And we come to a close!!

I did it. I stuck to a plan for 7 days! No processed food, no sugar, no junk foods.

According to the scale, I lost 4.6lbs. I don't know for some reason I thought the loss would be greater but I will take it. I am 4.6lb closer to my goal. 4.6lbs more than I was last week.

Where do I go from here? I have been sitting on a copy of Body Boss. It's an exercise routine for 12 weeks. The usual cardio plus HIIT sessions and it uses your body's own weight. Plus it has a 4 week routine for beginners, like me, who haven't exercised in ages.

My fasting blood sugar was 130 today, 139 yesterday. I am extremely bummed about that. My physical is in 15 days. If it doesn't come down, I am sure my doc will have to put me on meds. I can only imagine what my A1C will be and I am scared. I need exercise especially walking to help with that. I have proven to myself that diet alone did nothing to that number.

As for food, I am going to continue a variation of what I have been eating. I am going to reduce my fruit intake, lots of carbs there. No pasta, no rice but maybe an occasion whole wheat toast. Still stick to no junk food.

If I can sustain even a 1 lb loss each  week that would be awesome. My body doesn't like to cooperate with my efforts. :)

So my new goal: lose 5 lbs by the end of November. Baby steps people, baby steps!!

Day 6

I went to the office today after working from home for 7 days. Office was hard. I kept getting hunger pangs and may have ate more for lunch than I should have.

I ate the usual yesterday. Woke up this morning and had lost another 0.4 lbs for a total loss of 4 lbs.

My biggest fear is that once the week ends and I put some carbs back in and more of a normal eating schedule, all the 4 lbs will come back and the past week would have been for nothing.

Therefore, my goal today and tomorrow is to come up with a meal plan and calorie count. I thought 1500 might be a good place but I am not sure right now.

I am demotivated right now. I can't pinpoint why. Maybe I am hungry, maybe I am tired. Who knows? I am also constantly thinking about when I can eat dinner. Maybe I should have some tea.

Maybe, maybe, maybe, argh!

Day 5

I have never stuck to something so religiously as I have been to this "diet" routine. When I falter, I remind myself that this is not a strict, "you can only eat X food" kind of a diet. So, if I am really hungry, I eat something.

Yesterday was supposed to be all smoothies. I did not stick with that.

Day 4:

Morning tea
Breakfast: Smoothie
Lunch: Veggie Omelete
Dinner: Grilled chicken
I had a bowl of chicken corn soup while making it for my husband. My little cheat.

I am down another 0.6lbs today, total 3.4lbs.

However, I checked my fasting blood sugar and it was 127. Really disappointed. I knew when I started this diet that I cannot sustain it as it's very heavy on fruit which are heavy in carbs. I am going to count my carbs today. I was hoping I could lower my fasting levels through diet alone but we shall see.

Here's to finishing a week of this and then figuring out how to move next. If I hit the 5lb lost mark that would be awesome and then I have to figure out how to sustain that loss and not gain it back.

Day 4

I honestly did not think I will make it this far. This is how suspicious I am off my commitments to any weight loss plan. I did end up eating slightly more yesterday but within the confines of the parameters I had set for myself: no processed food and no sugar.

Morning Tea
Breakfast: Veggie Omelet
Lunch: Smoothie
4:00 pm: Salad
Evening Tea
Dinner: Grilled Chicken

I didn't log my food yesterday but I guesstimate I ate about 1400-1500 calories.

I am down another 0.8lbs this morning for a total loss of 2.8 so far. I have lost this much before just by eating clean for a few days so unless I sustain this and take it over 5lbs, I am not calling any victory shots.

Today and tomorrow are suppose to be smoothie only days and by estimate about 700 calories each day. I am pretty sure I am not going to do that. Since I am not doing this for detox (where I got this idea from), I would much rather carry the momentum then starve myself and maybe lose 2lbs that I will gain back in a jiffy as soon as I stop.

So I will see what my hunger tells me. Oh and I have been feeling less hungry and I don't think I am obsessing over food too much.

