Day 21

Morning weight @ 248. I am not surprised.

This past weekend was a yearly event known as "The Lost Weekend". A handful of high-school buddies and I get together over at someone's house and play video & board games all weekend in between handfuls of snack foods and beer with occasional breaks for pizza and burgers. Two days (and a Friday night) of acting like teenagers again. It is glorious. (Or horrifying if you are one of our wives.)

Saturday morning we went shopping and spent $140 on junkfood. I'm happy to report we didn't actually consume all of it though, and I did bring home some stuff that S can munch on during the week and I'll snack on on my feast days.

All in all, it wasn't too bad though, as I had weighed myself on Friday morning and was back at the magical 244. I seem to have plateaued in the lower-mid 240s, so I think from here on out the actual weight loss will slow down. Which I was expecting having read other accounts of similar experiences.

I'm going to try and make an effort to exercise a bit more too. (Read: actually start to exercise.) I'll take the coats off the rack and use it for what it was designed for - elliptical training.

This is gonna be a tough week.

Day 15

Morning weight 241.

Breakfast was a fried egg, 3 B&S sausage (I'm a sausage fanatic, even bad sausage like B&S) toast & coffee.
Packed lunch is a bowl of Z-P soup (hey, it's good!)

Thanks Jen for the comment yesterday! I started to reply, then thought I'd just post my thoughts here.

I did WW years ago... like 20 years ago! Yikes! Did pretty good with it too for the few months I kept it up. Anyway, I seem to recall similar advice. (Jen mentioned that WW advises clients to not weigh themselves in between weekly weigh-ins because daily fluctuations could be discouraging to folks expecting a continual loss.) If my posts seem a bit dramatic in this regard, well, I probably am playing it up just a touch. I expect daily fluctuations, but am surprised at the directions they occur, not if. The scientist in me is rather curious about the correlation between when I'm eating and what my weight is. I find it interesting that after a down day, I typically won't lose anything, but after the following feast day, I'll have dropped a pound or two. A part of me is already considering, if this observed trend keeps up, modifying ADF to something like AMF - alternate meal fasting. Rather than skip eating for a complete day, just alternate meals: breakfast, dinner, lunch, breakfast..., etc. If, ultimately, the goal is to reduce caloric intake, (and in my case, also modify my diet to smaller portions and healthier food choices) then that could still work if you did it 7 days a week.

Of course, after having started to form those ideas... I come off a famine day losing 3 lbs! Haha! Individual data points are totally nuts!

So, while I started this blog as a typical diet journal and a tool to help my resolve, it's also sorta become a lab notebook on my current dieting attempt.

Day 14

Monday morning weight at 244. Famine day. Packed a salad for lunch.

Weekend recap:

Satuday weight was at 242.
Had bacon & eggs for breakfast. I made a bunch of meatballs after cleaning / reorganizing the freezer a bit and grinding up various meat scraps. Had 2 of those as a late lunch. Dinner was some fish & chips and I tried wilting some salad greens in olive oil & garlic as a side dish. Turned out rather nice. Slice of apple pie as a nighttime snack.

Sunday weight was down to 241!
Toast & brown-n-serve sausage for breakfast. Didn't really have lunch, but ate some tortilla chips and Newman's Own Black Bean & Corn Salsa while watching movies. (Also made more of the zero-point veggie soup for the week.) Dinner was spaghetti & meatballs in marinara. We ate late (for us, anyway, at 7:30) so I didn't have any dessert.

So a 3 pound gain over 2 feast days. Not as bad as last weekend, and also unsurprising. I think if I can maintain a net loss of a couple pounds a week in the long run, I'll be happy. This is the beginning of my third week, and so far, I've lost 10 pounds in 2 weeks. And twice this weekend while I was cooking, my pants fell down. Luckily neither of the in-laws were in the kitchen at the time!

Day 11

Friday - a famine day.

Weight holding at 244. Both yesterday and this morning.

Yesterday, a feast day, I went slightly overboard, I guess.

Breakfast was 2 eggs, 2 slices of bacon, and a cuppa.

Lunch was a BLT with 3 slices of bacon and light mayo on a white hamburger bun and a handfull of fresh cherries.

