Image by alancleaver_2000 via Flickr

Okay, seriously, enough! Since the start of March, I’ve lost a total of 0.2 lbs. I managed to get rid of all of the vacation weight, and have been stagnant ever since. You can see my current weight chart at the bottom of the sidebar to get a feel for how things are going.

It isn’t a surprise when I look back at what I’ve been eating and drinking. If it isn’t having a splurge on donuts a couple of weeks ago, it was having a soda bender last week. In my defense, I was sick and soda is one of my comfort foods. Comfort foods can be the banes of one’s existence, of course. But there was a study out this week that suggests comfort foods might be worth the extra calories for the mental and emotional benefits. But only when done in moderation, of course.

My point is: I am responsible for my current plateau. This isn’t a case where I am doing everything right and my body is being weird. I am not following the Plan very well, and it is showing up on the scale. In the most annoying way possible. Grrr

- M

One of my dear twitter friends, @Dabobie, sent me a tweet that has me thinking. Her tweet was pure encouragement: “you’re on a roll ) this is your year!” Aside from being super-sweet, this tweet made me stop and think, though. Will 2011 be my year? Is this the year I get down to my goal weight? And, even more important, is this the year I stay there?

It is definitely shaping up as such. I had a bit of a plateau at the end of the year and the first week of this year, but that was by choice. I had hit one of my major goals, and it was time to stop, celebrate that, catch my breath, and then get ready to work towards my next big goal. Once I decided it was time to move forward again, I started seeing immediate results.

I am within a whisker of hitting my 10% loss this time around at WeightWatchers. I am motivated to keep going. I have internalized some of those things I should know by now, including not going inside convenience stores! I am slacking a little when it comes to exercise, true. Otherwise, I think I am at a really good spot.

Things will get a little interesting in a couple of weeks. My wife and I are going on a vacation – one of those all-inclusive things. I can eat and drink as much as I want. No one is going to stop me, no one is going to charge me any money. Talk about free reign!

On the other hand, opportunities to exercise will be everywhere! A half-mile walking track. ATV driving through a jungle. Power-walking along a stingray beach. Activity points should be a breeze to gain.

Add those Activity Points plus 49 weekly points, and you’ve got a situation where I’d have to work very, very hard to gain weight on this vacation.

Just somebody please save me from Bailey’s Irish Cream!!!

- M

I have mentioned here before – many times, actually – that one of my biggest trigger foods during the holidays isn’t actually food, it’s a drink: egg nog. I don’t know why I am as addicted to egg nog as I am. Sometimes I think that I don’t even really like it. I like the spices, and I like the creaminess. It’s a great flavor of yogurt. Or candy. Or ice cream. Or coffee.

But the drink by itself? Over the course of my lifetime, I have drunken gallons of egg nog. Did I ever really like it? Or is it just another bad habit I was inflicting on myself? Who can say for certain?

I’ve realized for the last couple of years that I need to control how much eggnog I have access to. I tried making sure I only had a little in the house, which helped a little bit (except for on Christmas Eve). Completely avoiding eggnog, though, led to deprivation. I wanted eggnog – or at least I thought I did – and denying myself was only making things work.

Those are two competing drives: I want some, but I have to limit how much I have. The solution turned out to be turning towards a massive corporation. (Don’t tell them or they’ll get big heads): Starbucks!

Starbucks sells a rather amazing eggnog latte. I don’t even want to know how many Points it has in its original form (13 Points for a tall). Leaving off the whipped cream and using skim milk lowers that a lot: 10 points for a tall. A tall latte is 12 ounces. 12 ounces of eggnog is 16.

End result? 6 ProPoints saved, eggnog AND caffeine cravings satisfied.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Show notes:

Down a total of 10 pounds so far this year. Yay me! This is an important milestone to me.

Summertime heat is here. I hate summer. Too damned hot, makes my lunchtime walk almost impossible. So I am changing things up, taking a different train in the morning so I have to walk 20 minutes to get to the office.

Watch out for liquid calories! It’s easy to wreck one’s diet and not even realize it by drinking sugar-sweetened drinks. Via Our Lady of Weight Loss:
Liquid Calories: Evil, Alluring and Dangerous – Our Lady of Weight

Do you find it impossible to stop snacking? Here are 50 activities to do instead of snacking. Note that having sex is suspicously absent from the list. Hmmm…
theworldaccordingtoeggface: 50 Things to do instead of snacking

Tip of the week: Put things back! When grocery shopping, stop every couple of aisles and see if there’s anything in your cart which isn’t conducive to your new life style. If there is, put it back on the shelf.