A wise man and a doctor (a.k.a my dad) told me to never stuff myself even with water. Never achieve the feeling of being full because from all the bad eating habits I have expanded my stomach and the only way it's going to shrink is if it's never full. I am working on that. If I feel full, I am learning to stop. I tell myself I can finish what ever is left after 2 hours. That way I am not hungry and my stomach isn't stuffed. This one is a mental block. Leaving food on the plate when you are not even satisfied yet.

Day 3

I have survived 2 days. Yesterday was hard but funny how it ended with me skipping dinner altogether. Not my intention though. I was lazy and key delaying dinner. Then I decided to have it after putting the baby to bed. Well baby went to sleep and so did I. When I woke up, it was 1:00 am and while I was hungry I was't starving plus 1 AM didn't sound like a good time to eat anything so back to sleep I went.

I did not wake up famished this morning but I did switch things up and ended up having a veggie omelet instead of the smoothie.

Food for Day 2:

Morning Tea
Breakfast: Strawberry pineapple smoothie. I put in two leaves of Romaine, never doing that again.
Lunch: Salad
Dinner: no dinner
Snack: slice of mozzarella cheese

Cheats: Piece of dried fig and some popcorns.

I am pretty sure I was under 1000 calories. It won't kill me and I have no intention of eating this low.
I was down 2 lbs this morning but that's probably the bloating going away since right before this whole clean eating thing I started things off by eating chinese for lunch and a footlong sub for dinner the day before. I have 5 more days to see what else I lose. Hopefully, not my sanity.

The Struggle is Real!!

On to Day 2 but how did Day 1 went, you ask? It went.

Here is the problem with being on a "diet", all my focus shifts to FOOD. What did I eat? When can I eat next? What can I eat? I start craving everything that I normally wouldn't. Therefore, I know this is not sustainable. BUT I did start this 7 day challenge as just that, a 7 day challenge. I wanted to give myself a head start, see if I can commit.

Here's what I ate yesterday:

Early Morning: Cup of tea w/milk an Truvia
Breakfast: Berry smoothie
Lunch: Huge salad
Dinner: Veggie omelet
Snack: Greek Yogurt

My cheats: 1 piece of fig and a cup of popcorns.

At the end of the day I totaled about 1250 calories. Again, not sustainable but we shall see.

There was no weight change, not that I expected any.

So far today, I have had the tea and another smoothie. I am feeling a little tired but that could easily be from WFH this whole week while taking care of the kids. I am just glad, it's Friday. 5.5 more days to go!

My hope at the end of this along with the commitment thing is that I can stop myself from stuffing myself. That hopefully it will give me a good start to stick with meal plans.

Successful weight loss takes programming, not will power. - Phil McGraw

For me it's taking both!

Dusting off the covers ...

That would be a lot of dust to dust off you know. I am still fat, no OBESE! That's the right term here. Anyway, it has never bothered me much before and I don't let it consume my life. It is who I am.
However, I am 34 and this extra weight is catching up. Most annoyingly the pre-diabetes that's looming on my head like a dark, angry cloud, ready to rain full blown diabetes on my head. OR the pain in my knees, back, arms, maybe not all of it is weight related but it's there.

So, two days ago I was browsing and I came across this detox article. Now, I have never fallen for the fad diets, the shortcuts etc. I'd like to think I have enough of a brain to know it won't work. Also, I know myself, very well and most of the time I am NOT in denial about that and therefore, I know that  I will not follow those detox blah blah. BTW, what the heck is a detox anyway? God did create us with organs to take the toxins out of our body. Anyway, back to the article. So I read it and realized it wasn't asking me to drink juice for 7 days or just eat fruits and vegetables but what it was cutting out was processed foods, sugar and complex carbs. Hmmm ... I think I can start with that.

I read through the whole thing and came up with a plan. This time, I printed everything. Set up what I'd eat for the next 7 days and off to the grocery store I went. AND came back with $130 worth of groceries. Ummm, this diet thing is going to break my bank but I am worth $130 and if this works we can figure this pricey tag out.

So I embarked on this mission this morning. I washed, cut and froze all the foods for my smoothies and weighed myself. We'll call my starting weight 0lbs. The goal for the next seven days is not to see how much weight I lose but to make sure I stick with it. It's a self control thing.

So, off to the races I go.

Oh and I am recording this, just so I can put this to paper, "virtual" paper.