Guilty Pleasure #1

Since nobody asked, I'm going to give you all some tips and hints. The type of tip that I'm going to be providing today is snack food (aka guilty pleasure). From time to time, I'll share some of the snack food that helps me get through the day.

First up... Glenny's Soy Crisps.

Now, these soy chips come in various flavors, including Barbeque, Apple Cinnomon, Lightly Salted, Salt & Pepper, White Cheddar, Onion & Garlic and about a half dozen others. Personally, I only eat the BBQ... the rest (aside from the cheese flavors) are flavors that I wouldn't want in a chip anyway.

The good side is that the BBQ chips taste good and for a 1.3 ounce bag, you only use up about 2 points. They make a decent snack food when you have that salt/BBQ craving.

The bad side is that they can be expensive (.99-1.39 for a bag) they aren't potato chips... and you're not going to be fooled by them. But, nonetheless, they still make a decent snack food and will, to a large degree (but not completely) hold off that potato chip craving.

The Wolf

Woo-hoo. Another 1.5 pounds.

Slow and steady, wolf. Slow and steady.

The Wolf

ARGH!!

The fruit vendor that hangs out in front of my workplace wasn't there this morning. I think, however, I might still have an orange in the fridge from last week.

The Wolf

Woo Hoo!! 6.5 pounds gone after the first week!

I think I'm going to celebrate with some pizza and ice cream... NOT!

To be honest, I'm a bit shocked that I lost so much in the first week. I wasn't expecting anything like this.

I remember from last time that I lost 6 pounds in the first week (and never more than 3.5 in any one week after that), so I knew that what I lost in the first week would be a fairly large amount. However, unlike last time, I wasn't always as good as I could have been. I've already posted about the Chinese sweet and sour chicken. But there was also the (large) Kit Kat bar at the theater when we went to see Les Mis (I was starving during the intermission -- again, failure to plan...) and one or two other times that I ate more than I should have.

On the other hand, I have replaced the potato chip/candy bar breakfasts with fruit, I replaced the fast food lunches with something more sensible and I cut back on the snacks. So, while I was expecting to lose something, I was quite shocked to find six and half pounds gone. But hey, I'm not complaining!!

On to week two...

The Wolf

A Failure to Plan is a Plan to Fail

This is something that was drilled into me the last time I lost weight and, sure enough, it came back to bite me in the very first week this time around.

The failure to plan, this time, was in not having a "backup" plan in case dinner wasn't ready. That was what happened last night. The result: Chinese Sweet & Sour chicken. I could have done worse, but not by much. While it didn't quite bust the point budget, it did put a serious dent in it.

Fortunately, I made up a bit of it by walking for 20 minutes today.

Lesson learned: Have a backup plan for a healthy meal if the primary plans fall through.

The Wolf

First Weigh-In: 237

OK, that's my starting point.

Goal: 155 or Bust!

For those of you who have met me in real life, you know that I am not a skinny person. On the contrary, I'm rather overweight.

Furthermore, for those of you who know me, I wasn't always this way. About three years ago, I weighed in at 247 pounds. At that point, I didn't like the way I looked, I was always feeling run down and, in general, wasn't as happy as I felt I could be.

So, I trudged myself down to the local Weight Watchers center and bought their plan lock, stock and barrel. I stuck to it faithfully for eleven months, and in June of 2005, I was down to 152 pounds -- a total loss of 95 pounds. People told me that I was half the man I used to be, although, in reality, I was about 62% of the person I was.

What I liked about the WW program was that it didn't restrict the foods you could eat (like the Atkins diet). Instead, it focused on teaching you to eat properly. You learn how to make intelligent food decisions -- how to properly plan portion sizes, how to allocate your food budget over the course of the day, and how to make trade-offs for the foods that you want to eat. I liked the fact that if I wanted to have ice cream, I could... I just had to allocate enough points* for it.

Independently of WW, I also began to realize that there were certain behaviors that were causing me to gain weight. I found that whenever I sat down to watch TV, I had to have food. Even if I wasn't hungry, I'd find myself in the kitchen rummaging around for something to eat while watching that Simpsons episode. If I was reading, I would often need to be stuffing my face at the same time as well... and I read a lot. If there was food on my plate, I would be terribly disturbed by the thought of wasting it, so I ate it... even if I wasn't hungry. By recognizing these behaviors, I was able to learn to change them, so that I wouldn't have to have the bag of chips just to watch television. I learned that it's OK if I don't eat every last bit of food on my plate.

Sadly, over the course of the last two years, it seems that I've unlearned these things. I once again find myself going to the pantry just to watch TV. I find myself feeling that I have to finish everything on my plate. I find myself eating even when I'm not hungry. And, I have stopped keeping track of what I am eating. Sadly, as a result, I've put back almost all of the weight that I worked so hard to lose. I don't think I'm back up to 247 yet, but I'm pretty sure that I'm in the 240 range.

Of course, there are other options. Skipper had the stomach band surgery a while back. A brother-in-law of mine had it done as well. My aunt and stepmother had the bypass surgery. But I'm not going to go either of these routes for several reasons:

1. For starters, I'm pretty confident that I can lose the weight again through diet and exercise.
2. I see the adjustments that Skipper and others have to make in their lives for this surgery. The changes to their eating habits are far more extreme than any changes that I made when I lost the weight three years ago.
3. I am one of those odd people who (thank God) has never broken a bone, never had an operation and never needed stitches. I'd like to keep it that way.

So, I'm off. After Shabbos, I'm going to step on the scale and I'll know my starting point. I'll probably put a ticker on the top of this blog so that people can see, at a glance where I'm holding. I'll update this blog with notes on my progress, on things that I learn (or re-learn) and hopefully give advice to others who ask.

Here's looking forward to the journey: 155 or bust!

The Wolf

*In the Weight Watchers system, each food is assigned a "point value" based on the number of calories, fat and dietary fiber. A person is allocated a set number of points over the course of the day.