It's 4 AM you Ninny!

I was in the middle of writing a long post about the urge to give up, updates on life, beekeeping and all things my life, health and happiness yesterday  and I stepped away from the computer and poof, it was gone!    ~~deep sigh~~   So here I am again!  This time on the computer (I was writing it previously on my phone).   This post is not getting away from me!

I'm Not Giving up
The last two weeks have been a real struggle.  I have been so frustrated with my weight loss efforts.  Ok, not really with my efforts.  I'm frustrated with the numbers on the scale, how I feel and how my clothes fit.I have been for the last few weeks eating about 1500 calories.  I've been exercising.  I've been doing it!  Yet I'm not losing and in fact I may even have gained a pound or two.   Talk about frustrating!  So I reevaluated where I am and what I'm doing.   I looked back to what I have been doing in the past when I have been successful.   I came up with two things.  Cut calories and lower my intake of carbs.

I talked in my last post about the carbs already.  I know that I can have 1 serving of bread/pasta/potatoes a day.  I've known this for a while.  Yet it seems so innocent to just have a small sandwich at lunch.   Seriously, it's just a sandwich. However, that is true, except that I don't cut my complex carb from dinner.  I'm within my calories so no harm done right?   However, that is not right.  For me this doesn't work.  So back to limiting.   I'm ok with limiting, it allows me to have my much loved carbs but still lose.  (Oh heavens, I hope that this rule never changes!)  I have been working to enact this change.

The second thing that I am working to change is my calorie count.   I have been eating about 1500 calories.   I have LONG known that this doesn't work for me, yet I keep bumping my calories to that 1500 level.   1200 calories is where I need to be.   Yes, I know that seems low, but this has been tested time and time again in my life.  I first discovered it while I was losing with weight watchers.   Every time I tried to eat all of my weekly points, I would maintain or even gain.   Likewise, if I tried to eat my 'earned points' (earned through exercise) I would gain.   I had to keep my calories at the lower level.   I've encountered this numerous more times over the years.   In terms of calories 1200-1300 calories is my magic.   That's not a lot of calories!   So naturally more calories creep in...and if it's just a random day of 1500 calories I'm ok.  But when one day turns into 2 or 3 or weeks worth, then I don't lose!   So I'm getting strict again about keeping it at 1200!  

It's working!  Not fast, but I'm seeing the trend on the scales going down.

Exercise

Exercise has been really rough this week.   The alarm goes off at 5AM and I have only been able to muster up the gumption to exercise 2 times out of the last 5 days.  I've been just so tired, so sluggish and so unmotivated.  It wasn't until about midway through the week that it hit me.  The time change!   My body has been screaming at me.  It's been saying "It's 4AM you ninny!"  It doesn't seem like a huge difference but 4AM is sooo much worse than 5AM (and 5 AM isn't fun either!)

Beekeeping Class

I went to my second night of beekeeping class.  It is quite enjoyable.  Ok, I love learning new things, so I didn't expect it to be anything else.  However, I almost let my fear of trying something new keep me from it, but the fear was more "where to go, how to find it," etc and not fear about learning something new.  I'm glad I didn't let my fear win.  

Are we ready to pull the trigger on purchasing the set up and the bees?   Yeah, I think I am.  Sure, I"m scared senseless about the prospect but I'm ready.  What may hold me up is finances and time.  It will be a bit of outlay of expenses this year, and not sure we can swing it!   Secondly, there is time.  Ok, not really time, but the timing of all of this.   Shipments of bees are happening literally in 2 weeks.  Some places are already 'out' of bees to purchase.   So being ready at the right time may not happen.   But we will be ready for next year it not.

Weekend

We have a busy weekend planned.  We HAVE to get those bare root trees and plants into the ground.  We don't want them to move out of their dormant state!  This is a grocery week. It is also a week to clean the bird cage.  There are also a few other things that may or may not be happening!

Recipe Project

I have been working diligently on my mothers recipes.   This has been a much bigger project than I first thought when I took on the project.  So what is the project?   Gathering all of my mothers recipes, digitizing them and compiling them together.  Sounds easy and quick right?  NO, it has been huge!  Some  recipes that are near impossible to read. 

But that wasn't what made it a huge task.   What made it difficult was the fact that mom never settled on any one organization system for her recipes.  She had grand ideas though.  My oldest nephew and I have worked on cookbooks, baking magazines and recipes a few times together and we have laughed so hard because we have come across no less than 5 different organizational ideas for recipes.  Mom tried each one, but never really managed to finish any of them.   The problem with these multiple organization systems and the lack of any set system is that each time she started a new system she copied her tried and true and most used recipes into the new system.  So we are talking multiple versions of some of these recipes.   The lack of system also caused multiples as she had the same recipe written on a card and tucked in multiple books, magazines and drawers.   

