Weight-Loss The CHaTAM Challenge!

[Little John]

I've been doing this awhile for myself without thinking about making it a shared challenge, but it seems to work: CHaTAM* = Change a Habit Twice A Month. The idea is to figure out what bad habits you want to drop and what new ones you want to add to your routine. Doesn't have to be a daily habit, either, just try to improve your routines a bit at a time.

Open to ideas on how to keep score if we wanted to do that. No need to reset your counter when you do stumble. The idea is that these habit changes are permanent, though, so you'll have to keep monitoring them.

My habit changes:
Oct 1: Cut out the fast food (Success 44 out of 45 days)
Oct 19: No evening dessert during the week (Sun-Thurs) (Success 16 out of 20 days)
Nov 1: Cut out soda (Success 13 out of 14 days)
Nov 14: Limit unhealthy weekend meals to once/day (Fri, Sat, Sun) (Success 0 out of 0 days)





*Acronym note: I was going to call it the CHEPP Challenge - Change a Habit Every Pay Period, but I'm sure you weekly-paycheck folks might have a helluva time with that. Another acronym thought, I work at a massive corporation which has an acronym name, and there're A4E (Acronyms for Everything)

 

[Little John]

OK, no takers. I'm still going to track my own progress!

My habit changes:

Challenge	Start Date	Current Date	Challenge Days	Misses	Successes	Success Rate
Cut out Fast Food	1-Oct	16-Nov	46	1	45	98%
No evening dessert during week	19-Oct	16-Nov	20	4	16	80%
No soda	1-Nov	16-Nov	15	1	14	93%
One bad meal per weekend day	14-Nov	16-Nov	3	0	3	100%
Total			84	6	78	93%

 

[Risty]

I just restarted here and completely forgot about the challenges section. I know that helped me a lot in the past!!! I'll join this one! I know there's one habit I need to change/add really so that would be my first!

I don't quite know how to set it all up, or make a table like that on here :| But here's my first change:

Challenge: No more dehydration (drink 8 glasses of water a day). This is going to be super hard because I currently drink 0-1 cups right now :O Haha...

 

[Little John]

Hey Risty, water isn't too hard for me since I'm always thirsty. During the week I have a 22oz plastic drink bottle and a straw and manage to empty that easily. At home, I keep a pint glass next to the kitchen sink and drink it up a few times a day.

I think I'm going to add a third habit this month. Cut out bedtime snacking. That's a killer for me, especially in the last couple weeks - far too easy to fall into the trap again and again.

As for my spreadsheet, here's what the formulas look like. Because some of the challenges are only for specific days of the week, I had to do some digging around to figure out how to make them work for me. I couldn't tell you how that INT-WORKDAY thing works, but it should work if you have some weekend-only challenges (mine covers Fri, Sat and Sun). NETWORKDAY is nice for counting just the workdays.

Challenge	Start Date	Current Date	Challenge Days	Misses	Successes	Success Rate
Cut out Fast Food	10/1	11/20	=+C2-B2	1	=+D2-E2	=+F2/D2
No evening dessert during week	10/19	=+C$2	=+NETWORKDAYS(B3,C3)	7	=+D3-E3	=+F3/D3
No soda	11/1	=+C$2	=+C4-B4	1	=+D4-E4	=+F4/D4
One bad meal per weekend day	11/14	=+C$2	=3*INT((WEEKDAY($B5-1)+$C5-$B5)/7)	0	=+D5-E5	=+F5/D5
Total			=+SUM(D2:D5)	=+SUM(E2:E5)	=+SUM(F2:F5)	=+F6/D6

 

[Risty]

Water is SOOO hard for me. I hardly feel thirsty, and I don't know how as I rarely drink anything at all. I'm lucky to get a glass in a day. So doing 8 is so hard, I have to really try and remember and all afternoon I forgot so I'm playing catch up... before bedtime... yay! lol

 

[Little John]

How about ramping up to it? 2 glasses today, 3 glasses tomorrow, etc? Can you keep a water bottle at your desk and keep it visible? Or set up a reminder on your phone? Maybe have a glass of water with breakfast, lunch and dinner? If you have a pint glass at each of those meals, you've got 6 glasses done.

