Accountability buddy
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Here’s Snoopy. He’s 3 years old we’ve had him since he was about 8 weeks old.1
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Here’s Oreo. We had him since he was 4 months old. Sadly his health deteriorated really fast this past May and we had to put him down. I still miss him everyday. He was the best dog. 😣2 -
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Hello everyone! Wow this year has been a whirlwind already. I browsed through the posts I missed and it sounds like everyone is going a good job setting goals and being mindful when working towards them. I have only eaten from a drive thru once since january 1st and have had a dessert only once since then as well. Those two things have been my major goals since I'm not working out like I should be.
@PatriceFitnessPal, the group is still doing the hourly exercises but I fell of that wagon. Working from home three days and in the office two has ruined me. When I work from home, I work from my dad's and take care of him. When I'm in the office I'm running around like a loon because I have a new role that I'm learning and my boss is retiring the end of this month. It's a lot of stress, but it's good stress. I'm hoping that I can get out of the house and walk more as soon as the weather cooperates with that goal. We do have a company step challenge starting in March, so I plan to set a challenging goal for that. I still get shortness of breath and exhausted from covid too, so I'm just doing what I can. Your posts are always so motivating and inspiring; I just keep logging in to read them.1 -
Morning all!!
Managed to lose 3lb this week with a bit of focussed effort on tracking and being mindful of how much I move... So I am really pleased with that!
Well done @highmaintnance for avoiding drive thrus... Its so tempting isnt it! Luckily we live somewhere where our closest drove thru is actually 15/20 minutes away, so it isnt a quick option for us and we dont tend to do it often unless we are out and about, which during lockdown we just arent!
One thing I did at the end of last year.... I keep really detailed accounts on our household finances so at the end of the year I went through and worked out how much we had spent on takeout or eating out last year... And it was WAYYY more than I was comfortable with. So with that figure in mind this year we plan to try and only spend a quarter of that amount!2 -
@kiay131982 and @beshamama - Thanks for sharing the adorable photos of your dogs. They keep us accountable to walking and help regulate our emotions so much. Maybe health insurance companies should give a discount to people with pets because of their success in improving our wellbeing. 😀 It’s so difficult when they leave us though ... my condolences, @beshamama. I’m glad to hear you’re at the point of feeling able to smile at the fond memories that your family shares about good times with Oreo!
@highmaintnance - You seem to be handling your ‘sandwich generation’ role with amazing agility. It’s hard work to care for an aging parent and a daughter on the cusp between childhood and teenage years. They both want their independence but need your support! Good work avoiding the drive-through, even when you’re burdened with making too many daily decisions in your new job, etc. ... and planning dinner just feels like one too many!! I know many people swear by food prep on the weekend to help cut down on time and planning during the week, but I wasn’t very good at it. So I relied on some crockpot options - like chili the night before a busy day - or tried to have a pizza crust on hand. That way, I could throw together a salad and veggie loaded option in the same amount of time as delivery. Have you come up with some strategies that have helped you avoid the drive through and desserts? I’d love to add some new ideas to my toolkit. Even though we try to order healthy food - while trying to support local restaurants during the pandemic - I find I exceed my daily calories most often when eating takeout instead of cooking at home. Maybe I should try ordering just one item to compliment a homemade salad or something like that ... I’m starting to learn that I can spread the order over a couple of days but we always seem to order too much food.
@kiay131982 - You’re so right about using the high cost as a motivator for breaking the habit. We are creating a family budget with our sons for the coming year. It’s been helpful for all of us to reflect on whether a subscription or the cumulative price of ordering food is worth the monthly expense. Once we get through a full year of tracking everything together through regular monthly family meetings (that are virtual with the college students), I’m going to ask each son to develop his own. I told them we don’t need to have a description of every spending item, but we should have a general sense of where our financial contribution is going per category (e.g., food cost, entertainment, transportation, etc.). I’ve noticed one son ordered a lot of food delivered to him and we already bought a college meal plan for him so the budget helps open conversations and builds their awareness.