Dinner was some roasted broccoli with garlic and olive oil and a bunch of pot-stickers (dumplings.) And then the last (big) slice of peach pie. I felt over-stuffed and regretted having the pie.

So, yeah, waking up to 244 again wasn't really a surprise. Hell, to be honest, I half-expected to have gained a pound or two. So holding at 244 was rather nice. I'm more disappointed in myself for picking at the dumplings and having the pie. I initially only took 4 dumplings... but kept going back and munching another one here and there. Probably ended up having 7 or 8 of them all told. The pride I felt at lunch after not taking any of the free pizza available from a celebratory lunch was quietly smothered by the shame of no control.


So far today, a cuppa at breakfast and I just finished off the roasted broccoli for lunch, which ain't exactly a 'free' food since I did it with a bit of olive oil. Oy.

Day 9

Back down to 244 this morning after a feast day. That's cool that I managed to drop that back off after 2 days. Still, it would've been nicer if my weight hadn't bounced back that high in the first place!

I deviated from my plans last night for dinner. I ended up making a sandwich out of 2 slices of ham and the rest of the braised greens. A scoop of the carrot salad on the side. And even a slice of FIL's peach pie for dessert.

Famine day today, and so far, only coffee. Packed a bowl of the soup for lunch, and there's still a serving left if I want to finish it off for dinner. We'll see.

I also found a link to a blog from someone who is in the same CSA as we are, and documenting what we're getting every week and offering recipes. Pretty cool!

Eating my way through my CSA

Day 8

Missed posting yesterday, so here's a quick update: Monday morning weight - 248 lbs! +4 lbs in a day! WTF?! I was completely shocked. I'd expected a bit of a gain, maybe 2 lbs back at most... but damn! While I did eat what I normally would on a weekend, I did watch portion sizes and stopped eating when I felt full. Here's what I ate:

Saturday
Scrambled eggs with kielbasa, coffee
Crackers, cheese, and salami
Slice of pizza & 6 wings

Sunday
Cold pizza (2 slices) and coffee
Lunch... wtf I have for lunch?
Baked ham, braised greens, carrot salad, & baked beans

Nothing out of the ordinary. I don't understand.

Monday, Day 8
A famine day, I did eat some zero-point food. I had a bowl of the soup I made on Friday for lunch, and a green salad for dinner.

Tuesday, Day 9
This morning's weight was back down to 246. So that's something. But today is a feast day, and I already started big, stupidly enough - 2 fried eggs and 3 slices of homemade bacon for breakfast. Oy - that will come back to haunt me, but I've been waiting for a chance at that bacon. (I started curing my own bacon last year, and I really have to say, I'll never buy bacon again. Home-cured stuff is so much more tasty. And the thing is, I thought I was out of it until a few days ago when I was rearranging the freezer, and found 2 more big slabs from the last time I made it. Sweet!)

Packed a salad for lunch, and am planning another for dinner along with the braised greens and maybe a tiny slice of ham.

Recipe

So today is a second feast day, it being the weekend, and Independence Day to boot.

Weight this morning @ 244 lbs. That's 10 lbs lost in a week. Pretty cool.

We never made it to the big party yesterday, so I easily avoided all the temptations that were sure to be on hand. Instead, we opted for a quiet weekend at home and ended up ordering a pizza and wings. An All-American couch-potato weekend! Haha! I was happy to discover that after 6 wings and a slice, I was friggin' full. A month ago, I could've eaten twice that before even thinking about stopping. So I'm thinking my stomach has already shrunk some? Dunno. All I know is that it seems to take less food nowadays for me to feel satiated.

I also got to thinking that maybe I'll start posting recipes. After all, the word 'Diet' in the title of this blog could also refer to what I'm currently eating as well as the intended meaning of modifying my eating habits to a healthier perspective. Plus, I love to cook, so why the hell not? And it'll gimme a reason to try and dress this place up with some pictures.

Quick blanch some diced salt pork.

Then drain, rinse, and brown it on medium heat to render the fat.

Chuck in a sliced medium onion. Reduce heat to med-low and sweat that onion down.

