So, its been a while since I've posted anything here. During the holidays I got out of my healthy eating habits and gained back about 5 pounds. I still have lost a total of 16 pounds since starting my weight loss journey. Wintertime is always difficult for me because I am more prone to depression, and the combination of darkness, loneliness, and cold make me crave high-sugar, high-fat comfort foods.
At my workplace, we have formed teams for Choose 2 Lose. This is a program put on by the Hutchinson Clinic in which teams at different companies compete in a weight loss/fitness challenge. The program lasts 10 weeks and teams receive points for days participants work out, number of pounds each participant loses, and percentage of weight lost by team members.
Each Choose 2 Lose team has a team captain. I was elected captain of my team. Part of my strategy is to provide weekly healthy eating tips to my teammates and archive them on this blog so that they are easily accessible to my teammates and to others who are interested in weight loss.
Sometimes the greatest motivation is motivating others.
Showing posts with label healthy eating. Show all posts
Showing posts with label healthy eating. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Day 31
Breakfast (7:30 a.m.)
1/8 "Thing" (2"x4" piece)
Hot tea with splenda
The Thing is gone! I'll have to work on some sort of fruit and nut bread, cookie or bar that is a bit more pleasant. It was edible, though.
Snack (10:00 a.m.)
2 clementine oranges
Lunch (12:45 p.m.)
2 1/4 c. broccoli cheese soup
Snack (2:00 p.m.)
2 oz dry roasted almonds
1/4 c. chocolate chips
1/4 c. raisins
Dinner (5:30 p.m.)
2 c. broccoli cheese soup
5 c. popcorn (popped in oil with salt)
1 O'dell's Ale
1/8 "Thing" (2"x4" piece)
Hot tea with splenda
The Thing is gone! I'll have to work on some sort of fruit and nut bread, cookie or bar that is a bit more pleasant. It was edible, though.
Snack (10:00 a.m.)
2 clementine oranges
Lunch (12:45 p.m.)
2 1/4 c. broccoli cheese soup
Snack (2:00 p.m.)
2 oz dry roasted almonds
1/4 c. chocolate chips
1/4 c. raisins
Dinner (5:30 p.m.)
2 c. broccoli cheese soup
5 c. popcorn (popped in oil with salt)
1 O'dell's Ale
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Day 20 - First week of work craziness
So, the whole daily journal thing kind of went out the window this week. I started a new job on Tuesday. Even though I'm only working part time, this is the first time in a while that I've had to keep a regular schedule (and be awake before 10 a.m...way before 10 a.m, actually). Although I had a day off on Wednesday, I didn't feel like doing anything except watch the Mad Man season 1 disk 2 dvd and other movies/shows on Netflix watch instantly. Let me give you highlights from the last few days:
Tuesday - snack day at work and fried chicken dinner at a volunteer banquet
Wednesday - grilled cheese and turkey sandwich, popcorn
Thursday - chicken, mirepoix and light gravy/broth over crash-hot potato (my new obsession), lots of coffee
Friday - Hutch High football game, small peppermint mocha at Metro Coffee afterwards (complete with whole milk and whipped cream)
Saturday - work at 7:00 a.m., crazy busy, more chicken & potato, more coffee
Today:
Breakfast (10:30 a.m.)
2 eggs, over medium
5 slices bacon
8 oz smoothie (1/2 c frozen peaches, 1/2 c lowfat plain yogurt, 3 oz skim milk)
I plan to make a white bean and chicken soup in a bit for dinner and food for this week.
This week I lost 2.8 pounds for a total of 17 pounds lost in the past 13 weeks.
Tuesday - snack day at work and fried chicken dinner at a volunteer banquet
Wednesday - grilled cheese and turkey sandwich, popcorn
Thursday - chicken, mirepoix and light gravy/broth over crash-hot potato (my new obsession), lots of coffee
Friday - Hutch High football game, small peppermint mocha at Metro Coffee afterwards (complete with whole milk and whipped cream)
Saturday - work at 7:00 a.m., crazy busy, more chicken & potato, more coffee
Today:
Breakfast (10:30 a.m.)
