dianaschnuth

First and foremost, my weigh-in: I gained 0.8 pounds this week.

Last week, I’d decided on three strategies to help me get back on the wagon. How did I do?

1.) Stay within my daily Points range.

I was only successful at this for three out of seven days, with Saturday and Monday being abysmal slip-ups:

I failed to plan on Saturday, eating Pointariffic meals for both lunch (Thai) and dinner (Indian). Note to self: in the future, only eat one meal with rice per day.

2.) Eat my fruits and vegetables.

I did better on this one, increasing my maxxed-out veggie days from two to three, and eating at least some fruits and veggies daily.

It’s really not that hard to get all my fruits and veggies in. A bowl of fruit salad will get half of that, and I’ve changed my nighttime noshing during Connor’s feedings from granola bars to apples (Honeycrisp, specifically).

3.) Increase my exercise frequency.

This one I just failed miserably, hands down. I only managed to get out for one short walk last week.

Since Aaron and I will be doing a trial run of workday feedings starting on Monday, I may take a guilt-free morning run/walk starting on Monday. I know he’d tell me I can go out for a walk any afternoon I want… but my afternoons seem to be devoted to feeding Connor his lunch, then eating mine, then giving Connor some tummy time (or just wrangling him to figure out why he’s cranky), then taking a nap, then seeing Aaron off to work. As it is, I usually have to choose between nap and walk.

Since the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, I’m going to modify my admittedly vague goals and see how I do this week.

1.) Have some Weekly Allowance Points left over at the end of the week. I’ve already gone over my Points one day this week, using 11 Weekly Points. If I can just try not to use them all, I’ll be doing better than last week.

2.) Eat more fruits and vegetables. Max out my servings more than three days this week, and always get at least some in every day.

3.) Exercise for at least 20 minutes a day for at least three days. That could be a walk around my neighborhood, some calisthenics in the basement, a yoga DVD, or finding some workout-with-baby thing on YouTube. It could even be post-cesarean abdominal exercises.

I signed up for this thing because I felt like I needed the structure of Weight Watchers again; it doesn’t do me any good if I don’t follow the program. I’m just flushing money down the toilet if I don’t apply myself.

I’d like to rejoin my At Work meeting at the weight I left it (191.6) — or, preferably, my all-time low weigh-in (184.2), which happened the day after I found out I was pregnant. That means I have between three and ten pounds to lose.

I can do that.

I would venture to say that I was on the verge of being obsessed over my pregnancy weight. I continued to track my food intake while I was pregnant, just as if I were actively trying to lose weight (as I have been for the past several years), except my intention was to allow myself to gain — ever so slowly. After having been on Weight Watchers for the past three years, intentionally letting the scale move the other direction was disconcerting, and I monitored my weight just like I always had: daily, every morning, but without letting myself obsess too much over daily fluctuations.

From Connor’s conception to his birth, I gained 33 lbs. (Granted, I lost several pounds in that first two months when I didn’t know I was pregnant and was still eating to lose, so my pre-pregnancy weight was not my lowest weight.) Within a week of Connor’s birth, I lost 20 of those 33; after another week, I leveled off after having lost 26 pounds total without really trying.

I had hoped that breastfeeding would be enough to keep the momentum going, but my body apparently decided that the low 190’s was a good place to chill at for a while. Not surprising: I’ve plateaued at that weight before.

My measurements reflect my slightly higher weight: since mid-March (when I was not yet three months pregnant and before I started showing) I’m up two inches in my hips and three in my waist. My bust is obviously bigger now that I’m breastfeeding, and I’m not concerned about that. The other parts, though… those do concern me.

So, since I know what’s worked for me in the past, and since I won’t be going back to work for another month, I signed up for Weight Watchers Online. Once the next At Work session starts in February, I’ll jump on that, since my employer subsides the cost, so it’s actually cheaper than Online. Until then, though, I needed to return to the structure that I knew.

Non-Scale Victories (NSVs) for this week:

• My pre-pregnancy jeans fasten! *happydance*
• I made a successful return to tracking my food and exercise, after a six-week post-pregnancy tracking hiatus.

I’m focusing on my NSVs because I actually gained 1.2 pounds during my first week back on Program.

So, how am I going to turn this around and really get back on the wagon?

Turns out that, in my absence, Weight Watchers has added a new tool to eTools: a Weekly Progress Report. I’ve been desperately wanting a dashboard like this, but have also been too lazy to manually tabulate all of my data for myself.

This definitely helps me see where my issues lie. First and foremost is to stay within my daily Points range. I’ve come to learn that my body doesn’t need those extra Weekly Points Allowance if I’m looking to lose weight. I also need to eat my fruits and vegetables. Saturday wasn’t a tracking flub: I really didn’t eat enough fruits or veggies to bother tracking, unless I had an entire cup of shredded lettuce on my tacos at San Marco’s or ate an entire half-cup of kimchee and other veggie side dishes at Korea Na.

Finally, and this is something I’ve been looking forward to addressing for some time now, is to increase my exercise frequency. It’s going to be a challenge to fit in a walk or a run/walk with a baby in the house, but it’s just not negotiable. Not in the long run. Eventually, I’m going to figure out a way to work this into my new baby-toting lifestyle.