Still not convinced this project was huge.   Right now, I am at 450 plus UNIQUE recipes.   That doesn't include the duplicates! 

It has been interesting to see the evolution of mom's baking through the years.  I found recipes from when we were kids.  Very basic and simple recipes.   I found fancier recipes that she used when she was a personal chef for some local priests.  Just this past week I found the recipes from the restaurant.  Yes, my grandmother owned a restaurant for years and my mom cooked there. (I also worked there doing short order, waitress and whatever else was needed).  The restaurant recipes were in my grandmothers handwriting!   The last evolution of my mom's baking was when she baked and sold her baked goods at a stall at various farmers markets.  How interesting to see my mom's life in recipes!

 So what am I going to do with these recipes?  First and foremost, it is for family.  For our use, for our memories.  I have toyed with a book...but where to begin with 450 plus recipes!

 

I remain  busy and active and taking steps to make my life, my health, myself the best version of me!

 

 

Beating my Head Against the Wall

​How many times will I try to get successful results from something that I have time and time again proven to not work?   I’m doing it again!  I’m trying a method of weight loss that I KNOW doesn’t work for me!   And I am so frustrated.  Why do I do it to myself??  

So what am I doing?  I am eating about 1600 calories and expecting to lose weight.   I know…I know.  1600 calories SHOULD by the actual numbers be a great goal for eating.  However, time and time again I have experimented and each time I come to the conclusion that it doesn’t work for me.  I am LUCKY if I maintain at that level of calorie intake. Yet I try It.  Over and over I try!   When will I learn and just accept?

I know that my profile on myfitness pal was reset a while back and my goal is 1500…but I am going to go back online and fix that….I would rather see the 1200 or 1300 ad my goal and be over budget  at the end of the day versus seeing the 1500-1600 as my goal and see that I am right on budget or every under budget at the end of the day.  Why?  Because if I am aiming for the lower calories and I end up over budget I will not be expecting to lose weight!  It may happen…but I won’t be expecting it!    When I am under budget with the higher calorie limit it is human nature to expect a loss and it is very disheartening to then not lose!!!  

I am still struggling with the emotions of my own personal revelations about the long term negativity that I have been dealing with it.   Basically, I have heard the negativity for years but it has just become part of the fabric of my life.  But the wedding dress comment (your butt looked fat in your wedding dress) just has played through my mind constantly in the four months the since I got married. (Yup…it’s been a bit more thanfour months since we got married.). I have replayed that comment many times in my head.  In the meantime,  I started a new quilt.

The new quilt is coming along.  The negativity wasn’t immediate…I got a compliment about how beautiful the quilt was turning out.  However the next words were ‘I sure hope you are doing it right…your stuff tends to fall apart’?   What?   We sometimes sleep under a quilt that I made 30 years ago….that doesn’t sound like it fell apart to me?  It’s a quilt that I drag around …..literally drag around…it goes on vacation with us as I remove the comforters on hotel beds and use my own quilt….they don’t wash those hotel comforters every use!). This quilt is used and used hard.  But my stuff falls apart?   And there have been multiple snide remarks about my quilt.  And those comments…I think of them all the time when I’m working on this quilt…second guessing myself.  Worrying that for some reason this quilt will fall apart.  It totally undermined any ounce of self confidence I had about it.  So two comments that stayed in my mind for a long time (never ending).    And once those comments were stuck in my head it opened my memory and my awareness to what really happens.  So I still am struggling with those emotions.

But I move forward.  Processing the information…the comments…the events in life.  Life throws negativity at you.  Life throws moments when we keep doing the same old thing and expect different results. (ie my calorie counting).   How I respond and react is what makes me awesome, mediocre or a slug of a human being.  I want to be awesome.  So fixing issues and rising above is my goal!

Planning and Plotting

I have been spending a lot of time thinking about where I am in this journey.  I have spent quite a bit of time pondering how I have been stuck.  I have been thinking a LOT about how I have been not losing weight and how I even gained 13-15 pounds since the Coronavirus reared it's ugly head in my life (late March).

A few things that I do know.  

1. I track my food...but I have allowed more snacks to creep into my food budget.  Those snacks account for the extra calories that throw me over my self set budget.   

2,  My sleep has been messed up for months and has gotten really bad in the last few months.  I sleep for maybe 4 hours and then I am awake...wide awake!   I am constantly in a state of tiredness.

3.  Exercise has been spotty at best.

So how am I going to fix this?  What is my plan?  How am I going to proceed?