2 eggs, over medium
5 slices bacon
8 oz smoothie (1/2 c frozen peaches, 1/2 c lowfat plain yogurt, 3 oz skim milk)
I plan to make a white bean and chicken soup in a bit for dinner and food for this week.
This week I lost 2.8 pounds for a total of 17 pounds lost in the past 13 weeks.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Day 15
First day of the new job! Up before daylight! Breakfast...at breakfast time!
Breakfast (6:45 a.m.)
1 1/2 c. Special K Red Berries
1 c. skim milk
1 c. coffee w/1/2 tablespoon heavy cream
I have a little bit of a soft spot for statistics, so I'm kind of addicted to Google Analytics. This site allows you to track statistics about who visits your site. So far I have had 78 visits from 53 unique visitors. This blog has been viewed by people in 4 countries other than the United States: France, Brazil, Canada and the United Kingdom. Within the United States, this blog has been visited by people in 12 states. The majority of views come from Hutchinson, Kansas. My visitors from Illinois and New York spend the most time on the site (10 min 25 sec and 9 min 20 sec respectively). For all visitors, the average time on the site is 1 minute 43 seconds.
(End geek-out for the day)
Breakfast (6:45 a.m.)
1 1/2 c. Special K Red Berries
1 c. skim milk
1 c. coffee w/1/2 tablespoon heavy cream
I have a little bit of a soft spot for statistics, so I'm kind of addicted to Google Analytics. This site allows you to track statistics about who visits your site. So far I have had 78 visits from 53 unique visitors. This blog has been viewed by people in 4 countries other than the United States: France, Brazil, Canada and the United Kingdom. Within the United States, this blog has been visited by people in 12 states. The majority of views come from Hutchinson, Kansas. My visitors from Illinois and New York spend the most time on the site (10 min 25 sec and 9 min 20 sec respectively). For all visitors, the average time on the site is 1 minute 43 seconds.
(End geek-out for the day)
Monday, October 18, 2010
Day 7
Once again, my day is starting with lunch. I should get up earlier, I know...I even set an alarm clock. However, since I'm mostly unemployed and usually have nowhere I have to be, I turn it off and wind up sleeping until 10 or 11 a.m. In an effort to justify my late sleeping, I will tell you that I don't normally go to sleep until sometime between 12 a.m. and 3 a.m. Lets just say that getting up early is a strugle for me.
Lunch (11:30 a.m.)
Chicken Salad Sandwich
Chicken Salad Sandwich
1 whole wheat English muffin
1 c. homemade curried chicken salad
A few spinach leaves
2 c. coffee
2 1/2 tbsp. International Coffees f.f. Hazelnut creamer
1 tangerine
Last week's chicken is now finally gone. God rest his tasty, productive soul. Let us remember his succulent contributions to chicken pot pie, lentil soup, and chicken salad. He was a part of 13 meals this week. If you're buying boneless skinless chicken breasts and sauteeing them one at a time, you're paying too much per serving. Cook a whole chicken, pick it apart and boil down the carcass for chicken stock.
Boneless, skinless chicken breasts usually cost $4-6 per pound. A package of 3 typically costs $6-7 and most people eat 1 breast piece as a serving for a total of 3 servings per package. Whole chicken is usually $1.50-$2 per pound, but sometimes you can find it on sale for $0.99 per pound (which is what last week's bird cost). For about $5 I bought a whole chicken. Considering that chicken was part of 13 servings...it cost about $0.38 per serving. The chicken breasts cost about $2 per serving. Take some time, work with whole foods and save money.
