Weight loss and exercise #2

Went over a bit more than planned yesterday, ~350. Given that goal was a deficit, really more like 200 or less above maintenance. Had a good workout at PF this morning and planning to paddle this afternoon; 81 degrees forecast today and no other day above 70 in long range forecast. Again the challenge is controlling the monster that my appetite has become lately.

I didn’t do a morning or afternoon weigh in today. I’m doing a morning weigh in tomorrow though. I got sonic today but I managed to work it into my 1,200 calories. I had a string cheese and a diet Snapple for a morning snack at work which was 75 calories and then the Sonic was 790 and the soup which I still really have no idea is about 300 calories. My stress has been a little bit better today.

I was over 500 below goal yesterday because of all the exercise. I weighed in at 157 this morning. I will do some TRX circuits at home today and try to step up the intensity a bit.

EDIT - A little touch of vanity...
I have gone up a few pounds from the low I hit, but have stayed in maintenance range. From looking in the mirror and from how clothes fit, it's not fat, it's muscle. This makes me feel a bit better about that gain. I still want to trim back down a little; abs are starting to show.

I was 156.8 today. My next weigh in won’t be until a week from Thursday. We are having family over and they are staying in the room where the scale is. So I can’t weigh on Sunday and I am working all the other mornings. I’m hoping by then I’ll be at 155. I’m just going to continue with my 1,200 calorie goal.

I woke up with a chest cold and I didn't have enough sleep.Consequently I missed my yoga class.The yoga teacher was very good about it and said she would help me catch up next week.I went to the cinema complex and had lunch and to the bank and post office.I was extremely tired and extremely depressed....I am still in a very low mood,and I feel terrible.

Another stupid way over day. Gym tomorrow then try to eat nothing; well very little. Weigh Thursday.

11925 steps. Exercise for 3.83 miles. 406 calories burned. Target of 2606 calories. Consumed 2710 calories. I am over about 100 calories. I did my best guess on a couple items. Also I was very hungry at 1 AM, so this was my first of four meals. The last one, dinner, I just had frosted mini wheats. No good dinner, but no energy to do better. I may visit the gym tomorrow.

PS Today I did manage 6.5 mph speeds for three quarters a mile. This is where I do intervals of walking and running. My average speed for this entire exercise was 5 mph. Not too bad, but once again I need to pace myself.

Going to the gym in the afternoon. My goal is to lose about 30lbs in 6 months.

This is what worked for me...

It's just some simple math; you need to burn 3500 calories more than you eat to lose 1 pound of fat. For 30 pounds, that's 105,000 calories which seems like a crazy number but you get 182 days to do it, so you need to average eating 577 calories less than you burn. For easier math and because it is more common to accidentally go a little over than under, make it 600.

Enter your stats to see how much you need to maintain:
Calorie Calculator

Set a daily calorie goal 600 below that. That was all really easy.

Now comes the hard part...
Join mfp (MyFitnessPal) or another site like it that has a phone app. I used mfp. Actually that part was easy too. Okay the actual hard part...

Log every single thing you eat every single day; no exceptions. The first few days, you don't even need to limit yourself; just eat like normal but record it all so you know what you are working with and can make decisions about what to limit.

Adjust your eating habits to the goal you set and stick to it. If it is too hard, adjust it and reset your expectations about how long is reasonable.

After you lose the weight, go back to the calculator and enter the new figures in and compute how much you burn. This is your new calorie limit if you don't want to gain it back.

Don't deny yourself foods; make them fit by trading off and having a light meal or two at other times so you can enjoy that piece of pumpkin pie or whatever. You cannot lose the weight and keep it off if you go right back to old habits.

The gym is a great idea; getting in shape while you are losing weight helps with motivation and gives you a few extra calories you can add to your daily goal on gym days. Just be careful not to overestimate how much you burn. The machines lie; it's hard work to burn 400 calories an hour. you lose the weight in the kitchen.

Thank you

I recently started logging everything I eat and drink because I'm recovering from an eating disorder. Hopefully it helps. I reached 100 lbs lost in 2 years , now I want to get down another 30 so I'll be at a weight I'm comfortable with. I'm technically in a healthy weight range for my age , gender , and height, I just want to get in better shape and eat less junk food and have a healthier diet. That's my big downfall, sweets

I didn't get to the gym today because I had all kinds of stuff I ended up having to do but I do plan on going for some walks tomorrow. I did get some pretty good steps in today, just from walking around my college and some other places doing things today. 12,000

I thought you were just starting out; if you have already lost 100, then you know what you are doing. I lost 65 from a BMI of over 34 to a BMI of under 25 and hit goal 7.5 months ago. Maintaining it has been as hard as losing it.

I drank a 64oz bottle of Snapple half and half this afternoon. It only had 50 calories, but was that still not a good idea? I had about 1,200 calories today. Is it still considered stress eating if you are not eating an excessive amount of calories? Like I’ll decide to go to ihop and I’ll get chocolate pancakes and French fries which will come out to 930 calories but then just have 270 calories the rest of the day and still be at my calorie goals. Would that still be stress eating?

I’m trying to find a nutritionist. I talked to my therapist today and she said they don’t have one at the clinic I go to because they don’t focus on physical health. They must have them for people who have lost weight and are trying to maintain? I want to maintain at 135. I have 20 more pounds to go.

Where would I turn to? I don’t have an eating disorder or diabetes. I’m on medicare. I’m not sure Medicare pays for one. But if it’s like $150 or less for one session out of pocket is ok.

I’m just worried about all this talk about how difficult maintaining is.

