Weekly Post - 12.2.18 - 18.2.18
Meghan509
Posts: 1,951 Member
Good morning everybody!
Here is our new thread for the week!
Be back in bit with a fresh post for you all...
Here is our new thread for the week!
Be back in bit with a fresh post for you all...
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Replies
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Hope you all had a great weekend.
Ours was busy but good. We met up with some friends on Saturday night. (Recapping what I said in last week's thread). We discussed the annual trip that we tend to book to the Caribbean and what pricing we had found, the week we can all agree on in early May, etc. etc. Long story short, yesterday afternoon we booked our trip! There is a sale going on for Jet Blue that ends today so we jumped! We are going to the Dominican Republic. I am very excited! Right now there are two couples going, including us. There may be up to three more couples going, we shall see how it all works out in the coming weeks. Some may stay for the full Saturday to Saturday others may go for shorter times depending on schedules and budget.
We managed to crank out four meals this weekend, as far as meal prepping for the week and beyond. WOO HOO! I say we because I am thankful that my guy is very helpful around the kitchen. Two meals are for light day and two are for regular. One of the regular meals is one I had seen floating around here on MFP - Greek Macaroni and Cheese bake for 300 something calories. Looks awesome!
Planning to stay focused on my WOE for the next few months to try and get the rest of my weight off and maybe, hopefully get to my goal in time for vacation in early May. Exactly 30 pounds left and to get there by Saturday, May 5.
Probably need to buckle down a little more on the weekends, but I think I have a chance of getting there!
Have a great day all. Got my big water and a green tea sitting in front of me. Let's go! We got this!
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Hi! Today is a low day for me, too. I was also going to try a new workout this morning, but instead my kids are home from school due to snow and we're going to walk to the park (not sure I can get the car out of the driveway) and go sledding. It would be nice to have lunch before doing that, but at least it's a distraction. Hope everybody else is finding something fun to do this week!2
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Hi @whatIwont
Good luck with the snow! Stay safe. We had quite a bit of rain here this past weekend. Today has been sunny and actually sort of warm. I will take it! Supposed to a decent week here weather wise. Tonight a little cool but otherwise 40's and 50's F for the week.
I am taking this coming Friday off as a vacation day. Office is closed Monday for President's Day (US) holiday. Makes it a nice looooong weekend! No big plans at the moment. We will be spending time with friends and going to a hockey game on Sunday afternoon, which we are looking forward to. We scored some free tickets!
Light day is going well here. Been drinking lots of water which means lots of trips to the LR.
But, good for the organs and skin!
Tonight will be strength training at the gym. I missed my opportunities to get it in last week, so hopefully it is not too hard tonight!
See you all soon.1 -
Hi all, glad your feeling better ryenday! Boy I’m jealous of your trip Meghan!! Excellent motivation for sure!!
Been busy here checking in on my mom & her broken hip every day, plus their car died!! Boy oh boy things are getting challenging at times... luckily my hubs has a sense of humor! All this stress has made me not want to work out or walk at all, so I drank an entire bottle of red wine last night!! Haha... didn’t mean to, it was a few sips here few sips there.... organic too, so that’s smart, right? Anyhow, I had some decent dinners to compensate, wild sockeye from my nice neighbor.... short ribs etc... but instead of mashed potatoes I had cauliflower... I’ve decided I love cauliflower!! Roasted with turmeric, steamed with soy sauce, plain, it’s so yummy to me!
Well it’s a holiday here... family day, and we had beautiful sunshine today but cold at 1 deg C.
Funny photo of the cat!!!! Thanks for the laugh!1 -
Good morning everybody!
Yes, forgot to say from the last post that I was glad that @ryenday was feeling better and I also enjoyed the cat picture! Love the idea of the door, to keep out the kitties. LOL
@mamainthekitchen hope your Mom continues to improve. Ugh, car troubles are no fun! Hang in there with the stress. A little red wine is okay now and then - organic is good LOL! Wild sockeye sounds yummy. We eat a lot of cauliflower! We tend to buy the frozen "riced" variety and use it in place of rice. Lower calories and very tasty!
