This just in....

All my bras are too small now. Even the small ones. I don't really have the money to buy new ones, esp. if I am only going to use them long enough shrink out of them too. So until further notice, I'm sagging. That is all.

Junk food Vs Real food

The argument has been made that it is cheaper to buy junk food than to go to the store and buy real food. The graphic below is meant to illustrate that it isn't really cheaper to buy fast food than to buy and prepare real food. Even if you bought the entire meal for 4 off the dollar menu, it still wouldn't be cheaper than buying and preparing the real food. It would only be lazier. So I think the real case people are trying to make is that they are too lazy to buy and cook real food.
Click for a larger image

Low Glycemic is the way to go.

Here is a good list of low glycemic foods. I find that I eat most of these and they are mostly just regular every day foods.
Low Glycemic Shopping List

108 yesterday

I was out of strips this morning, I got some this afternoon so I will know my sugar in the morning. It was 108 yesterday morning. My weight was 242.3 today. It has not been back under 239 since the morning of the cheat meal at Eclipse Di Luna. Even though I saved up all my calories and didn't go that far over my weight went up and that was 4 days ago and it has barely come back down. I have learned my lesson about saving calories and spending them all on one meal. I have been good with the diet all week and have been spreading meals and snacks out and have lost back a couple of pounds, but I will NEVER eat all my calories for the day at one sitting again. I have a barbeque tomorrow. I have planned ahead on what to eat and won't be going outside my plan and will be spreading my food out to the regular 100 calories or so every 2 hours. This gaining weight back is BS.
I have also figured out that I am gonna hit a mini plateau about every 5 pounds. Every time I break past one I think I have made progress and then in just a few pounds I flattens out again. My plan is to just except this and keep on trucking.

138 this AM

I ran out of 3 of my meds for my diabetes so I only had one pill of one med yesterday and that is all I took for the whole day. When I got up today my sugar was at 138, I impress myself. That ain't bad for being basically med free :)
The scale is still being mean to me today though. It said 243. I know that I haven't eaten enough calories to gain that in the last three days, so I know it is not real. Also I haven't had a real potty break if you get my meaning, in about two days so I am going to wait on that and see.
I have decided that my new goal for August 1st will be to be under 235lbs.

Garden Update

Things in the garden are coming along nicely albeit slow. Too slow to make me happy, I want some tomatoes! We did harvest a lone yellow squash and cooked it up the other night and it was delicious! It's been pretty hot and I have been trying to keep them watered daily because being in pots they lose their moister very quickly. I haven't really been noticing any animal molestation. I had a backyard garden once before and all my baby vegetables would disappear overnight and I didn't get much from it. That yard was seriously sunlight challenged so I gave up after that first attempt and this is the first attempt at having a patio garden in about a decade. The back patio gets ok sunlight, I wish it got more, there are many trees that line the back yard so it gets kind of shadowy back there during the day. the front yard gets direct sunlight all afternoon and the sun sets on that side of the house but there is not really any place to plant things or even to set pots. The front yard is on a pretty steep incline. So far there are several tomatoes on the vine, the Early Girl is the only one with fruit at the moment, but all the plants have flowers so it is just a waiting game. There also 3 baby squash sprouted.
Here's some pics:


Herbs


Chives


Parsley


Basil


Tomatoes and Peppers


Tomatoes and Squash


Tomatoes and Lettuce


Baby Peppers!

Alice's Restaurant

My very good friend Alice is in town on business and last night we took her to a tapas place here in Atlanta. This is one of my favorite places to go eat. On Monday they have all you can eat for $18. The food there is wonderful. I saved all my calories for the day up for this meal. We stretched it out over 2.5 hours. I tried to control my carbs. I didn't go crazy. I'm listing the foods I ate below, some of these were shared and they are all small dishes, portions are the sizes you see on fancy cooking shows on TV. My blood sugar was 111 when I got up this morning, my weight also went a couple of pounds but I'm sure that is fake from the sodium or something. At any rate, I am being VERY good today to make up for it. :D
Here are some photos I took.