@highmaintnance, do you think your daughter would be motivated by calculating the cost-savings of avoiding the drive-through and then using a percentage of the money saved to buy a non-food item?.... or compare with the money needed to buy groceries to show the difference in expenses? Those are just some thoughts that came to mind as I was thinking about my family, but you’ll know what works best for your daughter.
I made it back from New York without too much damage to my weekly plan. I had to make some adjustments and trade-offs but I can live with them. I’ll post a status update soon but wanted to thank everyone for sharing so many great tips and inspiring updates. I appreciated your encouraging words to me @highmaintnance! ... and I feel the same way. It motivates me to login to MFP to read your comments and certainly helps keep me on track in reaching my goals. Thank you, Accountability buddies!
Let us know how you’re doing when you get a chance and, most importantly: Go get those goals you set for yourself!
Every decision you make is an opportunity to move closer to becoming the person you envisioned when setting your goals. Change doesn’t happen overnight but it does build overtime when we tally more good decisions than bad ones, and learn enough from our bad decisions to improve the next time. Best wishes for the coming week!1 -
I’m looking for the same,, I’m looking for people who support each other in our fitness journey,, I think it goes both ways,, so please add so we can support each other!!!0
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@kiay131982 I use the envelope system (well....mostly), so I give myself the budgeted amount for eating out for the following two weeks. Once the money is gone, there is no more eating out. @PatriceFitnessPal I use this system to teach my daughter about expenses. When we don't use the budgeted amount of money, I put it in a jar and that's what we are going to take on our vacation in November. Or it goes in the jar that we have to save for quick road trips. Eating my own food makes me feel better and I hold onto that when I get a craving for fast food. Plus, I really like Kroger brand curly fries and that's what I usually crave anyway. The desserts are much harder to give up but after a few days, the cravings mostly go away. I read that the cravings are from the bad bacteria in your digestive system craving more sugar. That thought grosses me out, so I drink my kombucha to kill the bad bacteria and eat raw honey with my breakfast, which I've heard helps keep sugar cravings at bay. It's mostly mental exercises, lol.1
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Morning all!
After a good weigh in on Saturday we then had a zoom social with friends, which I had budgeted a bottle of wine for in my allowance.... What I didnt budget was all the snacks that being tipsy then led me to eat!! Doh!!! We had a nice evening catching up though and thats what counts.
This week my plan is to stop planning!! I am a serial planner, list writer, spreadsheet maker... Sometimes I plan so much that I run out of time to just do. So this week Im hoping to DO. Get extra workouts in that arent the rigidly planned zoom ones, get on with the training schedule with my dogs, and just do it rather than plan it!!! We shall see!!! I also need to be rigidly good with logging as otherwise next Saturdays weigh in is going to be higher than this one, judging by my cheeky weigh this morning!! Oppps!!!
Its the last week before half term, 2 of my children have no homeschool on Friday either, and I have booked Thursday off work as I have lots of leave to use up... So hopefully it will be a fairly stress free week!!1 -
@wickedpug3637 - Welcome! We’ve been posting weekly goals here and then checking in to report our progress as a way to stay accountable. Feel free to post a little bit about yourself and your fitness goals and we’ll do our best to support you. Do you have a specific fitness or nutrition target in mind? Is there a particular habit you’re hoping to change - or a plan you are following- in order to attain your goal(s)?
At first, my goal was simply to log my food and exercise at least 5 out of 7 days each week but now that habit is well integrated into my day so I’m concentrating on other areas, such as replacing one cup of coffee with two glasses of water, and switching to fruit instead of processed snacks to satisfy any sweet cravings. These still need work!!
@highmaintnance - It sounds as though you’ve got a great system in place. I wish I could be that organized and disciplined. Good for you! I’m going to use the image you conjured up for me of a nasty sugar-craving intestinal monster that grows if I feed it unnatural sweets. I love honey and should probably incorporate it more often. I hear local honey also helps alleviate allergies and have considered creating a bee habitat in my yard but that idea needs more research and development before I can make it happen.