Things are good here. Plugging along. Had a good strength training work out last night which was good. I like to get in at least two per week on Mondays and Wednesdays. Tonight will be cardio.
Tomorrow for lunch I will be going out for a coworker's going away luncheon. I am not a big fan of mid-week events because I really try and stick to my plan during the week. I am skipping drinks tonight to head home, go to go to the gym, and have a healthy dinner. Shhh... LOL I will definitely miss my coworker who is leaving. Going to stick to the healthy menu options and hope for the best!
Have a great day everybody. See you 'round soon! -Meg2 -
@Meghan509 I’m told the term is “jelly”. That is a friendly jealousness over something good in someone’s life. I sure do feel that way — your vacation sounds fantastic! It is been so long since we have had a real vacation. We are considering trying to save up for one as next year will be our 25th anniversary. We think that deserves a bit of a do!
@mamainthekitchen sending all the best wishes out to you and your family. I agree, holding on to a sense of humor is key.
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Not a vacation but we will be having a small trip down to San Antonio Texas in a couple of weekends. We will be visiting my husband’s best friend – and a good friend of mine – and San Antonio is the city where my husband and I met. So I am very much looking forward to that weekend.
I seem to be finally on the mend from the sicknesses that has been plaguing me since the beginning of the year. I’m not 100% but I did start up with weights again yesterday and am dictating this while on my exercycle to try to get a bit of movement going again.
The good news is my weight has remained stable. The bad news is my calories are hovering between 8500 to 9500 weekly. 6+ miles of walking, weight training, light work on the exercycle and with the hula hoop, and three HIIT sessions a week are the 9500 cal weeks. That’s not a lot of food folks. Even with a 5:2 regimen allowing me more food on the five days. This is maintenance calories not diet calories!
When I can get back into the swimming pool that will help – giving me 500 to 1000 extra calories a week but that’s a lot of time in the pool for such a small return calorie wise. I just don’t understand how my body has such a low maintenance calorie allotment. Using MFP (sedentary setting) or using Apple Watch both say that my “maintenance“ calories are actually what a normal person would get a deficit of about 3000 cal each week. That’s kitten huge.
I’m being a little more flexible in my light days, however. What had been Tuesday and Thursday without fail is now Monday or Tuesday and Thursday. So still two days a week but sometimes it gets later in the day on Monday and I realize I have an eaten too much and decide just to get my first light day of the week over with. Given my calorie situation, it does look like 5:2 eating is going to be a lifetime thing.
I’m looking pretty OK. By the scale, and calculated BMI, I’m probably one or 2 pounds in the overweight category. I figure that the periodic five-day fast mimicking diet that I plan to do throughout the year should get the back solidly into the normal BMI category. But by all the other metrics I am pretty much around the center of a normal/healthy weight range. That would be genetics, and my particular body shape. As for clothing I’m wearing a size small uptop or in skirts and a size 6 or 8 in pants so I’d say I’m doing pretty good for an AARP member.
Wishing everybody and easy, and happy, and healthy week!2 -
Hi All!
Did my first fast day yesterday. Love when that day is over because it means only one fast day left for the week!
@Meghan509 - Your vacation sounds dreamy! How exciting to have a trip to the Caribbean to inspire your health goals!
@mamainthekitchen - So glad you are hanging with us during all that you are going through. It will get better.
@ryenday - Not sure I understood your calories and exercise. It looked to me like you eat 9500 cals per week and exercised 9500 cals per week. I am sure I must have missed something. In any case, the important thing is not being slim but healthy. One can live on candy and be a size 2 if they don't eat a lot of it but their health would be dismal. You know what I mean? Having a healthy BMI that is made up of mostly healthy food and proper exercise, like you are doing, is an excellent goal. I know you will get there!2 -
Hi all... thank you everyone, your support and 'ear' are appreciated!!
