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I actually don't know what number film this is, as I can't remember exactly how many times I've made a serious attempt to lose weight, or what even counts since there were a couple I started without fully committing and fell off within the first month or less. I know it's at least the fourth, in that I can remember three individual successful attempts that all just ended abruptly when something in my life changed and I was unable to maintain discipline.
So three weeks ago I embarked on whatever number this is, let's call it VII because, sure, that's close enough. Not like anyone saw the last three in the theatre anyway.
I was inspired by Rob Donoghue who had been posting daily about his foray through a book called The Beck Diet Solution which turns out not really to be so much about dieting as it is about behavioral management. The author of the book is a psychologist, not a nutritionist, and the book is primarily there to teach Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which is a fancy way of saying it gives you tools to use to change your behavior. This of course assumes that you have identified the behavior you want to change, and that you want to change this behavior.
After he'd gotten through a couple of weeks of the book, which is organized into a six week plan of daily topics, I was intrigued. I bought the book, slapped it on my kindle, and started reading. And what the hell, I said, let's do this.
Since it's actually diet agnostic, the book tells you to pick two diets: One you think you can do, and another one you can fall back to if the first one doesn't work out. It gives you an egress without just falling off the plan.
I picked one that had actually worked for me before until I stopped paying attention to it, which was to basically just reduce my stomach size and try to consciously pay attention to when I'm full. But that one failed when I stopped paying attention to it, so I wanted something a bit more rigorous to help keep it in my head, what I had to do, and help me keep track of what I've been doing.
Enter MyFitnessPal, which is an app on the iphone as well as a website. It calculates a daily caloric limit for you, based on how much you want to lose (and this is editable if you want to do something different), and gives you a way to easily log what you eat and your exercise. Where it really shines is its database. It includes an app to scan UPC codes, so you can easily scan items and look up their nutritional value. It can suck in recipes off of websites and calculate the approximate caloric value of a serving. It can calculate the caloric value of exercise (though in the forums people say it overestimates these numbers).
It also integrates seamlessly with Apple HealthKit as well as FitBit.
We already have a FitBit Aria scale. This means that weigh ins are effortless; I weigh myself, it records that weight on the fitbit site, and then MFP sucks that data in. Bam, I have instant graphs of my weight. one thing I'd love here would be more graphing tools. I'd like to be able to get a moving average, and some graph R values and what not to try to normalize the results, knowing that any individual result is +/- 3 pounds off my real weight, roughly, but with enough data points that real weight can be calculated easily enough.
Still, it's got good features. It has good sharing, so people I'm friends with can see what I've been eating, what my exercise has been, and it'll let people know when I've lost weight (though it doesn't broadcast the actual number, just the amount lost). It's also been startling how the *easiest* way to reduce calories has been not to reduce the expected things, but to reduce the starches from my meals. I can't eliminate them entirely, I don't think, I need them to feel like a meal is complete. But I can reduce them to a few bites and still have decently generous portions of protein and vegetables to go with it.
To go with this, I started picking back up on the walking regimen. Walking is great for me for multiple reasons, not just the weight loss; I need to walk for my back. It keeps the muscles strong, and it also is the only way that liquid gets into or out of the herniated disc, because discs are basically an isolated system in the body with no actual incoming or outgoing flow. But that pumping motion is really good for them. Plus it keeps the muscles in the area stronger.
To help with this, we bought a treadmill. Though I have to compete with Charlotte for that. We told her she could watch as many videos as she wants while walking on it, or for every mile she walks without videos she can have a treasure box trip (We have a box full of little reward goodies that she can go into when she does something we approve of). So far she's doing 2-4 miles per day on it. This is REALLY good for her, and I guess that means if she's using it I'll just walk the old fashioned way. Except when it's hot. Then she's going to HAVE to share.
Also, we pulled out the Wii Fit, and the Wii Fit U has some nice features. It also makes annoying noises at you if you're fat, and it artifically enfattens your Mii, which I find bitchy and I suspect will negatively impact me on days when I'm feeling emotionally unwilling to face that. Yes, Mr. Wii Fit, I'm fat, but you're supposed to be a tool to help me fix that, and wagging your finger at me right when I'm trying to do something about it is counterproductive.
Fuck fat shamers, anyway.
So far, as of today, day 1 of week 4, I'm down 11.4 pounds -- though I'm think I'm on the -3 part of that weight cycle so really it's probably about 8.5 pounds. I get a lot of calorie credit from my exercise, thanks to my abundance of weight, so I have finished some days 1,000 or more calories under target, because I've gotten THAT much exercise.
I'm not really committing to weekly blogging about this, but I am commenting on this here and there regularly over on Google+, because that's where the inspiration came from and Rob cheers me on every post, along with Gretchen and Leeann and a couple of other folks.
I am, however, committing to the following things:
So there, blather blather. Potential updates in the future, or not, but friend me on MFP and/or fitbit and you can follow my progress there too, as well as shorter, quippier updates on my google plus page. I know, it's G+. It's got some uses, though.
So three weeks ago I embarked on whatever number this is, let's call it VII because, sure, that's close enough. Not like anyone saw the last three in the theatre anyway.
