In/Out for Thursday, August 14

IN:

Breakfast: Coffee with a splash of half & half and sugar-free sweetener; a few ounces of low fat vanilla yogurt.

Snack: Oh god, a chocolate glazed donut. I got it in return for helping a coworker. I really have to stop thinking of food as a reward.

Lunch: Lentil soup and Coke Zero. Love, love, love lentils. They are a perfect food.

Dinner: Well….nothing. Bad girl. I had rehearsal and then went out for drinks and came home at 10:45 realizing I hadn’t eaten, but that I’m also not hungry. Maybe I’ll have a little yogurt.

OUT:

Nothing, it’s an off day.

In/Out for Wednesday, August 13

IN:

Breakfast: Coffee with splash of half & half with sugar free sweetener. No food, because I am a bad person who forgot to buy breakfastable foods yesterday.

Lunch: Went to Whole Foods for the hot bar! Two triangles of fried sweet & sour tofu, a serving of garlic basil zucchini & squash, about 3 forkfuls of curry shredded chicken, and half a cob of roasted corn. Plus a natural cherry soda (140 calories).

Snack: A bottle of Coke Zero.

Dinner: About half of the portion you see below of JUNGLE FUCKING CURRY. We went to a Thai restaurant and I found a curry made with no dairy or coconut milk, which is much healthier. It was very spicy red curry with chicken, zucchini, bamboo shoots, bell peppers, green beans, etc, and avocado which I made them add to it (avocado is somewhat caloriffic, but has good-for-you vegetable fats, tons of fiber and some protein, not to mention tasting amazing). I only used about 1/3 of the rice. I’m bringing the other portion for lunch tomorrow!

Dessert: 150 calories worth of jelly beans. I counted.

OUT:

I walked 7/8 of a mile (0.86 miles) meeting a friend for lunch, burning about 85 calories; and swam 18 laps/36 lengths/ half a mile in the pool after work, mostly breaststroke, some freestyle and backstroke, burning about 490 calories.

Man, think about how much more I burned swimming for 40 minutes than I would have if I walked for 40 minutes, which is twice what I did today!

Also, I want to point out that I did excellently on veggies today.

Diet Tip: Trader Joe’s Fruit Floes

Trader Joe’s Fruit Floes are a great dessert for the weight conscious. They have no artificial flavors or preservatives, and water and fruit are always the first two listed ingredients. Best of all, they taste AMAZING. Most nights I’d rather have these than ice cream. They are excellent low-calorie, no guilt desserts year round.

The strawberry flavor is pictured below, which has 120 calories per popsicle. My favorite is Caribbean flavor, which has amazing chunks of mango and pineapple in it and only 80 calories per popsicle. Lime and Mango are also available.

In/Out for Tuesday, August 12

IN:

Breakfast: Coffee with a splash of half & half and sugar-free sweetener, a few ounces of low fat vanilla yogurt.

Lunch: Half a salami & cheese sandwich (about 6 slices of salami and one slice cheese folded into one slice of bread) and about a cup of  cucumber-tomato-green pepper salad dressed in lemon juice, olive oil and dill.

Snacks: A giant diet Coke with about 50 calories of regular Coke mixed in; a bag of chips (210 calories) as carb prep for three hours of musical rehearsal. Two popsicles totaling 140 calories.

Dinner: Three Indian vegetable samosas (about 260 calories). When I was putting these bad boys in the oven I thought they would have more calories since they are fried, but they only had about 85 calories each. So I kind of accidentally underate because dinner should probably be a tad more substantive than that.

But I did eat more veggies….

OUT:

No technical exercise, I’m exercising Wednesday. But I did have music rehearsal tonight, which is a lot of standing and a lot of singing. Basically two extra hours of being on my feet, during most of which I was actively singing, which is more physical than most people think. You need excellent ab and diaphragm control for breathing, good posture, etc. I’m sure there is a minor net caloric benefit to rehearsal, but I have no idea how to quantify it.

In/Out for Monday, August 11

IN:

Breakfast: Coffee with half & half and sugar-free sweetener, 5 or 6 spoonfuls of vanilla low-fat yogurt.

Lunch: A salami and cheese sandwich (6-8 really thin slices of salami, like, so thin they can barely stay together as a slice) on whole wheat with mustard and a can of Diet Dr. Pepper.

Snack: a can of Coke (regular; I feel guilty but I needed caffeine and there was no diet anything left in the machine)

Dinner: Two hot dogs in buns and about half a serving of baked beans.

Dessert: 1/4 pint of Haagen Dazs Mango Sorbet, 150 calories

NOT ENOUGH VEGETABLES TODAY.

OUT:

Nothing. I am aiming for three days a week. This is an off day.

Bodies vs. bank accounts vs. schedules

For anyone on a budget and trying to lose weight, there’s a battle between your wallet and your body. I have this friend who keeps saying, “But vegetables and healthy foods are inexpensive! It’s actually cheaper to eat healthier!” I usually end up restraining myself from asking this friend whether or not they have actually been to the grocery store this decade.