I’m hoping to keep myself honest by posting weekly updates — at least until I have the accountability of meetings again.

I don’t feel like I “wrecked” my body by having a baby; this was just another detour on my journey to getting as fit as I want to be.

“I think of you every time I see those shirataki noodles in the store,” a fellow Weight Watcher told me a few weeks ago. Turns out that she doesn’t share my much-professed enjoyment of Tofu Shirataki Noodles.

Granted, if you try to eat shirataki noodles like a normal flour-based noodle, the texture will seem a little off: gummy, or slimy, or chewy. That’s why I stir-fry mine:

Quick Shirataki Stir-Fry

One 8 oz bag tofu shirataki noodles
8 oz imitation crab or frozen cocktail shrimp, thawed
1 cup frozen broccoli or stir-fry vegetable medley
1 Tbsp soy sauce
dash of fish sauce
sriracha (rooster) sauce, to taste
basil, dried
one egg (optional)

Combine ingredients in a non-stick pan and stir-fry until slightly browned.
Weight Watchers PointsPlus: 9 (including egg)

A few ideas from different sources have recently converged in my brain. They haven’t all quite congealed into a cohesive thought, but they’re trying.

I rode a Segway for the first time at The Next HOPE in New York. Upon seeing the pictures Aaron took of me, my first thought was, “Look how puffy my arms are!” Only secondarily were ideas of a.) how much fun it was to ride a Segway, or b.) how awesome it was to wear a cute girly-cut shirt, because I can now.

Aaron and I had dinner and drinks with a couple in NYC whom we hadn’t seen in person in about four years. Their first comment to us was, “You’re so slim!” Sure, I’ve lost 30 pounds since I saw them last, but Aaron’s lost over twice that much. Mentally, I just assumed that his massive weight loss was making us as a couple look thinner. Hey, I’ll take what I can get!

I watched a TED talk last night (via Whore of All the Earth) about happiness. In a nutshell, psychologist Dan Gilbert posits that the human brain has the capability to synthesize happiness. It comes off like sour grapes… until he relates the results of an experiment with amnesiacs, which supports the hypothesis that this is an innate function of the human brain, rather than a conscious decision to just be happy with what one has.

I related an incident to my Weight Watchers meeting today, one that happened a few months back, in which a co-worker asked me, “So, have you always been overweight?” Rarely have I witnessed the entire meeting room being so taken aback. They all insisted that the comments were harassment, that I should contact HR — but I disagree. At the time, I actually didn’t think much of that particular comment, and merely responded that, yes, I have always been overweight.

I’ve had a hard time wrapping my head around the Fat Acceptance movement — not because I think weight should be a reason to discriminate, but because I’ve always been overweight, and have wanted to be a “normal” weight instead. I have a hard time accepting myself at the size I am, whether it’s 80 pounds overweight or just 20 or 25. I can’t imagine — literally can’t fathom — being obese and seriously happy about it, or even OK with it… because I wasn’t. I’m still not, even though I’m only “overweight” now.

Although I’m no longer an active practitioner of Zen Buddhism, I still appreciate and adhere to many of the teachings. One of these, one that helps me considerably, is the concept of non-attachment. I’m not attached to any given outcome. It’s like ambivalence, but not. It’s not basing my happiness on this or that. This weight or that weight. This job or that job. Kids or no kids. This city or that city. Every outcome has pros and cons, and I don’t need to prefer one over the other. Either can make me happy.

I can be happy as I am now, or I can be happy 20 pounds lighter. Preferably both.

When I decided last week that I’d be pushing toward my 10% milestone for this week’s weigh-in, I failed to factor in the Fourth of July.

Good thing, too — I wonder how much I would have gained if I hadn’t? As it is, I’m up 0.2 pounds from last week, which is fine by me.

Even before the Fourth, though, I’d gained a little back of what I’d lost so far. I think it has to do with white rice, especially when served with Mediterranean or Indian food. Either my body doesn’t process it well, or I don’t estimate the serving size well, or both. I guess I’ll be shying away from the rice for a while.

On Sunday, Aaron’s uncle grilled some chicken and German natural casing hot dogs and cheeseburgers, served with baked beans and mustard potato salad (vegan, with jalapeños) and salad and fruit. Ice cream in waffle bowls or cones for dessert. Overall, I ate about 50 Points worth. My normal daily allowance is 25, but I also have 35 Weekly Allowance (aka “Flex”) Points to play with.

So, last week was practice. This week, I’ll be doing the same thing (minus the Sunday extravagance, of course): not eating any of my Flex Points, running three nights a week, only having one sweet treat in the evenings (even though they’re low-cal), and maxing out my fruits and veggies. In addition to that, I’ll be eschewing white rice this weekend — excepting, perhaps, stuffed grape leaves and/or sushi.

Next weekend, there’s nothing fancy going on. In upcoming weekends, I’ll be in New York City; Ann Arbor, MI; enjoying a couple of local ethnic festivals (the International Festival and the Festival of India); and maybe visiting friends out of town.

While I’m not going to eat boring this week by any means, I’m definitely going to avoid unnecessary splurges… so I can splurge when warranted, later on.