Struggling

I've had a rough holiday weekend so far but am feeling a little better today. I have been very sad, depressed, angry and have had insomnia. It all has to do with a family situation with my stepdaughter and grandson. I worry about him and I miss him. Anyway, I haven't been making great food choices -- been eating too much corn on the cob, ribs & sausage and have been using real butter instead of spray margarine. I've been making runs to WaWa for bags of Cheetos. On the up side, they've been the smaller sized bags and I haven't gone for the chocolate. I think I'd be unable to get back up on the wagon if I ate any chocolate! Still...this has to stop...NOW.

Positive & Negative Energy

I've had a lot of both flowing today. On the up side, I lost 1 more pound. I realized that I might have been feeling very blue lately because I haven't been getting any sunny Vitamin D. I went outside while DH was cleaning the grill. It was so lovely out I decided to pick up a broom and sweep the dirt and helicopters off our patio. It felt good to be moving around in the sunshine.

After about 20 minutes, I took a break and went indoors and that's where I was when my older stepdaughter called with some news that upset and depressed me very much. I cried and/or napped just about all afternoon. This kind of upset is bad for me because I can feel how it impacts my body. My head is aching and my stomach is tied up in knots.

But I'm not eating at least. :P

Cat Friday: Ain't She Sweet?

oh, the shame! 

Amber may not look very pleased in the picture but she sure is cute! I had another reason to share that photo--I'm in it. It reminds me to stay on track! I have a long way to go!

Where's the stop button?

We're all supposed to have them, right? Yet study after study seems to show that if we're offered big portions, we eat everything on the plate. At the buffet table, if there's a lot of food available we can really load up our plates. Hunger doesn't seem to have much to do with it either. People don't seem to realize that they're offered more food when it happens -- they think they're eating about the same as usual. It's not just us big people who have this problem. People who don't have a weight problem and aren't dieting also eat much more.

Again, the answer seems to be awareness. Know that this is going to happen to you in a restaurant or at a buffet table. When your meal is served, ask for a doggie bag right away and put away part of the meal. This way when you clean the plate, you aren't eating everything although you might feel like you are. You can always eat later from the doggie bag if you are still hungry.

Serve lots and lots of vegetables and serve meals on smaller plates to give people the illusion that they're eating plenty of food. Set out huge bowls of fruit for dessert. Sounds doable? Read this article for more suggestions.

One more thing: being broke cuts down on cravings! Why? Because I know I can't go buy anything anyway. Hmmm...is this a good thing?

Obese Moms Overfeed Their Kids?

Before I get to the article I read, I just wanted to say that I am feeling pretty pleased with myself. I was at the grocery store with my two daughters and waiting on the check out line. I was treating them both to a soda and the younger one said to me, "Mom do you want a cookie?" She pointed to a sign that said something like Oreo cookies 3/$1 and said that she had some money. Boy, it was tempting! But I said to her, "No, I don't think that's a good idea."

I think I have to treat chocolate the same way I treat cigarettes and alcohol -- I have to NOT eat it. Period. I gave up drinking and smoking knowing that I had a problem with alcohol and was addicted to nicotine. That means NO MORE. Well, it's the same thing with chocolate. I notice if I eat a little bit, I crave it. Once the cravings start they are hard to fight. I look at it like this: right now I am not craving chocolate. Why cause trouble for myself?

I read this article and found myself feeling very annoyed. I realize it's because I was taking it very personally. Basically, there was a small study involving 7 mothers. They were followed over a period of months. The study indicated that obese mothers may overfeed their normal weight babies and, not only that, interact with them less. That would seem to lead to childhood obesity.

I felt myself becoming annoyed because I was an obese mother. When my kids were babies, I wasn't as heavy as I am now but I was at least 50 lbs overweight. I thought to myself, I did *not* do that. I was active with my kids! I played with them! But ... I had to shake myself a little and reflect that I shouldn't be so defensive and try to look at it objectively.

Did I overfeed my kids? Well, two of them always fell into the 50th percentile or less for weight. One, however, was consistently up there in the 75-90th percentile range. Genetics? Or carelessness on my part?