Lets tackle the food issue.  I have a caloric budget.  I have been at this journey for many years.  I know that I SHOULD lose weight at 1500 -1700 calories.  But I also know that my body doesn't seem to agree with the theories and numbers.  I lose weight at 1200-1300 calories.  Yet, I continue to add snacks to my daily food intake....because it 'only puts me at 1500 calories...that's still in losing range!".   That has to stop.  My budget is 1300....that has to be a set in stone budget!   I will allow a cheat day/meal.  I think that is a healthy (mentally and physically) aspect of this journey.   But I am going to be serious....no extras.  When the budget is empty...so is my mouth!

Sleep.  I have been so messed up with my sleep lately.  It has been totally tiresome.  We think we may have solved that problem.  Jason has been plying me with Hemp/CBD pills...and unless it's a coincidence, I have been sleeping much better!  SO I am crossing my fingers and hoping and praying that the pills do the trick long term!

Exercise.  I have not been exercising.  I have that exercise bike and I have used it on my lunch breaks.  I was determined that September I was going to use it 3 days a week....if not more.  Yet the training that I was asked to lead really took my time and I ended up working through breaks and lunches.  I think I got 3 rides in.  That is coming to an end.  My health is very important and I need to act as such.  So the bike is a great option for me!   Furthermore, I have been itching to get out and run again.  My plantars fasciitis is still kicking but I am so tired of waiting for that to magically get better. I"m going to attempt to run.  I will ice my foot and stretch and roll it and do all the good things for it.  But I"m going to try it!!!!!

That is my plan.  Just focus.   I am not promising myself perfection.  If I promise myself perfection, then when life gets in the way and I have a less than perfect day, I will feel like a failure.  SO I am promising myself that I will try my hardest!  That's all I can do!   

I am not giving up.  Part of my plan is that I will be going to the doctor later in the year.  I want to go with the stats of a few weeks of really good behavior.....1200 calorie days and the results and the 1400 calorie days and the results and talk to her about the stats.  So if this little 'good behavior' works awesome...and if it doesn't, it will arm with me the necessary information to share with my doctor to get the help that I desperately need!!!

I've got this!

Weight watchers vs Calorie Counting

So this past week I started the great debate in my mind.  Which is better?  Calorie counting or Weight watchers points counting?    How to decide what method to follow????

I started my weight loss journey years ago with some rudimentary calorie counting.  I started with good old pen and paper and a calorie book.  But then I started to use a website, I  believe the website that I used was fitday.com.  Eventually I switched over to Weight Watchers and I had great success with the plan.  I even made lifetime.  But at some point I had issues......I know that some of the issues that I had were in my own head , my attitude and behaviors.  BUT, I also know that when they changed the plan and added so many additional free foods (fruits for one) that I struggled.  I worked the system, even before they added so many free foods.  And it worked for me when the free foods were limited.. Yes, I ate green beans (free) and Sourkraut (also free) and a Wasa cracker (the one I got was free points) EVERY. DAY. FOR. LUNCH.  I ate green beans and sourkraut so much in the year or so it took me to lose my weight that I didn't eat those things for a few years afterward.  But the free foods were limited and so I was limited and restricted.....which for a food addict is a good thing!

When weight watchers stopped working, I started counting calories using myfitnesspal.com.  This works too.  Recently though I had figured out that my body is whacky!  I only lose when my calories are down at about 1200 to 1400 calories.   If I hover around 1400-1600 calories I maintain and anything over that I gain.  I know...I know....this is not typical.  By the numbers I should be losing at 1500 calories...but I can't help it!  It is what it is!

But a month or two ago I decided to rejoin weight watchers.  And I had success for the first few weeks but then it just became a constant struggle.  I want to know why??

So about a week ago, I decided to double track.  I did that for most days this past week.  And I remembered a few things and learned a few things.  Number one....I love the fruit and all of those 'FREE" fruits still do add up in calories.  Number two......my daily points, without my weekly points usually take me right to the 1500 calorie mark.   I have already ascertained that I don't lose at that caloric level!  So maybe it is no wonder that I am not losing.  Those first few weeks on weight watchers, i was gung ho and I ate below my points goal each day......so I was most likely eating down around 1200 calories!  Then when I am 'spot on' and expecting a loss because of being spot on with my points I am really sitting at 1500 calories...which is maintain zone for me.  And Heavens...those weeks when I drill into my weekly points (which I could never eat many of my weekly points....or activity points even way back when I was losing the weight the first time)  I am up in my gain zone!

It all makes sense for me!   So that leaves me with the question........weight watchers points or calorie tracking ?    I haven't decided yet.   They both have certain aspects that I like.  I know that double tracking is just to unwieldy and time consuming. But I just hate to make that decision!   Hmmmm...maybe I will just push off that decision for another week..or two!