Enjoyed a 5km walk early this morning, then took our dog out for a shorter 2km, plus all my other steps I did while grocery shopping and a pit stop at Walmart.... equals a total of 12000 steps today! and it's just dinner time! My feet are complaining but I feel soooooo much better for being outside and walking on my own.
I bought a container of baby spinach and arugula the other day... one of those plastic containers that take up so much space in the fridge! I dumped it all into a one of those large freezer bags with a zip lock, squished out the air and that keeps in my fridge a whole lot easier!! I've been serving my dinners on top of a handful of it! Today I grabbed a handful then topped that with 2 fried eggs and some avocado sliced with it... so delish!! Tonight I'm making beef veggie soup - I started out making it for me (the freezer) but everyone said oh, good beef soup for dinner!! I may end up with a fast day today afterall.
I'll check in on thurs. cheers.0 -
Good morning everybody!
Happy Valentine's Day! Anybody doing anything fun with their spouses or SO's? We are not doing anything special. We will go to the gym tonight like usual and come home and have the Greek macaroni and cheese dish that I made off this site. Looks yummy. On the weekend we will probably go out for dinner one night and make a little toast or whatever.
Sounds like everybody is doing pretty good and rolling along! Happy to hear it.
@ryenday thanks!
I know you will get to have a nice trip planned with your husband! Early congrats on 25 years!! If you are looking head to the Caribbean then let me recommend the website www.cheapcaribbean.com as there are great deals on there and if you sign up for emails then you will get $100 off your first booking.
Glad you are feeling better and your weight has been stable. I do think that your calories for the day/week sound low for maintenance. I did a comparison using my information just out of curiousity. I am 5 feet 4, female, 45 years old. I also punched in my current body fat %, according to my scale. When I plug my info in, using my goal weight it says I can have 1634 calories per day or 11441 for the week and that is sedentary. It will go up to 2111 per day or 14777 per week, with moderate exercise which is probably what I do at five days a week.
Just an FYI is all. I am still trying to figure out how to get the rest of these pounds off before I can tackle maintenance.
Thanks @jknight001 I know exactly what you mean about tackling one light day and only having one left for the week! One down one to go woo hoo!
Wanted to ask you about the HIIT - did you find a good one on the internet or did you make one up on your own? And are you walking or running, etc. Sorry for all the questions.
Lately when I am walking on the treadmill in spurts for a few minutes at a time I have been raising up the incline on the treadmill really high and then going back down again. Back and forth. Not speed but intensity in this case and I am liking that. Gives me a great burn and my legs feel awesome. Was thinking about trying some HIIT too.
Glad you are hanging in there too, @mamainthekitchen you got this! Congrats on your steps! We buy those containers of arugula and put it in our sandwiches for lunch on regular days. Goes well with turkey, light swiss, and reduced calorie mayo. Gives boring turkey a nice wake up!
Okay all, I better run. See you all soon! Have a great day!0 -
Jackie Kane, Kidd Kirby, and Charlie Underfoot have a message:
Yeah, the calories are ridiculously low. 8500 (sedentary) 9500 for pretty darn active normal for me (normal for me 10,000 to 15000 steps a day, HIIT 3x week, weights 2x week, + stuff like hula hoop, mini trampoline, occasional exercise class etc.) or 9500+ some extra swim calories on weeks I swim. (1/3 to 1/2 calculator or watch estimates for swim burn seem to be reality).
I’m hoping I’m in some wierdo Groundhog Day February calorie warp or something, because dang I’m always some level of hungry it seems! (5 3 3/4, 146lb, 53 yo, 22-25% bodyfat.).1 -
Good Morning everybody!
Someone was nice enough to bring in a dozen Dunkin Donuts and Munchkins for our break room today.
Oh well. IGNORE! Light Day here! Nothing to see here folks. Carry on! 
Cute kitty pic @ryenday keep them coming!
FYI - I went to the site https://tdeecalculator.net and I came up with different stats for you...
They say they use the Katch-McArdle Formula.
Here are the different breakdowns based on a 5 foot 3 inch female, 53 years old, 25% body fat.
I went on the conservative side with your numbers, to see....
