Up 4 lbs...and Doing Ok

My original title to this post was Up 4 lbs...and Happy.  Then I erased "happy" and just put "doing ok".  I can never really say I'm "happy" when I'm only 3 days into a nearly 2 week cycle.  Physically, I feel like crap...a lot of pain and heaviness and general "yuck" feeling.  However....the reason I'm ok with being up 4 lbs is I know it's ALL from the cycle bloat.  Every time I start, I'm up 4-5 lbs within a couple of days.  I've been tracking it long enough to know now.  I may not especially like it, but it doesn't piss me off like it used to.

My goal for weekend calories is the goal I started this challenge with...to eat at the calorie level that I will be stuck with have when I reach my goal weight.  I am 5'10 and my goal weight is 170 lbs, so my maintenance level is 1870 cals.  I weighed in at 242 lbs. Sunday morning.  By the afternoon the serious cramping had started and I knew what I was in for.  I came in right at 1800 cals. on Sunday.  On Monday I came in at 1200 cals on the nose.  I've also drank all of my liquids...water and coffee.  I knew when I woke up Tuesday morning that I had full bloating going on.  I hopped on the scale to confirm it...yep...246 lbs. 

Monday night I had a few things to cook for our Thanksgiving luncheon at work.  I was up pretty late making broccoli, cheese and rice casserole....bread stuffing....baking sweet potatoes and making a sweet potato bake with them, baked a pumpkin roll w/ pecans and cream cheese filling....plus 2 loads of dishes through the dishwasher.  Tuesday morning I got up at 5am and made a pan of baked mac 'n' chz....took down all of my Fall decorations, packed them up and loaded them along with all the food into the car. 

Got to work and we set up everything buffet style....with the racks and the pans with the water in the bottom, setting the smaller food pans inside, with lit Sterno underneath.  Decorated the tables and the office, lit some seasonal candles....and everyone showed up to eat at 12:30p.  My plan was the same plan I have for Thanksgiving at Mom's house on Thursday.  One plate w/o any major piling....not the 2-3 plates I would normally eat....and no leftovers going home.  (I had one of those 230 cal. Jimmy Dean breakfast bowls at 7am).

Billie and Staci also cooked food for our get together, and some people brought in some store bought items as well.  Here's what all we had yesterday:

Baked mac 'n' chz
Broccoli, cheese and rice casserole
Bread Stuffing
Sweet Potato Bake
Cornbread Dressing
Gravy
Turkey Breast (Boston Market)
Ham (Honey Baked Hams)
Deviled Eggs
Green Bean Casserole
Asparagus
Corn Souffle
Mashed potatoes
Cranberry sauce
Pumpkin pies
Petit Fours
Truffles
Chocolate-dipped strawberries
Carrot Cake
Cheesecake
Pumpkin Roll
Hawaiian rolls
Parker House rolls

I did almost exactly as planned.  I had one moderate plate w/ turkey, a tiny piece of ham, and a small spoon of the broccoli & rice, mashed potatoes, and green bean casserole (less than 1/2 c. each).  One deviled egg & 1 roll.  And then a spoon of my sweet potato bake that served as my dessert.  That's it...didn't touch the rest of the stuff on the buffet table or dessert table.  For a Thanksgiving meal, this is moderation for me and I'm proud of it.  The "almost" part comes in with taking a small bowl of leftovers home for dinner.  After 5 hours of sleep the night before and being busy all day I was exhausted and there was no way I was cooking.  Not at all.  I put some food in a small tupperware bowl...it equaled less than the amt of food I ate at lunch, plus it was shared with Scarlette.  I felt good about the day...but just to make sure my thinking wasn't too skewed, I got on the scale again this morning.  Said the same thing....246 lbs...no gain, not even from sodium.  Apparently I didn't eat enough of the casseroles for the sodium in them to affect me, and that's awesome. 

Also, after doing so well with my plan of moderation yesterday....I'm not near as worried about eating at Mom's now.  If I did well yesterday, I'll do well again tomorrow.  It also helps that I keep thinking of Allan's phrase in my mind..."first it's food, then it's poop"...lol.  Kind of simplifies things, while also taking some of the allure away.  :)

I totally meant to take pics yesterday, but just forgot my camera with the rush of getting all the decos and food in the car and getting to work.  I did remember it this morning though, and I'm shooting for another 1200 calorie day today.  I took a pic of my breakfast....a Jimmy Dean breakfast bagel...and will post it along with my other food pics from the day later tonight.

By the way....regarding the 1200 calorie/day thing I'm doing right now....this is not for life.  It may not last through next week.  I don't know.  I'm just messing around with different stuff right now.  I intrigued myself the first day I actually did it w/o starving to death and that made me want to do it again the next day.  Then I got on the scale and started to see the #'s drop after only 2 days, and that fueled my fascination.  I ended up with a 6 lb. loss last week and it was worth dealing with the hungry feelings most of the week.  I had one weird day last week where I was under the 1200 and wasn't hungry.  Not sure what was up with that, but the honest revelation about the rest of the week is that 1200 a day is damn hard to stick to.  Most days you ARE hungry...and it sucks.  Nobody likes that feeling.  But I'm trying to keep that in perspective, and Allan is helping with that, too.  He talks about starving people in third world countries....and what do we really have to complain about?  The little bit of hunger you have to deal with at 1200 cals isn't even worth mentioning when you think of it in those terms.  So....I'll do the 1200 cals/day for as long as I feel like torturing myself a little....as long as I continue to be amazed by the fact that I'm actually being this regimented....and also amazed with the scale results.

I can go back to 1870 cals/day...the original rules of this challenge...whenever I feel like it.  Still just taking it day by day....one day at a time seems to work best for me.  My brain can't handle looking too far down the road.  So far, Sun-Tues have been good days....I'm a little anxious about the next 4 days being spent with Dwayne thanks to the 4-day holiday weekend.  Those will most probably be 1870 days....I don't even want to TRY to stay at 1200 when I'm around him.  My head might explode from all THAT stress and I'm not even going there. 

I hope you all have your Thanksgiving plans firmly in place.  Don't be too anxious....it's just food, and then it's poop.  :)  Enjoy your loved ones friends...and I'll be back later tonight with food pics.  :)

Oh!  And Allan offered us a "No Coddling" badge for Friday....the day after the Thanksgiving, and most assuredly where we'll be reading about all of those people who did NOT stick to their plan....or who flat out chose to eat as they normally would...with no diet in mind.  I don't judge....it's up to each person how fast and in what way they want to lose their weight....it's none of my business...and I'm not cool with judging peoople for ANY reason.  With that said, I don't think I'll be coddling people either to make them feel better afterwards.  We're all going to make conscious decisions at the Thanksgiving table...and we all get to own them on Friday...and again on weigh day....including myself.  Here's my badge: