Why I eat under my points

As you can see on this page, my weeklies that I've eaten has shot up dramatically from my first month and a half OP. My first two weeks (Sept), I averaged about 1 WP per day. My first full month (Oct), I averaged about 1.6 WP per day. In November, I had a few rough weeks and my average shot up to 7.5 WP per day. That's REALLY high and that basically means that in November I basically at all my weeklies and then MORE.

Last month (Dec), I averaged 6.5 WP per day which was great for a holiday month with parties and trips, etc. I strived to bring that number down from my November average and I was able to.

My DPA has only gone down 5 points so far. It only drops 1 point at a time. So the reason I've been going over into so many WP is all mental because living on one less point per day isn't difficult. I think I'm getting worried about living on 29 PP. But at least living on 29 PP won't be forever. Once I hit goal weight, my maintenance points will go up.

Lately I've been purposely eating light lunches and breakfasts because I know I don't need to eat that much food. If I strive to be BELOW my number of DPA each day, I usually can achieve it. If I don't think about it every day, I end up above my DPA especially at this time of year because I have a drawer full of candy from my stocking on christmas day.

Sometimes I only end up eating 25 PPs in a day. That usually happens when I have a light dinner and a normal lunch because I'm not hungry until after 12pm. Those are good days and they help make up for the days when I'm going crazy with hunger lol. :)

Holy huge!

This huge thing weighs 226g as you see and has 6 servings. It's bigger than the palm of my hand!

Nutrition info per 1/6:

Cal: 190

Fat: 11 g

Cholesterol: 5 mg

Sodium: 130 mg

Carbs: 22 g

Fibre: 1 g

Sugar: 20 g

Protein: 4 g

Yeah, big huh? The WHOLE thing is 36 PP. I'm thinking of checking it out on Tuesday and seeing how big it really looks unwrapped. Then I will decide how much I want to eat and freeze the rest either for Wed or next Tues. I fully plan on eating a GINORMOUS piece on Tuesday as it's my treat day.

And btw, my FIRST thought was not "I'm gonna eat that now!" It was "WOW! I can't wait to eat that on Tuesday!"

BAM! High five for good habits!

The true test of habits

I'm headed to away for the weekend to volunteer. With it comes a struggle. How can I stay on plan when I have almost 0 choices in what to eat for the main part of a meal...

Well, careful planning.

Here's what I plan to eat:
Friday dinner:

• leftover pizza on the ferry
• probably some of my normal lunchie things (yogurt, jello) since I have a fridge up until 3pm
• fruit

Saturday breakfast:

• WW oatmeal
• fruit (I'm bringing fruit that doesn't need to be refrigerated like apples, oranges and grapes maybe)

Saturday lunch:

• fruit
• snack pack of WW BBQ chips or cheese twists
• reasonable portion of what's served for everyone else

Saturday dinner:

• fruit
• snack packs
• reasonable portion of what's served for everyone else
• WW chocolate bar for dessert or cinnamon puffs

Sunday breakfast: 

• WW oatmeal
• fruit

Sunday lunch: 

• fruit
• snack packs
• and probably eating out with my grandparents (hoping it's lunch that we do that and not dinner but idk)

Snacks:

• fruit
• snack packs (including desserty like cinnamon puffs)
• oatmeal if I'm really hungry
• WW chocolate bars

What I get back, I'll make sure I post about how I did (or I might be able to post while I'm out if we have wifi. I'm bringing our netbook when I go.

Let's just hope the $40ish I've spent on WW treats in the last 3 weeks actually ends up paying off :)

Parents are a problem

Parents help to create the obesity problem in the world according to me. I'm not singling anyone out in particular but I remember comments like this and comments like this really are a stereotype.

• "Clean your plate."
• You took it, you need to finish it.
• "You're not leaving this table until you finish those beans, young lady!"
• "No dessert until you finish your vegetables."
• You'll spoil your dinner/lunch.
• "People are starving in (add third world country)"

I think my weight loss journey has helped change my mind about how I'll deal with certain situations when we have kids. In a food situation, I think we will:

• make our kids have a couple bites of everything
• not enforce the clean your plate rule
• if they're leaving food on their plates (and it's veggies or non preferreds) then they get less of what they want and have to clean their plates before they get MORE of their favourite
• not have dessert (which I didn't growing up)
• teach our kids that when you say you're full, you stop eating
• eat at the table and no TV (maybe... lol)

(LOVE THIS QUOTE)
At the end of the day, though, that food is wasted whether it sits on the plate or whether it ends up in my already full stomach. And wasting the food on myself means I’m going to consume too many calories and ultimately be more unhappy with myself than just leaving it on the plate.

Read article here.

Ultimately I'm working to not overeat... see my two posts ago on good choices where I left half my pasta at lunch and half my fries at dinner. I'm trying to help my husband see that too. He keeps eating even when he's full... I caught him one night. 

"Ugh I'm so full." 

"Stop eating then."

"It's just one more bite."

"Nope." (I scraped it onto the leftovers plate) "Eat it tomorrow for lunch."

Why does he do that to himself? Even Sunday he was eating all his fries and everyone was done. I asked him "are you still hungry?" He told me he wasn't full and when I asked again he said, no he wasn't hungry. He seems to think that his sensor to tell him he's not hungry is broken... I guess he's got to learn the portion sizing that satisfies him if that's true. Restaurants are terrible. 

My strategy for next time? Ask for an extra plate and put half my food on that plate before I start eating. Let's see how that works. If it's just the two of us, I'm going to impose my strategy on Josh too. Let's see if he remembers it's even there :P

New habits

I haven't gotten rid of all my old habits, of course, but I definitely have gotten rid of some. I still struggle on my days off to eat healthily (including the weekends).

BUT... When making my lunch, I look for turkey pepperoni, sugar free jello, yogurt, fruit, etc. and NOT for leftovers. When making breakfast, well, I usually gravitate towards egg whites. When shopping, I immediately look for low fat/sugar free/fat free stuff. I look at the old things I liked but I don't even consider buying them.

I think next time I go shopping I will buy a boxed cake mix and try the diet soda + cake mix tricks.

Mindless Munching

I'm sure Mindless Munching affects all of us at some point. Movie theatres are bad for mindless munching as well as watching movies with family and maybe even eating in front of the TV.

My husband is a TERRRRIBLE mindless muncher. I've had chips on my desk in the past (like a whole bag) and I came home after working and the bag is empty. It's there, it's within reach and he eats it while he's bored. This was all in between our two WW goes. I haven't noticed it recently, thankfully, because I get protective of my food and I will eat more and faster to ensure that I get what I want.

Mindless munching can work FOR me in some situations. For example, I have two big BOXES of Zotz sitting right beside my desk. I've even separated some of the rows into individual candies and still they sit at my desk, beside my desk, or ON my desk and I forget about them. Therefore, I have no mind and I'm not munching! If I open chips or candies, I eat them. If they're closed up, I forget about them :)

Dinner time is bad and good in this sense. We tend to eat at our computers. We get dinner ready and sit down and I get into something on my computer and forget about the fact that I have food sitting there.

• THE GOOD: I eat it slowly and sporadically and therefore know better than ever when I am full.
• THE BAD: Hubby gets home late and therefore if I eat slowly and forget about my food, it's cold AND it's close to 7:30 when I finish eating.