This is the food I ate. As I said I tried to watch the carbs. I felt like I ate more than this and was surprised when I totaled it up that I didn't eat more.

Ensalada de Berros- Avocado, Oranges, Almonds and Watercress w/ an Orange Vinaigrette

Pan Catalan - Toasted ciabatta bread topped with tomato, garlic & thyme puree.

Ensalada de Manzana - Arugula, radicchio, granny smith apples, candied walnuts, shaved manchego cheese.

Mejillones con Salsa Verde - P.E.I. Mussels in a spicy salsa verde

Costillas Espanolas - Spanish-style ribs in aged balsamic vinaigrette.

Hongos Fritos - Beer-Battered Button Mushrooms w/ Truffle Ailoi

Pollo a la Parrilla - Grilled Chicken w/ Tomato, Zucchini, & Squash Sofrito, Chickpea & Potato Puree

Meat and Cheese plate with sarrano ham, assorted cheese and marinated olives.

Shrimp and cous cous salad with spicy salsa and citrus.

I was very bad yesterday, but still.....

We went and saw two movies yesterday, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and Brave. I'm not going to do a movie review though, what I am posting about was how I went 600+ calories over my diet yesterday. I ended up eating most of a large popcorn and 2 different candies, Whoppers and Milk Duds. Honest to god, real sugar filled candy. It was spread out over the course of both these movies and even though I made allowance for cheats in the food for the day, I ended up going way over. I plan to have cheats like that from time to time so I am not beating myself up for it. One thing I didn't do was get on the scale today, I'm not crazy. If it was up it would make me beat myself up and I don't want to do that. I did check my sugar this am to see how awful that would be and it was 89 :)
Today the nose is firmly placed back onto the grindstone. But still, it makes me happy that I can eat real candy again, just not very often. It is a good trade for me. I am happy to only eat it once in a while as long as it can be something real. I will be cutting down to a smaller popcorn though. I found out that if you get a huge one to share, what do you know, you eat a huge one, esp. when it comes with free refills *face palm*

Undecided

I got my financial aid award letter this past week, my hours were cut so much at work last year and my salary went down as a result that my grant went up. In fact it almost doubled. I will be sending my signed award back to the school this week and classes start up in August for the school year. I can't decide what classes I want to take this time but most of all I can't decide on my minor. One is required for my degree (Social Science) I was thinking about Psychology or Criminal Justice but my last psych class made me want to get a double major and add Psychology as my 2nd major, so maybe I will minor in CJ.

Doing the Happy Dance: 239.6!!

239.6 Bitches!!! A week early at that! Go me. :)

Bob Harper's Skinny Rules

Bob Harper, one of the trainers from The Biggest Loser just put out a new book called The Skinny Rules. I haven't read the book but I have seen him on several talk shows recently out pitching his book. On the shows he has given out some of his rules, here are the first nine.
1. Drink a full glass of water when you wake up and before every meal. It keeps you hydrated and helps you feel full faster.
2. Eat protein with every meal. (I agree with this, he said that he keeps boiled eggs in his fridge at all times, I had already been doing this. Helps me feel validated in some way. If you always pair a carb and a protein it will help keep your sugars level.)
3. Eat berries and an apple every day. (I have been trying to eat fresh fruit at least twice a day so I think I have this covered. Berries can be pricey but he says that frozen are also fine.)
4. Plan one splurge meal per week. (That one is easy. This has generally been our grilling night so even though it is splurge we try and keep it healthy.)
5. Go to bed hungry. (This one is very hard. I have been doing this already, but do drink a couple of cups of decaf coffee or hot tea, esp. chai, it helps with the hunger.)
6. Don't be fooled by labels. Keep an eye on calories, sodium, fiber and carbs, but the most important thing is to keep the servings size correct. A box of pasta really does have 8 servings per box. Portion distortion is what causes the most problems.
7. No carbs after lunch, (Ouch! I don't do this one, but if I get stuck, I might add it.)
8. Don't set yourself up to fail. Put things you can eat like the berries apples, some proportioned cups of yogurt at eye level in your fridge. Cook turkey meatballs or check ahead of time and have them in the fridge ready to go. (I have been doing this but instead of meatballs I have been making the onigiri. They are a full meal ready to go.)
9. Eat a real breakfast. (I couldn't function if I skipped breakfast so this is no problem for me at all. Besides if you go to bed hungry you WILL wake up hungry so it isn't a problem)

