Emerging Pattern

After being on this "4 list" idea for a few weeks I've started to settle into a new pattern.

• breakfast smoothie (up to 10 oz of fruit) w/a multi-vitamin
• 8-10 oz of water with 1 tsp flax seed fiber added
• green tea - 16 oz
• usually salad for lunch (2 cups lettuce, w/onions, carrots, cucumbers, tomatos, almonds)
• 3x/week add sardines in salad
• sometime left over home-made soup
• 1 Kashi Honey Almond Flax granola bar either right after lunch or around 3ish
• 8-10 oz of water with 1 tsp flax seed fiber added while preparing dinner - some cocktail
• Dinner - more on that below, trying to stay to 1.5-2 helpings of whatever we're having
• green tea - 16 oz, right after dinner or around 9 PM
• snack around 10 PM or so - either almonds or low-fat, no sugar added yogurt.

I'm doing pretty well on the "eat every day" list with the exception of carrots. If I don't eat a salad I usually don't eat carrots. Occasionally I'll make them with dinner. On the 3x per week list I'm really struggling with broccoli, sweet potatoes and avocados. I may have to try including broccoli in a salad, same with avocados and I'm just not into sweet potatoes. I'll probably look into comparable super food substitutes.

I think I'm most proud of staying away from the "never eat" list. I've had no soda for nearly 3 weeks. I've had only 1 meal containing pre-processed food - some frozen boneless buffalo wing-lets that I warmed, ran through the food processor and made a passable chicken salad sandwich out of. Interesting idea, didn't live up taste-wise. No canned soup, no "diet" anything and no fast food!

I use the no more than 1x per week as my dinner guide. Each week I plan 1 red meat centered meal, 1 pasta centered meal, and at least 1 vegetarian and 1 chicken meal. I have enough on hand to make salads for lunch on the weekends and perhaps a small cheese pizza.

Desserts, well there was that spice cake that I had on 2 successive days, as well as the butterscotch pie, but that's pretty good! But I only prepare 1 dessert for the week and after a couple of days take what remains out of the house - sent it with my wife to where she works. Alcohol - this is were I figured I have the most problems. I love to have a couple of drinks on Friday and Saturday - sometimes more than a couple. So far I've been able to have a single (albit large) Scotch and soda on Friday and sometimes a single beer on Saturday. I don't know that I can get down to 1/week, but that I'm down to 2 for a number of weeks in a row is a good thing.

.. and I'm eating breakfast every day! Monday-Friday it's the smoothie. Weekend I play fry cook - eggs or pancakes/waffles, with a side of either hash browns, sausage or bacon. Occasionally I'll make biscuits and saw mill gravy. Mind you I'm watching the portions but after drinking my breakfast Monday-Friday I look forward to a fry cook breakfast.

I feel better. I can tell I've lost a little around the middle - may be just water wait but who cares. I have more energy and I feel good about what I'm putting in my system . I'm reading the sugar content of things and am more aware of how the sugar cycle effects my eating. I get discouraged at times that I'm not making faster progress but that I'm making a little progress - whether in keeping to the list or in bodily changes -  is keeping me going right now. I really want this to work!

List Progress

I've been trying to introduce AB's "4 lists" into my daily diet. Not all at once mind you but as I discover how they can fit in. The smoothie was pretty easy and fit right in with my eating habits - quick breakfast fare for the work week.

Beyond the smoothie, eating greens every day is pretty easy since I enjoy salads. They are available from a "made to order" shop where I work. I can get them with a variety of add ons - carrots, cucumbers, almonds, etc. and have that for lunch. 

I also decided to tackle the "at least 3 time per week oily fish" item. AB suggested sardines and some web surfing shows them to be good for you. However, I'm not a sardines fan. Still, I figured I'd try adding it to the salad and see how I felt about it. I started off adding 1/2 a can and just today managed to dump in a full can (less the oil) int the salad. Between the lime vinaigrette dressing, the add-ons and the romaine lettuce, I don't notice the fishy taste to much. Truth be told, they are not that bad. I figure at least 3 times per week I can eat a full can in a salad for lunch.

I think I'll tackle the yogurt part next. Since I like to snack in the late evening and like something creamy and sweet perhaps that'll work vs. a bowl of cold cereal or a snack cake.

Summer Update

I've not posted in some time since I got discouraged over my lack of weight progress and that posting food intake was getting, well boring.

However, that doesn't mean the project is done. Instead I've been focusing on other aspects of loosing weight, mainly exercise. The place where I work started a walking program via the American Heart Association. The goal is to hit 10K steps per day. Everyone that participated received a pedometer and promised to record their total steps every day for a twelve week period.

Well, I'm closing in on the end of the 12 week period and except for a few rainy days, I've been pretty good at hitting 10K per day. I turned my evening walks into a routine and cover about 3-3.5 miles in an hour time frame. That usually puts me over the top of whatever I've manged to walk around the office and home.