I took the kids swimming and to the parks to play every day for at least an hour. Two of my kids were very active -- the same two with the lower weight. My other child always complained of being "tired" rather quickly and would sit down. Again -- genetics? Or something else?

I read to my kids. We played board games.

Boy, I am defensive, aren't I? :P

On the other hand, there is my stepdaughter. She weighs almost as much as I do and that is very bad because she is only 24. She doesn't interact with her baby much and she sleeps away much of her free time. If she's taking care of the baby, so does he -- sleep excessively, I mean. I don't know that she overfeeds him. She does give him a lot of junk. I worry about the situation but ... what can I do? I try to give advice but why would she listen to me? She doesn't live here with us anymore either.

Where is that good feeling I had earlier? I need to get it back...

My cousin and me

I was emailing with my cousin yesterday about and one of the topics we discussed was our frustration with losing weight. I realize that both of us have battled weight all our lives. My younger cousin is also very heavy. My aunt is heavy. My grandmother was heavy.

Are we doomed here?

Sadly, my cousins and I seem to be even heavier than the older women were. Activity has everything to do with that, doesn't it? We have so many more conveniences now than the previous generations did. My grandmother loved to garden. She walked a lot. She was heavy, yes, but I bet she was healthy-heavy.

My cousin has always been heavier than me and -- this is mean to say -- I took some comfort in that. Well, at least I'm not as fat as she is, I'd think when people teased me or nagged me about my weight. When I was 17, I joined Weight Watchers and lost 50 pounds. I felt so much better and looked better and ...I felt smug. See, I'm not fat anymore.

My cousin has tried all the programs too with no measure of success. When our grandmother died, we moved into her house and shared it until it was sold. My cousin made several attempts to diet but would always fall back. We'd go shopping and she'd pick up something she shouldn't have. I'd say, "I thought you were trying to lose weight?" and she'd get so angry with me. Fine, I'd say, do what you want. See...I'm not fat anymore.

But now I am fat again, heavier than I have ever been in my life. I could kick myself for being smug and complacent and taking my health for granted so many years.

My cousin had a heart attack a few years ago. Then she started having trouble with her knee. She can no longer walk without a cane. She needs surgery but the doctor refuses until she loses all her weight. Well...but in the meantime she is in a great deal of pain. The doctor suggested a bypass which scared her. She went on the Atkins program and lost 85 pounds. It wasn't enough to satisfy the surgeon.

My cousin has hit a plateau and has become severely discouraged. She's seeing a nutritionist and exercising in the water but the weight is no longer coming off. She wrote me that she probably has to see an endocrinologist to find out why she's not losing weight.

Boy, do I hear her. I understand about being in so much pain exercise is next to impossible. I understand how much being overweight affects your health. I understand how frustrating and discouraging it is to lose -- especially after having been so successful before. Like I said, I could kick myself. I have nothing to feel smug about now.

Do I want to just say, oh, well, this is just genetics and we're screwed? NO. Even if genetics has everything to do with it, I can still fight back. I'm losing weight ... too slowly for what I want but I'm going in the right direction. The point is not to gain anymore.

And keep trying to exercise.

I found this joke in my email and it's about exercise:

HOW TO GET IN SHAPE

Just came across this exercise suggested for building muscle strength in the
arms and shoulders. It seems so easy, I thought I'd pass it on to some of my
friends. The article suggested doing it three days a week.

Begin by standing on a comfortable surface, where you have plenty of room at
each side. With a 5-lb. potato sack in each hand, extend your arms straight
out from your sides, and hold them there as long as you can. Try to reach a
full minute, then relax.

Each day, you'll find that you can hold this position for just a bit longer.
After a couple of weeks, move up to 10-lb. potato sacks, then 50-lb. potato
sacks, and eventually try to lift a 100-lb. potato sack in each hand and
hold your arms out straight for more than a full minute.

After you feel confident at that level, put a potato in each of the sacks.

Should the doctor say anything?

There were a couple of interesting questions posed on a weight loss support email list I belong to, 3 Fat Chicks. The first question: should the doctor say something about the effect of excess weight on your health? I'm assuming the question to mean after that first time it's brought up. I didn't say on the list how I felt about it because I wasn't sure.