I was inspired by Rob Donoghue who had been posting daily about his foray through a book called The Beck Diet Solution which turns out not really to be so much about dieting as it is about behavioral management. The author of the book is a psychologist, not a nutritionist, and the book is primarily there to teach Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which is a fancy way of saying it gives you tools to use to change your behavior. This of course assumes that you have identified the behavior you want to change, and that you want to change this behavior.
After he'd gotten through a couple of weeks of the book, which is organized into a six week plan of daily topics, I was intrigued. I bought the book, slapped it on my kindle, and started reading. And what the hell, I said, let's do this.
Since it's actually diet agnostic, the book tells you to pick two diets: One you think you can do, and another one you can fall back to if the first one doesn't work out. It gives you an egress without just falling off the plan.
I picked one that had actually worked for me before until I stopped paying attention to it, which was to basically just reduce my stomach size and try to consciously pay attention to when I'm full. But that one failed when I stopped paying attention to it, so I wanted something a bit more rigorous to help keep it in my head, what I had to do, and help me keep track of what I've been doing.
Enter MyFitnessPal, which is an app on the iphone as well as a website. It calculates a daily caloric limit for you, based on how much you want to lose (and this is editable if you want to do something different), and gives you a way to easily log what you eat and your exercise. Where it really shines is its database. It includes an app to scan UPC codes, so you can easily scan items and look up their nutritional value. It can suck in recipes off of websites and calculate the approximate caloric value of a serving. It can calculate the caloric value of exercise (though in the forums people say it overestimates these numbers).
It also integrates seamlessly with Apple HealthKit as well as FitBit.
We already have a FitBit Aria scale. This means that weigh ins are effortless; I weigh myself, it records that weight on the fitbit site, and then MFP sucks that data in. Bam, I have instant graphs of my weight. one thing I'd love here would be more graphing tools. I'd like to be able to get a moving average, and some graph R values and what not to try to normalize the results, knowing that any individual result is +/- 3 pounds off my real weight, roughly, but with enough data points that real weight can be calculated easily enough.
Still, it's got good features. It has good sharing, so people I'm friends with can see what I've been eating, what my exercise has been, and it'll let people know when I've lost weight (though it doesn't broadcast the actual number, just the amount lost). It's also been startling how the *easiest* way to reduce calories has been not to reduce the expected things, but to reduce the starches from my meals. I can't eliminate them entirely, I don't think, I need them to feel like a meal is complete. But I can reduce them to a few bites and still have decently generous portions of protein and vegetables to go with it.
To go with this, I started picking back up on the walking regimen. Walking is great for me for multiple reasons, not just the weight loss; I need to walk for my back. It keeps the muscles strong, and it also is the only way that liquid gets into or out of the herniated disc, because discs are basically an isolated system in the body with no actual incoming or outgoing flow. But that pumping motion is really good for them. Plus it keeps the muscles in the area stronger.
To help with this, we bought a treadmill. Though I have to compete with Charlotte for that. We told her she could watch as many videos as she wants while walking on it, or for every mile she walks without videos she can have a treasure box trip (We have a box full of little reward goodies that she can go into when she does something we approve of). So far she's doing 2-4 miles per day on it. This is REALLY good for her, and I guess that means if she's using it I'll just walk the old fashioned way. Except when it's hot. Then she's going to HAVE to share.
Also, we pulled out the Wii Fit, and the Wii Fit U has some nice features. It also makes annoying noises at you if you're fat, and it artifically enfattens your Mii, which I find bitchy and I suspect will negatively impact me on days when I'm feeling emotionally unwilling to face that. Yes, Mr. Wii Fit, I'm fat, but you're supposed to be a tool to help me fix that, and wagging your finger at me right when I'm trying to do something about it is counterproductive.
Fuck fat shamers, anyway.
So far, as of today, day 1 of week 4, I'm down 11.4 pounds -- though I'm think I'm on the -3 part of that weight cycle so really it's probably about 8.5 pounds. I get a lot of calorie credit from my exercise, thanks to my abundance of weight, so I have finished some days 1,000 or more calories under target, because I've gotten THAT much exercise.
I'm not really committing to weekly blogging about this, but I am commenting on this here and there regularly over on Google+, because that's where the inspiration came from and Rob cheers me on every post, along with Gretchen and Leeann and a couple of other folks.
I am, however, committing to the following things:
- I will log everything I eat, and everything caloric I drink, at least throughout the rest of 2015 and hopefully beyond.
- I am cutting out artificial sweeteners as much as possible. The only place this really affects me these days is my morning coffee, as I've already gotten largely away from sodas. But it's taking some getting used to, as I've always preferred my coffee sweetened.
- I will get 70,000 steps per week per my fitbit. Using a weekly goal allows me to take a day off here or there, especially since 12K and 15K haven't been that much trouble given how much I want to walk.
- In addition I will work out at least 3 times per week, and by workout I mean either a walk of no less than 3 miles or 30-45 minutes on the WiiFit.
- I will enjoy my food; I will only restrict the quantity, not the quality. I will eat a healthy variety of foods that I like.
- If I fall off plan, I will continue recording, and I will try to use CBT techniques to get myself back on the plan.
So there, blather blather. Potential updates in the future, or not, but friend me on MFP and/or fitbit and you can follow my progress there too, as well as shorter, quippier updates on my google plus page. I know, it's G+. It's got some uses, though.
Re: Well...
Date: 2015-06-18 11:29 pm (UTC)