Meanwhile, Take a bunch or three of greens. Here I have 2 kinds of collards and some beet greens. (I actually used the 2 bunches of collards, 2 bunches of beet greens, and a 2 handfuls of chopped kale I had left over from the zero-point soup I made the other day.)

Mixed greens all washed and ready to go in the pan. Yes this will all fit. Trust me.

Here's the SP & onion all sweated down and full o' flavor.

And the first half of the greens go right on top. Add ~1/2 cup of veggie stock (I use the stuff from a jar you reconstitute in water,) cover the pan, and turn the heat up to high.

After a minute or two, uncover and toss the greens around a bit. See how much they wilted? Chuck in the second half and repeat.

Again, after a few minutes, they will have wilted down nicely. Toss around some more to help reduce the liquid a bit. Add a bay leaf, reduce heat to low, partially cover, and let braise for about 40 minutes.

Then return the heat to med-high and add a splash of cider vinegar, a few teaspoons of sugar, and a healthy grind of black pepper. Another quick toss around to combine flavors and reduce the liquid, and you end up with:

Braised Mixed Greens

Crazily delicious. Up until about a year or so ago, I would've turned up my nose. My Dad used to make collard greens every now and then, and I remember them as always bitter and slimy. I didn't touch greens for close the 20 years because all I remembered were Dad's. Then I tried some at a BBQ joint and they were a revelation. Now, I try to make them at least once every few weeks. Luckily, the CSA I belong to has been harvesting collard, kale and beet greens the last few weeks, so I've made braised greens twice in the last month.

Day 6

A feast day, which is good, as I'm headed to a massive 4th of July picnic / party later today. I just need to keep control... but I am looking forward to all the typical summertime cookout foods!

This morning's weight was at 246 lbs. Again, a no-loss after a famine day. I commented to S, and she replied that the body, no getting any nutrition, is going into conservation mode. I guess that makes sense. She has a Ph.D. in biology, so she might know what she's talking about. Thing is, I had the salad for lunch, and made a WW zero-point soup last night and had a nice bowl of it. So I did eat yesterday. And while I was proud of myself for not snacking during last nights gaming fest, I wasn't exactly hungry either. The snacking is just habit, and one I need to break.

Here's the other blog that got me inspired:

My 21 Days by Jen. She's doing it 'hardcore', and I wish her the best. She commented that she too started off slowly, and that now doing the hardcore route is a self-challenge. Go Jen! Stay strong!

Rather pleased

with myself. Made it through my typical Friday night game night without snacking. Yay.

Inspiration

Here's a link to the blog that got me inspired:

21 Days of Jake

He was inspired by someone else, whom I'm also hoping to link to.

I'll add these links, and other food & diet related stuff, to the sidebar as I find 'em. I found a zero-point food list and added that too.

As an update of my progress, lunch time was upon me before I knew it, and I wasn't really hungry at all. Still ate the salad I packed though. I think, for me, I'll be relying on the crutch of the zero-point foods to get me through the famine days. At least for now. Who knows... maybe after a while, as my body adjusts to reduced calorie intake, I'll be able to go all day without food and just swig water or low-cal sports drinks. I know a lot of this is going to be a mental game, and I really salute those folks that can quit eating cold-turkey... mmmmm... cold turkey sammich.... wait, what!? Oh, yeah, I really admire those folks that can just make up their mind and do something.

My biggest problem, food-wise, is I just never stop thinking about it. I love it so. I already have plans to make one of those zero-point soups from the link.

I'm obsessed.

Day 5

Famine day #3. Not too worried about it really.

Morning weight @ 246 lbs.

So I didn't lose anything from famine day 2, but lost 2 lbs from feasting. Hmmm. The human body is weird and amazing. After having the chowder last night, I munched on some grilled kielbasa that S had done for herself and her folks. And I'm not talking a bite or two... I ate probably a friggin' half a pound or more of the stuff as little nibbles between 7 and 10 PM. So much for a battle of will.

