowl, so it is pretty high in sodium but I try to drink a lot of water on the days I eat it and while I'm eating it. Not sure if that actually does anything to counter the salt content but I'm going to go with it.

Campbell's Chunky Sirloin and veggie soup (280 per bowl, 140 per serving)

So that only gives me a daily amount of 647, but there is leftover cookout food from yesterday and our office is having a second cookout... healthy right? So I might steal some nibbles from that.

Have a good day!!! Stay on track!
 
Just testing to see if my new signature thing works.

Also, I have another goal in mind. I still want to weigh 140lbs for my first goal and then reevaluate my health when I get to that point, but I want it to be in time for our spring break vacation that we've decided to take. We want to go to Jamaica in the second week of March, which is 239 days from today. I want to be looking fabbbulousss for the vacation. So I have seven and a half months until Jamaica, which equals about 4lbs per month. I know for the first five or ten lbs, I might be able to do it kind of quickly (1-2 months), but for the last few times I've tried to diet, any time I get below 160 or 155 it's like a constant struggle to lose anything at all. So I think seven months is a good goal. I want to weigh 140 lbs when I step off my plan in Jamaica in March.


I CAN DO THIS!

And if I do it, I am giving myself permission right now to spend $300 on swimsuits that I feel GREAT IN!!! Especially ones from victorias secret because they're always SO CUTE!
 
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So this evening was not as successful as I hoped. I got home and made dinner (italian sausage alfredo pizza) which doesn't SOUND very healthy but I ate a healthy portion of it. If I had allowed myself to eat all I wanted, I probably could've downed 2,000 calories no problem. I figured it out, and when it's all said and done - 2 pieces of pizza and applesauce for dessert, I had about 1,000 calories. I am okay with that because I had only eaten 647 until that point in the day. So about 1647 for the day.

Things I am proud of today:

I only had soup for lunch!
Resisted the temptation for a snack bag of chips.
Told my co-workers that I want to lose 20lbs. I will feel more motivated knowing that they know and less likely to snack around them.

I didn't go on a dedicated walk today because my feet have been bothering me (plantar fascitis) but i did go shopping and was on my feet for about two hours this evening. One of my big purchases was a FOOD SCALE, made by Perfect Portions at Bed Bath and Beyond (if you sign up for their e-mail newsletters you get a 20% off coupon.) It was $50, which is kind of a lot, but it was $40 with the coupon. It has awesome features. 1,999 stored foods, so you can just put whatever you are eating on the scale and look up the code, type it in and find out how many calories you're about to consume. it also has 99 available spots to store any special foods you eat that don't have a standard caloric measurement.

I also bought some popsicle moulds, and i used a recipe i found online to make strawberry cheesecake popsicles. I used sugarfree cheesecake pudding mix, and put fresh strawberries in the blender with a quarter cup water. I mixed the pudding up with some skim milk (it was instant pudding) and it got thick really fast. I added extra milk. Blended up the fruit and water, and then layered the two things in the popsicles. I did one tbsp of pudding, one of fruit, one of pudding, and then one of fruit. I'm not sure how many calories are in that. it says that a half cup of the pudding is 70 calories, and there's six tablespoons in a half cup. so about ten calories per tablespoon, and i would say there is two strawberries in one blended tablespoon, which is about 17 calories according to my scale. so two pudding layers is 20, two strawberry layers is 34. about 54 or 60 calories in one popsicle. Not bad for an after-dinner sweet tooth craving, huh??!! I'm excited to try them tomorrow when they're good and frozen.

Have a good night and healthy habits for tomorrow!
 
Today started out really well! I walked four miles today before breakfast with my dog. Then I came home and had:

one of my popsicles (60)
blueberries (100)
multi-grain cheerios (190)
1% milk (102)

I have a Dr. appointment at 3pm, so I have to leave around 1pm. I might have a small small lunch or snack before I leave, since I won't be home until 5 or 530. Now I am going to clean the whole apartment!!!
 
Appointment went really well! She said my skin is pulling up really nicely and that my continued draining is really healthy. My bruising is almost completely gone and you can start to see definition in my abs. Hooray!! Only negative thing: I have to continue wearing my spandex suit until the middle of August. Poooop! This thing is super hot in the summertime. Luckily my work is air conditioned.

Dinner is chicken and kidney bean enchiladas. The whole pan is 2,244, and there is seven enchiladas. So 320 per enchilada. Not bad! I could have three if I wanted. I think I will stick to two though. I definitely want to have another one of my popsicles for dessert and maybe some applesauce... I'm a sucker for applesauce.