On the one hand, a doctor is supposed to be concerned about your health. If there's something that's affecting it doesn't he or she have the responsibility to speak up about it? On the other hand ... how helpful is it? Does it make the patient feel nagged, shamed, pressured and maybe unwilling to return?

This has been my experience: I go into the doctor's office half dreading what I'm going to hear. I know what my weight is doing to me without the doctor even saying so. But having my face pushed into it will make me have to look at the issues ... at least for a few minutes.

Has it helped? Not really. I feel motivated to lose the weight and I try but it's not easy to stay true to a diet over a period of time.

I remember I lost about 30 lbs in 2002 and happily shared that with my doctor. She was so pleased and said she was proud of me. And then ... I gained it all back plus another 20 lbs. I felt so ashamed. The doctor hasn't addressed that issue and I thought, hm, is it because she's disgusted with me now and figures I'm just going to stay a fat person with deteriorating health now?

The subject came up when my daughter and I were at the doctor's office to have working papers signed. My daughter's been losing weight too and the doctor once again said that she was happy and proud.

I asked her about the question that came up on the list and her answer was that she didn't want to create a situation where overweight patients would be reluctant to come and see her because they were nervous about being lectured. Her view was that she would discuss the weight issues with a patient and then not bring it up again unless asked.

I didn't quite get the courage to ask my next question, which is: when we lose weight and then gain it back, does the doctor figure we're sort of a lost cause?

45 Weight Loss Tips

I belong to a mailing list called 3 Fat Chicks and they also have a wonderful website of support. In March, one of the members passed along this email and I'm finally getting around to reading it! :P

My only issue with this article is the use of the word "diet". I think we have to look at these as tips for a new healthy lifestyle in eating.

Weight loss advice that really works--from top
nutrition pros.
by Top Dietitians of the American Dietetic Association

Courtesy of the American Dietetic Association (ADA),
we took our readers' toughest diet problems and ran
them by some of the top dietitians in the US: RDs who,
in addition to their private careers, serve as media
spokespersons or heads of specialty practice groups
for the ADA.

Here's what they told us, in their own words. These
tips are solid gold, learned from successful
experience with thousands of clients. Some tips are
new. Some you've heard before, but they're repeated
because they work. This treasure trove of RD wisdom
could change your life-starting today.

I Can Only Handle One Diet Change Right Now. What
Should I Do?

1. Add just one fruit or veggie serving daily. Get
comfortable with that, then add an extra serving until
you reach 8 to 10 a day.

2. Eat at least two servings of a fruit or veggie at
every meal.

3. Resolve never to supersize your food
portions--unless you want to supersize your clothes.

4. Make eating purposeful, not mindless. Whenever you
put food in your mouth, peel it, unwrap it, plate it,
and sit. Engage all of the senses in the pleasure of
nourishing your body.

5. Start eating a big breakfast. It helps you eat
fewer total calories throughout the day.advertisement
Which plan is right for you? Find out.
· Atkins®
· eDiets Weight Loss Plan
· Total Body Makeover
· Eating for Life Plan
· Slim-Fast® Optima™ Diet
· Blood Type Diet®
· Living with Diabetes
· Heart Smart Plan

6. Make sure your plate is half veggies and/or fruit
at both lunch and dinner.

Are there Any Easy Tricks to Help Me Cut Calories?

7. Eating out? Halve it, and bag the rest. A typical
restaurant entree has 1,000 to 2,000 calories, not
even counting the bread, appetizer, beverage, and
dessert.

8. When dining out, make it automatic: Order one
dessert to share.

9. Use a salad plate instead of a dinner plate.

10. See what you eat. Plate your food instead of
eating out of the jar or bag.

11. Eat the low-cal items on your plate first, then
graduate. Start with salads, veggies, and broth soups,
and eat meats and starches last. By the time you get
to them, you'll be full enough to be content with
smaller portions of the high-calorie choices.