Dinner (5:15 p.m.):
1 c. homemade pasta
4 oz roast beef
1/4 c. gravy w/mushrooms and onions
1/2 cup raw spinach (cooked down into the gravy)
1/2 c. f.f., no sugar added peach yogurt
Lets just say the homemade pasta was a disaster, starting with me miscalculating the Ratio of flour to egg. I'll eat a big snack/second dinner when I get back from the Kansas Equality Coalition meeting. I'm usually pretty good in the kitchen, but occasionally I FAIL. Today I FAILed miserably. (Seriously. It was so inedible I threw out 3/4s of what I made).
And now a photo depicting how I feel, thanks to Failblog.org, part of the Cheezburger Network.
After the KEC meeting, I went to dinner with a couple of the guys. We went to Lonestar. This was my first dinner out since I started this project. I wasn't super hungry, but I did need to eat something, so I had:
Dinner (8:30 p.m.):
3 tablespoons spinach artichoke dip
6 tortilla chips
1 small dinner roll
1/2 teaspoon butter
2.5 c. chicken tortilla soup
Total calorie intake today is 1904 calories. I need a snack to boost that a bit...
Snack (10:45 p.m.):
1 small apple
1.5 tablespoons peanut butter (Smart Balance - no added sugar or sodium)
1.5 c. skim milk
Now I'm up to a healthier 2228 calories.
Lunch (11:30 a.m.)
Chicken Salad Sandwich
Chicken Salad Sandwich
1 whole wheat English muffin
1 c. homemade curried chicken salad
A few spinach leaves
2 c. coffee
2 1/2 tbsp. International Coffees f.f. Hazelnut creamer
1 tangerine
Last week's chicken is now finally gone. God rest his tasty, productive soul. Let us remember his succulent contributions to chicken pot pie, lentil soup, and chicken salad. He was a part of 13 meals this week. If you're buying boneless skinless chicken breasts and sauteeing them one at a time, you're paying too much per serving. Cook a whole chicken, pick it apart and boil down the carcass for chicken stock.
Boneless, skinless chicken breasts usually cost $4-6 per pound. A package of 3 typically costs $6-7 and most people eat 1 breast piece as a serving for a total of 3 servings per package. Whole chicken is usually $1.50-$2 per pound, but sometimes you can find it on sale for $0.99 per pound (which is what last week's bird cost). For about $5 I bought a whole chicken. Considering that chicken was part of 13 servings...it cost about $0.38 per serving. The chicken breasts cost about $2 per serving. Take some time, work with whole foods and save money.
Dinner (5:15 p.m.):
1 c. homemade pasta
4 oz roast beef
1/4 c. gravy w/mushrooms and onions
1/2 cup raw spinach (cooked down into the gravy)
1/2 c. f.f., no sugar added peach yogurt
Lets just say the homemade pasta was a disaster, starting with me miscalculating the Ratio of flour to egg. I'll eat a big snack/second dinner when I get back from the Kansas Equality Coalition meeting. I'm usually pretty good in the kitchen, but occasionally I FAIL. Today I FAILed miserably. (Seriously. It was so inedible I threw out 3/4s of what I made).
And now a photo depicting how I feel, thanks to Failblog.org, part of the Cheezburger Network.
After the KEC meeting, I went to dinner with a couple of the guys. We went to Lonestar. This was my first dinner out since I started this project. I wasn't super hungry, but I did need to eat something, so I had:
Dinner (8:30 p.m.):
3 tablespoons spinach artichoke dip
6 tortilla chips
1 small dinner roll
1/2 teaspoon butter
2.5 c. chicken tortilla soup
Total calorie intake today is 1904 calories. I need a snack to boost that a bit...
Snack (10:45 p.m.):
1 small apple
1.5 tablespoons peanut butter (Smart Balance - no added sugar or sodium)
1.5 c. skim milk
Now I'm up to a healthier 2228 calories.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Why I'm Writing This Blog
I have been overweight or obese pretty much my whole life. I remember in 3rd grade I weighed in at 109 pounds. By my Freshman year of high school I was up to 180. At the time I felt huge. Now, I would love to be 180 pounds. March of my Freshman year I tore my right Achilles tendon. It didn’t completely rip into. It was a hairline tear, but it was very painful. I spent 6 weeks in a plaster cast up to my knee to keep my foot immobile and then spent several weeks in physical therapy after that. I was not able to play rec-league softball that season, and I missed about 4 months of horseback riding lessons.