@kiay131982 - I’m a list maker, too! I can definitely identify with the need to override the urge to keep planning when action is needed. I’ve been trying to scale back the details in my lists and block out chunks of time during the day to pursue broader goals, like strengthening social connections and professional growth, old habits die hard so I still need to act more and plan less. I appreciate your post so I can remind myself to keep working on turning all my planning into action.
I learn so much from you all. Thanks so much for all the lessons and ideas you share!1 -
We are getting the puppy!!! We got to go meet her on my birthday but don’t get to bring her home till next week. She is absolutely perfect and it was love at 1st sight for all of us!!!
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@beshamama oh look!!! Such a sweet little face! How old is she? Xx
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@kiay131982 she is about 10 weeks old. Just a baby!!0
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@beshamama - How exciting! That is a special birthday week. Congratulations on your adoption. I’ve heard that pets have as positive an influence on our mental health as a therapist so it’s also a good investment in personal well-being ... and what a lucky dog, too!1
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I’ve posted some comments this week but I didn’t really provide an update on my goals. The TL/DR version is: Bad to mediocre week for me, as expected. There are some good points but it was basically a ‘maintenance’ week. Here goes ...
I set lower aspirations than usual because I knew my trip to New York City (NYC) would interrupt my regular schedule, despite trying to plan some ‘work around’ strategies to stay on track as much as possible. I definitely drank more alcohol than usual but poured smaller portions (2-3 ounces) so I don’t think I went too far afield. I didn’t measure the portions exactly but I had three glasses (and thought about a fourth!). I skipped the ‘first round’ by having a glass of water and replaced the ‘last round’ with mint tea. So, that could have been worse. I was glad to keep it contained and drink a little less over the course of about five hours.
BUT, we decided to have breakfast together the next day, which I hadn’t planned, and our friends wanted to meet a little later than we thought we’d eat breakfast before ‘hitting the road’ for our return trip. So, that meant we had to miss our personal trainer appointment later that afternoon. We had warned him we might not make it back in time so it wasn’t a big problem but ... in a nutshell, we ended up eating more and exercising less. 🤨
Since I set my weekly goal to eat maintenance calories on Friday - and Sunday - I tried to adjust by keeping within my calorie deficit on Sunday to make up for indulging a bit more on Saturday. That worked somewhat ... not perfectly, but I’ll take it. Sunday, was ‘Super Bowl Sunday’ which (for our UK friends) is when the American-style football teams play their championship game. I ended up eating a slice of banana bread that I made but I didn’t go too far off the rails that day.
I thought I could accomplish my yoga goal on Sunday morning instead of Saturday but there was no class 😕 so I signed up for my first Zumba class 🙃. I warned the instructor that I’d probably mess up the moves but everyone was supportive and it was fun. They limited the number of people because of Covid-19, so it was a little more noticeable if we turned the wrong way; but, everyone was spaced out with lots of distance between us, so at least I couldn’t step on anyone else’s toes! 🤪 ... and I was more anonymous hidden behind my mask 😷!
Because of our trip, combined with baking and enjoying the football game, I didn’t make any progress on my downsizing project. In fact, I didn’t even get rid of any clothes this week. I’ll definitely need to concentrate on that goal the rest of this week and into the weekend!! I’ve been making tiny steps forward on the professional goals by setting up regular appointments with friends and colleagues to stay accountable. I also hired my son to help me with some accounting tasks. That helps me set aside time to focus on necessary - but monotonous - duties that I might avoid otherwise. I kind of look forward to working with him as a way to connect, which helps me face the drudgery.
My weight is still about the same, fluctuating between 136-133, with my official weekly weigh-in on Wednesday. My physical therapy (PT) sessions are helping. My back muscles are getting stronger and my shoulder is healing! My goal is to fully recover by the end of February so I’m hoping I can check that off the list soon. Then, I can replace that time slot (twice a week) with another fitness or overall health goal. I’m looking forward to adding yoga or cardio.
I might need the help of my Accountability buddies when the time comes to choose a new habit to replace shoulder rehabilitation. I need to improve my flexibility but burning 200-300 calories through cardio would help me reach my weight goal more quickly. Once I get to my goal weight, I’m planning to get a body fat assessment and work on body recomposition. So, I guess I’m feeling a bit eager to get to the next phase but, for now, I’ll just focus on my PT progress and try not to skip my ‘at home’ PT exercises. I’ve been neglecting that ‘homework’ 🙈 so back to work. I’m looking forward to a clean slate with new weekly goals on Thursday and I’m bracing a little as I anticipate tomorrow’s weigh-in. 😬 Thanks for your support through the tough days!
How is everyone doing out there? ... better than me this week, I hope! I’m pulling for you all and sending positive vibes your way. Go get those goals!0 -
Here’s my goals for the week
*Track all my food
*Stay under calories at least 3x
*Exercise at least 4x
*Drink more water1 -
@PatriceFitnessPal that doesn't sound like a bad week!! It sounds like a week where real life things happened and you adjusted your targets to make things work in the moment. And thats what this is all about....a lifestyle change. So the fact that you adapted but also didnt take away from actually living your life and having that banana bread, sounds like actually you smashed it!!!
You might burn through more calories in a cardio session, but a strength session will mean burning calories for longer, and building muscle which in turn burns more calories..... So maybe mix it up and do a bit of both?
I havent done any running this week, its far too cold, and I worry about slipping... However I have made sure that I have done a pilates session every day that I dont have a zoom gym class... And I am doing a longish dog walk every day too. Im watching the scales with anticipation this week. I weigh in on Saturday and had a really good weigh this week... But have been higher every day since, I know weight fluctuates, but I would like it to fluctuate downwards now thanks!!! 🤣0 -
@beshamama - Thanks for sharing your goals for the week. How’s it going? I did better with drinking water at the beginning of the month, but I’ve recently tapered off so I appreciated seeing your goal as a subtle reminder to stay accountable.
@kiay131982 - You lifted my spirits and changed my perspective with your comment above. Thank you for the encouragement. I feel as though it was requiring too much ‘headspace’ to stay on track but your post helped me reflect on the situation more positively. The trip was short but wonderful! We shared many laughs with friends, enjoyed walks in Central Park, and contributed (ever so slightly) to the City economy that is suffering so much right now. Like any other lifestyle change, it will get easier to make adjustments ‘in real time’ with practice. So, I strengthened that muscle, just a touch!
Here are my new weekly stats and goals:
CW: 133 (fluctuating but 3 data points at 133)
GW: 125 (maintenance range will likely be 125-130)
So, I have 8 pounds to lose by the end of 2021.
Goals:
(1) PT twice a week and PT home exercises at least 2 out of the other 5 days.
(2) Personal trainer twice and add yoga class 2 days (Sat. plus one more day - maybe Wed.?)
(3) Continue Zumba classes on Sunday and walk with friend as a bonus goal.
(4) Accomplish at least 2 professional goals (finish calculating tax expenses; start developing website content and map out the main menu sections, finalize contract with California, submit 2 invoices).
(5) Pack up at least 2 boxes to donate and plan the actual drop off (for next week with bonus points if done this week)
Another bonus will be buying some books I’ve been planning to read. It’s a busy work week so I may not get to my ‘bonus point’ goals; but, I have a reward in mind if I do. I received a message that the masseuses at a local massage business have received vaccinations. So, I think it will help my shoulder heal, provide some stress relief for positive mental health and offer a nice reward for achieving extra goals. I’m motivated! 😀
How are you all doing? Have you set some clear and manageable goals for the week? Be kind and care of yourselves ... and go get those goals!0 -
Morning all! I need a refocus... Again!! Had a good loss last week, then a small hiccup of a weekend (wine and snacks) and have been peeking at the scales all week and havent been able to undo the gain I had after my loss!
weigh in day is tomorrow and I think Im going to end up showing a gain!
Need to prioritise protein and water and get back on track!!!!!0
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