12. Instead of whole milk, switch to 1 percent. If you
drink one 8-oz glass a day, you'll lose 5 lb in a
year.

13. Juice has as many calories, ounce for ounce, as
soda. Set a limit of one 8-oz glass of fruit juice a
day.

14. Get calories from foods you chew, not beverages.
Have fresh fruit instead of fruit juice.

15. Keep a food journal. It really works wonders.

16. Follow the Chinese saying: "Eat until you are
eight-tenths full."

17. Use mustard instead of mayo.

18. Eat more soup. The noncreamy ones are filling but
low-cal.

19. Cut back on or cut out caloric drinks such as
soda, sweet tea, lemonade, etc. People have lost
weight by making just this one change. If you have a
20-oz bottle of Coca-Cola every day, switch to Diet
Coke. You should lose 25 lb in a year.

20. Take your lunch to work.

21. Sit when you eat.

22. Dilute juice with water.

23. Have mostly veggies for lunch.

24. Eat at home.

25. Limit alcohol to weekends.

How Can I Eat More Veggies?

26. Have a V8 or tomato juice instead of a Diet Coke
at 3 pm.

27. Doctor your veggies to make them delicious:
Dribble maple syrup over carrots, and sprinkle chopped
nuts on green beans.

28. Mix three different cans of beans and some diet
Italian dressing. Eat this three-bean salad all week.

29. Don't forget that vegetable soup counts as a
vegetable.

30. Rediscover the sweet potato.

31. Use prebagged baby spinach everywhere: as
"lettuce" in sandwiches, heated in soups, wilted in
hot pasta, and added to salads.

32. Spend the extra few dollars to buy vegetables that
are already washed and cut up.

33. Really hate veggies? Relax. If you love fruits,
eat plenty of them; they are just as healthy
(especially colorful ones such as oranges, mangoes,
and melons).

34. Keep seven bags of your favorite frozen vegetables
on hand. Mix any combination, microwave, and top with
your favorite low-fat dressing. Enjoy 3 to 4 cups a
day. Makes a great quick dinner.

Can You Give Me a Mantra that will Help Me Stick to My
Diet?

35. "The best portion of high-calorie foods is the
smallest one. The best portion of vegetables is the
largest one. Period."

36. "I'll ride the wave. My cravings will disappear
after 10 minutes if I turn my attention elsewhere."

37. "I want to be around to see my grandchildren, so I
can forgo a cookie now."

38. "I am a work in progress."

39. "It's more stressful to continue being fat than to
stop overeating."

I Eat Healthy, but I'm Overweight. What Mistakes Could
I Be Making without Realizing It?

40. Skipping meals. Many healthy eaters "diet by day
and binge by night."

41. Don't "graze" yourself fat. You can easily munch
600 calories of pretzels or cereal without realizing
it.

42. Eating pasta like crazy. A serving of pasta is 1
cup, but some people routinely eat 4 cups.

43. Eating supersize bagels of 400 to 500 calories for
snacks.

44. Ignoring "Serving Size" on the Nutrition Facts
panel.

45. Snacking on bowls of nuts. Nuts are healthy but
dense with calories. Put those bowls away, and use
nuts as a garnish instead of a snack.

The American Dietetic Association RDs serve as media
spokespersons or heads of specialty practice groups
for the ADA.

What's the best program?

Almost every time I turn around, I seem to find another article or news story that focuses on which diet plan works best. Now Consumer Reports has 'weighed' in. They based their ratings on how easy the plan is to follow, the nutritional values, how long people stick with it, and how many pounds they lose. Getting off track for a minute, first of all I think calling these things 'diet' plans are a set up to failure. Doesn't everyone think of a diet as a temporary painful period of time where you starve or limit your food and then you lose weight and then you go back to what you were doing?

I think the bottom line is for any of these plans to work, we have to look at it as life style changes, not temporary torture, and the changes have to be ones we can live with. Who can go through life thinking 'I'll never have a brownie again'? The trick is to have just the one brownie and learn how to stop there.

Back to the study: not surprisingly, Weight Watchers came in at the top. I have had the best results with that program and I think it's partly to do with the fact that it's balanced and partly to do with the support from the meetings. I just wish it wasn't so expensive. I can't afford to go to them but I remember enough about the program to incorporate it into my eating plan.

The report will appear in the June issue but a lot of the details appear here.

While I was reading the article, I saw a link to a quiz about dining out. Ho-hum, I thought, this is going to be another one of those where they ask if you eat a lot of cheeseburgers or chicken or salad...but it wasn't at all. It was hard! But I learned some things! Check it out! It's an interactive quiz that appears on the same page as the article.

