It's Time to Weigh In

It's been a month since I weighed.  I struggled so much during December that I was afraid to weigh.  I know I gained several pounds because I could tell the difference in how my clothing was fitting.

So this last week I was back on plan, eating right and exercising every day.  I did everything right, kept to the plan and when I weighed on Saturday the scale said 137.  That exactly what I weighed at the end of November.  So the plan works.  I  It got me down almost 5o pounds and it will take me down into the 120's, where I'll start maintenance.

This morning I told my husband that I want to get down one more size and then I'm done trying to loose weight.  He said, "you know that means nothing will change".  He's right.  In order to maintain I'll have to go on working the plan, eating how I'm eating now and exercising every day, twice a day.  It won't get easier.

If anything, it's getting harder.  I understand why the vast majority of those who loose weight gain it all back within a year.  The end of a successful weight loss journey is the beginning of the struggle to keep it off.  For me it's quite easy to stay on task during my work week.  It the weekends where I struggle.  And vacations are a nightmare.

As long as I'm working full time I'll be safe.  I don't think I can ever retire.

Week One as a Vegan

I decided to go vegan and this last week I made a start.  I made some mistakes and I learned some things as I continue to educate myself.

When I was in my 30's I went vegetarian for a year.  At the end of the year I didn't feel any healthier and I walked away from it.  What I realize now is that I really had no idea what a healthy vegetarian diet looked like.

I started out my return making some of the same mistakes as I had before.  I bought lots of processed foods in an attempt to replace what I had been eating before.  It was all good and I really enjoyed what I ate, but it's not where I want to be in attempt to be healthier and loose weight.

A vegan whole foods diet is where I'm trying to get.  I did loose weight last week, but I feel like that's mostly due to my portion control and intermittent fasting.

Here are some of the things I ate:

 Several mornings I had this sandwich - nut bread (processed), soy cheese and "turkey" (processed) and lettuce, tomato and onion.  This was a delicious sandwich but it's almost totally processed foods; not the best choice.

 This was a much better breakfast choice - All bran cereal, almonds and dried fruit....but the nuts are high in fat and the dried fruit is very high in sugar.  Still very good, but I think I still missed the goal of eating whole foods.

 I took salads every day and this is the one I took on Friday.  The soy "pepperoni" was so good.  I was really just trying to use us the soy products I had bought and it did make a great tasting salad.

 I had this "pepperoni, cheese" open faced sandwich on Friday morning.  SO Good!  Really tasted like pizza.  Again, these are all processed foods and not the best choice for a whole foods diet.  But I did really enjoy it.

 In the afternoons I had soy yogurt with blueberries and granola.  Again, really good but processed food instead of whole foods.

So, that's pretty much what I ate last week.  I did loose weight and I did really enjoy all those soy processed foods.  But, for the coming week I've done a much better job of buying whole foods.  I'll post about that next.

I don't think there's anything wrong with consuming soy products and if I were at a healthy weight I would include them in my vegetarian diet.  I still have a lot of weight to loose, so I'm being very strict.  Once I reach my goal weight I'll probably add a few soy products and nuts/seeds back, but for only occasional use because of the calories and fat content.