1731 calories per day or 12,120 calories per week for sedentary.
Light Exercise is 1984 per day / 13,888 per week
Moderate Exercise is 2236 per day / 15,652 per week
I think what you should do is keep checking around the internet for these types of calculators and see what they all say. Find the middle ground and go with that. What do you think?
In Dr. Mosley's book he says that to maintain the 5:2 lifestyle we should be able to move to a 6:1. And if I recall, not all the time if we don't need it. Just when our weight goes up from holidays, etc. Correct me if I am wrong anybody? Still having to do two fasts a week while on maintenance just doesn't seem accurate and sustainable for the road ahead. Just my two cents.
Light Day today. I am up a pound on the scale. Some of that could be the salad I had yesterday at the chain restaurant we went to for lunch yesterday for my coworker. It was low in calories but full in salt when I logged it in MFP. Sigh... Going to try and focus on my water today and hope for the best with tomorrow's weigh in.
Looking forward to a few days off on Friday and Monday.
See you all soon!0 -
Did my fast day yesterday as our plans are to take our son to see the movie Wonder and then do dinner tonight. If you haven't seen Wonder I highly recommend it. A great movie about family and friend dynamics. Our son is going away to Winter Camp this weekend and while it will be nice to have some alone time with DH, I will most certainly miss him! Passing another milestone.
@meghan509 - I looked into HIIT and just didn't feel like I wanted to invest that much time in learning how to make it work for me. It looks like you only do maybe 3 minutes of it a day alternating between pushing yourself really hard then taking a break, maybe every 30 seconds? I couldn't wrap my head around it. Seemed like exercise should last more than 3 minutes. None of these thoughts are good reasons for not trying it. Just wanted to explain where I was at. However, I have been doing something I really like and I think is making a difference (who knows what really makes the difference in weight loss. ). On the treadmill, I alternate slow and fast every 5 minutes for 40 minutes. We have Precore treadmills so I start at 3.8 for 5 minutes (the fastest I can go and still be walking) and then ramp it up to 5.8 for the next 5 minutes, then back down to 3.8 for 5 then back up to 5.8 for 5 an so on for the 40 minutes. I believe I started at 4.8 for the fast part and move it up .2 when I start to feel comfortable for the level. The Precore treadmills have a random setting which means it will pick random levels for you for the session. I do that so my body will not stagnate by doing the same level all the time. I do this modified HIIT training once a week. I am steadily losing weight so I am hoping this is part of the reason.
@ryenday - I agree with @meghan509 that the calorie levels seems really low. Too low and your metabolism will stall out making it harder to lose. Just my two cents too.1 -
@jknight001 HIIT exercise seems like a cheat to me, as well. I just don’t see how the small amount of time can be that useful. But I do it anyway.
I get on the exercycle for 10 minutes and go as fast as I can at a low resistance. Then I will bump the resistance up to as high as I can for 30 seconds. That is exhausting! Then I bring it back down to the low resistance and keep doing a fast exercycle and a couple minutes later bring it back up to a higher resistance for 30 more seconds / so I end up with 10 minutes and one minute and 30 seconds of which was done at the hardest resistance possible. I do something similar on the mini trampoline, and if I were a runner I suppose I would do 30 seconds sprints.
As for my calories. I’m trying to find maintenance now - I’m not actively trying to lose more weight. Thanks @meghan509 for checking that out for me. It jibes with my apple watch estimate too (approx 1350 BMR and activity raising it to 1650 to 2000 on average days). Unfortunately it doesn’t match my weight changes. Maintenance for normal days (including my activity and exercise other than swimming) is proving to be around 9500 a week - at least that is what I have been finding this past month is holding my weight steady. No gain/loss. MFP and Apple (and most calculators think 9500 a week should be about a 3000-4000 weekly deficit but I’m not losing weight.
Yes this amount of calories seems bizarrely low. If I had the money I’d have my BMR checked. Dr said blood work is fine when checked last year so I can’t blame it on thyroid or anything. Just not sure what I can do except vent about it.