There is some truth to the statement – sure, carrots are pretty cheap, and so are lentils and split peas. You can find a good deal on chicken breast almost anywhere. But they get boring fast, and food boredom is a sure way to create diet breakdown. Many of the items that are healthy but have interesting tastes, textures and nutrients cost as lot more than the staples. See avocados, peppers of any color besides green, white asparagus, many berries, etc. And, if you don’t want pesticides or genetic modifications, you have to shop at specialty or organic supermarkets, which of course are even more expensive.

Making a meal that is healthy and satisfying can be expensive, not just because of the money you spend to make sure your beef has no rGBH in it. The real expense here is time – your time. I don’t know about you all, but some days, my time is more precious than my money. I have a 9 to 5 job (lol @ actually being 9 – 5, more like 8:15 to 6 minimum), I have an ongoing art project that occupies about 9 hours a week, I’m trying to get half an hour to an hour of exercise three times a week, I like to read books and follow my favorite TV shows, and I have a partner that I want to spend quality time with. Where the hell does that leave any time for cooking? I barely have time to grocery shop.

That’s why turning to processed foods and packaged items is so tempting – it’s not about how yummily delicious they taste or whatever, it’s that I don’t have time to waste doing food prep most nights or most mornings. And the thing is – my life if fulfilling. I want to keep my art projects, my hobbies, my reading, and my boyfriend. And my job. Is the tradeoff for this that I have to be fat?

I don’t think so, but it’s sure as hell making it more difficult to eat right.

In/Out for Sunday, August 10

Everyone always says to that weight loss is as simple as calories IN vs. calories OUT. Well, I wish it were that simple, but things like psychology, schedules and inherent body tendencies tend to muck it up. However, I think it’s a valid point, and I think I should track what I’m eating and my exercise on a daily basis. I’m not going to get really obsessive and count calories for everything on here, though. When I can easily figure out the calories for what I am eating and do it, I will post it. But I am not aiming to start an untenable diet that I can’t keep up. The point is for to be able to eat enough healthy food to satisfy my hunger that isn’t overeating. I’m a big girl and I know what foods are healthy and what aren’t; it’s a matter of not giving in.

Okay so, today, August 10:

IN:

Brunch: Fruit salad (melon, peach, grape), 2 hash brown patties with a bit of ketchup, 5 or 6 spoonfuls of vanilla low-fat yogurt, and a cup of orange juice.

Snack: 4 Finn Crisp thin rye crisps with chevre crumbles (about 150 calories), an organic root beer (150 calories), a white chocolate fudgsicle (60 calories). Finn Crisp thin rye crisps are a great snack because they are high in protein and fiber, while also being super tasty. They’re a perfect partner for chevre or cream cheese and peanut butter.

Dinner: Half a Trader Joe’s Pesto pizza (465 calories) and a cup and a half of cucumber-green pepper-tomato salad dressed with lemon juice, olive oil and dill. Diet Hansen’s Black Cherry soda, which has no calories, caffeine, or sodium.

OUT:

Swimming: 16 laps (800 yards or about 0.45 miles); online exercise calorie calculators are giving me answers varying between  275 – 450 calories burned.

Exercise Update

So, I started exercising again last week, after being sedentary for about a year and a half. I have this history of getting gym memberships, getting all excited about exercise, counting calories really closely, and then dropping it after a couple months. It’s the same story most people who try to lose weight have: I have trouble permanently incorporating exercise into my habits, routine and life. My membership to Rain Fitness in Seattle has been sitting unused for over 6 months now.

So the other week, when I was in Florida for a work conference and making use of the giant pool to float around and relax at night, I thought: “Hey I should try swimming laps, that would be fun!” And 30 seconds later, I realized that that’s the first time in a long time I thought about exercise and the word fun came to mind, rather than boring, awful, or any other of a handful of other negatively connoted concepts. So I decided to jump on it and try lap swimming for exercise.

So, starting last week I decided to exercise more again. The results so far:

Sunday, August 2: swam 15 laps (750 yards or about 0.40 miles), mostly breaststroke, some freestyle and backstroke

Saturday, August 8: Biked 5 miles on the Burke-Gilman bike path and played catch for half an hour.

Sunday, August 9: Swam 16 laps (800 yards or about 0.45 miles), mostly breastroke, some freestyle and backstroke. I also alternated some breaststroke laps with a paddle board, so I worked my legs more on those laps.

Status Check #1: August 9, 2008

This is where I’m starting from.

Size 20/22 on the bottom, 18/20 on the top, 38DD-40DD bra size.

Weight: 261 pounds | BMI: 39.5

Photos below are of my front, side and back as on August 9, 2008. Bra from Target, pantaloons from Lane Bryant.

Front:

Side:

Back: