NON WW & WW NEWBIES, OUR NEW LIFE, THE START OF SOMETHING WONDERFUL

trooworld Yaaay on the retirement party. What I do when I'm invited to an event and I don't really know what they will be serving is pretrack something similar so the amount of calories is already in my food diary and then I can work around it for the other meals. Otherwise I end up going over. For instance if I know there is going to be dessert there, I will pick "cheesecake" and then 1/2 serving as I know I will be getting a 1/2 serving of some kind of dessert. For appetizers I use the Mini Appetizer Rolls from Market Place (2 pieces). That way I know I can eat 2 pieces of some kind of mini appetizers. I know these calorie counts aren't exactly correct but they wouldn't be even if I entered something else because I wouldn't know exactly how everything was prepared but it gives me an idea and I have been successful doing this the last two months. Thanks for the recipe.

cbabie great job on tracking now work on staying within those calorie counts. PRE-TRACK. You are a rule keeper. The rule is eat what you have already tracked. Your snacks are already planned out so no need to go grabbing stuff because you feel sad. What can you do besides go grab ice cream. That little party in your mouth only lasts for so long and then it's replaced by guilt. Then your fingers swell up and your pants get too tight and then you are disgusted with yourself. Then comes the promise of I'll do better tomorrow. We've all been there. So stick to your rule. Why do you grab ice cream instead of a beer when you are sad? Cauliflower. So many things to make with it. You can even use your new food processor. I think the best thing I made was the soft tacos. it's cheaper than meat so you save money. Double win. I've also made tater tots. I've seen recipes for grilled cheese sandwiches. Mac and cheese. So many things to do with cauliflower. So many health benefits to cauliflower. I "rice" mine in my food processor and then bag it up in 2 cup portions and freeze it. That way it's handy to use.

Friday- food-over exercise-none water 3 cups

Today- food-check exercise 30 min treadmill water 4 cups

I gained 1.5 lbs

Hi all! Had a great day yesterday. Ate my 1200 cal, got in a 60 min Zumba class (and didn't eat back all of my exercise cal), tracked every morsel, and got in my 8 glasses of water... We'll see if the scale rewards me for the effort! Oh, and a small NSV: I have a suit that I love that I wore to an event that was being videotaped earlier this year. When I saw the tape, I was mortified. It looked awful -- that's what gave me the swift kick in the pants to get back in charge of my life and started my weight loss journey this time (hopefully for the last time!). While I'm not at goal yet, I wore that suit again yesterday and got a ton of compliments! I felt better in it too with room to move... So here's to us and getting to where we want to be -- in mind, body and spirit! Hope everyone has a great day today!

achagpar Sometimes the scale doesn't reward your efforts. Too many uncontrollable variables. That's why you need to do it yourself. Your success lies within your consistent actions not the number on the scale. Cheer yourself for making a plan and sticking to it today. Woohoo. (that was my cheer for you) Especially the NSV. Look at the difference in how you feel.

cbabie I found for me habit was a lot longer than 21 days. lol I'd be going good for a couple of months and BAM! back to where I started. What I have found this time around is to change my environment to make it easier for me to continue the habits. Food tracking and pretracking/planning meals have been combined into one thing. Whatever I ate last week on Thursday is what I'm eating this week on Thursday. With MFP, I just have to copy to the new date. Then I just mix it up for dinner. I can go back to other Thursdays and choose one of those meals or try a new recipe. It beats me sitting there thinking what am I going to eat or what am I going to cook. I have a hard time making decisions so in the past sometimes it was easier to just do nothing. I would grab whatever or we would eat out or order take out. That kept me fat. I spent the last 8 weeks focusing on my calories. I was successful on that. This next 8 weeks I'm also focusing on my carbs which makes meal planning a bit trickier. I just had to rework my plan for tomorrow because I would have been 9 carbs over. So now my banana pudding won't have a graham cracker in it. lol I'm using a Sugar Free ready to eat vanilla pudding cup and cutting up a banana to go in it.

trooworld I hope the gallbladder ultrasound goes well. I had mine out 3 years ago. I don't know that I would have made the same decision. Still have digestive issues. Well, I hope your plan works for you. If you see you aren't losing weight consistently then maybe taper down to 3. Your coach will help you with that.

Daily check in- food-check exercise 20 min treadmill water-11 glasses

achagpar Doing the happy dance for you. A little bit closer to goal.

trooworld Your Mediterranean meal sounded good. I don't like tabouleh either. I'm learning to like babaganough. Trying new things. Great news on the ultrasound. One less thing for you to worry about. Have you checked your uric acid levels? They thought my mil had gallbladder issues and it turned out to be high uric acid. So we have to check again in September (after two months). I have two days a week where I raise my calories so I can include some fun foods. Then I reduce my calories a bit on the other 5 days. It all balances out at the end of the week.

cbabie Why didn't you go do something for those 4 hours? Then when that person was done they could have called you on the phone and then you could have went and picked them up. Of course my choice would have been a nice cafe so I could have some tea and I would have brought my Kindle along. Win-win for all. But here are some ideas for you for next time you get stuck in that same situation. Sorry about the migraine. You certainly don't want a repeat of that. You could have found a closeby "mall" or shopping center and walked around getting in some exercise. Hospitals are nice for that sort of thing too. You have the advantage of stair climbing or walking the halls. You could go to a coffee shop and worked on your school work or other reading. You could sit in the lobby of a hotel nearby and do the same thing. The important thing is that you get out of the heat. My grandmother died of a heat stroke.

Daily report: Food-check Exercise 37 minutes circuit training Water- 7 glasses

cbabie Granny. She was out working in her garden and didn't wear her sun bonnet like she usually did. She got overheated and got put in the hospital. When she was released her health took a nosedive quickly, mentally and physically. She was fine before the day in the garden. There's always hotels near international airports. Go sit in the lobbies and parking is usually free. But you may not survive next time or maybe you will but just be impaired. Can you hear your mother saying A word to the wise....."

trooworld They are not smarter, just more experienced. Continue learning all you can about your industry and your knowledge will grow. You asking those questions is how you grow. Along with reading articles, journals, etc. Sounds like a very interesting field. You got this. I always thought gout was just a joint related thing but my mil pain is upper right quadrant and radiates to the side. Of course could be this doc has no idea what he's talking about. lol But she was high and we've had her on a special diet. He wanted to go NO meat, fish, poultry but I refused. She has to eat something. She's diabetic and I can't give her a bunch of carbs. So I told him I would give her chicken once a day. Then we already give her lowfat diary. But I switched to skim on everything. She seems fine now. But still have to go back in for a recheck.

Daily report:

Yesterday: food check exercise 18 min walking water 6 glasses
Today: food check exercise none water 5 glasses

@trooworld thanks for the welcome!! I have tried iTrackBites but only the free version. I am going to give MFP a go for more than just maintenance and see if I can "reset" my body by feeding it healthy increments of what it's asking for - not the high protein food that WW is pushing at this time. Protein seems to not mesh well with my body in high quantities. We will see! Do you guys check in to this group daily or as needed or anything specific?

I lost 0.9 lbs this week