Grilling on Saturday? What you say?!?

I have had some boneless pork ribs in the freezer for quite some time and since we will not be grilling on Monday because we have different plans for Monday night this coming week and we are both off this Saturday I thought it would be great to gill on the weekend for once. The plan is to also grill some peaches when we do the pork. Since I have not been eating any potatoes or bread here of late I have been getting carbs from fruit and I have discovered that I love to grill it with the meat. I would take grilled pineapple over a potato any day when we are grilling. :)

240.8 and 108

So yeah, got on the scale this morning and it said 240.8. Yes that is just barely under 241 but hot damn it sure did surprise me! Blood sugar was 108. Doing the happy dance today!!

241.6 and 132

Yay! Today when I got on the scale it said 241! I am now VERY confident that I will able to make my 239lb goal for July 1st. My sugar was a bit high but not really. They say that it should be under 130 after fasting but last night I did a test just to see what it would be like and I didn't take my medicine to see what would happen so I am happy with that. I will be taking my meds tonight but can tell that it won't be long and I can go without meds and be able to control my diabetes with diet alone. Yes, I will wait for my doctor to tell me to go off my meds, I'm not crazy :D

89

My blood sugar was 89 this morning :D I still weigh 242. As of today I have 10 days to meet my goal of hitting the 230s by the beginning of next month. Ten days to lose 3 pounds. I think I can do it!!

Quality Vs. Quantity

I asked a friend at work not too long ago if you could have one bite of something wonderful or a big plate full of something mediocre, which one would you pick? She said the plate because she can't eat skimpy food. I told her that I would go for the one bite of something wonderful. I think that the quality of your food should win out of the quantity but somehow we as a nation have gotten that backwards.
I remember once about 30 years ago now in about 1983 or 84 I was at the grocery store with my mom and in the bakery section, in a freezer case they had some real, New York cheese cakes. They didn't look like anything I had ever seen in a cheese cake before. The small ones where over $8. That was ridiculously expensive for a grocery store cake in Alabama in 1984. They sat there forever and nobody bought them. Then one day I saw that they were clearing them out for half price. Almost $5 was still too high BUT they had one cut up into chunks about an inch square and I picked one up and popped it into my mouth. It was the best cheese cake I have ever eaten before or since. I can honestly say that this one bite has really ruined cheese cake for me because every single time since when I get one I am looking for one that tastes like it and none ever have. I always feel a small amount of disappointment because of this.
I mention that because I would gladly give up all the cheese cake in the world for another bite just like it. The point I am trying to make is that I would much rather have a few bites of something great than a whole plate of not so great, any day. I think that most people get too caught up in the amount but really the first bite of anything will taste the same as the last bight so what difference does it make if you end up with 10 or 20 bites? Does bite 20 or 30 taste any better? How about we strive to only eat the really good stuff and then focus on portion size and if you really need 30 bites, just take smaller bites.
I have been trying to do this and honestly haven't really strayed from it. I could care less if I ever eat fast food ever again. I only deserve the best, right? :)

242.4 and 108

My sugar was 108 this morning, pretty good. Got on the scale and it said 242.4, the lightest I have been in pretty darn close to 20 years. I have family members who have never seen me at this weight. Makes me happy. :)

My kitchen scale

This is my kitchen scale. I got it off Amazon and it was only about $15. So important for weighing out stuff like your meat. You can't really eyeball the amounts on anything. Everybody will over guesstimate everything. So use your measuring cups, spoons and get a kitchen scale!