Anyway, here's my tally as of last night. Dessert's still a big issue, and I have a feeling the new addition will be, too. Hard for me to skip a little snack for bedtime.

Challenge	Start Date	Current Date	Challenge Days	Misses	Successes	Success Rate
Cut out Fast Food	1-Oct	23-Nov	53	1	52	98%
No evening dessert during week	19-Oct	23-Nov	25	8	17	68%
No soda	1-Nov	23-Nov	22	1	21	95%
One bad meal per weekend day	14-Nov	23-Nov	6	0	6	100%
Cut out bedtime snacking	20-Nov	23-Nov	2	0	2	100%
Total			108	10	98	91%

 

[Little John]

Update so far. Looks like I have a problem with hunger after dinner, not sure the proper resolution, maybe will-power? Maybe I need more water during meal time. Also need to think of a new one to add for today. Maybe I'll add 5 servings of fruit/veggies a day? That could be tough, but that's kind of the point, right?

Challenge	Start Date	Current Date	Challenge Days	Misses	Successes	Success Rate
Cut out Fast Food	1-Oct	30-Nov	60	2	58	97%
No evening dessert during week	19-Oct	30-Nov	30	9	21	70%
No soda	1-Nov	30-Nov	29	2	27	93%
One bad meal per weekend day	14-Nov	30-Nov	9	1	8	89%
Cut out bedtime snacking	20-Nov	30-Nov	7	2	5	71%
Total			135	16	119	88%

 

[Quercus]

Just stopping in to encourage. This challenge doesn't really fit were i am right now, but it's a great idea and I hope you keep at it! I think upping your fruits and veggies will help a lot with hunger and energy. Great work so far!

 

[Little John]

Appreciate the encouragement, Q. Funny to see my weaknesses spelled out as days go by.

Cut out soda? No problem.

Skip having some crackers before going to bed? What am I, a monk?

 

[Risty]

I think I'm going to stop for now. I'm just not in the right frame of mind for anything with what's been going on. I'll just stick to keeping track of my calories (which I've slacked on this week) and restarting my exercise. I need to get that down first.

 

[JerseyMama]

I think I am going to try this! I only drink Iced T and Water as it is..though i Do not drink 8 12 oz bottles of water a day... and I always have fruit in the house for my kid...but seldom do i eat it late at night..i kind of go for anythings ...shameful

 

[Omega]

I think that this looks like a great challenge. I think that I'll play...

Since I missed my 10,000 steps twice last week and this really is my first week back here - that'll be what I start with since it's cumulative.
wk 1 start date 27/03/2017 walk 10,000 steps per day MTWTFSSMTWTFSS



period 1 completed 100%

 

[Omega]

So I've completed my first 2 weeks and done that...

For my next 2 weeks I'm going to try to cut out bread... It has been my biggest downfall over the past 2 weeks so time it got axed.
I'm also going to keep going on the step-count - but step it up too... I intend to set as a base target a minimum of 12,000 steps a day.
Period 2 start date 10/04/2017 walk 12,000 steps MTWTFSSMTWTFSS no bread MfWTFSSMTWTfSS

Tuesday 11th fail bread - I ate a peshwari nan
Friday 21st fail bread - I ate a triangle of pizza



period 1 completed 93%

 

[Omega]

Last period I was doing 12,000 steps - so my increase for the next period is increasing that step count to 14,000 - a level I didn't hit three times in the past week...

Period 3 start date 24/04/2017 walk 14,000 steps MTWTdddddddddd no bread MTffdddddddddd

Bread failures:
Wednesday 26th - 1/2 bread roll
Thursday 27th - 2 triangles pizza