In the fall of my Junior year (the night before the Homecoming dance) I got kicked by a horse in my left leg just above my ankle during a horseback riding lesson. I got 7 interior stitches and 11 exterior stitches at an emergency clinic that evening. Later that night, I had to be taken to the emergency room because the pain meds had worn off and the pain was unbearable. There, I was treated by the same doctor who treated me for my torn Achilles tendon. He said that a nerve had probably been severed, which was why I was in so much pain. They gave me IV antibiotics and morphine, a prescription for Loritab and, after about 2 hours, sent me home.
After a couple of appointments with the doctor at the clinic who stitched me up, it became apparent that my wound was not healing properly. He scheduled an appointment at 7:30 a.m. with Dr. O’Boyle – the orthopedist who had treated my Achilles tendon and who had seen me in the emergency room. At that early morning appointment, Dr. O’Boyle told me that I had developed a hematoma and told me not to eat anything because, “Even if I have to cut open and drain that hematoma at 3 a.m., it will get done tonight.”
My parents took me to the hospital around 5 p.m., and finally at 11 p.m., they took me down to surgery. I had a fairly miserable 3-day stay in the hospital. My leg felt better, but between the strange place and the nurse coming to check my temperature every 4 hours, I couldn’t get any sleep.
When everything was said and done, I missed almost a month of school, had to wear a strap-on cast for several weeks after surgery, then had months of physical therapy after that. I did not resume horseback riding lessons after that incident. The whole time I was in the hospital and at home, I never received a phone call, card or anything else from the stable owner (who was also my instructor) where I had taken lessons for 7 years.
By the middle of my Senior year, I was up to about 275 pounds. That was when I went on my first diet. My parents and I joined Healthy Weigh, at my mother’s insistence. She had dieted off and on for several years and was a bit overweight, but not obese. My father had steadily been gaining weight, and he and I were both obese according to our BMIs. Over about 4-5 months we all lost weight. I lost about 50 pounds. When I graduated high school, I weighed about 225 pounds.
My first year of college I continued to be conscientious of what I was eating, I walked a LOT and even tried out (unsuccessfully) for the girl’s rugby team. The summer after, I had a great trip to Spain (despite lots of pork, lots of walking kept my weight the same). Early the fall of my Sophomore year of college I noticed a pain in my left heel. Dr. O’Boyle informed me that I had a tear in my left Achilles tendon. Another cast. More physical therapy. After that, I didn’t walk as much. I used to walk 10, 12, 15 blocks at a time, after being in the cast I tended to keep to a 4-6 block radius. Junior year, same thing – less exercise, less attention to what I was eating. By the time I graduated from college, I weighed about 280 pounds.
The summer after college, I stared Weight Watchers and lost about 15 pounds before I moved to Kansas. I got to Kansas just before the start of winter. The cold kept me indoors and loneliness and frigid temperatures made me crave fatty comfort foods. 3 years of lots of restaurant eating, lack of exercise and battling depression resulted in my weight climbing to almost 350 pounds.
About 12 weeks ago I went to the doctor to get the vaccines I needed to travel to Panama. When they checked my weight, I weighed 346 pounds. I started then to try to be more conscientious of what I was eating. Over 11 weeks, I lost 11 pounds. From past experiences, I know that it is easier for me to actually track my calorie intake when I write things down. I figured I’d pair that with a need for accountability and my love of cooking and start this blog. Hopefully you find it interesting. I welcome suggestions on how to improve the blog.