243.2 and 118

I am still a bit under the weather and my head is still very stuffy and I am currently trying to ward off the worst cold sore I have had in forever but the diet, although slow, is still moving forward in the right direction. The goal for the end of the month is still to be in the 230's. I was 243.2 this morning so I am sure that in the next day or so it will be 242. So that goal still feels very doable. I am right now the lowest weight I have been in almost 20 years, and that is going to be true for ever pound I lose after this so I will try not to scream it too much :D

I have been MIA

I haven't posted in several days because I have been sick as a dog. I have barely left my bedroom at all. It has been so bad I just laid in bed and watched tv shows on Netflix via my computer monitor which is really way too small to watch from my bed but I did it anyways.
I got on the scale this morning and it said 244.0 which was a great surprise to me because I felt like I had probably gained weight because I feel like I have been eating alot. What I did was go great periods without eating and then ate several things at once when I was hungry so I guess in the long run it wasn't that much more.
My sugar was 128 this morning. Other than feeling like total crap everything is still going fine I guess. Weak and dizzy though :(

I like V8 but....

I recently discovered Mott's Garden Blend and I have to say I like it MUCH better than V8. They carry it at the dollar store by my work so I can get a whole bottle for a dollar so that is win. My only worry is now that it is at the dollar store does this mean that Mott's is going to stop making it?

A friend had this posted on her Facebook today

It shows you all the things you can improve by just losing weight. I have 5 of the ailments listed on there, it is a miracle it isn't more honestly considering how long I have been fat and how old I am. Click it to enlarge:

244.0 and 102

The scale said 244.0 today and this was before my morning potty break. The sugar was 102. All is well :)
I am making okonomiyaki, miso soup and some crab and cucumber salad for dinner tonight. It will be yummy!

My next goal

Like I said before, I am not trying to set crazy fantasy sized goals with this. I am aiming to set goals that I feel I can make if I just put in the effort. I am also not setting goals that are way too easy, that isn't really a goal to me. That being said, my goal for the rest of June is to make it to the 230's. I don't care if it is 239.9, but by July 1st I want the scale to say something in the 230s.
I have set my calorie goals at just above 1000 per day. That seems to be working out pretty good. If I am able to keep all my numbers as good as they are and still lose weight I will be so much better off than those people who go ahead and have the surgery. I want to still be able to eat something delightfully wicked and evil on occasion and people who cut their stomachs out can't do that.

Oh and I almost forgot....

I made the Provost list at school, 2nd term in a row. You needed a 3.65 for the term to qualify, I had a 4.0!

244.6 Today

I was 244.6 on the scale this morning. I don't know what my blood sugar was because I forgot to take it before I ate something so it will wait until tomorrow. I would be surprised if it wasn't something good, it has been so good here of late.
This is what I had for my snack today. Carb Master yogurt from Kroger. This is the carrot cake flavor and it really does taste like carrot cake but alas the texture is more like pudding. I am thinking of tossing in a tablespoon of rolled oats and let it sit to help the texture be more like the real thing. :D
60 calories and 4 carbs, you can't beat that! Oh and I had a banana with it too.

Feeling demotivated

I spent the vast majority of the last week with an intestinal ailment. I thought it was my hernia but wasn't quite, so I'm not sure what it was. Once that started feeling better I was so hungry that over the last two days I have been food crazy. I am sure I have gained weight because of this. I didn't go out and get bad stuff to eat, I just ate waaay too much of the stuff I already had. Today I am trying to get back to normal as best as I can. I am having a very hard time getting and staying motivated. I am trying to not let a couple of days of crazy knock me all the way back down, but it is hard getting up. One bright spot is after eating way too many carbs last night, esp. before bed, my sugar was 131. That is where they want it if you have diabetes and I am pretty sure I forgot to take my nightly meds so that was a surprise.