That’s it for this week. Remember to follow us on Twitter, @weightjournal.

I haven’t updated here lately, but this time it doesn’t mean that I’ve been gaining. I know, I am surprised too! I’ve actually done okay lately, as you can see either by my recorded weight up there, or by taking a look at my weight charts. Either way, you can see a definite weight loss over the last couple of weeks. Which is very cool to see.

We are, of course, heading into the holiday season. Actually, we are right in the middle of it. And some of my weaknesses are coming to the forefront. The worst is egg nog. I don’t know why, but every year I say I’m not going to have much egg nog over the season, and every year I end up drinking pints and pints. I have a profound weakness for it, and I have not figured out a way to get past that. And I need to: 1 pint = 17 points. Can you say HOLY CRAP!!! This is basically taking up all of the exercise Points I earn through a week, which means that I would have to really stick to the plan throughout the rest of the week to balance that out. And I haven’t exactly been doing that.

My other weakness? Cookies. And we have had a TON of them here at work. It started last Monday, with a cookie competition. Since then, people have been bringing in more and more home-made cookies. And I have to try each one. y’know, to be polite and stuff.

I know, I know, that’s cheating.

I am all grins and smiles right now. I’m down another three pounds or so (mebbe a little less; we had to switch scales this week). I’ll know for certain when I weigh in at WW@W tomorrow. But I am fairly confident that I lost weight. And I am fairly confident that it is because of my dedication to the plan.

As silly as it can be sometimes, Weight Watchers has given me something that I’ve been lacking: structure. Between knowing how many points I have to eat in a day and having to be accountable to it – both on the daily food log and in the weekly meetings – I have found that I can no longer just wing it. I need to think about meals (I spent a good five minutes trying to figure out what to order when I had to make a stop at KFC this weekend). I need to decide what is worth the points, and what isn’t. I need to choose to drink water, even though I might want something sweeter. I have to be accountable.

I don’t know if I really learned anything important this week. Maybe it was learning that, after a really bad day, I can still recover and move on. One splurge won’t throw off anyone’s program, as long as they learn from it, and make plans to make sure that they don’t repeat it.

Actually, I guess that is pretty important.

One other thing, and I keep harping on this: the importance of an anchor. I wear my TARDIS key necklace every day, and Erin has noticed how much I rely on it nowadays. When I am tempted, I actually grab ahold of the necklace and hold on until that craving passes. It’s my way of remembering the promise I made, both to myself and my family. I will get to a healthy weight. I will make permanent changes to my lifestyle. I will fix what I have done to myself.

I will!

Oops! I didn’t mean to miss a week – well, almost a week. The last few days just sorta got past me. Not quite sure how that happened. I still can’t believe it is Thursday! So that probably explains everything.

I gained a pound last week, and I already know why: alcohol. Alcohol is high-calorie, concentrated carbohydrates. Drinking alcohol does not go well with losing weight. It’s critical than one adjusts what they are eating to compensate for the extra calories. And I simply didn’t do that. I had three mojitos one night, and then three Sprite-and-Mango-Malibu the next night. All told, that’s like an extra 1,200 calories (including the mixers).

Add along with that the fact that we ate out a lot that week. And I made some poor choices for breakfast once or twice. It could’ve been worse.

Oh, I actually wanted to write about that. It could’ve been worse. The only reason it wasn’t is because I actually forced myself up onto the treadmill a couple of nights and got some exercise in. 40 minutes one night, 30 minutes another… It all adds up, and it helped counter my poor choices.

So I know what I need to do now. Don’t drink anywhere near as much as I was. Don’t eat out as often as I did. And stick with the exercise.

Or: eat less and exercise.

My goal for this year is to find a way to kick my egg nog habit. I’m addicted to the stuff, and I really cannot afford to be. Between my lack of will power and my slow metabolism, I am doomed during the holidays!

Anyone know the number to egg nog drinkers anonymous?

On the plus side, a Grande nonfat cinnamon latte from Starbucks weighs in at 200 calories. I am so down with that! The grande latte has 14g of protein, so it’s actually a fairly nutritious drink, too. I am altering my meal plan specifically to allow one of these beasties a day. Yummy!

This is traditionally my worst time of the year weight-wise. I always gain a lot of weight during November and December. Even back when I had gotten myself down under 250 pounds, I would gain during this time of the year. Most of this is due to egg nog. I simply cannot resist that fat-filled, 1000 calorie per pint concoction. I’m trying to limit myself this year, but it isn’t working out well.

Thanksgiving is tomorrow; after that, hopefully I can start reeling myself in. I need to do something, if not I’m going to gain back all the weight I’ve lost since September!