I'm not really doing all that well, compared to others, with sticking to this process. On both my famine days so far, I've caved and eaten salad, which is allowable, but not as strict as a few folks I've read about have done. My willpower is shit, and I've always known it. I'd hoped I'd be as strong as those other folks. Maybe I still can be. I know that if the weight keeps coming off, it will stiffen my resolve. In diets past, I've found strength in myself as the weight dropped. I've just always lacked the will to keep those diets going. I don't really consider this a diet, per se, as I'm continuing to eat all the regular (read delicious) food I normally would. I'm just skipping or postponing eating by a day on alternate days. I've only skimmed a couple of blogs about this plan, and they both made it a point to set a goal for doing it for 21 days. I'm afraid of setting that same goal however since I always seem to fall off a diet after 3 or 4 weeks. So instead, I'm gonna set a goal date for Labor Day. That'd be something I've never done before, follow a diet/eating/whatever plan for 10 straight weeks.

I admit that I'm not exactly full of confidence that I can stick to this ADF (alternate day fasting - I just learned this term yesterday) plan all the way through. The actual DF part, that is. There does seem to be some consensus that days, even meals, are flexible. The main point is to reduce calorie intake by postponing eating for stretches at a time. So while the plan is commonly referred to ADF, fasting for a complete day is not exactly set in stone and the ADF cops won't bust down your door and shoot your dogs if you have some crackers and cheese on a Wednesday night. That, I think I can do. If it's supposed to be a famine day and I completely cave in and scarf down a hot dog or something, I'll just go extra light on the meals the following feast day, or even skip a meal entirely. (I still think of eating 3-squares a day. I know a lot of nutritionists say it's better to graze all day on healthy food than sit down to 3 full meals. But I was raised on 3-squares and it's how I frame the day.) So, we'll see. My battle of will, will actually be following this plan for another 9 weeks. Wish me strength.

Mmmm

If I may blow my own horn for a moment... damn I make a good NE clam chowdah!

Tummy growls

Feeling somewhat hungry. Been countering it with water, but I'm really looking forward to lunch!

Day 4

Feast day today.

Weight at 248 lbs this morning. Nothing lost during yesterday's famine day. Hrumpf.

I woke up at 2 AM this morning because I needed to piss like a racehorse and my stomach was roaring like a lion. I was so hungry that I seriously considered for a few moments to go grab a bite since it was, technically, feast day already. But I didn't. One tiny victory of the will after last night's crushing defeat by chomping a salad.

Usual breakfast this morning: coffee, 2 eggs, and wheat toast.

Packed lunch is ~2 cups of the pasta, sausage, garlic, and rabe I made Tuesday night. (I'm somewhat surprised S didn't finish it all off over the past 2 days - she's a pasta fiend.) I also still have the salad I had packed for yesterday, so I have a ton of food for lunch. Let's see... rabbit food or hearty pasta dish? Such difficult decisions... not.

For dinner, I'm planning on a bowl of the chowder. I also have a bunch of collard and kale greens I need to cook up. Use some of the left over salt pork from the chowder, a bunch of sliced onion, a splash of cider vinegar... oh yeah.

Told S about the diet plan, and her only comment was, "Well, you're an adult..." Haha! Such support. She did say later that we should pick up Gatoraide for the famine days, as it is better than plain water. Eh, maybe.

Diet Day 3

Today is my second famine day, and I'm nervous about it. How bad will the hunger pangs get? I'm also gonna 'live blog' about it today, so there will likely be a few "ETA -" additions below. ETA stands for "edited to add", btw (by the way).

Morning weight: 248 lbs. Lost another 2 lbs. after eating like a pig at lunch and dinner yesterday. Very bizarre. I was certain I'd have gained a pound or two back.

Had the usual cuppa this morning. Already have slight hunger pangs, but have been taking a swig of water to counter.

ETA - 9:30: already been through 800 mL of water. If 800 Ml sounds like a weird amount, it's because that's how much my bottle holds.

ETA2 - 11:00: Earlier pangs have subsided. Swigging water at regular intervals. I did pack another zero-point salad (and 3 Tbs. dressing) for lunch, but I'm gonna see if I can skip it.

ETA3 - 1:00: Normal lunch time, and I'm doing fine. Will ignore the salad. Starting 3rd bottle (800 ml) of water though. Gonna add diet iced tea mix. 20 calories per stick pack. Shit, I thought it was lower than that.

ETA4 - 2:05: Went outside for lunch to enjoy the day and get away from the 'fridge. Iced tea nearly gone already. Had a nice text convo with an old friend. Helped keep my mind off of food.

