Today I did my 16 block daycare commute and a little light weeding.
I ate:
2 Builder's bars (one morning, one evening)
water
2 cheese scones (one day-old, alas)
Water from the water bottle I remembered to bring to work and then left there--but I finished the whole thing
quinoa and veggie casserole (1 serving plus a taste, with parmesan cheese)
1 medium chocolate ice cream cone, in a cake cone, not waffle, and no jimmies
No fresh fruit yet, but I have my eye on a pear before I go to bed.
I think I did pretty well.
I also emailed a bit with Jenny (hi Jenny!) on swimming, which is getting me all fired up to go to the pool. We join the Girl Scout pool every summer, and usually we go on Memorial Day weekend only to be put off by the cold of the water (not only is it early in the season, but the pool is spring-fed: brrr!) This year we skipped it because we had plans to go to a birthday party on Sunday and to have a mini-hike in the woods near our house on Monday. Maybe this weekend we'll go, though.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
I can't proofread in draft
This is true no matter what--I need to have hard copy in front of me to catch everything. In my main blog I often go back several times to catch typos and editing problems.
That is not what this blog is about, however. It you want smooth copy, you probably shouldn't be reading a diet blog.
That is not what this blog is about, however. It you want smooth copy, you probably shouldn't be reading a diet blog.
5/30/07, 11:30 pm
Here's the rest of the day:
Food:
Four cookies (Newman's own espresso chocolate chip--they are small.)
Water
slice of challah with cheese
Water
two servings of nacho casserole, with picking at cheese in both directions (Z. from my plate, me from the dish--hey, I guess the initials are carrying over)
No ice cream: sad big mama, good big mama
3 pieces Maya Gold (1/2 ozs.)
Exercise: Walked boo back from school, eight blocks (so I did my 16 blocks today)
Heavy gardening--actual spadework, maybe 15 minutes (hard to get going with the boo there
Much weeding
I'm reading the ARC of this book by A.J. Jacobs, My Year of Living Biblically. It's just what it says it is--for a year, he undertakes to live as close to the literal word of the Bible. I haven't finished it, but so far I recommend it. Not sure when it's coming out--probably this Fall. Anyhow, he kind of works his way up, trying to do everything but focusing on one thing at a time.
What I'm focusing on right now is in weight loss is cutting out the empty calories at work. I know that a bagel and cream cheese isn't really nutrition, but it's the actual sugar I'm targeting now, with the bagel as a later goal. I did good today--no candy, no croissant. Other things I need to get to are portion control and having water with me all the time, but those don't seem like they'd yield as much initial gain as eliminating those snacks.
And I'm making sure I get those 16 blocks in whenever possible.
Other health-related projects already underway in my life are getting out and gardening as much as possible, and getting back into weekly therapy with a good therapist. I love my garden, but I've also recently recast it as a serotonin-enhancement device. It's good to move, good to feel effective, good to see beauty emerge from my work right away. The idea is to just start a cycle of feeling better by pushing myself in that direction wherever I have an easy in. My weight is primarily a function of my level of happiness, so even thought shaking the depression is a goal in its own right, I am pretty confident that if I sget it to ease, my weight will be easier to bring down. I don't think I could even have contemplated a project of feeling better before the season changed--I needed the extra sunlight for emotional venture capital. It's been bad around here, folks.
Finally, I'm trying to pretend I'm a functional person and see if that actually makes a difference. I gone back to keeping a messenger bag stocked with the organizational essentials--calendar, address book, wallet, deposit bag (I own a bookstore and I actually lost the deposit earlier this Spring, thus keeping the deposit bag immediately to hand is necessary so that I don't take out a little folded stack of money from my pocket and absent-mindedly nestle it into an obscure corner of my house.) I went through a good period of time letting these items drift with the tides, and I lost count of how many publishers' I stood up through not having written down the appointment.
Food:
Four cookies (Newman's own espresso chocolate chip--they are small.)
Water
slice of challah with cheese
Water
two servings of nacho casserole, with picking at cheese in both directions (Z. from my plate, me from the dish--hey, I guess the initials are carrying over)
No ice cream: sad big mama, good big mama
3 pieces Maya Gold (1/2 ozs.)
Exercise: Walked boo back from school, eight blocks (so I did my 16 blocks today)
Heavy gardening--actual spadework, maybe 15 minutes (hard to get going with the boo there
Much weeding
I'm reading the ARC of this book by A.J. Jacobs, My Year of Living Biblically. It's just what it says it is--for a year, he undertakes to live as close to the literal word of the Bible. I haven't finished it, but so far I recommend it. Not sure when it's coming out--probably this Fall. Anyhow, he kind of works his way up, trying to do everything but focusing on one thing at a time.
What I'm focusing on right now is in weight loss is cutting out the empty calories at work. I know that a bagel and cream cheese isn't really nutrition, but it's the actual sugar I'm targeting now, with the bagel as a later goal. I did good today--no candy, no croissant. Other things I need to get to are portion control and having water with me all the time, but those don't seem like they'd yield as much initial gain as eliminating those snacks.
And I'm making sure I get those 16 blocks in whenever possible.
Other health-related projects already underway in my life are getting out and gardening as much as possible, and getting back into weekly therapy with a good therapist. I love my garden, but I've also recently recast it as a serotonin-enhancement device. It's good to move, good to feel effective, good to see beauty emerge from my work right away. The idea is to just start a cycle of feeling better by pushing myself in that direction wherever I have an easy in. My weight is primarily a function of my level of happiness, so even thought shaking the depression is a goal in its own right, I am pretty confident that if I sget it to ease, my weight will be easier to bring down. I don't think I could even have contemplated a project of feeling better before the season changed--I needed the extra sunlight for emotional venture capital. It's been bad around here, folks.
Finally, I'm trying to pretend I'm a functional person and see if that actually makes a difference. I gone back to keeping a messenger bag stocked with the organizational essentials--calendar, address book, wallet, deposit bag (I own a bookstore and I actually lost the deposit earlier this Spring, thus keeping the deposit bag immediately to hand is necessary so that I don't take out a little folded stack of money from my pocket and absent-mindedly nestle it into an obscure corner of my house.) I went through a good period of time letting these items drift with the tides, and I lost count of how many publishers' I stood up through not having written down the appointment.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
5/30/07, 2:30 pm
If you got here from my other blog, you're likely to have guessed that I started this sort of on the spur-of-the-moment when my two-year-old distinguished between me as "big mama" and my spouse as "little mommy." My spouse has pretty much the body type I should have, with nicer legs--she's not tiny, just normal. Before last night, the kid had always used "big mama" to distinguish from "little [herself]"
I did look at Weight Watchers, and at a couple of other online diet places, and they seem to provide a tracking service, sometimes also calorie counting, and accountability of some kind. And they charge--some have an entry-level free service, but it's pretty bare bones.
So I don't think that there's anything there I need to pay for if I'm already maintaining a daily blog. I'm just creating an annex, but since what I'm blogging about here is rather more earthy than in my other blog, I can tell I'm already developing a somewhat different voice. One that says crap, for instance. If I'm going to blogging about this at all, I'm going to just assume I don't care what people think. Or I couldn't do it. Probably.
Also, I notice that right now I'm avoiding identifying my spouse and daughter by the initials I use for them in the other blog, and also the other blog's name. Not sure why. I'm going to let it be for now, see how this space evolves.
What I do know is that I'm committing to using it as a food and exercise diary. I am not going to count calories here any more than I do in real life, which is to say, not at all, but I sometimes will opt for a lower calorie thing even though I'm not keeping track over the course of a day.
Here's so far today:
Builder's bar with milk (not great to start the day with an energy bar--too much sugar--but they are easy to keep around and they have a hell of a lot of protein, so I'm less likely to fall back on sugar right away.)
Half a pear and some soft cheese
Everything bagel with cream cheese
Water from water bottle, then I managed to lose the top
Iced tea (Honest Tea, actually this is pretty low cal, 60 in a 16 ozs bottle)
Exercise:
Walked the boo to school
Light gardening (very light)
Worked register (standing)
that's all for now.
I did look at Weight Watchers, and at a couple of other online diet places, and they seem to provide a tracking service, sometimes also calorie counting, and accountability of some kind. And they charge--some have an entry-level free service, but it's pretty bare bones.
So I don't think that there's anything there I need to pay for if I'm already maintaining a daily blog. I'm just creating an annex, but since what I'm blogging about here is rather more earthy than in my other blog, I can tell I'm already developing a somewhat different voice. One that says crap, for instance. If I'm going to blogging about this at all, I'm going to just assume I don't care what people think. Or I couldn't do it. Probably.
Also, I notice that right now I'm avoiding identifying my spouse and daughter by the initials I use for them in the other blog, and also the other blog's name. Not sure why. I'm going to let it be for now, see how this space evolves.
What I do know is that I'm committing to using it as a food and exercise diary. I am not going to count calories here any more than I do in real life, which is to say, not at all, but I sometimes will opt for a lower calorie thing even though I'm not keeping track over the course of a day.
Here's so far today:
Builder's bar with milk (not great to start the day with an energy bar--too much sugar--but they are easy to keep around and they have a hell of a lot of protein, so I'm less likely to fall back on sugar right away.)
Half a pear and some soft cheese
Everything bagel with cream cheese
Water from water bottle, then I managed to lose the top
Iced tea (Honest Tea, actually this is pretty low cal, 60 in a 16 ozs bottle)
Exercise:
Walked the boo to school
Light gardening (very light)
Worked register (standing)
that's all for now.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Starting out
I am calling this my embarrassing weight loss blog so no one can read it and say I didn't warn you. I may get pissy or self-hating or any number of things. I am going to be much crankier than in my other blog and in all likelihood I will swear more. I will definitely over-share, starting now:
My weight is 207.
My height is a shade under 5'5'
I'm somewhere around an 18 or a 20 in US sizing--in women's sizing that can be a 1x or 2x.
It used to be that most of my weight was in my thighs. Now it's kind of focused on my thighs but also evenly distributed elsewhere.
My face mostly doesn't give my weight away.
I should lose about 67 pounds, since 140 was a good weight for me, but I'll settle for 145-150.
I figure I have something like a year to take it off, since I want to try to get pregnant again around this time next year.
I started out my last pregnancy at 193, counting from the peestick, but I think I'd already gained three pounds. During the nausea of the first 4 1/2 months, I lost around 10 pounds. By the end of my pregnancy, I was 213. I didn't like being over 200 then and I don't like it now. After my pregnancy I hit 188 by the eight-week mark, which alarmed my midwife, but I'm not sure it should have. I was eating incredibly well then. I don't eat so well now. More on that later.
Exercise: I walk my daughter four blocks to school and back, twice a day, five days a week. It doesn't sound like much, but two four-block round-trips makes sixteen blocks a day, and two of them are uphill pushing a stroller. When I get into slumps of driving instead of walking (in bad weather, say, or especially flairy flare-ups of depression) then I understand how much I need those sixteen blocks.
I also carry my daughter a lot, mostly on my left hip. Right now she weighs 28 pounds. She is my weight training.
Eating. I have never been a calorie counter. I don't think that's wise, given my tendency to obsess over details and miss the larger picture. But I kept my high school weight until well into graduate school and I have been better about avoiding empty calories, usually by literally steering clear of them. The one change I hope this blog will do is keep me from eating sugar and white flour.
Here's today, which was somewhat worse than usual:
Builder's bar for breakfast with low-fat milk
Bagel and cream cheese mid-day
Seltzer--didn't finish
Chocolate croissant
Lemonade with a few cookies
Big glass of water
two squares of Maya Gold (about 1/3 ozs.)
Whole-wheat challah with soft cheese
a few chips and salsa
Sundrops w/peanuts
Big glass of water
Salad and homemade pizza
See, there's plenty of room for eliminating crap.
My weight is 207.
My height is a shade under 5'5'
I'm somewhere around an 18 or a 20 in US sizing--in women's sizing that can be a 1x or 2x.
It used to be that most of my weight was in my thighs. Now it's kind of focused on my thighs but also evenly distributed elsewhere.
My face mostly doesn't give my weight away.
I should lose about 67 pounds, since 140 was a good weight for me, but I'll settle for 145-150.
I figure I have something like a year to take it off, since I want to try to get pregnant again around this time next year.
I started out my last pregnancy at 193, counting from the peestick, but I think I'd already gained three pounds. During the nausea of the first 4 1/2 months, I lost around 10 pounds. By the end of my pregnancy, I was 213. I didn't like being over 200 then and I don't like it now. After my pregnancy I hit 188 by the eight-week mark, which alarmed my midwife, but I'm not sure it should have. I was eating incredibly well then. I don't eat so well now. More on that later.
Exercise: I walk my daughter four blocks to school and back, twice a day, five days a week. It doesn't sound like much, but two four-block round-trips makes sixteen blocks a day, and two of them are uphill pushing a stroller. When I get into slumps of driving instead of walking (in bad weather, say, or especially flairy flare-ups of depression) then I understand how much I need those sixteen blocks.
I also carry my daughter a lot, mostly on my left hip. Right now she weighs 28 pounds. She is my weight training.
Eating. I have never been a calorie counter. I don't think that's wise, given my tendency to obsess over details and miss the larger picture. But I kept my high school weight until well into graduate school and I have been better about avoiding empty calories, usually by literally steering clear of them. The one change I hope this blog will do is keep me from eating sugar and white flour.
Here's today, which was somewhat worse than usual:
Builder's bar for breakfast with low-fat milk
Bagel and cream cheese mid-day
Seltzer--didn't finish
Chocolate croissant
Lemonade with a few cookies
Big glass of water
two squares of Maya Gold (about 1/3 ozs.)
Whole-wheat challah with soft cheese
a few chips and salsa
Sundrops w/peanuts
Big glass of water
Salad and homemade pizza
See, there's plenty of room for eliminating crap.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