In addition, I've started taking the stairs at work every time I need to exit our office area. We're on the 3rd floor so that's good exercise up and down the stairs 6 or so times per day. I allow myself 1 elevator ride per day. I usually take that when I first arrive.

I've also kept busy doing home improvement on the weekends. Home repair and wood working can produce a lot of steps. So much so that on most weekends I'm at 10K steps by the end of the day without going on my walkabout.

So what has all this done do my weight? Hard to tell. The scale still says "E" so I guess I'm still above 340. However, my spouse told me my stomach looked smaller and that I looked like I've lost weight. I've also noticed the following:

• I'm one size smaller on my belt
• My pants are looser
• Bending over at the waist is a litter easier (hey, at 6'5" bending over is a chore no matter how heavy I am)
• My face and neck area seem less "full", i.e. my double chin isn't so pronounced.

All this has me feeling better about myself despite not being able to crack "E" on the scale. I'm inclined re-start the eating side of the program now that I feel the exercise is something sustainable.

Old Habits

Hank Williams Jr has a song about "Old Habits" that says they are hard to break. Late night snacking is mine. I opted not to walk last night since I participated in National Start Walking Day yesterday at work and figured I walked enough. As previously posted my late night walking trend (I hate to call it a habit since I have to remind myself to do it) keeps me away from the danger zone of late night snacking.

True to form I didn't walk and therefor I ate. The compulsion to eat when I wasn't that hungry was strong. I wanted something sweet. I did try some fruit w/cottage cheese but that didn't hold it. Eventually I got to what I really wanted which was sugary cereal - honey smacks in this case.

Late night cereal eating is a habit I picked up from my father. Just about every night at 11 PM or so he'd have a bowl (or sometimes 2) of cold cereal with milk before heading off to bed. He'd cut down every once and a while but more often that not he had one. That habit caught on with me and I tend to use that food avenue when I'm hungry late at night.

Despite the late night binge, I did have a light eating day that proceeded it. While not trying to excuse the binging perhaps I was a we bit hungry since I didn't eat a lot during the day.

Lunch Window

Due to the later breakfast this AM, I wasn't really hungry until close to 2 PM. Usually I eat around 12-1 PM. Sure enough at 12 I was thinking I needed to eat. But I wasn't hungry after eating only 2.5 hours before. Why was I thinking about eating then?

My lunch window is centered around eating dinner with my family in the 6 PM time frame. If I eat at 12-1 that's a good 5-6 hours before I eat dinner so I'm hungry for my main daily meal. If I eat later than that, I'm still not quite hungry going into dinner, which will be the case this evening I think. Still, do I really need to be hungry at 6 PM? Wouldn't I just, well, eat less if I wasn't that hungry? Do I really have to wait until I'm completely hungry before eating dinner? Wouldn't I not "snack" even if dinner took longer to make than usual?

If the goal is fewer calories per day while still feeling adequately nourished and well fed, then would eating later be better? Perhaps a way to phrase that would be to eat off from of my normal meal schedule - skip breakfast, eat lunch around noon and dinner around 6. A better schedule may be: eat breakfast and lunch when I feel hungry and then dinner on time with family (and hopefully less since I'm not likely to be as hungry).

Humm....

Unconscious Snacking

2-4 meeting was exactly 15 minutes long - most of the key participants in the meeting were out attending to other things. Usually I pick my daughter up from middle school at 2:20 PM and take her home, except Thursday's when I have that standing meeting. Since I was done early I figured I'd try and pick her up. No luck, she's already started home by the time I got over to the pickup spot.

Instead of heading back to work I went home and.. well grabbed a 6-pack of peanut butter-n-crackers. I don't know if I was hungry or not. I didn't really think about it. I just wanted something to snack on and grabbed something handy. I have no idea why I feel that way - the "just wanting something to snack on" feeling. I've got to get some sort of handle on that and, without a lengthy internal debate, understand the urge and be able to quantify it into a hunger level - real or imagined.

Even with that snack I'm feeling the pinch again at 3:20 PM. Trying gum and water.

Breakfast?

I'm not a breakfast eater, never have been. I'm never really hungry when I get up and coffee is about all I have until I eat lunch. If I don't eat breakfast I start getting hungry (or I think I am) 10:30 - 11 AM. If I do, I'm not hungry until after 1:30 PM.

My schedule is such that I need to eat by 12:30-1:30 PM at the latest because my afternoon is full and if I wait until later in the PM to eat (after 2 PM) then I won't be hungry when the family sits down to eat dinner in the 6 PM time frame.

Is eating breakfast that important to loosing weight? My dietitian says that it's important. Googling the subject seems to verify it:

• Eating Breakfast Helps Weight Loss
• Breakfast: Why is it so important?

Attempting to look up "don't feel like eating breakfast" gives posts on the same advice - learn to eat it even if you don't feel like it. This is just the opposite of what I do: I eat when I feel like it and don't when I should.

I'll try eating something for breakfast, even if it's just a cereal bar.