As far as I know I’m doing everything right, 10000 to 15000 steps most days, standing 3 to 5 hours a day at work (standing desk). HIIT 3x a week, exercycle, mini trampoline, hula hoop ‘mini’ workouts throughout the week (prob at least one 15 minute session per day average) and weights 2x a week. Weeks when I’m not sick and the pool is open I probably get 2 miles+ swimming in 2-3 hours a week. But the calorie estimates for swimming ( approx 450 for a mile or about 500 an hour) appear to be at least double the actual amount of calories in my experience).
Ach, this is even boring me. Time for my light day soup!
Have a great day all!!1 -
Oh my hello! I wrote a load in agreeance and responding to everyone and my dog jumped up on my lap and i lost the lot. She's cute but i obviously had a lot to say that i cannot be doing with writing again lol! I would post a picture of my floppy eared friend but don't know how at risk of loosing this post!0
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@jknight001 HIIT exercise seems like a cheat to me, as well. I just don’t see how the small amount of time can be that useful. But I do it anyway.
I get on the exercycle for 10 minutes and go as fast as I can at a low resistance. Then I will bump the resistance up to as high as I can for 30 seconds. That is exhausting! Then I bring it back down to the low resistance and keep doing a fast exercycle and a couple minutes later bring it back up to a higher resistance for 30 more seconds / so I end up with 10 minutes and one minute and 30 seconds of which was done at the hardest resistance possible. I do something similar on the mini trampoline, and if I were a runner I suppose I would do 30 seconds sprints.
@ryenday - so I was right!
Seems crazy to me. I just don't think I have the patience and stamina for HIIT. Now I feel old.
@sjgold123 - I hope one day MFP will upgrade the app and the website to retain what one has wrote. All of us have experienced what you have experienced. What a pain!
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Yes agreed. How do i post a pic?0
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Hi all!
Thanks for the scoop on HIIT training @jknight001 I think I will try a version of that myself. I have been doing a version with incline but will try speed. Agree on the three minute one, seemed odd to me too!
Hang in there @ryenday you will find your magic number for maintenance.
@sjgold123 looking forward to seeing a pic! We love our furry friends here!
I am down a half a pound this week, so happy about that. In the past I had weeks where I was up or the same. Last few weeks have been losses, even if small they do all add up in the end!
Today is a vacation day so we are going to the gym, even though we would normally take off today. Keeping it moving LOL. #vacation goals
Have a great day and I will see you all soon! -Meg1 -
Down .4 today. I'll take it. I moved my second fast day to Wednesday and has enchiladas last night. I am sure there is some water weight somewhere in that number.
Good loss @Meghan509! You are moving closer and closer to a fabulous Caribbean vacay! Will be interested in seeing how the modified HIIT works for you.
Enjoy the day!2 -
Well done on your loss! That's great and such a motivator. My loss is slowing down i am familiar with this bit where after loosing a stone the is harder to shift. We have a ball in a month so i have a goal of a dress i used to fit into. We ate out this weekend and i feel it's important to slot in treats without over doing it. I had a steak burger in broiche with bacon jam, mayo and the tastiest chips it was totally worth the 1100 calories i estimated as best i could for it to be.
However i stayed within my calories all day with a low breakfast and tea. I also avoided the danish pastries, and indulgent desserts and chose tea over a latte. It's about a balance of choices for me to maintain my weight goung forward. My children are not too well so not cooking much today so opting for a light day today. I opted for bacon, egg and mushrooms in a low dough wrap for under 200 cals for breakfast so i don't feel hard done by for a Sunday. Have a good week all...i'll look out for the new post.1 -
Good morning all!
Thanks! I think slow and steady losses are good. I am happy with that. If I can be close to goal by my vacation, I will still be thrilled.
Going to have to start buying new clothes for the warmer weather, as all of mine will soon be too big.
Hope everyone is good! Was nice to have Friday off! Got two good gym trips in on Friday and Saturday. Today we will take off. We are heading out with friends today and will enjoy some pizza and beer.
Have a good day and see you guys soon.2
