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Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Giving an old plan a new try


For the next couple of weeks, I am home alone as my husband is on business travel to Xiamen, China.  I look at this as both a good and bad thing.  It’s bad, because of the disruption to our routine and because I will miss him.  On the other hand, having him away may help me eat better if I don’t succumb to take-out the whole time.  While he was home for two weeks between trips, I put on a couple of the pounds that I had lost earlier in the month.  Without a plan in place, we reverted to our usual habits of dining out often and snacking daily.  Fortunately, I am still down five pounds for the month so I am at least making progress albeit slowly.

My plan for the immediate future is to stick to a calorie budget.  I’ve found from past experiences, that if I track my food intake I tend to eat better.  It’s not much of a plan, and not the best plan, but it’s a plan. To start off, I will aim for 1800 calories or less per day.  If I can average between 1500 -1800 calories, I will be happy.  For the most part, I will try to eat healthier foods, meaning unprocessed, less grains and less sugar.  I am unable or unwilling or a little of both to cut off all sugar and grains cold turkey.  I will start with the calorie budget and work from there.  Knowing that the healthier the food is, the more I can have of it will hopefully cause me to look for ways to eat better.  That’s the plan anyways.

Thanks for stopping by!

Monday, July 14, 2014

Get out of that chair


This weekend was very restful.  My husband, a little sore and swollen from traveling, had a bit of jet lag.  He had missed his lazy boy chair and made up for his absence by spending as much of this weekend as possible with his butt glued to the seat.  Even though it was a beautiful sunny summer weekend, we kept mostly indoors napping and catching up on television programs.  Yes, it’s a sedentary life.  Each year it becomes more sedentary, at least for me.  This might be the reason why I cannot stand for very long and often seem to be in pain. 

My husband doesn’t get much activity, but what he does get is still more than twice of what I might do.  Our workplace just completed a six-week challenge for employees to be more active.  T-shirts and other prizes are awarded just for participating and the top go-getters will win nice prizes.  When an employee signs up they select a daily step goal.  The lowest goal they allow is 6000 steps.  I am lucky if I walk 2000 steps a day.  Over the six-week challenge, my husband walked more than twice of what I did.  He does our shopping and most of the errands requiring walking.  I hardly seem to go anywhere anymore besides work or over to my sisters.  To become more sedentary, I am afraid, would mean being housebound.  I’m probably heading that way and if I want to avoid it (I do), I need to start moving more. 

While I work to change my eating habits, I also need to increase my activity level and decrease the total time spent sitting.  I sit while I work, play at my computer, read, watch television, eat, and nap.  I am a champion at sitting not walking. Last week, I walked an average of 1800 steps per day. 
This week I plan to step it up.  I’m not sure that means that I will take a walk outdoors in the public.  It does mean however that I will find ways to rise from my chair more often throughout the day for some movement.  Because of my stiffness, joint pain and overall sluggishness I need to move more.  I need to move more before I can’t.   This week I start.  I will increase my average step count this week and then increase it again next week.  I imagine a day when walking and activity will be more a part of my day than sitting around.  It may be far in the future, but the sooner I start, the sooner that day will come.

Friday, July 11, 2014

Failed my goal for this week


Not eating out until my husband returned from his trip seemed like a reasonable goal.  I had less than a full week left when I stated the goal.  As much as I hate to admit it here, I need to.  I picked up fast food last night.  I ended up working three hours overtime and did not feel like cooking.  My plan tonight was to have the fish that I didn’t cook last night.  Yet again I worked a long day and was feeling sluggish so I picked up something quick.  Working longer days isn’t a good excuse to veer off track, but that’s what I did.  While I am disappointed in myself, I am not going to beat myself up about it.  It happened and now I need to keep going and keep trying to change my ways.

My husband landed at SEATAC airport a short while ago and should be in a shuttle van on his way home.  He has been enjoying cooler temperatures for the last couple of weeks and is coming home to the mid 80s.  The combination of the heat and traveling for the last twenty-four hours means that his weekend will include a lot of rest.  What I hope it doesn’t mean is that all of our meals will be prepared outside the house.  It will take focus and commitment to stay on track this weekend. Right now I feel somewhat optimistic but know that it will be a huge challenge. 

Even though I have been consuming smaller quantities of food while he has been away, I still have given in to sweets.  My blood glucose readings are looking better too, but a huge part is due to insulin dosages.  Still I am working to have better control by eating less sugar and carbs.  There is much room for improvement.  I do not feel like I can give up sugar entirely cold turkey, but I will work to reduce, reduce, reduce.  I’ll need my husband and sister’s help with this.  The less we bring in the house, the less tempted I will be.  I know it is ultimately my responsibility and I accept that, but it would be nice if they could help.  I am weak, oh so very weak.  In the next couple of months, I hope to make big improvements in this area.  Stay tuned.

I feel like I am rambling in this post, so I will end for now.  I hope you all have a great weekend and spend time with people you enjoy and love.