Almost 10,000 steps today. Walked at work some and went to the park for a walk in the evening.

A few things to try:
1. Keep a food diary of all food you eat for 1-2 weeks and estimate calories you eat, also make 1 small change per day or week towards eating balanced and healthy. If rarely eat vegetables then eat 1 cup cooked vegetables at lunch and again the next day at dinner.

No exercise. Target 2200 calories. Consumed 2113 calories. I am 87 calories short. I will weigh myself and exercise tomorrow. Unfortunately, skipped meals and ate desserts to make up for it.

159 this morning. Still flirting with the top of my range. Went over again yesterday, but not by much.

I didn’t eat anything until 12:30 this afternoon. I went to ihop for lunch.. I had the chocolate pancakes and fries. I ordered some cupcake pancakes for tommrows lunch. I ate the fries and half of the pancakes. I came home and around 2:30 had a can of artichoke hearts. The can had 140 calories. I finished the pancakes for dinner. My calculator said 1,060 calories today. I think the pancakes might have had a bit more. So I’m probably more at 1,200 or 1,250. I only drank water today. Not even anything diet. I’m guessing my weight is at 155 but as I said I can’t weigh myself for another week.

No exercise today again. This inactivity needs to stop. I will exercise tomorrow. I will go to the gym soon tonight. My target is 2200, which I reached almost exactly. I must remember to weigh myself tomorrow morning.

159 again this morning; still high in the range but still in the range. I will weigh next on Tuesday.

My calculator says 1,170 calories for the day. I didn’t measure or weigh my dinner. I doubt my chicken was 4oz and I think I only had about 5-6 shrimp and the serving was 11. I felt self conscious weighing and counting my food in front of everyone. We are having a large party at my house. So I’m probably way under. I’ve had no energy mentally lately so I didn’t really care tonight.

I ballpark chicken a lot and I am usually pretty close. I always guess before I weight it, so that when I can't I feel pretty confident. Converted to calories, my guess is probably within 50 well over 90% of the time. I would worry more about guessing with something more calorie dense and unusual (in terms of logging it and knowing calories) like a dessert. I don't eat mammals, so I eat a lot of chicken and a fair amount of seafood. You want to weigh things when you can, but guessing shrimp and chicken every now and then is not likely to get you off course.

I ate too much yesterday and returned to one of my old habits of rolling forward today. I am hopeful this will help put a stop to my recent overages. I really can't remember now what made me think it was a bad habit. I started the day with close to 500 calories already logged and it did make me think harder about breakfast choices, eat healthy but light and not have that last cupcake. The "just try and do better tomorrow" approach really isn't working. I still have not gone over my maintenance range, which is 150-160, but I have been 159 the last couple of times after moving in that direction for the last month or two. I was down around 155 with a few lower dips not all that long ago. I need to get back in weight loss mode and go to the bottom of the range.

I am going to yoga again on Tuesday.My diet is not going well this week,I ate chocolate biscuits and ginger biscuits,usually I never buy biscuits and I also had two packets of jam tarts.Today at the cinema I bought candy and ate a whole packet of Jaffa cake biscuits.Not the way my diet should be and I need to make improvements and change my diet so I am losing weight.Not to mention I am a type 2 diabetic.

I ate a 430 calorie bag of chips today for my first meal at 10. But then I had 8oz of grilled chicken in a flour tortilla for lunch. That was 410 calories. Dinner was a turkey and stuffing Stouffers TV dinner. That had 280 calories. It was only 1,120 calories for the entire day but I have barely left my couch at all today. I doubt I’ve done more then a thousand steps.

Zero exercise today except maybe vacuuming. I will do a little TRX and pull ups in a few minutes, but it won't really be enough to log or count towards anything.

The good news is that I am 15 below calorie goal and because I rolled all but 49 calories of the overage from yesterday into today, I averaged 1517 for the two days this weekend. It's a little early to say I got my mojo/discipline back but I am hopeful. I really think rolling forward again is the best idea. Knowing I have to pay the piper and not just try to make it up knowing I have some room to slide a little helps. I have to keep doing it even after I get back room to slide a little again. One motivation I have is that some of the ab work I have been doing is starting to pay off, but I need to lose to the bottom of my range to really make them pop.

I will weigh next on Tuesday.

Lets start with yesterday, Saturday. 13,212 steps. Exercised 4.17 miles. Burned 460 calories. This made for a target of 2660 calories. I had only consumed 1677 calories. So I was woefully short by 993 calories. I just was not hungry enough to finish off something like a piece of mega-calorie pie.

Now for today, Sunday. I weigh 171 pounds. I slipped a little. I did not exercise. So I have a target of 2200 calories. I think the shortage from yesterday was so outrageously low that I could not do any wrong. I ended up with a dessert that I made myself of around 1000 calories. So I ended up consuming 2848 calories. This makes for an overage of 648 calories, which still makes me short net calories. At this point, I am not seeing this much of an issue, but I will eat a bit more tomorrow.

I am finding out that if I push myself for my running exercise one day, I may need up to three days to recover. I waited three days by happenstance this time and found myself to have noticeably much more energy. I think recovery time can be just as important as time spent exercising. So I need to keep this in mind for the future.

When I am not running, I go to the fitness center. I focus mostly on my arms and back and midsection. My arms are scrawny. This will take time. So if I do not run tomorrow, which is actually later today, I will go to the center. As I get better, I am actually beginning to enjoy running. I think what may begin to happen is weight loss due to calories spent at the fitness center that are difficult for me to assess.