ETA5 - 4:00: On 4th bottle of water and still no real hunger pangs. I feel empty, but not hungry, if that makes any sense. Still have decent energy too, which is also surprising. The real test will be at home tonight, because the fridge is absolutely full of food. Pasta leftovers, chowder leftovers, and I think there's still a brat and beans in there from Monday too. S went grocery shopping today to boot. Evenings are the worst time for me because it's become such a habit to snack while sitting in front of the TV. And... well, not to air a bunch of dirty laundry or anything, but I've asked S repeatedly in the past to stop bringing home junkfood. She's good for a while, but then she can't help her own cravings and starts buying chips and candy a couple of weeks later. If it's in the house, I'll succumb. At least I've always had. Time to be stronger, willpower-wise, than I've ever been before.

ETA6 - 6:55: Ended up having a large salad for dinner. Mixed greens, radish, and carrot with low-fat dressing. Oy.

Diet Day 2

So today was a feast day, and the actual day I started this blog to keep track of it all.

Morning weight was 250 lbs. Seriously. 4 lbs in a day. But when you're this fat to start with, 4 lbs really isn't much.

Typical breakfast: 2 eggs fried in Pam spray, 1 slice light wheat toast with Olivio (sp?) spread, and a cuppa coffee.

Another double-cup of coffee at work, before lunch. This consists of a serving of decaf coffee and 3 shots of espresso, 2 packets aspartame, and a couple of Tbs. of non-dairy creamer powder. It tastes better than it sounds.

Lunch was a big bowl of chowdah. I mean big... 800 mL big. Too much. I felt over-full afterward. This is one of my problems; I eat until I'm too stuffed and uncomfortable. No wonder I've been fat since 2nd grade.

Dinner was whole-wheat pasta with Italian sausage and broccoli rabe. Good stuff. Again, I over ate. Feeling very full right now.

Diet Day 1

I actually started this diet on yesterday, so consider this post a day late. See? I procrastinated starting a blog about it. I need to apply my natural procrastination to eating. Maybe this will really work! Ha!

Starting weight Monday morning was 254 lbs. Famine day.

Despite the water and zero-point food restrictions of famine days, I ain't going that nuts.

I had my usual cup of coffee while getting ready for work. 1 packet of aspartame sweetener and a splash of fat-free half and half. I had looked up the calorie count of that a while ago, but can't recall it now. Oh well, I ain't gonna worry about it.

I was happy to discover that amongst the zero-point foods list, were the makings of... salad. So yeah, I packed a salad with mixed greens, some sliced cucumber, sliced radishes, a bit of grated carrot, and I cheated by dressing it with ~3 Tbs. Newsman's Own Light Caesar. I'll check on those calories later too. But, I found myself not really hungry at lunch. I was a bit worried at how hungry I might get by skipping my usual breakfast, but I was actually only mildly interested in lunch. Every time I did feel a little pang, I took a swig of water.

And I also had about 1 cup of home made clam chowder. Seeing as I was the one making it, I needed to taste and adjust seasonings. I will point out that the 1 cup amount as eaten over about 1 hour's time; basically a tablespoon here and there during the cooking process, and then about a half-cup at the end to savor the final product. Rationalizing away a cheat? Yeah, maybe. All I'll say is that I had to use the clams yesterday, or they would've been a week old. Again, I wasn't really that hungry last night, which was a pleasant surprise.

We'll see how tough the 2nd famine day goes.

So, yeah

Starting a blog for the hell of it. Actually, I got the idea from a forum I frequent where a guy started a simple blog to document his attempt at dieting. After reading through his blog, I got inspired to copy him... so I am, by blogging about my umpteenth attempt to diet.

His plan, which he got from somewhere else, sounds almost too easy to be true. Simply put, skip eating 3 days a week. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, don't eat anything and only drink water. Although further delving into this plan reveals that you are allowed to consume "no points" food, a Weight Watchers classification, on your 'famine' days. On 'feast' days, you eat what you normally would. The idea is to reduce calorie intake by simply postponing eating for a day, three days a week.

So I'm giving it a go. Details to be posted here. Maybe post other random thoughts and observations too.