As I mentioned earlier, this is not a lose weight quick scheme. I want to lose the weight through gradual, permanent changes, not through some fad diet that I can’t follow the rest of my life. When I started this week, I weighed 334.6 pounds. Tonight I weighed in at 331.8 pounds. This week I have lost 2.8 pounds.
In the fall of my Junior year (the night before the Homecoming dance) I got kicked by a horse in my left leg just above my ankle during a horseback riding lesson. I got 7 interior stitches and 11 exterior stitches at an emergency clinic that evening. Later that night, I had to be taken to the emergency room because the pain meds had worn off and the pain was unbearable. There, I was treated by the same doctor who treated me for my torn Achilles tendon. He said that a nerve had probably been severed, which was why I was in so much pain. They gave me IV antibiotics and morphine, a prescription for Loritab and, after about 2 hours, sent me home.
After a couple of appointments with the doctor at the clinic who stitched me up, it became apparent that my wound was not healing properly. He scheduled an appointment at 7:30 a.m. with Dr. O’Boyle – the orthopedist who had treated my Achilles tendon and who had seen me in the emergency room. At that early morning appointment, Dr. O’Boyle told me that I had developed a hematoma and told me not to eat anything because, “Even if I have to cut open and drain that hematoma at 3 a.m., it will get done tonight.”
My parents took me to the hospital around 5 p.m., and finally at 11 p.m., they took me down to surgery. I had a fairly miserable 3-day stay in the hospital. My leg felt better, but between the strange place and the nurse coming to check my temperature every 4 hours, I couldn’t get any sleep.
When everything was said and done, I missed almost a month of school, had to wear a strap-on cast for several weeks after surgery, then had months of physical therapy after that. I did not resume horseback riding lessons after that incident. The whole time I was in the hospital and at home, I never received a phone call, card or anything else from the stable owner (who was also my instructor) where I had taken lessons for 7 years.
By the middle of my Senior year, I was up to about 275 pounds. That was when I went on my first diet. My parents and I joined Healthy Weigh, at my mother’s insistence. She had dieted off and on for several years and was a bit overweight, but not obese. My father had steadily been gaining weight, and he and I were both obese according to our BMIs. Over about 4-5 months we all lost weight. I lost about 50 pounds. When I graduated high school, I weighed about 225 pounds.
My first year of college I continued to be conscientious of what I was eating, I walked a LOT and even tried out (unsuccessfully) for the girl’s rugby team. The summer after, I had a great trip to Spain (despite lots of pork, lots of walking kept my weight the same). Early the fall of my Sophomore year of college I noticed a pain in my left heel. Dr. O’Boyle informed me that I had a tear in my left Achilles tendon. Another cast. More physical therapy. After that, I didn’t walk as much. I used to walk 10, 12, 15 blocks at a time, after being in the cast I tended to keep to a 4-6 block radius. Junior year, same thing – less exercise, less attention to what I was eating. By the time I graduated from college, I weighed about 280 pounds.
The summer after college, I stared Weight Watchers and lost about 15 pounds before I moved to Kansas. I got to Kansas just before the start of winter. The cold kept me indoors and loneliness and frigid temperatures made me crave fatty comfort foods. 3 years of lots of restaurant eating, lack of exercise and battling depression resulted in my weight climbing to almost 350 pounds.
About 12 weeks ago I went to the doctor to get the vaccines I needed to travel to Panama. When they checked my weight, I weighed 346 pounds. I started then to try to be more conscientious of what I was eating. Over 11 weeks, I lost 11 pounds. From past experiences, I know that it is easier for me to actually track my calorie intake when I write things down. I figured I’d pair that with a need for accountability and my love of cooking and start this blog. Hopefully you find it interesting. I welcome suggestions on how to improve the blog.
As I mentioned earlier, this is not a lose weight quick scheme. I want to lose the weight through gradual, permanent changes, not through some fad diet that I can’t follow the rest of my life. When I started this week, I weighed 334.6 pounds. Tonight I weighed in at 331.8 pounds. This week I have lost 2.8 pounds.
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