Monday, July 7, 2014

He told me I need to lose weight



Some would think that a person who basically spends 24 x 7 (we work together) with her husband would welcome the break when he goes out of town.  While I’ll admit that it is nice to have some extra time for reading or whatever I want to do when I want to do it, for the most part I miss the guy.   
I miss our routine and I miss having him around to talk with at any given moment.  He’ll be home Friday evening, so I have another week of cooking for myself.  Oh did I not mention that I miss having the cook around too? 
My goal for last week was to eat meals prepared at home for at least 75% of the time.   I was successful.  There were a lot of scrambled eggs, some dry chicken and some processed food (canned chili).  I stopped for fast food three times. My plan this week is to not eat out at all through Thursday.  I have meals planned, so I am pretty confident I can make this happen.  Eating at home and drinking way more water than I normally do helped with the scale.  Yesterday, I weighed in at 390 lbs which is down seven pounds for the week.  I like that start but I’ve been here before.  I must find a way to keep going and keep improving my eating habits.

This afternoon I spent some time playing with my just-turned five year old nephew.  He has so much energy and is a great deal of fun.  At one point, just out of the blue, he told me that I needed to lose weight.  My sister did not like that and told him that he shouldn’t say things like that to people because it could hurt their feelings.  I accepted his apology and told him that he was right and that I will work on it.  I never want to be a source of embarrassment for him, but some days I worry that my size will do just that.  Just one of the many reasons I need to stay focused on improving my health.

Wednesday, July 2, 2014

Next time I will use the thermometer



Having gained weight in the first half of the year and feeling more sluggish and more pain all over, I need to make changes and start dropping some weight.  One of the biggest changes that I can make to aid me in losing weight, is to stop eating fast food or dining out on cheesy gooey Mexican food.  My goal for this week is simple.  75% of the meals I eat this week need to be prepared by me at home.  Totally doable, right?  Yeah it should be, but here’s the catch.  I don’t cook.  Unless my husband is away on business travel (which he is right now), I don’t cook.  Either he cooks or we eat out/dine in.   It’s been that way for years.  It wasn’t always like this, I used to cook.  In fact, a couple of the early years of our marriage I did most of the cooking.  Not sure when I stopped, but it has been years.  My husband won’t be home until a week from Friday, so I need to step up and cook me some food.

Tonight’s dinner was a big fail.  I should stick with breakfast.  I can scramble the heck out of some eggs.  In fact, last night’s dinner was scrambled eggs with mushrooms and bacon.  Let’s all say it together, ‘mmm bacon’.  Aaahh.  Tonight, I prepared a chicken with broccoli and rice meal.  The rice turned out and the broccoli was perfect, but the poor chicken was dry as a bone.  I put the leftovers in the fridge, but I’m not sure that I will eat them.  Reheated already-dry chicken doesn’t sound appealing to me.  One of the problems may have been that I used chicken fillets rather than whole chicken breasts, so they cooked faster than I expected and longer cook time because I was slow putting all the ingredients together.  From now on, I will use the meat thermometer and pull the meat on time.  Even though I won’t win any Michelin stars for tonight’s meal, it was edible (barely) and still counts towards my goal. It was better for me than fried food.

This morning I was out of the house early for the 30 mile commute to work.  It was nice to find closer parking.  Yes, I need exercise, but in my current state I need to work up to it.  My legs felt a little bit better today, but my back was still hollering for a break half way there.  I am working from home tomorrow and Monday, so I will not be back in the office for five days.  Unless I want to start from scratch, I need to work some walking in this weekend.  If you have read any of my previous posts, you might remember that I have issues with being out in public.  I may try to hit the park this weekend for some short walks.  If I go early enough, maybe I will avoid too many people and be done before it gets too warm.

Thanks for taking time to stop by.  I appreciate all the support and know how important it can be (giving and receiving) along this journey. 

Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Remember me?


The first half of 2014 has flown by and as per usual I have failed to lose any weight or improve my health in anyway.  As things stand now, I am in the worse shape of my life health wise.   Sunday morning I weighed in at 396.7 lbs, my highest ever.  I haven’t given up and never will.  Every day is a struggle and more days than not, I lose the battle.  I want to change so badly and improve my health.  Wanting, wishing and dreaming are fine but they don’t take the weight off.  Eating less and moving more will.  Somehow, someway I will do both and after the second half of 2014 I will be in somewhat better shape. 

My husband is in New Zealand for two weeks so I must fend for myself.  Since I never cook and he usually drops me off in front of the door to the office building, I am finding myself struggling without him.  If I am not dead upon his return, hopefully I will be in the tiniest bit better condition and able to stand for longer than a minute without looking for a seat or something to lean against.  Okay, it may take more than a couple of weeks to lessen the back pain, but the extra walking is sure to help.

My goal for this week is to survive.  Secondly, I would like to eat food prepared by me at least 75% of the time.  That sounds good, two goals nice and simple.  There are many habits I need to work on and the sooner the better.  Eating at home this week is a goal that I can accomplish.  I’ll start there.