"On the Heavy Side"

I get a Mountain Wings newsletter in my email every day. I usually find them to be very inspiring but sometimes there is a message that just really clicks. This one really clicked with me not only because I love cats but because of my weight issues. Here it is:

-------------------------------------------------
MountainWings A MountainWings Moment
#5130 Wings Over The Mountains of Life
-------------------------------------------------

On the Heavy Side
==================

Miki is our 16-year-old cat; she's always been "on the heavy side."

Up until recently she was subject to eating anything people ate plus her regular food. She was also subject to leaving us little tokens around the house which should have been in her litter box. This was a relatively new behavior.

There was nothing physically responsible for her tokens.
The vet said that her tokens were probably signs of the lack of nurturing as compared to the attention paid to our male cat, Meaux. This was true.

We then worked hard to love Miki as much as we loved Meaux.
Now Miki does not leave us many tokens any more and has simultaneously lost weight.

I am, and have been most of my life (for some 60 years now),
50 pounds overweight. I have worked at almost every weight loss plan including gastroplasty. I have lost probably about 500 pounds in my lifetime; and if I had all the money I have spent on diets, etc., I could have retired ten years ago and lived comfortably for many years.

It occurs to me at this point that if I would "let go and let God" nurture me as we have nurtured Miki, I would slim down also.

This was a MountainWings Moment to me.


~A MountainWings Original by Nancy Beard, Shreveport, LA~

Lost Another 2 lbs!

It may not seem like much but it sure is a small step in the right direction! I am so happy. I am about where I was when I fell into that vat of Reese's white chocolate peanut butter cups. I'm still not exercising as much as I'd like to but I'm hoping if I can continue to lose I'll feel better (in less pain) and will be able to take up walking regularly.

I stopped having anything to eat after dinner and that has definitely been a big help! It's also helped that I haven't felt hungry or had cravings for foods. I'm not sure why that is because there was a time that I would have these chocolate cravings several times a night. I better not tempt fate by talking about it, eh?

I found a site that has helped me stay away from fast food. This one is called Fast Food Calorie Counter and I have been really shocked to see how loaded my meals are even when I went from super-size to medium.

Five years ago, my typical meal from Mickey D's was a super-size diet soda, double cheese quarter pounder and super fries which, I learned, came to well over 1200 calories. I don't even think super size meals exist anymore, a concession made by the fast food industry!

I switched to getting the medium size big & tasty cheeseburger meal but when I checked this website last month I was dismayed to see that I was still eating up near 1000 calories for just one meal and that there was 49 g of fat in it! ARGH, better try the kid's double cheeseburger meal I decided. Well... that's a little better but it's still 690 calories & 34 g of fat!

What's left?

A nice healthy salad, right? It depends on which salad. If you get a salad with grilled chicken, it'll have around 200-260 calories in it and 6-11 g of fat. But if you want crispy chicken, add on another 100 calories and another 5-7 g of fat. Then there's the dressing ...

Somehow, it just doesn't seem worth the money. Why am I going to pay more than $5 for a salad and a drink? And that salad won't have various lettuce greens, carrots, broccoli, green peppers and other goodies.

After finagling with this counter, I'm not loving it anymore.

Ah, Wendy's ... they have salads and chili and all kinds of good stuff...or do they? I was dismayed to see how many calories and grams of fat are in the salads!

I checked Burger King salads and they seem to have the healthiest choices but ...

is this really what I want? Fast food salad?

I think I'll pass and make myself something at home.

Resisting Impulses

The stress since Sunday has been almost relentless. We got word that my stepdaughter was thrown out of her friend's house and that she had no where to go. We didn't know where the baby was in all of this although I was fairly sure he was with his father. We had unpleasant conversations with SD that day as well as with the friend and boyfriend's mother. About the most I was able to determine is that the baby is safe. Today, SD was to appear in court for distributing alcohol to minors. I don't know what happened there although a part of me wishes the judge put her in jail. Probably not though. Anyway, normally my first response to a crisis like this would be to run to WaWa (or have my DH run to WaWa) and buy chips and candy ... but this time I haven't done it. I'm sort of proud of myself for that small victory.