Here's my enchilada recipe (for ten enchiladas):

two chicken breasts, boiled
1 cup greek yogurt
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
1 can kidney beans
1 small yellow onion
1 packet taco seasoning
1 can enchilada sauce
10 fajita-sized tortillas

Chop boiled chicken into bite sized pieces. Add drained beans, chopped onion, seasoning packet, one cup yogurt and one cup cheddar cheese. Mix well, until the yogurt coats everything and the seasoning is mixed up. Fill tortillas and roll, placing into a baking dish (I sprayed with pam first). Pour enchilada sauce over the top, and sprinkle remaining cup of cheese. You could cut out a lot of calories by only using one cup of cheese, and either not putting it in the filling and just putting it on top, or by splitting it up and doing half a cup inside and half a cup on top. But I love cheese and I had the calories to spend, so I used two cups :)

Ole!
 
Oh, and things I am proud of today:

went for a walk first thing this morning
my Dr. said my results are amazing for such a short time
cleaned the apartment
 
Yesterday went really well. I had a burrito (320) and a side of steamed veggies (50). I also had a cup of applesauce and a popsicle (280). I also had a blue moon at the bar (229). That brings my daily total to 1542. We walked a mile to the bar and a mile back, so my total mileage for the day is 6 miles.

I wasn't hungry for the second burrito on my plate, which is amazing! I can't believe one burrito filled me up. It was nice to see that.

This morning I weighed 163.8, but I think it was all water weight (I have to take a water pill for swelling). So we will see what my weight is in a week or so.
 
afternoon snack while watching the world cup (congrats Japan!), bowl of strawberries, 100 cal.

day total: 522

Going for a short walk to the laundromat to meet my boyfriend (who drives the laundry). It will only be 1.2 miles total, there and back. But I did about 45 mins of calisthenics this afternoon, stretching and glute work. I might walk more tonight when it's cooler and the sun has gone down. It's HOT today!!!
 
had a bowl of strawberries during the world cup: 102

For dinner I made a portion-controlled dinner for two, to the exact specifications of everything I put in. I used whole wheat penne pasta, dried tomatoes, fresh cherry tomatoes, capers, artichoke hearts, shrimp, red pepper flakes, parmasean cheese and a little bit of alfredo sauce (1/4 cup for two servings), green olives and a side of cheesey cauliflower. The whole meal came out to 517 calories per serving. It was SO GOOD.

Daily total: 1041.


I would have liked to have more calories, maybe in the 1400-1700 range, but it just didn't happen for me today. I wasn't super hungry or anything except right before dinner, but I was able to control my hunger and make a healthy-portioned meal and enjoy it.
 
Breakfast:

1 homemade egg mcmuffin, with half a slice of american cheese: 320
glass of milk: 102

Lunch: Burrito, 320
strawberries and blueberries: 115

Day total: 857

Went for a walk at lunch time, 1.9 miles. Got home to explosive diarrhea from my dog, spent an hour cleaning carpets and the couch and wood floors. What a lovely Monday evening I've had. Probably going out for dinner until the smell in our apartment dissipates. How disgusting. I will try to make wise choices and estimate the calorie intake as best I can.

Last night: We out for Mexican since our apartment was stinky. I thought I would be able to find the most healthy options at a Mexican restaurant. I had steak/chicken/shrimp fajitas (2). Tortillas (200), sour cream (75), guacamole (100), beans and rice (145), grilled onions, bell peppers and tomatoes (45) and I'm sure there was oil in the veggies/meats (150). It's so much harder to eat at a restaurant than it is to make your own food when you're keeping track of calories. I boxed up half of the fajita filling and took it home with me for lunch today. I had a popsicle when I got home (60).

Day total final: 1632

Breakfast:
1 whole wheat hamburger bun (160)
1 XL egg (85)
1 piece of canadian bacon (20)
half a piece of reduced fat american cheese (25)
1 cup of milk (102)

Lunch:

I weighed the meats separately today with my scale for lunch and it said 58 for the steak and 67 for the chicken. There weren't many veggies left so I added some grape tomatoes (50) and I'm sure there was oil again (100). I also had a chobani yogurt (150).

Day total so far: 817

Will go for a walk in a bit, 1.9 miles.

Things I am proud of from yesterday:

I didn't eat any of the chips at the restaurant. I have been known to polish off an entire basket before, plus some of a second basket.
I had water at the restaurant.
I wanted a bowl of cinnamon toast crunch SO BAD when I got home, but I compromised with a low-cal popsicle.
 
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I weighed myself this morning, and the scale said 162.2!!! Of course I do it before breakfast, but I always do it at the same time every day. I think that is the most accurate way. I am still not going to move the ticker though, because I think a lot of it is water weight. I will record the weight that it says on Monday.
 
For dinner I had sloppy joes made with ground turkey, chopped bell pepper and onion, one hotdog bun, and a side of buttered green beans. I also had some romaine lettuce with a little ranch dressing. This added up to about 700 calories.

I did not go for a walk today because it was so hot. I will walk later when it cools down.

Day total: 1517

I walked about 2.7 miles to our gym, where I did some shoulders and arm workouts and then stretched a lot. I spent about 40 minutes there. I'm taking it easy so that I don't hurt myself or something. My Dr. told me to do a lot of stretching and that it will help the results!
 
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