Too much sodium?

So I got on the scale and it said 245. I'm not sure why because I have been eating right. I did have one day where I went over my calories by way more than I thought, but it wasn't enough to add 2 pounds. I did have way too much sodium yesterday because I had some salty foods and also marinated them in soy, which is also high in salt so I'm going to blame it on that until I find out different. Not freaking out about it though. My sugar was 105 this morning and 95 yesterday morning. I had a banana right before bed last night so I think that is why it was higher but still VERY good, esp. when you consider that I ate a banana right before bed. :)

Your basic metabolic rate

If you are female you can go to this calculator to find out you basic metabolic rate and discover how many calories you burn daily just existing and so it gives you the amount you need to eat to maintain your weight. This number might seem low but it does not take into account any extra calories you would need for the activity you engage in daily. This number is just the calories you burn existing. This calculator is for women, but the formula to convert it for men is on this page. You can google one for men, I found this one by doing a search. So mine today is 1765.

http://www.ajdesigner.com/phpweightloss/weight_loss_equations_female_metabolic_rate_bmr_calorie_day.php

Daily calories

Since it has been a month since I started the new diet I have bumped the number of calories I eat daily up like they do for people that are post bariatric surgery. I now eat in the ballpark of about 1000 calories a day but it usually comes in the low to mid 900's. I can also say that for the most part I am not hungry all the time. I think a big factor in this is that I eat about every 2 hours all day long. I try to keep my calories between 100 to 150, depending on what I'm eating, per meal. I remember hearing many times in the past that for people with diabetes it is better to eat many small meals during the day and not 3 big meals. I can now say that I agree 100%. I eat my food, track it at livestrong.com and when I hit my stop number, I stop. The only time that I don't stick to this is on grilling Monday because it is hard to do when you have to grill everything at the same time, but I control the calories, and save up during the day and because we mostly have been grilling stuff that fits in the diet it has been working well. I can honestly say that the only time it failed was when I didn't plan ahead and it showed on the scale. We are grilling turkey ham and pineapple kabobs again tomorrow, those are so nummy :D

Fresh fruit

Trying to eat it everyday. Today I had a banana and later on some fresh strawberries. Yesterday was a banana and then as a late night snack I had blackberries. I have a whole container of blueberries just sitting in the in the fridge waiting on me. I also have a melon that is calling my name and of course tomorrow for grilling Monday, fresh pineapple!

TRUTH!

Disc Golf

I have been thinking about starting to play disk golf. I find that it is easier to get in exercise when you are playing a sport or a game. Some how it just feels different and is way more enjoyable. Disk golf is just like regular golf except you play with Frisbee disks instead of golf clubs so the start up expense is much less and it doesn't cost anything to play.
A friend of mine recommended this course, it is fairly close to my house. I was surprised at how many courses there are in the Atlanta area. It is Wills Park in Alpharetta. There are a few closer but this one has much better reviews. http://www.dgcoursereview.com/media.php?id=4309

Ate too waaaay much yesterday

I had a very early meeting at work and didn't get to fix/eat my breakfast so I grabbed something that similar to Lara bars, they turned out to have twice as many calories as I thought. I discovered this at the end of the day, worst time to do that. I also ate at the food court at the mall and that ended up having waaaaay more calories than I thought. On the plus side I did a ton of walking yesterday, on the down side I ate it all back. No blood sugar from yesterday either because I was in such a hurry to get out of the house.

243!! Almost

Got on the scale today and it said 243.8! Yes, I do realize that is just barely under 244 but dammit, it is NOT 244lbs, so I'm claiming it :D I didn't leave the bedroom yet so I am not sure what my sugar is.

*edit*
My sugar was 108 this am. :)